A/N- So this is literally my first fanfiction posted online ever. I decided to do this cos I had this really long head-canon about what would happen to Jack after his parents died and I really needed to get it out on paper. Red Dead Redemption is my all time favorite game and I noticed a few times through it that John would mention how the old west was dying out or something like that and the idea really seemed like something I wanted to explore DX there really is an overarching plot coming soon, I swear. anyway, if you like this please review it so I'll know, if you don't, please tell me how I can improve! I'll appreciate any feedback honestly. Also, I know this first chapter is kind of slow since it's the prologue but I'll publish the second chapter very soon. Also, this story is full of spoilers so don't read if you haven't finished the game :)

Disclaimer: I do not, nor will I ever own Red Dead Redemption or any of its characters. The only parts of this story I own are the plot lines that come after the ending of the game as well as my original characters. The content of this story was not meant to insult anyone in any way, shape or form. Rated T for violence and coarse language.

Chapter Track: Everything Has Changed -Taylor Swift

Chapter 1: Prologue

When I was seven years old, my father sat me down and told me exactly why it was that I had never met my mother. He explained that she had been a prostitute that he had visited in a moment of weakness, and that he never knew her beyond the one night they spent together. I remember him looking at me as if waiting for admonishment, but I didn't say a word. I'd suspected, after noticing the way some of the townspeople of Blackwater treated me, that my father had done something wrong in my infancy. Our relationship did not falter because there had never been much of a relationship between us in the first place. The distance that had always kept us apart did not grow or lessen.

My father, a business tycoon, made up for what he lacked in social standing with his impressive and ever-increasing wealth. Every few years we would move from one house to another, larger one until we ended up in Uptown, the part of Blackwater in which all the so-called elites made their homes. His business left him little time to raise me and so I was handed over to my nanny and placed under the influence of the other children at the one school in Blackwater. I was at first stigmatized, then accepted, and then, at last, befriended as I aged. In time my illegitimate birth came to have little meaning to the people around me and I was able to approach them as an equal or, if they were significantly poorer than me, a superior. The only person who ever spoke of my origins was Clara, my nanny, who informed me that my mother had been a regular working girl of no repute. She'd wanted to keep me, I was told, but could not afford to do so on her salary. My father was eager to have a child and I knew he loved me in his way, so I reciprocated the feeling as best as I could.

If you're a girl from a rich family in Blackwater, you're expected to do one thing at the age of sixteen and one thing only: prepare for marriage. Getting a regular education is hard enough by itself, but when you add on the the notion of finishing school for an entire year the whole idea is really too much to bear. Most days, however, it seemed like I was the only one who was against the idea. Every other girl was excited about the prospect of leaving their father's house just to settle down with another, richer man. While I saw nothing wrong with the thought of marrying a rich man, I just couldn't imagine myself dedicating my life to someone I didn't love. Besides that, I was itching to get out of the city. Why anyone wanted to stay in Blackwater when the land around it was so much more beautiful was a mystery to me.

Unlike the parents of the other girls in my class, my father did not believe in arranged marriages. That's not to say that he believed in marrying for love either, he certainly did not, but he was the sort of man to whom gender differences did not matter in the least despite the time period. The only thing that drove Patrick MacFarlane was money and he didn't care if I was a girl, he wanted me to grow up to take over his business after he was gone. I suppose that being the oldest and longest surviving MacFarlane brother had given him an acute awareness of the fragility of life. Of course, being a MacFarlane also meant that I'd become acquainted not only with the culture of West Elizabeth, but with that of New Austin as well. My grandfather and aunt still lived in Hennigan's Stead at the very well-known ranch where my father was born in the year 1878, and I would happily go and visit the two of them from time to time.

At the age of nine my grandfather bought me an especially large birthday present, something I didn't even know I wanted until I first came into contact with its muzzle. His gift to me was a War Horse, all black with light hair and a level of stamina above that of all steeds. The horse practically grew up with me, but I was forced to leave it behind at MacFarlane's Ranch whenever I returned home. My father was adamant that I'd never bring any of that "country trash" back to Blackwater with me.

After a few trips back and forth between the two states, my aunt propped a repeater into my unwilling hands and insisted that I get acquainted with the dangerous piece of machinery.

