Bodacious Creed: a Steampunk Zombie Western (The Adventures of Bodacious Creed Book 1)

by Jonathan Fesmire

  Cantrell gulped the rest of his coffee then sat at the table beside Gregg. “A handkerchief?” he said as Gregg set it on the table.

  “This one belonged to Creed. It's one of those he wore on his face at night. Your automaton hound can track by scent, can't it?”

  Cantrell stared at Gregg. “So, you already know your tracker doesn’t work any longer.”

  “I suspected. You didn’t see him in the lab?”

  “I saw him leave the building.”

  “Boyd must have found a way to make him untraceable, but I doubt she can cover his scent. Oh, you might be interested to know that the price on Creed's head has gone up. I spotted a new wanted poster this morning.”

  “How much?” Cantrell asked, despite himself.

  “One thousand five hundred shiny dollars. You bring him to me and I’ll pay double.”

  “Why do you want him so badly?” Cantrell didn't expect an immediate answer, so he snatched Gregg's ledger. His would-be employer reached for it but Cantrell stood and flipped through the pages. Illegible markings filled the book. Cantrell slammed it back on the table. “I see you've got yourself a code. ‘Course you do.”

  “We need him. My colleague tried and failed to apprehend him, but he's no bounty hunter. You've brought in hardened criminals.”

  “Outlaws like you,” said Cantrell.

  Gregg continued, unabashed, “Much tougher than me. There’s no one out there like James Creed, nor like you. You’re the only man for the job.”

  Cantrell crossed his arms. “I'll do it for triple.”

  “That's acceptable. With Creed out and about again, he’ll probably hit the Flats tonight.”

  Cantrell took the handkerchief and draped it over the metal ball beside the bed. “I'll keep that in mind.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Anna worked all morning and afternoon in the saloon. She helped serve food, mixed drinks, charmed customers, and set up matches between johns and doves. She had Jonny improve the lock to the trapdoor to prevent anyone else from picking it, and reminded herself of how much they had recently accomplished, providing Morgan with the know-how to track individual steelies while also making Creed nearly impossible to track. Still, she missed working with the other women.

  She didn’t care for the rumors concerning Creed. The night before, he had shown up in the Flats to report Heidi Nelsen missing, and some claimed that one of the deputies had shot Creed in the back, but that he had fled in a burst of speed, like a mountain lion. On top of that, the new federal marshals had increased the price on his head to one-thousand five-hundred dollars.

  In the late afternoon, Lucky and Dixie exchanged a glance and Dixie bounded up the stairs, across the open hallway—where the doves looking over the railing with their skirts hiked up cried out in surprise—and up the next flight to disappear on the third floor.

  Anna dashed after it, holding her Deringer, though she couldn’t recall drawing it. By the time she arrived in Karla Hotchkiss’s room, Dixie already stood in the hall, her recent john laying across its metal arms, unconscious and naked from the hips down.

  Lonzo, who had been in the bar, stepped up beside Anna. “What in the hell just happened?”

  Anna held his shoulder. “Dixie, do as Lonzo asks.” She looked back at the deputy. “Please get his pants on him and take him to Marshal Bateman. I'll ask Karla about this.”

  Anna looked at the man hanging in Dixie’s arms, a tall john with a black beard. Her breath caught as she stared. Could it be the man who had broken into her laboratory? Possibly, but the bridge of his nose looked too narrow.

  Karla's room smelled of musky sweat and perfume, though a breeze came through the window blowing the scents away. Blankets on the large bed were pushed aside, and Karla sat at her vanity, dabbing makeup around her right eye. The voluptuous woman was nude, hips shaking as powder puffed against her face. Anna took Karla’s wrists and looked over her face.

  “You're cheek’s cut. We’d better clean that up.” Anna went to Karla’s cherry wood dresser and found several handkerchiefs in the top drawer.

  “His wedding ring, most likely. Son of a bitch.” Karla took a swig from the whiskey bottle on her vanity. Anna then poured some on the handkerchief and used it to dab at the cut. The bruise around it had already turned purple. “He wanted a service that costs extra. When I told him, he punched me.”

