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 Thirty-Nine: Dutch

8:32 PM, August 20th, 1899

Despite his claims, the ivory smoke Dutch inhaled came from a cheap cigarette—the damn state bonds were still too hot, and losing their best salesman had certainly hurt. Hosea…

He let the embers fall onto his hand; the pain was sharp but quick, like a pinch. It kept him awake. There was too much to do to sleep. He was in his tent, reflecting on what was to come. It's all comin' together, he thought. If Alden can be trusted, then the train is bein' loaded up in Dallas. A few more days, a week maybe, then it's ours. Then we take the boat up to New Orleans and buy a real ship outta the country. If we work fast enough with the natives, we can get 'em to stir up some trouble. That'll keep the Pinks off our backs long enough to slip away. The plan was working, it was working. They hadn't had a single run-in with a Pink or O'Driscoll since Dutch's move with Kieran, even with everyone's goddamn bitching…

He sucked it in again, letting the ashy waves calm him; he needed to keep his composure. That famous Van der Linde temper was jockeying against him, and he found himself repeating his mantra more than he should: don't be Esau, be Jacob.

The chief hadn't liked his temper much, that was obvious. He had the eyes of an owl and the friendliness of a tooth infection. Traits Dutch normally admired, but in this case… it made his job complicated; no favor, no labor was good enough, he couldn't seem to win the old man over, and if he needed the natives in the fold, he'd need Rains Fall. I don't get it. Why can't he see how alike we are? Every other dog has domesticated themselves right on Cornwall's fat lap, but not us. No, we're still feral as ever, and we won't lie down for the beatings when they come, we'll bite back, till that fat old man goes pale. The image brought a smile to his tired, hairy visage. He hadn't shaved in a few days.

The cigarette sizzled down to a stub, but it was no longer having any effect. Sometimes he missed the days when it was just him, Hosea, and… and Arthur. Simpler times, they were. There had been one vision, then, his—now of course Hosea never shied from a comment and Arthur's trap hadn't been sewed back then, but Dutch was the one drawing up the plans.

Now everyone had an agenda. Abigail was working John against him, Javier had called his leadership into question in front of everyone, Charles was mitigating his progress on the natives, and Grimshaw… she'd never objected to what he did, but now, even she…

He was losing them, he could tell.

Intuitive as ever, Molly picked that moment to enter his tent. "Howdy, sweetie," she greeted, wearing his rotund red and black hat on her small head.

Instinctually, he groaned, expecting her to argue, to fight with him, just for the sport of it. Instead, she sat beside him, stretching her long legs, asking for a cigarette.

He broke one off and she slid between her cherry lips, motioning it in and out in a bawdy way that was both humorless and tasteless. He hated the way she smelled, smothered in perfume. He told her when they first met he wanted to taste her scent, not some damn European chemical made by children in a factory. Naturally, she began applying a coat twice as heavy after that.

Dutch raised a light for her, seeing her features glow in the orange flame, and he so badly wanted to see them glow more by holding the match directly against her face until it charred black and crumbled away.

She breathed the tiny white cylinder in, moaning as she exhaled. Is-is she tryin' to be seductive? he wondered. But those features in the flame betrayed her; her face was smug and ugly.

Dutch thought back to her behavior earlier and an idea wormed its way into his head. Has she been havin' an affair? He chuckled before his brain started fact-checking this against his wishes. He remembered all those times in the last few weeks she left in the middle of the night, thinking he hadn't noticed, or all those evenings she picked a fight when the sun fell so she'd have an excuse to leave and come back in the morning. Was she seeing another man?

The maturity of his sigh surprised him. He found he didn't really care—he was gonna cut her loose at Orleans anyway. Maybe he'd give Ms. Adler a shot, she was more than hard enough, especially now. He'd been patient, given her time to grieve, maybe now—

The sound of someone screaming bloody murder outside derailed his train of thought. He rushed under the flaps of his tent, forgetting he left his hat with the one person in camp who'd piss in it if she got the chance, just to do it.

It was Swanson, slick all over with sweat, mixing his words with anxious breaths so no one could understand him.

"Whoa now," Dutch said, lifting his hands in a jovial manner and placing them on either of Swanson's shoulders. "Calm down, reverend. What happened?" He glanced over his orange head of hair. "Where's Lenny?"

