Knowledge Freedom Escape

 

    “Escape....escape to where?”
    “Through knowledge comes freedom to escape.”
    “What knowledge, and what price freedom?”
    “If I knew where I was escaping from, I might calculate where I was escaping to!”
    “Escape...how, do you know what’s out there?”
    “No.”
    “A wasteland that’s what, there’s nothing between here and the mountains, nothing for hundreds and hundreds of miles, in all directions.”
    “But there is a road, and roads lead to places, stands to reason.”
    “Reason, what reason is there here?”
    “More the reason for escape, you are a taxi driver!”
    “Me?”
    “Yes you.”
    “Look man I’m only the local service, I make local destinations.”
    “Good, then you can drop me off at the village shop, while you fill the taxi with gasoline.”
    “What do you want to go to the village shop for?”
    “Provisions!”

    “Okay mister I think this has gone far enough, if 2 finds out what we’re doing he’ll take my license away from me, and he’ll do worse.”
    “No.”
    “No, what do you mean no?”
    “You won’t be here, now drive!”
    No.232 drove his taxi around the village until he was flagged down by a man standing on a street corner.
    “Where to mister?”
    “Take me to the nearest town” No.37 said climbing into the back of the taxi.
    “I’m only the local service.”
    “Alright then, take me as far as you can!”
   The taxi driver took the main drag through town, then took a left at Conway and Brewster, a right at 54the street, and then he floored the accelerator out of town following the road out into the wasteland. This had not gone unnoticed by the Observers.
    The taxi travelled the road which stretched out for mile after mile. Driver and passenger took turns to drive through both day and night in the heat of the wasteland. Then......brakes were applied, the tyres squealed, rubber burned, the taxi fishtailed and finally the taxi came to a stop, they had run out of road!
    232 and 37 got out of the taxi, the road had come to the end at the edge of a plateau, and below the wasteland stretched out as far as the eye could see. 37 turned to look back from where they had come it was implausible to think they would have to go back to the city, then he saw a small cloud of dust.
    “The Guardian!”
    In the control room 2 and the supervisor watched via a camera mounted on a drone.
    “That’s a mile and a half mile drop” said the supervisor.
    “What are you telling me?” 2 asked “that it’s going to hurt when they hit the ground!”
    “I can’t go back” 232 said.
    “Neither can I, I’ve an appointment at the clinic I have no wish to keep” 32 said.
    “We could just sit it out in the taxi” 232 suggested.
    “For how long, they would simply send a team of guardians.”
    The two men looked at each other, both realizing there was only one way out. They were about to get back into the taxi when the drone hovered just above them.
    “Do not do it” the voice of 2 said “that’s not the way.”
    They stared up at the drone, saw the dust cloud was getting ever closer, the got back into the taxi, the vehicle reversed back along the road. The drone descended and hovered in front of the blue and cream coloured car. 323 engaged first gear and floored the accelerator and the taxi shot forward, the drone rose high into the air avoiding being destroyed in the collision. The taxi travelled at speed along the short piece of road, but then the wheels lost contact with the ground.

Be seeing you