Chapter Seven

"I'm on fire," Slim shouted, his arms flailing wildly as he worked to remove the layers away from his body, but the added weight of the rocks prevented him from finding success, which only made the panic rise higher.

"Easy, Slim," Jess said, gripping Slim's shoulders tight to ease his trembling, and at once, Jess noticed the difference of movement under his skin. This was a reaction to fear, not from being cold. He could have let out a hearty whoop, but there was a nag repeatedly poking him in the back. "Easy, now, I've got you."

"It's hot." Slim shuddered, his eyes wide and wild as his head thrashed back and forth. "Let me free."

"Hot?" Jess shook his head, his right hand slowly reaching for Slim's face. "I'm as cold as a polar bear's tail, you gotta be…"

Jess' voice trailed away as he made contact with Slim's skin, but even before his fingers could find his cheek, it was radiating with enough heat that anyone that couldn't read would have known it spelled fever in capital letters. He could almost hear the laughter of the flames as they flicked upward, but the internal amusement wasn't only for Jess' benefit, but was taking Slim on a ride of cruelty, similar, but different than the one they had already traversed together. Jess tried to silence it, but the groan passed through his lips as his head bent low over Slim's chest. Mercy had been short lived, as they had only taken a single step in the right direction before it would get run over by a herd of stampeding cattle. Fever was staking its claim inside of Slim's body, not at a crawl, but at a rapid sprint, not wanting to stop until it obtained complete control. If Jess could just slow it before it reached that point, then he had a chance.

Reaching for the canteen, his fingers worked the closure free as his opposite hand tugged at the bandana around his neck, and once both were freed, he doused the cloth with the water. Wringing out the extra beside him, Jess began dabbing Slim's forehead, wincing as Slim recoiled from his touch, but his determination wouldn't follow the lines around his face, staying firm without a similar flinch. His coat set aside, Jess left the dresses where they lay, only pushing the rocks away from Slim's body to give him more room to thrash. The cloth already turning warm under his hand, he switched to pour the water directly onto Slim's neck, letting it drip down his chest, but as he raised it toward Slim's head, an arm rose upward and smacked the canteen out of his hand.

"Come on, Slim, don't fight me, fight the heat!" Jess reached for the canteen before every drop was drained away and then slapped the cap in place with a stony fist. "Dad-gummit, how can we go from one extreme to the other?"

Keeping Slim's right arm pinned down, Jess mopped his partner's brow, tracing the bandana down each cheek before sliding back over his forehead and then into his hairline. It was that touch that switched the signals in Slim's brain from fever to pain, and he got a response that wasn't completely controlled by delirium. It came through Slim's mouth as a rush of air that held the distinct notes of a groan and then it turned into the clenching of his teeth, but it was the wrinkling of Slim's eyelids as they slammed shut that gave Jess a surge of encouragement. Jess slowly released Slim's arm, and as there was no longer resistance, Jess reached his hand through the open door, scraped the surface of the freezing ground and deposited the flakes of frost on Slim's neck. The gasp was clear, the shock was evident, and the temperature no longer was leaving an imprint of hooves over dangerous ground.

"Jess." Slim's eyes blinked three times, and as the recognition was made, there was an immediate change to his wearied hue, but not enough to chase away every shadow of fear. "It's really you."

"Yeah," Jess answered, his head creating a nod as a smile spread into his cheeks. "It's really me. You feeling better, Pard?"

"No." It came out with so much honesty, that Jess felt the strike to his vein as if a rattlesnake had just sunk its fangs into his flesh.

"You are kinda rough," Jess replied, testing the stability of his voice in its lowest register before raising it higher. "I ain't gonna lie, Slim. You've got a long way to get out, too. But you ain't in it alone, Pard."

"What's it like, Jess," Slim implored, his voice tracing the lines of wonder and awe. "What's it like, where you are?"

Stunned, Jess lifted his head away from Slim's body and looked around him, noting the dim coloring of the stage's interior that contrasted with the squares of light from the windows and then slid his gaze back to find Slim's blue set still upon him. "Kinda dreary, but I reckon it's no different than where you are."

"But I'm not there yet." Slim frowned at the question mark that seemingly printed itself over Jess' face. "You've taken the step beyond, not me."

"Dad-gum," Jess muttered into his palm as he slid his hand across his face. "He still thinks I'm dead."

"Jess?"

"Well, Slim," Jess began, working his thumb and forefinger back and forth across his jaw as he searched for a proper response. "It's gonna be a sight better once you make it over. I'll be honest with you, Pard, I ain't taken many steps into this new big open just yet, but we'll give it a good look over together when that time comes."

"Thanks." Slim swallowed, not noticing the difficulty that it took to get his throat to function. "I needed that."

