Ch. 1
Haven
Dust settled over the barren wasteland. It had nearly one hundred and fifty years when the war had started. Nobody really knew how it all began though they all tell the same tale, those that survived anyway: it was a a typical, average day. Blue sky, birds were singing. People were going about their lives when the first bomb fell. It hit Canada first. The next hit Alaska. Then the United States. The bombs fell in no specific pattern; it was as if the controller logged in random locations and continuely pressed the launch button. The first years were chaotic. With no form of law, crime grew rampant, uncontrollable. Those that tried to stop it were elected as leaders of the small factions that sprouted up throughout the wasteland. Some survived. Those that did not fell into the shadow of their successors who turned into the Knights and evenatually they turned away from the light and soon formed the Raiders. The two factions were at war with each other constantly until the radioactivity finally took its toll the Earth. Mutations nowadays weren't uncommon but in the first days, the Raiders and Knights joined forces temporarily to combat this new foe. It didn't care about the two warring factions; it saw a new foe and it hungered for blood. The battle lasted for twelve years but that depends on who you're asking. Most folk say it's still going on just not as big as in the First Mutie Wars. The mutation population decreased slowly after each passing year that it fought with the humans until it turned tail and hid. Sometimes a Knight or Raider spots a wandering Mutie on his own and guns it down immediately, not knowing if the mutations are starting up again, testing the humans' barriers.
The mutations are biding their time when hope arises again in humanity. The permanent union of the two factions. It will come and snuff out whatever hope the humans find.
It was said that the world was to end December 21, 2012 when the bombs dropped. But little did anyone know that humans were resilient creatures. We rose from the raidoactive ashes wondering what the hell just fell on us. No one knew the answer. Nor we were ever going to find it.
Now it is the year 2162 in April. Spring's already began in New Haven. It is just one town out of many that have sprung up in the Wasteland; a product of humanity's second attempt at civilization. The small town is constantly harassed by small groups of Raiders. A radio turned on low began to play in one of the nearby homes. A young woman of about seventeen leaned back on an old rocking chair and flipped through the few radio channels that are availiable. An old 1950s song plays through the old speakers. The girl glances down at the radio when static kicks in. "Signal's weaker than yesterday. R&R needs a new dish," she muttered as she tried to adjust the long antenna. Finally the static cleared and she sat back down.
A keening wail broke through the air. The young woman shot up out of her seat and quickly turned off the little radio and jammed it into her jacket pocket. Several people ran by her. She got up and followed the bodies into the town center. The crowd grew thicker as she grew closer to the plaza. A hand on her shoulder caused her to turn around. Lloyd gave her a grim smile. She had known him since she first arrived in Haven. She gave him a questioning look which he responded with a quick jerk of his head back. She looked over his shoulder and spotted her brother, Caedus, and their friend Amy. They nodded once and slowly made their way over to where the crowd had gathered around.
A baby's cry could finally be heard over the dim buzz of muted talking. A woman of about thirty laid on the ground crying next to the statue of New Haven's new Overseer. The faces all looked the same whenever the sculptors set in a new one. The Overseer stood next to the distraught woman, his guards stood around the woman. The baby continued to cry. "What're they doing?" the girl whispered. She felt Lloyd shrug next to her. The woman started to get up but was suddenly struck down by one of the guards' batons. The sound of metal on flesh caused several people to visibly flinch. The Overseer seemed to nod as he watched the scene unfold. He looked as if he approved of it. The girl felt sickened by all this. She wanted to walk over to the Overseer and punch the smug man but knew she would be shot long before she got within an inch of their leader. The woman on the ground lifted her head up and searched the crowd for help while ignoring the man standing above her. Her face was covered in blood from the hit by the guard and blotchy from crying. Her eyes rested on the girl's and held her gaze for a long moment. Tears pricked in the girl's eyes as she broke the woman's gaze. I'm sorry, she tried to tell the woman silently, I am so sorry.
The Overseer's voice suddenly broke the tense silence. "Anyone who attempts to steal anything from my quarters or any of the trading will lose what property they 'own' and will be kicked out of New Haven to wander the Wastes."
"B-but my child will die out there," the woman's voice sounded.
The Overseer bent his head down to hers but stage-whispered, "He is already dead." Cold realization shot through the woman and the crowd as a guard walked briskly over to the woman's home. "No!" she shrieked, lunging forward but was held back by another guard. The gun shot silenced the baby's cries forever.
The woman continued to scream and curse incoherently as she was dragged to the main gate to the town where she was thrown out with a meager amount of supplies that would sustain her for no more than three days if she rationed it correctly; that is if something out there didn't kill her first. With the disturbance taken care of, the townsfolk were immediately dispersed. All that remained were the four teenagers standing and staring at a very empty house.
