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The Only Rules That Matter: Legacy (Corsair and Madam Mim)

Jackie laughed. "Years of practice, kemosabe," she said, dropping her white folk accent and using the pone as a stop to scoop more chicken onto her fork and shovel it into her mouth. "All you gotta do is act like a real slick man and learn how to spot the right kinda woman. And Alice there," she gestured with the bread, "looks like she's turnin' out to be the right kinda woman."

Alice dropped the directory on the table. It was only about twenty pages, all told, but that was promising enough. The waitress flirted with Sam, and Jackie had to wonder if it was just for tips or if she swung both ways. When she turned her attention to Jackie the Apache swallowed and grinned.

"Always do like me a good chicken breast," she returned, allowing her eyes to linger again at Alice's cleavage. "Long and slow's just the way t' take it, too, til it just falls right off the bone and you gotta lick the juices right off your fingers. Sam here don't always take it real slow, but he's always real good at gettin' it all off when he eats." Sam flipped through the directory while she flirted, eventually finding an A.M. LaMonte who sounded like her best bet. Jackie tore her eyes away from the waitress to look at the directory. "Alice honey, d'you happen to have some paper and a pencil we could borrow for a tick to write this down?" she asked sweetly. "And maybe the address of that place you were gonna suggest?"
 
Alice smiled at the request. “I surely can,” she replied sweetly, producing a notebook and scribbling for a minute before tearing the page out. “There you go. You folks don’t mind sharin’ with a colored lady, I hope?”

Sam smiled at that, remembering BD as she jotted down the address of this Doctor LaMonte. “Ain’t never shared wit’ a colored lady before,” she replied, “but we’re pretty open.” God that sounded awkward and stupid, but the pleased little smile Alice gave her as she handed the pencil back said she didn’t mind. “An’ thank you.”

“Oh,” Alice grinned, “it’s my pleasure. I’ll look forward to seeing you two when I get off,” she added as she turned and headed back to the kitchen.

“Reckon Ah am too,” Sam murmured, watching her hips sway. Then she tucked the slip of paper into her pocket and went back to eating. “Well, Ah’m lookin’ forward ta this event by now. Probably outta see th’ doc first, though. Think Ah’m makin’ an appointment, or jes’ walkin’ in?”
 
"Hmm?" Jackie jerked her attention away from Alice's fine ass back to her lover. "Oh, just walk in," she suggested with a shrug. "Get up in their faces, they can't kick you out. That's how I've always dealt with them 'educated' types. They don't usually take kindly to it, but I figure tough shit, if you're there in the flesh they can't duck you."

She leaned over her meal, shoveling food into her mouth again, thinking about BD and about Alice. With a snicker she shook her head. "If little Miss Alice is the wild ride she seems to be, my ankle ain't never gonna heal right. Worth it though."

Once they were done with the meal and had paid their tab, Jackie looked at the address Sam had written down. "Well if this here's fifth..." she gestured vaguely at the street sign, "and this LaMonte is on third, then he probably ain't too far from here."
 
"If little Miss Alice is the wild ride she seems to be,” Jackie snickered, “my ankle ain't never gonna heal right. Worth it though."

Sam smirked. “Ah kin Leah’s see ‘bout breaking her ta th’ saddle fer yeh,” she offered with a laugh. “Then y’kin have a gentle, easy ride. Do yer ankle a world o’ good, Ah reckon.” She ate some more of her barbecues. “Makes me was need, though. Y’reckon Ah might get taken fer a fellah by a fellah what’s takin’ by fellas?” Pursuing by her lips, she ran back through that silently before shrugging. “Could happen.”

Butterflies returned after the meal, churning the barbecue in her stomach. Jackie was chatting away, but Sam barely registered her. The ghosts were back. She could see them in the corner of her eye, following. Not threatening, really. Just... disapproving. The head doctor wouldn’t help, but she knew the. She wasn’t crazy, after all, she was haunted. What could a doctor do about that?

Then she saw the sign hanging next to the post h of a white-washed two-story house. A discrete thing, white with the words “A. M. LaMonte,” in an elegant cursive and “Psychiatrist” in smaller letters beneath. “Well,” Sam drawled, “Ah reckon Ag’ll stake mah rep as a tracker on this here house bein’ Th’ right one.”

A small card on the door said “Open”, so she pushed it open. Inside, the drawing room had been converted into a waiting room, and a pretty dark-haired woman looked up curiously. “Howdy, ma’am,” Sam said, riffing her hat. They were about the same age, she guessed, but their worlds were awfully different. “Is th’ doctor available? Ah ain’t got no appointment, but Ah’d sure like ta talk ta him if’n he’s got a minute.”
 
It could happen that a gay man could take her for a man...but he would have just as much to lose by snitching on her, so she oughtn't worry about it. Jackie told her as much, and held her hand under the table when Sam looked visibly nervous. She could tell she wasn't listening, looking out of the corner of her eye at something Jackie deduced wasn't there when she'd casually looked around. Still she chatted away, trying to give Sam some sense of normality. It wouldn't do to lose it every time Sam saw one of her ghosts.

They came to the offices of A.M. LaMonte. It looked a quaint little place where the sort of settling-down type person would look right at home. The waiting room was quaint and comfortable, with a deep-pile, plush carpet, a sofa, and two wing-backed chairs. A young woman a little older than her, probably nearer Sam's age though she'd wager a little older, sat at a desk, rifling through papers. A picture of herself and an older man--presumably Dr. LaMonte--standing at some fancy to-do with some man with a fancy mustache was perched on the edge of the desk, as though that wasn't its usual place but she was making some attempt at personalizing her desk. She looked up curiously with large, brown eyes then wordlessly opened an appointment book and scanned the page.

