FSE

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formerly SoFurry search engine

I didn't get all that much feedback on the teaser I posted for this, but I don't care. I like where this story is going.

Enjoy!

The gunslinger walked placidly along his way, head down, deep in some form of thought. His boots crunched the gavel with each step, creating a sound that beat softly against the ear with each step, pumping slowly into the mind like a pulsing rhythm, heard form far away. The gunslinger had been taking in this sound for the majority of his walk, not taking much time to think. At times like this, he never dared think. This particular drifter has found over the years that if you plan to do something in any way unkind, then you shouldn't think on it too long, lest you goad yourself into turning around.

He walked with a slow authority. His hands thrust deep into the pockets of his buckskin duster, hat pulled down tight over his brow, and back hunched. Slung low on his hip you could see the gleam of polished steel on either side, and an observer would have caught the occasional glimpse of a sandalwood revolver grip when the wind caught his duster. His tail, which was a mess of matted orange fur and dirt, drifted lazily from left to right behind his boots, switching the direction of its unchecked swing every two or three steps. From the side of his hat poked a black and orange ear, protruding from a hole he had cut into the flimsy wide-brim gallon hat for comfort.

Not many of the muties came out looking as close to human as he did these days. After the war, and the bombs fell, mutations among children spread like wild fire, and now (after about 100 years or breeding.) these birth defects had become commonplace. Humans would simply come out looking like animals sometimes, and that was that. Unfortunately, this is not always a "giggles and rainbows" ordeal. This drifter was, in fact, one of the lucky ones. He would never forget the sight of his mother, or his sister, who had been born with patches of rough fur and her guts on the outside of her body. Most muties were none too fine to look at. However, this particular individual came right from the womb clean as a whistle and fit as a fiddle, with nary a defect to be found (Obviously disregarding the fur, tail, ears, snout, and other vulpine characteristics.). He was just swell and normal, as far as muties went.

Now, after 30 years of trudging the New Mexico wasteland, this wanderer was looking a little less fine. At first glance, you wouldn't really noticed how the years had treated him, save for the usual dirt and dust, but one dead giveaway was his ear. Only one poked from the left side of his wide-brim hat. The other was long gone and forgotten. Oh sure, the actual HOLE was still there, but the "dish" part had been blown away long ago, and now it's only trace is the empty rip on its side of the gunslinger's hat.

He continued his march, and tilted his head up to sample the air with his keenly tuned nose. He could smell them better now. Two men, and some form of pack mule, probably mutated. He quickened his pace and then he saw them as he crested a hill. Far down on the cracked and battered remains of I-25 were two men and an animal that looked as if it was distantly related to a dog, but had now grown bulbous and grotesque from its irradiated mutations. On the animals back were several large saddle bags and a blanket. These were the men the gunslinger was after.

He stuffed his hands even deeper into his pockets and continued along the old highway toward the wasteland merchants. He didn't want to have to do this, but times were hard, and as the litany goes: Desperate times call for desperate measures. When he reached the merchant and his bodyguard, he mumbled a gruff salutation as he passed. When he was parallel to the bodyguard himself, he drew back his duster slowly and revealed the large steel revolver hidden beneath. The bodyguard noted this action (Correctly) as a threat, and began to unsling an old pre-war machine gun from his back. Unfortunately, the gunslinger was faster by far. His hands were a blur as he drew the revolver from his left hip and fired three times, fanning his hand against the hammer of the gun for quicker shots. The bodyguard uttered a short cry of shock, and feel back off of the road, coaxing up a large cloud of dust and sand around him. Then, he lay still.

The gunslinger turned and pointed the long barrel of the six-shooter at the merchant before he could have a chance to draw his own weapon and swapped the revolver over to his right hand.

