Journal of an Unknown Soldier | CreepCast

(upbeat music) - Welcome back to Creepcast. Today we are doing a fan submitted story. That's right. You can upload your stories on our slash creepcast and you don't have to post on no sleep and have it deleted immediately and I probably shouldn't throw shade in no sleep all the time. We had a 15 minute dig at them in an episode where if I recall your impression of them was "Uhh, that was you, that was how you said they sound." - You can upload your stories to our slash creepcast and we'll read them like this one here, which is if I love the title and also Harry Reddit, which as recently doesn't have the best track record stuff, but still the Journal of an Unknown Soldier, U.S. Navajo War 1863. We get to go back in time a little bit. Have we done like a western thing? - I mean, I feel like there's been historical stuff. - I don't think we've got like a western though. - No, no. - We've never done like a western story, which would be kind of fun. - Which also if you're like, "Whoah, whoah, whoah, cowboy story." - Why don't you just fucking hang around for a second? - I don't know if we won't listen to a cowboy story. - I think at this point, like the people who are like watching this right now, they're here. - Okay. - I think what I'm gonna say-- is they're just going on. I think we've established well enough that a lot of our die traps have nothing to do with the actual subject matter. - That's true. - For what's being discussed, so I think they're here. All right. So the author of this story is user strange accounts. It seems his real name is Travis Weaver. Although he doesn't have any like social media accounts leaked for linked for me to see like specifically which Travis Weaver if he has work elsewhere. But on this Reddit account, this guy posts a ton. We've got this one and seems a lot of them are historic based because he's got this one. The Journal of an Exorcist diocese of Richford, 1975. The Journal of a former detective, Irish Coffin, Irish Coffin Ship 1847. So it's like all these different things-- - This feels like a fan of yours. - Probably, I hope so, probably. - This feels like somebody who likes the deep divy stuff. Like I feel like there's gonna be a lot of niche comments or like, you know what I mean, like Easter eggs, niche Easter eggs where you'd be like, where I'll get you a little chubbed up and like, that reminds me of this. - Okay, well listen to this. One of them, he posted 12 days ago, is called The Journal of a coal miner's daughter, West Virginia, 1907. What was I talking about right before we began? The US military killing mole people. (laughing) - Coal miners. - Coal miners. - That was talking about the coal miners. - I was talking about the coal miners that he wrote a story about a horror story framed around. - Yeah. - I like him already. He's also super active in our slash creep cast, not even about his own stories. He's just like talking to different people. His favorite episode it seems is the left rock game. So, good man. - You know, it's like being a Metallica fan in your favorite album is the black album, you know. - It's easy, easy. - You know, sometimes like just the popular thing is good. - That's true. - That's possible. - I mean, it was one of my favorite ones to record. - Yeah, it's a good story. - I love it. - Yeah. - It's made a hall of famer. - Yeah. - I'm just saying, a lot of good stories out there too. - Also, if you're real fan-- - Is this because you think he's my fan, is that why you're being like aggressive? - No, no. - All right, well, we're gonna read this today. It's the O.D.s. - I'm excited. It's cool. I always like with these fan submitted stories of people that are active in the subreddit. It's someone who's so active to commentating and stuff. This is the kind of community that we need, you know. People build each other up. That's what I love. - I will also say about him. Every time someone else posts a story, he's like reading it and replying like advice and stuff. - King. - King move. - He's about a king. - Like to see it as opposed to our slash no sleep. - Wow. - When it's like, well nothing happened in your story. - So bye bye. - Bye bye. - Don't leave, bye bye story. - Don't leave, band, band. - Right now. - Okay. - He actually, not to completely slander. He does, before Creed cast, he posted on no sleep a lot. So. - Great words too. - Should we band him here? - Should we band him? - If you post a no sleep at all your band. - That's the only rule on our slash creep cast. You cannot post a no sleep. - Even though we've read almost 90% of our episodes are all no sleep. - This entire show has been built on no sleep strip. - Kidded half the game. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Throw it out. - All right, go almost, let you want to jump in. - I'm ready, let's begin. - From the journal of an unnamed soldier, 1863. A auxiliary scout, attached to Colonel Carson's column. September the twelfth, camp along the Rio Puerco. I set my hand to an account of our company and the deeds pass under a man who's had his share of smoke and not near enough coin. But, oh, he's already got me. I like that, that was a good, that was a good one. - I don't know what that means. - A man who's had his share of smoke and not near enough coin. - He's had too much gunfire and not enough pay. - There you go. - What if you just tum out like fucking. - What if you just, he's like, "Let me bust out the zone." (gunfire) - That'd be pretty cool. (imitates gunfire) He does fog machine. (imitates gunfire) And like, stop, that's crystal meth. (imitates gunfire) (imitates gunfire) (laughing) - Dude, dude, too much of that crystal. (laughing) - My bad. All right, first line, pretty good. - My name need not be written full. Cut of these pages will tell it. I was once of the artillery, a gunner of fair repute and bore the weight of the 12 pounder as a mule bears its choke. Yet a soldier under flag is forever shackled by a rule and quarter, while a soldier for hire, he'd only answer the call of his stomach and the weight of silver. So I turned cutthroat, right now, it's crawly breaks. Briggs is hard stock. Calvary man turned out of the regulars for sins no one puts to paper. He looks hewn from black oak, cracked by sun, with a set to him that cuts keen whenever there's profit to be sniffed. He holds the leash on our company, though it is a leash frayed and near to snapping, for we are no single breed. Thieves runaways, half blood scouts, turn coats from both sides and one fellow swore to have shot his own kin at Shiloh. I hold no admiration for them, but I keep their pace. For coin cares little for the color of a man's soul. I said, I'm vibing and I was just waiting for the break 'cause of news. I walk all around the inn, I was just waiting. I was like holding there, I was just like, you know what, I'm sorry I like stories. I'm sorry I like writing. My bad, probably a bad podcast to be a part of. (laughing) Yeah, my bad. I sat down here the talk I caught by the fire when we pulled clear of Santa Fe. Tell it again, crawly. One of the boom boys said, kicking dust at the blaze. How many did you ride down that night? Briggs leaned back on his stone and crawled. Ape by my reckon. Though a few broke and I ran before I laid steel them. Yancy let out a bark. Hey, I'd be glad to tell you half that in a week. Another boy's cut through in the smoke. You keep y'all niente. You're the only fool I know ever shot it on the whore with middle of the fight. Circle broken a laughter, harshest gravel rattling from a sack. Yancy spat into the coals. That beast near pitched me on my neck. Got what it asked for. Sides, I'll break the next one. Pock worked a job between his teeth and pitched his question across the blaze. Captain, they say Carson means to drive the Navajo clean out. Burn the crop, start until they can come begging. That's true. Briggs shifted his boots on the stone and answered flat. Carson means to herd the whole breed in the Bosch Redondo. They'll grow the skate bark for winners done if the army has its way. All workers seen them driving. No hoagin' left standing. No sheep left grazing. Old Donley hacked into his sleeve and wheezed. "You reckon the pay will hold?" Briggs raked a call with his boot heel. Pay hold when there's meat on the carcass. Uncle Sam's purse opened his date, went suits him. And if he clenches it shut, we'll cut our share from whatever's left behind. The boom-brothers, Texans as they were, barked out a holler and knocked their cups together. Harlan pushed his hands near the flame. Heard the Navajo Cape trinkets, maybe silver. Stone's finer than Mexican-Coin. You reckon we'll come cross any? Fire through a gleam across Briggs. You'll find what you've gotten a stomach to bleed for. But mark me. Anything lifted belongs to the troop. Try to shave any man's portion and I'll see your hands cut off. After that, the talk's out. It turned it toward women. The kind of boasting of man's ears have no use for. I laid my tennis hide and he's back from the ring. Man may stomach war and butchering beef, yet there's a cruelty in these fellows that rides deeper than hunger itself. It's on these nights, I reckon the desert keeps its eye on me. own book on us. The maces just like judges. The maces rise like judges. The stars burn holes to remain skin. We bury the little, but there's no time. The coyotes drag what we leave. The wind takes the scraps, yet the land holds the memory, all the same. Lay now under a bit of canvas, the desert rasping its song across the edges. Their talk drifts yet, tumbling like dice in the dark. I know well enough I ride with men who cut me as soon as shake my palm, but the pay is promised. My gut recalls the lean months when I quit the guns, that are a place among wolves that go hungry with the sheep. Close here for the night, rigs alone to keep