"You're gonna learn how to use a gun, Effie," she'd said, "Might save your life one day."

And learn I did. It turned out that I was a natural with guns and, by the time I was thirteen, I could outshoot many of the men on the ranch. My Grandpa Drew would eye me with pride on these occasions, something that only encouraged me to work harder.

Pretty soon I was frequenting the ranch much more often than my father was comfortable with. He could see changes in me that started with dirt under my fingernails and ended with me losing interest in every subject I'd once excelled in. Like all other girls my age I'd been taught to sing and dance, draw decently and sow pretty, tiny stitches that were practically invisible to the naked eye, but suddenly I was cringing away at the mere mention of these accomplishments. I kept up with my piano lessons and German classes because those were activities I'd chosen for myself, but it seemed, in the end, that my interests lay elsewhere. My friends in Blackwater began to notice my indifference not to long after my father and many did not understand the appeal that New Austin held for me. My closest friend, Collette Miller, was the only one who even tried to sympathize, but somehow I found that I didn't care either way. I'd accepted that my life in Blackwater would always be separate from the life I lead in Hennigan's Stead, and everything felt fine again for a good amount of time.

I was thirteen before I made the decision to move to the ranch entirely. My father was displeased by this news but, as he'd never enforced many rules on me in the first place, he allowed me to leave with the promise that letters would be sent to either him or my nanny with news of my well-being. I wasted no time packing my bags and saying my goodbyes to Collette and the others before hopping onto the first train that would take me safely to MacFarlane's Ranch. I understood then that I was trying to use the country to fill the hole I could feel growing in my heart. Something was lacking in my life and although I was under no fairytale illusions that moving would fix any of it, I had high hopes that it would help. As it was, I found that I could eventually wake up each day looking forward to what would come after rather than worrying about what the future would bring. Life was good, stable even. Until it wasn't.

It was autumn when my aunt Bonnie brought home a man, and not in the way unmarried women of her age usually do. He was shot in the abdomen and on the verge of death somewhere close to Fort Mercer when my aunt and one of our ranch hands, Amos, rode by in a wagon and dragged him on board. Dr. Nathanial Johnston came up from Armadillo to see what he could do and, miraculously, the stranger pulled through. Upon waking up for the first time the man informed us that his name was John Marston. I was initially frightened of him. He was quite tall and rather thick in a way that indicated he had a good amount of muscle packed on, probably as a result of years of heavy labor. He had scars on his face where some manner of wild animal must have attacked him and thick, unkempt hair that reached his chin. After talking with him on and off for a few weeks and then again when he saved my aunt Bonnie from being hanged by some despicable outlaw gang, I came to realize that he was the embodiment of everything that was missing from my own life: freedom, strength, and the spirit of the west. I admired him, something that turned to outright affection when I discovered that his entire mission revolved around the well-being of his wife and son. He was the father I'd always wished I had. This was why when he disappeared from my life without absolutely no warning to speak of, I was terrified. I'd come to realize some important things about myself in his time with us and I was worried that losing him would mean losing those things as well.

A full two months passed before he reappeared, hat cocked and eyes bright like he'd never even been gone. This time, however, he'd brought his son along with him. Looking back on it I'd eventually realize that this particular day, for some reason, stuck out to me more than any of the others. It was the day everything changed.

His eyes are wide as they sweep over me, my horse, the cows milling about. He looks nervous for some reason. His father smiles down at him and I suspect that there's a hint of pride in the action.

"Jack, introduce yourself, boy!"

The newcomer slides off his horse and moves towards me. He can't seem to quite look me in the eyes as he shakes my hand.

"H-How do you do?" he stammers out, "It's nice to meet both of you."

Aunt Bonnie gives me a sideways glance that I can't quite decipher and beams at the boy. He makes to pull his hand out of mine but I grasp it firmly with my other.

"You're Mr. Marston's son?"

He gulps, wavering under my scrutiny. I'm close enough to him that I could count each freckle on his face if I wanted to. His free hand flies up and buries itself in his messy brown hair.

"Yes."

"I'm Effie. You look like him." I say, releasing his hand. He drops it to his side as soon as I do.

