12:70 Copyright ©1999 by Peter Prellwitz  All Rights Reserved.

In the wild days of the Martian Iron Rush, fortunes arose and vanished as quickly as the planet’s red dust storms. It was a time when a man had countless ways to strike it rich: in the titanium mines, in the wide open frontier towns that provided supplies and diversions, on the vast underground cattle ranches that fed the hungry miners, or in a dark, airless canyon, picking clean a murdered victim’s possessions. Riches were available to all, as was death. Laws were decreed by the wealthy, enforced by the strong, and sentences were meted out swiftly and without mercy by the ruthless, according to those who held sway. Many innocent people died.

Into this chaos rode the Martian Territorial Rangers. Known with fear and respect throughout the frontier as the Red Marshals, these hardened loners brought the one thing lacking, the one thing cried for by the ghostly wails of the dead on the wind and the pleading eyes of the living: Justice.

And of all the many deeds performed by these brave men and women who carried the red iron badge, one man most exemplified their thankless service. He was a man who’s swift hand and unerring judgment inscribed him forever into the tomes of Martian lore. He was a man who tamed what couldn’t be tamed and brought to a raw, savage frontier the seeds of justice and order, watering them with the blood of those who fell under his guns. He was a man few knew, a man few loved, and a man who’s name the guilty most feared. He was a man who helped decide the future of all Mars.

He was a man named Roids Cavanaugh.

by H.K Devonshire

"Miss Becky?" The cowboy's voice called out quietly. Becky Elam opened her eyes and looked at the man's flickering shadow, cast onto the small tent wall by the fire behind him.

"It's not time already, is it, Paul?" Becky moaned, burying her head deeper into the sleeping bag. She definitely needed to cut back on reading in bed, at least when out on the range.

"Yes'm," came Paul's short, warm chuckle. Paul was the foreman of the Elam ranch, but he wore his position with a casual familiarity that put everyone at ease while motivating them to work. "My watch says 12:52, so your shift starts in forty-five minutes, at one A.M. sharp. Up and at 'em, lady!"

Stretching and yawning, Becky gave in to the man's pleasant encouragement and crawled out of her bag. Dressing quickly - even in the sealed, pressurized canyons of their ranch, Martian nights were still plenty cold - Becky slipped on her favorite blue and white checked shirt and pulled on her denim jumper. She brushed her thick, brown hair out and eased into her surface suit, then picked up her helmet and emerged from the tent.

Four of the seven hands her mother had hired for the roundup were at the fire, watching the flames cheerfully eating away at the artificial rockwood they used as fuel. Either the portable or hov thermal heaters would have been more than ample, but a glowing panel could never match the atmosphere created by crackling flames, and Becky was very glad their ranch, the DVB Connected, stuck to the old traditions of the Martian frontier, patterned after the Old West of Earth in the late 19th century.

"Where's Texas Tommy?" Becky asked, sitting on her helmet which she'd placed on the ground. She accepted a cup of hot chocolate from Randy, their cook and oldest hand. Randy cracked a big grin and jerked his thumb off toward the darkness to the south.

"Out watching the herd with Zeke and Martin," Phil replied. With the DVB only a year now, he was a tall, thin man with wiry muscles and a constant grin. He'd quickly established himself as the ranch prankster; a calling he served with great zeal. "Tommy still ain't got a handle on the right time."

The others laughed knowingly, Becky included. Texas Tommy was new to Mars, fresh from Earth. Like all Terrans, he was bulky, strong and clumsy. And like most Terrans, he struggled with Martian time. Since Mars' rotation was thirty-seven minutes longer than Earth's, the extra time was added on at midnight, making the "witching hour" ninety-seven minutes long instead of sixty. When her mom had first hired him a month ago, he was consistently early to work each morning. Now that they were on the range, he had overcompensated and stayed out too long.

(continued)

Appearing in Short Story Form on

DOUBLE DRAGON PUBLISHING and FICTIONWISE in 2006

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