by Dylan Jones
'Since forever I guess.' His voice cracked and I noticed the resemblance in their faces. Not father and son, but close enough. Perhaps uncle and nephew, cattle owner and cow-hand.
'That's right son,' he turned his smile to me, 'show the nice Sheriff what I bought you for your sixteenth this year.'
Christ, only sixteen.
Jake produced a bone handled blade from his belt and held it up proudly. Now the act of a big man all but dissipated as he showed off his prize possession. 'It's for skinning rabbits and such.' he blurted. 'It's...' he stopped suddenly, realising too late that he was overstepping his place. He blushed a dark crimson and handed the knife to his boss, who twirled the knife in his hand as he spoke.
'You see Mr Sheriff, I'm a man of many qualities. But unfortunately for you, sentiment isn't one of them.' I saw a flash of silver as he moved to slap Jake in the face. There was no noise and for a moment I thought he'd missed. Then a terrible gurgling noise came from Jake, and red froth bubbled from his throat. Jake smiled and tried to cough. It was such a clean cut he didn't even know it had happened yet. It dawned on him slowly and he clamped both hands over his leaking throat.
'Please..' he whispered to me as he fell to his knees. I stepped toward him, already taking off my jacket ready to put pressure on the wound.
'Ahem...' The wiry man stepped nimbly between me and the boy, and gently pressed the tip of the knife through my buckskins and I felt the cool blade scratch my groin. 'He's done. Leave him be. Besides, the little prick's been helping himself to my whores. And I hate to share, don't you?' he winked at me, and I saw for the first time that his eyes were almost colourless.
The other big guy had apparently seen worse than this and actually chuckled. He seemed older, and a little darker skinned. He clicked his tongue twice and the horses harrumphed and trotted toward him. He led them quietly out of the Saloon. Leaving me alone with the maniac, the old barman, a snoring ox, and a dying sixteen year old boy, bubbling quietly from the neck. Mercifully he had either fainted or slipped into his final moments, for he lay on the ground silently, his lifeblood quickly draining from him.
The maniac shut his eyes and rubbed his temple with his thumb and forefinger, as if all the killing had given him one hell of a headache.
'Now then Sheriff.. or do I call you...' he waited for me to fill in the blank. I didn't.
I saw the old timer behind the bar reach slowly for the rifle. I made eye contact and shook my head fractionally, No. He seemed thankful for the intervention and sagged as he exhaled, as if his neck were no longer able to hold the weight of his head.
The maniac with the knife opened his eyes and looked into mine. 'I guess it's just plain old 'Sheriff' then.' and smiled. The voices of a group of men shouting and whooping somewhere out in the street followed by screams of women reminded me that I had seen seven men in the distance, and not just three. I hoped they weren't all as slippery as this fucker. I only had one pocket-full of bullets after all.
One of them, a good-sized, sweating man, barged in through the busted saloon doors. He seemed about ready to shit his pantyhose.
'Sir, you just gotta come see!' his face was red and he was wearing a big shit-eating grin.
The maniac calmly turned around and put a bullet right through the man's teeth. The guy still looked delighted even as he crashed to the floor, the back of his head a gaping, bloody hole.
'You just can't seem to get them these days.' the maniac said calmly, as if we were discussing it over breakfast. He misread the blank look on my face as a question and continued. 'The damned workers. Always forgetting the big picture. Always beating on some damned bitch or stealing some god-damned animals. Lord damn it!' This last he spat out with the first real hint of any feeling I'd seen from him yet.
He flipped the knife over in his hand and threw it down in anger. It spiked and juddered into the floorboard near the sleeping Ox's head, missing his right ear by a couple inches.
'After you good sir.' He motioned me toward the sunlight now streaming in through the splintered doors, waving me forward with the still-smoking gun. 'Let's see what these dumbwits have gotten me into now shall we?'
