He soon found his city an even less safe place than he remembered. The blue were EVERYWHERE. He tried hanging in the subway. No dice. Two different bus stations. Cops. Even his old neighborhood alleyways that were ALWAYS clean were crawling with police. But it was in that alleyway off Mockingbird that he heard something that set his heart to racing, and nowhere near in a good way.

"Ay Wolf!" 

He whipped around to see his old buddy Ritz strolling towards him, smiling wide as the chapel doors. Noah laughed and ran to him, nearly knocking the man down with a massive bear hug.

"Fuckin' shit, Ritz! How are you bud?!"

"I'm makin' it, brother, I'm makin' it! Ain't seen you on this side of town in a hot minute. What you been gettin' into?"

"Shit, I've been in the east end under the Red Line. Had some nice digs over that way but I ran into trouble. 3 years I've been there, and I never talked to not one cop. Two nights ago there's three, under the bridge at my place! So I tossed 'em cold and split, but I can't find no kinda place that ain't fuzzy here. What the hell is all that?"

"Tell the truth, I've been thinkin' of ya lately. Couple whack jobs are on the run, blowin' shit up. Cops are everywhere lookin' for 'em, trouble is each place that goes up don't leave no clues as to who or how. Got me thinkin' that maybe...maybe it's some cats like you, Wolf. Doin' shit folks ain't supposed to be able to do, ya know."

"Fuckin' hell..." Noah sat down in the alleyway utterly dumbfounded. Maybe Ritz was right, maybe he wasn't. But the idea had never occurred to him. That there were others. "...damn. Maybe...listen, Ritz, I gotta blow. It was good seein' ya, but if there's a manhunt goin' on I better skip out too. Maybe catch up with these cats and check what they're about."

"Shit, yeah you better go. Keep a tight head, brother. And keep a bullet out of it." 

They shook hands and parted ways, maybe for good.

So here was Noah, hitchhiking out of town. Two drivers had picked him up and he was getting practically nowhere. So he had the last one drop him at a service station where he promptly boosted an old ratty Lincoln. 

Finally making some distance, he was about to doze off at the wheel before he heard an explosion.

"The hell? More explo...SHIT." [i]That's GOTTA be them.[/i]

He just barely saw an old dirt road in time to tear off the pavement (rather loudly and jarringly) and follow it for a spell. He was gonna check these bastards out, for better or for worse.