Disclaimer: I own none of the characters presented in this story. Red Dead Redemption and all associated with said property belong to Rockstar Games.

Disclaimer: Strong depictions of violence, murder, and other such heinous and repugnant acts, very harsh language used throughout, and some taboo and offensive material occasionally presented.

Part Six: Micah

7:06 PM, July 18th, 1899

"What the hell was that?!–"

"They're over there!"

"By the entrance!"

"They shot Tommy!"

"No! Not the damn kid!"

"Goddammit, Micah!"

"Waste those cocksuckers!"

"Kill 'em!"

"Run!" John screamed, and they went charging for the front gate, away from the swarm of Saint Denis police officers, locking it behind them–it wouldn't hold back the crowd forever, but hopefully buy them a few moments–only to find themselves staring down…

"Shit! "

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

… the other half of the hive of officers–they must've been patrolling outside to catch anyone who managed to slip out. John and Micah fired, not bothering to aim–they couldn't miss with such abundant targets. They whistled for their horses, but it was for naught. Old Boy and Baylock–Micah's Missouri Fox Trotter–were shot dead on sight, their cries causing John to bawl out in pained heartbreak while Micah just looked on expressionlessly, leaving the men completely abandoned and in the face of a dozen guns. They ran for the sanctuary of the city features, hiding in the alleyway between the small apartment complex across the street and the Lowenstein Brothers' pawn shop. A sweet little pair of Jews owning a pawn shop? How perfectly apt, Micah thought, as he took a shot over his shoulders without looking, the odds saying he hit someone. Seeing the alleyway come to a close, Micah felt a tinge of panic, of inescapable doom as they hopped the wooden fence, racing to the right, the blue militia on their tail, who didn't bother hopping it, instead just berating it with the shoulders of twenty gorillas, causing it to split asunder, spraying little raindrops of timber everywhere. The outlaws raced on to the right, hitting a crossroads of another dead end, and gate that led onto the main road, where plenty more wild indigo chimpanzees roamed, spotting them through the slits of the gate and racing over. John and Micah had failed, were trapped, had threats on every side, and were soon to be dead.

Everything was going according to plan. Mostly, anyway.

Of course, things would have gone a lot smoother for everyone if Dutch would've just told him where the damn money was. Not that it would matter. Micah fancied himself a crocodile; he'd wait submerged in the cool, muddy water–he was damn, damn good at waiting–eyes on an axle, hell, on one of those New York carousel doohickeys, absorbing everything like an open cooze. He'd move quietly, calculated and patient, eyeing his prey carefully, giving them room, making them feel safe. Then… chom–

A bullet clanging against the gritty brick wall he and John were dangling over broke his train of thought as he scurried skywards like a squirrel; it may have been a dead end, but the roof hung low enough for them to scale, and so scale they did onto the roof of Perrault Preserves. He'd get back to thinking later.

They climbed up the second skillion roof connected to this damn jam place, this one so steep John had to give Micah a boost to get him up. Micah looked about, seeing all the monkeys around them on ground level, unable to hit him because of the angle of the roof; it looked like they were on a lighthouse in the Atlantic, a tower surrounded by endless blue below.

"Dammit, Micah! Pull me up!" John called from below, his hand reached out, expectantly. On instinct, raw, uncontrollable, regrettable instinct, Micah's hand lowered before he grasped the situation. Arthur was gone, that smug, arrogant prick. John, he reckoned, is the only one of them left so close to Dutch. A sense of jealousy, as well as delight passed over him; without John…

Too late. The bastard grabbed his traitorous arm, holding it with such beast-like ferocity that Micah had no choice but to oblige him, tugging him up the wall. Law trailing them from the streets, the men jumped across the two-story rooftops of cheap apartments and occasional French hotels in an M-shape, landing at the bottom of the roofs, working their way up, and running back down, before finally striding up to the peak and leaping to the next building. They moved at a right angle, a half-square from where they had started at Perrault's, before bracing the impact of the drop to Flynn's, a one-story general store. Seeing the path was clear, they made for the church across the street, John kicking the door down as they entered. With the lock busted, Micah moved a church pew to hold the door shut, buying them some time if the law found them; for now, they had a moment of silence to plan things out.

Or they would've if John hadn't grabbed him from behind, tossing him onto his back where he saw the upside-down statue of Jesus wailing in agony on the cross at the altar.

