Last week super-chameleon man-hero Dylan underwent the surgeon’s knife and came out all… Rusty.

This week, in equal second-place getter’s Tycho Dwelis’s bullet-riddled saloon saga, Dylan trespasses onto a scene visited by none-other than the Angel of Death himself. He’ll forever wish he hadn’t.

Enjoy Steady yourself for…

Dylan’s face had turned a pale shade of old sock. His hand lingered on the saloon door and the whole building creaked as he stared into what he had hoped to be abandoned space. A dry wind was blowing dust down the road and past his feet. Shelter was shelter, but what his eyes beheld had turned his stomach to rot. All color drained from his face as he realized why the place had been deserted. 

A man, who some time ago, had been shot straight through the forehead, slumped over the counter, whisky bottle still in hand. But he wasn’t the only one. The saloon, from the door to the stairs, from wall to wall, may as well have been a sea of corpses. Bodies piled together in such a dense mound that Dylan couldn’t even see the floor. 

“I reckon I should’ve camped by the creek,” he muttered to himself. No job in Corpus Christi, no matter how good, was worth this. 

Dust-covered planks creaked beneath his boots as he crept into the saloon, tiptoeing between bodies to get to the bar. A worm of thought wriggled into his head. He couldn’t get rid of it. He needed to know what had happened before settling down in an unfamiliar place. For a brief moment, he imagined what it must have been like when the town pulsed with life.

Now, it stood as a sepulcher for memories etched into its wooden bones and blood that had long since soaked into the floor. Some of the dead had fallen in this room, gunshot wounds in their chests, but others had been dragged from elsewhere for some unholy reason. 

The door swung open on its own and banged against the wall. Dylan’s hand instinctively twitched for his six-shooter but froze as he found himself alone. The smell of decay choked up his throat. Despite his unease, he approached the poker table anyway.

The players had stopped mid-game, the cards in their rotting hands a snapshot of the moment when death had claimed them. One hand was a royal flush. Dylan’s fingertips hesitated over a stack of chips. It was then that he spotted a dusty gold bar under the table. 

He suddenly understood. Weeks ago, a poker game had begun. A high roller entered the saloon and waged a bar of gold that now lay unclaimed. The tension escalated, palpable and electric, and then… the stakes were higher than any amount of gold. Someone snapped. A stolen glance. The flicker of a hidden ace. 

A massacre.  

Dylan’s eyes scanned the saloon. The bullet-riddled walls spoke volumes about the sheer number of shots that had been fired, each hole telling the story of a life cut short. And still… his eyes fell onto the gold bar on the floor. The thing that had caused so much death had been left behind. 

Dylan turned to leave, spurs clinking. Some things were better left with the dead.

Next week, it’s wobbly unicycles all ’round as we discover the charm and effervescence of 3rd-place getter Sue Barnard’s –

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