“ Yes sir, we can beam in about two or three kilometers away, just to be safe.”
“ I think that is a wise course of action Sub-Commander, and please make sure all members of your landing party have been surgically altered to look like the people of the planet.”
“ We have already made arrangements in this regard.”
“ Can you make any guess why Mr. La Trenne has not tried to contact us by now?”
“ He has no tricorder, phaser or COM badge. We found them at the base of the cliff. Of anything else I have no idea. I can only surmise that he is trying to preserve the prime directive himself.”
Just then Mesetta walked through the door with the Captain’s and Beani-Poohs meals. “ Sub-Commander, I was not aware that you were here. I will bring another meal for you directly,” Mesetta said.
“ No do not bother, I am not staying. I just came in to speak to the Captain.”
“ Please stay Sub-Commander, this is a very nice meal. You can take my word for it.” Mesetta was insistent.
“ I will most likely come back later, I am a little busy just at the moment.”
“ We would like you to stay Sub-Commander,” said Beani-Poohs.
Before she could say anything else Mesetta had brought another meal to the table.
Even Kazzie-Spockers thought that the meal smelled appetizing. Normally her concentrated sense of smell put her off human food. “ I suppose I can postpone what I was doing for a few minutes.” She picked up her folk.
The three of them talked during the meal but the subject was definitely not work related. Even for a part Vulcan it was relaxing to unwind in this manner.
After she had finished she took the turbo lift and walked into the sick bay.
“ How are the repairs on Commander Base proceeding?” she asked.
The Doctor was working with Yeoman Amsterdam. “ We are progressing very nicely Sub-Commander, we will have Mr. Base fully operational within a few hours. His vocal program is back online if you would like to ask him anything.”
This relieved Kazzie-Spockers somewhat. “ Mr. Base, what can you tell me about what happened the other day?”
Mr. Base immediately responded. “ Myself and Commander La Trenne scaled the cliff because we had a reading of useful minerals in that area. I was scanning the cave while Vincent was out near the edge of the cliff. I can not inform you of too much more because once the quake started I had my hands full inside the cave. My guess is that Mr. La Trenne must have fallen from the top of the cliff.”
“ It is a very long way down, a fall of this nature could have proved fatal.”
“ He might have been thrown against small trees and rocks on the way down and this may have slowed his fall somewhat. I am only speculating of course.”
Kazzie-Spockers thought for a moment. “ I believe you have given me the correct conclusion. Perhaps Commander La Trenne was injured and made his way to the closest town to seek medical help.”
“ That would be a logical course of action.”
“ Thankyou Commander, you have been most helpful.”
She turned and walked out of sick bay.
* * * *
La Trenne and the Sheriff were sitting in the café and had just finished eating. The Gulag had been poured and La Trenne drunk his cup down very easily. He groaned at the thought that he was getting used to this bitter drink and he remembered how foreign it tasted the first time he had tried it at the waterfall.
“ Sheriff, I need to ask you a question that has been bothering me,” he said.
The Sheriff sighed.“ Go ahead, you seem to be always asking me questions anyway.”
“ You said that the whole town paid Logan to come and clean this bad element up?”
“ Yes that is what I said.”
“ You also said that yourself and the mayor did not approve of hiring Logan to come here. If you are so worried about these bad men, why did you not want to do anything about it?”
The Sheriff just sat still for a moment. He took a drink of his Gulag.
“ The mayor does not approve of the use of fire arms. He is a religious man and he says that violence is not the way to take care of violence. As for me, I am a paid representative of the people here and I am the only lawman for long distances, in more than one territory. I didn’t go along with the idea of hiring a mercenary because then I would have to face up to the fact that I have failed here. I would be obliged to resign if that was the case. I am not as young as I once was and I would like to keep my job.”
“I understand. But I have an idea.”
The Sheriff sat upright. “ You do?”
“ Why don’t we do it together and stand up to them? I could be your assistant in the law.”
“ Are you applying for the job of Deputy?”
“ Yes, if that is what you call it. You may feel overwhelmed facing these people alone but with a deputy by your side, it may be the edge you need to help you win.”
“ I can not pay you, I do not earn enough as it is.”
“ I do not require money, I just want to help keep this town safe.”
“ Why do you want to do this? After all you are a stranger here.”
“ I just know I want to help.”
“ Let me think about it. I’ll let you know in the morning.”
Just then La Trenne remembered that the girl would be singing at the bar that evening. “ I am going over to the saloon Sheriff. The young lady I have seen around town has invited me to hear her sing tonight.”
“ You go, I will be going back to the jail before doing my rounds.”
“ Alright then, I’ll see you back at the jail later this evening.” A few minutes later La Trenne walked out of the cafe and into the saloon. There was a large crowd of men standing around and everybody had a drink in his hand.
He walked up to the bar.
“ What will you have kid?” The man behind the bar asked. As La Trenne looked around the bar he noticed that almost everybody was drinking the same type of drink.
“ I’ll have what everybody else is having,” he replied. After all, it couldn’t be worse than Gulag.
