WHAT UP, BRUHS?! xD Yes. I know the title of this chapter says it all (I know you can't see what the title is on the Fanfiction app, but meh..)

I will most probably be limping through this particular chapter.. HOWEVER! This chapter is CRUCIAL in the storyline, so I WILL do my best, *points with my index finger fashionably towards your direction* for YOU, readers! ;)

*throws tissue box out the window* 33 REVIEWS. *screams really loudly in happiness and excitement*

BTW, if you're wondering about the use of terminology for this chapter (particularly at one word that starts with 's') I was in the mood to watch Pirates of the Caribbean because it is the shit.

Here we go peeps! And as always: Enjoy! :D

"You want me to WHAT?!" I ask Uncle Tommy incredulously. I've been asked to hand over all my gear the Fireflies have given me, along with my backpack. The gear is understandable, but my bag too?! "You have no right! You're not gonna friggin' take my bag too! I won't let you!" I yell at him angrily.

Uncle Tommy uses both of his hands to comb through his long mahogany brown hair. "Melanie. Calm down. We'll give your stuff back the next time we meet up. It's as simple as that. Okay?"

I snort at his reply, shortly after shaking my head at him in disapproval. "She's trying to get back at me, isn't she? She wants to steal our shit and then ditch us to rot in the city, is that it?"

"Mel, it ain't like that."

"BULLSHIT."

"You really are as stubborn as your dad, ain't ya?"

"Don't try bringing Dad into this. This is about Marlene and her crew. It ain't fair that-"

"We're taking all your bags."

"IT'S NOT FAIR." I tell him, like a pouting child asking his mum for a coin to use a gumball machine. I can literally hear the eye rolls of the other Fireflies standing nearby.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph! Melanie! We're just taking your stuff so that the soldiers up front don't confiscate it when you get past those gates!" Uncle Tommy points out.

We've been going on like this for about as long Anna and Marlene were, when they argued about leaving. Now, it's about my lack of patience for the Fireflies' wanting to take our packs.

"You're taking away my jackets and vests. Now my own bag, too? All my stuff is in there; my beanie, my guns, my ammo, and Sarah-!" My voice makes a screeching sound when I mention Sarah's name.

Uncle Tommy grabs me by my shoulders and asks, "MELANIE. How much do you trust them?"

I don't know how to respond to that, so I stay quiet.

"Exactly. It's 'cause you don't. FEDRA's the one that's supposed protect us, and look at what they're doing. No, wait. Look at what they've done. It's because of them that our lives have gone to shit. Look at you! Look at what these people have turned all of us into! We're all bitter, we're all selfish. They couldn't take all of us in, so they left the rest of these people to die in the open, exposed to the Infected, including us. And seeing that you're willing to give up your supplies and your identity to them, is just plain wrong. Do you even think that for one second that Sarah would agree to this?"

I hang my head real low and try to hold in every swear word I can think of to say to Uncle Tommy. I clench both of my fists, as tightly and as hard as a possible, I guess it is a good enough method for staying patient. "Stop bringing them up, Uncle Tommy. Please." I say silently to him. The pain I can feel in my gut is excruciating. If someone were to ask me what the difference was between the two most important people in my life was, I'd tell them the difference immediately: I could've saved one of them, but I chose not to. I can practically hear the cringe on his face after my request. A long but brief period of silence follows.

"Okay. I'll hand over my bag. Can you just.. make sure they don't take anything?"

He claps my left shoulder and gives me a half smile.

15 minutes later..

"Hands in the air!" One of the soldiers on guard at the gates yells at us. All the soldiers on the gates' towers hear him and as if rehearsed –which it probably was – the remaining soldiers aim their assault rifles down at us, locked and loaded.

Thank God we've all got spare clothes, not the cleanest or the best quality of the bundle, but spare clothes nonetheless. We have the appearance of civilians living on the road, looking for a better life in the Boston Quarantine Zone – which we are, anyways. All we have to do is pray to God a lot more than we usually do so that they don't ask to check our pockets for anything suspicious or related to criminal activity AKA our old Firefly dog tags.

But… hang on. I don't think soldiers will even know who the Fireflies are at all. They did come to spread the message across the USA after all. This might be their last stop, hoping to get more people joining in, from both inside and outside the QZ. All I can hope for is that Uncle Tommy doesn't get killed in the process, what I'm hoping for even more is that he leaves all together. I don't want him getting arrested or court martialed just because he decided to chase some stupid ass dream.

We all raise our hands above our heads, without a moment's hesitation. "Calm down, ladies. We just wanna enter the city is all. Nothing to be worried about." Logan starts off, with the most charming smile that he can put on his face. He's awfully calm right now, but then again, when is he not?