"Well there are no appointments until three," she said, and Jackie was a little surprised at her accent. She wasn't familiar at all with the tongues of Europe, but she'd heard her daddy make fun of a Frenchman by talking that way once. "I do not usually take walk-ins, but it has been a slow day; I don't see the harm in it." Anne Marie flipped her book closed and looked up with a friendly smile. People often mistook her for the secretary whenever she sent hers home early for the day, but disguising her identity in this godforsaken country was the only way she was going to get any clients to come in in the first place. "The going rate is five dollars per hour, with an hour being the standard session. Your..." Her eyes flicked over Jackie not disparagingly, but appraisingly nonetheless, "companion may accompany you if you like, but she may wait out here if you wish. Either way, you really ought to sit down. Please."

She stood, somewhat taller than both of the other women and substantially more graceful, and tucked a notepad under her arm. "And in the sake of full disclosure I am afraid I must correct you. I do not yet have my doctorate. This way please, Mademoiselle...?" Anne Marie held open the door, waiting for the new client to fill in her name. At Jackie's glance she realized her potential mistake. "Oh, I apologize. Would you prefer 'monsieur'?"
 
“The going rate is five dollars per hour, with an hour being the standard session,” the doctor’s assistant explained, speaking in cultured tones that made Sam really feel her sixth-grade education. Not that it seemed like she was doing it on purpose, but it still made Sam feel awkward.

Then she glanced over at Jackie, and Sam tensed. If this stuck- up bitch said one word about Jackie, she’d... “Your...companion may accompany you if you like, but she may wait out here if you wish. Either way, you really ought to sit down. Please."

That wasn’t what she’d expected, and it took her a minute to rearrange her thoughts. “Uhm... no. She kin come,” Sam finally managed. “Nah, uhm, mah problem... it, uh, it kinda affects her, too, y’know?” She glanced back at Jackie, wanting to just leave, and tensed as she saw one of the ghosts next to her. “So, Ah kin see th’ doctor now?”

The woman rose from the desk. She was taller than she’d expected, tall enough that Sam as hesitant to guess which of them was taller. “And in the sake of full disclosure I am afraid I must correct you. I do not yet have my doctorate. This way please, Mademoiselle...?"

“Ah... Sorry? Yer th’ doctor?” Sam shook her head. “Ah’m sorry, ma’am, Ah don’ mean no disrespect. An’,... madam-wah-sell? Ah don’...”

Doctor LaMonte glanced at Hackie. “Oh, I apologize. Would you prefer 'monsieur'?"

French. The doctor was speaking French. Sam had tried to teach herself French, one summer, from a book she’d got from a Church sale. It had looked pretty, but she’d never quite got her tongue around it. “Oh. Uhm...”she glanced at Jackie as well, wondering if the truth would cause problems. Then she shrugged mentally, deciding she’d risk it. “Madam-wah-sell, Ah reckon. Sam Cavendish, ma’am. An’ Ah surely hope y’kin help us.” She looked around the office as she followed the doctor in. “So, uhm, how does this work?”
 
Anne Marie resisted the instinct to wince at the butchering of her language. The woman was trying, after all, and she could hardly have found anyone else here who could do better. She had come to the United States to get away from Algie's scrutinizing gaze and controlling tendencies, to conduct her business the way she wished. That, and she had felt a desperate need to leave when she had realized that she was falling in love with him. Time away would do her good, and would return their relationship and her feelings back to the filial devotion of the protege. Or so the theory had gone, anyway. She had left with his tepid approval and found that here in the middle of nowhere--in Texas, of all places--she missed Paris and Algernon Swift more than ever.

Jackie hobbled in after Sam and gratefully took a seat on the couch, pulling her leg up and setting it gingerly on an ottoman. The walls which weren't covered by bookshelves--more books at one time than Jackie had ever seen in her life--featured framed diplomas and licenses as though she had to prove that she was allowed to do this. She probably did have to prove it, being a woman and all. She had been surprised that a woman had been allowed to go to school and become a doctor at all, but then she saw that a diploma and two of the licenses were in French and that made more sense, she supposed. Jackie had heard all sorts of wild things they did differently in Europe that would be considered immoral here, and she guessed that letting a woman go to school and be a doctor was the least of them. Interspersed on the packed bookshelves were more pictures of her and the same man from her desk, or sometimes just him. Her husband, maybe? No...there was a single photograph of her when she was very young, standing with a different man, the two of them dressed up in wedding regalia. Strangely, that was the only picture of her husband in the entire room, that Jackie could see. Anne Marie caught her gaze and glanced at the picture, drawing up a tight smile.

"God rest his soul," she murmured by way of explanation before turning her attention back to the two women in her office. In her experience people didn't ask too many questions about Gustav whenever she said that. "The way this works, Samantha--may I call you Samantha?--is you tell me about this problem you've been having, and we talk about it. Although I ought to tell you, gender dysphoria is more common than you might think, and if it doesn't bother Mademoiselle...?"

"Jackie Sparrow." She didn't trust folks who used big words to say simple things, and whatever gender dysphoria was it sounded like this LaMonte was doing exactly that.

"If it does not bother Mademoiselle Sparrow then there's really not much call for you to be here." She smiled. "And there is no need to stand on ceremony; you may call me Anne Marie, if you wish, or Madame LaMonte if you do not."

"It does bother me though," Jackie insisted. "It's...it's startin' to worry me." She glanced over at Sam guiltily, knowing she should be more supportive but unable to forget that outburst in the desert.

"Well, Jacqueline--"

"It's Jackie."

"Pardon me. Jackie, why do we not let Sam tell us in her own words how she feels?" Anne Marie turned her attentive gaze to Sam, pen poised over her notepad.
 
