Author's Note: First off: thank you so much for all your reviews! You've all successfully reminded why this is my favorite fandom to write for. You guys are awesome!

IMPORTANT NOTE PLEASE READ: I am going to be changing the title of this story! So I always struggle with titles. When I posted the first chapter of this, I didn't feel great about the title, but I decided to just go with it. Well, since then I've come across a song that gave me a much better title for this story that better encompasses the themes that I'm going to cover. So this story is now going to be titled Calling On Saint Christopher. I'll probably officially be changing it sometime tomorrow; I don't want it to affect any notifications until after everyone has a chance to see this note.

Okay so without further ado let us continue!

Chapter Two

Calling on St. Christopher
Gonna need some help tonight
For the long, dark road ahead
On my way back to the light

'Cause the path is so unclear
And I'm not sure who to be
All I know is I can't stay here
Won't you please watch over me?

[Michael Logen – St. Christopher (On My Way)]

Darry had insisted that Steve show them the exact route that Soda would have taken home from the where the drag races had been. As they drove, he couldn't help but scan the sides of the road, looking for any signs of an accident. It was a natural – albeit painful – conclusion for his mind to jump to. There was a strange mixture of relief and frustration as he saw no signs of any such thing. He also carefully scrutinized any gas stations or strip malls they passed, constantly searching for the familiar truck. A few times he thought he had spotted it, but as Two-Bit slowed the car he found that each time it hadn't been the right green truck. As logical explanations began to be eliminated it left worry and confusion in its wake. Where in the world could Soda possibly be?

They took a very familiar path to the outside of town. Before they got there, Darry had already figured out where they were going. It was a popular spot for drag races; he himself had been to a few here when he was younger. It was a long, straight stretch of road that wasn't well traveled on the best of days. At night it was practically abandoned, making it an ideal spot for drag races that weren't strictly speaking legal. It was also isolated, with no houses or businesses around for miles.

Steve instructed Two-Bit where he should pull off to the side of the road. The grass here was torn up with tire tracks; obviously this had been the spot where all the spectators had parked their cars. Before Two-Bit had turned the car off, Darry was already pushing his door open and climbing out. His eyes carefully took in his surroundings. The area was virtually deserted, without a soul in sight. Even so, Darry couldn't help but take in every detail of the area, as if there would be some clue that would pop up and tell him where his brother had disappeared. Of course, this was only wishful thinking.

"I told you he wouldn't be here," Steve pointed out as he climbed out of the car and came to stand beside Darry. "It was already pretty cleared out by the time I was leaving just a few hours ago."

"There's no reason for him to hang out here anyway," came Two-Bit's voice. Darry glanced back at him. He had opened his door and stepped halfway out, resting one arm on the hood of the car as looked across it at them. "If he did have car trouble he'd have gone to a gas station."

"How was the truck runnin' last night?" Darry asked, looking over at Steve.

Steve shrugged. "A bit rough, as usual. I've been meanin' to take a look at it for a while."

"So it's possible that after he drove outta here fine, the truck coulda broken down somewhere else?" Darry questioned. "Bad enough that Soda couldn't have fixed it?" Admittedly, he didn't know a whole lot about cars. But to him, it seemed odd that after driving all the way out here, Soda could have gotten in the truck and driven partway home only to get stuck somewhere. It seemed even more odd that even if he had broken down, Sodapop – the mechanic of the family – wouldn't have been able to rig it to at least be able to get him home. It wouldn't have been the first time something like that happened. It would just be the first time that Soda wouldn't have been able to make it home anyway. At one point or another, they had all witnessed how resourceful Soda could be when it came to fixing up cars. But then again, this was not his area of expertise.

Steve was quiet for a minute, clearly analyzing the possibilities in a way only a fellow mechanic could. Finally he nodded. "Any number of issues coulda caused it to stall when he was idlin' at a red light or somethin'. Several of them Soda wouldn't have been able to fix himself. Not without tools or replacement parts at least."

This didn't make Darry feel much better though. He ran a hand through his hair as he looked around at the empty area anxiously. "What I don't get is, if he did just have car problems, why didn't he call?"

Steve shrugged. "Maybe he did and you two just slept through it."

Darry had a hard time believing that, knowing full well that he tended to be a pretty light sleeper. But he couldn't definitively say that it was completely outside the realm of possibility. He knew they all wanted to believe the answer was that simple anyway.

"Maybe he couldn't find a gas station that was still open last night," Two-Bit spoke up. "He might not have been able to get ahold of a phone either that late at night. Maybe he just got in to a gas station this mornin'."

This made a bit more sense. This would have happened close to midnight after all, most gas stations would be closed at that time of night. It was strange that the sound logic was coming from Two-Bit of all people though. Even so, Darry felt the tension in his muscles relax a fraction. It was comforting to be able to come up simple explanations for this mess.

Then, Ponyboy had to speak up from where he was standing beside Two-Bit, shattering that illusion. "But how many hours ago was that?" he asked. "He coulda walked and still been back hours ago."

