“Split up,” Troy said. “You head into the woods, I’ll go behind the Y and try to circle to the street. If I can get there, I can divert them.”

That made sense. I turned and ran into the woods behind me. This sounded easier than it actually was. It was dark now. There was only the faintest light coming from the distant streetlights. Woods have a lot of, well, trees. So put it altogether: running in a dark place with a lot of trees.

Not easy.

The third time I kissed bark, it dawned on me that I’d have to slow down. What choice did I have? If I kept running face-first into trees, I would probably knock myself unconscious. I started moving like Frankenstein, keeping my hands out in front of me, feeling my way.

“Stop! Police!”

The voice made me duck behind a tree. I risked a look. Two of the cops—or least, two flashlights—were entering the woods now. Because they had flashlights, they didn’t really need to worry too much about smashing into trees. They could move at a pretty fast clip.

Oh man, I was in trouble.

Those dumb excuses—I heard someone call for help, the door lock was broken before we got there—started flooding back in, but I knew that they would just help sink me. Bat Lady would not be able to get me out of this one, and I somehow doubted that Buck’s father would say that I had permission to break the lock on his shed door and shatter a bunch of beakers.

Yep, I was in trouble.

I stayed behind the tree but I could tell from the bouncing flashlights that they were getting closer.

Think, Mickey.

The fact was, the two officers had one advantage over me: They could see. I had one advantage over them, albeit temporarily: I could hide. But the hiding could only last a little longer. The flashlights would discover me. But then again, if I put my flashlight on too, yes, they’d see me, but it would also even the playing field.

There was one other thing to consider—the police officers might be armed—but this was Kasselton, not Newark. In towns like this, officers don’t pull their guns, especially on suspects running through the woods.

I flipped on the flashlight and ran.

“Stop! Police!”

I didn’t know which was worse: breaking into that shed or running away from the police. Either way, I picked up my pace. They were fast. I was faster. More than that, I did figure out an advantage. I would shine my flashlight in front of me, plan out the path, turn off the flashlight, confuse them with that, turn it on again when I needed it.

Then I got a break.