Syzygy [Risus] (IC)

[Sophistemon]

S+Y+Z+Y+G+Y

CHAPTER ONE: RED-EYE BLUES

Our story opens on a nighttime bus making its way west through a vast and barren desert, bee-lining from one of America’s great cities to another as it powered through the torrential downpour of a raging storm. It was late, so late it was almost early, and the bus’s high-beams fought to slice through the sluicing rainwater. The wet dark of the storm enveloped the bus like a shroud, and though it wasn’t yet the witching hour the bus’s driver, Marty Puhlman, felt a shiver run icicles down his back.

The wipers did their best, but the rain came down in thick winter blankets so heavy that Marty struggled to see the road. “Jesus,” he swore, and then felt guilty. His mother would have cuffed him for that – not out of some sense of Christian decency, but because the Puhlmans were Jewish and good Jews, so spake mother Edna, did not use that name. Marty’s mother had been a good Jew. She’d been the kind of woman who would have followed Moses through all 40 years of the desert and only kvetched when they stopped to make camp. Marty, by comparison, was a lousy Jew. He doubted he’d have made it a month; two, tops. That was perhaps why he’d spent so much of his life crossing a very different desert. Day after day, year after year, he’d driven his bus from one end of the great desolate sand-trap to the other. He bounced, like a ball, from city to city and never felt at home in any of them.

His passengers were sleeping, a luxury he could not afford. He envied them, stretched out and snoozing on the padded seats. As their driver he was confined to a very narrow schedule, a leash that chafed against his need for nightly shuteye. He fought back as best he could with chemical help. Coffee and NoDoz did the job well enough for the most part, and he’d sometimes sneak a snort of this or that when the legal stuff wasn’t enough. No, Marty was a lousy Jew – but he was a very good bus driver.

It was 11:24 at night when his latest dose ran out and Marty began to feel the insistent scratching of exhaustion at the door of his unconscious. The steady rain and hypnotic swish-swoosh of the wipers didn’t help. Ten minutes later Marty peered into the dark, eyes squinting behind his glasses, and failed to suppress the yawn that forced his eyelids shut. It was then he drifted off, just for a moment before the sensation of falling snapped him awake again, but it was enough. His mind reeling, the wheel twisting like a snake beneath his hands, Marty reached for the glove-box and retrieved his bottle of tablets. He took them dry, crunching pills like bitter beetles between his teeth to wake himself up.

He needn’t have bothered. As of 11:34pm, sleep was the very least of Marty Puhlman’s worries.

---

You, however, sleep through the night. You are blissfully unaware of the storm’s apocalyptic climax, protected as you are within the embrace of your automotive cocoon. Dawn comes without warning, and the heat of the rising sun erases rain from the desert’s memory. Your slumber is rudely interrupted by a ragged, determined shout that ejects each of you, one by one, from the relatively safe harbor of your dreams.

“Wake up!” a man is bellowing. Dark haired and thickly built, you recognize him from the night before. He’s another passenger, and you recall he’d spent the evening taking what he must have thought were surreptitious sips from a whiskey bottle crudely wrapped in a brown paper bag. Eventually, he’d finally drunk enough to fall asleep not long before you did. “Wake up!” he shouts again, pointlessly. His eyes are red and rimmed, evidence of the hellacious hangover he must be feeling. “We’ve got a problem here; the driver’s missing!” It’s true, you quickly notice. Glancing out the window, you see the bus has been parked at an angle at the side of the road so that countless miles of desert wasteland stretch out in all directions. The driver’s seat – you can still picture the man who sat there in your mind’s eye – is ominously empty.

OOC Thread.

[Artemis97]

Maria Quetzalli sits bolt upright from where she had been leaning against the bus' window in her seat near the front. She pushes her dark hair out of her eyes and glares at the man who was yelling. What did he mean the driver was missing? Surely they'd just stopped somewhere. Maybe he really had to go to the bathroom or something and had to pull over. She looks around, out the window. Shouldn't they be closer to the city by now? How long have they been stopped? Maria checks her watch for the time, before getting up and stretching. She then heads for the back of the bus, to check the restroom for the driver, and maybe to use it herself if it's unoccupied. Always had to go to the bathroom after sleeping so long.

