An Original Steemit Story

Chapter 3

Help On The Way

Joshua took a lone seat in the middle of the bus. After he had come across that seemingly innocuous data dump, he reached out to some of his hacker "friends," that he knew from various Deep Web forums, letting it be known that he needed a place to lay low for awhile. That was 3 days ago. Or was it 3 minutes? The muddled perception of time cast shadows of doubt in his mind. Could he ever be certain of anything?

One thing was certain. Joshua had been in contact with somebody who said they would help. He just had to find that person. It may have even been more than one individual or a group speaking with one voice. Who knows? Joshua certainly didn't.

For whatever reason, he thought he had been told to come here, on a certain date, at a particular time, to meet somebody who would help.

But he was the only person on the bus. Save the driver.

The driver looked at him in the mirror.

"This is your stop," she said. "Best watch your six and make sure you weren't followed. Help is coming." She nodded towards the horizon where a single vehicle was approaching.

Startled, Joshua grabbed his pack and glided onto the road. The bus whirled and swung out of view leaving dust in its wake.

Joshua looked around the stop. It was a small, dusty town, that resembled a Western Frontier town, with a solo bus stop in the middle of it. Two-story buildings of a bank, a general store, the jail, and the post office lined one side of the street. The other side loomed with saloons. But the town was deathly quiet.

Joshua had no plans to sit around and wait. At the least, he should hide from the supposed help. Probably safer. He could see them in the distance. How much help, if any, can he get from some random stranger on the internet?

To be continued ...