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Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

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Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103 last won the day on October 27 2016

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About Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103

  • Birthday 03/31/1956

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    27332
  • SASS Affiliated Club
    Firelands Peacemakers

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  • Gender
    Male
  • Location
    Lorain County, Ohio
  • Interests
    History, calligraphy, any game that burns powder
    BOLD 103, Center Township Combat Pistol League
    Skywarn, ham radio, and no idea what I want to do when I grow up!

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  1. I HEARD A SMALL VOICE A cowboy hat came over the crest of Cemetery Drive. A pink cowboy hat, with a silver-and-turquoise hatband and a back strap. It was attached to a pretty lass, bigger than a child but not yet a woman, an equestrienne between the ages of thirteen: intelligent enough to have been graduated shockingly early, with enough drive and savvy to establish multiple business ventures, but vulnerable enough to realize that sometimes a girl just wants to come home. She drew her mare to a halt, swung down: though the mare was knee-trained and bitless, she was reined, and Victoria dropped the reins and caressed the warm-furred, spotty Appaloosa neck and whispered, "Stay," and the mare started snuffing the winter-dry grass sticking up through the snow. Victoria walked over to a grave, stared at the tombstone, at the image of the woman she barely remembered. "Gammaw," she said, her voice small and thin in the winter wind, "you came home to here when you were young." She swallowed, bit her bottom lip, looked out over the graveyard, looked across the great distance to the town below: she closed her eyes, took a long breath. "Gammaw, I need to come home and ..." Victoria blinked, her eyes stinging, her voice tightening to a squeak: "I miss my Daddy!" Sheriff Linn Keller stood behind the podium, stepped out from behind it. "You don't need a lecture," he said, "so here's what's on my mind." He reached for a box on a low table beside the podium, pushed a toggle switch: there was a sharp *click* -- a cylinder of light seared into life beside him, then within the cylinder, an attractive young woman: she stood, hands clasped in front of her, head tilted a little, apparently looking at the audience. "This is a hologram," the Sheriff said. "That's my daughter Victoria. "I told her what I'm going to tell you right now. "Victoria was graduated far earlier than usual. There was resistance from the school board, that resistance was overcome, and since then, Victoria has been broadening her education in ways I could never have dreamed of. She is established in business, she has a market base that puts to absolute shame anything I ever tried, she is a success and a marvel and she is a gifted performer on top of that. "I told her what I'm telling you now. "If things get uncomfortable, come home. "If things get too rough, come home. "If you find someone you think will be the perfect mate for life and they hit you -- even once -- come home. I have forty acres, a shotgun and a backhoe." The Firelands High School student body laughed quietly at that one, then applauded: the Sheriff grinned -- that quick, contagious, boyish grin of his -- "Well, maybe not that last part, but come home, and I told my sons that same thing. "If you can't handle credit cards and you bankrupt and get evicted from your apartment, come home." He looked at the hologram, looked back at the student body. "That goes for you guys as well. Don't ever be ashamed to come back home where you're safe." The light-cylinder beside him flickered, steadied: he reached for the box on the table, pressed his thumb against the chrome toggle switch, pushed. There was the usual sharp *click!* and the light-cylinder disappeared. Victoria did not. She looked out over the student body, blinked, then she turned to the Sheriff and said in a small voice, "Daddy, can I come home?" The student body came to its feet, roaring approval, pounding their palms together and whistling, yelling encouragement as a long tall Sheriff stooped and seized his little girl, hugged her into him, stood, bringing her feet well off the floor. Had he said anything in reply, the applause, the whistles, the yells of approval would have drowned out the sound of the small voice he'd heard.
  2. GAMP-PAW, CAN I STAY HERE WITH YOU? Littlejohn watched his Uncle Jacob with a fascinated attention. Uncle Jacob was talking to someone. Littlejohn's eyes were wide and unblinking as Uncle Jacob showed his nephew a picture of the globe, with colored rings around it, representing layers of the atmosphere: another picture, with a cartoon Sun and wobbly lines to indicate sunlight, then a third, showing a pointy thing (Littlejohn had never seen a radio mast) and zigzag blue lines to show radiation from the antenna and how it reflected off ionized layers of the atmosphere. Littlejohn watched and listened as Uncle Jacob made several ham radio contacts, then he watched, puzzled, as Uncle Jacob used what he called a "paddle" -- Littlejohn wasn't sure just what his Uncle was doing, but the radio made funny beepy noises as he did. Littlejohn clumped along, dutifully following his Gamp-paw as the older man forked out stalls -- Littlejohn wore a pair of Angela's outgrown muck boots, fortunately in kind of a greenish-brown instead of a girly-pink pair he saw hanging from the rack -- Linn put a little cargo in the wheelbarrow and had Littlejohn wheel the Irish Buggy out to the manure pile. Littlejohn bent and frowned seriously as Linn lifted the hoof on one of the white fire mares, as he scraped and tapped and inspected and pronounced that hoof good; Littlejohn laughed as his long tall Gamp-paw snatched him up, swung him way up on a mare's back: they walked the fence, grandfather and grandson and a cluster of mares. Linn had Littlejohn pull on a pair of work gloves and help him hitch a two wheel trailer on the Farmall Cub that usually lived with a mower on its three-point hitch. Linn showed Littlejohn how to pull the safety pins and he gave his grinning grandboy a rubber mallet and had him knock the pins out to drop the mower, there in the barn, and Littlejohn rode his Gamp-paw's thigh as Linn swung the Cub around and backed it up to the trailer. Four hands gripped the thickwall pipe trailer tongue and set it on the ball hitch. Linn had Littlejohn flip down the latch, then Linn looked very seriously at his grandson and said, "Littlejohn, you drivin' yet?" and Littlejohn blinked, surprised, then looked kind of bashful and mumbled something about just bein' a little kid. "Horse feathers," Linn grinned. "Climb up in that seat, it's time you l'arned how to run