[Aardvark 001]

Katie jerks awake and rubs the sleep out of her eyes. The journal she'd been reading had fallen to the floor at her feet. She picks it up and looks at the man shouting in the aisle.

"What do you mean he's missing?" she snaps. "Have you checked outside? There was probably a problem with the bus and he stopped to fix it." She stands up and stretches her legs, aching with inactivity. What time is it anyway? Maybe the guy just fell asleep outside. Maybe someone should check...

[Spectre_j]

Andy heard the shouting, but, for a moment, he was somewhere else. Men screaming, crying. The smell of the damp, the pungent scent of rotting vegetation, and the blood. You could almost taste it on the air. "God," he thinks, "why is there so much bloo-"

He awakens with a start, heart racing and coated in sweat. His eyes taking a moment to focus and adjust to the bright sunlight filtering in. Waking mind catching up to what his sleeping one had heard, he looks to see that, yes, the driver is gone. Standing up, he adjusts his jacket and smooths the front in an attempt to surreptitiously check for a shape made of blued steel. He cleared his throat, "I can take a look around outside." Looking out he sees the desert, stripped of any sign of last night's rain. The ground and vegetation greedily drinking in what water was left before being banished by the rising sun. He slides out of his seat and takes a deep breath, immediately registering the smell from the open window: dry, not damp. Desert, not jungle.

[Destro_Yersul]

Michael Williams woke when the shouting started, but didn't say anything right away. Instead he unfolded himself from the slightly uncomfortable position he'd fallen into while sleeping and looked around the bus, taking stock of the situation and letting himself fully wake up. He brushed at his suit, trying to smooth out the wrinkles that formed while he slept, and looked out one of the windows. If the driver was out there they ought to see him, it was so flat and empty. Reminded him of home. He smiled, a winning salesman smile if ever there was one, and stood. Then, still without speaking, he went over to the driver's seat to see if there was any indication of where the driver may have gone.

[Blarghy]

Like his fellow passengers, Daniel didn't worry at first. If anything, he was more concerned with this loud drunkard who seemed rather high-strung. Someone like that, so prone to panic, wouldn't do so well in the desert. How fortunate that the man was only here for a bus ride, and not a longer voyage on foot.

"Yeah, probably just fixing the bus," Daniel nodded toward Katie. He wiped the sleep from his eyes, stretched his long arms and legs, and maneuvered to the central aisle. "I'll go too," he told Andy. "The driver might need some more hands; I bet he just didn't want to wake us." He followed the older man outside and drank in the lovely morning, so familiar after having risen to similar conditions every day for the past few weeks.

Only when he was outside the bus did Daniel notice Andy's sweat-slick skin. The desert had a way of doing that--although it was still so early, and the man had only just come into the sunlight. "Are you alright, sir?" Daniel asked. I hope he's not another heavy drinker like that other guy; one is plenty, thanks.

[Sophistemon]

Maria looked down at her watch, squinting slightly to see the numbers through the glare of the sunlight pouring through the windows. It was a few minutes after 11:30 in the morning, which confirmed her suspicions that they were well behind schedule. A trickle of concern settled in her stomach when she considered the time. Though it wasn't too hot out yet -- just warm, but not quite that scorching desert heat -- it would soon be more dangerous to stay inside bus than it would to venture outside. With the engine off they lacked climate control to keep the temperature down, and at least outside there was the change of a breeze. Maria stood, stretched, and made her way to the bathroom at the back. She had to move past an elderly black woman to get to the toilet. The woman met Maria's eyes, excused herself from the aisle, and smiled.

"I don't think he's in there," she said. "I haven't hear a peep from the powder room in the time I've been awake."

---

The shouting man faced Katie, eyes narrowed in annoyance at her questions. "I mean he isn't here," he grumbled. "How hard is that to understand?" He shook his head. "And, yeah, I looked outside! Like I'm some moron who panics for no reason!" He turned his back on her and stomped toward the front of the bus, muttering something foul under his breath about the very specific kind of jerks who leave people stranded in the middle of the mother-loving desert.

---

The red-eyed man passed Andy as he stomped back to his seat, then turned to face him. "Don't bother," he spat. "I checked out the windows and he ain't out there." Andy could smell last night's whiskey on the man's breath, as well as the sour reek of old sweat and unwashed clothes. "What kind of man just leaves people, huh?" The drunk was gearing up for a rant, and Andy could tell. "I mean, he takes our money and just leaves us at the side of the road? What kind of scumbag does that?"

