Machine Oasis

The orange fire of the dying sun baked the world into a quiet and still submission. Nothing dared move or breathe within miles in any direction. Save a single lone figure. The dust that rose with every footstep lingered in the air for but a moment, then settled back down into leftover tattered footprints. The shoes that tracked their way through the wasted desert fell apart at the seams, small tears revealing the scabbed skin beneath. A carrion bird, nearly as big as the lone figure itself, perched on a nearby rock. The scorching rays of the sun seeped into the cracks of the mind and invaded the peace of the soul. The caws of the circling birds trembled the bones. Each step squeezed the heart a little tighter. And yet, the lone figure walked on.

Wayne took what he figured to be his last step. A second later he took it again. And again. And again. With each jarring thump, he assumed it was over. With each lift of his leg, he surprised himself. This continual feeling of surprise might have been the only thing keeping him going. For four days he had walked, and for four days he hadn’t had anything to drink or eat. Beneath the hot Arizona sun Wayne could feel his skin crackling as if on fire. Flesh peeled off of his face, his eyes swam with spots from the unprotected sun, he could feel the heat of the highway burning up through his soles. Yet, he kept walking.

It was an odd thing to feel oneself dying. In his feverish mindstate, Wayne was beginning to lose sense of reality, the continuous outstretched sand threatened to swallow him whole. The shoes on his feet came alive and begged him to stop walking. The booming laugh of the sun echoed in his ears and buzzed inside his brain. For the hundredth time that day he looked at his phone, the cracked display flashed NO BATTERY. If only he could send a text, just a single “I’m sorry” then the sun could finally take him.

Wayne was pulled from his reverie by a faint but familiar rumbling. He whirled around and shaded his eyes, looking for what he expected to see. There, in the distance, a sleek black semi, all wheels and no windshield was barreling towards him at high speeds no human could safely drive. Wayne jumped up and down, waving his arms like a madman, trying to catch the attention of the thing speeding past him. It showed no hint of slowing down. Wayne opened his mouth in a scream, yet no sound escaped his hoarse throat. As a last ditch effort he swept up a rock and hurled it after the retreating monstrosity. The rock fell far from it’s mark.

And like that it was over, as all the rest had been: never stopping, never slowing. He was alone once more in a dead world. The highway behind Wayne stretched back for several hundreds of miles, around one-hundred of which he had experienced on foot. If the broken sign before him told the truth, there was a gas station in another ten. So he walked.

The sun was beginning to set when Wayne was able to make out the faint shimmering form of a building. He did not get his hopes up, however, because this was the fifth shimmering building he had seen so far. Just another fever dream in the stark heat. As he approached, the faint noise of wind chimes reached his ears, the only sound he had heard save the crunch of his own feet for what felt like an eternity. A rusted sign, once painted a vibrant cherry red, beckoned him inside: Last stop for 90 miles it read, the paint chipping away to the bare metal beneath, Home of the World’s Largest Ball of Yarn, Only Found on Route 66! At some point, a vandal had added a somewhat fitting third six on at the end. Route 666. Wayne licked his dry puffy lips and walked inside.

The inside of the gas station was as dead as the outside. Wayne made his way down dusty aisles with outdated magazines, heading toward the back of the store. His footsteps echoed in the still silence, disturbing the peace of what seemed to be a forgotten place. He found the water fountain, an old rusted relic, and slowly stooped down over it. He pulled the lever and feverishly drank of the vile, orange colored liquid that spewed out. Wayne felt his stomach and throat convulse in an attempt to reject the foul water. He fought the urge to retch, and quickly lost. His vomit hit the floor with a sickening splash. Wayne’s vision swam, his legs cramped, and he too hit the ground with a weak groan.

What felt like hours later, although it was probably only minutes, Wayne slowly lifted his aching body off of the dirty floor. His company T-shirt, “Tomorrow’s Trucking”, the one his wife had patched with that silly pink string, was covered in the putrid waste of his gut. He pulled himself to his feet, eyeing the rusted water fountain. He went in for another drink, pausing for the water to run clear this time, and took slow sure sips.

