I turned back to the crowd. The Sherriff was starting to head toward us with his own shotgun.
“Stay back!” I yelled. “Those robots are coming! Scatter!”
Man, the look of fear in the Sherriff’s eyes. He turned and hightailed it outta there, with the rest of the crowd following.
I turned and gave Birkin another good blow to the head to keep him down. Then I got to Pace and helped him to his feet.
“Get up Pace!” I shouted. “We gotta get outta here!”
Pace was groggy and wobbly. Not one to take a punch, you know.
“What… what the…”
“It was Birkin! Come on, we gotta go!” I kinda hoisted Pace up on Flashbound, and that kinda got him oriented again. “Can you ride?”
“I can ride.”
I mounted Charon. Didn’t even need to tug on the reigns. He knew what to do. He and Flashbound started to run away.
I turned and saw Birkin slowly move to his feet. Almost felt sorry for him. But not really. He started shouting at us though. Couldn’t hear him over the hoofbeats so I decided to slow Charon so I could hear. Flashbound sidled up alongside us as well.
“I know how to get to you!” Birkin screamed, jumping all over the place. “Ain’t hard to get to you! You know who I’m talkin’ ‘bout, don’t you? Don’t you!”
Birkin turned and ran for his horse.
“We should go,” Pace suggested.
Birkin untied his horse and leapt up into his saddle.
“Wait for it…” I said calmly.
Birkin’s saddle came undone and swung over to the left, hurling Birkin down, smacking his head against the ground. I’d taken a few moments earlier to loosen his saddle. Every now and then I come up with a good one.
“Now we go,” I said.
As we rode out of town, I turned around to see if anyone was following us, and no one was.
But what about those robots I was yammering on about? Scared everyone out of their wits? Yeah about that. I wasn’t being exactly truthful. They weren’t coming. We knew where they were. And as we reached the outskirts of the settlement, we saw them. Just the way we’d planned.
Remember when I said we’d spotted something we were looking for when we arrived in Conrad, and needed to find something heavy? Well, we had located the trap door where the robots were supposed to spring out of. Same as the one in Augusta, and we’d found them in other settlements too. Finally figured out a way of dealing with ‘em. We found a fallen tree and placed it over the trap door. So as we rode over to it, we saw those robots trying to get out, but they couldn’t get the danged trap door open. They kept bumping their heads against it, and then the tree’s weight would bear down on them. We could hear the robots crashing against one another in their underground bunker. It was almost comical. They wouldn’t be troubling anyone for a long time. Probably ever.
“Wait a sec,” Pace said. He handed me his reins and quickly dismounted. He approached the trap door just as one of the robot’s turret arms was trying to make its way above ground. As the weighted trap door crashed down on it, Pace grabbed hold of the robot arm and snapped it off. He stared at it for a second, amused. And then he leapt up on his horse.
“Souvenir?” I asked.
“If we’re going to have to keep dealing with these robots,” he explained, “it would be nice to know more about them.”
And then we rode off.
Rode the six hours back toward our hideout without sleep. Funny what adrenaline will do to you. And nobody chased after us. No posse, no nothing. Robots do have one benefit – they tend to kinda scare off a posse. Birkin didn’t chase after us neither. I suppose he suffered a pretty nasty bump to the head along with all the beating I gave him. What a cryin’ shame.
Pace and I had something to talk about of course. I don’t know about Pace but I didn’t really wanna talk about it though. Wasn’t sure what to say. But I couldn’t help think about what Birkin shouted. Thought about it every second of the six hour ride back.
I know how to get to you…
Round midnight we returned to our hideout. We were beat, but still wanted to lock up our gold. As I got a fire going and we cracked open a bottle of whiskey, Pace used the light from the fire to examine that robot arm. The weapon on the end of that turret had gotten crushed, unfortunately. Would’ve come in handy. But still, it proved to be helpful.
“It says on here M-A-N-K-I-N,” Pace read. “Mankin. Guess that’s what these things are called.”