the edge of the fire now, darker shadow than the rest. She was made for the hours after sundown. Okay, so that's the end of the first entry. Okay. I know, I know you get on to me. I know you're like, oh, you like this body, but I am bought in. Okay. It's language. Very good command of words. You any cash on you? Why? Buy it in. Can't buy it and take a couple out and start on the floor. Buy it in. See how much she has bought in for $5 buy in price admission. There's the tip. What was that one? 20. Damn. $5 buy with a $20 tip for this story. Yes. All right. So let's go over the first journal entry. Couple cowboys going around getting ready to start a basically talking about the job coming in and some people who are talking to Briggs, the captain, who's just like, what do you think we're in for? And they're kind of looking around and he's more of a stern type. You can't take more than what you deserve kind of thing. You'll get whatever you're willing and bleed for. Yeah. Yeah. That'll be it's not going to be easy pickings because he, the author mentions he was like, I remember the lean months when I quit the guns. So he tried to step away from the violence, this career of his, so to speak. And he nearly starved for it. So he had to come back to this. But it seems like a lot of the other people there, they're for an easy dollar. They're talking like, I hear after we kill him, they've got silver, we can keep the silver. Briggs is kind of putting his heel on it, saying like this, you're going to be in a fight. It's written well. I like the, the very pedally, like floral nature of like the descriptions and the kind of fantastical. It fits that, it makes me think I'm in like the Southwest. You know what I mean? It fits that cowboy aesthetic. I guess what I'm saying. It also, I mean, not obviously Cormac McCarthy's McCarthy, but it reminded me of blood meridian in the way the scenery is so florally described, but the dialogue is so abrupt and like slug and like wreck and we'll get blah, blah, blah, but that's how to use quotations. Yeah, yeah. It's. Yeah, that's true. There's an interview with McCarthy one time when he said, he said, why would I want to mark up the page with silly little dashes? He's just like, no, I don't like the library guy sitting there. He's just like, okay, interesting. But like some of the, some of the stuff like the Mace's rise like judges, I reckon the desert keeps books on us, stuff like that. You're seeing the movie Bone Tom Hock. Yeah. Do you think this is going to go into something like that where the Navajo are like some kind of, it's less about it being like actual Navajo Indians and maybe it could be like more of a, not like zombie, but something where it's like a skin walkery kind of thing that exists out, you know what I mean? It could because it seems like they're venturing in an unknown land and they're getting, they're bargaining for more what they had, what they're, they're bargaining. What was the credit rate? They're, they're bargaining for more than they want. What's the, what's the deal? They're going to get more than they bargained. Yeah, they're a bit off more than they can chew. They're going to buy off more than they can chew. They're going to bargain more than they can chew. They're going to bargain. What they should have bargained. They're going to buy, they're going to bargain the bite that they should have chewed, but didn't. You know, I mean, is it, do you think we're going to lean towards that more? So the difference to me is Bone Tom Hock opens with the two runaways causing problems with that. Yeah. They were, it's never said what they were. It's like, oh, these are the people that killed the natives or whether. Yeah. I mean, I'm not saying that it's similar. I'm just wondering if it's a, if it's a thing where they go in with a preconceived notion of like, oh, we're going into Indian territory only to be met with like, in Bone Tom Hock, they're like, oh, these are like actual savages where it's like, these are like, almost like primordial entities that are like doing like, they're gutting people open and doing like, they're like, almost human. They like, they like get shot. It doesn't really affect them. Yeah. And there's some line in that movie where they're like, uh, oh, they're like the natives told legend of these. Yeah. They're almost like a skin walker kind of like, they're like an entity. They're not necessarily, but they're like, it's a collection of them. It's like a, you know, yeah. Yeah. Whatever. But basically, do you think we're going towards that or do you think it's going to? So what I was saying is the difference to me is in Bone Tom Hock. It is like a peaceful group of people that are attacked, right? Because of the actions of a couple, the two that go out, steal riches or whatever, then that prisoner gets brought to town and that's why they come and break him out and all that violence starts. Whereas here, it's like them going looking for the violence. They're the, they're the head hunters in this scenario. Um, so it could, it could just be they lose, right? But I feel like that may be not predictable because if it's written well, that's fine. If you can predict a story, but I guess kind of predictable on that, we're going to go fight. We lose. I feel like there needs to be some further twist rather than like these guys beat us, you know, fair and. I'm just wondering if they're even going to deal with any of the crazy crazy word to say. That's what that's how the Cowboys used to say. Yeah, yeah, that's a right. Is that how they used to say it? Yeah, but that's like a slur now, I think. What? I'm almost a stupid way of saying Indians. On emails. Well, you see if you do it like that, it's better. Rather than you mean like, what about the way they're going to come across the way they're. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm just wondering they said they're going to go looking for the Navajo, but they're going to stumble across something far darker. That's what I think will happen. Yeah, likely. Yeah. All right, entry two, entry two. September the 18th came near the San Mateo range. We pulled east with first light, column of dust and horse flesh winding out of the valley like smoke from a cannon's throw. So see how do you like stuff like that? The imagery like a line of horse flesh like smoke from a cannon's throw. Like how they don't do anything for you? I like it. You like it. Okay. Yeah, no, I think it's good. They get to me fired up. It's like coffee. I'm like, all right. I'm in. I'm bought. Price of a mission. That was all my money. Come back when you got more of $25. Also, not to derail it too much, but I do have a name I want to run by you because I don't really like, I hate the unnamed thing. The guy, like a name soldier, right? Can I pitch a name for you and just see if we can roll with it? Go on. La Jonah pepper spray. The sun rose fierce cutting long black lines across the maces is a cruel line. One that showed every wrinkle of rock and every sore upon a man's skin. This land gives no quarter. Man must bend to its terms or break outright. I've taken to reading the man by their horses for beasts seldom lie. Yancy, the fool that he is, rides a rock cult with the white showing round its eyes. The beast jigs and tosses its head until the whole line swears at him. He rides at hard, jerks of the reins, spurs till it bleeds, that the beast fights him still. Twice it near through him, and twice he struck it across the eyes. The animal rolls white in its gaze and foams like a rabbit thing. I think it waits for the art to kill him proper. This whole description of the horses, how they've been riding them stuff like that. Excellent. I don't know if he got it from somewhere, but this is great. I love it. Briggs rides another breed altogether. His one eye gray bears the mark of an old saber work along its hind, yet never falters, not even when shale breaks loose beneath. It carries him as though horse and rider share one mind, and the column waivers, that gilding steadies its gait. The rest fall in line with it. The rest fall somewhere between. Pike rides a mare lean as himself. Barlin's surreal dances at every snake, and the boon brothers kick their done ponies. Beast never starved yet running with the spite that keeps him living. My own is Rowan. I took off a farm boy outside Santa Fe, sound legs steady temper, eats what it can find, and he eats my rain without fuss. So that's interesting because it's talking about like how the different man the horses are kind of extension for themselves in his own is one that eats when it cans, but follows orders without a fuss. Similar to how like our author is willing to go along with this horrific, you know, the act they're about to go along. Yeah, it's a creative way of exquisite of like telling about your characters without being like, I'm like this. It's like the he's like this. He does. He does. You're doing your bit. You're literally, uh, Just understanding who the characters are by their horses or the horses, yeah, yeah, which is fun. It's very cool By midday we crossed the cedar flat where the soil split like old time Heat drove the men quiet Only the groan of saddle leather carried pike let a match and pulled a long draw Working it as if he met that smoke to the last day After mile or so, Yancey broke the hush as he always must Hatton Think we'll see Kit Carson out this way Bragg's kept his seat straight ahead Go on some rides to the soldiers Not with the lock of us Yancey gave a snort that fell flat thought he maybe give us orders face to face man's got a name out of share it Pike flicked ass from his lip Carson don't give nothing but long marches Donnelly hacked them to his sleeve and grounded and he give pay if we do the work Briggs drew his gray up and let his stare run the line too enough You won't pay you round forward