The Survivalist
by Alpesco
Two Travelers run into a Powerful young Woman.


It started when me and my boyfriend Vince hired a trailer for a camping trip
into the mountains.

It was the third day. We were driving through a remote area of wooded
mountains, about twenty miles from the nearest town, when we saw a tall woman
in jeans and a sleeveless shirt standing at he side of the road. The woman was
late twenties, with straggly blonde hair that fell to her shoulders. She waved
to flag us down. We stopped to see what the problem was. When we got out, we
could see that she was very tall. At around six feet two she was considerably
larger than me, at five foot eight, and she even looked down at Vince at
closer to five feet ten..

"Hi," she said. "I'm Karen Sandwood. I need some help. My car broke down along
the trail in the woods." She pointed into the trees. "Can you take me to
town?'

'Sure,' Vince said. "Hop in."

"It's about twenty miles to the next town," Vince looked at his roadmap. "Is
that okay?"

"That'll do fine," she said. "I've been out looking at new camping sites. If I
can get hold of a mechanic who'll come out to give me tow, that'll be great."

After another few miles on winding roads, we stopped to have a cup of coffee
at a picnic site overlooking the mountains.

Karen towered over us, and she was solidly built. Her blue jeans displayed
powerful legs with muscles that stretched them to the limit, her shoulders
were broad and her bare arms looked strong.

"Coffee is a rare treat," she said as I took the mugs out from the trailer
kitchen. "I don't take it much because I like to look after my health."

"You look fairly healthy," I said.

"I believe in staying strong." She raised her long arms and flexed them. I
drew a breath. Her biceps were huge! Her arms had looked quite strong before
she flexed them, with dense, corded muscles running along their length. But
when she tensed them, two ballooning hills of muscle erupted. Each was bigger
than any bicep I'd ever seem up close - and they looked so solid!

Looking reduced in the shadow of this six foot two inch girl and her
outstanding muscles, Vince looked subdued.

"My biceps split the tape at just about seventeen inches now," she said with
pride. "I mean to get them to eighteen. I work out a lot, and I do a lot of
heavy work. Feel them if you like. They're rock hard."

I felt them. "They are!" I gasped as I cupped my hands around the rounded
peaks. I could hardly get my hands around the biceps themselves. Sandwood
looked pleased. Then she hardened her flex, and the big bicep swelled again,
forcing my fingers apart irresistably. It was a strange sensation, like a rock
expanding and growing harder at the same time.

"I have my own place tucked away in these hills," she explained. "I have to
work hard to keep it up. I keep chickens and hogs, grow potatoes and
vegetables. I chop down trees for fuel. With all that work I weigh 175 pounds,
and its solid muscle."

Without warning, she bent, and picked me up in her arms like I was a baby,
bouncing me up and down as she walked around with me. It seemed no effort at
all for her to take my weight. It was a funny feeling. I was twenty eight,
about the same age as she looked, but she was carrying me around like a small
kid! Vince, my boyfriend, was thirty seven, and he hadn't ever carried me with
this sort of ease. Strangely I found the feeling of being carried so easily
and securely, quite enjoyable.

Karen lowered her right arm and my legs sank toward the ground, but they
didn't touch. I suddenly realised that she was still supporting my weight just
with her left arm that was still wrapped firmly around my upper body! She
raised her right arm in another flex, then set me down. Immediately she
stepped across to Vince, leaned to one side, and just scooped him up into her
arms as easily as she had done with me. He gave a yell of protest, but was
unable to resist the tall young woman's strength. His legs just came straight
up off the ground in Sandwood's arms, as he fell back into her cradle. She
seemed to be carrying his hundred and sixty pounds just as effortlessly as she
had my hundred and thirty! She was so tall that he seemed way up in the air as
she spun round with him in her long, powerful arms. I could see the muscles as
they supported his weight, large, hard and golden brown.

"Okay, you can put me down now!" Vince said, a little sharply. The tall woman
walked inside the trailer, and lowered him easily back to his feet.

"Do you live in these mountains alone?" he asked, brushing himself down.

"I'm a survivor," the woman said. "I've made it my business to learn how to
survive on my own out here in the wild. Very soon everyone is going to have to
do as I do."

