#nevergoingbackhome V.2

This story was inspired by trips to Moab, the surreal landscape, and some weird stuff that happened on one trip. And at the last minute, I added a few things for a little emotional gut punch.

Part 1

John hit send and watched the upload bar fill, hoping he hadn’t already left civilization before the selfie posted. It was a dramatic, pensive shot of him leaning against the Jeep’s window, the rolling hills and sparse trees behind him teasing the adventures to come. It wouldn’t get as many likes as the action shots he was already storyboarding in his head—angles, captions, hashtags and all, but it was his last reliable data connection for a while. One final glimpse of the outside world before he dropped into the valley.

"Post uploaded"

John pressed the side button on his phone and turned to the window, eyes tracking the landscape that looked like a painted belt rushing past on some hidden conveyor. Dove Creek, Colorado. It was beautiful country. Rolling hills and distant mountains. Being in the mountains was like nothing else, especially after spending weeks and weeks in the city, sitting at a desk or waiting in traffic.

But John and his friends weren’t stopping there. They were taking Ned’s Jeep farther into the red rock mountains of central Utah - Moab - home of the best rock crawling in the country. And some of the strangest geology in the world.

John and Bill looked up trails on their off-roading app and shouted over the Metallica Ned blasted as they drove.

...and my ties are severed clean

The less I have the more I gain

Off the beaten path I reign

"Flat Iron mesa? This one sounds cool," Bill shouted. He looked at the app. "Use a spotter to avoid body damage."

Ned glanced at him sideways and gripped the steering wheel protectively. He really wanted the shiny army green paint to stay that way.

John caught Ned’s expression and raised an eyebrow. “How about Metal Masher?” He held up his phone with the 5/5 difficulty rating, taunting him.

"How about Hell’s Gate?" Ned replied, "And I leave you there."

John laughed and pressed a link on his phone and waited. Nothing. He furrowed his brow and checked the data connection - completely dead.

“Weird,” he thought. Normally he had 30 or 40 more miles of at least spotty signal. He looked up. They had just dropped into the valley, but the signal should have only begun decaying here.

They’d driven hours past Dove Creek’s green pastures; now the landscape had shifted from sandy, desolate hills to warped terrain and eroded monoliths. The mesas were usually a pale red, but in the setting sun, they blazed deep crimson—like molten rock still flowing in behemoths of smooth, organic stone before being frozen mid-formation.

Around them rose impossible arches, jagged broken mountains too big to stay standing, and rolling labyrinths of red sandstone and shale—where narrow trails dared travelers deeper into the desert’s maze.

The red sandstone was the desert’s defining feature, luring off-roaders from around the world. Ironically known as “slickrock” in rock crawling circles, its gritty surface gave even the cheapest all-terrains enough grip to crawl up the most remote mountain obstacles. It gave new drivers a sense of confidence that often outpaced their ability—despite warnings from those who’d been there and back.

Slickrock trails clawed up brutally steep ascents and twisted along ledges so narrow and jagged that tires skirted the edge in places. Get too close to the drop, and a tire could slip on loose sand and rock, sending the whole rig over the cliff. Steer too far inward, and the uphill slope could tip you over the same cliff, but upside down.

The same grip that made Moab’s impossible obstacles passable could also shatter steel. A spinning tire could land and catch sudden traction, snapping axles in half, shearing differential teeth clean off, and leaving rigs crippled in the heat. Out here, even a minor failure could leave a crew stranded with no shade, no signal, and no easy way home. Enterprising rescue teams, armed with apocalypse-ready recovery trucks, hauled out the lucky ones who were found in time.

As the sun dipped behind the mountains, they approached a massive arch that loomed over the highway like a giant eye, marking their entrance into the red rock basin. Its shadow stretched long across the road, reaching across the valley like a dark hand. As they passed beneath it, John glanced up—staring for a moment, like he’d caught a stranger watching him from the corner of a dark room.

The arch was one of hundreds. The land made no sense to John, like an alien landscape—except he was the alien. How could rocks form a giant circle in the sky? How did they stand for millions of years? The eye, if it had been a real eye, would have seen generations of humans pass under it. Petroglyphs from thousands of years ago were carved into rocks all over the valley. Trails that scratched into the rock, like a paper cut on a giant, made a tiny network of roads.

The modern highway they arrived on only dared to cut through the center of the valley, connecting the few small towns. Venturing further into the desert was possible, but not smart. A car could travel only a few minutes or miles down a desert road, break down, and leave its passengers deserted with hours to walk in the hot sun and no cell signal to call for help.

If the people on their unplanned walk home decided to take a shortcut, they could easily end up standing at the edge of a sheer cliff, looking into the dark red maw. John had stood at the edge of these canyons before. He knew that a river had eroded the rock over millions of years, but seeing a bottomless chasm whose walls ended without warning, with a meek little stream trickling below, seemed nonsensical.

Above the jagged badlands, the sunset, like pink strands of hair across a pillow, rested on the rocks. The corner of John’s mouth lifted in a slight smile, thinking of someone who he hoped would notice his posts. The sun finished setting as the Jeep passed rolling rock formations, huge castle-like structures that dared humans to try to reach the top. One rock stood tall, even in the darkness of dusk, like a round watch tower surrounded by open fields.

The phone glowed brightly in John’s hands, bathing his face in bluish light and casting a halo on the roof of the Jeep. He held it close, staring intently, a futile prayer to the signal that had forgotten him. The last of the battery drained quickly as it strained for a connection. Finally, the screen froze for a second and then went dark.

Anywhere I roam

Where I lay my head is home

Carved upon my stone

My body lies, but still I roam

The blasting music faded as John took in the darkening hellscape. It didn’t seem real, and it didn’t matter how many times he had driven on this road, it seemed to him that a giant hand had created the land, forming the eye-like arches, rounded, organic formations, and jagged mountains like broken bones.

John leaned his head against the window, feeling unbalanced as the tall Jeep surged over invisible sharp turns, steep hills, and canyon bridges in the dark. He looked into the night for a landmark or streetlight, something to make him feel like he wasn’t hurtling through space.

He jolted awake at the sound.

Bill rapped sharply on the window, the crack echoing through the cooling air. Without waiting, he turned and walked toward the lone bulb above the cabin door, his footsteps crunching across the narrow island of gravel connecting the Jeep and the entrance. The single bulb cast a roof of light over his head, creating a tiny world for him to exist in outside of the darkness.