3. Blood
Three men were dragging a heavily pregnant woman through the dirt. A man lay on the floor in their wake, blood trickling from a gash across his temple. The girl's husband I presumed. She was kicking and fighting like a cougar. One had her by the hair, one was pulling hard on her clothes, and the other was laughing and kicking her bare legs as she went. I saw that this third had his hand down his trousers, and was feverishly trying to undo his belt.
Enough was enough. Time to get rid of these maggots.
I jolted forward a step as if I was making a dash toward them, then stamped my foot down hard and reversed direction and heaved backwards with all I had, hurling my right elbow viciously backward, swinging it past my shoulder at about a hundred miles an hour. The maniac was fast enough to react to the dash forward with a leap after me, but if he noticed the double back he left it a fraction of a second too late. He leapt face first and my elbow caved in the front of his skull. There was a terrible crunching noise and his body went limp instantly. He fell like a dead dog, his face a mask of red. I picked up his gun and aimed it at the trio. They smiled at me. Like they were having so much fun they couldn't switch to business mode quite quickly enough. I smiled back.
The pregnant lady screamed, a high wailing whine.
I fired four shots. The first blew a black hole where trouser monkey had been exploring himself. I could see red daylight through his thigh. The second bullet took off the right half of hair-puller's face. Except for his eye. It dangled in the wind. He stayed alive for maybe half a second to enjoy it. The third bullet went through coat-tugger's left lung, and a spray of arterial blood arced over the whole party. The fourth was for the big horse guy now standing a foot behind me, his finger tight on the trigger, maybe a second away from blowing my head off with his shotgun.
I dropped to my knees and spun at the same time. I fired the shot before I hit the ground. He looked stunned. He had the shotgun in one hand, his revolver in the other. He looked at each hand in disgust, like he was more disappointed with himself than he was about the fact that his guts were trailing behind him like fat pink spaghetti. He aimed his pistol at me and then died on his feet. His carcass crumpled in a heap in the dirt.
A slow clapping echoed through the windy street. I instinctively aimed at the noise and blinked the grit from my eyes. The Ox was on his feet after all it seemed. Maybe sixty yards away, leaning on the saloon's porch. His nose was broken where I'd hit him with the gun.
'Most impressive Sheriff Jack. Certainly a lot quicker than you were indoors. Must take you a while to get warmed up.'
I saw it then. Not a party of seven men. But eight. One sent out ahead to scout quietly. The others to follow on afterwards, big and loud and ugly. The Ox had been playing me all along. If he was expecting a conversation he was going to be disappointed.
I ran through the scenarios available. Didn't like my options. I had fired four shots from the gun, the maniac had fired two before that. Empty. I let it drop to the floor.
Adrenaline is good for two things. Flight and fight. I put everything I had into flight. Towards the Ox. I closed 50 of the 60 yard gap quickly. My lungs burned and my leg muscles bunched into tight coils. I pistoned my arms to gain momentum. I felt like I could run through walls. The Ox remained where he was. He sneered, his lips peeling back, his teeth almost canine in the sunlight. I was almost on him, and his hands were still resting on his hips. Relaxed almost. Something was wrong. If he had a gun, he would be aiming it by now. No reason not to. The sun glinted off his buckle and I suddenly remembered. The boy's knife as it pronged the ground near the Ox's face. The Ox meant to skewer me. And I was doing all the work for him. I was running toward that knife as fast as I could. Too late to stop now. Three yards to go. I watched his eyes. A man could bluff in hundreds of ways but the eyes couldn't. I was a
lmost on top of him when they changed. They seemed to go darker a fraction of a second before his right hand came up, the blade a quick flash in the light.
When a man drops to the ground or slows himself down, it's always predictable where he'll be at the end of the movement. Unless he doesn't even know himself. I kicked my left leg hard up to the right like I was kicking a rabid dog and let the momentum spin me around and down. I was going to fall hard but I was also moving quickly away from my expected tangent. The move had an unpredictable outcome because I wasn't limiting myself to the known safety positions of a man in a controlled fall. I was spinning all the while, yet falling toward him. The blade scratched my sleeve as it sliced past. Just where my belly had been two fractions sooner. And then I was crashing into him at full force. I saw the knife jerk out of his hand with the impact. Then his chin hit my head, my head hit the ground and we were a tangle of limbs and boots and dust and rocks.