"The hell?!" Micah bellowed, drawing his shotgun at the same time John drew his revolver, forcing them into a standoff.

"Do you… have any idea… what you've just done? The heat you just put on us? We're gonna be torched!" John growled out slowly, his hands shaking with irresistible impulse.

"That kid saw us!" Micah lied. "He was gonna get the others, you saw it too!"

"No…"

"Yes…" Micah imitated in John's rough voice.

" No!" John insisted, not buying it. "They're gonna kill him now. Jack… oh Jack!"

"He was already dead to begin with, or with the Pinkertons, I'm telling ya. And besides, what you care? He ain't even yours."

John took a furious step closer until he was practically standing on top of Micah, gun taking up most of Micah's frame of vision.

"Oh, come on!" Micah griped. "You know it's true. Wasn't a man in camp that didn't have her. Think good ol' womanizing Dutch wanted to raise him? Or lazy Uncle? Or stupid Bill? Or Arthur after what happened to his last one? You're a patsy, cowpoke."

"N–no."

"Y–y–y–y–yes," Micah imitated again. John looked down, and Micah knew he won, putting his gun away and standing up, knowing he wasn't getting shot.

"Now… let's get back to how we're gonna get outta this town."

"Still can't see past yourself…" John whispered.

"What are you mumbling for?" Micah asked.

"Bronte wanted to see if we was reliable, trustworthy. It's why he didn't start a-shootin' the second we walked into his home. He knows by now we's the opposite of trustworthy, and he ain't got no use for that in his town. With all that in mind, you seein' any problems?

"I see a prick who thinks being vague makes him smart, that it?"

"Dutch," John said, and the pieces clicked together in a panicked hurry inside Micah's mind. "All alone in the hearth of their power; where Bronte's got thirty men with guns trained on him. You think he can talk his way outta your mess?"

Micah's throat felt dry suddenly, dry as Grimshaw's cooch. Did I kill him? He wondered. Did I kill Dutch?

The roots of this execrable possibility were given no time to grow, as his attention was overwhelmed by the sudden sound of… geckering?

"I see 'em! They're in here!"

"Get 'em! Surround 'em!"

Then the front door of the church was shivering from the impact of a hundred, hell, a thousand greasy paws banging against it. Micah and John made a break for the back door, gunning down a few stray coppers as they leaped from the Lord's house.

"We need to split up! Divide 'em!" John said, barging over the fence to the left, avoiding gunfire. Micah took heed and made for the right, hurdling over two identical fences in such quick succession that he'd made James Connolly hot under the collar, hung up laundry kissing him as he went by. Micah couldn't see any more of those savages, but he knew they were there, following him like bloodhounds. He reached another alleyway, one that was blocked off, guiding him towards the only door out, which he cautiously took, leading him to another door that opened to the main street.

He stuck his head out, seeing no one on the street currently except for a few beggars and a guy walking his pig. He braved it, tossing his rather conspicuous sawed-off shotgun away (he still both his LeMat revolvers in case of emergencies) as he departed across the street towards the opposite ginnel in slow, casual strides, keeping his head low and his hat covering his face. He connected with Doyle's Tavern's back entrance through that alleyway and entered, making sure to draw as little attention as possible.

Even so, he couldn't resist sticking his tongue down some pretty black whore's throat by the bar.

"Argh–gghat… dah… Fhuc…!" she cried, pushing him off in her push-up bra and slender corset, "... a–off! Goddamm maniac!"

"Hey!" the barkeep–probably Doyle–called out to him. "No funny business 'round here partner. You want it, pay like any other guy here."

A few guys took a stand, rising and filling the distance between Micah and her, one big guy especially looking smug in his gray flat cap.

"We got a problem here?" Flat Cap asked, complacency displayed proudly on his ugly face. Just like goddamn Morgan.

"No," he said, relaxed. "You can have her, big guy. Tastes too much like dicks for my taste, though I imagine that'll be just perfect for you." Flat Cap made no move, revealed no signs of rancor. His friends did though, also burly as a house, moving closer to their pal, letting Micah know he was messing with them too. But still, Flat Cap said nothing. Too high-and-mighty to let me get under your skin, eh? Micah thought. Think I'm nothing, too? Think I'm goddamn nothing?!

