This Side of the Dirt

The man pauses, leaning against the side of the building to catch his breath, hoping that, this time, he's lost his pursuit, trying to slow his breathing, the loud, pounding rhythm of his blood crashing through his ears, straining to hear over his own body's betrayal. Wild, wide eyes search the alleyway around him as he puts his head down, hoping to get a brief respite, a moment to catch his breath and lose the one chasing him.

He's been on the run for months, and it's draining him, almost pushing him to the point that he wants to quit, to just give in, if for no other reason than he won't have to hear the sound he's dreading.

As his breathing slows, he straightens, listening, straining to hear...

...to find that the sound he is dreading is not there. The only sounds are the small, quiet sounds of the night around him. A long, ragged, shaky breath of relief is drawn in and let go as he leans his head back against the wall, closing his eyes.

Thank God for small favors, he thinks. Jesus, man, all of this for a f*cking hold up job that had only gotten him maybe 200 in silver, at the most...and no one had even gotten hurt!

He should never have let his friend talk him into it, shouldn't have said yes. But his friend had been desperate, had needed the money to pay off a debt to a man much bigger and badder than themselves. And he had agreed to help him.

He sighs, recalling it all as if it were yesterday, rather than months ago. Six long months of hearing those damned bootsteps walking up to his door, a steady, slow, clocking sound as rhythmic as a metronome, almost maddeningly slow and patient, persistent. Those same dark, cold eyes watching him, the small, infuriating smile on the man's face as he watched him run, walking after him with that same slow stride.

Never stopping, always there, until it seemed that, at every moment, he was hearing those steps. Waking up in a cold sweat in the night, unable to sleep, hearing those damnable steps in his sleep, even when they weren't there.

He had become a jittery, paranoid mess, jumping at shadows and the softest of noises, until he had ended up here, leaning back against the wall of a building in some stinking alley, his eyes closed, thankful just not to be hearing those bootsteps.

He opens his eyes, ready to move on, and the motion halts before it's even begun.

Right there, in front of his eyes, is a dark hole, surrounded by steel. The barrel of a pistol, right there, nearly resting against his forehead.

The sight strikes such terror into him that he almost forgets to look past it, at the figure holding it. The same tall figure that had been in his nightmares for six long months, his face cast in shadow under that broad-rimmed hat as he bows his head. A match flaring to life illuminates his features for a moment, revealing those same dark eyes looking at him as the flame is touched to a cigarette, then cast away.

Acrid smoke fills his senses as he stands there, paralyzed by panic, his eyes wide and full of fear as the bounty hunter looks at him. The silence, drawing out for what seems to be a significant portion of eternity, is finally broken as he raises his head and speaks.

"You have one of two choices here, boy. You can try to run, and end up with your brains splattered all over this here wall...or...you can stop running, give up, and keep breathing."

The voice is calm, the words spoken in such a way that they are almost unthreatening. One could almost hear kindness in them, as if he were offering the boy a gift rather than an ultimatum.

They have the desired effect on the boy, young and scared as he is. Without so much as a word, he raises his hands up to either side, closing his eyes again.

Curiously, as the man takes his hands and ties them behind him, the young man feels more relief than anything else, at the realization that, finally, it's over.

Three hours later, the bounty hunter walks out of the office of the local sheriff, counting through a stack of twenties, a satisfied smile on his face.

On to the next job.

The Burn, the spark, the kindle, the flame had become her trademark. Some would say it was homage to the Burning Times for a vision of a woman ever to be on fire. She would ever be a woman with a tempestuous spirit that ever willed itself to catch fire, ignite until all around her seemed but embers. The heat, the warmth, the devouring claim of the fire was the only thing to soothe her. To calm that snarling rage that moved like a sun burned prairie wolf through her soul.

She had become addicted to the thrill of watching a fire ablaze, to watch wood catch flame and thus begin the Burning Times again. No longer was she worried about it being an answer to a problem, a cleansing ritual, or a sin purging resolution. To Tempest it was the end of all means a way to burn the bridges of her past… and those bridges were so plentiful.

Time and the threads of life lapped over and extended out, never constant lines but instead jagged circles with thorny sharp grooves.

Did she remember it all? Perhaps, yet for Tempest nothing was as constant as change. Moving on and moving forward and burning everything behind her to assure that her footprints would never be traced. The gods and their trickery, the wicked gamble they would play of souls was a well known landscape to Tempest… one she cared nothing for.