Even as we rolled, I felt his sledgehammer blows on my back, on my neck, on my chest. He had fists like cannon balls. If one of those connected with my face, I wouldn't be getting up again. I couldn't even see him, let alone hit him. The world was still upside down and a spinning blur. Purple lights danced across my field of view. I opened my eyes wide, and looked for the brightest light. Two more blows, one to the shoulder another to the chest. I was running out of time. His next combination was likely to kill me.
Then I saw what I was looking for. When a man looks directly at the sun two things happen automatically. First, his eyes clamp shut, and second, the image is burned onto the retina. The world was no longer a sea of incoherent images. It was now a blank bright red canvas with a single perfect white disk shape toward my right shoulder. I knew exactly where I was at that frozen split second; facing eastward, directly away from the saloon.
I hauled myself toward where I thought the timber platform ended and launched off into empty space. I fell two long feet and landed hard on my side in the dirt, the air knocked out of me. I heard the Ox breathing heavily, scrambling after his prey. I rolled back toward the wooden overhang and slotted neatly under the saloon porch. I figured the Ox was an intelligent man. He would work out within three seconds that he couldn't squeeze in after me and would instead head toward the easier option of the shotgun by the door. Then it would be another two seconds to pick up the gun and another four to reach under the floor and blast his way into the gap after me. Seven precious seconds.
I thrust two fingers into my left boot, took out the folded rag in there. Inside it was a single translucent capsule, filled with black liquid. As the Ox stomped loudly toward his gun, I bit down hard on the vial. My vision blurred and the last thing I heard as the darkness came was the Ox's voice as he peered into the gloom.
'Just like shooting cats in a crate.' And he pulled the trigger.
I didn't hear the gunshot. Or feel any lead. I was already a thousand miles away, 3 days further in time.
Black Book
Part 2: Out of Time
Dylan Jones
The 'Black Book' series spans several centuries in an epic tale of good against evil; From the Old West to the Earth's fragile future. 'Out of Time' catches up with stranded Sheriff Jack, battling on alone in his quest for the Black Book.
Jack learns that he's not the only one stalking his prey. The hunter has become the hunted, as Jack becomes a target of greater powers from across the vast distances of space and time.
1.
San Diego, California. 1862 AD
An ice-cold gale whipped California's shoreline. Night was fast approaching and only a single gull braved the winds. The bird ventured a little deeper out to sea, skimming the swelling waves, waiting for her chance to take a bite. A dark shape appeared in the depths below her, much bigger than the swell's usual inhabitants. It rose quickly toward the surface, and the gull squawked in protest, letting the wind carry her away to more uneventful waters.
The shape crashed out of the waves, thrashing its arms to stay afloat. As the wind lashed at its face, its naked bipedal form shuddered and retched, emptying its stomach of salt water. Its muscles shivered and spasmed in the cold as it fought to stay above the surface. It looked around in the fading light and saw infinite blackness ahead toward the horizon, and only a faint smudge of something in the opposite direction. Its survival instinct opted for the latter, and it kicked and dragged its way towards the shore.
The animal did not consciously know what it was, or how to exist, but instinctively it swam.
The darkness was complete by the time the exhausted creature dragged itself onto the sand. The moon dominated the sky and the animal stared up in awe. It examined itself, curious of the world in which it had just arrived.
A memory flash. The creature cowered in defence, mistaking the memory for reality.
Another; Faces. Humans. Violence. He looked at his hands. He was human. He could think. He saw a big bear snarling at him. The bear's nose was bleeding. The bear opened its jaws wide and lunged at him...
Sheriff Jack jolted awake, drenched in sweat, still lying where he'd lost consciousness at the water's edge. The sky was a dark red now. Nearly daylight. He sprang up, and screamed in pain as the electricity speared his brain.
