Name: Trake Havers
Nicknames: The Workhorse, Big Man to the 1007th, Wiley to the Condemned, now just Death
Age: 32
Class: Former 1007th, Former Condemned Biker, now Combat Salvager
Subclass: Close Combat Expert, Demolitions
Gender: Male
Sexuality: Heterosexual
Physical Attributes:
Trake is a broad-shouldered, muscular, rugged looking soldier. His most striking feature is most likely his eyes, though. Due to a rare birth condition, his eyes changed into unnatural colors, finally settling into a mixture of
gold, green and a light blue. Other than that, Trake is full of scars just like any other survivor. His chest has multiple slash and stab scars on it from hand-to-hand combat he gained in the few hand-to-hand fights with Al-Qaeda. He has gunshot scars on his right shoulder and his chest. His hands are especially scarred with his knuckles being near leather.
He has tattoos littering his body, a
Marine Corps tattoo on his right shoulder, another
USMC tattoo on his right pec. He had the word “DEATH” inked in large, solid letters across his left shoulder, with a
skull under it. He has the phrase
“No Gods, No Masters” tattooed across his back. His right hand has the word Texas in stylized letters across it, and he has a Condemned tattoo on his lower right stomach. Or he did.
Going back to his basic looks, Trake has a rather muscular body. His skin is a light tan, and his hair a light brown.
Attire: Trake feels comfortable almost only in his fatigues. They’ve served him well, and he’s worn them for so long that he isn’t used to wearing anything else.
Height: 6’ 3’
Weight: 215
Personality: Trake was always a happy, loud man. The Morale Machine, they used to call him. Then again, that was way before he saw the worst of what the world had to offer. Trake lost his two best friends to the same man that nearly killed Trake himself. He’s seen an entire base full of men and women that he served alongside ripped and torn apart in mere minutes. He’s had to execute the first friend he had in 3 months, just because another guy wanted his shirt. Trake tore himself up over the fact that he couldn’t save his best friends, and all the other men and women he watched die in front of him. When he killed in Iraq, it was in self-defense, but now…Trake was murderer. The sole thing he never wanted to become. Still, Trake still tries his hardest to be a normal, happy person, but he finds most time he’s rather drown in his own self-hate, and ponder what he even lives for anymore. Even if he does give you the occasional quip or quirk, it’s just a façade.
As for fighting, Trake is savage. All his anger, frustration, sadness and pure misery comes out when he fights, making him fight like a complete savage. He screams, and brutally murder’s his enemy. You cannot control him when in a fight. Even when not fighting, and dealing with a person he deems unworthy, he can’t control himself. If he knows that the person deserves it, he can kill with no remorse or self-control. But if there is any hesitation in his minds, he finds it difficult to kill in cold blood.
Trake does get mad pretty easily, though. Even more now that he’s seen the depravity of Man, and can no longer stand it. He doesn’t have a very long temper for anyone he deems unworthy of his time, namely rapists, men who beat women, men who beat weapons, usually almost any type of criminals. Even though the apocalypse has shown him that anyone from any walk of life can be a hero, he still has uneasiness around homosexuals. Trake is in no way a religious man at all, but homosexuals just confuse him and make him feel uncomfortable. He tends not to ask anything regarding anyone’s sexuality, just to make it easier on him.
Before the Infection: Trake Havers, a natural born Texan, was born an only child on September 2, 1988, to his mother Elizabeth and his father Cordell, both only 20 years old, young lovers. He didn’t grow up on a ranch, or listen to country music, or own anything bigger than a dog, but he still brought the same kind of warmth and kindness that Texans are famous for. Or at least what they should be famous for. He grew up in the most Texan of Texan cities, Fort Worth. His father was a US Marine, and his mother was a nurse at a local hospital. He didn’t see his parents much when he was a child, but his parent’s loved him to death when they could all actually spend time together. Then the news came on August 3, 1990. That hairy SOB Saddam had gone and invaded Kuwait.
Trake was only 2 when his father was killed in action on December 23rd, 1990. The papers in the mail simply stated that due to his manner of death, the remains of Sgt. Cordell Havers wouldn’t be sent home. “He died a hero, and served his country honorably.” No details on how he died, where he was, his last words, anything. Trake, of course, was too young to realize what had gone on. He grew up without a father, and finally knew the truth when he turned 10, on his birthday, his mother finally explained why Trake “Trake never had a daddy.” And why “Mommy would cry a lot when she looked at old pictures.”
Other than the issues with his father, Trake was a normal kid. He went to school just like all the other kids, loved recess and nap time, and always brought the best cookies for snack time. The only problem is that Trake was a big boy. I mean BIG. By the time he was in 3rd grade, he was already standing 6 inches over the next biggest kid. He was setting up to be over 6 feet when he was an adult. He was a ‘gentle giant’ of sorts. He always made quick friends with the new kids, and he was a friend of most of his grade. All except Billy. That motherfucker Billy.
