DISCLAIMER – I do not own any Sonic the Hedgehog characters, settings, etcetera (anything copyrightedly relating to SEGA's works). Fang the Sniper / Nack the Weasel is property of SEGA, although some aspects of this story are my own work. Alterations to the Sonic universe in this story are not to be considered canon. Do not steal (forge in your or another person's name) or sell this story in any manner. I have a good lawyer. You may, however, place this on your website without permission. Please ask permission before using aspects of this story in yours. If sections of it look similar to another, please inform me. I'm no thief myself. Thank you, and enjoy.

Bounty Hunter
By Rusty Dillingham

--Chapter Fifteen – Under the Stars--

"Oh my God. Ow."

For much of that night, Sombrero spent more effort than he'd ever accumulated in his entire life slithering his way out of that enormous, thick patch of cacti. It was a horrifying weave of prickly pear and saguaro, much more than the gila monster could believe really existed, but above anything else that crossed his mind, he no longer doubted the effectiveness of the plant's interesting defensive measures in the form of two hundred thousand goddamn needles all over the fucking place.

"Ow," he said meekly, finally nearing the edge when it was damn near midnight. His body, covered head to toe in cactus needles, was tangled lopsidedly throughout a couple of branches of prickly pear as he took very careful, and very, very slow steps to get through it. He felt his arm nick one. "Ow." Then his leg bumped one. "Ow." His tail caught a few. "Owwww—rrrrgh."

A couple of Sand Hill sand-surfers stood near the edge, holding their sandboards under their arms and watching him the whole time.

"Ow. Ow... What the hell are you looking at!? Ow. This look like a fucking show to you!? Ow. Ow. Yeah, I really need an audience right now. That's fantastic. You want an autograph or something? Wait until I get out there, I'll give you a damn auto—" In his anger he neglected to be as careful as he'd been and his leg bumped hard into a patch. "OW!" He recoiled fiercely and jammed his side against a tuft of needles, eliciting an absolutely blood-curling: "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH--!!!"

"You, like, want some help or somethin', dude—"

Sombrero began tearing his way through the stuff, too mad to care about the pain. He already felt enough of it as it was, what was a little more? It quickly became apparent this was not the best course of action, and moments later he was awkwardly writhing in pain, standing, metaphorically, between a rock and a million sharp places. "Ooowwww," he moaned pitifully as tears started welling in his eyes.

When he finally, finally reached the very edge of the patch, it was a magnificent—or magnificently pitiful—spectacle. He did everything in his power to make it look like a hard-fought victory as he clamored slowly from the depths of the green cacti on his knees, panting, gasping for breath, cussing, and so on. "Yeah," he wheezed, looking like he'd just been through a war with the number of little cuts and scrapes on his green body. "Hell yeah. That's," pant, "that's how we do it in the bush. Oh yeah. I'm the man. Yeeeaaah."

He rolled over onto his back and laughed to himself happily. "Hoo! Hahahaaa! Yesss. Yessss. Haaa."

You know, one of the sandsurfers thought, you probably would have had an easier time getting outta there without that big, dumb-looking hat slowing you down.

"Ha," Sombrero wheezed again, "nothin' keeps me down. Rock you like a hurricane, baby. Oh yeah. Still alive. This was a triumph. I'm making a note here." He sat up and looked around for his airbike, still giggling like a retarded ten-year-old schoolgirl. He had to get out of here, but where was it? "Huge success." Pant. "It's hard to overstate my satisfaction."

Sombrero remembered seeing the thing come flying into the patch after him just before he'd lost consciousness. He looked deep into the patch again, and saw, far within the coiled, tangled innards of saguaro and prickly pear, his airbike. "Haha, ha--... what."

He disappointedly fell to his back again with a puff and lay spread-eagled in the sand, staring up at the stars and letting the tears flow. "D'ohhh..."

The sun had been long set by the time Fang awoke. He'd been so tired he'd drifted away into slumber shortly after Claudia had left the room, but he was not a particularly heavy sleeper, for a man in his profession who slept too heavily invited danger. He knew something was amiss when he felt funny—and realized it was his leg. It had been bandaged much better than before he'd fallen asleep. He must have been so exhausted that he hadn't realized someone—probably Claudia, he assumed—had tended to his wound. He wasn't sure if he liked that yet.

Light from the kitchen illuminated part of the den he sat in, and a glance outside confirmed the stillness of a desert night. Hot as he'd been, it could get winter cold in the desert during twilight, so cold a man would think he'd just set foot into the Ice Cap Zone, and some of that cool air found its way into the ranch home. Fang rubbed at his eyes with a pair of fingers, by no means rejuvenated.

He rose and stepped into the kitchen. Nobody else inhabited it.

It was a small section of a home that wasn't very large itself to begin with. The countertop was worn and bare. A nearby wooden table had seen better days, but everything looked well-kept for. Through a single-paned window he could see part of what could barely have been called a backyard, which contained a tiny, half-complete wooden fence and a small assortment of "outside" things—from the minimal light of the window he could make out a bicycle with a flat tire. He doubted it saw much use in an environment like this.

She had told him he was welcome to anything in the fridge, but for some reason, despite having eaten little for the past few days, he wasn't very hungry. Some water would have been nice instead. He searched her drawers for a cup and spent three minutes looking, eventually settling for a bowl when he couldn't find one. He tried the faucet, and there was only a trickle. Turning the handle all the way only helped marginally. Should have expected that, in a place like this.

He drank, spilling some of the water on his chest, and didn't care enough to do anything about it. Boredly he stepped closer to the window and stared into the darkness.

