"Bartertown" (closed)

[ToniTaylor]

Deleted. We aren't writing this anymore.

 

[ManInTheLoft]

(OOC: I still haven't found an image for Richard that I am happy with. Soon.)


Richard Reid flipped the Harley's switch to off and listened to the diminishing echo of the 1200cc motor off the mining pit walls. Soon, all he could hear was the wind, a few birds, and Claire's boots crunching across the gravel between him and the drop off before her.

"Watch your step," he warned playfully as he dismounted. He shed his leather jacket and chaps. "There's a pretty nasty drop off right there in front of you."

To Claire's comment about the location not being much, he responded, "Probably why no one's ever considered coming up to live here. Nothing but rock and water.
By the way, Nurse Nancy tested the water yesterday."

He smiled at his description of Nancy Keen. She was in fact a nurse. But Richard called her that because their group of 22, which was 2/3s female, included three Nancys. Three! Hell, Richard doubted he'd ever met three Nancys (or was it Nancies?) in all of his life. He continued about the pond on the far side of the pit, "Believe it or not, its practically pristine. No toxins, no separation chemicals from the mining process. I think it's like we thought, they were just taking gravel out of here, not ore that had to be chemically separated."

Richard was looking around the pit as was Claire as she looked back and asked, "Will you remind why we chose this place?"

"Safety," he answered in one word. He could see that wasn't enough for Claire, so he clarified, "We can block off the entrance. Put two, maybe three guys on the rim. Guys and gals, I mean."

He smiled at Claire's reaction. The pandemic and the near extinction of the human race had had a result few had considered. Women had been pressured (and even forced against their will at times) back into the one role they could fill that men couldn't, that of child bearer.

Richard wasn't of that frame of mind himself. His grandparents and parents both had been liberals. They'd taught him a woman should be allowed to do (or at least try to do) anything a man could. Progressively during his life, he'd seen women losing many of the gains they'd made over the decades. When Claire came to him with her her plan to escape the CDC location in Texas and liberate the females from the new role being forced upon him, Richard's response had been, "What can I do to help?"

"A couple of guards on the entrance, maybe one or two at certain times down above the switchbacks with rifles," he continued talking about security. "I don't think we can find a safer place to hole up."

"Tell me about what's on the other side of the rim again?"

"The other six of the Seven Sisters buttes are over there," Richard said as he swept his extended finger to the west and northwest. "They're all steep, just like the Seventh Sister. That's where we are, the Seventh Sister, 'cause its the last one in the chain, you know, from northwest to southeast, I mean. Bedrock, gravel, loose ground. Some vegetation. It's all pretty barren and scary even."

He pointed directly past her to the north, then to the east. Richard said, "Nothing over there but drop offs. Five hundred feet, thousand feet. More actually in places."

"So, no one's coming up that way then?" she asked. "There's no threat there. All we have to worry about is this."

Richard followed his sometimes-sometimes-not lover's gaze. "I guess if you're a rock climber and really wanted to, and if you had the climbing equipment, you could come up over the rim. But why? Like I said, there's nothing here."

"We're gonna have to build, you know."

Claire talked about the need for housing and other structures. She asked about the shipping containers he'd pointed out to her earlier in the day. He spoke about the sizes of the containers and vehicles in question. "I think we can get what we need running. If not, we'll figure something out."

Robert and some of the other mechanically inclined personnel had looked at the machinery earlier, before he and Claire came up here. It had been decades since most if not all of them had had their engines fired up. But Claire's little cohort luckily had some talented people in their number.

"Well put two containers side by side in the gap," he explained, gesturing to where the cliffs on either side of the road rose. "We'll fill in the space on either side with stone, making going through the containers the only way in or out. Then, we'll put one crosswise, on the outside end as an upper wall."

Not realizing that she was already thinking it, Richard said, "It'll be just like a castle from the knights in shining armor days. We can even put, what did they call'em, arrow slits? You know, for our guards to look out and, if necessary, shoot through without being easily shot themselves. "It'll all be very secure, trust me.

He looked down over the side of the hill. The road had two switchbacks below them, which was fortunate. It meant that anyone wanting to come up the mountain would be directly below them for the entire trek. No one could reach the entry to the pit without being watched for several minutes. Even a fast moving vehicle would take long enough for his people to put plenty of bullets into the engine blocks or tires, stopping them.

"It's gonna be a lot of work," Richard told Claire. He gestured to the mining company's lot near town. "But I think we have to bring up as many of those containers as we can."

He looked around them at the plateau that lay all about them on this side of the manmade crater. It had been leveled decades ago for structures the company had had here. Richard guessed it at maybe the size of two football fields. What was that, maybe 100,000 square feet? Little over 2 acres.

