Like a lot of what I tell you kids, I got most of this story secondhand. I stayed back at the Ark, playing pinochle with Marion and watching those Mechanics try to get some useful data out of that robot head they scavenged from the junkyard. Sensible guys as they were (for a bunch of handwaving, chanting freaks with axle grease under their fingernails), they chose to hold off on busting down the door until they’d knocked first. “Stretch, can you give us any information about Fleetwood’s headquarters? Does the Citadel have any known weak points?” they asked, and the head buzzed and sparked and farted blue smoke before spitting out four glitched-up pictures of different locations and finally subsiding into silence.
Acting on a hunch Jane passed out the pictures to the Scouts. “Anyone recognize any of these locations off the top of your head?” she asked. Nobody did, though a couple pictures looked vaguely familiar. “Head on out. The Mechanics will see what further data they can hack out of the head. Stay tuned to the TCB; if we can figure out locations, we’ll forward them to you. I bet we’ll find a clue about the Citadel’s security at one of these locations.”
The Scouts headed out, the Mechanics settled in for a good long hack, and the Mule Train crawled on. Everyone was jumpy with the words of Toecutter’s threat at the forefront of our minds. Many of our best guns had gone to the Citadel, and it was hard to ignore the perilous situation that put us in. The Drivers that stayed behind to guard the Ark drove walleyed, trying to watch both sides of the freeway at once, as we inched closer to Fleetwood’s neighborhood. Cougar led the delegation to the Citadel, her gleaming black paint reflecting Junior’s Freightliner, the Major’s Knobbly, Nervous Mike’s Firebird, Channing Hunter’s Hilux, Rideword’s Vanagon, and “Knife” Boyer’s Mopar Escort playing the role of a Scout for this ride…
Before they left, Cougar addressed the Mule Train guards. “Didn’t realize we were going up against this Toecutter guy. You’re on hazard pay now. Same as the other missions, plus if we come back from the Citadel with anything worthwhile and find out you guys saw action, we’ll make sure our appreciation is known.” And then they were gone.
That’s what the Citadel looked like in her heyday before Chelsea lost her shit and triggered the final chain of events that led to Fleetwood elevating himself from humble Watts-based gentleman dealer in secondhand automotive components to one of the most powerful human beings on the West Coast. After he moved in, Fleetwood beefed up the already formidable security of his new fortress, installing guards on the roofs, razor wire along the parapets, and more machine gun nests than he strictly needed, to be honest. In a nod to his stubborn insistence on corporate legitimacy, the Fleetwood MacChanics logo was posted prominently above the door.
Mutants, androids, creepy lizard-men, and battle-hardened Raiders served as his security detail, and they all glared menacingly at Cougar’s crew as they motored up to the huge double door. “Come inside!” bellowed a familiar old voice. “The party’s been itchin’ to start! Hey, you with the speakers! Get over here.” Junior rumbled over to where Fleetwood stood next to the DJ’s turntable, accepted a long 1/4" cable, and plugged it into the E.A.R.A.C.H.E. “Now let’s get our groove on to a particular favorite from my old days back on South Central and 91st. Sally, baby girl, would you cut a rug with me?”
I didn’t know mom could dance, but a couple of the people present at the Citadel’s last party assured me that oh yes, she could. Despite the fact that everyone present was armed to the teeth and out the other side, the whole thing appeared to be an enormous apocalyptic world-ending party. Drinks flowed like the previous night’s rain, and the contests began. Right there inside the Citadel’s factory floor (which Fleetwood insisted on calling “my main audience chamber” as if he had a secondary one off to the side somewhere when his attention needed dividing), Mules like Rideword’s Vanagon squared off in PvP tractor-pulls. Between each opposing pair of contestants, a sizable pile of fuel barrels teetered over a roaring fire, and each truck tried to pull its opponent into the inferno before being pulled in itself. SHITGO engines roared far beyond their nominal redlines as the drivers, forcefed for days on the highest-octane deep-dish four-meat pizzas with extra sauce, grunted desperately into their thrones.