"As glad as we are to see you, I'm suspectin' you're here for somethin' other than a visit," Aunt Bonnie says shrewdly. Mr. Marston nods at her.

"I'm finally startin' up my farm again. Or tryin' to, at least."

"You'll be fine. You've been taught well. Come on then; I remember makin' you a promise that involved some cattle."

Together the two adults round up about fifteen heads of cattle and start herding them out of the pen. Mr. Marston asks Jack to lead the cows towards the river and I, after getting on my horse, catch up with him.

"How old are you?" I ask as our steeds trot forward side by side.

"Sixteen." he says, sounding less nervous than before, "What about you?"

"Thirteen."

We are silent for some time as the four of us round the edge of the property, sneaking careful glances at each other while Bonnie and Mr. Marston chat away behind the herd. The sun is bright in the sky and the weather is warmer than it should be for this time of year, but I don't really notice any of that. I only see Jack. It's strange, I'd never been one to make friends easily- in fact I only have one true friend back home in Blackwater- but somehow I feel different with him. He makes everything simple.

"You know, I've never herded cattle before." Jack speaks up. I snicker and he narrows his eyes at me. "What?"

"Look, Jack, it's obvious to anyone with eyes that you've never so much as touched a cow until today."

He wants to laugh at this, I can see the corners of his lips lifting up in preparation, but he covers it up well by feigning his indignance.

"Right, and I suppose you're the expert on farmin'?" he mocks, "Should I come to you with all my cow herdin' questions?"

"You bet-" I start, but Mr. Marston's gruff voice rings out from behind us before I can finish the thought.

"Looks like those two are gettin' along well, don't you think, Miss MacFarlane?"

"I'm not surprised," my aunt replies with a smirk, "She's got a way with boys, don't you Effie?"

This is, one hundred percent, a joke. My chest is so flat I'd need a magnifying glass to see signs of life on it. In addition I'd received zero propositions of marriage during my time at Blackwater while my redheaded friend, Collette, had gotten two. I snort in reply.

We reach the edge of our land and my aunt coaxes her horse to a stop. I follow suit, knowing that this is where we'll part ways with the Marstons.

"Looks like you got 'em under control. We'd best get back to Pa."

"Nice to see you again, Miss MacFarlane. And thanks for everything." Mr. Marston says kindly.

"Call me Bonnie, you dolt!"

The Marstons move ahead with the herd and Jack glances back at me before we part. He looks like he wants to say something but his mouth stays firmly shut. I wave at him, and he waves back, and that's that. They're gone.

A few weeks passed since my initial meeting with Jack Marston but I quickly found that I just couldn't stop thinking about him. It was great seeing his father again and I was so relieved to find out that he was alive, but there was something about the younger Marston that made me want to replay our time together over and over again in my head. It just fascinated me that he was so...uncomfortable, I guess would be the word. And not just with me, with the entire world. I'd never met someone so ill at ease in their own shoes and I was very curious about where that particular trait could have come from.

Some time later my grandfather reported to the family that we had a bit of a weevil problem in our corn fields. My aunt sent a telegram over to the Marston ranch, hoping that they'd had a good yield and could spare some corn for us. When Mr. Marston brought over said corn a few days later with his pretty wife in tow, I was frolicking about in the cow pasture with my horse, War and did not see the pair at all until they were on their way back from unloading the produce they'd brought for us. Some strange force gripped me, and I didn't even stop to think; I just ran after them on foot. They slowed down a little close to the edge of our land and I took the opportunity to hop onto the back of the wagon. I guess I was lucky that neither of them noticed me, and I was reluctant to make my presence known. My eyes drifted closed somewhere close to Thieve's Landing and, despite the incredibly reckless thing I'd just done, I found that I felt a twinge of excitement for the first time in a long time.

When I awoke a good while later it was to the sound of raised voices calling to each other somewhere beyond my line of sight. The landscape had changed drastically as I slept and the plains were no longer the flat fields that surrounded MacFarlane's Ranch, but instead a hilly conglomerate of grass and trees. The voices I'd heard before were the Marstons, greeting Jack happily as they pulled into their own ranch. I straightened up in the back of the wagon to scrutinize the place and everything from the tall silo to the wide, single-story house astounded me. It was beautiful. It was nothing like my family's ranch but it was beautiful nonetheless.