Smiling cautiously, Andy made a move to head outside regardless. The drunk, still clearly incensed but not at the veteran in particular, let him pass with only one further comment: "Sure, just ignore me. What do I know, right?"

---

Michael, who was seated opposite Andy and could therefore avoid the drunk while he ranted, stood and inspected the driver's seat after his own glance out the windows at the endless beige expanse of the desert. There was some scrub-brush and a few hillocks here and there, but for the most part the desert was singularly uniform, split in half by the gentle weave of the road. The driver's seat offered no clues as to the whereabouts of its former occupant. There was a comfortable looking groove in the leather which retained the shape of Marty's bony buttocks, but no sign of the man himself. A small placard bolted to the dashboard displayed a grungy photograph of the man, his name, and his employee information. The photo was unflattering, and made Marty look like the kind of man you wouldn't trust your children with. The glove compartment, which would have normally been locked, was hanging open.

---

After attempting to console Katie, Daniel stood and followed Andrew to the door, stopping only briefly when the drunk interrupted them to start his tirade. Daniel himself managed to bypass the red-eyed man, who was still growling obscenities under his breath as he stomped the length of the aisle in search of someone he could complain to, without incident. The heat of the desert sun felt glorious against his skin as he left the still tolerable interior of the bus, and he felt invigorated by the natural beauty of the region. He took a few steps and stood beside Andrew. A moment passed before he spoke his question.

[Destro_Yersul]

"Glovebox is open," Michael said, mostly to himself. He had a southern accent, which sounded like it had come from a good deal East of where they currently found themselves. It was the sort of voice that managed to sound friendly no matter what it was saying, another trait that had probably helped the salesman. He took a brief look in the glovebox, checking to see what, if anything, was in it, then returned to his investigation of the dashboard. Were the keys in the ignition? Did the bus have gas? In a pinch, one of the passengers might be able to drive the bus themselves.

[Spectre_j]

Andy stepped out of the bus into the bright sunlight. He could hear the kid coming out behind him. "Kid," he chuckled to himself, shaking his head, "I was younger than him my first tour."

"Are you alright, sir?" The Kid asked. Andy looked over at him. Scrawny, wild red hair and the kinda beard you grow when you need to convince everyone around you you're a bonafide adult. "Fine," He replied, "Just needed fresh air."

Taking a few steps, he stopped and put his hands on his hips. He didn't see any sign of, well, anything. Just sand and scrub-brush. In the jungle, men could vanish. The dense vegetation could hide almost anything. Out here the tallest thing was a cactus, with no foliage to obscure the landscape. If the driver were nearby, he'd be visible. Unless, of course, he wasn't on his feet, and that was a different kind of problem.

Time was against them. They themselves were stranded, and their driver might be in distress. They had no idea how long they had been stopped, where precisely they were, or what shape the bus was in mechanically. Andy decided that it was best to focus on one problem at a time. Specifically, the driver. He didn't know him from Adam, but Andy was a medic. He hadn't left a man behind yet, and he wasn't about to start.

[Blarghy]

Between Michael's discovery and the angry lush, Daniel started to worry a little himself. "Would the driver just leave?" he asked quietly. "Why? Where could he even go?" If they were closer to civilization, then he might see some cruel logic in robbing the bus and leaving its inhabitants stranded, but so far they had no evidence that Marty took anything except himself, and in any case, why would the man just go wandering off in the wasteland?

Daniel grabbed a handful of his shaggy red hair and squeezed it, a nervous gesture, before shaking his head and climbing onto the bus's hood, then up to its roof. From this higher vantage point, he looked hard in all directions. He hoped to spot the driver, of course, but failing that, he also searched for landmarks. Anything that could tell him where they roughly were, or perhaps a spot they could use for better shelter, if necessary.

[Aardvark 001]

Katie frowned at the drunk man as he sat down, muttering angrily to himself. Why would the driver just leave? In any case, if he had just left them how were they meant to carry on with their journey? Had he left the keys? Did buses even have keys?

She shook her head. Too many questions. Not enough answers. She got up and walked out of the bus, into the heat of the desert. Her jacket was too warm but she refused to remove it. Instead, she clambered on to the roof with the guy who's spoken to her before. She scanned the desert for footprints, signs - anything that could to point to where their driver had gone to.

