Jack McTaggart was a conscientious man-- Ask anyone at the depot ! Quiet, careful, with the handy knack of being else-where when a wheel came off, the black ice bit or freezing fog descended... Tack... Ta-Tack... Tack. Tack. Tack. Something was loose. Or was it a misfire ? Jack had driven the '3AM Perishables' for two years straight, knew every sound a laden reefer rig could make on the M8 route. This was different. It bugged him. Tack... Tack... Tack... Tack... Enough ! Jack thumbed the hands-free, waited for the speed dial. "Mac ? Jack. Just North of Abington Services. Something's flapping. I want to check it out--" Tack... Tack... Tack... "Hear that ? Yeah... Road's quiet as a grave, visibility is forever, won't take long. Right, there's the cell mast. Okay, I'm off the slope, easing down. Sure, I'll leave the mike open. Twenty, ten, five. Stop and hold. GPS ping. Grab the torch... "Cab's okay. Nothing snagged on the steering. No flats, nothing dangling from truck or trailer. Tow-bar's sound. Truck's offside latches and tags secure. Working my way around... "Hey, those Northern lights are really something ! I'd swear they're humming-- What--" "The other caller has cleared. The other caller has cleared. The--" "Jack ? Jack ? Oh... Bill, we've lost Jack. Red Phone. 999. Yes, officer, we think we've lost a driver. He was stopped, checking his load, surprised by something, then cut off. By the cell-mast at Abington. That mast's off-air ? That's strange; Ah, you've a car on the way: Thank you." --- Twenty years has seen a generation grow up with The Change and its consequences. The Abington gap was by-passed, of course, but cameras and sensors still watch, watch and hope... Worldwide, perhaps a billion people were lost to The Change and its aftermath. Yet, of all those, the logging tape with Jack McTaggart's last known words is still among the most poignant in The Change Archive. That tape, plus the six inches of his cab's corner with half a fog-lamp tell the whole story. Had he stopped even a few seconds later, a dozen yards later, Jack McTaggart would have been on our side, for better or worse...
