"Get up Jackie." He pushed on the boy who had once again taken over the small bed to sleep on, piled under warm furs and heavy woven blankets, and trying his patience. The teenager grumbled, rolling over and away from him now, still half asleep prompting him to shake the boy harder now. "I said get up."

"Five more minutes." Jack mumbled back in response, it had been some time since he had slept in a proper bed. He had only been missing from Beecher's Hope for about two weeks, sleeping in the rough and trying to survive in the wild on his own like his books had told him to. He was half dreaming, forgetting where he was for a moment, believing he was back at home and John had come to wake him up.

"Then move over, and," he pushed on the boy again with a grunt and slid him across the mattress and into the wall, "stay on your goddamn side."

"Wha?" Jack thumped into the wall and startled awake, thrashing a little as he realized he was not at home and Dutch loomed over him in his thick black jacket. His breath came out in steam, the cabin darkened as the fire died down and he had put out the candles for the night.

"You're in my bed, son. Emphasis on mine. But," he growled at first before shaking his head and sighing exasperatedly, "it's cold tonight so I suppose I don't mind for the sake of warmth. Just, again Jackie, stay on your goddamn side."

He turned, sinking down onto the mattress and began to remove his boots with the fur wrapped up to just below his knee as the boy sat up in bed.

"I'm a man so it ain't really right for me to–" Jack began, shivering a little as he began removing the covers off of himself, preparing to leave when Dutch held up his hand to quiet him.

"I ain't gonna fuck you. I ain't Williamson or that Italian dandy. I'm mad but I ain't queer, son. Besides," he lowered his hand and slid his other boot off with a grunt, "you ain't a man yet. Probably don't even have your first short and curlies."

"I have a couple." Jack folded his arms, "And, I've been having to shave my face now, see."

The boy gestured to his upper lip, scratching his finger across the faint stubble audibly as he could. The older man rolled his eyes and snatched at the blanket, leaving his coat and other clothes on as he slid into bed too now.

"You got a ways to go. You know, your daddy used to crawl into bed with Annabelle and I when he first came to be in our care. Bout your age too, claiming to be plagued by nightmares. He'd do it to be close to her, I knew, seeking the comfort of a mother even though he was far too old to need such a thing. I used to feel rather uncomfortable with the two of them curled up beside me on that tiny cot, half the time I'd let her stay with your daddy a while and then carry him back off to his own tent. Point is, I'm used to sharing a bed with a child who believes he's a man." He rubbed his beard with a chuckle and sank down into the pillow, facing up at the ceiling and drawing a bit of blanket over his exposed hands and feet, trying to lie still but comfortably as he could. He still felt as though the small teenager were taking up far more room than he ought to and Dutch didn't like feeling constricted, so he shifted awkwardly a little as he tried to settle in.

"What was she like, Uncle Dutch?" Jack crawled back under the covers, laying on his back as well as close to the wall as he could and folding his arms behind his head underneath the ragged pillow. The boy was still thinking about the old poetry book and the reaction the man had to it when he had read it aloud earlier tonight.

"Who?" He asked, closing his eyes. You know who, dumbass.

"Miss Annabelle. Pa says she was your woman, the way Miss O'Shea and Miss Grimshaw–" He began but the older man interrupted him rather abruptly.

"Wife, not just a woman, Jackie, there's a difference. The others were…interests, fleeting and temporary like pleasures of the flesh often are for men like me. But I made her an honest woman, and she wouldn't have accepted anything less than cementing herself to me in matrimony being the daughter of a wealthy horse trader and a gang leader in her own right. Aspects of herself that she gave up to be with me. But, gunslingers and outlaws aren't exactly cut out to be decent husbands or fathers. You should know that better than anyone, son. I would've been no better than your daddy to that child or her if she hadn't died. But like your momma, that woman loved me anyway." He opened his eyes again, realizing the boy had flopped over onto his side now and was listening with interest, propped up on his elbow now.

"Pa mentioned she was pregnant when Colm O'Driscoll killed her. Said you came back to camp in a bad way too, like Uncle Arthur did once. But he doesn't really like talking about it."