[Artemis97]

"How long have you been up?" Maria asks the woman. "Do you have any idea how long we've been stopped?" She'll still check the restroom, just in case the driver had passed out in there or something. Wouldn't make much of a peep then.

[Sophistemon]

Michael searched through the glove compartment, shifting through the detritus and withdrawing only the more interesting items, which he laid out in a small pile on the seat. Among these items were a half-empty bottle of NoDoz caffeine pills, a dog-eared copy of Frank Herbert's Dune, an unopened box of condoms so old they couldn't possibly still be any good, and a small plastic bag containing a child's handful of white powder. Notably, the glove compartment contained neither gloves nor the anticipated portable flashlight. Perhaps it had, and the driver had taken them with him when he left. As for the dashboard? It was devoid of clues; no note, no keys, nothing at all that might indicate the driver's location.

---

Andrew watched Daniel ascend the bus to scan the horizon, and turned his own attention back to the desert. The driver must have left in the middle of the night, he concluded. Or at least while it was still raining. He knew this because he couldn't spot any footprints leading away from the bus. The only prints he could see, still stark against the desert sand, were his own and those of his fellow passengers. A picture started to form in his head, only half-baked, but plausible. The driver must have had a reason to leave them behind in the middle of a dark and stormy night -- they just needed to find out what it was. And then, armed with that reason, they might find and return the driver himself.

---

One might think, standing on the roof of a bus, that they could see for miles and miles across the flat cracked surface of the desert. But the heat of the place makes such a thing impossible, the haze of refracted sunlight bringing the horizon closer than it should be and hiding distant features behind a cruel distortion. There was a creaking thump as Katie joined Daniel on the roof, and he was startled despite himself. He'd spent time in the desert; he was no stranger to its dangers. But he was missing something now that he'd always had with him before, and he felt its absence keenly. It was a way out, and its loss was gnawing at the pit of his stomach. The woman -- not too much older than himself -- was mimicking his stare into the desert, shading her eyes with the flat of her hand. She was wearing a jacket far too thick even for the mid-morning. If she wasn't careful, she'd overheat and hurt herself.

---

The black woman smiled at Maria and shrugged her shoulders. "Oh, only since that fool there started yelling some minutes ago," she admitted. "But even if the driver was taking a whiz he'd have been out by now, don't you think? Especially with all of the commotion." Her warm eyes saddened and she inclined her head towards the drunk, who'd returned to his seat and was staring mournfully at the empty bottle he'd extracted from its bag. "I've known men like him. He's feeling the kind of lost the drink won't help him out of." The old woman's eyes met Maria's, and the young woman felt a bizarre thrill. "I'm sorry, dear, I've been rude; my name is Mable. Mable Mulberry Jones. I'm pleased to meet you." She extended a hand, thin and bony as a sparrow's wing, for Maria to shake.

[Spectre_j]

Figuring that answers most likely lay on this side of the road, Andy walked around the bus to investigate the desert beyond. The driver couldn't have gone far. There was, in Andy's mind, no good reason for the driver to go more than a dozen yards or so away from the bus. Mechanical trouble? No, he thought, Why would you walk away from the bus for that? Medical distress? A lot of these long-haul drivers used amphetamines to get through the long, dark, stretches of highway you found driving through the night out West. Had the West coast turnarounds gotten the better of him?

The man had been older, from what he could remember. Likely been driving that bus, or one like it, for years. If he had stopped, in the middle of the night, with sleeping passengers, he'd have tried to stay close. Or at least that's what Andy told himself.

[Destro_Yersul]

"Well now, ain't that interesting," Michael said, regarding the little bag full of white powder. He had a couple guesses what that might be, and left it alone. The box and the book were similarly discarded as useless. The title seemed appropriate for the location, but he'd never read the book and the giant worm on the cover convinced him it wasn't likely to be filled with survival tips. The pills were another matter, and the salesman slipped them into a pocket when nobody was looking. Never knew when those might come in handy. There were no keys, though, and without keys he couldn't start the bus. Stepping away from the driver's seat, he straightened up and looked around. How many other passengers were there?