  “Well, he tossed the bacon,” said Anna.

  “He did what?”

  “Never mind. He’ll feel embarrassed later when he learns he got carried to Marshal Bateman in the arms of a steely named Dixie.”

  Karla chuckled. “Dixie's fast! I never knew.”

  “No one’s ever tried to hurt you.”

  “Before that, after he finished the first time,” Karla said, “we were laying in the bed, and he kept going on about Corwin Blake. You remember him?”

  Anna raised an eyebrow and stared at her. “Of course.”

  “He said the marshals are fools if they think Blake's gone. He said Blake still had a powerful urge to kill Bodacious Creed. Ah… that stings.”

  “Did he?” Anna set the handkerchief by the bottle. “What else did he say?”

  “That Blake couldn’t go after Creed right now, as much as he wants to.”

  “What does that mean?” Anna asked.

  “He didn’t elaborate. He just got up with his pecker in his hand and asked for more than he’d paid for.” Karla went to the door and shut it, then went to her armoire and looked over her rainbow of dresses. “You think you can slip that information to a marshal, or to the mayor? Think it could help?”

  “If it’s true, sure.” Anna thought what a fool she had been not talking to the women in her employ more often. They didn’t get paid in money alone. Overheard pillow talk could be just as valuable. Anna placed a hand on Karla’s shoulder. “You need to rest?”

  “Nah, I’ll tend bar. I'm all right.”

  Anna headed downstairs, straight to the kitchen. Marjory and Anna’s elderly head cook, Pedro, juggled frying bacon, flapjacks, a steak, and a shark fillet. Pedro put on a mitt and pulled a pair of big baked potatoes from an oven, then set them out on plates, sliced them open, and filled each with a hunk of butter. As he worked, Anna placed a hand gently on Marjory's back. The young lady was busy drying dishes.

  “How's Mrs. Nelson adjusting?” Anna asked.

  Ott's daughter set down the dishes and leaned a hip and hand against the counter. “Good. Dad's gonna pay her some to help in the stables and to cook in the house.”

  “Did she say anything about what happened at her place?”

  “Just that she got the hell out as soon as she saw an armed stranger coming toward it. Well, she says she got her rifle and meant to confront whoever it was, then saw other men coming, too, and that’s when she made for the forest.” Marjory pulled the plug and let the food-laden water drain, then replaced it and pumped in clean water. “Santa Cruz has become a little weird.”

  “The last month has been crazy,” Anna agreed.

  “Not just the last month,” Marjory said. “Since these automatons. Since the city got lit up with glass bulbs. With a Morgan’s Automatons factory not a few miles away, this is a weird place.”

  Anna did her best to look understanding, though the words stung. She wanted people to enjoy the steelies she had worked so hard to bring into the world. Had she unleashed something people weren’t ready for? Miles Morgan was primarily a businessman, so Anna worried about him taking some of her inventions too far, but she just wanted to make the world a better place.

  “It is an adjustment,” Anna said.

  Marjory held her hands against the sink. “It's not just that. I mean, I don't mind Lucky and Dixie, or the steely at the city building. That one will talk to you, give you directions around town if you ask. Now we have a dead man come to life. He’s stopping outlaws. Can’t be against that, can I? But what happens when people resurrect more corpses?”

  Anna looked away and re
called that day Marjory had rushed outside with the smoking skillet of pork belly. Had she, Anna Lynn Boyd, admittedly a genius, tossed the bacon when she brought her father back from the dead? Maybe she had done so much earlier when she had learned how to draw on the luminiferous ether.

  No, she refused to believe that. Her advancements would help the entire planet. She simply had to make sure Morgan didn’t take them too far. “People always distrust the new.”

  “Nobody would complain if someone made lamplight that burned longer or oats that made a horse gallop faster.” Marjory scrubbed a plate with a wet brush and placed it in the water. “Now we have mechanical men and beasts, and men coming back from the dead.”

  Anna refused to see Creed’s resurrection as a problem, but others getting ahold of her technology could be. How could she continue to protect him while closing that door to others? “I’m glad Heidi’s doing all right at your place, Marjory,” Anna said, and she left the kitchen.

