(A/N) Sorry for it being late, underestimated how much editing was needed and I had things to do tomorrow which basically wiped me out and I played Kerbal when I got home. Oh well, it's here now. Enjoy.

Chapter Twenty-One

Aftershocks

/-\ Blake Moriyama Belladonna /-\

The day started like any other did at Camp Mercy.

I awoke shivering, the sleeping bag and cot provided by the government was completely inadequate for even a California morning. As usual, I was the second to wake up in my tent, the first being Eloise. The woman just liked getting up early, from what I'd gathered. I threw on a change of clothes – unappealing and poorly-fit jeans with a baggy but surprisingly comfy grey sweater – and headed out to one of the common areas with Eloise, who was wearing basically the same thing. I still felt a little awkward about hanging around someone who had been on this Earth for several multiples of my age, but honestly? Her and Harold were kinda alright. It didn't hurt that none of us knew if any of our friends actually walked away from the attack, either. Well, actually, it very much did hurt – none of us brought it up, but all of us understood. So, for now, we kept each other company.

We passed tent upon tent, all those same circular white things the government had put up by the hundred. Very few people were out and about this early; the sun hadn't even risen yet. Soon enough, we arrived at our destination – a big patch of grass devoid of any tents. This place used to be a nature preserve before the aliens hit. Now, it was just tents and the occasional common space with nothing in it. To the north, the city was being rebuilt, but that left the rest of us without a home in the meantime. We were some of the quote-unquote "lucky" ones who still got to stay relatively close to the city, even if we were closer to Mexico than San Diego now. Occasionally, they'd pass out before-and-after flyers of streets being cleaned of rubble – it was intended as a morale booster, but given those "after" photos usually didn't even have buildings in them, they just served to remind us of what we'd lost. They hadn't bothered to tell us how many people died in the attack, but it was the twenty-first century; we had ways of finding out regardless. Even so, I stopped paying attention to the death toll once it had climbed well into the five-figure range – I just didn't want to know after that point.

As I sat there, on the dewy grass watching the sky get lighter and lighter, I thought back to that day. I thought back to the screams, the gunfire, the- the bugs. As I sat there, shivering, I also thought back to, well, me. The other me – the one with cat ears, glowing armor, and twin swords that glided through the aliens as if they were simply air.

I was still wrestling with a lot from that day, her most of all. How could she be me? I'd already dismissed the idea that she was a twin I didn't know about; though they weren't around to ask, I sincerely doubt Mom or Dad would ever have given one of us up. Also, the neko thing she had going on. People don't just have cat ears, even if it would be amazingly cute if we did. The best idea I could come up with was that she was some secret government project taken from my DNA when we immigrated, but that sounded absolutely batshit.

Then again, a year ago, an alien invasion would've sounded pretty batshit too, I thought. Huh, maybe there was actually something to those rumors about genetically engineered catgirls from Area 51…

"Thought I'd find you both here," a male voice said from behind us.

"Eep!" I let out, whipping around. Any tension immediately evaporated when I saw who it was, though. "Oh, hi Harold." He wore much the same as we did – seemed to be the unofficial uniform for these sorts of camps, given everyone here lost basically everything in the attack.

"Sweetheart, you ought not to sneak up on us like that, you almost gave the poor girl a heart attack," Eloise said.

"Didn't really try. I just wanted to make sure you both knew what time it was."

I pulled out my phone and sure enough, it was almost eight o' clock already. I stood up, giving him a nod. "Thanks, we wouldn't want to miss breakfast."

"Don't mention it," he said. Shortly, we all headed to the mess tent, where the cooks were just finishing preparations. Already, a small line had formed, just barely stretching outside. We all took our places and gradually, the line got longer and longer. In the ten minutes it took for the cooks to get to us, the line was already stretched out of view from its end. We'd all learned early-on that you needed to be in line at most by the time they started serving if you wanted to eat at a reasonable hour. There was always enough food, but whether you'd be eating breakfast at eight-fifteen or ten-fifteen often depended on only ten minutes of getting in line.

However, even as early as we were, the few picnic tables were already fully seated. So the three of us walked back to the common area and sat in a tiny circle. People were already there, but there was still plenty of room for us on the ground. We'd just started digging into our breakfast sandwiches when the giant loudspeaker at the center of camp crackled to life. "Attention citizens, this… is the Camp Mercy Coordinator," it began. "We've… just received word that… that the United Nations has signed a… a treaty with the aliens. The war is over." There was a short pause in his speech. Everyone looked at each other in disbelief; had we won? The Coordinator's tone sure didn't imply we did. What did winning even look like at this point? "Please… await further instructions from the… the… Earth Provisional Authority. May God help us all."