There was an awkward silence as the other three tried to come up with a theory to explain that.

"Tell me again," Darry said, shifting his attention back to Steve. "Why did he say he wanted to leave early last night?"

"He said he wasn't feelin' great," Steve reminded him. "He looked beat from workin' the double shift, I think it was just that he was tired." He paused. "Maybe he didn't feel up to walkin' home and just slept in the truck for the night until he could get to a gas station."

It was far from a flawless theory – they all knew they were grasping at straws at this point – but it was still plausible.

"So what now?" Pony asked after another pause, looking to Darry to provide all the answers.

Darry sighed, rubbing the back of his head as he thought that over. "We drive back home the same way he most likely woulda gone," he finally said, trying to speak with conviction, as if he weren't just making this up as they went along. "We'll stop and check any gas stations on the way. If we don't find him, someone's gonna have to stay at home with the phone in case he calls and the rest of us can go searchin' some other routes he coulda taken. Maybe there was an accident or somethin' and he had to detour."

It sounded like a solid enough plan. It sounded like he knew what he was talking about and was taking charge of the situation. But, as they all climbed back into the car, Darry couldn't help but feel like he was ill equipped mentally and emotionally to deal with this. Pony running away several months ago had terrified him. Losing track of his other brother – admittedly the only that was supposed to be easier to take care of at seventeen years old – felt even worse. He hadn't even known that was possible.

His most important job was to take care of his little brothers. He couldn't help but feel like he had failed again.

Despite all of that, Darry did his best to keep calm as they retraced the route they had just taken. They still had a logical – even if it was somewhat unlikely – explanation that wouldn't devastate them that they could hold on to. There was still a chance that this would turn out to just be a bad morning and not something worse.

However with every gas station they stopped at, Darry felt tension working it's way back into him. There was no sign of the familiar green truck. Even so, they still stopped and went in to each gas station to talk with the workers to see if any of them would recognize either Soda's description or the description of the truck. None of them did. In fact, none of them had any new customers at all that early in the morning, most of them having just opened up within the last hour.

Their "logical" explanation was growing weaker by the minute.

As they pulled back up in front of the Curtis house, everyone was visibly more uptight than they had been when they had left over an hour ago. They were quiet as they all piled out of the car and headed back up the walk toward the house.

"Soda?" Darry called as he led the way back in through the front door. Even though the truck was still nowhere to be seen, he still couldn't help but hope that Soda had somehow made his own way home while they had been out.

Only silence answered him.

"Somethin's wrong," Pony said quietly. He looked up at Darry, pain and fear in his eyes. "Something's really wrong. Soda wouldn't do this to us."

Darry agreed wholeheartedly with that, especially given how he had watched Soda break down every night while Ponyboy had been missing. But he just couldn't admit that out loud just yet. He had to keep it together, at least on the outside, or he felt like everything would fall apart.

"Two-Bit, you and Pony stay here," he said, getting back down to business. He couldn't acknowledge Pony's comments right now; he had to stay in control of this situation. "Steve and I'll head back out and check out some different routes between here and where the drag races were. There may have been an accident or somethin' that he had to go around."

"But Darry…" Pony started.

Darry silenced him with a look. "Please, Pony," he said evenly. "We have to take this one step at a time, and this is the next step."

"We'll hold down the fort," Two-Bit said, visibly straining to keep his voice light. Even he was starting to see the seriousness of the situation. He handed over his car keys to Darry. "Don't forget to check out the DX too. He mighta headed for a place he could fix the truck for free."

"The DX woulda been too far," Steve pointed out.

"Not if he got detoured early on and headed up Sycamore and around the long way to Broadway," Two-Bit argued.

"We're gonna check everywhere, no matter how unlikely," Darry said determinedly. He turned and almost walked out, had he not caught Pony's gaze. He paused before he turned to his youngest brother, placing a hand on his shoulder and meeting his look with what he hoped to be a reassuring look of his own. "It's gonna be okay, Pony," he said gently. "We're gonna find him. You'll see."

Pony nodded silently. Then Darry took a deep breath before he turned and walked out the door, Steve close behind him.

As they headed down the walk, Steve was lighting up a cigarette. "You shouldn't lie to him," he said, his tone bitter with anger boiling just below the surface. Despite the fact that he had seemed so confident that a simple break down had caused Soda's disappearance, his tone now betrayed his doubts. "You know better than most that things don't always turn out okay."

"I didn't lie to him," Darry insisted flatly. "We will find him, no matter the circumstances."

He swallowed at the implication of his own statement. They would find Soda. Darry had made no promises of what kind of condition that they would find his brother in though. That was painful to even think about, but it was the truth of the situation. He had always been a realist, no matter how much that hurt sometimes. He couldn't help it though. Life had already taught him the hard way that Steve was right. Things didn't always turn out okay. Especially for Greasers.

Not finding Soda wasn't an option. That was without question. They wouldn't stop until they found him. There was just no guarantee that what they found wouldn't destroy them all.