240 What is there in it for us
“They are all either dead or turned.”
Mathew opened his eyes a bit wider than usual when he heard Norbert reveal the harsh truth to his former leader. He opened his eyes not because he was shocked by the news but because he was curious.
Curious as to how Beatrice would react to that news and, more importantly, how she would react to Norbert seeing stuff that he wasn’t anywhere near.
“What the hell are you talking about?” the woman asked while raising both of her eyebrows. “There is a limit to what kind of bullshit I can take,” she then added, pushing her body forward only to then use the swinging momentum at her hips to push herself up and to her legs.
For a moment, the woman managed to stay upright, although on wobbly knees, only to then plummet right down, with only Norbert’s quick reaction saving her face from striking squarely against the floor.
“You are too exhausted to move right now,” Norbert said only to turn his head over at Mathew. “Can we get her something to fill her stomach?”
“Leila, could you?” Mathew then turned his eyes to the one wife of his that happened to use the least of strength in the recent fight. As someone who ensured the car barrier would remain free of zombies, she only had to kill a few of those who not only stumbled down the street but then managed to somehow move either underneath or above the line of the cars.
“I will be right back,” Leila replied, standing up from the shadow she was hiding at only to run back the same way Norbert came to their current place.
“I don’t even want to ask where you guys get your food,” Beatrice commented under her nose while refusing to look Mathew in the eye. Then, she shook her head only to move her eyes back to Norbert. “Now, how the hell could you know what happened to those civilians we hid in the cars?”
“Oh right, you don’t know yet,” Norbert said, finally realizing the point that made Mathew curious all along.
“Don’t know what?” Beatrice barked in response.
Norbert looked at the woman for a moment only to then sigh and turn around, showing her his back.
“Put your healthy hand behind your back and erect a random number of fingers,” Norbert said.
‘So that’s how he is going to prove it,’ Mathew thought, a small smirk dancing in the corner of his lips.
“Huh?” Beatrice twitched. “Sure?”
She clearly had no idea what was going on… but decided to simply go with the flow anyway. She then allowed her wounded arm to just hang by her stomach while pushing her healthy hand behind her back.
Then, she threw a suspicious glance all over the room, as if expecting to find Norbert’s helper or some sort of mirror mechanism allowing him to see whatever was behind her back.
“If you are that worried, then you can hide your hand under your shirt,” Norbert said with a sigh.
“What?!” Beatrice opened her eyes wide as she shook her head back towards her former underling. “How did you…”
“I can see everything,” Norbert said while shaking his head to the sides. “Five, three, five, fist, fist, one, fist…” he then started to give out seemingly random numbers in rapid succession.
“How the hell…”
“As I said,” Norbert repeated himself. “I can see everything. Or rather, right now, my point of view is hanging roughly a meter away from your back,” he explained.
“I… I see…” the woman muttered, clearly not convinced.
“Now that I think about it, didn’t you kill even a single zombie early on?” Mathew asked, rejoining the discussion while looking at the woman with a strange look on his face.
“What do you take me for?” she replied angrily, throwing an annoyed look at Mathew. “Or what, do you think that since I’m a woman I cannot do anything to protect myself?”
Mathew only rolled his eyes.
“Then let me reiterate the question,” he said only to lean forward and cup his hands together before resting his chin on top of them. “Excluding the use of firearms, did you manually kill even a single zombie early on?”
This time, the woman remained silent.
“I… I did not,” she then replied, turning her eyes to the side. “When I ran out of bullets…” she then waved her bloodied stump around. “I guess you can tell what happened.”
“And that’s why you still can’t believe your subordinate,” Mathew sighed only to stand up from the piece of rubble he was sitting at. He then grasped his hand at the air before squinting his eyes.
‘Barrier of lights,’ he thought, calling forth one of the very few abilities that he had in store.
Thankfully, fate didn’t bother to make him look stupid by temporarily denying him the use of the ability. And just like back when he first used it, a wall of light appeared all around the young man, separating him from the rest of the world.
‘Enough, disperse,’ Mathew then thought a moment later, allowing the light to vanish and returning back to the same area where everyone else was.
“This is the power of the system,” Mathew said, staring right down the woman’s shocked eyes. “I mean, what I just showed you is pretty meaningless and useless in a fight,” he said while shrugging his shoulders, “but it’s the thing that’s easiest for me to manifest.”
“I… I see…” Beatrice muttered before gulping down her saliva. She then looked towards Norbert. “And your… system?” she then asked.
“I can create a ghost of sorts and move around with him however I wish,” he stated. “I can slip through any gap that I can see through. My range is roughly half a kilometer away if I don’t want to strain myself. Oh, and I’m pretty useless in a fight,” he then added, finally revealing most of what there were to his system-given abilities.
“Okay, I understand,” Beatrice said, only to turn around when Leila finally returned with her hands busy holding up all kinds of foods. Yet, what she quickly came to realize, was how every last package was either directly a can or a cardboard box that implied its insides were still packed within one.
The woman then brought her hand down to her stomach. The sight of food had to remind her just how long did she go without any proper meal.
Yet, her focus on the food lasted for but a short moment. And right when Leila started to stack the cans right by the woman’s side, she already managed to overcome her bodily weakness and raise her eyes back on Mathew.
“Assuming I believe what Norbert said about the other survivors, there are still people more left alive,” she said, overcoming her desire to stand up again.
“Just shut up for now and wait for food to be ready,” Leila stopped the woman before she could finish what she wanted to say.
She then grabbed one of the green-colored cans only to smash a special capsule at its bottom before dropping it down to the ground by the woman’s legs.
“It should be warm enough in a minute or two. And I hope I don’t need to remind you not to gobble it all up in one go,” Leila said before standing up and moving from Beatrice’s side to Mathew’s side.
“Be it as it may…” the policewoman looked at the plastic wrap that started to grow in size as if someone pumped air inside. And through this plastic and partially see-through wrap, she could see the food inside warming up under the influence of the chemical heating agent that Leila smashed.
“But still,” she said, raising her eyes back to Mathew and overcoming her hunger to focus on the task she considered to be even more important. “Seeing how you guys managed to pull the three of us out, I hope you can do the same for the other five that are still left alive.”
“If that only was so easy,” Mathew said only to turn around and move away from the woman. He took a few steps away, only to then turn around and look at the policewoman with his squinted eyes. “Pulling you all out took the combined effort of nearly forty people, ten of which had to risk their lives for hours.”
“So it’s not going to happen, is that what you are trying to say?” the policewoman asked while Norbert turned his head away.
“No,” Mathew replied, shaking his head sideways. He then paced right back to the place he was formerly sitting only to lean over the woman and grace her with a gentle smile. “We can help them. And I can actually see us doing it,” he stated.
Mathew then turned around on his spot, as if he didn’t want to look at the woman while saying his next bit.
“But there is one thing that I need to ask,” Mathew stated before raising his eyes toward the ceiling of the floor. “What is it in us to risk our lives for the sake of some random civilians?”