Chapter 20

After enjoying the care of his sister and having an afternoon snack, time quickly passed as everyone went about their business.

It was already evening and the sun had set. Paul, who was lazily leaning against the railing on the upper deck while on guard duty, was also keeping an eye on the burned man and the Asian woman, both introduced to us as Jake Powell and Alex Wu.

He contemplated whether he could use them both to experiment with his vampiric side. Musing about their usefulness and how they could be of service to him, as he pondered further on what to do at a later time.

While engrossed in his thoughts, Nick appeared on the stern, accompanied by Strand.

"Nick, will you be able to remember exactly what to do, as I have instructed?" Strand questioned Nick, ensuring he could carry out his task.

"Yes, yes, no problem at all," Nick assured him, preparing himself.

Paul, seeing them both and intrigued by their conversation, followed them. "What are you doing?" he inquired.

"Nick has a mission to complete," Strand said, as if it wasn't a dangerous endeavor to undertake at such a late hour of the night while the inky darkness envelops everything.

"A mission, did you see him with the face of a ninja or something?" Paul asked, his smile not reaching his eyes.

"No, but you will not do it at this hour, and he can do it well. We need to do this if we want to enter Mexico," Strand explained. "He is about to reunite with our contact."

"Let it go, Paul. I will do it," Nick said, already undressing and putting all his clothes in a bag, preparing to jump overboard.

"So, you will swim ashore naked in the middle of the night to the coast, avoiding the patrol, huh?" Paul said, overlooking the continent in the darkness. Coast guard boats and helicopters were patrolling far away with searchlights.

"That's the plan," Strand said, as if it were easy.

"Then what?" Paul sighed with a raised eyebrow.

"He needs to get to a specific location on Sunset Cliffs and make contact with a person named Luis Flores who will help us cross the border," Strand explained.

"And how are you planning to avoid the sea of dead roaming between the coast and the location?" Paul inquired.

"I will camouflage. Stop asking questions already, I'm going," Nick said and jumped into the water without waiting for his next words.

"Nick, you damn fool, make sure you don't get any blood on your eyes or mouth, you dumb fuck," Paul yelled to him as he swam away.

"All is in place," Strand said, satisfied, before going away.

"Fuck," Paul cursed on the stern, looking at Nick until he disappeared into the darkness. That guy was getting obsessed with the whole idea of the walkers not seeing him among them, as if it were some kind of superpower.

Paul then went to continue his night watch turn on the bridge deck, next to the M2, while armed with the M4A1.

After a few hours of seeing nothing, he relaxed on the sun chair, smoking a cigarette while looking at the stars. Chris and Ofelia approached, seemingly keeping him company.

"Why don't you sleep?" Ofelia asked Chris, who seemed distracted.

"Yeah, there's too much noise in my head," Chris replied, gazing at the sea.

"Yeah," Ofelia said, lazily leaning against the railing.

"You ever been to Mexico?" Chris asked her, given that she had come from El Salvador with her family to the USA.

"No, my parents crossed through Tijuana when they first left El Salvador," Ofelia said.

"Have you been back?" Chris inquired, showing interest in engaging in a small chat.

"We didn't really leave the neighborhood once we got settled. They put everything into that shop, and I put everything into watching over them. I gave up a lot, and they didn't need as much watching over as I thought," Ofelia said, thinking about everything that had happened in the last weeks and the discovery about her parents' past.

"What'd you do, you know, for yourself?" Chris asked, a bit shy about it.

"What do you mean?" Ofelia wondered, confused.

"Like... relationships," Chris clarified, a bit shy.

"Yeah, I had some," Ofelia answered with a smile.

"Yeah? I was seeing this girl back in Pomona," Chris revealed, shrugging off his embarrassment.

"Yeah?" Ofelia raised an eyebrow, surprised.

"Maria Santos," Chris said.

"Mm. For a long time?" Ofelia asked, intrigued.

"No. No. A few months, then my mom moved us back to LA. New school, Parochial," Chris explained, a bit disappointed, but then, thinking about his mother, a smile appeared on his face.

"I went to Catholic school from K through 12. Definitely had some fun that my parents didn't know about. Made some bad decisions," Ofelia reminisced about her days as a kid. "Hey. You're gonna be able to make some too. There are still girls on this planet."

"That's what I'm banking on?" Chris asked, doubtful, with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes," Ofelia nodded, smiling.

"Other girls left on this planet?" Chris doubted, but in any case, he already had someone in his sights. His mother, and he liked where it was going.

