Thick darkness lingers heavily across the cold jail as I stare blankly ahead, my mind once again aimlessly wandering through all that has happened and had led me to where I am at now. Of where my future will be taking me. If only I had stayed in Knoxville and allowed my dad to turn me in as he had been threatening to do, I’d only go away for the things I actually had done. Now that I had optioned to move Kristy to Hazzard in attempt to escape jail time, I am not only facing the charges of what I had done in Knoxville, but also for beating the hick mechanic that I had found lying upon his floor in his own blood. “Damn,” I cuss angrily in frustration as I silently wonder of how long I could be spending behind bars now.

“Awesome,” I hear Ronnie whisper behind me and I slowly glance behind me to find a hand slipping a note into the open bars of the window. Ronnie reads the note by a dim light that his friend shines through the window only for a broad smile to cross his face. “It’s about time, Steel. Let’s do it!”

The man he had called Steel whispers something before I hear footsteps walking away and Ronnie slowly climbs down from standing on his cot to meet his friend, as he always does at this time of night. “What’s that about?” I slowly ask, turning around the rest of the way to face him.

He makes a snarling face at me to scrunch up his bruised face before he shrugs at me, anger in his face. “Why should you care? Remember, you don’t seem to remember me?” he pouts.

“We both know you are making that up, Ronnie, so you might as well stop playing your games,” I quickly throw back at him, “What’s the note about?”

“As if I’d tell you,” he says as he restlessly sits down upon his cot, eyeing the note in the dark.

“Because if you don’t,” I smile at him, “the first thing I’ll do when I see Sergeant Mills will be to tell him your little dark secret that you’ve been writing notes to your old gang and that they are sending you some. What you think, he’d say to that?”

He eyes me wildly for a long moment, his attention goes back to the note. “You wouldn’t,” he boldly states and I coldly stare back at him, “I can’t tell anyone.”

“You tell me,” I shrug, “I wouldn’t have to tell anyone that didn’t need to know. Otherwise, ol’ Mills will hear it from me once he walks downstairs in the morning.”

He nods, his hands shaking while he eyes the note once more before he slowly walks over to me and slowly hands the note through the bars. I nod at him as I move to the window where the moonlight leaks in to slowly read the letter:

Ronnie – 

We got to get moving out of Hazzard real soon due to the blond Duke messing up our robbery yesterday at the grocery store. . .we are to kill off his cousin in the morning and then him. When we are finished with them, we are to pack up and move on to our next location. . .here is a note to indicate what you are to do. Wait for a half hour and I’ll make my way down to you after dealing with the guards and I’ll help you to escape…lucky for you, Max doesn’t want to leave any witnesses behind. 

PS: Don’t say a word! 

Steel

After finishing the note that Steel had slipped through the bars, I suspiciously glance over at Ronnie who watches me silently and nervously. “You can’t tell anyone now,” he says, moving from foot to foot. “Max is already upset at me for messing up, that’s what happened here.” He points to his bruised and ugly face, “He hears that I gave you the note…he’ll definitely kill me.” He pauses nervously as he runs a hand through his hair, “Hurry…Steel will be coming. Give me the note.”

I shake my head at him as I fold the paper up and slide it into my back pocket as a plan slowly unfolds within me. “Nope, it’s mine…but I won’t tell Steel or Max that I have it. Though,” I pause thoughtfully, “since we both know your plans to escape if Steel can get past the guards, I’ll make you another deal. Once you are out, you help me to escape…once I am out, I’ll tear the note up and no one will see it.”

He shakes his head. “I can’t do that,” he stutters as the ceiling starts to creak as movement begins to crawl around upstairs, “Steel won’t allow me to do that…it’d be outside of the plans and they don’t work outside of their plans.”

I shrug at him. “I guess I’ll be handing the note over to Mills when he walks in, in the morning,” I stiffly respond, “he’d love to see that note…bring him up to date on Max’s plans and everything. Could be too late to save the two cousins, but it could help them catch you all before you leave state.”

He stares at me wildly as he begins to pace the floor in his cell as one of the guards upstairs yells something out before a loud gun shot rings from upstairs, the guard cries out in pain and a big thug sounds from the floor. Another gun shot is rapidly fired and another cry of pain pierces the dark jail and is quickly followed by another thug. “OK, ok,” Ronnie says nervously as footsteps moves closer to the stairs, “I’ll linger behind to hand you the key…but you can’t follow us!”

“Wouldn’t think of it. You go your way, I’ll go my own way,” I pause as I pat my back pocket, “go my own way to rip up this nice little note.”

