Late Bloomer

HHHOOOOOOOONK

"SHITSHITSHIT", you stammer, and jerk away from the passing trailer, greeted by the driver's middle finger. He yells curses at you as the semi speeds off ahead of you, and you yourself to calm down as his taillights fade into the distance.

You shudder a bit and reach for your phone to figure out where you are. The road's somewhere in Utah, you know that much, but all that's out here is sand and plants and sand. No wonder you dozed off.

According to the phone you've got another hour before civilization... you wonder if you can just find a spot out in the sand to sleep for a little while. It's not like you're gonna miss anything.

It's been this way ever since you finished college - the wandering, the low-end jobs to keep you situated (before you inevitably get fired), the occasional flings with women that never really work out. You're a modern 21st-century gypsy, and you pitch your tent wherever the car breaks down. The only person who keeps tabs on you is your uncle, and all he cares about is whether or not you can bum him some money "for the beers you fuckin' stole from me in high school". Somehow he's more of a bum than you are, despite his inexplicable ability to pick up some of the most gorgeous older women you've seen. How does he even DO that? Your uncle's not even that hot! He lives in a trailer, for crisssakes!

As you mull over this, you glance up to see if there's a flat spot to stop. Oddly enough, you can see another huge car in the bush... and you recognize the semi truck that nearly killed you earlier. Why is it out there?

As you pass, your curiosity turns to horror as you see a massive gash in the side of the thing, a ring of metal exploding outwards from the canister. The driver's door is completely missing. Blood trickles down from the vacant seat.

You slam on the brakes and the smell of burnt rubber fills your nostrils, your old car squealing in pain. You haven't seen any other car for hours on this road - what if he's alive? Did someone else hit him? He might still be out there! Your heart goes into turbo as you turn your car around and slowly approach the wreckage.

Your headlights illuminate the wreck and you see that there's not just blood in the truck's cab, but EVERYWHERE. A brown-red stain trails back into the gaping hole of the container. Trying to steel your nerves, you step out of the car and get closer.

As you near the accident, your feet land in some sort of puddle and you slide face-first into a large patch of the fluid. You hack and spit the stuff from your mouth and crawl out of the puddle, absolutely terrified and sick to your stomach at the same time. You're absolutely covered in dark slime. But your disgust becomes confusion as the liquid you stepped in starts to glow a bright green, lighting up yourself and pretty much everything nearby - including the "blood".

"What the hell...?!", you mumble. What was IN that truck?

The goop's light only intensifies, and you see a thin layer of vapor trailing from the liquid's surface, accompanied by a light tingling sensation all over your body. The tingling quickly becomes burning as you realize that the stuff's evaporating, even though it's the middle of April. Rather than ponder the scientific phenomenon, though, you scream in terror as the stuff fries you alive.

The glow of the slime becomes too bright for you to see anything, and all at once, you fall backwards into the sand. The bright green fades to total darkness as you ebb into unconsciousness...

beeeep. beeeep. beeeep. beeeep.

Your eyes open again. White, unremarkable ceiling tile and an odd chemical smell in the air. You lift your dizzy head to see yourself in a gurney surrounded by medical equipment, and you groan. Last night's events trickle into place as you try and figure out how you got here. And furthermore, how you'll pay for the visit. You can barely afford a tank of gas, but you sure can't pay for the hospital stay, you know that much.

Before long, the door opens and your nurse steps inside. "Oh! You're awake!" You blink once or twice at the 5'-4" sight before you.

She is clad in pink-scrubs that hang loosely from her body, but fail to hide the gorgeous curves of her thighs and bust from you. A name tag ("Nicole") balances precariously atop her left breast. Her blonde hair is held back in a single bun, revealing a smiling face with dimples and alluring eyes.

You're definitely awake now.

She wags a finger, still smiling, as she approaches your heart monitor. "You coulda died out there, yaknow. You're lucky a farmer saw you stumbling around out on his ranch - most times when drunks get lost in the desert, we just find the leftovers from the vultures." She pauses to scratch some notes into a clipboard and fails to notice your confusion. When did you...?

Suddenly, you're hit with a wave of pain, a burning not unlike the slime from before. Nicole notices your groan and leans in a little closer, frowning. "Mmm? Where does it hurt?"