Justin had sat up slowly, rubbing his eyes with his hands before swinging his feet down onto the ground, shoulders slumped forward. His eyes closed again, allowing the exhaust to swallow him once more before he heard Cam tell him she was ready. 

"Of course you are." He mumbled, eyes slowly opening, rising to his feet with a groan. 
"I think..." He yawned widely before continuing:
"I think the past couple of days are just now getting to me. Sorry if I won't be much of a conversation partner today. I'm just...wiped. So. Wiped." He rubbed his eyes again, much harder. Another groan as he shuffled to the doorway, looking down to find two duffel bags. He knelt down, laughing to himself as he pulled out a fresh change of clothes. 
"Bless their hearts..." He mumbled, slipping on a dark red t-shirt and loose fitting cargo pants with enough pockets to store half of the United States in. Other than a couple of outfits packed, there was dried food, a water filter, a canteen of water filled and two boxes of pistol ammunition each. Two modified pistols, one per bag, were also included. 
"Like what they packed you?" Jes stood across the hallway, her impressive physique looming in the doorway opposite. 
"Yeah...yeah, this'll do."
"It was just a few of them, the ones that lost family out there. They really appreciated what we did and wanted to send you both off the right way." Jes walked to within about a foot of Justin as he stood up, the squad commander eyeing him with an emotion that Justin couldn't necessarily identify. 
"We don't have many of us left. Come back in one piece." 
"No promises." Jes shook her head.
"You WILL come back in one piece. That's an order." She leaned forward slightly, looming for a moment before turning around, walking back into her room, a sigh echoing across the hall.

_________________________________________

It wasn't hard to trace their steps back up through the territory they had traversed earlier, making it back to the spot on the freeway where they had diverged into the clearing a few days ago. The body that had once been fresh had decomposed, sending out the stench of death from almost a quarter of a mile away. Once they cleared the body, Justin consulted the map they had originally used to reach this spot, grimacing a bit.
"We're going to have to go through Hartford. That was a major population center before this happened...I haven't had very positive experiences with places like that, but it's either that or go through savage territory again." He stepped forward a couple of paces and stopped, looking down the remnants of the freeway and blowing out a sigh.
"Take a look at this." There were rusting hunks of metal that served as obstacles on the road, but what Justin was more concerned about was the overturned tanker trailer a few hundred yards off.
"Those things are normally used to mark boundary lines. See the markings on the outside?" There were symbols barely visible painted in dark and crimson shades of red. 
"Anything that large and immovable gets used as a marker by raiders or groups that don't want others crossing into their territory." He looked to Cam. 
"Get your gun ready. I've got a feeling savages won't be the only group we'll be worrying about today."