A call to arms
OR
Driven up the wall

My best friend Steve introduced me to lots of interesting and memorable people during our early years. Some of the best of these was Matt Halpern and his two nephews.

Matt and his wife had adopted his nephews after their parents died, and together they'd all started up a honey production facility, and apparently done well with it financially.

Matt's wife had died too by the time I got to know him and his boys.

Those three guys were some of the friendliest and finest people you were ever likely to meet.

Matt and his nephews were the driving force behind Steve and I getting into the habit of using CB radios (and me using a police scanner-- though my dad was some influence too on that one).

Steve always knew the trio better than I did. And although I spent some time with all three, most of my experience was with one nephew in particular, with their uncle Matt in second place (Matt sometimes worked with some professional racers of my acquaintance).

But I truthfully simply didn't get much chance to spend any time with the other nephew. Because they all three ended up suddenly disappearing from my life about as fast as they'd shown up.

The nephew I knew best used the CB handle "President", so that's what me and many others always called him, even to his face. "President" also had a girlfriend of the time by the CB handle of "Sweet britches".

I personally always thought it a nice coincidence that "Sweet britches" had a voice over the radio like honey, and her boyfriend ran a honey farm. I mean, if you heard her over the radio, you just had to see what girl came with that awesome feminine voice! Grrr! Ha, ha. Sweet britches' real name was Rhonda Grasso. Appealingly well contoured and a few inches shorter than President, Steve, and me, Rhonda had long fuzzy hair and bedroom eyes. I say bedroom eyes because they always looked like she'd just awoken, with the lids usually appearing half-closed. I could see what President saw in her too, because Rhonda seemed to be in real life as sweet as her voice implied. And a lot shyer than her CB handle suggested.

Matt had a bare-bones blue Chevrolet van he'd use to travel to nearby mountaintops and perform various extreme radio stunts with his impressive array of electronic gear. Steve and I accompanied him and his nephews and a few others at times on those trips, and learned a lot. But it'd sure get cold up there!

Steve and I soon added the family's honey farm and homes to our frequented haunts of those days. If tragedy hadn't struck, there's no telling how many more experiences Steve and I would have had with the whole lot.

But one day Matt's nephews were killed in a robbery at their farm. Smack out of the blue. Rhonda was there too and witnessed much of what transpired, but managed to escape as the brothers kept the killer busy as best they could. The brothers were unarmed though. Against a murderer who evidently possessed far more weaponry then he needed to take their lives. Judging afterwards from the eight bullet wounds in one brother, and eleven in the other.

Steve and I were stunned when we heard the news. Matt of course took it much harder. He'd raised those two boys from near toddlers into some of the best men you could ever meet. And now some scum had murdered them both.

The killer got caught soon after, due to being pretty reckless. He managed to wound another couple people before being brought in.

The killer's name was Pete Wenger.

This guy had been in and out of prison multiple times already. Turned out he'd been in the local jail again just prior to his murder of the brothers, but escaped.

There seemed to be lots of escapes from the local jail sometimes. As far back as I can remember. Most likely it didn't cost too much to bribe someone there into helping you get out.

Rhonda was slated to testify at the trial.

Apparently Wenger stayed in jail just long enough to learn the identity of the sole murder witness, and escaped again(!)

Steve and I didn't find out about the escape until after Matt. Remember that Matt almost always had a radio of some sort going around him, no matter where he was or what he was doing. In those days-- before the advent of the cell phone-- ham and CB radios were the cutting edge in mobile instant wireless communications. And Matt had apparently been keeping close tabs on Wenger in jail, as well as radio-monitoring anything out of the ordinary happening in Rhonda's neighborhood.

After escaping jail, Wenger apparently went straight to Rhonda's house to kill her.

Matt showed up though to spoil his plans, and between Rhonda's dad and brother and Matt's combined firepower, they all managed to drive Wenger off. At least for the moment.

After that, Matt pursued Wenger alone in his van. Wenger was driving a small tow truck he'd stolen from the vicinity of the jail.

Naturally Rhonda's family had called the cops during the incident. But in those days our local cops weren't exactly known for their eagerness to confront dangerous criminals-- much less doing so during a shoot out in progress. So they were late showing up to the melee at Rhonda's house.

Matt likely tried raising the police on his CB to tell them where Wenger was as he followed him, but got no response.

Of course, like many other county residents, Matt probably figured the police would somehow let Wenger loose again, even if they did catch him. Grr!

When Matt finally concluded Wenger was getting too far in his escape, he took action with his van, harassing Wenger until Wenger was finally forced off the road.

