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Cheap, lightweight, reliable, modular and with ammunition widely available, the AR-15 and Ak-47 rifles have been staples of wasteland combat since the bombs first fell.

I woke up parched later that night. I laid in bed for a few minutes after I came to, listening to what was going on around me. The AC was still going strong and the room was chilled. The wind was goin strong out side as well, blowing sand up against the house, incessantly attacking, but unable to enter. I pushed aside the covers and slunk over to my pack, still half asleep. I fished one of the liter bottles out of my bag, unscrewed the cap and took a large gulp, practically pouring the liquid down my throat.

"There, much better", I thought to myself as I caped the bottle and tucked it back away in my pack. I went back to the bed and crawled inside, pulling the covers up to my neck again. I was almost back to sleep when I heard a high pitched scream tear through the night. I was wide awake now. I lay there for a moment, quiet as a mouse, trying to see if I could hear it again, or maybe something else, and I did. Seconds after the first scream, I heard a female screaming.

"HELP!", she stuttered, seeming as though she'd tried getting it out more than a few times, "Somebody help me!"

"Shit", I said pushing aside the blankets and sitting up, "that's close...either it's a trap or someone's in serious trouble."

I turned off the AC unit, quickly got dressed and grabbed my AR-15, chambering a round as quietly as I could. Over the wind, I could just barely hear sounds of someone fighting and struggling against attackers who were almost certainly much larger than she was. Mere seconds passed as the sounds and voices grew louder, until eventually I heard the front door burst open.

"Here, we'll do her here", a rather gruff sounding voice said, it had a slight British accent to it. I heard him throw his victim down on the old couch, legs of which snapped off from the force.

"Well bro since you won the bet you do her first. I'll stand guard."

"Come on bitch, spread for me", the first voice said.

The female screamed for help again, the sheer desperation in her voice made my scales crawl.

"Quit your whining bitch!", the first voice said, "no one's coming to help you."

At that point, I stepped out of the bedroom with my AR tight into my shoulder, flashlight on. The light showed me two bears and a female dragon. The two bears were nasty looking bandits and were clearly suffering from radiation sickness. They were super skinny as well, skinnier than I'd ever seen any bear. Be that as they may, either of them could have easily overpowered their victim. She'd already been stripped and looked like she hadn't eaten in a while. I didn't see any guns on them, or even weapons, but I could tell already there wasn't gonna be any talking, and to be honest, I wasn't prepared to talk anyway, the safety was already off. As stunned as they were that I came around the corner, they didn't waste time in forgetting about their victim and barreling straight at me. Their flaking, diseased flesh was no match for my AR-15 and the first two rounds dropped the first one like a bag of soggy concrete, while the other one went straight over his dead comrade and attempted to take a swipe at me. I raised my rifle over my head and sent her stock crashing down on the skull of the bear, causing his entire body to pivot. He flipped heels over head and landed on his back as I quickly changed potions and put a burst into his head, splattering bone and brain every where. It took me a second after that to realize I didn't have my hearing protection on, and my ears were ringing super loud, I'd probably come to regret that in the morning. I turned the light on my AR off, and turned to the dragoness, who was still laying on the couch sobbing hard enough that it seemed like it was hard for her to breath. I lowered my weapon and walked towards her, before I'd even closed a foot of distance, she leapt off the couch and threw herself into me, crying into my neck.

"Thank you!", she said between her sobs, "thank you, thank you, thank you!!"

At first, I was hesitant to hug her back, but after a few seconds, I put my free arm around her and held her tightly to me. I could feel the bones in her spine through my arm and her wings were shriveled up to the point where it was no wonder she couldn't just fly away from these two fucks, probably wasn't strong enough. I stood there, just letting her cry for a good ten or twenty minutes before she managed to collect herself.

"Thanks for getting rid of them", she said wiping her eyes.

"No problem", I said, "where's your equipment?"

She shrugged, "shit...I don't know. They hit me so hard that I was seeing stars when they stripped me."

"Could you see the house when they attacked you?", I asked.

She nodded. Sighing, I took my AR and handed it to her, "when I come back, I'll yell star, you'll reply Texas, then I'll say always. If they don't reply after that, shoot them."