The stars were low, as they always were here at night. Fang found himself taking in the vast, broad scope of the sky, a black blanket coated with crystals. When was the last time he'd actually given stars a good look? Probably when he'd been a kid. They were one of those things that utterly mesmerized you as a young one, then lost their fascinating appeal or romantic, otherworldly mystery when your life became too full of things formulaic for coming of age, like work and women and all the other hardships one faces as the years stack up. A fellow didn't see things like this in the city anyway, with all the lights. He often wasn't there, though so that was no excuse, but the fact that he was always busy filled that role.

But with nothing to do at the moment, and no city lights, he took a second to examine them. Was it sights like this that drove Claudia and others to live here despite the danger?

He sensed someone's presence at his side, a form teasing his peripheral vision. Fang's gaze traveled slowly to the source and he stared at it for a good number of seconds.

"Hi," said Bronson, one of Claudia's kids, after a few awkward moments. He was a small one, dressed in light clothes as many here did to deal with the heat, but looked capable for his age and size.

Fang turned away and refilled the bowl, regarding the boy with as much interest as he'd give a sack of broken bricks.

"We have some soda in the fridge."

Fang ignored him. Like he needed to be any more dehydrated than he already was. Kids.

"That water ain't that good. The pipes are rusting and we don't have anyone around here who can fix them. Smells like ass, don't it? You shouldn't drink too much of it."

No response. Refusing to open one's mouth was a good way to make other people leave you the hell alone, especially kids. Not talking to kids kept them from gaining too much interest in you or trying to ask you questions you had no viable interest in answering. Only by virtue of his silence had Fang managed to avoid obnoxious interrogations from children. He wanted to keep it that way.

Bronson stood where he was. He stared at the bounty hunter like a dog stares at something it's never seen before but doesn't have the sense to realize any danger that may be present.

"What happened to your gun?"

No answer.

"What about your leg?"

No answer.

"Where's your airbike?"

No answer.

"Why is your hat so dirty?"

No answer.

"Why do you only have four fingers?"

No answer.

"Are you tired?"

No answer.

"You look tired."

Fang glared at him.

"You kinda smell too."

Fang gave this due consideration.

He glanced down at his fur, noting it was sprinkled with sand, dirt, mud, blood, and so on. I guess I haven't showered for a while. Sand Hill had taken its toll on his appearance—and bodily odor, as it turned out. "Shouldn't you be in bed?"

"Nah. No school tomorrow. Plus that coyote buddy of yours decided to use my bed even though I told him he couldn't. So I gotta sleep on the couch or somethin'."

Was there any way to tell someone to get lost in a nice manner when one was in as foul a mood as he was? Fang was too tired to think of one. "Well, buzz off anyway."

Bronson again remained in place. Fang sighed below his breath as the little goat worked up the courage to ask something, until asking in a tone that implied all the cordiality of a Sunday brunch:

"You ever killed anyone?"

Fang's brow lowered further. He glared ahead into space, wishing he'd kept his trap shut. What the hell was wrong with kids? Why were they so obsessed with death and murder? And war? What was so cool about any of it? He reasoned they were just mystified by the magnitude of such things, and they usually grew up learning of its realities anyway—either that or they turned into men like Juarez or Claw. He tried to not take any offense at the question, but it took him a while to answer anyway.

When he finally made up his mind, he said, "No one you probably know."

"How many?"

As much as these questionnaires got under his skin, he answered anyway. "I don't recall."

"Wow," was the reply.

"What do you mean, wow?" Fang glanced at the kid without turning his head, put off by the reaction. "Impressed?"

Bronson tucked his hands in his back pockets, still watching Fang carefully. "I guess. Why'd you kill 'em?"

"They needed killing."

"All of 'em?"

That one made Fang hesitate.

"Yes," he eventually said.

"Wow," was all Bronson could say.

Fang watched him, then looked back down at his bowl.

Yeah, he thought with a derisive snort. Wow.

"You okay?" asked Bronson.

Fang puzzled over that, as if caught off-guard. When was the last time someone so small had asked about his well-being? Not that it had never occurred, but he wasn't used to such a question, and his discomfort showed. "I'm fine." The irony of saying this with a hole in his leg and blood and dirt and gashes all over his body did not miss his notice.

"A'right then." Off went the goat to find somewhere to sleep. "G'night."

Fang stared after him, then saw, in the reflection of a cabinet's glass, someone enter a doorway behind him.

"I wouldn't drink that water," Claudia told him.

Fang tossed the bowl into her sink with a louder crashing noise than was necessary. He turned to the opposite doorway Bronson had just exited through, feeling his irritation bubble. "You have a blanket I can borrow?"

She nodded to an adjacent room which Fang went into for a moment, before he returned with a quilt. He walked past her and headed towards the ranch's back door.

"And where exactly do you think you're going?" she asked, but he didn't answer. Fang headed out into the darkness, the sheer, bitter cold making his fur stand on end as he threw the quilt into the sand and started to curl up.

Claudia was at a loss for words. Fang the Sniper, in all his dogged, pathetic glory. She couldn't bring herself to feel anything for him but pity. "You have got to be kidding me," she finally said.

Fang ignored her. He tried holding it tighter against his body.

Claudia rolled her eyes. "You can't stay out here all night, you'll die of pneumonia before dawn breaks."

"I have no intention of sleeping in there. It's not my place to ask you if I can, either."

"But," she said, "you can't... you can't just sleep outside in the freezing cold."

"I've done it before."

Claudia folded her arms, unable to believe someone more set in his ways than Fang the Sniper existed. "You realize you're still on our property. You may as well get in here."

She expected him to get up and walk past her fence before setting the blanket down again, but instead Fang sat up and considered it. He glanced at her with a mildly annoyed look in his eye, then rose and headed back towards the door. She moved out of his way, aware he was galled.

