Everyone Told Them The Old Highway Was A Waste Of Time So Of Course They Took It Anyway

The map said it added two hours. What they found out there was worth ten.

Everybody they asked said the same thing: take the interstate, skip the old road, it's slower and there's nothing out there but heat and telephone poles. So naturally, they ignored all of it.

The first hour proved everyone right. Nothing but shimmering asphalt and the occasional rusted sign for a town that no longer exists. They started to think they'd made the wrong call.

Then, around a bend that the GPS didn't even bother to name, they had to pull over. Not because they wanted to. Because what was up ahead made it genuinely hard to keep driving.

They still can't fully explain why nobody warned them about it. Their best guess is that the people who know about it want to keep it that way, and honestly, after seeing it, they get it.