Cars fall apart. So do people. So do phones. You pull out your old iPhone and check the time in the cracked screen: 6:05 a.m. Unlike your poor Honda or the tattered air freshener hanging from your mirror, which used to hide the smell of dried blood, you'll last forever—if you can find somewhere to hide before 6:41 a.m.
You've been making these courier runs for ten years, each year making less than the last, hiding in trunks and storage units during the day, racing down the desert highways at night with messages and parcels on your passenger seat. It's been boring. It's felt like getting old, trapped in this body that can never age.
Well, you're not bored now. You're even breathing again—short, frightened little breaths, as you watch the sky lighten in the east. Nerves you thought extinguished years ago fire up again, making your hands shake. You feel almost alive as you check under the hood.
The cable clutch is fucked. No surprise there; maintenance hasn't been a possibility, let alone a priority. And when you look at the engine, you realize the problems run deeper than one busted cable. You've been ignoring the warning signs, like an old man who keeps coughing and won't go to the doctor, and the engine looks like…
The engine looks like you're going to look in exactly–you check your phone again—sixteen minutes.
Maybe there's still time. You look around at the dusty highway, the wasteland that stretches out to the black horizon in every direction, and try to recall your mortal life. Something you learned when you still drew breath must have the power to save you here.
You've been in worse situations than this, you tell yourself.
Actually, you never saw serious combat, and you were never in this much trouble when you were alive. And back then, you weren't alone.
Where did you serve?
Three years in Afghanistan taught you one lesson that was more important than all the firearms and technical training you received. You learned to recognize when a situation was fucked, and you saw what happened when people stayed put when a situation was fucked.
You're not going to end up like them. You grab the satchel with your deliveries and head away from the highway, looking for anything that might save you from destruction: an old mine shaft, an abandoned shack, anything.
The stars to the east are gone, replaced by a blue-purple haze. It's 6:30 a.m. You remember the last time you saw the sun.
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