Wreck Mouth and Robot. (Part 1)

I want to start off by saying that if you think we’re using our real names in this, you are out of your mind.  I don’t want to get into all that much detail of how we left the camp either or else the policy enforcers might figure out who it is telling this story.  To make double sure of that, I’ve changed a few things.  Man, but you’ve not lived until you’ve taken to the road in this day and age.  Back before the war, it was cool but could get a little dull.  Now…oh hell…it is a totally different ball game.  I didn’t care what happened or where I ended up as long it wasn’t back in one of those damn camps.

Me and Jeff were sick of the camps.  We’d been to two in a year, right?  Both were a beat scene and nothing a couple of ramblers like us would ever, ever get used to.  I didn’t know Jeff before because he was locked up.  He got stabbed in the throat and neck in a fight so then he had to speak through a voice box.  Sometimes he didn’t even bother with it and just spoke in what had to be the faintest whisper.  When they let out all the “low risk” offenders, they turned him loose or rather put them and us in the minimum security prisons we call “the camps.”  That’s right, they have a war and we all go to prison for it.  Don’t hold your breath waiting for the state to make any sense.  They called us Wreck Mouth and Robot.  I guess since I had bad teeth and Jeff had an electronic voice, huh?  To tell the truth, his teeth were a lot worse than mine. 

They had Jeff and I working in the food storage warehouses.  We had a good thing going at first.  We used to grab little stuff we could sneak out and sell it to folks who wanted to eat between meals.  They didn’t let you have food in your dorm because they said it led to health concerns and hording.  Also they said that it interfered with rationing.  Yeah right!  They just wanted to make sure they had total control over you.  If you had to come out of your dorm to eat, you had a hard time staying out of sight.  Also, they could control you with food.  How?  Simple, if you acted up or just grumbled too much, they’d cut your rations.  Next time you scanned your card, you’d have less food credit. 

Our policy was that you had to eat the stuff in front of us to “destroy the evidence.”  If it came with a wrapper, we took it back with us to where we stashed them.  We did it this way because you know that the first one that got caught with the snacks on them would snitch us out.  Finally, somebody found one of our wrapper stashes and they started actively looking for whoever was taking food from the warehouses.  Jeff and I knew there was no way to catch us on the books because the system was full of ways to be ripped off already and to go after us meant you'd have to scoop up some big fish too.   We saw the shirts (kind of like guards but not exactly admin people) slipping a case of this and a crate of that off all the time.  They’d sell it to someone outside the wire who would in turn give them something in trade for it.  Whatever they got in trade was presumably something that couldn’t be easily stolen from inside the camp. 

My guess was most of the shirts were on meth or something like that.  I’ve been around enough tweakers to know one when I see one.  They’d talk on and on for hours to one another while the rest of us worked.  They'd yammer on 90 to nothing all day just about.  Sometimes, you’d leave the warehouse, go home and realize you forgot to scan your card or left something in your locker (or needed to steal something on short notice).  You’d go back 6 hours later and there would be the same shirt who was there 16 hours earlier, still acting sketchy.  They were all paranoid too.  I’m not talking about pot-paranoid.  I’m talking about paranoid like if a blind guy just shanked somebody and had no way or knowing who saw it go down or not.  And tempers?  All the guards had tempers but the shirts were the worst.  I heard that most became shirts because they didn’t do well enough on their psyche profile test to be regular guards.  If they had been allowed to carry sticks, they would have spent half their time just beating us.  A few guards would beat or taze someone just for fun once in a while and some stayed in a bad mood.  But the shirts were always on the edge of snapping, at least the ones working the food warehouses. 

The longer they stayed at work, the worse they got.  But the very worst you ever saw them was when the camp was on lockdown.  That meant no outside work-details, nothing coming in and nothing going out.  After about 24 hours of this, the shirts started getting edgy.  After 48 hours, they were in a walking panic.  How come?  Whatever was keeping them jacked up all the time was on the other side of the wire.  Me and Jeff joked that if we could figure out what they were on and cooked it up in some forgotten corner, we’d run the camp.  But I’ve always steered clear of hard drugs—doing them and handling them.  Jeff, I couldn’t say the same for him. 

We started planning to leave.  That is all you need to know.  Jeff said he was too close to the road and he couldn’t stand it anymore, he had to get outside those walls.  Jeff had been locked up in a state prison for two years before getting transferred to the camps. 

The shirts were getting wise to our racket.  One had OD’d (we think) and disappeared from the warehouses.  This led to the FEMA brass doing random drug test.  The shirts knew ways to beat it and in fact, one came and asked Jeff which was the best method!  The drug tests themselves weren’t their big worry, it was now the brass saw drugs as a potentially serious problem.  Oh, they always knew there was some of that going on but what did they care?  They turned a blind eye at the inventory reports always coming up terribly wrong and in return.  They got people who would run around the warehouses all day and night keeping everything more or less running on track.  Both parties had to know it wouldn’t last though.  Crankheads don’t just go on forever before they mess things up in a big way.  One finally flipped out, either from too much drugs or the lack thereof.  He beat up another shirt and broke his jaw.  If it would have been one of us, nobody would have cared but shirts were the system.  They weren’t supposed to ever suffer damage.  Soon there were guards everywhere in the warehouses.  If you stepped outside the white tape walkways on the floor, they knew and would write you up for a fine.  Our gig was over and it was time to move on.  Screw that, we said.  We put in for work on the farms.  

I think they were happy to see us go too, otherwise the request would have sat on someone’s desk for weeks.  The new shirts who were trying to run the place were wanting to get control of the inventory problems.  They figured at worst, we were causing some of it and at least we weren’t helping it get any better. 

We started hiding stuff on the outside during our trips out for aggri-work detail.  Farm work isn’t that bad with fuel but because of the lack of fuel, a lot more was done by hand, hands belonging to guys like us marked “unskilled labor.”  I’ve got skills but I haven’t ever been paid to use them!  Not yet!  So we started cashing in on favors and collecting supplies for the road.  We heard rumors but didn’t know what to expect once we got out. 

Our first time on Alpha farm was creepy.  The farm house where the farmer had once lived was burning to the ground and all the buildings nearby had bullet holes in them.  According to rumor, the farmer who owned all the land had refused to hand it over to FEMA or whoever was in charge of taking over stuff for the “emergency use.”  It had ended up in a bloody shootout between the farmer and the military or cops.  Just for kicks, Jeff asked one of the shirts about it.  How did the building get burned?  The shirt just said the Chinese had done it early in the war.  Yeah right!  There weren’t really any Chinese this far east and if there had been, why would they just burn a house down?  What about all the equipment, grain silos, the warehouses and fuel?  If they had come to destroy the farm, they would have set explosives or whatever and ran off.  There wouldn’t have been a big shootout like what we’d seen evidence of everyday when we arrived for work.    Everything they ever did to anybody got blamed on the Chinese.  If a guard knocked your teeth out, it was the Chinese-made stick which was to blame.

