He woke up after some time to find himself standing in the middle of the camp. Around him lay an assortment of bodies, all in some form of black western attire. Directly in front of him was the body of Bert, shot through the chest with a hole the size of a fist in his shirt, blood gushing through.

“Over here,” shouted Lewis.

The Writer turned to see Lewis standing next to a young woman dressed in a light blue western dress. Her hands had been tied, but now the ropes hung from her wrists where they had been cut. She looked longingly into Lewis’s eyes, but he didn’t seem to pay her much attention. Instead, he was waving at the Writer.

“Come on, let’s get her back. Then we can do your thing,” he said as he moved his fingers to his mouth and whistled.

Suddenly, both of their horses appeared standing next to them. Lewis jumped onto the back of his horse, and the woman quickly followed. The Writer, remembering the struggle he had mounting his horse the last time, grabbed firmly onto the back of the saddle, put his foot in the stirrup, and pulled himself up. His small brown horse fell in line, trailing behind Lewis on his black mare. The woman started to talk to Lewis.

“Thank you, minister. You are truly a hero,” she said.

But he didn’t answer. Instead, he urged his horse into a full gallop. They were heading out of the mountains, and the landscape quickly changed. The snow and pines gave way to the rolling plains of the grasslands.

After several more minutes of riding in silence, the woman spoke again, “I don’t know what would have happened without you.”

Lewis remained silent. This continued for the rest of their ride. The woman would speak to Lewis, seemingly unaware of his lack of responses, and time and time again, he acted as if she had said nothing.

The Writer felt relieved when they finally approached a small farmhouse situated on the rolling prairie. He did not like Lewis’s seeming indifference to the woman. Lewis rode his black mare through the gate around the house and right up to the front porch before dismounting. The woman quickly followed, dismounting with no trouble despite wearing a dress. The Writer chose to stay mounted to avoid the embarrassment of what he was sure would be an unsuccessful attempt to get off his horse.

The woman gave Lewis a small peck on the cheek before running up the porch, turning and waving, then walking off toward a butter churn. Without any apparent reason, she began to churn butter.

Lewis turned and looked at the Writer. “Okay. You want to find Emily?”

The Writer heard Lewis, and just a few moments ago, he would have enthusiastically embraced any opening for a question. But now, his mind was pulled to the woman. What was she churning? She hadn’t even checked to see if there was cream in the churn. How would she know if there was or wasn’t anything in there? He was puzzled.

“Isn’t she going to do something else?” the Writer asked, pointing toward the girl.

“Nope. She’s not real. Just some poor AI generation. You and I probably exist in some pirate world polishing a cannon or drinking rum,” Lewis answered, leaning on the railing of the porch.

The Writer looked at her intensely. She seemed real. Her curly hair hung off her face slightly to the side, and he could see some sweat beading on the side of her face. But then he thought of Bert. First, he had approached him in Creativion wearing a large suit of armor, and then he saw him there wearing a cowboy hat carrying a gun.

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“Look, everyone here except you and me is AI-generated. The whole world is. This house, the prairie, even that quest we went on. It’s just some cheap knockoff of things I wrote,” Lewis said, spitting out some chewing tobacco he had placed in his lip. “Now get down, and let’s talk.”

Remembering what he was there for, the Writer climbed down from his horse, carefully, only slipping a little. The woman was still churning on the porch, but now a dog had joined her, sleeping beside her as she worked. She stared off into the distance as if she didn’t care that they were still there.

The Writer looked at Lewis, took a deep breath, and said, “I need to find a woman called Miss Rapusha.”

Lewis smiled. “Call her Emily, not Miss Rapu…whatever. She signed up with Angel Inc. right before me. I’m sure she has her own world somewhere, though I doubt you want to go to it.”

By this time, Lewis had sat down on the first step of the porch, brought out a flask of whiskey, and began to drink. He gestured for the Writer to join him on the step. As the Writer walked toward him, he held out the flask, and the Writer grabbed it and took a drink. It burned as it went down his throat. Then Lewis held out a piece of jerky, and the Writer quickly ate it.

“I guess you can get to her world, but she’s a romance novelist. I’d imagine her world is probably not rated G, if you know what I mean. Why don’t you stay here with me? I could use the company. These NPCs can only say so much,” Lewis said.

The Writer rubbed the pearl grip on his pistol. This world did seem fairly fun. It was a lot better than Creativion, where he would have to go up against that stupid machine over and over again. Here he could shoot bad guys and be a cowboy. But he might get shot too, and what would happen since he only had one life left. He looked around, half expecting Bert the bandit to be hiding behind some bush or fence post.

“How do I get more lives?” he asked.

Lewis cracked a smile when he answered, “I have unlimited. I didn’t even know you could have a set number. How many do you have left?”

“One,” the Writer said.

“Well, that sucks. You only win coins from the missions not lives,” Lewis responded.

The Writer took a deep breath. He knew what he needed to do. He had to go back to the Challenge Room. If he could win with the tripled payout, maybe he could get some more lives or at least something useful.

“I have to go back to the Challenge Room. If I win some more lives, I can come back,” he said to Lewis.

“Sounds good,” Lewis said, mounting his horse.

Quickly, the Writer followed and mounted his horse with much more ease than before. The two of them galloped off toward the town. After some time, they rode their horses back into the same dirt street that the Writer had entered earlier that day. By now, the sun had set, and they were alone in the street, though there was a glow coming from the saloon. They hitched their horses to the post outside of the Challenge Room.

“If you lose in there, what will happen?” Lewis asked, pointing at the Challenge Room.

The Writer looked at Lewis and said, “I don’t know. I guess I die.”

With that, the Writer started toward the Challenge Room, taking the wooden steps up to the deck where the entrance was.

“Hey, stop for one second. This might be the last time I see a real person, and I need to get something off my chest,” Lewis said, sweat forming on his eyebrows.

The Writer stopped and looked at the man. He seemed different than before. His eyes were hollow and empty. He looked like the Sheriff when he saw him in his condo after the massacre. He looked as if something in his spirit was dead.

“The other me is probably a lot nicer. I know that. But watching some AI publish new works by me for three years killed me. It was as if something inside me was gone. But please don’t go in there then leave. I don’t know how it works if you get to choose where to go, but if you when choose to come back. Don’t go back to him, and please don’t go to Emily. The Sheriff may be nicer, but he isn’t me. Angel Inc. killed me, and I can’t handle that happening again,” Lewis said, wiping a tear from his eye.

The Writer did not expect Lewis to need him, but frankly, the Writer needed him too. Miss Rapusha might have helped him some, but Lewis had shown him more kindness than anyone else so far.

“I’ll come back,” the Writer said, stepping through the door to the Challenge Room.