"You're welcome for the repair work," she said, indicating his leg despite his back being turned to her. "I suppose it's too much for your ego to take if I ask for a favor in return. God forbid I ask for a thank you."

"I don't do favors."

"Don't go after Claw. Leave him alone."

Fang turned to give her a sour look. She still wanted to discuss this? He was getting a little tired of it already.

"Look," she began, "I wouldn't ask you if I didn't—"

"I didn't come all this way to go home empty-handed. I haven't been shot at so much so I could just up and leave right when I'm so close to getting him. So don't hold your breath."

"You're not close to getting him at all. There are a hundred gunfighters in New Mettle and he's sticking right there until he knows you're gone. I wouldn't expect him to split any sooner than that. Face it, bounty boy. Your fishing line just snapped."

"As if you would understand just what I'm capable of," he snarled contemptuously. "I've hunted people far more dangerous than your little four-eyed friend. Every once in a while some clown thinks he's gotten away, loves to believe he's finally out of reach. The looks on their faces when I show up thereafter is priceless. I'm sure his will be too, at least before I string him up and skin him alive."

Claudia's expression stiffened angrily. 'What is wrong with you?"

"I get the feeling you don't like the way I do things," Fang mused.

"You don't even know the story. You hate him and you don't even know him at all. He didn't even have anything to do with those deaths in that heist of his."

Fang's irritation gave way slightly to curiosity, though not enough to change his expression.

"Yes," she continued, "he robbed the bank. Yes, it was an extremely dumb thing to do. He's not like that anymo—"

"I don't care."

Claudia's exasperation began to break through. "It wasn't even him who shot those kids. It was that little freak lizard friend of his, the one with the sombrero. He's a maniac."

"And just how would you know that?"

She seemed hesitant to give him the answer. "Because," she said, "because I knew him—I do know him. He helped Claw rob the place, and he's just so messed up, he went ballistic. He's just a sick, crazy fool. I knew Claw's other friend too, a bison. He helped too, but I haven't seen him for a while."

And you won't for a while longer, thought Fang. "I see no reason to disassociate your buddy from what happened. He was in charge of what happened that day; the responsibility for what happened lies with him."

"But he's sorry!" she pleaded. "You've never even met him and you're going to make such a judgment about him?"

"I apologize for not being a knight-in-shining-armor," Fang growled, feeling his patience with her thin rapidly.

She looked at the floor and placed two fingers between her eyes, looking more tired with each passing second.

"I can't show generosity in my job," he said. "That would be stupid. That's what gets people who do what I do for a living dead and buried. I already told you, all I know is that I'm after someone who may think they can get away with what they've done, and I have to show them they can't."

That did it. Claudia's anger broiled past her desperation, and she looked ready to walk over and smack him. Fang wasn't sure how he suddenly felt when he realized the level of her vexation. But he could tell this discussion was about to get a lot less amiable.

"You," she hissed with a voice that seemed near as capable of killing something as Fang's, "you think you're such a macho tough guy. Mr. Professional. All about a wild sense of justice. Ice cold and cool-handed, always gets the job done no matter the cost." She was doing a better job of giving the words a bitterly humiliating flavor than he wanted to give her credit for, and it made him angry. "Well, you know what I think? I think you're nothing but a cruel, gutless vigilante-wannabe. You take the law into your own hands because you're too smug and full of yourself to put in the effort to do anything else."

"What," Fang spat back at her, "you think I'm going to go apply for a job at a goddamn computer store!? Do I look like someone who could have a normal job? Yes, I do this because it's the only thing I know how to do. It's the only thing I want to do!"

"Is that true?"

The question stopped Fang's mouth from blurting open before he bothered to consider an answer. "Why wouldn't it be?"

"Well, gee, I don't know. Could it have anything to do with your current state? Have you looked in a mirror recently? You've got dirt all over you. There's blood all over your leg. I'm guessing you took a bullet to the arm recently. You look like you haven't slept in days. You're no closer to finishing your little current mission—" she was certain to say the words with a remarkably snide tone, "—than when you started. And, though I hesitate to tell you because unlike you I have some semblance of a decent nature, I feel I should inform you that right now, you are in sore need of some deodorant. Is this really what you want in life? All you're doing right now is making life worse for everyone around you."

Fang huffed through his nostrils. "That's not what you said the other day when I was here. Seems you changed your mind awful quick."

"I didn't know you were such an asshole," she growled through clenched teeth.

There was no immediate reply.

"Really?" she said, as if incredulous. "This is all you want? How many more men are you going to kill before it's all over?"

Fang felt something angry swell up inside of him. He ducked his head away and further under the brim of his hat to hide it. "Just because I kill someone doesn't automatically mean I was thrilled with the prospect. Get that through your head."

"I didn't say you enjoy it. I want to know how many more people are going to lose their lives just because they get in your way while you're doing your job. Really, if you have any respect for law and order, you should know what you're doing is terrible."

"I know it's terrible," he growled back at her, incensed at her continuous prodding into his personal life. He was unused to having it so explicitly studied with such a negative, critical eye. "I don't need you to tell me that. Your biggest exposure to killing is probably squashing a roach hanging around on your bathroom wall. You have no idea what goes through a man's mind when he takes a life. Taking even one could warp your thoughts until you die. I'm stronger than that."

"Oh, really." She was giving him that unimpressed, talking-to-a-fool look again, and it made Fang even madder than he already was. "So all you desire for the rest of your days is to kill and get a paycheck for doing it. You're nothing better than a common assassin. For all your bluster, you have about as much worth as a hired thug."

Fang turned back around and placed his hands on her sink's countertop. Everything she was saying was suddenly having a gnarling effect on him. Damn it, stop it. Stop feeling like this. She doesn't understand.