With some hesitation, she took my weapon. I prayed to God that I hadn't just fucked myself as I stepped outside the house, using my arms to brace myself against the light sandstorm currently coming from the darkness. The dragoness' gear turned out not to be that hard to find, laying in a pile about 70 feet from the house. Her skimpy backpack and clothes were held against the wind by her weapons, a customized AKM, double barrel shotgun and a Beretta M92FS in a holster with straps flying in the wind. I gathered her gear, finding it strange that the bandits who attacked her would just let all of it lay there. I walked back to the house, tapping on the door way.

"Star", I yelled.

"Texas", the dragoness replied, I heard the bolt on my AR go back.

"Always", I said.

My weapon's strap rustled, "guns down."

I cautiously stepped inside the house, finding her sitting against the wall, enfolding herself with her shriveled up wings, clutching my AR-15 like if she let go of it for a second those bears would come back to life and try to rape her all over again. I set her gear on the couch, took her clothes and handed them to her.

"Here, get dressed, can I have my rifle back?"

She slowly and uncertainly handed me my rifle back as I handed her her clothes. They were rather tight on her, and it made me wonder how someone as skinny as she was had still managed find something a size too small. As tight as it was, it covered everything, so my guess, was that the bandits saw her walking along the road, and ambushed her, initially only intending to take her gear, but then found out she was female.

"Man I'm glad you were camping in this house", she sighed pulling her jeans and sweater on, "another minute or two and they would have gotten tired of my screaming and shot me."

"Divine intervention or just luck", I shrugged.

"Divine intervention", she said, "I hit up Saint Mike on a nightly basis to make sure shit like this doesn't happen."

"Or at least when it does someone's near by to help", I said, "I'm Arien."

"Eirren", the Dragoness said, "you've got an American accent, where you from?"

"Texas", I said.

"What are you doing in Canada?", Eirren asked.

"Heading home", I said, "my family moved up to Maine shortly before the nukes fell."

"Texas is a long way to walk", she said.

"I'll get there", I said, "I don't care if the house is nothing but a concrete block, I'll pitch a tent and rebuild it brick by brick."

Eirren laughed, "I gotta say I admire your determination. I didn't really have a destination in mind, kind of figured I'd just pack up and go, I'd know where I was supposed to be when I got there."

I shrugged, "that was the hardest part of the apocalypse, pretending I wasn't exited to live like it was Fallout 3."

"More like the Book of Eli", Eirren said, "that's what all of this reminds me of."

I sighed through an agreeing nod, "I've got AC working in the bedroom if you wanna stay for the night and calm down."

"Thanks Arien", Eirren said, "it means a lot how you helped me tonight."

"World's falling apart", I said using my AR to push myself off the couch, "doesn't hurt to save a life, and try to put a little bit of it back together."

Eirren smiled at me as I walked back into the bedroom. I put my rifle in the corner and pulled off my now sandy clothes. I was still mostly clean, but now my shirt and jeans were full of sand. Shaking my head, I folded my stuff up and crawled back into bed after flipping the AC back on. Eirren curled up in the corner like a feral, draping her long, skinny tail over her snout. I lay there watching her for a few minutes before eventually falling back to sleep.

I woke up to a surprise the next morning, a few surprises actually. Not only had Eirren stayed the entire night, not only did she not run off with the bulk of my gear, but she'd stripped down to her underwear and somehow manged to work herself in between me and the wall without waking me up, or even moving me from my position in the middle of the bed. She was already awake by the time I returned to the land of the living.

"What the hell?", I yawned as I came to my senses and realized exactly what was happening, "why the hell are you in bed with me?"

She shrugged and pulled me tightly against her, "too many damn nightmares. I scare easily."

I turned to face her, propping myself up on my elbow, "is that so?"

She smiled and touched my nose with her own, "yeah. First time I saw someone with radiation sickness I had nightmares about it for weeks. Of course, that was years ago, last night was the first time I've been legit scared in a long time."

