In this big, wide ‘verse, there’s a million stories.
But this one’s more excitin’ ’cause it’s got cowboys.
***
Wesley James “Jim” Wesson stands atop a dusty rise, dressed in a black wool cloak with fringe on the edges, a floppy, wide-brimmed, black hat with a dark red band and shiny, Sunday go-to-meeting shoes, and a white and red pinstriped bandanna tied so that it obscures his chin and mouth without touching them. All that can be seen of his face is his nose and two hazel eyes with a messy, brown forelock falling down from under the hat.
As the wind picks up, it pushes his cloak open to reveal a simple dark gray suit over a red linen shirt with the top buttons open, a white silk lining to the cloak, and a huge, shining revolver in his left hand with a pair of entwined, serpentine dragons etched on the barrel. The drum of the revolver is glowing a soft orange from inside.
Beside him is Bardlet Colt, standing six-foot five to Wesson’s five-ten and probably twice the weight. His head is bald under the small derby he wears and on his broad face is a red mustache, curled at the ends and heavily waxed. He’s dressed in a cheap, brown suit with a blue vest and light yellow undershirt. His boots are sturdy brown workman’s boots. He’s wearing steel knuckle dusters on his hands which have a small emerald chip centered over each knucle, and he’s carrying a huge shotgun with a roaring lion’s head cast around the muzzle.
***
And like every good cowboy story, it’s got guns:
***
Wesson fires his revolver multiple times from different angles in a montage.
***
Dangerous females:
***
“Bonetaker” Kate Winchester doffs her stetson to a pair of seedy looking men. She’s got a narrow chin, long, thin nose and plain features with lank, brown hair, and is wearing a chocolate brown shirt under a blue and gray checked vest and long brown leather duster with a bola tie and regular cowboy boots. Her hatband, tie and sleeves are all decorated with short bones wired to them.
In the middle of doffing her hat, her other hand comes up holding a double-barreled handcannon and blasts both men dead before they can react. She then stows the empty handcannon, in the process revealing that her coat is concealing a a gunbelt with two revolved at her hips, a shoulder holster for the handcannon, a bandolier of throwing knives across her and a bowie knife strapped to her leg.
***
And real nice hats.
***
A well dressed man with a top hat and beard has his hat blasted off his head.
Wesson, holding a smoking revolver looks over to Colt. “You know something, Bardlet? I don’t think he’s taking this seriously.”
***
But don’t take this to be your regular tale outta the Old West. It’s got magic:
***
A pair of bandits disappear and reappear in swirls of dust around a canyon floor while Wesson and Colt try to shoot at them.
***
And monsters too.
***
Duke Beretta, a barrel chested man with a huge, black beard, dressed in an all-white, expensive suit and stetson raises both hands over his head n the middle of a small town at sunset.
“Let ’em rise clear up outta Tarnation!” He bellows.
A fissure suddenly breaks open in the middle of the street, causing a horse to fall screaming into the fiery pit just before something crawls out.
The creature is easily two stories tall with green-gray skin and four arms growing out of its back, each tipped with four blood-dripping claws. Its main body is leathery and limbless like a cross between an elephant and a snake. It uses two arms to drag itself out of the pit while the other two immediately set to work tearing off the facade of the nearest building. The monster’s face, vaguely humanoid with an extra-wide mouth filled with silvery shark teeth, roars into the falling twilight.
***
Yeah, we got some real tough hombres here in Tremundi di Leone.
***
Flashes of Wesson, Colt, Winchester and Beretta go by.
***
But only one can rise up an’ prove that they’re the tough, smart and good enough with the gun to become worthy of the title:
Cowboy King.
***
Cast
Westley James ‘Jim’ Wesson
Known in the Territories as one of the fastest gunslingers alive and wanted in the same for illegal gun-fighting Wesson does everything he can these days to avoid the scored of young bucks and old hands looking to prove themselves on the draw against him.
Despite carrying the antique revolver the Mercury Arm, Jim prefers to make his money taking odd jobs performing quick cons instead of bounties.
Bardlett T Colt
Colt’s family took Wesson in when he was just a child and when the met back up again later in life, Colt fell right back into the role of protective older brother. While he doesn’t know exactly what Wesson’s been doing the past five years, he believes him when he says that none of it justifies the bounty on Wesson’s head.
Colt makes his money as a card player, occasionally taking up odd jobs like his brother, but unlike Wesson, he’s fine with taking bounties if the price is right.
“Bonetaker” Kate Winchester
After six years as sheriff in the city of New Ives down south, Winchester is brought back to the Territories when she hears tell of a bounty on Wesson’s head. With a grudge of her own against the man, she follows the trial of the pair with tenacity and Heaven and Tarnation help anyone who gets in her way.
Her nickname isn’t an exaggeration: Winchester has taken a bone off every man or woman she’s brought in dead and uses them to decorate her bounty hunting gear. It’s whispered in the Territories that the Bonetaker has never failed when she’s taken a Dead or Alive bounty.
Duke Beretta
The most powerful land baron in the Territories and a man denied the respect he thinks he deserves from the upper class back in Rean, Duke Beratta is determined to out everyone in their place and that place is bowing down to him. He’s hatched a plot to use the denizens of the Third World, Tarnation, to destroy his enemies and extort his allies. What he doesn’t expect is pushback from the natives of Confey and two brothers in search of the same legendary weapon he needs to rule all three worlds.
Ummm, you might want to look up the graphic novel, “Caliber.” About a cowboy named Arthur who is destined to overthrow an evil land baron and bring justice to the West, once he finds a legendary magical gun…
Suits? These are some snazzily dressed cowboys!
This all sounds rather interesting. 😛
I sense a political flame bait in naming the Third World a place where monsters come from… Might want to reconsider the term to avoid nasty misunderstandings.
Hard to say how the story would turn out, but the good old horse & sixgun-esthetic is one I’ve always liked, and it doesn’t get as much attention as it deserves in today’s popular culture.
Point. I have no idea why I capitalized it. It’s just number three out of the three, not titled that.