"Yeah. Somewhere out there," Ofelia said, as if it were easy.

"What do you think about that, Paul?" Chris asked him, his gaze drifting lazily over the expanse of water and sky before them.

"She's right, there are plenty of girls still on this planet. Far away and close, you can hunt high and low," Paul smiled, seeing the stars.

"Easy for you to say when you have them near," Chris said, thinking that Paul was just talking stuff while he had it easy.

"What the hell?" Chris exclaimed, after spotting a boat quickly approaching in the dark, appearing silently through the waves. 

"What?" Paul said, becoming alert.

"Shit," Ofelia said, seeing the boat.

Paul rushed to the railing and spotted the boat. He quickly loaded a live round and, through the scope, saw two men rowing fast and a pregnant woman.

"Ofelia, go find your father quickly and tell him we're being boarded. Three people, go now!" Paul yells at her, snapping her out of her frozen state.

"Shit, this is going to get ugly. I can't let them board alive," Paul says to Chris. Then he was already preparing to deal with them brutally. These uninvited guests were not coming at a friendly hour or in a friendly manner. Boarding without permission as they pleased.

"What do you mean, do I shoot?" Chris asked not knowing how to act.

As they touched the boarding platform, they started yelling.

Man #1 shouted loudly, "We need help!" His yelling trying to create a distraction, preventing the people from realizing what was actually occurring.

"Should I shoot them?" Chris asked again.

"Follow my lead," Paul replies coolly, already knowing how to handle the situation.

"Help!" Man #1 kept calling loudly.

"Please, help us! She's bleeding." Man #1 started pleading. To try to make the people aboard sympathize with their predicament.

Paul, upon seeing them already standing on the boarding platform, fired a shot into the water beside the man who was already attempting to tie the boat, scaring the hell out of him. These people behaved as if they had everything completely under control, as though this place were a safe haven or a location where one could come and go at their leisure.

"QUIET! Stop yelling," Paul yells, giving his first warning since they appeared.

"Please, help us," the Man #1 continues to yell pathetically.

Paul growled, "I don't care! Board the boat and go away, or I'll kill you all.!!" His gun was aimed at the pregnant woman and the man who had been chirping nonstop. Despite the dire circumstances they described, their eyes and movements seemed far too composed.

"Stop crying, or I'll kill you!" Paul yelled at the woman feeling annoyed, who instantly fell silent, not intending to determine whether he was telling the truth or not. She doesn't even bother to whimper or make any other sounds after going quiet, which makes Paul feel really weird. How can she stop doing sad noises even when told to be quiet, especially if they are desperate?

Suddenly, all the people aboard the yacht stirred awake at the sound of gunfire. They rushed to gather near the boarding platform.

"Mom!" Chris calls out as his mother tries to move towards the boarding platform. He stops her before she can get near them.

Noticing Liza's attempt to reach the woman in hopes of helping them after their desperate pleas, Paul fired again to warn her off and everyone.

Paul shouted, "No one gets near them! They are not getting aboard." Then he kept his distance, having experienced their occasional foolishness firsthand when they first encountered Daniel.

"Something's wrong. Something's wrong with the baby," the first man shouts, seeing the situation spiraling out of control as they are at gunpoint while trying to play the pity card to the group.

"Mom, don't do anything rash. Paul is not joking right now," Chris warns Liza as he sees her wanting to speak up.

"Alright..." Liza reluctantly agrees, resigning herself to the situation.

"I don't care about the fucking baby! You will do as I say now or I will kill you all right here, right now. I'm not fucking joking!" Paul barked at them, clearly displeased by their aggressive boarding attempt. They were being raided, and this shit show was like something straight out of 'Rust', with players sneaking C4 into their walls while they were online inside, trying to cook a damn bistec. The goal was to kill them and steal their shit.

"Please help. Please," the woman starts talking now, seeing the man not getting any sympathy.

"Dad?" Ofelia asks Daniel, feeling bad about the situation. But she is too naive to see the bigger picture.

"Shh. Ofelia, don't interrupt or try to help these people," Daniel says to his daughter. He can feel that something is wrong with these strangers and has his pistol in hand already.

"GET DOWN ON THE GROUND. YOU TWO, HANDS ON YOUR HEADS!" Paul orders, pointing to the men.

Seeing them resist the order, he shoots the man who has been doing most of the yelling since they came, hitting his right leg. The man yells in pain while also scaring the other two and the people behind him are shocked that Paul opened fire on them. However, no one is voicing objections to his actions, they are just unsure of what to do in this tense situation.

