“I hadn’t thought of that,” Jack said.

  “You should,” Wyatt said.

  “My great-grandfather fought with Napoleon in Russia, and my grandfather found my grandmother while helping Texas Rangers against Comanches. I reckon if I have to fight, I can do the same as them.”

  “Reckon so.” Wyatt turned to Virgil. “I’m satisfied.”

  “Then let’s get going,” Virgil said. “We’ve already wasted too much time jawing about this.”

  -24-

  Jack Steele joined the three-wagon caravan. There were two scouts, three drivers, the Earp brothers, himself, and two other gunmen, ten men altogether like Virgil had said.

  They left a snowed-covered Goldfield, heading along a rough path north. The blizzard hid their leaving from most people. The scouts rode ahead, around and then back. There was no sign of any following outlaws.

  That night, they made camp by an outcropping of rock, stoking up a big fire. Jack had a turn at watch. No one showed up.

  “We should have brought some dogs,” Wyatt told Virgil the next morning.

  Jack heated the coffee over the fire, bringing cups to each of them.

  It wasn’t snowing no more, but the world was a vast sheet of white everywhere they looked. Even the pine trees were coated with snow.

  Soon, the heavy wagons with their one million dollars’ worth of gold creaked and swayed as they headed north, making easily followed tracks in the snow.

  None of them could know it, but they used a route that would later be Nevada State Route 305, then onto U.S. Route 50. In time, people would call 50 “The Loneliest Road in America.”

  It was lonely in 1905, the ten men wary because of the vast fortune they hauled.

  Jack found he liked the Earp brothers and their laconic manner of speaking. They reminded him of his grandfather, Thaddeus.

  Finally, four days out of Goldfield, one of the scouts rode hell for leather for the rumbling wagons. He was waving an arm as he rode back to them.

  “Why’s there only the one?” Virgil asked from his horse.

  Jack rode beside him on his gelding.

  Wyatt was on the other side of Virgil. “I’ll tell you why. The other scout got shot up.”

  “How do you know that?” Virgil said.

  “There’s someone following the scout,” Jack said.

  The Earp brothers traded glances with each other.

  “He’s got young eyes,” Wyatt said.

  Virgil nodded. He drew rein with his good hand and shouted back to the wagons.

  The drivers pulled the heavy wagons into a semi wagon fort like settlers used to do against Injuns. The drivers jumped down and unhitched the mules, driving them into the middle of the wagon fort.

  The Earp brothers and Jack heard the scout shouting at them. There were shots from the riders chasing him. The scout threw his arms into the air and then toppled to the side onto the snow.

  “Murderous bastards,” Virgil said.

  “You any good with a rifle?” Wyatt asked Jack.

  “Used to shoot jackrabbits as a kid for the family pot,” Jack said.

  At that point, the riders veered and rode like mad away.

  “How many are there?” Virgil said.

  “I count six,” Jack said.

  “Six against eight,” Virgil said.

  “They’re trying to whittle us down,” Wyatt said.

  Virgil nodded. Then he stared at Wyatt as if asking a silent question.

  “Okay,” Wyatt said. “I will.”

  Jack was frowning at Wyatt, wondering what he was talking about.

  “Get what gear you need, Jack,” Wyatt said. “You’re riding with me.”

  “To where?” asked Jack, mystified.

  “We’re going to whittle them down some in our favor,” Wyatt said.

  A cold feeling grew in Jack’s stomach. This was it, the real deal.

  “You afraid?” asked Wyatt.

  Jack shrugged.

  “It’s good if you are,” Wyatt said. “If you weren’t a little afraid, it would mean you’re an idiot. We’re going to do this right, but with the scouts gone, we had better do it right the first time.”

  Jack swallowed a lump down his throat. Then he listened as Wyatt outlined his plan. It was a simple plan. Wyatt said the best ones were.

  The wagons started moving again, this time without any scouts. Wyatt and Jack rode in the opposite direction as the outlaws had taken.

  “We need to get out of their sight first,” Wyatt said.

