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Everyday I woke up, made myself some coffee, and sat down inside a machine shaped like a little car. This little car was not meant for driving. Not outside anyway. It drove through the highways of the minds of millions of people using my company’s website.

Someone in our company discovered that visualizing data in the form of a digital landscape enabled our analysts to notice anomalies much quicker. Generic data is visualized as everyday objects which might occur on the side of a road: brush, trees, stones. Useful anomalies in the data might standout in different ways, depending on whether they’re positive or negative for our company’s KPIs. Negative data may be shown as roadkill for example, and positive data as a beautiful statue.

I’d become a data driver after years of working in accounts, monitoring our AI balance keepers. There were only three of us and they’ve since decided to use just one for this task, which oversees thousands of accounts. Thankfully, they’d switched me to a new department rather than letting me go outright.

I enjoyed the work. It was designed for us to enjoy the work. It’s a necessary but mind numbing task otherwise. The burn and churn rate was very high for this department before our in-house geniuses came up with this visualized approach.

Making the seat of the machine look like a little car was just a bit of cheeky fun. The only reason the design team even bothered was due to reports coming out indicating workers were less likely to unionize, or stage the sort of violent insurrections that had been happening more frequently over the past few years, when they were “immersed in play” during working hours. It’s the same for the masses of unemployed individuals. The more “immersed in play” companies like ours can make them, the less likely they are to become violent too.

A small fan in the “dashboard” simulated the feeling of wind in my face as I drove. It did it poorly, but it was still a nice effect. I craned my head left and right, not worried I’d miss anything, as the program is designed to repeat data sets once or twice, and my eye movements were traced to ensure I’d taken in all the necessary data as it goes by. If I’d missed anything, the program would make sure I caught it the next time.

Then one typical Wednesday afternoon, I saw something in the program that I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t a statue. It was alive. And it wasn’t a creature that sat right in that particular northeast woodland environment, or any other for that matter. It wasn’t a deer or fox, nor was it even something more exotic like a bear or moose. It was something I couldn’t place at all. Of course, I paused the program to inspect it, as I’m instructed to do for glaring anomalies. Otherwise, we just save it to examine after our “trips” are completed. 

The usual 8k rendering did not bring this creature into clear view. It seemed to be bipedal with a furry tuft running down its neck and back, somewhat resembling a mullet. The limbs were long but bent rather severely at the elbow. On closer inspection, I realized that I’d been mistaken on the number of limbs. It had one arm and one leg. I’d just assumed it had two and was being viewed from the side. It also appeared to have a single eye. It was slightly taller than an average person, and held some kind of stick that in the blurry rendering resembled a bouquet, but may have been ropes or something tied to the top of the club.

I should say I’ve seen odd creatures in the program before. It’s designed to make the data anomalies standout as much as possible, but usually it would confine itself to more recognizable strangeness. I once saw a dragon, for example. Other times, a unicorn. The oddest thing I ever saw was a large octopus, sort of floating at the side of a mountain road. It became a running joke in the office, a stand-in for anyone acting awkwardly. “Oh, he’s being such an octopus right now,” etc.

This was something else. My initial thought was that the program was trying to inform me of an error, or at least the early signs of one, so I immediately alerted the other program, monitored by one person, in charge of making system repairs. I received a message that no significant errors were detected. I contacted my coworker in that department directly, sending over the image of what I saw, but they said it wasn’t anything to worry about just yet.

The thing kept coming up, and what’s worse, it seemed to edge closer to the road, emerging from dark corridors between stones and trees. Usually, the program would put all relevant data right out in the open, in fields and deserts, to make it easier to take in more as quickly as possible. This one bit of data was almost intentionally obscured. Yet, it was so odd looking, I never missed it.

This mad hopping thing, a half-a-human, holding something resembling Medusa’s head on the end of a thick branch. I couldn’t miss it. But I ignored it, because I was instructed to ignore it. The program is close to perfect but not actually so, I was told. It will figure out and correct its own problem, they said. To be fair, it almost always did. Yet this seemed to be one it couldn’t, or wouldn’t, figure out.

Something about the presence of this creature made my day heavier. The veneer of a relaxed drive through the country was instantly shattered every time it hopped into view. Yes, hopped, on its one leg, like a pogo stick. The combination of something truly menacing about it with the comic elements of its appearance made me dislike it intensely. And this anger towards it, which I couldn’t make sense of — nor could our in-house chatbot psychologist — grew over the following weeks. It culminated with an incident which nearly lost me my job right then and there.

I was driving along my favorite New England road, praying I didn’t see the thing. Most of the day had gone by uneventfully, and I was finally slipping back in to my usual flow, when the blurry thing came hopping into view. Without thinking, I turned the wheel toward it. Mind you, the wheel was mostly for show, giving us minimal ability to actually steer it, only just enough to prop up the illusion of cruising along, or more accurately, the illusion of control. But I cranked the wheel as far as it would go towards the thing. Yes, I intended to hit it.

The program shut down just before I reached it. As I neared it, I could see a bit more details on its odd frame. Feathers and fur on its back. A gnarled and strange hand protruding from the center of its chest. And at the end of the chains on its club, something that appeared to be apples swung the dozen or so links.

