PRAIRIE WARS

The street was empty, with no movement save that kicked up by the restless wind. Two men stared into each other's eyes from opposite ends of the street. Slowly, they neared, until they were separated by a mere ten feet.

One figure was much younger than the other, barely a man, really. His thin form was wrapped in the traditional dress of the plains Indian. His hair was long, his demeanor solemn. The other man, much older, possessed of a gaunt face lined with scars and cruelty, was dressed in black from head to toe, red accents showing on his hat, his vest, and on the handle of his gun, still in its holster.

"My step-sister was right," the youth announced. "This was a trap. Where are you keeping them?"

The man in black smiled. "That's for me to know, kid." He gestured around himself. "This is a big town, Butte City...my town, you understand?"

"This town belongs to--"

The dark man shook his head. "Not anymore. We had a deal, but I altered the details a bit. Butte City is now wholly operated by the Creekridge Mining Company, and when that railroad comes in, boy howdy! I'm gonna be a rich man."

"You are a silver-tongued murderer."

"Perhaps." Suddenly, the dark man's gaunt form was racked by violent coughing. He folded at the waist and hacked a wad of bloody phlegm into the dust. He straightened, wiped his chin, and adjusted his hat.

"You have the wasting disease."

"It's called consumption, you ignorant redskin, and yeah, I do." He put his hand on his pistol. "But I'm still fast enough to take the likes of you. Let's get this started...I reckon you've got a head full of blood since you saw me shoot down that old hermit. He was kind of like your pappy, wasn't he?" The dark man's teeth were specked with blood as he smiled.

Slowly, the youth pulled a long knife from its rawhide sheath. "My name is Luke Walks-in-the-Sky," he announced. "You shall die this day, Dan Vetter!"

"I'm already dyin'," Vetter whispered.

Luke moved, lightning fast. The knife soared, piercing home just as Vetter drew. But it was off-target. It wasn't a fatal wound, merely an inconvenient one. Vetter smiled, trying his best to disguise the pain as he removed the knife from the superficial wound it had left in his right side. "Impressive," he said to Luke. "Old Ben taught you well." He dropped the knife to the ground, and then his right hand cocked his pistol and fired. Luke flinched, and his right hand exploded in a shower of blood. He fell to the ground, cradling his bullet-torn hand, now missing two fingers. "Not well enough, but, eh..." Vetter shrugged as he closed the distance between himself and the felled boy, wincing with every step. "I could'a killed you, kid, but I didn't. Why do you think that is?"

Luke held his ruined hand close to his face. "What do I care?" The words were full of hate.

Vetter smiled, then holstered his pistol and crouched down on his haunches. "Ow, shit...that hurts, kid."

"Good."

Vetter looked to his left and right, just in case any of the townsfolk cowering in their storefronts were eavesdropping. "Did...did that Old Ben ever tell you about your father?" he asked quietly.

"He told me plenty...how you killed him when I was just a pup."

Vetter laughed and shook his head. "No, Luke...I'm your daddy. That's why you're still alive."

"No!" Luke's face went through a catalog of emotions: shock, denial, hate. "That's not true! That's impossible!"

"I think you know it is, son. Ask around. Anybody'll tell you that old Dan Vetter had a weakness for squaw. Now..." He straightened back up, staring down at the boy. "Are you gonna join my side, or what? It's where you belong."

"I'll never join you!"

In the distance, the faint sound of hoofbeats, and Luke, from his position, could see dust rising in the distance through Vetter's legs. He allowed himself a little bit of a smile. Help was coming.

Vetter hadn't heard anything yet. He raised a fist. "If only you knew how powerful this company is, son! It's progress, and it's comin'! If you join up with me, we can tame this valley together! As father and son!"

The approaching horses were impossible to ignore. Vetter spun. "I said clear the street!" he shouted, but he saw soon after that these weren't quickly cowed townsfolk. He recognized the faces through the kicked-up dust: Luke's step-sister Lily O'Malley, the drifter Hank Solo and his partner Bear, and following up at the back of the group: Lawrence Delricio, the man Vetter had sworn he had an arrangement with. "That sonofabitch set them free..." He drew his pistol as the horses came down on him. "You set them free!" He raised the gun to fire.