Billy always picked on Trake, and he couldn’t figure out why. He was just like Trake, and made good friends with all the other kids, but always solely picked on Trake, even though Trake was a much larger child, compared to the relatively small Billy. Then, one day it became frighteningly apparent why Billy picked on Trake. You ever hear someone tell a little girl, that when a boy picked on them it was because they liked them? Well, you could say that applied to Trake and Billy. Except, Trake wasn’t a little girl, and he also didn’t share those feelings.
Billy approached Trake one day, and punched him in the shoulder. Sick of Billy’s shit, Trake pushed Billy down, only for Billy to jump right back up, and begin hugging Trake. When Trake questioned Billy’s actions, Billy simply responded “You picked on me back! That must mean you like me too right?” The idea of a boy liking another boy was extremely alien to Trake, so he shoved Billy down, and ran away to get help from a teacher. Trake’s mother later explained that there were boys who liked other boys, and not little girls, and that they were nice people, but Trake wasn’t hearing any of it. It was then that Trake’s awkwardness came from. He didn’t hate them; they were just odd to him.
It wasn’t until 5th grade where this awkwardness blossomed into a hate. It was Billy again, and he was still attached to Trake like a lost puppy. Billy promised to keep it at only friends, but infatuation can only stand so long before it reaches a boiling point.
Trake was at lunch, with Billy following in his shadow. Trake had just gotten his food, and walked out to the front of the cafeteria to reach his table, when Billy threw his food down, and began yelling to the cafeteria “Hey everybody! I have some news for you! Me and Trake are really best buddies!” Trake, paralyzed in fear and embarrassment, could only choke on his own air when Billy latched his arms around him, and smiled as if nothing was wrong. There were no words to describe the terror Trake felt when Billy began puckering his lips, and slowly moving his face closer to Trake’s. Trake threw Billy down, and rushed out of the cafeteria, his ears and mind filled with the mocking jeers and laughter of the other children. It was then that Trake grew hatred, not only for Billy, but for all homosexuals. They were all disgusting weirdos that had no place in society. At least Trake thought that.
Other than all that, Trake had already made 2 best friends; Jay and Joe. They stuck together like a bear’s paw in a honey jar. He spent most of his Middle School life with these two knuckleheads, racing go-carts, listening to Eminem, all kinds of stuff. Up until Trake met a little lady named Lizbeth. She was the purtiest lady he ever done laid eyes on. Not a single thing was ugly about her. She was smart, fun to be around, and most of all, she was funny. Being the hormone raging teenagers that they were, Trake and Lizbeth clung to each other like magnets. Trake went through 8th grade with her, 9th grade with her, 10th, 11th, and then finally, Senior year came.
Trake was dead set in his head that he wanted to be a hero like his father. He was gonna be a Marine. About this time, the US was in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the horrors of war were on the television daily. Trake was too blinded by his young eagerness and American pride to see what he was getting himself into. Lizbeth and Trake’s mother both begged and pleaded with him to consider a different path of work, but Trake wasn’t going to have it. He wanted to be a Marine, and American hero. He wanted to be in the history books that he had dreaded so much during high school.
Joe, Jay, and Trake all enlisted together, keeping the brotherhood alive. Trake was dismayed by leaving the love of his life behind, but the thoughts of being a hero clouded those of sadness and homesickness. He was sent straight to Camp Pendleton, and the Three Musketeers passed. They may have passed by their hairs on their chests, but they still made it. They were sent to Iraq right off the bat, straight into the meat grinder of urban combat. These next 7 years would destroy, rebuild, and then tear Trake back down into the hollow shell he now is.
Trake, Jay and Joe fought in some of the most horrifying urban fighting in Iraqi. Families were murdered in cold blood, a punishment for assisting American troops. Children lied in the streets, torn apart from stray gunship rounds, or killed by Taliban fighters to scare the neighborhood into submission. Men of Trake’s unit were no strangers to the carnage. The young Trake and his friends were sent in as replacements for a fallen squad of battle-grizzled veterans. An IED got them, according to the men of the platoon. The trio had a lot to prove, by Trake was able to make friends with some of the men using his friendly charisma, getting him in a little cozy with the men. This would prove to be useful, as year after year, Trake and platoon would be sent back into the meat grinder, losing a few good men each time. Soon, a large number of the platoon were recruits, Trake, Jay, and Joe along with about 13 other men being the last of the ‘old-timers’.
