Static Shock Fan Fiction ❯ Banditos ❯ Richie ( Chapter 1 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: Manga-Chick 
“Git used to it,” she said curtly. “This is your life, now.”
Non Anime: Static Shock Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Hentai | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 02.28.2006 | Pages: 4 | Words: 6.7K | Visits: 517 | Status: Completed
“Git used to it,” she said curtly. “This is your life, now.”
Non Anime: Static Shock Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Horror / Hentai | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 02.28.2006 | Pages: 4 | Words: 6.7K | Visits: 517 | Status: Completed
Extreme AU, OOC, non-historic West, violence...supernatural themes, violence...Just be prepared for the amount of violence and utter chaos.
Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN STATIC AND OTHER ASSOCIATED CHARACTERS!
Based somewhat on that thrilling vid-game, Darkwatch. Heh. My inspiration for something gory and dark.
Chapter One:
Richie
Teresa winced, the other girls commenting in sympathy as they listened to the violent slashes the horse whip made as it connected with the new kid’s back. The accompanying screams of pain were just as violent, and though she felt little sympathy, she felt that he earned what he’d gotten. She had warned him, of course, that the penalty for trying to run away was something of horrendous design, but the boy hadn’t listened to her. Overlooking the weak railing of the second floor, glancing down at the courtyard that separated the saloon from Alva’s main building of business, she watched as Junior shouted expletives as Trapper continued with the lashing. She’d heard and counted four lashes so far; she’d figured that they wouldn’t hold back on him because he was male.
It was nearly dawn, and while men cheered within the saloon over the punishment, rowdy laughter and comments escaping the wooden walls, everyone was either passing out for the night or moving onto a more quieter location. It all didn’t matter; the girls’ night was over, and the ones that weren’t tied with customers at the moment were watching the new kid receive his punishment for trying to run away.
Mirage, the pretty little beauty that had been forcefully separated from her brother a couple of years back, gave a sad sigh. “Such a pity...you told ‘im, Teresa. Can’t go feeling sorry for that city slicker.”
“You say he’s working with us, girl?” one of the other women, Patty, asked the Spanish whore skeptically. “A boy? They do that sort of thing in nem big cities, now?”
“Apparently so,” Teresa said curtly, looking down as the sixth lash was administered. The screams were less violent, now. Any moment, she expected him to pass out from the pain. Her own back seemed to ripple with the remembrance of the only five lashes she’d received the first year she’d come to work for Alva and son. She was quite sure the others’ were feeling the same way. “Now they introducing that sort of bullshit out here.”
“Ain’t nothin’ sacred,” Mirage whistled lowly, crouching against the railing. Her dress drooped at the shoulders, baring her thin arms and back in such a provocative manner, but she wasn’t trying to entice; her dress was just ill-fitting. “Look at ‘im. Pale like them clouds in the sky. How you think he gets that color, huh?”
“Gross,” Miranda commented disdainfully. The older woman was smoking a pipe, blowing smoke rings up at the night sky. Teresa glanced back at her, noting that the woman depended on alcohol just to get through the night. It showed on her face, and she couldn’t help but wonder when Junior was going to get rid of her. Less competition for the others. “I ain’t ever seen that shade of white since my granddaddy died, an’ I hadda clean him. Needs to lay that wimpy body out for some color. No man’s gonna want somethin’ like that, when he gots woman of color ‘round. Bullshit.”
“Men like other men for such things?” Patty asked in astonished shock, looking at the others.
Teresa gave an absent shrug as she stared down at the scene, noting that the screams had stopped. That Trapper was lashing an unresponsive body, now. They watched as Junior waved off the last lash, grabbing a handful of golden blond hair, peering into a slack face. She straightened away from the railing as men cheered loudly from the bar, lifting their mugs at the younger Alva for a job well done.
“Git to yer rooms, ladies. He’s done.”
010101010110
His parents couldn’t possibly have had a hand in this horrible situation. He was very sure of it. He was very sure that those men had picked up on the wrong man, because this entire reality was a terrible nightmare. Sitting at the edge of his lumpy bed, his back horrendously sore and his mind numb, Richie Foley stared down at the worn floorboards of his room, almost lifeless in appearance. It was nearly noon, and he had yet to sleep despite the exhaustion he felt. His stomach was clenching in on itself, wanting food, but it had been denied after last night’s ordeal with his first customer.
His left cheek throbbed where the drunken man had struck him, and Junior had been more than furious when he heard the complaint. The night had passed without another incident, but when he produced no money in the hour that it was expected before the girls retired to bed, Junior had lashed out at him once more. He’d never been struck in his life; his parents had never gone through such lengths to discipline him, as he’d always been a good kid. To be subjected to the merciless horse whip twice since he’d arrived had been just as much abject torture as the very acts he was supposed to perform.
He felt the strong yearning and need to be back at home in New York, safe and comforted with the poor life he’d lived there. No matter that they’d lived in the outer stretches were sanitation was less cleanly than it was here; no matter that they’d struggled daily for food and payment on a small shingle roof house; no matter if he was shipped from one parent to the other in an effort to maintain a sort of thriving lifestyle. His parents had always wanted him to do better, to live better than them, and they’d struggled to have him educated.
The day his mother came back to him, excited at the prospect of sending him West to teach the uneducated, had been the day he’d promise to make them proud. He was going to make a life from what he was being given; perhaps he’d find a good wife that was in the same social standing, where he’d come back full of experience and certainly a little richer and able to give his parents what he’d earned.
His parents had loved him, devoted on him; they’d struggled for him. They couldn’t have possibly agreed to Alva’s offer into making him into a whore. They just couldn’t. He couldn’t ever imagine his mother readily agreeing to such a thing. Not his quiet, gentle mother, and proud, hard working father.
He heard the shrill whistle of the train, and slowly rose from his bed, to stand at the dusty window. He had taken his glasses off when Junior had told him bitterly that if he ever wanted to see anything again, he should hide the things. He wouldn't be needing them, anyway; he didn't have to look closely at a customer because he had no choice in such judgements, anyway. The precious pair of glasses were tucked safely underneath his bed, underneath a loose floor board. He attempted to wipe the window clean, but the dust outside gave him only a blurry look out at the busy correl and a few other buildings that he assumed were boarding areas for the cowboys passing through. His hand was shaking as he dropped it to his side, staring forlornly at what he could.
His thoughts kept their bewildered and numb sort of thinking over the possibility of his parents selling him. The very idea was just much to imaginative! Too ghastly!
His back felt sore and stung terribly, and he struggled to ignore what had been done. He wished that Teresa would come by to apply that salve, but she hadn’t even spoke to him since the night before. He was still dressed in the clothing that he’d been given, and he looked down at it with trepidation. Hurriedly, he ripped off the shirt he’d pulled on after his last lashing, and tossed it to the floor. The pants he struggled out of, the material tight and clingy as he hopped from one foot to the other.
When he was at last free from the binding material, he stood in the nude for a few moments, then quickly crouched to the floor, to pull out his suitcase from underneath the bed.
A moment of horror told him that something wasn’t right as it felt much too light, and he opened it with a dismayed gasp, to see that all his new clothing was missing nearly half of its accompanying articles. Shirts, trousers, socks–all the things that his mother had spent nearly all her savings on to give him something to wear out in a brand new place, and most of it was missing.
