John helped to remove the remaining corpses from the suits. He wasn’t a stranger to moving corpses around, unfortunately.

The bodies were all piled up near the first one that Travis had bisected in his rush. The smell had already attracted birds, which likely meant larger predators weren’t far behind.

When he turned back around, he found Travis eagerly inspecting one of the suits. John was forced to throw a small rock at him to get his attention.

The man jerked. “Huh?”

“Perhaps it would be best if you loaded them up and saved the ogling for when we’re safe back in Ember Creek?”

The man looked around, seeming to remember where they were. “Oh… Um, that sounds like a splendid idea!”

John watched the wiry old man for a moment as he clamored onto the walker platform and began moving the crane arm around to lift the heavy suits of metal.

A long lonely howl broke the quiet. John turned in the direction the sound had come from and grunted. Nothing was ever easy. He pulled out the rifle he brought with him and inspected the treeline in the distance.

After a minute of scanning the forest, he pulled the trigger and the rifle gave its distinctive soft hiss. A puff of dirt marked where the round struck. The close impact sent the coyote scrambling back into the woods. That round was meant to hit the animal. John cursed the weak weapon under his breath as he pulled the bolt back to load another round.

The animal would be back, or more like it would show up soon. He looked back over at the artificer to see if he could hurry him along, but the man looked like chaos in motion. It was probably best if he left him to it.

By the time the sun had crossed behind the mountains to the west, Travis had loaded two of the suits. But John had also been forced to scare away or kill five more predators that were drawn in by the scent of a free meal. He managed to hit three of them with the rifle, yet they were so far away that the shots probably didn’t even penetrate the animal’s skin. At least it scared them off. It was still better than letting them get any closer.

He wasn’t much worried about the coyotes, they were opportunistic predators. But the last creature he had shot at was a wolf. Another pack of wolves wouldn’t be good. He could probably kill them without getting too injured, even if it was a group as large as the last he tangled with. But he couldn’t guarantee the artificer’s safety if it came down to a fight. Wolves were only a minor concern for him right now.

It was what he hadn’t seen yet that worried him the most.

This area was known to have mountain lions. During the day, John could probably spot them before they got too close. But with the sun going down, even his vision wasn’t good enough to pick up the large cats. The damn things were more stealthy than anything their size rightfully should be. With that in mind, he made a decision.

“Time to go!” He took one last look around the clearing before hustling over and hopping onto the platform.

“What?” Travis asked in confusion. “We still have three more suits to grab. You can’t simply expect me to leave them behind.”

“Sure I can,” John stated as he walked over and gently pushed the man toward the walker’s controls.

Travis muttered a few choice curses under his breath. One of them called into question John’s heritage and compared him to the barbarian Harc’otti, but he started operating the walker. John ignored the artificer as he cranked the lift as fast as it would go before jerking it over the platform and dumping the final suit on top of the others.

Travis gave an indignant squawk at his rough handling of the suits, but John didn’t care. What he cared about was the fact the area had suddenly gone quiet and the birds had flown off. They wouldn’t leave a free meal behind unless there was a predator nearby.

“How long?” he asked, as he pulled out one of his pistols and scanned the bushy clearing.

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“A few minutes,” Travis responded in annoyance, fully invested in what he was doing. “It takes time to build steam.”

“Should have kept it running,” John stated offhandedly as he surveyed the darkening clearing. The predator was nearby, he could practically feel it in his bones. The question was, would it wait and go for the free meal, or was it here to hunt?

Travis scoffed, completely oblivious to the change in atmosphere. “We would have burned through our supply of coal if we did that.” Then the man paused and tapped his finger against his chin. “Although, I suppose we could have used wood. Or maybe whatever the suits run on.”

That statement caught John’s attention and he turned toward the man. Which turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Hunkered behind a bush less than a dozen feet from the front of the walker was a large tan-colored cat. It was already preparing to leap for the unsuspecting artificer.

John whipped his gun up.