We all froze. Every conversation in the camp had stopped, every motion aborted, every breath held. Softly, a little boy – probably about six or seven – started to cry, grasping for his mother. Several others cried too, even adults. I myself felt tears start welling in my eyes. Everything I knew and loved was just destroyed by the aliens. They'd taken my home, they'd taken my friends, they'd taken my school, they'd taken my job, they'd taken my city… and now they took my world. The same nation that my long-gone parents had given up everything they'd known for, was now gone as well.

"Finish your food, you two," Harold suddenly said. "And finish it all."

My head darted towards him. "What?"

He grimaced. "I lived through more than my fair share of the government screwing me over – and that was just Uncle Sam, the ones who are supposed to care about us," he said. "I ain't waiting around to see how this new alien government does. Eloise, we're moving to the mountains. Blake… I can't force you to come, too, but I'd highly suggest it."

"But you can force her to go?" I muttered, almost automatically.

"No, you misunderstand," Eloise said. "He's not forcing anyone; he just knows there's no place I'd rather be than by his side. He's the only thing I have left now, and I'm the only thing he has."

I thought about it for another few moments. I looked around our little group – everyone else was locked tight in their own despair; some cried, others tried to appear strong, but no one was immune. Glancing back at the other two, they weren't either. Neither was I.

In that moment, I realized I had two options; go with them, or simply give up.

When I thought of it that way, the choice was easy.

/-\ Yang Xiao Long /-\

I slowly opened my eyes, the soft pitter-patter of rain rousing me from a dreamless sleep.

My shoulders cracked when I rolled them, still stiff from sleeping in my armor. I raised my gun, scanning the area just to be sure. My truck was stashed amongst the pines that hid us so well from aerial observation. The others were all strewn about the place, huddling beneath various evergreens by the roadside. Ruby still looked to be soundly asleep, as did Mom. Weiss sat ramrod straight against one of the trees, gun by her side. Strangely enough, I didn't see Pyrrha anywhere – you'd think she'd be more noticeable with that orange jumpsuit of hers.

As I moved my head around to look at everyone, though, I felt a strange pain in my neck. I winced and grasped at it with my hand. The skin on my throat felt tender to the touch – like I'd somehow gotten a papercut on it overnight. I was still sore from my other injuries as well, but the pain was a lot less than I thought it would be. The physical pain, at least.

For a moment, when I closed my eyes to blink, I saw Qrow's mangled body, rasping out his last words. I didn't recognize the song he was singing, but just from the tone, I knew it would've been a melancholy one. I was certain nobody else heard the gunshots after we'd moved into the hallway, despite the close proximity – the door was very thick. But I heard them. I knew he'd died so we could get away. I don't know what did it and I don't know if he'd stacked one last alien body, but that didn't change the fact that he was gone.

Weiss groaned, shifting uncomfortably against the tree. Finally, this brought me out of my thoughts and I moved towards her, but froze after only a few steps. She was hogtied – bound to the tree with the rope I kept in the truck for emergencies. "Weiss?!" I shouted, running towards her. She struggled even more violently now, letting out a muffled but clearly angry cry. I ran around the front of the tree and saw that her mouth had been duct taped shut. Without a second thought, I removed it. "What the hell happened?!"

"It's about time you woke up, you big lummox," she said. "And… and Pyrrha happened. I was keeping watch like I was supposed to, then the next thing I know, I've got a hand around my mouth and an arm around my neck. I woke up like this and she was in front of me," she said, shivering. "She… she told me to say that she let us live this time, but if we ever see her again…" Suddenly, she froze, staring intently at me but not meeting my eyes. "Holy- Yang, are you okay?! Your neck looks like-"

Someone gasped behind me and I whipped around to see Ruby, eyes wide as her body shook in her cocoon of blankets. I ran over to her, sliding on the muddy ground until I was right next to her. "Ruby, hey, it's- it's oka-" I froze. Her neck was marked up with several hair-width red lines, each running across her throat.

She looked at me, eyes watery. "It… it was real?"

I simply nodded, unable to find the words.

"Then- then Qrow-" she stammered. "Oh my God, Penny! She- she wasn't even on-shift, I don't- where is- is she alright?!"

