A howl of a wolf rose. Desperate against the night, its lonesome note drew on, and covered the darkness. All would know its sorrow. Hot sun scorched the day, yet persistent was its wrath. Even after nightfall, earth held the heat in a deathly embrace. Sweat ran down Cassidy's spine, dripped from his chin like tears. He loosened the bandanna. Last of the whiskey, a fine drought from Kentucky, clung on to the throat. Absently, he wiped dry lips, and swallowed with a click. The horse, perhaps his only friend, walked with steady clomps. Moon above looked down on the land. Peace of the silence had soured. All around him was far away, forgotten and uneasy.

Civilization had lost its appeal to the bounty hunter, but the quiet of the lonesome places were filled with voices. Believing superstition for fools, rational was Cassidy. Whatever phantoms that stalked him, they were the devils of the past. Things lurked in the savage lands, places yet untouched. Long days, longer nights, led the mind astray, yet the ephemeral world was unsteady. They taunted him at the edges. Beyond explanation, at least the bounty hunter's knowledge, strangeness of the land ate at him through the dark. Anything he was unable to explain was shoved to the back of the mind.

When did it start, this breaking of the mind? The Civil War, that day, a whisper deep inside rose up to curse. Side by side, in rows, they marched to their deaths. All went to the Devil. Verdant forest became hell. Inside, terror had almost robbed him of resolve, faltered yet held. "Tommy Watts," he muttered to the night, but even the horse ignored him. The name slipped his mind, oddly enough, but it always crept back. He was young, brash, but Cassidy had liked him. Out into the field, the young man had chosen a bold act over a useful one. All watched the idiot charge, which no one else joined. A bullet had caught him, and all mourned him, until he began to cry, beg. Relentless pleas were carried across the gunpowder choked air. They listened, but soon, another soldier whose name was just beyond the bounty hunter's recollection, could take no more. To the fallen compatriot he ran as Tommy praised God above. A Confederate sniper got him. Soon, the begging started anew. No one dared the no man's land between the Blues and Grays. Pleas turned to tears, wails became curses, and finally, all the dying man done was laugh. A chill chuckle devoid of reason or hope was carried to all.

"Pretty Tommy wasn't so pretty anymore," Cassidy looked up at the moon, "when the flies set up a revival in his mouth." The bounty hunter may forget his name, but the sight of the young man looking up at the sky never faded. He'd come that night to find them. Full moon lived in Tommy's gaze, as the bugs crawled down his gullet.

Had those eyes shifted? "No," he said, and the horse's head rose, ears flicked, but chose to ignore its rider.

He stopped the horse. An island of light shimmered in the dark, civilization swallowed by moonlit desert. Over the still air, under the fat moon, a fiddle player belted out music at a frantic pace. Bang of a gunshot rolled over the land. Cassidy eyes, like the coming dawn, roamed over the settlement. Even at this distance, the smell of whiskey and steak found him. Time in the wild sharpened the senses. Meager rations on the trail were sufficient, but a man missed a real meal. Dust and grit of the road had settled into his clothes, slick grime of dirt and sweat. When was the last time he'd had a cigar, bath, or even a cigarette?

He padded pockets, and took stock of his supplies. Money was low, but there was enough food to camp out without going into town, at least tonight. Civilization, Cassidy found, was driven in blood. Every foray into the world, where man ruled, there was always death. Uncivilized hearts knew only the rule of fist, and many walked among the domesticated gents and ladies, who clung to rules. Legality of actions, in those civil, barred the act from the mind, so would never move to the hands. More barbarous among them saw no impediment, except the hangman's rope or Sheriff's gun. The bounty hunter was a man, who kept the scales of justice in balance. Rational thought served him, yet the savage heart preserved Cassidy. Without the brutish advantage afforded him, he would've perished, and the company of others was a distraction from darker thoughts. Time always soured the company of his fellows.

Now, the company of others felt heavy. Over to the desert moved his gaze and the bounty hunter felt the night grow darker. At the edges of the world, there were things challenged the mind, defied the limited understanding of civilization. He swore an answer would burn away there cancerous thoughts, which set roots in the psyche to devour sanity. They began to ensnare Cassidy. Every day outside the light of consciousness grew uncertain, unsteady. Each night, after darkness descended, murk crawled around at the tip of vision. Closer to the campfire they came, yet fled the eyes of the bounty hunter. Last night he spent in the wastes, he'd awaken throughout the long hours, hand on the revolver, and gaze flew to the desert.

Shift of the shadows was subtle, easily dismissed, but Cassidy looked back at the town. He rubbed his brow. Too much was the waiting dark. Like the yawning maw, the desert opened to swallowed him, if he only looks back. Chill fingers trailed the spine, while the air stilled. Sharp stink of his clothes felt peeled from a long dead corpse. Sour taste of saliva tugged at the stomach. Wind dragged fine stones, as if ghosts marched in rows, phalanxes sent to die. Eyes, blue as the dawn over the desert, fell to his hand, which had picked up a tremor.

"I need a whiskey," he said and the horse turned its head to listen, but went back to the business of studying the road. Gloom of the mind was voracious, and sought to consume the remnants of tattered rationality.