By 2010, a lot had happened in what little was left of Trake’s civilian life. Lizbeth had finally gotten sick of the worrying and constant fear that Trake wouldn’t return from his ‘last tour’. She took all her belongings, and left during his 2nd tour. She left only a small letter with the promise ring Trake had gotten her their Junior year. Only did Trake discover this after the first event of his spiral into emptiness happened,
It was a normal, if you could call it that, day in Iraq. Trake and a few other squads were on patrol walking down a dusty, hot street. It was the quietest day they’d had in a long time, and so they were on full alert. Trake was bored, feeling a dent in the plates of his ballistics vest, a bullet he’s take a few weeks before, a firefight between two straggling insurgents. The squad scanned the whole street for any oddities, but before they could react, a window opened on one of the high floors in the apartment in front of them, and a sniper mounted up, and cleaned out the skull of a rookie, Tanaka, whom was standing right next to Trake. The men instinctively moved for cover on the side of the road, but it was scarce. That fucking sniper had a dead zone over the entire road. Joe couldn’t find good enough cover, and took a bullet straight through his temples, making a mess of his head. Instant death. Trake tried to suppress the sniper with his SAW, but a round managed to pierce the damaged plate in his vest, and went straight through his right lung. Trake went down, and started choking, falling behind the box that Joe was about to hid behind. Jay tried to reach out and pull Trake out of the line of fire, but he reached out too far, and took a round through his neck. He fell next to Trake, and they stared at each other, knowing this was the end.
Trake knew that Joe was dead, and stared into the eyes of a choking and sputtering Jay, until finally his eyes fell lifeless. He could hear nothing, and only felt his chest throb, and his breathing was getting harder and harder, until finally Trake got too tired. It looked like Joe and Jay were having a pretty enjoyable nap, so Trake figured “Why not?” He surrendered his life, his last thoughts of Lizbeth, and his mother, sitting in front of his coffin, with faces of pure misery on their heads. It was like he was watching the future in his dreams. He didn’t like that future. It… it wasn’t fun. Trake started trying to push himself from his sleeping friends. He felt his eyelids weigh down, and he was taking shallow, sputtering breaths, until finally, a yank came from around his neck. Someone was dragging him out of the street. He felt something pierce his thigh, and suddenly he didn’t want to sleep so much anymore. The rest of the platoon had responded, and the medics were quickly on Trake, carrying him to the truck, anxious to get him to a proper medical station, desperately trying to keep him alive.
Trake woke up in a hospital. There was a nurse checking in on him when he woke up, and she rushed to get a doctor. From what he could gather, Trake was in no position to be moving, much less be awake. The doctor explained to him that they had just barely re-inflated his lung, and told him that if Trake could heal up and start breathing with no assistance, that there was a possibility of him being able to continue his serving. This caught Trake by surprise, the first thing that they told him was that if he lived, he could get another chance to die again? It was a bit much for Trake, but it didn’t matter to him, He wanted to get back in the fight anyway. At least he’d get to spend some time at home with Liz for a bit. Boy, was he in for a surprise.
Next came the second event of his spiral into emptiness.
Trake was ecstatic to finally be home, even with the circumstances of his health. He was confused when Lizbeth wouldn’t answer his calls. She didn’t even visit him in the hospital. It worried Trake. He was finally home, but his one and only love wouldn’t even visit him? Maybe Joe and Ja-…..Oh. That’s right. They were both dead. It hit Trake as hard as a punch to the chest would’ve hit him. His two best friends were now dead, and his girlfriend, wouldn’t even visit him in the hospital. It was then he realized that he was…alone. For the first time, he didn’t have anyone around. He had his mother, of course, but she was having to travel a long ways from Texas to San Francisco, where the hospital was.
Trake sat in that hospital for a whole week, alone and cold. It wasn’t the best experience, as he’d go into crying fits over the loss of Jay and Joe, but end up almost chocking himself from breathing too hard. Trake couldn’t even grieve without his injury getting in the way.
Finally, Trake got a phone call. It was from someone he didn’t expect to be the one talking. It was his uncle. One he hadn’t talked to in a while. He had some news for Trake. He was excited to finally get some insight on what was going on, but what his uncle said next was the second spiral into emptiness.
“Your mother has passed away.”
Trake froze at the words. The last thing he had expected to hear from anyone, was that his mother of all people was dead. First Jay and Joe, now his mother? What the fuck did he do? Who did he piss off? Why him? At first, he couldn’t move. His breath was caught in his throat, the thought processing in his head. The tears came slow at first, but soon his bedding was soaked, as the phone sat broken in the corner of the room, torn out of the wall by Trake.
Trake’s mother has died on the way to the airport. She drove at night, because it was late when she got the news. She packed her bags, and hopped in her car to rush to the airport, but as if she was specifically chosen, destiny had a different idea. She had just made it out of the neighborhood, when a drunk driver t-boned her, and killed her instantly.
