JONATHAN

Jonathan watched through the window as Evelyn brought the axe down on yet another block of wood, sending pieces splintering in different directions. With Guy's maze of traps there was little chance the Soulless would be in range but worrier that she was, Evelyn had still ensured that half her face was covered with a camo mask from Guy's seemingly endless supply. Even without seeing her expression, Jonathan could tell she was troubled.

Being locked in isolation for three days would do that to you... Finding out your father might have been involved in causing a catastrophic world ending event wouldn't help... and being responsible for someone's death would definitely be the cherry on top...

He watched as the axe found its mark, finally splitting the log apart and Evelyn stepped back to grab another piece of firewood off the pile. He'd offered to do it, but she'd just laughed at him.

"As your primary physician, I can't in good faith allow you to do any kind of intense workouts." She'd said.

He would've pointed out that he had just helped battle off a horde of Soulless and saved her skin in the process so chopping firewood surely was less of a workout but that seemed in bad taste considering what had happened so he hadn't argued.

Jonathan couldn't stop thinking about what she'd done to save them and how he should have been the one to pull the trigger. It was true, he might have been the one covered in bruises, stitches, and scars but her wounds were impossible to see and harder to heal. It was strange but for some reason he knew he would do anything to shield her from that pain, yet all he could do was sit helplessly on the sidelines. Every time he looked at her, he had to bury the feeling of guilt that sat with him like an ever-present weight on his chest that she'd had to shoulder the burden alone. He already had blood on his hands, maybe it would've darkened the black spot on his soul but hers hadn't been tainted before this.

To make matters worse, they finally had time to look at the coordinates in Evelyn's father's journal only to find that they were just a string of useless numbers; apparently not coordinates after all. In the last few days, she had tried her best not to let on how much it all was bothering her, but he could tell. It was in her eyes when she spaced out during dinnertime conversation, it was in her voice when her sentences trailed off when the topic hit too close to the nerve, and it was what lay unspoken between them as they tried to consider their next move.

He tore his gaze from the window. He knew he shouldn't be trying to take on her problems right now especially when there was really nothing, he could do about it.

Ever since he and Evelyn had tried to piece together the scraps of information about the virus, about the cure, and about what in the hell the military was doing in River District, Jonathan couldn't stop his thoughts from latching on to conspiracy theories or worse spiraling into the past... maybe he'd been hanging around Guy too much.

What had his father said to him when they moved to River District? Not much, even when they were still speaking to each other. He'd only said that the General had an important job for him at another colony and they'd be leaving the base. That was fine, it would have been worse if they stayed. Everything about that place was haunted by the ghost of his mother. Her spirit wouldn't have wanted to know that to Jonathan, every brick was tainted, every flagpole, every rock on that stupid unpaved road. His father was haunted by her there too. That was why when they first moved, Jonathan thought that things were better but that was just the pills. His father was no longer haunted because he had become something of a ghost himself. The Colonel drifted in and out of their River District apartment, barely speaking or acknowledging his son's presence at all but then when the pills would run out, Jonathan would have to barricade his door. Of course, they wouldn't have advertised the severe withdrawal symptoms in the vague TV or billboard ads.

Jonathan hadn't known his father was off his medication when he'd initiated the fight about the shortages in the storeroom. They'd yelled. They'd exchanged barbs. At some point, Jonathan called him an "emotionless drone" and his father countered with the fact that least he was useful and productive, whilst Jonathan was useless with a gun, which was stupid considering he worked in what should be the most protected part of the colony and couldn't be trusted or counted on. Jonathan had always assumed he'd said that last bit because he knew that Jonathan had been sneaking out, but now he began to wonder if his father had been trying to keep him away from learning about the Serenozine shipments. He'd told him he'd be better off re-sanctioned to the records room where his incompetence wouldn't bring down the colony. When Kells had asked, Jonathan blamed the black eye he'd sustained on knocking a soup can off a shelf in the storeroom and cited the workplace injury policies as the reason why he'd been forced to change positions. He and his father had not been on speaking terms since.

He was still standing there by the window when Evelyn came in from outside. They were experiencing another cold snap and Guy kept swearing that it would snow at least one more time before the month was up stating he could feel it in his appendix, apparently a skill acquired from his time abroad with the extraterrestrials. There were crystals of frost in her hair strikingly white against the dark black. She'd cut it since arriving at Guy's safe house, so it now fell at a medium length just below her shoulders, in soft waves that framed her face. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold February air when she pulled off her mask, a bright red that stood in stark contrast to her pale skin. She stomped the frost off her boots at the door and glanced up, eyeing Jonathan's position by the window. She looked him over with those inquisitive brown eyes and he could tell she was analyzing his battered, but healing features, a rather annoying habit she'd taken on when she'd proclaimed herself, his primary physician.