Wrapped up in her thoughts, Sam barely registered the dialogue between the other two women. Gender dis-for-yeh? What on Earth did that even mean? But she registered Jackie commenting on his the ghosts were bothering her, even as she took a seat.

"Pardon me. Jackie, why do we not let Sam tell us in her own words how she feels?" Anne Marie turned her attentive gaze to Sam, pen poised over her notepad.

“Well, ma’am,” Sam said uncomfortably, glancing around the room. “Ah reckon it’s like this. Ah, well, Ah reckon Ah outta start at th’ beginnin’.” Swallowing nervously, she looked to Jackie for support. “See, ‘bout three months back, Ah was caught in an ambush. Th’ Texas Rangers Ah was guidin’ was all killed, an’ Ah was shot up good an’ left fer dead. Jackie dragged mah dyin’ add back home an’ nursed me back ta health.”

Licking her lips nervously, she watched the doctor write something. “Since then, Ah... Ah been seein’... things. Ghosts.” She focused her attention on the floor. “Hassilin’ me, y’know? Pushin’ me ta... ta help ‘em get revenge on their murderers. An’...”. She swallowed. “They, they’s Athreatened Jackie. They don’ like how she’s, uhm, distractin’ me.”

She fell sil not for a minute Kent, chewing on her lip. “Jackie that now there might be somethin’ wrong with n mah head. Like, Ah got mah brain hurt or somethin’ an’ it ain’t healed right. But it’s scarin’ her - Ah’m scarin’ her - an’ Ah don’ want that, Doc.” She swallowed. “Dunno how Ah’d gender this fer yeh, though.”
 
Anne Marie took notes shorthand as Sam described how she and Jackie had, presumably, met. The Indians out here, she knew, had rather different ideas of gender roles so it was entirely possible that Sam had felt more comfortable exploring this part of herself. Then there was the trauma from being left for dead after a violent, shootout, but that---

Voices. And hallucinations. Anne Marie kept the mask fixed carefully in place but something like surprise alighted in her eyes for a brief moment before she jotted down more notes. As Sam finished she nodded, thinking for a few long moments. Taking advantage of the silence, Jackie put her hand on Sam's thigh.

"You're not scarin' me, kemosabe," she assured Sam. "It's the damned ghosts. And they--did you say they're threatening me?" She scowled and looked around as though expecting to see whatever it is Sam saw whenever she had her visions. "Well they can just fuck right off coz I ain't goin' nowhere."

"Have you taken any hallucinogenic drugs since this shootout, Samantha?" Anne Marie asked, looking up from her notepad. "Ayahuasca, anything which might make you see or hear things that aren't there? They can trigger things like this. Before you answer I would like to add that everything said here is entirely confidential: I cannot by law say anything to anyone unless you pose an immediate danger to yourself or others. It's like confession."

"I mean, she was in a pretty bad state at the Sunrise Ceremony," Jackie said thoughtfully, before adding, "the Sunrise Ceremony is--"

"I know what it is," Anne Marie interrupted gently. "And there were no drugs involved?" Jackie shrugged and shook her head. Anne Marie hummed in consternation and wrote a few more things down before looking up again. "Well, there's more talking to be done but at this point I am afraid you may be schizophrenic."

"Skitzowhat?"

"Schizophrenic," she repeated. "Schizophrenia is a disease of the mind, when the affected person sees or hears things which are not there and the brain is unable to differentiate between perception and reality." She sat back in her chair and watched their reactions. "There are several treatments, most of which I personally find barbaric and morally reprehensible. I can hardly see how a patient might be helped by boring a hole in their head."

"A hole in her head?!" Jackie began pushing herself to a standing position. "Now you listen here, lady--!"

"I do not recommend a hole in the head, Mademoiselle Sparrow, now please sit back down before you injure yourself further." She fixed Jackie with a stern gaze until she sat down again. "What I do recommend is hydrotherapy to relieve congestion in the blood vessels around the brain. This can be done in a specialized tub sort of contraption at the hospital in Houston, but I would not recommend that. You're likely to both be committed against your will to be cured of your homosexuality. I could also order a wet sheet pack and treat you here, upstairs, away from the prying eyes of heterosexual men who are generally afraid of brown people, transgenders, and women with minds of their own." She graced them with a small smile. "There is also electroshock therapy; I happen to have a machine upstairs, and in small, regular doses it has been known to help patients immensely with all sorts of diseases and manias. The only other treatment I might recommend is prolonged narcosis, or sleep therapy: I would keep you in a chemically-induced sleep for a few weeks, maybe a month, waking you two to three times a day for meals and other necessary bodily functions. This treatment is, however, highly experimental. But since your visions are telling you to hurt someone, someone you care for, I thought I might put it out there for consideration."

Jackie looked at Sam, taking her hand gently. "Whatever you want, Dhateste, I'm behind you," she promised. "I just don't want them ghosts botherin' you no more."
 
Keep yourself calm, Sam told herself as the doctor described drilling a holen her fucking head. She’s not r commending that. But the other treatments hardly sound need better. Hydrotherapy? Being forced to sleep? Electric shocks? She shook, just a little, then really see that the doctor was addressing her directly. “But since your visions are telling you to hurt someone, someone you care for, I thought I might put it out there for consideration."

“They ain’t,” she managed, licking lips gone suddenly dry, “they ain’t tellin’ me ta hurt nobody,” she declared, gripping Jackie’s hand. “They’re threatenin’ her direct like, an’ Ah th’ one that kept ‘em from doin’ it. But, Ah’m also th’ reason they’re threatenin’ her an’ Ah don’ rightly know what ta do.”

Jackie looked at Sam, taking her hand gently. "Whatever you want, Dhateste, I'm behind you," she promised. "I just don't want them ghosts botherin' you no more."

