Static

He didn't remember it, but some part of him did. He'd been running from the stuff ever since.
 It was coming. His hair was standing on end and his gooseflesh was doing a shivery dance. The pressure in the air was so thick he couldn't breathe...
 The next moment, his world exploded, and was gone - in a massive blast of overwhelming white.

***

 Brand?
 Brandon looked at his watch and growled into the phone, It's eight-thirty am - on a Sunday. This better be good.
 I think he's been out there all night.
 Nate?
 Yeah.
 D'you know where?
 You were there. He didn't say.
 Brandon was already yanking on his pants. Did you check his house?
 What d'you think? Aje said sarcastically. I'm here now.
 What about his cellphone?
 Not in service. Aje hesitated. I could be wrong. Maybe he just took off to have breakfast or something.
 Any sign of his day pack, or other gear?
 Nope.
 Brandon nodded. He knew Aje wouldn't have called him unless he thought there was something to worry about. The storm the night before had been the biggest in years. A bad night to be out in the weather.
 Maybe we should have checked a little sooner.
 I'll be right there. I'll call in his plates on the way. Maybe somebody's seen his car.
 Nate's gonna love that. An APB on his hide.
 Better than a DOA. Brandon slammed down the phone, gave Rita an apologetic nuzzle, and tore out the door.

***

 It was the cold that nudged him awake. Invasive, numbing his body -
 Like a slab of meat in the deep freeze. He'd gone beyond shivering, and his first thoughts were nigglings of panic. Too cold. Gonna die if I don't get warmer.
 There was a heaviness in his chest; in his limbs. If it weighed him down any more, he'd never get up again.
 Gotta move.
 Only, moving was synonymous with pain. With a sharp, stabbing pain in his chest, and a nasty pang in his gut. With the throb in his head, and the twanging aches in his leg.
 Don't move the patient.
 Better to stay here...The cold could numb him again, and then it wouldn't hurt. Some part of his brain assured him it was sensible, and he started to drift. He was almost there, in that chilly darkness once more, when the chills began.
 He shivered, and groaned. His damned metabolism had been stirred up by those brief moments of wakefulness. The shivers were never going to let him have any rest. And the irregular movements were sending jolts of agony through his chest, his leg.
 Hey - better I can feel. With the kind of stunting I must've done, it coulda been a helluva lot worse...
 His headache was tightening his cranium like a vice, and he kept his eyes scrunched closed. He tried to force himself to relax, to ease the pain in his head...
 Think about something else. Like where you are.
 There were wet leaves. Under his face. Something was crawling across his neck. A whole lot of somethings. Ants.
 Hope they're not the stinging kind.
 Negative thinking, Nate -
 He heard something buzz his head.
 Yellow-jacket. Nate remembered catching a fish as a kid, and finding it later, covered in wasps. They'd stripped the flesh, and eaten their way down to the bones.
 Nate for dinner.
 Nate-carcass - stripped down to the bones.
 Nate au tartare.
 He realised he was drifting again, and brought himself back on track. It was time to get into action, and find his way home.
 He opened his eyes, but everything was blurry. He fought to focus, and was rewarded with a painfully haloed version of his world.
 It's the best I can do.
 He wasn't on the trail, or even near it.