The Treehouse Ch. 04

Getting all the girls to settle down was no easy feat. The excitement of being free along with the whole hideout living arrangements had them all talking a mile a minute. Molly showed them all the shower and that all brought up the arguments. "Girls!" Molly said as loud as she could. "Girls, I just screamed, and that was very dangerous and stupid of me. Who knows who could have heard that and come investigate? If I have to scream to get your attention, then we have a serious problem. I don't want problems period but serious problems normally get Adam involved, and Adam solves problems by feeding them to the pigs and gattors. I really don't want to have to get him involved. Especially about something so stupid. So, listen, so what if you're last? Being last means you can take your time. And first or last its all the same water. Unless you plan on standing there for a long time, we will have plenty of water. Here life is simple, you eat sleep and train. Fighting is part of training, it's the only time it will be allowed. We all get along or die."

Connie always had to have the last word it seems, "Your suggesting Adam would feed us to the pigs for fighting? We've only been with him a day or so, but he just doesn't seem that cold."

Molly slowly shook her head, "Girls over time you will hear Adams story but for now just know this. As gentle as he is, I assure you, if he thinks for a minute that you are a danger to this place or me, he would feed you to the pigs and not loose any sleep over it. He has stayed alive by living by the moto, 'if it's dangerous kill it'. Simple really, you don't talk to danger, you kill it. So do not ever make him think you are dangerous."

Gwen, quietly murmured, "As if we could ever be a danger to him."

Molly answered her, "If you endanger this camp, say by being too loud, by building a fire that smokes. By ruining the water supply or any other stupid thing, you are a danger to him. Think about this, no one has ever gotten in this camp other than me and I didn't get in without his help. He was actually keeping me alive to find out who was following me. After he got all the info he could he had ever intention of killing me and feeding me to the pigs. I was lucky my back trail showed I was on the run, not searching for him. I convinced him to give me a chance. Over and over he would say, I'd be better off just feeding you to the pigs. This camp is more important than any one of us. I'm telling you this, not to scare you. I believe he is the kindest man I have ever met but I also don't doubt for a minute that he would kill any and all of us if he thought we were a danger to this camp."

The girls were all quiet, trying to get their minds around how he could be the kindest man and yet would kill them all fit in the same sentence. Judy asked if they would be better off outside, but the others felt this was still the safest they had ever felt. After much discussion they did agree on one thing. Adam could be as cold as he needed to be so don't mess up. Molly didn't really want them to fear him, but she did want them to take him seriously. None of them had ever really known any nice guys so why did they put him in that category? Maybe because he treated them with respect? So being nice to them means he's a nice guy and we all know nice guys are weak.... "Girls let me make this very clear, Adam is probably the nicest guy you will ever know but that doesn't make him weak. As long as you do your best to make his home safe then you will never be in any danger. If you are his family, he will kill to protect you. IF you are a threat to his family, he will kill you. Anyway, enough worrying, for now let's eat."

After a few days the girls had all fell into their routine, they slept, ate and helped with the various chores. Gwen mentioned she was worried about Adam. She hadn't noticed him being around the camp. Molly just laughed and said with all us girls here he felt safer in the trees. They didn't know about the nights he had came to her bed and slept with her. He always left before anyone woke up.

One morning they woke up to him sitting by the fire cooking bacon. Bacon was something they hadn't had in years, but the smell was something they knew. "Where did you get bacon?" Gwen asked. After a bunch of teasing about her not really knowing where bacon came from Adam explained how fast pigs bred and how he killed one ever week or so to keep the herds under control and to have plenty of food in the smokehouse.

"I keep a few deer and some pigs in the smokehouse but with 6 people to feed I may have to work a little harder to keep up. Ya'll need to get busy learning how to hunt. I'll help you for now, but you have to learn how to take care of yourself. I'm busy watching the outside. I don't know if your former owners will be missed or not. Somehow I doubt it, but I'm still paying extra attention to that area. My point is I'm not going to baby you forever, if Molly hasn't started showing you how to shoot then she will soon. Learn how to use any and all of the weapons around you and I will test you later.