"And like your daddy, I really have no desire to chat about Belle, Colm, or Uncle Arthur, Jackie. Just go to sleep." He mumbled, closing his eyes again and exhaling softly. He didn't want to remember, he had spent years trying to scrub the night she was taken from him out of his mind forever. He shifted a bit, recalling the one time she screamed, calling out my name too. She had been a tough woman, like Sadie Adler, bearing the cruelty of Colm and his men, talking shit to them the entire time. He smirked, it was only too bad that she wasn't like Mrs. Adler, crazy enough to survive serious injury. Maybe then it would've all gone differently.

"Goodnight then, Uncle Dutch." The boy replied quietly, rolling away from him to face the wall.

—-

He held his hand up, closing his open hand into a fist to tell the boy to stop as they both hunkered down in cover and gazed out at an open meadow nearby. He had taken one of the blankets and fashioned it into sort of a poncho for the boy, considering he was far too small for one of his jackets. He pointed at a small herd of deer that were browsing nearby, kicking at the icy ground and nibbling around the fallen leaves of the trees. While they had plenty of bear meat, he knew he would get sick of it if he had to survive the entire winter on just that greasy and gamey meat alone.

He reached into a small satchel and pulled out bait, keeping it carefully wrapped and gesturing for Jack to move towards him slowly and quietly as he could. The boy practically crawled to his side, looking down at the small wrapper before looking back up at the herd of deer in the distance.

"You ever hunted with a bow before, Jackie?" Dutch whispered, tugging at the weapon slung around him as the feather quills danced a bit in the wind in the quiver.

"No sir." The boy mumbled back, excitedly trying to keep his voice hushed.

"Your daddy never took you hunting?" He felt stupid asking such a thing to the young man. He and Annabelle took John on hunting trips at least once a month, sometimes more frequently if his woman insisted on it. Surely John would've taken the boy with him into the wilderness. After all, this was basically their family "rite of passage". But as he saw Jack's facial expression as he shook his head no, his heart sank a little.

Right, he still stubbornly refuses to believe even after all this time that this boy is his through and through. But for him to not even, try…Goddamn it, John.

"A couple times," Jack admitted in a whisper, still anxious and somewhat sweaty over the sight of the deer in the distance, "but it was awkward. He would ask me to do somethin' and then get mad when I made a mistake and decide to do it himself."

Ah. He gets that from me, she was always having to remind me to be more patient with him when he was about your age. Perhaps this is my chance at redeeming my failures as a 'father' to both Arthur and John. Belle, if you're floating around out here somewhere, I need you to remind me of the values of temperance. Because I cannot do so on my own.

"Son, what you're experiencing, all that anxious tension in your chest is called 'deer fever'. Take a couple deep breaths to calm down, you want your shot to count. I'll take one and you skin it. Just watch me." He unwrapped the bait, letting the stinky substance carry itself along the wind as he tossed it between the meadow and the cover they hid behind, waiting.

He undid the bow from around his middle, testing the tautness of the string for a moment before reaching back into the quiver to retrieve an arrow. He notched it but kept it facing down as the smell began to reach the deer. He had made the boy put on the scent cover too, practically dousing him with the stuff along with himself before they headed out into the autumn forest. Jack had been with him now for three days and two nights, and while the boy would occasionally try to prod him for stories of the glory days of Dutch's Boys, he had managed to keep his composure for now.

His father will come for him, but…at least he's safe, well as safe as he could be considering he's with me. The one who nearly got us all killed. It is…nice I suppose, having the boy around even if it's just a little while. At least I haven't been tormented by the fallen with him around.

A buck bounded out of the cover, sniffing the air and grunting a little as he shook his antlers side to side. The challenger to the small herd was confronted by the old buck, a massive white tail with six points on either side who snorted and began to paw the ground. He kept the arrow ready but gestured to the fight that was about to take place, leaning down to scratch his words into the dirt so as not to draw the animals attention to them.

"It's the mating season. Watch."

He gestured back to the two bucks with his dirt covered finger as the animals swayed their heads back and forth, trying to intimidate the other rather than fight it out. But the challenger was young, inexperienced, and probably too stupid to realize he was outmatched.

The posturing quickly gave way to violence as the two bucks clashed heads and thrashed around in the meadow. Their antlers clacking loudly as their breath came out in puffs of white, hot steam from their black noses, efforting and grunting as they pushed on each other. The harem of females lifted their heads to watch for a moment, before a few returned to browsing as though the struggle happening nearby were of no consequence to them. They would simply follow the winner when it was over. That was just the way it was.

