The first night of the celebration seemed to be winding down fairly early. It wasn't quite midnight yet, but the revelers, visitors, and rabblerousers all seemed to have had their fair share of excitement for the day. At the beginning of the evening, the group had a rendezvous at the Dog Eye for a quick drink and a general plan. Under Caleb's direction, they formulated a quick plan. They broke into three groups of two: Caleb and Gabby, Daniel and Sky Dog, Randolph and Coraline. Two groups would patrol two lengths of the block for a time, while a third held down the fort at the Dog Eye Saloon, their rendezvous point in case of trouble. Every once in a while, the groups would rotate, giving one a rest, so that someone was always fresh.

As the crowd began to dissipate, the newly minted law dogs sat down for a spell to discuss their day and their plans for the next. The night had been fairly uneventful, generally speaking, aside from minor squabbles and meaningless drunken brawls and the occasional misunderstanding. Needless to say with so many deputies to man the place, the shine of a tin star and a stern word were often enough to set things straight, though sometimes a stern hand was needed as well. No bullets were fired thankfully.

The saloon's namesake himself came by as they all sat down. His own saloon was mostly empty by this point, most everyone having drunken themselves into a stupor and gone home. "Can I get y'all a quick drink 'fore the night's over?" A quarter could get a glass of beer here or a spot of whiskey, and a half dollar would get good whiskey - or as good as you might expect at a place like the Dog Eye Saloon.

Randolph passes McNary a half-eagle, "This should take care of everyone's thirst, I expect -- the good stuff for those that want whiskey."

He was glad to have his first night behind a badge come to a successful conclusion and well-disposed toward his fellow deputies. He raised his glass in salute to each of them before taking a long sip. Surprisingly, it actual was good whiskey and Darling felt its warmth spread from his stomach through his body.

"Whiskey for me as well, Mr. McNary," Morgan said. "Thank you kindly, Mr. Darling."

Morgan took a sip of the liquor, appreciating its warmth. He set the glass on the bar, willing himself to wait before imbibing more. Much as he wanted to relax, to settle down after the night's events, he found it difficult to do so, especially when he had been focused on being vigilant for so many hours.

Even so, the lawman allowed himself to enjoy the company he was in. They were good people all and he was genuinely happy to be amongst them.

"Just a beer for me." Gabby says. He was tired. It had been a long time since the days he could stay up this late at the drop of a hat, and he wanted to unwind a bit.

Daniel didn't have Gabby's age to hinder him, but he did have a desire to sleep at a reasonable hour given how late they were up he prior night. "Same." He pointed to Gabby to make certain they understood to whom he was referring.

He rapped a couple times on the wooden bar, "Well, that weren't so bad, eh? I kinda like this here lawin' gig. Easier pay'n barberin'. So far." He again knocked on the nearest bit of wood as he tempted fate to prove him wrong.

"Here ya go," he said, bringing  by the requested beverages. He carried the whiskey glasses over first, then the beers, and finally came by with water for Coraline and for Sky Dog as well. As he handed the glass to the Siberian, he said, "I think you've had enough beer for a lifetime." He counted out the change for Randolph.

As he slid the coins back to the reporter, the relative peace of the night was shattered by a piercing scream that came from upstairs in the saloon. "Well, shit," he said, with a jump. "Damn, that don't sound good."

The scream continued, stopping, and resuming followed by a series of unpleasant shrieks and sobs. It was a woman's voice.

Sky Dog gave a wry twist of a smile to the comment, quiet, content and briefly fascinated by the novelty of water in glass...then a hideous scream sent him loping up the stairs, big ugly knife already in hand.

Korpi blinked awake on the end of the bar and looked after him, confused. "Kor."

The few milling patrons that were there still all looked towards the deputies and the stairs.

The native was first up the stairs, hearing only the continued screams as he went up. At the top of the saloon there was a small hallway, with three rooms of modest size on either side, but the disturbance was coming from one on the end of the hall. When Sky Dog burst in the door, he found a woman pointing wildly at a man's body on her bed. The sheets were stained red, and blood still dripped on the floor.

A man's body lay on the bed, his head and arms severed but nowhere to be found, and the window was shattered. The woman's hysterical screaming and sobbing didn't stop, but she fell to her knees.

Gabby's out of his seat fast enough to make his drink spill. He unslung his shotgun as he rushed up the stairs...he hadn't had to use it at all today, but it looked like he'd need to start. He was just behind Sky Dog entering the room...and was caught off guard by the body.

"Oh, hell." he muttered.

The shaman took in the corpse and at once looked to the nearer corners of the room, giving the other angles of ceiling and floor a good stare before circling round to the woman and crouching before her, knife still tucked ready alongside his forearm.

"Quiet...quiet, quiet, quiet." Sky Dog sought her gaze, tried to bring her to focus. "Yes? See, here is cold iron, here you are whole. Do you hear me?"

The woman stopped screaming at Sky Dog's tone and his words, but she remained transfixed as she stared at the corpse and continued to sob. She bore a bruise on her face, and there was some blood on her but otherwise she seemed unharmed.

Sky Dog's head turned enough to get Gabby in his peripheral vision, the small movement bird-sharp. "Maybe you will tell Dog Eye there is a corpse, Uncle?"

"You need not go down yet, lady...did he strike you, the dead one?" The shaman's tone remained gentle, speaking more for the noise than in expectation of reply so soon.

Darling thinks there are plenty of people in the hall and the room.

"Coraline, stay with the woman. Morgan, will you take charge here?"

He looks around for a back stairway. If he sees one, he goes down it to the back door. Otherwise, he runs out the front and around to a spot below the broken window. He's watching for a man moving fast with an axe or knife or bloodstains and trying not to disturb any tracks once he gets there.

As he runs, he draws his revolver.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:27, Fri 01 Mar 2013.

The woman sobbed loudly, her sobbing occasionally interrupted by incoherent mumbling,  seemingly unable to respond to Sky Dog at all.

