The giant convoy travelled the streets of Toronto, attracting a good deal of attention from people holed up in their homes and even more from zeroes along the way. A few people in the convoy had hung up signs on the side of their vehicle telling any onlookers to check to their water in a few days and to spread the word.

There was a vanguard team that went ahead of the convoy to clear the way, allowing them to make the trip without too many stops.

Later that morning, they arrived at a spacious complex south of the city that overlooked Lake Ontario. The problem was as expected, the complex was overflowing with zeroes. From where they sat on the road, overlooking the complex, it looked like a busy hive of activity as the zeroes crowded around various pools filled with wastewater.

"Are they actually drinking that shit water?" Vance said through his binoculars. Since Joseph was back in Nirvana, he was in charge of their group.

"I'm surprised they don't drop dead from falling sick." Jacques added.

Noah looked like he wanted to abandon the assignment of securing the meat that Anne had likely given to him.

"Maybe it has something to do with being reborn?" One of the younger men posed.

"How about testing that theory once we secure the facility?" Vance countered.

"Ugh, no thanks."

Vance turned to the crowd. "Alright, people, we've got our work cut out for us. Let's get to it."

"It's gonna be a long day." Karen said.

There was a large field of grass in front of the complex. After retrieving the tools they had brought, everyone worked together to dig into the field and fill up burlap bags full of dirt, while a few others were on guard duty to deal with any stragglers.

In about an hour and a half, they created a fortified position that ran along the length of the field, with a narrow ditch in front to give them a high ground advantage.

By the time they finished, many zeroes were already starting to wander their way, attracted by the dead corpses of the stragglers.

And thus started a long day of stabbing at zeroes that constantly rushed at them non-stop, trying to climb up their makeshift fortifications. When someone was tired, they swapped with another person who was resting. Everyone participated other than Gerald—who was sleeping in one of the vehicles to prepare for a very long shift.

They found that some animals that could easily bypass the fortification were annoying to deal with, especially the flying ones.

There was one scare about half an hour into the slog.

"Super zombie!" A man screamed as a Category 1 zero unexpectedly climbed up the fortification with unnatural speed and finesse and lunged on top of the man.

The person resting behind the man—who happened to be the giant man, charged at the zero and knocked it off the man. Before it could recover, several shotguns and assault rifles were emptied onto the zero. Although many of the shots only left flesh wounds on the zero, it was hit in vulnerable areas multiple times and the zero was soon put down.

After that incident, people were much more vigilant and ready to call out anything that looked threatening.

Thwack.

Will swung his Halligan bar and knocked a larger than average raven to the ground. The raven had reacted last minute and dodged the sharp pike of the weapon. It instantly recovered, rolling away and distancing itself from him before taking flight again.

"Super zombie!" Will called out and pointed at the raven.

A few people stepped forward and aimed their firearms at it, taking a couple shots, but the clever raven quickly dove after taking a few shots and disappeared when it took cover behind the other zeroes.

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Will turned his attention back to Norman who seemed interested in where the raven had gone.

He had been keeping his eye on the man the entire time, but other than patrol the area behind them to look out for any zeroes that might be attracted from else where, Norman showed no suspicious movements.

Half a day later, the amount of zeroes coming to attack them decreased to the point that they could finally relax.

"We'll take a break before we move into the complex. Anyone spot that raven super zombie again?" Vance asked, but received no confirmation. "Then we should keep an eye out for it when we move in."

As they were taking a break, there was a small commotion off to the side. When Will went to see what was going on, he found Donny being confronted by a man he recognized from Jerry's group. Will could roughly guess what was happening when he saw Donny with his phone out.

"I told you to delete it!" The man said angrily.

"Dude, you need to relax. It's just a video." Donny said.

"I don't want my face on the internet!"

"I can just blur your face out. In case you haven't noticed, it's not like we have any power, I won't be able to upload it for a couple months, maybe even years."

