tumblewhats?

If you've ever driven through the Mojave or Arizona Desert at night, you know there are some windy places. Sand blows across the road, cars drive in crooked lines, things fly by that you can't focus on. And there are usually piles of tumbleweeds at the side of the highway. Every now and then the tumblers all leap out as a group -- yaaaaaaaah!

In fact, the tumbleweeds hunt in packs and pick off the weakest cars in the herd, those which are running on empty. You can see the cars at the side of the road, their windows bashed in and no clues to where the drivers went.

But it doesn't stop there. Cactus roots slowly drag the empty cars further and further from the road. And though there's never any rain, the carcasses rust quickly and sand creatures strip their paint away with digestive acids. Eventually the dead vehicles sink into the sand completely, and nothing is left but a mound of earth with a ring of agaves raising their spectacular stalks up to the heavens.

It's best to just drive on. Even if the little blue signs say there is food and gas at the next exit. Some of those towns are just rusty skeletons, picked clean by even larger monsters.