Randolph couldn't easily find a back exit or stairway, so he had to run down the front stairs. Outside in the front he found a large milling crowd had gathered and they seemed to be generating some kind of commotion. Running past them and back around the building where the window overlooked, he didn't find anybody, but broken glass was there in abundance.
This message was last edited by the GM at 11:48, Mon 08 Apr 2013.

Korpi perked up at all the running about and flew after those exiting to see what the game was, picking up the warm draught from the saloon roof to soar over the lights and commotion of Dodge.

---

Upstairs, Sky Dog watched awhile then offered his free hand for the contact.
This message was last edited by the player at 21:32, Thu 28 Feb 2013.

There hadn't been much foot traffic back behind the Dog Eye Saloon, if any, so there were some footprints that were set forth there on the ground, clear to read for the experienced eye. The city slicker ordinarily wasn't the best tracker around, but at that moment it seemed like he was reading an open book.

Korpi wheeled, moonlight playing over her feathers. The little iron devil with all the shiny round things seemed to be running along a certain set of tracks, so she raced him to the corner of Chestnut Street and perched on a rooftop, pleased with her swiftness. "Ha! Ha! Ha!"

The raven took off and circled wide just for fun, swooping higher in case there was more excitement afoot.

Randolph crouched for a moment to study the tracks, then started following them at a good pace down the alley, but losing them in the heavily trodden dust of Chestnut Street. He returned to the Dog Eye.

Korpi stayed out, pausing on a roof here, a frongage there, memorising where choice morsels might be found when the town finally quieted for the night. A backalley scuffle attracted her attention; full of just-woken energy and a taste for mischief, the bird dropped silently into the shadows nearby and joined in the fighting noises with a fine firearm impression:

*krotoclik* "Ha! Ha!"

Morgan walked carefully around the bed, trying to study the details of the scene, specifically the nature of the man's wounds and the damage to the walls and window.

Looking to Gabby, he said, "We need to get Earp over here. Make sure the law knows what's happened. Could you see if McNary could send a runner to the Town Marshal's office?"

Turning to the woman, he knelt down, keeping his voice calm, "Ma'am. I'm a U.S. Marshal. My name's Caleb Morgan. I think we need to get you out of this room, take you downstairs where you can calm down a bit. Are you injured at all?  Did whoever did this hurt you in any way?"

While Sky Dog tried to comfort the woman, Gabby took a look around the room. He cast an experienced eye over everything, trying to pick out anything odd or unusual. His days as a miner had lent themselves well to spotting small details.

At Caleb's words, Gabby nodded. "Just a sec...let me get a look around the place afore I do that. Get an eyeful while things are fresh."

He tried not to let the lump in his throat get to him as he looked over the dismembered corpse on the bed.

Daniel's first instinct was to go running toward the scream, but he saw that the others all went running that direction. His mind went instantly to thinking that it might be someone trying to distract the deputies while mayhem is done elsewhere. And five people weren't needed.

He instead stood and looked around the room in an appraising manner, then walked outside to see if there was anything out there of interest. Perhaps someone would act suspicious when Daniel emerged.

Coraline frowned at the fact that Randolph simply left her to go be heroic elsewhere and looked with distaste at the whore.  She was more than happy to let the men comfort her, not wanting anything to do with the painted tart that had been throwing herself at Mister Darling that same day.  Instead, her eyes swung to the carnage, narrowing at the sight of so much blood.  She did a survey of the room, searching for possible clues as to what had happened.

Gabby picked at something caught on the glass of the window. "Huh." he says, picking the scrap of cloth he'd found out of the glass. "This looks fancy."

It's a scrap of white silk.

He sticks it in his pocket as he goes over to examine the body. He patted it down, trying to avoid the sticky mess where the man's head and arms had been. He heard something crinkle like paper as he patted the man's vest down. It felt like something in the lining.

Not seeing any other way to get at it, he ripped the lining out. In the lining was a letter with a fancy wax seal. Gabby opened the letter and began to read, then let out a low whistle.

"What in tarnation..." he mutters, as he reads the letter again to be sure of what he's seeing. "Holy hell in a hand basket."

Morgan remained with the young woman, but glanced up when Gabby whistled.

"What did you find, Gabby?" he asked.

"If I'm readin' this thing right," Gabby says, "The dead fella was a Yankee spy." He reads over the letter again. "Maybe even one o' them Agents you was talkin' about." he holds the paper out for Caleb to inspect. "I think we done wandered into a deep ol' rabbit hole here."
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:54, Fri 01 Mar 2013.

Sky Dog had carefully backed off at the larger man's intervention so as not to crowd the lady and slipped out to pace the corridor; whilst so engaged, the shaman reassured any disturbed patrons that the woman was all right, just shocked at the sight of a man who had died from violences. Probably not of suicide, he conceeded, but did not join in speculation, merely padding back and seeing if the woman was ready to come down yet. He leant on the doorframe behind Cora to listen in on goings-on meanwhile, scratching a point behind his ear with his knife.

"Hell and damnation," Morgan said softly as he read over the letter.

Glancing back up at Gabby, he added, "Rabbit hole is right. It's important that we keep this quiet. We need to let Earp know, but no one else. If word of who this man was gets out, it could spark all kinds of hostility from Union and Confederate sympathizers alike. There might not be enough deputies in all of Dodge to contain the chaos."

He looked at the young woman, then back to the others gathered in the room. "It might be best if we take her to Earp as well. See if he might know somewhere safe where she could stay, out of sight. We don't know exactly how this transpired, but she very well may have gotten a good look at who did this."

"If you would like to sleep away from the settlement, lady, I will be going to such a place - you can sleep in my warm coat and I will share the blanket with Igor, whose ears are sharp, yes?" Sky Dog offered. "Maybe it is better comfort than the little boxes in Wyitterp's working-building."

Darling turns up the street to the saloon and finds Daniel out front.

"I found where the killer landed when he jumped through the window upstairs after cutting off that man's head and arms. The trail led to Chestnut here, but then got lost.