"I know you want something", I said, locking my gaze with hers. Her bright yellow eyes contrasted super sharply with her dark green scales and light grey highlights, reminding me a bit of one of my friends Pre War. They were some of the most adorable eyes I'd ever seen in my life, and I'd seen my share of cute, sweet girls, "but I can't tell what."

Eirren closed her eyes and pulled me tightly against her, enough so that she could whisper in my ear.

"I wanna come with you", she told me quietly, "I wanna move on and leave Canada behind, there's nothing here for me any more and I can handle myself in a gun fight so long as no one caves me in the head with a shovel."

"God I wanna kiss you so badly", I thought to myself, I couldn't tell at this point if she was legit, or a bandit queen or what, but whatever the case, she had me, I wasn't sure if I could say no. I laughed at her remark.

"You know what? I could use the company, not sure I can do 2000 miles on my own."

"Thanks Arien", Eirren said, "it means a lot to me."

"Just know that once we hit the road, there's one pace", I told her, "mine."

"Fair enough", Eirren said sitting up in bed, "should we get going? It's six thirty if my watch is still right, which means we've only got an hour to move before the sun wakes up."

"Damn", I sighed sitting up, the air in the bedroom was super brisk, a feeling I hadn't felt in a while, "oh shit that's brisk." I rubbed my arms a few times before hopping out of bed and turning the AC down super low, at least I could still have the white noise while I got dressed.

"Hey...where are your wings?", Eirren asked.

"Hmm?", I asked pulling my jeans and socks on.

"Your wings....they're gone?", Eirren commented, "did...did someone cut them off?"

"Nope", I said, "I'm a Hybrid, my Dad was a desert dragon and my mother is an Arctic Fox, all of my brother's can fly, but I can't."

"And I'm assuming you're the youngest in your bunch?", She asked.

"Nawp", I told her pulling on my Hanes X-Temp shirt and putting my snap up on over it, "everything thinks that I am but I'm not, I'm the first born. My mom miscarried the first time."

"I'm....sorry to hear that", Eirren sighed.

I shrugged, "it is what it is. I like to think I have an older sister watching over me."

She smiled, "good way to look at it."

She got dressed and grabbed her pack and AKM while I finished checking my vest and packing what I'd used last night back into my pack, making sure everything was in it's place before closing everything up and tying it down. I hoisted it to my shoulder's with a grunt and grabbed my AR-15, hat, Shemagh and sunglasses.

"Let's get going, I wanna cover at least 20 miles before sundown", I said racking the charging handle on my weapon.

"Seems like a high number", Eirren commented as she turned off the AC, "will complimentary peanuts be served on this flight?"

"Yes of course let me pull them out of the crack of my ass", I joked as I checked outside the door, gusts of crisp, cool morning air blowing into the house with bits of sand in tow, "clear left."

"Clear right", Eirren replied, "looks like we've got the whole wastelands to ourselves."

"Nah", I said as we walked from the house and started down the old, dusty road, "we've gotta share it with the sun."

"Right", Eirren said taking sunglasses from her coat pocket and putting them on her head for easy access, "forgot about him."

During morning hours, the wastes had a distinctly different vibe to them. It wasn't that hot this early in the morning, felt like it was barely 70, of course that would all change given a couple of hours. There was more moisture in the air, and you could soak the dew of untarnished metal surfaces and wring the water out into a container if you had the patience. More critters were out in the morning hours as well, scorpions, snakes, lizards and the like, your typical desert inhabitants, gathering food and water to last them the day before the sun turned up the temperature dial and made the bleached landscape only borderline inhabitable.

As we moved on, the road and scenery began to change, slowly going from empty of any sign of life, to jam packed with cars, white skeletons and the remains of what at some point may have been animals. About 200 yards away, there was a cluster of buildings along with a super tall gas station sigh with a banner slapped across it that read "No Gas, Diesel Fuel only." The legs of the sign were rusted out, the sign itself was broken with holes of varying sizes in it at different places and the banner was tattered, with the wording barely legible. Prices for gas were up in the $20 range, a stark reminder of how bad things were before the bombs fell.The station itself sat stop an artificial hill from the looks of it and seemed as though Eirren and I were the first living creatures to set foot here since the bombs. Upon approaching the station, we saw some more of the condition it was in, which was bad at best and outright a deathtrap at the worst. Broken windows, chunks of concrete missing from the parking lot, piles of scrap consisting of anything from large shards of glass to sharp, twisted pieces of rebar and concrete chunks. Underneath the creaking covered area that looked like it could collapse at literally any second were about a dozen old cars with various bits and pieces missing along with a semi trailer that had been stripped down to it's frame and even had pieces of the frame itself missing.

