Chapter 18

Y and Hannah had made a small camp far off the nameless dirt road they'd taken out of Wilmington. As the sun had set that day Hannah made note that they were headed south and west, that they would continue in that direction as long as they could, evading any major settlements, camps, forts or towns along the way. All of Minnesota would be searching for them, and soon the rest of the country would be too.

After hours of silence during which Y was terrified of asking Hannah anything about what happened, after a fire had been hastily built and a hasty meal of salted jerky and some berry preserves had been consumed, after the fire was put out with a pail of dirt and a flask of whiskey opened and shared between the two of them, Y at last had the courage to try and unpack his mind, culminating in the utterance of a single syllable: "Why?"

Hannah was swigging the whiskey. A cigarillo was balanced between two fingers, tucked in there snugly. Smoke rose and curled around her silhouette in the dark, her presence illuminated sparingly in a somber, crimson light by the dim crackling embers of the dispatched fire. "'Why' what?"

Y felt a stab of nervousness. "I mean, I guess, what was all a that, Hannah? I mean, why did that happen at all?"

Hannah smoked her cigarillo and coughed. Her breaths were raspy and a little choked. She cleared her throat and her head dropped into the crook of her elbow. "It went on too long, that's what happened. It wasn't supposed to be like that, kid. You weren't supposed to happen. Fucking Dean, goddam moron."

"He's dead, Hannah. They're all dead!"

"I know it, Y! I was there. Christ. I ain't an outlaw, or...I didn't used to be. I was doing a job, a damn good job if you ask me, and you got in the way. Not of your own accord, of course, but...I figure it's only right that I see you safely to Deerhead. From there I aim to disappear completely."

His temper snuck up on him. Wynchell, Acorn, Will...they appeared one by one in his mind and he wanted to scream, to holler their names into the sky and wake up, be back at the hotel in Hera, ready to rob a bank again, ready to keep living and heading West. He heard his voice rising but he couldn't stop it. "They trusted you, Hannah! They thought of you like a sister, and you gunned them down! That's...you're...evil--you're evil! They was good men and doing me a favor no less, looking out for me, paying me, teaching me--and they loved you. But you bit them like a snake! How can I trust you? How could anyone? You're a cold-hearted, miserable bit--"

She slapped him. Her hand came down hard across his face, catching his cheek with an audible crack! and turning his vision black. When he recovered from the sheer shock of the blow he could taste blood pooling in his mouth. His hand reached up and touched the tender part where she'd struck him.

"I'm sorry," Hannah said quietly, "it's just...just that you're right." She looked at him--her featureless, black, silhouetted face looked at him. Though it couldn't be seen, it was obvious she was crying. "You're right and you're wrong. Those weren't good men, Y. They were killers, robbers, criminals. Just criminals, for whom the rules did not apply. What use is a person like that in our society? In any society? It's wrong any way you want to look at it, but I can't stand men like that, people like that. I've dedicated my life to putting those people out of our memory. I've done it before and I'll do it again. It's my mission."

Y spat blood into the grass at his feet. He was sullen and pridestruck. "Nice you got a mission. Making folk think you're their friend so that you can put them in a grave when they ain't looking. Some mission."

"That's how I survive. It's what wakes me up, gets me dressed each day. It's what feeds me. You don't got to understand or appreciate it--it ain't for you. Anyway I am offering to take you to Deerhead--you can choose to come with or not. Ain't my choice." She flicked away the smoldering cigarillo and stood up, brushing off her clothes before walking away towards the wagon where she had a canvas bedroll waiting for her.

Y was about to either break down and sob breathlessly or steal the horse from Hannah and ride off. Somewhere he'd find money, somewhere he'd find passage to Deerhead, to New Attica. New Attica...a dream, a nothing which he chased in his mind and which he chased on the ground...a memory, an empty nothing. He saw his father in uniform before him, wearing the Calvary hat and the gloves, looking tired, looking at Y. Would he even recognize Y?

"Your mother taught you right and wrong. Use your head," he told Y one afternoon before he left for the West. They were in his grandparent's parlor, that cold and austere place which taunted Y in his loneliness, which haunted him with his mother's ghost. His father was dressed in full and his uniform was pristine. Y thought his father looked heroic when he dressed in his uniform.

"You'll write me?" Y had asked.

"Of course. But remember what I said, son. Right and wrong, and if you have trouble telling one from the other, think on what your mother might do. Alright? Can I tell you a secret?"

"Yes."

"That's exactly what I do. When I can't decide on something, I think about how your mother might see it and what she might do. That's how smart she was. Eh?"

"I wish all the Indians were dead, then you wouldn't have to go fight them all."

