KINETIC

**Author note - unedited chapter**

Leo and Clay joined Cain next to the safe. It was slightly smaller than the painting that was covering it, about half a meter from corner to corner.

"It's great that we found it but what now? We don't know the code and using force would be too loud." Clay said as he contemplated a way to open the safe quietly.

Without saying a word, Leo lifted his hand and placed his finger against the lock of the safe. A dull blue glowed on his finger and then there was the sound of metal crunching.

The safe door swung open, revealing its contents. Clay was in awe 'How did he control his power like that?'.

The metal inside the safe was bent inwards in the spot that Leo had touched. It looked like someone had forced something through the metal.

Inside the safe there was several documents in folders. Cain reached forward and grabbed the folders. He was still excited about having found the safe, and when he saw what Leo did to open it he felt a surge of adrenaline and the urge to compete overwhelmed him.

There was about 6 folders, each containing several documents. After a brief moment the others looked at Cain like he was insane, they each took 2 of the folders.

For the next several minutes they poured over the contents of the documents as fast as they could.

The documents detailed different things, such as procedures, war plans, the names of their spies and eventually, the location of the headquarters. They all skimmed over the information that wasn't relevant, only looking for a document pertaining to the headquarters.

"I've got it!" Cain exclaimed. He was quite pleased with himself after having found the safe and now also finding the correct document.

Leo took the file from Cain and read over its contents with a confused look on his face.

"What's wrong? Cain asked, noticing the look on Leo's face.

"This... It says that this is the headquarters..." Leo answered.

A smile appeared on Clay's face "HA! This is..." the other two turned to look at Clay and in the next moment the smile on his face faded away.

Just as Leo was going to say something, Clay looked up and was about to say something when Leo stopped him.

He sensed someone walking directly towards the door of the room they were in using his Aura.

He gave it a moment to see if the person would change directions, but they never did. Leo could sense the person approach the door and placed something in the lock.

"Let's go!" He exclaimed in a whisper as he ran towards the balcony. The other 2 followed suit and Clay shrunk while grabbing onto Leo's back.

Leo jumped off the balcony and braved himself for the impact. The door to the room opened and a woman walked in just in time to see the back of a figure jumping from the balcony. She began screaming and saying that there were intruders.

Leo hit the ground with a thud and felt a shock run through the bones in his legs. He had used Redirect to slow himself, but it didn't do much. Luckily, his body wasn't hurt and he recovered from the shock after a few seconds.

Leo heard the woman calling for help and the next second the entire base became alert. There were dozens of guards swarming towards their direction from the front and back of the building.

Cain had just landed next to Leo and the worry was visable on his face as the group began running towards the wall they jumped over when entering the base. Clay remained on Leo's back in his small state as there wasn't time to get off.

After a few seconds Leo noticed Cain was falling behind in terms of speed and that the guards were catching up to them.

Leo grabbed Cain and lifted him onto his shoulder. Cain was making himself lighter so that he could run faster, so he felt much lighter than Leo was expecting.

[Dash]

Leo suddenly increased his speed and charged towards the wall in a straight line. It only took Leo abiut 20 seconds to reach the wall and the gap between himself and the guards chasing them continued to increase.

[Leap]

Leo bent his legs and pushed up while using Leap. His body, and that of his friends holding onto him, flew up into the air and easily cleared the entire wall.

The guards chasing them began cursing and many of them were asking how it was possible for someone to jump over the wall that easily.

The boys landed on the other side and this time Leo didn't want to strain his legs again, so he released the others and they all rolled along the floor.

Cain and Clay grumbled from the pain for a few seconds but Leo just got up immediately without making a sound.

"Fuck!" Leo shouted as he punched a wall. 'That was it! This was the headquarters the entire time! They will be on high alert for a while and we won't be able to get back in there again...' Leo was furious that their mission had failed.

This was the only place that he knew had information about the masked and he hadn't been able to learn anything. All they had done was cause a commotion.

The other two had gotten up by now and were both silent as they watched Leo hit the wall and shout out in anger.

Clay walked forward and placed his hand on Leo's shoulder "The mission wasn't a failure."

"We didn't get the information we needed, we still don't know where to start looking for John." Leo said while gritting his teeth and clenching his fist that was still against the wall.

"I managed to learn something about the masked before that woman walked in." Clay revealed a piece of paper that was scrunched up into his pocket.

"Let's get back to the girls so we can talk about our next step." Clay said confidently.