“Mankin,” I repeated so I wouldn’t forget it. As if I could.
“Never seen any kind of construction like this. This metal is so lightweight but really sturdy.”
“Anything else written on it?”
Pace examined it on all sides. “Bunch of numbers, not sure what those mean. A serial number I suppose. And… wait a minute…” Pace peered at one section of the arm really closely – right where it had been severed by the trap door. Then Pace got this amazed look in his eyes. “Well I’ll be damned. See here? It says ‘Property of the Great Plains Holding Company. All rights reserved. I was right!”
I wondered how many decades or centuries or whatever that the bank had those Mankins hidden just outside our settlement. Probably the whole time we were alive, they were just waitin’ right there.
We mounted the Mankin arm on the wall by the electric staircase, just for the hell of it. It was our little memento – may as well put it on display.
After a little more whiskey we headed off to sleep. Couldn’t sleep. Wasn’t the cold. That wasn’t so bad anymore.
“Pace, you sleepin’?” I asked.
“Nope.”
“Been thinkin’ about somethin’.”
“That’s dangerous.”
“Our lives just got a whole lot more difficated.”
“You worried about that guy Shādo Shay?”
“Nope. Been thinkin’ about what Birkin was yellin’.”
Pace hesitated a whole long time before he finally replied. Wasn’t sure if he fell asleep or something.
“Yes, me too.”
“He says he knows how to get to us.”
“He said we know who he was talking about.”
“I reckon he does. What do we do?”
“I suppose we go rescue Rebecca. That’s what we do.”
8.
Probably the single most dangerous thing we ever did was go back home.
Sure, in the other settlements we’d been to we stuck out as strangers, but not necessarily outlaws. Not unless someone got a good look at our Wanted poster. In Great Falls, everyone knew our face. And they’d either want to gun us down if they were able or collect the five thousand gold coin reward. Or both. And of course the Nuggets would be on the lookout for us. We knew we couldn’t just ride into town, rescue our girl and then go about our business. We needed a better plan than that. Fortunately we thought we had one. But even if we didn’t, we couldn’t give up on Becca, no matter the cost.
For an idiot, Birkin was pretty smart. He knew what he said would draw us out. We’d go to Becca to protect her and then the Nuggets would close in on us. We didn’t think she’d be locked up somewhere or anything like that. Boze probably still cared about her, wasn’t gonna let that happen. But Birkin would keep himself nearby. Wouldn’t hesitate to cut her or even kill her if it brought us outta hiding. Sure, he’d have a problem with Boze if he harmed her, let alone us, but he’d do it for five thousand in gold, that’s for sure. Or just for the satisfaction of gettin’ back at us. He was twisted that way.
So we knew what we were riding into, but that didn’t matter. I was okay with that. What concerned me more was how Becca was gonna react when she saw us. The way we left her, that sad way she was looking at me, not sure she’d even want to see us again. Had no idea how she felt about us anymore. That was the most dangerous thing.
We rode up toward the settlement around supper time. The sun was fully set once we reached the outskirts, so the darkness would help hide
us. And as we walked down Main Street, everyone – and I mean everyone – was gone. The place was a ghost town. Did all the townsfolk find a spaceship and fly off into the stars past the hypernova? Eff no. They were just in Town Hall. Sitting in the dark. It was movie night. Effing brilliant plan. We just walked into Town Hall through the back door and no one saw us. All eyes were glued forward staring at that tattered screen watching some kind of romantic movie. I dunno, I didn’t pay much attention to it, but there was a lot of kissing. It was easy to find Becca. She sat where she always sat, toward the back, by herself so she could enjoy the movie without interruption. Sorry Becca, we had other ideas.
I tried to scout the room for the Nuggets. Too dark, couldn’t see ‘em. But they usually sat toward the front with their girlfriends, usually slept through the movie. They probably didn’t think we’d have the balls to just barge right in.
