But one small handful of people refused to surrender hope. Ryan Cawdor and his companions traveled the continent searching for someplace where they could settle down and live in peace. Armed with functioning pre-dark weapons, the companions killed only when necessary, and preferred trading for supplies rather than stealing. In a world gone mad, these simple acts of dignity nearly made them legends.
In addition, Ryan Cawdor and the others knew the greatest military secret of the predark world: the redoubts.
Hidden across America, these often huge underground bunkers were built by the government to withstand direct nuclear hits. Powered by the near limitless energy of nuclear reactors, most redoubts were still intact after a century, incredible havens of safety with fluorescent lights, air-conditioning and drinkable water. Originally, the subterranean bases were stockpiled with everything needed to rebuild the country after the coming apocalypse—weapons, tools, military vehicles, fuel and medicine. Those countless tons of supplies were long gone, with only a few forgotten boxes of dusty weapons and dehydrated food packs remaining. However, these meager scraps from the past were more than enough to give the companions a fighting chance to stay alive. And sometimes they came across a major prize.
Yet even more importantly, the redoubts were linked together by the incredible mat-trans units. These amazing machines depended on technology advanced almost beyond understanding. The mat-trans units could transfer a living person from one redoubt to another in only seconds, which allowed the companions to quickly leave a dangerous area, hunt for food and continue their search for a permanent home.
Unfortunately, it now seemed possible that others might also know the vital secret of the redoubts.
A few days earlier, a stranger named Overton had attacked Ryan’s home ville of Front Royal with an army of sec men. The troops were wearing impossibly clean blue shirts and were armed with predark weapons in mint condition. Overton’s goal was to conquer Front Royal by any means available, then physically link it with two neighboring villes in Virginia, creating a single massive walled city, a gigantic metropolis the likes of which hadn’t been seen for more than a century. The would-be usurper was finally neutralized by Ryan, but the reasons behind the insane plan were lost in violent death, and the mysterious origin of the weapons was never resolved.
Had Overton been working alone in his plan to seize control of those three East Coast baronies? Or was he a vanguard, an advance agent paving the way for somebody else? Was creating a new metropolis in Deathlands the final goal, or only the first step of a much larger plan? And was the secret of the redoubts’ existence still safe?
A dying man had said the answers to these questions could be found in a distant ville called Shiloh. While the baron at Front Royal started to rebuild the badly damaged ville, Ryan Cawdor and the companions left on a perilous overland journey to try to discover if the brutal war for the baronies was indeed over.
Or only just beginning…
Chapter One
“Black dust!” the man screamed, pointing toward the horizon. “What the hell is that?”
A dozen people at the campsite stopped whatever they were doing and turned to look in the direction indicated. Cresting a hill far down the road was a wag of some sort—no, it was a rolling box of metal, with a stream of faint bluish smoke coming from its rear. The sides were sloped at sharp angles, no windshield or windows were visible and it had numerous big black wheels. There wasn’t a single visible piece of wood in the whole contraption.
“A wag,” a teenager murmured, wiping his mouth on a dirty sleeve as he placed aside his plate of stew. Standing, the teenager grabbed a longblaster from the top of a woodpile and worked the bolt, chambering a round. He licked dry lips as a soft wind ruffled the thin rags that were his clothing.
Another man stood and pulled a crossbow into view from his nest of clothes. “A metal wag. I never seen one that moved before!”
Leaning heavily on a repaired crutch, an elderly man glanced over his shoulder to a nearby grassy field. A crude wall of thickets and sharp sticks formed a defensive barrier around the clearing, and in the middle stood a faded yellow school bus, its many windows heavily patched with gray tape and bits of plastic. The wheels were sunk into the hard ground, and a tilted stone chimney rose from the back. The rusted remains of a few other wags doted the field, the grass thin enough in spots to see the cracked black material underneath. Way off by itself, the rounded shell of a beetle-shaped vehicle was surrounded by weeds, the open front door showing that the interior had been completely stripped except for a cushioned seat that had a hole cut in the bottom. The opening continued through the chassis and deep into the ground. Fat flies buzzed around the battered wag, and for an unknown reason, a half moon was painted on the door.