  Marjory’s ranting about steelies and raising the dead had Anna’s thoughts racing. Everything had changed with her father coming to Santa Cruz. She had made him her responsibility, and what might unfold from bringing him back to life? She had only wanted to save her father and had set the implications aside.

  Then, there was the break-in. She couldn’t tell the marshals about it, or Morgan, but she could tell Creed. He would want to know that the criminal underground knew about her lab. They probably knew that she had resurrected Creed. If they knew, did Miles Morgan? He surely must have guessed. Why hadn’t he come to her?

  She gripped the edge of the bar and shut her eyes tightly. For the last month, she had put this possibility out of her mind, but the fear had been tickling at her consciousness. What did Morgan mean to do?

  Something touched Anna’s shoulder and her heart raced. “Oh shit!” she cried with a jerk.

  “What’s going on?” Karla asked, pulling her hand away. “Maybe Dixie needs to help you. Are you alright?”

  “I am. Excuse me.” Anna strode past patrons to her room and locked the door behind her. She unlocked and opened the trapdoor, noting a difference in the click, and stepped into the basement. There, she sat at her desk with her pen, ink, a piece of paper, and an envelope, and began to write.

  “Three things,” she penned in her code. “Break in at lab. Stranger took the steely brain unit. Might be criminals. Might be someone working for Miles Morgan. Though you should know. Heidi Nelson is safe, staying with Ott Smullen.”

  Anna folded the letter, stuffed it in the envelope, then pressed it into the space between her window sill and the wall. She kissed her fingers and touched it before heading back to the bar, where she planned to help until evening.

  Elsewhere, the female, for that's all she innately understood about herself, cringed at the bright lights. A pale hand flashed into her lower vision. She squinted, and that brought the blinding intensity down enough to spy the face of a bearded man wearing brass goggles. The hand flipped something over the lenses and his eyes doubled in size. The face edged closer.

  She tried touching the man’s face, but her arm stopped, so she lifted her head to stare into his giant eyes. He pushed her head down into softness, but she had glimpsed her body. Her left breast rested against her left arm, pale as a whitewashed wall. She looked to one side then the other—an open cabinet with odd metal objects, a table with a red cloth and scalpels, another man beside the first—until the man took her head in both hands and forced her to look upward.

  Again, she tipped her head to gaze at her body. This time the man shoved her forehead hard. An unpleasant feeling rose in her chest and she tried to look down. The first man shouted gibberish and the other pressed against her head as well, two grown men against her.

  When they pulled their hands away her head snapped forward. She bit at fingers that passed her lips and crunched down on one, leaving half a digit in her mouth.

  “Fuck!” The second man screamed as she spit it out.

  She knew that word, and it played over in her head as something sharp went into her left shoulder. The room faded to darkness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  At approximately the same time that Anna was running upstairs after Dixie, Rob Cantrell and Bernard made their way through the forest, several miles north of Santa Cruz. Sunlight streamed through the trees and dappled the shrubby earth. Cantrell liked the redwoods, the scent of dry needles and sun-warmed bark, the way they stood like sentinels over all.

  That morning he had oiled Bernard’s joints, tightened bolts, and synchronized its senses. Cantrell figured today of all days he needed Bernard at top working capacity.

  By Cantrell's reckoning, Creed had claimed Santa Cruz as his territory, but only at night. Day seemed the most opportune time to capture him. He wondered if Gregg had tried bloodhounds, or even mechanical hounds, of his own to sniff Creed out. He reckoned no, because Gregg didn’t trust his own men with the zombie marshal. Though Cantrell didn’t care for Gregg, he nevertheless felt flattered.

  In any case, Bernard was special. After purchasing it, Cantrell had taken it to the Morgan’s Automatons factory in San Francisco, insisting on the most enhanced senses possible for his new companion. After all, his livelihood depended on being one of the best bounty hunters in the West. With his stubbornness and imposing presence, he soon had the ear of one of the top inventors there. After doing the gentleman a favor, the factory had installed new prototype parts into the steely.