Ronnie nods as footsteps begin to descend down the stairs and I slowly make my way to my cot to silently lie down upon the stiff and ratty cot. Closing my eyes I listen to the large man’s footsteps and the clinging of the keys as he walks over to Ronnie’s cell. After a moment, I listen to the door squeaking open and Steel whispers, “Let’s go. Max is waiting for us to give us more orders…especially to you.”

“OK, thanks man,” I listen to Ronnie’s raspy voice as I hear footsteps climbing the stairs before the jingling of keys comes to a halt outside my door before another set of footsteps climbs the stairs, “I was really getting tired of being locked up.”

I wait for a long couple of minutes, waiting for the footsteps upon the ceiling to come to a halt before I open my eyes to find that Ronnie had rested the keys in the lock so all I’d have to do is unlock the lock. “Oh thank-you Ronnie,” I whisper aloud, smiling as I stand back up to walk across my cell to unlock and open my closed door. Grabbing the key ring out of my door, I slowly hang it back upon the old rusted nail it had been hung on before I slowly climb the stairs two at a time to silently arrive upstairs. “Damn,” I cuss aloud once more as I reach the top stair to find the two large and muscular guards that Mills had set out to guard us and the sheriff’s station, to be lying on their backs upon the floor. Blood covers the front of their uniform shirts from where they had been shot while they both stare blankly at the ceiling, their skin quickly changing to a deathly blue color.

After making sure that both guards are dead, as they seem to be, I slowly walk out into the narrow halls and out into the cold and dark night. Relief floods through me as I walk out onto the front lawn of the jail to look around, feeling freedom slowly sink in, though knowing it will be short last. Unless everything goes as planned. Taking a deep breath, I silently revise the plan in my head before I slowly make my way across the street where the old motel lies dark and holds an almost abandoned look to it.  “Here goes nothing,” I whisper to myself as I take a small look around me and the thick darkness that melts down from the dark night sky.

After opening the cracked glass door, I slowly walk into the narrow and dimly lit hallway to be surrounded by thin and cracked walls that had been painted an ugly dark peach color. The old and torn burgundy carpet lies darkly stained while five small light bulbs hang from the darkly white plastered ceiling, two lights remaining lit, while three light bulbs are burnt out. For a short moment, I stand silently in place staring down the long hallway, four closed light brown doors lies on each side of the hallways while at the far end of the hallway another closed door lies shut. Questions explodes within me as I stare down at the closed rows of doors, wondering which one would hold Sergeant Mills or his partner, Mueller.

Taking a small step forward, I abruptly come to a halt as the turning of the handle and a door squeaking opening forces my heart into a quick race in fear as Mueller slowly steps out of a room on the far right side of the hall way. A loud latching sound echoes off the thin walls as he pulls his door shut to take a couple of steps to the door next to his where he taps on it a few times before another latch clicks and he slowly disappears within the room. As the door latches closed, I quickly and silently walk toward the door he had entered in hopes of it being Mills’ room

“Mueller,” I hear Mills’ voice through the door as I press my ear against the thin door, “you know what time it is?” There is a long pause as footsteps shuffle within before silence briefly enters the room. “It’s one fifteen in the morning, Trey. That means we have -“

”Three hours until we have to wake up. I know,” Mueller sighs heavily and audibly through the door, “but I have this really bad feeling.”

“Bad feeling?” Mills quickly shoots back at his agent as I picture his cold eyes, “You woke me up just for a bad feeling?”

More silence enters their room as my stomach churns within me as I slowly become nervous and anxious about facing the men who are certain of my guilt based upon the small facts they have upon the mechanic’s beating.  “Well, it’s more than just a bad feeling, Frank,” Mueller slowly begins to defend himself, “Micah woke me up forty-five minutes ago by calling my cell phone. He said he saw a shadow walking outside his window, though was uncertain what it was…said he had only seen it for a second and it was gone. He stepped outside to check what it was, but couldn’t see anyone or anything, but there was a car parked up the block that hadn’t been up there the last time he had been out. Thought it was odd it’d be out at midnight like that.”

My mind instantly flashes to the two dead agents that had been shot upstairs as Steel had made his entry into the sheriff’s station to help Ronnie to escape. “The shadow could be anything, Trey. An animal…perhaps a dog got lose and is on the run. Or a racoon or whatever kind of animals this hick town may attract,” Mills replies skeptically, “and a car could be parked on the corner for any given reason. Perhaps it is an owner checking on their store, they forgot something and returned to get it. Or maybe someone works late and returned home and that’s where they parked. Just because Hazzard is a small hick town, don’t mean the people within it don’t have lives to live.”