The second she said her name, I immediately felt extremely guilty. She's my sister for crying out loud, and I didn't even THINK of her… "I… we weren't the only ones to get out…"

"And we can't know one way or the other," Mom said. I glanced over to her and she looked tired – like she'd hardly slept at all. "We… we have to keep moving, though. Yang, untie Weiss, we've got a long way to go."

"Where can we even go?" I asked, even as I moved to do what she said. "The house is gone, the cabin is on the other side of the country, and there are probably aliens everywhere!"

She sighed. "Just… get in the truck. The less time we spend near the base, the better. With any luck, we'll run into some survivors along the way."

I didn't really have a retort for that, so I just finished untying our friend. Nobody said a word as we piled back into the truck, the rain getting worse by the minute. Silently, Mom directed me towards the driver's seat – I'd done a good enough job getting us out of there, and it looked like she wanted that to continue. Weiss was right beside me in the passenger seat, weapon cradled in her hands, while Ruby and Mom took the back seats.

The truck started right up, as I knew it would. I drove down the same mountain road we'd already been on for almost an hour after leaving base, the pines whipping by as we headed vaguely north. We were barely a minute on the road before Mom was asleep; I really couldn't blame her, yesterday was one hell of an experience. Only half-an-hour on the road and an announcement came over the radio. The UN had surrendered to the aliens. My grip tightened on the steering wheel, Ruby softly wept in her seat, and Weiss simply stared outside with a blank expression on her face.

I had never felt so goddamn helpless in my life. Yes, they were terrorizing the world, and yes, they did just blow up XCOM… but did those fucking paper pushers over in New York really think nobody still wanted to fight?! This was our home, and they'd just signed it away like we hadn't bled for it – like good people hadn't died for it.

As we drove on through the mountains, I noticed the fuel tank was only a little under half-full. We hadn't topped it up when it got put in deep storage upon our recruitment – it wasn't like we planned on going anywhere. Hopefully it would be enough to get us wherever we were going. A few minutes later, I heard a loud grumbling roar come from right beside me. Weiss muttered an apology under her breath and I pretended to forget about it. Guess the truck isn't the only thing we have to worry about feeding, I thought.

Far ahead, I saw a pair of deer gallop across the road. I had half a mind to gun it, hoping they were still there, and shoot them for some breakfast. The second the thought entered my mind, I realized there was a zero-percent chance of that happening. The Xiao Longs weren't hunters; I'd be surprised if I could catch an earthworm, to be honest. There were only two people I knew of that likely could've turned those animals into steaks; one was a Branwen, the other, a Belladonna, and both were probably dead. At least one definitely was.

There was just so much death in my life nowadays. I glanced around to the others in the truck with me; who would be next? Would it be Weiss, the lost girl thrown into the deep end that was already struggling to adapt? How about my mother, whom I'd already thought died before? Or Ruby, who never really recovered from Harvard? I hated all three possibilities. I almost wished I was the next one to go; at least I could see Dad and Qrow and Jaune and- and Blake again. A brief scratch at my itchy neck reminded me just how close that was to being reality.

As the sun got higher in the sky, our stomachs only growled louder. For a while, I started wondering if Bradford had lied about the base being in the US. There was nothing here – we'd driven for about three hours, cumulative, and hadn't come across any sign of Human habitation save for this road we were using. For all I knew, we could be way up north in Canada and the nearest town was days away. Just as I was giving into despair, we crested another peak. Lo and behold, there was a town in the valley below – three, actually, all ringing a miles-wide quarry. For once, we caught a break and I immediately spotted a gas station near the main road leading in and out of the town we were nearest.

We could fill up, get some lunch – maybe some idea where the hell we were, too – and be on our way.

Just as I was about to ease off the breaks and let gravity take over, I noticed a spec in the distance – a glimmer of metal in the sky. "Hey, Weiss, any idea what that is?" I asked.

"Huh?" she muttered. I pointed towards the glimmer, which was slowly getting larger. "...Hide us, I don't like it."

I couldn't help but agree. Maybe it was just a plane and we could continue on, but of all times, now seemed like the perfect time to be just a little paranoid. I threw the truck into reverse and cranked the steering wheel. We backed into the wall of trees either side of the dirt road, the little truck neatly squeezing between the massive pine trunks. I kept the engine running as I got out, scatter laser in hand, and crawled back up to the peak only a dozen feet away. Weiss wasn't far behind with her own rifle.