But that only escalated things into a road-side shootout, for which Matt was out-gunned.

From what we could put together later, Matt had possessed only a working 22 caliber pistol by that point (having already expended all the ammo for his hunting rifle at Rhonda's house), while Wenger was packing at minimum a pump shotgun and a couple of large caliber pistols.

I believe Matt tried to take him down on his own, but mainly got shot up for his trouble.

Matt did, however, manage to hole Wenger's truck's radiator with his 22.

Around that point a single local cop actually did arrive on the scene. But he fared little better than Matt.

As Matt's van had gotten badly chewed up forcing Wenger off the road, and Matt's damage to the truck's radiator rendered it useless for a long drive, Wenger commandeered the police car after downing the officer.

Matt was left down and bleeding, but managed to get back to his CB and report all this to someone with their ears on, who then relayed an urgent message to Steve via phone.

Steve got in touch with me right after that, also via phone. Dad heard us discussing things and alerted me to snippets of info coming in over his police band radio about the matter.

All this was how Steve and I found out where the two gunfights had occurred, and that Wenger had apparently gotten hold of a police car for yet another getaway.

Although the police on the scanner didn't know where Wenger was headed, Steve and I had an idea. Matt had relayed to us his best guess via the message from the radio go-between.

It was Traveler's Bend; Steve's own rugged mountain neighborhood. Wenger had escaped the law by retreating to that vicinity before in the past, and the location of the last shoot-out with Matt on the interstate made Traveler's Bend nearly the ideal escape route for Wenger afterwards.

Traveler's Bend was one of the wilder parts of our home county. It contained a relatively narrow strip of often isolated homes among heavy forest, with flatland farms and town on one side, and the wooded mountain wilderness of a National Park on the other. There was also a state border which could be crossed in there, to pass from Tennessee to North Carolina or vice versa, further complicating some police pursuits in those days.

Unfortunately, Wenger had a head start on us. If he got too deep into Traveler's Bend, we might never find him.

Steve had lived in Traveler's Bend all his life though. Knew it well. Partly due to his Korean war veteran father forcing him to, for reasons of survival training, for life in general. This allowed Steve to come up with a plan for us to beat Wenger to his getaway. If I was up for it. For although Steve had recently acquired his own second Mustang, it wasn't at his disposal at the moment. Instead, it was getting extensively reworked body-wise, and painted, to somewhat resemble a fantasy dragster version of his wrecked Boss 351.

But even if Steve's car hadn't been in the shop, we'd still have required Shadow for this: for Shadow's internal roll cage was vital to Steve's scheme.

Though I'd never met him, I hated Wenger with a passion for what he'd done to our friends. I was willing to do whatever it took to try to stop him.

Those in the know try never to get resourceful young men angry at them. For that demographic has been one of the top world-changers all throughout history! It can be incredibly difficult to stop them, once their mind is set.

Steve's plan though was radical. He had me race Shadow at top speed up the interstate to Traveler's Bend-- but then not get off at the exit. Instead, Steve met me at the exit, jumped into Shadow with me, and directed me on up the highway quite a ways, until we reached a spot we could get turned around to come back in the other lanes. Then we proceeded a short distance farther, and stopped in the emergency lane on the right-hand side, up against a steep rocky slope with a steel cable net bolted across it to reduce rocky spills onto the interstate below.

The mountainside looming above us was intimidating. But Steve said we had to get up on top to definitely cut off Wenger. And we had to take Shadow with us. For we'd need his wheeled transport once atop the escarpment.

Steve's idea was sort of a spin off of my successful Model T bridge crossing some time back. Where I'd basically crossed an ancient bridge with a collapsed wooden roadbed by block and tackling Shadow along the steel girders of one of its vertical side walls. I also still carried most of the gear from that escapade inside Shadow. Shadow's internal roll cage had been crucial to the crossing, providing me with a convenient spot to attach my crossing gear.

We gathered up my tow ropes and come-along from my trunk, plotted some possibilities, and began our preparations for the incline.

It was a good thing I wouldn't need the heavy plywood sheets here that I'd used on the bridge before as makeshift tire platforms across girders: for since the bridge crossing I'd reshaped and resized the sheets to form parts of Shadow's permanent interior.

I moved Shadow into a better position in the emergency lane as interstate traffic whizzed past us only feet away. I hoped no trooper came by; for he'd surely stop to see what the hell we were up to. And such a delay would likely let Wenger escape.