So we started slipping stuff into a pair of holes we had dug at the edge of a corn field.  We had all the time in the world to do it since the work team leaders really didn’t care what we did.  The biggest thing was finding plastic to wrap our supplies in before we buried it.  The irrigation system soaked the ground for a few feet and if we dug for more than a few feet, somebody would have probably noticed.  So we stashed some food packs, some extra clothes, some lighters and a couple of cut in half blankets with enough cord to sew them back together.  You had to carry the blankets out in halves so you could hide them.  Clothes smuggling was easy since you just wore two shirts out and one shirt back, like that. 

If you went missing on work detail, it was a big deal for some reason.  Our plan wasn’t to leave then.  They actually looked for you if you weren’t there during the return roll call.  They counted heads before we got back on the bus, you know.  So we just pretended to be assigned to help out some guys who were moving some food processing equipment between camps.  When they loaded up, we just got on the truck with them and they assumed we were supposed to.  Hell, they were glad to have someone help them unload what they’d picked up anyway.  But we weren’t going that far. 

When we stopped at a fuel depot, there were army guys everywhere.  Military people are very concerned about security around fuel depots.  For one reason, the fuel doesn’t care if it is in a Chinese, Cuban or American ride.  For another reason, Chinese commandos love hitting these depots since they might be able to take out some armor while it is just sitting there gassing up.  There were army people everywhere with guns but they were all looking for people to try to sneak in, not necessarily sneaking out. 

Jeff was sketchy but I told him it was our best chance since we didn’t know how good security was at the camp we were headed to.  They might card everyone who goes through the gate.  Some camps are loosely run at the gates and others aren’t.  You see, the Chinese don’t attack camps.  They like the fact that we’ve got these huge places where hardly anyone ever successfully produces anything and they always have to eat. 

We got off the truck and said we were going to find a restroom.  We then found some regular guys like us washing tanker trucks.  I just walked up to them and told them that we were to take over washing and they were to go check with their supervisor for a more important job.  One asked who sent us and I said, man, some army guy.  They gave us hoses and told us to start at the front and work our way back.  They hadn’t even got finished with one truck and there was like 8 of them.  We said we’d start at the back and come forward since the sun was setting in that direction.  Cool, they thought!  Those guys know what they are doing when it comes to hosing mud off mud flaps! 

We washed for about 2 minutes, for free, and then casually walked away.  Jeff and I had to sleep in the woods that night but that wasn’t a big deal.  The next day, we headed back to the fields to uncover our stuff.  Pretty soon the office would know we were gone.  You see, everything in the camps works on cards.  You slide your card to go anywhere.  You have to have it to eat, leave and return to your dorm, go on work detail and all of your money is on it except you can’t use it at an ATM.  You know, you aren’t even allowed to have cash in the camps anymore.  So if the office sees your card hasn’t been used for anything in 24 hours, they come looking for you.  They know the last place you were so that is where they start looking.  That is another reason we couldn’t bolt during a work detail.  Even if they somehow didn’t miss us in the head count, they’d know sooner or later that we never came back.  But if we went missing in the camp, they’d figure we were hanging out somewhere and just avoiding using our cards.  All total, we figured that gave us about two days to put between us and a search detail, if they even sent one. 

Unless you were important or worse, someone they didn’t trust, they didn’t come looking for you.  I was just what they called a drifter and Jeff was considered a non-violent repeat offender.  Neither of us were probably Chinese spies and neither of us had a very important job.  Pulling weeds and picking corn a few hours a day didn’t keep the whole camp population alive.  Leaving the camps would land you in jail but what I heard was that they often beat you to death or shot you.  They’d come back and go out again the next day.  The next day is when they’d “find” your body.  This scared a lot of people into staying put.  They’d say how it was bandits or Chinese or whatever.  Maybe they were telling the truth sometimes.    Who knows?

Once in a while, they’d open up the 50’s on something in the night and blow off a few concussion grenades.  An old Marine told me they were concussion grenades because there was no shrapnel damage anywhere.  It would scare the hell out of everybody, especially the old people.  Then guards would tell everybody that some Chinese sappers tried to throw explosives over the wall but they killed them from the guard towers.  Now that is a joke they keep telling even though it isn’t funny.  First, the Chinese must have super human strength to throw something over even the lowest part of the wall.  These are the semi-portable walls they had stacked everywhere alongside the roads right before the war.  You might could throw a grenade over one if you were in the major leagues.  Second, if they shot some Chinese with their machine guns, they must have eyes in the backs of their heads since the MG’s are almost always pointed down at us.  And how come the bombs were always “thrown over” when we were on lockdown and there was never anybody around to see it happen?  Besides, the camps were ringed with intrusion detection equipment and some people had ever heard there were land mines. 

Jeff and I figured out that a lot of people just didn’t go to the camps.  They rounded up the people who didn’t resist or were already locked up for stupid stuff.  I was staying with some friends when it all went down.  We were told on TV to go to the camp for assistance.  We heard they were giving out food and supplies.  Nope.  We showed up, got processed and locked inside.  SUPLI—Showed Up, Processed, Locked In.  You got assigned to a housing zone and that was it.

We spent about half a day walking back to the fields.  It poured down rain the whole way too.  But that was a good thing!  They never sent out an outside work detail in bad weather.  So there was nobody around when we got there.  Sweet! 

It wasn’t long before we were back on the road with our gear.  What we did was tie both bundles onto the ends of a long straight stick and take turns carrying it.  This worked fine until we found some packs.  That was a really bad scene.  The packs were empty and undamaged and I wish I could have said the same for their former owners.  Somebody had shot the three of them full of holes and took their stuff, leaving the empty packs.  The three bodies laying there rotting kind of freaked me out but Jeff said I’d get used to it.  No way, not in this lifetime.  We couldn’t even tell who was a man and who was a chick.  Whoever killed them took their socks even.  At least it wasn’t plague, radiation or chems, huh?  I don’t know, maybe that’s a better way to go out:  shot up and gone in no time. 

We were moving pretty fast then with our new packs.  I couldn’t stop thinking of where they’d come from though.  People are so un-cool to one another.  You don’t see blue birds trying to peck the eyes out of red birds, let alone one another, you know.  I knew that when I got the chance, I was going to trade for a new pack, one that didn’t belong to a robbery and murder victim. 

Everybody talked about Atlanta and how everybody there was dead except for a few.  Chemical warfare attack, they said.  It was on our way since we were headed south.  I didn’t want to stop through there even though Jeff was constantly trying to talk me into it.  What the hell did we know about chemical warfare?  Nothing except how to die in it! 

Going through the north Georgia Mountains was incredible.  Life hadn’t changed much up there for some people.  The power blinked in and out, there was less on the menu and not many cars on the roads but for a guy living on the side of a mountain in a single wide, life changed only slightly.  That was the kind of person we came across first.

Crook was a guy in his 50’s.  He was short, had long unruly brown grey-streaked hair and looked like what you’d think Willie Nelson would look like on his first day out of prison in a long time.  His place was down a back road and on a little flat stretch of land, half way up one of those bigger hills.  He was out messing around in his yard and he signaled to us when he saw us walking down the road.

We walked down to where he was and without even saying hello, he called out, “you guys want to buy some grass?” 

