#going legendary animal hunting with charles..

[pasta-pardner]

arthur and john at the top of mount shann

rdr2 companion mod

#rdr2 photography #rdr2 photomode #rdr2 #morston #arthur morgan #john marston #these pics are kinda old and u can tell bc i still have the default satchel and weapon equipment #so thats unfortunate. but oh well #i took these while i was grinding for the legend of the east satchel!! #i've been using the companion mod to do ambient stuff with camp npcs. #going legendary animal hunting with charles.. #going legendary fishing with hosea or javier or kieran #and satchel grinding with john :') #i think its fun to have arthur and john hunt all the pelts for the legend of the east satchel together. #like.. the satchel will be john's someday. him coming along for the hunts adds an extra layer to it. we're making memories!! #im so sad that u can only free roam with npcs via mods bc taking them on trips adds so much to the story for me #anyways. i passed by mount shann while arthur and john were hunting in big valley and the view looked pretty #they are . antagonizing in this photoset <3 #pardner posts #red dead #tagged as morston but as always: idc if u see them as platonic or romantic #theyre both and neither to me.

[knightmareaceblue]

The Amazonian Amethyst.

Since being stolen from its rightful owners by the tyrannical Queen Empress, no one has seen this legendary gemstone. Rumor has it that the Amethyst, like many lost treasures, was taken by the Queen Empress to her tomb, the Red Pyramid, from which no one had ever returned alive.

It'd make the perfect anniversary gift. When Charles of all people presents this plan to his partners, Henry and Ellie are completely on board. An anniversary adventure suits the Triple Threat more than some dinner date, anyways.

And nothing could possibly go wrong… right?

--------------------

Deep in the heart of an ancient jungle, far away from the modern comforts and conveniences of the human world, all was calm. The animals scurried and scattered about, out to hunt or gather for their next meal. The roaring rapids of a nearby river echoed through the tangle of trees, calling to creatures near and far to take their fair share of its fresh water and plump schools of fish. The songs of birds in the upper canopy competing to attract a mate completed the natural soundtrack of this ancient, majestic place.

Then, quite suddenly, the sharp mechanical buzzing of helicopter blades sliced through the melody of environment, causing the animals to scatter in fear of this strange new sound. At least one thousand feet above these scared grounds, three people, oblivious to their disruption, chattered excitedly amongst themselves.

“Man, doesn’t this bring you back?” Spoke the sole female of the group, a red-head named Ellie, who stared out at the jungle with a fond smile, her eyes soft with nostalgia. “Our first mission as the Triple Threat, flying over the Dogobogo Jungle to mess up the Toppat Clan’s day and send their rocket flying off into the sun.”

“Well, actually, Hen sent it to the Wall? But, you know, close enough.” Responded the pilot, one Mister Charles Calvin, who glanced back at her for only the briefest of moments before returning his focus to the wheel. His eyes scanned the canopy, searching for their destination, and a wide grin stretched across his face when he finally found it. “Whoa! Guys, you gotta check this out!!”

Henry, the final and most quiet member of the trio, raced over to Charles’ side first, Ellie hot on their trail. Their crimson eyes scanned the horizon, until they widened when they landed on the group’s destination: a gigantic pyramid, covered from top to bottom in green foliage as nature fought to overtake the ancient structure.

“There she is.” Ellie murmured, entranced by the sight, “The Imperial Tomb of the Queen Empress.”

“Exactly where my contact said it would be.” Declared the pilot, flicking switches and checking gauges as he prepared to descend. “According to him, the Amazonian Amethyst should be buried inside, along with the Empress. But everyone who’s ever gone searching for the tomb’s hidden treasure has mysteriously vanished~” The change of tone from Charles was accompanied by an amused smirk, almost as if daring fate to try and do the same to them. “So no one’s ever found the amethyst hidden inside. Which means it’s all ours for the taking.”

With a sharp squeal, Henry’s arms wrapped tightly around Charles’ shoulders, and they nuzzled their head into the side of Charles’. “This is the best anniversary gift ever.” Henry declared, and Charles felt his heart flutter.

When accepting the Airship mission so long ago, Charles hadn’t expected to fall in love with a criminal mastermind, let alone two of them. But exactly one year ago today, under the gentle light of the moon, Henry had taken both their hands and proclaimed their love to the heavens. The year that had followed had been the adventure of a lifetime; it hadn’t been without its challenges, but ultimately Charles had never been happier. The two standing behind him were his heart and soul made manifest. Of that, Charles was certain.

Of course, Charles’ love didn’t equate to ignorance of who, exactly, he was dating. By the time the government had picked them up for the Airship mission, Henry had become somewhat infamous for their prison break and theft of the Tunisian Diamond, and Ellie was in a similar position, living an outlaw’s life for various crimes she’d committed with a previous gang. And while they’d turned over a new leaf, partially for the benefits but mostly for Charles, it was clear that the transition to a clean cut lifestyle was… difficult, to say the least.

Thankfully the majority of what they craved, the action and adventure and excitement, was quelled by the missions they went on to save the world from whatever bad guy of the week dared to think they could stand up to the Triple Threat. However, the other addictive quality of their criminal lives – the material gains, the glitz and glamour of wealth that people like them could only get through illicit activities – that was another story entirely. Charles couldn’t count the number of times he’d had to drag Henry away from a display of shiny jewelry, or watch Ellie gaze longingly at the security trucks stores used to transport cash. He knew the two of them would never go behind his back to return to their old ways – he trusted them. But it was obvious even to him that they still missed it.

So, when their anniversary began to approach, Charles devised a plan. He’d preemptively gotten them a full two week’s vacation, scoured the dredges of the library and uncovered a lost treasure: The Amazonian Amethyst. A rare, large, and highly valuable purple gemstone that was said to have been stolen from its rightful owners by the very Queen Empress who was buried below them. She had taken many treasures with her to the grave, and for their anniversary, Charles had made all the arrangements necessary for them to go hunt it down. He’d rented a non-government helicopter (none of the bells and whistles he was used to, but the leather seats were a hell of a lot more comfortable than the ones from his usual bird), made sure they had all their paperwork and supplies, and took his two loves deep into the heart of the jungle on a death defying adventure to technically-not-steal a large amethyst from a long dead tyrant.

Maybe not entirely on the up and up, as far as legality went, but seeing the looks on Henry and Ellie’s faces when he told them his plan was totally worth the huge risk.

As their helicopter descended, Ellie scurried about, grabbing any last minute supplies she could get her hands on and tossing them into her personal inventory for later use. Simultaneously, Henry yanked open the door to the helicopter and hopped out as it landed, surveying the area with experienced precision. A practiced hand signal alerted their partners that the coast was clear, and Charles and Ellie soon hopped out after them. Inventories fully equipped, limbs stretched, and helicopter secured, the infamous Triple Threat made their way into the maw of the pyramid, eagerly chasing the adventure it promised.

Behind them, the song of the jungle stilled too suddenly, leaving only the increasingly loud crunch, crunch, crunch of plants being crushed.

--------------------

“Yo, check this place out!” Charles exclaimed as the trio stepped into the main hall. The smile on his face stretched from ear to ear, and Henry could practically see the stars in his eyes as he shook his fists in excitement.

Not that Henry could fault his sunshiny enthusiasm. The main hall was adorned with very ornate murals, each one portraying the Queen Empress throughout her life. From her miraculous birth, with light shining down on her from the heavens; to her childhood of objectively being better than everyone; to the worship of her citizens, despite the blood lust that lead her to raid and pillage and steal from weaker kingdoms near and far. The blatant narcissism on display was staggering. The shiny gems that were used in place of her pupils, however, made Henry’s fingers twitch.

Of course, they wouldn’t settle for those little pebbles. Charles had picked a gem especially for them. Henry was going to get their hands on it if it killed them.

“According to the notes from the last expedition…” Ellie flipped through her notebook pages casually, even as she sidled up to one of the murals and plucked out a shiny blue stone. Unlike Henry, she didn’t mind easy pickings. “In the 1950s, geez… this first area is relatively safe. It’s where the Queen’s followers were expected to bring offerings of food and drink to their Eternal Queen.” Ellie’s eyes, full and bright like the full moon, scanned over the entire room. “Given how open this place was, though, it was probably all eaten by animals.”

Henry openly scoffed. “Wanna bet the people in charge used the missing food as ‘proof’ that the Empress really was there?”

In response, Ellie only shook her head. The trio walked along, making light conversation up until they reached the end of the hallway. The doorway between the Offerings Hall and the rest of the tomb contained a final masterpiece: the Queen Empress, in all her regal glory, being called into heaven by the gods themselves in the same radiant light that had shone upon her at birth. It’d be poetic, if Henry didn’t find it so nauseatingly self-serving. Whoever the woman was, she tried incredibly too hard to portray herself as a literal gift from the gods.

More importantly, the entrance to the tomb was stuck shut. “Notes said it was sealed after the last expedition,” Ellie explained, shutting the book in her hands. “Probably so no more idiots would get themselves killed trying to get that big treasure.”

“Well, they clearly hadn’t counted on these idiots!” Charles proclaimed, pulling the two of them close so he could point his fingers down at the trio, as if that was supposed to be a compliment. Still, he wasn’t entirely wrong. Idiots though the three may be, this wouldn’t even be close to the toughest thing they’d tackled. The three of them? They got this. First they just had to find a world in which they got this stupid door open.

Should they Force it open? No, that probably wasn’t a good idea. Ellie’s powers were strong, sure, but they could be too strong at times. Using just the right amount of Force would require extreme concentration. Henry could see the future play out before their very eyes; Ellie’s powers would pry the heavy door away from the wall bit by bit, pulling at the melted welding keeping it in place until it finally broke free. They’d celebrate for a moment, just a second, before the door would hit all three of them, knocking them back and out. Apparently, there was such a thing as too much force. Who knew?

So that was a no go.

What about some controlled demolition, then? Somehow that seemed like an even worse idea. They would manage to knock down the wall surrounding the door, sure. It was just a matter of applying enough force to remove the stones. Then the whole ceiling would crash down around their ears, their universe ending in a single cosmic crunch. Of course it would. Henry had the luck of a black cat zooming underneath a row of ladders while crushing mirrors underneath its claws. And besides, it was Remodeling 101: You never destroy a load-baring structure.

“You know, we could always just teleport past it.” Ellie teased with a quirk of her lip. This caused an instinctual full body shutter from Henry at just the thought of that infernal contraption. Though they’d never used the device in their own world line, the aches and pains of its future malfunctions still radiated across their skin, a phantom pain from a wound that never was and always had been.

Future sight was a real bitch sometimes.

With an annoyed pout, they scolded her, “Don’t even joke about that.” Henry could see the amusement on Charles’ face as he joined Ellie with an elbow propped on her shoulder, and tried not to scowl. Ellie and Charles took their concerns seriously – Neither of them had ever doubted their future sight even once– but the two weren’t above teasing their beloved about the borderline paranoid raving they could go on. “In fact, new rule from now on: No more bringing the teleporter. It always backfires.”

“So that means we won’t get to see you make that cute pouty face whenever you pull it out of your bag anymore?” Teased the pilot, a grin as bright as the sun stretching along his face. He didn’t even look a little sad at the idea of Henry no longer being burdened by the infernal plaything of cruel fate that was the Teleporter.

“What a shame.” Ellie joked right alongside him. In terms of acting, she was a little better, in that she managed to look a little disappointed at the thought. But her eyes shone like the moonlight, letting her true feelings be known to those who could read her.

All the annoyance melted away at their expressions, and Henry tried not to let this show as they rolled their eyes and spun around to dig through their inventory. “Yeah, yeah. Give me a moment, I think I have something here… aha!”

Henry triumphantly pulled their prize from their inventory’s storage: a blowtorch, which Henry immediately lit up before their red-headed girlfriend dropped a protective mask down over their face. Pausing only to give her a brief thumbs up before going to town, they traced the outlines of the sealed metal entrance and slowly but surely began to destroy the fused sections between door and wall, allowing for the door to be effortlessly removed. Henry turned around and bowed to their sun and their moon, gesturing dramatically to guide them through the newly created hole in the ruin. Ellie, proper woman that she was, bowed back as she passed, her eyes reflecting the mirth Henry felt. And Charles, ray of sunshine that he was, gentle tapped Henry’s nose with a soft boop before all but skipping through the doorway.

They could be walking into death, sure. After all, no one had seen the interior of the pyramid and survived. Despite these terrible odds, Henry couldn’t help but feel at ease. After all, they were already capable of the impossible alone. With Ellie and Charles by their side, they were all but invincible.

Behind them, an ominous shadow shadow spread across the stone cold floor.

--------------------

The Triple Threat were greeted by a long, long hallway on the other side of the sealed doorway. It stretched onward and onward, shadows obscuring the pathway and all its secrets. The only lights came from the dull blue luminescence of the blue spheres embedded into the walls. There were more murals, Henry was certain, but their pictures were obscured by the darkness the entire corridor was draped in.

A darkness that was suddenly slashed through by a beam of light, courtesy of Charles. Now they could make out the plain, cold stone floor, the elaborate detailing on the wall portraying some myth long since lost to the age, the arches on the ceiling that provided the support needed for the heavy stone structure. There were no traps to be seen; no buttons, no spikes, no glowing eyed accursed beast doomed to wander these twisted hallways forever. It looked perfectly safe.

Naturally, Henry didn’t trust it.

Apparently Charles didn’t share this suspicious sentiment, because with a chipper, “Welp, let’s get moving!” He bound forward a few steps, and Ellie and Henry grabbed him and pulled him back just in time to avoid a long and dangerous drop down a pit of spikes.

“Watch your step, dumbass.” Ellie scolded, her hand tight around Charles’. In the meanwhile, Henry quickly checked him over. They’d been quick enough to catch him in this world (Future sight was a bitch), but better safe than sorry when it comes to mysterious ancient ruins and their many traps. And tetanus.

For his part, Charles seemed more embarrassed than scared. “Whoops.” He chuckled nervously as Ellie and Henry, now that they were done making sure he was really okay, crossed their arms and shot him matching glares, flat and unimpressed. “My bad. Sorry, guys.”

“Sheesh.” Ellie uncrossed her arms. On the outside she looked calm and composed, but Henry knew her well enough to see the slight tension in her face, or the way eyes kept darting to view the area behind Charles, as if expected another trap to jump out of nowhere and blot out the sun. “You’re going to be the death of us, I swear.”

With Charles’ near death experience out of the way, Ellie picked up a small pile of loose stones near the side of the passageway and began tossing them, one after the other. With each stone tossed, a section of the floor collapsed underneath the weight, revealing a pitfall that went down for meters. At the bottom, cascading off the floor, were subtle buttons that could only barely be made out in the dark, and entirely less subtle rows of spikes. A ghastly smell rose as the floor fell: a noxious fume of decay and rot that told them, even before Charles’ torch revealed the scatterings of bones both human and otherwise, the fates of all those whom had entered beforehand. An ominous rattling echoed up through the chamber as the light awoke various species of serpents lying in slumber in between the spikes, scattering quickly to hide around the buttons with their tails resonating dangerous warnings about disturbing them further. As the light continued to travel upward, the trio could make out tiny little holes in the walls, just large enough for any number of potentially poisonous instruments to fly or jut out, all the way from the bottom of the pit to the very top of the ceiling.

Now, if this had just been Henry, then they’d use a grappling hook to fly across the chasm, no problem. Or maybe create a platform with something nearby. But it was more than just Henry they were worried about today, and the ceiling was far too old and decrepit to hold all of them if they swung across. And the ruins were far too precarious to support the weight of three people. They’d collapse into the pit, get impaled on the spikes, and that would be the end of the Triple Threat’s story.

Despite the impending death of their loved ones, it struck Henry as more lame than terrifying.

What Henry forgot, of course, was that they were flanked by two equally competent (and equally crazy) partners, and Charles’ face suddenly lit up as he pushed his two partners behind him. “Don’t worry,” He smirked back at them confidentially, “I got this.”

Ellie and Henry were, naturally, extremely worried.

Without any further warning, Charles bolted forward. Henry’s panicked attempt to grab him and pull him back to safety was narrowly dodged, and Ellie’s call to halt was similarly ignored. Upon reaching the edge of the pit, Charles bent his legs down and sprung over it with an admittedly impressive leap, but one with nowhere near enough force or air to make it to the other side of the hazardous chasm.

Ellie gaped like a fish, her eyes following Charles with all the horror of witnessing an impending wreck. Henry winced and somehow managed not to look away.

Just as he reached the peak of his jump, Charles tossed a grenade down into the pit trap. The explosion was instantaneous, almost completely silent, and… purple? A cushion of purple gelatin arose from the torturous trenches, and Charles landed perfectly in it’s center with a boi-oing that echoed through the pyramid. And he bounced. Once. Twice. Each time a joyous laugh escaped Charles, loud and carefree despite the precarious perils underneath him.

A few bounces later – to test the durability of the gelatin or just for his own amusement, Henry couldn’t say – Charles leapt forward again and launched another grenade. He bounced off the cushion it produced and threw another, and another, until there was purple, bouncy path to the other side of the hazardous chasm. He finally, finally landed on the solid ground of the other side, and as he steadied along with Henry’s heartbeat, Charles turned around and tossed his partners a double thumbs up.

Henry stared after him, slack jawed. Words failed them completely.

Ellie, who had always managed to find the words that eluded Henry, commented, “That dumbass is going to get us killed one of these days.” Her voice was steady and strong, but a slight twitch of the eye betrayed her inner anxiety.

“Well? Come on!” Charles, whose ability to read the room was about on par with his risk assessment skills, called across the chasm, “The Amazonian Amethyst ain’t gonna come to you, slowpokes!”

Despite themselves, a grin stretched across Henry’s face. Now that the initial scare had passed, they found themselves more amused than upset. None of the Triple Threat were the cautious type to begin with – cautious types wouldn’t rob tombs, after all – and the heart attacks weren’t anything new, especially in their profession. So, only pausing to shrug at Ellie, Henry followed in Charles’ footsteps and leapt down into the pit of spikes.

They hit the mass of purple dead center, and was surprised to find that it was not at all sticky or mushy, as would be expected of gelatin. Instead it was soft and smooth, the same texture as a rubber exercise ball, with enough strength to hold their weight while standing firm against the spikes. An almost childlike joy came over Henry as they bounced up and down with loud, echoing boings, flipping and posing like they’d seen trampoline artists on the television do, before finally moving forward on the playful path Charles had created for them.

Behind them, Henry could hear Ellie bounce along as well. Her squeals were surprised and nervous at first, but quickly faded into the more melodious sounds of delight and enjoyment. A million ways to tease their moonlight popped into Henry’s head, but for the moment they simply enjoyed the sound of her unrestrained elation and focused on bouncing from one cushion of violet gelatin to the next, putting their signature style into every leap.

Henry hit the ground next to Charles hard, face first. Ellie landed much more gracefully, on one foot and one knee. She was up before Henry could even get to their knees, and by the time they were back on their feet she’d reached Charles and socked him in the arm. Not hard enough to hurt him, but not quite soft enough to be playful, either.

“Hey!” Charles flinched back a little, rubbing his arm. “What was that for?”

Ellie raised a brow at him. “You mean besides the heart attack you gave us when you jumped into a pit of spikes?”

Comprehension dawned on Charles’ sweet, stupid little face. “Oooh… yeah, I can see what you mean. Uh… whoops?” This earned him another hit, slightly more playful this time. “Okay, okay! I’m sorry, alright? I just wanted to show off for you guys.”

“You’re lucky you’re cute.” Ellie muttered with a glower, but no force in the world could stand up to Charles’ puppy dog eyes, so it wasn’t long before she was fighting a smile as he pouted up at her. “Okay, I forgive you. Just… no more throwing yourself into death pits please?”

“I won’t.” Charles promised, rewarding Ellie’s mercy with a sweet nuzzle and a gentle kiss. “’M sorry.”

Henry watched the tender moment play out between them, transfixed on their two loves from the sidelines, when Charles’ arm suddenly stretched the distance between them. It didn’t reach all the way to Henry, didn’t so much as brush against their skin, but Charles’ hand was open, invitation clear for Henry to accept at their leisure.

“I scared you too, didn’t I?” Asked the pilot, almost rhetorically. “Sorry, Hen.”

Affection flooded Henry’s heart, filling it full enough to burst, as they reached across the distance between them and took Charles’ hand. This was why he was their sunshine; Charles didn’t always have enough awareness to recognize his screw ups (and Henry had the phantom scars of worlds never lived to prove it), but when he did, he always approached them with complete compassion and understanding. He gave them each what they needed; Ellie a laugh to calm her nerves, and Henry the choice of contact and comfort, instead of startling them with a sudden touch they weren’t ready for. Henry relished in his light, the same light that brought the hope of daybreak to the hearts of two darkened criminals.

Instead of voicing their appreciation aloud, Henry accepted the unspoken invitation and allowed Charles to pull them close, peppering their faces with sweet little kisses, causing them to giggle. With his apologies accepted, Charles released his partners and the three turned around to face their next challenge, together.

Another door. Stone this time, a dark and heavy slab that sealed them off from the interior of the pyramid.

“Something tells me we’re not going to blowtorch our way through this one.” Ellie mused, then smiled as she added, in a light, airy voice, “Oh, if only we had some sort of device that could displace us through space and time to get us past this impossible obstacle!” She dramatically flung her hand over her forehead.

Charles tittered dramatically as he played along. “What a shame. Looks like we’ll have to go home without the Amethyst.”

“Knock it off.” Henry scolded, unamused. “Besides, who needs a Teleporter when you’ve got a…” They ruffled through their inventory until they found their prize, and triumphantly pulled out a... “Tire Jack!”

“Tire jack?” Echoed Ellie and Charles behind them, identical looks of confusion adorning their faces.

“Tire Jack.” Henry repeated one final time without elaboration, before dropping to their knees in front of the door. This little baby was a thief’s dream – unassuming, easy to carry, and absolutely perfect for doing things like prying open doors, or… whatever else a tire jack was used for. Henry fitted it to the stone slab, then pumped down once… twice… three times… and managed to create a crack just large enough for the three of them to squeeze through, one at a time.

Ellie nodded in understanding. “Ah. Tire jack.”

“Ooh, ooh! Me first!” Charles called as he ran at door. Henry managed to jump back just in time to avoid being bowled over by Charles’ power slide as he launched himself underneath the door’s crack.

All poor Henry and Ellie could do was gape after him, before Ellie shook her head and mumbled, “Going to be the death of us,” before following suit. Henry crawled underneath the door after them, leaving the chamber in silence.

…

Boing. Boing.

--------------------

Somehow, the chamber they entered after crawling under the door was even darker than what came before. None of the rooms allowed for any sunlight to penetrate the densely packed stones, but at least the previous chambers had the dim glow of the luminescent blue stones on the walls to provide a little bit of light. In this room, however, even that minuscule bit of illumination was absent, leaving Henry and their partners shrouded in complete darkness.

“Eugh, I can’t see a thing.” Ellie summarized, her voice echoing just enough to let Henry know that this was a large, spacious chamber. Her call acted as a beacon, drawing both partners’ attention over to the little corner of the dark expanse where she must have been. “Charles, a little light, sweetheart?”

“Huh?” Either to preserve battery life or to keep from smacking anyone in the eyes with the beam of his torch, Charles had shut it off at some point. The reminder from Ellie, however, caused him to audible scramble to pull it back out. “Oh, right, yeah! I’m on it-!”

The clacking of plastic against stone echoed through the chamber once, twice, three times as the torch hit the ground and bounced away. Then silence.

“…” Henry couldn’t see a damned thing, but they could practically feel Charles wince. “Uh, Yeaah… I’ll, uh, I’ll just…” Shuffling fabric could be heard, followed by a repetition of slap, slap, slap against the cold stone floor as Charles fumbled around. “I’m sure it’s, uh, around here somewhere… Hehe…”

Then, stone sliding against stone. Followed by a painfully loud click.