John stepped out of the Jeep and looked around, hearing nothing and seeing only the circle of ground and the cabin door enclosed by the dim yellow light. The air was still and cool. If anything had been nearby, he would have heard it.

He stood motionless for a few seconds, instinctively still, scanning for a wild animal or some other unseen threat, even though he knew this “forest cabin” was essentially part of the city. He heard nothing and saw nothing outside the light.

Except for a pair of dull red circles, faintly glowing in the darkness.

John squinted and strained, motionless, trying to convince himself they weren’t actually there.

But they were. He tracked them as they moved together, slowly from right to left, like eyes, gliding through the blackened forest beyond the light.

He stopped breathing, listening for hooves or paws or shoes, but there was nothing—only the faint static of absolute silence in his ears.

He blinked, and the eyes vanished.

John stared for a few more seconds before giving up. He grabbed his bag and walked quickly toward the cabin, eyes wide, still wondering if what he saw was real, pausing only to kick a triangular rock back into the darkness.

The inside was barely large enough for the three of them—just two bunk beds within arm’s reach of each other.

“So, what’s first tomorrow?” John asked, as he climbed into the top bunk and stared at the ceiling. He needed something to stop imagining those red eyes still wandering outside, somewhere in the trees.

"It’s a surprise," Bill answered. "You’ll love it. Or maybe you’ll piss your pants, I don’t know," he said as he flicked off the light.

John could still see Bill’s smirk in his mind. He was a little glad that it wasn’t his Jeep that would be barely scraping past the sharp rock outcroppings.

The next morning they rolled out, tires crunching over the dirt lot. John felt the wind and sand on his face as they flew down the trail. It was a long, rocky dirt road that linked the various obstacles. They were headed to Hell’s Gate, a notorious climb on the long trail called Hell’s Revenge. The ominous name belied the groups of off-roaders they passed every few minutes, giving a short wave in greeting and solidarity.

Hell’s Gate was different from other obstacles. The descent was a formidable challenge, the pinnacle of Moab’s gauntlets. It dared everyone who passed to try, but few attempted. Failure meant a destroyed rig at the bottom and leaving on a rescue helicopter. John, Bill, and Ned stood at the top, looking down at the jagged descent into the pit—an uneven staircase of rock shelves, each drop deeper than it looked from above. Every ledge required the driver to ease forward until gravity took over, rolling into a slow-motion freefall. It was a roller coaster built from rock, where survival depended more on nerves than complex maneuvers, and there were no engineers to ensure the riders’ safety. The twin black stripes leading into the pit indicated that many had made it down without incident. The scrapes and gouges on the sides indicated some had not.

Ned ran his fingers through his hair. "I don’t know…" he said, trying to convince Bill that it was a bad idea.

"Come on, why’d you put those 38’s on if you weren’t going to try new stuff?"

Ned hemmed and hawed for a few minutes before finally getting into the driver’s seat and shutting the door. John stood on the nearby rock with his phone held out at eye level, thumb ready over the record button. From above, he could see Ned’s slightly shaky fingers grasp the steering wheel. He knew from experience that it would be a slippery grip by the time he reached the bottom.

John positioned himself near the front of the Jeep with his phone to maximize how steep and far the steps appeared to drop in pictures. Bill stood at the edge of the frame, shouting instructions at Ned.

"A little bit driver! A little more! Ok, slowly… "

Bill indicated to his left with open hands while concentrating on the position of the wheels. Technically, it wasn’t a difficult obstacle. Sometimes a driver just needed the confidence of someone giving authoritative directions before he let off the brake. All he really had to do was drive straight over and he would be fine. However, driving over a ledge one wheel at a time could mean tipping over and rolling down the rock steps.

Ned breathed out slowly—a long, measured exhale that carried a muttered curse—as he eased his foot off the brake.

He instantly regretted every decision he had made in the past 36 hours, starting with leaving his driveway.

The ground in front of him disappeared from view, and his stomach dropped as the Jeep lurched forward and the tires slid down the step, finally slamming onto the first landing.

BAM

The Jeep came to a stop. Ned grimaced. The front tires were planted solidly on the ledge, four feet below. Looking straight down and sitting in his seat tilted that far forward felt completely wrong.

Ned leaned out the open window, "What happened? Did I break anything?"

"Nah, you did great. Nine more steps to go."

The Jeep slammed as it went over every step, the sound of two and a half tons of steel landing solidly attracting a gradually growing crowd.

Ned’s confidence grew when he saw the crowd, some cheering, all watching intently.

Ned’s final slam came at the bottom of the obstacle. He carefully turned the Jeep to the left, bringing the small crowd into view. A few cheered and clapped.

John waved his phone in the air and hopped down the rocks, shouting "I got it all on video!"

Ned felt invincible for all of five seconds—until he looked up—all the way up. The trail rose, twisted and slow, like a crooked spine standing skyward, asking the Jeep to scale a stony Tower of Babel.

The trail up was a deep, slanted crevice in the rocks. No steps or breaks on the way up. If Ned had never been off-roading before, he would assume that driving up was impossible. Turning slightly to one side would mean laying the Jeep over on its side, all while looking into the sky, nearly on his back, like an astronaut strapped in, staring into the sky, with no view of the ground.

"Hey, uh, do you want a turn?" He asked John, trying to sound generous. He really needed to wipe off his sweaty palms.

John looked up at the trail and back to Ned. He hadn’t driven on this trip yet. He would have preferred to ease into it with an easier obstacle. But he didn’t want to disappoint his friends by chickening out, either. He had done a few obstacles that required leaning the rig far to the side before - off-camber, the experienced off-roaders called it.

"Yeah, why not?" He replied casually, trading with Ned. "Hey, get some good pictures."

Ned nodded, waved his phone at John, and positioned himself on the rocks for a video that would hopefully impress a few new Instagrammers.

Part 2

John gripped the wheel and shifted into gear. He felt the transmission engage and the jeep tense, like a wrestler taking a stance.

Bill began indicating with open hands the precise path up the rocks.

"Passenger! A little more! Ok, driver! No, not that far!"

They inched up the mountain, taking the trail one rocky ledge at a time. Most of John’s weight was pressed against the door, the rocks outside mere feet from his face. In his head, he heard the shriek of twisting steel, the scrape of sandstone clawing at metal. He leaned in, even though his instinct was to reach out to catch himself. If the Jeep did tip over, anything outside would be crushed beyond recognition, mashed into the gouges left behind by those who didn’t make it out.

