Dr. Gray didn't know how to handle a gun. That was what Jaimie was for. Or, at least, one of the things she was for. She was currently bringing Dr. Gray to meet Lt. Bryce, who was to continue training Jaimie in Nick's absence. Dr. Gray was certainly curious as to how the whole thing was set up in the first place, but she decided to bide her time before pressing her sister for information.

Jaimie, for her part, was being very quiet. She was still wearing her ratty sweatshirt underneath her trenchcoat despite her sister's offers to buy her new clothes. She had turned out to be rather independent, and Dr. Gray felt a small swelling of pride, even though she hadn't had any particular influence either way. Unless not being around counted as an influence.

Shaking her head, Dr. Gray dismissed the thoughts form her mind. No use thinking about that now; she had the future to think about.

Jaimie was doing the exact opposite, dwelling on the events of the past as she walked silently toward their rendezvous point. She didn't acknowledge Lt. Bryce beyond a sharp salute, and besides one in return, he didn't acknowledge her either. Dr. Gray introduced herself, and Jaimie soon found herself ignored as she wandered away from them to sit beside a collapsed building, leaning against it as she thought what had happened the night of Landown's capture.

She had been on her way to meet up with Nick to train as she had most nights, when the two privates Lee and Phillips had spotted her near the food stores and the locust had attacked. She sighed aloud, looking incredibly tired for a girl her age, despite the fact that she'd been in a hospital for three days, and allowed her mind to drift onto the subject on which she had nightmares every night.

"Nemacyst!" Phillips shouted, and he and his companion had immediately started to run behind the food stores building, exactly where Jaimie was hiding. Jaimie wasn't entirely sure what a Nemacyst was, but she couldn't be caught sneaking around so she dashed down an alley, soon hearing a building explode nearby. There was a loud whistling noise that she didn't recognize ringing through the air, scaring her more than anything she'd ever encountered before.

Suddenly someone grabbed her and pulled her onto a side street, and she nearly screamed but whoever it was covered her mouth and shushed her.

"Jaimie, it's just me. Calm yourself."

"Nick! Thank God-"

"Not now, we've got to get out of here," Nick said. "Come on." They could hear people screaming a little ways off. Nick's mouth formed a grim line, and he began to jog in that direction. Jaimie followed, clutching her sniper rifle so hard that her knuckles turned white. She had never fought a living, breathing enemy before, and she was terrified. Nick remained calm, maneuvering through the backstreets until they emerged at a road teeming with scared civilians, all running, running to Jacinto, drawn there as bugs to a lamp.

"What do we do?" Jaimie asked, slightly panicked and very pale but forcing herself to remain in control.

"We? We do nothing. You get out of here, I'll provide cover," Nick replied, pushing toward the back of the screaming mass of people. They mostly avoided him as he went, knowing that he was their only source of protection. Jaimie followed closely, a panicked look on her face.

"No! I can't leave, I can fight! I have to help!" she shouted over all the noise.

"You need to get out, go to Jacinto and I'll meet you there," Nick yelled back over his shoulder.

"I'm not going anywhere." Nick sighed, realizing that Jaimie was going to be stubborn about this and knowing that he couldn't make her leave, and that it would be a waste of time to argue.

"Fine," he said, finally reaching the edge of the crowd and turning around to face her. "But I swear, if anything happens to you-" He was cut off by the explosion of a nearby building, which killed some civilians and sent debris everywhere, injuring others. Jaimie paled at the gore and Nick cursed under his breath. More whistling was heard overhead, and Nick broke into a low sprint in the opposite direction of the crowd's surging movements. Jaimie struggled to keep up, until he finally stopped, not even sweating.

"Shit," Nick mumbled.

"What?" Jaimie panted. He pointed, and at first Jaimie saw nothing except darkness. She heard them first; boots, heavy and thick, pounding on the pavement. She could feel the ground shaking; she could smell the stench of blood and rotting flesh, and she fought the urge to vomit as her hair stood on end. She forced herself to stay, even though she wanted nothing more to flee when she saw them; gray, scaly, hominid creatures with fangs that seemed too large to fit in their mouths, not even wearing armor, but their equivalent of cargo pants, and even that was probably only so they could carry ammo.

One of them, in the front of the pack, roared a deep, guttural battle cry, which was taken up by others soon after. This one in particular, however, had a bullet through its skull before it could even finish, before it even knew it was in danger. Nick reloaded and aimed for another, and the whole mass of the vile creatures charged, many spreading throughout the city.