I know weed was illegal and I guess on the books it still is.  But to us back then, it was a good alternative to alcohol.  You could easily pack enough of it to keep you going for a long time and you never got a hangover.  But he might as well been offering to sell us a ride on the space shuttle.  We didn’t have any money and nothing good to trade. 

“That’s fine,” Crook said.  They called him “Crook” because his middle finger was crooked.  “You guys can work off some if you want to.”

He offered us a job.  You see, Crook had been on government disability for about 20 years or more.  He was one of those people who worked like a dog for about 10 years until he found a good way to get himself hurt, either by accident or on purpose.  With the right doctor and lawyer, a guy like Crook could retire at age 30, more or less.  His dad before him had done the same thing, he told us later. 

Crook really did have a bad back though.  He’d hurt it working at a big money job where they were building a nuclear plant.  There were a lot of things Crook hated doing and some things he just couldn’t do.  Most of the weed he sold to people walking down the road was trade for services he needed to keep his place going.  He told us he had about all he needed as far as material things went.

He had a young wife who actually turned out to be his girlfriend.  His original wife had run off right after the war started and the power started winking in and out.  His new “wife” was a gal he’d been slipping around with “for years”, which was scary since she couldn’t have been more than 20.  She smiled a lot, didn’t say much but didn’t seem too dumb either.  Me and Jeff both assumed she was his daughter until he told us they were married.  Another thing about her was that she didn’t wear shoes and kept her long hair pulled back all the time except for a beaded braid that hung down by her ear.  She laughed at everything and we couldn’t tell if she was happy or just high all the time.  It would make sense either way but she handled the pot growing side of Crook’s homestead. 

One thing his wife, Annie, wouldn’t do with Crook was hunt.  She wasn’t against meat or shooting an animal.  She just could be still and quiet long enough, Crook told us.  So Jeff and me spent the whole day gathering game that Crook brought down with his .22.  Leaning over to pull a weed from his garden once a day was fine, but all day bending over to pick up small game would leave Crook unable to leave his bed for days.  He later told us that Annie probably just carried on giggling and laughing just to avoid helping him in something she wasn’t interested in. 

“She’ll cook a rabbit but hates squirrel,” Crook told us.  “She didn’t like cooking deer either but we haven’t shot any in a long, long time.”

When we got back from our first half-days hunt, I came to a conclusion.  Crook wanted to get to know us a little better while he had a gun in his hand.  He was a fairly trusting soul after that.  We skinned the small game and Annie got to cooking it.  It was the most food we’d had since we started off on wanderings.  Crook cleaned his scoped .22 while we sat on the floor with Annie, listening to her read from an old paperback.  Eventually, it got too dark so Annie got up to light one of the Crisco candles and set it in between us.  The night was cool but not cold and before too long, I was stretched out on the soft shag carpet, dozing off faster than I’d like to have. 

We woke up the next morning to the sound of an electric vacuum cleaner roaring by our heads. 

“Sorry boys,” Crook shouted over the noisy machine.  “But the electricity is on for the first time in days!  It’ll fade out before you know it!” 

Annie called out something from the bedroom.  Crook called back, “put it on fast charge but watch it!  You could blow up a battery if you aren’t careful!” 

Jeff got up, found his voice box and asked Crook if there was anything we could do.  Crook shook his head so Jeff lay back down to get another couple hours sleep.  I knew Jeff couldn’t really talk but then I was wondering if he was a little deaf too.  He slept right on through the racket that was going on around him.  Finally, Crook told me to toss a load of laundry in the beat up old washing machine that was recessed into the hallway next to an equally old looking dryer.  I did and when I turned it on, the whole trailer shoot like it was in an earthquake.  Jeff slept through that too.  Annie was happy as could be since she could get a day’s work finished in a couple of hours. 

Over lunch, Crook asked us frankly if we’d escaped from one of the camps.  We said we had and that we were headed south to Florida where we heard they were closing the camps and letting people out anyway. 

Crook shook his head.  “They are but not without special ID cards.  The cards are called ‘Campus-Cleared’ or CC cards or CCC.  What it says if that you’ve been to the camps and eventually got cleared as a non-security risk.  Once they get ready to close a camp, they’ll start out-processing everybody over a few months.  If you were never in the red or orange zone, you get processed out pretty quick.  No infractions and green zoned the whole time you were interned; you’d get your card.  The CC card lets you get through check points, purchase whatever where you can find a store, whenever you can find a store and that sort of thing.   If you get caught without your CCC, you’ll go straight back to the camps and it will be a long time before you ever get out again, legally at least.”

“We didn’t leave legally this time,” I told him. 

“Yeah…escape or being AWOL is a pretty big infraction.  I’d say you wouldn’t get your cards anytime soon if you go back.”  Crook shook his head in pity as he looked at me.  “Or get caught.”

I began to have that sinking feeling we all get when we know we messed up and the consequences are coming soon.  Jeff didn’t have that problem.  He never gave the future a even minute of his time.  His criminal mind worked a lot faster than any part of my brain too. 

He lifted his voice box to his neck and said, “where do we get fake ones?” 

“Ann knows a guy not far from here,” Crook replied, lifting a spoonful of soup to his mouth.  “He is pretty sketchy and doesn’t make them for just anybody.  You have to meet certain conditions.”

“Great…” I said, knowing we had nothing to trade or offer. 

“What conditions?” Jeff asked. 

“He has to either know you, need something you’ve got or owe you already,”  Crook told him.  “He both knew and owed me so I got Ann’s for her..  Ann might have gotten hers without me though.  He’s got a thing for women that goes beyond what most consider normal.  I told Ann to wear shorts and a tank top when she went to see about her card.  I got mine legit when they were setting up the whole thing.  Believe it or not, I still had a security clearance from when I worked at the nuclear plant.” 

“It was November too!”  Annie added, laughing.  “I almost froze to death wearing that skimpy get up!”

We finished our day doing handy work for Crook.  Whenever Annie would appear, Jeff would look her up and down, especially when she was walking away.  Crook didn’t like this and every time Jeff would check out Annie, Crook would be staring right at him.  Maybe he hoped Jeff would notice that he didn’t approve without him having to say it.  I was going to talk to Jeff about it but Crook kind of beat me to the punch.

After a few more days of light work around their property, Crook told us it was time for us to go see the guy about some fake CCC.  This was his nice way of saying “get lost.”  I don’t think he minded me much but he was definitely starting to dislike Jeff. 

So we got up one morning and packed our gear.  Annie was nice enough to fix us breakfast but Crook didn’t get up to see us off.  Annie said his back was giving him trouble and he was just going to stay in bed all day probably.  It was a good thing he did since Jeff tried to kiss Annie on the mouth once we were outside but she smiled, turning to offer him her cheek.  Oddly, she touched her lips to mind after I only held out my hand to shake hers goodbye. 