Trake was truly alone now. His father was dead, Sgt. Cordell Havers, US Marine killing in action on December 23rd 1990. Cause of Death: Stray Iraqi artillery shell. Jay Hudson and Joe Shelgie, US Marines, killed in action on April 23rd, 2010. Cause of Death: Fatal sniper rifle shots to vital body parts. Elizabeth Havers, Triage Nurse at a Fort Worth hospital, April 27, 2010. Cause of Death: Car crash with drunk driver.
The thought of a military-like list of his dead loved ones floated around in his head constantly. The only other thought in his head was the missing love of his live. Where the hell was she? He needed her. He needed her so badly; it made him dizzy to think about it. How could she just up and leave without telling him shit?! Who did she think she was?! Trake could only wonder. Wonder and cry.
Trake sat in the hospital for another few days, until he was moved back into his home. There, he found the letter and ring. This was the third of his spirals into emptiness. He sat the first night in darkness and silence, wondering one thing. What was left to live for? What would drive him to get out of bed in the morning, and not rip the stitches in his chest out, and pull his own lung out? Why did he want to live? Then, it came to him. If he gave up now, the deaths of his loved ones would be for nothing. It was up for him to keep their memories alive, and pass on their stories. He was the one to remind others about them. To keep their spirits alive, even if he was dead inside himself.
He lived the next few months in misery and loneliness. His recovery went a little faster than expected, seeing as how the bullet went clean through his lungs. After about three months of sitting at home, watching T.V and eating every few days, Trake’s lung finally healed up well enough for him to breathe without machine assistance, and he was finally able to return to service in the military. He scraped through the Fitness test, just enough to land him a communications job. He was able to go back into combat, but he decided to play it safe for now, and tried to train when he could to strengthen his lungs. It was a different change of pace from combat missions, but he could still see the men
After about a month on base, training and exercising, along with a few breathing exercises, Trake was well enough to return back into combat. He of course had a few pains and trouble breathing, but being a non-smoker, and perfectly healthy, his wound didn’t hold him back too much. Although one thing did come back around to bite him in the ass.
Remember that birth condition that made his eyes odd colors? Well, with all the combined trauma from the loss in his life, it spurred the condition up, and Trake started experiencing head-splitting, random migraines. Only prescription painkillers could really quell the pain. Trake tried his best to keep it hidden, thinking it might get him discharged. Random migraines, on top of a lung wound? Not good. After a few weeks of migraines, Trake could handle them anymore. He finally reported his condition to the base medic, and they set him up with a regular dosage of meds to keep the migraines away.
The next three years of Trake’s like went very slowly. The missions in his area of operation slowed down, as the Taliban were being pushed out, with the help of the locals. Trake’s platoon finally all got to rest in the base, and went on leave in late 2012.
The men were on leave until April 23, 2013, when the first infected meteorite struck Lost Springs. His Platoon was pulled from overseas operation and tasked with keeping the crash site and town secure. It was different than his FOB in Iraq, and Fort Worth in Texas. It was a scary, sterile area that gave Trake the chills. The men fortified the town, and protected it. Barricades on every road leading out of town, wall erected everywhere. Trake was stationed with keeping the scientists safe from “treats within the town.” This meant the sick, insane people of the town.
Trake was one of the men that stood around holding an assault rifle, with a gas mask plastered to his face. He stood and watched at the entrance of the ‘Quarantine Area” as bodies of dead and dying people were carted in and out. Trake didn’t know it yet, but he was seeing the start of an epidemic way beyond his understanding. He would have time when on the people would go savage, and maul a scientist. Usually, Trake was the one to kill these things. The images of these former humans, holding a large chunk of a scientist’s neck or arm, or face were burned into Trake’s head. The migraines and nightmares made his time at Lost Springs were miserable. After a good year of patrol duty, Trake’s platoon was relieved by another one, and they rotated more frequently for the next year. Trake saw the same things each time. Dead people being carted out. Scientists being mauled to death by cannibals. Test subjects in large, metal containers. It was all a nightmarish scene. Only to be followed by the outbreak.
When the outbreak of 2015 came around, Trake’s platoon had just arrived to their base in Fort Worth. They would finally be off of guard duty for a while, and could get a nice break. It seemed his platoon got a lot of leave days. They didn’t get to enjoy but a few days of relaxation, when the orders came to fortify and stock the base. A contagion was coming up fast from Mexico, and all the bases in Texas were being ordered to ball up and hold a line. They were supposed to keep the contagion from the Mainland. A steep task for just a few scattered military bases, but other soldiers from states like Ohio, Michigan, New York and the likes were also being deployed to assist with the defense. None of them knew of the horrors of what was about to come.
