The drone that had been sent from Birmingham would take a while to arrive, but everyone was surprised that such an unmanned military vehicle was being used in this operation.
"Zz… We are above your position, checking more closely. Targets found, there is a shelter less than five hundred meters from your position, showing images."
On the screen, a shelter appeared before their eyes, guarded by armed men, and it was clear that many people were living in that place.
"It can't be…"
A shelter, very large and with numerous people, appeared in this place. Moreover, nothing stopped them from imagining that this group was the one who had attacked Jason's group.
"Zz… Central, what are your orders?"
"Zz… You have to wait, over."
…
"Captain, look!"
A soldier, who had been paying attention to the surrounding situation, immediately noticed the anomaly of the soldiers patrolling outside. When he saw that a large group of people was coming, he ran toward Jack and shouted.
Hearing the shout, Jack straightened immediately, frowning deeply, not understanding what was happening.
At that moment, in the parking lot, they were the only convoy preparing to leave the area. Needless to say, everyone knew that this group of people could somehow be coming for them.
"Are we exposed?!"
This thought flashed through his mind instantly but was quickly dismissed by him.
Jack had already made the points of this operation very clear to others; if they were suddenly exposed before the commander's group arrived, it wouldn't be good for anyone.
"They're coming directly toward us, they possibly saw us on the way to this place," Emma said nervously as she put on her gear.
"Listen, the enemy knows where we are but doesn't know how many of us there are, that's our advantage! Besides, we have air support that can armor up and help a lot to buy time and escape if things go bad."
"Yes, sir."
Besides, he believed he had some understanding of the character of these people from what he had seen so far.
Even Emma, who was in the group, had been observing the behavior of these people for at least three hours and they had never done anything bad.
"Now all we can do is say that we are not enemies and we are just passing through…"
Seeing that the team gathered for unknown reasons was approaching, Jack couldn't help but feel nervous, and even his palms began to sweat.
The others weren't much better; they all stood stunned, not knowing what to do at this moment.
"Relax, they may not be here to catch us!"
Perhaps because he noticed the changes in the others, Jack thought to himself that he could not allow himself to panic at this moment. He had to calm down even more and quickly made a sound to carefully remind the others around him.
Hearing his soft shout, Emma and the others instantly came to their senses, adjusted their state immediately, and continued doing their own tasks as if nothing had happened.
The car leading the convoy from that unknown shelter slowly stopped in front of the house where Jack and his people were, and the armed men stopped in an orderly formation from left to right, surrounding the front part of the building where Jack was.
These actions put Jack's people on high alert, who were already holding many weapons on the second floor, ready to fire if there were any sign of enemy attack.
Emma and the others immediately stopped what they were doing and quickly walked to stand behind Jack.
But no one noticed that when the convoy was surrounding the front of the building, the faces of the soldiers were a bit nervous.
"Stay here, Emma and you come with me." Jack only took two people including himself and walked toward the door, which was being knocked on at that moment.
Click!
After a moment of opening the door, a middle-aged Caucasian man in colorful clothing jumped out of a car when he saw the door open, casually looked at the building, and walked toward Jack.
Jack observed the middle-aged man approaching him, looked at the colorful uniform the old man was wearing, and then realized that beneath that uniform were military plates, and Jack never would have thought that this old man was military.
Although Jack was slightly surprised, it was only for a moment; after all, he was on a mission right now and needed to act normally.
"Greetings, sir!"
When the old man approached him, Jack immediately gave a military salute and then remained silent, waiting for the man's next words.
With his hands behind his back, the middle-aged man looked Jack up and down and then looked at Emma and the others behind him.
He did not speak until he saw the guarded look on the soldier's face behind Jack and said, "I'm Reginald. Hello, soldier. I heard a rumor going around these streets, so my curiosity is quite strong. Who are you?"
Not understanding why the man would say such a thing, Jack responded in an expressionless and formulaic manner: "It seems you have us confused with someone else, sir. We were only resting in this place before moving on. If something happened, I hope you won't confuse us with your attackers."
"Well, I like what you're saying."
As if he didn't expect Jack to say that, Reginald nodded with satisfaction and said with appreciation, "It would be great if other people thought like you, but there's a misunderstanding I want to resolve peacefully…"
"Out of the way, out of the way."
At that moment, a sharp voice suddenly rang out from outside the crowd, and then five or six soldiers squeezed in from outside. The leader was a short white man with a flat head, and his name was Julio, one of those leading the people outside.
Julio had originally been dominant in the community he served.
Not long ago, it seemed, one of the squads under his command had been attacked and most of them killed, and now hearing that a group was resting in this place, he came to ask some questions.
So, without even thinking, he rushed in with some of his "loyal" men.
"Hello, gentlemen, I'm also Julio and I live in a community not far from here."
Julio, who had arrived at the scene, saw Reginald.
Wanting to avoid causing more problems than they already had with other groups, and now seeing Julio's arrogance—who had heard rumors that he had allied with a certain special group—Reginald frowned, his eyes full of disgust, but his voice didn't change at all.
"Do you need something?"
Maybe because he was used to being dominant before, and had been protected by his immediate superiors, he was very good at observing words and actions. The very sly Julio, at this moment, seemed to notice Reginald's expression, so he said, "I received a report from someone who saw a strange group in this place, I only came to see if it was safe."
Reginald didn't even look at Julio directly, only glanced sideways at him. He didn't understand how someone like him became a captain under someone else's arrangement. It seems that after returning, he will have to make the people under his command check this thoroughly.
But since he came here with a mission today, he didn't want to cause trouble, so he said lightly, "We live in the same community, but you should focus on your work and don't cause me more problems. Go do your job."
"Huh?"
Julio didn't expect his "good intentions" to be perceived like this by the other party. He had to know that when he behaved arrogantly, Reginald never said anything—so why was it different now that his group had been almost wiped out?
"Sir, you don't need to be polite with these unknown men. After all, we don't know if they're friendly or our enemies; nowadays, we have to be cautious of strangers."
Jack didn't expect Julio to be so obsessed with causing trouble after seeing Reginald's clear attitude of rejection, and he thought that these people weren't bad.
"It seems you didn't take my words seriously!" Julio was a man who killed people—rumors said so in the community they belonged to—but after all, the only reason he led was because of his brutality, yet now he had lost power since his group was mostly wiped out.
Since they already had enough enemies, Reginald didn't want more problems with unknown forces. "Captain Julio, you are truly a man with a lot of guts!"
Hearing that cold voice, Julio trembled all over, and his mind instantly came back to reality. Seeing the solemn situation around him, he suddenly realized how stupid his behavior was at that moment.
Pretending to act reasonable, he forced himself to appear calm, forced a small smile, placed his palm on his chest, rubbed it back and forth several times, and said, "Sir… sir, I'm not seeing the real situation we're in. I'll leave right now."
While saying that, he lifted his gaze and looked coldly at Jack.
"You were told to leave!"
Seeing that Julio had made his own decision, Reginald, who originally only wanted to give him a small lesson, became even angrier. The group of armed men looked at each other and all nodded.
Hearing the voice behind him, Julio, who had originally wanted to gather more information about the people Reginald was visiting so openly, turned around and said, "Sir, we don't know them, it could be dange— wait! What are you doing?"
But before Julio could finish speaking, two men who had been standing next to Reginald approached him. Each grabbed one of his arms and pushed his body down without any explanation.
The force used was so great that Julio, who usually prided himself on enduring pain, immediately screamed, his legs giving out as he fell straight to the ground with a thud.