Both masked men slumped to the ground after bullets came flying up through the floorboards.
The young man shook off his shock and rushed past Gerald and ran straight towards the wagon.
Dasher started to push up on the floorboards while Gerald went over to help him out.
"Is that all of them?" Dasher asked.
"All the ones that came." Gerald answered.
Dasher knelt down and pulled the masks off their faces. "Hey, do you think this guy looks familiar?"
"Carl Dickson." Gerald answered.
"Did we meet him somewhere?"
"Nah, he is on the sheriff's wanted wall. Dead or alive for five hundred dollars."
"Damn, that is a nice pie falling from the sky. Right when we are in need of money."
"Nope, we can't claim it."
"What, why not?"
"Come on, help me drag the others in here." Gerald said after stripping the man of his possession with worth. "We can't claim it, because if we do, the Cult will know that we killed him and his men. Stay focused on our mission." Gerald said as he dragged a corpse by his feet and took him into the house.
Thirty minutes later, Gerald took the lit torches and placed them under different corners of the house.
He lit up another smoke as he watched the fire begin to grow.
When it was ragging, the young man and his family finally came out of the wagon. Gerald could see the marks on their arms from where they were bound. The dad's face was bruised and scraped, but they were all alive.
Gerald tied the saddle bags of money to his horse before mounting it. Dasher rode up next to him as the watched the fire quickly consume the dry timber.
Dasher leaned forward. "I checked the wagon, there are some supplies and a bit of cash, looks like these guys were planning to head to their base from here."
"Still no maps or any idea where the base is?"
"Nope, nothing."
"Then we ignore it for now. If the Cult doesn't come looking for trouble, they won't find it."
Dasher nodded in agreement.
"Marshal… This is my family. We can't even begin to thank you en-."
"Take the wagon and horses and head far away from this town. I guarantee that there is no future for your family here."
"Yes, we plan to gather our things and leave before morning. Thank you Marshal, I owe you everything."
"Then pay your debt by leaving now and not turning back. You can't get your things. If you return to Brokenfall, there is a good chance you will never leave again."
"But sir-." The young man started.
"Dasher and I tracked the bandits to this location after they took Mr. Hordan's money. We put them down and recovered the money, but you and your family perished in the fire. We were too late."
"Marshal-." The young man started but his father placed a hand on his shoulder.
"We understand and we thank you kindly." He said while lowering his head.
Gerald clicked his tongue and dug in his heels. His horse took off as he and Dasher headed back to town.
They tied their horses in front of the short-stay and took several saddle bags into Gerald's room. They put the money under his bed, they wouldn't be able to deposit it till the morning. They then checked the other bags and divided up the guns. But compared to their own, they were junk. The bullets were useful though. They planned to sell off the guns in the morning. All but one. Dasher found a sawed-off double barrel shotgun that he was fond of.
They had found a bit of tech with the masked men. But it was fairly basic. They had found another tracker, along with a receiver that was able to locate the tracker they had given the young man. Both trackers and the receiver were left in the fire.
Gerald had hijacked the signals with his cellphone. He could activate his phone to mimic the signals if he wanted to, but right now, he wasn't concerned with the cult.
The pair then called it a night.
The next morning, they rode to the bank. It was busy inside, but when the manager saw them walk in. He recognized them immediately and went over.
"Gentlemen. Mr. Hordan contacted me and explained that he would no longer be making a deposit. What can I do for you?"
"He changed his mind." Gerald said as he motioned to the two saddlebags that hung over his shoulder.
"Ah, okay, please come to my office."
After they entered, Dasher shut the door behind them.
Gerald dumped the money onto his desk.
The manager then began to count while Gerald sat to the side.
The manager counted a lot slower and more carefully compared to the masked money man. After forty minutes he reported.
"Everything we were expecting is here. It is the full amount. I will mark it into Mr. Hordan's account right now."
"Good." Gerald said while rising from his chair.
"You boys must have gone through a hard time to get this here. Hopefully it wasn't too straining. Is there anything else I can help you with?" The bank manager asked when he saw that the Marshals weren't leaving.
"A receipt."