Jess didn't allow it to make noise, but he released a heavy sigh of relief. "No problem, Slim."

"Mmmm." Slim rumbled out a moan that seemed to have been birthed in his core. "Why's there a cow sitting on my chest?"

"Maybe Jonesy brought one out for you to milk on account of you doing nothing but lazing around."

"Sure," Slim cracked a smile, but it withered so fast, Jess wasn't certain it had even been there. "Wait. Where's Jonesy? And Andy? I'm surprised I can't see them too. They're with you, aren't they?"

"They're here," Jess said, and although the truth wasn't on his tongue, in Slim's condition, the lie wasn't going to hurt either of them. "Just waiting for you to turn that corner is all."

"Good," Slim said as his eyes fluttered closed. "I just want us all to be together again. I want to go…"

He had to lay his hand on Slim's heart for several seconds before the thumping of Jess' chest could reduce to a less severe level. Despite Jess' fear, Slim's final breath hadn't just been taken. Dropping his head into his hands, Jess' mouth found the tip of his thumb, the gnawing done without sensing the pain that it caused, only aware of the nervous gesture when a dribble of blood landed on his tongue. His fist grew tight as he returned his gaze to Slim, grateful that his friend was secure under the shielding cloak of oblivion, but there was still too much to worry over to let the gratitude stick to anything solid.

Other than the injuries Jess could see and feel, Slim only had two symptoms. A cow sitting on his chest, and the fever. Since there wasn't an actual bovine with lowered haunches on Slim's upper half, Jess knew the sensation was coming from the inside, but without a visual aid, Jess could only guess the cause. Sickness or internal damage, and both could end up taking Slim's life. Jess didn't have to look far to know that his partner had little fight left. Maybe that part of him was already fit in a coffin, just waiting for the rest to be laid inside with it. There was ample air in the stagecoach, but Jess had the sudden urge that if he didn't vacate fast, he would be in the same predicament as Slim, with a cow's rump fully lowered on his chest, blocking his ability to breathe, and with two quick strides, he was in the center of endless space.

Inhaling deeply, Jess shivered as he blew outward, his breath curling into a plume of fog that retained its shape as the wind carried it away from him. Even among the daylight hours, the temperature had dipped far enough that the earthy surroundings were shimmering as the blossoms of frost opened against every surface, but it wasn't nature's beauty that was grabbing his attention, but something much more sinister. The dead man. He had yet to take care of his body. It shouldn't have been a surprise, as there was another that needed his care even more, but Jess could never ignore the duty of a burial.

The shovel that all stagecoaches were required to carry had been dislodged from its holding place during the bounce downhill, but it didn't take long for Jess to find it, for the growing ice turned its metal surface completely white. He would make the hole almost exactly where the outlaw had landed, but before he punctured the earth, Jess' gaze settled on a lifeless face, that somehow even in that form, still emitted evil. The guilt of murder didn't show, for even at his end, the outlaw's heart never turned contrite, but the blood that he had shed, some even on his hands, spelled out the names of the men he had killed. Scott, Dusty, and Papa T. And the one that still remained unknown was written across the ground. Slim.

"You did this," Jess said to the man beside him as he pushed the tip of the shovel into the ground, his foot needing to give an extra stomp over the freezing layer to get it to penetrate the soil. "And all I get to do is bury you."

Shovelful after shovelful, Jess worked through every blast of fury and hatred that sprung up inside of his chest, but not a single portion of it would get relieved, even when he tamped the last piece of sod underneath his foot when the task was completed. He stood still for a few minutes, the words racing through his head the farthest they could get away from solemnity, closely resembling the bitterness that bubbled on his tongue.

"Jess?"

The sound of his name tugged his head and his heart back toward the stagecoach. "Slim?"

"Jess!"

The call became more urgent, repeated twice more and the shovel landed behind Jess in a clank as he rushed over the slick ground to the door of the stagecoach, the end step coming with a slide as he nearly fell to Slim's side. "I'm right here, Slim."

"I thought you were gone," Slim said, the color in his eyes dim while the color in his cheeks flamed.

"Just went out to…" Jess paused, and his thumb that had begun to jut toward the freshly turned earth slowly folded back into his fist as he dropped the entire hand to his side. This wasn't the time for revealing a harsh detail such as grave digging, especially when it was clear to see that Slim still didn't have both hands grasping reality just yet. "Well, I wasn't far."

"Oh," Slim responded with a sigh that couldn't be completed without a wince. "It hurts."

"I'm sorry I can't do anything for the pain." Jess' hand brushed Slim's forehead, taking care to not let his thumb press too deeply into his temples and add to Slim's discomfort. "That fever though, it sure is blamed stubborn."

"It doesn't matter," Slim whispered, and Jess felt the first signal of grief catch his throat.