[Artemis97]

Maria accepted the offered handshake, her own hands somewhat rough from her time working under the desert sun. "Maria Qutezalli, nice to meet you, too." The Mexican woman looked back to the tiny restroom. "It's if he's in there and didn't or can't hear us that I'm worried about." He might be passed out or OD'ed or dead, for all they knew. She'll nod politely to Mable, then move to check the door.

[Blarghy]

Slowly, Daniel swallowed hard. Even though he had more than a decade of survival skills, he'd never actually been stranded, and now panic was beginning to set in. He grabbed his hair again, this time with both hands, and looked across the desert once more, hoping that this time he'd see something different. When he didn't, he turned his wide eyes to Katie.

"Why would he just leave us?" the young man asked. His voice cracked a little. "I...I don't even know where we are! Whether it's closer to go back the way we came, or to keep moving ahead..."

Without waiting for a response, he made his way quickly back to the ground, almost falling, and drummed his palms anxiously against the engine cover, probably already getting hot from the sun. "Can you pop the hood?" he called to Michael. "If the driver was working on it...maybe he...didn't have the right tools, so he...tried to walk for help, or..." Daniel trailed off; even desperate as he was for answers, he knew how unlikely his theory was.

[Aardvark 001]

Katie pursed her lips and kept her eyes on the horizon, seeing the haze rise from the bus in a shimmering mirage. The catch in Daniel's voice was worrying. They couldn't afford to go to pieces out here. They had to get out of the desert, and the only way to do that was on the bus, driver or no driver.

She clambered back down just as Daniel was speaking to Michael. 'How about we try to start the bus up first? If it works then we don't need to pop the hood. We can just get the hell out of here.'

[Sophistemon]

Mable returned Maria's nod and shook one of her birdlike hands in a "shoo, shoo!" gesture, encouraging her to go and check the restroom for their missing driver. Maria, polite enough despite her worry, rapped her knuckles against the door. It shook beneath her knocking, rattling in the frame, but no one answer. She called out for the driver, once softly and then more forcefully, before she tried the latch. The door swung open on oiled hinged to reveal nothing more than the cramped confines of a bus's bathroom and the bitter scent of chemical sterilizers. More disappointment hit Maria than she'd been expecting, crashing into her like a wave -- but she was pleased to see the bathroom came equipped with a sink, which meant it had at least some supply of running water.

---

A sudden thump shocked Michael from his inspection of the bus and the counting of the seven passengers. There, on the opposite side of the windshield, were two younger people looking in at him. One, Daniel, was suggesting they pop the hood and inspect the engine. The other, Katie, interjected that they should attempt to start the bus before poking around in its guts. Michael glanced back at the dashboard, looking for the hood release lever, and noted the time on the little clock set beside the speedometer. It was 11:34 exactly, the second hand pointing straight up at at the 12. Michael's eyes narrowed when, after another second passed, that hand didn't move. He reached out a finger and cautiously tapped the glass protecting the clock face, and a bitter chill settled in his stomach when time insisted on standing still.

---

As Andy paced, thinking, his eyes caught the sun as it rose steadily higher in the sky. As the day grew later, their troubles would increase with the temperature. The jungles of Vietnam had been hot, there was no denying that, but there had been such moisture in the air you hardly ever needed to drink. The desert was different; breathing here was like opening the oven door and getting a lungful of baked heat. The medic bit his lower lip and gazed down the serpentine stretch of road. As he turned to head back, his stepped down on something that crumpled beneath his feet. Frowning, he dropped into a squat and retrieved a square of plastic from the ground. It had a broken metal clip on one edge and inside was Marty Puhlman's identification card, complete with a scowling black and white photograph.

[Destro_Yersul]

"No keys!" Michael called back. "Can't start the bus unless somebody fancies a go at hotwiring. Gimme jus' a minute here..."

He searched for the hood release, popping the engine compartment and heading around the front to speak to Daniel and Katie. "Dashboard clock's dead at 11:34. Either of you got the proper time? Bus like this, they like to keep 'em to a schedule, so probably whatever it is caused the driver to up and go, that's what stopped the clock."

[Artemis97]

Maria sighs. Well at least the guy wasn't dead in the bathroom. She steps inside and shuts the door, availing herself of the facilites. The archaeologist considers the water in the sink, or more accurately in the tank somewhere under the bus. Was it potable? She washes her hands using a minimum of water, not knowing how long they'd be stuck out here, before exiting out into the bus again.

