On May 28th, 2199, a patrol unit on Route 20 — the old highway running through the Ohio badlands east of the Toledo corridor — reported tire tracks of unusual character in the roadside dust. The tracks are present, absent, present, absent — repeating in arithmetic intervals of exactly 3.7 meters. Not approximately. Exactly. Measured by laser rangefinder across a 12-kilometer stretch of road, the interval does not vary by more than 2 millimeters.

The tracks begin at a point on the road that has no intersection, no pullover, and no feature that would explain a vehicle starting from rest. They end 12 kilometers later at an identical nothing — the tracks simply stop, mid-interval, as if the vehicle ceased to exist. Between start and stop, the 3.7-meter present-absent pattern is unbroken. The vehicle was on the ground for 3.7 meters, then not on the ground for 3.7 meters, then on the ground again. For twelve kilometers.

The tread pattern matches no vehicle in the GLMZ registry or in any historical tire database. It is regular, geometric, and appears to be machined rather than molded — the tread elements are sharp-edged, as if cut by a tool rather than formed in a die. The depth of the impressions suggests a vehicle mass of approximately 2,000 kilograms. The spacing between left and right tracks suggests a wheelbase of 1.9 meters. These are normal vehicle dimensions. The behavior is not.

A vehicle cannot skip. It cannot leave the ground for 3.7 meters at regular intervals without some mechanism — a ramp, a bump, a propulsion event. The road surface is flat and featureless. There is no mechanism. The tracks record a vehicle that was intermittently in contact with the ground, moving through the Ohio badlands on a road that goes nowhere, leaving prints in a tread that no factory has cut, at intervals that are precise to a degree that physics does not require and probability does not favor. The tracks are still there. No one has driven Route 20 since.