Though neither of us had binoculars or even phones to make this a little easier, we still observed the towns below as the glimmer got bigger and bigger. Eventually, it got close enough for us to recognize – a raider-class UFO. It lazily spun as it approached the towns and hovered for a minute before setting down in one seemingly at random. We could just barely see the doors open and a combination of humans and aliens exit the craft. They didn't seem to be attacking the citizens – who were fleeing the area as fast as they could – but they couldn't be up to anything good either.

I wanted to run in there and kill them all – show the aliens that they couldn't just come in here and take our land – but… they just kept coming. There must've been forty or maybe fifty crew aboard the UFO. We couldn't fight that, not with what we had. With a shuddering breath, I started pulling back to the truck. Weiss came to the same conclusion as I did, wordlessly following me. We hopped in and sped off back the way we came. There was a fork in the road a few miles back; guess we were taking the other way.

For just a moment, I glanced at the XCOM insignia on Weiss's armor. Did I really deserve to be a part of that if I abandoned civilians so easily?

/-\ Adam Taurus /-\

It was always an honor being on the Elders' Ship.

Even now, when I'd been summoned to explain myself, I couldn't help but admire the craftsmanship of their vessel. Their gleaming metal studded with psionic lights – the architecture was simply superior to anything the lowly Humans could've built.

Finally, I arrived at their chamber. The door shimmered back out of being, allowing my passage before reforming behind me. Their chambers were grand – a space large enough to hold hundreds of people, even discounting the area taken up by their arches, obelisks, computers, and other things. I knelt the second I set foot inside, knowing my place. "My liege," I greeted, sensing one of Their presences nearby. It was as if someone was driving needles into my aura; not deep enough to harm, just enough to be felt.

"Rise, Taurus," the voice said. "Rise and explain yourself."

Slowly, I did so. "The girl was craftier than I'd anticipated," I said. "I bested her in combat, but in her retreat… no, in her running away… well, she was always extremely talented in that area."

"And why did your Cobras not corral her in?"

I glanced away. "Because… I made a tactical error in their deployment. They were not ready to face her and she-"

Suddenly, I was swept off my feet by a massive psionic force. I barely rolled back to my feet before they were encased in glowing purple energy. "THEN WHY DID YOU ONLY TRAIN THREE IF THEY WERE SO INADEQUATE?!"

"Because I can only train three at once, my liege. If I were to attempt more, their quality would drastically decrease!"

"You talk of quality… they died just as any other against her," the voice paused for a moment. "We… will allow you one more chance, Taurus. Retrieve the asset, and you may just earn our favor. Fail, and we will have you put to death, as is the eventual fate of all Humans on this world."

"I understand," I said. "However… if I may ask a boon of thee…"

I got the sense I should stop talking – just a feeling, rather than words. "We… shall consider your proposal, Taurus. For now…" The door shimmered out of existence once more, three Vipers slithering towards me. "For now, your new students await."

/-\ Weiss Schnee /-\

Before I'd even opened my eyes, the first thing I felt was hunger.

After a few moments of shifting around in the confined space, I remembered where I was. Yang's truck; the same place I'd been the entirety of yesterday, save for the occasional bathroom break. I opened my eyes and was unsurprised to have my vision completely obscured by trees. We'd elected to sleep in the truck last night, trading room to lay down for completely waterproof cover, security, and ease of getting away should the need arise. As I looked around, I realized there were only two people in the truck with me instead of three. Also, my rifle was gone, Yang's fancy laser shotgun in its place.

Right as I was about to get out and start looking for her, the driver door opened and Yang slid back into her seat with a sigh. Her face still held the dried red streaks of blood from when she'd been thrown against the wall by that Muton during our escape, and there were great big bags under her eyes. She was about to pass my rifle back to me when she blinked. "Oh, you're awake."

"Just woke," I said. "Where did you go?"

"Hunting," she responded, voice dejected.

"And you took my gun, why?"

"Because we can always get more bullets for it – nothing special about them. This?" she asked, taking her own weapon back. "We can't recharge this. We need it for fighting the aliens if they find us. Plus yours has a longer range than mine. Not that that mattered – didn't see a damn thing. Heard plenty, but I could never get the drop on anything. How the hell did cavemen do this every goddamn day?!"

"I have no idea, but one thing's for certain: we're not good at that lifestyle. We… we need to find a store or something and just buy food. Hopefully soon."

She snorted. "With what money, Weiss? Unless you've got a wallet in that armor of yours, none of us have anything."

"Oh, did you lose all our money between yesterday and now? No? Then what was your plan in that town? Just walk up and ask politely for gas and provisions?"

