Meryl fell, flung backward by the impact, and threw her arms up to cover her face. Just as quickly, hands seized her wrists and pulled them apart. She gasped and looked up automatically, despite the danger, and for an instant she saw flashing green eyes. Falling hard on her back, Meryl winced and felt something land heavily on top of her—or nearly so. The man in red had thrown himself down over her, falling hard onto his elbows to keep his weight from crushing her. He bent his head low now, his forehead touching hers as he shielded them both from the shrapnel flying around them.
Moments later the dust was settling and he raised his head enough to look down at her, eyebrows drawn in concern. He had to yell to be heard over the commotion—others in the saloon were shouting loudly to each other now—asking, "Are you alright?" But Meryl was already answering his question, shaking her head hurriedly, dismissively.
"I'm fine, I'm fine," she interrupted, her face just iches from his as she tried to scramble out from under him. The rapid report of a dozen different weapons filled the saloon with the deafening sound of gunfire and bullets tore into the high liquor shelves behind the bar. The man in red pulled Meryl back down, shifting even further over her and bending still more closely as bits of broken bottles rained down on them. Meryl shut her eyes tightly and buried her face in the man's collar, hoping to avoid the glass. Somehow over the shouting and commotion on the other side of the bar she could hear the sound of the larger shards of glass bouncing off the man's red jacket, felt tiny splinters of it catching in her hair and knew it would be in his as well.
A moment later the man in red raised himself to his hands and knees and Meryl shuffled backwards on her elbows, scrambling out from under him. They were both breathing hard and, absurdly in the midst of this veritable war zone, Meryl managed to notice again the odd sweetness of his breath.
Meryl could see over the man's shoulder that the wagon McDonough and his men had demanded had crashed into the bar, presumably after smashing through the saloon's entrance. The wheels were still spinning and burning rubber on the saloon floor behind the bar, the engine grinding as the wagon tried futilely to keep moving forward, driverless.
A piercing scream split the air, an unending cry that rang in Meryl's ears even over the noise of the battle happening on the other side of the bar. She and the man in red both understood at the same moment and gaped at each other.
"You go—" began Meryl, and simultaneously the man in red started, "I'll go—" Nothing else needed saying and the man in red disappeared as Meryl was already moving back toward Milly and the butler.
"Ma'am," said Milly, her nod to Meryl turning into a wince as bullets swept above the bar again, sending more debris down on their heads.
"Where's your stun-gun?" Meryl asked, but Milly shook her head.
"I tried around the end of the bar, but there's too many of them."
"How many?" asked Meryl, covering her head with her hands as more glass rained down on them.
"I don't know, I couldn't see," Milly explained, almost apologetically.
"Then I'll have a look," said Meryl, tensing up as she waited for an opportunity to act. A moment later there was a brief pause in all the gunfire and Meryl leapt head-first over the counter where she had last seen the stun-gun, rolling as she hit the ground on the other side, breathing a quick sigh of relief as she landed practically on top of it.
There were shouts from the men around her—she could only see them in silhouette from the bright light through the gaping hole the wagon had smashed in the wall—and Meryl grabbed the heavy stun-gun in one hand and threw herself sideways behind a large chunk of the bar itself that had been blown apart from the whole when the wagon first crashed into the saloon. Heavy gunfire punched splintery holes in the wood, missing her by iches, and Meryl scrambled back behind the bar with the others again, heaving the stun-gun towards Milly.
"Ma'am?" Milly asked, the single word question enough between them. Meryl nodded mutely: Still in one piece.
The man in red had retrieved the young woman and untied her and now she was sitting with the butler, clutching his arm and crying, breathing in quick gasps. "Are you alright?" the man in red asked them, kneeling in the narrow space next to the woman. When she kept crying he grabbed her elbow and shook her once. "Are you alright!" he hissed, looking fiercely at her. His green eyes flashed momentarily toward Meryl and she gave a tiny, quick nod of her head. The man returned it and then looked back to the sobbing woman, who hiccupped into silence long enough to reply, "Y-yes, I'm fine."
