Code Zulu Alpha: Nerd in the Apocalypse!

I began to talk a little bit more about Old Man Kaiseki and they were all interested in him, especially Dasiy on how he decided to have his own path of doing things artistically. I didn't notice at first but Daisy continued to ask more and more about Old Man Kaiseki's appearance and how he carries himself. Kaley and the rest were simply giving faint smiles and it was too late when it clicked in my head.

Daisy was blushing like a girl in love as I drew a simple portrait.

"He's taller than Mikhail too?" Tatiana chimed, surprised.

"Yep, he's like one of those old dudes that forgot to age when they reached a certain point. I could swear on my life that on the first time I met him, after all these years, he still looks the same from the last time I visited him." I continued.

"I wish I could see him..." Daisy had a look of longing.

'Oh no… She has a thing for Old Man Kaiseki… I'm gonna omit to tell her that he's jacked after all these years too...' I thought to myself.

"If you look closely though, he kinda looks like Sky with a filter that makes him look older. His hair was long and a bit wilder but the other features were exactly the same, right?" Kaley chimed.

"Hmm, now that I think about it… They kinda look like they're relatives, even if not by blood..." Rin added.

"What tattoos does he have then? He has a few, right?" Daisy was excited as she gave me a short glance.

"Tattoos? Oh, his arms and back were covered with them. However..." I trailed.

"However?" they all tilted their heads.

"However… I couldn't tell you what they look like, sorry." I replied with a mysterious undertone.

They all gave me various reactions and I couldn't help but let out a faint smile. However, Daisy became flustered as she covered her mouth and paused working on Tatiana for a moment.

"Stop it with the mysteriousness! You're making Daisy weak on the knees!" Kaley started chuckling.

"N-No- I'm just- sorry I'll continue to- it's just my little thing- I don't know why but- whew~ Okay… Okay… let's continue..." Daisy tried to compose herself and almost failed.

Daisy continued to finish the outlines on the braided hair of the female warrior she made on Tatiana's back. The warrior had some of Tatiana's semblance and I bet it would be even better once the whole tattoo was done. However, deep in my mind, the person made to look like in her tattoo was none other than the lady whom she had feelings for and saved her life.

'I need to meet her to confirm though...' I thought to myself.

"Okay, we're done for now! Don't forget the aftercare tips I told you about earlier, okay?" Daisy said to Tatiana as she placed a plastic wrap over the outline.

Daisy also gave Tatiana the ointments she had prepared prior to the session because Tatiana asked her yesterday.

"I guess I'll use them but the ones I had before I never bothered though..." Tatiana scratched her head as she put on some clothes.

"You need to really take care of it to have a lasting one. If you could, as much as possible, wear loose clothing when you're not outside. I know you're wearing body armor so I don't want the tattoo to place you in danger..." Daisy was wearing a solemn expression.

"You guys heard that? Daisy literally asked me to be topless while at home. No yelling at me when I start doing that soon." Tatiana chuckled.

We shook our heads while laughing but we soon said our goodbyes to Daisy and the rest of the people inside their household.

I let Kaley ride on the back of my bicycle while Tatiana made Rin ride on the back instead as she drove. We discovered that Lois and Mauricio were still in Matthew's house but we continued to drive back home.

The food was being prepared when we reached the compound and we decided to give the people we passed by a courtesy call. However, we discovered that Marisha and Cathy prepared a separate dinner for Matthew and Mauricio but Lois and Olivia would be coming here shortly.

We ate a simple meal of soup with bits of meat and different pieces of vegetables eaten over rice and we started the meeting right after.

I opened up the meeting with the walls of the dead we encountered earlier.

"From what we know, they are starting another series of irregular behavior. The ones we've found were all successful in building up a wall but only one of them was blocking a road completely. Also..." I said as I continued with everything my group witnessed.

"Are you gonna continue searching for them?" Johnny asked.

"Yes, we will continue the search for them tomorrow. We'll prioritize clearing the roads that are direct routes to other cities. However, we wouldn't be clearing a city at a time because we also need to clear a path that could lead us to Iskoh's base." I replied.

"Are they even doing the same thing? I'm good for establishing connections with other groups such as the ones in the Intercity but the effort put in by both groups should be equal in my opinion." Johnny added.