"At least I’m sitting up when I lean in," John consoled himself.

He pressed the brake and looked in the rear-view mirror. The ground seemed to drop away, even as he was pointed into the sky. There was no changing his mind now. It would be far more treacherous to reverse down Hell’s Gate than to crawl up.

Bill furrowed his brow, stepping left to right on the rocks, trying to trace the Jeep’s line—its path out of the pit. Ned hovered behind him, tossing out suggestions. Some clarified, some contradicted. John clenched his jaw and shut his eyes. One more word and he’d tell them both to shut the hell up.

"Ok, uh, turn slightly driver!" Bill shouted.

John opened his eyes and tried again. He turned the wheel. The Jeep lunged forward, tilted left, and balanced—just for a moment—on two wheels. In that breath of stillness, a flash of pink caught his eye on the hill above the crowd. Spandex shorts on an athletic woman hiking the ridge. She glowed against the sky, the first light of sunrise after a dark night. He squinted, forgetting the Jeep entirely. Was that—? It couldn’t be.

The hood rose into view, cutting off the vision. It climbed higher, and gravity answered. Instinct took over. He jammed the brake with both feet. One hand on the wheel, the other braced against the OS bar. His breath caught. The Jeep tipped back, farther and faster, falling into a slow, dreadful descent—then slammed down onto the rear wheel, the front right hanging high in the air. “What are you doing?” Ned shouted, “back to passenger!” As if the Jeep hadn’t just nearly rolled.

John turned the wheel back, jaw tight. He reminded himself: the drop always felt worse inside. From the outside, the Jeep just lifted a tire. If the spotter was calm, then you would probably be fine.

“Give it some gas—just crawl over!”

He did. The tires spun and chirped, scrabbling for grip.

“More gas!”

John pressed the pedal. The wheels spun faster, chirped louder. The Jeep bounced, searching for traction.

He gave it more. Same result—except now it lurched harder to the left, the lifted tire rising higher.

“STOP! STOP! STOP!” Ned screamed, both hands up, his calm gone, replaced with a grimace.

John stopped. The Jeep rocked back, then settled into something that felt almost stable. He leaned out the window, testing the balance.

“What’s going on?”

Ned didn’t answer. He crouched, inspected the steps, then sprang up onto one beside the Jeep and hopped from rock to rock toward the rear.

While he waited for Ned to figure it out, John looked up at the crowd. Bigger now, but quieter. No cheering, no clapping. They watched with the focus of a chess match—silent and analytical. A woman chewed her fingernails. Behind her, a man gestured as he spoke to another onlooker, tracing some imaginary line with his hands. Probably how he’d climb out, if it were him. John wondered if he’d ever run this obstacle—and if he had, why he was just standing there, talking like a commentator instead of spotting.

They sat sideways on the final sharp ledge when another rig appeared at the top of the hill. The deep rumble of the V8 resonated through the ground and into their boots. Then the front axle crested the ridge, riding on huge tires that gripped the rocks below. The axle looked like it had started life under a heavy-duty work truck but was now sentenced to live out its days straining under torque in the rocks. The truck crawled in silence through the still desert air, despite the ground trembling underneath the engine.

An old man climbed out and stood high on the rocks, surveying his domain, watching like a man who knew every stone by name. He didn’t crouch to inspect the trail as Ned had done.

He let them struggle while he scanned the valley below to his satisfaction. Only then did he begin to descend—slow, steady, unbothered by the slope. He moved through the rocks effortlessly, as if they shifted to meet him. His untied leather work boots landed without a sound. His approach made time stretch, a mirage in the distance.

Finally, he stopped behind Ned, who didn’t notice—too focused on finding a line—until the old man's shadow darkened the trail. Ned looked up and saw only a silhouette, backlit by the dark blue sky. Startled, he rose to face the stranger. He was pot-bellied and long-bearded, with the weathered look of a man who could have bought the rusty truck new.

"Looks like you’re a bit stuck," he said, smiling.

John laughed nervously. "Yeah, we might be."

The man looked around. "Where’s your winch?"

John looked at the ground, then the sky. "I guess Ned was planning on getting it for the next trip."

Ned shrugged sheepishly. "Do you have a winch?"

"I might," he said. He didn't move.

His shirt had once been red. Now it matched the rocks—stained, dusty, sun-bleached. Across the chest were the words “Handsome Devil.” Beneath that, a grinning cartoon devil with a long, thin villain mustache and staring eyes.

"Well, um...," Ned mumbled, not sure what the old man was waiting for, or if he had intended to help them at all or just gloat at their misfortune.

The old man sighed dramatically, emphasizing how much effort he would have to expend to rescue them.

"I suppose you want me to pull you out."

"Yeah, that would...," Ned trailed off. The old man was already walking.

He hitched up greasy jean shorts as he clambered back up the mountain with uncanny ease, like the rocks themselves carried him up. Minutes later, his old black Dodge perched at the top of the ledge, just above the Jeep. He pulled the hook of the winch down, hooking to the Jeep’s bumper without needing to look for the D-ring.

Soon Bill was at the truck, manning the winch. The old man stood above the Jeep, far enough up the trail to watch the front tires as they crawled.

"Take up the slack when he gives it the beans," he told Bill. Then to John: "You—gas it when I say."

John nodded.

The winch groaned. The Jeep lurched side-to-side as it was pulled up and out of the pit.

The man unhooked the winch and rewound it, not bothering to acknowledge the completed rescue.

"Woo, that was a close one! Thank you, sir!" Ned shouted.

The man turned around and stared, giving a cold smile, "Be careful next time. You might not make it out."

John swallowed. It was a judgment—for daring to face Hell’s Gate unprepared and then to expect mercy.

Ned opened his mouth to respond, but by the time he thought of something, the old man was already pulling himself up into his truck.

He slammed the door of the old Dodge pickup. Drove down the obstacle. Then back up with no drama.

John watched.

The wind picked up as the old man drove away—sharp and sudden, the mountains exhaling in relief. Sand hit his face, burning his eyes until they watered. By the time he blinked the tears away, the old truck was gone, and the ground was still again.

He wondered if the man had been there when Hell’s Gate was named—or if he had named it himself. Maybe the man hadn’t just climbed Hell’s Gate. He had helped shape it—every ledge, every false hold, every spot where momentum rattled confidence. It was a trial by stone, and he was its architect.

