Sam waved at Isaac as he approached, the tanned man stepping lively as he made his way back to the group.

The group had practically doubled in size with the addition of the former Enclave soldiers. Sam gave them a quick look as Isaac got closer, trying to put names to faces.

The pony tailed man, Abercrombie, was obviously the leader. A man with peculiarly white eyes, Leon, was clearly his second. His brief introduction hadn't given him a good idea of what the others did, but there were obviously a few riflemen, starting with the older dark skinned man, Mike, and including another with a strange, framing helmet, Beaumont, another with an even stranger breathing device covering his mouth, Julio, that gave him a metallic voice Sam remembered from the stand off earlier and, the last, was a young looking man, cocky, arrogant, named Hart. There was also a smaller man who wore combat armour, unlike his power armoured companions, and carried around a sniper rifle, Hannibal. Finally, there was a tanned man with long braids running from his scalp down each side of his body, Hollow, but he had disappeared behind the others long ago, likely keeping an eye on their back trail.

Even worse, their new found desire to work together didn't seem to move past any of the tension being former enemies had created. Furtive glances passed between the two previously separate groups every other minute it felt, and Oz in particular seemed to get most of them. That was, at least, somewhat understandable, all things considered. The death glares Julio gave them, and Sam in particular, were a whole other kind of worry though.

Strangely, it didn't seem to affect either of the two people that straddled both groups. Charity looked unconcerned, although Sam was starting to realise that she probably always looked like that, while Eagle was just as nervous around his own people as he was around Sam and his lot. The whole situation was just as awkward as when they had first sat down together but, as Isaac approached, Sam pushed it from his mind.

"See anything?" he asked the tracker.

Isaac shook his head. "It's clear for a while, but..."

"But?" Abercrombie asked, almost making Sam jump. He hadn't seen him approach.

Isaac cocked his head to the side and looked at the man with a mild smile tugging at his lips, before turning back to Sam. "You just have to see it," he answered with a shrug, giving Abercrombie a wink before turning around and disappearing back up the trail.

Sam turned, intending to tell the others, but Abercrombie's hand on his arm stopped him.

"If we're going to work together..." Abercrombie started coldly, his eyes staring at the trail Isaac had disappeared down, "you'll have to put a leash on your dog..."

Sam turned slowly, letting the other man's hand fall gently from his arm, a smile on his face. "Maybe if you could do the same," he said, equally as cold, his eyes flicking towards Julio. Abercrombie's followed his, sighing explosively when he saw Julio giving Sam another death glare. He turned back, a frown on his face, his eyes staring into Sam's, challenging. Clearly a man not used to taking orders, at least from people like Sam.

Abercrombie turned, intending to head over to Julio, but Sam's hand on his arm stopped him.

"And don't ever tell me what to do," Sam added coldly, his smile gone. "You might be with us now, but I'm still in charge. If you don't like it...we can go back to killing each other," Sam let his hand visibly fall to the hilt of his pistol, seeing Abercrombie's eyes glance at the action, "but that didn't go so well for you last time."

He took his hand from the man's arm and straightened, moving his hand away from his pistol as well. "Your choice," he finished, turning and striding back towards Charity.

He knew it was a risk, and a stupid one at that, to turn his back on someone like that, after the conversation they had just had. But it showed confidence, power, strength, all the things a leader has to have and all of the things others recognize. In this case, the risk was worth the reward.

To his relief, no bullets hit him in the back. When he reached Charity he glanced back, seeing Abercrombie waving his men over towards Sam while pulling Julio aside.

The two men started talking, Julio becoming more and more animated before stomping away angrily. Abercrombie tried to grab him but the other man roughly pushed him off, striding away from everyone else, huffing as he did. Abercrombie made to go after him but stopped short, thought better of it, then turned back and joined the others.

"Everyone," Sam said, loud enough for them all to hear, as Abercrombie merged into the group. "The road ahead is clear, for now. If we move quickly we'll be at the Vault in a day, maybe two. That's...all, really," he finished lamely. He looked at Charity, who raised her eyes as if expecting him to continue. He looked at the group, at the sceptical, occasionally clearly hostile former Enclave soldiers, and then at the mismatched group he had assembled himself. He sighed and cleared his throat loudly before continuing.

"I know...I know we don't see eye to eye, that there is a division in this group. But why is that? Beliefs held by our fathers, ingrained in us from birth? The actions of others, projected onto those who were associated with them? It is the past, inconsequential to the future. Behind us is ruins; both figuratively and literally. Ahead of us lies an enemy none of us have faced, an enemy none of us know. If we're to see this through, we need to do it. Division, distrust, only leads to death..." he trailed off, highly surprised at the words that had just come out of his mouth. He glanced across at Charity who looked just as surprised, the rare emotion showing on her face adding to his shock.

