Cowboys and Aliens

by Joan D. Vinge

  Dolarhyde blinked the darkness out of his eyes and looked at Nat. There was a look on Nat’s face now that he’d never seen before. He frowned slightly. “I don’t remember telling you those stories.”

  Nat glanced up, looking almost guilty. “I’d listen when you’d tell ‘em to Percy.”

  Dolarhyde stared at Nat for a long moment, seeing a different person sitting across from him than he had ever allowed himself to see before. For a moment the pain of the past receded, as the full implication of the younger man’s words sank in, and he felt something stir inside him that he thought had died long ago.

  But then he looked away, at the darkness surrounding them. “There was nothing I ever did worth liking.”

  “All the same . . .” Nat said, the smile grown quiet on his face, “I liked the stories.”

  Dolarhyde looked back into the fire, letting it immolate all traces of an emotion he didn’t deserve, and never wanted to feel again. He said irritably, “They weren’t for you, they were for my son”

  Hearing it come out of his mouth, he looked down abruptly, so that he didn’t have to see Nat’s face. “Wish he’d listened . . .” he muttered. Wishing to himself that the son he’d likely die for had turned out to be half the man that Nat Colorado was. “Now go check on the horses.”

  Nat got up without a word and left the fire, seeming as glad to put an end to their conversation as Dolarhyde was.

  Dolarhyde picked up his knife. He cut a slice from the apple, chewed it without tasting anything as he stared at the flames again.

  He heard stirring just beyond the firelight. He looked up with faint surprise to see Emmett, John Taggart’s grandson. He had forgotten the boy had been there at all.

  He studied Emmett’s face, seeing the admiration in the boy’s eyes as he gazed at the Bowie knife, along with plain hunger when he looked at the apple.

  Dolarhyde cut a piece from the apple, keeping his eyes on the boy as he did it. He held the piece of apple out. “Here.”

  Emmett came forward and accepted it with a sudden smile. He sat down cross-legged beside the fire and began to eat, as Dolarhyde cut another slice for himself. Dolarhyde wasn’t sure how he’d managed to invite the kid to dinner; but there wasn’t much he could do about it now that he had. He handed Emmett another piece of apple. Emmett watched each time he cut a slice, with a fascination that was almost awe.

  It occurred to Dolarhyde that the boy was the only one here without some kind of weapon. It made him think about what the boy was even doing here—then he remembered that Taggart had been taken by the demons, just like Percy.

  Taggart had been a smart, fair man, Dolarhyde knew, and a good sheriff: The fact that Taggart hated everything he stood for—his total disregard for the law Taggart was sworn to uphold—and wasn’t afraid to show it, only proved the man’s integrity. He was tough enough to do dirty work when he had to, but still human enough to miss his only child, and try to keep his only grandchild shielded from the real ugliness of the world they lived in for as long as he could . . . whether that was a smart thing to do or not.

  Dolarhyde looked at Emmett again: all alone, but as determined as any man to save the last of his family. Even if he had to fight demons with his bare hands . . . The boy suddenly reminded him of someone else, but he couldn’t think who.

  When they had finished the apple, Dolarhyde held up the knife. “You lookin’ at this knife?” he asked Emmett. “You like this knife?”

  Emmett nodded, his wide brown eyes as serious as they were surprised.

  Dolarhyde flipped the knife and caught it by the blade, He held it out to the boy. Emmett took the knife from him, speechless.

  “You look after that,” Dolarhyde said, his voice stern. Emmett nodded, his eyes going even wider. Dolarhyde took the knife sheath from his belt and tossed it after the knife. Emmett held the knife, staring at it in wonder. He picked up the sheath and put the blade into it, very carefully, and fastened it to his belt. Then, still silent, but with amazement reflecting like firelight in his eyes, he got up again and moved off into the shadows beyond the pool of light.

  Dolarhyde took a deep breath, relieved to have his solitude back. This time, at least, he hadn’t been left feeling ashamed by the results of what he had done. Instead, he felt oddly satisfied. Remembering the way the boy’s eyes had shone as he accepted the knife, Dolarhyde suddenly realized who it was that Emmett had reminded him of: another boy, named Nat Colorado—orphaned, unwanted, and all alone—when Dolarhyde had first brought him home.