“ Most people like to drink mohe, it has always been a very popular drink in Bitter Creek.”
The barman took a glass and poured some mohe into it and then gave it to La Trenne. He picked up the glass and smelled it first. It didn’t smell like old socks, it smelled kind of sweet. He took a drink and he felt like his head was about lift off. It was very strong liquor.
Just then the barman walked up on a stage at the front of the bar.
“ Tonight we have some entertainment for your enjoyment. Miss Iffy is going to sing for us.”
La Trenne leaned back on the bar as he watched Miss Iffy walk onto the stage. She was wearing a very low cut dress and it was very short as well. All the men started to cheer and some fired their weapons into the air.
A man in the bar started to play what could best be described as a piano and Miss Iffy started to sing in her deep throaty voice. All the men did not stop cheering while she was singing so La Trenne could hardly hear her above all the noise.
She looked to be almost finished her second song when everything went deadly quiet all of a sudden.
Six men walked into the bar and straight up to the counter.
La Trenne felt suddenly very nervous as he suspected that these men were the bad element that so many people had talked about. A minute later four more men walked into the bar and joined the others. One big man with red hair who looked like he was the leader poured himself a drink and then turned to the direction of the stage.
“ Miss Iffy honey, do not stop singing on our account,” he grinned,“ Sing, honey. Me and the boys want to hear you.” The men all hooted at this and applauded and stamped their feet, their eager eyes on the girl.
Miss Iffy looked very embarrassed and she started to walk off the stage.
The man spoke again in a very loud voice. “ Perhaps I di
dn’t make myself clear. I want you to start singing. Start singing NOW!”
A man standing nearby turned and said. “ She usually only sings two songs.”
That man was thrown across the bar smashing two chairs and then the big man took out his weapon. “ I came here to hear Miss Iffy sing and that is what is going to happen. Now start singing or I am going to start firing this weapon.”
Miss Iffy nervously started to sing once again, it was easy to hear her this time, as there was no noise. The only thing was that Miss Iffy was now apprehensive and this made singing difficult for her. The big man made her sing three songs and at the end of each song everybody in the bar was told to clap and applaud.
The Sheriff across the street had heard the commotion and had strapped on his weapon. He started to walk across the street slowly and could see all ten of the men in the bar. He knew he could not handle them by himself and he knew La Trenne had no weapon with him either.
Unsure of what to do, he walked back over to the jail.
La Trenne stood against the counter observing everything that was going on. He was in no position to do anything for the moment. He had no weapon and he would need the Sheriff and a few others to help if they were to do anything about these men and stop them coming back to this town.
“ Do you know why I like coming to Bitter Creek?” shouted the big man.
“ Why?” answered one of his men.
“ Because I find everybody here so accommodating. Why would I want to go anywhere else? It seems reasonable to me that Bitter Creek is the place to come to. Until I heard some disturbing news the other day.”
“ What disturbing news would that be?” asked the same man.
“ Why, the news that this town had hired a man to drive us away! A man that would stand up to us and tell us to leave and not come back.”
“ Who would ever do such an inhospitable thing like that?”
“ LOGAN! A man named Logan. A man who fires his weapon for money.”
“ Who is Logan?”
“ You got the question wrong. The question is not, who is Logan but who was Logan? Logan is soon to be a dead man.”
These statements brought a wave of apprehension in La Trenne’s gut. He could see there was no way out of this bar.
“ I have another question,” the big man raised his voice and looked around the room, grinning widely.
“ What would that be?”
“ Where is Logan? Is he here in Bitter Creek and is he man enough to stand up to us?”
“ I doubt it, I have heard that Logan is yellow and he would not have the guts to stand up to real men like us.”
“ Logan is here right now!” said Miss Iffy suddenly in a loud voice. “ He is standing at the counter.”
Then she pointed her finger right at La Trenne.
This was the last thing La Trenne wanted to happen. All the townsmen scattered from the bar as all attention focused on one man standing at the counter… him
“ Logan, so you’re here!” said the big man with an evil smile.
On once more hearing this familiar phrase La Trenne didn’t feel frustrated. This time he felt frightened and with good cause.
The big man sauntered over to him, looking him mockingly up and down. “ So you’re the famous Logan - you’re the man who takes money to rid towns of vermin like us. I’m glad to meet you Mr. Logan, why don’t we have a drink to celebrate the occasion?” He held up the bottle in his hand. Then he moved up right next to La Trenne, who was watching him warily.
Most of the men walked over to the counter and started pouring drinks. The big man poured one for La Trenne and handed it to him with a flourish. La Trenne took the drink and had a sip, to him it tasted like some awful medicine.
Well, it was now or never.
“ If I tell you I’m not Logan do you think that will make a difference to this celebration?” He waited for the answer with a feeling of futility. When had this question ever helped him before?
The big man looked at him with a strange expression on his face that could only be described as doubt. A few seconds later the doubt had passed and the man started laughing. “ Logan is having a joke with us boys!” he roared and, “ Laugh it up boys! It’s always good to have some fun before you get down to being serious.” He slammed his drink down on the counter and leaned back on his elbows, his eyes still on the other man.
