Nine Open Eyes

Of Betrayals and Accidents

Fifteen-minute read

"The saddest thing about betrayal is that it never comes from your enemies"

Annie's POV

Annie sat up straighter in the passenger seat. Her red gown rustled with the movement. The alluring red one that had cost her an year's worth of savings. She'd waited at Bottlework's for Allison that day, but she'd never shown up.

They'd been celebrating Tule night.

Yet all had stopped when Allison's text had come. Finally, after weeks of searching, they had a location. And instructions. Sam had borrowed a fellow baseball player's car, who'd been too occupied at the time l
to notice that Sam had also slipped his keys out.

They'd been worried, tense even when no lead could be found as to the location of A5. The Mercedes-Benz had been a dead end.

Duha  now sat at the back seat giving instructions and planning routes to the location they'd presumed was A5.

The car swerved for the fourth time and Annie placed her hand on Sam's, which was clutching the gears with whitened knuckles. His hand loosed its grip infinitesimally.

Sam sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. The highway stretching ahead was empty at this time of night.

The streetlights passed over the windows like guiding angels.

"Turn right from here." Said Duha.

"Are you sure?," He asked but pressed the breaks, his polished leather shoes gleamed in the light.

"Yes, it goes straight to the 'right wall' if that's what she meant."

Ah yes. The wall of a military facility that probably already knew their surnames.

Annie knitted her brows, she'd never asked Duha her surname. It was just Duha.

Sam backed up the car before entering the small dirt track with trees on either side. The single lamppost was switched off here, the cut bathed in darkness.

Sam switched on the car's headlights

Car tracks. Multiple car tracks marred the soft dirt and leaves. They looked recent.

"Well, atleast someone's been through here.", Said Sam, failing at an attempt at humor as he deftly put the car in first gear."Just have to see who."

"Why don't we park the car somewhere here? It's too conspicuous", Said Annie, squinting at the far end of the gaping darkness.

"No way, it's a two mile walk to the wall. I can't walk in these heels", Duha exclaimed.

"We drive to the 1000m radius. Then wait for Allison.", Declared Sam.

He drove the car before either could protest, though he put the headlights out. They passed nothing but trees and the distant howling of jackals.

"Hey, did you know why the jackals howl in winter?", Asked Sam, breaking the mile-long silence and looking at Annie.

"No, but I'm guessing it's a joke?", Responded Annie.

"Not a joke, a fact. The jackal howls in winter because each year it forgets to make a den in the summer."

Annie shook her head."That's just absurd, how can it forget each year?"

Sam's distraction was working.

"Maybe because new jackals lead the pack each year?", chirped in Duha.

And thus, they launched into a debate of howling jackals. Sam's distraction had worked too well.