a tractor!" What followed was less a collaborative effort and more ... well, young hands on the wheel did all right, but young legs were too short to run the clutch, and the gearbox was out of reach without leaning over to a significant degree, but on level ground, Linn leaned back and told Littlejohn, "She's all yours now," and bumped the throttle open a little more, and it would be hard to tell which of the two was grinning the more broadly as the little red Farmall cackled happily across the pasture. Angela told a colleague, some years before, that her Daddy operated by the medical school principle of "Learn it, do it, teach it," and in another classroom example she quoted him -- "Show men and I'll forget it, tell me and I won't remember it, but involve me, and I've got it forever!" Littlejohn learned about hosing muck off his boots before he took them off and hung them up, he learned how to hitch on a trailer and how to pull the safety pin and then knock out the heavy pins to drop a mower from the three point hitch. Littlejohn learned what a level was, and how to use a level, Littlejohn strutted back to the trailer and brought Gamp-paw the tamper (it was the only long thing in there) and he learned how to tamp in a fence post, and how to use the long aluminum level to determine plumb. He wasn't sure quite why a fence post had to be plumb, but his Gamp-paw seemed to think it was important enough, and so Littlejohn decided in his young mind fence posts had to be trued up when they were tamped in. Littlejohn wobbled a little once they got back in the house, Gamp-paw held one young hand to steady his grandson as one boot, then the other, was slid off and left in the boot tray: Littlejohn sprinted upstairs, washed his hands with the abbreviated ferocity of the impatient young, then washed them again, knowing Gamp-paw would examine them to make sure he'd gotten them clean. Littlejohn came back downstairs with all the stealth of a bear cub after two pots of coffee. It had been quite some time since Linn and Shelly had an active, noisy, curious little boy under their roof, and both decided this was very much to their taste: Marnie and Dr. John were off on their own for a week or so, and in the meantime, Linn fully intended to teach his grandson a variety of manly skills, such as how to whistle, how to whittle, how to spit ... you know, important stuff! Littlejohn was about two-thirds of the way through his slice of pie when they noticed he was starting to drowse: to his credit, Littlejohn finished dessert, but only just. He had no recollection of being carried upstairs; it was only when he'd been divested of shirt and drawers, only when his socks were pulled off, only when flannel sheets covered him like a warm, fuzzy, gentle hug, that he rallied, that he looked up with the sudden sincerity of the very young. "Gamp-paw," he said in a drowsy, little-boy voice, "can I stay here with you?" He didn't stay awake long enough to hear whatever reply his Gamp-paw might have given.
  3. Madame Pele is restless!
  4. SOME SEASONING REQUIRED Dr. John Greenlees, M.D., Chief Surgeon of Firelands (Mars), shook hands with his relief. "Dr. Summit," he said, "I'm trying to think of some good free advice, and my mind just went blank!" Robert Summit, a respected physician and surgeon from one of the more advanced Confederate worlds, laughed quietly: "Doctor, I believe each of us will benefit from the experience! How long has it been since you had vacation?" "Too long," Marnie interjected, claiming her husband's arm. "Now before you think of something to delay us, John, we are packed, Littlejohn is already insisting on riding my Daddy's Outlaw-horse, and you know what that means!" "Duty calls," Dr. Greenlees sighed, looking at his wife and smiling gently: "and a most pleasant duty this is!" Husband and wife stepped through the Iris, disappeared; Dr. Robert Summit looked around, nodded his approval at the Martian infirmary, so very much like his own suite back home. Michael Keller leaned forward in the saddle, hands flat on Lightning's bulging, muscled neck, feeling her move, feeling her gallop, feeling her very life! -- there is no ride like a ride on a fast horse, and when that horse had fangs, ate meat, killed native buffalo and stood as tall as an African elephant, the experience was at once better than, and yet so very unlike, running his Pa's horses back home! Lightning found her stride: she ran with a four-strike cadence, slower than a saddlehorse, owing to her heavier build, her greater height, the greater reach of her heavy-boned legs, yet her velocity was comparable to an Earth-horse. Two smaller Fanghorns paced Lightning: they were smaller, just as fast: Jacob knew from watching Fanghorn herds that their young were remarkably swift, rarely outrun by the rest of the herd. Michael kept an eye on the young Fanghorns: when they started to drop back, he leaned back in his saddle, slowed Lightning: the small herd coasted to a fast walk, Thunder and Cyclone chirping intermittently as they slowed. They drew up in sight of town. Michael let them graze: Thunder waded out into a stream, drank, came back up the bank, slashed his thick, coarse-haired tail: Michael didn't see any flies, but he reckoned this was a sign of contentment, or at least approval. Cyclone paced downstream, rather than surging boldly down the embankment: she drank almost daintily -- "Yep, you're a girl, all right," Michael said softly, his hand caressing Lightning's thick neck: the Herd Mare waited until the young watered, and were returned, before she, too, drank -- but Lightning drank like a deer: she took a taste of the water, lifted her head quickly, looking around; another drink, another look: the colts, if that's the proper term for young Fanghorns, saw this, and began looking around as well. They made their leisurely way toward the town. Michael wanted to see a man of his acquaintance. He had all day to get there, the distance was not far, and he was not about to rush his small herd, for the grass here was good, it was what they were used to. Michael smiled a little as he recalled something his pale eyed Pa told him once. I think better in the saddle. A preacher looked out the window and smiled. A little boy's fingertips gripped the edge of the widow sill, a little boy's legs thrust him up barely far enough to see out, at least until his Pa's big, warm hands gripped him under the arms and hoist him up. A little boy with curly hair and big eyes stared, awe-struck, at someone he'd only seen on the Inter-System, at something he'd only seen on the glowing screen, at two smaller versions of that big, fanged creature. A little boy put an uncertain finger to the corner of his mouth and looked at his Pa, wide-eyed and hopeful. Michael bent over a little. It wasn't necessary, not really, but he knew he was being watched, and he knew Thunder was like any child, full of play, and as a preacher came out the door with a little boy in his arms, Michael