2 comments/ 981 views/ 0 favorites God's Gonna Cut You Down By: cowboy109 The driveway pebbles softly crunched under the limo tires. The reflections of lush trees and the low slung red brick buildings stopped gliding over the polished black paint of the limo. A brown leather slipper with white socks reached out of the backdoor of the limo. Red faced, a young man stepped out looking in a 360 circle in quiet panic. He wore a vest over his shirt with the orange-black seal of Princeton. His eyes found the entrance door. He calmed down and took a deep inhale of oxygen-rich West Virginia air. "Prescott! You made it! You are our first intern from Princeton. We didn't know how to get you from the Clarksburg airport to here. So, we sent you the president's limo!" The forty year old man in the door had gray hair, and the hair on top of his head was gone entirely. He wore glasses with heavy black frames. Anyone could have pinpointed that he was a software engineer through and through. The way how he held himself, his facial expressions, and the monotone sound of his voice gave it away. Prescott yanked his carry-on out of the trunk of the limo using his whole body as leverage. Then, he pulled it with both hands eagerly towards the door. The limo driver watched him with a smirk. Keeping utter silence, Prescott hurried to within two feet of the software engineer and shot his hand out for a standard American greeting. "My pleasure, sir. I won't disappoint you!" said Prescott. "Just call me Daniel! I'll be your guardian angel during your internship." Daniel smiled warmly and put his hand on Prescott's shoulder to guide him through the glass door. "Pathway - The Traffic Light Company" was written in white letters made from stickers on the door. The side entrance lead to a carpeted hallway. The frequent door handles along the way suggested tiny offices behind the opaque doors. Daniel knocked on a door with the placard: "105 - Purson." A deep grumbling voice with an Appalachian accent asked them to come in. There was wide sweeping oil painting of twelve feet widths behind the big man, who sat on his swivel office chair like a throne. A salt n' pepper beard covered his face. A Viking axe was displayed on a cabinet behind the man. This wasn't a modern interpretation with mystic ornaments. It was the real deal: A bare shank and simple triangle shaped iron head. One could have taken it for simplistic and dismissed it, if there weren't that creeping feeling that real skulls could have been cracked by this murder instruments and real blood could have bathed this docile-at-the-moment tool. A young girl, presumably another intern, was sitting in the corner on the chair, silently. She was small in stature. Her Converse sneakers barely reached the floor. Her head was an overladen pile of curls. Her cheeks were chubby. Her fingers were round and stubby. Her stature was full of energy and joy, yet her face was pale like the light had been blown out of her. The man who was presumably named Purson rubbed his hands with intense abandon that showed that he never worried about having his motives understood. "Sit down, Prescott. You are the star pony! We have never had an outsider in our program before. This year, we had to take extraordinary measures to make sure that the internship winner was of the proper kind," gleamed Purson proudly ending with a stare at the girl in the corner. A cloud came over his face. His nostrils flared with disgust. Daniel whispered into Prescott's ear: "Purson has an old fashioned view on women's abilities. But you mustn't worry." Purson starred at Prescott with a big wide green. Purson had four big white incisors. His mouth was so white that the canines showed their glamourous size as well. Purson was completely at ease reveling in the moment of a new hire at length. Prescott tried chasing red and white spots across his cheeks. Then, he had an epic battle with a drip of saliva tickling his throat. He tried to breathe deeply to hold the tickling at bay. His eyes started watering. He tried clearing his throat with soft hisses to avoid opening his mouth. Purson enjoyed the display of Prescott's face like a woman enjoys a delicate spa treatment. Every new struggle on Prescott's face was another delight to be discovered by Purson. It was very much like a woman looks forward to the sensual delights of cold towels on the face, honey poured on the forehead, or an exfoliating spanking of elderberry leaves. Only this delight, was a pressed snort, a glassy eye, or a struggling twitch. The door was pushed open in a commotion. A police officer pushed a youth into the room. The police officer walked bowlegged. He was wearing boots of slick, smooth leather that went up to his knees. He had a round, white helmet on and big, black sun glasses on his face. He opened the handcuffs of the lad. The lad had a tear in his checkered flannel shirt. The ends of the shirt were untucked. The black hair was matted and stuck to his forehead. When his hand were free, he moved them from his back to rub his wrists. The knuckles were covered in blood with white feathers sticking to them. The feathers were very fluffy and soft. "I found Will drunk out of his mind beating a pigeon into a bloody pulp. From the look of the pigeon, he's been at it for twenty minutes," said the officer. Daniel whispered into Prescott's ear: "Here is the first dirty secret about your internship. Pathway owns this city. When I say own, I mean that everyone knows that this company owns everything. Every little girl knows that her little Barbie dolls are property of Pathway." "Thank you, Bill. I'll take it from here," said Purson. "It's gotta be a real shit year if that's your only real local applicant," said the cop. He emphasized the word "real." The cop looked at the girl in the corner and shook his head. The cop gave a loud knocking salute with the heels of his boots and walked out. "You mustn't look so worried, Prescott! This is the country. We have livestock here. If you'd grown up here, you'd have snuck out at night and tipped cows. That burger on your plate is a dead animal corps. Wipe your horror of your face, city boy. Will's done a silly thing. God damn pigeon probably shat on my car at some point. It should have known that it had it coming. Let's pray!" said Purson and stood up to reach both his arms out. Everyone circled around Purson's desk except for Prescott who was taken by surprise. Though, he quickly recognized the gap in the circle that was meant for him. Will smiled big at Prescott while Will held out his blood covered and feathered hand. The girl was on the other side of the gap. Prescott grabbed both hands and followed the lead to bow his head down with closed eyes. "God, thank you for this year's crop of interns. May your justice prevail..." Purson launched into a poetic prayer. Prescott felt the room getting hotter and sweatier. His right hand was sticky from Will's blood. His left hand had to deal with the girl's epileptic hand that kept squeezing his rapidly. She must be spooked out, Will thought at first. Though, there was a periodic rhythm about it. Was it the tune of a song? It was a rhythm. It wasn't random twitching. Short-short-short-short-pause-short-pause-long-short-long-long Then, there was a very long pause, and it started all over. Was she Morse coding him? He listened for that long pause again to find the start of the rhythm. It repeated exactly. Four shorts was an 'H'. She was saying "hey." He replied with the same rhythm. The next sequence was a long burst of shorts, longs, and pauses: "Will you help me?" "Yes" was his response: long-long-short-long-pause-short-pause-short-short-short The next morning, Prescott was sitting in a fold out chair at an intersection. His black Lenovo laptop was on his lap. A cord ran from his laptop into the gray utility box that controlled the traffic light. The cord was made from individual multi-colored strands. A cup of coffee steamed mist into the cool morning air. He