As the duo began their journey homebound, somehow their chest felt lighter and better after that short apology.

          Everest knew everyone's got a good bone in them though she couldn't figure it herself of how to make that shine, so naturally.. She'd just either ignore them or deal with them until it eventually comes.

          Their surroundings had fallen much more quiet, and the crickets began to bow a sweet steady rhythm in the background. Trees passed by them like silk falling through.

          Her eyes were heavy, as if her lids were carrying chains of metallic balls, her head reforming into an anvil that weights a tonne.. Her mind couldn't function properly that she thought that she's feeling pretty delusional herself.

          Marshall sensed her energy slipping away and had to look back to make sure she doesn't slip away with it. She was barely holding on, so he knew he had to slow down, otherwise she'd tumble out of the truck and the blame would be on him.

          Honestly, he wished he could close his eyes for a moment and rest his weary mind. It has been a long day, and a lot of thoughts have crossed his mind today.

          From it being Chase to other several thoughts that live free rent in his mind, both were enough to exhaust him and deplete his brain cells.

          "Can't wait to get home and sleep" He slurs indistinctively  to himself. He too, felt like an infant that was ready for slumber during these times, but he knows himself doing his so would place both the driver and the passenger in danger.

          So he fought those fatigue away anyway, and continued to look into the dim road — forcefully.

          "Ugh.. It's too.. Quiet." He complains to himself at the realization it truly was deafeningly quiet. He looked around his surroundings for no reason and continued looking ahead.

          According to his newly installed GPS, they should be out of this rough road — with this pace, within thirty minutes or less. In his opinion, it was a good bargain in exchange for a slow speed for their safety.

          As the slow driving pace continues to persist, the only rhythm he could hear were the engine that continuously functions, the deafening silence, the steady breaths of the husky, and his heartbeat that beats oddly weird.

          Of course, he shrugged this off and thought of it as something relates to fatigue. But he heard faint whispers from the passenger behind him. He couldn't quite comprehend her words clearly, but one word he understood was — that one syllable, to listen.

          But why? He thought himself. Looking to the left, the right, there gleamed a bright yellow hue. Right away, he knew what they were and stomped at the gas pedal with no mercy.

          Immediately, this sped up the vehicle's speed and threw him aback for quite awhile as the wind rushed to his face.

          Rocks and pebbles that were displaced onto the rocky path threw them off balance and tossed them on the air constantly. It was no peaceful ride at all.

          "A-ahh!" Screams the husky in terror, as she had opened her eyes in such a tense scenario and landed on it without such context. She looked to the back to catch up and file a few pages of information for herself.

          Due to her luck, she was provided nothing but utter confusion. So her only choice left was to question the dally in front of her. She attempted once, nothing. Then came the second, still nothing. Pebbles flying away from the speedy tires were the ones who answered her query.

          But this time, really loud and clear; she repeats her statement, for her to hear—

          "WILL YOU JUST DAMN HOLD ON?!" Yells the dally at her in full frustration. Clearly taken aback by this, it's as if her system had shut half of itself: clearly aware of the surroundings, but not of what she's doing.

          In the corner of his eyes, he found her slipping off from the hood she sat on. Grunting in struggle and anger, he let go of the controls for a short while and leapt onto his paws and grabbed her with his jaw.

          Because of this, it caused her pain, which she winced at at the unpleasant sensation. "What the h*ll?!" She barks at him, feeling offended that he had to bite her painfully by the back.

          "Well, if you just held on, I wouldn't have had resided to that solution in the first place!" He yells, as he tried to get a control on the vehicle back. It was swerving violently from left to right, and it was becoming more and more harder to correct it's path.

          "I beg of you, sit down." Hissed the dally, which the husky saltily obeyed. As she let him perform what he needs to do. She's still very dumbfounded at what is currently occurring.

          She wasn't given any context as to why he seemed so tense. He refused to provide her any information about this, so she's on her toes whether he should believe him or not — especially if she can't see where the danger was.

          Finally, they were out of the rocky path and had already emerged out of it and had transitioned to a smoother one. Not longing after, they far away from danger and soon the vehicle decelerated in speed.

          Breathing out of relief was only one sided, as the husky remain seated on the hood with her brows raised.

          "What made you tense, exactly?" She began, genuinely curious and eager to get information from him.

          Rolling his eyes, he ignored her query and continued to drive forth home. But Everest too, ignored the signs that he doesn't want to converse with her right now, and was persistent in finding the answers for herself.

          Questions tapped the dally like pesky flies during summers, and by every growing minute, it slowly grew more annoying as well. But he refused to talk and wanted to lock himself and his voice within him for a few or more moments.

          Unfortunately, Everest had gotten to push all his buttons which made him set off like those of fireworks exploding in the skies, fuming of blasphemies within the atmosphere.

          "What do you want Everest." He answers her with gritting anger behind his teeth. She answered and demanded she be filed with information.

          "Damn you pesky husky.. Hadn't you seen the danger behind us awhile back?!" As Everest looked back and reminisced the previous events, she clearly remembered that nothing were chasing them but the darkness, like shadows clipped onto you against sunny days.

          So she replied that she hadn't seen anything but pitch darkness and him loosing a grip of himself.

          "You little—" Marshall attempted to bite his lips to keep himself from pulling that trigger again. It's been harder these days — he doesn't know why, but he's trying. He really is. But somehow, Everest is making everything twice harder and worse for him.