“Ah don’...”. A breeze played over her skin, bringing a chill to her spine. As she watched, one of the dead Rangers appeared - a blurry, whispy image that she still recognized. He stared right at her, watched by asche crissed the room to stand next to the doctor. “No,” she whispered.

“revenge,” the dead Ranger whispered. “we need justice. we need you, sam. we need you to save us, to free us from bennett.”

“Go,” She snarled through gritted teeth, “away.”

“you were with us in the otherworld, dahteste,” came the whisper. “with us, but you returned. you are our justice. you are our vengeance.” He stared at her, stepping behind the doctor as he did. “your jackie can help. she is tied to this, more than you know. but this french woman?” He reached up, another breeze blowing as he rested a spectral, bloody hand on a bust on the bookshelf. “she will weaken you.”

The bust moved. Tipped. “No!” Sam yelled, coming to her feet as it began to fall.
 
Jackie saw Sam's gaze shift before Anne Marie did. She squeezed her hand, trying to anchor her back in reality, but it didn't seem to work. "Dhateste? Sam?"

Anne Marie motioned for her to stop trying to help. "It could be helpful for me to observe an episode," she informed Jackie quietly, sitting forward on the edge of her chair.

Anne Marie followed Sam's gaze briefly, unable to help herself, as though she might see something there too...but of course she didn't. She was perfectly sane...well, as sane as anyone could be. Kieran had often teased her that the only difference between the patients and the doctors were keys. She would have an earful and several insanity diagnoses to give him when next she saw him, though God knew when that would be, for suggesting she come to Texas of all places. Sam admirably fought, telling it to go away, and Anne Marie tilted her head curiously when the patient's eyes tracked around the room, from the door, around the edge of the room...to her. Not at her, Anne Marie realized, but focused on some point above her head.

"Are the voices threatening me now, Samantha?" Anne Marie asked gently. When she didn't seem to be able to draw Sam's attention she rose, intending to reach out to her. Sam rose at the same time, however, and cried out when the bust fell with a soft thump! into her chair then cracked as it rolled and fell to the floor. Anne Marie jumped and stared at it. A few seconds later and that crack would have been in her skull. Fixing the mask back into place after the brief slippage, she looked at the startled couple. "Do you think that was them?"

The bust had, after all, been on the edge of the shelf above her. It was reasonable to think that over time, after her retrieving books from that shelf numerous times, that it could have moved far enough to fall. These floors were carpeted, but there was no padding beneath them to keep vibrations from traveling through the floors and walls to knock it off of the bookshelf over a long period of time.
 
"They rightly are," Sam replied, staring to Anne Marie's left. The dead Ranger - she knew it was one of them, even if she couldn't make out his shape clearly - stared back at her. "They say Ah'm wastin' time here. They say you'll weaken mah resolve, keep me from helpin' 'em."

"go, sam," the dead man whispered. "we're right, she will."

"Ah ain't goin'!" she snapped, taking a step towards the ghost. "Y'all are houndin' me! You're weakenin' me, damnit! Yer makin' me think Ah'm crazy! Makin' Jackie think Ah'm crazy, an' worryin' her!" Another step. "Ah ain't havin' it!"

'what will you do, dahteste?" the ghost - or maybe it was a different one, one she saw standing on the other side of the doctor - asked. "we are bound together, bound by ties of blood. you can only be rid of us by freeing us."

"Is that true?" Sam snarled, whirling on the new ghost. "Y'really think that? Cause Ah reckon it's a mite more complicated than that." Her palm itched, longing to draw down on the spirit, but she resisted. It'd only make Jackie even more scared, and it wasn't like a bullet would threaten a ghost. "Ah still got yer ashes, ain't Ah? An' y'all'r th' ones pushin' me ta use them."

"our remains are not our anchor," the ghost murmured. "you are. they only serve as your conduit to view the world of the dead."

Something moved out of the corner of her eye. She glanced up in time to see the first ghost pushing a heavy hardback book loose. Reacting as it fell, she caught it just above Anne Marie's head. "Yeah," she said, looking the doctor in the eyes as she handed it over. "They are threatenin' you. Ah'm jes glad they cain't move somethin' bigger, or Gawd alone knows what they'd do." Another book stirred and fell, missing Anne Marie by several feet. "Ah'm sorry Ah troubled you, doc - Ah reckon they've done proved ta me it ain't all in mah head."

"go, sam," whispered the first ghost.

"Fuck you," she snarled back. "Y'want mah help? Y'get it on mah terms. An' if'n y'don' like it, Ah swear ta Gawd Ah'll find a way ta be rid of y'all."
 
Jackie was visibly shaken by the outburst and behind Sam's back gestured at her to Anne Marie, who nodded her head very slightly but didn't say anything. She remained standing--no sense in tempting fate, after all--and took occasional notes as Sam ranted to the thin air on either side of her. The ashes were an interesting addition to this case. Out of the corner of her eye something moved, and Anne Marie barely had time to open her mouth to cry out in surprise before Sam had caught it before it hit her. Behind her another one fell, landing lamely on the floor. There had been small earthquakes recorded here before, she reasoned (though the last one, if she cared to look it up, had been more than two decades ago and three hundred miles away in Rusk). There was also a theory she had heard once that vibrations caused by running underground springs, or geomagnetism, could also be a cause of poltergeists. Worst case scenario, if she chose to believe the preposterous notion that poltergeists were real, was that Sam didn't realize that she was the one doing it herself and this was her mind's way of explaining it.