“I’m not saying that, Frank,” Mueller shortly replies, “but he said before hanging up with me that he would call me back in a half hour to report if it was something or not. He hasn’t called back, in fact, I tried calling him and he hasn’t answered his phone. I’ve called him several times as well as Eddie. Neither one would answer their cell phones.”

Silence abruptly fills their room as I tightly grip the cold metal handle of their door, hoping that they didn’t lock the door when they had closed it.  “You’re right,” Mills says, worry entering his thick voice as I twist the handle and sigh in relief, “they’re not answering.”

With that, I quickly open the door to find Mills sitting upon the end of the single double bed in the room while Mueller sits in an old cracked wooden chair that he had pulled away from the small and dirty looking table. Fear and surprise enters their eyes as they watch me walking into the room, their hands instantly go for their guns. “Surprised?” I ask calmly, placing my hands up in surrender, “I’m not here to pose any threat to you or to anyone in this hick town. Just as I didn’t pose any threat to that mechanic, I went in to pay for gas and found him on the floor, just as he was found. I didn’t beat that mechanic and I am not apart of this gang that you are after, in fact, I am here to help you.”

They both instantly stand up with their guns in hand, Mills has his shiny silver handcuffs out as they take a slow step towards me and I take a step back to kick the door closed. “How…how you get out, Duke?” Mills slowly ask.

“First of all, I want you both to pocket your guns and that there handcuffs, Sergeant,” I eye Mills hardly and they both look at each other, “I had my chance to escape, otherwise I wouldn’t be standing here, yet instead of running, I came to you. I came to you, to help you. But I am not going to help anyone who has guns aimed at me or with anyone wanting to tie my hands up.”

“We can’t make deals with our prisoners, Duke,” Mills strictly replies.

“Then I can’t lend you the help that I came to give you,” I shrugs putting my hands forward for him to handcuff, “or to tell you how I escaped or why your agents aren’t answering your phone. It’s your choice, Mills.”

Mills sighs heavily while looking questionably at Mueller before eyeing me hardly. Sighing heavily, he pockets his gun and handcuffs and signals Mueller to do the same. “OK Duke,” he finally responds, “you have a minute. You try to leave this room in your attempt to escape, we’ll shoot. Trust us when we say we’re good shooters and we don’t miss our targets.”

I nod. “Your point taken, though you are yet to listen. If I were to escape, I would have been long gone by now, instead of coming here. In fact, I would be long gone by now, if I didn’t know that people has been hurt and will be hurt,” I pause heavily as I glance around the small and stained room, “why don’t you both have a seat, be relaxed. You both standing over me like that, makes me a little edgy.”

“Look Duke, we’re not playing your games,” Mills says as they both sit at the end of the bed, “get to it.”

I once again nod as I fight to sort my thoughts. “You haven’t gotten a hold of your two guards, because they’ve been shot. They’re dead…not by me, you can even search me. I don’t have a gun,” I pause heavily, “but by some guy called Steel. He’s been stopping by the window by Ronnie’s cell since you brought him in, always whispering so I can’t hear what they’re saying. Tonight though, he brought Ronnie a note,” I yank it out of my pocket, “I blackmailed Ronnie to give me the note and then later blackmailed him into helping me to escape. Where then I came here instead of ripping the note up as I had told Ronnie I would.”

I take a step forward to hand the note to Mills who reads it quietly and then hands it to Mueller to read before he re-folds the note. They both eye me for a long moment before they both jump to their feet, fear and anger in their eyes. “How long ago did this happen?” Mills gruffly responds, “They ever tell you where they were located at?”

“Just a few minutes ago,” I slowly shrug, “I overheard them talking once about an abandoned house in the swamps.”

“You know where that is?” Mills asks as he grabs a coat that had been thrown upon the small table and as I shake my head at him they both eye me coldly.

“I just moved here when I found that mechanic, sir,” I slowly reply, “it’s the first time I’ve been here. Can’t say I’ve been too impressed.”

He grumbles something as he walks to the door before Mueller stops him. “What we do with him?” he points to me, “What are we going to do?”

“Well,” Mills says eyeing me and then Mueller, “you are to make a call to Vint. Tell him to awake the others and to have them get dressed and ready to meet us at the swamp. Once we find the house, we’ll find a hidden location to meet at and we’ll relay that to them.” Mills pauses for a short moment, “while you are calling them, I’ll call and awake the local sheriff, which in turn will wake his deputy. We’ll take the sheriff with us to give us directions, the deputy can ride along with Vint to help the rest of the guys find the location.”

