Sundown In Montana

Short fiction as J.D. Vance and the Murdochs Plan Trump's End

October 2025, Beaverhead Ranch, Montana

The helicopters came thwocking in, low and fast over the ridges frostbitten by an early winter, stirring the dust and snow into a golden haze, a glow that would be golden if it wasn’t so thick.

Photo by Matthew Lancaster on Unsplash

The sundown sky was a bruised yellow, a late-autumn day in Montana, cloudless and cold. In a meadow, a few dozen black Angus stared blankly as the one, two, three Blackhawks touched down near the main lodge.

The security detail walked the principal passenger towards a waiting Suburban.

”Sir, we still have to insist…” said the lead agent.

“Parsons, no. I’m not negotiating. You stay here,” said the Vice President of the United States. “We’re safer here than in D.C.”

He slid into the front seat next to a sandy-haired man and they sped away toward the lodge.

Inside, the oldest crocodile on land was already halfway through a glass of Penfolds G5 Grange and a game of three-dimensional chess, metaphorical, not literal, of course. Chess was for sissies and grinds.

Rupert Murdoch, 94 and essentially embalmed in a slurry of billionaire contempt and the blood of his vanquished enemies, was still alert and evil. He didn’t bother to look up as the doors opened and two men entered.