Henry only had a brief moment to brace themselves for whatever barrage of arrows or spikes or fire was about to kill them dead. Instead, an explosion of white began searing their retinas, forcing their eyes closed and their arms up to defend against the sudden barrage. To their side, Henry could hear Ellie grunt in pain, and the sounds of Charles crawling around had disappeared entirely. Time eased the burden of their pain, their eyes adjusted, and Henry lowered their arms and gazed out into the now lit room.

What greeted their eyes was a circular chamber, far larger than the entrance or connecting chambers behind them, with sunlight pouring through the rooftop. Like the entrance, the walls were painted with spectacular images, icons that had long since forgotten their meanings and portraits of divine beings with names lost to time. Three tables – or, more likely, altars – were set up around the chamber, one underneath each grand portrait of the gods. The grandest of all, however, was that of the Queen Empress, recognizable even to Henry’s history ignorant mind. She was encircled by heavenly light while, to each of her sides, the Gods shifted their gazes unto her.

“Whoa!” Charles, having found the flashlight not three feet in front of him, quickly picked it up and got back to his feet.

“These are amazing!” Ellie gushed, eyes lighting up as she took in the ancient murals. Her aesthetic sense was certainly different from Henry’s – a little flashier, a little more on the romantic side – but her eye for art was second to none. “I wish I had a camera.”

Without even thinking, Henry pulled a disposable camera from their bag and held it up in front of Ellie’s face. It’s primary function was for note-taking and placing identical photos of crime scenes in front of security cameras, but even though they were technically done committing crimes, Henry had never removed it from their inventory.

“Oh.” Ellie blinked, then took the camera. “Thank you.”

“Is this the burial chamber?” Charles asked, then, as if that was a definite yes, excitedly changed the question to, “Is the Amethyst here?”

“I don’t think so.” Ellie responded as she took more and more pictures. The film in that thing wasn’t unlimited, but she’d probably document all she wanted to long before it ran out. “Given that there’s no actual tomb or body here, this is probably a temple of some sort, to honour the gods rather than her.”

To that, Charles and Henry exchanged a glance before gazing up at the image of the Queen Empress, who was larger and grander than any of the divine beings on the wall. “I’m, uh, not a theologist.” Charles said as he quirked an eyebrow at her. “But isn’t imagery like this, like, umm… what the word I’m looking for?”

“Blasphemous?” Henry suggested.

Apparently that was correct, because Charles nodded. “Yeah, that.”

To that, Ellie only shrugged. “Eh, who knows? Maybe having the gods revere you was an old form of worship?”

As they spoke, Henry surveyed the temple. Beyond the portraits and the skylight, the round temple was decorated with ornate columns and intricately carved altars, each adorned with various symbols that had lost their meanings to the flow of time. Their eyes went from mural to mural, from wall to wall, and as they scanned each corner of the chamber a cold feeling sank to the bottom of their stomach.

“Uh, guys?” Henry interrupted, getting Ellie and Charles’ attention. “There’s no exit.”

Indeed, the walls had many things painted on them, but none of them had a door of any sort beyond the entrance.

“Oh. That’s a problem.” Charles mumbled as he too began to look around. “Uh, are you sure this isn’t the burial chamber then?”

“Do you see a body anywhere?” Ellie retorted, then kicked at the ground. The interior of the temple, in the open area just underneath the skylight, was a large circular stone slab inlaid in the floor, again adorned with a symbol Henry didn’t understand. “We entered around the center of the pyramid. The burial chamber and treasure chamber are probably below us somewhere.” Ellie scratched her chin, gazing around, “Which means… to proceed we’ll have to…”

“Dig!’ Charles interrupted, triumphantly pulling a shovel from his inventory. Grinning, he posed to strike down at the stone ground, only to have the shovel nabbed away from him by Ellie.

She spun it in her hand as she shook her head. “Not exactly. There’s probably some mechanism in the room that opens the floor, the same way that button you found opened the skylight. We just have to figure out where it is.” She tossed the twirling shovel into the air, allowing it to whirl before she caught it with ease. “So, let’s start by investigating the room. Charles, see if you can find any more buttons on the floor. Henry, check out the pillars and walls. I’ll take a look at the altars.”

With their tasks divided up, the Triple Threat went about exploring the chamber. Charles dropped to his hands and feet, crawling about the floor like a hound dog sniffing for clues. Henry couldn’t help but smile at the ridiculously serious display before turning to the walls. Like the entrance, the iconography seemed to tell a story. A trickster, a mysterious being cloaked in shadows with a crooked smile, stealing from the gods and causing them to turn their wrath on each other. A divine clash breaking out, a battle of apocalyptic proportions with the trickster caught in the middle. A god of the sky defeated with a necklace, a god of the ocean defeated with song, a god of the mountains defeated with a seed. And the spirits, the innocent bystanders who had perished in the clash, being escorted by the trickster to a new paradise.

Huh. What an odd story.

Henry didn’t have much time to take it all in, however, as a sudden and triumphant, “Aha!” from Charles caught their attention. They turned to find him in front of one of the altars, grinning and rubbing his hands. “Found the button!”

Ellie had been investigating the altar on the other side of the room, but she somehow managed to reach Charles’ side before Henry had. The three of them started down at the button for a long time, contemplating the many, many ways this thing could kill them, before a shrug from Ellie gave Charles the go ahead. It gave a soft click as it depressed all the way.

The Triple Threat tensed, got into formation, and waited for the trap to spring.

And waited.

And… waited…

And there was no trap. Not even a little one. Henry almost felt disappointed.

“Huh.” Ellie mused, getting out of formation and pressing the button down with her foot. Again, nothing happened. “Okay, that’s strange… but maybe…” Ellie stroked her chin as she walked away to the next altar, testing the ground in front of it with her foot until she found what she was looking for and smirked triumphantly. “Ah ha!”

With the same cool confidence as always, Ellie let her foot fall onto another hidden button. It crumbled under her mighty strength, clicking into place neatly.

Henry could sense a pattern here. They quickly walked over to the other side of the room, to the unattended altar, and stared down at where they were certain, based on where Charles and Ellie were standing, that the final button would be. Should they press it? Do they dare risk their life on the mere chance that this button would open the passageway forward?

...Eh, screw it. Henry stamped down on the button hard.

A final click echoed through the chamber. All was silent for one moment, then two, then three. The silence was broken by a rumbling, small at first but then, gradually, getting louder and louder until the whole chamber was shaking. Shadows began to stretch and grow across the floor as stone eclipsed the skylight, slowly, steadily, until nothing but darkness remained.

Henry’s fingers itched. Their every muscle tingled, phantom pains from a world soon to be echoing across their skin, screaming at them to move, move, move-!

Fire burst forth from the symbol on the altar, giving Henry mere seconds to dodge out of the way before the gods could scorch them with divine retribution. Behind them, Henry could hear Ellie gasp as something heavy slammed down way too close to where they knew she was standing, and on their other side, sputtering and coughing and what sounded like a geyser.

Before they could even thinking of running to their partners’ aid, another pillar of fire sprouted up just next to Henry, setting the room alight with a dangerous orange glow. Then another. And another. For now Henry could dodge them, but the streams of fire were going off faster than faster. This was not a matter of if they got burned to a crisp, but when.

In the glow of the firelight, Henry could make out Charles, soaked head to toe, struggling to push against a strong spray of water that had him pinned. Ellie, on the other side, was only narrowly dodging giant stone pillars raining down on her.

“What kind of trap is this?” Henry snapped in frustration. “There wasn’t anything on the walls!” There couldn’t have been, not with those portraits. A button would stand out far too much.

As Charles was too busy battling a barrage of water, it was Ellie who replied. “I have no clue! The way the buttons were positioned – I thought it made sense-”

She sounded genuinely distressed, and that made Henry’s heart ache worse than anything. Ellie was their moon, their constant anchor in an ever-changing world, and they felt her distress as if it were their own. “Hey- hey- it’s okay.” Henry consoled. “If it helps, this is less stupid then, say, jumping out of a bag and directly into an alarm.”

“Yeah!” Charles had managed to keep the extreme stream of water at bay enough to finally contribute – or maybe he was just powering through it. Hard to say with him. “It’s just a little water… and fire… and some rocks… we got this! We’ll just, uh- um…”

As their sunshine rambled on, Henry could see something click in Ellie’s head. Her eyes widened, shimmering with reflected firelight. “Water… fire… and rocks- no, earth…” Ellie’s gaze traveled upward, to the eclipsed skylight. “Henry!” Her force powers kept the crushing stone pillars at bay while she pointed towards the tip top of the ceiling. “I need to get up there!”

Henry rolled out of the way of an incoming stream of fire. They didn’t have a lot of time. Inside their bag were a few things that could get Ellie away from the rocks and up towards the skylight, but what?

There was a pair of boots in Henry’s inventory that would allow for a super jump – just bend your knees and boom! Up you go. Of course, there were way too many ways for that to end horrifically. The flames that were one wrong dodge away from ending Henry were not the greatest source of light. All it took was too much force and Ellie’s head would crack like an egg against the tough stone ceiling. Or too little force, perhaps, and she would fall into one of the various traps spread across the chamber. It was unwise to leap before one could look, after all.

There was a wooden pole stashed away in there as well. One of those nice collapsible ones. Henry could toss it javelin style to Ellie and of course she’d catch it, she’s Ellie, and once she had it she’d go vaulting over the stone crushers keeping her trapped. The wood was very flexible after all, so it wouldn’t be a-

Wait, no. It was made of wood. Which meant, with Henry’s luck, they’d toss it to Ellie only for the trio to watch it be burnt to ash mid-flight. That would be a terrible way for the Triple Threat to burn out.

So, something that wouldn’t be destroyed by the fire, and something that she’d be able to control even under these poor lighting conditions. That left…

A silver chain glistened in the firelight, strong and fierce and far, far more fireproof then the wooden pole. The primary purpose of this thing was to lift and pull, and Henry couldn’t use it for much else. Ellie, however, was far more versatile, and that showed in her shining eyes as she caught the chain in midair, not even looking back at Henry as she did.

Ellie smirked, and Henry knew they were in for a good time.

She whipped the silver chain over her head and out to one of the many decorative protrusions on the rounded ceiling. It stuck firmly in place, and just before a crushing pillar could flatten her into pancake, Ellie launched into a wide swing. Fire licked at her feet and clothing as she came around to Henry’s side of the chamber, but she didn’t so much as flinch. Instead, she held one arm out wide to catch her partner as she swung past, and Henry gripped her hand for all it was worth. They continued their arc around the chamber, and Henry didn’t even need to be told to hold on to Ellie with one arm as they approached where the strong geyser of water had Charles pinned. Henry grabbed him by the collar and held him tight as the soaked pilot got his grip on Ellie.

“You guys okay?” Ellie called down to them, and Charles nodded while Henry gave her a thumbs up. “Awesome! Hang on tight, we’re going up!”

The arc of their swing widened and quickened, spinning them around the room again and again until they built up enough speed for Ellie to launch them towards the spot where the skylight would be. The air rushed past them as they flew upward. Ellie released one hand from her chain, reaching towards the stone covering. They inched closer, and closer…

And something clicked as Ellie’s outstretched hand pushed in the final button.

Below them, the traps disappeared as quickly as they had activated. The fire stopped. The stone crushing pillars retreated back to their spots hidden in the ceiling. The stream of water sputtered to a halt. The trio landed back on solid ground just as the skylight began to open again, illuminating the temple with sparkling sunlight. Just behind them, the ground rumbled and shook before opening up to reveal a spiral staircase into the unknown depths.

“Woo-hoo!” Charles cheered. The fabric of his clothing was drenched and worn from the pressure of the water that had trapped him earlier, but Charles hardly paid it any mind as he threw his arms around his partner. “Way to go Els!”

“That was so cool!” Henry gushed, piling into her from the other side to keep her sandwiched between them. With her two loves surrounding her, Ellie was able to wind down a little, her shoulders relaxing and her smile widening to expose cute dimples on each side of her mouth.

Ellie giggled in response to their compliments. One of her arms snaked around Henry’s waist while the other latched around Charles’ shoulders. “It wasn’t a big deal.” She shrugged, mock bashfulness on her face even as she reveled in their praise. “I just figured, once Charles said that thing about fire and water and stone, that the traps were based on the elements, and from there it wasn’t hard to figure out that there was another button on the skylight.”

“Still! That was AWESOME!” Charles eyes practically sparkled with delight. “The way you tossed that hook and just-” Charles paused to lift both Ellie and Henry off the ground. He was strong enough to do so, but only barely, leaving Ellie squealing and Henry clinging on for dear life. Charles spun as he continued to recount the events that they’d just lived through, thank you very much.

When Charles finally put them down, Henry took the opportunity to link their fingers with Ellie’s, bringing a softer expression to her face. “Seriously. You were amazing.”

Ellie met their eyes. Those purple orbs seemed to glow softly in the sunlight, reflecting every feeling she couldn’t say. All her worry, her joy, her excitement, her pride, her love… she could spill it out in a thousand words like Charles, but that was never her style. She showed her love in her actions, in her worried fussing, in the look in her eyes as she watched after the two of them.

Henry squeezed her hand a little tighter, relishing in her tender gaze.

“-and then you landed perfectly!” Having finished his little tirade, Charles gazed back at the two of them, and his entire demeanor seemed to soften when he noticed their intertwined hands. “So, yeah. That was super cool.”

“It was.” Ellie agreed finally. She gave Henry’s hand a final squeeze before pulling away to jog lazily towards the newly revealed stairwell. “Now come on! We’re so close to the amethyst I can practically taste it!” Charles chased after her, laughing, and Henry followed suit down the long set of spiral stairs. Darkness waited below, but for now they had the beam of light from the opening directly overhead, granting them safe passage. As they descended, the air cooled; from Henry’s limited experience, the jungle was never anything but unpleasantly humid, so it was a nice change of pace. They zoned out as they walked: listening to Ellie and Charles discuss what might lie ahead, feeling the cool air grant their skin sweet relief from the awful heat, seeing the shadows grow across the ground below them, smelling the old musk of trapped air rise-

Henry blinked and looked back down at the ground below the skylight. The rays hit the ground uninterrupted, illuminating the old stones for the first time in centuries. They then looked upward at the skylight, seeing it clearly, without any sort of obstacle that could cast a shadow. But Henry could have sworn…

No, it was just their paranoia acting up again. Henry exhaled deeply and continued onward.

--------------------

The spiral staircase went down a long, long way, extending past what Henry thought would be the bottom of the pyramid. When they finally reached the end, the Triple Threat found the passageway as dark and foreboding as the ones upstairs before the skylight. They had Charles’ torch, but even its beam could only extend so far. Down below the surface the air was cooler but stale, and the walls, while thick and beautifully crafted, had no more stories to tell. Instead a pattern of intricate molding and paneling lead their way to the depths of the tomb.

The silence between them was deafening as each member of the Triple Threat prepared, in their own way, for whatever traps might lay ahead. As it turned out though, the largest trap they had to worry about was the architecture. Each pathway ended with a split in two directions. All it took was two turns for Henry to realize just how lost they could get in this convoluted maze. Luckily, their partners had a solution.

“It’s the same system we use when gaming together.” Charles explained as he scribbled on a piece of notebook paper. “We’ll make a map as we go, and mark shapes into the walls so we don’t get turned around.” As if to demonstrate, Ellie marked an o with a line through it right next to a clear dead end, and Charles made a corresponding mark on the map. “I don’t mean to ah, brag or anything, but we’re basically professional cartographers at this point.”

As if to demonstrate their prowess, Charles turned and proudly presented the map, which was just a jumble of lines with random symbols on it to Henry. Still, they gave the two an approving thumbs up.

So the trio marched on. This section of the pyramid wasn’t necessarily difficult, given that the traps were all laughably easy to dodge, but it did drag on a bit. The labyrinth was designed to confuse and entrap any enterprising thieves, and perhaps it would have successfully diverted one on their own.

Good thing these thieves came in a set of three.

At some point they reached a long sloping hallway, stretching so far forward that Charles’ flashlight could not even illuminate the far wall. The scent of upcoming danger wafted in the air, causing a mixture of anxiety and excitement in the trio. Charles got the privilege of leading the way due to his incredible skill of remembering to bring a torch, but Ellie and Henry were not far behind.

“Keep a sharp eye out.” Ellie warned as they crept down the long, long passageway. “There could be traps everywhere. Be prepared for anything-”

Click.

Henry looked down at their foot, and the slight indent in the floor from where they’d managed to step on a button. Whoops.

“What did I literally just say?” Ellie scolded, looking more annoyed than genuinely panicked. All Henry could muster in response was a sheepish grin.

The whole pyramid shook underneath their feet. Ellie and Charles, somehow, kept their balance, but Henry could not, and it was only after they’d fallen to the floor and were forced to look up that they saw the giant boulder cascading down towards them. They were up and running in an instant, and the screaming behind them told Henry their sunshine and moonlight were trailing behind them.

“Ah, Henry?” Charles called. His voice held a hint of nervousness – just a small touch – as he somehow managed to keep pace with the two thieves. “Now might be a good time for one of your tricks. You know, like that earthbending thing you can sometimes do-” Wouldn’t work. Henry’s skills weren’t strong enough to stop something that big in it’s tracks. They’d create a ramp to launch the blasted thing just above their heads and end up managing to crush the trio like a batch of gross pancakes. “-or maybe one of those Gizmo Gabe things you’re always carrying around-” Nah, Henry didn’t even need future sight to see where that would go wrong. Gadget Gabe (Charles never could get that name right) meant well, but their devices were… well, half-baked. The Float-O-Matic in their pack might get them away from the boulder, but it might also get them stuck to the ceiling with no hope of escape. No thank you.

“Or, you know,” Ellie yelled over the rumbling. Her voice was a little stressed, but also a little teasing, “We could teleport away from it!”

“Get bent!” Henry snapped back at her. “We don’t need that thing! It ALWAYS backfires!”

With that, Henry pulled out a sheet of paper, a canvas about the size of their body, and spun around to face the boulder head on. Ellie and Charles called out behind them, but Henry was singularly focused on the rock speeding at them at high speeds. The paper in their arms crinkled loudly as Henry waved it with both arms, as if airing out a towel, before dramatically bringing it up over their head. They waited for the boulder to get in to place.

Waiting…

Waiting….

Waiting… now!

The paper tore the boulder into tiny little shreds, sending shrapnel flying all around. Henry paid it no mind, driving the giant sheet of paper down further and further. It ground down the boulder until nothing but dust remained.

“See?” Henry looked back, speaking between deep breaths. Using that much force really took a lot out of a person. “We don’t need the teleporter.”

Ellie blinked stupidly at the display in front of her. “What- but- how did you-?!”

Dearest Charles, the only sympathetic party to her confusion, patted her gently on the back as he explained: “Paper beats rock. That’s just logic.”

“That only works in rock, paper, scissors!” Ellie cried out, frustrated. “That’s not how-”

She was shushed gently, and treated to one of Charles’ sunshiny smiles. “It’s Henry.” He said plainly, as if this explained what she’d just seen. “Don’t question it.”

As Henry passed her, listening to her frustrated grunting, they couldn’t help but smile. Mere moments after they disappeared into the darkness, the crackling and crunching of stone debris could be heard behind them.

--------------------

Finally, after long hours of trekking, after all the falls and traps and near death experiences that had protected the treasure within, the Triple Threat arrived at the grand entrance to the tomb. Before them stood a door at least as tall as the three stacked up. It was engraved with the Queen Empress’ visage, grand and imposing as she stared down at the mighty rats who dared steal from her precious tomb. Never one to do things by halves, the Mighty Empress had the door’s framing made of shining gold, which had Henry and Ellie salivating and Charles rolling his eyes. The torches that once illuminated the path to her final place of resting had been damp and cold far longer than any of them had been alive.

“You know,” Ellie looked up at the humongous image of the woman, as grand as she was tall, with crossed arms and thin lips, “I think this might be the burial chamber. Not sure why, but I just get that vibe, you know?”

Charles snorted. “I dunno, we’ve seen a lot of this woman plastered everywhere.”

“Good point.” Ellie agreed.

While they bickered and quipped, Henry took a good look at the grand entrance and stroked their chin thoughtfully. They pushed at the door and, to no one’s surprise, it didn’t budge. So they’d have to pull it open. A difficult task, without handles on a door more than twice Henry’s size, but Henry was a master of work smarter, not harder.

Except for that one time with the bank.

Or that other time with the prison.

Or… you know what? Henry was just going to drop this line of thought before they embarrassed themselves further.

Instead, Henry pulled a crowbar out of their inventory and wedged it carefully between the giant stone doors. Its lodging gave Henry the leverage needed to pry the door open, and the task was made easier when Charles and Ellie finally broke away from their banter to lend their strength. Together they succeeded, as they always did, and the door to the crypt opened with a gust of wind and a pungent odor. Rot and decay caused the trio’s eyes and noses to burn, but they pressed onward. Ellie, in a moment of practical brilliance, handed out air fresheners she’d stolen from the helicopter rental place. The scent of pine was too faint to completely block out the stench, but it provided a little relief.

The entire interior of the chamber was bathed in green light, illuminated by lines of shimmering green stone on the ground. Made from the same glowing material as the murals upstairs, it did such a good job of lighting up the joint that Charles was able to give his poor, overworked torch a well deserved rest. The lines ran up the walls, across the floor, in circles and in straight dashes across dark stone, revealing a room about as large as the temple above, and… largely empty. A few altars were placed in each corner beneath a mural, and in the center of the room was an unremarkable stone box which must have contained the queen’s body.

Charles echoed Henry’s thoughts exactly. “Wait, is this it?”

“Not seeing a lot of treasure here, Charlie.” Ellie remarked. She waltzed ahead to the stone casket, frowning as she mulled it over.

“No, wait, no!” Almost frantically, their poor pilot began zipping around the room, at this point uncaring of any traps he might uncover. “There has to be more! There’s no way this isn’t the place! Unless… they didn’t bury her with it? But that wouldn’t make any sense…!”

Henry idly pat Charles on the back while he spiraled over the misinformation. They were just about to tell him something along the lines of ‘It’s about the journey, not the destination’ (a useless platitude, but one that might make him feel better) when their eyes drifted to the wall behind one of the altars, to the large portrait of a god surrounded by mountains. The divine being’s eyes were blank, painted without pupils, but the rest of their body language – their stance, their expression, the scowl on their face – suggested pure, unbridled rage. Scanning the rest of the room, Henry found two more familiar figures along the walls near the other altars. The Ocean God and the Sky God, each gazing into the room with the same fury as the Mountain God.

Henry had seen this before.

While the fire and water and giant stones had been a very good distraction from what Henry had assumed was just a common legend immortalized upon the walls, they had still managed to take a good look before they’d been forced to move on. Three altars for three gods that had needed to be placated by a trickster.

Just as Ellie had made her way over to join them in comforting Charles, Henry left his side and made their way over to the Mountain God’s altar. How had the mural gone again?

A god of the mountains defeated with a seed. All Henry had on them that could satisfy that condition was some sunflower seeds that Charles had packed for snacking. Taking a breath and praying this wouldn’t get them all killed in some horrible way, Henry took one seed from the packet and dropped it on the altar.

The glowing lines on the floor suddenly shifted, spinning as the mural changed before their eyes. The angry god smiled down happily at the seedling on their altar, placated by the promise of new plants spreading across the mountains. Sounds of awe came from Ellie and Charles, but Henry paid their partners no mind as they struggled to recall the next image. The god of the sky, with storm clouds flooding the air around them and lightning a their fingertips, had been placated with a… piece of jewelry? A ring? No, that wasn’t right… a necklace…? Yeah, that was it.