"Samantha?" Anne Marie asked cautiously, unsure whether she was done yelling at her ghosts. "You said you--" Her hand shot out to snatch a falling picture frame moments before she realized she'd seen it start to fall. It was her most recent picture of Algie, standing with the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford after having been a guest lecturer there. "That," she said coldly, setting the picture carefully back on its shelf, "is quite enough, Monsieur. Leave this office and never come back or I shall make you regret it." She glared some three feet to the left of the ghost who had done it, determined that if she absolutely must act as though these things were real then she was going to take a very firm stance with them. She stared down the empty spot for a few long moments before turning back to Sam.

"You said you had their ashes," she continued as though she hadn't just personally addressed her patient's delusions. "Do you think perhaps interring them, or returning them to the proper authorities, might bring them peace and help them leave you alone?" If the shootout had triggered her schizoid behavior, after all, perhaps releasing these triggering--and morbid--mementos would help bring her psyche to terms with what had happened and rid her of these visions. "They want you to help them, after all, and putting them to rest is helping."

"We were gonna do that," Jackie put in, "before they started getting worse. So we decided to come see you first. Only right their families should know what happened to them. But doc..." She leaned forward as much as she was able, glancing at Sam then back to Anne Marie. "They're tellin' her to make a paint outta it or somethin'..."

Well, that was alarming. "Is this true, Samantha? They want you to make a paint of their ashes?"
 
The doctor had some stones, didn't she? Sure, she wasn't staring at the ghost, but Sam had to give her credit for trying. It was better than even odds that she was putting on an act for her patient's sake, but still. She sold the authority and subdued anger in her voice. Whoever this Anne Marie LaMonte was, there was clearly more to her than met the eye, and Sam found herself grinning in spite of herself. "Y'heard th' lady," she added, glaring at one of the ghosts. "Git."

you need, one of the ghosts began.

"Ah need ta work this out," she said, folding her arms and staring him down. "Ah ain't yer gal nor yer servant, so if'n y'want me ta help? Git." The ghosts hesitated then turned and left, and Sam gave a soft sigh of relief. It always felt like she was riding the ragged edge of disaster, pushing them around.

"You said you had their ashes," the doctor stated, breaking into her thoughts.

"Yep," Sam answered, slowly taking her seat once more.

Anne Marie appeared to consider that for a moment. "Do you think perhaps interring them, or returning them to the proper authorities, might bring them peace and help them leave you alone? They want you to help them, after all, and putting them to rest is helping."

"Ah don' reckon it will," Sam began, then paused as Jackie jumped in.

"We were gonna do that," her lover answered, and the fact that she believed that lie tore at Sam's heart. To be honest, she'd known all along that she wasn't burying them, not yet. "Before they started getting worse. So we decided to come see you first. Only right their families should know what happened to them. But doc..." She leaned forward as much as she was able, glancing at Sam then back to Anne Marie. "They're tellin' her to make a paint outta it or somethin'..."

"Is this true, Samantha?" the doctor asked, arching an eyebrow. "They want you to make a paint of their ashes?"

"War paint," Sam answered, not bothering to address her distaste of strangers calling her Samantha. "They want me ta make a war paint out of the ashes." And certain other ingredients she didn't feel like bringing up right now. "Smear it around my eyes, like so." With that she stroked her fingertips over her eyelids and the bridge of her nose, outlining a mask of sorts. "It'll let me see spirits, they say. Let me see 'em ta interact wit' 'em. Ah didn't understand why, at first, but it's makin' a hella lot more sense." Grimacing, she glanced back at Jackie for support. "'Cause we ain't up against no livin' men, are we Jackie? Dead men walkin' is who killed 'em, an' Ah reckon it'll take more'n jes silver ta put 'em down fer good."
 
Sam seemed to feel more at ease once the "ghosts" were gone and finally sat back down. Anne Marie straightened the picture back in its place on th shelf with care before following suit and taking up her notepad and pen once more. She made a note of the clarification that it was war paint--not less alarming than canvas paint, though she didn't let that show--and sketched the same sort of shape Sam had outlined on her own face. It looked like a mask, the sort she had seen bank robbers drawn wearing in cartoons. This...this wasn't good.

"Dead men walking?" She looked to Jackie for clarification. This was going beyond schizophrenia and into something else altogether. "Do you mean like zombies or vampires?"

"Not exactly," Jackie said carefully, aware that jumping on board would make her sound just as crazy. But she wasn't going to hang Sam out to dry like that, not when she knew the truth. Not when her Pa had told her the truth years and years ago. "They're kinda like zombies, 'cept they ain't died yet. There's a cursed treasure chest that makes 'em invincible and immortal, but at the price of never feelin' right again. Can't eat, can't have sex..." She shook her head. "Leaves you less than a man, wishing you could die but unable to. Only the moonlight shows 'em for what they really are."

This was sounding familiar. "The cursed gold of Cortez?" Anne Marie smiled when Jackie looked surprised. "It is an obscure tale, Mademoiselle Sparrow, but one I have heard." One Halloween she, Kieran, and Colin had been drunk to hell in their favorite park in Toulouse and she had demanded that the pirates tell her ghost stories. Colin had told of this old pirate's legend of Hyperborea, and Kieran had relayed a tale passed down through the generations of his family, the story of Cortez's curse. "I do not think, however, that it is wise to encourage your partner's--"

"I ain't encouraging nothin', doc," Jackie retorted fiercely. "Hell, I wish I could say Sam was just seein' it. But I seen it myself. He can't die, even shot himself in the goddamned head to prove it."

Well, like souls tend to find one another--she and Algie had, after all--and the mentally ill were no different. This was proving to be an interesting case. "I see." Jackie didn't like the way she said that as she scratched something down on her note pad. "And what exactly makes you think these ghosts and these undead men are related? Or that making war paint of ashes would help in any way with the undead men?"
 
"I see."