  If anything could track Creed by scent, it would be Bernard, and the mechanical dog had led him this far.

  Cantrell climbed off his horse and held the handkerchief Gregg had given him in front of the steely’s nose for the dozenth time. It sniffed once then moved quickly between the giant trees. Cantrell returned to the saddle and Malcolm trotted after the automaton.

  A good twenty minutes later, he spotted planks nailed against the mountainside, which could only be the entrance to a mine. With a smile, he hitched his horse to one of the shorter redwoods. He idly patted the deactivation machine Gregg had given him, now strapped on an ammunition belt across his chest.

  Cantrell then looked over the boards, which appeared undisturbed. The ground right at the entrance was too dry and hard to show recent footprints, but that didn’t matter. Bernard stood beside him, tail wagging, staring at the wooden barrier as though it could see inside. It glanced at him with a high-pitched whine and a faint, internal whirring.

  He grasped one board and pulled. The nails squeaked as it came out half an inch, then another, then finally jerked free. He removed another, and another, the effort making him warm in his coat. After the fifth board, Bernard bounded in

  “Wait!” Cantrell smacked a plank then ducked in after his steely, hoping his quarry hadn’t heard.

  He went down a lengthy tunnel reinforced with beams and posts, the hole he'd made letting in enough soft light for him and the canine to reach the end of it. The cave air cooled Cantrell’s face. They made it to a large mining room, where visibility dropped to nearly pitch darkness.

  “Lights,” he whispered. From each side of Bernard’s head, a section slid out and two bulbs lit. The beams hit the walls and gave a glow to the rest of the space. Though he couldn't make out details, aside from where the light shone directly, he could see enough.

  Cantrell drew his Prietto and Son Lawkeeper and tossed it to his right hand. He wasn't here to kill Creed. In fact, he didn't want to hurt him. He also wanted to accomplish his task without dying.

  Bernard trotted into the first rough-cut room. A lot of gold must have been mined out of here, Cantrell figured. A dozen posts extended from floor to ceiling to help prevent collapse. Three other passages branched off. The steely sniffed around and trotted briskly down the one to the left. Cantrell wanted to call for it to sneak, but his voice would have been louder than the mild creaks and clanks coming from the metal canine.

  They took a few more turns at different rooms, until the steely reached one Cantrell judged as med
ium sized, perhaps twenty-feet across. Cantrell had learned from years of experience to always have an escape route, but another few turns and he might forget a left or right. At least he had Bernard to guide him.

  The steely's light focused on a pack, a black hat, and something that shined. After a moment, he realized it was a metal mask, at once a thing of simple beauty, and something from a nightmare, silver plates welded together and reinforced with bolts. The mouth section looked like five long teeth. It had no forehead, so the curving slopes of its eyes gave the impression the room was watching.

  Bernard smelled the mask, the hat it rested on, the pack, and the ground. The canine tilted its head, its left ear turning. Cantrell walked across the room to it, past a few support columns. “What is it...”

  In a flash, Cantrell’s fingers twisted back and pain flared. He held the hand to his chest, pistol gone as the sound of one gunshot echoed around him.

  Hands seized his shoulders and he flew back, lifted off his legs like a marionette. Creed stood in the pale light, coat hanging like a shroud, arms outstretched, metal eyes flashing red.

  As Cantrell's back slammed against the wall, Bernard leaped. Its lights brightened against Creed's chest, but the zombie blocked the steely with his left arm.

  The canine bit down.

  Cantrell considered calling Bernard off. Its jaw featured hidden teeth, and Creed’s cry led Cantrell to believe the canine had extended them and that they’d gone through the leather coat. Then again, without the hound, he stood little chance against the risen marshal. El Tiburón had taken in many wanted men, but Creed was simply too fast.

  Bernard had Creed on the ground, the marshal pulling at its lower jaw with his right hand. On a lark, Cantrell hit the switch on the deactivation machine. It clicked, but Creed kept fighting. Cantrell heard two growls now, the steely's, and Creed's, rough and distressing.