"Not a twitch from you." said the gunslinger in a low, coarse voice. The merchant made only enough movement to unbuckle his gun belt and the 9mm pistol that was slung in it fall to the ground. The gunslinger then proceeded to sort through the contents of the dog-thing's saddle bags for anything he could make use of. In the bags were several types of narcotics (A real rage now that law couldn't protect them.), medicines, some scraps of wrapped deer meat and other mutant flesh, and four boxes of .357 magnum ammunition. The drifter took the ammo, meat, and all but a few of the drugs, and stuffed it all into the courier bag that he kept strapped below his duster. He then turned to the merchant again and spoke:

"What ye got on yer person, son? Any money? If so, then hand it on here." To this the merchant hastily pulled the contents of his pockets out, spilling about 240 dollars worth of Old Coins and Old Bills. The gunslinger was shocked to see such antique currency around such a dried out place as this, but took it all the same.

That much done, the drifter then drew out a morphine hypo needle and a chemical powder that had become known around the wastes as "Fix-up", which promoted very fast wound knitting and healing, from his courier bag. He tossed both the hypo needle and the bag of powder to the merchant.

The merchant, surprised at this "charity", said "What's this for, then?"

"For your foot." Replied the gunslinger, still pointing his weapon in the merchant's general direction.

"But my foot's fi-" The merchant began, but his comment was cut short when the drifter's six-shooter roared a shot and a neat hole was blown into the merchant's left shoe. The merchant fell to the ground, clutching his injured limb and howling in pain. The gunslinger then continued his slow walk along the remains of I-25, confident that the merchant wouldn't be following.

By the time the Fix-Up had fully restored his foot, the gunslinger was long gone.

Chapter 1: To the victor...

The gunslinger trudged his way along the interstate until sundown. He stopped in the beat-out remains of a town, and a sign informed him, through layers of rust and neglect, that he had arrived in "Wagon Mound". After rooting through the abandoned houses for anything useful, he followed a once-paved road into the town (Park Avenue, the street sign proudly proclaimed.), and stopped outside the charred-out remains of a large old building. At first glance, the drifter assumed it was an office building, but after turning up a fallen aluminum sign with the toe of his boot, he discovered that he was in the presence of what was once the town school. He traveled around the entire building's perimeter, checking for anything hazardous or otherwise (30 years in the Wastes makes you into one paranoid sunovabitch.). Chills skipped along his spine at the sight of a rusted-out jungle gym to the east of the school. Bodies that were all but dust and bones hid beneath the sun bleached play tubes, probably still wearing the grimaces of their final moments. Around the back of the school were rusted remains of cars, buses, and the usual skeletal frames that were scattered across the Wastes. Looters wasted no time salvaging scraps of iron or plastic from the cars that had once stood here.

Once sure nobody was nearby, the gunslinger walked back up to the double doors leading into the school, and settled himself down into a dust-encased classroom with all the chairs and desks hastily shoved this way and that. The obvious path through the desks made sense of the mess: People had scrambled out of this room when the news spread that all clocks would soon hit zero. The drifter hunkered down on his haunches and unslung his courier bag from his shoulder, setting it on the floor beside him. He then removed the heavy revolver from his left hip and hefted it into his right hand, springing the cylinder open with a flick of his thumb. These guns were his pride and joy. Almost 7 years ago, when this man had dubbed himself "The Last Real Gunslinger", he hadn't the luxury of such fine firearms. He spent hours in the Deadfield behind his home practicing whipping an old 9mm handgun in and out of a homemade sling that hung at his hip. His decisions then were fueled only by anger, and not the driving determination he now relied on.

This pattern of hopping from town to city to wastes to town had been all there was for him for the last few years. The gunslinger was on the hunt for a settlement he had heard of only in whispers and rumors, and the man who is said to now live there. From all that he knew, which wasn't much, he knew that he was going south, toward Mexico. From there, he would find his own way. What seemed like ages ago, he had leapt upon the knowledge of the man he hunted like a hungry wolf, setting out from Bighorn in Wyoming along I-25 without hesitation. He had been waiting all his life for the knowledge he now had, and he wasn't about to let it pass him up.

