Hero
I sat and pondered my sorry situation as the bumps caused by the carriage shot up my seat and seared straight into my spine. It had finally happened: the law had caught up to me. I guess it was inevitable; a man can only luck out in this business so many times before a bullet or the noose caught up with him.
Didn’t mean I had to like it.
“Hero,” said the thin, mangey scum sack seated next to me. He was an ugly man, his mutt-like features more than telling that his parents most likely had the same parents. Seated lazily against the cushioned seat of the coach, rifle loosely held in his right hand with the stock resting on top of one knee, he did not look like your typical county deputy. But, regardless of his qualifications, the tin star on his chest testified to his official position. Maricopa county must be desperate for deputies if they had to hire this nitwit.
“Hero. Hero. Hero?” Deputy Bumblefuck continued to say. “Hero. Now, what kind of notorious bank-robbin’, murderin’, bushwackin’, horse-nappin’ son of a gun would have the balls to go around with the name Hero?”
The other deputy, seated to my left, let out an annoying chuckle. Unlike his scarecrow of a friend, this one at least had some meat on him. Sadly most of that meat was fat from his belly, though most the rest of him were normal sized. His rifle was resting with its butt on the carriage floor, his left hand holding the barrel upwards. I eyed his sidearm, a Remington holstered on his right hip, for just a moment, hopefully not long enough for the man seated across from me to notice.
Unlike the two surrounding me, the man on the other side of the compartment looked the part of a lawman. Neatly trimmed beard, powerful build, and a nicely pressed suit that was now all but covered in dust from the road. He, too, had a tin star on his lapel, though this one had a circle of metal around the star, along with the words “UNITED STATES MARSHAL” etched onto it.
“You ain’t no hero,” the first deputy said, his mongoloid face twisted in a sneer directed at me. “Men like the Marshal,” he nodded to the man, who looked like he was doing his best to ignore the conversation, “and Ben and me! We’re the real heroes. Not scoundrels like you!”
I sighed in annoyance. I got asked this question a lot, and usually I would ignore it. But at the moment I was a bit of a captive audience to this knuckle-headed oaf so I might as well indulge myself.
“I wasn’t named Hero after your dime novel protagonists, you dimwit. I was named after Hero of Alexandria.”
What I said didn’t seem to impress him much, as he had a confounded look upon his face. “And who the fuck is Hero of Alexandria?”
I indulged myself further and rolled my eyes at him. “Hero of Alexandria was one of the greatest inventors of antiquity. He made steam engines and talking automatons. My father had an unhealthy interest in ancient history.” The deputy just seemed even more confused. “Don’t think too hard, you illiterate ape. You might hurt yourself.”
“Oh, fuck you!” the deputy snarled, moving as if to pounce on me. The marshal’s loud shout stopped him in his tracks.
“Chuck, that’s enough!”
The product of incest, whose name was apparently Chuck, sat back down and resumed his lazy recline on the seat, mumbling epithets under his breath the whole time.
“And you,” the marshal turned his hawkish gaze to me, his steel gray eyes pinning me to the seat. “Sit back and shut up. As soon as we get to town, you’ll have a date with the gallows.”
I hid my sneer, maintaining a neutral expression. The marshal seemed disappointed that I wasn’t going to take the bait and sat back, turning his attention out the window.
And so, I sat and waited. Despite the marshal seemingly capable of doing his job, it was more than obvious that he had no idea who he was dealing with. If he did, he would have brought more men.
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Many folk often told me that I had a sixth sense. They said that I always knew the right moment to act on something, whether it be a robbery, cards, or just plain old shooting down a man in the street. I don’t believe in such hocus pocus though; I was raised by a rational man and he taught me how to see the world as it was. Instead of falling on superstition or faith, I relied on my brain to get me out of rough situations, situations which would often lead men of lesser stock plain dead. I just knew when to take advantage of the right moment to strike. Of when to charge into a bank, guns steady, when there were the least amount of people in it. Or when to light the fuse on a few sticks of dynamite to cause a rockslide that buries only the engine of a steam locomotive instead of crushing all of the train cars and along with the cache of gold being transported within it. Or even when to go all in on a hand of cards because I noticed a small tick in the other fellow’s face, telling me that he was bluffing.
So no, I don’t have no psychic powers. All I had was the distinct and rare ability to know when to act. So when the carriage hit a rock or some sort of dip in the trail, causing me, the Marshal, and the two idiots to rock violently to and forth, I knew that the time to act was now.
The shake-up caused Chuck to lose hold of his rifle for a moment and the stock slipped off his thigh. He was quicker than I gave him credit for, as he managed to catch the gun in both hands by the barrel before it could topple to the floor. Unfortunately for him, that left the muzzle pointed directly in his face.