"NOW, get down on the ground and put your hands on your heads. I'm not repeating this. And YOU stop crying or I will make you be quiet!" Paul shouts again. At his command, the two men get down on the ground with their hands on their heads.

"Paul, babe, she is pregnant. Are we going to do this to her too?" Madison quietly asks him from the side, but she doesn't do anything to obstruct him. It's just her morals compel her to ask for the well-being of a pregnant woman. It was just the collective human empathy doing his work that we all have as a species to preserve ourselves and thrive.

"I don't fucking care if she is pregnant or if they are the savior. They will do as I say or I will kill them. Anyone trying to do funny business of trying to get near me, I will shoot all three without hesitation," Paul responds coldly, uninhibited and warns everyone on both sides.

"Now, you preggo, kneel and put your hands on your head. NOW!" Paul orders.

"Paul," Alicia says just to release some tension, but she doesn't ask anything of him. She just looks worried.

"This is wrong, Paul," Liza says while observing the pregnant woman, but she doesn't try to do anything more.

"Paul," Amy is the same as Alicia, not knowing what to do in this situation.

"No, he is doing the right thing to do, defending the boat," Strand says firmly beside them, thinking Paul is not wrong in doing what needs to be done.

"Daniel, search them for weapons or anything on them!" Paul orders Daniel to frisk them.

Daniel's thoughts pause for a second as he feels a sense of déjà vu when Paul tells him that.

"Just breathe. Breathe," Ofelia says to the woman from afar, not daring to do anything else.

"Madison!" Liza says, trying to appeal to her.

"No, Liza. I will not stand against my man for those people. He knows what he is doing," Madison says, not caring about Liza pleading for these strangers. Deep inside, she thinks it's not entirely wrong and she doesn't want to be on bad terms with her son and lover for these unknown people.

"Mom, they just got on the yacht. They just boarded," Chris says, telling her that these people didn't even ask for permission or help from a distance. They just did whatever they wanted.

Daniel started frisking the second man who was quiet all the time but preparing to tie the boat when they came, while the other guy squirmed around in pain from the shot, the woman wasn't as in pain as she showed before and was pretty calm but nervous about the out of control situation.

"Wire. They have wires," Daniel says, showing the black wires found on the quiet man.

"Tie them with it," Paul orders him, using their own shit against them.

At hearing that, they started speaking again

"No, please. We are just looking for help. Please," the woman pleads, not liking where this is going and feeling defenseless in her current state.

"She's in bad shape, man. She's in bad shape," the first man follows her lead, talking while still in pain from the shot.

"Don't care. Not my problem. Tie them well," Paul says, smiling widely at their faces and not caring at all about what they say.

After a moment, Daniel finishes tying the quiet one and goes to the first man who likes to talk. He finds a short-barreled revolver on his back and shows it to everyone, making them all go quiet. Then Daniel finishes tying the three, but also finds a pistol on the preggo.

"Liza, Mom. You can inspect the preggo, but here on the boarding platform. She takes a step towards those stairs and I'll kill her and whatever that is inside her. She's been too quiet since the bullets started flying, like she's not in pain anymore. And look at her, carrying a pistol like a warrior woman she is," Paul mocks the woman.

"And you don't even try to make a sound for the pain; you can cry silently if it's unbearable," Paul says to the guy he shot. His attention then turns to the silent one, who had remained quiet the entire time. Paul presses the barrel of his gun against the man's head. "Why haven't you spoken at all during this time, like the other two chirping birds? Are you mute? I need to shoot you to see if you can make a sound?."

The group was more shocked by Paul's demeanor than the three strangers who had abruptly and forcibly boarded them.

"No, please, don't kill me," Man #2 started talking while sobbing slightly.

"Who are you people, and where did you come from?" Paul asked calmly, resting the barrel on the back of his head, right in the parietal bone.

"We lost our boat, we lost our engines. We've been drifting for days," Man #2 stammering began talking about his history, a bit disturbed, as if trying to convince himself of what he was saying.

"Aha, and you don't have a better idea than to board a boat in the middle of the night? Right off the coast? Why don't you lot swim ashore, or better yet, use the damn boat you have to get to the coast?" Paul's tone with sarcasm not believing even a little bit what the guy was talking. It was pure bullshit. Come on, imagine something more believable.

"Yes... We thought we would receive help here. Please," Man #2 said, sweating profusely and trembling. He knew he had messed up.