gave a mock-indignant yell and made a futile swipe at the bandanna Thunder neatly pickpocketed from where he'd intentionally hung it out of his back pocket: the young Fanghorn stallion threw his head, waving the wild rag like a banner, Michael chased Thunder, Cyclone chased Michael, Lightning unfolded her legs and followed, her hoof-falls absolutely silent, in spite of her (quite literal) tonnage. Thunder ran up behind the preacher almost as if he was hiding from the man. Michael grinned and thrust out his hand, then he carefully reached up and very gently shook the Preacher's little boy's hand. "Nehemiah," he said quietly, "are you behavin' yourself?" "Yis!" Nehemiah declared. Thunder came up beside Michael, thrust his head under Michael's arm: the wild rag was surrendered in favor of some ear scratching, and Michael grinned, "Nehemiah, did you ever see a genuine wild Fanghorn before?" "Yis!" Nehemiah laughed, and Michael laughed with him, then looked at the preacher. "Reverend," he said, "I've got some coffee that needs ground, and I could use some wise counsel." "I've got that brand new coffee grinder you gave me," the man replied, "come on inside!" The Parson's wife smiled as she watched their little boy running, the Fanghorn colts on either side: they turned, they came back, and their son, red-cheeked and laughing, stopped and turned and looked at the elephantine Lightning. Lightning turned and looked down at this small creature that seemed to delight the colts with his laugh and with his exertion. The Parson's wife smiled, the back of her hand to her mouth, as the little boy looked waaaaay up at the Fanghorn mare and declared, "Vurbeeg!" "Parson," Michael said, his fingers delicately gripping the crystal watch fob and the memories it held, "I lost someone ... I thought ... very ..." Michael's voice trailed off and he swallowed hard, as if trying to down something sticky. "I can accept death, Parson. I've seen the Valley myself. So did Lightning. I'm not afraid of dyin' ... nothing I could do to keep her from it, or I would have." "Her?" "Her name was Annette. She was my age." "Ah." "Parson, I can't say as my boiler is fired up yet. I'm too young to have that happen." Michael shifted, his expression uncertain: he frowned, struggling to form up coherence from the vagueness he felt. "Do you miss her?" "I do, sir." "Is there something special ... she liked?" Michael considered for a long moment. "Parson, she'd been blinded by some-or-another plant. I don't know what it was, everyone got together and dug out every one of those plants once it burned the eyes out of her head. The same doctors that regrew my spine and all those nerves and got everything connected back up and workin' right, they ... regrew her eyes." The Parson waited. Michael leaned back, a look on his face the Parson had never seen in one so young. He'd seen it in men who'd seen horrors and death, he'd seen men's eyes staring through the wall, seeing something a thousand miles distant. He'd never seen that in one of so few years. "The first thing she saw, once they regrew her eyes and they took off the bandages ... the very first thing, was stars. "When she found out near to a year later that damned plant poisoned her brain and it was killing her and not one thing anyone could do to stop it" -- Michael's hands closed to fists: they rested on the table top, he closed his eyes, took a long breath. "Parson, she asked me to send her ashes out among those stars she saw. She said she wanted to be part of that great beauty." "Did you?" "I did, sir." Michael's fingers caressed the dangling crystal watch fob. "From dust we came, and to dust we shall return," Michael said softly, "and hers ... hers is returned to Creation." "Then you have done a good thing." Michael nodded. "I arranged funding for them to build a children's wing on that hospital that worked on me and worked on her. Doubled the size of the place. I arranged ..." Michael closed his eyes, took a long breath. "Parson, I raised funds enough to make ten men wealthy, and I gave it in her name. I asked only one thing of them, that they put her name somewhere that it could be seen." "Did they?" Michael nodded. "Right over the front door of the new construction," he said, the pulled out something rectangular that lit up when he touched it. He turned the screen to show the Parson. It showed a wide set of glass doors, and overhead, across the lintel: The Juliette Wing, he read. "I didn't do it all myself. Marnie is Ambassador and she arranged necessary introductions, but ..." "But you raised the money." "Yes, sir." "You made it happen." "Yes, sir." "You made a difference." "For some," Michael said hoarsely. "I heard Pa talk about 'Too little, too late,' and that's how it felt." "What of the children that came after, those who were treated there?" Michael looked at the Parson, considered. "I don't know them," he said frankly. "I knew Juliette." "And you hurt for her loss." Michael nodded, looked away, looking as lost as he felt. "What is the advice you need from me?" "Parson" -- Michael blinked and almost visibly shifted gears -- "ever since I've been on the Inter-System, ever since Victoria and I came across the screen and rode to the sound of a fight, we've ... we're known. Victoria receives marriage proposals, she's way too young and so am I, I've had women and girls all in a lather to snatch me up for a marryin' prize." The Parson nodded slowly, thoughtfully. "Parson, I don't reckon I need advice as much as I need what you're givin' me right now." "How's that?" The Parson leaned forward, clearly interested. "Pa told me most times a man already knows the right answer and sometimes he has to sort through the gravel to find it." "Have you found it?" "Yes, sir, and thank you." "I'm glad I could help, but I'm not sure I understand what help I've been!" Michael leaned back, squared his shoulders. "Parson, there's an awful lot in me that's ... most times I don't know straight up from go-to-hell," he said frankly. "I reckon I just needed a sympathetic ear so I could throw some things out on the air and see what they sound like." The Parson nodded thoughtfully. "I just needed someplace safe," Michael said softly. The scent of roasted coffee being ground teased their senses as Michael stood, suddenly, decisively. "Thank you for your time, sir. I reckon I need to go talk things over with my Pa." "Before you go," the Parson's wife said gently, "if you wondered about making a difference, look out the window." Parson, mother and guest came to the window, looked outside. Lightning stood, facing the small group of curious folk who stared at the two young Fanghorns bellied down in the Parson's front yard, heads toward the house. Parson, mother and guest smiled as they saw a little boy with curly hair, sound asleep on the grass, a sleeping Fanghorn colt cuddled up close, solid, warm and comforting, on either side of the sleeping child, and over them, a watchful, protective Fanghorn mare.
