The jeep bounced along on the pothole filled road on a dark cool night. He was sitting in the passenger side of the vehicle with Bart driving, Sam riding shotgun, and Dr. Greene sitting to the left of him. Looking into the sky, he wondered how he could remember what the Big Dipper was, but could not recall even the slightest detail of his own life. The only sounds he heard were the powerful engines of the convoy of Jeeps, SUVs, and Trucks as they battled across the severely damaged highways. He thought back to this morning when he was woken up a second time to discover he was still alive. Thoughts flooded his mind, and the biggest and most generalizing one was 'Why?'

Matt's voice broke the silence in vehicle in a startling fashion "So, I was thinking that you need a name."

"I know I have a name, I just don't remember what it is," was all that the amnesiac could say.

"Exactly why your name should be 'Enos'. It means forgetful," the doctor stated while smiling at him, "And once you remember what your real name is, Enos will lose it's meaning anyway and will be no longer fitting. I think it suits you."

"It's certainly better than, 'Hey, you,'" Sam added without even looking toward the back seat.

He reasoned that at least would no longer be the man with no name, "Ok. That sounds fine."

"So, Enos, " Matt began, "Why did I find you dehydrated and nearly burned to death that day?"

"There was a fire and I survived, " Enos' voice felt his voice crack a little, but it felt good to talk, "After I woke up, I didn't remember anything before the flames. So...I walked and looked for anything I could find. The only thing I remembered was to "Walk in the light", which I thought meant to walk toward the sun, so I would have more daylight, I guess. That's why I was heading west. Where are we going now?"

Bart spoke up from the front, "West. Tha same way you're headin', I figure. Cept now, you ain't likely much to die from no dehydratin'. Ya can bet it'll be a bullet 'stead. Them gang-bangers gittin' worse 'nuff can't no one barely go outside at nighttime. We ah least still got these here trucks till the gas runs dry."

"Why did everything get so bad? I'm really confused, " Enos asked innocently.

The car fell awkwardly silent. The only sounds going on were the murmurs of voices from nearby vehicles intermingled with roars of large engines. The jeep then hit a particularly deep pot-hole, jostling everyone in the vehicle around, after which Sam leaned back in her seat.

"The war, Enos. That is why everything is so bad. 10 years ago a small skirmish in international waters, which seemed to be more of a misunderstanding than anything, exploded into a full fleged war between the United States and China. At first it was retaliatory strikes, but due to these strikes fuel supplies became a concern for China, and they started making strikes against other countries to secure resources. The United States responded first by trying to stop China, but realized they would need resources as well. That started the biggest land and resource grab ever seen. At that point all other countries in the world began to unite to stop both countries from attacking. After nearly 9 years of struggle and war, both China and America never had a battle on one another respective soils. Only enough, they both decided to open up a land battle against the other and to open up each other's coasts they used some nuclear weaponry. That's the day the war got real for North America. Of 30 nuclear weapons fired, 3 landed. Two in the US on the west coast, 1 on the eastern coast of China, closest to Japan. Troops stormed in on both sides, coast air defense sites were knocked out and the war was the heaviest ever seen. Then, 8 months ago both nations threw everything that they had at one another, and so did the rest of the world. It became a nearly total Nuclear free for all. As far as we know, no nations are left, and total population of the world has fallen by 50% since the beginning of the world at least. And now, we're just struggling to survive. The horrors that we've seen are no match for those we will eventually experience."

After the long story, Enos solemnly added, "I guess then it's a blessing to be forgetful right now."