High Midnight: Chapter One

By Christopher Mitchell

The Crawler Hunt

Pick rode under a violet sky, unaware of the rest of the world around him. His horse, Booker, plodded slowly up the Arizona basin, much less enthusiastic about how the pinks melded with deep oranges as his riding partner was. But the view was majestic, nonetheless. And as Father Sun finally bowed its head to Mother Night, Pick pulled his six-of-grain, lovingly named Beverly, from the holster at his side. 

Newer models were available, but he liked the way the old girl felt in his hand. The way the ivory handle flared at the base, and how the grip was worn to a near-perfect indentation of his fingerprints. The barrel, long and filigreed, served its purpose better than any newfangled semiautomatic ever could.

Its heft also made a better club when out of ammo. 

Booker suddenly grew skittish, drawing Pick’s attention away from his agitation with a changing world.

The rattling told Pick all he needed to know. 

“Sorry, fella,” Pick said to Booker, “I’d say plug your ears, but—”

Pick trailed off and fired, sending one white-hot slug of tungsten into the rattler’s coiled body. Clods of dirt shot skyward, and when they stopped raining from the sky, Pick could see his shot had connected, leaving behind only bits of rattlesnake and a smoldering, molten hole where the round had impacted.

He’d have one more shot before he’d have to cycle the chamber but decided to go ahead and spin it anyway…no sense going into a fight half-loaded.

Booker snorted and tensed.

Another one? 

“Dammit, Booker,” Pick snapped, “if you put us in the middle of a rattlesnake den, I’ll—

He was knocked from his saddle by a blur, sending Booker up on his hind legs, screaming in fear. Pick landed with a dull thud on dry desert soil. He rolled quickly, thankful he’d had the sense to hold on to Beverly in his fall. He raised the weapon and took aim, sending a tungsten slug hurtling at the malformed shape.

The crawler leapt, and the slug kicked up bits of rock and sand instead.

Dammit, Pick thought, cycling to the next chamber, didn’t think they’d be that fast.

Crawlers weren’t exceptionally bright, but they were reported to be unnaturally quick…Pick had underestimated just how quick. 

And if you put a group of them together…

He heard the yipping of the crawler’s friends some way out still.

Shit.

“We gotta go, Booker!”

Pick took off at a run, sending one more round at the barking crawler before setting his sights on the horse, who was already racing to meet him. He grabbed the reins and took a running leap at the stirrups. He almost fell from the other side of the saddle but managed to right himself. He kicked Booker hard in the flanks…much harder than he’d meant to.

I’ll make it up to him later, he thought as the barks and howls of the other crawlers melded with the one that had knocked Pick from the saddle. He could hear the scraping of their claws as they dug into gravel, snarling and biting at each other for a better chance at taking the kill. 

They wouldn’t be content until their prey was safe in their bellies.

“Faster, Book!” Pick shouted over the wind building in his ears.

The horse picked up speed. The fastest of the crawlers raced up alongside them, its deformed snout opening and closing rapidly, showing rows of teeth that quested out in every direction. Its pupils contracted, highlighting unsettling rust-orange eyes, as it took an awkward lunge before it was fully ready. Pick was ready with a slug of six-of-grain to send the creature’s burgundy blood across nearby scrub brush. 

“Any minute now, Mattock!” he screamed to his partner, finally crossingthe barrier of the trap.

He didn’t have time to see the spring give way as Mattocktugged the ripcord on the delay switch, only to feel the warmth of coppershot radiate across his back. The green flames shot skyward, scorching the crawlers consumed in its wake and momentarily blinding the desert in the wave of the explosion.

Bits of crawler and brush and desert rained down, and Booker moved to avoid the worst of it. Pick felt a clump of something cooked land on the brim of his black Stetson, and he groaned.

That damned fool…

“That was too close, Mattock!” Pick shouted, annoyed.

A large tan face, with a beard that obscured all but his dark brown eyes and cheeks, rose from the nearby scrub.

“Well, whose fault is that?” Mattock snorted, “I wasn’t the one taking pot shots at cactus out there!” He had only the slightest remaining tinge of an Irish accent, but Pick always gave him a hard time for it.

“A damn rattlesnake was in the path, you ornery mick bastard,” Pick replied hotly, grabbing the hunk of crawler from his hat and hurling it at Mattock, “nearly scared the shit outta Booker!” 

Mattock huffed, coming to stand near eye-level with Pick on Booker’s back. “To which I reply again: What the hell does your skittish horse have to do with this being my fault?”

Pick raised a finger to argue and halted. It didn’t have to do with Mattock. The adrenaline coursing through Pick’s bloodstream was waning, and he was no longer as itchy for a fight as he had been before. He dropped the subject, using the finger to point at the spot where the coppershot had done its job. “Did we get them all?”

“I think so,” Mattock replied, drawing his modernized ten-grain. It resembled an old flintlock but was made of some alloy that neither of them could pronounce. It hummed as the tungsten rod heated to thousands of degrees Kelvin.

They heard the gurgling cries of a wounded animal, and Mattock moved cautiously toward the sound. Pick raised Beverly, ready to keep his partner safe if this was a feint.

As Mattock approached, Pick saw the tension in the man’s shoulders slack. Mattock lowered his pistol. “It’s dying, Pick.”

The creature’s left side was caked in charred flesh and matted fur. It whined and tried moving on its good side, but even that was peppered with the shrapnel of pebbles and sand. It fell, using the last of its energy to face itself toward Pick’s partner.

“Good,” Pick called to his partner, “serves that damn chupacabra right for trying to kill me and old Booker here.” He patted the side of the horse’s neck. “Ain’t that right, you grouchy old bastard?”

The horse snorted, and Pick turned his attention back to Mattock.

Mattock was kneeling, slowly inching closer to the wounded creature.

Pick looked around nervously. If crawlers were here, then the Faction safehouse would be underground somewhere nearby—Faction lackeys always kept crawlers as low-level guard dogs. 

“We’ll have to head back to the outpost,” Pick called,“before the toadies swarm this area. Leave it, Mattock.”

The crawler snarled and snapped at Mattock’s outstretched hand. The large man pulled back for an instant, then came back in slowly. 

The light in the creature’s eyes was fading—it knew it was dying— and Pick shook his head as the crawler finally relented, letting Mattock put a hand on its malformed head.

“You’re gonna get your damn hand bit off one of these days, you big dummy,” Pick grumbled.

“I’ll stop doing it when it stops feeling right, you insensitive old prick,” His partner called, stroking the crawler between the eyes with his thumb. Mattock whispered to the thing. “Go on now and rest, fella…hope you dream of pretty things.”

He raised the barrel reverently, pressed it to the side of the crawler’s head, and fired. 

The explosion of the new weapon dwarfed anything Pick had heard before and, even a year later, he still had a hard time getting used to it. He unconsciously placed his hands on his pistol and stroked its ivory handle lovingly. “You gonna wanna bury the thing too?” he asked, staring up at the night sky.

Mattock rose and turned to face Pick, eyes glistening even from this distance. “If we had more time…yes.”

“Well,” Pick said tersely, “then it’s a good thing we don’t. Now go get Cripple. We gotta go before the toadies come looking for their pets.”

Another successful mission, he thought, watching Mattock mount his horse and nudge her into motion. 

Too bad we still got more to do…