"Have they found out anything from that woman?"

Coraline frowned at the body on the bed and stared for several minutes, working through a particular detail in her mind that nagged at her.  Eventually, she glanced to the hapless woman on the floor.  "Are we quite certain that she didn't create this little scene to cover up a murder she committed?  I saw her arguing with this man earlier today.  I assumed he was her pimp."

Sky Dog pushed away from the door and stalked up to Cora, though she had not turned to him. "It is no crime, to have the wolf disease or be the daughter of a bear," he said softly.

"-But the blood is still running when I come here: his little skull is not crunched up with teeths, and it is not a thing done, the knives hidden, window broken, now you scream, there is no time."

Sky Dog stepped around Cora, holding up his knife. Her attention naturally brought to the blade, he used it to point, his gaze sharp, jaw set. "Turn your eyes on her, Hawthorn, that you talk above. See fear. You judge without seeing this, I think."

Gabby nodded at Caleb's suggestion. "I reckon you're right."

He frowns at Cora, and looks at the woman. Then he regards the letter he found. "Hmm."

He nods with Sky Dog's assessment. That fear there was too fresh and too genuine.

"It's a bit deeper than that, Miss Cora. The dead man's a Union spy. Opens up a whole 'nother can o' worms than what you're thinkin'. But Sky Dog's right. You ain't seeing the girl here. We take her to Marshall Earp, hole her up someplace safe until she's able to talk. What was it you was sayin' this mornin'? Somethin' about 'false accusations?' Let's see what she has to say before you start leapin' to conclusions."

Daniel briefly gave Randolph a confused look, though he quickly worked out there must have been a murder where someone's limbs were hacked off and the screaming woman must be expected to know something. He shook his head at the man's query, "I been out here since everbody else ran upstairs. Lookin' 'bout ta see if anythin' showed isslef. How old ya think them tracks is? Shouldn't be no shortage o' eyeballs lookin' round this way earlier an' I dint see or hear nuthin since I came out this way."

He looked around at some of the building fronts in the nearby vicinity. During their beat walking, they had seen plenty of people. "Mebbe it's time ta start askin' some questions o'folk."

"I didn't hear any glass breaking before the woman's scream. So the man could have been dead a while or maybe her scream covered that sound. We better see what she was screaming about and what else she might know."

He glances at the dog at Daniel's feet, "Why don't you take the dog and see if she picks up any scent. The tracks came down that alley there and hit Chestnut street.

"Here, you boy!" he snags the arm of a youngster going past, "Here's a nickel to run down to the Marshal's office and tell him there's a murder at the Dog Eye Saloon and he better come quick. Run!"

The messenger dispatched, Randolph goes up the stairs to the murder room.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:45, Sun 03 Mar 2013.

Daniel watched Randolph recede, his brow knitted together with curiosity at the man's suggestion. He bent down close to Clementine, "Yer a good girl, but without no hound in ya and no scent, ya might jus' need a mir'cle ta find a scent an follow it. Mebbe he don't know the difference 'tween a hound and a retriever. But I do, and yer a damn fine one. Gabby's one lucky feller, I tell you what." He reached behind Clementine's ear and scratched at one of the spots she liked so much. Then scratched along her flanks along her ribs and patted her right flank with his right hand.

He quietly added, "Mir'cles are more my bag o' tricks, but we'll see if ya gotta few in yer bag as well." He then stood and started to walk toward the indicated alley with a whistle in Clementine's direction. Not that he could spot a track to save his life and not that there was any actual light to track by. But even a walk down the alley would give him a chance to figure out who might have been able to see the person that fled the scene. Maybe some folk on Chestnut could help Daniel out.

Clementine barks happily, licks Danial's hand, and sets about sniffing the crime scene to prove him wrong about her bonifides.

"I wasn't accusing anyone or leaping to conclusions," she said flippantly, waving off the strange man with his half-English and uncanny gaze.  "I was simply offering it as another explanation to rule out.  The fact was that I did see her arguing with the dead man only just this morning.  That was before she attempted to proposition Mister Darling while I was standing right beside him on the street."  The scorn in her voice was very evident.

"What's this letter that you found?  I would very much like to read it." She held out her hand.

Sky Dog watched the dismissive waving as though expecting meaning there, then Cora's face, backing off only enough not to be struck by the gesture. "Proposing of what?"

The low lamplight did not conceal the colour risen under the shaman's skin, nor the slim glitter of bared teeth in his expression, but he turned to Gabby and Morgan, sheathing his knife. "Is it important, to capture the one that struck here?"

The question seemed genuine and immediately relevant. Sky Dog's fingers played over his knifehilt, more uneasy about the fact that the position of the bed did not allow the room's corners to be seen at once than the corpse.

Darling stops at the door to the room.

"I've sent a boy for Earp," he reports, "There were some tracks in the alley under the window. I followed them as far as Chestnut, but too muvh traffic there. Daniel's seeing if Clementine can pick up a scent.

"Has she said anything yet? Who's the dead man?"

He catches the tension in the room and notes how bristly Cora is. He hazards an apologetic smile in her direction.

Seeing the knife in the shaman's hand, he speaks quietly to the man: "Why don't you put up your blade, Sky Dog? I don't think there's any danger and it may be frightening our witness." He nods toward the young woman standing in the corner. "What's her name, Morgan?"

"Sky Dog, it's of the utmost importance in any situation like this to apprehend the killer - that is to say, to find him and put him in a cell or put him down if he pushes it to that." He was silent as to the matter of the proposition, though he didn't have any doubts as to what it had been about. If anything, that was between the nameless woman in the room, Randolph and Coraline if they wished to share it.

Turning to the reporter, he shook his head. "Mr. Darling, we don't know her name and I don't think we're likely to get it in the condition that she's in right now. This is a rather gruesome killing. I've seen a lot of that in my line of work, and this one is up there. She's in shock, which is something else I've seen a fair amount of. I think the best thing we can do for her is to get her to someone that's kin to her, who can take her to a doctor in the morning."