Someone snorted their disbelief, their contempt, clearly from the former Enclave side.

"He's right," Abercrombie grunted, pushing his way to the front of the group. If Sam could have looked any more surprised, he would have. "We were Enclave," he continued, addressing his men, "but the Enclave is gone. Its people, its...methods, are dust. We are free men now, free to make our own decisions, follow our own orders. I can't order you to stay, so make your choice. I'm staying," he finished, giving Sam a slight nod before striding over to stand behind him.

"I'm with you," said Leon, immediately.

"Me too," answered Mike, somewhat reservedly.

"Why not?" Hannibal.

Beaumont nodded.

Hart scowled at Abercrombie, then at Sam, then shrugged.

Julio and Hollow were both missing, but Sam would take what he could get.

He was nodding. "Good, good," he said, almost to himself, "let's keep moving though, we're losing sunlight."

They all stood on the hill, mouth agape. All, except Isaac, who leant heavily on an improvised branch-walking stick with a knowing smile on his face.

Ahead of them sprawled a canyon, plains stretching out to the east, likely leading to Wyoming if Sam knew his American geography, and a mountain rising up on the western side, likely where the Vault was, if their construction sites were consistent. But that wasn't what interested them.

No, it was the blanket of flora and fauna, of forest, that covered the entire area that interested them.

"Told you, you had to see it," Isaac said, one hand sweeping out to take in the entire site.

Sam nodded dumbly, before turning to Oz to see the same stupefied look on his face that was on everyone else's.

"You weren't expecting this?" he asked.

Oz shook his head. "It wasn't here last time..." he muttered.

"And when was last time?" Abercrombie asked.

Oz shook his head harder, breaking himself out of the trance the forest seemed to have them all in, then let his eyes drift to the skies as he thought the question over.

"80..." he finally answered, "no, wait...90 years."

"90 years?" Sam groaned.

"I did have other things to do," Oz muttered defensively.

Sam palmed his face with his hand and sighed. "Fine...let's get down there. No point in just staring at it..."

The forest rose above them like mountains, the trees easily 12 to 15 feet high, their shadows overlapping to create an overwhelming darkness between their trunks. A darkness that seemed to want you, to suck you in and not let go. Sam resisted the urge to shiver.

"Strange, aye?" Isaac asked casually. Sam nodded.

"I'm getting radiation readings," Leon, the white eyed man, said suddenly. Sam glanced across at him, then checked his Pip-Boy; sure enough, the forest seemed to be giving off low levels of radiation.

"It looks safe," Abercrombie said, "but we shouldn't take the risk."

"You're right," Sam said, shrugging off his pack and pulling out a small bottle of Rad-X.

The drug, developed before the War, was almost an essential part of living in the new, wasteland world. It was a small, unassuming white tablet that, when consumed, lessened the effects of radiation. It didn't lower current radiation, so a man dying of radiation sickness could take bottles of the stuff and feel no effect, but for un-radiated people heading into an irradiated forest, it was perfect.

He cracked the bottle open, took out a tablet, swallowed it and passed the bottle to Charity. She did the same and passed the bottle on to the next person; eventually everyone had taken it. Isaac hawked and spat.

"Tastes like shit," he complained. The taste was one of the worst side effects, Sam had to admit, tasting like the inside of an asshole at the best of times.

"Well, if I'd known you'd been coming I would have packed the cock flavoured ones," Sam said, with a small smile. Isaac frowned at him but couldn't hide the smile tugging at his lips. Several of the others chuckled; Hannibal, Oz, Leon, people from both 'sides'.

"You want to see something weird?" Isaac suddenly asked. Sam nodded, still smiling, deciding not to say anything about the man suspiciously changing the subject.

The pair strode towards the forest, Abercrombie joining them a second later. They got closer and closer, the blackness got larger and larger, until they were standing right in front of one of the trees. Sam leant forward slightly, peering into the depths, but couldn't see anything.

"So..." Isaac started, striding closer to the tree until he was standing close enough to touch it. "There's this..." he continued, and suddenly jabbed his improvised walking stick into the root of the nearest tree. Sam instantly thought he was insane, but jumped back as the root slithered away from the attack, retracting into the base of the trunk.

"What the fuck..." he muttered. As if to answer him, a loud roar echoed out from inside the forest, the sound bouncing against the cliffs in the distance and coming back again.

"... and there's that," Isaac finished casually, turning to look into the forest.

Sam continued staring at the blackness, thinking over the déjà vu he had with the moving vines, before it hit him; he had seen this before. In Vault 22.

