Chapter One
Mercy was pulling on the last of her builder's gear when she heard the explosion. Running outside to her gate, she saw flames and smoke rising from the water tower - or at least, where the water tower used to be.
The sound of hoofbeats echoed along the tracks, and she caught her first glimpse of Logan, the bandit who had been terrorising the town. Was the explosion his doing?
He rode past her workshop, passing within feet of her gate. He turned and looked at her. His steely blue gaze drilled into her and despite his reputation Mercy found herself intrigued rather than scared. He nodded at her, then tore off down the tracks, as Justice and Unsuur arrived on foot.
“Mercy!” Justice panted. “Did y’all see anythin’?”
“Only someone I assume was Logan, flying past like a panbat outta hell. What happened?”
“Water tower got blowed up!”
“Logan blew up the water tower?”
“Sure looks that way, was hopin’ for a witness?”
“Nope, sorry, just came out when I heard the noise.”
“Well, Unsuur an’ I’ll follow the tracks. You’d better get over to the water tower, they’ll be lookin’ for all you builders, I reckon.”
When Mercy approached, the townsfolk had congregated near the site, and Burgess was sitting on the steps of Water World, shaking. Matilda had a hand on his shoulder, comforting him.
“As long as no-one is hurt, it’s okay. We can rebuild, you know.”
Burgess gave her a wan smile, then looked back at the smouldering wreckage.
Justice, Pen and Unsuur appeared from various directions, shaking their heads.
“He got away,” Justice admitted. “Mind you, if he’s on that goat of his, we’re no competition on foot.”
There were mutterings from the crowd, most of whom had known Logan as a boy. Many of them were in disbelief that he could act that way, while some expressed that Logan’s pa, Howlett, would have been disappointed in him, had he still been here. Mercy kept quiet as she didn’t know the man, but considered that Howlett no longer being here was a big part of why Logan was acting like this.
“I think we have to face the truth,” Matilda announced to the gathered crowd. “The Logan we knew is gone. We’ve given him a break, out of respect for his pa, but after this! No, I say we make him pay!”
Pen’s eyes lit up, and he started shouting orders, much to Justice’s obvious annoyance, but the two lawmen and the self-proclaimed Protector of Sandrock headed off to plan.
“Now, Yan, we need a new water tower.”
Yan, normally lazy and obnoxious, jumped to attention as soon as Matilda spoke.
“Of course, of course, I’ll have them working on it by tomorrow. Hey Newbie, and… the other one… where is she? Anyway, Newbie, find her and tell her to get ready, you can expect the plans tomorrow!”
Mercy headed back into town towards Mi-an’s workshop. She found Mi-an with Elsie, lurking in the alleyway next to Amirah’s shop. They were looking at the empty building across from the pottery shop.
“Hey guys,” she said.
“Shhh, don’t be so loud!” Elsie hissed. “We don’t want everyone knowin’ what we’re doing!”
“And what are we doing?”
“Breakin’ into Logan’s house, we need to find evidence to prove his innocence!”
“Seriously? He looks pretty guilty from everything I’ve seen.”
“That’s why we need to find more evidence! You believe me, Mi-an, dontcha?!”
“Well, I believe that you believe what you’re saying.”
“That’s good enough fer me! Now c’mon let’s get inside afore anyone else comes along!” Picking up a rock from the ground, Elsie smashed the pane next to the latch, and opened the window.
“You’ve done this before, I take it?” Mercy asked.
“Yeah, I been in here before. I need y’all to look through with fresh eyes,” Elsie explained. “I musta missed something!”
Between them, Mercy and Mi-an found a few things that Elsie had overlooked - a drawing of Logan and Haru by Jasmine, some cosmetics that Haru appeared to have made for Arvio’s store, weapons from Hugo’s store, but nothing out of the ordinary. The one unusual thing that they did find hidden on a bookcase was a torn photograph.
“Lookin’ at the date, that’s Logan’s ma and pa,” Elsie explained. “I never met her, she left town shortly after Logan was born, his pa never really recovered.”
“Hey, is that Owen?” Mi-an asked, pointing to a young boy in the background.
