The slave Wagon

l y p t i c T o y s #2
Post Apoca
By
Quinn
Co n k l i n Art B
y
And Ashe
h y d er
R
Gary
Montgomery
 Contents

The Black Sparrow 3

History 3
Description 3

Possibilities 5
Shop Smart 5
This Town Ain’t Big Enough For the Both of Us 5
I Saw What You Did There 5
A Chance Meeting 6
How Many Sides Are There in This Fight? 6
The Compound of Saint Steven 7

People 7
Abigail Wilson, aka The Black Sparrow, Slave Trader 7
Ashland Quill, Escaped Slave 8
Bristol Shaw, Rival Slaver 8
Austin Hope, Potential Buyer 9

Encounters 9
Salvage 10
Rumors 10

2
 The Black Sparrow
History
Under the white and pitiless sky,
there’s a wormscribble track etched
into the hardpan – the yellow dust
pounded by weary feet and watered
with tears.
It’s the route that the Black Spar-
row runs, signposted with the bones
of those who’ve died of redfever, the
seeping boils, or plain old fear. It’s the
same looping trajectory she’s made
for near a decade now, out from the
shanties and drug-dens of Rebar City
– through the pass to the farming
outholds, running the gauntlet of the
cannibal-cults and the machine tribes
to the hillfolk and beyond, to the very
edge of the domains, where the poi-
soned ground nurtures virulent, mon-
strous life.
There at the domains, Abigail turns
and makes her way back – and it’s
there where her true purpose is re-
vealed. She carries useful trade items
like ammunition, food, batteries, slosh-
ing cans of fuel and fresh water – but
these are very nearly a cover. Her real
mission is to gather a particular re-
source: not supplies, but people. Abi-
gail’s merchant caravan is a conduit
of human misery, bringing the foolish
or desperate close enough to disappear
into the belly of a closed cage-cart.
Her drogues (the foulest bunch of op-
portunistic criminals ever to shiv each
other in the back) act as guards and
slave-raiders. Over the years that Abi-
gail Wilson has attracted their ilk, it’s
been clear that only the most vicious
drogues survive.
But Wilson does far more than raid
the hillfolk for bodies. The people
dwelling
along her route are more than will-
ing to sell prisoners, criminals, or their
own kin into bondage. From cannibal-
cultist to the most stoic dirt-farming
outholder, every society out in the
waste has a need for the goods and
services purveyed by the Black Spar-
row, and they need access to the fun-
damental resource of the slaver: a
living human. Abigail will take just
about anyone, and for a good price
too. Convicts are fine for labor – they
can chop old tires to feed the fur-
naces or pick through heaps of trash in
search of useful goods. Kids are natu-
rally obedient and don’t eat a lot, they
break easily, they take to training. The
good-looking folk, well, it’s not hard
to imagine what happens to them. The
souls too crazy and mean to work in
a garbage mine or a cesspool get held
back for bloodsport, or for barter with
the likes of the machine tribes. Which
is the same thing, really.
There are other caravans that brave
the searing heat and scratching wind in
search of a profit. There are the mer-
chants with a side business in slavery
and the out-and-out slavers who’ll sell
whatever their victims were carrying
or wearing, but no one has the com-
bination of experience and hardnosed
indifference to suffering that Abigail
Wilson possesses.
Description
Abigail Wilson travels with at least
four wagons, usually more except in
the leanest of times. They’re drawn by
a motley assortment of whatever her
pet mechanic can keep running
– jalopy cars maybe or a black-
smoke-snorting tractor with 3
wood-
en-plank wheels - just any crazy con-
traption of generator and chain. The
lead wagon’s always the biggest, and
always armored. These days it’s even
got a little tower on it, clad in sheet-
iron, with slits cut through for her
sharpshooters. Her lead enforcer, a
kettle-bellied muscle mass who goes by
the name Dogface, rides there keep-
ing a personal tab on the caravan’s
armory. Following that is the Black
Sparrow’s residence, a (comparatively)
palatial old vehicle, like a little house
on wheels. The crew calls it “Arvey,”
a nickname it’s had since Abigail stole
it from one of her former competitors.