Despair hit him with just as much impact as a physical hit, and he burst into tears, feeling momentarily shamed at doing so. But he pulled out the remaining shirt and a set of pants, pulling them on with shaking limbs. The moment he did so, he quickly turned and located his book bag, and saw with some mixture of relief that all of his books and things he’d planned to use with teaching were still there.
Whomever had gone through his clothing had probably decided that they couldn’t do anything with the valuable articles of education. A quick glance around told him that his coat was missing, as well. His hat he hadn’t seen since meeting Alva and his son the first day he’d arrived.
He clutched a book of sonnets with grief, bowing his head as he finished crying. Sniffling loudly, he wiped his nose and face with the sleeve of his shirt and froze when he realized he heard the ominous sounds of men walking up the pathway toward his room. Quickly, he shoved the book back into the bag and shoved that underneath the bed. He sat gingerly on his bed and watched with fear widened eyes as the door opened, Junior, Specs, Trapper and Casey walking in.
“Ain’t you supposed to be resting for tonight?” the younger Alva asked on a drunken sneer, the others fanning out with similar expressions.
His throat was tight with terror, but Richie managed to choke out, “I couldn’t sleep.”
“We been thinking, boy, that perhaps last night, you shooed away your first customer cuz you had no idea what you were doing!” Casey said, his voice light with amusement. “So, we came on up here to see if that were true.”
The image of that man’s horrid penis came to mind, and his stomach churned violently. He entwined his fingers, clutching them fiercely as he looked from one to another with uncertain expectation. He knew something horrible was going to happen, but he didn’t know what. He had the traitorous thought take form in that they were just going to beat him again, for the fun of it. Every muscle was locked tight, stiff, and unyielding as he focused on Junior, looking for some clue in what was expected of them.
“You ain’t got no experience at all?” Trapper asked, in a sort of insolent tone. “None? Not even with serving yourself?”
“That’s kinda funny, man,” Specs laughed. “All men know what to do with themselves!”
“Well, let’s get this over with,” Junior decided. “I’m starting to sober up an’ realizin’ what I agreed to.”
Still unable to fathom what their intentions were, Richie felt himself draw back, eyeing that man with undisguised horror as he began moving first.
But before the man could even touch him, a shout registered from the yard below, and all four men hurried out. The door slammed shut behind Casey, and the lock slipped into place as muffled shouting commenced. Knowing that he’d escaped something terrible, Richie exhaled harshly, struggling to maintain his composure. That incident certainly didn’t help him sleep, as he laid awake throughout the rest of the day, waiting for them to come back.
010101010110
Patty had her tongue caught between her lips as she carefully applied a thin line of kohl around Richie’s eyes, the teen blinking repeatedly at the unfamiliar application. “Hold still, dammit. You’re making me smudge it!”
“I’m sorry...it tickles,” he said quietly, still blinking when she finally pulled her brush back.
Patty observed her work, then tilted her head. “You have weird eyes, man,” she finally commented. “They’re almost gold. But...then they’re brown. What color your parents have?”
“My mother had green eyes. And my father had blue. But my grandmother on my mother’s side had amber eyes, as well.”
“Well, this intensifies that color. It’s quite attractive, actually. Ooh, I hate you boys. Why is it boys have longer lashes than us girls? It’s so irritating. Here...just a little bit of...this on your lip...now rub it in.”
As Richie did as she instructed, very uncomfortable with that he was allowing this woman to apply makeup to his face. Patty set aside her lip color, then sighed. “That’ll have to do. Sometimes men like that their whores have color on their faces. Kinda distracts from the fact that we all ugly underneath.”
Richie didn’t say anything, just directed his tired stare to the floor as the older woman straightened, her dress rustling. He had the thought that she was making fun of him, playing with him–but at the same time, he doubted that. She wore a very horrid combination of orange and brown, her bosoms pushed up and on display, sprinkled with a sort of glittery dust. She would have been a friendly, popular woman if she wasn’t so occupied with the competition among the other girls. Richie was sure she was being this friendly only because he wasn’t a threat to her... yet.
He felt himself give a derisive shake of his head as he wondered why he’d mentally added that adverb. He didn’t want to think that way. He was still determined to leave this wretched place, and he’d already planned another escape tonight. While the girls were busy working the floor and their rooms, the men that were supposed to be watching them were occupied with their own drinking and carousing among the locals. He was going to escape when the one that was supposed to be watching him after his last escape attempt grew occupied with Mirage.
He glanced at his book bag nearby, propped against the wall, containing all that he now owned, save for the horrendous clothing he was wearing, now. His feet had blisters where they’d rubbed against the inside of his boots, and it only just added to his misery. Patty gathered her small box of cosmetics and left him with a cloud of patchouli perfume and an airy wave over one plump shoulder.
His stomach growled in protest when he caught the scent of something being grilled from the streets below when she left the room. Calming it with a steady rub of his palm, he rose from the edge of his bed and considered once again how he was going to leave this town. He knew he could catch the train, having to sneak onto one of the carts once it got moving, and that had him antsy with both anxiety and uncertainty. It had been done before, numerous of times, but never by him. He could still remember the day he and his father had happened upon an accident in Boston, where an immigrant had tried to catch the last car of a moving train and had fallen under the moving wheels.
The gruesome sight had left him sick and upset for days, but he’d rather a fate like that than anymore time spent here.
He nearly jumped when he heard the approaching sounds of boots coming his way, and quickly left his room to start heading toward the bar. Patty had told him to met with the bartender, who would then signal his readiness for a customer that may have been waiting, or to signal that he was available. He really didn’t want a repeat of last night; couldn’t really escape the images he’d been left of a dirty man’s dick before him. What the man had wanted, he couldn’t even imagine. What had he meant by ‘just his mouth’? What was he supposed to do with it?
He narrowly avoided what looked to be Casey and Trapper as they walked past the hallway he took toward the bar, hearing them laughing about something that didn’t sound quite so entertaining. Nervousness made his stomach clench with both humiliation and fear as he neared the rowdy area, smelling tobacco and alcohol.
The moment he peeked out from the thick curtain that closed off the hallway, he felt as if he were going to pass out. The saloon was packed with people, the stench of their unwashed bodies unforgivable. Laughter, shouts, music, women shrieking with pretense made him dizzy. He could see Teresa sitting in the lap of a couple of men, taking sips of their drinks.
Miranda was trying to coax a shy cowboy to buy her a drink, and Mirage had two men battling over her as she giggled childishly. The others–Jessie, Patty, Dominique and Angel–were no where to be seen, and he presumed that they were in their rooms.
He really didn’t want to step out there, to expose himself to the curious stares as many found themselves staring at his bared collarbone and chest, made up face and pale features. It made his skin burn with color as he took a deep breath and stepped back from the curtain. But he peeked out once more to see that the man that was supposed to be tailing him was busy playing poker down below.
Anxiety flooded him, and he hurried back to his room, taking care in case Casey and Trapper were still lingering about. But they’d taken another stairway down to the street, and were busy shouting at a group of men across the way.
He hurried into his room and grabbed his book bag, tossing aside his new hat. Cautiously making his way out, he used the natural shadows of both the building and the night to scurry across the pathway that wrapped around the second floor. He made his way to the front, frowning when he realized how crowded and impossible it’d be if he tried to make his escape there. He turned and moved back toward his room, to see if he could leave there when Junior and Specs popped up unexpectedly from one of the rooms before the hallway.