But I knew troopers weren't all that common through here. I think they figured the curves would weed out speedsters by plunging them off the cliffs. And the rock fall reputation of the place would usually scare those in the know into taking it slow and easy through the winding mountain highway, without any need for law enforcement personnel making an appearance. Too, Smokey probably didn't like the idea of pulling anybody over in these parts. Again, due to the frequent rock falls. Sometimes a single massive rock the size of a small asteroid would simply liquify anything which happened to be on the road below it, without any warning at all.

Steve climbed up the steel cable netting to place our improvised anchor. Steve had considerable experience working with his dad on construction sites by this time (despite his tender age), and so had a decent feel for fixing connections to handle substantial loads.

The other end of Steve's anchor line was securely connected to the upper passenger side hub of Shadow's roll cage-- where it connected to Shadow's roof-- through the open window. I completely disengaged and removed the small quarter window also in the vicinity to reduce clearance problems. There was going to be a lot of pressure on that rope!

Once we were securely tied off I drove forward a bit to combination test and tighten the line. Then I drove up the steep slope a ways using the anchor as a pivot and Shadow's horsepower as raw strength.

My first attempt proved to be too timid and I had to back down again. Then I tried once more, this time realizing I had to build and maintain momentum against the tug of gravity.

And yes, Steve was highly annoyed with my timidity, and bellowing about driving Shadow himself for the feat-- just as you'd expect an angry and impatient teenage male friend to do.

But man was this a tough thing to implement! If you didn't steer the car exactly right-- or use the precise amount of acceleration-- you'd lose traction and slide sideways or down the near vertical slope. You had to keep the anchor line taut-- but if you pulled it too tight, you'd hurt your traction with the sideways pull. Too much or too little play in the anchor line either way could be very, very bad.

Heck: during my first few tries it was all I could do to avert catastrophe!

But I was learning. And the anchor proved itself up to the task of removing the worst risks from the equation. The attachment to my roll cage greatly limited the kinds and degree of damages which Shadow might suffer from the experiment. But man, it was still scary!

Unfortunately for Wenger, Steve and I were mad enough for that to over-ride our fears in this instance.

The same immense lattice of steel cables holding the mountain together-- to which Shadow was anchored-- also gave him a decent tire hold. Which was a good thing, as I didn't think to attach my tire chains before we started.

The plateau we wanted to reach wasn't very high. So I basically was able to use the anchor as a pivot point to drive in something like a quarter-circle up the slope and onto something approaching flat ground again.

Once I got past the half-way point in the arc though the driving became much hairier. For prior to that the anchor was helping me, but after it, if I diverged too much from the proper path it might make me break loose and start skidding or even tumbling down the mountain(!) Agh!

So I actually had to accelerate once I reached that point! Yikes!

This was truly a steep wall. Not sheer vertical. But so close that there was no way even a four wheel drive could have made it without an anchor and some speed, I believe. At least on the lower portion. Past the half-way point, where the anchor line wasn't nearly so much help, the incline thankfully leveled out some.

After some truly horrific scares, we finally did it! Steve had stayed at the anchor point rather than accompanying me in the car, for several reasons. Trying to remain ready to dodge a wild flying rope or steel come-along cable, if anything snapped. Of course, hanging onto a near vertical rock face as he was, about all he could do was flinch closer to the mountain if something did go wrong in his direction.

Now he and I synchronized our efforts to get unhooked from the anchor, pack back up, and continue our effort to cut off Wenger's escape. It helped Steve climbing up the rest of the way that I was able to pull up the ropes and come-along separately from the top, once he'd unhooked the anchor.

Now we were in Steve's million acre backyard. He was able to quickly direct me to an old logging road in the vicinity, by which we proceeded to the bottleneck where Steve expected Wenger to come through.

Once at our destination, we scrounged around for the biggest natural looking obstruction we could find and move, and put it where we figured Wenger would have to stop or at least slow down for it. The partial remains of a tree fallen long ago became our candidate. We tried to make it look like a naturally placed obstacle, but it did look pretty old in the tooth for such a thing.

Then we hid ourselves and waited. And schemed. Shadow idling, CB on and switched to the channel we felt most likely to provide relevant information. Steve had his .22 at the ready. The 22 caliber rifle was the best weapon he'd been able to get on short notice. His father had far better guns at home, but Steve would have had to get past some hefty and time-consuming safeguards to acquire them.

Yeah, I know we really should have had a better plan, but heck: I think we did darn well considering how fast it all came about!

And it turned out we didn't even have time to plan in that moment, either. For here came Wenger!

