1990–1998
Rise of global terrorism on an unprecedented scale. Political violence funded by organized crime syndicate called HAVOC—The Hijack, Assassination, and Violent Opposition Consortium.
1998–2003
The governments of many small and impoverished nations fall into the hands of HAVOC. International terrorists receive arms, training, and shelter in these ‘Badlands’.
2003–2008
Raids on oil and gas installations, assassinations, and the kidnapping of prominent world statesmen become commonplace as HAVOC attempts to terrorize the civilized world into submission. Despite public outrage and growing international tension, the major powers steadfastly refuse to give in to HAVOC’s demands.
2008
President of the United States and General Secretary of Supreme Soviet both assassinated at emergency summit meeting. US, USSR, and major European nations create the World Defence League and declare war on HAVOC. The Badlands are invaded, key HAVOC bases destroyed, and thousands of HAVOC agents are captured.
2009
HAVOC leaders imprisoned for life in ‘Deep Pens’—maximum security gaols located deep underground—to prevent their escape or release by HAVOC agents still at large.
2010
New leadership emerges to unify the scattered remnants of HAVOC and plan revenge.
2011
A WDL train transporting seventeen 100-kiloton nuclear warheads, slated to be neutralized and dismantled, is attacked by HAVOC agents. The train is destroyed and its deadly cargo stolen.
2012 New Year’s Day
HAVOC hijacks a WDL news satellite and broadcasts a chilling ultimatum. They have planted the seventeen stolen warheads in major cities throughout the US, USSR, and Europe. They call for the immediate release of all HAVOC agents held in Deep Pens, plus the payment of $2 trillion in gold bullion, or they will trigger the warheads one by one until their demands are met in full. A twenty-four hour deadline is set. WDL leaders declare an emergency and request that the deadline be extended. HAVOC refuses.
2nd January
First warhead detonated at Brie Nuclear Energy Plant, ten miles south of Paris, France. Blast and radioactive fallout claim millions of lives. HAVOC repeats its demand and extends deadline by twenty-four hours.
3rd January ‘The Day’
World Defence League agents discover location of HAVOC command headquarters on an island in the South Pacific Ocean. Immediately orders are given to infiltrate and destroy the HQ and its occupants. The assault is swift and decisive; the complex is quickly overrun and its inhabitants are killed. Yet, ironically, as the news of this victory is being relayed around the world, HAVOC enacts its ultimate revenge. A transmitter hidden on the island, fitted with a time-delay mechanism, clicks on, sending its high-frequency radio signal to a communications satellite orbiting the earth. This signal is amplified and returned to earth where, simultaneously, it triggers the remaining nuclear warheads. The initial explosions set off a disastrous chain reaction that feeds on civil and military nuclear installations all across the northern hemisphere. Hundreds of millions of people are killed within days, and many more perish during the years that follow, falling victim to the lingering radioactivity and the severe climatic changes that affect the earth.
2012–2019
Gale force winds sweep across the world, carrying enormous amounts of dust into the upper atmosphere and preventing much sunlight from reaching the earth’s surface. Temperatures plummet, deterring survivors from remaining above ground. Communications are disrupted by gamma radiation, making all radio, cable, and satellite contact impossible. Small colonies of survivors develop in total isolation from one another during these years of darkness.
2019–2020
Gradually, the dust storms die down and the sun penetrates the atmosphere, thawing the earth’s frozen surface. Radiation has decayed to tolerable levels, and survivors emerge to reclaim what little remains of the world they once knew.
You are Cal Phoenix, a survivor, born in California on Thanksgiving Day in the year AD 2000. In 2012, whilst on winter vacation at your Uncle Jonas’ and Aunt Betty-Ann’s ranch in Texas, you were invited to visit a shale-oil mine near Austin, the first of its kind in Texas. As Chief of Construction, your uncle was proud to take you on a guided tour of the whole underground complex, which, for security reasons, was totally self-supporting. It was during this tour on 3 January 2012 that the unthinkable happened.
You remember how the ground shuddered when the shock waves from the first distant explosions reached the mine. Immediately you assumed it was the start of an earthquake, which you had experienced many times at home in California. However, as the levels nearest the surface began to collapse and the central elevator shaft filled with rubble, you realized the awful truth: the holocaust. At first there was no way of telling the extent of the surface devastation. Below ground, the safety generators had switched into operation automatically when the main power supply failed, and the tremors had faded quickly, which encouraged your aunt and uncle to believe that the damage above was superficial. Uncle Jonas was confident that the military would mount a rescue operation and that you would be brought out within a few days, a week at the most. Aunt Betty-Ann, too, was optimistic. After all, there were emergency supplies—enough to feed 200 men for a whole month. Little did she know that the three of you would end up consuming all those supplies, or that the mine would become your home, your shelter, and your prison for the next eight years of your lives.
