I didn't know how long I was out. An hour, maybe longer. But when I woke… I wanted to go back to sleep and never wake up again. Pain shot through my entire body sending my nerves to freak out. I yelped and felt the tears coming on. But the fear I had felt in my stomach was gone. I just felt pain. Sharp, almost unbearable antagonizeing pain. I felt still, and my muscles ached from hard ground. A familiar feeling to me all of a sudden. I felt a warmth on my back, but my arms were cold. I felt itchy and dirty. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes.

All I saw was the night sky. Dark colors of blue and black with specs of light as the stars. I sat up, and gasped at the pain that shot through me again. I was laying on the ground with thick tall brush surrounding me at the bottom of a small hill that had a creek running through. A fire was next to me keeping me some what warm and I had an old blanket over me. I sighed… knowing exactly what had happened. I starred at the fire again. I wanted to cry… but no tears came. Why had I gone back… and then time traveled again? Why? I was SO CLOSE! I looked down. Bandages covered my waist and shoulder. The pain in them was sharp… but not as much as I remembered it being. I took a deep breath.

Then my mind flashed. Like literally thoughts flashed through my mind like memories… but they didn't happen… or they didn't happen yet. I saw Keith… and the other boys and Lou from the hotel. Men I recognized… good friends of mine were moutning horses… and loading guns. One gave a shout and they all took off kicking up dirt. As they left behind them was something that wasn't there when I was there: A gallow. A noose. Three of em.

Lit with a ghostly red light of the torches set around it. I snapped back into my own mind. Without speaking… I knew what the nooses where for. I knew who the men were and what they were looking for. Me. They went out looking for me… and would hang the men who took me. My eyes flared with their own fire now. I didn't know how I knew that… but I knew it. And in this time… I learned not to ignore those feelings. I looked around. No one was in sight. I heard the horses close by. I had to get out of her. If that posse found me here… Billy would hang for sure.

I tried to stand… but I couldn't even get to my knees before gasping in pain and falling back over. I breathed for a second, the fire crackled and an idea popped into my head. Time traveled. The time warp. Things changed in the time warp. Lots of things. Things I may not have discovered yet. Like how well trained my horse was. It might not work… but it was a try. I took a deep breath.

Pursed my lips and whistled. Nothing happened other then a few horse ears flickering. Dang. I bit my lip, and did it again… this time directing it at my horse. It flickered it's ears again, and shook it's head.

Then it walked over.

A smile crept across my fire lit face. There was some advantages to this time warp. And a trained horse, was one of em. I used the horse to pull me to my feet and onto the saddle. I could feel the skin pulling on wounds, making my blood pump hard. I grabbed the reigns and steered it hard away. I started off, but pain shot up through my body, and I leaned heavily over the saddle, pulling the horse to a stop. I stayed hunched over for a few seconds, breathing hard.

Then I straitened a little. I pushed the horse into a walk again. There was a noise to my left. Without thinking, my hand swept up my side gripping the pistol, cocked and aimed all in one move. But it also sent pain down my spine again. I shuttered for a second, my eyes locked in the direction the movement had come from. Nothing.

Nothing stirred. I turned the horse closer to the spot where the noise had come from. It was a creek, filled with water, but nothing else. I put my gun away, uncocked it and tuned my horse again. I kicked it up a little faster once we got out in the open. I cursed when I realized they might follow me. Track me down, wondering if I was ok. But they couldn't… if they were around me, I was putting them in danger. The tracks I was leaving wasn't hard to follow. I pulled my horse into the creek… and decided to backtrack.

To the opposite direction from which I was heading. I would pass the camp again, but it was a risk I would have to take. I started down, making a soft sloshing noice was I trotted through the shallow water. I came to an unexpected fork in the creek where it split. I took the one going north, relaxing a little at my luck. I was fully loaded, my horse packed. I could last a week maybe out here in the open on my own. That is if my luck held. The cold night air made me glad I had nice coat warm coat and thick leather gloves. But every once in a while a breeze would find it's way down my neck or up my pant leg and I would shiver.

