Plan

" What do you think about that? " Jamal started looking for the opinions of the girls, he was leaning on a wall of the living room, the arms crossed, and was seriously looking at the small crowd before him.

" The first and most important information is quite obvious I think, " Lina responded, " an army of monsters is coming to us. We all recognized the wooden sculpture that is in the city Matteo was describing, it is the other half of our city, right? He was clearly referring to the statue of Abidal Woodstock the founder of the city ".

Natasha nodded affirmatively, " we can also infer that this mysterious shadow is responsible for this strange phenomenon, " she stepped forward to expose her point, " when we interpret well, the scene with the crow bicolored, it seems like the people from the other half were exposed to a kind of virus which causes them to transform into monsters when we kill them ".

" However the main reason for all this is still unknown, " Jamal said while he was shaking his head, a little upset " what the point of causing so much trouble? For what reason? ".

" Maybe to invade your city, " Matteo supposed, Jamal immediately stopped him and corrected him " our city! You're one of us since now, don't ever forget that ".

His words unconsciously made their effects and a slight smile started to draw itself on Matteo's face. Jamal surely didn't know about it but that was the first time the boy had been accepted by anyone.

In his previous hometown, he was an orphan until he reached the age of 10, a tranquil boy without any psychological problems who had always been told that his parents died in a car accident but was smart enough to infer that he has just been abandoned. He never had any negative emotions towards the parents who abandoned him though, in fact, he never had any hatred for them since he rarely thought about them.

Despite his good behavior and his exceptional results at school, no one even wanted to adopt him. Whenever the chief of the orphanage recommended him to the people, they would always reject the offer after meeting him, claiming that he was too smart and quiet, more like a robot than like a normal and they would feel uncomfortable raising him or just having him in their houses. These comments did not bother Matteo at all until he realized that even people from the orphanage itself were thinking the same and were also afraid of him.

One day he made up his mind and he ran away from that place. He started to live in the streets of his town by himself, for 4 years he achieved to survive without lacking anything and for a sharp boy like him it was not very difficult though. However, he was still lonely, though he would never admit it the absence of a family and a warm home always made him feel depressing. He would probably never acknowledged it but when he looked at other people having fun and being happy with their families or friends, he couldn't help but feel sad. He couldn't even befriend or getting close to anyone, and it became worse after the catastrophe of that infamous night when he started sensing abnormal things and having strange dreams.

It may sound silly but with those simple words and without him knowing, Jamal gave him an incredible sentiment of happiness and familiarity that he never expected to experience and until here was just a dream for him. Finally, someone recognized him, furthermore that someone was the most incredible person he ever met.

Natasha, who was the only one to notice that aura of satisfaction coming from Matteo, smiled at him and after she pushed him teasingly she told him with a low voice, " You see? Ye is not as terrifying as you were thinking, isn't he? ".

Matteo blushed and quickly bowed his head to hide his face.

Lost in the conversation, Jamal looked at one after another and asked " What are you talking about? Who was terrifying but isn't anymore? ".

Matteo didn't respond while trying to avoid his gaze what made Natasha laughing uncontrollably, " never mind... let's continue " she waved her hand.

But Jamal didn't want to give up, " It's me, right? I'm the terrifying guy you're talking about, right? " Matteo had a small reaction but kept quiet stubborn in his decision to not respond. " So that's it, that is why you didn't want to talk to me, because you were afraid of me, huh? I'm such a good guy though ". At that moment, Lina joined Natasha and they laughed together loudly for more than one minute.

When the calm returned and everyone came back to their senses. They wore back their serious faces, Matteo repeated, " as I said they may want to invade the city. History told us that when someone raised an army, it is usually to conquer new lands. Moreover, in my vision, it was clear that they were walking toward us, fully prepared for war ".

" But why now? They could have come earlier, no? " Natasha asked.

" Is it not obvious? Because they couldn't " Lina responded, she paused to maintain a sort of suspense to focus their attention on her, " when we observe, the operation started long ago. If I remember correctly, Jamal didn't stop complaining that lately, the number of cases of people crossing the barrier increased, however, there was no undead at that time. Yesterday two appeared with excellent physical capacities but easy to defeat when we figured out how to proceed to eliminate them. Then today five appeared, almost double the day before, and with that, there was a specimen who was smarter than the others. What can we infer from that ".

Jamal frowned, he and Matteo responded at the same time " It was a test ".

" Exactly " Lina declared while stretching her arms, " that fucking mysterious shadow has been testing us for all this time on how to create those monsters and now he seems to have found out the correct formula, he can freely begin his war against us. Now you maybe want to ask me, Pr. Lina, why did this bitch choose especially our city instead of another? " Jamal and Natasha rolled their eyes as Lina started to be a bit too much in the character " the answer is simple and that's because we have already provided for him a laboratory with all the materials and guinea-pigs he needed to realize his horrible experiences ".

Matteo nodded and added, " by separating the population. When you isolated the bad people from the others, you allowed them to practice their experiments with them secretly and to test his creation within the other half of the city ". Lina turned to Jamal and held, " we are not saying that you were wrong honey, however, the enemy made good use of your great idea ".

" Now the main question is how would we proceed to defeat them, we don't know whether they will come by wave or rather in one time," she asked Matteo " have you been able to estimate their number? ".

He shook his head, " it was a too huge crowd, as we are now we should just consider that it was composed with all men remnant there ".

