Freedom Lost: Book Summary
The book begins a week after the destruction of Freedom city, and the destruction of Lord Kaa’s mutant army. Two people, one a hideously scarred man, and a stickie are walking together. The man is Lester Johnson, the sec man who was forced to work at the wheel because of missing Doc’s sword cane. Because of his scarring, he considers himself no longer human, and hopes to pick up where Kaa left off, building an army of Stickies to wreak havoc over the local baronies.
The group arrive in the desert redoubt after defeating Hell eyes. They have no wish to stick around, just in case the new Egyptians decide that they want to kill them. They jump out, suffering from the usual nightmares.
When they awaken, they discover themselves in what appears to be a civilian gateway. Almost at the same time they smell smoke. It turns out that a scavvie, named Alton Adrian is in the redoubt. The redoubt is in the basement of the Wayne Feldman Baptist Hospital and Medical Center. He’s running for his life as he is being chased by a small group of stickies.
The group run into both Alton and the mutants. They end up killing the stickies, but in the fight, J.B. loses his glasses and they are busted.
They learn from Alton that the hospital might contain cryonic chambers, and go searching for them. Sure enough, they find the chambers, but all the freezies are dead. They figure that a pissed off hospital employee might have sabotaged the chambers as a final act of defiance. At the same time it could have been a simple accident.
Alton tells them they are in North Carolina. They decide to head out to a giant mall that survived the war, a mall called Freedom. Along the way they are ambushed by a pair of bandits. One is knocked cold, the other is saved by body armour he is wearing.
After a short period of time a man named Rollins shows up and lets the group know that they are not actually bandits, but a pair of outer rim guards who are supposed to watch out for the mutants. The stickies have been attacking several times over the past few years, and they seem to be getting smarter.
They learn about some of the history of the mall and decide to stay in for a short while. They first trade some of their jack for mall credits. They then spend a few hours exploring the mall, seeing it’s sites. One of the places they stop in is an optomitrist to see what they can do about the loss of J.B.’s glasses.
Currently the prices are far beyond their range, and have to decide what to do to make the money to get him replacements. They retire to their rooms for the night.
The next day during breakfast they encounter a midget who overhears that they are lacking in funds. The man’s name is Logan and suckers Ryan into participating in a gladiator contest. It turns out that his opponent is a sec hunter droid, much like the ones they encountered quite some time ago.
Ryan almost backs out, but decides to fight it. He beats it, but gets pretty battered in the process. They get their jack and head over to the optomotrist.
It is learned that J.B. discovered he needed the glasses when he was in his early teens. It is also learned that he is suffering from Glycoma, and if not somehow treated, it’s going to get much worse over the next year, possibly two years.
They go back into the mall and look around. They go into a comic store. Here they buy Dean an X-files T-shirt, and then leave, heading back to their rooms. Dean and Jak learn about a local Arcade where the kids who live in the mall hang out. They decide to go and check it out.
While in the video arcade, they get into a tussle with a couple of local kids and end up killing one, wounding the other. Both boys are taken into custody.
Late that night Ryan goes out to hunt down Doc. He finds him in an all night bar. While he and Doc are talking Rollins shows up and informs him what happened with his son and Jak. They are taken to see Morgan, the administrator of the mall.
Here, Morgan informs them that in order to get Jak and Dean out of jail they will have to work as sec men in the mall for a months time. Reluctantly, they agree to it.
Alton left the mall and is captured by the stickies. He is killed by the mutants, after letting Lester know that Ryan is in the mall. Lester decides that it is now time to attack and attack in force with his mutants. His friend, tells him that it is not a good time to attack as they don’t have as many mutants as they would like, but he won’t hear of it. He wants to kill Ryan.
Late during their second night in the mall, the mutants launch their attack. What surprises them the most is that some of the mutants are using hang gliders to get on the roof and drop fire bombs. The battle begins.
Because of the attack, the people inside the mall panic, making it exceedingly difficult for the security forces to be effective. At the same time, some of the more disreputable people begin to loot.
J.B. Mildred, and Doc are inside the mall’s only working theater at the time the attack occurs watching Dawn of the Dead. They decide to try and find the others. On the way, they run into the two security guards that tried to jump them earlier. They are forced to kill the men.
Ryan and Krysty meet up with them. They head to the holding cells in order to break dean out. Here they find that the cells are trapped with explosives. J.B. has to try and disarm the trap in order to get Dean out of it. It takes a while, but he suceeds.
Once the boy is free they decide to get out of the mall. On the way they run into Morgan. He isn’t angry at what happened, just saddened that the mall has finally been destroyed. He helps them by taking the group to where their weapons are stored.
As they make their way to the lockers, they run into Lester and some of his mutants. Ryan goes at it with Lester, hand to hand until Krysty finally shoots him dead. With the leader of the mutants gone, the stickies will eventually be defeated. But, it’s to late for the mall.
Morgan gives them their weapons and shows them pretty much the only safe way out of the mall, through the sewers. The stench is horrifying, but they can make it. Along the way they encounter a mutant snake, but get passed unharmed.
They make their way out of the mall and decide to head to the gateway.
End of Freedom Lost