"I had a lot on my mind, okay?! I didn't realize that yet!"

"So now what's your plan? We clearly need to buy food at the next town – wherever that is – but we still don't have money."

Yang crossed her arms. "That's another reason why I went hunting! People like nice fur pelts, right?!"

"Straight off the animal?! That's disgusting! Furthermore, do you even know how to make a pelt?!"

"I watched Blake do it once!"

"When on Earth did Blake have time to skin an animal?!"

"It was before Harvard; she just woke up one day and decided to go kill a bear! It was the weirdest thing!"

"Well! It was still just one time! Did you even help?!"

"I'm trying to get us out of this fucking mess, Princess; if you have any ideas – any ideas at all – I'm all fucking ears!"

"You lived out in the woods, right? Don't you know some plants we could eat or something?!"

She laughed – it was a deep, rumbling thing coming straight from her empty stomach. "Want dandelions? That's all I got, and I haven't seen any of those around here. Anything else? It's a hell of a lot more likely to put you down than it is to keep you going. You wanna go start munching on those bushes over there? Be my guest – the rest of us'll even eat the same stuff if you don't keel over!"

"Girls! E-nough!" A voice shouted from behind us. Both of us whipped around and saw the furious face of Summer Xiao Long glaring right at us. "This isn't productive, you're both just yelling in circles. Neither of your plans are feasible for one reason or another."

"Oh, and you have one?! Where's this plan been the entire time?!" Yang shouted.

Summer took a deep breath. "I admit, I… was stuck in my head, yesterday. But today… today, we're gonna eat. We'll keep going until we hit the next town, wherever that happens to be. We'll stop at a gas station. You three will stay with the truck, I'll go inside and grab food."

"With. What. Money?" Yang asked.

"With none," Summer said, her voice hollow. "We… we need it. We're just going to take it."

"You mean… we're going to rob a store?" I muttered.

"We don't really have another option," she said. "We aren't anywhere near starving yet, but I won't let us get to that point. Back in… back in college, I was friends with a guy who wanted to be a dietician. He helped with a study on starvation in the US; they basically gave homeless people a bunch of physicals before giving them a week's worth of non-perishable food and some money. The shit he told me… stealing some gas station pizza is a much, much better crime than allowing us all to go hungry. It's what we'll do until we figure something out."

For a while, we were both silent. Neither of us wanted to acknowledge that she was right. We still had some pride about us – that we were above common criminals who robbed convenience stores. But, eventually, practicality won out and we did nod. "Can… can one of you drive, though?" Yang asked, yawning. "I didn't get much sleep last night."

I blinked. "How early did you go?"

She shrugged. "At least a few hours… four max. Maybe five. It's a little hard to tell time without a phone or a watch or something."

"I'll do it," Summer said. "Though, Yang, why did you go out for so long? And why in the dark of all times – you probably couldn't see your hand in front of your face, let alone a deer."

She tapped the side of her head. "Gene mod. I could see everything just as well as in broad daylight. Just not in color."

"That still doesn't answer why you were out there for so long," Summer said as they exchanged seats.

"Mom, I'm hungrier than I've ever been before, and I know you're feeling the same thing. So is Ruby and Weiss. I… I just want it to stop. And I know they do too."

I could certainly empathize with her, the hunger was easily the worst I'd ever felt, too. Completely unsurprising given my upbringing, but that fact brought me no comfort. The only way it would be worse is if Yang didn't keep a case of water bottles stashed in the bed for emergencies.

"...We'll get some food, sweetie. Just rest for now." She turned back to the front, starting the truck and pulling out of our hiding spot.

Yang was back asleep within moments, though I wish I could say the same for her sister. Ruby may have been awake, but she clearly wasn't mentally present. She stared at nothing with those vacant and unblinking eyes of hers, body swaying back and forth with the motion of the truck.

Out of respect, I turned away and back towards the dirt road which had become such a familiar sight in recent times. Due to its curvature, we couldn't even go very fast – stealing a glance at the speedometer, we were barely doing twenty – and the fact that the road doubled back on itself all the time just made this fact worse. I settled in for the long haul, getting as comfortable as I could in my grimy armor with my mostly-empty rifle in my lap.

My mind began to wander as the trees flew by in a blur. At first, my thoughts drifted back to the Attack – the thing that had put us in this situation – but I forcibly clamped down on those images. I wanted to think of something better; something I wanted to remember. It only took a moment to think of my family – or, rather, one specific member.

