Neri

Two Bandits

The sun beat down on the Arizona desert, relentless as the lawmen on their trail. Dan Bearhunter waited in the shadow of a red rock outcropping, his eyes scanning the dusty valley for any sign of Brian Blacks. They had agreed upon this desolate meeting spot days ago, knowing full well it could be their last rendezvous. The thought that Brian might have been caught clawed at Dan’s gut, setting off a perverse thrill within him. Death was a constant companion to men like them, and the notion of Brian swinging from a noose or riddled with bullets stirred something dark and primal in Dan. He relished the kill, the finality of life snuffed out by his hand.

As hours crawled by, the stark silence of the desert was broken by the sound of a horse approaching. Dan's hand instinctively went to the grip of his revolver until Brian's familiar form emerged from the heat-haze, a crooked grin splitting his weathered face. Relief washed over Dan, quickly replaced by their shared morbid humor.

"Shit, you look like hell, Dan," Brian jested, clapping his friend on the shoulder as they embraced roughly.

"Speak for yourself," Dan replied with a gruff chuckle. "I reckon our portraits are plastered on every goddamn post from here to Tombstone."

"Wouldn't surprise me if they were," Brian said, stepping back and wiping the trail dust from his shirt. "There's a hefty price hangin' on our heads, partner."

"Then we'd best get movin'," Dan suggested, his eyes narrowing. "We've cheated death's clutches this long, but even we can't outrun the devil forever."

They both knew the truth of it—their sins ran deep, and there was a limit to the mercy of the open road. With a final glance at the forsaken valley, the two outlaws set off, their laughter hanging in the arid air, masking the dread of the inevitable gallows awaiting them.

The relentless sun had begun to dip below the horizon, casting long shadows across the desert terrain as the two outlaws settled beside a flickering campfire. Brian tossed a few more sticks onto the flames before shooting Dan a curious look, his eyes reflecting the fire's dance.

"Damn, what kinda mischief you stir up while we were apart?" he asked, the hint of a smirk playing on his lips.

Dan stretched his legs out, the heat from the fire warming his worn boots. "Robbed a stagecoach heading east," he replied with a casual nonchalance. "Took the money, shot the driver... and then had my way with him. Nice ass." His voice was merry, a crude grin revealing his enjoyment.

Brian let out a low whistle, clearly impressed by the audacity. "Hell of a time you've had."

"Your turn," Dan said, his eyes narrowing with interest. "You run into any trouble?"

"Caught by a sheriff while I was bathing in a damn pond," Brian confessed, a shadow crossing his face as he recalled the encounter. "Bastard wanted to have his fun with me before stringing me up."

Dan's surprise was evident. "And you got away from him?"

"Sure did," Brian's voice carried a dark edge. "He saw me naked and decided to take advantage—fucked me right there by the water."

The admission struck a chord in Dan, a perverse excitement building within him. For both of them, being taken like that was an unthinkable submission, a violation reserved for their victims.

"First time for everything, huh?" Dan said, the words thick with implication.

"Couldn't fight it," Brian continued, unflinching under Dan's gaze. "Knew he'd kill me after. The thought of dying while he took me... it stirred something fierce inside me." His tone was almost reverent. "I came while he was still inside me."

The raw confession hung heavy in the air between them, mingling with the smoke from the campfire. A twisted arousal flickered in Dan's eyes as he pictured the brutal scene. It was a potent image—one of dominance and surrender—that fed into the darkest part of his soul.

"Shit, Brian," Dan murmured, the growing bulge in his trousers evidence of his lurid fascination. "Never figured you for one to get off on your own death sentence."

"Neither did I," Brian admitted, a wry smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "But there ain't no rules when you're staring the reaper in the face."

Their laughter was swallowed by the vast expanse of the desert, two doomed souls reveling in the cruelty of their existence, each man intimately acquainted with the intoxicating blend of sex and death.

The rain descended upon the valley like an unwelcome judgment, heavy droplets hammering against the parched earth. Dan and Brian scrambled across the rugged terrain, their horses slipping in the mud that was quickly forming beneath them.

"Damn it all," Dan cursed, his voice barely audible over the roar of the storm. His grey beard was already soaked, droplets clinging to the wiry strands.

"Over there," Brian shouted, pointing toward a shadowy opening in the side of a cliff—a cave offering refuge from the downpour. They made for it, their soaked clothes clinging to their bodies.

