MERC
G.A. Scheinoha
They came for him in the bar. He sat at the fold-up card table with a huge, ancient Remington atop it. Beside the typewriter lay a gun, as ancient as the typewriter and its operator.
The old warrior glanced up, his two index fingers perched, hovered a mere inch over the keys. Poised to strike. This simple action froze each man in place. All three fingered guns.
“We can do this any way you’d like.”
The leader of the trio, a tousled thirty year old scratched at his beard with less than clean fingers.
“We could skip it.”
“Too easy, old man.”
“I gave you a chance.”
Nearby, the warrior’s nephew leaned against the bar, a drink rested uneasily in his left hand, right strayed to the middle of his back where the hunting knife pierced the dirty cloth vest.
“Not so fast kid.”
Leader stepped in, seized nephew’s arm, twisted it behind him till the knife clattered to the floor.
“Let him go. This is between us.”
Leader saw something in the old man’s eyes. Something he hadn’t before.
“We’ll settle this.”
“That we will.”
The mercenary rose unsteadily from the table. His folding chair collapsed suddenly, noisily.
“I wanna piece of you myself.”
They circled each other warily. His uncle shoved him roughly aside.
“Go!”
The boy stayed where he was. Leader wiggled a finger invitingly. The merc spun, his shoe crashed into the leader’s groin. As the brains of the operation sank slowly to the floor, something snapped inside the other two.
The warrior pushed his nephew down. They aimlessly triggered their pistols, sliced a swath of destruction. Bottles exploded on the back bar, shards rained down, liquor sloshed, floor wet, the heavy stench of hundred proof.
A shot shattered the merc’s shoulder. He tumbled sideways. The boy lunged for his knife.
“No!”
The scream was torn from that fearless throat. The old man rose on one knee, snatched up the Colt. Hammered six bullets into one of the pair in an eyeblink. Just a second later, the gun jammed.
He flung it at the third gunman. Rising like a wounded lion, he charged death. Number three smiled. His only shot pounded past the merc.
Then he was seized in two powerful hands, twisted until he went limp with the loud, sickly snap.
They sat at the uprighted table later. The pain was already edging in but the warrior felt the effects of his third whiskey combating it.
“I’m sorry I never believed you.”
“Forget it.”
“You really were a mercenary.”
“. . . a long time ago.”
The boy glanced at the sheet in the typewriter.
“Will you let me read it?”
His uncle hastily covered the paper with his forearm.
“Someday,” he smiled. Someday.”
The boy gave his uncle a final glance. Left by the side door a moment later. The merc stared after him a full minute. Then as an even bigger smile spread across his face, he began to pound the keys furiously.
