23 See You On The Outside

Zac swallowed nervously as he noticed Ying staring at him. 'I hope he hasn't noticed something.' Zac thought, as the winger Augmented continued to stare at him for a few more moments, before turning away.

Ying had wondered about the speck of blood for a moment, then dismissed it, it was definitely due to the savage wolf Augmented spraying the wolf's blood all around him.

After all, what could a scrawny and naked teenager be hiding

"I told you, Fredrick, that spares always come in handy." Jay laughed, as he walked over to Zac, and pulled a set of camouflage clothing from the pack on his back, handing it to Zac.

He reached in further, pulling out a set of boots that were definitely far too large for him, and dumping those on top of the clothes already in Zac's arms.

"You pull those on, kid. We don't want to lose you to stepping on a poisonous plant. And then we'll get out of here, sticking around with these corpses is only going to get more and more dangerous by the minute." Jay ruffled Zac's hair with an enormous hand, his shiny white teeth revealed by his wide grin, he was enormous that even the muscles on his head bulged weirdly when he smiled.

Zac stepped away from the group, and turning his back to the others, he draped the blanket around his shoulders and pulled on the clothes.

His face was burning red, he knew he couldn't get any privacy, not in the danger ridden place that was a Transition Zone.

"Come in Rachel. This is Fredrick, we're moving out soon, do you have the locations of nay other possible survivors?" Fredrick had started speaking into his walkie talkie the moment Zac had started pulling on the clothes. Other MAgical BEasts would be honing in on the smell of blood, and the sooner they left, the safer they would be.

"I've got nothing, still moving through the forest back to Klaus. Our survivors weren't much help, maybe you can ask yours for any residential areas besides the location from earlier?" Rachel's smooth voice piped out from the walkie talkie, and immediately, Frederick turned to Zac.

"You hear that, kid? You know of any locations near your apartments where other people lived?" Frederick asked, speaking surprisingly softly for his rough voice.

"I didn't really go around much, other than back and forth from my work. The area around my apartment has always been pretty desolate, and I don't think many people lived nearby." Zac said, he was now wearing the camouflage fatigues. He had needed to roll the sleeves and trousers up, but even then, he looked like a child playing dress up in adult's clothing.

"Alright, son. How far was your work from your apartment? There would have been people there, right?" Frederick asked, he wasn't about to give up that easily. He would go looking for survivors if there was even the smallest chance that he could save even one person. That was the one thing that he and the others in his crew had in common.

"It wasn't far, just a few hundred meters from my apartment. It was a gas station, and there would always be at least two people working." Frederick held the walkie talkie near Zac's mouth as he spoke, and there was a faint crackling as it transmitted his words to the others.

"Do you know of the compass direction it was in, in relation to your apartment?" Frederick said softly, nodding for Zac to keep speaking.

"I don't know, sorry, I always just walked down the street to it." Zac said with a sad smile, he wished he could be more helpful to the rescuers, but he couldn't describe even the buildings he passed on his walk to work, let alone the compass direction it was in.

Zac had lived the past year in a haze of sadness, anger, and self loathing, not much had gotten through to him, other than his manager's constant whinging and complaints.

"What about you, Winston, Mary?" Frederick turned to the other two survivors, who were huddled together near Jay, as if sheltered next to his enormous bulk.

"Sorry, young man. I never used to go out much, and when I did, it was to the gas station the young gentleman mentioned." Winston croaked, he was shaking slightly, still in shock from the actions of his fellow survivors.

"I used to work at a restaurant nearby, but the people who worked there were with the group I was with. Sniff. To think, I thought they were my friends, and then they…" Mary's voice trailed off as she burst into tears again, and Winston lay a wrinkled hand on her back.

"Copy that, Frederick. I'll have a loop around the white trees when I return, but it's getting far too dangerous near there. Meet you all on the outside! Stay safe." Came Rachel's reply, she had been carefully listening to the voices of all the survivors.

Fredrick immediately answered.

"You too. See you on the outside." Frederick stowed the walkie talkie into the utility belt that all the Augmented were wearing around their waist.

"Alright, Ying. You head on upwards and forwards and scout ahead. I'll take the lead, Jay, you bring up the rear. The rest of you, stay between the two of us, and don't take one step away. Understood?" Frederick said, a serious expression on his face.

The survivors, Zac included, all nodded. There was a gust of wind as Ying took off into the sky, quickly disappearing toward the direction that Frederick had pointed in.

Frederick's arms started whirring, tearing a path open in the dense forest, Zac and the other survivors following him into the dark depths.