But instead, he spoke calmly, disarmingly. "Sorry, fellers, a little too much to drink. I'm… sorry. You too, ma'am," he said to the black tart. "I'm just… gonna sit… over by that window"–he demurely squeezed past them, hands raised high–"and wait for the trolley."

He took his seat, turning away from everyone, his dread begetting sweat all across his back; dread that they'd pull a John, take him behind and then take him out back for a proper beating, maybe worse. Maybe far, far worse. But as the minutes passed and talk in the joint started up again, Micah was relieved to find it wasn't going to happen. He gawked out the window, in preparation for the trolley that would be passing by. It was the safest way out; they'd be looking on the rooftops or in the alleys. They never think he'd be on the main street right out in the open.

Micah dared a peep behind, seeing the chocolate-skinned bitch sitting with Flat Cap and his gang of muscly man-whores; she shot him a look that would make Old Scratch blush. Micah turned back to the window and grunted. Wasn't sure why he did it. Maybe because she looked a pinch like Tilly–not that he found the damaged goods hussy very fetching. Still, he'd thought about it on more than one occasion–fucking her that was–really only wanting it because she didn't want it. A smile curved onto his face then. There was something so satisfying about doing what you weren't supposed to do, so liberating! That was the first thing his father–Micah Bell Jr.–had drilled into him and his brother, Amos' heads: there was no fun to be had getting what was owed to you. His grandfather, Micah Bell Senior, had seen that; he worked on Greenmen's Plantation for forty years, since he was eight years old, like his daddy before him. Had a damn good relationship with the man of the house, Louis Greenmen, and his son Theodore. Hell, he'd been the goddamn godfather. And what happened next? Daddy Greenmen choked on dried pig's penis–man always had a taste for unorthodox cuts of meat, or so Micah had been told–and little Teddy Greenmen fired him and got some darkie slaves to work for a fraction of the cost. And he'd told Micah's dear daddy's daddy, one hand on his cross, one hand on Pappy's shoulder, to be grateful. "My daddy provided for you and ya boy," he'd said–or so Micah had been told, "let you go on with your three barrels of Irish whiskey a day. Let you sow like you was givin' a haircut. Let you sleep in the house and eat with the family like you was one of us. You. One of us. You, with your three barrels of Irish whiskey a day. I want you to remember somethin': we done you a courtesy over them years, and you should look back on them and know how damn well you was treated."

They hadn't a cent to their name a few weeks after that. Forty years of hard labor for pennies and they should be grateful? Grateful! Micah took a deep breath, calming himself, recalling the point of this story: working for a living, receiving alms in exchange for grueling toils, it wasn't fun, it wasn't something you should feel grateful for, it was just fair. That was the problem with people; they all wandered about, being grateful for things they should've had to begin with. Well fuck that!

Micah's granddaddy had seen that, and he'd made sure his son had seen that, and he'd made sure his sons had seen that. By hell or high water, Micah would get what he wanted. By hell or high water, Dutch would tell him where the money was, it didn't matter how long it took–he was patient as a croc–how many disasters he needed to create before the man got desperate enough to tell him where he stashed it. By hell or high water, he'd get it.

And by hell or high water… he'd bring it back to camp. And by hell or high water, they'd dote on him, make him their hero, their savior. Recant any and all nasty things they ever said about him. Tilly and Karen would straddle their legs in a never-ending cycle, and he'd take them whenever he damn well pleased–though he hoped they'd resist, prayed they'd fight back. That bitch Mary-Beth would dance with him when he wanted to dance, Javier and Bill and the rest would respect him, look up to him, and Dutch would call him son. Once he had the money, and he would… very soon…

Then he heard the musical one-two punch of the trolley bell. Ding, ding! He checked through the smudged glass, the path was clear for now, the trolley slowly creeping closer to the tavern.

"Can I get some whiskey?" he asked Doyle, who responded in the classic high-and-mighty Morgan fashion (maybe they were related) of ignoring him. Instead of shooting him, which was an urge that sucked most of his already fading energy reserves, he asked again. "Look… I know I was outta line earlier, but please: just one drink, and I'm gone.

