Lane 5
The smoking cigarette is smothered into the bottom of the glass ash tray. Smoke drifts up as John presses it back and forth seizing any air that allows it to breathe.
'I got the results.' John says.
Billy turns his head, his arm acting like an axel as he leans on the railing.
'Results?' he mumbles.
'Yeah, that fucking interview I went to a couple days ago, fucking piece of shit. I'm really sick of this bullshit.'
'Oh, was that the one where you had to write a stupid test, and then they told you to fuck off?'
John clasps the railing with both hands and looks out onto the towering cityscape as it gets consumed by the setting sun. The traffic rushes on all five levels today, each taking up a lane of air space. Not unusual for a Friday.
'I think I'm just gonna become a taxi driver.' John sniggers as he reaches for another cigarette.
Billy peers over the edge of the railing gazing down the eighty deck apartment block.
'You've gone mad. You know that Johnny. You've gone fucking mad.'
He turns and smiles at John, 'I don't even have a fucking job, shit, I don't even have a fucking interview.'
'Well that's because you've got a bank account bigger than my fucking kitchen.'
Billy laughs and heads inside. 'I'm gonna get a couple beers.'
The street lamps begin to glow a hazy orange as the sun sinks allowing the night to take control and the dust particles floating in the air reflect the sunlight creating a fine mist throughout the city.
Shuttles buzz past, all interconnected to some giant electronic super system keeping the traffic on route and on the correct path, proving its ninety-nine percent effectiveness.
Billy strolls back outside holding six beers wedged between his fingers.
'Hey Billy, you ever wonder what would happen if two shuttles had to' had to pee on the same tree?'
Billy giggles and hands John a beer.
'You never heard?'
'Heard what?'
'Not long ago a bug slipped past somebody in the monopoly of the tech world. Two shuttles with different destinations were calculated to take the same route.'
He slogs a mouthful of beer down his throat and points out to the colossal telecommunications tower on the north-east side.
'They met just under that SkyNet tower. Booom!', 'Dropped to the ground like iron balls, took out eight other shuttles on their way down. Mayhem, absolute mayhem.'
'Shit. I never heard about that.'
'Yeah I think you were still up in HorrinRidge.'
John takes a drag of his cancer-rolled tube and exhales three perfect rings of smoke. Billy walks up to the railing and points at a cargo ship entering the fifth lane from the north side.
'It's that shit' Billy claims. 'It's that shit that causes accidents. They're so fucking slow and they break down every twenty feet.'
'When have those trucks ever got--'
A cracking boom sheers through the air. The city goes dead quiet just before an explosion erupts, louder and louder; as though a bomb went off in the centre of the city.
John spins around covering his ears and ducking to his knees. Billy freezes with his arm outstretched still pointing at the city, his beer falling towards the granite tiles below.
Smoke and flames billow into the air and the traffic piles up clogging Lane 5.
The two shuttles drop though the air just next to the cargo ship with smoke streaming upward as they descend toward the ground below.
A nearby traffic controller hits its boosters and launches down after them dodging the heavy traffic. The air whistles at the windows as it reaches peak speed. Down and out of site. The fog covers all below the five-thousand feet level these days.
John stumbles back to his feet, his eyes prancing all around trying to find the collision.
'Where is it, where the fuck is it?' John questions a bit flustered.
'Relax John, just' relax.'
Billy cracks open another beer and takes a seat on the deck chair.
'Told you, those fucking cargo ships.' Billy claims.
John falls back onto his own deck chair and breathes a deep breath. 'What did the cargo ship have to do with it?'
'The one fucking shuttle overtook the ship, don't know, must of somehow overridden it's pathfinder or something. And then bang, head on with some other poor fuck who was abiding by the laws.'
John jumps up and head inside. 'I'm gonna go take a shower.'
'John, what you getting so tense about?'
Sirens echo through the city corridors and the traffic on Lane 5 starts slowly edging forward once again.
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