The night pressed heavy against the windshield, a velvet-black curtain swallowing the glow of Eddie Morgan's headlights. He'd been on the road long enough to know that night driving wasn't just about covering miles, it was about surviving them. Out here, past midnight, the highway had its own pulse, its own secrets.
Eddie's rig, an old but faithful Peterbilt 379, growled steady beneath him. The dash lights painted his face in dull green, highlighting the creases carved deep by years of road fatigue. He was forty-eight but looked closer to sixty. Long hauls, bad coffee, and nights like this had stolen years he couldn't get back.
He reached for his thermos, took a swig, and winced. Lukewarm, bitter, but necessary. The smell of diesel and faint cherry air freshener clung to the cab, a combination that somehow felt like home.
On the seat beside him lay a folded manila envelope with his dispatch orders. His eyes kept drifting to it, though he'd already read the instructions a dozen times:
Pickup: Industrial yard, Junction City.
Delivery: Black Creek Depot, Sunrise.
Notes: No questions asked. Do not stop until arrival.
It wasn't the first time Eddie had taken a job that smelled fishy. But this one had reeked. The yard manager hadn't met his eyes. The trailer had been sealed before Eddie even backed in. And then there was the pay, double his usual rate, cash upon delivery.
Easy money. Too easy.
The CB crackled to life, breaking the monotony.
"Breaker one-nine, breaker one-nine, this here's Ghost Rider eastbound, mile marker 148. Anybody out there keepin' me company tonight?"
Eddie exhaled slowly. He knew that handle. Ghost Rider had been haunting the waves for years, a voice without a face. Some drivers swore he was just a lonely old-timer too broke to fuel a real rig. Others whispered he was dead, still talking through static.
Eddie reached over and flicked the switch off. Not tonight. Not with that kind of haul on his back.
The road stretched empty in front of him, blacktop lined with skeletal trees. His headlights carved twin tunnels through the dark, but beyond them, the night was absolute. Even the stars seemed swallowed.
Up ahead, a neon glow bled into the distance. A sign flickered weakly:
SMOKEY'S TRUCK STOP – OPEN 24 HRS. COFFEE / SHOWERS / DIESEL.
Eddie hesitated. He'd been driving since dusk, and the clock on the dash read 12:47 A.M. His eyelids felt heavy, a warning bell he couldn't ignore.
Still… his gut told him to keep rolling.
Truck stops were safe, sure, but they were also places where stories began. And Eddie had enough stories, most with endings he didn't like.
He rolled past the exit ramp, eyes flicking to the lot as he went by.
A waitress stood under the flickering neon, apron stained, cigarette glowing between her fingers. A pair of truckers leaned against their rigs, swapping stories too big to be true. And in the far corner of the lot stood a man. Not moving, not talking, just standing in the shadows, staring as Eddie's headlights swept over him.
For a split second, Eddie thought the man smiled.
Then the truck stop was behind him, swallowed by darkness.
The CB crackled again, though Eddie hadn't turned it back on. Static bled through, carrying a whisper that tightened his grip on the wheel.
"…Morgan… don't stop…"
His name.
Nobody had called his name over the radio in years.
His throat went dry. He glanced at the CB, its switch still firmly in the OFF position.
The engine hummed, the tires hummed, and the highway stretched endless. But something had shifted. The night wasn't just dark anymore, it was watching.
Eddie tried to shake it off. Ghost stories on the CB, shadows in parking lots, whispers on dead channels, they were part of the job. Every driver heard things at night, especially when fatigue gnawed at the edges of their mind.
He focused on the road, letting the steady rhythm of tires against asphalt carry him. Just another haul. Black Creek by sunrise. Easy.
But the words on the dispatch replayed in his head like a warning: No questions asked. Do not stop until arrival.
"Yeah, sure," Eddie muttered to himself. "What could go wrong?"
The highway curved east, pulling him into a stretch of thick woods. His headlights picked out nothing but tree trunks, tall and skeletal, closing in on both sides. The moon had disappeared behind a bank of clouds. It felt like he was driving through a tunnel of black.
That's when he noticed the headlights.
In the rearview, a pair of beams appeared in the distance, faint at first but growing steadily. Eddie frowned. He hadn't seen another vehicle for nearly half an hour. Out here, past midnight, traffic thinned to almost nothing.
