Well, Real Life threw me a curve ball and as per usual I could not focus on my stories, the chaps in my head would not come out so I defaulted to what I usually do when stressed. I thought of an entirely new Verse to occupy and distract me from the shit around me. Hope you like this one ... I have no idea where it is going but it contiinues to grow ... in the three days that I have been writing it has garnered 16 chaps already and I know there are many more.

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1

John was still laughing as they rode towards the ravine ahead, "Did you see his face?"

"I told you to hold" Jack snarled and John glanced over with that petulant look he gets when he knows he was wrong about something.

"He moved"

"You shot him, I'm not surprised. I would have moved too" Jack sighed as he looked up at the clouds gathering, "Gonna rain, we need to make shelter before nightfall anyway. Those bloody things are still out there."

"I heard back in town there that there have been three kills this week alone" John agreed as he looked towards the dark shadows growing by the minute.

"Yeah, three workers trying to get their herds in" Jack shifted in the saddle, "I think we need to put a little pep into our horses."

They urged their horses forward and were soon galloping towards a shack travellers often used on the trial, John tending to the horses as Jack took their gear into the shack. John entered soon after closing the doors to the barn then heading in to find the fire going and Jack mixing food.

"Smells good" John sat and accepted the plate offered as Jack slid back to watch him eat.

"We should split up" Jack suggested, "That last job was not what I expected."

"But we got it done" John pouted then saw that his partner was being serious, "Really? You want to leave all this?"

"John, we were supposed to part three jobs back" Jack reminded him, "I think we are so badly burned this time that if we don't go our separate ways we will both wind up hanging by our bloody necks."

"Aww, he didn't mean that!" John laughed, "You know he was pissed that we won the competition."

"Yes, and he will probably work out sooner or later that it was rigged" Jack reminded him.

John snorted and settled to sleep as Jack went through their large haul from the winning pot of the shooting competition. Jack had won, not John. Jack stood behind the spectators as they all fired and John fired his blank, Jack's bullet running true to the bull's-eye as John swaggered about hooting.

Jack didn't have a choice see …. He was a wanted man. His dimpled chin was going to be as much of a giveaway as his searingly blue eyes if the law took a good look at him. A deserter. A soldier that gave up on the war and simply … legged it.

"OK" John said into the darkness as the fire faded, "but I want my half."

"Of course, I promised didn't I?" Jack whispered as he reached out to pat John's arm, "You know we need to. This is not because you and I are not good together, it's just tht we are too good and will get noticed sooner or later."

"Yeah" John agreed finally, "not like we can't meet up later, right?"

"Exactly. We will meet again, we always do." Jack lied, knowing that if he ever met this man again it would probably be the end of him. John was insane.

"I will leave at first light, when those things are gone. We know the watering holes we always go to, I will meet you at one when the Gods decide" Jack said and John grunted, rolling away to show him his back, and his disappointment as Jack evened out their hoard. He left the two piles so they could swap and change anything John might be a prick about, as he tends to be. He then settled to find some sleep, hoping the night would be quiet and the things out there didn't' come sniffing about, even in the barn the horses might not be safe.

Jack woke to the sound of the birds and rolled to wake John only to find him gone …. Jack's eyes shot to the table and the ….. Along with the hoard.

"Fuck!" Jack struggled to his feet and ran out into the morning light to see the barn door open. "Oh Gods, Barry."

He walked to the door and looked in relieved to find his horse still there, the black hide moving in the shadows like a wraith. He walked to him and crooned as he ran his hands over the neck and to his relief he found the small sack he had taken out in the dark, braving the chance of the Things to weave the string of the draw bag into the horse's mane.

The best pieces were in there, his cut more than enough to see him right for a while, John not even noticing in the half light of morning as he slid his own bay from the barn and high tailed it thinking he had won.

"When will he learn, huh boy?" Jack smiled as he slid his hand down the Horse's flank, "You can't con a conman."

Jack let his head fall to the warm muscle and he sighed as he listened to the world around him.

Where to now?