Gun against his scalp, Dexter's feet rooted into the ground. The Azarean female loomed in the corner of his eye, a cold and calculating demeanor with an undefinable expression behind a lens. She hadn't killed him yet, which could only mean one thing. 

His thoughts were a loop of his last exchange with Jessica. Though it could have and probably should have been different, he was grateful. 

A deafening bang accompanied a liquid sensation on his cheek. He flinched over his right shoulder, where the Azarean female collapsed. Meters away from her fallen body stood Ike, alive with a smoking barrel in his grasp.

"Run, shit-stain!" he yelled and commenced firing at the male agent, who'd begun a sprint. So quick, he dodged the bullet and grabbed Ike's arm like a lunging viper. He shoved him and dented the hood of the nearest car before tossing successive body shots the eye could barely follow. Ike somehow took the brunt of them before blocking his taller opponent's fist and punching back.

The alien swiped the bruise on his face as if it were cosmetic.

Meanwhile, Ike rolled off the hood of the car and set some distance between them. He assumed a fighter's stance and wasted no time advancing with successive jabs. Rigorous breaths escaped his every exertion, but nothing made contact.

The Azarean dodged like a slippery worm, swerving out of his opponent's reach, no wasted motion. Ike tired himself into the Azarean's grasp. His entire body was lifted then slammed onto the roof of another car. Broken glass hit the street, and dry cackles escaped his lips.

With control of his nerves, Dexter scrambled and picked up the dead agent's pistol nearby. He brought its holographic sights to bear on the agent. Aware of this, the agent left Ike's bloody face on the car hood, stole his magnum from the ground, and pulled the trigger. All in the time it took to blink.

Dexter's pistol flew out of his hand; Ike's magnum burned into flecks, and before Dexter could even register the pain in his palm, the Azarean kicked him with enough force to dent the car behind him. But an arm seized the agent from behind.

Ike heaved the Azarean's collar and tossed him onto the car hood, switching places. He accompanied his next flurry of punches with loud, begrudging moans.

***

Down the highway of scattered vehicles and scared citizens, Jessica skated at high velocity across numerous obstacles. She moved faster than the viral signal transmitted through Babel, which quickly transformed static traffic into a rising tide of metal over the superhighway. Mid-focus, Monarch's voice returned.

"Asgard is splitting off! Without a specific target to follow, they're scrambling. Now's our best window: all units, disperse and meet up at the rendezvous. J1182."

Per Monarch's observation, the Asgard airships en route had abandoned their formation to swerve in sundry directions. Like fledgling birds in the sky, they split their attention for every offroad car and its potential suspects, and there were many.

"Dexter!" Jessica called, breaking near the fiery wreckage. She found her friend shaken, sitting against the car where the agent kicked him. The agent was nearby, squaring off with Ike, Ike who had drawn a knife only to sweat bullets in front of his opponent. The fire in his eyes may have stemmed from fear.

"Jessica?" Dexter moaned. He was tiredly gawking from his sorry position, where surprise impeded his effort to rise. Jessica crouched and carefully wrapped his arm around her neck. 

"We're leaving, Dex!"

"Now's your chance!" Ike shouted. His fist landed in the Azarean's hand, and the ensuing enemy counter pinned him to the ground. He had no hope of escape then, no purpose aside from distraction.

Jessica wanted to help, to relieve Ike's bloody, sacrificial exhaustion. She was unwilling to push her luck, however, as the Azarean, without remorse, began beating Ike to death... The operative only managed to spit one last sentence.

"Get out of here, Dark!"

"That's not—"

"Hold on tight!" Jessica accelerated away from the conflict, Dexter's arms instinctively wrapped around her waist. When they began their escape, the Azarean turned. Just one step in their direction and he suddenly stopped to groan in pain. Ike had stabbed his leg with a piece of glass, drawing blood.

"Babel, engage!" A hum and green light underneath preceded their levitation offroad. Though the board's ground kickoff was subtle, it carried their combined weight into the air. Fortunately, Shannon's vehicle was visible on the horizon.

"Jess, behind us!" Dexter warned.

She witnessed a car launch off the superhighway, speeding directly after them. All the worry in the world suddenly struck harder than the wind. Her heart pounded in her chest, ready to drop. It pounded, and the car burst into flames. An implosion brought it spiraling down in ruin, and the tumultuous crash left nothing to the imagination.

