Two weeks. That’s the amount of time that has passed since that meeting with Blake and Gale. Time surely flies past when your threatened with death and even with the death of your fake girlfriend.

Since then, we’ve been busting down doors of every dealer in the Syndicate. From Croydon to Barking and then to Ealing. We’ve been investigating, interrogating and finding potential leads that’ll lead to where the Madness leaks were happening.

In all that time, we found that it wasn’t just Tyrese dealing with the Russians, it was also other dealers and their area officers, like myself, were kept in the dark. I also surprisingly found out that the Syndicate, Mr Smith’s organisation, believes that I was a Russian spy sent to kill his son. That information was good news, even though I found it bizarre, it meant the Syndicate believes the Russians to be behind his killing. This good news also brought me an opportunity, how can I put the blame on the Russians entirely and completely clear mine.

Me and Bagley have been trying to formulate a strategy for the past two weeks and we’ve reached a conclusion. I will need to impersonate a Russian and commit a false flag. But what that false flag is going to be like is still a mystery.

“We’ll need to hit a high value target, something that is off Immense value that’ll completely shift the warlords marbles, that he’ll be out for lots of blood,” suggested Bagley from the backseat of the car. Blake couldn’t see him, neither hear him, which allowed him the luxury to freely speak to me whenever he wanted, which sometimes got annoying.

I was sitting next to Blake, who was in drivers’ seat, taking me to a location he wouldn’t tell me. He told me that we were going to meet Gale, then I simply grunted in response, like Don would’ve done. Also, over the past two weeks Donna has been helping me in perfecting Don’s mannerism, body language and speech to perfectly mimic him. I had this certain fear that I’d be found out if I come across someone who knew Don, so to combat it I’ve been becoming more like Don everyday, and Blake seems to buy it.

Within the hour we reached a location outside of London. It was a road off the motorway, then off that road on a dirt trail, to an area deep into the forest where we found two defenders waiting for us, along with armed men and Gale, slightly pissed off.

“You were supposed to be here twenty minutes ago,” he said, annoyance in his tone.

“Oh, I’m sorry your highness, we didn’t know that instead of an address you were going to send longitude and latitude coordinates.”

He sighed. “The place I’m taking you to requires secrecy.” Then the men pulled blindfolds from the car.

“Really,” I said in an annoyed tone.

“Yes, really, now put on the blindfold and get inside the fucking car, moron.”

One of these days, I was going to kill this bastard and devour his soul. I just hope that day is not far from today.

I put on the blindfold and entered the car. I could her Blake mumbling something as he sat next to me. I couldn’t hear Gale though, which means that he was probably in the other car.

As the car moved forward, a thought entered my mind. This place he’s taking us, it’s secretive. Meaning it’s valuable. So it’ll be a high value target.

“Bagley, how good is your memory,” I said, with an Idea in my mind.

He pulled funky glasses out of nowhere and put and them on. “Define good? Does memorising the name of 1.3 million planets, the trillions of species contained within the planets and the billions of geographical locations within the planet count as having a good memory?”

“Uh...yes?”

“Then yes I have a good memory, what do you need from me?”

“I want you to memorise our entire journey. The road, the locations, any historical site. I have feeling we’ll need to visit this place on our own..”

He nodded then phased through the roof of the car. He only came back when we reached the location and I was escorted out of the car.

“You would not believe what we just found Zak,” he said, as they removed my blindfold.

In stood in a clearing of trees and in front of me stood a warehouse, a massive warehouse. That housed dozens of trucks that were unloading crates onto belts on the right side. The other side of the warehouse was men loading crates into the trucks. Then there was security, lots and lots of security. Heavily armed men carrying rifles, some RPGs and even a few vehicles with mounted turrets. If I didn’t know any better, this was a small private army protecting this place.

We began walking and Gale began explaining what was happening. “This is the first of three sites, this is where Madness is delivered in the rawest forms. White powder like Coke, but it has a glint to it that differentiates it. It comes to us via flights. The air strip is just behind the warehouse.”

As soon as he said this, a plane flew over us so low, that it caused Blake to flinch. I, remained unfazed. The plane most likely landed at the air strip Gale talked about, seeing as it hearing the sound of very large breaks stopping.