It was early September in the year 2019 when eventually you broke through to the surface. When first you set eyes on the landscape surrounding the mine, it was like looking at the surface of another planet. Few structures had survived the blizzards and intense cold that had swept around the world in the years following ‘The Day’, and now, after the dust had settled and the sun had returned, the once-fertile plains of Austin resembled little more than a desert of parched and broken rock, littered with the artefacts of an absent civilization.
During the first few days, when you set out to explore this wilderness, it was easy to believe that you were the only survivors. But on the morning of the fifth day Uncle Jonas made chance radio contact with a family called Ewell who were living near the ruins of McKinney, thirty miles north of Dallas. They told him that they had been in touch with a handful of other groups who had managed somehow to survive the holocaust. Most were isolated and unable to move due to lack of fuel, food, or water. They had urged those who could travel to join them in McKinney to start a new community there, and some people were already on their way. When your uncle and aunt accepted their invitation, the Ewells were enthusiastic, but they also warned you to be wary—not everyone who had survived wanted to establish a new community. The ruins of some large Texan cities, such as Dallas and Fort Worth, were controlled by gangs of criminals who fought with each other and terrorized anyone seeking to reestablish law and order. They urged you to avoid these gangs at all costs.
It took more than a week to discover a vehicle that could transport you to McKinney. It was an old school bus, one that had been parked in an underground lot and had survived the years of sub-zero blizzards. With fuel and spares salvaged from the mine, you managed to coax it back to life, and then set off on your journey north.
When you arrived at the town, it was easy to find where the Ewells lived—their ranch was the only place that was still standing. It looked more like an old frontier post than a ranch, with its fortified perimeter wall, lookout posts, and stake-filled moat. However, after being ambushed and shot at by the city gangs of Fort Worth during the final stages of your journey, you fully appreciated the need for these defences.
‘Pop’ Ewell, the seventy-year-old grandfather of the Ewell family, was the leader of this small colony of survivors, and it was he who had urged Uncle Jonas to join them when they had first made radio contact. The colony numbered less than a dozen at the time of your arrival, yet, as the airwaves became clearer and new contacts were made, soon this number had more than doubled to twenty-five. It was decided that a name was needed to identify the settlement. The name ‘Dallas Colony One’ was adopted, known as ‘DC1’ for short. From that day on, everyone worked hard to make DC1 a secure haven for those seeking refuge from the hostile wastelands and marauding city gangs.
‘Cutter’ Jacks was one such refugee. Before ‘The Day’ he had been chief mechanic at the International Grand Prix Circuit near Lake Dallas, and his incredible skill with, and knowledge of, engines was soon to prove invaluable to the colony. He taught you how to drive, and from a pile of old wrecks that you helped him salvage from the circuit, he built you a powerful, customized car. You used it to patrol the highways north of the city, keeping a lookout for gangs of city punks who frequently mounted raids to steal or destroy DC1’s supplies. Cutter also taught you to shoot. It was your natural prowess with a gun, and your skill behind the wheel, that was to earn you the begrudging respect of your enemies, who took to calling you the ‘Freeway Warrior’.
![[illustration]](42/small3.png)
Six months after you arrived at DC1, the colony was faced with a major crisis. A heat wave was causing a drought that threatened to destroy the food supply. Crops were failing and the colony’s artesian well, its only source of uncontaminated water, was beginning to dry up. The drought was also provoking more attacks from the city punks, who were desperate for food and water. Their common need had united them and now they posed a very real threat to the security of DC1.
It was the last day of May 2020, when Pop Ewell made radio contact with another colony who were based in the city of Big Spring, 300 miles west of McKinney. Their situation was completely the reverse of DC1’s: they had food and water in plentiful supply but they were desperately short of fuel. They told of their contact with survivors in Tucson, Arizona, who were also without fuel. The Tucson colony reported that the territories west of the mountains of the Sierra Nevada had been spared the worst effects of the radioactive blizzards that had devastated the rest of the country and, miraculously, much of southern California was still widely populated. In fact, it had survived the last eight years virtually intact. When you heard the news you could hardly believe your ears. Perhaps your family was still alive. After all that had happened, there was now a real hope that one day you might be reunited with them.
