The escaped officer went straight in the direction of the forest. His leather shoes clapped onto the road annoyingly loud, making him grimace with each step; his tie flapped with the wind, swirling a sickening pattern; his formal uniform restrained his steps, as if tugging him into the arms of his pursuers. He knew people were behind him. He’d just escaped a room full of officers, the fact that he made it to the outside was a miracle.

He glanced back. Only two people were after him, both teenagers. He recognized the slower one as the senior officer Phil’s son, having matched gray eyes like his father. The other’s dilated pupils were an alarming red, matching their hair color, an effect of the pill he knew too well. Shivering, the officer realized injuring any of them could lead him into a much worse situation.

Dylan and Carlos sprinted down the pavement. Crowds of families started to gather as the sun pierced through. Dylan ripped off his jacket, chugging it onto the street.

In front of them, the officer hesitated as he reached a crossroad. Dylan saw Carlos’s lips raise up to a smirk-like grin at the slip-up, feeling himself do the same. The officer was just in their reach, barely meters away. Dylan ghosted his hands above his belt, over the handle of his dagger. It was Phil’s birthday present, and he was willing to test out its usefulness on any willing subject, especially one who killed Jen.

Carlos quickened his pace yet again, Dylan realized the guy was going for the final sprint. Before Carlos reached out his arms to grasp at the man, his ankles wobbled momentarily. The boy cursed and shouted to Dylan.

“Pill’s wearing off!” Dylan only grunted in response. His eyes trained on the escaper.

Seconds later, the sense of fatigue coursed through Carlos’s body, undoing what the pill did, only ten times worse. His limps were jelly when he fell, face-flat onto the pavement. He groaned comically. The red pupils flickered back to brown like a dying candlelight. Dylan leapt over him, overtaking Carlos. Carlos will probably fish out his pill stash when he gets the strength.

Dylan and the officer played cat-and-mouse until Dylan realized they were going the same way he came earlier today. His legs are burning as his knees threatened to buckle, wobbling more than he would like. The scent of spices reached him after the crowd’s noise. The officer sprinted to market and plunged into the noon crowd.  

Dylan followed. The officer disappeared into the clad of colors as Dylan gets caught in the crowd. Families passed him, creating a nauseous swirl of colors. The stench of sweat and oily market food made Dylan’s stomach churn. He grazed a hand up to his mouth, hoping he won’t puke.

“Officers on duty,” Carlos screamed as he caught up to Dylan, flaying his officer uniform at anyone in the way.  

“I so smell him,” Carlos mused when he reached up to Dylan, wiggling his nose.

“No use, your senses will lead us to a butcher shop” Dylan frowned, “that’s why he came here.”

“Maybe he is hiding in a butcher shop,” Carlos suggested.

“Reverse psychology,” he explained smugly as Dylan’s face turned to fifty shades of the rainbow. Carlos took no notice. He skipped around the market, pupils dilating and widening on repeat, like predator searching for its designated prey.

“It’s not gonna work, I’m sorry that your wolfy attacks are useless,” Dylan groaned.

“Excuse me? Wolfy?” Carlos gasped at the direct insult-like statement. Dylan wondered if he’d taken the joke too far. His thoughts evaporated after Carlos continued with a high-pitched, flirtatious voice, “You can bring a leash and a bone next time for me.”

“Wolves won’t want bones; guess I’ll call you dog next time,” Dylan deadpanned, dragging Carlos further down the market.

After a few minutes, it became clear there was no way to find the officer by Carlos’ pill-heightened senses.

“This is no use, we’ll need to think of an actual strategy,” Dylan groaned, pulling Carlos from a barbecue stand, again.

We need high-ground, Dylan decides before ordering Carlos to kneel.

“For the record, I don’t remember his shoes if you want us to track those,” Carlos complained but kneeled anyway.

Dylan hopped onto Carlos’ shoulders. The boy heaved him up, tipping with every step and swaying like leaves in the autumn wind.

Dylan head-locked Carlos, steering him to spin. The crowd around them thinned slightly as apparently no-one wants to be associated with such a dangerous feat.

The officer whipped his head around, checking for his chasers. In these situations, all came down to luck of who finds the other first.