"Well?"

"Well what?" he snapped.

"Is this all you want?"

Fang didn't answer, his eyes riveted on the countertop, seeking anything that wasn't her face.

"There has to be more than that," she pried, easing her voice. "Everyone wants something better for themselves."

An uncomfortable silence oozed from the bounty hunter as he stared down into her sink.

"There has to be. No one just goes into such a life willingly."

"Why don't you just mind your own damned business?" Fang seethed under his breath, feeling his way of life disrupted more than it ever had been.

"I think we're a little past the stranger stage by now." Claudia's arms folded across her torso. "You can drop the act, tough guy."

The fur on the back of Fang's neck bristled, his eyes flaring. Few people could speak to him like that without repercussion. But he couldn't so much as look at her right then. She wasn't someone Fang could draw on and so conveniently end. Damnit.

"Calm down." She read him like a book. "Talk to me. You know how to do that."

Fang settled his nerves some, glancing halfway at her, but still refusing to discuss this kind of matter. The iron curtain remained in place.

"Why do you even do this? There has to be more to it than it's my job. Don't you have higher aspirations?"

There was no way out of this. Fang clenched and unclenched his fists, working up the nerve to say something.

"It doesn't matter," he said.

Claudia measured him carefully with a long look that scoured his rough frame. It was a sad sight. Something in him, blanketed by his perpetual state of bottled-up anger, seemed so despondent, so hopeless. It was as though the feelings radiated from him, like some kind of third-party that had attached itself to him and become a part of who he was.

"You don't understand." His voice was deep and ragged. "This is all I'll ever be able to do. You think I could just run off and do whatever I please? Well, I can't. I couldn't do anything else even if I tried. People see my name and that strikes their nerves like a shot to the gut. They know what I've done, and they're either afraid to be in my remote vicinity or they want to test their luck against me. Make a name for themselves." He thought of people like the Kangaroos. People who seemed intent on hurting the world they lived in for no reason. People who wanted to do anything to get ahead. Hated his very existence just because he was better—or supposedly better. Someday, someone would prove he wasn't better anymore, and suddenly that day didn't feel so far off to him.

He looked up at her, returning her thorough, careful look. "Sure, I want things. Trivial things. New TV, new guns. Nothing nicer. It can't be anything more," he spent a second to look for the proper term, "meaningful than that."

A quick glance was cast around at the interior of the kitchen. "Nothing like building a house. Making sure my offspring have a good home they can look back on with pride. Raising them to be right and doing what I can to make their community a better place for them to be. That's not the sort of thing I can do. I know there's more to life than a job, but, well. You get the idea. I can't do anything like that."

"Yes you can," she said. "You can help those around you. You just need to use better discretion."

"I can't use better discretion when half the people I meet try to kill me. I don't suppose you've ever had that kind of problem, toiling away here in the middle of nowhere."

"No," she considered, "I can't say I have. But does someone who only wants to be left alone in solitude for the rest of his life thinking about what he did deserve such treatment? Do so many people have to be killed just because they get in your way? That's insane."

"I'm doing what men have been doing for thousands of years. It's our natural instinct to kill. But I've not some primitive, uncultivated oaf. I've got control. I don't do it unless I need to. It's not easy, but I do it anyway. If I don't, I'm the one who dies. You start thinking about the rights and the wrongs of killing someone who's half a second from raising a gun to air out your skull, that's insane. Are you starting to understand how my life operates?"

Claudia shook her head. "You don't have to kill at all. You can get out of this."

"No, I can't. Don't you get it? Are you even listening to what I'm saying? What the hell would you know?"

"You don't even have to go back to that life if you don't want to. You could just stop—"

"And do what!? Live alone in solitude for the rest of my life? What the hell kind of life is that? A man only has so much time on this planet, he ought to do something with it. Make it at least worthwhile; try to be the best at something. I'm not a veritable hobo who's content to live in his parents' basement for eternity. I'll do what I can to get ahead, and if some fool tries to stop me, he'll pay for it."

Claudia's head dipped slightly as she stared at the floor, then closed her eyes. Fang could not take his eyes from her. She was working so hard to make him see things her way, and he almost felt bad for it.

"Please," she said quietly as she opened her eyes and struggled to salvage her argument. "Please just consider it some more. There's always a way out. You decide your own destiny. No one else does that for you."

Then she stared at him quietly.

There was a small jump somewhere in Fang as he stared back. She genuinely must have felt he was worth something were she putting so much effort into this. He didn't know what to say. All he could do was gaze at her as she placed her hands behind the small of her back, waiting patiently for some kind of response. He couldn't find one for her. He was nearly speechless.

"I—"

"FANG THE SNIPER!"

Claudia nearly jumped at the voice. Fang tiredly faced the general front of the house. Now what?

A frightened Bronson rushed into the room, as if to say something, but didn't know what words should come.

"Show yourself," boomed the voice from outside in the darkness. "I know you hide in there."

"Who," Claudia said warily, "who is it? He sounds familia—"

"What in thunderation is makin' all that racket?" blurted Zipp, who bumbled around a doorway into the kitchen, rubbing bags from his eyes. "Y'all must've been raised in a barn or somethin', I tell you. Out in the west when it's bedtime we don't go around bawlin' like a cow just got himself branded—"

"You shut up. Everyone stay calm." Fang took a few steps toward the kitchen doorway before feeling fingers grasp his arm. He turned to see they were Claudia's. "Get your hand off me."

"You can't go out there!" she breathed. "You don't even have a gun."

His eyes looked over her pleading face. "Would you prefer I invite him in for tea?" he asked in a mocking tone.

