NOT IMPOSSIBLE CHP. 7

7 

I N T O   T H E   T U N N E L S 

We traveled farther than I thought we could go. Deep, deep, into the small confined black space. It was quiet, but I could hear muffled footsteps above us.

“Daniel…you shut the lid, right? They have no idea we’re down here…”

I froze. “Um…no?”

Trinity flinched so hard, her back hit the hall. 

“Quiet!” I shushed her. “They can probably hear us!”

“Daniel, we’re going to die! They’re gonna find us! You didn’t even shut the lid!”

I groaned in frustration. The space was too small to turn around, so I just had to speak to her facing the endless black trail. 

“Trinity, listen, we are not gonna die. You’ve seen thriller movies, right? The good guys face a lot of dangerous obstacles in the beginning, but in the end, they always get to safety.”

“But that’s a movie, Danny. This is real life!”

It was deathly quiet. And then—

“Trinity?”
“What?”

I straightened up just a little tiny bit, and to my surprise—I didn’t hit the ceiling right above me. I straightened more. Then I sat up. “Trinity, there’s an opening, look!” I shone my flashlight, but I could see was the little streak that cut through the darkness. Slowly, we made our way farther through the tunnel, until I took her hand and we stood up. 

“What is this place?” She whispered.

“It’s…it’s just these tunnels.”
“But now it’s a whole room.”

Darkness. And a hiss.

“Daniel?” Trinity grasped my arm and gasped. “Wh-wha-what was that? Is-is it a sn-snake?”

I tried my little flashlight. Nothing. 

“Um…what would you say if I told you, the flashlight’s dead?”

A scream.

“We’re trapped in the dark? Daniel—” Trinity slipped and fell on something slippery and landed in the sloshy mud with a hard thud.

“You okay?” I asked reaching my hand down in the blackness to find her hand.

Trinity sat deathly still and shaking, whispered, “Daniel, there’s something on me.”

I tried to keep calm, for her sake. I could hear the slithering of a snake.

“Trinity. I don’t know what kind of snake that is, but if you keep calm, it won’t bite you.”

Trinity swallowed and closed her eyes, or at least I think she did. After a minute, she lightly flinched as the snake slid away down another hole somewhere.

I sighed with relief and helped her up. She wiped off her skirt and wiped her face with her hands. “We’re never going to get out of here alive. Two wanted criminals.”

I fought the urge to roll my eyes and tell her to be quiet. 

Patience, Daniel. She’s just scared.

“Hey, Trin? Can I call you that?”

Trinity sniffled. “Call me whatever you want. It’s not going to change anything.”

“You must be pretty brave to go through all this with someone you barely know. You could’ve just kicked me out and told me to look out for myself.”

“No one would do that.”

“You’re wrong, though. A lot of people would shut the door in my face and go back to their life. But not you.”

I could feel her smile, though I couldn’t see anything.

“Let’s keep moving.”

…

We hiked on, hands extended out in front of us for miles it seemed. I was beginning to think there was no end to this underground world. And we would die down here.

“Daniel? Where are you?” Trinity’s hand released from mine for a moment and she stumbled and fell to the ground.

“It’s alright, I’m right here. It’s gonna be okay, we’re going to make it out of here alive.”

Trinity found my hand once more and released a long breath of air. “Can’t we rest? I’m so tired.”

I decided this was probably for the best. We needed our strength if we were to escape from the troopers later on. 

We sat down and all I could hear was the soft trickling of water somewhere. Just a few drips sliding down the edge of a wall.

My breathing started to get heavier.

“Daniel? You alright?”

I breathed again. “Um…yeah.” I remembered what my doctor had told me, If you ever feel you may have an attack, just take deep breaths and try your very hardest not to panic. Panicking can effect your Asthma way worse, if you’re not careful.

I reached in my pocket needlessly. I was looking for my inhaler, though I knew it wasn’t with me.

I laid my back up against the wet dirty wall and sighed. 

“Please…” I whispered.

Trinity sat beside me. “What is it?”

“Nothing, I just…”

“It’s definitely something. You sound terribly bad.”

I didn’t know what to say. “You know I have Asthma. And well, now it’s kind of catching up to me. So I have to stay real calm or I could have an Asthma attack. The farther we go, the harder it’s getting to breathe.”

“Oh, Daniel. Here I was, complaining the whole time over me, when I had no idea you were suffering from serious breathing problems. I’m sorry, I'm so annoying...”

“No, it’s fine. It distracted me. I didn’t really notice it until now.”

…

I couldn’t tell if it was night or day, as we had been in there for a whole day, I think. But I was so tired, all I could think about was sleep.

And sleep, I did.

NOT IMPOSSIBLE CHP. 6

C H A P T E R 6 

I N T O   T H E   T U N N E L S

I looked out the window. A uniformed trooper was out there.

“Daniel?”

I turned around and Trinity stood in the doorway, all dressed. “I need to go to work. Stay hidden.”

I nodded. 

