Author's note: You know what's weird? For most of these that I've done so far, I seem to finish them when I'm on the brink of falling asleep over my computer. Sorry if this one is kind of rambley compared to the other chapters, but they can't all be all action. The story must go on!

And for those of you who have stuck with this story so far: THANK YOU FOR READING IT AT THE VERY LEAST!

P.S I probably missed some grammar errors, but again, I'm tired. I'll fix it later.

I fixed them. :)


Somewhere far, far away from Providence HQ, an employee with a big-time office job was cringing in the face of his worst nightmare. With this bad news he was about to give his boss, he was risking his job, or a much higher price: his life. This man is no ordinary CEO of a big successful company. This man is someone to be feared by all, even outside his company. This man has the means to put an end to anyone he wants; money, power, and weapons at his disposal. This man is Adrian Collins, a man no one wants to mess with.

He was in his mid-forties, but his looks were deceiving. Scaring went up on the left side of his head, disappearing into a wig of thick brown hair. It was easily fixable. He had the money to afford it. He just chose to keep it because it added to the fear and respect his employees had for him.

His face was wrinkled with the stress of his job, among other things. A cap was constantly placed in the middle of his neck, barely visible by the concealing collar of his business suit. The cap was covering a hole, a hole made due to a medical emergency that occurred years ago, and the only thing that was letting him breathe and talk.

"S-sir?" the employee tried saying.

Collins had his back to the scared person. He didn't need to turn around and show off his disfigurement to frighten him. He knew the guy was already scared for his life. He replied in an annoyed tone, "What is it? I'm a very busy person."

"Um, the E.V.O dog we had…"

Collins turned his chair to the employee now, his interest piqued, not in the good way.

"Had? Is there something I should know about?"

The hapless employee groaned in anguish. He faced the floor, unwilling to look his superior in the face. "It—it got out—during transport to the new facility."

Collins leaned in, his eyes narrowing and his features darkened. "Explain. Now."

"Well, sir, apparently the dog woke up earlier than expected, and escaped from the truck. I was nearby in one of the escorts, so I tried to call it back, really! But it growled at me and was about to attack me so I…"

"So you ran."

"Yes, sir," the employee said ashamed.

"Well," Collins started, turning his back to the coward, "No thanks to your incompetence, one of my prize specimens is at risk of being captured by Providence if we don't locate him soon."

The employee was silent, staring a hole into the back of the chair. Collins sensed this, and shifted his chair just enough to look at him from his peripheral* vision. The already frightened man flinched from the return stare.

"If I find out that Providence has my dog, I will have your head served on a silver platter with a steak and barbeque sauce on the side!"

He stood up from his chair with is arms crossed behind his back, and started for the witless man before him.

"I will make your life a living hell. I will make you wish that you were never born!"

The employee backed up as his boss moved closer, his hands searching for the exit behind him.

"I will make sure that my pets eat you for breakfast, spit you out, and then eat you all over again!"

The employee found the door knob jabbing at his back. "C-c-can't you just find another prize E.V.O like him? I hear the best ones are in—."

"Do you see this scar on the side of my head?" He gestured to it. The employee nodded his head slowly.

"Do you know how I got it?" He shook his head no.

"I got it because when I want the best ones., I want to be there to see for myself if it's worthy of being caught. The last prize E.V.O that I captured did this to me!"

Collins removed the wig and exposed the long, pale scar, which extended nearly all the way to the other side. The employee trembled, shocked at the sight of the scar and frightened by his boss's anger still.

"It nearly killed me, and before that E.V.O, another punctured my wind pipe." He pointed to the cap on his neck.

"Since then, I've done all my E.V.O collecting to a minimum, being that there are plenty of them in my collection now. But that's beside the point. Do you want to find out what it's like to be disfigured, to be so close to Death's Door? Do you!" The employee vigorously shook his head.

"Then find that dog! Do I make myself clear?"

The poor man shook his head, and ran out the door as fast as he could open it. Collins, finished with his rant, replaced his wig and went back to his desk, angry but satisfied all at once, and resumed with his work.


"You can't be serious. Can't you just build another one? And do you not remember what just happened to you yesterday?" Rex was trying to discourage his brother from retrieving his gadget that he had just remembered losing. He was failing miserably. The younger brother was following Cesar to the zoo as they spoke.

"I don't want to build another one until I know for sure that it's lost or damaged beyond repair," Cesar said, firm in his resolve to do just that.

"But Holiday—"

"Doctor Holiday never said that I couldn't go back into the zoo. She was just mad at me for going in there without someone else."

"You don't have anyone with you now!"

"What do you mean? I thought you were coming with me. Isn't that way you've been following me?"

"No! I—you—Augh! Why do you have to be so stubborn?"

