General Richard Ryman stood at his office window, a draught of whiskey in his hand, and watched this rare tranquility. His men would soon interrupt it by drinking and singing, fraternising that the General didn’t approve of but couldn’t very well stop if he wanted to keep them on side. Particularly with how far they were stretched at the moment. So he would cherish the quietude while it lasted.
The General sighed. This absence of activity only highlighted how much he disliked this posting; he had always enjoyed being busy, working all hours God sent, and previously would have hated such stillness. Now, apparently, he longed for it.
What concerned him most was that three Solution made him long for the Mexican War. Not just because he’d been a younger man, a rising officer with a full life ahead of him, but because it had just been so simple back then. He and his men were tasked with taking this hill, killing that platoon, securing some fort… the orders weren’t simple, many men had to die to complete them, but their purpose had been. As had their cause; Texas belonged to America, the Mexicans disagreed. So there had to be a war. That was all there had been to it.
A horrible, bloody war and he was longing for it…
Life had a way of becoming complicated as you got older, trained gained prestige, he knew that. But at the Solution he had to drag in liquor and families, whores and priests, to maintain the fine balance between the hot-blooded men who risked their lives day and night and the more sensible scientists and researchers who didn’t. Daily, he went below and faced down demons and the men who’d somehow surpassed their evil and, more often than not, sparred with Dustin Longe afterward. Then there was the outside world, where he had to marry the conflicting priorities of a Senate that didn’t understand the Dixie Problem with the locals who knew it only too well…
He sipped his whiskey. It was old and rich, single malt, expensive but worth it because he hardly ever drank. He’d found a bottle like it in a dead officer’s trunk after his first battle, alongside stolen portraiture and three shining pennies. The loot, such as it was, went to command but he had shared the drink with his men that night. So whiskey always reminded him of victory. Of glory.
Perhaps it was the knowledge that he would never taste victory in this assignment which truly got to him. ‘The Solution’. It was a joke name, something thought up by some snake oil salesman in Lincoln’s government; there was no solution to the Dixie Problem, except to contain and pray.
The Solution’s scientists disagreed, though, so they toiled and searched for a method of harnessing the power of the Triangle to use against them. The very notion made the General uneasy in a religious way. Dustin Longe was bad enough but at least he was human. Mostly. You could talk with him, reason with him, control him. Tapping into whatever the Triangle used didn’t feel like it could be quite so controllable.
The General took another sip. Victory indeed. Maybe he should treat every day as a victory. Maybe he should think every sunset that someone got to see because the Solution were there a triumph. It was awfully short-term thinking, defeatist even, but having no clear, human enemy was getting to him.
How he’d love to have a proper battle against the Triangle, one big dice throw…
He sipped again. No, that would be throwing good men after bad. It wasn’t like him to be so callous. He must be worried about something.
Usually when the General worried it was about Dustin. All the other matters would take care of themselves eventually but Dustin… he was a walking dose of trouble. He and Eleanor had only been gone two days but already the General felt nervous. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Dustin to keep her safe, or that he didn’t trust Eleanor to not put herself in danger, but there was something about the mission that hadn’t sat right with him, some unsettling pattern to it that he couldn’t discern at the time and still couldn’t.
“You’d better come back, Dustin,” he said to the sunset.
As if in response, a carriage rolled over the horizon and barrelled toward the Solution. Then two more appeared, followed by a fourth. The horses were going at a good pace, not quite racing but not slouching by any stretch.
The General frowned, turned from the window. Under his desk, he’d had a small lever installed that rang a bell downstairs. He pulled it and watched it click back into place. Instantly, someone ran upstairs to see him. When they got to the office, they stopped and knocked.
“Enter.”
It was Kyle Reeves, one of the younger recruits. He had a wild mop of hair the General would never have allowed in his army days but his salute was smart enough to make up for it. “Sir?”
The General realised he was still holding his whiskey. Putting it down now would be embarrassing, so he swirled it idly and said “Are we expecting guests, Reeves?”
Reeves glanced at the ceiling as he thought. “No sir.”
“Are you sure?”
Another glance. “Yes sir.”
The General watched his whiskey dance in his glass. Who, then, was thundering across the plains to meet them?
Someone else came running down the corridor. They saw Reeves saluting in the doorway but still knocked against the wall. The General did all he could to not smile; such manners were the sign of a well-trained force.
“Enter,” he said again.
This time it was Joshua McManaman, a damn fine man who’d served with the General since the Mexican War. Almost forty now, he was battle-scarred and the best sniper a leader could hope for. He stood to attention and said “Sir, we’ve got guests.”
“We’re not expecting them. Reeves, you’re dismissed.”
The boy nodded and excused himself.
McManaman stepped into the General’s office, closed the door and said “I’ve already sent uniforms out to greet our guests, sir. It doesn’t look like an attack but it could be a decoy.”
“Good man.”
McManaman straightened with pride at the compliment. “One of the coaches has a coat of arms on it,” he said.
The General stopped swirling his whiskey. “The Naismith arms?”
