Snow
Chapter 1
So this was how it felt. Somehow it wasn't so bad. The cold had numbed his senses along with his fingers and toes, in fact the cold had penetrated his very being. His brain kept ordering parts of him to move, to find shelter or he would die out here alone and forgotten. On reflection that option did not seem so bad. He tried once more to move but the bullet lodged in his hip refused to allow any significant change in position. In addition the beating that Yancy's men had inflicted on him did not make things any easier. He had to admit that all the effort he had put into escaping from the outlaw gang had been in vain. For a while it had worried him, made him angry with Yancy, angry with himself and then even with the Almighty.
That feeling had passed now and acceptance was setting in. Death was not so bad anyway. He had been riding the prairie dodging people who were out to get him, for too long now. His body was tired and, he had to admit it, there had been too many years of rough living. He had been a young man when all this started, a young man with hopes and aspirations but somehow they had all been buried by his choices. It had all been a dream, he looked back on it now, just a foolish dream. How much much did he seriously think one young man with lofty ideals could accomplish? It didn't matter, he could sleep now, no need to wake up. A woman's face kept appearing before his half closed eyes, a woman he had loved but never married. Nothing he could do about that now, his own foolishness had destroyed his dreams. He tried to let his body drift into that final rest. The cold ceased to be so bitter, it was acting as a comfort now, numbing his mind and body as he gave into it's welcoming embrace. Slowly he managed to reach his hand towards his shirt, his fingers searching for the badge that had been there. Then the sad realization that it was gone. He remembered now, the deep sense of loss that had come over him when he had to give it up. He would not have its comfort even in death.
He must have laid there for hours. The darkness of night had been replaced by a slight warming as the early streaks of dawn cracked the horizon. Not that he could see that far, but it didn't matter. The light was relentless and forced its way through his closed eyelids making him stir into a slow, painful awakening. At first he thought that his life must have ended and he was preparing to meet his maker, but as consciousness continued to force its way through him, he knew that could not be so. He felt pain, a terrible burning pain in his hip and and even the slightest movement caused a shock of lightning to travel all the way down towards a foot he could no longer feel. The first time it happened he was not prepared and a scream he barely recognized as his own, pierced the cold air. Now all he could do was to wait for the end.
TBC