“Wow.”
I held her in front of me between my arms and I agreed, I could see why ancient people could have entire histories and countless stories by just staring at the sky at night.
“See that strip? That’s the Milky Way.” More awed noises.
“There’s a whole cluster that I can only see from the corner of my eyes.” It was weird.
“Oh! That’s my dad’s favorite, it’s called the… Pleiades cluster?”
“Huh, thanks Duck. It’s a cool one.”
“Make a wish!” we both called as a shooting star shot right above our heads. It even seemed kind of close.
After a bit, she looked around and rubbed her arms, “It’s kind of creepy out here.”
I joined her in evaluating our surroundings, she wasn’t wrong. Having lived in cities our entire lives and suddenly being alone, ALONE, out here was something different. Even if I did enjoy camping, this was a bit more remote than what we had usually done. There was nothing out here except what we brought in, no water, no toilets, nobody else.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep, it’s too quiet.”
“I think I can help with that,” my hands started to drift. We retired to the tent and fooled around a bit, though not all the way. She was saving herself for ‘marriage’. An antiquated concept, but you take the great with the not-so-great.
“Tom?”
I wearily opened my half-lidded eyes, “Yeah, Duck?”
“It’s creepy out here, I feel like anything can be just past the tent.”
I debated leaving her to it, but it was the first time we’d ever been camping this far out and I didn’t want it to be a one time thing. I really didn’t want to glamp or go to a place that had boomboxes blaring to either side of our spot. This time we were next to the car, but still pretty remote. The time after, I’d convince her to hike in to a camp spot.
“Here, I have an idea.” I’d been wanting to do something like this, so I dressed and unzipped the tent, “Get dressed, I need you to hold the light.”
I ignored her questions as I used a knife to drill holes through the cans that we had used to make dinner, we had used four and I took out another two empties I had in my trunk. Then I wrapped thick fishing wire between trees and around our campsite, running them through the holes in the cans and stringing them up.
“All better now!” I admired my handiwork.
“What… did you actually do?”
I scoffed, “Walk through it!”
She walked forward and stepped over the wire, I rolled my eyes.
“You won’t be able to see the wire unless you have a flashlight, Duck. And we’ll be able to see that easily from the tent, otherwise…” I knocked my leg against the wire and the cans rattled, loud in the quiet of our surroundings, “Alarm system”, my test had knocked the fish wire down a bit so I repositioned the set up, tightened some parts, and secured it all with a couple of sticks I found nearby. V.2 worked perfectly. Much more secure.
She leaned in close and wrapped her arms around me and gave me a long kiss, “My knight, nobly protecting ducks like me, I feel much safer now.” I knew she was joking but the warmth and appreciation was real.
“Where are you going?”
“Little girl’s room.” She looked cautiously around at the somewhat ominous surroundings.
I smirked, “Just go anywhere.”
I didn’t even need light to see the scandalized look on her face, “And then you’ll be able to see it during the day! Your master plan is revealed.”
I rolled my eyes at that, “Yes, my master plan is to see your poop, you’ve foiled me once again, dastardly duck!” I shook my fist in outrage.
She hissed, “I knew it!”
“Well unless you want to dig a hole just go,” I waved my hand, “Somewhere over there and bury it in the morning.”
“Then you can see me poop AND see my poop!”
“Duuuck…” I groaned but still stood up and stepped over the can wire then opened my car to grab the portable shovel and started to dig.
“Can you do it behind the car? I don’t want you to watch.”
“At this rate I’m never going to be able to watch you poop.”
I laughed at her sharp intake of breath, but still, I moved to put her poop-hole on the other side of the car from the camp.
“Ok, now back to camp, my poop-watching voyeur knight.”
I rolled my eyes, went back to our camp, stepping over my alarm system and sitting in the camping chair around the dead fire. I debated starting it up again as I watched the light on the other side of the car.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
“Face the other way!”
I sighed and made noises like I was turning my chair then called, “Let me know if you need any help!”
“Thank you for the offer my love, ‘noooo thank you!’” The final part came in a sing-song lilt. “And you didn’t turn around, I can tell!” She turned off the light and I grumbled as I actually did turn my chair around this time.
I looked up to the stars and lost myself in them.
There was a burst of light from behind me, like a shooting star had just hit the ground, but different, reversed. I wasn’t really able to pay that much attention to dissecting the new visual input, because of the sound that came in the same fraction of a second.
It wasn't the sound of a bone breaking, I’ve heard that before. It wasn’t a twig breaking either, not even a branch. It was everything and nothing. I heard EVERYTHING ‘snap’.
“Casey?” I couldn’t hear her respond.
“Duck! Where are you?” Nothing, again.
I looked around in a slight panic but couldn’t see her, maybe she had gone to the car.
I put my hands around my mouth and shouted toward it, “Casey!”
Then I noticed I couldn’t even hear my own voice. I looked around and didn’t see her anywhere. I freaked out and ran toward the car as fast as the moonlit illumination allowed. My feet tangled in something and I hit the ground face-first, an ill-placed rock knocking me senseless.
----------------------------------------
My head was absolutely killing me when I came to. I wasn’t unconscious for that long, I knew that people being knocked out for hours was an incredibly unlikely ‘movie’-thing, that amount of time spent unconscious was more likely to kill them than anything else.
