"I think I have an idea of where we can go," I whisper, looking up at Finn from where I have my face resting on his chest.

"Hm?" He is almost asleep, has to be completely exhausted. He had just crawled in here a couple of minutes ago from being on watch, and I have to say that I am glad he joined me. The sleeping bag is just big enough to fit all of us, me cuddled up to Finn and Viola fast asleep on his chest.

"My family owns a beach house down in Half Moon Bay. It's in Northern California." Scooting closer to him, I try to absorb some of the heat that he is radiating. "My grandparents were big believers in saving the environment, so the house is powered by this small wave power generator my grandpa helped design. Plus, there aren't too many people around, since it's kind of a small town."

Finn blinks open his eyes, but they are still half-lidded. "It sounds like the perfect place, but how are we supposed to get there?"

Shaking my head, I look back down at Viola, who is sucking on her pacifier contentedly in her sleep.

"We are just wandering around here aimlessly anyways, might as well have a destination," I say.

Finn stays quiet for a few minutes. Just when I fear that he may have accidentally fallen asleep during our conversation, he breaks the silence.

"Alright," he says, letting out a wide yawn. "We'll leave tomorrow, once everyone gets some rest."

I am a little surprised with how quickly he agreed to my plan. With Finn, he likes to think every little thing over, weighing out every single pro and con, which can sometimes take hours. But when I peek up at him again, I see that Finn is completely asleep.

He didn't have hours to deliberate, it seems, being too exhausted to stay awake any longer. His chest rises rhythmically, and it makes a part of me unwind. I had maybe gotten a couple of hours before Finn had come in to join me, subsequently waking Viola who decided she needed to eat and have a diaper change. Now, though, it is quiet again, the only sounds coming from the crackling of the fire outside the tent. My exhaustion is catching up with me, and soon enough my eye lids are becoming too heavy to keep open.

Finn is warm and comfortable, so snuggling closer, I revel in his heat, allowing myself to once again fall asleep.

It is only when someone begins to shake my shoulder that I wake up. Squinting my eyes, I see that Jacob is crouching over me, hand on my arm as he watches me wipe the sleep from my eyes.

"I'm about to pass out," he says, already sitting back on his own sleeping back. "Can you be on guard now?"

"Sure," I mumble, forcing myself away from the warmth that is Finn.

Viola seems to be awake now, too, so once I wiggle out of the sleeping bag and into a somewhat clean pair of clothes, I pick her and her baby bag up. Danny gives me a mumbled good night before completely falling asleep, laying next to his already passed out brother.

The sun is just starting to rise, meaning that it is still pretty chilly outside. I must have gotten nearly eight hours of sleep, and I have to say that I feel much better than I did before. But as they say, sleep is the best type of medicine.

Viola gurgles against my chest, and I hold her a little tighter. By the fire, there seems to be a fallen log with a towel over the top of it. Seems like someone had rolled it over here from the forest further up the bank, giving us someplace to sit other than the ground.

There is even a rope tied between two trees, damp clothes hanging from the line. So someone must have done laundry during the time that I was asleep.

"Not a bad idea, Viola," I say, looking back down at her with an impressed look. She just stares back at me with wide eyes, letting out a small coo.

Smiling, I sit us down on the log, resting her on my legs as I rummage around in her bag for a fresh diaper and warm clothes. She lets out an unhappy grunt when I unbutton her pajamas, leaving her exposed to the cold but doesn't cry.

As quickly as I can, I get her changed, wiping her down with a baby wipe so she is a little bit cleaner. Her bottle is easily made, and I wrap a blanket around her before cuddling her close to my chest. Pulling the pacifier from her mouth, I replace it with the bottle before she can start to cry.

As she eats, I look around the camp, mentally making myself a list of things to do while the others are asleep. My bag is sitting outside of the tent, meaning that someone must have moved it to have some more room in the tent. I can get started on washing my own clothes and Viola's as well.

We have a small bag of her dirty cloth diaper inserts that need to be cleaned, but we haven't had the chance over the last day or two. The disposable ones are my favorite, but seeing as we can't rely on always having them, Finn had whipped up some makeshift ones. Though, I have to say they are working pretty good so far.

