The last thing that Logan remembered of home, was how it had crumbled like day old bread in the hands of a god. The air was filled with smoke from thousands of fires, dirt and dust and the acrid sweetness of burning flesh. How the sky had flashed a brilliant white, how the ground had heaved beneath their feet, buckled, and began to fall away into the valley below.

Logan had remembered how it felt as though God were throwing darts at Los Angeles, peppering the entire coastline with white hot bolts of light straight from heaven. That feeling of betrayal seemed a theme destined to play out for the rest of their lives. It had seemed fitting that their former lives had ended with training and ghost stories. Now, their days were filled with nothing but.

The first few months had been a haze of terror and rage. Hesh had watched as Logan focused on nothing but the war. Words left, as did any sign of the person Logan once was. It seemed buried under a mask of dirt, blood and a black bandanna. The only communication seemed in the form of radio clicks and sign language. Hesh thought it a result of the tanker explosion that had knocked Logan back when they were escaping Los Angeles. But the silence seemed deeper than a mere physical injury.

Years had passed, and both Elias and Hesh had almost forgotten what Logan's voice even sounded like. Hesh did all the talking now, not that he didn't always. Logan had always seemed content to follow rather than lead. It had been this way since Logan was a baby. Hesh always took the lead, no matter what they did.

After a decade, their relationship had not changed. The only difference was their father's training. Before the attack, Elias had shown his children just a taste of his special forces training. Now, he immersed them in it until they could recite it chapter and verse. Elias had trained the two in every martial style, every weapon, every tactic until it was as natural to them as breathing.

Logan woke with a groan, the rhythmic sound of Hesh bouncing a tennis ball off of the floor and wall to amuse Riley echoing through the halls. Command wanted them to do a sweep of the wall around Fort Santa Monica in the wake of Dallas' fall.

The loss of an entire city had become old hat to the two. Houston had disappeared in the same cloud of dust and fire Los Angeles had and those who had survived moved north toward San Antonio. Less than five years later, it too lay in ruin. Austin had fallen shortly after and Dallas was the last nail in the coffin for the once proud state of Texas.

Washington had appealed to the U.N. for help, but the Federation had every member nation by the balls. All were forced to dance to it's tune, or their entire economy would collapse when the Federation pulled their oil shipments. The U.N. could pass as many resolutions and issue as many condemnations as they liked, none of them meant a thing. The United States was on their own, though the war wasn't over yet, not by a long shot. A bruised and badly beaten nation had fought a superior force to a standstill.

Like the slip gauges on either side of the San Andres fault, trilling an alarm when all motion stops. Logan could feel it as they gathered their gear and followed Riley out of the building. Something had to give.