Still, I laid there dazed for a few seconds, thoughts jumbled and scattered, difficult to hold onto. My bell definitely got rung from that one. The fact that I couldn’t hear anything at all didn’t help the disorientation. I turned on the small light on my keychain and looked to my feet and saw the fish wire, still holding up, perhaps a bit lower than it had been before. Yeah, that made sense. I felt a small surge of pride at the sturdy construction, even if it had been to my detriment.
Duck.
I scrambled up, a faint spell of dizziness almost sending me back down again before I stabilized myself.
I called again, “Duck? Casey!”
It felt like I was forming the words correctly but I couldn’t hear it at all. I existed in a world of perfect silence. Whatever it was, maybe it was just affecting me. Though the fact that she wasn’t heading toward my voice wasn’t exactly good evidence for my first assumption. I had been on the ground for a decent period of time after calling her name. Even if it was only me that had been struck deaf, she should have made her way back to the campsite and saw me.
A small, dim bit of light helped navigate my way around my truck. I was confused, then horrified.
Her clothes, ALL her clothes were in a pile, her socks still in her shoes, the larger flashlight still and unlit on the ground. My heart raced and I felt it pulse in my head before I managed to wrangle it down to a dull pumping roar. She was missing AND naked. Did someone take her? Shitshitshit.
I grabbed the larger flashlight and called out again. Nothing. I went back to the car and clicked the keyfob and pulled at the handle, nearly ripping my shoulder off at the unexpected result of it not being unlocked. I fumbled with the keys a bit then manually unlocked it and pulled out my .45 and slid the action back to load a round in the chamber.
Flashlight and gun in hand I went back to her clothes and moved them aside. Her .38 was in the holster I had her carrying it in, to get her familiar with carrying it, to stop thinking of it as some unfamiliar, dangerous, thing. Lot of good that did her. Shit. I took it off her belt and slipped the gun and holster into my pocket.
I called again and got nothing, I had to fight down the urge to go scrambling through the bushes. If I couldn’t hear anything but whoever, or whatever, took her could still hear, then it would only be a bad thing to continue calling out. It’s not like I could hear her respond anyway. I grimaced but cooled myself down, I’ve thought through plenty of these types of situations before. Look for tracks.
I scanned my flashlight around the area surrounding the hole and saw a few footprints, they all centered the area though. I grabbed her shoe to check the print and it was the same… but there was another! I almost sprinted to follow before a subconscious hint had me picking up my own foot to check my sole. Shit. Same print. I flashed the beam of light around the spot, a small pair of eyes stared back for an uncomfortable amount of time before darting off in the underbrush but nothing looked particularly disturbed. This was bad, I needed to work my way from the beginning, then figure something out from there.
I looked down at her piles of clothes and carefully rummaged through them. An animal? No, there weren’t any signs of struggle, no tears, nothing like that. I unzipped her jacket and couldn't figure out what felt wrong about it, then it hit me as I tugged on her long sleeve shirt underneath it. The sleeves were fully inside the arms of the jacket. I remembered something and looked back toward her shoes, her socks were completely inside her shoes as well.
How long had I been out? This would have taken time and conscious effort for her to have removed her clothes and rearranged them like this. For someone else to have done this? Without any signs of struggle? No excessively disturbed tracks? Impossible. It didn’t add up. I lifted the rest of her clothes up and shined the light in the hole I had dug a bit ago. I found poop.
I couldn’t help my imagination flashing the scene of her calling me out for looking at her poop. I could almost hear her cackling. My brow furrowed as I spooled down my imagination. If she ever called me out again. I looked around for something, anything, trying to recall my surroundings as I saw them in the day. We were camping in the entrance to a valley and miles away from anything. I needed to be able to see better, then maybe I would be able to see her. It was dark out here and chances were good that if someone took her then they would be using a flashlight out here. I needed a better perspective. It was dark as sin and I headed toward the start of one of the large hills, or mini mountains, and started to climb.
After nearly shooting myself while trying to stabilize myself I put my handgun away. No sense in killing myself. I couldn’t wound myself either, if something happened to me then Casey would be… well in a bad spot.
I cursed myself for the stupid camp trap I had put up, I would have been there right away if I hadn’t knocked myself stupid. I was getting worried now, my hearing had no indication that it would be coming back soon and my concern for her was settling in as a deep sense of bone-twisting, gut-clenching dread. A small cube in my pocket felt like it was burning a hole directly through the meat of my thigh. I blinked away the water that threatened my vision and put the flashlight in my mouth. I needed both hands, I had to climb faster.
I broke through the final layer of scrub and covered in scratches and small bruises, I pulled myself to the top. The moonlight clearly illuminated the barren surroundings of the top of the hill and I turned off the light. Hearing was definitely one of the more important senses, but sight was still king. I looked in each direction, then waited for my sight to readjust to the dimmer moonlight and did it again. Nothing. Dim darkness surrounded me on all sides. Even for me, this was starting to feel dangerous at this point. I familiarized myself with the direction I had come. I could faintly see the moon reflected from the metal of my car. I turned to look and kept that direction in my mind as I turned another loop, still desperately searching for any trace. I stayed near the side I had climbed up, it wouldn’t do to get myself lost as well.
“Cas-!”