You're a friend's hand turn back to Santa Fe. No man here's promised company a reputation Words closed Yancey's mouth for a time though his cult still jigs sideways and near upset the file I caught Briggs watching him with that knife hard gaze of his One day soon he will put Yancey in the dirt. No man will warn it long So we wrote on She didn't smoke yonder's last night Pock said nodding at the hills Donnelly squinted over could be mescalero could be Navajo Could be some farmer too dumb to know where to plow Farmer said Yancey was a laugh like a bark. Sure thing The Texan boon brother called Charles spoke up Let it be Navajo. I'm sick of riding with empty hands Ain't shot a soul in a week. His other half Jesse spat and flared crooked teeth. You'll get your chance Cars and hounds always flushed game Briggs looked back. It's black hat low over his brow Best keep your power dry For falling smoke you'll see more than you care for before long By evening we drew up where the grass hissed underfoot in the sky blood purple along the wrenches fire went quick to life The men sat close talking as they ever do plundered to come women to take silver promised and silver imagined I kept back with my tin in this journal letting their talk drift while coyotes raise their racket beyond the glow It's a curse thing riding with wolves Still my purse runs thin and their fire warms the shurs any Are we pushed towards that smoke? The country will bear what it hides She was like Briggs kind of knows maybe something that they don't Yeah, well, so here's what I was gonna say People will probably compare this so far to like the judge right the judge being the figure in blood Meridian who's like the overbearing Kind of presence in the camp that leads them to war even though he's not the group leader that's Clanton But I think this is more similar to the beginning in blood Meridian when the kids riding in the Calvary before he meets the Clanton gang group before he becomes a part of it Because in that story I forget his name. I think it's white white something but the Calvary leader is taking them to kill the natives and Over the course of it everyone's like real eager for battle and the leaders just trying to keep a level head like Just keep your business up boys. We'll be fine. We'll get it done and as soon as they get into contact They are all slaughtered instantly like they get decimated. There's this Section in the book where it talks about the band of Terribles and talks about how the natives are wearing armors of like Spanish Conquista doors and like the Aztecs like just pieces of war that have been gathered by the tribe for centuries Yeah, you can tell they've just like they've all the people they've killed yet They're their generations on generations of warfare and then you have a group of people coming in like I hope I can get a hundred dollars from this and they just get wiped out immediately If we could see something similar to that. Yeah, so basically I'm kind of turning back to what you're saying to be any maybe they just get wrecked. I've never I've never read blood meridian, but I've seen that the judge character Is he supposed to personify like capitalism or like that kind of like looming kind of That kind of like looming western expansion or whatever right? I would say western expansion more than like just capitalism I guess the capitalistic thing of like taking more than you're required or whatever like you know I mean like kind of like the ever growing expanse or that kind of thing Do you think the Briggs is going to be something similar here of like do you think he will and like show well Or do you think it or guys instead of like speculating I guess has his With all the characters we've seen so far have you gotten any inkling of that so not really because With the judge so the judge one of the judges main influences was Lucifer from Paradise lost and that's in a lot of his dialogue the judges Attemptor like where as Briggs is kind of like don't think about the money. This is gonna be a hard fight The judges like think of all the money you could get think of how great this will be for you He's like he's like the the whisper in the back of the area and yeah brings definitely a little more He's more like I guess not a little more. He's definitely like only take what you need kind of thing Yeah, or what you earn stick to the battles stick to our plan like this is a serious thing sort of whereas the judge would be more On leading I think that the line that kind of made me be like yeah, I feel like he knows more It's just when he's just like because like oh, I haven't shot a soul in a week. He's like no He might not like what you see are you basically just like good being more with your bargain for I feel like there's more to that statement Yeah, I'm comparing it to blood meridian. That doesn't mean the story is not one for one I'm just saying the characters I want to mind me of some of the characters are just from the flyery language of which is a compliment to the story because blood meridian is a fantastic novel But I think Briggs is Trot trying to keep his head on straight. I think whatever happens I think he'll be either the first to die like in that will immediately disrupt everything or the last because he's the only one that actually has Like a sense of the danger they're getting into like you got one guy back there I ain't shot a soul in weeks And it's like this is the only parallel that I've made so far because you've done blood meridian. I keep thinking about Moby Dick I keep thinking about e-mail parallels between those yeah e-mail being Comparable to the unnamed soldier here and then Briggs to me has a very a-hab Stoicness and it's just very it's laser focused on the hunt for this thing Which great that I don't know what the hunt is like in the Moby Dick It's very much the obsession of the whale the whale, but here. It's just so far it's been the prize But I'm wondering if there's going to be like a fun ulterior motive like yeah I brought everyone in this dangerous thing for my kind of like I can see you know, yeah, maybe that's where my That's where my world where I was like I you know, there's just like that, you know, Quie Quag being like the Yeah, the ultimate, you know, Harpooner kind of guy and stuff like that and he's like the big Just like some of the fun parallel with like you know starbuck and all the other people I mean like that's a good comparison because one of the main things with Moby Dick is a-hab didn't reveal his intentions Till I got out there and it was only the people that had been with him a while that knew of this obsession Yeah, like itch-mail didn't figure it out until they were at sea and came across it I think they actually don't have a mission until he sees the white whale for the first time and like recklessly Charges towards it. Um, so yeah, that's a good comparison. Man, we have we just started reading this guy's stuff and we have compared him to blood Corrigan Carthie and Herman Mills at all. Well, I think it's interesting for I guess it's just to say for people that are writing Because this is also once again, there's just a fan submitted thing on the self-flag strip. Yes Whatever is that I think that you can also proudly wear your influences or not Even we're presuming that that's what he's influenced But I just mean I think you can wear your influences in a way where it's like the flavor and the texture of like the other stories are there That only benefits your story. You know, I mean, I think that just just something to be mindful of People are writing just be like don't shy away From your inspiration. Yeah, assuming this is like some of the which I think it's fair Uh, especially like you said if he's a fan of mine Uh, I think it's fair that he's familiar with blood maridian and stuff like that at least. Yeah, there's nothing wrong with writing stories that have things Yeah, I mean, I just I just don't want to be presumptuous and he's just like yeah, I did wasn't even thinking about it Everybody's like I've never thought about it. Yeah I don't give a fuck yeah, I exclusively read Jeff the killer fan fiction. Yeah, I'd be like that's awesome. That's great and now it's very well for yourself. 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Hogan scattered love, smoked coiling from vents, sheep nose the creek bank. Young ones poked the mud with sticks, when we worked clay and meal, scenes sat plain and home like near harmless to the eye it offered, antsy showed us gums, easy pickings, and laughed for rocking in the saddle. Briggs showed a finger. He took the hollow in with a hard mouth, then spoke so clean every man caught it. We ride hard, camp sits in the flats. We strike mounted, fast, wheel left round the Hogan's, break them from their fires. First volley, carbines, second sabers, no prisoners, burn what you leave. The antsy's cold pitched and slid, pikes way, wrote it out, still gumming. Back time was near to forget the stink of fresh work. You remember how to keep your seat. Any man bested by his horse gets left way lands. Gray stamped once and squared. Briggs leaned in and laid a palm and mongered to crest, sighting narrowed into the valley. He cut the figure of a captain then, at full tight car being resting across the horn. Briggs lifted a hand and broke us in too. Jesse and Charles Boone took half to the right. Rest followed after Briggs, through his sage choked cut. My rowing placed each hoof down as if it smelled to come and work. The camp showed all at once. Six Earth low Hogan's, smoke turning out the vents, sheep inside it will open. Women moved at the fires, youngsters with armfuls of sticks, two men taking sheep to the creek. What struck me was the hush of it. They had no notion that wolves were upon them. Briggs drew his saber and held it high, the sun flashed cruel of the blade, his voice