Sam threw herself down in her seat, crossing her arms beneath her breasts and fuming as the doctor dismissed Jackie's explanations about the walking dead men. It wasn't fair, she knew on some level. Hell, she probably wouldn't believe it if she hadn't seen it herself, but that didn't give this stuck-up French bitch cause to talk to Jackie like she was soft in the head. But she made herself hold her tongue, and waited for the woman to finish making her notes.

"And what exactly makes you think these ghosts and these undead men are related?" Anne Marie asked. "Or that making war paint of ashes would help in any way with the undead men?"

"Ah think," Sam said slowly, "they're related because the haints are th' ones what shot down th' Rangers, an' me with 'em." She drew herself up defiantly, daring the doctor to contradict her. "'Cause they was a'headin' fer Beckett's place, an' he's the one behind them. An' no, Ah dunno why he is. Jes' that..." That my brother's one of them, and he told me Beckett's up to something. She bit down on that particular statement, though, deciding it would just sound crazier. "That he cain't be up ta no damn good if'n he's makin' an army o' dead men, now can he?"

The other question, though. That was a good one. "But th' dead... they say th' mask'll let me see 'em. The haints, that is. Cause y'cain't tell 'em from livin' folk, not unless th' moon shines on 'em. The mask'll let me see into th' other world, th' spirit world." One of the shadowy ghosts was back, now, whispering in her ear and repeating what they'd told her in her dreams. "The spirit world," she echoed. "Ah'll be able ta see th' dead an' the spirits that were never born, same as Ah kin see yeh right there. Ah'll be able ta see th' magics that Beckett's done, follow 'em an' stop 'em. Ah'll be able ta lay 'em ta rest."

Blinking suddenly, she looked around. "That's why, doc. But Ah reckon Ah'm wastin' mah time an' yers, cause y'don't believe me at all."
 
Haints. That word was peculiar to this part of America, she had found, and it was an obnoxious word. It seemed that people in this part of the country were pathologically incapable of pronouncing the -au sound in English, and Anne Marie found that absolutely unacceptable for native speakers, especially if she could pronounce it properly as her third language. Still, she had a few months ago parsed out from context what exactly a haint was, and wondered what Sam's ghosts were called if these undead men were haints.

A change came over Sam, though, as she described what exactly making a war paint of the ashes would do. Her eyes slid out of focus and her voice sounded distant. Anne Marie pursed her lips. "I thought," she said sternly, "I had told you to leave, Monsieur," she addressed the spot over Sam's shoulder.

Blinking suddenly, she looked around. "That's why, doc. But Ah reckon Ah'm wastin' mah time an' yers, cause y'don't believe me at all."

"I believe that you are seeing these ghosts," Anne Marie contradicted gently. "I believe that you underwent a traumatic experience and have yet to deal with it properly, and I believe that you feel responsible for them." She wasn't going to address Jackie's delusions yet. One patient at a time. "And I believe that I could help you if you gave me a chance."

"You can't help if you don't believe in spirits, doc," Jackie asserted, jutting her chin out. "This ain't a normal case."

"Clearly," Anne Marie agreed. "But I think that these spirits are your way of processing what you've seen and felt and experienced, Samantha, and I think I can help you with finding a healthier way to do that if you'll let me."
 
It was difficult, but Sam managed to swallow a biting retort. After all, if you thought about it, the story she’d told the doctor sounded crazy if you weren’t living it. And she had come to a head doctor - this Anne Marie hadn’t come looking for her. “Ah reckon,” she finally said, licking her lips, “that it’s like mah pa always said: if th’ only tool y’got’s a hammer, then yer gonna bust some heads.”

She fell silent, thinking some more. “All right,” she sighed. “Mebbe yer right. Ah mean, Beckett’s haints’re damn well real enough, but...”. She shrugged. “Mebbe them ghosts are all in mah head. Mebbe Ah’m jes’ scared cause Ah nearly died.” She didn’t sound convinced. “An’ mebbe not. But... whether they’re real or in mah head, Ah gotta do somethin’. ‘Cause they’re pushin’ me, harder ‘n harder, tryin’ ta make e do what they want, an’ Ah cain’t be havin’ that.”

She stared at her boots now, flexing her fingers and making fists. “Ah ain’t never let nobody push me round,” she murmured, more to herself than anyone else. “An’ Ah sure as hell ain’t gonna let nobody threaten Jackie, not no damn bigot on a train, or ghosts, or voices in mah head.” Her hands balled into fists, and she looked up suddenly. “Right, doc, Ah’m listenin’. Whaddya got fer me?”
 
Anne Marie blinked when Sam quoted her father. "C'est bon," she agreed distantly. She hadn't quite understood what had been meant by that, but she had found that the locals were generally pacified by a little French and never caught on to her confusion. Then Sam moved on, insisting that this Beckett's 'haints' were real, but that perhaps her ghosts were not. "It is perfectly natural to be frightened of such a thing," she affirmed, back on familiar ground. "The human mind has incredible ways of protecting itself, Samantha. We simply have to figure out why it's protecting itself in this particular way, and how to fix it."

Jackie put a hand over Sam's balled fist and massaged it gently. "Easy, kemosabe," she said gently. "Ain't no ghosts gonna get rid of me, anyway."

When Sam asked what Anne Marie suggested, she thought for a moment. "Well, more talk therapy would certainly help," she said, looking with a frown at the clock. "Although next time, I'm afraid, since my next patient is likely waiting in the parlor. There is also electroshock therapy, which I have upstairs. I assure you it is quite safe, and I can even call in my secretary to assist me in demonstrating for you, upon myself." She smiled reassuringly as she stood. "Next time, though. Would you be able to call on me tomorrow, around five o'clock? I cease most of my appointments by then, so we should have more time."
 
