by RW Krpoun
A gust of breeze stirred the tufts of grass and sent old leaves dancing, and the Shootist picked up a smell akin to uncut peppercorns, faint and tantalizing; for an instant he was transported back to his youth, sitting at a round table covered with white Formica spooning up his mother’s homemade soup made with uncut peppercorns like black BBs while his sisters blathered on about nothing. The memory stabbed at his heart-he hadn’t been in touch with his family as much as he should have, steadily drifting out of their orbit since he first joined the Regular Army. A flash of melancholy washed over him at the thought of his dying in the Realm without the chance to say the things to them that he should have said long ago.
He mentally shrugged off the emotional baggage and steadied his hands on the warm hardwood and steel, listening hard. A faint click of stone on thin metal sounded to his right: someone was tampering with the noisemakers. Moving without haste he reached up and carefully folded the hex-sheet, which promptly collapsed into ashes.
Dropping his hand back to his shotgun he slowly lifted his chin and surveyed the brush in front of him, planning his options as he did so, grateful that he had run twenty rounds through the shotgun since he had acquired it in order to get familiar with its quirks.
Thirty feet away a skeleton was lying in the mulch beneath the trees; Shad blinked away the sleep-haze and realized that it wasn’t lying but in fact was low-crawling. As that registered with him the Undead looked in his direction and he saw that the glow in its sockets was red with flecks of black, and that it seemed more graceful than the ones they had fought a few days ago. Smoothly shouldering the shotgun he shot it, the silver shot shredding its skull, and then scrambled behind the tree he had been sitting against.
As if his shot had been a signal skeletons began clambering to their feet all across his north front; the Shootist took a quick look to his flanks and rear before opening fire. The range and general disposition were perfect for shotgun-use as the full choke meant his shot pattern expanded an inch for every yard travelled. At ten yards the shot were in a circle formation ten inches across, making aiming much more forgiving.
As he fired he noticed that these skeletons seemed cleaner and whiter of bone than others he had fought, and that several were attempting to bring javelins into play. It was not a topic he dwelled on as his weapon ran empty and he ducked behind the tree, thumbing more cartridges into the loading gate at the bottom of the receiver.
He ran through seven more rounds, doing very well, but one shooter could not hold that length of frontage by himself no matter what sort of weapon he was using. Drawing a Colt he sprang to his feet and raced back towards the picket line, firing as he went.
Yanking the picket pins free he vaulted onto Buttercup’s back as the mare shied nervously and promptly slid off and crashed into the ground with enough force to drive the air from his lungs and to lose his shotgun. Winded but still hanging onto the picket lines he was dragged struggling and cursing about sixty feet as the horses and Durbin trotted away from the Undead. His shirt ripped, he was showered with dirt, battered by every minor irregularity in the ground, and he lost the Colt in his other hand, but finally he regained his feet and turned the animals towards the open prairie. Jogging marginally ahead he led the animals out into the open ground, still gasping for air but feeling better about his chances.
Drawing his other Colt he paused to catch his breath and take the skeletons under fire, getting one hit of out six, noticing as he did so that the Undead shied away from leaving cover while under fire.
Resuming his trot into the wide expanse of grassland, he reloaded as he moved, filthy, battered, and vastly annoyed, but glad to be still armed and in an environment where he had the tactical advantage.
The thundering crack of the Sharps was followed a heartbeat later by the searing cramp of burning pain in his left forearm. Hopping around in a crouch the Shootist hissed curses until the pain finally faded; when it was finally over he led the animals in a circle and faced the tree line, Colt in hand, waiting.
The undead moved back and forth in the trees but didn’t seem inclined to try to cross the hundred yards of open ground to get to him. After a few minutes he heard the flat report of a Spencer, and the Undead began moving north.
Ten minutes later Derek appeared in the trees waving the all-clear. Retracing his path the Shootist found his other Colt and tiredly trudged on to the camp.
“Hey, Roy Rogers, that was an impressive feat of horsemanship,” Jeff cackled, tossing the Shootist his shotgun.