He kept his pace steady. Eighty thousand pounds of steel and mystery cargo didn't move fast, but he wasn't crawling either. The lights behind him gained ground, closing in.
"Alright, partner," Eddie muttered, checking his mirrors. "Let's see what you're about."
The headlights grew brighter, then brighter still. But they didn't swing left to pass. They just hovered, hanging behind him, maybe thirty yards back. Too close.
Eddie's fingers tightened around the wheel. Tailgating a big rig at night? Amateur move.
He flicked his CB back on, more out of habit than hope.
"Eastbound shadow behind the 379 Peterbilt, you wanna back off a hair? Ain't no sense ridin' my bumper like that."
Static. No reply.
The lights stayed glued to him, steady, unblinking.
Minutes dragged. Eddie tried everything, easing up on the gas, speeding slightly, drifting right onto the rumble strip to signal annoyance. The headlights matched every move, never gaining, never falling back.
A cold ripple crawled up Eddie's spine. He couldn't even make out the shape of the vehicle. Just those two beams, white and merciless, burning into his mirrors.
"Alright, then," Eddie said, voice low. "You wanna play."
He flicked his high beams on, angling them back, but the mirrors only flared with blinding white. His eyes watered. He cursed and snapped them off.
Then, as suddenly as they had appeared, the lights were gone.
Eddie blinked, checked again. Empty highway. Darkness stretching back for miles.
He leaned forward, searching the mirrors, even cracked his window to listen. Nothing but the roar of his engine and the whisper of wind through the trees.
"Lack of sleep," he told himself, though his gut said otherwise. "Seeing things. Hell, hearing things too."
But the CB chose that moment to come alive again.
"…Morgan…"
His stomach clenched. The voice was faint, almost drowned in static, but it was his name.
"…don't stop…"
The hairs on his arms prickled. Eddie reached for the CB, checked the dial. Channel 19. Standard. Nothing unusual. He lifted the mic anyway.
"This is Morgan, eastbound on I-70. Whoever's yankin' my chain, you're about two seconds from, "
The line went dead.
No static, no hiss. Just silence.
Eddie lowered the mic slowly. His heart thudded against his ribs, louder than the engine for a moment.
Something wasn't right. He'd felt it since Junction City, since backing into that industrial yard and watching those men seal the trailer without a word.
Now the road seemed to agree.
The clouds shifted, spilling a sliver of moonlight across the asphalt. For a heartbeat, Eddie thought he saw tire marks ahead, not the usual twin stripes of rubber, but deep gouges, as if something far heavier had dragged across the pavement.
He shook his head, blinked hard, and when he looked again, they were gone.
Fatigue. Has to be.
The clock on his dash read 1:28 A.M. He had five more hours of darkness to kill before sunrise delivery.
Five more hours with nothing but road, coffee, and the possibility that he wasn't driving alone.
Eddie reached into the overhead compartment, pulled down a cassette, an old habit he never kicked despite the digital age. He shoved it into the player. The speakers crackled before spilling out a familiar country ballad.
Music filled the cab, grounding him, pushing back the silence. Eddie tapped the wheel in rhythm, eyes fixed on the endless black ribbon stretching ahead.
But even as he drove, even as the song played, his eyes kept flicking to the mirrors. Searching. Waiting.
Because out here, after midnight, on roads too empty for comfort, once something found you, it never really let go.
The cassette rolled on, filling the cab with scratchy guitar and mournful lyrics. Eddie let the music settle into his bones, a reminder of quieter days, back when long hauls felt like freedom instead of debt collection.
He thought of Marlene, his ex-wife, who used to ride shotgun back when they were young and reckless. They'd made a game of chasing the horizon, stopping in small towns, living off diner pies and bad motel beds. She used to laugh at the way he talked to the road, as though it were alive.
It is alive, Eddie thought grimly now. And it's listening.
He adjusted in his seat, rolling his shoulders to shake off the ache. His logbook sat on the passenger seat, untouched since the pickup. If a DOT officer stopped him, he'd be cooked. But something told him no officer would bother him tonight. The highway was too empty, too hollow.
He tapped the CB mic again, half hoping for a normal voice.
"This is eastbound Morgan, 379 Peterbilt, mile 172. Anyone got ears on?"