Adrenaline still made her breath come too quickly, but Meryl gave everyone her usual once-over and was glad to find no one seriously injured. Both Milly and the man in red seemed to have some minor cuts from the glass or wood splinters flying around them but the young woman and the butler were unharmed, largely because the rest of them were injured trying to protect them. And, miraculously, no one was shot.
"Five," Meryl told the man in red, tugging at the sleeve of his jacket to get his attention as she tried to catch her breath. He looked at her curiously but then seemed to understand before she finished, in a whisper, "There's five of them."
"But who are they?" asked Milly, quietly. "What do they want?"
"S-Stan," whimpered the girl, through tears. "The sheriff. He m-must have hired them."
At the end of the bar, near the wall, there was movement and a giant figure appeared from under a pile of wooden planks. It was McDonough, extricating himself (with some difficulty) from the remains of the great heavy table he had used as cover during the first volley of gunfire. Still alarmed, Meryl drew a derringer quickly but the man in red stayed her hand. His long fingers circled her wrist and pulled her arm back. She glanced back over her shoulder, but he just shook his head and leaned forward to speak quietly in her ear.
"We're all in the same mess now," he told her. The man in red nodded toward McDonough and the other man made his way toward them, almost silently. The table behind him tipped over and the men on the other side of the bar opened fire again, making everyone duck down. Meryl and the man in red both moved to shelter the young woman while Milly bent low over the butler. To Meryl's surprise, McDonough put himself between Milly and the falling debris, trying to protect her.
When the shooting stopped again, the man in red held a finger to his lips, conveying the need to stay silent. They waited.
"Where aaaare yoooou?" one of the men across the saloon called, in a weirdly high-pitched sing-song voice.
"Yeah!" said another, thuggish voice. "Come out, so we can shoot ya!"
"Shut up," hissed a third.
There was a tense silence, where Meryl could hear each of their heartbeats pounding like drums behind the bar, surely loud enough for the mean on the other side to hear. She realized she was holding her breath.
Then somewhere else in the saloon there was a different sound:
"Nyao!"
The men were already shooting at the cat as it leapt down from the rafters onto the bar counter. The young woman nearly gasped in surprise but two hands clapped tightly over her mouth, one just an instant after the other.
Meryl had gotten there first and the man in red nodded at her, removing his hand from over hers. The woman was breathing quickly through her nose and her eyes were wide, though she nodded when Meryl held a finger to her lips in the same shush gesture the man in red had done earlier.
Bullets sprayed in every direction in the saloon now and Meryl kept hearing the loud yowls and hissing as Kuroneko somehow managed to avoid the gunfire. Meryl removed her hand from the young woman's mouth and then felt an arm wrap around her middle and had to bite back her own gasp of surprise.
"Move," whispered the man in red, but he didn't give Meryl the opportunity, already pulling her sideways toward him, crawling over her to reach the other end of the bar. He grabbed a keg from a stack of the containers piled in the corner and Meryl could tell from the way he hefted it that the keg was full.
The man in red moved back toward the rest of them, keg in hand, lumbering awkwardly so as to keep his head below the height of the bar. "You all stay here," he said, "and keep your heads down." Meryl opened her mouth to protest but the man actually grabbed her chin in one hand to silence her and pulled her face closer to his. From iches away he fixed her with a severe gaze, those sharp, dangerous, other eyes boring into hers. "Stay," he ordered.
Shocked, Meryl could do nothing but sit there and watch him heave the keg high into the air, watch it sail over the bar toward the men on the other side. Almost immediately the keg was riddled with holes and beer sprayed everywhere. Meryl heard it land, crashing into something, and the man in red suddenly leapt forward and planted one hand on the bar counter, throwing himself over to the other side. Meryl almost stood up just to see what the hell was going on and before Milly yanked her down again by the back of her collar she saw the man's revolver in mid-air, flying toward him from nowhere. He caught it deftly and then disappeared from Meryl's view.
There was a resounding silence.
"What are you waiting for? Shoot him!"
Meryl glanced down the bar to see that McDonough was looking just over the counter, despite the other man's order to stay down.
