Young Writers Society

This place is nowhere.



Nowhere is not its name; that name has been long since forgotten. It is a description of what the place is. It may be in Arizona or Nevada or Nebraska or some other wide, endless state, but it is impossible to tell. The highway nearby is rarely in use, having been forgotten by the creation of one that spans even farther. Set to the side of this highway is what was once a successful truck stop and motel. But as the newer highways were favored over the old, they quietly went out of business. Like the highway they border, have been forgotten by civilization.



For whatever reason, you have ended up here. It is not my business to judge why you ended up in this godforsaken ruin of a building, but you are here and that is all that matters. But beware the darkness and the shadows - they are watching your every step. And when their hunger grows too strong, or you learn too much, they will waste no time in ending your life.

As Issac studied the yellowing map in the passenger's seat and Gabriel grew increasingly more agitated in the back seat, Sebastian was beginning to wish they had taken a different route to their destination. Night had begun to fall only minutes before, but Sebastian was already beginning to grow drowsy. It had been a long journey. As he was the only one with the proper paperwork to drive a car, he had been stuck behind the wheel for the duration of the entire day.

The GPS suddenly malfunctioning a few miles back hadn't helped. It had irritated them all more than they already were, and they had barely managed to convince Gabriel from leaving the car. They were lost, frustrated and very exhausted. They needed time to rest. It didn't take long for him to discover the perfect place to stay the night - an abandoned little motel and truck coming up on the side of highway.

Unsurprisingly, Gabriel loved the idea and Issac advised against it. But Sebastian was the one in the driver's seat, and he drove his old van into one of the less overgrown spots in the parking lot.

Bo shook the thought from his head as a grasshopper struck the side of his helmet, splatting across the glass, bug guts coming into his vision. Without really thinking, he flicked the remaining hopper carcass off and wiped the guts away with his hand. It was only immediately after that his entire face shriveled up into a disgusted wince and he mildly panicked, wiping his hand on his pants, his bike, anything to get it off.

All of that only a temporary distraction to the one returning thought in the circular motion of self-flagellation in his mind. He could never be rid of it: the guilt, the shame, the lingering ache of innocence lost. But he was escaping. He was running. And for the first time in his life he felt a freedom he had never known that was both relieving and completely daunting.

But it was a freedom that had gotten him lost.

He'd had a map, and the GPS on his phone was working until service got spotty. But for a long while, as his motorcycle sped across the open plains, he thought he knew where he was going. Now the scenery shifted, and what was once a newly paved road grew old, cracked, and weathered. Somewhere, somehow, he'd taken a wrong turn. And with nightfall only a few hours on the horizon, he wouldn't be able to keep speeding into the night.

Not unless he wanted to crash or something anyway. And dying wasn't exactly in his plans.

So as the musty figure of an old motel came into his view, along with a van in the parking lot, he figured, maybe if there was someone there, he could at least ask for directions.

He pulled up a few spaces from the van and hopped off, sliding his bug-gutty helmet off and tucking it under his arm. He waved to the people inside the van, gesturing for them to roll the window down so he could talk.

Would you wake up?

I believe we have training soon.

Taber opened his eyes, expecting to see familiar green eyes and blonde hair over his head. Instead, he was greeted with a brown ceiling, coated in dust and specks of green and black mold. A few holes allowed the light of the sun to stream through, highlighting the threadbare green bedsheets he'd slept in. He blinked, racking his brain in the hopes of figuring out where he'd been last night. Groggy as he was, he had no idea if he'd fallen asleep here.

Eh, it wasn't important. He'd find the others soon enough. Shoving aside the blankets, Taber sat up and yawned, his sense of calm only broken by the bedframe popping and creaking beneath him. Alarmed, he yelped and jumped off of the bed. He turned around to see the bed hadn't fallen to pieces. Still, it looked well, abandoned. He looked around. The floor was littered in holes, vines snaked through the shattered windows, water dripped from the ceiling, and the door to the room gently opened and shut in a light breeze.

He breathed a sigh of relief. This was normal - he slept in places like this all the time. Quietly laughing about his panic, Taber wrapped himself up in one of the bedsheets and made his way to the door. "Hey?" he said, pushing the door open and stepping into an empty hallway. "Anyone home?"