"Careful what you wish for."

He had left. That was the last time Y had seen his father, a man who looked young and old all at once, a man whom Y would look like himself when he was full man--he looked enough like him already he reckoned, or he looked liked how he remembered his father. There was no telling what the man might look like now?

Just then Y asked himself if he still wanted to kill an Indian. An Ixopaw, his father called them in his letters. Y thought there might be enough anger in him, or enough fear, that he could pull the trigger of a gun and be okay. Generally ok, at least. Never mind if he had killed a man before or not. Just look at Hannah--she had no qualms, nor did Dean, certainly. Dean had meant to turn Y into a soldier, according to Dean's own definition, but maybe Y was already a soldier because of his father. Or maybe his mother had put enough of herself in him to be altogether something else. And what might that be?

He wasn't going to sit around here with Hannah. It was a matter of time before she turned on him as well, out of convenience or malice or whatever--time was all that stood between them. Y hastily collected his satchel and jacket, put them on and went to the horse. He gave it water from Hannah's canteen and slung the canteen around his shoulder. The horse, which had not long ago bedded down, stirred and lopped it's strong tongue around its lips and nose, then stood up as Y brought out the nearly emptied jar of strawberry preserves they had eaten with dinner and gave the horse the rest. Then, remembering the sweet and patient disposition of Acorn, he climbed on top of the beast and took hold of the reins. The saddle lay next to them on the ground but Y didn't have the time or proper light to mess with that. Exhilarated atop the mount, for the first time riding by himself, he clicked his tongue and gave a light boot and the creature snorted and started a forward trot.

Y, ignorant of the exact direction he was headed in but confident he was headed south and west as Hannah had meant to, spurred the horse ahead over the grassy clearing and into the forested unmarked roads that must be lying in wait ahead. "I know you're tired," he told the animal, bent over and rubbing its neck, "but we won't go too far or too fast. Let's keep an easy gait, now."

Here he was, alone for the first time since he left Chicago. He would remember Dean Hollis and his boys for the rest of his life, and a part of him would miss them, but it was better to be alone again, Y thought. It felt that way, anyway. Just getting away from Hannah gave him such a feeling of freedom that he was almost optimistic.

He crossed the clearing where he and Hannah had been camped and broke through a tree line into a cluster of wood. Maple spruce and oak were spread out far enough to get through, but their number seemed endless and moon and starlight struggled to reach the ground. There was an ethereal quality to the woods like this, and Y listened to the flapping of bat wings and the chattering of nocturnal rodents as they scampered somewhere in the dark. A crisp, cool breeze jostled branches and rustled leaves.

Insects chittered. Buzzed. Coyotes cried and whined and the horse whinnied and grunted.

"We're ok, don't spook me," Y said. He said it again, in a lower voice, more to himself. "Don't get spooked."

Something wasn't right. He couldn't place the feeling, but he was anxious about something. His eyes were wide open and darting left to right. His head swiveled constantly, his heart beating and beating and beating faster, faster, faster still. It felt like someone was brushing the back of his neck, just barely, with a delicate feather.

He almost asked who was there, then laughed at himself. He was being ridiculous. He was acting like a child.

All went quiet.

Animal noises ceased all at once. Even the breeze seemed to die. Y couldn't even hear the footfalls of his mount.

Somewhere out there, a twig snapped.

The horse reared backwards whinnying and slicing at the air with its front legs. Y, taken by surprise, was bucked off, landing hard on his back. "Sonufabitch," he tried to say, but the air was knocked out of him. He was dazed and helpless as he watched his getaway horse charge off into the blackness of night.

"Aw hell," he cursed, trying to stand up. The back of his head throbbed, his elbows were sore and his lungs sucked air desperately, but he was okay. He heard it again--another snapping branch.

His Peacemaker came out. He pointed it all around him as his eyes canvassed the wood. Everything and nothing seemed alive and moving, just beyond his vision. He was being hunted. Every instinct told him to turn tail and bolt, but he'd read in a book before that that wasn't wise. Most predators in the wild enjoyed a chase.

In his stupor he had forgotten to pull the hammer back. He might need a bullet chambered, just in case something did get brave and jump him. He meant to go after that skittish horse, and so he made his way slowly in that direction, taking one uneasy step, waiting, listening carefully, then took the next. He pulled the hammer back.

A horrific, monstrous screech descended upon him from the trees above. This was followed by another, and another after that. Screeching, howling, bloodcurdling bellows rained down. He heard what sounded like claws on tree bark. Heavy scratching, the rigorous shaking of leaves, absolute tumult in the treetops.

Prowler apes.

