Issue #74 : Routine Reports

“I’m telling you, it was dead bodies.”

Larry looked up from the coffee that was now hovering halfway between the desktop and his mouth and decided to set it down, wondering if it was too late to think about adding some of whatever it was that Gervais had been drinking that night.

“You’re going to have to run that one past me again, Gervais.”

“Dead bodies.”

“You mean like road kill? I guess you need permits to transport stuff like that, but I can tell you that stretch of road has been due for a cleanup since—”

“Not animals, you idiot. Human bodies. Flatbed trailer piled high with human bones.”

Larry dropped the pen onto the desk and took his glasses off. He looked around the mostly empty station, wondering why he had passed on the opportunity to go home early when it had been offered. No, he had to stick around for the shit-bird shift, because a few extra hours of shit pay would surely make all the difference to him. He had taken some crazy complaints over the years, including one person who insisted that an alien had sucked his eyes out through his nose and then made new ones out of melted jello, but this one here was already shaping up to be one of the top five.

“All right Gervais, just … just go over it again for me, all right?”

Gervais rolled his eyes and shook his head, clearly never having been so put out as this. “I was driving south, down the I-ten. I was workin’ that graveyard again so I’m used to pretty much having the road to myself.”

“Okay, with you so far.”

“I had just passed that big ass oak tree, the one out Cider Lane? Anyway, I’m driving along when all of a sudden, this big ass truck is right next to me, weaving in and out of my lane. I almost pulled off onto the shoulder just to get away from the idiot.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Big son of a bitch, the truck I mean. I couldn’t believe it could even go that fast.

“Yeah, I bet.” Larry paused in the middle of the tiny sketch on his notepad long enough to write, “big son of a bitch,” saying it out loud to satisfy Gervais.

“It was just a flatbed, no covered trailer and when it passed at first I figured he was just hauling firewood or something. But I looked again and I shit you not, that thing was covered in human bones.”

“Gervais—”

“Just shut up one damn minute. You know I’ve been hunting these woods my whole damn life. I know the God dammed difference between animal and human bones.

“Gervais, what are you expecting me to do here, really? I know for a fact that you were at Rusty’s Tap tonight.”

He put out a shaky finger as he spoke, “Now hold those horses there, that got nothing to do with—”

“And if I already know about it, there’s likely a dozen or so people who would be able to recollect seeing you. Now you’re telling me you were driving home, probably shit-faced out of your gourd and that you saw a flatbed truck covered in human bones.”

“It’s what happened.”

Larry let out a sigh. “Gervais, I bet you actually believe that. But what do you think is going to happen if I fill our a report like this? I end up eating government cheese and you end up sucking your meals through a straw.”

“I saw what I saw.”

“Can you at least tell me anything else about the truck? Make and model? Any markings? Did you get a clear look at the driver? Any logos on the mudflaps? Flag in the window? Did you catch the plate number?”

“No, but—”

Larry put his hand out again to stop him. “No … to which question?”

“Any of ‘em, I guess. I didn’t see anything else, otherwise I would have told you about it.”

Larry closed the notepad and clicked the pen shut. He straightened out his tie as he pushed back from the desk.

“Gervais, I’m going to do you a favor. I’m not taking this report. No one would believe whatever it is you have to say and to be honest, I don’t want my name attached to it. Go home, sleep it off. Trust me, you’ll thank me in the morning, if you even remember any of this.”

“If I’m even here in the morning,” he muttered.

“What?”

Gervais shook his head, gaze still dropped to the floor. “Don’t matter none.”

“Come on, it’s one thing to come in here, spouting off about seeing dead bodies on a truck but now you’re saying someone is actually after you?”

“You don’t see something like that—”

“Gervais, you didn’t—”

“You don’t SEE something like that without getting yourself into some bad trouble in the long run, see? They won’t let me stick around, not after what I saw.”

“Who are you talking about?”

Gervais leaned in so close that Larry reflexively winced at the chariot of scotch fumes driven out of his mouth, with the stench of tobacco at the reins.

“Don’t matter who “they” is, you dummy. It’s all the same in the end. If I knew who they were, all I’d know is what direction to high-tail it in. As it stands, I’ll do what I can, head for home and grab whatever I need. Then I’m smackin’ pavement.”

“Gervais, don’t do anything stupid.”

“Stupid would be staying here. So unless you’re planning on arresting me.” Larry shook his head and nodded towards the door. He frowned at the sight of Gervais struggling to stand up.

“Are you hurt?”

“Naw. God dammed son of a bitching prosthetic in my knee. Titanium, my ass. Might as well be made out of paper clips.”

Larry watched him stumble out of the station, fairly sure that it was the booze making him wobble more than the prosthetic.

The rest of the night was boring, by comparison. More drunks, a few domestics, a dog attack. No trucks. No bodies. Not that he was expecting either.

It was late before he got onto the road, choosing to take the I-ten south to avoid the stoplights. For a change, there was no traffic for him to contend with as he made his way up to cruising speed. His autopilot had kicked in so strongly that he almost didn’t see the truck. He heard it before he saw it, the heavy sound of springs protesting, the flatbed jerking forward and clanking against the cab. He glanced to his left as the truck passed, rust glaring in the moonlight. Somehow, the truck was managing to accelerate past him and in a moment, he felt his jaw start to go slack and he immediately wished that he had taken the report more seriously.

The flatbed was covered in human remains.

Bones and skulls with the barest remnants of sinewy flesh clinging to what was left of the their former bodies. He had written off the whole thing as a joke, a drunken delusion and now he found himself having to focus well enough to keep his car on the road. Then, as the back end of the truck passed he saw, perched on the very top of a pile, wobbling as if it was about to fall off, what looked like a leg bone. It lay there, mocking him, polished to a near sheen, the lights from his high beams reflecting back at him off of the titanium prosthetic where the knee had once been.

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