"It does to me." Jess shifted around the gravel that rested against his vocal chords. "That's why I'm gonna do whatever I can."

"No." Slim struggled to move, and as he gasped, it became evident that he was also struggling to breathe. That cow again, but maybe now it was an entire herd. "No. It's… it's too late. I want to die, Jess, I deserve to die."

"Dad-gum," Jess said with a firm shake of his head. "That ain't so. If anyone's gonna be deserving of a death sentence, it's someone who's already earned that right, like the man that did this to you."

"But I did it to him," Slim answered, the dullness in his voice able to finish with a solid punch to the air above his lips. "The stage. It was my doing."

Blue eyes reluctantly pulling away from a similar, more muted shade, Jess looked around the belly of the stagecoach and then shifted his focus through the open doorway, finding the marks of the stagecoach's tumble, all the way up the craggy hillside to the road where the fall began. The most experienced drivers could lose grip on a corner like the one Jess viewed and no one would raise a single question, laying the blame on the terrain, but Slim was giving a different excuse. Jess didn't need the details spelled out in front of him, but any stage man knew how to sabotage his own equipment, which was exactly what Slim had done to ensure that one of the worst men that ever walked the earth, could harm it no longer.

"You ain't got no reason to feel shame, Slim," Jess said, noticing by the deepening lines around Slim's eyes that he was touching the correct, yet sensitive, place in Slim's core. Bending nearer to Slim's face, he didn't know what Slim could gauge while he rode the invisible waves of heat, but Jess hoped that through their bond, his words would register in the place of honest understanding. "He was a killer, too many times over and you know that he wasn't gonna let you walk away when he didn't need you no longer. You did what you had to do, and in doing that, you saved a lot of lives, while putting a firm lock of closure on a whole lot more that are suffering. I don't know much about passing out medals, but I reckon that makes you kind of like a hero."

"I… I had to get him."

"I know, Slim." Jess didn't know how he could create one, but he smiled, and by the tiny spark in Slim's eyes, Jess knew it had been seen, and that made the adjustment of his lips easily deepen. "And you did, Pard."

"I couldn't have made it this far without you," Slim whispered, the delicate sound becoming even quieter than he had delivered his words before.

"I reckon in a way," Jess' reply paused in midair as his thoughts focused more on the days belonging to his troubled yesterdays than what was actually present, for it was Slim's friendship that had made the difference as he transitioned his life from bad to good. "I could say the same."

"You seem so close, Jess." Slim looked up at him, but it was obvious that by the glazing over his blue that whatever was on his side of the fever, Jess' face wasn't the complete image in front of him. "Maybe God sent you to guide me home."

"God sent me to guide you home, all right," Jess said with a shake of his head, "but it ain't to no mansion in the sky. There's a house back yonder that's kinda small, smells like Mulligan and a coupla unwashed bachelors, but it's home, and that's where we're gonna be bound. But dad-gum, that's gonna take some doing."

"No, it's coming. I can feel it."

"What is it, Slim?"

"It's getting dark, Jess," Slim gasped through a lengthy shudder.

"Dark?" Jess turned his eyes toward the window, the brilliance of the sunlight over the frozen ground making the display even brighter, but all of that color was lost to Slim, as the light that was his life was fading away, fast. "I reckon it is, on your end of things. But Slim, that kinda darkness ain't got a permanent hold. It's only temporary."

"Jess," Slim cried softly, the tears only being able to be seen as they welled through his lashes, dissolving into his skin as they made contact with his burning cheeks. "Don't go, Jess."

"I ain't going anywhere, Slim," Jess said, closing his hand around Slim's. "No matter where it leads, I ain't gonna let you ride this trail alone."

"Jess…" Slim's whisper faded away as his eyelids lowered, his head shifting to the side as he slipped under the dark veil that had already surrounded him.

"Oh, Pard." Jess' body folded in half, nearly lying on top of his partner as one hand remained attached to Slim's while the other palm lay flat against the surface of the stagecoach along Slim's side. Grief was raking the lining of his heart raw, but the weeping that went with it Jess would only allow to come later, perhaps to go on for a lifetime.

Slim was still alive, but the thread he was hanging onto was fragile, only remaining in his grasp because Jess had a hold of it too, refusing to let it go. But even though it remained intertwined with their fingers, Jess knew that sometimes, the kindest thing to do was to let go. No matter how valued the life being held was, a point becomes reached when the opposite heart turns toward compassion, letting the loved one go, to not allow them to continue suffering. And that's what Slim was. Loved. As a friend, a partner, and a brother, and in all three, Jess had never known one that was better than Slim. And compassion was beginning to outweigh everything else.

"Dad-gum. Goodbye's gotta be the hardest word."

But it wouldn't be his next.

"Jess!"