Seeing Michael at the front of the bus, she calls out. "Hey, is there a radio? They have to communicate with the home base somehow, right?"

[Spectre_j]

Andy felt his stomach drop. He stared at the surly visage of Marty Puhlman and his gut told him that, beyond the obvious "stranded in the desert with a missing person" problem, something was seriously off. This was the feeling he had always got right before the **** hit the fan, and he had seen that happen often enough that he knew to trust that instinct.

Standing up, he looked out into the desert one more time, What dragged you out there, Marty? he wondered. Andy turned back to the bus. The Kid was looking at the engine with a pretty, black-haired woman. Maybe we can get this bus moving, get help, he thought. Walking up to stand beside the Kid, he held up the ID card. "I found this", he said, "I think he's still out there, somewhere, and, this might sound crazy, but I'm not entirely sure he went willingly."

[Blarghy]

Dismayed, Daniel shook his head to both of Michael's comments; he didn't have a watch, and he definitely didn't know how to crank the bus without its key. He felt even worse when Andy came up and showed him the ID badge, along with his disturbing theory.

"You think somebody took him? Why? How? Without waking anybody else up?" The idea unnerved Daniel and set his mind to thoughts of rescue. That, at least, was a nice shift from directionless panic; the more Daniel thought about it, the more he realized that no matter the cause of the driver's disappearance, he still was out there somewhere, very likely in even more danger from the desert than they were. At least the bus had some supplies and a degree of shelter.

"...We can't just leave him," he muttered to Andy. "I'm gonna take a look at the First Aid kit. See if it's fully stocked. Just in case." But what we really need is a good plan, he thought to himself, which was a taller order.

He heard Maria's comment when he stepped back on the bus; it gave him a flash of renewed hope. "Yeah, the radio!" he agreed enthusiastically. "Check the radio! We can just call for help!"

[Sophistemon]

While Michael attempted the radio, Daniel searched for the first aid kit. It took him a few minutes to locate it tucked up under one of the padded benches that serve passengers as both seat and bedding. It was a battered green metal box left over from the early 1970s, but it appeared to have been rarely if ever used. The scout unclasped the lid to reveal a few rolls of clean white bandages, some bottled disinfectant, suture needles, the requisite thread, and other odds and ends of keeping people as alive as possible until real medicine can be performed. As he inspected the interior of the kit, an old black woman sitting a few seats away called out to him. "Excuse me? Could you help me up, please? These knees of mine aren't what they were." She smiled ruefully at the young man and then indicated the box he's working through. "I hope we won't need any of that," she says. There was a touch of something heavy in her voice.

---

While Daniel searched for the first aid kit, Michael attempted the radio. It took him a few minutes of fiddling with knobs and pressing buttons before he finally stumbled on the proper combination almost by accident. When the radio clicked on, there was a pregnant buzz -- like a thriving hive -- followed by a rush of static that reminded the salesman of the rain they'd driven through the night before. He turned the tracking knob slowly, seeking signal, before he finally heard a woman's voice finishing a word, the number 6. He stoped quickly, pulse rushing, and turned the dial back. Only static remained, rushing like water. Michael grumbled a curse beneath his breath and the muscles in his hand prepared to turn the dial further when, as if by Providence, the message repeated. The red-eyed drunk started with a jerk and rushed on unsteady legs to the front of the bus. "That's a... what'd he call them? A numbers station! I know a guy back home with a CB radio and he'd play them for us at the station. F***ing weird, aren't they?"

[Destro_Yersul]

"They are strange, yes. There's a few out where I'm from." Michael listens to the numbers for a few seconds, checking where on the dial they appear, and then looks for other stations, or any way to use the radio to broadcast instead of just recieving. "That friend of yours. He ever show you how to use one of these? I admit, it ain't my strong suit."

[Spectre_j]

Andy felt some regret about shaking up the Kid like that. But he stood by what he said. Something had gotten Marty out there, and that same something had made him disappear. If he had succumbed to amphetamines, or even cocaine, he'd have ended up close to the bus. Cardiac arrest would've prevented him from making it far. Coyotes wouldn't have drug off a full grown man, either. They'd have left something behind, and not just an ID. The likely scenarios mostly accounted for, all that was left was the unlikely.

