Cha'Nara's Gift

Chapter 10

Chapter 10 The Quick and the Dead

Emily was now getting up, apparently Pip had filled her in on the night's activities, I then noticed the army colt Ben had tucked in his pants. "Where did you get that?" I said, pointing to the pistol. "Cha'Nara let me borrow it, here, I'll give it back," "Not so fast there son, Cha'Nara had the right idea, tell ya what, there's a holster that goes with that, it's your's Keep the pistol, I've got a Winchester I'll let you have as well, I was just going to sell them, they go for a real nice price in my time, can't let you go unarmed around here, you and Cha'Nara did real good, I'm proud of you two, got some other stuff I'll let you have as well, but for now let's eat I'm starved, Woman! Where's my breakfast?" "Up your's Marine!" replied Emily. I laughed and walked over to her and gave her a hug and a kiss, "Did Pip say anything about how Ben's mom is doing?" "Still sleeping, no change really," "Do we risk going out again today? I'm starting to trust Cha'Nara more now; she seems to rising to the challenge." "Yeah" replied Emily, "I'm really pleased with her, she's been a natural when it comes to helping me with Mrs. Miller." "That's good, C'mon let's go chow down on some of those MRE'S"

"Ben, come here, got breakfast for ya," I dangled an MRE bag as Ben walked over, "Son, believe it or not there's a full meal inside this bag, all us badass Marines eat 'em, here let me show you." I had Ben sit down on a log and proceeded to tear open the plastic bag, I handed Ben each separate pouch inside. Boom! Smack! I heard the rifle shot before hearing the slug hit a post. "Everybody hit the dirt!" I pulled Ben down on the ground, his breakfast flying in all directions. "Pip get inside your craft NOW! Ben, you go there too, the rest of the guns are there, ammo too, watch her, both of you stay in there, now move!" Ben scooted over to the "unit" entrance as more shots rang out; I crawled for my rifle as I shouted, "Where are they at?" Emily yelled back, "On the hill." Emily opened up with her Armalite as I retrieved my TAC vest with all its ammo pouches, and my rifle. "Remember babe, pick you're targets, squeeeze that trigger." By now pieces of wood were flying everywhere as heavy caliber slugs smacked into our little stockade, I also heard a couple "Pings" indicating bullets had found the spacecraft. "God I hope that thing is heavy enough to withstand bullets" I thought.

I crawled up to the base of the stockade and stuck me barrel through trying to acquire targets with the scope. I relaxed and centered the crosshairs on what looked like a man lying in the grass, suddenly a white puff of smoke appeared indicating where the shooter was. I fired just below the smoke and heard a scream, now more puffs of smoke appeared, one thing about black powder, it gave away you're position. I carefully located my targets by the smoke. I must have been getting "hits" as suddenly a man raised up to run, I caught him in the chest, pitching him backwards, "I hear something over here to the right" shouted Emily. I crawled over to that side, and saw movement through the cracks in the posts. I looked through the scope and fired through the cracks. POWM, POWM, POWM! A man screamed and I could see trashing around out there. I moved closer to the wall, and watched for more movement. I saw something moving through the brush towards us, I centered the cross hairs on the bush and squeezed off several rounds, slow and steady. I was rewarded with a body flying backwards. The shooting seemed to stop, I checked quickly at the craft, calling out to Ben. "Everybody OK in there?" "We're fine sir," replied the boy. "Good, just stay put until I give the all clear, we don't know if we've got 'em all yet."

I then crawled over to Emily who was just slamming another magazine into her carbine. "Hellava way to greet the morning ain't it babe?" "f**k! Who are these assholes?" "Could be the buddies of those guys we killed the other day, who knows? We'll wait for a few more minutes then check, grab your shotgun." Emily slung her carbine and grabbed her shotgun; we waited almost fifteen minutes before cautiously exiting the fort and moving towards our right. We came upon the first guy I shot lying on the ground, blood all over his chest, but still breathing. "I'm killed" he gasped, " "You sure the f**k are!" snarled Emily as she obliterated his head with a blast from her shotgun.

