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In the last episode, the people of Contention City met at the
Metropolitan to discuss the events of the past week concerning the ill-fated
posse that tried to hunt down the Pxelepiti. Next week is the conclusion of The
Alien Sheriff.
Episode 44
The second posse retrieved the bodies. East of the area, we
found an area of crushed vegetation the size of a parade ground. It looked
like a giant African elephant had dropped down from the sky and sat for
awhile. Other trails crisscrossed the area too, where the aliens had knocked
down trees, cactus, grass and the like. There also were bits of metal and
paper with strange writing found here and there.
After the second party returned to town, the City Council
passed a resolution in support of a fight against the Pxelepiti. We all
suspected the Pxelepiti moved their spaceship somewhere else in the area.
As the rowdy Apaches were tamed, Congress closed area
frontier forts Bowie, Buchanan, Lowell, Grant, Thomas and Huachuca. The
Contention City Council wrote to the commanding officers of these forts,
telling them of the Pxelepiti threat. Several of the letters were returned.
The forts were already closed. But, from Bowie and Huachuca, soldiers
obligingly went to scout out the Chiricahuas. They wrote back reporting how
they'd seen what we found but nothing more.
The Contention City Human Defense League (C.C.H.D.L.) wrote
back, urging to military to keep trying to root out the Pxelepitis. We never
heard back from them.
The C.C.H.D.L. was ready to fight the Pxelepiti for a couple
of years. We started with a hundred members and a couple thousand
sympathizers. Month to month we grew smaller as people lost interest in the
organization. The memories of those men who died began to fade.
While I was disappointed in the C.C.H.D.L., I'd never forgot
about those men. I'll always remember how their heads fissured and the way
their blood poured out. None of the other members of the C.C.H.D.L. had seen
that.
Without other sightings and other victims, the story became
something of a joke to the newcomers. The trails grew over and the bits of
paper with funny writing wasn't enough to convince anyone.
I stopped going to C.C.H.D.L. meetings when the active roster
attritioned to eleven. We never had anything new to discuss about the aliens
but talked instead of the weather, people who weren't at the meeting and
cards. The eleven members drank too much to be of any use in a fight anyway.
A year later, the richest silver veins were flooded out by
ground water, one right after another in the space of a few weeks.
None of the pumps sent from around the area worked. They
ordered extra-large pumps from a firm in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It took two
months for them to get there. In that time, many families moved on. Those
pumps ultimately failed as well. When the failure of that effort sunk in, most
left for good. Contention City became a ghost town, going into the dustbin of
memory, the same way so many other towns in the area had gone before. Only
ranching and farming continued. By 1897, the train quit stopping and much of
the agricultural activity died off as well.
The only time Graax and the Pxelepiti came up was when two
former Contention City residents met in some far-off locale and started
reminiscing. That happened more than one might think. The world is a small
place.
Edith and I joined Caleb and his wife in Durango, Colorado in
1900. I was sheriff there, again, as I'd been in Contention City. I'd put in a
few years up in Prescott, Arizona learning the skills of law enforcement
without the brrkup. There wasn't a day I didn't yearn for such a device
without its problems.
I dreamt of the Pxelepiti and Lebe'piti from time to time,
dreaming someone I'd seen that day was really from Squaattoos. I'd read a
little on the power of the subconscious to see through deception and I
believed it. It made sense. I was seeing their true nature. How many of them
were from Squaattoos, I didn't know and didn't see how it mattered. I had an
idea the Lebe'piti's study of Earth and her inhabitants didn't end when I lost
track of Graax.
Since Edith made herself a doctor, I figured I could make
myself a optical scientist in the same way. I started reading books about
light and physics in earnest. In May 1901, Edith gave me a set for my
birthday. When I thought I had an idea of what to do, I ordered a set of a
hundred blank lenses and some grinding equipment. If there really were
creatures from Squaattoos studying us, I'd see them.
Some people enjoyed teasing me about my hobby, asking me,
"Why do you do that?"
"Somebody has to. If the Pxelepiti come back and if the
glasses work, everyone's going to be glad I did," I said, telling them
the story.
"Did that really happen?" they'd ask, incredulous.
"Or are you just trying to start a sideline business making
glasses?"
"I wish it didn't happen," I'd say.
People didn't believe me. That upset and annoyed me, but
there wasn't anything I could do. The prospect of fighting a war with an alien
people scared them too much.
Some said I'd read too much H.G. Wells. When his and Jules
Verne's novels started to become popular, I learned to keep the story of the
Pxelepiti to myself. I wanted to be reelected. And while I ran the sheriff's
department well, it wouldn't do to appear to have too many other interests or
much of an imagination. Opponents could and did use it against me. Still, I
was able to win debates and the election by pointing to my record. It also
helped that I never faced an opponent who could speak well.
I knew constructing my glasses would be a process of trial and
error, like hunting for the Pxelepiti always had been. I ground three dozen
different monocles, unsure if any of them worked. I didn't know if I'd even
realize what I was seeing when I saw it.
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