"You, okay?"

He shifted under her gaze, suddenly self-conscious by the way she was looking at him, though he was not quite sure why. Maybe she was curious as to why he'd been watching her. Looking into those deep, melting brown eyes, he suddenly thought about unburdening himself to her and talking to her about his father, his mother, River District, the compound before that but he'd spent so long bottling it all up that he doubted he could do it even if he tried.

"I'm fine. You?"

"I've been thinking about what we talked about before," Evelyn said, "our questions about how each of our fathers are involved with what is going on... it all seems too subjective, I don't want to jump to conclusions, which is all we seem to be able to do here. I don't want to make any more judgements until we have more information and I think I know how we do that."

Jonathan frowned, "What do you mean?"

"I think we need to go to the NeuroGen Corporation Headquarters."

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To say Guy was less than enthusiastic about their plan to return to his old headquarters was an understatement. Instead of being helpful, Guy spent most of the morning blocking their path through every doorway and occasionally reaching into Jonathan's bag to throw anything he could reach across the room, snickering as Jonathan had to get up to retrieve it.

"There's nothing back there," He reminded them adamantly, "all the vending machines are empty, and I cleaned out my cliff bar stash. It's basically just rubble."

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you wanted us to stay. "Jonathan teased, retrieving a t-shirt that Guy had flung over the couch, "Are we growing on you, Guy?"

"Yeah, like a fungus!" Guy responded indignantly, "Like a bad foot fungus, that I can't wait to be rid of. It's better that the two of yous are leaving. What kind of survivalist would I be if I just rescued every stray human that I found?"

"Not a smart one." Jonathan agreed.

"Exactly!" Guy said, tossing a balled-up pair of Jonathan's socks into the kitchen, "Waste of my resources! You know the Martians may have invited me into their civilization- and I could probably convince them about her-but can you imagine what they would say if I tried to bring you along?"

"I love and care about you too, Guy." Jonathan said, with a smirk.

Evelyn laughed and Jonathan looked up. He hadn't heard her laugh in a while. It felt good to hear it, like someone had opened a window in the world's darkest room.

"You could always come with us." Evelyn said, "Keep us out of trouble. We could use a good survivalist like you. I'm sure it would help to have someone who's on the alien's good side."

Guy twirled his beard thoughtfully, "You know Jonny boy warned me about your habit of dragging people on dangerous quests..."

Evelyn raised her eyebrow, "Did he now?"

Jonathan averted his eyes and stood to retrieve his socks from the kitchen, "What? It's been known to happen."

It was late afternoon when they were finally ready to go. The rest of the day had turned out nicer than anticipated after the morning's frost as the sun had managed to sneak out from behind the clouds. Even so, Guy suggested that maybe they stay and leave the next morning having lost so much travel time already. From the look on Evelyn's face, Jonathan knew she wouldn't have the heart to tell him they still needed to go so he played the role of bad cop. It didn't take a genius to realize that behind Guy's bushy wall of hair and tough guy demeanor he was going to miss them. After Guy navigated them through his maze of booby traps, he had submitted to a tearful goodbye hug from Evelyn who promised him they'd come back and visit once they'd found what they were looking for. Jonathan knew better than to make promises he wasn't sure he could keep but he didn't want to be a downer, so he just nodded along. When they finally began walking out towards the road, he reached into his pocket to turn on his Walkman and didn't look back.

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EVELYN

Evelyn had never been to the NeuroGen Corporation's laboratory. She'd seen it on the news and had a vague idea its location was somewhere in Vancouver's downtown core, but getting there was another story.

When Jonathan suggested they hunt for a ride, Evelyn didn't protest. Even though he hadn't acknowledged it, she knew he was also aware of the fact that given how far they would have had to walk and the shape they were both in, they wouldn't have managed the journey while keeping up enough strength to fend off the Soulless should they need to.

Most of the cars clogging up the roads were electric ones that had been rendered useless by the EMP blasts. Jonathan claimed that it was fine because he preferred "real cars" anyway. Evelyn thought about bringing up the fact that electric cars were, in fact, real cars and that they had been better for the environment but thought better of it considering she was, once again, in debt to him for his navigational skills and there was no use arguing with him.