  That took some hard riding for hours. Jack was impressed that a man Wyatt’s age would be so good at this.

  For two days, with no campfires to warm them on the outside or some coffee to do it on the inside, they worked in a huge wide loop. They knew where the wagons were headed, and they worked their horses hard. It was cold, and Jack got tired of riding in the saddle all the time.

  “Not like swinging a pick,” Wyatt said at the beginning of the third day.

  “No,” Jack said. It felt as if he had blisters on his bum and his knees ached all the time.

  “As a lawman, there are a few times you work harder than anyone else,” Wyatt said. “But it’s not every day of your life.”

  Jack believed he understood.

  “The time you do work hard, though,” Wyatt said, “you’d better work damn hard so you beat the other guy.”

  Jack listened intently, knowing he was learning from the best.

  Wyatt Earp and he rode over rocky, snowy ground and hills. At last, they moved into position far back from two hills overlooking a long stretch of the path to Reno.

  “We’ll wait here,” Wyatt said.

  “How long will we be waiting?” asked Jack.

  “We’ll find out the hard way,” Wyatt said.

  They unsaddled their horses and put feedbags over their snouts, letting them eat grain. Then the two men stood and slapped their gloved hands and stomped their feet. It was cold out here.

  Four hours later, with a weak sun in the sky, they saw the wagons appear far in the distance between the two hills.

  “Why do you think this was the spot for the ambush?” Jack said.

  “Because Virgil is making it easy for them,” Wyatt said. “If we weren’t here, he would take the wagons in a wide loop from these ambush hills.”

  “And you think Big Ned is watching somewhere through a spyglass?”

  “Almost positive about that,” Wyatt said.

  The wagons trundled closer, although they were still miles off.

  “Time to saddle up,” Wyatt said.

  Jack did as ordered, wondering if the legendary ex-lawman really knew what he was doing.

  “Follow me,” Wyatt said. On foot, he led his horse for lower ground, picking his way with care.

  Jack followed, and then he saw motion ahead. “Wait,” he hissed.

  Wyatt must have heard, for he turned around.

  “There,” Jack said, pointing to the edge of one of the hills.

  A line of riders moved into sight down there. It would be the perfect place to intercept the wagons. Wyatt had been right about that.

  Wyatt rubbed his chin. Then he mounted up.

  Jack did, too. He followed Wyatt, who used a different trail than planned to head lower.

  Sometime later, Wyatt said from his horse, “It would be better to try to pick them off with rifles, but you said you’re no good at that. Men aren’t jackrabbits, as they often shoot back. That means we’re going to ride hard at them just as they get ready to ride at the wagons. Surprise is the key. If you surprise a man, he’ll often do stupid things. There’s one other trick. Do it as bold as you can and it can frighten the enemy. We’re going to try to frighten Big Ned and his boys.”

  Jack felt his gut clench. He couldn’t believe he was going to ride like a madman at six outlaws ready to rob a gold delivery. Ned and his boys would be getting ready to attack. How could Wyatt know the outlaws would be here? It was all a mystery to Jack.

  The point was this: they got into position, and then Wyatt hissed at him.

  Jack drew his Peacemaker and on his horse followed Wyatt down a steep path. Below, the six outlaws had mounted up. Farther down below the three wagons trundled into view.

  Wyatt kicked his horse’s flanks and rode low down to his mount’s neck. Jack did likewise.

  To Jack’s amazement, a fierce exhilaration filled him. His head seemed to pound with blood. He shouted at his gelding and raced to reach Wyatt Earp.

  What seemed like the last minute, the six outlaws turned on their mounts and stared at the two of them.

  Wyatt started shooting. He used a Smith & Wesson Model 10, a double-action revolver. He had several of them on his person.

  Jack held his fire. He’d heard stories about his great-grandfather. You wanted to get close before you fired a shot at the enemy.

  Some of the outlaws fired at them. Some began riding away hard. Two went down the ravine toward the three wagons. Others rode elsewhere. It struck Jack that the outlaws were trying to escape.