Ned, John, and Bill stood at the top of the nearby cliff, overlooking the sheer drop into the valley below. The river traced the canyon floor in a thin glint. Cars vanished beneath them as they passed the base of the cliff, only to reappear later, smaller and slower. The cliff’s rim curved ahead of them, hugging the river in a sweeping arc that didn't let them forget the hundreds of feet of unseen and unforgettable nothing beneath their feet.

John took pictures. A few selfies, some with his arm around his buddies. A couple for the 'gram. Some funny ones to shake off the tension. He glanced at the dispersing crowd, hoping to catch a glimpse of pink shorts, but she was gone.

He took a few wide shots—cliffs, river, sky. None of them caught the jaggedness of the rocks or the deep blood-red of the stone. The drops looked shallow, the sense of scale collapsed. In the photos, the mountains flattened, and the shadows concealed details. But he kept taking them. He stared at the screen, but it wasn’t there. Not what he saw or how small he’d felt beside monoliths older than human memory.

He knew no one would believe it. Not the depth. Not the danger. Not the old man vanishing into the wind.

Part 3

John closed his eyes and exhaled. He was ready for some silence.

“...I’m just saying,” Bill said, “if we were in a Toyota, we wouldn’t be sweating every bump.”

“At least solid axles don’t snap in half every time you leave pavement,” Ned shot back.

“Yeah, but the rest of the Jeep does. How many parts have rattled off this thing since Dove Creek?”

“At least I can flex without looking like I’m doing yoga in a minivan.”

“A 4Runner could do this trail backwards. In sandals.”

“And still crack the frame on a pothole. That IFS garbage folds like a taco.”

“Big words for a guy who almost cried when we scraped his bumper.”

“It’s called respecting your build, B-hole.”

John stood up. “I’m going to the store. You guys want anything?”

“Cinnamon bears, if they’ve got them,” Bill said. “Why can’t we get those in Texas? They slap.”

“Get me Funyuns,” Ned said. “A man’s snack—not candy, like a child.”

Bill punched Ned’s arm. “How’s that for a man’s snack?”

Ned punched him back, harder. “That all you got? My sister hits harder.”

“Shut up, bro. That Karen next door’s gonna call the front desk. She looked like she wanted to mace me when I parked.”

“Nah, she was checking you out.” Ned laughed and smacked Bill’s arm with the back of his hand.

“Maybe we should give her a reason to knock,” Bill said, raising his eyebrows.

“Or maybe you should learn to park between the lines. That Jeep’s more rig than you can handle.”

John stepped into the neon-lit parking lot, the door clicking shut behind him. He stepped over a pothole and headed down the sidewalk. The store was a short walk, and he wanted a few minutes of quiet. Inside, he could still hear them through the window.

“Just admit you’re wrong before you die on this hill,” Ned said.

“Better than dying under a Jeep, waiting for a tow,” Bill said.

“Better than pretending overlanding counts as real off-roading just because your Toyota can’t crawl. Hey, at least you have that tent on top to sleep in when you get stuck.”

His footsteps echoed in the night. The buzzing of street lamps grew louder and softer as he stepped into the dim yellow circles and back into the darkness. Insects buzzed in the warming spring air, landing on every light source, blocking it in dozens of tiny spots, some living and moving, some dead and still.

He stepped into the last yellow reprieve from the shadows and pressed the crosswalk button. The street was empty. No one walked after dark. They lay on hotel beds, recovering from hours of riding, climbing, or hiking.

Without waiting for the little white crosswalk light, he began walking to the shack of a gas station. It had two pumps out front, old pumps, probably from the 80s, the kind that relied on honesty and not a card reader or tap square. The gentle ticking of the crosswalk began and the light came on as John crossed the yellow center lines.

“Well, that’s a relief. I definitely won’t get run over now,” John muttered. He stepped onto the curb and walked through the tiny parking lot, avoiding cracks and potholes in the asphalt. Faded advertisements for cigarettes covered the windows, partially covered by newer posters hawking three for two deals on sickly green Monster energy drinks - before they came in several hundred flavors and guys named Kyle got garish M tattoos on their elbows and stickers on their lifted black trucks.

John’s hope for decent snacks sank to his feet as he approached the door.

A tiny store with a trailer-home toilet and floors that hadn’t been mopped in weeks might offer nothing better than off-brand potato chips and old candy bars—hard as a rock, blooming into powder under the wrapper.

Still, they’d have cinnamon bears, tucked somewhere in the rack of 99-cent generic gummy bags. Every gas station and grocery store in the west did.

John, Ned, and Bill agreed on one thing: the sickly sweet, vaguely spicy little bears were GOATed. If they were chocolate-covered, even better. Diabetes be damned.

He pulled the door.

The inside of the store was not a surprise. There was a small cooler of tuna sandwiches only the bravest gambler would try—just in case hunger ever became stronger than a sense of self-preservation.

John grabbed a bag of Flavory Onion Hoopz (close enough), two bags of gummy bears—one plain, one chocolate-covered—and a fistful of greasy “meat snack” sticks. He’d worry about his cardiovascular system when he got home.

The skinny, slack-jawed clerk took his money without breaking focus, eyes fixed on an endless stream of ten-second vertical dopamine hits—teasing angles to keep men like him watching forever. John pushed open the door with his forearm, careful to avoid the handle touched by people who didn’t pack soap or toilet paper.

The other side of the street didn’t have the buzzy yellow streetlamps with foggy plastic and swarms of bugs that flew into John’s face, so he didn’t cross back over to the hotel side yet. There was a public park in a big spotty grass field. Without the glow of the streetlamps and the empty field to his left, John could have been walking through space. For a few minutes, he relished the lack of stimulation. No noise, no excitement, no stress. Just one foot in front of the other in darkness and the steady tap… tap… tap… of his footsteps.

He approached a bench in the distance on a square of concrete next to the sidewalk. Were those red lights in the air? He squinted into the dark. They were. Motionless, two sets of little round red lights. Dull, not intended to illuminate anything. They bobbed up and down with every step closer, themselves unmoving as if they were waiting for him to approach.

The crinkling of the plastic bag holding his snacks distracted John from concentrating fully on the red lights. He held it tighter. Why did it have to be completely silent for him to see what was ahead? Maybe what the red lights were a part of would make some noise to identify itself.

John stopped fidgeting with the crinkly plastic as he neared the lights. They were eyes. Eyes on very elaborate Halloween decorations, little black phantoms or something. He stepped closer and the eyes moved, tracking his motion. Elaborate and fairly high-tech Halloween decorations at this time of year? It didn’t…

They jumped.

