Trainwreck

1870

Karen lay back in the seat of the old steam engine train where she was dumped there like a sack of potatoes, for a moment she enjoyed the gentle rocking of the car, the motions relaxing the pain in her back. Blood dripped from her as various cuts and bruises became apparent. Her arm was sore, the knock on the head she had gotten from wherever she was, had formed a goose-egg on the back of her head.

“TICKET!” A prune faced old man stare down at her, for what must have been the umpteenth time as he snapped the hole punch in his hand so loud that the clicking sound can be heard at the other end of the car. His voice was raspy but sharp.

“Ticket?” Karen looked up, the first time being conscious since…whatever it was that did this to her. She had no idea where she was but saw the prune-faced man staring her down. “What for?”

“Are you stupid?” The conductor looked around the train car suggestively.

“No.” Karen looked around, barely aware of where she was she watched as the scenery passed by, the old town the train pulled away from morphed into open desert, then she looked down at her clothes a black jacket was what she wore, typical for her, but it was ripped and cut, which was not typical for her. At least she didn’t think so. “Where am I?”

“Don’t play that game,” prune-face scolded, “are you going to pay the ticket?”

“Oh,” Karen patted at herself, as she looked fort the ticket, the scenery passed by her as a reminder, and as if she needed another, she looked at the conductor. “I don’t have a ticket.”

“Then I will have to ask you to pay the fare!”

Karen rifled through her pockets for money with a “How much?”

“$1.00.”

“What?” Karen grumbled, he didn’t know where she was going, heck, she didn’t know where she was going. She could be on a one-way train to Hell for all she knew. “OK.”

Prune-face held his hand out for the money intrusively and impatiently, his fingers wiggled like they were worms doing a dance.

Karen came up empty. “It seems as though that was somehow stolen.”

“Along with your ticket, I assume.” Prune-face looked at Karen. “Where exactly are you going, by the way?”

“Where exactly ARE we going, by the way?”

“You got on a train without even knowing where you are going, no ticket and no way to pay?” A voice from the seat behind her said with an almost giggly laugh.

“To tell you the truth, I don’t even know where I am, how I got on here or even when now is,” Karen said.

“Hey,” a curly haired, clean-shaven man in salt and pepper hair, a green jacket and white hat leaned forward with a dollar and some change, “I think this will cover the lady’s fare.”

“And I was so looking forward to tossing her off the train!” Prune-face grumbled.

“I just bet you were,” the man sighed, the schoolboy smile wiped off his face, showing the man’s true age, and his thoughts on the seriousness of the situation, “but then you would have been next, only I would have waited for us to be going over the trestle to do you!”

“You wouldn’t dare!” Prune-face gulped.

“I would. If I can handle a brother that is twice my size and weight I can handle you. Now leave the lady alone and go bother the next passenger,”

“Thank you,” Karen turned to the man who paid her ticket, “how can I thank you.”

“You can start by telling me your name,”

“Karen,”

“Karen who?”

“Just,” the hit on the head must have affected her more than she thought, she had a last name, she knew she did, but remembering what it was, was a little out of her reach. “Karen.”

“You may call me Joe,” the man flipped the paper he was holding.

Karen quickly looked at the date. July 21, 1870. “July 21?”

“Yes mam,” Joe responded.

“What happened to--.”

“What happened to what?”

“Last time I remember was 8:00 July 20.”

“Morning or night?”

“Well night of course.”

“So that leaves you with 12 hours to account for.”

“I guess,”

“Listen, Karen,” Joe moved to the seat next to her, “maybe you should fill me in on a few details.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, first of all, you’re dragged on here by two men dead to the world, dumped into that seat like a sack of potatoes then they light out of here like a bat outta hell. You can’t remember your full name, and now you reveal you’re missing twelve hours of your memory.”

“I see,”

“No, you don’t,” Joe said, “and that’s the point.”

“Please,” Karen said, “I may not know my full name, but it may help if I know yours.”

“OK,” came the response, “my full name is Joe Cartwright.”