rang out. We spurred down the slope, the sound was thundered, hooves tore the crust, carbines barked and the day split into haulers. I marked the first shot I sent, the man by the pin, palm still on a sheep rope, the ball struck center and folded without a word. My rowing drove on, stinging my sight, powder reek and horse-heat rolling. Gancy wooped like a drunkard, swinging his carbine by the barrel and striking a woman across the back as she fled. She fell face first into the dust, her hair black with dirt, red with worse, his cult fought the reins even in the charge, yet he spurred it harder, with man and beast salivating at the mouth. Man, just in the violence, the command of worse, the back of her head with dirt, her face red with worse, and the horse and beast salivating, like just such great descriptors for our horrific painfuls. Yet, Briggs cut through the camp like a scissor. Briggs whores, stepping sure, his saber flashing in the sun. The man came from a hoagin with a bowdrawn. Briggs split him from crown to collarbone, for the arrow-loosed. The air turned to cries, sheep broke the pin and went under our hooves, pike hung deep over the horn, snapping shots and door shadows, working charges with foul talk between. Parlin cut down a little one clinging to its mother's dress. The woman dropped over her child, and the Texan yanked her off by her braid, laid an eye for cross her neck. I cannot pretend I stood aside. By Rowan ran a man down, the bones breaking under hoof, when the first rush passed, I dismounted, took my pistol and walked among them. The man stumbled from a hoagin with blood down his arm, a shot him squaring the face. It was work, no more or no less. The thing went fast, as this breed of thing does. Roof slit, stock open, corn poured into dust, the cries sank under flame and smoke. When the killing thin, we worked back on foot, torches went into thatch and vents. Dry cedar took fire and ran skyward with the roar. Women dragged themselves out, closed burning and found steel waiting. I kept a brig through the wreck, spoke no mercy, and made no halt. Only tipped his blade where a crawler moved, another man into them. His grace stood patient under him, the fire like the linting off its blind eye. The far edge, antsy hold a girl from a doorway, no more than 14. She clawed and bit, but he struck her down and set down her wrist. Briggs rode up close and leveled to steel, he said, "Boys flat, Briggs fixed him and the thought died. "Killer." The antsy wavered, then pulled iron and fired into her beak. The antsy wavered, then pulled iron and fired into her breast, and went down like a feed sack. He's bad after. "Waste." Briggs put a heel to the grain, moved on. The earth that turned dark was what bled, smoke clawed the chest and fired her tall. She played open, legs still stomping out their last. I dropped one knee to chamber again, my grip shook, though not from scruples or shame. Hard money is bought this way. In the meantime, fire took the Hogan's one by one until a lonely charred rib stood, smoke bed at sight. Ash rode the wind and gritted our mouths. Men prowled the ruined light dogs that have torn a carcass and still knows for scraps. I near had the pistol charge when Charles Boone called. Another hut yonder, tucked in the brush. Briggs had taken the grate of the creek. With him away, there was no rain on the men. Retailed the Texan through scrub and rock till it showed, a low Hogan, aft buried in cedar. Thread of smoke slipped from the vent, then a jorn. "Though we had 'em all." Back Mudder drawn his carbene, pack of wolves came tight, hungry still. He set two with our rifle's level, though none thought of fight was waiting. Jesse shoved the mat aside and the door gave with a boot. Inside it was a near dark, save for a shaft of late sun and cutting through a gap in the hatch. The air was close, rank with sweat and smoke, yet colder than the burn of outside. Against the far wall, squatted a cage of willow poles bound with sinew, a woman crashed with him. Her hair fell in a dark snarl. Her stare sunk in a dirt smeared face. When the light found her, she showed her teeth. Her forearms bore raw marks, maybe her own work. No words came. Only a hiss through the bars, like some wild-think concordered. She looks like she bites. Harlan said, flicking a pebble through the cage. She snapped at it. Teeth bright. ANSI sank beside the bars with pistol loose. The stalk still got fat, no use in her, best put her down. Pock said. "He used enough for me." ANSI answered. "She'll pay me back for what Briggs calls me." Few laughed, then his leaves, don't leave bent and double in a fit of coughs facing your purple. "Leave it!" "She's wrong. You can read it in plain." The woman sank lower, body drawn tight, sight cutting from man to man. When it struck me, it felt like cold steel laid flat to the neck. "Shut it!" "You've been hacking since Santa Fe. Only sick one hears you, and you'll cool for any of us." By the doorway, Jesse worked with Seramic Jar open with his boot and whistle short. "Boys, over here!" "Here," we turned, inside lay a folded thing. Feathers laid like scales, gray, white, and model dark. No old dry scent came off it, like long-shot rooms. "Birdcoat," Jesse said and left in a quills chatter, brittle under the beam. "Rage like owl," Donley said, clearing his throat. "Old folks like me say that owl ain't no good look, means deaths close." Nancy barked. "Death walks with us in a howl, maybe they suited her for the end of the road." He dipped his chin at the cage. Her his client, sight pinned to the code in Jesse's grip, she thrust through the slats till her nails scraped bloody against the wood. "She wants it back," Pock said, spitting black juice on the floor. "Regging it stands for more than dress," Regging it means we ought to burn the thing. Harlan said, shifting his way. "No," said Jesse, clutching it to his chest. "Worst something, sure. Look at the work." "My fetch of traders coin." The woman shrieked in, saying, "Not if it's throat alone, but from the gut," Ron ragged. Coled outside, reared and screamed with her. Nancy swore, features drawn. "Cat made me drop the last one. I won't get robbed twice. What'd she say, boys?" Charles churped in. "I have to be one at a time. That's just snapin' half." Donley cut in. "Enough." This ain't soldier's work. He folded with another fit, but his words carried. Nancy rose slow. "A soldier's work?" "When ain't soldier's?" "She's ours till she's dead." Talked her in a course then. Each man put him bored his say. "Each Jesse's fowler than the last. Their shadows swayed across the walls long and twisted. The woman's gaze never shifted. She watched as if weighing us. As if our words were pebbles in her hand. Donley caught my coat. "Come on." The saying outfied. Up back for the door, Nancy swung towards me. "Are you walkin'? I am." I said, "You wanna take her? I don't know part." Their laughin' chased me into the smoke outside. Donley braced on a post and coughed into his sleeve. He said nothing. When we said a worn look on me, no fever could explain. Behind, behind, the hut swelled with harsh talk. Sound ran together with the snap of burning roofs, horses struck the ground farther off, restless. I poured a measure of water over my hands, though no dirt came free. Briggs came back before long, his grave flank wet from the creek. He saw the hogan smoking, the men walkin' out with their shirts half done, their faces like dogs after the kill. And stories, or any kind of narrative, whatever, whenever you have a build up of characters that seem a bit cartoonish, almost like innocent. You have the two Texan boys who are kind of joking and be like, "Well, I hope I get a kill somebody." Yeah. Whatever all that stuff. And then you do something great with a narrative here where then you actually dump it and you make it, oh, this is like real, and this is brutal. One, even the thing here where the woman was assaulted by these men doesn't draw it out, doesn't do whatever. It's just a sting of just like one. It's doing a couple things across this. It shows how ruthless everybody is. Even Briggs are main protagonists, even though he isn't participating in that. He's still like stampede over somebody, did all this other stuff. The cartoonish joking nature they had before translates over in this horrible way to where now when you're like, "Oh, I kind of like this group of people." Now you're kind of like, I don't really know how to feel about any of them. It went from like likable dialogue and set pieces. Well, it resets everything. It resets every dynamic you have, which I think is a lot of fun. But, I mean, obviously they were bad in the conversations before. Well, yeah, but it's not in practice, it's not in practice even. It's like having, it's like in a story where it's like, "Well, I've killed 20 men." Or whatever. Exactly. You never seen it. And you also haven't seen it described where this is an innocent, these are innocent people just hanging out and all of a sudden these people raid in. Even like the idea of the job was just kind of like, "Yeah, we're going to go in and do X, Y, and Z." But until you actually hear about it, you're like, "Holy shit." So this reset one cleanses you of being like, "I don't even know how to feel about any of these people." So now you're kind of suspicious of everybody of like, "Well, if they're able to do this, what else are they willing to do?" But then there was a couple of things by having it be so over the top, and kind of like people were fucking getting mulled. There was a couple, which I don't know if I read this right, literally, literally a comprehensive engine once again. But arms bear, she's biting at this thing, almost reads like a fucking like a werewolf kind of creature or something to where it's like, it's like digging across the ground. You have no idea what