The child's body would no doubt be disposed of before dark fell lest the Overseer wanted to risk infection. Amy was the first to leave, then Caedus. Lloyd left not too long after the other boy while the girl stood rooted to the spot where the woman had lain only an hour ago. "Terra, it's nearly curfew. Let's go home," Lloyd said quietly. Terra shook her head and Lloyd left her alone, standing in the darkness. Staring at the three drops of blood that stained the ground. A dog howled nearby, reaching its peak and slowly drifting off into the night.

The next day dawned grey and humid. The sun hadn't even risen yet. Terra opened her eyes and turned over to watch her bedside candle slowly die as it devoured what was left of its wick. She had barely made it to her house the other night, narrowly missing curfew by two minutes. Her and Caedus' home was on the other side of town, a good half mile from the town center. New Haven was growing each year; the Overseer constantly pushed for more land and worked his people to death when drawing up new blueprints for a bigger Justice building or larger plots of ground for fieldwork; those were just the small stuff. Still haunted by the woman and her dead son, Terra quietly threw back the threadbare blankets on her bed and slipped into her shoes. Going to have to go into town later to trade for some new ones, she thought as she fingered the fading fabric.
The woman was in her dreams. Switching between crying out for help and cursing the younger woman for not aiding her. Terra had woken up in the middle of the night to find her pillow damp. She bit her lip in anger and forced herself to sleep. Terra absently ran a finger across her bottom lip and felt a tiny scab where she accidently bit into the soft flesh. She got up and carefully made her way into the kitchen where she packed a small breakfast. She paid no attention to the prone form on the living room floor half wrapped in blankets. Soft snores could be heard from it. Terra shook her head in disgust. Her father must have gotten home late last night or earlier this morning from his daily trip to Hedz or Tales, the local pub where people, from the poorest fieldworker to the richest bodyguard of the Overseer's, could be found drowning their sorrows. Their father wasted what precious little money he earned on his drink, leaving bare none for them to live on. Were it not for Caedus' talent for finding valuable items and Terra's knack at haggling the local caravaners, they would be either dead or wandering the Wastes by now.
Terra wrapped up her meager breakfast and tip toed back into the room she shared with her brother to grab a flashlight and pocket knife. One could never be too careful when walking in New Haven. The flashlight was hidden under her nightstand where it typically was but her knife was nowhere to be found. Terra tried not to groan in frustration as she searched for it as quietly as she could; she had traded a good amount of items for it when she first lost it. Misplacing it yet again made her feel stupid. A lightbulb lit above her head and she turned quick to find her brother still bedraggled but wide awake watching her fumble around. "Where are you off to this fine morning?" he asked, his voice still layered with sleep. Her eyes instantly zeroed in on the blade twirling around in his hand.
"Off to Lookout," Terra replied quietly, naming the sorry excuse for a hill the sprouted out near the perimeter of the Wall that surrounded Haven.
"Doing what?" her brother asked.
"Can't I just go off on my own without having to ask you permission?" Terra snapped and made a move for her knife but Caedus moved it farther out of her reach.
"Ass," she muttered and sat back down on the floor. Their room needed to be cleaned again, but what was the point? Terra thought. It was just going to get dirty again the next day. She picked at a stray thread on her faded flannel shirt while waiting for her brother to finish playing with her pocketknife.
"Catch!" he said suddenly. Terra's head snapped up as she watched her knife turn cartwheels in the air. It pinwheeled over her and headed towards the half opened window by her bed. Without thinking, Terra threw herself backward and lunged for the knife. She caught it just as she fell down, gripping the handle with the point up. Her brother was laughing at her endeavor; Terra sat up quickly and threw the knife at Caedus. The boy barely had a chance to react as the knife flew over his ducked head and embedded itself in the wood wall behind him. He looked once at the knife and then back at his sister, a look of incredulity ran across his face.
"Don't ever do that again," she said and held her hand out for her knife. Her brother still watched her warily as he pulled the knife from the wall and handed it back, butt first, into her waiting hand.
"'Don't ever do that again'?" he repeated, "Aren't I supposed to be telling you that?" His sister smiled once without humor and turned to leave.
"Don't be late for the morning work assignments," Caedus reminded her. Terra waved back in acknowledgment.

Lloyd turned around at the sound of gravel underfoot. His face broke out into a grin but fell slightly when he saw Terra's face. She sat down next to him without speaking and brought her knees up to her chest. Lloyd searched her face.