"Well, Morgan," Darling replies, trying to keep his voice even, "In order to do that, we'll need to find out who she is, won't we?

"Miss Hawthorne, let's you and I remove her to another room, where we can help her get control of herself. That'll give the Marshal and Mr. Clarke time to figure out who the victim is."

He turns to the shaman: "Sky Dog, I believe your sister is off helping Daniel and Clementine try to track the killer. Maybe you can assist that effort."


"Miss," he addresses the young whore in a quiet tone, but firmly, "Why don't you come along with us to a quieter place and we can talk." He lightly takes her arm and steers her out into the hallway, looking for McNary.

"I think we've established that her identity is important, Mr. Randolph. And though you may find it difficult to believe, I want to see her get the help she needs as soon as possible," Morgan said.

"I'm certain that McNary will know who she is and I'm equally certain that Deputy Marshal Earp will know how to locate any kin she has in town. My immediate concern is for her condition."

Morgan offered the letter to Hawthorne, allowing her to peruse its contents.

Doing his best to swallow his anger at the reporter, Morgan turned to Sky Dog. "Sky Dog, I think you would be a help to Daniel in tracking the person responsible for this. But I'd appreciate it if, before you go, you had a look at this man's wounds, to see if you notice anything unusual about his injuries. Anything that might tell us about what happened to him."
This message was last edited by the player at 06:42, Wed 06 Mar 2013.

The woman was rooted to the spot where she was on the floor, and removing her from the room wasn't as simple as it had must have first seemed as an idea. Fortunately, before the situation could become awkward, the saloon's proprietor made an appearance.

"Oh my good heavens. I didn't imagine it'd be anything this bad," he said, nearly recoiling at the sight before his eyes landed on the woman.

"Suzy! Suzy come here," he said, but he rushed over to the woman's side as she sat there on the floor, ignoring those that were trying to move her. Gently taking her shoulders, she rose to her feet in the presence of a familiar face. After unsuccessfully attempting to elicit a response from her, Dog Eye turned to the others. "Shit. This is messy. I might as well name this place the Red Dog Saloon after tonight. Did...did she..do we know who did it?"

The noise outside from crowd in the street in front of the saloon began to grow louder, and angry shouting could be heard even this far inside the saloon.

Hearing the shouting outside, Morgan immediately understood he had other priorities. He moved carefully through the room, doing his best not to disrupt anything within. Making certain his deputy marshal badge was readily visible, he walked hurriedly downstairs and through the saloon, hoping to bring some calm to the shouting crowd outside.

As he exited the Dog Eye, he silently hoped that the boy Darling had sent had already found Earp.

Darling says to McNary, "Is there another room where we can take Suzy and talk to her? Staring at that mess can't be doing her any good. What's her last name anyway?

"And who's the fellow on the bed?""
This message was last edited by the player at 15:30, Wed 06 Mar 2013.

Hank looked with concern at Suzy. "Her name is Suzy Winger, and she works outta the saloon from time to time. I don't know who the fella is, though. It'd help if he still had a face, wouldn't it? Or at least a head. Maybe some...friend o' hers. I seen 'er talkin' to him before. Think his name is Paul. Ain't one o' her customers, though," he said, leading Suzy along with him.

"She's gotta room here that I let to her, but if yer gonna talk to 'er, I'm gonna have to stick around while you do it. She looks like she been through a rough time, and needs a friend. And I suppose we are that, at least." He lead her to one of the neighboring rooms, and opened it with a key from his keyring.

Sky Dog stopped bristling at Darling and Cora at Dog Eye's words, nodding seriously to him. "It is good you should stay with her."

He paused until the wolf-hearted woman and the shadow man seemed to be moving off before pacing around to the window. "It may be only this man the thing was sent for - I see it in the land of the Western Ice, the shamans put scraps of thing and spirit together until it moves, tell it 'kill my enemy' - after, it is again only sticks. It is not a man does this thing, to come, stay in the corner, cut a man's head like it is a little cranberry and leap head-first through the window."

Sky Dog looked out into the night, frowning at the shouting. "-But my eyes they are poor, like the white-eye sledge dogs'...things fine like hair, I see badly as things far away. I will look at the cutting, but first I will ask the window what shape is going through it."

The shaman closed his eyes and pressed his hand to the remaining pane of glass, his spirit calling to that which had been, the object-soul made up of the myriad ghosts of mountains become sand, plants become ash and furnace-flame, the thoughts and will of its makers. He concentrated, trying to run his mind down the cracks, backwards through the traumas until the point of impact was reached...and let that non-memory run through him, trying to catch the shape of what had passed through.
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:49, Thu 07 Mar 2013.

Hank 'Dog Eye' McNary wandered out of the room with his arm around Suzy, who was still weeping. He gestured for Randolph to come after, and he took them into the next room, which was Suzy's. From the outside, one gunshot can be heard, followed by another. Suzy burst into tears again, and Hank just said "Aww, hell."
This message was last updated by the player at 14:38, Thu 07 Mar 2013.

Coraline followed Hank and the others into Suzy's room, though she resented the fact that everyone would automatically assume she was a caretaker simply because she had tits.  She sighed at the sound of gunfire and glanced in the direction of the door.  "Don't worry, Mister McNary.  Marshal Morgan went to check on the disturbance and I'm sure he'll be able to handle things.  He's quite capable with that sidearm of his."

Randolph gives Coraline a small smile and a slightly skeptical tweak of his eyebrow. His voice, when he speaks, is pitched low.

"Perhaps you should try speaking to the woman, Miss Hawthorne. She might find a woman's voice more settling. We need to find out what she knows and what she saw."

Gabby, not entirely certain poor Suzy should be left in the care of the dandy reporter and the woman who seemed to despise her, followed along behind after giving the room another look-over. He arrived to see Mr. Darling whispering.