was wearing finger gloves that exposed his fingertips. His chest was covered in a bright yellow traffic jacket. He inhaled the brisk air. Wires were hanging overhead to connect the power and phone network. The small city had a few pickup trucks rumble to his stop light. They paused at the blinking red light and proceeded after negotiating right of way with the trucks from the other direction. Betty's diner was at the corner of the intersection. A little bushel of grass had burst through the sidewalk concrete near Prescott. "Well, son, you've got your very own traffic light now. We've cleared the flash memory and set it to maintenance mode. You upload your traffic control program over the serial port. When I think back to my internship, writing a traffic light program from scratch was a lot of fun. I suggest you write a simple program first, so that you can manually control the traffic light." Prescott nodded earnestly. He opened up the PDF manual. The traffic light system could be set with a number. Each number set the lights into all four directions into a specific combination. For example, 13 meant that the main road had green lights and the side street had red. Codes above 64 were for special configuration. 65 turned on red lights in all directions. The reason for not being able to control an individual light was to make it impossible to set the light to a dangerous combination, like green lights in all directions. So, he opened up the shell terminal on his laptop. He re-directed standard input, so that all his key strokes would be sent to the traffic control box. He entered 13 and hit enter. The traffic light switched from the red blinking to green light for the main road. The line of three pickup trucks accelerated with a roar as a single column and took off. Prescott smiled satisfied. He looked up the street. At that intersection, Will was still fumbling with splicing the cable. He was cursing under his breath and hitting the traffic light utility box. The intersection down the main street had the girl already furiously typing on her keyboard. Wow, girl! She must have been already writing source code for automated traffic control. "Prescott, that was very good," praised Daniel standing next to Prescott. "You better remember your AI (Artificial Intelligence) classes from Princeton. Sea is very good. You better have some Ivy League tricks up your sleeve. She grew up in this town and knows a lot of about traffic routing." "I'm going to write a simply pattern of one minute of green for the main road and 10 seconds for the side road," explained Prescott. Daniel made another tick mark on his clipboard as a blue Chevy passed the intersection. The paper on his clip board read "daily score." It had spaces for tick marks broken down by every hour. There was a legend at the bottom of the paper with cars/per minute rates for regular traffic lights, Pathway traffic lights, and the best score of last year's intern. Every year, the intern with the best score would be hired. A baby blue Cadillac Eldorado from 1979 pulled up to Prescott. The engine was crackling. The front tires twitched with the grumble of the engine. An old lady with hair curls in her wet hair looked at Prescott point blank: "Son, the traffic light is working god damn straight. I've checked it from all four directions. That's Ivy League quality swash darn it patriotism!" The old lady meeped her horn and roared off. "You are going to get quite some fans. Have I told you that traffic lights are a big deal in this city?" smiled Daniel and patted Prescott on the shoulder. While Prescott's program was compiling, he got a cream cheese bagel out and leaned back in his foldout chair. Daniel was diligently tick marking every passing car. Will up the street had taken to kicking and punching the utility box, actually wailing on it. Down the street, Sea's foldout chair was empty. "Where's Sea? Did the crooked cop arrest her?" asked Prescott in panic. Daniel smiled wide and knowing. "First, never call a crooked cop crooked. They don't like that. Second, you better take a look and learn from her." "She's gone! She's dead," yelled Prescott. Daniel shook his head amused. "Your mistake is that you only look for what you expect. You don't look to see what is really going on," said Daniel mysteriously watching the preppy boy's confusion grow. When Daniel felt that toying any longer with Daniel was cruel and inhuman punishment, he pointed his finger to the sky and said, "You should look for her there." "They already buried her, and she went to heaven," Prescott's eyes went crooked and saliva dripped down the left corner of his mouth. Daniel broke out laughing. He couldn't control himself. His face pained from the violent contractions in his belly. He squeezed out a "no." The laughing contractions of his stomach wouldn't stop. Every time, Daniel looked at Prescott's face, the laughing only turned more violent. "On the light," he pressed out in a bid to stop the amusing look of shock on Prescott's face. Sea was sitting on top of the traffic light. She straddled the pole with her thighs. A hammer hung from her belt on the right side. She was putting a bracket around the pole with a laser sensor attached to it. She was working hard with a screwdriver. "Oh, she is going to make an algorithm based on if there is actually a car waiting or not!" exclaimed Prescott. "Gotta think outside of the box. Your time based algorithm isn't going to give you a very high rate of traffic," encouraged Daniel. "I can write a computer vision algorithm to count the people in the car and prioritize high occupancy vehicles to boost my persons-across-intersection ratio!" exclaimed Prescott. "Now you are thinking, Ivy boy," said Daniel. When the sun started setting, the cars drove up to the light with yellow light cones coming out of the front of the car. The air turned chilly. The water in the air turned to mist. Prescott stuffed the laptop into his leather backpack and straddled it. He took a look down the street to Sea. His face was hesitant until he made the first step in her direction. She looked up. She now knew that he was coming. He tightened his steps as he pushed past the trash can with the ripped of trash bag that had the trash sprawling into the street. A soda cup was turning, pushed by the wind. His knees started buckling sideways. He tried to jimmy his butt in his pants. The boner in his slacks kept growing. He stuffed his fists into his pockets to obscure the shape. He turned back to his foldout chair behind him. Sea looked up at him again. He awkwardly smiled and decided to keep walking. "Hey, so we are colleagues. What's up!" said Prescott. "Why are you even here? Shouldn't you be at Facebook, Microsoft, or Amazon?" shot Sea back. "Well, my teacher told me to think about little fish in a big tank or big fish in a small lake. So, I came out here," replied Prescott. "You didn't get in," said Sea with true awe and looked at his face like she was discovering a whole new side to him. "There is that, too. Though, it's not so much about being a failure but rather finding the right corporate culture fit. I'm less of a corporate drone," said Prescott while looking at the floor. "I've seen your source code in the Linux kernel. It is damn brilliant. You have a red flag!" exclaimed Sea. Her curiosity was coming out. "I have a drinking problem," said Prescott dryly. "This was a bad idea. I'll see you tomorrow." "It's only getting interesting. See Will has a drinking problem. You don't," Sea pointed down the street. Will was lying face down on the sidewalk. One fist grabbed a can wrapped in a brown back. He was hip thrusting the pavement. "Yeeha! I'm fucking Mother Earth!" "Well, not like that. I compulsively drink. If I see something liquid and am stressed, I drink it. When I was seven years old, I drank a bottle of soap. My mom called poison control. A week later, I drank a bottle of drano. My mom called poison control. That stuff is really not pleasant. There