Scalped Book 7: Rez Blues (#35-42) PART TWO

"I'll goddamn will stay dead. Rest in peace, bitch" - Carol

Time for the second half of volume seven, which is all one arc called "Unwanted".  This story focuses mainly on Carol, the estranged daughter of Red Crow and her dealing with the revelation she is pregnant which closed out volume six.  This story deals with the issues of abortion in an upfront and honest pro-choice matter so if that offends don't read on.   Carol was pregnant in the past, but she was shot in the stomach when her boyfriend stole drugs from her father and tried to make a getaway from the rez with her resulting in his death and her losing the baby.  She developed a burning hatred of her father after this and got herself a very heavy drug habit which she passed onto Dashiell Bad Horse when they were sleeping together, but she knows he's an FBI agent now and has thrown him out.  Both of them facing up to kicking the habit is another part of the story as Dash is suffering extreme guilt over his utterly brutal torture and murder of Diesel in volume six and has gone on an epic drugs bender. Anyway, let's continue with this powerful story of two very lost souls having both finally hit rock bottom and how they both start climbing back up towards the light.

We start many years ago, a woman called Claudine is at the abortion clinic desperate for an abortion, right now, now.  She says she has to have it done before "he" finds out. 

Claudine: "I can't bring his child into the world.  Oh god, I can't do it.  Please don't make me."

But it's too late, and Red Crow comes striding into the clinic, he picks her up and slings her over his shoulder and takes her out and drives away with her.

Red Crow's direct approach.

Out on the road he says he can't believe she was going to kill their child.  She says she's not afraid of him she's afraid of it.  She says she knows he doesn't love her and won't be around much longer and she can't raise a kid on her own, "especially not the breed of one you and I are bound to have."  

He says he does love her and he's done with the Dog Soldiers, he promises he won't go away. The cops force them to stop and Red Crow is arrested as he is dragged off he promises her a nice place in twn and she can quit her job. If it's a boy they'll call it "Winston" after his grandfather and if it's a girl she can pick the name.  "Carol" she says to herself, "I've always liked Carol."

Carol, having a bath of angst.

We then cut to the present.  Carol is curled up in the bath, still in her clothes and crying.  She remembers being pregnant before and what happened.  That for a while after she got better she tried a lot to get pregnant again.  She would have given anything to have a baby and got back what she felt she'd lost, "but now... now it's a different story."

Someone knocks on the bathroom door and she yells for them to fuck off.  But Granny Poor Bear says she can't do that.   Carol doesn't know who she is and Granny Poor Bear introduces herself, "I'm Agnes Poor Bear.  Most folks call me Granny".  The hospital sent her in an unofficial capacity, she knows she pregnant and knows she's got a heroin addiction and she can help her with both.  If Carol turns her away the hospital will bring in the tribal poice and then "you-know who is bound to find out.  And I'm guessing you don't want that."

Granny says she'll have to go on methadone and the baby will be born addicted but can be weaned off it.  Carol says she assumes she wants the kid to live.   Granny says Carol has a lot to think about and not much time to do it:

Granny: "They call me Granny, but I ain't never had kids of my own.  I couldn't.  Instead I spent my whole life raisin' ones had by other folks.  I don't regret it.  And I love 'em all like they was my own.  But at the end of the day theu ain't.  It's a gift havin' a baby.  You get the chance, you don't want to throw it away. 'Cause it may not come again."

When Carol makes up her mind she should come and find her.  She picks up Carol's drug paraphenalia as she tells her even if she doesn't want the baby, the way she is living is no life at all and she tosses the stuff into the water and leaves.  Carol curls up even tighter and thinks how she's never wanted to get so high in her life before.

Granny Poor Bear tells it like it is.

We then join Dash, frantically searching his room for the drugs he thinks he has stashed around the place.   He is ignoring Nitz who has been calling him for the past two days:

Dash: "Can't close my eyes without seeing Diesel. And me shooting him over and over and over and over..."

But Diesel deserved it and Red Crow is setting him up but fuck them all he fooled them all, did he?  He won, so what now?  His face is contorted in distress as his thoughts get increasingly disordered.

Shunka then kicks his door down.  He wants Dash to come with him but Dash refuses.  They square up and Dash throws a punch that Shunka easily dodges.  He smashes an elbow into Dash's face knocking him down then he kicks him hard in the face as Dash crashes through the table.  Dash picks up a broken bottle and Shunka grins saying "I was hoping you'd do that".  He slashes Dash with his knife then crunches his foot into the side of Dash's knee.

With Dash grounded, Shunka holds the knife to his face and says he knows Dash is a liar and maybe he should cut out his liar's tongue.  Red Crow comes in before he can get too vicious with Dash and Red Crow contemplates Dash curled up on the floor and says to get him cleaned up and dressed, he's coming with them.

Dash hits a new low even for him.

We're back in the past.  A young Carol is sleeping in bad and her mother Claudine is writing her a letter apologising for the fact she is running away from her and Red Crow.  She writes that maybe one day Carol will understand it's not Carol's fault, some women just aren't cut out to be mothers  She wants Carol to grow up and not make the same mistakes she did.  She leaves the letter in Carol's hand and slips away forever.

Back in the present we see Carol reading the letter and she says her mother was a "fucking coward".  Some days she doesn't know who she hates more, her mother, her father or herself.  Someone needs to die today, someone she hates.  It can't be her mother or father, so that only leaves herself.

She's tried to kill herself before with pills but was found in time.  We see her pouring petrol on the floor of her home.  She thinks how she's never tried to die like this.  And she lights her mother's letter to her and tosses it on the fuel.  She stands outside with a couple of bags of belongings and watches her house burn.  Then she goes to the Poor Bear's house and Granny lets her in saying supper is almost ready.

Carol bids her old life and self farewell.

A bus arrives on the rez and a man gets off.  He goes to the casino and orders a drink.  He comments that legal booze on the rez is a big change since he was last here to the barman.  Then he asks if he knows Dashiell Bad Horse?  The barman says Dash isn't the most social of fellows, and it's not recommended to find him unless he wants you two.  The man says "Oh don't worry, he'll wanna see me... a boy always wants to see his father."  And it's Wade.

We're back in the past and in an abortion clinic but this time it's Gina Bad Horse and she's just had one. She leaves looking sad and outside is Wade with young Dash.  She tells him to get out, he can get a ride of his own and collect his stuff she'll leave it outside the house.  He starts yelling how she's blaming him for everything, and that she has no idea how to raise a kid.  She'll wind up running out of use for Dash, maybe she already has.  She just tells Dash to say goodbye to Wade and she and Dash drive off as she sheds tears.

Then we're back in the present, Dash is in a sweatlodge, naked with hands cuffed together going through terrible withdrawal symptoms.   He screams and begs for help while the medicine man ignores him and we see Shunka sitting outside and they are pretty far away from town.

Dash's brutal detox.

Carol is at the hospital being given her daily dose of methadone.  She'll have to come back every day for it they don't do take home doses.   Back at the Poor Bears where she is living she lies in bed and looks at the ultrasound picture in anguish and Granny silently observes her.

At the casino Red Crow comes to see Wade.  He asks what the hell he's doing on his rez as Wade toasts him.  Wade says it's not Red Crow's rez it's Lakota's land. Red Crow threatens him with bodily harm if he doesn't tell him why he's here.  Wade says he's here to see his son.  Red Crow says it's more like he heard Gina was dead and might have left him behind something of value.

Wade says it still eats at Red Crow that Gina chose him and not Red Crow doesn't it?  Red Crow says that was a long time ago and he knows Gina had plenty of regrets from that time. And Wade was certainly one of them.  "Did you kill her?" Wade asks him flatly.   He knows she was a thorn in his side so he'll understand if he did it.  Red Crow says Wade didn't know Gina as well as he thought he did and he doesn't know Red Crow at all.  The investigation into her death is on-going so he can "go the fuck back to wherever you came from and wait there to die."

Tension between Red Crow and Wade.

