Code Zulu Alpha: Nerd in the Apocalypse!

I already gave Jared my SCAR-H long ago, but my own abandonment issues made me jump up defensively. It was triggered by him trying to buy it off of me with the gold coin he just won, and I just don't want to make it official-official.

To be fair, there are other ways I could obtain a gold coin, and exchanging it for something I deem much more valuable would just prompt a reaction.

Jared put his hands up, "C'mon, bro! I thought you already gave this thing to me! Just lemme give you something for it!"

"Fine, fine… but before we forgot, don't mix the ammo you won with ours."

Quinn interjected, "Why's that? They're all the same, right?"

I scratched my head before I looked at everybody, "It's u-umm, different."

"Different?"

"I'm sure they work but I don't want to risk it."

Quinn just squinted her eyes as she just stared at me while folding her arms together, "You're hiding something, aren't you? Is your ammo a little special? I already told you that 'I know', right? You can tell me."

I chuckled, "On the contrary, what's special about it is that there's nothing special about it."

'Except for the higher-caliber loads… If you want to hit where you want it or sub-sub-MOA, it should be a custom load…'

Quinn never looked so confused, "Are you messing with me now? I'll grab your balls and crush them if you are."

I quipped, "Is that an invitation?"

"You!" Quinn suddenly lunged forward.

I jumped back before she managed to grab hold of me, "Easy now. I'll tell you but you gotta tell me one of your secrets."

"Secrets? Is it that important?"

"Kinda. And yeah, the secret you gotta tell me should be something special that your group could do aside from building engines and pimping out anything that moves. If you can tell me something like a~ you know, a trade secret of your group, I'd tell you something about mine and possibly share it."

Quinn and I just stared at each other while everyone else was just watching us, but after a few moments, she eventually sighed before opening her mouth.

"Trade secrets, huh? Is being able to engineer our own engines not enough? I'm pretty sure it's more complicated than manufacturing your own bullets. However special your bullets are, it's still limited to how it is utilized by the shooter. If your shooter is shit, your 'special' bullet is wasted."

I threw Quinn an approving look, "You're right but I already told you, what's special about my bullets is that they're not special. Yeah, I made them myself– with the help of some people, but that doesn't necessarily mean you'll get headshots 100% of the time."

"Then what's special about them?"

"I already told you–"

Quinn never looked so annoyed, "Then what makes them not special?!"

"Now, you're asking the right questions. Good job!"

"You fucker… I'm this close to shoving my fist up your ass. Just answer me!"

I just chuckled once more before I put my hands up, "To be completely honest, I'm partly messing with you 'cause it's funny, but here's the real answer: The reason I'm saying that they're not special is that they're all just made the same way with the same exact quality. Special bullets have different attributes: tungsten core, plastic tips, extra powder, etc., but mine's regular old ammo as regular old ammo goes."

As soon as I said that, Quinn was breathing like she was trying to contain her anger but she was partly squinting, trying to figure out what I was trying to say, "You're not making any sense. Then how's that different from the ammo in that pile? Those are also regular old ammo, right?!"

"You're really not getting me," I said before I turned to Ibarra, "Dude, can you pick out a bunch of 9mms from those ammo cans?"

"O-Okay?" Ibarra replied before he did as he was told and picked up a bunch from the ammo cans present. He took a few moments since everything was mixed together but he eventually placed them between me and Quinn.

Before anyone said anything, I spoke up, "Okay, everyone from my crew, pull out a 9mm from your sidearms. And after that, place them right next to the pile of 9mms Ibarra picked out."

Everyone listened to me and did as they were told, and once we made a small pile of our 9mms on our own, the difference was fucking uncanny.

My crew never said a word because they already knew what was up but Quinn was slowly taking in what she was seeing. I already knew that she had an eye for detail because she knew how to build engines, but I'm pretty sure that her knowledge about guns wasn't as deep compared to mine.

However, she already noticed that our pile looked like all the 9mms came from a fresh box or a single magazine, because as I said earlier, everything was the fucking same.

On the other hand, the bullets Ibarra picked up not only had different casings, some of them were FMJs, Hollow Points, or even those crazy RIP Rounds that looked like a drill bit. Granted some of them looked almost the same but I'd only let my crew use them if we ran out of our own stock.