Never would she wish for the claim of family, never to care for the bonds of marriage or companionship. In the Burning Times you were better off alone.

She had survived on her own and looking back the only one that ever would look out for her… was herself.

Brethren in arms a different story, something she never would speak on but ever would stand for to serve, to protect, to respect.

The black gold sun of her eyes smoldered into life as she crumpled the wanted: dead or alive flyer in her hand. So she would be hunted again.

There was a savage smile as the lighter was flicked open, the small flame igniting the bit of rolled addiction between her lips. A sharp inhale before that zippo was moved for the flame to set that flyer on fire. Its dancing smolder played such an exquisite cast of copper-gold and crimson against the beaten metal of the pendant worn.

Five once shiny tags now dulled with time and survival.

The wanted sign was dropped in her footprints as she headed off to the horizon, the bit of flame becoming wildfire against the dry brambles and dead grass… it made such blissful warmth against her back.

They wished to hunt her? Well let them come… she was looking forward to it.

"I've got a good one for you, Bill."

He looks up from the bulletin board in the sheriff's office, looking over the posted fugitives and their bounties.. That easy smile that comes to his lips feels, to him, so very brittle. He doesn't want to smile, he wants to hunt, and something other than kids knocking over mom-and-pop shops or B'n'E that had skipped out on bail.

He wants a real job, something that'll be a real challenge, for once.

"This isn't like the last 'good one,' is it? That kid could run, and he could even hide halfway decent, but it turned out to be a waste of time. In the end he was worn out."

The sheriff just chuckles, holding a slip of paper that's been folded in half to him, and walks back over to sit his fat ass behind the desk. Lazy bastard. Bill had been in this godforsaken side of the dirt for four months now, and hadn't seen the sheriff do much, aside from lock and unlock cell doors and eat doughnuts.

Bill wasn't even sure it was called a sheriff here, but whatever. He's the guy in charge of the local law enforcement units, and that makes him sheriff.

He unfolds the paper and looks, noting first the big, bold black letters screaming across the top of the page.

WANTED, DEAD OR ALIVE.

The next thing he notices is the picture, and for a long time he simply stares at her. His face is as neutral and stoic as ever it is, but inside, something stirs slightly, some remnant of the man that still resides inside and is only allowed out of its cage when humans weren't anywhere near him.

Looking down further, he sees the price of the bounty. Substantially higher alive than dead. That gets a slight reaction, an eyebrow raised as he looks back at the sheriff, holding up the poster and putting on that easy smile, his tone light and amused. "Don't know if I'm supposed to hunt her down for the bounty or for her number."

The sheriff chuckles at that, nodding. "Yeah, she's a cutie, all right, but don't let that run away with you. She's about as cuddly and warm as a porcupine, Bill, and from what I understand, she has a personality to match."

Bill snorts at that, looking back at the picture. He can see that, of course - the picture really is worth a thousand words. After another long moment of staring into those eyes, he folds the poster up and shoves it into a pocket.

"I'll take it."

She always loved the desert. The sultry still heat of it, the warmth of the dirt beneath her toes as the sun beat down mercilessly against her skin, stroking burning fingertips of sun rays across her flesh.

The desert was vast and empty with a solitaire tree that braved the dust and the scorching heat to linger on. Perhaps it was a sibling of the Joshua Tree, Tempest imagined it was just a rebellious youth becoming defiant against Mother Nature.

Tempest could understand why, she had no love for the Green Mother.

In the desert she would have preferred to be alone with her thoughts, the savage blades and cruel edges of the past that would play over and over again, so many versions and lives lived. Like the layers of an onion peeled and shredded away to leave a new skin. Rebirth and redemption it was such a beautiful thing for Tempest to find.

The ones trusted were remembered, tucked away nice and save in the dark crevices of her mind. The ones she had come to lose faith in had been murdered over and over again in her nightmare soaked dreams. The stability of her mind had been lost leaving the insanity to corrupt and forge her into a more… adequate… adaption of the prior.

No family. No love.

These were the things that were not hers to find the storylines of, she preferred it that way. Merciless and Solo she was one better off working alone until exceptions were made.

A long time ago, another time so long ago she had made mistakes. Unforgiveable mistakes that she would not make again. This was a do over that she would not destroy. This was the life she was meant to possess.

Egypt was on her mind, a Machete buried in her heart, a Killer in her soul.

Those would be the only things she would carry with her, save for the dull shining rest of the dog tags resting at her chest.

