CRASHED — Part One
It was 2:00 a.m. when Ken and Patty were jolted awake by a violent explosion echoing across the night.
It sounded like it came from the tobacco field.
Ken was out of bed instantly. He rushed to the window and yanked the curtains aside. Far in the distance, an amber glow flickered against the darkness, half-hidden behind the silhouette of their old barn.
Patty moved closer to him.
“What is it, hon?”
Ken squinted into the distance.
“It looks like a small plane crash,” he said. “I’m going to take a look. You stay here and call 911.”
Normally she would’ve argued — but something about his tone told her this wasn’t the time.
Ken pulled on his jeans, grabbed a shirt from the chair, slipped into his boots, and headed down the stairs. He cranked up the 4×4, the headlights cutting through the darkness as he drove across the land. The field was about a thousand yards out… but whatever had crashed was even farther, closer to the ravine.
Now that he was outside, the glow was clearer.
It’s definitely in the ravine, he thought.
Minutes later, he was there.
“I knew it…” he muttered.
Below him, flames licked at twisted metal, barely recognizable as any type of aircraft. The fire was wrong — not normal orange and blue, but a strange mix of dull gray, amber, and bright yellow at the center.
“I’m going to have to climb down,” he decided.
The ravine dropped at least thirty feet, steep and overgrown. He grabbed a flashlight from the 4×4 and carefully began his descent; grateful he’d chosen his boots instead of the house shoes he almost wore.
The darkness made it worse. The flames helped — but not much. They gave off more of a glowing haze, like fog made of fire.
It took far longer than he expected, but eventually Ken’s boots hit the bottom.
There, he saw it, Wreckage.
Fire.
And something… wrong.
He aimed his flashlight at the object — but the beam didn’t seem to reflect. It bent. Scattered. Almost as if the light itself didn’t want to touch it.
Then he heard sirens.
He looked up.
Red and blue lights flickered through the trees. Flashlights swept across the top of the ravine.
A voice called down:
“Sir, this is Horry County Sheriff’s Office! I need you to come up immediately!”
Ken climbed back out, slower this time, glancing over his shoulder once more before losing sight of it below.
At the top, police tape stretched between trees, blocking off the area like a crime scene already planned in advance.
A Burly deputy stepped forward and began questioning him — sharp, repetitive questions, like Ken had already done something wrong.
But Ken didn’t understand what he’d seen yet…