[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/6bK49TU.jpg[/img][/center]
[b]”The Ranchero of Miracle Mesa” - Strings: Part One[/b]

[center][i]“The Cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage.”[/i][/center]
[center][indent]-Anonymous[/indent][/center]
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[indent][b]Texas --- The Desert[/b][/indent]
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It was only a few hours since they... Emerged. Vigilante still wasn’t sure quite how to describe it. One moment he was on his knees on a slab of brimstone, with a Demon Lord’s claws wrapped around his head and his friends waiting for death all around him. The next he was lying in a bed of sand, all his broken bones and scars knitted together like nothing had ever happened.

The walk to town was silent. Each man seemed content to contemplate what it meant to be well and truly alive again. The crunch of the sand beneath seven sets of boots. True, fresh Texan air swelling their lungs. It was unlike anything in hell had ever been. The sky twinkled with stars instead of crackling with fire. The wind whistled instead of howling. It was almost enough to make Vigilante forget what had happened there. If it weren’t for the screaming.

It started as a quiet throbbing in the back of his head once he accepted Mephisto’s deal. A little reminder of what he’d done. The closer Vig and the six others drew to Warpath, the louder it got. Every footstep raised the voice a decibel. The voices, rather.

[color=#3d045e]“Vengeance. Must. Be. Done. Vengeance. Must. Be Done. Vengeance! Must! Be! Done! VENGEANCE! MUST! BE! DONE!”[/color] It was a cacophony. If Vig focused on it, he became more aware of it, more in tune with it. Somewhere in recesses of his being, there was a swirling, pulsating vortex of fire and shrieking skulls baying for blood and retribution -- and it was trying to pull him in. He tried to shake his head and clear himself of it, but it was always there, gnawing. Begging him to let it out. He felt the pressure on the back of his eyes. It was all he could do to ignore it and continue his slog through the desert. He needed a goddamn drink.

[indent][b]Warpath, Texas --- The Crossroads Saloon[/b][/indent]
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The Crossroads Saloon was The Bar at the End of the World. It had been in Warpath since the early 1800s. It had survived attempted buyouts, a handful of shootouts, a few arsons, and countless charms and curses placed upon it by wannabe sorcerers. It was there when Vig was born, and would likely be there long after he died. Hex probably still recognized it, the paint chipping off the cheapest boards available and the subtle scent of watered down booze. To Vig, it smelled like home.

Not a word had passed between the men, but a thousand years worth of teamwork had cultivated a silent understanding between them. Drink came before discussion. The only stop they made was to exchange their clothes for something more pedestrian. Costumes and armor weathered by hellfire were exchanged for worn out jeans and dusty flannels liberated from the boarded up shack Vig used to call home.

The place still had the same swinging “cowboy” doors, with all the little holes and nicks in ‘em from various nights of drunkenness and debauchery from the few locals who attended the slag heap. Vig pushed through first. It was empty. The tables sat deserted, with a handful of stools askew. Some lay overturned. The barkeep idly wiped dust motes from glass mugs, but his eyes snapped to the door as it swung open. The barkeep set the glass down. His hands dropped below the bar.

“Greg Saunders? Why, we ain’t seen you around here in a long time, feller.” The barkeep said.

[color=#f92a0e]“Yessir.”[/color] Vigilante nodded and tipped his hat.

In an instant, a sawed-off was in the barkeeps hands and Greg flinched, slamming onto the ground on his back. His revolver was in his hand before the shotgun’s report reached his ears, and his finger squeezed the trigger as buckshot obliterated where he’d just been. His pistol cracked in his hands and the barkeep’s hat disappeared, Greg adjusted his aim down a micrometer.

[color=#f92a0e]“Boy, you [i]best[/i] think about where you next aim that shotgun,”[/color] Greg said. He could scarcely hear himself over the ringing in his ears.

“Jesus H. Christ, Williams, what was that?” The swinging doors behind the bar burst open and an old man in a droopy bucket hat hobbled out. His eyes flickered over the scene. He slapped the gun out of the barkeep’s hands.

