by Chloe Garner
Kayla shook her hands out.
“I know. I know. We’ve been trying to get everything ready for them. Thomas… Thomas has…”
She stalled, and Sarah frowned, but just put her gently to the side and followed after Jimmy into the dining room.
The table there was full of tall glasses of water and blocked by four women, Nina Joiner among them.
“Do you want water, Sarah?” Nina asked.
“I’m fine,” Sarah said. “What’s this?”
“Worst thing is men knocking everything over,” Thomas said. “We have enough for everyone, but we’ve got to get it distributed.”
Lawrence had hundreds of young men wandering around it.
The house wasn’t that big.
She shook her head.
“Gonna be a disaster,” she muttered. “Where’d Jimmy go?”
“Kitchen,” Thomas said. “But you’re supposed to help me.”
“Pass out water?” Sarah asked.
“Triage,” Thomas said. “Jimmy wants you to put eyes on every man coming in the door. Healthy ones go to the front, ones who need light patching go upstairs in the back, and the ones in dire need go to the kitchen and… your room.”
She looked around the house in her mind, counting out space.
There wasn’t going to be enough, but she could work with that.
“Once we get everyone through the first time, the women are going to keep water and bullets where the men can get to them, but we need to get everyone in and to a spot.”
She looked sharply at him.
“Don’t talk like this is gonna go easy, Thomas,” she said.
“More men than floor comin’ in any minute…”
The front door opened to the sound of clomping footsteps and Thomas put both his hands on her forearm.
“We know,” he said. “I know. But I’ve done my best to make this as easy as I can.”
She shook her head.
“Jimmy shoulda run all this past me,” she said.
“Take it up with him,” Thomas said, patting her arm in a dismissive sort of way and hurrying away. Sarah turned to watch as the first group of men lunged for the table.
“Easy, fellas,” she said, holding up her hands. “There’s plenty…”
There was the sound of a shot gun round loading, a loud ratcheting noise that would scare a dead man, and the group hesitated.
“I ain’t gonna pause to use it,” Nina said. “Behave.”
Sarah raised her eyebrows and stepped to the side as the other three women started handing out glasses of water.
One by one, Sarah grabbed the gulping men and gave them a very quick eye-over.
“Front room,” she said. “Front room. Entry. Upstairs, there.” She pointed. Every one of them. It shouldn’t have surprised her that the first men to arrive were all healthy. Little Peter swerved through the room at one point, going into the kitchen, but they ignored each other.
The next group included a man who had a broken arm. She sent him upstairs to one of the unused bedrooms, continuing on. It was about a hundred men in that she found her first gunshot wound, and two-hundred before she got the first man dragged in by friends, unconscious. She had them lay him down on the floor in her room and kept going. He might die in the meantime, but she had to get everybody ready. The gunshots outside were getting louder, and from time to time, someone upstairs took an opportunistic shot at the oncoming mercenaries.
She saw a few of the homesteaders go by, but almost all of the men she was dealing with were boys who had come here in hopes of making a life.
She didn’t want to guess how many of them had already died, this day, defending the hope of that life.
The thought made her stomach queasy, even as she looked at a boy and sent him into the kitchen, knowing that he was going to die. There was nothing in her bag of tricks to save him, and without Doc and an awful lot of the equipment Sid had brought with him, nothing could have saved him. That equipment was just too far away and too unavailable, right now.
The firefight was right outside the house as the last, weakest stragglers struggled into the house, and Sarah was itching to go push the invaders off her hillside, but there was too much misery to deal with first.
“Jimmy Lawson,” she bellowed at the kitchen as she took a sagging, dry-shirted man from his friends, sending them up to a bedroom upstairs that faced the front. He appeared, holding out her saddle bags.
“Do what you can,” he said. “Kayla and some of the other women are going to help you. Tell them what to do.”
She nodded, taking the bags. She looked at Nina, who appeared just as eager to go take some shots as Sarah felt.