"Why?" I asked.

"Isn't it obvious?" she said. "It's all falling apart. The cities. Society.
The world. The whole of civilisation is going to break down very soon. You can
see it happening even now. I left the city two years ago, and I'm preparing
for when it all goes belly-up. That's why I came out to these mountains."

"You can't believe all that.." I said.

"Of course I believe it," she frowned. "I've found myself a good pure mountain
to live on, and I'm gathering a big stockpile of supplies for when the bad
times start. That's why I'm going to need to borrow your car and your
trailer."

"You what?" Vince said.

"I'm going to need to borrow your car, and this trailer," she repeated. "My
homestead was meant to be self-sufficient. But I've had some important stuff
get damaged and broken in the past few months. Transformers, feed, parts for
the power generator. I'm beginning to believe people in the government are
working against me. I need to replace these things. I was waiting at the
roadside for a pick-up to come by, but there weren't any, so I chose you."

"Well. We're very sorry about your troubles," Vince broke in, "but there's
nothing that we can do to help..."

"I've told you what you can do," Sandwood said. "You can give me the loan of
your transport so that I can get the supplies I need."

"What about your own car?"

"That broke down past fixing a long time ago. That's why I need the use of
your vehicle. And since I currently have some banking problems, I'll also need
you to make payment up front for the things I need. It'll all come in at less
than twelve hundred dollars."

'Twelve hundred dollars!" Vince exclaimed. "Are you crazy?"

"You'll get the money back," the young woman said. "I've got a whole set of my
best woodcarvings back at the cabin. They're worth at least two hundred bucks
apiece. That'll be a whole lot more than twelve hundred dollars."

"Woodcarvings?" I could see Vince getting steadily angrier. "Do you think
we're going to let you fill our trailer with your junk, and then pay you over
a thousand dollars for woodcarvings? You seriously need help, lady. I think
you'd better just walk away. You'll have to find another helper. You're going
no farther with us!"

Karen put her hands to her ears and started shaking her head. "Why is everyone
trying to sabotage my life? Sometimes I think the whole country is working
against me! Do you work for the government? I know they want to stop me.."

"Look," Vince walked up to her. "I've had just about enough of this. I want
you out of this trailer right now. Not only are we not going to help you, if
you don't get out of here right now, I'm calling the police."

"I don't think so." Sandwood stretched her arms out across the trailer. They
were so long they almost touched the side walls, barring our way past her. As
the two of us tried to push past her, her long arms curled around our midriffs
and set themselves rigid. "Don't think you can stab ME in the back!" she said,
bracing her long body against us both.

The two of us tried to press forward, anxious to be rid of this half-crazy
woman. But to our surprise, we found that we weren't making any headway!
Sandwood's outstretched arms were like granite. They just did not move! Nor
did the young woman's powerful legs give a single fraction of an inch - even
though both of us were pushing together!

We pressed harder, in disbelief that this one alarming woman was capable of
resisting us both! But the large muscles on Karen Sandwood's long arms merely
seemed to be growing more starkly defined as they fought our attempts to press
forward. I found myself tiring and gasping for breath. I looked across to
Vince, whose face was red as he put another surge of effort into dislodging
her. But the six foot two woman was exerting herself too. The stone-hard
muscles across her shoulders had grown into chiseled boulders as they flared
and striated.

"I'm pretty strong," Sandwood said. "I'm awful hard to get the best of."

We couldn't believe that she was preventing both of us from escaping the
kitchen area. Vince pushed harder, but the big young woman, smirked as she
resisted, bracing her solid legs against the two of us. Then she gave a grunt
of effort, surged forward, and pressed both of us fiercely back into the
storage units.

"There!" she said, sounding satisfied as she stepped back, her broad arms
outstretched. She looked as though she had expected no other result. "Have you
played around enough now? All I'll need from you is your car keys, your credit
cards and the authorization codes. I'll load up the trailer and take it from
there." She turned to reach for my purse which was lying on one of the
upholstered seats.

"Oh no you don't!" Vince lunged forward. Karen stretched out a long arm and
planted her hand in the middle of his chest, holding him at bay. As six foot
two, she was four inches taller than Vince, but her arm seemed nearly eight
inches longer than his, as he struggled to reach her.

