Loving Ashlynn (#Wattys2016)

Prologue - Faith POV

Samson Conrad has lived his life closed off since the death of his twin, until her.

17 year old Faith Ashlynn has lived her whole life locked away, will she ever find her place in this new world when everything is unknown? After her release, will she be able to trust anyone, possibly Samson Conrad?

Prologue - Faith POV

Two months, all of May and all of June. Truly that was the longest I had ever gone without seeing Dmitri in my whole life, although maybe that was to be expected because I had long figured out that the older I got, the less dependent on him I was and the more frequent his trips became. Though, now I could tell something was wrong, two months, with very limited supplies? Dmitri would have made an appearance a month ago.

I'd never had to ration food for three days over that of nearly nine.

Sighing, I walked to the window overlooking the forest around me, my mind drifting... the age-old question of what was beyond those trees?

Beyond the mountains?

Had things calmed?

Had the war finished?

I had been inside my whole life, never setting a foot outside in the poisonous air that killed many. I wondered how different things had become since many of the videos that donned the living room? I knew that progress had been made, the proof in the selection of videos that Dmitri brought along with supplies when he came.

Restless, I left the window, pacing in the kitchen, wondering if any danger had come to Dmitri? Of course it has, he would never have stayed away, he must be in peril, a small part of myself admitted.

Had someone witnessed him leaving our safe place and taken him from me?

It was already the third of July, my birthday, and in the previous sixteen years he had never missed a single one, always bringing me a new batch of things, books to read, records to play, movies to watch, new special treats. Yet today on my seventeenth, he had yet to make an entrance.

With no way to reach him, I pushed the negative thoughts from my mind, despite my greatest fear coming true, being truly alone in the world. Fading away in my safe place, taking my last breath alone and forgotten, an empty existence in this new dangerous world. My heart ached with sadness, I would never get to visit the many places I had read in my stories, never using the lessons Dmitri brought for me to study, to feel the sun on my face outside of my glass walls.

Although I guess I wouldn't get to feel the heat on my bare skin, no one could survive that way anymore, without a protective suit, a mask and tank with clean breathable air. All my life Dmitri had searched for one for me, never being quite so lucky, to my greatest disappointment. Other children, like myself had to wait until they had reached the right size, to put on the nearly one size fit all overall. But I had grown, his next visit, the one that should have been many days before, I would've been able to use his suit if just for a moment had he not found one for me.