As he walks away he says of he really cared about Dash he should stay the hell away from him especially now.  "He's not your son, Red Crow.  He never will be" replies Wade.  The fact he's Wade's is the problem retorts Red Crow and we return to Dash in the sweatlodge.  There is vomit everywhere, and he starts seeing spiders crawling out of the sick and onto him.  He bursts out of the tent still cuffed and naked and runs away through the heavy snow.  Shunka just shrugs and says to the medicine man, "fuck it.  Let him go."

At the Poor Bear's place, the family are having a meal cooked by Granny.  Dino is sat feeding his little girl Angie while various aunts and uncles tuck in.  Carol comes in and there is a lot of bustle as Dino says he's going into town as various people ask him to get stuff for them.   Everyone bustles away to fetch money and help get the truck ready for the snow leaving Carol sitting at the table with just Dino's retarded brother for company.  He asks if she's having a baby then laughs and runs off and she sits alone at the table thinking.

Dash walks through the snow and starts hallucinating.  He finds a Lakota campsite with tee-pees and he has a blanket put over him and is given a hot drink.  Then Gina appears and scowls saying he can't be here.  She says she tried to tell him and he didn't listen.  She kicks him saying "go!  Get out!  We don't want you here after what you did!"  She tells him to never come back.  He shouts back that he was always on his own and they can all go to fucking hell.  The vison fades and he stumbles off.  The final shot of the chapter is Dash, curled up on Gina's grave, busy freezing to death.

Dash, once again drawn to his mum's grave.

Back in the past, Claudine is heavily pregnant and is smoking watching Red Crow drive off.  One of her eyes is swollen and puffy.   She then flings herself on the ground. She gets up and pleads with the baby inside her to stop moving.  She grabs a wire coathanger and is about to attempt an abortion but then she tosses it away and yells "why won't you just die?"

In the present Red Crow contemplates the burnt out husk of Carol's house.  He asks Shunka where she is and he says he's working on finding her.  Red Crow tells him not to fuck it up like he did with Dash.  Speaking of him, he's in hospital being treated for frostbite.  Wade had come to visit Gina's grave and found Dash there, maybe it was her way of looking out for him.

Wade: "Everybody was a little curious about how come you was running around in the snow naked and handcuffed and what all. But then Red Crow come by and people stopped wondering.  You in some kinda trouble with him, son?  If you are you should tell me.  Maybe I can help."

Dash snarls at him to get the fuck out.  Wade says he's being a bit ungrateful but Dash just wants him gone.  As the nurse tells Wade he has to go if Dash doesn't want to see him, he protests then walks away as Dash shouts after him to "go straight to fucking hell for all I care!"

At the Poor Bear's, Dino is putting Angie to bed.  Watching him is Carol who says he's a good dad. Dino says he doesn't know what the hell he's doing.  Carol says it's obvious Angie loves him.  Dino says she doesn't know any better, he could be the shittiest father in the world and she wouldn't know.  "Trust me... kids can tell the difference" says Carol.

Dino tells her that after he got his girlfriend pregnant, they were going to get an abortion.  But when Granny found out she said she'd raise the kid and they wouldn't have to do anything they didn't want to. He says most days he's glad Granny talked them into keeping it, he can't imagine life without his daughter.  But some days he imagines just picking up, forgetting about her and just leaving like her mother did.  But if he sticks around and tries that's still better than never trying at all.

Carol has a decision to make.

Carol gets sniffily.  She shows Dino a cigarette saying she's had it a week and hasn't been able to bring herself to light it.   But now she's going to go outside and try again.  Standing looking at the Poor Bear's house is Red Crow and Shunka.  Shunka asks if Red Crow wants him to go in and get her.  Red Crow says to leave her be.  Then he says to Shunka to never have kids.  And they walk away.  Carol was hiding behind a wall and having heard that silently starts crying.

A short while later Dash is out of the hospital.  Wade is waiting for him though Dash still wants him to get the fuck away from him or he'll beat his ass.  Wade says he's livelier now than the quiet kid he remembers.  Dash asks what he wants.  Wade says he's not here to make amends or ask forgiveness.  He's here because he cares about Gina.  He came to pay his respects to her and to find out who killed her.

Dash is surprised by this, Wade goes on to say Dash can't trust Red Crow.  Dash says he doesn't need advice.  Wade says they are Gina's kin, it's up to them to get justice for her.  He asks Dash what he knows.  Dash is silent. Wade asks if he's done anything to find his mother's killer? "It's been a busy fucking year" says Dash.

Wade says he's heard and thinks he and Dash have a few things in common.  Dash says "I'm nothing like you."  Wade says he might not want to admit it but he has the same weaknesses, same holes inside that need plugging up.  He's got a temper that's lost him more fights than he's won. Dash says that's enough, but Wade goes onto say Dash has a longing inside that's made him roam and to dare god to put him out of his misery over and over. If he's like Wade he's also done a lot of running, from things he's got no right to be proud of, from the rez, from everything.  But here they are.

Wade carries on saying Gina broke them apart but now she's brought them back together.  He doesn't want a hug or love anything like that, "but you got to help me. For her."  He loved her and never should have left the both of them.  But he can find her killer and he needs Dash's help for that.  Dash finally speaks, telling him to come to Gina's house where he lives now.

Trust is not easily given by Dash.

He tells Wade to come around tommorrow afternoon and they'll talk.  But "don't expect no tearful fucking reunions".  And Wade has to stop calling him "son". Wade asks if he wants to grab a beer but Dash walks off telling him not to push his fucking luck.  Then he goes to see Carol but finds her burnt out abandoned house.  Carol is at the casino asking after Dash. That night they end up driving past each other and stop, get out and silently approach each other.

We get a fantasy of Carol's.  She is clean and happy and playing with a baby girl.  A smiling Dash comes in, kisses her and cuddles his kid as they laugh together.  Carol wakes from this fantasy being shaken awake by Dash as they lie on a mattress together surrounded by rubbish.  He lights up some heroin and she smokes it too.

A final meeting.

After that flashback we return to them standing in the snow looking at each other in silence.  They make awkward small talk as their thoughts go back and forth.  He thinks about how he regrets hitting her, while she thinks about how she can't forgive herself for dragging him down with her and that she's pregnant with his child.

He thinks that coming back to the rez was a mistake, he just spreads misery.  Carol thinks she'd be dead if it wasn't for him and this baby.  It's saved her.   She speaks telling him she'll never tell anyone about him being in the FBI.  He thinks he put her life in danger telling her.  She thinks that her father is still her father and although she hates him she can't help Dash get him. Dash thinks Red Crow would kill her too.

He thinks how he has no idea what he's fucking doing. She thinks he'll get killed by Red Crow.  Dash thinks how she needs to get off the rez. She starts to walks away, thinking she's pregnant.   He asks her to leave the rez with him, when he is done here she should come with him, doesn't she want to get off the rez? She says she doesn't want to anymore.  He asks her to just thing about it.  She bids him goodbye thinking over and over that she's pregnant and should tell him.  She doesn't and drives off.

They can think but can't quite spit out their feelings.

Later they are both lying in their respective beds. Dash thinks he shouldn't have asked her to leave with him.  She thinks she should have told him she's pregnant.  He thinks he scared her off, she owes him nothing.  He was stupid.  She thinks it's his baby and he has a right to know. They shower and Dash thinks it's just him now.  She thinks she should have told him but didn't.  She gets dressed and smokes her cigarette then a policeman asks if she is ready?

He escorts her past pro-life protesters outside the Planned Parenthood clinic.  She goes through the proceedure, while Dash waits for Wade to come over.  After the deed has been done, Carol washes her face and looks at herself in the mirror and says, "I'm not sorry."

Time passes and Wade doesn't show up much to Dash's annoyance.   He's on his way over and a car draws up behind him and Nitz gets out asking Wade what the hell he's doing here.   He asks what the fuck Wade is doing on his rez.  Wade says it seems the rez is everyone's at the moment.  Wade is then arrested when he refuses to get in the car voluntarily and Nitz bundles him inside.