Furious, he took a swipe at her with his clenched right fist. Sandwood just
leant her head back, out of the way, watching the blow speed past a foot in
front of her face. She scowled.

"My turn," she said, as she balled her right hand into a fist. It looked
disconcertingly big and heavy. Vince just didn't have time to move as she
drove it into his lower chest. The blow was unexpected, and alarmingly,
powerful.

"Oooouuurrrgghh!" Vince made a horrible gurgling noise as her blow impacted.
He doubled over, clutching his stomach, gasping for breath and continuing to
groan in pain.

I looked at Sandwood, alarmed to note that the younger woman still looked
really annoyed as she watched my boyfriend slowly regain control of his
breathing and straighten up.

CRACKK! Her heavy arm moved again, cleanly and purposefully. It connected with
the left side of Vince's face, and it connected hard. He spun into the side
wall of the trailer, his cheek misshapen, and blood streaming down his face. I
was shocked to see him stagger so badly that he had to prop himself up against
the counter to remain upright. The woman scowled and primed her fist again.

"Stop!" I threw myself on Karen, desperate to protect Vince from another big
shot like that. I was clinging to her. But she tore me off, gripping me under
the arm and around the upper thigh. I cried out at the pain of her steely
grip. Then she just extended her strong arms beneath me, lifting me right off
my feet! I struggled, trying to free myself. But Sandwood's arms just kept on
pushing upward, raising me higher and higher until my body was halted by the
trailer roof! I cried out in alarm, looking down at the trailer spread out
beneath me as those powerful arms held me pressed up against the steel roof.

"Enjoy the view?" she said. Then she let go of me.

I screamed as I plummeted back down to the trailer floor, landing on my side.
I hit so hard the whole trailer shook. The pain was intense. She was so
strong! I was bleeding. My head was spinning. I saw flashing lights. The whole
of my left side seemed like it was on fire! This woman was just too powerful
for me.

I looked up to see that Vince had recovered, he lurched toward the tall young
woman, shocked by what had happened to me.

But Sandwood stepped across me, and her long right arm lanced forward to
strike Vince again. There was an explosive crack as her heavy fist met his
jaw. He gave a cry as he was spun completely round and hurled back into the
wall.

"That's enough!" the interloper shouted, her voice so loud it made the closet
doors rattle. It was really intimidating, coming from such a tall figure.
Vince was propping himself up against the trailer wall as though if he didnt,
he'd collapse in a heap. I could see he was hurt badly. His free hand was
cradling his jaw, and he looked really shocked by the young woman's raw power.

He held up his hand in surrender as she stepped closer. I could see that he
really didn't want to take another hit from Sandwood's powerful arms.

"Please! No more!" He stumbled, falling on to one knee. "Please don't hit me
again!"

I lay where I was, stunned. I couldn't believe this woman had beaten us both
so completely. Beside a shimmer of sweat on her brow, she looked untouched.
Even her buttoned cheesecloth shirt was undisturbed apart from where the
sleeves had been torn away to reveal her strong arms. She wasn't even
mussed-up. She was just towering over us, as strong as ever, and capable of
doing even more damage if she chose.

"Now neither of you give me any more trouble," she said as she bent, picked
Vince up easily in her arms, and crried him to the couch that ran along the
far side of the trailer. He offered no resistance. What was disturbing was
that this crazy young woman didn't even seem to consider the possibility that
the two of us might be able to stop her from doing exactly what she wanted.
She produced a cord and ordered him to put his hands behind his back while she
tied them together. He obeyed in silence.

Picking me up, she did the same to me, binding and gagging us securely. Next
she opened our wallets and purses, removing the credit cards and cash.

"Now I want the correct authorization numbers for these cards," she said.

"You don't think we're giving you the authorization codes to let you take all
our money, do you?" Vince said.

"I've told you what's happening," Sandwood clenched her heavy fist. "The first
law of survival says that you only own what you're strong enough to keep.
You're going to give me the numbers - and they'd better be the right ones. You
either give them to me in the next thirty seconds, and make it easy on
yourself, or you'll give them to me in a few minutes time, when you're in a
hell of a lot more pain. It's up to you. I'm easy either way." The big muscles
of her right arm swelled as she drew back her fist above Vince.

