Hollow Faces

Mile after mile of Texas highway thundered away beneath the navy blue Mustang.  Jeff pushed the muscle car into the far left lane and dropped the hammer.  Sara’s hair flew back.

The high southern sky stretched blue and clear over the bone-pale landscape opening around them. Scarred by dry arroyos, the land was dotted with mesquite, bent low, twisted by decades of wind. Sword-sharp yucca leaves, blistered and blooming in the thorn-webbed caliche, swept past. Limestone formations jutted in different directions, exposed after centuries of erosion. Their surfaces were stained with iron, crusted with fossil traces.

Sara watched the withered, sun-bleached landscape roll by, remembering the old story - a young son stealing his father's sun chariot and flying too close to the earth, scorching the land in his wake.  The iron stains, the cracked earth, the wind-scoured rock—all of it pressed against her eyes. Sara turned away from the brittle, crusted land and stared into the cloudless, flawless morning sky. The same sky that had witnessed their impromptu departure.

That morning, they woke up surrounded by half-open drawers, clothes spilling out, unwashed dishes, and boxes that hadn't been unpacked. Sara stood alone in the bathroom holding their future. She read the directions on the smallest unopened box in the house, then set the test down on the counter, not ready to know the answer.

Jeff appeared in the doorway. "We should know for sure," he said, reaching for the test.

"Not today." Sara caught his wrist and, in one smooth motion, pushed him out of the bathroom onto the bed. He landed with a surprised laugh as she pinned his shoulders down.

"Still stronger than you," she grinned, remembering the times her older brothers had underestimated her, too.

"Not fair," Jeff protested, but he wasn't trying to get up. "The priest said you're supposed to love and obey."

"Love and cherish," she growled, squeezing his ribs between her knees.

“Okay, okay! Love and cherish,” he wheezed.

She kissed him on the forehead.  “Let’s go get lost for a little while,” she said, jumping off him.

Which was how they'd ended up racing down the highway, the mile markers rising and falling like tombstones along the vacant highway, the bleak horizon endless.

Sara pulled her hair back into a ponytail as they passed a field of tireless oil jacks.  Endless powerlines flashed past, all silent sentries of the Texas scrublands.  She slipped off her sandals and rested her feet on the dashboard.  Leaning back, she closed her eyes, soaking in the day.  Jeff reached over and rested his hand on her thigh.

She smiled at him. She loved him—wouldn't be in this car if she didn’t believe he could be a good father, better than hers. But how many women had watched that hope crack open and rot? That was why the test stayed in the box. For now, they were safe in this moment, in the space they’d built together. But if a new life joined them, who would Jeff become then? The questions were too big, too heavy. So, she left them buried.

Ironic. As a geologist, her whole job was to dig for answers, to cut through layers and expose what lay beneath. But today, she hadn’t gone looking. Today, she’d taken the shovel and buried those questions deeper, where the sun couldn't reach them.

Ahead, she saw a dusty station wagon parked just beyond a slight rise, positioned where the driver would have a clear view of oncoming traffic long before they could be seen, angled toward the highway, ready to go.  As they approached, Sara noticed how still everything was—no one checking under the hood, no one changing a tire. The car just sat there, patient, a sleeping snake. The chipped paint job looked decades old—a faded oil company logo on the side.  Sara glanced toward the driver's side window as they passed.

Her breath caught in her throat.

A white, melted face dripped behind the dusty glass. Eyeless black sockets stared, hungry, searching for more than just prey. Her hand squeezed Jeff's. Then they were past it, and the face was gone.

“Woah, you okay?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah,” she paused.  She forced her grip to loosen, taking a big breath to slow her racing heart. “Yeah, just scared myself.

She sat up, bending to look into the side mirror.  The highway was empty.  Nothing followed them.

“We should be getting close to the turn-off,” Jeff said.  “I was thinking that after our hike, we could stop off in Iran and eat lunch.”

The familiar joke calmed her.  “Stop it. You know they hate that.  It’s Ira-Ann, and sure, if you behave yourself.”

Jeff slowed and turned up the next dirt road. A rusted gate hung off one hinge. He eased around it, pushing down the old dirt road, leaving the sound of the highway far behind them.

He returned his hand to her thigh, sliding it a little higher. Maybe, she thought, this was their last chance to be risky—one more moment to feel like twenty-year-olds, to play at danger. To make the stark landscape a little more beautiful before everything changed.