"Well, now, if'n you want some info, there's this here, which I found on the dead man." He offers the letter he'd found to the pair of them. "The dead man looked to be a Yankee spy. If she was meetin' him, maybe she was givin' him some info."

He crept into the room, hat off, and looked at the girl. "Hey." he says softly. "Hey there, now. It's all right. You're safe now." He kneels next to Hank. Not too close--he didn't want to crowd her, and she knew the barkeep better anyhow.

Darling takes the letter and looks it over.

Sky Dog took his hand from the glass, frowning, then started as a shot rang out outside, flinching away from the window at another. His frown only deepened at turning to find the room empty of all but himself and two thirds of a man.

The shaman hesitated, reasoning that the others were likely gone to investigate and that Wyitterp would soon be there. On the other hand, bare minutes had passed since seeing how badly iron devils could treat each other, and it was the one white man he trusted implicitly who was probably being shot at.

Moving swiftly, Sky Dog took out a twist of paper and scattered salt along the sill and the threshold of the door as he backed out, murmuring a ward against the man's ghost. This done, he turned, drew his blade and took the stairs two at a time. There was an agonised scream from outside as he crossed the lower floor, turning his steps to a cautious hunter's lope. A brief, wild grin touched his lips as he considered how foolish it would be if he were shot here, though it faded as he moved into the night, all senses alert.

Daniel followed Clementine in the direction that Randolph had suggested. Clementine sniffed happily along in that direction, but at Chestnut Street, she looked either distracted or as if she had no ability to determine what to do next. "S'alright, girl. Woulda been quite the mir'cle had ya been able ta do better."

Of course that didn't mean that no one saw a person emerge from that particular direction. Daniel walked across Chestnut and looked at the area from which he emerged to see if there were any shops or saloons or the like where someone might have seen the man they sought.

Spotting the Cowtown Saloon directly across the way, Daniel headed in the direction of that establishment to see if he might get lucky.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:38, Fri 08 Mar 2013.

Darling watches for a moment, as McNary and Gabby try to talk to the woman.
Turning to Coraline, he asks, "Shall we take another look at the murder scene?"

"You know, I think it's best that we let her get some rest for tonight. I think the morning might be better for questions. She might be more inclined to talk then. Right now, it don't like she's gonna do ya much good," the barkeep said to Gabby and the others.

"I seen this look before, in the war, back when I was a soldier."

Randolph turns back from the door. "Someone ought to stay with her, or she ought to be secured in the jail. I expect Earp will make that call when he gets here."

"Secured in the jail? Are you out of your goddamn mind, deputy?" he said angrily.

"Can you think of a safer place for her, if whoever chopped up the fellow next door comes looking for the witness?

"But, as I say, it's Earp's call."

"I don't often agree with Mr. Darling, but I think he's right." Gabby says quietly. "The jail would be a safer place to hold her, and I can stay with her until the mornin'. The only other place I could think of would be the church that's takin' care o' the Hays folks. Either way, she should be moved so the maniac what did this don't find her if she decides to come back."

---

Clementine follows behind Danial, glad that he didn't seem angry at her failure to find anything.

"The room straight on, down the building," Sky Dog told Earp, seeing a man paused on the stairs, then spoke to Walter, installing the ex-soldier at a table. "Where is worst?"

Hank grumbled something under his breath, but finally relented, somewhat sulkily. "Well, I suppose you're right about that. I better get back downstairs and tend to my saloon before some drunk makes off with all the whiskey." He headed back down the stairs, running into Earp on the way, who spoke to him briefly and offered him some money that McNary refused, before heading up himself. McNary brought Walter a bottle of whiskey and a glass. "Whiskey. Alcohol. It's for him, not for you and it's on the house," he said trying to make sure that Sky Dog understood, shaking a warning finger at the native. "Don't mind Injuns, but y'all can't hold your liquor for nothin'. We already saw how that went with those three sips of beer you took earlier." McNary wandered back to his bar, but kept a close eye on the table where the Siberian sat with the wounded young man.

Walter thanked McNary, and with his free hand opened the bottle and poured himself a short glass of it. Putting the bottle down, he took a sip of the fiery liquor and grimaced slightly. He pointed to his arm. "That fella came and done set it, but it still hurts somethin' mighty fierce. I don't know what else. Mostly just bleedin' I guess. I prolly gonna have some real bad cuts and a swolled up face tomorrow. Least they didn't get my good hand, or I'd be useless. Next time...I dunno, I think those fellas got it out for me."

Deputy Marshal Earp wandered up the stairs quickly after seeing that the young former soldier had been seen to, at least as best as they could do for now. He peeked into the room with the grisly killing scene briefly, taking a quick inventory of things before moving on. Finding an open door, he walked over to where Randolph, Coraline, Gabby and Suzy were. He looked at Suzy with a little bit of sympathy. Once upon a time, he had worked at a brothel as a bodyguard and he knew the working girls in Suzy's profession put up with a lot. Still, she seemed to be of little use in this situation, so he turned his attention to the others.

"Well, there's been a murder on your watch, deputies. I know, I know, it's not really what we were expecting nor anything y'all could have done about it. Caleb told me the dead man was an Agent. I've seen him around, and knew the man was from Back East. I never figured him for an Agent, though he did seem to have more grit to him than most men. Still, I hope you know it goes without saying that we have to keep that part quiet. I don't want Bob's Boys or the Unionizers rolling up on the Wilderness Riders. As if we didn't have enough trouble in town to deal with without Jayhawkers and militia groups here as well. Last thing Dodge needs is its own little Civil War. We need to keep the gory details out of public earshot too - we really don't need a panic to top it all off."

"Whiskey, I know." Sky Dog's teeth showed in an almost-smile. "Beer...now I am warned of it also." Sky Dog tensed his suddenly-cold spine against a shiver, abruptly aware of the breath he'd just taken. Memory played across the surface of his thoughts like wind over endless snow: lying there for the entirety of that night with sound of his own breath, the whisper of the hearth at the chüm's centre and Korpi's gentle snores, warmth and smoke...and outside, the old shaman not breathing and not breathing and not breathing.

