by J.G. Martin
Chapter 4
April 15, 2034
Ruins of Enterprise, NV
After freeing the people trapped in the slavers’ wagons, Minerva helped them get ready to travel. She made sure they ate and drank from the slavers’ surprisingly bountiful supplies and treated them for minor injuries. She helped them strip the slavers’ clothes off so they would have something warm to wear, and gave them the weapons so they could defend themselves on their journey. All of them were very grateful and kept asking her how they could repay her. Her only response was that they pay it forward and help anyone else who got enslaved.
She watched them drive away in the pickup and the two slaver wagons. They couldn’t all fit in the pickup and truck cabins so some still had to ride in the cages, but the locks had been broken so they weren’t trapped. She was keeping the SUV; after all she had bills to pay herself. Ammo and food weren’t cheap and there was a chop shop just inside the Strip that would give her a good price and not ask any questions.
They had a long drive ahead of them. The rescued slaves had decided that the safest place for them was in the Confederated Cities of America, or C.C.A. There was a rumor that they were taking any volunteers who were willing to work or fight. Their numbers had been greatly lessened after the war with the U.S.T.G. and they needed people to help hold their nascent country together.
Minerva knew it would be tough for them, but the payoff would be enormous if they succeeded. She hoped they made it, but she couldn’t worry about that. It was enough that she had given them a chance and cut down on the number of slavers at the same time. It was personal for her and she never missed an opportunity to get some payback.
Her journey to Vegas had been a long and tumultuous one. They had made it to the supposed enclave in the Rockies only to find that it was a trap set by slavers. Her parents had been taken by the slavers as soon as they arrived. Defenseless, her mother had been dragged off for who knows what and her father had been savagely beaten as she and her brother had watched. Then the slavers had come for them.
They had been very surprised when Minerva had pulled out the pistol and shot two of them in the face. She hadn’t known exactly how to use the gun, but it was instinctual. She pointed it at them and pulled the trigger until it stopped shooting. The shocked silence had been like a physical barrier preventing any movement. They had all stared at her with wide eyes and open mouths. The look of disappointment her father had given her had broken her heart, but it had steeled it as well. If he wouldn’t defend them, she would; and if he couldn’t accept that then he was as good as dead to her.
Before the slavers could react she had dragged Timmy back into the car. After watching mom and dad drive for the last few days she had a pretty good idea of what to do and started the car. Throwing it into drive she pressed hard on the accelerator. Without any prior driving experience, she drove as best she could. The SUV swerved wildly around the open grounds of the abandoned commune. Slavers alternated between firing at her and trying to get out of the way.
From the screams and the meaty crunches and collisions, she assumed that she ran over several of them. The old Minerva would have been horrified, but the new one only grinned as she exacted some payback on the slaver scum. Windows shattered and bullets struck the vehicle as she circled around the yard. Her brother lay on the floor of the SUV and cried as he was tossed about during her wild ride. Finally she got the hang of it and headed out of the compound.
Looking in the rear view mirror she could see the carnage her rampage had created amongst the surprised slavers. There were at least four bodies lying on the ground not moving. Several others were limping as they chased after the escaping vehicle, firing their guns. But Minerva had kept the SUV going full speed as they bounced along the dry wasteland until the slavers were out of sight. Even then she had kept going until she thought it was safe.
The slavers had not pursued them and after she had calmed Timmy down, they had driven aimlessly looking for a town or safe place to stay. They had eventually stumbled on a Texas Republic Express Station in western Kansas. The men running the station had been sympathetic, but had been unable to help them without payment. One of them had least explained a little of what had happened in the Collapse and the Aftermath and how things stood now.
Minerva was mind boggled by the amount of information that had been kept form her, and how sheltered she had been. The men at the station had been similarly baffled by how her parents had managed to survive so long as pacifists. She had noticed that every single person working at the station and all the customers were armed to the teeth and openly carrying weapons. Looking back she realized how nice the men there had been, and that it was unusual that they hadn’t tried to take advantage of her. One older gentleman had even given her some extra ammo he had for her pistol. He had insisted it was worthless to him and that she could make better use of it.
She had also had her first encounter with the baser instincts of men when a customer approached her with an offer to trade money for what he called some personal attention. She was rescued from the man by a scantily dressed older woman who escorted her away and told her that she didn’t want to do that. When Minerva stared at her blank faced, the woman had laughed and explained what the man had been offering. She had been disgusted and confused. She was just a little girl, what man was interested in that?