"They are. I've been keeping in contact with them and they have their own measures against the city of their size. The kid and Rod talked about it with Iskoh before and his making good use of the soldiers given to him. The last time we've talked is that they're starting to open up a path to the harbor and was about done." Oscar answered.

"I see, if they manage to clear that harbor, they could make it into a valuable outpost. It gives us a sea route straight towards them while the kid and his group open up the land route crossing over another city." Johnny nodded a few times.

"Yes, that's the idea. As soon as they're done, they're gonna start working on the land route from their side and we'll meet much faster that way." I replied.

"How about the air route? Who would clear that?" Allan chimed.

"I agree, the air is important too. Much valuable than the other routes in my opinion..." Bing added.

"..." everyone else.

"S-Sure… w-we'll g-get to it too..." I couldn't believe their words.

"Good, it's good you listen to us sometimes. Two heads are better than one, right?!" Bing gave a hearty laugh along with Allan.

"..." everyone else.

"A-Anyway… are you guys done with our makeshift trackers?" I turned my gaze to Ken and Kris.

"Yeah, that's quite easy if we didn't need to pinpoint them. As long as we could see if they move from their original spot, it's quite easy as a prototype. However, if you wanted to make it a little more complex like triangulating them as a GPS would, we'd also have to change the relays by a bit." Ken replied.

"Does that mean we're gonna retrieve them all again?" Jay asked.

"Not exactly but we could do it remotely. It would take some time because of the speed the data travels." Kris replied.

"Kid, why aren't we just using a simple GPS tracker instead of the ones you guys are making?" Oscar chimed in.

"We could but we better start using things we don't need the help of other facilities we don't have a way of repairing the moment it goes down. We're still using our Sat Phones but who knows how long it could remain functional? If we ever make relays around the places we control, we could treat it as our data route in the future, upgrading it to better ones as we go on." I explained.

"Hmm, I'll trust you guys on it then. I don't fucking understand most of it but I bet it'll fucking work." Oscar nodded a few times.

"What else do we have to talk about then?" I looked at Rin for the topics given to her.

"Umm- I think Raphael has something to report?" Rin replied.

"Yeah, I- we have a little something." Raphael said as he stood up.

"We've been busy modifying the vehicles by adding gun compartments and whatnot but I just wanted to report that we repaired the Killdozer. However, we removed the pneumatic spikes, and instead of adding to its offensive capabilities, we fortified everything that we missed the first time we made it. A good defense is also a great offense, right? The hydraulics and a few other important parts were shot before so we made a proper module to cover them up." Raphael reported.

"Oooh~ I kinda wanted to take that for a spin as well." Oscar gave a look of approval.

"Oh! Don't forget that we tweaked the engine so it could bring out more power. It could run a bit faster now and we are planning to do the same thing with the skid steers. However, on the skid steers, we're planning on making custom headers. The headers will vary depending on the situation and we'll need some input from the people that are going on runs so we could know what they wanted us to do." Anthony added.

"Can you guys make a sleeper car? We have a lot of engines now and they're not being utilized yet. We could use one to make one, right?" Lois interjected as he also looked at Oscar.

"Hmm, we could do that but we're in the process of upgrading the goedendag to something entirely different. We're working on a few designs and we just finished some custom work for Mikhail's new axe too." Unc Zeidrick replied.

"Really? You guys are done?" Mikhail became excited.

"Yeah, yours is quite easy because we just needed to… um- scale it a little bit bigger." Unc Zeidrick chuckled.

"What did you have made, big guy?" Tatiana turned to Mikhail.

"He said it, right? I asked for an axe." Mikhail replied.

"Well~ an axe wouldn't be the right term for it now. Wanna see it? I don't have the right word to call it too so just give it a name, okay? I'm sure you're the only one worthy to lift this one-handed too." Unc Zeidrick gave an excited look then he turned to me and chuckled.

'Worthy? Oh no… these motherfuckers...' I chuckled inwardly.

"Where is it then?" Mikhail was looking around.

It didn't take long before Unc Zeidrick revealed it dramatically.

Music started to play and sound effects of thunder and lightning crashing down followed. Slowly, an axe-like weapon, covered with a dark fabric was brought in front of Mikhail and it was slowly unveiled. It had small differences but the main outline would make you think of it the first time you lay your eyes on it.

'I FUCKING KNEW IT!!!' I shouted in my head.