"I could ask you the same question. I guess we just get it from our mother."

Rex couldn't take it anymore. He slapped his face, reluctantly accepting defeat and deciding to accompany him anyway. There was no way he could stop him. He was too thickheaded. Going back to the zoo for some device that he could just as easily make another one of was—and he already said this before—downright stupid for a genius. He didn't even know if Holiday would be angry about Cesar going back to the zoo so soon after the incident, or could care less about it. He was hoping badly that it would be the latter though.

He found himself staring at the dressing wrapped around Cesar's head. For some reason, he hadn't been able to take his eyes off it the entire time. He was angry at his elder brother for going in the zoo by himself. But, he was also angry at himself for having taking his own sweet time. It was his fault. The more he thought about it, the more he knew it was his fault, and no one else's. It was all his fault.

Even as they navigated the endless white corridors, that dressing was still nagging at him. More precisely, something mental was nagging him; something tugging at him from the inside, like he should be remembering something at the moment. Rex perked up. Could it be some long lost memory trying to come out? Could it be just ordinary guilt? Whatever the reason, Rex was now determined that nothing would harm his brother ever again as long as he could help it. This time, he would do what he should have been doing yesterday, and he was going to need his attention to keep an eye on his supposedly older brother, who acted sometimes like a little kid.


They made it to the zoo at last. Rex punched a code in and stepped inside, Cesar following behind. He generated his Rex Ride, let his brother get on, and they went through the dense jungle looking for one small device.

Cesar pointed in the general direction of where he had traveled, but even he didn't really remember where he had been when the E.V.O, whom Rex told him was named Blinky, had attacked him, due to the head injury he received. Rex knew where Blinky was, and went straight there. There was only one problem: when they got there, the device was nowhere to be found. There was no sign of it at all, not even shrapnel if had been been stepped on. When Cesar thought he remembered maybe a little of where it might've been tossed, they got off the Rex Ride and searched the area. They didn't find anything there, and they combed the entire place, Rex having to warn Cesar several times to stay far away from Blinky, and threatening that tree that he'd punch its eyes out if it attacked them.

Time was moving too slowly for some reason, because by the fifth or sixth time of looking over the same places, Rex was getting irritated, and had even suggested that they give it up. Cesar wasn't ready to quit though, so they kept looking. And then, after over an hour-and-a-half of searching for that annoyingly small gadget, Rex found it It. It was in the worst place it could have been in; the mouth of the E.V.O dog.

It was staring at him blankly, and he at it, his mouth agape. But he managed to say, "Found it."

"Really? Where?" Cesar quickly turned around, only to be shocked just as much as Rex. His mind raced as he tried to figure out what to do. Hopefully, even though he never got the chance to observe it properly, the E.V.O would act as if it was a normal dog. Hopefully.

"Don't—move. Dogs respond to body language. One wrong move and it will attack."

"So what am I supposed to do?" he asked in a panicky voice.

"Back away, slowly. And don't make eye contact with it."

"Too late for that."

"Just back up, now!"

Rex complied. He backed up, but unfortunately he tripped over one of the many tree roots covering the ground. He fell back, and the E.V.O went to him.

"Rex! Get up!" Before he could do that, the dog pressed its snout against Cesar's little brother and sniffed him, its wet nose tickling him and making him laugh.

"Get off! Ge—ge—t—off—m—me! Tha—that—tickles!"

Cesar wasn't sure to relax, or to worry some more. He had no idea how E.V.O dogs behaved toward humans, but he wasn't about to wait and find out.

"What are you waiting for? Move!"

Rex was confused at Cesar's behavior. "Why? I think it's finally warming up to me."

"After taking care of a dog for two years, I know a thing or two about them. But I know nothing about E.V.O dogs!"

"Really?"

"Really! Now please move!"

"Alright, alright. You don't have to blow—" Rex got distracted by the wildly moving branches coming from Blinky. He had a bad feeling that all of Cesar's yelling had unnerved the tree. Cesar saw it too, and walked away from it surprisingly calm; nervous, but calm. It left the people alone. The dog, however, was in for some major payback.

Blinky seized its neck, receiving a growl at first. But as the monstrosity tree tightened its grip, the dog began yelping. It tried getting free, but the tree was just too strong. Even though the dog had just dropped the gadget that they had been looking for, the brothers just stared in shock at the scene taking place.

"Hey, let go of him, Blinky!"

When it refused to listen, Rex took action and brought out his B.F.S. He converted it to a buzzsaw and sliced the branch in two, the other end still wrapped around the dog's neck. With Blinky letting out a screech, the said dog went behind Rex, its head and ears lowered.

"Next time you'll listen, won't ya?" The tree closed its eyes trying to hide itself. It was doing a fairly good job except for the odd welts on the bark that happened to be its eyelids. Rex disabled the B.F.S and got his arm back to normal, and turned to the dog.