It was a warm morning in Texas, usual for an August. Trake awoke to the violent shaking of his body, and the sounds of screaming men and sirens. A solider from New York was shaking Trake, trying to get them awake. The young boy was blubbering something about the base being overrun, and then ran with the rest of the men outside. Trake could hardly get his boots on, before something burst through one of the windows on the side of the barracks. The person was blood drenched, and made sounds of a savage, rabid animal. It looked up to see a frozen Trake, stiffened with fear. The savage thing rushed towards Trake, screeching as it did. The thing jumped on Trake, and went straight for his neck. Trake had already gotten his hands around the things’ own neck, and shoved it off. Another soldier ran though the barracks, and was surprised by one of the things flying onto the floor right in front of him. In his own surprised, he ripped open on the creature, unleashing an entire magazine into it, until it stopped moving. After getting over what he just saw, Trake finished putting on his fatigues, vest and the works, and rushed outside to a nightmarish scene.
The base was in disarray, horrible disarray. Soldiers and infected alike ran amok the base. The painful screams and cries of dying men and women filled the air, along with the smoke of the multiple fires that had sprung up around the base. Trake looked around to see men and mutants strewn about, all brutally dismembered or wounded. Trake himself nearly couldn’t keep what little that was on his stomach down, and started moving along the wall of the base trying to avoid the creatures, and wall of friendly fire.
Infected poured over the walls tens and twenties at a time, a flooded the base with carnage. Soldiers, who had just been killed, got up and began to kill again. Except this time around, they were nothing more than savage cannibals, ripping their former friends limb from limb, and taking savage bites out of their flesh. The remaining soldiers were beginning to flee from the base, hopping into trucks and Humvees, stuffing large amounts of troops in at a time. They peeled out of the base, leaving Trake running across the base for the last truck out.
The truck sat of the main gate, a machine gun mounted in the back. It was the final truck left, and only a few troops were left in the base. A soldier stood next to the gunner, screaming and motioning for the remained soldiers to get on the truck. Trake sprinted his way across a field of dead and dying bodies, and had barely made it to the truck, before a hand grabbed his vest, and yanked him down. He hit the ground, his head pounding, and was staring into the empty eyes of an infected soldier. One he didn’t recognize. Before he knew it, the creatures head exploded, and another hand grabbed onto Trake’s vest, this time from the front. It was the soldier in the truck dragging him in. The other soldiers had been caught by the infected, allowing the truck to finally leave.
Trake watched out of the back of a truck at the burning and destroyed military base. They smashed through the roadblocks around the base, into the main body of Fort Worth. The streets were littered with lifeless bodies, with a few live people rushing to get into the truck, only to be taken down by the hordes of infected now ravaging the streets. Trake looked away, and vomited in the corner of the truck. The sights, the smells, the sounds, all of them too much for Trake to handle. He finally took a look at the few men scattered in the truck. They were crying, blubbering about their families, or simply frozen with horror. There was a boy in the corner. He was some of the few Marines they sent in from Pennsylvania. He was shaking violently, and his face was soaked with tears. He finally moved, his hand reaching down to his hip. Trake knew what the boy was planning and tried to stop his hand but it was too late. The boy raised his M9 to his own forehead, and squeezed on it.
It was quick, the boy slumped in his seat, his eyes rolled into his head. All of the men in the truck finally just collapsed and took a breath. They were alive, but for how long? Were they destined to die anyway? And Trake continued to ask himself the same cryptic question. ‘What am I living for?” This made his head hurt more than the migraines.
After the Infection: Trake stayed with this group until they discovered the 1007th a few weeks later. By now, Trake knew the 6 men in his group., Richard, Frank, Alex, Ulysses, Guenther and Rick. Up until then, the men survived off of what little MRE’s they had. They were ecstatic to find the 1007th. They had food, protection, and medical supplies, namely Trake’s pain meds. The three main things that the old truck lacked. The man gave disturbing news to Trake’s group. The virus had already spread through most of the US, and the military crumbled under the attacks. The 1007th were remnants of the military, trying to help out the people that were still out surviving. At least for the first one or two years they were. Trake was only 27 at this time, but he felt like an old man. Maybe helping out survivors would bring his spirit back.
Trake and his group of soldier buddies rolled around the states for the next 54 years, picking up new troops, rescuing survivors from their own hellholes, and delivering them to safe settlements, and the newly established ‘Havens’. It was a good time for Trake, it built him back up as a person, and gave him a glimmer of hope for his life. The first 3 years of these 4 were the best. There were no major losses for Trake, and the 1007th had saved about 115 people from the infected. The missions were always fun and dangerous.
One Trake always remembered was when they saved a couple from the roof of an apartment building. They had seen help signs a few days before, and had geared up for the mission. They drove through heavily infect streets, running over hordes of the savages at a time. The men rushed up the staircase, mowing down any infected they saw, and finally made it to the roof. They bust through the door, just to find the couple against a wall making love. It was a touching moment, but the infected were starting up the stairs. So the man of the couple simply asked “Will this help? I got it off a dead soldier guy.” He then pulled a hand grenade out of his back pack, and then nonchalantly threw it down the stairs, destroying a large number of them. The soldiers referred to that couple as the ‘Explosive Lovers’ after that.