This little gesture caused Jeff to stare at me as we made our way back to the main road.  Jeff, you see, didn’t talk unless he had to since his voice box ran on batteries.  He kept four or five with him and they must have lasted forever since I never saw him change them.  But he still said he was always afraid of running out.  So instead of making small talk about Annie’s kiss, he just looked at me like I was supposed to explain something.  It was the first time I’d ever touched Annie in my life but maybe he didn’t think so.  So that led to him thinking that I was the reason Annie never paid any positive attention to him.  Jeff was that type of person.  No, it wasn’t that he was a bit of criminal with ugly tattoos and scars all over.  And no, it wasn’t because he didn’t know how to talk to women, with or without his voice box.  I guess he would have done fine if he could find a girl who fantasized about being seduced by a robot.  No, it wasn’t that Jeff treated almost every woman like a prostitute.  Annie didn’t like Jeff for the soul reason that I was there and somehow I’d done something to woe her first.  And naturally, I did this just to piss Jeff off.  I wanted to point out to him that most people didn’t like him.  Only about half the people I met liked me but that was about triple the amount that seemed to take to Jeff.  We just walked down the road not saying a word to one another. 

Our directions were simple which wasn’t really a good thing.  I asked Crook to draw us a map and he did but told us to memorize it before we left since he wasn’t going to risk us getting caught with it.  We both thought he was being a little over-cautious until the second day we’d been walking. 

I knew what a drone was but wasn’t 100% sure I was looking at one until it turned around and came back over us for another pass.  Once in a while, one would circle the camp.  If it hadn’t been late in the evening, I wouldn’t have seen it at all.  This one had two blinking lights on the wings and on the second pass, I knew what I was seeing for sure.  There is no mistaking the profile of that particular model.  It was the most common, I guess.   I always wonder why they didn’t make them look like regular planes then people wouldn’t have gotten so freaked out by them. 

I pointed it out to Jeff who started to freak out a little.  “What if it attacks us?” he asked.  “We need to get the hell out of here!” 

“If we run, they’ll know we are up to no good,” I urged him.  “Just walk normal but stop and look at it.  We want them to know that we see it.” 

“What if it is one of those kind that just go killing anybody they can’t identify?”  Jeff asked.  His face registered fear but naturally his electronic voice didn’t. 

“There is no such thing…” I told him.  “Guards tell people stuff like that to keep them from leaving.”

The drone made a third and final pass, this time even lower.  That is when Jeff did something I could have totally predicted but couldn’t have stopped.  He raised his finger and shot a bird at the drone.  I glared at him and shook my head. 

“What was the point in that?”  I demanded.  “Just a minute ago you were worried about the thing attacking us!” 

“I don’t like people who don’t mind their own business,” he said before making an exaggerated gesture of turning his voice box off. 

So we kept on going until dark.  We camped off the road a few hundred yards and didn’t make a fire.  The drone, maybe two of them, kept flying over.  They didn’t make much noise but as silent as the world was those days, you could hear a lot of things you couldn’t normally hear.  You also got used to relying on your ears more since a car, truck or bus wasn’t going by every minute.  As I lay there in my homemade sleeping bag (two wool blankets stuffed with old paper and stitched together), I figured out what they were doing.  They knew we had left the road but at what point?  One side was mostly a mountain that the road had been cut into.  We wouldn’t have climbed up it.  They had to know we climbed down the hill on the other side but where?  We had been sure to leave the road when we didn’t see a drone overheard and that had to create a little confusion. 

What if they found us and just killed us rather than dragging us back?  That thought hung in my mind and caused me to have nightmares.  Twice I woke up thinking I heard someone coming through the woods. 

Neither of us spoke until daybreak.  “It was nothing,” Jeff said in his robot-duck voice.  “They don’t have time to waste on guys like us.  We’re a couple of bums.” 

Wrong, wrong, wrong…

We heard the white SUV a long time before we saw it.  They were riding slowly down the road about ten miles per hour, shouting through a PA.  The loudspeaker was hard to understand because the echo coming off the hills.  Also the guy on the other end of it had a heavy Mexican accent.

“Come out peacefully with your hands raised.  If you have any weapons, drop them at once.  This is not a game.  You are in a restricted area,” the voice called out. At least that was what we thought he was saying once we were able to figure out the gist of what was being said. 

“Screw them,” Jeff scowled as he spoke through his voice box.  “Let them come and get us.” 

We started to bolt for the valley below us.  The woods weren’t very thick and I knew that was a problem if the drones started looking for us again.  I figured they’d give up though.  Didn’t they have a huge problem with the Chinese invading our country?  Why bother with a couple of zeros like us? 

This was the second time I was wrong that day. 

Fetcher gang warfare

This brief account of a skirmish between the Fetcher gangs outside the areas of Atlanta not controlled by Mars Tribe.  This account is given in an interview done by the Argentinian news service to a Fetcher named "Bliss."  Though the news team is English speaking, they were forced to use a translator because Bliss is a near-mute moldy, though of average human intelligence. (See Moldies or Man-2). 

News Agency of Argentina:  Start by telling us your name and a little background on yourself.

Bliss:  My name is Bliss.  I'm a second generation Man-2 and I work in hazardous area salvage.  Some would call me a Fetcher.  That's slang.  Slang is when you use a special word you like to use.  You apply it to something that already has a name. 

I grew up near Stewy (Fort Stewart).  My folks weren't part of Atom Bomb Eaters (a large local tribe) so we didn't have much.  We lived near a pond and ate fish.  My mom and dad grew corn.  One year it was too dry.  Our crops died and the pond almost dried up.  It became just a big mudhole and all the fish died.  They left to talk to ABE about use going to live in Stewy.  There was some kind of trouble going on there.  Must have got caught up in it.  Neither of them ever came back.  My brothers and sisters went south down the road, looking for help.  I don't know what happened to them.  Basemodels probably killed them, that was all that lived to the south.  A basemodel is like you men with the cameras.  No offense. 

I went north.  I got in with a new family on a farm outside of Atlanta or Toxic City or CT.  Good people.  Most of them were Originals like my parents but weren't too bad off.  They traded with Mars Tribe sometimes.  Those guys were loaded.  I knew from an early age that I wanted to be loaded too. 

News Agency of Argentina:  Describe life on the farm, away from your parents. 

Bliss:  Wasn't bad.  They told me about God.  I learned how the man who owned the farm and his wife both had cancer.  Something in the soil, they think.  They became moldies during the war.  No more cancer.  That was 20 years ago or more.  I won't say his name because he doesn't believe in what I do.  But I believe in God and his miracle.  Have you ever seen a miracle?  The farmer did and he thanked God everyday that he woke up without cancer.  That was everyday.  He also thanked Jesus.  Him too. 

Work was hard but it was rewarding.  What I mean is, it felt good to do the work.  We grew all kinds of stuff.  Had pigs too.  Basemodels tried to rob us a few times, stole a couple of pigs.  We killed one and put another one out of his misery.  Stomach shot.  Did him a favor.  But the farmer felt bad so he built a church.  We also took some warning sighs from around the outskirts of Atlanta a placed them around the farm here and there.  I'm not sure what they said but it was about chemical hazards.  Nobody tried to rob us after that.  Farmer and his wife says it was the church and me and the other hands say it was the signs. 

One night the farmer saw us burning a field we'd harvested.  Said he saw the devil's face in the flames.  He and his wife said at church that the devil had been summoned by one of the farm hands or the house women.  That next day someone trashed my room while I was working.  Maybe they were looking for something, I thought.  They might think I summoned the devil.  It seems like if the devils face was in the fire, we who were closest to the fire would have seen him.  I told the farmer that and he asked me how the devil had tempted me to evil. 

