The Unnamable of State Route 87

The Night on State Route 87

It was a usual drive on a well traveled road in Arizona. State Route 87 was a route William Church knew like the back of his hand, often traveling to and from Phoenix. So well in fact that he felt safe enough to bring his wife and travel with her across the desert. Something he went back and forth with in his head seeing how the desert heat and endless terrain can often be unforgiving. What if the truck broke down and they were left stranded? The drive time was about an hour on a night where the moon rose faster than anticipated, and stars started to shimmer bright, twinkling like a mother smiling back at you, on this night a little too bright for the vast expanse.

The Dashcam Footage That Changed Everything

Church drives for 500 feet of bliss when suddenly his mind breaks as if a windshield were smashed by debris, his wife, paralyzed, the brain failing to record the account fully in her memory, as if a last line of defense trying to preserve what little sanity she could some day keep. For a brief second this encounter would change their lives, breaking the monotony of the miles upon miles of deep gray asphalt. On the corner to the passenger side lay in full display something that did not agree to be filmed. Church’s hands twitching at the wheel, His muscles spasmed, the body rejecting intent it no longer recognized. The mind of both defaulting to a safe zone. “a human”, “a ghost”, “a glare”, Church and his wife thought? The brain attempts warmth. The face, if you can call it that, was pale, a deep white resembling the void, there was a slenderness to the thing but it denied any suggestion of weight, the movement violent yet still, calm as if gravity were glitching at its presence.

The "Thing" that should not Exist

This insanity stood where a person could stand, but it did not occupy space like a person should. It did not react to the passing of the truck. It remained upright in a way that questioned the wholeness of a human figure. The wife did not speak, she remained silent, her mind racing to blur the saving of this encounter. For church, his mind choosing denial, complete irrelevance to the spirit of the thing, like a thought abandoned mid sentence. The couple reached a rest stop, when they remembered the truck had dash cam footage. The dashcam captured the highway exactly as expected: the yellow reflective lines, the signage of laws, and the moon casting light on the barren landscape ahead. And there, perfectly centered for less than a second was the figure. It was not translucent like a ghost, it did not blur and distort, it did not reflect light the way a physical object should. It simply existed. When the video was paused things got worse! The longer they looked, the less certain the reality of the thing became. Edges started mocking geometry. Body proportions shifted suddenly between frames, as if the recording device captured the embarrassment of straight lines. It is then when Church noticed the timestamp, it flickered like light from a candle. Enough for the mind to trance and retreat to the safety of a placid reality.

What Viewers Saw, And Didn't See

When the video was posted online, viewers argued, some saw nothing, a lie! A waste of time! Others saw a figure, the silhouette of slenderness in the night. Some saw a reflection, a mirror of the rule of law; the reflection of a life well structured. Lastly, some saw a ghost, not a ghost apparition, but the only thing that could encompass a definition under its umbrella for limited minds. For you see, everyone saw something different, not because it was a hoax. But because the Universe on this night chose peace and mercy. The arguments never settled and poll numbers fluctuated strangely. Totals never appeared the same way twice. Votes, Percentages, all rebalanced themselves. Screenshots taken minutes apart contradicted each other.

Liminal Roads and the Uncanny

A professor of Gothic literature was consulted. He spoke about liminal roads and a reality that was uncanny. He dubbed it “productive ambiguity.”

But he stopped responding to emails after making a final statement

“It is for the best of humanity that one does not decide what this thing is. I know it is not a ghost or an alien, but that is what I will study. Because those nightmares feel safe. Like ice to a finger that just recently touched the flame”.

Church no longer drives Route 87. His brain deleted every part of that night including with it the task of knowing how to drive, not out of shock or fear, but out of the brain's long term memory no longer functioning. The wife was also gone, missing not in divorce, but in mind. Staring into space thoughtless. This is because after reviewing the footage one final time, they realized something that had nothing to do with ghosts, aliens, or a pale crawler. The unnamable was no longer at the corner of the frame, but it was standing directly where the road should be, and it was looking directly at them.

Original Footage

Second Take Zoomed In

Source Credit:

Inspired by FOX 10 Phoenix, “Ghost? Glare? Arizona trucker shares footage of chilling sighting,” (March 14, 2023).

Truckers: William Church and Erika Lake.

About:

I’m Lobo Miasma, creator of the 13th Transmission, a cosmic‑horror project that explores: UAP's, Cryptids, Conspiracies, and the madness of our reality. I rewrite eyewitness accounts, legends, and documented events through a cosmic‑horror lens to reveal the unsettling patterns they don't want us to question.

Thank you for reading and being part of the tribe!