Attack!

The two men caught up over coffee, although Jed’s remained untouched in the mug. Dawson told him how some folk had left town while they still could, having heard reports from travelling traders about the roads to Tarnation slowly being cut off. When the traders stopped coming, it soon became clear that the town was isolated from the rest of the county - the rest of Vultures’ Moon too. In the absence of the sheriff, Dawson had done his best to keep a lid on things. Last thing we need, he shook his head, is folk causing a panic, and shooting each other for basic supplies.

He had called a town meeting in the Last Gasp, saying the time had come for the good folk of Tarnation to prove they had Pioneer blood in their veins and Pioneer courage in their hearts. This motivational speech had been received well but folk were getting fractious all over again; like bugs trapped in a jar, it wouldn’t be long before they turned on each other.

“I don’t know nothing about bugs,” Jed muttered, “but I’ve a feeling this here jar is about to be tipped over if not smashed altogether.”

“And that means...?”

“Trouble’s coming. And soon.”

“Pity you didn’t bring Sheriff Marshall back here with you. I have the feeling folk respect him more than me. He didn’t tell you where he’d been?”

“You sound like a friend of mine,” said Jed. “I guess we’ll find out - if we get out of this alive, that is.”

Dawson drained his cup and shook the coffee pot to see if would yield another swig.

“You didn’t have to come here,” he told the gunslinger. “I mean, this ain’t your circus and it ain’t your monkey. Folk here are a hardy breed. We can face down whatever’s coming.”

Jed’s chest heaved.

“I’m obliged to be here,” he said, flatly. “I owe these good folks a debt of honour.”

“And that means...?”

Jed told him about the men he had killed in the mistaken belief that they were robbing an old man and his granddaughters, rather than trying to prevent three wayward souls from perpetrating more wrongdoing.

“An honest mistake!” Dawson dismissed Jed’s story as though shooing a fly from his face.

Jed stared at the table. Making mistakes was alien to his nature and injurious to his pride.

“I’m here anyways,” he stood up.

Commotion in the street curtailed their conversation.

“What in Hell...?” Dawson hurried to the door.

“Trouble’s here,” said Jed.

***

Both men burst from the sheriff’s office and joined Horse and the townsfolk staring up the street at an approaching dust cloud accompanied by the sound of thundering hooves.

“Who in Hell...?” Dawson dropped his mug in the dirt.

“From up at the fort,” Jed muttered.

“But the town’s cut off!”

The gunslinger wasn’t sticking around to debate Tarnation’s isolated status. He mounted Horse in an easy movement and then cast over his shoulder to the lawman, “Get these folks indoors. In cellars if possible. Ain’t nobody to come out until I say so.”

He rode at a steady pace towards the approaching troops. Behind him he heard the deputy address the onlookers.

“You heard the man. Clear the street. Everybody inside. Let’s move it, folks.”

No one showed signs of budging. Deputy Dawson’s implorations were falling on deaf ears. The coming spectacle was more interesting than personal safety.

Horse came to a stop in the dead centre of the street. Jed lifted his hat and waved it like a flag, not of surrender but of parlay or powwow.

The thundering hooves slowed to a dull roar. The blue uniforms of the soldiers became visible as the dust began to settle. At their head, decorated with gold braid, a general, a broad-shouldered man who could have been any age. His muscular form stretched his tunic - the brass buttons looked likely to pop at any second. He had been enhanced to the extreme.

“His eyes are different colours,” Horse observed, in Jed’s mind.

“General,” Jed nodded in greeting and put his hat back on. “I’d be obliged if you and your boys turned tail and left town.”

“Ain’t going to happen,” the general spat on the ground. The gobbet of spittle zinged into the dirt like a bullet. He raised a gloved hand. His men aimed their rifles at the gunslinger. “Not till we get what we come for.”

“And what might that be?” Jed continued to look the general in the eye - his green and gold eyes.

“Step aside, gunslinger,” the general made a shooing motion with his fingers. “Be a shame to get a scratch on that fine Horse of yours.”

“You can stop him, Jed!” cried young Billy from the crowd.

