You Want To What?

George Bailey didn't know that much, but he knew enough that Alec was willing to keep him alive for future information extraction. For now.

He was only able to take that risk because he could see that George was the type of person that greatly valued his life. Before the man was certain that he would be able to deal with the threat towards him, he wouldn't dare to make a move.

This was the type of person that was the easiest to control.

Anyway, the thing that was the most surprising piece of information that they acquired from George was that even the people who'd gathered to spread this infectious virus throughout the entire planet hadn't entirely been willing in the first place.

George confessed everything to them like he'd been bearing a great burden just from holding in his complaints.

Things like how he felt like he hadn't been in control of his body when he spoke, and when he gave orders. How they made the decision to spread the virus amongst the earth.

It felt like he'd been the one agreeing with the decision, yet at the same time, George didn't think he would have done something like that. Especially when his own survival wasn't confirmed.

It was only when the red haze spread throughout the world that he felt like he snapped out from a long dream.

He even gave voice to the suspicion that it was aliens who had come for their earth, bewitching them to cause the fall of the planet.

This information caused both Dominique and Alec, who was still hidden in the shadows, to fall silent.

There was more behind this than they thought.

Where it had originally been rather easy to deal with since it was supposed to be a gathering of the powers that joined hands, now what George was telling them was that it might not have been the case after all.

While Alec would originally have been suspicious to believe him, there was a kind of hidden worry and terror in the man's eyes that convinced him.

More than that, Dominique's way of working the man over was really… let's just say it was brutal for the sole person being interrogated.

There weren't any external injuries on him, but the man sweated so profusely it wouldn't be a surprise that there were internal ones.

After knocking out George for the night, Alec and Dominique slid into the hidden level under the base, where the virus that had caused the world's apocalypse was held.

The lab underground was state of the art and was unknown to anyone besides the people who'd been sworn to secrecy. According to George, even adding together his personnel, there were only five people that knew of this place, four if you excluded himself.

Compared to the various labs that the two had been exploring through these months, this lab was even more pristine, and the surfaces practically shone. The place was cold and maintained using air-conditioning even when the rest of the places within the base had to make do with barely any electricity each month.

Right now, there was only a single scientist that was working with a beaker.

Before they even realized that someone had entered the place, Dominique knocked them out from behind, catching both them and the beaker, arranging them in a way that made it look like they'd knocked out for the night after fatigue took over.

Using George's thumbprint and retina scan, the giant vault that was in the corner unlocked for them, revealing what was hidden within.

They brought George's limp form with them into the vault as insurance.

In the middle, floating was a piece of red meteorite about the size of a human head.

Alec slapped a few seals onto it – as many as he could think of – before placing it into a glass container that kept it suspended and was used to contain it, handing the box to Dominique for safe keeping.

Though George claimed that there wasn't anything adverse about it that would affect them, Alec would be an idiot if he believed him.

Even if there wasn't, he wouldn't take the word of someone who had much to gain from killing them instead.

Right now, even aliens appearing wasn't anything that Alec was willing to discard. Outlandish a theory as it sounded, even the apocalypse had come to fruit on this planet, so he wouldn't rule anything out just yet.

They placed George back into his bed and left him there once they were done, slipping past the man's security with no problem.

With that done, Alec managed to find Joseph and Jane's whereabouts as they were just only entering N1 base after having finished the quarantine checks.

"Joseph. Jane."

Joseph shivered as all the hair on his arms stood up straight hearing the voice that was so deceptively gentle as if he'd heard the devil call him from the depths of hell.

He froze before turning around as naturally as he could.

Jane was already beaming at Alec, ignoring Dominique's surly expression. "Boss!"

The expression on Dominique's face darkened because they never told them what to call them, but they'd heard Dominique refer to Alec as 'boss'.

"Boss," Joseph reaffirmed a little nervously.

Dominique's face just got progressively darker the longer they were around.

There were already a few eyes looking at them when they interacted, and he had no intentions on having them become famous, yet he didn't quite want to invite them back to their apartment either.

Alec placed a pebble in Joseph's hand, and one in Jane's, to their befuddlement.

"Keep this pebble on you at all times. It will keep you relatively safe from zombies."

Bemused, Joseph put it in his pocket. He silently thought to himself that this boss was kind of cute at times, acting like a child for once.

"Thanks! But why are you giving it to us now?" Jane questioned as she played around with the smooth pebble. It gave her a strange feeling that she couldn't quite place.

"We're leaving."

Both Jane and Joseph were stunned upon hearing that. The two were already leaving?

But they had only been in the base for less than a day, yet business was already concluded?

Joseph hesitated, but his gut was screaming at him to follow the two if they wanted to live freely without any worries. They were the single most powerful people he'd ever met in his life, and they were unconstrained by rules and regulations.

As the two unfathomable males were about to leave, Joseph abruptly made up his mind.

There was nothing else other than his intuition left, so he would take a chance to gamble now that it came down to it.

"Wait!" Joseph called before they got too far away. "Could you please take us with you?"

Jane cheered, though she was surprised at her father's decision. She had good feelings from the boss and his subordinate. Most importantly, the flying whale was way too cool!

Alec was confused.

…The kidnapping victims wanted to go with the kidnappers?? But they'd already been released earlier?

What was happening exactly?

This was like watching a fish that they caught then let go after admiring it for a while jump back into the bucket.

But he supposed that he didn't mind taking them with him. They were heading back to meet up in H base with the rest of his party to share their findings since they finally acquired more evidence.

Joseph and Jane wouldn't be a problem.

"Fine. Let's go."

Dominique's expression directly blackened.

"Please, give us a few minutes. We need to bring stuff with us."

"Half an hour."

Joseph and Jane both rushed back to their apartment at the quickest speed, out of breath by the time they arrived.

"Quick, quick! Move it, Janey!"