PRN EAD EV Taye
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Y ereDeadlands™ Dime Novel™ #4
Wek A- Ha kROWET> Moon (PAT One):
SIRMGE BEDFELLOIS
Written by: Matt Forbeck
Production: Barry Doyle & Hal Mangold
Cover Art and Logo: Ron Spencer
Interior Art: Kevin Sharpe
Maps: Jeff Lahren
Special Thanks to: justin Achilli, Kelley Foote, Shane &Michelle Hensley, John
Hopler, Ann Kolinsky, Ashe Marler, Dave Seay, Ethan Skemp, Richard Thomas, Matt
Tice, Mike Tinney, Stephen Wieck, John Zinser.
Deadlands created by Shane Lacy Hensley
Werewolf: The Wild West created by Justin Achilli & Ethan Skemp
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Printed in the USAThe moon rose wide and bright as the dead man’s horse
slowly tapped out a funeral drum's beat on the hard, dry dirt of
the high plains. Steam rose from the horse's flanks in the chill of
the autumn night. Ronan Lynch didn’t feel a thing.
Ronan didn’t feel much of anything these days. Being dead had
a way of doing that to a man. Still, while most of the dead lay
rotting in their pine-box beds, Ronan was roaming about the
West, so he counted himself lucky.
These days, though, Ronan’s luck seemed mostly bad.
A howl pierced the night sky like a silver needle through
black velvet. Back in his breathing days, a shiver might have shot
up Ronan’s spine. Now hc just listened to his bay skitter
nervously as a chorus of howls rose to meet the first long,
lonely wail.
He ignored the wolf songs and concentrated on the task at
hand. As he crested a low hill, he spied the object of his
midnight run off in the distance, standing exposed sharp and
stark in the pale moonlight: a circle of pup tents squatting
around two larger tents that would have made a circus
ringmaster jealous.
Ronan had run across dozens of camps like these before:
small, lonely places that stood at the vanguard of the rail lines
racing across the broken landscape to be the first to reach the
shattered coast. What was left of California in the wake of the
Great Quake was chock full of ghost rock, the most valuable
mineral ever scratched out of the planet's crust. Rail barons
would kill to win the contract to bring the stuff Back East to the
power-hungry War Between the States that raged on to this day.
FicEZ
STRIGE BEDFELL OIE
There was something different about this camp, though. The
larger tents bore the brassy emblems of Wasatch, the company
controlled by Dr. Darius Hellstromme, the most notorious master
of steam technology the West had to offer.
That wasn't why Ronan was here though—at least not directly.
Wasatch was laying dozens of spurs off of their main line on
their way toward the coast. Hellstromme's workers were scattered
throughout the west, and situated in northern Arizona,
Monument Valley wasn't so far from Salt Lake City, the
overdeveloped Hellhole the Tombstone Epitaph liked to call the
City of Gloom.
No, Ronan had run across many rail company camps in his
meanderings around the West, but one thing made this place
odd: No tracks ran in or out of the place.
When Union Blue had hired him on to investigate this site,
Ronan’s first thought had been that the people here must have
just been a massive survey team. Now that he saw the place, he
knew that he'd been wrong. You didn’t need that many folks to
survey a stretch of land, even one as broad and starkly beautiful
as this one with its tremendous towers of stone stabbing into
the blanket of stars overhead.
Something else entirely was happening here.
Ronan reined in his horse, putting an end to its clip-clop gate.
It nattered quietly as the choir of wolves sang on.
The gunslinger dismounted and wrapped his reins around a
nearby outcropping of rock. Carrying a dead rider made the nag
nervous enough. The wolves were making her want to bolt, so he
tied her down good. She wasn't going anywhere.
Ronan strode off toward the camp, trying to stick to the
shadows as much as he could. The crunching of his boots on
the gravelly ground seemed like it would rouse a man from his
grave, but the few sentries Ronan could see patrolling the camp
didn’t appear to hear a thing.
Unfortunately, the camp squatted right in the center of a
broad, relatively smooth section of the valley. When Ronan got
within a few hundred yards of the place, he saw that nothing
larger than a jackalope could make it the rest of the way to the
camp unseen.
He knelt down and began to study the movement of the
sentries. He noticed they took a break every 15 minutes or so,
and it lasted for at least five minutes. All he had to do was wait
for their next rest and he could stalk into the camp unseen. He
didn’t have any idea what was going on here, but he was sure
the secret was under those two big tents.
He waited with the calmness of the grave until the guards
took their next break. The wolves had fallen quiet, and the only
sound he heard was the crackling of a small fire in the center of
the smaller tents.
PAGEDSriRuGE BEDFELL OWS
Ronan was just standing up to make his way into the camp
when he heard the rifles cock behind him in unison.
His right hand wandered vaguely toward the Peacemaker
hanging from his belt.
“Don't think of it, wasichu.” The tone belonged to a man
prepared to kill. The accent had Apache all over it.
Ronan lifted his gloved hands and turned.
A trio of Winchester rifles pointed down at Ronan from the
rocky top of the last small rise before the plain on which the
camp sat, The wan moonlight bleached the color from the land,
but Ronan didn't need that to tell him that the three Indians had
murder on their minds. He could see the warpaint on their faces
just fine.
The man in the center aimed his weapon right at Ronan’s
heart. “You are trespassing.”
Ronan smiled inwardly. He'd been shot through the chest
before, and he knew he could take it, even at this range. But that
didn’t mean it wasn't going to hurt.
“I was just wandering through, partner.” The gunslinger
brought down his hands and spread them wide as he walked
forward, up the rise. The two other guns poked like a viper's
fangs at Ronan’s ribcage.
Ronan ignored them until he was halfway up the rise. Then he
stopped short and put his hands back up. “I'm on my way from
Denver to Virginia City. I just saw the camp and wondered if
they'd be willing to let me bunk near them for the night”
A single wolf's howl punctuated the sentence. The beast was
closer now—much closer.
“You are not welcome here!” hissed the Apache to Ronan's
right. Her voice was thin and brittle. Even in the dimness, Ronan
could see that she was beautiful, her long, black hair running
down her back in a warrior's braid.
The Indian to Ronan's left whispered something to the others
in Apache. Then there was a burst of conversation in hushed
tones. There seemed to be some sort of disagreement among
them that was soon cut short by the man in the center. The only
word the hired gun was able to make out was “Taza.” It was
apparently the center man’s name.
“What's the story?’ Ronan asked when the Apaches fell silent.
The center man snorted and glared right into Ronan’s eyes.
“My friends here,” he said, not taking care to be quiet this time,
“they ask me why | bother talking to you at all. Why do | not
shoot you down.”
“And?”
‘| tell them that I don’t want to hurt an innocent man.
“You're Taza, right?” asked Ronan. The center man nodded.
“Son of Cochise. I've heard of you. Your words mean a lot to your
people.”
Face 4
SIRMGE BESTEL OWS
Taza nodded. “Finally, you speak truly.’ The wolf sounded off
again, even closer this time. Taza's friends shuddered at the
sound, but the Apache leader's face was like a fresh-carved
tombstone.
“So what did you tell them?”
“| have heard your story and measured your words. You are not
an innocent man.”
Ronan could see where this was heading, and he didn't like it.
He glanced from one set of murderous eyes to another and
waited for the wolf to howl again.
When it did, he dove to the ground, scrambled to one side and
went for his gun. As he brought it up, a bullet grazed his ribs.
Ronan barely noticed the second shot pierce his left thigh as
he squeezed off three quick shots. The first smashed into the left
Apache's arm, knocking his gun away. The next caught the
woman in her right shoulder and sent her spinning to the
ground and exposing Taza to Ronan’s sights.
Just as Ronan was firing at the leader, Taza’s rifle barked. The
bullet smacked the gunslinger square in the chest, and his own
shot went wide.
Stunned, Ronan went rolling down the short rise until he
came to a rest in a dusty heap. When he recovered, he scrambled
to his feet to spot Taza helping his injured companions escape.
Ronan grunted and started up the side of the rise again,
hunting for his pistol, which he'd dropped. He spotted its
polished barrel gleaming in the moonlight and went for it,
keeping his eyes trained on the top of the rise the entire time.
Taza and his friends were gone for now, but there was no telling
how long that would last.
Just as his hand closed on his gun's grip, he spotted the
creature.
It topped the hill near where Taza had disappeared. It was
taller than the tallest man and covered entirely in long fur that
gleamed in the silvery moonlight. It stood on two legs like a
man, but when it reared back its head and let loose with a howl
that curdled the gunslinger’s long-dead blood, Ronan knew there
was nothing human about it.
Ronan kneeled into the shadow of a nearby rock and
furiously reloaded his half-empty gun. As he did, he peered over
the top of the rock and watched the abomination as it prowled
the crest of the rise. It moved like a hunter, sniffing the air for a
scent on the wind. Ronan had no doubt as to who it was
planning to make its prey.
The blackish stuff that passed for Ronan's blood was trickling
thickly down into his boot, reminding him that the damage to his
leg was going to make it difficult to run. The wound was already
closing, but it wasn't going to heal quickly enough to do him any
good.
PAGESSIRMGE BEDFELLOIS
Ronan brought his arms over the top of the rock and leveled
his gun at the slavering beast. As he took aim, the thing
suddenly spotted him. It turned, snarling savagely and baring the
meat grinder that overplayed the part of its massive, fang-filled
mouth.
Ronan fired as it leapt at him. Two shots buried themselves
into the thing's chest but didn’t even slow it down. The beast’s
leap carried it entirely over the rock the gunslinger was hiding
behind. As it landed, it let loose another horrific howl.
Ronan drew his Bowie knife with his left hand while
brandishing his Peacemaker in his right.
“Nice doggy,” he said. “Just roll over so I can scratch your belly
with this knife.”
With that, the creature cocked its head at the gunslinger and
raised its furry eyebrows at him. Then it reared back its head
and let loose an all-too-human cackle.
Ronan spit on the ground. He knew he was in trouble.
The beast leaped at him, and he had just enough time to
reverse his grip on his knife before the thing was on him. He
jammed his knife arm up under the thing's throat, exposing its
massive neck.
The creature's claws slashed deep into Ronan's chest, tearing
him open like a Christmas present. Ignoring the pain, the
gunslinger shoved his Peacemaker up into the thing's throat and
let loose.
Ronan emptied the whole cylinder into the beast’s neck. Bullet
after bullet blasted away muscle, bone, and fur. Gristle and gore
flew everywhere, and Ronan was covered in the creature's hot,
red blood.
When Ronan's hammer finally fell on an empty chamber,
though, the beast was still relentlessly tearing at him. He gagged
on its fetid breath as its jaws snapped at his head, held back
only by his left forearm, which he held out before him like a
wrought-iron rod.
It was then that the beast stabbed its razorlike claws around
Ronan’s sternum and cracked his ribs apart like he was a
Thanksgiving turkey.
The massive trauma took Ronan’s breath away, and before he
could find it, he'd also lost his heart.
The beast ripped the lifeless muscle from between the
gunslinger's lungs and held it up toward the moon like some
savage trophy before wolfing it down in a single gulp.
The creature let loose a howl of sheer triumph and was
answered by what sounded like every canine in the county.
The last thing Ronan remembered before he finally passed out
was the sound of the beast gagging up its prized meal.
A smile crossed his face as he finally fell still. Apparently he
had disagreed with something that had eaten him.
FAcE6
SIRMGE BEDFELLOIS
CHAPTER Two
It was still night when Ronan awakened. The moon had gone
down, and the land was shrouded in darkness except for the
constellations shining down on the land below.
The first thing Ronan realized was that he could barely move.
As he shook the sleep from his head, he quietly hoped that it
had all been a bad dream.
Not the way his luck was running.
His hands were still intact. In fact, he still had his Bowie knife
trapped in a death grip in his left fist. He dropped the knife and
felt around.
His chest had been shredded like a mass of wet newspaper.
And sure enough, his heart was gone. Still, he thought it might
not have gone too far.
His spine was still intact, he was pretty sure. He'd never had a
chance to touch the front of it before, but he couldn't think of
what else in his battered corpse would feel quite that way. Plus,
he could feel his toes.
Of course, with the mess that had been made of the muscles
in his belly section, he wasn’t going to be sitting up any time
soon.
Ronan looked over toward the east and saw the first hints of
the false dawn. He was going to have to hurry to get out of here
before someone found him in the daylight. He could play dead
forever by just keeping still, but folks had a way of burying
corpses, even ones as ugly as his. He had no desire to have to
dig his way out of a grave today, and as weak as he felt, he
wasn't even sure he could.
Putting aside the pain that every move sent through what was
left of his butchered body, Ronan reached out, grabbed a stretch
of ground, and pulled himself over onto his stomach. It tried to
squirt out from beneath him, but he pushed it back below his
ribs as best he could.
Ronan needed meat to help replace the bits he'd lost, and he
needed it soon. The only way to get that was to make it back to
where he'd left his horse.
Ronan started the long, torturous crawl up and over the rise.
He hadn't gotten 30 feet when he stumbled across what he was
really missing: his heart.
The mangled lump of flesh had once pumped his blood
through his body. He'd relied on it constantly from his birth all
the way through to his death. Since then, it hadn’t seemed like
he'd ever have much use for it again.
He didn’t want to do it, but he desperately needed meat.
“Any port in a storm,” Ronan muttered to himself, then bit
into his heart like a ripe apple.
FAcE7SIRMGE BEDFELLOVS
He finished off about half of it before stuffing the rest into his
pocket.
Ronan could struggle to his knees now, and he was pretty
sure he'd be able to make it to his horse before the sun peeked
over the rim of Monument Valley. With luck, the thing wouldn't
shy away from him, and he'd be able to make a much-needed
meal from its flanks. After getting his fill, he could try to hike
into town.
Desmondville was a tiny place, not much more than a stop on
the stage line, but Ronan had friends there. These were the kind
who knew what he was and would be willing to help him out,
far away from the prying eyes of the locals. If he could only get
to them.
He worked his way over the rise and down into a dry
streambed. He made his way along it for a while and then
crawled up and over another hill.
As he looked downward, his heart would have fallen into his
stomach if it hadn't already been ripped from its regular place.
At the bottom of the slope, he saw his nag being picked over by
a flock of buzzards in the grayness of the imminent dawn. She'd
been gutted by some monstrous creature—probably the same
damned beast trying to get the taste of Ronan’s heart out of its
mouth.