Its looks are spoiled by a gun nest atop
and patchwork armor on the sides.
Somewhere in the middle of the cara-
van are the goods wagons, both dry
and human. Guards and overseers ride
on these, armed with whips, and the
odd scattergun. Compliant slaves well
enough to march are chained neck-
to-neck and follow the goods wag-
ons. Slaves who aren’t compliant are
chained to a wagon, and if one of them
happens to fall down the whole coffle
gets dragged across the hardpan for
a couple miles as an instructional ex-
ercise. Last comes the drogue-riders
and the meatwagon. The drogues are
a miserable group of hangers-on, a
“mercenary force” on a collection of
roaring, smoke-spewing motorbikes,
armed with whatever, a spear may-
be or zip gun, it might be a hatchet.
They’re hardly above slaves themselves,
the scum of the scum of Abigail’s op-
eration. The drogues provide some
motivation for laggardly slaves to keep
marching, and serve as a sort of buffer
or early-warning system against
attack from the rear. The meat-
4 wagon manages the caravan’s
non-human livestock. A couple slat-
sided mules draw it and a couple more
are stiffening in the wagon bed. Slaves
who die, or are too sick or weak to
march tend to get thrown in here af-
ter the drogues get bored with mauling
them.
Typically the caravan will stop at
some local gathering place and set up
shop for a span, three days to a week
at most. Wilson’s run this route long
enough to be fairly predictable, so by
the time her tents are up and the
lights strung, people with an inter-
est are gathering. She’ll buy and sell
slaves, goods, food, crafts, and salvage
from the city ruins. She also provides
services including “entertainment”
by the best-looking of her slaves. Her
preferred unit of exchange is anything
consumable, bullets maybe, medicine
if it’s available – though luxury items
and intact technology from before are
highly prized. Wilson’s gang of drogues
provides the first and most visible layer
of security with Dogface’s overseers and
taskmasters always an intimidating
presence.
The Black Sparrow’s market and
slave auction feels something like a
county fair, but the music braying from
crackling speakers, the lights, even the
smell of cooking over open fires isn’t
enough to obliterate the seedy under-
current of hair-trigger violence and the
odor of despair and corruption that
always travel with her.
 Possibilities The Black Sparrow’s walking
market rolls into town just about
the same time the party does and
Shop Smart promptly sets up a bustling market.
The party, low on supplies, sees Abigail undercuts whatever the local
the Black Sparrow’s caravan and merchants charge so prices plummet
stops in to see what she’s got. Abigail and petty crime runs rampant.
greets them with rote cordiality The town itself is sympathetic
and gives away some freebies. She’ll to the abolitionist organization,
try to sell them, but won’t push too Brotherhood of the Phoenix so both
hard in the haggle, just guide the sides are suspicious and aggressive,
party past the human goods. If they and any party misdeeds are likely to
can stomach Abigail’s manner and be blamed loudly on one faction by
her business, she’ll set them up with the other.
whatever they need at a fair price.
Twists
Twists Someone important in town has had enough of
Abigail and asks the party to get her to move on.
As they’re walking down the shuffling chain
First they are told to ask her nicely, then offer her
of slaves, a slave calls out in tones of surprise and
money and goods. If the party isn’t successful they
despair. It’s someone they know! If they show
may be shunned by the townsfolk, or harassed, or
interest Abigail starts to wheel and deal. It turns
sold to Abigail in a fit of poetic justice.