Before he could even move, Junior screamed an expletive, already seeing his bag and realizing what he’d been up to. In a flurry of movement, Richie found himself dragged back to his room, Junior thumping him repeatedly at the top of his head, both of them screaming furiously about his attempt. Shouts from the streets turned into cheers and jeers, those sounds quickly muffled when Specs slammed the door shut.
Junior shoved Richie away from him, the blond stumbling in his too big boots, dropping his bag with startled apology. He turned to see the younger Alva pulling his belt from his waist, and immediately began to panic at the prospect of another sound beating. Amid the frenzied lashes of that wretched belt, with Specs trying to grab him while his partner whipped him, Richie screamed apologies and tried to curl in on himself to escape the stinging pain of the belt. The room was filled with such noises, ignored by the constant chaos on the streets below.
When he finally began to register that he was being yanked toward the bed, hearing a guffaw from one of the men that had come up to investigate the noise, it was to his horror to realize that Specs was meaning to tie him down. Junior kept on cursing and whipping in a sort of furious hysteria, and amid all the chaos, Casey and Trapper were there to help them along. Panicked and abject terror shot through the teen when he realized that his pants were being yanked down, that someone was holding his shoulders down. He kicked and screamed himself hoarse, giving incoherent apologies as men began to laugh, and the belt stopped falling over him.
The pain left from the frenzied lashes of Junior’s belt left him a little dazed, and the activity had left him panting, winded. He could hear them talking, in a mixture of laughter and incredulous disbelief, and forced himself to focus on what was being said. Junior was arguing with Casey, who was telling him that it had to be done.
That the younger Alva wasn’t going to earn any money by keeping him ‘coddled’. He wasn’t sure what that all meant, just began to realize the exposure of his backside and the humiliating picture he produced with lying on his stomach in this position. He started to turn, his wrists held in front of him by a puzzled Specs, when Junior finally gave Casey what he wanted to hear.
Swallowing hard, Richie heard many unpleasant sounds, but wasn’t sure what was going on. A couple of more men were standing in the doorway, with expressions of both disgust and fascination, but he had no idea what was going on behind him. He felt and heard heavy breath on his neck, feeling a heavy and warm body moving against his exposed backside. He started to panic then, giving mindless begs and apologies as he felt Specs tighten his hold on his wrists.
The moment he felt an immense and agonizing mixture of pain and fullness into his rectum, he screamed hoarsely, even as the men began their drunken cheers and shouts. The pain crowded any other thought or sensation he might have registered, dulling all other senses, leaving him with a sort of mindless state in which he registered what was happening; but unable to fully accept it.
The night carried on; the streets continued with their nightly activity. The horrid actions that had taken place in that small, stuffy room was nothing new to those that heard what was happening.
When Teresa awoke sometime during mid-afternoon, feeling stiff and unclean from her own actions the night before, she performed her normal morning routine. She used a treatment that she used after every man was done with her, to discourage pregnancy. It was also so that she could feel a sense of cleanliness, to trick her body into thinking that it was clean when she felt that it wasn’t. She used what little clean water she had to wash other areas, and left her room, to find something to eat before the night began.
She had just taken her share of food when the cook passed her another tray, instructing her to take it to the boy upstairs. She was a little surprised at the request, but did as she was instructed. In one way, she was relieved in that the teen finally satisfied his owner, but in another, she felt extremely bad in that it had happened. She really didn’t want to see him; didn’t want to see the pained humiliation she knew she would see when she saw him; because when human beings broke, it was hard to accept.
She knocked a couple of times on his door and entered without waiting for an answer.
Her eyes fell on the forlorn teen that sat in the back corner of the room, staring at nothing. The room reeked of various odors, but many of them were things she knew well. She held up the tray of food, and set it at the edge of his bed.
Pausing, she took in the defeated expression, the lingering horror that pulled at his features. She didn’t know what happened; what he had to do. Just that it had been done.
“Git used to it,” she said curtly. “This is your life, now.”
She didn’t expect a reply, and she didn’t get one when she left.
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The tickling began on his right ear, and somewhere between wakefulness and dream land, he began to realize how annoying and uncomfortable that felt. Not really wanting to move, he snorted and shifted slightly, determined to return to the world of dreams. But as he did so, he felt that tickling begin on his left. While some part of him recognized that this was unnatural, that there wasn’t the buzz of mosquitos or flies, that this was deliberate, the other part of him was much too interested in sleeping more to fully awaken.
The tickle turned bothersome, and his body reacted quickly to shoo the nuisance away. He just wasn’t expecting to slap a very hot patty of horse shit across his face.
“GODDAMN IT, YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT NIGGER!” he howled, spitting out the small trickles that dribbled down the corners of his mouth. Then he had to groan as shouting seemed to cause his head to pound with an awful amount of pain.
Virgil Hawkins guffawed uproariously as he ran out from the barn, Francis Stone’s cursing ringing out the early morning darkness. The sun had yet to break over the mountains that entrapped this area, the sky still dark with enigmatic color. But the ranch was already crawling with movement from those that woke early to start their full days’ worth of work, and it wasn’t unusual to hear such shouting and cursing at this time in the morning.
A few of the ranch hands chuckled as the larger man stumbled out from the barn, a little whoozy from last night’s drinking escapade and a seemingly endless game of poker. He had no idea how he ended up passed out with the animals in the barn. Ranch hands usually slept in the quarters nearby.
“Git on up, cracker!” Virgil shouted just as loudly, performing a few jumping jacks, spurs jangling. “We got us a few diggin’s to do out yonder, pardner!”
“Aw, man, fuck you, Hawkins! Eat shit and die, you fucking prick!”
“Oh, uh-uh, no it was not! YOU were the one eatin’, cracker jack! Remember, buddy ole pal ole friendola? Or do ya need a little reminder?”
“Stop being so damn chipper in the damn mornin’!”
“Can we possibly go one day without a curse word from you? I swear on my Momma’s grave–!”
“EAT ME!”
Virgil laughed once, dodging the rocks that were thrown at him. “No, really, seriously! We gotta get on past the south end to fix those fence lines, man. You up? Or do I gotta try harder?”
Hotstreak, as he was aptly named for his temper, yawned loudly as he plopped his worn hat over his head, belatedly remembering the shit he’d just slapped over his face. Virgil laughed uproariously as he bent, dry retching.
“Virgil Hawkins, the sun ain’t even up, yet!” the shrill female voice rang out over the ranch, startling a few chickens and sending a few horses nickering. “Cut out that annoying voice of yours!”
“Oh, geez, her voice just drills into my brain,” Hotstreak moaned as he clapped his hands over his ears. He crouched in place, determined to stay up despite the violent swaying of the earth underneath his feet. “Someone just shoot me now...”
“That’s why you trust me to wake your lazy ass up, man. Not her. C’mon...at least I’m kind enough to wake you up gracefully and with a lot of tender lovin’,” Virgil said, hand on his chest. Hotstreak scoffed in his direction as he stood and began strolling toward the nearest water pump.
Hawkins’ Dakota Ranch was a grand sprawl of timber and ranch land, owned by Virgil’s father, Robert. As well off as they were with the natural treasures of the land, Robert preferred the hard working hands of his son and his friends to work the land and the animals they owned.