“Ah dunno ‘bout no ‘electroshock therapy’,” Sam said nervously, squeezing Jackie’s hand as she spoke. “But, yeah. Ah reckon we kin be back tomorrow round five. We gotta couple o’ things we gotta do round town, but ain’t nuthin’ too pressin’.” Rising, she shook Anne Marie’s hand. “See yeh then, doc.”

She walked easily out of the house, but felt her knees start to shake by the time she reached her horse. “Ah dunno,” she managed, hanging on to the saddle. “Ah... am Ah wastin’ our time here, Jackie? Ah mean, we got things ta do. Kin we...”. Drawing a deep breath, she swallowed and tried to get herself under control. “No, we got time. Ah cain’t let them ghosts push me, Jackie. Ah cain’t. But... shocks?”

Still shivering a little, she helped her injured lover up into the saddle. Then, without intending it, she found herself lean g against Jackie’s leg. “Ah... Ah’m scared, Tsidiiligai,” she whispered. “They feel so real. But... what if they ain’t? What if... what if Ah really am... crazy?”

She remained there for a long moment, seeking reassurance. When she finally moved to mount up on Silver, the shakes had largely subsided. The fear, however, remained. “What say we get a drink?” she asked, trying to lighten the mood. “An’ then see if’n Alice is off shift?”
 
Jackie heaved herself up into the saddle and carefully pulled her bad leg around, but then Sam was leaning on her good leg. She frowned down at the top of her head as she admitted she was scared and asked whether she were crazy. Suddenly Jackie found herself wishing she had never suggested the idea of seeing a head doctor, not at the expense of Sam thinking that about herself. She leaned down and put a hand on the top of her head, wishing she could do more to comfort her without making a fuss of getting back down.

"You ain't crazy, Sam," she reassured her quietly. "Spirits are real, Dhateste, and maybe they're spirits or maybe they're all in your head...but even if they're in your head you ain't crazy. Don't you ever think that, hear me?" She had noticed Sam shivering even in the warmth of the late Spring evening, but couldn't think of anything to help. This was entirely new ground for her.

"What say we get a drink?" Sam asked after swinging herself into the saddle. "An' then see if'n Alice is off shift?"

"Sounds like a plan to me," Jackie returned, glad to see her at least mostly back to normal. "I'd say we could both use a drink after that. My daddy used to go on about how snobby and high-n-mighty the French were...now I see what he was talkin' about."
 
“More’n Ah knew ‘bout them,” Sam laughed, touching her heels to Silver’s flanks. “Seems like yer daddy knew what he was sayin’, though. Last time Ah talked ta a know-it-All like that, Ah...”. She grinned. “Well, Ah reckon Ah was talkin’ ta mahself.” Laughing, she glanced sideways at Jackie. “Still, at least she’s easy on th’ eyes. An’ Ah’m kinda glad she ain’t a fellah like Ah assumed - feels a mite easier, talkin’ ta a lady.”

After a moment, she spoke up again. “Still, what th’ hell did she mean by ‘gender this fer yeh’? Like, did she reckon Ah was there ‘cause Ah ain’t got no unnerstandin’ of what men an’ women are, an’ Ah’m jes’ guessin’?” She shook her head. “Reckon’ that’d jes’ need a few pictures an’ a chat ‘bout where babies come from, not a head doctor.” Unconsciously, the mention of babies made her pat her stomach nervously. Could she really be..?

Finding a bar wasn’t hard, and soon enough they were hitching their horses outside a whitewashed building with a sign declaring itself the Dew Drop Inn. Sam helped Jackie back in, then opened the door for her and followed her inside. It was between lunch and dinner, so there was a scant handfull of patrons sitting at tables. All of them stared sullenly as the two women made their way to the bar. “Two beers, please,” Sam asked.

The bartender gave Jackie a sour look. “This is a nice place, sir,” he said slowly. “And I aim ta keep it that way.”

“Really?” Sam answered, sounds unnaturally cheerful. “Why, whatever do y’all reckon might be changin’ that?”
 
"Daddy knew a lot of things 'bout a lot of places and a lot of people," Jackie shrugged. "He was...an interesting man." She still hadn't quite forgiven him for going and getting himself shot in that train robbery, but there was no use holding onto the past like that. Not when he was long dust. When Sam mentioned how easy on the eyes LaMonte had been, though, she smirked in agreement. "Yeah, and she seemed to know what she was doin' more'n any doctor I ever met. Well, white doctor, anyway. Think they know every damn thing. And it sounds like she's on your side, even if she wantsta shock yer brain or somethin' like that. She did mention that she didn't wanna force us to go to one of 'em...Whatcha call em? Sanitariums." She crinkled her nose with distaste. A few people she'd known--not people from her own village, but folks out on the res who'd already been shrunk down and defanged--had gone to one of those white-folk sanitariums and never come back.

She was pulled from her bitter musings on the largely male-centric institution of White medicine when she noticed Sam pat her belly. Jackie glanced over, tempted to tease her but knowing now wasn't the time. She didn't want to worry her more by putting words to it, so she just shrugged at Sam's question about gender. "No idea," she admitted. "Maybe it had somethin' ta do with you dressin' like a fella."

The Dew Drop Inn was a charming little wooden building, at least as charming as a dusty building in the desert could be. With a grunt and a hand on Sam's shoulder Jackie slid off and hobbled inside with her crutches. She didn't like feeling helpless the way she did when Sam opened the door for her, but there was no point in making a fuss about it, especially not now with folk watching. And watch they did, all the way to the bar, and Jackie could feel their eyes on them--on her. It was getting awful tiresome, tell the truth...but that's what she got for leaving her village on Sam's crazy mission. It took an act of will not to sigh audibly when Sam acted ignorant of the anti-miscegenation laws, but was relieved that at least she hadn't been discovered as a woman. It didn't seem to matter, Jackie noticed, how the brown girl was dressed; part of that whole 'savage Indian' trope, she supposed. Savages didn't know better than to put their squaws in dresses and their braves in pants, when they weren't running around buck nekkid.