8:44 PM, August 20th, 1899

The news was fifty grams of morphine stabbed right into Dutch's forehead; he couldn't move, couldn't think.

"How many men?" A voice asked. Dutch was pretty sure it was John because it came from his direction and sounded like him, but his lips seemed to be moving a mile behind the words striking the air.

"I don't know," Another voice answered, Dutch was pretty sure this one was Swanson. "Twenty, thirty, I think."

Esau almost laughed. Thirty men, he thought. All that goddamn noise we kicked up—Saint Denis, the oil fields, Annesburg mines—and still those sons of bitches have thirty men to spare?! Thirty men they can just leave, haunting a whole town, for weeks? He sat down, before realizing there was no chair and hit the cold blades of grass with his ass. Why wasn't the plan working?

Others were there now, all surrounding Dutch. Strauss sighed, patting his red box rhythmically. "Shame. Lenny was a good kid. He'll be missed."

"Are you outta your mind, you cowardly weasel?" Grimshaw scowled at the Austrian, walking to Dutch, standing over him. "We got to get him back, Dutch." Her waist was close to his head and he could catch a whiff of what was underneath that purple skirt… it was nice. Dirty, which was a sizeable improvement to Molly.

"I don't mean to start nothing," started Micah, clad in his white apron, "but the kid did get us into this mess… y'know, with the Saint Denis job. Maybe it's… deserved?"

Charles rushed him. Dutch wasn't looking up, but the man's eyes were ablaze with scary hate. Javier held him back and Micah held back his smug smile.

"Dutch…" Bill began, staring him down with large confused eyes. "What do we do?"

He groaned and stumbled to his feet, brushing the dirt off his pants. Thirty eyes were sewn on him and he hated it; he loved it. "What do we do, what do you think we do? We're gettin' our Lenny back." He pointed across the camp. "Kieran: you're gonn—oh, shit… your eyes are still fucked up. Okay, Charles: scout out Van Horn and meet us at the ridge overlookin' the train station in half an hour. Be detailed."

"On it," he said, dashing to Taima II.

"Everyone else," Dutch continued, "get your things, prepare yourselves. We leave in twenty."

"Me too?" Javier asked, excitedly.

"Of course, now get moving!" Dutch bellowed, heading to the only wagon still booming with stock—the armory wagon. Bullets were cheap. And tonight, he'd need them.

Tilly met him there, bouncing with apprehension. "I want to come."

"No," he said flatly, enwreathing a bandolier around his chest.

"I can help! I ain't like Strauss, I know my way around a gun!"

"You aren't a gunslinger, Tilly, and I don't need more bodies on my conscience." He tucked the extra ammunition away and turned to leave. Her grip was stronger than he thought on his shoulder and she whirled him around.

"I don't care 'bout your damn conscience! I care about my—our friend!"

Dutch studied her brown eyes closely. He knew she and Lenny were friends, but was there more to that story? When she spoke there, for a moment, her eyes exploded with… was it passion? "O-okay," he said, caught off-guard by her authoritative presence—it wasn't a staple of her personality.

She marched off to pack and he meandered to the cave, locking himself in its dark halls. He could see outside but no one could see him; it was lovely. He'd buried the state bonds inside this cave just in case their camp was raided by Murfrees—in a small black box he'd covered with rocks and stuffed inside a crevice in the wall. He couldn't see that gap now, but he wished he could, wished he could hide inside that black box with the papers. But there was work to be done.

He stared up at the glaring gibbous moon, hoping the white cat eye in the sky would settle his nerves. It didn't. His heart pounded a mile a minute twenty times over.

Then he left the cave, strolling past his tent as its flexible sides whispered in the wind. Were they whispering a goodbye? Micah was standing behind Pear—Tilly's chuckwagon, looking as unprepared as a man in an apron three times his size could.

"The hell, Micah? Mount up, already!"

Micah pulled a train whistle in his mouth, shaking his head. "Aww… I'd-I'd like to, but… remember? Can't use my guns. On account of my… condition."

Dutch snarled his teeth. "New rule: that condition is lifted in times of crisis. Let me check my watch… yep! Time of fuckin' crisis!"