"Ah, yes, how could I forget." He said as he bent over his desk and pulled out a pad and started to write. When he finished, he passed them the signed note.
The pair left the bank and headed to the Sheriff's office across the street.
Gerald then took out his radio and turned it to the channel that the Hordan Ranch used.
"Marshal for Hordan, this is Marshal for Hordan." He then waited.
"Hordan here." The radio sounded.
"Your money was deposited, minus forty dollars."
"That's good new Marshal, and the kid?"
"He reunited with his family, but their lives went up in flames."
"Oh, I see."
"You can pick up your receipt from the Sheriff's office next time you are in town. Marshal out."
Gerald then clipped his radio back to his belt and walked into the Sheriff's office. They dropped off the receipt and then informed Sheriff Daniels of the story they had put together. Only Gerald, Dasher, and the young man and his family would know the truth.
Dasher then went and sold the gun's that they didn't want. They were able to add another twenty-five dollars to their funds.
The tailor returned to town the next day. But like Sheriff Daniels thought, he wasn't any help. The button was their newest model, but they had already sold five thousand pairs of pants with them. And with how things were, it's not like they could get a list of customers. The world used cash; electronic credit cards weren't even a thing.
A few days went by and the doppelganger's identity remained unknown. Without anything to go off of, Gerald and Dasher did the only thing they could. They mingled around town and spent there days getting to know people.
They had been in town a week when Gerald got a radio transmission from the Sheriff.
"Sheriff to Marshals, Sheriff Daniels to Marshals."
"Marshal Acers here."
"We just received a transmission from the Lonely Pine Ranch. The ranch is under attack. The attackers are killing without hesitation. Me and half my men are on route to the ranch now. I can't pull anymore deputies from the city. Looking for assistance."
"We are heading that way."
Dasher, who sitting at the same table as Gerald, heard everything. He already had a map out and had found Lone Pine Ranch on it.
"It is a ways outside of town." He reported while showing Gerald the location.
"Then let's get going."
"Waiter!" Dasher yelled to catch the man's attention.
When the server looked to Dasher, he saw the man holding up money and setting it on the table. Before the waiter could come over, the two Marshals were already outside and on their horses.
***
Two and a half hours later, the pair crested a hill and could see the ranch. Every building was on fire. In the center of the ranch, a single pine tree, almost a hundred feet tall, struggled to stand while the flames licked at it.
The Sheriff's and his deputies were at the well. They drew buckets and passed them forward. But the fires were already blazing with a passion. Buckets from the well was no different than trying to spit on the fire to put it out.
Gerald and Dasher dismounted in a flash and ran up to the Sheriff.
"How can we help?" Gerald asked.
Daniels passed the bucket in his hands to a deputy and shook his head.
"It was like this when we showed up half an hour ago. We haven't seen any traces of a soul." He said with a disheartened expression.
Dasher frowned while Gerald spoke. "We will take a look around."
The Sheriff nodded and got back to it. Just because it didn't look like they were making a difference didn't mean he was going to stop.
Dasher and Gerald ran to the main house. The roof and second floor had already collapsed. The flames were starting to die down, but the embers radiated an even stronger heat.
Gerald tilted his head and listened to the crackling wood and the whipping flames and then he moved on.
He ran to the bunk house where the ranch hands stayed. The buildings frame was still standing, but the walls had started to collapse. The roof wouldn't be long behind it.
He tilted his head and listened. Metal squealed and red-hot cinders popped.
Gerald ran from building to building. He checked the stable, the livestock feed room and so on. He listened but only heard the sounds of fire.
*Crash*
The bunk house collapsed.
Dasher went to help the Sheriff and his deputies who were trying to put out the main house.
Gerald continued to the smaller buildings. He checked the long storage, the blacksmith, and the granary.
He came to the chicken house and tilted his house and listened.
Suddenly, Gerald's eyes squinted as he tossed aside his hat. He took a step back and ran into the burning building straight through the walls that were growing weaker by the second.
In a water pool that was dug into the ground, a small five-year-old girl was curled up and crying.
Embers and cinders were falling from the roof above while the little girl hugged her legs and buried her head in her lap.
She slowly looked up with a heartbroken expression when she heard Gerald smash down the wall.