Mueller takes out his phone as does Mills. “What are we to do with Garrett?” Mueller skeptically asks while opening his black cell phone.

“He’ll ride in the back seat,” Mills asks as he begins to fumble with his phone, “with you. The sheriff will be in front with me. I’m not going to take the time to go put him back in jail, Trey. This may be our last opportunity to stop Max and not let him get away from us. . . again.”

Mueller shakes his head in disapproval as anger flairs in his eyes momentarily as he redirects his attention onto his phone. “I’m not going to be handcuffed,” I firmly state, “I think I proved myself enough by coming to you instead of running off as I could have done.”

“Fine with me,” Mills smiles coldly at me, “You’ll be sitting right next to Trey there. I can guarantee you that you won’t be going anywhere.”

****SERGEANT FRANK MILLS***

Listening to the dial tone upon my small black cell phone, my heart races quickly within me with intense fear and anger as my thoughts continue to wrap around all that the Duke boy had told me. What the note had said. Micah and Eddie are dead. Bo and Luke are next to dead if we are unable to find Max and his men before morning and if we aren’t able to stop them before they leave Hazzard, who knows how many other people will be killed. Or of how long they’ll be keeping little Keith alive if we can’t stop them in time. I slowly glance over at Trey who sits at the edge of the bed, sliding on his coat while he talks on his phone and I slowly begin to question how he’s been able to stay focused and alert the past few weeks that his son has been kidnaped. Of how he is able to stay in control as he has been. It has now been at least three weeks since anyone has heard Keith talk or any sign that he’s still alive. Ever since Bo and Luke has seemed to run off and disappear, Max has yet to contact us with Keith on the line to give Trey incentive to cooperate with him. Nor has he been used in any of the bank robberies or thefts here in Hazzard since the Hazzard Bank had been robbed. Who is to say if he’s still alive? Perhaps the elder Duke is right, there has to be a reason his boys would do what they are doing. Perhaps Max has moved from using Keith to using the two country boys that had disappeared. If that was the case, Max wouldn’t have a single reason to keep Keith alive.

“Rosco Coltrane,” a groggy voice slowly answers the phone upon the fifth dial tone, “it’s one thirty in the morning.” He slowly continues, agitation entering his groggy voice, “What can I do for you?”

“Sheriff,” I quickly state, “it’s Sergeant Mills, I’m sorry to awaken you at this early hour, but I wouldn’t be doing so if it wasn’t an emergency. Our two agents that had been guarding the prisoners has been shot and killed. Ronnie has escaped with Steel…a well known member of Max’s gang. Garrett Duke was kind enough to come over to give us the note that Steel had given Ronnie and to explain what had happened.”

“Killed?! Escaped?!” the sheriff yells, awake and with fear, “What do you need me to do, Sergeant?”

“I need you to get dressed, call your deputy and inform him, and then to meet me at my car. Tell your deputy to find one of my agents behind and he’ll be riding with them and giving them directions, “I pause heavily, “Garrett said he had overheard them say something about an abandoned house in the swamp. You’ll be driving shot gun and giving me directions.”

“OK…I’ll be there,” he says before hanging up, “he’s going to meet us after calling his deputy. You get Vint up to date?”

“As you told me to,” Mueller sighs heavily while eyeing me, “though am unsure if we should trust him as much as you seem to. Not handcuffing him? You think that’s a good idea?”

“Stop worrying, Mueller, and let me worry. That’s my job, your job is to listen and do as told to do. Got it?” I force a smile at him, “besides, I tend to agree with him. If he wanted to escape, he would have done it when he had the chance instead of coming to us. Though Garrett, you pull one move, the cuffs go on. Tightly. You understand?”

“One hundred percent,” the Duke nods while shrugging his shoulders to send the dim light to shine upon his ugly thick scar running down his neck, “as I said, I came to help.”

*                                  *                                              *

An unnerving fear grips a tight hold upon me as I drive silently down the abandoned dirt road as I stare out through my windshield, taking in the thick swamp land that surrounds it. “How often you come out here, Sheriff?” I slowly ask to interrupt the thick silence that has built within the car. Silence as everyone sits anxiously in their seats, staring out the window while fear the worse and saddened by what all has happened.

“No, not often,” Rosco dryly replies as he turns away from the passenger window to look at me, “I don’t come out here unless I have to. . .especially at night. Spookier at night with the darkness and all. Can’t remember the last time I had been out here at night, think it was fifteen years ago when Ritler had that fire after his still exploded.”

“His still?” I question to force my thoughts onto other things than Max’s gang and the damage they’ve done, “As in, moonshine?”