  How many men did the outlaws think were riding at them? More than just the two of them? Could this be because of surprise as Wyatt had said?

  Jack shouted.

  Big bearded Ned rode for the ravine. His mount didn’t gallop as fast, probably because it was carrying such a beast of a man.

  Jack realized he was catching up to Ned. The thrill of the chase was beginning to consume him. He urged his gelding faster.

  Big Ned turned in the saddle, the whites of his eyes huge. With one hand, he brought up and around a double barrel shotgun.

  Jack thrust out the .45 Long Colt, thumbed back the hammer and fired. The Peacemaker’s kick against his hand felt wonderful. Using his thumb, he cocked the hammer back again and fired again.

  Ned’s double barrel boomed, fire spewing from the ends. That must have spooked the horse, as it bucked, and Big Ned tumbled off to the snowy ground.

  Jack gained ground fast.

  Ned slowly rose. At the last second, he scrambled up and drew a huge Bowie knife.

  Jack was almost on top of him. He saw the Bowie and fired once more. It was either luck or the best damn shooting this side of the Mississippi. A bullet hole appeared in the middle of Big Ned’s forehead.

  The Bowie fell out of the monster-man’s hand, and Ned toppled to the snow dead.

  Jack thundered past, riding after the rest heading for the gold-carrying wagons.

  -25-

  The only outlaw killed that trip was Big Ned. The others fled and never showed up again.

  It turned out that Wyatt Earp knew what he was talking about concerning killing a man. When everything settled down and they figured out what happened, and after Jack stared at Ned’s corpse in the snow, he staggered away and threw up.

  Wyatt was there and patted him on the back.

  Jack straightened, turned and wiped his mouth. “Is it always like this?”

  “Not always,” Wyatt said.

  “Most of the time?”

  “No,” Wyatt said.

  “You get used to it?” asked Jack.

  “I can’t say that.”

  “Is that why you’re not a lawman anymore?”

  Wyatt stared at him.

  “Sorry,” Jack mumbled.

  Wyatt walked back to his horse and mounted up.

  Virgil spoke to Jack later, coughing because he’d caught a cold, telling him that he’d done great. “You still want to be a lawman after all this?”

  Jack had been thinking about that. Killing Big Ned had been grisly, even though it had felt great at the moment. Still, the excitement of this, the outdoor camping, it sure beat swinging a pick or weeding fields.

  “I reckon I do,” Jack said.

  Virgil nodded, coughing more.

  The trip took nineteen days, but then the wagons and gold made it to Reno. The men returned to Goldfield by the same route.

  On the way back, Virgil’s cold worsened. It snowed and actually rained toward the end of the trip. They were wet a lot. Back in Goldfield, Virgil’s cold turned into pneumonia. It was touch and go for a time. He got better and then the pneumonia returned, and Virgil Earp passed away in Goldfield.

  Wyatt Earp left Goldfield soon thereafter.

  Jack Steele stayed on and became a deputy for a time. Eventually, the gold rush came to an end and Goldfield no longer was a boomtown. It emptied of people faster than anyone could have imagined, although a few hung on.

  Jack moved, later becoming a sheriff in Northern Nevada. He never forgot the Earp brothers, or the time he killed Big Ned. That haunted him, but that was another story for another time.

  ***

  Author’s Note: Virgil and Wyatt Earp did live in Goldfield for a time, being there in 1905. Goldfield was a boomtown and was once the largest town in early Nevada with a population of 20,000. Virgil Earp died in Goldfield of pneumonia. He died October 19 at St. Mary’s hospital.

  According to Allie, Virgil’s wife, his last words were, “Light my cigar and stay here and hold my hand.”

  Wyatt Earp left shortly afterward, living until 1929.

  Goldfield was one of the last gold rushes in America, a tribute to a bygone era of gunslingers, saloons, and gambling.

  -26-

  28.34 LIGHT YEARS FROM EARTH

  149 YEARS AGO

  Life drastically changed in the seventeen years since the three missiles had made it through the nebula.