“Need you to keep him alive,” she said to the woman.
“Heat stroke,” Nina said, seeing his shirt. Sarah nodded.
“Jimmy’s got some ice in that kitchen, if it comes to it.”
Nina pressed her mouth, then nodded and knelt next to the boy there in front of the dining room table, pouring half a glass of water across his face. She put her hand on his chest and shook her head, then looked at Sarah.
“Can’t make no promises,” she said, and Sarah nodded.
“You know how to treat this. If he’s too far gone, ain’t your fault.”
She stood, shifting her saddle bag over her arm and found Kayla standing in the doorway.
“Thomas said I could help,” the young woman said. She was pale, and Sarah felt for her, but this wasn’t the time for mercy.
“Bunch of men doin’ their best not to die, that way,” she said. “We’re gonna go help ‘em.”
Kayla nodded, eyes fluttering everywhere but Sarah’s face, and Sarah put an arm around Kayla’s waist, escorting her to the room where the men lay dying.
Sarah took out a can of foam and a roll of bandages.
“There’ll be more bandages in the kitchen,” she said. “Might as well go get all of ‘em you can carry.”
Kayla nodded, hustling away, and Sarah started working through the gunshot wounds.
She gave painkillers to the men who were conscious, but there weren’t that many of them, in this room. She stopped bleeding where she could, moving as fast as she could from man to man, making a full circuit before Kayla returned. Sarah pointed.
“His arm. Pressure on the hole with bandage, and then wrap it.”
Kayla froze, and Sarah sighed, going to sit next to her on the floor and coaching her hands through the process.
“If it ain’t snug, it’s gonna keep bleedin’. If it’s too tight, he’ll lose his hand. See?”
Kayla pressed her lips hard.
“I’ll try.”
Sarah looked at her hard.
“Kayla, these men are countin’ on you to keep ‘em alive. I can’t stay long. You watch ‘em close. You know how to take a pulse?”
“I think so,” Kayla said.
As they worked, other women drifted in and Sarah set them to work, monitoring, bandaging, doing anything they could to help keep the men alive. None of them were bleeding out, anymore, so at least there was that. Sarah took several of the women and went to the kitchen, treating the worst-off of the men who hadn’t yet died while Jimmy and Little Peter sat at the table with several Lawrence men.
Finally, Sarah stood.
“I done what I can,” she said. “Kayla should go up and check for men what need bandagin’ upstairs, but it’s time to keep ‘em from comin’ in like this more than fixin’ up the ones what already are.”
“I don’t like it,” Little Peter said.
“I don’t care,” Jimmy said, standing up. He was watching Sarah. “You’re ready?”
She nodded.
“Full up and set,” she answered.
“All right,” he said. They walked out of the kitchen into the dining room, where there was only a little bit of room around the table. Men pressed in everywhere, leaned against walls and milled about in the center of the floor. The front entryway was even tighter; men had to move out o
f the way to let Jimmy past with Sarah behind him. Jimmy went out the front door, pulling up a trap door in a smooth motion and dropping down into the cool space below the porch, walking with his knees at his shoulders to the front, where a thick masonwork stone wall stood between him and Sarah and the army of mercenaries.
“They think they have us,” Jimmy said, peering through a slit. “But they’re hot, they’re tired, they’re dehydrated, and now we’re going to kill the rest of them.”
“Why are they still pressing?” Sarah asked. “They should’a fallen back and set a siege.”
“Because they haven’t got effective field leadership,” Jimmy said. Sarah fed the rifle barrel through the slit, looking through her scope. They were actually uphill, from here, at every advantage possible, and yet the men were trying to make their way up the hill.
“They think we’re done,” Jimmy muttered. “They don’t know how big an advantage we have, here.”
“They set a proper siege, we’re cooked,” Sarah said. “Ain’t got the resources to keep everybody fed, not to mention rested and still.”
