It was a good night to be out with friends, and so that’s exactly what I did. I was out with my two best friends at the time. The night was young, the moon was crescent, and we just started it by getting some Wendy’s, which is affordable for three college students. So, it’s the three of us, Kadence, Lexi, and me, Claire. We’re chatting, laughing, and sharing funny Tik Toks with one another. Then Lexi showed us a Tik Tok about Randonaughting. 

      Randonautica is an app that uses some sort of algorithm to

find specific energy points. The way it would find your points is

by following the directions and thinking of what kinds of things

you want to see. Once the energy points were located, you

could find them by GPS. Then these energy points would either

show you what you thought of or similar things. Ergo, we

decided to try it since it would spruce up our night.

       Our food was decent and filling, and we decided it was now

time to try the app. The night was still young, we were excited

and nervous since it was Kadence’s and my first time using the

app. Lexi told us that she hadn’t had much luck and

Randonautica had brought her to some creepy locations. To

start off the trip, we decided to try and find a specific color

combination. Those colors were purple and orange. We had to

sit in silence and just think of those colors while the app did its

hocus pocus. Our location pops up and we head off.

      “Do you really think it’ll work?” Kadence said, while driving

her mom’s white minivan towards our mysterious location. She

wore a black shirt with some lemons scattered and black jeans to match, and sported a pixie cut with buzzed sides with the top dyed a light teal. 

       “I hope so! I saw this one video on Tik Tok about someone finding a dead body! It’s been trending.” I said as I sat in the passenger seat, staring intensely at the GPS. I was wearing jeans and a black tank top that had a skull with blue roses on it. Fuzzy, curly hair fell everywhere and often got caught. 

       “I haven’t seen anything like that when I used it with my other friends,” Lexi chimed in. “The creepiest thing I’ve probably found was probably graffiti on that abandoned gas station near Smith’s.” Lexi was the comfiest one, wearing a crimson hoodie and pajama pants. She also sported a messy pixie cut; it was just a fluff of hair on her head. 

Excitedly, I ask her about the graffiti, “Really!? What was it?” 

       “A bunch of dicks and a bad replica of a pentagram,” said Lexi with a slight grin.

       “Sorry to interrupt this lovely conversation, but am I turning left, or right?” Kadence asks. 

       “Ah, sorry. Uh, go right.” I replied. We’re almost there, she was watching the GPS since I was distracted. We approach a big parking lot, park, then start looking around. “See any of the colors?” I ask while still scanning the space around the passenger seat view. “No.” both reply. 

       “Oh shit, actually-” Lexi suddenly said, “Behind us, there’s a Home Depot sign.” Kadence and I turn to look where she’s pointing, and sure enough there’s a dark, giant orange Home Depot sign barely peeking out over a building. 

       “How did we not notice that when we came in?” I asked them. 

       “Eh, who cares? The point is, it kinda worked, right?” Lexi said as she prepped her phone for another round. “Now let’s do something scary. Maybe like ghosts and shit.”  

       “Yeah, something spooky!” I excitedly responded while taking the phone, already thinking of all the creepy things I know of. 

       With the GPS prepped and the car humming, we set off towards our creepy energy place. Our next location is a bit far from where we are right now. It’s near some houses up by the mountainous area. It’s gonna be on our left when we approach it from the roadside. 

       “What thoughts did you guys have?” Kadence asked while putting on some music for background noise. 

       “Just the usual: death, spirits, ghosts, and ghouls. Maybe a creepy lady, like from The Ring,” Lexi said. 

       “Yeah, mine were pretty much the same,” Kadence responded, “But I also had the thought of like GhostBusters.” 

       Nervously laughing at Kadence’s response, I replied “I kinda took a darker turn. I didn’t mean to! It just sorta popped into my head and then I tried to fix it, but by then, we got our location.” 

       A little concerned, Lexi asked, “Okay, then what was so bad about your thoughts?” 

       “I thought of like ghosts, spirits, evil, death. Then I quickly started to think of angels, good spirits, no bad spirits or bad angels.” 

      “Damn, I didn’t think you would get that dark.” Lexi stated. 

      “Yeah dude, way dark for the theme, man.” Kadence responded while turning at a red light. 

      “Yeah, sorry. But I tried to fix it,” I meekly said. 

       Kadence sighed, “It’s fine, but if something bad happens, I blame you.” She pointed a wiggly, threatening finger and we all laughed.

      For the rest of the ride there, I was in my head trying really hard to lessen or get rid of the evil and dark energy I put out on the rest of the ride to the point. Kadence and Lexi chatted about something, but I wasn’t paying attention because I was just in my head thinking over and over: Please stay safe. Let nothing bad happen to us. Please Dad, protect me. Please guardian angels, protect me. Protect us please. Staring at the stars in the dark sky, I kept repeating these thoughts until we approached the point.