Once inside the cave, they found remnants of past travelers: a pile of dry wood stacked against the wall. With practiced ease, Dan struck flint to steel, igniting a flame. Soon, a fire crackled before them, its warmth seeping into their chilled bones. Without a word, they stripped off their sodden garments, draping them near the heat to dry.

Standing naked by the fire, both men felt the storm's chill yielding to the heat. Brian cast a long, admiring gaze over Dan's stocky form, the firelight casting shadows that danced across Dan's hairy chest and potbelly. He took in the sight with an appreciative smirk, letting his eyes linger on the parts of Dan he found particularly impressive. "Never noticed how big your cock is," Brian remarked. His voice held a note of genuine wonder, adding, "Looks really huge, goddamn it!" His own body bore the marks of a life hard-lived, muscles defined beneath a sheath of dense hair, skin scarred from past fights and escapes.

Dan grunted, surprised by Brian's apparent revelation. "What’s the fuck?" he responded with a coarse laugh. "Seen me bare-ass plenty of times before, partner. Seen my hard cock while I fucked a sheriff’s ass or a bounty hunter cleaned it." Despite his words, there was a note of satisfaction in Dan's voice, a recognition of his own impressive size. The kind of acknowledgment that feeds a man's pride.

"Yeah, but not after bein' taken," Brian replied with a rough edge, the memory of his encounter with the sheriff still raw and vivid. It was a shift in the way he perceived the world, a newfound understanding. "Changes how you see things, I reckon." The admission was a rare show of vulnerability, something that flickered between them in the fire's glow.

Dan watched the flames dance in Brian's eyes, seeing a wildness that matched the storm outside. The heat from the fire radiated through them, drying their skin. A different kind of warmth spread through Dan as he imagined Brian's recent submission, the thrill of it making his cock twitch with a perverse excitement. He was curious, eager to understand how the man before him had been altered by such an unexpected and submissive encounter. It was a twist that intrigued him, one that played into his darkest fantasies.

"Should've seen your face when I told you 'bout the sheriff," Brian continued, breaking into a coarse laugh. "What a sight that would've been—him swinging from a rope with his own jewels stuffed in his mouth."

"Would've been one hell of an end," Dan agreed, his arousal evident as he gazed back at Brian. Their laughter mingled with the crackling of the fire, two outlaws sharing a deep kinship in the face of their inevitable demise.

The flickering firelight cast shadows over their rugged features as Dan and Brian huddled close to the flames. Dan's eyes, darkened by thoughts of a looming end, studied Brian, whose chest rose and fell with the weight of their reality. "What do you want?" Dan's voice was gruff, the words cutting through the crackle of burning wood.

Brian's gaze held steady. "We ain't outrunnin' them forever." He spoke with the somber acceptance of a man who had danced with death more than once. "It's comin', and it's comin' soon."

"Aye," Dan acknowledged, his lips tightening into a hard line. "But that ain't what I asked."

Brian's eyes glinted with a mix of defiance and desire. "Only my killer can fuck me," he said, his voice low, resonant. They stared at each other, a silent understanding passing between them as the heat from the fire seemed to pale in comparison to the tension that sizzled in the air.

"Got these from the sheriff," Brian murmured, breaking the silence. He reached into a small pouch beside him and withdrew the cold iron of the handcuffs, their metallic surface catching the light.

"Handcuffs..." Dan rumbled, his curiosity piqued. "How'd it feel?"

"Powerful," Brian admitted, his voice a low rasp that carried a hint of something raw and unguarded. The admission seemed to cost him, but he relished the telling, savored the way it felt to reveal it. "To know I was about to be taken, killed... It felt right, like a good way to go." Each word was an offering, stripped bare of pretense. He paused for a moment, his breath heavy, his eyes never leaving Dan's. The look in Brian's eyes was wild, untamed, like a horse that had never felt the harness. Dan could see the excitement building, the anticipation of something shared and inevitable. Brian's lips curled into a smirk, a reckless grin that spoke of intimacy, danger, and a defiance that called to Dan's own.

"Fucker was strong," he recalled, the memory fueling the fire inside him. "Had a cock almost as massive as yours. Would've made a fine murderer," he added, a dark reverence in his tone. "Damn near the best—after you."