out the person is destined for something especially
unsavory – the main course at a cannibal-cult W
revival, or a special delivery for the Tradesman and The Black Sparrow decides to offload some
his unwholesome appetites. of the dead wood that’s been slowing her caravan
down. She offers the party plum positions as
W guards and wants them to dispose of half her
Abigail has been taking heat from both the
drogue riders. No gun battles in the streets,
cannibal-cults and the machine tribes. The cults
please! But the drogue riders really are the scum
are getting tired of snacking on stringy, gamy old
of this poor, scarred, twisted earth. They’re
ex-slave, and the tribes want some real sport to
surprisingly well-armed and see no reason to avoid
honor their gods of iron and petroleum. Who could
indiscriminate carnage.
be tougher (or tastier) than the party? If they buy
provisions from the Black Sparrow, she’ll drug W
‘em and truss ‘em to be traded for passage rights The party gets mistaken for Abigail’s agents by
across the zone. a local purveyor of human stock. He offers them a
string of “choice, absolutely choice specimens.” In
W fact all the slaves are sick, and when their sedative
While Abigail is distracted plotting against
wears off they’ll start coughing out spores. It’s all
or entertaining the party, some enterprising
part of Gansom Crane’s effort to destroy the Black
slaves stage a breakout! It’s chaos all around –
Sparrow and end her reign of commercial terror. If
the drogues are whoopin’ it up, running down
this works, the Brotherhood of the Phoenix has to
fleeing slaves. Party members who pitch in and
let him join!
help Abigail will be rewarded. Those who help
slaves escape, or just stand there and laugh, will
be remembered and marked for untimely ends by
Abigail, if she survives.
I Saw What You Did There
Somewhere out in the wastes
This Town Ain’t Big there’s an enclave of normal-
Enough For the Both of Us looking but psychic dirt
farmers. One of their people 5
has ended up in the Black Sparrow’s
penwagon and she telepathically
asks the party for help. She’s been
using clairvoyance to spy on Abigail’s
operation, and offers the party
information on where to find all the
guns, money, drugs, or whatever
else she thinks will motivate the
party the most.
Twists
The psychic is a stunningly powerful freak, but
her enormous mental prowess was bought at the
cost of her sanity. She is totally unhinged. She acts
like a normal person until the escape succeeds, at
which point she goes ballistic, screaming insults,
and shooting up the caravan if she’s got her hands
on a gun.
W The party is walking across the
Suspicious behavior on the part of the party
is reported back to the Black Sparrow and the
party emerges from the penwagon to discover an
ambush. The psi-slave takes a bullet. Her last act
is to implant a message in a party members brain
and a need to go haring off to her people with it.
W forces of raiders descending on the
The girl is part of a scheme by the
Brotherhood of the Phoenix to telepathically
subvert the Black Sparrow’s control. But Abigail is
somehow protected and it’s not working. The psi-
girl’s Brotherhood handler wants her to attempt a
risky skin-contact brain attack. She’s begging the
party for help. If they succeed they’ll have Abigail
on their case, as well as the militant abolitionists of
the Brotherhood.
A Chance Meeting
The party literally stumbles onto
Ashland as he hides out in the desert
from a passing band of slavers who
are looking for him. He cries out
bringing the slavers towards the
party. The slavers, underestimating
the party, decide to try for a bonus
and bring them back too.
Twists
6 The fight against the slavers easily
goes to
the party’s favor, but the caravan itself is too well
guarded for the party to take it on by themselves
and help is too far away. What they need is a
cunning plan and a small tight canon up ahead
may be just what they need to make one work.
W
The slavers retreat soon after the fight starts
but not before grabbing Ashland and a member of
the party. Why are trips like this never easy?
W
The party gets Ashland to safety but he
insists on going back and saving everyone which is
something the party does not have the man power
for. Ashland suggests that if the party stood with
the hill tribes they might be willing to bring war on
the slavers and take back their people.
How Many Sides Are There
in This Fight?
hard pack just minding their own
business. As they clear a rise thy
see a caravan ahead of them. From
their position they can see two
caravan. These forces are dressed
differently, but both seem prepared
to steal whatever it is the caravan is
carrying.