The road ended in a large turnaround, surrounded by three pump jacks, rocking back and forth—the only sign of life for miles.  Jeff turned the car off.

“Come over here,” she whispered in his ear.

Sara pulled him close, desperate to feel connected to him.

“No matter what,” she whispered, “promise me we'll still have this.”

Jeff nodded, but they both knew promises were fragile things. He pulled back from her, his attention stolen by movement behind them.

“What the hell?” he asked.

Sara turned.  The dusty station wagon crept towards them, a sharp-toothed predator, stalking closer. The dust-caked windshield hid the driver, but she had a horrible idea of what might be driving.  The wagon inched closer. Jeff sat up and started yelling.

“Hey! Watch it!” he yelled, reaching to open the door.

“No, let’s just leave.”

The car stopped inches from the Mustang's bumper, pinning it against the fence surrounding the pump jacks.

“We’re stuck.” Jeff opened the door; Sara held his arm.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m just going to talk to him”.

"I don't like this. Let’s find a cell signal and call the police."

He pulled his arm free and smiled at her. "I don’t think anyone could get her anytime soon," Jeff said. "I bet we made a wrong turn and ended up on someone’s land.  You know how spooked ranchers get out here.  We will just apologize and then laugh about it over lunch."

Heat radiated off the cracked earth, but Sara's sweat felt cold against her fear-chilled skin. Jeff left the door open and walked to the back of the Mustang.  The station wagon’s big, heavy engine hummed like a big cat. Sara could feel it in her chest.

Jeff craned his neck, trying to see through the driver’s side window. It started to drop down in a jerky motion, the old hand-crank turning round and round.

“Sara, why don’t you jump over into the driver’s seat? Get ready to drive us out of here when he moves.”

Sara stumbled as her bare foot caught in the strap of her tool bag.  She bent over, untangling the strap from her ankle, and slid on her sandals.

Jeff’s yell cracked the air.

She jolted, sat up. Nothing. Just empty air where Jeff had stood.  With her bag in hand, she climbed over the driver’s seat and jumped out.  Jeff lay on the ground, both hands covering the blood red bloom expanding to the left of his belly button.

“Jeff!” she yelled, running to him.

She skidded across the hard, rocky ground.

“Oh god, Jeff. What happened?”

“He stabbed me,” Jeff gasped.

She pushed on the wound with both hands, Jeff moaned.

The squeal of the opening car door froze her in place. A massive figure unfolded from the car. Thick boots hit the dirt, and it lifted itself, broad-shouldered and wrong.

The face was white as old bone, soft like clay, and crosshatched with deep furrows that followed no natural pattern - carved rather than weathered, as if something had taken tools to what had once been a human face. Where eyes should have been gaped hollow sockets, not darkness but absence, voids that seemed to pull light into them and give nothing back. And somehow, that emptiness was watching her.

The creature raised the bloody knife. The blade caught the light, long and gleaming like liquid mercury.

“I think it’s time to go,” Jeff said.  “Get me up.”

Sara pulled, straining to help Jeff gain his feet.  Groaning, he stood, leaning on her. The creature fixed its empty gaze on Sara, and its hunger iced her veins.

“Sara—grab your bag, your phone. Run. Get help as soon as you can.”

“I’m not leaving you.”

The monster waited, measured and patient.

Jeff pushed her back with a bloody hand. “You have to get help, for our family. Please.”

The monster stepped forward, knife tight by its side.
 “Run!” Jeff shoved her hard. She stumbled, caught herself, and sprinted toward the pump jacks.

Thirty yards of open ground blurred beneath her feet before she threw herself behind the nearest separator tank.

She dropped to her knees; heat pulsed from the sun-warmed metal against her spine. The pump jacks groaned on, indifferent, bowing and rising without care. Through the swinging arc of the nearest horsehead, she saw the car: the door still open, Jeff bleeding, the white-faced killer gone.

Staying low, she rose just enough to scan the pump jacks and outbuildings.  No sign of him.  He must not have seen where she ran.

If she circled back, she might be able to drag Jeff into the car. Carrying him wouldn’t be easy—he was heavy—but if she moved fast, before the killer returned, they could get out. She had to try.