While Henry had more than their fair share of fine accessories, they weren’t in the habit of bringing those accessories with them, on account of potentially losing them, or breaking them, or being electrocuted when the metal catches lightning or something. So instead of a nice, fancy necklace like in the mural above ground, all they could offer to the sky god was their employee badge from work, a little lanyard with a picture of Henry and a bar-code on it. Nothing like the ornate piece that was offered in the mural, but the sky god accepted it anyways. As before, the lines on the floor changed, transforming the image instead to that a pleased god with calm skies and a sunny smile.

That just left the final mural. The god of the oceans, vast and temperamental, plagued with storms and swells alike, glared down at Henry in clear rage. The last god was soothed with a song, Henry recalled. So how should they proceed?

Henry already knew singing was out of the question. Their throat was already sore from a day of mere conversational talking, and even beyond that Henry’s musical gifts did… not extend to their vocal chords. Breaking out into song would only shatter all their heads like glass. Hitting the high note was not among Henry’s many talents; Their B sharp would only fall flat.

So, instead, Henry produced a long out of date mp3 player from their inventory. How long had that thing been in there? Five years? Ten? However long it took for the once widespread piece of musical tech to become completely irrelevant. Of course, somehow, it still had a charge on it, and Henry’s grin only widened as a familiar hip hop tune, popular in whatever decade Henry had last bothered to update the thing, began thumping out, echoing sweetly in the large chamber.

Charles’ face lit up immediately, “Ooh, I remember this! Aw man, I used to sing this all the time when I was a kid!” As if to prove his point, Charles joined in with the next line. Much like Charles himself, the singing was a little clumsy, a little off note, but so sweet and so enthusiastic that you couldn’t help but bask in the warmth.

Ellie laughed along, reflecting Charles’ enthusiasm with her own uniquely charming mirth, and joined in on the singing. Her voice was elegant and refined, carrying the tune of the song far more easily than Charles’. Ellie would have never sung like this even a year ago, when they’d first started dating, too concerned with proving herself cool and reliable to her new comrades, even if she let her true self slip through once in a while. Now she was unafraid to really let her hair down, matching Charles’s silliness with unrestrained enthusiasm.

And, of course, they’d never leave Henry out. For even though Henry couldn’t sing, they were quite the dancer, and all it took was the gentlest pull of their sun and moon’s gravity for Henry to be sucked into their orbit. They spun and twirled and danced to the beat of the song, Henry guiding their partners through the motions of the rhythm. None of the Triple Threat paid any mind to the change in the green lines, or the appearance of a fourth mural as the beaming trickster appeared to create a fourth line of green luminescent light. It was only at the end of the song, when the trio were exhausted and laughing on the floor, did they catch the tail end of the changes in the room as the lid of the coffin retracted.

Henry exchange a look with their partners before approaching the open tomb. They expected a collection of withered bones and tattered clothes to be laid before them as they peered into the grave, but to their surprise what instead met their eyes was one final staircase.

“So this was a false burial chamber.” Ellie mused from behind them. “Sneaky. Verrrrry sneaky.”

“Hah!” Charles cheered, pumping an arm in celebration. “I knew there had to be more to it! No way my information was wrong!” The melancholy of his earlier disappointment had completely flipped on its head, leaving fierce determination in its place. “That treasure’s gotta be just up ahead! Come on, team! Final stretch!”

He extended out a hand, and it was almost without thought that Henry reached out to place their own atop it, followed swiftly by Ellie. Their eyes met, green and red and violet sparkling with the emerald light of the glowing stone lines surrounding them, and the Triple Threat nodded as they broke their huddle by launching their hands to the ceiling in one final show of commitment to their quest before charging down the secret stairs, energy renewed.

All the while unaware of the silhouetted form shadowing them, silently darkening the space behind them. The figure halted, watching and listening, before descending down after them with slow, tenacious steps.

--------------------

Darkness crept upward as the Triple Threat crept down. The ray of Charles’ torch, now beginning to fade in intensity after several hours of use, was the only source of light in the dank, shadowy crypt. Almost as unnerving as the darkness was the silence, the complete and utter cessation of any sounds other than their echoing footsteps. Tingling sensations traveled along Henry’s spine with each stride downward they took, muscles tensed as they awaited the next trap, the next emergency, the next big bad thing that would jump out from the pitch black nothing stretching ahead of them and their partners.

What instead greeted them was the sound of rushing water.

Each member of the team immediately jolted to a halt as their tired minds finally processed the sound, and once they did Henry spared a glance to first Ellie, right behind them with eyes blown wide, then Charles, whose jaw dropped so low it was practically on the floor. Caution thrown to the wind, the Triple Threat redoubled their pace, going as fast as they dared until they reached the end of the final descent. The bottom of the stairs lead to a hallway only a few meters long, its exit beckoning them with a rainbow of illuminated stones. Charles’ torch clicked off, but the light in the room didn’t diminish enough to hamper the quickened steps of the suddenly elated adventurers. Henry’s heart pounded harder, disbelief buzzing over their bones as hope built in their chest. Was this it? Did they make it?

The end of the hallway opened up, and Charles’ sharp gasp of shock and awe did more to express Henry’s feelings in that moment than anything they could have put into words.

The Queen Empress had built her final resting place atop an underground spring full of crystal clear water carving its way through the spacious cavern. Its forks and twists created small islands, upon each of which was a small mountain of captured treasures for the Empress to take into her next life. It felt like something out of a cheesy movie; piles of glittering gold coins and cups and whatever else the tyrant had managed to snatch away from their rightful owners, stretching so tall one almost couldn’t see over them to the rocky edges of the naturally formed cave. Henry took a few stunned steps forward, only noting the possibility of more traps after failing to be hit by any. A quick glance to their six showed that their partners were in similar states of awe, Charles oohing and ahhing and Ellie practically salivating over the piles of treasure.

With this much moolah, the Triple Threat would never have to work again… they could live in the lap of luxury, servants at their beck and call, all their wishes and desires fulfilled with only a snap of the fingers… diamond jewelry and name-brand furniture and private chefs and golden toilet seats and-!

“Aw man, this is so cool!” Charles chirped up behind Henry, knocking them out of their daydreams, wading across the one of the streams with a carefree swagger. “It must’ve taken years to get all this down here! How do you think they got it all down those stairs?”

Of course. Damned logistics. Well, Henry was certain they could get at least a good chunk outta here before their vacation was up. After they found their prize, of course.

At the center of the spring, surrounded by waterfalls and luscious cave flowers, was the Queen Empress’ sarcophagus. It was delicately carved, much more ornate and intricate than the fake sarcophagus upstairs, which made Henry feel silly for ever thinking that slab of lazily slapped together stone was the real tomb of such an egomaniac. And hovering above her coffin, the centerpiece of a grand chandelier dangling from the ceiling, was the Amazonian Amethyst, shimmering stunningly as light from the glowing stones that decorated the tomb reflected off of its brilliant surface.

“Beautiful…” Ellie whispered, walking ahead of Henry almost as if in a trance. Henry themselves hadn’t even realized they’d paused in a stupor until she overtook them, and then, well, it became a race. They playfully, not too hard, shoved Ellie to the side and bolted ahead, and of course she ran after them and shoved back even harder.

Somewhere behind them, Charles laughed. “Play nice, you two!” He called forward, no doubt fully aware that his demand would go unheeded.

The impromptu race took Ellie and Henry swiftly across the pathway through the spring, up the staircase and finally halting just underneath the chandelier. Now, how to lower it? Henry could just jump up and try to pull the gigantic gemstone loose, but something told them that they’d take the whole chandelier – and part of the stalactite it was dangling from – down with it, crushing both themselves and Ellie. Not the kind of bringing down the roof they were fond of. They could try and poke it loose with a stick or something, but it looked pretty wedged in there. It wouldn’t budge for quite a while, and them and Ellie would poke harder, and harder, until they’d used enough force to launch it into the air, where it’d fly up and up and then down and down and then hit their pilot in the head, knocking him out cold. Some anniversary present, eh Charles?

It was while Henry was skimming through their options that the sudden sound of metal clanking and clacking startled them into a jump. Their gaze darted around until it finally rested on Ellie, carefully lowering the chandelier on the opposite side of the sarcophagus with a smile and, once her eye caught Henry’s, a playful wink.

God, they loved this woman.

The chandelier came to rest atop the coffin. Henry and Ellie stood above it, and Henry didn’t need to look over at their moonlight to know that her eyes reflected the excitement as their own. They didn’t even need to speak; Henry pressed down on the chandelier with the full weight of their body while Ellie hopped atop the structure to pull at the amethyst.

“Come on,” She muttered to the gemstone stuck in the structure,” Come to mama.”

Her arms were quivering with the effort it took, but unlike Henry Ellie was strong, so with each pull it came a little more loose, then a little more… then more…

Until, with a pop, it was finally free. Ellie had been using so much force that she toppled off the chandelier and into Henry’s waiting arms.

She looked down at the gem, as if she couldn’t quite believe it was there in her hands, and then back up at Henry to begin laughing in sheer astonishment. “We found it,” She forced out between chuckles. Henry sauntered over to place their own hands underneath the gigantic gem, helping Ellie to support its weight. “We actually found it! Charles! Hey Charles!” Their guy, who had been distracted combing over the mountain of treasures, looked up at them and immediately his eyes popped out of their sockets. The expression had Ellie laughing even harder. “Aw, man, I can’t believe-”

Her mirthful tone was cut short by a bang.

Its echos thundered across the cavern, piercing Henry’s eardrums and stilling them instantly. There was no mistaking that sound, not for a trio of experienced adventurers like them. The sharp gasp that followed, however, was far scarier.

Henry and Ellie whipped their heads down to watch their partner gasp and stumble back, clutching at his leg, Without a second to spare Ellie dropped the gem and began sprinting back, and Henry followed swiftly after. They only halted when Charles’ fall to the ground was interrupted by a pair of large hands grabbing him and forcing him back on his feet. Streaks of red began running down Charles’ leg, staining his clothes, and as painful as it must have been for him to stand on his wounded leg, Charles’ only response was to bite his lip and glare up, past the muzzle of the gun shoved in his face, at the assailant now holding him hostage.

There was something familiar about this man, something that had a name dancing on the edge of Henry’s brain, but in their panic they couldn’t quite grasp it. Rather than try, Henry squared their shoulders and took a defensive stance, eyes darting around as they looked for options.

So far, nothing that wouldn’t get Charles killed.

“I don’t know who the hell you are,” Ellie addressed the attacker with a near business-like seriousness, only a hint of the rage Henry was sure she had bubbling within her lacing the words, “But if you drop the pilot now and begin running, I’ll give you five minutes to get out of here.” Swift as a hurricane gale, the sidearm Ellie always carried was in her hands, drawn and pointed at the assailant. She wouldn’t actually fire it, of course. She’d never risk hitting Charles-

(Which was why Henry hadn’t drawn theirs. With their bad luck, it’d misfire and put a hole clear through his skull.)

-but the attacker didn’t know that. Probably.

“Feh.” He scoffed, his red mustache twitching as his lips curled in disgust. “Ya don’ bother talkin’ about us, Henry?” The sheer resentment in his tone tickled something in Henry’s mind – a life they hadn’t lived, an alliance they hadn’t made, broken by a man they’d never met. If only they could put a name to the face…

Henry forced themselves to snap back to reality. Charles’ needed them in the now, they couldn’t afford to get lost in a life not lived.

“Or do you two actually not remembah me?” This time his embittered query was directed at Charles, which sparked an increasingly familiar protective fury in Henry’s chest, “Ya took everything I had, ruined my life, and ya can’t even be bothered ta remembah?!” As he went on, his voice got louder, his wrath colouring his words more and more, until he was screaming in Charles’ ear. Credit to their partner, Charles didn’t so much as flinch, the stern military composure that he almost never displayed finally being put to use.

That didn’t make it any easier to watch.

“If you’re so ticked about us forgetting,” Ellie quipped, the only clue that she shared Henry’s fear and fury hidden in the tenseness of her shoulders, “Then why don’t you remind us?

The call-out caused the bristling man to cool, at least somewhat. “Tch. It don’t actually matter a lick if ya know why ya need to die.” He pressed the muzzle of his gun into Charles’ neck, and their pilot, their sunshine, only grew colder and stonier in response. “Just that you do.”

He forced Charles to take a step backward, and in response to Ellie’s call of, “Wait, stop!”, he only aimed his gun at Henry and Ellie, forcing them to stop. His grip around Charles’ tightened to prevent escape in lieu of the gun threat; even if he hadn’t, the shot to the leg would’ve kept Charles’ from running.

“Oh, no, you two ain’t goin’ anywhere.” Growled the assailant. “This ol’ tomb is yours now. You’ll both die in this place. Not ‘im though.” Again, the gun’s tip rested against Charles’ skin. “’E’s my ticket to my next target. Can’t kill ‘em ‘til I get my ‘ands on that ringleader o’ yours.”

That one puzzled Henry a bit, but Ellie picked up on the clues faster. “You’re after the General.” She accused.

“Him,” The assailant proclaimed, and for just a moment Henry could see a flicker of red mechanical? light in one of his eyes, “’Is subordinates, ‘is witnesses… everyone who ‘ad a hand in bringing us down. I’m gonna get a little payback.”

Echoes of a voice across a timeline, a fight that never occurred, a betrayal from a man he never met… “Time fer a little payback!”

Without even thinking, Henry’s mind found the name amongst the fractures of futures that never were, and they whispered, “Right Hand Man.”

“So ya do remembah me.” He snipped. In this world, Henry had only really seen the man on the news, back when the Toppats were first being arrested, but he’d changed since then. His hair had grown far longer, his body thin from a diet of delicious prison slop, and his hat didn’t quite match up with the ex-con’s memories. But Henry felt stupid for forgetting what the man looked like, considering his impact in the alternate futures Henry had seen. “How flattering.”

“Know this guy, Hen?” Ellie asked, her brows furrowing at her partner. Henry tried not to think about what that could mean, or, with their mind fractured between timelines, how easily she could pull up memories from a world they weren’t as friendly in.

All they could manage was one word. “Toppats.”

“That’s what this is about?!” Charles exploded, breaking his stoic mask to glare at his captor. Henry’s silent prayers for him to shut up went unanswered, proving once again how the universe hated them, “Dude, we took down the Toppats, like, three years ago or something! You seriously couldn’t have found another clan to-?!”

Apparently this was what it took to offend the Right Hand Man, because he shifted his hold to grab at Charles’ hair and yank hard, causing a flinch of pain that made Henry’s arm hair stiffen. “I may need ya alive fer now,” He spat, “But if ya wanna keep that waggin’ tongue of yers, I suggest puttin’ a sock in it.”

Charles, thankfully, took that advice, even as he was forced to walk backwards on his injured leg. Everything in Henry was telling them to run after the Toppat cretin, to take back their Charles and make him pay for the damage he’d caused, but the gun barrel pointed at Charles’ face kept both them and Ellie painfully still. All they could do was watch as their sunlight was dragged away from them, leaving the duo stuck in the dark of the cavern.

“Dammit,” Ellie growled under her breath, We’ve got to-”

Once again, she was rudely cut off with a bang, this one much grander in scale. The cavern began to shake with the force of a small explosion set off from the very exit Charles and the Right Hand Man had just taken. Rocks began falling from the ceiling and, with growing horror, Henry realized that the Right Hand Man had intended to keep his promise: The exit was being sealed off. They would die here.

Ellie’s voice cut through the air with a sharp, “Henry, move!”

The exit seemed so far away, and the rocks were falling so fast. They wouldn’t make it. Not at the speed they were running at. Henry’s gut sank, and their mind raced as they peered desperately into the future.

A power slide wouldn’t get them enough speed. They’d make it just close enough for their foot to be crushed underneath the falling debris. Miles away from a home run.

Ultra speed shoes would make them go too fast, overshooting their target and burrowing through the staircase on the other side. That would cave in on top of them just as painfully as standing in the entrance would. And them without any power rings.

Time was slipping away. Fast. Soon the clock would run out, and they’d be trapped, and Charles would be- Charles would-

There was one other option. A change for escape that was just fast enough to get one of them out before the passage was sealed off. Without warning Henry grabbed Ellie’s hand, ignoring her sharp shriek as they spun around once, twice, three times… before tossing her like a hammer. Ellie barely had enough time to brace herself as she flew just underneath the falling the rubble, making it to safety on the other side before the final stones fell, sealing off the tomb completely.

A sigh of relief escaped Henry.

From behind the pillar of rubble, Ellie’s voice cried out. “Henry?! Henry!! Henry, are you there?!”

“I’m here!” They called, moving more swiftly towards the barrier between them and the outside. “I’m okay, I promise! Now get out of here!”

“What?! But you-!”

“Have air and water.” Henry cut her off. “I’ll be find until you can send for help. But Charles is alone with that psychopath. He needs you far more than I do right now.”

There was a pause from the other side, but no sound of Ellie moving away, so Henry kept silent until they finally heard her, “I’m coming back for you.” She promised, her voice carrying a rare sense of desperate seriousness. “I promise, I’m not going to abandon you here. No matter what happens.”

Ah, of course. Their Rose, their shimmering light in the dark, had been chewed up and left for the cops by some previous associates. If there was one thing she’d never joke about, it was betrayal. “I know.” They told her with all the trust in their heart, and they hoped that was enough for her. “Now go get our boy and show that Toppat jerk just who he’s messed with.”

“Okay.” Ellie agreed, her footsteps audible even through the debris. Then they fell silent. “I love you.” Her voice called back, and before Henry could respond Ellie was sprinting off into the distance.

Though their was no way their quiet voice could reach her, Henry whispered back, “Love you too, Moonlight.”

They continued listening through the rubble, Ellie’s footsteps becoming quieter and quieter until, finally, the only sound remaining was the babbling of the underground river, slowly flowing by. With no way to follow after their two loves, all Henry could do was drop to the ground, releasing the tension within them into a heavy sigh.

There was nothing they more they could do at this point. As well stocked as they kept their inventory, they’d somehow failed to think they’d need to bring any sort of mining equipment. Forcing their way out was out of the question. And while they could follow the underwater streams, there was no way of knowing how far the channel traveled before emptying itself outside – if it did at all. There was just as likely a chance of Henry finding a flooded cavern, and while they could swim reasonably well, they were far from a seasoned diver. The safest option was to wait for Ellie to save Charles and return to rescue them.

If she managed to catch them at all, a traitorous part of their brain whispered. Henry swallowed thickly around the familiar dryness in their throat.

Instead of dwelling on the what ifs and the fight no doubt going on above, Henry tried instead to focus on the positives, what few they could find. Right Hand Man’s explosion had only been large enough to cave in the entrance; the rest of the burial chamber, sans some debris and a few displaced pieces of treasure, was entirely intact, with little chance of caving in on Henry’s head. Glancing around the cavern, they could also see algae and moss growing along the sides of the river. With luck, that meant fish, so they were not likely to starve before help arrived either. Sushi was far from their preferred meal of choice, but they were used to working with what little they had.

Continuing their observation of the burial chamber, Henry’s eyes were quickly drawn to something out of place; a splotch of bright red in a room otherwise filled with muted blues and greens and golds. A gym bag, made of a rough modern fabric with a dark zipper, sat unassumingly not far from where the bloodstain of Charles’ shooting marred the ground. Alarm bells went off in Henry’s head the second they registered what they were looking at. Bags like this were typically used in the case of an inventory being exceeded, but the only tool the Right Hand Man had used was their gun, a pistol that lacked the equipment requirements to necessitate that much gear, and the explosives that had blown up the cavern. And why leave the bag behind?

Henry forced themselves to stand, an uneasy weight shifting in their gut as they moved. The bag was zipped shut. Henry’s fingers were slowly and shaky as they pulled the zipper up, over, and down…

Exposing the bomb left instead the bag. A much larger explosive with a much bigger yield. Henry’s experience with this particular brand of bomb was minimal, but they knew enough to know that it could easily level the entire pyramid.

The bastard had promised that Henry would die, after all. Of course he wouldn’t leave it to chance.

There was no clock on the bomb, no sign that it would just explode at random. That didn’t mean it wasn’t on a timer, of course, but given how spiteful the Right Hand Man had been so far, Henry had a feeling it would go off at his whim. Either way, however, time was short for Henry Stickmin. They had to find a way out of the mess, and fast.

Attempting to disarm the explosive was a possibility, of course, but Henry didn’t know diddly squat about bomb disposal. Any attempt to cut the wires would just set the bomb off. All the wires might as well be the red one when you have no idea what you’re doing, after all.

Their next thought was to attempt an escape through the river, but their previous logic gave them pause. If the stream emptied out into a completely submerged cavern, then Henry would either have to swim for freedom and hope they could find an exit or… drown. And there was no guarantee a bomb with this kind of yield wouldn’t cause a cave in that could leave Henry trapped without air. Of the many, many ways they’d seen themselves die, suffocating to death tended to be some of the worst, primarily because suffocating was slow. The worst deaths were always the slow ones.

Sighing heavily, Henry plopped themselves down next to the bag. Their eyes scanned it over when they noticed something… underneath the bomb.

No way. The Right Hand Man was NOT stupid enough to leave anything else inside that bag… right?

Very carefully, so as not to set off a premature explosion, Henry inched the bomb aside and took a gander at the contents underneath. Indeed, the Right Hand Man had left other things inside along with the bomb… mostly his trash. Old wrappers, what may have been a shopping list before water damage got to it, a photograph of Henry and their partners littered with cigarette burns that was absolutely not chilling in any way, thank you very much. Growling a little, Henry continued to shuffle things around, hoping that something in this trash might be a little useful. A manual for the explosive was probably too optimistic to ask, but maybe there was some gum they could use to gunk up the interior, or an old radio that could be used to jam the activation frequency, or… or…

Henry’s mind ground to a halt as they reached the bottom of the bag, staring down at the final piece of garbage with their mouth agape. For the first time since bidding Ellie adieu, they spoke.

“You have GOT to be kidding me!”

--------------------

For the second time in a single day, a thousand years of peaceful rest for the dead was disturbed by a barrage of footsteps. The first time Ellie traversed these halls, her steps carried caution, nervousness, excitement, and determination that damped the sounds of her and her partners’ (and their stalker’s) traversal through the tomb. Now, however, those same sounds were louder, stronger, more frequent as they bounced off the walls and amplified ten times over. Just as loud was the steady, heavy breathing that escaped from her gasping mouth as she raced backwards through the pyramid.

Louder still was the beating of her heart in her chest.

Ellie couldn’t’ let herself think. If she did, all her worries and fears, the danger her boys were in, would overwhelm her in an instant. All she could do was keep pace, keep looking forward. Follow her map through the labyrinth protecting the burial chamber and try not to think of the silly look on Charles’ face as he focused on making it. Climb the staircase into the temple and don’t think of Henry’s confident smile as they danced their way through the false burial chamber. By this point the purple jelly… rubber… things had dissolved or something, so Ellie had to use Henry’s metal chain to swing across the pit of deadly spikes and potentially less deadly snakes and not think about whether or not the kidnapper got Charles across unscathed.

At last she reached the exit, the light at the end of the tunnel. Exhaustion was seeping into her bones, but Ellie did her best not to heed it any mind. She ignored the searing pain of fresh sunlight piercing her sensitive retinas as she returned to the land of the living. Ellie’s gaze darted around the jungle, searching for her targets with the same discerning eye that once picked originals out of fakes. In mere moments she found her boy struggling against the grip of his attacker at the very edge of the treeline.

Ellie couldn’t waste a second. She skipped the stairs and slid down the side of the pyramid instead, coming to a halt at the very bottom. She didn’t pause to so much as catch her breath. Instead she flew forward, her lungs burning at the sight of Charles stuck in that bastard’s grip, his pistol at Charles’ temple, and without so much as a cry of warning she shot her pistol with pin perfect accuracy. Her mark, the tree immediately to the left of the captor and hostage, had a smoking hole clear through the center ring, at the same height of the red-headed bitch’s face. A singular warning of just what kind of force he was messing with before things got ugly.

(And if there was so much as a scratch on her Charles… oh, would things get ugly.)

