Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) by Milo Fowler (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📕

swarming around the big rig and firing their rifles with no apparent attack pattern. None of them have attempted to jump onto the trailer's shipping container; they're content with flanking the vehicle, trading fire, and vaulting their dirt bikes off the rugged terrain and into the air at untimed intervals. A few idiots pass in front of the truck's menacing grill, as if their airborne presence will slow it down.

It's clear to anybody with eyes that the raiders are perfectly fine running over anything in their path.

Then all at once, as if the same thought has occurred to every Wastelander simultaneously, they turn their weapons on the truck's tires, blowing them out one by one. The rig lurches side to side awkwardly, pitching over one way and then the other like a lumbering giant whose ankles have given out. The driver fights the steering wheel and brakes, but it's too late. The tractor-trailer is out of control and careening off the beaten path, plowing through dust and dirt, shoveling it up into the air and smothering the grill and windshield.

Heading straight for us.

I slap Samson's shoulder. "Hey, you might want to—"

"On it." He revs up the jeep and floors the accelerator, swerving out of the way in a tight U-turn, leaving those boulders for the semi to slam into.

Which it does, smashing against the rocks with deafening force. Dust explodes upward and outward, obscuring the impact zone, as broken pieces of granite tumble across the ground. The Wastelanders pull up on their chugging bikes and surround the crash site.

"We haven't eaten them!" one calls out, looking my way. Like he's expecting me to be proud of him.

I give him a thumbs-up. Might as well humor the freak.

All ten of them kill their motors and dismount, their weapons trained on the truck. None of them are watching the back of the trailer. That becomes a problem when the rear door on the shipping container swings open, and half a dozen well-armed UW raiders hop out, firing at will.

I throw myself over Shechara, holding her down. Samson raises his metal arms to shield himself. Cain grunts in a frenzy, cringing in his seat.

But the raiders aren't shooting at us. They've targeted the bikers, and in less than five seconds, the number of Wastelanders is down to three. Those left alive have their hands in the air and their weapons on the ground.

The raiders close in, hunched over their assault rifles, black armor gleaming in the sunlight. Their environmental suits are barely recognizable as such, nothing like that bulky monstrosity Sergeant Bishop was forced to wear a few years ago. These next-gen suits are sleek and form-fitting. The raiders move with ease, their tinted helmets sealed tight against the contaminated air.

Half of them split off and aim their weapons our way. "Get out of the vehicle!" one orders, his helmet's external speaker cranked up so we can hear him clearly.

Shechara and I tuck our semiautomatics under our tunics and step out. Samson leaves his rifle behind, his metal arms raised and gleaming under the desert sun.

"Him too!" the raider barks, referring to Cain.

"No can do." Samson shakes his head. "If it's all the same, we'd like to turn him over to you."

"Why the hell would we want him?"

"He hijacked one of your trucks yesterday, then decided to blow it up last night. Along with most of Stack," I tell them. "From what I've heard, you had a good deal going with Mayor Tullson. Fifty-fifty split of everything they scavenged, right? Well, that's all shot to hell now, thanks to this guy's inability to keep his missile-launcher in his pants."

Cain has resumed his eerie silence, still as a statue.

"How do we know you had nothing to do with it?" the raider asks.

I nod toward the three remaining Wastelanders. "Ask them. They rode with him."

The bikers nod quickly, pointing at Cain, their voices clambering over each other: "It was him. All his idea. Fire and judgment, he said. Fire and judgment!"

The cab door of the truck swings open with a long creak, and the blood-spattered driver stumbles out looking a little rattled. The raider riding shotgun is dead. For a second or two, the driver doesn't seem to comprehend what's going on. But then her hand rises to point right at us, and she stammers, adamant and building in volume.

"They hijacked my truck!"

"Not good..." Samson mutters.

"It was those two!" She singles out Samson, then Shechara. "Killed one of my men and sent us hiking, the bastards." She laughs, her helmet jerking. "I told you there was no place to run!"

The raiders who already had us in their sights close in now. The leader of the pack barks out orders, and soon we're kneeling on the ground with our hands up. The three Wastelanders get the same treatment. Only Cain is allowed to stay put, his eyes bright, enjoying the show.

I suppose we're his accomplices. In the eyes of the UW, all seven of us are guilty.

"Stupid bitch," Willard says, standing over me with his arms crossed. If he was really there, I'd be in his shadow. "You just can't help getting the people around you killed. Now it's going to be your dear Shechara. All because of you."

I grit my teeth as sudden tears sting my eyes. Fury does that to me sometimes. Good thing my goggles keep them hidden.

"What are you going to do with us?" I demand.

The raiders have all six of us lined up beside the jeep, and three of them keep the muzzles of their weapons trained on us. The other three have already started unpacking the shipping container, setting crates and boxes of food, fuel, and supplies on the sun-scorched ground. They've collected the Wastelanders' dirt bikes and weapons, lining them up next to the other scavenged goods. A real organized bunch, as far as thieves go.

The driver walks toward me. Unarmed, she steps right up and kicks me in the gut. As I pitch forward, she drops to one