Its us versus them (Open)

[guyloveshotstories]

I don't know what happened that led to this but what I know now is that our group was encamped on the eastern slope of the Cascade Mountains to shelter against the harsh wind, rain, and snow of the winter with a small group of trusted people. We were all mixed up. We had women, men, black, white, latina, the whole lot. We had been on the move since leaving San Diego. At the time we were about fifty, but as we went our numbers dwindled, expanded, and split as we encountered other groups, government, rebels, and deranged. There were rumors of zombies but we hadn't seen any, yet.

I don't know how it happened but some called it a second civil war, but all I cared about was staying alive and now paper money meant nothing, only hard currency; gold, silver, platnium and also trading of anything of value from food, water, even people. I admit to buying people but only because they appeared to be helpless and I would have them in our group where they would be cleaned and well fed and not slaves compared to our groups we met, real animals and butchers, but I you stayed with us, you had to contribute something.

My name is Sean Zimmerman, the leader, 32. I was a garage manager in San Diego before going north and took my truck as well as many people as I could fit. We got to Northern Nevada before having to go by foot. By then my six foot tall, 180lb frame was rock hard with the rough, sun kissed skin and capped thin lips and blue eyes shield behind a pair of sunglasses and cruecut blonde hair. There were no tattoos on my body and no piercings but the hands were pretty roughed up by my old labors and having three months of survival on the run and by then we learned better on who to trust and who to not.

My nominal right hand man was my old foreman was Chuck Damian, 25, a tall, powerfully built black man with smooth, firm jaw and bald with bulging muscles. Though strong as a bull some called him stupid, but that's when he turned into a locomotive. When Chuck was little he was constantly picked on and he got back by building his muscles and began a battering ram. Many times he saved us by tackling whole groups of men and beating them with his bare hands. But Chuck, to our group, was as soft as a teddy bear. He called me 'Boss' because I was, once, but the others followed me. We did have tiffs and fights but stayed together after several of them broke off and headed for what the thought was a sanctuary near Spokane. Haven't heard from them since.

On people trading Chuck found a group at the Oregon/ Washington border that had many people to sell and Chuck looked at them and found a woman, a white woman that was wearing Army ACUs and captains bars on her collar with long red hair, real pretty that looked like she had been though the ringer and Chuck begged me to buy her. He said, "I give you my food. I give you my water. Please, boss, buy her." Like a kid in a candy story and I relented and purchased the captain. The two formed a bond. Her name was Susan Carroll from New York. She didn't talk much about what happened but she thanked us every day by cooking and cleaning, watching the ill, and would kiss me and Chuck every day.

My job, it came rather impromptu, was to get the group to safety and for the winter we were encamped on the eastern side of the Cascades and wouldn't go any further. We were in a good position with ample water, good hunting ground with fishing and forage and better we were alone but we kept up a constant vigilance as I went through our supplies. We had more than enough to live off during the winter, but we were gathering up extra to trade. We needed women's hygiene products as well as antibotics to fight the fever.

PM me if you're interested. Looking for a woman. We can go over the details.

 

[guyloveshotstories]

We had set up several small log houses at the base of the hill that would be able to give us shelter. I had my house that was 20 x 30 that was the first to be set up and we lived in, all of us, until the other houses could be built. Chuck was a heavy builder, able to tott whole logs on one shoulder and ferry them around with ease.

I shared this house with Chuck and Carroll whom was rather timid with the others though she tended to the sick and the needed she would come back here for warmth and shelter. The house has small rooms on either end of the rectangle and a common area and kitchen in the center. I had one room and Chuck the other and CAroll would sleep in the middle, but there were times she would come into either of our rooms and ask for company. I didn't mind and neither did Chuck.

The rest of the folks had houses for familes and smaller ones for individuals that way everyone could have their privacy but we were drawn into a circle so that they could be made into blockhouses in case of attack.

Thus far we haven't had trouble, haven't seen an outside person for a month. That was good and bad because we had stuff to trade that we needed and we hadn't had anyone to worry about sneaking inside and stealing one of us at night.