Were there others she missed? Maybe so… but it was best to walk away before they followed her footsteps and became damned. Damnation was only hers to own. She was such a selfish b*tch.

For a moment she forgot where she was until the whimpering screams of the girl hanging from the tree by her feet brought her back to the present hour.

“Why…. Why are you doing this?”

Her whimpering pleading words of confusion and loss grated on the nerves of Tempest.

Ashes and wine were the voice that parted her lips.

“Why? It’s simple enough. I am doing this merely because your hair is red.”

“Only because of that?!?”

“There are other reasons…”

Softly, so distant as the borderline seething fury began to prick its claws through the calm of her insanity, leaving a hole to burn in the black sun of her eyes.

So many reasons, like the damnable catlike upturn of the redhead’s eyes. Her hands lifted as her fingertips pressed into her temples as Tempest looked flatly to the woman.

“Stop talking.”

Just like a woman, she never would shut up until someone made them shut up.

A faint sneer and before Tempest knew the reaction of her body, the instinct of her mind would coerce.

The blade’s serrated edge cut swift and smooth, ripping open the throat of the woman like it was butter.

She no longer would continue her senseless, foolish babble. No… oh no she wouldn’t.

“I know they are watching me. It’s only a matter of time before I give them all the more reason to… pursue… me.”

A faint pat of the dying redhead’s cheek as she overstepped the blood puddle spilling across the desert dust.

“Ta ta. Don’t worry. By the time they find you, you’ll long be gone… the carrion birds… are waiting.”

Maybe not so long gone as was thought.

He?s always loved the desert. The hot, dry, desolate barrenness of it all. One of the extremes that nature would sometimes show, the scorching heat that felt like fire in your lungs, like an oppressive weight on your very body.

A person could go mad out in all this dry expanse, with nothing but the rodents or the vultures to keep you company, their endlessly circling forms just waiting for that final moment of collapse to bring them wheeling down, cruciform shadows falling upon a corpse to cleanse it from the land.

Much like the black, feathered forms munching on the girl hanging from the withered branches of the tree before him.

Not close enough to make him a noticeable presence, too healthy and in fit condition to be considered as a potential meal?yet.

Slipping from his mount, he strides over to the remains hanging from the tree, dark eyes looking it over with a critical, analytical gaze.

As he nears, the vultures give a raucous cry and take wing, fleeing the hanging figure as though he perhaps wanted some claim upon the dead meat for his own feeding.

Much of the meat is gone, huge tears and gouges in the corpse revealing the places where the birds had been feeding their appetites, gorging themselves. But still there?s enough left to identify the remains as human, and female. A long, wavy shock of red hair hangs upside down, fluttering in the faintest of desert breezes like a fiery, tattered flag streaked with darker streaks where the blood from her slit throat had flowed over it.

The fortunate thing about the desert is that things out in it that are dead don?t rot so much as they dry out, and therefore when he steps in close there?s no stench, save for the coppery sweetness of blood.

He traces a finger along the wound in her neck, feeling the ragged edge of it, as though it had been ripped through rather than sliced.

?Hmm?serrated blade??

But why this one? He can?t see any reason behind it, really. Pretty girl, or at least, she was before the vultures started in on her. Jealousy? Rage?

He?s not a sentimental man, not by a long shot, but even given that, he finds the death completely meaningless.

His eyes fall to the ground, following the traces and hollows where the killer had walked. Around and around the victim, looking her over, a smile on the killer?s face as the best method of murder was contemplated.

And then, after the deed was done, walking away into the desert, without so much as a look behind?

He kneels next to the path the killer had taken away, looking over the traces. Meaningless to another?s eyes, maybe, but he?s been following killers for a long time, and knows the ways of reading the earth.

Small feet. A long stride, but still far shorter than his own.

A woman?

His woman?

Standing, he walks back over to the horse and mounts, climbing into the saddle again and guiding the beast along the trail he?s found.

The ground had been covered well and quickly. Some paths tracked back and retraced as she stirred against the cold kiss of the desert night on her flesh.

A random stream had been found and she took that time to cleanse herself. Ritualistic near how she scrubbed her skin raw, as if to take the memories from her as much as the blood from her skin.

Her hands cupped the water before leaving it to pour down the desert canvas of her skin, tendrils of the stream spilling down her body to caress her hips and the smooth offerings of her curves. In that moment she was peaceful.

The time would not last for long as the chaos whispered and smoldered in her mind. A look back as she scented at the wind, inhaling the dry air and the distant smell of... man.

