Episode Details
Back to Episodes
A Speedometer Outside Of Windshaw
Published 3 years, 5 months ago
Description
Recorded for 1-1-23A Speedometer Outside Of Windshaw
by PepperSalt89
Everyone knows what a speed camera is. Roadside cameras that track your car's speed. You've probably seen the ones with LED matrix displays; they form a happy face if you're going below the speed limit, and a sad or angry face if you go above. They're very common in my part of the world, anyway. Now I feel abject terror whenever I pass one on the road, stiffen up as its LED display blinks to life. It sounds ridiculous, but if you had seen the same thing that I've seen, you'd understand.
Just outside of Windshaw (a village I used to live in), a new speed camera had just been put in. Several speed cameras, in fact, were being erected around the village, after a child was hit by a speeding car the previous year. I had passed by them hundreds, maybe thousands of times, when the incident occurred. It was a late night, and I was driving home. I was going a little over the speed limit. I passed the speed camera. I was aware that I was going a bit fast, but I didn't care. The red angry face that would appear on the LED matrix was nothing more than a slap on the wrist. I'd decrease my foot's pressure on the accelerator, and that would be it. But instead, something worse happened. The LED display began showing images. Images of corpses. Children's corpses. It all happened so fast. It was a blur of legs and arms and spines and limbs bent in directions that made me physically sick, streaks of red and the discolored blues and greens and pinks of kid's clothes, chunks of suffering smeared across a background of tarmac. I was so distracted and horrified that I swerved off the road, hitting the speed camera.
I had never spent a night in a jail cell before, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The police were ready to let me off with a warning for reckless driving, but after I had explained the whole story, they seemed to get even more tetchy. They were convinced that such a speed camera did not exist, and I wanted to believe them. They tried to convince me that I had imagined it in a tired stupor, and some suggested that I had been taking drugs. I was ready to leave the police station and (hopefully) never look back, but one officer took an interest in my story. His name was Detective Shall, and he invited me to discuss the incident later that afternoon. Well, the afternoon came, and I returned to the Detective's office. I found him to be a fairly likable man, though he had a habit of interrupting me. We came to the conclusion that the speed camera that we dubbed the 'murder camera' did exist, and was some sort of macabre PSA. The government's never shied away from using shocking or grisly imagery as a way to scare us straight. Shall suggested that the corpses were victims of vehicular manslaughter, like a way of saying 'this is what happens when you go over the speed limit'. We joked that the murder camera would take your eyes away from the road, making it even more likely to crash. Shall told me that the village council were in charge of implementing and managing the speed cameras, even if they were surveyed by the Windshaw police. He suggested we went to the camera, to look for evidence. Why not.
The road was closed, but Shall's police pass gave him access. The speed camera lay on the side of the road like a wounded animal, surrounded by construction workers and council members in blinding hi-vis jackets. Me and Shall watched them for a while, before the apparent foreman noticed us and came to have a word. He was a snide, slightly overweight, red-faced man, closer to sixty than fifty. Shall was out of uniform, and the foreman must have thought we were trying to vandalize the construction site or some other lofty claim. He seemed somewhat deflated when he found out that Shall was a police officer, and I immediately got the sense that he took great joy in calling the police on people. Shall asked him if the speed camera's LED could be test
by PepperSalt89
Everyone knows what a speed camera is. Roadside cameras that track your car's speed. You've probably seen the ones with LED matrix displays; they form a happy face if you're going below the speed limit, and a sad or angry face if you go above. They're very common in my part of the world, anyway. Now I feel abject terror whenever I pass one on the road, stiffen up as its LED display blinks to life. It sounds ridiculous, but if you had seen the same thing that I've seen, you'd understand.
Just outside of Windshaw (a village I used to live in), a new speed camera had just been put in. Several speed cameras, in fact, were being erected around the village, after a child was hit by a speeding car the previous year. I had passed by them hundreds, maybe thousands of times, when the incident occurred. It was a late night, and I was driving home. I was going a little over the speed limit. I passed the speed camera. I was aware that I was going a bit fast, but I didn't care. The red angry face that would appear on the LED matrix was nothing more than a slap on the wrist. I'd decrease my foot's pressure on the accelerator, and that would be it. But instead, something worse happened. The LED display began showing images. Images of corpses. Children's corpses. It all happened so fast. It was a blur of legs and arms and spines and limbs bent in directions that made me physically sick, streaks of red and the discolored blues and greens and pinks of kid's clothes, chunks of suffering smeared across a background of tarmac. I was so distracted and horrified that I swerved off the road, hitting the speed camera.
I had never spent a night in a jail cell before, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The police were ready to let me off with a warning for reckless driving, but after I had explained the whole story, they seemed to get even more tetchy. They were convinced that such a speed camera did not exist, and I wanted to believe them. They tried to convince me that I had imagined it in a tired stupor, and some suggested that I had been taking drugs. I was ready to leave the police station and (hopefully) never look back, but one officer took an interest in my story. His name was Detective Shall, and he invited me to discuss the incident later that afternoon. Well, the afternoon came, and I returned to the Detective's office. I found him to be a fairly likable man, though he had a habit of interrupting me. We came to the conclusion that the speed camera that we dubbed the 'murder camera' did exist, and was some sort of macabre PSA. The government's never shied away from using shocking or grisly imagery as a way to scare us straight. Shall suggested that the corpses were victims of vehicular manslaughter, like a way of saying 'this is what happens when you go over the speed limit'. We joked that the murder camera would take your eyes away from the road, making it even more likely to crash. Shall told me that the village council were in charge of implementing and managing the speed cameras, even if they were surveyed by the Windshaw police. He suggested we went to the camera, to look for evidence. Why not.
The road was closed, but Shall's police pass gave him access. The speed camera lay on the side of the road like a wounded animal, surrounded by construction workers and council members in blinding hi-vis jackets. Me and Shall watched them for a while, before the apparent foreman noticed us and came to have a word. He was a snide, slightly overweight, red-faced man, closer to sixty than fifty. Shall was out of uniform, and the foreman must have thought we were trying to vandalize the construction site or some other lofty claim. He seemed somewhat deflated when he found out that Shall was a police officer, and I immediately got the sense that he took great joy in calling the police on people. Shall asked him if the speed camera's LED could be test