Chapter 66: Barren

Chapter 66: Chapter 66: Barren

Chapter 66: Barren

"Big Bob" Carter glanced confidently at the family packed into the vehicle and continued driving deeper into the desert. With him were his wife Ethel, their children Lynn, Brenda, and Bobby, Lynn’s husband Doug Bukowski, and baby Catherine. Bob had originally imagined the trip as a spontaneous family vacation around his wedding anniversary, hoping that a few days on the road might also repair some of the tension that had grown between him and his children.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Carter family had long since become accustomed to Bob making decisions with far more confidence than preparation. When he proudly announced that another vehicle was following them, nobody looked particularly reassured. If anything, several of them were wondering which unfortunate strangers had made the mistake of assuming Bob knew where he was going.

Bob ignored their doubtful expressions and kept both hands firmly on the wheel. "See? I told you this road had to lead somewhere." The white box truck behind them remained visible through the rear window, and Bob took its continued presence as confirmation that his instincts had been right.

That confidence survived for another few hours.

As the sun dropped lower, the highway still failed to reappear. The rough road stretched endlessly through barren New Mexico desert, while scrub, dust, and rocky hills replaced almost every sign of civilization. Even Bob finally began looking from the road to the mirrors with increasing uncertainty.

"That doesn’t make sense," he muttered. "People use this road. There has to be a way back to the highway somewhere." The headlights were becoming more important by the minute, and the empty terrain beyond their beams seemed to swallow the road ahead.

Doug had been studying their map from the back seat for some time. Eventually, he leaned forward and said, "Bob, I can’t find this road anywhere. We may have actually taken the wrong turn." He glanced through the rear window toward the white truck and added, "And I’m starting to think those guys behind us aren’t locals either. They might just be following because they think we know where we’re going."

Bob immediately frowned. Having his son-in-law point out the possibility was somehow worse than simply being lost. "No chance. They’ve stayed behind us for hours, so they must know this route too."

Doug gave him a look that said exactly what he thought of that logic.

Bob cleared his throat. "Fine. I’ll ask them."

He switched on his hazard lights and eased the family vehicle to the side of the rough road. When Axel Vance saw the Carter vehicle stop ahead, he brought Seth’s old cleaning-company box truck to a halt behind it. Seth Brundle looked through the windshield and smiled.

"Maybe they’re stopping to camp."

Axel glanced at the darkening horizon. "Or maybe we finally reached wherever they were going." He added that if the Carters actually lived around the region, there was at least a chance they had heard rumors about the abandoned federal testing facility Seth was supposed to visit.

Seth immediately shook his head. "I wouldn’t count on that. The facility barely exists in the records available to people inside the government." He looked toward the Carter vehicle and added, "Someone could probably live ten miles from it their whole life without knowing what’s actually there."

While they spoke, two men climbed from the vehicle ahead. One was the middle-aged driver Axel had seen at the gas station, while the other was a younger man who appeared to be his son-in-law. Bob walked toward Axel’s window wearing the confident smile of someone determined not to admit anything was wrong.

"Hey, guys," Bob said after Axel lowered the window. "You taking this shortcut too? How are the roads farther ahead?"

The truck went quiet.

From the back, Lionel slowly leaned forward between the seats. "Shortcut?"

Bob’s smile faltered.

Lionel pointed toward the vehicle ahead. "We’ve been following you this entire time."

Bob stared at him.

"You were following me?"

Seth’s eyebrows slowly pulled together. "Wait. You’re not from around here?"

Bob’s face changed.

Seth leaned toward the open window. "We’re from Florida. You turned off that highway like you’d been driving this road since birth, so we assumed you knew a shortcut."

For several seconds, nobody spoke.

Axel looked at Bob.

Bob looked at Seth.

Doug looked away, clearly trying not to laugh.

Both vehicles had spent hours traveling deeper into the desert because each group had assumed the other one knew where it was going.

Bob’s face slowly reddened. The presence of Doug beside him made the humiliation visibly worse, and Bob could practically feel his son-in-law’s unspoken judgment pressing into his back. He coughed twice and struggled to recover some dignity.

"Well... in that case, we should probably turn around." Bob gestured vaguely toward the road behind them. "We can go back to the gas station and ask the owner where we went wrong."

Axel nodded. "Best idea I’ve heard all afternoon."

The two vehicles turned around on the empty desert road and began retracing the long route they had just traveled. Inside the Carter vehicle, the atmosphere quickly became painfully awkward. Ethel crossed her arms and stared silently through the window, while Doug considered saying something reassuring before deciding there was probably nothing he could say that would help.