"Hm. You can't move it, no?" Sky Dog moved around the table to inspect the injured arm. "It will need binding, yes - it is good to keep it still. Has Suzie stopped weeping, Dog Eye?"

"I traded some of the snakes like instruments for chai today, it is left in Dalix's room...the warmth would encourage her to drink before her head hurts from crying, I think."

"I will give you the flowers to eat against bruises, if you like, mister," he said to Walter, looking over his skull and neck. "You are half murdered! It is not well they were not told they merit punishment...you want that I should curse them for you?"
This message was last edited by the player at 22:01, Wed 13 Mar 2013.

"Did you know his name, Marshall Earp? Not for publication, of course.

"Or who he consorted with? Besides Suzy, that is."

"Damn agents, sneakin' around bein' sneaky." Gabby mutters. "I hate all these secrets n' skullduggery." he frowns. "First we got someone claimin' to be William Quantrill runnin' around butcherin' Union folk, then Radcliffe gets snatched by them Agents, and now an Agent gets murdered. It can't be no coincidence."

"What?!!" shouts Randolph, his face darkening with anger, "Radcliffe snatched? From the jail? Goddamit, Earp, I was supposed to have an interview with him in the morning! What sort of jail do you run, deputy?"

He slams his fist against the wall, causing a picture to fall to the floor, it's glass cover shattering.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:51, Tue 12 Mar 2013.

Earp gave Randolph a hard look. "We have higher priorities than your interviews, reporter. What some two penny newspaper does or doesn't get to write about is the least of my concerns, and if the Agency or the Texas Rangers come by and need to take a criminal into their custody, then I'm not very well gonna get in the way. That's what kinda jail I run, the kind where we don't give a shit about reporters. Now, you have a job to do, so get your head outta your ass and do it, deputy," he said glaring at the reporter.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:50, Tue 12 Mar 2013.

Darling draws a deep breath, making a visible effort to get himself under control: "Damn. Forget it."

He shakes his head and stalks over to the murder room, closing the door behind him.

After Randolph left the room, he said to Gabby, "I suppose he's gonna try to get an interview outta that dead body instead."

Unaware of the conflicts going on upstairs, Walter took another sip of the liquor and grimaced, then grinned at Sky Dog. "Yeah, put a curse on 'em for me. I don't think I'll be eatin' any flowers, though. No disrespect."

Gabby scratches at his beard. He hadn't expected that sort of reaction from Darling...maybe he had just been a pushy reporter trying to save his scoop, and not some dastardly Yankee agent. Not that this changed his opinion of the man much...he agreed with Earp.

"I don't know how he'd do that, unless he's plannin' one o' them seance things." That gave him an idea, though. "Say...where is that white injun fella?"
This message was last edited by the player at 02:51, Wed 13 Mar 2013.

Coraline frowned at Randolph's outburst and peered after him as the door slammed behind him.  She opened her mouth to comment, but snapped it shut rather quickly.  There had already been too many harsh words spoken between her and Gabby and she didn't have the energy to spare for another long-winded argument.

"Excuse me, gentlemen," she said to the remaining men.  "I think I'll venture downstairs to see what all of that commotion was about."  Leaving them to their discussion, she left the room and passed by the murder scene, walking calmly downstairs to the public area of the saloon.

Sky Dog made a slight gesture away from himself that was probably a shrug and carefully collected a little of the blood that had run under the edge of the dark man's jaw, drawing it along the edge of one of the raven feathers that had been half-holding back a knot of his hair.

"If I see them and they remain wicked, it is done," he assured the injured veteran. "Dog Eye, do we have things to bind and...carry this breaking?" He mimed a sling.

Earp looked at the door that Randolph had gone into, and shook his head. "You talkin' about Sky Dog? He's downstairs last I saw him, with the colored kid that got beat up by Ralphie Simpkins. The next time that asshole causes trouble, I'm gonna run him outta town."

---

"I think I can rustle somethin' up that might could help," Hank said. Heading back into the kitchen, Hank came out with a clean towel and handed it to Sky Dog.

The shaman came to meet Dog Eye halfway, glancing over at the movement on the stairs but making no special acknowledgement of the other deputy's presence. "It is my thought we will need a long cut from the firewood also, for that the bone-ends do not move away from how they are set and make a twisted healing..." He looked to the injured ex-soldier. "Whilst you are still sensible, mister - is it the side with the thumb or the lump of the wrist where comes the pain?"

"Tha side with tha thumb," he said. "You know, I can go to the doctor in the mornin'" he said.

Korpi flew in after a bit of scavenging, bemused by the woman outside acting like Morgan had beaten her up and stolen all her shinies. Iron devils, she had to conclude, really were pretty crazy. She perched on the bar with a chunk of abandoned beef sandwitch and looked about for somewhere to hide it, just in case.

Sky Dog looked at the wounded man awhile. "...it would be good to bind it to stillness, at the least."

"-If the bone moves when you are sleeping or not feeling, it may make injury inside the arm which becomes bad very quickly. Like the gone-green, yes? Different sickness, but it moves along the bone and poisons blood in such way. If you you cannot trust my medicine, it is well not to let me help you, because it would work badly, that your mind and onnir fight it, but also it is well to know you risk from fever to the white doctor taking the arm, for waiting."

Randolph hesitates for a moment, his back to the door, the sharp, metallic odor of a great deal of blood filling his nostrils. Taking a deep breath, he pushes away from the door and lights the lamp on the dresser.

By its glow he spends several minutes carefully examining the room: opening each drawer and moving the contents enough to disclose whatever is among them, carefully looking into every corner and under the bed, lifting the threadbare runner between bed and dresser, running his hand under the mattress and the blood drenched pillow. He rinses his hands in the basin on the washstand, drying them on the thin towel hanging there.

