Bard Hill walked toward the fluorescent-lit gas station sitting just beyond the edge of town. A pair of original neon signs still burned above the building, one pink and one green, though both remained lit, making it impossible to tell whether the place was open or closed.
He and the station were about all that occupied the narrow road. It cut between two walls of pine forest like a drunk cutting a cake. Wind shook the trees violently. The rain moaned awkwardly like a camel.
The building looked older than the road itself. Water poured from the parapets on either side of the doorway, converging into a shallow river that rushed down the decrepit concrete steps. One of the front windows had been boarded from the inside, while another flickered faintly with television light.
Bard stepped onto the cracked concrete leading to the entrance when something burst upward from beneath the awning.
He recoiled as a wild mass of movement exploded into the rain with the sound of wet cloth and frantic scratching. Dozens of bats spiraled into the storm above him, their wings catching flashes of pink and green beneath the dying neon before they vanished into the trees.
Bard stood motionless for a moment, his pulse hammering in his chest. The ringing in his ears slowly subsided until only the rain and wind remained.
One bat still hung upside down above the doorway. It swayed slightly, as though watching him.
Bard stared at it for several seconds, noticing a small patch of white hair on its head, then pushed through the door.
A brass bell rang overhead as warm, stale air rolled over him carrying the smell of burnt coffee, wet cardboard, gasoline, old fryer grease, and beneath all of it, the unmistakable stink of cat litter laced with shit.
The fluorescent lights buzzed inconsistently overhead. Narrow aisles were lined with faded cans and dusty bottles. Somewhere in the building, a radio crackled through static.
The cashier didn’t look up.
Bard walked to the humming refrigerators along the back wall and reached for a case of bottled water. He put it back and selected one with a less sun-bleached label before carrying it to an abandoned cart. He moved through the aisles, filling the cart with canned beans, soup, ravioli, peaches, and toilet paper. At one cooler he grabbed a can of Monster.
Near the end of the aisle, a massive white-haired metalhead in a faded black band shirt suddenly body-slammed a small case of bottled water he was stacking. The man turned and stared viciously at Bard.
Bard ignored him.
He pushed the cart a little faster, wondering how the gas station had managed to employ a half-starved troll that wandered in from the woods.
For a moment, he stopped and took the place in. Between the stale air, flickering lights, and storm battering the windows, it felt less like a business than some roadside den.
At the register sat a squat, heavy-set woman with long brown hair, speaking quietly to herself about a disappointing dinner. She didn’t seem to notice Bard as he began setting cans on the counter. He lifted the case of water beside them.
“Can I get a gallon of gas, too?”
The woman snapped her head toward the back of the store.
“¡Padre!”
Then she turned to Bard.
“He has to turn on the pumps, if you can wake him…”
Her voice changed completely.
“Twenty-five dollars.”
Behind her, an ancient man sat with his eyes closed, clutching a paperback western in both hands while the radio hissed through static.
Outside, thunder rolled through the pine forest like something enormous moving between the trees.
Bard paid and collected his things into a cardboard box, pushing the Monster into his pants pocket.
“Yeah,” Bard said, lifting his wet red gas can slightly. “I need some gas.”
The old man didn’t stir.
Actually, it was hard to tell if he was alive.
“Some gas?” Bard repeated.
Several minutes later, Bard was back outside in the spiraling wind and rain. He made the mistake of looking toward the woods and shuddered. Everything looked indistinguishable right about now.
He shook his aching head, chuckled lightly, and closed his eyes.
The pop of the gas dispenser made him jump.
Even standing in the rain, he’d nearly dozed off. It couldn’t have been more than a few seconds.
Bard returned the dispenser to its holster on the ancient pump. He was surprised the thing still worked, but really didn’t care why.
When he looked through the windows, the woman had disappeared somewhere into the back of the station. Only the fluorescent lights remained, humming over the empty counter while rain drummed against the building.
The old man was gone too.
The place felt strangely vacant, as though it had resumed waiting for something after briefly tolerating his presence.
The storm had intensified while he was inside. Rain swept across the road in silver sheets, and the forest on either side appeared to lean inward beneath the wind. Bard adjusted his grip on the red gas can and started back the way he’d come.
His car waited somewhere down the road. He was ready to leave the station behind.
Nothing about the encounter had been threatening exactly. Just strange. The woman talking to herself. The old man who might have been asleep or dead. The metalhead throwing bottled water around.
The bats.
Whatever.
Bard kept walking.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
The station’s radio played faintly behind him, fragments of sound surfacing whenever the wind shifted before disappearing again beneath the storm.
He’d gone maybe a hundred yards when another sound emerged from the darkness. At first, he mistook it for wind moving through the trees.
Then it came again.
A siren.
Bard stopped.
The sound faded almost immediately, leaving him alone with the rain and swaying forest. He waited, but heard nothing.
He resumed walking.
A few moments later, the siren returned. This time it lasted longer.
Bard stopped again and listened. Something about it sounded distant and wrong.
He looked back toward the station. Its neon signs had become little more than pink and green smears in the rain. From the woods behind it, a pulse of red light briefly illuminated the low clouds before vanishing.