“Thirsty bugger aren’t you?” The voice, a dry and raspy feminine twang, sent Wayne shooting upright in surprise. She leaned up against the wall to his left, a burnt out cigarette dangling from her open hand. The woman, all overall’s and greased fingers, watched him with hawkish eyes. Wayne scratched his balding head, and tried to croak out a response. Only a raspy wheeze escaped.

“Well, don’t stop on my account,” the woman continued, arching an eyebrow. Her face was a ruddy brown, punctuated by wrinkles and creases and framed by a gray shock of cropped hair. Wayne looked down at the water fountain, up at the first human he had seen in four days, and gingerly went back to slurping up water through swollen lips. The woman moved around the shop behind him, Wayne heard the clatter of debris being shuffled around and the light swish of a counter being cleared of dust.

“My name’s Greta by the way, I haven’t had a real human customer in a good few weeks, what brings you out this way?”

Wayne paused from drinking long enough to croak out, “Wayne. Walked.” His throat stung and his vision began to swim once more.

Greta raised an eyebrow in surprise and gave a quick barking laugh, “Walked? In this heat? No wonder you look about as baked as a cactus. Where the hell did you walk from?” She peered out the window in the front of the store, as if the answers lay out in the scorched sand.

Wayne stood up straight, water dribbling from his lips. Something in his head pounded like the heavy beat of tires on a washboard, his eyes began swimming in spots, Greta’s voice echoed from far off.

“You’re not escaped from that penitentiary are you?”

Wayne turned toward her, or at least where her voice was coming from. The black spots swallowed his vision.

“I don’t want no damn trouble if you are.” The women’s words came from across the desert, from a place of pine trees and burnt lasagna.

Wayne took a step, his foot caught on something. He surrendered to the darkness before he even hit the ground.

Trucking had been the lifeblood of the country. Those massive eighteen wheelers pumping their cargo over every inch of the fifty-thousand miles branching across the United States. Every fruit, vegetable, IPhone, and gizmo the American consumer needed. Brought to the table by a mid-western rubber tramp whose family missed them half as much as they hated them. The lifestyle was near impossible, the hours grueling, and the pay hardly worth it. But the feeling. Detroit, Houston, Seattle, Denver, New York City and back again. Truckers were free. Free to come and go as they pleased, free to be themselves. They were the last bastions of an American dream long since forgotten. They would live forever.

In the vague etherealness between reality and dreams Wayne forgot all about Route 66 and Greta. He was back in bed with Marie, it was winter, and they had cuddled up for warmth. It was one of the good memories, full of playful banter, longing looks, and a warmth between them that offset the cold Chicago winter. Allie, their four year old daughter, quietly sleeping between them. As peaceful as an angel. They had been happy, for but a moment. Wayne had been content, his wandering spirit subdued. As with all things, it wouldn’t last.

A faint and insistent clack clack clack brought Wayne back to the present. His jaw ached, his head pounded, but worst of all, he was absolutely freezing. His eyes opened groggily to take in his surroundings. He was in a bathtub, filled to the brim with cold water and ice. The clacking was coming from his own chattering teeth. A single light bulb hung above him, illuminating his pile of vomit stained clothes to his left. Wayne gingerly pulled himself out of the bathtub and slowly got dressed.

Greta was nowhere to be found when Wayne made his way out of the bathroom. He found himself in a small living space attached to the rear of the gas station. Fading sunlight illuminated a plethora of hanging plants and garden boxes scattered throughout the small home. Twisting vines and ripe vegetables covered nearly every inch of counter space, tables, and windowsills. The only surface unmolested by the reach of the plants was a small shelf with a single meek framed photograph. Wayne picked his way around a tomato bush and examined the picture. In it, a much younger Greta had her arms wrapped around another woman. They stared at the camera and grinned broadly, arms outstretched towards the newly built gas station behind them. There actually was a giant ball of yarn too.

