[h1]Kansas[/h1]
[h2]Seward County[/h2]

Dunes of brown dirt and sand marched across the naked flatland of south-western Kansas. To the south was the Oklahoma state line. To the north a barren nothingness that marched into perpetuity towards Canada, and beyond. Dark clouds swirled in the north, darkening a bone-white afternoon sky. The harsh chill and befallen the now renewed Great American Desert as the rumbling Model A made its rumbling trip down the forlorn highway from the town of Liberal. The road had been swallowed up by the dunes of uncontrolled dirt. The only markings that laid the course of the road was the regular march of the telephone poles along the road-side.

The Model A Tudor sedan had long lost all its paint to the buffeting and attack of the dust storms. It was a desolated and skeletal car. The exposed metal had begun to turn a dry arid brown like much of the landscape and the windshield was marked and pitted with scratches and cracks left by hail and the harsh grit of the sandstorms. It rumbled and coughed as it went, throwing up dust from the road and even more dust that came up from the long chain it dragged behind it to ground the car from the immense powers o f built up static electricity.

Riding in the car, swaying and bobbing sat four men, each covered head-to-foot in heavy clothes, masks, and scratched well worn goggles as they sputtered down the long road. At their feet sawn-off shotguns, rifles, and handguns lay across the dirty floor boards as they made a straight line through the near-desert landscape.

“Hey hoss, we gotta 'nother duster comin' along.” cried the man in the passenger side seat. His voice carried a heavy Texan drawl that dripped heavy and slow like molasses. But it was embittered by venom and vitriol. It had a nearly combustible role in the tongue, like gasoline.

“We'll make time.” the driver croaked, not even looking north at the storm that was just a distant brush stroke across the horizon.

The sedan was making its way at thirty miles an hour down the road, kicking up as much dust as its narrow wheels could throw and being thrown well over the threshold of safe driving under every circumstance in the dust bowl. But the clarity of the day awarded the driver with no sighting of anyone coming the other way.

“Are ya sure?” the passenger asked after a few minutes, his voice betrayed a heavy concern as he rose a gloved hand reached into a pack at his feet and retrieving a whetted sponge he began to work at putting under his mask.

To the north, the duster was coming closer at shocking, lightning speed. While still far away the crown of the bank of swirling dust clouds could be seen against the infinite sky, spinning tufts of cloud up over it where they lingered heavy in the sky before falling back down in a cascading waterfall of spinning, turning fists of darkened dirt thrown south across all of Kansas and Colorado.

“Damn right I'm sure, now shut up.” the driver demanded in a course voice. It was as dry as the arid air and as abrasive as the winds to come.

Up ahead, a lonely wooden barn stood in an empty wasteland. At its unprotected northern side a large dune had climbed up to the roof, burying half the building in a hill of fine silt. Nearby the wind-blasted skeletal frame of a house stood with a rusted windmill spinning frantically in the hard northern winds.

The driver began to break suddenly to slow to a turn and the shifting of the Model A's weight betrayed the treachery of the lose dust and sand that now covered the road. It shifted with the back end trying to continue the old speed of thirty miles as the front head quickly decelerated. The driver regained control of the sedan and it straightened out in time for it to turn into the farm and the barn doors to creak open like the gate of an old castle. They closed methodically behind as the Model A scooted into the lamp-lit, amber light of the barn.

The driver killed the engine and stepped out as the first winds of the storm came to buffet the barn. There was a low howl as wind found holes between the boards and began singing a low note. Standing in the light of lanterns and one of a small fire with metal rods tucked in the hot embers men stood patted down in similar patched over heavy clothes. Potato and flour sacks cut to patch holes in plaid workman's shirts. Rabbit hides sewn to fix hats, boots, and the elbows and the knees of pants and shirts. They stood solemnly in waiting, with their hands wrapped around in front of them as a red banner hung from the far wall opposite of the door.

The car doors popped open as the rest walked out, carrying their rifles and shot guns as their boots crunched across a floor covered in Russian thistle and more than a few stomped bugs. Sitting in a bare wood chair, strapped down with ropes and a spud sack over his head sat a man in a tattered suit vest. He was breathing heavily and his deep rattling breaths were audible over the moaning whistles of the wind.