This particular Vault sat a day or so journey west from New Vegas. Sam had gone there while working for the NCR, or more specifically their scientists. They wanted him to investigate the strange plants that grew unkempt from the Vault's open doors. Of course, they failed to mention that Sam wasn't the first person they had sent, nor that no one else had ever come out.

The Vault was a mess. Fungus and other plant growth covered most of the walls and floor, but it wasn't until Sam had gotten attacked by one of the vaguely human green monsters that he got truly worried. Still, he'd come to do a job, so he fought his way down, eventually learning through the Vault terminals that the research they had been doing mutated the original inhabitants into the creatures that had attacked him. He also met a ghoul named Keely, one of the others the NCR had sent before Sam, and together they destroyed the mutating spores once and for all.

Obviously here, in this forest, he doubted there were mutating spores. But he had seen moving plants in that Vault, and they hadn't been friendly.

"I've seen something like this," he muttered.

"As have I," Abercrombie grunted. Sam turned slightly to look at him. The man was frowning and looked concerned. "In Florida..." he continued, "an irradiated GECK created a moving forest..."

"GECK?" Isaac asked.

Abercrombie glanced up at him, still frowning. "The Garden of Eden Creation Kits. A terra former." Isaac still looked confused. "A device that promotes life, created before the War to rebuild the world."

"I saw it in a Vault, where they did Pre-War in advanced plant growth," Sam interrupted.

"How'd that go?" Isaac asked, leaning on his stick.

"They created spores that mutated everyone into zombie monsters"

"So...not well?" Isaac asked.

"We should be careful," grunted Abercrombie, turning to look at Sam, his face even more serious than usual. "There were creatures in the Floridian...dangerous creatures."

Sam nodded, still looking at the forest. "Tell the others," he said, and Abercrombie turned to relay what they had found to everyone else.

"I don't trust him," Isaac said when the man was out of earshot.

Sam sighed. "Neither do I, but we're not getting through this without him"

"And what about after?" Isaac asked.

"What about after?" Sam countered.

Isaac snorted. "You think this little partnership will last once we've found the Vault? They'll kill us and leave us in this forest, you know that."

"Maybe not," Sam muttered, half-heartedly.

"Ha! Why? Because you and the blonde are an item? Give me a break," Isaac said, "she's a traitor to them, you saw it. The only thing she'll get from them is a spot next to you in our mass grave."

"You know, you're free to leave whenever you want," Sam snapped.

"And miss out on half my pay?" Isaac asked incredulously, "No, I'll see this through."

"Then shut up and lead the way," Sam ordered, still annoyed. Isaac had that defiant half smile of his on his face, but still turned and headed into the forest as the others joined Sam.

If the forest had been imposing on the outside, it was even worse inside. The trees seemed higher, the darkness, despite their eyes having adjusted, seemed thicker and a fog swept across the forest's floor like a blanket. You couldn't even see your feet, it was so thick.

The group was spread out, a tightly clustered circle in the middle, Isaac 10 feet in front, Hollow 10 feet behind and 2 more of the Enclave men 10 feet out on either side. Everyone was on edge, tightly gripping weapons, eyes darting between every trunk, scared by every imaginary demon created by the shadows.

There were several more roars heard the deeper they got and, eventually, everyone had severe cases of paranoia.

"This is scary shit..." someone muttered. Sam had to agree, but Abercrombie turned and hissed for silence. Sam nodded approvingly, though no one saw it. The former captain did know how to run a group of people.

Just as long as he knew who was in charge.

There was a rustling of foliage on the left and everyone whirled around at once, guns frantically pointing at the source of the sound. As they looked, the leaves on the small shrub continued moving, dancing in an eerie wind none of them could feel.

A twig snapped on their right and they whirled around again but, again, there was nothing but a darkness that seemed to surround them, making an impenetrable wall between every trunk of the huge trees. There was an unsettling silence now; no birds chirping, everyone breathing as quietly as they could, trees creaking occasionally. Sam swore his heart was beating so loud the others had to be hearing it; judging by their faces, they were having similar thoughts.

There were more sounds coming from in front of the group, like someone running through the forest. Everyone turned slower this time, more prepared than the last two times and expecting nothing but paranoia to greet them again.

But it was Isaac that hurtled back into view, leaping over roots jutting from the ground.

"Get down!" he screamed, just as his legs seemed to go out from under him and he disappeared into the dense foliage and mist that coated the forest floor.

A missile shrieked between the trees, flying through the somewhat dumbstruck group, before detonating against a tree a few metres to Sam's left. His world rocked as the concussive forces hit him; the trees tilted, his stomach lurched and suddenly he found he was on his back, staring up into the unending ceiling of leaves that squatted above them. Charity came into view, a worried look on her face. Her mouth was moving but he couldn't hear anything but bells, ringing and ringing.

