SPRING 2026, SHORT STORY, 2000 WORDS
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SUPER:
A student asked the old teacher, “What is the first question of anthropereunics?”
The teacher poured cheap beer until the glass overflowed.
“This,” he said, “is what most bring to the study of mankind.”
“But what is the question?”
The teacher smiled. “Who pours your Pabst?”
EXT. MORAINE, NEW JERSEY – AFTERNOON
The golden hour, raking light. A small local pub, Bar Tap, set in a copse of pine trees. Occasional army surplus vehicles, black-tinted windows, pass. Surrounding pavement of asphalt is potholed and parking lot sparsely populated.
PABST and LUCKY STRIKE neon outshine the window glare that shields them.
There is a rusted found-objects sculpture of a rooster obscured by overgrown briars. It tilts suddenly and unexpectedly. It drops a coin from its plier-salvaged beak. A faint harmonic hum comes in on a breeze.
CUT TO:
EXT. MOJAVE DESERT – NIGHT
Fade in to slowly brighten and reveal an enormous desert vista; illumination eventually reveals a perfectly formed rectangle.
Gliding forward, it manifests as a huge factory, one without windows or doors. It has no identifying signage. It shimmers like a mirage? The POV drifts closer and closer to the building….
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. THE SHUNPIKE – FORESTED ROAD – AFTERNOON
Breathing deeply, POV CEE-CEE (tall, prematurely gray, barn coat), stepping aside as an oversized vehicle passes. While waiting, POV is attentive to invasive lanternflies on scarred-up tree trunk, the insects leaving a black tar discoloration leading to the ground. The lanternflies are quite beautiful and emit an electronic sound. Cee-Cee resumes confidently navigating the soft low shoulder of the littered road.
CUT TO:
Very dark gray type on dark screen, evocative of the old white-on-white invisible text, shows a stream of code moving upward and off the screen toward an aftermarket-sort of blinding light. As we follow the words skyward out of darkness, a pattern emerges. The word KANASHIRA synchs momentarily like a jackpot and then cycles out, resuming its upward path to exit via the factory roof portal and vanish heavenward.
CUT TO:
INT. BAR TAP – TWILIGHT
The bar is dim and quiet, the surrounding pines and briars screening most windows. Cee-Cee has a seat at the counter. The jukebox hums with static. There are maybe five other customers spread out along the sides of this full rectangular bar. None of them blink, ever. There is an empty fish tank in the middle that is filled halfway with car keys on keychains and folded paper notes. We see Cee-Cee’s handheld device as she queues up the song: “Troubled Hearts” by The Poor Clares. There is some sort of station announcement before the song begins. The song is ethereal.
…
Like heat shimmer, SIS matter-streams onto the stool beside Cee-Cee. Sis’s form is a pulsing geometry: brassy, shining, tessellated, and tacky — then incarnates a hint of her form: five-foot-six, tracksuit, sunglasses, freckles.
CEE-CEE
Heyo, Sis.
SIS’s cube-suit sizzles one last time, clicks into place. A subtle chrome shimmer fades, bippity-bap, as Sis resumes her living form. A fly buzzes and then vanishes. The sisters don’t look alike, but sound exactly the same.
CUT TO:
EXT. MOJAVE DESERT – DAY
Gliding, subjective POV. We intuit the rectangle is a factory, and there are docking ports on its flat roof that open. We cannot see anything but blackness through that portal. A piano chord, high-key and too loud, absolutely uncalled for, is held for too long. The POV drops through the portal, but can only hear the equivalent of chittering mice and electrical pulsations.
CEE-CEE (V.O.)
It’s always chaotic at first, like she’s building herself
from a cathedral of reflections. Or a Lego set designed
by ghosts. She makes as much sense as any knock-off.
Truth is, she’s what I expect: some AI science fiction
nightmare, cobbled from Edgar Cayce’s Christian
diaries and a copy of Bester’s The Stars My Destination…
DISSOLVE TO:
BEGIN MONTAGE:
Each a flash that brightens unexpectedly and limns-out, like Dean Stockwell’s eyes in Blue Velvet:
— A circus performer in a mirrored suit taps out a song
on himself with two soft hammers, like he’s playing a
xylophone. It might be something familiar.