Wayne meandered between the aisles of the gas station in search of Greta, his stomach making itself heard with angry growls. He traced his finger along the dusty shelf until he came to a rack of keychains. His eyes picked out a miniature Arizona license plate, the name on the front reading Allie. He fondled the keychain for a moment before slipping it into his pocket. Lost in his reverie, he rounded the corner, where he nearly bumped into a tall handsome man sitting in a chair.

The man’s blond hair was stylishly cut, and his face was freshly shaved. He was tall, lithe, and muscular all at once. He was perfect all the way down to his delicate eyelids, which were closed. Wayne took another step, and the eyelids shot open.

“Greetings consumer!” The thing said, standing with surprising alacrity, Wayne took a stumbling step backward.

“How can I assist you today? I have a few thousand functions immediately on hand.” The voice was metallic and distant, a near perfect imitation of life that was right in all the wrong ways. The thing took a step toward Wayne. A croak of fear escaped Wayne’s throat as his foot caught on the corner of one of the aisle shelves, he stumbled backwards and fell. The thing sprung forward and offered its hand, skin the perfect shade of tan, but with an odd gleam.

“Here consumer, allow me to assist you!” Wayne reeled backwards, his flailing foot caught the thing squarely in the chest. The noise it made was a metallic thump.

“Please consumer, I may not have feelings, but I can still be damaged.” Wayne gave another yell, his dry raspy voice finally breaking through.

“H-h-help!”

The thing took another step closer, “I cannot assist you.” It’s voice began to deepen and its eyes glazed over, “if you do not tell me the caaaaaaauuuse…” The thing gave a shudder and it’s shoulders slumped, still towering over Wayne. He could feel the thing’s vacant eyes staring through him.

“Sorry bout that,” came Greta’s voice from around the corner. Wayne scrambled to his feet and took a few cautionary steps away from the robot, casting a look back at his savior. Greta clutched a sleek remote in her callused hands, she hit a few buttons and Wayne watched as the thing righted itself, brushed the dirty shoe print from its chest, and sat back down in its chair. Eyes closing once more.

“Never seen anyone react so violently to a C.A.R.L. bot before, I know he can be a lil’ off putting but damn, if you’d kicked any harder you’d be paying for my friend here.” Greta shook her head and returned behind the counter. The way she had said “friend” hadn’t seemed as sarcastic as Wayne would have liked.

“Sorry,” croaked Wayne, he shrugged his shoulders to emphasize how he felt.

Greta gave him a disapproving look, “Sorry don’t pay the bills Wayne,” She set the remote on the counter and walked over to the robot, beginning to carefully buff the already perfectly clean imitation muscular chest. “He might not look like much to you, but those fellers over at Horizon believe he’s the next step in consumerist advertisement. They pay me handsomely to keep him around my store for naught but show.” She took a step back from the CARL bot and waved her arm around, indicating the masses of people who were seeing him, “What they don’t know don’t hurt em” she finished with a quick flash of a grin.

Wayne nodded, he had seen a robot like this in an ad a few years ago, but they had quickly been discontinued due to consumers stating they were “just too lifelike”. Greta’s world was just far enough removed to have remained untouched by such criticism, and Horizon was such a massive corporation it seemed likely that they had simply forgotten about her. Wayne decided it was best to keep this to himself.

Wayne was interrupted from his thoughts by Greta once more, “Glad to see you’re up and about,” she said simply, “Thought I was gonna have to leave you out for the buzzards for a minute there.”

Wayne scratched his sunburned bald spot and winced, “You saved me,” he croaked through his raspy voice, “Thank you.”