All the men started to laugh and one threw a glass at the big mirror, which hung behind the counter smashing it to pieces. Two more began to throw chairs around and another began to kick the spittoon across the floor, which started a game of sorts while they hooted and hollered and all the while the big man and La Trenne just stood and watched. What now?
Miss Iffy had been waiting for a moment to escape the bar so while everybody was concentrating on La Trenne she started walking towards the front door. The big man noticed her as she attempted to pass him and grabbed her by the arm. “ Leaving so soon little missy?” he said, “ stay a while and let’s get to know one another.”
“ I need to leave.” She was almost frantic.
“ That is no way to talk, we are all friends here.” He slung his arm around her waist while she struggled.
“ I like to be in bed early and it is cold in here and I am not dressed very warmly.” She panted as she struggled.
The big man took this as some type of challenge. “ Did you hear that boys, the little lady is cold? What can we do to warm her up?”
One of the men took a big mouthful of mohe and then lit a match. He spat the contents of his mouth at the match causing a large ball of fire to shoot forth. The next thing everybody knew was that the bar had caught on fire and the flames started to shoot up to the ceiling. This agitated everybody at the bar and a panic took place. Men were running over each other trying to get out of the only exit.
The big man released the girl and roared at his men to stop being such cowards and to come back. He shrugged as he poured himself another drink, amid quickening flames.
With all the panic La Trenne managed to catch hold of Miss Iffy’s hand and sneak her out the door with all the other men who were running out. Neither noticed the big man slowly saunter outside, rubbing his smoking hat as he joined the fast growing crowd in the street. He squinted up at the building with some interest as the flames took over the second storey.
La Trenne and Miss Iffy both ran to the hotel and he saw her safely inside. “ You go to your room Miss Iffy, I must go and see the Sheriff.”
“ Oh thank you. I will. “ She ran up the stairs without a backward look.
As La Trenne ran across the road to the jail he heard the roof explode at the bar. The fire was out of control by this time. There was an enormous crowd gathering in the street to watch, some of the townsfolk were patting the barman on the shoulder. He was crying.
La Trenne burst through the doorway of the office to see the Sheriff watching events unfolding through the window.
“ Give me a weapon, I intend to do something about this!” La Trenne said.
“ There are too many men for you to go up against them.” The sheriff said calmly as he turned to look at the younger man.
“ Somebody has to do something!” La Trenne said angrily,
“ It’s clear you intend to do nothing.”
There was a short silence.
“ The weapons are over there in the cabinet.” The Sheriff pointed across the room.
La Trenne opened the cabinet and started to take out one, but something hit him from behind and he fell down unconscious.
* * * *
When La Trenne came to, he felt nauseous and his head hurt in almost the same spot he had hurt his head two days earlier. It was daylight now and he surmised he had been knocked out for almost twelve hours when he saw the time. He was lying on one of the beds in the jail cells and the Sheriff was nowhere to be seen.
He struggled to his feet and walked out of the unlocked cel
l and into the street. A large crowd stood in front of the smoldering ruins that was once the saloon. It had completely burned to the ground. Many of the shop windows in the street were smashed and everywhere he looked there were some type of destruction. It looked like a typhoon had ripped through the town, it was such a mess.
La Trenne walked up to the Doctor who was standing with the others. “ Do you know where the Sheriff might be?” he asked.
The Doctor stared at him. “ Where have you been? We brought you here so this sort of thing would not happen anymore.”
La Trenne wondered how he could have prevented this happening by himself. It had been a moment of madness in the office when his anger had almost caused him to act stupidly. But clearly, some may feel that he had not lived up to his mission.
“ There was nothing I could have done. “ he said simply, “ I have been unconscious for most of the night.” La Trenne showed the Doctor the lump on his head.
“ That is quite a bump you have there. So you do not know what happened last night?” the Doctor asked.
“ I knew that the bar was set on fire.”
“ That was only part of it. After the bar was on fire the men came out into the street and demanded to know where Miss Iffy had gone. The sheriff walked out towards them and told them to get out of town. He said to them that they had done enough damage and this was where it would end. The big man told him that they were just getting started and he had better go back to the jail and hide there until it was over. Otherwise he was going to get hurt. The Sheriff got distracted when one of the men dragged Miss Iffy into the street and the big man struck the Sheriff so hard that he almost killed him. I have the Sheriff at my house recovering from concussion. He will be out of action for some time. He is lucky they didn’t kill him.”
“ What about Miss Iffy, what happened to her?”
“ After they destroyed our town they took Miss Iffy to the house on the edge of town and they want you to come and try to rescue her.”
“ Me? They think I am Logan don’t they?”
“ Of course they do. They are expecting you to come to the house very soon. The Mayor was told to tell you to be there by midday or Miss Iffy would be dead. The Mayor didn’t know where you were, so he told a few us to tell you when you surfaced.”
La Trenne stood thinking for a moment.“ Is the Sheriff able to have visitors?”
“ Yes, he can talk but you should not stay too long. I don’t want him to get excited at all. He needs rest right now.”