"Is that the guy on the radio? What was his name?" Andrea asked from the back to the others, seeming to recognize his voice.

"Jake, was it?" Claire responded uncertainly.

"Yes, something like that. It's the same voice," Amy echoed in agreement with the other girls' observations.

"It's Jack," Alicia said almost sure.

"Yes, that was his name," Ofelia confirmed.

"So, Jack, why don't you lot carry Rose in your little boat to the coast? Instead, you came here to disturb us," Paul asked mockingly.

"Everything's been a blur. Frankly, uh, we've had a very hard time and did the first thing we thought," Man #1 spoke up, his voice strained with pain as he saw that Jack was about to get them fucked in no time.

"Please, we're... We're good people," Man #2 said, clearly scared out of his wits.

"Yeah, I don't think so. Every time they say that, it's the opposite. It's a common phrase that means shit," Paul quipped, still keeping the barrel on his head. "Look at those beautiful guard coast patrol boats in the distance. It would have been safer to try your luck with them than us."

"No, no, don't shoot, don't shoot," Jack pleaded, a few tears streaming down his face as he knew he was about to die at any moment.

Paul paid no heed to the other man, preferring to focus on the one who was on the verge of a meltdown and would start singing soon what he needed. "So, Jack the good man or Jack the pirate, which one are you?"

"NO, NO, no, please, please don't shoot, I… I…" Jack started stuttering like a rattle.

The other guy, seeing that they were already fucked, started trash-talking.

"You lot are in a shit load of trouble," Man #1 talks while moaning in pain, trying to make himself strong and scary.

"Yeah?" Paul then shoots his other legs, smiling at how his strong face crumbles in the face of physical pain.

"I love trouble. Keep talking bullshit two times more, and you will not have arms," Paul smirks while mocking him to keep talking shit.

"Liza, Mom, get away from her. It is obvious that she isn't in labor right now," Paul goes to talk with the not-so-innocent preggo.

"When are you due? Be honest, lest getting irritated makes my finger pull the trigger," Paul says not having trouble in pointing and even firing the pregnant woman.

"Don't know. Lost track." The woman started speaking honestly, no more show of crying in pain or any tricks.

"Look how well she is now, no more crying or pain," Paul said to Madison and Liza.

"Well, if you were counting before all this, you're still counting," Madison says, seeing that all this is a trap.

"Four weeks." The woman relents and speaks.

"Oh, any day now," Madison says mockingly, not caring anymore about their destiny.

"Doctor says first one always runs to term," the woman says trying to sound weak and small.

"True. That's true. Usually," Madison says disinterested.

"But today wasn't the day to happen right?" Paul says while he lets her hear the sound of his finger tapping the trigger, making her scared.

"True, it's a trap to take the boat, but they made me do it, it isn't my fault, please, let me leave, I will just take the boat and leave," the woman breaks down at her imminent death faster than Jack.

"Vida, you whore, slut, I am gonna fucking cut you in half when I have my hands on you when my brother comes," Man #1 started cursing and telling that he will do some serious psycho shit to her.

"Do you hear her that shit fam? What that guy can do to any of you aboard? I am not the bad guy in this movie at all; they are. I almost am a side character next to that guy with the nasty shit he can do," Paul says then shoots the woman in the head and kicks her body into the sea to feed the fish.

"No!" Liza screams seeing Paul kill that woman like nothing "What did you do, what did you do?"

Madison hands go to her mouth surprised as the majority of the women in the group after they cried in fright, but they don't say or do anything.

"Well done," Strand satisfied with the turn of events.

"No, no, no. Please. Please..." Jack was trembling and squirming like a worm on the wooden floor. Crying his eyes out seeing Paul walking with his eyes on him after killing the woman.

"Jack, you are Jack the pirate, unfortunately for you," Paul says to him and kills him too and kicks his body into the water.

"My brother, my brother will kill you all if you don't let me leave," Man #1 started again spewing threats already scared for his life.

"Yeah? Do you see me scared of your brother? Look around, haven't you checked the boat before coming? There is a .50 cal machine gun on top ready to welcome your brother into this show if he were to come," Paul mocks him at seeing his face pale more from his words than the blood loss.

"Now, who do you want to interrogate you, me, or Daniel? I am generous in giving you the choice," Paul smiles widely at the man as he points to himself and Daniel.

"Him, not you, I want him to interrogate me," the man asks for the other person fast, knowing that he will die at his hands seeing how he kills not giving a thought to it.