these people are. She's like this feral kind of like creature basically, whatever she is. She looks human by just being like, she's like biting all this, there's just like a couple of things where it's like, "Oh, it looks like she had shaved arms where it's like, oh, probably by her own doing." It's these little, it's like these little remarks where those, I think those are important details to where it's like, "Well, no wonder you want to pay attention because of all the fucking crazy thing around them." But even for the reader, then it's like when you go back and read it again, you're like, "Oh, was the marks were right there? I just didn't notice with all crazy the rest of the things were, you know, gone." Almost crucially when one of them picked up the feathers at the front of the door, she started freaking out trying to get over to it or something and they're like, "I reckon she wants it back." But then you have that because that is dropping clues for the reader. But then you immediately, once again, blinds the viewer with them just like taking advantage of this person. Yeah, right after that. She says, "Well, she's ours, till she's dead," which is horrible, despicable thing. But it just like, the author is dropping these clues for you, but then he's also just being like throwing these other stuff away. It's just like so much happening, but all the information's there. Yeah, it's all laid out in a way where you process it. It's not brushed over, but it's in the midst of so much other stuff happening that it just comes off naturally. Yeah. Which also we talked before in stories. There's so many that will use sexual themes poorly, sexual violence and stuff like that. And we'll always say, "There is a way to do it right." And I feel like we rarely ever get to one that does it right. But I do feel like this is, if you're going to include it in a story, a way to do it right. Where it doesn't become exploitive of the topic. It is an element of it in a sense that you would be doing a disservice to the original historical account that it's working off of. This was a thing. Headhunters were doing on behalf of the government around this time in history, right? If you don't, if you shy away and act like they weren't murderers, that kind of discredits what actually happened. Yeah. I mean, I think that there's an argument always that this story could be the exact same without that, but the author is using it in a way where I think now more than ever. It's not even just all this other stuff, but it's just like, it makes you hate the people even more. The murder and stuff is horrible and everything. And it's just like the extra cherry on top of all this other stuff that they're doing to where it's like these people are just like, you could agree that our main character and that other character, Don Lee, I think, are like, this isn't our fight. Walk out. Like they're fine to like, as I said, like kill people with swords and shoot families and children. But this is like too much for this isn't part of the job. After the horse earlier, the horse is willing to follow whatever orders if it can get scrapped in between. Yeah. I think that that's like an interesting thing too is it's worth knowing that like, I don't think that they're, it's not that they're any better. I mean, they're still fucking murderers or whatever, but I think that there's going to be like this gray area where like, you're like, oh, well, Donald is cool because he didn't participate in that. Yeah. And then you're going to be blindsided when, oh, no, he's still a fucking murderer. Yeah. You know, like it's just, yeah, when Don Lee walks out, it's very, it's woven in a way that's, it's interesting. When the two of them back out there, yeah, it's Don Lee. When the two of them back out right there, it's like, oh, well, that's good. But they didn't stop her from getting raped and also they murdered dozens of people. That's an everything. Yeah. And there's still something about Briggs where I'm like, I just don't think that, that full story. I don't think he has. He hasn't revealed everything yet. He's letting down. I will say like for the way that burning everything, I feel like he's trying to purge something or he's trying to, well, that was, that was standard for them at the time. Yeah. Burn everything and come across. So they can't reestablish the area because the idea was to wipe them off the face of the earth. So burn everything to come across or take it. And like, there's that one yancy was trying to type a 14 year old girl to keep and stuff. Like, they're horrific things, but the author understands the weight of what he's talking about. There's a respect for the subject material that makes it feel earned rather than like, phoned in with the details like that. Good writing. Next entry. Next entry. September the 22nd, camp north of the San Mateo range, three days from the burning and the stink rides our hair still, smoke out last blood, the each mile of the troop grows sore tongue for fortune has turned the mutton we dragged from that place spoiled in a single night. Okay. prediction, then like specifically the feather and object. obviously killing the village, but messing with the feather and stuff like that, they've brought, like, a curse upon themselves, something of that effect. The mountain we dragged from that place, boiled in a single night. Grubs, thick as grits, work the fat. Pike split the sack, gagged and kicked it shut. We pitched the mess into the wash. Counties made short work of it. Come sun up, one dog lay stiff on the bank with a black tongue. Corn went the same road. Stamp got into the cloth and the kernels turned to mush. Don Lee swore it smelled like a body left too long in the sun. He would know the scent from his own stench. Toward dark by the blaze, Jesse broke out cussing. "God damn my hide!" he said, thumpin' the dirt with a fist. "I left it behind." Pike asked him, "Live what?" "Jacket, our feather stitched fine. I had my hand." Said down when the ants made his nose with that girl. Mint-de-fetched after, "For God, Harlem let out a rumble. You weepin' over bird feathers? Where's more than any of you?" Jesse said, fire painted a mean cast over him. Woulda brought silver, shoulda been mine. Briggs had a part, charping in his saber along a wet stone. He said nothing, though I saw his eye on Jesse. Don Lee hocked red into the dust. You oughtn't not have touched it all. That woman looked ready to tear the bars apart when you held it. Best lead behind what riles a beast. Beast? Jesse crawled his lip. She weren't beast. Just a squall like any other. She held enough to sit Yancey's coat near out on his back. Pike muttered. I remember it. Thought the damn thing bolted the fire. Yancey bristled at that. My coat's got more fight than your crow bait. Takes a strong seat to keep 'em. Strong seat or not. You ain't it's master, Harlem said. Yancey pushed up from his blanket. Say that again. You shall ride and bastard. Briggs cut across him. Sit down. He did not look up from the blade. The wet stone sang in the long pulls. Fire snapped. And sank back to their cups. Night dropped heavy. No star-worth naming. Wind cut keen. Oh, my gosh. Oh. I'm just such a sucker in the mid. After the conversation, like, no star-worth naming. Not drift. Reminds me of, like, all the poems I would read, like, growing up around Appalachia, the, like, local authors, when you used to talk about the mountains and stuff like that. Like, uh. Inbred stuff. [laughs] [laughs] Such an after cut. [laughs] Geez. [laughs] [laughs] I was having a good time. Earlier I was talking about coal miners, and I was describing, like, the big workers' shrugs and, like, people dying in the mines, and Hunter doesn't say a thing, and then when I get done, he goes, "Well, I mean, they were, like, mold people, so it's really, like, uh, give and take sort of that." No, I tell you that, but you're, you're right. I mean, like, the people sat there, and the brother and sister lovers, oh, you can't. Brother and sister lovers with the three fingers, and, and the fish mouth and stuff like that. They do write pretty poems, and stuff like that. Why would you have brother and sister lovers with three fingers and a fish mouth? Is that what you think of me? It's a poetry, and it's own, right? Better than her, and her, and her, and her, and her. Yeah, everyone's spock out there. Fish love, so make love to your sister. I want to take a moment to think today's sponsor, A.G.1. 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The rest jinked their ties, drawn hard, hooves, drum and dust, easy now. It's a called voice too sharp for comfort, said, "Damn it!" He seizes the reins of his cold and pulled hard, the animal screamed high, half like a woman. He came up and lashed out with both hind feet, the kick took yancy square in the skull. He went down without a word, but for bone crackling, his body pitched sideways and his legs kicked as though he still rode in saddle. Bum showed it as lips. Man scrambled from their blankets, curses flying, pikes shouted, "Hell, he's done for!" Rick stepped out of the dark, he stood over yancy first spell, man lay on the ground, the white's rolling, limbs jerking in fits, Rick's shoe is cold, thumbed it back, set one round into the skull, twitching stopped. Rick's holstered the iron, and freeed the rone's tie, smacked the flank and sent it off into the dark, then he turned, the eyes black as burnt wood, "Get some sleep!" He said words then by long miles, "We ride the first line." No man answered. I alone kept watch after, in the glow of the dine fire I saw a shape above, a great owl set upon the limb of a cedar, feathers dark as a coal, eyes wide and fixed upon the camp. It did not move nor stir when I rose to throw more wood on the coals. Skays burnt steady, and I knew it had come for us. Daylight we left yancy where he fell, coyotes would see the hymn by sundown, no grave was dug. So interesting way for yancy to die, because it's mentioned earlier how unruly his beast is, both of them like foolish stubborn, then it kills him, but there was the line earlier, when I think it was yancy said, or maybe as the author said, "Briggs would be the death of yancy." Or maybe yancy's looked at Briggs and said, "You'll be the death of me." Something to that effect. Sure enough, Briggs was the one who walked out and put him down with the gun, but it was from yancy's own foolishness. He was unable to control his horse, had no interest in actually breaking it, and then I think it's killed when it's in a wild spur kicks him in the head. Yeah, even like this owl kind of omen that's looming over them now, what would they find in the hut? Owl feathers. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's what I mean is it almost seems like they cheated death or they were kind of, it just seems like the owl feels to me almost like death following them, where now it just seems like they're the sins of man, whatever, their faults are going to be the things that kill them. It's a racking thing. You said greed as well, like I think that's just like, you know, you're gonna pay your dues kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah. Next entry. September the 24th. So five days since the last one? The last one was the 22nd, because the killing was on the 19th. Yeah, okay. Three days of riding. Two weeks' seconds and no two days later. September the 24th, east of the San Mateo range. The nights draw out or feel that way, the owl's still with us. Each camp we make sets itself above, watching. Eyes inside, though never near enough to strike with the lead. Its wings spread wide, black against the moon. Some of the troop grumble, some spit curses, others go still. None of us find clean sleep. Donnie went bad soon after Yancey's bearing without a grave. First, the same cough is always, then worse. What he hacked up ran thick. By yesterday, he could not mount without another man lifting at his belt. Someone peeled him down till he shook. Riggs rode near and gave the order, no one favored. Time to that saddle. He rides. Else he dies here. Man, talk about a, could you imagine how miserable that would be? I mean, obviously the caretaker. Like living in that time, or whatever? Well, living in that time, but specifically, like getting sickly and then setting in a saddle all day in the hot sun, no shade, just baking. I like the way it describes it. It peels him in the saddle. He's chapped. Yeah. Like a blip's probably all blistered and stuff, coughing up, dehydrated. All know. Oh, by God. Yeah. And worst of all, no internet. Now you have to time do a saddle. We're supposed to just leave him if it falls out. Yeah. Yeah. And now too, Briggs is also becoming this kind of person where everyone's just kind of like man, he's gonna be alive until Briggs says we have to go. - Yeah, you know what I mean? - If Briggs says we leave him, we leave him. Briggs walked out. I mean, obviously, Gancy was at a point you couldn't do anything for him. - Well, yeah, it's like a merciful kind of thing. - It was like a mercy killing, but Briggs was also the only one who could make that call. Let's say, walk out, shoot the guy. - Well, yeah, no one better than I. - Yep. No one can complain. - And which also, again, Ark is back earlier this story. When the author says, when Gancy dies, there will be little fuss over it, cheering up they don't dig a grave. Just leave him for the wolves. - We bound Onley upright, a hung like soaked canvas, chin sunk to chest. His done bore him without protest, though the beast staggered under the weight. Onley's head bobbed with the trail's roll, and once or twice he gave a rast that might have been words, none could tell. At the midday stop, Pike broke the quiet. - He's done, Captain, best to end it. Briggs fixed him with a stare then said, "You're right." - Ain't no good to him or us, Arlen added. Briggs hand rested on the butt of his cult. - He rides. - That shut the talk. - It almost seems like he needs him. Like it seems, I wonder if he's just, like, prop him up. It just seems like, with the other one, if he really didn't need him there, I feel like he would have killed him. - He needs Donley for some reason. - I think so. Or whoever is, yeah, I think, yeah. I think that there's just something where he needs a certain amount of people or something like that. - By the flames, Donley let out a low grind. The sort of man makes when the inside of him is gone to water. Jesse dragged a stick through the coals. - Head over side. - Worst and the antsy. - Pike said, "The antsy went fast. This one drags." - No one laughed. Briggs settled beside Donley, a great toddler near, spoken near nothing. Donley brushed a strip of cloth across that brown. No man dared wise crack. Donley once stood close to Briggs, as close as any can. They fought side by side in Texas, or so, Pikeswares. Not dropped. The blaze fell to coals. Then the first call toward the dark. I had drawn out two strong for any bird, yet it carried the shape of an owl's call. It came once, then again, near. Charles swore that bird is following us. Then shooted it. - Pike muttered, fumbling with his carbene. Arlen flicked us from his cap. - I drew it on the last even. Lead went through the branch. Bird never so much as twitch. - Call rose again, up above. I raised my face and marked it on a juniper limb. Twin embers set in tar. Wings tall, spread wide as two men across. It held fix on us, only watched. It's got like a ten foot wingspan up in the trees. Briggs rose, revolver drawn. He planted his boots, took his sight, and fired twice. The reports rolled over the rock. Chips jumped from the limb. The bird did not shift. Only the smoke slid off the barrel on the night wind. I lay close to the ground, listening. Nonley raced beside the fire, a wet choke with each breath. His chest heaved, and sawed, ribs like blades under skin. Briggs sat beside him, brim slanted, revolver laid across his thigh. The owl held still till the fire dimmed. Then it spread wide and rose with a cloth ripping sound. Dark flick against the stars. - End of entry, man. - God, that giant owl. This black owl in the trees following the-- - Kind of interested too, that they've all noticed it, and tried to kind of shoot away instinctively. And it just almost has the raven kind of Edgar on Poe vibe, you know. - I mean, he shoots it twice, and it just-- - It doesn't even care. - Also, it's a wings toy, like-- - It's like a fucking-- - It's like it's accepting their souls. Like, it's waiting to gather them up and take them. - Makes you think of like, when an owl comes down and grabs like a mouse or something, and then they're like, - It's just like waiting. - It's like looming out there in any moment. It could just be like, whew, whatever. - Big enough to carry him off too. - Fucking 10 feet wingspan? - Yeah. (laughing) - Oh? - Yeah. - Who? (laughing) - Holy shit. (laughing) - Bricks, that is the scariest bird I've ever seen. - Bricks, I've been playing this for a long time. - It's the scariest fucking thing I've ever seen in my life. - I've believed to God. We burn the forest and everything in it. (laughing) - We should really stop settling for the night near trees. - We should, we should. - How about this, we keep riding until we're dead or we get there. - Yeah. - I don't know where we're going, but I'm not stopping again. - September the 27th, foot hills north of the San Mateo range. We rode three days more with the owl dog and us, ever above, ever near. Donnie, whether to a husk, tie it to his done like a feed sack. It's a crown drooped, mouth gone loose, a wet brass working in his throat. The talk drained out of the troop, even Jesse, never short of words, kept his own council. Toward dusk, we struck sign of a runner, fresh moccasin prints thread in the sage. Bricks swung down and read the dirt while the grade knocked flies from its hide. He raised two fingers and sent us along the trace into a wash. There we found him, a Navajo, lean and worn, a stave across his knees and a knife at his belt. He carried the stamp of a man driven near the end. It is regards that hardest tender. He circled him fast, carvings up. Pike took his measure up and down. - Oh, he got here. - A straggler? - All to drop him now. - Jesse rolled. Pike ground his heel in the dust. - Let's hear what he knows first. - Bricks ease, just gray, and pace closer. - Speak English. - Navajo spoke rough but plain. - I speak enough. - The man's regard ran hard across our line. - Camp no more, burned. - Tipped the stave towards the way he'd come. - Smoke rise, children cries. You make it. - Jesse snorted. - He knows us boys. - Navajo lifted his hand, palm outward. - Not for talk of smoke, I stand for woman. You let her free. - Oh, there he goes, there's a turd. - That was the woman that they, one of those in the cage. - Pack shifted on their feet. Pike spat a brown stream and asked. - What woman? - Navajo's mouth twisted. - Not woman, never woman. Chihiti. Sheed babies, take hearts, wear feathers. Owl now. Owl always, you see. - Interesting. I had the thought when it was like a giant owl. I kind of thought to myself, maybe it's like a skin walker transformation thing. - Have you heard of like the Chihiti before? - I don't think I have, let me be lame real quick. Ghost or dead. The level of spirit of the dead often thought of as a ghost or devil, that's excellent. What a great thing to let out something. - Oh, damn, man, we had sex with it. (laughing) - Oh, fuck. Most often the spirit of a dead person. Talk to avoid contact with the dead or in close places like a Hogan, where someone has passed to avoid coming into contact with a Chindier contracting it, okay. So you're not supposed to come into contact with one. That's why the house was over in the bushes, put to the side in a cage. 