"Looks like someone made off with a truck", Eirren noted as we scaled the small incline up to the parking lot of the gas station.

"But why not just hot wire it and drive off? Or tow it to wherever you wanna sell it at?", I thought aloud.

"Whatever they were using to tow probably thought it was too heavy", Eirren said.

"Think the station is worth looting?", I asked crouching down to inspect the truck, the heat from the nuclear reactor in the sky pierced right through my vest and shirt, agitating the already bad sunburn on my back.

"Meet back here in 20 minutes?", Eirren said, "you handle the cars in the area and I'll take the store?"

"Sounds like a plan", I said, "Try not to get attacked."

"Only if you do the same", Eirren said.

"Always", I smiled, "do you have a radio on you?"

"Yeah", she said, "Channel?"

"5", I told her, "only call if you find something that requires the other's immediate attention."

Nodding, Eirren trudged off towards the gas station building, whereas I started my search at the far left end of the covered area. There were two cars on either side of every pump pretty much and often contained the shadowy remains of their former owners. They proved to not be hard at all to get into, in many cases they were unlocked, and the ones that were locked couldn't hold up to a gun bash to the window. I took care to avoid disturbing the bodies of the dead as I searched their cars, figuring that braking into their final resting places was disturbance enough. Many of the car's didn't yield much other than compact knives, basic tools found in any car, jumper cables, tire irons, tire repair kits and the occasional window breaker and first aid kit. We could trade the lesser knives for ammunition and maybe some food if we could find a Cavern at some point down the road, and first aid supplies are always useful, but the biggest surprise, and shock, of all came in the form of a tall, alcohol bottle sized brown paper bag passenger's side floor of a blue Ford F-150. Both of the doors were locked, so I had to smash the window to get in. I unlocked the door and pulled it open, grabbing the bag off the floor and opening it, finding 3 cases packing three each of 3 ¼ inch 12 gauge dragons breath rounds.

"Holy shit", I laughed inspecting the packages, "dragons breath? Too bad they won't fit in my shotgun", I pressed the button on my radio, "Hey Eirren, what's the chamber length on your over under?"

"Umm", She replied uncertainly, "three and a half? I think? Why? What did you find?"

"I found some 3 ½ dragon's breath 12 gauge", I told her, "9 shots."

She whistled, "that's a hell of a find, I found some treasure too, when you're done searching the cars, bring your stuff in here and we'll see what's worth taking and what's getting left behind."

"Rodger", I said going back to the truck. I checked the glove box, under the front seats and in the doors, finding nothing but sand and decayed interior cloth. Moving towards the backseat, both doors were empty, but when I put my hand underneath the backseat, something snapped at me, barely nicking my fingers, but enough to make me recoil.

"Ouch what the fuck!?", I growled reaching for my SigSauer, racking a round into the chamber as it cleared the holster, "there a damn snake under the seat?"

I backed up a good two or three feet from the car, well out of your average rattler or adder's striking range, turned on my flash light and peered under the seat, and what I found made my heart sink into the bottom of my boot. There was a Feral wolf pup, looking like he was barely 2 years old, cowering in fear underneath the seat. His face was blistered, his eyes were cloudy, making me think he was blind, but just barely or very close to getting there and both his ears were torn. His fur was a matted mess and there were many, many raw spots on his legs. I couldn't help but wonder how the hell he got in the truck in the first place, to say nothing of managing to work himself under the seat. I holstered my pistol and walked back to the truck, crouching down so I could see him better, the sun glinted off his silvery eyes, making me think he was totally blind, because just a little bit of sun in most people's peripherals is enough to make them instantly recoil.

"Hey buddy, what are you doing under there?", I asked reaching into the drop pouch on my leg for a smaller bottle of water I kept on tap, "where are your parents at?"