I hopped out of the wagon and it was immediately clear that John Marston and his wife were amazed to see me, quite rightly so, but Jack didn't seem surprised at all. It was almost as if he'd been expecting me. I made a beeline for him and embraced him for the first time, a moment that would mark the beginning of our friendship in the years to come.

The Marstons took to me quicker than I expected, but in retrospect I suppose that's not as an unusual a thing as I'd originally thought. They were the sort of people who'd faced the worst of everything and come out of it still filled to the brim with hope. Despite their easy acceptance of my presence in their home, however, my aunt and grandfather were not so pleased about my sudden, spontaneous visit to the Marston household. I returned to MacFarlane's Ranch under duress and gave my family the cold shoulder for a good long while. To me Beecher's Hope represented a sort of happiness I'd never felt anywhere else. It seemed cruel that my own flesh and blood were so determined to keep me away from it.

Two weeks sped past and I would not quit moping around. I learned during that time that Jack, whom I suddenly and inexplicably felt closer to than anyone else in the world, was almost as upset by our separation as I was. His parents wrote to my aunt and explained in a carefully worded letter (that I would learn later was penned by Jack) that they would be quite willing to let me stay with them at their ranch as long as I did not mind pulling my own weight. After discussing the idea with each other and then with the Marstons over the phone, it was decided that I would be allowed to traverse between Hennigan's Stead and Beecher's Hope as long as I traveled by train and kept my winchester repeater on my person the entire time. Thus began the happiest year of my life.

I was pleasantly surprised to discover, as time passed by, that the reason I was so comfortable with the Marstons was that they were all a lot like me in different ways. Mr. Marston was, as he always had been, someone I couldn't help but admire. A lot of the evening hours of my days were spent with him and Jack in front of their fireplace as he regaled us with the least gory parts of his adventures. He quickly recognized my talent for sharpshooting and worked with me and Jack to hone the skill in. His careful ministrations eventually became the dogma that I'd follow for the rest of my days. Mr. Marston's wife, Abigail, was, by his description, a woman in a man's world. After spending a month in her company I quickly understood that her best quality was determination; she simply refused to give up. Her relentless teasing of Jack provided me with a constant source of entertainment and she laughed easily and often, brightening up any conversation she joined almost instantaneously. At times she'd stroke my hair or place a kind hand on my shoulder and I'd feel, with a pang, the mother I'd been missing my entire life. Uncle, who turned out not to be anybody's biological uncle, was her opposite in many ways. He didn't put up with any laziness from me despite the fact that he spent most of his own time napping in the sunlight. From him I learned how to properly tend to the farm work I'd often skipped out on at my family's ranch and he was, if nothing else, someone I could count on to teach me the right way of things.

Over the year I spent with them, the Marstons were visited by a near constant stream of people Mr. Marston had met on his quest to get back his wife and son. The first of these people was a marshal named Leigh Johnson, a man I had met myself quite a few times before seeing him again at Beecher's Hope. He was on his way to Blackwater for a meeting with the governor and had dragged his fifteen year-old son along with him, explaining to us that he was training the boy for a future as a lawman. Wade was a year younger than Jack and two older than me so we got along well enough in the one day he and his father were with us, but the two of them left too soon for any lasting bonds to be forged. The next person we'd met was a rather rotund man with a gentlemanly air and an impressive white mustache who called himself Nigel West Dickens. When he spoke to us it seemed as if he was from another, more genteel time period. He'd tried to sell me a bottle of what he called "elixir" before he departed for Cholla Springs and mentioned to Mr. Marston that someone by the name of Irish may stop by eventually (he never did). Our last visitor, who came by far more often than the other two, was one Seth Briars. Seth wasn't a clean or healthy-looking man by anyone's definition, and I could tell that Mrs. Marston was particularly uncomfortable with the idea of having him around, but despite his apparent insanity he seemed to be somewhat fond of Mr. Marston. I myself didn't think much of him at all until one fateful day he'd saved me from a cougar attack using only a small and rusty knife. Afterwards I maintained an irrational fear of cougars but an even more irrational loyalty to Seth Briars that made Jack doubt my sanity.