Greta simply nodded. She proceeded to show him around the remainder of the store and her attached home and garage. She seemed to always teeter the edge between babbling ceaselessly about something or saying nothing at all, Wayne got the impression she had been alone with only a robot for company for some time. The gas station was a bit of a phenomenon Wayne discovered, for its existence was next to meaningless. Greta explained that Route 66 had been taken off the road maps awhile back, but the state was still required to ensure gas and electric stations existed along it. Greta’s shop was one of a few that fit into this requirement. So she stayed here, subsiding off of the supplies brought to her from automated trucks, never seeing a single person for months at a time. Her very purpose just to ensure that the electric pumps that fed the trucks, that in turn fed her, continued to run. It was an oasis of machines with a single necessary human caught up in the mix. The CARL bot did all the cleaning, and a lot of the cooking too, Wayne soon found out. The only thing Greta absolutely excelled at and kept to herself was her plants.

When Wayne asked if he could contact his family Greta had simply shook her head. She had an internet network, of course, but it didn’t extend beyond her own little island of connected devices. Anything beyond that would have been too expensive. Privatized internet networks were rare, but when they happened in a place like this, with no competition, companies raised prices through the roof. Greta had mumbled something about “Missing net neutrality” and moved on.

Wayne asked about a car next, to which Greta made a noise in her throat. She owned an old Honda motorcycle, but it couldn’t fit two, and she made no mention of letting Wayne borrow it. The only thing Wayne got from this conversation was the sudden knowledge that he was well and truly stuck here.

The Truckers were immortal until they weren’t. It happened slowly and inevitably. They welcomed the changes that made the job easier. A GPS system to overhaul maps. Better radios to improve communication. Monitors to ensure the driver didn’t fall asleep. Tracking systems to keep the truck between the lines. Every new addition edged the driver just a little more out of his seat. The autopilot was the first warning sign. And when the company revealed the latest and greatest fully automated semi-truck, the one that would stop all truck accidents, the one that would never fall asleep behind the wheel, the one that would save lives? They all knew it was over. Truckers became fossils.

. The soft whistle of a wind chime was the only thing that broke the tangible silence between Wayne and Greta. The CARL bot cooked with unnerving silence, it’s dextrous joints able to articulate down to micro millimeters of movement. It only made noise when it wanted to. It made Wayne severely uncomfortable. They sat in Greta’s “dining room” which was nothing more than a table and two crates to sit on.

Wayne watched as Greta quietly picked at her fingernails, the same fierce intensity evident in her eyes, even while completing such a mundane task. As a trucker, Wayne was used to prolonged silence, but this was beginning to unnerve him. He finally decided to break the silence himself, picking the first thing he could see.

“Who's that lady in the picture?” He said, motioning toward the portrait on the wall. Wayne thought he saw Greta’s cheek give a twitch, but other than that she showed no sign of recognition. He figured she must not have heard him, he cleared his throat uncomfortably and tried again, “So who’s that…”

“I heard you.” Greta’s voice cut through the limp question like a knife. Wayne felt the color rise to his sunburnt cheeks as those fierce eyes turned on him. He opened his mouth, an apology leaping to his tongue, but quickly closed it again with another look from his host.

Greta glanced over at the photo on the wall again, her shoulders visibly softening. Quiet overtook the room once more.

“You love someone, Wayne?” The rough woman finally asked.

“I… Yes, I do.” The answer felt like a stone in his chest.

“So did I once,” Greta continued, “Her name was Cara, she was the sunshine.” Wayne nodded, uncomfortable with the sudden emotion in Greta’s eyes.

“What… uh, what happened to her?” Wayne asked, the words tumbling out of his mouth. For a long time the only sound was Greta’s fingers drumming on the table.

“These plants were hers.” She finally said, her voice choked with emotion. A gleam echoed from beneath the wrinkled eye sockets, a tiny bit of moisture that was hurriedly brushed away by a calloused hand. Greta sat up straight and made a deep rumbling noise in her chest. The CARL bot poked its head from around a particularly bushy hanging plant.

“Is everything alright ma’am?” The thing asked.

“Yeah yeah, I’m fine” She flashed the bot a smile that seemed more than adequately genuine to Wayne, then turned back toward him with the same hawkish interest she showed before, “Wayne here was just telling me about his life back home, weren’t you Wayne?” And with that it was over, all the emotion, all the pain she had just expressed, gone in an instant. She was a peculiar person. Her hard eyes were once again locked on Wayne’s, he felt like a bug being scrutinized. “Let’s start easy,” Greta continued pulling a bottle of vodka from beneath her chair, “Where yah from?”

