The sun hadn't yet climbed the horizon when Mark pulled off the empty road. The sky was still bruised with night, pale light creeping in from the east like a secret trying to break free. His eyes, bloodshot from too little sleep and too much adrenaline, scanned the desolate stretch ahead.
The town--if you could call it that--rose like a fever dream from the dust. No name on a sign. No welcome. Just a scattering of low, squatting buildings, hunched against the wind like they regretted being born. They looked the way the desert felt: sun-bleached, exhausted, forgotten.
He rolled into it at thirty-five miles per hour, the rental car's tires kicking up little flurries of grit. Everything about this place told him to keep going--but he couldn't. The tank was nearly empty, and he needed caffeine, direction, and maybe… maybe just a single thread of information. Something to help him understand why someone was following him.
He hadn't spoken to another human being since the morning of Day 1. Not really. Not with honesty. Not with both eyes open.
The gas station was the first thing he saw.
It looked abandoned at first glance--an old single-pump setup beside a cracked concrete storefront. Rust had devoured the signage, and a bent flagpole jutted from the side, limp and forgotten. But when he stepped out, the door creaked open. A man with skin like tanned leather and eyes too sharp for someone his age stood behind the counter. He didn't smile. Didn't blink.
Mark filled the tank in silence, trying not to look at the man too long. He felt the gaze on his back, like a weight. When he stepped inside to pay, the clerk slid a receipt toward him without a word.
Mark paused. "You got a café around here?"
The man said nothing. Just gave a small nod, chin jutting toward the opposite side of the street.
Across the road sat a building that didn't quite qualify as a diner. Whitewashed bricks, windows smeared with dust and handprints, and a faded awning flapping loosely in the hot wind. The letters above the door might have once said CAFÉ, but the "F" was gone, leaving it to read CAE.
Mark crossed the street slowly, his every step dragging eyes from unseen corners.
Inside, the café smelled like overcooked bacon and sour coffee. A ceiling fan churned uselessly above, blades thick with grime. Six patrons were scattered throughout--an old man hunched over a paper, two dusty truckers with mirrored sunglasses resting on their collars, a young woman cleaning a table, and a waitress behind the counter who looked like she'd smoked through her twenties and hadn't stopped since.
Mark sat at the counter.
The waitress didn't ask what he wanted. Just poured the coffee and pushed the chipped cup toward him with a sigh like she'd seen too many of him pass through.
He sipped. It was burnt.
Silence stretched around him. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved with urgency. But everyone watched.
From the reflection in the silver napkin dispenser, he could see eyes flicking his way, quickly, furtively. He hadn't said a word, but somehow they knew.
That's when she appeared.
An older woman with sun-wrinkled skin, a face lined like a roadmap of regret and sunburns. She moved with that dry, sandpaper grace of someone who belonged to the desert. Her eyes were cloudy, but her voice was clear.
She stopped beside him and leaned in close.
"You're being followed," she said.
Mark stiffened. "What?"
She didn't repeat herself. Just gave a thin, knowing smile, like she'd told him something he already knew. Then she turned and walked straight out the café's back door, never once looking back.
Mark stared after her, coffee cooling in his hand. His pulse ticked up, not fast--just enough to remind him he was alive. He left a few crumpled bills on the counter and stepped back outside.
There it was.
The motorbike.
Black. Polished. Immaculate. It leaned casually against the side of the post office like it had every right to be there. Dust hadn't touched it. The helmet, resting on the seat, was glossy black with a mirrored visor.
But Mark knew.
He hadn't seen it on Day 1. Maybe not even on Day 2. But now that he was looking, the memory slotted into place like a puzzle piece. It had been behind him yesterday, far off in his rearview, too far to raise alarm. Just close enough to always be the same distance away.
His skin prickled.
He got in the car that he just rented and drove.
---
He didn't go far.
Three miles out of town, he pulled onto a dirt trail that looped behind a low ridge. From here, he could see the highway in both directions, framed by dry brush and cacti. The wind whistled through the rocks, carrying the heat and silence in equal measure.
Mark turned off the ignition and waited.
He knew the rules: make three right turns and see if someone follows. Check your six. Use reflections. Walk into a crowd, then double back. But the desert didn't offer crowds or cover. Just open sky and the quiet judgment of the land.
So he made his own trap.
When the sun began to fall, turning the horizon to blood and fire, he saw it.
The bike.
A black dot gliding along the road. No headlights. No hurry. Just… there.
Mark ducked behind a boulder, heart beating hard but steady. He watched the bike pass. It didn't stop. Didn't slow.
But it didn't need to.
The rider knew exactly where he was.
Mark waited another twenty minutes, then returned to the car. He drove the opposite direction, cutting across a wash, kicking up dust that would cover his tracks for an hour, maybe two.
He didn't stop until he reached a bluff overlooking the valley.
The sky was darker now, ink bleeding into the edges of the world. Stars flickered like sparks over a dying fire.
He took out his binoculars and scanned the area. Nothing. No lights. No movement.
But still…
He couldn't shake the feeling.
---
That night, he didn't check into a motel. Instead, he parked beside an abandoned water tower, the skeletal remains of a ghost station. Inside the car, he laid keeping the knife near him.
The wind howled around the structure, groaning through the rusted beams. Occasionally, something skittered across the roof--animal or spirit, he wasn't sure.
Mark didn't sleep.
He stared through the windshield, eyes burning, watching the horizon for the faint red blink of a tail light… the gleam of a helmet.
Nothing came.
But it would.
Of that, he was sure.
---
***
A/N: he should sleep *really*.
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