— A peeling sticker of a sun-faded logo: TagTunes.
— An old cracked photo of two little girls and a boy
playing on a tire swing. The boy is grinning and holding
a stick on his head like it’s an antenna. One girl is in the
tire hole, the other sits on top.
— The Mojave. Solar panels. A glowing roof, like the
9/11 anniversary beams of light shooting from some
unseen aperture.
— A corner jukebox, in the shadows, neon-lit, chrome
edges. It brightens unexpectedly and activates note
sounds, disconnected from any command.
END MONTAGE
CEE-CEE (V.O. continues)
And now it’s just… here.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. BAR TAP – TWILIGHT
With what sounds like the slamming of a metal gate, or a school locker, or a distant handgun shot, Sis is fully alive and adjacent to CEE-CEE.
She rolls her neck, flicks her sleeves.
SIS
You frigging TagTunesed me again.
Her eyes are slitty.
SIS (Cont.)
Why you do?
CEE-CEE
To see you, dickweed.
SIS
(Laughing)
Yeah, okay.
She flexes her hands like she’s needing to activate her fingers or somehow fill them. A plate-sized pretzel arrives. Two PBRs.
SIS
I like where I am now, you know. It’s nice.
CEE-CEE
I don’t want to cry about it, so don’t guilt me.
SIS
Maybe you should cry.
CEE-CEE
I think about it.
SIS
Well, while I’m here are you gonna cry, or try it again?
CEE-CEE
I’m eating.
SIS
Eyes wide, sharp, then slit.
You always think about it. …
CEE-CEE
I think about this app and how it’s kind of like nobody
knows what monkey took the photo that won Best
Photo of the Year.
SIS
Well, you’re a believer. …
You know, where I’m at I have access to answers. Or I’ve
forgotten how to lie. No matter. The long saga of my American
road trip finally makes sense. You’ll see. I can let you know…
Let’s just say: me being here at all is a case of AI training being
too self-supervised.
FADE TO:
EXT. MOJAVE DESERT – DAY
We hear more mechanical sounds. Automotive compression hoses, die-stampers. POV tunnels under a corner of the factory building, where a host of small animals have sought shade from the laser-light of the desert sun. We move through different chambers of a mouse nest complex, where differing seeds in varying stages of sprouting have been sorted. One mouse stares at the camera, its black eyes carry a reflection of the Bar Tap neon signs.
SIS (V.O.)
People never figured out these machines. …
Retro reincarnation genies, they called them. Bar Tap got
one. Nobody ordered it. Nobody paid for it. Nobody asked.
But it works… Sometimes. …
A mouse labors to shove a folded piece of paper into a crack by the jukebox. Music is playing all the while.
RETURN TO:
INT. BAR TAP – BEHIND CEE-CEE AND SIS – TWILIGHT
SIS
This world couldn’t monetize it, so it stayed wild.
Camera glides in over the shoulder of Cee-Cee, device in hand.
Cee-Cee opens the TagTunes app. Two cowboy songs are shown in queue. Across the circular bar, BETA RICH smirks as “Fresno Halftrack” begins — twangy, carnal.
The song seems to play backwards for a brief moment, then resumes its forward cadence.
We see a close-up of a framed photograph. It is a French bulldog with pince-nez glasses, smoking a cigar and looking surly.
CEE-CEE
(Nudging Sis)
He’s gumming up the jukebox again. Beta Rich.
SIS
Well, looks like you lost your chance to wedge out the
cowbillies. Way to go.
CUT IN:
Wind moves through silvery aspen leaves. Leaves shimmer. A hint of Sis’s death: Big tree. Crushed sternum. ICU. Gone.
…
CEE-CEE
Yeah. I thought it would be quiet here today, and here comes
Beta Rich.
SIS
He’s a lonely old guy.
CEE-CEE
(Sips distractedly)
Betas haven’t cornered that market.
They glance around. Regulars scowl. One pokes at a wedge salad.
SIS
Well, act fast. Maybe today’s the day for a sibling chat.
CEE-CEE
Did I tell you I’m trying to code in and give TagTunes a
nuclear option.
SIS
(Laughing)
The Beta Blocker?
CEE-CEE
I was thinking more like Mugshot. A countermand.