She slipped from behind the tanks, dropped into a shallow runoff trench, and circled the third jack, using its rhythmic pounding to mask her movement. She crab-walked, getting as low as she could, until she reached the end of the fence line surrounding the pump jack. She was in line with Jeff and the station wagon.

One more step, and she would be out in the open. A straight shot, nowhere to hide, an easy target.  Doubt paralyzed her.  She glanced down the empty dirt road. No help was coming. She slumped against the fence, terrified she was going to die.

The steady beat of the machinery thudded above her. Just behind it, the motor hummed inside a weathered aluminum shed.

Her heart matched the thrum, pounding against her ribs, slowing. She closed her eyes, wiped her damp palms on her thighs, and inhaled—hot Texas air laced with oil and diesel exhaust.

She opened her eyes. The pump jack's relentless rhythm hadn't stopped—it just kept working, mechanical and purposeful. Like she needed to be.

She needed a distraction. Something loud enough to pull it away from noticing her.

She looked back at the dilapidated shed; the motor inside it might be her answer.

She hesitated. This was reckless. If it didn’t work, she might be found and have nowhere left to run.  But doing nothing would get her killed.

Shifting her weight, she crawled toward the shed, stones digging into her knees and palms.

The motor shed loomed, a battered corrugated outbuilding—loose panels rattled in the west Texas breeze.  She slipped under the yellow sign warning:  High Voltage - Moving Parts - Keep Clear.

The large motor hummed, turning a long, thick belt connected to the pump jack.  This was the heart of the machine.  If she could seize it up, make a loud enough noise, it might buy her time to get to Jeff and escape.

Her first idea required a gas-soaked rag stuck in the fuel intake.  She would light it and run.  The whole shed would blow up in a cinematic explosion, and she would drive away with the flames and smoke billowing behind her.  She had matches in her bag, but blowing herself up felt like a more likely outcome.

She could drain the oil, but there were no tools out here to loosen the drain plug.  The second-best option would be to get the oil dirty.  She found the oil cap on top of the engine and grabbed it.  Stuck. She squeezed tighter, a nail dug in and split when the cap finally gave.

The floor of the shed was composed of natural Texas soil—loose caliche over a clay hardpan. She knew the gritty sediment would grind the engine's moving parts to a halt.  She scooped up dirt, rocks, sand—whatever she could grab—and dumped it in. Then another scoop. And another. Was it enough? She grabbed another handful, larger this time, listening for any sound of footsteps. The dirt felt pathetic, inadequate. But she kept going, one more scoop, then another, her heart hammering with each second that passed.

This is stupid, she thought.  He’ll hear the engine stall before I can get out of here and come straight here.

Left with no other choice, she dropped in one more handful.

Finished, she scurried back to the fence corner, shaking.  She held still. Waited.  Praying that it would work. Any second now, she expected footsteps, the glint of that blade.

At first, a pitiful grinding whine from the shed. Then the motor choked. The pump jack bucked like a rodeo bull. Smoke billowed from the shed. A final bang exploded across the site. The acrid smoke stung her eyes as she realized her plan had worked.

Time to run.

She sprinted to her bag and dropped to her knees beside Jeff. Blood had pooled beneath him. A second knife wound, between his ribs, straight into his heart.  He was gone.

She choked back a sob.  Reaching for him, she paused; his features were wrong.  The hard angles of his nose and cheeks sagged his face felt doughy to her touch.

A cold shadow fell over her.  Fear stole away her sadness. The creature loomed behind her, close enough that she could smell old blood and decay. She wanted to run, but her body froze; it wouldn’t obey her mind's screams to move. She was a rabbit paralyzed in a big cat’s shadow.

Cold clarity followed: she saw herself trapped in the back of the station wagon, bound in darkness. A prisoner taken far away. Mourned—but eventually forgotten.

No, she thought. There was someone else to live for.

The shed erupted in a thunderclap of fire and shrapnel.  A scream, not hers, ripped through the air.  A jagged piece of pipe impaled the creature, it staggered, holding its face.

She felt the scream in her soul—a pressure in her chest, vibrating in her bones.

Released, she didn’t wait. She launched herself forward, scrambled to her feet, and ran. The desert waited ahead, as cruel and patient as the thing she left behind.