“I couldn’t tell,” McManaman replied. “My eyes aren’t that good.”
That would be unusual; it had been more than two years since their benefactor’s last visit. William – he always insisted on being called William, couldn’t abide by ‘Bill’ – preferred to leave the management of the Solution to the General… and, he reluctantly admitted, left monitoring their progress to his daughter. After all, a man as busy as him couldn’t afford to spend too much time away from his bustling empire.
The whiskey came to an eventual stop. “Who did you send?” the General asked.
“Tom Cartwright and ‘Tall’ Henry Smith, sir. With a team watching them.”
The General smiled. He needn’t have asked; of course McManaman would have sent the most polite men out in case it really was their benefactor. It was good to have affirmation that he had men he could rely on.
“I guess we’d better prepare then,” he said. Then he pressed the lever again.
Reeves came running back up. “Sir?” he said, smartly saluting again.
“Prepare quarters for William Naismith. I shouldn’t need to tell you how good they have to be. And get an honour guard ready to follow him.”
Reeves nodded and ran away. McManaman saluted then left as well.
For a moment, the General simply stood in the quiet of his office. He didn’t know quite how to react. Normally his life and many others’ depended on his quick decision-making, his ability to absorb facts rapidly and make the right choice… but this wasn’t urgent so his surprise at William’s arrival expanded to fill the available space. As did his concern at what it meant.
You don’t get to be a general without a certain amount of political nous and the General was no exception; he’d done his share of glad-handing, gone to the right parties, lost the right poker hands. But the game had always wearied him; he preferred to be honest with his superiors and his men as much as possible and tended to resent anyone who wasn’t.
William B. Naismith was such a man, someone who slid through High Society, a mover and a shaker. He would not waste time coming out here unless he had a purpose. The General couldn’t imagine what it could be, though his mind eagerly tried.
Ultimately, the General supposed it didn’t matter what said purpose was; he had come and the General would hopefully find out why soon enough. So he stood, placed the whiskey on his desk and changed; his leisure suit, a simple dark, three-piece affair, was sufficient for reading reports and gathering his thoughts at the end of a day, but not for receiving guests. No, for that he went to a wardrobe ingeniously hidden in his office’s wall and pulled his full military gear out, Yankee blue with golden medals.
Putting it on made him feel more comfortable, more in control. It was like returning home after a tour.
Shortly after he was ready, there was a knock on his door.
“Enter.”
It was Reeves. He opened the door and said “Mr Naismith is here, General.”
The General nodded for him to be let in. He didn’t need to give William permission to enter what was essentially the man’s own office but it was courteous of the Southern Gent to wait for permission.
Reeves stood aside and William B. Naismith entered. Not tall, he was nevertheless built like a boxer and twice as imposing up close. William was well turned-out in a white suit with black lining. He wore a wide black tie that he always knotted himself and dusty black boots. Beneath his white dress hat were sharp, small eyes and the well-combed goatee that hung from his chin. They adorned a gnarled but endearing face like jewels, the face of a man who knew exactly how important it was to be selectively honest.
William stepped inside and said “Thank you, young man,” in a smooth Texan voice. “But please, call me William next time.”
“Sorry, sir,” Reeves said with a crimson blush. “I mean, William.”
“Thank you kindly.”
Reeves stepped back, closed the door gently then escaped once more. The boy didn’t like to be in the presence of power. And he really had been with William B. Naismith; the Naismith Mining Company could by all rights claim to own half of Texas. The half that’s below the surface; through a series of clever deals and lucky breaks, William B. Naismith had gathered the mining rights for most of Texas.
Normally that would be discouraged by the Government but William had friends in high places. And his involvement in the Solution only helped to detract from his opponents’ case. After all, a greedy man wouldn’t be spending so much of his own money to protect Texas and indeed the entirety of the United States, would he?
The General didn’t know; their interactions had shed no light on why William spent so much on the Solution. One could surmise that he was hoping to protect his Texan concerns by containing the Dixie Problem but it seemed to go beyond that. Not that he would ever admit anything to the General; all such questions were rebuffed in that gentle manner of his.
“Richard,” William said, smiling like he and the General were lifelong friends, “it is so good to see you.” He extended a hand to the General.
“And you, William,” the General said. He stood straight as he spoke, like a telegraph pole.
William smiled. It was a broad smile. “Come now Richard, after all we’ve done, can a man not get a handshake?”
The General walked stiffly over, took the extended hand and shook it. William’s skin was cold to the touch. It must be a chilly night. Not that the General would know; thick walls and excellent heating hid such things from him.
“It is good to see you,” the General said. “If not a little surprising.”
“Of course,” William replied, continuing their shake. “Forgive me, Richard, I didn’t really have time to send warning. You see, Senator Chalmers was very keen to get down here as soon as possible.”
“Senator Chalmers is here?”
William’s smile faded slightly and he released the General’s hand. “He is. The poor man is an absolute wreck. First his wife and now his daughter… I wanted to keep him north, away from the madness, but he said to me ‘William, I can’t rightly be hiding away whilst some heathens have my baby girl’. As you might imagine, I was moved as a father. He can be quite persuasive, can the Senator.”