Vince gave her the numbers. So did I.

"You'd better be sure these are correct," she said, scribbling them down. "If
there's any trouble in the store, I'm going to come back here and make you
wish you were off the face the planet."

She drew the blinds on the windows and left the trailer. A minute later we
heard the car engine start up and felt the trailer pull out onto the road. The
two of us had been hijacked. we were tied securely. We couldn't move or speak.
We could do nothing to stop her.

Just over a half hour later the trailer stopped. The car engine shut down and
the door slammed. There was silence for nearly two hours as we struggled with
our securely tied bonds. It was dark when the trailer door opened and the tall
figure of Karen stepped in.

"I'm going to have to move the both of you," she said.

Vince grunted as Sandwood picked him up in her arms and carried him outside. A
moment later she came back for me. Her arms slid beneath me and lifted me up.
I groaned in pain as the bruises from her earlier bodyslam raged back to life.
The tall young woman carried me outside to where a flat-bed trolley loaded
with sacks, cans and boxes stood waiting. Our trailer was parked on a stretch
of waste ground about a half mile from an out of town shopping mall. There was
no-one else around. Karen set me down on the car hood.

"I'll untie you if you promise not to try to run away or betray me in any
other way," she said. "If you agree, nod."

I nodded. She untied me, then turned and picked up the still-bound Vince once
more, laying him in the back seat of the car and slamming the door.

"Don't move," she ordered me as she began to load the sacks and boxes into our
trailer. "If you're thinking about running, it's half a mile to the nearest
building. I can cover that distance in a hundred and thirty seconds from a
standing start. Faster on a good day. Unless you can beat that, I'd stay
exactly where you are."

I shivered. I couldn't escape. She was obviously an athlete. I would find it
hard to keep up half that speed for more than a few yards. "What do you plan
on doing?" I asked. "How much of our money have you spent?"

"About twelve hundred, like I said," Karen answered. "I know exactly what I
want."

The trailer was soon weighed down with our hijacker's supplies. The girl
lifted hundred pound sacks with ease, and tossed a wooden crate of generator
parts into the trailer as if it were a bale of wool. As I watched her loading
I heard Vince's voice come faintly through the car window.

"Are you untied?" he said.

"Yes." I hissed.

"There's a cell phone in the trailer. If you can sneak in, grab it and call
the police!"

"Okay." I was sorry I hadn't thought of that. I waited until Sandwood had
finished loading up the trailer, then edged my way in through the trailer door
as she dragged the pallet trolley off to the side of the park.

The trailer was full of boxes and piled-up sacks, but there at the front of
the trailer was the cell phone. I shut the metal trailer door, locked it, then
squeezed forward for the telephone.

"Hey!" Sandwood's shout rang across the truck park and into the trailer. "
Come out of there!" I managed to grab the cell phone. I tried to switch it on
in the dark.

Our captor was rattling the locked trailer door now. "Open this door," she
shouted. "NOW!" Even inside the trailer, her shout was intimidating. My hands
began to shake, fumbling the keys. At last the light on the phone came on.

"Okay." I heard Karen's voice from the far side of the steel door.

I tried to dial the emergency number with shaking fingers. Then, something
that felt like a small truck smashed into the trailer door. The glass
shattered in the tiny upper window as the whole trailer rocked with the force
of the impact. What on earth was happening?

Almost at once there was another impact, even harder than the first! Pans and
plates fell on to the floor as the whole trailer rocked again, almost throwing
me over. A mirror fell and shattered. I screamed. I looked across to see that
the steel door had been dented inward, buckling in the center, in the clear
shape of a foot. Karen was kicking in the door! I shivered. Karen was six foot
two and her legs were clearly extremely powerful. If she could kick that hard,
the door just wasn't going to stand too much more.

I stared desperately at the phone. I'd tapped in the number. Why wasn't it
ringing? My heart sank as I noticed the information bar. It read: No Signal!

KROOOM! The trailer door flew violently inward in an explosion of noise.
Shards of metal flew across the interior of the trailer as Karen's booted foot
burst through. An angry Karen stood in the ruined doorway.