Jessica goggled at the vehicle heap, pondering the cause of the combustion. Since the ruins offered no explanation, she read Dexter's somber face. He shut his eyes. 

"Run a scan of the superhighway, Babel." Magnified, infrared vision revealed a faint heat signature where they left Ike. And within seconds, the survivor's body heat gradually degraded into blue, like everything else.

Panning over the sky,  Jessica's deep breath cast anxiety to the wind. Nothing was chasing them beyond the city limits, where civilization surrendered to forest. Surfing across the weightless expanse of blue, she trailed after Shannon's vehicle, which showed no signs of stopping. Furthermore, the extra passenger limited her speed. Dexter remained quiet throughout the flight, his heart beating at her back. She counted over a hundred beats per minute.

With the fear of being spotted, Jessica looked down at the seemingly endless sea of trees. Her friend's health was among the list of factors to consider. "Dexter!"

"Yea?"

"Do you know where the rendezvous is?"

His silent delay gave the answer before he did. "I just know it's in this general direction!"

"I'm going down!"

"What about the others?"

"They won't forget us!" She glanced back one last time, relieved by the clear horizon. "Hold on!"

Jessica lowered to the lush canopy in a steady decline, a few branches threatening to smack their faces. When the ground came to, so did a clear flowing stream that mirrored the pines, the blue dome. Over a hill, Dexter hopped down before a complete stop.

"But Doc!" Jessica landed several meters away and sprinted close.

"I'm alright!" he remonstrated.

"Are you sure? Because I think you hit your head on a falling car."

"Yea, I know, Jess. I was there... So was Ike."

Jessica stared daggers at his attitude, then warily paced several feet away. Nothing but rows upon rows of bark lay ahead. "Something else got you irritated?" she asked. "I haven't heard 'Thank you for saving me, Jessica'." The silence was instructive. Back around, she watched him squat upright, inhale, and huff. His brow furrowed in either resentment or sickness. Unclear until he spoke.

"It was a bad idea coming after me. It just wasn't... There was no way you could have known the end result on that highway. That was pure luck, and you're lucky to be alive."

"Maybe," Jessica replied, fist tightening.

"No. No maybe!" He stomped up to her, the gulp of his neck muscle apparent. "There were two agents, Jessica, and the whole thing was a clear shitstorm, meaning you could have gotten killed. That's all. And it wouldn't have been worth it, you know that? You're here because you're needed, not me. So, no more stupid decisions."

Jessica couldn't calculate her words. Instead, acid welled in her gut and made them spill out of her mouth. "Listen, you ignorant slut, you want to know what's stupid? It's thinking you had to sacrifice yourself for a clean getaway. Tell me, honestly, was martyrdom your first thought after hitting your head?"

Dexter leered. "What the hell else was I going to do? Seemed like the right way to go."

"Don't talk to me about the right way. There's smart, moronic, and then there're variables. Even if Beelz and Dissent weren't perfectly capable, even if Monarch didn't have an intervention plan, even if Ike wasn't sneaking up on NSS before you clumsily drew their attention, even if I didn't transmute the GPS monitoring signal, the one factor that wasn't going to change anything was you dying, moron.

"And you're right, I didn't qualify the agents as a risk! The one thing I did know before I made my stupid decision was that I had to save my friend! But if you have a problem with that, fine! Now, I know. Stupid or not, though"—she closed the remaining distance between them—"you don't get to fucken tell me who I can and cannot save."

Jessica stormed from Dexter's sight, down the hill, to huff and groan at the stream bank. A strong desire to break something slammed her foot on the ground. "Idiot..." Languid silence passed as she mulled over the water, reflection plagued by visceral memories of Beth. She resisted the flashes again, unable to cope at a moment's notice.

Deep breaths. 

Eventually, she heard Dexter's footsteps. If one more stupid utterance escaped his stupid mouth, she would jog past the water and find Sub Terra on her own. Already, she deliberated on Valerie and Shannon's whereabouts.

"Thanks for saving me, Jessica."

Her angsty frown slowly uplifted into a sly smirk, and her fingers came together like a conniving villain. Her chakras aligned and helped sedate the trembling frustration. Halfway on the path to satisfaction, she turned around with a canted grin. "Okay! Let's get the hell out of here."