Doyle sighed, pouring Micah a shot glass of cheap brown whiskey–rightly prepared with the finest lace of raven hair submerged within, below the most detailed and elegant frothy topping of gray dust Micah had ever seen. All the same, he downed it, feeling his energy reserves blast back up, more from the eagerness of what he'd do next than from the shitty drink.

"Thanks, pal!" Micah exclaimed with a sunny-bright disposition, before shattering the shot glass against Doyle's head causing blood to run down to his black soup-strainer moustache. Micah rushed out–without paying of course–the front door, before slowing down a hair outside, enough to make it look like he was desperately trying to catch the trolley as it went by–which he was–but not so much as to make it seem like he was literally running for his life–which he was.

The trolley conductor, a man with a standard, company-issued smile welcomed him aboard. "Welcome aboard, sir! However, I must ask you to wait for the trolley to come to a complete stop next time for your own safety. Okay? Okay!" he finished, diverting his eyes back ahead, letting Micah know the conversation was done. He took a few steps, seeing only one other passenger on the trolley, some young French feller, holding some piece of paper. He wasn't too special, fashioning a simple goatee and a simple enough suit and tie. The one part of him that did catch Micah's eye was that he was staring daggers right at him. Micah then took notice of some more dumb Simian cops riding along the main street on horseback; just two, a general patrol. Micah gasped in premeditated pain before falling onto his knees, clutching his left leg (not unlike how he imagined some of the women doing on another member of his), bending over out of sight of the approaching officers.

"Oh no," the trolley conductor said, not looking back, not really caring. "What's wrong sir? If you need, I can direct you to the nearest doctor's office, or I can come to a halt at the nearest stopping point and–"

"No, that's alright," Micah interjected, happy to see the two primates getting smaller and smaller as they rode on, oblivious. "It's just an old knee wound. My wife caught me nine inches in some striking blonde German gal and tried bringing a cinderblock down at my balls."

"No way…" said the conductor with such weak enthusiasm it almost came off as sarcasm.

"Yeah," Micah continued, "I got lucky she swung off course two inches to the left, just getting my thigh good."

"Yessir…"

"'Course, now it means my leg's got some vile habits I gotta correct soon, and believe you me, I will surely see to that."

"Hmm… nice weather we've been having," the conductor added naturally, his raillery and silver tongue matching the all-time greats of Loki and Sisyphus.

"Yeah…" Micah said, sitting down in the seat across from their ever-aloof and watchful third passenger, who looked down at the placard he held before ogling back at his trolley companion. Micah leered at the Frenchman, yielding the desired result, unnerving him until eyes fell back down demurely to the paper he held. They were driving past the Saint Denis butcher now, who even in the dead of night was sawing the head of pig off from its backbone, having a hard time with it; the carcass was stuck on the jagged blades and he had resorted to slamming it against the table again and again, trying to get the blade to cut clean through. Thud, thud. Thud, thud.

He looked back at the Frenchy, whose eyes darted back down the second Micah's head turned, looking back at his paper. His poster. Thud, thud. Thud, thud.

"What's that paper you're so enamored with? Enlighten me," Micah requested, although it wasn't a request. They both knew it.

"I–I–uh… je ne parle pas anglais?" the bearded stranger tried, unconvincingly.

"That a… wanted poster ya got there?"

Thud, thud. Thud, thud.

"Uh, p–pas d'anglais?"

Thud, thud. Thud, thud. The sound came one last time, but it was timid now, they were so far from the source, nearing the train station. It's the dead of night, Micah thought. Police are looking on the other side of town. No witnesses…

Then the trolley vibrated as it came to a complete stop by the island in the middle of the street, the one with the gentleman statue at the focus point between the theatre and post office, and suddenly the Frenchman was a hare, sprinting towards the exit by the conductor, almost making it out before a bullet ate through his skull, stopping him dead in his tracks. Micah was running then too, deciding not to waste a bullet on the waste-of-space trolley pamphlet who wore the conductor's outfit.

The law would be on him any minute now, the gunshot hadn't been quiet, hell, it echoed through the cramped city like he was ringing the dinner bell. Then he saw it.

Happy day, Micah thought, smiling. Happy goddamn day.

There, stopping right in front of him, was the butcher, riding in a one-horse wagon, pale with fear. Guess the bastard got tired of that pig's head. "Y'know…" Micah began, "you really shouldn't be working this late. Should be restin'. It ain't healthy, I tell ya."