If it wasn’t for his much quicker reaction speed, he doubted he would have even gotten a shot off before the animal pounced on Travis. As it was, he still only fired off two shots.

The sound made Travis drop to a crouch and cover his ears in surprise. That act likely saved him as the large feline passed through where he had been standing only a moment before.

The cat crashed to the ground on the opposite side of the platform, rocking it enough that John almost fell off. His back slamming into one of the posts along the edge was the only thing that kept him from tumbling over the side. The fall wouldn’t have hurt him, but it would have given the big cat time to recover. Before the wounded creature could rise back up, John emptied two more rounds into it. One to the heart and one to the head.

With the last shot, the feline dropped to the ground and finally stopped moving.

“Is- Is it dead?” Travis asked as he started to approach the cat.

The cat twitched, making Travis scream and leap back. John might have laughed in normal circumstances, but this certainly wasn’t normal.

“Never approach an animal unless you’re sure it's dead!”

The frizzy-haired man nodded at the rebuke before turning back toward the walker’s controls. He kept glancing over at the downed feline, probably expecting it to get up and attack him at any moment.

John kept his weapon trained on the cat, but it remained still as its blood leaked out over the boards. With its death, the sound of small animals, bugs, and birds soon returned to the area. With darkness approaching, the birds would not be back tonight. The scavengers would have one hell of a feast ahead of them.

Eventually, puffs of smoke started coming from the walker. Travis must have been getting antsy to get some distance from the ground because the man didn’t even wait to pull the lever to make the contraption rise.

It was slow and almost steady, but soon they were ten feet off the ground. After another minute or so, the thing finally reached its proper height. “I- I sort of used up what little pressure we built to do that, so we’re gonna be here for another half hour until it can build more steam.”

John nodded. “Prolly for the best.” Seeing that they were relatively safe, he popped open his revolver and reloaded it. The spent casings went into a pocket.

After reloading his gun, he went over and inspected the corpse of the mountain lion. There was no point letting the hide go to waste. He pulled out a knife and began skinning the creature. When he was done, he kicked the rest over the edge, making the platform sway slightly.

“You didn’t want the meat?” Travis asked in confusion.

“Have you ever eaten a large cat before?” The artificer shook his head.

“I don’t recommend it if you have any other alternative. It tastes like shit.” He wiped the bloody knife off on a spare cloth before shoving it back in its sheath.

Eventually, they left the valley, but the trip back was much slower. With only two lanterns, hanging off some hooks on the front of the walker, it didn’t provide much light to see. Despite that, it was still faster than traveling by horse at night.

A horse wouldn’t scare off a determined pack of wolves, the walker didn’t have that issue. It was loud, large, and moved quickly. Nothing dared get in its way once it was moving.

Now that John had a moment to relax, he asked the artificer something. “What did you mean earlier when you said what the suits run on?”

“Huh?” Travis responded nonchalantly. “Oh, yeah. They have no firebox.”

John blinked at the statement. He would be the first to tell you he barely understood all this artificer mumbo jumbo, but he was pretty sure they all used some form of firebox to produce steam. “How do they work then?”

The man shrugged, John barely spotted the motion in the growing darkness. “If you had given me time to study them, I could tell you.” A bit of annoyance slipped into the man’s tone.

“If I had let you ‘study’ them, you would be sitting inside that cat’s stomach right now,” John responded evenly.

“…There is that,” the man admitted.

The rest of the trip back was uneventful, and the pair arrived just as the sky began to lighten. It was still a good hour away from sunrise, but John was exhausted. “I’ll be back in a few days to find out what you’ve learned,” he stated as he hopped off the descending platform. The landing kicked up a bunch of dust, causing him to cough.

He stood and stretched his back before taking off his hat to brush off the dust. He turned to Travis. “I suggest you also get some sleep before mucking about with these suits.”

“What, are you my mother now?” Travis grumbled.

“No, but if you screw something up because you’re tired, that’s on you.” Travis started cussing up a storm when he realized John was right. John smiled. “I’ll see you in a few days.”

With that, he popped his hat back on and headed home.