Silence.
The CB's red light flickered once, faintly, as if it wanted to answer but couldn't.
Eddie cursed under his breath and tossed the mic aside. He took another gulp of coffee, cold now, sour against his tongue, and pressed the rig harder.
The woods broke suddenly into open farmland. Wide fields stretched on both sides, the moonlight silvering patches of frost on the ground. Out here, the highway seemed even lonelier. No gas stations. No billboards. Just miles of emptiness.
That's when he saw it.
A pair of lights on the horizon. Not behind him this time, ahead. Low to the ground, unmoving. Eddie squinted. Could've been another rig parked on the shoulder. Or… something else.
As he drew closer, he slowed, instinct prickling. The lights grew clearer, but the shape of the vehicle didn't. It looked wrong. Too tall, too narrow. Like headlights floating in the air.
He flicked his brights.
The lights vanished.
Eddie's heart stuttered. He blinked hard, rubbed his eyes, and when he looked again, the road was empty. No truck. No car. Just blacktop stretching on.
Enough. I need a break.
His body ached for rest, but the dispatch instructions burned in his skull: Do not stop until arrival.
He debated it anyway. Five minutes to stretch his legs, splash water on his face, maybe figure out if he was going crazy.
Then, as if answering his thought, the CB flared with static.
"…don't stop, Morgan… don't stop…"
The voice was sharper now, urgent. Not mocking. Not playful. Warning.
Eddie's grip trembled on the wheel. His throat tightened. He wanted to shout into the mic, demand answers, but something in his gut told him not to.
He drove on.
The road narrowed, funneled between tall overpasses. Concrete walls boxed him in, the sound of his engine echoing back like a heartbeat. His headlights cut into the gloom, and revealed something that made his blood run cold.
Tire marks. Fresh, black gouges zigzagging wildly across the lanes.
Something big had come through here, skidding, dragging. Eddie slowed, scanning. The marks led toward the shoulder… and then vanished, as though whatever made them had lifted clean off the ground.
His breath caught. His skin prickled with sweat despite the cold.
And then the headlights appeared again.
Behind him this time. Closer than before.
They flared to life in his mirrors, so bright they washed out everything else. Eddie cursed, throwing up a hand to shield his eyes. He stomped the accelerator, the Peterbilt groaning under the weight of its load.
The lights matched him. Always the same distance, impossibly steady.
"Son of a bitch," Eddie growled, slamming the CB switch.
"Whoever's playin' games back there, cut it out! You're gonna cause a wreck!"
The response was not static. It was a sound Eddie would never forget.
A low, mechanical growl, deep as thunder, rolling through the speakers. Not an engine. Not a voice. Something in between.
"…Morgan…"
The growl stretched his name, made it something inhuman.
His hands slickened with sweat. His chest thudded like a drum. He thought of Marlene, of the son he hadn't seen in six months, of every mistake that had driven him into this lonely life. If this was a nightmare, it was one born from every mile he'd ever driven.
And then, just as suddenly, the lights vanished.
The mirrors reflected nothing but darkness. The CB went dead. The only sound was the hammering of his own heart.
Eddie forced himself to breathe. He gripped the wheel until his knuckles ached, until the tremor in his hands subsided.
The clock blinked 2:03 A.M.
Three more hours until sunrise. Three more hours until Black Creek.
He pressed harder on the pedal, whispering to himself. "Just keep driving. Don't stop. Don't stop…"
And somewhere, faint but certain, the CB whispered back:
"…we're waiting…"
The highway stretched out like a strip of black glass, the Peterbilt's headlights carving tunnels through the dark. Eddie Morgan leaned on the wheel, thermos of bitter coffee in his hand, trying to ignore the envelope on the seat beside him.
Pickup: Junction City.
Delivery: Black Creek Depot, sunrise.
Notes: No questions asked. Do not stop until arrival.
He'd run a lot of shady jobs in twenty-five years on the road, but this one felt different. Too much money, too much secrecy. And the way those yard hands had sealed the trailer without a word had left him with a knot in his gut.
The CB crackled, a voice breaking through the static.
"Breaker one-nine, this is Ghost Rider. Eastbound, mile 148. Anybody out there keepin' me company?"
