Exhausted

S8 who was about to press the button on the walkie-talkie device already in his hands stopped at S7's yell.

"They aren't in the forest yet, their scents are getting stronger but it isn't mixed with the unique scent of nature and leaves. Hmm but it's just one of them though. There!" S7 said as he opened his eyes and pointed at a particular direction that was obscured.

"Well let's get the brat before he or she goes in there! We could use this one to threaten the others to surrender." S8 advised as he kept the walkie-talkie back into his upholstery.

Squinting his eyes at the spot S7 pointed at, S6 was able to make out a particular figure that was on it's way to the dense forest. But something was wrong, the wind wasn't blowing as much why was there a cloud of dust surrounding this figure?

"Intentionally stirring up dirt to obstruct our vision, cute," S6 said as he began to run towards the figure enshrouded by a dull cloud.

••••••••••••••••••

Penny was beginning to get exhausted, the dull ache in her head was getting more prominent and though she didn't know it, her eyes were blood red too.

After she exited the secret passage that she and Cy created whenever they wanted to sneak out of training, she noticed that her head felt heavy and her vision blurry.

And to make things worse, she was seeing things in twos and threes.

Shaking her head sideways multiple times didn't work, squeezing her eyes shut tightly didn't work either but instead made her run into different objects: a pole, a wall, the foot of a tank and among several others that she couldn't make out clearly.

Ramming into objects, falling heavily onto the ground several times and getting cuts and bruises didn't make things any better for Penny as she felt weakness taking over.

Stopping by and leaning on what she presumed to be another wall due to the information her fingertips sent to her brain, she tried to gain her focus back to avoid running into more things and catch her breath.

Closing her eyes to take deep breaths seemed to work as that feeling of weakness diminished to a certain degree but the stinging sensation of the bruises made her feel really hateful.

Snapping her eyes open, she rose her right arm and tried to see how much damage had been done. Her vision was blurry for a while but it later cleared up and she was able to see perfectly.

Glaring at the small dot of blood that had soaked through the silver shirt, she clicked her tongue and dropped her arm in slight anger.

She hated bruises the most!

As tiny as they were, Penny felt that they were the most painful.

Pushing herself off the wall she leaned on, she gritted her teeth from the pull of the bruise and looked back to see if the men had gained on her but she noticed an abnormality instead.

There wasn't a soul in sight.

Not a single one.

Even if the buildings were burnt down or demolished, there should still be a good amount of people seeking shelter or loitering around somewhere but there was no one.

'What really happened here?', she asked herself a question no one could answer for her as she looked around.

Winters couldn't possibly house the large amount of people living in Platinum Valleys now could it?

Just as she was about to walk towards a building to see if anyone was hiding there, she heard something faintly, it wasn't clear but it was the exact sound she heard when she was with Cyrus and the others. The sound that invoked the urge to run in her!

Suddenly she found herself running as fast as her legs could carry her. But it didn't take long before the suppression on her head and the blurriness came back in full force.

"Oh not now! Please!", she muttered as she rose her eyelids and tried to make out the green forage of the forest.

The men were obviously behind her now and stopping to take a rest wasn't an option, fainting on the spot wasn't a good alternative either so she came up with a plan.

Grabbing any object that had a bit of weight but not too heavy that she couldn't carry from the sea of blurred objects she could make out from the ground, Penny began to use it to hit the ground with force, causing dust and debris to rise up around her.

'This should buy me enough time, I guess. The Azure forest is very close now, if I could just reach it in time and get to Cy, Avi and Timmy, I'll be fine.' she thought as she threw the object in her hand away and tried to pick up her pace.

How they got to her so quickly even after taking the secret passage would have taken her by surprise if she didn't know they were mutants but that didn't mean she was expecting them to be that fast.

Feeling the reins of her mind and body gradually slip away as darkness began to replace the blurriness in her vision, she was about to give in to the force that was rapidly sucking her energy away.

When suddenly, she heard a gun shot!

------------------

S6 didn't know how or when S8 got to his side. He had left a huge distance between them when he took off after the figure and knowing S8 who hates anything that had to do with the word running, how he got beside him even faster than S7 got him taken aback.

However, what really took him by surprise was that S8 took out a gun and shot at the figure they were chasing!

Quickly snapping his head to observe, S6 realised that the figure was still running away from them which meant S8 missed, only then was he able to release a breath of relief as he prepared to blast S8.

"Are you crazy?!" he yelled.

"What? Can't you see this chase is getting pointless?! Let's just shoot them and get it over with!" S8 yelled with a huge scowl on his face.

"Mr Dev specifically said not to let any harm befall the kids, they are useful to him." S7 chipped in with a look of disapproval on his face.

"As the leader, I'll give him my reasons." S8 cockily replied as he began to speed up.

"Orders are orders, whether we like them or not Simon, so please don't create any problems for us!" S6 admonished while S7 rolled his eyes, realising that S8's ego was currently blown up to the size of a hot air balloon.

S8 clearly pissed rolled his eyes and said, "Fine, orders are orders, blah blah blah, alright....." and then a second later, fired at the figure once again catching S6 & 7 off guard.

-----------

Hearing the sound of the second gunshot, Penny was already at the foot of the Azure Mountain Forest and without wasting anymore time, immediately rushed in using the forage as a cover to escape.

Truth be told, as ironic as it may seem she was really grateful to the person that shot at her, the loud sound triggered her senses back on and made her brain more alert.

Erasing all sensations that was about to shut down her brain.