Moon Fate: Book Summary
After arriving back at the redoubt in New Mexico Ryan and Dean reach Jak and Christina's homestead to find it totally destroyed. They wonder what happened and where the others might be. A note is discovered, telling them to head north, where they will be able to meet up with Krysty and the others. They wait until dusk then travel north.
Unknown to both of them, a sec hunter robot used the gateway and is hot on their trail.
Later in the evening they are caught in a downpour, but are otherwise unharmed. Around midnight they stop to make camp for the night and get some badly needed sleep.
A short time after waking up the next day they come across the corpses of about twenty people who have been covered in lime, to help the decomposition take place even faster. Dean climbs down into the pit to see how they were killed. Each and every one of the people had been killed execution style. They head to a near by stream to clean up.
Near the stream Ryan discovers a pile of notes left by Krysty. It describes how the settlers arrived in wagons, and how they were suffering from a virulent form of the bubonic plague. They learn that there were eight men, six women and four kids. Two of the men were so desperate they attack, and were killed. During the fighting one of the sick women falls into the well, contaminating it. Mildred insists on examining one of the kids and takes him into the ranch house. He is unable to control himself and shits all over the ranch house. They are forced to kill the entire group, as they were going to die anyhow, and destroy the ranch. After reading the notes, they leave the charnel pit and continue to move north.
The next day they stop by a small lake to eat a rabbit they caught. It is at this time that the final Sec hunter droid catches up to them. It destroys a small deer that got too close and comes after Ryan and Dean. Ryan heads into the lake, forcing the droid to follow him. When it gets up to its chest in the water, it stops, refusing to budge. Ryan dives under the water and swims up to it. Grabbing its legs, he topples it into the water, but not before catching two powerful blows from it. The water seeps into the computer controls and short it out, destroying the droid.
Later on in the late afternoon they catch a large fish and finish off the entire thing. This is when Krysty and the others finally catch up and they are reunited. That evening they shoot several small deer and goats for food, then make camp. Ryan relates what happened when he rescued Dean. They also discover that there is supposed to be a huge tribe of Stickies living up in the hills near where they are. They rest the night and plan to meet up with Mildred and J.B. the next day.
Krysty, Jak and Ryan leave to meet up with J.B. and Mildred, as well as to hunt for signs of Stickies along the way. Sure enough, as they near where Mildred and J.B. are staying, they spot a pair of Stickies who are actually dressed neatly and are carrying blasters. They track them all the way, and finally confront the mutants as they are about to open fire on J.B. and Mildred. They are able to kill them without too much trouble.
As they are about to join their friends, they are discovered by a group of eight Stickies, led by a blond haired stickie named Charlie. He orders them to drop their weapons and strip off all their clothing. Jak is able to make a clean break for it and escapes, but Ryan and Krysty are caught without hope of escape. After a very thorough search, they are allowed to dress once again, but their weapons are taken away. It turns out that Charlie knows Ryan and J.B. They had met for the first time twelve years ago, in 2085. Charlie was the only survivor of the unfortunate encounter.
Jak meets up with J.B. and Mildred and tells them what happened. Mildred heads off to join up with Doc Tanner, Dean and Christina, while J.B. and Jak hope that they will be able to follow the trail left by the Stickies and rescue Ryan and Krysty.
Christina is very bitter over the loss of her homestead and the fact that she has been separated from Jak yet again. She blames the entire thing on Ryan. Doc show's her that if it wasn't for Ryan, her sick family would still be very much alive and she would never have met Jak. Reluctantly, she sees Doc's point.
Ryan and Krysty are led to a huge stickie community. The mutants took over an ancient Indian village nestled deep in the hills. There are ninety men, forty four women, and eighteen children living in the ville. Unlike other stickie communities this one is neat and clean, well organised, and maintained. Charlie runs a tight ville. Krysty is able to anger him and he attacks, nearly killing her. He is able to calm down and orders both of them to be placed in a Kiva to await their fate.
They meet Abe. He did survive the arrow to the throat after all. He tells them his story on how he survived and ended up getting captured by the mutants. They also meet the rest of the captives. They are kept in the Kiva for the night.
The next morning they are brought out of the Kiva and fed. In order to ensure that they can't escape they are shackled together. A stickie female is attracted to Ryan and fakes spilling his food on him. She uses her hand to clear it away, feeling him up while she's at it.
During the day a Stickie teenager tries to throw a rock at the prisoner with the broken ankle. Charlie catches it, and as punishment blows the boy's hand off. He dies later that night from shock and blood loss.
Around noon a powerful storm hits, washing away most of the tracks to the mutant's encampment, making it very difficult for the others to continue tracking.
Ryan and Krysty spend most of the day talking to the others, trying to come up with some way of escaping. Only a couple would be able to hold their own if it came down to a fight, and Ryan knows that the odds are stacked heavily against them. On of the men, named Red Folsom, decides to make a break for it. If it wasn't for the mud, he may have managed to escape. But, he trips in a hidden depression, falls and breaks his arm. He is recaptured and separated from the others.
That night the remaining prisoners are taken out of the pit and are forced to watch as Charlie uses a knife and gun powder to kill Red. It takes a long time for him to die. When he is finally killed, Charlie has the corpse dumped into the river, where it is discovered next morning by Dean.
Now that they have a clue where to look, J.B. leads the others upstream, knowing that it is only a matter of time before they come across the stickie community.