She tried not to think of the bodies and what they’d have to do with them.
Jimmy put his hands over his ears as she pulled the trigger, the brass shell flying past his face as she pulled the bolt.
“One hit,” she said, picking her next target.
Men who had strong postures, ones with a good aim at the house, ones who were actively shooting.
“Two hit.”
“There’s a chest of ammunition down there,” Jimmy said. “I’m going to take some shots.”
She nodded, lining up her third shot.
“What about this wasn’t Little Peter gonna like?” she asked.
“He isn’t going to like what happens when they break,” Jimmy said.
Sarah snorted, sitting back to reload.
“Y’all just assume they’s gonna lose. I’m more concerned what happens when they get sense.”
“They haven’t got water, Sarah,” Jimmy said.
“There’re wells in town,” she said. “They got motorcycles.”
“No one’s thinking,” Jimmy said. “They have an objective and they’re going to keep coming after it. There was a clanking noise that started overhead and Sarah heard Jimmy laugh quietly as he continued to line up a shot.
“Jimmy Lawson, what am I hearing?” Sarah asked as shots began to chew up the yard.
“Custom,” he said. “Had to find a guy willing to do one. Illegal anyplace with real law enforcement.”
“Lawson,” Sarah said.
“Belt-fed machine gun,” Jimmy said as bullets continued to tear across the yard, kicking up dust and sand everywhere. “Not very accurate, but it’ll keep ‘em thinking about how much this is worth to them.”
“Fine,” Sarah said, loaded and starting after her next shot. “What’re we doin’ that’s so bad when they break?”
“We’re hunting them,” Jimmy said. Sarah looked over.
“As opposed to lettin’ ‘em turn bandit?”
“You and me,” he said. “Petey would send out the men, just let them go the other way. But they’re just going to hold the house, and you and I…”
She took another shot.
“Three hit.”
“One.”
“Why?” she asked. “Why not use the troops we got?”
“Because this is our fight,” he said. She glanced to find him sitting on the ground, watching her, his face lit oddly from the side by the light coming in through the slit.
“Damn, Jimmy,” she said. “Thought I was the idealist.”
The dark corner of his mouth went up and he blinked, looking away thoughtfully.
“My family will be safe,” he said. “We can do it ourselves, and it will build confidence with the town, give us a reputation that…” he smiled thoughtfully, “I couldn’t buy if I wanted to. The ones who slip through will have such a story to tell.”
“I’m with you, Lawson,” she said, turning her attention back to the rifle as a pair of shots smacked the stonework.
“I know,” she heard him say. “You always have been.”
--------
It didn’t take much more than half an hour of baking under the high sun for the men to break. Sarah went into the house, getting a spare duster out of the hall closet, then loaded the pockets with nothing but ammunition, water, and the bare essentials from her patch kit, then she went back out onto the porch with Jimmy, who was standing behind the railing, picking men off with his rifle as they ran.
“Sarah,” Kayla said. Sarah turned her head. “Sarah, they aren’t doing so good.”
“How many?” Sarah asked.
“Four of them died, I think, and some of them that were talking are unconscious…”
Sarah looked back at Jimmy, knowing that there was no way this fight wasn’t happening, knowing that there wasn’t anyone else to help, but waiting for him to say it.
“In thirty minutes, send someone into town on a motorcycle,” Jimmy said. “Let Petey pick who. Bring back either Sid or Doc, let them pick who. In forty minutes, have Petey and Thomas send out crews to find the injured and bring them back here.”
“They ain’t all gonna fit,” Sarah said quietly.
“We’ll worry about that when it’s true,” Jimmy answered. “Come on, Sarah.”
Sarah looked back at Kayla, seeing again how pale the woman’s face was, but Kayla nodded.
“We’ll take care of them,” she said. “You finish this.”
Sarah touched her hat then slipped quietly down the stairs after Jimmy.
“You got a count?” Sarah asked.
