Where The Dusty Trail Ends.

Chapter 1: The Long Walk

Four years had passed since the lawmen had retrieved her limp body from an oak trees branches. As of Vixen? The horse was apparently taken by the warden to his personal stable, since he thought the mare was beautiful. The two being separated, she served her sentence.

The morning was chilly, not anything in comparison to the mountain, but still a ruthless reminder of that night...
A bugle had woken Juno from her sack, jolting her senses alert in alarm. It appeared the warden was summoning forth prisoners from each sect, as a rough and freezing cold hand grabbed her forearm, and yanked her to her feet. A guard pressed a shockingly familiar revolver to her skull, nudging her onward with three other young women around her age.

A look around led to the deduction... they were transferring. A convoy was packed up, the horses impatiently pawing the earth, and the guards just as much. Their cold and soulless eyes, as a storm, held a trigger-happy expression.

Her gut nagged her, acid rising up the back of her throat with anxiety at the head of the pack of emotions. One as a prisoner shouldn't fear death, but the scent was heavy in the air. That, and the four corpses riddled with holes on the ground were far from the smell of roses.
With a nose crinkle, she hesitated, but was smacked across the face with a rough hand that smelled heavily of whiskey.

"Get on wit' it... GET IN YOU DAMNED WHORE. I ain't sayin' it again..."
His rancid breath rolled over her, causing an involuntary gag from the woman as she stepped up onto the splintering, wooden seats. The other women's faces were stricken with grief, hunger, and fear, unlike her own which was simply relieved to be at the prison gate. The free world laid beyond. But...an escape at this point? That would be suicide. The fresh air was doing a clean sweep of her lungs. Beyond the cobbled walls was a packed dirt path, rolling hills, and lush green grass. Juno was happy to be leaving, but deep down, she knew her feet feet would never touch the grass, nor feel the crumpling of fallen leaves.

The driver hushed the women's mutterings with the echoing shot of a navy revolver into the sky. His yelling was unintelligible, but the basic point was shot across. 'Shut up, or die.'
Hard to argue with that.
He lashed, his whip striking the shires and they leapt forward with their weight fully into the yoke. The rhythmic clopping of their hooves could nearly lull you to sleep... nearly. Sweat trickled down her brow, and a dusty hand rose to wipe the salty beads that dappled her face. The heat was unbearable as always, and the iron cage didn't provide any shade for the group of women.

Four hours passed.

The heat of the day was in full swing, high noon only minutes away at most. The sun was blazing, unforgiving, and became their new task master. In intervals, they would switch seats, sharing a women's pair of trousers that they'd hold over their head like an umbrella. The smallest spot of shade was immense pleasure or relief.
The pair of guards were casting wary glances into the surrounding wilderness as they passed a flask between them. Trees toppled over the caravan and allowing darkness to shroud them and relieve the heat.

"I hear there's bandits out this way. 'Specially in West Elizabeth. New bastards robbing traders and killing passerbys. Ruddy fuckin' luck, eh?"

"You're just speaking out yer ass. Take my canteen. Suns making you crazy is all, we ain't got nuffin' to worry 'bout."
He patted his carbine repeater and smirked, his missing teeth a gaping hole in the what would be smile.
"Ain't nobody messin' with the law these days."
To his left a bush rustled, and his gun was immediately cocked in reflex. The steel glinted in the dim light, as he was met with the tawny head of a doe. Her ears flicked forward before she turned tail and ran, her characteristic white flag waving to and fro in her admitted defeat.

A sigh squeezed from his lungs, and his eyes shut for a brief second in relief.
"Ya' got me all riled up for nuffin. What'd I tell yous-"
Crimson splattered onto his companion's face, and an arrow protruded from from the man's neck, silencing his never spoken complaint.
Ungracefully, he fell. His body landed with a dull thud on the road and before the other could process what just had occurred, an arrow stuck out from his skull, dripping a few brain fragments through the cage before he joined his friend on the dusty trails end.

The women started to scream in alarm, frantically clawing at the cage bars, and one even began to sob when blood and brain matter dropped on her lap.
"I don' wanna die, LAWD, I DON' WANNA DIE-"
Gunfire ran down in redemption like Sodom and Gomorrah.
The driver had not even thought yet to grab his gun, when his head was blown to smithereens. A slug by the looks of it, or what remained of it.
Juno's world had slowed to black and white, nearly slow motion. The guards...were dead. The women, panicking, and the driver was beneath the wagon treads in anthem abstract pose. Then, a piece of metal flew past her cheek, slicing it, and she lifted a hand in a wince to touch the cut. The lock had been blasted clean as well, and the three other women clambered over one another to get past the swaying hinge.
The first woman's foot barely touched the ground before three consecutive shots were fired, and they fell lifeless to the dust, a panicked glaze still in their fading eyes. And the woods was eerily silent.

"Fucker made me waste a slug. Damned idiot should've kept driving..."
A deeper voice snarled from the shadows, clearly irritated, but she had no idea yet where it came from. That is, until he stepped from the bushes.

"Whatever. No witnesses."

There was a man, dressed quite nicely in a stylish vest, pants, and boots. But the bandana around his neck and slanted hat betrayed one fact: Bandit. His face, weathered a tad and scarred showed he had seen many fights and made it out alive, and she had nearly no experience or chance of winning.
Her body froze, and hesitantly she rose both dirty palms. Dropping a knee, she lowered her head and spoke in a steely, but gentle tone.
"Hey...hey. no need to shoot... I ain't resisting."

For a moment the man stood, confounded, but recovered with a pissed off sigh as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Just get your ass over here, and you can drop the act. Don' know how dumb you are, but they're all dead. Sooner we leave. The sooner I get paid. James better be damn good for the money...you're already making me want to send a bullet right through your temple."
His right hand rose in a finger gun, firing with a small mouth sound before he smirked menacingly. The expression did not reach his eyes. It was almost like the cold, dead eyes of a raven, circling to a carcass.

No. A crow.