This three-part, six-hour prequel to "Lonesome Dove" finds Texas Rangers Augustus "Gus" McCrae and Woodrow F. Call in their middle years with their two great loves, Clara Forsythe and Maggie Tilton, respectively. The two men join a Ranger troop to pursue three outlaws: the Comanche war chief Buffalo Hump; Kicking Wolf, a Comanche horse thief; and the deadly Mexican bandit king Ahumado. The trail also leads them into an encounter with Blue Duck, Buffalo Hump's violent outcast son.