Micah drummed his index finger weakly on the table. "Look… I'd like to, but… my leg… it's still hurtin'. I don't think I could get on my horse, let alone shoot off it. And that's not even to mention that Pig's Blood is dead and we only have eight horses as is and with Tilly going—"

"Stop," Dutch roared softly. "You're pathetic." He left the poor wounded soldier, making an executive decision: he ain't comin' to New Orleans with us, when we get on that boat—he realized. There is no boat. The Pinks own Van Horn. Fuck!

He felt the plan unraveling, the final limpsy string coiling around his foot. I won't fall alone, the plan said. The sins of the son are the sins of the father…

Dutch kept walking. Sadie, Bill, Javier, Tilly, Uncle, and Kieran were mounted on their horses, Sadie on Karen's, Tilly sharing with Kieran. The only steeds left unoccupied were The Count and Horse. John was on foot, bickering with Abigail. Of course.

"—ain't your call!" Abigail hollered.

"Dutch," John said, "tell Abigail she can't come."

"Abigail, you can't come."

"Yes, I most certainly can," she answered forcefully, trying to climb atop Horse before Dutch yanked her down. "You can't do this. I'm a better shot than Tilly, but she's snuggling with Kieran up there!"

"Exactly," he said quickly. "I need someone to keep what's left of camp safe. Who's gonna do it? Strauss? Swanson?"

"Lenny's just a damn boy!"

"So's Jack! And he's your boy! What, you just gonna leave him here, alone? Remember what happened last time?"

Dutch loved arguing, and it was even better when he was on the right side of it. Even now, amidst all this turmoil, a smile was fighting him at the sight of Abigail frowning with an enraged understanding that he was right. He despised himself for it.

"I-I was idle before, Dutch," she whispered. "And they died. Pearson, Sean, Trelawny. I don't want to be idle no more."

"And you won't." He stroked her shoulders comfortingly, forgetting all those awful lies she spat about him the other night. "But I need you here. Abigail, I'm scared. Please, put me at ease by saying yes. Please keep everyone safe for me."

Tears formed in her eyes and she nodded weakly. "I will, I will."

His hands left her person and onto The Count's reins. The Dutch Van der Linde rode off into the night.

Dutch hadn't bothered bringing a lantern; he knew the path by heart. And with light or without it, the surrounding forest would always be the same, dark and foreboding. A twig snapped in the shadows, and The Count whinnied loudly, begging Dutch to turn around.

"What a goddamn mess," Uncle hawked. "The fuckin' Pinks… was the whole damn thing a setup?"

"No," John said flatly, grunting as Horse nearly tripped over a sly root. "Trelawny ain't a fool. They musta gotten to the boat recently."

Tilly spoke for everyone. "But how?"

Dutch shuddered as a name came to mind. Hosea. Did they get to Hosea? He knew about the boat. Is that why we can't find him? He's been in a Pinkerton base for weeks gettin' tortured until he croaked 'bout the boat. A whimper escaped his lips. Has he outlived his usefulness? Is he dead?

"Those fuckin' Pinks," Uncle repeated. "How are they always one step ahead of us?"

Dutch heard a mouse squeak in the distance. Or perhaps a rat.

They arrived at the top of the ridge right on time. Charles was waiting for them.

He spoke as they dismounted, removing their binoculars to gauge the town themselves. "Lenny's bein' kept on the roof of the Silas Crawford Retail Store. Dutch… they want him to be seen. It's a trap, and they aren't bein' subtle about the bait."

"Bastards," muttered John.

"What's the best way in?" Dutch asked, scanning the town through two small circular holes. It was like winter solstice, most of the lights were turned out and Dutch could barely see—not accidental, he imagined.

"West side. Closer to the store, less ground to cover. But… on the east side, there's a lighthouse. Perfect—"

"—for a sniper," Van der Linde finished. "He'd take out the guards on the roof—keep Lenny from gettin' shot dead at any moment."

"I'll do it," John volunteered. "I'm the best shot."

Dutch lowered his binoculars, turning to face his team. "Alright, and Tilly, Kieran, Javier, Uncle: I want y'all entering on the east side too. Make a whole hell of a lotta noise on that side, draw the Pinks there. That'll give me, Charles, Sadie, and Bill the room to flank those sons-of-bitches from the west, make a barge for the retail store."

