Car trouble on a road trip through the Utah desert has left werewolf friends Paul and Oak stuck on the side of a back road. In this story for WEREWOLVES VERSUS: NATURE by JD Laclede, things are going to get a lot weirder before they get better.

Paul stretched, whistled, and glanced sunward. No cars had passed them in the time they’d stopped here, which was nice and private, but not promising. If anyone did happen to report two automobile-deficient dog-people by the side of the road, he could have put on enough of a smiling, furless face for any police or animal control vans that dropped by to check. Then again, if nobody noticed the weirdos by the road, because no one was driving on this road, because nobody used this road, then that seriously impaired any chance of getting a tow. Or a mechanic. Or a cherry-flavored ice slushie.

Where was this place, anyway? Surrounding them were gigantic angular crags of red, brown, and peachy stone. The mile-long formations, with small juts at the top, sat like upturned battleships with their rock cannons pointing to the sky. The dust around them glared, in a cutting white, an almost pink or sugary thing, blowing in small, precious gusts. It snowed over the road, a road far more beaten than the interstate had been, its concrete pallid and cracking under what might have been a hundred years of murderous Utah sun.

He really didn’t want to have to call for a lift. He didn’t want to run into anyone out here. He didn’t want to have to explain himself, or act like an adult in front of anyone. He wanted to wear his fur again, feel the wind through it again, smell the everythings that hit his nose at those speeds. He didn’t want to ride to the next stop in someone’s truck cab, to hear them ask that stupid question about how two breastless and bepenised individuals could possibly ride in the same car together for a thousand miles, and he didn’t want to feel the urge to do something untoward with his teeth. He didn’t want to have to resist that urge. Again.

“Found it!” Oak barked, and chucked a rusty toolbox out the passenger-side window. Paul smirked at their playfulness, and got to work.

You can read the rest in WEREWOLVES VERSUS: NATURE! It’s available for $1+ on Gumroad and Itch.io. Your purchase of this issue will benefit all of its contributors.

JD is the creator of Ask the Werewolves and El Indon. You can find more of his work here and here.