Eventually other noises got through. The staccato of gunfire, the strange whoosh sounds of the plasma weapons and the grunts and shouts of men fighting for their lives.

"Are you all right?" she screamed.

He shook his head, trying to clear the noise away. "Yeah," he yelled back, waving her away as casually as he could. "I'm fine."

She disappeared and he was pulled to his feet, the ground lurching around him again. He looked across to see Abercrombie, one hand pulling him up, the other wildly firing his plasma rifle. He gave Sam one quick pat to check he was alright, then dashed behind some available cover. Sam stood there a moment longer, amidst the chaos, before a bullet whizzed past his head, his mind returned to full function and he hurriedly dived to the ground.

He got a glimpse of their attackers; barely clothed, heavily tanned, muscular men and women with strange paint covering their faces. They looked like savages and Sam would have assumed as much...if they weren't using automatic weaponry. Their attack wasn't random either; Sam could see clear lines of covering fire being laid down, these 'others' advancing in groups like trained military.

Sam shrugged his rifle off his shoulders, gripped it tightly and rose, whirring around to find a target.

But there was none. The attack had ended as fast as it had begun.

The forest was a mess; most, if not all, of the nearby tree trunks were missing large chunks of themselves, several branches were now jutting from the misted floor and leaves were still drifting, carefree, slowly down to the ground. The only thing that remained the same was the silence, even more eerie and unnerving considering what had happened.

"Is everyone alright?" Sam asked.

"Sound off!" Abercrombie roared, coughing roughly. His soldiers all answered, so they hadn't lost any of them.

Sam looked around. Charity was still next to him, Original a few metres back, Eagle huddled next to him. Isaac, groaning, rose to his feet, holding up a piece of wire with two rocks tied at the end.

"Bastards hit me with this," he grunted, before tossing it violently back between the trees.

Sam frowned. Someone was missing, but who?

"Oz?" he asked. "Has anyone seen Oz?"

Everyone looked around their immediate areas, but their shaking heads told him they had no success.

"Oz is gone?" he whispered. Isaac began laughing, cackling almost. Sam frowned at him. "What's so funny?"

"Again? He got kidnapped again?"

The first thing Oz saw was darkness. Not the darkness of the forest, as he first thought, but an all-encompassing darkness, like a room with no windows or doors or a cave down in the depths of the earth. His head was pounding, his stomach weak. He tried to remember how he had gotten here, wherever here was, but found he couldn't. The last thing he remembered was seeing Isaac rush through the trees, then...blank.

"Hello Oswald," came a voice. Commanding, soothing, female voice.

Oz squinted, as if it might actually help him see in the dark. "Who are you? Where am I?"

"You're safe," came the voice again. "That is enough for now."

Oz swallowed nervously. "Who are you?" he asked, hoping to keep his fear from his voice.

He heard her giggle, the voice, and then a light appeared, seemingly far away. At first Oz thought it was the crack of an opening door, someone entering the room to speak to him face to face rather than over an obvious intercom. But the bright white quickly turned to a light blue, slowly getting closer, slowly become larger and larger, morphing into a ball shaped object. Sparks of electricity shot out as it grew, hitting the floor, ceiling, walls, whatever was closest and illuminating the room briefly in the process.

It was an unassuming room, from the brief glimpses Oz got. It had flat walls, a flat floor and ceiling; there were no tables or computers or instruments of any kind. Just...a room.

The ball of light continued to close on him and he found himself stepping back warily. At that the ball stopped, seemingly frozen, still hovering in mid air. It began to change, expand and collapse over and over, something new taking shape. It continued like this for a while, until it finally stopped.

Oz found himself looking at a face.

A bluely lit, female face, with two locks of dark hair framing her eyes and cheeks. She smiled slightly.

"My apologies," she said smoothly. "The projectors down here are a little...crude."

The face started to expand, a smooth oblong growing out the bottom, eventually taking the shape of a fit, attractive body, arms resting lightly in front of her body, legs seemingly on solid ground despite still hovering at least half a metre from the ground.

"What are you?" Oz managed.

"I would think that would be obvious for a man such as yourself," she answered, smiling.

"A survivor? From before the war?"

She laughed, genuinely. "No, no, I am no withered husk of a person locked away in an advanced tomb. I am, simply, what I am."

"A ZAX?"

"Come now," she said, feigning hurt, "must we sling insults? I am to them as you are to the common ape."

"The common what?" he asked, confused.

She sighed. "So close, yet so far," she mused to herself. "I am the parent, they are the children. Do you understand?"

Oz nodded, narrowed his eyes. "So what do you want with me?"

"All in good time," she answered with a smile. "For now, just let me tell you my name is Sera and I have been waiting for you for a very, very long time..."