Ryan tells Krysty that their only chance of survival is to make a clean break of it the next day, and that means the entire group, not just a couple of them.
While they are waiting, a stickie guard approaches and tells Charlie that there is a group of norms approaching. Ryan fears that it may be J.B. and the others. But instead, it turns out to be a group of fladgies. Charlie captures the group and orders them stripped naked and tied to a rack, where he has them whipped to death. J.B. and the others are close enough that they can hear the screams as the fladgies die.
During the night Ryan discusses the plan of escape with everyone. Krysty is forced to talk to one of the prisoners, a fat candy salesman named Harold. She is able to convince him to join with the others. If she hadn't been able to do this, Ryan surely would have killed the man.
J.B. is taking the capture of Ryan and Krysty very hard. He can't stop moving about. Always polishing his glasses or checking over his weapons. He finds it hard to accept that his oldest and closest friend may actually be dead. While he is on guard duty, he spots movement heading towards the stickie encampment.
Ryan is woken up when Krysty uses his weighted scarf to kill Danny. The man was going to turn them in to the Stickies, probably in hopes of them allowing him to live. It may have been the pain from his broken ankle that caused him to turn coat on the others.
A short time later, the mutant woman who was attracted to Ryan arrives and has him taken out of the Kiva. Under guard she has him brought back to her home where he is tied to her bed and she rapes him four times. The woman's name is Marcie, and when she is about to force Ryan to lick her, she is shot in the back and killed by a group of Lepers who are attacking. One of the lepers is about to kill Ryan when he himself is killed after catching a musket ball to the back of his head. Ryan is able to grab Marcies knife and frees himself.
Ryan is able to free the others. They head towards Charlie's home where their weapon are stored. On their way, two of the prisoners, Bob and Helga are cut down by Charlie's Uzi. Dorina throws a rock, hitting him in the wrist. This ends Charlie's attack on the prisoners. As Ryan watches, he can tell that the mutants are slowly gaining the upper hand in the fight. He knows that they have to move and quick, because it won't be long before Charlie organises a search party and comes after the group.
After getting their weapons, they waste no time getting out of the village. On the way out Abe is shot in the stomach, and begs Ryan to leave him. He refuses to do it this time and they help get him out of the ville and head deep into the hills. The reverend Joe Bob gets separated from the group while they escape.
Joe Bob runs into Mildred and the others and she promptly shoots him in the head, as he was about to attack her. Only moments later do they run into Ryan and the other survivors.
Mildred inspects Abe's wound and announces that it isn't serious and shouldn't suffer any long term side effects from it. They don't bother stopping, knowing that it won't be long before Charlie finds them.
Around noon of the next day is when Krysty spots Charlie and about twenty Stickies pursuing them. They run across a small group of lepers who survived the attack the night before. They ask for food, but Ryan refuses to give it to them. A woman makes the mistake of trying to attack and is put down. Ryan warns them that a large group of very pissed of Stickies are only a short distance behind them, saying that it would be a hell of an idea to get away as fast as they can.
They come to the ruins of a resort town called Bear Claw Ridge. Abe has slipped into clinical shock and can't be moved any more. Ryan stay's behind to ambush any of the Mutants that enter. To Christina's horror, Jak refuses to go with her and stays behind to watch over Ryan and help him out. They hole up in the ruins of an old movie theatre.
The mutants were able to track them into the ruins and Charlie leaves three of his men behind to search for any of the norms that may have decided to stay behind. Ryan encounters one of the muties in the projection booth of the theatre, but is unable to kill it. He chases it down to the lobby where Jak kills it. They leave Abe alone and split up to hunt down the other Stickies that may still be in the theatre.
Jak finds one who has stopped for a moment to take a drink. He fires at it three times before finally killing it. However, he is ambushed by a third and is knifed in the chest.
Charlie and J.B. hears the shots. J.B. opens fire on the group of Stickies wiping them out. The only one who is able to escape is Charlie.
Ryan has come to love Jak like a son. When he finds the boy stabbed through the chest he loses it. He hunts down the mutant responsible for it and suckers it into the open where he shoots it through both elbows, knees and four times in the stomach. He lets the mutant writhe in agony for a short time before finally putting a bullet through its head, killing it.
Abe comes around and offers to watch over Jak while Ryan hunts for any other Stickies that may have survived. He is almost cut down by Charlie who managed to make his way back to the theatre. He is standing over Abe and Jak, ready to kill them both. J.B. and the others are so close on Charlie's trail that the woman, Dorina is able to knock his aim off with a thrown stone. Abe turns around and stabs the mutant leader in the stomach using a jagged piece of glass. In the confusion, the mutant is able to escape.
Two months have passed and Jak is nearly totally recovered from the stab wound. Dorina and Harold have taken over a near by ranch and she is pregnant. Christina has given birth to Jenny, and they have nearly rebuilt the homestead they took over. Christina is still terribly bitter towards Ryan and wants to see them leave, never to return.
Charlie, starving and ragged, approaches the ranch. He makes the fatal mistake of threatening Jenny. Christina butchers him using an axe. Ryan announces that they plan to leave at sunrise the next morning. This pleases Christina greatly.
After a big breakfast they head to the ruined redoubt and jump out.
End of Moon Fate.
A total of two months and eight days have passed in this novel.