The Deadliest Pistoleer's Fondness
Chapter One: The Montgomery's Daughter
Muse: As a child, I never really enjoyed Westerns. But as I grew older, one Western stood out. I found myself re-watching it many times. Tombstone. Of course, many avid movie goers will tell me that it is such an obvious choice, what with Val Kilmer's incredible portrayal of Doc Holliday, and Kurt Russel's Wyatt Earp. But the character that stood out the most to me was Johnny Ringo. Each of the scenes he was in always left me wondering about the character, more than any others. Questions like, was Doc right about his need to kill and inflict pain? Was Johnny Ringo simply a good man who hated himself so much that killing was the only way rationalize his self-loathing. Or was there something even darker, even more complex to the brooding cowboy among all the others. I recently read a long New York Time's Article on Val Kilmer, which immediately made me go back into nostalgia mode and want to re-watch Tombstone, and of course that inevitably led me to looking up some fan fiction on Johnny Ringo – I hope I'm not the only one who does this (crickets?)
Alas after reading a few stories, some good, some great, others not so much, I realized I was craving a longer story about the man. Being a hopeless romantic with a taste for the brooding, often "bad boy" types (so cliché I know) I decided to start one of my own. So off we go…
In this version of Tombstone as we know it, only a few minute details have changed. For instance, Josephine Marcus and the ever-elegant Mr. Fabian along with the other travelling actors and actresses have a new addition to their crew – That is our main character and heroine of the story –Victoria Montgomery a 25 year-old woman who has found herself in the midst of Tombstone and all of its both quaint and deadly peculiarities. She appears to be a spoiled young woman, with delusions of wanting to experience the 'real world' through her travelling acts, but perhaps there is more to the young woman than everyone, even she expects.
I DO NOT OWN THE MOVIE TOMBSTONE OR ANY SETTINGS MENTIONNED IN IT, NOR DO I OWN THE CHARACTERS OF JOHNNY RINGO, JOSEPSHINE MARCUS, MR. FABIEN, PROFFESOR GELLMAN, WYATT EARP, DOC HOLLIDAY, IKE CLANTON, OR BILLY CLANTON OR ANY OTHER COWBOYS.
The only characters I own are Victoria Montgomery, her family, as well as the minor characters written into the story.
Victoria is the daughter of a wealthy socialite family in the East. Her parents, though both rigid and traditional, doted on their daughter and instilled in her the value of not just polite conversation and diplomacy during those fine dining dinners and balls, but they also demanded their daughter excel in her education. Victoria had spent most of her childhood and early teenage years in boarding schools across the European continent, France and England. Her teachers, governesses and professors all demanded and pushed her to not only be the best she could be, but to also challenge the world around her. The problem is that they preferred she challenge the world in the confines of classrooms and lavish study halls. Her summers were spent in extravagant estates in the French or British countryside, learning music, languages, and theatre. She fell in love with the theatre – the plays, the ability to be as outrageous, as angry, as dramatic, as devastated, as she wanted while all eyes were on her. Her greatest pleasure came from the strange dynamic that only an actor of stage understood – but an audience could only guess – that the emotions often played by actors were not a mask, but of their true souls.
Even though the countryside estates she resided in were hidden among grand oaks and expansive gardens, and the gates of the schools were built of brick and iron, even with all that, the young woman would not be spared tragedy. She meets calamity and horror face to face months before coming home to New York. It changes her in ways not even she knows. She pushes down the soul-wrenching event and comes home to New York.
But soon, Victoria finds that her life in New York is restless. Her parents, though she adores them begin to press her to consider the many matches for marriage that are made available to her. As Victoria becomes more resigned to the fact that no matter how many books she had read or how many sonnets she has memorized, her next chapter will be written for her and it will be one of a loveless marriage or worse a marriage to a pedantic man over twice her age. But, again, as Victoria knows too well, no one, not even the wealthy and entitled and not spared.
Her parents become tragically ill of a mysterious disease and die within months of each other. Victoria learns to once again steel her heart and emotions, always remembering the mantra that it is unladylike to be hysterical. But, unlike other young women who often became impoverished when parents or spouses die, Victoria through wit, cunning, and sheer stubbornness, takes over her family's finances. She may not be able to carry on her family's name through marriage, but she does well in preserving her family's riches – relying on only herself. She realizes that there is nothing left for her in New York. She shies away from high society and avoids the endless balls and waltzes and begins to explore the world of acting and theatre in nearby cities. Here she feels at home.
She meets the alluring beauty Josephine Marcus as her circles of theatre aficionados, actors, wannabes and other eclectic characters widens. When Josephine realizes that not only does Victoria have intelligence and charm, but she shines so brightly on the stage, that she could put the brightest stars to shame, she invites the young woman to travel with her across the country. Josephine knows that behind those sapphire eyes, those silk and satin bodices and perfumed hair, lies a fierce woman, a wounded woman, a woman who is looking for a reckoning or perhaps for a reason to live again.
And hence Victoria's adventure begins…