Settled in the back country within unmapped territory, with a few day’s worth of riding into the nearby town, Hawkins’ Dakota Ranch depended on the many heads of cattle that roamed the area, and the thick timber that seemed to stretch out beyond the horizon on the eastern section of their land. A creek with quickly running water that connected to a much broader river intersected the farm land, and was used for many of the things a body needed; they had installed hand pumps to coax the water into closer reaches of the house, and this one was used mainly for the thirst of the horses that were milling around in a correl nearby, the small, wet ditch currently dried. As Hotstreak ran the water, the small ditch coaxed water to flow toward the correl, the horses neighing softly as they heard the familiar sound.
“Stop your bitchin’ and get on dishin’, you two,” Adam Evans called cheerfully from nearby, hauling a brand new calf from the barn out to the field, mother cow in tow. “Got a long day ahead of you and me! Got a lot of things to do, and there ain’t no need for us to be all lazy!”
“Oh, shit, he’s doin’ it again, V. Stop him. Sic Sharon on him for that idiot talk,” Hotstreak grumbled, washing his face. “Rhyming should be outlawed in the country...’Specially so fucking early in the morning!”
“I don’t have a say in it, man. I think that’s how Sharon got all pregnant.”
Both of them shuddered as Adam sent them both a scowl, calf braying loudly in protest.
“I told you boys both, she ain’t pregnant,” Adam snapped. “She just a little more healthier than she was a year ago. An’ don’t you be tellin’ her I said that.”
Virgil grinned suddenly as he jogged over to his friend’s side, waiting for him to wash his face. It had been nearly six years since this day when Hotstreak was brought back to the ranch by Robert, passed out in the back of his day carriage, sprawled over the month’s supplies. Robert had explained then that he’d needed more hands to tend to the ranch, and the redheaded man seemed sturdy enough to handle the hard work that was demanded of him.
Virgil hadn’t trusted him, at first. The hot tempered man, barely two years older than he was, proved reckless and fool hardy, putting himself in dangerous situations without any regard to his own safety. His aiming for a deathwish had made the other hands wary of him, but Virgil began to gradually accept the older boy when he’d overhead Robert telling Sharon that Hotstreak was actually a man trying to hide from the law. Nothing else was really known about him, but Virgil had been raised on stories of outlaws–to actually know one had sent him eagerly trying to match the boy’s daredevil escapades.
Slowly, with time, the pair bonded as friends. It had taken awhile, but Hotstreak learned to trust them as they learned to trust him. But once that trust was won, he’d proved time and time again that he was trustworthy and loyal, fiercely defensive of his new family. Though, from time to time, he took risks in going into town with Virgil and the others–he was wanted back in Orleans, but he figured no one would really keep an eye out for him, here. They were nearly thousands of miles away from Orleans, and the law was considered extremely lax in these parts.
The gangly loner had grown into a six foot four wall of muscle, intimidating to those that were unused to such giants. Virgil himself was a couple of inches smaller, but just as strong and sturdy, such genes running in the male side of his family. Together, the pair of them made quite a sight; it wasn’t common for whites to hang around with blacks, but then again, it wasn’t common for a black to be so successful with a ranch, either. The West was a territory of surprises and unconventional methods that leapt all modern bounds and laws; something that was actually more comforting than repressing.
Slapping the worn rust-colored shirt that his friend was fond of wearing, he said cheerfully, “Daddy decided to send us cattle selling next week, man! What say you to broads and booze?”
“Have I ever complained?” Hotstreak asked cheerily, popping up with a grin.
“Never, but one never knows with you. An’, this time, don’t be ditchin’ me in favor of that Latin lovey you’ve got hidden away in town...what, she pregnant last time we there!”
“Ah, shit, Virgil, I just gotta look at ‘er, and she gets all with child...”
Virgil guffawed and stuffed his head back under the water, making him yelp out loud. “Just you an’ me, an’ mebbe Adam if Sharon loosens her leash–! We also gots some money to get some material for some brand new clothing...” Virgil elbowed him playfully in the side, eyebrows wiggling.
After fiddling with the water, the pair headed toward the main house, guffawing and elbowing each other over some stupid jokes.
“It’s about damn time ya’ll got to washing them stanky asses of yours! But it didn’t do you no good!”
“Oh, geez, Sharon, it’s much too early for me to be seein’ monsters,” Hotstreak complained as Virgil’s older sister prompted her brother to shriek in surprise at her appearance.
Both of them were whacked across the head with a wooden spoon, earning drawn out yelps of pain as Sharon faced them. Barely five feet tall, the little woman shot them both stern expressions, her eyes narrowed with warning.
“Both of you REEK. I can smell you both before I even hear you, and that’s saying something,” she growled, crossing her arms over her small chest. “I suggest you git on outta here and get those stanky asses washed real good before comin’ in here and tracking my house with horse shit.”
“We took a bath last Tuesday!” Virgil exclaimed, rubbing his head. “You know us ranchers ain’t ever gonna be all clean all that time! Shit, Sharon!”
“Aw, c’mon, who we tryin’ to impress?” Hotstreak scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Ain’t no women out this way to get all bothered about!”
“...No pretty ones that don’t resemble dogs, anyway,” Virgil muttered low under his breath. “I mean, she’s my freakin’ sister, man. We ain’t the fuckin’ South, here. Gross.”
Hotstreak suddenly laughed, both of them silenced by another whack of the spoon. Ignoring their growls and curses over the sudden pain, Sharon set her hands on her hips and began walking toward them, intimidating them back toward the doorway.
“It ain’t all about impressions, you stank ass creatures! It’s about decorum! Both of you smell like something the pig shit out after a night eatin’ on a drunken idiotic’s vomit!”
Virgil gave her a curious look. “How would you know what that would smell like? Pig’s shit after a night eatin’ on a drunken idiot’s vomit?”
Sharon grabbed both their ears, and steered them roughly back to the door, both of them yowling in protest. “I know this cuz both of ya been drunk enough to dirty the pig’s pen with your stank ass vomit, and I know cuz I had to do your chores that day, cuz the both of ya’ll weren’t even responding to nothin’!”
“That was four years ago!” Hotstreak protested as she shoved them both back onto the porch. “Why you keep bringing that up?”
“Get washed up before you ever set foot back here again!” Sharon snarled, slamming the door shut behind her.
Virgil burped loudly. “How kin she still remember that? Weren’t that when Adam shaved off your hair?”
“Yeah. And when your daddy done shaved off all your eyebrows and cut your hair down to the stubs.”
“Ah.”
“...Shit, that was fucked up when he did that. Took me awhile to grow my hair back out,” Hotstreak muttered, reaching up to pat protectively on the uneven strands. The shaggy crop had gone untouched in all that time, occasionally pulled back into a messy ponytail.
“Aw man, me too!” Virgil exclaimed, looking at him as he touched his uneven dreads. “Still don’t look all right! Man, I get all these fuckin’ nightmares that I wake up with my hair all missing! Every morning, I gotta wake up, check to see if my hair’s there, and to see if I got any eyebrows. It’s fuckin’ horrible, and puts me under a lot of stress...thinkin’ of the bowels, man. The bowels.”
“Shit...gotta take a bath in this friggin’ cold ass water? What she expectin’, fuckin’ God in the kitchen? Ain’t gonna take no damn bath, ‘specially when I’m just gonna get all dirty, again.”