  A rifle shot rang out in the quiet, echoing through the ship, making him start and look up. But it wasn’t followed by further noise, no shouting or screams. He sighed, and tossed another chair leg on the fire. That damn fool Sorenson, he thought. Nothing but dead weight.

  DOC SORENSON LOWERED the rifle, his face tight with frustration as he looked at the bottle he’d been trying to hit, still sitting unscathed on the table. He ran his hands through his dirty hair, further disheveling what had, until last night, always been a carefully groomed and tonsored look.

  “Treat her like a woman,” Meacham said, adjusting the rifle in his grip. “Talk to her like one: ‘You look beautiful, darlin’, you’re the most beautiful gun I ever seen’.”

  Doc raised the rifle to his shoulder again, not sure whether hearing a gun compared to a beautiful woman, or hearing the comparison come from the mouth of a preacher, was more disconcerting.

  He hated killing, hated the kind of men who enjoyed it. His hands and eyes were trained to use a scalpel, to heal the injuries men like that inflicted, and his memory was filled with the names of medical terms, not the caliber numbers of bullets, or who made the best rifles. But if it meant saving his wife he’d learn to be a killer—even if it killed him.

  “Align your sights now,” Meacham repeated, going over the checklist again with saintly patience. “Don’t pull the trigger, you squeeze it . . . gently.”

  Doc fired the rifle again; the sound deafened him, the gun kicked him in the shoulder, hard. He looked toward the table: the bottle was still intact. “Dammit,” he muttered.

  “Keep your hands steady,” Meacham said, sounding like one of his instructors from medical school, now. “You can do it.”

  Doc cracked open the rifle’s breech and reloaded it, fumbling with the bullets in his anger and frustration. “Maria was right . . . I ain’t no gunfighter . . . ain’t no saloon owner. . . .” He was a doctor. But here in the territories where he’d grown up, a genuine doctor was still as much of a freak as he’d been to his own family: a small, sickly boy growing up with a father and brothers who believed in an Old Testament God, and that what defined a man was his ability to beat down or shoot anyone who didn’t believe the same.

  They’d called him “Mama’s Boy,” because his mother had tried to protect him, along with herself . . . until finally the misery of her life had driven her to alcohol, and he’d lost her to sorrow and drink.

  When she’d taken to spending more time at the cantina that Maria’s family ran than at home, he’d taken a job there, to pay for her tequila; it had been the only thing he seemed able to do for her, by then, in return for a mother’s love. Maria’s family had become his real family, and Maria . . . Maria. . . .

  “That woman’s the only one who ever believed in me,” he said, looking back at Meacham. After his mother died, he’d learned she had family—rich family—back east. They’d granted his mother’s final wish and sent him to medical school, when they learned what had become of her. And Maria had waited for him, until he came home. . . .

  But he’d come home only to discover that he couldn’t make a living out here as a doctor. He couldn’t take Maria back east, away from her family and everything she knew—he’d had a hard enough time with that himself. The way he talked and acted had made him stick out like a sore thumb. He wouldn’t expose her gentle heart to the stares, the remarks—all the hard feelings left after the War, after too many wars—which even a Mexican wife would h
ave attracted.

  Maybe they should’ve gone to Santa Fe . . . but they hadn’t had the money to start a new life together there. His memories of the cantina were good ones: a place where not just drunk cowhands, but actual families, had come to enjoy life and celebrate. He’d wanted to run a place like that—but the only place available was the Gold Leaf Saloon, in Absolution. . . . “All I wanted was to put her in some silk, y’know?” he said. “Give her a little buttermilk. Show her I could provide a better life . . .”

  But he’d failed at that like he’d failed at everything else. “It’s my fault she got took. If I hadn’t brought her to that damn town . . .” He felt his voice beginning to shake. He struggled to keep control, to hold onto his belief in any future at all; barely holding it together, afraid that in another minute he’d—

  “You’re gonna get her back,” Meacham said firmly. “Y’hear? You’re settin’ things right.”