Fucking Nitz, ugh.

Wade says he's just here to see Dash.  He has nothing to do with the FBI anymore.  Nitz says he's not to go near Dash and he's getting off the fucking rez right now.  Wade realises that Dash is FBI, "tell me you didn't!  Not Dash too!   Not my son!"   Nitz doesn't responds he just keeps on driving.

At the Poor Bear's, Carol is packing up. Granny comes in and Carol says she didn't keep the baby so she thought she better move out.  She says she knows Granny didn't approve, "but it was something I had to do."  She says she wishes she had some way of paying Granny back.  Granny says maybe she can.  Because she isn't going to live forever when she dies she doesn't want the things she knows to die with her.   She wants Carol to learn them, and she is welcome to keep living at the Poor Bear's as well.  She leaves Carol who sheds a tear then begins to unpack.  And we finish on the image of Dash sitting by Gina's grave deep in thought.

Carol is finally where she belongs.

This is a very emotionally draining arc.  Abortion is a tricky subject and this story goes to great lengths to show it's a decision that no woman makes lightly. I'm a big fan of Granny Poor Bear and I like how even though Carol doesn't keep the baby in the end, she is non-judgemental and sees in Carol the potential to learn the old ways and has taken her on as an apprentice.  There's real warm heartedness in how Carol gets through kicking her habit in the company of a family that just accepts her immediately as one of their own.  And to contrast with the more brutal way Red Crow has Dash work through his habit as well as showing us he does have a measure of fatherly concern for him much to Shunka's disgust.  It's good to see that Dash has suffered nightmares and guilt ridden waking moments reliving his murder of Diesel which shows he's not a total psychopath.  The meeting between him and Carol in the snow is deeply sad as both obviously still care a great deal for each other but know it's better for them to stay apart.  Carol has learned that the rez is her home now after her symbolic "death" immolating her house and all the misery that went on in there.  Finally we meet Wade as he is today, and it's interesting how although he's been out of Dash life since Dash was tiny, he still has the measure of him.  Dash is already showing signs of caring about his mother more than he'd care to admit and tentatively trusting his father is another step along his road to making peace with his past.  Of course Nitz is there to ruin that, as Wade is horrified by the realisation he and Dash had more in common than even he thought.  So as usual fantastic writing from Jason Aaron and stunning artwork from R.M.Guera. Join me in a few days time for the next book, "You Gotta Sin To Get Saved".  Cheerio!

Scalped Book 7: Rez Blues (#35-42) PART ONE

"It should go without saying.  But I'll say it anyways.  This never happened" - Shunka

Time for the ongoing FBI investigation to go on hold for some more character studies.  Because this volume is more than seven chapters I have split it into two parts.  This actually works out very well as the first four chapters are two done-in-ones and a two-parter, and the rest is one four part arc.  So I am doing the three stories first with part two covering the four-parter in a few days time.   So as you probably know by now Scalped is the story of Dashiell Bad Horse's undercover FBI investigation into tribal leader and casino owner Red Crow set on the fictional Prairie Rose reservation.  Red Crow is something of criminal mastermind who has killed and schemed his way to the top his whole life. The tribal police bar a couple of exceptions is in his pocket and although he isn't afraid to get his hands dirty, has his right-hand man Shunka do much of his enforcing.  We haven't learned much about Shunka so far except that's he's a glowering intimidatory prescence, devoted to Red Crow and always waiting for Dash to fuck up. This two-parter takes a look at the man with a surprising revelation about him.  The other two one-shots tell the story of an elderly Indian couple still working the rez and trying to stay self sufficient in their twilight years.  The other focuses on Dash's deadbeat dad Wade who so far has only been seen doing drugs around Dash when he was a little boy.  His story also gives us a very interesting thing that Dash and he have in common.  So without further ado, let us dig in.

LISTENING TO THE EARTH TURN:  Art by Danijel Zezelj (apologies if tht's wrong, his name is spelled two different ways on the cover and the credits page), the first fill-in artist whose work is up to R.M Guera's standard. He also did some fill-ins for DMZ.  We're introduced to Mance and Hazel making their way through heavy snow to their home, freezing cold, every step an effort.  Hazel stumbles and Mance catches her saying they are almost home.

Hazel and Mance.

We then go back in time a few days, Mance is working in the garden thinking how he's a man of simple pleasures. He likes doing the harvesting on his own as he likes being lost in his own thoughts working the same land his daddy worked and his daddy before him.  They live far away from the centre of town:

Mance: "Back when the rez was formed, the only Indians lived near town were the ones who had given up the fight and sold out.  The real Indians lived out as far from town as they could get.  The further out the more real you were".

He brings the last of the turnips to Hazel who is cooking.  She thinks to herself, "it ain't enough".  The garden used to be all they needed to sustain themselves but this year she had kidney troubles and Mance broke his ankle and now they don't have enough to support themselves anymore.  It's going to be a long hard winter and for the first time in forty-three years, "I don't know if we can make it."

They have a quiet meal, and afterwards Mance also thinks that they don't have enough food.  He thinks he let Hazel down not being able to bring the garden in this year.  If he can't do that "then what the hell good am I?" Hazel does some sewing and thinks that it was the well water that gave her kidney troubles, people said it is contaminated thanks to the uranium mining going on close by.  Mance had to tend to her and wasn't able to bring the garden in as usual.

He smokes his pipe in secret although Hazel knows he does spend money on tabacco, Mance gets a small pension and some social security so they can get groceries and Hazel's medicine.   She sells a quilt here and there, which gives them enough money to keep flowers on their son's grave.  He was in the army and died in an accident when his jeep flipped, no medals just a folded flag they keep upstairs in a chest.

Mance and Hazel, very much in love still.

They lie in bed together worrying seperately and listening to the sound of military aircraft flying low over their home. Mance thinks, "we ain't talking about what we really wanna talk about."  They both think they have not enough food and no money and that leaves them only one thing to do.  He doesn't want to say it, but he'll have to go into town.  He finally speaks the words even as he thinks Hazel is ashamed of him.  She holds him and tells him he's a good man, who has nothing to be ashamed of.  And they both think how much they love each other.

Next day he drives into town to the place he has been dreading, the "Nutrition Assistance" place where free food is handed out. He puts it off by doing some chores and catching up with friends, but finally he has to go, for the first time ever he needs a handout.   He loads up a box then he is handed a pencil and told to sign:

Mance: "I've fasted for eight days and hung by hooks from a sun dance pole until my flesh tore.  I've killed snakes big enough to eat a baby and reeled in paddlefish the size of small cows.  I once killed a coyote with nothing but a pocket knife.  I buried my only son and didn't cry.  But I ain't never done nothing as hard as this."

And he manages to force himself to sign for the goods.  He walks out feeling like a criminal like he's been forced to admit to the crime of being poor.  But thinking about being blessed to have Hazel in his life, he suddenly feels like a "very rich man" indeed.

Hard thing for a proud man to do

Later he brings in the firewood and finds her collapses on the floor.  He puts her to bed and think he should have forced her to go to hospital.  But she is thinking about how her mother died in hospital, "a cold and miserable way to go"   She was terrified and ashamed, so Hazel wants to die in her own bed or die on her feet.   Mance says he'll go into town to get her some medicine and she says she'll come with him.

As they drive she thinks about when they were young and would take drives all the time, making love the first time by the French Creek.  They never seem to drive anywhere now except for going into town and funerals, "so many funerals".  They make it into town and get the drugs Hazel needs, but on the way back home the truck's engine dies.  They walk through the snow and we get to the scene at the start with Hazel collapsing and admitting she's scared.  Mance cups her face and says he isn't scared and talks about the first time they made love.

When they did she blurted out that she loved him and he said they shouldn't rush into anything.  The reason he said that was because he was scared of growing up, and when he realised that a couple of days later he also realised he loved her. If he loved her and she loved him, "that'd take us about as far as we ever wanted to go."  He's never been scared since especially not of a bit of snow.  And that gives her strength to start walking again. 

