The Hunter - GMuxx's Art Prompt Writing Contest #5

Dutch Rhodes was a hardened man. People in his line of work usually ended up dead or settled down on a ranch somewhere by his age. For years he made a livin’ tracking men down for the price on their heads, but these days called for another sort of hunting. It was with whiskey glass in hand at a small saloon that Dutch found his latest prey.

The undertaker ran from across the street and burst into the watering hole. He was screaming about finding some beast in the mortuary crouched over one of the corpses, gnawing on the poor deceased. The room fell quiet. No one dared question the mortician, because in these times the west had turned weird. Unnatural beasts, psychotic inclinations, evil spirits; the occult had become all too common; such tales stopped being considered superstition. Corruption saturated the new frontier.

Without hesitation, Dutch emptied his glass and walked out the door. Inside the mortuary he found a figure in the lamplight, just as the undertaker described. The creature’s gray skin was pulled tight over his bones, covered in seeping sores. Claws like knives had cut the corpse to shreds and the beast’s mouth was full of wet, red fangs. The common man would miss the truth in plain sight, blinded by the initial horror, but Dutch instantly understood.

The ghoul was wearing a butcher’s smock, and Dutch happened to be searching for the town’s missing butcher. When a man develops the vile taste for human flesh they’ve surrendered to the evil running rampant in the west. Guess the rumors of the butcher’s taboo habits were true and it got the best of him.

Dutch leveled the barrel of his LeMat revolver and pulled the trigger. The thing that was once the butcher let out an inhuman scream when the lead buried into its shoulder. It charged and razor claws tore into Dutch’s arm, knocking him on his back. Before the ghoul came down on him Dutch flipped the pivoting striker, selecting the single shot under-barrel of his pistol, and pulled the trigger, letting off a 20 gauge shotgun round.

The ghoul flew back, slamming into a table. It swiftly fled through the front door on all fours like a rabid animal. Dutch got to his feet and followed. Those brave enough to investigate were outside the saloon and witnessed Dutch fire a .40 caliber pistol round into the back of the beast. It tumbled into the dirt road with an awful screech.

Scrambling onto all fours, the ghoul turned on Dutch and lunged forward. Firing again, Dutch’s bullet missed, but an uncanny blast of energy struck the beast from behind before it closed the distance. The ghoul fled and all eyes were on one person: a kid previously sitting at the poker table in the saloon. He held a deck of cards in his hand, emitting a faint glow if one looked close enough.

The other patrons began to mumble. “He’s a huckster...”

“I bet he was cheatin,” grumbled another.

Dutch had heard of hexslingers and their ability to wager with spirits for supernatural abilities; however, this was his first meeting with one. He didn’t know much about Hucksters, but with any game of chance there’s always risk in losing; one could only guess what those risks entail when wagering with spirits.

They looked at each other and that’s when Dutch could tell: this boy wasn’t afraid like the others. He had grit.

“It’ll leave town,” said Dutch in his gravelly voice. “Look for someplace underground to hide ‘til tomorrow night.”

“I’ve got a place,” the young card player replied. “We can try to track it down from there.”

The two left town together. Kid said his name was Leo Clayton Hoffman. He’d won a cabin just outside town at a poker table; it reminded him of his pa’s old shack. They’d set out to California when he was young with dreams of striking it rich. Leo instantly went quiet and looked like he regretted bringing it up. Dutch surmised things didn’t go as planned.

The next night they ventured into a nearby canyon, the only place with tunnels nearby where the ghoul might hide. It didn’t take long in that dark fissure before they found the creature. The battle was savage. A common man would suffer from endless nightmares if heard the amalgamation of sounds echoing from that canyon. Shrieks, shouts, gun blasts, and lightning.

When the dust settled, Dutch couldn’t deny Leo’s efforts kept him unscathed. He’d never seen anything like it; the kid was shuffling a deck, flipping cards between his hands with a proficiency he’d never seen in a typical card shark. He swore playing cards materialized from thin air. Then Leo would throw one, the card suddenly becoming enveloped in pure energy, exploding on impact with the beast.

After killing the former butcher they returned to the cabin to recoup.

Dutch always liked to unwind with a nice pipe after dispatching an abomination. He sat back while Leo poured a couple fingers of whiskey in a pair of glasses.

“You handled yourself out there well kid.” The hunter’s spirits were high. He was usually nursing more wounds than this after finishing a job; he’d never had a partner, let alone met someone worth more than two grains of salt when it came to going toe-to-toe with supernatural beasts.

The kid didn’t answer. During their short time together Dutch had the impression the boy held a healthy balance of respect and fear of him. Leo sat at the small table and set the whiskey glasses down, holding a hard gaze on Dutch.

This was real odd; the boy’d never looked at him like this before. There was a madness in his eyes.

“The hell’s gotten into you Leo?”

“Leo can’t talk right now.” The kid shuffled his cards. “How about I deal a couple hands?”

---

_{Story inspired by the Deadlands tabletop RPG setting. Picture from GMuxx writing prompt, edited by me. Artwork made by me.}