Alex quickly stomped on the device, breaking it into pieces.
A silence came over the room once again as everyone thought over the consequences of the tracker getting so far into the compound.
"Do you think they were able to find the compound?" Amora asked. Chase put an arm around her shoulder as she began to shake.
Vida thought over when anyone could have possibly put a tracker in Hendrix's wound.
"That killer probably dropped it on purpose while he made his exit." Vida grit her teeth. Akilah nodded in agreement.
"What do we do?" Vida asked Alex.
Alex turned to Bloom, she usually had a way to comfort the kids through hard times. Alex wasn't very good at that gushy stuff. Alex turned back to Vida.
"We'll stay here. Hopefully the information didn't transmit fast enough for them to get it." Alex rubbed her forehead in doubtful hope.
"You know, Milo has always been tech savvy. You could bring it to him, maybe he'll help us." Jessica pointed down the hall.
"I-I don't want to leave Bloom." Alex said quietly, as though she was ashamed of the fact she cared about someone.
"We'll go." Taro said as he picked up the flattened device. He gestured to the rest of the kids to come with him, which they happily did, except Vida.
"I'll stay here for a bit." Vida said as she put a hand on Hendrix's shoulder. "Please be okay. I can't lose you too." She said under her breath.
Taro, Kai, Akilah, Chase, and Amora all made their way out of the room and down the hall. They didn't talk very much.
"Do you guys know where this Milo guy is?" Chase looked to Kai and Taro for an answer.
"Yeah, he's our senior by five years. He came here when he was younger than us and just stuck around. His Mode is technology, so he'll be useful." Taro explained as he tried to keep the broken pieces in his hand from crumbling anymore.
"Technology, huh." Akilah thought about her own training and how her mode could be of any use.
"Yeah, it's not very useful until there's a piece of tech around, then he can put it to good use." Kai said.
The group got to Milo's room. Taro knocked on the door.
"What?" The voice from inside sounded annoyed.
"It's urgent." Taro responded.
"Ugh. Come in." The voice said reluctantly.
The Taro opened the door as the group was met by walls covered in schematics. At the very farthest from the door in this small room a man with slicked back hair and thick glasses faced a laptop. He had a white coat on with a baggy t-shirt and sweatpants underneath.
The man turned around to see the still bruised up group of kids.
"Holy shit, what happened to you guys? Training or something?" The man was met with silence as the kids looked down at their feet.
"Okay… Anyways… I'm Milo. Nice to meet the new kids. Taro and Kai know me very well." Milo threw up a hand as a quick wave.
"We found this in our friend's wounds when we got back to the compound." Taro showed the broken device.
"Shit. Was it an altercation with Correctional Officers?" Milo said as he took the pieces from Taro and placed them on a desk.
"Yeah." Chase answered.
"Those bastards. This is definitely a tracking device." Milo's words sucked out some of the hope the kids had left. Milo toyed with the broken pieces with a thin tool.
"Hold on a sec." Milo put down the tool and hovered his hands over the broken pieces. A red laser expelled from his palms and onto the device, seemingly scanning the broken pieces for something.
"Got it. It's still intact." Milo said as his hand reached for one of the broken pieces.
"This is the transmitter. It'll let me find out how often its location was given to whoever placed it." Milo showed the kids a tiny, thin piece of metal as he continued. "It'll be a while before I have an answer to give you guys, so go ahead and fix… All of this." Milo circled his hand in the direction of the kids.
Taro nodded as the group made their way out of Milo's room.
At the capital of the North American province of the United Nation, citizens went in and out of the publicly viewable area unaware of what was going on right under their feet.
In one of the many underground chambers under the capital, Officer 1060 faced a ginormous screen while nurses in Correctional Forces uniforms addressed his wounds. They stitched his wounds while he showed no sign of pain.
The Correctional Advisor came into view of the camera. Once again he bore his wooden mask, messy black dreads and military style cap.
"Advisor." Officer 1060 bowed his head.
"You failed again. This isn't very like you, 1060." The Correctional Advisor voice sounded cold, even colder than Officer 1060's.
"The boy got saved by the public. I still managed to put a tracker on him." 1060 responded.
"Have you gotten the location back?" The Advisor inquired.
"No. It was a slow transmitter, the only thing I had on my person."
"Well, I've gotten orders to get that boy you mentioned into our custody, so you can't keep letting those subjects get away." The Advisor sighed as he continued
"Tell me when the intel sect has the information. The defectors aren't dumb, so they've probably broken it already, but let's hope it had enough time to give an exact location. If not then send your subordinates to survey the general area that the tracker last gave. When you find the location, tell me. I'll lead you and your subordinates since you clearly can't." The Advisor cut off the signal as the screen turned black.
Back at the compound, days past. After a full 24 hours of sitting in the infirmary, Vida decided to leave until Hendrix woke up. Bloom woke up only 20 hours after she got to the infirmary.
"Alex?" Bloom said with a weak voice. Alex sat with her head down next to Bloom's bed.
"Bloom." Alex hugged Bloom as she began to tear up. "I thought I lost you for a second."
"I would never leave you honey." Bloom said as she hugged back. "How are the kids doing? I don't remember a lot about the fight."