Considering there were only 22 of them now, that was a lot of room. However, Richard knew that Claire had big goals for the future. They'd sat together and discussed her ideas many a night. Sometimes, he thought she was a bit crazy.
Other times, he thought she was a genius.

"I have to tell you, Doc," he said, reminding himself of what her profession was. "I think this can work. I do. It's secure. It's plenty large. There's water and room to grow crops. Of course, we have to get seed and stuff to do that. But I think--"

He stopped short at the screech of a hawk overhead. He watched the bird pass over, looked to Claire and continued. "We've been through a lot over the past few weeks. Your Cohort is exhausted and spent and ready to settle down. I think this is the place."

Robert headed for the Harley and threw his leg over. He righted it and pulled back the kick stand. Smiling, he said, "Shall we go tell the others?"

 

[ToniTaylor]

"Safety," was Richard's response to Claire's question about why they'd selected this odd location to build a new home for themselves. He repeated some details and offered more, not that it was necessary as she'd already come to the conclusion that this was their best hope for not just surviving but thriving. Regarding her question about how they were going to get what they needed all the way up here from Rockville, Richard reassured her, "I think we can get what we need running. If not, we'll figure something out."

Claire trusted Robert and his confidence. If she hadn't, she would never have told him about the planned escape from the CDC facility at which they worked in a remote, rural location in West Central Texas. Claire had begun working at the classified location just shortly after the pandemic that had nearly eradicated the Human Race, and after a decade she had become the program's Chief Epidemiologist.

She reflected sometimes on whether she'd earned that position on her merits ... or because the doctors, scientists, and researchers more senior to her had all died because they weren't what she was, an Immune. In fact, after that decade of research, Claire had been the last original medical professional at the facility. A handful of doctors and others who'd discovered they also were Immunes had been brought in over the years from other locations, but in the end most of the staff at the facility had originally come there as patients, security personnel, or administration staff. Claire had had to teach them to what they needed to know to continue the program's research.

(OOC: I'm not done yet but I have to leave where I am currently feeding off a wifi hotspot. You can feel free to post for your other character is you are online or you can wait for me to finish Claire's post.

 

[ToniTaylor]

(OOC: Continuing my reply above.)

"Shall we go tell the others?" Richard asked, returning to the Harley.

Claire smiled as the motorcycle's powerful engine fired up. She'd never in her life been on a motorcycle until their flight from the CDC facility in Texas, and although it had scared the crap out of her the first time she climbed aboard behind Richard, Claire was finding it less frightening and even exciting as time went on.

To be totally honest, Claire found riding the Harley exciting ... physically. The vibration of the big engine up into her vulva and clitoris often pleasured Claire so deeply that she feared she might orgasm wrapped around Richard's backside.

Claire donned a pair of polarized goggles for the ride down the mountain, foregoing the helmet that remained strapped to the cycle, as did Richard. She studied the valley over her left shoulder, then the right after they took a hard turn at the switchback. She would repeat the turn of her head at the second 180 turn as well, this time shifting her attention to the little town below them.

When they'd first reached Rockville, they thought it was entirely abandoned. Most of her Cohort, as Claire liked to call the group, had remained outside the town as Richard's armed personnel entered and scouted. He'd signaled it safe, and the others had met the Security Force at the Rockville Boarding House. It seemed like a safe enough place to spend a night or two...

(OOC: Hop in here, MITL, as we discussed.)

 

[ManInTheLoft]

(OOC -- still in the flashback you started above.)

Richard and his 7 member security squad had split into pairs and spent two hours carefully scouting Rockville. They looked through every window, checked every door, entered still-standing buildings; they found no signs that indicated anyone had been in Rockville for some time, possibly years.

The town that had once supported 2,000 reminded Richard of his hometown back in Iowa. It had a centrally located park block which was surrounded by mostly two story commercial and public buildings. These were surrounded by blocks of other buildings, mostly one story businesses and one or two story residences. And all of it was located on a tight grid pattern of a handful of roads running east and west and another handful running north and south. There were other buildings outside of this downtown district, of course. But most of Rockville had been right here in this eight or ten acre plot of land surrounding the now brown and neglected park.

Only after his scouts indicated on their CDC-provided radios that the town was clear did Richard signal the others to come in from their waiting spot half a mile from town. It was ironic, then, that just seconds after he'd called for Claire to join him that he turned around to find himself staring into the barrel end of a very large rifle.