Paul laughed loudly at him, "Him? You choose right and wrong at the same time."

"Daniel, he picked you, will you do it?" Paul asks with a raised eyebrow to him.

"Papa," Ofelia says, trying to stop him.

"I'll do it, I will need a room for him. Liza will need to help me. We need to tend his wounds before he bleeds out," Daniel looks at her for a second and picks the man.

Paul then left the place amidst the different reactions from the group to the bridge deck to sit on the sun chair with Madison on his tail.

"Why" Madison asks, wanting to know the answer to her doubts but not confronting him strongly about it.

"Why? What?" Paul asks, putting the gun aside.

"You know what I ask, why did you kill them, even a pregnant woman?" Madison looks at what her son is now and breaks her heart, not wishing that for him. But inside she knew they all would need to do the same at some point or worse.

"You know why. To protect you, my family," Paul says calmly about it.

Madison didn't say anything more, just silently embraced him as if trying to carry his burden too. 

"How can you ask that of him, Mom? You heard them speak, they boarded with bad intentions our boat disguised as seeking help. What would you have done if they succeeded, huh?" Claire says as she approaches them both.

"He lied to us, used us, Jake. Just to get here and Paul was the one most certain of that," Alicia says too beside her sister.

"You heard that man, the awful things he could have done to any of us if he got his hands on one of us. Do you want that to happen, Mom?" Claire inquires with a raised eyebrow. She knew she was wrong saying that but wanted to end this.

"No!! I just... I'm just worried about Paul, not them. You don't understand what it can do to him or any person. But sadly, eventually, you will, because this is what this world is trying to let all of us do." Madison denies what she said and sadly answers.

"I know, you don't want me to become a killer, you want me to stop killing at every chance and look for other ways to do things," Paul says resting his forehead with hers.

"Yes, because it will become easier and easier, and at some point you will not value life anymore. I don't want you to lose yourself, babe," Madison says to his eyes with infinite motherly love.

"I do value life Mom, I do. My family's life and after them, the people of trust in our group. That's why I kill with no remorse on my mind, because by doing so, I am helping myself and all of them. Today I avoided one bad ending that could have been a reality. I don't want to think about what would have happened if I hadn't done it," Paul says smiling, not regretting anything.

"All choices done on this boat and people left behind to me were right choices. Yes. I helped with Jake and Alex because their situation was different from those three people who came forcibly onto our boat. The other two were in a dire situation and they did not act like those three at all. I had a choice I could make with them, those three imposed their own choice boarding the boat as they liked and trying to move as if they were right doing so in the middle of the night. The situation and the method were different." Paul explains further his thoughts.

"So I acted as I found fit for the situation. While I can kill anyone with no remorse who is a danger to us, I don't take pleasure in that and they deserved it." Paul says ending the matter.

"I'm sorry, it wasn't my intention to make you feel that way or judge you. It's my fault." Madison looks guilty now at Paul and kisses his lips to try to ease him.

"It's not your fault, it's no one's fault, it's this damn world..." Paul closed his eyes trying to rest a little. If it wasn't for that he would be a happy millionaire enjoying both his sisters for all his life and maybe his mother too. Now he enjoys it all but in a more dangerous world.

"Rest for a while, I will ask Strand to do the watch so you can go to sleep with us in bed... And relax you while we are in it." Madison deeply kissed his lips and went away.

Alicia and Claire took the opportunity and got on his chest from both sides. They started wandering their hands all over his body. With Claire ending resting her hand over his cock through his pants.

"You did nothing wrong," Alicia says while kissing his neck and caressing his chest with her hand beneath his shirt.

"We are the ones wrong, we shouldn't have talked to that guy on the radio, it got us in this trouble," Claire says a little depressed and at the same time she was pumping slowly his brother's cock in her hand, making it wake up from its slumber.

"It wasn't only you talking to him, we were too," Andrea appeared along with Amy.

"He lied to us all the time with baits to get what he wanted," Amy says while embracing Paul from his back, resting his head on her soft tits as a soft pillow.

"Damn him." Claire cursed while moving faster her hand.

"That bitch deserved it, she is the same kind as the other two or worse." Andrea spats while kneeling between Paul's legs, intending to take over Claire's hand at some point, but first, she will delight in his heavy balls.

Paul doesn't comment more about that, not caring about the pregnant woman or the child on her or anything else, he was more interested in the pleasure his women were giving him with them four acting at the same time. "This night would be a cold one."