Molly wanted a family, you're it. She explained to me her reasons and while I may question her motives, I can't disagree with her logic. This family may be the last one left on this world for all I know. My job is to keep it safe. I can't keep us safe and feed us all at the same time."

Connie or course with her ever ready smirk asked," Are you gonna expand the family by saving more girls like us or are you gonna get us all pregnant?"

"Having babies will happen on its own. No need to work at it, we will all discuss that at a later time, Adam doesn't want to have any part of that discussion." Molly said, trying to derail that subject before Connie pushed Adam too hard.

But she was too late, Adam grabbed his gear and walked away. "Connie you stupid little tramp, you just had to push. Can't you learn to keep you mouth shut? Shit! Listen, I know you want to get him in your bed, but it won't work. If he thinks you are trying to manipulate him by using sex, he will kill you. Seriously, do not ever try to manipulate him. I like you, hell we all like you and I would like you to be a part of this family. He will never get close to you if pull that shit. If somehow you convince me that you really want it and you aren't just using it to gain favor, then I will try to convince him. But if you push him, he will just walk away, or if he thinks you're causing trouble in camp he will kill you. The women who killed his family pulled the same shit you just did. Do you want him to think about that? Do you want him to remember them while your pulling him toward your bed? How do you think that will work out?

I know you are just trying to survive and getting on a guy's good side is normally a way to do it. But not here. With this man you talk straight. You don't use sex as a tool and you don't manipulate. You find a way to help the family and do your job and treat him like a king because like it or not, he is the king in this part of the world. With a flick of his hand he could kill us all and have no one to answer to. He makes all the decisions and if he wants our opinion, he will ask for it. He may or may not ever join you in bed but if he does it will be because he trusts you first. He lived for 20+ years without sex and he will not let it control him."

That shut everyone up and Connie managed to look guilty but with her you never know when to take her serious. She had a smart mouth and while it was fun at times it wasn't something Adam was used to. Judy trying to be helpful and take some of the heat off Connie said. "He did mention on the way here that you had opened up a hunger in him and when you told him it was ok; we might better watch out."

Janet threw in, "He also said we all had beautiful asses."

That got lots of giggling, and they settled down to finishing up the bacon.

"I'm sorry," Connie softly said, "you're right, I've always used sex as a tool. If nothing else it made it better for me, instead of being raped I felt in some small way it was my idea. I don't know if I can just, as you said, talk straight. But I will say this for sure, that man makes my legs shake. And I mean that in a good way. I want to curl up against him and just eat him up. He said he would never force us, and while that's fine and dandy in one way. It sucks in another. He won't just take me and in return I can't just take him." That got some giggles, like if that was even possible. "But damnit, I'm horny! Something about him just gets my juices flow and I can assure you no matter how much I used sex as a tool I've never flooded myself like this."

"Will someone just change the subject? Let's go work on the bows, I need to practice killing something before I join Connie in the flooding department." Gwen whispered.

Everyone else just laughed, even Gwen giggled, embarrassed at herself for admitting to it. The all wondered how in just a short period of time they went from hating men to lusting about one. Good men were hard to find, and if they did find one, they all wanted him hard!!!

"Grab your bows, time to go kill a scarecrow."

After showing the girls how to strap down their girls and not get the string slap they all practiced till they got tired. Even making it a competition didn't help. Their arms were just not strong enough to keep going. And working on throwing knives or spears didn't work with either. Molly mentioned working on climbing the ropes and they all just laughed at her, "We're too tired to pull a bow string and you want us to pull ourselves up a rope. Sorry there has to be something we can work on that doesn't require arm strength."

So, Molly decided to give them a tour of everything that was in their safe zone. It was a fairly large area but other than a few trailers and garden there wasn't much to it. "Do any of you know how to fight?"