"What did you fucking call us, pretty boy?!"

"Shit." Mark mutters. A thud and a quick "OW!" also come from Mark. I snort when I realize that Anna punched him, hard.

"Marcus! Stop thinking so negatively! Now shut your mouth before I shut it for you!" Anna hisses at him. MARCUS. I stifle a laugh when I hear her say it. Dear God, this just keeps getting better and better.

"Gentlemen! Um… Y'all are looking fantastic in this fine morning. How are you doing?" I attempt to throw playful banter at them to pull them off of Logan's back. Besides, if it comes from a girl, it technically counts as.. flirting..? Honestly, I don't even know. Might as well give it a try.. "What say you to let us in so that we can all quickly progress with life and such? Savvy?" I say this to them in my best singsong voice, batting my eyelids at them in the process. The looks I receive from everyone are priceless. If only I had a camera, which I sadly don't. Pretending to act like a frilly little school girl in the middle of a zombie apocalypse will surely win us over some pity.

"Dude, this day just keeps getting weirder and weirder. Are we even getting paid enough for this?" one of the soldiers asks, loudly enough for all of us to hear. Even if they didn't mean for us to, we'd still hear it since they're right above us.

Rolling her emerald green eyes in annoyance, Anna hollers up to them, "Yo! We're not deaf, you know! Still here!"

They ignore her and continue to discuss whether to let us inside the Boston QZ or not. After a couple of minutes, one of them asks us at last, "Is it just you four?"

We nod indignantly. Technically speaking, it's just us..

"Alrighty then. Boys! Open up the gates, let 'em in! We can't just leave y'all out there."

I gratefully mutter several thanks to God as the doors of the gates are pulled open, loudly creaking. "Shit, they really need to oil this thing." I hear a soldier saying to us. "Welcome to Boston, civie."

I could only see Boston very briefly from outside the gates. Now that I really am in Boston, it's not quite as cooked up as they say it is. It's only been three years and the amount of security here is super tight. FEDRA must really be working hard over here compared to everywhere else. Let's see how long we'll manage to live here without causing too much trouble.

3 years later...

The sound of jingling keys and the door unlocking wakes me up. "I'm home." The sound of Logan's voice pulls me out of the darkness and back into reality. I force myself to move my jelly-like limbs off of the rock hard couch I've been lying on. Ugh. God, I feel like shit. Then again, when do I not?

"Hi." I give him a quick peck on his bristly cheek by the time I get to him. "You're home early. Anyways, how was 'work'?"

He snorts before he replies. "Bad. I fucking hate my job."

I roll my eyes at him, "Then why'd you sign up for it then, idiot?" I shoot back at him as I pull his navy blue cap off of his head.

"We aren't made of money, you know. And I don't hate it for the reason that you think."

"You meant the fucking ration cards. It's not like we use them that much anyways, so why the big fuss?" I ask.

"I seem like 'the bad guy' every time I handle the crowds at the ration line. Every day, I have to deal with it, and the looks I get from these people are like a kick in the teeth for me. You know how much I hate being labelled. They think we're all the same. We're just doing our job! It's not our fault that they won't stop cutting in line and then pushing and shoving each other!"

I cup his face with both of my hands, coaxing his face towards mine, touching our foreheads together. His is warm and sticky from the sweat from work. I can feel him heavily exhaling from his nose. "And you're doing a great job of it, sweetie. It isn't your fault that the crowd's acting like a bunch of pricks. You tried your best, and that's all that matters." I whisper to him reassuringly. "Besides, you've been doing this for what? 2-3 years now? Why start ranting now?"

Logan rubs the back of his neck as he tiredly walks over to the couch. He collapses on it as soon as he gets there. "Hey.. No fair. You took my spot." I whine at him.

He gives me a tired laugh and a smirk before giving me his answer. "Mel, I thought you hate this couch."

I make a duck face and look away, muttering excuses on my behalf.

"I'm especially tired today because I asked for an early leave." Early leave? What the hell for? "What's the date today, Melanie?"

I scrunch my nose and spend a minute thinking about it. "Shit, I haven't been checking off the dates in my calendar again." I say to him, giving myself the hardest facepalm ever.

"September 22nd." OH. It's my birthday. How the hell could I forget?

"Oh."

Logan raises both eyebrows at me and says, "You sound surprised." He catches me off guard when he starts to mock me, "Oh my gosh, Logan! How could you, of all people, remember when I couldn't?" I stomp over to him with a stormy expression and give him the hardest punch that I can on his shoulder. "OW! Shit! You do hit like a girl!" Logan yelps, giving me a hearty laugh in the process.

"What's THAT supposed to mean?"

