Nathan Yocum - The Zona

“I’ve taken life, young man. I know the feeling and price.” The Old Preacher released the pistol’s hammer and slipped it back into his shirt.

“You won’t die by my hands. Not today.”

Lead looked up at the Old Preacher’s face, a leather visage of dirty creases and grey beard and yellow-blue eyes that spoke of humanity.

“Why was I sent to apprehend you?”

The Old Preacher’s eyes moistened. He rubbed them in irritation and looked back to the rising sun.

“I was what you are; I preached the word of the Church. They sent you to me because of killing.”

“What killing?”

The Old Preacher looked into Lead’s eyes. “Killing doesn’t make me happy. Killing doesn’t make me good. I can’t kill anymore. That’s why you were sent to apprehend. I’m a rusty tool of new use or value. I need to be disposed of.”

Lead tried to regain his feet but instead lost consciousness in the Arizona sun.

Lead woke in a comfortable bed with sheets that smelled of lilacs and bleach. His room was painted a shade of green he remembered as glow-in-the-dark. The Old Preacher watched him from a stool in the corner. On a wooden plank table lay the parts of Lead’s gun, dismantled and oiled. The Old Preacher smiled.

“What were you going to do with no ammunition?”

Lead mumbled about demons in the night. The sliver of metal left by Century’s knife was cold in his chest. In contrast, the knife wound in his shoulder was hot and puckered.

“Demons, boy, you should have given those Jimson eaters wide birth. That flower will make you blind or crazy as sure as it’ll make you high.”

Lead tried to sit up but his head was too heavy. Pain shot up his arms and legs. The air in the room was musty and hard to breath. He shifted his gaze to the old Preacher. Terence had shaved his beard and combed back his white hair into a thick main. His eyes flashed ruby red and then turned back to yellow-blue. Lead whispered a prayer.

“Preacher, you’re going to need a lot more than prayer, look at me. You’ve been poisoned. No demons. No smiting or plague. Your mind is not right and won’t be for awhile. You need to reckon this. You need to know that the wrong you’re seeing isn’t real. It’s the Jimson weed in your blood.”

Lead lifted his hand to his face. His fingers traced rainbow afterimages of themselves. He shook his arm and watched the images overlap, turn, and flex like wings of a bird with no feathers. Sweat streamed down his face. He closed his fist and felt the numbness across his palm. The old Preacher’s words were far away. Lead closed his eyes. His dreams brought him back to the demons in the desert and running blind into the night.

Terence examined Lead’s dismantled gun. The six-shooter was at least a hundred years old; a thirty-eight, maybe an old cop’s gun. Its barrel was scratched and pitted, the rubber grips were worn and showed metal patches. Terence reassembled the gun and slipped it into his knapsack. Somewhere outside, galloping hooves broke the silence of the day. Terence looked to the unconscious Preacher. He drew his Van Cleef and silently crept to the front door. The galloping stopped. Footsteps sounded on the front porch.

“Speak.” Terence yelled through the door. He pressed his gun barrels against the door just below head’s height. It was an old habit of his.

“It’s Philip, Philip Magenty, from the Dead. My news is urgent.”

“I know you Philip, are you alone?”

“Yes sir, I am.”

Terence cracked the door and looked upon poor ugly and marked Philip. A cross-shaped scar ran across his face vertically from forehead to chin and horizontally under the eyes. The scar dug misshapen canals into his nose. Philip held up a metal triangle.

“Be at peace sir, you know me.” Philip said.

“I never forget any who I’ve set free from the Church.” Terence slipped his gun back into his shirt. He touched Philip’s triangle.

“Whose idea was this symbol?”

“Twas Century’s, I’ve brought you one.” Philip reached into his pocket and withdrew another cobalt triangle.

“No. We shouldn’t be identified with symbols. Makes keeping secrets difficult.” Terence said.

Terence admired the triangle for its beauty and simplicity. He reluctantly handed it back to Philip.

“It didn’t help Century none. He’s dead,” Terence said.

Philip recoiled, “How?

“Preacher’s bullet, what’s your news?”

“I was at the South Parish when three strangers rode in with goodly bred horses and armored vests. One wears his Cleef out of shirt. It looked sharp, probably just pre-Storms.”

“Ah…shit.” Terence let the foul language slip out of his mouth for the first time in years. Philip winced as if struck.

“Those are Crusaders. Leave now with discretion, leave town, I’ll not have you taken by their lot.” Terence said.

Philip knew better than to question the panicked look in Terence’s eyes. He left immediately.

Terence ran through the house, checking the windows. There was no time. He returned to Lead’s room. In the distance he heard the hooves of Phillip’s horse fleeing and the gallop of more horses coming from the south.

“Shit,” he whispered.

Havasu Parish, like most of the towns in the Zona, was full of hunger and desperation. Information and morality were made cheap by despair. Crusaders paid silver notes. Terence knew their sanctuary was defiled. He hoped Philip remained untouched. He looked again at Lead.

Eliphaz the Crusader dismounted in front of the mark’s hideout. Terence’s horse stood tied to a pig iron fence. The creature whinnied and kept a suspicious eye on the Crusader. Eliphaz motioned for his men to circle the house. He thumbed the hammer of his Browning Hi-Power and looked to the weather-beaten front door. The house slanted as if the wind had tried to push it over and half succeeded. Eliphaz kicked the door open.

Terence peered through tattered curtains at the Crusaders down the street. He had moved his horse to a decoy house after Philip’s warning. Terence hefted Lead over his shoulders. His back crackled in protest. He sprinted through the back door into an overgrown cactus garden. Behind the homes of Havasu Parish a natural network of flashflood washes stood as a safeguard against monsoon rivers; a holdover from the Broken Times. The floods were all but extinct with the new scalding heat, but the washes stood as a testament to what was. Terence jumped into the ditch, the soft sand gripped his boots up to the ankles, and his knees joined his back’s protests. Terence ducked and plodded through the wash.

Eliphaz scanned each room with his Van Cleef pointed low, precise, and trained to hit sudden targets. By the second room he knew it was a ruse, an empty home, but he finished the sweep anyway. Better to be safe. Eliphaz exited the house and whistled loudly, the other Crusaders left their posts and returned to the front of the house.

“He’s not here,” Eliphaz said. “But they are or were here. Search each house up this block. Be ready for resistance.”