They get within visual distance of their house and suddenly a military jet smashes into it, the shockwave hits them and they are both badly injured.  As they lie in the snow, Mance looking back on what happened narrates that the young pilot lost his way in the snow.  He was killed and they were barely hanging on, they both woke up in hospital full of tubes with Hazel saying she wanted to go, she didn't want to die in hospital, but they didn't die. Not that day.

Suddenly an aircraft!

Mance ended up full of screws and Hazel's kidney problems were brought under control so now she feels, "fair to middlin' again".  When they got out of hospital the military gave them a bunch of money and their friends all started looking for a place near town for them.  But they don't want to move and we end with the image of the pair of them checking over a blueprint for a new house where the old one was, holding hands as they do so.

THE FINE ACTION OF AN HONOURABLE AND CATHOLIC SPANIARD: Now the two-parter where we take a peek into Shunka's personal life.  Unfortunately the artist is Davide Furno, my least favorite of all the fill-in artists.  The story is narrated by a man called Joseph Crane.

He begins by saying he never knew much about the man called Shunka.   But he gets the feeling no one ever does.   He knows Shunka means "dog" in the Lakota language but he has no idea if that's his real name.   He knows he lives on the Prairie Rose reservation in South Dakota but he doesn't think he was born there.   He knows he works closely with the tribal leader Red Crow but doesn't know how he feels about the man.  He knows he's done some horrible things, "I know he has his share of secrets like the one that brought him to my house".

We see Shunka inside Joseph's house pointing a gun at him.   But Joseph says he knows he didn't come here to kill him. Shunka demands to know what he knows about him.  Joseph says he sees a man burdened by his secrets.  Shunka yells he's fucking lying and who told him?  Joseph says he didn't know for sure until Shunka came here tonight.  He stands up and when Shunka says he came to kill him, Joseph says "no you didn't.  Why did you come here?"  Shunka glowers then grabs Joseph and plants a passionate kiss on his lips.

Did not see that coming!

We cut to earlier and Shunka arriving at the "Potawatomi Palace Casino and Hotel".  After a tussle with the security that leaves one man downed covered in blood and the other having pissed himself in fear, the tribal elders come rushing up.  Turns out Red Crow sent him on a mission here because they have all the best acts and he thinks they've been telling people's management not to come to he Prairie Rose casino.

The leader says if Red Crow needs help booking acts he'll do so, but first could Shunka deal with a problem for them.  Their ex-tribal leader Joseph Crane who had united the tribe and had the idea of setting up a casino came out of the closet a year ago, "he's a berdache.  A gay.  And apparently quite proud of it all of a sudden."  He got voted out as tribal leader because they can't abide that sort of behaviour but he's making noises and wanting to have a Pride protest outside the casino.  Could Shunka maybe discourage him?  "How discouraging do you want me to be?" Shunka asks.

The tribal leader, "Bobby" Greenwood and Shunka visit Joseph.   Joseph says they didn't mind him speaking out when he was making them money.  Bobby says he should have stayed in the closet instead of telling the whole world his bedroom habits.

Joseph: "Right.  It's my fault for not being able to stick to a steady diet of strippers and barely legal cokeheads like you and the rest of the fine, upstanding gentlemen on the council do."

Greenwood says he's a sodomite rubbing everyone's face in it. Joseph says he gets a sackful of hatemail every day from people trying to "discourage" him.  And the occasional brick through his window.  Soon he believes someone with work up from a brick to a bullet.

He says if he's going to die it'll be as himself, "it's not healthy to live with secrets like that for so long".  Those kinds of secrets can eat a man alive and he starts staring at Shunka as he says that saying he looks like a man who knows a thing or two about secrets.  Shunka lunges at him and grabs Joseph by the collar saying if he wants to fuck boys, fuck them but "no parades, not ever."  And he tosses Joseph to the ground.

Hot man on man action time.

That night the tribal elders soak in a swimming pool and joke about putting the fear of Shunka into Joseph while he stands aloof drinking and a sex-worker says he can fuck her, she's already paid for.  Then we cut to Joseph and Shunka in a passionate clinch and they get to the fucking themselves.

Joseph: "He fucked angry  He didn't fuck out of hate or disgust or self-loathing.  He fucked like a man of intensity,  He fucked like a soldier on the eve of battle.  He fucked like a thing made of concrete and fire.  He fucked for hours."

Afterwards Joseph reflects, "he wasn't the best I ever had.  But he was close."  Shunka gets dressed say this never happened.   Joseph says Shunka must have a lot of nights like that, quick hook-ups when he gets out of town and can let his guard down.  He tells him it's not healthy, Shunka says meddling in his affairs isn't healthy.

Joseph starts to give him a lecture about the history of LGBT people in various Indian cultures.   Apparently almost every tribe had special classifications and roles for gay and transgender people, the "two-spirits" as some were called.  The Cheyenne had the "Hemanah" who served as matchmakers and medicine men.  Amongst the Navajo the "Nadleeh" worked as marriage counselors.  For the Lakota the "Winkte were teachers and prophets."

He goes on saying some tribes had up to seven different genders and the people were not only accepted but often revered.  It was only when the Christians came that "gender diversity suddenly became a bad thing". A monk wrote about a conquistador called Balboa who when he saw native men dressed as women had them fed to the dogs.  The monk called it "a fine action of an honourable Catholic and Spaniard".  He asks what Shunka thinks about that but Shunka just leaves without saying a word.

After that night Joseph narrates that he never thought he'd see Shunka again.  We see Shunka on the phone to Red Crow say he wants to hang around a few days as a vacation, Red Crow asks "what's her name?"  Then tells him to enjoy himself and hangs up.  Joseph wonders if he stuck around because of him, but thinks it more likely Shunka just needed a break.

Joseph: "Maybe he needed a break from the lie that leads back home.  Maybe go somewhere deep, deep down inside he was secretly hoping to trip up and get himself outed.  Whatever the reason. I knew he'd never dare come see me again. So I went to him".

We see him approach Shunka in the casino and whisper in his ear that he needs his help, but Shunka says to keep the fuck away from him or he's dead.  Joseph says he is dead if Shunka doesn't help him. But Shunka just tells him to stay away again and walks off. Then Greenwood slings Joseph out of the casino.

The proverbial straw for Shunka.

The next day Shunka is getting a taxi to the airport but traffic is backed up because there's been a murder. Shunka goes to take a look and sees it's Joseph's house.  Joseph says he'd been shot point blank in the face, "I was dead."  He says you couldn't blame Shunka for leaving, he didn't owe Joseph anything.  It would be crazy to stay and would involve a lot of bloodshed.  We see Shunka in the taxi leaving the rez.  He mutters about the "a fine action of an honourable Catholic and Spaniard" to himself.  He tells the taxi driver to pull over and strides back into the rez.

We then cut to Shunka looking into a bathroom mirror where the three tribal council members are sitting in and around a swimming pool. Joseph narrates that that when he was growing up his father was a medicine man and was extremely respected, but he got cancer and passed on his duties to a man who was known to be a two-spirit.  Gay.  That's when Joseph learned the history of LGBT people in Indian culture.

But his father died and as the members of the tribe who remembered the old days also died off people stopped going to that medicine man, "they started giggling about him behind his back or even snubbing him to his face."  His friends would make crude jokes and he'd laugh along with them, hating himself as he did so.   He doesn't know what Shunka was thinking that night but it might have been a similar story from his own upbringing.

Joseph: "I couldn't tell you exactly the sort of forces had shaped him over the years and led him to that point in his life.  But if he was like me, then he was sick of being despised for who he is.  He was an angry gay Indian with a gun... and he'd had enough".

He walks back into the pool room where one is relating a crude anecdote.  Greenwood says he though Shunka had snuck off without saying goodbye.  Does Shunka have any questions about "dead queers" or are they done?  Shunka pauses and then says there is one more thing and he turns and unloads two pistols worth of ammo into them.

One pissed off gay Indian.