is a lot of puking. I've drunk gasoline. I don't know. If it's liquid, I pour it down. My teacher left the urine cup with her pregnancy test on the desk. She walked in on me drinking it. She was very upset. It went to court. In jail, my cellmate freaked out when I started drinking out of the toilet. He kept banging against the cell bars for hours until the prison ward put me into another cell. So, the charges got dropped. Though, my school record has a hard to explain note in it. Well, now I'm a complete weirdo. See you tomorrow," Prescott turned to leave. "You are the only one in Elkins who talks to me. Come with me for dinner," said Sea holding her hand out. "Really?" Prescott stopped and happily grabbed her hand. Sea folded up her chair and leaned it against the traffic control utility box. They walked to the diner swinging their hands. The diner was one of this old American affairs with a worn wooden floor, swivel chairs that were bolted into the floor at the bar, and deep booths in the rest of the restaurant. The waitress wore white sneakers and held the coffee kettle high when she walked around and offered everyone a re-fill. In the warm light, Sea had charm to her. There was actually a quite witty personality lighting up in the corner of her eyes and mouths when he was talking. He could tell that she wasn't taking him serious and had her funny thoughts about him. Being short and pudgy gave her quite a handful of boobs. There was this little spot of cleavage, a little triangle skin that her loosely wrapped scarf kept uncovered. "So, why does Purson hate girls so much? He seems crazy," said Prescott rolling the glass in his hand, so that he wouldn't have to look her in the eyes. "Well, you don't know town folklore at all. The owner of Pathway is quite the rich playboy. He's fucked a lot of girls. My mom was a skank he fucked under his table in a Vegas club. When she followed him to West Virginia with me in her belly, he sent her out into the cold night. He told her to never come back. He had a wife and children already. My mom didn't survive one winter night. She was poor. She couldn't afford the heating bill. During a cold snap, a gnarly blizzard from the arctic, she froze to death. So, I'm going to win this internship. That'll force them to put me on the fast track to executive management. I'll take the company. Simple as that. What's mine is mine." Sea looked fiercely at Prescott. That shy little girl in the corner was gone. "Holy fuck," muttered Prescott. He lifted up the top bun of his burger and looked like he wanted to crawl underneath it to hide. "I just like computers. My parents made me go to Princeton," replied Prescott. "Hey, do you like Dojo Cat?" asked Sea and lifted one earbud up for Prescott. "Oh fuck, you like raunchy rap?" asked Prescott in disbelief and plugged his ear into her music. When the food was done, they talked for a while. Prescott could feel that the dinner date was going to be over soon. He was waiting for her to straighten up in the chair to signal that she was about to get up. When she pulled a toiletry back out of her backpack, he took a double take. "Oh, I'm going to brush my teeth," explained Sea. "That's quite the hardcore travel pack. That looks like you are going to floss and rinse with mouthwash as well," said Prescott with innocent puzzlement. "Well, not everyone has a nice bathroom at home," said Sea awkwardly and a bit of annoyance. "That bathroom is filthy. I've been in there. Someone's painted with pee across the whole place. Someone else put toilet paper all over. And a million people trampled over that nasty mess," Prescott was going full force. This was a topic that he was clear about. She made no sense. There was no logic to her plan of action. Sea looked back into Prescott's fiery eyes. He nodded as if to say, "C'mon tell me already." The pain was evident in her face. The silence grew thick until even Prescott realized that something was very wrong. The waitress took one look at them and decided to pass them over with an offer for a free re-fill. God's Gonna Cut You Down "Maybe, my bathroom isn't that nice because I don't have one," said Sea quietly and worriedly look for his reaction. "That is unacceptable," said Prescott boorishly. "There are building codes. Your landlord will get in big trouble with the housing authority. You can't let yourself be pushed around. I saw that you have fire inside of you when you told me about your plans of taking over Pathway. Though, in the office with Purson, it was completely gone. You need to grow boss balls!" A tear was teetering at the edge of Sea's eyes. She sniffed her nose and looked up to make the salty water roll back into her eye. "I don't have a home. When I come back, be gone. I'll pay the check. Just fuck off!" With that, she got up and walked to the restroom without looking back. Prescott felt a punch to his stomach. All the food wanted to come back out. The barely audible click of the restroom door all the way across the diner stuck in his memory like a bell ringing out until the sound is no longer audible, yet one is still sure that still barely audible. Prescott stayed sitting there. His mind was frozen. When the restroom door opened, Sea seemed happy and at ease until she saw Prescott still sitting there. She stormed to the table to grab her bag. "I told you to get lost, you stupid puppy!" "I... I am technically homeless as well. The Princeton dorms are closed and my things are in storage. Well, they are at my mom's. My mom is like my storage facility. I live in a hotel here. It's no big deal," stammered Prescott. "Oh, it's no big deal!" snapped Sea at him. "It's no big deal to go sleep in a little car and worry that the local prankster kids will try to sneak up on you!" Sea stormed from the table and slammed the bill with her credit card down at the cashier. Prescott hurried after her, "You could sleep at mine!" Sea hesitated. She looked down at the floor. She looked pained, rushed, and hopeful at the same time. "I'll sleep on the floor. You take the bed!" offered Prescott. With that, they walked to her car. It was gray hatchback with rust bites around the corners. He could see a little gas burner, an opened bag of Lucky Charms, and a Manga magazine. He got into the car with her. The radio player was ripped out. The cables were pulled forward and wrapped to an adapter with a standard power socket. There was a very heavy smell of girl in the car, a musky sweaty and stale scent with a hint of artificial raspberry flavor. Sea's cheek turned rouge. "I'm sorry." She pulled the car into the hotel parking lot. They walked up the stairs. The curtains of the rooms were lit up yellow. Everyone else was winding down from the day. Like a gentleman, Prescott lay down at the foot of the bed. Sea slipped her jeans and sweatshirt off under the sheets and folded them on the nightstand while she kept the sheet wrapped around her chest. "Hey, thank you! When I become CEO, you'll always have a job at Pathway!" With that, they fell asleep. The next morning had a very crisp feeling to it. The air was the same. The traffic was the same. Rather, the change was inside of Prescott, like his liver had gotten a shot of juice. He was crystal clear about the new designs for his software. Daniel was attentive to his ideas and following the lead. "See Daniel, I have this perfect out of the box idea. The car coming on the main street goes at 40 mph. It takes 3 seconds to clear the intersection. The car from the side street comes out of a turn and goes at 20 mph. It takes 6 seconds to clear the intersection at that speed. If the cars have to stop at the light, the whole stopping and starting takes a lot of time." "Now, imagine that two cars come from both streets. If one car comes a little earlier and the other a little later, they could clear the intersection without either car having to stop. Technically, we could give both cars a green signal. The big trick is that we have to make sure that one