"Sibling issues," she said at last. Lloyd nodded once and opened his pack. They ate their breakfast in companionable silence as the sun finally burst through the cloud cover. Lookout Point gave them a small glimpse of the Wastes. The only people who were even allowed in New Haven were the traders who brought back with them tales of horrible creatures and beings who claimed they were human. The traders kept saying that the folk of New Haven were lucky to have this sanctuary out in the middle of a barren wasteland. Watching them carefully, one could see how this one's eyes darted around skittishly at the number of guards nearby, or how that one fiddled with his cloak, eyes cast down. They brought on an air of tension which unsettled a few people who watched them carefully.
"We need to leave," Terra muttered after awhile. Lloyd looked at her, as if he didn't hear her correctly. Terra rolled her head over in his direction and raised an eyebrow. "Oh, don't tell me you don't have the same thoughts bouncing around inside that empty head of yours, now?" she teased.
"Hah," Lloyd said once before wrapping his arms around his knees. "I do," he replied, "but... what about those who've failed? They barely made it past the Wall. Even if they did, they'd die out in the Wastes."
"I'm not saying it'll be easy, but there have been people who managed to escape and now live free of this tyrannical bastard," Terra spat. Lloyd flinched subtly. She looked at him carefully. He just shook his head. "Didn't his son escape?" she asked.
"Only to be found a couple miles away from Shadow Peak," Lloyd grumbled.
"But he still found a way out of this godforsaken place," Terra snapped. Lloyd looked at her, confusion and concern flitted across his face. Terra glanced at him once and looked back at her knees. "Sorry, just had a bad morning. Ignore me," she apologized quietly.
Lloyd spoke up after a few silent minutes passed. "Look, if we are able to come up with a plan to escape... It has to be foolproof."
"Oh, come on, Lloyd. You think I'm letting Caedus make this plan? You know me better than that," Terra smiled for once that morning.
"Yeah, I do," Lloyd replied. They both got up and scrambled down to the recieve the morning's assignments.

Folks were already up and out of their beds, making their way down to the dining hall. The name was too grand for a dozen tables and chairs set up under a leaky awning. People rubbed the sleep from their eyes and stumbled into the line where the teller behind the window wrote down each person's name on board and the assignments they had done before. Those who had done a decent or good job on their assignment recieved black marks by their names. Those who half-assed their work got red checks and the more red checks they recieved the greater the chance they'd get to being kicked out of Haven. There were a few whose names were practically bleeding red.
Terra and Lloyd slipped into the line along with Caedus and Amy to recieve their jobs for the day. The assignments ranged from fairly paid jobs like a construction worker for the Overseer to a medium paid like a trader to a poorly paid collector. When each person was given their task, there were quiet grumblings or soft cheers as they read the tiny slip of worn down paper. Terra walked up to decaying front and watched the teller behind rusted bars. He looked up at her once.
"Name?"
"Terra Kinley."
The man looked at the board and glanced around for her name. "I.D.?" he asked. Terra fumbled around in her pocket for the little card she was given when she was first enrolled into New Haven's school system. She handed it to the teller who held it up to the small lamp on his desk, checking for authenticity. "Identification number?" he asked. Terra sighed heavily. Doesn't this guy remember I was here just yesterday? Terra thought glumly as she raised her sleeve from her wrist to reveal a small set of numbers and letters that every resident is given at birth. That way, whenever a citizen left or entered New Haven, they would have to pass by a large set of security poles that lined the sides of the gate that keep track of that person.
Terra didn't know how the guards kept track of people with numbers on their wrists when more than half the time that part of their arm was covered with gloves or sleeves due to the fact that the temperature out there in the Wastes dropped to freezing temps. The tracking, she assumed, was all due to a scanner, she guessed, that was built in with a low level x-ray scanner added to see through whatever was covering that person's wrist. Terra knew that some of the guards fooled around with the x-ray whenever a woman passed by. They were always snickering like girls at one of the old boy band concerts she heard about back before the war began. It sickened her.
"Oi! Chicky! You want your task or not?" the teller said. suddenly jolting her from her thoughts. Her eyes finally focused on the yellow-white stripe of paper being waved in her face. She grabbed it and opened it. Her eyes narrowed as if she was trying to see through it.
"I think there's been a mistake," she said looking up at the teller.
"Oh yeah? And how's that?" He leaned forward, his aged face almost pressing up against the bars.
Doing her best not to let his expression bother her, she turned back to the paper in hand. "I have been working hard for the past few months. I think I deserved a small raise," she replied and held up the strip that had TRADER written across it in bold font.
The teller sniffed, smirked, and returned back to the old computer in front of him. "Excuse me?" Terra said, "Did you not hear me?"