Despite the fact we had planned to catch him here, for some reason it still seemed surprising for him to actually show up. Or maybe part of me had been hoping he wouldn't. For the ominous possibilities of the pending confrontation only began to sink in on me in that moment, I think.

He didn't seem to be in as big a hurry as I would have expected. He drove up to the log and slowed to a stop. Then he got out of his car, and lit a cigarette(!)

He strode over to the log and looked at it, then pushed at it with one foot to gauge its weight.

At that moment, Steve got a shot into Wenger's right shoulder with the 22. Hell yeah! I thought to myself.

Wenger barely seemed to notice his new wound though, as he quickly ducked back into the police car and pulled out a shotgun, somehow instantly realizing where we were despite our hideaway, and loosing a couple shots at us.

The blasts almost completely ruined my windshield, even as Steve and I avoided significant injury by ducking below the dash.

Small bits of shattered safety glass flew about Shadow's interior.

When we dared peek out the side windows we beheld Wenger back in his stolen police car again, trying to push the log out of the way with the vehicle, but the log stubbornly not playing along. Instead, it just sort of tumbled around in front of the car, threatening to get stuck under the wheels or front end in general.

Steve fired his 22 again, this time striking the right side of the windshield protecting Wenger. But the single bullet didn't spider the whole glass like Wenger's buckshot had mine.

Wenger persisted in trying to push the log out of the way, and Steve struck the car roof above Wenger, and just ahead of the police lights. Steve got another shot in the windshield, too.

At that point Wenger threw it into reverse and backed out of the ambush at considerable speed.

We followed, avoiding the log entirely. Though it was hard to see much through my windshield at that point. Steve and I both hung our heads out the side windows to see much of the way. This of course resulted in us getting whipped and scratched face-wise and on our exposed arms by the foliage along the old roadbed, which in many places was heavy, and intruding deeply across our path from both sides. On rare occasion some briars were present as well: ouch!

I didn't even consider the possibility that my radiator had been hit. Or take much notice of the occasional whiffs of steam sometimes puffing out as we wound around the grown up forest road. I was too excited. Plus, we were raising some dust and forest debris along the way too, which helped disguise the true nature of the smoky-looking vapor.

It was a warm growing season in our region. So the air was easily filled with all sorts of items like insects, pollen, and more.

The road here was basically a single dirt lane, with light foliage transitioning into full-scale forest on either side.

We and Wenger got brief glimpses of one another as we moved through curves in the track in asynchrony.

Steve was a decent shot-- though here hampered by both us and our target moving wildly about, and Wenger shooting back at times. Plus, Steve was young like me, and excited-- two elements which themselves can reduce the accuracy in one's aim.

On occasion though Steve would make another hit on Wenger's vehicle, trying now to concentrate on the windshield directly in front of Wenger himself.

It seemed the 22 bullets either weren't usually getting through, or maybe bouncing off at times, due to the angle of the glass. So Steve was trying now to hit the same spot again and again to punch through there.

I guess Steve should have been shooting at the radiator. But this was our first manhunt of this type. And we weren't as well armed as Wenger, plus were improvising on the fly.

And it may be Steve was concerned about his limited ammo. Thinking that his priority had to be hitting Wenger any chance he got. For merely disabling his car could leave us at Wenger's mercy.

It seemed Wenger was either out of shotgun shells now, or else couldn't handle it one-handed while also driving backwards. For he now on occasion shot back at us with a pistol out the driver's side window.

I don't think he hit us a single time with that thing. It was too awkward for him under the circumstances. But maybe he was hoping he'd scare us off.

He plainly didn't know who he was dealing with. As quite a few of our high school classmates could have told him, Steve and I could act plain nuts at times.

And that was true even when we weren't mad as hell, and out for vengeance.

Steve and I were ready to attack him bare-handed with teeth and fingernails if it came down to it.

He'd killed two of our friends. Two really, really good people. And maybe Matt too (we weren't sure of Matt's status during this particular moment). Besides all the others he'd hurt before and gone to prison over.

And the law just kept letting him out again and again.

I wasn't really aware of the word "vigilante" at this time in my life. Or its implications. But if your so-called local law is missing in action, it seems there might not be any alternative.

The barely there road suddenly widened greatly into a spot maybe several car lengths in diameter, including at the far edge a drop off of uncertain magnitude, and Wenger looked to try using the new space to turn around in. He was already halfway done by the moment we emerged into the volume as well.