John screamed and sprinted down the street, letting out a string of expletives

He ran for a full 10 seconds before he heard laughing. He turned and saw some kids were taking off last year’s costumes and laughing hysterically. It was a prank. The simplest prank in the world: jump out and scare someone. But John felt his heart pounding and adrenaline pumping. OK, he nearly had a heart attack, but that was a decent prank. They got him good and he had to give them credit.

“Nice one,” John said flatly, not sure if he meant it or if he was being sarcastic, waved and walked home, still shaking.

Bill and Ned were watching old Family Guy episodes, laughing loud enough to keep the neighbors up.

John tossed the junk food onto a bed and relayed his near-death experience with a mouth full of cinnamon bears. He finished the story and the last non-chocolate bear. It left a sticky film on his teeth and a warm burn in his throat. That’s when he realized he’d forgotten actually drinkable water. All he had was a six-pack of BuzzCola™ and warm sink water.

The next day was supposed to be an easier, more scenic trail. As Bill and Ned argued over whose trail app was correct, John looked across the canyon near the staging area. He squinted at what was probably a waterfall in wetter months. The cut it had carved hid a cave waiting in its shadow.

John took out his phone and snapped a few pictures, changing positions to get a better shot. The cave was deep and practically square, with an arched top for strength. Definitely artificial. He would have to come back and explore after the next trail. Weird man-made features always made for great pictures, and he needed something other than mountains for at least one post. Variety was good for the algorithm.

“Hey man, let’s go!” Ned hollered, jumping into the Jeep and revving the little V6.

It responded with a buzzy rasp.

A second later, the stereo kicked in, drowning out the engine in early Pantera:

Here we come, reach for your gun

And you better listen well, my friend, you see

It's been slowed down below

Aimed at you—we’re the cowboys from hell.

John grabbed the passenger OS bar and slid in, slamming the thin Jeep door—just in time to get startled by Bill standing inches from the window.

“Aw man, I wanted to sit up front.” His voice was muffled through the glass.

“Too bad,” John said, waving his phone. “I have to get some pictures. Can’t let the followers down.”

Bill climbed into the back and popped open the last can of BuzzCola™, his disappointment forgotten.

“Are there any cinnamon bears left?”

Ned got in with his mouth full—chocolate and red gelatin mashed together into something unholy.

“What?” he said, barely audible.

Bill sighed. “Never mind.”

Ned shrugged, cranked the stereo volume to way too loud, and stomped the gas. The V6 rasped again—immediately buried under the sound of tires spitting sand and gravel as the Jeep spun off down the trail. John looked back as they sped away, imagining what could be on the other side of that tunnel.

Unlike most trails in the area—rocky, narrow, and slow to navigate—the road to Coyote Wash was (relatively) wide and flat, more like a city-maintained dirt road than a true backcountry trail. Easy driving—unless you didn’t respect the edge. Then it was a long drop to some very large and unforgiving rocks.

John usually tensed up near cliffs, unless he was distracted by the distant red formations.

Today, he couldn’t stop thinking about the thick black mouth of the tunnel they’d passed earlier. The way it swallowed light and its odd precise shape. Where did it go? What if something was hidden inside it? He had to see for himself.

He stared ahead, imagination spinning.

“Hey man!” Bill shouted in his ear, over the music. “Aren’t you taking pics for the ’gram or whatever? You got some good scenery here.”

Ned had slowed around a sharp curve, revealing steep red cliffs and ridgelines that could be seen miles away. It was the kind of place travel influencers would sell their soul for—if it were closer to pavement.

John watched a hawk drift on a thermal, wings outstretched, gliding effortlessly. For a second, he imagined being in the air—weightless, fearless, above it all. Surveying the rocks like they were his, just him and the land, instinct, and air. A flicker of movement a mile away, and he dropped—gone in an instant—returning to the nest later with still-warm prey in his talons.

John raised his phone and took a few shots. Dust on the windshield. Bad angles. Juniper trees clipping the frame. The camera couldn’t capture it. With the darkened tunnel opening still in the back of his mind, John motioned for Ned to slow down.

“Hey, pull over here. This is a good spot.” There was a jagged outcropping that jutted into air with hundreds of feet of sheer drop on either side. John stood at the edge and took a deep breath.

He got a selfie at the edge of every cliff he could find, getting closer and closer as he got more daring. This would be his masterpiece. Without room for two people to stand side-by-side, he would be shaking with ragged breath by the time he came back. He started toward it resolutely.

“I’m gonna piss.” called Ned and walked into the bushes.

Bill was busy standing in front of the Jeep and posing for his phone camera.

John kept walking past the ‘safe’ area, onto the outcropping itself, where the cliff ended to the right and left and a slip or fall would be the longest of his life. He stepped close to the tip where only air surrounded him on three sides. This part was easy. Anyone can stand still and not fall over.

He turned around and shakily pulled out his phone, holding it over his head. His face in the foreground and nothing in the background except cliffs in the distance. He hit record and slowly turned right and left with his upper body, not daring to shuffle his feet even an inch.

His palms were cold and wet and the video would probably have a slight tremor from his unsteady grip. He was about to say something brave and epic when the tunnel, safe and low, flashed through his mind. John felt a sudden and intense urge to be there, underground, and to never leave. The wind dropped. The canyon went still. He shifted his weight. The phone slipped from his grip. Instinctively, he tried to catch it with his free hand, knocking it sideways instead, sending it skidding toward the edge.

John froze and assessed his situation. He and his phone were still on the correct side of the cliff’s edge, so he stepped forward, keeping to the center of the narrow rock. The phone was still recording. He bent, grabbed it, made a quick face for the camera, hit stop, and walked back to safety.

He stopped. Turned. Looked back at the gaping maw in the earth. They called this place a “wash,” the same as an empty ditch that sweeps the flash floods away during sudden thunderstorms. Something he played in as a child when the sky was clear.

Calling it a wash was a joke. A casual insult to something that looked like the Earth had been split open by a sadistic creator, leaving a gaping passageway to the center of the earth, surrounded by rocky outcroppings like jagged teeth. Once again, the relative safety of the tunnel flashed into John’s mind, making him crave the cool safety, the strong walls and the protective ceiling.

“Are you getting a picture or chucking your phone off the edge?” Bill startled John, zipping up his fly as he approached the Jeep to leave.