Ronan shooed the damned things off as he made his way over
to his ex-ride. He didn’t want to scare them off with his gun for
fear of gathering unwanted attention. They were cowardly things
that took flight as he neared. They flapped casually away but
continued to circle overhead, eager to finish off the dead horse
or its long-dead rider.
His stomach still growling, Ronan looked down at the horse.
The best parts of it had apparently been wolfed down by the
heart-eating beast, and the buzzards had picked the remnants
pretty much clean.
Ronan rolled on his back to curse at the birds, but before he
even really got started, an idea hit him. He closed his eyes and
lay in wait.
A few minutes later, the buzzards began circling lower and
lower. It wasn't long before one of them landed near the horse's
corpse and began pecking away at what it could find. Then it
turned its attention to more fleshy pickings.
Ronan waited until the bird actually tried to peck a chunk out
of his liver. Then, in one swift move, he reached out and wrung
the surprised buzzard’s neck.
With a few quick strokes of his knife, Ronan had enough fresh
squab to make himself a decent meal. As he devoured the raw
meat, he looked up at the other buzzards that had been warned
off by the squawking of their dead sister, and he thought about
seconds.
Faces
SIRMGE BEDFELLOV=
CHAPTER [KEE
“You do get yourself into the strangest situations, Ronan,”
offered Velvet Van Helter as he ministered to the dead man’s
wounds, The meat Ronan had eaten had helped some, but he
was still a real mess. His rib cage had knitted back together, but
his flesh was still flayed to pieces.
The slim, sandy-haired huckster—as those who followed the
mystical teachings of Edmund Hoyle liked to call themselves—did
his best to put back together the jigsaw puzzle that was Ronan’s
skin. He was wearing one of his signature, all-velvet suits. The
color of the day was, appropriately enough, a burgundy so dark
as to verge to black. He'd already taken the jacket off and rolled
up the sleeves of his crisp, white shirt.
“Interesting,” Velvet murmured as he examined Ronan’s
wounds. “You'd almost think that these were made by some kind
of huge dog or wolf.”
The huckster poked around in the hole in Ronan's chest a bit
more and seemed to come to a conclusion. “From what you told
me of your attacker, I'd say it's pretty clear what you were up
against last night.”
Ronan just looked him in the eye and grunted for him to go
on.
Velvet stood up and walked over to his steamer trunk on the
other side of the room. He continued to talk as he rummaged
through the smaller drawers.
“Now, I've never actually had any personal contact before with
one of these creatures, you understand, but there were always
dark and nasty rumors of their ilk being involved in all sorts of
nasty affairs around the fair Crescent City. The Cajuns in the area
called them garou. The rest of us simply referred to them as
werewolves,
“By day, these creatures walk among us as human beings, but
they carry with them a terrible curse. On nights when the moon
is full in the sky, they transform themselves into savage beasts
more wolf than man. And they are compelled to hunt—and to
feed.”
“Are you Sayin’ these critters don’t have any choice about what
they're doing?”
Velvet nodded as he continued to search through the trunk.
“Well, then I think your New Orleans wolf-men are different
than what they got here in Arizona. This fella enjoyed what he
was doing, no mistake about it.”
“You mentioned, though, that you shot this werewolf several
times with little effect.” Velvet seemed to find what he was
looking for and turned around to face Ronan. He held something
in his balled-up hand.
PicE?SIRMGE BEDFELLOWS
“True enough. So?"
“According to the legends in N'awlins, such creatures are
unaffected by normal means of destruction. Only one thing can
hurt them.”
Ronan raised an eyebrow at the huckster. Now he was curious.
“What's that?”
Velvet stepped forward and opened his hand, revealing six
brass-jacketed bullets, the tips of which shone brightly in the
light. “Silver,” he said, “only silver.”
Velvet dropped the bullets into Ronan’s outstretched hand. The
gunslinger examined them carefully. “Just like that ranger, eh?
These must have cost you a mint.”
“In Nawlins,” the huckster said flatly, “we take our legends
seriously.”
Silence fell over the room for a long moment. Ronan plugged
the bullets into a spare cylinder for his Peacemaker, and Velvet
turned his attention to his friend's wounds once again.
“How's Betty doin’?” the gunslinger finally asked. She'd run out
of the room soon after Velvet had hauled his battered cadaver up
the back steps of the Full Moon Saloon. He'd heard her slam her
thumb in the door on the way out. They didn’t call her “Bad
Luck” for nothing.
“Oh, I suspect she’s doing well. I'll go down to check on her as
soon as | finish up with you.” Velvet's demeanor darkened,
contrasting sharply with his gentle Southern drawl. In his days in
the Union Army, Ronan’s general policy was to shoot any Rebel
on sound or sight. He didn't feel too much differently about the
situation now than he did then, but for Velvet he was willing to
make an exception.
“You know that as much as she values your friendship, she
has a deucedly hard time reconciling that with your lack of life.”
Ronan grimaced as Velvet's hands dug into something
sensitive. “And what can I do about that? Fall over into a grave?
I've been dead once already. It didn’t take.”
Velvet finished what he was doing and went over to the
washbasin to scrub his hands clean. When he was done, he drew
a fresh deck of cards from his shirt pocket. He broke the seal
with his thumbnail, shook the deck into his hand, and began to
shuffle it deftly. “Shall we begin?”
As Velvet walked over to where Ronan was lying in one of the
room's two beds, he said, “All I mean to say is that Betty is a
delicate, young lass with easily offended sensibilities—at least as
far as the arcane is concerned.”
Ronan ignored him for a moment as he reached into his
pocket to get something Velvet had missed.
“Is hard for her when you come in like this,” the huckster
continued. “It’s not that she doesn't know you're dead, of course.
I's just that at times like this...”
Face 10
SIRMGE BEDFELLOV=
Velvet looked down at his patient and saw that Ronan was
holding the remnants of his heart in his hand and prying apart
the skin on his belly with the other.
“Don't let me stop you, Reb. I'm just trying to put this back
where it belongs.”
Velvet, just a bit paler now, whispered, “Don't let me stop you,
please.”
* * *
Velvet shut the door quietly behind him and made his way
downstairs into the main room of the saloon. Betty was waiting
for him at a table by herself.
She had taken off her beige Stetson, and her curly hair, the
color of hand-rubbed pine, shone in the early morning sun
peeking in through the saloon’s front window. She looked up at
Velvet, the trouble in her heart showing plainly on her face. She'd
already bandaged her thumb.
“How is he?" she asked quietly, looking only at the way her
hands were folded on the table in front of her like the steeple to
a church.
Velvet let out a long sigh. “He'll live—that is to say, he'll soon
be as good as he ever was. All he needs now is a little time. By
tonight, he'll be knit together tighter than your favorite blue
sweater.”
“I'm glad to hear that,” said Betty, unable to meet Velvet's eyes.
“Betty,” he started, laying a hand over hers.
“It's okay, Velvet,” she said, pulling away. She looked up at him
with tears welling in her eyes. “Gosh, I'm sorry. We've ridden
together for so many miles. I know you're a good man, and
Ronan is too. It’s just that...”
“What?”
She stumbled for the words, then, “Well, you both work with
evil in your own ways.
“Ronan, he's got some kind of spirit in him that keeps him
walking around long after he should be fertilizing a flower bed
near Denver. And it makes it so we can’t entirely trust him. Ever.
That's hard.”
Velvet reached out to pat her hands again. This time, she didn’t
pull away.
“And you, Velvet. Ronan never had much of a choice about
what happened to him. He didn’t ask for it. But you, you chase
down these—these...”
“Manitous.”
“Yeah, and then you play games with them.” She squeezed his
hand tightly. “And what kind o’ monster coulda hurt Ronan like
that? It just scares me, Velvet.”
A deep frown creased the huckster's normally amused face. He
didn't wear it well. “I'm sorry, Betty, but that's just who | am—who
we are.”
Pace tt
OO LE EE EE EO —SIRMGE BEDFELLOW=
“You're not so innocent yourself, you know. That rifle of yours
doesn't fire pralines. But the people you use it against have all
got it coming"
“We do what we have to do. We fight fire with fire—evil with
evil—and that's that.”
“It's the kind of world we live in.”
“But what does that say about this world and where were all
headed? I know what you're saying is true, and I can see what
might be coming. All too clearly.”
A single, fat tear rolled down her cheek as she stood up to
leave. She picked up her hat and turned to go, but before she
left, she looked back at him and said, “But it doesn’t mean I have
to like it”
CHAPTER For
Albert Dinkins sharpened his knife as his old nag trotted along
slowly toward Desmondville. It had been a long, hard trail to
Arizona from Deadwood, but it was almost at an end. Dinkins
was already making his plans for the rest of the evening. He was
going to grab himself a room in the local saloon, saw some
quick wood, and then head out that night to investigate the
Wasatch encampment.
Kang was paying Dinkins plenty—the mysterious warlord
behind Iron Dragon always did—but he'd have made this
particular trip for free. According to what Kang’s man had told
him, Lynch was already in Desmondville, and Dinkins had a
score to settle with that Yankee.
Dinkins ran the edge of his blade along the back of his
forearm. It was sharp enough to shave a tract through the thick,
black hair.
Dinkins thought about how he was going to cut Lynch's throat
with that blade. He held it up into the midday sun and watched
the blinding light glint off its edge.
When he brought it back down, they were there.
“Howdy, stranger,” said the first one. He was a short man with
a greasy beard. He wore a long, grimy coat stained all over with
splatters of dark stains He carried a Spencer buffalo rifle slung
over his right shoulder. Dinkins could see the man’s sneer, even
behind the mustache yellowed by years of exposure to tobacco
juice.
Dinkins didn’t say a word. He just stared back at the quartet as
he let his hand rest on the grip of the pistol hanging low on his
hip.
“What my rather rustic friend here is trying to say,” started the
well-dressed tinhorn to the mountain man’s left, “is that we
would appreciate it if you could tell us just exactly, well—”
PaseizZ
SIRAMGE BEDFELLOWE
“where are we?” finished the lady standing behind them. She
was a true beauty, a dusky thing with smoldering eyes that
instantly reminded Dinkins of just how long he'd been on the
trail. From the look she was giving him now, though, he knew
he'd have better luck with a pack of wild wolves than this sweet
thing.
The Indian to her left stared at him with a face carved of
something harder than stone. Dinkins felt like he was being sized
up-—for a pine box.
At the woman's question, Dinkins just laughed. “Where the Hell
do you think you are, ya durned fools? How in Tarnation do you
think you got here?”
The tinhorn with the funny accent flushed red. “Sir, | apologize
for what must seem to you a marvelously amusing situation. You
have us at a disadvantage.”
Dinkins thought about that for a moment while he kept
laughing. The woman seemed slightly intrigued by her
companion’s flustering, and the trapper and Indian were actually
grinning. Then Dinkins went for his gun, and suddenly no one
was smiling at all.
“Yd say yer right about that, mister. Four o’ you out here in the
wilderness. Lost and alone. Not a horse for any o' you.”
Dinkins chuckled. “Way | figure it, 1 shoot the three o’ you, I'm
doing you a favor. Leastwise this way you'll go quick-like 'steada
starving here lost in the middle of nowhere.”
“Only three of us?” asked the woman.
“Sure, sweetie. You're too purty to go to waste.”
Dinkins cocked his Navy revolver and pointed it right at the
trapper’s head. “You, on the other hand, somebody shoulda shot
you at birth.”
Despite the fact the trapper had a loaded gun pointed at his
head, he was showing all that was left of his teeth with a grin
wide enough to split his head. As Dinkins watched, the gash
grew broader until both sides almost touched the trapper's ears.
The trapper's face drew longer and more ferocious—and even
furrier than ever. Before Dinkins knew it, the trapper had grown
tall enough that he was staring the gunslinger straight in the
eye, despite the fact he was sitting atop his horse.
Then the thing that the trapper had become snarled.
Dinkins fanned his pistol, unloading everything he had into the
beast’s heart. Slug after slug slammed into the monster's furry
chest, but the trapper-cum-creature just stood there grinning.
When Dinkin’s gun was done, the werewolf reached over and
grabbed the revolver by its scorching-hot barrel. Then it blew the
smoke off the pistol’s barrel and into Dinkin's wide-open face.
The gunslinger stared straight into the creature's saucer-sized
eyes and fainted right off his horse.
* *
Pace BSIRAGE BEDFELLOVS
Earl Cotten shrugged out of the ruins of his clothes and
laughed. “Sonuvagun never had a chance.”
“Certainly not,” opined Isaiah Morningkill in his upper-class
New York accent, dabbing at a spot of blood on his lapel. While
Cotten’s wounds had already healed, the bullets had made a bit
of a mess as they'd exited his body. “The Delirium would have
seen to that. You hardly needed to tempt fate with the man’s
fragile heart.”
Cotten smirked as he removed Dinkin’s jacket and pants.
“His fate could have been worse.” Proud Speaker's words were
flat but true.
Cotten slipped into Dinkin’s clothes and then went after the
man’s boots. “Yeah, but if I'd messed him up, where would I be?
Wandering ‘bout this world with nary a stitch for myself.”
The mountain man caught Walks-Among-Men’s eye and lent
her a broad leer. “And we wouldn't want that now, would we,
Annalee?"
“You paint such a pretty picture, Mr. Cotten,’ said the woman-
shaped wolf. “It’s too bad the subject doesn't quite measure up to
the portrait’s billing.”
Proud Speaker and Morningkill did their best to stifle their
laughter, but it wasn't nearly good enough. Cotten silenced them
both with a steely glare.
“Enough chatter, boys,” said Annalee LaBelle. “We haven't come
all this way through the Umbra and from one world to another
just to banter meaninglessly.”
Morningkill cleared his throat. “Too true, sweet girl.” He turned
to the trapper. “We are all weary from our long journey. Have you
any idea where we might be?”
The Indian spoke up. “This world seems similar to our own.
This is Monument Valley here, just as it was when we left our
own realm. The land seems entirely the same. In our world,
Desmondville is only about 20 miles to the east.”
Cotten sniffed at the air “That's not the way our boy’s gone,
although it's kind o’ hard to tell. His scent’s all around this place.”
“I suggest we adjourn to Desmondville and relax until sunset.
It's sure to be a most intriguing evening, and we're bound to need
our rest.”
“what about this...man?” asked Annalee.
“He will awaken soon,” offered Proud Speaker. “He will be
burned badly by the sun, but he should be able to make it to
shelter before the light falls from the sky”
“Whut the Hell d'ya care ‘bout him for?” complained the
trapper. “He'da killed us dead given half a chance.”