"We're there," Javier said, leading the others onto horseback.

Dutch stopped them just before they left. "Wait, wait. I want to say somethin'." He stood on a loose rock, trying to make it a pedestal. It crumbled from his weight so he sighed and continued normally. "Y'all know me, I'm a man of many words, so I think it's only right that tonight I keep things short and sweet. We've lost a lot, and those whores have taken a lot of it from us. We won't let them take any more. No one dies tonight but Pinks!"

They cheered and the auxiliary riders trotted downhill, moving to position. Dutch's team turned to mount their equines, and when their back was turned, he shriveled into himself. He was so, so tired.

Puffing out his chest, he followed their suit and they drove down the ridge. It was time.

9:31 PM, August 20th, 1899

They stalked their bellies across the dirt, keeping low for any sentries. They left their horses in the forest, keeping them unhitched in case they needed to whistle for a fast exit. They had passed the crossroads sign and were now nearing the town's entrance, just upline from the hotel, which stood next to the retail store. The land was arid, but with how much Dutch was sweating, he wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow there was a whole field of green.

Just a moment longer. Once the noise started and the Pinks pulled away, they'd strike. Dutch's hands were shaking—there were a fuckton more than twenty to thirty Pinkertons. Stupid fuckin' waste of space old man can't even fuckin' count! There's no fuckin' way he's clean…

"How are there this many?" Charles whispered. "We lit 'em up back in Lakay."

"Fuckers reproduce faster than cockroaches," Sadie grumbled.

Dutch looked back to his troops, feigning an encouraging smile. "The plan ain't changed. We can do this." The sins of the son are the sins of the father… He pushed those thoughts away. Don't doubt, never doubt. The world doesn't remember folks that think, they remember folks that do. What did it matter that there were enough dark figures skulking about to stack up to the pale shining cat's eye for the top man to leer at it until it closed forever? What did it matter that each of those men was equipped with enough ammunition to kill the Dutch Van der Linde gang, here and now, three times over? What did it matter that—

Bang…! Bang! Bang! Bang!

An orange flicker went off high in the distance, followed by others on the ground.

"Hold!" Dutch ordered. "Wait for them to fall for the diversion!"

Dozens of hazy boots trekked past them, following the gunshots like moths to a flame.

"Hold…"

The orange flickers persisted stubbornly, unyielding. More and more well-dressed moths flocked to it. Dutch could see Lenny.

"Hold…

Could feel the boy in his arms again. His grip was soft and firm… like Arthur's had been.

"Now!"

They raced forth, blasting wildly—missing was unlikely—striking all the bastards where they didn't expect it. Bullets ran at them in a counterfire, and the familiar whistle of volleys hit the air. They moved to the hotel.

Dutch and Charles lept behind the wooden columns for cover. Sadie hied up the stairs, shooting at the Pinks overlooking the balcony. Dutch heard her grunt and crash through one of the rooms. He kept his hand steady as he fired his twin pistols, mowing down everything that moved. He aimed for the chest and scarcely missed, grounding six before hearing that disappointing click sound. He reloaded completely behind the pillar and Charles took his place, his carbine repeater yelling triumphantly as he pulled the trigger.

Dutch restocked with the speed of a veteran and leaned out of cover, enjoying the sight of those bowler hats fly away, ruddy as hellfire. "Move up," he called to Charles over the gunfire and they shimmied to the next pillar, squatting low and never letting up their trigger fingers. Bill hung back, stalling the Pinks who were beginning to cycle back from their distraction eastward.

Dutch kept firing, trying not to think about how young and inexperienced Tilly was. Had he sent her to her doom? He imagined Sadie in that hotel room, defenselessly being pinned down on the hard mattress by a horde that never, ever ended.

A stick of dynamite glimmered in the dim moonlight. Dutch raised his gun. Click!

"Get down!"

The explosion blew him onto the wet ground. Dead men stared at him with red tears. One of them looked like Arthur… His ears were ringing. He couldn't breathe. He crawled to a stack of crates in front of him, breathing roughly as the roaring sounds of hell came back to him. His eyes drooped to the side: all Pinkertons were in a full retreat back to the hotel. He had to get Lenny out now.

