Down the Axon Highway …
Down the Axon Highway lies a saucerful of secrets. Past the cotton fields and catfish farms, the stands of trees and blooded soils, dat Crim Lo, yo, is the terminal. There’s rarely more than one saucer or jet at a time; mostly cars, and few of them still, arcing in or out, landing or launching from what is scarcely more than a cleared out jungle field.
If you’ve been with me for a very long time—nine years or more—then you might recognize it as the place where I met Mickie’s mom. If none of that rings a bell, never mind. We’re not going there anyhow.
No, we’re rolling on past it, on to the settlement of Bouton, a ways East.
Bouton is the swollen of the three sisters, the eldest. She is bigger than Soma, but not grander. She is more recognizable, yet featureless. Her buildings are taller, her streets longer and wider, with intersections approximating urbanity. But she is little more than an inflatable bounce house to me.
Again, her streets might be familiar if you’ve long traveled by my side. But if not, it’s of no consequence, as she is but the gateway to our destination.
We reach it, our terminus, and you see nothing, nothing but trees.
“Look again,” I say.
You do, yet you still see nothing but woods.
I sigh, then walk out ahead, sweep away some low hanging branches with my arm. Smiling and in an enchanting voice, I say, “Come and see!”
You do. And lo you see a blonde woman on a pale campus: and the woman was Lori.