"Sure, shoot him!" one of the thugs said, another different voice. "All the more for us, then!"
Milly was hurriedly checking the state of her stun-gun, too busy to notice Meryl sneaking toward the opposite end of the bar to peek around the corner. The man in red had one massive thug at gunpoint while four of his fellows stood with guns pointed straight back at him.
For a moment, nothing happened. Meryl held her breath, waiting. Then she saw the man in red whisper something, too quietly to be heard. He let his hand fall to his side, pointing the revolver toward the floor.
What? No!
"This guy's an idiot!" laughed the man with the high-pitched voice. He stepped toward the man in red and pressed a gun to his chest. Reacting without a real plan, Meryl drew a derringer and darted out from behind the bar. Before she could do anything Milly was already standing, her massive stun-gun trained squarely on the thug threatening the man in red. Meryl saw his eyes widen and turn, but it was too late. A giant metal claw snapped shut on him, propelling him backwards through the window left standing in the saloon's front wall. Another claw barely missed a second thug and Meryl saw some kind of commotion around the man in red, though she had no idea what.
There was some kind of scuffle and Meryl watched one of the thugs shoot his partner in the foot as the man in red ducked casually to one side. The injured man was howling, his aim wavering but still generally pointed in the direction of the man in red. The three of them were all moving clumsily, struggling against one another, too near to each other for Meryl to pick either of the thugs off. Looking around desperately for inspiration, Meryl glanced up and saw the ceiling fan was spinning off-balance again, still making the ker-clunk, ker-clunk noise.
For a moment she hesitated, but then resolutely aimed her derringer for the ceiling.
Oh hell, at least if it takes them all out he won't be shot.
It took two attempts, but a moment later the fan fell heavily to the floor. At the last instant, the man in red darted sideways and avoided the spinning blades that nearly crushed the other two men, pinning them down. Meryl gaped as the man in red turned to wink at her, but the next moment she caught sight of one of the thugs still standing turning his gun on Milly, who was still too preoccupied firing the stun-gun on another man to notice.
"Milly, down!" shouted Meryl. At her words the man swung around to aim for Meryl and she threw herself sideways toward what little cover the broken tables nearby could give her. She fired twice even as she heard the report sound loudly from the thug's gun. She felt a quick, searing pain in her left arm and she clapped a hand over it automatically. Kneeling behind the toppled tables, Meryl pulled her palm away bloody, but the bullet had hardly grazed her bicep. It had done more damage to her sleeve than to her arm, really.
There was silence again and Meryl drew another derringer and stepped carefully out into the open.
Only she, Milly, McDonough, and the man in red were left standing.
McDonough moved suddenly toward the man in red and grabbed him by the collar of his jacket, hauling him forward. Meryl stepped toward them, anxious but unsure what to do.
"Why did you hesitate?" McDonough demanded, furious. "Why didn't you shoot him?"
The man in red just looked back at him in silent defiance, giving the other man stare for stare.
"Fine," said McDonough. He released the man in red and looked away. "Nevermind." As McDonough searched for his fallen comrades among the thugs' bodies, kneeling down to check the severity of their injuries, Meryl marveled again at his level of concern for his men.
This clearly wasn't just a man employing random bandits for a kidnapping and payoff. What's really going on here?
"I told you!" said the young woman, finally standing. Her voice was weak and her trembling hands were carefully brushing glass off her rumpled skirts in a gesture Meryl was sure was only to calm herself. "I told you that sheriff is crazy!" She coughed and swallowed hard, saying, "But it's over, now, if you stop I can ask Daddy to let you go!"
McDonough was starting to bandage one of his men with a strip of thick cloth torn from his own jacket, but he looked up at the woman. Meryl watched his eyes glance from Milly's stun-gun to the revolver the man in red still held. Then McDonough stood and drew his own gun from its holster, though his arm hung loosely at his side, the gun barrel pointed at the floor.
"I can't do that," he said, quietly.
McDonough thumbed back the hammer of his revolver with a metallic click that seemed to echo through the now-silent saloon.