The Surgeon, Ch. 3: How to Bring Knives to a Gunfight

News doesn't travel as fast as it used to, but out in the South Dakota Black Hills, stories are starting to spread. Stories of the lonesome doctor on the painted Palomino, the healer whose skill with a saber is more legendary than her skill with the scalpel. Stories of the Hot Animal Machine death cult spreading west, into new territories that are unprepared for their savagery. Stories of the peaceful fort of Turtle Island, where the doctor came to work for a spell, and which the Hot Animals decided to attack. Last anybody heard, the Hot Animals had Turtle Island choked down under siege. That's not good news for anybody, because if Turtle Island can't stop them, nobody can. The good people of the fort are overwhelmed in numbers and by the insanity and violence that has arrived outside their walls. But nobody said Dr. Hanover was "good people." When things look bleak, heroes arise. And antiheroes sometimes do good despite themselves. Innocent lives hang in the balance. And to survive, they will need to shed some of their innocence.