Wastelands Chapter 3

The girl was the first to make a move lowering her pistol "I'm Cassandra Ravine, who are you?" she asked bluntly "My name Is Michael Nestov..." he extended his hand "it's nice to finally meet someone out of a town that's not a raider." Cassy gave a light laugh as she shook his hand putting her gun back in it's holster "So what brings you to the wastelands?" she asked "Well right now I'm looking for a farmhouse that someone said was west of the town I left not to long ago." Cassy picked up her things slinging her bag over her shoulder and headed west. "You coming?" she asked him looking over her shoulder. He quickly got alongside her, the two looked different in appearance Cassy was short and curvy (which was rather rare to see in the wanderers in the wastelands) with wavy black hair and Mike towered over her and had a rather muscular build with his blond hair cut close to the scalp. After walking for in silence for a long while Cassy finally spoke "So do you know exactly how far out this farmhouse is or if it even exists, I mean hell take a look around it's not like there's a lot out here." Mike paused thinking for a moment "Well I don't know how far out it might be and to be honest I'm not exactly sure if there is anything still out here." Cassy let out a heavy sigh and muttered under her breath "Well that's just fantastic." "Hey cheer up a little, I mean after all isn't that what wandering the wastelands is all about rediscovering what was lost in the past." Cassy stopped dead in her tracks and glared at Mike who stopped as well "Hell no it's all about surviving, living to see the next day however you can." She turned back and continued walking while she muttered under her breath "Jeez haven't been out long have you?" Mike let her get ahead of him before walking again and answering her question, despite the fact it was most likely a rhetorical one "Well no I've only been out of the vaults for just under a year now." Cassy let out a light laugh "The vaults, I didn't think anyone would come out of the safety of one of those." Mike was about to respond when he spotted something shambling towards them and lifted the scope of his rifle to eye level. "Well I lived in the vaults for as long as I can remember and was trained by my grandfather who served a tour of duty in war, and once I was finished training I got bored..." Once he had a clear view of the creature coming towards them he pulled the trigger taking out one of it's legs making it fall to the ground "and besides it'd be a shame to put all that training to waste." They walked toward the now fallen creature cautiously. Once they reached it they saw it was a feral mutant and that it was still snarling and clawing at them. Mike sighed placing his bag and rifle down and pulled a sawed off shotgun and touched the barrel to the mutants forehead which made it stop almost as if were scared. Mike pulled the trigger as Cassy closed her eyes and looked away. They picked up their things and headed off again "So you were trained by your grandfather?" Cassy asked in an attempt to lighten the mood. "Yes he served in the army towards the end in the Russian spetsnaz and then he moved the family here and then into the vaults." Cassy was only half listening to him talk "Lucky you, you got real military training I had to train myself to fight against mutants and raiders." "The raiders are scum, but I have a slightly harder time killing the mutants..." he looked over his shoulder, the mutant he'd just killed still visible with a hole in it's head large enough to see clearly through "I remember at one time they were human like us." Cassy looked back too before talking "I used to have a hard time killing them too but I put it out of mind, but I guess for some people that might be hard." She said putting a hand on his shoulder. They walked for most of the day making idle chit-chat until the sun was setting and they spotted a medium sized shack looking house, it seemed they'd found a place to stay for the night but they felt uneasy as they approached it. As they got closer Mike brought a finger to his lips signaling to keep quiet as they crouched down getting closer they saw there were many holes in the walls. Once they were close enough they ducked under one of the larger holes as Mike began searching through his bag then pulled out a homemade flash bomb. He counted down mouthing the numbers before lighting the fuse '3, 2, 1.' he lit it and tossed it in. After a few seconds there was a small explosion that blew out a few windows in the house and left a blackened scorch mark where the bomb had landed. They peered through the hole they'd been hiding under "Well it looks like everything is all clear." Mike said hoping through a now broken window "So what now?" Cassy asked climbing through the same window. "I guess we should see if there's any supplies." He suggested making his way toward the kitchen area. They searched everything in the house to find that only the sink worked, which didn't matter because there was no telling what might be wrong with it. "Well that was a lot of effort for nothing." Cassy said as she slumped back against a wall "Well at least we found somewhere safe to bed down for the night." he said as he laid down on the floor using his bag as a pillow his hand on his pistol. "Yeah I guess so." Cassy yawned as she curled up on the floor her back still against the wall. It wasn't long after they fell asleep that someone else had entered the house his footsteps making the floor boards creek. Mike waited until the stranger passed by him to jump up and place his pistol against the back of his skull. "And just who the hell are you?" He asked as the young boy shook "Please don't kill me, I was just looking for somewhere to stay." he begged. The sounds coming from the next room woke Cassy up who came into the room with a yawn "What the hell is going on?" Her question was answered by a loud rumbling outside fallowed by the flash of flood lights being shined into the house. "Oh no he fallowed me." The stranger said.