"We have to go," Nick said, knowing that there was no winning. Jaimie ran with him, and the pair of them shot the locust when they could, killing or injuring with well-placed Longshot rounds. Screaming continued, and soon the two were chased right up to the back of the crowd. They screamed even louder now that death was upon them, and Nick and Jaimie saw and heard civilians being shot or chased down despite their efforts. They couldn't save very many civilians, though any locust that approached them directly were killed by Nick's Lancer. There were too many; likely, they'd die with the civilians that they couldn't protect.

"Private O'Brien, your location," Lt. Bryce come in through the COM link, just as the locust retreated temporarily.

"Heading northeast following the civilians sir. The locust are here, but they're behind us for now."

"Get as many of them on the highway out as you can ASAP."

"Wilco," Nick replied grimly, probably thinking that the number would be small. Only the ones already on the east side of Landown had any hope of escaping, unless they knew how to protect themselves.

And, as it was about to be proven, that didn't guarantee survival either.

There was a cranking sound, almost like gears clanking together. Jaimie was puzzled by the noise, and saw a faint yellow light in the distance.

"Jaimie, move!" Nick yelled. He ran over to her, spraying Lancer bullets in the general direction.

"Futile!" a hoarse, strained voice said, and the wet sound of something piercing flesh was heard. Nick looked back at Jaimie, and she saw that it was an arrow of some sort, sticking out of his chest, still glowing. His pained look startled her.

"Take care of yourself," he said, sprinting forward into a crowd of locust. Jaimie didn't know what he meant and was about to run after him when fire and gore exploded from his core, engulfing some locust with him while others fell. She screamed, but was soon silenced by the strained voice again, like the wind or a siren, willing her to her death. She saw a locust dressed in a cape with an odd helmet that covered all of its face but its teeth, decked out in red armor making its way toward her, and not in any hurry either. In its claws was what seemed to be a bow, an arrow notched in it. It laughed, pulling the trigger, and the cranking noise started again. It was quite a ways off, Jaimie saw, but she knew there was nowhere to run. She brought her scope up to her eye, hoping she could pull off the shot before she ended up like Nick was. A single tear slid down her cheek as she pulled the trigger, her bullet sliding through the helmet like paper and cleanly killing the locust. She rolled to the side, in case the creature had already loosed the arrow, but saw that in its death the explosive arrow struck into the ground several yards short of its target, and instead of trying to kill the few other locust that were with it, she ran, crouched to avoid the Hammer Burst bullets flying at her...

Jaimie was crying even after her reverie, wishing that it had been a sick nightmare, that her childhood friend could still be with her. Or at least that there had been a body to grieve for, but instead all that was left of him were limbs and bloodstains.

She jumped when she heard a gunshot, and turned her head slightly to see that Lt. Bryce was trying to show Dr. Gray how to shoot, though she was having a terrible time of it. The target they'd set up wasn't even punctured, though, looking at the ground, Jaimie saw a few empty cartriges. They weren't real bullets, she knew; Lt. Bryce would never waste supplies for such a thing as teaching a Doctor how to shoot a sniper rifle.

Jaimie wiped her eyes and sighed. What did Dr. Gray want with her anyway? She said she'd wanted her to help get revenge for their father's death, but now it was about much more than that. At least, for Jaimie it was. Would Dr. Gray try to join the army after she learned how to shoot? Couldn't she have just joined, and they would teach her then? As far as Jaimie knew, they weren't going to let either of them join anyway; they were fertile females, after all. After a few minutes of listening to Lt. Bryce try to tell Dr. Gray how to aim properly, Jaimie stood, walked up to them, and wordlessly fixed her sister's stance, physically moving her into the position in a way she knew Bryce would never do. The she stood in the pose herself, raised her old sniper scope to her eye and aimed it at the target, right in the center, and fired. The recoil pushed it into her shoulder, bruised from the very same thing, and she hissed in pain. With that, she reloaded and walked away.

Dr. Gray stared at her sister in amazement careful not to move from the careful position that she'd put her in. Her sister was pretty good. And, the doctor knew, she had a lot to learn.

Author's Note: Woo, an update! I know its been forever, lol. I'm working on a lot right now, though. Thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated. Heartfelt thanks to those who are still following after all this time... haha.

Edit: Alrighty. I have edited every chapter so far. A new chapter is coming soon... for realz.