"Mel, relax. I meant that as a good thing. Girls hit a lot harder than people say. Trust me, I know. Besides, I only have to worry about you hitting me now, and I have been for the past year." The smile he gives me melts my heart. Ignorance is bliss, I suppose.

I smile at the wall, as I lean against the couch. He takes my hand into his and starts kissing it softly. I always feel so safe around Logan. "I still can't believe we actually got married last year." I add quietly.

"Well, believe it, then." I let out a small laugh, for real this time. "Now we can use the saying: 'We're like an old married couple!' since it's official." Logan tells me, giving me the toothiest grin possible.

"Ugh.. We aren't that old." I declare to him outright. "We're college age kids, except for the fact that we don't go to college and that we're technically high school dropouts. Besides, I don't see how college can help us in this kind of situation. But wait. Where'd you get the rings from, anyways?" I ask suddenly out of interest.

"Mel, you do know there's this new thing called an abandoned jewelry store. Ever hear of one?"

"Shut up." I say to him, flushing a deep red in embarrassment.

"Come on," he says to me as he strokes each of my fingers with his thumb, "we're headed for Anna and Mark's. We've got a mini celebration to get to."

An hour later..

"Miller, you're such a kid! You're only 20?" Mark exclaims, roaring with laughter. The number of eye rolls he receives from Anna is unbelievable, I'm getting a headache just by looking at her; frankly, I'm surprised she hasn't got one for rolling her eyes so much.

"Shut up! How many times have I told you to stop calling me that?! It's not my fault that I'm younger than all of you!" I screech at him.

"You guys, please. My head already hurts from the eye rolling," Anna counters, putting the back of her hand over her right eye, "can we please just celebrate Mel's birthday in peace, thank you very much?"

Logan just lets out a laugh he's been stifling from the start, along with a pointed look at Anna which CLEARLY says, "These two.."

I stick out my bottom lip as Logan wraps his arm around me. I look around the room to find something else to talk about. My eyes widen in shock when I see Anna's belly. Is she..?! No.. She can't be.. I thought she hates kids! I think to myself. I'd better ask, otherwise I won't know.. Anna catches my eye and asks what the matter is when she sees the look on my face. "Umm.. How.. far along are you..?" I ask her hesitantly. Mark and Anna exchange looks and laugh when they turn towards us again. "You only notice now? Talk about clueless.." Mark adds with a cruel tone in his voice. "There's no point in acting like a dick, you know that, Mark." Anna says, scolding him. "I'm due any day now, and the pressure is killing me."

I purse my lips and clench my fists on my lap. "It's just.." I try saying.

"What?"

"I thought you hated kids!" I blurt out.

Mark laughs nervously and adds, "Yeah, well. It couldn't be helped."

We spend the rest of our time there, communicating in glances and nervous bubbles of laughter.

That night..

"I could get a job, you know." I say quietly to the back of Logan's head.

Logan rolls over to his left side, facing me now. He makes no effort to brush away his chocolate brown bangs poking into his gentle gray eyes. I can't read the expression on his face. He's playing the poker face card now. "Why would you want that?" he whispers to me.

I sigh and put my right hand below my head. My eyes wander as I start observing the form of his collarbone and how broad his shoulders are. Only the right side of his face is glowing in the moonlight, I'm the one who insisted on sleeping under the window, after all. My stubbornness is getting the best of me; I don't even want to admit that I'm wrong, even after 3 years of the same argument.

"Admit it, you're bored home alone." I scoff in reply. "Fine. This means I win again." Logan says to me with a smirk.

I roll over again so that I can lie on my back to face the ceiling. It's like sleeping on a rock when you lie down on this bed, except this rock's got bed sheets and a couple of dank and stinky as shit pillows. One word to describe this apartment: gray. Dull, boring, forced.

"Well, I don't want to be chastised for doing my job like you." If looks could kill, I'd be dead at the hands of Logan by now. "I wanna be respected for my job, you know?"

"There's newspaper delivery."

"Too boring. Besides, why would I wanna do that and how am I gonna get respect with THAT?"

"It was just a suggestion, and it's not that bad." A brief pause follows. "What about smuggling?"

I turn my head briefly to look at Logan. "Smuggling." I repeat aloud. "As in, you want me to work with Robert? That rotten, slimy, lying son of a bitch. We can't trust him!" I say, shaking my head at the ceiling.

"Mel-"

"No," I continue, propping myself on my elbows, "he snatched our packs away when we first got here, remember? THEN, we were blackmailed into giving him all our ration cards to get the packs back from that sick bastard. Jesus, I could go on forever." I say finally, slumping back onto the bed.

"What I was trying to say," Logan interjects gently as he pulls me into him, "is that there are others."

"Others..?" I whisper to him.