  For one thing, the Akkad swarmed with buxom Valiant women, strong, big-breasted Amazons with a virile need for men. The ladies had proven extremely fertile as well. There was something of a population explosion in the making aboard the great generational vessel.

  The first generation Valiant women mated young in old-style terms, at fifteen and sixteen for the holdouts. The explosive desire for wives had been too strong to let them mature any more than that. At this point, many of the Valiant women were already on their fifth or sixth child.

  All cylinder-produced Valiants had ceased many years ago, as Enki and others had foreseen this population explosion problem.

  There were well over one hundred thousand personnel aboard the ship, although vast amounts of them were babies. What would happen when the babies grew to maturity?

  One could imagine Rim-Sin grinning at the ship’s growing unrest, given his history. He’d died decades ago already, and he’d kept his secrets to prolonged life with him. That had been after enduring agonizing sessions and other humiliations. Those had broken the man but he’d managed to kill himself before revealing his cherished secrets, including how close he’d been to finding the elixir to true immortality. Given the Akkad’s population problem, maybe that was just as well.

  Ningal yet lived, although she’d aged considerably for several reasons. One, she’d long ago run out of Rim-Sin’s Treatments. The Chief Marshal’s suite was now home to a much younger and more energetic mistress. That meant Ningal lived elsewhere. Enki had been the first to take one of the Valiant teenagers into his bed, hastening the end to Ningal’s vaunted position in the hierarchy.

  Without the Rim-Sin Treatments, time had rapidly caught up with Ningal at one hundred and seven. She had wrinkled skin, trouble walking and worse hearing. She did know that there was talk about eliminating the unneeded, among which she was most certainly one.

  Her rank aboard ship was so much different now that she wasn’t one of the rare women and now that she wasn’t Enki’s mate.

  One major obstacle to her expungement—it was funny how she still preferred the old way of saying it. The training of her childhood and youth yet held sway in her mental makeup. Anyway, the obstacle was her seventeen-year-old son Assur. Chief Marshal Enki was his father. Assur was bigger and stronger than Rim-Sin had ever been, but he was smaller than most Valiants. Assur had a blue tinge to his skin, and he had one of the sharpest minds on the ship.

  Assur had taken basic combat training, but he had declined to become a combat specialist. Nor did he want to be an engineer, a more obvious choice. He was too small for combat and Ningal considered him too bright for engineering. He presently served on the bridge as a cadet. That was a privileged position. Assur didn’t serve as an aide to the Chief Marshal, but worked at a navigation and piloting station.

  In any case, the Akkad had nearly reached the second nebula, one deemed thicker than the first.

  Ningal requested to board the bridge at this historic occasion. This time, Enki denied her request.

  Traveling through the nebula proved worse this time. The ship shaking started almost right away. Ningal learned a little from her son the cadet. The magnetic scoop recoiled under the impact of massed stellar debris. That caused several generators to explode. Thankfully, Enki had replacements ready to go. He knew that if the magnetic scoop failed, the Akkad would surely face many hull breaches and perhaps destruction.

  The event was a replay of many years ago, with emergencies all the time. What made it worse was five and a half weeks of travel through the nebula instead of a mere four.

  The ship took damage, although none of it proved critical. At the end of the five and a half weeks, they burst through the nebula on the other side. There was ship-wide rejoicing. Surely, the enemy missiles could not withstand the endless impacts of the thick debris field. This time, the nebula would finish the missiles and their threat.

  The missiles were a little more than five light years behind them. The Akkad had gained just a bit more separation since the last nebula. Seventeen years ago, it had been a little less than five light years separation.

  The Akkad needed that separation. When the great generational vessel finally began to brake, the separation would shrink fast.

  Ningal thought about that time, if she would be alive when the great ship started to brake. Enki had yet to decide where to land. He must be hoping the second nebula would destroy the enemy missiles for him.

  Ningal wondered at times about her grandfather in the stasis unit. No one had ever thawed out Chief Analyzer Sargon. No one knew how. If Sargon returned to the land of the living, what would he make of this Valiant mess?