We jump to a few hours earlier.  Shunka is sitting in a bar scowling.  Two men discuss Josephs death which is being spun as a suicide.  One of them says he obviously "could't live with being a butt fucker no more".  Shunka leaves his drink undrunk and departs the bar.  He breaks into the crime scene and immediately realises it was a murder which had been tampered with to look like suicide.

We see him approach the casino as Joseph tells us Shunka must have been wondering why he was here, risking discovery for a man he fucked once and didn't know.   A man who didn't save Joseph when he had the chance and meant nothing to him.  He probably came up with no answers except what happened next.  He walks into the pool room and confronts them over the messed with crime scene.  Greenwood asks what the "hell business is it of yours?"

Shunka says he was taken to the house to inimidate Joseph and he wants to make sure he isn't being set up.   Greenwood says they don't work like Red Crow.  Shunka says he's right about that.  Greenwood says that Joseph's death makes him happy.  He had nothing to do with his death though, Joseph was a sinner who flaunted his lifestyle and his end was bound to be violent.

He says when he was young his father told him when he was a boy he saw tribal elders lynch a man for "turning queer" so Joseph got off lightly, and he's burning in hell now.  People round there won't care about his death, they'll move on and so should Shunka.  Shunka asks if Greenwood has ever killed a man with his bare hands.  When you do that you're as intimate as lovers and sometimes "when I'm putting a man down, my dick gets hard" so does that make him a faggot?  Greenwood says it doesn't but it makes him a dangerous man he's glad to have on his side.  Shunka asks where the bathroom is.

Back in the bathroom, Joseph says he isn't foolish enough to think he was being avenged.  He was angry at those men for what they represented. 

Joseph: "A world where he would always have to hide.  To sneak around in the shadows to live in shame.  I think Shunka looked out at that world and for the first time in his life he admitted to himself... he wanted it to die.  He wanted to kill it. So he did.  He killed as much of it as he could."

And we're back with him shooting the three men.  Two die immediately, Greenwood manages to gurgle out out a "fuck... you".  And Shunka curb-stomps him on the edge of the pool.  He looks over the scene of carnage and then leaves.

Catharsis.

Joseph says he could have walked away that night and no one would know he had been there.  Instead he broke into the coroners office to get a look at Joseph's body.   Maybe he still wasn't convinced Joseph was dead.  Maybe it was his way of saying goodbye. Joseph never expected him to do that, and Shunka certainly wasn't expecting what he found.

Come the next day he walks to Joseph's house and kicks down his door demanding to know where Joseph is.  Joseph stands in front of him saying "let me guess you're not here to fuck me this time."  It turns out Joseph had a plan and it was his assissant  who killed himself and his body mistakenly was identified as Joseph's.  Joseph was "away on business" and was unaware of the what happened until tonight where he has just got back from sorting things about with the sheriff.

Oh and because of "the incident" at the casino where Chief Greenwood and some other members of the tribal council were killed, he's now tribal chief again, "funny how things turn out, isn't it?"  Shunka realises he'd been set up from the start.  Joseph says he has no idea what Shunka is talking about.  Shunka says he used him to kill those men, Joseph denies it.  "Fuck you Crane" says Shunka. "Yes. You did, didn't you and quite enjoyed it remember?" responds Joseph. Shunka puts a gun to his head but Joseph has henchmen now and they pull guns too.

Joseph, totally not dead.

Joseph thinks as he looks into Shunka's eyes that some people might look at Shunka and see only a mindless, hired gun of a killer.  He sees much more.  He saw in Shunka's eyes the desire to kill him more than he'd ever wanted to kill someone in his life.  But Shunka didn't, "and that makes me fear him all the more."  Joseph tells Shunka to have a nice trip back home and to tell Red Crow the new chief doesn't deal with thugs and criminals.  As Shunka goes, Joseph says his secret is safe with him.

Back on the rez Red Crow knocks on Shunka's door and asked what the fuck happened.  Shunka says it's better Red Crow doesn't know.  Red Crow says he fucked up and Shunka agrees.  He opens his door to show a woman in his bed, so Red Crow says to meet him at the casino when he's done.  When he's gone Shunka tosses the woman her cash and tells her to fuck off much to her confusion as they haven't had sex yet.  And our final image of this two-parter is Shunka, stony-faced, half-dressed, sharpening his combat knife...

Alone again.

FAMILY TRADITION: R.M Guera is back on art duties again as we finally get some backstory on Wade, Dash's dad.  He narrates that his great, great grandfather was a scout for the U.S. Marshals.  His great grandfather was in a submarine that sank during World War One. His grandfather flew combat missions during World War 2 but was shot down over the Philippines.  His dad froze to death in 1950 during the Korean War and Wade was born the very next day.

Now he's here in 1969 "carrying on the family tradition of fighting and dying for a country that never gave a damn about us."  And he stumbles over a tripwire in the jungles of Vietnam but the "bouncing Betty" grenade attached to it is a dud and doesn't explode.   His squad call him the "luckiest son of a bitch alive."  He was charmed.

Next brush with death is when a sniper rifle bullet bounces off his helmet and just gives him a headache. His squad laugh it up about his good luck. Next day him and two others are caught out in the open, they are cut to ribbons, he isn't even scratched, "this time there's no laughing."  He doesn't even tell them about the King Cobra that climbed out of his sleeping bag one night.   As he hears it bite someone else he doesn't feel charmed, he feels cursed.

Three weeks later they charge up a hill and mortars start falling, everything goes black and he thinks he's dying.  He's found the next day sitting there, the only survivor of a massacre, "the whole fucking platoon."  The chaplin says he was saved by God for a great destiny, he was given his papers and told he was free to leave the army, "free to face my destiny".

Wade and his destiny.

Six years later we see him laying in bed with a Vietnamese woman smoking what looks like opium.  The woman asks if he is leaving and he says yes today would be the day to do it.  She wants to come with him saying she'll be a good wife and give him lots of kids.  Wade asks what would he want with kids, he can barely look after himself.  She calls him a fucking asshole and without anger he says "yeah.  I know."

Now he's going to make one last deal before this place goes up in flames.  She says she'll be here when he comes back but he says he isn't come back.  She calls him a coward and that everyone says "Wade the Indian, he big fucking coward".  She says he's too scared to go home, too scared to stay here.  Where is he going to go now?  "Hell. I guess.  If it'll have me."

It's April 29th, 1975.  Saigon.  He hasn't much time, the NVA are encircling the city and the South Vietnamese government is crumbling.  The American embassy is being evacuated.  Once the troops roll in the Vietnam war will be officially history.  Everyone is trying to get out except for him, he still has a job to finish.

He meets up with a dope dealer he's been working with.  The man asks him how Wade thinks he'll smuggle sixty pounds of heroin out of the city.  Wade says he hasn't given it much thought.  The man says they had quite a run and their two friends back in the states must be disappointed.  They are great men the man says, Wade says they're "fucking bastards". The man asks why he works for them, and Wade says he's a bastard too.

Wade and his drug hook-up.

The dealer asks about the rumours that Wade can't be killed.  Wade says if they stick around when the NVA roll in they'll find out.  The man says he is going to Laos next, where he'll continue to produce heroin.  Vietnam has been good to him but the communists can have it now, he has two crates of poppy seeds, thirteen suitcases of US currency and even his work force.  He doesn't want to leave them behind now he has them specially trained.

He says his business will continue, Wade must also be a rich man but Wade says he spent the money he's dirt poor.  The dealer says is Wade heading home to South Dakota which he told him was a shithole.  But Wade says it's "the most beautiful place on Earth".  He trails off and looks at the workforce crammed in the back of a truck and sees them as Indians.   He drops his bags of drugs and shoots the dealer through the head and takes down his non-workforce men. 

The workforce get out of the truck as Wade says "I'm so sorry. God. I'm so sorry" and hands one of them his gun telling him to use it on him he deserves it.  But the man doesn't shoot him, he just spits on him and they walk off leaving a devastated Wade still kneeling on the ground. He leaves his bags of drugs and races to the embassy where the last choppers are evacuating Americans, he manages to make it aboard one, a soldier grabs his hand and pulls him up.  His name is Dashiell, Wade says he likes that name.