I have never drank alcohol, cursed or stolen anything from a living person.  The devil tempts me like anybody but unlike a lot of people, I do not give in.  Some do, maybe some of you, and that doesn't mean you are evil.  You just have to not let him tempt you a second time or a third or a fourth or a fifth.  Even the old Bible says that. 

So I left the farm and go in with a Fecter gang.  I was good at it.  Brave.  Strong.  Fast.  High chem tolerance.  DD (Death Dust) didn't phase me.  Wasn't long before I had a real share in the gang. 

News Agency of Argentina:  How long had you been in the gang?

Bliss:  Let's see, cold, hot, cold, hot, cold, hot and cold again.  3 years? 

News Agency of Argentina:  What can you tell us about the battle at Shoe Warehouse?

Bliss:  Everything.  Most Man-2 don't wear shoes.  Some do but don't need to.  Some like sandals, give the feet air.  Feels good in the sun.  Mars Tribe didn't care about a warehouse full of shoes.  It was even called Show Warehouse.  Battery Bob, the leader of the gang, he said it even had words that spelled "Shoe Warehouse" across the top of the building.  If you could read, you'd know it said that and that would tell you what was inside the building.  Every Fetcher gang that does well has someone that can read.  You also need at least two guys who can speak loudly.  Those are the facts. 

Mars Tribe told everybody who was fetching that they could have anything near Shoe Warehouse.  They put a green mark on the road signs to let people know that it was a free area.  That is how you know.  Orange or Red means their stuff:  stay out or die.  They didn't want the shoes and had taken out all the food they needed from a food store across the street. 

You can sell shoes to Basemodels and get good stuff.  They always need shoes.  If your stuff is chemical free and not radioactive, they'll take it.  We knew we could make out good after we found out about the place.  Mars Tribes sends guys out, you see.  You pay them and they'll tell you what areas Mars Tribe has opened up to Fetcher gangs.  Rules though.  You've got to have rules.  No more than two Basemodels per party.  No automobiles.  Only what you can carry and don't leave traps. 

News Agency of Argentina:  Were there other gangs in the area?

Bliss:  Yeah.  That was the problem.  There had been hard rain lately.  That brings out the Basemodels.  Toxics in Toxlanta aren't as dangerous then.  DD is harmless when wet.  Wet with water.  Or soft drink.  Or soup.  It wouldn't matter. 

Like I said, rules are rules and they are there for a reason.  Basemodels don't think our rules matter.  They want us to obey their but they don't act like ours mean anything.  Not you all but most.  We came across a party that was nothing but Baselines, all wearing chemical suits.  Some call them "chem suits."  Chemical-suits is the proper word.  We saw them over at the food store.  One waved at us and we waved back.  No problems so far.  Battery Bill said for me to stand outside Shoe Warehouse and keep an eye on them.  I didn't mind but I wish I'd had a gun.  All I had was a sword, the same one I have now. (a cheap Samurai sword, made in India but with a good edge---ed). 

The other 5 guys went into the dark building and started loading up shoes.  Four guys carry, two walk security.  You need six people.  Four plus two is six.  I lost sight of the Basemodels.  I was going to walk in and tell Battery Bill but then something happened.

KA-Boom!  I heard an explosion and then screaming.  It wasn't the loudest but loud enough to scare the piss or urine out of me.  I heard the guys shouting at one another.  "Bring him into the light!" somebody called out. 

It was Cricket Cap.  He always wore a hat with a cricket on it.  Fishing hat or something.  Let me start by saying this was the first time I'd ever seen anyone with both hands blown off.  Just blood stumps...like bloody tree stumps after a tree has been cut down.  He was in shock too.  Shaking, cold and talking nonsense.  He tried to say that a pair of boots at had exploded.  Battery Bill tried to tell him, no it was a bomb or a booby trap.  After just a few minutes, Cricket Cap was dead.  They couldn't stop the bleeding.  Battery Bill cried and said he blamed himself.  I actually blame whoever set the trap.  That seems like the person who you'd consider guilty. 

News Agency of Argentina:  Who set the trap?

Bliss:  I don't know.  Everybody immediately said it was Basemodels who did it.  Them across the street.  So Battery Bill says two things,  they are there illegal and they set the trap.  King was a good fetcher and he says, we should just go find a Mars Ganger and tell them.  Anger can make things hard to figure out.  Everybody has been mad before and anyone who has been mad over a killed friend knows how hard it can be to think.  Think about what you are doing at the time.  Everybody but King said the Basemodels set the trap and everybody was getting mad at King too, so I kept my mouth shut. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What happened next? 

Bliss:  We didn't have many guns.  King had a shotgun, pump action.  Battery Bill carried a mini-14.  Very nice gun.  Only two mags though.  Joker, King's younger brother, carried a .380 pistol.  Me and Locks carried just swords and a couple of good knives.  Locks had a couple of fire bombs.  Molotov Cocktails people called them.  Invented in Asia, the home of China. 

Battery Bill told me to follow Joker and Locks to follow King.  He'd stay nearby with his rifle.  He told us to sneak around to the sides of the buildings and wait.  When the Basemodels came out, whoever was closest ambushed.  That means to jump out and attack someone.  Jump out from hiding.  Whoever was not closest was to come running once they heard shooting.  If they tried to run, they'd run into the others or him.  Dead meat, we all thought. 

Me and Joker hid between a couple of old cars.  I hoped that the Basemodels didn't come out where we were but they did.  Joker was excited and popped up from over the hood and started shooting his .380. 

I looked up but had nothing to shoot.  All I could do was watch.  Don't know why I was even there.  Blap-Blap-Blap---a Basemodel in a green chemsuit grabbed his arm and dropped the rifle he was carrying.  It was a nice AR-15.  Those are the best for a lot of reasons.  (Edited---Bliss trails off talking about the benefits of carrying an AR type rifle until we got him back on the subject---ed)  I wanted to rush out an grab it but didn't. 

Joker shot 8 times or maybe 9.  All that shooting and he only hit one person from just a few cars away.  The other Basemodels, must have been 10 or so, more than we'd thought, fired back at us.  Plunk, plink, plunk!  Bullets were making Swiss cheese out of the cars we were behind.  Swiss cheese is made in Europe.  Or America.  Or anywhere I guess. 

Joker reloaded his pistol so fast that he even dropped a few bullets on the asphalt.  He didn't bother to pick them up.  He just raised his head to shoot and all I heard was something that sounded like someone dropping a melon off the roof of a house.  Joker just stood there leaning over the hood of the old car.  He was fine except he had no head.  No head = dead.  It doesn't matter who you are and how tough you are supposed to be. 

I pulled Joker's headless body back down.  You guessed it, shot in the head by the Basemodels.  I tried to get the pistol out of his hand but he wouldn't give it up.  I think his last thought was "I have to hold on to this pistol no matter what."  I gave up and started climbing under the cars away from the shooting.  The shooting stopped though and I heard shouting.  Boom!  Someone, either King or one of the Basemodels fired a shotgun.  I heard Battery Bill shooting from where he was across the street. 

