The sticks and stones and other bits of forest debris hurt my feet. Trekking through the increasingly dense forest in such a sorry state made me feel, for the first time in a long time, as if I were back to my normal self again; no powers, no superhuman stamina.

  And what did it take to be rendered this useless? I thought to myself.

  You lost your mind, went full monster, got beat down, spent hours healing, all so you remember what it's like to be exhausted like your old self again.

  The acidic burn in my stomach pitted for my attention. The need to eat wasn't going away, and all of the climbing through the thick forest brush was only making the hunger worse.

  Xandra bounced ahead, leaping over the thick bushes, landing, then jumping ahead again, all whilst holding Azad in her arms.

  Something sharp scraped along my left arm.

  I looked down and saw lines of blood leading down my forearm.

  I had just walked into a thick rose bush with sharp thorns.

  Without being able to tap into the power to heal the wound, I instead ripped a piece of my shredded shirt and wrapped it around the cut. The amount of blood made the cut look worse than it was. It stung, but that in a way was helpful because the pain was helping keep me awake; a heavy drowsiness had taken hold of me and it was becoming increasingly difficult to fend off. My stamina wasn't as limitless as I thought. I did have limits.

  Being in a delirious state of mind and kind of bored, I started to sing to take my mind off things.

  The lyrics I sang were, all in all, pure nonsense, even to me. Part of the reason why was because I was singing the song to the second opening introductory title credit sequence to Mega Fighters M, the anime. I didn't know any Japanese, though I had tried for a few evenings to learn; the furthest I got was understanding the existence of Kanji, and Hirigana, and appreciating just how time-consuming it would be for me to learn Japanese; so I had given up on that. Singing the lyrics to the 2nd Opening song was more about feeling whatever the intent of the song was.

  Over awesome fight scene clips from the show heavy metal played, joined by a triumphant sounding chorus which sounded like the kind of song you would want to fight your arch-nemesis to.

  There was one section of the song which was in English, because the Japanese tended to enjoy adding in the odd English phrase into their songs for no other reason than it sounded cool.

  "Fight the world, fight the world, awesome power, burning in my soul!"

  I sang the 2nd Opening twice over, at first quietly, but the second time I started to belt it out. Singing whatever I vaguely remembered the sound of the Japanese lyrics to be, then singing the English parts with even greater enthusiasm.

  "Fight the world! Fight the world! Awesome power! Burning in my soul!"

  With a sudden heavy thud Xandra, still holding Azad, landed beside me.

  She had landed at just the right time to join in with the song; instead of singing the lyrics, she sang the shredding guitar theme which made up a good chunk of the song, and was probably my favourite part of the whole thing.

  "Dee-now-now-now, dee-dee-now-now! Now-now-ne-now-ne-now!" Xandra sang out.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  I laughed. Azad, his eyes still closed, was smiling too.

  Well, I thought, At least I'm dealing with all this crap with fun people by my side.

  Things grew quiet. I stopped singing. I could feel Xandra's questioning gaze on me. The crunch and snapping sounds of the forest debris broke some of the silence.

  I had started to think back on climbing down that huge ladder down in the Wedder Gorge facility.

  Although the memory was pitch black, in my mind's eye I could still picture singing the 'climbing down the ladder' song with Sophie and Walter. That had been fun too, though totally horrifying to experience climbing down in the dark, all while being drenched in icy cold water.

  It had been just enough time that I could think back on that moment and not want to immediately think of something else, because anytime I thought about what happened at the Wedder Gorge facility there also came a nasty sickening dread and a pain in my gut.

  "What'chu thinking about?" said Xandra.

  "Some friends I made back at the facility," I said, "Was just thinking about how they're doing."

  "Are they tough?" said Xandra.

  "Yeah," I said, "I'm sure they're doing fine."

  "Why didn't you go with them?" said Xandra.

  I thought she already knew this. I had told her the gist of what happened at the facility, how I had escaped. About Sophie and Walter too.

  "I stayed back to help the Pied Pipers," I said.

  "Peepers," said Xandra, correcting me.

  "Right," I said.

  I pushed through a particularly thick bush, feeling the uncomfortable sensation of stinging nettles against my left knee.

  "Guess that was a wasted effort," I said, more to myself than to Xandra, "I stayed behind to help the Peepers, only to go and slaughter even more than I saved last night."

  Xandra, who had walked through the bush and found it little bother to her tougher rubbery legs, came to a stop.

  "You didn't kill the Peepers," said Xandra, "You lost control. It's not the same thing."

  "Isn't it?" I said.

  "Or do you regret coming back to save me?" said Xandra.

  "No," I said, "Of course I don't."

  Xandra looked at me, unblinking, and then sighed.

  "You overthink everything, B," she said, "Stop that."

  I nodded, and smiled a little.

  The hiding spot Azad led us to wasn't an abandoned building like I had imagined. Instead, the thick forest brush opened up to reveal a small pocket in the forest. Daylight shone in through the canopy above, but closer to the ground the foliage was so thick it was like hedgerows for large sections all the way around the area. The spot was quieter as a result There were much more rush bushes and thorns bordering the forest clearing.

  Ahead lay more trees, and even more foliage, but there was also a poorly built wooden structure. A large tattered blanket hung from unevenly hammered nails at the entrance to the haphazard structure.

  "This is it," said Azad, in a croaking voice.

  "It's a clubhouse?" I said, "I mean, like a hangout Den?"

  "Yeah," said Azad.

  I got the idea Azad wanted to say more, but the soreness in his throat wouldn't allow it. It didn't matter, it was obvious enough what Azad had brought us to.

  "It'll work," said Xandra.

  Azad croaked something to Xandra, and then she set him gently on his feet. He walked like a feeble old man to the Den entrance, moved the blanket aside, and entered. Xandra and I followed after him.

  Inside the Den was much more impressive than it had been on the outside. Whoever had built the structure had taken a lot of care to make the inside the best they could make it.

  A large weatherworn sofa dominated the middle of the space. A huge amount of fairylights hung from the ceiling. There were all kinds of objects littering the space telling the story of teenagers having used this place a lot to hang out.

  Azad had hobbled over to a little green battery pack hanging from the ceiling. He flicked a switch on the pack and the fairylights came on. The inside of the den was lit with blues and reds and whites as if it were Christmas.

  "Wow," I said, "This place is pretty cool."

  Azad looked as if he might fall over. He settled down onto the couch, sighing contentedly as the cushioned seats took his weight.

  There was a fold out chair close by. I sat on it, and I couldn't help but let out a content sigh to be able to rest again.

  "Okay," said Xandra, with her hands at her hips, "I'm going to head out for supplies."

  "Wait, what?" I said, "On your own?"

  "Yeah," said Xandra, in a way that implied I had just said something stupid.

  "Neither of you can keep up," she said, "I'll be faster if its just me."

  "Where're you going to go?" I said.

  "Don't worry about it," said Xandra, "You guys just rest, and I'll be back as soon as I've gotten supplies for us. Don't worry, I won't cause any trouble."

  "Okay," said Azad, "See you when you get back."

  Xandra looked from Azad, to me. It seemed like my time to object to her going, or forever hold my peace.

  "Just look after yourself," I said.

  Xandra smiled, winked at me, and then left the den.