Golden Arrow

If This You Read

by Blackwolf247

If this you read, then I am either dead or some damn fool done transported me in time again. If that’s the case, I sure hope its far enough into the future that it don’t almost feel like home and yet feel sorta alien at the same time. Flat out total strange I think I could handle better.

Maybe, but you’re wondering maybe, who I am and why you should care?

My names Parsons, Gary Parsons. I was born in the year of our Lord, as I heard it said, nineteen hundred and twenty, during a thunder storm out in the desert of Arizona, and a comet or shooting star or something was seen just as I came outta my momma. ‘Way I heard it a, Pawnee who was a co-worker and pal of my pah said I was born to be a traveler and man he got that right, born with itchy feet it’s been said of me.

So hello, I am Gary Parsons, born July 1 1920 and today is October 20th or so 1987 which should make me 67 but I am really 34.

And that’s because my friend O’Casey and I were transported from the year 1953 forward about 32 years, by some well-meaning folks who were themselves superheroes, but not the ones I knew from the old days of the Justice Squad.

All of that stuff is probably written up somewhere and I ain’t here to write the history of the world, just tell you who I am and how I got here, and why I’m writing this.

I am not just a rodeo cowboy, but also The Golden Arrow, a masked crime fighter and champion of the people, fighter for what’s right and all of that, because maybe because my parents were killed when I was a child, and maybe because I believe in my heart and soul that pushing people around, chasing them not only off their own land but hunting them down and killing them for sport is cruel and evil no matter what glorious name you give it, like manifest destiny. Evil must be stopped and I was trained to do that, as a warrior.

Course the rodeo circuit pays for winning, not just showing up, and the crime fighting, well that’s not a for-pay career but sometimes someone would slip me reward money, or a meal. That’s OK but still both cost money. Hell, life costs money, but thing is, what you earn should be yours to use as you choose, stealing people’s means of survivival, no.

Well so I was up here in the mountains, looking for a place I remember learning about in 1942 while on a manhunt, Los Padres Blanco’s tomb, a sacred and forgotten spot where two Franciscan friars had been buried with much honor in 1789, killed by Anglos looking for gold. Some one got em, and these two honest decent men were buried with more treasures then they ever conceived of wanting, and their burial site was secret to only a few. I had found it and of course, judging from sign, no one had been here in many man years. I hid some old golden Spanish coins in here figuring the padres would guard it for me until I needed some of it to sell, in case I didn’t make enough doing rodeos, to pay for gas, repairs, equipment, my horse and his care and we needed to eat and sleep.

Take the gold and stuff from the padres’ graves? Are you that unknowing? I would not remove from a saint or hero’s grave without permission nor would I seek it unless it was important, no I found this place by accident and made use of the offering. Besides, I had on occasion seen what happened to some tomb thieves, and I ain’t no thief. I live honestly.

So I was up here to dig up some of the old money I had left her. and when I found out about the blizzard, I figured I would have time to come and go before it hit. I had parked my truck down below and hiked up and there had been some changes in the terrain since I been here last. Even so I could have beaten the unseasonal but expected to be fierce ice storm had it not been for encountering Gorilla Jones, escaped murderer and former World Heavy Weight Wrestling Champion. Jones had been imprisoned for killing three people men, cops, not wrestlers, but men in good physical condition, all of which I knew about from the radio. Only I wouldn’t even have suspected this huge hairy kinda bear-like man of being called Gorilla. At first I thought he mighta been half big foot and maybe he is.

But he was about to molest a young woman and was in the process of beating the young man who was with her into a coma and maybe worse when I spotted him. I wished to God I had brought my bow and arrows with me so I could have put an immediate stop to what was transpiring instead of having to yell and run forward uphill…

Already this was definitely NOT an indication of “likely to beat the blizzard….”

I yelled “Drop that boy!”

As I ran uphill, shedding my pack and pulling my .45 [it's rattle snake country after all] he surprised me and threw the youngen at me, actually knocking me down. I moved the kid off me and grabbed my pistol, catching a glimpse of Jones running off with the girl. I checked the young man, and saw he was more dead then alive, internal bleeding as well as outward, it was obvious he was gonna die and die soon. There was really nothing I could do for him, but I couldn’t just leave him, could I ?

I made the decision to cover him with a blanket and come back as quick as I could, then I took after Gorilla Jones and the girl. It helped that I was raised to track and hunt, and Jones for all his size and strength was a city boy.

Still he was fast moving, so after following him a bit, I found him right near the mouth of this cave, just as the storm hit and hit hard. He threw the girl down and picked up a large rock. I aimed my pistol at him and yelled at him to drop it, which he did by throwing it at me. I ducked rolled and fired, hitting him in the left shoulder. He grabbed a smaller rock and threw that, I fired again and got him between the eyes. ‘Good shooting!” if I do say so myself. The storm then came on like a pack of howling coyotes and twice as fierce as a grizzly momma on her period. So I grabbed the girl and ducked in here.

Fortunately there was still a considerable pile of brush and wood in here, and no animals holed up, but as the winds carried on and snow mixed with ice started to pile up faster then you can say ‘Jack Rabbit’ I expected other animals might try for here. So I fixed up a fire, real quick and then checked on the girl, unconscious, but breathing OK. In her pack I found this notebook. Her name incidentally is Laurie Miller and according to her cards she’s a 19 year old U of Denver student. Pretty girl too. Black hair, brown eyes, and fortunatly for her, still out cold, there’s a nasty lump on the back of her head where Jones hit her.

If it’s as bad down below as it is here then the boy is a goner for sure. Damn sorry about that.

Using an old bit of crockery I got some snow and ice and melted it for drinking water but we got no food here, and this storm could last a couple of days. Already can’t see much of the outside, it’s piling up fast.

This could well be the end of old Gary Parsons a.k.a. the Golden Arrow, not to mention the girl Laurie Miller.

So we are in a fine pickle here, trapped by this storm. We got water but no food and things do not at all look good, at all, at all.

Looking around using a torch I made I found a tunnel. Now to check it out would require me to leave the girl and looking at her she shows no signs of waking up. Funny, I don’t remember a tunnel here, but its been like 30 years since I was here last. Memories can play tricks on you.

I checked it out a little bit, It does go in a ways, see a turn and that is interesting. Wonder if this place gets some use I didn’t know about.

Laurie was awake for a while, weak but fine, gave her some water and told her what I could. She’s gone back to sleep now., Gary the boy was her boyfriend. I say was because I’m quite sure he’s dead now. Gary Zbigniew interesting name, that. Sounds Russian or something.

So making sure she’s OK I’m going to check this tunnel.

Later-

It goes back quite a ways down the mountain and that’s a good thing. I had to come back and check on her, she’s stirring now, if she’s up to it gonna take her with me. I think this might be our only way out. The snow and ice surely make walking outside more dangerous then jumping into a rattlesnake pit. This could be how the Indians got the padres and all this stuff here in the first place.

Post Script- Decided to finish this off, the tunnel led to bottom of the mountain and we got out, found the encampment Laurie and Gary had started to set up, covered in ice and snow, of course, but we were able to dig out some food. The storm’s over and we dragged Gary out to my truck. He’s dead of course, but I believe he died peacefully. Now I’m at the hospital here at Hell’s Pass. She’ll be OK, some frost bite and hypothermia. Also shock, it was quite a situation. Notified the authorities as to where Jones was, and, well, gonna get some breakfast and head out.

Not sure what I’m gonna do with this writing, maybe use it to start my next camp fire. In a way this story seems rather what do you call it anticlimactic. Best I can say is it was a rough twenty four hours indeed.

The End