Strange Dominion

by Lyons, Amanda M.

  Malumba, the Congo headhunter, snuck up on Andromalius but got a Bowie knife in his chest for his troubles. Stone also removed Oly Olson, the Norwegian grave robber, with an arrow, and then Kurt Austin, a rich kid that liked killing women, and the last arrow killed Randy Palardi, the bank robber.

  The rest were hiding behind rocks in the canyon. Using their rifles made the canyon into a shooting gallery with the advantage going their way. When the shooting started the Hell Bent dropped like flies. Andromalius killed Dean Todd, stage coach robber; Dutch Sharpe, the second man of the Savage Gang; Rick Patterson, molester of young boys; Siegfried Von Hess, the mass murdering miner; the Texas Outlaw, who preferred not to go by another name while robbing settlers; Snuma, the Samoan killer; Pat Morrow of the Savage Gang; “The Frog”, the French highwayman; Kenji Saito, a murdering samurai; and Mr. X, a traveling snake oil salesman and killer.

  Stone, on the other hand, killed Jerry Stamp of the Savage Gang; Terry Kiniski, a werewolf; Masa Shibuya, the Japanese vampire, Joe Moretti, your average sinner, Larry Ramstead of the Savage Gang, Mike Olsen, the defrocked pervert priest; Killer Buddy Tenta, the mass murderer; Stenke, the German killer of old women; Huguchi, the knife throwing assassin; Moondog Mayer, the killer hermit; and John Mosca, a thief that stole from churches.

  Andromalius and Stone arrived on the canyon floor with just two fugitives left, Iron Mike Sharpe, the leader of the Savage Gang and Snake Meyers, the leader of the Hell Bent. These men weren’t in any hurry to come out of hiding.

  “And here I thought we was chasin’ us some bad men, but these are just little boys playing at bein’ bad men. Are you girls back there pissin’ in your bloomers? You two cowards either man up and come out fightin’ or we come back there and kill you, and then let the dime novelists know you died hidin’ like whipped dogs.” Stone taunted.

  “I think they have those backdoor trots you were talking about.” Andromalius added.

  The killers came from behind the rocks with their guns drawn and bullets flying. Andromalius fired six shots in rapid succession into Iron Mike, while Stone let Snake empty his gun before taking careful aim and putting one in Snake’s head. All of the Hell Bent were dead now, the relentless pursuit was over.

  “That’s all of them. I guess you’ll be heading back down below, unless you want to have a drink?” Stone offered.

  “And what then, choir boy, a hug? You want to be partners? Hell no, I still don’t like you and would just as soon kill you.” and after a pause he added, “But I must admit this little hunt was fun. See you in Hell, choir boy.” Andromalius said.

  “Tell Lucy I said hi,” Stone told him, making fun of Lucifer. “And the whiskey is on you if you ever come back.”

  “I’ll be back.” and with that Andromalius stabbed himself in the heart with his Bowie knife and went up in flames.

  “Hasta la vista, baby,” Stone said

  That Bastard Loner

  Kent Hill

  If only he had been a poet, then maybe he could have worn a waistcoat well. This was one of the reasons but no excuse, the day he really lost his mind and started killing people.

  I think, if pressed, you would struggle to find an explanation which would wholly satisfy the curious. It is one of the things you think about during bad days. When some lowly dog cheats not once, but twice during the same card game; their reckless abandon takes on a torturous quality which stretches the limits of the kingly virtue which is courtesy.

  So one day he snapped.

  Now they are all gone, the human race on earth . . . or so he thought.

  ***

  Chet the firewalker had reached his limit. The dusty road ahead was without end and he was in no condition to continue. Above his own panting and the dry wind, he heard then the faint hooves of the killer’s mule. It was ominous but slow. The footsteps of doom were not healthy, so when the lean silhouette of the scourge of mankind came over the horizon behind him, it came at a snail’s pace.

  Chet, his hands on hips, parched beyond belief and sucking in air as though it were water, watched as his death came into full view. The killer on his mount seemed to stop for a moment then, as he had for the duration of recent memory, he followed Chet’s tired footprints, one at a time. The mule from this distance looked as though it were fashioned of volcanic glass. But the whine it let fly with after a dozen steps gave it back its earthly and ragged making. The killer fell with the animal into the dust. The firewalker’s split and dry lips, for the first time in a long time, nearly brought forth a chuckle. Chet looked off down the road ahead of him now with his second wind, and a little hope back in the twinkle of his eye. A twinkle that burnt out the second it flourished into existence when the life of the former firewalker was snuffed out; ended by a bullet from a man who sincerely made the devil seem affable.

  The dead man fell, revealing the killer striding confidently toward him, on foot now, with his pistol drawn. Taking a seat beside the corpse, the first thing the dark man stole was Chet’s sandals. They had been the height of fashion in the days when Jesus walked the earth and not even this evil spirit was prepared to disagree with the son of God on this score. He would rather wear the sandals than continue barefoot any longer.

  Next on the agenda was food. Anything at this point, but Chet’s satchel was as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard. The dark man was not perturbed; he would eat the mule, which was the way of things out here in this place far from heaven.