“He is an innocent,” said Morningkill, “and never a real threat
to those such as us.”
“He was harmless, all right,” Cotten snorted. “But as for
innocent, there ain't no such animal.”
Puce 4
SIRMGE BEDFELLOWE
CHAPTER FWE
That night, Velvet found Ronan in the main room of the
Monumental Saloon. The gunfighter was in the middle of a long
argument with a bottle of cheap whiskey, and the whiskey was
losing. As Velvet sat down across the table from him, Ronan
poured the man a short drink.
The Southern aristocrat pulled his glass to his lips and sniffed
the golden fluid, then drew back, wrinkling his nose. “How can
you drink such vile slop?” he asked.
“Given my condition, it’s not so hard,” the Yankee said flatly
“Besides, I'm not drinking it for the taste of it.”
“Ah, yes," Velvet nodded. “Something to keep off the stench of
death. As a drink, it makes a wonderful deodorant.”
“Yep, but it’s a piss-poor way to get a bad taste out of your
mouth.”
Ronan poured himself another shot and downed it in one gulp.
“Just trying to be polite to my trailmates. Speaking of which, just
where is the fair Miss McGrew?"
Velvet grimaced. “Up in her room.” He hesitated for a moment,
then: “Packing”
“Really?” said the gunfighter. “Where's she planning on leading
us next?”
“That's just it, friend,” Velvet began. “She's working more on
leaving than leading.”
Ronan rubbed his chin as he thought for a moment about
what that meant. He took a long pull straight from his bottle
while he ruminated further.
“| suppose | know what this is about.”
The huckster nodded solemnly. “She'd like to depart in the
morning.”
“And how about you?”
Velvet sat back in his chair. “She's asked me to accompany her.
I'm considering it.”
Ronan snorted. “What's to consider? You can be trailmates
with an ungrateful bag of bones or a pretty young girl. Doesn't
seem like much of an argument to me.”
Velvet smiled mirthlessly. “I knew you'd understand.”
At that moment, the conversational roar of the room was
shattered by the arrival of four strangers.
The place went entirely quiet as the long-timers paused for a
moment to size up the new folks. Apparently unimpressed by
what they saw, they returned to their jobs, drinks, or cards
straight away.
Cotten lead the way into the saloon and plopped down in a
chair at an empty table. The trio with him glanced around
suspiciously for a bit, then followed suit.
Pace1sSIRMGE BEDFELL Ov=
As the travelers sat only yards away from Ronan and Velvet,
Morningkill motioned to the bartender, an easygoing young man
in a grimy, once-white apron. The man favored the newcomers
with a nod and an easy smile.
“A bottle of your best wine,” Morningkill requested as he
removed his tailored jacket and hung it over the back of his
chair.
The young man snickered softly to himself as he sauntered
over to the table, uncorking an unlabeled green bottle as he
went. “I don't know if this'll please your refined palate,” he
offered as he slapped the bottle down on the table, followed
quickly by four sparkling, spit-polished wine glasses. “But it’s the
best you're gonna find ‘round here.”
Missing the youth's gentle sarcasm, Morningkill sniffed at the
offered cork. For a moment he seemed pleased. Then he suddenly
crinkled his nose as if he'd found something repulsive on the
end of the stopper.
“Somethin’ wrong with it, mister?”
Cotten looked up to see his “civilized” friend giving the hairy
eyeball to a pair of men sitting in a corner of the bar. One was
sharply dressed in a finely tailored suit made seemingly entirely
from the same bolt of midnight blue velvet.
His companion looked, literally, like death warmed over. To the
sensitive nose of the tracker, he smelled worse.
Cotten rose slowly to his feet, his hand already reaching for
the rifle he'd propped up against the wall. “I don’t think yer ol’
grape juice is what's bothering my friend there, son. | know the
smell of the grave when I'm sitting next to it.”
The bartender looked at him confused, then noticed Cotten’s
white-knuckled grip on his rifle and took three long, slow steps
backward. “Now, mister,” he began, “we don’t want no—"
“Hey, you!” barked Cotten, loud enough for the entire room to
hear. Everyone ignored him. Lots of people shot off their mouths
in a saloon.
Annalee plucked at his sleeve, trying to get him to sit down.
“Now's not the time,” she started. “We have more important issues
to concern ourselves with."
Then Cotten cocked his rifle and tried again. This time, he had
everyone's attention. “Mister,” he said, “| mean you!”
A man who'd been playing the piano shut the lid on the
keyboard, grabbed his hat, and left. Most of the other saloon
patrons decided the piano player had the right idea and were
close on his heels. In the end, only the Garou, the bartender, and
two others were left.
Velvet reached into his vest pocket, brought out a deck of
cards, and began shuffling.
Ronan looked up to stare straight down the barrel of the
trapper’s rifle.
Puce 16
SRMGE BEDFELLOV=
CHAPTER Sx
Ronan knew when someone had the drop on him. He put up
his hands and got to his feet.
“Do I know you?”
He knew he'd done a lot of evil in his day, especially since the
manitou inside him had dragged him screaming back from Hell.
This wasn't the first time someone he didn’t remember had come
after him for something he'd done. It likely wasn't going to be
the last.
“Naw,” said the trapper, inching closer behind the barrel of his
gun, “and we ain't gonna have us any time ta get acquainted. 1
know all about yer kind. I guess bloodsuckers like you are just
as common.in this world as mine.”
Proud Speaker stood and put his hand on Cotten’s shoulder
and looked deep into his hard eyes. “This is not the time. It is
not our place.”
“Yes," offered Annalee, a note of pleading in her voice, “we're
not here to hunt this prey. We've got more important game to
ursue.”
g Cotten looked down at her for a moment, his resolve
crumbling. It was then that Ronan knocked aside the rifle and
went for his gun.
The flat crack of the shot banged out, and Cotten was
knocked sprawling to the floor.
Morningkill jumped up and went for the shiny new pistol _
hanging on his hip, but a second shot smacked into the table in
front of him. He froze, his move half complete, as Ronan shook
his head at him and once again cocked his smoking gun.
Proud Speaker and Annalee huddled over their injured friend
as he lay on the floor.
“Is it bad?” asked the Indian.
The woman ripped apart Cotten's blood-soaked shirt to get a
better look at his wounded shoulder. “He'll survive, although I'm
worried about how he'll be when he awakes. A normal man
would likely die from this, but—"
Just then, Cotten’s eyes flew wide, bloodshot with a horrible
rage. “But I'm no normal man!” he growled, the fur already
spreading across his face.
Ronan kept his gun trained on Morningkill. The tinhorn put up
his hands, mimicking Ronan's own position of a few moments
earlier. A wide smile creased the man’s face.
“Scrape your friend's hide off the floor and hightail it outta
here. | wasn't asking for trouble.”
Morningkill’s smile widened as he glanced down at Cotten, still
on the floor. The trapper’s clothes were shredding as he grew
larger and furrier.
Pace l7SIRMGE BEDFELLOVE
“Oh, but your bullet has certainly purchased it for you, foul
abomination. Gaia does not gladly suffer such affronts to nature
as yourself. We are the Earth Mother's servants on this or any
other Earth, and..." Morningkill looked down once again and then
stepped aside.
“But I see the time for talk is over.”
With that cue, the beast that had once been Earl Cotten stood
up to its full height. Its pointed ears brushed against the low
ceiling as it rose. Blood still glistened on its shoulder, but the
wound had already healed, showing little more than a pink patch
of hairless skin poking out through the beast's thick, glossy coat
of fur.
The werewolf snarled, baring two rows of spiky teeth at
everyone in the room. The young man behind the bar fainted
dead away.
Ronan and Velvet stood their ground. “Ronan,” the New
Orleans dandy said out of the side of his mouth, “do you still
have those little gifts | gave you?”
“Yeah,” whispered the gunfighter in an awed voice. Although
he'd faced one werewolf recently, that had been a ferocious
struggle in the dark of night. Here in the well-lit saloon, he could
take in the entirety of the beast in all its terrible glory, and the
very sight gave the dead man pause.
With a quick riffling of his cards, Velvet said, “I think now
would be a good time to put them to use” His voice was as
brittle as new frost on glass.
Ronan’s hand dove into his jacket pocket and whipped out the
cylinder packed full of silver. With a practiced move, he removed
the original cylinder and began to slap the new one in place.
Before he could finish, he looked up to see the once-trapper
beast launch itself at him with a snarl that almost curdled his
blackened blood.
“Damn,” he swore. “Here we go again.”
The burly creature smashed into Ronan, slamming him into
the far wall and nearly knocking him senseless. The Yankee’s
head wobbled around for a moment as if it might simply leap off
in search of greener pastures, but it held on for the moment.
Ronan looked up, wondering why the beast wasn't gutting him
again, and saw the thing hanging above him in midair.
His wonderment was shattered by Velvet’s sharp words. “The
bullets, Ronan—now! | can’t hold him up there forever.”
Ronan glanced over to see the cards glowing in Velvet's hands.
The huckster's brow knit with concentration as he glowered at
the werewolf struggling about in the air with nothing to find
purchase on.
The Yankee's hands went to work on their own, and in a
moment his gun was loaded with the priciest bullets they would
likely ever fire.
Face 18
SrRnck BEDFELLOWS
He leveled the Peacemaker at the creature's head as it howled
in total frustration. Ronan hesitated for a moment. Even if it
wasn't always possible, he liked to know why someone was
after him before he plugged him.
However, he knew the werewolf would come crashing down
sooner or later. When it did, it was sure to want his head on a
bloody platter. “I'm not about to be gutted by your kind twice in
one day,” he said as his finger tightened on his trigger. ,
Before he could fire, though, he heard the sound of two pistols
being cocked off to his left. He turned his head and saw that the
Indian had his Army revolver pressed against Velvet's temple. The
dandy’s LeMat was pointing the gunslinger’s way.
The situation was not good.
“Hold it!” shouted Annalee as she thrust herself between
Ronan and Morningkill. Glaring at Ronan, she said, “Did I hear
you say you've encountered ‘our kind’ before?”
Ronan grunted a ‘yes! “Have your friends back off before my
bullets turn this critter’s head into hamburger” _
A knowing look filled Annalee's face. "What kind of bullets?”
she asked.
“Silver.”
She grimaced. “We need to talk.”
Just then, “Bad Luck” Betty burst into the room, her rifle at the
ready. She took one look around and saw several men with guns
on each other. Then the beast hanging in the air caught her
attention.
Frustrated, Cotten gave Betty the kind of snarl that offered to
rip her throat out from where he was. She stared at him goggle-
eyed for a moment, then fainted dead away.
Ronan looked the dark-haired woman straight in the face and
lowered his gun. “So talk.”
CHAPTER SEE
“Velvet. Velvet!” Betty's harsh whisper cracked the relative
silence of the Arizona night. “What's going on? Who are these
eople?”
E velvet sighed as he sidled his horse up to the markswoman.
“It's complicated,” he began.
She cut him off angrily. “Then use small words.”
He favored her with a winning smile. “I meant no insult to
your intelligence, my dear. I was referring to the fact that it’s all a
bit bewildering to me. Despite having studied the mystical works
of Hoyle these many years, I've never heard of such a story.
“Apparently, there are many worlds—these visitors call them
‘realms'—like our own, all floating in an interdimensional soup,
similar to, say, shrimp bobbing about in a bowl of gumbo.”
Puck?SIRMGE BEDFELLOVS
“Correct,” offered Proud Speaker over his shoulder as their
horses clip-clopped in formation into the darkness. “Our people,
the Garou, are able to enter this ‘soup’ by stepping sideways,
slipping from one way of being and into another, We call the
soup that surrounds our realm ‘the Storm Umbra’
“Normally, we stay near to our own realm, but there are those
among us, like friend Cotten, who can navigate deeper into the
Storm Umbra. It is extremely dangerous, but there are rare
rewards. Sometimes those who survive find other realms. Your
world is just such a place.”
“As you know,” Velvet explained to Betty, “my arcane powers
come from my ability to work with spirits from a dimension the
locals call the Hunting Grounds. Apparently, these people would
call that the Near Umbra. It’s all just a matter of semantics.”
The group fell silent for a moment. At the front, Ronan led the
pack with Cotten close behind him, the Garou still wrinkling his
nose at the stench of death.
‘I should have killed you when I had the chance,” the trapper
growled at the gunslinger.
“Someone beat you to it a while ago. Try to finish the job any
time you think you're up to it.”
“Now, boys,” interrupted Annalee, coming up from behind.
“We've got ourselves a common foe. Arguing among ourselves
only helps him.”
“This exquisite woman is right as always,” said Morningkill.
“We're here to bring Billy Stormwalker to Gaia's justice. All else is
secondary.”
Ronan rubbed his still-sore belly. “I've got my reasons for
wanting that shapeshifter dead. What's with you folks? You've
come a long way to put that thing in the ground.”
For a long moment, no one said a word. Then Morningkill
spoke up.
“Stormwalker was born one of us, but he was seduced by the
dark power of the Wyrm, the thing of rot and chaos that
threatens to destroy Gaia herself. We are the warriors of Gaia,
the only thing that stands between the Earth Mother and total
te We are charged with her well-being, and we shall
not fail.”
Ronan snorted in disbelief. “That's a lot of fancy talk, but it
don't explain why you followed that bugger from one world to
the next. Seems he might be out of your jurisdiction.”
Cotten hacked loudly and spit on the ground. “I'll track that
son of a bitch to the end of all that is, if I have to, and I'll taste
his throat before it’s all over,” he snarled. “Let's just say, I've got
my reasons—and they're enough for all of us.”
“Actually,” Annalee pitched in, “what Isaiah was talking about
is why Earl has so many problems with you, Mr. Lynch. A
walking dead man is an affront to Gaia.”
Pace 20
SIRMGE BEDFELLOVS
Ronan turned in his saddle to look back at the woman. Her
dark, wavy hair shone in the light of the rising moon. “I never
said a man crawling out of his grave was right. I didn’t ask for
this, but it’s who I am. 1 don’t go around sucking blood from
folks like your friend here seems to think. That ain’t my way.
“If you're gonna share a trail with me tonight—or any night—”
at this, he glared pointedly at Betty, bringing up the rear, “you're
going to have to get used to it.”
Before the conversation could go any further, there was a
shushing sound from the front. Earl Cotten turned to wave them
forward as their horses trotted to the top of the hill.
“We'te here.”