It was the 4th year that the 1007th started changing. Soon, the food was starting to get a little thin. Rations were being reduced in size drastically, to the point where the men had just one piece of cured meat, half an apple or orange, and 8 oz. of water for their meals. The men became hungry, and slowly became desperate for food. Trake tries not to remember what lengths they went to, just to get food, but they will never leave his mind. They would raid small villages, and slaughter the men and children. They would take the food and women for themselves, and this horrified Trake. His sleep was constantly interrupted night after night, always by screams of miserable women, gunshots showcasing the execution of a combative woman, or a women that wouldn’t put out. This became such a normal occurrence that Trake began waking himself up, and would wait for the shots to be over, only to return to his nightmare-infested sleep.
Trake, fed up with a year full of atrocities committed by the 1007th, left in the dead of the night with a backpack full of food, ammo, and a few bottles of his painkillers that he needed. He left behind everything he came to know, the 6 men of his old group, the camaraderie of the fellow soldiers, the safety of the camps and convoys. He knew that he needed to find a new group, or his food and ammo wouldn’t last too long, and his painkillers especially wouldn’t. That meant that Trake wouldn’t last. It’s all came down to Trake’s survival, which looked bleak.
Trake’s travels with the 1007th had carried him from Texas to about Illinois. After he left, he wandered the empty woods, foraging for food. He planned on taking the most of what he could from the land before even thinking about delving into his own food supply. He knew that the 1007th would come looking for him. They couldn’t have someone walking around, with their intel and supplies, along with the ability to warm surrounding settlements of the 1007th aggression. Even if settlements were extremely few and far between, if they moved, the 1007th wouldn’t have ‘livestock’ to prey on. They couldn’t have that. They [u] wouldn’t ]/u] have that.
Only a few days after that, Trake was walking down an abandoned highway. It was a hot. September day, and he was extremely thirsty. His water had run out the day before, his birthday if his watch was still correct, and he was becoming dehydrated. He was 32 now. 32 was an age that he never expected to reach. He expected to die a young, sad death, and end up in a shallow grave somewhere in Iraq,or Afghanistan. Seemed like more than just a coincidence that he had run out of his water on the celebration of another year survived, but it seemed that destiny had other ideas for him.
He saw what he thought were hallucinations for thirst coming over a hill. It was a large convoy of RVs, motorcycles, and large trucks. It didn’t look like a 1007th convoy, so Trake figured that it was safe to flag it down. It was probably a group of smart survivors, like the ones he had watched on T.V what seemed like an eternity ago. The men on the motorcycles sped ahead, and began circling around Trake, until a large, black and red RV reached them. It parked on the side on the road, and a large, gluttonous man walked out of the squeaking and straining RV. He walked over, and halted the circle of motorcycles. The man stepped forward, and spat to side, getting ready to talk. He finally moved his multiple chins, uttering the words “Now, just where the in the hell is a soldier boy like you going? Don’t you have some sort of group of men just like you?”
Trake opened his dry mouth to answer, but loud bangs erupted from the woods behind him, narrowly missing Trake, and striking the men around him. Trake acted on instinct and pulled the fat man behind him, and ran past, as more gunfire erupted. Trake ran to hide behind an RV closer to the other side of the road, as bullets tinged around him. He loaded his trusty handgun, and then his assault rifle, knowing his moment of truth. He peered around the RV, and what he saw only confirmed his worries.
It was a group of about 20 1007th troops, laying waste to what Trake now recognized as Condemned around the vehicles. More of the Condemned were rushing to the front of the motorcade, and even more of them were being mowed down. Trake began shooting at the men, taking about two of them, before the former soldiers started directing they’re fire towards Trake. As he basically distracted them, a large mass of Condemned rushed in at their chance, and overwhelmed the soldiers. With Trake’s sharpshooting from the other side of the road, and the savage, melee-armed Condemned over ran their position. Even more of the Condemned were lining the road, forming a firing line, decimating the outnumbered, and out-gunned detachment of 1007th troops.
It was over before Trake knew it, and only a few men were left on the ground, wounded, with the other soldiers lying dead. Before Trake could do anything, rifle butt struck the back of his head, and he woke up a few moments later, cold water soaking his chest and face. It was the fat man again, this time bloodied. He moved his chins to speak again. “Now, what you pulled back there, tryna’ to get me shot instead ah you, was pretty fuckin’ crazy. I should have you kil’t fer getting’ me shot, but I’ll make ya a deal. I know fer a fact that you used to be one o’ these soldier fuckers, so here’s the deal. You kill these crybaby fucks over here, and we’ll let ya live, and hell, we’ll let you be one o’ us. Hows about it?!”
