June 30th, 1991

Baking in the hot sun, the Arizona desert was just as dry as could be. Travelling across the vast expanse of the mysterious and almost hell-ridden landscape, a lone coyote was looking for prey to satisfy its need for food. So far, as is the case with most hunts, he wasn't finding much. All that was accompanying him was the heated sand, large mountains and the all too familiar saguaro cactus. Though soon, the little guy came across a dark gray strip of rock extending for miles. What was this thing? He had never seen anything like it before. Stranger still, there were yellow lines and white lines decorating it. Were they one of the ancient structures left behind by the original humans that lived there? Right when the coyote was about to set his paw on the strange object, a big blue machine rushed past making popping sounds from its engine leaving clouds of smoke behind. The coyote jumped back, but rather than continue on his hunt, he felt an evil air coming from the machine that had just passed him. The pungent smell it left behind was easily traceable by scent. Because he was a coyote, it was his job to protect the desert from evil spirits. The little canine ran after the strange machine that had just passed him.

The blue machine was a 1930's Chevrolet bus owned by the Southwestern Highway Transportation Company of Glendale, Arizona. At its wheel was 40 year old Joe Kramer, a veteran road warrior. Today, he was operating the Triple 7 service from Sun City to Laughlin, Nevada. Next to him was a cup of his usual black coffee, courtesy of Winchell's Donut House. The old engine of the bus growled with age. Not only was it nearing the old age of sixty, but the bus was the oldest in the company fleet and constantly had maintenance issues. Maintenance workers gave it the moniker "Bus From Hell". This was all too prevalent today, considering just outside of Wickenburg, Bus 777's air conditioning had given up. To make matters worse, blue smoke belched from the exhaust pipe. It was burning oil, meaning the engine could very well explode along the at least 200 to 300 miles remaining to Laughlin. "HURRY IT UP WILL YOU?! THE SOONER WE'RE GAMBLING THE BETTER!" An old lady shouted at the top of her lungs followed by many other senior-aged rude passengers. Ugh... Someone just kill me now or destroy this God damned machine... Joe thought to himself. He hated his job, but this was the only one he could get. At least he could make up for the pain with a little gambling in Nevada.

They were just south of Wikieup and the bus was baking hot from the sun. Joe felt like he'd puke. "Look, can I just stop the bus for a second in town or turn the bus back, I'm baking in here-" "NO!" Almost all the seniors cried out in protest to his simple request. A grumpy 72 year old man stood up, obviously weighing less than 100 pounds, but had an energy of a heavy weight boxer. "Like hell we'd let you skip out on us! We'll push this damned bus all the way to Laughlin if we have to, Sonny! Those slot machines ain't waitin' any longer. Just do your job!" Joe grumbled to himself. "Fine! Just sit the hell down will you?!" Normally, he had better social faking skills than this, but the way these passengers and his bus were tormenting him today cancelled that out. His last resort option of getting a better bus sent up from Phoenix was hopeless too. Not surprisingly, the bus slowed by a whole 10 miles an hour soon as they passed Wikieup. That, coupled with the cracked and buckling old narrow pavement of the two lane US 93 assured that this bus ride would be anything but comfortable.

Joe's torment got worse when they reached I-40. Plenty of angry motorists heading to California honked at his slow gaudy blue wheeled coffin for the 50 or so miles to Kingman. One pulled next to him and the driver rolled down the window of his 1989 Toyota Corolla, giving Joe the bird. "Can you go any fucking slower Grandpa?! Get off the road!" That got a chorus of yelling going from the elderly passengers in the bus all rolling down the windows and yelling at the other driver. Being only two lanes long and both lanes being taken up by the slow bus and rubber necking driver, traffic was beginning to pile up behind the two vehicles making even more people angry. Joe yelled in frustration and floored it, straining the bus' engine to pass the jerk next to him. "I'm just fucking glad the rest of the route to Laughlin isn't a freeway..." Joe grumbled to himself obviously reaching the strains of his temper.

In Kingman, Joe pulled off onto old Route 66 and took it through town, not wanting to risk any more trouble from Interstate travellers. "Get us back on the freeway you hooligan!" Once again, the elderly passengers were pushing Joe's temper to its limits. "Stop yelling! STOP!" But alas, they all continued on has he went west on Beale Street, rejoining US 93. They even kept up as he turned off onto State Highway 68. They were more than halfway to Laughlin, running on a rusty old engine with no oil and the bus was hotter than hell itself. Finally at Union Pass, the bus couldn't handle any more stress and reached its climax towards the top of the hill. The radiator cap blew off as hot steam hissed out. The bus was slowing down even more. "Come on, come on! You can do it, baby. You can do it!" The coaxing did nothing as the machine ground to a halt. "What's the hold up?! Get going!" Joe slammed his hand down and pulled the emergency brake. "I can't go any further! This is it!"

