DEAD
OR
ALIVE
William Harms
Dead or Alive
By William Harms
Copyright © 2010 William Harms
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever without the prior written permission of the copyright holders.
Contact email: [email protected]
Cover art by Ray Lederer
Copyright © 2010 Ray Lederer
Used with permission
www.raylederer.com
Book and cover design by Rob Osborne
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author's imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons (living or dead) is coincidental.
Published by Absolute Tyrant
1510 Main Street
Cedar Park, TX 78613
www.absolutetyrant.com
First Edition 2010
Published in the United States of America
DEDICATION
For my mom, Gail, and my dad, Larry,
who both love horror movies as much as I do.
PROLOGUE
ARIZONA TERRITORY
1885
Snow swirled through the mountainous foothills.
It was late in the afternoon and gray clouds completely obscured the sky. The ground was frozen and the air was filled with small dry flakes of snow. Lieutenant Robert Weichel dropped off his horse and began to piss, the urine marking a yellow trail in the dry snow. His men filed slowly past him, their horses panting in the cold air. There were twenty men all told, their eyes struggling to see through the growing snowstorm. Most of them wore worn and faded uniforms and more than a few suffered from frostbite.
Weichel shook himself and closed up his pants. They had been following the Hualapai for a week now and he knew that those damn Indians were screwing with him. Their trail would suddenly end, split into three different paths, or occasionally loop back toward Weichel and his men. Still, they’d catch those damn savages soon enough and end this once and for all.
The wind picked up. Weichel lowered his hat and climbed back onto his horse.
Most of the men slept. Despite the biting cold, fires were strictly prohibited, so the men slept in small clusters in an effort to keep warm. The ground was hard and cold. A young private by the name of Joe Fletcher sat under his dirty blankets, staring nervously out into the night. Weichel walked past the private and unrolled his bedroll a few feet away. Fletcher was pretty damn green and had only been with Weichel for a little over a month. The other men in the unit were a motley collection of buffalo hunters and cattle hands with a couple of Civil War veterans tossed in for good measure. All of them had killed a man at one time or another. All of them except Fletcher.
“Go to sleep,” Weichel said.
Fletcher looked at him. “They’re watching us, ain’t they?”
“They’ve been watching us for the past week. Nothing we can do about that. Get some sleep.”
“Yessir.” Fletcher lowered himself further into the depths of his blankets and covered his face with his hat. Weichel knew that Fletcher wouldn’t be worth a damn when they finally engaged the Indians, but he didn’t care. The young man had no business out here and the sooner he was dead, the sooner he’d be out of Weichel’s hair.
Weichel looked around the camp. They were situated inside a ring of boulders at the base of the bluff. The boulders provided natural cover from both the wind and gunfire and would muffle the sounds of the camp. Lt. Weichel lay down and looked up at the gray sky and the swirling snow.
#
A gunshot rang out, followed by a scream. Fletcher opened his eyes and sat up, his mind heavy with sleep. The air was extremely cold and his hair was touched with frost. He could barely feel his fingers or feet. Another shot rang out and now the entire camp was rising as men grabbed for their rifles and side arms. The first hints of the sun tinged the eastern horizon, but the sky was still dark and gray.
Thunder filled the air and a Hualapai brave, riding bareback with his naked body painted black, charged into the army camp, his horse snorting and gnashing its teeth. The brave raised his rifle and fired. A man a few feet from Fletcher fell to the ground, a ribbon of blood erupting from his throat. Men scrambled to their feet, trying to find cover. The brave fired again, this time striking a soldier in his head, which cratered in a shower of blood and shattered bone. Fletcher scrambled out of his blankets and fumbled for his revolver. The brave’s horse beat the ground impatiently, its breath erupting from its nostrils in a cloud of white vapor. A shot rang out and the brave fell off the horse, blood spiraling out of a gaping chest wound. The horse ran off and the brave struggled to regain control of his rifle. Lt. Weichel ran up to the brave and smashed him in the face with the butt of his rifle and then spun the rifle around and fired point blank into the brave’s face. Blood and flesh and bone splattered across Weichel’s clothing.
“Get up and fight,” Weichel said to Fletcher.
Fletcher stood and followed Weichel through the camp, shots and screams echoing all around them. The stink of burnt gunpowder and blood hung in the cold air and the stench was so strong that Fletcher had to fight back the urge to retch. They reached the boulders and joined three other soldiers who had taken up defensive positions behind the rocks.
One of the soldiers turned to Weichel. “They got Johnson and Owens, sir. Took their damn heads clean off.”
Weichel spit. “We’ll hold here and take them one by one.”
“Yessir,” the soldier said.
Weichel looked around the remains of the camp, which had suddenly fallen silent. The wind blew in hard from the north and it was starting to snow again, small cold flakes that whipped around in the bitter wind. A few men guarded the entrance to the camp and the rest of the men hid behind the boulders on the opposite side. The blood-splattered ground slowly turned white.
