Chapter 22: S8's Anger

"This way....", S6 said as he rushed down a trail which he presumed one of those brats took with S7 & 8 following closely behind.

He could already feel his head getting heavy, due to the excessive use of his clairomancy, which meant he needed to find those brats and round them up once and for all, that too quickly.

As they hurried along the trail, amidst the piles of broken wood which had nails sticking out and shattered concrete walls, S6 took in the dilapidated and desolate state of the grounds they were currently on.

Seeing no single soul in sight proved that their plan was in full progression, lifting his already terrible mood.

'Hunter should have those people on the SUB by now,' he thought with a subtle smirk on his lips which was quickly turned upside down into a frown as he, S7 & 8 suddenly came across a broken brick wall forcing them to a halt.

"Why is there a wall? Hey Sulli, did you see wrongly?" S8 asked with ragged breaths not leaving any chance to make a jab at S6 ability.

'So much for having my mood lifted up for a second!' S6 thought as he ran his fingers through his red silky hair irritatedly, trying his best to ignore S8.

Truly, he didn't see where the brats escaped to clearly and judging by how S8 had been on his neck since their last argument, telling them about it now was just going to make it worse.

But that being said, was his Clairomancy so bad, that it'd lead him to a dead end?!

'No! There must be something fishy here!' he thought as he placed his palm on the brick wall, looking to the left and right of it searching for clues. The wall was too high for just one person to climb by him or herself.

"Why are you looking from left to right? Are you admiring the dusty scenery or what?! Do your clairo- whatever and let's get out of here!"

"And you, try to perceive their body scents or what are you still waiting for?!" S8 commanded smugly, totally forgetting the whole situation they were in was his fault.

However, it was as if S6 &7 didn't hear what S8 said as both didn't make a move to carry out his orders.

"Are my words falling on deaf ears?!"

Silence once again cascaded their surroundings as S6 kept looking around the wall while S7 was quietly observing him like he was a master piece.

"Knowing we are mutants means they've upped their game so that means the wall here is to take us off track. Saber, sniff them out." S6 said lightly ignoring S8 again whose ears were about to bleed from how S6's voice was dripping with authority.

"Alright!"

Hearing S7's response, S8 whipped his head towards him with a look of disbelief on his face.

"Who is your leader here?!" he demanded rather harshly.

"The one whose actions and character mirrors a true leader." S7 replied, not giving S8 so much as a side glance.

Leaving S8 to deal with his nasty comment, S7 closed his eyes and readied himself to figure out which one in the millions of elements combined to form different scents and gases in the air were the kids', when suddenly he heard a loud thud followed by things falling on the ground, breaking his focus.

He opened his eyes to see the tall brick wall which was standing in front of them a second ago, broken completely with it's pieces scattered all over the ground and standing right next to it with clenched fists covered with particles from the wall, was a fuming S8 confirming he was the culprit of the wall's demise.

"What did you say?! I dare you to repeat what you just said!" S8 yelled as dust and some grains of sand rose and danced along with the tapering winds around them.

Just as he was about to approach S7 who had his eyes wide open in shock, S6 who was busy brushing dust off his clothes suddenly squinted his eyes.

"What's that?" he asked as he approached the right part of the wall that was yet to be broken by S8 and lifted the vines and leaves entwined around it, successfully gaining S8's attention who turned to look at him instead of S7.

"Seems like a secret passage of some sort...," he paused to kneel, "..and judging by the fresh footprints, I'm sure one of them went this way. Good job Simon!" S6 nodded at S8 as he got back on his feet while looking intently at S7.

S7 who was previously in shock from S8's outburst, quickly understood S6's signal, "Ah! As expected of a true leader! You knew there was a secret passage beside the wall and decided to break it down for us to see. What we didn't see, you saw it, how wonderful. Here, let me dust your royal fist for you, it shouldn't be tainted with dust." he said as he walked towards S8 and began to use his shirt to clean his dirty hand.

The sudden change in character plunged S8 directly into a state of confusion.

'What the hell is going on?' he thought as his head shuttled between his two colleagues. His emotions were spiralling all over the place, he didn't know if he should still be upset or feel happy at their praises.

On the other hand, S6 who was still holding the vines at the entrance of the secret passage, rubbed his sleeved arm as he cringed at S7's bootlicking words whilst thinking how he had such a high survival instinct.

Well it wasn't surprising cause one of the reasons why S8 was made leader over their team was his enormous strength which usually doubled when he is emotional especially in his angry state.

And if he was to use such a great amount of power to fight S7, he'd obviously not survive it which was why he decided to create a diversion to confuse S8 who was really easy to fool in situations like this and luckily S7 got the hint or he'd have been minced meat.

As S8 watched how S7 cleaned his fists with confusion written in bold all over his face, he began to reason, 'S7 said the one whose actions mirrors a true leader is his leader and now he's praising me and even cleaning my fists. So that means I'M the leader he was talking about. Ahhh, I got upset for no reason,' he thought before bursting into a smile.

Puffing up his chest, he said, "That was exactly what happened Saber. You know most times we leaders don't need to talk to show our prowess, we also have to put in action," he made a hand chop gesture in the air.

"And I hope you were able to learn from that. Come, let's go get those brats, it's been long enough," he continued while patting S7 on the shoulder with a smile on his face before he brushed past him and S6 into the secret passage.

As they let S8 lead the way, S7 released a breath he didn't know he held in causing S6 to glare at him for almost causing a disaster to which he shrugged in response before following behind S8 closely. With S6 walking behind them, they ventured into the passage way and exited to find themselves standing feets away from a dense forest.

"I guess this is the Azure forest they talked about?" S6 commented as he observed the trees moving along with the wind in the distance.

"Well, this is bad," S7 said as he placed his hands on his hips. "Finding them when they hid amongst buildings was hard enough, now this? It's like we just went from intermediate level to very hard level!"

"Just who ARE these kids anyway?" S8 asked in exasperation.

"Should we just go back? They are just four measley kids, I'm sure one of our men will get them sooner or later. Let's head back to the lab, we've been gone long enough and that dumbass hasn't sent me any messages yet!" S8 said referring to S3 as he reached for the walkie-talkie from his upholstery.

"They are not just brats but special ones too. Leaving them alone would bring back trouble to us and could ruin our plans. The first hint given is they know we are mutants,I thought only the Marsons knew that, the rest think we are born gifted," S6 said in contemplation before his eyes suddenly shined.

If the brats know about their existence as mutants that means Davis knows about it too so then the Leo Daniels....

'Ah..this raid just got a lot more interesting.'

Nodding his head in reasoning, S8 replied, "You're right, leaving them here is like leaving a lose thread, they could disturb our plans. I'll contact S3 now to know about the situation of the lab. That loud noise must have been caused by those clumsy idiots! I really don't know why Mr Alb...Dev left them to handle the controls and kept US outside! What was he thinking?!", he stammered in guilt as he almost made the 'unforgivable' mistake of calling Dev his birth name.

"Wait!"