They just about finished lunch and repacked their things when they heard rifle fire.  Lincoln whined first.  “Not again.”  Roughly thirty natives came over a ridge to attack the group.  Elder Stow yelled.

“Hold your fire.  Hold your fire.  I turned the screens on around the camp when we stopped for lunch.  The bullets cannot reach us.”  He stepped forward and pulled his own weapon.  He still had it set to a wide angle. He adjusted something and fired.  All of the natives and some of the horses fell straight to the dirt.  The horses that did not fall, mostly the ones in the back of the group, staggered about like drunks.  Elder stow spoke up.  “It doesn’t do to have thirty horses ram into the screens.  They can’t penetrate, but it shakes up the device and might loosen something.”  He looked at the fallen natives and excused himself.  “Just stunned and temporarily unconscious, I hope.”

“Arapaho,” Doc named the tribe and Captain Barnes confirmed that.

“With the Cheyenne and Sioux, they are most against the settlement of the west.”

“Elder Stow, can you make a Decker wall to separate us?” Lockhart asked.

“Eventually,” Elder Stow said.

Lockhart understood.  “Then can we get close enough to talk to them when they come around?”  Elder Stow could do that easily enough.

“Everyone, finish packing up first,” Decker said, and they did.

When they got close enough to the Arapaho to talk, they first heard shouting and rapid-fire conversations among the natives.  Lockhart interrupted in the same language.  “We are just passing through and mean you no harm.  The Sun Dance is in that direction.  We were just there about two weeks ago.  Sitting Bull of the Sioux and White Bull of the Cheyenne are both there, with many Arapaho chiefs. “

“The Medicine Men are our friends.” Katie added.

“We see you have strong medicine,” one of the warriors said, pointing to the screens that Elder Stow had colored with that slight blue tint.  Several warriors who had come around touched the screens and saw that they were solid.

“Go in peace,” Lockhart said.  “We will leave and head south.  We are going to fort…”

“Randall,” Lincoln said.

“…We will be out of your way very soon.”  Lockhart smiled.

“Smoke the pipe of peace when you get there and mention us.  Tell them we are praying for peace,” Katie added.

The man nodded and got his men mounted again, shaky as they were.  They made a wide birth around the screens and headed off to the north.

“I hope they don’t attack the Crow camp,” Katie added, but Captain Barnes shook his head.

“There is a ford not far from here,” he said.  “I’ve seen the map.  But notice, Colonel Custer did not bother to warn us that there was an Indian raiding party in the area.  I swear, that man is a real corporal.”

“Corporal?”  It was Lockhart’s turn for one-word questions.

“War slang,” Sergeant Reynolds spoke up. “It means a real screw-up and all-around ass who unfortunately outranks you.”

“We can go,” Elder Stow reported and turned off the screens as he clipped his screen device back into place.

Three days later, they arrived at Fort Randall around three in the afternoon.  It snowed a little on the second day, and the weather stayed chilly, especially in the wind, but it never turned bad.  The fort itself sat right against the river.  They had to pay to get ferried across to the south side.  Fortunately, the ferry was made to transport cavalry.

They found Marshal Casidy and the others in a saloon by the fort.  The little town, hardly a village, had a few stores and some homes, but not much else.  Decker had to ask what the soldiers did for fun around there.  One of the soldiers, a black man sitting on the steps, whittling, answered.

“Whittle and eat buffalo hash three times a day.”  He did not sound happy.  “At least some got wives and children.”  Decker smiled for the man as he followed the others.  The man raised his voice.  “That is not for our kind.  That is officers only.”

Decker knew what the man meant.

Marshal Casidy hugged Sukki while people got introduced and pulled three tables together.  Then Marshal Casidy spoke.  “Good thing you got here.  Elder Stow, your scanner if you please.”  He held out his hand.

Elder Stow got it but held it close to his person.  “You are not going to break it again, are you?”

“Just tune it,” Marshal Casidy said with a shake of his head.  “I need to locate the shape shifter.  He has eluded us all the way to Oregon and back. I need to find him before he leaves town.”

Elder Stow reluctantly handed over the device and Marshal Casidy went to work.  After a moment, he traded places through time with Martok the Bosposi, and without a pause in whatever he was doing.  The travelers did not blink.  Most of the local Men in Black looked around to see who might be watching.  The room was mostly empty at that time of day.  Mini Taggert shrieked.

“Michel Henry, you promised to give fair warning when you did that.”

“You’ll get used to it,” Katie encouraged the woman.

“No.  Never.” Mini responded.

“She screams pretty good too,” Gordon said in a slight British accent and with a big grin.  Mini hit him in the arm, and not softly, but that just made him and Sergeant Reynolds laugh.

Marshal Casidy returned to his own time and place fairly soon, then while Marshal Casidy worked, of course Captain Williams and two lieutenants had to come into the saloon and came right to the table.  “Marshal Casidy,” he said in a voice where the steam appeared ready to come out of his ears. “It is bad enough the Colonel let you and your gang into this establishment, including a red Indian as long as he sat quietly at a civilized table, but who are these others, and negroes no less.  Buffalo soldiers are not allowed in this place, and what is that you are wearing.  You will go on report for being out of uniform.”

Captain Barnes stood and stuck out his hand.  “Captain Jacob Barnes, special agent to President Grant.  My companions are Doctor Wilhelm Brandt and Sergeant Tom Reynolds.  They work for me.  These others are Robert Lockhart, my boss.  Lieutenant Colonel Decker, Major Harper-Lockhart, and Lieutenant Carter are on loan from the United States Marines.  Army Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Lincoln is on special assignment from Washington.  Nanette is Colonel Decker’s wife.  Sukki is daughter of Mister and Major Lockhart. And Elder Stow is on a mission so secret even I don’t know the full extent of what he is doing, and I have top secret clearance from the president himself.  Now, is there a problem here?”

Captain Williams had already backed down and started shaking his head, but fortunate for him, he did not have to say anything as Marshal Casidy stood and shouted.  “Aha!  I got him.”

He walked to the door, and everyone followed him.  He walked slowly down the street, eyes on the scanner, until he came to the horse trader’s fence.  There were twenty horses in the fenced in area waiting for branding and training to be cavalry mounts.

“Now that does not make sense,” Marshal Casidy said.

“Allow me,” Elder Stow took back his instrument and called up a holographic image of the scene.  Marshal Casidy shouted on seeing the sight.

“It’s a horse.  Don’t let it change.”

Gordon threw his tomahawk first.  Captain Barnes and Mini were masters of the fast draw and Decker never let go of his rifle.  Three bullets struck and prevented the horse from hiding behind the others as it staggered.  Sukki raised her hand as Commander Roker, no slouch in the quick draw department, let out two streams of power that reduced the horse to slag and ash. Then Gordon’s tomahawk arrived.

“Damn,” Gordon said.  “Thought I had this one.”  He went to retrieve his weapon and Rodrigo and the Doc followed.

“Dead.”  Rodrigo pronounced judgment.

“As you say, sincerely dead,” the Doc added.

Katie turned to Captain Williams.  “Close your mouth.”  The man clacked his teeth together.