This is a portion of a book I'm working on related to a couple of 18 year olds dealing with being chased by a nuclear weapons plant security team in South Carolina. SEMI-autobiographical.

The woods were dark. Not a regular dark you experience when you take a walk after dinner. This was darkness you could feel. It was oppressive, so much in fact, it could take your breath.

Walking around in the pitch black was out of the question. Move one step forward trip, fall or be smothered by a tree branch, or worse, running into the hundreds of spider webs spun like gate keepers of the forest.

Mike and I eased ourselves on both sides of a large gully that was cut from years of rain washing down to the river. The normal fear I would have of spiders sankes and other creepy crawly things was suppressed by the fear of our lives. The ditch was the only thing we knew we would be able to elude the Wackenhut infrared tracking systems. We didn’t know if they were actually using them, we just didn’t want to take any chances.

“What are we going to do?” I asked. The darkness swallowed my words, unknown if they would ever make it to where Mike was pressed against the side of the gully.

“We’re gonna have to wait till daylight. We’ll try and get to the 3-700 area. Then maybe we can find someone without running into those assholes.

Both of our mothers worked in that building. Security was not as intense in that area because there was nothing nuclear there. It was just an administration building.

I was not prepared for Mike’s question. “What happens if we don’t make it?”

The starkness of his question cut through the darkness like a knife. It hit me so hard I could not respond. The only sound was that of the insects and frogs. Moments later I could hear him stifling back sobs in harmony with my own. What could I say? I had my doubts that we could make it. Here we were, two kids, pitted against one of the most elite security details in the world. My mind drifted as I nodded off to sleep