He didn't answer, he just kept trying to back away from me. After him nipping me, probably thought I was still intending to shoot him.

"I'm not gonna shoot you little dude", I said, "why don't you come out of this hot truck and I'll get you something to drink huh?"

I could tell he didn't trust me, so I showed him the water bottle, and he scooted forward just a little bit. I kept my other hand on the floor behind the seat and eventually, he stuck his head out from underneath it. The fact that he was suffering from radiation sickness became even more apparent, as my Geiger counter immediately began to spike. There were so many spots on the little guy's face that were crusted over and blistered that I couldn't tell what was radiation and what was sun burn. I unscrewed the cap off the bottle and let him drink, and he ended up sucking it all dry before he came out completely and let me pick him up.

"What's your name little guy?", I asked sitting up against the truck's rear wheel.

His voice was so light and raspy I almost couldn't hear what he said, 'Nero."

"Where are your parent's Nero?", I asked.

"I...I don't know", he said, "they said wait here...but they never came back."

I could tell he was about to start crying.

"How long have you been hiding here?", I asked.

"Three days", he sniffled, "I want my mom!"

My heart sank even lower as Nero started balling for his mother. I couldn't bring myself to fathom exactly what must have happened. What kind of parent could just take off and leave their son, their BLIND son, to fend for himself in this god forsaken wasteland? If his memory was good, then it was by the grace of God that I'd found him when I did, there's no way he'd have survived a fourth day under the seat of that truck. It pissed me off seeing him like this, and as much as I didn't want extra people with me on this trip, I knew my team was now at three, because leaving him here would be a certain death sentence.

"Hey Eirren?", I said over the radio.

"What's up brother?", she asked.

"I think you need to come see this...this is...important, to say the least."

"What you find?", she asked.

"More like who I found, come have a look, you should beable to see me from the store windows."

"On my way", she said.

I held Nero tightly to me, letting him cry into my Shemagh as I waited for Eirren. When she came out, I motioned for her to be quiet and she pretty much glided on her toes across the concrete to me, her mouth dropped in shock when she laid eyes on little Nero.

"A wolf puppy?", She asked crouching down and mouthing the words, not actually talking, "where the fuck are his parents?"

I shook my head, "I think they left him to die."

Eirren shook her head, "what kind of heartless bastard would take off and leave their kid?"

I shook my head, "I guess the kind that think disabilities deserve the death penalty."

"Disability?", Eirren inquired.

"I don't know if he was born this way, or if he got too long a glance at the sun, but he's blind, he didn't even react when he was looking into the sun a few minutes ago", I explained.

Eirren put a paw over her mouth in shock, I could see a little tear roll down her face. It was tugging heart strings I didn't know I had to see him like this.

"We're not leaving him are we?", Eirren asked after some time, Nero, at this point, had cried himself into a fitful sleep.

"Hell fucking no", I said, "I hope you found Triamidol or some other kind of anti rad drugs inside, cause he's got the sickness and got it bad, my Geiger's going nuts around him."

She shook her head, "no, Miss Fortune won't give us that gift today, but I found some things we can use to help treat all of these festering sores, can't be doing him any favors. If we run across a Cavern or a Caravan we can probably get the right medicine from them."

"Odds of that are low to none", I said. I pushed myself against the truck and used it as leverage to stand up so I didn't have to hand off Nero, figuring it was probably best to let him sleep as long as I could. The inside of the store was totally trashed, but it looked like Eirren had cleaned up just a little bit in searching for things. Empty shelves and displays had been bolted to the ground, stripped of all items side from a pack of tissues here and there. Empty and broken glass bottles, bottle caps and any manner of random, discarded and forgotten junk littered the store and the glass in the doors to the cooler had been broken out, the cooler ransacked of all of the beer and liquor that you might find at a higher end gas station. Some electronic bits and pieces, ear buds, car chargers, phone cases and USB cables were left on a spinning rack near the entrance and some car repair tools and first aid supplies also remained on the shelves. Eirren went over to the remaining first aid supplies and gathered them up, while I brushed off the sand from a section of the counter and laid Nero down.