A meeting was held to decide how best to deal with the crisis facing DC1. Everyone agreed that to stay at McKinney would lead eventually to death, either slowly from starvation or suddenly at the hands of the murderous city gangs. The only choice open to DC1 was to try to reach California; only there lay real hope for the future of the colony. The decision was relayed to the survivors at Big Spring and a deal was struck to rendezvous with them as soon as possible. DC1 would refuel them in exchange for food and water, and together they would join up with the Tucson colony for the final stage of the journey to California.
Careful preparations were made for the long trek, and three vehicles were chosen to make up the convoy: the school bus, your customized roadster, and a gasolene tanker laden with 5000 gallons of petroleum siphoned from underground storage tanks at the Ewell ranch. Supplies of food and water were adequate but the colony lacked sufficient firearms and ammunition with which to defend itself. So, on the day before the convoy was due to leave, one of the colonists was sent north to search the town of Sherman for weapons. He radioed back to say that he had found a cache of hunting rifles and ammunition, but that his truck had broken down and he was stranded in the town. He had also found a survivor—a beautiful teenage girl—and he requested that you be sent to Sherman to pick them up. As soon as you arrived you were ambushed by the scouts of a brutal gang of bikers known as the Detroit Lions and, in the ensuing gun battle, you killed Stinger—the scouts’ leader.
Later, you learned that the girl, Kate Norton, was the sole survivor of a Kansas City colony, which had been attacked and wiped out by the Detroit Lions. The Lions’ leader, who calls himself ‘Mad Dog Michigan’, had taken a liking to her and spared her life. Mad Dog had once been a high-ranking HAVOC agent. He had escaped from Pontiac Deep Pen near Detroit, and he and his gang, most of whom were also HAVOC escapees, were heading for the Fort Hood Military Reserve near Killeen, Texas, the largest armoury in the whole of the United States. There he hoped to find enough weapons to equip the other HAVOC clans who were now in control of cities all along the eastern seaboard. Kate had managed to steal a motorcycle and escape from their camp, but Mad Dog had been determined to get her back. He sent his brother—Stinger—and a handful of his best scouts to track her down. They had finally caught up with her at Sherman.
When Mad Dog learned that you had killed his brother, he vowed to get even with you at any price. He abandoned his plans to loot Fort Hood and embarked instead on a relentless pursuit of your colony as it crossed the sun-scorched wastelands of central Texas. The journey to Big Spring was fraught with great danger. Yet, in spite of the many perils you faced, or perhaps because of them, you felt yourself falling in love with Kate and you sensed that she, too, was becoming increasingly fond of you.
Sadly, the convoy was only a few miles from Big Spring when disaster struck. The land surrounding the settlement was controlled by a gang of bikers, a renegade clan called the ‘Mavericks’ who had been the bane of the Big Spring colony for many months. As the convoy drew nearer to its destination, the Mavericks launched an attack, and, in the running battle that ensued, they captured and abducted Kate. The convoy entered the fortified gates of Big Spring to a rapturous welcome from the colonists of that settlement, but for you the mood of celebration was soured by the vivid memory of Kate’s abduction. You vowed to rescue her, and, from that moment on, every waking minute of every day at Big Spring was spent thinking about little else.
By chance it transpired that the leader of the Mavericks, a blond-haired murderer called Amex Gold, was a former HAVOC agent who had served under Mad Dog Michigan before ‘The Day’. He offered to join forces with the Lions, and, as a token of his loyalty to his former commander, he returned Kate to him. Together, the Lions and the Mavericks launched a hasty attack on Big Spring. However, although they outnumbered the colony by more than three to one, they were unable to breach the settlement’s fortified perimeter wall, and were repelled with heavy losses.
On the day after the attack, Pop Ewell discovered the radio frequency that the clansmen were using and was able to eavesdrop on their communications. He learned that Mad Dog had ordered another HAVOC clan, based in New Orleans, to come and reinforce his command; they were expected to arrive within the week. He also overheard Mad Dog arrange a meeting with Mekong Mike, the leader of the Angelinos, a gang that controlled the city of San Angelo. He wanted him as an ally and was prepared to offer guns and ammunition in return for his help in destroying the Big Spring colony.
Two days later, Mad Dog Michigan set off for San Angelo at the head of a motorcycle pack 200 riders strong. Those few clansmen who remained with Amex Gold tried myriad tricks to convince the colony that the Mavericks and the Lions still surrounded Big Spring in strength, but to no avail. The senior members of the newly-enlarged colony convened a meeting at which it was decided that, with the clansmen now at their weakest, and with the appearance of the New Orleans gang expected at any time, a breakout had to be attempted without delay.