“Amen, brudder. Just gonna wash important parts and change my shirt. That should throw her off until we eat breakfast.” Virgil sniffed at himself experimentally, then abruptly back handed his partner upside the head. Guffawing, he held his hat in place and raced off toward the creek. “Last one there loves Adam up the ass!”
“HEY!”
Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN STATIC AND OTHER ASSOCIATED CHARACTERS!
Based somewhat on that thrilling vid-game, Darkwatch. Heh. My inspiration for something gory and dark.
Chapter One:
Richie
Teresa winced, the other girls commenting in sympathy as they listened to the violent slashes the horse whip made as it connected with the new kid’s back. The accompanying screams of pain were just as violent, and though she felt little sympathy, she felt that he earned what he’d gotten. She had warned him, of course, that the penalty for trying to run away was something of horrendous design, but the boy hadn’t listened to her. Overlooking the weak railing of the second floor, glancing down at the courtyard that separated the saloon from Alva’s main building of business, she watched as Junior shouted expletives as Trapper continued with the lashing. She’d heard and counted four lashes so far; she’d figured that they wouldn’t hold back on him because he was male.
It was nearly dawn, and while men cheered within the saloon over the punishment, rowdy laughter and comments escaping the wooden walls, everyone was either passing out for the night or moving onto a more quieter location. It all didn’t matter; the girls’ night was over, and the ones that weren’t tied with customers at the moment were watching the new kid receive his punishment for trying to run away.
Mirage, the pretty little beauty that had been forcefully separated from her brother a couple of years back, gave a sad sigh. “Such a pity...you told ‘im, Teresa. Can’t go feeling sorry for that city slicker.”
“You say he’s working with us, girl?” one of the other women, Patty, asked the Spanish whore skeptically. “A boy? They do that sort of thing in nem big cities, now?”
“Apparently so,” Teresa said curtly, looking down as the sixth lash was administered. The screams were less violent, now. Any moment, she expected him to pass out from the pain. Her own back seemed to ripple with the remembrance of the only five lashes she’d received the first year she’d come to work for Alva and son. She was quite sure the others’ were feeling the same way. “Now they introducing that sort of bullshit out here.”
“Ain’t nothin’ sacred,” Mirage whistled lowly, crouching against the railing. Her dress drooped at the shoulders, baring her thin arms and back in such a provocative manner, but she wasn’t trying to entice; her dress was just ill-fitting. “Look at ‘im. Pale like them clouds in the sky. How you think he gets that color, huh?”
“Gross,” Miranda commented disdainfully. The older woman was smoking a pipe, blowing smoke rings up at the night sky. Teresa glanced back at her, noting that the woman depended on alcohol just to get through the night. It showed on her face, and she couldn’t help but wonder when Junior was going to get rid of her. Less competition for the others. “I ain’t ever seen that shade of white since my granddaddy died, an’ I hadda clean him. Needs to lay that wimpy body out for some color. No man’s gonna want somethin’ like that, when he gots woman of color ‘round. Bullshit.”
“Men like other men for such things?” Patty asked in astonished shock, looking at the others.
Teresa gave an absent shrug as she stared down at the scene, noting that the screams had stopped. That Trapper was lashing an unresponsive body, now. They watched as Junior waved off the last lash, grabbing a handful of golden blond hair, peering into a slack face. She straightened away from the railing as men cheered loudly from the bar, lifting their mugs at the younger Alva for a job well done.
“Git to yer rooms, ladies. He’s done.”
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His parents couldn’t possibly have had a hand in this horrible situation. He was very sure of it. He was very sure that those men had picked up on the wrong man, because this entire reality was a terrible nightmare. Sitting at the edge of his lumpy bed, his back horrendously sore and his mind numb, Richie Foley stared down at the worn floorboards of his room, almost lifeless in appearance. It was nearly noon, and he had yet to sleep despite the exhaustion he felt. His stomach was clenching in on itself, wanting food, but it had been denied after last night’s ordeal with his first customer.
His left cheek throbbed where the drunken man had struck him, and Junior had been more than furious when he heard the complaint. The night had passed without another incident, but when he produced no money in the hour that it was expected before the girls retired to bed, Junior had lashed out at him once more. He’d never been struck in his life; his parents had never gone through such lengths to discipline him, as he’d always been a good kid. To be subjected to the merciless horse whip twice since he’d arrived had been just as much abject torture as the very acts he was supposed to perform.
He felt the strong yearning and need to be back at home in New York, safe and comforted with the poor life he’d lived there. No matter that they’d lived in the outer stretches were sanitation was less cleanly than it was here; no matter that they’d struggled daily for food and payment on a small shingle roof house; no matter if he was shipped from one parent to the other in an effort to maintain a sort of thriving lifestyle. His parents had always wanted him to do better, to live better than them, and they’d struggled to have him educated.
The day his mother came back to him, excited at the prospect of sending him West to teach the uneducated, had been the day he’d promise to make them proud. He was going to make a life from what he was being given; perhaps he’d find a good wife that was in the same social standing, where he’d come back full of experience and certainly a little richer and able to give his parents what he’d earned.
His parents had loved him, devoted on him; they’d struggled for him. They couldn’t have possibly agreed to Alva’s offer into making him into a whore. They just couldn’t. He couldn’t ever imagine his mother readily agreeing to such a thing. Not his quiet, gentle mother, and proud, hard working father.
He heard the shrill whistle of the train, and slowly rose from his bed, to stand at the dusty window. He had taken his glasses off when Junior had told him bitterly that if he ever wanted to see anything again, he should hide the things. He wouldn't be needing them, anyway; he didn't have to look closely at a customer because he had no choice in such judgements, anyway. The precious pair of glasses were tucked safely underneath his bed, underneath a loose floor board. He attempted to wipe the window clean, but the dust outside gave him only a blurry look out at the busy correl and a few other buildings that he assumed were boarding areas for the cowboys passing through. His hand was shaking as he dropped it to his side, staring forlornly at what he could.
His thoughts kept their bewildered and numb sort of thinking over the possibility of his parents selling him. The very idea was just much to imaginative! Too ghastly!
His back felt sore and stung terribly, and he struggled to ignore what had been done. He wished that Teresa would come by to apply that salve, but she hadn’t even spoke to him since the night before. He was still dressed in the clothing that he’d been given, and he looked down at it with trepidation. Hurriedly, he ripped off the shirt he’d pulled on after his last lashing, and tossed it to the floor. The pants he struggled out of, the material tight and clingy as he hopped from one foot to the other.
When he was at last free from the binding material, he stood in the nude for a few moments, then quickly crouched to the floor, to pull out his suitcase from underneath the bed.
A moment of horror told him that something wasn’t right as it felt much too light, and he opened it with a dismayed gasp, to see that all his new clothing was missing nearly half of its accompanying articles. Shirts, trousers, socks–all the things that his mother had spent nearly all her savings on to give him something to wear out in a brand new place, and most of it was missing.
Despair hit him with just as much impact as a physical hit, and he burst into tears, feeling momentarily shamed at doing so. But he pulled out the remaining shirt and a set of pants, pulling them on with shaking limbs. The moment he did so, he quickly turned and located his book bag, and saw with some mixture of relief that all of his books and things he’d planned to use with teaching were still there.