Dexter's brow jerked. "Uh, okay, where are we going?"

"If you don't know, I don't know, but it's better to run than to wait for Elsa, don't cha think? By the way, why Elsa?"

"Because space-elves are ice cold and need more sun, yea."

"Tell me about it." She smirked. "Later, perhaps, when we're not in danger."

"That might be a while."

Jessica and Dexter trudged up the next hill, navigating terrain seemingly untouched by civilization. Not a soul in sight, not a strand or hint of man-made mechanisms infringed upon the avenues of leaves. Only solitude. Never having visited the wilderness, Jessica had no clue what to expect. The novelty of their surroundings was almost tangible enough to rub the skin. The sun's descent envisioned a spiraling shift in the scenery. New traits came in the iridescence of local flora.  Deeper into the region, the undulating shades morphed from cool greens to warm reds and yellows while the unrecognizable trees embalmed a sense of mystery no thinner than the air they breathed—which almost seemed alien. Never had she laid eyes on so many wreaths of nature.

Eventually, they came to a halt, and Jessica circled until she made eye contact with Dexter. One look at his clueless face helped her accept the fact that they were lost. Thus, she peered beyond the canopy to isolate the position of the sun. All the hours of food delivery helped her memorize the direction of its rays during each hour. Unfortunately, nothing along the way clued them on the rendezvous. No sign, no car, no Shannon, no Valerie, and no jerk.

"You have no idea where we're going, do you, Dex?"

"Nope." He sighed. 

"Okay. What do you know?"

He shrugged and wiped his glossy face with a leaf. "Just that it's somewhere up north. I think I overheard Monarch, actually, give this very cryptic sentence for the coordinates: 'On the highway out of hell, beware the energizer bunny.' But, I figure if there was any clue about the rendezvous, I would have seen it by now.  Sub Terra's got hideouts in different places. Only ones I know of are in the city. So, no one leads everyone; no one knows everything. It's all very secretive. Has to be. And I'm just a small cog they wouldn't keep in the loop."

"Energizer bunny out of hell?" Jessica pursed her lips, shut her eyes, and imagined a rabbit beating a drum out of a circle of fire. "When did you join Sub Terra?"

Dexter snickered, eyes to the ground. "Not long after we graduated."

"You're not the type."

"No, I'm not."

"You wouldn't even hurt a Cazador," Jessica snickered.

Dexter lifted polite, brown eyes. "And when did you"—swirling his hand around her figure— "when did you start all this?"

"Really? You're just noticing that I cut my hair?"

"Nnnno. Stop messing with me!"

Jessica smiled through her teeth at Dexter's rolling eyes.

"What exactly have you been up to?"

"Now's not the time, Dex. We have to keep moving." She walked ahead of him.

"The hell?" his voice cracked. "You started this!"

Further, into the unknown, the two wanderers paused atop a hill of leaves. Jessica fastened her goggles to scan for distant clues. Approximately an hour had passed since they made landfall, so if Shannon and Valerie had stopped, they might approach from the opposite direction. However, while Jessica had no doubt her friends would want to search for her, she was unsure about Raptor. In the middle of that thought, her scan revealed movement in the bushes.

"I think I see someone."

"Really?" Dexter whispered.

"Yea. Hold on."

A searingly loud crash broke the silence of the forest, fading into a distant echo.

Jessica hit the floor, under Dexter's arm, left to ponder the origin of the gunshot. Breathless, she stared from the empty green to her friend's dilating brown eyes. He was quick but not that quick. The bullet hit the nearby tree well before they could duck, so her eyes wandered from Dexter's nervousness to the rising pile of leaves behind him.

"Dex!" Swiftly, she sprung up and tackled the figure. It evoked a feminine moan that persisted into the ensuing ground wrestle. The camouflaged hood came down, to reveal a white face and blonde hair.

"Jess!" yelled Dexter

As Jessica pinned the stranger's wrists, she peered into the blue eyes of a young girl. Those eyes glared with adolescent fury. 

"Jessica!"

She sat on the girl's stomach, but when she dared to look up found herself surrounded by hoodies in camouflage. A painful gut compression flung her back to the ground, after which the blonde girl crawled back and rose, but not before fetching her wooden rifle from the floor.

