The flight was bumpy largely because it never left the ground. Something went wrong but apparently the pilot decided to just go for it. Now they were barreling down Interstate 3 at around a hundred kilometers per hour. Stanley, who had booked the flight to save time, was amazed and annoyed. He gazed out his first-class window at the scenery rolling by.
"I'm not saving any time at all this way" he muttered to himself.
"Huh?" said the man sitting next to him in the aisle seat, looking up from his magazine. "Do you mean this route? I couldn't agree more. Any nitwit can see that Interstate 9 woulda been a lot quicker."
"No," Stanley replied, "I mean not flying! Being on the Interstate at all!" He was angry about it.
"Oh. That. Well, I guess you don't travel much. There're very few actual flights these days due to the wing loss."
"Wing loss?"
"Yeah, you remember when we went under that overpass? Right after we got on the freeway?" Stanley nodded mutely. "And that big sound, like a wreck or something?" Stanley remembered that alright. He'd thought that the take-off had failed and they were crashing into the end of the runway. He'd been terrified but the plane just kept on rolling calmly along so he'd settled back wondering what the hell, you know? Now, realizing that the plane was taking the highway instead of flying, he was getting angry.
"Well that big sound," the man continued, "was the wings getting torn off by the big pillars on the sides while the plane's top scraped the bottom of the overpass. Saves the pilots from ever having to actually fly. Very few planes left that can actually fly anymore."
"What? Why would they do that?"
"Fear. Surely, you've felt the fear that has overtaken us?"
He had. It was why he was flying, well, motoring home. He'd had such a sense of dread and fear that he canceled his business trip and immediately booked the flight home. He nodded slowly.
"Well, the government is shooting down UFOs, which is anything that flies that they aren't 100% sure about. They're scared too, just like we all are." He leaned back and smiled. "For me the planes are way more comfortable than the buses."
Stanley, somewhat mollified, wondered what was causing the fear. He hadn't realized that it was so all pervasive, that everyone felt it, and he began wondering why. What was going on?
Politics came to mind. A big election was coming up and there was one guy said he could fix things, that he and only he could do what needed doing so that the fear would go away. With his constant anxiety Stanley couldn't decide, couldn't even think. Things were wrong, felt wrong anyway, and this guy said it'll just get worse if he's not in charge. So if he can make the fear go away, well that sure sounded good.
Yet somehow, things did not quite make sense and he found himself thinking what if it was actually the election itself that was generating these waves of fear and anxiety? Then he'd lose the thought. He mentally shrugged, and, with a determined look, he settled back for the ride. He didn't know much about politics but he now knew something he could do, an easy thing, to help stop the fear and knowing that was quite comforting.