Lt. Weichel looked over the boulders at where their horses had been tied the night before. Three of the horses were dead and the rest were gone. Weichel cursed himself and slumped down behind the boulders. At least they had unpacked all their gear the previous night, so they’d have supplies for a few days. Still, those damn Hualapai had them penned in good. In this weather there was no way someone would be able to reach Fort Jackson and bring reinforcements. The rest of the men would be dead long before they ever got back.
Weichel turned to his men. “They got our horses, boys, so this is it. Pick your shots carefully and kill as many of those savages as you can.”
The men nodded in agreement. Fletcher fingered his revolver nervously. Its metal was icy to the touch and Fletcher’s fingers hurt from the cold.
#
The sun vanished behind a bluff and darkness descended upon the camp. The snow had fallen off and on all day and the wind tore ceaselessly at the soldiers. Despite the constant snow, the ground was bare in spots, the snow pushed away by the driving wind.
Throughout the day Weichel had moved around the camp, speaking with each of the soldiers. Fletcher watched him work. In spite of the overwhelming odds, the lieutenant moved with confidence, secure in the knowledge that if he was going to die he’d take a whole lot of Hualapai with him.
Fletcher held his hands under his armpits in an effort to keep them warm. The cold seeped into every pore of his body and Fletcher knew that his feet were frostbitten; he could no longer move his toes and he was numb from the ankles down. He tried to think of summer, of hot breezes and green grass, but the only thing his mind conjured up was snow and ice and freezing wind.
Fletcher looked across the camp. Lt. Weichel said something to some men and started to run back
toward Fletcher. He was halfway across the camp when a shot rang out and Weichel was struck in the head. Weichel’s corpse, with its ravaged and bloodied head half gone, took two more steps and crumpled to the ground.
The Hualapai came out of nowhere, their horses stirring up swirling clouds of snow. Despite the bitter cold, the braves were naked, their bodies painted black, their faces leering out of the darkness like corrupted skulls. Shots erupted across the camp and men screamed as they were gunned down. Fletcher pulled his hands out of his coat and grabbed his revolver. The man next to him stood and fired two shots before an arrow impaled him in the throat. The man gasped for breath and pulled at the arrow in vain for a long moment before he fell to the ground. A pool of blood spread from the wound and turned the snowy ground red.
Fletcher fired at anything that moved, the sound of the revolver drowning out all other noise. The Hualapai were everywhere. There weren’t supposed to be this many, Fletcher thought. The lieutenant had said there were twenty, thirty at the most, and nearly half of them were supposed to be old men, not much more than cannon fodder.
Soldiers ran across the camp and the Hualapai fell upon them without hesitation. A Hualapai brave rode up to a soldier and grabbed him with one hand and scalped him with the other. The soldier fell to the ground, his moist skull gleaming in the fading light. Another soldier was speared through the chest and shot in the face.
Fletcher fired wildly into the battle, tears streaming down his face. He didn’t want to die out here in this godforsaken place. He was too young to die. A solider ran toward Fletcher, a look of sheer terror etched on his face. A brave rode up behind the soldier and threw a rope around his neck, pulling him to the ground. A second brave rode up and thrust a spear through the soldier’s throat.
Another soldier shot the brave with the rope. The bullet tore through his chest and the brave flipped off his horse and hit the ground hard. The soldier ran forward, his revolver aimed at the Indian. The brave suddenly sat up, looked at the gaping wound in his chest, and stood. The soldier stopped in his tracks and fired again, this time hitting the brave in the abdomen; a thin ribbon of intestine oozed from the wound but the brave did not go down. Fletcher looked at the Hualapai brave in amazement. Snow and wind swirled all around the naked Indian, but he was just as unaffected by the cold as he was by the steel. The brave pulled out a knife that had been tied to his leg and walked toward the soldier. The soldier fired three more times and then the brave fell upon him, the knife taking off the soldier’s head with one fell swoop.
The camp suddenly fell silent, a haze of gun smoke and snow drifting across the ground. Fletcher lowered his gun and looked around; the dead were everywhere and the ground was covered with blood and flesh and violated organs. Three braves rode toward Fletcher, their black bodies smeared with blood and sweat. Two more braves walked toward the private, their rifles at the ready. A brave on the other side of the camp cut off a soldier’s head and drank the blood that dripped from the bloody stump.
Fletcher raised the revolver and pulled the trigger again and again and again, the firing pin hitting nothing but air, then the braves were on him and the world went black.
#
He felt the pain first--searing pain that ripped through his head and neck and chest. He tried to move his hands, but they were tied behind him. Fletcher opened his eyes, struggling to bring them into focus. It was full night and the sky was a shifting mixture of gray and black and swirling snow. He was tied to a large post and a ring of stones circled him.
Fletcher looked around. Torches fluttered in the cold wind, the flying snow partially obscuring their light. At his feet were the bodies of several soldiers, their lost blood frozen in the snow. The Hualapai, still painted pitch black, formed a large circle around Fletcher, their eyes glimmering in the dim torchlight.
An old Hualapai man walked out of the darkness and approached Fletcher. The old man was completely naked, and despite the cold, beads of sweat ran down his body. His chest was painted black and in one hand he clutched a long bone knife. Feathers tied to the ends of his long black hair fluttered in the wind and a small sack hung around his neck.