The nights were getting colder. Was winter coming? The air was getting thin, and the sky suddenly seemed bigger, wider and deeper. I could see my horse's and my own breath as it fogged in front of us. Finally I realized the cold breeze was coming off the river, and I pulled out. The air was warm again, and I realized I had been mistaken. Winter wasn't coming. The river was just cold. I pulled to a stop, suddenly thinking the horses feet might freeze from trotting in the ice cold water for so long. Slowly, I dismounted and pulled the horse's feet up. they were cold and he was wet from the stomach down from splashing as it walked. Now, I figured horses could handle it, but I felt bad for driving it so hard in such a painful state. I rubbed the legs down drying it off with the blanket as best I could. The horse didn't mind at all.

As I mounted back up I spotted the tracks in the dim light behind the horse and I. I wasn't to happy about leaving tracks, even though I had a good change of loosing them in the river. I sighed, as nothing came to my head to cover up my tracks. I slowly mounted up again, the pain coming in expected waves, and started out on a trot again. I must of dosed because when I opened my eyes, the sun had barely just finished rising. The warmth of it felt good on my face and put my lips into a small smile. Even the horse seemed a bit more lively and picked up the pace by itself.

I must have traveled a few more miles then I had expected. Where was I going? No clue. To find me a small town to patch myself up and rest. I let my horse choose his own path, hoping it would take me to town. I had put trust into the time warp. Trusting that it would somehow put a connection with me and this horse. Now that I thought about it… we were pretty close. My first adventure against the law, my first real shoot out, and escape were all on this creature, and I hadn't given it a name.

What should I call it? I thought of western moive I had watched. I couldn't recall any of them having a name for their horses. But I felt like I owed it to the animal.

"Jaime?" I said. The horse snorted. "Naw, to human." I thought, "How about Scalp? No no. To… weird. Dusty? No. How about… Ghost?" The horse's ears flickered back. Alright. Ghost is was. I had named my gray pet, Ghost. Kind of an awkward name, but I had already began to feel closer. But the horses ears kept flickering back. My smile turned, and I stopped moving so much, trying to listen. Nothing. But horse hearing was better then mine. I took a deep breath, "Alright, GHOST, let's pick it up shall we?" I kicked Ghost into a faster trot. My mind wandered back to ways of covering up my tracks. I looked up, careful not to look behind me, or let anybody who would be watching me know that I knew they were there.

I didn't see any cliffs or rocky terrain I could use. But I did see something that would work just as good. A herd of deer. I smiled. They would cover my tracks better then any rocky terrain. I kicked Ghost into a full run at the deer. When they saw the threat racing toward them, they took off the way I forced them to.

The direction I wanted to go. A few miles of chasing them, and they began to split off. Perfect. I split off going my own way now. Try to track me NOW, I thought. My victory was soon eaten by the pain that had found itself to my neck. I cursed, and focused on my direction. I would be heading to a town now. A town with people who didn't know who I was, would think I was just a pass by like most folks. Wait… how did I know there was a town ahead? Yet another advantaged the time warp had weighed on me. Like before, I had to find a goal… find a place to rest. And then I would ponder if my day at home was a dream or the real thing.

And what about the posse coming out for me? Would they find Billy? What would happen when they met? Surely neither of them would give in lightly. There was bound to be lead flying. But think about that later. Now I had to heal, rest, and eat. Oh eat. That sounded good right now. A nice big plate full of stake and potatoes with corn and tall glass of water… ice cold water. My mouth watered.

Stop thinking! I shook my head, regretting it after ward. The pain came again, but I ignoried it. I took deep breaths trying to stay focused on that and not my thoughts. A few more minutes passed of a fast trot and I was soon arriving at the town as the sun rose. I pulled up to a hotel and asked for a room. They had one left. Just my kind of luck. It was at the bottom floor at the back. Good.

I brought my horse around to the window of my room, and tied it off their. I don't think I would be staying long. Just enough to eat, rest and clean up. I pulled the saddle off and threw it through the window. I gave the Ghost a nice brush down, and brought it a pale of water and a slice of hey. That made him happy. But it made my own stomach growl. I sighed and went back around to the front.