Chapter 313 An Invitation From Good Guy Luke
Luke shook his head with a smile. He then signaled to Samantha, and they spoke in private a few steps away. “Samantha, have you called Elizabeth?”
Stunned for a brief moment, Samantha slapped her forehead. “I forgot.”
Luke comforted her. “It’s fine. I’ll call her in the morning and tell her what happened, but she’ll be more relieved to hear from you. So, get some rest and call her in the morning, okay?”
Samantha nodded. “Thank you, Luke.”
She was feeling grateful, fortunate, scared and happy all at the same time. If her daughter hadn’t persuaded her to allow Luke and Selina to help with the case, it would’ve been hard to say if her family could have survived the disaster last night.
Looking at the six hundred residents here, Samantha knew that almost half of the town’s population was gone.
But it was a good thing that nothing happened to her children, or she would’ve broken down.
Luke nodded with a smile. “You’re welcome, but you should really thank Elizabeth, who asked for our help even though she could’ve been reprimanded for it. You have a good daughter!” He then left.
It was three in the morning, not the best time for phone calls. He would have Selina call Los Angeles in the morning.
It was already habit to leave the long-winded reports to Selina.
After speaking with Samantha, he went through the shopping center once more and took back all his equipment.
There was no way he would let the fake FBI agents take his steel wires or the cameras.
Those agents were now too busy searching the mines and rescuing residents to examine the shopping center yet; this was the best time for Luke to cover his tracks.
After that, Luke walked over to the front of the shopping center and nodded at the two agents who were guarding the entrance. “Don’t mind me, I’m just looking around.”
The agents simply nodded and remained on guard against any activity outside.
The door had been rolled up, and a lot of things could be seen through the gla.s.s doors of the shopping center.
A helicopter hovered in the sky and occasionally took potshots at the giant spiders that popped up every now and then.
Teams of agents were searching the rest of the town to see if they could find more survivors who might still be hiding. Luke shook his head slightly and stopped looking around. This town had been about to close down in the first place. After this incident, most of the residents would probably move away.
However, there might still be a way to turn things around. As he pondered this, Luke returned to the utility room. Selina was still sound asleep inside the tent.
Luke sat down on his blanket and examined his harvest from tonight.
For each resident he saved, he got twenty experience and credit points. After a night of hard work, he obtained 4,200 experience and credit points.
He was also rewarded with more than three hundred experience and credit points for miscellaneous tasks that he had accomplished.
So, he obtained more than 4,500 experience and credit points in one night. The hard work had been worth it.
Good rewards for a good guy! Luke smiled in delight. At dawn, the residents were escorted to buses and transferred to a temporary shelter in the neighboring town of Wintersburg. They couldn’t return until Boom Town was completely cleaned up.
At the shelter in Wintersburg, investigators who had already been waiting questioned the survivors one by one about what happened last night.
Luke and Selina were the very first to be questioned and also took the longest time.
Luke basically told the truth. After all, this matter was on file in LAPD, and so was Elizabeth’s birthplace.
The two agents in charge of the interview were very polite as well.
They had personally seen Luke risk his life to rescue others when the agents had still been eliminating the spiders in town.
After hours of arduous work, Luke rescued dozens of residents.
Everybody liked a hero.
But of course, if the hero had died the moment he showed up, he would’ve only ended up as a name in the casualty report and would have been easily forgotten. The questioning was finally over by noon. Luke asked the agents if he could leave.
The agents made a call and soon returned. “Detective Luke, you and Detective Selina are free to go, but I’m afraid we might have to trouble you again during our investigation in the future.”
Luke thanked them with a smile. “That’s fine. We’re in Los Angeles anyway, and you can look for us there at any time.”
They b.u.mped into Samantha on their way out.
After some thought, Luke greeted her. “Samantha, is your interview over?”
Samantha replied with a tired expression, “Yes, it is.”
Luke said, “That’s good. We’re returning to Los Angeles today.”
Samantha was surprised. “You’re leaving so soon?”
Luke nodded. “Since all of you are safe and sound, we can report to Elizabeth now that we’ve completed our mission.”
Samantha was a little embarra.s.sed. “Thank you very much for everything.” Luke chuckled. “You’ve already said that. Right, why don’t all of you come to Los Angeles with us?”
Samantha shook her head. “But there are a lot of things that need to be done here.”
Luke waved his hand. “Samantha, the incident here isn’t simple. Boom Town will probably be closed for a while for investigation. You might as well make a trip to Los Angeles for a couple of days instead of idling here. After what happened last night, don’t you think Elizabeth will be relieved to see you in person? She almost asked for leave to fly back here right away when I called her this morning.”
Samantha hesitated. “But…” She then looked at Chris.
Luke noticed that and smiled. “How about this? I think Chris is a nice guy. Bring him to Los Angeles with you. As it so happens, there’s something I want to discuss with him.”
Samantha found that odd. “What is it?”
Luke simply replied, “It’s about the mines.”
Samantha didn’t ask further, and went over to talk to Chris.
When the two of them returned, Luke talked to Chris in private. “Chris, can your mines still operate?”
Chris shook his head with a bitter smile. “The FBI told me that they have to clear the spiders’ nest in the mines before I can send workers in. That’ll take at least two months.”
Luke nodded. “In that case, why don’t you come to Los Angeles with Samantha? I want to talk to you about the mines.”
Chris thought that Luke was only being polite, and quickly shook his head. “Thanks, but I’ll be fine here.”
Luke patted his shoulder. “Chris, even if the FBI clears the mines for operation, will they still make money? As far as I know, your mining business isn’t doing very well.”
Chris smiled bitterly.
“Not very well” was an understatement. The truth was that the company was about to go bankrupt.