Judy was the only one who said she could. Had a brother growing up and they fought quite a bit. So, Molly had the girls all fighting the best they could and Judy and her would step in and offer suggestions. She told them to avoid hitting each other in the face. It didn't really hurt the enemy as much as your own hands. You want to hit the throat or groin. Any thing to disable them long enough to either get away or for you to get behind them and choke them out. They worked on the choke holds and how to not only do them but how to get out of one. Molly had worked with Adam enough that she actually could help them. She made sure they all knew that this was the kindergarten school. Adam would take this to the next level as they got better.

She told them numerous times to not get overconfident, no matter how tough they thought they were that Adam could take on all of them and once with one hand and have them all crying for mercy within a minute.

"Girls, we are going to have to work on our strength, we need to run and climb and shoot everyday till we drop. I have been here for months and I climb that rope a dozen times every day. You don't understand. This is a new world for us. One, we don't have men to beat us, which is nice. But we don't have men to feed us either. We don't have men to protect us, not that they ever did that much. My point is you now have to take care of yourselves. We take care of the gardens, but they are seasonal, we won't always have fresh vegies. We have to smoke and take care of any of the meat Adam brings. If you don't know how to do something, ask. We need to work on cleaning and tanning the deer hides. We can always use the skins for clothes when it gets cooler and also to protect us. Rope burns and scrapes on tree bark is a hassle. If we had leather clothes it might be helpful. Have any of you skinned a deer? OK, well, we'll have to work on that. Either we get good enough with a bow and are able to climb out of here or we wait for Adam. That's probably the best bet because even if we were able to shoot one. Maybe we could gut it out there, but we would still have to carry it in here and none of us are strong enough to do that. You see the worries I'm talking about? We as a tribe or family, whatever we think of ourselves are gonna have to get strong enough to survive. Then Adam will respect us and in truth, maybe we can learn to respect ourselves."

So that's what they did, they worked hard on anything that needed doing. Adam came by and brought meat. He watched them with the bow and told them they were nearly ready to hunt. He told them he would take them out, maybe in groups of two. One to hunt and the other to watch. He also said he would work on a way to make in easier for them to bring the meat in here. The safe zone was nice for them but getting in and out by rope made carrying things in tough for the girls. He had them work on making sure all the knives were really sharp and he searched the tool area and found a saw that would work on bone. He intended to bring in a whole deer and teach them how to skin it and then how to cut it up in small enough pieces that they could carry.

He was so accustomed to just carrying the meat and climbing with it on his shoulders. It never crossed his mind that the girls might not ever have that kind of upper body strength. Even the larger pigs he killed he would just tie a rope to them and pull them up and lower them down. Again, something the girls would have trouble with. But that's just something they were gonna have to work on. Maybe two or more girls could work together to pull it up. Next time he killed a pig he would take a few of the girls and let them devise a way to carry it. They could learn teamwork that way.

He knew he could do it but on the off chance he was gone for a longer time or heaven forbid, something happened to him they had a chance of surviving. He could always make a ground path through the traps but hiding it would be tough. Especially with the path the foot traffic would leave. Hard to hide those. Not that he ever thought anyone could ever get this far past the outer traps. He may have gone a little crazy setting up the mazes and traps but losing your whole family tends to make you paranoid.

Life was settling down to a routine. The girls were getting stronger, climbing the ropes dozens of times every day was making a difference. He had taken them all out over time and they had all managed to kill a deer. They worked together to get the meat to camp and he was comfortable with leaving them to handle it. Tanning the hides was a lot more work than they thought but after some trial and error they were getting it down. They were having fun making leggings and shirts. They also made some nice back backs and weapon belts.

Adam decided to take another trip outside. Figured to search a few miles out around and make sure no one was getting too close. This started an argument. A few of the girls wanted to travel with him. Most of them could ride the horses well enough. But in the off chance they came up on a camp of slavers he was worried about them being able to handle it. Riding and even hiding they might be able to do, but kill someone? When he first set them free, he offered to let them kill the one slaver and none of them could do it.

