25
Cell phones and cell phone towers still existed but reception was abysmally bad. Moreover as luck would have it, the team had crashed just beyond a mountain pass near the city of Paso Robles which all but erased their chances of getting a signal to call out. To add insult to injury even if they could get a call back to their family or friends there would be no way for them to charge up and mobilize two cars early enough to pick them up before the following morning.
Chupacabra elected to drag the deer off of the road to prevent another tire screeching near-fatality should a motorist happen by their location. Selfishly and perhaps stupidly the team mowed through a large portion of the rations that they packed for their trip. Evidently twenty plus years of growing up in an introverted, sheltered environment had engendered a confidence among the group. They all quietly believed that someone would come to their rescue well before they had to resort to eating the freshly pulverized remains of Bambi or even worse, each other.
Over the course of the next few hours the group split up into opposing directions in an attempt to get a call or text back to Murkin to alert him to their situation. Betelgeuse and Katt tried climbing up a hillside as high as they could while the other three backtracked the way they came for a few miles. After several failed attempts Betelgeuse said to Katt half joking, half serious "What if we die out here?"