No more than 5 miles into his journey, he had been mugged. He was left beaten, broke, and penniless on the side of the interstate with the cruel voice of reality laughing in his ears. From then on he had grown harder, and the world had grown with him. Now the search for bandits, traps, food, rest, and all in between, had become commonplace for him. The anger and greed for the man who he sought was replaced over time with the steady driving will to go on that held him now.

The gunslinger tilted the six-shooter up and let the four spent shells from the body guard's death and the merchant's foot spill from the cylinder, holding the other three in place with his thumb. He had two of the beautiful polished steel revolvers. Each he had built from scraps he collected from old guns along the way. Both were large .357 caliber weapons that packed a heavy punch and weighed almost as much. The barrel was longer than usual and the grip was set in with sandalwood. He had build and polished them up to resemble the trademark of his fictitious role model: Roland of Gilead.

After settling into Bighorn when he was about 22 years old, he was introduced by the villagers there to the electronic library that had been implemented into the town after the fragile Declaration of Peace and the generous "Freedom Bills" had been minted and distributed to all towns and cities in America. Bighorn had spent its new wealth on the school systems, and that meant a new Net-Library. Unfortunately, the bombs fell before the purchase could have lived up to its full potential. The computers and electronic books sat dormant for possibly 50 years before the first survivors moved in and re-discovered this bank of knowledge. The drifter was amazed by this device, and spent many of his days living in Bighorn engrossed in the library, reading book after book, collecting all the knowledge he could, and would still be hungry for more. One of his favorite stories had been written by some man named "King" (Names meant little to survivors of the bombs, so it made little difference to the drifter if the book claimed that Gandhi himself had come from the dead to write it.), and told the story of a weathered peacekeeper from a desolate dimension, separate from the one we live in. The peacekeeper was the Last Gunslinger of a forgotten time, and was wise and deadly with his twin revolvers. This man traveled across the destroyed lands of his dimension in search of some tower that controlled the fate of existence as we know it, and his name was Roland.

The drifter looked up to this Gunslinger, and loved every moment of the stories that he read about him. When the knowledge that the man from his nightmares was about and alive, the drifter had decided once and for all that it was time for the Gunslingers to live again. Now, 7 years after the fact, this drifter was sure that Roland of Gilead would be proud. He had become formidable with his wit, as well as his guns. He thought always of what Roland had called "the face of his father", which he assumed was his inner conscious, helping him along the way.

The gunslinger pulled three fresh rounds from the courier bag beside him and slipped them into the empty slots of the revolver cylinder. He then flipped the cylinder closed again with a casual flick of the wrist that can only be developed through constant repetition. He placed the six-shooter back into its holster on his hip and unbuckled the entire gun belt, laying it carefully next to his bag. He unstrapped a small bundle from his back and unrolled it, revealing a medium-sized pouch stuffed with supplies and rations, a deerskin sack full of water, and a thick bar of flint. The gunslinger shook out the mutie leather that all this was wrapped in and laid it across the floor below him. Then after a final look around to ensure he was well and truly alone, save for the present company of bodies, he sat on the skin, leaned against the wall, tipped his hat forward over his eyes, and drifted into what promised to be a deep sleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The drifter awoke suddenly and experienced a slight moment of panic as he tried to recall where he was. Then the sound that had roused him came again, banging along the hallways outside the classroom like a bowling ball sent to bounce. He leapt to his feet and yanked one of the revolvers from the belt beside him as he stumbled toward the door, still shaking off the last clutches of sleep. He gripped the handle of the solid wood door and hesitated for a moment to gather his wits. The gunslinger threw open the door, and took one wide step out into the middle of the hallway, thumbing the hammer of his revolver back as he did. He made to raise the weapon to eye level but quickly realized that would be futile. Whatever was in here has kicked up mounds of the long-neglected dust and dirt that had settled -undisturbed until now- onto the hallway's floor. The drifter coughed on the grime and squinted in a desperate attempt to see through the cloud. The sound raucous started again, and the staccato thumps and bangs seemed to be getting louder. At the last moment, the gunslinger realized that the owner of this racket was moving down the hall in his direction VERY quickly and leapt to the side just as some animal -large as a rhino and mean as a bear- went roaring past him.

