Jack smirked at the thought of him potentially being ex-military. The past year his appearance had undergone quite a change - his hair had grown a bit longer, unkempt; his once clean-cut face now sported the stubble of a man usually too busy to cut it. His more formal black blazer and the other remnants of his old life were inside with his things. He found that a simple black t-shirt and a pair of blue jeans suited him fine. It almost seemed impossible that likely, two years ago exactly, he would have been in his office in Washington picking at a lukewarm Chipotle burrito, poring over some bill he was sponsoring. Now, as he flipped the venison over, revealing the browned underside, he wondered over how lucky he must have been to have survived all this time, while others, soldiers, survivalists, didn't. 

"No, no, not military," he replied, still by the fire. "I've just had a year-long trial by fire when it comes to surviving. Before all this, well.. I used to serve as state Representative for Washington's 5th Congressional district. I spent a lot of my time in D.C., then a few up here; but by some stroke of fate, I was in Southern California visiting friends when all this.. [i]happened[/i]. I lived with them for months, and as a group we survived together a few miles out of L.A.. But.. I came up north on my own to see if my parents in Spokane made it through all this." He let a pause hang in the air, unsure whether or not to go on. He finally decided not to. 
"And then I headed out here," he went inside briefly to find three old, plain red plates in the cupboard, and dusted them off (they looked clean, just unused. He also checked for silverware but unusually, there was none at all), before returning outside to take the now medium-cooked steaks off the cooking stone, and placing two beside Chris and Claire. He sat down with his own opposite the two, removing his knife to cut the meat and use it as both a knife and a makeshift fork. 
"Have you two been alone this entire time? Or did you used to be in some kind of group around here?"