Welcome to the Shit Show

Chapter 2

The sound of tires screeching on pavement broke the silent atmosphere that had previously invaded the truck cab. Sy was thrown forward violently only to be stopped by her seatbelt. Her head jerked sickeningly for a moment until it was slammed back into the headrest with equal force. My own body was in a deadlock state. My arms and hands were frozen in place and my eyes were locked on the immobile mass in front of the truck. The only thing that voluntarily moved in all this madness was my foot switching from the gas to the breaks in a nanosecond.

It took five seconds for us to skid to a complete stop. My eyes tracked the mystery object until it disappeared in front of the truck, but there was no jump of the tires or impact so I doubt we hit it.

"What the actual—," I began but I didn't get far before Sy started.

"Ow ow ow what just happened? What the fuck was that? Did we hit something? Oh nononono . What should we do?," Sy rambled on letting the adrenaline from shock fuel her never ending stream of nonsense. Before she could continue I grabbed her lips between two fingers, preventing the words from escaping her mouth.

"Shhhhh calm down we haven't hit anything, at least I don't THINK we hit anything. I'm gonna get out and check. Do not leave the truck bed under any circumstances do you understand?," She tried to pry my fingers off, but I stand by my convictions and waited for her to calm down a little before asking again. This time she nodded slowly, so I released her. That was my stupid mistake.

The first thing she did was hop out of the truck. Slamming the door leaving me inside.

" Fine go look, see if I care when you come clawing at me about nightmares and moving shadows,"I whispered. Knowing Sy, whatever she saw would get cooked into a nightmare of epic proportions if there was even a drop of blood on whatever was lying in front of my truck. She knew I could see things sometimes, but I never shared much about what I saw. It was better to keep her oblivious to the horrors that lurked in the dark.

I turned the truck off but left the headlights on so we could see what was going on. When I hopped out Sy was silent so, at least that was a good sign.

Which turned into a bad sign when I came around and saw silent tears rolling down her cheeks. Her lips were quivering like she wanted to sob but couldn't yet.

Protect Sy mode turned on immediately and my eyes scanned the scene for the problem. We were on an abandoned stretch of road with little else to look at other than trees and grass. Both sides of the road had barbed wire fencing that stretched to the horizon as far as the eye could see. What we had almost run over looked to be a calf that couldn't have been more than a few months old. It had light brown-red fur, a pink nose, and big brown eyes. There appeared to be a brand on its right haunch and a foreleg that was bent at the wrong angle.

Sy's hand was now covering her mouth and nose trying to keep the dam wall from breaking. It was a valiant effort but I knew she wouldn't be able to keep that up for long. Her fingers were starting to tremble as the corners of her eyes were overflowing with tears. I would have laughed if it was anyone other than Sy, but that's not important right now.

I knelt down next to the calf to examine the leg better. It was resting on its left side so that wasn't very hard to do. The injured leg jutted out straight from the body and a white solid object appeared to be poking out of the fur just below the knee.

The back of the calf was facing my bumper so I knew I hadn't broken it. It was also apparent from the amount of flies buzzing around the open wound. Luckily there was little blood... unluckily that also meant that Sy was hyper focused on the bone protruding from the animal's forelimb.

I rose from the ground and silently went to Sy, careful not to disturb her quiet crying fit. Once I was behind her I.... smacked her hard across the back of the head with my open hand.