Pace and I sat on either side of Becca. She kept her eyes staring front but she shifted her weight around uncomfortably. Probably pissed off that anyone would sit right next to her. Probably thinking she needed to move. But then Pace leaned in and did his suave thing.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” he whispered in her ear. “Is this seat taken?”
I could actually hear her gasp for breath. She immediately turned to look at me, and she lit up like I never seen before. Then she turned back to the screen. Tears started to stream down her cheeks. Guess she was relieved we were still alive. I was relieved knowing she still cared about us.
“It’s not safe,” she whispered.
Pace gave her a reassuring smile, which she glanced at, and then we all stared forward to look at the screen. If we didn’t make much commotion, who would notice?
Onscreen there were a couple a fancy people on a boat. They did a lot of dancing and kissing. The guy looked familiar. I think I saw him in a few movies before, maybe running from a crop dusting plane or something like that. The woman I never saw before. Pretty I guess in an elite sorta way, but not my type. The girl sitting right next to me was my type.
I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. It was Pace’s hand, landing right on Becca’s knee. Man, that infuriated me. After only a minute he was already claiming his territory. Well, I’m not sure how but I mustered the courage to put my hand smack on her other knee. And the funny thing – she didn’t seem to mind. Even though she had jeans on, it felt so warm under my touch. Then I noticed that she started smiling under her tears – maybe even trying not to laugh.
Pace inched his hand up slightly. He got away with it, so I did the same. Then he went again, inching ever closer to paradise. So I did too. I snuck another look at Becca and she was doing all she could do to not bust out laughing. Pace moved a nudge higher. Then I did too. Then Becca couldn’t contain herself – she blew out a burst of air from her mouth and started laughing. Probably not the best part of the movie to laugh in. There was more kissing going on up on that screen. Miss Taylor even turned around and shushed Becca. Becca quietly apologized, and we were all quite grateful that Miss Taylor turned back to watch the movie and paid no mind to the gentlemen creating the commotion in the first place.
We all held still for a minute, enjoying the moment. It was like I could feel the energy in her body burning out into my hand. I’d touched a thigh before, sure, but not that thigh. Soon, Pace decided to inch up again, and I matched him, and we moved up closer and closer until both of us were right under her jewel box.
This was a dangerous game. Way more dangerous than robbing some old bank.
I held my breath wondering what she would do next. Would she let our hands stay there? Would Pace make the final move, with nowhere else to go? And would I follow? Would I be allowed to follow? I’ll never know, cause she shoved both of our hands away with a sigh of frustration. Not sure if that was sexual frustration or she was just frustrated with our juvenile antics. Like I said, I’ll never know.
But Pace and I got a great consolation prize. Instead of punching us both in the balls, she firmly clasped each of our hands and held them tight. I hadn’t held hands with Becca since pre-puberty when it didn’t mean nothin’. But it sure meant something by this point. If that had been my last human contact with a girl, I woulda been all right with it.
We sat there and watched the movie for a while. The guy and the woman had some kinda problem. They were both married to other people or something like that. So they were gonna get off the boat and go break up with their spouses or whatever and then meet again when they were freed up. They were trying to decide where to meet.
“How about the top of the Empire State Building?” he suggested.
She seemed thrilled. “Oh yes that’s perfect! It’s the nearest thing to heaven that we have in New York!”
“102nd floor, and don’t forget to take the elevator!”
102 floors. That’s nothin’. I shit 102 floors. Our skyscraper was probably a hundred fifty floors, bare minimum.
Looking out from the boat they showed what New York City looked like back then, around 1850 or so, I dunno, whenever they made that movie. That Empire State Building was pointy and tall all right, but the rest of the skyline wasn’t all that impressive. Our Old City was much more built up. More impressive. I’d seen New York City a lot in movies. Like the one with King Kong. Yeah, I remember that one. That big old monkey grabbed that hot girl and carried her to the top of that same building. Fingered her boobies too. That was a way cooler movie.
