Today's story comes courtesy of "Life With Archie #230", and it sort of touches upon the danger that is surrounded by winter driving. Considering that as I type this out, we currently have a lot of snow on the ground caused by an overnight snowstorm, it's certainly something to watch out for. Winter driving is bad enough during the day when you have slushy snow on the roads, and people who seemingly don't know how to drive when snowflakes fall. It's even more dangerous at night when you have limited visibility and sometimes you have patches of black ice covering the roads that are invisible to the naked eye.
That's just the problem that Archie and Veronica find themselves in when they are caught in the middle of the "Perilous Journey". And, no, the Perilous Pike from the Little Archie comics doesn't make an appearance in this comic. When you see what they both go through, I think we all will agree that they don't need that extra headache in their night!
So, the stage is set like this. There's a winter dance going on at Riverdale High - perhaps it's a Valentine's Day dance or New Year's Dance or what have you. Archie asked Veronica to the dance, and it's presumed that they had a great time. Given that this takes place in 1982, I imagine that they danced to "Bette Davis Eyes", "Freeze Frame", "Planet Earth", and "Endless Love". But once they leave, the snow and ice is falling from the skies, and it's made the roads a little bit unsafe. The good news is that they took Veronica's nice heated vehicle instead of Archie's unreliable Ol' Betsy whose top won't even go up! Archie offers to drive them home, but Veronica insists on taking the wheel, as she's used to the controls of the car. Fair enough, I suppose. But on icy roads and slick surfaces, your controls don't mean a thing if you don't have good traction on the road.
Eventually the sleet stops, and Veronica's visibility improves. But the roads are a mess, and they are so slippery that Archie can see the reflection of the moon on the surface of the road. Now, here in my neck of the woods, when you have a road that slick, that's enough to cancel school buses! At the very least, you probably shouldn't be out on the roads. So when Veronica accidentally drives over a patch of black ice, the predictable happens.
Veronica does her best to keep the car on the road, but it's to no avail. The car smashes through the guardrail, does a couple of flips down the side of a hill and eventually comes to a stop right next to a frozen lake several feet away. By all accounts, Veronica and Archie should be dead, but because of the snow that has covered the ground, it softens the blow. They are very lucky. But, their luck only goes so far. Archie immediately comes to with a few scratches on his face, but otherwise okay. Veronica, on the other hand, is knocked out cold, and despite Archie's best efforts to wake her up, she is out like a light.
To further complicate things, the impact of the car accident caused the door locking mechanisms to fail, causing all of the doors in the car to be permanently locked. And with the car located so far away from the main highway, no passing vehicles could possibly see them. The engine of the car is broken as well, so the heat is not working. If Archie doesn't find a way to get out of this situation fast, both he and Veronica will freeze to death.
Fortunately, Archie has an idea. He thinks that maybe if he can access the trunk through the backseat of the car, maybe he can get in there and find some tools that can at least help him escape. It takes a bit of effort, but Archie manages to crawl back into the backseat and work his magic.
And once he pokes a hole through the interior of the car (which I'm sure that he'll likely have to cough up the funds to fix it once they get out of this situation), he crawls into the trunk where the only tool he finds is a jack handle. But that tool is just what Archie needs to escape.
So, Archie is now free. But that's all he is. Veronica is still unconscious in a car that is dropping in temperature very quickly. Archie can't exactly leave Veronica's side to go and get help because she might freeze to death before he gets back. But he can't very well stick around either. He needs a miracle to get out of this situation.
Archie wonders how the car finally stopped and he realizes that it is perched upon a boulder. A few feet away is a lake completely frozen solid. In the distance on the other side of the lake are houses that likely have people inside of them. Archie believes that if he can dislodge the stone, climb into the car as it heads towards the lake, and wait for it to slide across the other side, he might be able to get help. The only variable he doesn't know is how thick the ice is on the lake. If there are any thin patches on the lake, and the car falls through...well, Archie doesn't even want to think about that right at the moment.
Taking a deep breath, Archie knocks the boulder out of the way and the car starts to move again. Unfortunately, Archie only has enough time to grab onto the trunk door and he holds on for dear life as the car speeds towards the lake. Archie is lucky in that the ice held the weight of the car, but without anybody steering the wheel, the car is essentially out of control as it slides across the surface of the frozen lake.
It's a wonder that Archie hasn't thrown up yet from the jerkiness of the car slipping and sliding away. But it appears that the night is really cold, and that the ice on the lake has had time to freeze into a solid layer. No chance of Archie and Veronica sinking into a watery grave tonight!
The car reaches a stop at the other side of the lake, and Archie falls off of the trunk into a snowbank. Against all odds, Archie's plan has worked. Now to get the attention of people on the shores of the lake. He crawls back into the car and presses against the steering wheel, hoping that the horn still works.
Finally, Archie and Veronica's ordeal is over. A kindly old couple who live nearby hears Archie's horn, and brings the two stranded teenagers inside to warm up and to call for help. Shortly after warming back up, Veronica comes to and clearly she might still be a little out of it when she responds to the couple who helped them out.
The sad thing about it is that Veronica will never really know just how much of a hero Archie was on that night. Seriously, Archie was a major badass in this story, and he really showed that he has excellent street smart skills when put to the ultimate test. I really like seeing this side of Archie, and wish we would see more of this Archie instead of the indecisive Archie.
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