His words hung in the air, heavy with implication and promise. A silence fell between them, thick and charged, until it was broken by an understanding that didn't need to be spoken, by the thing that thrummed between them like a living force. The thrill of submission, the pull of death—these were the things that bound them, that drew them into each other like moths to flame. Their eyes met again, two hardened killers acknowledging the bond they shared. The fire popped and hissed, but the sound was drowned out by the pounding of blood in their ears, their mutual arousal an unspoken language only they could understand.

The firelight flickered, casting a lurid glow on Dan's rugged features as he shifted his weight, the shadows carving out the hard lines etched into his face. He eyed Brian for a moment more, the silence stretching between them like a rope pulled taut.

"Want me to slap them cuffs on ya?" The words rumbled out of Dan, low and heavy with implication. His predatory gaze never wavered from Brian's, reading the answer in the glint of those deep-set eyes before he'd even spoken. The fire crackled between them, its heat a mere whisper next to the inferno of their shared anticipation.

Brian tilted his chin up, defiant even now, the smoldering light catching the edges of his stubbled jaw. He allowed the moment to stretch, to infuse itself with the weight of their sins and desires. "You think you'd like that? To cuff me?" His voice was rough, but it carried a sharp edge, a challenge wrapped in their history of violence. The call to the darkness they both harbored deep within their souls was unmistakable.

"Fuckin' oath, you'd like that," Dan shot back with a coarse laugh, the sound raw and intimate. He shifted his weight, never breaking the taut line of tension that tethered him to Brian. "Be like that sheriff all over again—only this time, you ain't gettin' away."

Brian's lips curled into a knowing grin. "Don't be so sure," he drawled, the words soaked in provocation. His eyes gleamed with an untamed fire, daring Dan to make good on the threat.

Dan leaned forward, desire and danger twisting into a singular need. "Not with these on your wrists, you ain't," he said, nodding toward the shackles that lay between them.

The air was thick, charged with the anticipation of the act and the lure of its violence. Brian savored it, the thrill of relinquishing power to someone who knew him so well, someone who could match him in both brutality and lust. His breath was ragged, his own excitement unmistakable as he pressed, "What if I ask you to cuff me?"

"Reckon I would," Dan growled, his hand already reaching out for the cold metal that Brian offered. "You got one hell of an ass, Blacks."

"Then do it." Brian's command was a guttural whisper, the words heavy with a hunger that echoed Dan's own.

With a decisive motion, Dan clasped the handcuffs around Brian's wrists, the click of the lock loud in the hush of the cave. He observed Brian's arms, now bound behind him, a sense of possession washing over him as he took in the sight.

"Good and tight," Dan muttered, satisfaction lacing his tone. Brian's chest heaved with each breath, and the fire was not the only heat that burned in that secluded space. Their eyes remained locked, two predators caught in a dance as old as time, where power and desire collided in the most dangerous of ways.

The fire crackled, its heat mingling with the oppressive warmth of two bodies entangled in a primal dance. "Suck it," Dan commanded, his voice a gravelly sneer that cut through the air as sharply as the edge of a Bowie knife. Brian's lips parted without hesitation, enveloping Dan’s massive member. The sound of wet suction and guttural moans reverberated against the cave walls.

Dan watched with hooded eyes as Brian worked him with a blend of desperation and resignation. His hand found the back of Brian's head, guiding him with a force that was both brutal and familiar. The world outside—the relentless pursuit of lawmen and the impending specter of death—faded into insignificance against the raw carnality of the moment.

"Stop!" Dan commanded, his voice a crude bark that mingled with their ragged breaths. With a sudden, forceful movement, he shoved Brian backward onto the cave floor, the hard ground unforgiving beneath him. Dust rose like a choke of smoke around them. Brian's eyes were wild, lustful and challenging, as Dan loomed over him, a shadow of primal intent. For a moment, Dan's gaze lingered on Brian's spread legs and vulnerable asshole, a wicked smile curling his lips. It was a sight that inflamed him, drove him to near frenzy. "Fuck," he muttered, the word rough with desire. His massive cock, rigid and ready, pressed insistently against Brian's entrance. With a brutal thrust, Dan forced himself inside, the sheer violence of it making Brian grunt through gritted teeth. A grunt that was half pain, half ecstasy. Dan reveled in the savage tightness, the way Brian's body fought and then yielded to his invasion. The handcuffs rattled against the stone floor as Brian's arms twisted behind him, every motion a testament to his submission. Dan's hips moved with punishing intensity, setting a relentless pace that echoed through the cave like gunfire. He fucked Brian viciously, mercilessly, each thrust a claim, a reminder of their shared depravity.

