Wasteland Rules: Born to Fight (The World After Book 2) (3 page)

June 16, 2029

FDOT Yard South of Tallahassee

   They headed out towards Tallahassee from the
abandoned garage. Derek made sure to lock it back up since there were still
supplies in there and he might be back this way again. The keys had been in the
truck and it was in perfect condition. A quick look under the hood had revealed
it had the most powerful engine available for this model. A great find. A bonus
he would have to thank the Voice for.

   They made it about twenty minutes before Rora’s
curiosity got the better of her. “So what’s the plan?”

  “We should get there near nightfall. Assuming the
trucks are still there you will create a distraction and I will sabotage the
trucks.” He explained.

  “Then what?”

  “We head back to the drop off point and watch the
ensuing fireworks. Once the Reapers are fighting each other we should be able
to enter NASA.”

  “You really think they will get that worked up
over losing the meat?”

  “Reapers aren’t exactly known for their patience
and calm demeanor. They usually fight with each other over the slightest provocation
so this is pretty unusual for them to stay in one place and not fight with each
other. Once they realize there is only enough meat for one or two tribes they
will start fighting over it like rabid dogs.”

  “Why do you think the trucks will even be there?”

  “Because it’s the last stop before NASA.
Everything after is Reaper territory. They wouldn’t want to be there after dark
so they will leave first thing in the morning and return in the afternoon.”

  “Okay…how are we creating the distraction?”

  “Easy. You are going to bump into one of the
truckers and then start screaming how he assaulted you. Make a big scene and
everyone should come to watch. While you are doing that I’ll use the spider
suit to sneak onto the trucks and disable the air conditioning units.”

  “Seriously? I’m the distraction again?”

  “No one’s going to believe the trucker assaulted
me…” Derek replied with a grin.

  “Fine.” Rora agreed reluctantly.

 She rode the rest of the way to the roadhouse with
a frown on her face. He did feel bad about exploiting her again, but they
didn’t have much choice. They had to get the Reapers out of the way to get into
NASA and this was the only way. A woman crying rape didn’t mean much in the
wasteland; but in civilized places it was a serious crime, usually punished by
hanging. Even the suggestion of a man acting inappropriately towards a woman in
a place like a roadhouse could have serious consequences.

  They arrived at dusk and Derek was grateful that
the guards let them in. They did eye the truck suspiciously. Despite the damage
he had done and the dirt from the road it was still in remarkable condition for
a truck coming in from the wasteland. Normally he would never have brought it
into the compound, but he didn’t see any other way.

  The roadhouse was built around an old Best Western
and a Country Inn & Suites with a restaurant and general store in between.
It was just off the main highway and slightly east of the city. The lots were
pretty empty. It was technically in Reaper territory and there were few places
to travel to beyond Tallahassee heading east or south. Thankfully the six
refrigerated tractor trailers were parked in neat row in front of the old
Country Inn and Suites. He pulled in front of the Best Western and parked the
truck as far from the trailers as he could. He didn’t want his vehicle
associated in any way with the trouble they were about to cause.

  He exited the truck and climbed into the back of
the work truck to change into the stealth suit previously worn by the Outfit
assassin. Rora watched while he changed to make sure no one saw them. Once he
was changed he signaled her to go create the distraction. She banged on the
truck twice to acknowledge and then he waited.

   It wasn’t long before he heard the screaming. He
quietly exited the bed of the truck and made his way along the wall that
surrounded the compound. The suit blended perfectly into the shadows and he
quickly traversed the distance between the truck and the parked trailers. As he
passed by the restaurant he looked over and saw Rora creating the distraction.
She was waving her arms wildly and poking at one of the truckers. He could hear
her screaming all the way over where he was.

  The trucker had a confused look on his face and he
was surrounded by the other truckers. Most of who had amused looks on their
faces. The few other travelers had gathered behind Rora and looked upset or
amused. But the guards who had come over to try to calm the disturbance look
angry. They were trying to sort out the commotion and keep the peace. Everyone
was totally distracted. She was doing a great job keeping them distracted and
he should be able to work undisturbed.

  The trailers were all parked neatly and were
completely unguarded. He assumed they thought the roadhouse lot was safe. And
it probably was every other time. No one messed with the Hauler’s Guild. They
had connections across the entire country, money for merks and bounty hunters;
and no city, town, or faction wanted to get cut off from their goods. The lot
was also fairly well lit and would normally have had a guard patrolling. But
the guards were distracted and the suit kept him virtually invisible.

