by Dick Wybrow
"Put it on the pretty lady's tab," she said.
The bartender looked over at Anza, slightly exasperated. She waved him off and nodded. "Is fine, Eduardo."
We waited for a moment as he slipped away to talk to a group of fat tourists dressed in pastels at the end of the bar.
There was something odd about the gunslinger's demeanor—and her face. It was a bit splotchy, red in the eyes, and if I'd thought she was anything but a cold-hearted killer, I would have said she'd been crying a few minutes earlier.
Anza's fists were in little balls. "You must be Sally." The last word came out like she'd cursed.
Sally nodded and tipped her hat. Her eyes never leaving us, she took a sip of her whiskey. "Just so you know, I was the fastest gunslinger alive. For a while."
"Thought that was, I dunno, Wild Bill Hickok or something," I said.
She laughed and spat. "What a pansy. Hair longer than any woman I knew," she said, taking another sip of her drink.
Strangely, I would have thought she would sling it back. In all the old movies, they just downed it in a gulp. She was a sipper. Hmm.
"Nah, none of us gals got the good press because all the papers were owned by men with small cocks."
Anza chuffed. "Typical."
I shot her a look.
Sally gave an appreciative nod to my friend. "I tell you that not in a braggadocio manner, but I mean to say that I am quick on the draw. So even if I drop my pistol back into its holster, I can have it out and put a slug in your skull before you can blink."
"Well," I said, crossing my arms, frowning, and putting on my tough-guy voice. "I am not much of a blinker."
Both Anza and Sally just sort of stared at me, and I felt my cheeks go a bit red.
The gunslinger did, in fact, holster her pistol, stood up slowly, and slid to our table in a surprisingly graceful move. As she sat between me and the Actor, my heart seized.
She caught my expression. "Ah, don't worry," she said, dipping a finger into her drink and licking it. "I don't shoot sleeping men." She smiled at me. "I prefer them to see it coming so they know who delivered their comeuppance unto them."
Anza leaned forward, her expression blank. "You say that the Devil's lair is in NoCal. Northern California? How do you know this?"
"Well, first of all, I certainly didn't say it was no lair."
"Fine, fine," Anza said, trying to steer the conversation. "You say this is where the Actor's hell contract is?"
Sally nodded. "Near San Jose. Got a ranch out that way myself. Won it in a poker game." She took a sip from her glass. "Long time ago now. Real long time ago."
Anza started to speak, but I held a hand up.
"Wait," I said. "Why would you even tell us that? Aren't you supposed to be killing him?"
The sleeping Actor snorted and shifted in his seat. Sally put her hand on the butt of her pistol. I eyeballed the beer bottles in front of us. I could get one in each hand, but as she said, she would be quicker on the draw than me.
"Yes, I will still be killing your friend here," Sally said as if she'd just told us it might be hot today and we should consider wearing something made of cotton. "But I can tell you where those” —she nodded to Anza—"hell contracts are kept. For a price."
Again, I eyeballed two of the bottles closest to me. "What… price?"
Sally was staring at the Actor, as if willing him to open one of his eyes. I looked sideways, catching my friend's attention, and nodded at the beer bottle in front of her.
Anza mouthed at me, What?
Then, more aggressively, I nodded toward the bottle in front of her.
She sighed and looked over at the bar. "Eduardo? Another beer, por favor."
I rolled my eyes.
The Actor shifted in his seat then resumed drooling on the table.
"Okay," I said, steeling myself. "What is it you want?"
"First," she said, slugging her drink—admittedly, that made me smile—"I'll let you buy me another round. Not the rotgut I was ordering. Something expensive."
I looked at her, not blinking. "The sign outside has a fucking frog with a top hat on it. I'm going to wager there ain't a lot of Glenlivet back there."
"Whatever they got," she said and nodded to Anza.
My friend took that as her cue, and she walked to the bar. Once she was out of earshot, the lines in Sally's face deepened. She leaned forward and looked as though she might sprout fangs and sink them into my neck. A tiny bit of pee dribbled out of me.