          "Shut up Everest. You do not want to hear what may come next." But Everest had interpreted his sentence into a different and verily wrong one, something that he doesn't mean, but came wrong to her. Of course, because of this, he was rained with a storm of dynamite of questions.

          Every time each words had entered his ear canal, they all were converted into loud bomb thuds, disarraying the land that is his peace of mind. That land of His soon broke into pieces until those debris-turned-anger doomed down onto the husky.

          That unbeknownst to her, was the last layer to eradicate his land. Due to this, snapping his neck onto her, his eyes were fuming with heat anger, yet his lips were carved into a thin line.

          Everest found these and just remained silent with an offended energy infesting her heart. "Fine, I'll shut up then, your majesty." She mumbles, which the Dalmatian heard loud and clear, but came out more like a child angrily throwing a childish tantrum at him.

          They've arrived at the Look-Out with a worried Jake, waiting outside the building within the dark. He has his eyes locked into the floor, his lips carved into something that tells him he's been thinking, and his overall position just yells that something's wrong.

          Hopping off, Everest approaches him and tried to break the spell he's in. Immediately, his eyes blinked multiple times and had landed them onto the husky.

          "I was worried sick about you fellas! What took you so long?" With relief crashing in, he had knelt onto his knees with a smile and had hugged her.

          She hugged back.

          "Sorry we took some time. The road was rough and had to slow down." Marshall tells the guy, as he shuts the truck's system down.

           "How's Cap'n Turbot by the way?" The spotted canine questioned, at the thought of the earlier emergency popping in his head.

          Upon looking up to meet gazes with the man he's conversing with, he found that his face glooms and those previous convex smiles that were plastered upon him turned into a concave.

          Seeing this, she wondered why it seems that he's heavily impacted by this, and half of him felt guilty for asking such question without realizing that it may be a touchy subject for him.

          "He's alright. He's stable." Was what came out of his mouth, it was bluntly told to them, yet bares a bit of a sting to it. Everest didn't question this any further.

          Attempting to lighten the mood, the dally began to question where the others were. He told them Zuma and Ryder's still with Cap'n; Rocky and Rubble were finishing off the repair; and Skye's preparing dinner.

          Nodding, he excused himself and left the duo alone in the hot and humid night. There was silence for a moment, as both of them tested the waters if it were safe to set a conversation on sail.

          Everest couldn't function properly though, her mind was foggy, thanks to good 'old fatigue caused by the day. There were about a million words she could tell him. Words she wanted to express containing all the events in this course of only a few days.

          So many words yet to be said, yet not one of them were related to what she wanted to say. Silence filed in for her tonight, and the growing awkward tension didn't make matters better.

          It seems that Jake too, had a lot to say, it the only couple of words that came out of him were "How's being a PAW Patrol?"

          The inquiry caught her off-guard, that it made her eyes shot open, adrenaline pumping her to wake and stomping away those weariness that decided to paint her deep blue.

          How was being a PAW Patrol? she questions this herself. These past few days, she was quite enthralled by the thought of receiving an offer to be a part of heroes despite of having no flashy costumes, nor capes to show off.

          But now.. Rude Reality's hit her hard in the face and won the game of dodge ball. Recounting the things that have happened, all she could remember was tip-toeing her way around Marshall and tried to impress him so she won't get kicked out because of his opinion.

          Back then, she thought that she'll be walking into a dream and that her life no longer will feel like a competition. Unfortunately for her, it seems that it was just a nightmare dressed like a daydream.

          She hoped though, that this is not forever and all her hardwork won't be burning down into flames; and hoped that soon this will all be over.

          Having thought of this long and hard, she's almost concluding that being this high up — living a dream that might finally make her happy, is not worth the pain to endure, if in the end she'll just get rejected.

          Finally returning back to the question, she realizes that moments have already passed, and she hadn't properly given Jake a proper answer.

          Looking up to him, there was a smile upon her face and said "It's going well."

»»——⍟——««

          Upon arrival, he found Chase filling up everyone's bowls and Skye seems to be wiping some of them. He hypothesized that the German Shepherd was feeling better, which made him sigh in relief.

          "Glad you're feeling better now," He smiles at him, as he began to assist them, which Chase grinned in return. "Yeah, thanks to Skye."

          A look was passed to the Cockapoo by the Dalmatian, and his look conveyed he was very thankful for all the things she've done.

          "What took you guys so long by the way?" Mentions the Cockapoo. Marshall nonchalantly tells them that the road was bumpy and had to tiptoe around pins and needles to avoid any injury.

          Nodding at his response, another question followed this and was executed by Marshall, he questioned what was Cap'n Turbot's status as of now. He hadn't had a word received from them, and was genuinely concerned and curious about it.

          Chase looked at him weirdly, and Skye's expression seemed unfazed and had only dimmed. Apparently, the German Shepherd had no news about this situation and thought that everything was going smoothly. Skye on the other paw..

          "Something worse happened, huh?" He calls out the problem, as Skye simply nodded at his correct assumption, and continued to carry on with her task.

          The Alsatian was still in plenitude of perplexity, though Marshall refused to tell him any further than that.

          He was still quite unpredictable; none of them has any idea which thing would trigger a core memory within him. So they agreed to stray away from getting complicated matters reach to him as much as possible.

          As the silence just infested and took advantage of their atmosphere, everyone fell in a hushed spell and had fed off with their somber expressions. It was deafeningly silent, but Marshall preferred it than living in a place where noise was in abundance, yet all he would feel that period of time..

          Is pain.