"We don't play host to law-breakers, son," the bartender answered firmly, "but if yer squaw here wants ta take her drink out back like she oughtta that's fine." He jerked his thumb to a sign at the end of the bar that read COLOREDS ONLY. "But we're good law-abidin' folk who don't want no trouble and if that's a problem you can just move on along."

"Law-abiding," Jackie scoffed, drawing the bartender's attention.

"S'there a problem, miss?"

She shrugged as best she could with the crutches under her arms. "I just find it funny that invaders, thieves, and rapists have the gall to declare themselves law-abiding. That's all."

"Now just one minute! You come in here and--!"

"And don't get served in my own country," she interrupted, "by the plundering, raping imperialists who stole it from me in the first place. Don't seem like justice, does it?" Jackie didn't rightly know the exact definition of 'imperialist,' but her daddy had used it enough times--mostly in the context of some far-off conflicts in a place called Britain--that she'd gotten a vague idea of what it meant. Nobody had ever called her out on it, plus it really seemed to rile up the white folks whenever she used it either because of its meaning or because it made her sound educated. Either way, it was a good word.
 
"We don't play host to law-breakers, son," the bartender answered pointedly addressing Sam and Sam alone, "but if yer squaw here wants ta take her drink out back like she oughtta that's fine." He jerked his thumb to a sign at the end of the bar that read COLOREDS ONLY. "But we're good law-abidin' folk who don't want no trouble and if that's a problem you can just move on along."

Well, shit, Sam thought, trying not to react to the 'squaw' line. Jackie'd already read her the riot act once about starting trouble over that, and she damn well wasn't going to start that fight again.

"Law-abiding," Jackie scoffed, drawing the bartender's attention.

Well, shit again. Sam recognized that tone of voice, and it promised trouble.

"S'there a problem, miss?"

"No, no trouble suh," Sam tried to interject, her own voice carefully calm as she tried to head off any trouble. "We'll..."

"I just find it funny," Jackie interrupted, shifting her crutches, "that invaders, thieves, and rapists have the gall to declare themselves law-abiding. That's all."

"Jackie..." Sam groaned.

"Now just one minute! You come in here and--!"

"And don't get served in my own country," she interrupted, "by the plundering, raping imperialists who stole it from me in the first place. Don't seem like justice, does it?"

Returning his attention to Sam, the bartender reached down and pulled out a length of two by four. "You best learn your squaw to keep a civil tongue in her mouth," he growled, "or someone else w..."

Moving like greased lightning, Sam grabbed his ears and used them to drive his head into the bar. There was an audible crunch and a splatter of blood as his nose broke, and he moaned in pain as she ground his face harder into the surface. "She ain't no squaw, y'unnerstand me? She's mah wife, an' Ah ain't inclined ta let no no-account yellow dog pretend he's tough 'cause he kin threaten a woman." Angrily, she twisted the man's face against the bar again, dragging him a few feet to build up enough momentum to fling him to the ground.

There was dead silence as she turned to face the room. One man started to rise, then hesitated as she swept back her duster to reveal the Colt strapped to her thigh. "Now," she said coldly, sweeping the room with an icy gaze, "we'll jes' be leavin'." Her eyes locked with the man who'd started to rise. "Ah reckon this has jes' been a big misunderstandin', an' we'll be on our way." She hooked her thumb in her belt, fingertips touching the grip of her pistol. "Peaceful like."

Everyone remained extremely still as the two women made their way to the door, staring in a silence that was broken only by the agonized groans of the bartender. "Shit, Jackie," Sam murmured as she helped her lover back onto the horse. "Ah thought Ah was th' hot-headed one." Glancing back at the door, she mounted Silver and nudged him into motion. "C'mon. Ah ain't as thirsty as Ah thought Ah was."
 
Jackie couldn't help but laugh when the bartender pulled out the plank to threaten her. She reached for the knife in her boot, but by the time it was out Sam had smashed his face into the bar, blood spurting from his broken nose as she wiped it along the wood. She winced as she watched, but even the blood wasn't enough to distract her from the fact that Sam had called her her wife. Squaw--while linguistically inappropriate and personally infuriating--was one thing, girlfriend was one thing...but wife?? They'd already agreed not to say the l-word and now she was going and announcing that they were married?

Wordlessly she turned as well as she could on the spot when Sam did. One man started to rise, but Sam quietly threatened him with her colt and Jackie raised her knife as though to throw it. It wasn't a throwing knife, and she couldn't throw for shit even without the crutches, but once again it was what white folks expected of Indians, and when it came to getting them to leave her the hell alone she was more than happy to play along. Tucking her knife back in her boot, content to let Sam do the threatening, Jackie stumped after her and out the door.

"You are the hot-headed one, idjit!" Jackie snapped back, putting a hand on Sam's shoulder then pushing herself up into the saddle, setting the crutches in front of herself. "I ain't the one went visitin' violence on the bartender and declaring in front of God and everyone that I was married to someone the wrong color. We'll be lucky if we ain't run out on a rail by morning." She flicked Paint's reigns with irritation. "Look Dhateste, if you're gonna have me along on this yer gonna have ta get used to either gettin' kicked out of most 'respectable' places, startin' fights in 'em, or just waitin' in a different line than me. There's a reason I don't usually go into white towns too much, and sometimes I just get sick of bein' told my place."
 
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