“As in moonshine,” the sheriff confirms as I follow the road around the curve and a small shack looking house comes into view with a small shed a few feet behind it. Darkness lingers around the house except for a small light burning in one of the windows in the back of the house, dark smoke is noticeable through the dark swirling up from the brick chimney. “Oh my,” Rosco says as he straightens up in his seat, his eyes glued upon the house as if he’s never seen a house as such, “that’s…that’s,” he stutters as he points the house, “that’s ol’ man Ritler’s house. The one I had just been talking about.”

“Yeah? So?” I question as I slow the car down to take it in. The view from the road shows the back of the house and the yard that sloped largely down until it meets the road. On the opposite side of the road lies the swamp and large trees as far as the eyes can see. “There must be another road that leads to the front of the house?”

The sheriff silently nods. “Scott Ritler built a small road to lead from this road to his drive way up in front of the house. For some reason he wanted the back of his house to face the road and not the front and had to go through this battle to get it approved, but he finally got it approved and went a head with it,” he pauses for a long moment, “that had to have been forty years ago at least.”

I nod as the car creeps along without my foot pressing on the accelerator, my mind still lost upon the importance of the house belonging to an moonshiner. “So what’s the big deal about it being Ritler’s house?”

The sheriff remains silent for a long moment, his eyes remain glued upon the old shack-like house and through the darkness a hint of fear seems to cross his face. “Ol’ man Ritler died in that fire I had just told you about. Fifteen years ago his still caught on fire and exploded back there in the woods,” he points back to the thick wooded area that lies in front of the small house, “way back in the woods. You can’t tell by looking at it now, though. Luckily the fire department was able to get the fire out from the still and from the area around it.” He pauses as he shakes his head for a long moment, “it was ugly and sad. After they got the fire out, there was Ritler lying on the ground besides the still. Couldn’t recognize him at all by just looking at him. Poor guy.”

I nod as the car comes to a halt. “Bet that was ugly,” I agree with him as I allow silence to enter as I glance through my rearview mirror to check up on Garrett who stares out silently through Mueller’s window who sits behind me. “Who lives there now?”

“No one,” Rosco states silently, “Ritler was an old hermit that tended to be on the grouchy side, no one would want to mess with him while he was alive. He had no family, no friends. No one…just him and his dogs.” He pauses, “After he died, we adopted the dogs out to families here in Hazzard to get taken care of, but no one wanted the house or the land. Not out here in the boondocks in the swamp. Most of his stuff, if not all, is still in there.” He pauses for a long while, “When no one would buy the house, no one gave the place much thought. No one wanting the house, no reason to go through his stuff. Stuff no one else would want.”

Chills race up my back in thick emotions as I stare at the house as I drive forward and as we come straight behind the house, questions explodes within me as thick tire tracks sink into the moist dirt. Tracks that seem to spin before driving down the deep ditch on the right hand side of the road, the side where the swamp waters lies before the tracks stop at the bottom at the trunk of a thick tree. The tree is covered in slime while the barking is peeled off as if it had been hit by something, a car or a vehicle by which made the tracks. “Someone has been here,” I point it out, “and had some sort of trouble.” I pause as we drive by the house before we meet the road that would connect to the driveway. “We’ll drive around the corner here,” I point a head as the road once again curves around a thick layer of trees, “and see if we can hide our vehicle here. Trey,” I call back, “Call Vint and let him know. Ritler’s house.”

“OK,” he says in a half whisper as I watch through my mirror as he drags out his cell phone.

Looking ahead, I say, “Thanks, Sheriff.”

The sheriff nods silently. “Anyway I can help, I will,” he pauses, “Look Sergeant, there is something that is bothering me.”

I pull the car into an opening in the woods where it would be hidden behind the trees thickly from the view of the house and from the road. “Which is?” I ask as I pull the car into park.

“I know how you feel about Bo and Luke being apart of this gang here and I know as well as understand the evidence that is packed up against Bo,” he pauses thickly, “but I still say I know them well enough to know that they wouldn’t do this. Not unless they are being forced into do it…or some other reason like that.”

“Well,” I pause shortly as for the first time I really listen to his statement about his local people’s innocence, “hopefully by the time the sun comes out, we’ll have all our questions answered and we will know why Bo did what he did. I mean, it was him,” I shrug, “his uncle even identified him.”

“I know,” the sheriff nods, “all I am saying, is that when you all go in there for Max and his gang, please make sure they don’t get hit in the crossfire. There has to be an explanation behind it all…Bo and Luke, or Daisy and Jesse, they’re the most honest people I know. Always lending a helping hand to anyone and everyone.”