'Cause someone had died there, it was a spirit contained. No one was supposed to step in there and they came in and touched it a lot, got super close to it. - Also all the stuff that they had taken for the place is completely rotted. - Yeah. - So I think each person's gonna start deteriorating, probably they're gonna start decaying, falling apart. The spirit's been let loose now. I have a friend who's Navajo, and I remember him telling me that there are, 'cause me and him we're talking about like demons within like some Christian beliefs like succubes and stuff like that. And we were talking about like things that will be a temptress or appear as a woman. And he mentioned that there's like shape shifters within Navajo belief like that. And I don't remember the word Chindy, but I imagine that's. - Also I could be completely mispronound to that. - Well it's said, often spelled as Chindy. - Chindy. - Yeah, 'cause the abbreviation was like the eyes and the italics is like Navajo speaks specifically, but Chindy's, or Chidi's probably like the English way. - I'm still saying Chindy if we keep sitting coming on. - But this, by the way, this story being like a blood meridian-esque like headhunter group coming across a cryptid that like cares in pieces. My heart, bright up my alley. - I'll have it. - You're about in, so. - I'm about in. - I've been about in and I'm doubling down. He lifted the stave towards the sun. The men fell silent. Each eye following the skyline. Briggs voice cut hard. - Say it plain. - He said. - She was caged by people bind her long years. Hungry, but bound. We feed her little just to keep her not loose. You cut cage, you use her, you leave her. Now she walk free. She hunt all. Not only white men, not only Navajo, all. - Perlin swore on Rebus Chindy. - Hey lies. Some red gone mad, that's all. - Navajo looked on him with contempt. - You think lies you see. She eatenest, no bird safe. I'll take all. Sky, ground, night, day. No, sir. Jassy snarled, then you'll die too, die, all die. Navajo leaves this land, not safe, you too. Pike leaned on a saddlehorn. Captain, I say we got him here, he talks too much. Briggs kept him in his eye, where should I keep my men from you? Navajo said on dawnly, slumped and tied to the dawn. Dead one sick, breathed black, you leave him, he'd die slow. I take him, he lived maybe, he'll us try. Hard laugh went around, Charles grounded. Healers, he means cut his throat and leaving for the buzzards. He ain't living anyhow, let the Navajo spare us the work. Pike asked Briggs, "You trust him? How sure don't?" Briggs held his tongue and ran a palm along the graze neck. Finally he spoke, his words cut straight. "Give him over. This man dies by your hand, if you leave him the dust, I'll come for your tribe. Every lodge, every tent, you understand me? Navajo kept a dark face, I understand." Briggs turned us on time. This is interesting because earlier, he refuses to let Donley die and then there's the mention by Pike that two of them have fought together a long time. So it's like the one thing that would make him not just kill this Navajo, like he has everyone else, is his loyalty to Donley, their friendship, that maybe if this can help him, then I'll trust him. I'll let this guy go. Pike scaled yet loose the knots. Donley slid from the done like a sack of meal and gave one deep crown. The Navajo bent and swung him up, light as a child, slinging him across his back. Jesse twitched towards his revolver. "Catten, you were letting this rat walk off with one of ours?" Briggs eyes burned black. "Donley's near gone. We waste food and time strabbing him upright. This way both sides get changed." Harley kicked a clawed, over a hole in his throat. Briggs answered, " cold." "If so, I'll know. I'll come back for every one of his people. That is enough." Man moved off into the brush with Donley over his back. Their thread thinned among the common woods until only the wind kept on. No one spoke for a long spell. The grace stamped once and settled. After a moment, Jesse said, "I'll stay calm and we never see Donley again." "Pockwork just a backhoe. Butter in the me." All right, man. Next entry. Next entry. September the 29th, along the broken mesa country. Two days since the Navajo runners slipped off into the contwoods and the camp has grown mean with silence. The owl follows yet, none can deny it. It circles when we ride. Each night it perches near enough that the fire light snags in those embers carries for eyes. Near midnight, Harley came up screaming. Blanket wound round his forearm like a drowning man to a spar. "Our dreamt of her. The woman pulled from the cage. She walked through the flames and her hands were feathers. She set them on man's eyes and then we opened them and house flew out." That night, we built three fires, drew in tight. First light, we found the Texan boon, not Jesse, the other one, Charles. He had held the watch before Don, carving across his knees. We found him split. Ribs bent like fingers prior to part. His eyes were gone, only two wet holes left, feathers stuck in the blood across his chest. That's interesting because Harland had the dream and said she walked to a man, and when she says eyes on him, owls flew out. I imagine either of him of her. So it's like that was his dream of what actually happened to Charles over the hill. Jesse dropped to his knees and let out a noise like a hound caught in a trap. Then he came up, colored drain, taken the ring of us. "Which of you bastards did this?" No one spoke, but crossed himself, then caught my eye and stopped. Harland swore small and worked his hat rimmed to the floor. Ribs came up, took one measure of the body and swept dirt across Boone's face. "Rig's gone. We ride without him." Jesse rushed him, teeth showing clawing at air. Ribs stepped in, caught him at the wrist and slung him to the earth. Colt was out before Jesse hit. "He's carry on." Ribs said, flat as truth usually is, "Stay down or join him." Blood threaded from Jesse's lips as he rolled to his knees, kept his mouth shut. That night, we stacked the fires high. We drew the stalking close yet none of them settled. Pikes Bay ran slick with sweat. Harland's surreal, punched holes in the earth. Ears pinned eyes white. My own row and trembled, necked down, snorting. Only Briggs Grey held steady. The blindside turned to the night. The owl called once more. Sound cracked through the dark like a green log on fire. It set Jesse to his feet. The brandishes revolver. "Cover me then," he hollered. "Come on, and I'll spit you to hell." He threw six rounds into the black. Each flash lit his face, lip skinned back in a grin that meant nothing. When the smoke thinned, the bird still called. Pike told him, soft as mud. "You're pulled in, fool." Jesse wheeled wild face. "Let it come. I'll put my knife in his guts." Out! Cry came again. Closer. It set the horses to screaming. The bay broke loose, rain snapping, hooves tearing the ground. It ran headlong into the night. We heard a shrink once. Nothing. No man said a word after that. The owl did not call again. It's like every time she comes as an owl, death someone dies each time. Her death seemed to come like with Conley. October the first, broken Mesa country. I set my hand to these pages, though the grip shakes near as bad as Donley's did before we gave him over. If any man should find this book, take it for a warning. I know not if the sun will find me alive, come morning. This night split with a wind full of grit enough to skin a man raw. We tied the stock short, set three more fires, checked rifles. No man slept. Jesse hunched over his blade and talked to himself in a thin thread of sound. Meanwhile, shadows worked tricks across the ground, swelling large, shrinking small, never matching the flames that cast them. Every beast tethered near rolled its gaze to the ridge line, snorting, stamping deep holes in the crust. The smell of cinched hair rode the air, though no man said to orch. It was when the night was loud as the owl came for us. No call first, none of the distant mournful notes we had grown to dread. Instead, it dropped like a stone from heaven, wings spread wide enough to swallow half the stars. The air slammed against us as though a canvas had been ripped overhead. The fire burst upwards as if some hand had seized the flames and torn them sky high, sparks rained down upon us, biting the skin, setting blankets alight. In the glow, I marked her, tall, twisted, cloaked in wings thick as tar. Her eyes were red, cold set deep, her mouth a beak that split wide and natural teeth like endless stones. She strode between firelight and shadow, and every man swore he saw her in a different place. Gosh, that's so cool. It reminds me of a mother horse's eyes and in the old story of the the water tribe, how the giant bat demon thing comes onto the rock for the girl. Even the description were like the cats in that story were watching it rise above the hills and the land. All the horses were looking to the the ridge line where it came cruising down and pipe cried out and fired blind into the dark. Shoot it, shoot damn you! His round smacked dirt and wind away. Harlan raised his rifle and the stock tore against his cheek as though wrenched by unseen hands. I fixed side on it full then, straight in my path, feathers heavy as storm banks sagged from her shoulders, no bird, no woman, but some mistake between. A creature built from the wrong parts of both. The beak tore open and what poured out was no simple cry, but a how carried by a dozen throats, men groaning, women shrieking, children wailing, all rising together. My guts folded as if every sin I'd pressed down came rushing back through that one sound. Briggs cut through the racquet. "Settle up! We ride!" Pock shouted. "Ride