Though she hardly needed to make the demand aloud, Ellie called out to the Toppat, “I’ll give you one more chance. Release the pilot, now.”

The Toppat – what had Henry called him? The Right Something? - took one look at her, at the smoking tip of the gun in her hand, and had the utter audacity to smirk at the sight of it. “Heh. You all by your lonesome, girly?”

Let it be known that Ellie’s boys could never keep a secret from her, and even through his military bravado Ellie could see the truth in Charles’ eyes. The initial wave of relief when her shot rang out, noting her safety, followed by a stunned sense of fear and panic. His eyes met her, the unspoken question broadcasted plainly in the crinkle of his brow, the way his lips pressed tight. Though he dared not speak aloud, Charles was all but begging for the truth.

Never one to let a dramatic moment go to waste, Ellie answered the questions of both men with a smirk. “What, you mean to imply your little firecracker did any actual damage? Hardly.” Charles’ shoulders relaxed just a fraction in response to Ellie’s answer, and her grin widened. “They’re a little caught up though, so I’m sure they won’t mind me having all the fun.”

The Right Hand Whatever’s smug expression only got smugger. Something sour coiled in Ellie’s gut, an alarm bell signaling trouble on the horizon, but despite her suspicions Ellie couldn’t back down. Not when all the chips were on the table, when Charles was clearly struggling on his injured leg. Not when her opponent clearly had an ace up his sleeve, while her cleverly disguised hand was an utter train wreck waiting to happen. All she could do was shore up her grin and keep her poker face strong.

For her Charles, who was hurt and scared and had a gun pointed at his face. For her Henry, who was trapped and alone and waiting for her to return. She needed to find out what this son of a bitch had planned.

“That right?” The Right Something or Other asked cheekily. “You should know something, girl. I was Right ‘and Man of the Toppat Clan. Second in command of the entire brigade. The enforcer to our leader’s brains. I ‘andled every threat that would ever cross ‘is desk.” His one hand, the one that had Charles’ arm in a death grip, began moving up, fingers dancing on Charles’ sleeve, until they reached his shoulders, where they tapped, tapped, tapped away. Ellie could see Charles’ brow wrinkle as he tried not to show his discomfort with the action. “I nevah missed a mark. Even when I did, I didn’t. Because I always, always ‘ad a backup plan.”

Ellie’s very mind went numb as a bone chilling dread set in.

And then, behind her, the pyramid exploded.

The force of the explosion was enough to very nearly knock Ellie off her feet. All she could bring herself to do was stare back at what remained of the ruins. Every thought in her head came to a grinding, crashing halt as she struggled to comprehend what she was seeing. Henry, her gemstone, her partner in crime, her best fucking friend was in there. Ellie left them there, and had promised to come back, and didn’t. And now they’re gone. She wanted to cry. She wanted to throw up. She wanted to scream.

All she could do was stand there and stare, like the idiot who’d let herself be betrayed all those years ago.

Charles did the reacting for her, calling out, “Henry!!” In a bone-chillingly horrified cry that, momentarily, drew Ellie out of her stupor. She spun back around just in time to see the Right Hand Man’s grip around Charles shift so that his arm was wrapped around their sweetheart’s throat, not quite tight enough to completely cut off air but tight enough to choke and hurt, and a new terror grew in her when she saw Charles struggling to break free. Their eyes met.

The hope that had ignited in Charles when Ellie had appeared was entirely gone now, replaced with a darkness Ellie couldn’t quite place in her normally optimistic partner. The tears in his eyes broke free every few seconds, leaving a scorching trail down his face. Ellie felt the sight trigger a burning in her own eyes and bit her lip to try and keep it in. She already knew that was a losing battle.

Then, Charles’ escape attempts redoubled as he shouted, “Shoot him!”

Stunned, Ellie’s eyes briefly darted to her gun, the sidearm she hadn’t lowered once throughout the entire exchange, before returning to Charles, “What?!”

“Shoot him!” Repeated the pilot. His lack of resistance to his captor so far, combined with his injury, must have left the Right Hand Murderer complacent, because he was genuinely struggling to get Charles under control again with only one arm, “Fucking kill him-! Make him pay, he can’t get away with this, he can’t-!”

“But-” Half of Ellie’s remaining strength was channeled into her hands, trying to prevent them from shaking. Her vision was too blurry with building tears to tell how successful she was, “I can’t- he’ll shoot you-” The Right Hand Monster’s weapon had been drawn away a little, but it was still pointed at Charles’ head. He could still very easily get a shot off before Ellie could finish pulling the trigger.

The utter rage in Charles’ voice only made Ellie’s shaking worse, “I don’t care, I don’t fucking care! He needs to die! He needs to suffer for what he did-!”

The murderer was yelling something at Charles, but it flew over Ellie’s head as she swallowed past the heavy lump in her throat. Her eyes burned, her vision blurring so badly she could only barely tell her boyfriend apart from that monster. The pressure of all that had happened in the past two minutes began to crush her lungs, leaving her gasping for air.

Henry was dead. They were gone and dead because of that man, that monster who hurt her partners and if she were a better agent, a stronger person, she could take the shot, take him out and avenge her gemstone but- but Charles was right there. All it would take was one misfire, one mistake, one twitch of her shaking hands and then she’d have lost both her partners.

She couldn’t breath. Her lungs were burning, Every gulp of air she took only fed the fire, suffocating her faster in a smoky haze of grief and terror.

Then, for what must have been the fourth time that day, Ellie was blinded by light.

This burst of light, however, was far more short lived, only blinding the three for a few key seconds. Just long enough for Henry’s fist to collide with the Right Bastard’s face. He flew back from the force of it, head colliding with the trunk of a nearby tree. That accursed gun was launched into the distance and lost amongst the natural chaos of the rain forest. Ellie frantically wiped at her face, desperate to clear her clouded sight and prove this wasn’t a trick of the eyes.

Once she could see, Ellie was treated to a vision of absolute beauty. Her partner, her gemstone, standing tall and proud above the Right Hand Loser, breathing heavily. His one hand was balled into a fist. His other kept hold of a painfully familiar device, and the sight of it nearly brought Ellie to tears of laughter.

“Never bring the teleporter!” Henry scolded the old man with all the fierceness of the drill instructors Ellie overheard back at base. They tossed the offending device far off into the distance, utter disgust written on their face. “It always backfires!”

“Henry…!” Charles called out, having been knocked aside in the chaos. As Henry’s attention was directed to their partner, Ellie noted the Right Hand What’s His Face darting towards the jungle and immediately turned her gaze in his direction. Her hands still, her vision clear, Ellie aimed true and hit the hat clean off his head.

This knocked the Right Hand Bastard off balance, which gave Ellie just enough time to rush him with all the force she could muster. Compounded with the strength of her force power, it was more than enough to knock the monster off his feet and onto the ground.

Her follow-up blow was blocked by his elbow, and when their gazes met Ellie could feel the resentment in his sneer. There was something below the hate, below the anger that brought them to this point, but now that her two lovers were safe Ellie let the full force of her rage out, throwing her fists and her feet into the man’s body wherever she could manage. His arms, his stomach, his head, his legs… wherever her hits could land, they landed with precision and force. Ellie barely felt the blows she got back in return, the punches to her stomach and head and chest that she knew she’d feel tomorrow. She didn’t care. She couldn’t care.

All she cared about was unleashing her pain on this sick, sick bastard.

An explosion of force suddenly hit Ellie’s stomach, propelling her back and away from the target of her wrath. For a moment nausea and vertigo overwhelmed her, just enough that the Right Hand Man managed to get back on his feet and start hurriedly limping towards the jungle.

Gritting her teeth, Ellie twisted herself around to launch herself again, feeling the rocks on the ground dig into her palms, feeling the heat of the jungle sun on her back. She could leap like a lion, could tackle him to the ground and beat him bloody before he even knew what hit him-

“Ellie!”

Henry’s voice gave the once thief pause, and she turned her gaze around to see Henry sat on the ground, Charles’ limp form cradled in their arms. The sight of the bloody bandages hastily wrapped around his leg caused her stomach to start spinning all over again.

Cursing her own stupidity for letting the Right Hand Whatever distract her for so long, Ellie pushed herself up and limped over to help Henry. Looking her partner over, Ellie could tell Henry had escaped by the skin of their teeth yet again. Their clothes were filthy, covered in soot and damaged from the rocks. Their hands, wrapped around Charles and holding him close, were stained with blood. Ellie briefly wondered if all of it was Charles, then immediately shut that thought down. She couldn’t handle any more worries right now.

Henry’s mouth opened and shut in a few false starts as their overly stressed brain struggled to put words in their mouth. Eventually they managed to spit out, “Help. For Charles.”

“Help for Charles.” Ellie agreed. Hopefully Henry remembered more from Charles’ on the fly piloting lessons than she did, because otherwise it was going to be a very long, very dangerous flight back.

--------------------

Ellie awoke to fingers at her face, pushing in her cheeks. Not forceful enough to hurt, but definitely enough to be annoying.

“Henry?” She grumbled, clumsily pushing their hand away from her. Despite their mutual agreement to get some sleep while their partner was being treated, Henry barely looked any better. They’d changed clothes at least, wearing some cheap t-shirt and sweatpants that the hospital had kindly provided, but dark shadows still highlighted their eyes.

But there was a shiny happiness in those ruby red orbs that brought any complaints Ellie had to a grinding halt. Their hands, stiff from soreness, moved slower than normal as they signed to her, “Charles is awake.”

That woke her up more thoroughly than any coffee could have.

Sure enough, sitting up on the bed at the end of the room was their pilot, their sweethearted ray of sunshine, who was too focused on picking the crust off his provided sandwich to notice the two approach at first. But Ellie could see the moment he spotted them, how his excited grin grew so wide it brightened the entire room.

“Yo, Els!” Charles greeted. “How are you feeling?”

“I think I should be asking you that.” She responded, keeping her tone light and playful despite the nerves wriggling within her. “Are you alright? Are you hurting anywhere?”

“Don’t worry, they got me hooked up on some good stuff.” Charles assured her, then hesitated, and something in Ellie went cold. Was something wrong? Had she missed something snoozing away?

Before her thoughts could get away from her, a warmth enveloped Ellie’s hand as Charles took it in his own. The light in his eyes was dim, morose, and it only made her want to hold him tight and never let go. The urge to follow up on that impulse, however, was halted by a single pair of words.

“I’m sorry.”

For a moment, Ellie hadn't been sure she’d heard him right. “You’re… sorry?” At his affirmative nod, she asked, “Sorry for what?” A thought occurred to her, and Ellie scowled, “If you’re blaming yourself for getting shot-”

“No, no, that’s not it.” Charles paused a second, “I mean, I should have been paying more attention-” Whatever he was about to say was interrupted with a light jab from Henry’s elbow into his side “Ah!” He shot a glance at Henry, who merely stared back at him, silent, expressionless. With a sigh, Charles proceeded along his original train of thought. “But I’m talking about what happened when- when Henry-” The words seemed to get caught in Charles throat, so again he redirected, “Uh, when the pyramid blew up, I said some… really aggressive things.”

Ellie forced her face into something neutral. She knew what Charles was talking about. She was trying not to dwell on it, on that unfamiliar rage in his eyes, on the sickening feeling that she was going to lose everything in one single, horrible day. If she looked as bad as she felt even remembering that moment, Ellie was certain she’d only make Charles feel worse.

But her skill at maintaining a poker face must have been out of practice, because Ellie could see the hurt in his eyes anyways.

“And- And I know I made you feel awful. I’m so sorry.” Charles buried his face in his hands and leaned back, allowing Henry to hold him as he continued. “I was just so mad… I thought Henry was- was gone, and I thought it was his fault, and- and- I just wanted him to pay for it. I didn’t care what happened to me, as long as he suffered. But- but that wasn’t fair to you.” Charles sighed, and Henry’s fingers began coming through his hair soothingly. “I’m really, really sorry, Els.”

Ellie exhaled deeply, feeling the tension in her body begin to relax a little. “I get it.” She said, approaching Charles’ bedside and sitting next to him. Curled up into Henry’s side, Charles looked incredibly small, and it made her heart leap. Ellie slipped her hand onto Charles’ knee, rubbing it comfortingly. “When the pyramid exploded, and Henry was still inside… I was angry too. I still am.” Ellie looked down at her bruised knuckles. She wondered if she’d managed to hurt that insufferable bastard. She hoped so. “If I thought for a second he’d have been the only one hurt, I would’ve taken the shot. Hell, if I were in your place…” Ellie could feel Charles’ muscles tense under her hand at the mere thought, and leaned over to lay her head on his shoulder. “I’d have probably done the same thing.”

“Are you sure?” Charles asked, uncertain. “Because you’re supposed to be smarter than me. You remember that, right?”

Henry snorted, drawing both of their attention upward. “If you thought that explosion could take me down,” They signed, grinning smugly, “Then both of you are idiots.”

“Rude.” Ellie snapped back with no bite. One of Charles’ hands came to rest on hers, and she brushed their fingers gently together, hoping the sensation was as soothing to Charles as it was to her. Judging from the pleasant sigh her partner let out, she was right on the money. On Charles’ other side, Henry had taken a seat on the bed and seemed content to have Charles’ weight pressed into their own, eyes a shimmer with fondness as Charles nuzzled into their side.

All was peaceful. All was calm. So, naturally, the government had to step in to ruin it.

More precisely, a small procession of soldiers came through the door with barely an announcement, causing the Triple Threat to scramble to attention, practically throwing themselves away from each other to sit up straight and look semi-professional. They inspected each corner of the room, clearing it inch by inch, before lining up at the doorway and saluting professionally.

When Galeforce walked into the room and dismissed the procession to play guard in the hall, Ellie felt her muscles all simultaneously slump into an awkward half-laying, half-sitting position. She was so done with surprises today. Any more and her heart would burst, Ellie was sure of it.

Once they were alone, Galeforce quickly reached their bedside with long, purposeful strides. “I’d just gotten word through my contacts that you’d been rushed in with a gun wound. Glad to see you’re all alright,” The old man admitted, an unusual softness in his voice. When working, Galeforce endeavored to remain professional in his interactions with his men, but it was not much of a secret that he had a weakness for the little orphan pilot that could. His attention turned to Henry and Ellie, both now recovered enough to sit casually by Charles’ side. “But what happened? I didn’t receive any reports of organized criminal activity in this area- at least, not anyone who would’ve known who you three are.”

“Toppat scum.” Henry signed at their commander. Just those two words had them looking like they’d swallowed something sour.

Galeforce’s sign language skills weren’t quite at Charles and Ellie’s level, but he recognized at least the important word and his shoulders went rigged. “Dammit.” Swore the general. “You all have my sincerest apologies. I should have warned you sooner.”

“Warned us?” Ellie asked, her tone sharpening at the implications.

The General sighed heavily, barely managing to keep his shoulders square with the weight of his guilt on his back. “Just after your vacation started, I’d gotten word that the leader of the Toppat Clan, Reginald Copperbottom, had been assassinated in prison.”

Ellie felt her eyes go wide, and she could feel Charles stiffen in surprise as well. Glancing across the hospital bed at Henry, Ellie found them staring up at the general aimlessly. She’d seen this lost look in their eyes before, when they were gazing into futures that would never happen, and wondered, not for the first time, how they managed with such a heavy burden on their shoulders. Seeing the future was a curse Henry bore mostly with silence, but her and Charles had been learning to pick up on the cues. Ellie’s arm wrapped around Charles, gripping Henry’s hand with just enough strength to anchor them to the present, and a moment later she felt them squeeze it back in recognition.

They’d explain later, most likely. For now, though, the General’s explanation kept their attention.

“Some prison guard had a family history with one of the chief’s predecessors. I won’t bore you with the details.” Galeforce sat on the empty bed nearby, leaning forward with his hands folded in front of his face. “But that very same night Reginald’s Right Hand Man, the second in command of the entire clan, escaped from prison. We’re still not sure how he even knew about Reginald’s death, but he managed to kill the assassin and grab his leader’s corpse on the way out. I thought he’d be more focused on resurrecting the clan than anything else, and with your vacation being out of the country, I decided to bring you into the loop once you got back.” Regret and frustration shone in the General’s eyes as he spoke, his gaze downcast to avoid looking at any of the trio. “I have no idea how he even managed to find you three, let alone pull off something like this. He has nothing; no resources, no allies, not even a penny to his name. I didn’t think-” The old man sighed, burying his face in his hands. “I don’t know how I can even begin making this up to you.”

Ellie took a moment to breath. Her first reaction was the familiar sting of hurt and betrayal, and at one point she may have gotten up in Galeforce’s face to really give him a piece of her mind. Years of unconditional support from her partners, however, gave her the patience to wait out that initial wave and follow up with a much more logical response of understanding. They were on vacation, out in the middle of nowhere with minimal ways to track them down. It wouldn’t have occurred to Galeforce that the bastard would even know where they are, let actually finding them and making them suffer. It would have been nice to have warning, but at the end of the day it wasn’t really his fault.

Henry stared off into space, their eyes clouded with conflict as they struggled between the frustration they were no doubt riddled with and the same logical conclusion Ellie came to. Charles sat slumped in the hospital bed, gazing down as he fiddled his thumbs. Charles had known Galeforce longer than either of them, and the bond of trust they’d built as subordinate and commander was hard to break, but she had no doubt her sweetheart was still upset.

So Ellie took the lead, smiling cheekily at the General, “Well, a few more weeks of vacation would be nice.”

Two pairs of eyes instantly hit the back of Ellie’s head, and she struggled not to turn around and face them. But hearing Ellie let the General off easy must have helped them make up their minds, because soon she felt Charles leaning against her back, his smile tickling the skin on her shoulder as he agreed, “And maybe a bit of overtime? I mean, we did technically face off against an enemy of the state…”

Galeforce chuckled at their responses, the weight on his shoulders lightening up bit by bit. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Henry pushed away from the wall, drawing enough attention to them so they could sign, “I can come up with a trap for the guy.” Their signing was more fluid, more playfully bouncy, and Ellie felt a little more of her worry edge away, “All we need is a few miles of rope, a pool of pudding, the Tunisian Diamond…”

“Now you’re pushing it.” The General joked back, standing with a smile. He seemed lighter on his feet than when he first entered. “I’ll arrange for transport back to base once Charlie is feeling a little better, and you’ll be under guard until further notice. For now, though, just focus on getting some rest. We’ve got protection duty taken care of.” The General began walking back towards the door, only to pause and look back, tipping his hat. “Oh. And happy anniversary.”

Silence rang loudly between them as Galeforce stepped out, quietly opening and closing the door behind him. The moment hung in the air and stretched the seconds into hours.

Finally, at last, Charles broke through the quiet with his usual blunt charm, clumsily destroying the remaining tension in the air with his joking snort. “Some anniversary.” He declared, crossing his arms. “We almost died, an ancient marvel of the lost world got blown up, and we have nothing to show for it!” He huffed, pouted, and then loudly declared, “Whoever planned this trip deserves to get shot.”

And despite all of it, Ellie couldn’t help but burst into laughs.

“It is a shame,” She agreed, wistfully recounting the weight of the amethyst in her hands. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Henry stand, but paid them no mind for the moment. “Still, up until that Toppat clown showed up it was pretty fun.”

“Yeah.” Charles agreed. “Like when you swung over those traps to pull our sorry butts out of the fire? Heh, that was pretty cool.” The stars shimmering in his eyes suggested he remembered the event being way more than cool, and Ellie couldn’t help but puff up a little in pride. It hadn’t been hard – she’d done way crazier back in her criminal days – but something about Charles’ earnest, enthusiastic reactions made her feel like the tallest person in the world. Henry (standing weirdly close, with a weird grin spread across their face) called him their sunshine for a reason, and as much as the two liked to tease them about their choice of nicknames, Ellie had to admit they were right on the money with that one.

“Or how you created a path of freakin’ bouncy balls to get across that weird spike pit.” Ellie recounted. At the time she’d felt her blood pressure spike with each bounce, but now, in hindsight, it had been both impressive and hilarious.

Charles laughed along, as full and bright as himself, and nodded eagerly. “Or- or how Henry broke out into a random dance and that somehow opened the way to the real tomb?” The memory of their dance across the false burial site only caused Ellie to laugh harder, a deep blush growing across her face. How could she have ever wanted to be a serious criminal, when being silly with these two idiots was so much more fun?

The fluttering laughter came to a slow halt as Ellie suddenly noticed Henry’s arms outstretched between her and Charles. More specifically, the gigantic purple gem nestled in their hands, reflecting the harsh light of the hospital to shine brighter than it had in the dim catacombs of the tomb. Ellie’s eyes trailed up Henry’s arms, across their shoulder, all the way up to that stupid smug grin on their face.

The cheeky bastard. When had they even had time to grab that thing?

“You clever little sneak!” Charles yelled out, recovering from the shock of seeing their hard won prize much faster than Ellie. His arms reached out, grabbing for his two partners, and Ellie and Henry reached back without hesitation. Any thought of the Right Hand Whatever, of the dangers past and dangers to come, of anything that could stand in the way of the Triple Threat floated to the very edge of Ellie’s mind, leaving her clear to focus on what was really important.

As far as anniversaries went, Ellie supposed this could have gone a lot worse.

--------------------

As the sun set over the city, a single man sat on a lone rooftop. His gaze was as piercing as the setting sun, matching it’s blinding glare with equal fierceness.

Feh, of course they bloody survived. Nothing could go right for the prior Right Hand Man lately.

Unwilling to let himself drown in his thoughts, the once Right Hand Man removed a crumpled piece of paper from his inventory, directing his ire down at the paper as if it was what had offended him, and not the myriad of names listed upon it.

Dozens upon dozens of people would have found their names upon that list. A small number were crossed out. A worthless avenger, a couple of gossiping jail guards, an old judge with a bad hair cut; a mere handful, compared to the number of names remaining. A thief, a pilot, and, more recently, an ex-gang runner. A general, his personal guard, a witness pulled from the airship’s brig. Turncoats and traitors to the clan, selling out their brothers for a scrap of leniency. Anyone and everyone even remotely involved in the fall of the Toppat Clan and the death of it’s leader were listed on this single scrap of paper.

“Don’ you worry a bit, Reg.” Murmured the enforcer, running his finger down the list like he was running a knife across some traitor’s skin. “I’ll make ‘em pay. Every last one of ‘em fuckers ‘at destroyed our clan. ‘Ey’ll all pay for wot they did. And once ‘ey do…”

His finger finally paused on the list’s final name, the ultimate victim of his revenge spree. The one who’s failure had lead to the destruction of everything the once Right Hand Man held dear.

“...I’ll be comin’ for ya, Reg. Save a spot in ‘ell fer me, would ya?”

--------------------

Aw, yes! More Polythreat!

I'm sorry for kind of being AWOL. I've been active on Tumblr, but was afflicted with some nasty writer's block. It took me a whole year to write this, believe it or not. I'd hoped to get it done by my birthday, but I'm just happy to have it done. Merry Christmas, everybody!

The events surrounding RHM and Reginald are depicted in a comic here on my tumblr: Atychiphobia - Fear of Failure. You can probably find it pretty easily. Neither RHM nor Copperright have been tagged, though. To preserve the surprise. Tags do kind of give away something going down, but it happens.

Thank you for reading! Hopefully I'll come up with something else to write soon.

#The Henry Stickmin Collection #THSC #Henry Stickmin #Polythreat #Poly Threat #Charles Calvin #Ellie Rose #They/Themry #Triple Threat #Knightmare Writing #Action/Adventure #Gun Violence #Hostage Situations #Tomb Raiding #Protective Triple Threat #Henry's powers are depicted as Future Vision #Assumed Character Death #Galeforce is here too for a lil bit #There's also a surprise mystery character! #They'll help the plot later!

[grantofalltrades]

Something from way back that has stuck with me - not wanting to claim credit by any means, just really want to be sure it does not go unremembered, I give you this tale from Scylla of the Straight Dope Message Board circa 2001:

Another Dog Story

I once read a story about an Irish Wolfhound.