“As long as they don’t shoot at us, we won’t shoot at them, sheriff,” I pause heavily as my mind goes back to how close the hick had come to shooting Mueller in the head at the grocery store yesterday, “If he shoots at us as he did yesterday at the store, I can’t guarantee anything.”

The sheriff nods slowly before he falls into silence and I listen to Mueller giving directions into the phone for them to meet up with us while I silently begin to build a plan.

***BO DUKE***

“Alright Duke,” Sergio’s familiar voice breaks through the silence that had lingered around me ever since they had locked me within the small dark closet. The door slowly swings open and the light from the kitchen shines into my eyes, hurting my eyes as my eyes slowly adjust from the pure evil darkness to the hint of light. “Thanks to Ronnie over there,” he points behind him to a tall muscular man standing in the corner, his face all bruised and cut up, while Randal and Steel stand tightly next to him. Steel holds a sharp knife up to the frightened man’s neck while he stares at me with pleading eyes filled with fear. “Our plans has changed. We no longer can wait until morning to go ahead with the show, so you’ll get to watch your cousin die sooner than expected.” Instantly, everyone but Ronnie begins to laugh evilly with a hint of nervousness laced within.

“No, no,” I silently say as I once again begin to fight with the cords that tie my hands and feet together behind my back only to cause the cords to dig deeper into my skin and the pain to flair up even more. “Leave him,” I gasp as my breathing continues to be painful and hard, “alone. I’m the one,” I begin to cough as Sergio sharply tugs at the cords to drag me out of the closet and into the kitchen, “that messed up. Kill me.”

“Not a chance, hick,” Sergio hisses as he sends his boot into my face and blood instantly begins to flood down from my nose and into my mouth while he continues again to drag me, this time into the living room. As we reach the couch, I notice that the coffee table has been moved and a large open area lies in front of the large television where it had once been. “We made just enough room for you to watch and to enjoy. I’m here to make sure you watch…you take your eyes off of the TV, I’ll do this.” He goes silent before he grabs a tight hold upon my hair and yanks back and I yell out in pain. “Understand? One way or another, you’re going to watch your cousin suffer a painful death…all because you couldn’t shoot one agent.” He shakes his head in disgust as he roughly grabs the cords once more to drag me in front of the TV. “There…this should do it.”

“You… you won’t get away with this,” I slowly say only to receive another kick, this time into my stomach to force me into another attack.

“Watch us,” Sergio laughs as he walks around to sit on the couch behind me before he abruptly yanks back my hair while yanking on the cords to force me on my knees before keeping me there by holding back the cords. I gasp in pain as the cords dig deeply into my skin as he continues to hold tightly onto the cord with a strong hand while he pulls out a phone with the other. A moment later he speaks into his phone, “OK Max,” he pauses as he holds the phone up with his shoulder while he grabs the remote control and the TV instantly flashes on to show Luke sitting silently in the chair, “Bo and I are ready whenever you are.”

Footsteps slowly creak from behind as Sergio goes quiet and Max says something on the other end of the line before he makes his entrance within the shed that holds Luke. “Thanks Sergio,” Max says, audible through the TV screen before he closes his phone to place it into his front pocket while he circles around Luke. Luke stares silently ahead, once again the look of surrender lies thickly across his face as he pays little to no attention to Max circling him. “Well Lukas,” Max speaks up as he comes to a halt to lift Luke’s chin up to force Luke to look at him, “I’m sorry to say that this is the end for you…was going to wait until morning, but one of my dim-witted men messed up. Again.” Max shakes his head on the TV as he drops Luke’s chin to begin his circling once more, “So we can no longer wait until morning. We have to do it now so we can pack and be gone before the feds finds us. All due to one man’s stupidity, but don’t you worry none, Duke,” Max pauses, “Ronnie will pay for his stupidity once I am done with you. It will be his turn to die…slow and painful. Truly make him pay for what he had done. Just as you will pay for snooping around!”

Max abruptly comes to a halt in front of Luke to back hand him across his face and a smacking noise echoes off the wall as Luke’s head is thrown to the side with the impact. “You know, Lukas, you being a Marine and all, I never thought you’d be the one to give up as you have done,” he pauses to stare Luke in the face, “with all that time you spent in war, fighting and killing people yourself…you didn’t give up once while you were over there. Not even that time you and your troop were ambushed. Everyone in your troop had died, your buddy died in your arms. You?” Max pauses in search for a reaction to get none, “Nah you didn’t die. You spent a month in the hospital with injury due to that shrapnel that had hit you in the stomach during that ambush, you lost a lot of blood and had internal bleeding that couldn’t be stopped.” Max laughs once again, “After a month they let you out of the hospital and let you out of the Marines and out of the war with metals for your heroism…though you were unable to save anyone.” Max slowly begins to circle around Luke once more, allowing a moment of silence to build before going on, “No, you didn’t die. You were too stubborn to die. Yet here you are locked and tied to a chair and you are ready to be killed painfully and slow without a struggle even? C’mon…you’re disappointing me.”