"W-what? What do you want with me?"
She inched toward me. "I want to know what you did to my bike!"
I pointed outside, my mouth dry. "It's outside! It's just outside."
Sally hit the table with a fist. The beer bottles bounced, and the Actor stirred. Again, Sally's fingers went to the handle of her gun. When he settled, she relaxed again.
"I saw it!" she said, her eyes watering. "I want to know what… you did to it!"
* * *
Outside the bar, Sally and I walked into the hot sun, sweat immediately popping from my skin. That was likely more about walking next to a hell-sent gunslinger assassin than it was about the heat.
In the distance, I heard the low rumble of several bikes, but Sally was only focused on one.
When we got to the space where it was parked, she reached out with a hand. In a surprisingly sweet gesture, she put her fingers on its tank, almost stroking it. When I'd done that earlier, it had nearly raised and met my hand. As she did it, it lay there, a cold chunk of metal.
Sally said, her teeth together, "What'd you do to my Horse?"
"What?" I asked. "It… I didn't do anything. She works perfectly fine. At least she did—"
"No!" Sally hauled back and slapped me across the face.
I fell to a knee.
"She don't respond to me now. What sort of bewitching did you perform to take her from me?"
I started to get up, but with Sally's expression, I decided it might be nice to stay near the ground for a moment. Cooler down there. Heat rising and all that stuff. "I don't know."
"What do you mean you 'don't know'? What kinda lame ass—"
"Listen to me!" I said then slowly did rise to my feet, one eye watching her hand. "I don't know what you're talking about. When we rode her over here, she worked perfectly fine."
Sally reached out to the bike again and let out a small sob.
Curious as to what she was feeling around for, I did the same, and the bike came to life beneath my fingertips.
With her other hand, Sally slapped me, and down I went. Both sides of my face now stung.
"Bedeviller! Spellbinder!"
She raised up for another slap, but that time the bike edged forward and sounded like it actually growled. The gunslinger put the hand to her mouth and looked as though she was going to weep.
I said, "I didn't do anything. I've been nothing but kind to Bucephalus, and if—"
"What did you call my Horse? Moose phallus?"
"No, no!" I said.
She wasn't pointing her pistol at me, but I raised both hands anyhow. Her scowl looked like it was loaded.
"Bucephalus. It was Alexander the Great's horse."
"It was my Horse!"
"Right, yes, what I meant—"
"But now," she said and reached for the motorcycle.
It rolled back out of her reach.
"What sort of man wiles have you performed upon my steed? Answer me!"
"I—I don't even know what those words mean!" I said and slowly, once again, got to my feet. "I just thought, you know, it needed a name. I didn't know it might already have one."
"It does!"
"I'm so sorry, seriously."
I put my hand on its handlebars. The bike rubbed lovingly against my fingertips. I snapped my hand back before Sally could smack me again.
"What do you call it?"
"Its name is Horse."
"Horse? You called your motorcycle… Horse?"
"No,
idiot," she said, sniffing. "My horse was called Horse. This here is that noble beast reincarnated into a twenty-first-century machine." She put a hand out then pulled it back. "But it's still my Horse."
"Whatever you want," I said. "I'll call Boo anything you want—"
"Boo? BOO?" Sally roared. "What sort of unnatural relationship do you have with my motorcycle?"
A group of three young women who'd been crossing the parking lot chattering away all turned toward us. They gave me a collection of identical frowns.
One of them said, "Eeew!"
I was getting angry. "Listen, I don't have any sort of… designs on your bike here," I said. "You take her."
The bike trilled, shuddered, then went dead again. I covered my head with both arms. Sally punched me in the stomach. That time, though, I didn't go down. But I really, really wanted to. It hurt like hell.
Sally looked toward the east and sighed. "I help you and your moronic friends find where you are looking to go, but I want my bike back in return." She wore a small, sad smile. "I want my Horse back."
