"Same with those 7 or 8 little insects inside that alien's foot."
He must have some kind of dedicated vision if he can already see Parasites inside of others. Although the [Night Vision] Will used to have in his other life wasn't as versatile as his current one, it was much more effective at Category 0 than what he currently had.
Will took another look at Jacques. Although he doesn't concern himself with politics back at Hope, he sure chose the time to corner me on the subject. This man in front of him would likely become someone in the future.
"That sounds like a very interesting discovery." Norman said.
Will let out a sigh as he looked around the room at all the people staring at him. It seemed he had no way of out this one. "Fine. Since you know that much already, there's no point hiding it." Will turned to look at Norman. "But before I say anything, though, I want to know why you came back."
"It sounded like you were in trouble over the radio, and there was so much shooting afterwards. You're lucky we left last, I'd imagine the others were already out of range by the time the shooting started, or maybe they heard but ignored it." Norman shrugged.
Will gazed at Norman, trying to discern if he was genuine or not.
"You don't trust us?" Norman asked, showing a bit of discomfort with the scrutiny.
"I don't."
"Why not? I don't believe I've ever given you a reason not to."
Norman was right. He had never given Will any reason to doubt him. If anything, he had been nothing but friendly, at least in this timeline, but Will obviously couldn't tell him the truth. "Because you're with Nirvana."
"Ah...I see now." Norman nodded in understanding. "Then how about I prove my sincerity? Did you know that Vance had your jeep bugged?"
"So he was the one trying to break into my car..." That piece of news surprised Will slightly. If anyone, he thought it would have been the two standing before him—who had showed their interest in him.
"Oh? It seems he wasn't as covert as he thought he was."
"Oh...ahem, that would be me." Jacques coughed into his fist in embarrassment. "I was trying to get a better look at that worm you hid in there."
"In any case, that device on your jeep will transmit its location to this receiver if it's within 250 meters." Norman took out a small device from his pocket, and activated it. After sending a transparent dome of rainbow out, a line of rainbow returned from the direction of his car, and the display on the device pointed in the same direction. Norman then dropped the device to the floor and crushed it under his boot. "I was supposed to wait for you and follow you back to your home."
"Why did he do it?" Will asked.
"That's because you gave a fake location."
"You guys went out of your way to check up on us." Will surmised.
"Of course. Joseph's goal is to build up Nirvana, find allies, and recruit capable people to help fortify his position, especially now that he's learned about the whole 'rebirth' business. The fact that you can brave the streets of Toronto instead of holing up at home shows how capable you are." Norman explained.
"So he wants to be a president or something?" Jacques asked.
"That's the plan. In fact, while we were all here, he should have been out recruiting the people from the other places."
"People actually go along with him?" Donny spoke up.
"Why not?" Norman shrugged. "He's providing everyone a normal life inside of Nirvana."
"What are his plans for Hope?" Jacques inquired.
"Why don't you ask your two leaders? I'm not sure on the details but he made separate agreements with both of them."
Jacques scrunched his brows together when he heard that.
"How does he recruit people exactly?" Donny questioned.
"By any means necessary." Norman said with a hint of steel in his voice. "But I believe his playbook this time is to release that dog we captured into the building those people are holed up in and then coincidentally come in as the 'savior' after it's made a mess."
"And then he'll bring up how unsafe the building is and take them over to Nirvana." Will added.
Norman nodded. "But he probably had a surprise this time around, because one group left early, and also because of what you took." Norman said, hinting at Will to explain what he promised.
They suddenly heard gunshots echoing in the distance.
"Looks like they ran into a bit of trouble." Jacques said, looking in the direction Noah and Jerry had just left.
"Alright...then, I'll make this quick. You probably have some guesses of your own. We found this out by accident but..." Will only explained the most basic things on what a parasite did. Surface information that some organizations and lucky individuals were currently finding out around the world right now.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
"So some of these special insects somehow transfer their abilities over to their host?" Norman held his chin.
"Amazing..." Jacques muttered.
"Then how come you and Donny aren't turning into walking insects?" Jason asked.
Will shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it has to do with the fact that that ant man out there has almost a dozen ants inside it?"
"Then if we take those ants for ourselves, wouldn't we also be able to display some of that power?" Jacques said with desire in his eyes.
"I'm all for it." Norman quickly agreed
"Sure." The giant man beside him nodded. "Better than becoming a cannibal."
"Let's do it." Jason also agreed.
"You'll have to count us out." Gerald declined after exchanging glances with his neighbours. They were in no condition to fight, and Gerald didn't seem too interested in the Parasite.
After the other two members on Jacques' team agreed, everyone turned to Will and Donny.
"I'll stay here and look after the injured." Donny said, looking at the resting Karen.
"I'm in." Will accepted. He wanted to keep an eye on Norman.
The world's most common Parasite wasn't particularly attractive to him. With it, at most, they would be able to exude pheromones to communicate with ants—which would require a special permit in the future because of how widespread this Parasite becomes and how large some ants will grow, and climb walls—if they placed the Parasite in the right location.