I saw Wenger pointing his pistol at us through his open passenger side window just as I turned into the new space, and instinctively spun Shadow around in a tight doughnut as a defensive measure. This left our tail end facing him, and gave me an idea.

I immediately threw the shifter into reverse and sent us backwards, abruptly T-boning Wenger's stolen police car, and shoving it towards what appeared to be a precipice from my vantage point.

The sound of rending metal and breaking glass could be heard, and Shadow's rear wheels hopped badly across the hard dry ground.

My traction bars apparently didn't work as well on wheel hop in backward motion and under acceleration on dirt, as they did in forward acceleration on pavement.

Slowly but relentlessly though, we drove Wenger towards the edge. I just hoped there was enough of a drop beyond it to do some damage.

It seemed Wenger's car had died when Shadow struck it. Or maybe Wenger had run out of gas. I don't know. In those days cars frequently stalled out from collisions-- especially if their engine revs were low at time of impact.

Wenger was spinning his starter motor like mad. You could hear it over all the other noise on the scene.

I threw a glance at Steve as I continued to push. To make sure he knew what I intended-- and give him the chance to stop me.

Steve surprised me though by immediately placing his right hand on Shadow's steering wheel too, and his left foot atop my right on the gas, as we both looked backwards at Wenger in the purloined law car.

Steve didn't cause me any problems by applying excessive pressure with his hand or foot in their new locations. He just put them there in case any questions ever came up later about which of us had done the deed, I realized.

We would both share the responsibility for whatever happened next.

There'd be no insider here to let Wenger out to kill again. To possibly this time come after my family or Steve's.

Together we held the gas down, and Shadow continued to inexorably nudge Wenger closer to the edge. An edge which was now more clearly showing its threat to us all.

Wenger was yelling at us and waving his apparently empty or jammed pistol, while also trying to get his engine running again.

Shadow was madly spinning his rear wheels with the effort to push the cruiser over the edge, and jumping a bit as his tires clawed at the dirt. The law car was probably a good ton heavier than Shadow, plus presented more resistance being shoved sideways like this than it would have in a more straightforward fashion. The ground was rough, too. And Shadow especially light in the rear end, where weight was needed most for traction in the moment.

I think that's when it first occurred to me I should have installed the tire chains at the interstate. But in the end the chains weren't necessary.

We continued shoving him closer and closer to the edge until Wenger finally realized he'd better try something different. Now too near the edge to get out via an open driver's side door, Wenger began scrambling out the driver's side window to try to get onto the roof, and then over the car body, back to solid ground.

I wanted Steve's cooperation and moral support in the push, but I also knew that too much force on the pedal and we'd be following Wenger down. So I tried to manage the pressure exerted on the pedal with resistance to Steve's own force as I felt necessary.

Plus I kept my left foot ready to stomp on the brakes.

When I saw Wenger about to clamber onto the roof though I knew we had to chance a quick, last effort-- and did so.

That moment will be forever frozen in my memory. Like a time-lapse sequence of photographs. Punctuated at the end by my frantic stomping on the brake pedal with my left foot, and trying to lift both my right foot and Steve's left off the gas simultaneously.

Wenger managed to get his chest level with the roof of his car just as his vehicle dropped over the edge and out of sight.

Wenger looked surprised. Then both he and car were gone.

I managed to stop us from following him over, but just barely. As Shadow's own engine noise subsided after the struggle, we could hear the crashing and rending sounds of tumbling automotive calamity on the steep rocky slope below.

I morbidly hoped that Wenger's position at the tipping point left him crushed across the chest in the first impact of the series.

Steve and I parked, got out, and trotted over to the edge to see the results of our joint effort.

The law car didn't catch fire or blow up. But some smoke and dust did waft up from it and its bouncing wake down the jumbled cliff-side.

We could see no sign of Wenger though, and worried that he might have been thrown clear, unharmed.

So we gathered up our meager weapons and began climbing down to look for him. He couldn't be allowed to escape yet again!

We found him though about three fourths of the way down. Maybe ten yards or more from the car. He was a broken and bloody mess. Looking something like road kill.

We didn't want to touch him. So we just sat there for a while to see if he ever showed any signs of life. But the only sound or movement which came stemmed from a breeze causing the edges of his blood-stained clothes to flutter.

We stayed there for maybe an hour to be sure. Then we climbed back up the cliff, got into Shadow, and left.

I'm sure glad Wenger never moved or moaned (or perceptively drew a breath) during our watch. For anything like that might have made further remedial action necessary on our part. Or maybe not. For being badly hurt in that particular spot, with no aid, for hours or days on end, might have done the job too (and any accompanying agonizing pain and suffering would have been a nice touch as well). So Wenger apparently got a better end than he deserved.