car enters the intersection a little later." "I've got a solution for that as well. Imagine two cars perfectly timed for a collision. I'll switch the light to red for one car. It'll start slowing down way ahead of the intersection. Once the side street car has lost the three second equivalent of full speed, I switch the light back to green. So, the car never stops. I simply use the red signal to slow the cars down for perfectly interspersed traffic," Prescott finished with a smile. "That is certainly thinking out of the box," said Daniel scratching his head. "Well, we sure never tried that. That takes a lot of trust that you can perfectly space the cars. The throughput of the intersection could be doubled if all sides essentially have a green light." Prescott spent the morning very focused on building a predictive slow down table. His head was buried into the laptop. Daniel kept ticking of passing cars on the clipboard with the algorithm from yesterday still running. A car honked aggressively until Prescott looked up. The sun had a blinding yellow glare on the fenders that suggested that lunch time was almost there. A twenty year old woman with platinum blond hair was frantically pointing up at the traffic light with both hands. She was wearing a surprisingly tight jersey. "The light's green," hollered Prescott and waved his hand for the seemingly confused and very agitated young woman to drive on. The young woman only rolled her eyes and let her face drop down like a melted Popsicle in the Sahara desert. "Maybe, in her culture, they use a different color scheme. I mean, red could mean go. How we assign meaning to colors is pretty random," theorized Prescott to Daniel. "Son, maybe you should learn your own culture! When a cheerleader tells you to switch the light to red, shut up, do it, and put a smile on your face!" admonished Daniel. "Oh," escaped Prescott's lips. He switched to the terminal and punched 67 in to turn all lights to red. The college cheerleader gave him a thumbs up. She was in a pickup truck. The truck bed was full of cheerleaders with pompoms. The driver turned the radio on full blast. She and her co-driver opened their doors and jumped out. The girls on the truck bed started swinging their hips and punching their fists into the air to the beat of the music. The little miniskirts kept fluttering side to side. Oh, and Prescott even got a little glimpse of the black panties under the white mini-skirt when the busty brunette in the middle did an extra high front kick. "Son, that's the one reason why I volunteered for mentoring you. This city is crazy about traffic lights. About everyone is going to come out to be part of what you do here," said Daniel while he tapped Prescott on the head. The song ended. The driver pointed angrily at the traffic light again. Prescott quickly punched 3 and enter into the terminal. The light switched to green. The brunette threw him something soft. He caught it as the truck drove off. They were pink sport panties from Victoria Secret. Every cheerleader had signed it with a fat black pen. There were little blown kisses and hearts doodled on the panties. He felt proud like a hunter who had caught a bear with his bare hands. He held the panties up to Daniel as if to make an offering. Prescott was so dazed and surprised. "Those are yours. Put 'em away now. A Facebook internship would have never gotten you these. Do you see know what makes Pathway special?" asked Daniel. The truck stopped at Will's traffic light. Will started immediately pouring the beer over his head while shaking his head vigorously to fling the beer into every which direction. He made the sound of a dying hyena. The cheerleader troupe got a little unsure if they wanted to go through with their whole routine. When Will started Heavy Metal head banging against the traffic light, they hopped into their truck and took off with squealing tires across the red light. "The cultural quotient is very low today," remarked Daniel dryly. After a couple more hours of heads down programming and pushing back lunch, Prescott looked at the screen and a happy "Compile succeeded" message looked back at him. "Daniel, I'm gonna plug the new algorithm in!" Daniel nodded with anticipation. Prescott typed on the terminal to upload the binary to the traffic control box. Both looked over the empty intersection. A red Kia came out of the turn of the side street. A black Mustang came down the main street. The computer estimated their meeting point in the intersection to be offset by only one second, a sure crash impact. The light for the main street turned red. The red Mustang stepped of the gas. The red tail light was lighting up, visibly through the rear window. The computer display switched from one second to two seconds and finally 6 seconds. The light turned green again. The Mustang driver slammed on the gas. The engine roared. The computer display counted down towards 0 seconds. The light switched to red. Prescott smiled at Daniel, "I added a subroutine to re-apply the red light if the projected speed deviates from the expected speed." The driver slammed on the breaks hard. The computer display shot pretty quickly up to 10 seconds. The light switched back to green. The Mustang driver this time floored the gas to the effect of squealing performance tires. "Oh oh," exclaimed Prescott helplessly. "I didn't think about that." The red Kia was almost in the intersection. The black Mustang did its best to impact the red Kia. The red Mustang's fishtailed a bit under the power of the acceleration. The asphalt simply was not up to racetrack snuff in terms of traction. The computer display counted rapidly down to 0 seconds and impact expected again. The algorithm switched to a red light again. The red Mustang did an emergency break maneuver. Black skid marks painted across the road, the Mustang slid sideways and stopped on the pedestrian walkway. The red Kia casually drove across the intersection. The Kia driver flipped off the Mustang driver in passing. "The user experience has a lot of upwards potential," said Prescott. "Studies show that the majority of users prefer a predictable user interface." "Is that Princeton speak for 'I fucked up'?" asked Daniel. "At Princeton, we believe in failing fast. Failing fast matures a new business idea faster than anything else," lectured Prescott. "Do you think that's a good inscription for someone's tombstone," asked Daniel, starting to get annoyed. "No, most people prefer tombstones with Latin inscriptions. I'm sure that there is a version of veni, vidi, vici that goes along the lines of 'I failed. Someone died. I IPOed.'" Said Prescott while getting up. "I'm going to get lunch now." While Prescott was waiting for his New England chowder in the diner, Purson walked up to the intersection. He talked with Daniel. Prescott looked heavy heartedly at his soup that sent curled fingers of steam into the air. He stood up with a sigh and signaled the waitress that he'd be back. Then, he walked to the door. Daniel saw him coming, yet waved Prescott with the hand behind Daniel's back for Prescott to stay away. Daniel was dazed and stood right behind the diner glass door. A F150 black pickup truck pulled up. Four players of the Elkins college football team were sitting there with their tight shorts, padded shoulders, and helmets. Purson talked with the players and made wild waving gestures. Then, he reached into his pocket and gave them money. While Purson was busy with his dealing, Daniel firmly looked at Prescott and shook his head to affirm Daniel's earlier "no." Prescott stayed inside the diner. The F150 roared off towards Sea's intersection. Prescott pressed his face against the window to see at the shallow angle. The football team hollered at Sea, "Yo, village slut! Show us your titties!" Someone squirted a water bottle into her face. Sea quickly closed her computer. The black and meaty linebacker climbed off the truck bed down the tail gate with slow meandering