The guy and the woman in the movie smooched. It looked like a forbidden kiss, like they were afraid of getting caught. I can relate to that. Then the boat was docking and it was time for them to split up. Pace caught my eye and nodded to the door. He wanted us to split up with Becca too. I didn’t want to. Boze could have come over and shot me in the head right then and there and I woulda been okay with it.
“Meet us at Black Eagle Falls,” Pace muttered into Becca’s ear. She nodded, and then next thing I knew she released our hands. Damned shame. Pace and I quietly got up and exited through the back door.
We waited two hours for Becca at Black Eagle Falls. Seemed like the perfect spot. Isolated, far enough away from town, not one of the usual make out spots that people went to after the movies like the hill over by the blacksmith’s. We knew it was gonna take time for Becca to go home, probably being watched by the Nuggets, then go to bed, wait a while, then sneak out the window. Pace was pretty relaxed about the whole thing. I admit I was jittery. Wasn’t concerned about us getting caught so much. Was more concerned about anything happening to Becca. I kept my gun out most of the time, looking out through the tree branches to see if anyone was coming. Finally someone did. Lone footsteps, in a hurry. Kind of a light footing. I put my pistol away.
Becca embraced us both at once. It was a long hug and my shoulder got wet from her tears. Then she pulled back and looked at us both as best she could in the dim moonlight.
“You are both such fools,” she said finally through a smile. “I heard you’ve been busy.”
“You might say that,” Pace replied.
She shook her head disapprovingly. “There won’t be a safe place for you to hide pretty soon.”
“You’d be surprised,” I said.
Becca took a moment to take my face in her soft hands and looked at me soulfully. “My little bandit,” she laughed.
“Not so little anymore,” I felt compelled to say.
“Oh yeah,” Pace interrupted. “He’s big all over. He could hurt someone with that thing in his pants!”
Embarrassed, I shoved Pace pretty hard, but they were both laughing so I cooled down. It wasn’t like I’d been insulted or anything. And of course it was true. Anaconda and all. But I did take that opportunity to look away for a moment and scout out the path where Becca came from. Didn’t see anything.
“No one follow you?” I asked.
“I don’t think so,” she replied.
“How’ve you been, Rebecca?” Pace asked.
She kind of moaned. “I’ve been wo
rried.”
“Oh we’ve been just fine,” he said reassuringly. “And how’s everything been in the settlement? Everyone must be talking about those robots.”
“Oh yes, my little robot killers!” Becca beamed like she was almost proud of us.
“Nobody was hurt by ‘em, right?” I asked. “Except Frank?”
“That’s right. And Frank’s still got a little hobble but he’ll be all right.” I wasn’t surprised, but I was relieved. “Some of the townsfolk think you’re heroes for fighting off those robots.”
“Well let’s drink to that!” Pace said, beaming. He had brought a bottle of good whiskey, naturally, and he cracked it open for us to share. Pace just kinda wanted to loosen up the conversation before we talked about what we hadda talk about.
It was also a celebration of sorts. A reunion.
“Well I can say one thing for you boys,” Becca mused, “you sure are committed to this life of crime, aren’t you?”
“It suits us in a fashion,” Pace explained.
Becca shook her head. Judgmental, sure, but she was right. “It’s going to be the death of you both.”
Pace tried to get Becca to take another sip of whiskey – loosen up her mood. But she was too smart for us. Of course she was too smart for us. She knew when she was being liquored up for a reason.
“So why are you boys here?” she asked pointedly. “Here to sweep me off my feet?”
“Something like that,” Pace replied. And then he got to the point. “Seen Boze much? “He’s been keeping tabs on you?”
Becca rolled her eyes. “Won’t leave me alone. But he’s been respectful. I don’t want you going off shooting him or anything.”
Pace and I shot each other a look.
“Hopefully won’t come to that,” Pace said.
I decided to just say it. “Becca, we’re a might concerned about Boze and his Nuggets. We had a run-in up in Conrad. We suspect they’re gonna use you to get to us.”
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