A short (possible) prologe to a story I'm working on. Hope it's ok. Set just after season 4 of Justified and season 2 of Dallas.

Disclaimer: Don't own

Rating: T. Minor mentions of possible sexual situations. Rating may change.

Burn

There's no Kentucky in him, this businessman sitting down on Boyd's turf. No Harlan county anywhere in his bearing, none of the harsh Harlan vowels, none of the rough air of coal in his speech. He ain't from around here.

("Mr Crowder. John Ross Ewing." An extended hand and a smirk. Odd eyes looking him up and down, sizing him up, much the same way as Boyd's doing to him, he guesses.)

Texas clings to him. The smoothness of oil in the way he speaks. Not coal, never coal. Coal is dirty and rough and hard and coal gets people killed in messy ways. Oil is good honest crude, and money, and the entitlement glittering in in the boy's eyes. He wants something, and he thinks he ought to get it.

It's all business for this boy, the way oil is business. He wouldn't understand the coal. How it's survival for the people here. Coal is a job, a paycheck, a way to be something.

(The hand that grips his is surprisingly strong. He blinks slowly, and sees the muscle under the boy's shirt, the way he moves and sees someone who does know what work is.)

Coal isn't for a Dallas boy with mismatched eyes and a disheveled suit and the dark smoothness of black gold in his speech.

("We came to talk business," the boy continues, settling himself back in his chair, never taking his eyes off Boyd. Never flickering those eyes to look at the men at Boyd's back, though Boyd can see that he wants to. He hides it well, beneath his smirk and his easy reclined sit, but there is tension in the kid.)

Coal is for people like him. Coal is in his blood, he was born and raised in the Harlan air, breathing down the dust and the smoke and praying for a way out. Coal is how he made his living long years before, coal nearly killed him.

(The boy raises an eyebrow at Boyd's pause. Then sighs. "My father is J.R Ewing. I'm taking over his business enterprises." At that, Boyd suddenly understands. Sees J.R Ewing in the boy, in the confident sit, the smell of oil and money. Sees a boy like him, playing his father's game, trying to be someone different, but still trying to be all his father is.)

Coal burns. Like Kentucky bourbon burns. Like betrayal and love and anger and so many other things he's feeling right now burn.

("And why can your father not be here to conduct this business venture himself?" he challenges, looking the boy up and down again, taking in the sudden, obvious tension. Sees the hurt and anger suddenly flare up in his eyes, the tightness of his jaw.

"He's dead," the boy drawls, glaring at Boyd, setting up a challange of his own.)

It's then he realises that oil burns too.

("Mr. Ewing. Can I offer you a drink?" he offers, "And then we may discuss this 'business.'"

The boy smiles, accepts the drinks, and doesn't flinch at the harsh burn of Jim Bean. Boyd nods, smiles back.)

He doesn't think of Raylan, or Ava, or Wynn Duffy and his poisoness offers. He thinks of business, of a Dallas boy who burns like him, and of how this Dallas boy can help him.

To be continued ...

Maybe. I hope. Anyways, R&R, pretty please?