It didn't take long to learn Shadow himself had taken some drive train damage in the incident.

For one thing, we had to stop again and let Shadow cool off for a while before we had completely exited the woods. He'd lost some coolant due a leak created by buckshot, apparently.

I had a tube of stop leak onboard, and used it. But we had no extra water. And didn't want to have to search for some on the mountain.

So we ended up peeing what we could into the radiator. That and the stop leak and cool down seemed to be enough to allow Shadow to get us to Steve's parents' trailer in the vicinity.

Due to my busted windshield we took Shadow and hid him near Steve's place-- making sure his parents didn't see him-- and borrowed his mom's car to return to town and make various arrangements.

I ended up having a fresh windshield in Shadow within a couple days, with no one the wiser.

Whatever damage Wenger had done to my radiator appeared to be resolved with some stop leak for the time being, allowing me to attend to that repair at my leisure later. I found no other significant damage to the front of the car, other than a possible scuff mark or two from scatter shot bouncing off metal too angled and/or thick for it to puncture, and one broken headlight.

The rear bumper showed little damage either. Even the lower edges of the steel rear spoiler seemed to have escaped serious harm.

Apparently Shadow's rear had been considerably tougher than the police car's side panels.

I would find no bullet holes in Shadow's tail from shots taken during our backwards attack.

Maybe a week later the local newspaper reported Wenger's body had been found, and from all appearances he'd accidentally skidded off the cliff to his death (my county's law enforcement agencies have never been known as being especially good or dogged in terms of forensic investigations; especially during the 1970s).

The single 22 wound we knew for certain Steve had given him didn't seem to catch anyone's attention afterwards. Maybe because everyone was simply relieved that he was finally gone-- and nobody much cared about the how of it. But of course, if anyone had wondered about it, it was easily explained away by one of the two separate shootouts Wenger had been a part of before we ever got to him.

Steve and I never told anyone about our role in Wenger's end. Not even Rhonda (though we badly wanted to). But revealing such stuff seemed unlikely to accomplish anything positive for us or Rhonda-- or anyone else.

Our main regret was that we couldn't have rid the world of Wenger earlier. Before he'd killed Matt and his boys.

For we did find out later Matt had died too. And he died before we could tell him we'd gotten Wenger for him. But Steve and I felt like Matt and his boys would somehow know it anyway.

Rhonda of course was now safe. But still bereft of her beloved 'President', and his brother and uncle.

The police officer Wenger had wounded and taken the patrol car from on the interstate survived.

From this point on, Shadowfast would always be equipped with a working CB radio during my ownership. At least most of the time (I lost my radio a couple times and had to replace it). I'd also eventually install an onboard police scanner.

Other changes I made after this included finally arming myself with more than the marine flares, hunting knife, and cable club which had been my previous mainstays of that sort. With characters like Wenger running about, I figured I'd better get me some serious firepower. And make them arms more substantial than the 22 pistol Matt had died holding, or Steve's 22 rifle, which had failed to stop Wenger too.

I didn't immediately purchase any guns. Partly because I didn't have the money. Plus, I wanted to study up on the matter a bit first, to make sure I got the best weapons I could.

And all this is how Shadow ended up with his radio gear, and conventional onboard weaponry.

As for our obviously scratched up faces and arms, that wasn't unusual for Steve and me in appearance terms. So no one made much to do over it. For we often looked somewhat bedraggled in those days, between the bumps, bruises and scrapes of jobs, woods hiking, cliff-climbing, cave exploring, and plain old fighting, the dirt and grease and cuts of car work, and various injuries of the random sort (such as the day Steve rapidly hand-spun a long metal lug wrench to remove a wheel like men in race car pits do, only to have the fast moving handle badly chip a tooth, painfully exposing a nerve to the open air: OUCH!)

One thing I left out above was how Steve and I managed to embark on this particular trek without our parents stopping us.

On Steve's end, his parents simply had no idea what was going on at the time. And Steve was able to get a neighbor to give him a ride to the interstate exit for me to pick him up.

Me, I had a somewhat tougher time of it, what with my dad having an inkling of it all. In that case I just told him I was going to pick up Steve and go see Matt in the hospital. Which wasn't exactly a lie, as we did intend to do that-- after stopping Wenger.

I was very lucky my mom wasn't home that day! For I might never have escaped the house in that circumstance!