Author: To be honest, I have had this chapter written for a very, very long time. It, is unedited, my beta is again, in Iceland. I will try to keep up with updates from now on, for I honestly have nothing to do.

Warnings: Unedited (I will try to look at it it the next couple of days)and bad southern accents (I have only encountered true Southerners in a Walmart in North Carolina).

Enjoy!

Glittering diamonds decorated the black desert sky, creating a beacon that spread for miles. People from all corners of country come to view the spectacle. Another light joined the diamonds, an eerie red glow swallowed them whole, leaving nothing but smoldering remains.

Screams and the wail of a fire engine pierced the night air as the glow consumed the desert city. The city had burned so quickly, any help to stop the raging flames now futile. People that had made it away from the city watched as their homes were consumed by the fire.

A girl clung to her mother's leg, tears streaming down her face as her heart broke in two. Her mother embraced her, trying to protected her child from the terrible scene. Her own heart, like so many others, filled with the need to know why. Who could have done such a thing.

A gunshot rang through the night and the already panicked people scattered, searching for the source of the shot.

Smoke ghosted from the barrel of the pistol, steel glinting in the light of the moon. The wielder of the gun was nothing but a black splotch against the night sky. His gun aimed trained between a pairs of red eyes accompanied with a snarling face. His target ran a bloody hand through his sandy blonde hair, slicking back all of it except for four strands in front of his face. His other arm limp at his side, rendered useless by his attackers' first shot.

The clocked figure cocked the gun again and his grinned at the downed man. The other man's eyes widened, his whole body stiffening.

"Why?"

The gunman looked at his target, it appeared that his target had one last request.

"You are no longer of any use to us, you father came when we captured you older brother. Now you have to be terminated." The injured man stared at him, disbelief crossed his tan skin as his bullet wound kept pumping blood. His face started to relax as his body started to stump, a smile crossed his face.

The smile faded from the gunman's lips, his victim was begin to gather the courage to die without regrets. He wasn't about to let that happen.

He'd have to make it fast though, "I'll make sure I show your brothers your corpse before I kill them."

He fired the moment he saw the delicious look of shock cross his victims face. A neat hole appeared between the blond man's eyes, forever sealing that look on his face. He walked over to the dead man, placing a piece of paper on top of the man's chest, right over his heart. He dipped his fingers into the pool of blood forming, drawing an X on the paper.

He then stood up, walking off towards the moon. He looked back at his handy work. Imprinting in his brain how the scene looked, just so he could describe it when he was finishing off his other targets.

Las Vegas burned in the back ground, fires lighting up the motionless body of Nevada. Storm clouds rolled in as if to save the city from its demise. But they were far too late.

Colorado jolted awake, a warm stickiness dripping down the left side of his face as he glanced around. The silver walls and the rope around his limbs gave him a grim reminder of where he was. His flexed his hands, seeing if he could slip his fingers underneath the rope. Not that would do him any good since he was surrounded by his kidnappers in a moving van. He would have been listening to their conversations if they were having any. They were eerily silent as they drove on.

He wasn't going to be doing much of anything anytime soon, Colorado closed his eyed again.

A bleach white grin occupied his mind, he thought harder about the face it belonged too. His big brother Nevada. He'd always been the strange one, taking money way father then he had to, gambling and cheating were his only strong points. Nevada had even bet his own siblings on more than one, Colorado can recount more than two times in the past month that people had come to his door to collected their "dues". Luckily Utah was with him or else their might have been trouble. This had happened an uncountable number of times in the past century, to Colorado's luck the only time these people came knocking on his door were when one of his brothers were around. Texas being the most persuasive of them all, the gun toting Texan was good for some things.

Despite all this he would never wish any harm on Nevada, let alone have a dream about him being killed, it didn't add up. He ran through the dream in his head, Las Vegas burning in the background, the gun pointed at, Nevada's head, the finger pulling the trigger.

BANG!

The van wobbled as a van does with only three ties, it got the humans talking again.

"What was that?"

"I don't know, but keeping your eyes on the road!"

Colorado glanced at them, the blood had finally reached his eyes.

POP!

Another tire blew-out and the van started to skid, the remaining tires skreeched as the driver slammed on the breaks. Tires burning, the van flew of the road and into a ditch, throwing its passengers into a crumpled heap. Colorado struggled to free himself from the heap as he heard the van doors swing open. Before he could look back two hands grasped his shoulders and pulled him out onto the ground. He blinked, tiring to clear some of the blood from his eyes, it seemed hopeless for more just dripped in. A hand reached down and wiped his face, clearing his eyes long enough to see the stranger.

"Arizona!" Colorado cried out, " I knew you'd come!" Arizona just smiled at him as he undid Colorado's hands, pulling the shorter state to his feet just as the first man appeared in the van door.

"Now where do you think you're going young man?" He reached for Colorado only to have his hand slapped away by Arizona.

"I'm going home old man, and I'd rather it be with my brother," Arizona spat, positioning himself between the man and Colorado. The other man growled at him, hoping out of the van. Arizona readied himself to jump at the man, over a hundred years of brawling with New Mexico had taught him a thing or two. The man stepped closer to the Arizona's prone form, Arizona tensed, a second away from attacking. And he would have to if it weren't for a gentle hand on his shoulder.

Colorado looked up at him, shaking his head. Arizona stared at Colorado before stepping aside, wordlessly understanding what was being demanded. Colorado looked at the waiting man in front of him, smiling at him as best he could with blood covering his head.

The sight earned him a laugh from the other, Arizona starting to get nervous again as the man advanced towards his injured sibling.

