Road Wars: Book Summary
After recieving the message from Abe, Ryan and J.B. prepare to head to the Pacific Northwest and meet up with their former leader, the legendary Trader. The farewells are bitter, but they know that they have to go meet their old leader. They leave bright and early on the 14th of July, using the LAV 25 they captured when they destroyed 'The General' and his band.
They spend the day travelling. They pass a group of fladgies who demand food. Ryan and J.B. refuse to give them any and send them on their way with only a threat of force. This group call themselves the Slaves of Sin. Turns out allowing them to live was a mistake.
Later in the day while Doc is off riding Judas, he spots the dust trial left by the fladgies. The potential for danger is too great so he returns to the ranch to warn the others.
The faldgies stop at Jak’s ranch and demand food, which he refuses to give. They are turned away with the threat of violence if they are not off Jak’s land by noon the next day. The religious nuts make camp about a mile away from the homestead.
During the late evening Dean leads Doc to the fladgies camp. They witness the fladgies crucify one of their own people. It doesn’t surprise them at all. What does take them by surprise is Mildred and Jak showing up, asking the fladgies leader if they have seen Dean or Doc. He says no, and they attack by surprise, knocking both out cold. Dean and Doc race back to the ranch to let Krysty know what happened.
Dean and Doc join up with Krysty, letting her know what happened. They prepare for expected visitors. While Doc is in the barn, three of the fladgies sneak in and attack. Judas attacks two of them, giving Doc the chance he needs to attack and kill them all. When Krysty and Dean join him, they are impressed with what he did. Krysty come’s up with a plan to distract the fladgies and rescue Jak and Mildred.
Krysty, Dean and Doc sneak up to the fladgies camp. Dean pretends to be the Messiah, Doc pretending to be the voice. When the fladgies fall to their collective knees, the massacre begins. Not one of the sicko’s survive. Jak and Mildred are rescued, and everyone returns to the ranch.
It isn't long before they come across the ville of Huston Wells. A toll booth has been set up and they demand payment. Ryan and J.B. run the toll, killing several people including the 'baron' of the ville, a man named Noah. The baron was about to fire an old anti tank weapon at the LAV 25 but misses when he's cut down. They stop for the night about fifteen miles away from the ruined ville.
The next day after travelling for most of the day they stop at the Chaco Canyon and look over the ruins. They head up the canyon looking for a suitable place to make camp. It isn't long before they find one.
They just cross the border into Colorado the next day. As the LAV 25 begins to overheat they stop at the ruined ville of Durango to let it cool off. Ryan steps outside to do natures bidding and comes face to face with a fully grown African Lion! He's just about ready to blast it when a tall good looking woman calls the cat off. It's name is Balthazar, and her name is Ellie Kissoon. She invites Ryan and J.B. to come to her camp.
At the camp they meet Ellie's three daughters, Julie 21, Nell 19, and Katie 18. They talk for a short time and finally agree to go with the four women to the ville of Wetherill Springs, acting as escorts and guards while they are stopped in the frontier pesthole. The four women run a small show with exotic animals. A Tiger, two lions, a mess of rattle snakes, and two bears. They go by the title of Satana's.
At the ville the four women get things set up and are about to begin the show. Ryan and J.B, go out to check the LAV 25. They spot four Buffalo hunters checkng it out. They warn them to back off, and when they are too slow, Ryan punches him, knocking to the ground. No blood is shed, but the feels are hard. They return to the show.
The four women put on quite a show and at the end offer to let the audience come up and pet the animals. But one of the Buffalo hunters sticks the end of his cigar in the Tiger's rear, starting a riot. In the end, nine people are killed, including the man who stubbed out his cigar. The tiger literally tore his face off. The only casualty on their side was the old tiger. It's shot three times and Ellie begs Ryan to put it out of it's misery. They split up and head out of town, finally meeting up about a mile later.
Once again the four women ask Ryan and J.B. to travel with them, but they refuse, wanting to meet up with Trader and Abe. They could have had quite an experience with them, but old loyalties lay too deep.
During the day of the 17th Ryan and J.B. get caught in a huge buffalo stampede. The LAV 25 is badly battered during the stampede, but they escape relatively unscathed. They continue on their way. It isn’t long before they are caught in a bad storm and are forced to take shelter in the ruins of a nameless ville. They do a little exploring and come across several restored buildings, each one filled with stuffed people. It isn’t long before they encounter the man responsible for the work
The name of the embalmer that Ryan and J.B. encounter is Malachi Gribble. He invites them to stay the night and have supper with him. Seems like a harmless enough man, so they take him up on the offer. During the night when Ryan goes to relieve himself, he spots Malachi trying to sneak in through a secret door. He Lets out a scream of anger, scaring the small man, and allowing them to catch him. They truss him up outside and leave him there overnight. Next morning, they question him, learn that he did indeed kill all the subjects he used, as well as quite a few others because there were many that he had to redo because of a mistake. It totals over eighty people, and to make matters worse, he even had sex with several of the female corpses. They shoot him and continue on their way.