His fur was bright tan and he had a silver stripe running the length of his body from the tip of his nose, up his head and all the down his back and tail. He had a small, silver splotch on his right cheek and each of his paws had a different, random looking silver marking. Both his ears were torn, but they were small tears and would probably heal up once his system was flushed of radiation, which is easier said than done. Triamidol, which is the strongest and easiest to use anti radiation drug in existence, is also nigh impossible to find post war, and I didn't have any on me. I did, however, have a few vials of Epinenosine. The most basic of anti radiation drugs, it was no where near as powerful as Triamidol, but it was super common and could be found any where that sold basic, over the counter medication. I usually sold them when I found them, since radiation doesn't bother me much at all, and what little bit does get into my system get's flushed out and the damage repaired within a span of one or two days. I didn't have a whole lot, maybe a single dose for someone my size, would probably be good for three or four doses for Nero, but I figured I'd need at least five, maybe six depending on how many rads were actually in his system. Another problem we faced was how to actually give it to him, seeing as how it had to be given by infusion, and I didn't actually have the kit I needed to administer it. I set my pack on the counter with my rifle and dug into it as Eirren joined me, scavenged medical supplies in her arms.

"You've got anti radiation drugs right?", She asked setting the supplies down, "I'm gonna guess no, otherwise you wouldn't have asked me outside if I'd found any."

"I do, but I don't have an infusion kit with me", I said, "I didn't bring any with me when I left home and I haven't found any since I started my trip."

"I wish I could say different", Eirren sighed, "I have a half of one at best, but it only amounts to an IV bag and some surgical tubing that looks to decayed to use."

"Let me see it", I said, "we may have to improvise here."

Eirren fished the tubing out of her pack and handed it to me. It was about six feet long with a bunch of joints and small connectors and valves, all of which looked good, but the tubing itself was yellow and cracked in various places all throughout the length, not good for anything now except maybe a water still, and I'd bet all of the cash in my pocket that even that would be pushing it.

"No", I sighed shaking my head, "worthless at best. Save these connectors though, might come in handy."

She nodded and packed her things away, retrieving her own first aid kit from her pack. It wasn't a whole lot, but the large bandages she had gave me an idea.

"Let me see those bandages", I said, "I've got an idea."

She handed them to me. They were those huge, square ones that you would use to cover scrapes on your knees or elbows when you fell off your bike when you were little. Assuming I could get a good seal between them and the skin, I might be able to give Nero the radiation medicine by applying straight to his blisters and sores. I didn't fully know if it would work enough, because I'm no vet, the furthest thing from it, but I had to try something to flush the rads out of his system.

"What are you thinking Arien?", Eirren asked.

I sighed, "I'm thinking I might have to apply the rad meds directly to his blisters and keep shit out of them with the bandages. Every few hours we'd have to stop to clean it and sterilize it, but it's gotta be better than letting him suffer and put all of our hope on the off chance that we'll run across a Cavern or a Caravan with a semi competent vet."

"Will that even work?", Eirren said, 'I mean, it sounds like a good idea...but..."

"I never claimed to be a vet", I sighed, "but do we have a choice? We can't hang around here, but I can't in good conscious hit the road without doing something to help Nero at least start getting better."

Eirren sighed. I could tell she wasn't onborad with what I wanted to do, but didn't have a better idea, so we went forward with it. First up, we had to get him cleaned up and get all of the mats out of his fur, which proved not to be that hard in of itself, but the problem was not agitating all of the blisters that were hiding under the mats, and there were a lot of them. With some soap from my hygiene kit and a bunch of distilled water that Eirren found in the store, we basically gave Nero a sponge bath, which he desperately needed. We used a combination of an old comb dunked in rubbing alcohol and our fingers to work the mats out of his fur one at a time and get it all brushed down. Once that was done, we put the Epinenosine on a few of his larger blisters and covered them with the bandages, at which point, he woke up.

"How you holding up buddy?", Eirren asked.

"Who are you?", Nero asked, staring with his silvery eyes at Eirren.

"I'm Eirren, a friend of Arien's, the dragon that found you in the truck", Eirren smiled.

"Are you a dragon too?", Nero asked.