That was when something under one of the cars caught my rig.  I had left my pack behind across the street but still had my rig on.  I started to take it off then thought about how much I liked it.  So I just struggled with it. 

The shooting stopped and I heard the Basemodels talking through masks.  They killed King, I knew that and they weren't sure they had killed Joker but pretty sure.  I was sure he was dead.  Both brothers, dead and gone, I thought.  It was sad but I had my own problems, you know. 

All they had tried to do was make a little money and it amounted to getting bombed and shot.  I knew Battery Bill and Locks had taken off, I was sure of that.  Gone.  I didn't blame them.  You know, problems of my own. 

I had just got free from whatever had me hung up.  That was when I see a gas mask face staring looking right into mine.  Someone looked down to see if anyone was hiding under the cars and it was me.  It scared us both but I did something I didn't even think about doing.  I reached with both hands and yanked the mask off the Basemodel's face as hard as I could.  It slipped off and out from under his hood.  I saw his face for a second.  Surprise was how he looked.  He put his hand over his mouth and nose and tried to snatch the mask out of my hands.  I don't know about you but I have a good grip.  I can hold a coffee can full of lead for an hour.  Maybe not an hour. 

He finally choked and died, almost as quick as having his head blown off but not as gross.  I heard the other Basemodels saying, "Jackson?  Jackson?"  Then they came running.  I crawled out quick and took off through the parking lot.  Bullets whizzed by me, close too.  I knew I'd get hit but there is something you'd do well to learn.  Most people don't shoot as good wearing a gas mask.  They shot worse than Joker.  At least he'd hit somebody.  If they would have hit somebody, that somebody would have been me. 

I got to where I thought Battery Bill and Locks might be.   They were no where to be found.  Just poor dead Cricket Cap.  The Basemodels were behind me but going slow, cautious.  They thought I might have a gun. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What did you do then?

Bliss:  Hid in the shoe store.  I didn't think about it until later but the reason they didn't follow me in was that they saw Cricket Cap and figured out what had happened.  They knew the trap that had killed him had been inside the building.  They knew there might be more.  And besides, nobody wants to go into a dark building not only full of traps but with someone doing an ambush somewhere inside.  I already told you what an "ambush" was. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What did you do after they left you alone?

Bliss:  I don't know why, but I followed them.  I thought maybe I'd see someone from Mars Tribe maybe and be able to show them where the Basemodels were.  We all have to stick together, you know.  It was easy to follow them too.  They had a hurt man with them and even though he was bandaged up, he was still bleeding.  I think it must have been the one Joker shot in the arm.  When the suits get punctured, the Basemodels don't stick around anyway.  It was a drop here and a drop there, but it was plenty enough to track them.  You also learn to look for smudges in the dust, poison kind and regular kind.  It had been dry for a while too, even easier to track somebody.

News Agency of Argentina:  Did you eventually find them?

Bliss:  Yes!  I'd lost them for a little while but then found them again.  They were under a bridge making camp.  But when I saw them, it all made since.  They had been tracking Battery Bill and Locks.  They had caught them too.  I didn't know it but I'd been on the trail of my friends and my enemies at the same time.  Battery Bill and Locks looked like they'd been beaten up, but were standing beside a tall metal pole or pipe sticking out of the ground.  It went all the way up to the top of the bridge.  Each had one hand handcuffed to a chain that ran through a metal loop that was bolted onto the pole. 

The Basemodels had a camp set up there but it was temporary I think.  There was a huge water tank or something turned over with a door cut into the side.  Over that door was a showerhead, maybe so they could wash off the Death Dust.  You always know a regular human place since they have to keep the DD off of them.  I don't care for it either and it taste terrible.  It kills them though.  Quick.  Everybody knows that around here.

A few of the Basemodels came up with some old car tires.  The tires could have been from trucks too.  Hard to tell from where I was hiding.  They cut the tires and put them around the pole, just a few feet between Battery Bill and Locks.  There was a big stack of them. 

That was when one of them said, "This is payback for our friend you did like that."  Or something like that.  I could hardly hear them. 

They took one of Locks' own firebombs and threw it into the tires.  It caught on fire but only burned in the middle of the tires. 

"We can stand this all night!" was what Battery Bill shouted. 

"Just wait," said one of the Basemodels.  "When it gets going, you'll pull one another into it.  The one who lives can go free!  Sound like a deal, mold-trash?" 

They said "mold-trash" a lot too.  They were all derma-phobes.  Dermaphobia is the worst thing that can be wrong with anyone.  You can't hate somebody just because they an physical improvement of yourself. 

"We're good friends," Lock hollered.  "You'll never make us do that!"

"Just wait," the evil Basemodel said again, from under his ugly looking gas mask. 

The tires began to blaze and the heat was too much.  Fire will make you do anything and say anything.  Battery Bill was trying to get away from the heat just a little at first but even just a little caused him to pull Locks closer to the raging fire around the pole.  Locks screamed as his shirt caught on fire.  I didn't want to watch but I did want to see who would win, so I kept watching. 

Locks was bigger than Battery Bill and gave a hard snatch on the chain.  It pulled Battery Bill right into the burning tires.  He let out a holler like you wouldn't believe and literally jumped the other way.  He was burned bad in his arm and face.  They say some Man-2 don't feel much pain.  That is only a few and that wasn't Locks or Battery Bill, I can tell you that. 

Battery Bill dug his feet into the ground and leaned back.  He pulled Locks into the flames, this time on purpose, I think.  He leaned back so far that he almost laid down on the dirt.  Locks jerked the chain so hard that he dislocated Battery Bill's wrist, you could tell.  I thought he might pull Bill's whole hand off.  But he didn't. 

Locks whole arm, shoulder and face was in the fire.  He thrashed around but couldn't get a good foothold to pull himself out of the fire with.  Battery Bill jerked on the chain with all his might, trying to pull it with his good hand.  Suddenly he cursed and let go.  The chain was red hot where he'd grabbed.  Locks fell out of the fire a little and dragged Battery Bill just a little closer.  But Locks was done for.  His whole face was burned and was nothing he could do even though he was still close to the roaring fire.  He tried to stand and instead just fell.  A few minutes later, he was dead. 

It was sad to me, so much that I cried as I crawled away from hiding place nearby.  Anyone will tell you that I don't cry easily either.  We'd tortured and killed dozens of Basemodels with fire but not that way.  When we did it, it was to teach the Basemodels a lesson like not to come on our land, take what was ours or not give us what we needed more than them.  It wasn't because they were "normal" and we were Man-2.  It wasn't because of hate. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What happened to Battery Bill?

Bliss:  I don't know.  I never saw him again.  He was badly burned and I knew even if the Basemodels let him go, he wouldn't be doing any fetching for a long time.  I had to make a living still.  Also, I wanted to get as far away from the Basemodel camp as I could.  Seeing a Basemodel burned up and hearing him scream was different.  You knew they deserved it and even if that particular one being burned or tortured some other way didn't deserve what they got, their kind did----all of them!  But seeing Locks burned that way and Battery Bill being forced to kill him was too much.  It was all over a simple misunderstanding. 

News Agency of Argentina:  Do you still believe it was that party of normals that set the bomb that killed your friend?