  5. Making Eagle is an achievement indeed. Eagle, and every last merit badge ... an immense amount of work, outstanding!
  6. BEDSIDE COMANCHE Deputy Sheriff Angela Keller crossed athletic, white-stockinged legs and tapped her forefinger thoughtfully against her cheekbone. Her Daddy's face was serious: he leaned forward, pressed a button and hung the handset up. "Say that again, Uncle Will," he said, and Angela knew from his tone of voice that a) Something was Very Not Right, and b) Putting it on speaker meant he wanted her to hear it too. It was Uncle Will's voice, and it wasn't quite ... right. "Is this better?" Will growled. "I hear you better now, say again your traffic." There was a long pause. "Linn, can you take me in to ER? I don't want that damned squad whistlin' up here, everyone will know I'm gone for a while and they'll break in and --" "I've got it," Angela snapped: she stood, whirled, and was out the door before the Sheriff could say anything. There was another long pause, then Will's voice again. "Angela," he said. "Good." Angela Keller drove a purple Dodge Charger. Angela's Dodge had the turbocharged engine. Angela liked her pretty purple Dodge with the turbo. The only thing she did not like about it, was it lacked that telltale whistle that a big truck's turbo had, but she could live with its lack, especially when she planted her hind hoof on the go pedal and got shoved back into her seat. When Angela was coming of driver's license age, Linn asked a personal favor of his chief deputy, Paul Barrents. Pauls' father WJ was the best driver Linn ever knew -- he could get more speed out of a vehicle, he could maintain control better, at higher speeds, than anyone he'd ever met, his lead foot Mama not excepted -- and so he decided Paul, who shared the Swiftrunner's gift, would be the one to teach Angela how to drive. He did. When the two of them came in after a session, they were both red faced and almost laughing, and had Linn and Shelly not both trusted Paul implicitly, and known he was teaching a craft that he loved and in which he excelled, they might have suspected some ... red faced and almost laughing impropriety. Angela, as much as she loved velocity, was also careful, and so she neither launched like a rubber-screaming arrow, nor did she leave black skid marks on the pavement as she headed the short distance from here to there. It is probably to her credit that she did not make a dramatic, broad-slide skid to come to a stop near to her Uncle Will's front door. Angela rapped twice, shoved the door open, yelled "It's Angela!" and swung in, warbag over her shoulder: she followed her cheerful announcement with an utterly spontaneous, "You look awful!" Will was pale and sweaty, he glared at her from under no-longer-shaggy eyebrows (he had his hair cut the day before and the Sweet Young Thing trimmed his eyebrows for him), and he managed kind of an irritated grunt. Angela thrust a hand into her shoulder bag, came out with something boxy: "Hold still," she murmured as she swung in behind her Uncle. Will was hunched over some, sideways on a kitchen chair, one arm hooked over its tall back. "I see it," Angela murmured. "Let me give you something." "I don't want any damned narcotic," Will growled, and Angela saw his hand start to close. She knew if he was feeling better he'd make a fist. He either hurt too bad to close his hand completely, or he lacked the strength. From what she saw on her scanner, she surmised it was both. Will felt something press against his throat, heard a hiss, felt kind of a cold sting. "Smooth muscle relaxer," Angela explained. "Non-narcotic. I know how you hate painkillers." Will almost growled by way of reply, and this alone was frightening. Angela was used to her Uncle as cheerful, chatty, laughing, a man quick to play on words or pull your leg: to see this strong man reduced to cold sweat and grunts was concerning, both in terms of medical assessment, and from the standpoint of having honestly never seen her Uncle this out of sorts. Angela adjusted the injector, pressed it against his neck again: another quick chill and Will felt himself relax again. "Taste anything?" she asked. "Old leather," Will muttered. "Good. I tried to get peppermint but that's all they had, now hold still." "Just take me in to ER, honey --" "Shut up." She pressed something against his flank. "This will take about a minute okay we're done." "I don't feel any difference." "You won't, until that first injection takes full effect. Want to see what's causing your pain?" "Just take me to the damned hospital!" Angela thrust her scanner in front of his face. "What the hell is that?" She withdrew the device, tapped a few keys, set it on the kitchen table, pressed another. "That," she said as she thrust an accusing finger at something coarse, spiked and brownish-yellow, rotating slowly above the scanner's suspensor, "is one hell of a kidney stone." Will looked at it with the expression of a man who wished he had a large hammer. "That one's about seven millimeters across. It's too big to pass. They'd have to dunk you in a horse tank of hot water and set underwater speakers to play acid rock at high volume to blow that thing to sand!" "Is that a picture or is that the stone?" "That's the stone. Pick it up if you like." Will swallowed, shook his head. "The second shot should be taking care of the colic. You're still nauseated?" Will shook his head. "Good. Just sit there and let me run another scan." Angela picked up her scanner, pressed it lightly against her Uncle's back ran it slowly down one side of his spine, then down the other. "Some men collect stamps," she murmured thoughtfully, "you collect kidney stones." "I quit countin' after two dozen of the damned things." Angela whistled. "Damn, Uncle Will," she murmured, "kidney stones hurt worse than giving birth!" "You are not helpin'," he muttered irritably. "No, I suppose not. Let's get that gravel out of you, now hold still." Will sighed resignedly, nodded. That night, after supper, Angela yelled "I'll get it!" and scampered downstairs the way she used to as a girl at home: she opened the door, her face absolutely lit up with delight: "Uncle Will!" she squealed as she jumped up and hugged the man around the neck. Retired Chief Will Keller laughed and ran an arm around her, came in, handed her a fragrant bouquet of flowers: he shut the door behind him, hung his hat on a peg and gave his eyes-closed, flower-sniffing niece kind of an odd look. "Darlin'," he said, "that's by way of apology. I was an absolute crank earlier today and you didn't deserve that. I'm sorry." Angela turned, handed the flowers to her Mama, gripped her Uncle by the shoulders and smiled up at the man. "Uncle Will," she almost whispered, "I've seen strong men wallow like a worm on a fish hook and cry like a little girl for those damned stones! Believe me, you're fine!" She reached into a pocket, pulled out a slender pill bottle one-third full of what looked like sand and gravel. "Here's what I got out of you today. I'll run a monthly check and we'll keep the damned things cleared out of you, whattaya say?" Will lowered his head and gave Angela a long look, then he blinked and nodded and said softly, "I'd say you're younger, smarter and better lookin' than me, darlin'!"
