Rewards Of Compromise

We'd caught him at dawn, typing him up quick.

It was an hour before sundown and they were still arguing about what to do with him.

Glen and Pete were insistent we take him to Valley Garden over the border, reward was greater.

But Big and Little Dex were insistent that we take him to Bluebush, as the crimes he was wanted for there were greater.

I lost patience, and untied him. Then shot him in the back as he ran.

"Bluebush will take him dead, Valley Garden won't."

No-one was happy, so you know it was a good compromise.

Crossfire

The two thieves, hidden in the basement, could hear the sheriff and his men just outside the shack. Orders being given, a perimeter formed, lines made.

They waited, pistols drawn, waiting for them to kick down the door, or order them to come out.

Instead, they heard gunshots, hundreds of them, and lots of shouting, until eventually, silence.

The sheriff crawled into the shack, blood oozing from several wounds, but a native came in, slit his throat, and left.

The thieves were safe.

Or would have been, if they hadn't shot each other to save themselves from dying slow like.

No Laws, Just Order

The MacArthurs and the Saxons had been fussing and fueding, as the locals put it, for over a century at this point. Both families had long lists of grievances, both real and imagined, enough that there was always a threat of violence occurring at the drop of a hat.

And while there had been a few star-crossed lovers, they never seemed to solve anything. And besides, there was always another cousin, another branch of the family to pick up the fight.

In the end, it was stopped by the Marshalls.

After they bought out the goldmine, they hired numerious goons.

Grandpa's Trap

The trap was old, rusted, stiff, even before I was given it. Grandpa said I needed to know how to provide for myself, and the ranch backed onto woodland. So we walked out together, and he taught me how to oil the trap, plant it, how to secure it to a log just heavy enough for an animal to drag and tire themselves out, assuming their leg didn't break between the jaws.

Every day I come out here and check on the trap. For him, in his memory, and all he did.

But I never set it. That's for me.

Lures With Net

The Injun girl was sitting crosslegged on the boulder in the middle of my fields, oxen milling about her. A man, I'd just fired a couple warning shots at, but a girl, that was different.

As i approached, I saw her eyes were closed, and the wounds on her arms and legs. When I went to tell her to move on, she spoke.

"Had I come to your door, you would have ignored me. So instead I pose as an oddity. So you are here, where you need to be."

I readied my rifle, as the O'Malley boys rode in.

Like The Wind

When he spurred his horse to try and outrun the law, the wind was brisk, the fog heavy.

When his horse had dropped dead at a point halfway up the mountain, the wind had been strong and the snowfall light.

When he got to the ridge near the top of the  mountain, the wind was intense and the track murderous.

When his luck changed and he saw the cave opening, the wind was gale force and the opening inviting.

When he settled down in the cave, the wind was outside and the sherrif already in the cave was heavily armed.

Two Deepgulches

The guy who drew the maps for the government had a bit too much whisky the night before he drew this area. He put Deepgulch about ten miles north of where it actually was.

Now, the locals knew where it was, but all the stagecoaches and traveller types relied on the maps.

So the O'Malley boys set up shop at 'Deepgulch', and soon there was two of the damn towns.

Now, this was fine, until we struck gold here in Deepgulch. Because everyone came to 'Deepgulch' greedy.

The rioting forced the local sherrifs to get the maps fixed at least.

Bluebirds Of A Feather

When the horse came to a stop, I looked around as much as I could while remaining hog tied on the back of it.

"So where are we?"

The bounty hunter finished tying up his horse then picked me up over his shoulder.

"You don't recognise Drycreek? This is where you killed a man!"

"For the last time, I-"

He dropped me roughly onto the floor of what turned out to be the Sheriff's office.

"Here to collect on the Betty Birdbird bounty!"

The Sherrif sighed and lent over his desk.

"That ain't her." said Sherrif George Bluebird.

I winked.

Dead Iron

I didn't look up at the banging on my door, focused on my work as I was. But I was forced to look up when they broke the door lock and stormed in.

"Can I help you?"

The figure dumped a gun onto my anvil.

"Bullets."

I awaited further information.

None came.

"I'm a blacksmith, I don't make bullets. The general store sells about a thousand for $25."

"No, stop them."

I took a long breath.

"Well, yes, that's slightly more in my field."

I picked up the gun and, seeing it was loaded, shot him for breaking my door.

Pine Valley

I'd notched a dozen kills on my belt, not including Chinamen. But after every showdown, I kept hearing about how Wild Joe was the best gunslinger still alive.

So I got on my horse and headed into Pine Valley to kill Wild Joe.

I guess townsfolk were used to visitors like me, they pointed me towards the saloon. Inside, up the back, looking over the floor, an older gunslinger was drinking with a painted lady.

I strode up and was direct. Told him I was there to kill Wild Joe.