Trake stood up, and felt a rifle barrel up against his back. “Now, don’t try anything fuckin’ stupid, or yer brains er gonna all over this goddamn asphalt before you can do anything to piss me off me anymore.” The man held out Trake’s handy M9, the one he’d been using ever since he joined. Trake slowly took the handgun, and slowly walked over to the moaning, crying soldiers, about three in all. They all had shots to both knees, but other than that, wounds were varied. Trake grimaced when he saw them. 2 were from the group that made it out of the base. Rick and Alex. They both had shots to the gut, and Alex was sobbing quietly, while Rick only stared at Trake, pale in the face. The third was an officer that had ordered the executions of civilians, and killed many himself. Alex was the first to begin begging for his life, blubbering about how they were forced to go after Trake, even if they didn’t want to. Rick simply stated that Alex was lying about that, and that they all wanted to go after Trake. The officer was the last to speak, and spoke with an angry, disgusted tone. He looked into Trake’s eyes and began screaming. “You got have the fucking guts to kill me you spineless fucker! You couldn’t do shit in the 1007th, and you still can do shit with your fucking hick buddies! Kill me, you little shit! Show me you have a fucking dick between them chicken fucking legs!”
Trake finally snapped. All the energy that had built up Trake over his life came out. He yelled at the top of his lungs, and started stomping on the officer’s head. The officer’s attitude went south real fast, as he began screaming for mercy, and Trake relentlessly pounded on his head. Trake cocked his rifle, and stuck it in the groin of the officer, and slowly squeezed on the trigger, as the officer begged for mercy, sobbing uncontrollably. The gun finally went off, and the officer let out a pitiful scream of pain and agony, only to Trake’s pleasure. Trake simply held the man’s head down, and roared “Now who the dick between their legs, huh?! Because it sure as shit isn’t you!” He then shoved the barrel of the gun in the man’s mouth, and let the silence set, the only noise being the officer’s dying whimpers, and Alex’s sobbing. He squeezed the trigger, watching the officer’s head burst in the back.
Satisfied with what he accomplished, he moved to Alex. The young man, maybe only 22, or 23, simply cried, and muttered out “Please don’t.” every now and again. Trake made quick work of Alex and Rick, simply shooting them in the head just as anyone else would do. He no longer dwelled on feelings of remorse when it came to the 1007th. Rick and Alex weren’t innocent of the atrocities committed by the 1007th either, showing Trake that they no longer deserved to live. Trake was the only one other than maybe 2 or 3 other troopers that were pure of the crimes committed. They all deserved to die.
In awe of what Trake had just done, the Condemned buried or burned their dead, and hopped back into their convoy. The rest of the men told Trake of the location that they were moving towards. It was a town that they had heard was clear of zombies. They wouldn’t say what they were going to do once they got there, but Trake just figured they would do what anyone else would do, but, boy, was he wrong.
They took Trake back to their camp in the woods, and showed Trake a good night. They had women who seemed to want to be there, and not forced to pleasure the men. Everyone was happy, and most of the food they had looked to be from the land around them. Seeing as how Trake loved tattoos, Trake was ecstatic when one of the men offered to give him a tattoo to mark his entry into the Condemned. Trake figured this was a good set up. And now that they were heading to a zombie free farm?! This seemed too good to be true. Because it was.
Not even two days after Trake had made it into the group; he was introduced to the same type of horrors he went through with the 1007th. A small group of men went out on a ‘scavenging’ mission, and came back with an entire family. As soon as Trake saw the restrained family be thrown out of the truck, and lined up in front of a ditch, he knew what was going on. A tall man with a long, black beard walked behind them with a 12 gauge shotgun, and blew their chests out one by one, killing them one by one, until all 5 were dead. There were two adults, assumed to be the parents of 3 young teenagers, none of them older than 15. Trake tried his best to hide his utter disgust and dismay at the act. Trake went to bed that night, knowing what he was going to do. He knew here that zombie free farm was now, and figured he could pull the same stunt he did with the 1007th. The Condemned were never that easy.
Night came, and Trake stuffed his pack full of tinned food and cured meat. He fit 4 bottles of water in it, and topped it off with the pain pills they had, combined with his. He thought he had made it out without being seen, but a sentry saw him, and silently alerted the camp to Trake’s actions. All the while, Trake thought he was home free.