There is only one way for the colony to reach Tucson overland and that is to follow the remains of Interstate Freeway 10 through the arid, mountainous territory of western Texas. Precisely halfway between Big Spring and Tucson is situated the city of El Paso, which is chosen as the colony’s first destination. The city lies at the end of a long, steep, and tortuous stretch of mountain highway, and few doubt that the journey to El Paso will prove the most exacting test of strength and endurance any of you are ever likely to face during your long journey to California.
Before embarking on your adventure, you must first determine your personal characteristics and the weapons and provisions with which you are equipped. An Action Chart has been supplied on which to record and amend these details as the adventure unfolds.
Your personal characteristics comprise two basic attributes: CLOSE COMBAT SKILL and ENDURANCE. To discover your initial CLOSE COMBAT SKILL, take a pencil and, with your eyes closed, point the blunt end of it onto the Random Number Table. If you pick a 0 it counts as zero. Add 10 to the number you have picked and write the total in the CLOSE COMBAT SKILL section of your Action Chart (for example, if your pencil falls on the number 5 in the Random Number Table, you have a CLOSE COMBAT SKILL total of 15). When you fight an enemy in hand-to-hand combat, your CLOSE COMBAT SKILL will be measured against that of your enemy, so a high score in this section is desirable.
To discover your ENDURANCE level, repeat the process, but this time add 20 to the number you have picked from the Random Number Table. Write the total in the ENDURANCE section of your Action Chart (for example, if your pencil falls on the number 8 on the Random Number Table, you have a total ENDURANCE score of 28). If you are wounded in combat, or injured at any other time during your adventure, you will lose ENDURANCE points. If, at any time, your ENDURANCE points total falls to zero or below, you are dead and the adventure is over. You can regain lost ENDURANCE points during the course of the adventure, but your ENDURANCE level can never rise above your initial score.
Ever since the day you returned to the surface, you have endeavoured to develop your skills and natural instincts fully in order to best defend yourself and your colony.
Listed on your Action Chart are your five basic Survival Skills:
Your ability to control powered vehicles, such as cars, motorcycles, and trucks.
Your familiarity and experience in the use of missile weapons, such as pistols, machine pistols, shotguns, and rifles.
Your knowledge and experience of all aspects of outdoor survival.
Your physical fitness, the speed of your reflexes, and your dexterity.
Your intelligence, your ability to evaluate information, your education, and your mental alertness.
Your ability in each of these five individual skills is measured in skill points. You begin with 3 points per skill. Before starting the adventure, you may allocate an additional 4 skill points to your list of five Survival Skills. These 4 extra points can be used to improve one or more of your five skills. During your adventure, all five skills will be severely tested; therefore the higher the individual skill level, the better your chances of survival. You may allocate your 4 additional points entirely how you like.
When you have decided where to allocate your 4 additional skill points, make a note of the totals in the Survival Skills section of your Action Chart.
(If this is your first Freeway Warrior adventure, your total number of skill points should be 19: five skills x 3 points each = 15, plus 4 additional skill points = 19 points.)
If you complete successfully the mission set in Book 2 of the Freeway Warrior series, you may add an additional 4 points to your Survival Skills in Book 3. These additional points, together with any equipment and provisions that you possess at the end of Book 2, may then be used in the next Freeway Warrior adventure, which is called The Omega Zone.
Apart from your clothing, a number of useful items form your basic equipment. This comprises a Backpack and a belt on which hang your Ammo Pouch, Medi-kit, Water Canteen, and Hunting Knife. In addition to these items, you possess a Map of Western Texas, which you carry tucked inside your leather jacket.
Up to ten separate items may be stored and carried in your Backpack at any time. However, if more than three items are carried, your Stealth level will be reduced by 1 point. If more than six items are carried, your Stealth level will be reduced by 2 points; and if you carry a full Backpack (containing ten items), your Stealth level will be reduced by 3 points.
In order to equip yourself for the task ahead, you may choose up to four items from the following list:
List the items you have chosen on your Action Chart. If you have picked four items, adjust your current Stealth level accordingly.
Opportunities may arise during your adventure for you to pick up useful items. These items will appear in the text in bold print and, unless you are instructed otherwise, they can be stored and carried in your Backpack.
You will need to eat regularly. If you do not possess any food when you are instructed to eat a Meal, you will lose 3 ENDURANCE points.
