Chapter 6

The Captain had preserved but little of his possessions in the fallout from the battle. He had lost his saber, his rifle, his sidearm. His retreat for his life lingered in all of his thoughts, lingered in the form of ghostly material things, swimming up from the bottom of his dark pool of memory, glowing with iceberg light, hinting at what lurked below. If he thought about his pistol, he thought also of the man he had given to in an effort to save his life. If he thought of his saber, he thought of how it had gotten lodged in a tree swinging at a Cheyenne warrior who promptly used the opportunity to kill another retreating Calvaryman. So in a way he was grateful when the man called Sass showed him Fort Labrador's "armory", and told him to pick out new munitions. He was grateful to be allowed to forget the old ones, even if he couldn't forget the tragedy they had been lost in.

"They're all a little old," Sass explained. They were in a dusty storage area beneat the fort, surrounded by walls of mortar and stone. "Plenty of em were used in the Big One. You don't look old enough for that."

The Captain went over to a Peacemaker lying with its cylinder out and empty. It wore a pearly metal casing aroud it, this gun, with a pearl grip. There were some flakes of rust beneath the hammer and around the trigger guard, but otherwise it looked in fine condition.

"I've kept up a lot a these. Most of em were mine at some point. Shit, I've shot about everything before. That red Rhineland lever-action there?" he was pointing to a wall mount where the resplendent service rifle shone. "Saved my life more times than I can count."

The Captain set down the pearlescent Peacemaker and approached the Rhineland. "She is a beauty," he said.

"Fires .223 rounds. Bought her in Dodge City. You been there? I used her taking Ojibwa down to Indian Territory."

"The Major told me you were a Buffalo Rider."

"I was. Till I got shot. Them boys thought I was a goner, and I was. Ended up surviving somehow, crawled my ass down here. The Major took me in."

"Can I?" The Captain was still looking at the gun.

Sass waved his hand, "Go ahead."

The Captain took it down and worked the lever, listened for the reactive mechanisms. He aimed down the sights and balanced the weight in his hands. "This is a nice weapon."

"Cost me a nice dollar amount to get. Cost me all of my dollar amount. Black soldiers don't get what white soldiers get, you know. Last rifle I had was a Mormont. Jammed half the time, nearly kilt me a dozen times more. I almost used a year of wages on that gun."

"Well, it really is marvelous." He out the gun back on its mount.

"I seen what you was talking about myself, you know. The storm, the bird. The Ixopaw. They ain't Lakota nor Sioux nor Cheyenne nor Algonquin nor any tribe of Indian I've known. I seen their chief. He ain't a man so much as a force of nature. Killed my best friend, he did. In cold blood, too."

"I fought him. Caught him carrying one of his men through a clearing, this was a year ago now. We was tracking them after they was raiding our camp, and I sprung em. I shot one, but the chief and his other rushed me. They closed at an impossible speed. Chief was holding a big damned knife. I killed the one with my pistol but the chief had none a that. We gave each other a hell of a beating, and in the end he had me dead to rights. Knife to my throat. His eyes, when I saw them, they was sad. Not angry or impassioned in any way, they was devoid of killing intent. But they was sad becuse he was resolved to it. Because he had to do it. Anyway, if my unit commander hadn't come up on us right then and chased him away, I wouldn't be talking to you right now."

"This country's a dangerous place," Sass said. "Full a angry folk and guns. Damned powder keg. You forget what you're fighting for. All you can do is try and live."

"I got something off of him, too," the Captain continued, pulling something out of the front of his shirt. It was a pendant, carved from wood, hanging on a loop of dried sinew. "Off that chief I mean. He was wearing this, and I got it in the tussle. Don't know what it means, if anything, but I like it. I thought I'd give it to my son."

Sass looked at it and shuddered, pushed it away. The carving was that of a giant eagle, or some type of massive raptor. "That thing's bad luck, man. Put it away."

"Funny you should say so," the Captain smiled, looking at it in the palm of his hand. "I think it saved my life."

After a while the Captain selected his firearm, the pearl peacemaker, and took a replacement sword for his saber as well. The next morning he joined Sass, the Major and his Hand of the Devil. They mounted up and the Captain was leant a fine riding horse called Windchaser. Before the sun crested the horizon they were headed northeast for New Attica.

When they got back to the cabin Will was waiting outside with a rolled up newspaper in one hand and a cigarette in the other. As Acorn came trotting up the pathway Will raised his head and waved at them.

"You look pale, Wynchell," he said when they got close enough. "Take it you didn't get no ground sloth."

"Where's Dean?" Wynchell said.

"With Hannah, fixing breakfast. Well, she is. Dean's probably telling her how to do it. You got my rifle?"

Wynchell was headed towards the front door, Y just behind him.

"And where's Percy?" Will added.

But Wynchell didn't answer him, instead going straight on inside. Y went in with him shaking and nervous. Had Percy been killed, or did he do the killing? That boy was just...he was a boy. They were innocent enough, but he didn't think of that word: "innocent". He thought that they were like him, regular people leading regular lives. If one kept their nose out of business that wasn't theirs, then they wouldn't get hurt. He had believed that until today.