  ***

  A warm wave of nostalgia swept over the killer as the chill of night descended and he made a fire on the roadside among the bones of the retired. Contentedly eating the roasted meat of his expired beast of burden, the sky above dancing for him, the dark man was at peace now. They were all gone, all of them. The poor wretch being slowly carried away piece by piece in the form of bloody morsels trapped in the beaks of grateful crows was the last. He rested his head on his coat, the color of the shadows, and allowed his eyes to close. How long had it been? Days, nights, months, years, time itself had become as forgotten in this place as life. The silence was what calmed him now, the silence that walked behind him during the day and blanketed him at sunset. His feet, gnarled and painful, relaxed and were soothed by the cool wind that moved, moaning its way over the empty earth like the tormented spirits that wandered there aimless. The killer couldn’t remember the last time he slept deeply, that time existed in an age where men fought to keep what they had; fighting looking into each other’s eyes, not like the world that fell . . . a world where death came swiftly and in the back. You could kill or be killed and no one seemed to have the strength to muster concern.

  ***

  A birthing dream was upon him when something put him back in the game, back on the edge. That something was a sound, a rustling among bushes somewhere out there in the dark. He rose and awoke the fire, thrusting a stick of wood deep into the embers until the flames returned. Then out into the blackness with torch in hand. The wind was animating the dry brush now, but that was not what the dark man was in search of. He sought the dirt, and to put a finer point on it, footprints in the dirt. There they were, coming and going to this place just in sight of his fire. They were small and heavy yet hasty. Whoever it had been was, or had been, on the killer’s heels, yet had some point of retreat as the prints scurried away to the east and far off the road, that road he had been on for a lifetime. A road lined with death.

  He would wait now, awake and alert. He would wait for the dawn and follow the footsteps.

  ***

  The town came up out of the desert like an old man waking close to his passing, awkward and grudgingly. The footprints the killer followed came up to the thoroughfare, then left signs of their passing on the remaining boards that lay like broken piano keys before the empty structures which stood in equal disrepair. The faint trail had wandered indoors and the killer followed, his own footsteps harkening in an air stirred and shaken by the breath of the desert, which is all that was left beyond this place.

&
nbsp; Up some stairs and along a hall to a door that hung open, expecting company. The room within was an oubliette. There were some dusty books piled high in one corner, an old blanket had served as a bed. There were torn papers and maps of a sort, hand-drawn with a candle almost at the end of usefulness, it’s dried blood cementing it to the neck of bottle which had in its day washed away painful memories for but a brief portion of time.

  The dark man looked at the scene and knew it to be a place of last hope. The trail he had followed came and went some time ago. It was possible that whoever it was had anticipated his coming, and so, like the killer himself, wasted little of the night with sleep and spent more on waiting and preparation for this day, as good as any, for a dying.

  ***

  Something below stairs scuttled then. The dark man came down quickly and found fresh markings. This person was cunning and not a complete coward. They knew how to stalk, how to get the drop on a man. With a pistol and these talents, the dark man studied some on the notion that there might well be a new sheriff in town. But he let a smile creep from ear-to-ear at that. Who was the law going to protect and serve here? This land had already watched the human race finally, as one, reach a level pegging. With all folks now with their wooden coats on, they were at last equal.

  A scurrying across some boards and a door being made use of by something other than the wind brought the dark man back out into the daylight. The footprints, the fresh makings, zigzagged over Main Street and from there into the opposing edifices. The killer mused on going in, following them back into the shade, but held his ground. He could spend the better part of the day doing that; chasing this ghost with earthly feet all over town. As much time had gone by, and as much as he had the hours to put in the practice, the dark man knew in his heart that the love or the use for patience did not abide in him. This being a cold fact, he holstered his guns and sat upon the boardwalk, using the dried remains of an old horse trough as a wind break. There, he brought forth fire, and after the gathering, set it to dance its way over the town. This place was already over and done. The fire that rose simply allowed this last station of humanity to pass into legend in a blaze of glory.

  The killer moved to a rise in the landscape to watch the town disappear. His gaze, though, was not fixed on the flames. No, it was on the desert beneath the black smoke, watching and waiting for his prey, his last victim, to take to the sand and run for their life.

  ***

  The sun was at its peak and the dark man was at his limits when a shape ran from the fires of damnation and out into the nothing. The killer rose slowly. For him there was no need to run. This person’s own tracks would work against him and the dark man put little credence into the notion that whoever it was could keep up a pace required to see the sun come down on them for the last time.

  ***

  But the hours came in. The tracks ahead of the killer were deep and constant. This last prey wasn’t done yet and it was beginning to be troublesome. This person had brought some of the fire that drank their last place of refuge with them. They were not content to merely lie down and die.

  The dark man, though, could match this resilience with tenacity. He who had followed in the footsteps of many and played judge, jury, and executioner had not been beaten yet. Sure, some of his victims had possessed a certain wiliness that prolonged the inevitable, but not for long, and not forever. Eventually he caught them all; he would catch up with this person. Though, he thought to himself: I will greet this person, I shall ask them of that which has allowed them such a life. What power it is that has seen them endure. I shall ask them to give it name; I shall ask them their name. As this shall be humanity’s end, then this passing will be well made.

