Dozens of hard, bad men had entered the town, bent on blood.
They were destined to meet 'Fancy' Felicity.
She'd made a costume change in the bullet riddled general store. Dresses were so awkward.
So, she went out to meet those bad 'uns and make some suggestions, dressed a little like a prim and proper male filing clerk. In dark tailored, close fitting suit, shirt and pants, tied back blonde hair tucked up under a derby hat, with the exotic flourish of a purple neckerchief. She also wore slim framed glassless reading spectacles. The last time she'd geared up like that one of the others had drawn a moustache on her face with some charred wood from a campfire. She'd killed twelve men that day. Such was her sartorial selection.
No guns in sight.
Still, she was a top pistol.
Her main weapon did not even require loading, ever.
Big C men roamed and prowled the town, in the way of her casual stroll.
They met her, and were given Felicity's piece of mind.
She pointed at one man, stopping him, as if paralysed, from drawing his Colt. He stared at her with an intense, strained expression. The only bullets he unleashed were the ones he was sweating.
"You," she said with a harsh frown, "are going to the stables and you will clean up horse apples for two hours. Then you will travel to the city and assist in every way you can at the local free hospital."
The barrel of her trigger finger left the man and he walked off and he did and he did and did.
Another leering bastard further up the street, poised to swoop upon her - Felicity's voice froze him.
"You - will join the cause of women's suffrage, for the next ten years."
"Suff - sufrage?" the man stammered incomprehensibly.
Felicity sighed. Amended. "You will go to a big city library, look up 'suffrage' in Mr. Webster's dictionary. You will also look up 'suffragist' and 'samaritan' meaning number two, and you will study their meanings, ask the head librarian about their meanings, until you understand what they mean, then you will become a suffragist and a samaritan. Keep asking for help if you still do not understand. Then - "
"Cain't read," the man said.
Felicity stomped her foot angrily. Set her glasses straight again on her nose. "You will devote yourself to learning to read. Then do as I have told you."
He did and he did.
And so it went. . .
"You - will join the temperance crusade - "
"You - will leave town now and dedicate your life to helping homeless waifs."
"...And every morning that you arise and go out into the world you will ask of the first six people you meet: Can I help you? And if they ask a favour, or tell you how you can help, or tell of a problem, you shall help them."
"Every stray dog you see, you will help make its life better. You will seek out such dogs. Being bitten by such dogs will only encourage you to help them more."
"Any abuser of animals that you see you will horsewhip. Go find Margo, the lady with the whips, tell her Felicity sent you and she will give you a whip and a lesson. Go, now, then - seek them out."
Felicity was multilingual. Fluent in eight and counting. Her talent effective in each.
She rounded a corner and was confronted by four nasty looking men, alcohol fuelled, guns in hands. Seeing her their wicked eyes flared, for her outfit could not completely conceal her womanly curves. Two of them unbuttoned their pants right then and there and unleashed other threats, began to briskly ready themselves as they crooned suggestions to her.
She did not even step back. She began to speak - until the stinking, rough hand from behind covered her mouth. She fought, but an iron muscled arm clamped about her, flattening her breasts, restraining her movements.
"How badly do you wanna live?" the unseen gunman's voice grinded into her ear, as the others moved in closer. He smelt of burnt gunpowder, sweat and halitosis, with a hint of onion.
"Flip a coin, boys," he said then. "See who goes first."
She rammed her elbow into his ribs and heard him grunt. She stomped his feet, tried to heel his shins, sought his balls with her clawed hands, threw back her head to smash into his face - none of it worked, he just squeezed harder, constricting her breathing, lifting her feet off the ground. The other men laughed coarsely, two of them drew knives.
Then there was a deep and sudden growl, from behind her, and she knew that it was not her captor. She felt a rushing motion from back there, swifting by her, glimpsed a darting, elongated moon shadow that seemed to disappear into the air it had formed in a scant few seconds later. There had been a slashing, crunching sound, then a noise like highly pressurised water released from a pipe, a liquid pattering on the earth... She saw the other men pause, eyes widen, step back, fear reflected on each face, something terrifying having penetrated the armour of drunkenness and lust.
She was released. Heels of her boots finding the ground again she turned to see the body of her captor stumbling back from her, arms waving, headless, roughly torn neck still venting crimson into the air, save it looked black under the moon's illumination.
Heads you lose, won't get that back, she thought. It's on the other wet side of the page now.
She smelt the musk of a Tyger in the air and smiled. She closed her eyes briefly. "Thank you," she whispered. Turned back to the stunned sober men before her attacker's corpse even hit the dirt.
She spoke quietly.
"You will all remove your clothes, then you will line up and, because you love one another so much..." She couldn't help grinning as she detailed this one.
"...And you will all sing bawdy songs as you do," she completed. As she walked on the four began to happily strip each other of clothing.
Felicity giggled.
Further on she said to one burning tar torch wielder "You will ride as fast as you can, with that torch, to the Big C ranch. You will not let that torch go out, it is an Olympic torch, a very, very important torch that must keep burning. If anyone tries to stop you you will tell them that the boss wants that torch, if they still try to stop you you will kill them. You will go quickly to the Big C gunpowder and ammunition stores area, you will put the torch out in a barrel of black powder. Even if you are killed you will still do this. Do you understand?"
The man nodded. That last was an experiment she had tried in the past without any success, but what the hey, she wanted to confirm if her wishes could be carried out beyond the extinction point of the brain she planted them in and the body that they rode upon.
Off the torch wielder set and on Felicity strolled.
As she did she lightly sang. "When you wish, up-on a star, makes a diff'rence who you are..."
Dozens of hard, bad men left the town, bent on good deeds.
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