Bliss:  If it wasn't them, it was some just like them. 

News Agency of Argentina:  Do you want to kill all normals?

Bliss:  No, some are okay, like you.  But there can't be any peace until we are all Man-2.  At least there can't be any peace until we have everything we need.  When the war broke out and God punished Basemodels, they were so jealous of us that they killed us on sight, even little kids.  They are still jealous of us and they all hate us deep down, even if they don't show it.  Not you all though.  But Most, most all. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What if all the normals moved to South America or Australia and left all the Man-2 here?

Bliss:  They'd take everything with them, I've been told that.  They would take their farms, animals, vehicles, weapons and their women.  What do you call a Basemodel trying to swim with a rifle? A drowner!  You see what I mean?  They are the greediest kind of animal on earth. 

News Agency of Argentina:  What do you think of the Moldy tribes that are peaceful and trade with the normals?

Bliss:  Wait and see.  I heard a preacher say something once.  "Nothing lasts forever, nothing but extinction."

Cruel New World Breakdown 1: The Moldies, south eastern US.

Here are is the start of white might eventually become a sort of wiki for the Cruel New World series.  Let's start with one of my favorite subject:  the Moldies.


Moldies (aka The Afflicted, Man-2)

The Moldies came about as a precaution made by scientist in the wake of M.A.D. (Mutually Assured Destruction).  After the cold war between the USA and USSR, science to toughen up man kind to survive after a full scale nuclear war, was put to the wayside.  Funding was cut and the idea of all out nuclear war was growing distant in the minds of the scientific community.  Genetic experiments of all types were still conducted and much advancement was made in the field, though little thought was put towards creating a more survivable human to live in the wake of a nuclear conflict.

However, relations between China and the USA soured soon after the economic near-collapse of America.  China not only built up its navy and nuclear arsenal but also its chemical and biological weapons stockpiles.  Interest in the changing people into tougher humans to survive a large scale conflict involved WMD was renewed.  But science had came so far that it was no longer about making a person more resistant to radiation and bio/chem warfare.  The idea was also put forth to include making a human who would evolve more quickly based on what may be encountered after a potential war.  A program was put in place to research how humans could not only largely survive such a war but reach new heights of intelligence afterwards.  Longer natural lifespans were also to be increase. 

The problems came about when the war approached at a faster rate than was previously expected.  When it was obvious that war with China was unavoidable, the project(s) were rushed out too quickly without proper testing.  People were given an injection of a serum which they were told was to protect against a deadly new strand of flu.  In fact, this drug was meant cause the person's genetic structure to alter the moment radiation levels rose or they were exposed to certain toxins.  This part didn't work and some people started mutating shortly after being given the drug.  Though this was blamed on bio-terrorism and few cases of "premature alteration" were ever reported.  It is difficult to tell what caused people to become "moldies" before the war or how many actual cases there were. 

What is certain is that after the onset of the war, moldies began appearing by the thousand.  The transformation into "Man-2" as it was code-named by the government, was a rapid one, taking anywhere between a few days to a week or more.  The more rapidly someone changed into a moldy, the less likely the person was to survive the transformation.  The slower cases appeared to retain higher mental function, sensory and motor skills than the "fast burners."  Some argue that the length of transformation into Man-2 was dictated by what harmful factor the transformee was exposed to and what levels.  Some reports state that no outwardly harmful factors were involved at times.  The transformation into Man-2 could be induced by high levels of stress, normal illness such as a common cold or without any noticeable factors at all. 

Most in the government weren't aware of the Man-2 project and mistook the moldies are victims of bio-chem warfare.  Some even thought their condition was contagious and orders were given to shoot on sight.  This was the start of the bad blood between moldies and humans.
The project was largely unsuccessful in most aspects.  Though Man-2 caused the affected humans to build up a tolerance to radiation, many harmful chemicals and most known bio-weapons, it had horrible side effect.  The most noticeable side effect was the horrible rashes which left unusual grayish green scares.  Hair fell out in patches and either partially regrew or never came back.  Often the rashes would invade the person's mouth and throat, causing them in some cases to lose the ability to speak or taste.  Some suffered partial or total blindness.  Roughly half to three quarters of cases originally suffered from some form of psychosis.  Damage to the nervous system also occurred in roughly 1/3 of reported cases, often causing the victim to feel almost no pain in most of the body and very little sensation at all.  Some reported that victims suffered from chronic thirst, dryness of the mouth and skin. 

There project did have some victories though.  Besides Man-2 allowing affected humans to live through man-made disasters and the aftermaths, it allowed them to also require resources for basic survival.  More food and water sources became instantly available.  Moldies can normally consume rotten food and drink stagnated water with no noticeable effects.  Most appear to need less food than the average human to stay relatively healthy, however, all seem to need more water than normal people. 

There are also reported diseases that seem unique to moldies.  A few cases have been reported over the years of moldies dying from coughing fits that last for hours or days before finally killing the individual. 

Baron of the Coast era Man-2 info:

Years after World War 3, moldies have somewhat adapted and in some cases, actually evolved into a somewhat higher functioning human than the original injectees.  Though none have reached the level of "super human" as was the project's original aims, many have either reverted to previous intelligence levels or have at least dropped to a lower level of psychosis and slightly higher mental function.  Children born to moldies have a 90% chance of being moldies themselves but have lesser rates of mental illness than their parents.  Multiple births are frequent and there are seldom cases of miscarriage. 

Moldy society is a tribal one.  Moldies frequently group according to levels of mental function/illness.  The more mentally ill are prone to roving in packs, raiding and stealing from both the normal human population and other moldies.  The ones with decreased mental function yet less frequent or severe mental illness often find employment as scavenger gangs, entering areas too toxic or irradiated for humans.  These are often refereed to as "Fetchers".  Most of the time they will be led by a "Fetcher Captain," normally a moldy or normal human of average or above intelligence.  Fetcher gangs often work for a larger tribe as a way to make money from the tribal members who don't fit well into their settlements.  It can also be a form of punishment in the tribes.  One might serve in a Fetcher gang for 1 year for theft or for example, 3 years for the assault of another tribe member. 

It is not uncommon to find outcast humans living in Moldy settlements.  Most humans living among Moldies are outlaws, runaway slaves and deserters from various armies or paramilitary groups.  One intriguing aspect of Moldy tribes is their acceptance of normal humans with physical defects.  A crippled person is often welcomed into a Moldy tribe and cared for, if they are of average human intelligence.  Moldies also believe that mating with normal humans cause a more intelligent Moldy to be born as offspring, though this has never been proven.  Offspring of humans and moldies almost always bare no normal human traits.  The same percentage of normal humans born to moldies exist when one or both parents are moldies.  Many maimed and crippled war veterans have been known to live among moldy tribes, some even leading them.  However, Moldies have little tolerance for drug addicts, normal or otherwise. 

Slavery is legal in most Moldy tribes, though outlawed in most normal human settlements.  Normal human slaves are normally only found in the most isolated moldy settlements.  This is due to the fact that most moldy tribes don't want to draw unnecessary attention to themselves and avoid breaking most laws of nearby normal human settlements when at all possible.  Fetcher gangs are said to kidnap normal humans for slaves but this is most likely urban legend. 

