The Last of the Twenty: The Setting of the Board

Chapter 52

Alex drove as fast as he could, the wind blowing at his face from the broken windows helped to relieve the strange dizziness that had been getting steadily worse since Nadia’s. With the road occasionally blurring out when the dizziness got bad, Alex was forced to pull over twice to throw up. The only thing that kept him going was fear for Nadia, he had to get to her.

Alex pulled over a third time with his head spinning out of control. He ran a couple of steps to a small pond and ducked his head into the cold water. His anxiety for having to stop and his fear for Nadia’s life were growing by the second. Alex lifted his head out of the water and screamed in frustration, slamming his fist into the cold water. Why does this have to be happening now? He stood up and took a couple of unsteady steps back to his car, tearing off down the winding road.  

The water must have helped, suddenly the world stopped its spinning and Alex was able to drive through the sharp turns of the road without feeling the need to throw up. With the dizziness subsiding, he gained a little more confidence and pushed down harder on the gas. He had no idea what he was going to do when he found Nadia. He had no illusions about being able to beat both Ethan and the two wolves on his own, but he would be damned if he let anything happen to her. If he just gave her enough time to get away while they killed him he’d be happy.

Suddenly, Alex’s head filled with a blinding white pain, more intense than anything he had ever experienced before. His hands gripped the wheel like he was being electrocuted, his entire body suddenly stiffened out, forcing his foot even harder down on the gas while he screamed out helplessly. The car tore forward, its wheels screeching nearly as loud as Alex’s screams. He had no control over either himself or the car and the pain was too great for him to force his eyes open.

Alex never felt the split second sensation of weightlessness when his car drove off the road and dropped into a pond. With his foot still on the gas, the tires found enough purchase at the bottom of the shallow water to drive out and sink in the deeper water before the engine was drowned out. The last thing Alex felt besides the pain in his head before he blacked out was cold water rushing into the car as it quickly sank.

Finally, the car was swallowed by the pond and the night went quiet except for the last remaining air bubbles floating to the surface of the pond. Just as the last air bubble broke on the surface of the water, a bright, white light illuminated the pond from within. Suddenly, the submerged car exploded underwater with enough force to send pieces of metal and glass flying ten feet in the air above the pond’s surface while everything around the pond was soaked with the water that flew fifty feet in the air in every direction.

For just a few minutes the twisted remains of the car door hung above the road in an old pine tree until the limbs could no longer support the weight. It fell onto the road with a metal clang before coming to rest on the pavement, the last unnatural sound before the night became silent once more.