"Goddammit Emily, don't kill 'em I want to find out who these guys are!" I bent down and did a quick body search, finding a small bag of gold dust, some coins and a pouch of tobacco. I pulled off his gun belt with a pistol, and recovered another Winchester. We then moved on to the guy in the bush who was quite dead. Nothing in his pockets, but another holster and pistol with a sharps this time, I figured he was the one who started shooting first. We threw the guns over the wall and continued up the hill. Two more bodies awaited us one however still showed signs of life. "Don't kill him Emily; let's get some intel off him first." I pulled off his gun belt then bent down close to his face, and asked, "Who the f**k are you guys?" The man struggled and coughed blood, he gasped out a response, "J-j-just saw your fort, figured you'd be easy picken's." "Well you thought wrong shithead!" snarled Emily, "All your buddies are dead. f**k with us you f**k with death!" The man coughed once then died.

A body check of the two men revealed around ten dollars in change, a couple silver dollars, another pocket knife, more tobacco, extra bullets and a crumpled letter.

The horses were tethered about 20 yards away, we checked the saddle bags and found rancid bacon, jerky, a couple boxes of .44 rounds, a small bag of gold dust, and a curry brush. Emily and I walked the horses over to our picket line where we secured them with the others. "Quite a lot of loot here I'd say," Ben and Cha'Nara came out to inspect the slaughter. "Ben, please keep Cha'nara away from the bodies, OK? I'd like you to go and collect any items of clothing that look useable, outfit yourself first, any boots that might fit you, any hats vests, whatever, there's a practically a brand new Winchester in that scabbard over there, it's yours as far as I'm concerned, claim a saddle as well." Ben smiled at the prospect of gaining all this "loot" "Pip go and see how Ben's mother is doing, would you please?" said Emily. "Crap! More damn graves to dig!' I muttered. I talked it over with Ben and we decided to just load the bodies on the wagon and haul them about a mile away and shove them off into a small ravine. "Hellofa way to go, carrion for the buzzards, a man shouldn't end up like this Ben," I said as we finished disposing of the bodies.

Before we left, I said, "Ben, wanna shoot my rifle? You'll be the first 19th century person to shoot a 21st century weapon." "S-s-sure," We stood away from the team and I instructed Ben on shooting in the prone position. "Ben, this is the best way to fire this weapon, tuck the stock tight into your shoulder, body positioned at a slight angle, like you're doing there, OK, pull the charging lever back, you got it, now aim at that tree way out there, that one so far out it looks like a bush." Ben indicated he knew which one I was talking about. "OK son, center that tree on the upper level of the crosshairs. Now, gently squeeze the trigger, gently now," Ben squeezed off five shots, I spotted with my binoculars he hit three of five times. I gave him some more instruction on breath control and maintaining the proper sight picture then let him fire a few more times, his aim really improved. "Only the Marine Corps really trains soldiers to soot properly, even Emily can be a crack shot when she wants to, but don't you tell her I said that!" As we traveled back to the fort, I asked Ben what he thought of the M1A, "I can't believe there's no smoke, that rifle is incredible sir, If we had many of these, think what we could do to the Indians!" I did, and didn't care much for the thought.

As we pulled up near the gate, Emily came out and asked, "What the Hell was all that shooting? Scared the Hell out of us, thought you two got ambushed or something." "Just teaching young Ben here how to shoot." Emily grunted then said, "Ben, you're moms awake, she wants to see you," Ben jumped off the wagon and ran into the tent. "How's she doing?" I inquired. "She's awake and sitting up, I'm keeping Cha'Nara out of there until Ben's mom can take the shock of seeing somebody like her. "Where is she by the way?" "Sleeping in her "unit" being up all night really had her dragging, then after all the excitement this morning."