But the super strength they were expecting to receive wouldn't be as pronounced as they imagined. Most of an ant's strength came from their exoskeleton and the shape of their bodies as well as their small size. So unless they were planning to amass several ant Parasites and become similar to that human ant, there wasn't much to gain from these Parasites. Doing that would also greatly slow down any progress towards the next evolution.
This particular species wasn't even capable of chemical attacks, making it an E-rank Parasite. If anything, Will would prefer the corpse. But he could think of a way to use it if he had one, especially before the government starts controlling the wildlife population around the city.
"Perfect, there's 7 of us and possibly 7 of the ants." Jacques smiled.
Will wasn't surprised that the human ant out there found so many ant Parasites. It either must have attracted more Parasites after the first one with the pheromone ability it gained or it stumbled upon a supercolony.
"You said there might be 8. What happens if that's the case?" Norman asked.
"Then we can draw lots or something."
"But you have the largest group here." A frown appeared on Norman's face as he argued.
It's already starting. Will shook his head. This same situation would be the cause for many conflicts in the future.
"How about we give the last one to our biology student?" Norman proposed, greatly surprising Will. "He did supply us with this information after all, even if we had to force it out of him."
"He also injured the ant already, and the three of them contributed a lot earlier." Jacques nodded in the direction of Donny and Karen. "I can agree to that."
"How do we catch it?" Jason asked.
"I have an idea." Will proposed.
----------------------------------------
They waited by the windows of the lobby on the first floor as Jason operated Will's drone to fly around and search for the human ant. Will approached Norman—who was checking over his rifle.
"Why are you doing this?" Will asked.
"What do you mean?" Norman put his rifle down.
"Why betray Joseph and why are you really back here."
Norman stared into Will's eyes for a couple seconds before speaking up. "I never really bought into his whole vision."
"I can tell, you never used the words 'rebirth'."
"Ah, looks like I have to be careful with that." Norman nodded, he paused before continuing. "I really did come back here to help. But I also came back to find more corpses—the rotten ones that no one wanted."
"Why go so far?" Will pressed.
"I have a wife and little boy. They went over to Vancouver to visit family for the summer, while I was stuck here for work. I had been working on gathering people within Nirvana to make the dangerous trip over. But when I found out about the powers we can gain, and now with this new info on the special insects." Norman gave Will a nod of gratitude. "I believe I can leave right after we deal with this ant problem."
The Norman in front of Will was so different from what he had expected. Will had a guess at what happened to the Norman in his other life. He very likely lost his family and then went off the deep end afterwards.
Will understood. He knew that if anything ever happened to Sara, he'd probably end up the same as the other Norman did. He'd tear the world apart to get revenge.
Any intent he had to kill the man in front of him disappeared at that moment.
"I hope you find them." Will held out his hand.
"Thank you." Norman said as they shook hands.
"The name is Will, by the way. William Lee."
"Norman Donovan."
As for the question on whether Norman's family was alive or not, Will would have to check up on Norman when he stopped by Vancouver on his way to Hong Kong in the near future. If Norman's family wasn't alive, then Will would have no choice but to put him down.
"Found it!" Jason suddenly spoke up, causing everyone to spur into action.
They followed Jason outside and out of the complex towards the woods nearby. Although the ant was now blind, it still had its antenna that can pickup the chemical trails it had left behind which it must have used to retreat all this way.
They found it shambling through the woods and quickly surrounded the ant.
Bang!
After throwing a flashbang and causing it to run around in a daze with its face covered with its only working arm, everyone surrounded the ant and extended a rope between each other. It soon came in the direction of Norman and the giant man, and tripped over the rope that they held.
A net that Will kept for situations like this was toss over the fallen ant as it screeched and flailed wildly but still made sure to keep its face covered. The entire group ran around in circles, tying up the ant. Although it cut apart some of the net and rope, but it still ended up getting heavily tangled up.
The giant man approached from its bottom side with a fire axe in hand and put his entire body into a massive swing.
Crack.
He just cracked the chitin on the ant's leg. The ant went into a frenzy as it began swinging in his direction forcing him to back up and everyone to pull on the ropes binding the ant.
"Looks like you'll have to act, in the end." The giant man shook his head and handed Will the fire axe.
After the ant calmed down, Will carefully approached its bottom side and charged up a powerful strike. With a burst of energy, the fire axe soon fell.
Thud!
The ant's left foot was cleanly severed from its leg and the axe was embedded into the ground.
"Now that is completely ridiculous." Norman remarked at the contrast between the effectiveness of the attacks by Will and a man twice his size.
Will slowly backed away, feeling like he had agitated his wound. Everyone also kept their distance and watched as it struggled while keeping an eye out for any other zeroes. About a minute later, the ant finally untangled itself but its exoskeleton was slowly separating from its body. With the constant harassment from everyone, 3 minutes later, the first of its shell fell to the ground.
Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang!
Bang! Bang!
Bullets followed right after, and soon, the human ant also fell.