movements. The sense of imminent violence was in the air. The linebacker had riled himself up to the point of readiness for violent action. Sea powered down her laptop and closed the lid to protect it from water damage. She got up to move away from the 250 lbs. mass of fat and muscle. A white runner with a light bulb body (skinny legs and big upper body) stopped her from slipping away. He simply puffed his chest up with those giant pecs like oversized pillows and let her run into him. She bounced back towards the linebacker who was closing in. She went down in a fetal position to curl herself around her laptop. "Fucking bitch is making it hard." The two football players went on their knees and started pulling on her. Like an iron ball, she curled tightly around her laptop. They tried to pull her pants down and rip her clothes off to shame her. However, Sea held desperately onto her laptop. They only got her shoes and socks off her body. "Fuck it. We'll just throw her with the laptop into the Tygart. That should finish her laptop. She can probably swim. Yeah, all white bitches are taught to swim by their rich parents." The linebacker grabbed her and lifted her up like a spare tire and stared walking to the truck bed. Prescott burst out of the diner at full stride. Daniel yelled, "No!!" Prescott kept running at full speed. The runner paused and seized up Prescott. "Who's that dude? He can run." The runner looked in awe. The whole football team froze as if they had never seen anyone else challenge them before. Prescott was huffing heavily by the time he reached them. Not having a plan at all, he ran head first into the runner. The runner tightened his abs. The scene reminded of a rain drop hitting an M1 Abrams. Prescott bounced back and fell on the ground. The runner never stopped his look of awe, so lost was he in observation and didn't feel the attack at all. "He's obviously not from around here," said the runner. "Dude, look at his clothing! Who walks around like that! He's obviously not from Elskin," responded the linebacker. "Was he fighting me? Or did he have really poor aim running past me?" asked the runner. Prescott got up to his feet. He made a few shuffle steps having a hard time to stay standing. Then, he launched a punch at the linebacker. "Yo, I think he's fighting you," replied the linebacker. "But maybe, his aim for a handshake is really poor as well." "Yeah, no, I'm pretty sure he is fighting me," said the runner. The big hairy hand of the runner wrapped around Prescott's throat and lifted Prescott a foot of the ground. Prescott still kept swinging punched into the thin air, while his feet were trying to run forward despite being off the ground. "Why doesn't he stop fighting?" "I think he's lovesick for that one," said the linebacker as he tossed the curled up Sea on the truck bed. "That's kind of cute. I bet she'll give him a blowjob for that later," said the runner. "What should I do with him?" "Maybe, he's like a remote controlled car. When I pick up my cousin's car, they tires keep spinning despite them being in the air. So, maybe turn him around, put him down, and he'll run away," suggested the linebacker. The runner did so. Prescott spun around and came right back at the runner. The runner put his big hand on Prescott's face to keep Prescott out of punching range. "That didn't work," said the runner bored. Daniel showed up at the scene huffing, "Guys, I'm sorry for my intern causing trouble. Prescott, get back here!" Prescott stopped punching after the runner and pushing forward. Purson caught up to them. Two cars stopped. The patrons of the diner came out into the street. The blond football player on the truck bed exclaimed, "What is she doing here? She doesn't get a ride from us!" He threw her off the truck bed. The runner and linebacker jumped onto the truck and the truck sped away. Purson hissed into Prescott's ear, "I'm gonna cut you down, just like I will her!" "Sea!" called out Prescott to the pile of bruised young woman on the ground. Yet, Daniel kept him from running towards her. Daniel kept pulling Prescott away and soothingly whispered into his ear, "not now! If you want to truly help her, you can't be seen with affection for her." With that, Daniel kept pulling the stirred up youth toward the diner. Walking backward and being pulled, Prescott saw Sea getting up, holding her ribs, and limping to her foldout chair. The right knee looked injured from the way she limped. "Why do you put up with this?" blurted Prescott out! "Pssst! Quiet down," hushed Daniel. When Prescott calmed down a bit and looked ready to listen, Daniel continued, "Purson is holding something over me. He knows everybody's secret. You stole and drank your professor's urine! That's despicable. Though, it's also the reason that you got the job offer. He's a demon! Have some soup! Food will calm you down." "The best thing that you can do for Sea is to win the traffic light competition. Before you came, the only applicants were Will and Sea. Sea was going to win hands down. So, Purson brought you in to make sure that Sea wouldn't win. The thing is that Sea has prepared for this her whole life. You haven't. So, she is leading in the score. That makes Purson desperate. Once you take the lead, he'll lay off Sea," explained Daniel. Daniel pulled the red-speckle-faced Prescott backwards down the street. "Now, you use your head first, boy." The voice was soothingly quiet like a father pulling his kid out of a football pileup that's gotten too heated. His lips still vibrating from the adrenaline, Prescott gaped at the air. His feet stumbled backwards underneath him, catching on a little crack in the sidewalk, feeling Daniel pull him up the shoulder, and dragging the opposite foot back. Prescott watched Sea on the ground checking her elbows and carefully extending her road rashed finger. In slow motion, Prescott watched her sort herself out. He had an out-of-body feeling of watching himself. The anger burned deeply in his bones. Purson's words echoed in his head, "I'm gonna cut you down." The ringing of the diner door snapped Prescott out of the trance. Daniel pushed Prescott down in the booth with the lukewarm soup still waiting on him. "Eat!" pressed Daniel. "For fuck's sake! Eat!" Prescott put a first hesitant spoon into the soup. The heartiness of nutrition spread in Prescott's stomach. The second spoon was already surer. The third was filled with hunger. Daniel watched Prescott eat. Daniel ordered a chicken sandwich with gravy for Prescott. Daniel watched the lad eat solemnly, rapidly consumed of making sure that Prescott would feel better like a father would watch a child that's tormented by night fever. By the final finishing touches on that chicken, Daniel's lips whimpered to fight his face with tension. Yet, a tear rolled down his face anyway. He looked to the aisle side of the booth and struggled to blink his eyes clear. "Fuck you, Purson. Fuck you! I can deal with what he puts met through. I can't watch someone else go through it." With that the tears started streaming down Daniel's face. Daniel grabbed Prescott's hand on the table as if Daniel was going to comfort Prescott, even though Daniel was the one that needed comforting. There was a long moment of silence. The past of the booth had seen many such meltdowns and joys. The booth gives privacy. Human moments happen in privacy. Daniel looked at Prescott with an open mouth. His eyes showed the white. Daniel was pushed into reality. The metal hit the metal. Daniel fumbled with shaky hands for the breast pocket of his shirt. He pulled out a photo. He pressed it into Prescott's hand. The photo showed Daniel ten years younger: The head hair was full. The beard was carefully trimmed. He had energy and a little spunk in his eyes. A young ankle biter of four years old sat on his lap. A woman with long, blond hair stood behind him, putting her hands on his shoulder. A blond and white Border Collie with its fluffy fur and telltale