Whomever had gone through his clothing had probably decided that they couldn’t do anything with the valuable articles of education. A quick glance around told him that his coat was missing, as well. His hat he hadn’t seen since meeting Alva and his son the first day he’d arrived.
He clutched a book of sonnets with grief, bowing his head as he finished crying. Sniffling loudly, he wiped his nose and face with the sleeve of his shirt and froze when he realized he heard the ominous sounds of men walking up the pathway toward his room. Quickly, he shoved the book back into the bag and shoved that underneath the bed. He sat gingerly on his bed and watched with fear widened eyes as the door opened, Junior, Specs, Trapper and Casey walking in.
“Ain’t you supposed to be resting for tonight?” the younger Alva asked on a drunken sneer, the others fanning out with similar expressions.
His throat was tight with terror, but Richie managed to choke out, “I couldn’t sleep.”
“We been thinking, boy, that perhaps last night, you shooed away your first customer cuz you had no idea what you were doing!” Casey said, his voice light with amusement. “So, we came on up here to see if that were true.”
The image of that man’s horrid penis came to mind, and his stomach churned violently. He entwined his fingers, clutching them fiercely as he looked from one to another with uncertain expectation. He knew something horrible was going to happen, but he didn’t know what. He had the traitorous thought take form in that they were just going to beat him again, for the fun of it. Every muscle was locked tight, stiff, and unyielding as he focused on Junior, looking for some clue in what was expected of them.
“You ain’t got no experience at all?” Trapper asked, in a sort of insolent tone. “None? Not even with serving yourself?”
“That’s kinda funny, man,” Specs laughed. “All men know what to do with themselves!”
“Well, let’s get this over with,” Junior decided. “I’m starting to sober up an’ realizin’ what I agreed to.”
Still unable to fathom what their intentions were, Richie felt himself draw back, eyeing that man with undisguised horror as he began moving first.
But before the man could even touch him, a shout registered from the yard below, and all four men hurried out. The door slammed shut behind Casey, and the lock slipped into place as muffled shouting commenced. Knowing that he’d escaped something terrible, Richie exhaled harshly, struggling to maintain his composure. That incident certainly didn’t help him sleep, as he laid awake throughout the rest of the day, waiting for them to come back.
010101010110
Patty had her tongue caught between her lips as she carefully applied a thin line of kohl around Richie’s eyes, the teen blinking repeatedly at the unfamiliar application. “Hold still, dammit. You’re making me smudge it!”
“I’m sorry...it tickles,” he said quietly, still blinking when she finally pulled her brush back.
Patty observed her work, then tilted her head. “You have weird eyes, man,” she finally commented. “They’re almost gold. But...then they’re brown. What color your parents have?”
“My mother had green eyes. And my father had blue. But my grandmother on my mother’s side had amber eyes, as well.”
“Well, this intensifies that color. It’s quite attractive, actually. Ooh, I hate you boys. Why is it boys have longer lashes than us girls? It’s so irritating. Here...just a little bit of...this on your lip...now rub it in.”
As Richie did as she instructed, very uncomfortable with that he was allowing this woman to apply makeup to his face. Patty set aside her lip color, then sighed. “That’ll have to do. Sometimes men like that their whores have color on their faces. Kinda distracts from the fact that we all ugly underneath.”
Richie didn’t say anything, just directed his tired stare to the floor as the older woman straightened, her dress rustling. He had the thought that she was making fun of him, playing with him–but at the same time, he doubted that. She wore a very horrid combination of orange and brown, her bosoms pushed up and on display, sprinkled with a sort of glittery dust. She would have been a friendly, popular woman if she wasn’t so occupied with the competition among the other girls. Richie was sure she was being this friendly only because he wasn’t a threat to her... yet.
He felt himself give a derisive shake of his head as he wondered why he’d mentally added that adverb. He didn’t want to think that way. He was still determined to leave this wretched place, and he’d already planned another escape tonight. While the girls were busy working the floor and their rooms, the men that were supposed to be watching them were occupied with their own drinking and carousing among the locals. He was going to escape when the one that was supposed to be watching him after his last escape attempt grew occupied with Mirage.
He glanced at his book bag nearby, propped against the wall, containing all that he now owned, save for the horrendous clothing he was wearing, now. His feet had blisters where they’d rubbed against the inside of his boots, and it only just added to his misery. Patty gathered her small box of cosmetics and left him with a cloud of patchouli perfume and an airy wave over one plump shoulder.
His stomach growled in protest when he caught the scent of something being grilled from the streets below when she left the room. Calming it with a steady rub of his palm, he rose from the edge of his bed and considered once again how he was going to leave this town. He knew he could catch the train, having to sneak onto one of the carts once it got moving, and that had him antsy with both anxiety and uncertainty. It had been done before, numerous of times, but never by him. He could still remember the day he and his father had happened upon an accident in Boston, where an immigrant had tried to catch the last car of a moving train and had fallen under the moving wheels.
The gruesome sight had left him sick and upset for days, but he’d rather a fate like that than anymore time spent here.
He nearly jumped when he heard the approaching sounds of boots coming his way, and quickly left his room to start heading toward the bar. Patty had told him to met with the bartender, who would then signal his readiness for a customer that may have been waiting, or to signal that he was available. He really didn’t want a repeat of last night; couldn’t really escape the images he’d been left of a dirty man’s dick before him. What the man had wanted, he couldn’t even imagine. What had he meant by ‘just his mouth’? What was he supposed to do with it?
He narrowly avoided what looked to be Casey and Trapper as they walked past the hallway he took toward the bar, hearing them laughing about something that didn’t sound quite so entertaining. Nervousness made his stomach clench with both humiliation and fear as he neared the rowdy area, smelling tobacco and alcohol.
The moment he peeked out from the thick curtain that closed off the hallway, he felt as if he were going to pass out. The saloon was packed with people, the stench of their unwashed bodies unforgivable. Laughter, shouts, music, women shrieking with pretense made him dizzy. He could see Teresa sitting in the lap of a couple of men, taking sips of their drinks.
Miranda was trying to coax a shy cowboy to buy her a drink, and Mirage had two men battling over her as she giggled childishly. The others–Jessie, Patty, Dominique and Angel–were no where to be seen, and he presumed that they were in their rooms.
He really didn’t want to step out there, to expose himself to the curious stares as many found themselves staring at his bared collarbone and chest, made up face and pale features. It made his skin burn with color as he took a deep breath and stepped back from the curtain. But he peeked out once more to see that the man that was supposed to be tailing him was busy playing poker down below.
Anxiety flooded him, and he hurried back to his room, taking care in case Casey and Trapper were still lingering about. But they’d taken another stairway down to the street, and were busy shouting at a group of men across the way.
He hurried into his room and grabbed his book bag, tossing aside his new hat. Cautiously making his way out, he used the natural shadows of both the building and the night to scurry across the pathway that wrapped around the second floor. He made his way to the front, frowning when he realized how crowded and impossible it’d be if he tried to make his escape there. He turned and moved back toward his room, to see if he could leave there when Junior and Specs popped up unexpectedly from one of the rooms before the hallway.
Before he could even move, Junior screamed an expletive, already seeing his bag and realizing what he’d been up to. In a flurry of movement, Richie found himself dragged back to his room, Junior thumping him repeatedly at the top of his head, both of them screaming furiously about his attempt. Shouts from the streets turned into cheers and jeers, those sounds quickly muffled when Specs slammed the door shut.