“The, uh, lighting is bad,” John explained, shaking off the intrusive urge to fall into the tunnel’s abyss. “I’ll try again in a few hours.”

“Sounds good.”

“Crank it up!” Bill shouted, the stereo already blasting.

'Cause high noon, your doom

Comin' for you we're the cowboys from hell

Pillage the village, trash the scene

'Cause a ghost town is found

Where your city used to be

So out of the darkness and into the light…

The song ended and another began, and John kept staring ahead, eyes frozen behind his sunglasses, thoughts elsewhere.

A few hours later, the Jeep slid to a halt in the same spot as that morning. Ned got out to fill the tires back up. John practically jumped out of the jeep and marched toward the actual wash that held the opening to the tunnel.

“There are bushes over here, dude!” Bill called, assuming John needed to piss.

“Give me a minute, I want to check out this tunnel really fast. Eat lunch or something, I'll be right back.”

Ned shrugged as he knelt by the tire, mobile compressor in hand. “It’s a little early, but I guess that works.”

John was already sliding down the sandy hill, leaning back and steadying himself with one hand. At the bottom of the wash, he stood face to face with the tunnel. If Coyote Wash was a toothy mouth, this was the throat—leading straight into the belly of the red rock beast.

He continued toward it. Or maybe it just went to the other side of the road to lead flash floods under the highway instead of over it. John stepped into the tunnel. It was long, far longer than he thought a simple highway culvert would be, and tall, at least twice his height. The sides and ceiling were as flat as one could get rough-hewn shale. He wondered why someone would go to all this work just for drainage control. Maybe there was a secret passage on one side that led to a hidden chamber or a trap door.

The air was cool, protected from the sun. But as John neared the center of the tunnel, it was downright cold, and he shivered in his T-shirt. This wasn’t desert shade—it was something else. The chill pressed into his skin until it carried weight.

A memory flashed: a girl with dyed-pink hair, hoodie pulled tight, her arms wrapped around his waist. He’d pulled her close, trying to keep them both warm. They laughed, walking together, white breath in the winter air.

The scene burned so vividly it stole the air from his lungs. He stumbled, hugging himself, until it faded. At the far end of the tunnel, warmth returned as he crossed back from one world to another. He tried to remember who she was, but her face and laugh slipped away. He stumbled to the end of the tunnel, searching for her in his own mind, but finding nothing. The memory evaporated, leaving him with an aching melancholy—something lost that he hadn’t even known he had.

Then the sun hit him, harsh and blinding. He blinked, his eyes adjusting. The cold, the arms around him, even the sound of her laugh—gone, like a dream upon waking. By the time he reached the wash, he couldn’t remember what he had been trying so hard to hold on to.

Reality returned—but only halfway. He was just a guy in Moab, on a hike, pretending nothing felt off. He didn't find anything amazing. In front of him: just a wash with a sandy hill to the highway above. John snapped a few dramatic pictures, grateful that his phone wasn’t smashed on a rock somewhere and got ready to climb the hill. Might as well climb a little hill and cross the street. Shortcut.

He put his foot into the sand on the hill, immediately causing a small sand collapse. This might be challenging. There were rocky spots here and there, and if he went from rock to rock, it wouldn’t be so hard.

Halfway up, he turned around. The mouth of the tunnel was calling to him again, inhaling gently. He pulled out his phone, mistaking the draw for his instinct for photography. The tunnel was open just enough to be mysterious, but not enough to reveal that it was just civil infrastructure. He took a half step up to steady himself, turned around, and took a few shots. He didn’t know if he was photographing it or trying to prove it was real. The sun was too bright. He couldn’t see what he was capturing but took the pictures anyway. He’d look at them later.

A funny idea came to him suddenly: a flexing selfie to show off his climbing prowess. Just enough for a not-so-humble brag and to get a few laughs.

He stood up taller, found his angle, and raised the phone.

His foot slipped.

He wobbled, waving his arms, catching nothing. The hillside gave. He fell backward, nothing but warm air catching him, his arms outstretched. For a moment, he floated—view tilting skyward—and thought of the gliding hawk.

In the instant before he hit the ground, he had a strange, final thought: the tunnel had pulled him back. It had been waiting for him.

And then everything went black.

Part 4

John lay flat on his back, staring at the sky, while he remembered why he was there. Something was off. It was just before lunch, but the light looked wrong—dim, washed out, like he was seeing it through sunglasses that were too dark or some overused vintage-style Instagram filter. The sky was clear, but he couldn’t feel the sun’s heat. It wasn’t even bright, just a pale yellow disc hanging overhead.

Ants crawled up his arm. He watched one reach his forearm without reacting, only remembering after a few seconds that you weren’t supposed to let insects wander around your body. He sat up, brushed off the dirt and bugs, and looked to his left.

The tunnel was still there. He remembered being interested in it, maybe even thinking it was worth a photo, but now it just looked like what it was—a shale box for rainwater. He gave it a glance, already bored. He’d wasted the moment on infrastructure.

The hot sun from minutes ago had made him want to cool off in the breezy underground air; now he wanted to feel the warm sun on his skin. He felt odd without it, like he was suddenly naked or far away from the familiar weight of the desert sun.

John started back for the Jeep, this time climbing the hill without falling. He was suddenly too annoyed to bother with loose sand or his phone. He took his last step off the hillside and onto flat ground without pausing to look back or changing his pace. He watched the trail in front of him, jaw clenched and eyes straight forward, listening only to the flat crunch of his hiking boots.

The highway that ran over the tunnel stretched out to the horizon in both directions. John looked left, right, left again, and right, studying the mirages that broke up the road as it snaked past rocks and hills. No cars came from either direction. The road was silent and the air still; walking would break the silent hold that had frozen the world, so John stood and watched, his ears empty for the first time in his entire life. Even the chirping and buzzing insects had gone away.

John shook his head. What was he doing, staring off into the distance like a crazy person? He started to cross the street and tried to remember what he had brought for lunch. The blast of a horn shattered his silence. A truck blew past him, and he could hear someone’s fading shout from an open window.

“...Idiot!”

Where had that truck come from? He’d been watching both sides of the road for what felt like several minutes.