Meanwhile, Knife and the Major had taken their rides over to the short-track. Fleetwood’s minions had erected a dirt oval 3/8 mile in length, around the circumference of the cavernous room. Jumps and berms made it resemble a motocross track of old, yet even the hardest-core MX rider hadn’t faced such a heavily-mined track. The Major gulped at the prospect, but giving his Knobbly’s dash an affectionate pat, he motored to the starting line.
And up in the galleries above the oval track, Channing and Nervous Mike were shown the skeet-shooting course, wherein the Escort-class drivers would barrel around the balcony at top speed and take aim at “retired” vehicles hung from the ceiling, their frantic drivers still chained to their thrones. This event took place in two simultaneous counterclockwise heats with each starting line directly opposite the room form each other, ensuring that for most of the time at least, the Escorts would be firing at each other as much as upon their hapless targets.
And Cougar parked next to Fleetwood’s enormous and heavily-modified Cadillac, smile nailed securely onto her face, undergoing a heavy debriefing that nobody else could quite overhear. And all the while, all seven Drivers scanned their surroundings, searching for a weak point that might allow escape.
The obvious point of egress to anyone who’s seen these kinds of movies before would be the windows. Oversized and leaded, they let in enough grimy light to reveal that they were bulletproof, and their very presence was evidence that they were nuke-resistant. Indeed, Bill Samson had founded his tire empire during some pretty heavy labor unrest, and overbuilt his windows as a prescient precaution. Not once in 91 years had they been breached.
During his warmup lap, Knife took note of the bas-relief sculpture at the south end of the room. It appeared to depict a muscular, hirsute man being shorn of his luxurious locks by a beautiful woman while he slept. It seemed an odd objet d’art for a tire factory until Knife recognized Delilah robbing Samson of his legendary strength by cutting his hair. The sculpture had seen better days and appeared to show a few cracks, but the wall seemed otherwise quite thick and solid, and Knife couldn’t think of what might lie beyond it.
Channing ascended the ramps to the gallery and took note of possible egresses up there. These windows were not bulletproof, unlike the downstairs ones, and in fact several were already broken out. Channing saw a couple of places where, with the proper application of SPeed, ManeuVerability, and pure badassery, a driver could haul ass down the gallery, catch air off one of the improvised berms, blast through the windowframe, and then plummet down to… what? She couldn’t quite make out what lay beneath those windows outside, but she seemed to remember a lot of twisted metal and burning stacks of tires outside the building. Might be tough.
Cougar listened to Fleetwood ramble on about the old days in Watts as her mind raced, looking for a way to get herself and her companions safely out of this deathtrap. At the same time, now that she had an idea of the strength Fleetwood had gathered around him, she hoped to find another kind of weakness to exploit. She didn’t want to leave this treacherous old bastard behind to cause trouble for herself and her family or indeed anyone left behind on Earth. He had to be eliminated now, or at the very least neutralized as a threat. Next to her was the DJ booth which stood next to the kitchen doors. Uncle Freddy… that is, Fleetwood dearly loved his jams, and always kept a pair of DJs on constant duty in 12-hour shifts so that the music might never cease. Fleetwood’s mood seemed much improved with his discovery of Junior’s E.A.R.A.C.H.E. system, and she could see the wheels turning in his mind as he calculated how to get rid of Junior without actually harming the speakers. While he schemed to himself, Cougar watched the DJ disappear through the kitchen doors for a moment. The kitchen might be a good way out. All that food and drink had to get in somehow, and Cougar doubted Fleetwood had taken up farming and canning and brewing.
-“And now, Miss Sally… you wanna tell me what you’ve got in mind hauling that shiny ol’ dildo around town? It’s apt to embarrass an old fella like me what used to change your diapers.”
Cougar gritted her teeth and surreptitiously patted the smelly paw she’d dug up a couple of nights ago. She hoped she wouldn’t have to use it. She hoped some intel would arrive from the Mechanics soon.
She hoped she hadn’t doomed them all by coming here.