Largest moldy settlements:

Fort Stewart:  Atom Bomb Eaters or ABE.  This tribe moved into what was left of Fort Stewart Army base in Georgia after an indirect hit from a highyeild nuke launched from a Chinese sub in the Atlantic ocean.  Tribe ABE, as it is normally called, became a beckon for thousands of moldies in the area after the first months of WW3.  Scouts were sent out from the half-ruined base to gather up the most desirable moldies from southern Georgia and northern Florida.  By the first year's end, the population of the tribe had doubled.  The US military made no effort to remove the moldies from the base not only due to the radioactive status of the area but also because of the containment it provided for Man-2 in the area.  Years later, various military factions bartered with the moldies for some of the heavier hardware contained in the base, most of which the moldies were unable to use.  After a bloody civil war (started for unknown reasons), the tribe became more isolated and stopped recruiting other moldies from the area into their tribe.  Rumors of Tribe Abe building strength to attack the coast city of Savannah are persistent.  Some speculate they may soon do so with Cuban support.

Northern Atlanta/North Georgia:  Mars Tribe.  Mars Tribe likely got its name from the fine Red Dust or powder (aka Death Dust) that was used in a massive Chinese chemical attack on the city of Atlanta.  Death Dust or DD has little affect on the Moldies except for giving them an uncomfortable burning sensation in the throat when breathed.  Most living in the toxic zones do so in relatively sealed environments and use respirators or gas masks while out in the open.  These areas are not advisable for normal human travel unless one uses a full chemical protection suit.  Some moldies of Mars Tribe are said to have built up a tolerance to the dust and use no protective gear in the city.  Mars has a loose confederation of Fetcher gangs called "Martians" though most Martians are only considered probates of the tribe for years.  Mars Tribe is one of the wealthiest of all moldy tribes occupying the Southern States.  They have extended their territory into northern Georgia where they frequently clash with normal humans living in the area.  Mars Tribe is famous for collecting DD and using it as a payload in make-shift rockets which are fired into normal human strongholds in the North Georgia mountains.  Though the dust is said to have lost a lot of its effect over the years, it can still be weaponized and used to deadly effect. 

Carolina Coast:  Tribe Iron Claw or TIC.  TIC is a medium sized tribe consisting of no more than 1000 members, occupying several islands on the coast of South Carolina.  Their symbol is a red crab claw on a black flag which is difficult to recognize at a distance.  They survive mostly by fishing and have little contact with the outside world, both normal and moldy.  Some have reported seeing large alcohol stiles on their islands protected by heavy machine guns and homemade cannons from under fortified shelters.  However, they have never displayed any open hostility to passing vessels and avoid contact if at all possible.  Their islands are surrounded by rusting ships, most visible during low tide.  Some say these ships (mostly military) were part of a Chinese landing force and others claim that TIC dragged the ships out and sunk them on purpose to create reefs.  Radiation levels around the sunken ships are higher than normal but not dangerous in the short term.

Central North Carolina:  White Buck Tribe (WBT) or White Buck Collective.  WBT boasts the highest mental function levels of any moldy tribe.  They occupy the smallest settlement tucked away in the NC mountains and maintain a close alliance with Mars Tribe to the South.  They are the most hostile to humans of any tribe and are known to be fierce fighters.  Unlike most moldies, they tend to posses good motor skills and are the most mobile of all the tribes.  They purposely keep their numbers small due for fear of breeding out their genetic advantage they have over the other nearby tribes.  WBT maintains a fleet of armored cars as well as dozens of motorcycles, modified to run on alcohol.  Unlike most moldies, they covet technology and will go out of their way to obtain it, often sharing it with other allied tribes.  WBT is rumored to have control of a remaining global-mapping satellite in orbit, selling access to it to other tribes.  They also sell valuable maps to other moldies, presumably made from their satellite data.  Most maps are covered with packing tape for water-proofing and have a drawing of the White Buck on the back, denoting their origin.  Numerous attempts by various human paramilitary forces have been made to destroy the White Buck Collective but all have failed.  As of recently, Mars Tribe has been cutting off trade with anyone hostile to WBT, even when WBT has initiated the hostilities.  WBT is also the only known tribe of moldies who refer to themselves as "Man-2", the government codeword from before the war.

Southern Florida:  Crocodile Clan.  CC's symbol is a crocodile holding the globe in it's mouth.  In addition to their holdings in southern Florida, they also occupy and control a large oil rig in the gulf.  What little oil that is produced there is normally sold to Cuba.  Likewise, anything that breaks on the rig and needs skill to repair is normally performed by Cuban engineers and techs.  Though considered a large tribe, they are known to be one of the least intelligent for their level of organization.  Cuba would be to blame for this since they frequently send advisor to assist the Crocodile Clan in running their tribe.  Part of the Cuban/Crocodile Clan's military and economic alliance includes the Cubans working constantly to put down or resolve civil wars which are fought among the clan every few years.  The frequent civil wars has left central Florida dotted with tribes of CC castaways and rebels.  Most of these small tribes are hostile to the human populations in the area with few exceptions.  Crocodile Clan maintains a small fleet of small ships, including a former Coast Guard cutter.  The cutter has since been refitted with more easily maintained weapons by the Cubans.  The cutter, name the "Hell Shark", has participated in escorting cargo vessels from Canada down to Cuba and has been known to randomly shell human settlements on the coast. 

Cuba/Dominican Republic:  El Gato de Noche Tribe.  This is not a real tribe by most standards but rather Spanish speaking section of moldies residing in the Caribbean and completely under Cuban control.  They are notably intelligent and receive various forms of special training from the Cuban government.  They are known for committing acts of sabotage and stirring up moldies near American human population centers.  They are "walking WMD" and are rumored to carry plagues into North America, which moldies are immune to but humans are certainly not.  Some have been spotty by spies wearing Cuban army uniforms while in Cuba.  All are devoted Marxist and are frequently seen attending state-funded communist rallies.  A black cat with an arched back on a red background is their symbol, often worn as a patch.  The Cats of the Night frequently carry Communist propaganda to the other moldy tribes, both large and small.  Most of this propaganda is in the form of video and cartoon books to save on the fact that many moldies have lost their ability to read and many of the younger ones are never taught.  Such dogma is often completely lost on wealthy tribes such as Mars, who essentially rely on capitalism to sustain itself. 

Southern Alabama:  Children of the Warm Star Tribe, CWS or Warm Star Community.  These relatively peaceful moldies operate several large farms and a scattering of smaller ones.  Most specialize in wheat, corn, soybeans and peanuts but one of the larger ones grow large amounts of hemp, though most of it goes towards producing rope and clothing for trade.  Warm Star are some of the most religious of all tribes, their religion coming as close to 20th century Christianity as moldies ever get.  This is not without their own spin on things however.  They claim that normal humans carry the "mark of the beast" and those who were transformed/born moldies are marked for Heaven and God's new Chosen People.  Their contact with others include sending out missionaries to various moldy tribes and trade with both moldies and normal humans.  The "Warm Star" is a reference to their status as an agrarian society.