The man behind the weapon was wild looking: long, unkempt hair and beard, ragged clothing, weather worn skin. Paula George, Richard's scouting partner, took note of the man a moment later and lifted her pistol his way, but her boss told her to stay calm and lower her weapon.

"We're not here to hurt you or rob you," the former Head of security of the Texas CDC facility said in a soft voice. "We're just looking for a place to spend a night."

Richard took note of the way the gun shook in the man's hand. He let his lips widen in a friendly smile. "If you tremble any harder, you're gonna pull that trigger, whether you mean to or not."

He continued to chat with the man cordially, reassuring him that they meant no harm. Richard even told the man that he and the others would leave the town if he wanted. The wild man simply continued to stare at him with the gun shaking before him dangerously.

Finally, the man spoke. "Food."

"We have food," Richard told him. "I have food in my pocket. Would you like some?"

He continued speaking with the man softly, defusing the situation in degrees: he got the man to take his finger off the trigger, then to point the weapon upwards away from his head. "You don't want to shoot me in the face. Some people say I have a pretty face."

Soon, Richard had an energy bar out of a pocket, then out before him, then finally into the man's hand. And after what seemed like an eternity, the confrontation was over. The man was sitting on the ground eating and drinking from Paula's water bottle, the rifle which he'd set aside now in Richard's care.

Claire's head of security had had to calm the man down again at the sound of the other scouts approaching. Richard's mike, like the radios of the other scouts, had been open so that each of them could hear each other during the search of Rockville.

"It my friends," Richard had reassured the man, adding quickly, "They have more food. Better food even."

The man had eagerly devoured Richard's energy bar and finished off all of Paula's bottle. Yet a third time, as the two other vehicles arrived, the man was calmed down with soft words and reassurances that he was not in danger. As he inspected the man's rifle, Richard chuckled.

"It's empty," he told Paula and the other scouts. "There's one round in the chamber, and it's spent."

After explaining to Claire the details of the encounter she hadn't heard over the radio, Richard gestured her to the man. "This is our doctor. Her name is Doctor Claire."

 

[ToniTaylor]

Claire was confused when she first heard Richard speaking to the stranger over the radio she was carrying. When she finally realized he was talking to someone other than one of his Scouts, she'd panicked, first telling the driver of the vehicle to hurry into town, then demanding they stop instead.

"We should wait," she told the woman behind the wheel. "Let's let Richard resolve this."

Claire was soon trembling as much as the man who was pointing a gun at Richard.
They'd come into contact with people like this before, and she should have been getting used to it. So, why was this time different? Claire knew why. Richard wasn't standing at her side this time around but, instead, was half a mile away staring down a gunman. She wasn't sure why it mattered, not that she was really thinking about that aspect at this moment. But later she would realize that she'd been panicking because if something had happened to Richard, she wouldn't have been there to help him.

Did Claire care more for Richard than she wanted to admit? She'd always enjoyed his company, and she'd always enjoyed his cock. But she'd been too busy with her work -- and too conflicted about the future -- to allow herself to want more from him than the occasional and very satisfying release of sexual frustration. She presumed Richard felt the same way about her. He'd been with other women during their time at the CDC together, just as she'd been with other men. But they'd never talked about that. The had had the consummate friends with benefits relationship for almost a decade, something very few people in this world -- pre- or post-pandemic -- could pull off as well as they had.

When Richard signaled over the radio that it was okay to complete the drive into town, Claire gestured the driver to continue. Soon, she was out of the rig and looking to her lover with relief as he told this haggard man, "This is our doctor. Her name is Doctor Claire."

"I need everyone to back away, please," she told the members of her Cohort as she herself donned a mask and gloves. She approached the man, kneeling down to look him over. He showed no concern whatsoever regarding Claire's safety precautions. After a moment, she said to Richard and then asked of the man, "He shows no sign of being infected. Do you mind if I take a blood sample?"

The man simply stared at Claire, eating a second energy bar he'd been given. Carefully, not wanting to alarm him, she pricked one of this fingers and soaked a drop of his blood onto the end of a swab. The variant of COVID that had nearly destroyed the human race was more quickly and accurately indicated with a blood test if you had the right equipment, and who was more likely to have that equipment than an Epidemiologist from the CDC?

"Test this," she told one of the former research participants who was now her Medical Assistant. The man went off to the trailing rig with the swab, and Claire returned to looking the man over. She told Richard, "He's malnourished, and he's suffering a serious case of lice. But I don't think he's infected, and other than that--"

"Maria," the man suddenly said, speaking his first word. Claire smiled to the man, told him her name again -- thinking he'd been calling her that name -- and chuckled as the man clarified, "My wife, Maria."