Eddie stiffened. Ghost Rider was a name whispered in truck stop stories, a handle that belonged to no rig anyone had ever seen. Some said he was just a lonely old-timer. Others swore he was dead, his voice stuck forever on the airwaves.
Eddie reached over and switched the CB off. Not tonight. Not with this load.
The road curved through a tunnel of trees, their shadows pressing close against the glass. That's when he saw them, headlights in his mirror.
They crept closer, steady and bright. Too close. Eddie eased up, then sped, but the lights clung to him, thirty yards back, never passing, never falling. His skin prickled.
He grabbed the mic, though the CB was still switched off. "Eastbound shadow, you wanna back off a hair?"
Static hissed. No answer.
Then the lights vanished. One moment blinding, the next, gone. Empty blacktop stretched behind him. Eddie's breath stuck in his chest. He rubbed his eyes, muttering, "Long night. Too much coffee."
But the CB came alive on its own.
"…Morgan… don't stop…"
The voice was faint, barely more than static, but it was his name. His blood turned cold.
Up ahead, a sign glowed through the dark: Smokey's Truck Stop – Open 24 Hours. Eddie thought about pulling in, maybe grabbing ten minutes of rest. But as he rolled past the lot, his headlights swept over figures, truckers swapping stories, a waitress smoking under the neon, and a man standing alone in the shadows, staring straight into Eddie's cab.
For just a second, Eddie thought the man smiled.
Then the truck stop was gone, swallowed by the night.
The CB hissed again, louder this time.
"…don't stop, Morgan…"
Eddie tightened his grip on the wheel. His eyes stayed locked on the endless road, but he couldn't shake the feeling that something out there had locked onto him.
And once the road found you, it never let go.
Eddie exhaled slowly, letting the heat of the cab wash over him. The coffee had gone cold, but he drank it anyway. Night driving had a way of warping time, hours could feel like minutes, and minutes could stretch endlessly. Every mile he drove tonight seemed to hum with a strange energy, as if the asphalt itself were watching him.
The trailer behind him shifted slightly as he hit a small patch of frost, the cargo inside groaning faintly. Nothing moved on its own, yet the sound carried a weight that made Eddie glance nervously in the mirrors. He'd been on the road long enough to know that even the smallest creak could mean trouble.
His mind drifted to the stories told at truck stops, legends that kept drivers awake longer than fatigue ever could. Phantom trucks that followed unsuspecting rigs, disappearing without a trace. Drivers who vanished on long hauls, their last transmissions only static and warnings. Eddie had never believed those tales… until now.
The wind picked up, whistling through gaps in the trailer's panels. Eddie tightened his grip on the wheel. Somewhere in the distance, the faint rumble of another engine echoed. He squinted through the darkness. Could be a distant rig. Could be… something else.
The CB hissed again, the voice low, almost pleading:
"…Morgan… don't stop…"
Eddie froze. The words weren't just sound; they were a presence, an invisible weight pressing down on him. His pulse raced, but he knew better than to panic. Panicking at night on a highway with eighty thousand pounds of steel was a quick way to make a grave mistake.
He leaned back, forcing himself to focus. He recited the basics: keep the rig steady, watch the mirrors, track the mileage. Control the situation. But even as he muttered these words, he knew the night wasn't ordinary. Not tonight.
Ahead, the road narrowed, flanked by dense woods on either side. Moonlight flickered through the clouds, illuminating patches of asphalt like fleeting glimpses into another world. Eddie's headlights caught something strange, tire marks, deep and jagged, zigzagging across the lanes as though a massive vehicle had skidded violently.
He slowed slightly, scanning for any sign of another truck, any clue of what had made them. Nothing. Just empty road. But the marks didn't feel old; the asphalt still bore their darkness like a fresh scar.
A shiver ran down his spine. He wanted to tell himself it was a trick of the light, a product of fatigue. But he didn't believe that. Not anymore.
The CB's static flared once more. "…we're waiting…"
Eddie swallowed hard. He pressed the pedal, forcing the Peterbilt to surge forward. His headlights cut through the darkness, but the shadows seemed alive, twisting in shapes his mind could barely comprehend.
The highway stretched ahead endlessly, each mile a reminder of the long night to come. Eddie knew one thing for certain: whatever was out there, whatever had found him tonight, it wasn't done. And by the time sunrise came, the first mile would already have changed everything.