Sam awoke in a cold sweat. Another nightmare. This one was worse. They had plagued her for a month now, almost nightly. She knew it had been 10 years since the nuke had hit the city and everything went to hell, yet she still couldn't believe anything like this ever happened. They had matured, fled the city, and she actually remembered a lot of the hell they went through after that. Shortly after they were rescued, she remembered waking up to Freddie's whispers.


"Sam! Sam! Wake up! Shh! Don't make a sound. This isn't a rescue copter, it's being piloted by a Vestigial.. What do we do?"

"Huh? Wha-? Wait, what? Shit, shit, shit! Alright Fredward, calm down. Don't wake Carly up, you know how she reacts to this type of situation. Uh... grab that fire extinguisher. Alright, slide that side door out, and watch out. Don't go falling to your death."

Freddie nodded, and tossed her the extinguisher. She slowly slid the door to the cockpit open, and when the pilot looked at her, she hit him in the face and knocked him out. She dragged him to Freddie, and the two dropped him in a lake that was below. Freddie commented that it was handy that a lake was below, and Sam shrugged. Then, Freddie pointed out that nobody knew how to pilot a helicopter, and they couldn't exactly fly forever. Just then, the helicopter lurched, and Sam thought fast, opening a nearby cabinet. Two parachutes. Sam fastened hers over her and Carly, still asleep. Freddie grabbed one too, and got ready. Sam signaled, and the three left. Carly woke up, and began screaming.


She laid back on her makeshift pillow, a sack full of crumpled paper, and tried to fall back asleep. Soon, the hellish sequences returned. Her fears decided to turn on her. She never let Carly know, but her biggest fear was the dark. Well, rather what lurked in it. All she could remember every time she woke up was being pounced by a massive black beast, the size of a bear, yet... different. That, and then the teeth. The teeth and the gnashing. Trying to ease herself, she reached next to her mattress, and pulled up her bottle of Wild Turkey. She took a swig of it, and put it back. 80 proof, she thought, was the only way to go. It was a very rough whiskey, but, then again, she liked it rough. She finally was lulled back into sleep, and a peaceful one, at that. She wished that every night could be like this, but she knew neither her or her liver would enjoy that. Carly already yelled at her enough over her boozing habits.


"Sam! Sam! Are you drunk? Look at me! Look. At. Me!" Carly shouted, across their room. Sam always smiled when she thought of the fact that they shared a room, and Freddie wasn't in that room. The two had their own beds, Carly's looking nice, and Sam's looking like... well, the bed one would expect from a 26-year old alcoholic woman.

Sam complied, and looked at Carly, and then fell down. Carly helped her up, and muttered something about hiding her whiskey soon. Sam flailed, and spilled a bit of her precious Jack Daniel's all over.

"Mneh! Let gooo.. ehhh.." Sam futilely nudged back, and fell asleep before Carly even got her onto her bed. She threw Sam's covers over her, and went back to her bed, and fell asleep. In the morning, she tossed every bottle she had outside at a wall, and went back inside. Sam was angry, but ended up scavenging more anyways. Carly knew unless she could get Sam to kick her habit, she shouldn't even try.


Sam awoke as Carly nudged her bed at the crack of dawn, and headed through the door into the hallway. Sam put her clothes on, and looked into the dirty, almost ruined, cracked mirror she salvaged. Admiring herself, she went into the hall. The three had stumbled upon an abandoned military outpost, and had lived there for almost 10 years, gathering supplies, taking out the occasional Vestigial mob, and recruiting other survivors. Sam herself taught combat training in the East wing for the last 7 years. She lead a small assault squad, nicknamed "The Children Of Sam" by a few of her soldiers. There may only be twenty of them, including her, but with the total population of the base being around 70 strong, she had a good amount of them. Besides, 40 battles and not a single "Child" lost. Sam loved what she did, and always looked forward to the end of the class, so she could go get something to eat. Vestigials commonly inhabited military structures, and they always took food and guns. Carly had learned how to make the food edible again, and Sam learned to keep the guns and conserve ammo using hand to hand and close quarters.

Carly toiled in the mess hall, and kept everyone fed. Sam always came in at 8:30 in the morning, and got her rations and left. Carly knew how to increase the maximum gain from the Rations, and added vitamins and the sort to the food. While she was at it, she made it taste like food, not cardboard. Later on, the two headed to the pump rooms and made sure the pumps worked, as they made the water drinkable. It was all a very tedious life, but they survived it. However, there always were the fun days. If only Sam knew what she was about to get herself into that day...


Author Note: Sorry it took so long guys! It's been busy as hell for me, returning to school, having a hectic summer before that, and having to actually sleep instead of 5:45 AM updates. The chapters might not be daily, but I WILL try to update WHENEVER POSSIBLE. PUT THIS ON YOUR ALERTS, PUT ME ON ALERTS, LEAVE A REVIEW, AND EVEN STORYMARK IT (Or whatever they call it).