As Viola finishes her bottle, I raise her to my shoulder, patting her back until she lets out an impressive burp. With her in one arm, I grab our bags with my empty hand, lugging them down to the creek bed. Even though the shore of the creek is lined with rocks, they are small enough where the ground is soft, almost like sand.

Viola is happy enough when I lay down a towel on the ground before putting her on her back, a tiny plush elephant sitting next to her. She is just now starting to become more aware of her surroundings, waving her arms around and kicking her legs. She has taken a liking to the small plush elephant that Jacob mysteriously had in his pack. We hadn't questioned him, though, when he pulled it out, mostly because Viola loved it the instant she saw it.

So, once I have two baby blankets placed on top of her and her hat in place on her head, I start unpacking all of the dirty clothes. Laundry has always been my least favorite chore to do, mostly because my old apartment didn't have a washer and dryer, so once a week I had to haul all of my dirty laundry down to the Laundromat, which was four blocks away.

Starting with Viola's things, I work through all the clothes as quickly as I can, not allowing myself to take a break until everything is clean and hanging to dry on the clothes line.

By the time I finally look up, I see that the sun is much higher in the sky, but it is still pretty chilly out. Looking back at Viola, I see that Harry had joined her sometime during my clothes washing, and she has moved to pulling at his ears and letting out little gurgles.

Something catches my eye when I look back at the creek. Curious, I walk over to the contraption, and it takes me a minute to piece together what it is. It looks to be like some type of fish net, and there are already a couple of sizeable fish entangled. They are still alive, though, enough room in the net for them to keep swimming.

Now I know what Jacob had been fiddling with when we first made camp here. He and Danny seem to be pretty equipped for everything outdoors. I know they had owned a hardware shop, so I assume they are pretty good with there hands, and they knew what all the outside equipment the owners of the last house we had stayed in had stored away in their shed.

Without them, we probably would be sleeping on the ground, no tent and only a sleeping bag to protect us against the elements. It is a good thing we ran into them when we did.

Leaving the fish in the net- mainly because I don't want to have to deal with gutting and cleaning them- I make my way back to Viola and Harry. Viola gives me a wobbly smile, something that she has just started doing, and I don't hesitate to pick her up. Harry follows behind me as I make my way over to the camp.

We sit there for a while, while I heat up a kettle of water, some for coffee and the rest to use to give Viola a quick bath. She hasn't had one in a while, and with her being so vulnerable, I want to keep her as clean as possible.

While waiting for the water to boil, I see that someone had left a small hand held radio out on the log. My eyebrows raise incredulously as I bring it closer to me, fiddling with the dials to see if it works.

And work it does. A surprised laugh makes its way out of my mouth as I turn the tuning knob, trying to find any working station. There seems to be only static for a while, but just when I am about to give up hope, a scrambled voice comes through. Carefully, I tune the device, not stopping until the voice is coming out as clear as it can.

"-trust them. They are not right; some thing is wrong with these people. Scientists and doctors who gave up their code of ethics, claiming to be trying to find a cure. We escaped, but they are coming for us, I can hear them in the night, but the others say I am crazy. But they are coming, I know they are coming."

The voice stops after that, and heavy breathing just comes over the line.

"Alden?" someone says from behind me, and after hearing that eerie message, the suddenness of their voice scares the shit out of me.

Looking up, I see Finn standing behind me, a concerned look on his face. He steps over the log, sitting down next to me.

"Did you hear that?" I ask him, waving the radio still in my hand. "Please tell me I am not the only one who heard that."

"No, you weren't the only one," he says, wrapping an arm around me and pulling me closer.

"Should we be concerned?" I question, despite my already growing worry.

"I don't know," Finn says with a grimace. It looks like it hurt for him to say that phrase, and I can understand why.

"The person said that people- bad people- were looking for them. And if the radio was able to pick up the frequency, then they have to be relatively close."

"That doesn't necessarily mean that they will harm us," Finn says, but the pinched look on his face tells me that even he doesn't believe that. "They could just leave us alone since they aren't looking for us, or they may not even find us."

"I don't know, Finn," I murmur, looking down at a smiling Viola, "something about this just doesn't seem right."

"Well, what-"

A scream rips through the air, cutting off his next words. Both of us freeze, looking at each other with wide eyes. The scream came from a distance, but so close after hearing that message over the radio, I know the two things can't be a coincidence.

Looks like another shit storm is coming and heading directly towards us.