In the valley that stretched out before them, they could make
out a circle of pup tents squatting around two big tents, each
large enough to hide a house in. A fire burned brightly in the
center of the camp, and there were several men huddled around
it. From behind the blaze, a harmonica wailed a lonesome song
that drifted thinly up the gentle rise.
Velvet pulled out a spyglass and scanned the area below.
“There's got to be twenty men wandering around down there, not
including any inside the tents. I don't see any sign of a werewolf
though. Of course, if he was in human—excuse me: Homid—
form..."
Morningkill looked down his nose at Ronan. “The stench of
death around us makes it hard to discern Stormwalker's scent.”
Cotten sniffed the air loudly. “Oh, he’s here all right. He's been
marking his territory like a rabid dog. I'd recognize that stink
anywhere.”
“So where is he?" asked Betty.
Ronan got off his horse and pointed to a large splotch of
darkness on the ground. “This is where I was attacked. That's my
blood right there.”
Proud Speaker was next to him. “There's more than your blood
here. Two people and one of the Garou had their life spilled
here.”
The rest of the riders dismounted. “Can you find Stormwalker's
tracks?” asked Annalee.
The Indian and the trapper scoured the ground for a few
moments. They conferred quietly for a moment, then Cotten
spoke up. “Near as we can figure, our boy headed back to camp
right after the fight. There's no way to tell without getting in
there somehow.”
“There could be more than fifty guns down there," stated Betty.
“We can't just walk in and ask around—not after what happened
to Ronan”
“l concur wholeheartedly, miss,” agreed Morningkill. “There
must be a way to outmaneuver these cads.”
Velvet cleared his throat. “I believe I have an idea.”
Pace 21SAIRMGE BEDFELLOW
CHAPTER Fatt
The young, skinny, dark-haired man stooped over his
workbench, tinkering with a small device of no apparent use.
Perhaps it was part of a larger machine, a piece that could be
designed or repaired on its own and then plugged back into the
thing from which it came. Or maybe it was just an absurd
experiment with some insane contraption that defied the known
laws. of physics—at least as they'd once been defined before
everything had gone weird.
The lamp burning atop the young man’s long, thin head (it was
fastened there with a series of canvas straps) stood in front of a
convex mirror that focused all the light from the oil-soaked wick
into a tight ray. This beam illuminated the device in a way not
even sunlight could have, shining into all the gadget's intricate
crevices and angles.
The young man’s attention was focused on his work even
more sharply than the light. Because of this, he failed to notice
that anyone else was in the tent with him until it was too late.
Proud Speaker tapped the inventor on the shoulder. When he
turned around, the Indian slapped a hand over the man’s mouth
and shoved a large, vicious knife up under his chin.
“Whispers only,” the Indian said softly, “or your next words are
your last.”
The inventor nodded his agreement, and Proud Speaker
removed his hand. He kept the knife in its place.
“Lam Proud Speaker, warrior of the Kiowa people. Who are
you?”
For a moment, the young man was too shocked to speak, but
a little pressure from the knife prodded him along. “T-toomes.
Wendell Toomes.” The man's accent sounded much like that of
Mor soft and educated. “How did you get in here? The
guards—"
Velvet stepped forward from the darkness then, revealing
himself for the first time. In his midnight blue suit, Velvet seemed
to Toomes like he was part of the shadows themselves, suddenly
transforming into a man. “Ah-ah,” the huckster wagged his finger
at the young inventor. “That would be telling. Besides, we're
asking the questions here.”
' “What are you doing here, Toomes?” Proud Speaker pressed
along.
“Ah, I-I'm an employee of Wasatch Railroad. I'm the head of
this project. Dr. Hellstromme himself put me in charge.”
“Young sir, he didn't ask you who you're working for. He asked
what you're doing here.” Velvet gave Proud Speaker an appraising
look. “If I were you, I'd tell him. Speaker here's got one Hell of a
temper and not a whole lot of patience.”
PAGE ZZ
SiRMGE BEDFELLOVWS
“Of course,” Toomes swallowed, a bead of sweat running down
his left cheek. Eventually it caught and pooled on the blade
pressed against his neck. He didn't dare raise a hand to wipe it
away.
We're setting up a mining operation here. Dr. Hellstromme
believes that there's ghost rock in these hills, and we're going to
keep digging until we find it.”
Velvet nodded insincerely at the man. “Uh-huh. Well, Proud
Speaker, I believe that Mr. Toomes here is being something less
than truthful with us. I've been all over the West, and I've never
seen a mining operation like this.”
The huckster looked at the Indian. “What do you have to say
to that?”
Keeping his blade against Toomes’ throat with his left hand,
Proud Speaker raised his right with one fluid motion and
smashed in the inventor's nose. The man crumpled to the floor,
blood streaming down his face.
Proud Speaker looked down at his handiwork and turned to
Velvet. “He will live.”
Velvet breathed a sigh of real relief. “Fine, fine. I'd like to keep
the body count down to something reasonable if we could. ‘Don’t
spill blood unless you're ready to help clean it up/ as my daddy
always used to say.”
With that, the two set rummaging about the tent to see what
they could find. “I had to leap us into three different tents—
thankfully all empty—before we found something interesting, but
it looks like we may have finally struck ghost rock.”
The huckster held up a set of blueprints into the light still
streaming from the lamp on Toomes' head. Proud Speaker leaned
in behind him and scrutinized the papers, scratching his head.
Stormwalker’s name was scribbled in the notes lining the pages,
but that was about all he understood. “What is it?”
“As nearly as I can figure it,” Velvet offered, “this man is
working on a ghost-rock bomb.”
“A bomb | know is bad, but what is this ghost rock of which
you speak?”
“Something really bad,” the huckster answered absent-
mindedly.
Velvet stopped studying the papers for a moment to give the
Indian a sidelong glance. Then he returned to the matter at hand.
“They don't have that where you come from? Well, that might say
a whole lot about it.
“Anyhow, it's this sort of superfuel that burns a thousand
times better than coal. It's what powers the latest wave in steam-
powered science.
“It's nasty stuff. Some say those who handle it often go mad,
and you can always tell those who do. See how black Toomes'
hands are? That stain never comes off.”
Pace 2?SIRMGE BEDFELL OVS
“So what would a ghost-rock bomb do?”
Velvet rubbed his chin for a moment. “Well, I've never heard of
such a thing before, and it looks like Toomes here has set up
more than a bit of sorcery to help his infernal detonator work. I'd
Place any wager you like that this man's soul is as tainted as his
ands.”
The Indian waited patiently for the huckster to answer his
question.
“The long and the short of it is this: The bomb would release
an explosion the likes of which this world has not seen before.
Everything for miles around would be devastated, including that
sleepy little town we met you folks in.”
Velvet kept sorting through the papers, becoming more frantic
about it as he saw more.
“Why would one wish to destroy Monument Valley?"
“Hm, well, according to these papers, this would open one half
of a transdimensional rift. The other half..” Velvet shuffled
through some more papers.
“The bridge between the dimensions would be completed with
the destruction of something this man calls a ‘caern’ on the
other side.”
Proud Speaker grunted. “That is a Garou word for a sacred
place of power. This crazy man means to create a way to cross
easily between your world and mine.”
“Why would he want to do something like that?”
“1 do not know, but if it has something to do with
Stormwalker, then it is sure to be bad.”
“That's what I like about you, Speaker,” offered Velvet as he
rolled the tattered plans up into a tube. “Your gift for
understatement.”
CHAPTER WE
“They've been gone a while,” said Betty, a note of worry in her
voice.
“| wouldn't worry about it, miss,” Morningkill said. “If Proud
Speaker had been found, he'd certainly put up enough resistance
to capture that we'd have been able to hear him clearly in
Colorado.”
“Same for Velvet,” Ronan offered. “We'd know”
ey said Cotten, “I think it's us we ought to be worried
about.”
“Why's that?” asked Annalee. His tone made the hair on the
back of her neck stand up.
“Maybe you oughta ask him.” The trapper pointed up at the
rise they had worked their way down from. An Apache Indian
was standing atop it.
Fuse 24
SIRMGE BEDFELLOM=
Ronan recognized him instantly. “Taza.”
“Hello, wasichu. I'm surprised to see you alive. Stormwalker
was sure you were dead when he left you.”
“I'm just full of surprises.”
Taza clapped his hands, and suddenly Ronan, Betty, and the
Garou were surrounded. Apaches stood on all side of them, their
rifles at the ready.
“I don't suppose you'd want to talk about this,” started
Morningkill.
“You ate right. There has been enough talk from white men
like you who have promised to leave us what little lands we
fight for—and then try to take them away.” The voice came from
a man who stepped around from behind Taza and into the full
moonlight.
“tt is time for you to listen instead.”
He was a large Indian with a shock of silver running through
his raven-black hair, which he wore in a thick braid that fell
down the center of his back. A thick scar ran down the length
of his left cheek, and his dark eyes sparkled with hatred and
madness.
“I grew up on a reservation in my world, white man. One
where men like you beat my people down, stealing what little we
had and destroying the rest. We were powerless against your
numbers and your guns. Our medicine deserted us, and we were
nearly destroyed.
“When | came of age, I claimed my heritage as a Garou, and |
wandered the West, hoping to find some way to return my
people to their former glory. There were some who tried to stop
me—" with this he glared at the seething Cotten, who was doing
all he could to not let his rage have its way with him, “—but they
were doomed to fail.
“I threw off the Garou society that told me I should sit and
wait for my enemies to attack. I began talking to the Mockeries
and other servants of the Wyrm. Their whispers rang with truth."
Stormwalker wrung his hands together, warming to his tale.
“At their insistence, | explored the wilds of the Storm Umbra.
With their help, | avoided the wrath of the Storm Eater. 1
wandered from realm to realm until I found one in which my
people were becoming ascendant.”
He stopped then and pointed directly at the ground.
“The people here have powerful medicine, and I am going to
bring that back to my people. With the help of a man named
Hellstromme, I am going to create a bridge between our two
worlds. Once this is fashioned, the mighty spirits that aid my
brothers in this world will be able to come to the aid of the
people in mine.
“We will rise up against the wasichu, and push them back
once and for all.”
PASEZPSIRMGE BEDFELLOVES
There was a moment of silence which was broken by the
sound of a man laughing softly. It was Cotten.
“You think it’s that easy? You think you can undo hundreds of
ug of bad blood with a few Indian spirits? You're crazier than
a loon!”
Stormwalker strode forward into the circle the Apache had
formed. “I will not be mocked by you.”
With that, Annalee moved between Stormwalker and Cotten. “I
don't believe you have a choice, evil one. You may have larger
numbers than we, but you have only brought your friends to
their deaths.”
“True,” said Morningkill. “You know what we are. You know
that not even forty men could stand against even we three. Send
them away before this hill runs with their blood.”
“Either way,’ Cotten snarled, “you'd better say yer prayers,
‘cause you're gonna die.” With that, he began to grow larger and
hairier and even more savage. As if on cue, all three Garou
launched themselves at their captors at once.
For a few moments, it was a glorious battle. Cotten squared
off against Stormwalker, and he held his own against the larger
beastman. Morningkill and Annalee tore through the ranks of the
Apaches, the bullets from the Indians’ guns doing little to slow
them down in their full werewolf forms.
Ronan dashed over and knocked Betty into the dirt, covering
her with his body. Of them all, she was the only one who would
really regret taking a stray bullet, and there were enough of
those flying around to make the gunslinger nervous.
While Ronan tried to pick off a few braves with his
Peacemaker, five men came up from the rear of the group, each
armed with a strange sort of gun. The weapons looked as
though someone had bound a number of shotgun barrels into a
massive cylinder, almost like a Gatling gun.
At that, the alarms went off in Ronan’s head. “Get down!” he
shouted, but it was too late. The Garou would never even know
what hit them.
The crew armed with the Gatling shotguns let loose with a
thunderous spray of shells that caught Morningkill square in the
chest as he stood howling over the body of a fallen foe.
The flying lead buckshot sprayed flesh and chips of bone
everywhere, and the Garou was blasted backward into the dirt,
where he landed in a bloody heap.
Everyone froze as the smoke blew off the barrel of the
rotating guns. Stormwalker tossed Cotten toward his fallen
companion like a rag doll as Annalee raced to his side.
“Unless you'd like to all end up like your friend, you should
surrender,” said Taza.
“Any objections?” asked Stormwalker.
There were none.
FucEe 26
SIRMGE BEDFELLOVS
CHAPTER TEN
“So, Earl Cotten,” said Stormwalker, “you've come a long way
to die.”
The Garou glared at the villain (both of them in their human
forms) from where he'd been bound with steel links and
strapped to a large metal box that stood ten feet on a side.
Annalee was on the side to his left, Ronan was to his right, and
Betty was behind him. They were in a tent large enough to hold
a circus in, likely one of those in the center of the Wasatch
camp.
Isaiah Morningkill—reverted to the human form in which he'd
been born (and naked as he'd been on that same day)—lay
strapped atop the cold cube, out of sight. He hadn't made a
sound since he'd been blown away, and there was no way of
telling whether he'd finally been forced to shuffle off this mortal
coil or not.
Cotten just snarled at Stormwalker. He was beyond words.
Despite his rage, though, he was unable to transform himself
into the terrifying beast that could rip out the traitor's throat.
Bound as tightly as he was, growing into such a monster would
cause the chains to squeeze him to death. From their soft
gleaming, Cotten was pretty sure the chains had been plated
with silver too.
The trapper knew a good trap when he saw one. Now he just
had to figure a way out. He gave Stormwalker a wild-eyed look,
like a coyote caught in a bear trap. If he could have reached his
wrists, he'd have chewed off his hands to have a crack at ripping
out Stormwalker's throat.
The tainted Garou just threw back his head and laughed.
Taza and his braves stood uneasily to one side of the room. It
was late at night—not too long before dawn—and the Wasatch
workers were still asleep in their tents, or perhaps just rising for
the day.
Betty looked to the Apache leader. “Taza, I'm told you're an
honorable man. How could you ally yourself with this beast? You
know of the damage the manitous have done to our world, both
to your people and mine. How can you let this happen again?”
Taza stared at her coldly. “Stormwalker has told me of how
our people are treated in his world, much the same as they were
in ours until recently. The white governments push them back
further and further onto smaller and smaller pieces of land.
Land so hard it cannot be farmed, and the game does not come
to graze on it.
“They are a people put down, as we once were, as we still are.
I cannot stand by while my brothers suffer in this way. If I can
help them, I will.”
Puce Z7SIRMGE BEDFELL OVS
“But at the cost of so many lives?” Betty pleaded with the
man. She could see his resolve wavering.