Black sun eyes narrowed to deadly horizons as the knife was found at her back. So they would hunt her and she would be ready. This game though was something that thrilled her more. His determination was something that intrigued her especially when it seemed the man was very much like her... working alone.

It was time to change the pattern. Time to bring a new presence and stir up the trouble to make the hunt far more entertaining. Was she showing off? Perhaps so.

The town was found like a distant mirage. A memory perhaps she would rather forget. The woman smiled to herself as she lit up another clove and trailed a lone soul in the dark of the alley way.

Feral, Carnal needs would hardly be sated in that alley but it was a beginning.

Taking him to the edge before it could be tipped over. That cry of bliss would soon be a cry of pain and gurgled surprise as the knife edge found its way beneath rib cage and to the heart.

A whisper, near tender to hush that panicked whisper and ragged shout.

He was screaming far too much for her liking. A low growl of warning in hopes it would silence him but to no avail. She leaned in close as if to share a lover's kiss before those sharp teeth sank in and cut through the soft meat of the man's tongue.

She left him choking on his own blood even as the knife plunged down and jerked up once more to still his heart.

"Ashes..."

A wipe of her mouth with the back of her hand to take from it the taste of his bitter blood.

"Ashes."

A twisting open of the whiskey flask she had found at the man's side and the contents were spilled upon his flesh and upon her own blade to clean it of the blood.

"We all fall down."

A snapping hiss of a match against the book before it was dropped upon the bloody gash at the man's chest.

Leaving that man awashed with flame as the scent of burning flesh filled her senses and took from her the scent of him.... the scent of the one that tracked her even as she lured him on.

In the dead of night, in that hushed silence she licked at her mouth and smiled at the long road before her.

A long road that in its gravel carnage seemed to greet her.

Oh yes indeed, Tempest, welcome to Rhy'din.

The game is indeed afoot.

And this hunt is, by far, the most challenging he has had in some time.

No mean amateur, this one, no petty criminal that had robbed some mom-and-pop outfit and was running in desperation.

No, this one is enjoying the hunt as much as he, it seems, as he crouches over the remains of a charred corpse.

How had he come this far, one might ask?

Well, it certainly hadn't been easy. Tracks can be covered, and not only had this one covered her tracks well, she had managed to do it in such a way that it blended neatly with the rest of the desert.

There had been traces, though. Certain small, faint traces, invisible to near all but those that know precisely what to look for.

Even so, it had been a b*tch of a time following.

And the funny thing is, he has the feeling that even those faint traces had been left intentionally, bait to lure him on, meant to intrigue him further, whet his appetite.

And now this.

It's not the easiest thing to see, but the corpse before him had been a man once. Perhaps not much of one, but a man, a living being.

He doesn't feel any pity for the man. Anyone caught with his pants down - or in this case, off, tossed into a pile of filth nearby - in a place like this with God only knows who for such foolish fumblings in the dark might even deserve such a fate.

"Y'should've taken th' lady someplace nice, pard. Y'might still be alive."

He places a hand on the charred remains as he speaks to the dead man, his touch detecting faint traces of heat still in the bones. Another touch to the ground next to the body finds more heat stored in the ground. This fire is old, but not so old that all heat has fled the scene with the perpetrator.

Looking on the remains, he runs his fingers over exposed bone on the chest, and over the place the heart used to be, his fingers find a jagged notch.

A blade, thrust into the chest.

"Or maybe ya wouldn't be."

Standing from the remains, he brushes his hands off, looking down at the withered ruin of what once was a man, and is now only pathetic.

"Ah'm gonna have t'meet this li'l lady."

Turning away from the corpse, he exits the alley, shaking his head.

"Someone's gotta teach her that the dead don't learn nothin'."

Tempest was dreaming beneath the old cedar tree and the starless sky, dreaming of dragons…or was that a dinosaur? She wasn’t so certain anymore as the images flickered through her mind as fire embers against the dark lit canvas of her mind even as she awakened.

She couldn’t remember how she ended up in the desert, only recalled the blood seeping into the sand spilling from wounds that were healing even as she attempted to remember how she had come about them.

It had been a long road back to Rhy’din. Somehow and in some way she remembered the dreadful town and a memory was the only thing left she had to go on and she catered to that will of returning to what she remembered.

Death, Blood, and the savage way of Fire trailed in a heralded wake of her footfalls, streaking like a banner that would glow in the shadows but never lead back to her. A mystery, a solstice she had become.

