A Future We'd Like To See 1.21 - Death Before Yielding
By Twoflower (Copyright 1993)

     And on the third day, Ytt'iok made the land rover.  And it
was Good.

     That's what my bumper sticker says.  Alright, so land rovers
aren't mentioned ANYWHERE in the Scrolls of Ytt'iok.  Even so,
Yttian Motors has elevated the production of rovers to a divine
level.

     Every casing is fitted perfectly.  Ritual layers of paint
are added, creating the perfect blend of colour.  The engine
rumbles and roars like the breath of a mighty beast, as the
muffler spews fourth the fumes of hell and ozone depletion.  This
was the definition of the word ROVER.

     Cost me quite a bit of money, but it was worth it; I got the
most dependable, sturdy, and above all FAST car out there.  I
performed weekly rituals to keep it clean and moving along at the
right speed.  Once a month, it was treated to an oil change and
new chunk of sucrose-like material to feed upon.

     I treated it better than I treat my own children.  All it
had to do was get me from point A to point B.

     This is no easy task on Yttia.  We've got about 500 major
cities, with vast networks of highways, superhighways,
underground tunnels, bridges, overpasses, underpasses, rotaries,
and even some self-morphing roads which add lanes to ease the
flow.  None of it works.

     If you'd like an accurate vision of the Yttian transit
system, cook up fifty four pounds of spaghetti as one incredibly
long, twisted, tangled strand, and put seventy five thousand ants
on it, each crawling over each other and pushing each other out
of the way to get nowhere quickly.  All I can do to stay sane in
this mess is to keep a well-maintained rover.

     Fortunately I work in my home city, so my commute is just
down a few normal blocks and intersections to the office. 
However, since I am a field researcher for D-FENS technologies
(some Terran pun... sure, you're reading this in flawless
english, but it's all Yttian to me) I have to travel across-
planet occasionally.

     I had my wife pack up a large lunch and a few rations, with
water supplements, to put in the back seat.  I brought a few
changes of clothing, and some money, as well as a blaster for any
would-be roverjackers.  I kissed my wife 'n kids goodbye, and
fired up the rover.

     The sun gleamed off the well-polished hood, as the airbag
below the car inflated, hover jets synchronizing.  The airbag
serves a few purposes : it keeps the gravs and jets concentrated
on the road, keeps gravel out, and ensures that if I slam into
another rover I'll merely bounce off.

     I shifted the gravs into reverse and pulled out of my
driveway, sliding along the suburban lanes.  There it was : the
huge Y-270 sign.  The gateway to hell, the point of no return. 
Hate the highway, love the car, I always say.  I slammed it into
17th gear and rocketed into the fray.

     My car bounced off of a few creeps attempting to merge into
the 25th lane, causing a spinout or two and a bumper banger
behind me.  I didn't care; I just wanted off of the highway as
soon as possible.  I gunned the engine past the 263 M'wwts an
Hour mark, the normal speed limit.  Nobody really pays attention
to the limit.  It's every Ytt for himself.

     I weaved through fourteen lanes or so, following the route
given to me by my boss for getting to G'thrsB'yg city.  Take Y-
270 to the G'hh cutoff, head down the subpass and swerve through
the undertunnel to Y-78, where you immediately cross five lanes
and head up the spiral ramp back to Y-270.  If you don't make the
five lane crossover in three seconds, you'll miss the ramp and
have to circle around through the next three crossovers until you
can try again.

     Back on Y-270 (neatly missing the ten lane bottleneck...
yeesh, only TEN lanes?  Are they insane?), I cruised along,
cutting off a few losers and maneuvering into the left three
passing lanes.

     Wouldn't you know it?  Just my luck, three hatter hap
g'llars are hogging the passing lanes!  These are a bastard breed
of driver that sputters along at 200 M'wwts an Hour to conserve
sucrose and plays Adult Contemporary at top volume with the
treble cranked up.  They usually wear large hats as well.