"Dean, Hannah," Wynchell said, crossing the main large room and passing into the smaller kitchen addition. It was much hotter in here and the smoke from the scullery was suffocating. Y lingered at the threshold next to Wynchell. Will came up beside him.

"What is it, Wynchell?" Dean said. Y couldn't see him but could hear well enough. "You look ill, man."

"Something happened, Dean. It's...I think it's bad...well, yes, bad. Percy, he's...he may be in need of assistance."

"Assistance?" Dean echoed. "What in the hell happened exactly?"

"W--we, we was hunting and...we was alone, I swear it! We was alone when we set off..!"

"We ran into somebody!" Y called out. Wynchell turned and looked at him, his eyebrows raised and his mouth hanging agape. With his lavish brush of a beard, his mouth was actually invisible. He stepped back and Y took his place at the entryway.

Hannah was in a dirty blue dress, darting back and forth from the small table where Dean sat to the scullery fire. Dean was rubbing his forehead over a plate of bacon and beans. He looked up and, when he saw Y where Wynchell had just been, vexation drained from his face.

"We was out hunting the ground sloth, and we came upon some farmer and his son," Y said, his voice low and heavy. He realized he was trying not to cry. "I don't know what happened, exactly. Percy was to, erm, 'deal with them', I suppose."

Dean's eyes widened with understanding. His lips pursed, he drew a large breath through his nostrils and stood up. "Is that so? Wynchell?"

Wynchell's massive frame loomed over Y as he stuck his head in. "Yes boss."

"Head back out and help your brother, then," Dean said. "The rest of us will decide how best to proceed."

"I should tell you, boss: that farmer claimed he knowed we was here."

"Thank you, Wynchell," in a tone that was dismissive.

Y felt the presence of the big man leave. He found he was still shaking. His whole body felt like it was crawling with ants.

"Come eat something, Y. Come eat." Dean pulled his chair back from the little table--it was the only chair. He walked over and patted Y on the shoulder. "You alright?"

No! No I'm not! I want to go home, I want to leave right now! "Yeah, I'll be fine. I am kinda hungry."

Dean smiled. "Atta boy. Sit down there and fill your belly." He passed Y, heading into the main area. "Will, we better go with Wynchell, after all. Just in case."

"Ok. Maybe I'll find my gun," Will answered. They called out Wynchell's name and went out after them.

Y, noticing that he was hungry now that he was smelling the food, took Dean's seat at the table.

"Ain't you just a regular prince," Hannah said. "I don't know why they thought taking on a new member was a good idea." Talking to herself more than Y, she was angrily filling wooden bowls with beans and a slab of bacon in each. The rims of the bowls dripped rendered fat and salty juices. Steam and smoke made a thick fog.

"I never aimed to join up with some gang," Y said quietly, scooping a mouthful of beans into his mouth.

He felt Hannah shoot a mean stare at him but he refused to look. "Least you got some semblance of brains, then. If that's the truth, anyway. Not like Dean. He thinks with his heart, he thinks angry all the time. Damned moron."

Y paused the next spoonful. "How much killing goes on with you guys? If you don't mind me asking?"

Hannah rubbed her hands on the front of her dress. "I can't say. Dean's a fighter, a warrior. Fought with the Confederacy, you know, and for him the war never ended. He was a boy then, shaped and sculpted by the deaths and nobilities he was exposed to. He ain't bloodthirsty, nor mean-spirited. Least I don't think. But he ain't afraid to kill if he thinks he has to. Most of these boys, they're the same way. Most of em are all soldiers, and the soldiering never stops. Not till death."

"My daddy...he's a soldier. I never thought about it, but he's a killer, too. I mean, if there wasn't no war in the West, would he be a killer too?"

To his surprise Hannah came over and stood next to him. She looked down at him not with hate nor with animosity. She looked at him like he was human. "He's fighting Indians, kid. Indians. If he don't fight them, they'll kill everything in sight. They've been conditioned to it. It ain't like they're fighting for America or nothing."

"I don't know," Y said. "Maybe you're right."

"Ain't no maybe. Everyone these days has a battle to fight. So do you. Some man gets in the way of you finding your daddy, would you let it happen? Would you?"

Y thought a moment, remembering the peacemaker in his satchel. A gun he'd only ever fired at bottles and empty warehouses. "I guess."

"Sure you wouldn't. We get found out, Y, after that robbery...we'd all get killed, by bullet or hangman. Even you, though you had nothing to do with it. It ain't a good world out there, kid. No it ain't, and it ain't for kids neither. Take my word on that. Ain't no such thing as innocence these days."

She looked off for a moment, out the little square hole in the wall above the scullery, where the smoke and steam escaped. She looked the way she did when she went out at night and stared at the stars. She looked like she was somewhere else. Then, in the next moment, she was back. "Well," she added, "enjoy your breakfast. I got a feeling you'll need a full stomach for the day."

"Thank you," Y said. "I got a feeling you're right!"