It’s real fuggin’ hot. Sweat’s makin’ my hat slip over my eyes as we ride into town. Glad we made it ‘fore sundown, though. Good ol’ Gloria’s feelin’ a bit thirsty, ain’t you, girl?
Ain’t no one out, an’ I guess there ain’t reason to be past sundown. Still, I s’pose it is a tad odd, lookin’ out an’ seein’ how empty the streets are. It had to be no more’n ten minutes after sundown. You figure there’d be things like couples packin’ up after romantically watchin’ the sun set or some shopkeep sweepin’ the porches. Hell, I don’t see any other dragons in none of the hitchin’ posts neither. Do you, girl? Me neither. It’s not like Santa Tabo, remember that? Those illegal dragon breeders tried to hunker down when they caught wind that we were comin’ to collect their bounties. Sure, the townsfolk tipped them off by notin’ how quiet it was the day we came in, but hell, now there ain’t no townsfolk in the first place.
What’re you lookin’ at? I see your yellow eyes starin’ at somethin’ across the way as we pull up to the front of the general store in town. I decide to look myself, an’... I ain’t see nothin’. Just the doctor’s house, door shut, blinds draped, ain’t no one.
What was that? I saw that, too. Heel girl, heel. I’ll check it out. Even as I’m tyin’ your lead to the hitch, I see the blacks of your eyes shrink down to the size of a bullet. Whatever you saw, you’re still lookin’ for it.
I kick up some dirt as I walk across the road to the front of the doctor’s place. It’s gettin’ quite dark now, but some things look a tad suspicious. A crack on the left window, a broken wooden railin’ on the porch. Sure, these things can happen with natural wear and all, but that look in Gloria’s eyes tol’ me somethin’ ain’t right.
The creakin’ of the floorboards is so damn loud since no one’s around. I knock on the door, and tha’s even louder. I hear quite the scuffle from the other side, an’ then the door swings open an’ suddenly my face is pressed against the bad end of a double barrel.
The doc ain’t lookin’ so good, and if my ol’ man taught me anythin’ besides bounty huntin’ is that if a town’s doc can’t keep himself healthy then they got a problem. His clothes are all raggedy, his face an’ arms all covered in fresh scratches, a bit’a char on his untucked shirttails. “What’s your business?” he barked, and I hesitated for a moment ‘cause, well, it’s been a while since I had got a gun in my face an’ all, not since that scuffle with the Green Scale Gang at Scalville. The doc’s lookin’ at me all funny, like I got somethin’ on my face. “It’s in your best interest that you leave,” he lowers his gun to his side.
Now, when a man in such a disposition such as the doc tells you to leave, you best know he means that. You do as he says, no protest, nothin’. However, I feel my mouth open to ask somethin’. Maybe about the people, maybe just to ask to see if he’s alright. I don’t know.
Suddenly, I hear Gloria behind me, thrashin’ around like hell and spittin’ sparks into the sky. I turn, and I see this huge black dragon circlin’ us above. Even though it’s dark, I see these dark green cuts in her, but dragons bleed red, now don’t they? Her wings are all tattered, and after every flap she drops some of her rotten black scales.
“It’s one of the infected,” doc says. “I’ve been trying to develop a cure, but it’s spread to all the townsfolk, the firebreathers, hell, even the dogs. You need to get out of here, now.”
The beast swoops down, its crusted claws reachin’ for the doc. I grab doc’s arm and run, pullin’ him across the road. I hear the creaking of rotten wood as doc’s place crumbles under the weight of the beast.
“Hop on,” I say as I untie Gloria. I look behind me, and out the rubble I see the dragon. Her maw was caked with crimson and enough spittle to drown a pig. She smelled like a body, like the coffinmaker ain’t close the lid all the way.
She lunges for us just as I get Gloria loose. “Hyah!” I spur Gloria and roll to the side. Gettin’ up, I see the doc holdin’ on to Gloria for dear life as she evades the beast, who has just demolished the front of the general store. The look in the beast’s eyes told me that there was a bounty on our heads, and we weren’t goin’ to be taken in alive.
Reachin’ for my belt, I approximate how far Gloria is. I lasso toward her in the air and come up short, but she sees an’ grabs the rope. I’m yanked off the ground and thrown a dozen feet into the air as Gloria heads east towards the risin’ moon.
I hear a hellish roar behind me. The beast is chasin’ after us on foot, a wing of hers pierced by a metal post renderin’ her flightless. She’s slower, but damn persistent. Grapplin’ my lasso in my left, I reach for my gun with my right and fire one, two, three.
She don’t die, but she stops her runnin’. Lettin’ out one final roar, she thrashes in anger, and as Gloria flies higher the black beast starts blendin’ in with the ground in the darkness of night.