At the far end of that spectrum was abduction by Martians or maybe the Rapture his grandmother had always rattled on about when he was younger. But Andy was more concerned with reality than reverie. Marty seemed to have gone into the arid expanse beyond the bus, and he sorely wanted to know why.

Just then Andy caught the sound of radio static. "Finally," he thought, "Maybe our luck is turning around."

[Blarghy]

I guess this is better than nothing, Daniel thought. Even without an emergency so far, he felt a little better knowing what he had to work with, just in case the bus driver was hurt out there, or perhaps if their bad luck continued to get worse. He, like Andy, perked up when he heard the radio crackle, but the subsequent absence of real conversation brought his hopes low again.

Then the elderly woman got his attention. He came over quickly; helping old ladies was a favorite pastime for a former boy scout.

"Happy to, ma'am." He put the kit down in a nearby seat and carefully helped her stand. "Me too," Daniel agreed, "but at least the box is stocked. I wanted to make sure before anything happens." He looked around a bit ruefully and added, "Wish there was some wood to knock on."

[Artemis97]

Maria frowns at the sound of the radio. That definitely wasn't the home base of the bus company. She slips up to the front of the bus. "Can you broadcast out? Is there a microphone?" She wonders.

Maybe the bus driver just liked those weird stations, maybe on another frequency they could get a hold of the bus company or the police?

[Sophistemon]

The drunk looked at Michael, red eyes scanning him from head to toe before he noticeably decided he wasn't being mocked. "I mean, nah?" he admitted. "He treated the damn thing like it was his kid or something; wouldn't let none of us other guys mess with it. But I've always been kinda good with my hands... I could take a look, see what I see." He cleared his throat and looked at the others in and immediately outside the bus's cabin. "Yeah, 'scuze me here, pal." He edged passed Michael and examined the dashboard himself, tutting and clucking as he pored over the buttons and knobs. "S***. I don't see any kinda outgoing radio; there's no microphone here or anything. If that ain't a Godd*** design flaw, right?" He huffed a frustrated sigh and moved to fiddle with the instruments. "But maybe I can adjust the reception, get a better signal? If nothing else, some music'd help the mood." His fingers moved with the delicate steadiness of a surgeon's as he manipulated the radio's controls, and eventually the static faded away, like water draining, to reveal the bizarre numbers station playing on every station on the dial. Ralph swore, something more vulgar this time, and twisted the knob this way and that in search of something else, to no avail. "That doesn't make any sense," he said, and looked up at each of the nearby passengers in turn before standing. "Every station saying the same thing? That doesn't make any sense!"

---

The old woman accepted Daniel's help happily and gave his cheek a brief pat of thanks when she was upright. Her skin was cool and soft despite the steadily rising temperature within the bus. Her voice was kind, but convicted when she spoke. "None of that pagan stuff, kiddo," she said. "God's watching, you know." She glanced skyward as she spoke and smiled softly. "Even now, He's watching over us. We'll be out of this mess in no time, you'll see. Why, I bet the driver's on his way back right now with whatever he needed to fix the bus." She gave Daniel's shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and her grip was surprisingly strong. "Keep your chin up, son." She looked back at the kit. "Finding that was smart. God helps those who help themselves. Were you some sort of scout? Most everyone else was getting panicky, but you went looking for solutions -- that's good."

[Blarghy]

Daniel smiled uncomfortably at the old woman's praise and optimism. I wish I was that confident, he thought, feeling lingering panic despite what the lady claimed about him. "I hope you're right, ma'am," he more or less agreed. "But I wonder if God expects us to do the rescuing this time. If the bus driver is out there in the desert, he might be the one who needs help."

Curses from the front of the bus drew his attention, and with a polite nod, Daniel excused himself to check out the situation. "That's so weird," he mumbled, puzzled at the available stations. Then he shook his head and added, "But it seems like the important thing is that we can't call for help, right? We could wait a little longer on the bus driver, but if he's right--" Daniel pointed toward Andy, "--then we need to go find that man, fast. I dunno why he left the bus in the first place, but even if he had a good reason, he could've gotten hurt or lost. I say a few of us should stay here in case he comes back on his own, and everybody else starts looking. Standard search and rescue."

Wish we had dogs. And radios, too. And more people. And a flying unicorn, while I'm at it. No point in wishing; all I can do is use what we've got and make the best of it.