“If we can get fifty of them, I’m happy,” he said. “You equipped?”
“I’ve got the ammo, if you can refrain from burning it too fast,” she answered. She heard his dry snort as she raised her rifle, watching slowly, carefully, as a man - a living man, exhausted, afraid, and defeated - ran away from her.
She ended him in a moment.
“One,” she said, pulling the bolt on the rifle and pumping the next shell into place.
--------
The men scattered, but without a better idea of where to go, they mostly ended up around town, from the look of things. Once more, Sarah had to pass the men dying along the road. Jimmy shot most of the mercenaries, ensuring they were dead before he or Sarah got too close, but the Lawrence men were painful. They had passed a few motorcycles that they could have taken, but neither of them even discussed it, because the motor would have drawn attention. Gunshots were audible from a long way away, but they didn’t have the continuous location that an engine did.
By the time they got to Lawrence and stopped at the wells, filling their canteens and taking stock, Sarah had lost the count, though she knew Jimmy still had it. He put his hand into the drawing bucket and sloshed it at his face, drinking some, but largely just wetting his skin.
“A lot of them will try to get back to the train,” he said, leaning against the well and looking down Main Street. The entire side of the street where Kayla’s shop had been was charcoal. “If it were me, I’d come back here and try to find some clothing and blend in.”
“Can you tell who’s who?” Sarah asked.
“You mean beyond who shoots at us?” he asked.
There was motion around town, like rodents scuttling, but there wasn’t anything visible.
She looked at Jimmy, just for a moment. He had his chin jutted off to the side, and he was still staring out at the horizon.
“I’m less worried about whether I can tell who’s with us and who’s against us, and more worried about whether you can execute all of them.”
She looked away.
“Lotta bodies on my gun today, Lawson.”
“I know. But you’re the law. I’m an enforcer, but you’re the law. And they attacked Lawrence.”
“Did they?” she asked, the thought coming to her suddenly. It was clear, she thought, that they’d intended to,
given their equipment, but there was a very good chance that Lawsons had drawn first blood, or at least fired the first shot.
Jimmy didn’t answer. She hadn’t expected he would.
Finally she shook her head.
“Can’t do it,” she said. “They turncoat and make an attempt to look like one of us, without firin’ on us again, I’m ‘onna let ‘em walk. Half of Lawrence has taken a shot at me, one time or another. No good lookin’ for guns that ain’t killed me.”
“And if they’ve killed men back there on that road?” Jimmy asked.
She pressed her mouth into a line.
“Can’t prove it, can’t know it,” she said. “They drop the gear, blend in, they ain’t any worse than most of the scoundrels we’ve had around here for years, and I ain’t huntin’ them none, either.”
He gave her a moment of pause.
“And if there’s a bounty on us? You’re willing to keep those men here, even with an incentive to assassinate one or both of us?”
She glanced at him again.
“Ain’t no different than any other man pullin’ into the station on that train,” she said. “You done gave ‘em all guns, now, anyway.”
The corner of his mouth ticked and he nodded.
“You’re the law.”
“So let’s root ‘em out and be done with this,” she said. “Go get the train runnin’ again.”
“I had someone waiting to disable it,” Jimmy said, pushing off of the well and letting the draw bucket fall back into the water down in the darkness below.
She looked at him with a sharp frown and he shrugged.
“I need to see what’s on that train,” he said. “I didn’t want it getting away before I got to it.”
“They’re gonna shoot you a quarter mile off,” she said.
“If they do, I deserve it,” he said.
They went to the end of Second Street, by the new livestock arena, and they started going through the buildings one by one.
There were bodies in a few of them, but they didn’t find anyone alive until the third one, where a couple of men in black body armor were crouching around the door. Sarah jerked her head back as two shots hit the solid wood of the door, throwing splinters. She closed her eyes, turning her face away and pulled the door most of the way closed, looking at Jimmy.