The beast slammed against walls and stomped holes in the floor as it went stumbling and skipping with all the grace of a dead rabbit down the hall. The behemoth was all bulging muscle and iron strength, with large round feet as wide as a frying pan. Its skin was covered in patches of mangy fur and bristle, and the skin that could be seen was red and welted. The gunslinger pressed his back as hard against the wall as he could while the beast went stampeding past him, knocking up dust and plaster and any other sort of debris it could toss. Splinters and shrapnel were spewed at him as the animal barreled head-first into a wall and let out an agonized and terrified bellow. It pulled its head free and tripped clumsily left, ramming its side into yet another wall and slumping to the ground with a thud. For the few moments it was down, the gunslinger was able to see that both of the animal's eyes were not where they should be, and it's face was scarred with two black and bloody sockets where they once were. Something had gouged out the cursed creature's eyes.

The beast regained its feet and charged in blind terror down a bend in the hall, and the gunslinger trotted along to the turn to watch its next move. The mutant crashed its way through the front door and out into the open, screaming it's frightened fury at the sky, and anybody within at least a mile or two. Following this, the drifter heard a sudden chorus of braying laughter from outside the school, and high-tailed it through the hole that the blinded beast had made. What he saw outside the school made his stomach clench in sickened anger.

Three young men were outside the school, chocking out bursts of laughter at the sight of the wounded animal stumbling its way down the road and out of sight. One of these three was holding a rusty screwdriver coated in blood and a viscous white fluid, and the gunslinger easily put two and two together: These three "pranksters" had come across the poor mutant in its sleep, and got it into their heads that it would be worth a few yucks to pop it's eyes and watch it squirm.

"You there!" The gunslinger called. The three hooligans glanced in his direction and straightened up, trying hard to suppress their raucous laughter.

"Aye?" Asked on of the three, waving a vague sort of salute to the drifter with two fingers extended. "What got you on us, sir...?", he began, but this his eyes widened as he glanced toward the ragged hole in the front of the school building."You wasn't in there when the pig found in, was ya?" Looking down at the ground, the gunslinger shook his head in disbelief, and lowered the hammer of his pistol back down with his thumb. At this, all the laughter suddenly hushed. None of the three jokers wanted to annoy a man with a gun who's nerves were probably already frayed from the brute's rampage.

"Aye, ye foolish shit!", the gunslinger roared at the three pranksters. "What on this tarnished earth lead ya to think that would be a good idea?!" The three retreated a step at this, not expecting such a loud response. The drifter tore his hat from his head and slapped it on his thigh to beat the dust from it, grumbling under his breath. One of the jokers who felt that the joke wasn't over yet, called out:

"What done happened to yer ear, mate? That old brute snag it off?" This comment drew forth another wild string of chuckles from the boys, who seemed to have lost the feel of the moment. The drifter felt the hair along his back and scruffy tail begin to stand up on end, and he pulled back the hammer of his pistol once more, taking two great strides toward the hooligans. He placed the barrel of the revolver over the top of one of the laughing prankster's heads, and before the boy could react, he squeezed of a shot into the air, jarring the youngster out of his wits. The prankster screamed in surprise, clapping his hands over his ears and falling to his knees. The gunslinger looked at the other two and they immediately fell silent. One was holding up the bloodied screwdriver as if to use it as a weapon. The drifter pointed his pistol back and forth between the two, but left the hammer down.

"I aint afraid to kill some gutsy mutie." The tool-wielding joker said, but his voice betrayed him. They were both terrified. The gunslinger gave him a stern look and then grabbed the boy on his knees before him by the arm. He jerked him back to his feet, and pushed him back over to the other two.

"I want you three to put a mile between you and me in five minutes. Start running." The gunslinger declared. When the three lingered, he pointed his pistol into the air and squeezed the trigger. The resulting noise was enough to spur the prankster's on their way, and out of the gunslingers hair. He waited until he saw them atop a hill and descend into the distance, then turned and walked slowly back into the school. The wreckage from the mutant animals dying chaos was still settling in the hallway.