The mesquite and yucca blurred past as she ran, her sandals finding purchase on stone and sand. The rhythm of the pump jacks faded behind her.  The sun hammered down. Her lungs burned. Still, she ran, even as her legs began to shake with exhaustion. She stumbled, half-blind with tears and terror. Her breath came in ragged gasps, but she couldn’t stop—wouldn’t stop.  Jeff’s plea to run echoed in her ears.

She fell.

Her sandal caught on a petrified Mesquite branch, and she crashed, rolling and sliding down the bank of a deep-cut arroyo.  The impact knocked the wind from her lungs as she landed in the riverbed.

Cut and torn, she lay on the smooth river stones, polished flat by generations of flash floods.  Skinned palms burned, ripped fabric clung to bleeding scrapes, and her ribs ached from slamming into the unforgiving dried-out riverbed.

For a moment, silence - she strained to listen.  She strained to hear the rhythmic moan of the pump jacks but heard nothing. Just the blood pounding in her ears and the quiet, which might mean safety, or might mean his crunching footsteps had stopped because he already knew where she was.

Heaving herself up into a sitting position with one leg splayed at an angle, Sara noticed her tools scattered around her, one sandal missing, the other hanging crookedly from her big toe by a broken strap.

Part of her wished for a West Texas flash flood.  Drowning would be worth the risk of getting a chance to be washed out of here.

The thought of drowning, suffocating, made her shudder. She breathed in the faint scents of sage and creosote. Something in those desert smells cleared the fog from her mind enough to remember Jeff’s voice:  Run! Run for our family.

A few hours ago, she stood in front of their bathroom mirror, holding that unopened box. Now she reached down and rubbed her flat belly. "What if I had just taken the test?  Faced it. Faced everything. What if…”

The question remained unfinished.  Devastating loss racked Sara's body until she pulled her knees to her chest before she broke apart into a thousand pieces, to be lost and washed away during the rainy season.

Catching her breath, Sara noticed movement in the shade. A small brown lizard sat motionless on a warm rock, tail extended, eyes unblinking. It watched her—not with fear, but with eerie stillness. Observing, like the land was taking note.

For a moment, it was the only thing in the world not trying to kill her.

Her heart still pounded. Had the lizard startled her—or was that crunch of gravel from above?

She froze. Waited. Silence.

But the lizard remained. Watching. Grounded.

Lying in this dead arroyo wouldn’t get her home. Wouldn’t get her back to Jeff.

She was a geologist. A reader of land, a solver of problems. This place wasn’t just a trap—it was a map.

Use it.

Duct tape lay within reach. The adhesive ripped cleanly in the silent air, the sound somehow calming. Her hands steadied as she worked.  Logic, muscle memory, survival.

The other sandal wasn't far—standing on one foot, Sara hobbled over to retrieve and reinforce it.

She looked back at the lizard on its rock.  “Not too bad,” she said, rocking back and forth on her duct tape boots.  The lizard blinked once, then darted into the cracks of the broken earth, satisfied the message had been received.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Sara turned and squinted into the heat shimmer beyond the arroyo. The land rippled like it was hiding something—and maybe it was. She had to find out what, because quiet things were following.

Staying low and bent, she moved cautiously down the riverbed, roughly in the direction she’d come, angling away from the pump jacks but keeping them in mind as a landmark.  Survival out here was hard; even making it to sunset felt precarious.  She couldn’t let that creature chase her so far that the land destroyed her before he could.  If she could circle back ahead of him (if he was following), maybe she could return to the service road and then run down to the highway.  Why hadn’t she run that way to begin with? So many bad, impulsive choices today—and now she had to outthink all of them.

She crouched in the arroyo, heart thudding, trying to map her next move. Then, like a Magic Eye picture snapping into focus, the land gave her a clue: stacked limestone sheets along the bank—ancient pages of a closed book.  Markers of erosion.  Signs of possible water settlement.

She kept close to the banded rock face, scanning for more clues, until her foot caught on the uneven ground. Limestone cobbles littered the riverbed, chalky white, smoothed by time and flow. She was close. She followed the stones like breadcrumbs as they grew more numerous.

Ahead, a small grove of saplings shimmered green against the muted desert floor.

Cottonwoods. The desert's water markers. Their roots had to be reaching groundwater somewhere below.

She could almost smell it—cold, clear mineral water just beneath her feet. She moved toward the tiny oasis and pulled out her rock hammer, ready to dig.

