<hr/><div class="floatleft">(http://gunsofold.com/marshal_badge_silver_balltip.jpg)</div><br/><strong>Date:</strong>May 2, 1876<br/><strong>Time of Day:</strong>Midnight<br/><strong>Location:</strong>Camp Gǒu<br/><strong>Tagged:</strong>Margeurite, Closed<br/><hr/>The explosion of gunpowder left cacophony in its wake, but it was the ghost-rock which burned great plumes of green up into the sky.  A hundred times hotter than coal, there was little way to stop a large ghost fire once it had been lit – the surrounding fires could be fought, but they'd be fought for hours, as the deadly fuel threw off howling smoke.  Skeletons and horrific faces seem to dance in the plumes of smoke that lit the sky, and the light made shadows leap and thrash.  Every brush seemed to become a leering horror, every cactus a hidden monstrosity.<br/><br/>Behind her, the shouted Cantonese continued unabated as workers and laborers did their utmost to fight the fires, but it would be long into the early hours of morning before they had any success in letting the ghostrock burn itself out.  All they could do in the meantime was contain it, and it would take most of the camp to have any success at that.<br/><hr/>