When Joseph awoke from his sleep he looked around to see that the sun was setting, they had slept for at least a few hours. The vehicle was still moving and Joe could feel the odd bump now and again. He went to sit up and noticed something pushing down on his chest; Jaden. His eyes widened as he wondered why she had done that, were all girls out of the vault this open when it came to these things? Even with the confusion of it all he couldn't help but enjoy the feeling of her soft breathing on his chest. Maybe he was a little too obvious about his feelings toward her, now she had done this. It's not like they had done anything drastic, he thought, just a few minutes of each other's warm embrace and the taste of each other's lips; nothing. He needed to get up though, it was almost time for supper and if anyone saw them like this there would be no end to it.

He grabbed her shoulders and moved them gently over to her own seat, making sure not to make any noise. He sat down then as soon as Jane was in a proper sitting position, and he tried to snap Matt out of his trance on the road. "Hey, Hey man." He had his hand on Matts shoulder. Matt's shoulder jerked back and the car swerved a little.

"Holy hell man! Don't scare me like that!" he responded. Joseph held his chest as he wheezed and breathed with a high pitched exhale.

"Well you scared the hell out of me too! Shit!"

"What time is it?" said Mathew. Martin stirred a bit in his sleep then and grumbled something in his own sleep talk.

"Seven, we need to eat."

"Fine," Mathew shrugged, "There's a truck stop over there, and we can make a fire."

Soon they were on the side of the street on an outcropping of pavement with a few busted down trees and an old building. The two rusty gas pumps beside the building had been toppled over and grass was growing tall all around them. They had spent a few minutes collecting wood from the trees and then made a fire on the pavement. The fire with stones surrounding the scorched wood licked up orange flames into the orange red sky. Heat blasted Joseph's face as he shielded himself with his arm. Jaden sat on the opposite side of the fire, smiling at him as her face was distorted by the heat waves of the flames. Emile and Martin were both eating Pork and beans out of the cans with spoons and Mathew was enjoying an old TV dinner, straight out of the package. Joseph had his own can of chicken noodle soup and he slurped it out of the can whilst trying not to burn himself on the hot can or the liquid within.

He couldn't focus; Jaden was looking at him through a sinful smile and, although he really did like her, it was distracting; almost in a good way, good then bad, then good again, damn my mind is a mess.

The Sky was dark now, black dotted with little glints of light and a few clouds spread across the sky. They chucked their trash into the tall grass along the road and started walking back to the Vehicle. Mathew spoke: "We should just stay here for the night, because that SUV ain't comfortable at all, ya' know?"

"I'm alright with that if you guys are, what ya' say?" Said Martin

"I'm fine with staying the night, there should be a room for… each of us." Said Jane, she winked at Joseph. He thought that he couldn't take much more of this before he caved and gave in to something unspeakable, given his beliefs.

"I think I only saw four rooms actually." Said Martin back.

"Not a problem, I can bunk with Joe."

"Fine by me." Spoke Jo- What are you trying to pull you idiot!? What would your mother say? He thought to himself, but that didn't matter because his mother wasn't here right now, and Jaden was.

They made their way to the separate rooms in the old rickety building on the side of the road with their sleeping bags in hand. Apparently Emile packed them and decided not to mention them for some reason, typical. Matt slept behind the counter in the main building, Martin was in the Janitors closet, and Emile grudgingly lay down inside of the room conjoining the two bathrooms. Lastly Jaden and Joseph both set up their sleeping bags in the storage room in the back, it was cold and dark and the only light for them to see was a small crack in the back garage door.

Damp floors were not a problem, the sleeping bags were huge and weather resistant, the problem was how hard the floors were and Joseph was quite uncomfortable. When he looked to the other side of the room where Jane was he saw a dark figure hovering over her sleeping bag. Fearing that it wasn't friendly he drew his pistol and turned on his Pip-boy light, illuminating the room, and Jane. She was stripped down to nearly nothing, and she cringed at the bright light, Joseph turned it off and flinched at what he had just seen.

"Are you alright?" he whispered, "I didn't mean to hurt you." In the moment that his vision was readjusting to the darkness he could feel pressure on him, through the sleeping bag, lighter than he was and he definitely knew what it was. Even when nearly blind he could still make out her facial features with ease.

"You didn't hurt me," She whispered back, "You just scared me is all."

"What do you think you're doing…" his heart was racing faster than ever, his hands were on her back, her naked back. He stared at her and she stared back, she smiled that same smile.

"Life is short in the wasteland, so why don't we make it count." She made her way into his sleeping bag and started getting comfortable. She faced him and kissed his cheek, feeling the skin of his face with her hands; rough hands, working hands.

"Look, I like you," Said Joe as he pushed away from her slightly, "But we need to take things slower, I've never even seen this much of a woman before!"