Weaving between the trunks, Sara scanned the soil for rust-colored streaks, telltale signs of groundwater leeching through the limestone.  She pushed aside a leaf-laden branch and saw it:  a rip in the earth.  A long, jagged opening between the trunks of three Cottonwood trees. Narrow, but wide enough for her to slide into.

She dropped to all fours and peered inside. The slope disappeared into darkness. Rabbit pellets littered the entrance.  If rabbits hid here, other animals might too, the kind with sharp teeth.

She rocked back on her heels.  Her chest tightened.  She hated small places.  Years ago, it had taken full sedation to get her through an MRI for a dislocated ankle.  She strained her ears but heard no trickle of water.  Still, the rocks and trees told her it was down there.

Then she felt him. Dread cascaded over her.

She turned.  It couldn't be. But there he was.

Far down the riverbed, where she had fallen, framed in stark sunlight, he stood.

The monster. Slender. Pale. Still.

His back was to her.

How had he gotten so close?

She dropped to her belly and began sliding her feet into the crevice.  She didn’t know how deep it was. Didn’t care. She wasn’t staying up here.

The clay-faced killer turned. He started walking. Steady. Unhurried. Its gait looked familiar.  A swing of the arm like Jeff’s.

Her breath caught. The sight hit harder than the gunshot - harder than the explosion.

It was becoming.

Its slippery face sloughed in soft, molten ribbons.  Features slid, melted, and reformed.  Pale white eyes rolled over to show crystal blue pupils.  The jaw narrowed.

Then, Jeff’s face rose from the ruin like a melted wax candle: the twisted nose, the narrow lips she kissed that morning.  Familiar. Wrong

Through the leaves and shadow, his gaze locked on hers.

Sara’s body rebelled.  Hands shaking, she pushed back, her arms braced against the rock, searching blindly for a foothold.

Jeff’s mouth twitched into something between a smile and a snarl.

No time.

She let go.

It was a short drop.

Sara hit the ground hard. Above her, a razor-thin slash of midday light cut across the caramel-colored limestone. The silence felt absolute—until her breath began to echo off the walls.

Digging into her pack, she pulled out her headlamp and clicked it on. The beam cut through the gloom. Slick walls glistened with water runoff, and droplets dripped in uneven intervals from the ceiling. The space was small—smaller than her bedroom back home.

She looked up. The opening she’d fallen through loomed out of reach. Even if she could climb the walls, she didn’t have the gear to pull herself out.

“Oh god,” she whispered.

She edged forward. The slick soles of her duct tape boots slid across the damp stone, and she crashed to the floor. Her knees slammed into the rock, elbows scraping. Pain flared through her arms, numbing her fingers.  She rolled over on her back, staring at the sky through the narrow opening, flexing her dead fingers.

Jeff was dead, she was trapped.

Exhaustion sat on her chest, squeezing out the last of her willpower.  Closing her eyes, ready to give in to her final moments, she realized her back and shorts were soaked.

She had landed in a puddle.  Without thinking, she turned, dropped her face in the puddle, and slurped greedily from the shallow pool.

Finally satisfied, she braced a palm against the cold stone. A faint current of air tickled the hairs on the back of her hand. Airflow—an opening somewhere deeper.

But could she find it before he found her?

The sandals had to go. She ripped off the tape, each tug leaving streaks of dirt-stained adhesive across her skin. Her sticky bare feet stuck better to the rock, raw and reliable.

She pressed her palms against the slick walls, searching for anything—another passage, a foothold, a way forward. The chamber felt like a tomb, but water had carved this space; it had to go somewhere.

Then she felt it—a whisper of air against her wrist. Following the current, her hands found a narrow crack in the wall to her right, barely wide enough for a person. She pressed her face close. The breeze grew stronger on her neck and cheeks, carrying the faint scent of open air.

Turning sideways, she pressed into the gap, ribs scraping stone as she wormed deeper into the dark.  Her bruised shoulder snagged on a rocky protrusion. She pushed forward, but it was wedged tight. No room to bend. Her head turned sideways, cheek mashed against wet stone. She couldn’t twist. Couldn’t move.

She could back out—or risk going forward and getting wedged forever, compressed until her lungs gave out.

A sharp metallic clatter echoed behind her. He had dropped into the chamber.

The killer’s flashlight jerked from wall to wall—fast, wild. Then, darkness.

