Hearing Jonathan say that, it slowly formed a chink in the way I was looking at him. It was because I pegged him as a 2nd-rate gangster trying to play a family head but the way he delivered that statement plus the weight or pressure I felt after that told me he had the makings of Mr. Alvarez or Mauro—not Mr.
Cuervo—and he either needed a bit of time to get to where they were or he needed a push in the right direction.
'He's basically a person who started from the bottom and is still in the process of getting there… It's just that only a handful of people could get there and the rest… not so much…'
But yeah, it could all have been a fluke but with the way I am, I'll keep a watching eye out.
In any case, we eventually shook hands and said our goodbyes but as I was about to close the door behind me, Allie caught up to me with a knowing smile before handing me a card.
"What—"
"Don't lose it, okay?"
"You—"
I didn't even get to check what it said before she gave me a peck on the cheek, ran back, and closed the door in front of me.
"..."
And as I finally looked at the card, a few things made sense and a few things also became muddy because the card said "GARCIA FAMILY" in bold capital letters and then "Special Services" in a smaller and curvy font, and right behind it was their address and contact info—where it specifically had their three numbers for their satellite phones and their exact coordinates that could be easily typed in a GPS.
I was just standing in place for a few moments before I decided to pocket the card this "Allie" gave me then I walked back the same way to my group and found Kuzma in somewhat decent gear, familiarizing himself with Tatiana's AK.
It seemed like he had gone through a couple of mags but when Tatiana saw me eyeing Kuzma weirdly, she approached me and lightly tapped my chest.
"So, do you have any questions about him? Like, at all?"
I lightly shook my head as I kept staring at Kuzma, "That's your—"
"Yeah, I let him borrow it."
"But—"
"You do know it's already cumbersome lugging around an axe and a sword, do you also require me to lug around my AK and my Benelli M4?"
"..."
"Hey! You can answer me, for once!"
"Right… My bad— it's totally okay, but—"
"But what? You kept looking at him weird—"
"Oh! He did it! He did it! Did you see that?! He did—"
Tatiana never looked so confused, "What… What are you—"
I then turned to Tatiana with a sense of relief, "He did the thing!"
"W-What thing?"
"T-The thing! The thing where you guys 'tactically' rack the charging handle back without letting go of the pistol grip… The reach-around thingy? You didn't recognize him from the get-go earlier so I thought he was a spy so that's one thing to prove that— Tatiana?"
"..."
"Y-You okay?"
"Geniuses do be crazy sometimes…" she trailed as she walked back to the group.
"Wha— Where did you even learn that phrase?!"
"I'm not even replying to that, gonna wait for the crazy to fade a little bit…"
"Oh, come on! Tatiana~!"
On that note, since Tatiana and Kuzma still had a lot to catch up on, they sat at the back of the Raptor and shuffled our seating arrangement once again to give them a little bit of privacy as we were back on the road.
And since I was the only one besides Jesus who hadn't eaten lunch, I helped myself to some grub as I listened to radio chatter.
-
*bzzt*
[Alright, Alright, Alright~ Another warm welcome to our new friend, Kuzma! I believe he's been doing good work over here and once he retired or some shit, he uhh~ turned to prize cockfighting—becoming the place's Reaper of sorts to the people who did wrong or just owed a lot of debt!]
*bzzt*
-
*bzzt*
[Woohoo!]
*bzzt*
-
*bzzt*
[Please, no woohoos are allowed while I'm deliberating but I do welcome applause!]
*bzzt*
-
*bzzt*
[BooooOOooOO~]
*bzzt*
-
*bzzt*
[That's strike one, Isaac! A-Anyway~ as you can all notice, we're starting to see some undead presence in the immediate vicinity but at the speed we're going, they'll barely be able to keep up unless it's a— Holy fuck! Who took that shot?! Was that Kaley?! Jesus— Huh?
I'm not talking to you, you really should rename it to Jes' or something because there are a lot of curses that— Nevermind that, our cap'n is still eating so I need to entertain you all in his absence. But yeah, it'll be a few more hours until we reach the edge of the Rivas' Household, and a bit of bumpyness due to the terrain once we get there is expected…]
*bzzt*
-
The trip continued on for another half hour or so until the ones driving ahead began to decrease their speed, so we had no choice but to follow after them.
Turns out, Meg intercepted chatter from different frequencies that an armed convoy would reach this particular area by this mall in ten minutes or so, so we needed to slow down and park somewhere to discuss our plan going forward.
Jesus walked over to me with a map and said, "As surprising as this would sound, I don't know who those people are and their intentions, but it'll be way~ past sunset if we turn around and use another road besides that—or we could do some offroading and figure it out from there."
I turned to Meg, "What else did you hear besides that?"
Meg shook her head, "Not much, unfortunately. But whatever it is, they'll be expecting us."
"Have you tried contacting them? You know, to see if—"
"That's… That's not advisable at the moment but I can give it a shot."
"Hmm, they did say we'd reach some sort of mall in ten minutes, right? Do you know of any mall we'd reach in ten minutes?"
The crew pondered for a bit but Jesus answered, "The closest one is Robinson's Mall but we'll reach that place in a couple of minutes with our speed… But… Hmm~ The next one that kinda fits the bill—around 12 minutes to reach it, the SM Mall is probably—"
I cut him off as I said, "Then if we use that as a base and work our way backwards… I think the scout or scouts who spotted us are around this warehouse or that electronics store above that fast food joint—"
Kuzma cut in, "If you're gonna try and locate their scouts, you'll have a hard time due to the size of our group and they could easily split and give the others a warning if they see us driving back. They probably know the are too well and they could slip in and out on foot or just a bicycle… Just saying…"
I nodded as I sighed, "That is true… Fine, then there's only one choice."
"And that is?" Jesus asked.
I chuckled dryly, "You already said it right before we discovered the infestation in the public market way back. It's not our fault if they get shot or blown up the second they try to risk their lives to take what's ours, it's on them. We move as is."
"Alright. Where's my hair tie—"
But I called over Meg for one last order, "Do announce that we're coming and we know that they know that we are, and everything that happens if they try anything funny wouldn't be the least bit chuckle-worthy if something funny did happen. Got that?"
Meg lightly shook her head, "I'll just tell them beware. Less confusing."
"Sure…"
On that note, we continued to drive on the same road Jesus chose for us but everyone else was keeping a close watch on our surroundings while having a firm grip on our weapons.
Furthermore, we spaced our vehicles—and drove as much as we could in twos—in a way that the ones behind the wheel would be able to react in case things go awry though I specifically ordered the ones in the Raycolt to get the machinegun ready while we readied something of our own.
This time, I was riding behind Tatiana, Kuzma, and Jose, and the quiet was just fucking deafening.
It's like waiting for the surprise of a wind-up toy, both exciting and uncomfortable at the same time, but in our case, it was a wind-up toy that went on for a good 15 minutes before a group of people were blocking the road like they were a certain movement that was evolving backwards appeared.
We saw them from a good distance away but to our surprise, Jesus and his crew cranked it up and sped up like they were making sure they didn't have to reverse on them if they somehow survived being run over.
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