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| The Unseen Guide |
On the third day of his solo expedition, Nate veered off the trail to investigate a strange cluster of bird calls. The sky was cloudless, the early summer heat dry and buzzing with insects. His GPS lost signal somewhere near a bend in the valley, but he didn’t worry. He’d studied these mountains for years. He knew how to navigate.
Except he didn’t.
By the time the sun dropped behind the ridgeline, Nate realized he hadn’t seen a trail marker in hours. The birds were gone. The forest, thick and alive, had swallowed every familiar landmark. Trees looked the same in every direction, and his compass needle spun slightly—magnetic interference, maybe, or a technical failure.
Still, he kept walking.
The next morning, his canteen was nearly empty, and his emergency satellite phone refused to power on. His notes, carefully annotated in a field journal, had been soaked in a stream crossing the day before. His body ached. His pride, sharper than any pain, kept him from panicking—until he slipped on loose gravel and landed with a sickening crunch.
Nate cried out and collapsed onto a bed of pine needles, biting down a scream. His ankle throbbed—misshapen and swelling fast. The pain made him dizzy. He reached out and touched it lightly.
Broken. He knew it.
He sat there, sweat beading on his forehead, listening to the silence press in.
That was when he first heard the voice.
“Long way from the trail, aren’t you?”
Startled, Nate looked up. A man stood a few yards away, tall, sun-worn, dressed in old canvas clothes. He had a walking stick and a weathered satchel slung over one shoulder. His face was deeply lined, his beard silver. But his eyes—his eyes were young.
Nate blinked. “Where did you come from?”
The man smiled. “Just over the ridge.”
“I didn’t hear you approach.”
“Most don’t.” He gestured to Nate’s ankle. “That looks rough. Mind if I take a look?”
Nate hesitated. He didn’t like strangers, especially ones who appeared without explanation. But he was in no position to argue. The man knelt beside him and gently examined the injury.
“This is bad,” he said quietly. “You can’t walk on it.”
“So it’s broken?”
The man answered right away. “Yes, it is.”
Nate frowned. “Are you a doctor?”
“Nothing like that.”
“You from around here?”
“Sort of.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I know the way back.”
That sentence dropped into Nate’s chest like a stone. “You… you can guide me out?”
“You can’t go anywhere on that ankle.”
“Then can you go and get help?”
“We don’t have to do that,” the man said. “I can help.”
“How? If you’re not a doctor?”
“I’ll build a fire,” he said, already gathering wood. “And a splint for that leg. Then we’ll see.”
He worked quietly, tying branches into place and wrapping Nate’s ankle with strips of cloth from his own pack. The fire crackled to life under the man’s steady hands. Nate leaned back, exhausted.
The man hummed an old tune—something Nate didn’t recognize but found strangely comforting.
As the flames danced higher, Nate watched them flicker. For a moment, he thought he saw… something. A shape. A glow. A presence. A figure sitting within the flames, still and watchful, robed in light.
He blinked.
Gone.
He turned toward the man, but he was already lying down, eyes closed. Maybe sleeping. Maybe not.
“Rest,” the man murmured, without opening his eyes. “You’ll feel better in the morning.”
Nate meant to ask how he knew that—but sleep pulled him under before the words could form.
The next morning, he woke to birdsong and an empty campsite.
He couldn’t remember falling asleep.
The guide was gone.
No footprints. No satchel. No sign that anyone had ever been there.
Nate sat up slowly—and froze.
His ankle.
The swelling was gone. The bruising, faint. He moved his foot. No sharp pain. No resistance.
He stood.
No pain.
His breath caught. He crouched, stood again. Balanced on it. Walked a few steps.
No. This wasn’t possible.
Not medically. Not logically. Not… humanly.
“Hello?” he called out, louder now. “Where did you go?”
No answer.
Then, faintly, from somewhere deep in the trees, he heard a voice—not a shout, not a whisper, but something inside his chest.
“Keep going. You’re almost there.”
Nate stumbled forward, heart pounding, feet steady. For the first time in days, he wasn’t afraid.
Minutes later, he stepped onto a ranger trail—sunlight breaking through the trees, and the distant rumble of an engine.
On the ride to the ranger station, Nate shared his story. The rangers listened quietly, exchanging glances.
One of them finally said, “You said your ankle was broken yesterday?”
“It was,” Nate replied.
The ranger raised an eyebrow. “Then how are you walking on it?”
Nate didn’t answer. He couldn’t.
Later, as they approached the station, another ranger added gently, “People see things out there sometimes. Hear voices. When they’re alone too long.”
But Nate knew what he saw.
What he felt.
And it hadn’t come from inside his head.
Back at the station, the rangers gave him a hot meal, clean clothes, and a ride into town. He thanked them, filed a shaky report, and boarded a flight home to New York the next day.
But nothing felt the same.
When he stepped into his apartment—walls lined with books, specimens, and framed degrees—Nate felt like a stranger in his own life.
He looked at the evidence of everything he’d built. Everything he had trusted. Everything that now felt… insufficient.
He limped—out of habit, not necessity—over to the far end of his bookshelf. His fingers hovered for a moment, then pulled down a Bible he hadn’t touched in years.
He flipped it open at random.
“Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so some have entertained angels unawares.”
—Hebrews 13:2
He read it again.
And again.
That verse burned itself into his memory.
He closed the Bible slowly, his hands trembling.
He wasn’t sure what came next.
But for the first time in his life, he wanted to find out.
He didn’t know what he was looking for.
But he knew where to start.