Terrified, I ran to the window, managing somehow to squeeze out. Dropping to
the ground, I ran forward to the car, climbed in the drivers' seat and locked
all the doors and windows.

"Open the door!" Sandwood's voice penetrated the locked doors and sealed
windows. I tried to locate the key to get the car started.

CRASSH! I was showered in a storm of glass fragments as her fist came straight
through the reinforced glass side window, missing my face by inches. I
screamed. Her arms reached in, grabbed me beneath the armpits and simply
pulled my whole body out of the car.through the shattered passenger seat
window. She held me in front of her, supported by my armpits, my feet dangling
a foot above the ground.

"Please don't hurt me!" I begged, squirming to break free.

"You lied to me," Sandwood scowled. The pain from her grip under my arms was
becoming unbearable. "Don't you think you deserve to be punished?"

"But its OUR car," I mumbled.

"Wrong answer." Karen lowered me to the ground, releasing my left shoulder but
still keeping a firm grip on my right. Her long arm held me pinioned three
feet away from her. "I ended your property rights the moment you both turned
on me at the picnic site. As of now you own nothing, apart from whatever I
decide to let you have. Do you understand that?"

I wanted to tell her what i thought of her, but I didn't dare. Instead I
stayed silent.

"Do you understand?" I felt her grip on my right shoulder tightening. In
seconds I could feel my arm bruising where her hand gripped like a steel vice.
"Oww! Owww! Owwwww!"

I tried to claw my way free as the pain became unbearable, but my hand only
stretched as far as her bicep. I tried to scratch her upper arm, feeling the
granite massiveness of her bicep. Her response was to tighten her terrifying
grip on my shoulder. A flood of pain blazed through it like1,000 volts of
electricity, the searing pain running down my arm and shoulder. "Aaaaahhh!" I
cried as I lost all feeling in my arm. It dropped, paralysed, to my side.

"I just deadened all the nerves in your arm," Sandwood said, maintaining her
agonizing grip. "If I squeeze any harder, I'll pop your arm right out of its
socket. Shall we go for that?"

"No!" I wailed. "Anything you say. I'll do it. The car's yours. Everything's
yours! I won't resist!"

Karen's right arm moved. Suddenly there was a searing, blazing pain across the
left side of my face. I saw flashing stars as my head was hurled around. I'd
never been slapped with anything like that sort of force. If it hadn't been
for the tall woman's hold on my shoulder, I'd have been sent crashing to the
ground.

"Aaaaagghhhh!" I screamed again. The pain was incredible. My face was burning
as if boiling water had been thrown on it.

"Why? Why?" I howled, clutching my rapidly swelling face.

"Because you broke your word." Sandwood released my shoulder. "Your face is
going to hurt like that for a day or two, maybe three or four. That's part of
your punishment, and a reminder not to betray me again."

"I won't. I won't!" I said, stumbling backward, terrified she would hit me
again. I just didn't have any defense at all against this powerful woman. She
was more than twice as strong as I was, she could hurt me badly, and she could
outrun me. I had no option but complete surrender. "I'm sorry," I squeaked. "I
won't do it again."

"I hope so," she said, taking my cellphone in her right hand and closing her
fingers on it. There was a cracking and crunching from the plastic cover as
her fingers tightened around it. The cover split apart, caving in beneath the
pressure. I heard a continuous crunching noise as her hand continued to
squeeze. There were several sharp pops. Her hand unclenched, and bits of
plastic and broken circuit board fell to the ground. Our phone, our main means
of communication with the outside world, was no more.

"Now sit in the passenger seat and don't move a muscle," she ordered. I did
exactly as she said.

We drove for hours along lonely roads. Toward the end, she blindfolded me so
that I couldn't see where we were going. There soon followed a long bumpy
section of road that went on for about half an hour. Then the car stopped.
Sandwood opened the door and ordered me out.

As she lifted the still bound body of Vince out of the back seat, I had a
chance to see where I was. It was a camp in the woods.A steep hillside rose up
into darkness. A neat cabin and a stable stood in the shadow of the trees.
There were a couple of low barns for chickens and hogs. Two trapdoors seemed
to lead to underground stores or shelters.

"This is my place," she said, raising Vince in her arms so he could see. "Get
used to the view. You could be staying some time."