“Goddammit, you dumb son of a bitch! Don’t you know who that [i]is[/i]?” The old man said. Billy Gunn hadn’t changed much in the… Well, however many years Greg had been gone. He still wore the same hat, pulled low over his face with as many buttons and as much memorabilia that would fit plastered over it; and he still walked with that same limp. Greg slid his pistol into his holster and drew to his feet.

“But what if he’s a --” The barkeep couldn’t finish his sentence before Gunn’s hand cracked across his face.

“You think a changeling could aim like that? Git yer keister in the back.” Gunn elbowed past the man as he passed and planted both hands on the bar.

“Things have [i]changed[/i] ‘round here, boy. Where the hell have you been?” Gunn said. He gestured to a barstool.

[color=#f92a0e]“I’ve been… Around. Coast’s clear, Frank.”[/color] Greg said, stepping up to the barstool.

The titanic frame of Johnny Frankenstein shouldered through the doorway. Greg could see the buckshot pellets dug into his skin, with fresh holes blown in the many-sizes-small shirt. Somehow he seemed less undead under the flourescent lights of the bar. It helped that he had a cowboy hat pulled over his head scars, and that the seams in his patched-together body were covered, [i]mostly[/i].

“Sir.” Frankenstein tipped his hat to Gunn and sat down next to Greg. The stool shuddered under his weight.

The rest of the Seven filed in, one by one. Sir Justin seemed to stumble as he came in, evidently suppressing his instinct to bow. Lee Travis came in next, cracking that big wide grin of his. Then was Sylvester Pemberton and Pat Dugan, each giving low nods and shuffling to stools of their own. Lastly was Jonah Hex.

The bounty hunter stood in the doorway a moment, looking the bar up and down. He stepped to the left wall, and moved a hanging picture a hair to the left.

“Heh. Still there.” Hex righted it and pulled up a stool. Gunn’s eyebrows were furrowed, and his eyes scanned over each of the bar’s new patrons. He opened his mouth to ask a question, but Greg cut him off.

[color=#f92a0e]“Gunn, what… [i]Exactly[/i] happened while I was gone?”[/color] Greg asked. He pulled off his brown cowboy hat and began fiddling with the brim. He locked eyes with Gunn’s baby blues.

Gunn sighed. He scratched the back of his head and stared at the ceiling for a moment, his face scrunched in thought.

“Three years is a long time to up n’ abandon Warpath, Greg. Since you split town, things got…” Gunn gulped, “Well, things got [i]weird[/i].”

Greg exchanged a glance with Frankenstein. Hex looked up from his hat brim. Three [i]years[/i]. It felt like a thousand.

[color=#f92a0e]“I got some kinda [i]acquainted[/i] with weird in my time away.”[/color] Greg said. He reached across the bar and placed a hand on Gunn’s shoulder.

Gunn looked deep into Greg’s eyes, searching for some kind of truth in them. He swallowed.

“Every now n’ again we get hit by… Well, to put it to ya straight, gentlemen, monsters.” Gunn reached down and put the sawed-off on the table.

“Williams back ‘ere thought you was a [i]changeling[/i] like we’ve been callin’ em. Nasty ‘lil buggers. Takes your friend’s face n’ kills you with it. N’ that’s just one o’ the many we’ve been gettin’. SHIELD's been tryin’ it’s damnedest to help, but with the metahuman business n’ everything, they don’t have much by way of resources to spare for a lil’ town like us.”

Sylvester shot up in his chair. “[i]Metahumans?[/i] By God, SHIELD finally let the cat out of the bag.”

Gunn nodded. “Lotsa cats in that bag, then.They got a boy up n’ Metropolis who just spent his day rippin’ apart a bunch o’ robots.”

“Well, we’re whistling Dixie if we think a fella all the way in Metropolis will help you, pal. Or us, for that matter.” Lee said.

A moment of silence washed over the bar. A thousand years of combat, but Greg may as well have been back where he started. Knee deep in demons and without any kind of backup.

[color=#f92a0e]“I’m sure we’ll figure something out, Billy. Pop always did, n’ I’m sure that we can, too.”[/color] Greg said. By now, the voices had settled into a steady chant.

[color=#3d045e]“Vengeance. Vengeance. Vengeance.”[/color]

[color=#f92a0e]“I’m [i]more[/i] than sure.”[/color]