"Please. Please, it doesn't have to be like this. You don't have to do anything."

"So I should just shut myself in here like a coward and wait for him to go away. That would be a brilliant idea if he wasn't going to just pop up somewhere else later on and try to finish it then. I might as well get it over with."

"Listen to me, I know you're better than this—"

His callous voice cut her off and invited no room for argument. "You know what, I've had just about enough of your peace and love bullshit, woman. There's a man out there who wants to kill me, in case you haven't noticed. And what's to stop him from coming in here and slaughtering you all like a butcher once he's done with me?"

She was taken back by his sudden anger, but she stood there, staring at him harder and deeper than anyone he could remember.

"GET OUT HERE!!" raged the voice.

"Please," was all she said.

Fang's expression did not change as his silence and his blank, unmoving look told her all that needed to be said.

Claudia stared back at him, unable to say anything else. She seemed to understand, then resigned to closing her eyes again, as if to shut it all away and go somewhere else.

The adjacent coyote's head moved back and forth, from her and then to Fang and back again.

"Uh," he eventually chimed in, "I don't suppose you still have your hubby's piece around here anywhere's, d'you, Claud'?" Zipp rocked back and forth on his feet, taking in the amount of tension in the air, but offered it no outright regard. "Reckon it might, y'know, come in handy 'bout now. So we all don't die, or somethin'."

Her hesitation lasted. Finally she turned and took a few steps to a high cabinet on the opposite side of the kitchen, opened it, and uncovered a box from within. After a moment she returned to the bounty to hand him something.

Fang studied the semiautomatic. It looked like a large caliber, probably a .45, with a silver finish and brown wooden grips; it looked very much like his old gun, and it was the same ammunition type he preferred. It didn't seem like any sort of Saturday Night Special from what he could tell—Claw must have had some kind of attachment to it to keep it so maintained. He suspected he'd left it in Claudia's possession for instances such as this. But it felt light. Fang pulled the slide back to assure there was a round in the chamber ready to be fired. What he saw miffed him, for his eyes rose sharply and sorely at her, and he ejected the clip and examined the contents. "There aren't any rounds in this thing. The whole clip is empty."

"I," she stammered while glancing off to one side, a bit shamed by the mistake, "I didn't want anything to happen if the kids got their hands on it somehow."

A mother's discombobulated reasoning at its best. "You had it up so god damned high they'd have needed a cherry picker to reach it." He scrounged around inside the space where she'd gotten it, thankfully found a clip, inspected it, and jammed it into the gun. "I was about to go out there carrying a toothless shark."

Her embarrassment was obvious. "I—I forgot, I'm sorry."

Fang shook his head briefly, ignoring her dispirited expression before turning to the coyote. "I don't suppose I thanked you for your help earlier. Well," he pursed his lip a moment before saying, "thanks."

Zipp gave him an easy, stoic stare, then shrugged his shoulders in a long motion. "Buddy, if you gunned down all them sumbitches in town like you was bulletproof, and in case y'didn't notice you did, I think you can take whoever it is that wants your head on a stick. Don't be talkin' like you're dead the second you go out there."

Fang almost smiled. He examined the gun again, confident of its worth. Then he looked back to Claudia, and hated what he saw in her face. Misery, disappointment, and pain.

Fang could do little but apologize in his stare. She noticed, but did not respond.

Zipp moved Bronson and Fonda, who had been woken up by the yelling, out of the bounty hunter's way as Fang stepped through the door, slipping the .45 into his belt's holster.

The porch light came to life, illuminating the front yard of the ranch home. With a long whine the front door opened, and Fang the Sniper stepped into the cool night air, wooden floorboards moaning beneath his boots. The source of the vile shouting stood in the sand a short distance from the home, with a large black airbike further beyond, a desolate wasteland of cold air, desert and mountains the backdrop behind it. A stare of malicious intent was centered on the violet weasel-wolf.

"Fang the Sniper," said Juarez. The black-clad javelina looked no worse for wear after the day's events in town. Instead he looked even more ready for trouble, standing high in the darkness under the pale moon. A long shadow stretched behind him from the home's light. "Supposed you could get away with what you did, no? I am not someone to fool with, I hope you realize."

"I expect you're here to kill me for making you look like an ass in front of all your friends," said Fang. He stopped walking when he was at the edge of the porch. "You have remarkable intuition to know I was here."

"Saw you headed this direction out of town, I did." Juarez offered the barest hint of a pleasant smile. "No' hard to tell where you going."

"Clever boy. I'd have thought you'd know better than to try this after what I did to your noisy scorpion friend. Didn't you notice, or were you too busy trying to decide if alcohol tastes better on the way up than the way down?"

"Hondo?" Juarez contemplated it. "He was a casual amigo. No more. Allies come and go in this land, Fang the Sniper. Change hands and sides as often as money, they do. Too many pleasures, too many temptations. Hard for men to ignore. There will be others, eh?"

"Too bad they'll all meet the same fate as you. All you egocentric gunhands get a little bit dead sooner or later."

Juarez's impassive leer did not flinch. "Do not try to goad me into getting reckless, bounty hunter. Smarter than that I am. Caught off-guard I was." He shook his head. "You no' get lucky twice. A fool luck visits sometimes, but sits down with him it does not. A fitting... proverb, they call it, sí?"

Fang's hand dwelt a dreadfully small distance from the borrowed semiautomatic. Behind him the groaning of floor panels told him the others had come outside. He didn't bother looking over his shoulder at them.

Claudia watched Juarez cautiously. Zipp adjusted the red cowboy hat on his head, wondering what Fang had done with his only remaining six-shooter. Not that he was totally certain he'd have the courage to put it to use against a professional like Juarez, but he'd have felt safer with it, nonetheless. Bronson and Fonda stood by their mother, the former looking much less impressed with the notion of killing than he had before.

