The Boys' Clinic

It took me a few seconds to realize I was utterly and completely lost...

Glancing back and forth, my eyes catching glimpses of every rock, tree branch, piece of bark, and mossy mound that could possibly surround me. Biting my lips hard as I swallowed back a sob. I reluctantly spun to face the unfortunate band of Rust playing, Naked and Afraid watching frat brothers I had convinced to tag along my spontaneous urge for an urban exploration. It was of an abandoned tuberculosis clinic from the 1800's. Entrusting me to lead them to the very remote, for the most part safe- passage. But now, I hadn't realized we hit a part of the trail where service was lost, and the Google maps on my screen frizzled out and rerouted. Now only loaded to where the 5 of us stood.

"Anthony, what's the matter bud?", wondered Dylan, while nervously clutching the strap to his backpack.

My teeth ground as I clenched my jaw.

"Anthony?", murmured John.

"Anthony?", Trenton pressed.

"Anthony what the fuck is going on", snapped Bryce.

I finally relented, cringing as I revealed,

" I lost service."

Silence pooled in. Every one of us, our eyes bounced off of each others'. Bryce glanced from where we came, a long corridor of brush and trees and barbed blackberry bushes, then to me, as I stood at the lead.

"Okay, well we haven't been walking for long. We hopped just off the highway into this woodland fuck all. So can't we just go back?"

John chimed in,

"Yeah, if you lost service now, it should have the route up until wherever we lost it."

All while Dylan frantically pulled out his own cellular device and thrust it into the heavens.

Hissing,

"He's right, I got no bars. Anywhere!".

"Okay okay, Barrymore. Chill out please. So we all head back?", Trenton gazed around at everyone's visage. Reading the room but coming up perplexed,

"Okay, you all look like a bunch of idgets right now", he sighed.

I still had one more thing to tell them , but my knuckles were peach white as they clasped my phone. Still staring at the dot where we stood. No blue trails highlighting the way in, nor out.

"Listen, see. That's. Erm, part of the problem, when it lost service. Started acting up, and then when the maps came back. It's just showing us, but the paths are gone."

"Randonautica bullshit, what the hell Anthony!"

"It's cause you have a fucking Samsung", Bryce said snidely as he peered to get a better look at my phone. Pulling it tighter to my chest I frowned.

"Hey, I didn't think we'd lose service, like John said we just left the highway, where there's service. So like, we aren't all dumb right? We start going back the way we came and it will come back."

I then moved to push by them, to sustain the image of a 'leader' I had wrapped myself up in. But then I halted right at the back of the crew, beside Bryce whom of which stared dubiously at me. They all did, really.

"What's going on in that brain of yours Anthony?", Trenton said slowly as he reached to ruffle up my shaved head.

I move to take a step forward, eyes shooting all ways around. Did we go this way? No, no it was this way, oh fuck oh fuck, I genuinely had no idea how to navigate back. The thought of which stole the air in my lungs. I felt exasperated.

"You have no fucking clue where we are. My god", Bryce snarled before he abruptly shoved past me, marching his way into the thickets before he stopped. Shot his glaring eyes back and motioned for the lot of us to follow. I huffed through my nostrils. But watched as the boys all started past me. Trenton, Dylan and John giving me sympathetic looks but all systematically trailed behind the ever raging soldier boy that was Bryce who marched onward. I could hear Bryce at the forefront mumbling curses and 'what a waste of time' under- and not under his breath.

My shoulders felt heavier than ever as I drug my feet along. Eventually we came to a fork in the road. Where the man/animal-made path turned into 3. Back further, or the path to the left, then the path to the right.

Bryce halted, brows scrunched up. Trenton peered over his shoulder. Dylan was still staring at the bars of his phone, desperately awaiting a signal, and John just said,

"I don't remember any other paths."

"Maybe we just didn't notice them."

I was left dumbfounded, since,

"There weren't any", I hissed incredulously.

Bryce whipped his head behind to face me,

"What?"

"There weren't any other trails. I remember the map, and when I looked this place up. There's just the one. I guess there were others but they were overgrown to the point people couldn't get into them."

"Yeah these paths look... Kind of fresh", Trenton mused.

"What like you think someone just made them. In the less than 45 minutes we've been out here?", Bryce said deadpan.

"I don't know!", Trenton barked back. Then there was a gust of wind and a sudden shriek of a car's horn blaring toward us as if it were in the thickets about to clear us from the earth. We all braced, screamed in a panic and burst into a sprint forward. Down straight into the fork. We didn't veer to either trail, just kept forward. Running, and gasping until we all tripped and tumbled over the other down a sudden slope.

Groans and moans echoed in the silent wood. Twigs snapped and rustled as we all worked to get back on our feet.

"What the fuck was that?!", Bryce howled.

"It sounded like it was coming straight at us!", Dylan whined where he still sat pale on his rump in a muddy puddle. "Aw, n'now my pant's are wet."

