Jeff Hirsch - The Darkest Path

“Who do you think sent us, Nat?”

Nat said nothing and Limon laughed, clearly pleased to have stunned her. He turned away, but Nat grabbed his sleeve before he could go.

“He helped me, Limon,” she said, dropping her sarcastic lilt. “Jenny is in that gym too, right? She’s going to get antibiotics because of him.”

Limon tore away from her. “My wife wouldn’t be in there in the first place if it wasn’t for Pathers like him.”

“He’s not—”

“Enough talking,” the other officer said. “Let’s do it and report back.”

“But he doesn’t know anything!”

Limon unlocked my cell door, then made way for the officer with the light. As soon as he stepped inside, I sprang out of the corner and threw the blanket into the air between us. It hit the officer in the face, blinding him for the second it took me to dodge around him. I pivoted toward the still-open cell block door and it was almost within reach when something slammed into my back, knocking me to the ground.

He turned me over with his boot, then stood over me, grinning, a black baton in his hand. He kicked the cell block door closed with a dull boom. “Get him up.”

“Limon!” Nat called out from her cell. “Stop it!”

The other officer hauled me into the cell and put my back against the wall. Limon strutted in behind him, slapping the baton in his palm.

“Guess this is where your path gets you, kid. So unless you can tell me the Path’s plans for this region…”

“I don’t know anything. Honest. I’m just a—”

He pistoned the tip of his baton into my gut. Pain exploded through me and I started to crumple, but the other officer held me up to the wall.

“Okay, let’s try another one. What are the locations of Path safe houses along the border?”

“I told you! I don’t—”

The baton struck again, this time a stinging blow to the side of my arm.

“Limon, stop!” Nat yelled.

“What are the codes for incoming Path bombing runs?”

Before I could say anything, the baton slammed into my side, pinging off a rib. The pain was electric. I bit down on a scream, knowing that it would only get his blood racing faster. Limon pinned me to the wall with the baton, the tip of it grinding into my shoulder. He leaned in close.

“Now,” he said. “I want to know the numbers of Path forces on the other side of the border.”

“A hundred,” I said weakly, feeling unconsciousness tug at me.

“What?”

“A thousand,” I breathed. “A thousand men. And artillery. A Stryker brigade.”

Limon took my chin in his hand and turned my face up to his, examining me with watery, bloodshot eyes.

“Your friends murdered twelve of my buddies, kid. Damn near killed my wife. So if you think I’ve even begun hurting you, you’re mistaken.”

“I don’t know anything.”

Limon glanced at his partner. “Well, too bad for you, I guess.”

He stepped back and raised the baton over his head.

“Limon, no!”

He let it fall, but before it could strike, there was an explosion just outside the station. The floor of the jail shook violently, sending us all to our knees. Limon scrambled for the baton, but I kicked it into a corner and made for the door. The other officer grabbed my ankle and pulled me back just as the cell block door flew open.

“Natalie!”

Nat’s father stormed in, grabbing at the keys on his belt.

“Dad! You have to help Cal!”

Nat’s father stopped short when he saw the jumble of bodies in my cell. He reached into the cell and yanked Limon out by his arm. “What are you two doing? Get to your stations.”

He shoved Limon out the cell block door and then came back for the other one. Sirens were going off outside now, whooping shrieks that reverberated off the walls and steel bars.

“Get to your vehicles and sober up,” he said as he tossed the second officer out of the cell. “We’ve got Path incoming.”

The floor shuddered with another explosion. I struggled up onto the cot to catch my breath, my body vibrating from the beating Limon gave me. My cell slammed shut.

“Dad! What’s going on?”

There was a rattle of keys and a door opened. “Mayor gave the order to evacuate.”

“What about Cal? You can’t just leave him here!”

“He’s a prisoner! Now come on!”

Nat’s father had them halfway to the cell block door when the biggest explosion yet sent Nat crashing into his back. They both hit the ground. Nat was up first, digging for something on her father’s belt. The next thing I knew, my cell door was being thrown open. I started to run, but Nat pushed me back. There was a clatter of steel as she fumbled with something between us. Cold metal slapped against my wrist.

“What are you doing?”

Nat’s father appeared at the cell door. “Natalie, we don’t have time for this. We have to go right—”

Nat stepped to the side and her father stared openmouthed at the handcuffs that now secured my wrist to his daughter’s. Nat tore another key off the ring she’d stolen from him and threw it down the drain of the sink behind us.

“Sorry, Dad,” she said. “Looks like it’s both of us or none.”

The three of us ran through the police station. It was packed with a torrent of officers tearing up and down the hall, and the noise from outside was nearly deafening now. Emergency sirens wailed all around us.

“Is it drones?” Nat asked.

“Not this time. Manned bombers and ground troops on the way.”

The crowd parted and the front door of the station appeared before us. I stopped dead.

“Bear,” I said. “Where is he?”

“No time!” Nat’s father said. “We have to go now. There are trucks waiting outside.”

Nat turned, darting down a hallway, dragging me with her by our cuffs. Her father yelled after us, but then he was on our heels as we ran down the cell block.

“Here!” Natalie threw herself against a door and we found ourselves in the midst of a kennel full of furiously barking dogs in cages.

“Bear!”

“At the end,” Nat’s father said. “Last row!”

Nat and I ran for it as her father started opening cages to free the other dogs. Bear was cowering at the back of his cage, too terrified to bark. I got the gate open and he jumped into my arms.

“Okay, buddy, let’s get out of here.”

I pinned Bear to my chest with my cast and we all ran back out into the station and toward the front door. Outside, vehicles were already pulling away. Another officer appeared to lead the police dogs into a van as Nat’s father led us to a parking lot where one police cruiser still remained. I barely had time to push Bear into the backseat before Nat’s father was gunning the engine and pulling out. We left the station and tore through the town of Waylon.

The Path’s bombing run seemed to have subsided, leaving a ruined town in its wake. Everywhere we looked, there were fires. The frames of houses trembled within coronas of flame, and scores of trees burned, throwing off showers of sparks in the kicked-up winds. All around us, people were fleeing however they could. Cars careened through the streets, mixing with families on foot, loaded down with their possessions. Injured and dead lay on the sidewalks, some wept over, some abandoned. Nat’s father ignored them all, weaving through the streets, trying to avoid craters that pitted the roadway.

“Where are we going?” Nat shouted, but her father ignored her. He steered us around a traffic jam, half of the car on the road, half on the shoulder. We shot across a grass divider and onto a service road, where he shut off his headlights and sirens and pushed the speedometer to seventy.