The general calmly wiped his glove on his thigh. The kid leather came up grey and brown. He rolled the dark dust on his palm into a ball and hurled it in the direction of the heckler. Young Billy ducked but an elderly man was not so quick. The dark dust hit him in the chest. It surged up his neck and over his face, down his legs and around his back. The townsfolk parted, horrified and disgusted, as the old man toppled forwards, already an unrecognisable shape. The dark dust engulfed him completely, multiplying as it fed. It rose in a mass, seeking a new meal.

Panic struck! It filled every denizen of Tarnation instantly, as though galvanised by a lightning bolt. Folk ran in all directions. The soldiers, copying their general’s trick, made bombs of the dark dust on their uniforms and Horses’ flanks. Townsfolk fell as the dark dust struck them. If they reached out and grabbed someone else, the dark dust used their arm like a bridge to cross over to another victim. Those that escaped the dust were picked off by rifle blasts.

Through this, Jed and Horse rose above street level. Jed fired off blasts, picking off the soldiers where he could. Their enhancements meant his shots had wounding rather than fatal effect. There were too many of them.

Some folk got away, heading for the cover they should have sought at once. The general directed his men to tackle buildings harbouring fugitives. Storefronts and roofs were blasted away. Within minutes, most of Tarnation was either on fire or crawling with the dark dust.

Deputy Dawson was holed up in the sheriff’s office, sheltering as many folk as he could fit in. They were sitting ducks, he realised. He peered through barred windows, sighting his rifle on the general. He just needed the man to look up so he could get a clear shot.

Horse swooped over the soldiers. They fired upwards, their blasts deflected by Horse’s superior force-field deflector. This action exposed the soldiers’ chests - a couple of them were crumpled and toppled by gunfire from nearby windows.

The general looked up, cussing the gunslinger and his excellent Horse - as though complaining it wasn’t a fair fight. This gave Dawson the chance he needed. He squeezed his trigger and put out the general’s golden eye. The general reeled in his saddle from the impact but he did not fall. He furrowed his brow and squeezed the bullet from his eye socket. Dawson watched in horror as the remaining green eye zeroed in on the sheriff’s office.

The general pressed his heels into his Horse and made a steady path towards the source of the gunshot, leaving his men to tackle the errant townsfolk and the flying gunslinger.

He would have strong words with ole Gramps when he got back to the fort. Why cain’t my Horse get off the ground, damn it? But for now, he would seek out the varmint who had put out his favourite eye.

He raised his hand and beckoned to his men to come with. Then he described a loop in the air with his finger. A band of soldiers circled the jailhouse. The general crossed his wrists in his lap and addressed the window in a casual tone.

“Send out the gunman,” he even smiled, “and nobody gets hurt. Nobody else, that is.”

He chuckled to himself, proud of his ability to keep calm and be goddamn funny at times like this.

Deputy Dawson was sweating. He considered taking another shot and blinding the general, but the surrounding troops would destroy the building and everyone in it as soon as the bullet hit the cornea.

The others with him, shoulder to shoulder in the confined space, were giving off a stench of fear. There were men, women and kids. Deputy Dawson couldn’t risk them getting hurt. He’d brought them in for safety in the first place. He passed his rifle to the blacksmith. A look passed between them. The blacksmith nodded very slightly.

“I’m coming out!” Dawson yelled through the window bars. Some folk whimpered and protested. Some tried to hold onto his shirt sleeves but he wrested himself free. He opened the jailhouse door and stepped out onto the porch.

The single green eye looked him up and down. The appraisal was a positive one.

“Fine-looking boy,” the general spat - zing! “Step closer so I can see the colour of your eyes.”

Dawson stepped off the porch. The general beckoned him forward. The deputy shuffled a couple of steps towards the general’s Horse, his face upturned.

“Baby blue,” the general seemed to approve. “Reckon they’ll do. You got a good pair of arms on you too, boy. You’ll come in mighty useful, I’m thinking.”

It was Dawson’s turn to spit.

“Ain’t no way I’m joining your band of hellions,” he snarled.

The general laughed.

“Oh, we don’t want all of you, son. Just the good bits.”

Dawson faltered. He kept his arms tightly by his sides and clenched his fists, hoping the blacksmith had understood all he had tried to communicate in that briefest of glances.

Don’t let them take me alive!

He closed his eyes, expecting the back of his head to be blasted away at any second. There was a shot but not from a rifle.

