Stallman fled into a nearby village, having walked for a good while and avoided detection by the expanding swarm of police force personnel.

Not too far from the place where the hexes were hiding out, he sighed. It was getting late; too late, in fact. He would be sleeping now, most days.

He found a bench on the side of the road and curled up on it, too tired to do much else and looking like a homeless bum in the process. The faint sounds of sirens were in the distance, along with a strange smokey smell.

[hr]

Halthar had talked with the prison personnel all day and well into the evening. He had heard everything from exaggerated tales that would place the attackers at level S to a more interesting story about an employee who had acted suspicious and promptly vanished.

He once again was dragged out, joining a small team of police force personnel to investigate the burning house.

“Wasn’t this one of the doc’s houses?” he asked the sergeant, who had been equally busy all day ever since he came to the prison.

“Yep. Actually the lead scientist’s. Judging from what we could see, it was an arson job.”

Halthar considered this. The escapees were making a line; they went from the prison and somehow knew that this was the house of the lead scientist. One of the escaped hexes no doubt was a culprit, and a level A at that.

“Alright, secure the town, go door to door. And make sure the other docs are protected, we don’t need more bodies on our hands.”

The sergeant nodded and walked out.