The skirmish carried on for the better part of twenty minutes before the larger buck chased the younger one off, sliding to a stop just as the young buck dove through the forest, bellowing loudly.

"Uncle Dutch?" Jack whispered, drawing the older man's attention as the triumphant stag meandered back to where his harem was waiting.

"Hmm?" He replied, shifting his line of sight to the boy who gestured at the buck worriedly.

"We're not…we ain't…I mean he–"

"There will be more deer that come," He looked back to the meadow as another small herd approached the meadow cautiously, "attracted by the bait."

"Okay." Jack nodded, relieved that they weren't going to cut down the victor of the small battle they had just witnessed. Dutch smirked a little, despite being raised with a bunch of killers and thieves for most of his life, the boy would likely never have to suffer the way he and the others had. At least, he could hope so.

Your momma's right, you shouldn't turn out like us. Being an outlaw is a lonely lifestyle, chased from place to place like an animal just trying to survive in this harsh reality. Ain't no life for a smart boy like you.

—-

"We ain't gonna dress it in the field, Uncle Dutch?" Jack asked as the older man cleaned his hands and bloodied face off in the stream. That doe is heavy and I am far too old for this now. He grunted, standing up from his crouched position and placing both of his cold and wet hands against the small of his back, trying to stretch.

"Cabin ain't far and to be honest," he twisted side to side uncomfortably, "I thought it was a lot lighter than it turned out to be. Besides…there's other folks in the woods now. Didn't you see the man with the pack horses off in the distance?"

"No," the boy mumbled, looking over at the dead doe they had taken from the meadow, "I can carry it for a while though."

"You can certainly try." He yawned, cracking his neck and wiping his freezing hands off on his thick jacket now.

The boy bent down to retrieve the carcass when he earned a humming growl from the older man and he froze in his tracks, unsure of what he did wrong. It was the same sort of grumble that his alleged father would make before he'd snap at him or just give up on teaching him anything to begin with. Dutch stepped away from the bank and crouched, despite his lower back being in agony though he tried not to show it.

"With your knees, like this. You'll end up with lumbago like that lazy, good-for-nothing, fool Uncle if you try to pick up a body like that." He slowly rose to stand again, grimacing a bit as the boy repositioned himself in front of the doe and looked up at him curiously.

"Like this?" He gestured.

The older man nodded but their peace was interrupted by the sound of a rather close gunshot that immediately put him on the offensive. He unbuttoned the jacket, reaching for one of his revolvers and cocking it as he pulled it out and pointed it at the ridgeline above them nervously.

"Uncle–"

"Shut up." He hissed, anxiously chewing his lower lip and growling as he scanned the ridgeline and the bushes for anything that might seem out of the place. He strained to listen as the roar of the rifle echoed in the air, sending the birds from their hiding places and the smaller creatures scattering for cover. He panted a little, feeling very uncomfortable being out in the open now, especially on low ground. "Find cover, now."

Both of them retreated from their kill, with Jack being the first to duck behind a boulder that was close to the waters of the creek. Dutch pushed him a little further and into the water, unphased by the freezing liquid seeping into his own boots and sank down into a crouch, hyperventilating a bit more now as the cold water touched his lower body. It was stupid to be sitting in this cover for too long, unless he wanted to lose some toes along with his sanity. The boy's teeth chattered a bit as he too, crouched down into the water.

It didn't take long before they heard voices along the ridgeline, only two though that spoke rather loudly and openly to each other. A couple men on horseback with their own deer strapped to the back of one of the animals, they paused on the ridgeline glancing down at the dead doe by the creek.

"Looks fresh." One man said to another.

"Boot prints in the mud there," Dutch heard them ready their own weapons as they turned their horses down the embankment and dismounted, "two of them."

"Gentlemen," Dutch stood up from cover, having grabbed both revolvers at some point and keeping them raised as he shifted out of the creek, "now I don't want to kill you, but I will if you annoy me. It ain't nice sneaking up on an old man and his grandson out on a boys trip. Go back on your horses and git."