He stood and -- without attempting to retrieve his weapon from Richard -- began walking away. After a moment, Claire and Richard fell in behind him, and a block and a half away then entered what had once been Rockville's City Hall. Descending a flight of stairs, they found huddled in the near darkness a Latino woman of perhaps 35, an Asian girl they'd later learn was 18, and a fair skinned male Ginger who was perhaps in his midteens.

"Maria," the man repeated as he gestured his family forward. He introduced the children -- the young woman was Lanying (or Lanny as she would often be called), the boy Glenn -- then told Claire, "My name is Trevor."

Claire greeted them all politely, ensured they got food and water, and managed successfully to get blood from each of them, too. By the time they were all well into their meals, Claire got the good news back about Trevor's blood: clean, no virus. The other tests would come back clean as well.

"They're Immunes," Claire reported to Richard after they'd stepped aside to talk quietly. "I can't believe they've survived out her."

They chatted about the pair a while before Trevor led them out of the basement and to the fire department on the other side of the park. The family had been living here for some time it seemed. They'd been collecting rain water from the building's roof, saving it in plastic containers that lined a wall, and bones of various animals scattered about outside the building seemed to indicate that the Rockville residents had had some bit of food over time.

It was only the next day that a member of the Cohort noticed the odd looking mountain directly to the north and Trevor subsequently explained what was up there. Claire and Richard both knew that their group needed more security than what Rockville had to offer. The mountain, upon inspection, turned out to be just what they'd needed.

They didn't want to take a chance on the vehicles not being able to handle the load heading up the mountain road, so they unloaded half of the weight in each and made the trip. By sundown, they had all of their supplies and people inside the mining crater. Most of the others were as unenthused about the location as Claire had been, but once the security features and potential for a thriving community were explained, most of the others seemed satisfied ... for now.

"You are welcome to join us, Trevor," Claire told their new friend after discussing it with Richard. "We are going to build a town up here, within the safety of the walls. You could be a part of our community, you and your family."

 

[ManInTheLoft]

"I need everyone to back away, please," Claire told the others who had gradually come to surround the stranger. She told Richard the guy appeared virus free, then asked, "Do you mind if I take a blood sample?"

Richard had gestured the others to back away and holster their weapons or at the least make them seem less threatening. He, though, stayed nearby. The security of the entire Cohort was his responsibility after all. But even more than that, he wanted to watch Claire. He'd never seen her provide care to a stranger before. All of her patients so far during their time working together had been participants of the CDC research or members of the facility's staff.

It was a treat to see her go to work. Richard found her bedside manner simply a marvel. Claire only proved herself to be even more of an empathetic professional when Trevor led them to the others. Richard had been surprised by the man and even more so by the other three. But Claire took it all in stride. It was as if she was simply taking a shift in a pre-pandemic community clinic.

Richard took a moment to study each of the strangers in the city hall basement. Trevor looked a great deal older than the 29 years old they would learn he actually was. There was nothing particularly special about him. He was just your average white guy, hidden under hair and grime. His wife, Maria, however, wow. Even in her current state of disarray, Richard could tell that she was shockingly beautiful woman.

The children were a mystery initially to Richard, until he asked more about them. As he suspected, Lanny, and Glenn were not Trevor and Maria's blood children. They had been adopted, Trevor called it, as young children and cared for as if the couple's own. Lanny was as beautiful as Maria was, and Richard found himself taking unconscious and quick ogles at her delicious body a few times. Glenn, while only 16, looked to Richard as a boy who could grow up to be a strong, strapping young man, if only he could get more to eat than the occasional snare caught rabbit or crow.

"They're Immunes," Claire reported. "I can't believe they've survived out here."

"Determination and perseverance," Richard said, smiling and winking before adding, "It's how we're all gonna survive."

He asked Trevor if there were any other people in Rockville and got no as an answer. The man said, "People pass through often. We try to avoid them. We would have avoided you, 'cept..."

"Except what?" Richard asked with a tone that was half empathy, half concern. He feared that Trevor was about to drop a bomb that the cohort was going to have to dive away from to avoid.

"Honestly?" Trevor asked. When Richard nodded his head, Trevor's eyes glazed over with threatening tears. He said with a cracking voice, "I think I wanted you to kill me. To kill us. To end it."

Richard could understand that. Back in Texas, the CDC researchers, staff, and program participants had had nearly everything they wanted. The government, as it was at the time, provided for them well. Richard never asked what it took for their suppliers to get supplies so easily. He should have. The economy had collapsed, very little was being made anymore, farming had moved indoors to highly secured locations to prevent overnight theft by the starving, and more. And yet, the facility's population never wanted. How could that be unless others in need were deprived of what was theirs?