“Sara,” it called, soft and intimate.

The whisper hollowed her chest. Her breath caught, strangling the rising scream. She didn’t move. Didn’t breathe.

The moment stretched, time stopped, then the light clicked on.

Footsteps receded. The light shifted.  He had not noticed the crack.

If she backed out, he would hear her.

If she pushed ahead, she might get stuck. What if her ribs locked tight and she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t scream? Would he just wait for her to die in the dark?

The stench of old blood wafted through the crack behind her. His heavy steps echoed. She could imagine his warm, dead breath on the back of her neck.

She sucked in her stomach and drove her feet into the stone, forcing herself forward. Her shoulder compressed so tightly it felt like it might tear from the socket.  The stone let go all at once. She spilled into the chamber and collapsed, chest heaving, filling her burning lungs.  Grabbing her shoulder, she stood up, looked back at the crack and the wall, and knew that it had been a one-way trip.  She turned to follow the breeze.

A faint crunch beneath her foot made her freeze. Without turning on her lamp, she reached into her pack and pulled out a glowstick. Wrapping it in her shirt to dim the brightness, she cracked it.

Unwrapping her shirt, fluorescent green light leaked into the chamber, illuminating the ground.

Veins of cracked mineral spidered under her feet, glowing faintly in the green light. A cavity below. She tested the ground with the edge of her foot. More fractures. Broken stone. This floor wasn’t solid.  She looked up. Stress fractures in the limestone ceiling—the kind that formed when water pressure found the weak points.

This spelunker's nightmare was an opportunity. An old-school tiger trap. Lure the creature onto this fragile floor and hopefully end the chase.

But she needed the right position—somewhere she could draw it in without getting trapped herself. On the far side of the chamber, a small opening, large enough to crawl through waited.  She edged along the wall, testing every step, until she reached the far side of the chamber. The air flowing from the opening was warmer, fresher—it had to be close to the surface.

She stared into the dark. She could run—try for the exit, gamble on escape. But the thing in the cave would follow. It wore Jeff’s face now. It wouldn’t stop.  And who would be next? A new thought hit her. It already had Jeff’s face. Why chase her at all? Why not just become him and vanish into the world? Unless it needed something from her—something deeper. Something growing inside her that couldn’t be copied.

No. This ended here.

She grabbed the ripped duct tape from her pack and tossed it onto the brittle surface—something the killer would see as a sign of her panic; a dropped item left in fear.

She backed up into the opening, hiding as much of herself as she could, watching the chamber’s entrance.  Shallow breaths. Tight muscles. The hunter had set the trap.

Let it come. Let it believe she was broken. Then she’d break it.

Time to ring the dinner bell.

She struck the rock hammer against stone in sharp, panicked bursts—the sound of someone trapped and digging.

The narrow blade of illumination knifed through the slit in the far wall.  Then it went dark. The sideways shuffle of feet echoed in the chamber.  Sara had enough time to wish Jeff had been larger, a built man, maybe one who couldn’t so easily slide into this chamber.  That thought vanished as the creature squeezed into the chamber, wearing her husband like a suit.

“Sara,” it whispered again.  Low, soft, haunting.

She pushed back.

The flashlight glare found her.  This is it.  She wanted to call to it; pretend it was Jeff. But the words were locked in her throat. He paused. Stepped back. Studied the floor.

Then, as if he could read her thoughts, he smiled.

Never taking its eyes off her, it took a step to the right, to the safe path around the broken, hollow floor. As it circled the trap, it pulled the liquid metal knife from its pocket.  The blade swirled in the darkness, almost like it was hungry, like it wanted to taste her warm, red flesh.

"Sara," he gasped. Her knees buckled. For one breathless moment, she wanted it to be him. Wanted it so badly she almost stepped toward him.

“Oh, Jeff,” she whimpered.  How close had they come to almost having it all? It would be so easy to walk into his arms right now, how she wanted one last hug.

She looked back over her shoulder. A dark, narrow opening that may or may not lead out of this cave.  Could she make it to the top before he grabbed her by the ankles and pulled her back into this coffin?

Here she was.  Die or fight?

Jeff’s face slipped, and her sadness evaporated, burned away by the hate she had for this creature and what it had stolen from her today.