"That… I mean, that would be incredible!" I said, feeling more hopeful than any time in the previous twenty-four hours. That was, two smacks and a punch notwithstanding. "Yes. Agreed."
"Okay, we gotta deal, then," she said and pulled out her two pistols. "First, I'm going to shoot the little guy."
"Wait! What?" I said. "No! No shooting. Shooting is not part of the deal."
She frowned. "You never made that stipulation."
"I—well—I'm making it now," I said. "An addendum to the deal. No shooting, um, the little guy."
"I have a job to do!"
"Well," I said and reached for the motorcycle.
It again came alive under my fingertips.
"I have a motorcycle called Bucephalus."
She pointed her pistols at me.
"And, and, if you want your old Horse back… there can be no shooting. Not me, not Anza, and not the Actor."
Sally growled, spun in a small circle, and growled again. She holstered her pistols. "Fine!" she said just before the shotgun blast hit her chest.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Sally, still smoking from the chest blast, hid behind a Toyota. Since she seemed to have more experience in such matters, I followed her lead. I crouched next to her. A funny thought hit me. The last time I was hiding from bullets behind something, she'd been the one shooting.
The vehicle's back window exploded, raining glass down on the two of us.
"Goddamnit!" Sally shouted and pulled both pistols from her hips.
I stared at the part of her vest that had been shredded by the first shotgun blast. "Are you hurt?"
Sally was scanning her surroundings, but then, as if she'd just heard the question coming to her on a six-second delay, cocked an eyebrow at me. "What did you say?"
Looking closer, I saw no blood. "I said, 'Are you hurt?' Are you okay?"
"What's it to you, bedeviller?"
"You took a blast to the, you know… you were hit!"
Sally looked down at the smoldering part of her shirt. She snuffed it out with her wrist and again looked at me. "Why do you care? We ain't kin, and we ain't friends."
"Yeah," I said. "But you know, I'm not into people around me dying so much. Except bad people, I suppose." I looked down at my hands. "But maybe not those people either. I don't know."
Sally sighed. "I don't have time for no suitors now. Hate to break ya heart."
"What? Gro—I mean… what?"
"Sure, I ain't as pretty as I useda be." Sally squinted at the reflection in the hubcap of a Subaru. She jumped up, fired four shots, two from each pistol, and crouched back down.
I heard a thud on the other side of the Toyota.
"But if you're suddenly taking a fancy—"
"What? No, no fancy!" I said, ducking lower. "There is no fancy taking! Just, you know, you got shot in the damn chest."
"Oh," she said, looking the other direction.
A short graying man in black leathers was reflected off the bumper of a Buick.
"It'll take more than a tickle like that to put me down."
"Good to hear."
"But if a blast hits you, you'll splatter like a rabbit on the railroad," Sally said. "Just so you know."
"Wait, but you'll protect me, right?"
Sally laughed and shook her head. "No." The gunslinger jumped up again, running to the next car, a Fiat, firing her pistols as she did.
I peeked up and saw another motorcycle gang member go down, but three others got shots off, one hitting Sally's shoulder. She ducked, spinning, her long duster coat fanning out like the leaves of a dying desert flower. Rolling once, she was back up with her shoulder to the Fiat.
I shot a fist in the air and smiled. "And the hat stayed on!"
Sally looked over at me and scowled.
Then I heard a groggy voice. "What's going on?"
I turned and saw the Actor, looking unsteady on his feet, standing at the door of the bar. He shifted his gaze toward Sally, who turned from the encroaching black-leather gang and leveled her pistols at the man at the door.
"No, no!" I shouted, hearing the strangest echo to my voice, and for the briefest moment, Sally hesitated and looked at me. Then she scowled and aimed again, but by then, the Actor had gotten a clue and was down on all fours, skittering out of range.
She shouted, "Goddammit!"
From inside the bar, Anza shouted, "I don' like that talk!"
I looked up and saw her carefully peeking around a cement pole.
Sally shouted back, "I don't give a fuck what you like!"
Two more motorcycle gang members were coming around the Fiat as Sally flattened her back against it.