Twists
The party rushes into the fight to defend
the caravan and part way through the fight they
realize they are defending slavers. Now they have
to find a way to switch sides in the middle of the
fight and make their opponents trust them.
W
As the attack starts the party sees a number
of slaves escape from the caravan. A contingent
from both of the attacking groups go after them
as well as a small contingent from the caravan.
To make matters worse, all the commotion has
attracted a sandworm that is bearing down on the
fleeing slaves.
W
Both the slave caravans involved in the attack
think the party is mercenaries hired by the other
group and decide they are a particular threat and
dedicate their forces to come after the party.
 The Compound of Saint
Steven
Out in the desert not too far
away from the slavers route is a
well fortified compound run by the
followers of Saint Steven. This tech-
cult has been hording technology
for many years while their adepts
find ways to make it work again.
Lately they have been gathering
slaves to do the work of cleaning
and prepping the old tech for
repair. These slaves work some of
the longest and hardest hours in
the waste and are treated similar
to disposable machinery, except the
machines are treated better.
Twists
The mother of a young man taken by the cult
has hired the party to break her son out. The only
way the party has found to slip into the compound
is to hide themselves in the next shipment of slaves
which Abigail will be bringing in.
W him over. She refused the reward offered her and
The disciples of Saint Steven have realized it is
cheaper to pay mercenaries to raid the slave trains
then to pay for slaves. These attacks are harder
on the slaves being captured than they are on the
slave traders who lose a bit of stock. The party is
approached to make one of these raids, but refuses.
Now they feel obligated to stop whoever the tech
cultists find to do the job.
W few years now and has a reputation as
After touring the cult’s facilities,
Abigail’s rival is infuriated at how the
slaves he has sold the cult are treated. He
approaches the party and several other
bands of wanderers to help him wipe the cult
off the face of the earth. The rival will smuggle
them all in and they will remove the cultists
and free the slaves. The wanderers will get any
salvage tech they can find.
People
Abigail Wilson, aka The
Black Sparrow, Slave
Trader
History
Abigail was born in a poor waster farming
family and hated every last minute of it. She hated
plowing fields, keeping the crops safe from the
bat rabbits and never seeing anyone she was not
related to. Most of all she hated the dust. She still
hates dust, but has learned that it’s just another
price to pay to make a buck.
She has also learned that it is not just her
family she hates. It is pretty much any other
person she has run into who is not giving her
money. As she puts it, “Money or lip, which are
you givin’ me?” She got her introduction to the
slave trade one night while she was sitting out
in the fields with a shot gun trying to catch a
particularly clever bat rabbit that had been stealing
bait from the traps she was setting. Suddenly
something big came plowing through the field and
rather than running, she jammed her shot gun in
its belly.
Turned out it was an escaped slave from a
caravan crossing the plains of Sul just north of the
family farm. The slave begged for her to let him go.
Instead she marched him to the slavers and turned
instead asked for a job. She never even said good
bye to her family and never regretted it.
Abigail grew up quick and tough in the slave
trade. After a few years and a lot of money earned
she put together her own company and set out
to gather the savages that make their home in
the high plains beyond the hills. She has run that
route and several others for more than a
someone who can deliver the goods. Most
of her stock is broken and more than ready
to obey when they get to market.
Description
Dark hair, thin face and features
attached to a sack of a body, Abigail is
strong and muscular but not in any way
that makes her look attractive.
She wears rough clothing most
of the time and looks down
on all that frilly, lacy crap
that most women wear
to catch a man. Or, as 7
she puts it, it is easier to catch a man with a snare
and shot gun than with a painted face.
Stats and Skills
Abigail is a hard woman and not a nice person.
She can bargain with the best of them, shoot as
well as anyone and better them most. She has a
gift for cruelty and meaness that goes a long way
to breaking the will of her stock.
Ashland Quill, Escaped
Slave
History
Up until a few weeks ago Ashland lived among
his tribe mates in the sacred hills of the fire king.