Sometimes, it was not about how special a single bullet was, it was about how the same or consistent a magazine or a clip of bullets could be. Consistency never sounded special compared to Armor Penetration or Larger Wound Cavity, but it was the very reason it was special to me even though it wasn't.

A lot of questions seemed to be clouding over Quinn's head right now but I broke the silence.

"As you said earlier, if the shooter was shit, the bullet is pointless. But you see, there are more things to consider when someone fires a gun. A few examples are the shooter's technique, the gun itself, and the bullet used, but if you have a bullet that does the exact same thing over and over, you'd have fewer things to worry about."

"..."

"We've all heard it, it's the gun's fault, the bullet's fault, I held it wrong, my hand slipped, etc., but if you remove one thing to blame, you'd have a higher percentage to solve your fucking problem. You can perform proper maintenance on your weapon and hone your technique too, but to take it a step further, you make batches and batches of ammo that's the same fucking thing. Some people could almost do the same by doing large batches but I could make the exact same thing I made last week, last month, and last year. They'll have all the same ballistics and shit and it's more consistent than any match-grade ammo you'll find on the market. That's the secret."

"Hmph. And you're the only one that could do that?"

"The proper term is that I'm the only one crazy enough to do it. Sure, there could still be differences between each bullet but it's so fucking minuscule to fucking matter. And if I notice something amiss because it's so obvious, I'd take it apart and make it again from scratch. I guess my own trade secret is that I'm borderline psychotic to do shit some people are too fucking lazy enough to do."

Quinn finally let out a smile, "Is that so?"

"It's my OCD talking but yeah, passable is not enough for me... bullets-wise. Well, to be fair, the word 'passable' is different for me. Passable for other people is just straight-up trash to me and the word perfect should be fucking absolute. I love things when they're perfect but I rarely get to call something like that wholeheartedly. Imperfections couldn't be avoided 100% but every time an imperfection was cast out was music to my ears."

Quinn was just looking at me with the same smile on her face but she eventually sighed before she pointed at the black SUV that I saw earlier, "See that Escalade? We made that."

Everyone else looked confused but she continued, "To be specific, we worked on that thing and the other SUVs parked by that house. Mr. Cuervo had a vehicle or two that we handled, specifically his Range Rovers at the back, but all of them– even the Humvee you took from us, it's all armored… professionally."

My interest was immediately piqued, "Armored how?"

"Not as much as APCs because they're made to look unassuming but that thing could withstand high-powered rifles and even a grenade blast. Every single thing was swapped with the materials sent to us and even the windows, the battery, the gas tank, etc. are armored and protected."

"So, you mean to say you just refit them with the–"

"Don't misunderstand, we do just refit them but we still have to machine the parts they sent to us. They always send us extra and we are free to use them however we wish as long as we get the job done."

"Hmm, something doesn't sound right."

Quinn instantly scrunched her brows, showing displeasure, "What? Are you telling me that I'm lying to you?!"

"Not exactly."

"Then what are you saying?"

"Your DB9."

Quinn instantly shook her head, "That's true. Why does someone who armor vehicles for a living have a DB9 that's not armored?"

"Exactly."

"Those are still the original parts before your friend wrecked them–"

"You also did."

"Irrelevant. It's already wrecked so my doing doesn't matter."

"Sure…"

"As I was saying, yes, those are still the original parts and I don't want to just throw them away but the windows are already bulletproof with the gas tank and the battery armored. I'm just looking for the right time to replace them but– remember Jackie?"

I nodded, "Yeah, Number 2. The guy you shot for killing Number 1."

"Yeah, that guy. He's a fucking asshole but he's kinda like you in a way. He was the one supposed to machine the parts to replace the hood and the other parts of my DB9 since he's the best out of everyone in my crew, but he gotta go. It's a damn shame but I guess you could do much better... much, much better."

I faintly smiled, "Hmm, I get it now. Armored stuff, huh?"

"Yeah. Interested now?"

"One more thing."

"What now?"

"Can it take a .50?"

"Wut?"

"Did I stutter? It's armored, right? Can it take a shot from a .50?"

Quinn never looked so confused from my question but it just so happened that Ibarra tripped over an ammo can and spilled several shotgun shells right as I asked my question. The gunshots that followed almost perfected the intro, but Quinn was looking at everyone's expression, thinking that I was cracking another joke.

However, I just pulled my Barrett out of its case to show Quinn that I was actually serious.