“Doesn’t help,” Karen said after thinking the name over, yet the name did sound familiar.

“Well, I know something that just might,” Joe responded.

“What is that?”

“What is the last thing you do remember. Don’t leave out any detail, no matter how trivial.”

“I--. I don’t want to get you involved in whatever happened.”

“Listen lady,” Joe leaned in, “if I didn’t want to get involved, I wouldn’t have paid your fare, and I wouldn’t be sitting here asking you all these questions, now would I?”

“Guess not,” Karen sighed, “OK. The last I remember I was at the Lucky Diamond playing poker.”

“What was your hand?” Joe was more curious than anything.

“Four aces,”

“I see,” Joe said, “you had the winning hand, and the guys you were playing didn’t like it.”

“Now that you mention it,” Karen’s hand went up to her head, “yes. The one guy threw the card table at me, there was this fight, then…well--.”

“You woke up here.”

“What I don’t get, why did it take them 12 hours to put me on the train?”

“Good question,” Joe responded as he looked around, while the two guys who dumped Karen onto the train were long gone, there could have been others, he spotted two others, from the Burke gang, but why were they on the train, unless it had something to do with his new friend, “it could be that there was more involved than just you won a hand at poker.”

“But what?”

“I’m not sure,” Joe mused, “Hey I’m hungry, it’s possible we’ll both think better when we have something to eat. I know the guys who run the dining car don’t make the best food in the world, but it should be eatable.”

“OK,” Karen frowned.

“My treat.”

As the two moved to the dining car, Karen looked out the window, and noticed that a station whizzed by. “Hey, weren’t we supposed to stop?”

“Yes,” the conductor spoke up, “but there’s nobody getting off anyway.”

“Oh,” Karen shrugged, “but still.”

“Ah, don’t worry about it,” Joe said nonchalantly, “it’s just a little one-horse town, probably one of those towns they frequently fly by anyway.”

“True,”

“So, what do you want?” Joe let Karen sit down first, then looked at the menu after he took a seat. “Looks like we have a major decision here – breakfast special; scrambled eggs, pancakes and sausage.”

“Then that’s what I’m having.”

“Excuse me,” Joe said as he got the waiter’s attention, who came over, “we’ll have two plates of the breakfast special.”

Karen watched out the window, as the conductor called out the next station. The food was placed in front of them, the pancakes were so over cooked they looked more like a flat stone, and the sausages were burnt, and the eggs were runny.

“Looks…” Joe winced as his nose literally turned upwards, “…like something I wouldn’t even feed to the pigs.”

“That’s two bits,” the waiter smiled.

“Two bits?” Joe cried out. “I wouldn’t pay two wooden nickels for this carp!”

“Each.”

“What for?”

The waiter looked Joe up and down, while the guy was tall he was also very skinny, and not very muscular. “Want to make something of it?”

“Yeah!” The waited balled up his fist and hit Joe across the jaw.

“Aw come on,” Joe mocked, as the fist landed weakly across the jaw, “I’ve seen little girls hit harder than that!”

“The coward’s not even hitting me back,”

“Coward?” Joe laughed. “Guy, I’m the one standing here waiting for you to throw the first actual punch!”

The waiter threw another punch, this time it drew blood. Exactly one drop of blood, and only because Joe bit his lip when he was hit.

“Come on, a big guy like you,” Joe scorned, “that’s not even worth it. Come on, I’ll give you one more try!”

As Joe marked a spot on his chin, the waiter threw a punch, which Joe dodged, and grabbed at the fist and applied pressure until he felt a few bones cracking, then threw a left hook that sent the waiter staggering backwards, then ended up with a rabbit punch in the gut with his weaker right.

The waiter staggered, as Karen caught him and guided him to the chair.

“Wanna go again?” Joe “brushed the dust” off his jacket.

“Argh!” The waiter growled, he rose to his feet and barreled towards Joe, who only side-stepped him, sending him crashing through the car window. He looked up to see the ground speeding past him, giving him a good case of vertigo.