“If it must be: yes.”
Stormwalker cackled again at his ally’s concession. Then he
turned to Ronan. “So, my indigestible foe. You are looking much
better than the last time I saw you.”
Ronan just glared at him with his dead eyes. “You gave me
your best shot, pooch. I'm ready for more.”
“Oh, are you?” Stormwalker approached the gunslinger where
he hung manacled on the steel-cased cube. He wrapped his
meaty left hand around Ronan’s leathery throat.
“Taza has encountered your kind before, and once I told him
of our battle he knew you for what you are. He called you one
of the ‘Harrowed' A man with a manitou masquerading for his
soul.”
The tainted Garou rumbled out an evil chuckle. “The Apache
also told me that this tainted soul of yours lives between your
ears. To let it out, all I've got to do is open up your skull.”
Ronan noticed that the hand around his neck was becoming
larger by the moment. Stormwalker's face slowly transfigured
from that of a raving lunatic to a slavering, mad beast with
silvery hair.
The ten-foot tall Garou brought up his right hand and
extended one razor-sharp claw directly at Ronan’s eye. The
gunslinger didn’t flinch. He wished he could reach his gun. He
was aching to put a silver bullet into this creature's brainpan.
“One poke of my finger. Right through your eye. Right into
your brain. That's all it’s going to take.”
Suddenly Ronan felt his pistol leave its holster.
“Any last words?" Stormwalker asked like a bartender making
the last call.
Then Ronan saw his Peacemaker float up behind the
werewolf’s head, and he grinned from ear to ear.
“Sure. Let me go. Or else”
Stormwalker snickered as he brought his claw close enough
to touch Ronan’s eyelashes. “Or else what?”
The ownerless pistol tapped Stormwalker in the back of the
head.
“Or my friend will blow your stinking head off.”
Stormwalker laughed nervously, looking over his shoulder to
see the gun floating there, pointed right at his head. “You should
know by now that you can't hurt me that way.”
From far off to one side—away from Taza and his braves—
Velvet and a massive, brown-furred werewolf that had to be
Proud Speaker stepped into the gigantic tent. Velvet bore a
handful of cards before him and a look of intense concentration
on his face. “'d be happy to show you just how wrong you are,”
he said.
Face 28
SIRMGE BEDFELLOVS
His companion continued for him. “He certainly can, traitor.
There's as much silver in this world as in ours, and it makes fine
bullets.”
Stormwalker seemed to consider this for a moment, becoming
angrier by the second. He snarled like a caged beast unsure of
what to do.
In one eye-blurring move, he let go of Ronan, reached out, and
snatched the gun.
“Hat” he shouted as he wrestled the thing away from his head.
“Your friends were foolish to show themselves. Now they can die
with you.”
The gun went off.
The bullet slammed through Stormwalker’s shoulder, tearing
his muscles into useless meat. He dropped the gun as he was
knocked backward into Ronan. Unable to use his arms, the
gunslinger's teeth clamped down on the beast’s ear.
The pain in Stormwalker's ear revived him from the shock of
the gunshot and set him howling. He shoved his way off of
Ronan, losing a good portion of his ear as he went. Ronan
munched on the scrap of flesh for a moment, then spit it out as
if it had tried to bite him.
“Never tried weremutt before. Tastes ‘bout as foul as you'd
think.”
The tainted Garou howled in pain again as the Peacemaker
trained itself on him again.
“You are too late to stop me!” Stormwalker snarled. “That box
I've strapped you all to is an explosive device powered by ghost
rock. It's set to go off in minutes.”
The beast cackled like a mad jackal as he watched the
reactions of everyone in the room. Taza and his braves made to
leave, while Proud Speaker leapt atop the cube and began
straining at the chains.
“You fools!” rasped Stormwalker as he clutched at his mangled
shoulder. “You cannot run far enough away. The explosion will
reach for miles around.”
Taza stepped forward. “But we will all die! You are a trickster.”
“And you are the tricked!” The beast snorted up blood as he
tried to laugh.
“You'd better turn the damn thing off if you don’t want to die
with us!” yelled Ronan.
“He is likely dead anyway,” said Annalee. Proud Speaker had
freed her, and now she was working on the bonds of the others.
“But you must have planned this all along,” said Taza in a low
voice. “How did you think you would get away?”
The beast coughed as he struggled to his feet. “Nothing on this
Earth can stop me.”
With that, Stormwalker suddenly seemed to start fading into
nothingness.
Puce ZSIRMGE BEDFELLOWS
“He's stepping sideways!” yelled Cotten. “Shoot him!”
The Peacemaker went off again, but the bullet passed right
through the place where Stormwalker had once been, and he
was gone.
CA4UPTER El EvEN
Wendell Toomes awoke with a slap to his battered face. He
was pretty sure that someone had been slapping him for a while,
and he wanted it to stop. He mumbled something to that effect,
and it did. Then he got a bucket of cold water poured over his
head, and he was wide awake.
When he opened his eyes, he wanted to shut them again. He
was standing atop the ghost-rock bomb that he'd invented, and
the clock atop it told him that it was ready to go off in less than
a minute.
Toomes nearly fainted again, but someone shook him to bring
him around. It was the strange fellow in the blue suit that he'd
seen earlier that night.
“Mr. Toomes, you've got exactly forty-five seconds to shut off
your latest invention, or we're all going straight to Hell on the
express train!”
The young inventor shook his head and got straight to work.
His vision was still a bit wobbly, which made it hard to focus on
which wires from the sorcerous detonator needed to be removed,
but he finally figured it out.
“The green one,” he muttered. “Cut the green one.”
Ronan brought his knife down on the wire.
“Are you sure?” asked Annalee. “That wire looks blue to me.”
Toomes sighed in frustration. There were twenty seconds left.
“The blue one then. Either way, that's it.”
Ronan looked his companions in the eye one by one. They
each nodded at him. He slashed at the wire, and it came free.
The clock kept ticking.
Five.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
CHAPTER [WELVE
Ronan sat back on the top of the cube and let out a deep
breath. Velvet reached forward and ripped the detonator off the
top of the bomb.
moe must be a fortune in ghost rock in this container,” he
said.
Fuce 30
SiRMGE BEDFELLO/S
“Too bad we ain’t got time to use it,” the gunslinger said flatly.
“What do you mean?” asked Betty from down on the ground
below.
Suddenly, the four Garou shimmered back into existence next
to her. They were all visibly relieved, including the already-
healing Morningkill, who was supported by Proud Speaker and
Annalee, each beneath one of his shoulders.
“1 apologize for leaving you behind,” began Morningkill. “It was
all I could do to bring the rest of us into the Penumbra.”
“There's no need for that,” said Betty. “We didn’t all need to
risk our lives.”
Ronan and Velvet climbed down off the cube, leaving Toomes
lying up there exhausted and nearly forgotten. At that moment,
Taza stepped forward. Most of his braves stood behind him, but
two came up with him. One had her arm in a sling, and the
other leaned hard on a makeshift crutch.
“1 would like to apologize,” the Apache leader said, his voice
heavy with remorse. “Stormwalker was a trickster to rival Coyote.
He would have left us all here to die."
Proud Speaker stepped forward and shook Taza’s outstretched
arm. “There is no shame in wanting to help your brothers,” he
said to him in Apache. “But you should be more careful in
choosing your friends.”
Cotten turned to Ronan, Betty, and Velvet. “Thanks fer all yer
help with that s.o.b. but we need to get going now.”
Ronan stood up and holstered his Peacemaker, which he had
collected from where Velvet's hex had let it fall. “I'm coming,” he
said flatly. His tone demanded no argument. “No one guts me and
gets away with it”
“Im coming too,” Velvet piped up. “No student of Hoyle would
ever pass up the chance to walk the Hunting Grounds and
experience a whole new world.”
“Me too,” said Betty as she looked into Velvet’s thankful eyes,
her resolve firmly drowning out the touch of trepidation in her
tone.
“| would also like to go.” Everyone turned to face the
surprising source of the voice: Taza. “I must atone for my
decisions to support Stormwalker. And if he still lives, | swear it
will not be for long”
“You're gonna have to get in line,” growled Ronan, and the
Apache bowed his head, his face still burning with his shame.
Cotten started to say something, but Annalee stepped in.
“Then it's settled. I'm sure we could use—and appreciate—all the
help we can get.”
To be continued in
Under a Harrowed Moon, Part 2:
Savage Passage!
AGE ZL| SIRMGE BEDFELLOVE
THE ASSBRE
Bp dbp ote is ls bed dd his
Hey, pardners! How’d ya like
our tall tale? They just don’t
get much more twisted than
that. Now it’s your turn to take
part in the earth-shattering
plot and put Billy
Stormwaiker's plans to an end
for good.
In case you're not quite clear
on what's going on here, you're
holding the first of a brand-
new trilogy of Dime Novels™
featuring heroes from both the
Weird West of Deadlands and
the Savage West of Werewolf:
The Wild West. It's already been
one Hell of a ride, but we
promise it's only going to get
wilder from here.
All you Deadlands players
out there already know what a
Dime Novel’s all about. It’s a
story with an adventure based
upon the story. Cool, eh?
For you new readers from
the Savage West side of things,
don't get your britches in a
bunch. This adventure includes
statistics for both games, so
you won't find yourself left
colder than a wendigo's heart.
Just read on, and it should all
become clear.
THE STOR
SO TAR
Word is that all worlds, like
those of the Weird West, the
Savage West, and even our
own, are simply different
dimensions, each a variation
on a theme (although some are
more varied than others). Some
folks call this situation the
“multiverse” because there's
“multiple universes.” Get it?The theory runs that these
universes are separated from
each other only by the thinnest
of veils. If you know what
you're doing, you can part this
flimsy stuff and actually walk
between the worlds. The only
problem is that most people
can’t even see the veil, much
less part it.
Garou are the kind of folks
that can find the veil, and they
can reach through it by doing
what they call “stepping
sideways.” When they do this,
they find themselves in the
place between the dimensions,
the otherworldly mortar that
holds the bricks of the
multiverse together.
Garou have a special name
for the region around the
world of the Savage West.
They call it the Storm Umbra
(or sometimes just plain
Umbra). The people of the
Weird West have another name
altogether for the strange
locale that invisibly surrounds
their world. They call it the
Hunting Grounds—and they're
usually not of the Happy
variety, if you know what I
mean.
“THE WALKER
BEWER WORLIDS
However you want to slice it,
our story begins in the Savage
West. There, a bitter young pup
of the Wendigo tribe (that’s a
kind of werewolf, not Indian,
although the young man was a
Sioux brave as well) got it into
his head that he should go
looking for another world, one
in which his people (the
Indians) weren't quite so
oppressed by the white men.
This man—Billy Stormwalker,
of course—wandered the space
between the worlds for many
years. Along the way, he made
himself a lot of enemies and
precious few friends. His anger
and frustration usually got in
the way, and he found himself
always returning to the Savage
West, and always disappointed.
Until he stumbled upon the
Weird West, that is.
GETING WERI>
Stormwalker had a hard
time getting through to the
Weird West, what with it being
surrounded by manitous and
all, not to mention things
darker and more dangerous.
Eventually, though, he broke
through, and he liked what he
found.
In the Weird West, the
Indians were doing just fine.
Sure, they‘d been shoved
around by the white
governments for years, but that
had all come to a screeching
halt a few years ago. Back in
1863, things had somehow
changed.
What happened is an even
more bitter Indian shaman by
the name of Raven touched off
an event that's come to be
known as the Reckoning. The
upshot of the Reckoning is
that certain evil spirits (which
the Indians call manitous) were
released from their long-held
prison and unleashed once
again upon the Earth.
Since then, things have gone
from the frying pan straight
into the fires of Hell.
Ivs 13 years later, and the
American Civil War's still
raging on, although a bit more
quietly than before. California's
fallen into the sea (at the
hands of Raven, once again). A
fantastic superfuel called ghost
rock has been discovered in
the remains of California (a
place known as the Great
Maze) and the Black Hills of
South Dakota, right in the
heart of the newly ascendant
Sioux Nations. And the dead,
well, sometimes they get up
from where they're rotting and
walk.
The long and short of it is
that magic has returned to the
world, and in a nastier form
than you might expect. Along
with it, all sorts of
supernatural critters have
reared their horrific heads. So
creatures like werewolves aren't
exactly unheard of around
these parts.
Anyhow, the place is full of
all sorts of strange types.
Hucksters that cast magical
hexes with cards. Mad
scientists that work ghost rock
into new, strange, unheard-of
technologies. Preachers that go
about banishing demons. And
native American shamans that
call on the spirits of nature—
and actually get them to
answer.
“TtHe Mat>= Meet
Billy Stormwalker really
liked what he found. With their
new magical powers, the Indian
nations across the continent
had finally been able to rally
against the encroachment of
the white men (particularly
since the white governments
were having problems of their
own Back East).For a while, Stormwalker
lived among his brethren in the
strangely similar Black Hills in
relative peace and harmony,
but eventually his thoughts
turned to those he knew back
home. He had to figure out a
way to bring this Reckoning to
his own people, to restore
them to their former glory. The
only question was: How?
Stormwalker wandered
about the Weird West, looking
for an answer. Eventually he
found it in the mind of the
self-proclaimed smartest man
in the West: Dr. Darius
Hellstromme.
As the President of Wasatch
Industries, Hellstromme had
launched his company to the
top of the burgeoning new
(ghost-rock powered) steamtech
industry, And he hadn't done it
by being nice.
When Hellstromme heard of
Stormwalker's plight, he was
struck by two things. First, if
he could come up with a way
to build a bridge between the
two worlds, he could establish
for himself a whole new world
to exploit.
Second, he was going to find
an answer.
Eventually, after days of
research and conversing with
Stormwalker, he did.
Stormwalker was constantly
bemoaning the lack of
something called a Spirit Gate,
and Hellstromme soon figured
out a way to make it.
Bul Die BRIDGES
Traditionally Spirit Gates (or
dimensional bridges, as
Hellstromme prefers to call
them) are places of incredible
power, holes in the fabric of
the multiverse laid there when
the different realities first
formed. No one had ever tried
to create a new one, until
Hellstromme bent his twisted
mind to it.
It was clear from the start
that what was going to be
needed was a terrible rent in
both worlds at the exact same
geographic location. That and a
bit of sorcerous help (by
means of black magic),
Hellstromme claimed, would be
enough to build a bridge
between the two places. Once
that happened, the manitous
would flow freely between the
two worlds, and the Reckoning
would enter the Savage West
as well.