“Didn’t lose any horses, did I?” Shad shook his head. “What the hell was up with those skeletons: they low-crawled up on me.”
“Derek said they’re called Boneguard, amped up skeletons that only Death Lords can make, and only using materials from the Isle. I guess we weren’t quite as clever as we thought.”
“Speaking of him, where did the goat-lover disappear to?”
“Looting.”
“Well, clever or not we bagged the necromancer, so we’ll call it a win. Where’s Fred?”
“Pacing off his shot. The Death Lord was pretty shy.”
“OK. I’m going to take a quick bath and then we’ll go find another camp site.”
“Getting dragged is dirty work,” Jeff nodded, grinned.
Shad flipped him off.
Chapter Eleven
“That’s the last easy one,” Shad, bathed and in clean clothes, observed as the four rode southeast, looking for another camp site. “They won’t trust the marble’s location again. Once can be luck, but two Death Lords dead means they’ll reevaluate their tactics and assumptions.”
“Will they know that two are dead?” Fred wondered.
“Yeah,” Derek nodded. “They keep tabs on each other, same principle as our rune-wards. No details at my skill level but they’ll know when one of their fellows cashes in.”
“So what happens if we kill Cecil and then find out there aren’t three more Death Lords?” Jeff asked. “We could end up stuck here.”
“No worries,” Derek assured him. “There’s usually at least a dozen true Death Lords and six or more home-grown versions here.”
“Home grown?”
“Local Necromancers trained by the Death Lords who stayed with them,” The Alienist shrugged. “Some just go off to pursue their own ambitions, but the rest join up, as it were.”
“Join up to do what?” Shad asked. “They’re coming here in fair numbers. If its not an invasion, then what is their purpose?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can you find out?”
“Next level I can get a subset skill that ought to cover it.”
“Do so. Jeff, do you know anything about the Tek that stands out in terms of our situation?”
“Nope.”
“What about their magic in the pyramids?”
“Just some basic stuff. The best analogy I can use is finding a uranium deposit and then building a nuclear reactor on top of it.”
“The reactor is the pyramid, right?”
“Yeah.”
“What would it take for you to learn more?”
“Couple more points of Tek Lore. Why? You got an idea?”
“Yeah. Grab those points next level.”
“Really? I was planning on getting Tactical Reload with at least one.”
“In the Prison the Council brought us in close enough to an intruder to draw their attention, to get us motivated,” Shad explained. “Here Cecil brought us in fairly close to a Tek pyramid, he’s an expert on the Undead and our wards are tied to Death Lords. I’m thinking there’s a connection.”
“Between the Tek, Cecil, and the Death Lords?” Jeff looked unconvinced.
“Yeah. We ran into a Tek patrol before we met Amid. We could have ended up in a fight before we ever made contact with Cecil’s man, who incidentally was further from the Tek border than we were when we came in.”
“Actually, we were inside Tek territory when we came in,” Fred pointed out.
Shad thought about that. “Yeah, I missed that. Anyway, I keep getting the feeling that bringing us in so close to the Tek has significance.”
“Makes you wonder if he really cared if we survived long enough to encounter Amid,” Jeff mused. “OK, I’ll invest in Tek Lore next level.”
The next day, moving their schedule back to daylight-oriented, the Black Talons were approaching Wellring from the east and discussing the leadership differences between The Walking Dead and Z Nation.
“Rick has too much angst,” Derek observed. “Always mooning over that bitch of a wife, his psycho kid, and that sort of thing. At the prison they never fixed up the fence or built fall-back positions, or even established a rally point in case they had to bug out. He hasn’t designated a team medic, nobody wears tactical gear, hell nobody even carries a canteen. They wander around in dirty civvies with no spare ammo, water, or survival gear. Frankly, his leadership is pretty non-existent.”
“I like Warren on Z Nation,” Shad said thoughtfully. “There’s no doubt she is in charge, there’s a team structure, and there is discussion of tactical options. Plus she has a really nice rack, and jogs at least once in every episode.”
“But Z Nation doesn’t have much more attention to tactical gear, ammo, or equipment than The Walking Dead,” Jeff pointed out. “How can you explain long term survival without equipment?”