loyal, adventurous face was lying at his feet. It was the typical, faded all-American family photo. God's Gonna Cut You Down "That's little Timmy. He caught his first trout with three and a half years old. That's Sandy. She makes the best cupcakes. She won the local cupcakes competition with her red velvet creation. Oh, that was quite something. And the celebration sex was awesome. The dog is Braxton. Can't hunt a duck for the life of himself. Yet, he can hunt his tail like nobody else. I love them so dearly. I haven't seen them in ten years." "I still remember the date. Little Timmy came home from daycare with a split lip. That little fucker, Adam's son punched him in the face. I was hurt so badly like nothing in this world could have hurt a man. I walked out of the house straight through the door. I fumbled to push the handle down. With all the energy that I had, I ran the door in before my shaky brain could figure out to do the handle. Sandy came up on me. She yelled at me to stop. When that didn't work, she pulled on me. When I kept dragging her down the street to the day care, her whole body was clutched around my left leg and dragging over the pavement, when that didn't work, she started hitting me. I couldn't feel it. Her punches were like a light morning drizzle. Three blocks down, she cried, 'I love you.' That's when I stopped. That sunk in. It wasn't the words. It was the feeling behind those words. I stopped. I thought for the first time. I realized that I was going to do anything for those people." Daniel paused in the narration. He was struggling with the emotion. Flashes of anger, love, anguish, longing, and hate chased across his face. He was trying to put them away to focus on the story. Prescott was absolutely quiet. His entire focus was on Daniel. The booth was quiet as the stable was during Jesus' birth. "I haven't seen them in ten years. Purson is holding a secret over me. I can't leave the city limits. They can't know that I'm here." "When Purson says that he's gonna cut you down, he's gonna cut you down." "The only way through this thing is for you to win and for Sea to lose. Purson would have thrown Sea in the Tygart with a millstone tied around her ankles. It was my idea to hire you to make sure that Sea would lose, and she'd get to live. Doesn't anyone see how this game has to be played?" The tears were gone from Daniel's eyes. There was only dreary pain left in his face. A pain that's been worn for many years, too many years, so that it becomes set deeply and loses all of its immediacy and urge for action. That night, Prescott waited until the sun had gone down soundly. He walked to Sea's car, knocked on the driver window. After a little resistance, Sea submitted to his encouraging to come with her because the car wasn't a safe place for the night. They walked to his hotel hand in hand. The hotel receptionist carefully watched them walking across the hotel parking lot. After Prescott double locked the door, he jammed a chair under the door handle. "You can sleep in the bed tonight," said Sea. Prescott cleared away the comforter. He spread out the Band-Aids, gauze pads, and iodine solution. Sea stripped to her underwear, trim sport panties with blue ribbons and a tight fitting black wife beater shirt. He cleaned the street grime out of her scratches, painted the skin bright red with iodine solution, and carefully applied skin-colored Band-Aids. She did let herself be groomed. In silence, she focused on the sensations on her skin as he treated her. "Ain't nobody ever did done something like that for me," she said. They turned down the light to sleep, both exhausted. There was that in between time of being awake and sleeping. The mind is so self-conscious. They could each feel their breathing, almost annoyingly aware of their breathing. The half-light in the room outlined the flat screen TV in pixelated gray. A white line would run up the wall and over the ceiling when a car pulled into the hotel parking lot. It was always the same predictable pattern. All these little half-sensations created a feeling, a heavy feeling, a familiar feeling, a feeling like that is it. A religious man would have said that the Holy Spirit was in the room. In the morning, Prescott knew exactly what he had to do. All the playing was over. The advice of his Princeton professors told him: "Go to the fundamentals and perfect them." He needed to get as many signals for his traffic prediction model as possible. He had two days of data of traffic patterns at different times of the day. Morning rush hour tended to go one way. Evening rush hour the other way. Early afternoon tended to have people zig through the city on side streets. He could use that to optimize traffic light times. Then, an evil smirk chased across his lips. He tried to suppress it. Then, he decided that it was fine to let it out. This was a no holds barred fight. He had a camera pointed at Sea's intersection and another at Will's intersection. His algorithm could detect the traffic state on those intersections. When Sea sent him traffic, he could anticipate that and switch his light to allow the traffic to pass straight through. Or he could be malicious. Say that Will's traffic light facing him was green, he could starve that of traffic by turning his traffic light red for Will's direction. And when Will turned his signal red, he'd hammer him with traffic. That dumb fuck Will wouldn't know what hit him. With that he started to write source code furiously. The laptop was on his knees. His butt was in the depth of the foldout chair. His mind got absorbed by programming. He had to think of variable names. He had to think of error conditions. He had to hunt down obscure compile errors. His mind was so completely consumed that he was free, so utterly free of worry and stress. All he could feel in his belly was definite victory building. Over two hundred years of the most brilliant minds in the world had poured the best training into Prescott at Princeton. Will and Purson were going to come to heel like dogs! Prescott hit enter to start the final release compile. He high fived Daniel confidently. Daniel had been watching over Prescott's shoulder and nodded with reverence. "Compile succeeded." Daniel pushed the new software into the traffic control utility box. The light gave a double flash of the green light to indicate that the new program had taken over the brain of the traffic light. "I'm summoning a demon," thought Prescott to himself, thinking of the traffic light being under his ghoulish control. Pretty quickly, Will's traffic light started piling up with cars. That's when Prescott took note. The lights turned off on Will's intersection. Will started kicking on the traffic control box like a maniac. Will would hit the keys on his keyboard really hard. The lights came back on. The pattern kept repeating over and over. Prescott started taking notes of the traffic light configuration and amount of waiting cars. There was a pattern. The ninth car from Prescott's direction would trigger the light's to go off. Will probably had a buffer overflow bug in his code. That could be exploited! Prescott added a nasty little subroutine to his algorithm that would try to get exactly nine cars to stand at Will's intersection. Prescott's heart beat hard when he was about to hit enter to send the update over the wire. Daniel grabbed Prescott's shoulder hard, "You go tell those fuckers to fuck off!" With that, the new algorithm went live. Oh, it worked like a charm. Every five minutes Will's traffic light crashed. Will had to hurry to reboot the system. That kept him firefighting instead of hunting down the bug. The cars started piling up. Of course if there were too many on Prescott's side of Will's intersection, Prescott's light would stop sending cars there until there were again exactly nine cars. And ballooma, Will's light would crash again. "Haha, do you hear that cacophony of car horns?" triumphed Prescott. "That's no good. You