Junior shoved Richie away from him, the blond stumbling in his too big boots, dropping his bag with startled apology. He turned to see the younger Alva pulling his belt from his waist, and immediately began to panic at the prospect of another sound beating. Amid the frenzied lashes of that wretched belt, with Specs trying to grab him while his partner whipped him, Richie screamed apologies and tried to curl in on himself to escape the stinging pain of the belt. The room was filled with such noises, ignored by the constant chaos on the streets below.
When he finally began to register that he was being yanked toward the bed, hearing a guffaw from one of the men that had come up to investigate the noise, it was to his horror to realize that Specs was meaning to tie him down. Junior kept on cursing and whipping in a sort of furious hysteria, and amid all the chaos, Casey and Trapper were there to help them along. Panicked and abject terror shot through the teen when he realized that his pants were being yanked down, that someone was holding his shoulders down. He kicked and screamed himself hoarse, giving incoherent apologies as men began to laugh, and the belt stopped falling over him.
The pain left from the frenzied lashes of Junior’s belt left him a little dazed, and the activity had left him panting, winded. He could hear them talking, in a mixture of laughter and incredulous disbelief, and forced himself to focus on what was being said. Junior was arguing with Casey, who was telling him that it had to be done.
That the younger Alva wasn’t going to earn any money by keeping him ‘coddled’. He wasn’t sure what that all meant, just began to realize the exposure of his backside and the humiliating picture he produced with lying on his stomach in this position. He started to turn, his wrists held in front of him by a puzzled Specs, when Junior finally gave Casey what he wanted to hear.
Swallowing hard, Richie heard many unpleasant sounds, but wasn’t sure what was going on. A couple of more men were standing in the doorway, with expressions of both disgust and fascination, but he had no idea what was going on behind him. He felt and heard heavy breath on his neck, feeling a heavy and warm body moving against his exposed backside. He started to panic then, giving mindless begs and apologies as he felt Specs tighten his hold on his wrists.
The moment he felt an immense and agonizing mixture of pain and fullness into his rectum, he screamed hoarsely, even as the men began their drunken cheers and shouts. The pain crowded any other thought or sensation he might have registered, dulling all other senses, leaving him with a sort of mindless state in which he registered what was happening; but unable to fully accept it.
The night carried on; the streets continued with their nightly activity. The horrid actions that had taken place in that small, stuffy room was nothing new to those that heard what was happening.
When Teresa awoke sometime during mid-afternoon, feeling stiff and unclean from her own actions the night before, she performed her normal morning routine. She used a treatment that she used after every man was done with her, to discourage pregnancy. It was also so that she could feel a sense of cleanliness, to trick her body into thinking that it was clean when she felt that it wasn’t. She used what little clean water she had to wash other areas, and left her room, to find something to eat before the night began.
She had just taken her share of food when the cook passed her another tray, instructing her to take it to the boy upstairs. She was a little surprised at the request, but did as she was instructed. In one way, she was relieved in that the teen finally satisfied his owner, but in another, she felt extremely bad in that it had happened. She really didn’t want to see him; didn’t want to see the pained humiliation she knew she would see when she saw him; because when human beings broke, it was hard to accept.
She knocked a couple of times on his door and entered without waiting for an answer.
Her eyes fell on the forlorn teen that sat in the back corner of the room, staring at nothing. The room reeked of various odors, but many of them were things she knew well. She held up the tray of food, and set it at the edge of his bed.
Pausing, she took in the defeated expression, the lingering horror that pulled at his features. She didn’t know what happened; what he had to do. Just that it had been done.
“Git used to it,” she said curtly. “This is your life, now.”
She didn’t expect a reply, and she didn’t get one when she left.
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The tickling began on his right ear, and somewhere between wakefulness and dream land, he began to realize how annoying and uncomfortable that felt. Not really wanting to move, he snorted and shifted slightly, determined to return to the world of dreams. But as he did so, he felt that tickling begin on his left. While some part of him recognized that this was unnatural, that there wasn’t the buzz of mosquitos or flies, that this was deliberate, the other part of him was much too interested in sleeping more to fully awaken.
The tickle turned bothersome, and his body reacted quickly to shoo the nuisance away. He just wasn’t expecting to slap a very hot patty of horse shit across his face.
“GODDAMN IT, YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT NIGGER!” he howled, spitting out the small trickles that dribbled down the corners of his mouth. Then he had to groan as shouting seemed to cause his head to pound with an awful amount of pain.
Virgil Hawkins guffawed uproariously as he ran out from the barn, Francis Stone’s cursing ringing out the early morning darkness. The sun had yet to break over the mountains that entrapped this area, the sky still dark with enigmatic color. But the ranch was already crawling with movement from those that woke early to start their full days’ worth of work, and it wasn’t unusual to hear such shouting and cursing at this time in the morning.
A few of the ranch hands chuckled as the larger man stumbled out from the barn, a little whoozy from last night’s drinking escapade and a seemingly endless game of poker. He had no idea how he ended up passed out with the animals in the barn. Ranch hands usually slept in the quarters nearby.
“Git on up, cracker!” Virgil shouted just as loudly, performing a few jumping jacks, spurs jangling. “We got us a few diggin’s to do out yonder, pardner!”
“Aw, man, fuck you, Hawkins! Eat shit and die, you fucking prick!”
“Oh, uh-uh, no it was not! YOU were the one eatin’, cracker jack! Remember, buddy ole pal ole friendola? Or do ya need a little reminder?”
“Stop being so damn chipper in the damn mornin’!”
“Can we possibly go one day without a curse word from you? I swear on my Momma’s grave–!”
“EAT ME!”
Virgil laughed once, dodging the rocks that were thrown at him. “No, really, seriously! We gotta get on past the south end to fix those fence lines, man. You up? Or do I gotta try harder?”
Hotstreak, as he was aptly named for his temper, yawned loudly as he plopped his worn hat over his head, belatedly remembering the shit he’d just slapped over his face. Virgil laughed uproariously as he bent, dry retching.
“Virgil Hawkins, the sun ain’t even up, yet!” the shrill female voice rang out over the ranch, startling a few chickens and sending a few horses nickering. “Cut out that annoying voice of yours!”
“Oh, geez, her voice just drills into my brain,” Hotstreak moaned as he clapped his hands over his ears. He crouched in place, determined to stay up despite the violent swaying of the earth underneath his feet. “Someone just shoot me now...”
“That’s why you trust me to wake your lazy ass up, man. Not her. C’mon...at least I’m kind enough to wake you up gracefully and with a lot of tender lovin’,” Virgil said, hand on his chest. Hotstreak scoffed in his direction as he stood and began strolling toward the nearest water pump.
Hawkins’ Dakota Ranch was a grand sprawl of timber and ranch land, owned by Virgil’s father, Robert. As well off as they were with the natural treasures of the land, Robert preferred the hard working hands of his son and his friends to work the land and the animals they owned.
Settled in the back country within unmapped territory, with a few day’s worth of riding into the nearby town, Hawkins’ Dakota Ranch depended on the many heads of cattle that roamed the area, and the thick timber that seemed to stretch out beyond the horizon on the eastern section of their land. A creek with quickly running water that connected to a much broader river intersected the farm land, and was used for many of the things a body needed; they had installed hand pumps to coax the water into closer reaches of the house, and this one was used mainly for the thirst of the horses that were milling around in a correl nearby, the small, wet ditch currently dried. As Hotstreak ran the water, the small ditch coaxed water to flow toward the correl, the horses neighing softly as they heard the familiar sound.