“Chicago, recently. Before that…” Wayne gave an apathetic shrug, before Chicago it was too many places to count. Greta slid a smudged glass of the vodka over to him. He gave it an experimental sip. It burned.

“So, the someone you love, your wife?” Greta asked before downing her whole glass and pouring another.

Wayne nodded, the words not making it past his throat.

“Does she have a name?” Greta’s tone was the patience of an exasperated parent dealing with a mentally disabled child.

“Marie, her name is Marie. We also have a kid, an eight year old named Allie. I… miss them.”

Greta gave a barking laugh, “That sure sounded convincing!”

Wayne winced, finished his vodka, coughed, and held it out to be refilled. Greta poured him another with a growing look of interest.

“I don’t know if they’re going to want me back.” He said meekly.

“Why? Your face ain’t that uglied up from the sun!” Greta barked another laugh at her own joke, swigged another shot, and looked back at Wayne with a deadly serious look. “What did you do man? Out with it. I won’t have any secrets under my roof, at least none that aren’t mine.”

“Marie always hated that I was a trucker. She hated the hours, hated the time I spent away from them. I’ve missed more of Allie’s birthdays than I’ve seen. Marie threatened to leave me, said she’d find a new dad for Allie who she’d actually remember.”

Greta was quite a moment, finally she asked “So why’d you leave again?”

The question hung in the air with a menacing reality. It made Wayne feel sick, ridiculed, and angry. The fire from the vodka was beginning to curl its way up Wayne’s stomach and into his chest, he felt lighter, and more emboldened.

“Things have been rough these last few years I guess.” He said, Greta looked at him and nodded, prompting him to go on. He took another swig of vodka and finally acquiesced, “There’s no jobs anymore. The markets… changed, in the last few years. There was a time, long ago, when being a trucker meant something. We had a purpose. These last few years though, with all of these fancy new machines,” the last word was spit out, like a curse word, “We haven’t mattered anymore. They’ve replaced us.”

Greta sipped her drink and glanced at the CARL bot, who was still cooking silently in the kitchen. Wayne felt confidence flood through him now, with his fourth drink in hand he hurdled onward. “You know what they said to me? When they told me I was being replaced, I asked them what I was supposed to do, this little punk shrugs and says ‘Learn to code’, as if it’s that easy. So this right here, this is my last job. After this I’m to be replaced.” Greta was leaning back now, an eyebrow raised at the can of worms she had just opened.

“And you know what I was carrying? More damn robots. Some kind of Horizon home security robot. Well they won’t be protecting anybody anymore. I left them in that smoking wreckage when I swerved into that…” Wayne caught himself. He let his words trail off lamely. Greta seemed content to just sit back and watch him. After a while Wayne found his thread of thought somewhere in his cup.

“Everywhere I look, robots doing everything for us. Telling us where to drive and when to eat and how to do our goddamn jobs. I’m sick of it, I’m sick of all these…”

A heavy clunk interrupted Wayne as the CARL bot set their food on the table.

“Your dinner, sir.” It said.

Wayne deflated like a balloon. They ate their meal in silence.

Later that night Wayne was jostled from his uncomfortable sleep by an eerie bright light. He had made a bed in the store itself, by the window in case any other drivers stopped by, and now two beams shone through the windows and into his groggy eyes. He pulled himself out of his dreamless slumber and cautiously walked outside, a faint hope that maybe someone could give him a ride.

