Code Zulu Alpha: Nerd in the Apocalypse!

Rod started rifling through the pages available and his disgruntled expression remained the same. A few were curious as to what the notebook said while my team was curious if the president could shed some light on some of them. It was because I showed them the contents of the notebook beforehand and they couldn't make out some of the words written.

The president started from the beginning once more, "Hnnrrghh..."

The notebook wasn't filled page by page and most of what was written was unreadable due to what the person writing on it was experiencing at the time. Aside from that, the blood invading each page made reading them much more difficult and have also caused some pages to stick together. However, a few words in no particular order were present:

[WU, CEBU, VISAYAS, CLAN, 500, DOCK, HOME, TUAN, PIER, SEA DRAGON, HOUSE, WU CHING, 1000, FIVE, ZERO, ZERO, CHINA, MACAO, LIM, MARCELO, STORAGE, COLANGCO, HELP, SORRY, SAFE, THREE, SIX, DEATH, and MINDANAO.]

After a while, I displayed on our screen the pages I took pictures of. More eyes seeing them would help us make out some of the things we weren't able to understand.

"Is that a puzzle?" Oscar asked, scratching his head.

"You really think that guy would make a puzzle at his dying breath?" Johnny answered.

"Without context or the keys to put them together, it would be harder than a puzzle," Matthew commented.

"That is true..." Johnny nodded a few times.

"A few of them are fairly obvious but like Matthew said, if we don't have the key to make the connection, it's gonna be impossible to what the other words mean. And we don't have a fucking key," Oscar said, taking a closer look.

Rod finally spoke, "There's a few that doesn't need keys though. I think he's hinting that Wu Ching is in Visayas, the other island group, mainly in Cebu City."

"And how about Macao? It's far but it's a cause for concern. We have no idea of what they're still capable of," Iskoh interjected.

"I doubt that," Oscar said.

"What?"

"It's not like we're the only ones left they had to fend for. They could be a big syndicate but everyone got affected by this shit. Everyone is clawing at each other and I'm not talking about the undead."

"Still-"

Rod shook his head, "I couldn't care less for that place as of now. It could be their main base of operations or even where Wu Ching is currently at but I'll worry about what's happening in my country first. Going to other countries to worry about them is not on my plan at the moment. I have a lot on my hands to deal with as of yet. We could exchange information about their leaders but that's all we could do. In all honesty, they're also properly equipped and they could take care of their own. We're already housing a few of their dignitaries and I think that's enough help for now."

"You don't need to explain your troubles to us, we understand," Johnny said.

"Yeah, I'm just looking at the connection that brought about this. I guess that I'll be going home earlier than I thought. Kid, do you have any idea what the numbers meant? You were there when he wrote this, right?" Rod then turned to me.

'Jason would've known about it...'

I replied, "Yeah, I'm there obviously but I'm listening to your guesses first if anything would come up that I missed or didn't understand. There wasn't any particular clarity or organization when he wrote each of them so I want someone to look at it with fresh eyes. He wrote that in the worst state possible and some of them might give us more info or be just a red herring."

"Hmm, is there a way we could figure out what's what?" Rod asked.

"I could have Garbo Marcelo's input on it. I'm sure he knows what half of those words meant at the very least. We just need to filter out the unreliable information as you've said," Morales commented from the side.

"We could do that for confirmation but some of the numbers points out to a certain ship that contains what's left of his belongings or valuables stashed."

"Sea Dragon?" Oscar asked.

"That's the one."

"Then how could the numbers point to it? It literally said the ship's name."

"It's the location as to where it is docked and there's a number combination needed to access it. I couldn't care less of what treasures he have in hiding but I'm more concerned with the ship itself and the routes it used to take. We could have a more concrete idea as to where they frequent and stay so we could take care of them once and for all and focus on what's looming behind us. The sooner we end our old problems, the sooner we could move forward."

"Really~ Kid, you sure you don't want a piece of what they're hiding in there?" Oscar chuckled.

"To be honest, I'd pick up one or two items but realistically speaking, most of those items are worthless once this shit started happening. An authentic jian or dao would suffice for me and I'll just store the rest in a museum. If you could give the ship, I'll take it."

"Heh, one or two items, eh?" the oldies chuckled simultaneously.

"What? A ship counts as one, right?"

"You greedy motherfucker."

"You couldn't let go of losing your ship, can you? You've got a fuck ton to choose from your place, just get another one and I'll grab another after another bet!"

"You!"

The discussion got derailed for a while but we soon got back on track.

The president would fly back to his island group first thing in the morning while Iskoh would stay for a couple more days. However, the bulk of his troops would fly back to their city and would continue on with their own plan of breaching the gap with our own routes and slowly exploring the outskirts of the cities surrounding them. More time was needed with these kinds of operations and a little patience could go a long way.

Iskoh was much closer to the City of Marikina where ARMSCOR was located and he made small progress with making contact with them. The issue he had on hand was the two cities he had to traverse the edges on and the kinds of specials he was encountering on their side. He showed us a few recordings and small herds of ferals were up and about, wreaking havoc to anything they laid their eyes on.

Despite that, no news of new specials was located but irregulars were making everything harder to identify properly.

One of his recordings showed a large herd of what seemed to be ferals but all it turned out to be were just the regular undead walking on all fours. Panic immediately set in once they laid their eyes on them but shooting one from a distance revealed that it was all a ruse. Still, it took them a lot of time and resources to get rid of them but the soldiers present dealt with them swiftly and properly.

The only other footage that baffled each of us was a group of undead continuously slamming into a concrete wall and another group choosing to stay inside a single building. All of the footage came from Iskoh's soldiers and more questions were left besides answers.

The operation to reach ARMSCOR was halted for the moment because once our groups made a proper channel with each other, heading to that place would be easier and safer for both parties. Discovering a fake herd was one thing but a real one would just decimate a scouting group if caught unguarded.

A lot of variables were still unknown but sooner or later, we'd discover them and react accordingly. Our meeting soon ended and Morales insisted to have the supplies and equipment he requested to be loaded onto a truck immediately so they wouldn't have to do it tomorrow morning.

"That reminds me, you have something to say to me, right?" I said to Morales.

"It would be better if Jose and Artem are present. We could talk some other time. As soon as the president left for Davao, I'd be driving straight back into my place. We still have a lot of things to do back there."

"Yeah, just give us a call if you need more help. If you want, you could let a few of my workers operate one of those fishing boats you got so they could bring back fresh seafood. I'll make them leave half of what they catch in your place in exchange for guarding them while at sea."

"That's the plan. I'll leave it to you. Now, I want to talk about vehicles."

"Hmm? Sure, what do you have in mind?"

"What would it take to have one of those 'armored' SUVs?"

"Ah, depends. Are you looking to protect yourself, or deal some damage?"