  Doc looked up, needing to see something in the man’s face that could make him believe. “So you . . . think she’s still alive?”

  Meacham grinned, his face brightening with belief. “Wouldn’t be here, if I didn’t have faith.”

  10

  Jake’s restless midnight wandering brought him at last to what must have been the private cabin of the riverboat’s captain. Right now the middle of the room was occupied by a waterfall, maybe the biggest actual waterfall he’d ever seen: Rainwater poured in through a hole in the upside-down floor, gleaming like molten silver in the near-constant flicker of lightning; it flowed away like a river through another doorless opening.

  Jake leaned against the wall outside the range of the waterfall’s spray, staring up at the silver curtain, listening to the sound; realizing as he did how much worse his body felt than it had when he’d gotten here—sick to death of always moving, being driven by his own fear . . .

  At least he was finally alone; even Ella had given up following him some while back, surrendering at last to boredom or fatigue. He took off his hat, removed the tintype of Alice from inside the crown, and looked down at her face. Without even realizing it he started to smile as she looked up at him, smiling.

  Alice . . . God. Any woman who could make him feel glad he was alive, even when he felt like he did right now, just with her smile, was someone he had to find—to save, if he could—if only to find out what they’d really meant to each other.

  If she was still alive. . . .

  The pain in his side suddenly seared him like hot metal; his face tightened as he put Alice’s picture back into his hat, controlling his movements with conscious effort. He righted a chair and set his hat on it, feeling something warm and wet soaking the side of his shirt. He unbuttoned his vest with clumsy fingers, untucked his shirt and saw fresh blood on it. Shit. The damn wound had pulled open. He unbuckled his gun belt and hung it over the chair back.

  He took off his coat and vest, pulled the shirt up over his head, cursing under his breath. That wasn’t a good sign, more blood. He should have paid the wound better heed—

  Not having a bottle of whiskey with him to pour into the wound, he ducked into the falling water in the room’s center. Goddamn, it was freezing. . . . He rubbed the wound clean as best he could with his hand, relieved to see that most of the stitching Meacham had done was still holding. He stepped out of the flood again, shivering, and shook the water from his hair. Blinking his eyes clear, he raised his head.

  Ella was standing in the doorway, staring at his body.

  Startled almost to embarrassment, he turned his back to her as he reached for his shirt. “You been standing there long?” he asked over his shoulder.

  “Yes,” Ella said, still fixing him with the unabashed stare.

  He suddenly wondered if he’d been wrong about why she was following him. “Something you need—?”

  “Does it hurt? she asked, glancing down. Had she only been looking at the wound?

  “It’s fine.” His mouth thinned.

  “They did that to you . . .”

  Jake looked at the wound; up at her, stunned. They . . . did she mean the demons? The wound . . . the strange weapon . . . his whole missing life: The demons had done that to him? How—? Unless . . . unless they’d taken him, along with Alice. But that meant. . . .

  Ella closed the space between them. He saw something raw and vulnerable in the way she looked at him now, as if she’d seen wounds like this before . . . seen a lot of them, maybe even felt that pain herself. “They took my people, too,” she’d said, and he realized now that she hadn’t been lying just to use to him.

  She put out her hand slowly, gently, and he let her fingers touch the wound; her fingers came away with blood on them.

  Jake said nothing, pulling on his shirt. Ella moved away; crouched down to search the floor as if she’d dropped something. Finally she straightened up again, holding an intact bottle of liquor and an unused table napkin. She was now almost as drenched as he was, but she didn’t seem to notice.

  “Who’s the woman in your picture?” Ella asked, as she poured liquor onto the cloth.

  Jake glanced toward his hat; realized she really had seen everything he’d done, without him even suspecting she was there. He looked back again, with a slight head shake. “All I know is . . . she got taken when I did.” When I did. . . . They took me, too. Then how—? His right hand covered the solid band of the weapon on his other wrist: the demon gun.

  He must’ve escaped. But if he had . . . that meant Alice—

  “So you’re going to save her,” Ella said softly, as if she assumed the woman was his lover.