A subtle sneer appeared on Fang's visage while he and Juarez traded glowers. "You're going to make a fight over something so pitiful and irrelevant. Just take your hits like a man and be off with you. Go home and get back to your life or you'll win a one-way trip to that big tortilla factory in the sky."

"This is my life, Fang the Sniper. An interesting profit, killing is. Black, but curious. A shame we could not be compadrés. You seemed like a good man from what little I saw. A shame, it is. But you will fetch a good price, and I will enjoy what follows. Fang the Sniper met his match on this day under this sky."

Fang's frown intensified. Juarez was so sure of himself, and so pompous, and arrogant—and he was good at what he did. Fang knew the man had killed for the sake of killing. That was one of those things gunfighters went about doing in their daily lives, if they managed to come across a chance, and if they didn't find any reasons they'd make them. The killing made them better, faster, stronger, and most importantly, more notorious. He was, in all essence to Fang, a terrible man who wouldn't be missed by anyone but perhaps his parents, if that.

But still, for some reason, Fang could not bring himself to do it. It didn't feel right, after everything Claudia had said to him. He could see her face, her fine white features right behind him, staring at him, pleading against all hopelessness to not do what needed to be done, to find away around this.

Fang stepped off the porch, boots crunching the sand beneath him as he walked. Those behind him could do nothing but remain an audience. The javelina gunfighter, a hollowness in his eyes, stood very tall and still in the night, as if a statue. Fang stopped.

"If you so much as breathe on that gun, I'll kill you right now." Fang squinted. "But it doesn't have to be like this. Just ask yourself before you do anything if this is really worth it to you. I mean really."

He noticed the javelina was watching much more carefully than before, the smile having disappeared.

"And if it isn't," Fang continued, pausing momentarily, "then just go home."

Juarez's dark eyes dwelled on Fang, then, very slowly, they traveled to where Claudia and the others stood. The air around them all was almost completely silent in the open wild, with nothing but the small breeze stirring distant sands. He looked back at the bounty hunter.

Don't do it, damn it. Fang clenched his teeth beneath closed lips. Don't do it. Not in front of them. Don't make me--

Juarez went for his gun and Fang shot him.

It happened so fast the others weren't immediately certain of the result of the deafening bang until they saw Juarez drop his sidearm and crumple to his knees, a flabbergasted look of shocked pain on his visage. The javelina draped a hand over the red hole so precisely placed in the center of his chest as it bled profusely with a coppery smell. He looked up to see Fang holding the gun level at him. Then, with the kind of slow destruction of a catastrophe, he fell to his side and clung to the hole as tight as he could.

Claudia, Zipp, Bronson and Fonda made no movement as Fang returned the pistol to its holster. They all stood there under the porch light, watching a man die.

Fang waited. He did something he was unused to doing: he watched too.

For just a moment, Juarez seemed to want to reach for his fallen gun, but he didn't. His face strained in agony, the red circle around him growing larger with every passing second. He rested his head against the ground, swallowed once, stared at something the others couldn't see as if in sudden fear, and then was still.

Fang turned around to walk back toward the home. He stepped on the porch and headed past Zipp for the front door, glancing sideways at Claudia. She did not return the look.

Speedy the Kangaroo couldn't remember being so ticked off.

When a dry period of tedium had settled into the trio's journey, Shifty had wanted their map of Sand Hill; he'd begged and whined and moaned and spat and cussed and pleaded. God only knew why. It seemed to Speedy the poor little dimwit probably wanted to make himself feel valued—everyone felt the need to have some kind of important responsibility at some point in their lives. Speedy lamented that he'd been around for this such point when it had finally come around to hitting Shifty, because the next thing he knew Smiley had gotten sick of listening to it, given in, and now as a result of Shifty's mind-boggling inability to successfully handle the responsibilities of a goddamn map they were all lost and trying to figure out how off course they were.

He was angry at everything. He was angry at Smiley for giving in (however annoyed he'd been by it himself), angry at Shifty for being such an idiot, angry at Fang the Sniper for no real reason that had anything to do with this, and angry at himself for ever agreeing to come along on this rapidly-worsening nightmare. He was starting to wish he could go home. He'd have confessed to any sin he'd ever committed if it meant he could go home tonight.

For some reason Shifty had brought along marshmallows. He'd stuck some on a stick and was roasting them over their camp's little fire while Speedy glared at him and Smiley struggled to find out where they were. It was hard to do so at night, so he'd probably have to wait until morning before being able to do a good inspection of their surroundings.

Speedy sat there, wishing he were dead. Suddenly, because apparently no one ever told Shifty you're not supposed to actually hold the stick inside the stupid fire, the marshmallow and then the stick came ablaze. "Shit." He started smashing it repeatedly into the sand next to Speedy, spraying sand and destroyed marshmallow onto him. Speedy burned silently, wondering if his nearby boss would take notice if he strangled Shifty while cussing and screaming at the top of his lungs.

Shifty tried again. Same result. "Shit!" Same swatting-into-sand motion. Speedy watched his legs get covered in a tasty combination of sand and black, much-hotter-than-it-looked marshmallow bits.

While the other kangaroo was retrieving more of the little puffs from a plastic bag (during which for some reason he dug and dug and dug around inside it even though there were a bunch right at the top), Speedy opened his mouth to say in a very polite tone, "Shifty, I guess I should inform you just so that you're aware, if you get one more molecule of that grimy crap on me, I swear to God in heaven, partner, I will take your life. Is that clear?"

"Sure, bud'." Shifty went about his business. Seconds later: "Shit!" Swatswatswatswat.