Wade comes to the rez.

Back in the USA he drives to the Prairie Rose rez and who should he be meeting but FBI agents Bayer and Berntson the two killed by Catcher and whose deaths are fuelling Agent Nitz's present day mission of vengeance.   They tell Wade they are suprised he didn't die over there, they heard the commies killed the dealer and his whole crew so Wade got out in the nick of time.  They've now got more work for him.

We get a flashback to when the two agents were MPs in Vietnam were they first offered Wade a job running drugs.  His new job will be legit this time, as they tell him he'll be working for the FBI.  Wade imagines himself killing both of them but doesn't draw his gun.

Wade: "I'm a coward.  I will always be a coward.  I should have died in Vietnam.  This is not my destiny.  Then again...maybe I've found my destiny after all."

And as he says that he sees a photo of Gina Bad Horse in the file the agents have on the Dog Soldiers who they want him to infiltrate.   And that brings his backstory to an end.

A greater destiny awaits.

Well some amazing character work in these three stories.  The story of Mance and Hazel was just what was needed after seeing so many failed and destructive relationships in the series.  Their love for each other is so pure and beautiful I found the story profoundly moving.  And the great art from Danijel Zezelj really complimented the story too.  Shunka's story despite sub-par art is also superb.  When I turned the page to see him lay a massive smooch on Joseph I was completely surprised.  I have never been in the closet myself, but I dated a woman in the US military for a while when being found to be gay was ground for being kicked out so she was a similar "Armour Closet Gay" as TV Tropes would have it.  And I recognised a lot of the same burdens of secrets, having to pretend to be someone she wasn't and only able to let her guard down round at my flat.  So I found myself really sympathising with him and his double life and it explains a lot about his attitude towards Dash which will be fully revealed in a couple of volumes time.  And of course we get yet another character living a lie, an on-going theme of the series.  The history lessons Joseph gives us are fascinating, I don't know how rose-tinted they are, but it's still interesting to know and sad that the acceptance of LGBT now in Indian circles isn't what it one was thanks to the corrupting influence of westerners and the Christian church.  I have to applaud Joseph despite his rather cruel manipulation of Shunka, it was a hell of a plan to get back to being the tribal chief, he really knew which buttons to press in the taciturn man.  Finally we have Wade's story, he always comes across as a someone pathetic individual and I have to wonder what Gina saw in him.  Tying him to the murdered FBI agents was very clever, and shows the "saints" that Nitz paints them at were just as grubby and corrupt as Nitz's ex-wife Marci said they were as well as explaining why they were coming onto the reservation clandestinally, and who the FBI mole
 was. All-in-all fantastic story telling and character work from Jason Aaron.  Come back in a few days for part two which will move focus onto Carol's story.

Scalped Book 6: The Gnawing (#30-34)

"This is our home.  This is not a fucking battlefield" - Red Crow

More Scalped, the critically acclaimed Vertigo series that mostly tells the tale of Dashiell Bad Horse an FBI agent undercover on the Prairie Rose reservation he grew up on.  The reason he is undercover is that his immediate boss Agent Nitz has a vendetta that he's kept going for thirty years over the deaths of two FBI agents who were murdered in 1975 by a man known as Catcher.  He doesn't know that Catcher both did the deed and also scalped the agents, he is fixated on tribal chief and casino owner Red Crow who was present at the murder as was Gina Bad Horse, Dash's mum who has also been murdered by Catcher.  Dash unfortunately hooked up with the self destructive Carol, Red Crow's daughter and has picked up a heavy heroin habit from her.  Another FBI agent was placed on the rez by Nitz, a man nicknamed Diesel, currently being held in prison for killing a woman and her vengeance seeking twelve year old son whom Dash had taken under his wing.  Finally Red Crow has a serious headache in the form of Mr. Brass, a sadist who has been sent by the East Asian criminal gang who part funded the casino to deal with any threats to its profitability. Brass raped and murdered two runaways just for his own enjoyment and was caught by Red Crow gouging the eye out of Dino Poor Bear's head.  This was the final straw and Red Crow shot Brass's goons then broke his nose and had him arrested for the two murders.  Now in this volume we see the fallout from those actions as he has to deal with the possibility of war coming to the reservation.  Jason Aaron writes and thankfully R.M. Guera's fantastic art graces all the chapters of this arc.

Officer Franklin Falls Down is sitting on Granny Poor Bear's porch chatting with her as day breaks.  He tells her of a dream he had, he was falling and the whole world was falling with him.  Gina was there, she fell past him while he tried to grab her but missed.  He asks Granny what she thinks it means.  "Means you still got a lotta work to do" she tells him.

She says the Cheyenne have a story, which says there is a great big pole holding up the Earth. And the "Great White Grandfather Beaver of the North" is always gnawing it.  It's been gnawing a long time and is halfway through..  When people do things to make him angry he gnaws faster and pretty soon he'll have gnawed all the way through and the pole will topple and "the whole world will crash into bottomless nothing and that will be the end of everything.  The end of all ends."  Falls Down asks if she believes that and she just says that sometimes when she first wakes up she can hear the gnawing.

Falls Down and Granny sit and talk.

Dash has arrived at White Haven Sheriff's Office with extradition papers for Diesel being held in jail there. Sheriff Karnow is not being cooperative though saying he won't release the prisoner to him unless Red Crow comes and asks in person.  But he can take a different prisoner off his hands, Catcher was picked up the previous night for "drunk driving on a horse".  If Dash takes him, Karnow will consider handing over Diesel.

So Dash drives back to the rez with Catcher in the back.  Catcher tells him he talked to Dash's mum the other day.  Dash says she's dead, but Catcher says he knows and that Dash has spoken to her as well.  Dash asks if he knows him and Catcher says they met in a bathroom where he told him he was on a "long black road."

He tells Dash to get his life together or he'll be the next to die.  He must stay away from Carol, she's a parasite who'll bleed him dry.  He says Dash needs to stop being afraid of who he is and he's going to have to kill a lot more people which Catcher can help him with.  Dash is confused, who the hell does Catcher think Dash is?

Catcher: "You're Dashiell Bad Horse.  You're a drug addict and a Lakota warrior and an undercover agent for the FBI.  You've been sent here to save us."

As Dash turns angrily towards him, Catcher says "eagle" and an eagle flies at the windscreen causing Dash to swerve into a tree.  When Dash comes round, Catcher is gone.

Eagle!

We cut to Red Crow as Shunka asks what the fuck they are going to do with Mr. Brass.  Red Crow strokes his chin saying he hasn't figured that out yet.  Shunka says they have got to make ready for war, "When Johnny Tongue finds out you pistol whipped his pet psycho, he'll come gunnin' for us."  Red Crow says they will be no war on the rez when they are so close to turning things around.  Shunka says he's made war inevitable, but Red Crow says he doesn't want anyone else getting killed around here.

He calls Dash into his office and asks if he has heard of an Agent Nitz, Dash says he hasn't but Red Crow goes on to say he believes Nitz has managed to get an agent undercover in his organisation.  Dash's new mission is to root that person out. He says Dash hasn't been performing so well lately so this is him auditioning for his job again.  Dash leaves and Red Crow says to Shunka, "give him a week.  If he doesn't get it together..."  And Shunka grins saying "my pleasure".

Dash walks outside in a daze, ignoring Falls Down asking to speak to him about his mother.  He gets to his truck and vomits hard with a look of utter terror on his face.  He then rings Nitz in a panic, but Nitz says if Red Crow thought it was him he'd be dead and buried already.   Dash want's out but Nitz says no.  The situation with Brass and the Hmong's will blow up into a full fledged war and sooner or later, Red Crow will pull the trigger on someone. 

There's a lot of vomiting in this series.