And, of course, Hellstromme
would have a whole new world
to plunder.
Hellstromme appointed
Wendell Toomes, an ambitious
young protégé, to head up the
Weird Western half of the
project. All Toomes had to do
was engineer an explosive
device of such terrible
potential that it could actually
tear a hole in the fabric of the
multiverse. To do this, he
turned to both sorcery and
literally tons of raw ghost rock.
Such a large amount of this
precious ore was worth a
tremendous fortune—more than
most folks ever even saw ina
lifetime—and even with
Hellstromme's financial power
behind him, it took Toomes a
long time to amass it. It took
him even longer to plumb the
depths of occult obscenity and
devise the sorcerous device
that would act as the payload’s
detonator.
Toomes spent a lot of effort
on creating this bomb, and he's
damn well going to use it.
Toomes has set up his bomb
on spot in Monument Valley, in
the northern part of Arizona.
This, he’s told by Stormwalker,
corresponds with a caern (a
place of power) in the Savage
West. Once the bomb is blown,
the bridge is halfway on its
way to completion.
Toomes is holding things up
to make a few last-minute
tests, but it's only a matter of
days before he detonates his
prized device.
It's at this vital point that
the heroes finally enter the
picture.
THe See
How the heroes get involved
in the adventure depends a lot
on which of the two worlds
(the Weird West or the Savage
West) they call home. Overall,
this is a lot looser of an
adventure than you might be
used to seeing. We're just
presenting you with a situation
and letting you take it in
whatever direction you like.
There's no plotline as such,
and while this can be kind of
liberating for a Marshal, it can
also be more than just a little
bit intimidating. Relax and just
run with it. Give the heroes
their head and let them loose
for a while. Just be sure to
reign them back in time for the
finish of this portion of this
epic tale.
In the end, you want a
climactic confrontation
between the heroes and
Stormwalker. Everything else is
gravy.WERTS HEROES
If the heroes hail from the
Weird West, there are all sorts
of ways to get them into the
thick of the plot. After all, the
heroes are going to catch up
with Stormwalker in the world
of Deadlands, not Werewolf:
The Wild West. Still, it's up to
you, Marshal, to snag any
reluctant heroes in your
wicked web. Spin it as wide as
you need.
HRED Hass
The fact that Wasatch has
been hoarding a tremendous
amount of ghost rock hasn't
gone unnoticed among
Hellstromme's competitors in
the Great Rail wars (the race
to complete the first railroad
across the Weird West), If the
not-so-good doctor's collecting
such a large amount of the
stuff, it certainly can’t be good
for anyone except the professor
himself.
Hellstromme'’s rivals like to
Keep a close eye on him and
his unusual operations,
difficult as this may sometimes
be. The heroes can be hired by
any of the opposing Rail
Barons to check into the
mysterious camp that Toomes
has set up. They are to report
back as soon as they figure
out just what's going on well
enough to satisfy their
employer's curiosity.
CH CE MEETING
Of course, it’s always
possible (however unlikely) that
the heroes could simply
stumble upon Toomes’ camp
entirely on their own. It’s right
in the heart of Monument
Valley, so it's not impossible.
However, it’s a lot more
reasonable for the heroes to
run afoul of either one of
Taza's patrols or even
Stormwalker himself. Which
way it goes from there is
entirely up to you. Mayhem
isn’t out of the question.
Money My aTERS
If the heroes are something
less than heroic, they may be
interested in making money
the old-fashioned way: stealing
it
With Toomes collecting as
much in the way of ghost rock
as he is, someone's bound to
get wind of it. If that someone
happens to let the heroes
know about it, they might
think that a small camp out in
the middle of nowhere should
be easy pickings. After all, how
tough can it be to knock off a
bunch of scientific types in the
middle of nowhere. They
probably think it would be a
piece of cake.
They'd be wrong, but you
can let them find that out the
hard way. After all, who are
you to interfere?
Syace tHeie
If the heroes are entirely
from the Weird West, they're
eventually going to need some
help from the Savage West.
Otherwise, at the end of the
adventure, they're not going to
be able to follow Stormwalker
once he gets away.
Even if the heroes could
actually somehow manage to
get into the Hunting Grounds,
chances that they could track
Stormwalker back to the
ag West are pretty much
nil.
Its perfectly fine to run the
game with a mixed posse
featuring heroes from both
sides of the veil. If there are
no Garou involved, though,
you'te going to have to bring
one in as an extra. The Weird
Western heroes are going to
need his services at some
point in their adventure.
The extra Garou knows
about Stormwalker (although
not all of his plans), and he
asks the heroes to help him
put an end to the madman's
reign of terror. If you need this
kind of hero, simply use
Stormwalker’s stats with a few
modifications of your own, and
you'te set.
Of course, this extra doesn't
have to show up until after the
heroes foil Stormwalker’s plans.
Let the heroes deal with the
bulk of the adventure on their
own.
If the heroes are Garou, then
getting them involved becomes
a bit more complicated. After
all, it takes a lot to get a pack
of werewolves to chase their
quarry all the way from one
world to the next—even if it’s
Stormwalker.
As for how the heroes might
track Stormwalker across the
Storm Umbra, that’s up to you.
They could discover a map of
the route that Stormwalker
discovered, or possibly they're
just good enough to follow the
monster's foul scent between
worlds. Tailor what happens to
your needs.Orn Mea01
Stormwalker's name is
notorious among many Garou
elders, It's certainly possible
that one of these wise folks
would have gotten wind of the
renegade Wendigo's plans for
altering the state of their
world.
Wise elders certainly aren't
going to sit still while such a
man wreaks havoc upon Gaia.
Many of them are too old or
don’t posses the proper skills
to take off after a Garou such
as Stormwalker. However, they
are certainly more than willing
to call upon younger members
of their sept (or of several
different septs if need be) to
come to the aid of their
people.
when faced with such a
request, what proper Garou
could refuse? After all, the fate
of their world could be at
stake.
VENGEANCE le Mae
In his time, Stormwalker has
stepped on more than a few
toes. And heads, throats,
gonads, and so on. He's been
known to fly into frenzied
rages that don't stop until he’s
killed everything in his wobbly
path.
The heroes may have lost
someone dear to them to
Stormwalker, In fact, one of
their pack might even have
been killed by the mad Garou.
Either way, they're not about to
rest until they track the s.o.b.
down and administer their own
brand of Garou justice on him.
A- Lae Sor
If the heroes are the kinds
of folks who like to wander
about the Storm Umbra (they'd
have to be out of their minds,
but hey, they're heroes, so you
never know!), then they might
encounter Stormwalker in their
travels. This could happen in
either the Weird West or even
the Storm Umbra. It’s really up
to you.
Of course, with these kinds
of odds against them crossing
paths with Stormwalker, you
might want to have it turn out
that Stormwalker was looking
for them. Well, maybe not them
specifically, but any kind of
Garou that might be gunning
for him and trying to ruin his
plans. That makes it kind of
ironic that his own need for
air-tight security is what
causes him to run roughshod
over the wrong pack of
innocent Garou, but that’s what
destiny’s all about.
MigOR T7_ AYERS
There are two men the
heroes are likely to encounter
in ways that are bound to
change their lives (and
hopefully—for their sakes—not
involve their deaths).
Bit STORMwWALKER
Stormwalker was born an
Oglala Sioux, somewhere in
Dakota Territory. He grew up in
poverty and watched as the US
Army waged war on his
people, crushing them onto
smaller and smaller
reservations and stripping his
once-proud people of what
little was left of their dignity.
It was too much for him to
bear.
As Stormwalker came of
age, he learned that he was, in
fact, a Garou: a Wendigo
Theurge, as a matter of fact.
“Wendigo” refers to his
werewolf tribe; “Theurge”
speaks to the phase of the
moon the man was born under
and how this affects his
personality.
The Wendigos are culled
from the Indians of the Savage
West. They're a solitary bunch,
preferring to deal with the
white encroachment with their
claws.
Theurges are born under a
crescent moon. This makes
them closer to the spirit world,
making them great shamans
and mystics. They're the wise
men of the tribe, spending
most of their time pondering
the fate of their people and
how to prevent the Garou from
being destroyed.
Over the years, Stormwalker
became frustrated with the
position of his Garou and
Indian tribes. Both seemed
doomed to early extinction,
fated to be drowned under the
encroaching tide of white
settlers. He struck out from
time to time, often outright
Killing those who were
unfortunate enough to get in
his way. That's how he first
became an outlaw.
While on the run from the
remaining members of a sept
he had decimated, Stormwalker
stepped sideways into the
Storm Umbra and got decidedly
lost. When he finally found
himself, he was on the
outskirts of another realm. It
was then that his wanderings
through the multiverse began.Stormwalker is a thin man
of medium height, at least in
his Homid (human) form. He's
lean and fit from his years of
having to fend for himself in
both the wilderness of the
Savage West and the Storm
Umbra.
Clean-shaven, he has long
black hair, streaked with silver,
that he wears in a long
warrior's braid. He has a scar
down the left side of his cheek
that he got in a fight with Earl
Cotten many moons ago.
The years have not been
kind to Stormwalker. Although
he's only in his early 30s, he
could easily pass for a man in
his late 40s. Perhaps it's the
premature gray in his hair that
does it, or maybe it's the
hunted look in his eyes.
Stormwalker carries a
scattergun with him but it’s
only for show. He much prefers
to rip people open with his
talons when in his Crinos form.
He uses an oversized knife
instead when in his Homid
form.
The profiles given for
Stormwalker below are
necessarily incomplete. Let's
just say there's more to our
villain than meets the eye. We'll
let you in on the secret in the
next Dime Novel. Until then,
consider it your job to keep
Billy alive and free. After all,
it's not much of a story if the
villain gets capped in the
opening act.
WERT> PROFLE
Corporeal: D:3d8, N:4dl0, S:5d8,
Q-4d8, V:4d12
Climbin 3d10, dodge 4dio,
fightin’: brawlin’ 5d10, horse
ridin’ 2d10, quick draw: knife
4d8, shootin’: shotgun 2d8,
sneak 5d10, swimmin’ 2d10,
throwin’: knife 448
Mental: C:2dl0, K:4d6, M:1dl0,
sm:2d8, Sp:3d8
Area knowledge: storm
umbra 2d6, guts 3d8, native
language: Sioux 3d6,
language: English 2dé6,
overawe 3dl0, professional:
occult 5d6, scrutinize 4d10,
search 5dl0, trackin’ 6d10
Edges: Sense of direction
Hindrances: Grim servant 0’
death
Terror: Depends on form. See
rules on Garou in the back
of this book.
Special Abilities:
Garou: See the rules in the
back of this book.
Gnosis: 7
Assimilation: The Garou
can assimilate himself
into any culture with a
scrutinize check. The TN
depends on how alien the
culture is. If successful,
the Garou does not suffer
any prejudices from
anyone in that society.
This lasts for one day.
Command Spirit: The
Garou can force a spirit to
obey a single, simple
command. To do this, he
must spend a Fate Chip
and make a persuasion
check. The difficulty is
determined by the
strength of the spirit. On
a success, the spirit obeys
the command. Each
command requires a new
Fate Chip. This does not
summon spirits, nor can it
exorcise a spirit.
Dust. Storm: The Garou
spends a point of Gnosis,
then makes a Faith check.
The TN is determined by
how dusty the terrain is
(desert=TN 3; city=TN 1). If
successful, a storm whips
around the area, blinding
everyone, fouling
machinery (time for those
Reliability checks), and
coating everything in dirt.
This lasts for two turns
for each success.
Grasp the Beyond: This
permits the Garou to step
sideways with something
or someone without
having to dedicate it by
means of ceremony. The
Garou grabs the object to
be taken with him, then
spends a Fate Chip (white
for small items, red for
larger items, and blue for
huge items, like a person).
He then makes the usual
roll to step sideways (see
the end of this book). If
successful, he and the
object or person pass into
the Hunting Grounds (or
Storm Umbra). An
unwilling passenger can
resist with a Fair (5) Faith
roll. Every success the
passenger gets negates
one of the Garou's, The
Garou must have a
success and a raise left to
win the battle.
Persuasion: The Garou
makes a Fair (5) Mien
check. If successful, he
adds +2 to all other Mien
rolls with the current
group of people
(maximum of one hour),
Reach the Umbra: The
Garou can step sideways
into the Umbra (or
Hunting Grounds) without
having to look into a
reflective surface.
Savage the Mind: The
Garou spend Gnosis and
then makes a contested
Spirit check against the
target. If he gets at least a
success and a raise, he
can permanently destroy
one die type step from
the target's Smarts for
every raise he got. He
must spend 2 points of
Gnosis for every die type
destroyed.
Spirit Speech: The Garou
can converse with spirits
(including nature spirits
and manitou). They won't
necessarily listen to him
though.
Gear: Scattergun, box of 20
shells, Bowie knife.SAGE PROHLE
Attributes: Strength 3,
Dexterity 3, Stamina 5,
Charisma 4, Manipulation 4,
Appearance 3, Perception 4,
Intelligence 2, Wits 3
Abilities: Alertness 4,
Athletics 4, Dodge 4,
Empathy 4, Subterfuge 4,
Animal Ken 3, Crafts 1,
Firearms 2, Melee 5, Ride 2,
Stealth 5, Survival 2,
Enigmas 1, Linguistics 2,
Medicine 1, Occult 4, Science
1
Gifts: Assimilation, Command
Spirit, Dust Storm, Grasp the
Beyond, Persuasion, Reach
the Umbra, Savage the Mind,
Spirit Speech, Tornado Rider
Rage 10, Gnosis 6, Willpower
8
Equipment: Scattergun, box of
20 shells, Bowie knife.
WEYIDELL TOOMES
Wendell Toomes is an
ambitious young man who was
born and raised in Salt Lake
City, the notorious City of
Gloom (so named for the
constant haze of pollution
that's settled over it since
Darius Hellstromme set up
operations there). He's spent
most of his life working for Dr,
Hellstromme, and he even
graduated from the master
scientist's notorious Wasatch
University with only the best
grades.
Toomes is of medium height
and build, with curly, dark hair
kept short on the sides but
permitted to go a bit wild up
top. A kind of madness
sparkles in his pale blue eyes
whenever he starts talking
about science. The sparkle
might be explained by the dark
stains on Toomes' hands, since
the man rarely ever takes
precautions when working
with ghost rock. (One side
effect of the mysterious
mineral is that it can drive its
handlers insane).