He walked back into the classroom with his makeshift bead and began backing all his gear back up. He made his way around the rubble and was on his way back outside when his weathered boot struck a cloth object unearthed by the rampage. An old backpack was lying on the floor, coated in soot and dust. It seemed to be in decent enough shape, so the gunslinger picked it up and pulled the knife he kept strapped to his boot. He cut free the shoulder straps of the backpack and pulled them taught in both hands. Both the straps held, so he stuffed them into his courier bag for later use. Once he was sure nothing else note-worthy had been unearthed by the stampede, he went back outside. He walked back down Park Avenue toward I-25 and headed south once more, along the path to his prey.

Along the way down the highway, the drifter pulled one of his revolvers from its sling as he walked. He turned it over in his hands, scrutinizing it for scratches that it may have obtained in the latest scuffle with the hooligans. These guns were his pride as of late. He had finally found the last few materials he needed to complete the weapons about two month ago, and now he kept almost obsessively good care of them. Without realizing it, he had begun calling them his "Big Irons" or "Sluggers". As he walked, he popped the cylinder open and looked down the inside of the barrel, checking for dirt.

About fifteen miles down the road, the vulpine wanderer came to an old truck stop which seemed more or less intact. A few people walked in and out of the station, which had been layered with boards and salvaged aluminum roofing. They were dressed in rags or robes which had been either stitched or taped together from old salvage that had been gathered in the wastes. Several wore makeshift armor from cut up aluminum strapped to their arms and shoulders, and sported old pre-war weapons strapped to their backs or hips. Makeshift shacks were set up all around the main station, and a few of the settlers walked in and between these shacks.

The drifter had seen places like these along the route south that he had been following, all the way from Wyoming. People tended to seek out other people after the bombs fell, and eventually the circle of life picked up again. Settlements cropped up near sources of water or food, trade routes began to flow, and society flowed on as it always had, and probably always will. People moved on, compensated, and lived as well as they could. Although there would probably never again be something like the upper-class that the world before the bombs knew, things would eventually even out all together.

The gunslinger slowly paced his way off the highway and into the settlement, looking around at the lean-to's and shacks as he went. He was pleased to see a couple muties like himself walking the dirt streets through the shacks. Though none of them seemed as genetically fortunate as the gunslinger; the mutations that did manifest themselves on these anthropomorphic creatures were not too much of an eyesore. One, he noted, almost looked perfect. The mutie was coated in a thick, wooly layer of fur and a long tail protruded from beneath the rags it wore. The gunslinger was about to move on when the mutie turned and he noticed it's imperfection: Only one eye looked out from under his fur on the left side. As for the other, there was no trace, not even a socket.

The drifter continued his walk through the town; looking for a place to get his hands on some fresh water (His leather water bladder that he kept in his knapsack was almost dry.). A few people spared him a curios glance as they passed, but despite being one of the rare perfect muties, he was still nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe, if they could see the unique six-shooters hidden below his duster, they may have reacted differently. As it was, this man preferred to remain discreet, enigmatic, grey, what have you.

He clomped his way a toward building that looked to be pre-war, but had undergone some salvaging and was now sporting a new wing made entirely of bolted shingle and aluminum roofing. Across the building, badly centered over the glass double-door, the words "Trading/Buying/Selling" were painted in black industrial paint, which had run down in small trails toward the door before it dried. On a plywood board propped up beside the door were painted the words: "We have clean food, produce, water, and liquor!". The gunslinger walked into the building, pushing the door open with his elbow, not wanting to pull his hands from their pockets and expose the revolvers slung on his hips. A strip of tin suspended over the door clanged and announced his arrival. Along the right wall was a makeshift bar about four feet high, and it was lined with stools that were probably salvaged from the rest stop in the town. This sight brought the ghost of a smile at the sides of the drifter's snout. The settlers had constructed their very own bar. Hot damn.