A shout, sounding more like a bark, echoed from behind him. He turned his head only to witness disaster, a 2-people human tower crumbling like a card house. The boy named Dylan tumbled down, managing to keep steady as the other tripped, falling backwards.

His eyes met with the boy’s. Red pupils dilate. The officer froze. All it takes is a primal response, the predator stared into his soul. The officer heard his own heart-beat, accelerating by the second. His brain wired into fight-or-flight mode. The officer chose the later.

He tore through the crowd, panicking and bumping into several food stands. Sauce dripped on his shirt, his hair tousled by the wind, paled face from eye contact with the kid. The crowd sensed the distressed energy as they jolted away from him.

The two boys are catching up. Agonizing footsteps clapped louder by the second. The officer turned sharply down an alleyway, cascading off the narrowly spaced walls.

From nights of dwelling in the market square, the escape routes locked into the officer’s head. He heaved himself up a low wall, swayed momentarily as he tried to find balance on the tilted rooftop. Brick tiles clattered and whined beneath him.

The wind threatened to push the officer off the edge. The boys still chased him, the fear of falling limiting their speed.

The officer soon reached the town’s edge, the grassy hills and forest finally visible. He crawled uphill before rolling down the opposite end. He staggered forward, suddenly feeling too exposed in the plain. His feet stuck into the mud. Sometime amongst the chaos, he heard the ringing of school bells and chattering of teenagers. A pang of familiarity shot through him. Why’d the town decide to build their school so far away? He never knew.

By miracle, he made it into the forest alive. Trees moaned as he swashed them away. Branches scarred his face, leaving trinkets of blood. He was starting to pant, the collar of his shirt tugging too chokingly, his back already drenched with sticky sweat.

He used the trees as cover from his chasers as he pocketed a pill, the last one in his stash. The capsule crackled between his teeth, bitter powder coating his tongue. It always had been a sweet delight. He smirked as he waited for the pleasant feeling of regeneration.

His insides heated up, warmth engulfed him. Finally. It took the officer a few seconds before he noticed something was wrong. The heat kept building up, the warmth was still there, but this time it wrapped itself in flames. He burned, couching violently before tumbling to the ground. An agonized shriek came out straight through his lungs.

Dylan whipped his head around the forest. His legs burnt out from the run but still craving for more. Trees clawed against each other, looming over Dylan, forming mazes and perfect hiding-spots. Now, he wished they would have caught the man sooner. Carlos sniffed the air beside him.

“He’s taken a pill too, I can’t track his scent.”

“If only I had the pill like you, maybe we won’t be slowed down so much,”

“Don’t sweat it, not your fault,” Carlos shrugged, still wandering around for any hidden traces of their target. Eventually, he sat down beneath a tree. His chest rose and fell in time with his breathing.

A pained screech echoed through the trees, making Dylan flinch. Carlos jumped up as Dylan followed.

The stench of blood reached Dylan, and making his heart drop. The escaped officer coiled and twitched on the forest floor, still clutching his pill bottle.

“What the-,” Carlos froze in his tracks, hesitating what to do next.

Dylan approached the officer, holding out his dagger. The ruby on the dagger handle glimmered in the sun, mirroring the state of the officer. The officer must had sensed their intrusion, curling into a ball. His forehead oily with cold sweat.

Dylan kneeled and flipped the man over. He moved his hands under the other’s throat, feeling a weak and strange pulse. The thumping changed beats, agonizing like a pair of trapeze artist performing a show, slipping at every catch, only successfully holding each other at the last possible moment. Dylan knew the fall wasn’t going to be caught by any form of safety net.

He immediately retracted his hand as the other winced and twitched, shutted eyes opened to a slit before recognizing Dylan.

“In the labs-” the officer coughed out, black blood spilled onto Dylan’s palms. His words were uncomprehensible as he spluttered more of the black sludge. It clawed onto Dylan’s skin like living oil. His stomach flipped at the stench of something worse than rotted fish and expired milk, something evil.

He jumped away from the officer. This was the man who killed Jen. She was the warm lady who comforted Dylan when his crush rejected him, the nerdy mother-figure who helped Dylan with his literature assignments, the cool friend who sneaks sugar cubes for Dylan even if Phil told everyone not to.