“If my count is right,” Fred interrupted the discussion. “Wellring is just over that rise.”
“No smoke from campfires,” Shad observed. “Let’s take a quick look to see how it stacks up to our portfolio and then plot our next move.”
“I’ve decided that Fred’s horse is named Boxcar,” Derek announced abruptly. “Because of his ability to haul heavy loads.”
“Who pulled your string?” the Scout snapped as the others snickered.
Shad rubbed his face as the horses trudged up the slope. They had left Bloodseep thirty-two days ago, thirty-two days of sleeping on the ground, eating poor food, and living on edge. The thirty-two days had included four fights, and all four Talons were sun-baked, battered, and losing weight. They needed a rest and some answers.
Fred was slightly in the lead, slouched on his tall horse with his Yellowboy across the saddle in front of him; Derek was slightly behind and to the Scout’s left, humming Wannabe from the Spice Girls, the current song stuck in his head. Jeff rode behind and to Fred’s right, the butt of his Winchester resting against his saddle horn and the barrel lying against his right shoulder. Shad was further to the Scout’s right, forward of Jeff but still behind Fred, a long-barreled Colt in his right hand resting against his thigh.
As they reached the crest of rise Fred abruptly reined in Boxcar. “Hooves…” he began, the sudden explosion of events drowning out the rest of his statement.
Even as Fred spoke a young woman with light brown hair billowing behind her raced over the crest towards the Black Talons, holding up the hem of her trade cloth dress so she could run better; Derek was struck by her deer-like grace and speed as she silently flashed past the four mounted men and the pack mule.
No more than a split second later a group of Hobgoblins exploded over the crest in pursuit and Shad promptly shot the lead humanoid in the chest, the heavy bullet unseating the Horde warrior. Shad liked to brag about the speed of his reflexes in combat, but the others suspected that his speed in reaction was based more on an absence of moral qualms and a disinterest in whom he shot.
Fred was hit by a bolo even as he raised his carbine, the cords enveloping his torso as the weights spun in swiftly diminishing orbits until they struck with rib-cracking force, sending the Yellowboy tumbling into the grass.
Jamming his stirrups forward to brace himself Jeff smoothly dropped a lance-wielding Hobgoblin with a .44-40 to the forehead, worked his action, shot a pony, and turned Dancer away from the Horde charge as he chambered a fresh round.
Derek cast aside Durbin’s lead-rope and was leaning to reach for his Spencer when a Hobgoblin’s pony slammed its shoulder into Sundae’s ribs and the Alienist was unseated. Kicking his feet free of the stirrups the Radio Shack manager crashed awkwardly onto the ground, narrowly missing a clump of cactus.
Gagging for air Fred dragged his Remington revolver from its holster as the bolo slid down around his waist; he didn’t see the flash of the trade musket as it was fired but he felt the heavy lead ball slam into his belly. The revolver tumbled from nerveless fingers as the big man slumped across Boxcar’s neck.
Jeff dropped the musket-armed Hobgoblin a second after the beast shot Fred, and urged Dancer up alongside the wounded Scout. Flipping two anti-bleeding charms onto the big man’s back, he grabbed Boxcar’s reins and wildly looked around as he shoved his rifle back into its saddle scabbard. Shad was enveloped in a cloud of gun smoke, pulling his shotgun as he rolled off Buttercup, grinning like a madman. Derek was nowhere to be seen, and Hobgoblins appeared to be everywhere, racing in on all sides.
Cursing, Derek struggled to his feet as hooves thundered around him, guns barked, and dust rose in ever-increasing clouds. Before he could get his bearings a Hobgoblin raced up on foot and dove onto the Alienist. As the two crashed into the prairie in a kicking, punching, biting, and head butting frenzy Derek felt steel slice through his side, but he was too far gone to care about knives. The inner volcano of anger that always simmered inside him was belching forth like Mount Saint Helens and he fought like a man possessed, ignoring two long drawing slices made by an increasing desperate Hobgoblin.