These are the largest of all dog breeds, and the reason there are no wolves left in Ireland.

There was a Prince, and he had a wolfhound that he loved.

The dog was named Gledden.

Every morning the Prince would go hunting with the dog.

The Prince felt bad when his wife gave birth and he didn't hunt with Gledden for a whole week tending to his wife and daughter. Gledden didn't seem to mind though.

Finally, the Prince felt that his duties would allow him a morning off, and he took off, eager for the hunt. He was a bit miffed that Gledden seemd nowhere about. He hunted by himself, and after a fruitless morning, returned to his castle.

Upstairs though, he had cause for alarm. The nursery was disheveled. The bassinet was empty, and there was blood everywhere. Fearing the worst, the Prince called loudly for aid.

Hearing the cry Gledden came bounding to his master from the adjoining room. His mouth and chest were covered with blood, as he leaped onto his master with greeting.

Putting two and two together, the Prince concluded his prized dog had become jealous of his son, and killed him to secure his affections. In a murderous rage, he plunges his sword into Gledden's chest.

Gledden's death howl wakes up the Prince's son, and the the Prince hears his son's wail from the adjoining room Gledden had just appeared from.

In that room the Prince finds his son, unhurt, and still wrapped in his swaddling clothes. His son lies next to the corpse of the giant wolf that had pulled him from his bassinet.

It was that wolf's blood that covered Gledden.

The Prince buried Gledden on top of the highest hill, and changed the town's name to Gleddenfeld, meaning

"Gledden's Bed." That is what it is called today.

It is said the Prince never smiled again.

Gelert by Charles Burton Barber (c.1894)

I was intrigued by that legend, and I read up on the dogs.

When we bought this property, I wanted a large and fierce appearing dog.

Everything I'd read about Wolfhounds said they were gentle giants, and I spent $750 for a pup from a breeder. I figured such a large and loyal dog would be excellent around the farm. My wife would be spending a lot of time here alone while I worked, and the presence of such an animal might be a strong persuader to anybody who thought of messing with her.

The pup grew awkwardly. His front legs would grow, but the rest of him would stay the same for a few weeks, and he'd look funny. Then his ears would get left behind, and he'd look funny.

When fully grown, Corwin was 130 pounds. He'd jump up and greet me, and when he did so, he'd place both paws on my shoulder and look down at me.

The Irish Wolfhound- Get to know the Legendary Gentle Giant

When we wrestled he did something I've not known another dog to do. He'd give you a foot sweep. He'd walk up and club you in the lower leg with his big baseball bat of a paw and knock you down. Then he'd slobber you to death.

Sometimes he did look fierce, but then he would move and spoil the illusion. The fact of the matter was that he was obviously a big goof.

He'd run full speed through a field, and suddenly trip. He'd go cartwheeling and sliding fifty yards before coming to a stop, and there'd be a big trail of dust marking his crash. It was like watching a bus wreck.

Little kids loved him, and would actually ride him. He was polite, always friendly, and a good companion. He'd go wherever you went, and love it.

He was a terror inside the house though. He had that hound smell, and he'd render furniture unfit for human use just by being near it. If he sat on the couch, it'd be all dented and covered with coarse white hairs. There'd be a huge trail of drool soaking the side of it and puddled on the floor.

He'd wag his tail and it was like slinging a baseball bat.

Chairs would get knocked over and lamps thrown from tables.

My wife and I worked a deal to preserve the marriage. I built him a home in the barn to sleep in. He could spend evenings in the house, but in the Great room only, so that the damage could be contained.

Corwin, being rather agreeable towards anything, was fine with this.

The other problem was I got no respect. People around here are serious about their dogs, and nobody took big goofy Corwin very seriously. People have Rotweillers, Shepherds, Jack Russells, Retrievers, but I had the only Wolfhound, and there weren't any wolves.

Then, one day, at my nieghbors house, Corwin and my neighbor's Rottweiler hooch were messing around. They were in the back of my neighbor's pickup truck. I called Corwin to go, and he jumped out of the truck.

He didn't quite make it.

Corwin's balls landed on the trailer hitch.

H0000000000wwwwww000000000000! He cried, curled up pitifully.

It cost me two hundred dollars to get his balls treated.

What little respect I had received from my neighbors for Corwin was due to his considerable size. Now he was the laughingstock.

People would ask me how my dog's balls were as a form of greeting, their deadpan delivery giving way to a sly grin.

In spite of his clumsy good-natured klutziness and the ridicule it got me, I loved that dog. When he sighed contededly, it was a titanic emotion. You could lay down on the floor with your head on his chest and hear his mighty heart pulse. When he played with little kids or smaller dogs you beheld an infinite and epic goodwill and kindness, and a careful gentleness.

Later we got another dog, and it was the height of comedy to watch the little puppy "pin" Corwin to the ground.

He had a great soul, and I came to think of him as "Great-Souled Corwin," and admire his humanity (for lack of a better word.)

But, I thought of him as a lovable, but ultimately inept goof. A comic figure.

Corwin though, showed me differently, and we shared a defining moment.

I was walking around the property. Corwin was off galumphing about somewhere ahead.

There's a wild dog problem in this area. People buy a dog, decide they don't like it and set it free in the gamelands a mile away. Every late fall these dogs get hungry, lean, and mean, and they cause trouble with livestock and scare people. I've had five or six encounters in my time here, and I now do what my neighbors do when they encounter one.

They shoot it.

This was my first fall though, and my first encounter. I was unarmed, and merely out for a walk.

It was a Doberman, and it had been shot in the side of the head at some point. It had a big infected wound, and it was pissed off and seemed inclined to take it out on me. I knew better than to run, but this dog had me scared. It would charge forward silently a few paces, stop and back up. It wasn't barking, just growling quietly, and it felt like it was testing me out prior to a serious attack.

I was trying to make my way to a tree when Corwin showed up.

He came bounding over, toungue hanging out of his mouth, tripping over his own feet, and stopped dead when he and the Doberman simultaneously spied each other.

And then the dog I knew was gone. For the first and only time in my knowledge, Corwin became all business.

His goofy ears flattened against his shovel of a skull. His great long neck angled low to the ground, leaving his huge head parallel and a few inches above the dirt. The tounge withdrew into the mouth whose lips curled, revealing teeth and jaws more befitting a T-rex than a dog. The front legs and paws splayed widely and his huge shoulder muscles bunched. His tail whipped slowly from side to side like an angry and venomous snake.

The Doberman growled dangerously.

Corwin did not growl. I swear it. I know a growl. A growl is a threat. This was not a threat. It wasn't even a promise. This was a fact that issued from his throat. It was the eager fact of death both imminent and inevitable. It was the sound of murder.

I had never heard a sound like that before, and it's difficult to describe. It's a sound like an IRS audit, or the last tortured cry of the turbine engine on a jumbo jet before the plane crashes. It's the sound of a bill due and payable when you're already overdrawn.

It literally gave me goose bumps and loose bowels as I stood there. I knew if he had ever made that sound to a human being he would have had to have been destroyed.

Suddenly I understood his epic good nature and careful clumsiness. Equipped as he was, a perfect machine for murder, Corwin could not afford to pose or play it tough. Any overture in that direction would have been overkill.


Later I figured out that he shared something in common with every legitimate badass I’d ever known. He didn’t give a shit about his image. He knew he was deadly, and saw no reason to adertise the fact.

The other dog saw it too, and tried to back off without turning tail. It didn’t work. Corwin slid in low and fast.
His front paw shot out and swept the front legs of the Doberman, knocking it off balance. Then the Corwin’s huge jaws were around the throat of the Doberman. His neck came off the ground, taking the Doberman with it. The muscles clenched and you could hear bones snapping like crunching Broccoli.

All the while the same low yet insistent sound of murder continued.

It ended quickly, but Corwin held on for a long minute, unmoving.

Then he dropped the dog, and turned to me.

The ears popped up in their airheaded way, and he bounded comically over to me

“Duhhhhh, how ya doin?” his look said.

Wolfhounds don’t live long. 10 Years is a rarity. They are too big. Bloat gets them a lot, as does cancer, but most die of a heart attack.

Corwin made it to three years old. One night he seemed tired. He’d jogged with me that day, so that wasn’t unusual. He was mighty but he never had especially good endurance. The next morning he was dead.

I buried him, and planted a Maple. My brother, never a sentimentalist, loved that dog, and drove 4 hours to say goodbye.

I’ll never get another. The heartbreak was too much, and three years is far too short a time to spend in the company of such a magnificent animal.

That dog taught me a lot about manhood. I had just gotten married when I got him. Just bought this farm. I was pretty caught up in my image and felt very self-important at my relative success in business. I was proud, and thought dignity was something you wore like a piece of fine clothing. I thought it was a thing like a museum piece.

I’d like to think I know better now. I���d like to think that manhood and dignity are a compassionate fool who moves like a living Chevy Chase pratfall, that the greatest and stongest of us all, hide as clowns.

And, I hope that I learned enough from that dog that my daughter knows him, though they have never met. I hope that I’m man enough to reflect enough of that animal onto my daughter.

#tw: animal death #cw: animal death #straight dope message board #sdmb #mpsims #Scylla #corwin #irish wolfhound

[gonk-droid]

HC What type of RDR player the VDL Boys are

Crazy idea that came at me last night, basicaly, what if the boys played the game in a modern setting ? Might be a bit meta. It’s my first time doing headcanons but I had fun ! If you want to propose a SFW scenario, I’ll try my best writing some more :)

Dutch:

- Would mostly follow the storyline and find Dutch (duh) to be the most intriguing character of the game

- Would be a super history nerd and spend time online explaining what rockstar did right or wrong

- Always dresses Arthur elegantly and change his outfits for each occasion

- In online, he would definitly want to be the leader of a big gang and do high reward missions

Hosea:

- Would start the storyline then get lost roaming around the map, taking the scenery in. Stops and sit on rocks when he wants to find some peace

- He probably would spent hours trying to find each legendary animal and fish before even thinking of continuing the story

- Actually enjoys reading each page in Arthur’s journal, and crafting things at the campfire

Charles:

- Master hunter. He knows everything you need to know about any weapon and ammo

- Has his camera roll filled with artistic pics of the night sky or his horse grazing next to pretty lakes

- Took a selfie of him next to the legendary alligator to show his friends

- Likes to spent time in camp, doing the chores and listening to every character’s line of dialogue

- Is trying to do all the challenges but has a hard time

Javier:

- Really enjoys playing as John more, cause he loves the second half of the map

- Not against fishing sometimes when he wants to have a slow day playing

- Pretty casual with his way of playing, touches everything but never get too far into any

- Does enjoy the song nights around the campfire, especially when Javier plays alone

- Biggest fan of the “great great antagonize” technique

Arthur:

- Would play the story and most stranger missions he came accross while roaming around the map

- He would definitely keep his first horse and play with them till the end

- Like to play RP and actually walk around towns, listening to musicians in Saint Denis or in saloons, greating them. Probably also went a few times at the movie theatre after the Mary mission

- Never changed Arthur’s outfit since the beginning, likes to stay simple

John:

- Wants to be good but somehow always end up having terrible honor. He’s the type of person who wants to buy some apples in the Valentine general store, then happens to miss press his buttons and end up beating up some random guy, everything snowballing into killing the whole town and having to escape (and didn’t even get to buy apples)

- Never goes close to water and hates fishing

- Enjoys playing dominoes or poker with the gang occasionally

Micah:

- Is a dick to most NPCs

- Antagonize everyone in camp just for laugh (His favourite interaction is when Arthur tells Jack he doesn’t look like a Marston)

- Makes it a tradition to always take the worst choice possible in any given mission he come across

- Probably dresses Arthur with dark and edgy looking outfits

- All of his guns have black metal parts engraved with gold accents

- Likes to smoke cigarettes a lot and wonder everytime if smoking will make Arthur’s condition get worse faster

Lenny: 

- Looks like a casual player, is actually a big nerd

- Watches all videos he can find about the lore and secrets of the game. Is definitely the guy who teaches each gang member where to go to find gold bars and collectibles.

- Like to get drunk and attempt missions like this

- He reads all the letters and newspapers and tries to find some secrets between the lines

- Would play online and be the kind to give his legendaries to low ranked players to help them

- Is actually sad Arthur and Mary didn’t end up together

Bill:

- Enjoys hunting the most, but still finished the storyline

- He cried when his horse died but will never tell

- Likes to use melee weapons everywhere and slash random NPCs with the machete or pirate sword (Lenny told him where to find it) when he gets bored

- Has most of the trapper’s outfits and always make Arthur wear one of those animal fur hats

Pearson:

- He played the main game but flourishes in online

- The type to have the best campsite ever with a perfect stew cooking at all time

- Likes to RP a lot with other people on RP servers

- Is sad that there isn’t really much to do in the main game with boats, even if he enjoys using them everytime he spots one

Sean:

- Arson. The guy tries to set fire to everything and would shout “BOOM!” out loud everytime he does it

- Doesn’t really care about his horse, probably steals horses whenever just cause he can, and then get angry when his main horse doesn’t answer his whistles (he never bonded with them)

- Takes the notorious “Micah in prison selfie”

- Never pays his wanted prize, so the boy is constantly running away from bounty hunters

- In online he would duel any player he can find and end up spending all his time respawning everytime he got killed

Kieran:

- Spends most of his time trying to find THE perfect horse

- Always picks the lawful answer to any stranger mission (he does them all and loves them)

- Probably pets every horse he can find everytime he has to stop in a town

- Sad you can’t have a dog that follows you in your journey

- Is scared senseless of the serial killer side quest and had to ask Lenny to stay with him before he had to enter the basement

Uncle:

- probably plays once in a while cause the boys told him it was a great game

- He does play the story but keeps adding his commentary on every bad choice Dutch makes

- Thinks Guarma is wasted potential

- Tries to get on with prostitues then complain when he discovers you can’t

#rdr2 #Red Dead Redemption #rdr2 headcanons #dutch van der linde #hosea matthews #charles smith #javier escuella #arthur morgan #john marston #sean macguire #kieran duffy #micah bell #lenny summers #bill williamson #uncle #simon pearson

[revswanson]

red dead asks

questions to ask your rdr mutuals n favorite blogs, or to answer and fill out n post on your own (i’m going to!)

1. who do you think is a misunderstood or underrated character in the red dead series- why?

uncle for sure, I made a post about this already... Also, Jack, Abi, and John- all three of the Marstons are incredibly misunderstood. As for underrated, I think people do not talk about Tilly much at all but I think she is great.

2. what is your favorite TOWN or SETTLEMENT, and why? think of not only how pretty the town may be but the available amenities ie saloon, doctor, general, table games..

I love Saint Denis, truly, in every way. Just wish I could traverse it a bit faster. I love the dichotomies between rich and poor: the two saloons, the slums vs the mansions on main street... Chefs kiss.

3. ^ and what is your favorite state or region? Mexico areas from RDR1/Undead count…

Lemoyne is the best state because it has the prettiest locations to me, but I love Roanoke Ridge region too as it reminds me of my home state which it was clearly inspired by (Missouri).

4. which Stranger mission is your favorite? is your favorite Stranger in your favorite Stranger mission? (for example, one might love Charles Chatenay but thoroughly enjoy the Dragic missions more)

Albert Mason is my favorite Stranger, but I also love Chatenay and Francis Sinclair, too. The best missions are the Dragic missions though as they are thought provoking and unique, unexpected, etc. Legendary fish mission is cool too but just because the guy is funny and the fish are fun to catch.

5. favorite quote from the series?

"If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging."

6. what is your favorite non-story activity? hunting, fishing, herb gathering, greeting and watching people, sightseeing, swimming/boating…?

Sightseeing, watching people, and fishing. 🥰

7. why do you love red dead and what would you say you have legitimately learned from the series and will use in your life?

It makes me think and makes me feel. It makes me want to create (virtual photography and writing) and it has made me some pretty cool friends. It has taught me lessons about what makes somebody good or bad and how quickly someone can be perceived as either.

8. favorite time of day in game? favorite weather?

Sunrise/sunset. Best weather is right after it rains.

9. who is the most evil? cornwall, ross/milton/pinkertons, dutch/bill (rdr1), colm/other gangs, or micah/his men? who do you hate the most? do you empathize with or understand any of them?

They're all evil. They all represent evil. Greed, corruption, arrogance, unneeded violence... I hate Ross the most because of what he did to the Marstons and I hate corrupt cops more than most things in this world, tbh. But I think  Cornwall is the most evil as he has the most power (money = everything, always) and is willing to use it.

10. least favorite mission or companion activity, why?

I find the stagecoach robberies boring, or whatever, I just don't like them

11. which activities, historical callbacks, etc would you have liked to have seen in the game that aren’t?

Edgar Allan Poe/mystery crime stories... Gold panning as a playable activity. Decorating camp more/decorating Beechers Hope. Petting cats!

12. does your favorite character die? do you think that their death is important and necessary for the story, or does it take away from the character for you?

Many of my favorites die but my main favorite, Jack, does not die in canon. I find that the deaths in the series are all fundamental and while incredibly sad, make the story what it is.

13. favorite legendary animal?

probably the Badger, is cute

14. favorite outfit: including trapper outfits?

every trapper outfit that looks like a bounty hunter outfit, or any outfit I can make piratey

15. least favorite/most unused weapon?

I don't really use my repeaters much unless the game makes me or for some hunting

16. which rdr mystery still plagues your mind? do you think it will ever be solved? what do you believe?

Strange Man- nothing really to solve though, he's just strange...

17. how do you allow for immersion within your own playstyle, or do you? (ie not doing certain things you don’t think Arthur would do, adhering to a certain level of realistic play [no fast travel, etc])

I don't go to Saint Denis until the story has you do it, I love the feeling of Arthur seeing the city for the first time? I also am a huge honor snob and if I lose honor either through a purposeful action or an accident, I try so hard to get it back lol. I also don't like antagonizing camp members except for Micah or Strauss, occasionally Dutch.

18. if you are currently or want to create art (written, drawn, etc) about or inspired by rdr, please tell us about it.. share it!

I'm working on a couple of fics... idk. I also have many virtual photography projects planned/that I want to work on

19. which gang is the scariest? most evil? most fun to dispose of?

Skinners are terrifying, Murfees are screwed up... I enjoy disposing of O'Driscolls and ESPECIALLY Lemoyne Raiders and Laramies.

20. favorite filter to use in photomode?

Twin Pass probably

21. favorite campfire song?

Poor Lonesome Cowboy

22. does honor matter to you? favorite way to either get more or to lose honor?

YES... I'm a huge high honor snob.. I'll throw back a bunch of fish or stroll through town and greet everybody. Donate to camp in cents...

23. would you eat any of the food in rdr2 saloons? which item on which menu looks the best to you?

oh yes. The prairie chicken or whatever at Blackwater saloon? YUM

24. which gang member’s horse do you wish to have yourself?

TRELAWNY'S!!! Or Sean's, Charles', or Old Boy (John's before Epilogue)

25. favorite hat you can find, create (trapper) or steal (NOT purchase).. including trapper hat ornaments..?

Tricorn hat. I also like the hat ornaments, or miner's hat

26. how many playthroughs have you had of rdr2?

I'm on my third, I completed 100% on my second

27. ^ did you ever play rdr1? how does that experience change the rdr2 experience, if at all?

Yes, I played it once after completing 100% in RDR2 as a reward to myself lol. It was great and playing the second game before the first was a totally unique experience. Knowing what I knew about the story before changed it all.

28. best rdr fanfiction you’ve read?

This great Albert and Arthur one on ao3, if you want it send me a message!

29. who is your favorite rdr blogger?

I hate that I put this question because I don't want to answer ahahaha I really love @foundynnel because they post super cool picture sets

30. what is something random you’ve been wanting to say but haven’t? a theory maybe, a comment on your favorite/least favorite ship.. let’s hear it.. hehe

Dutch and anybody is not a good ship. Nobody deserves to deal with his ass. Hosea and him definitely had/have a thing but I still don't ship it- does that make sense? I don't want them together, Dutch hurts Hosea... :( But people who ship Dutch and Mary Beth 🤢

[bitalis]

i’m supposed to be hunting the legendary animals rn and here i am crying about how charles found arthur barely breathing and rushed him to safety so he could get well and he probably thought he lost him until he woke up one morning and there was that little spark of hope and how they stayed up north for a while and charles decided to go to give arthur time to recover and even though he’s still sick at least they’ll have more time together 😔

#nat.txt #charthur #my dumb brain said shut up and now i simply won’t ? #only ones who know that arthur is still alive is sadie and john and when micah died charles went to arthur #and told arthur and arthur cried the biggest cry because all he ever wanted was for that man to just drop dead #he’s just mad he couldn’t be there to see it

[365days365movies]

March, 6, 2021: Wolfwalkers (2020) (Part One)

I love Cartoon Saloon so goddamn much.

Before I’d seen a single Ghibli film, I was a big fan of the Irish film studio because of their first film, The Secret of Kells. They’d also done a few TV series in the years prior (I’ve heard of Skunk Fu!, and have no interest in seeing it), and still make a few to this day, but the first time I’d heard of them was with Kells, a delightful movie that borrowed from both Irish history and folklore in their telling of the making of a famous illustrated version of the Bible, and a young boy’s friendship with a mysterious forest spirit.

And yeah, that movie is great, but I didn’t have much to go off of then. And then, 5 years later, they released their second film. And that one fucking BROKE me.

Song of the Sea is the second in what would become director Tomm Moore’s trilogy of movies based on Irish folklore, and was a bit more contemporary as compared to Kells. That one’s about a boy and his mute sister, whom he blames for the death of his mother. However, his mother is not dead, but is a selkie, a mythical Irish mermaid that becomes a seal when donning a magical coat. And it turns out that his sister is one as well!

And you think, “aww, look at the seals, they’re drawn so cute” FUCK ME IT’S BEAUTIFUL AND HEARTBREAKING. It takes a lot from Irish mythology, from giants to owl-women, and it’s a fantastic fuckin’ movie. And then, three years later...Tomm Moore’s directing partner stepped up.

See, while Moore was developing Song of the Sea, his partner from Kells, Nora Twomey, stepped in with her own solo project: The Breadwinner. We leave Ireland this time for a book adaptation based in Afghanistan in the 1990s, where a young girl is forced to pretend to be a boy in order to provide for her family (which was apparently a common practice). A LOT happens in this one, and it’s goddamn fantastic as well! It lost to Coco for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars, and...yeah, that’s fair. It’s hard to beat Coco.

But wow, a 2-D animated feature-based company! WHICH IS FANTASTIC! Seriously, in a landscape with fewer and fewer 2-D films in theaters, I’m overjoyed to see these guys hanging in there with some fantastic films! And just when I’d neared desperation for a new Cartoon Saloon feature...here comes Moore.

Ohhhhhh, let’s fucking GO! The last entry of the Irish Folklore Trilogy, today’s entry is Wolfwalkers, a film that was exclusively released to Apple TV, which I got SPECIFICALLY for this movie. It’s $5, I can afford it.

But I am absolutely pumped for this one. It’s based off of the legend of the Werewolves of Ossory, a kingdom in medieval Ireland in which there was a legendary tribe of people with the ability to turn into wolves to hunt in the forest. It’s also based upon the Irish wolf, a population of grey wolves (Canis lupus) on the island that were sadly extirpated  in 1976. People, man. People.

But OK, let’s get this baby STARTED! Been wanting to watch this one since I heard about it, and I’m excited! SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Recap (1/2)

Kilkenny, Ireland, in the Year of Our Lord 1650! A group of loggers are working in the gorgeous and atmospheric Irish forest, when they’re accosted by a pack of...honestly very cool looking and well-designed wolves. One of them is caught by the pack and scratched up, then they all retreat.