The elderly man from earlier got up and marched to the driver's seat, grabbing hold of Joe's shirt. "Listen here, you'd better get us going again! I've put everything but my false teeth into this trip and I ain't gonna wait any longer." Joe, now at the end of his sanity, saw the man and other passengers as demons, when in reality they weren't. As they all began to crowd around Joe, he lost it. "FINE!" He pulled the emergency brake and got out shoving the bus, allowing gravity to get it going again, if only for a little while. He got quickly back in before the bus had gone without him and steered it around Union Pass. Not using the brake, the bus picked up 40 miles an hour in speed. It soon ran off the road and plowed through several cacti as it finally came to a stop 50 feet from the highway. "You twit! Get us back on that road!" This was it. Joe couldn't take it any longer. "NO!" He got out of the bus and thew his cap on the ground stamping on it several times. As he was losing his temper, a dirty idea came into his head. A very wicked one too. "Alright, sorry I lost my temper everyone... I'll get us to a service road a few miles ahead of here, just let me patch up the engine." He took out a repair kit within the bus and began working on the engine. Thankfully, the passengers weren't rude enough to deny a donation of water for the vessel's radiator. After doing a bit of repair work, Joe got back inside and turned the key. The still complaining passengers didn't bother him anymore. Nor would they bother him ever again...

Coaxing the engine at least 20 times, he finally got it started again and began driving the bus gently through the Arizona sand across bleak desert for the next several hours, with nothing in sight at all. "Where the hell are we?! What are you doing?!" The passengers continued complaining and even a pair of false teeth was thrown at the dashboard bursting into pieces. "Joe looked back in the rear view mirror grinning, keeping silent the whole way. When he felt he was far enough, from anything, he turned off the bus. The battery kept the ancient wiring of the bus on and kept the cabin of the bus lit. Though they flickered every now and then. "What are you doing?! Turn it back on!" Joe got out of his seat and reached into a metal toolbox gently sifting around. "Forget Laughlin everyone... I'll give you all a vacation you'll never forget!" He pulled out a large tire iron. "Has he gone mad?!" Joe grinned as he walked down the aisle patting the blunt instrument in his hand, with everyone finally going silent. He stopped and turned towards the 80 pound man who had given him hell. "Mind explaining yourself Sonny?!" He cracked rudely. Joe shook his head, then lifted up the tire iron and began beating the man to death. Blood and pieces of brain went everywhere and landed over everyone. The people inside began screaming in horror and some tried to stop Joe, but he was much younger and stronger than these seniors. They could do nothing as he continuously beat them all with his instrument until every single passenger was a mangled and/or decapitated mess.

Covered in blood, Joe looked around him, dropped the tire iron and beat the metal frame of his bus in frustration. His plan had succeeded... Officially making him a mass murderer of over 20 people. He had to hide the evidence one way or another. He got out of the bus with the toolkit and opened the hood. He used the tools to cut a wire and the main gas line, putting them close together. Running the starter of the engine, the cut wire sparked the leaking gasoline igniting a fire. Joe quickly ran out of the bus and watched as the fire ran through the gas line and hit the gas tank creating a small explosion. The fire soon was large and hot enough that it began engulfing the entire bus. Joe looked on with the orange glow of his work burning away the old machine. Glass broke and melted under the heat after 30 minutes along with the headlights, melting the chromium lining within them. It slowly dripped out of the bell shaped headlights, making it appear that the bus was crying. Weeping. Soon, the smell of popcorn filled the air; the stench of burning bodies.

Having enough of it, Joe walked off. The bus was far enough from any town or civilization to be discovered easily. Joe had stolen any food items and water from his victims before he had burned the bus and was careful to use it as he hiked his way back to Highway 68. He slept under a cactus around midnight and when he woke up, used a portion of the water to wash as much of the blood as he could off his pants, then removed everything but his underwear and pants before he continued his. It took him a day and a half by foot, but eventually he found himself walking facing traffic on the northern shoulder of the highway. A semi-truck pulled over when Joe gave the hitch-hiking thumb signal. "Looks like you've been through hell," the driver stated. "Buddy, you don't know the half of it. Can you give me a lift?" The driver looked at him in the eye. "As long as its on the way to Bullhead City." "That'll work..." Joe stated. The driver opened the door and Joe got in. He closed the door behind him. "Mind telling me what happened to you pal?" The driver inquired. "I was driving a bus to Laughlin... My bus was hijacked... By demons and they shoved me onto the road, leaving me to die." The driver shook his head. "Yeah right, I've heard better stories from my grandma."

It was that same day the Coyote caught up to the bus' path. Looking around, he soon saw a horrifying site in front of him. He dropped the lower jaw of his muzzle in shock, seeing the same bus from earlier right in front of him, but completely destroyed by flames. Cautious, the coyote found a way inside the burned hulk. What he saw was far more horrifying than the wreckage of the bus itself. There were dead humans everywhere, mostly burned all torn up and mangled with blood showing everywhere. Whatever evil spirit had done this was gone and had succeeded with murder. The little canine could do nothing but lower its head and whimper, failing in his duty to protect the desert from evil. Knowing there was nothing he could do, the coyote got out of the bus and slowly walked away, every so often looking back on the dead bus with sorrowful eyes. Though unbeknownst to him and Joe... The tale of Bus 777 was far from over...