  7. KIND OF STOVE UP AND SORE Chief Deputy Paul Barrents gave the Sheriff an assessing look. Linn closed his eyes for a long moment, then muttered, "Go on, say it." "You'rrrre ... movin' kind of ... carefully," Barrents hazarded. Linn grunted, and this was not a good thing, for his Navajo chief deputy knew he'd normally give a single, shallow nod. Whatever happened, must've hurt bad enough he didn't want to move his head. Paul did not see any marks on the man's face -- he'd not gotten slugged in the face, at least -- but long pants and long sleeves will conceal a multitude of sins, and something seems to have been right sinful with his pale eyed boss. "Is there someone I should look at?" Paul asked diplomatically. Linn glared at the man, which did not put off his old friend one little bit. Paul opened his mouth to ask another question and Linn raised a hand, then looked at the conference room. "Coffee," he said, and Barrents closed his mouth on words unspoken. When the two sat down at the far end of the conference room table, Linn sat carefully -- not as if his backside hurt, more like his legs hurt -- Barrents, like most lawmen, noticed things, and he knew how the Sheriff normally lowered himself into the folding tin chairs in the conference room. Barrents waited. Linn very carefully did not move his head, he did not turn his neck: he lifted his eyes to look at Paul. "Scared hell out of Shelly," Linn said, and Paul mentally kicked himself for not realizing the man's jaw wasn't moving much at all -- further sign of injury? he wondered -- Linn took a very cautious sip of coffee, closed his eyes for a long moment. "Boss, if you need to be seen --" Linn looked at his segundo. "If you need some time off --" Barrents saw Linn's shoulders lift, knew the man was taking a long, calming breath. "Paul," he finally said, his voice quiet, "I am tryin' really hard here." Paul waited, not sure which direction this line of talk was going to go. Linn looked up at his lifelong friend and finished his thought. "Paul, I'm afraid I'm a-goin' to laugh, and if I laugh it's goin' to hurt again, an' I'm hurtin' enough the way it is!" Paul spread his hands: "Dammit, Linn, don't leave me hangin', what happened?" The man's words were sincere, they were firmly spoken in the tones of a man who saw someone he thought well of, in pain, and felt frustrated as hell that he wasn't doing something to make it better! Jacob Keller was Linn's oldest son. Jacob and Marnie were very close to the same age, four years or barely under. Where Marnie was shy -- where Marnie was fearful, though she was slowly learning that she didn't need to fear every shadow, every word -- Jacob was the opposite: he was quick, fast, noisy, inquisitive, all the things that healthy young boys were, and at the moment, he was buck naked, half-scampering and half-skating across the hardwood floor, dripping soap suds and laughter, and his Pa was right after him. Father and son made a laughing, noisy turn out of the bathroom and into the landing, the rug slid out from under Linn's sock feet and he went down, rolled: he came up, bathtowel gripped in both hands, as Jacob slipped, skidded, slid on his wet and soapy backside, right toward the stairs. "NNOOOO!" Linn yelled, dove for Jacob, intending to throw the towel over enough of his torso to get a grip, and yank him back -- but momentum, a slick wet varnished floor and outrageous Fate conspired otherwise: Jacob scrambled, stumbled, went over backwards, down the handmade stairs, all legs and big eyes and distressed expression and shining little bottom, and Linn tobogganed down the stairs, the towel providing absolutely no padding whatsoever: he tried to roll toward the passing bannisters, overcompensated, slid the rest of the way on his back, banged the back of his head on the hardwood floor at the foot of the stairs and slid hard against the coat rack, which fell over and banged him across the right shin with an absolute sunball detonation of PAIN! Shelly was out of the kitchen and to the stairs just as father and son arrived at the finish line together: Shelly watched, horrified, as little Jacob stood up, shook himself, laughed and said "WOW!" -- just as the coat rack fell on her husband's shin and she heard his teeth click together, and his breath hiss as he drew in a sharp lungful through his pain-clenched dentition. Chief Deputy Paul Barrents regarded his boss with obsidian-black eyes. Chief Deputy Paul Barrents honestly tried not to laugh. He tried. He looked at his lifelong friend, his boss, his Sheriff, and pictured him skidding downstairs as a naked little boy tumbled, boom-boom-boom ahead of him, spraying drops of water as he went. He pictured a little boy getting to his feet and exclaiming, "Wow!" and then looking over at his Pa, just as the coat rack fell and smacked the man across the shin bone. He imagined Shelly Keller, wife, mother, paramedic and friend, planting her knuckles on her beltline and glaring murder at the two as she snarled, "Are you two quite finished?" He looked at the Sheriff's darkening face, at the tightening of the corners of the man's eyes. "Jacob didn't so much as bruise," Linn said quietly, then he carefully -- carefully! -- bent a little, reached down, rubbed his shin. "Can't say as much for me."
  8. ... trust me to cause trouble ...
  9. Yeah, but you're smarter and better lookin' than me! I'm just a pore dumb hillbilly!
  10. THE DEATH OF TIBERIUS Parson Belden frowned as he came into the Sanctuary. Something was on his pulpit ... a paper? -- he'd left nothing on it after services, at least not that he remembered. The Parson looked around, frowned a little, then crossed the front of the Church with a vague feeling that something just wasn't right. He ascended the two steps, came up behind his pulpit, blinked, picked up a small sheaf of bills and a few gold coins. Puzzled, he read the sheet of folded, worn, stained paper the money rested on. He read it a second time, raised an eyebrow, then he took out a kerchief, put the money in it and tied it, took the paper and held it carefully. He came down from behind the pulpit, walked quickly down the center aisle. Sheriff Linn Keller looked up, stood at the summoning knock on his door. His Stetson came off its peg and onto his head -- he had no recollection of reaching up and setting it in place, so automatic was his gesture -- he strode to the door, opened it cautiously, then drew it wide open. "Parson?" The Parson's face was troubled as he handed the sheet to the Sheriff. The Sheriff read it, read it again, looked at the