"You are welcome to join us, Trevor," Claire told their new friends as plans were being made to occupy the mine. "We are going to build a town up here, within the safety of the walls. You could be a part of our community, you and your family."

Trevor looked to his wife, who nodded after initially hesitating. The children, who were actually an adult and a teen to be specific, nodded as well. Richard gestures over a pair from the Cohort, telling them, "Help our new friends load up their possessions. They're coming with us."

Trevor led the pair, with Richard following as well, to another room in the city hall's basement level. His eyes widened with surprise at a room jam packed with this, that, and the other thing. "This is all yours, Trevor?"

Trevor explained that they'd arrived in Rockville a handful of months ago in much better health than they were now. They'd searched every building in town for food and other supplies of value. They hadn't found much of the former; the latter was here in this room.

"Some of it was upstairs, but the Barrows got it," he said. He explained to Richard that the militia from the town 30 miles to the east sometimes rolled through Rockville in 4x4s, ATVs, and motorcycles. "They look for people like us. Rob'em. Beat'em."

He looked toward the two women of his family and said more softly, "Try to rape them. I hid my wife and daughter, so, they were safe. They beat me up. My son, too. Took all we had at the time. So, now, we hide it."

"We ran into those people, too, Trevor, "Richard explained. "We won't let that happen to you again."

Again, the man's eyes glazed a bit. He gestured toward the room full of stuff. "This is all yours, then. All of it. For saving us."

Richard shook the man's hand and reassured him again that all would be fine. He returned to the streets to join the continuing scouting. When the trucks were ready to begin carting people and supplies up the mountain, Richard divided his security force in two. One half stayed here to watch over what remained. The other went to the pit to watch over moved stuff and people there.

They were on their way!

 

[ToniTaylor]

Determination and perseverance, Richard had told Claire about how her Cohort would survive. That was fortunate, because Claire had both. Back up in the pit, as the others were unloading two of the vehicles -- the third had stayed in town -- she took a long look around their future home. She smiled wide, contemplating the possibilities this location offered. Determination and perseverance, she thought. And a whole lot of work.

"Come with me, Mel ... I wanna check out the pond," she told one of the women with whom she had spoken a great deal about the pit's future. Then, glancing at the young beauty's bosom, she shook her head and laughed, saying, "And put a coat over those things before someone gets distracted and falls over a cliff."

She laughed a second time and turned to head down the decline to the pond.

 

[ManInTheLoft]

Richard trusted that Trevor's assessment of Rockville being otherwise abandoned and ceased any further scouting for now. Instead, he sent two of his security team members out to the northwest and southwest edges of town with radios and told them to keep an eye out.

Back at City Hall, the rest of them began sorting through the Rockville family's things. Trevor, Maria, and their two adopted children had gathered an interesting collection of things over their months of living here. Richard was at the moment more interested in what was of immediate use, of course. He had tents, tarps, cold weather clothing, and other such things loaded in the trucks for transfer to the pit.

Some of these items were still in their original packaging, having never been used by their previous owners. That didn't surprise Richard. The pandemic that had wiped out the vast majority of Americans had struck hard and fast. People had isolated themselves in their houses only to die there; others had fled to remote areas trying to distance themselves from the infected, again only to die there. Either way, their stuff was left behind for the Immunes to do with as they'd pleased. Many times, scroungers simply never found that stuff and it simply stayed put, untouched. Good for us.

"You two ride up with the first truck, unload, and stay there," Richard told two of his armed security force personnel. He handed one of them the most powerful pair of binoculars they had. "See if you can get to the rim to look out toward Barrow. If they decide to come after us again, I want to know before they get anywhere near us."

The three vehicles continued their up and back deliveries to the pit. Each trek up, two more of the cohort's members remained there. Rockville's occupation dwindled until there was only Richard and two laborers, Trevor and his family, and two scouts. The sun was nearing the horizon when Richard packed in the packing of trucks and ordered everyone left to the last truck.

When he arrived at the pit, he found tents belonging to Trevor and the cohort already set up around the plateau. An ATV they'd found had been fueled, and it was being used to transport water up from the pond. On a grill over a fire, some of the group's last food was cooking. A tarp enclosure had been erected for showers and had a line of four chatting and laughing as they waited their turn inside.

"I'm going to put two people on the rim during the night," Richard told Claire when he came across her. "I'm gonna take a nap now and get up for watch at oh-two-hundred. Tomorrow, we'll try to start on our gate."

He could see she had something she wanted to tell him from her expression. He donned a knowing smirk. "What's rolling around in that sharp little brain of yours?"