Joe got a good laugh in, then helped the waiter out of his precarious position, as the cook scolded him.

“You damned fool!” The cook growled, “now we’ve got to pay for the damages again!”

“Ain’t my fault!” Joe snickered.

While Joe was obviously having his fun, Karen watched as another station whizzed by, this one had people waiting at the station. “Joe!”

“I see,” Joe flipped two wooden nickels at the waiter, “let’s check this out.”

“Behind us,” Karen noticed the two guys from the riding car.

“I see him,” Joe suspected that this was going to be a little bit more of a substantial fight than with the waiter, so he made sure his guns were fully loaded, then handed one of them to Karen. “I think you’ll need this.”

“I don’t use guns!”

“Memory coming back?” Joe said sternly.

Karen wasn’t sure of how to respond, as she reluctantly took the gun.

Joe led the way out the car, through the baggage car to the coal car just ahead, he could see the engineer slumped down on the floor with a bullet to the head, and he was obviously dead for a while, a bullet from a warning shot whizzed past. “Still don’t think you’re not going to use the gun?”

“Well--,” Karen looked up.

An explosion took place on the trestle that took out the tracks about a mile ahead.

“Holy--. Pull the pin!”

“What?”

“Pull the pin joining the cars!”

“Wh--.”

“DO IT!” Joe yelled as Karen pulled the pin, he scrambled to the engine room, he looked back to see the Burke boys firing at him, from the front of the dining car lucky they were all “warning shots” either that or Billy Burke was really that bad a shot. But the cars were slowing down and were actually coming to a stop because they were on a slight incline. “OK, it’s just us,”

“What are we going to do?” Karen watched as they careened towards the end of the tracks.

“Jump!”

“Where?”

“Anywhere!” Joe ran towards the side of the engine, grabbed Karen and took a flying leap off the train with her. They lost contact with the engine floor, as it literally dropped out from under them.

“Oh my GOD!” Karen yelled, they were jumping towards a thorny bush, as the train engine dropped 1000 feet to the canyon below. “You have got to be kidding me!”

“Will you shut up,”

“Don’t tell me to shut up!”

“Seriously,” Joe’s face lost all expression, the cars came to a stop only around two feet away from the end of the tracks, and the Burke gang was still onboard, and he hoped against all hope that it was only those two he had to deal with, “shut up!”

Hoss and Ben Cartwright rode through the open plains towards the train station where they were supposed to meet up with Little Joe, all at once there was a loud explosion followed by the falling away of the trestle, then a train engine and the coal car dropped straight down.

“What the sam hill of going on?” Haus looked at where the trestle was not more than 10 seconds before.

“One guess,” Ben Cartwright said with a roll of the eyes.

“How can one little man create such a big mess?”

“With you guys, would it turn out any other way?”

“Not really,” Hoss gulped. “Am I really that bad?”

“Oh no,” Ben said sarcastically, “you’re worse!”

“Really?” Hoss said sheepishly.

“Come on, let’s see what damage he’s done this time!”

Karen lay on her back with Joe straddled straight over her pinned to her in some way. She could feel that he had an erection. “Get off!”

“I’m trying,” As Joe tried to get up, he found the thornbush they had landed in was making it hard for him to move. He tried to push himself up, but found himself pushing against Karen’s groin.

“I hope that’s your gun I feel!”

“NO! It’s not my gun you feel!” Joe pushed through the thornbush and noticed Billy Burke aiming at them. He fired the gun and hit Billy Burke in the shoulder. But there were others in the Burke gang that were joining them.

Karen pulled away and was finally free of the bush and Joe Cartwright. She looked up and saw three of the guys shooting at her, she fired a shot that hit the one guy in the chest and sent him reeling backwards.

“Good shot!” Joe said with a look of amusement.

“Thanks,” Karen said, “my daddy taught me to shoot field rats at an early age.”

“Your daddy?” Joe fired a random shot before reloading. “That mean your memory’s coming back?”

Karen fired a shot at Billy, the shot hit him, but he kept on standing. “I think it is.”