A fast moving group of Trackers moved through the forest, flashlights shining. It wasn’t too long until they found Trake, taking a leak on tree. One of the trackers muttered over to another, “Ey, look. A pisser pissin’.” Trake only heard a twig snap, before a rifle butt met the back of his head. He woke up presumably hours later, tied up and in a pick-up truck with 3 Condemned men in the cab with Trake, and about 2 in the bed, totaling 7. No hope of escaping. They were driving down a highway before they took a turn down a dirt road, and pulled into a clearing in the forest, as if they had been here numerous times. Trake was pulled out of the truck, and was hit with the stench of death. He could see mutilated bodies on the ground, rotting, and half buried. Trake’s weapons were in the bead of the truck. Odd that they hadn’t left them at base, so Trake had no chance of getting them back, but Trake wasn’t coming back from this clearing, so the only thing Trake cloud thing of was that they wanted to kill him with his own weapons. Sick fuckers.
Trake stepped mere feet from the truck, when the men kicked him down, and untied him. They instructed him to strip down to his under wear, and to get his knees. Trake was finally ready to die. He at last felt like he could meet an acceptable end. Shot down by some fucking hicks in a backwoods forest in the middle of nowhere. Good enough for him. Except they didn’t shoot him. Instead they began savagely beating him with wooden boards and their rifles, and torturing him using anything they had. Four men held down as they began slicing the tattoo off of Trake’s lower belly, but something else was waiting for them.
A zombie grabbed the man slicing Trake’s tattoo, and sunk his teeth into his neck, dragging him down to the ground. It looked like a horde of them had come in from the forest left of them, and were now converging on the men. The other 4 of them turned their attention to the close zombies, but were quickly toppled over, giving Trake time to crawl away to his freedom. Now to just get out of there. The truck was open, but not for long. Trake grabbed his clothes and boots off the ground, and limped over to the truck. He hooping, ready to take off, but was dismayed to find that the keys were not in the ignition. Fuck.
Trake jumped out of the truck and grabbed his belt and assault rifle from the truck, slinging the rifle over his shoulder, and running down the dirt road as fast as he could. He had no time to stop and put his boots on, so his feet took the punishments of the road, but all this pain was worth not being eaten alive.
Arsenal: His favorite M9 handgun, and M16A3 rifle with no attachments and a single mag.
Strengths/Skills/Talents: Trake is a natural fighter. You give him a knife, brass knuckles, an assault rifle, anything! And he can kill things with it. But for a guy that’s so good at killing and injuring things. Especially at close range. A shotgun in his hands is like a katana in the hands of a shogun. And as stated aaaallll the way up there in the Personality section, Trake is all around devastating in combat. Not invincible in any way, but he just destroys thing.
I know I said he’s not invincible, but he’s not that easy to kill either. He’s taken a lot of damage, and can still take plenty more, and he’s been taught to ignore pain. The Marines made him a mean motherfucker.
Did I forget to mention that Trake’s a former soldier? Well, he is, all that survival and combat type stuff comes naturally to him. The little bit of time he spent in the forest after he left the 1007th was a bit of a teaching experience. He got a little bit of knowledge of how to live off of the land, and it really helps him.
Being in Iraq, you had to pay attention to anything out of the ordinary, and be able to detect anything. While he has had his moments, Trake still has quite sharp senses, and can pick up pretty minute details that other people wouldn’t easily pick up.
Growing up in hot Texas, Trake has turned into a bit of a human cactus. He doesn’t need water that often, and doesn’t usually drink it that fast if he can help it. He used to heat, and it doesn’t bother him as much as it does other people.
Weaknesses/Problems:
Being through the stuff Trake has been through; Trake has a few problems keeping him from being the best all-around person. Those bullets he took in Iraq? One went through his chest, making heavy breathing painful, and strikes to the area of his body are especially painful, and that isn’t helped by all those knife wounds he took in his abdomen didn’t help either. Plus, just being freshly tortured has made just everything painful for him.
As stated before, Trake has a minor bit of homophobia, but that doesn’t hinder him as much as his PTSD does. He has constant nightmares that can’t be cured, his PTSD triggers can’t really be tracked , and if he doesn’t have his pain meds, his migraines come back to disable him completely. He’s a walking container of fucked-up, with the last glimmer of hope left being stomped out. He’s on edge, and there’s not much that he can do about it.
Trake can no longer use his sugar coating charisma to talk to people. Although he may get better someday, it’s not going to be anytime soon. So, he’s gonna be pretty blunt. Like ‘Yes those pants make your butt look big’ kind of blunt. While it can’t harm too much, it’ll rarely help him, so it’s a bit of a problem.
After seeing the shit he’s seen, you might not have an ordinary appetite either, so yeah, he doesn’t get hungry that often, and even when he does, he doesn’t eat much, and he needs a bit less food to run on.
Other than that cliché crap, Trake doesn’t like those arachnids. Who likes those things anyway?
Vehicles: None
Home Base: None
Starting Point: Running down a dirt road connected to a highway.
Extras-
Theme Song:
Sound Off – Slaughterhouse Additional Information: This is where I talk about how sexually adept Trake is. K? Also, he has a voice that makes any woman orgasm automatically.
Username: FirecrackerMain
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