Chuck the Fuck may have been fast, but I was faster. As soon as he caught the gun, I lunged for the trigger as fast as my manacled hands allowed. Thankfully it was enough, and I managed to get my pinky inside the bronze trigger guard. I pushed forwards with all my might, and pressed down on the trigger. A simultaneous explosion of the rifle going off, blowing apart the deputy’s head, as well as the loud snap of my pinkie finger breaking that was more felt than heard, occurred.
The event happened so fast that the Marshal and the other goon didn’t react as fast as they should have. It might have been that the carriage was still jostling, or maybe they were shocked at seeing their friend’s ugly face blown apart by his own gun. Hell, it was probably both. I didn’t give them another second to react as, like always, I seized the situation.
Ignoring my injured finger, I lunged to the other side of my seat, intent on grabbing deputy pudgy’s gun. He noticed my movements and tried to draw his pistol, but I managed to grab it as well and the two of us began struggling for the weapon.
The Marshal was not idle during this, as he too began to act. He drew his pistol from his belt (it was one of those new semi-automatic contraptions that used a magazine system instead of a cylinder) and was in the process of pointing it at me. Seeing my imminent demise, as well as noting that I had a perfectly working gun in my hands at that moment, I acted, too.
Pudgy had his finger inside the trigger guard, the large digit resting tightly on the trigger and ready to blow a hole in me as soon as he got the chance. I didn’t give it to him, and instead pushed hard on his hand, causing the finger to jerk. The Remington fired, shooting a .45 caliber round right into the Marshal’s shoulder as he was lunging forwards. The man let out a pained grunt, his right hand going numb causing his gun to drop to the floor as the force of the shot slammed him back against his seat. Undeterred, the lawman snarled and launched himself at me me again.
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I stomped my right boot’s back heel against the floor, causing a hidden knife to flick out of a secret slit under the sole. Like my namesake, I liked to tinker with a few gadgets, too. Nothing fancy, but they sure as hell came in handy. Like now. These morons may have taken my pistol and rifle away when they caught me, but they sure as hell didn’t take all my weapons.
I quickly lashed up with my foot, catching the Marshal directly between his legs. As I felt the knife easily pierce into the soft flesh, the lawman let out a loud, unholy shriek. He fell to the floor of the carriage, hands clutching his profusely bleeding groin, and just continued to scream out in agony.
Meanwhile, me and Pudgy were still wrestling for that gun. The deputy had a tight grip around it with both hands while I was trying to pry those said hands open all the while struggling to keep the pistol’s muzzle pointed away from me. He wasn’t budging, so I lashed my head forwards and smashed my skull into his face. He grunted in pain but did not relent his grip. I continued head bashing him over and over, but even after getting a swollen eye and busted nose, he would not let go.
So instead of prying, I pushed. I used all my strength to push forwards, putting my right foot on the opposite bench to leverage my body against his. Slowly, oh so slowly, I was pushing the gun upwards towards his head. Sweat was pouring from both me and the deputy as we struggled, but I was winning. As the gunbarrel drew closer, Pudgy began talking.
“No… no… no no… no no no no!” He continued barking like a seal all the way til the muzzle was pressed against his chin. I did my part in shuffling him off this mortal coil, and pushed down on his finger that held the trigger. There was a loud POP! And soon Deputy Pudgy’s head was decorating the carriage walls as well as most of my face.
“Shit,” I let out a relieved breath. I sat back on the bench and began wiping the blood and gore off my heavily panting face. I saw that the Marshal was still on the floor of the carriage, no longer screaming, but his face was red and sweaty, and his body was trembling. “Deputy Lardboy over there was stronger than he looked,” I told him.
“Gotohell!” The Marshal hissed out between tightly clenched teeth, veins sticking out of his forehead.
I chuckled darkly and picked up Pudgy’s Remington. It took a few moments as I had to pry apart fingers that still gripped the gun tightly. I smiled when I aimed the gun towards the fallen U.S. Marshal. “You first.”
Then I pulled the trigger, and put him out of his misery.
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It took me a while to notice that the carriage had stopped. Looking out the window, I saw that we weren’t anywhere near our final destination. Nothing but dirt and the occasional sprout of brown vegetation for miles. I quickly spotted a figure running in the distance, towards the direction of a set of nearby hills.
The coach driver. I guess he heard the commotion inside and decided to hightail it out of there. Though I admired the man’s will to survive, I couldn’t have anybody reporting about my successful break-out too early. I needed miles between me and this coach, and for that to happen I needed all the hours of blissful lawman ignorance I could get. It would probably be until after dark when the Marshal and his goons would be missed, and a few more hours after that before a posse was rounded up to ride out and look for them. And that wouldn’t happen if Mr. Driver made it out of here alive to warn folk.