"Then we can take it slow if you want," that wasn't the response he had expected, but it was welcome, "but let me lie down with you for a night or two, we don't even need to do anything, just… hold me. I get lonely." She said bashfully. Whether her sudden shyness was genuine or to get his attention he couldn't tell.

"Why are you so obsessed with me? I don't understand, from the moment that we had met I was struck dumb by you, but now you're falling over me." He breathed this question towards her, making sure no one else would hear it.

"Because it was the same way with me," she laughed, "I just know how to compose myself, instead of making it obvious." He looked down and immediately felt the blood rush to his cheeks. He could see almost all of her, covered only by a bra and her underwear. He looked back up to see her smiling.

"Do you have room enough in that coat for two?" She asked, cocking her head. She felt her way to his coats zipper and pulled it down, the inside was soft, like a faux fur or something along those lines and she snuggled herself right in. It fit baggy on him so there was most certainly enough room for her. She wrapped her hands around his waist but not before taking his gasmask off of his neck so that she could get just that much closer to him, he returned her embrace, wrapping her in his jacket and allowing her to fit her body with his. She felt up and down his vault-Tec jumpsuit. She positioned her head just underneath his chin and let out a long breath.

"Goodnight?" Joseph said timidly.

"Goodnight." Yawned Jaden.

Joseph opened his eyes; he could hear something, that much was sure. Jane still had her head under his chin and he feared for what might happen if someone walked in on them. He could hear a hissing sound with a growl along with it, the sound subsided for a moment and then a rattling sound started; Nightstalker. He moved to grab his pistol on his chest, noticing that he had taken it off before going to bed, it was to his left. He reached for his revolver and pulled it out of its holster, sliding his hands back into the sleeping bag and wrapping them around Jaden. He lightly shook her and her eyes fluttered open; they went into a sitting position still inside the bag.

"Don't freak out yet but I heard a Nightstalker-!"

"Oh shit!" she whispered in a yelling tone, if that was at all possible, "What are we going to do?" Joseph breathed in and out calmly, hoping that his calm would rub off on her.

"I'm going to go send it to hell, you're going to stay here and-!"

"Fuck. That." She said, she reached for her ten millimetre pistol and got out of the sleeping bag, he got up as well.

"Okay, I think he's outside of the room but we-!" and the beast was on him. He hit the ground with a thud with the slithering coyote thing grasping his arm in its jowls, hissing through its remaining mouth-space. He thought that the coat would help protect him a bit, but the sleeve was up and the thing was biting through his vault jumpsuit. He screamed and writhed around on the ground trying to throw it off. Up this close he could see the menacing yellow eyes of the repto-mammal as it enjoyed the taste of his blood.

"Shoot it!" he said in a groveling voice, himself growling back at the predator. Jaden was pointing the gun she held in all different places toward the Nightstalker. Her hands shook generously.

"I can't, I might hit you!" she was right, it was doubtful that she could hit it like this, it was too dark. Joe took his other arm and reached down to his side, grabbing his knife. The fangs went down with more pressure than before.

"Arrr-gahhh!" he screamed in agony as the thing growled at him through a full mouth. He took his knife and plunged it into the beasts head; it whimpered once and then fell limp. It was dead.

"You did it!" said Jane, she got her flashlight and turned it on, resting it on a desk nearby; Joe could see the room now, but it didn't look normal. Everything looked twisted, distorted and wrong, blurry or spinning, like a drug setting in.

"Oh God no! The poison!" he pulled the nightstalker's snake head off of his arm and it revealed two puncture wounds covered in a black viscous liquid. Joseph started to breath very heavily, "Get my medical bag, I don't have much time." Jane let out a worried gasp and went over to his bag. She brought it to him. He reached into it and pulled out a brown vial full of a strange liquid. He immediately poured some of the clear-brown liquid into his wound; he cringed and groaned loudly and then swallowed the rest of the mixture. He sat it down breathing heavily still, and grabbed a stimpack, he stabbed that into his arm and lied down on the sleeping bag. There was more hissing.

"Are you fucking kidding me!?" he shouted as he sat back up glancing around the room. There was a bang and smoke coming from Jaden's gun, a dead Nightstalker lay on the ground in front of her. A few moments later the other boys burst into the room, Pip-Boy lights on and guns ready. They saw the creatures and Joe first, and when they saw Jaden they turned away covering their eyes.

"Oh my God, we are so sorry! We never knew you slept in your… you know." Stuttered Martin

"We have the situation handled, now get out!" Joseph said still grappling his right arm. The men left the room through the doorway that they had entered through and Joe was alone with Jaden. He looked up at her and she looked down at him, she ran over to him and grabbed his shoulder.

"Are you alright!?" she asked. Joseph let out a cough.

"Fucking dandy." He said laughing, "I never thought they would leave that easily."

"I guess they trust you enough."