"Insomnia. Since I got raped out in the swamps," the butcher replied.

"Ah… I see. A friend of mine had that problem too. Got over it, though. Here, let me show you how he did it." And Micah shot him in the head, before climbing atop the wagon, pushing the corpse over, and jockeying the horse to ride off, as more baboons in livery riding astride their bestial neighbors, equus ferus caballus, gave chase after him, communicating in that primitive tongue:

"There he is!"

"Kill 'im dead!"

"Christ alive, he got another one!"

Micah paid them no mind, riding beneath the colossal town sign, which reposed like a pretty charcoal-ironed siren calling visitors in: Welcome to Saint Denis! Welcome to Saint Denis! They were riding faster than he, looming closer like a blue shadow, but Micah didn't fear; he had too much of a head start, and they wouldn't catch him in time. He'd saunter past Eckhart Stables, over the viaduct that led out of town to the swamps, before vanishing into the murky night, right back to camp. 'Cept Dutch wouldn't be there no more, Micah realized. Suddenly, temptation swept over him, the repugnant craving to do the right thing, to go back, fight Bronte's men off, to try and save his admirable admiral. Luckily, the hankering vanished before he did anything rash, unlike with John…

It ain't personal, Dutch, Micah thought. I mean you'da done the same. Did do the same, with Mac and Sean at Blackwater. Short lives got nothing to do with bad luck, but bad decisions, and by God, I ain't making any.

And so, Micah sauntered past Echart Stables, onto the viaduct that led out of town to the swamps, the murky night beckoning him to vanish, when a wheel popped off his wagon and he flew off of it, barely staying on the thin strip of bridge keeping him from the alligator-roaming waters below. He looked up to see the butcher's horse fleeing– damn coward–across the long bridge, leaving him behind with a troop of cops faring closer with the pitter-patter of their horses. Micah rose and turned around, assessing the situation.

Eight guys riding towards me. No exit. No problem. I'll just take one of them horses and ride off with it. I've gunned down more than eight guys at once before, I got this.

He drew his only remaining LeMat revolver–the other one achieved the rank of shooting star when he'd fallen off his wagon, glittering even in the dark as it went by, landing in the Lannahechee River with a mocking splash–facing down his foes with focused, narrowed eyes. Then those eyes went wide as a motherfucking train plowed by from Saint Denis in reverse, knocking those men and their horses off the bridge into the cool dark waters. Micah tried vainly to best the train with a split bullet, which bounced off the railing of the train's caboose, inflicting no fatal damage. Micah ducked down in a second vain act, a black wave of melancholy spilling into him; this is it: the end of Micah Bell. Abhorred by many, loved by none.

Yet the train ceased one inch from his face, grinding to a pained stop.

"The hell are you doing in the middle of the damn road!" called John, climbing out from the engine onto the second cart, smog and ash lining his face.

"The–the hell are you doing on a train?" Micah asked, lamely but genuinely.

"Gettin' us the hell outta here, that's what!" he declared, jumping down to the passenger carts, warning shots popping out with an echoing bang as he shooed the small deposit of travelers, the meager bunch in the abnormal circumstance of trekking to a cesspool of a city past midnight.

"Go! Go! Get a move on! Vamos!" John called, herding them across the bridge not in narrow lines, but in crowded clumps, in such a precise way that they'd act as both a barricade of protection for any Saint Denis officers with a sniper or long-range weapon and act as a blockade from the horde of police trying to get to them on foot or on horse.

Smiling, Micah spoke: "Got to hand it to ya, cowpoke, ya really got settled in Napoleon's saddle for this one. These're your finest hours, I'm thinking. Your Trojan Horse, so to speak."

"Shut the hell up and get us a goddamn horse," was the only thank you Micah received for his munificent compliment as John strolled past him, jogging to the other side of the bridge as the law slowly filtered through the huddle of whining folk.

