1899- Journey to Mars

Sheriff, Lincoln County

New Mexico Territory

Dear Mr. Garrett,

The country is in need of your assistance. You are summoned to report to the Governor’s Office in Santa Fe on January 4, 1899, at approximately 4:15 p.m., at which time you shall be prepared to file a full report with regard to your knowledge of the events surrounding the space ship Arcadia, which engaged in hostile activities with federal troops in 1889 both in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and in San Antonio, Texas.

Further, please be prepared to embark upon a journey to meet with one William Gostman aka “Billy The Kid” whom at this time is suspected to be living in Waco, Texas.

The secrecy of this meeting and these events is of utmost importance. I cannot express the gravity of this sentiment.

I will see you in Santa Fe.

Respectfully,

William McKinley

President

Letter from Pat Garrett to Billy Gostman

January 3, 1899

Billy Gostman

General Delivery

Waco, Texas

Dear Billy,

What the hell have you done this time? I am about to board a train to Santa Fe to meet with the President of the United States to file a report on YOU. Also—and this is supposed to be secret—I believe I am supposed to thereafter come to Texas and get your ass. Somehow he knows your true identity.

How is Ekka and that strapping boy of yours? I miss your people, Billy, and I am very happy to be the boy’s Godfather. But your job is to stay alive so that boy never has to come to me as my Godson. If you get yourself killed over all that old Arcadia bullshit, I am going to dig your skinny ass up out of the ground and beat you with a chain.

That being said, I suppose I will see you soon enough. If I am coming to arrest you, I will try to send word ahead. If I have to come at you with a gun, my shots will miss. All of them! I may have federal regulators with me, so make sure your irons are loaded and that you shoot them, not me. Those you don’t get, I will shoot them myself. All that being said, I have no idea of what is going to happen. Likely I will be alone. Regardless, I’m a comin’.

Your friend,

Pat

P.S. You should destroy this letter after you read it, for reasons obvious.

PART I:

THE MISSION

(January 10, 1899)

[ 1 ]

Pat Garrett stepped off of the train in Waco, Texas at lunchtime. A trainload of the new Tesla robots was busily being offloaded onto the wharves of the Brazos River docks for transshipment to points south and west. They were ugly contraptions, yet they looked more sophisticated than those Pat seen employed in law enforcement in New Mexico. Garrett’s lips twisted in disgust at the sight of the phalanx of automatons. A puff of steam rose up as each robot was switched on in turn and ordered up and into the hold of the dirigible that hung mere feet above the waters of the river.

“Now, to find Billy,” he whispered to himself. Pat ran the points of his mustache between his fingers with one hand while fishing in his coat pocket for a cigar with the other.

Before Pat could begin his long walk, a young boy pulled on his coattail. Garrett glowered at the tyke for a moment, until he recognized the boy from his likeness to an old friend.

“Dakota?” he asked the kid.