"Yeah," he coughed again, "Sure." He cringed and then shook his head violently. "Man that anti-venom tastes like shit." He stuck out his tongue and tasted the air around him, it tasted like wet dog.

"Would they have left you with a half-naked woman otherwise?"

"They probably know what we are together, no point in hiding that, but just in case they don't know," he continued, "Don't mention it to anyone." She nodded her head and turned to the animal corpses on the floor. Their scaly hides had fur sticking out in between them; sickly would be a good word to describe them. Joseph went to stand up and then crumpled back down on his sleeping bag and Jane rushed over to him and put her hand on his shoulder. He cringed again. "What time is it?"

"Check your wrist thing you idiot." He looked at his wrist and then back at Jane.

"Seven o'clock; damn we didn't get much sleep."

"Let's get dressed and tell them what happened" said Jane, still standing in her underwear with a gun in her hand. Joe shrugged her off and looked around the room for his medical bag; he was obviously still delirious. He could see a bit better than he could before, but the affects were still there. He reached into his now-colorful-looking satchel and brought out a roll of gauze as its form shifted in his liquidly hand. He then unravelled it and wrapped it tightly around his arm, biting it off with his teeth. Jane looked in amazement at his swiftness with a bandage as he knotted it off.

"Without the… personal info' I hope?" he said.

"I'm not stupid, just crazy." She answered. Joseph shook his head a few more times.

"Man, colors are weird…"

The other men were sitting in the middle of the store, fully dressed and car parked outside with all of their belongings. The sun was rising on the eastern horizon out of their direct field of vision. Joseph and Jaden walked into the room, fully dressed as well and they went to sit down beside their friends. The men looked awkwardly toward them and glanced around the room.

"Two Night-stalkers, they're dead now." Joseph looked down at his wrapped arm and pulled his sleeve down over it. "I'm fine, don't ask or anything."

Martin had seen this act before: whenever Joseph was embarrassed or trying to hide something he always acted distant and enclosed in a shield of self-pity. Emile however did not know this. Joe turned his head away and let his hair fall to the side.

"Whatever you say captain-awkward, are we going soon Matt?" asked Emile.

"Soon, let's have something to eat first." Everyone searched the remains of the store and found some old food to eat for a quick breakfast, no need to waste the food they already had stockpiled. The whole time they were eating by the derelict roadside Jane was leaning close to Joseph. Martin had known Joe since they were kids, he was only a few days older than Joe and he knew that something was wrong. At a time like this there was no time for anything to be wrong. Jaden had been acting strange around him recently, maybe that's what he was hiding, and maybe they were doing something, planning something. He figured he was just being paranoid and went on eating a loaf of bread.

"What in the fuck is going on!?" Amos hollered throughout the old crumbled buildings. They were surrounded by large skyscrapers, toppled over; rubble everywhere and they were in serious danger. Plasma and lasers, bullets and dust flew through the air and Amos grasped his heart with his hand where a bullet had hit his vest; he held his monstrous pistol with one hand and it waivered in his grip. He sat behind a large broken wall as his friends shot out at the offenders.

The men and women shooting at them were of numerous lots and they wore many different sets of attire, but one thing was certain: they were not at all friendly.

Thaddeus sprinted forward toward cover and as he slid behind the rubble he reached to his belt. As soon as his foot hit the side of the concrete he used his momentum to hurdle a grenade at the group. One man was caught in the blast and died instantly. In the confusion Amos' group had gained the upper hand in the fight. Solomon had hit a woman in the head with his plasma rounds and all that remained was her skull; he cringed.

Bullets continued ringing out of the dust and smoke so Amos figured it was time he joined in.

He gathered himself and grasped his pistol with both hands, his tired, torn hands. As he came around the corner of the wall he saw a man right in his sights, he was nearly naked and an easy kill shot. When he pulled the trigger it was the only noise in the vicinity, it was certainly the loudest and it left a hole of gigantic proportions in the man's chest; blood was everywhere. The man's body fell to the ground with a thud and Amos turned to see another man, this time in formal attire with an assault rifle. He tapped a button on his Pip-boy and in a second in everyone else's time the man had no head, just a splatter of blood and flesh all over.

The dust soon settled and they all went in with weapons drawn. Daniel almost fired on James when his stealth boy wore off and he hovered over a woman's body with his knives sunk into her chest. James put away his knives and walked over to Daniel, he grabbed his friends gun by the barrel and forcibly lowered it.

"You'll kill someone Mr. Jumpy Mc-Leg-Hole." Said James as he pointed to Daniel's left leg, a bloody bandage surrounding a large part of it.

"Fuck you squint!" replied an angry Daniel jutting out his rifle at James. James raised his full face visor and looked at him through, as he said, squinted eyes.

"What the fuck did you just say?! You bastard I thought we was friends man! That mean nothin' to you? Huh!"