The world outside—the relentless pursuit of lawmen and the impending specter of death—faded into insignificance against the raw carnality of the moment.

Time stretched and contracted around their coupling until the thunderous sounds of their climax echoed the dying storm outside. Spent, Dan stepped back, watching Brian's chest heave. "Clean it," he barked, motioning to his soiled cock with an imperious jerk of his chin. Without words, Brian lowered his face and complied, his tongue tracing the length with a diligence born of necessity.

Silence reclaimed the cave as the rain ceased its assault on the land above. Dan turned away, leaving Brian to watch from his position by the fire. He moved with purposeful strides, exiting the cave to wrestle a length of rope from one of the saddlebags hidden among the rocks. The noose came together with well-practiced ease; the slipknot tightened with a tug that held the promise of finality. He slung it over a sturdy tree branch, the loop dangling like an ominous pendulum.

"Get up," Dan called out when he returned to the cave's mouth, his voice carrying a new weight. Brian rose, his movements stiff, the soreness evident in the lines of his body.

"Feels right... dyin' with your seed warming me inside," he rasped, a grimace cutting through the pain. "Ass hurts like hell though."

"Your neck will be hurting worse soon enough," Dan retorted, a savage glint lighting his eyes. A harsh laugh passed between them, humor dark as pitch—a shared understanding that pain, in this final act, was a companion as intimate as any lover they'd ever taken.

Dan closed the distance between them, his movements predatory as he nudged Brian toward the oak tree. The coarse bark stood in stark contrast to the soft flesh of Brian's back as Dan forced him against it, the humid air thick with anticipation. With a rough hand planted beneath Brian's ass, he hoisted him upward, muscles straining under the weight.

"Time to fit you for your noose, boy," Dan growled, the words slurred with an intoxicating mixture of arousal and impending doom.

The hemp rope was coarse, scratching against Brian's neck as Dan manipulated it into place, tightening just enough to make his intent clear without cutting off the breath they both knew would soon be stolen from Brian's lungs. Brian’s head tilted back, exposing the vulnerability of his throat—a silent submission to the inevitable.

Dan’s finger found its way back to the warmth of Brian's violated flesh below, probing deep. Brian let out a guttural moan, a sound that danced between pleasure and pain, surrender and resistance. Their bodies were close again, and Dan could feel the throb of Brian's arousal pressing into his chest, a reminder of the life that still pulsed within his doomed companion.

"Goodbye, Brian," Dan whispered harshly, his voice barely audible over the pounding of their hearts and the rustle of the leaves in the gentle breeze.

With that, he released his grip, and Brian’s body dropped. The noose caught him abruptly, jerking his head back with violent finality. The rope groaned under the strain, and Brian's struggle began—a drawn-out battle against the tightening embrace of death. His feet clawed at the air, seeking purchase where there was none, every instinct screaming for survival even as his fate was sealed.

Brian's eyes bulged, a wild terror flickering within as the pressure around his neck built, a crescendo of agony that bloomed across his face. Dan watched, a spectator to the grim tableau he had authored, his own heart racing with a perverse echo of Brian’s desperation. They were bound together in this final dance, hunter and hunted, executioner and condemned, until nothing remained but the silence of spent lives and a story that would end here, in the dust and shadow of the Arizona valley.

Dan stood over the writhing form of Brian, smoke curling from the cigar between his lips as he watched the macabre spectacle unfold. With each convulsive twitch and gasp, the end drew nearer for Brian, the once-fierce bandit now reduced to a desperate dance with death. The telltale warmth spread beneath him as his body relinquished control, a dark stain seeping into the dust below. A final shudder ran through him, and in that prolonged moment of release, Brian's essence spilled forth, a stark contrast to the dry earth.

Dan exhaled a cloud of smoke, his gaze fixed on the grotesque throes before him. His own arousal stood in stark defiance of the scene, a monument to their twisted brotherhood and the thrill of life's curtain call. He took another long drag from his cigar, savoring the tobacco's bitter taste, a familiar comfort amidst the chaos of their final act.

The last embers of the cigar died between Dan's fingers as he flicked it away, its glow fading into the encroaching darkness. Without a word, he set about crafting another noose, the rope sliding through his calloused hands with practiced ease. The loop fashioned, he secured it alongside Brian's, a morbid twin to the one that had claimed his partner's life.