Three days have passed. Ryan and J.B. find themselves in Utah. They come to a check point and are sent by the sec men ahead to the ville of Baron Tenbo. They come to the ville and are treated to a free drink while they are waiting for the baron to show up. He gives Both Ryan and J.B. rooms on the third floor. At seven thirty in the evening they are shown to the baron’s dining room where they meet with the baron a second time, as well as his two step sons. Right from the start neither J.B. or Ryan like the two boys. Turns out that they had a third brother, but he was killed as well as their mother when the baron found them in bed together. The baron suffered a stroke and hasn’t been the same ever since. He lets Ryan and J.B. know that they are waiting for him to buy the farm. Both of them head to bed early so they can wake up at dawn.
After waking up Ryan and J.B. go to see baron Tenbo’s weapon collection. Most of the weapons are junk, but they do find a few really decent weapons among the collection. The baron asks J.B. if he wouldn’t mind staying behind to help him refurbish the weapons, stay about a month or maybe longer. The offer is almost too much for J.B. to refuse, but once again, his loyalty to trader wins out. They leave and go get ready.
Once the LAV is loaded and they are ready to continue on their way, both decide to say their good byes to the baron. When they get into the armoury, J.B. is hit in the head by one of the two brothers, and is nearly killed. Even in the poor light Ryan can see that the baron is dead, his treacherous sons finally having done him in. Ryan takes on both, killing one with a loaded black powder weapon, then the other using the packing rod. The sec men arrive, and believe Ryan when he tells them what happened. The head sec man goes as far as to spit in the unseeing eyes of one of the brothers.
Over the next five days J.B. recovers from the near fatal blow to his head. During this time the citizens of the ville offer both the chance to take over as barons. They are quite surprised, but refuse. They suggest that the head of the sec men, a man named Jethro take the position himself. They leave the ville, the throne still unoccupied.
Another two weeks have passed and they find themselves in a frontier pesthole on the border of Oregon and Washington. Here the locals hire them to go and kill a small band of Stickies who are suffering from the shitting disease. They take the job simply to get gas for the LAV. Before heading out to earn their fuel, an old woman warns them that the people intend to kill them after the deed is done and take the LAV and weapons for themselves.
While Ryan and J.B. watch, scouting out the Stickie camp, a group of deer hunters stumble upon it first and kill the muties for them. They then go and rape the only female mutie before they kill her. The two companions return to the small ville to claim their reward. They stop the locals well before they can execute their plan. They get the fuel, and warn the locals that they intend to pass this way again in a few weeks. If anything happens to the old woman, they will make them pay for it.
A short time after leaving the ville they encounter the deer hunters, who are already showing signs of being infected with the shitting disease. As revenge, they send them towards the small ville they just left.
Yet more time has passed since they left the small ville. At this time there are only five more days until the deadline. The LAV gave up the ghost days before and they find themselves sharing a cabin with a blind seventy year old man. They both find him to be the kindest, gentilest man they have ever met. He survives on the kindness and generosity of the locals. They learn from him about the posse and the killings. It puts a damper on the evening. After spending time with him, they finally continue on towards Seattle.
Abe and Trader find themselves in a small nameless redneck ville. They are short on food and intend on stealing what they need, but one of the locals opens his big mouth, pissing the Trader off. He shoots him in the gut and they both leave, after grabbing as much food as they can. They race out of the ville with cries of 'blood for blood' ringing in their ears.
With the posse hot on their tails, Trader and Abe come across a strange woman, totally naked and riding on a broom. Trader finds out that she has food in her cabin and takes it. She gets quite angry and Trader is forced to kill her. They hear the pursuers and run past the cabin, seeing her mutant children. They then cross a stream and scare a herd of wild ponies, slowing down the pursing posse somewhat.
By the late afternoon they come across another cabin, along a river. They also spot a raft. Approaching the cabin, the inhabitants come out and try to stop them from taking the raft. Trader and Abe kill them, and are about to take the raft when it gets shot.
Near Seattle, Trader and Abe discover that the two people they killed in the cabin had friends. They head across the river using a rope bridge, Trader is forced to threaten Abe to make him move. Abe starts to feel sick and ends up losing sight of Trader, then spots a ruined hotel. Thinking that Trader may have made his way there, he goes to it and runs smack dab into a posse.
Abe has had the living hell kicked out of him by the posse. They intend to keep him alive as long as possible before they finally kill him.
Abe wakes up to find Trader with him. Trader tells Abe not to worry, that he will get him out. He slips into unconsciousness once again. When he finally does wake up, Trader is taking care of him, as he slit the throats of all those who had captured Abe.
On the morning of the last day, Ryan and J.B. climb the highest point the can find near the ruins of Seattle. They spot their old leader and Abe coming towards them.
End of Road Wars