A still-flaming piece of the stupid crap flew at Speedy, except instead of his leg this batch landed in his eye. "AAHH—SONOFAWHORE—!!" Speedy bolted out of his seat like he'd just been shocked in the ass and slapped at the offending snack. Somehow he knew deep inside that was going to happen, yet he hadn't had the sense to get out of the damn way.

"Oops."

Speedy reached for his gun when finished, contemplating the interesting notion of using it on himself after dealing with Shifty.

"Ahoy, mateys." Smiley ambled up to the group far too jovially for anyone else's good, prompting the darkest kangaroo to cancel his motions. "Too dark to see anything 'round here. Gotta wait until morning 'til we can get our bearings. Thanks for that, Shift'."

"You're welcome."

"He's being sarcastic, you stupid—" Speedy's glare could have bore a hole through the dimwit with just a bit more effort; if only Shifty hadn't set his right eye on fire. "Do you even know how you sound when you talk? Your voice makes me feel like someone's pissing on my brain."

"It's just how I was brought up." Shifty almost looked hurt. "You don't like the way I talk?"

"It hurts my ears."

"But, that's just how my mom taught me—"

"Well, your mom must have been an idiot!"

"Easy there, partners," intervened Smiley. "And that's my aunty you're talkin' 'bout, Speed'. And I don't take kindly to anyone talking smack about my aunty, even if she is a damned sight retarded and tried to ravage civilization by birthing Shifty over there."

"Yeah," said Shifty through a frown at Speedy, who silently thanked God he wasn't related to either of these morons.

Smiley moved closer to the blaze and held the map near it, already having reassumed ownership of the blamed thing, however badly Shifty hadn't wanted to give it up earlier. "I would imagine we're somewhere's around..." He tapped his index finger against a portion of land. "... here. And we just came outta here," and he indicated the little hole-in-the-wall town they'd all passed through, "aaaaand, let's see. We know buddy Fang was headed north, as was the little prick he's after. And there ain't much up there but this right here." He tapped a higher spot on the map with an air of finality. New Mettle.

"Biggest spot on that thing." Speedy had only half-glanced at it, but it hadn't taken long to digest the contents. Sand Hill was pretty barren and devoid of much worth looking at, as far as maps went. "Could be any number of hiding places along that way, though. Stuff no one's bothered to chart. Places people don't want you to know about."

"That's the problem. From what I've seen, aside from the strange allure of that hill folks like to sandsurf and get themselves killed on, this place is just a backwater zone built to house all the sad sacks nobody wanted as a kid. God Himself only knows just how in the hell many little spots there may be from here to there." Then he paused. "That's interesting."

"What?"

"This." Smiley planted his finger against a very small spot south of New Mettle. "What do you suppose this is?"

"Hell if I know, I look like a goddamn cartographer? Someone spat tobacco there and called it a landmark."

"Could be worth investigating, wouldn't you think? We don't want to just run up into that town without exploring possible leads. Hell, we might even run into someone we know while we're there."

"Yeah, sure." Speedy stood up and trodded away. "'Cause we all know Fang the Sniper's just takin' his damn sweet merry time too. He'll be back in Station Square by the time we get to that craphole."

Smiley didn't answer, but his expression was devoid of his trademark smirk.

"Well," said Shifty, giving another shot at frying some puffs, "I think it's a good idea."

Speedy stopped to glare at him for the hundredth time that night. "And just why, pray tell, should I give a holy damn what you think?"

"'Cause the boss is the sauce, and the big cheese aims to please."

"I hate you."

"You hate everyone," commented the boss.

"Sometimes I sure think so."

The cold night air didn't do much to cool down Speedy's head. He was so pissed off inside, he could have burned a hole in the ground if he didn't keep moving around so much. He stalked around the perimeter of their tiny camp to blow off some steam, since walking was one of the few things that could somehow eventually calm him down when he was ticked.

Smoking helped him think better than walking too. He took out a cig along with his lighter. Smiley had told him in days past that he wasn't allowed to light one up when they were out in the darkness, since any kind of light attracted potentially-unwanted attention, especially in this kind of environment, but then the fool goes and starts a fire? Because Shifty was cold? Speedy put the cig into the side of his mouth and torched it. The hell with Smiley. And fuck the asshole who'd invented maps!

He shook his head and tried to stay warm, and keep his brains from exploding out the top of his head. There was far too much opportunity to let one's mind wander out here in this desolate darkness. How had it even come to this?

He could still see their faces. Telling him they didn't need him anymore. Didn't have the money. Buddy boys like Fang the Sniper handling all the big trouble in little Station Square.

That guy who raped your sister? Already taken care of, Fang the Sniper caught him, don't you worry about it. Yeah, we know you wanted him bad, but we're gonna tell you a few cheer-up-about-it words wherein we pretend to give a shit. Anyway, city's decided to cut back on our funding. Here's your last paycheck, now give us your gun and your badge.

Without removing the cig from his mouth Speedy blew smoke from his nostrils, recalling it all far too clearly to not still get angry over it. That rat bastard's face was too easily readable as well. Puck had always been trouble, but no one else knew it until it was too late. South Island may have been more pristine than other locations in the world, but it had its share of losers too. Puck was the poster child for losers. Speedy had had never liked him, and never would. Every time he'd been called out to handle something involving Puck, the rat acted belligerent and dumb enough to make crack addicts look around and ask what the hell was wrong with this fool. One time Speedy had gotten sick of it and hauled him to the station for smacking a woman around, and that had left a definite mark on Puck, who made his intentions of revenge clear.