A large mysterious woman with big red hair and her young daughter stop the wolves from hurting the man further, and also heal up his scratches. He thanks them, and they flee with the wolf pack as the angry townsfolk chase after them.

Wolves are the enemy of the townsfolk, and those townsfolk include the newly-arrived Bill Goodfellowe (Sean Bean) and his daughter, Robyn (Honor Kneafsey), who’ve just moved from England. Bill is a hunter, and his daughter is eager to help him in his endeavors, armed with a crossbow and her falcon, Merlyn.

Bill is on the way to hunt wolves, as assigned by the Lord Protector of England. Robyn badly wants to join him, but it’s dangerous out there, and the Lord Protector forbids children beyond the walls of Kilkenny. Robyn wants out, though, as she’s an English outsider in the Irish village, and this is at a point where their relationship was at an all-time low.

Robyn, clever girl that she is, finds a way to use a group of bullies to distract the men guarding the gates, and sneaks out to the forest with Merlin. As she follows her father (currently unbeknownst to him), she hears a cry warning of a wolf. Robyn runs off to investigate.

A group of shepherds are being accosted by a pack of wolves. Robyn tries to shoot one of them, but the panicking sheep knock into her, and she fires her arrow at...Merlyn. Fuck! I already liked him! The commotion grows...until a distinctly human howl is heard from the forest, stopping the wolves in their tracks. Robyn looks over at the downed Merlyn.

The little girl takes Merlyn away, and retreats back into the woods. The wolves block Robyn’s path, and as they’re about to attack her, Bill arrives, and shoots one of them with his crossbow. The human howl is heard again, and the wolves retreat, one of them injured. Bill chides Robyn for going into the woods, and she tries to go back to get Merlyn. But Bill promised her mother that she’d keep her safe...which means that she’s almost certainly dead. Well, damn. 

They leave the woods, only to be berated by the logger from the beginning, Seán Óg (Tommy Tiernan). He tells Bill off, as the increased logging under the Lord Protectorate has angered the wolves and the people who live with them, whom he refers to as “Wolfwalkers”. But Bill insists that the Lord Protectorate wants the woods cleared, and the wolves exterminated. Seán badmouths the Lord, and of course, who would show up but...

The Lord Protectorate is...oh dear FUCK, it’s Oliver Cromwell (Simon McBurney). Cromwell was a NOTORIOUS asshole for a lot of reasons, and he plays a big role in Ireland’s subjugation by England in the 1650s. I’m in no way educated enough to comment in detail on that, but like I said earlier: it’s a rough time in Irish history, and Oliver Cromwell, cruel, paranoid, but technically historically important douchebag that he was, was right at the center of it all. 

Fun fact, Cromwell actually overthrew the Monarchy shortly after this, during the English Civil War, and became the ruler of the Commonwealth of England. After his 1658 death, his son took over, until he was overthrown by the return of the Monarchy, via King Charles II about 3 years later. And he was SO FUCKING PISSED at the whole affair, that they had Cromwell’s corpse dug up from Westminster Abbey (where kings and queens and Charles Darwin are buried), beheaded, and stuck on a pike on Westminster Hall! Damn.

Anyway, this Oliver Cromwell is just about to overthrow the Monarchy, and he wants Ireland under his heel. He’s commanded the woods to be cut down in order for farms to be established, and Goodfellowe is assigned to exterminate the wolves completely so that that will happen. Upon seeing Robyn, he commands the guards to take her to the scullery, where she’ll probably be trained as a scullery maid. Yay, child labor!

Seán, having just seen the girl with the wolves, tells Robyn who she is. He tells her that the Wolfwalkers can talk to wolves, and will also heal the injured with wild magic. To go back into the woods, she unlocks the cage that Seán Óg was thrown in for insulting Cromwell. His sheep are also in there, and the release of  Seán and the sheep causes enough of a distraction for Robyn to flee into the woods.

Once there, she quickly finds Merlyn, who has indeed been healed by wild magic . Once there, a red wolf approaches her. Robyn readies her crossbow, but Merlyn prevents her from firing, and she gets caught in a snare as a result. During a struggle, the two clash, and the wolf bites Robyn.

She falls out of the snare, but also sees a new kind of vision, seeing the wolf as the girl from earlier in a beautifully animated type of vision. Her arm swirls with golden magic as well, emanating from the bite. Merlyn follows the wolf as they run away, and Robyn’s pursuit of the two leads her into a beautiful hidden grove, with a massive waterfall. Behind it is a cave, covered in drawings of humans and wolves. And that’s not all that’s in the cave.

At the center of the cave is the girl and her mother, sleeping and now surrounded by the wolves. The red wolf becomes yellow energy, and the energy goes into the little girl, who wakes up. Robyn is immediately found out, and the young girl approaches with the wolves at her back.

This is Mebh (pronounced “Maeve”) Óg MacTíre (Eva Whittaker), and I’ve IMMEDIATELY taken a liking to her, from her voice to her character design to her personality. Robyn doesn’t feel the same way, as the two clash. Mebh bit Robyn, but she was actually trying to get her out of the snare. The man are getting to close to the woods, which Mebh isn’t happy about, but Robyn says it’s “their” woods. Here we go.

Mebh uses her wild magic to fix the wound, before it’s too late. I get the feeling that it’s too late. Robyn tries to find out more, including who her mother is, but Mebh chases her off with her wolf pack in tow. And before I get to mention it, I just want to say that this is my favorite design for cartoon wolves. Real talk, I love this good bois. In the process of the chase, though, she’s again caught in a snare, which Mebh frees her from.

But as the two banter again, Mebh senses a “townie” like Robyn in the woods. It’s Bill, and Robyn goes to prevent the wolves from hurting her father. After a close call, Mebh points Robin back in the direction of the town, and blindfolds her to prevent truly discovering the location of the cave...this time. She guides Robyn back, but runs off when she smells food.

Robyn and Merlyn make their way back, and we overhear two shepherds from earlier talking about how one could turn into a wolf if bitten by a Wolfwalker. So, yeah, werewolf rules. Makes sense, given this story’s basis. The two shepherds also have Robyn’s crossbow and fresh bread. Mebh and Robyn work together to steal the food and crossbow, and run away together. Fast friends!

The two young girls bond, and share their struggles. Robyn wishes to go back to their simpler life in England, and wants to spend more time with her father, potentially in the woods. She warns Mebh that the forest is about to be cut down, endangering her and her pack. Mebh notes that her mother went to look for a new place for the pack to live, but hasn’t come back since. Robyn promises to tell her father about the Wolfwalkers and the struggles of the wolves. The two new friends part ways, promising to meet each other in the woods.

When she comes back home, Robyn prepares to tell her father her plan to get the wolves to leave without killing any of them. The preparation is entertaining, as she does a pretend back-and-forth with herself and her dad. Once he gets home, the reality is less great. When he finds out that Robyn never even went to the scullery, he doesn’t listen to her plan at all. He sends her to bed, and the plan is dead before it’s even proposed. Still, Robin promises Merlyn that they’ll find a way to help the wolves.

But that may be...harder than you’d think. As she sleeps, the golden magic comes back, and Robyn sees a wolf in her dreams. Pretty sure of where this is going. She wakes up with a start, and Bill hears this. He gets her up and takes her to the scullery, where she’s put to work.

Y’know, I’ve heard the term “scullery maid”, I’ve never once thought of what the term means. Apparently, it’s a kitchen or backroom in a house for housework, but where the hell is this? Is it, like, the town hall scullery? Not really clear, and it’s made more confusing when Robyn finds her way into a red-carpeted room with animal heads on the walls.

While there, her bite-mark glows, and a whisper of “giiiiiiiiirl” comes from a covered cage towards the front of the room. She approaches the cage, but is interrupted from checking it out by the head scullery maid. The Lord Protectorate has forbidden anyone from entering that room, and Imma call it now: that’s Mebh’s mom. I mean, yeah, no duh, but still. Calling it now.

That night, while asleep, the Wolfwalker’s magic officially takes hold, and Robyn wakes up as a wolf in her bedroom, while her human body sleeps. Her father hears the commotion in Robyn’s loft, and is about to literally kill her wolf-self, but she jumps out of a window and flees the city for the woods.

She quickly finds Mebh, who’s also panicking, as she thought she cured the bite. However, that panic subsides pretty quickly, as Mebh has never met another Wolfwalker before, and is excited to show Robyn how to be a wolf. And through Robyn’s eyes, we get a lovely view of the world through a wolf’s senses, backed by Aurora’s “Running with the Wolves”. And it’s...it’s lovely.

Its also QUITE a good half-way point, so let’s put that right here! See you in Part 2!

#wolfwalkers #cartoon saloon #tomm moore #ross stewart #honor kneafsey #eva whittaker #Sean Bean #simon mcburney #tommy tiernan #jon kenny #john morton #maria doyle kennedy #fantasy march #user365 #365 movie challenge #365 movies 365 days #365 Days 365 Movies #365 movies a year #mygifs #my gifs #nyssalance

[irishmacguirefucker]

Home

Or alternatively, Charles Smith loves his new family and would follow arthur anywhere

(4 pages of writing brought 2 u by me blacking out and typing a lot. TW: Hunting, non-descriptive skinning/harvesting of animals, Wolves)

Charles may be a newer member of the gang, but he was there long enough to be just as loyal as any other.

He found a family in these people, brothers and sisters and friends. He would stick with them until the end. An end that seemed to be rapidly approaching.

Charles Smith wouldn't consider himself much of an intellectual, but it doesn't take much to see that the gang life is dying out. As he and Arthur got close, they spoke of it a lot.

Arthur's new focus on treasure hunting was really confusing. For the second time, Arthur asked Charles if they could take a detour on a hunting trip to go find some treasure stash or another that he heard about.

They weren’t exactly in a rush to get back, so Charles didn't exactly have a reason to decline. And Dutch was in a foul mood lately anyway, so maybe coming back with a little treasure might help with that.

So he agreed and followed Arthur and his weird map, all the way up assfuck nowhere Amberino, AKA Coterra Springs.

The whole way there, Arthur seemed off. Neither of them are exactly talkative men, but this wasn't their usual comfortable silence. Arthur barely stopped, not taking the time to comment on landmarks or interesting animals, they even passed a herd of paints and he barely glanced at them.

Getting there was somewhat of a blessing, Arthur seemed happy they had made such good time and immediately wanted to try and find the treasure. Charles had to be the one to pull him back and point out the obvious signs of a wolf pack living nearby.

This seemed to ring a bell in Arthur’s mind, and he pulled out his journal, flipping to the back where he had various maps tucked away. Pulling out his Legendary Animals map, he showed it to Charles. Should they encounter wolves today, they would be dealing with some dangerous ones.

They made a plan, Charles would keep an eye out for movement along the treeline (as well as pull a distracted Arthur away from the geysers), and Arthur would search for the next piece of the Jack Hall Gang's treasure.

(Charles had broken the silence on the way there to ask. “Jack Hall Treasure...as in the gang? What were they doing hiding maps and treasure?”

Arthur responded lowly, not wanting any passersby to hear what they were out for. “Apparently ‘fore they died out, they robbed some banks out in California, ran out here to escape the law. Buried the gold they stole an’ wrote out the maps to find it again, but Hall got his gang killed and arrested with a bad robbery ‘fore they could go back for the money.”

“Huh, some story. Song don’t quite hold up, specially with Sean and Uncle singing it.” Arthur chuckled at that, “Most songs don’t with ‘em.” The break in heavy silence was nice, but short lived as Arthur set back to studying the map.)

Arthur seemed to be getting more and more frustrated with the doodles on the map, trying to compare it to his regular map, and his surroundings. Charles said nothing, focusing on what looked to be shifting forms in the trees, wondering if it was elk or wolves.

By the time he realized it was wolves, it was too late. They had herded the men and their steeds without the knowledge of either. Just as Charles was about to quietly get Arthur’s attention, the man spotted what he was looking for.

“Charles, I think I found the damned treasure!” He said loudly, and pulled out a rattling bag of coins, effectively scaring the nervous horses into rearing and setting off the wolves.

It was a close call, the wolf of legend was massive and more intelligent than the average wolf. The pack was bigger than either of them had seen. A few of them ran off after the fleeing horses and the men could only hope they would be alright as they dealt with the majority of the pack and the biggest of them all.

The wolves seemed to run at them in waves of 3 or 4, always outnumbering the men and getting mighty close to biting distance before they were shot down. It was almost sad, having to take out such a large number of mighty animals, but it was the wolves or them.

Just when the pack seemed to be thinning out enough that they might start to retreat, the massive legendary wolf made his move. He took down Arthur from behind, and it was pure luck that Charles landed a shot through its massive head with his rifle.

The moment the legendary wolf went down, the rest of the wolves seemed to realize they would not be getting their prey and retreated. Several wolves ran back from the direction of the horses and based on the lack of blood covering their muzzles, they were unsuccessful in their pursuit.

Before Charles could even be relieved by the horse's success, Arthur groaned from beneath the massive animal. Charles quickly fell to his knees and dragged the wolf's carcass off Arthur, briefly marvelling at its weight.

Arthur groaned again in relief and heavily pushed himself up into a sitting position. “Christ, I'm too old to be getting knocked down like that. Creature outta be nothin but muscle, taking me down like that.”

Charles laughed, half in relief and half at Arthurs commentary. “He was huge, I’ll give you that. He was likely nearing 150 pounds, very large for a wolf. Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, just outta breath. Caught me off guard.”

Charles looked at the bag of gold coins sitting on the ground a few feet away. “Was it worth your treasure?”

Arthur seemed to remember it and quickly reached for the bag, apparently not wanting to get up yet. “Suppose we’re gonna find out.” Inside the bag was another map, that Arthur sighed at, but tucked aside to look at after.

He quickly counted the money. “15 dollars, not quite a damn treasure Hall.”

Charles was confused. They had been finding stashes of money like this for a while and as far as he knew, Dutch was just putting it away and it had barely been spent on anything. “It's not a bad haul Arthur, especially not for us. Why are you so focused on treasure lately? We could earn more if we went back to robbery.”

Not that robbery seemed such a good idea right now, after the mess that chased them out of Valentine. But it would certainly get them a larger haul than chasing ambiguous treasure from a years-old map like pirates.

Arthur was silent for a while, what he was contemplating, Charles had no idea. He seemed to be thinking mighty hard on it though. Finally, he sighed deeply and seemed to make up his mind about something.

“It’s quite the story if you wanna hear it. It's a pretty big secret too, not that I've ever been worried ‘bout you running your mouth or nothin.”

Charles smiled warmly at his friend, attempting to put him at ease. “You don't have to tell me Arthur, but you never have to worry about me sharing secrets with anyone. And we have nothing but time, we’ll be skinning these wolves for a while anyway.”

Arthur sighed before dragging himself to his feet. “Suppose you’re right. Let’s start getting these dogs together and I’ll tell you all about Hosea’s plan.”

Arthur did just that. He told the story from the beginning, every detail he remembered as they carefully skinned the wolves and salvaged what meat they could. Partway through, the horses had found their way back, a little antsy but no worse for wear.

By the time Arthur had explained the entire plan, night had fallen and they were finding a spot to camp. (Away from the spot where they left the stripped carcasses, lest they be attacked by a damn bear in their sleep.)

Charles had a lot of thoughts. The plan itself seemed rather solid and safe, definitely a result of Hosea being the one to make it. He would definitely need some time to think about it before he could make any real comments on it. For now, he could only say; “Certainly explains why Dutch is so irritable lately.”

Arthur laughed loudly, and Charles smiled. Arthur seemed so excited about this plan, happier than he had seemed in the whole of their friendship.

“Yeah, he weren't a fan of our lack of faith...Do you think you’ll go, Charles?”

Now that was quite the question. Such a life wasn’t anything Charles ever thought of as a possibility for himself, though he expects that how most everyone feels about it.

He thought about his family. Not so much his father, but his poor mother. She had always wanted a peaceful life for her family, and he can’t help but think she would have been thrilled at the idea of her son finding a ‘proper’ home after just wandering since he was 13. The lone wolf was never a title she would have wanted for him.

He also thought of the rest of his gang, his new family. He would never say it to her, but he had always hoped that one day Abigail would take her baby and find herself a safer home, he never wanted that boy to end up an orphan like him and many of the other members. Them and everyone else in the gang could be safe and fed and happy, and in a way, he felt he deserved to be a part of it. After being a lone wolf so long, he had earned a home to share with his family.

“I think I will. I’d like to see what it's like to have a real home. I haven't had that since my mother was taken.” He hadn't meant to be so open when he started speaking, but he supposed that Arthur is his closest friend now, so why not.

Arthur seemed surprised at his open words, but it shifted to happiness. “You know, I think that's somethin’ I’d like to try as well.”

They sat in comfortable silence for a while as the fire got properly warm, and Charles couldn't help but notice that this silence felt so different from Arthur’s silence on the way here.

And on their way home, Arthur stopped to study the herd of American paint horses, and Charles knew all was well once more.

#Charles smith #arthur morgan #rdr2 #red dead redemption 2 #Red Dead Redemption #ranch au #rdr2 ranch au #not technically charthur but like it honestly could be if you want #like i said #i avoid writing in any non canon ships that way people can ship whoever they want in the au #writing #headcanons #im sorry all my writing is in bulletpoint form idk how to not do that #rdr2 ranch #rdr2 au #my au

[danger-r-98-5]

Ya know what I just love? Dutch sent Charles to come find me while I was out catching a new horse and hunting legendary animals and I go back to camp because hey my boss missed me and what does this fucker do?

"Your spending to much time in camp"

Like bitch I was fine camping on a nice lil hill in big valley, your the one that asked me to come back!

#getting mixed signals here #gee pop missed you to #take your money while i go back to my hill #rdr2 #red dead redemption two #dutch van der linde #my new horse is named balu #but where be the fing shires! #i like big horses and i can not lie

[the-girl-who-used-to-write]

Masterlist (Finally, I know)

Series names will be in bold

Character and ship names will be in italics

Teen Wolf

Choices of Love (Incomplete) (Scott McCall and Stiles Stilinski) Chapter 1 

Which Alpha (Incomplete) (Scott McCall and Theo Raeken) Chapter 1 Chapter 2

Manipulation (complete) (Theo Raeken) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3  Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7

You Should Have Told Me (Liam Dunbar)

You’re Back (Liam Dunbar)

She’ll Be Loved (Scott McCall)

It’s Her Life (Theo Raeken)

You Cannot Leave Me (Liam Dunbar) (16 Days Of Songs)

Bad Things (Theo Raeken) (16 Days Of Songs)

Halo (Scott McCall) (16 Days Of Songs)

Smile (Stiles Stilinski) (16 Days Of Songs)

I’ll Help You (Brett Talbot)

Lucky (Stiles Stilinski)

Another Species (Derek Hale)

Wolf In Sheep’s Clothing (Scott McCall)

Save Me (Peter Hale)

Feelings For The Alpha (Peter Hale)

Not My Family (Scott McCall)

Honourable Injuries (McCall Pack)

Big Brother, Little Brother (Stiles Stilinksi)

Down To Gown Town (Stiles Stilinski)

Where Did You Go? (New Year, New Prompts) (Void Stiles)

Ha, Yeah, You’re Not Doing That (Complete) (Stiles Stilinski) (Part 2)

Familial Warnings (Liam Dunbar)

Not Our Last Hurrah (Scott McCall and Stiles Stilinski)

Not So Evil Stepsister (Stiles Stilinski)

Charmed

Costumes (Chris Halliwell)

Huntress (Chris Halliwell)

Creepy and Kooky (Complete) (Chris Halliwell) Prologue  Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5  Ending 1 Ending 2

We Could Have Lost You (Chris Halliwell)

I’m Here Now (Chris Halliwell)

Baby Steps (Chris Halliwell)

Is She Ok? (Halliwell Sisters)

I’ll Be Back (Chris Halliwell)

Damn, You’re Pretty Scary (Cole Turner)

Who’s The Scared Girl? (Complete) (Cole Turner) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 

Sorry For My Evil Brother (Chris Halliwell)

Let’s Be Bad Together (Chris Halliwell)

Right Back At You (Chris Halliwell)

I Fell In Love With The Devil (Cole Turner)

Just A User (Cole Turner)

Memories (Chris Halliwell and Wyatt Halliwell)

Hunting For My Heart (Chris Halliwell and TVD Crossover)

Never Stop (Chris Halliwell)

The Feeling Of Power (Chris Halliwell)

Taken With You (Cole Turner)

The Best Brother (Chris Halliwell and Wyatt Halliwell)

Try To Get Along (Chris Halliwell)

Never Stop (Chris Halliwell)

How They React To Your Death (Preference) (Chris Halliwell and Cole Turner)

My One And Only Demon (Chris Halliwell)

Advice Columnist (Chris Halliwell)

Saved By A Demon (Wyatt Halliwell)

Liking You But Being Scared Of Wyatt Would Include: (Chris Halliwell) (Headcanon)

Full Moon Routine (The Sisters)

In The Future (Wyatt Halliwell)

Treat You Better (Chris Halliwell)

In A World Of Our Own (Wyatt Halliwell and Supernatural Crossover)

Black And White Movie (New Year, New Prompts) (Chris Halliwell)

Whoever I Want (New Year, New Prompts) (Chris Halliwell)

How Many Times?! (New Year, New Prompts) (Wyatt Halliwell)

Don’t You Remember? (New Year, New Prompts) (Chris Halliwell)

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

Was This Just A One Time Thing? (Spike)

Try To Be Subtle (Spike)

It’s A New Life For Us (Spike)

That’s What I Do (Spike)

Big Bad Wolf (Oz Osbourne)

Piece Of Work (Spike)

Old-Fashioned (Spike)

My Sister?! (Spike)

Poetry In Motion (Spike)

Vampires Need Saving Too (Angel)

The Best Pair Of Matchmakers (Xander Harris)

Cute Date (Spike)

Secret Vampire Lover (Spike)

Courage (Doyle)

Yes, I Bought You A Leather Jacket (New Year, New Prompts) (Spike)

Peter Pan 2003

Out Loud (Peter Pan)

Nothing Can Break Us Apart (James Hook)

Never Gonna Land (incomplete) (Peter Pan) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 

Once Upon A Time

No Longer Lost (Peter Pan)

Really, Him?! (Peter Pan)

You’re Still Perfect (Peter Pan)

Animals (Peter Pan) (16 Days Of Songs)

Finally (Peter Pan)

Boyfriend (Peter Pan)

Puppy Love (Peter Pan)

The Truth (Once Upon A Time)

You’ll Never Take Us Alive (New Year, New Prompts) (Peter Pan)

The Walking Dead

Back Off (Carl Grimes)

I’m Sorry, Are You Ok? (Mitch)

I Choose (Mitch and Louis)

Guns Are So Out Of Style (Carl Grimes)

American Horror Story

Co-Leaders (Kai Anderson)

Meant To Be Yours (Tate Langdon)

Devil’s Playground (Tate Langdon) (16 Days Of Songs)

You’re Not A Freak To Us (Jimmy Darling)

You’re Everything I Ever Wanted (Jimmy Darling)

Never Meant To Hurt You (Michael Langdon)

No Dinner This Time (Michael Langdon)

We’re Not Going Back There (Kit Walker)

Powerful Scares (Michael Langdon)

First Day Of School (Coven)

Toxic (Tate Langdon)

Happy And All (New Year, New Prompts) (Kyle Spencer)

High?! (New Year, New Prompts) (Tate Langdon)

It (2017)

In Derry, No One Can Hear You Scream (incomplete) (Loser’s Club) Chapter 1  Chapter 2

You Couldn’t Guess? (Henry Bowers)

Hope For The Underrated Youth (Bowers Gang)

Original Me (Henry Bowers)

How Much?! (New Year, New Prompts) (Bill Denbrough)

Nowhere Boys

Trust Fund Baby (Sam Conte)

Doctor Who

That’s Me! (10th Doctor)

Romeo and Juliet

A Rose By Any Other Name (incomplete) (Romeo Montague) Chapter 1  Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