Winter, my baby sister.

I remembered holding her as she softly cooed, looking around at all the new things in the world with wide, excited eyes. I remembered when she started crawling; clumsy and slow at first, but she got the hang of it in time. I remembered how she'd love to play with blocks, and how I'd sit with her, trying to coax a word or two out as she banged them together. I'd left for Harvard before that could happen, to my eternal disappointment. Doing the mental math, she'd be almost two years old by now. I've missed half her life, I realized.

And then the state of the world caught up to me all at once. The planet had just surrendered to the aliens. Winter was going to grow up under their occupation and in that household. I grit my teeth in rage – that was unacceptable! If I couldn't stop the aliens, then I was at least going to go get my sister.

"We need to go to Washington," I said.

"What? Why?" Summer asked.

"Because I need to get my sister. I'm not leaving her."

"Washington is all the way across the country – it'll take a long time to get there."

"Washington State, sorry. We have a cabin there, on Puget Sound, right across the bay from Seattle. It's somewhat isolated, but still within easy reach should something happen. It's where Father would take the family in a scenario like this."

"Huh. Didn't picture the Schnees for people who liked cozy, shoreside cabins," she said.

"We only call it that because it's smaller than the Manor. It's still roughly the size of a standard city block."

She glanced over at me for a moment before refocusing on the road. "...What do you even put in something that big?"

"Luxury cars, a pool, a gym, an art gallery…" I sighed. "Nothing that really matters."

We lapsed back into silence as we drove down the dirt road. My mind wandered more, bringing up different memories; less happy ones. Mainly, they were of my brother. I went back and forth on whether or not to bring him with; he was essentially just a clone of Father, but on the other hand… he was even younger than I was. Did he really deserve that fate, simply because he looked up to one of our so-called parents? Would he change if he was removed from that environment?

I didn't even come close to the answer before I was yanked away from my internal thoughts. We finally found a proper, paved road. All of the sudden, the ride got significantly smoother. And faster – much faster. We were probably doing fifty now! Only a few minutes after we found the road, I spotted a gas station up ahead. It was in the absolute middle of nowhere, just sitting by the side of the road.

Summer pulled up to one of the pumps and we both got out. "Start fueling, I'll get our stuff," she said, walking away.

I took one look at the pump and immediately called out to her. "I have no idea how this works!"

She stopped, mid-step, turning around. "What?" she muttered. "It's a gas pump. Don't you have a car?"

I crossed my arms. "We had… people for this sort of thing."

Summer just stared at me for a moment before walking back to the pump and showing me how to use it. She hit "Pay Inside" and then it let us start fueling. As she walked away – telling me to keep an eye out and just put the nozzle back when it was time to leave – I watched the sale price increase on the display. Was that a lot of money to most people? I wondered. Gas was, apparently, seven dollars a gallon. I had absolutely no idea if that was good or bad.

"Hey! Stop her!" I heard from inside the store. Quickly shutting off the nozzle and stowing it, I peeked around the pump to see Summer running with a lot of groceries, including a frozen pizza under her arm. Behind her was a short Asian woman with a frying pan raised over her head.

Taking a deep breath, I stepped out, drew my empty pistol, and pointed it at the woman. "I'm sorry, but we need this," I said. "It's just food and fuel. You have more."

She stopped in her tracks, eyes wide as Summer started loading the food into the truck. "Is not easy for us either! Fuel truck hasn't come in three days!"

"I'm sorry, I really am," I repeated.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw an armored figure stumble out of the trees. Instantly, my gaze – and gun – whipped towards them, only for my eyes to widen.

"Blake?!"

(A/N) And the Catgirl rejoins the party! We'll see what she was up to on her lonesome next chapter, fair warning: she's not doing any better than her friendos here.

So fun fact: that thing with the gas station where you can tell it you'll pay inside and it'll just let you start fueling? Yeah, that's how I thought it worked everywhere. My beta reader tells me otherwise, but I've left it in because the plot would kinda screech to a halt if they couldn't get gas and, like Yang so eloquently said, they ain't got no money. So forgive this rural Minnesotan for living in a "high-trust society", as my beta reader put it, lol. Note that people absolutely still steal gas here, it's just rare enough since there's cameras that can and do catch the license plate of the people who do.

Anyways, the only other thing I had was that the Bye Week has a date again! There won't be a chapter on June 21st because that's when I'm moving now. (stupid bank delays).

And that's all! See ya guys next week!