"Get up!" She cocked her gun at Jessica.

Reluctantly, Jessica followed the pissy girl's command and noted every stranger's finger snug on the triggers of their outdated weapons. She slowly reached for the sky, like Dexter. But in glancing from the guns to the blonde, she based her next act on work experience with difficult Tacquizza customers.

"Was geht ab? Es tut uns leid. Ich weiß nicht, was los ist, aber ich spreche kein Englisch," she casually exclaimed. Dexter squinted at her.

"Who are you!" barked one of the jackets.

"Aussehen! Es war nur ein Spiel! Naaa?"

One of their detainers relieved Dexter of his pistol and frisked the rest of him while the blonde girl began a close inspection of Jessica's entire body, using her hands. Few comparisons could be made to the sensations that followed. Actively, she withheld the urge to yelp as her jeans and shirt kneaded her skin. More disconcertedly, the girl found her R2-D2 drive and tried to sniff it.

"What is this?" she spat.

"Mein anale Sonde."

"Not answering, huh?"

The armed adolescent stashed the flash drive in her pocket. Then, she forcefully removed Jessica's backpack and began carelessly tossing out the contents. Jessica inwardly seethed. The reality of the situation started to sink in. Her tablet, thrown aside; her RWBY T-shirt, thrown aside; her dignity, thrown aside.

"What is this?" The girl dangled an unused tampon in Jessica's face.

Jessica cringed until her legs nearly buckled. "You've got to be kidding me."

"So, you do know English!"

Oh, my God, she just tricked me. 

Dexter awkwardly and actively diverted his gaze from her general direction – His eyes rolled upward while he whistled. Jessica meanwhile pleaded very seriously. "I know we've just met and are a long ways off from being BFFs, but can you ask them to put their guns down."

"Maybe, if you bring down the sarcasm," the girl replied.

"Touché. Sounds like a plan. Can I have my drive back?"

But the blonde waved the tampon in Jessica's face, once more. "Are you going to tell me what this is or not?"

"My God... Do you live under a roc—you know what, you probably do. No judgment. Do I even wanna know how—I don't, actually. That's an easy one. Oh, boy, my mind's on autopilot. It's in my mind. Oh, no..." 

A man angling a double-barrel shotgun stepped closer. "What are you doing out here?" he said. Not only was his voice throaty, but it also had an accent. Very rustic. 

He sounds like a hillbilly.

"Probably better for everyone if we don't answer that," said Dexter, stepping forward. But a gun stock hit the back of his knee, and he fell with a guttural moan.

"No, worse for you if ya don't," replied the man with the shotgun, lowering his hood. He had a middle-aged mug of warm brown facial hair greying down his entire jawline. "You're from the city, which means you're only business here is bad business. And bad business can only lead to bad business."

"We're not here because we want to be," said Jessica.

"And I promise we're not here to be hostile," Dexter added. "Or to be spies or some random crap."

The elder man frowned impatiently. "You have three seconds..."

Jessica outstretched her arms. "Everybody, just be cool!"

"Be very, very cool," said Raptor. Out of nowhere, flanked by Valerie and Shannon, Raptor leveled his pistol at their leader. Her friends were armed as well, but while Valerie appeared very confident through her specs, Shannon looked very nervous.

The mysterious leader pointed his shotgun at Raptor. "I say you're outnumbered," he warned. "And so long as you're in these woods, there's nowhere to run."

Raptor eyed the man intently, slowly lowering his pistol. "What is above and below the view of a sane moon?"

At those words, the man with a shotgun raised his brow. "A mountain of madness," he answered, uplifting the barrel. His followers took after him, and, sure enough, the tension withered.

Pieces of the puzzle came together. These people in the woods knew Sub Terra, and Raptor's cryptic greet meant they were in the know, as it were. Another mystery but one which let Jessica breathe easy.

"I am Gideon," said the leader, personally helping Dexter to his feet. "And these are the Woodsmen... and women. This is my niece, Danielle. Dani." He pointed to the blonde teenager. "Welcome to our neck of the woods. See, anything you can find in the city you won't find here. There's no fancy techs nor wireless waifus. We're off the grid."

A/N. So, before I published this, I deliberated on whether I should even include the first part on the highway or if I should delete it. Thoughts and comments would help. And if you happen to like this chapter, feel free to vote ;)