The two men looked at each other somewhat confused as the soggy man continued to approach with his guns drawn before one noticed Jack peering around the corner. The older of the two smiled a bit, nodding to his partner and shifting his horse back towards the trail they had come from with his reins in his hand. He held up his hands and took a few steps backwards, trying to appear as non threatening as possible as Dutch looked more and more menacing now.

Even Jack felt a little concerned for the men, he had never seen the old man this cold and callous looking before. His long graying black hair falling over the sides of his face a bit as the wind picked up, the boy shivered a little from the chill on his wet clothes but it didn't seem to affect the older man at all. He had a thousand yard stare, as though he were looking at something beyond the men as he felt his heart pound in his chest. He hated feeling cornered and though the men might not actually mean them harm, he knew better than to assume these strangers would leave them be. He had learned that the hard way.

Jack won't understand, he thought, shifting his attention momentarily to the boy who had begun to try to warm himself up by rubbing his hands on his makeshift poncho. But it doesn't matter, this is the law of the jungle, kill or be killed.

"You oughta get that kid out of them wet clothes before he freezes to death." The man who had raised his arms in surrender gestured with a nod to Jack.

"I can protect my own just fine." Dutch replied shortly, snorting a bit as he shook the hair from his eyes but kept a firm lock, one gun each on the men.

"Ain't that the kid missin' from Beecher's Hope?" The other man asked in a near whisper, causing both schofield's to be turned onto him now and prompting him to raise his hands too.

"That ain't something to concern yourself with, friend. Get on your horses and get lost." He commanded again, dropping back away from them and keeping Jack to his back as he motioned to the boy to begin retreating.

"Boy's folks are willin' to pay a pretty penny to have their son returned to them. Or you still recruiting 'lost souls', Dutch Van der Linde?" The man dropped his reins but kept his hands up over his head.

It didn't matter, the fact the man had even so much as hinted in a way that he perceived as a threat was enough. He snapped the gun over and fired both weapons at nearly the same time, dropping both men by nailing them in the face. One twitched a little from the ground and he answered the movement with another round, the sound echoing loudly in the little canyon crafted by the creek. The horses spooked a little, dancing out of the way but still maintained enough composure to stick around close enough for him to have an idea.

Quietly he pushed both schofield's into their prospective places and turned to the task of calming the animals of the men he had just killed. He had probably known the dead men at some point, probably some local boys he had run into over the years who knew his name, but it didn't matter. They had threatened him and consequently the child in his care, their death was justifiable as self-defense.

"Easy now," he held his cold hands out to the brown and white paint who was closest to him, lowering the register of his voice and slowly inching forward, "just settle down. There's a good girl. Nice and easy now."

"You murdered them." Jack murmured, half disappointed and half shocked as Dutch managed to grab the reins of the paint horse and held them out for the boy, not even bothering to look over his shoulder as he went for the other one now.

"No," he replied frigidly, "I protected us. Now come take the horse, Jackie."

"They meant us no harm Uncle–"

"You're naive, son. This world is kill or be killed, regardless of the wonderful and alleged 'progress' we've made in this new century. They would've killed me for the goddamn reward money, bringing my corpse into the sheriff or the goddamn Pinkerton's like a trophy buck, and then held you for ransom, only to be gunned down in turn by your daddy. Kindness does not exist in this world, Jackie and to believe in it is foolish. Look where all my generosity and kindness got the gang, hmm. I wanted to believe we could all be a happy family, but my faith in other people's generosity and good nature is what got most of them killed. Now…come get the goddamn horse, boy." He continued to hold the reins out behind him.

"O–okay Uncle Dutch." He replied nervously, his boots squishing loudly as he took the reins from the older man and held close to the animal in his care now. This brutal man was not the same one he had known as a small child, for there was not an ounce of tenderness or patience in his voice. He really is mad, Jack thought as he watched Dutch go to retrieve the other horse with the dead deer on it. The older man seemed to have switched personalities almost instantly as he spoke with warmth and softness to the dark bay gelding, calming the animal down and reaching for the reins.

"We'll load the doe we took earlier, you'll skin both of them back at the cabin where it's safe. And tomorrow," he finally turned around as he led the second animal towards Jack, "you'll go home to your parents."

"You changed, Uncle Dutch." Jack let go of the reins now and went to go lift the dead doe from the ground by himself and onto the horse.

