Episode 54 - Roads

## Roads

A white sign pointing in two directions. The one facing us points to California. On top of the sign is a small red rat with a crown hovering above its head.

### Author

William A. Wellman

Gale is woken up by an unexpected guest, Riot spends her first night on the road, and Barb goes for a drive. The theme of tonight's episode is Roads.

***Content Warnings:** Violence, Kidnapping and abduction, Death + Injury, Blood, Gun Mention, Misgendering, Emotional Manipulation, Smoking*

## Intro - A Curse And A Blessing

Nikignik narrates to the Dreamers from the point of view of Ray. Telling them about how the road ahead of him was a curse and a blessing. A curse because he had not chosen it. Perhaps if he had been born in a different house, he might have had a home that loved without condition, a family who would not cast him to the wind. Now all he had were a few upholstered seats, and a set of wheels, and enough fuel to bring him into the next horizon. And it had been a blessing because for the first time he had peace, and when he woke in the morning he chose where he went, and he looked for a place where he would be welcome, and safe, and home.

Nikignik sits in a tank full of fish in Glass City Farms. He rants about how stupid and unperceptive fish were, unare of their purpose or their inability to escape it. They were also unable to comprehend the roaring engine of an automobile that echoes throughout the farmland.

## Story One - Welcome To The Farm

To his dismay, Gale Scarberry wakes up to the sound of an automobile (see Ray) outside of his house, stirring up a racket. He calls out to the other residence of the house to get ready to pack up, in fear that this strange occurrence was Botco, come to tear the lives they'd made for themselves away. He grabs a sledgehammer (his weapon of choice), Darla backs him with a shotgun, telling him that she'd shoot him if he kept shouting. Thy discuss if it might be Botco, but Darla dismisses this theory. They leave the house, and Gale approaches the automobile, asking if they cared for a cup of sugar, to which the passenger side door of the automobile opens, and Moth Scarberry steps out.

Gale asks what moth was doing there, asking if Bill Scarberry was with moth, but moth tells them that the other person with moth was ' friend from the road', and Ray drives off. Gale asks how Moth had been, and moth tells him that moth'd been better, and asks how Darla was, and he tells moth that she'd been better too. Darla yells out asking who it was, and Gale calls back that it was Moth. Gale leads Moth inside and moth asks Gale where they actually were, which gale explains (see Glass City Farms) and Darla leads Moth away to find moth a room to sleep in. Motha asks Gale if he'd grown everything in the farm, and he tells moth that it'd been a community effort, and asks how Moth had managed to find them, which Moth explains (see Episode ) and they make it to the chosen room to become Moth's bedroom. Gale asks how Bill was, and Darla tells them that she'd had a dream (see Darla) about Bill, she'd dreamt that Lady Ethel Mallory was talking, and that Bill had been captured (see Episode 37 - The Morning Hour), and Moth tells them what had happened to Bill, however moth makes it out to have been Bill's decision to call the flies and not Moths. But Gale points out that it wasn't in character for Bill to call the flies (see Bill Scarberry), and Moth lies telling him that moth hadn't expected it either. Darla asks moth is moth was there to stay, and moth tells them that if they didn't mind moth would like to as moth had no one else. Gale tells moth that moth was going to have to pull moth's own weight of moth wanted to stay. They wish Moth goodnight and leave the room to let moth sleep.

### Interlude - A Bloom In The Heart

Nikignik tells the dreamers that if North America was a corpse, then the highways were its bones. The only life left in the desolate husk was that of the Dreaming Boxes, silver larvae, churning with the sleeping inside. Ther were still some who wormed their way across the landscape, hoping that where they go might hold more sustenance then where they are coming from. And they were all beginning to realise that there was nothing more to consume, and they could feel the panic rising. There was no paradise to be found in this blackened world. And yet, at the heart of it all, there was bloom and growth, the Hallowoods was home to many an unfriendly and hungry thing.

## Story Two - A Place To Rest

Riot Maidstone tells the RV Gang to be quiet as she was tiring to sleep, and Diggory Graves offers to drive for her that next day. She denies them this, under the justification of Diggory's flashbacks (see Diggory Graves), Percy Reed offers up Olivier Song to drive, but Olivier turns this down, saying that she didn't know how. They've parked besides a rest stop, and Riot tells them that they were making good time and would be crossing the Detroit River that next day. The group begins bickering about Olivier making clouds and weather her entire personality, with Riot and Percy mocking her, that ends with Olivier defending herself against the accusation that she died her hair, and Riot throwing back in her face the time she tried to kill Diggory (see Episode 24 - Storms), which makes Olivier leave. Riot vents to Diggory about missing Walt (see Episode 36 - Swords). She grabs her sword and leavers the RV to look for Olivier, and goes inside the rest stop, finding it ransacked and predictably abandoned. She calls out for Olivier, turning a corner to find The Rat King in the middle of attacking her, having put her seemingly in a trance.

### Marketing - You Deserve Better

Lady Ethel Mallory interrupts Nikignik's broadcast with her marketing segment. She speaks to the listener, informing them that they were dreaming, and that she was there with a message form Botco. She compliments them on their dream, telling them that their creativity could be used in the Prime Dream, She tells them that they deserved better than this, that they deserve to stay asleep and not have to return to where it was they were laying, in a ditch, or a ruined building. She was there because she wanted to give them a life they didn't need to wake up from, a life where it could be safe, peaceful, and sweet always, no more running and no more survival. Their friends, family, and so many others wanted to see them and dream with them.

