"That'll be twenty dollars ma'am. No ma'am. No. I. Do. Not. Accept. Loose. Change. Only bills please."
Name: Warren Ames
Age: 62
Gender: Male
Former Occupation: Cashier, Vietnam War veteran.
Appearance: 
Height: 5' 10"
Weight: 180 lbs
Scars/Tattoos/Other: A US Marine Corps tattoo on his left arm, faded now with his old age.
Past Affiliates:
- His old military friends, men from his platoon and company that lived, fought and died alongside him. Some made it back to the States to attempt to reintegrate back into normal society, most came home in boxes.
- His old landlord, a younger man named Miguel. The two shared an odd form of respect: neither bothered the other; Ames paid his rent on time and with the exact amount, not a cent more or less, and Miguel minded his own business about some of the old man's...eccentricities. After the outbreak occured Ames lost track of the Spaniard, maybe he's still alive out there somewhere. He really doesn't know.
- A neighbour, by the name of Richardson, more specifically the widow of said Richardson. Her husband had passed some years before and she lived alone in the apartment across from his, and you could say that there was something between the two, but in all truth Ames enjoyed her company the same way she enjoyed his, nothing more and nothing less. Two lonely souls just looking for someone to spend the rest of their days with.
Current Affiliates: None. Everyone he's known has either died of old age, natural causes, or the virus. A sad, lonely existence seems to be Ames' life. Until now.
Skills: His years spent in the business of managing and crunching numbers has given Ames a very good head for quick calculations, a talent that lasts even into his old age, though it is hampered somewhat by that age and its effects on his gray matter. That same mind for quick, unfettered number crunching is also the home for a precise eye, one that is well trained not only by numbers, but also by the time he's spent in the military. Not only is he able enough to guesstimate a distance or odds, but he is also precise enough that things do happen to within a reasonable frame of them happening. No he's not superhuman, neither is he super smart, but he's smart enough.
The military has also prepared Ames for more than he bargained for in the apocalypse, for if it had not been for those treacherous months in the jungles of North Vietnam and the shitstorm at Ho Chih Minh, he would not have learned, through sheer will and determination, the skills and ways of living with the bare essentials, and even without them. Ames is a survivalist by nature, one skill he had taken to practice even after the war and his old age. Once he retired, Ames would spend days or even weeks on end camping out in the forest by himself, perhaps to relive those misbegotten moments of the war, or maybe it's because he is the most at rest in those conditions, encapsulated in the memories of his brethren, both fallen and living alike.
Of course, having been in the military means he knows his way around firearms. He is no crack shot, but he knows enough about firearms and firearm safety to ensure that maybe something doesn't go wrong with whatever ill-begotten gains the Towers have.
Strengths: His prior military training in the Marines has given Ames the abilities of thinking quick on his feet and a natural leadership sense that has yet to evade him. Add to that a keen eye, though worsened with age, and a bravery matched only by the VC he once fought against, and Ames is quite the man. He can survive a good while on his own given enough provisions (and heart meds), and though he's no craftsman, he at least knows how to tie decent enough knots and how to fashion extremely rudimentary gear or fixes for broken stuff. He is also dependable and an honest man, past the hard soldier exterior which he does little to maintain.
Weaknesses: Mild PTSD, rheumatism, general old age, the years have not been kind to Warren Ames. His mental faculties may still be those of a man turning forty, maybe, but his physical capabilities aren't so great. He can't even run a few feet without stopping to catch his breath, and occasionally, his chest acts up. Maybe it's a side effect of the medication he takes for his PTSD? Or maybe it's his old pump complaining about his lifestyle. He doesn't know. All he knows that his body's slowly failing and, one day, it'll give up the ghost, and so will he.
History: The Vietnam War was not good on Ames. He made friends in his company, and he watched half of those young men end up in plywood boxes buried under six feet of dirt. Some never made it back to the States in one piece. The memories still haunt him to this day, though Ames is a tough man. After the war, he went into accounting for pretty much his whole life. It's what he was born into, having a mother and father that were both dedicated number crunchers whose lives were so stale and boring that you might think that he'd be the same. That was the main reason that influenced him to go into the military, where his father hadn't.
The 70s were a turbulent time, and soon the war effort was put into gear; Ames was shipped straight off to Vietnam, leaving his ailing folks behind. When he returned, momma was dead of a stroke and pop was in the hospital, where he too went several days later. They left him their considerable wealth and their business, in the hopes that he wouldn't put it to waste. In their memory, of course he didn't. With the money he hired several folk younger than himself to run their accounting firm while he furthered his studies, whereupon he took a graduate degree in finance management, qualifying him enough to start watching over his own company.
He planned on offering good, affordable insurance rates to families of the time, but seeing as this was the late 70s going to the 80s, it didn't sell so hot. He kept his chin up and forged through the tougher times, when insurance started to sell better after the world got less and less safe. Through the decades he toiled, struggling to keep his company relevant through the 90s and into the new millenium, where even more tragedies befell his nation and places abroad; good business for him, yes, but now he had to keep up with demand as well as keep up all the good work he'd made for himself in the past. By this time he was already in his fifties, pushing sixty, and he decided, finally, to step down and let someone younger than him take over. He separated from the company entirely, intent on using his gains to live out a quiet, peaceful life.
Of course, he soon got bored with the retired life, and so he scored himself a job as a cashier at a local grocery store, where he worked all the way until the outbreak itself hit. When that happened, he instinctually did what every other American would do: stock up and hunker down. Canned foods and long-lasting supplies, like bottled water and soaps, were plentiful at the start, but one week was all it took for things to dwindle down to trickles and drops. Soon there was almost nothing left to scavenge, by which point the infection was in full swing, dropping people like flies, left and right, destroying whatever semblance of a life Ames had left. He barricaded himself into his apartment, intent on staying away from the worst of it, while he lived off of tins of beans and bottles of water, slowly regressing into his training while the world around him crumbled.
Eventually the worst was over, and when it seemed like everything was calm, he broke free from his cocoon and went wandering. A few weeks later and he stumbled upon a working radio that was broadcasting a message from the Towers and he, naturally intrigued, made a beeline for them.
And my guy's done.
Funny. I always saw Ermey as one of those old guys that doesn't believe he's old. Now I've written him as an old guy that knows he's old. Hah, take that stereotypes!