"Lift with your goddamn knees!" He hissed, tossing the reins out of his hand and grabbing the other side of the carcass as Jack was struggling with it, the boy almost let go but decided that it was probably in his best interest to keep a hold of the front of it.

"I'm sorry, sir."

—-

"Not too bad, but you've got a long way to go if you're ever going to get competent enough at it to make any kind of money. Deer ain't sheep, son. You ain't shearing them." Dutch called from his chair on the porch, watching Jackie struggle to rip the remaining skin off the second deer they had stolen from the two men he dispatched. He took a sip off his tin cup, it was some cheap bourbon he had brought back from Cochinay and he had plenty of booze he had stashed here over the years.

"Yeah but," Jack looked at his hands as he pulled the remaining skin off and went to set it on the drying rack like the old man had told him to, "it sure is messy compared to wool shearin'."

"There's a well out in the pasture, the wash bin should be in the shed. Bring it into the house and you can fix us both a bath tonight. Wash our clothes while you're at it." He called back as the boy laid out the last pelt and wiped the sweat from his forehead.

"You can't do all that?" Jack mumbled bitterly, hoping that Dutch didn't hear him but it was clear when the older man raised an eyebrow over the rim of his tin cup that he indeed had.

"Oh I could," he took a long sip from his cup before setting it down beside him, "but you're younger and stronger and besides…I thought you wanted to learn all the things your daddy ought to have taught you from your crazy Uncle Dutch? Or did you change your mind, son?"

"I know you said we had to kill those men to survive but–" Jack began, prompting the older man to roll his eyes and wave a hand at him with a scoff.

"This world is dog eat dog, son. But, hey…if you wanna be the dog getting eaten, just don't curse me with your dying breath!" He went to chuckle when the memory of Cain came back to him and he realized he should've worded it differently. "I apologize, that was…I…"

"Did you ever really care about us, Dutch?" Jack folded his arms and looked away causing the old man to sink in his chair and run his hands through his hair quietly.

"No, well…maybe I did from time to time. Hosea and Arthur absolutely did. I wanted to but…" He sighed, brushing his hair back with his fingers and debating whether or not he wanted to pour himself something stronger than bourbon.

But anything I become attached to gets stolen from me by Death himself. How do you explain that to the boy, huh? That you shouldn't love or be attached to things because they'll be taken from you. Sooner than we'd hope, if a man even dares to be optimistic these days.

"So it was all bullshit." The boy replied angrily, finally turning to look at him with tears in his eyes as he fumed. Not that he had much of a heart these days but he still felt his chest and throat constrict as they once had when Arthur died at his feet. The way they did when he couldn't say a word to the boy's father when they took down Micah together not that long ago.

I didn't want it to be so. I wanted to do right by her because she believed in me, but without her and Hosea to talk sense into me…

"I tried. I tried for her sake, for the woman I loved because she loved them almost as much as she loved me. But," Dutch paused stroking his beard for a little while before continuing, "at the end of the day, I can't be someone I ain't. You asked me why I fell for Micah Bell's bullshit and while I hate to admit it, 'cause I'm the kind of man who needs to be infallible…truth is, he knew how to cater to what I really wanted to hear. Jackie, I didn't want a family, I was given one but I never dared to desire such a thing personally. No, that was something Annabelle wanted most and something I certainly tried to give her long after she passed. And like everything I have ever loved, I lost it because of my own arrogance. I have always been a fighter, son. It didn't matter who the hell I was waging war against so long as I could win. But the gang…the family was something I didn't know how to fight for, so I waged war against it for feelin' like they were turning their back on me."

There was a long and awkward pause between them as the wind picked up and neither of them could look at the other. After a while the boy unfolded his arms, his head slumped over in thought as he mulled over what the old man had said.

"I don't want to go home." The boy replied quietly, "But…I shouldn't stay here either, huh, Dutch?"

It stung more than he thought it would. The boy dropped the honorific 'Uncle' title and it wounded him, but only for a moment until it passed. He brushed his fingers through his tangled graying hair, trying to untangle some of the knots at the ends as he did so. He couldn't even look at the boy.

"Probably not." He mumbled quietly, fishing his fingers out of his hair and sitting up in his chair as he grabbed the tin cup again to finish it. "Go fetch the wash tub and some well water, I'll get the stove heated up before it gets too cold."