Several moments later, another flash followed.
Blue.
Bard turned and ran.
The cardboard box shifted immediately in his arms. A can of peaches rolled free and vanished into the darkness. The case of water slammed against his chest as he fought to keep hold of everything.
Between strikes of thunder, the siren howled.
His boot struck a large rock. Bard stumbled, and his toilet paper went flying into a puddle.
“NO!”
He nearly stopped for it.
Ahead, his red Honda Civic sat along the road where he’d left it. Bard sprinted the remaining distance, dropped his supplies, and began pouring gasoline into the tank.
An engine roared somewhere behind him.
“Come on.”
He emptied what he could, capped the red can, and scrambled into the Civic.
The engine cranked.
Nothing.
Again.
Nothing.
“Come on.”
He turned the key.
The engine fired.
Bard threw the car into gear and sped into the night just as a vintage police vehicle came into view around the bend. Between turns in the winding road, he caught glimpses of its long, angular body in the rearview mirror, red and blue lights flashing across the wet pavement.
It gained on him.
Bard pushed the Civic close to seventy.
The road twisted sharply. The tires broke loose, and the Civic began sliding sideways. Bard fought the wheel until he felt the tires catch again and straightened out.
He checked the mirror.
Nothing.
Another turn.
Still nothing.
He’d lost them.
For the moment.
Bard slowed and reached across to open the glove box. A folded road map spilled into his lap.
Where did this road go?
He wasn’t even certain he’d been here before. Better to put some distance between himself and the cops before stopping to figure it out. He kept driving, searching the roadside for a forest road, turnoff, anything that might get him out of sight.
Ten minutes later, Bard sat with the map spread across the steering wheel.
Behind it, his gas light glowed.
He stared at it.
“Of course.”
Cool forest air drifted through the open window, carrying the clean smell of rain and pine into the car.
His finger traced a thin forest road across the map. If the thing still existed, it would eventually reconnect with Route 4 somewhere behind where he’d last seen the police.
It looked like the turn was less than a mile ahead.
He was somewhere between Jemez and Valle Grande.
Good enough.
The dirt road rumbled beneath the Civic’s tires as Bard drove into the black. Calling it a road was generous. Massive divots scarred the earth. In places, his tires rode along narrow ridges of raised dirt with drops on either side deep enough to make him wonder whether the Civic would come back out if he slipped into one.
Bard leaned toward the windshield. His eyes felt like they were bleeding.
He just needed somewhere to stop. Somewhere quiet. He could camp out, sleep, and double back toward his little camper and base of operations once this shit had passed.
Then something glimmered between the trees ahead.
Blue.
Red.
Bard stared.
“No… fuckin’… way.”
The lights flashed again.
Police.
Ahead of him.
Their siren was off.
Bard scanned the trees for another route.
Nothing.
Nothing.
There.
A patch of grass opened between two trunks.
He turned the wheel and drove through.
The Civic made it about ten feet before it began sinking.
Mud.
Bard stomped the gas. The tires spun, throwing muck as the car sank deeper.
“Fuck.”
He let off.
The red and blue lights were getting brighter.
For a moment, Bard sat there assessing the situation. Then he shut off the engine and climbed through the open window onto the roof.
The Civic had driven straight into a hidden mud pit. There was no chance he was getting it out before the police arrived.
A low branch stretched over the car. Bard grabbed it, pulled himself up, and shimmied toward the trunk before dropping onto firm ground.
Thankfully, the trees around here were enormous.
He moved deeper into the forest as the flickering lights drew closer. Bard found a cluster of bushes beneath one of the trees and crouched where he could still see the Civic through the branches.
Several minutes passed.
The approaching engine grew nearly as loud as the rain.
Then the police car came into view.
The rain stopped.
Not weakened.
Stopped.
The vehicle pulled up near Bard’s Civic without entering the mud. Lightning flashed somewhere beyond the trees.
The passenger door opened.
A man stepped out wearing an unusual black police uniform.
Black aviator sunglasses covered his eyes.
At night.
Not a drop of rain clung to them.
A wide-brimmed black cowboy hat shadowed the rest of his face.
Bard’s heart pounded.
Yup.
Same guys as yesterday.
He slowly retreated farther into the darkness.
“We know you’re here!” the cop shouted.
Bard froze.
“We’re going to find you!”
He ran.
Plants whipped his arms and face as he pushed blindly through the forest. Branches clawed at his clothes. He kept expecting flashlight beams to appear behind him.
Nothing did.
After several minutes, Bard stopped and listened.
Nothing.
No voices. No footsteps. No flashlights cutting through the trees.
They didn’t seem to be chasing him.
His eyes had adjusted somewhat to the fierce darkness.
He turned.
Someone stood five feet away.
Bard stopped breathing.
The figure lurched forward.
“Fuck!”
He bolted.
Bard looked back as he ran.
His foot caught something.
His body twisted backward.
He expected the ground to slam into him.
It didn’t.
There was no ground.
Bard fell backward into the earth.
For an instant, there was only a small glimpse of sky above him.
Then complete darkness.