where? She flies!" Briggs swept the line, face black was slit from the smoldering camp. "Settle! Mountain ride! You flee for Carson's main! My horse is the only one with courage. I'll keep it busy." Pock threw up cracked. "You'll be killed!" Briggs glare burned through the haze. "We already did. Best I buy you another hour." He swung into the saddle. The gray lifted its head proud, stamping once, eyes like chips of glass in the blaze, the side of the pair struck me frozen. For that instant, Briggs stood the hero he might have been. A true soldier unbroken. He spurred forward into the stands. "Ride!" Barked once more than he was gone. We mounted in a frenzy, men dropped their rifles, kicked at stock, clawed at tack, my row and trembled under me, veins thrumming, spit hanging thick from its mouth, still it carried me when I drove heels into its flanks. Behind us rang three sharp shots, measured, stirred in, in silence. We drove through the mesa country. Each man bent low, attention, cutting to the sky. At first, there was only the wind, then came the cry, that terrible cry. After a spam pike twisted in the saddle, his color drained. It comes. I wheeled in the leather and watched. It crossed the star's dark and vast, wings wide as canyon walls. It fell upon us like night itself. Arland screamed, "The thing stooped once and he was gone. Mountain man lifted into the black. One Christ split off and died, then nothing." [laughter] It just snatched up. Him and the horse. Just. [laughter] It makes fucking huge. Yeah. You know, also, this probably, have you heard of the Thunderbird before? No. There's this legend that, like, Calvary soldiers out in the West around this time reported seeing something they called the Thunderbird, which was a giant bird with a giant wingspan that would pick up horses from camp and carry them away. There's, like, there's some people who say, like, maybe it was a tear-dacked old that survived or whatever, like a giant dinosaur bird thing. So, it's kind of ties into the legends of that as well. Pike fired over his shoulder, spinning curses so raw, they hardly made sense. The bird fell again. It's wings, hammering, air. It smashed Pike from the saddle, rider vanishing into a spray of red mist and quills that drifted down like snow. [laughter] It's just like crushing a death. My roan fled behind, foam running, white's flashing, I clung to saddle and horn, the dark a smear, behind all went still but for the thunder of wings. Then the roan stumbled, a four-leg snapped-like timber under an axe. I pitched forward and the beast toppled, weight crushing across me. My leg pinned under, bone near cracked, the flesh screaming. The horse thrashed wild, foam and blood working from its muzzle. I drew pistol and put a ball through its skull. The weight sagged dead. I lay under it, air burning my chest, desert rough against my skin. She came on then. The owl set upon a rock, not twenty paces off. One cold bright orb glowed from her ruin of the skull, the other socket now hollow, where a heart ought to rest on two holes surrounded with black and plumage, yet it lived, if such a life can be named. I reached for my powder horn, the arm shook but held true. I poured what charge I had left into my palm, set it with ball and wading. I meant to make a bomb of it, to set it alight and strike when she came. Under that, the weight to be plucked apart like a bone. The owl shifted, wings stretching wide, feathers spilling into the dust. The sound of its call rose again, low and long, a voice like the tearing of the sky. My ears bled with it. I scratched these lines with the book on the dust, the charge waits beside my knee. She closes in, on him burried, her shape draped against the stars. If these pages be found, no eye rose to meet her. I aimed to trade fire for flesh and powder for blood. Whether it is her or not, it will not be said, I lay idle. Her wings roof over me, night bends to her shape, the air spits, your earth shutters with her cry. I close here. And that is the end. Oh my gosh, it was written so well, what a great writer. The journal of an unknown soldier. It's fun like the idea too, that someone did come across it, and that's just the transversal. Just found it amongst the desert, amongst the pile of bones. The thunderbird kind of analog, or like the thunderbird mythology kind of thing is fun too. Like it feels like this is a piece of that mythology that you would find out there. Yeah, like one of the early legends that started the stories about the desert of the western landscape. Just the writing was so good. The descriptors, the adjectives, the command of words. There were so many fun things set up, like antsy, or being like antsy, or Briggs will be the death of the antsy. And then he was and like the brutality that smashed by like the fear they experience over the next coming weeks. And like the Navajo that come across and like how Briggs almost had not humanity, but he had valor in his own mind and senses where he's like, like I'll let this Navajo go if he can save my friend. Or at the end where he's like my horse is the only one brave enough human ride. I'll hold it off and he dies like obviously a horrible person, but in his mind, there was a justification. There was a, there was a code. There was a code. Yeah, code of honor. Yeah. They had a code of honor amongst himself. Yeah. Even if he wasn't deserving of honor, just so many interesting little character moments baked into such a short story and like the, it was all written so well, like each of those character moments were described and the way the language changes between like the narration and the dialogue. And it just felt so full. Even little things like how do we write in that the men discover it's a chinde or whatever cheating? And it's like, okay, well, they come across a Navajo. That could be a cheesy moment, except because there's been another village burned and he says he can take Donley, maybe the only person that lived through this, which would not the Donley, Donley still a killer, but he was one that stepped out of the tent. He, him and the rider were the two who left. So maybe it's saying that, you know, Donley survives taken away by the Navajo, the same people he had killed because he didn't go in this one further active evil with the woman in the cabin or the woman in the Hogan, who turned out to be the, the chinde. But like that moment, one that feels natural with Briggs giving off Donley is also the expository moment that's used to give the information about what this crypt it is, but it doesn't feel like exposition because it all works together so well, just so many interesting moments like well written from like the actual wording to how scenes are framed and stuff like that. This is great, Trevor strange accounts. We're going to have this story linked in the description. He has written multiple of these in our slash creep cast subreddit, which sounds, this is an absurd place to put it, just that he's this talented. And as far as I can find, he's not published anything, which this keep writing to this was fantastic. Yeah. I mean, I think that we, I say it's a broken record, but simplicity in this story, two things literally happen. They rate a village and they ride away and you're able to get so much out of something that's so simple. It's not convoluted. It just takes its time and it like ushers through these like two simple things. It's so crystal clear. And I think that like it benefits greatly from it. Like I think that sometimes on paper, you're like, and all they did was raid that and then they just rode away and they got attacked, but you can really, I mean, you can really get so many miles out of something that's just so simple. And I think like it didn't overstates welcome the characters. It's like we got to, we, we knew enough about them to be invested and then they were taken away from us. And you know, I mean, it's like, yeah. It's just really fun. I mean, like it was, it was great. I mean, I'd love to read another one of his stuff sometime. I think it was awesome. Especially I like this format of the entry is, that's always fun. You know, I always like to, we read some stories to have like the kind of like little entry points, but I like that this would also, by the way, not to not to take away from Trevor's writing. This would also not be allowed on our slash no sleep. Really? Because it didn't happen to the author, it didn't happen to the person posting it. Right. Right. So it's just something I found. Mm. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Wrong. I don't think so. And unless you open with the beginning, yeah, you open the beginning with, uh, hey guys, so I'm posting this thing I found. Also, I think there's an indestructible pedophile in the closet. Band. Uh, thank you so much to our audio listeners of an Apple podcast. Spotify. Thank you guys for giving us good ratings there. Also, thank you to our patrons who support us and get a little extra juicy content on the side. And thank you to the author who decided Trevor, who decided to upload this to our creep uh, creep cast. Like we'll be in the description. Read us down. But please guys, be creative, post the stuff on there. I like it. Their community's been reading more stuff and commenting on stuff. If you want an excuse to just dive in, not everything's going to be a fucking home run. Sometimes you got to like make some shit before you make some stuff that you're really proud of. It's all about the process and having fun. Even if people are like this sucks, that's fine. It's okay. So just know, post it, have a good time. We thank you. And we will see you in the next one. Bye-bye. See you in the next one. And also, I think this story uh, makes up for what Harry did to us with the brick story. So he's back on neutral grounds with that. Don't get too excited. Bye. [Music] [Music]