Dylan felt no pity for the murderer. He should have thought through the consequences. Dylan glanced at Carlos, who was still in a daze.

He thought about slicing the officer, light enough to feel the itch, but not deep enough to accelerate the death. He held his dagger, knuckles whitening with his grip as he approached the twitching body again.

Footsteps echoed behind him, crushing twigs and dried leaves. Dylan whirred around.

Phil ran up to them, muscles flexing with his strides. Dylan caught the hidden panic inside Phil’s eyes as his father noticed the scene.

“Go get the Marina and the others,” Phil ordered Carlos, leaving out the usual bark in his voice. The poor boy jumped out of his daze, escaping the scene faster than he came.

“What happened? Are you hurt?” Phil demanded Dylan.

“I’m ok, I didn’t know what had happened to him though,” Dylan said, he felt he sounded guilty, “We lost track when we reached the forest. Carlos only found the guy when we heard him scream.”

“Heard it as well,” Phil’s posture relaxed slightly. He summoned gloves as if out of midair and knelt down to touch the blood which dripped and oozed like slime. Dylan watched as Phil pocketed the officer’s empty pill bottle with nothing labeled except the red letters, V#75-100.

Dylan asked, trying his best to tune out the quaver of loath in his voice, “Do you think this could be the murderer?”

“Large possibility, he ran but anyone will in his situation.”

“Must be terrifying with a room full of your bosses accusing you of murder. He really woke up and decided to run away from his own problems,” Dylan snorted in disdain, schooling his expression as soon as Phil turned to stare at him disapprovingly.

“Dad,” Dylan called, knowing he could get Phil’s attention this way, “The officer also mentioned something about labs”

Phil stiffened slightly but continued to examine the body, “I found some notes at Jen’s place about the said lab, and I could show you sometime later. Essentially, it mentioned a place called ‘Erukas Lab #12’, not in Erukas, but near here” He hesitated a second before adding, “Don’t tell anyone about the notes yet, I’ll need to find more if we want to sound plausible.”

A dozen minutes later, Marina, Carlos, and about five officers hiked up to the scene.  

One of the officers carried Carlos in a piggyback ride, a mop of red hair sticking out from her shoulder. Carlos’ eyes were back to the familiar earth-brown hue as he pointed forward gingerly, his eyes drooping down every other second. A combination of a cough and yawn escaped his mouth. Ugly red hid under his skin, tattered with purple and green bruises.

Dylan frowned, noting down to lecture the idiot about pill intakes and the process of pill wear-downs.

Marina, misunderstanding Dylan’s expression as confusion, commented, “Post-pill effects, pill wore off and he tripped.”

“The little guy was running as the pill wore off, he practically rolled down the stairs,” the officer carrying Carlos mused. Seeing Dylan’s concerned expression, she explained quickly that it wasn’t a big fall.

“Phil, you and Dylan can go home with Carlos now. We’ll take care of the rest,” Marina cut out their small talks.

“What about this?” Dylan frowned again. When has Marina ever shooed officers away from the crime scene? For a case this interesting, people had to beg to be sent home.

Dylan voiced his concern more politely, “Somebody dying out of black ooze is unheard of. Don’t we have to go through the questioning?”

“I don’t think you guys would know as much as we do. You all had a long day, you deserve some rest,” Marina’s eyes flickered to Dylan and Phil with an unrecognizable expression, “Don’t go around sharing what you saw. We don’t want crowd panic nor the Erukas’ media attention.”

“I agree with Marina, but he looks far too righteous to be a murderer,” Phil stepped in, “We should continue investigating Jen’s case.”

“For god’s sake, Phil! He ran! Of course, he did kill her!” Dylan barked, surprised by his own outburst.

Marina sighed, rubbing her temples, “You two are clearly, very tired. Go home. We can talk about everything tomorrow.”

Dylan could sense a trace of disappointment from her and Phil, masked by tiredness. He trotted beside Phil, who carried Carlos on his back. Phil's hand ghosted atop Dylan’s back, guiding him out of the forest.