text: He had five bullet wounds in total: two in his torso, one in his right shoulder, lower abdomen and a scrape on the inner side of his right calf. That wasn’t what occupied Dale’s mind at the time though. He was more wounded by his gang's readiness to gun him down. The men he considered his brothers no more than three days ago were now trying to take him out of the sky as he fled his past life. The distinct sound of their Buzzer jets told him it was Bill and Bach close behind him. He never liked the two. They were never up to any good, no one was, but the two had a special way of going about it. Dale quickly cleared his mind, the longer he thought of all those men the more this whole situation weighed on him. He locked his jump drive on SPEN-64201, the planet he had planned a homestead with his fiancé, Diane. His dream was doomed, however. He was dying and Diane- Diane was already dead. As his engines spun up and prepared for the jump Bill and Bach chewed away bits of his ship. He lost them with ease though, once the jump was initiated. The only people who knew about his plan, D, Mark and him were either dead or dying so he didn’t worry about being followed. He skipped through the universe like a rock on the water. On the other side of the divide, he was met with a planet so bright he was almost blinded by it. In his hurry, he forgot to darken his windows. Once his vision adjusted, and sight of the beautiful planet established, a tear worked its confused way through the beads of sweat and joined the blood in his lap. He entered the atmosphere with haste, but enough patience to keep his swinger from catching fire. He flew past the northern hemisphere looking for a place to stop, a place to rest his spirit. He was getting too low to the ground now. Gravity had more control over the ship than he did. It guided the worn ship into a hill above a clearing which was home to a wandering river. The landing wasn't gentle. The force from the collision acquainted his nose with the dashboard of the ship. Blood now reached from his nose down to his shirt, already dark red with the blood of his previous wounds. Still jumping with adrenaline, he cracked the door to his ship open and fell out. Over the span of a minute Dale slowly dragged his corpse toward a big tree, must have been hundreds of years old, he thought. There was almost no strength left in his body, just enough to maintain a grasp on conscience, no matter how weak. At this point it was more his spirit pulling him along than his two remaining, functioning limbs. After what felt like an eternity, he slumped what remained of his body against the tree and looked out at the horizon. An evening breeze this far south would have regularly chilled a man to the bone, but it felt pleasant upon his wet skin in his dying moments. The weight of his guns didn’t affect his body at all, but he had to get them away from him. With his good hand he removed one, set it on his lap. Then removed the other and proceeded to throw them, one at a time as far as he could. They didn’t make it very far, maybe a yard or two at most. He removed his bandolier then and tossed it aside. He could feel the blood leaving his body and taking his life with it into the ground. He dug into his left pocket and produced a pack of cigarettes. He took one out, it was bent, he paid it no mind and set it in his mouth. His hand went back into his pocket and pulled his harmonica out. Not what he had in mind, he looked at the harmonica for a minute though, looking back on all the times he played it while sitting around a fire with D. He set it at his side and reached back into his pocket and this time brought out a lighter which lit his cigarette. Lastly, he reached up slowly with his left hand, removed his hat and set it atop his harmonica, close at his side. His head finally rested against the tree. He took a short drag of his cigarette and took in what a sunset he was before. The clouds along the horizon; all different shades of yellow, orange and pink, the sky directly above, a pale shade of blue and the clearing and surrounding trees, blessed with an amazing orange light. The river reflected the dazzling colors. Dale took the cigarette out of his mouth and pinched it out with his bare hand, he felt nothing now, it was all fading away. He enjoyed his last few breaths of the fresh air. Despite all that he's been through in the past few days, hell, the past few years it was all coming to an end. Here and now as he closed his eyes for the last time, all the pain left his body. The brilliant light of the sunset turned from orange to white. He couldn't open his eyes. He stayed there a moment, rubbed his eyes and realized they were already open, the light in front of him wasn’t a sunset anymore. *It was heaven*.