"You blue bitch," Puck had spewed in that punkass way he talked, despite being smaller, weaker and less imposing than ninety-nine percent of the world's police officer population, "you fucked with the wrong boy now. You think you so bad, hidin' behind that little oval on your chest. You know what? None of you pigs can wheel and deal like me. An' I'm gonna prove it. An' when that time comes you gonna be bleedin' on the floor. So you remember me."

"Yeah, whatever, tough guy."

"I don't think you heard me, mothufugga. You gonna die."

As if taking your stupidity out on the cop was going to make things all better. The words followed Speedy as his life on the force continued, and every time he thought of it, as well as his inability to do anything about the threats being made against him, he got mad.

A year later Sarah had been at a club in downtown Station Square where she met Puck, found something interesting beyond his dipshit dopehead appearance (Speedy had never understood what girls saw in "bad boy" types, especially ones as brainless and classless as Puck), and soon got more than she bargained for after waking up in a men's bathroom stall. After getting hauled in by Fang, Puck wasn't even been smug during his trial. He'd just been too stupid to realize the danger his way of freedom was in, but his thinks-he's-hot-stuff attorney got him off on some stupid technicality (Speedy hated it when criminals got away with blatant crimes thanks to court incompetence), and pretty soon Puck was back out on the streets, having no idea whose sister he'd boned. Speedy knew. And Speedy remembered him.

By the time Puck was walking fun-and-fancy-free, Speedy had been off the force for a while, but that hadn't made him complacent. He had a vendetta to salve, and it was going to start with Puck. He'd already hooked up with Smiley, who was well-aware of the hang-out spots of many quick "pick-me-up" bounty targets one might want to go after if they needed a quick buck. Puck happened to be one of them, since he was always wanted for something. Puck could sneeze and he'd somehow break the law doing it. It didn't take long for Smiley to smell the rage burning deep inside his new partner, and he opted to help him do something about it.

One night Smiley went into Dead-Drunk Dave's bar, and there was Puck, getting nice and liquored up and bragging about how much rock he'd stolen from some messed-up spaz down the street. Smiley dragged him out the back door, much to the rat's alarmed disdain, and into the alley they went. Yelling and growling he fought pitifully against Smiley's powerful grasp until the two of them stopped. Smiley turned the guy on his heels, and there in the darkness a few feet away from stood Speedy, hand at his side near a big, black gun.

It had taken Puck a few seconds to realize whose grey face it was under the brim of the black Stetson. At first he had tried to talk to Speedy like he was a brother just returning from a war. "Hey, 'G, holy shit. How you doin'? I like your hat, what're you, Buffalo Bill now, homeboy?"

From Speedy's other hand he'd thrown a belt to Puck. Latched to it was a holster that contained a pistol.

"Put that on," Speedy had told him. Puck's face degenerated into confusion. He glanced at Smiley, who'd just stood there and smiled at him. With little choice, Puck did as he was told.

"Do you remember a little conversation we had some time back?" Speedy had asked amiably.

"Brother, I can't remember what the hell I had for dinner yesterday."

"Let me give you a hint. You told me a while back to remember you. I do. You also gave a certain friend of mine a little put-me-down and did something to her that made me a little unhappy when I heard about it."

Puck had stood motionless, his anxiety seeping more into his expression with each passing word. He rapidly sobered.

"You told me I couldn't wheel and deal like you and that you were going to prove it. Now's your chance." Speedy had said no more.

The kind of bone-chilling feeling that curls up a man's spine as he looks death in the eye had seeped through the coke addict in a flash. Another glance to the amiable Smiley did nothing to quell his fear, but it was better than looking at the veritable reaper standing before him. He could have yelled for help, but they'd just kill him sooner.

Puck had moved his hand down near the gun, fingers shaking. Speedy did not flinch in the least. The rat's breathing grew heavy, tormented as his forehead broke out in a sweat. All the ghetto street smarts he'd learned over the years throughout his life did nothing to calm his nerves. Before he could even realize what he was doing, partially from his nerve-wracked panic, his hand had slapped against the pistol's grip.

Speedy had killed him effortlessly. Nobody screwed with him or his family and got away with it.

He remembered it all much too easily to not feel the wrath those days brought bubbling somewhere inside him, lingering, influencing the way he talked, the way he walked, the way he shot a man. God damn his bosses, damn Puck, and damn Fang the Sniper and all the other bounty hunters who'd caused him to degrade himself into doing this for a living.

Beyond all the death and lonely days, though, it wasn't that bad a gig. He still took a bite out of crime, and he didn't have to worry about court anymore. But he missed his uniform. He missed the comradery of actual officers, family men. People not like Smiley or Shifty. And, of course, you had bozos like Sonic the Hedgehog too, whose very presence brought crime in the area he happened to be in at any given point in time to a standstill. Speedy couldn't stand people like him (let the professionals do their work, he felt), but his hatred focused on higher priorities like Fang. He'd make them all hurt someday, especially that weasel-wolf-whatever he was. He stared down at the sand, cigarette near the end of its life.

He flicked it into the wastes and exhaled one more breath of smoke, trying to savor every instant of it. He sniffed loudly.

Then his eyes reached the stars, and he found himself staring at them for a moment. Near the fire he hadn't been able to get a good look, but away from its light as well as the other annoyances around it, he realized the heavens were an endless sea of black and silver.

I guess they are kind of pretty out here.

Sarah had always liked looking at them with him when they'd been kids. She'd gotten a telescope for her birthday once, and even though it was some cheapo thing and it didn't work very well, she was excited to have it and had made him stay outside in the freezing cold with her for hours, just exploring the sky together. He remembered himself bitching all night about it, but she'd just smiled the whole time, and sometimes he'd smiled too, to let her know it was alright.

He missed her then more than he'd ever missed anything in his life, and wanted to go home even more.