The old man stopped in front of Fletcher. Fletcher looked down at the knife and began to cry, the tears freezing to his cheeks. “Please,” he said, “just let me go. I wasn’t supposed to be out here. This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
The Hualapai braves started to chant in an indecipherable language. The chant was low and guttural and resonated like the beating of a drum. The old man paced in front of Fletcher for a few moments before he joined in the chant, his teeth colored blood red. The chant grew louder and louder and the old Hualapai spoke in a loud and booming voice and the knife flashed across Fletcher’s chest like a viper, leaving behind long, thin cuts. His chest felt like it was being burned from the inside out. Fletcher closed his eyes and tears ran down his cheeks. It hurt so damn much. The internal fire felt like it was moving out of his chest and into other parts of his body.
The old Hualapai removed the bag from his neck and poured its powdery contents into one hand. He smeared it across Fletcher’s chest, the powder mixing with his blood. The old man tossed the bag to one side and raised the knife again; this time he ran it across Fletcher’s throat.
Fletcher saw his blood, now colored white, landing on the dead soldiers below him, where it formed in hissing and foaming pools of white. Just as Fletcher's vision faded for eternity, one of the dead soldiers opened his eyes and smiled.
CHAPTER ONE
EAGLE MOUNTAIN, CALIFORNIA
1889
The late afternoon sun beat down like a furnace and a dry wind skirted along the ground, filling the air with dust. John Smith sat on a small wooden stool in the middle of a large corral. Large clumps of horse manure lay everywhere, and even with the light wind the smell was strong. Flies buzzed all around, large black flies with green heads that would bite hard if given the chance. John wiped the sweat from his forehead and spit out a wad of dry snot. His back hurt from being hunched over and his left shoulder was a little numb. A fly landed on his hand and he shooed it away before it got situated.
John looked at the horse in front of him, grabbed its front right leg, and lifted the hoof toward him. The horse snorted but remained still. John took the cutters in his right hand and started to trim the horse’s hoof, being careful not to cut into the fleshy padding. He hated this job. When John and his brother Paul had been offered the chance to work on the ranch, they had thought the work would consist of breaking horses and herding the cattle. Instead, they were stuck with the worst jobs--trimming hooves, slopping pigs, and scooping shit. Still, it was better than nothing. After the bank repossessed the farm and their father died, John and Paul bounced from one farm job to the next. Things were pretty bad back home in Nebraska, but there had still been plenty of work.
Unfortunately, Paul couldn’t seem to stay out of trouble. Each time they settled into a good paying job, Paul would steal something, have relations with the young woman of the household, or slack off on his work, and then they would both get fired. They had finally decided to come west to California, and John spent the three-week journey chewing Paul out. His brother was all the family John had left, and he’d stand by Paul no matter what, but enough was enough. They couldn’t keep living like this.
After cutting off the last overhang of hoof, John lowered the horse’s leg and gently swatted it on the rear. It walked away slowly and deliberately. John watched it go, then looked across the pen. There were still six horses to go. He looked up at the sun. He’d probably finish up just as it was getting dark.
John walked across the corral, grabbed one of the remaining horses, and led it over to his small stool. After stretching his back, John sat down on the stool, grabbed one of the horse’s legs, and started cutting.
#
Paul Smith pushed hard on the head of the spade with his foot, driving the shovel further into the ground. This damn thistle was proving to be a bitch to re
move. Paul twisted the shovel to the right and then brought it back to the left. The thistle’s roots clung to the dry earth and the plant refused to budge. Paul lifted the shovel out of the ground and struck the thistle two quick times. He felt his temper rising. This was bullshit.
He looked down the hill, back at the ranch. Most of the other men were already milling around the back of the house, cleaning their boots, washing their hands at the well, and smoking. Paul looked over toward the corral. John sat on a stool, bent under a horse. Paul turned back to the plant and drove the shovel into its roots. He ground the shovel deep and twisted the head in a half circle, cutting through the roots. Paul repeated this on the other side and popped the thistle out of the hole. At least half of the root system remained and the weed would grow back in a few months. Not that it mattered, though. Paul was damn sure he wouldn’t be busting his ass around these parts when the plant returned. Let some other damn fool dig it up for good.
Paul filled the holed with dirt, took one last look around the top of the hill, and started to walk down to his brother.
#
John pushed the last horse away and stood up, his back popping as he straightened up. Despite his pain, John was glad that this job was done; he wouldn’t have to do it again for another couple of months. He grabbed his stool and walked toward the gate.
“All done?” Paul asked. He was a few yards from the corral’s gate.
“Yep.” John exited the corral and waited for his brother. “How about you?”
“I’ll have to go back up tomorrow, probably a half day. The back side of that hill is covered. Don’t know why that fucker wants the hill cleared to begin with; he never sends his cattle up there and that hill ain’t no good for planting anything.”
“He’s probably afraid they’ll spread down here.”
“He’s a damn fool is what he is.” Paul spit and kicked one of his boots against the side of a fence post. The sole was nearly off and there was a huge hole in the side. “Is this what you expected when we came out here?”
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