Somewhere in the backwoods of Alabama.

It was a quiet night in the woods. Only the sound of the squirrels, owls, frogs, and assorted bugs could be heard at the moment. At least that was what it was supposed to be. Here in a particular spot in the dense oak forest where a long and winding dirt trail, used mainly by a logging company for transport, th silence of the night was broken by the sound of engines.

The dark of the night was pierced by the brightness of high-powered xenon headlights coming from the lead vehicle, a 2007 Subaru Impreza STi, that was kicking up dirt like nobody's business. But this was far from an ordinary Impreza STi. Far from it.

On the outside it's modified with an ACCOLADE Spec RA body kit and 18" Enkei Racing NT03 rims. The stock STi spoiler received added support from 3 Perrin STi Wing STIFFIs that gave it a slight WRC look. In better light, one would be able to easier indentify the two-tone paint job where the hood, roof, and trunk where painted a glossy black and the rest of the car's body was a metallic lime green. The side was decorated with wild, graffiti-style, bright silver zig-zag lines on top of smooth, faded, black lines.

Under the hood, the already impressive STi engine was made more impressive by a rotated turbo kit, intercooler, cat-back exhaust, fuel rail upgrade, and tuned AccessPORT maps from Perrin Performance that bumped the power up to 500 bhp.

The legendary rally-bred handling was improved with a MONO FLEX coilover kit, performance sway bar, tie rods, and pillowball tension rods from TEIN, high performance TOYO competition tires and a Brembo 6-piston STi big brake kit kept that power in check.

Whatever the limit of those performance enhances may be, the driver of the Impreza STi was more than glad they were they. They were proving extremely useful in the driver's situation.

BANG!!

A gunshot echoed through the forest. As the Impreza passed by, a tree next to it suddenly lost part of its bark as a bullet impacted it. The source of the shot came from a Glock 17 pistol wielded by a helmeted rider on a Honda CRF150R. Right behind that rider was another such rider on a similar bike. And right behind them was a big Toyota Tacoma that looked to be heavily modified for off-roading.

The driver of the Impreza was aware of the shot but tried to ignore it. It wasn't the first shot of the night and it won't be the last.

The road was long and winding, on top of having minimal grip and next to no visibility due to all the trees covering every bend. The rally-bred technology behind the Impreza STi and the skill of the driver were keeping pace rather well with the road, despite the driver having no familiarity with the road. The two bikers and the Tacoma driver however were finding the road hard to navigate, on top of trying to shoot the Impreza's tires. They were given orders not to harm the driver, but it was clear they were getting desperate.

The lead biker aimed again, trying to go for the left rear tire. He fired twice, missing both times and hitting tree and dirt. The Impreza driver started to get irked by all the shooting as was thinking of ways to possibly get rid of those pursuers. The lead biker aimed again, this time while coming in a little closer. As he was about to fire, a bump in the road suddenly lifted his front wheel, messing-up his aim. He ended up firing 4 perfectly good rounds into the air.

He regained control of his bike and tried to aim again but when he pulled the trigger the gun only clicked in his hand. He stared at his gun for a while wondering if he ran out of ammo or maybe it just jammed. That moment of distraction was spotted by the Impreza's driver in the rearview mirror and quickly slammed on the brakes. The lead biker was too focused on his gun to notice in time the Impreza's drastic decrease in speed and ended up instinctively turning to the side too fast.

The lead biker quickly lost control of his bike and soon found himself thrown off his bike by inertia and rolling off to the side before slamming face-first into a tree that he didn't want to be there. He thanked his rotten luck that he at least put on a helmet as he fell back onto his back, stunned. The Impreza quickly sped away.

The remaining pursuers ignored their fallen comrade and continued the chase. The second biker noted that there was a long, easy, right bend on the road ahead. He hatched a plan and quickly turned his bike to the side and quickly hopped off the road and into the forest and weaved through the dense trees for a short distance.

The Impreza STi took the corner hard as it was coming in at high speed. The driver did the classic Scandinavian flick and drifted all the way around the ling and easy bend. As the car was coming out of the turn, the driver was slightly surprised when the second biker suddenly popped out of the woods and stopped in the road ahead of the Impreza.