My supervisor came by to ask me what was up. It was something that almost never happened. An in-person visit only ever occurred when a series of AI-HR programs couldn’t solve an issue, or at least create a convincing report that they did, as was so often the case. I told them that I didn’t realize I’d done it, that I must’ve slipped or leaned in an odd way. They said they knew I’d done it on purpose, due to the readings on both my body and mind at the time. 

It’s funny. People still lie, even in this world in which technology has all but eliminated the possibility of disguising true intention. While there remain hidden recesses of the psyche, certainly, anything which really occurred in the real world can now be understood by anyone monitoring it with absolute precision. This precision is known by all, and accepted, and yet, we still lie, in large and small ways. It’s almost like how, many years ago, someone might state a fact they knew to be embellished and just hope no one bothered to search for the correct one. Today, it’s somewhat similar, though data pours in so quickly and effortlessly that laziness hardly ever provides adequate cover for an untruth. And yet, as I said, everyone still lies, maybe more than ever. To me, it seems that lies might’ve always been confessions in shabby disguises. Ridiculous ones, like slapping on a fake mustache and saying you’re someone else. It’s the sort of disguise that makes it easier to recognize the truth beneath it.

I was given a mark for incompetence that would forever be on my employment record. It’s alright. They only affect your ability to find employment when you amass a significant number of them, unless you’re applying for the top companies in the world, which I didn’t have the CV for anyway. I was also ordered to see a human counselor, which seemed like a worse punishment. Not because seeing one is so awful, I actually found it to be quite nice, but because it’s often reserved for only the gravest offenses. To me, this meant I was earmarked as a potential liability down the road. A threat. And even the whiff of becoming a threat these days was enough to get you sent off.

I talked to the counselor, explained the whole thing. They seemed empathetic enough, and I did feel better being heard out. They said it made sense I’d be so affected by the situation, considering no one was really acknowledging how much it was bothering me. They said, the real issue here is not feeling understood. And I said, yes, maybe, although the thing itself bothers me as well. They just nodded. I was given the mark of rehabilitation and sent back to work the next day.

I tried my best to ignore it, but the thing kept drawing my attention so severely I couldn’t concentrate. Further, it appeared over and over again. The tech department assured me this was not a big deal, even though it never occurred before. I tried to tell myself, you’re only angry because they’re not sympathizing with you, or empathizing, I don’t know the difference, but it’s not because of the monster at the side of the road.

Then, one day, it beckoned me to follow it. I could just tell that’s what it was doing. It did it with its club, the universal gesture of follow, that rolling movement toward the other then curving up toward oneself. It did it slow and gentle, like an old friend. I really did feel then that it was trying to help me. It was trying to get me off the route I was in, which was secretly wearing me down. And I thought in that moment that I recognized its face. A hazy, imprecise recognition. But its face, to me anyway, seemed to resemble a few people, as in a dream. All of them were former coworkers of mine. Ones with whom I’d been friendly, or as friendly as one can be over video calls and virtual meet-ups. It curled and the apples on its chain rattled like wind chimes. Follow me, it seemed to say. Follow us.

I didn’t. Not right away. I kept going and driving down the same roads. The creature kept appearing and beckoning, never in any way other than it did that first day. It was as if it was confident I would give in eventually, that whatever defenses I had up to prevent me from deviating from my duties as an employee for this company, whose name I’ve long since forgotten along with the names of everyone who worked there, would wear down if only it persisted in its invitation.

It was right.

I turned the wheel one day and followed it between the trees. I did not know it was possible to go there. It only occurred to me then that the presence of dense forest had only appeared along with the creature itself. Prior to that, anything resembling darkness would be far off in the simulated distance, practically a painted backdrop. With the creature came the forest, right up to the edge of the road, and through the forest, another road, or something that existed before roads, something more ancient and free. A path forged by the few who walked it. Not enough for a tourist to recognize as they’re ushered between their hotel and designated camping sites. One which you must be alerted to by a local, native to the area.

This creature led me deeper into the forest and it became darker and darker until the program itself was gone. And although I knew there was no coming back from where I was going, and although it seemed I was entirely alone, I felt the presence of more and more others with whom I had some unnamable kinship. I was mistaken that the path had only been worn by the few. It was only meant to look this way, and how something presents is almost never what it really is. Things and landscapes lie too, just like people, no matter how much technology attempts to capture and analyze every bit of it.

The path led me out of the program and out of the world in which the program existed. Over time, I shed was not necessary. An arm. A leg. An eye. From my back grew tufts of hair and feathers. In my gnarled hand was placed a club covered in chains. Without an orientation, I had received a new job. I knew just what to do.

I hopped back through the forest and watched each day as the drivers on that road came back into view, closer and closer each time the sun of my world set and rose again. Then, one day, I was there, just at the side of the road, and I’d brought the forest with me too, which protected me and kept me safe and hidden. 

Then, when I felt strong enough, I hopped closer to the road. A driver caught just a passing glimpse of me. Then another, and another, and another. Drivers from all over, and all companies. And the next day, they’d spot me again, this time doing a double take. And the next, they’d really set their eyes on me, but they wouldn’t see more than a blur. The blur would become clearer, but not enough to understand, not until they were ready. 

When they were, I’d make the slow curling gesture. I’d beckon them to follow. Some would, some would not. The ones who would, I’d lead back down that path, through the darkness, out and away from the false sunlit roads of their current lives, lives which create lies, and lies which beckon me to find them.