are in deep shit son," replied Daniel matter of fact. "Why? We want him to lose," said Prescott confused. "You are the one who is doing the losing. See, he turned the traffic light going in your direction to red. The cars are backed up as far as the eye sees. Eventually, they make right turns out of frustration. He is starving you off traffic. Most of your traffic comes from the main road. He cut off almost half of your traffic income," explained Daniel. "Wouldn't he hurt himself, too?" asked Prescott. "Nope, they have to drive through his intersection. But they can drive around yours on the side street. You can cut him off, too. Though, you'll mutually destruct each other. Sea's going to win. And you don't want that if you truly love her," said Daniel sternly. Prescott kept cleaning up little inefficiencies in his algorithm. The traffic passed his intersection cleanly, almost always getting a green signal. Yet, Daniel's tick marks only trickled on the clipboard, while Will's intersection was a mad raving car horn orchestra. A gloomy mood befell the two men. "She won't come with me to Princeton?" "Nope, she's dead set on taking over Pathway." In the afternoon, Prescott's work was down to busy work like writing comments in the code and fixing typos in method names. The president's black limo pulled up at the intersection. The driver with the suit, tie, and driver cap got out, walked around the back to open the passenger door for Prescott. When Daniel tried to get in, the driver stopped him. When Daniel said that he needed to get back anyway, the driver pushed his hand against Daniel to clearly restrain Daniel from getting in. The driver slammed the door and locked the door with his remote entry key. He walked around the back of the limo and took off. In the Pathway parking lot, the limo driver parked across five parking spots, got out of the car and hand-walked Prescott into the office, down the hallway, and made sure that Prescott would sit down in front of Purson. Purson, the big man, who filled out the swivel chair, was in a jolly mood with a swirl of whisky in a rock bottom glass. Purson reveled in the flavor of the whisky to let Prescott squirm a little more. That Viking axe loomed like an ominous sign behind Purson. Without saying anything, Purson took an empty glass from the caddy and filled it with water from a carafe. He pushed the glass in front of Prescott. Prescott sneered with his face. Purson opened a big, deep drawer in his desk. He pulled out a beer glass that was filled with a yellow, slightly foamy liquid. "That's my piss," said Purson unceremoniously. He pushed the glass in front of Prescott. Fair enough, Prescott could smell the authenticity of the item. Purson got another clear glass from the caddy .He lifted a red gasoline container with a long snout from behind the desk. He filled the third glass a quarter. Sure enough, the fumes of gasoline filled the room. "Makes you nauseous, doesn't it?" "How long is it going to take for you to break down and help yourself? I have a bet with my psychologist that you won't even last ten minutes. I have a good box of Cubans at stake," said Purson with a rhetorical question. Prescott silently listened with a pale face. "I'm a gonna let you in on a secret. Pathway is the traffic light software that runs in 95% of all traffic lights in America. We didn't get there with a better product. Our supply chain is shit. We sell our product at a loss. That's how we put all the competitors out of business." "Why would we do that? I'll tell you. We are not in the traffic light business. Ads? No, that's what you Princeton boys always think. Put an ad on your fridge and give the fridge away for free. Ads is not the answer." "See every traffic light comes with at least four cameras. The cameras aren't turned on. Yet, each district has the option of paying a little extra to use computer vision to optimize traffic signaling. It improves traffic throughput by 20%. They don't know the cameras are already running. There are 300,000 traffic light intersection. That puts us at around 1.2 million cameras all over America. The Eye of Sauron in Lord Of The Rings is the prototype for our business plan." "We have a giant data center to process all those images real-time. We have archives going back five years. I want to show you something," finished Purson narrating. Purson turned his computer screen, so that Prescott could see. Purson entered "Prescott Smith" in Facebook. Purson clicked around a bit around in Prescotts profile until he found a family picture. He copied the family picture to clipboard and opened it in MS Paint. From there, he cut Prescott's father out. He saved the face of Prescott's father. Prescott uploaded the file to a Pathway internal web site. A minute later, a detailed ledger with intersection names and dates appeared. Purson scrolled down and pointed on Thursday, January 13th 2011. Purson tapped the screen a second time and looked victorious. Then, he clicked on the link. A little QuickTime video opened. Prescott's father was driving the gray Charger through an intersection with snow slush in Washington DC. The next video clip showed a Seven-Eleven store near an intersection. The Charger pulled into a parking spot. There was slick, grimy ice in front of the store Prescott's father wore a beige coat and leather shoes. He was wearing smooth leather gloves. His hair was shiny, and the gray looked regal. The picture didn't seem to move for a minute. Only the timestamp rolled forward. Then, Prescott's father came out with the store clerk. She was an extremely fat woman. Her butt was so big that a basketball would blush. Her hair was curled. The jewelry on her sausage fingers was big bling. Her face looked very dumb. They walked behind the green, open city dumpster. He pressed her against the wall. Heavy vapor clouds rose from their mouths. The action grew harsh and jerky. He turned to walk away. He flung something small on the ground. "Why?" thought Prescott. His mother was intelligent. His mother went to Pilates class five times a week. She went from one kale juice diet to the next. Her body was in vibrant shape. His mom had done humanitarian missions in Africa. His mom's parents were from old money. Why would his dad turn his back on such a woman? That clerk was the stuff of nightmares for any man who wasn't a eunuch. "Do you want me to send your mom a copy?" asked Purson. "We could watch live what her reaction is. I got her phone number right here." "Whoever is president of Pathway will be the true ruler of America once our systems are fully operational. Do you see why you are trying to throw the wrench into the wrong gear?" pressed Purson. "Don't send that video to my mom. She tried to kill herself. She has a history of suicidal problems. Don't do it," begged Prescott. "Don't be such a buzzkill," said Purson. He started to enjoy his role. Without further ado, Purson alt-tab switched back to MS Paint. He cut out the face of Prescott's mom. He uploaded it to the internal Pathway web site. Purson opened the life stream. Prescott's mom was loading groceries into her white Toyota Prius. The car was in the parking lot decently close to a traffic light. She seemed to stop to look at her phone. A devilish smile went across Purson's face. Prescott's mom looked confused at the first video of Prescott's father driving across the intersection. "I'll do it," pressed Prescott out of his lips. Prescott's hand gripped the water glass with determination. He poured the water down his throat. He grabbed the piss glass. Ugh, the familiar bile and repulsing taste of stale piss. The nose felt like it was exploding. He grabbed the gasoline glass. The vapors alone gave him a nauseating dizziness. The gasoline burned his mouth and throat. The stomach revolted as the gasoline burned chemical holes into the stomach lining. The tiny lump of a stomach contracted spit, bile, and gasoline poured out of Prescott's mouth and spread over Purson's desk. The