Shadowhunters/The Mortal Instruments

Shadows Follow Me Home (Sebastian Verlac)

You’ll Be In My Heart (Jace Herondale) (16 Days Of Songs)

Just Say (Alec Lightwood) (16 Days Of Songs)

Let’s Be Friends (Alec Lightwood)

Narnia

Princess Of The Telmarines (complete) (Edmund Pevensie) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 

Knight In Shining Armour (New Year, New Prompts) (Edmund Pevensie)

Gotham

The Wayne Girl (Complete) (Jerome Valeska) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3  Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7

Get Away From My Daughter You Bastard (Jonathan Crane)

Don’t Be Scared Of Me (complete) (Jonathan Crane) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 

Marvel

Legendary (incomplete) (Peter Parker) Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

He’d Be Proud Of Us (Peter Parker)

I Miss My Old Friends (Peter Parker)

Monster (Erik Lehnsherr) 

Hold Onto Me (Logan Howlett)

Your Dream Will Be My Dream (Warren Worthington III) (16 Days Of Songs)

You’re My Best Friend (Peter Parker) (16 Days Of Songs)

Forgotten (Charles Xavier)

I’m With You (Peter Parker)

Somebody Else (Erik Lehnsherr)

Stay With Me (Erik Lehnsherr)

Gravity (Charles Xavier)

Sleep Peacefully (Scott Summers)

Coward (Charles Xavier)

Ocean Eyes (Erik Lehnsherr)

Get Well Soon (Stephen Strange)

Motorbike (Scott Summers)

E-Boy (New Year, New Prompts) (Peter Parker)

Game Of Thrones

Hellfire (Joffrey Baratheon)

Thank You Kind Sir (Renly Baratheon)

Bates Motel

It’s Always Been You (Dylan Massett)

Harry Potter

I Have No Choice (Draco Malfoy)

Together Or Apart (Fred Weasley)

Misguided Ghosts (Golden Trio)

Slipped Away (Cedric Diggory)

Wish You Were Here (Sirius Black)

Pictures Off The Wall (Draco Malfoy)

Because Of You (Sirius Black)

The Tournament (Cedric Diggory)

How Much Did You Pay? (New Year, New Prompts) (Draco Malfoy)

Friends

Are You Sure About This (Joey Tribbiani)

Baby Of The Group (Joey Tribbiani)

You

How Predictable (Incomplete) (Joe Goldberg) Chapter 1  

Bohemian Rhapsody

10 Things I Hate About You (Roger Taylor)

The Society

I Have A Separate Masterlist For This

NCIS Los Angeles

Welcome To The Madhouse (Platonic Team)

Rescue (G Callen)

The Umbrella Academy

Ghost Of You (Ben Hargreeves)

Mona Lisa (Diego Hargreeves)

Paralyzed (Klaus Hargreeves)

Me! (Klaus Hargreeves) (16 Days Of Songs)

Heart By Heart (Five Hargeeves) (16 Days Of Songs)

I See Dead People (Klaus Hargreeves)

Z-Nation

Shallow (10k) (16 Days Of Songs)

From The Start (Murphy)

Be More Careful (Murphy)

The Vampire Diaries

A Thousand Years (Damon Salvatore) (16 Days Of Songs)

Mysterious Feelings (Matt Donovan)

Perks Of Being His Girlfriend (Jeremy Gilbert)

What A Buzzkill (Damon Salvatore and Enzo St John)

Hunting For My Heart (Jeremy Gilbert and Charmed Crossover)

Pushy (Damon Salvatore and Enzo St John)

This Complicates Things (Matt Donovan and Jeremy Gilbert)

Feel Like Arguing (Kol Mikaelson)

Gifts (Stefan Salvatore)

Why Don’t You Care (Damon Salvatore)

Always In Trouble (Klaus Mikaelson)

How They React To Your Death (Preference) (Kol Mikaelson and Jeremy Gilbert)

Study Buddies (Jeremy Gilbert)

Vampire Twin (Elijah Mikaelson)

Listen (Klaus Mikaelson)

The Only Mikaelson For Me (Kol Mikaelson)

Regular Customer (Kai Parker)

Memories Lost (Damon Salvatore)

Date Ruined (Kol Mikaelson and Enzo St John)

All I’m Saying (New Year, New Prompts) (Damon Salvatore)

So, What Are You Gonna Say? (New Year, New Prompts) (Damon Salvatore)

Pretty Little Liars

Old Friends (Toby Cavanaugh)

Six Feet Under (Ezra Fitz)

Never Meant (Jason DiLaurentis)

All I Wanted (Toby Cavanaugh)

I Miss You (Jason DiLaurentis)

Just My Imagination (The Girls)

Skins UK

Uptown Girl (James Cook)

On The Bus (Sid Jenkins)

Our Last Moments (Chris Miles)

Karma Hit You Hard (Tony Stonem)

Perfect Wedding Song (New Year, New Prompts) (Tony Stonem)

Maze Runner

Piggy Back (Newt)

Master Chef (Newt)

Into The Unknown (New Year, New Prompts) (Aris)

Supernatural

In A World Of Our Own (Dean Winchester and Charmed Crossover)

Grimm

Fairy Tales (Nick Burkhardt)

Our Kinds (New Year, New Prompts) (Nick Burkhardt)

The Hunger Games

Panic Room (New Year, New Prompts) (Finnick Odair)

Supernatural

Devil On My Shoulder (New Year, New Prompts) (Lucifer)

#masterlist #master list #charmed #teen wolf #imagine #imagines #x reader #series #fanfic #fanfiction #harry potter #bates mote #game of thrones #marvel #gotham #narnia #shadowhunters #mortal instruments #the mortal instruments #romeo and juliet #doctor who #nowhere boys #it (2017) #american horror story #the walking dead #once upon a time #peter pan 2003 #buffy the vampire slayer #friends #you

[sublimegentlemanalpaca]

A Current list of Eldritchicians those developed and under developed.

I will list the Currently thought up Eldritchicians. This might be repetitive but ah well. Will have their name, what Eldritch topics they’re familiar with, any particular interesting bits about them like if they’re part of a Splinter group or what have you. Hope you find this interesting, and if you have any questions be they important or otherwise...please ask away! Please? Alyss Violet Eldridge: First Eldritchician. The Arch Overseer, Founder and leader of the FoE. Adopted daughter of Alvis Vadim Eldritch. Raised by Alvis and the rest of his Fellows. Has learned a little of everything from the each Eldritch Fellow (even Alastor) Skilled in the Rapier, Carnwennanian Dagger, excellent persuader and diplomat (when necessary). Always has a book on her person. Has an Awoken Shadow. Is Dark skinned with unnaturally white hair. Wears three Rings. Her Overseer and Arch Overseer Rings on her left (An Iron Ring set with Amethyst and a Silver Ring set with Lapis Lazuli), and a Ring gifted to her by the Eldritch Fellows which is visibly made of Orichalcum with a brilliant blood red stone of some sort (a very philosophical sort). Immediate superior to all Eldritchicians. Will occasionally not wear her Overseer Rings and go about business as a simple Eldritchician, usually teaming up with Tomomi and Charles Williams. Overseer Secundus Sinbad Al-Amin. A Cartographer and Blacksmith from Damascus. Knows how to make Damascus Steel. Has learned from Alvis(Wisdom) Albus(Ghosts and Sea Creatures) , Algimantas (Items and Objects and Allan (Demons and things considered Demons and such). Vice Chancellor of the Academy for Eldritchicians. An avid Cartographer of Strange and unusual Locales. A friend to Alvis. Wears two rings. One is his Overseer Ring, the other is a Agate Ring which to my knowledge is a custom of Muslim men. If this is incorrect, please correct me. Overseer Morgan Maddox. A Scottish (or Welsh? I’m not sure yet) Warrior. Friend of Alyss. Heads the Saint Alyss Academy for Eldritchicians. Skilled in Spear, and Carnwennanian Dagger. The Overseer who ...oversees the paperwork for the occasional necessary extermination and such? Monster hunting and the like. Learned under the Legendary Scàthach before meeting Alyss and the Eldritch Fellows. As an Eldritchician Studied under Alvis, Algimantas, Albus, and Alaire. Her Spear is made by Albus from The bone of a Sea Monster, Silver, Cold Iron, Meteoric Iron, And Orichalcum. Has a Prosthetic Arm of Magic Silver made by Algimantas. Wears her Overseer Ring on her left hand. Overseer Runa. A Norse Elf who along with her sister Huld followed Alvis around for a month or two certain that he was Odin. When the two realized Alvis was in fact not Odin they stuck around all the same. Runa joined the founding Eldritchicians while Huld helps in managing the Archives alongside Sophocles. Runa is basically the Bard (or Skald I suppose) of the Overseers. Has studied under Alvis, Algimantas, Albus, Alaire (for storytelling). Wears her Overseer Ring on his left hand. Overseer Cosmin The Solomonar: as the Title suggests, Cosmin is a (former?) Solomonar. A Wizard (?) From Romanian Folklore (Mythology?). Controls the Weather and rides a Dragon. Runs the Grey School, modeled after his own Education as a Solomonar at the Scholomance. Already knew a whole lot but has studied with Alvis, Algimantas, Albus, Alaire, and studied with Algernon even. Wears his Overseer Ring Overseer Archimedes: A Mothman. Tall black winged thing . Best friend to Alaire. In charge of the Fellows In Grey, a Splinter group in the Fellowship that deals with Cryptids, Aliens, and so on. Does not wear his Overseer Ring nor any of his pins. He leaves all the stuff which denotes him as an Eldritchician with Alaire. Alaire being the only Eldritch Fellow to actually kinda sorta join the FoE. Sophocles of Alexandria: Head Archivist for the Fellowship. He is not really an Overseer....he is imprisoned in the Archives for having tried stealing a book from Alvis...this did not end well for Sophocles place of Employment, The Library of Alexandria (books were sparred, rest was destroyed). Can not leave the Archives. Medusa: Former Priestess of Athena, Gorgon. Studied Alvis’ Wisdom, Algimantas’ stuff (who she hates), Alpheas, and with Albus. In a Trio with Ismene and Prioska. Studied shapeshifters and transformation with Alphaes (spelling?). In a relationship with Ismene. Her serpent locks are Golden. Ismene: Former Priestess of Athena. Also a Former Statue. Still has some Statue characteristics. Studied with Alvis, Algimantas, and Albus. In a relationship with Medusa. Prioska Lakatos: A Vampire from Hungary. Skilled in Clockwork. Has a Coat she stole from Albus. Calls Albus Alucard. Studied under Albus, Alvis, Algimantas, and Alaire. On a Trio with Ismene and Medusa. Also a part of Alyss’ Intelligentsia (keeping track of other secret Societies and Spy things). Loves teasing Quincey. Quincey Johnathan Jack Harker: Eldest son of Johnathan and Mina Harker. Vampire Hunter. Studied with Albus (Ghosts and stuff), Algimantas, Alvis. Duel wields Bowie Knives (one belonging to his Namesake, the other made of Adamant by Albus). Is Bi...not always the brightest...Can see Ghosts. On a Trio with Horatio and Runa. Might be in a relationship with Huld? Lucius Abraham Arthur Harker: Second Harker Son and Younger brother to Quincey. Is not an Eldritchician. He is a ghost though and is haunting his Brother (‘To keep an eye on my dummy of a Brother so he doesn’t get himself killed). Will regularly set up Hauntings so as to set up his brother with Eligible Bachelors and Bachelorettes and so on. Huld: Norse elf who followed Alvis for months thinking he was Odin with her sister Runa. Might be in a relationship with Quincey? Learned from Alaire, Albus, Algimantus, as well Alewar (Eldritch Horrors In a Extra Planetary Or Lovecraftian sense), and Alwin (Fae and Elves). In a relationship with Quincey? Leader of her Trio? Horatio aka ‘Doctor Faustus’: A Danish Man recognized for dressing in all black. Wields a Rapier. Known as Doctor Faustus since he’s studied Demons with Allan and he studied at Wittenberg. Studied with Alaire and has an Awoken Shadow. It is named but he always says it so quietly, only Horatio and Alaire know the name. Quincey has been able to catch that the name of Horatio’s Shadow starts with an H...followed by an A. Horatio has put all his Eldritch studies into Shadows, Demons and Ghosts. It is rumored he gave his Soul over to Allan V Eldritch. Wields a Carnwennanian Dagger Or a Bespoked Bodkin. Leaving his own Shadow...Lighter for lack of a better phrase . In a Trio with Quincey and Huld. Aeschylus Adams: A Werewolf Ranger, and one of Alyss’ Intelligentsia. Think of a mix of Aragorn and Halt O’Carrick. Excellent Thief and Pick pocket. Studied with Alaire (Cryptids, Shadows, and Folklore), Albus, and Algimantas. Studied Druid craft and stuff with Alfr. In a Trio with Midas Little and Murdann. Dr. Mercury Little: one of Four Little Brothers (three of whom are a part of the FoE), differentiated From his brothers by his Seemingly unnatural Silver hair. Studied Angels and Alchemy with Aldread, Albus, Alvis, and Alaire. Murdann Eldritch: A Finwife From Orkney. First Wife of Albus Viggo Eldritch. Joined after having been with Albus for some years. Knows what Albus has to teach, learned from Alvis, and Alfr. An exceptional Healer. Regularly has Weaving Contests with Ismene and Medusa. In a Trio with Dr Little and Aeschylus. Open relationship with Albus. Dr. Hermes Little: Same as Doctor Mercury Little. Only he has white Hair. Eldest of the Little ‘Brothers’. Studied all the same stuff. In a Trio with Charles Williams and Clarissa Williams. Charles Williams: Once an Editor now an Eldritchician. Tried repeatedly to join the FoE and finally managed it after trying forever. Studied Alchemy and Angels with Aldread, Magical Items with Algimantas (specifically Relics), Ghosts with Albus, and a bunch of others (Alvis, Alwin, and Algernon). The Left hand of the Arch Overseer. Go to diplomat between other Secret Societies. One of Alyss’ Intelligentsia( occasionally answers to the Codename Walsingham). Also, I should mention he’s an ESPer....Telepathy, Telekinesis, and Pyrokinesis for fun ;) . Clarissa Williams: Alternate Charles Williams. ESPER, Can see Ghosts Naturally. Intelligentsia member (Code Name Francis). Dr. Midas Little: same as the other Doctor Littles except that his hair is Golden. In a Trio with Tomomi and Dr. Leeds. Tomomi.: a Kitsune, friend to Alyss since she (Alyss) was young. Expert on Yokai and things. Studied with Alaire, Alvis, Albus, Algimantus and Alpheas (because shapeshifting). Just decided to be the guardian of Alvis’ Bookshop when they were in Japan one time. In a Trio with Dr. Midas Little and Dr. Leeds. when not going on solo missions for Alyss. A part of Alyss’ Intelligentsia (Code Name Dee, because she wasn’t fond of Kit Marlowe as a Codename). Doctor Mary Leeds: 12th Child of the Leeds family and the immediate Elder sibling and Caretaker to John Daniel Leeds...aka...the Jersey Devil. A Medicinal Doctor. Studied with Albus, Alvis, Algimantas, and Alaire. Stood up for her baby Brother when he killed one of the Night Crawlers working for Archimedes. She keeps track of Her Brother to make sure he doesn’t cause trouble (otherwise Archimedes and Alaire will need to deal with him). Learned medicine from the Black Doctor Ghost. One of the Fellows In Grey. Developed the spray they use to wipe memories and things. Mr Erland Ranswell: A Grey Alien in a Grey Suit. One of Archimedes’ Fellows In Grey. A Linguist and Cartographer. Has endeavored to learn the Whooping language of the Fresno Nightcrawlers Employed by Archimedes and Alaire. In a Trio ‘officially’ but not really with Dr. Livesey and Dr. Mercury Little. Dr. Yorick Roger Livesey: Once a Ship’s Surgeon now an animate Skeleton (rather than a Ghost like most who stay at Albus’ Lighthouses). Dressed in Piratey clothes and wears one of Albus’ old Coats when not doing Surgery or what have you. Has studied with Albus, Alaire, and Alvis. As well as Algernon. Can not speak and communicates In two ways. Either sign language or a horrible creaking noise that has an echo of bone saws. The first is interpreted by a Talking Raven Named Apollo Teach, the second by a Talking Snake Named Asclepius Hands. Asclepius’ Voice is supposed to serve as an auditory Balm after hearing Yorick Speak. Dr. Livesey gets along with Murdann and Prioska. He works closely with Albus ( being his First mate in a way?). Teaches medicine at Sinbad’s College for Eldritchicians. When out and about he will wear gloves and a mask to hide the whole...being a Skeleton thing. Dr. Mercury Little: Same as the other Little’s his hair is Silver and he looks younger than Hermes Little. Miss Calista Flatwood: Archimedes Second in command for running the Fellows In Grey. Is the Flatwoods Monster.... Mister Ray Green: A little green Alien. Astro Cartographer. Teleportation technology? I don’t know. Just thought to have a little green man. One of the Fellows In Grey. Let’s see am I forgetting anyone...ah right. Rosemary: A Fairy, once Royal Retainer to King Alberich (who is now Alwin) V Eldritch. Corrupter of Words. A Member of Alyss’ Intelligentsia, Rosemary keeps his eye on the the goings ons of The Fae Courts since his Master has had to abdicate. Is ultimately Loyal to Alwin, but works for Alyss under Alwin’s orders. The expert on Fae among the Eldritchicians. The Nightcrawler Corp: A bunch of Fresno Nightcrawlers that act as Scouts and Recon and things. They are Archimedes’ Eyes and ears for all the goings ons of Cryptids and whatever else they’re asked to look into. They answer to Archimedes only or those who relay things from Archimedes. They communicate in a series of Whoops and Kicking. Only Archimedes and Alaire are fluent in their language. The Hide Behind Network/ Erebus Hyde: A Hide Behind was stalking Alaire once...only to get caught by Aldjoy (Alaire’s living Shadow). Alaire befriended the Creature, and gave it the Name Erebus Hyde. The Hide Behind Network is all Hide Behinds being in a sort of Hive Mind (A Hide Mind?) they are many....They are not Shadows as Alaire originally thought. But they are something...something Old...perhaps only younger then the Eldritch Fellows themselves. Certain Eldritchicians (Dr. Leeds, Horatio, Overseer Morgan and others) know when a Hidebehind is behind them, and they will be sure to make people who they’re giving messages to know they’re there. They all answer to the name Erebus Hyde...all address Alaire as Friend, (and Address all the other Fellows by that title)...others they’ll address by their relation to Alaire. Okay..I think that’s everyone! And in Trios to! Be sure to ask any questions about any of these Fellows you might have. Stuff subject to change. Make of this what you will. Al, the Chronographing Cottager and Prince of Naming

#FoE #The FoE #OCs #My OCs #Eldritchicians #the Fellowship of Eldritchicians #Make of this what you will #My Writing

[meloncholor]

Halloween Prompt #8

The crunch of dead leaves underfoot.

Just a short of Charles and Arthur hunting a legendary bobcat!

Arthur followed close behind Charles, the only sound between them was the crunch of dead leaves underfoot. It was getting colder the longer they traveled, and the sun was getting close to setting. Charles trudged on, his buffalo-skin moccasins making much less noise than Arthur’s snake boots. He held his varmint rifle firmly in hand, ready to shoot at the sound of Charles’ signal. 

“You still on the trail?” Arthur whispered, shivering as another cold gust of wind barreled against his face. 

“It’s going faint, but it’s getting tired, we’ll find it pretty soon.” He crouched done, plucking a few browned leaves up from the ground.

“Thanks for coming out here with me Charles, I was having some real trouble with this bobcat.” His eyes searched the dying branches and decaying trees with intense focus, looking for any signs of the injured creature. 

“It’s no problem. You say it’s white?”

“Whiter than snow, looks like. Meaner than anything I’ve ever seen.” The pair make their way through the growing brush, dead spindles of wood reaching their waist, giving them a bit of a disadvantage. The trees obscured much of the sky, and soon the bobcat would better suited to hunt them than they would be to hunt it.

“We should head back, we’ll get slaughtered out here if we go any further into its territory.” Charles stood straight but pulled his bow from off his back. “Keep an eye out Arthur, this animal is wounded and desperate, it’s not going to have a problem trying to get us before we get it.”

The other hunter nodded and turned around, steeling himself for the long march back. “Damn thing is gonna be the death of me.” He grunts and carries on.

#rdr2 #red dead redemption 2 #Red Dead Redemption #Charles Smith #arthur morgan #halloween #spookfest #spookfest 2019

[nordic-breeze]

Arthur and Hosea on that Legendary Bear hunt mission

My view of RDR2 changed drastically over the course of chapter two, especially of Arthur but also of the other gang members and the story. Which is why I’ve recently re-watched early story missions and seeing them in a new light. In particular, the mission where Hosea takes Arthur bear hunting caught my interest.

Hosea’s general advice and guidance serves well as a tutorial in the beginning, and undoubtedly that is the intent as well. Exit Pursued By A Bruised Ego is no exception and is basically a tutorial for hunting legendary animals, and also use of stables. But story-wise, what does that mission tells us about Hosea, about Arthur, about the dynamics between the two? Why did Hosea pick this precise moment to drag the gang’s most capable enforcer and Dutch’s right hand man away for at least two days to go hunting for a bear? This is right after the gang has fled the law after a job gone bad, leaving behind almost everything they had? They should be focusing on getting money while lying low. The timing seemed to me a little odd.

I have some thoughts as to why this may be. Taken from dialogue between the two, between Hosea and other camp members and my own speculations.

Picture.

One – Hosea needs to prove to himself that he still ‘got it’. In his journal, Arthur mentions how he thought Hosea would not make it out of them mountains alive. And some of Hosea’s lines as well as (maybe) the title of the mission suggest Hosea has the need to prove to himself that even thought he’s old, he’s still capable of hunting and fighting.

Two – Hosea is basically preparing Arthur for a post-outlaw life. While Charles taught Arthur the basics, Hosea gives him detailed guidance on how to track and kill animals, from small, easily hunted but oh-so-fragile lil rabbits to big’ole mean bears. He tells Arthur to go and hunt rabbits for dinner, only to decline any meat afterwards, as if he just wanted to make sure Arthur could hunt even small animals for quality pelt and meat. He makes a point on how Arthur in the past used a shotgun to hunt rabbits which literally decimated the poor animal. This serves as a clever way to tell the player that it does indeed matter what kind of weapon you use when you hunt animals. It also tells us that hunting has not been Arthur’s job nor responsibility prior to the events of RDR2.

For me, it felt like Hosea wanted to make sure Arthur could provide for himself after their time as outlaws had inevitably come to its end. He’s one of the few that has insight enough to realize they can’t keep living like they do. At one point, I think at Clemets Point, he specifically says he thinks they might be able to outrun/escape the law one more time or two. But then…

He will also tell Arthur at Clemets Point it’s time to start thinking. Several of his comments in chapter 2 and 3 is him hinting at how their lives as outlaws will come to an end soon. I think maybe Hosea wanted to make sure Arthur knew how to hunt for meat and for pelts to use in crafts or sell for money as he knows Arthur would have trouble settling down in society and likely would want to retreat to a quiet, rural life when the van der Linde gang is no more.

Or, simply…

Three – Hosea, knowing their lives as an outlaw (and likely his own life) is coming to an end, just wants to spend some quality time with Arthur, whom he thinks of as his son, just the two of them, while things are quiet. Before all hell breaks loose again and they have to flee – again.

These theories are not mutually exclusive so it could be a little of all three. Or maybe I’m putting way too much thought into this idk. Either way just felt like sharing my thoughts as I can’t stop thinking about Arthur, his friends and his story.

