We’ll never get out of here.

The fear couldn’t be ignored or denied any more but all the same not much was said. What could they say? They were lost on trails hardly anyone walked on.

LOST AND FOUND BY ARMEL DAGORN 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 17

Rugged-looking and turtle-like under their backpacks, the four men shuffled through the leaves and limbs and stepped onto a muddy path. Their faces, reddened by the fight between the warmth of the hours spent walking and the evening’s descending coolness, strained under the hard stubble of days in the mountains.

They stared down at the fresh tracks in the mud, and hardly needed to look at each other, as they hardly needed to bend down and inspect the tracks to confirm those were their footprints.

“Ah for fuck’s sake,” said Ronan, disgusted at having, once again, discovered they had been walking around in a circle. “We’ll never fucking get out of here.”

Ronan and his three friends had gone for the two-day trek linking Teresópolis and Petrópolis on the assumption that it was …