They hunted and gathered among the bones of the
old city and in all it was a pleasant life. Sure, there
were the normal threats, spider crocks were always
a problem, but the real danger was slavers.
They would come out of nowhere and snatch
up people without warning. It was so bad that as
a child Ashland and his friends would play slavers
and slaves. He was a small child and not too
popular with his peers so was always cast in the
role of a slave which he hated. However, the tricks
he learned playing at being a slave and trying to
escape from the caravan have helped him.
A week ago, a few months after the
celebration of his 15th year he and a few other
young men around his age were caught by a female
slaver know to the mountain folk as the Black
Sparrow because of the way she darted in and
out of the hills. The Black Sparrow bound him and
tossed him in with the other slaves. He watched as
she beat the weak ones and killed a few of his tribe
mates who tried to defy her.
Ashland decided he had to escape and slowly
started working on loosening the rope that bound
him to the other slaves. Even though the food they
were given was not much, he saved what he could
and despite his small stature he was well suited to
surviving the endless trek across the hard pack to
the slave markets.
A week into the journey he managed to slip
his bonds and has up until now managed to
elude his captors. He is not heading
back for home, however. He is out
to find people who can
help him save the rest
of the slaves.
8
Description
Short but wiry Ashland is dressed in only a
dirty loincloth. The rest of his clothing and the
tribal baubles that marked his status have been
taken from him. His wrists are cut and scabbed
over where he was bound to the other slaves in the
line.
Stats and Skills
Ashland is clever and a survivor, well practiced
in eluding people and spider crocks that are trying
to catch him. He is not strong, but he is fast and
enduring. He was also one of the best runners in his
tribe, able to cover large amounts of ground quickly
and with little effort.
Bristol Shaw, Rival Slaver
History
Bristol Shaw is the son of the man who taught
Abigail the trade. As Bristol and Abigail grew up
together they had a brief romance which ended in
betrayal when she left to start her own caravan.
Since then he has worked hard for his father, losing
himself in work to set aside the feelings of rejection
and betrayal she left him with.
However, Bristol still cares for Abigail deeply
and wants to prove to her that he would make a
worthy partner. He knew her when he was young
and still sees in her the things his father prized
that were not in him. She is strong, decisive and
hardnosed about business. She is everything that
he has been taught is good. He sees her as the ideal
he could also live up to with her to push him, so
he emulates her. Knowing that the only thing she
respects is strength and drive he hunts much of
the same areas she does and sells in most of the
same towns. While he does not have the passion
for slaving and breaking people that she has he is
nearly as accomplished as she is, though he is solely
fueled by the drive to impress her.
Bristol’s cause, however, is a lost one.
Abigail needs another person in her life about as
much as she needs more escaped
slaves. These days, all she sees
him as is competition . She is
actually thinking about raiding
his next caravan rather than
going after her own slaves.
If she puts his people in
chains then there will be more
money for people to give
her.
Description
The inner conflict between the lover and the
slaver in Bristol is easy to see if one is looking for it.
When he is on, in front of people, his dark eyes are
hard and cold and he holds himself at attention. He
barks orders and curses, but when he is by himself
or among the few people he holds close, his gaze
softens and his shoulders sag. He has dark hair, is
fairly tall and cannot grow a beard to save his life.
Stats and Skills
Bristol is a good slaver but a better business
man. He leaves most of the physical work to his
staff and keeps worries about making the books
balance and the money coming in for himself.
Description
Austin is sallow and walks with a bit of a limp
from a beating he received as a child slave. He is
completely hairless, a small mutation he picked up
from his father. He has long fingers and a hooked
nose. His clothing is made of soft natural fibers
layered with leather. He packs a sidearm and a
short knife.
Stats and Skills
Austin is a shrewd negotiator getting as much
value for his barter as possible when he deals with
the slavers. His greatest skill is as an actor hiding
his hatred and true intentions. He is also good at
remembering and reporting what he has seen.

