24 Departure

After having decided about what to do, Mark went back to the trucks and begun his preparations.

'Two camouflaged uniforms, check'

'A lot of salt to make jerky meat, check'

'A pack of 50 rifle bullets, check'

After packing the essential, Mark also grabbed a few other things, like rope, and a few things to create more traps, and other things for daily needs like toothbrush, to tell the true, Mark could prepare himself better thanks to the supply vehicle than he would be able if he departed from a city, just the bullets were enough to make him go broke, because one thing was to receive bullets to use during a mission, and another to buy them for personal use.

After packing everything, Mark prepared the rest of the snake, and made several jerky meat pieces that he could eat later in a more convenient way. It was a bit salty to eat them without washing the salt, but it was doable.

'The water will be a problem,' thought Mark, looking at his small water bottle that hanged from his belt, then he grabbed another bigger water bottle and filled it with water and put in his backpack.

'This should last a few days if I don't find any other sources of water on the way.' Thought Mark, remembering all the types of water sources he knew, like the liquids he could gain by eating an animal, the own animal blood, rainwater, or even water from a few kinds of vines, in last case there was still the morning dew, it was hard to accumulate a sufficient amount for an adult, but in last case was better than nothing.

"The ideal would be to find a river, or lake, but that is hope for too much" said to himself Mark, while putting the backpack in his back, because he would not even wait for the next day, he would be departing right away.

Any time that Mark lost now was one day closer to his death, when all this started he just wished to find new mutated animals to gain strength, but now, if he didn't find them, he would starve to death.

...

In the next day, in the exact same spot where Mark cooked his snake, close to the supply truck from the army.

"Sir, we found the researcher, but he was not with the files you asked," said a guy in a military uniform, with the lieutenant patents on his shoulder.

"Did you already searched the entire place?" asked a man with a white mustache using a military uniform.

"Sir, yes sir, we believe someone from the fleet survived the beast attack, because this fire here was made just yesterday, and we have also found a trail that leads inside the forest. We believe he was afraid to wait here for more time and decided to take risks by going inside the forest, where would be harder for wyverns to spot him from faraway"

The mustached man put his hands behind his backs, and said, "Do you have someone in this platoon capable of tracking this guy?"

"Sir, we have Jacob. He is a skilled hunter and a pre-invasion veteran, Sir."

"Dispatch a team of twenty people. I want him dead or alive, and if you find the files, the order is to burn them on sight, and I want the entire operation recorded from the first moment to the last one. Do you understand?"

"Yes Sir!" said the man, making a military salutation before leaving the place.

'I doubt he is afraid of wyverns. If he read those files, he is probably hunting mutated animals right now,' thought the mustached man, while looking at the crate that had two holes on the side of it.

The mustached man averted his gave from the crate and looked in the direction of the forest, and said, "Tyler, I want you on this mission. Keep a constant line of communication and inform me about any news."

"Do you suspect he has an ability, Malcom?" asked a man in a black uniform standing five steps behind the mustached man.

The bearded man turned to Tyler and said, "How many times I need to say to not call me by my name on a mission? Doesn't matter if there is no one around! Your ability doesn't grant you any ranks above me in the army! Am I clear, soldier?"

Tyler furrowed his brows at seeing the exaggerated reaction of his old friend, but refrained from saying anything, and only gave a formal army salutation and left the place to do as he was ordered to.

After Tyler left, Malcom looked at his own fleet of vehicles, one hundred men, two armored tanks, and dozens of vehicles, but he was not pondering over the size of his fleet, or feeling proud for commanding an entire platoon, what he was thinking was, that all of this would become obsolete in a matter of months. He knew that Tyler alone could fight an entire squad of 10 soldiers by himself,

'What would be the use of hundreds when 1 or 2 could kill them all in a blink of an eye? Times are changing way too fast, doesn't matter if we capture this soldier that escaped today, more and more will eventually find out the true and will start accumulating power. The only way to avoid a bloodbath is strengthening the army before all the mess starts,' concluded Malcom.

...

Three days later, in the middle of the forest,

A soldier in a camouflaged uniform was hiding behind a few bushes with his back against a tree, while panting to recover his breath.

~bang~

Hearing the shot, the man looked to his left side and saw the body of another soldier falling to the ground. He was not as fast as him, and was still running to find cover.

The soldier grabbed a radio communicator from his belt and turned on.

"Sir, we got visual of the target. Awaiting orders."