“We found 'im tryin' to break fer Missouri.” a man in the back said, “Must'a heard we were after him. But he can't run for shit. Soft men don't move very fast.”

The driver said nothing as he came up to arm's reach of the captured man. The wind was groaning heavier as he leaned over and grabbed the burlap sack and tore it from his head.

The man immediately released a strained gasp as he struggled at his binds. He looked up at his captor with eyes wide with terror. A pair of small cracked glasses rested on a short boy-ish nose. He would have looked too young to be a man if it weren't for the short stubble of his chin and cheeks. He hadn't shaved for a few days, his beard was as thin as his head of hair. Lines in his face betrayed a premature aging.

The driver knelt, coming down to eye-level with his captive. The captive could not see anything of his face, only his sorrowful fearful eyes in the aviator goggles the man wore.

“James McCaffer.” the driver spoke, in a low rattling voice, “How nice to finally meet you.”

“W-who are you?” James asked, stricken by fear.

“A nobody, comrade.” the driver answered him, “But you're a somebody, an important somebody who I hope have answers to our questions or we be swinging you from a rope by a windmill. There ain't no law and order much 'round here 'cept us. Understand?”

James shivered as he store into those empty eyes that was the goggles. “I guess you do.” the driver grumbled in a low voice. “What do you know 'bout the election of '32?”

James leaned his head back, the shiver of fear subsided briefly. He looked perplexed at his interrogator and asked, “W-what?” and moaned.

The driver rose in an instant and a gloved hand came sweeping from the side in a violent back-hand smashing the glasses from the man's small nose. James cried in pain and terror as the driver lowered. “The election of 1932!” he bellowed, “WHAT WENT WRONG?” he demanded in a terribly loud voice. James whimpered as he tried to escape, kicking at the floor. The effort wasn't wholly worthless as the chair backed up slowly, much to the amusement of the men around the barn.

The air darkened as the dust storm arrived. The air was filled with loose particles as dirt and sand found cracked between the boards and drifted in. The lights of the lanterns and the fires were slowly dimmed as the air was filled the black dirt. A dark amber glow filled the room. To James, he could not see his interrogator. To the driver, James was only a silhouette against a dull glow of fire.

“The election of 1932, you were an elector in the collage. You voted for the state of Kansis to elect our last president. What went wrong?” the driver demanded in a stern voice.

“I-I don't know!” James pleaded, his voice was quick to become rough and dry from the air he breathed in. He heaved and coughed, unprotected from the fine silt coming through. Many years ago his mum and pa brought him west to the Great Plains because New York was too dirty. Now he was breathing air worse than New York, and he could feel the claustrophobic sickness of his lungs being invaded by the airborne pollution of sand and dirt.

“You're going to have to do better than that!” the driver bellowed, “I have a man, an old ranch-hand. Steady and strong. Iffin' ya not gonna tell us what the fuck happened that day I will have him brand you so many times with a hot iron you will not have one inch of skin left unexposed to burns. You're going to be wincing as you piss and there ain't gonna be any whore anywhere that's not going to shiver at the site of your over-cooked sausage.

“So you're going to add more detail, or we'll roast it out of you.”

“That's all I-I... That's all I know. I don't know what happened that day, I cast my vote when the poll numbers came in and left. I swear to god I voted the way everyone in the state voted! And they all voted to hell with Hoover!

“Please for Christsakes I don't know shit!”

The driver was silent for a long time, then asked, “You're not the only state elector. Who else was there to cast a ballot?” he asked.

“I-I think an old acquaintance of mine was there, an old law-partner from the boom days! Jackson Donaheugh, that's his name. He had a farm-stead on the north-side of the state. That was his retirement plan. I don't know where he went after we stopped practicing together.”

“Where abouts in the north?” the driver asked coldly.

“A-ah shit, I don't know. All those towns are the same fucking thing there. It was all property to him!  You can probably find out in the state archives, if they haven't been burned  yet.”

“They shouldn't.” the driver crooned, standing to his feet. James coughed against the assault of the dirt and the grime. “Cut him loose and throw him free into the storm. If he lives then it's God's fucking good graces. If not, we're one less jackass to worry about. We're going to Topeka when the sand settles.”