As she came to learn, the laws and rules that had once governed civilized society did not exist outside the various city-states or the U.S.T.G.. Everyone had to more or less look out for themselves. The woman had taken pity on her and given Minerva a small blade. The woman, who she learned later was known as a “lot lizard”, had told her to keep it hidden and use it if a man tried to touch her. Scared and disgusted she had grabbed Timmy and high-tailed it out of there.
Not realizing the SUV needed gas, they had run out of gas along the highway. The cans in the back had turned out to be empty. They had already been running low when they got to the commune, and the rest had been shot full of holes so the gas had leaked out during the escape. They were stuck in the wasteland with no idea where to go or what to do. At first they had sat there waiting for help, but Minerva had quickly realized that no help was coming; that they would need to help themselves.
The two of them had hidden nearby when people had approached the vehicle. The first couple of curious visitors had been bikers. They had moved on when they found nothing of value in the vehicle. A Scavenger also examined the vehicle and stripped some of the spare parts before leaving. Finally a man in greasy overalls and driving a tow truck with a crossed gray screwdriver and wrench logo painted prominently on it had shown up. He had started to hook up the disabled vehicle when Minerva confronted him with the gun.
“You can’t steal our car!” She had shouted at him.
The man had been surprised by her appearance and had raised his hands defensively in front of him. “I didn’t know it was occupied. I thought it was abandoned.” He had said calmly.
“Well it isn’t!” She had stated firmly. “It’s our car and you cannot have it!”
“Missy, I don’t think it’s going anywhere.” He said and sneaked a quick look inside. “It’s out of gas for one thing, and it looks like you are missing some key parts for another.”
“But it’s all we have…” Timmy had sobbed next to her.
“Look, I’ll do you a favor.” The man had offered. “I will give you a lift to the nearest civilization and I’ll give you a few New Republic dollars for the car. Deal?”
She hadn’t liked it, but they really didn’t have a choice. Even if he left the vehicle it was useless. They would starve to death in the wasteland. At least this way they got somewhere safe and some money for food. It would be the least one-sided exchange they would get for the next few years.
The Wrecker had given them a ride to the nearest Roadhouse in exchange for the SUV. It turned out that many roadside hotels and motels had been turned into fortified safe places. You could get a meal and
a room for the night and sleep in safety. They had paid for a room and spent the night in a deep slumber after crying themselves to sleep.
In the morning they had asked about jobs and where they could go to live. The general response had been laughter. Jobs were hard to come by and everyone was just struggling to get by. Minerva’s response had been to get angry and stamp her feet, but that had only made them laugh harder. Finally, one man had suggested going to Vegas; that there were plenty of jobs on the Strip. A few had agreed, but no one really gave her a concrete answer.
When she had asked how to get there she got more interest, but she realized that most of them were just trying to get “personal attention” like the man at the Express Station. Finally, one of the waitresses had pointed her to a Hauler, a long range truck driver. He made the run to the Strip on a regular basis and was headed there now. According to the waitress he was safe because he had always treated the waitresses with respect and never taken on a “passenger”. Sheltered for her entire life, Minerva had no idea what that meant; but he seemed safe and he was willing to take them in exchange for the little money they had left.
Looking back, she should have seen the warning signs. But she was naïve then, and blindly accepted a drink from an unmarked container. She woke up in a haze the first night to hear weird sounds coming from the sleeping partition. The trucker had recommended she sleep in the seat so she had more room to stretch out, but Timmy would fit with him. As she came out of the haze she heard her brother crying and the man trying to shush him.
Bursting into the sleeping compartment she found the trucker with his pants off on top of her brother. Naïve or not she had known he was hurting her brother and she had only seen red. She only remembered flashes of what happened. When it was over, the little knife was in her hand and the trucker was clutching his bleeding neck and bleeding from multiple stab wounds. He tried to reach for her, but he quickly succumbed to the blood loss and collapsed.
Her brother never recovered from the incident, and when they finally got to Vegas he was easy prey for the drug dealers. After a couple of years he disappeared into a meth house and never came back out. He was still a kid, but Vegas was merciless like that. The whole trip had left her with a burning hatred of slavers, drug dealers, and rapists. Really, she had great antipathy towards any man or woman that would take advantage of the weak and helpless.