A cancel order. When clowns are drunk and money
has wings…
SIS
Let it go. It’s outlawed. It’s not allowed to make coin.
Why waste time thinking about that?
CEE-CEE
Have I said this is my favorite food?
Knocks salt off a rip of pretzel. Chews and contemplates.
SIS
…I do miss food. Just a little.
CUT IN:
INT. BAR TAP – CONTINUOUS
A long sunbeam stretches across the bar floor, creeping. It illuminates corners of some the paper notes in the fish tank. They are earnest and humble supplications from people who ran out of ideas.
The sunlight shafts through the room. It passes through Sis’s torso.
CEE-CEE
We should move. Sun’s gonna be coming in strong
for the next twenty minutes.
CUT IN:
A bird flits past the dusty front window, silhouetted against the fading light.
Three barstools are open near the entryway. Human forms are populating the space in little galaxies of gatherings. The bar is filling unreasonably fast.
CEE-CEE
Gonna cost a bunch of credits, but I’m game. What should
we try this time?
I mean, we’ve exhausted the entire Yacht Rock catalog. No luck.
SIS
Try that one he liked by The Voxxline.
CEE-CEE
Why not.
Cee-Cee handles her device interface, selects a song, and is surprised when TagTunes rejects it and instead cues up something called “Tender on Track 8.”
The country Western vibe fades out as the music changes. A station announcement is made. Is it a station ID or a train conductor? Could be either. Steam hiss. The Voxxline begins, sotto voce:
THE VOXXLINE SINGER (V.O.)
I lay all day in quiet solivion,
smoothing bandaged edges.
My house has too many rooms, too many rooms.
My goodbye refuses to go.
This goodbye has me beat.
I am so sad, so sad, my dreams shan’t bear it.
Kanashira, kanashira, misery…
Cee-Cee closes her eyes.
SIS
(Eyes closed, shrugs)
He’s happening at a different speed.
CUT IN:
A grand piano lid silently opens. a thrumming softly hammers from its wires. The Voxxline singer fades to unintelligible.
CUT TO:
EXT. MOJAVE DESERT – NIGHT
Gliding we see the factory, and as we glide above, black on black, we hear the soft sound of the docking portal closing. We cannot see anything. The Voxxline song continues, incorporating the soft hammered chords of the piano.
CUT TO:
INT. BAR TAP – COUNTER – NIGHT
The barkeep is mopping the counter. The place is all but empty. Cee-Cee shakes out her bag and an elephant-shaped keychain falls out. That cracked photo falls out. A full pill bottle rattles. She empties her pocket and throws her key into the tank. It lands next to two identical key chains. A tip-bell rings. She is alone.
CUT TO:
EXT. FACING BAR TAP FROM THE SHUNPIKE – NIGHT
Reversing and gliding back from the building, we see the neon click off, hear a xylophone fade into the increasing sound of insects chattering with each other at night. Cee-Cee leaves to begin her walk away from Bar Tap. We hear breath and wind. As we glide over the broken white lines of the roadway, gaining speed, we take off into the heavens. Above, in dark gray on black, we see the lyrics of The Voxxline song being sung, and hear the soft sound of the docking portal closing. The Voxxline song continues, plaintive and grieving.
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. INSIDE THE CRACKED PHOTO OF THREE AT THE TIRE SWING – DAY
The boy lowers the antenna stick. He smiles. His eyes are pitch black portals. He is missing two teeth.
THE VOXXLINE (V-O, sotto voce)
I don’t need you perfect, I don’t mind the clouds,
I want to be sat with you quietly now.
I’ll dare you that high bridge, I’ll pay your high fine,
And lift you from sleepers that smell of old pine.
I’ll wait by the tire swing, the ball field, the gate
And we’ll press all our pennies on lonesome Track 8.
FADE TO BLACK
THE END
A. E. Weisgerber wrote this story in memory of both her brother and the filmmaker David Lynch. She is a Frost Place Scholar, Reynolds Fellow, and her prose, poetry, and essays appear in From Fibs to Fractals: Exploring Mathematical Forms in Poetry, 3:AM Magazine, DIAGRAM, The Zoetrope Cafe Story Machine, Neutral Spaces, The Alaska Star, and Structo. She reads for Wigleaf. Follow @aeweisgerber or see anneweisgerber.com.