"Ugh, what? Where? Oh damn, my head," I moaned, struggling to open my eyes. When my eyes opened they snapped shut against the glaring light.

"What the hell?" I asked, not really expecting an answer. I opened my eyes again and looked past the light, blinking the spots from my vision away. Squinting, I looked around the room.

There was a very bright light in front of me that made it difficult but I tried regardless. There seemed to be no other light on except for the one in my face. I tried to move but my arms and legs seemed to be tied down.

"What?" I looked around confusedly. This didn't look like my room. Where was I? I was pretty sure that I didn't have that much to drink last night.

'Oh god,' I thought with despair.

'He got me! He found me again! Damn it! I gotta get out of here!' I thought desperately and looked around, my eyes adjusting to the light, and tried to find anything that I could use to get free.

There was a small TV in the far corner with a chair and a couch facing it. There was a small table in the space between the chair and couch and a stand with a broken mirror on it. I looked back at the table and saw a wooden baseball bat lying on it. That's when it all rushed back to me. The mission, the ghouls, the girls, that damn bat!

'Oh thank god,' I thought.

'That psycho isn't here after all. But still, where am I?'

I tried to glance behind me and see the rest of the room but all I could see was shadow thanks to the light that blinded me initially. As I waited for my eyes to refocus I heard a feminine voice speak from behind me.

"You're up."

I tried to turn around but couldn't see anything.

"Are you ready to answer my questions?" the voice asked.

"Eh? What questions?" I asked the voice. The voice came again, this time with a hint of annoyance.

"I am asking the questions here, you're going to answer them. Got it?"

"This is the most cliche interrogation I've ever been in. But I'll bite and answer your questions. Could you show come into the light though? I don't like to talk to people, especially women, in the dark. It makes me uncomfortable." I heard footsteps and suddenly there was a girl to my right. Well, young woman actually. In the light I could just make out a long dark brown braid that hung over her right shoulder and a shining pair of green eyes.

"That better?" She asked indignantly, "Or do you want me to untie you and give you a gun as well, you know, so you're 'comfortable'." I was about to say something snarky and maybe a bit flirty when I realized that my respirator was gone. I was breathing the stale air of the room.

'This isn't good. If there's any radiation in here I'm in trouble.'

I kept my face neutral as I got an idea of how to turn this situation around. I opened my mouth as if to say something and feigned an incredibly shocked expression.

"No! No no no no no! Where's my mask? I need it! I'll die! I need my mask! Where's my Geiger counter? Is there any radiation nearby? You need to give me back my respirator!" I screamed and ranted at her, struggling to free myself of my binds. My sudden and extreme behavior caught her off guard and her stance shifted into one of uncertainty.

"Uh, alright! I'll get it for you! Just calm down!" She turned and opened a drawer in the mirror stand, presumably to get me my respirator.

'Thanks, that'll make me more comfortable,' I thought.

I stood up and pulled my arms over my head so that my bounded wrists were in front of me. I did a quick hop to place myself behind her and used my hands to bang her head on the stand. Her head came back up with a red mark on her forehead and her eyes unfocused. I rammed my elbow into her stomach and sent her keeling over on her side, spitting out whatever had been in her stomach beforehand. I got down on my knees and put her in a sleeper hold. It only took a few seconds before she was out cold with a bruised stomach and forehead.

'Thank God I'm double jointed,' I thought as I went back over to the stand.

I opened the drawer and looked through it's insides. Alright, there was my respirator, some paper, some scrap, a pencil, aaaand...Ha! A knife! It was a kitchen knife with a blade sharp enough to cut through my binds but not much more than that. I flipped it around in my hands and started to cut away at my bindings. It took me about half a minute to get my wrist binds off and another half-minute to cut away my ankle binds. I rubbed my left wrist and looked back towards my would-be-capturer. It didn't seem right to check her for weapons while she was sprawled on the floor like that, so I picked her up and set her down gently on the couch.

Then I checked her for weapons.

The strange part was that she was completely clean. Nothing that could even be conceived to be a weapon besides the clothes on her back.

"Wow, not even a switchblade," I mumbled to myself. It was very unusual for anyone NOT to have some sort of weapon stashed away somewhere. Why this girl is completely unarmed is beyond me, but weren't there two of them? A younger girl?

And right on cue, a door opened behind me.

"Ashley? What's going on?" Said the girl, rubbing at her eye sleepily. She opened her eyes in a squint and they wandered the room, eventually settling on me. I stood perfectly still, looking at her with surprise. It took her a second to process, but once she was done her eyes opened wide in fear.

"AAAAAAAGH!"

I tried to grab at her, to force her to be still, but the girl just threw the nearest object (a book) at me and ran back behind the door. I heard the click of a lock and sighed in exasperation.

'That went well,' I thought to myself.

I looked back at the brunette and thought about what I should do next. There was no way I was getting into that room the girl locked herself in. She may have a shotgun in her tiny hands aimed at the door for all I knew.

And I didn't survive this long by being rash in my decisions.

I decided to avoid that room for now and returned to the stand with my respirator in it. The respirator was still in the drawer with the tube that connects it to the tank. Speaking of the tank, where did she stash it? I looked around and saw it laying under the couch, almost out of site. I crouched and pulled out the slightly curved metal tank.

It was a simple gray tank that was molded to my back so that it would lie flat against me with relatively little discomfort. The tank served the purpose of taking in outside air and filtering out any dust or debris that could be floating around in it. The next function in it's filtering process is radiation. I don't know the specifics of the process but after the radiation filtering the now clean air is sent to my respirator via a connection tube. The CO2 that I exhale is released through a vent in the mask itself, which is one-way so only air and CO2 can leave and nothing can get in. I had some modifications made to it to make it more intimidating to help me during interrogations or anything of the like. I modified it so that while it continues to vent what I exhale continuously, it stores some of what I exhale in the mask. When I exhale hard through my nose, it activates a release mechanism to immediately release all of the CO2 build-up in a loud steam of gas. Of course, it can't hold the gas indefinitely. So there's a small mechanism in the mask that vibrates when the container reaches its capacity, telling me to vent as soon as possible.

I did this after one of my employers made a comment about the mask and my mechanical voice and breathing's intimidating effect. Intimidation can get you a long way in the wasteland, and I intent to utilize it whenever it becomes useful.

I hefted the rather light pack up and adjusted the straps. I slung it onto my back and clipped it on before I walked back to the stand to retrieve the mask and tube.

I grabbed it and placed it on my face, the seals hissing shut against my skin as I quickly connected the tube to the mask and the tank. I took in a big breath of freshly filtered air and wished that I had my Geiger counter. I guess that I should try to locate my gear. The brunette obviously hid them all over the house.

"Well, this is just fantastic." I said with a metallic sigh. It looked like it was time for a little game of scavenger hunt.

I HATE, scavenger hunts.

A/N

Sup guys! Please don't forget to submit some OC's! Outside OC's are essential to my story guys! Give me an OC in the Reviews not in a PM please. That way I can keep track of all of the OCs I've gotten from you guys. Thanks mees and lees I'll meme y'all later!