Chapter 288

Chapter 288

“It’s too dangerous,” Catalina insisted. “We need to wait.”

She was in the security control room, seated in front of the bank of monitors. The central one showed Melissa, with whom she had been arguing for the past ten minutes.

“How long are we gonna wait?” Melissa asked.

“As long as it takes to grow stronger.”

“We’re already quite capable of messing with

Los Demonios

,” Melissa said. “I’m not talking about launching full-scale attacks on other bases yet. Instead, I’m suggesting we ambush

Los Demonios

patrols, which usually consist of one to two vehicles. We can definitely handle that.”

“Maybe we are,” Catalina replied. “But when their patrols start disappearing, what do you think Skullface will do? Have you thought about that? He’ll start to wonder what’s going on.”

“So?” Melissa challenged. “Let him wonder. He won’t be able to realize what is happening. We’ll take or destroy their vehicles and hide the bodies. But honestly, I don’t think we really need to bother with that. He will never be able to figure out who is really behind the attacks. He’ll likely just think it’s some random group of survivors who suddenly grew a pair to fight back. He’ll never be able to figure out that the real masterminds have already seized control of two of his bases.”

Catalina’s patience was wearing thin. She knew she had to find a way to reason with Melissa; otherwise, her friend would put all of them in danger.

“Don’t underestimate Skullface,” Catalina warned. “He’s smarter than you think. Those groups of wandering survivors who haven’t joined us yet aren’t strong enough to take on the patrols of

Los Demonios

. There’s no way they could pull that off. You should know that. Skullface definitely knows that, so he will never believe that some of the wanderers somehow managed to successfully ambush his patrols.”

Melissa stared at her with stubborn defiance. Catalina felt her reasoning was falling on deaf ears, and she was growing increasingly frustrated with the argument.

She had already told Melissa several times that they were too weak to start attacking

Los Demonios

. While they had amassed some resources and recruited new members, they were still too weak. They had only two bases at their disposal while the gang had many more.

As for

Los Demonios

, they were much better equipped. They even had helicopters at their disposal. Even though Catalina and Melissa controlled two bases, they weren’t strong enough yet. So she urgently needed to convince Melissa to delay attacking

Los Demonios

.

“He’ll start digging, trying to figure out what is really going on,” she continued. “And believe me, once he starts digging, he’ll eventually find out that we have control over his two bases. And once he learns that, he’ll throw everything he has to reclaim the lost territory. Which is why we’d better sit tight for now and do our best not to raise any suspicions because if he has the slightest inkling that something is wrong, we’ll be doomed.”

She went silent, watching Melissa to see if her words had the desired effect. Melissa didn’t reply immediately, which was a good sign. She was clearly thinking, and from the expression on her face, Catalina realized her words had finally resonated with her friend.

“So what do you suggest we do?” Melissa asked. “Just sit on our asses?”

“For now, yes,” Catalina replied, relieved that her friend seemed to have finally come around. “We need to continue gathering resources, beefing up our defenses, and recruiting more people, all while trying not to attract

Los Demonios’

attention.”

“And when do you think we’ll have enough resources to fight back?”

“Well, I can’t say for certain,” Catalina replied, instantly regretting it as the incredulous look came back to Melissa’s face. “Tell you what, we just need to wait for Jake to liberate more bases.”

Melissa shook her head.

“You’re too trusting of him,” she stated.

“What? I thought you moved past your doubts about him.”

“I did,” Melissa replied. “But what happened recently made me realize we can’t fully trust him.”

Catalina frowned.

“What do you mean?” she asked. “What happened? Have you met him recently?”

“Not me. Some of my men ran into him half an hour ago. They got surrounded by ex-humans. Just as they were about to be swarmed, the morphus suddenly showed up and saved them.”

“Sounds like Jake,” Catalina said. “So what’s the problem?”

“What happened next is the problem. One of them, Malik, wanted to give a mana crystal to the morphus. Jake didn’t accept it, though. Instead, he just stared at them with his emotionless eyes, making no gestures and refusing to communicate. Then he suddenly shoved Malik so hard that he fell to the ground.”

Catalina couldn’t believe her ears. “Jake attacked your people? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Well, aside from pushing Malik, he didn’t do anything else. He just turned and ran away. But it’s still odd, don’t you think? It’s hard for us to communicate with him, and we have no idea what’s actually going on in his mind. That’s why we can’t trust him.”

Catalina was silent. She hated to admit it, but she thought her friend was right. Sure, it was great having such a powerful creature on their side, but what if it—he—turned on them at some point?

“There’s something else you should know,” Melissa added, pulling Catalina back from her thoughts. “As Malik and his teammates watched Jake run away, they saw him grab a walker and disappear with it across his shoulders.”

“What?” Catalina asked, dumbfounded. “What are you talking about? He grabbed another ex-human?”

“As he fled, three walkers attacked him. He killed two and captured the third. He shot a net that ensnared the creature, then hoisted it onto his shoulders and ran off. Any idea what he might be planning to do with it?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. I’ve never heard any stories of him doing anything like that.”

