Lonesome Dreams

Somewhere in the outskirts of The City of Huron, between the old ruined fortress, and the hillocks of dappled maples, he sat. Having set up his camp in a ruined watchtower, the small fire blazing in the hotbox he had packed with him. Orders were orders, he was told to pack light, move quick, watch the fields for furtive movement.

He dozed as the sweet smell of maple smoke filled the tower, flowing out like a censer lit in the temples of the divines. Falling into fitful dreams, though vivid nearly lucid. He sat in the watchtower still, seeing a bright red sky. The stars were visible even in the setting sunlight, basking everything in the golden glow as night wrapped its fingers around the earth.

A woman sat beside him, no, not a woman. It wasn't human, clearly female as it sat flicking an impossibly long tail in the faint breeze. When It spoke it slowly draped its tail around his hand. A sonorous sound, like music given life and glory. "Why do you do this?"

His voice was raspy from the lack of use over the last few weeks. His thoughts, his only company as thoughts and concepts melded together like the horizon on endless seas. "What do you mean?" He asked, sitting down next to her. Her long ears twitching at the sound of his voice.

Her eyes were like the night sky, echoed in her face. Or was it the other way around? "Why do you continue on? You hate this role, this post you have been given. You'd rather be with your family, you aren't getting younger. Will you spend your days toiling away to be ground into dust by a machine that cares not for you? Or will you allow your own sun to rise in the twilight of your life?"

He thought for a long moment, thinking that this dream was nothing more. Merely his mind voicing his own regrets as the image of his son and wife swam in his mind. Their voices audible in his ears, laughing and carrying on a conversation he couldn't hear. "I suppose it does weigh on a man."

"Like a stone around your neck, you will sink to the bottom of the swamp. Yet, you carry the knife you cut that rope around your neck." She said, her tail wrapping more around him, fully draping it around his waist.

"This is my dream, who are you? I've never seen you before." He answered.

She smiled in a pained way. As the moon began to rise along the eastern horizon, her voice was all he could hear, drowning out the slight breeze and crickets chirping away in the night. "Then dream your lonesome dream. I am someone you have always known, yet have never met."

He awoke with a start, the watchtower cold. His hotbox had gone out some many hours ago. Looking around as he stretched, he flinched. The woman was still sitting there, legs dangling off the side of the tower. Turning back to him, her eyes bored into him.

A sudden gust of wind blew across the open face of the ruined tower, and she crumbled to dust flowing away with the wind. Though his heartbeat sounded thick in his ears, he touched the service revolver at his hip. The weight of the badge on his chest now feeling heavier than he remembered it being. His son speaking to him in his mind. "I want to be a Law Hunter like you Da!"

"Never."