Jeremy Finley - The Darkest Time of Night

Joe slid back into the truck. “What’s going on?” William asked. “We can’t leave Miss Cliff—”

“Now, Mrs. Roseworth!” the soldier on the megaphone ordered.

“No! I want my husband on the phone—”

There was no order to open fire, only the sound of automatic weapons unloading. Joe threw it in reverse. I covered William’s face as we slid out of the garage and into the alley.

The shooting continued for several seconds more, masking our noise enough for us to make a sharp turn and approach another street.

“Jesus,” Roxy’s voice was tight. “Oh my God….”

“God love you, Verna,” Joe murmured quietly.

I made the sign of the cross across my aching chest.

“What happened?” William asked.

I held him close. “Miss Cliff wanted to save you.”

“Shouldn’t we go back and get her?”

I kissed his forehead and told him to close his eyes and try to rest.

Joe drove at a slow pace, unable to use his headlights. For the first time since arriving in Argentum, I was grateful for the fact that this was a small, isolated town. There were no streetlights on the side streets, which allowed us to creep along without being seen.

“Do you even know where you’re going?” Roxy whispered.

“You could blindfold me and I could still make it around town. At least, I hope so.”

“Once they… look closer at the coats, they’ll know. They’ll start looking for us,” Roxy said.

“If we can get up and over the rise…,” he said.

“Well, I sure couldn’t,” Roxy said. “It’s complete ice and snow. You better have a plan B.”

“It’s the only way out of town.” He leaned in to the windshield.

The lights of Main Street were still in view off to our right. Joe drove as far on the side street as he could before it dead-ended. Then he had no choice but turn towards the town’s main thoroughfare.

When we reached Main Street, he edged out just enough to look. We all leaned forward, seeing the Humvees along the boardwalk start separating. One disappeared down the alley where we’d gone to reach the mechanic shop, and the others turned towards the medical center before splintering off onto side streets.

“Hold on,” Joe said, turning left. Almost immediately, we began to climb the incline that had stranded Roxy only hours before. I whispered a silent prayer for the sharpness of Joe’s snow tires. We passed the crashed van and the police cruiser, its lights still flashing.

“Looks like my dancing partner survived after all,” Roxy said bitterly. “He was lying by the car when we ran off. Someone must have come to get his sorry ass.”

As we crested the hill, I looked back, certain we were being pursued.

My eyes lingered on the empty street for a moment before they were drawn to the heavens. Even the snow was unable to block out the two massive shapes hovering miles above the far edge of town. Their color was difficult to determine, but the thousands, maybe millions of lights, outlining their diameters and edges were clear. Comprehending their size brought on a wave of fear, like a child seeing a whale for the first time. I could only gauge they were the size of cruise liners, maybe even the battleships I’d seen on TV. I felt nauseous at the thought of William in one of them and looked away, but felt compelled to return my gaze, to make myself believe I’d really seen them.

Of course I had. I’d been in one too.

As we went over the hill, the last thing I saw was another beam of light shoot to the earth below.

Joe then stopped the truck, switched gears, and began to back up while turning the wheel.

“What are you doing?” Roxy demanded.

Joe ignored her, and pulled down the stick shift. The plow on the front of the truck slowly lowered.

Roxy’s hands flailed. “Joe, just keep driving—”

“Woman, I’m telling you what,” he said, waiting for the plow to crunch against the earth. He then drove off the road, the snow immediately piling up before him.

“They can’t chase us if they can’t get through,” he muttered.

Joe continued to drive a half circle and promptly dumped a huge amount of snow and ice on the road. He backed up and took another scoop, piling it behind the first.

“Now, we go,” he said, slowly advancing onto the road.

I glanced back to see lights coming up over the hill from the town. A Humvee was over the rise a moment later.

“Joe!” I cried out.

He swore and gunned the gas, and we started to slide. I looked back out the window and saw that the driver of the Humvee apparently had the same notion when he saw us. I watched the army vehicle race down the road and weave as he tried to avoid the mound of snow and ice. But instead, the Humvee crashed into it head on, the snow falling onto its hood and covering the window.

“Drive, dammit!” Roxy yelled. Despite the heavily falling snow, I could see the headlights of the Humvee rock back and forth as the driver tried to steer it free.

“Eat that, asshole,” Joe said, driving down the road as fast as he could while still controlling the truck on the ice. I saw one soldier get out of the Humvee with a long rifle and try to aim in our direction, but then we were off the road and onto the state route.

We crunched along, and Roxy patted Joe’s arm. “You did good.”

“Keep looking back,” he said. “They’ll be radioing in for anyone else to follow. It will be even more treacherous on these mountain roads. And it’s night. I’ll go as fast as I can, but the last thing we need is to end up in a ditch.”

“Been there,” Roxy said, holding up a finger, her eyes closed.

We drove in silence, the wipers pushing aside the snow that continued to fall, the pine trees rushing by in the dark.

“Joe, I’m so sorry,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry you’re caught up in this.”

“Miss Lynn, looks like I’ve been part of this for a long, long time, even if I didn’t realize it. I… can’t believe it….”

“How are we on gas?”

“I keep reserves in the wintertime, so I filled up before I started clearing the streets this afternoon. I have a reserve tank too. We’ll be fine to get to Denver.”

“What’s to keep them from following us from above? Helicopters? Planes?”

“Would be hard to follow from the air in this blizzard. It is the government, however. They’re probably tracking us by satellite at this very moment, following my cell signal.”

“Do you have one? In the truck?”

“In the glove compartment.”

Roxy opened the latch and pulled out the phone, handing it back to me. I powered it up and found it had no service. I shook my head and looked over to Roxy, who was clenching her eyes in pain.

“We’ll get you to a hospital as soon as we get into the city.”

“No,” she said. “We’re going straight to the airport, getting you and little man on a plane.”

“They’ll expect that. They’ll have people waiting for us there. I have to be able to make a call. Just one call.”

I knew Joe was doing the best he could in the conditions, but it felt like we were moving at a crawl. I kept looking back, expecting to see glaring headlights, or hear the thumping whirl of helicopters above.

We drove on, the snow pelting the windshield, the wind rushing against the glass. Roxy sat with her eyes closed, and Joe kept whispering to himself, shaking his head. I held tight to William, and constantly looked in the rearview mirror.

It seemed like an hour later, but we finally reached the highway. “Honey,” I whispered to William.

The boy had curled up deep under my arm, dead asleep. Delicately, I touched the camera app on the phone and took a quick photo, hoping the flash wouldn’t wake him. As I looked at the sweet image of the sleeping boy’s face, my heart leapt at the three strong bars of service.