After about an hour of walking they found an abandoned Subaru that still had some gas in the tank near the side of a ditch. Instead of taking it, much to Evelyn's chagrin, Jonathan merely siphoned the gas into a plastic bottle and kept walking. When he failed to provide an explanation for why he'd completely ignored such a viable option, naturally, she'd pestered him about his reasoning for the next twenty minutes until he finally conceded that it was because in his words "the sound system was utter crap."

She'd known he was reckless, but even still, this seemed to be pushing it. She probably would have shown some anger worthy of drawing out the Soulless if they hadn't found a vehicle that matched his standards within the next hour. The car they found didn't strike Evelyn as being much different from the Subaru, but Jonathan lit up like a Christmas tree when he saw it from down the block. The first thing he'd done when they'd gotten in the car was dig through the glove box in search of cassette tapes. He seemed pretty excited when he scrounged up the Foreigner tape that was now playing on the stereo.

"So, you don't know how to drive, huh?" Jonathan said, as he revved the engine of the silver Lexus and peeled off the shoulder onto the road.

"So, you know how to hotwire an engine, huh?" She shrugged in reply just as casually.

The corners of Jonathan's eyes crinkled and Evelyn figured that was as close to a smile as she was going to get from him seeing as he hadn't bothered to put on a mask; though she was quite certain that a dozen camo patterned ones were packed in ample supply in his backpack. Again, reckless of him.

"You're not surprised at all?" he asked.

"I guess I just figured it was something you might know. You seem like you know cars pretty well. And considering how picky you were about your choice of wheels..."

Jonathan shook his head, "I'm not that picky, but you must admit this was a good find! The Harman Kardon systems in Subarus have nothing on a Mark Levinson setup!"

"You realize I have no idea what you're talking about right?"

"Story of my life."

"If I stick with you long enough, I'm sure I'll learn," she said.

He changed the subject. "Honestly, I'm surprised you don't drive."

"Really? Especially with my sense of direction?" Evelyn sighed, "If you must know, I had my learner's permit, but it expired. My parents were busy with work, so they didn't really have time to take me out driving and we couldn't afford lessons. If I needed to go anywhere Vancouver's very walkable and then there's always transit. I guess I didn't leave the university much, but why would I have to? With dining hall up there and all my classes, what more did I need? I mean, other than going home..."

They were silent for a moment. Even the mention of her family felt like opening up an old wound.

"Did you ever try going back there?" Jonathan asked quietly. He kept his eyes on the road, navigating around the stalled cars as he tried to find quieter neighborhood streets to take.

Evelyn was absently twisting a lock of black hair around her finger.

"I did." She admitted, "I'd been out of the bunker, at least two weeks before I met you. It took me a while to find but yeah. We had a house in Coquitlam so as you'd expect I went there first... No one was home."

"Oh."

It was only one syllable, barely a reaction, but it weighed like a stone in Evelyn's heart. She'd never told anyone about this but if she couldn't tell him, who would she tell?

"The house was gone." She confessed in a small voice, "You know when they took out the cell towers? I guess the bombs leveled the whole street. The whole neighborhood, really. It was all just... gone..."

"But no one was home," he said, his eyes were still glued to the road before them, "lucky thing."

"Yeah... lucky." Evelyn averted her gaze out the passenger window. She thought back to Adam and the way he'd talked about fearing his return home. Maybe that's the reason she hadn't checked the rubble. She always told herself she was being optimistic that she knew they were still alive and couldn't have possibly been buried in the debris. But as she remembered standing on the edge of the freeway with her bike, looking out at the carnage of what used to be a familiar sight of houses and townhomes and grocery stores and parking lots; she understood why Adam delayed his journey home for so long. Maybe, like him, she was afraid of what she'd find.

Her thoughts were interrupted suddenly as Jonathan cranked up the radio.

"What are you doing?" She asked.

"Teaching you. You said if you stuck around with me long enough, you'd learn. Well that whole process will go faster if I teach you."

Beneath her mask, she cracked a smile, "Alright, you're the boss, let's talk music then."

"Oh, don't sound so resigned." He joked.

"You are literally in the driver's seat so you're the boss."

"Well, that's easily remedied."

Jonathan suddenly swerved to the side of the road and Evelyn was thankful for the seatbelt she was wearing as she might've slammed into the passenger side door if she hadn't put it on.

He opened the car door and stepped out motioning for her to do the same. Within moments they had traded seats and Jonathan was teaching her how to slowly accelerate the car forward, classic rock blasting away on the stereo system.

"The NeuroGen lab isn't going anywhere," he'd assured her, "I think we've got time."