Parson. The Sheriff turned, slipped past the Parson, looked up over the municipal building toward Graveyard Hill, took a long breath. "Parson," he said, "I reckon I'll need your help." "However I can, Sheriff." "Fetch yourself down to the livery ... no" -- he turned -- "come with me." He drew the door shut, secured it, then the Parson followed the long-legged Sheriff the short distance next door. They went in through the front door -- an intentional choice: there was a bell to announce them, if Digger was busy with a body, neither man wished to interfere, and if Digger was busy with a bottle, neither man wished to intrude on a man's private vice. Digger came bustling through the black curtains, saw the Sheriff and the Parson: his normally doleful face grew even longer as he murmured "Bad business, bad business," and shook his head before reaching for his black topper. "And how can I be of assistance, gentlemen?" "Fetch up the dead wagon," the Sheriff said without preamble. "You're needed at Hangman's Drop." "Oh, dear, oh, dear," Digger murmured, "the usual arrangements, I presume?" "Fetch a box. I won't know until we get there. Parson, you'll ride with Digger here." The Sheriff was saddled and ready before Digger drove the dead wagon up the alley separating his funeral parlor from the Sheriff's office: curious folk saw the Sheriff, saw how serious his face, and as happens in any small town, word began to spread, and spread fast. Digger followed the Sheriff to the bottom of the short dropoff. A man hung by the neck, deader'n a politician's promise, turning slowly at the end of a lariat. Linn climbed up onto the dead wagon, stood on the closed box, grabbed the dead man under the arms, hoist him up enough so Digger could get the loop from around his neck. They laid him down atop the box; both men knew how to tell if a man was dead, but their skills were not needed; this man had been hanging for some hours. A bloodied knife was in a sheath, shoved behind the man's belt. Jacob saw the dead wagon, his father following, as they came up the alley beside the Silver Jewel and diagonally across the street to the Sheriff's office. He walked his stallion closer as the three men disembarked, went into the Sheriff's office. "Hey Jacob!" came a shout, "what's going on?" Jacob looked at a local and admitted, "I just got here myself, but I reckon I ought to find out!" "Not much here," Linn said. "That must be the knife he used." He raised his head -- horse, coming in -- the door swung open and Jacob stepped in. "Sir, Harry." Jacob stepped inside and Law and Order Harry McFarland, Marshal of Carbon Hill, came in and brought an aggravated expression with him. "You're lookin' for someone," Linn said -- a statement, not a question. "Fellow named Tiberius," Harry nodded. "Got drunked up and knifed a fellow in our saloon." "We got him." "You got him? Wha'd he do here?" "He died," Linn grunted. "Have a set while we sort this out. Jacob." "Sir." "Fetch on over here and help me think." "Yes, sir." Linn laid out the dead man's belongings on his desk top, laid down the sheet the Parson handed him, set down the bills and the coin. He re-read the sheet, frowned, looked up. "Jacob." "Sir." "Head down to the Livery. See if some fella sold Shorty a horse with a rocking R brand and ask how much he sold for. Find out what-all Shorty knows and report back." "Sir." Jacob turned, strode for the door. "Shorty's pretty sharp," Linn murmured. "If it's to be known, he'll know it, and he's got a way of weaselin' information out of a man without they know it." He looked up. "Parson, tell me again how you came by this." "I heard the door close," he said. "In the Church?" Linn interrupted. "Yes. I was in the Parsonage trimming up my Sunday sermon." Linn nodded his go-ahead. "I saw the corner of this sheet, turned up a little -- it was on my pulpit, and I had left nothing on my pulpit. These bills" -- his fingertips rested on Yankee greenbacks -- "and these coin were on the paper. "I read the paper, I gathered the cash and I came over here. The rest, you know." "Paper? Paper? What paper?" Harry asked. Linn handed it to the Parson. "Read it," he said, "out loud, so we'll all know what it says." The Parson turned the paper a little to catch the better light across the pencil scrawl. "I got all drunk and knifed a man in the guts and he will die and I have kilt him. "I can run an get shot or give up and hang so I'll go hang below the cemetery God forgive me. I sold my horse and saddle to Shorty and I give this money to the Church I don't want to burn in hell." The Parson looked up. "It's signed with a capital T." "Tiberius," Harry said. "I know the man. Where is he?" "Out in the dead wagon," Linn grunted. "Parson, you might want to go a-prayin' over his carcass. Harry, has he got any family?" "He's got a sister back East. I'll see if I can find the pa'tickelars." "Parson, the money's yours. Digger, plant him in Potter's Field, the county will pay as usual. Parson, you'll want to preside at the burial. Digger, let me know when you're ready, I'll be there. Harry, anything else?" Law and Order Harry McFarland shook his head. "You want the knife?" "I got knives enough already. Clean it up and give it to someone, looks like a good enough skinner." Sheriff Willamina Keller looked at the knife, at the dried, cracked leather scabbard that came with it. She looked at the Parson, accepted the envelope he'd been holding. "There's a story with that old knife," the Parson said. "It belonged to a man named Tiberius. I don't know a thing about him." "Tiberius?" a woman's voice asked -- the Parson turned and Willamina smiled a little as a woman came up the steps from the library, into the back office where Sheriff Willamina Keller did her research into Firelands of the past. "I'm Shannon Miller," the woman said, "and I've been doing some ancestry research, and since I was out here, I thought I would ask ... " Her voice tapered off, and she looked hopefully at Willamina. "Tiberius is not a terribly common name," Willamina said. "Please. Come in. Let's see if we can find out."
  11. "Haggi" ... thank you for that ... always did wonder what their plural was ... 😅😅😅
  12. Dear old Dad talked about a trade he made, years ago. He said the fellow trading him was so convinced he'd swindled Dad out of his eye teeth, he couldn't look the Grand Old Man in the eye. Me dear Pappy was so convinced he'd slickered this fellow out of his birthright, he couldn't look the man in the eye either. He said both parties allowed as it was a good trade!
  13. "I just survived" ... well put!