"Ever hear of Tess?" Her name's always been a popular topic of discussion, especially since she helps everyone out in one way or other. We don't realize it, but we're all connected to each other. It's easier now since we need the help of smugglers to get what we need. Of course, it was a lot easier back when we had the Internet, WhatsApp, and every other social network related shit; working phones were good too. "You could work with her if you want." Logan adds, snapping me back to reality and out of my world of reminiscing about the past. "Where can I find her?" I ask him finally.

A couple of days later.. – Location: The North Tunnel

The things I did to get here.. Jesus Christ. The amount of talking Logan had to do to get me here, bless him.

Knocking on the door of someone I don't even know personally has got to be one of the weirdest experiences in my life. The fact that I'm actually doing it makes it even weirder. The door opens as I take a step back to look at the person living in this apartment. A slim woman, probably a little younger than Dad, opens the door. Her short frizzy brown hair falls loosely over her shoulder blades. She's wearing a gray T-shirt that happens to expose her collarbone, and the look on her face is clearly asking me, "What the fuck are you doing here and what do you want?"

She looks intimidating, but not enough to faze me. I've seen worse, specifically Dad and Gary. "Can I help you?" she asks me gruffly, both of her straight mahogany brown eyebrows raised in curiosity. Her breath reeks of alcohol; it's a bit early for drinking, isn't it?

"Uhh.." I seem to have lost the ability to speak. My insides have turned to jelly just by looking at her. She's terrifying, and I've failed to notice that from the start. She gives off this "stay the fuck away from me" aura. "You're.. Um.." I continue speaking to her like this.

"I haven't got all day, you know. What're you here for?" she adds impatiently.

The amount of Goosebumps she's giving me is ridiculous. I try to warm my left bicep with my right hand. "I hear you do smuggling?" I start off.

"So?"

"You interested in recruitment?" I ask quietly.

Her response is cruel, almost as if Mark's soul had taken over hers. Maybe she normally does act like this. It's probably from her lack of patience and her brutality. "What've you got to show for it?" she asks after she finishes cackling. "Impress me, and I'll think about it" she adds, a smug smile on her face. I brighten up a bit at that, but I also cower in worry. Impress her? With what?

My face probably registers what my mind is asking. "Come in," she tells me, "your 'interview' awaits inside," she says as she points inside with her left thumb. "I'm Tess, by the way."

There isn't much in here. There's another door which leads somewhere else, but other than that, this place is pretty much empty. A tall lamp, which probably doesn't even work, is placed in the corner of the room near the door. A few shelves have been put up, with a couple of things on it, probably junk. A fireplace rests beneath the shelves, unscathed and untouched. There are two couches in here, one of them – an individual's sofa - facing the window, the other one – for a pair – is plopped dead center in the middle. I only just noticed that there's a man sleeping on the individual sofa. After Tess shuts the door, she walks over to the man's sofa. I see his hair going gray a little, but it's evidently dark like mine.

Sitting on the couples' sofa, I try to get a clear read on him. I can see he's got a thick and messy beard, graying but dark like his hair. The crinkles by his eyes are telling me quite a lot about his age, probably in his 30's. Tess shakes him awake, and he does. He stretches his arms out and I notice a nice looking watch with leather straps on his left wrist. Funny, that watch looks just like the one that Sarah and I got for Dad on his birthday, 6 years ago. I notice the scars he has on his arms. "We've got a guest." I hear Tess telling him.

He gets up and turns towards my direction. My blood runs cold when I see who it is. I've lost the ability to speak all over again. My arms and legs are shaking like crazy, in fear of what he might do to me. "Melanie?" Dad calls out to me, the shock evident in both his voice and on his face. I can't breathe. My chest feels heavy. I can hear his footsteps as he walks over to me. I'm seeing different colors all of a sudden. "Wait. You know her, Joel?" Tess asks, just as surprised as the both of us.

Everything's gotten blurry; I can't really pick up what I'm seeing or what I'm hearing. Surprisingly, I do manage to hear this, "She's my kid." My eyes lull to the back of my head as I collapse. I've passed out.

DAT CLIFFHANGER THO. :33 FINALLY. Joel's back in on the action! And Tess is here! Yaaaaaayyyy! :DD Anna is pregnant! I wonder who's in there.. *wink wink* ;) LOGAN AND MEL GOT MARRIED! HUZZAHHHHHHHHHH! :DDD

The amount of work I put into this tho.. *wipes away the sweat coating my forehead* WHEW! Okay then!

What did you all think of this week's chapter?! A Follow/Fav./ Review would be highly appreciated! Let me know what you thought of all this! I really, truly, honestly do love reading what you guys have to say! I guess I'll see you guys again in a week or two! Bye bye people! :) See y'all later!