We walked past trucks unloading crates. They ordinary crates with nothing stamped on them, except a black star in the middle.

“Madness is offloaded from the plane, hauled into trucks and brought here where they’re offload and unloaded onto belts,” he explained as we walked deeper into the facility.

“Then workers unload it, put it through the belt again, it travels in the factory where machinery clear’s out the impurities and then we ship it in different container boxes ready to be shipped out again.”

“Where is it headed,” I asked quisitively.

“I’m getting to that, but first, you need to do the job why I brought you here. I’m going to bring you to a room, where I will bring all of the workers and I want you to interrogate them. Find out if they’re working for the Russians. As much as it pains me to say, but thanks to you both we have found a number of traitors. Though the leaking of Madness still happens, and I suspect there are a few more traitors in this site and others as well.”

“Others,” said Blake.

“Two to be specific, refinement facility and packaging facility.”

“Why can’t all of the process be done in one entire facility.”

I chimed in. “I suspect to prevent contamination and meet demand. The product needs to be pure, so it makes sense doing it in three different facilities, to avoid contamination and I suspect this product is very sensitive and because the size of each facility is huge, you’ll also be meeting demand.”

They both looked at me in surprise. “You actually said something useful for the first time,” said Blake, surprised.

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“Fuck off,” I replied.

But he snickered in response. The Gale clapped his hands. “Attention, stop messing around and do what I brought you here to do job.”

“Then lead us to the fucking room asshole,” I snapped. But then I quickly realised I made a mistake. I shouldn’t have snapped at him so loudly and this sentiment was reciprocated by everyone. Workers, drivers, machine operators. They all dropped what they were doing and looked at the scene unfolding in front of them. Internally I was thinking I’ll be forced to blow my cover, overtly I stood my ground. I faced him down. There was anger in his eyes and it was waiting to erupt.

“You know, I think you’ve gotten a bit too cocky being Don, just relax a bit Zak,” advised Bagley.

But I couldn’t focus on him, when Gale slowly moved forward. His pace slow and it build up a kind of anticipation that slowly kills a man. Not me though, I knew what it was. A threat. I’ve seen him do it a few times to a few people, who got big for their boots.

“The only reason I tolerate an insect like you is because Mr Smith deems you worthy enough. However, they day you stop being useful to him is the day I ground you like the insect you are.” Then he walked away, his footsteps echoing in the facility and people slowly begin working again.

“A little less assholery and being more quiet should keep your head on Don,” said Blake, passing by, following Gale.

My anger dissipated; a small smirk plastered all over my face. He couldn’t do nothing to me. Not when I’m still useful to Mr Smith and I plan on being useful for him. Just until I’ve figured out a way to escape him.

I then followed Blake, and we entered into the room. It was a small room, table in the middle with two chairs for us and one chair for the guys we’ll be interviewing.

Then the interrogations began as Gale’s men began bringing in workers. Drivers, workers, electricians. We interrogated everyone within the facility, there was no one we didn’t interrogate. My investigation skill came in handy, as I was able to notice the finer details. Such as a driver we caught that pocketed raw Madness into a sachet. His fingers had small amounts of Madness that he tried very hard to wash via soap and water, yet some of it still stayed and it made his fingers glittery. Why was this surprising? Because Drivers never touched Madness, it was the workers who did it. Their job was just to deliver the product, the workers had the right equipment to handle it.

We caught another one using the same skill. An electrician stole raw Madness and tried to hide it in his locker. He used a non-stick box, which I didn’t even know existed. When I went to check it out, I couldn’t see any traces on the outside, except for the hinges. He tried downplaying it saying it that he was fixing one of the Madness machines and Madness stuck to his hand, but that was weird, because if he touched Madness there’d be a slight glitter, even after washing it with soap for hours. His explanation sent alarm bells ringing and I tried to look in his locker, but he got defensive about it, which only confirmed my suspicion, and when I forced my way into the locker, he broke into a sprint, but he shot in the leg by Blake and caught.

But it didn’t stop there, we caught even more people and the number of people caught by the time the sun went down, rose to seven. Seven workers tried to steal Madness. Once they were caught, I asked Blake what they were going to do about that, though I had a small inkling of what was going to happen, I’m not stupid. I just wanted to believe that they were going to live.