He laughed, as Josephine pulled her gun and shot me.

Common Dust

Dust Gulch was one of those towns that existed purely out of simple arithmetic. It was exactly one day's ride from the state capital and another day's ride from the main port. The fact that there was little water, less grass, and an overabundance of heat meant it wasn't a nice town, but men needed beds, and beer, and women. So the town existed.

The town had the resentful distrusting openness of a town that hates outsiders but needs them to survive. But it got by fine.

Until the dust was found to be gold, then all hell broke loose.

The Clean Cowpoke

They call him the Clean Cowpoke round these parts. He turned up the day the government opened up the land to be claimed, his clothing as spotless as his cash. He convinced a few other settlers to sell their land. And then he vanished.

He turned up a year later, same clothes, still spotless, just before the sherriff foreclosed.

Then again, just in time, three years later.

Then five after that.

Every time spotless and just in time, ain't aging either.

Something's gonna happen on that land, and I...

Wait, that's him!

He ain't in danger of losing...

Oh dear.

Ranch Dictionary (Excerpts)

Maverick (noun) - Unbranded cattle, therefore unowned.

Maverick (proper noun) - The local known for being able to hunt down lost or desired cattle.

Unowned (adjective) - 1. Without an owner.
2. Currently possessed by one person that is not you but which you nevertheless wish to own.

Donation (noun, specific) - The price Maverick demands to deliver a Maverick or Mavericks that are unowned.

Deliver (verb) - The action of Maverick bringing you the cattle you requested. Takes place only at night, and only if Maverick still trusts you.

Double-Cross - (noun) What you intended to do to Maverick.

Dead (adjective) - Whst you now are.

Flipped Off

When he caught someone, he would trap them and go through a spiel about how he was now faced with a choice, he could kill them and get the reward, or keep them alive and get the slightly larger reward.

He'd then flip the coin, the crudely etched X on one side flashing through the air, before it would land in his hand, and he'd hiss and pull out his gun, and then if they had anything to offer, that was the time they'd do so.

It took years for two people to survive and realise both sides meant death.

Marshal Washington

The rider got several long stares in their ride into the town center. Possibly due to the blood streaming down, possibly because she was a she, but probably because she was black.

A few moments after she had dismounted, someone strode up to her. She didn't need to look over at him to know his hand was near his gun. She wouldn't have raised her arms even if she could. Instead, she turned and shrugged her broken shoulder just enough to show her Marshal badge.

She probably should have checked if it was who she was hunting before doing that.

Barn Raising

We were halfway through the barn raising, and we needed some more long nails, so I was asked to ride over to the neighbor's ranch to grab some. He trusted me to find them, giving me directions to where they were.

Instead, when I arrived, I found the neighbor's wife and the deputy sheriff going at it.

Now, this should have been good for me. I was having issues with the law over where my cattle were grazing, and I'd fancied her for a while.

But the deputy was quicker on the draw than I was stating my blackmail intentions.

Feeling The Rope

She was caught after the first stagecoach she robbed, but had the luck to be put up to be hung with the McBlack brothers, and she was cut down by their gang at the same time.

Unlike them, she chose to keep the noose as a souvenir, wearing it around her neck at all times. When asked, she would say it was a reminder to her how little she cared for feeling the rope once, and that she wouldn't feel it again.

She never did. But only because the Sheriff's bullet that took her down missed the rope by inches.

Cross

She didn’t want a cross. Not because she wasn’t a follower, but because she didn’t want me to be able to find her again. She told me, as the snakebite took her, that I was to bury her, and remember her in life, in love, not like this, not now. She made me swear, on my soul, that I wouldn’t so much as leave a rock overturned, that I’d just get back on the saddle and keep riding, once I’d dug her deep enough to cover. I swore I would.

It was the only time I ever lied to her.

Nancy Nobody

She was the fastest gun in the state, but because men have a habit of working out ways to pretend women don’t count, the fact that she’d never killed a man proved she clearly wasn’t. The ten men who had died near her died for unrelated reasons.

The town didn’t have a sheriff, since the townsfolk were just so darn honest, and not because she kept watch over the town and would often find criminals captured when nearby lawmen came to visit, purely coincidentally.

Then she fell in love. With the mistress of the brothel.

The town ignored that too.

Leading A Horse

The horse slowly walked up to the water trough, face caked in dirt, and began trying to drink down the entire thing. This was enough to shake the rider, who slowly slid off, landing with a heavy squelch.

The local tee-totaller stopped whaling away about the evils of firewater and ran to his side, followed by a few of those nearby. The rider looked dead, but there was breath, just, on his lips.

“This man needs a sawbones!” declared the tee-totaller.

“Drink…” the rider managed.

The tee-totaller had a crisis of faith until I poured water down the kid’s throat.