“So it only adds weight to my point,” Melissa stressed. “We can’t trust him. We have no idea what he’s up to. Who knows what he’s doing in his off time—when he’s not fighting

Los Demonios

, that is. He’s up to no good, that’s for sure.”

A person appeared on the screen behind Melissa, saying something to her. She nodded and turned her attention back to Catalina.

“I have to go,” she said.

“Did something happen?”

“Nah, I was just told one of my team returned with a truckload of rare resources. I just want to check it out, that’s all.”

“Okay then,” Catalina replied, but as Melissa reached to turn off the webcam, she quickly added, “Mel, hold on a second.”

Melissa looked back up at her. “Yeah?”

“Don’t do anything stupid, okay? I promise you we’ll eventually launch a full-scale attack on

Los Demonios

, but we first need to get prepared.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it,” Melissa said, avoiding her gaze.

“Mel, look me in the eyes and promise you won’t start ambushing their patrols behind my back.”

Melissa hesitated for a moment, then finally met her gaze and said, “I promise.”

Catalina locked eyes with Melissa for a moment before nodding. She trusted her friend. Melissa meant what she had just said and in that moment, was being honest with her. How long she would be able to keep her promise was a different question, though. Hating

Los Demonios

as much as Catalina did, Melissa was itching for a fight with them.

After they ended the video call, Catalina leaned back, lost in thought. She couldn’t stop thinking about what Melissa had said about Jake. Melissa was right: they had no idea what was going on in his head. He was too dangerous and, she had to admit, unpredictable. They couldn’t just let him freely roam the city and do whatever he wanted.

Right now, they needed Jake to help them bring down

Los Demonios

, but when—if—they accomplished that, they might have to kill him. She felt a pang of guilt for even thinking that, but she had to admit that Jake was likely a much greater threat to them than

Los Demonios

themselves.

Suddenly, a video call came through. Initially, she assumed it was Melissa again, but a glance at the caller ID made her tense up instantly. It was Skullface.

What the hell does he want?

she thought.

She took a moment to steady her nerves and then pressed a button to answer the call. Skullface appeared on the central monitor. He glanced at her and grinned, making his tattooed face look even more menacing.

“T’sup,” he greeted. “Is everything okay on your turf?”

“Yeah,” Catalina replied, noticing with displeasure that her voice sounded tenser than she would’ve liked it to. “Why wouldn’t it?”

“Hey, no need to get your panties in a twist,” Skullface said, his grin stretching wider. “You’ve only recently become the boss of an entire base, so I’m just checking on you. Going from a mere soldier to a base leader is a big step forward, y’know. You have many more responsibilities now than before.”

“Everything’s fine,” Catalina replied through gritted teeth, still feeling uneasy. The timing of Skullface’s call, just after her conversation with Melissa about attacking

Los Demonios

, struck her as suspicious.

“Have you upgraded your defenses as I told you to?” Skullface asked.

“Yeah, and we’re already gathering resources for the next round of upgrades.”

“Good, good. That’s reassuring to hear. By the way, have there been any attacks on your base or patrols from the morphus recently?”

“Nope. Why? Should I be expecting it? Or do you want to assign me a mission to hunt that freak down?”

“I do not. In fact, I wanted to tell you to avoid the morphus from now on. Tell your people not to engage it. I haven’t assigned a mission to find and kill the freak for a while now, so patrols shouldn’t take the initiative to confront him. Still, it’s worth giving your people a direct order to avoid any further confrontations with the morphus.”

“I’ll do that,” Catalina replied. Curiosity got the better of her, and she asked, “Does that mean that you intend to leave the freak alone from now on?”

“Hell, no!” Skullface exclaimed. “That freak will get what’s coming to it. But there’s no need to lose any more people than we already have. Regular patrols can’t do anything against the morphus. That should be pretty obvious by now. So I won’t be sending any regular patrols after it anymore. However, I’m not going to let it go. I’m going to put an end to this, and it’s going to happen very soon. Raw brute force clearly doesn’t work against the morphus, so for the past few days, I’ve been creating a precise tool, a scalpel, so to speak. And very soon, I’ll be ready to let it loose to hunt down the morphus. So believe me when I say this: the freak’s days in this world are numbered now. He’s done for.”

Catalina felt nervous again, but for another reason now. She wanted to ask Skullface what was on his mind, but he seemed to have shared all he planned to, because he declared, “That’s all for now,” before suddenly ending the video call.

It was bad. Whatever Skullface had planned was serious. The pride in his voice spoke volumes. He must have concocted something really nasty for the morphus.

Just a few minutes earlier, she had been considering the possibility of having to kill Jake at some point, but now that she learned Skullface had something sinister in store for him, she couldn’t help but worry about him.

A single question spiraled through her mind over and over again: if Skullface’s “scalpel” succeeded in killing Jake, would she and Melissa be capable of taking down

Los Demonios

by themselves?