He removed the handcuffs from Brian’s limp wrists, the metal clinking softly in the quiet that enveloped them. Dan placed a sturdy log beneath the new noose and stepped onto it, feeling the rough bark against his bare soles. The noose settled around his thick neck, snug but not yet constricting. Taking a deep breath, he slid his hands behind his back and snapped the cuffs closed, sealing his fate with the click of locking steel.

With a swift kick, the log rolled out from under him, and the world shifted. The rope bit into his flesh, an unrelenting grip that eclipsed all else. Dan's weight pulled taut against the unforgiving bind, his body suspended in a grim echo of Brian's final struggle. Their saga was ending, two outlaws tethered to the same cruel destiny, swaying silently in the aftermath of their storm.

Gravity claimed Dan Bearhunter with a ferocious urgency as the noose cinched tight around his thick, weathered neck. His legs flailed wildly, a primal dance between life and its inevitable cessation. With each convulsion, Dan's body told the story of a man who had lived by the gun and now swung by the rope. The air, once a friend to his lungs, had become an unattainable luxury.

As he writhed against the coarse embrace of the hemp, time stretched into an agonizing eternity. Each kick was a rebellion; each gasp for breath a futile protest. Dan's face reddened, veins protruding like serpents beneath his skin, while his eyes bulged with the pressure of his struggle. He grunted in harsh staccatos, sounds muffled by the constricting grip upon his throat.

Then, surrendering to the inevitable, his movements slowed, becoming less a fight than a macabre ballet. His bowels betrayed him, releasing their foul contents in a final act of indignity. As the waste trickled down his hairy legs, a shuddering climax overtook Dan's body, a perverse mimicry of ecstasy in the shadow of death. His seed joined the cascade, spilling out as life ebbed away.

The last of Dan's vitality fled, leaving his form still, save for the occasional twitch—a mere echo of the storm that had raged moments before. Now, side by side, Brian and Dan dangled from the tree, their bodies grotesque monuments to their lawless lives. Their once potent manhoods stood erect, though now only markers of death's grim harvest. Their soiled backsides and elongated necks completed the tableau of their demise.

As the sun arced across the sky, the scent of decay drew a morbid congregation. Flies and other scavengers of nature descended upon the pair, their tiny feet exploring the corpses' most intimate recesses. Eyes that had once held malice and mirth were now dull windows being invaded by opportunistic insects. The buzzing became a requiem, a discordant symphony celebrating the end of the bandits' reign of terror.

In the silence that followed, only the soft rustle of wings and the creaking of ropes bore witness to what remained of Dan Bearhunter and Brian Blacks—two souls entwined in death as they had been in life.

The relentless Arizona sun climbed higher, its rays unobstructed by cloud or mercy. Beneath its scorching gaze, the bloated forms of Dan Bearhunter and Brian Blacks swelled grotesquely. Their skin, once toughened by a life of action, began to pallor and stretch, yielding to the inexorable process of decay.

Nature, in her impartial wisdom, commenced the reclaiming of flesh. Tiny rivulets of putrefaction trickled down from the tree, darkening the soil where the bandits' shadows had once loomed large. The arid air hung heavy with the stench of their demise, an olfactory epitaph to the outlaws whose deeds were as foul as the odor that now permeated the valley.

The scavengers, ever patient, saw opportunity in death. Beetles skittered across the distended bellies, burrowing into the crevices, while maggots feasted within, a writhing mass concealed beneath the surface. With each passing hour, the once formidable figures of Dan and Brian diminished, reduced to mere vessels for a host of diminutive devourers.

Their eyes, which had once glinted with malice, now stared blankly at the sky—cloudy lenses being polished by the gentle touch of insect mandibles. The flies, engorged on their feast, laid the next generation of desecrators into the folds of decaying matter, ensuring the cycle of consumption would continue unabated.

As the sun traced its path toward the horizon, it cast long shadows that danced around the macabre scene. The bodies, now marred with the bloat of gas and ravages of decomposition, were barely recognizable as human. In this desolate place, where the lawless end came swiftly with rope and lead, nature's slow and methodical dismantling of the flesh proceeded without haste or judgment.

The visage of death, cruel and unyielding, had claimed the valley, leaving behind only the husks of Dan and Brian—two men who had lived by the gun and died by the noose, now nothing more than fodder for the carrion call of the wild Western frontier.