"There's two guys coming around the car!" I shouted to her.
Sally grimaced, gritting her teeth.
"You've got a tall, gangly looking prick with a stupid goatee. Saw that guy before," I said, hiding behind the Toyota, ducking low and peering through the broken window. "And a fat dude with chicken wing stains on his shirt."
"Hey!" Chicken Wing said, turning his head toward me.
Sally popped up and put another stain on his shirt, and he went down.
I felt a small fist smack between my shoulder blades, and I spun around.
"What the fuck'd you hit me for?"
The Actor.
"Why are you helping her?" he asked, his face red and shaking.
"It… because—" I started to say, not entirely sure what the answer was. "I'm not helping her, per se."
"You are helping her." The Actor spoke quickly, little bits of spittle flying from his lower lip. "Helping very per se. Let them finish her!"
Again, I lifted myself and saw at least six of the bikers we'd run from back at the motel heading her way. Near the back, once again, there was the man dressed in black, the messed-up hat pushed up on one side. He was scanning the lot, looking for something, or someone.
"It—" I said, stammering. "It doesn't seem very fair! There's a bunch of them and one of her."
"She's trying to kill me!"
I looked over at Sally and shrugged. "Not at the moment."
Another blast took off a side mirror of a Ford minivan, and the Actor once again punched me in the middle of the back. I turned and saw him crawling toward the bar.
"Where are you going?" I asked.
"Let them all shoot each other," he said, looking at me over his shoulder. "Let's get out of here!"
I went back up on one knee and caught sight of three more bikers surrounding the car Sally was crouched behind. She came up for a moment and fired. The two closest to her dropped low but kept moving forward.
I grabbed the Actor's heel, and he spun around on me, scowling.
"If they put her down, we're next," I said. "They already tried to kill us!"
"All the more reason to get the hell out of here," the Actor said, but then a strange expression crossed his face. I looked over at Sally, and she, too, was s
uddenly looking around.
Then I heard it—strange, because it was so incongruous to the gunfight in the parking lot—but I listened closely, and sure enough, I was hearing it. Music.
The Actor stopped crawling and flattened against the Toyota again. "What… what is that?"
It sounded like… but no, that didn't make any sense. "It sounds like," I said, scanning the sky. "It sounds like… Wagner."
"What? What is Vagner?"
"Composer," I said, and we both listened to the strings and horns growing and growing in volume.
“Composer?” the Actor said. “Which century?”
“Don’t get started on that again.”
I looked up again, and squinting in the sun, I saw them. An unbelievable vision, but sure enough, there they were. “I believe that's… wait, I recognize that tune. What is that?"
Above us but closing in was something, well, not possible, but there it was.
Someone shouted, "Back off, you bastards!"
The Actor cocked his head up. A strange expression crossed his face.
He muttered, "Uncle Jerry?"
Our old pilot friend was hanging in the air, flying, holding onto what looked like the phone that had been on the bike. Sure enough, it was blasting the charging anthem "Ride of the Valkyries."
"Behold!" he shouted, one fist in the air. "And feel the wrath of light!"
Then I saw how he was "flying." Uncle Jerry was being held by two legs wrapped around his chest. Behind him was, of all things, a collage of black, tiny metal spikes that twinkled in the sun, and electric blue and purple.
Our friend was being carried by, of course, a flying drag queen.
"Who is that?" the Actor asked.
I laughed. "It's Angel. He's being carried by Angel."
"But wait," the Actor said then slid back down the car, staring off. "Angel is… an angel?"
I shrugged and said, "It would account for the wings."
Uncle Jerry and Angel swooped passed us, their shadows passing over our heads.
I heard Uncle Jerry shout, "Hi, guys!"
We both waved.
They banked and arched back toward us, purple strands flowing behind them, and of course, keeping them aloft were the beautiful, flowing wings of an angel.
I glanced over at Sally, who was staring up at the sky, her mouth hanging open. Slowly she raised a pistol toward them, so I grabbed a rock from the parking lot and hurled it at her.