  14. CALL ME ANYTHING BUT LATE FOR SUPPER! Shelly prided herself on caring for her family. Shelly worked, yes; Shelly was not just a paramedic, she was a damned good paramedic, and she took a fierce pride in that. She took an equally sincere pride in the care she gave her family. Shelly stood at the far end of the table, regarded plates and forks and cups and glasses with satisfaction. There were times when the Silver Jewel did the cooking, and there were times when Shelly did the cooking, and when all her children -- or at least most of them -- came to her table, she showed her pride in the lay of the table and the provender which she prepared. Laughter and voices and the smells of good home cooking filled the kitchen, with the welcome interruptions that always occur: Jacob hugged his Mama and lifted her an inch off the floor, gave her a little shake -- she whispered "Ouch, do that again," and this time she lifted her arms and Jacob picked her up again, and gave her that little shake, and they both felt her spine pop in both protest and in relief. She bent, but only a little, to receive the happy hugs from the twins; Linn stood back and watched, smiling a little, he gathered his young in both arms and laughed quietly and listened, and when Angela murmured to Shelly that Marnie might not make it, Linn saw a shadow of disappointment cross his wife's face. Angela looked at her Daddy and said, "She is testifying in court. A capital case," and she saw her Daddy's eyes grow serious as he gave her a single, acknowledging nod. Michael saw his Mama's eyes go to Marnie's place at the table. "Mama," he said gently, "you know Marnie. If it's suppertime, she'll be here!" "The People call the Madame Ambassador!" Madame Ambassador rose, glided diagonally across the courtroom, from the Prosecution table, across in front of the Judge's bench, to the waiting Bailiff, nervous with a closed Book in hand. Marnie smiled a little as she recognized the cover: it was one of the newly printed Bibles Michael arranged to have freighted in. Marnie raised her right hand, laid her left palm on the Book, swore the usual oath: she smiled just a little and winked at the Bailiff, then she turned, sat the witness chair as if she were a Queen settling into a cushioned throne. "The Court thanks the Ambassador for her participation," the Judge said formally: "we recognize that the Ambassadorial Service does not usually take a hand in local matters." "I thank Your Honor," Marnie acknowledged, then looked at the prosecutor, who tried to look stern, but succeeded in looking uncomfortable. "Madame Ambassador," he said, "could you please tell the court what occurred on the day in question." "Briefly, I observed an arson fire in an occupied structure, and I moved to save lives by extinguishing the fire." "Objection," Counsel for the Defense popped up like a cork from deep water. "The witness has no credentials in firefighting, it is not possible to know this was an arson fire!" Marnie rose, bent her wrist up, tapped a control, looked at the defense attorney and smiled, then turned to the Judge. "I believe the Court grants the Ambassadorial Service leeway in reply," Marnie smiled: not waiting for reply, the courtroom disappeared -- or so it seemed to everyone in the courtroom. Each of them was standing inside a fire structure, feeling heat, smelling smoke. A figure in a filthy fire coat and helmet went to one knee, hauled the chrome Elkhart nozzle up, yanked the gate open, twisted the nob: a tight fan spray erupted, hissed, drove against the flames roaring up the wall and across the ceiling: they felt cool spray from the nozzle, heard the hiss and click of the self-contained breathing apparatus, saw the grim and determined expression through the air mask's face plate -- the expression in those pale eyes was unmistakable. The scene twisted, changed. None there were familiar with a garage that serviced over-the-road tractor-trailers, but no one had to be conversant in this unfamiliar transport to realize they were in a cavernous structure, smoke banked down to belt buckle height: they saw the same pale eyed figure, firehose under one arm, assaulting something blazing, harsh and bright, ahead of them in the thickening smoke. It did not matter that nobody in the courtroom, save only the witness, knew what a tire was. Nobody there doubted the seriousness of the moment when one of the tires exploded from heat, then something came flowing toward them, a river of living fire. They felt the pale eyed firefighter on the nob scream "PULL BACK! GIMME A SECOND LINE IN HERE, PULL BACK!" The scene cleared, and everyone was back in the courtroom: Marnie turned off the holographic envelope, sat. "You will find," Marnie declared coldly, "that my experience, my training and my credentials exceed anything your firefighting forces on this planet have. They were trained by my home department back in Firelands, and I was a fire paramedic with that department. " The Judge shifted uncomfortably in his chair, rapped his gavel. "The Court accepts expert testimony from this witness." The defense attorney was still standing. "You stated that the building was occupied, is that correct?" Marnie again rose, bent her wrist: this time the courtroom was transported to the Firelands County Sheriff's Office. Marnie walked through in uniform, confident, relaxed: she stepped to the head of the table in the conference room, pressed a tabletop control, lighting up the screen behind her. "Observation is our stock in trade," Marnie said. "When we meet someone we are constantly sizing them up and we are watching their hands. When we arrive at a building, we are looking at it -- we are not just casting our eyes casually across the front, we're looking first for threats to ourselves, then threats to everyone else. We're looking for signs of occupancy, whether residence, transient or commercial. Movement behind windows, movement of a curtain, light from within." The courtroom reappeared and Marnie held up a gloved hand, and in it, a six point star. "I am still Sheriff Emeritus on Mars, and a commissioned Sheriff's Deputy back home in Firelands. I make it my business to notice things, including which buildings are occupied." "Objection overruled," the Judge rumbled, giving the defense attorney a warning glare. "Madame Ambassador, you spoke of your actions as saving lives." "Yes." "Could you clarify that for us, please." Marnie tilted her head a little, the way a woman will, and gave the prosecutor a patient look. "I have survived fires, sir," she said, "in my earliest childhood, some very bad people tried to kill us by setting fire to our building. It is God's grace alone that we managed an escape, and that with nothing but the clothes we wore. Firing a building condemns those above the fire to death, whether by smoke inhalation, by immolation, or by jumping to their deaths to escape the flames. Persons in buildings adjacent are in similar jeopardy, as a fire will not confine itself to one building. To extinguish the fire is to save lives, and that's what I did." She shot a challenging look at the defense attorney, who looked away, uncomfortable. Shelly began setting big serving bowls on the table, Angela set a big bowl of fresh, steaming light rolls; butter, gravy, onion-roasted vegetables, all added their aromas to the atmosphere: just as Shelly thrust the serving spoon into the mashed potatoes, an Iris opened and a smiling set of eyes with Marnie wrapped around them, emerged from a slender Iris: she kissed her Daddy on the cheek, hugged him quickly, impulsively, like she was a little girl again. "I was just about to call you," Linn murmured, and Marnie looked at him and giggled, "Call me anything but late for supper!"