     I considered pulling out the blaster and deflating a few
airbags to clear the way, but they'd probably just swerve out of
control like the cheap sunday drivers they are and cause an
accident.  So, I sat, gripping the stick with light green
knuckles, waiting for these offs k'li ann tramps to get the hell
out of my way.

     Several other drivers gave up on it and decided to form a
new passing lane next to them by rear-ending anybody who didn't
want to.  There was a bit of high speed bumping, a few traffic
insults and obscene gestures were exchanged, but the traffic kept
at a sluggish 287 M'wwts an Hour.  Jeez, at this rate, it'll take
me three hours to cover the 1,400 terran-mile span!

     Luckily, the cavalry arrived, in the form of a bulky
lowrider rover.  Airbag variably inflating and deflating to make
it bounce along the road sinusoidally, it cruised a few lanes
closer, attempting to get in the passing lane.  The few lanky
youths piloting it didn't seem to enjoy the three slowpokes
either, so one of them pulled out an automatic blaster rifle and
pumped six rounds of red-hot energy into the rightmost hatter hap
g'llar.

     I cursed and swerved to my right as the car exploded and
knocked the other two hatters off track.  The middle one spun out
and flipped over, traffic flowing around the accident like a
river around a rock.  The one closest to the edge of the highway
was pushed over the railing, where it fell about a hundred feet
and exploded violently against the rocky Yttian terrain below.

     There was a number of cheers and honks from the drivers, who
quickly reassumed normal formation.  One of the kids leaned out a
window to take a bow.

     That was the mistake.

     An eighteen-grav transport rocketed by the lane on the
passenger side of the lowrider, the front cabin plastering into
the kid leaning out of the window.  The lowrider skidded
sideways, cutting off two lanes.  I yelped, slamming the BURST
button.

     As several cheaper, less option packed models slammed into
the lowrider, my rover's computer pumped about 10% of the sucrose
block into the engine at once.  The gravs spasmed, causing me to
leap twenty feet into the air over the accident, and land in the
empty space in front of it.  Then I could just cruse along,
lauging at the poor fools that didn't buy the Traffic Survival
Options Package like I did.

     Well, it SHOULD have been empty space, but someone
apparently tried to cut the land rover off.  I landed on them
instead.

     My gravs pulverized the roof of the landee, crushing the
driver.  The rover under me awkwardly curved into traffic and hit
another car, causing a chain reaction accident.  My car was
thrown about fifty feet through the air, bouncing off the road
and rebounding on the right barricade.

     I screamed, bending the stick as hard as I could to the
left.  Wait!  What was that about turning into the direction of a
skid?  Oh shiiiiii...

     My rover spun out of control, as various drivers attempted
to avoid it.  One slammed into my back side, as my torso was
thrown forward.  Yup, should have worn my seat belt today.

     After a nice trip through the windshield, I slammed into the
pavement face first with several painful lacerations.  My left
eye had redded out completely, and my face was all hot and runny. 
I stumbled about, as drivers shouted insults at me and dodged the
flaming wreckage of my car.

     I was a pedestrian in the middle of a thirty four lane
superhighway.  My survival chances were slim to none.

     I ran, screaming, for the right barricade, trying to time my
steps with the cars grinding down the road at me.  I leaped over
the barricade to safety before realizing I was one hundred feet
up.

     The ground rushed up to meet me, or I fell down to meet it,
the syntax doesn't matter.  Either way, I had about two seconds
to reflect on life as I knew it before impact.

     Impact.  Ow.  I can't feel my left leg, and my chest is
spurting some horrible purple liquid.  I tried to crawl away, to
move at all, but my remaining leg was going numb.

     Alright, maybe it wasn't that bad.  Sure, I had lost a leg,
was probably losing motor control and had an eye poked out, but
medicine these days can patch you up quite well, even if you lost
all your limbs and your head.  There was an emergency phone box
on that highway support there, I just had to crawl there, scream
for an ambulance, and I'd pull through.

     There was a bit of honking and cursing far above me, and a
large flaming object was pushed over the railway.  I recognized
it as the wreckage of my car before it crushed me and burned me
alive.

     I've got to admit, even on fire, the paint job looks pretty
good.