Taking my time, I searched the Marshal’s pockets and found the key to my shackles. After getting rid of those iron sons of bitches, I took his gunbelt as well as the shiny new semi-auto the lawman was carrying. Frankly, I had no idea how it worked, but I figured I could either learn to or sell it for a nice sum. I was grabbing for his hat when I noticed the shiny tin badge on his lapel.
UNITED STATES MARSHAL.
“Might come in handy,” I said with a smirk. Like a rose from a rosebush I unplucked that tin star from the Marshal’s cooling corpse and pinned it on my own lapel. It might not fool everybody, but it’d fool enough. Out here in the dust and the bullets, a man needed all the help he could get.
I opened the door and stepped out of the carriage, scanning the landscape in the direction of the fleeing driver. I spotted him easily, as he was only about half a mile away and was now limping. Probably tripped over a rock, which slowed his progress some.
Reaching into the carriage, I pulled out Chuck’s rifle. Like everything in there, the weapon was covered in blood. I cringed as I held the filthy thing to my cheek and aimed down the sights.
“Sorry,” I said to the man just before I pulled the trigger. I always apologized whenever I was forced to kill an innocent. Sure, it didn’t amount to much in the end, but it had to account for something. I started doing it when I killed a native boy by accident, some twenty years back. I must have said the same word forty or fifty times since then. I’ve said it so many times that the word itself lost all meaning to me. I don’t think I even feel sorry anymore; I don’t feel anything anything at all. I probably just do it mostly out of habit now more than anything else. Whatever, it was time to go.
Seeing as I had no idea how to drive a coach, (Shit. Maybe I should’ve kept that driver alive until he drove me to my safehouse. Whoops.) I unhitched one of the horses. Riding bareback was a pain, but I could do it. I exchanged Chuck’s rifle for Pudgy’s since it was less messy, then hopped on that horse and rode for the sunset. I saw no one for miles around.
Life was good to you sometimes.
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And a bitch most of the time.
The posse found me about four hours after leaving the bloody coach. I had settled down for a rest by a creek I knew of nearby. The horse went over to have a drink while I used the time to stretch my legs and plan out in my head what my next move would be. My safehouse was ten miles’ ride northeast, and from there I can get some ammunition and provisions. Then I could either ride south to the border or hide out with some friends in the canyon. I decided to wait until I got to the safehouse to plan things out further. I had half a day’s head start on the law after all.
I was getting the horse ready to head out when I heard the familiar crack of a rifle being discharged. I had no time to react when I felt a sledgehammer blow to my back. Things got fuzzy for a moment, and when my mind cleared I realized that I was sprawled out face-down upon the ground. I knew for sure that I had just been shot.
Shit. How did Johnny Law find me so fast? Nobody could have spotted the mess inside the coach, then headed to town to alert the authorities in such a short amount of time. It made no sense. And now I had a hole the size of a half dollar in the middle of my back.
Strangely, frighteningly, I felt no pain. Only numbness in my arms and legs. My back felt horribly sore, the type of sore you’d get if you’ve been working out in the fields for hours on end. I tried to stand, to move any of my limbs, but they refused to budge. Thankfully my neck still worked, and I turned my head upon hearing approaching footsteps.
“He’s still alive.”
Four people emerged from the sparse shrubbery around the creek. Three men, one woman. The woman was holding a long barreled sharpshooting rifle, one with an attached brass Malcolm Scope running atop the barrel. From the smug look on her face I could tell that this was the bitch who shot me.
“That him?” asked one of the men, who was dressed in leather and furs and had a long, bushy beard that made him look like a trapper or mountainman.
“Yup,” said another man, this one dressed like a banker.
“Excellent,” said the bitch. She was wearing a long tan duster and looked like a dime-store cowboy. “The Law owes us for this.”
The last member of the group, a Chinaman in black, squatted next to me. “Are you sure? This was way too easy. Hero Beaumont took out a U.S. Marshal and two strong deputies. I thought he’d put up more of a fight.”
“Lean a bit closer and I’ll show you a fight, you stinkin’ Celestial!” I snarled in fury. This was so stupid. I survived gunfights and shootouts that left better men than me dead. I’ve pulled off fantastical robberies and survived suicidal runs into injun territory. Now I’m gonna be killed by these bunch of bushwackin’ bastards?
The banker turned his head, regarding something to his left. “Yup. This is the guy. The newspaper photos corroborates it.”
“Man alive,” the Chinaman said, his shoulders slumping a little. “How disappointing. I wanted a good fight. Whatever,” he pulled out his six-shooter and aimed at my head. “Let’s get this stupid contract over with.”
And with that, he pulled the trigger. And just like that, I was dead.
Too bad I didn’t stay that way.