Caroline gave a short explanation about what happened with Dyson. Denton stomped angrily beside her. That bastard deserved worse than a clean death. Caroline should have dragged him back for Nelson to experiment on, or let him blast him once a day until he begged to die. Once both sides finished explaining, Tyler walked over with the same stick still in his hand. Without a word, he smacked Denton right on the butt. "Aww! Tyler, go easy! Ow! I did all this out of kindness!" Denton howled. Tyler's face stayed cold as he landed another hit, looking exactly like a fed-up dad disciplining his son. "You two made such a huge commotion. Anyone could have heard you. And you didn't even tell us you were going out. You scared me and Tyler half to death when we got back," Caroline said helplessly. "Come on, Caroline, me and Nelson planned everything. Silver checked a five-mile radius and confirmed nobody was around. The vibrations from these animals can only travel three miles at most. Outside that, there's no sound at all. Nelson did the math. It was completely safe!" Denton kept talking nonstop as he dodged Tyler's swings, both hands covering his backside as he hopped around. Basically, they made a full plan before heading into the mountains to round up creatures. First, they made sure that within five miles, there wasn't a single person, so making noise was safe. Then they set up traps inside that five-mile circle that would catch anyone entering on foot. Since they knew Tyler and Caroline left by car, the traps wouldn't affect them. After that, they went into the mountains, rounded up all the creatures, and drove them straight to Caroline as a gift. Even the number of creatures was calculated. Not a single one could be extra, or the vibrations might grow stronger and spread beyond the five-mile limit. In short, the two of them had gone through an insane amount of trouble to prepare this present. Tyler purposely slowed down several times to let Denton finish talking, almost catching him a few times before deliberately letting him go. Once Denton finally ran out of words, Tyler lunged forward, grabbed Denton by the collar, and growled, "Done talking? Good. Stand still and take your beating." Denton blocked Tyler's swings and protested, "Tyler! This is the most detailed plan I've ever made in my life! Why are you still hitting me?" Tyler didn't answer. He just kept a dark expression, smacked him a few more times, then pointed at the dead man nearby and the piles of mutated mantis corpses. "Wait ... aren't these the mantises I ... uh ... chased off?" Denton said, trailing off awkwardly as he touched his nose. Caroline looked at the mantises she had seen swooping down earlier, all raging and out of control, and understood. These must have been the ones Denton blasted away. Sure enough, Denton dragged over a giant bag filled with dead mutated mantises. He said these were the ones they hunted to give Caroline as a gift. Except they all had one thing in common. They stank. A familiar kind of stink. A smell that refused to fade even after so long. Yes. It was a gift that could knock someone out cold with its odor. It was obvious what had happened. Denton and Nelson ran into a swarm of mutated mantises. Denton blasted one group to death. The survivors panicked, became aggressive, and eventually stormed all the way to the base gate. As for the man... Denton said he was shocked to see the guy alive. He should have killed him earlier. They'd run into him while checking the perimeter. The man attacked first, and Denton killed him. Caroline and Tyler traded looks and pieced it together. The man must have almost died and transferred his injury elsewhere at the last second. He escaped, ran straight into the mutated mantises, panicked, and fled downhill. His terrified sprint probably led the mantises right toward the base. When he saw the house, he wanted help, but once the door opened and he saw Caroline's group, he got greedy. Meanwhile, Denton kept yelping between hits, occasionally throwing in a complaint. He said he didn't know what gift to give Caroline. The house needed mutated energy. Her ability needed mutated energy. His tiny brain worked hard and decided mutated creatures were the best gift. So he looked for Nelson, and the two of them started hunting. Since they couldn't store all the corpses, and Denton didn't have storage space, he figured ... why not just chase the live ones down instead?