The Alienist ended up astride his opponent and pounding on him with aching fists. Ripping his Le Mat free he jammed its barrel into the Horde warrior’s fanged maw and fired the shotgun barrel, spraying the contents of the creature’s skull across a square yard of prairie. Heaving himself to his feet he kicked the corpse of his foe one more time for good measure and then stalked into the fray.
It was Custer’s Last Stand, Shad realized as he shoved shells into his shotgun, the Hobgoblins swirling around them on fleet ponies hurling javelins and firing trade muskets. He had been hit in the left leg and shoulder; some distance away Derek, the back of his shirt soaked with his own blood, was kneeling and blazing away at the circling enemy. He saw Jeff crouched over Fred’s corpse with a Bulldog in either hand firing first one and then the other at the Horde warriors. It was the end-Fred was gone and the rest wouldn’t be far along. The Hobs were paying for the privilege, but the Black Talons couldn’t last.
Shouldering his shotgun, unaware that he was grinning, the Shootist vowed to run the butcher’s bill as high as it could go before he fell.
Jeff hadn’t been able to get Fred clear of the fight; the big man had slid off his horse not twenty feet from where he had been hit. Part of his mind told him to run for it, that they were over-run and the end was coming up fast, but the Jinxman dismounted and hit the Scout with another anti-bleeding charm and then three healing cards. He would have done more but the Hobgoblins had noticed them and in short order he had his hands full.
Dropping an empty Bulldog Jeff fired the last shot from the other and then swung the cylinder out and dumped the empty casings. As he reloaded he was startled to see that the girl who had run past them was now kneeling by Fred tending to his wound. It wasn’t as important as keeping the Hobgoblins off them and he wasted no thought on it; at this point the girl certainly couldn’t do the Scout any harm.
Catching sight of Jeff, Derek scuttled towards the Jinxman as he reloaded. The Alienist was feeling increasingly light-headed and dizzy, and a javelin hit to his right leg was making it hard to move, but he figured that he might as well die in close proximity to his friends. Or at least Jeff: Fred looked dead, and he guessed that Shad was already dead somewhere.
The Hobgoblins were pulling back to a wider circle, reducing the effectiveness of his shotgun, so Shad discarded the weapon and drew a Colt. He had been making his way to Jeff but a bolo strike had knocked him down (the shoulder rig with its two holstered Colts and the bandolier of s
hotgun shells had blocked much of the damage) and he had ended up taking cover between the corpse of a pony on one side and two dead Hobs on the other. He was getting tired and chilly from blood loss, and had decided that Jeff would just have to die without any company. This spot would have to suffice for the Shootist’s final stand.
As Derek staggered up Jeff hit him with two anti-bleeding charms and resumed fighting. He knew Shad was still alive because the harsh bark of his .45 Long Colt rounds rang out with regularity, but there was such a haze of dust and gun smoke he had only the vaguest idea of where the Shootist might be. Dumping out the empty casing and reloading he noticed the girl was tending Derek’s back while the Alienist fired, and that Fred looked like he was still alive.
Reloaded, Shad rose up over the dead pony and looked for targets, his ears ringing too loudly from his own gunfire to be able to pick up the sound of horse hooves. Peering through the haze of dust and smoke, Colt at the ready, he frowned in concentration. No matter which way he turned he couldn’t spot any more pony-mounted figures cantering around the battle area.
“Gone,” he muttered. “Or pulled back to regroup.” Catching up his shotgun he limped toward where he had last seen Jeff.
The Jinxman was applying charms to a nasty javelin wound in his own thigh as the Shootist approached. Derek sat nearby, bloody but ready. To his surprise Shad noted Fred was still breathing, although unconscious. “I thought we were dead,” he muttered through a terribly dry mouth.
“You don’t get much closer and talk about it,” the deathly pale Shop teacher nodded tiredly. “If she hadn’t pitched in Fred certainly would have died.”
“Who?”
Jeff looked around, startled. “The girl…the one we saw at the start of the fight.”
It took Shad a moment to remember the young woman they had seen running; although the engagement had lasted mere minutes it felt as if they had been fighting all day. “Good for her.” He looked around blearily. “We lost our horses.”