"Yes", Eirren smiled.

"Why do I feel all wet?", Nero asked.

"We gave you a bath", I told him, "got all of the nasty stuff outta your fur and put some medicine on your blisters. You'll be sore for a few days, but you'll get better."

Nero started to cry again, "thank you", he whimpered.

I smiled and petted him, "you're welcome son."

Nero paused for a minute and turned to look at me, and then started to cry harder as I picked him up. I held him tight to me as Eirren began packing up her things.

"Well, I guess that makes me a Mom then huh?", she smiled, "do we have something we can use to protect his skin and eyes from the sun?"

"I have a spare Shemagh buried somewhere in my pack", I said, "but he's already blind, so there's no point in giving him glasses, besides, I don't think I have any that would fit."

I reached into my bag and dug out my old, tan Shemagh. It wasn't made all that well, but it did work to keep the sun off skin and it was very light, so it probably wouldn't make him that much hotter any way. I wrapped it around his neck and torso and then set him back down on the counter while Eirren and I went through what she'd found, which amounted to not a whole lot more than empty bottles, some rubbing alcohol, scrap cloth, some cans of ravioli and the distilled water, most of which we used helping Nero. The bottles, alcohol and rags went to making some Molotov cocktails, which Eirren decided to carry, while I packed away the food and water. She'd found a metal pipe with some razor wire welded to it as well, which she decided to take with her, saying it was better than wasting ammunition on mutants, to which I agreed.

Once we left the gas station, there was nothing but miles of empty, dusty road ahead. With Nero too weak to stand on his own for very long, we took turns carrying him and letting him walk beside us when he wanted to, even though we knew it was a bad idea in his condition. As the hours passed, the sun arched high into the sky, beating down on us with righteous fury that of which I hadn't known existed pre war. Inch by inch and mile by mile, we pushed ever onward. With the same time that gave us distance, the sun began to let up, the landscape began to dim and the heat began to recede, we'd have to find a place to camp soon, and I hadn't seen much of anything since we left the gas station except a few burned out cars, despite continuing to follow the road. Round about 8PM, just as the sun was beginning to go down, Eirren spoke up.

"I see an old station wagon up ahead", she said pointing. I couldn't tell if it was burned out or not, at least not from here.

"Is it burned out?", I asked, "I can't tell."

"Me either", Eirren said sprinting forward. I followed after her. The station wagon had certainly seen better days and there was no way it was ever gonna drive anywhere again. It was missing wheels, the hood was ajar, showing that the engine was trashed, but at least the battery looked like it was serviceable, so if nothing else we'd have AC that worked, assuming of course the battery had a charge in it, which it likely didn't.

"Interior looks a little ratty", I sighed, "but there's not much we can do about that."

I set down my pack and tried one of the door handles, it was unlocked. A blast of furnace like air hit me in the face when I pulled the door open, no way I was climbing into this thing like that. I opened the rest of the doors to let the old wagon air out and cool off and started pulling the few pieces of junk out of it. While I was doing that, Eirren gathered some stones, wood and scrap metal from the near by remains of...I don't even know what, and started building a camp fire. She arranged the wood and stone in your classic campfire pattern and tied the metal pipe she found together into a tripod, and about halfway up their length she used some old wire to tie a metal grate to support cook ware. She put a dog bowl and a makeshift steel plate on the grate, filling the plate with one of the can's of ravioli for Nero and for herself, she filled the bowl with a can of soup.

"That's a ghetto rigged mess kit if I've ever seen one",I commented sitting down and pulling my vest off. Nero lay down next to me and started starring off into the distance.

"Do what I can with what I have", She shrugged, "I didn't have a lot of money growing up, so my brother and I had to make most of our toys ourselves, even got busted by the cops once for stealing things from the junkyard", she smiled, "Officer Parker always did like us."

"Guessing he let you off?", I asked.

"And took us to a toy store the next day", she laughed, "spent 200 bucks on us, all of it airsoft guns."

I laughed, "wait, is it illegal to take things out of a junkyard in Canada?"