He was greeted by a sleek black machine, sixteen wheels and all aerodynamics. The front, the part that was facing him, lacked any kind of a normal vehicle aspect except two bright headlights. The truck sensed his approach and dimmed the headlights automatically. Wayne had seen these on the news, seen them advertised, overheard his bosses talk excitedly about them in company meetings, even seen them speed past him on the road the last four days, but he had never seen one up close. It was the newest automated big rig, the “Sixteen Wheeler of the Future.” It had no cab, no wasted space, almost nothing to connect it to the semis of old. It had stopped at the electric charging station, pulling up the perfect distance away to suck up as much juice as it could. Its engine hummed quietly. His plan before had been to stop one and hitch a ride, looking at it now however, there was absolutely no room for hitchhikers. It was built for efficiency, not human convenience.

Wayne stared at the beast for a few moments before turning and walking down the road. He got about a half mile, where he figured the thing would reach its top speed, and waited. He waited till he saw the headlights turn out onto the road. Waited until he heard the beast approach. Waited until it was almost upon him.

Then he leaped out into the road.

No impact, no sound, nothing.

Wayne opened his eyes. The semi, about three feet from his shaking body, was emitting a blinking red light that bathed his lonely form. He walked up to the beast, gazing into its glossy black shell. He searched its blank slate for something, anything, to give him an answer. The only thing he could make out was his own reflection, cast in an eerie red glow. This thing had stopped effortlessly on a dime, the air brakes not emitting a single sound. In the back of his mind Wayne knew that this thing was better. If the roles had been reversed, if he had been driving and one of these machines had jumped out in front of him? He would have smoked it. Intentionally or not, he couldn’t stop that fast, he couldn’t be that objectively ambivalent about the enemy. The news, the corporates, the politicians, they were all absolutely right. These things would save lives.

Wayne hated them for it.

Wayne slowly trudged back to the gas station, trembling hands shoved deep in his pockets. He made his way past the Route 66 sign, into the doors, and through the aisle that brought him to the slumbering android. He walked within a few feet and waited for the thing to turn on.

“Greetings consum-” The thing began to say, before it was cut off by a powerful slug from Wayne’s fist. He felt the silicon shell crunch beneath his hand, felt a few of his own knuckles pop, the machine made a whirring sound as it went down. Wayne swung awkwardly with his other fist and caught it on the shoulder. He kicked, he stomped, he screamed as loud as his scarred throat would allow. Tears streamed down his face. When he had finished, the broken robot lay in a mess at his feet. Wires hung from beneath it’s eye sockets, oil seeped from its metallic heart.

Wayne heard the pump of a shotgun. He slowly turned around to face Greta.

Her eyes were wide and her nostrils flared. Her fingers trembled around the barrel of the gun, a look of anger and utter bewilderment on her face. Wayne felt a cold stone settle in his stomach.

“What the fucks the matter with you?” She seethed at him, her eyes darting between him and the destroyed CARL bot. “What the hell did he ever do to you?!” Spittle flew from her mouth as she took a step closer, Wayne took a step back.

“I didn’t... They…” Wayne stumbled around his words.

“They? Who is they? You're so goddamn caught up in they you can’t see the real problem!” Greta took another few steps closer, forcing Wayne to back up toward the door, “You're lucky I don’t just shoot you and let the buzzards eat you.” She said, her voice cracking as she looked down at the broken bot. Her eyes filled with emotion. At that moment Wayne understood.

“You loved that thing.” He said stupidly. Greta’s eyes snapped back up to him, the fire returning.

“Get the fuck out of my store!” She yelled, pumping the gun to prove it was loaded, a shell flung from the chamber as she advanced toward Wayne. He scrambled backward and out the door, tripping over his own feet as he tumbled outside into the sand once more. Greta stood at the entrance, her terrible screams hounding Wayne as he fled into the night.

The cold light of the moon cast its pale shadow across the still desert. The noise of thousands of nocturnal insects, reptiles, and animals filled the lonely miles with their cadence. The only sound to break the cacophony was the slow footsteps of a lone figure. His eyes fixed on the distant horizon, the figure took slow but steady steps one after another. His shoulders hunched and his eyes burned bright. The desert came alive as he walked past, reptilian eyes peaked from their holes and tracked his progress. There was no mercy in their eyes, for there was none in the desert. The fate of the man’s future hung in his own choices. The lone figure walked on.