"You are going to be okay." Gerald said as he knelt down in front of her.
"They… they…dead…Mama…"
She was hysterical and could barely speak between her sobs.
Gerald was about to pull her out when he heard something that caused him to stop.
"Silver…monster…goo…"
Gerald grabbed the little girl by the shoulder.
"Look into my eyes." He commanded while bring her right in front of him.
Gerald's eyes disappeared and were replaced with tiny balls of hellfire that swirled in his eye sockets. The flames within five feet of the pair suddenly retreated as if they were living beings that were running in fear. They didn't dare to touch Gerald.
"Calm down and tell me what you saw." Gerald slowly said.
The young girl's body and face suddenly went slack, and her tears stopped falling. She then spoke in a clam and monotone voice.
"I heard loud noises outside. Guns were being shot. My daddy pulled me out of my bed and took me here. He told me to hide and not come out unless he or mommy came and got me. I stayed with the chickens and peeked through the gaps in the boards. Bad men on horses rode into the ranch and shot everyone they saw. They pulled everyone out and shot them one at a time. My daddy tried to save my mommy, but they made him watch as they killed her and then the other ranch hands before they killed him. Then they searched all the buildings while wagons came into the ranch."
"Go on, what happened next." Gerald said while his eyes continued to blaze with hellfire. Two small horns started to poke up through his hair. Each moment that the hellfire swirled, the horns slowly grew.
"I hid under the water when they came to check the building. I held my breath real long as the bad men chased the chickens out. They let them run wild, not like the livestock. Then I went back to the crack. The bad men on horses were herding the cows, sheep and pigs. Then a carriage pulled into the ranch. A man in a black suit got down. Everyone called him boss. He spoke to the bad men and they started to carry everyone into the buildings and set them on fire."
The horns on Gerald's head had grown two inches long and were starting to curl back on themselves as they grew thicker.
"The bad man who was ordering the horse riders then said he wanted to talk to Boss in private. They came and spoke behind the chicken house. That was when… That was when…"
"Tell me what happened next."
"The bad man said he would be a better boss. The man in the suit frowned. When he reached for his gun, the bad man grabbed his face. The man in the suit went limp while the bad man turned silver, like liquid metal. But he held him up by his head. The Silver monster took off the man's suit and shoes. Then the boss melted and turned into a pile of goo. The Silver shine on the man disappeared and he looked exactly like the boss. He put on the black suit and shoes and then walked back out towards the others. He started yelling and giving orders, but he sounded exactly like the first man. Then, when they had put all the ranch people into the buildings, they set them on fire. Everyone then left with the animals."
"I want you to tell me what the man in the suit looked like."
"He had brown hair. Glasses with gold rims on a hooked nose."
"Any scars or tattoos?"
She shook her head.
"Did you see the color of his eyes?"
She shook her head.
"How tall was he?"
"About the same height as my daddy."
"Was he fat or thin?"
"About the same as my daddy."
Gerald then thought about the shoes that the doppelganger took. Not many people have multiple pairs of shoes.
"What did his shoes look like? And were they shoes and not boots?"
"They were black shoes, but the tips were painted white."
"It is okay, everything is over now." Gerald said to the little girl. "Now I want you to pay extra special attention to what I am about to say next. Can you do that?"
The girl nodded in a robotic fashion.
"Good. I want you to forget everything that happened after you hid in the water. After that, you don't remember anything. Your memory will start again when you wake up and it is sunny out. Alright, last thing. Bury this deep in your heart. Remember this when things get their hardest. Don't ever forget that as long as you have hope, things will get better. When things seem impossible you will keep believing in yourself. You won't give up. Can you do that?"
The girl nodded again.
"Okay, now go to sleep."
Her body went limp and her eyes closed as she fell asleep.
Gerald put an arm around her and held the girl close to him as the fire in his eyes disappeared. He then walked out of the building as the fire parted around him. He looked around first and made sure nobody was around. When the coast was clear, he stepped out and grabbed the hat he had cast aside. He then put it back on his head to cover up the horns that were slowly shrinking down.
He then yelled while running towards the others. "Over here! I found someone still breathing!"