Raelynn didn't expect her rundown Volkswagon to pull into an empty lot of a restaurant. The dimming lights twinkled on and off, seemingly sending Morse code to the girl. She yawned, rubbing her hands over the wore down wheel. It had been a few hours since she left the previous place, a house that supposedly contained a violent ghost and children laughing that rang through the walls. Raelynn came up empty-handed, as usual, and left the house to just continue driving. Her mind was frantic and she hardly had any plans to go anywhere new. Now, in this empty parking lot with the flickering light, there was a gut feeling that told her that maybe this was the place she was meant to go.

Sighing, Raelynn turned off the bug. She then stepped out, slamming the door. Next to the empty restaurant was a motel. It was rundown, much like the restaurant, with brown outer walls and letters that didn't light up. Raelynn saw a van and a guy getting off his motorcycle. Maybe I could make some friends, she thought to herself. She quickly grabbed her bag in the passenger seat and headed over.

You're a monster, just like them.

Clarice swerved to the side, narrowly avoiding a collision with a tall, scratchy-looking bush. She gave it a glance as she rode past, only for her dirt bike to kick up a cloud of dust directly into her face.

Ugh. That's what she got for not wearing goggles or a helmet.

She slowed her bike and rubbed her eyes until her vision cleared enough to properly see her surroundings. When she finally looked up, Clarice noticed an abandoned-looking building on the horizon.

That wasn't there before.

The building's sudden 'appearance' was strange, but Clarice had been through stranger. She revved her engine for the fun of it and subtly adjusted her path so she could get a better view of the building.

She was closer now. By now, she could tell that the building was (or used to be) a motel and that there were people. Clarice found herself smiling; she hadn't slept in an actual building since she'd left Montana, and she hadn't spoken with someone in just as long.

She came to a sharp stop in front of the motel but didn't step off her bike. As much as Clarice wanted to stay and chat, she didn't know how safe these people would be.

As soon as Sebastian parked the car, people began to emerge from all sorts of places. It would be a stretch to call it a multitude of people; there was only a handful of them. But it was a handful more than there should have been, and that was a cause for concern.

Issac carefully folded the map up and slipped it into the pocket of his jacket, and went to open the door beside him. But before he could do so, one of the car's back doors went flying open. The two in the front turned to see Gabriel with his leg sticking out - he had kicked the door open.

Sebastian started to reprimand him, but Gabriel had already hopped out of the car. "Freedom!" he shouted. Issac sighed and finished opening the door. Sebastian followed suit, joining his friends when he left the car.

In just a few seconds, people were coming out of the woodwork as if the run down motel were some obscure meeting place. Except he knew none of these people. His eyes followed the girl approaching on a motorcycle - looking closely at the model and the type, sheerly out if curiosity. Then he realized it was a dirt bike. Oh well.

He spoke to the guys getting out of the car.

“It sounds like you’ve been on a long road trip, but I was wondering if any of you know anything about this area.”

Ahh, freedom. It's great.

As he rounded a corner, he glanced down the cliff side. There, down at the bottom, was a small down.
"Weird. It's not on any GPS," he mumbled to himself, though he didn't have time to dwell on it. The next turn came up quickly, and he threw the steering wheel of his Toyota Supra hard to the right. It seemed as if he had turned too far, and if anyone was watching, for a split second, it looked as if he was going to crash head first into the rock face. But, he didn't. He had played many a video game as a child and he was no stranger to twisty roads. Immediately, he threw the steering wheel the other way. Sideways, the car moved, a cloud of white tyre smoke being thrown up behind the car. The sound of his engine was bliss to his ears: that deep rumble that reminded him of a lion's roar, with the whistle of a turbo that reminded him of an angel. A wild grin came over his face as he took the next corner, his foot seducing the throttle with its light touches and minor adjustments.

<><><>

A few minutes later, he was driving calmly along the straight road, nearing the small town-like thing he had seen from the cliff. It reminded him of a film he saw once as a child. He wondered if it was anything similar to it.
He watched as people got out of their cars and off their motorcycles.
"...y'know I might as well," he said, slowing down as he neared the driveway in to the Motel's parking lot. Though his car's engine wasn't anything close to silent, it was much quieter than before when he was going ham on the twisty roads.

He pulled into a parking space opposite the other cars. Raiden stepped out his white Supra, locked the doors and pocketed the keys before walking over to the others with a silent, awkward wave.