Luckily, the butcher's horse hadn't gone far, and John was able to bribe the fickle brute with a carrot. They rode back to camp subsequently, long abandoning the alluring gateway of Saint Denis, trailing along the muddy shoreline, flies tracing Micah and the horse, who still smelled faintly of man and pig's blood, respectively. The moon shone on them like a spotlight now as they encroached on Shady Belle, spying murmuring dark figures the size of ants, before they came into plain view as regular old people; the gang. Javier snapped to them, gun at the ready, before seeing who their nightly companions were and running over along with the rest of the gang to greet them. Upon dismounting, they were embraced by Mary-Beth and Tilly–or rather, John was–with Kieran slyly acting in the background, not wanting to disrupt any moment with his O'Driscoll stink ( a wise play, Micah trowed), moving Pig's Blood (Micah's new horse) to the other horse stations.

"Thank God!" Mary-Beth cried. "We thought you was dead!"

"How many times you gonna almost get yo'self killed, John Marston?" Tilly badgered.

"I don't know…" John muttered, not really listening, instead simply waiting in fear of what was to come.

"I'm right for a good squeeze too, girls," Micah said, pulling Mary-Beth over to him, a move he regretted when she ripped his hand off of hers, gutting it with her talons.

"Bitch!" he wailed. God, she's just like that Saint Denis whore. Thinks she's something real special. I'll enlighten her… he thought, raising his bleeding palm to slap her, until a heavy hand clutched it, keeping it still and throbbing with pained pressure.

"Good to have you back," Charles told him, yanking the red hand down to the matching red-stained pants of its wielder, " Micah. What the hell happened out there–"

"There you muttonheads are!" Grimshaw called, approaching, her presence clearing the two girls away like she smelled of farts and shit. "What the hell happened out there?"

"Just asked that," Charles said.

"Well, I asked it better! Unless you–gah! The hell is wrong with you?!" she shrieked as Micah sniffed her.

"Just… testing something." She did not smell of farts and shit.

"Christ! You're alive!" Hosea cheered, pulling John into a hug–this one wasn't like the one from Tilly and Mary-Beth, it was strong, passionate, like a bear-hug. "God, I was so worried! We heard the shots; what the hell happened out there?"

"Asked," Grimshaw added, staring at John for an answer.

"Well the more the merrier," Hosea responded, finally letting go of John.

"I'm here too, y'know," Micah said, a twinge of envy obvious in his voice.

"Shut up," said Grimshaw.

"Hey, what the hell happened out there?" Bill asked from afar, beside Javier and Strauss.

"Shut up!" Hosea called back.

" John!" a voice called, and Shady Belle went deathly quiet, the only sound being the rhythmic hum of crickets. Abigail marched out of the woods, Sadie behind her, calling out some words of encouragement. Widow must've taken Abigail out to unwind. That or they secretly fucked in the woods. A lecherous smile adorned Micah's face from this thought.

"Where is Jack?" the woman asked, eyes so saggy and dark with fatigue it looked like Bill'd given her a matching set of black eyes.

John opened his mouth to speak, his voice croaking so pathetically that Micah decided to bear the burden for him.

"Boy's lost, ten to one that he's dead."

Abigail's blue irises exploded with devastation as she crumbled onto the floor. " No!" She howled. "No–ooooh God!"

"Micah!" Hosea berated, wanting him to have played that better.

"What?" Micah defended. "You want me to lie?"

"Did you see that boy die yourselves?"

"No."

"See!" he said to Abigail, pulling her onto her feet by her shaking hands. "We don't know he's dead. Stay positive, we'll get him back."

"Boy was only alive to be used as a bargaining chip," Micah started, "but me and John got put in a spot that made us do something that Angelo Bronte won't like."–he looked over to John, thinking he might contradict Micah's version, but to his luck, the man was too paralyzed by Abigail's desolate spirit, that he was made speechless–"And so, what was a bargaining chip, is now… you guessed it: a loose end."

"Nooo…!" Abigail started until her fit of woe descended into animalistic groans of sadness.

"We don't know that!" Hosea insisted. "For now, it would do us best to look on the bright side. I, for one, think that boy's alive–know it too. Let's just wait for–Dutch!" he hollered as an incoming horseman caught his eye.

It was the duo of Dutch and his horse, not a scratch on either of them, but one look at his face, and crimson vesture, and they knew it wasn't a peaceful departure. He looked tired, Dutch, as he dismounted from his horse, looking ten years older, that famous charismatic smile long gone. His gaze shot around until it landed on John.

"What did you do?"