Finally, he takes a close look at the shattered window, looking for anything caught on the jagged edges and for any sign of blood, the perpetrator's or the victim's.

Then he examines the corpse, noting the condition of the wounds and the clothing, reaching into the pockets, studying its attitude on the bed.

Satisfied that he has found everything there is to find, he stands at the door for another minute, just allowing the room to imprint itself on his memory.

He extinguishes the lamp and leaves the room.

"I think I can trust ya," he said. "We used to have us some Injuns that would scout for us, and he knew how to put things right, medicine like. None of 'em was as white as you, though I heard there's some Injuns that look like white folk, all pale like. I guess you's one o'them."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:53, Sun 17 Mar 2013.

Sky Dog padded into the kitchen and selected a suitable bit of firewood, trimming it with the large, coarse blade and swiftly returning, content to speak as he rejoined his patient. "Ha! I think it happens with all creatures, sometimes one is born without colour. I have seen several like yourself in Dodge, with more colour-" he set down the things needed and considered how best to deal with the sleeve.

Meanwhile, Korpi separated out a piece of bread and cannily pretended to hide the rest of the sandwitch under the bar, then behind some bottles, then finally dropped it behind the cash register.

"-it is my thought you are a kind of American whose ancestors are from another place than the white kind, yes? Beware not to bite your tongue." This warning given, Sky Dog deftly stripped back the outer sleeve and with a couple of swift cuts along the material and a little careful tying got the arm checked over, splinted and slung.

"Yes? Breathing down to the belly, it will quiet your little heart." He grinned and murmured something over the arm in Evenki, pressing on a spot high on the humerus until the pain from lower down faded. "It is well to trust the medicine of a shamán. White medicine, it makes you as well as you were before. This medicine, it makes you better."

Korpi landed on the table and dropped the staled bread into one of the water glasses from earlier in an attempt to soften it.
This message was last edited by the player at 08:35, Mon 18 Mar 2013.

"Well, Mr. Clarke, I think I'm gonna take charge of Suzy for now and call it a night. I think the best place for her is in a cell until we can figure out what this killin' is all about, and whether or not the killer is gonna come for her next. I'm gonna have to be up early to help finish cleaning this mess up. We're gonna get Doc Smith to take a look at this body bright and early in the mornin', and then get him out and buried. What's left of him anyway. Nasty business."

He shook his head. "I suggest you get some rest. Deputy duty doesn't start till later, but I'd appreciate it if y'all come see me in the morning and I'll update you with the latest. The sooner we catch this killer the better - and I expect there'll be a pretty handsome reward out for those as helped with it." With that, he bid Gabby goodnight, escorting the still trembling Suzy carefully down the stairs. Passing Randy in the hall, he simply nodded to the hotheaded reporter and continued downstairs with Suzy.

Downstairs, he paused briefly and told Coraline, Hank, and Sky Dog much the same as he told Gabby, and left with Suzy.

Recognizing Sky Dog's patient, Coraline ventured over to speak to Walter.  "You again?  I thought we told you to stay out of trouble."  She glanced to his injury and frowned.  "Were those men bothering you again?"

Sky Dog straightened from where he had leant. The flush from Hawthorne's first words left his face starkly, taking the normal tint with it; it was a dog-tense and bone-pale man that stepped up to the lady deputy. "Hawthorn."

He leaned in a little and spoke softly, too close to completely ignore even if she still considered him Earp's talking dog. "A man is not at fault for being set upon and beaten; it is well you do not first say this, yes? You will be doing bad service for the law you are given. It is not dollars only you work for, it is trust. Of Wyitterp, of the people, trust. You worked badly with that woman not of your tribe, to wear the little star but not to help her for your hatred."

He moved back a little, letting her approach the injured man if she would. Korpi, having picked up on her brother's white rage midway through trying to get the sunken bread out of the glass, abandoned it and stood on the edge of the table, head low and hackles up, to show she was ready to jump in if Cora drew on the shaman.

"Oh, hello again, ma'am. I didn't try to start nothin' or hand out no fliers. I just got rid of all o' those. That Simpkins feller, he don't like my kind I guess. Or just Yankees. Either way, he'd already had it in for me and started beatin' me for no cause. I was just mindin' my own business, you can ask anybody. Even that 'no devil liquor' lady'll say the same thing. She seen it all," he said calmly, studying what Sky Dog had done for his arm.

"Hey Injun fella, what you say yer name was?" he asked of the Siberian.

Pondering what he had seen in the murder room, Randolph headed downstairs. Exhaustion from the evening's exertions beginning to take their toll.

Seeing Coraline, he approached the corner table as she spoke to a young Negro with his arm in a sling. With a bit of surprise, he recognized Jackson as the fellow who had been threatened over his Independence Day handbills. Then he saw the albino shaman step up to Coraline in a threatening manner, addressing her in a harsh tone too quiet for Darling to catch what he said.

"Howdy there," he said to Randolph as the man approached. Walter looked the worse for wear, having been beaten up rather badly but his spirits seemed well enough.

Coraline sighed loudly at Sky Dog's admonishment.  "Yet again you lecture me for your own misconceptions, and I do not appreciate it in the slightest, sir.  I was only teasing Mister Jackson.  Perhaps you misunderstood me, yet again, because you are foreign and do not completely understand the language.  Mister Jackson and I had a very nice talk earlier after Mister Darling and I helped him out of a bit of trouble.  I was certainly not insinuating that he was to blame for being beaten."  Turning from strange shaman and his stranger bird, she cast her attention upon the colored man.  "I am not surprised that they came after you again.  They didn't look to be the kind to simply let the matter drop.  We will get witness statements, of course, to build a case against them.  Do you know what happened to the men that attacked you?  Did Marshal Morgan run them off or arrest them?"

In reply to Walter Jackson (msg # 92):

Gabby followed along behind Earp. "I aim to see this lady safe, sir." he says. "You can't stay up all night long. I done pulled many long hours in my minin' days, and I reckon my duty ain't done just yet."