Bob attempted to start a conversation more than once, but each attempt died before leaving his mouth. In the end, he simply gripped the steering wheel tighter and drove faster than necessary. It looked as though he hoped sufficient speed could leave the embarrassment somewhere behind them in the desert.

The mood inside Seth’s truck was considerably better. Lionel leaned against one of the secured equipment crates and looked toward Seth with open satisfaction. "I told you that guy didn’t look like a local."

Seth refused to look at him.

Lionel grinned. "But no, apparently turning off a highway confidently makes somebody a desert survival expert."

"This is completely normal human behavior," Seth muttered while pretending to concentrate on his notebook. "In unfamiliar environments, people often follow whoever appears most confident, even when there’s no evidence that person actually knows what they’re doing." He paused before adding, "It’s a group-behavior problem, not a failure of scientific reasoning."

Lionel laughed. "Sure."

Axel ignored both of them and kept his attention on the road. The last portion of sunlight was disappearing beneath the horizon, painting the distant sky a deep blood-red that made the empty landscape look even more hostile. For reasons he could not fully explain, his unease had been steadily increasing since they turned around.

Something about the gas station bothered him.

It had seemed ordinary enough during daylight.

Now Axel was no longer convinced.

By the time the two vehicles finally returned, darkness had completely covered the desert. The gas station’s old illuminated sign was no longer glowing, and the building itself appeared black against the night. Only the headlights from the Carter vehicle and Seth’s truck cut across the abandoned forecourt.

Bob slowed to a stop.

"What the hell?"

He climbed out with Doug and walked quickly toward the convenience store. The front door was locked from inside, and repeated pulling did nothing except rattle the glass in its frame.

Bob moved to the nearest window and pressed close to the glass. "Hello? Anybody in there?" His voice carried across the silent station and disappeared into the desert without an answer.

Axel, Seth, and Lionel climbed from their truck as well. Lionel stretched until his back cracked and looked hopefully toward the dark store. "You’ve got to be kidding me. I was counting on this place having hot dogs."

Axel did not respond.

He approached the window and looked through it using the vehicle headlights.

The interior was wrong.

Several shelves were disordered, merchandise had fallen onto the floor, and an overturned coffee cup lay near the counter. More importantly, loose bills were scattered nearby as though whoever had been working there had left without bothering to collect the money.

Axel’s expression hardened. "This wasn’t a normal closing."

Seth stepped beside him and studied the scene. "Agreed. If the owner had simply shut down for the night, he wouldn’t leave cash scattered around and the store looking like somebody ran out halfway through doing something."

That possibility immediately changed the mood around the Carter family.

Ethel climbed from their vehicle and looked uneasily toward the empty station. Brenda, already badly unsettled by the desert and the failed shortcut, stayed close to her mother while staring into the darkness surrounding them. Bobby also watched the buildings carefully, no longer amused by his father’s mistake.

"Bob, nobody’s here," Ethel said. "We’re lost in the middle of nowhere and now the gas-station owner is gone too." Her concern was obvious, though she tried to keep her voice steady for the rest of the family.

Bob refused to let the situation frighten everyone further. He forced a smile and spread his arms toward the desert. "So what? We’re on vacation."

Ethel stared at him.

Bob continued before she could answer. "Camping somewhere unexpected still counts as camping. We’ve got food, water, supplies, and two vehicles, so there’s no reason to panic."

Then he looked toward Axel’s group.

"Guys, I owe you an apology for dragging you all the way out here," Bob said. "Why don’t you camp with us tonight? We’ve got plenty of food, and at least we can make something decent out of this disaster."

Axel considered the offer.

Three extra adults and an entire family nearby meant more eyes during the night, and moving around an unfamiliar desert after dark would accomplish very little. Whatever was wrong with the gas station could wait until morning unless something forced the issue first.

"Sure," Axel said. "More people is probably better tonight anyway."

Seth immediately turned toward him. "But—"

Axel gave him a slight shake of the head before lowering his voice. "We’re already somewhere near the region you wanted to search, and wandering around in complete darkness won’t make the research facility easier to find." He glanced toward the empty desert beyond the headlights. "It’ll just make it easier for us to disappear."

Seth reluctantly looked toward the black landscape.

Axel continued, "Tomorrow morning, they can head back toward civilization."

Then he looked in the direction of the abandoned testing grounds.

"And we’ll continue toward the research facility."

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