Toomes is bossy, bordering
on dictatorial. He expects his
workers to follow his orders to
the letter. When he tells
someone to jump, he tells
them how high right then and
there, and they'd damn well
better hit the mark.
In essence, though, Toomes
is a man haunted by the
possibility of failure. He's rarely
actually been faced with a
situation in which he was not
in complete control. Working
with otherdimensional
werewolves and Apache
Indians in the wilds of Arizona
makes him feel something less
than secure, and he tends to
take this out on those around
him. He and Stormwalker have
clashed from time to time, but
as mad as Toomes might be,
he's not so foolish to try to
stand up to the Garou—at least
not in anything resembling a
fair fight.
WERT PROFLE
Corporeal: D:3d6, N:2d6, S:4d4,
Q:3d8, V:4d6
Climbin 2d6, fightin’: brawlin’
1d6, horse ridin’ 1d6, shootin’:
flamethrower 2d6, sneak 1d6
Mental: C:3dl2, K:6d10, M:2d8,
Sm:4d12, Sp:2d4
Guts 2d4, professional: occult
5dl0, science: ghost rock
5dl0, scrutinize 3dl2, search
2d12, tinkerin’ 5d12
Edges: Dinero, mechanically
inclined
Hindrances: Curious
Gear: Peacemaker, box of 50
bullets, notebook full of
untested designs, rocket
pack (perfect for an easy
escape), flamethrower.
SAGE PROMLE
Attributes: Strength 1,
Dexterity 2, Stamina 2,
Charisma 3, Manipulation 3,
Appearance 2, Perception 5,
Intelligence 4, Wits 5
Abilities: Alertness 3,
Athletics 1, Dodge 1, Empathy
1, Subterfuge 3, Animal Ken
1, Crafts 1, Firearms 2, Melee
1, Ride 1, Stealth 1, Survival 1,
Enigmas 5, Linguistics 2,
voll 1, Occult 5, Science
Willpower 8
Gear: Peacemaker, box of 50
bullets, notebook full of
untested designs, rocket
pack (perfect for an easy
escape), flamethrower.
CHAPTER Ol:
TDESNODILLE
Desmondville, AZ—Fear Level 2
There's not a whole lot to
say about this sleepy little spot
on the map. It’s more a small
collection of businesses
servicing the surrounding
ranches and farms than a teal
town. There are only four
buildings in the entire place.
Most of the so-called
residents of Desmondville are
farmers and ranchers living off
in the sticks surrounding the
township. They come into town
whenever they have the desire
or the need.WHAT'S THERE
TO Kiiow?
The people of Desmondville
are always happy to have some
new visitors in town, although
they're a little bit more
suspicious lately than they
usually are. They've been paid
a visit on more than one
occasion by Toomes’ men, and
sometimes the local saloon
has ended the night a bit
worse for the wear.
Still, no one's complaining
about the extra business. They
know that the people from the
camp are Wasatch employees,
and this has fueled speculation
that Hellstromme is planning
to string a railroad through the
area soon. If Toomes plans
"Ny
i
Ee
RY
» X
succeed, this is sure to happen,
but by that time, most of the
area will be a smoking crater.
Some of the cattlemen in
the saloon may speak of cattle
mutilations that have been
taking place in the area lately.
Mostly they blame it on a pack
of wolves they've heard
howling around the area ever
since that Wasatch group came
to the area. Still, none of them
have yet to bag themselves a
single wolf.
Other folks talk about the
strange explosions they
sometimes hear off in the
distance: big bangs followed by
a strange howling of the wind
(actually small, test ghost-rock
bombs that Toomes’ has been
setting off in the open valley).
Most attribute it to the rail
crews blasting their ways
through tough parts of the
valley. Sure, Wasatch hasn't
officially claimed the area for
its railroad, but competition is
fierce enough that it often
doesn’t pay to tip your hand
before you have to.
THE AILine
Oh, yeah. And then there
was that business with the
oldest Darcy boy, Wilbur.
Seems he was found staked
out in the middle of the valley,
his skin peeled away from his
chest and pinned down to the
ground with makeshift stakes
fashioned from sticks.
His chest had been carved
opened like a Thanksgiving
turkey, and his heart was gone.
Young Darcy used to like to
ride around the area from
ranch to farm, selling his
family's goods. He was favored
by all the locals as the only
Darcy who wasn't so greedy as
to sell you back your own hat
if it fell off your head. Helll be
missed.
Wilbur was secretly having
an affair with young Mrs.
Martha Persimmons of the
Monumental Saloon, and she
suspects her husband Johnny
of the horrible murder, but she
can't figure out how he could
have pulled it off. He's got a
rock-solid alibi.
Of course, Johnny didn’t kill
Wilbur. He was working in the
saloon until closing time. After
that, Martha had helped him
clean up and then gone to bed
with him. Johnny didn't even
know about the affair, only
that Martha had been distant
of late. The killing was
Stormwalker’s handiwork.
Folks are willing to talk
about Wilbur's murder, but they
don’t know a whole lot about
it. Still, it should be a clue that
something is really wrong here.MOUMENTAL. SLOOK
Description: A fine place to
wet your whistle and maybe
find a bed for the night. It's
a quiet place, with little in
the way of entertainment
save drink, cards, and a little
piano music when Al
Wilshire (a local feed corn
farmer) gets the hankering
to tickle the ivories. This
clapboard building consists
of a main room, a
storeroom, a kitchen, and
five bedrooms, one of which
is occupied by the owner
and his young wife.
Occupants: Johnny
Persimmons and his wife
Martha (owners; a young
couple who recently put up
the saloon in hopes of
capitalizing on a railroad
coming through town), 2d4
other patrons from local
farms and ranches. Martha
lives in fear of her innocent
husband, who just doesn't
understand what's going on.
Tara's GRIERAL
SIE
Description: A run-of-the-mill
general store in a two-story
building. The owners live in
the back of the main floor
and the entire second story.
Since they're the only game
in town, the Darcys
overcharge mercilessly.
Expect to pay 25% over the
standard list price for any
goods. Still, they're well-
stocked with just about
anything a local could want.
Occupants: Alex and Wanda
Darcy (owners; pleasant folks
in their middle years; they're
unwilling to bargain on their
prices) and their four
children, ages 3 to 14. All are
mourning the loss of Wilbur
Darcy, the eldest child.
WALTERS SST
Description: A small place
with just enough room for a
forge. There's a horse pen
behind the smithy, and a
shack behind that.
Occupants: Janice Walters
(owner; a stocky woman
who could arm-wrestle a
sailor to his knees; she's
good-natured as can be, and
she makes no secret of the
fact she’s in the market for a
husband..at least for a few
days).
Tow HALL
Description: A small, one-
room building that stands
unoccupied. This place
serves as the seat of the
local government, but there
is none to speak of. No
sheriff, no jail, no mayor, no
judge. An assayer passes
through about once a week
to see if anyone needs him
to evaluate a claim.
Occupants: None.
CHAPTER Two:
Mowmarr VALLEY
__ Monument Valley is located
in northeastern Arizona, high
on the Colorado plateau and
Not too distant from such
wonders as the Grand Canyon.
It’s filled with the massive,
awe-inspiring, towering rock
formations from which the
place gets its name.
If you want to really see
how this place looks (and you
don’t happen to live nearby),
check out one of John Ford's
Westerns. Most of them were
filmed in this place of
staggering natural beauty.
It's a perfect place for a
bomb threat.
PATROLS
There aren't a whole lot of
people who live near
Monument Valley. That's just
the way that Toomes likes it.
After all, it won't do to have
folks snooping around the
camp and trying to interfere
with his plans.
Of course, Toomes isn’t so
confident in how isolated his
locale is to leave the place
unguarded. To make sure that
no one disturbs his gate-
building project, he's arranged
for guards to patrol the area
for him.Toomes realized right away
that bands of armed white
men wandering about the area
were bound to attract a lot of
unwanted attention. With
Stormwalker's help, he hit
upon the perfect solution: Use
the local Indians.
No one would ever suspect
roaming bands of Apaches of
being involved in anything
more sinister than a hunt.
After all, they were crawling all
over the place already, And
they'd been known to work
with Wasatch for a price.
At Toomes’ request,
Stormwalker approached a
nearby band of Apaches (led
by Taza, son of the famous
chief Cochise) and explained
his plan to them. With the aid
of Wasatch, he would be able
to build a bridge to his world
and bring the Apache's :
newfound power and prosperity
to his people.
He simply forgot to mention
that he'd be willing to murder
everyone in the area, including
any Apaches, to put his plan
into action.
TooeE=’ Camp, Mower VALLEY
= ZAZA A A 4
= =,
Wie
Clueless as to Stormwalker's
true intentions, Taza and his
braves set about patrolling the
area for several miles around
Toomes’ camp. They are
experienced trackers and
hunters, and they know the
land like their own mothers.
They generally find anyone
poking about, unless they take
extreme (usually supernatural)
measures.
Any heroes that run into a
patrol are likely to encounter
three to six Apaches (possibly
including Taza). If the Apaches
are outnumbered, they simply
take stock of the heroes and
sneak off to get help to shove
them off the land. If the
Apaches feel confident they
can take the heroes, they stand
up and confront them right
then and there.
If the heroes are discovered
at night, the Apaches can call
upon Stormwalker for help if
they need it. The Garou
wanders around the area in his
Crinos form all night long,
every night, seemingly tireless.
During the day, he changes
back into a Homid and retreats
to his tent.
No matter where he is in the
valley, Stormwalker can hear a
gunshot. It should only take
him less than 15 minutes (or as
little as three) to find the
heroes from there. Garou in
those Crinos forms are pretty
darn fast, and Stormwalker
knows what's at stake.
THE RECLUSVE GAROU
Stormwalker is eager to
avoid any sort of attention,
although sometimes he lets his
baser appetites for blood and
destruction get the better of
him. Witness the deaths of
Wilbur Darcy and several local
beeves. Still, he tries to keep to
himself during daylight hours,
just in case someone comes
looking for him. He's pretty
distinctive looking, after all,
and it wouldn't take much for
someone to remember crossing
his path, especially if he
happened to be in his full-on
werewolf form.
That's actually behind what
happened to poor Wilbur
Darcy. The salesman was
traveling along his circuit when
he stumbled across the
Stormwalker butchering a cow.
The Garou wasn't willing to
leave any witnesses to the
carnage, so he stalked and
killed the terrified young man.
Of course, he got a little
carried away with
ceremoniously removing
Wilbur's heart, but you could
hardly expect any less from
such a hot-blooded killer.
Stormwalker's aware of the
attention the murder has
gotten in town. He knows a
Garou tracking him might
recognize his trademarks in
murder, but there's little he can
do about it now, so he's
decided to forget about it.CHAPTER [44REE:
TOOMES'’ CANE
Wendell Toomes' camp is set
up in the middle of a low point
in Monument Valley. It consists
of two large tents surrounded
by 10 medium-sized tents.
The smaller tents house two
to four workers each. At the
point the story begins, the
workers’ jobs are done, but
Toomes keeps them around
anyhow. They don’t know why,
but the real reason is that the
ghost-rock bomb needs the
sacrifice of a couple dozen
lives for the sorcerous
detonator to be able to rip
through the fabric of the
multiverse. In the meantime,
they collect their paychecks.
While the sheep wait
patiently to be led to the
slaughter, Toomes keeps them
busy as “security” for his
project. Few of the people
know a whole lot about what's
going on. All they're really sure
of is that Toomes has gathered
himself a half a ton of ghost
tock in a metal box he keeps
in Big Top #2, Also, Toomes
keeps tinkering around with
some huge device he keeps in
Big Top #1, but since all the
pieces were brought in
separately, no one's really sure
what it is.
The workers are all
moderately loyal to Wasatch
and Toomes. After all, despite
the fact they're sitting around
killing time these days, at least
they're well-paid to do it. If
push comes to shove, though,
these folks aren't really ready
to lay down their lives for their
company. They'll put up with
some gunplay, but at the first
sign that they're losing a fight,
they pull up stakes and head
for the-hills.
Toomes has trained five of
Taza's braves to use Gatling
shotguns, which tends to even
out a lot of fights. These folks
tend to hang back until they
know their services are needed.
Then they launch themselves
into the thick of the fray.
Bac Tor #1
This is where Toomes
spends just about all of his
time, This humongous tent is a
combination laboratory, sleep
space, and warehouse. The
place is strewn about with
plans for all sorts of things,
most of which concentrate on
various incarnations of the
ghost-rock bomb.
All of the blueprints are
dated, so it's easy to figure out
which ones are the most
recent. Given time to take a
good look at the plans, a hero
who makes an Onerous (7)
tinkerin’ check can determine
just what it is that Toomes is
trying to build: the most
powerful explosive device ever
known.
Of course, there's no way to
know what Toomes is building
the bomb for without somehow
getting it out of him. Since he's
rather easily intimidated, this
shouldn't be too much of a
push for someone who can get
him alone for a few minutes.
The big secret in the tent is
what's underneath the big tarp
in the middle of the room: a
number of metallic bodies in
various states of construction,
all loaded up on a steam tank
that's ready to go ata
moment's notice. These are five
different automatons that
Toomes is designing to help
him out in his first entry into
the Savage West.
Be Tor #2
The second huge tent is
where the real payoff is. This is
where Stormwalker sleeps (on
the rare occasions that he
does—mostly in the day) and
where the ghost-rock bomb is
housed.
If the heroes haven't seen
the plans for the bomb, they
might not understand what it
is. It looks just like a steel
cube, 10 feet on a side. Chunky
rivets hold the entire thing
together, and the seams have
been caulked with resin and
pine tar, making the box
airtight. The cube is built as
solid as a rock.Atop the cube, there’s a
space for the sorcerous
detonator that sets the whole
thing off. The detonator is in
place, and it's ready to go off
sometime soon (whenever you
feel it might be dramatically
appropriate—use your judgment
here).
ToenanG THE
BOVE
The detonator has three
wires coming out of it and
snaking into the box. They are
red, green, and blue. To defuse
the bomb, all the heroes have
to do is break the connection
with the blue wire. Toomes
can tell them this if he’s still
around and alive. Otherwise,
it's up to the heroes.
If they choose the wrong
wire, well.
Actually if the heroes pick
the wrong wire, nothing
happens, but the heroes don’t
need to know that. (Toomes
design for the sorcerous
detonator is slightly flawed.)
Play up the tension of the
moment for all it’s worth. Make
them sweat a little before
giving them the payoff.
