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The Weird West, or A Tale of Morality in an Immoral World

Started by Doktor Howl, March 17, 2015, 04:48:31 PM

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Doktor Howl

#60
And now, a very important message from our sponsors


Scene:  Irish Spring commercial, circa 1980.  Early middle age man wearing golf togs and a flat cap is sitting on a rock in a meadow whittling while he smokes a pipe.  For no apparent reason, he pulls out a bar of soap.   

"Welcome to the auld sod, where we like things fresh and green."

He gets up and move stage right, where a man is standing, looking nervously around him.

"Green as the Irish countrysoid" The man says, and slices a bit of the soap off with his knife, showing you that the inside has the same marbled appearance as the outside, "Green as a fresh summer marnin'."

He stops and silently considers the nervous man.

"As green as this supergrass here, who sold Finn McCool to the English."

Without warning, he stabs the nervous man in the eye.  The man drops dead.   The handsome man turns to face the camera, his face speckled with blood.

"So buy Irish spring, ye cunts ye, or me and the boys will be around with the power tools.  Cunts."

Fade to a box of Irish Spring sitting on a bloodstained stump.



Molon Lube

LMNO


Doktor Howl

#62
Chapter 3

The desert

The Preacher was making his way back Northwest when he met up with a middle-aged man riding a horse.  The man was dressed in non-descript clothing, and had a massive Colt on his hip, and a Winchester sheathed on his saddle.  Behind him on his horse, the ghost of a native woman clung to him.  The man was polite, leaving his weapons where they were, giving the Preacher the advantage.  The Preacher nodded a greeting.

"How do, Preacher?"

"Passable.  What's your name, mister?"

"Wade, Wade Schmidt.  Say, how long before we get to water?  I'm new to these parts."  Now, that was interesting.

"Not far.  Three hours, perhaps.  Where are you from?"

"Dodge City of late.  Before that I hailed from Boston."

"A Yankee, then?  And how is Boston?"

"Boston is what every other Eastern city is.  A collection of dead men walking, if you care for my opinion.  The war knocked the spirit out of both sides, about the same.  It weren't just the war itself, neither.  The sack of Washington made the North look pathetic and the South look like barbarians.  Barbarian slavers, at that.  Between that and the martial law, you don't see so many immigrants as you might have when I was a kid.  A flood dried right to a trickle, and that trickle is an unsavory lot."

"How about the South?"

"It's as I said, 'every Eastern city'.  Richmond is a ghost town, damn near.  After the war, after the bust, it's like nobody could find a reason to go on building stuff.

"Yes, it's the same out here.  You should know that I'm a wanted man."

"Me too, Preacher.  What are they after you for?"

"I erred in theological beliefs."

"Ouch.  They ain't gonna quit coming after you."

"Nope.  You?"

"Poker game gone wrong.  There was gunplay.  Nancy got shot," he said, nodding over his shoulder at the ghost at his back, "And I guess I killed two men."

"So there's a rope waiting for both of us, then."

"That seems to be the right of it.  So where are we headed?"

The Preacher chuckled mirthlessly.  "Small town called Hattersfield.  Awful close to the county seat, but that's what I'm banking on.  That close, who'd look?"

"Risky."

"Well, I shot the horses out from under the posse, and killed on of them to boot.  They think I'm heading for Mexico."

"So now what?"

"So now, while they are away, I cleanse the temple."

"Huh?"

"I'm going to kill the hangman and anyone else who gets in my way."

"Well, I can't see much else worth doing.  May as well plug the man who'll string me up."

The two rode on, into the gathering dusk.

To be continued.








Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

About twice that much more later today.  I have stuff to manage.
Molon Lube

Eater of Clowns

Nice. He's spun things into his favor very neatly.

Irish Spring.  :lulz:
Quote from: Pippa Twiddleton on December 22, 2012, 01:06:36 AM
EoC, you are the bane of my existence.

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 07, 2014, 01:18:23 AM
EoC doesn't make creepy.

EoC makes creepy worse.

Quote
the afflicted persons get hold of and consume carrots even in socially quite unacceptable situations.

LMNO


Chelagoras The Boulder

"It isn't who you know, it's who you know, if you know what I mean.  And I think you do."

Doktor Howl

Molon Lube

The Wizard Joseph

That Irish Spring commercial was the tits. Could not help but think about the soap residue probably still on the knife. It was kind of you as an ST not to have the poor bastard in shrieking agony as a background for the outro.

Also 2 on 3 is much better odds... the hook is set deep!
You can't get out backward.  You have to go forward to go back.. better press on! - Willie Wonka, PBUH

Life can be seen as a game with no reset button, no extra lives, and if the power goes out there is no restarting.  If that's all you see life as you are not long for this world, and never will get it.

"Ayn Rand never swung a hammer in her life and had serious dominance issues" - The Fountainhead

"World domination is such an ugly phrase. I prefer to call it world optimisation."
- Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality :lulz:

"You program the controller to do the thing, only it doesn't do the thing.  It does something else entirely, or nothing at all.  It's like voting."
- Billy, Aug 21st, 2019

"It's not even chaos anymore. It's BANAL."
- Doktor Hamish Howl

Doktor Howl

I have the rest of the story completed in my head.  I haven't slept in 29 hours though, so it waits.  One more day.  Promise.
Molon Lube

Mesozoic Mister Nigel

Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 06, 2015, 10:28:24 AM
I have the rest of the story completed in my head.  I haven't slept in 29 hours though, so it waits.  One more day.  Promise.