Luke continues to stare silently ahead as a tear breaks lose to roll down his cheek with emotions that he fights to hold back, not to show to Max. Feeling helpless and guilty for what Luke’s going through, my mind goes back to a couple of years ago when he had first returned home from war. Of how moody he had been, angry at the whole world for what he had seen and went through. Of how much the war had changed him from the person he had been before he had left to the person who we had met climbing down off the steps of the train as he had first came home. Of the nightmares he still awakes up from yelling in pain and horror from what he had witnessed over there and of how he still refuses to talk about it. Keeping the war and the nine years he had spent with the Marines a mystery to everyone around him.

“Now that retarded cousin of yours,” Max comes to a halt once again in front of Luke, “what was his name, again? Bo, was it?” A thin smile spreads across Max’s bearded face as he harshly grabs Luke by the face to force him to once again look at him, “Now he gave up a fight,” Max lets go to backhand Luke once again, “it didn’t do him much good, now did it? But he gave us a fight until the very end, made it all the more the fun to watch him die slow and painful. It’s just surprising,” Max pauses as he yanks out a gun from under his wind breaker, “we were expecting more of a fight out of you.”

Luke remains silent and withdrawn as he takes another blow across the face, this time with the butt of the gun to send blood beginning to seep down the side of his face once again. “Too bad we didn’t record his death so you could have witnessed his last minutes of life. Of him begging us to stop,” Max’s smile grows across his face at the story he is telling Luke, at seeing Luke withdrawing within himself through his story, “of him fighting to breathe.” Max begins to circle Luke once more, “Wonder who’s going to find Bo’s body? Maybe your Uncle Jesse will stumble across it,” he laughs evilly, “that’ll be a sight he’ll never forget, I can guarantee you that. And since we hid his body near your house and upon your uncle’s property, it will most likely be the old man to find Bo’s lifeless and beaten body,” he comes to a halt in front of Luke, “We thought it would be a nice touch.”

Abruptly, Luke glances up at Max and through the screen, anger and hatred floods through his crystal blue eyes as he angrily spits at Max for Max to violently hit him across the face with the butt of the gun. “You ruthless pig!” Luke forces out, his voice trembling weakly, “You won’t get away with this. One day you’ll be sitting on death row, awaiting for your own painful death.”

“A pig? Is that the worse you can call me?” Max laughs shortly before abruptly going quiet and throwing the gun to the floor before he walks behind Luke. I hear myself gasp in fear as he grabs tightly onto a fistful of Luke’s hair to jerk his head back, a large evil knife is pulled out from under his coat and is jammed tightly to Luke’s neck. “They’ll have to catch me first and seeing how bulletproof my plan is, it is highly unlikely that they will,” he pauses to press the knife deeper into Luke’s throat and a tickle of blood slowly seeps down from under the knife. “and if they do,” Max continues to say on the TV from behind Luke, “I’ll spend that time in jail, savoring each and every second I had spent torturing your cousin, envisioning the blood and the pain in his eyes. Listening to his yell of pain and fear. Of him fighting to breathe and to live, fighting for life, though knowing his fate.”

“Stop it!” I hear myself yell out to break the silence within the chilly farm house as I stare blankly at the blood slowly rolling down Luke’s neck from under the blade of the sharp knife that remains pressed against his neck. Evil laughter rolls around me from Max’s gang members, in their response to my yell and I abruptly turn my head away from the TV as a couple of tears slowly streak down my face. “No,” I plea in a half whisper as Sergio tightly grabs me by my hair to turn my attention back onto the TV and onto Luke .

“As we said in the beginning,” Sergio hisses in my ear, his hold upon my hair tightening, “you are going to watch it whether you want to or not. Now enjoy.”

“Trust me, Luke,” he throws Luke’s head forward while taking the knife away, “it will be well worth it.”

Randal and the rest of the crew within the living room laughs evilly as they watch Max slowly killing my cousin, killing him because I had failed to shoot and kill the FBI agent. Because I had failed to listen and follow instructions.