The dull roar of big tires faded into the mirages, and only the crunch of the gravel under his boots accompanied him on the short walk back to the jeep. John’s vision of the world bobbed up and down with his footsteps in a normal way, but his destination didn’t get any closer. He felt hours go by as shrubs lazily floated past. The jeep was behind one curve in the trail, a three-minute walk, but he had been walking for so long. Every crunch echoing louder and louder in his -

“Hey, you’re back. What did you see?” Ned asked, mouth full of a white bread ham, soggy tomato, and plasticky American cheese sandwich, the sticky bread on the roof of his mouth muffling his voice.

John was at the Jeep’s tailgate, opening the cooler, looking around for his lunch. He pulled out a sandwich and a BuzzCola, opened the Jeep’s passenger door, sat down, and slammed it shut. Seconds later, he was out of the Jeep and throwing the sandwich, plastic bag and all, into the bushes.

“Worst sandwich I’ve ever had,” he muttered.

“Whoa, John the environmentalist, throwing trash in the bushes.”

John gave Ned a sideways glare.

“Where did you get these, on sale at the gas station?”

Ned shrugged.

“It tastes fine to me. I put them together last night, remember?”

“I’m not hungry anyways.”

He cracked the soda tab under his fingernail, felt the metallic snap as the scored aluminum gave way, and felt the cold mist on his hand. The hiss and fizz sounded like summer: cream soda by the lake, root beer floats at his grandfather’s, Coke in a glass bottle during a barbecue. Memories flooded his thoughts.

The soda tasted like muddy chemical water. He spat it on the ground.

“How old is this?”

The expiration date wasn’t for another year. He threw it angrily down the trail.

Bill finished his sandwich. “Are you alright, bro? I hear some viruses can make everything taste weird. Maybe you’re - hey, are you bleeding?” He interrupted himself and pointed to the back of John’s neck.

John reached back and felt a trickle of blood on the back of his neck. He followed it to a split on the back of his head, like a tiny desert canyon under his hair. John groaned out loud. That’s right, he had fallen down the hill. How annoying. It wasn’t bleeding though, so it couldn’t be that bad.

“I guess I should see a doctor,” John said, almost a question.

“Yeah, hop in. There’s an urgent care in town next to the Wendy’s. I guess we can get lunch that’s up to your standards.” Ned chuckled uneasily and looked around for a reaction, hoping to lighten the mood. John was already slamming the door and putting on his seatbelt. He looked straight ahead through the windshield.

Bill got in the back seat. “Are you going to try to get some pictures?” His question trailed off when John didn’t react.

As they pulled onto the highway, the pounding heavy metal ended. The lazy, bittersweet riff of “Last Dance with Mary Jane,” started.

The road in front of the Jeep unfolded as they passed through the hills and valleys leading to town. It was a short drive, but once again, as John’s vision bobbed up and down with the Jeep’s suspension, the shrubs and the rocks drifted past lazily. John didn’t remember the song or the drive being this long.

Well, I don't know, but I've been told

You never slow down, you never grow old

I'm tired of screwin' up, tired of going down

Tired of myself, tired of this town

It was a good song and a pretty drive, so that was fine. Tom Petty could sing for an hour and the hills could float past all day.

John leaned back to rest against the seat, the back of his head on the headrest. Ned grimaced to himself, thinking about the stain the blood would leave, but when John began closing his eyes, he forgot the seat.

“Smack,” went the back of Ned’s hand on John’s arm. John’s only reaction was to open his eyes and keep looking through the windshield.

“Are you OK? You should probably not fall asleep. “Ned’s voice took on a concerned tone. “What did you do to your head?”

John shrugged, “I fell down the hill. I don’t know, I guess I hit my head on a rock when I landed. It doesn’t hurt, though.”

He reached up and touched the wound, “Look, it’s not even bleeding. It can’t be that bad.”

John showed them his fingers and the smudge of drying blood on the tips.

“I’ll keep my eyes open,” John reassured them. “I’m not sleepy or anything, I was just into the song.”

They were closer to town. They passed a few side-by-sides and bicycles.

The song was ending and John felt a twinge of melancholy, cold and hollow.

There's pigeons down on Market Square

She's standin' in her underwear

Lookin' down from a hotel room

The nightfall will be comin' soon

He thought about pressing the back button on the stereo and listening again, but it wouldn’t be the same. You can’t listen to a song twice, he thought to himself. The second time isn’t as good. And there aren’t any other songs like it --

A figure in black on the side of the road interrupted his thoughts. He didn’t notice it until it was just a few feet away and it was gone in just a few seconds. It had the same red eyes and black costume-y ghost sheet. And had it been looking at him as he passed?

He whipped around in his seat to look backwards, but the Jeep’s top blocked his view.

“Did you see that?” He asked.

“See what?”

John leaned back and forth trying to see it again. Was it just a hiker?

They pulled into the parking lot and stopped. Ned jumped out to make sure John wasn’t falling down, only to watch him stride off to the urgent care’s entrance. Ned shrugged and thought that it really must not be that bad.

John walked up to the reception desk and waited for the nurse. She was on the phone, giving someone advice for heat exhaustion. Her scrubs were a faded pink that tugged at something in the back of his mind. He searched for the memory, but it kept slipping away. Her voice blurred into the background along with the TV—an 80’s infomercial about a kitchen gadget. Clack. The nurse set the phone down, breaking his concentration, picked up a clipboard, and finally looked up.

“Fill this out, both sides, and bring back your insurance—” She paused like he’d startled her, a sudden look of recognition flashing across her face. John took the clipboard carefully, wondering why she had reacted to him like that.

Whatever. He knew the drill. Fill it out, sign 20 different forms, give them your insurance card and ID.

“Just have a seat over there,” she said quickly, pointing to the corner of the room that was as far away from her as possible.

“Great,” John thought. He knew what that meant. “Have a seat and wait for 127 hours. At least I don’t have to cut my arm off if I want to leave.”

He filled out the stack of papers and put his ID and insurance card on top. When he walked back to the desk, the nurse gave him an awkward grimace and pointed to a spot on the counter for him to set it down, making no move to take it from him.

“OK, thanks. Go sit down over there” She pointed to the far corner of the waiting room, near a child who was coloring to keep himself occupied, and didn’t touch the clipboard.

John walked back, slumped into the seat, and pulled out his phone - no signal. He played a puzzle game for a few minutes, but it didn’t make any sense to him. He had to match colors or line up blocks or something, but all the colors looked the same and the blocks never lined up quite right.

He looked up to the TV. It was the same infomercial. A corny looking man in a suit was furiously telling a woman about some kitchen device. It looked like the type of product that had malfunctioned and had to be recalled after a bunch of lawsuits over burn victims. She was trying her hardest to act amazed at how full of ease her life would become after simplifying this one specific task.