Dash says what if it's him having the trigger pulled on. Nitz says not to worry, so Dash should go beat the shit out of someone, look like he's pounding the pavement in search of answers and buy himself some time.   He tells Dash it's what he trained him to do and not to let him down now.  Dash slams down the phone. "I give him a week" says Nitz to Newsome. Newsome asks if word has really leaked out about there being an agent on the rez and Nitz says it was him who leaked it.  He did it to turn the heat up on Red Crow in the hope he'll fuck up and then "he's fucked."

Red Crow stands outside Mr.Brass's jail cell. Brass asks if Johnny Tongue has called yet, because he'll enjoy watching Red Crow squirm when he does.  It's at that point Johnny does call.  He tells Red Crow to let Brass out and give him a million dollars.  Red Crow says no.  Make it two million then says Johnny.  "You can make it two trillion for all I care.  I'm not doing it" responds Red Crow.

Johnny starts ranting and make a series of crude threats towards Red Crow, he says he helped build that casino and he'll come and take it apart piece by piece if he'll have to. He wants to speak to Brass so Red Crow hands the phone to him. 

Thus perished Mr. Brass.

Then he shoots Brass through the cheek.  Johnny wants to know what the fuck just happened. He says Brass better not be dead.  Brass groans, so Red Crow empties a full clip into him.

Red Crow: "Now he's dead. And you will be too, you slant-eyed mongrel fuck, if you ever dare set foot on my fucking rez".

Johnny Tongue is rendered speechless as Red Crow hangs up on him.   He then tells his men to gather everyone and get a many guns as they can find, they're going "to kill a bunch of Indians."

We return to earlier, Falls Down tells Granny he wants to speak with Catcher, all roads in Gina's murder lead back to the FBI murders in '75.  Grannt says that was a long time ago.  Falls Down says plenty of people think Lawrence Belcourt is innocent and in that case where's the real murderer.

Granny: "Lots of folks got killed back then.  Lots of murderers still running loose.  Some secrets is best left buried."

Falls Down says he knows Gina left the prison in tears and hurried back to the rez but never went home.  Granny says Catcher can't have killed Gina, he loved her.  Falls Down says in his experience there's often a "fine line between love and murder."

He says he just wants to speak to him and Granny says she can tell him where to look but he may not find him, he's a hard man to pin down.  But she advises him that no one will want to talks to him about the old days, lots of people did things they weren't proud of back then, "you ain't got no right makin' 'em relive all that". They sit in silence for a while then Falls Down asks after Dino.  She says he lost the eye but is otherwise holding up fine. She knows Red Crow saved him.

Granny: "I don't know what to make of that man no more. I surely don't.  Just when I'm ready to give up on him for good, he ups and surprises me.  Maybe I'm crazy but something tells me...he may surprise us all yet."

Back in the jail.  Brass lies dead and Red Crow yells that no one saw a thing.  Unfortunately sat in the adjoining cell is a young drug dealer called Ben White Elk who witnessed everything.  Red Crow is about to shoot him, but Shunka stops him saying "no boss. Not like this."  He orders the removal of the body and Ben to be put in the interrogation box.  And everyone else get back to work.

Didn't see nuffin' guv'nor.

Dash is sat in his truck on the rez's border, as if he was considering making a break for it.  But Nitz calls him saying there is a tonne of radio chatter at the police station and to get his ass back and find out what happened there.  Dash arrives to see the blood being washed away and asks "what the fuck happened here?"

Shunka and Red Crow are watching Ben through the one way mirror.  Red Crow says he can't believe he shot an unarmed man in a cell in front of a roomful of people.  Shunka says the people are loyal to him, but that leaves Ben.  He's a two-bit burnout who'd sell out his own mother if a fed flashed a badge at him, "and he saw me commit murder.  What choice do I have?"  Shunka says he'll sneak him out after dark and deal with him andhe'll spin the Brass murder as self-defence.  No need to worry about the feds.   It's Johnny Tongue they have to make ready for.

Outside the station Dash phones Nitz and tells him Red Crow killed Brass.  And there is a witness as well he's in the interrogation room.  Nitz tells him to not take his eyes off Ben and not let him be taken out of the station.  Nitz and Newsome then set off to go confront Red Crow. Dash meanwhile thinks how this looks like his job is finished and he can finally leave the rez and never come back.

Dash: "Goodbye shitheads.  You fucks are stuck here for the rest of your lives, but not me.  I'm getting the fuck outta here. I'm getting the fuck outta here.  I'm getting the fuck outta here. So why don't I feel good about it yet?"

Ben comes in shackled to use the toilets where Dash is.  He begs Dash to help him he knows his days are numbered. When Dash says he can't help, Ben says he'll out Dash as a heroin addict to Red Crow as he's been dealing to him, "get me the fuck outta here, or I'll see you in hell."  Dash has a flash of what could happen if Ben told either Red Crow or Nitz, a bullet to the head or jail.  He smacks the wall in frustration.

Nitz comes into the station and says to Red Crow that he knows there was a murder there today.  Red Crow says it was a man trying to escape and if he wants to read the report he'll send Nit a copy.  Nitz says all the witnesses will back his story?  Red Crow says they will.  Nitz asks who they have in the box, meanwhile Ben is being held in the back of the station away from Nitz.  Dash sneaks up behind the man holding Ben.

Dash has a decision to make

Then we look in on Carol.  She is phoned up by Diesel who calls her Dash's girl, she says she's not Dash's anything she threw him out.  He leaves a message with her, he got his papers he's getting out.  She puts the phone down saying she probably won't pass that message on. She gets up, takes a few steps and faints.  We end this chapter with Johnny Tongue and his boys tooled up and driving to the rez.

In a gun store, Catcher is buying a high powered scoped rifle.  He also buys ammo, a single bullet.  In the police station, Nitz forces his way into the interrogation box to find no one there.  Ben is still being held in the back of the station  Dash then knocks the man holding him out from behind so he isn't seen. He takes Ben outside and they hide behind some dumpsters.  Dash gets out a knife and Ben thinks he's going to kill him so panicking he smashes Dash over the head with a bottle and runs.  He finds a car with keys and makes his getaway just as Red Crow and Nitz appear wondering what the fuck just happened. Both Nitz and Red Crow tell their second-in-commands they need to find Ben.

Meanwhile Falls Down is knocking on doors looking for Catcher, or "Arthur Pendergrass" to give him his real name.   After another interview fails to help him he murmurs "it's like chasing a damn ghost" as Catcher watches him through the rifle scope.

Dash goes to Carol's house but she holds the door shut saying she doesn't let FBI agents into her house. He tells her to keep her voice down but she starts yelling "FBI! FBI AGENT, RIGHT HERE! HEY, EVERYBODY!"  He slaps her hard telling her to shut up.  She looks at him on the verge of tears as he says he's sorry. Then she gets angry again, slaps him and throws him out saying if she sees him again she tell her father everything.  As he drives off, she runs to the toilet and vomits down it.

Later that night, Shunka tells Red Crow they found the vehicle Ben escaped in.  Red Crow tells him to find out who let him escape and kill him.  Left alone he broods for a while then goes to visit Carol who opens the door with a knife in her hand.  She asks what the fuck he's doing here.  He asks if he can come in just for once.  She says no.  Then he says he wants her off the rez tonight, he'll give her any money she needs. 

There's trouble coming and he doesn't want her in danger.  She says last time she tried to leave he killed her boyfriend and baby and now he's coming to "buy me off like some cheap goddam whore?"  She isn't going anywhere then suddenly she swoons and Red Crow catches her.

Something it up with Carol.

Dash is sitting by his mother's grave.  He tells her that she would have told him to face up to who he is, "only thing is. Who I am ain't nice.  For the things I got to do now, momma.. I'm sorry."  We then see him with Diesel, he's getting out the next night, they have a plan worked out and Diesel laughs saying he knew only they could trust and look out for each other.  And they shake hands on it.  Meanwhile Johnny Tongue's crew has reached the rez and got a hotel.  Johnny Tongue looks at a poster of Red Crow advertising the casino and says "bang."