You should realize that the
heroes are supposed to
succeed at this adventure with
few problems. After all, it's not
a whole lot of fun if the
heroes get whacked right at
the start of the story.
When all's said and done,
you want a few things to
happen.
Toomes can be captured, or
he can get away on a rocket
pack he's got hidden in his
tent. If things fall right, the
heroes-are going to be too
busy to bring him to justice
anyhow, so you might as well
have him steam off into the
sunset.
If Toomes is somehow killed,
that's fine. He figures into the
plot later down the line, but he
can be easily replaced. To
Hellstromme, young inventors
eager to prove themselves to
him are a dime a dozen.
In the end, though, you want
Stormwalker to get away. If he
doesn’t, the whole adventure
comes crashing to an end, long
before he gets to become a
true threat to the two Wests. If
the heroes are from the Weird
West, the Garou can always be
captured or even “killed” and
then step sideways to get away.
Either way, Stormwalker just
waits for the right time to
make his break.
EPLOwe
With any luck, most if not
all of the heroes have made it
through this adventure alive.
The key thing is to make sure
that they have someone with
them who's going to allow
them to step sideways into the
Hunting Grounds. Unless
they've cooked up something
really strange, this should be a
Garou.
After all, the next battle’s
not going to be fought in the
familiar territory of the Weird
West. It's time to brave a whole
new world.
AmcHE Bers (12)
Attack:
Rifle 3d6/3d6
Defense:
Brawlin 2
Werewolf: Firearms 3, Brawl 2
GATING
SHOTGMER= (5)
Attack:
Gatling shotgun 3d8/2d6+4d6
Defense:
Brawlin 2
Werewolf: Firearms 3, Brawl 2
WASATCH MNERS (ZO)
Attack:
Pistol 2d6/3d6
Defense:
Brawlin 1
Werewolf: Firearms 2, Brawl 1CONERING WERBYOLE: THE WL I>
WEST 1O IDRDL ADs
WoRLIos Aart
Deadlands has already got
werewolves of its own, as
described in the Deadlands
rulebook, but they’re more like
traditional creatures of legend
than the Garou of Werewolf:
The Wild West. Up until now,
the Weird West and the Savage
West have mixed as well as oil
and blood, but the story begun
in this book has blended the
two into a unique concoction
all its own.
Roleplaying games are about
a lot more than just fiction, of
course. There's a game element
to it as well
If you want to play the
adventure in the back of this
Dime Novel (and the rest of the
Under a Harrowed Moon
trilogy), it's simple. Every
character that we give details
on here has statistics for both
Deadlands and Werewolf: The
Wild West. Just use the set you
need for the game that you
happen to be playing.
GAROU N THHE
WERI> WES)
Some of you out there,
though, may want to try to
take one of your own heroes
and cast him in a whole new
light. For you brave souls, we've
got some rules for converting
your Werewolf: The Wild West
creatures into Deadlands
heroes. Let's start out withputting Garou in the Weird
West. Next time (in Under a
Harrowed Moon:Savage
Passage), we'll cover Deadlands
heroes in the Savage West.
Sept:
ACTIREVTES
To TRAITS
First, you need to be able to
convert your Attribute dots
into Trait dice. This is pretty
darn easy. Just consult the
table below. Then figure out
your Coordination for each of
your dice. Just roll a d4 for
each Trait, and that’s your
Coordination.
2
3 d8
4 dio
§ di2
The real question, of course,
is which Attributes convert to
which Traits. Just consult the
following Attributes to Traits
Table. Any time you've got
more than one Attribute that
applies to a Trait, just average
them.
Attribute Trait
Perception Cognition
Intelligence Knowledge
Charisma+
Manipulation+
Appearance Mien
Wits Smarts
1/2 Gnosis Spirit
Dexterity Deftness
Dexterity Nimbleness
Strength Strength
Dexterity Quickness
Stamina Vigor
For example, if a Garou had
3 dots in Wits, then his Smarts
die type would be a d8. A
quick d4 roll comes up 2, so
he's got 2d8 Smarts. Simple,
right?
STEP Zz: ABLES convert the basic Abilities on
MvDeES
The more complicated part
of making a Garou into a
Weird Western hero comes
with converting Abilities to
TO
Ability
Alertness
Athletics
Brawl
Dodge
Empathy
Expression
Intimidation
Larceny
Primal-Urge
Subterfuge
Animal Ken
Crafts
Etiquette
Firearms
Leadership
Melee
Performance
Ride
Stealth
Survival
Culture
Enigmas
Investigation
Law
Linguistics
Medicine
Occult
Politics
Rituals
Science
Aptitudes. We've listed how to
the chart below, but this list
can't possibly cover every kind
of skill. Sometimes it's just got
to be up to the Marshal and
the player to get together and
use their collective good sense.
Aptitude
Scrutinize
Choose a Nimbleness skill
Fightin’: Brawlin’
Dodge
Scrutinize
Persuasion, Tale Tellin’
Overawe
Lockpickin’ and Filchin’
No equivalent
Scrutinize, Bluff & Gamblin’
Animal Wranglin’
Tinkerin’
Streetwise
Shootin’: (choose one concentration)
Leadership
Fightin’: (choose one weapon)
Performin’: (choose one concentration)
Horse Ridin’
Sneak
Survival: (choose one concentration), Trackin’
Area Knowledge: (choose one culture/area)
Professional: Detective
Search
Professional: Law
Language: (choose one language)
Medicine: (choose one concentration)
Professional: Occult
Professional: Politics
Trade: Garou
Science: (choose one concentration)When converting Abilities,
the number of dots a hero had
in a particular Ability is equal
to her Coordination with that
Aptitude
If your hero's got two or
more Abilities that convert to
the same Aptitude, use the
Ability with the highest
number of dots. If the Ability
converts to more than one
Aptitude, use the same
numbers for both.
Don’t forget that all
Deadlands heroes get some
levels in certain skills for free.
These are Area Knowledge:
Home County 2, Climbin’ 1,
Native Language 2, Search 1,
Sneak |.
Only use these numbers if
the converted Werewolf: The
Wild West hero has no skills in
these areas. Otherwise, use the
converted dots. Do not add
these to the converted dots.
SIEP #:
BACKGROW DS
TO Epcesé&
HWI>KANCES
It would take the better part
of a good-sized book to cover
converting all the possible
Backgrounds into the
corresponding Edges and
Hindrances, so we're leaving
that up to you and your
Marshal. Just use your common
sense and remember: the
Marshal's word is law.
Garo IDETMLS
Of course, Garou aren't like
your average garden-variety
werewolves. They're a bit more
complicated than that. Besides
all the Traits and Aptitudes,
Form Effect
Homid None.
Glabro
Add 2 die types to Strength and Vigor. Take 1 die
type from Mien. Terror 7.
Crinos
Add 4 die types to Strength. Add 3 die types to Vigor.
Add 1 die type to Deftness. Take 3 die types from
Mien. Terror 9.
Hispo Add 3 die types to Strength and Vigor. Add 2 die
types to Deftness. Take 3 die types from Mien.
Terror 5.
Lupus
Add 2 die types to Deftness and Vigor. Add | die
type to Strength. Take 3 die types from Mien. Take
2 die types from Cognition.
they've got some things that
set them apart from the
standard Deadlands hero.
Here's how to handle these
crunchy bits.
es APESHPFING
To make a change in form,
the Garou must make a Hard
(9) Vigor roll. The hero can add
its Primal-Urge Ability to the
roll,
For every success the hero
gets, she can change one level
of form. So a Garou that gets
two successes can change
from a Homid straight to a
Crinos.
If the Garou goes bust, her
transformation goes wrong in
a painful way. This causes 3d6
damage to the creature's guts.
Wows
Being the rough-and-tumble
mystical kinds of critters they
are, Garou take injury a bit
different than your average joe
might.
In any form, Garou take
damage normally. However,
when they're in Glabro, Crinos,
or Hispo forms, they heal one
wound level in every location
in which they're injured—every
turn.
The Garou's healing
automatically takes place at
the start of each turn. If he
ever takes a maiming wound to
the guts or noggin, the Garou
goes down. It's not dead,
though. Instead, it only heals
one wound level per hour until
it manages to heal the affected
vital area(s) back to critical.
This power makes Garou
terrible foes, but there are
ways to defeat them. Garou
cannot use their healing power
on any wounds inflicted by
silver, fire, electricity, direct
magic (like a soul blast), or
supernatural creatures (like
other werewolves, whether
they're Garou or not).
These wounds heal at the
normal rate. They can be
healed more quickly by
preachers, hucksters, and
shamans with the right kind of
magical powers.You should keep track of
your Garou's Rage, just like you
would if he was roaming
around the Savage West. Just
consider it an extra stat that is
gained and recovered like
normal. You can spend Rage in
Deadlands games in the
following ways:
Extra Actions: By spending
a point of Rage, the hero can
draw another Action Card. A
Garou can spend up to her
Deftness Coordination each
turn in this way.
Changing Forms: A Garou
can spend a Rage point to
shapeshift to any form it likes
without having to roll for it.
Stun Checks: When making
a stun check, a Garou can
spend a point of Rage (before
rolling) to make it instantly.
Staying on Your Feet:
When a Garou's taken a
maiming wound to the noggin
or guts, it can stay on its feet
(and continue fighting, running,
or whatever) by making a Rage
roll. He rolls 1d6 for every point
of Rage he's got left. The
difficulty is Hard (9). Each
success heals a single wound
level, even if from aggravated
damage.
Kuck Rous
Garou tend to think with
their large, pounding hearts,
and they might have to make a
Rage roll for a number of
different reasons (see Werewolf:
The Wild West for all about
this). The difficulty of a Rage
roll depends on the phase of
the moon (unless the critter’s
trying to stay on his feet, in
which case it doesn't apply).
Moon Target
Phase Number
Full 3
Gibbous 5
Half 7
Crescent 9
New i
Peeizip=s &
UCONTROLLABLE
Aion
Whenever a Garou gets three
or more successes on a Rage
roll, he goes a bit bonkers.
Handle this just like you
normally would (i.e. usually it's
pretty bad for the Garou and
anyone nearby).
Also, sometimes the Marshal
may reveal that the Garou has
an uncontrollable urge to do
something (like gut someone
who's hacking him off).
The Garou can get out of
either a frenzy or an
uncontrollable urge by
spending a Fate Chip to make
a Cognition roll.
The Target Number of the
Cognition roll is determined by
the phase of the moon, as
shown on the Rage Against the
Moon Table. The Fate Chip
spent doesn't affect the
Cognition roll, no matter what
kind it is, but you can spend
additional chips to affect the
roll. On a success, the Garou
regains (or retains) control.
FOE Gaes
A Garou can use Fate Chips
to purchase points of Rage, as
shown on the table below.
Fate Chip Rage Points
1
White
Red 2
Blue 3
Losne THE WOLF
If a Garou has no Rage (and
_ no Fate Chips to buy it with),
she cannot shapeshift. In fact,
she reverts to her natural form
until she has more Rage.
WILLPOWER
Garou don't have Willpower,
So to speak, in the Weird West.
Instead, this converts over to
Fate Chips. You can convert
beginning Willpower points
into Fate Chips by purchasing
them for the costs shown on
the Willpower Chips Table.
Willpower
Points Fate Chip
1 White
3 Red
5 Blue
Gloss
Gnosis is handled just the
way it is in Werewolf: The Wild
West. Keep track of it just like
you normally would. It can be
used to activate Gifts or
fetishes regularly.
Gnosis can be regained
through a variety of means,
but most often by way of
meditation. After one hour of
contemplation, the Garou
makes an Onerous (7) Smarts
check. She gains one Gnosis
point for every success and
hour spent in meditation
(whichever is the least).
Note that a Garou can never
have more Gnosis than she
starts out with.
Gris & FRISHESs
These things each have their
own subsystem that they work
on, and they're all described in
detail in Werewolf: The Wild
West. Again, it would take a
large book to recast each and
every one of these in a
Deadlands mold. Instead, it's up
to the player and Marshal to
figure these things out for
themselves.GLori, t-ovoR,
Wist>om & Fak
Don’t worry about these
things. They only function in
Garou society, and unless
you've got a whole lot of
Garou wandering around the
Weird West, they’re not going
to mean a whole lot in the
game.
T+ TEU
The Delirium doesn’t work in
the Weird West. The human
cultures in the world of
Deadlands haven't been preyed
upon by werewolves for
generations, so they don’t have
the same kind of reactions as
people in the Savage West.
Of course, people still get
scared out of their wits when
they see werewolves running
around, and they need to make
Terror checks.
STEPPING SIDES
Garou actually have the
power to move directly into the
Penumbra. In Deadlands terms,
they're stepping right into the
Hunting Grounds.
To do so, a Garou needs to
gaze into a reflective surface
of some type. Then his player
rolls 1d6é for every point of
Gnosis he has. The difficulty is
determined by how populated
a place is (since there are no
caerns in the Weird West), You
should also add an area's Fear
Level to the Target Number.
This represents how much
more difficult the manitous
make running the Gauntlet
into their home.
Area
City
Town
Frontier
Wilderness
The number of successes a
Garou gets determines how
quickly he moves into the
Hunting Grounds. Check out
the Stepping Speed Table.
Successes Time
Bust Stuck in the
Gauntlet
0 Failed; must wait
an hour to try
again
1 5 minutes
2 30 seconds
S Instant
Hanging around in the
Hunting Grounds can be
dangerous. For every 10
minutes a Garou stays there,
he must make another Gnosis
check. If he fails it, he’s forced
back into the Weird West by
rampaging manitous.Ronan Lynch doesn't know what's in
store for him when he checks out that
mysterious Wasatch camp basking in the
light of the full moon. But it’s:more than
he was bargaining for.
An encounter with a ferocious beast
known as a Garou.(that’s one mother of a
werewolf to most folks)launches the
undead gunslinger.and his friends into
the heart of a twisted plot. If they and
their Garou allieS failto’foil it, the Savage
West is going to look a lot like the Weird
West™, and a lot of people are going to
end up dead—or worse.
As someone once: said, “There will
come a Reckoning.” You'd better pray
that's wrong.
Strange Bedfellows is thé first Dimé Novel™
in the Under a Harrowed’Moon trilogy.
It includes the fitst part of a triple-length novella andja
Deadlands™/Werewolf:The WildsWest™ adventure,
50495 c
PINNACLE oi Witt Wig
ENTERTAINMENT 781889 " 546162 ;
ROUP, Inc. ISBN 1-889546-16-x .
reas