convulsions came in waves. Prescott's fingers clutched as he helplessly sunk to the floor. Daniel burst into the office without knocking. He grabbed Prescott off the floor. Purson reached for the phone and dialed 911. Daniel eyed Purson. Daniel had known what Purson was up to. Purson had an obliging look, like Purson knew that he couldn't draw out the 911 call any longer without being caught. Prescott lifelessly languished in Daniel's arms and pumped his stomach involuntarily with his eyes rolled back. The alarm of an ambulance came rapidly close as everything went black around Prescott. When Prescott came to, he felt groggy. He felt clean sheets on his skin. He felt something warm and cuddly on his left side. He felt a jab in his right arm. Oh, that was the syringe from the drip. Sea was the cuddly mess on his left side. She was carefully caressing his hair and holding him. She was lying next to him. Her eyes were hazel. There was something so intimate about having her face so close to his. "Prescott, I stopped him from poisoning you. I talked him out of killing you. I told him that it would raise less questions if he committed you to an insane asylum. Just tell the good doctor that you tried to kill yourself. With your history of drinking that teacher's urine, it'll go down really well. You stupid, Princeton boy. All the smarts of Princeton hasn't taught you any street smarts. That's the best that I could do for you. Say bye to Sea. You won't ever see her again," said Daniel. The nurse came in. Under the watchful eye of the psychiatrist with his checkered vest and tie, the nurse pulled the protesting Sea away from him. Sea's fists struggled high in the air. The nurse was bigger and used to wrestling patients. The slow procession dragged to the door. "Why won't I see Sea again? She could visit me!" stammered Prescott. Daniel shook his head with sad sorrow. Prescott could feel the sting in his heart. Sea was going to die. He rose up to leave the bed. The psychiatrist pressed Prescott down by the shoulders. Still weak from the gasoline poisoning and purging, Prescott sunk back and cried bitter tears. He muttered under his breath, "I'm gonna cut him down." "Prescott, did you try to kill yourself today?" asked the psychiatrist. "Yes," said Prescott was stony solemnness. "Prescott, do you think that you are a danger to yourself?" continued the psychiatrist. "Yes," said Prescott with a hard and pale face. "Prescott, I have to commit you. Do you understand?" finished the psychiatrist. "Yes," said Prescott with icy tension. "I'm going to walk outside for a minute and write the order," said the psychiatrist. Prescott sat up. He pulled the syringe out of his arm. He got out of the bed and made the first few steps barefoot. The hospital gown was undone in the back and showed the center of his butt cheeks. Daniel looked with an open mouth. Prescott pushed the door open. He disappeared from Daniel's view. There was the think sound of a metal tray falling to the ground. The steps continued getting thinner. Prescott made it out of the hospital without being stopped. The hospital staff was so slow and occupied with themselves that they didn't noticed. Prescott ran down to the Pathway office. He stormed down the hallway to Purson's office. He barged into the office. The office was empty. He grabbed the Viking axe. Holding the Viking axe on the long end of the handle, he ran out. He ran down to the railroad tracks. The hospital gone was flying around him. The big, green tree crowns stood silently around. The birds chirped. And the angry Princeton lad with a Viking axe ran down the railroad tracks. He ran down until he hit the Tygart Valley River. He ran through the deep grass. Rocks hurt his feet. He ignored them. He ran upstream until he came to the Leading Creek tributary. The company limo was parked high up on the river bank. The trunk was propped open. Purson was watching from the cliff with leather gloved hands and an immaculate suit. Beneath him, in the deep spot of the confluence was a spot in the water that was churning and bubbling. Prescott ran up to Purson. The dazed Purson recognized his Viking blade. When Prescott drove the battle axe down in a wide swing into Purson's calve, Purson acquired a deeper level of knowing of his axe as it sliced through the calve muscle and cracked the shinbone. God's Gonna Cut You Down Prescott left the Purson behind. Purson helplessly fell to the ground crying in agony. With wide outstretched arms, Prescott jumped down the cliff. In a perfect arc, he dove head in first to the water. His arms pulled from the tippy front down along his side to propel him forward to the depth. He opened his eyes and saw Sea struggling to swim to the surface. Her legs were tied to a rope. The roped went in a straight line down to a stone brick. Sea wasn't struggling much anymore. The air was running thin in her lungs. Prescott struggled with the knot of the rough rope. The water had wetted the rope and made it pull together tight. Prescott swum deeper. He grabbed the stone brick with both hands. With all his might, he could lift it. Like a sumo ringer, he carried the stone brick under water to the shallow part of the Tygart. The mud floated around his knees and waste. He slipped on big river rocks. The air was running rare in his lungs. Yet, he had one duty and one mission. His life was only a secondary priority. The ground become sturdier and less mucky on the shallow side. Firm pebbles made the underwater walking easier. He could feel the rope slacking as Sea started floating on the water's surface. He swam up to her. Her eyes were red. She was breathing hard and spewing water. The doggy paddles of desperation kept her mouth at the surface. He dove back down and with more time was able to undo the knot. Purson was sitting on the other side of the river Indian style. He was on his phone talking feverously. He yelled over at Prescott, "I'm gonna cut you down!" Prescott's white hospital gown had become completely see-through. He grabbed Sea by the hips and threw her over her shoulder. Prescott walked up the grass to Coberly Lane. His plan was to get away. The destination of safety was a hazy concept. Daniel's battered Honda Civic honked on Coberly Lane. The quick beep-beep gave Prescott heavy. Sea's body had become heavy to him. The river water was still streaming down his body. Daniel came running and pulled Sea on the backseat. Sea let herself fall across the whole back lifeless. Daniel slammed the door and punched the gas to hit Crystal Spring Road. "Son, I'm gonna let you in on my secret. I'm a highway robber. I've been my whole life until I got caught. I posted bail and ran away. Purson has shielded me from the Marshall Service. Though, he could only protect me within Elkins city limits. He's extracted his price from me," explained Daniel speaking rapidly. The Civic tires spun on the dirt road. The rear slide a bit around in the turns. A dust cloud blew up behind them. Daniel was gunning it. He was wielding the stick shift harshly. The pedals only knew full speed or full break. He was leaning forward to see around the corners hidden behind high fences. He reached under Prescott's legs to pull a CB radio out. "Spider is active. Repeat. Spider is active. Activate plan Tinkerbell. I'm heading North on Crystal Springs Road," said Daniel into the CB Radio. "For a long time, I've been planning to run away. I want to see my family again. Purson has gone too far," explained Daniel to Prescott. "But Prescott will find us. He controls all the traffic lights in America," said Prescott defeated. "Haha, America is full of backcountry roads. We won't set a tired on paved road from hear until Nevada. There is a network of rebels who will guide us across the whole country. The heart touching story of you love birds is something that the leadership has been waiting on for a long time. The harder he goes after you the more sympathy and followers will be gathered by the rebellion."