Sky Dog tilted his head slightly. "It is the way of the Americans, to see a man is injured, and tease him?" He moved a hand away from himself in a half-shrug. "I will remember. But for the woman...if she had been the daughter of a drunking kossak, I would have looked on her, and not spoken carelessly. Or do you say 'teasing', also, to accuse of wantful killing someone frightened to weeping, with her bird-soul fled into the shadows of the world?"

"Even if it is sport for you, this casts away the trust for this law, that it is our concerning as for our own tribe." The shaman forced his breathing to a slower pattern, still pale as the drowned. He encouraged Korpi up onto his right wrist and transferred her to his shoulder, then picked up the glass to fish out the dropped crust, pointedly not trying to maintain a conversational stance with Hawthorne's shoulder.

"I am Sky Dog," he supplied to Walter, the usual faint tinge of blood under the skin returning as he held up the bread for Korpi to make a mess of. "The men were allowed to go away only insulted, but if I see them again and they remain wicked, I will curse them."

"Howdy, Mr. Jackson," Randolph replies, "The same man who was harassing you this afternoon, did this?" He shakes his head, "He shouldn't have been allowed to walk away."

Hearing Earp and Gabby on the stairs, he turns to see them coming down with Suzy and crosses to the foot of the staircase. "Mr. Earp, I'm ready to back you when you arrest the man that assaulted this boy, now or tomorrow."

"It's alright, Sky Dog," he said. "It was a joke. This nice lady here and that gentleman over there saved me earlier today from that very same fella that cooked my goose out there. I should prolly spend mo' time with 'em, so's Ralphie don't bother me no more," he said, gesturing to Coraline and Randolph.

"Sounds like a plan to me, Mr. Clarke. You can take the first watch and I'll catch some shut eye. I'll take the second watch," he said, preparing to leave, though he stopped by the door as Randolph addressed him, and passed a glance between Coraline, Sky Dog, and Walter.

"Look, you're all right to think that I should bring in Ralphie Simpkins in for this. We usually let most fights go around here. Got too much more serious shit to reckon with, but he went a little too far with Walter here. I despair of what might've happened if you all hadn't been around. That said, all that's gonna do right now is set this lil' powder keg here on fire. His brother Jake and the Wilderness Riders are gonna figure this is a North-South thing, and God knows who else. Several of you are from back East, Caleb's a United States Marshal, and I used to fight in the Union army. Same with ol' Dog Eye back there. The only one in this posse o' deputies that doesn't have those kinda ties is Mr. Clarke, and I think the Wilderness Riders would be inclined to ignore that fact."

He shook his head, and continued, looking everyone right in the eye. "I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm not gonna go after Ralphie Simpkins till this whole celebration is over and everybody clears town. Then when tempers get settled, we'll bring him in together - that I promise you." He waited to see if there were any other questions.

"How you know he still gonna be 'round then?" asked the injured young man who had been the victim of Ralphie's attack.

The Siberian looked over with curiousity. "What is it shows the difference between North and South men? They wear similar clothings."

Walter's statement got a slightly dubious look, but his choice of companions was not the shaman's buisness. "...it will be well, Jackson: if he is cursed, ha! He will be very sorry."
This message was last edited by the player at 22:20, Tue 19 Mar 2013.

"He's a local character, and has always been around. It's only lately he's been with the Wilderness Riders, since his brother took over the gang. They're based outta here. When this all comes to an end, we'll form up a real posse to take him out, and handle any trouble the Wilderness Riders try to make for us. I'll get my old pal Bat Masterson to come along. He's handy with smokewagon in a tight spot," he said.

Gabby nods at the watch assignment.

He tugs his beard. "Actually, two without northern ties. Don't forget my nephew." he shakes his head. "Still...goddamned hotheads oughta not be blamin' the poor man fer his skin. I could take Danial and talk to them Wilderness Riders tomorrow, if'n you like."

he sighs at Sky Dog's observation. "The difference is a fifteen year war between north an' south. Me an' most o' my friends can pick out a Yankee from a country mile by the way he done talks, dresses, and holds hisself, and I reckon they can do most the same for a Southerner. And even since manumission, there's been a shockin' and distasteful tendency among Confederates to blame the negros for the war an' treat them as less than human, which I ain't never really understood none myself."

Randolph nods to affirm Earp's words, "You're the boss, Deputy Marshall. Say, do you intend to have a sawbones look at the dead man upstairs? I'd be interested in what he might say about the wounds.

"Sky Dog, There's not a bit of difference between Yankees and Southerners, except their opinions. And maybe a bit in their manner of speech, depending where they hail from."

He turns to Coraline, offering his arm, "Miss Hawthorne, will you walk with me to Dodge House. I am dog-tired and would like to re-acquaint myself with my pillow."

Sky Dog just looked extremely confused, considered taking a sip of the water and thought better of it, swapping the glass for the water without the bits of sandwitch and sniffing the same to double-check it wasn't beer or an excessive amount of vodka. Korpi cleaned her beak against the shaman's buckskins and yawned, fluffing, half a beady eye kept on Hawthorne.

"Do you stay here, Jackson? If you go I will walk near you, and seek Dalix and Clemya who are gone, making sure the town is quiet."

"Mr. Clarke, you and your nephew are more than welcome to try to play the peacemakers with the Wilderness Riders, though I think we're gonna have to take Ralphie in anyhow. They may take better to you than they would from me, since you both hail from the South. But don't be surprised if they don't take kindly to you, or accuse you of being 'traitors' or some nonsense like that. I know several upstanding Southern gentlemen like yourself Mr. Clarke, but the Wilderness Riders...well they're cut from a different cloth," he said.

"Mr. Darling, we're gonna have Doc Smith take a look at the body in the morning. I think the idea of getting some shut-eye is a good one. Mr. Clarke and I are going to head back to the jail to look after Miss Winger here and take shifts guarding her - for her own sake."

"I'll come find you all in the morning, to see if we can track down the killer."