At least the thing had chosen Jeff's form—and there was one thing about their relationship nobody knew: she could always kick his ass. She stood, holding up her rock hammer. Her thoughts flashed back to the unopened box—and her dead husband. A baby who would never know the love of her father.

The creature surged forward, blade raised, flashlight blinding her.

As he closed in, a thousand memories flooded her: Jeff’s laughter, his warm kisses, soft hugs. She drew her arm back and tomahawked the rock hammer at the creature’s face.

She’d always joked she couldn’t throw an axe to save her life. But today, she did.

The hammer struck dead center. The creature let out a guttural, inhuman roar and dropped the flashlight, clutching its dented face.

Sara almost apologized—horrified at how easy it was to forget this thing wasn’t her husband.

It staggered, casting giant shadows of the two fighters on the brown wall.

She ran at him, and as he looked back at her, she hit him in the chest, full force, driving him back towards the broken stone.  He dropped the knife as he stumbled back, one foot cracking through the brittle floor.   His other hand grabbed her arm.

She pulled, but he held tight, black ooze dripping down the center of its melting face.  The creature’s face pressed to hers. She felt it seep into her skin, draining her soul.  The longer it held, the more she could feel it inside her, stealing her, reaching for the tiny life growing within.

Its brow softened, the eye color swirled, the nose shifted. Slowly, she was coming face to face with herself.

She tried to pull free, but the grip was ice; she could not tear herself free.  It would be her, and she would be dead and withered.  She saw the blade on the ground, out of reach.

In a moment of surrender, she stopped fighting; to survive, she had to let it win.

The monster pulled; she fell forward onto her knees and grabbed the knife. Standing, she slammed the blade into the neck of the creature, piercing the soft flesh, driving the knife to the hilt. Black liquid spewed across the cave, splattering Sara.

The creature shrieked—a sound like metal tearing, sharp enough to make her ears ring. It released its grip, its frozen clay fingers tearing away skin and tissue from her arm, leaving a ragged bloody hole. She cried out, stumbling backward as the creature thrashed, wild and desperate.

Cracks spiderwebbed across the floor. Chunks of limestone broke loose and plummeted into the abyss below.

Then the ground vanished.

The creature’s flailing hand latched onto her leg, pulling her toward the crumbling edge. She skidded across the stone, heels scrambling, gravity pulling her and the monster closer to the end.

Clawing at the rock, searching, praying, her right hand caught a jagged outcrop. Pain shot up her arm as her body jerked to a stop.

Sara sat there, legs dangling over the abyss, breathing hard. Below her, the creature hung from her ankle—its icy fingers digging deep into skin and bone. When she looked down, Jeff's face stared back at her, twisted with desperation.

'Please,' it gasped, Jeff's voice exactly as she remembered. 'Help me up. I'm slipping.'

Its free hand reached toward her, fingers stretching. For a heartbeat, she almost believed—

The ledge groaned. A crack split the stone beneath her.

She spun around, lunging with her free hand to find a better grip just as her body swung out over the void, slamming against the limestone wall—a brutal collision that rattled her bones.

The creature's icy grip slipped, and she heard Jeff's voice turn from pleading to an inhuman shriek as it plummeted into the darkness below.

Hanging there, dangling, the pit yawning beneath her, she struggled to pull herself up. Her knee slipped—she dropped. For one terrible second, she almost let go. Followed Jeff into the next life.

Then she thought about the possibilities of the unopened box.  The second heartbeat that she carried with her.

She pulled hard, scraping her arms raw as she dragged herself over the edge.  With one last pull, she hoisted her leg over the jagged rock lip and rolled onto solid ground.  Exhausted, she lay in the dark, wondering if she was dead or alive.

She pulled herself up, grabbed the bag and flashlight, and slowly moved up the cave.  The path ahead was narrow, rising, uncertain. But it was hers.

The setting sun cast long shadows on the empty landscape.  Shifting rockets startled a jackrabbit from its burrow. It darted across the arroyo as Sara’s black-stained hand pushed through the dust.

Barefoot and broken, she hauled herself onto open ground, gasping, pulling in the freedom of the dusty desert air.

A light wind blew across the arroyo, colder now.  The desert, indifferent and quiet, waited for her.

Standing in the fading light, holding her torn arm, she looked across the watercolored landscape.

“For our family,” she whispered.

She turned her back to the arroyo and walked into the fading light.