Ghosts

Chapter 2

The next day

The soldier stared out the train window, watching as the scenery passed by within the blink of an eye. It had been quite some time since he had been in space quite this small with so many people. He had grown so accustomed to the open land and space of their home in Hope County, that anything outside of that life seemed...off. Not that there was a home to return to - something the Highwaymen had made sure of. No home and no wife. His head hung low, disparaging himself for being so naive as to leave the little lamb by herself. He had no doubt that she could protect herself, in fact, he trusted her more than anyone to protect their family should harm come to them.

The day Mai was taken however, it was like a light switch got turned off in the lamb's head. Her fire had gone out, and in the following months, was susceptible to dark thoughts and actions. The day he left he knew he was making a mistake, but they need to find their daughter overrode any other responsibility. The day he returned to a burnt-down house and a missing wife, he wasn't even sure if he could go on. The lamb had been his constant long before the bombs went off, even after their ten-year separation. She gave him his daughter who gave him a new spark of life that his aging soul needed. Though now he was reunited with Mai, at the time, standing before the remains of their home with the knowledge that he had lost both of them, he was afraid he'd have no willpower to go on. No certainty about the future.

No certainty but the ever-looming fact that Joseph was right. About everything.

Despite Mai's sightings, and Nayeli's belief, he had yet to truly accept for himself that his younger brother was still alive. He had mourned for his brothers following the Collapse, despite what each of them had done. He accepted that they, himself included were monsters. But he could not deny that he did not still love them to some capacity. That was not to say that he would not put Joseph in the ground himself for trying to hurt Mai, or for the pain, Nayeli endured when she was isolated with Joseph himself for five years.

Jacob peaked to a few rows behind him, catching a glimpse of the girl that brought him here in the first place. Mai had been staring out the same window for hours following the news that her mother was MIA. While he was relieved to have her back in his life again, he felt pained at the sight of her. She had grown considerably; she had the face of her mother, but the stature of her father. What really struck him though, was the look in her eyes; he had seen that look in many a soldier during his times in the VA offices that bounced him about. This was the look of a child exposed to the horrors of an unknown war. The look of someone with blood on their hands.

"We're limited on variety but I figured you for a whiskey type."

A voice snapped Jacob's attention away from his daughter; he was greeted by the sight of Mai's companion, Thomas Rush. He held his hand out, holding a glass out to him. The path that led the older soldier to Rush's convoy was purely out of the need to find his daughter - but also in hopes that Rush and his people may give the people of Prosperity and Hope County a chance to stand against the Highwaymen now that Nayeli was...well.

"Accurate assumption." Jacob replied, taking the glass into his possession, thanking him in the process.

The Rush fellow took a seat in the chair opposite of Jacob, taking a sip of his glass as he glanced passively in Mai's direction.

"You and your wife raised an amazing daughter. Never met anyone like her in my life. Determined, disciplined. Amazingly selfless." Rush commented, "I assume she gets that from your military background."

"She gets all that from her mother." Jacob smirked before taking a swig, "All she got from me was stubbornness."

Jacob's eye drifted to what appeared to be beads dangling from Rush's coat: M-I-L-A. He took another taste of his drink before continuing.