“Looks like it,” replied Mercy.
“Yeah, my ma said they used to hold a lot of weddings at the Blue Moon. Wonder if he remembers it?”
Overall, there was no new evidence, nothing to suddenly prove Logan’s innocence. They snuck out the same way they came in, and Mi-an fixed the window behind them.
“But I know he’s innocent!” Elsie wailed.
“Look, I’ll ask around,” Mercy said. “I might pick up something from stories you’ve heard before.”
Elsie perked up at that idea. “Once you do, we can meet at the saloon and discuss the evidence!”
“Yan says the work orders to replace the water tower will be out tomorrow, so it might not be straight away.”
“Yeah, yeah, just as soon as you can though!”
Heidi got the blueprints for the new water tower to Mercy the following morning. The engineer had already given Mercy an idea of what she’d need, so she’d been able to get a head start on the basics. Once she knew exactly what she needed, she spent the day at Gecko Station, gathering iron and bits and pieces like fibre mesh for the filters. On her way home, she called into the saloon for some dinner, and started asking a few questions, but no one was willing to talk much, not even Owen. He had just glanced at the image and told her he’d been too young to remember much. She also tried asking Hugo about the weapons. The blacksmith was normally one of the most laid back people in town, but his reaction was so aggressive, so out of character that Mercy took an early leave from the saloon.
As she settled down in her workshop for the evening, she could hear her machines working away in the yard processing the resources she needed. She found the noise relaxing, and often left the door open so she could hear them.
Since there wasn’t much she could do until she had enough steel bars and iron plates processed, she was spending the evening collating the notes from her investigations into Logan. Well, that’s what Elsie insisted on calling it. It was really just gathering up some town gossip. It didn’t really add up to anything that would help though, any more than the evidence in his house had.
“Ought to keep this door locked at night, there’s a lot of bad people about,” a voice drawled from the back door.
Mercy screamed and jumped up, scattering her notes as she tried to find the gun Justice had given her.
“You lookin’ for this?”
She finally looked round and saw Logan leaning against the wall by the door, her holster and pistol swinging from his hand. It was the first time she'd got a good look at him. He was taller than she expected, with broad shoulders. He still wore a mask across the lower half of his face, as he did in the wanted posters round town. They were a fair likeness, but what they didn't capture was the intensity of the gaze that focused on her from beneath his hat.
“What… what do you want?” she asked, shaking.
“Heard you were askin’ questions round town about me, thought I’d answer them in person.” He held the holster out to her. “I ain’t here to hurt you, so if you feel safer, take this back.”
Mercy snatched it off him but didn’t draw the gun. She stepped back, putting a chair between them. It wasn’t much, but she felt better for it.
“What do you want?” she repeated, her voice a little steadier.
“Just to talk, I swear.”
“So, talk.”
“Wanna tell me what you know, and I’ll fill in the details?” he offered.
Mercy stopped and thought about what she'd learned. She folded her arms across her body, mimicking Logan's posture, and blew some stray hairs out her face as she considered where to start.
“Your pa caught some virus when he was monster hunting. The church quarantined him, which you didn’t like, so you blew up the church to rescue him, only he was killed in the explosion. You’ve been on the run ever since, hijackin’ trains and blowing up the water tower.”
“Hmm, totally correct and completely wrong at the same time. Ain’t no way the bombs Haru and I used coulda done that much damage, and I swear to the Light I didn’t blow up the tower. That’s what I wanted to warn you about.”
“So if it wasn’t you, who was it?”
Logan shook his head. “Need to know I can trust you, first.”
“So how…?”
“I’ll be back in two days. If the corps or Pen are here, well I’ll know you can’t be trusted,” Logan replied with a shrug. “If you’re alone, we can discuss things further. Have a think 'bout who you can and can't trust round town.”
He turned and headed out the door. “Just promise me one thing. Keep your door closed and locked. Like I said, there’s bad people about, and I don’t just mean me.” With that, he disappeared into the night, leaving Mercy sitting on her chair, shaking.
She made sure both doors were locked though, something she hadn’t considered since moving to Sandrock the year before.
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