  Derek used the spider function of the suit to
easily climb on top of the first trailer. The generator powering the
refrigeration unit was humming along. He carefully sabotaged the generator so
it would fail in a few hours. That way it would fail after the truckers had
made their final inspection for the night and gone to bed. Before he moved to
the second truck his curiosity got the better of him. He had to know what they
were shipping to the Reapers. He had his suspicions, but he needed to be sure.

  The trailer was locked, but it was a fairly simple
lock and he picked it with ease. He slid the door open slightly and peered in.
As he suspected it was full of human corpses. It was pretty disgusting that
someone was providing dead bodies to feed the Reapers, and even worse was the
thought of where they would be getting so many from. Then he realized that all
of the bodies looked the same, and it hit him. They were clones; the Collective
was growing bodies just to kill them and send to the Reapers to keep them
around NASA.  The Collective was trying keep NASA contained and to keep people
and probably the device out.

   What exactly did this thing do that they were so
worried about? What did NASA know or have that was so important? The complex
was pretty well defended for a program that was facing obsolescence and had its
funding cut dramatically year over year. The Collective rarely interacted
outside their territory in the Pacific Northwest. To expend so many resources
outside that sphere of influence meant that the device was more powerful than
he had been led to believe.

   Derek realized his theorizing was wasting
valuable time and jumped back into action. He locked the trailer back up and
quickly sabotaged three of the remaining five generators. The truckers returned
as he was working on the final truck. He scrambled onto the roof of the trailer
and lay perfectly still. He went unnoticed as they did their inspections and
then went into the hotel.

   As soon as they had their backs turned Derek
dropped off the roof of the trucks and scuttled into the shadows. He was
pressed up against the side of the hotel when the guards strolled by on their
regular patrol. He held his breath and remained perfectly still as they walked
within a few feet of him. He could smell the cigarette smoke and sweat they
were so close. But neither man seemed to notice his presence and continued on
with their patrol. This suit was amazing; if they had had these in China they
never would have gotten caught.

   He returned to the truck and found Rora standing
patiently at the back. He watched for a minute before revealing his presence.
She appeared to be casually standing around, but her eyes were continuously
sweeping the area and she had her hand on her pistol. She even hesitated a
minute when she passed over him and looked directly at him. He could tell she
sensed something was off, but couldn’t tell what. Impressive. She was learning
quickly and demonstrating amazing abilities. Some she didn’t even know she had
apparently. There was definitely more to her than he had seen at first in that
scared, naïve girl he had rescued from the slavers.

   He slowly approached and made his presence known
so she didn’t shoot him accidentally. She started, but quickly recovered. He
climbed into the back before anyone could see him in the suit and started to
change. As he stripped out of the suit she whispered. “Did you do it?”

    “I did, but it was close. They came back as I
was finishing. What happened?”

   “I bumped one of them like you said and then
accused him of groping me. I made a big scene and everyone came over to see
what was going on.”

  “I could see that from a distance…” Derek
interrupted. “What happened after that?”

  “The guards came over and tried to sort it out.
Once they determined that I wasn’t really harmed they told the truckers to
leave and for me to stay away from them. They were more interested in
dispersing everyone and continuing their patrols than helping me.”

 He chuckled. “Business before anything else. Nice
to see nothing has changed.”

  “What now?” She asked.

  “We leave early in the morning, head over to the
drop point, and then wait for the fun to begin.” He replied.

June 17, 2029

Roadhouse East of Tallahassee

   They slept in the truck and left at first light. The
truck and the supplies were too valuable to leave unattended and Derek wanted
to be gone well before the truckers discovered their loads were compromised. He
imagined their reactions as they realized that their intended recipients would
be very unhappy with the cargo. Hopefully they would still drop the trailers
and then run instead of chickening out and failing to deliver. But he was
counting on the Hauler’s Guild reputation of always delivering. They could
always say something happened to the trailers after they left.

   After about an hour Rora got bored. “I know you
said you inadvertently created the Reapers, but how did they manage to cause so
much destruction? Why didn’t the other survivors band together and wipe them
out? And why didn’t they die out?”

  Derek sighed; he might as well tell her the whole
story. “The European army that became the Reapers mostly consisted of conscripts
taken from the poorest nations in the European Union. They were poor,
uneducated, and many were criminals. The E.U. government was trying to get rid
of them as much as they were trying to seize control of American assets. Only
the officers were professional soldiers and even they were the dregs of the
E.U. military. Trucks swept through Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Albania,
Croatia, Greece, Slovenia, Poland, the Baltic states, and the former East
Germany and collected these men. They also rounded up all the surviving Muslim
males in Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, Spain, and Scandinavia.”