On TV, a couple of tears begin to streak down Luke’s bruised and bloody face while a lifeless look enters his eyes as he has once again given up, surrendered to Max’s evil ways. Something Luke has never done before. Given up without a fight. Surrendered to someone else who is in the wrong, someone trying to kill him. Luke had always stood up for what is right and protected those who needed to be protected, fighting to get what he wants and for others. “C’mon Luke,” I hear myself say aloud, giving up my own struggle against Sergio’s tight hold of my hair.

***SHERIFF ROSCO COLTRANE***

Intense silence steadily grows within the crowded undercover patrol car as I stare through the mud splattered windshield at the thick trees and shrubbery that surrounds us. Thick trees and shrubbery that separates us from the gang that has held Bo and Luke captive for over a week now and has killed and tortured people throughout their several robberies they’ve performed throughout the south. The gang that has spread violence across Hazzard to get what they want and to force the innocent residents of Hazzard County searching for cover with fear of what will happen next. Chills rapidly spread across my numb body at the thought of the small barrier that separates myself from them while my imagination draws vivid scenes of all that could happen with Mills’ raid that he’s planning. If they succeed, Bo and Luke could hopefully escape a fateful end while the rest of Hazzard could rest in peace knowing the evil men has been stopped and arrested. If they fail, Bo and Luke could get killed along with several of Mills’ men to create a deeper and more violent nightmare for Hazzard and the rest of the world as the gang runs free. ‘That is, if Bo and Luke aren’t already dead,’ a nagging voice fearfully reminds me from within as Mills’ prisoner’s note and explanation of his escape once again comes to mind. Two guards shot to death to help one of their own members to escape in order to finish off Bo and Luke before they pack up and move on to another hideout, elsewhere and out of Hazzard.

“They’re a couple of minutes away,” Mills’ gruffly breaks the silence as he shuts his small black cell phone that he had been talking into for the past ten minutes, relaying information and plans to his the rest of his crew. The plans him and Mueller had discussed as we first parked their car within the shrubbery for their hideout. Plans of ambushing Max and his gang in order to get to Mueller’s youngest son that they still have captive. “Remember your role in our plan, sheriff?” Mills coldly stares at me, “You and your deputy will stay here in this car guarding Garrett and make sure he doesn’t escape or try anything stupid,” Mills pauses to stare coldly back at Garrett before turning to face me again, “if we need anything, we’ll call you on my cell phone.” With that he hands me the phone he had just been talking to. “You and Enos are not to do anything unless you are told to. Understand?”

“Perfectly, Sergeant,” I numbly reply.

“Good. He tries anything,” he points to the back, “call Mueller’s cell phone.” With that he shows me a shortcut to calling his partner on his phone, “But only in an emergency. Got it?”

“As I said, perfectly,” I respond once again as two identical cars as the one we are in pulls up to a halt besides me. I slowly glance away from Mills and over at the car to find Enos sitting in the passenger seat, fear wrote boldly across his face as he stares out through his own mud splattered windshield.

“Good,” Mills repeats as he throws open his door to be followed by Mueller in the backseat who mutters something to Garrett before slamming the door shut. Outside, they join the agents that had been jammed into the other two cars and with Enos where they talk amongst themselves. After a long moment, Enos breaks away from them while the agents split up to walk into the shrubbery and woods in different directions. Step one of their plan.

“Hi Sheriff,” Enos nervously says as he quickly slips into the backseat next to Garrett, where Mueller had been sitting before slamming the door closed.

“Hey Enos,” I sigh heavily while looking back at him and he eyes me with nervous blue eyes before he quickly glances away and out through his back window. Slowly turning back around in my seat, I catch a glimpse of Garrett sitting behind me in the rearview mirror to send chills racing up and down my back. Despite the doubt of his guilt that has arisen within the past few hours, his attitude and his cold, hard, and emotionless gray eyes shouts his guilt at me. Taking a deep breath, I attempt to control the raging and violent emotions that tear rapidly within me, forcing myself to feel weak and vulnerable.

“Boo!” Garrett abruptly yells after a few minutes of sitting in the car surrounded by thick eery silence to force Enos to jump and to send frustration and anger through me at his catty attempt to rattle us. “Are you that scared of me, Deputy?” Garrett asks after a moment of laughing at his little joke.

“I. . .I just t wasn’t expecting you to do that,” Enos nervously stutters as he eyes me for support before nervously eyeing Garrett once more with suspicion in his eyes. After a brief moment, Enos slowly looks away from Garrett to stare back through his window, out into the dark woods that surrounds us.

“Well Deputy, I would think with your job,” Garrett abruptly goes silent as several loud gun shots ring out from the near distance to send chills running across my numb body. “You’d have to be prepared to expect the unexpected,” Garrett slowly finishes before silence once again enters the small car.