"Shut the fuck up both of you!" shouted a woman with an assault rifle strapped across her chest. She wore a long black hooded sweatshirt and tight black jeans. Her white face stood out against her red-brown hair caught in a ponytail. "And you Danny!" she pointed at Daniel, "Quit it with the fucken' racism before I cut your balls off, I'll have none of it!" Samantha was easy to anger and when she did she made sure to take charge.

"Sorry bout' that James," spoke Daniel, embarrassed, "Heat of the moment."

"It's ok man," sighed James, he put his hand on Daniel's shoulder, "C'mon let's go see what's up." He patted Daniel on the back and they walked over to the group. The men hovered over a half dead man who was choking on his own blood. Amos, who had no patience left, had the man grasped by his collar. Amos was known for being both impatient and irrational when in the heat of the moment.

"Last time and we might help ya'. Now… Who. Sent. You?!" The man had a look of terror on his bloodied face and blood ran down to and past his moustache. Amos was not being gentle. The man finally caved.

"J… Ju…" he had a look of puzzlement and then sudden enlightenment on his face, "Joseph was the man's name, yeah Ju… Joseph, I mean." Amos just continued staring at him through glassed eyes and then let him go. He stood up and looked at the man with his gun still quivering in his hands.

"I don't appreciate jokes…" he said as he raised his weapon and ended the man's life in a bloody mess before anyone could argue. Solomon got some on his shoe and looked utterly disgusted. Amos looked at the ground and began breathing heavily. "No…" he whispered "No there has to be an explanation…" Solomon went over to him.

"It couldn't be our Joseph, that just couldn't-!" Amos grabbed Solomon's collar now to, with blood covered hands.

"That's just it!" he screamed, continuing on his own sentence and ignoring Solomon's completely, "There is no explanation, no other fucken' Joseph knows us!" he had a look of anger in his eyes covering the pain that hid behind them. Solomon wrestled himself from his grip and fell backwards.

"What are you going to do? You can't just kill him!" said Thaddeus.

"And why the Hell not huh!?" replied Amos angrily and unreasonably, "I'm getting them on the horn right now."

"But it doesn't make any sense." Said Sammy, "We need to think first."

"Fuck off new chick, I don't trust you either." Spouted Amos. Sammy looked awfully offended, but she never acted on it.

Mathew's Pip-boy made the sound again, someone was calling them. He answered and everyone grouped around. "Hey Amos how are-!"

"Fuck you, where is Joseph!"

"Whoa, whoa calm down; what the hell?" defended Matt, "He's right here." Joe walked over closer to the Pip-boy.

"I'm right here Amos what's wrong?"

"Wha—What's wrong is that you should fucken' know what's wrong, you murdering fucker!" Shouted Amos so loud that the microphone vibrated wildly. "I've known you for so long and I would have never thought that you would—"

"Wait, Amos calm the heck down for a second okay." Interrupted Mathew.

"I will not stay calm you tin fuck! Joseph tried to have us all killed!"

Joseph looked taken aback for a moment and he had a severely hurt expression plastered on his face.

"What are you talking about man?" said Joseph.

"Listen to me guys, he hired a bunch of thugs to get us all killed, I don't know why but this headless fuck here just confirmed it! Don't listen to a fucking thing he says!" Words of quarrelling and disagreement could be heard in the background. Amos caught his breath for a sec and continued "This guy said that a guy named Joseph hired him to kill us, and they probably killed Mike and Tony too." Emile straightened and flared his nostrils. "I'll give you guys time to decide what to do with him but I would kill him right now if I were you." Joseph looked almost like he was going to cry. "If the next time I see you guys he is still alive I will kill ALL of you! Fucken out!" he hung up.

Everyone slowly turned to Joe with concerned looks on their faces. Joseph fell on his rump onto the concrete.

"What—what is going on…?" he said. Emile had his gun pointed at Joe's head and his trigger finger was shaking.

"Emile! Put the gun down." Said Matt, Emile just looked at him with a face as red as newly spilled blood.

"He got them killed man, Mike and… and… Anthony they're…." he wiped some tears from the side of his face with his sleeve and looked back up.

"He didn't do it." everyone turned to Martin except for Emile. "That's not the secret he's hiding, but he was hiding something."

"How do you know that!?" said Emile, he pointed the gun closer to his head. "How do you know that he didn't get them killed?"

"How he acts, I've known him forever and I can read his body language like a book. He's hiding something," He continued, "Jane has something to do with it, that much I know."

Jaden blushed and turned her head away. Joseph looked at her and they both blushed then. She covered her mouth trying not to panic.

"I… I'll tell you just… just get this gun outta' my face, please!" Joseph pleaded. Emile obliged.

"Tell us this secret." Emile said with arms crossed looking at Jaden.

"If it means saving your life," said Jane, "then just tell them." His breathing began to slow and he spoke.