       It's about 10:50 as we’re slowly approaching the point, so I mentioned to Kadence and Lexi, “It wants us to walk to that field.” 

       Kadence and I agreed not to do that immediately, but Lexi said, “There’s nothing here, it should be okay.” But after a quick talk of common sense to her, she came to the smarter conclusion. 

       So, we’re at the point now and we’re just sitting there. Just talking about the point and how we are in no way getting out of the car. So, we decide that this was probably enough Randonaughting for the night, Kadence suggested        “Hey, do you guys wanna go to a stargazing spot farther up the road, my coworker told me about it.” So, we all are like "why not?", we head off to go stargazing. 

      With an empty road both ways, Kadence was surprised to see some headlights approach us from behind. She said,          “Oh look there's a car,” just to point it out to us, but Lexi had noted the car's presence before Kadence mentioned it. I looked into the mirror and saw that the lights were far behind us. 

       Still vibing to Kadence’s Spotify playlist, I decided to tell them about a scenario that popped up in my head while we were driving. “Yeah, I had imagined about what if someone came upon a murder taking place when Randonaughting. Or what if the person Randonaughting was killed? I was also having these thoughts when we were parked next to the Home Depot, but I didn't say them so I wouldn't scare you guys.” 

       Lexi and Kadence were not surprised, so we just continued chatting about similar topics until Kadence mentioned, “Dude, he won’t fucken get off our ass.” I looked back to see really bright headlights shining on us. Kadence and Lexi were talking about him being on our ass but I was more concerned about Kadence starting to speed up. 

       “Hey, Kadence, maybe we should slow down,” I said to her. She slowed down a bit, but was still within the speed limit so the person could get the message and go around us. 

       “They’re still following us,” Kadence said “I’m gonna stop real fast to let this dickwad pass.” We pass a turning point and Kadence stopped safely after it so the truck could pass or turn. We pull to the side of the road. 

       “Imma flip this guy off as he passes,” Kadence said annoyed and upset as she rolled her window down. 

Lexi and I were telling her not to: “Kadence no! What if they have a gun and they start firing? Don’t do that!” I said, getting ready to pull her hand and arm back inside the car. With my attention focused on Kadence, trying to stop her from flipping the bird, but the person didn't pass by...

       It all happened so fast. Faster than I could imagine. Once we all quickly realized they were stopping too, Kadence froze. I glanced in the door mirror to see the truck with its blinding lights and pitch-black tinted windows. I couldn’t see anyone. Lexi was ducking while peeking at the truck as I try to get a better look in the mirror. Lexi began to scream, “GO, GO, GO, FUCKEN’ GO!” just as the truck stops right behind us. This snaps Kadence out of her daze and she put the pedal to the fucken' metal, and we zoomed off. 

       We’re still in shock as we zip down the empty winding road. When we got a bit aways I gently said, “Hey Kadence, maybe we should slow down a bit.” She began to calm down and ease off the gas. We get to a point where we can make a U-Turn and head back home.

       As we were driving, we reached the turning point where we stopped earlier. Kadence slowed down as we approached it. Scanning the area we passed, there was a line of housing across our left with an empty parking area in front of it. Some cars were scattered in the lot, but there was no sign of the truck there. 

       During the rest of the drive back, we started chatting. Trying to calm each other down while getting as far away from that place as possible. “I can’t believe that happened,” said Lexi as she leans forward from the back seat, not wanting to feel alone. 

       “Dude that was fucken’ terrifying!” Kadence responded, “Look, I’m shaking!” She held up her hand and we could see in the dim light that she was indeed shaking as if she had been out in the snow without winter gloves. 

        “Do you need me to drive?” Lexi asked. 

        “No, I’m okay to drive. It gives me something to concentrate on.”

        Claire’s mind was a mess. She was very quiet on the drive back. Her mind was throwing guilty thoughts at her. Saying it was her fault because she put out that bad energy. It was conjuring up all the possible scenarios that could’ve played out. What if we hadn’t stopped and made it to the point? We could’ve gotten blocked, possibly trapped, and taken! Lexi’s mind was on the truck, trying to put together a description in case they make a police report. The other girls were not blaming Claire, they were just happy they were able to get out of there safely. They both knew this was a possible risk of Randonaughting. 

*

        We later found out from Kadence’s coworker, the one who suggested the stargazing spot, that she was also almost possibly kidnapped. The one difference being it was in the day for her, and a car followed her back and around town. Luckily, she was able to shake off that person. Unlucky for Kadence and the group, they also had a scare of almost being kidnapped. Is it possible guardian angels heard my calls, or did we just get lucky like Kadence’s coworker? Who knows for sure? I still don’t.