29 hours??? FFS, man!
"I'm guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk," Charles Wick said. "It was very complicated."


Doktor Howl

Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 06, 2015, 02:39:39 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on April 06, 2015, 10:28:24 AM
I have the rest of the story completed in my head.  I haven't slept in 29 hours though, so it waits.  One more day.  Promise.

29 hours??? FFS, man!

I am like unto the cyborgs of old.
Molon Lube

Doktor Howl

Hattersfield

Wade sat in a chair, Winchester across his lap, staring out at the street below.  The Preacher lay on the bed, smoking a cigarette.  The Preacher felt that the posse had gone the other way, and that Wade was being paranoid.  That was fine with him...paranoia was just fine and dandy with him, when you got down to cases.

"Pssst!"  Wade was pointing out the window, never taking his eyes off of whatever it was he was looking at.

The Preacher walked to the window and peered out.  Below, the three remaining gunmen were riding into town on mules, of all things.

"Doesn't look very archetypical," The Preacher said.

"Huh?"

"Never mind.  Let's just shoot them."

Wade shrugged, lined up on Hank, and shot him dead.  The other two by instinct, attempted to spur their horses...But mules don't spur.  The kid's mule ignored him, but Virgil's dumped him on the ground.  Wade chambered a round, and shot the kid through the head.  Virgil rolled behind a stand of crates, then sprinted out from it, behind the general store.

"Damnation."

"No, don't worry.  One of them being alive suits me fine.  Oh, yes.  See?  He's stolen your horse, and he's heading out of town."

"He stole my horse?"

"Relax.  All shall be set right, and soon.  Now let's get some sleep.  Mornings come early, and there's work to be done.

(more in a second)
Molon Lube

LMNO


Doktor Howl

#74
The next morning

The Preacher woke to the sound of the rooster crowing.  He splashed water on his face, and belted on his gun.  Wade was still sleeping, and the Preacher didn't disturb him,  Instead, he went downstairs, and out the front door.  Walking down the street, he passed the Undertaker's shop.  An empty coffin stood on its end, with "The Heretic" carved on it.  Laughing, the preacher continued.

He walked into the courthouse.

Inside, it was dim, and somewhat cool.  Sitting at the bench was the Undertaker, smiling at him.

"Aren't you the clever one?" the Undertaker jibed.

"Clever enough to put paid to you."

"For certain," the Undertaker smiled, "But is that what you want?"

"Course."

"Tell me...Have you noticed the lack of people?"

"They all moved during the bust."

"What bust?"

"You know, the bust."

"Pretend I don't know, preacher man."

The Preacher through back.  Of course there had been a bust.  Everyone knew that.  The Preacher just couldn't put his finger on what it was or how it happened.

The Undertaker smile, showing more teeth than was polite.  "Now do you get it?  Now do you understand the ghosts?"

"Shut up."

"YOU'RE IN HELL, PREACHER!  We all are! HELL!"

The Preacher calmly drew his pistol and shot the undertaker in the eye.  The Undertaker fell without a sound, dead before he hit the ground.

He sat on the prosecutor's desk, lost in thought.  He did have ONE idea.

The Saloon

The saloon was hot; the desert sun beat down on it, and there was no breeze.

Inside, the place was empty, save for four haunted lawmen - gunslingers, reallly, who just happened to have taken straight jobs at some point recently - who sat around a table drinking whiskey and playing cards.  To say 'haunted' in this situation is not a metaphor, as we shall see shortly.  The room was silent, save for the flipping of cards and the creak of the floorboards as one of them would, from time to time, go to the bar to refill his glass.  The rules said that there were to be no bottles at the table, and these four were (at the moment) rule-abiding men...To whom I shall introduce you:

There was the Commanche, another standard trope, and he was followed by the ghost of a scalped cavalry man.

There was the Black freedman, whose ghost was a whip, ready to deliver the beatings he'd fled from.

There was the Texan, whose ghost was that of a young Hispanic girl.

And then there was Wade.  Wade was from...Well, that was sort of unclear.  Wade had always been here.  It was he who welcomed the rest of this small group, Wade who showed them where the booze was, and explained the rules to them, in what seemed like the distant past.  Nevertheless, the others agreed he was a good host - though he denied owning the place - and they decided that none of them needed to learn more about his admittedly bizarre arrangement.

They were playing for matchsticks, the last payday they had being quite some time before.  As the other three threw down their hands in disgust, as The Commanche raked in the pile of matchsticks, there was a footstep on the boardwalk outside of the saloon.  The players looked up, somehow hoping not to see the only man that it could be.  And it was.  The Preacher stood in the door, holding a rolled up piece of paper...Their next job.

Wade walked up to the Preacher, and received the paper.

There was a picture in the center, and it said "Virgil Earp, Dead or Alive, $500.

There is, of course, a moral to all of this, but no time for that now.  There's a posse to form.

END
Molon Lube