Chapter 396: Super Suit

Jenny's eyes snapped to the sound. She ran across the asphalt, dropping to her knees beside the agent's body. She carefully reached down, unlatching the heavy helmet and pulling it free.

It was a young woman in her early twenties, her pale white hair tied into a messy ponytail. Jenny recognized her instantly. This was one of her brightest young squad leaders. Blood was pouring steadily from her nose and mouth, and her armor had been completely shredded by Jayden's claws.

"Elena," Jenny whispered, her voice cracking as she cradled the girl's head in her lap. She looked back at the surviving guards and barked: "Get me a healing serum now!"

"Captain..." Elena gasped, coughing violently as a fresh wave of dark, poisoned blood bubbled over her lips. "Don't... don't waste the serum. It's too late for me now..."

"No, stay with me, Elena," Jenny pleaded, tears finally spilling over her eyelids and cutting tracks through the dust on her face. "I am so sorry... this is all my fault. I shouldn't have let the line break. I should have predicted his movement."

"No. It's not... your fault," Elena whispered, her vision beginning to glaze over as she reached up, her trembling fingers catching Jenny's sleeve. "We knew... what we signed up for. Just... promise me one thing, Jenny. Catch that son of a bitch."

"We'll catch him together, Elena. Just hold on," Jenny cried.

"...tell my mom and dad... I love them..." Elena said. Then her hand suddenly lost all its strength, dropping limply into the dirt. Her chest hitched one last time, her body going completely still as her eyes stared blankly into the sky.

Jenny stared down at the dead girl's face for a long, silent minute.

An agent rushed up, a trauma kit in his hands, but he stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Elena's lifeless expression. He slowly lowered the kit, his head dropping. "Commander... I'm so sorry." he said.

Jenny didn't reply immediately. The sorrow in her eyes completely evaporated, replaced by a void of absolute, terrifying coldness. She gently laid Elena's body down onto the asphalt, wiped the tears from her cheeks with the back of her glove, and stood up.

"Commander?" the agent asked hesitantly. "Are you alright?"

"Call base," Jenny said, her voice entirely flat and devoid of human emotion. "Tell them we need a heavy carrier vehicle to recover twenty-four casualties."

"Yes, ma'am." The agent said, before heading back to the secondary vehicles.

Jenny turned her back on the courtyard, her gaze locking onto the dark, ruined entrance of the facility. "Those two better have put him down," she muttered to herself, her boots clicking sharply against the concrete as she walked inside, following the scent of ozone and copper.

She navigated through the shattered corridors, entering the primary reactor room where she expected to find Jayden restrained.

Instead, the scene before her made eyes widen in shock.

The massive reactor room was a disaster zone of twisted metal and shattered glass. Thea was collapsed on the floor, writhing in agony. Her signature speedster suit had been torn open at the shoulder, and thick, branching networks of black veins were rapidly creeping up her neck and jawline, her high-speed metabolism fighting a losing war against a foreign biological agent.

A few yards away, Theo was flat on his back, his left leg snapped completely backward at a grotesque, unnatural angle, his chest plate dented inward.

Standing over him was Jayden. He was still in his partial lupine form, but he wasn't looking at the broken twins. He was holding a large, light-blue crystal that had been ripped out of Theo's suit core.

Jenny and Jayden locked eyes across the ruined chamber.

Jenny instantly dropped into a low, desperate combat stance, her pink energy flaring to life, fully expecting him to blitz her to finish the job.

But Jayden didn't advance. He secured the glowing blue crystal in his inventory, turned on his heel, and dashed out of the room, blurring straight past Jenny, and bursting through the rear exit of the building, vanishing into the night before the remaining guards outside could even react.

He had escaped.

Jenny stood frozen, her breath shallow. She quickly tapped her earpiece. "All units, target has escaped. But we have a situation here in the facility. Bring all available health kits into the reactor room immediately!"

Then she ran over to the writhing speedster, dropping to her knees. "Thea! Talk to me! What happened?" She asked.

Thea grunted, her teeth grinding together as she tried to fight the poison in her system. "He... he was too fast. Even with our combined speed... we couldn't lock him down." She coughed slightly, barely able to breathe. "He struck me with his poisoned claws and broke Theo's leg. Then he took the beast crystal that powered the suit."

Jenny's mind reeled as the medical units rushed into the room, instantly plunging serum stabilizers into the twins' legs. She stood up slowly, leaving the medics to work, and walked back out into the open air of the courtyard.

She looked at the burning transport vehicle, the ruined walls, and the body bags her men were beginning to line up on the asphalt. It was a total, unmitigated disaster. They had possessed the element of surprise, the perfect containment technology, and S-rank asset support—and they had still been defeated. The Hunter had decimated her entire elite troop and broken the fastest Pioneers in the world without even using his entire rumored arsenal.

The mission was a failure. She was a failure.

A surge of pure hatred gripped Jenny's chest. She slammed her clenched fist into the wall of the building.

CRACK.

The force of her blow shattered the concrete, a massive, jagged web of deep fractures spreading wildly across the entire face of the structure.

"This isn't over, Hunter," Jenny whispered into the empty night, her teeth grinding so hard they threatened to crack. "I will hunt you to the ends of this earth… I swear it."

And for a single microsecond, her eyes glowed with a faint, inhuman yellow light.