The second biker was already drawing and aiming his own Glock 17 when the driver of the Impreza quickly reacted and suddenly turned on the Impreza's high-beams. The headlights blasted a bright white light which bombarded the eyes of the biker in front of the Impreza. The biker forgot about aiming and simply tried to block out the light with both arms.

Using the angle from the drift, the driver of the Impreza aimed for one side of the road and drifted around the blinded biker with what little road on the side was available. As soon as the Impreza passed the biker, it corrected its line and sped off into the darkness.

The biker looked behind him had to watch in frustration as the target got away. But this frustration took his mind away from what was important and he was brought back to reality with a honk of a horn. The biker turned back towards his front and was surprised to find the Tacoma approaching fast. The Biker's eyes went wide and he reacted quickly by abandoning his bike and jumping to the side. The Tacoma didn't even slow down and simply plowed the bike over.

As the Tacoma drew closer to the Impreza the passenger side window of the Tacoma began to open and an arm, holding an Israeli-made UZI submachine gun reached out and aimed at the Impreza. The Impreza driver noticed and started to maneuver out of the gunman's way. Bullets started flying at the ground where the Impreza was.

The Impreza driver glanced at the side view mirror to see where Tacoma was now. The driver didn't get a good chance to see as the side mirror promptly exploded into pieces as coupled of bullets hit it forcing the driver to turn further to the side nearly going off the trail. By then, the UZI was empty and the gunman pulled it back in to reload it. The Impreza driver was now looking for any avenue of escape.

The Impreza sped up in an effort to lose its pursuers but due to the driver's unfamiliarity with the road ahead and the fact that visibility was second to nil the speed was limited by the element of not wanting to crash. But in the distance the driver of the Impreza saw just what was needed to turn this chase around.

In the distance, after a few long bends, was an old saw mill. It was by no means operational and the machinery inside had not seen service in over 20 years.

The Impreza reached the mill in just a few seconds after the driver spotted it. The Tacoma followed a moment later, it's passenger gunner now reloaded and sticking his hand out the window again. The Impreza's driver took note of this and quickly steered into one of the old buildings for cover.

The Impreza managed to turn to the right duck behind one of the large mills just as the gunman opened fire. Bullets riddles the side of the building but missed the Impreza entirely. The Impreza drove inside the long mill as the Tacoma drove parallel to it on the outside. The gunman was taking shots at the side of the building hoping to penetrate and hit the Impreza somehow.

Inside, the driver of the Impreza was narrowly missed by a bullet which penetrated the side of the building and punched through both of the back door windows, littering the inside of the Impreza was littered with pieces of broken glass. The Impreza driver was shaken but was still had plenty of nerve.

The Impreza exited the mill and by that time the gunman had to reload again. The Impreza driver noticed and quickly looked for a means of escape. Conveniently, the means the driver was looking for was just up ahead: A stack of old and empty drum barrels, probably used to hold lubricant for the machinery. The stack was three barrels high, just what was needed.

The Impreza suddenly gained speed as the driver shifted up and activated the car's nitrous system. The men in the Tacoma were caught off-guard by this maneuver. They were even more surprised as the Impreza rammed into the edge of a pile of old drum barrels causing the whole stack to collapse right on top of them.

The Tacoma driver tried to brake in time but instead soon found the truck being bombarded by large drum barrels, one of which completely shattered the front windshield, and another smashing the hood and knocking the radiator and fan belt loose.

After the barrels stopped coming, the driver and the gunman stepped out of their truck to assess the damage. They quickly noted that the damage was severe enough to disable their truck. The driver kicked the front wheel in frustration while the gunman looked into the distance and spotted the Impreza already a long ways away from them.

It was plain to see that they were not catching their quarry tonight.

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In the distance.

The Impreza driver checked the rearview mirrors to see that the Tacoma was no longer coming. The driver breathed a sigh of relief knowing the chase was over. Now all that was left was to get out of these woods. Get out of Alabama and drive further east while there was still time left.

First order of business: Get those back windows and side mirror replaced. Second order of business: warn Alex.

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