The place was empty save for a couple patrons sitting at the stools. They spared the gunslinger a brief glance before looking back to their drinks, uninterested in the newcomer. Behind the bar was a tall, stocky man with a rough beard coating his cheeks and chin. He looked out at the drifter with beady eyes and held up a hand as a welcome. The others at the bar may be unfazed by another visitor, but the gunslinger could tell this man appreciated another customer a little more than was probably necessary.

"Welcome, good sir!" The bartender bellowed, causing the two men at the bar to jump slightly. "What brings you to my humble little establishment? Supplies? Food? I got drinks strong enough to keep ya warm or knock ya out, whatever your mood might be!" The gunslinger kept walking slowly up to the bar as the man spoke, his ear tilting from its perch above his hat in the direction of the bartender. "Hell," the man continued, "I'll even give ya a FULL glass of water, on the house, just cause ya look like a good sort of fellow." The gunslinger looked up quizzically at this, curious at how much emphasis the bartender put on the word "full". The drifter reached the bar and sat in a stool, pulling his hands from his pockets and crossing his arms over the bar. The bartender glanced down at the drifter's belt as he sat, spying the revolvers that were slung there. He pulled a glass from beneath the counter and began filling it with water. He raised an eyebrow and said "They're some slick-looking shooters ya got there, friend." The gunslinger looked up at him and accepted the glass silently, not answering him. "Make em' yourself?" the bartender continued. The gunslinger sipped the water and examined the glass, unable to tell the quality of the water within due to the misty fog that the glass had accumulated.

"Sure did." The drifter finally replied. The bartender took a step back and leaned against the wall opposite the bar, crossing his arms across his chest. He didn't seem all to phased by the gunslinger's attitude, and kept talking.

"Use em much? You seem like the kind of mutie who doesn't take to people too well." The drifter ignored this comment, finishing his water in slow, thoughtful sips. When the water was gone, the drifter scrounged into his courier bag and pulled out a wad of New Bills, tied together with twine.

"How much for a drink?" The gunslinger asked.

"Depends on what you want," the bartender replied, not losing his jolly demeanor for even a moment. "We got a few beers, some whisky, a whole crate of rum... Or if you want something cheaper, we got plenty of slop." Slop was the cheapest alcohol the Wastes had to offer. It was essentially a mish-mash of any or all fruits that grew in the aria, thrown together and left to ferment. As it turns out, nobody could figure out how to make REAL stuff after the bombs fell.

"I'll have a whiskey, then." The gunslinger stated. The bartender gave him the price, the drifter paid, and the bartender disappeared through a door behind the bar to retrieve the goods. In the moments before he returned, the gunslinger noticed that the two other bar-goers were now favoring him with sideways glances, trying not to stare, but unable to keep from it. The bartender returned and placed a narrow bottle of golden liquid on the bar before the gunslinger. The drifter took it, pulled of the cap, and took two large swigs, careful not to let it drip from the sides of his muzzle (You never really realize how useful cheeks are 'till they're gone.). He felt the warmth spread, and after a moment, he took a couple more swallows from the bottle. The bartender decided to take this moment to ask:

"What brings a weathered-looking fellow like yeself down here to our town, anywho?" The gunslinger, whose tongue was feeling a little looser after the alcohol, decided to play along and favor him with an answer.

"I'm looking for a man who owes me big." He said casually.

"What kinda big?" The bartender pried, drawing the curiosity of the other patrons away from their drinks.

"Lets just say this fella had done a few wrongs on me and my kin that I seek to right." The gunslinger replied, and looked back down, seeking to end the conversation. However, the bartender would have none of it.

"Well shit, we got time. Lets hear what ya got to tell eh? Have some more drink!" He prodded. The gunslinger did take another swill from the bottle, though for a moment, and sighed.

"Well, I doubt ye gonna leave me alone on it anyhow. This whole shitstorm I got goin now started bout 14 years ago, when I was somewheres around 16 suns old..."