Chapter 437
Catalina said, “Yes. I’m ready. I think… Just give a mont to collect myself. I need to gather up my courage before we head back out into the streets, y’know.”
She let out a nervous chuckle.
Jake replied, “Actually, I was thinking we could take the subway system and use it to get as close as possible to the coordinates your people were given.”
“Are you sure about that?” she asked, her gaze sweeping the platform. The faint beam from her PDA barely illuminated Jake’s form, leaving the rest of the station swallowed in darkness. “What if we get lost?”
“That’s not gonna happen.”
“And what makes you so certain?”
“I have a skill called Enhanced Intelligence. It doesn’t alter my judgnt or anything like that. Instead, it works more like a computer, helping calculate certain things.”
“So… what exactly can it do?”
“Let’s take our current situation as an example. When moving through a subway system, like we’re about to do, or any complex area like a cave network, it helps morize every tunnel and place them relative to one another in my mind, essentially creating a ntal map that I can never forget and can refer to anyti I want.”
“Wow. That’s impressive.”
“I also have another skill, Enhanced Senses, which lets see exceptionally well in complete darkness. So relax. Getting lost isn’t sothing we need to worry about.”
However, Catalina still looked uncertain. She swept her PDA’s dim light across the platform, but the beam was too weak to pierce beyond a few feet, leaving the rest subrged in darkness.
“I can barely see anything,” she murmured. “Are the tunnels open? No collapses?”
“They’re clear,” he assured her.
“Still,” she said cautiously, “we have no idea what’s waiting down there. What if there are ravagespawn hiding in the subway?”
“From what I’ve seen so far, I can assure you there’s no sign of ravagespawn down here. Those mutants never stray far from areas corrupted by the Ravage Contamination, and in this stretch of the subway, there’s no trace of the infestation at all.”
“But what if we run into ravagespawn deeper in the tunnels? Or maybe other kinds of mutants? They might suddenly ambush us from so hidden spot before we even get a chance to see them! Anything could be lurking in this place, and we wouldn’t even be able to see or hear it.”
She obviously wasn’t thrilled about the idea of wandering through the dark subway tunnels.
“Like I said, I can see in the darkness exceptionally well,” he said. “The sa ability that enhances my vision also sharpens my hearing. So I can’t tell you there’s nothing alive in our imdiate vicinity. But if we run into mutants deeper in the subway, I can handle them myself. I’ll hear them long before I see them, and I’ll position you sowhere safe before engaging. You have nothing to worry about.”
She was silent for a mont, then said, “Are you sure this is a good idea? Maybe we should get back up into the street and take our chances there?”
“Do you really think we’d be safer there?” he challenged. “Up there, ravagespawn will be appearing nonstop, all around us. We’d have to sprint through the city without slowing down for even a mont. Can you honestly keep up that pace, outrunning creatures coming at us from every direction?”
“Probably not,” she admitted quietly.
He could tell she was about to give in. Her gaze swept their surroundings as she flicked the faint beam of her PDA from side to side, but it barely reached more than a few feet ahead.
“And if we run into a cave-in?” she asked.
“Then my mind will calculate a way around it,” Jake said. “Trust , you have nothing to worry about. It’s not the first ti I’ve been in such a situation. Back in the mines beneath the Los Demonios main base, I was moving in near-total darkness, navigating a maze-like cave network I’d never been in before. Yet not only did I avoid getting lost, but I also managed to find the hideout of Samantha’s resistance group, all thanks to the skill that works like a computer.”
“Alright,” Catalina said with a faint smile. “You’ve convinced , Jake. I have to admit, you’ve eased my nerves.” Glancing down at the PDA in her hands, she added. “Want to pull up the location my people were given on the map?”
“No need. You showed earlier, and that was enough for to commit it to mory.” His eyes shifted toward the tunnel that extended in the general direction of their target. “This way. Stick close.”
They crossed the platform, stepped to its edge, and leapt down onto the tracks. Turning toward the darkness, they entered the tunnel. Catalina kept close, matching Jake’s stride while the beam from her PDA cut through the gloom ahead.
For a ti, her footsteps were the only sounds. He could tell she was uneasy. Despite her earlier claims of having cald her nerves, tension still lingered in her posture. However, as the minutes passed without incident, her shoulders began to loosen, and her pace grew steadier.
Eventually, she broke the silence and asked with a faint smile, “You’ve got impressive skills, Jake. What other abilities do you have?”
“Mostly combat ones that allow to morph my arms into all types of weapons,” he replied, offering no further details.
“That’s impressive,” she said. “What kind of weapons? Sure, I know so of them, as I’ve seen you use them at one point or another, but I’m nowhere near familiar with your full arsenal.”
“I’d rather keep it that way,” he said. “The less humans know about , the better.”
He didn’t appreciate her prying into his affairs.
“Well, Jake,” she countered, “if you’d like people to see you in a better light, maybe you should be willing to be more open.”
“I don’t care how humans view or what they think of . As long as they keep their distance and refrain from giving trouble, I’ll extend them the sa courtesy. Step into my territory, and you’ll leave no choice but to co for you.”
After that, they lapsed into silence again. She didn’t ask any more questions about him, either because she didn’t want to irritate him further, though he hadn’t been irritated by her earlier questions at all, or because she wanted to let him stay focused on their surroundings and on finding their way through the subway. Maybe she still suspected mutants could be hiding in the darkness and didn’t want to distract him from paying attention to their environnt.
Jake, however, didn’t hear a sound from anywhere. Except for Catalina’s footsteps, all was quiet. He wondered why the Ravage Contamination didn’t extend into the subway system. Was there a specific reason for that? What if sothing in the subway prevented it from spreading down there?
Or maybe it was the System itself that stopped the contamination? Perhaps it wanted to reserve the underground as a refuge for human survivors from the infestation. If that was the case, it didn’t seem like it had helped much, though.
They continued navigating the subway tunnels for a while. At so point, a thought struck Jake, and he turned to Catalina, asking why she hadn’t donned the power suit he’d given her many days ago.
She recounted how, in the early days of the Ravage Contamination’s spread through New Hope, she had attempted to combat it while clad in her power suit. At so point, it beca severely damaged. Since her group was still far from reaching the technological advancents Los Demonios had achieved, she hadn’t been able to repair the suit yet.
Eventually, they arrived at another platform. Jake stopped for a mont, closing his eyes to picture his ntal map and check if their path still aligned with the intended direction.
“Are we still good?” Catalina asked. “On course for the location?”
He was about to answer when his sharp hearing picked up a sound, one he recognized instantly.
“Did you hear that?” he asked.
Catalina’s brow furrowed. “Hear what?”
“Gunfire,” he said, tilting his head. “It’s coming from above.”
“Really?” she said, her voice rising with excitent. “You actually hear gunshots?”
“Yes. Sounds like energy weapons being fired.”
Her eyes lit up. “Then there must be humans up there! They’re probably fighting mutants. Jake, we have to help them!”
“I could go alone while you wait here where it’s safe,” he offered.
“No way!” she snapped. “We’re going together. If they spot you alone, they might think you’re another ravagespawn. In their position, they won’t have ti to figure out whether you’re friend or foe. Here, in a city crawling with monsters, they’ll decide to err on the side of caution and shoot you on sight.”
Jake didn’t argue. “Alright. Let’s go.”
He helped her climb onto the platform, and together they moved toward the stairs leading up into the street where the gunshots were coming from.
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