" It would be complicated since they were more than half of the total of men who have been living here after that tragic night, " Jamal pointed.

" But you have been chasing them for two years, there shouldn't be so much remaining, no? " Natasha said. Although she intended to be optimistic she could see through the eyes of Jamal that the situation was far to be positive. But since she didn't want people to depress, she knew that she had to cheer them up to find out a solution to their problems, " whatever it is still not a big deal since we have my super strength and my burning katana ". However, it was not enough to convince Jamal, " it's true that you're strong but you cannot face an army of more than one hundred monsters all by yourself, not yet, they would destroy you? ".

One time again his talk was sharp and convincing, how could she imagine beating such a huge army according to what Matteo said, it seemed more stupid than impossible. As she started to feel discouraged Lina quickly came to support her, " how would we be able to find any plan when you've been rejecting harshly all the ideas she came out with. Can you at least contribute instead of discouraging everyone? "

Jamal sighed " I'm not trying to discourage anyone, however, you must understand that as her teacher when I'm looking for a plan, I'm expecting for her a better answer than 'it's not a big deal since we have my super strength and my burning katana' " he tried to imitate Natasha, he turned towards her " now I want you to come out with a better and a wiser plan according to all what I have been teaching you ".

Natasha closed her eyes, breathed deeply, she worked her brain for quite a time and then reopened her eyes, " I'm the only one person able to kill them definitively and with the best physical aptitude so naturally I must be in the front line, but I cannot fight them and protect myself at the same time since they are too many, so I will need you to support me and to watch my back ".

All eyes turned toward Jamal who was smiling happily at the young woman, " yeah now it's quite better, but still not enough. Firstly since we assumed that they are coming to invade us, I bet they will not concentrate all their forces on you remember the enemy has managed to elaborate undead who can think wisely so I guess they would come with strategies too. You are our lone main force but the ways to penetrate the city are too many. You cannot protect them all ". He exhaled and landed his arm on Lina's shoulder as he said, " so my cute lover here must tell us the way to ensure that they will focus just on you ".

The latter smiled proudly and all excited she replied, " firstly, I want to know exactly when would they come, can you do it for me, Matteo? ". Matteo felt again like a heavy weight landed on his shoulders, but at that moment it was different, it was not a mere request from the random guys he had been working for when he was in his hometown, here, it was a request from his dear new family, and despite the pressure, he was determined to try all his best to fulfill his duty. He looked at her with his eyes sparkling with confidence and answered " I don't know exactly but be sure that I will do whatever it takes to find it, and I will give you the answer as soon as possible ".

" But don't we need it now? Urgently? " Jamal asked a little bit anxious.

" Stay cool honey. The boy must have figured out that the army will not come tomorrow or the day after. Raising such a big army is not a deal of 6 six hours or even one day, moreover, I don't think that the mysterious shadow can transform so many people at one time. And one thing, it's about the type of smart undead, " Lina raised one finger as if to raise awareness, " it may sound crazy but I tell that for the moment you shouldn't worry too much about them ".

No one replied, they just stared with a mix of surprise and confusion expression on their faces.

Lina understood that it was the moment to give arguments to explain or support her point, " OK, first of all, let me remind you that out of five outlaws who changed into undead only one turned into a 'smart undead' didn't you wonder why? " she paused, checked out their faces and after the three of them shook their heads negatively she responded herself her question, " that's because he couldn't. It may not look that obvious at the first glance but if we think about it little things take another. If we agree that creating smart undead was his initial objective and we check out the facts, we quickly see that everything was a failure until today where he finally got his final product but that's not all, out of five experiments only one was a success ".

" Seems like it's not that easy to create one undead " Matteo observed, deep in his thoughts while looking a little bit doubtful he added, " it's... it's as if there were- "

" Condition to respect for the experiment to succeed " Lina continued after she guessed exactly what he was about to say, " for example when a body is brought back to 'life' it loses its intellectual capacities or rather they get significantly reduced which means that for hoping to turn someone into smart undead the specimen must be at least someone with great intellectual capacities and many other conditions which I'm sure of but I don't know them yet. All that comes to emphasize my first point which is that we shouldn't worry too much about those smart undead ".

The three people started to nod as all what Lina just explained began to slowly make sense in their minds.

" So actually all we can do for now is waiting, right? " Natasha asked after a short moment of silence. Jamal started laughing as if just she said a hilarious joke and told " oh god, surely not. We still have to train you to use correctly your katana and if it's possible your entire powers until you become able to take on a whole army only by yourself. And we must also reinforce the patrol, if we refer to Matteo's visions there are still 16 of them left to eliminate, they must be the first vanguard of their army before the war began, " he turned to Lina, " it's not like I don't trust you babe but- "

" I know you're a preventive man " Lina cut him and repeated with a fake bored tone, " so you guys have to wake up earlier than usual and watch over the barrier to avoid anyone to penetrate the main city. On my side, I will work to obtain all that I need to elaborate on the plan which would permit Natasha to catch all the attention of the undead during the upcoming war and Matteo will help me in this task. Do we all agree with that? "

Lina lifted her head to see at the faces of everyone while they were nodding. When she saw that all people agreed on their respective jobs, she cleared her voice and said " OK, so the reunion is called for today, see you again when there will be more advancements of the plan " which concluded their meeting.