  ***

  But night came before the killer would be called again to go for his guns. The sun fell and rose, moving over the killer, whose prey still managed to elude him. It was in the heat of the day, three days after he set off on this pursuit into the nothing, that the trail vanished.

  The dark man knelt before the final footprints and quietly let his shadow linger over them in some strange form of worship. There, he came to it. There, in that moment, he came to the realization that he had been beaten. Whoever he had sought, whoever it was he had followed into town, and then, from there out here, out here to hell, was smarter than he and did not fear death. The dark man had unwittingly watched death change sides. They had traveled a long way together. They had comforted each other on nights when the silence cut like a knife, but here, now, death had tricked him. He was the last man. In the game of death, the house always wins and for the killer- he had just reached his limit. Death held all the cards, no choice left but to fold.

  ***

  So the killer stood, placing his feet, his feet that walked in the sandals of the taken, into the remaining footprints on the trail. His prints now would go on, the ghost had taken form and he would walk now, with his old friend Death holding those pistols that he wore so well against the back of his skull till he said when; till he asked to see the cards and watch for the final time as fortunes changed hands.

  ***

  For three more days the killer walked with Death into the nothing. They never spoke; he had no tongue for reminiscing under these circumstances. The only thing that passed between them was the shifting of the dark man’s feet through the hot sand and that was starting to get old.

  At length the sand rose ahead of him and the killer saw over its height a pool, a wound in the earth filled with the light of the sun. Its brilliance and terror reflected . . . on the surface of water. Resigned to his fate, the dark man fell to his hands and knees and crawled toward the pool, praying for it to be tangible and not merely the onset of madness.

  He saw his face in the water and knew it not. This was real, and the moisture rose into his nostrils. He brought forward his tired hands and plunged them into the cool depths. He splashed the water onto his face and forehead, letting it gently kiss his lips. The wind in the desert chilled the liquid further and the sensation almost caused the dark man to shed a tear. What bliss, what splendid bliss . . . such a kiss before dying.

  Then the burning began.

  ***

  It started out as itching, and the itching turned to pain, and the pain . . . the pain was terrible. It intensified quickly and the killer then, not unlike those to whom he had introduced Death, cried out; agonizing screams to wake the dead. He clutched at his face and felt the flesh there was flaccid and had the consistency of melted cheese from an age back when such things were to be had. Parts of it adorned the tips of his fingers, and the pain, O rich and unending pain, was alive as he sat watching as these hands which had held the water began to lose the shape and substance.

  The dark man fell onto his back, roaring searing oaths to the heavens for such an end. Death, it seemed, was not going to use his metal against him; it had sought out a different agent of destruction. He had not allowed any of his victims to choose the way in which they departed, so the killer’s old friend had given him that choice. He would drink of the agony he had caused, and it would eat away at him, like the scruples he was brought into this world without. At any time he could reach for his pistols and do himself a favor, but by the time that thought came drifting out of the transom of his mind, the flesh on the dark man’s hands was dripping off.

  The sun above him shone harshly, almost mockingly. The killer prepared himself, staring into that distant fireball. He felt his friend’s, Death’s, breath as it whispered in his ear, reminding him that this was always going to be the end. In the absence of a servant to do his master’s bidding, so it falls then to the master himself to act. The dark man looked into the sun and soon his world vanished . . . and he along with it.

  ***

  The killer awoke and saw the sun above him. No, this was not the sun. It was neither as bright nor intense in its heat. This light was softer and cooler, and he could reach out and touch it. He lifted his hands. The first was bandaged heavily, the second was unre
cognizable. The hand itself, to the forearm, was gone, replaced with a robotic equivalent. All the joints and mechanisms were polished, oiled and visible.

  The dark man sat up and the light above him shattered. Glass and sparks filled his view. It was a kind of lamp, dangling at the end of a steel arm. He pushed it aside and it swung away. More glass from the bulb’s housing fell and its sound as it hit the floor was all he could hear above his labored breathing. There was light without the lamp, coming down from panels in the ceiling.

  He put his feet on the floor. It was cold and smooth. Then the mirror appeared. It came up from between the panels on the floor at the end of the bed. It was as tall as the dark man and as thin as a razor. He saw himself in it. The killer moved slowly toward his reflection. He couldn’t recognize the image which looked back at him. The face above the bridge of his nose was no more. That metal which took the place of one of his hands now covered his head all the way back to the base of his spine. His eyes, no longer human, glowed red. The bottom half of his face was the only remnant of his former self; his sun-scorched flesh, his grizzled beard.

  Then he saw his reflection change again. His visage gave way to that of a thin man in glasses. He was dressed in a grey suit beneath a white lab coat.

  “Good day, old boy,” said the thin man, “glad to see you up and about.”

  Suddenly the thin man stepped forward and out of the mirror. He stood now before the killer; the mirror remained, but neither man was reflected in it.

  “Where the hell am I?” said the dark man.

  “The future . . . or more precisely, an alternative future dimension,” the thin man said.