The gunshots in that rang in the next room, put all my doubts to end. These people are ruthless to the very end.

“You’ll have to get used to this. It’s how it works in most establishments of this kind,” he said, probably his way of comforting me.

I accepted what he said, if I want to survive, it’s either me or them, though there’s a small part of me, that wants everyone to live.

Once that business was finished, Gale led us outside, me and Blake and we entered a small conversation, about our findings.

“Lot’s of traitors, but no Russians,” I said, faking disappointment.

Blake thought for a moment, “Either way, seven men. That’s a lot of traitors, you guys seriously need to tighten your security and who you induct.”

“That’s nothing to be concerned,” said Gale with a tinge of arrogance. “You just need to focus on finding the Russian traitors, but so far you’ve found none. Clock is ticking.”

It seems his words pissed of Blake. “We didn’t find Russian traitors, because there are none. Maybe the Syndicate overestimates itself?”

“Watch it, otherwise you’ll be joining this insect as well,” he pointed to me.

I ignored him. He just likes to say provocative stuff to get a reaction and then establish his dominance and when I didn’t give him his desired reaction, he simply gave me an arrogant smirk.

“You know, let’s not save his soul for later, let’s do it,” said Bagley.

As much as I would love to do that, I had a far bigger picture in mind than his simple quick death. I ignored the bickering from the two people and looked at the facility.

“We’re going to pay this place another visit soon.”

Then as the bickering subsided. Gale and Blake, tore away to go talk in private. The mood changed somehow. I could sense it and it was further confirmed when Blake got in car first and left.

I walked up to Gale, who watched on as the car left. “why did he leave without me?”

He didn’t answer the question and a punch to my stomach came. It was a strong and powerful one. I was surprised by myself as I fell over. I didn’t realise that after consuming this many souls, I’d still be weak.

A hook hit my temple, and I fell to the ground face first. There he mercilessly kicked me. His kicks were strong and powerful, and I struggled to defend myself against him, until he finally finished.

Every part of my body hurt, my ribs, torso, legs. There wasn’t a part that wasn’t buried and cut. I could slowly feel my mask slipping, I felt like I was becoming Zak again. I held on, pushed past the pain to control my breathing and control the shapeshift.

Gale grabbed my neck and began choking me with one hand. I struggled to break free, as I wondered how strong he was be? This was beyond the strength of a normal human being.

“You ever, speak like that to me, in front of everyone. Your dead. You and your girl both, are gone. Do you understand?”

I struggled to nod or speak, seeing as the grip of his hand on my throat only grew stronger. He leaned in. “Do you fucking understand?”

I pushed past his grip and nodded. Then he let go and I fell again, this time to catch my breath, by taking large breaths and occasionally coughing.

His men didn’t give me enough time to continue catching my breath as they picked me up and hauled me into the SUV and drove away.

“Honestly, I thought you were faking it, until he began kicking mercilessly for far too long.”

“He was strong. His punches felt like bullets,” I replied wheezing, as softly as possible even though it hurt.

“Despite the fact that you’re as strong as 25 men?”

I nodded, then brought up my profile.

Profile:

Name: Zakir Osman

Class: Apostle of the Death Lord.

Lesser Souls: 9

Normal Souls: 2

Greater Souls:

Absorbed Souls: 24

Abilities

* Gun Expert (E) > Gun (C)

* Investigation (B)

* Defensive tactics (C)

* Knife Expert (C)

* Soul Mirage (C)

* Soul Drain (C)

Bagley’s concerns were right. I was now strong as 25 men. I could easily kill any normal human being without breaking a sweat. Gale being able to beat me down, means he’s stronger than 25 men and that creates more questions as to who he actually was. He wasn’t human, that’s for sure. Though was he like me….an Apostle? I looked at Bagley and he understood the question.

“Maybe, maybe not. I’m not sure. We have no way of knowing until he reveals it to us. We don’t know whose Apostle he is, which clan he belongs to. We’ll have to wait till he reveals his secret. But forget that for now.” He waived his hand. “You need to hit that factory soon. We can’t delay it any longer.”

He was right, I can’t keep this façade up any longer. Eventually someone will catch on that Don isn’t really Don, so for the time being, I want to give them something else to focus on.