He was hit by a second attack, and burrowed his face in the sand in agony. His vision was a white hot blur and his gums bled. Pummelling the sand with his fist to focus the pain, he tried to remember the meditation techniques. Bullshit. They never worked. The only reason anyone time-travelled more than once was because they never remembered that it felt like dying.
The bear-man. His memories were still swiss cheesed, but Jack's fog slowly cleared in short bursts. He dragged himself up, fighting against the ice-cold finger piercing his skull. He walked like a drunk on a ship, away from the open space, toward the safety of the cliffs. The sun was almost up and he needed to find shelter before he lost consciousness again.
His dreams were fragmented. Violent. He jerked awake with the low sun on his face. He could hear voices and instinctively pressed himself down against the cool stone of the cave. Through gaps in the bushes outside he could make out four men, Indians, looking for something. Looking for him?
They wielded sharp tools and wore nothing but fur and leather. He held his breath and listened as their voices faded.
Jack ventured out through thick undergrowth, saw only their tracks and exhaled. He was at the foot of a great cliff. At the top he could see grass, but down here only sand and tall weeds. His mouth felt like sandpaper. He looked around for a way up to a better vantage point. Gripping the rocks with both hands, he scrambled up a gradual incline and found himself at the top of the lowest outcrop. There was nothing but ocean to the west. Rocks and trees to the east. North and south only offered more coastline. He started east. Water would be first. Then some clothing.
2.
Darka Project Base. Undisclosed Location. 2308 AD
The huge steel doors rumbled open and two silhouettes walked in from the hangar bay. One was a slim young brunette in a serious grey suit. The other was a tall African-American male in his late thirties. He scanned the entire area methodically as he walked. A security team fell in behind and covered all the exits points. Warm air and the drone of machinery wafted in after them.
A uniformed man on the wrong side of forty marched across the polished steel floor to greet them. “Mr President! Welcome! How was the flight?” General Daniels smiled as he caught up to them, pumping the hand of his old friend without breaking stride. He nodded a smile to the attaché as the heavy doors rumbled closed in the distance. She blinked, and smiled back.
“You should know better by now, General.” President Benjamin Freeman stood a few inches taller and a few pounds lighter than the General. “I would much rather have walked here, had we the luxury.”
The General laughed out loud. “You always were our best man on the ground, Ben.”
“Let's walk and talk Jim. Any further news?” The President's long strides had the other two w
orking hard to catch up. The General steered them toward an entrance hatch. “Only from this end sir, there have been no further signals from our Alpha. We have Beta juiced up and ready to drop in on the source signal as we speak. If we hurry we'll be just in time for the show.” The President stopped. “A retraction? That's fantastic. So why aren't we celebrating?”
“It's not that simple quite yet. Through here please. Mind your head.” They ducked into a long service tunnel that snaked deeper into the compound.
The long corridor eventually opened out into a small reception area, with large vacuum-sealed glass doors on each wall. A single potted shrub by the central desk only managed to magnify the sterility of the place. A man of about thirty looked up from his terminal as they entered. The CRT's glow coloured his face an artificial green.
He snapped to attention as he realised who had just entered. “Please check your tags here sir, ma'am... and, Mr. President.”
The brunette removed her magnetic badge and swiped it across the terminal's camera. It bleeped and her badge lit-up green. She replaced it on her jacket. “Sir, if there's nothing else, I have some clearance documents I need to go through for the return flight.” nodding toward the smaller door. In the room beyond, banks of white shirted office workers went about their day.
“Sure, thanks Cal. I'll see you at the de-brief.” He smiled and turned his attention back to the General.
Daniels waited until Caroline's long legs were through the door and it had hissed shut behind her before speaking. “You still hauling that old data recorder around with you Ben? Christ! She's probably logging everything you say.”
“She's actually much quicker than most of the new ones. Besides, the company insisted. The public love synthetics. Hell, she's probably worth forty percent of my votes by now.”