Your Ammo Pouch is where you store any spare ammunition for firearms. It can hold a maximum of the following:
40 rounds of 9mm calibre Pistol/Machine Pistol ammunition
or
20 rounds of 7.62mm calibre Rifle ammunition
or
10 rounds of 12-gauge calibre Shotgun ammunition
When carrying mixed calibres of ammunition, use this equation to check how much space you have left in your Ammo Pouch:
4 x 9mm rounds = 2 x 7.62 rounds = 1 x 12 gauge round
Additional ammunition can be carried in your Backpack. Ammunition occupies one space for each quantity that is equal to (or less than) the maximum that can be carried in one Ammo Pouch.
A well-stocked Medi-kit can make all the difference to your chances of survival should you suffer injury in the field or as a result of combat. It contains useful first aid supplies, such as dressings, antiseptics, antibiotics, water purification tablets, sulfonamides, pain killers, potassium iodide tablets (to delay absorption of radioactivity), and sutures.
For convenience, these medical supplies are grouped into units. To find how many units you have in your Medi-kit, pick a number from the Random Number Table (0 equals 10) and add 2. Your total score equals the number of units with which you begin your adventure. To keep a record of them, circle the appropriate number of unit symbols in the Medi-kit section of your Action Chart. The maximum number of units you can carry in your Medi-kit is twelve.
You may use your Medi-kit units to restore lost ENDURANCE points; each unit used in this way restores 3 points. Units cannot be used to restore ENDURANCE points in lieu of a Meal or Water when instructed to eat or drink.
Water is essential to life, and your life will depend on having a sufficient, uncontaminated supply. You will need to drink regularly during your adventure. One drink is equivalent to half a pint and your canteen holds exactly two pints of water: enough for one day’s needs. When instructed to drink, be sure to tick off one box in the Water section of your Action Chart.
If you do not have any Water when instructed to drink, you must lose 3 ENDURANCE points.
These weapons aid you in hand-to-hand fighting. You begin your adventure armed with a Hunting Knife which, when used in close combat, adds 2 points to your CLOSE COMBAT SKILL. Note this Hunting Knife in the Close Combat Weapons section of your Action Chart.
If you find a close combat weapon during your adventure, you may pick it up and use it. Close combat weapons will appear in the text with a close combat skill number, for example, Machete (3). This number indicates how many points this weapon will add to your CLOSE COMBAT SKILL when used in a hand-to-hand fight.
The maximum number of close combat weapons you may carry is two, though you may only wield one at any time.
There are four types of missile weapon:
Unless you are continuing to use weapons from a previous Freeway Warrior book, you begin your adventure armed with only one of these weapons. Make your choice and then record the weapon you have chosen, together with its calibre and rate of fire details, in the Missile Weapons section of your Action Chart.
In order to be able to use a missile weapon, you must have sufficient ammunition of the correct calibre. The following list shows the calibre of each weapon, the amount that is used every time the weapon is fired, and the number of rounds that you possess at the start of your adventure:
| Calibre | Rate of Fire | Initial No. of Rounds | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pistol | 9mm | 1 | 8 |
| Machine Pistol | 9mm | 6 | 30 |
| Shotgun | 12-gauge | 1 | 4 |
| Rifle | 7.62mm | 1 | 4 |
The initial number of rounds should be noted in the Ammo Pouch section of your Action Chart. Missile weapons cannot be used if you run out of ammunition or possess only rounds of the wrong calibre. However, the opportunity may arise for you to replenish your supply of ammunition and/or discover a weapon of the correct calibre.
You may carry a maximum of three missile weapons. However, for every missile weapon that you carry (excluding your initial choice), you must reduce your Stealth level by 1 point.
There will be occasions when you will have to fight an enemy in hand-to-hand combat. The enemy’s CLOSE COMBAT SKILL and ENDURANCE level will both be given in the text. Your aim in close combat is to kill the enemy by reducing his ENDURANCE points to zero or below while losing as few of your own ENDURANCE points as possible.
At the start of a close combat, enter both your own and your enemy’s ENDURANCE points in the appropriate boxes on the Close Combat Record section of your Action Chart. The sequence for close combat is as follows:
This procedure continues until the ENDURANCE points of either the enemy or Cal Phoenix are reduced to zero or below, at which point that combatant is declared dead. If Cal Phoenix is dead, the adventure is over. If the enemy is dead, Cal Phoenix proceeds but with his ENDURANCE points possibly reduced.
A Summary of the Close Combat Rules appears on the page after the Random Number Table.
During your adventure you may be given the chance to evade close combat. If you have already engaged in a round of close combat and decide to evade, calculate the combat for that round in the usual manner. All ENDURANCE points lost by the enemy as a result of that round are ignored; only Cal Phoenix may lose ENDURANCE points during that round, but that is the risk of running away! You may evade combat only if the text of the particular section allows you to do so.