We all got a nervous chuckle out of Dylan's pathetic-ness. But we were all still shook up by the brazen barrage of honking and crashing as if the phantom truck rolled right off the highway to get us. But there was nothing that came after.

Dusting off our hands and slacks, we found to see there was no angry vehicle that veered off the road, and to what we had actually stumbled upon. Was right into the entrance of, wouldn't you have guessed. The TB clinic, in all it's dilapidated glory.

Moss and roots clinging to the broken barred windows, and caving roof. We all gazed open-maw at it, in both disbelief and awe.

"B-but... How? We turned back?", I whispered, to myself and anyone who heard me.

"If it was here? Where were we originally going?", Dylan whimpered.

I Shrugged, I had no words, no thoughts. Just... Shocked with a heart that was still racing.

"No, no I saw his map. This, maybe it's a different clinic", Trenton added but I shook my head,

"No... It's just like the pictures of it on Google. This was the one we were looking for but-"

"I HAVE A BAR!", Dylan roared chasing us all out of thoughts as he said , "I have one! okay, lets see where we are."

We watched as he typed away. Thumbs punching the screen with haste but we all saw as the shiny glint in his eyes faded away and his pupils grew small and shallow, his smile dropping.

"Guys.. Like actually what the fuck", he gulped as he then showed us his display. A screen that revealed us as the little blue dot. In the middle of a blacked out map. There was nothing , no indicators, no trails, no urban or rural routes, no cities or highways nearby. It was just a sea of black, and then our little blue marker.

"Yeah that's well.. Disconcerting", John said reluctantly.

"Disconcerting!? Say less! I've never seen my phone do this before!", Dylan was nearly going mental, I swore we could all see his golden blonde curls start burning white.

"Okay calm down, will ya. Your phone is probably just as shitty as Anthony's".

"Hey!", Dylan and I both said simultaneously and offended.

Bryce just shrugged before his eyes made their way back to the building which at this point. Having been so excited to get to it at the beginning of our travels, now seemingly stood like a beacon of bad news.

"Might as well we all go in-"

"Nope!", Dylan squeaked.

"Yeah no way", Trenton followed, as well as John who just shook his head.

Now all their attention was fixed on me. And I had to agree. I didn't want to go in that building anymore than they did at that point. But then again. We were utterly and completely lost... Not having even meant to find this place when we decided to turn things around. Now it stood, almost like a warning- if the ghost car wasn't enough as one already. I swallowed a lump caught in my throat as I gave Bryce an apologetic look.

Bryce's eyes widened as his scowl deepened,

waving his arms all willy-nilly,

"Are you guys fucking kidding me? We drive half an hour to bum-fuck-ville to find this thing. Get lost tryna find it- then we finally find it and we all want to puss out and go back?"

"Okay, for the record Bryce. I don't know if you've been in the same woods as we've been this last hour but remember when we all turned around to get back to our CAR, in the opposite direction of the clinic and FOUND said clinic before we FOUND OUR CAR?", I finally snapped back at Bryce, emphasizing the scale of our strange encounters.

For once, Bryce fell silent, his lips a tight line as he crossed his bulky arms and took his eyes to look at any and everything that wasn't me. I glared at him for a couple more seconds before Trenton cleared his throat.

"Well, what do we do now?"

"Besides you wanted to take us here", Bryce mumbled and that's when I almost pounced on him. Getting real tired of his passive aggressive, and just plain aggressive antics he had the whole trip, and to be fair. Whole friendship I've ever had with him.

"Okay! Okay! Let's all just fucking settle down!", John jumped in to break us up before anything could actually start but as we were all so focused on not killing each other. We noticed, a silence. From one who was freaking out just moments before.

"Hey? Where the hell did Dylan go?".

Bryce, John and I all shot our heads to Trenton, as he stared back towards the clinic as that's where Dylan now suddenly stood In front of the entrance. Where the doors were missing and only welcomed darkness inside.

"Hey, uh. Dylan. Whatcha doing over there? I thought we weren't going in...", I started but fell quiet as I watched in to be honest- horror as Dylan took a step forward. And then another, and another until he was consumed by the dark that pooled behind those broken doorways. Mouth agape, I couldn't believe it and I looked back at John, Trenton, and Bryce and they all looked just as puzzled and concerned as I did.

"What the fuck?".

"Why's he just gone in there by himself?"

"That's not like Dylan-"

"He didn't even want to come with us in the first place-"

That's when his scream, something Wilhelm, tore scorching holes into the pits of our stomachs and sent our hearts plummeting. It was a scream I never knew, I never wanted to hear, and it came from the depths of that clinic. I felt sick, a wave of panic and nausea consumed me, and I think Trenton too as he howled back,

"DYLAN??".

Before any of us could stop him too, he rushed into the building after him. Silence followed as now it was Bryce, John and I. Pale and speechless.

Was it our turn?