"Girls, the problem is, if we find someone... Well the odds are we're gonna have to kill them. Ya'll couldn't kill the slaver who beat you, how are you gonna be able to kill one you don't know. It's not like we are gonna go up and talk to them to decide if they are evil men or not. We will watch, but if they are slavers, I'm killing them. So far, I've never came up on anyone who wasn't a slaver, so I've not run into that situation. Maybe a group or even a single person, if they are just traveling by, I'll let them go. But the point is, these decisions have to be made quickly and without second guessing. I think you will be able to ride and hide well enough but killing? I would love it if you never have to kill someone. But in this world, I don't think that's possible. In my mind, true or not, I believe everyone I've killed would do the same to me if they had the chance. This is still a war as far as I'm concerned. Everyone is the enemy until proven otherwise."

Gwen, the last person he expected to comment said, "Hard to prove otherwise if they're dead."

"True, that decision is made while I'm watching them, normally it an easy choice. I see slaves so all the rest are enemies. So far, I've always followed them and killed them one by one as they are travelling, and they normally run. I didn't kill all of them. Just enough to make them leave my area. If I had killed them all I'd have ended up with girls like you and I didn't want that. Now I'm not so sure what I would do. Groups of guys are easy, but how many more girls do you think we can save? We're lucky so far, ya'll seem like nice girls. But what if we save some and they end up being trouble. How are you gonna handle it if I have to, well, take care of some problem? Maybe we get three girls and one of them is trouble. I take care of her, but the other two girls are now so nervous about me that they don't fit in. Or if it makes some of you start doubting me.

I want ya'll to feel comfortable but at the same time I won't put up with anyone who starts trouble. And yes, if you're wondering, I will be able to get rid of the problem without feeling bad. My family comes before anyone else as far as I'm concerned, and I don't believe any of you will be able to handle that. I'm not sure I want you to even see it."

"We watched you kill the guys that had us and as for me, not sure about the others, but I've never thought a bad thing about it. It hasn't made me question you, it if anything just makes me feel safe." Janet was looking at the other girls as she was talking, and they were all shaking their heads in agreement.

"I believe if we were attacked, all of you would be able to fight and yes, kill. But in this case, I'm the one doing the attacking. In my mind it's the same thing. If you let the enemy hang around in your area long enough, they will end up finding you and attacking. To me the best defense is a good offense. Plus, it's always been me against the world. One person can't defend against a group, but one man can attack that same group and win if he plays it right. I take them out one by one, normally circle around and they think they are being attacked on all sides, so they run. I then take out a few of the slower ones to make sure the others are motivated to keep going. I never let anyone see me. My point is, if one or more of you go with me you will be expected to kill someone without them ever seeing you. In anything other than war that would be murder. Can you handle that?"

"I can." Gwen said. She was the last person anyone expected to speak up. "I'm one of the best at distance shooting. Some of the others may be better at the bullseye but I'm good at hitting the target at the longer distances and it sounds like that's what's need here."

Judy stepped up, "I'll go, I don't know if I can just shoot someone out right, but I can be backup and if you're boxed in, I can help out. In that situation I will have no problem shooting them. They're attacking you; I know you attacked first but I don't care. If they are attacking you, I'll kill em!"

"Ok, we're heading out early morning, if you're not up I'm leaving you. This is not practice, this is the real deal. I'll have the horses and some pack loaded outside the second trap. Can you find that, or do I need to come get you?"

"We can find it; we've been there numerous times." Both girls said. "We'll be ready. I'll bring bows and any weapons we can easily carry."

Adam was worried but the fact was, they were at war and he needed to know if they were warriors or not. He hated that they had to do it, but he also knew that by himself he could not protect all of them. At least half of them were gonna have to be warriors. Especially if they ended up with more freed slaves.