Y ran. He fired his gun into the sky to try and scare them, but he heard their vicious wailing in pursuit of him, heard them jumping from branch to branch, each shaking under the light pressure from the leap. He had never known a fear more immediate, more visceral.

After a few minutes of frantic running Y realized he had no idea where he was going. He crashed through brush and leaf, through thicket and bramble, covered in spurs and cuts and gashes. He kept running.

More wreckage and crashing from above. Sticks and rocks were being chucked at him, something catching him above the heel that sent a sharp pain up his whole leg. He grunted and tried to keep moving, but was being slowed down by the cocklebur plants and the grasping creepers lying in wait beneath the thick foliage.

Something grabbed him. Wriggling fingers, immensely strong, dug into his shoulder and above his right elbow. From directly above him dropped a shaggy black shape, screaming and growling in a deep gurgling baritone. Hot breath was on the back of his neck and the smell...acrid and sweetrotten. The force grabbing him was powerful, despite his writhing and flailing. The force of the grab made him drop his gun, so his left hand flapped at his waist, hoping to find the long hunting knife he had gotten from Wynchell.

The ape grabbing him screamed in his ear.

The one before him was baring its teeth--they were all he could see in the dark, rows of silver daggers, and the stench emanating from that gaping maw was so nauseating it nearly overpowered him. Only the gnashing, snapping teeth kept the endorphins pumping through his brain, kept him concentrated on staying alive. Some part of him knew, a sentient part buried deep in the moment, that he would be dead soon if some miracle did not occur.

His left hand could not find a knife grip. His right arm was being yanked back and forth, and eventually he lost his footing. The ape responsible yelped with delight, commencing a chittering conversation with the prowler now looming above Y.

They barked at each other, the one reaching over and slapping the other, the one which still held Y's arm. Then he heard a tremendous snap! All at once his left arm tingled with warmth. Then came a harrowing pain.

Y screamed in agony and fury. Fresh rage at the pain sent a powerful kick which caught the ape above him squarely in the jaw. The creature howled and jumped back, startling the one which held him, and at last he was released. At last he found the knife in its sheath and brought it out, just in time to slash at the prowler he had kicked as it leapt towards him for retribution. The edge of the blade sliced the prowler's palm, and he used it again when the other came behind him once more, trying to grab at his arms again. This time Y met it with a kick. It staggered backward and glared at Y with hungry, glittering yellow eyes. Y couldn't name much else out in the dark, so he went for the eyes. He rushed the ape, which stood bipedally no more than two feet shorter than Y, and gouged its eye with the knife. He heard a squishing, wet sound that was more than satisfactory. With gritted teeth he twisted the blade and listened to the anguished screams of the prowler.

Then Y was bitten on the shoulder. The pain was immediate and fierce, but Y held tightly onto his knife. He whirled around to thrust at this ape, but it was faster and stronger than he was. Soon he had lost the knife and was being wrangled onto the grass. A pathetic game ensued: Y crawling on his back away from the prowler, which would lunge at him, back away, lunge again, snapping its teeth and yelling at him all the while. Somehow, one of his eyes caught something glinting in the dark grass. His hands desperately reached for it, the prowler lept again.

His fingers closed around the gun. He brought it up to smack against the prowler's incoming mouth, as it wanted to bite at his face. The blow bought him time to pull back the hammer with his right hand, usable only by adrenaline as he was sure his arm had been broken.

The prowler hovered over him, ready to make its final attack. Its hands closed around his throat as drool poured out of its mouth.

His gun went off.

The ape's yellow eyes disappeared for a second. It snapped its teeth, the eyes reappeared, and the prowler screamed at Y. This was it. This was his final test and he'd failed. Then the weight of the prowler was gone.

It had jumped off him, grabbing at his chest, and limped back into the wood with the other. Their panicked cries could be heard crashing away, heard too long for Y's comfort.

He didn't think he'd experienced more physical pain before in his whole life, but he was alive. For the moment. He lay still for some time and as the rush of the survival instinct subsided, the sobering pain of his injuries washed over him.

He struggled to his feet, replacing the gun back into his belt as he staggered forward and nearly fell into the brush again.

How was he going to escape this? How was he going to get out of these woods? Would he get out? The prowlers, he knew, would come looking again, and they would bring friends.

But he heard a magical sound. The sound of a miracle, small as it was. It was a gunshot. It was late, and a little far back, but it was close enough. Y smiled, and despite the pain he pulled his gun again, drew back the hammer and fired into the air as an answer.

Somehow he had made it, and he knew he made it because that gunshot he heard could only be one person. As embarrassed as he was, he believed that beggars could not be choosers.

So he sat down in the dirt, holding his right arm, and waited.