Dutch found one gun in his hand, the other was lost somewhere amidst the sea of corpses. He reloaded it, rising above his cover and firing back at the Pinks… except… some weren't Pinks… they looked like… never mind, didn't matter.

More gunfire came from his direction and he felt soft, sweet relief to see Charles on his left, in the alleyway between the hotel and retail store, and Sadie above him, the last occupant of the inn, firing down from the balcony.

There were two men left standing at the retail store's front door and Sadie sniped both of them. They could make it. From there it was just one flight of stairs to their friend…

Dutch glanced to Charles and signaled to move in sync with him. They charged together like before, keeping low and their fingers on their gun's hammers.

The door jumped open and an ear-splitting bang cut into Charles and he dropped his gun and fell into the river, disappearing into the deep.

It was Ross. And others, Dutch couldn't tell how many. Hundreds, probably. They fired and he dove into the alley. They were moving closer now, Ross and his boys eastward, and they outnumbered him by a thousand, at least.

Dutch was dead. The plan was dead. Charles was dead. Hosea was dead. Arthur was dead. He fucked up, got tricked again. The Grays duped him, the Pinkertons duped him, Cornwall's laughing at him, and who the hell was Molly fucking?! Dutch felt his life adding up to nothing but a monumental failure. A zero. He was dead. Dead and buried like his father in the war, a zero. Zero kills, zero medals, zero commendations. The sins of the son are the sins of the father…

The common swell of fear took him as he heard the Pinks footsteps coming for him. They'd turn the corner and gun him down. And that would be his story. Pitter-patter, pitter-patter. His heart was crying out in agony, he'd never been so terrified. A corpse was staring at him. It smiled so wide its head fell off. Dutch waved his pistol weakly, waiting…

Bang! Bang! Bang!

A scream rang out. He felt the bullets enter, saw Ross looming over his body with glee. Then he realized he hadn't been shot. He peeked out of the alley and saw Ross crawling behind a set of crates, clutching a bloody knee. The rest of his cohort was lying dead. John had picked them off from the lighthouse.

The door to the retail store was ajar, inviting. Beckoning Dutch. You can still make it, it spoke, there's still time to save Lenny. But it was a trick. His heart wouldn't quiet and his hands still shook so it must have been a trick! There were more inside, he knew it. They wanted him to go in, they wanted to trick him again, just like Blackwater and Rhodes and Lakay. John wouldn't fire for him anymore, Abigail made sure of that, this was what she wanted—him gone. It was a setup.

Lenny probably cut a deal with them anyway, he probably wasn't in any danger—he was—is a smart kid, he cut a deal. Besides, how much did Lenny really contribute? Maybe Micah was right: the Saint Denis heist was a cataclysmic fiasco.

The Pinkertons were coming back now with full force, Bill couldn't hold them back any further. There was no humanly possible way he could make it to Lenny, he couldn't risk it. He couldn't die, other people needed him. It would be selfish to go in. Who the hell is Molly fucking?

And then Dutch ran away, underneath Sadie to the hotel. He called up for her, to Bill to retreat. They reluctantly joined him just past the hotel, and together they cut dirt out of Van Horn.

Dutch didn't turn around until they reached the crossroads sign, and when he did, he saw the form of a man on the roof of the retail store, gawking down on him. It wasn't Lenny, no, no, he was coiled in that man's grip, being forced to watch as Dutch abandoned him.

Even from the distance, Dutch saw the ugly look of betrayal curl across the boy's face. And the man who could only be Agent Milton shot Lenny Summers in the back of the head and the nineteen-year-old slapped the concrete with a sound that reverberated throughout the entire state.

Dutch never stopped running, not until he made it to his horse. Then he was riding, far, far away as fast as he could. He knew the path by heart. That was good—with all the tears in his eyes, he couldn't have seen three feet in front of him.

A moment of silence for our fallen comrade...

Anyway, hope this was as devilishly cruel to read as it was to write. This has been in the works for a while, stacking problem by problem on Dutch's shoulders until he folds in on himself. I like balancing Dutch as a hero being pushed too far and as a selfish prick who uses others as objects and I hope that rang true for y'all when reading.

Those non-Pinkertons Dutch shot in the middle of this struggle will be revealed soon, though you can probably guess...

Act II is just about wrapped up now...