Free Wasteland Rules: Kill or Be Killed (The World After Book 1) by J.G. Martin Page A

of the buildings had double
doors hanging slightly open and through the crack Derek could see an old pickup
truck. Even people eaters need a ride sometimes.
      He pointed to the truck and yelled to Rora, “Get
in the truck!”
      She nodded and they ran to the building and flung
open the doors. Inside was an old Ford F-150 pickup truck. It looked in decent
shape. They climbed inside and Derek used the butt of the machete to knock open
the steering column. He pulled the wires loose and started trying to hotwire
the car with little success. Rora suddenly batted his hands aside and said,
“Let me do it.”
      He watched in surprise as she quickly connected
the right wires and started the truck. He stared at her openmouthed for a
minute before he gathered his wits and threw the truck into drive. Derek
stepped on the gas and they lurched out of the garage. As he drove away from
the hotel they could see that the flames had spread to the first floor and the
hotel was well on its way to being fully engulfed. Unless those cannibal freaks
had another way out besides the cellar, they were all going to burn. A fitting
end Derek thought to himself.

Chapter 9
     June 10, 2029
     Near Sayre, KS
      Maximillian watched the truck pull away in the
distance, the magnification in his cybernetic eye allowing him to see much
further than the human eye. Who was this man? He had almost singlehandedly
defeated the slavers, apparently outrun the burners, and escaped from a Night
Children lair. Yes, he was battling the scum of the earth, but their sheer numbers
should have stopped him.
      Maximillian turned to the surviving burners. There
were only four of them left from a pack of twelve. Two had perished in the
Night Children lair and six of them had been overcome by the storm including
their leader. The survivors leaned casually against their bikes and gazed
lazily at him. They were obviously unimpressed by his appearance and that of
his drones.
      He wasn’t surprised. Maximillian made a point of
trying to remain innocuous when he was away from Home. It was always better for
people to underestimate you and let their guard down. Also, he didn’t want his
location or identity broadcast to opposing factions like the U.S.T.G.. He
preferred to work in the shadows and manipulate others into doing his dirty
work for him. To that end he wore a long dark gray trench coat with a hood over
a gray shirt and gray pants. His drones wore baggy gray jackets over a gray
shirt and gray pants. At around six feet tall none of them were physically
imposing.
     Before the Collapse and the Aftermath, six feet
would have above average. But only the biggest and toughest had survived the
apocalyptic events that had overwhelmed the world. Being the biggest and
strongest had become far more important than being rich, famous, or connected.
Natural intelligence and cleverness still put you at the top, but being the
best fighter made you the most likely to survive. Natural selection became the
rule instead of the perverted system that had held sway before the Collapse.
      What was not obvious was the heavy body armor they
all wore beneath their coat and jackets. Or the powerful plasma pistols they
concealed. Despite their average appearance both of his drones were genetically
altered and were faster and stronger than even an above average human. Maximillian’s
alterations went well beyond that and he was superior in every way to any
human. But that was something he kept concealed.
       He addressed the new leader, a well-muscled young
black man, “You have failed me. You are worthless.”
      The leader snapped back insolently, “Nobody talks
to us like that!”
      “It is a statement of fact. You did not capture
the man or the girl. You failed.”
      “We got caught in a sandstorm. How is that our
fault?”
      “Why didn’t you stop him when he left the hotel?”
      “We were checking our bikes and looking for our
brothers. That was more important. We can