“What the Hell?”

Dawson opened one eye and then the other one, to see the general and his Horse lifted off the ground by invisible hands. Above them, Jed and his Horse were hovering, somehow pulling the general away from the street. Dawson took this as his cue to get away. He darted into the nearby general store - he wouldn’t go far from the folk in the jailhouse.

The general dug his heels into his Horse, sharper and sharper. He tugged at the reins, cussing and swearing.

“What’s the matter with you, crazy thing?”

But his Horse, a lesser model, could not reply. Gramps had not figured out voice boxes and language acquisition.

The general reached inside his tunic and pulled out a revolver that was not standard issue. He tried to aim it at the gunslinger but his own Horse was spinning in the air and he had to focus on trying to hold on.

“Can’t do this all day,” Horse muttered. Jed could hear the strain in its voice.

“Drop him,” said Jed.

“Waste of a perfectly good Horse,” Horse sniffed. It blinked and, no longer dragging the extra weight, rose several feet in the air. The general and his Horse plummeted to the ground. They landed in a crumpled heap of man and critter. The Horse was still but parts of the general twitched and quivered. Dawson kept his distance but Ike from the general store was not so cautious. He burst out into the street and emptied both barrels of his shotgun into the general’s head, blasting it beyond recognition.

The green eyeball flew out and rolled along the street. Ike stomped after it and crushed it beneath his boot.

Before Dawson had time to inform the storekeeper of his error, the soldiers surrounding the sheriff’s office opened fire. Their barrage of blasts destroyed the walls, bringing the roof crashing down on the screaming townsfolk within. The screams were silenced all at once.

Jed watched in horror from on high. Cuss that storekeeper! Why does every dang fool with a gun think he’s qualified to use it? He clicked his tongue.

“Is that meant for me?” Horse rolled its eyes, but it began its descent just the same.

Jed dismounted and clapped Dawson on the shoulder.

“Best keep back,” he grunted. Dawson remained where he was, casting around for the nearest firearm.

Jed approached the sheriff’s office - or the rubble to which it had been reduced. The soldiers had also dismounted. They used their Horses to lift stones and chunks of debris from the bodies of the townsfolk. Jed’s Horse looked on. Its expression was unreadable but it seemed to be embarrassed for these lesser models.

The Horses lifted the rubble into the air and deposited it at the roadside while a couple of the men picked their way through the bodies they revealed.

“Couple arms...”one called out to the other. “A good ear over here...”

Jed fired his pistol into the sky.

“You can quit taking inventory,” he growled. “Ain’t no piece of nobody leaving this town.”

The soldiers ignored him. Another pair joined the searchers with a cart they’d commandeered from somewhere up the street.

“Gramps says to bring them back alive, wherever possible. Makes his job easier.”

“The old coot will take what he gets,” one of the searchers spat on the jailhouse floor.

A man - Dawson saw it was the blacksmith - was pulled from the jailhouse wreckage. He was unconscious and bore a few superficial cuts but seemed otherwise intact. It took four soldiers to get him onto the cart. They seemed pleased with their haul.

“I said,” Jed raised his voice, “There ain’t no piece of nobody leaving Tarnation.”

He put himself between the soldiers and the cart.

Thunder cracked overhead. The soldiers backed away. An unseasonal fall of rain dropped like silver dollars, darkening the scene in seconds. The dirt grew darker to match the sky. The dark dust rippled, coming together to coat the length and breadth of Tarnation’s only street. Those folk who still could, moved to the upper storeys.

“You better back off,” Jed growled.

“Um, Jed...”

Jed glowered at Horse but before he could scold the critter, he became aware of the reason for both the interruption and the sudden cowering of the men.

At the far end of the street, across the shimmering lake of dark dust, a tall figure in a full-length coat stood with his hands poised near his hips. A wide-brimmed hat masked his features but even from this distance, Jed could tell who it was. It could be nobody else.

Jed’s hands throbbed as a twinge ran through them like a hot iron plunged into butter.

He fumbled his pistol back into its holster, hoping no one saw his clumsiness; everyone was transfixed by the sight of the new arrival, who stood like a blackened tree, the sole survivor of a forest fire, emaciated and yet resilient.

Farkin Plisp!