  15. BLAZE, FOG, AND BLOOD Marnie leaned her forehead against Peppermint's head. The Appaloosa mare was content to let her. Marnie's hands caressed Peppermint's silky jaw: eyes closed, she reviewed the day, shivered a little as she did. Sheriff Linn Keller's voice was Daddy-strong and Daddy-confident as Marnie heard it again, years and leagues and impossible distances from where her Daddy spoke those words. She'd remembered them, and she'd taken them to heart, and she'd practiced them often, and practiced them to her benefit. When in doubt, her Daddy taught her, cheat. Whenever possible, cheat. As often as possible, cheat. To the greatest degree possible, cheat. She remembered looking at her Daddy, doing her best to look wide-eyed and innocent, which fooled everybody in the entire world except only her pale eyed Daddy and her all-knowing Mama. She remembered how much trouble her Daddy had, keeping a straight face as he said these words, until his humor broke through his reserves: with a laugh, he'd dropped to a hunker, he'd run his hand around her slender waist and he'd said gently, "Don't cheat if it's illegal, immoral or fattening, darlin', but take every possible advantage. Cheat as best you can. Like this." He'd been booming down a load of pipe on a friend's truck -- his friend was laid up with a broken hand, and her Daddy was making a delivery for him, and to do that, father and daughter loaded two-inch heavy-wall pipe on the man's truck, her Daddy wrapped chain around it from the underside, secured the chain around the corners of the headache rack, slid links edgewise through the grab hooks, then he'd put the snap binder on the chain and taken a pull on the binder. "Watch this, Marnie," he said, and threw the heavy steel handle over with an effort. The pipes crowded together, and he reset the chain, tightened it again until he could make no more headway. He'd taken a three foot length of the same two-inch, thickwall pipe, and he'd honestly beat the hell out of the bundle -- then he released the binder, took another bite, tightened the bundle -- he'd beat it again, from the sides this time, took another bite, shortening the snap binder's grip on the bundling chain. This time it was too tight to muscle over. He'd looked at Marnie and grinned -- "Let's cheat on this!" -- he took the three foot war club, slid it over the handle of the snap binder. It took an effort -- he'd hauled it until it went over center and SNAP! it was fast down -- he took the three foot length of pipe, tapped the chain experimentally -- "Singin' tight!" -- then he boomed down the back of the bundle in the same manner. Marnie believed in her father's version of cheating. To that end, she had certain items of emergency equipment available, wherever she was, discreetly staged: when she emerged from a restaurant where she'd just dined with a half-dozen women from the planet, women who were curious about this pale-eyed Ambassador, she froze and threw an arm in front of her dinner companion, stopping her abruptly. Marnie turned, her eyes suddenly very pale: "Sound the alarm," she said, her voice tight -- the ladies stared openly as Marnie seized her skirts, charged across the street, no longer the laughing, pleasant, decorous Madam Ambassador -- no Ambassador ran like a blue-satin arrow! -- they watched as Marnie skidded to a fast stop, drew her wrist up to her chest, did something -- A black-velvet ellipse opened beside her, tall as she was and three feet wide -- Marnie reached in, seized a red cylinder, brought it out, one dainty, lace-gloved hand death-gripping the chromed squeeze-valve on one end, her other arm hooked under it -- Marnie stepped up to the door, bent a little, freed one hand and tried the knob: she drew the extinguisher back, used it as a ram, hit the door hard at the latch -- once -- she drew back a step, thrust into it, swinging the extinguisher and putting her weight behind it, she drove its bottom hard against trauma-cracked wood -- Marnie leaned back and kicked the lock-shattered door, dropped the extinguisher's base, seized the valve with her free hand, ran her finger through the pin, yanked. Tank in one hand, horn in the other, Marnie advanced into smoke and flame, crouching a little, protected by her Confederate field and rage: she squeezed the handle, rolled a cloud of carbon dioxide before her. She knew the fire; she'd seen this kind before -- liquid hydrocarbon of some kind -- coal oil, she thought, or petroleum distillate, kerosine maybe, or hell maybe some vegetable oil. Whatever it was, the building was wood, the fire was hot and moving fast, and Marnie knew when she drove the door open, it got a good draft of fresh oxygen. If she didn't kill it fast, it would kill everyone in the building. Someone came in behind her -- "WHATTAYA DOIN' STOP THAT!" -- Marnie dropped, hooked her arm around the tank, brought it around: she drove the end into a man's gut, shot him with a cloud of cold vapor, gave the next man a good face full of cold suffocation and hauled the tank back for momentum, decked him -- hard -- broken arm, she thought, and realized with a fierce joy she honestly didn't give a good damn! Marnie turned back to the fire, gave it another long, noisy fogging, looked up at the ceiling: another few quick squirts, and it was out overhead. Marnie looked around, turned, stomped out into the open air, holding the nozzle like a weapon, gripping the squeeze valve with the other: she stopped on the sidewalk, waved the nozzle and shot a puff of vapor into the air as the fire truck came snarling down the road toward her. Marnie stepped carefully away from where the firemen would make entry; she set the heavy tank down, watched with assessing eyes as men pulled the crosslay, settled masks on their faces and shoved inside the darkened, scorched interior. One of their number with the single trumpet of a Lieutenant on his helmet shield approached her and asked her what happened: he spoke carefully, as if at once recognizing he was addressing Madam Ambassador herself, and yet realizing she was witness to a situation. After Marnie filled in what she could, after she opened the Iris and stowed the discharged extinguisher, Marnie lifted her skirts and stepped down to the street, looked both ways and glided back to where spectators were openly staring. Marnie Keller -- a much younger Marnie, still a schoolgirl -- positively devoured every reference she could find that mentioned, described or quoted a legendary war-goddess who (in her young mind) wore armor and wings and carried a sword, a mighty figure of legend with a silver Corinthian helmet and a skirt of plates: if it had to do with Sarah Lynne McKenna, Marnie wanted to read it, to know it, to be it! Marnie read of Old Pale Eyes' wife Esther and how she hired European blademasters to keep up her own skill with a fencing schlager: she read of Old Pale Eyes and his Cavalry saber and how he worked with the honed, curved blade on a regular basis, how his wrists were like iron and stayed that way to the day of his death, thanks to swinging a yard of steel on a daily basis. Marnie took an interest in the blade, at a very young age. Shelly may not have considered it a properly ladylike pursuit, but she did approve of dance lessons: it was one of the only areas in which Shelly's husband conspired ... not against his wife, exactly, more like he conspired with his daughter. Marnie reasoned that bladework was a dance; she fell in love with Ukranian sword-dancing, and got really good at it -- but she never confused it with the more deadly art of the shiv, as practiced by those less than law-abiding souls she'd first known as a very young child. Marnie was, honestly, deadly with a blade of any length, and her efforts showed in her musculature. She did not bulk up, like a man would, but her arms had not the slender taper of a woman of leisure. Madam Ambassador's wrists, like those of her honored ancestor with the iron grey mustache, were like iron, and she, too, made a habit of swinging a yard of steel on a daily basis, and so, at the dinner with the half dozen curious ladies from the planet she was visiting, when she was asked why she was never seen with less than long sleeves, she'd smiled and raised her teacup and said in a soft voice, "It would not be very ladylike," and took a dainty sip of the local oolong.
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