Despite his earlier caution, Cesar approached the E.V.O close enough to see how tightly wound the branch was. "We need to get that branch off him." He turned to Rex. "Do you think you can pry it open with your Smack Hands?"

"Pry it open? Can't it just be unwrapped?"

"The limb has been severed from the host. Because of this, it seems to have turned into a normal branch. You either have to force it open or carefully break it without hurting the E.V.O."

"Great, like this thing is going to stay still long enough for me to do that. Why is it never easy?"

Rex formed his Smack hands, but on doing so, the dog whimpered and backed away.

"Wait, wait! I'm trying to help you!"

He made the mistake of backing it into a (normal) tree. As Rex got closer, the E.V.O suddenly bit the hand part of his build.

"Hey!" Luckily, Rex couldn't feel it, "Let go—whoa!" Unfortunately, it tossed him to the side.

Cesar slowly approached the E.V.O, all the while it snarling at him. Rex watched in shocked horror. "Are you crazy? No wait, I already know the answer to that."

"It's okay. You and me practically raised Delmar, so I know how to gain a dog's trust." He came close to its leg, and the dog shifted away some. But Cesar came closer still.

"I don't see how that's gonna help. You said before that you didn't know anything about E.V.O dogs."

He put a hand to the dog's leg and stroked it. It was coarse and gritty from dirt and mud, like it hadn't had a bath in—never. A moment later and the dog calmed down. It even lowered its head to Cesar's level. Then he lightly patted its head in reassurance.

"It's okay, my mijo really is trying to help," he motioned for Rex, "Come here. He should let you take it off now."

Rex was hesitant, but he came forward anyway. His builds having been still up the entire time, he didn't have to move in as close as Cesar to reach the branch. A small metal finger slipped between gaps in the wood and began to crush it. Seeing as the bark really had become normal, there was no way to unwrap it. All the while, the dog fidgeted nervously as Rex crushed the branch little by little all the way around. Cesar somehow kept it calm by scratching its ear. He noticed that it was very similar to a Doberman physically. It even looked like the brown patches of fur where almost exactly as Delmar's…

He shoved it out of his head. There was no possible way that this could be their dog standing in front of them as an E.V.O. Delmar never had a long tail. His had been stubbed. Though, there would be a possibility that the mutation caused by the nanites would make it grow a new tail. But, even if it had been five years since anyone had seen Delmar, he would never attack him and Rex—unless the mutation was so severe that it impaired his memory. This would no doubt make him aggressive towards everyone and everything that he came into contact with. The E.V.O dog in front of him had just slung his little brother to one side and threatened himself. Yet, it allowed him to pet it, and it was allowing Rex to remove the branch.

It wasn't Delmar. There was no possibility whatsoever that it was Delmar. So why was he still thinking about it?

"Cesar? Bro? Hey!"

"Oh, what?" Cesar had drifted off into his thoughts and had been completely oblivious that his brother was done removing the branch, and had removed his Smack Hands.

"All done," Rex came forward, fairly confident that it wouldn't bite him, and patted the dog's leg. "Now maybe you'll stay away from Blinky."

The dog suddenly licked him in one swoop from top to bottom in disgusting slobber trying to express its gratitude.

"Gross! Ew, ew, ew, ew." The dog just wagged its tail and would have licked him again if it wasn't for Rex's protests. With drool dripping off his chin, he noticed Cesar was trying to restrain himself from laughing.

"You think this is so funny? Come on," he said, opening his arms wide with a huge smirk on his face, "Give me a nice, big hug."

"Oh no, I don't think so."

"Just one, I promise." He walked forward towards Cesar, and the elder brother walked backwards.

"Stay away from me, baba nino*."

Rex ran up to him and, before Cesar knew it, the little brother was hugging him tight and simultaneously covering him in dog drool.

"Que asco*! Bajas* Bajas!"

His younger brother wouldn't let go until he was sure there was a decent amount of slobber on the other. Rex was admiring the wet drool now on Cesar's jacket. He fell back and laughed maniacally. His brother was peeved. There would be payback later.

Afterwards, they noticed that the E.V.O dog had disappeared into the dense jungle. Cesar grabbed his device, and they headed back out of the zoo, taking their time instead of using the Rex Ride to talk about what just happened. Rex had asked, "This isn't the last time we're gonna run into that dog, is it?"

"Don't know. Only time will tell."


Quick note: Baba nino* means "drool boy," Que asco* means "Yuck," and Bajas* means "(you) get off." Thank you Bat-dove for correcting me! I feel like I'm missing one though.

Oh yes, I was! Peripheral vision* is our natural ability to see to the sides when we look straight ahead.