Next day Catcher is walking alongside is ancient horse Festus, still carrying the rifle.  He notes a helicopter over head saying "I guess pigs can fly."  It used to belong to channel 7 news, now Red Crow's crew are using it to do an aerial search for Ben while the mountains are crawling with FBI also after Ben who is quivering in terror behind some rocks.

Dash is at the motorlodge where Nitz and Newsome have their office.  Dash asks Newsome what was he supposed to do.  Newsome says he was supposed to keep an eye on the witness, now Nitz is away to clean up his mess using FBI from the local city to search the mountains.  He tells Dash he better pray they find the witness alive.  Dash then says he heard Diesel is getting out.

Newsome says they pulled some strings.  As far as the Nebraska cops know he's being transferred to federal custody.  He's done, Nitz want him out of sight when they get Red Crow.  Newsome says that he know how Dash feels about Diesel, Newsome feels the same.  He's actually arranged for a mental hospital in Wyoming to take him, "to hell with the guy right?  He's a drug addict and an murderer.  He'll get what he deserves".  And Dash looks completely shame-faced at that.  Later Diesel is passed a note in his cell that makes him whisper, "motherfucker."

Red Crow is standing in hospital where he took Carol after she fainted.  They are still doing tests on her and she doesn't want to see him.  He looks furiously at the nurse telling him this, then walks away.  Elsewhere Dash has found Catcher and they are both pointing guns at each other.  Dash asks how he knew he was FBI.  Catcher says the Thunder Beings told him.  Dash also asks if he meant everything he said in the car the other day.  Every word says Catcher.  Dash puts his gun away saying "then let's talk".

Dash confronts Catcher.

We don't see the outcome of that conversation, we then cut to Falls Down driving up to Catcher's trailer.  Then we see the FBI and Red Crow's men all searching for Ben.  Shunka ambushes Nitz and holds a knife to his throat telling him to call off his men.  Nitz just tells him and Red Crow to go fuck themselves.  Shunka knocks him out and stands over him saying "next time."

Then Shunka finds Ben.  Shunka tells Ben he used to track mountain lions for kicks where he grew up.   He wants Ben to tell him who helped him excaped the police station. Then we cut to Johnny crew driving up to the police station where Red Crow is.   Then we see Diesel in a car with Newsome.  He asks to be uncuffed and Newsome lies that he's going to be put up in a hotel until they have time to debrief him. Then Diesel lunges at him, taking Newsome's gun and shooting him through the head as the car careens off road.  Dash is there to "rescue" him and as Dash guiltily looks at the blood stained window and the dead Newsome, Diesel tells him to get going to Dash's car.

Johnny's crew spread out in front of the police station.  Red Crow tells his men not to do anything no matter what happens.  He doesn't want to turn the place into a battlefield.  He goes out alone to meet Johnny Tongue, he says "I got nothing to say to you, Johnny.  Just do what you came to do".  And Johnny smashes him across the face with his machine gun and knocks Red Crow to the ground. He keeps beating and kicking Red Crow and holds a gun to his head.

Johnny Tongue hands out a beating.

Elsewhere Diesel and Dash are walking and talking, well it's mostly Diesel talking.  He says they could run away to South America, he has contacts there and there's always demand for people who can do what they do.  He says fuck Nitz and the FBI, they worked their assholes off for shitty pay and the promise of a lousy pension.  If you're not doing anything to do with terrorists who gives a fuck?

Diesel: "Fuck 'em.  They lost two good agents tonight. The two baddest fucking Injuns the bureau ever saw, am I right?"

Dash says nothing.  Then he pulls out a gun and shoots Diesel in the lower back, then his legs.  As Diesel collapses in agony he says he doesn't remember this being part of the plan.  "This was always the plan" says Dash.

Dash begins his toture and murder of Diesel.

He said when he shot the twelve-year old boy that if he ever got out of jail he's kill him.  Diesel calls him stupid saying he could have walked away clean tonight.  Dash says he doesn't fucking care.  And shoots Diesel in the leg again.   Diesel screams to just kill him like a fucking man. But Dash methodically shoots him in the legs and arms while he screams obscenties at him.  When Diesel passes out after two full clips, he wakes him and shoots him in the balls.  He then stands and watches him suffer, when he finally stops twitching he puts one in his brain.

Dash: "I don't throw up like they do in the movies.  I don't feel suddenly overcome with panic or remorse.  I just look down as this man all shot to fucking hell... and I feel pleased."

Back with the manhunt.  Shunka is demanding the name of who helped Ben escape the police station still while Ben begs to be let go. Then he starts to say who it was... and Catcher shots Ben through the head with his rifle, "I did that for you, Gina.  I did that for your boy. If you should see him in the spirit world, this man I just shot... please tell him it weren't nothin' personal".

Catcher saves Dash's skin.

Shunka tries to go after him, at first thinking it was Dash.  But Catcher calls down saying "I know who and what you are.  I can see your spirit animal.  It ain't my place to kill you".  And he then disappears leaving a confused Shunka behind.

We return to Red Crow having the wounds he sustained in the beating being seen to. Shunka comes in and tells him his witness took a bullet to the brain before he could tell him anything.   Red Crow says that Johnny Tongue beating him down in front of his people was a way of saving face, "he couldn't afford to kill me, he knew that.  Just wanted to put me in his place."  He gets dressed and tells Shunka to get a gun and come with him.

At Catcher's trailer, Falls Down ventures inside and finds many pictures of Gina pinned to the wall and the words "I'm sorry" written in blood over them.  He realises Catcher is the murderer and goes to phone for back-up but gets knocked out by him before he can do so.

Johnny Tongue and crew are returning to their hotel.  Johnny says "Red Crow's a smart motherfucker. He knew he fucked up.  And knew he was beat." They go inside their rooms to find the people they left there dead and Red Crow standing with a gun over the bodies.   Then he and Shunka unload into Johnny and the rest of his crew until they are all dead.

You don't fuck with Red Crow.

Next day Dash shows the photos of Diesel's body to Red Crow saying he was the FBI agent.  He buried him in the Badlands.  Red Crow says he leant on Sheriff Karnow and found out it was Nitz who arranged Diesel's release from jail.  He also contacted some Kickapoo and they told him Diesel had tried to bring racketeering charges against the casino there.  Dash said he found out via his dealer, when he was high he liked to brag.  Red Crow asks him how he feels now and Dash says "like I wish I could do it again."  Red Crow shakes his hand and says he did good.

We then see Agent Newsome's body discovered and a rage filled Nitz kicking his car in frustration.  Falls Down has disappeared and can't be raised on his radio.  And finally Carol is leaving hospital and is told she is pregnant.  The final page shows Red Crow soaking in a bath. Dash looking at himself in the mirror and Carol crying out in silent anguish.  End of volume.

On that cheerful note..

We this is certainly an action packed set of storylines.  Dash plumbs the depths ever lower by getting the one FBI agent who seemed like a mostly decent guy killed by Diesel so he could have his revenge on him.  I know he made a promise to Shelton that when he caught the man who killed his mum he'd make him suffer, but the level of cold blooded torture Dash metes out to him is appalling.  The fact it conviniently solves the problem of the rumoured FBI agent on the rez is just a bonus extra.  Dash doing this deed will bring him closer to Red Crow and the significant look he and Shunka exchanged shows hints of the problems yet to come of Red Crow favouring Dash over Shunka.  Catcher remains an intentionally infuriating character, he saves Dashiell's hide by murdering poor Ben, somehow knowing the right place and time to be, and now he's taken Falls Down hostage to keep word of his murder of Gina from getting out.  He seems to think Dash has a great future linked to the rez and we are starting to see Dash make peace with his life there, apologising to his mother's grave was a major step forward.  And finally we once again see why you don't fuck with Red Crow.  He murders Brass almost as a reflex action and yet he takes a beating to stop a war breaking out and so he can silently deal with the gang when they don't expect it.  Jason Aaron as usual gives nuanced and believable characters while R.M.Guera's art gets more detailed and exquisite with each collection.  Join me in a few days for part one of "Rez Blues".