"What's going on?" Jerry and Jacques arrived to break it up, with Vance coming in right after. After they received an explanation of the situation, Jerry turned to Donny. "Why not just delete the video? We need everyone on the same page, and you should be focusing on the plan ahead of us."

Will noticed Karen and a few of the younger people from the other groups at the side, covertly putting away their phones.

"It's not a big deal." Jacques said, gesturing at the group on the side taking a smoke break. "Everyone has their own way of dealing with the stress."

"Yeah, I don't see what the problem is?" Noah stepped up to aid Donny but from the way he was looking down at Jerry, it was clear he had an agenda. "He said he would blur the faces out, it's nothing to get worked up over."

Jerry looked over to Vance for backup.

Vance crossed his arms. "I only care about results. I've been watching as everyone were clearing the zombies, and the kid did a hell of a job. You should all get your rest before we storm the complex, I want everyone at 100%."

Jerry took a breath to calm himself down. "Alright..."

As the crowd broke up and everyone went back to their breaks, Jerry turned to look at Jacques and Noah. "So this is how it's going to be?"

"I think you're misunderstanding something, Jerry." Jacques said.

"I don't think so. You said that you wanted to remain neutral, but now you're taking sides."

"I'm not taking anyone's side. It was only a harmless video, for Christ’s sake. You're blowing it out of proportion. Perhaps, you should cool your head a bit first."

Jerry took one last look at Jacques and Noah before walking away.

Before Noah could say anything, Jacques turned to him. "I don't know what you and Anne are up to but I don't want any part of it." He said before walking away.

"What just happened?" Karen asked Will as she drew close to him.

"I don't know. It looks like people are starting to play games." Will said, his attention still on Norman. The man had been following the entire scene closely. Norman suddenly turned his head and looked in Will's direction, giving him a smile and a nod. "Don't let your guard down when we go in."

Karen turned and teased Donny who approached the two of them. "Thanks for taking one for the team."

"Not sure why he singled me out from everyone else."

"That's cause you were the loudest."

After the break, the group moved into the complex, sweeping the entire grounds before clearing out each building one by one. Even after clearing everything, they couldn't find the raven from earlier in the day.

Once they couldn't find any more signs of zeroes, they drove all the vehicles into the complex. Will and a couple others had to apron and glove up, and begin dragging out all the bodies from the complex out to the field. It was especially tedious pulling bodies out of the pools and tanks full of wastewater and scum.

The rest were either patrolling the area or following a well-rested Gerald's instructions as they fixed or replaced parts and cleaned things up to ready the facility for operation.

When they were just about finished moving all the bodies and Will noticed that Norman's patrol had taken him to the other side of the complex, he grabbed his kit and went to a few bodies he had marked earlier. After cutting into them, Will found a couple duds but from one of the bodies, he found a 35 cm long white worm—a tapeworm Parasite.

Although this Parasite was only D-rank, it was a useful Parasite that aided digestion. Because of its length, it wouldn't be placed under the skin like how the other Parasites were. The tapeworm would go in its usual spot in the intestinal tract, where it would feed off of nutrients there, instead of feeding off of its host's blood. This would allow the host to eat more, thus, speeding up their evolution if they had access to enough evolved food.

This was something that Will needed, so he was glad to find it.

While Will was rapidly packing away the Parasite, he was approached by another person on patrol.

"What are you doing?" Jacques asked.

"Just taking a few samples."

"Even out here? You're quite diligent." Jacques said, eyeing the duffle bag that Will had quickly tucked the container with the Parasite inside. "Have you found anything out from the sample last time?"

"Nothing new." Will shook his head.

"That's a shame." Jacques finally took his eyes off the bag. "Welp, we should head back in. They're about ready for the facility to go online."

"Alright." Will said, standing up, grabbing his bag, and walking back to the complex. As he went to his car to put the bag away, Will glanced at Jacques' retreating back.

He suspects something.