The General nodded slowly. He supposed he would want to be near if one of his own children were captured. Not that it would do any good. “He knows there’s little influence he can have on the outcome of this situation though?”
“Probably. Deep inside,” William said. He strolled over to the General’s desk and sat before it, in the guest’s seat. “But a man has to be active in times like this. There’s nothing worse for his pride than to realise there’s nothing he can do.”
The General realised they might not be talking just about the Senator any more. “Of course. When your children are at risk, you feel like you need to do something. We’ll prepare him some quarters and-”
“There’s no need,” William said, raising his hand to halt the General. “The Senator will stay in my quarters. That young man at your desk said he’ll prepare me somewhere else to sleep. I don’t want to be a bother.”
The General frowned. “You never would be.” He rounded his desk, stood behind it and decided to reassure William. “But, going back a topic, tomorrow I will personally assure the Senator that the Solution has put their top man on the job of retrieving his daughter. There is no-one more suited to the task than Dustin Longe.”
William looked him square in the eye. “The Wanted Man.”
“We prefer to call him by his name,” the General said. “Titles can give a man an air of arrogance, make him dangerous.”
“Like ‘General’, you mean?”
The General held his gaze. Their relationship often contained such barbs. He couldn’t trust William, even if he had kindly extended the General’s career, and the General believed the lack of results from William’s investment caused most of the tension coming back at him; everyone at the Solution worked hard and the researchers were close to a number of important breakthroughs but all the Solution had really succeeded in doing was keeping the Dixie Problem at bay, which probably wasn’t enough of a return for someone like William.
Rather than call him on the comment, the General laughed it off. “You could say so. I’ve certainly met a few people who let the rank go to their head!” he said, sitting down.
“Power can do that so easily,” William said. His voice was almost wistful.
“It can,” the General confirmed, unsure as to what he should be saying.
William started stroking his beard. “There are so many rumours about the Wanted Man that, frankly, I’m not able to tell the fact from the fiction. I was hoping that you might give me some insight from your personal experiences with it.”
“It?” he asked.
William sat back in the guest’s chair. “Surely you don’t think the Wanted Man is actually a man? Not with what it can survive?”
Eleanor Naismith had always probed him about Dustin during their meetings, she had almost a fixation with the man, but William never asked about him. The General supposed that this was the time to start asking, with his daughter under Dustin’s care.
“Our tests have shown that Dustin Longe is likely a man; he bleeds, albeit with some difficulty, and he tires. He must eat, though he eats like a pig, and his excretions are as you would expect. There are limits to what he can do, though he can fight hand-to-hand with things which would rip my best soldiers apart. And his personality and views are those of a man.”
He didn’t add any of the State Secrets gleaned from their tests, or that Dustin was the most arrogant and infuriating person the General had ever met.
“Then he’s fallible?” William asked. A flicker of concern danced across his voice.
The General realised he wasn’t being very assuring. “Well, yes, but so are the cultists and creatures of the Badlands. And Dustin’s fallibility is so distant from yours or mine that he is almost something else; he takes wounds that would kill anyone else, is faster and stronger and sharper. You need not worry about his abilities or his dedication to protecting the innocent.”
“That must come from his past then. He was a Ranger, I’m given to understand? Before, I mean.”
“He was,” the General said. Eleanor had been sharing a lot with her father. “Part of President Houston’s expansion to keep the peace back in ’41. Earned himself a few commendations for bravery. He was also one of the hated Yellow Band, who collected deserters during the war with the Mexicans.”
“That was an important service though.”
The General shrugged. “I didn’t say I was the one who hated them.”
William looked down at his tie and played the fabric between his fingers. “So he’s an experienced and preternaturally tough man, then. Presumably he’s not as bloodthirsty as the legends make out?”
The General shook his head. “Not at all. I won’t say he doesn’t like a fight but only with outlaws.”
That seemed to dampen his patron’s mood. “Then he’s a moral man?”
“I suppose so,” the General said, choosing his words very carefully. “After a fashion.”
“Ah. That is his weakness then?”
The General paused at this. He’d never considered Dustin to be weak in anything but adherence to protocol. “If you put it like that then I guess so. He does have a strong sense of fairness, of what’s right and wrong.”
William leaned forward. Any joviality or camaraderie in his eyes disappeared. “Then I must sincerely hope that he is not placed in a situation where he has to choose between doing whatever his stupid corrupt mind thinks is right and saving my daughter’s life. There would be severely dire consequences if that were to be the case.”
The General coughed. “That is unlikely to happen. The Badlands is not a complex place; there are creatures and people who worship them out there and there are normal people caught in their wake. One set warrant killing, the other saving.”
William stood, flicked imagined dust from his suit. “Hopefully your Wanted Man will know which are which.”
The General had no answer for that.
“Good evening, Richard.”
“Good evening, William.”
The man walked out and left the General alone. Outside, some of his men started loudly chatting; there would be no more peace to enjoy tonight.