Gunner kept his hand locked on the Marshal's arm, cutting his eyes at the men closing in with heavy scowls and gritted teeth, noting their weapons, the guarded way they approached. He glanced down at the Marshal's gun holstered at his side, then back up at the lawman.
"You ready to meet the Reaper, Marshal?"
The Marshal's lips peeled back in a snarl. "No. But it looks like you are."
Everyone moved at once, hands darting for weapons, but one and all they were frozen in place by the woman's commanding voice.
"Stop."
Gunner turned, releasing his grip on the Marshal's revolver. The woman hadn't moved other than to hook her thumbs in the wide belt around her waist. The toothpick in the corner of her mouth was the only thing that moved, working up and down as she chewed it. She jerked her head at the Marshal.
"Wiley, take the preacher to the cage and lock him up."
His face reddened. "Baron, we got men dead on account of that old coot. By all rights, I should put a slug in his brainpan right here and now."
Her eyes narrowed into slits. "The Judge has men dead. It's his problem. Now run along and do as you're told. Take the rest of the boys with you. Go on now."
Wiley gave Gunner a venomous glare before reaching down and jerking Pablo to his feet. Shoving him forward, he motioned to the other men. They followed him through the town gates, glaring at Gunner as they passed. After a few moments he was left alone with the Baron, who studied him with hooded eyes.
"You're either very stupid or very dangerous. You got a name, cowboy?"
"Gunner."
The toothpick stopped in midmotion. "The Gunner? As in the scourge of the Ferals in Texas? The same one that got into a shootout in El Paso that left thirty bodies eating dirt?"
Gunner shrugged. "Lots of stories. I don't bother sorting them out."
She peeled her glove back, tapping on the holoband around her wrist, casting a screen into the air that displayed a bounty sheet with Gunner's picture on it. "Pic's old. You didn't have those scars then. If you're the same man, that is. This says you're worth a mil in gold bulls from a bounty in Texas. Makes you a walking lottery ticket."
"Plan on cashing in?"
"No, but I'm pretty sure someone will. Then again, most everyone in Town has a bounty on their head. I won't tell if you don't." She shut the screen down and gestured. "Come on — let's take a walk. I think you might feel right at home here."
He followed her past the gates, matching her stride along the broad main street. The sounds of the Town were nearly overwhelming: shouting voices, rumbling vehicles, humming generators, whirring drones, barking dogs, all intermingled together. And over it all was a rumbling, clanking sound that came from the power station that towered over the rest of the buildings, rusty and ancient-looking. He noted the number of cameras on every corner and nook. Electric eyes were everywhere.
They stepped to the side as a giant motorized bipedal walker stomped by with a load of lumber, operated by a hefty man who looked more beard than anything else. A few riders trotted by on lizard horses. One of the genetic crossbreeds hissed at him, long black tongue flicking from its mouth. The rider jerked the reins, guiding the beast down the street.
Gunner kept pace as the Baron continued her swaggering walk. "What are you gonna do with the preacher?"
"Lock him up for now. The Judge will have the final word on that." The Baron gave Gunner a sidelong glance. "Lots of wild stories told about you. The wildest one I hear is you were a lawman once. How true is that?"
He grunted. "I was a lot of things once."
The townspeople were a varied assortment differentiated not by gender, social, or financial status, but by predatory nature. There was a visible pecking order seen in the dropped heads and wary steps of the oppressed versus the strutting, lounging manner of the killers that populated the Town as if homegrown there. Mercenaries, gunfighters, Nimrods, and desperados sat on balconies, leaned against buildings, or simply went about their business; Mexicans in big cowboy hats and sashes on their waists, Nubians with long dreadlocks, braids, and painted faces, Tribespeople wearing markings of their societies in wide and varied assortments of beaded and brocaded garments and jewelry. Nearly every face was unfriendly, almost every stare challenging, creating an undercurrent of barely restrained violence that could erupt at any given second.
"This place started as a trading town," the Baron said. "The mines birthed it. They found a lode of hectorite here a few decades ago that started the boom."
"Hectorite. They use it to harvest lithium for fusion, right?'
"Exactly. That was before crimsonium was discovered on Mars. Once blood shards were found to be a much richer yield for fusion, mining for hectorite and other minerals on earth went bust. This place nearly became a ghost town, but it was saved by being off the rails. Blood shards still have to be hauled, and the Town was able to survive as a layover for maintenance and trade since it's the only stop a hundred miles in any direction."
A man exploded out the doors of a nearby saloon, hitting the ground in a cloud of dust. A woman followed, long braided ponytail swinging as she stalked out with a murderous expression on her heavily scarred face. The man cursed, scrambling to his feet while reaching for his sidearm. The woman pulled her gun faster, firing two booming shots that put the man flat on his back, limp and lifeless.
She looked up at the Baron, who tipped her hat in response. "What's this all about, Janey?"
"Caught that cheating dog red-handed in a game of Jackpots. Weren't nothing else to do but teach him a lesson."
"Hard for him to learn when he's dead."
"Oh, the lesson weren't for him. It's for anyone else that might think of doing the same."
The Baron shook her head, trying to hide her amusement. "Better check in with Marshal Wiley, then. Might have to hang up your irons for a couple of days until this gets sorted out."
"C'mon, Baron. How am I supposed to defend myself with buck naked leather?"
"We both know you're capable, Jane."
Janey responded with a sinister grin. "We do at that, Baron. I'm off to see Wiley now." Pausing, she narrowed her eyes at Gunner. "Say, do I know you?"
"Don't think so," Gunner said.
"Huh." She hopped off the saloon deck and sauntered down the street, taking a last suspicious look at Gunner before getting lost in the crowd.
The Baron glanced at Gunner. "Things have changed since the Judge took over. This place has grown so lawless that the railing companies bypass it, taking the longer routes through the Badlands. Now, the main trade that keeps the place going is in hired guns."
"Hired guns, huh?"
"Yeah. No shortage of folks that hire Nimrods to track bounties, or need men to escort them across the territory. Plenty of gangs looking to stock up on gunmen too, I hate to admit."
"So bandits are allowed free rein around here. I'd never have guessed."
"It's not to my liking," the Baron said. "I'm more of a law and order type. And since the railroad stopped coming, it's been bad business for everyone. Not a day goes by without another body fertilizing the ground. So much blood spilled that the ground is saturated. They say that's why the sand is so red around here. I'd like for things to change. Become civilized. But it's not my call."
"The Judge makes that call, I guess."
"That's right."
"Don't sound like you're his greatest fan."
"I'm a practical person. Any fool can see that the way he runs things isn't good for commercial enterprise."
"So why doesn't anyone do anything about it?"
"If it were that easy, it would've been done by now." She jerked her thumb at a saloon across the street, one of the few buildings that had a coat of paint on it. A painting of a woman slashing a man's throat and catching the blood in a wine goblet was mounted above the entrance. "This is Bloody Mary. My joint. C'mon, I'll buy you a drink."