  “She’s the only one who knows who I am,” he said, refusing to let his mind or his voice take it any further, especially in the presence of another woman . . . especially this one.

  He pulled his shirt up and Ella began to clean the wound, with the unflinching skill of someone who’d done it before. Jake held still, staring at the wall.

  “You know who you are . . .” Ella said. “You just have to remember.” She turned away, putting her foot up on a chair, and tore a long strip of cloth from her petticoat.

  But did he even want to remember being Jake Lonergan: the outlaw, the killer; the kind of man who’d . . .

  He swallowed the sudden, choking knot of shame that kept him from speaking. “. . . I can’t . . .”

  “Yes, you can,” she said, her face filling with encouragement and belief. She pushed his shirt up again; he held it as she began to wrap the strip of cloth around his waist, binding the wound to protect it.

  But she couldn’t imagine what kind of heartless bastard he must have been; what it would mean—

  He didn’t feel like Jake Lonergan. He didn’t want to be the Devil in human form, or a gutless mudsill who’d run away and leave a woman like Alice to demons. . . .

  He wanted to stay whoever he was now. Only human, free to start over . . . just a man . . . Ella’s face was so close to his now, and her hands touching his skin were so warm. . . . He realized she’d taken off the jacket of her dress and left it somewhere to dry; she only had on a camisole, and her bare arms were circling his waist, her long dark hair falling across her shoulder. He wouldn’t be a man, if she didn’t make him think about . . .

  . . . about Alice. He shut his eyes.

  She finished tying the knot on his bandage and started to turn away, not looking up at him. He gripped her arm, gently but firmly. “Now you gotta tell me something,” he said, making her meet his eyes this time, willing her to look at his face. “Who did you lose?”

  Her eyes filled again with a pain so terrible that suddenly she had to fight to hold back her tears—the same look she’d given him just after dawn, when he’d caught her trying to follow him.

  “Everyone who mattered to me—” she whispered.

  Their eyes locked, and before he could stop it he was seeing double—seeing two different people, each trapped inside their own loss and need, fate-bound to each other until they could become one, united to achieve a single im
possible goal—

  The demon gun on Jake’s wrist lit up and began to sound its alarm, shattering the fragile link between them.

  “It’s here,” Ella said in a shaken voice, looking toward the doorway.

  Jake grabbed his gun belt, and was out of the room before her.

  EMMETT ROAMED THE dark corridors of the river-boat with the knife Mr. Dolarhyde had given him clutched firmly in his hand. He felt stronger and more confident right now than he had since before Ma had died, and Pa had . . . left him behind, over a year ago.

  This morning, it had seemed like his whole world had ended . . . until he’d heard the final words of Preacher Meacham’s sermon, and they had given him new hope, and inspiration. He’d vowed then to go after the demons too, and bring his grandfather home.

  Grandpa was the bravest man Emmett knew, but that hadn’t saved him from being taken away by those things. If he could rescue Grandpa, he could prove to him, to everybody—and especially to himself—that he was as much of a grown-up, just as strong and able to survive as anyone here . . . even Mr. Dolarhyde.

  Today he’d ridden through the heat and dust and then the pouring rain without complaining, like all the other men. He’d helped them take care of the horses tonight, just like he’d promised, even though his legs had been so stiff he could hardly walk. And the respect he’d seen then in the eyes and smiles of the people he knew had made him feel sure he could do it again tomorrow, and keep on doing it for as long as he had to. . . .

  Charlie Lyle and Preacher Meacham were sleeping now, and so was Doc Sorenson; the dog had wandered off somewhere a while ago. As far as Emmett knew, he was the only one on the ship who was still awake. He was too excited, too eager for tomorrow to arrive, to go to sleep, so he’d appointed himself their sentry, keeping watch while they rested, like a soldier from Mr. Dolarhyde’s army days. . . .

  He was making his way through the eerie, upside-down world of the engine room now. It was like exploring a cave: Strange machinery hung suspended from the ceiling, and more unfamiliar shapes rose up from the floor, all of it silhouetted by the constant lightning that threw long shadows like the hands of monsters across his path.