She smiled and left. I stayed in the spare room almost all day, pacing and keeping quiet, sometimes talking to Andy. But finally, I decided to take just a short rest. I needed it.

Later in the afternoon, I woke up as a ray of sun stretched over my face. It felt good. And for a minute—just a minute mind you—I forgot I was suddenly being hunted down to die for committing a murder I didn’t do.

I looked at my watch. I suddenly was transformed into a memory of my twelfth birthday, when my father had bought me that watch. I had gotten birthday money from both my grandmas and Dad took me out to spend a little of it.

“What do you want, Danny? A drone? A remote controlled watch?”

“Hmm…” I rubbed my imaginary beard and scanned the place with my eyes. “That karate guy, Jason Kults has a really cool watch, you know. I saw it in the new commercial.”

Dad looked at me quizzedly. “You mean that stupid guy in the Sugar Flakes ad?”

“He’s not stupid, Dad! They have Jason Kults toys, Jason Kults socks, Jason Kults—”

“Ok, ok, I get it. We can look around for a watch. But what’s so special about it anyway?”

“Special? It’s more than special! One-of-a-kind, limited edition, rare deal watch! We have to get it, Dad, we have to!”

I laughed at my memory. When I was little, some famous guy from a dumb tv show had been my hero. I even took karate lessons for two years, in hopes I’d be just like him or even better.

We walked up and down the aisles and at last my face brightened up. “There it is!”

Sure enough, a shiny, black watch sat on a stand under a glass window box. 

“Can we get it Dad? Can we, can we, can we?”

Dad laughed and gave the cashier his money. The watch was slipped into a little square box and put into a plastic bag. I was so excited that day. Dad had been the hero that time.

Now he’s dead. And all Ohio thinks I’ve done it.

Rapping at the door.

I dashed to the window. Trinity stood on the porch, pounding hurriedly on the door.

I ran and opened it, helping her with her bags.

“Oh, you couldn’t have gone any slower!”

“I’m sorry! What happened, did they question you?”

“They did more than that, Daniel. They’re coming, I saw them! They were following me, and-and I heard one of then whispering—something like…I bet she has him, we have to check it out. Can’t let him escape again.”

“Again?”

Suddenly, a bullet whizzed past my head and Trinity pushed me to the floor. “We have to go!”

Troopers were surrounding the house, pointing their machine guns all around. Normal police officers were blocking off the roads, shouting for the neighbors to stay inside no matter what.

Trinity’s hands were shaking with fear. 

We crawled across the floor, down the hall, and into another spare room. I peeked my eyes over the dresser and saw more men in black army uniforms pointing their weapons right at me.

I caught a glance at the white words printed on the fronts of their black medal plates protecting them.

“The Black Police?” I whispered.

“Come out with your hands in the air!” Screamed one of them.

“There has to be a way out,” I muttered.

“In the basement there’s the crawl space, but it just leads outside near the shed. They’ll see you.”

“We have to take a risk.”
“Danny, we can’t. They’ll kill you.”

“If we don’t try, they’ll kill both of us.” I looked her in the eye. “Trinity. God’s not gonna let anything happen to us until He’s ready.”

She nodded, forcing back tears. We crawled out of the room, and trying to stay flat on the ground as much as we could, hurried to the basement door.

“You’ve got three seconds or we fire!” Screamed the officer in charge.

We ran down the stairs, fast as lighting, and Trinity showed me the little door to the crawl space.

“It leads nowhere hidden. We’re stuck.”

I looked around the dark basement. “I need to see if there’s another way.” I began searching the dark room, running my hands along the sides of the wall to find a door. When all was lost, I stubbed my toe.

“Ow!” I could barely see in the dark, so I fished my pocket and pulled out a keychain. I flicked on the little light that shone out when I held down the button.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“That’s our sewer. It has tunnels all under ground and leads somewhere far away.”

“Is it just water?”

“A little bit…” Trinity’s shoulders dropped.
“Danny, please.”

“Would you rather get blasted through your chest?”

She bit her lip and shook her head.

I found an old heavy tool and smashed it on the thing, trying to pry it open. When I did, I almost gagged. “It-it looks dried up.”

“It’s old. We never used it, but there’s some water down there.”

“It’s our best chance.”

Suddenly, it sounded like bombs exploding. “They’re shooting the house! We have to go, now!”

I took her hand and helped her in. “Brace yourself. I don’t know how long the drop is.”

She swallowed. And suddenly, she was gone. But only a few seconds passed when she shouted up, “Hurry!”

I jumped in and landed in a pile of muddy water. It seem like just a hole. I turned on the flashlight and shined it around. One little tunnel. Five feet tall, maybe.

“Let’s go.” I got on my hands and knees and crawled through the tunnel, the water only up to a little below my knees. It sure didn’t smell pretty, but it was better than being shot. Through the old metal tunnel walls, you could still hear the bullets shooting.

“See, this isn’t so bad,” I called back to Trinity who followed behind me.

She almost gagged. “What if they come down here too?”

“They probably will, which means we have to hurry.”