Encounters
He is not exceptional in any way except for his
dedication to his lost love.

1-14 A machine tribe war party

Austin Hope, Potential done up in face paint, ritual
Buyer scars, and piercings.
15-28 A couple of slavers dragging
History a struggling lad who calls for
Austin is a man who hates slavers with every help.
bone in his body. He grew up the child of slaves
and would be serving as a slave in some wretched 29-42 A poison-jungle nightmare
position today if it were not for the Brotherhood creature, half dire-wolf half
of the Phoenix. This order of abolitionists have mantis with chitinous armor
given up fighting slavery directly, at least for the and seeking jaws.
moment.
The order instead buys slaves from their 43-57 Two cannibal cultists lug-
owners and frees them. This is what happened to ging a crate across the waste,
Austin’s mother when he was still too young to “SUPLISE” raggedly stenciled
work. Her owner thought he was getting a deal on its side.
getting rid of the boy who was doing nothing more
than taking up food and the woman who had to 58-71 A squadron of Abigail’s
tend to his needs. What he did not know was how drogues on motorbikes up to
the order really worked. recreational mayhem
They offered freedom to his mother, but they
also offered a home for her and young Austin. They 72-85 Bristol Shaw’s caravan and
have started a community made entirely of freed outriders raiding a farming
and escaped slaves who are training to fight the settlement for slaves.
slavers and protect those who the slavers treat as
cattle. 86-00 A wrecked war machine
Austin has worked as a buyer for the Phoenix exalted into a holy site by the
for several years, but now he is on a different machine tribe Servants of the
mission. As he usually does he meets the caravans Gun.
in the desert to try and buy the slaves who are too
weak to make it to town or too aggressive to be
easily broken. This time he is also scouting for the
first of the Brotherhood’s attacks on the slavers.
Abigail has been targeted because of her cruelty
and disregard for life. The attack will begin as
soon as he gets the sick and wounded out of the
way and he reports to his fellows in the order.
9
 Salvage
1-10 An assault rifle and a box
of armor-piercing incendiary
ammunition. It’s probably not
a Callahan full-bore autolock,
but it was Dogface’s very fa-
vorite gun.
11-21 A dozen grenades.
22-32 A thing like a first-aid kit
including skull-electrodes and a
little computer. It’s a short-
range telepathy rig, granting
the user the ability to read the
surface thoughts of a single
nearby target.
33-43 A toolkit full of common au-
tomotive tools, well-cared for.
44-54 A heavy-duty ceramic wa-
ter filter, the kind you can run
just the nastiest stuff through
and still get drinkable water.
55-65 A briefcase-sized drug kit,
with substances pharmaceuti-
cal (aspirin, antibiotics, anti-
shock) and recreational.
66-76 A pair of portable radios,
soldered together out of the
carcasses of at least 5 indi-
vidual other radios. A set of
tape-wrapped batteries and a
hand charger to accompany.
77-87 A packet of business pa-
pers, including some gems
such as blackmail material and
this season’s password to get
through Machine Tribe terri-
tory.
88-00 A bottle of hooch! Not only
is it terrible-tasting, it’s half
turpentine. Being struck blind
after drinking it is the least of
your worries.
10
Rumors
1-14 There is a slaver who plies
his trades from the waste to
the mountain who hates the
job but does it to impress a
girl.
15-28 The followers of St. Ste-
ven have been buying an
unusual number of slaves
lately.
29-42 There is a small town
that will buy any unwanted
slave, particularly women
and children.
43-57 A slaver known as the
Black Sparrow will gladly
stop her caravan to trade
with travelers.
58-71 There is a lady slaver
who plies the wastes who is
known for her cruelty and
the submissive stock she
brings to auction.
72-85 When slavers come to
town it usually means a
party of sorts, but trouble is
never far behind.
86-00 The Black Sparrow caught
her first runaway slave
when she was only ten.