“Stop your bitchin’ and get on dishin’, you two,” Adam Evans called cheerfully from nearby, hauling a brand new calf from the barn out to the field, mother cow in tow. “Got a long day ahead of you and me! Got a lot of things to do, and there ain’t no need for us to be all lazy!”
“Oh, shit, he’s doin’ it again, V. Stop him. Sic Sharon on him for that idiot talk,” Hotstreak grumbled, washing his face. “Rhyming should be outlawed in the country...’Specially so fucking early in the morning!”
“I don’t have a say in it, man. I think that’s how Sharon got all pregnant.”
Both of them shuddered as Adam sent them both a scowl, calf braying loudly in protest.
“I told you boys both, she ain’t pregnant,” Adam snapped. “She just a little more healthier than she was a year ago. An’ don’t you be tellin’ her I said that.”
Virgil grinned suddenly as he jogged over to his friend’s side, waiting for him to wash his face. It had been nearly six years since this day when Hotstreak was brought back to the ranch by Robert, passed out in the back of his day carriage, sprawled over the month’s supplies. Robert had explained then that he’d needed more hands to tend to the ranch, and the redheaded man seemed sturdy enough to handle the hard work that was demanded of him.
Virgil hadn’t trusted him, at first. The hot tempered man, barely two years older than he was, proved reckless and fool hardy, putting himself in dangerous situations without any regard to his own safety. His aiming for a deathwish had made the other hands wary of him, but Virgil began to gradually accept the older boy when he’d overhead Robert telling Sharon that Hotstreak was actually a man trying to hide from the law. Nothing else was really known about him, but Virgil had been raised on stories of outlaws–to actually know one had sent him eagerly trying to match the boy’s daredevil escapades.
Slowly, with time, the pair bonded as friends. It had taken awhile, but Hotstreak learned to trust them as they learned to trust him. But once that trust was won, he’d proved time and time again that he was trustworthy and loyal, fiercely defensive of his new family. Though, from time to time, he took risks in going into town with Virgil and the others–he was wanted back in Orleans, but he figured no one would really keep an eye out for him, here. They were nearly thousands of miles away from Orleans, and the law was considered extremely lax in these parts.
The gangly loner had grown into a six foot four wall of muscle, intimidating to those that were unused to such giants. Virgil himself was a couple of inches smaller, but just as strong and sturdy, such genes running in the male side of his family. Together, the pair of them made quite a sight; it wasn’t common for whites to hang around with blacks, but then again, it wasn’t common for a black to be so successful with a ranch, either. The West was a territory of surprises and unconventional methods that leapt all modern bounds and laws; something that was actually more comforting than repressing.
Slapping the worn rust-colored shirt that his friend was fond of wearing, he said cheerfully, “Daddy decided to send us cattle selling next week, man! What say you to broads and booze?”
“Have I ever complained?” Hotstreak asked cheerily, popping up with a grin.
“Never, but one never knows with you. An’, this time, don’t be ditchin’ me in favor of that Latin lovey you’ve got hidden away in town...what, she pregnant last time we there!”
“Ah, shit, Virgil, I just gotta look at ‘er, and she gets all with child...”
Virgil guffawed and stuffed his head back under the water, making him yelp out loud. “Just you an’ me, an’ mebbe Adam if Sharon loosens her leash–! We also gots some money to get some material for some brand new clothing...” Virgil elbowed him playfully in the side, eyebrows wiggling.
After fiddling with the water, the pair headed toward the main house, guffawing and elbowing each other over some stupid jokes.
“It’s about damn time ya’ll got to washing them stanky asses of yours! But it didn’t do you no good!”
“Oh, geez, Sharon, it’s much too early for me to be seein’ monsters,” Hotstreak complained as Virgil’s older sister prompted her brother to shriek in surprise at her appearance.
Both of them were whacked across the head with a wooden spoon, earning drawn out yelps of pain as Sharon faced them. Barely five feet tall, the little woman shot them both stern expressions, her eyes narrowed with warning.
“Both of you REEK. I can smell you both before I even hear you, and that’s saying something,” she growled, crossing her arms over her small chest. “I suggest you git on outta here and get those stanky asses washed real good before comin’ in here and tracking my house with horse shit.”
“We took a bath last Tuesday!” Virgil exclaimed, rubbing his head. “You know us ranchers ain’t ever gonna be all clean all that time! Shit, Sharon!”
“Aw, c’mon, who we tryin’ to impress?” Hotstreak scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Ain’t no women out this way to get all bothered about!”
“...No pretty ones that don’t resemble dogs, anyway,” Virgil muttered low under his breath. “I mean, she’s my freakin’ sister, man. We ain’t the fuckin’ South, here. Gross.”
Hotstreak suddenly laughed, both of them silenced by another whack of the spoon. Ignoring their growls and curses over the sudden pain, Sharon set her hands on her hips and began walking toward them, intimidating them back toward the doorway.
“It ain’t all about impressions, you stank ass creatures! It’s about decorum! Both of you smell like something the pig shit out after a night eatin’ on a drunken idiotic’s vomit!”
Virgil gave her a curious look. “How would you know what that would smell like? Pig’s shit after a night eatin’ on a drunken idiot’s vomit?”
Sharon grabbed both their ears, and steered them roughly back to the door, both of them yowling in protest. “I know this cuz both of ya been drunk enough to dirty the pig’s pen with your stank ass vomit, and I know cuz I had to do your chores that day, cuz the both of ya’ll weren’t even responding to nothin’!”
“That was four years ago!” Hotstreak protested as she shoved them both back onto the porch. “Why you keep bringing that up?”
“Get washed up before you ever set foot back here again!” Sharon snarled, slamming the door shut behind her.
Virgil burped loudly. “How kin she still remember that? Weren’t that when Adam shaved off your hair?”
“Yeah. And when your daddy done shaved off all your eyebrows and cut your hair down to the stubs.”
“Ah.”
“...Shit, that was fucked up when he did that. Took me awhile to grow my hair back out,” Hotstreak muttered, reaching up to pat protectively on the uneven strands. The shaggy crop had gone untouched in all that time, occasionally pulled back into a messy ponytail.
“Aw man, me too!” Virgil exclaimed, looking at him as he touched his uneven dreads. “Still don’t look all right! Man, I get all these fuckin’ nightmares that I wake up with my hair all missing! Every morning, I gotta wake up, check to see if my hair’s there, and to see if I got any eyebrows. It’s fuckin’ horrible, and puts me under a lot of stress...thinkin’ of the bowels, man. The bowels.”
“Shit...gotta take a bath in this friggin’ cold ass water? What she expectin’, fuckin’ God in the kitchen? Ain’t gonna take no damn bath, ‘specially when I’m just gonna get all dirty, again.”
“Amen, brudder. Just gonna wash important parts and change my shirt. That should throw her off until we eat breakfast.” Virgil sniffed at himself experimentally, then abruptly back handed his partner upside the head. Guffawing, he held his hat in place and raced off toward the creek. “Last one there loves Adam up the ass!”
“HEY!”