"Yeah, I heard ya, girly," the man replied, "But I can't do a damned thing about it. It comes out all randomized. I have no control over it." He looked at her lazily as he pulled out a cigarette from his faded and moth eaten jacket to light. It was complete BS.
"So you say, but isn't it supposed to be ranked in how you've done with you previous tasks? With little to no red marks?"
The man looked at her and took a long pull from his smoke and breathed out like a dragon. "You keep making a fuss of this and I'll make sure you get an extremely shitty job and red marks," he said grinning like a chesire cat.
That nearly sent Terra over the edge. "What?!" she nearly yelled. The man just leaned back in his chair, grinning smugly. Before Terra could say anything that would more thsn likely get her kicked out, Lloyd nudged her shoulder, saying quietly, "He's not worth it." Obviously overheariing the one sided exchange, the man said, "Better listen to your boyfriend, chicky." Terra's face burned bright red. "He isn't my boyfriend, dumbass," she snpped angerly and hurried out away from the task line. She didn't see the shocked and hurt look cross Lloyd's face as she walked away.
"She's a bit of a tight ass, but damn isn't she a looker. What I wouldn't give if I wasn't stuck in this job," the teller remarked as he gave Lloyd his task. Lloyd glared a the man who flinched slightly. Lloyd was given his task for the week; he was CONSTRUCTION, among those few who got the nicely paying tasks where they repaired certain structures the Overseer needed done. Caedus and Amy were up next. Caedus was a COLLECTOR, someone who walks up and down the streets taking in whatever junk and old items people didn't need or want anymore to sell to the traveling caravans when they passed by. Amy got SCRUBBER; she had to clean out the houses the richer citizens of New Haven recieved after completing an important task for the Overseer. Almost everyone worked up to that miracle position, but very few were given the reward for their hard work.

The rest of the week proved hard and taxing for the residents of New Haven. The Overseer had to hire outside help to keep out the Raiders that continually attacked his city. Snowfall came early that Autumn and happened to fall that week. Temperatures dropped and tempers rose. There was not enough insulation in this house, that fire is overregulation, we weren't prepared for this drop in temp, what are we going to do? Most everyone turned to and relied on the Overseer which was how he both liked and regretted it. Everyone seemed to come to him and him only with their pathetic, useless problems and expected him to just whip out a solution from thin air. He both loved and hated his job and wished his son was of age and willing to accept his role. The other... he didn't like to think about that disgrace.
Trade was slow and the items Terra recieved were worn and tattered. Not many came over to her stall so she decided to perform small tricks for whoever passed by. Not using her precious dagger she so highly valued, but used a short steak knife to carve the air. It was well within the length regulation the Overseer put out and she performed hidden from the guards' eyes. She recieved a small profit for her tricks that she divvied up. Half for herself and the other half to go with the earnings from the trading stall.
Lloyd worked well into the night with the other workers in the cold snow. They were given the job to repair the roof of the Justice building. The shingles had to be replaced at least twice a day since they were subjected to many harsh Wasteland elements. He paused from his work for a moment to spot Terra a few streets over turning tricks for one of the neighborhood children. The vanishing coin. He could see the silver shining in the air as she flipped and twirled it, only for it to disappear in thin to appear behind the child's ear. She clapped ecstatically as she given the coin and held it in reverence.
Amy sat up in one of the mansions she was helping clean and looked around her. She and a few other men and women had been working for about six hours. The last one took almost eight. Amy stretched and turned in her working supplies for the day. She stepped out into the biting cold and lifted her face up to catch snowflake on her tongue. She looked back at the hous longingly and remembered from class about the holidays pre-war people celebrated and wished they could happen again around a roaring fire and a tree decorated with ornaments and tinsel.
Caedus hated his job, not only because it was a but depressing but the pay was for crap. He walked up and down each day collecting unwanted junk to give to the trading stall to sell. It took a long ass time to even place everything onto the cart he was given. He would recieve a small profit once he was done but he felt it wasn't enough. Nothing was ever enough. He trudged on throught the snow.

The only time the four really met up was at meal times when they were surrounded by other people. There you at least couldn't hear what everyone was saying. Terra played around with her food until finally she dropped her fork and looked up at her friends.
"God! I'm so sick and tired of everything!" Caedus quietly exclaimed. Amy and Lloyd nodded and stared into their food.
"If you're so tired of it, why propose a suggestion to the Overseer?" suggested Lloyd.
"And be shot for 'criticizing' him? Hell no!"
Terra was lost in thought for a moment before focusing on her friends.
"Well, we could always leave," she said.