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"Can\'t you go any faster?!" Peter shouted through his batted breath while rushing down the street at the greatest speed he could reach.

"I can," Leila replied leisurely only to leap forward, appearing ahead of the man in a mere instant. She then turned around without breaking her pace only to start running backward as if it was some sort of school exercise. "Can you keep up with me, though?"

The two of them were rushing back to Peter\'s base for the same reason why the rest of the fighters within Mathew\'s group were rushing to their own locations of deployment.

And it was all to prevent the incoming horde from doing any substantial damage to any of the survivors\' bases.

"I…" Peter opened his mouth, only to then close it shut… and open it again when the strenuous exercise of running at his top speed forced him to keep breathing through his mouth. "Nevermind," he then said, lowering his eyes and focusing on the run rather than the talk.

Back when they went from Peter\'s base to Mathew\'s school\'s compound, it took their group several hours to move between the two places. Yet, it was due to a huge number of noncombatants that went along with them, forcing all those who could move quickly to adjust their pace to the slowest member of the entire party.

Right now, however, only Leila and Peter were making the trip back, turning the several hours that they took before into a short, barely fifteen-minute-long jog.

Peter turned silent after attempting to taunt the core member of Mathew\'s group that went with him. He knew that this girl couldn\'t be someone ordinary if she was so close to that monster of a kid.

\'But how could I know that she was such a monster?\' Peter thought as he continued to run, barely able to keep up his pace… while the girl didn\'t appear to be at the level of breaking her first sweat.

\'Huh?\' Peter\'s eyes locked on a small column, an obelisk of sorts. It was a simple sculpture, signifying some sort of event of the past that he couldn\'t care less about.

What he cared for, though, was the location of said pillar.

\'We are almost there,\' Peter thought, feeling the wave of relief washing down his spine.

A wave of relief that he instantly reined in and cast aside, aware that the second he lowered his guard, he would simply fall down to the ground and whine about his lacking condition.

"Keep it up, man," the girl called out with a smirk on her face, slowing down for the first time since Peter suggested that they run the distance rather than calmly jogging it. "We are almost there," she added.

\'How does she…\' Peter raised his eyes, too low on the air to even think about opening his mouth to talk back to the girl.

He looked at the girl… and his desire to speak vanished.

\'Right, if she lived in this city longer than me, she likely knows all sorts of landmarks,\' Peter thought, turning his eyes back down.

Peter settled up in the city only half a year prior to the apocalypse. It was an exile of sorts, a result of supporting a radical faction within his company that brought forth his so-called promotion.

Within that short time frame, he only managed to learn the general lay of the land of the places he frequently visited. As such, by seeing the familiar pillar, he could tell how far he was and what direction he was approaching his base from.

On the other hand, assuming the girl lived her entire life in the city, she could likely tell where she was even if someone were to kidnap her, cover her eyes and then drive her all over the place before dropping her off in some random spot.

"How long do we have before…"

\'Before the horde attacks.\'

Peter\'s question was quite simple. But he didn\'t get the chance to properly ask it.

"DUCK!" Leila shouted, leaping headfirst forth and smashing the top of her head right against Peter\'s abdomen.

Not expecting such a rapid and random attack, Peter ended up bending in half…

Allowing the bullet to only graze the back of his head instead of penetrating right through his heart.

"What the…" Peter only managed to utter two words when his face turned stale yet again.

The girl… She disappeared.

Peter stood back up and looked left and right, hoping to see her behind some sort of cover. In the heat of the moment, he didn\'t even think about hiding himself at all, in spite of the strange, cold feeling on the back of his head proving the bullet didn\'t completely miss.

"THE FUCK ARE YOU SHOOTING AT?!"

Struck by the sudden blast of the sound, Peter shook himself out of the daze…

Only to see Mathew\'s girl ducking behind a wreck of a random car while looking at the buildings nearby with fury.

\'Right, I told them to shoot first, ask questions later,\' Peter thought, still somewhat stuck in the heat of the moment.

The man then shook his head, finally regaining his composure.

\'Slowly, no rapid movements,\' he thought, raising his hands high above his head as he made a step forward.

"Don\'t shoot!" Peter shouted, taking another step forward. "It\'s me! The girl\'s with me too!"

The shoots came from the very place the two of them wanted to reach. And judging from the slight glint of light reflected in one of the windows, it was one of the snipers…

Or rather, one of the men who were too cowardly to stand fast with an assault rifle at the forefront of the battle. And as it turned out, it was also one of the men who were pretty damn trigger-happy!

"I\'m sorry," Peter muttered once he reached the place where the girl was hiding. \'How the hell did she reach it the instant the shoot was fired?\' he asked himself. "I will be sure to chastise the idiot that shoot," he promised before turning his eyes back towards the street.

And with a mere few more steps, Peter reached the courtyard of the car workshop that served as the main entrance to his own base. Then and only then did he dare to lower his hands, just in time for one of his soldiers to push the only garage door that was still working.

"My apologies, boss," the middle-aged man on the other side of the doors said as he turned to the side to let Peter get inside. "It\'s my fault for putting one of the rookies on the duty."

Peter took a stop to take a look at the man.

For a moment, he felt the urge to chastise him from head to toe.

\'If not for that girl\'s reaction, I would be gone already,\' Peter thought, gritting his teeth as he struggled to rein in his anger.

Yet, the more he looked at the man\'s apologetic face, the easier the task of keeping his emotions in check became.

This ability of his, to keep his emotions reined in, was one of the reasons behind his rapid rise up the corporate ladder.

"Just don\'t let it happen again," Peter finally said with a small sigh as he looked behind his shoulder to see Mathew\'s girl standing right behind him. "It was dangerous, sure," Peter admitted as he turned his eyes back to one of his officers, "but if not for her reaction, I think the bullet would tear straight through my heart."

Peter stared at the officer\'s face for a moment before ultimately shaking his head and then waving his hand.

"Just forget it," Peter added a moment later. "Sure, I would like to pull his legs out of his ass…" he hesitated for a second, "but we can\'t afford to lose anyone who knows how to shoot."

Peter turned himself around, this time facing Leila properly.

"Especially now, anyone who can shoot that well is indispensable," he rationalized his choice only to drop his eyes and lower his head. "As such, I hope you will find it in yourself to forget about it."

There was a difference between Leila and his officer.

His officer would listen to him… simply because of the strict hierarchy established within the camp. The same couldn\'t be said about a girl that came from a different group, especially when, by the looks of things, she couldn\'t care less about the rules and regulations of Peter\'s camp.

And so, if he wanted to salvage the situation that could easily lead to hostilities, Peter had no other choice but to derelict the duty of punishing the trigger-happy offender to Mathew\'s girl.

"It\'s okay," contrary to Peter\'s worries, the girl didn\'t fly into a rage the moment this unfortunate incident was brought up.

Leila moved past Peter and raised her hand… Only to weave it as soon as she moved past the man.

"Just tell him that if it happens again," the girl started before turning her head over her shoulder and gracing Peter with a lovely, innocent, and yet extremely vicious smile.

"Then I will kill him before he gets to reload."