Issac was the one who stepped forward while Sebastian studied the other people in the parking lot. They had arrived in a mixture of motorcycles and cars, a curious thing to note when they were so far from any major parts of civilization. What was even more concerning was how all of them had decided to stop at a place like this. They had come to the same decision themselves, but it took a special kind of person - or group of people - to decide that an abandoned truck stop and motel were the best place to spend the night.

"We don't know much about this area ourselves," Issac said. Something that might have been called a smile graced his lips, but there was an unnatural touch to it, as if it was an imitation of a smile and not a real one. "We were just driving through when we realized how late it was getting, and decided to spend the night here."

While Issac and Sebastian had been occupied with their respective tasks, Gabriel had wandered over to the truck stop. The sooner he could get away from that death trap of a car, the better. Besides, the building was more interesting than any human could be - it smelled absolutely horrible and had long ago fallen into a state of disrepair. He approached the window and peered inside. Even the interior looked like it hadn't been touched in years.

No one answered. Taber scratched his head. Maybe they were all outside? He could definitely hear noises coming through the busted windows in the hallway. Strange rumblings grew louder and louder, cutting off abruptly outside of the building. They didn't sound like horses, or wagons, or anything that he was familiar with. As many places as he'd gone, and as many things as he'd run into, he wasn't alarmed. It helped that the sounds of people walking around and talking filled him up with joy - the others had to be out there, waiting for him.

Taber ran to the nearest window and poked his head out. His heart sank. They all looked like strangers, dressed in strange clothes and getting out of stranger...things? He was reminded of carts without wheels. In any case, they all appeared to be stranded in the middle of some desolate town, with a couple partially-destroyed buildings scattered around. The building he was in stood next to a massive sign, but he couldn't quite read the text. It wasn't in a script he understood.

He wondered if he was back in his first home. Yet, the atmosphere felt different; it felt wrong. As much as he wanted to go and say hello to the newcomers, he felt safer watching them from his window, where he blended into the shadows. Hopefully nobody would notice him.

Clarice hesitantly got off of her dirt bike and made her way to the motel. She hesitantly approached one of the windows and, after checking that there was no broken glass, walked up to it. After running a hand across the glass to clear away the outermost coating of grime and sand, Clarice peered through the window.

She saw a creature peering back at her. A creature with fur and teeth and a number of inhuman features Clarice didn't even want to think about.

It took less than a second for Clarice to turn on her heel and book it back to her dirt bike, which she hastily hopped back up on. Drumming her fingers on the handlebars, she glanced anxiously back to the motel, checking that nothing had emerged.

"Not to alarm anyone," Clarice's voice was muffled slightly by her bandana, which she absentmindedly raised a hand to tighten. "But unless we've got a furry on our hands, there's a werewolf inside the motel."

Whoops. Taber barely had time to pull himself back from the window before the other person turned around and ran away. In retrospect, he should've expected someone to look back, but he'd kind of hoped they'd be too engrossed in their conversations to notice him. And, based on the surprised expression of the person who had seen him, his hiding spot had worked.

Afraid that the person would call for backup, or that anyone else might try to head inside, Taber ran back to the room he'd come from. He closed the door and crawled into the narrow gap between the bed and the floor, wrapping himself up in a blanket. Now they wouldn't be able to find him, even though he suspected he was pushing the bed off of the ground. And the door mechanism was too damaged to keep it shut. And every movement caused something to creak. But he was pretty hopeful this would work out.

Issac looked from the motorcyclist to the teenager. Sebastian focused his attention solely on her. And Gabriel, who had been in the middle of observing quite the interesting bug that was crawling across the pavement, shot up with a start. The words were shocking in the sense they had been unexpected, but, in retrospect, a werewolf was far from out of place. One would fit perfectly among the decaying halls and dusty floors of an abandoned motel.

It was Sebastian who addressed the comment, hand going for his bag even before he spoke. They were not newcomers to things like this, and they had everything they could possibly need at their disposal. "A werewolf?" he questioned. "Are you certain that's what you saw?"

Gabriel was already beginning to make his way back.

A werewolf?

Bo quickly fell into silence, despite his initial reaction being simply to say that werewolves don't exist. But these people didn't fling that word around in a joking matter, not did it seem like an act. They were... serious. Which in any case, made him being lost out here even more concerning. That meant that these guys were either exceptionally delusional, or that the supernatural was way more real that he had ever experienced or known. Both were unsettling options, but he preferred the former to a werewolf actually being real.