The man started to taunt Colorado, "Aw, you think you can beat me all by yourself. Why, I bet you wouldn't even la . ." He never got the chance to finish for Colorado punched him directly in the face. The sickening crack that followed reminded Arizona just how the elder four corner state had survived with Texas as a older brother.

The man crumpled to the ground, Colorado retracted his fist. He gave one last triumphant smile before, falling to his knees. Arizona appeared at his side, gently picking the other state up.

"What do we do now?" Arizona asked his brother.

The centennial state looked up at him, worry crossed his features, "We have to go get Utah and New Mexico. Then we go call Mom."

A certain Frenchman crept stealthy through the night, if you counted stealthy as flirting with every women who crossed your path and also the fact that it in fact dawn, not night time. France had always had a certain idea about him that every single thing that walking and breathed was okay to hit on. But once every few centuries he actually does settle down long enough to get to know a person, maybe even maintain a relationship with them beyond sex.

This century it was England whom he was stalking, he had actually taken a liking to the island nation. He had maintained a relationship before with him (a.k.a Forced marriage) before and defiantly was interested in another.

He blew a kiss at a passing women who, in return, scoffed at him and stomped away. He waltzed right up the street, straight into the hotel where England was staying. And, by some odd twist of government power, he was too. He waved at the hostess manning the lobby, a dark blush appeared on her checks before she occupied herself with sorting already sorted keys. After last night's "activities" with her he had gotten the key to England's room.

"Oh, the things I do for love." he pressed his palm against his head in a dramatic fashion, getting glares from the occupants of the elevator he was currently in. Each and every one of them were taking in huge whiffs of the perfume/cologne he was wearing and each and every one of them asked god why their floor wasn't closer to the ground. Or even in the next hotel down the street. Unfortunately for them England's room was on the 50th floor.

Alabama was already scoffing down his twentieth beer before he picked up his shot gun. Pig huttn' was serious business and serious business requires serious concentration and serious concentration requires being drunk out of his mind. At least, that's how he viewed it, Georgia however, did not.

"Alabama! Put that gun down, we ain't shootn' drunk!" His brown-haired sister glared at him, promptly fixing him with one of her glares. He took another swig of beer.

"Mississippi! Stop fishn' and help me gut some of this hog." Mississippi looked up, his straw hat falling into place on his head from its previous position. Pushing back some of his dirty blond hair he hesitantly stuck his fishing pole into a pre-dug hole and headed towards his two siblings.

Alabama turned his head away from Mississippi, glancing down at his shotgun and then to his cooler of beer. In the next few seconds he realized he had to come to a choice: Beer or Shotgun. Suddenly two hands pinched his sides, making him shriek as Mississippi curled his arm around his waist. Throwing Alabama's shotgun away he led Alabama to a fold-up chair, guiding Alabama's free hand to his cooler before turning away. Alabama growled at him as he left before turning his attention toward hsi beer.

She handed him a knife before they went to work gutting the 1,000 pound wild hog they had killed, or rather, Alabama had killed when he was sober. Mississippi wasn't the best shot in his extremely large family nor was he the worst. He was somewhere in-between, which was just the way he liked it when it came to these things. He brought the knife down into the pig, cutting a T shape into his side of the pig. Georgia herself was busy cutting away at the thigh of the pig, not the best place to start but it was her favorite part of meat on a pig.

Georgia herself had been the best shot in the family up until a hundred year ago. A competition between all the states had Texas shooting a hole right through a sandwich that his brother Nevada was about to eat from over three-hundred yards away. While Texas had earned the rank of top shot, Nevada was not impressed.

Needless to say, she was one tough cookie.

Glancing down she scooped up Mississippi's hat, earning a grunt from him before placing it on her own head. She smiled down at him as his expression changed from passive to somewhat passive. Satisfied she took the straw hat off again, almost giving it back to Mississippi before tossing it to Alabama. Not prepared for the sudden intrusion and very drunk he spilled what was left of his beer onto his shirt. Even Mississippi laughed as Alabama gapped as them in disgust.

Turning her head back to resume her work, Georgia noticed something in the woods. Her body tensed as she realized it was a man. Turning back to the pig she pretended to cut another slice.

"Mississippi." He looked up. " Get me mah shotgun." Although Mississippi was among the top ten tallest and strongest states he knew better then to question his older sister.

She glanced down at him," Do it like your gettin' ah beer." Slowly he stopped what he was doing, steeping back and waking over to Alabama. Reaching down to the cooler he brushed his fingers over the firearm lying on the seat next to his brother. Alabama however, thought Mississippi was reaching for the cooler and weakly placed his hand on Mississippi's shoulder. In one fluid motion Mississippi had him slung over his shoulder and the shotgun in his hand. Mississippi carried him over to where the hog laid, setting him down before handing the gun up to Georgia.

Georgia nodded her over towards the woods. Where, instead of one man, three now stood. Mississippi stepped in front of Alabama, intend on shielding the incapacitated state from whoever else was in the woods.

"Aren't yah glad I wear ah bullet proof vest?" he joked, only the Mellow Mississippi had the nerve to lighten the mood.

"Weird time to be making jokes, especially since you only wear half of one." Georgia said, handing his handgun to him.

Both of them clicked the safety off as the men drew near, the spark of a taser appeared amongst them.

By the river, a forgotten fishing pole finally hooked a bit.

TBC

Is Nevada really dead? What happened to New Jeresy and the others?

All that and more in, THE NEXT TIME I UPDATE!