"I–I…"

"What did you do?!" he cried again, tackling John onto the white moonlit grass. "Do you know what you've done?! All you had to do was listen to me, just once! Too busy focusing on Micah's dumbass hat?! Too busy with the sarcasm and the doubt to do what I tell you?! Never shoulda taken you back in. Arthur knew it too. Never!" Finally, Hosea pulled the men apart, Dutch crawling until his back hit the gazebo, John lying still as a statue, looking up at the starry night. Micah held back a smirk. Oh, this is too good.

"Dutch, calm down!" Hosea demanded, turning to the gang, trying to reassure them. "We still got some money from that Valentine job. We'll pay whatever Bronte wants in return, do however many favors we need to do to make things right–but we'll get that boy back!"

"Bronte's dead!" Dutch bemoaned. "He's dead ya dumb fool! I had to take him hostage to get outta there, but one of his guys got dumb and took a shot… he's gone!"

His words echoed throughout the camp and the gang's situation became abundantly clear; they were done for. Pinkertons were coming in now, they'd made too much heat for them not to, and now they had the law and mafia of a major city-port against them! Even Hosea fell silent, the great Hosea who knew what everyone wanted to hear had nothing to say. The only person who did was Abigail, as she released a growl of raw ardor and lunged at the kneeling John, trying to choke his thick neck with her skinny little arms. Hosea pulled her off, carrying the screaming and squirming girl to the big house, before she brought the butt of John's cattleman to the old man's face, knocking him onto the dirt. Crafty slut had swindled Marston's piece.

She aimed it at him now, heavy tears streaming down her face.

"Abigail…" Mary-Beth said calmly, filling the gap between man and wife, trying to talk her down.

"Get the fuck away!" Abigail slapped back at her, pointing the gun at the poor girl until she took a few paces back, giving her room. Micah also took a great big sidestep away from John; he was more than fast enough to shoot that gun out of her hands, but why spoil the fun? Bastard was already living on overtime after what happened on that roof.

John crept to his feet, weary as can be, staring her down with an expression Micah couldn't place. She kept the gun trained on him, her eyes alight with hate and misery and confusion. "You killed him…" she whimpered, unable to stop the sob that came at the last word.

"No, he didn't, Abigail," Sadie jumped in reassuringly, "you know that. If you do this, you'll hate yourself the rest of your life."

"I already do," she responded with an eerie serenity.

Micah couldn't resist the smile sneaking onto his face, he hoped the darkness shielded it. This was delightful, rivaling his first beer and first rape. God, I'd kill for a Fry's Chocolate Bar right now…

"Abigail…"

"Don't do this…"

"I know what you're feeling, but this won't help…"

The girls kept pleading to no avail, although Micah was only half-listening to them; he just realized how hilarious it would be if he pissed on John's grave. Or would it be more ironic if he didn't?

"Why didn't you go fishing with him?" she asked John, to Micah's confusion. "Why didn't you love him? He's your son." She looked at her husband pleadingly, as if there was some collection of words that if arranged in the right order would fix everything. Her pale eyes goggled him unflinchingly as he breathed in and out with strain, taking his time to come up with a response. Micah saw Charles moving slowly behind them, getting in position behind Abigail, moving extra carefully so the loose twigs and leaves scattered below didn't reveal his intentions. Don't you take this away from me, Micah thought, considering shooting the ugly black-brown spawn, moving his hand to his holster.

"He's always been your son."

John kept his gaze down, refusing to look her in the eye. Instead, he looked over to Dutch before his glance moved back down low.

"I…" he finally started, his voice so lank it didn't even sound like his anymore, "... don't… believe you."

That sealed it. Abigail's hands stopped shaking, her body went tall with resolve, and against Charles' running and Hosea's screams, she closed her eyes.

And she pulled the trigger.

Thanks for reading!

That was definitely the most fun I've had writing this!

If you couldn't tell from this chapter, I'm going for a different approach to writing Micah in this story; in the game he's just some greedy heartless bastard who never loved or cared about anything, but I want to try something unique. Here, you'll see a man who is alone, who craves companionship, yet lacks all understanding of how to develop that. Micah believes, rather than simply changing like Arthur did, he can justify all the horrible things he's done by doing one good thing (that being getting the Blackwater money)-despite the irony of him doing damage to the gang in order to achieve said good thing. In a way, he's like Dutch in that sense.

Anyways, should have another three chapters out by next week. See you then!