Introduction
There was a blazing flash of light that would have temporarily blinded anyone within sight of it and, as it faded, three men stood in a spot where nothing but tumbleweeds and a small dust storm had existed before. They all shifted around and examined their surroundings with a sense of anxiety that accompanied them with every new place they were thrown into.
If someone were to pass by the group, they would likely be thought of as collection of worthless vagabonds. They were all wearing tattered, stained clothing as well as smears of blood and dirt on every piece of exposed skin they had.
"So where the fuck are we this time?" Spider casually asked, providing the trio with his usual post-transition question. Having just recently torn the sleeves off of his newly acquired shirt, he was picking at the ripped material where tendrils of loose threads kept tickling his shoulder like actual spider legs. Neither John Marston nor Herbert West batted an eye at his foul-mouth dialogue, as they had all been stuck together long enough to learn each other's traits and not badger one another about them. Spider didn't receive an answer, not that he really thought he would anyway... but it still would've been nice. Herbert began to clean his glasses, which had gained a fine film of dust on them in mere seconds of their arrival, and John surveyed the land in front of him. Something about it looked awfully familiar... felt awfully familiar.
Along with their ragtag look, each one of them was carrying something very... grisly. West's medical bag looked incredibly dinged up and blood was dripping out from something inside of it, Marston's large hunting knife had seen its fair share of combat, clearly displayed by the dulled edges and broken tip, and Spider's belt holstered a variety of bloodied hammers in it, some of which holding onto the fleshy remnants of whatever poor soul he had last bludgeoned it with.
"Does it really matter, hmm, Spider?" Herbert asked, taking an effort to say his companion's name in a way that continued to show his disdain for it. He liked the punk well enough he supposed (if Herbert could indeed 'like' someone at all, that was), but the name 'Spider' was just childish and irksome to him. Regardless, he doubted he would ever learn the young man's real name. "It's never where we are that should worry us, but what to expect: some form of the undead."
"Looks like your kind of shithole, John," Spider lamented, ignoring the doctor's reply and pushing forward with his rebellious attitude of disrespect and defiance. He had equated the area to the gunslinger because all he could see was overgrown weeds, cacti and lots of barren, dry earth all around them... and it reminded him of what the Wild West must have looked like almost as much as Marston himself did.
"It is..." John muttered in return, drinking in the sights as the familiarity gave way to full-on nostalgia. It wasn't easy to tell exactly where you were just by a desert landscape, but John was very acquainted with the rocky formations he had ridden passed time and time again, the nooks and crannies where outlaw gangs once hid and he would be damned if it didn't look like the town of Armadillo was just ahead in the distance. A huge smile spread across his face for the first time in what felt like ages. "Boys..." he said proudly, turning to face his traveling partners, "I do believe I'm home!"
Spider and Herbert looked at each other with equal measures of shock and disbelief. Was it true? Had they really come full-circle and somehow managed to make it back to John's old stomping ground? What would it mean if they had?
As John happily began to walk towards town, a much gloomier duo followed behind him. All three men began to reminisce on just how their stories began and subsequently intertwined, as well as the adventures they had had as a result.