Vandal
Overcharged! The illuminated letters coming off the billboard were a huge distraction for any car on the highway. This took advertisement to a whole new level. The billboard had a motion-activated camera. Whenever a car was driving by at night. The letters on the billboard would automatically angle themselves to shine light onto the car. The lights weren’t just distracting. They could outright blind drivers if they looked at them for too long. Derick planned on fixing the problem that night. He approached the base of the billboard and found that the ladder was raised so no troublemakers such as himself could climb up. This minor obstacle would not stop Derick. He looked around for anything he could use to reach the ladder. Near the highway, on the other end of the tree line, was a construction site. There had to be something Derick could use over there. He walked in the grass next to the highway as cars zipped by until he reached the construction site. One of the forklifts had a note on it with, large, tilted handwriting that said, “faulty battery, order placed.” Score! Derick pulled out a glove made by Overcharged and put it on his left hand. The glove is advertised as capable of recharging any battery within the palm of the wearer. It’s a popular product among high school kids who want to charge their phone while using it. Derick hoped that faulty batteries fell under the category of any battery. With fingers crossed in his right hand, Derick placed his left hand on the battery. The glove made a satisfying hum as it was putting power into the battery. Derick kept his fingers crossed, hoping the battery wouldn’t explode on him. After a couple of minutes, Derick put the glove back in his pocket and jumped into the seat of the forklift. No one was worried about someone stealing a vehicle with no juice, so they left the keys in the seat. Derick crossed his fingers again and turned the key. The forklift sputtered to life and Derick laughed with excitement while clapping his hands. It was appropriate to Derick that the downfall to Overcharged would be their own products. Derick grabbed a hard hat and safety vest to wear while he drove the tractor to the billboard. Any cars passing by only saw a worker running a night shift. When he made it to the billboard, he lifted the forklift high enough so he could reach the ladder and climbed up.
At the top, Derick found several ways he could sabotage the billboard. The simplest solution was to block the camera. The billboard only lit up when the camera caught movement, so blocking the camera would keep it dark. But Derick wanted to do more. Blocking the camera would be an easy fix and Derick wanted to do something that would backfire on Overcharged. Derick found the battery for the lights and came up with a plan. His handy glove should be able to cause a power surge if he put enough electricity in the battery. This should cause the bulbs to pop and maybe even set fire to the entire, awfully expensive, billboard. Derick put on the glove and placed his hand against the battery. The glove hummed as the dormant billboard built-up electricity.
The highway had been vacant of cars for the past twenty minutes, making the billboard build up electricity faster. Derick could feel the heat coming off the battery and knew the buildup would cause something to overheat any minute. Derick didn’t pay attention to the car coming into the camera’s view on the highway. When the lights came on, they shined like spotlights to expend as much energy as possible. The driver was instantly blinded and veered out of his lane. Derick only became aware of the situation when he heard the car crash into the corner of an exit below. At first, Derick thought his plan was a success and the crash was something in the battery breaking. Only when he looked down did he see the headlights from the car. He climbed down and found the hood of the car completely smashed from ramming into the exit corner. Derick turned on the flashlight on his phone and looked inside. The two kids in the back weren’t moving. Neither of them was wearing seatbelts and they were hunched forward against the front seats. In the passenger seat was another body. her seatbelt was on, but she was resting her feet on the dash. Her body folded in on itself when her airbag deployed. The windshield was exploded outward, like something flew out from the inside. Derick shined his flashlight to the corner and found the remains of a little boy. He was sitting in between the two other kids in the back at the time of the crash. Derick felt his stomach turn as he held the urge to vomit. He knelt on the side of the road and gagged, but nothing would come out. He heard a voice call out to him. “Please, please. Help.” Derick walked to the driver seat and found the driver was still alive. His seatbelt was still intact, but he wasn’t fully aware of the situation. “Get my kids,” He said. “I’ll… I’ll check on my wife.” The driver started shaking the wife’s shoulder in the passenger seat. “We need to get out, hon.” Derick panicked. He wasn’t supposed to be there. Police would wonder what a college student was doing on his own on the side of the highway. He could be sent to prison for this. The driver hadn’t gotten a good look at him yet. He could just walk away before the driver was fully aware. If he were lucky, the accident would be blamed entirely on a faulty Overcharged billboard. While the driver was busy trying to wake his dead wife, Derick walked away. He won’t need an alibi if no one knew anyone was there.