“So, what is your name?”

“Karen Crenshaw,”

“Of course,” Joe said, “I was supposed to give you the title to a strip of land we own.”

“The Ponderosa?”

“Yes,” Joe responded, another shot was inaccurately fired.

“These guys can’t hit the broadside of a barn at point blank range!”

“That’s because Billy is a little cross-eyed and his brother was dropped on his head when he was born,”

“Are these the two who dumped me on the train?”

“Naw, that was Pa Burke and his mate.”

“Mate?” Karen was confused.

“You know as in, mate.”

“But this was a guy--.”Then it hit her. “OH. You mean mate.”

Ben Cartwright weaved his way around the train wreck as he saw the Burke boys standing on top of a train car firing blindly, as Hoss caught up with him.

“Don’t tell me cross eyed Billy has Little Joe cornered,” Haus squinted his eyes through the morning sunlight.

“Nah,” Ben spat out, “he’s just playing around with Billy.”

“If you’re sure!”

“Yeah come on,” Ben pushed on to where Little Joe was playing around.

“OK,” Hoss gulped, then mumbled, “I don’t always like the way Little Joe plays around!”

“Oh, quit your mumbling.”

“But PA, people tend to get hurt the way Little Joe sometimes plays around!”

“I know, but we’ve just got to grin and bear it.” Ben patten Haus on the back as he spoke.

“If you say so,” Hoss reluctantly followed Ben Cartwright

Karen was firing like she was shooting at the field rats, one of them would pop up and she would fire, that was when she saw the big ugly creature pop up around 10 feet away, she pointed the gun at the guy’s face and pulled the trigger. The gun gave out a hollow “click”.

Hoss looked at the gun like a cow rechewing his cud, then the girl who was holding the gun, then at Little Joe. “See what I mean? I could have gotten my face shot off!”

“Oh, any idiot could tell that the gun wasn’t loaded!” Karen cried out as Hoss gave her a dirty look.

“Oh, Hi Hoss,” Joe smiled, sheepishly, “how’d you guys find me?”

“It wasn’t hard!” Hoss pulled out his gun and helped Joe out with the shootout.

Joe looked at the trainwreck that he created, or rather the Burke boys.

Ben took out the last of the Burke boys before they decided to retreat from their fight, with cross-eyed Billy the last to go, he fired one final shot, which ricocheted off of a random piece of metal, sending the bullet back the way it came, which hit Billy in the forehead leaving him with a deep scratch. “So, now that you’re done having fun, were you able to meet up with Kate Crenshaw ,and give her the deed to the strip of land?”

“Well, I met up with her,”

“Where in this mess is she?”

“Hiya,” Kate smiled.

“Of course,” Hoss muttered, as he looked at the woman who could have shot his face off, “wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Oh,” Kate muttered, “any dang fool could tell the gun wasn’t loaded!”

“Well, this fool didn’t!” Hoss said before thinking his words through.

“Well,” Ben said with a drawl, “it’s OK.”

“So,” Joe reached into his satchel and pulled out the deed to a fair strip of land, and handed it to Kate, “I guess this belongs to you.”

“Ah,” Kate took the deed, “me and my girl friend will greatly appreciate this.”

“Girlfriend?” Joe said with a stutter, as he tried to remain emotionless.

“Yes Joe, girlfriend,” Kate smiled, “but that doesn’t mean we still cant be friends.”

“Friends?”

“Now little brother,” Hoss placed his hand on Joe’s back, “don’t you go telling me you’ve developed feelings for a girl you just met.”

“N-no,” Joe came up with a smile, “that would be silly!”

“Uh-huh!” Haus led the two to where there were four horses tied up.

The conductor finally mustered up the courage to approach Little Joe with a list of grievances in his hand. “Who’s going to pay for the damages to the train?”

“Oh,” Joe shrugged as he rode away, he looked back to take one last look at the train wreck, “you can send the bill to Billy Burke and his gang of cross-eyed misfits in Carson City.”