"What part of stealing, didn't you understand?", Eirren asked with a huge, shit eating grin on her face, "we literally hopped the fence in the dead of night and tried to make off with every thing we could carry. Made it pretty far before the junkyard dog Max caught us. Plus, building an unregistered spear gun is illegal."

"You built a spear gun?", I asked.

"Out of junked car parts", she said, "you'd crank an old AC compressor with a handle from a window, fill a small propane tank, stick the spear down the barrel, turn the valve, kill a moose at 50 yards."

"Damn", I laughed, "that's impressive."

"How many Moose did you shoot Mom?", Nero asked propping himself up on my legs, barely tall enough on his hind legs to peek over my knees.

"I shot a few before the cops took it", Eirren laughed stirring her and Nero's food.

"Did you get in trouble?", Nero asked.

"I could have", she said, "but the man who took it liked me and so he let me off."

"I've made some ghetto rigged shit in my time, but never had the materials to do anything more complex than a melee weapon that could give you a good zap or make you bleed a lot. A functioning spear gun says something about your ability to kill shit, and to me that's hot."

Eirren's cheeks turned rose red and she quickly changed the subject by pulling the bowl and plate off of the fire, "hey look dinner's ready."

She handed the chicken soup to Nero, who began lapping it up. She started eating as well and I put water on the fire to boil for a t Cup a Soup soup packet and some Ramen noodles, one of the best dehydrated food combinations on the planet as far as I cared. It didn't take long to heat up, but by the time I was done, Nero had already finished and had fallen asleep, snoring lightly.

"He seems content", I observed stirring my soup.

"Yep", Eirren said putting aside her dinner, "probably the best the little guy's eaten since his parents left him to die."

I shook my head. Eirren crawled inside the station wagon, ripped the front seat from it's bolts, turned it around to face the back and set Nero in it, covering him with a spare blanket from her pack. She came back out, picked up her dinner and sat down next to me.

"It's amazing how quick he's taken to us", she noted.

I nodded, "agreed. Hell he called you Mom a minute ago, did you catch it?"

She shook her head, "yeah, surprised me a little. I think he's just testing the waters though, doesn't want anyone else to walk off and leave him again."

"Do you think we'll make good parents?", I asked.

"Time will tell", Eirren said leaning against me, "Arien, can I ask you something?"

"Sure, shoot", I told her.

"What are you gonna do when you get home?"

"Pick up what pieces I can of my old life and try my best to glue them back together, if I can't, well, I've got a mixer to toss them into, crush them up and make something completely new."

Eirren smiled, "god you're persistent."

"You have to be to live for any length of time out here", I said.

"Yeah, amen to that."

Eirren and I ate mostly in quiet after that. Once dinner was done, we cleaned up our mess and put out the fire. We made beds in the back of the wagon and stashed our gear in the area between the driver's seats and the back, opting to keep our shotguns close by over night, as opposed to our combat rifles, the wagon was cramped, to be sure, but it was better than sleeping in the sand over night. We tried to be as quiet as possible to avoid waking Nero up, tired as I was sure he was, but when you're trying to be quiet everything sounds like gun shots.

"Why does everything sound like gunshots when you're trying to be quiet?", Eirren asked kicking off her boots and stripping down to her underwear.

"Just the way shit is", I said sitting on the edge of the wagon's hatch back and rubbing my feet, "my back hurts, my paws hurt, everything hurts."

"Same here", Eirren said laying flat on her back, "most of the ache is in my wings though."

"I can't claim to understand", I said sliding inside, closing the hatchback, "you seem pretty comfortable just stripping down around me."

She shrugged, "don't pretend it bothers you. We both know you gawk when I'm not looking."

I rolled my eyes, "yeah right, there's nothing to look at."

She smiled as I lay down next to her. I pulled out my phone from my vest and turned it on, opening the soundtrack to Fallout New Vegas. The first song in my list was Shadow Of The Valley, real country music it was, not like the crap that was airing before the bombs fell. The soundtrack made the first week of my trip magical, believe it or not.

"In the shadow of the valley, I would like to settle down. Wide open space, wind on my face, a distant horizon, the moon on the grass. In the shadow of the valley, that I love best."

I smiled, slowly drifting off to sleep as the song played in my head.