Hank Solo leveled his own pistol over his horse's head and fired two times. One bullet ripped the gun from Vetter's hand, and the second took his hat straight off. Vetter fell on his ass. Solo and the others came to a halt. "I guess you're not the fastest after all, Vetter!" Solo called down through a wide grin. To put a point on the insult, Bear spat a thick stream of tobacco between Vetter's legs. "All aboard, kid!"

Luke stood, cradling his injury, and with effort slid onto the back of Solo's horse.

"I suppose you'll kill me now," Vetter said.

"Now, that would hardly be sportin', would it?" Solo winked. "Yeaaawww!"

The four horses road hell-for-leather until they were free of Butte City. Soon they were specks in the distance.

Vitter stood, picked up his bullet-ridden hat, and dusted it off. He put it squarely on his head. His throat rasped with phlegm and blood and dust. He coughed and spat a bloody wad.

This wasn't over.

GANG WARS

The room was dark, lit by a single weak overhead bulb, and small, with barely the room for the table and the few people in it. The air was choked with smoke and the palpable threat of violence. There were two men at the table. One one side was an older man, weathered, weary, dressed in a smart brown suit and a hat that had seen sharper days. On the other was a younger man, brimming with cold rage, dressed in black from head to toe, his hair slicked back and so shiny it could have been a helmet.

"So, who starts?" asked the old man.

"No skin off me, whoever," replied the other, and he took a heavy suck off of an asthma inhaler. The rasp had a faintly menacing sound about it. "But since you're the aggrieved party, right?"

"You want to go indendent, split off from my gang, and take half of my territory with you, so, yeah, you could say I'm aggrieved."

"I want to make money, Ben, and you're just too weak to do what's necessary."

Ben breathed easily. He was much calmer than the younger man, with less to prove. "Nobody in this organization has ever complained of going hungry."

"Or of being too full!"

"I taught you everything you know, Vinnie."

Vinnie took another rasp of the inhaler. "I was once a leaner, yeah, but what you can't see is that now I am the master!"

"Only the master of evil, Vinnie."

The comment took Vinnie aback. "Evil? Huh, what?" He looked around to his boys backing him up and they all shared a laugh. Across the room, Ben's men shifted uncomfortably. Vinnie locked eyes with Ben. "Evil, Ben? What have I done that's so evil?"

"Your button-men have been knocking off competitors all over this city. Hell, you blew up an entire building because you thought somebody inside was plotting against you, but you got wrong information...you killed dozens of innocents. That's not the way we do things."

Vinnie jumped to his feet. "It's the way I do things! I do whatever needs to be done!" He reached under the table, and there was a ripping of tape. His hand came up with a shiny .45, tape still hanging from the barrel.

"There weren't supposed to be any guns here!" shouted one of Ben's men, an impulsive teen, and he was restrained by another. "Don't start anything, kid," said the man holding him back.

"I see you've made your decision," Ben said calmly.

"Yeah, you could say I have," Vinnie sneered, out of breath with the impending thrill of the kill. He drew on his inhaler. "Good-bye, Ben."

"NO!" shouted the struggling youth behind Ben.

Ben's face changed. It both hardened and softened at the same time. He'd accepted his fate. "If you strike me down, Vinnie..."

"Yeah?" Vinnie asked through a clenched animal grin.

"I'll become more powerful than you could possibly imagine."

Vinnie barked a laugh. "You old fucks and your martyr complexes." The gun barked three times, and Ben flinched and jerked in his chair as the bullets tore at his flesh. Blood splattered the table. The old man was dead.

Vinnie grinned savagely at Ben's remaining men, specifically the kid struggling to escape the restraining arms that held him. "You'd better keep a lid on that little shit, Solo...if you want to live long enough to make your mind up about where your loyalties lie."

"Kid, this isn't the time," Solo whispered in the boy's ear. "We'll regroup, figure things out...don't let the old man's sacrifice be in vain."

The kid snarled at Vinnie: "This isn't over by a long shot!"

Vinnie twirled his pistol gunslinger style. "Cool down, son...we'll meet again. Now..." He pointed the gun. "Get the fuck out of here before I change my generous mind."

The room emptied, slowly, of Ben's men and then, after he screamed for them to leave, Vinnie's as well. Vinnie was alone with the corpse. He walked over to it and poked it with his gun. As confident as he was in his decision earlier, he was starting to think maybe he'd make a rash mistake. That kid...the fire in his eyes.

Vinnie had never been scared before.

"Huh," he said.