"Vida, Taro, Chase, most of the kids are fine."
"Most?" Bloom questioned. Alex looked past Bloom onto the bed next to her where Hendrix lay as Bloom noticed.
"Oh my god. We couldn't protect them, could we?" Bloom said as she cuffed her hands over her mouth. Tears began to water up in her eyes as well. "We failed your sister. These kids shouldn't be getting hurt like this." Bloom leaned into Alex as Alex brought her back into a hug.
"It's not your fault, Bloom." Alex questioned if it was her fault instead. She was the one left conscious, after all. She thought about her sister. She thought about the call she gave her a couple months before she died.
"If anything happens to me, take care of these kids. They're my everything." Her sister's words rang through her head.
A day after Bloom woke up, Hendrix woke up as well. He wasn't nearly as healthy as before the fight. His skin was still as pale as ever.
Hendrix looked around the room for a second, this room was a familiar place to him. He tried to stand up beside his bed but fell onto the floor. When Jessica heard the thump she came over to help him up.
"Relax. Your Spirit still isn't replenished. During the fight, your Spirit levels almost bottomed out. When that happens, your body starts to eat away at itself. Thankfully, your body knew to pass out before that happened. Have these." Jessica gave Hendrix some crutches to help him walk around.
"Thanks." Hendrix said as he tried to process the information he was just given.
Hendrix stood up and slowly made his way down the many halls to his room. On the way down the halls, he tried to remember what happened. It seemed to flood back in.
Hendrix opened the doors to the gymnasium, where he guessed someone would be. He found Kai, Taro, and Chase playing a game of basketball.
"Oh shit! You're alive, man!" Chase put an arm around Hendrix's neck and shook him around. "I knew you would pull through. You ain't no pussy."
"Good to see you up." Taro gave Hendrix a slight smile as he patted him on the back.
Kai gave Hendrix a wide grin and a thumbs up.
"Akilah, Amora, Hendrix's up!" Chase called to the two girls who were chatting on the other side of the gymnasium.
This surprised both of them. They quickly ran over and hugged him.
"I'm glad you made it. I was scared." Amora smiled as Hendrix hugged back.
"Thanks for caring about me." Hendrix uttered quietly.
"What do you mean, we'll always be here for you!" Akilah smiled as well.
"Where's Vida?" Hendrix asked.
"Oh, she's in the greenhouse watering some of the flowers. You know her." Amora chuckled.
"Me and Amora can walk you there, we were just going to check on her, anyways." Akilah said as Amora nodded in agreement.
The three made their way to the greenhouse, the two girls trying to slow their pace so Hendrix could keep up.
Once they made their way to the greenhouse, Akilah opened the door.
"Guess who just woke up, Vida!" Akilah let Hendrix through the door.
Instead of the smile and jump they expected, Vida made her way towards Hendrix with an expression Hendrix hadn't seen before.
"Hey Vida, I-" Hendrix felt a sting on his cheek as Vida slapped him across the face.
"Don't EVER do anything like that again." Vida's eyes started to form tears as she continued.
"The sight of you hurting yourself, it made my heart ache like I've never felt before. And then I try to go and help you only to be thrown into a wall." Vida held her arm out of nervousness.
Hendrix's eyes widened. He looked around at Akilah and Amora to see if they saw what happened, at which they both put their heads down.
He hadn't even noticed. He could've killed her. He never meant to harm the only people he cared for, but the fact that he did it meant the same to him.
"If you're going to keep hurting yourself like that… Then just stop training." Vida's words felt like they were burning into Hendrix's heart as he started to tear up as well.
He never felt such a heartache before in his life.
"I…I'll see you guys later." Hendrix slowly made his way out of the greenhouse as Vida watched him leave through watercolored eyes.
"Don't you think that was a little harsh, Vida? He didn't have control-" Amora's words were cut short by Vida.
"See you guys later." Vida said as she left the greenhouse as well.
Amora and Akilah looked at each other as a somber mood grew over the two of them.
On the other side of the compound, Milo walked over to the infirmary with an energy in one hand and the transmitter in his other.
He kicked open the door to the infirmary with no care for who it would hit.
"Milo, you don't have to be so annoying all the time." Jessica sighed at the sight of Milo entering the room.
"No time for your foolish remarks, Jessica. Alex, I've been able to pinpoint the last location that the tracking device was able to send." Milo said to Alex, who was still bedside, talking to Bloom.
Alex and Bloom looked up in surprise.
"Let us see!" Bloom said as she took the transmitter from Milo.
"Well, the transmitter was quite slow, so they only know that you drove the van north after the altercation with the Officers." Milo's words caused both Alex and Bloom to breathe a sigh of relief.
"That's great to hear. Thank you, Milo" Bloom smiled.
"Better? Yes. Great? No. I believe you two are underestimating the manpower of the Correctional Forces. Because of your scuffle yesterday, they not only know that we're in the city, but they also know the quadrant of the city that we're in. My most hopeful estimates only give us 6 months before they pinpoint our exact location." Milo's words sunk into the room.
Bloom and Alex looked at each other with some combination of dread and confusion.
"What should we do?" Jessica asked Bloom and Alex.