Jonathan scuttled along awkwardly through the trees past the side of the orphanage, only slowing down when he neared the front corner. As he eased his way past the nearest tree trunk, doing his best to see into the front yard, a voice spoke up.

"Did you hear that?"

Jonathan froze in place, then slowly lowered himself to all fours when he realized there was no way he was going to be able to hold his position for any length of time.

"No, what?"

"I thought I heard something moving in the woods."

"It's probably just some deer or something. Isn't that a royal hunting preserve or some such?"

The first voice grunted, and a man walked into sight. Jonathan tried to take shallow breaths, his heart pounding. The man was glaring at the woods nearby, though not quite in Jonathan's direction. That could change at any moment, though, and Jonathan's position wasn't particularly good thanks to a general lack of course underbrush in the immediate vicinity.

Shit, not good! Trying to move his head as little as possible, he looked around desperately and noticed a branch a ways ahead of him and a little further into the woods whose foliage was an unhealthy brown color.

That might do the trick. He enlivened his magic, focusing on the thug who was even now starting to turn his way. Hopefully the guy wanted to find the cause of the noise he'd heard and not a damn sandwich or something. Smoke flowed into him, and Jonathan quickly routed the magic into a small bit of destruction at the base of the branch he'd seen.

With a loud crack! the branch detached from the tree and fell partway to the forest floor before it's end snagged on a nearby tree and ended up swaying back and forth.

"Ack!" shouted the thug, stumbling back as his gaze immediately snapped to the branch.

"See, what did I tell you? It's just some deadfall," said the still-unseen second person. "You're way too jumpy."

The jumpy man whirled around, a scowl on his face. "Are you insane? Of course I'm jumpy! Didn't you hear the rumors about what happened to Morris and his team? Only Jed came back, and…"

"And Jed's a coward and a liar and always has been." The second man finally stepped just barely into view, grabbing the first man's shoulder. "I don't know what those kids did to Morris and the others, but Jed clearly made more than half that shit up. Come on, we need to get back inside just in case any of the little blighters come back sniffing around the place. Richard wants us to be ready to nab them, not to go jumping at every falling twig you hear in the cursed forest."

"Fine. Fine!" The first man shrugged the second's hand off his shoulder and threw a last quick scan over the woods. Jonathan's heart just about stopped as the man's gaze scanned over his portion of the woods, but the two walked out of sight without any further alarm.

After waiting several moments, Jonathan carefully eased his way further back into the woods. It was pretty obvious he didn't need to carefully survey the front of the orphanage if there were thugs positioned there, too.

Of course, on his second step he landed right on a small dried branch that audibly snapped in two.

"Did you—" asked the voice of the first man.

"Shut it!" said the second, and there was a meaty-sounding thump.

"Asshole," grumbled the first, and then both fell silent.

When Jonathan was able to get his breathing under control, he began working his way a little deeper into the woods again, this time focusing the majority of his focus on the ground.

Once he was far enough away that he could only catch occasional glimpses of the orphanage and its yard through the trees, he resumed his progress parallel to the property.

At last he drew close enough to the road to be able to see it without mishaps, but there was still no sign of Chris.

"Dammit," he muttered under his breath. "Where is he?"

"Jonathan?" came a whispered voice, and Jonathan snapped his head to the side. A bush rustled very close to the road, and Chris crawled out from underneath it.

"Chris!" Jonathan whisper-shouted and pointed emphatically at his feet. "Get over here!"

Chris looked around carefully before making his way to Jonathan with a lot more grace than Jonathan had been moving. He didn't bother to crouch down, and simply flitted between tree trunks. God damn thin kids.

"What are you doing here?" asked Chris in a low voice, when he'd reached Jonathan.

"Looking for you! What the hell were you thinking running of like that without telling anyone?"

Chris glared at him, but said nothing. Well, fair enough. This certainly wasn't the time or place for an argument.

"Nevermind. We need to get out of here. There's a pair of these thugs combing the woods, and I've lost track of where they are. Not to mention a couple lying in wait inside the front of the orphanage, and who knows how many others around the property. Make for the road back where someone at the orphanage can't see us. We need to get out of here."

"No good," said Chris. "Four of them went down the road right after I got here."

"Shit." Jonathan glared at the road and thought frantically. At least four men, possibly six, wandering around in their vicinity. He didn't think the two he'd seen enter the woods were likely to range very far in, so they would probably be easy to dodge, but he had no idea what the ones who had followed the road might do.

This was going to be rough. "Alright, here's what we're going to do. I'm going to try and detect any desire so we can hopefully get some warning ahead before we go stumbling into any of these people. That's not going to leave me much attention for anything else, though, so you're going to lead me deeper into the woods." Jonathan enlivened his magic and focused on the area leading deeper into the woods. A single puff of smoke faded into being, slightly off to their right away from the road. "It looks like Sandra is there—" he pointed to the smoke "—so head that way to start. Once we meet up, the two of you will be responsible for navigating to the fallback."

Chris looked mutinous. "I've barely seen anything! I could stay and—"

"No! It's too dangerous for you, and I can't necessarily protect you if something goes wrong and these guys catch you!"

"You could just summon that demon—"

Jonathan really wanted to hit this boy. "You think letting that thing loose here without any oversight is going to end well?!"

Chris looked uncertain, and Jonthan grabbed his arm, spinning him halfway around before grabbing his hand. "Sandra is right there! Now get a move on, and get us away from these thugs so we can make a proper plan back where I know everyone is safe."

Chris muttered something under his breath but Jonathan paid it no attention, refocusing on enlivening his magic and trying to push his awareness out as far as possible. After a moment of hesitation, Chris stepped forward, pulling Jonathan's hand enough that he stumbled and briefly lost control of his magic.

"Slower!" Jonathan hissed and Chris reluctantly slowed down, allowing Jonathan to once again enliven his magic and restart the process of scanning for smoke aside from Chris and Sandra's.

None appeared by the time they'd reconvened with Sandra, and Jonathan dropped his magic briefly to bring her up to speed. "We need to make for the fallback. Keep away from the road, if you can, and I'm going to need someone to lead me because I'm trying to detect any of the Petty Baron's people wandering around. Aside from the two who we saw enter the woods, Chris says four headed down the road."

Sandra shot a concerned look at Chris. "How many of them are there?"

"I didn't get a full count. At least ten."

"We need to go!" hissed Jonathan.

Sandra nodded, and led the way into the woods.

A few minutes later, Jonathan dragged Chris to a stop and whispered urgently. "Everyone down!"

The three of them dropped to their knees, Sandra pulling behind a tree and Chris and Jonathan awkwardly trying to slide under a bush. Jonathan kept his magic enlivened and watched the smoke from four people pass them by on their left side. When it had faded out as the thugs continued toward the orphanage, he pulled the other two up.

"That was the four Chris saw. Let's go, and I think we can be a little faster. I'm going to keep looking for Petty Baron people, though."

An interminable amount of time stumbling through the woods after Chris later, they arrived safe and sound at the fallback and were greeted by a worried group of kids, who were visibly relieved to see all three of them back.

Now Jonathan just had to figure out what to do next. They couldn't stay out here forever.