   “Didn’t they resist?” Rora asked.

   “Not really. Most of them were in such bad shape
this was actually a step up. And their families were promised food for their
participation. You have to understand that Europe was in even worse shape than
we were. Food was in extremely short supply and the weather was much more
extreme. They were desperate. The situation here wasn’t much better. I think
the troops were probably about ready to revolt when I wiped out their command
structure and supplies. With that gone they were on their own and they became
even more desperate. Desperate men do desperate things.”

  Rora nodded. “So that’s when they started eating people?”

   “Not at first. They started raiding the
surrounding areas for food and supplies, which they found at first. The
original officers had been smart and they had mixed the ethnic groups up
amongst the battalions, but after the command staff was killed they began to
separate themselves again. Each ethnic group formed their own band of troops
and the Muslims formed their own group based on religion and not nationality.
There was some conflict over who got the heavy equipment like the armored
personnel carriers but that was sorted out quickly.”

   “Why did the Muslims form their own group?”

   “Religion was a powerful motivating and
connecting force before the Collapse. Not so much anymore. The other groups
were primarily Catholics but that religion had been dying for decades and no
longer held the same bonds. The bands stuck together for the most part because
they were all Europeans in a strange land. They raided the surrounding areas
until they had been picked clean. Starving and increasingly desperate they
started eating the survivors they captured. This didn’t go over well with the
Muslim band and they tried to stop it.”

  “Why did they care? Weren’t they just as hungry?”

  Derek laughed. “Well…cooking flesh smells like
burnt pork and the Muslims don’t eat pork for religious reasons. They decided
it was unclean, which it is, and they started killing those who did it. That
turned the other bands against them and caused a small war within the Reapers.
Even though the Muslims were the largest band, they were still outnumbered by
the others and they were wiped out. At this point the bands knew they needed to
find more food so they split into two groups. One headed north and the other
headed south. They went towards the largest remaining cities because they had
the most people, therefore the most food.”

  “Ewww!” Rora exclaimed.

   “Yeah, the inhabitants of those cities weren’t
too happy either. Disorganized and outgunned they weren’t much of a match for
the marauding Reapers. But the Reapers took losses too and finally realized
that they had a finite number of men. Eventually they would all end up dead. So
they started taking in survivors to replenish their numbers. Only those of the
same ethnic background could join their band, although they allowed some women
in to breed children with. America was so multicultural that they didn’t have
as much trouble finding recruits as you would think. And as word spread of that
option, many flocked to join them. At this point they became more tribal.
Adopting the colors and symbols of their homelands and becoming almost
xenophobic towards others not of their ethnicity. The bands became increasingly
antagonistic towards each other and eventually fractured completely along
tribal ethnic lines. They carved up the remainder of the East Coast into
territories which they guard jealously against each other. The only time in the
past they have banded back together is when outsiders campaign against them.
They maintain small settlements for their women and children but spend most of their
time out raiding and patrolling. The rumor is that they have people farms to
supply food.”

  “That is gross! Why doesn’t the U.S.T.G. or
someone else get rid of them?” Rora asked.

  “For one thing there are a lot of them and they do
have some military hardware. But I think mainly, the U.S.T.G. has no current
need for the territory they control and they serve as a useful bogeyman to
scare their citizens with. The C.C.A. would love to get rid of them since the
Reapers do pose a serious threat, but they haven’t been organized enough to
make that happen. Even the group we disrupted wasn’t all of them. It was a
large number of them, but based on the colors and number of trucks it was
probably only the southern tribes. And not even all of them.”

  Rora sat in quiet contemplation after that. She
was considering what made people eat other people and how desperate they must
have been. Derek shared her thoughts and he wondered what might have been if he
had never detonated that bomb in Savannah. But he had, and he had to live with
the consequences. If he ever had a chance, he would wipe out the Reapers and
fix that mistake.

  They arrived near the drop off point after a
roughly four hour drive. Derek scouted out a good vantage point to watch the
trailers from and parked the truck. They camouflaged the truck with brush and
weeds and settled in to wait. Using binoculars Rora had found in the supplies,
they kept an eye on the parked trailers. A few hours later the new trucks
appeared and pulled into the gravel drop off point. From the frantic efforts of
the Hauler’s they could tell that the truckers knew the load was spoiled and
were eager to get the hell out of there. They detached the new trailers and
hooked up the old ones in record time. Derek and Rora could hear the squeal of
tires and the roar of the diesel engines as the truckers rushed back out.