John rolled his eyes and looked at the kid by himself. He was still coloring intensely. John glanced at his paper to see what he had been meticulously drawing. The paper was entirely black and shiny with the wax of a several black crayons that had been worn all the way down. The kid showed no signs of stopping.

John looked up at the desk for a sign that his wait would be ending soon. The nurse was talking softly on the phone. She glanced at him and quickly looked away while he was looking at her. He let out a big sigh and looked back at the TV. As his gaze swept from left to right, back to the TV, he caught the child staring directly at him. John looked away at the TV, awkwardly wondering what the kid had been staring at. He looked back at the kid who was still staring and was now grinning at him, ear to ear.

“Uh, hi, kid. What are you, uh, drawing there?” John tried to break the tension with a casual question. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the nurse looking at him again. He glanced up and saw a strange look of perplexity and fear as she glanced around the room before she looked back down to avoid his gaze.

She had reacted as though he was talking to himself. John shrugged and looked back at the kid, who had returned his intense focus back to the black paper.

More than an hour later, a few more awkward glances at the nurse and uninterrupted coloring from the boy, John was still waiting. The infomercial was still going, but the man in the terrible polyester suit was now shouting at the woman at the top of his lungs, screaming about the benefits of… something… in mere minutes, no, seconds. The woman's eyes were wide with excitement or fear, her face frozen in a big fake smile. He had backed her into a corner of the studio and was waving his hands wildly above his head.

John stood up and walked to the desk. She rolled backwards in her chair a few inches as he approached.

“Is there going to be much more of a wait?” he asked, annoyed.

She stared at him for a second before answering, “Yes, we’re pretty busy.”

John looked around the waiting room. It was just him and the weird boy.

“Can you just call me when it’s my turn or something?” He sighed in exasperation.

“S-sure,” she replied, a little too quickly. “I have your number.” She gave him a forced smile and didn’t make a move toward confirming the information in his paperwork, still sitting on the counter, untouched.

John remembered the Wendy’s on the main road through town. It was a short walk, less than a mile, but he had been outside all day with nothing but a terrible BuzzCola to drink. The nurse had a glass-front mini-fridge behind the desk, full of water bottles.

“Can I take a water?”

“Sorry,” she said, the forced smile unchanged. “Those waters are…” she looked around. “...old.”

An open bottle sat halfway hidden behind the sliding window.

John rolled his eyes. He would find a different doctor. Or maybe not, he felt fine - mostly. Well, he felt weird, but it wasn’t the kind of weird that came with a head wound.

John pushed open the glass office doors and walked outside into the not-bright-anymore sun.

“Was it some kind of eclipse?” he wondered to himself. “An all-day eclipse? Was that a thing?”

He looked back at the worst doctor’s office ever. He could see the nurse looking relieved at his exit as the door slowly closed. The nurse’s face disappeared, like a burial, behind the lowering door. In her place, a black figure surfaced behind the inky black glass, red eyes boring into his. John inhaled sharply and stared back, frozen. He was about to run back to the office and catch this strange phantom when a car flew past, way too fast for a parking lot, and nearly clipped him.

“Watch it!” he yelled and banged the trunk with his fist. The driver didn’t react.

When John turned around again, the black figure was gone. He stood for a few more seconds, shook his head, and started walking to the Wendy’s to meet Bill and Ned.

Once again, his vision bobbed up and down, but his surroundings passed lazily, like a dream about walking down the sidewalk. He stared straight ahead, stopping only to move out of the way of some people who nearly ran into him as they walked past.

“Rude,” he thought, and kept walking.

John arrived at the main road and turned right, away from the Wendy’s, with only a vague thought about where he was going. The sun on the pavement felt heavier here, as if each shimmered mirage was pulling him forward. He told himself it was just to clear his head, a short walk before heading back to his friends, but he never remembered to turn around.

He walked for hours, days, centuries, the sun only moving a few degrees in the sky. It was late afternoon. He found himself on the highway going back to the trail from that morning. A black figure was standing on the side of the road. John walked past, nodding at it. The red eyes nodded back, welcoming him.

The crunch of the gravel eventually faded. His feet were miles away. The sound came from the other side of the earth. He passed the massive arch, its legs straddling the hill. He looked up and nodded a greeting to it, too. It didn’t seem so silly anymore. Greeting a friend is normal. Expected.

John arrived at the edge of the hill and looked down. Now it all made sense.

He looked up at the dulled sun, not bothering to squint. He surveyed the deep red mountains, the waves of sandstone and shale seeming to flow again as they had billions of years ago. The eye of the arch watching and the belly of the canyon waiting.

The dim lights of the stereo, lulling him to sleep on his mother’s shoulder.
Racing his bicycle down the street to beat his brothers, dad cheering them on.
Pulling his prom date close for a picture, her pink hair brushing his neck.

He heard the familiar rumble of the old V8 until it stopped behind him.

Her pink hair resting on her shoulders above the white of a wedding dress.
His hand on her waist, pulling her close for a picture on a mountain trail.
Pink hair on the pillow slipping through his fingers, her breath in his ear, his hand on her thigh.

“Are you done?” the old man asked, gruffly, unused to patience.

Opening his front door, she sits on the couch, the baby gulping and sighing and falling asleep on her bare chest.
The boys jumping off the bunk bed at bedtime, avoiding their toothbrushes, laughing hysterically.
Snapping a picture of a teenage girl in a long pink prom dress, leaning on a sports car she couldn’t drive yet.

John turned slightly and looked at the goat-like symbol on the hood of the truck.

Her lips on his cheek and one hand on his back.
‘Have fun, I’ll see you in a week.’
She turns and walks away, her hair still pink after all these years.

“Yeah. Let’s go.”

It wasn’t as good the second time around, anyways. And there was nothing else like her.

He took one last look at the base of the hill.

He could see, with perfect clarity, the few ants that crawled on his arms and legs and the trickle of blood that had dripped from the back of his head onto a small rock and ran a few inches into the dust toward the tunnel before drying up. The rock was almost exactly pyramid shaped — perfect for breaking the back of a skull and cleanly severing a brainstem.

He turned around and walked to the old truck, opened the creaky old door, and pulled it shut. Chunks of red rust broke off into the dirt and floorboards. He leaned his head against the window and watched the rocks and formations drift past.

“Where to?” John asked as they disappeared into the blowing red dust.