Tempest still could not help but shake the feeling that she was cursed. A lone coyote had watched her from the thorny brush and a crow had cawed out an omen of warning in a voice that didn’t seem to belong to the avian, Memory. The bird carried a name that meant Memory.

A Hex gone, a Black Magic Baby had fallen to the spirits she worked with as their victim curse now.

The old ways were dead. Tempest knew that now. Points of no return had been surpassed and even though she walked alone there was something about her mind in the time that she dreamed that would not let her forget of that which remained significant.

Bonds in blood could not be forgotten.

She didn’t understand it but she felt the pull, the connection, the bond even as she had no recollection of who she shared that imprinted bond with.

Still so far her fractured memories had brought her back to Rhy’din to find herself deep in the West End where a club catered to those that seemed right up her alley.

The club felt like home to her, even as it felt different. Subtle changes, or maybe it was Tempest that had changed but the moment felt like d?j? vu as she looked around. Her eyes fell upon the graceful beauty of the dancer in the middle of the room, a glistening vision of radiant gold and shining emerald, the embodiment of youth and spring personified in the woman’s dance and delicate beauty before rising to a woman with a striped mane of black gold, predator eyes and a hunter’s frame.

The Huntress looked up and watched Tempest like she was nothing more then prey, a small frown upon her pierced lip as she dropped down from the stage silently and stalked toward Tempest

“You…who are you?”

“Tempest”

“Are you certain of that?”

A cut of a smile moved sharp at her lips as eyes the color of chipped peridot and smoldering absinthe lifted to the Huntress. Tempest could hear the breathless growl in the woman’s words, could smell the agitation that coiled in her tattooed belly.

“Perhaps.”

“You seem… familiar.”

An absent shrug, desert sun mane of hair shifted against her sand warm shoulders as she shifted her eyes away from the Huntress.

“Maybe in another life we knew each other, maybe in another time we crossed paths. It’s nothing now but the past or another life and time and plane. Nice place you have here.”

Tempest was lost in the sea of flesh then, rippling like a solitaire flame in the ocean of bodies. Only to emerge once more in the streets, back to the old cedar tree and a starless sky.

The significance of red save for the stain of blood was gone from her mind, the importance of staying from the solitaire path no longer mattered.

There was only the blood, only fire, only a bond that remained. Lost in a summer haze of burning fragments of her mind where there was an imprint and a raven called Memory.

She'd vanished.

The trail he'd followed had been faint to begin with, and he'd had to rely on that old standby, the hunter's instinct, to follow it at times where it had vanished.

But this time, it's a bit different. Most times, the instinct, that ability to see through the eyes of the hunted, works like a charm.

But this time, he's not hunting the hunted...he's hunting the hunter...and she's not running from the hunter, but leading him on.

Even if she doesn't quite know it.

Into town...into that haven of darkness known to the locals only as as WestEnd...to a den where the hedonistic and lustful find their pleasure, spending their money for satisfaction of some desire or another...

...and there, it went cold.

Dammit...

The thought is part angry curse, part grudging admiration, part enthralled enjoyment.

Be careful what ya wish for...

Nothing for it, for the moment. Maybe he just needs some rest, a night under the stars, sleep and a fresh mind to come back and look again...

The raucous cry of a crow distracts him from his thoughts. Looking up, he sees the bird perched atop a signpost, looking down along its beak at him with what he almost imagines as disdain on its features. As he looks, the bird shakes its wings and caws at him again, seeming to scold him for wanting to give up so easily.

The easy smile comes to his lips, this time not brittle or forced, but natural and easy. Animals he can relate to so much better than people - he's never heard of an animal stabbing someone in the back for a leg up or to save its own @ss.

"Look, pard, if ya know somethin' Ah don't, spit it out. Otherwise, Ah'm headed for some sleep. Ain't no use followin' the trail when Ah'm dead on m'feet 'n' endin' up like that crispy fella Ah found in th' alley."

The crow cries its hoarse cry again, giving him a look that almost seems smug, before it wings its way off into the night.

For a moment, he's tempted to just keep to his word - a night's rest and a fresh mind in the morning.

That hunter's instinct tugs at him again, though. That little voice that keeps him going on when he should be giving it up already.

"Th' hell. Time 'nuff fer sleep whem Ah'm dead, Ah guess."

The metronomic footfalls echo into the starless night as he changes his path, following in the wake of the crow's flight...