I quietly peeked into the spacecraft, and saw Pip lying on a couple sleeping bags down the aisle of her "unit" sleeping away, I took a picture of her, a picture I might add is one of the best ones we have of her.

I then went to the tent to see Mrs. Miller. She was lying back down with Ben sitting next to her. "How are you doing Mrs. Miller?" she groaned, but forced a smile, "I feel terrible, Ben's told me about you and him burying my husband, and the nice words you spoke over him, I don't know who you people are, but bless you so much." "Well ma'am, I'll let your son explain who we are, he's a fine young man, and has been a real big help around here." I gave Ben a wink as I went back outside. Emily was sitting on a log cleaning her weapon, I sat down next to her and said "Emily, how are we going to handle leaving here with two extra passengers, obviously, we can't take the horses, I thought that if we put the generator and converter in the Miller

wagon we could use Pip's disappearing device to bring it along, but Cha'Nara has never indicated whether we could use it or not. I suppose we've got to face the fact that we'll have to leave all the horses here." Emily grimaced and said, "I've been thinking the same thing as well, as soon as I finish cleaning this thing, we'd better go talk to Ben and his mother.

When Emily finished, we entered the tent and sat down, "Ben, Mrs. Miller we need to talk about something real important." Ben suddenly interrupted me by saying, "You're leaving and don't know what to do with the wagon or the horses!" I looked at Ben and smiled, "That's what I like about you son, you're right on the ball, sharp! We're only moving, up towards South Platte, roughly about 75 miles away, I've got an idea on how we can take the wagon, but the horses will have to stay here, I really hate to do this, but we have no choice." Without missing a beat, Ben spoke up, "Sir, how about if I take the wagon and only a couple horses and ride up to where you're going?" Mrs. Miller gasped, "No son, it would be too dangerous, look what happened to us." "Ben, you're mother's right, there may not even be a road up there as yet, you start herding a bunch of horses and you'll be the target of every horse thief or Indian in the area.

"You said you had a way to take the wagon, how about I just drive the horses up there, or at the very least, sell them somewhere?" This idea sounded more plausible but was still dangerous, "Selling them isn't a bad idea, but there might be a stock trader who might recognize those animals as belonging to the men we shot, and wonder what you're doing with them, you'll end up on the wrong end of a rope, sorry Ben, no can do, if it was only a short distance, I'd say yes, but I don't know what's between here and there and neither do you, I can't in good conscious let you do this, what about you're mother here?" "Ben! Do as this man says, it's too dangerous, I need you with me."

"Listen to your mother Ben" I said. Ben became very dejected; I went to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Ben, you're doing good work here, I want you with us, but I'm afraid we're just going to have to leave the horses, there's no way around it." Ben eventually gave in, and accepted my decision. "People will find them, prospectors, Indians, whoever, at least we aren't doing like the army did during Sherman's campaign in Georgia, and just shoot unwanted stock."

We waited another day for Ben's mother to feel better, and pack things up, Emily fretted about Mrs. Miller's reaction to Cha'Nara but I had an idea, Ben was still down in the dumps about leaving the horses, I took him aside and said, "Ben, we need you to break the news about Cha'Nara to your mother, we're leaving tomorrow, and I thought since you and Pip are getting along so well you could think of a way to, you know, explain her to your mom." Ben shrugged and said, "What's to explain?" He walked over to where Cha'nara was working on something, spoke to her and together the two of them walked into the tent; I heard a shriek, a "Mother!" another yelp then silence. Ben and Cha'Nara emerged from the tent and came up to me and said, "Cha'Nara touched her head to mother's and did what she did to your wife, when my mother awakens, she will understand." He then followed Pip back to where she had been working, leaving me just staring at them in total amazement. I told Emily about it and got a good laugh out of her, "I'd better go see to Ben's mom, I'll give her some aspirin for the headache she's gonna have when she comes to."