The Marstons became my surrogate family, filling more and more empty cracks in my life the longer I knew them, almost like cement filling in cracks on a broken road. The days I spent at MacFarlane's Ranch and Blackwater became increasingly less frequent as I made Beecher's Hope my home. I knew I wasn't being fair but the Marstons never complained and in retrospect I'd always hoped that they came to feel that I was one of their own.

It didn't take long for Jack Marston to become the most important person in the world to me, and we established a bond that we agreed could not be broken by even blood. I began to adopt some of his habits as my own and in return, some of mine rubbed off on him. Jack loved to read so we'd spend long afternoons in the family's barn pouring over book after book. I loved to exhibit my prowess with guns so we'd compete often in shooting contests while his father coached us. My fondness of snow took us up to Tall Trees more than once where the icy flakes were always plentiful and the cold was almost too much to bear. His discomfort with the world never fully went away but he would venture further out of his shell in time until we were able to travel together as far as Blackwater and Armadillo, always under the constant watch of either his parents or my aunt. We gathered the world in small handfuls and I had hopes that my life would always remain that way. One thing I'd learned in my fourteen short years, however, was that things always change.

John Marston and Uncle both died in the summer of 1911, murdered in cold blood by the same lawmen who had sworn to leave them alone. I wasn't there when it happened. Instead, I learned about it all almost a week after it occurred and nearly fainted when I did. For a while, nothing in my life felt substantial anymore. I could not imagine a world in which Mr. Marston did not exist.

When I returned to Beecher's Hope for the first time after Mr. Marston's death, it was immediately obvious that everything had changed. I brought my aunt along with me to visit her old friend's grave, but she ended up spending most of her time there trying to put a distraught Abigail back together. Mrs. Marston cried most of the time in those first few weeks and struggled through the oncoming months with little spirit. However after she'd carried on in that way for about a year I began to see some changes in her. She would laugh when I told her jokes, she would hum as she went about her daily chores. They weren't major things, and I still caught her with a blank look on her face more often than not, but these changes were definitely better than nothing at all. She proved to me once again that the world would not beat her down.

Jack didn't cry. I kept expecting him to but he didn't. As I watched, he transformed from a lanky and thin boy into a strong and wiry man during the period of three seemingly short years. By the age of nineteen he already looked like Mr. Marston in miniature. He didn't laugh anymore. He seemed to have no interest in anything outside of the ranch and discovering the name of the man who'd murdered his father and "uncle". When he talked to me he was still as sarcastic as ever but I could tell his words meant nothing to him. Even so I couldn't stop myself from following him around and worrying about everything he did or said. We were best friends of course, so I was well within my rights to worry about him, but this was different. I was starting to notice that his lack of interest in all but those two areas included a lack of interest in me. In the year before his father's death he'd never left my side unless he had to but now…it seemed like he couldn't care less if I was there. This sudden change in his attitude towards me wasn't something I liked at all. I was starting to miss the year we'd spent together before his father's death just because it meant he'd treat me like he used to.

I suppose it didn't matter if Jack refused to shed tears because I cried enough for the both of us. John Marston was not my father but when he died, I knew that was what it had felt like. I visited his grave often and wept beside it when I thought no one was around. The first time Jack saw this, he ignored me. The second time he asked me tonelessly why I was torturing myself so needlessly. The third time however, and everytime after that, he fought with me. He insisted on the point that I was in no way related to John Marston and thus should not have felt the pain that deeply.

"HE WASN'T YOURS!" he'd yelled, "HE WAS MY FATHER. MY MOTHER'S HUSBAND-NOT YOURS!"

I'd screeched back some pathetic excuse about family not ending with blood, but I knew even then that his words were true. I had no right. Eventually it got to the point that my tears dried up and I could sit by Mr. Marston's grave without feeling too sad. Jack and I stopped arguing and began a lengthy cold war that would last for nearly three years. There were breaks in it, of course, when we reminisced on the old days or had shooting competitions for the hell of it, but was never like it used to be. Our friendship had withered away to a husk of its former glory. At that point I was certain that things couldn't possibly get worse for us, but they did. Of course they did. It was 1914 before my real story began and it did so, unfortunately, at the ending of another's. "Always in our hearts." is what her grave said.

Always in our hearts.