Fast forward a few hours, which is an ironic term to use because where we ended up is in pit of solitary mountain where apparently concepts of time have gotten blurred, or connect as universal infrastructure I’m too simple of an organic creature to comprehend. We always quantify our lives in time, celebrating the annual marking of our birth, even though calendars remain arbitrary to a large extent. We recognize our limited time existing, and lament wasted years as we grow older and slower and achier and less likely to be full of fool blood ready to stab the earth with virility.
But Rey-Rey and me was in the middle of these tunnels. “This is where I came from,” Rey-Rey said, pointing down one tunnel which he claimed led back to his real world. “But up this one that’s over here down this tunnel about fifty yards or so, to the right is the tunnel that goes to my future me which actually is your future you too. So if we got the same future us, we must be the same, kind of.”
I don’t know, I’m far too proud of my individuality, as any righteous capitalized American should be, to easily accept that some other dude, albeit a pretty chill guy like Rey-Rey, is equal to me, not just like in equality scale but literally we’re equal, the same shit, just splintered off somehow in some space-time bullshit I don’t understand. I wasn’t high like Rey-Rey, so I was on that scientific tip, being belligerent and wanting some logical explanation for all this.
“I don’t know, Raven. We can’t explain everything in this world, ya know? I mean, I kind of freaked out too at first, but you know how when we was kids they did those time capsule things to bury and somebody else digs out in twenty years?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, maybe all that time just gets mixed together and that was like ants carrying sugar into a hole.” Rey-Rey, when he was really high, like he was, didn’t make the best sense, but in sunlight (or orb light) I could at least gauge his facial expressions to see what he was trying to say as he said it. He also could use my own facial reactions to reel himself back towards shared reality and not get too over-indulged in individual realities. But we were in a dark tunnel only lit close to our bodies by the dollar store glow sticks we used as light torches. Rey-Rey glowed a dull bright green in the tunnels while I was lit by purple (because purple forever).
“What the fuck does a time capsule got to do with these tunnels?” I stammered at Rey-Rey, louder than we’d been up to this point. A loud rustling happened up ahead down the tunnel in the direction of the future us turn Rey-Rey was taking us. Not really a dangerous rustle but a mass of movement, and we heard some hushed talking, deep voices but trying to be quiet.
Rey-Rey, high as fuck but clutch, took the lead. “Who’s up there?” he yelled. No answer but some shuffling. The sounds didn’t get closer though, so we stood our ground. “Who’s there, damn it?” Rey-Rey again asked.
“Railroad time? That you, railroad time?” a thick country voice hollered. Me and Rey-Rey looked at each other, no clue what that meant.
“Who are you?” Rey-Rey shouted down the dark sideways hole into parts unknown, realms unbelieved by me to exist yet, but there we were, at the door of some shit.
“Where’s railroad time?” the voice hollered. “You ain’t railroad time. Where he at?”
I looked at Rey-Rey’s face glowing green in the dark. There was no way to stifle our glow sticks unless we tossed them away, which neither of us seemed to eager to jump into doing, so we just stood there looking at each stupidly in shared green and purple chemical luminescence.
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