### Story Two, Continued

Riot hesitates for a few moments while she grabs her sword and tries to process what she's looking at. But she shortly thereafter manages to pluck up the courage to yell out and draw attention to herself, distracting the Rat Kind from Olivier. This work and the Rat King starts chasing Riot around the inside of the rest stop while Riot tries to think of a way to defeat it. She spots the security grill and notices that it wasn't completely shut, and slides under it followed by the Rat King. She turns back around and slides back under the gill, quickly shutting it the rest of the way behind her, trapping the Rat King in a temporary cage. She rushes to Olivier to see if she was okay and finds her unresponsive, turning behind her to yell out to Diggory to come in and help her, but finding that the Rat king had already escaped and had crept up on her, quickly snaring her in the same trance that it had Olivier in, which Riot describes as:

"*emerald stars in an ancient sky, constellations you could walk into forever. Each star was a secret, a dead world reflecting the light of a malign sun, archives buried beneath dead stone, dread crowns bestowed upon the heralds of extinction. All things ending, all things reborn, crown and eye and hand and lie and truth and death, death above all, death in the light and death in the void and death at the heart of life…*"

She is cut off and snaped out of the trance by the appearance of a cat by Riot's feet which effectively frightens off the Rat king, upon it fleeing Olivier also comes to. She catches the tail end of the Rat King fleeing, and asks Riot about the rats and the cat, the latter of which she immediately starts fawning over, and asks if they could keep. Riot is about to say no due to the cat being a feral animal but on account of her being attracted to Olivier she ignores her better judgment and says yes. Riot also apologises for bringing up Olivier's past, and Olivier tells her that it was okay, that she didn't blame Riot for not being able to forget what she [Olivier] had done but she was trying to be better. Diggory and Percy appear having heard the commotion and Percy asks about the cat. Riot tells the group that they were going to have to get back in the RV and keep driving a little longer.

### Interlude - Highways Through The Universe

Nikignik tells the Dreamers that there was no such thing as 'space aliens' as anything that lives in space has a right to be there. It was true that there were few things that had truly perfected linear travel through space as the emptiness between worlds was full of turbulence, frequently fluctuating temperatures, radiation, and had lots of hidden teeth, all of which prevented the establishment of a real highway through space. Xyzikxyz had bestowed upon her ascended scientists wings so that they could float un the vacuum, the Court of the Faceless King travelled as well whenever it was called to rule, his jesters being infamous across the universe. But none travel the galaxy so well as the Council of Heaven (see Indescribables) and Nikignik rejoiced to be so free as in a moment he could be in the deeps of the Hallowed pines, or standing above the Dreamers bed, or standing in the eye of the storm of Jupiter.

## Story Three - One More Bargain

Barb checks himself to makes sure that he looks presentable, straightening his bowtie. The Countess asks him where he was going, and he tells her a half-truth that he was going out for a drive, but she persists and asks him where he was driving to, and he gets defensive, sarcastically asking her if this was an intervention, but she tells him that she was worried about him asking him what was going on. He excuses himself by telling her that he had an appointment and he'd tell her all about what was going on when he got back. He leaves the Resting Place Hotel and drives for most of the night Looking for the Carnival Gang, finding them on a bridge, having followed their normal nightly routine of Mort and Yaretzi going to sleep while Polly stays up. Polly addresses Barb by tells him that he was the last person he'd expected to see, and immediately asking him why he was there, asking if he'd decided he owed him something for keeping Mort and Yaretzi safe for a few days (see Episode 39 - Promises). Barb tells him that he was there to tell Polly that he was in danger from the Industry, Polly being confused by this as he'd resigned (see Episode 39 - Promises) and wasn't important enough for them to go after. Barb tells him that him thinking like that was the reason he'd worked for the Industry for so long and never gotten a promotion, telling him that the Industry could track him by his Cane, but Barb could help him by hiding the soul fire within it in a different dimension for him.

Polly laughs at Barb telling him that he doubted this as the Industry wasn't equipped to store fire in different dimensions, let alone Barb, but Barb tells him that he knew someone who was (see The Diamond Rider). This causes Polly to go quiet with consideration, before speaking up and telling Barb that he knew better then to do business with Devils, but hypothetically what was Barb asking for. Barb tells him that he wanted half of Polly's supply, and Polly tries to haggle him down to 10% as Barb already had his own stock, but Barb tells him that his offer was half or no deal, reminding him of Mort and Yaretzi asking what the Industry Auditors might do to them. Polly stars at him in a way that Bar describes as incredulous and hostile, which Barb takes as a good sign, telling Polly that he was going to have to go back to the Resting place, that it's been a mistake to come out there, that maybe he'd done it because Polly remined him of himself. Polly calls after him to wait, and it is assumed that they went through with Barb's deal.

## Outro - Roads

Nikignik waxes poetics about roads, talking about the saying the journey is the destination, and how he might have once disgraced with this as the destination was the destination, an end in sight, a destination that upon arrival would make the toil worthwhile. However every time he'd thought this way through his long life, he'd found that destination disappeared, and he was left thinking what had been the point of the voyage. The Journey was all one had, that they could not keep postponing happiness for some idyllic land where no trouble could find them, and they could sleep in peace. They would travel their lives and it was within the dust, and the sunlight, and the strangers that they must find their joy. Every morning they walked forward and hoped that they would find paradise, but that today’s journey will hold more good than the day before.