Death Whispers In The Wind

Chapter 11

Castor had tried to resolve this dispute with the Bannister gang diplomatically, to ignore his blatant animosity towards Calvin and his cronies, to squash their differences aside in order to avoid any further bloodshed and to prevent anymore unnecessary violence from happening in his town. Because the way Castor saw it, Huxebee Creek had already paid the price, the ultimate price, his town had suffered dearly and now it was merely hanging on by a single thread at this point. The gang's twisted efficiency with the fires they'd started earlier in the night had went to work fast, the scorching hot fires had hastily done their job and they'd practically finished the place for good. When the handful of fires began to whittle down and by that time, just looking around at the state of things, there was no coming back from that.

The idea of rebuilding might've been possible, yet also seemed rife with plausible flaws and moreover, it faced numerous glaring issues. For one, it would be problematic to try and procure enough materials in order to begin rebuilding Huxebee Creek, then there was the setback of shipping dozens of materials across state lines without a hitch to supplant a rebuilding project of almost an entire town, it was very likely that Huxebee would wind up a ghost town. What remains, in its current state, is a sad remnant of what was once it's bright, glorious and beautiful past.

Castor absolutely hated the idea of coming to a logical compromise with Calvin Bannister, he had to swallow his pride and bury his feelings of anger for the sake of Huxebee Creek and its citizens. He really didn't want to gamble on the safety and well-being of the innocent bystanders, many of whom Castor had created close bonds with and he cared deeply about every single family that lived in Huxebee.

For the surviving townsfolk, they were now unwittingly out in the streets, without a home and pacing around with a lost look in their eyes as they dealt with their fear and rattled nerves, most seemed left in a debilitating state of complete and utter helplessness, watching as their homes with all their clothes and possessions slowly get destroyed by the fires, which some were still burning in abundance, raging on as if for some kind of devious purpose.

Castor knew he had to at least try to sway Calvin Bannister from anymore violence. But for Calvin, that wasn't a viable option, taking such a course of action or rather inaction, especially in the way Calvin had perceived such a notion.

It would in fact only jeopardize and hamper his gang's image amongst the newspapers that were reporting on their exploits of vile villainy. If word began to spread that the Bannister gang had holstered their weapons and had refrained from raping, pillaging and killing, where the gang resolved their issue or dispute through a diplomatic discussion, not with barbaric violence or starting a handful of raging fires, but with a non-violent solution.

Calvin believed this would outright ruin his carefully cultivated reputation of unhinged, psychotic savagery and pure anarchy. This in turn, could render his days of infamy forever done as the 'Front Page - Headline' story of the newspaper, specifically that of 'The American Independent', the same newspaper that had initially created this hailstorm of publicity for the Bannister gang would no longer cease to exist.

The sudden fame and notoriety he'd received nearly 4 months ago would slowly sizzle out and become a thing of the distant past, the attention the papers had doled onto Calvin and his gang would undoubtedly disappear and the supposed "gift that keeps on giving" which Calvin had come to call it, would come to a screeching halt. He never fathomed the prospect of his new-found celebrity and awareness in the newspapers to ever end. Shortly thereafter, the fame the papers had afforded him created almost constant delusions of grandeur and Calvin quickly grew an unhealthy attachment and obsession with would be gone, he refused to allow the possibility of it ever going away.

Therefore, a peaceful resolution would never happen... ever! Calvin's decision was simple, even glaringly obvious and that was to go all-out, guns-a-blazing.