   Derek and Rora shared a quick glance and smiled.
Everything was going exactly as planned. Now they just had to wait for the
Reapers to show up. It didn’t take long. They must have been watching as well
because they drove up about fifteen minutes later. There was one vehicle from
each tribe. The garishly painted technicals rolled in slowly and parked behind
the trailers. These must be the scouts, larger transport vehicles would
probably show up after they determined it was safe to unload the bodies.

   Reapers got out and opened the trailers to check
their load. It didn’t take long for them to figure out there was a problem.
Based on the wild gestures and their body language, Derek could tell they had
discovered that the meat had spoiled sitting in a hot truck for five hours. It
only got crazier when the larger group realized that not all of the loads were
spoiled. He could tell the two tribes whose trucks still worked were trying to
play along, but the others noticed. Pushing started amongst the cannibals and
escalated quickly into a brawl. Sunlight glinted off the blades as knifes were
pulled and both Derek and Rora could see flashes of gunfire as the Reapers
started fighting over the unspoiled meat.

   A running gun battle evolved around the trailers
and the parked technicals. On one side were the two tribes that had gotten
working trailers and the other tribes were trying to wipe them out and take
their loads. They had the two tribes pinned down around the working trailers.
Plenty of Reapers were already down and the battle looked to be almost over
when more vehicles arrived in a cloud of dust. All sides must have called for
reinforcements.

  Derek watched in glee as his most hated enemies
battled amongst themselves. Not only was his plan working, this was going to
whittle down the number of Reapers significantly. That would be a huge victory
in and of itself. He felt responsible for their creation and the ensuing destruction
and chaos; and this would help mitigate that some going forward.

  Both he and Rora flinched as one of the technicals
exploded in a giant fireball. The heavier and slower military vehicles the
Reapers possessed had arrived. The battle became a massacre as the heavier
weapons like the ZSU anti-aircraft guns and armored cars joined the fight.
Tracer fire from the heavy weapons raged across the battlefield leaving white
streaks. Missiles and grenades flew in all directions. No weapon was going to
go unused in this fight. Lightly armored technicals blew apart and burned as
the various tribes fired at each other. Bodies littered the ground all around
the drop point. At least a hundred Reapers lay dead, probably more. Explosions
rocked the combatants and fires burned out of control, but they fought on like
crazed dogs.

   It seemed like the sides changed frequently, any
time one tribe gained the upper hand their allies turned on them. More vehicles
continued to arrive and added their contribution to the chaos. Heavy black
smoke started to obscure the battlefield, hiding much of the battle from the
watching Derek and Rora. Reluctantly Derek started the engine and began to pull
away. He was really enjoying the show, but their primary mission was to get in
to NASA. Now that they had created the diversion, it was time to go.

  He gunned the engine and the raced away from the
battle towards the entrance to the NASA complex formerly known as Cape
Canaveral. As they approached they could see that the Reaper camps surrounding
the complex were empty and showed signs of fighting. Once word had reached the
camps of the battle; they must have turned on each other right then and there.
The remnants of the tents and shelters burned slowly and there were dead bodies
scattered around. Some of them appeared to have been hacked to pieces. Derek
smiled widely as they passed by. Rora gave him an odd glance but said nothing.

   As they neared the main gate entrance, he
suddenly slammed on the brakes and the truck skidded to a halt. Ahead of them
were the burnt out ruins of several Reaper technicals. They blocked the road to
the entrance.

  “Why did you stop?” Rora demanded.

  “Those vehicles weren’t damaged in the recent
fighting. It happened a while ago and from their positions it looks like they
were attacking the complex.”

  “So?”

  “So I don’t want to be blown up by whatever got
them.”

  “But we aren’t Reapers.”

  “Yeah, but they don’t know that. Even though this
is obviously not a Reaper vehicle, they might think it’s a trick and blow us up
just to be sure. I’m guessing they have a minefield and probably some sort of
defense guns. Otherwise the Reapers would have overrun them by now.”

  “That makes sense, so what do we do? The Reapers
will eventually come back.”

  “I know. I think we need to go on foot and then we
can hopefully come back for the vehicle. Grab everything you can carry and
let’s hustle to the gate.”

  “You’re going to lose another vehicle aren’t you?”
She said with a smirk.

  He gave her a look that made her drop the smirk
quickly and try to look contrite. Unfortunately she was right. If the Reapers
came back they would take the vehicle and supplies or possibly just blow it up
since they would be crazy with bloodlust. He shook his head and grabbed as much
as he could carry.

 “Follow my footsteps exactly.” He ordered her.