#red dead redemption 2 #rdr2 #Arthur Morgan #hosea matthews #rdr2 rant #rdr2 speculation #rdr2 lore #rdr2 character analysis #mine

[imladris-soldier]

Lashes (pt 12)

Bill Williamson is a racist asshole. Everyone knows it. They just punch him and go on about their day. When a Lakota woman joins the gang, everyone expects things to go on as normal, slurs and all, and for a time, it does. But her curiosity gets the better of her, and she finds that hatred is something learned - which means it can be unlearned, if given time, care, and patience. And she has plenty of those… the first two, anyway.

Bill Williamson x OC

The walk back to camp was spent in silence, and Star began to feel the weight of losing Sean. Her chest felt heavy, and breathing was a struggle. Her pace slowed, and Bill noticed. He slowed with her, taking her hand in his. Nothing was said, but he knew.

The camp was eerie and still when they arrived back. Everyone seemed to have split off to mourn in their own way. Arthur still hadn't returned, but knowing that he had survived the ambush and ridden away of his own free will was enough to keep Star from worrying.

Dutch pulled Bill aside to ask for his side of the story, so Star went on alone, taking Brown Jack with her. The horse seemed to notice her mood as much as his rider had, offering Star a gentle nudge with his nose. She scratched his neck as she removed his tack. “You did good, boy,” she murmured softly. He snorted.

Once Brown Jack was taken care of, Star found that she had no appetite for food or company, especially when she spied Mary-Beth crying by the lake. The tension that coiled so painfully behind Star's sternum would eventually have to be released, but she was not comfortable doing so in front of others.

She made her way to the tent she and Bill shared, letting the flap close behind her. Lacking anything productive to do, Star just sat on the ground, arms around her knees. Pressure built inside her, but she was not yet ready to deal with it. For a time, she just wanted to feel it. There was something exquisite about the searing pain of loss. Sometimes it was best to take the time to wallow in it. She was sure that some new horror would bear down on them eventually, and she wanted to have this out of the way before then.

When Bill entered, his gaze lingered on her briefly, but then he went about preparing for bed. It was early, really, but he seemed to have sensed that she had called the day done. Apparently, he had no intentions of leaving her to herself, and it made her heart squeeze in affection.

“Let me see your shoulder,” she murmured as he sat. He shrugged out of his shirt as she got up to kneel behind him, fingers poking gently at the red, swollen flesh surrounding the rip caused by the bullet. “Hand me my satchel.”

He did as told, and she fished around in it for some whiskey and the same poultice she'd used on his shoulders months ago. He flinched slightly when the whiskey hit his open skin, but he didn't pull away. Star dabbed carefully with a rag to get the excess, then put the poultice on the inflamed area around the wound.

As she worked, a drunk, melancholy voice floated through the muggy air to them. Karen seemed to have taken the news... well.

“But the heart throbs on as warmly now/ As when those summer nights were nigh/ Oh, the sun can never dip so low/ A down affection's cloudless sky/ A hundred months have passed, Lorena/ Since last I held that hand in mine/ And felt the pulse beat fast, Lorena/ Though mine beats faster far than thine...”

Karen continued to sing, but it was at that point that Star finally lost her composure. Tears slid down her cheeks, landing on Bill's back. He seemed startled, and she hadn't given him much warning, but he quickly recovered and spun around to face her.

She sobbed quietly, shaking with each expulsion of her grief. For a second, Bill hovered in a place of insecurity, but he finally just reached out and grabbed her into his arms, pulling her into his lap. She sat on his legs and cried against his shoulder, allowing him to just engulf her as she crumpled. Though he had nothing to say, Bill's embrace said everything. If at first it was unsure, it faded immediately as the need to comfort her took over his body. She felt safe, despite all, wrapped up in him.

It took some time for the tears to stop, but when Star began to grow more still and quiet, Bill leaned her out slightly to brush away the salty remnants from her cheeks. She sniffled and looked away, murmuring, “Sorry.”

“What for?” he replied, brows crunching together in confusion.

She just gestured to herself with a shrug.

He let that sit a moment, then pulled her back to his chest. “Y'ain't gotta apologize for havin' feelin's, Star. Not to me. You... you're the first person I ever felt... safe enough around to say some'a the things I've said. And it might... it might kill me if you didn't feel safe enough with me to cry once in a while.”

Star's arms wound around him, and she wished she could simply be absorbed into him, at least for the night. Perhaps the morning would be better, but she did not want to face the future. She just wanted him and their little tent. No more, no less.

They fell asleep pressed as closely together as was physically possible, fingers entwined. Star slept fitfully, dreams full of shadows that hounded after her, but any time she woke, she found Bill at her side, usually snoring, but it was a significant comfort nonetheless.

When the sun rose, Star groaned softly. The world would spin on, regardless of Sean MacGuire's death, and the gang would be expected to do the same. The last thing she wanted to do was attend to chores while Dutch deliberated about his next move. She had half a mind to barge in on him and demand a response, but knowing the level of anxiety that would cause Bill deterred her.

She rolled over to face her lover, smiling wearily at how disheveled he'd become in sleep. His hair was generally a little wild to begin with, but in the mornings it was something else entirely. Her fingers gently passed through it, trying to tame it just a little bit to varying effect. He stirred and blinked sleepily at her. “What you doin'?”

“Have you ever considered some hair pomade?”

He grumbled and rolled away from her, causing her to grin and scoot until she was flush with his back. Her right arm slipped over his side to dangle, at least until he somewhat grudgingly gathered her hand into his and held.

Letting her eyes close once more, Star sighed and pressed a soft kiss to the wound on his shoulder. “Thank you,” she whispered. “For last night.”

“Course,” he murmured. “I know what it's like to hurt like that and... and not have no one. You always got me.”

“Same to you.”

Both fell back asleep for a short while before reality came crashing down. It was ultimately Ms. Grimshaw's usual harping that woke them again, and they knew it was pointless to try and ignore it. Both rose and dressed for the day, but just before they left the tent, Bill caught Star's elbow and pulled her in for a kiss. It was probably meant to be a short boost to start the day, but it turned into something longer and more meaningful.

“If you need me, come find me,” he told her when they finally pulled apart.

“I will. Thanks.” She pressed another quick kiss to his cheek, then pushed open the tent flap, pinning it up. Bill exited as she did so, squeezing her hip as he walked by. She just smiled.

The day passed in an unnervingly normal way. It was almost as though the gang was ignoring what had happened to Sean. Some of it felt like shame – if Dutch and Hosea hadn't pushed playing both sides in the search of some legendary gold, maybe it wouldn't have happened. If this. If that. Ultimately, Sean was dead, and the gang was going to have to make a move.

Karen was drunk before noon, which, in the past, had been Bill's gig. She quickly became unbearable, so Star stayed on the edges of camp with the horses most of the afternoon. The animals needed some hoof work, so she was easily occupied.

Not long after lunch, Star found little Jack standing in front of her looking a little sheepish. “Hi, Jack,” she greeted, putting down Boaz' foot to crouch in front of the boy. “What's going on?”

“Um... I heard you cryin' last night,” he said quietly. “Momma said I should make you somethin' to make you happy again, so I made you this.” He held out a chain of flowers. “It's a necklace!”

Star took the circle of little purple flowers, feeling her chest blossom with warmth. “Well, thank you! It's lovely.”

Jack smiled widely as she put it over her head. “You really like it?”

“Of course I do.”

Jack's face fell slightly and he kicked at the dirt beneath his feet. “Momma says Uncle Sean is dead.”

“Yeah. Yeah, he is.”

“Bad men killed him?”

“That's right. They lied and said they needed our help, but they attacked us and killed Sean.”

“Oh.” His big, innocent eyes look up at her. “I don't want anyone else to die.”

Star put a hand on his head, combing through his hair softly. “Me either. We'll be ok. You'll see. Now, run on and play, ok? But don't go too far.”

“Ok.”

Star stood and watched him go for a moment before returning her attention to Boaz. However, it was quickly stolen once more by the lingering presence of Charles and Bill in the corner of her eye. She finally turned to look at them, realizing at that point that they had been waiting for her to notice. Charles waved her over, so she put down her tools and joined them.

“What?”

“We're going hunting. Do you want to come?”

Star looked over her shoulder at camp. The heat and the tension practically made the air visible. “Yeah, ok. Better than hanging around here, anyway.”

The three gathered up their items, then mounted their horses and rode out of camp. No one asked where they were going or even acknowledged that they were leaving except Lenny, who was standing guard. He just wished them luck and waved.

Charles led the way to north-eastern Scarlet Meadows. The ride was silent, but Star decided that they'd all left for the same reason: camp was stifling. The three of them together would easily bag a couple deer with minimal effort, so it was entirely a trip to get away.

Star's chosen brother more than proved this when he pulled Taima to a stop, got down and just stretched. She hopped down as well, observing him with amusement. “Hunting, huh?” she asked.

His lips twitched into a soft smile. “Yeah. Hunting for some peace.”

Bill jumped down, and Star turned to him. “You were in on this?”

“It was his idea,” Charles said.

Bill shrugged as he unloaded a tent. “Kinda figured you wouldn't mind.”

“I don't. I'm just impressed.”

“Hey, sometimes... I have an idea, alright?”

She smiled. “Fair enough. So, what? We just stay out here for a day or two?”

“Why not?” Charles replied. “Between us, we'll get some food to take back, and no one will be the wiser.”

Star nodded, sharing a glance with Bill who blushed when he realized that she was recalling the last time they'd spent time away from camp together. She just smiled.

Charles and Star hunted a few rabbits to feed them that night, and they all settled around the campfire that Bill built. The night was mostly spent telling stories, and Star eventually asked, “What do you remember of your mother, Charles?”

The big man shrugged, taking a swig of whiskey. “I remember that she always wore her hair in a braid. She would sometimes weave feathers and flowers into it. She seemed to love my father, and he loved her. He was never the same after she got captured.”

Star nodded, ruminating on his answer. As she did, Bill said, “My momma was... well... she weren't too nice. Always liked my daddy better. 'Course, he drank himself to madness. I-I-I told you that story, right? How he mixed his drinks. By the time he died, he didn't know his left from his right. Bad business.”

“My father fell to drink as well, though who knows what killed him. I ran away when I was twelve.”

Bill nodded. “Weren't much older when I left. Fifteen maybe. Wandered around for a while, thievin' and beggin' just to eat. Then I joined the army. That was worse.”

As the two men swapped stories, Star looked between them. There was a time when they might never have said a word to one another, yet here they were, sharing intimate details. While there was a part of her that wanted to take credit for it, the truth of the matter was that there had been a good man hiding in Bill all along. He'd just never felt secure enough to show it.

When it grew late enough, they turned in, and Star finally felt some of the weight leave her.

….

The next day, Star and Charles tracked down a couple deer to take back. Once they were secured onto the horses, the group made the decision to go ahead and return to camp. If nothing else, the deer for stew might lift a few spirits.

When they arrived back, there was no one on guard, and that was immediately troubling. They all exchanged glances, then hurried through the trees to camp. There was a group of people standing outside of Dutch's tent, Arthur among them. Voices seemed agitated and fearful.

Star hurried to Kieran who stood nervously at a distance. “What's going on?”

Kieran jumped when she spoke, putting a hand to his heart. “Jesus. When'd you get back?”

“Just now. What's happening?”

“It's... it's little Jack.”

“What about him?” Charles pressed.

“He's missin'. They think the Braithwaites took him. I seen a couple'a strange fellers lurkin' about earlier. Didn't cause no trouble at the time, but... I guess...” His eyes fell, and he fidgeted with his hands.

Star put a hand on his shoulder, turning to look at Bill and Charles. The latter had his usual calm demeanor about him though his jaw had clenched, but Bill had gone into a full protective rage mode that Star had never seen before. Even she was slightly taken aback by the hostility that had begun radiating off him. But, to be fair, she felt the same.

Dutch marched off towards his horse crying, “I will get that boy back, so help me God... right now!”

Before Star even had time to react, Bill ran forward calling, “Dutch! We just heard about Jack. You need some extra guns?”

“Why not?” their leader replied with a nod. “Micah, Kieran, if anybody strange turns up, kill 'em! The rest'a you, let's ride!”

Every man that wasn't Micah or Kieran mounted up, and Star joined them, already feeling a fiery anger burning through her veins. The necklace Jack had made her was still in one of her saddlebags. He was an innocent child. What kind of monsters made a child pay for the actions of men? All things considered, Star had decided she did not like the South.

The sun dipped below the horizon as they rode out, and a heavy fog fell over the countryside. The air was thick, though it started to cool almost as soon as the sun disappeared. However, the heat seemed to follow the gang, fueled by their anger alone.

“They must've figured out what we was up to, Dutch!” Hosea called.

“Yeah,” Arthur replied. “We got shot to hell by the Grays in town.”

Dutch replied, “I know. I heard. About Sean too. I don't even want to think about that right now. We have to focus on Jack.”

It was almost as if Dutch had taken the thoughts from Star's head word for word and put voice to them. This was exactly the new horror she had wanted to be prepared for. Thanks to Bill and Charles, she was. Grief had turned to rage, and god help whatever back country hick crossed her path now.

John snarled, “I swear, I'll kill everyone there!”

“Easy, John. Try to stay calm!” Dutch soothed. “We gotta keep our heads about this.”

“How the hell did they get to him?!” Star snapped.

“I don't know, but we will get him back, and we will make them pay. I promise you that.”

“What about the gold?” Javier asked.

“Who gives a damn about the gold? They got Jack!” John cried.

With a sigh, Hosea answered, “I hate to break it to ya, but I don't think there is any gold. Or, if there is, it's hidden somewhere no one knows. I've turned every stone.”

“For Christ's sake, Hosea!” John roared. “After all that? Another perfect scam.”

If anything, it was nice to see John finally coming into his role as concerned father for the boy. Star had been waiting and hoping to see it one day. While it wasn't ideal, scaring him into it was working.

“We underestimated them,” Hosea murmured.

“No!” Dutch cut in firmly. “They underestimated us. Enough talk. There is no point arguing how we got here. This is where we are. And we are going to fix it. So come on!”

That was the final word on that, so everyone concentrated on riding and stewing in their indignant anger. The further they went, the more Star felt it burn. It wasn't even the Braithwaites that had killed Sean, but they were going to pay for him too. It didn't matter which snob-nosed white family had committed which crime – they were all the same to her, and they would die for it.

The group passed through some trees, rounding a bend that exposed the elegant driveway leading to Braithwaite Manor. Large, very old trees lined the path, and their branches created a sweeping arc overhead. It was the epitome of wealth and status, and Star immediately felt the urge to chop it all down. Of course, that would be highly disrespectful to the trees, so perhaps the house would have to do.

The manor itself was old yet opulent, at least to her eye. It was two stories, with wrap-around balconies and columns. She'd never seen anything like it, and all she wanted was to tear it down.

As they started down the path, Dutch called, “Ok, get your heads right. Nobody makes a move until I say so. Dismount and come to me!”

They came to a stop, each person jumping down and retrieving weapons from their saddles. Star pulled out the Bolt Action Rifle she'd been given as well as checking to make sure she had her pistol and knife. Once she was satisfied, she joined Dutch by the walled entrance.

“You sure you're ok, John?” Dutch asked.

“I'm fine,” the younger man growled, adjusting his grip on his gun.

“Alright, then. Follow me. These redneck families think they can ruin us? I don't think so.”

The gang fell in behind Dutch, ultimately swinging outwards into a V formation. Star walked between Bill and Arthur on Dutch's left, fingers gripping her gun so hard that her knuckles had gone white. The air crackled with anticipation, raising the hairs on her arms, but in that moment, Star's confidence in Dutch and this attack was all she needed.

“There they are,” Hosea pointed out as several men exited the house, waiting on the porch for them.

“Who steals a god damn boy?” Dutch snarled, his voice rumbling deep in his chest.

“I'm gonna let fly at them sons'a bitches,” John hissed through clenched teeth.

“John, I need you calm,” Dutch told him before proceeding to yell, “Get down here now!! You inbred trash!”

“What the hell do you want?” one of the men on the porch replied with a sneer.

The gang spread out on the front lawn, taking positions within running distance of cover, but positions that also allowed for easy firing. Star stood just slightly ahead of Arthur, brown eyes taking count of the Braithwaites. She counted at least six already outside which gave the gang an upper hand, but there were undoubtedly more inside the house.

“We've come for the boy,” Dutch announced, stepping ahead of everyone. “You must have known we would.”

“Shouldn't have messed in our business now, should ya?”

Dutch took a sharp breath through his nose. “Whatever complaint you have with us... alleged or otherwise... that is a young boy. That is not the way you do things. Hand him over.”

“Get the hell off our land.”

Four or five more men came through the doors on both floors of the house, quickly outnumbering the gang. Star's grip on her gun came just short of causing the wood to creak beneath the strain. The silence that hung in the air was dangerous. Even the night birds had fled, though a crow or two had perched on the branches of the great trees.

Dutch's gaze swept the porches briefly, then, calmly, he replied, “If you ain't gonna be civilized about this...”

The initial shots from Dutch's guns alone took out three Braithwaites. Rage seemed to somehow increase his accuracy as he shot without care, dual-wielding, smoothly sweeping his arms between targets who then fell as commanded. The rest of the gang began firing after the initial shock and awe wore off.

Star skidded behind a parked wagon, firing around the corner. Even if she missed, her bullets would embed into the wood of the house or shatter a window, and she counted that as a victory. To mar the great legacy of these cretins was as satisfying as massacring their progeny.

Within a few short seconds, the Braithwaites present on the balconies were dead. Dutch was already moving up to storm the house. “Arthur, John, Hosea with me! The rest'a you, stay here and watch for any more arrivals.” He ran up, kicking in the door. “Get in there! Find Jack. And find that Braithwaite woman!”

Dutch's voice was so full of rage that it broke, like water on rocks. Every note of his anger flooded through Star, causing her blood to sing. It was dizzying, being so led by his every move. Was this why his gang followed him so loyally? Did they all feel his conviction rolling off him in waves? She had never known anything like it.

While the four of them ran into the house, Star turned her attentions to the fog surrounding the manor. Bill shadowed her as she paced, eyes prowling for the first sign of trouble.

It was ultimately Charles who saw the riders first, calling, “We got more coming in!”

Murky torch flames sped down the driveway, making the targets all too easy to spot. Star went down on one knee to steady her aim, sending a bullet ripping through the skull of one of the riders. For Sean. The others easily took down the rest, but Javier called, “They're in the fields!”

Star jumped up and sprinted around the house to face the orchard. These targets weren't bearing torches, so they were harder to see, but she was a trained hunter. Flickers of movement drew her eye, and the moonlight created just enough shadows.

Her desire for the thrill of the hunt caused her to drop her gun, pull her knife from her boot, and slip into the trees. She whispered through the fog, slitting throats and watering the peaches with blood. The Braithwaites couldn't see her coming, and neither could her friends as they fired skillfully in her direction yet never hit her.

It took very little time to send the Braithwaites running. Star took the time to drive her knife through the temple of one of them, but let the rest go. As she exited the orchard, the guns of the gang came up to face her until Charles cried, “Hold! It's Star!”

Slowly, gun barrels fell away from her, replaced by stares of shock. She could only imagine what she looked like, but if it was anything like she felt, it was probably horrific. Blood dripped down her face and knife arm, staining her clothes and painting her skin a sickening crimson.

As she walked down the line, back towards the front of the house, she felt their surprise. It almost smacked of fear. None of them had thought her the type. But, then again, none of them really knew her to begin with. There were stories she had not told. Not to Bill, not to Charles. No one knew. In short, she did not advise threatening her family.

The gang moved back to the front of the house, watching as John and Hosea set fire to the first floor. Dutch marched out of the house with the Braithwaite woman slung over his shoulder like a sack. Arthur followed behind.

“Put me down, you damn yankee!” the woman screeched.

Dutch heaved her to the ground with a sneering, “There ya go,” then drew his gun to hold on her.

“I never liked you,” she directed at Hosea.

“Why'd you take the boy, Mrs. Braithwaite?”

“You stole my liquor! You stole my horses!”

“Boys are off limits!”

“Ain't no rules in war, Mr...”

“Matthews!”

“Yes. That's it.”

Hosea crouched down low. “Where's the boy?”

Suddenly gathering strength, the old woman sat up and snarled, “My sons gave him to Angelo Bronte. So my guess is Saint Denis. Either there or the boat to Italy!”

Hosea's lip curled, then he stood back up and marched off. “Let's go!” he announced.

“What about her?” Arthur called.

“Leave her,” Dutch declared.

The Van Der Linde gang walked away, leaving a burning legacy in their wake – a signal fire to the world: Do not threaten us, or we will destroy you.

#my writing #red dead redemption #red dead redemption 2 #bill williamson #bill williamson x oc #arthur morgan #dutch van der linde #hosea matthews #charles smith #jack marston #kieran duffy #lashes

[rhetoricalrogue]

So Maggie is pretty much left alone to manage the homestead for long stretches of time. Her husband (I’m feeling like he’s an Alan??) sends money and tries his best to travel home as often as his current workload allows. Every time he comes back, he notices that there’s something new: a chicken coop that wasn’t there before (“when did we get chickens?”) a stretch of fence that’s brand new, that sort of thing.

When asked, Maggie tells him that she arranged things herself. It’s 99% the truth: she hooked up a borrowed horse to the old farm instruments she found in the dilapidated barn to plow a small portion of the field that one person could easily manage, she bartered free mending and seamstressing talents for chickens and the coop, and she has a standing deal with Strawberry’s butcher for certain cuts of meat. If she presents them pre-cut and cleaned to save him the time and physical labor, then he pays higher dollar. He also introduced her to a local trapper who was impressed with the way she skinned animals and they worked out a lucrative deal that kept the homestead afloat when Alan didn’t send as much money as he probably should. Bless his heart, he really didn’t know how much work the money pit he had bought was going to be.

Alan is away in Rhodes when Maggie writes him to announce that he’s going to be a father, and the reply she gets is more or less “at least you’ll soon have help around the house!” than the enthusiastic reception she had always dreamed of sharing. Maggie, now ever practical, just sighs and tucks that girlish dream away with all the others she’s packed away since getting married. Other people had it worse; the woman who she bartered for a bunch of vegetables in return for a new dress had a mean drunk for a husband. All Maggie has is an absentee one.

Life doesn’t stop once she realizes she’s pregnant. The plants still need tending, the larder still needs sticking for winter. She may waddle a little when she walks and her center of gravity shifted, but she can still handle a rifle and a fishing pole. It just takes her a little longer than usual to haul her kill onto her borrowed mare than it used to.

She doesn’t hear him approach, so when someone puts their hand on her shoulder as she’s busy grunting her way through tying a deer to a series of ropes that she fashioned as a makeshift pulley system to get the animal from the ground to the back of her horse, her first reaction was to scream bloody murder at being startled. Her second was to jab blindly at whoever had come up behind her with the knife in her hand. Luckily, Charles has better reflexes and he managed to dodge out of the way.

Charles was out looking for Arthur, who hadn’t been seen back at Horseshoe Overlook for quite some time. It wasn’t like him, and Charles was getting itchy thinking that his friend may have gotten himself into some sort of trouble (turns out he was just busy hunting dinosaur bones and catching legendary fish while messing with treasure maps.) When he came across this tiny little thing of a woman and seeing that she was in a delicate condition, he couldn’t help but at least offer his assistance.

He just didn’t expect for someone who probably didn’t even make it up to his chest to be so damn offended at the idea that someone may have seen her and had decided to stop and see if she needed help. It took him about ten seconds to realize that she was super independent and stubborn about doing things herself. Maggie did eventually let him haul the deer up on her horse and agreed to let him follow her home so he could put it on a skinning rack for her. By the time they made it back, it was dark and she felt awful for waylaying him from whatever he was doing, so she offered him dinner as payment.

“I didn’t ask you to butcher the deer for me, sir.”

“Well, ma’am, dinner was so good that I felt I needed to so that we were even.”

Maggie gets a good feeling from him, which is why when he comes back around a few weeks later, she isn’t as hesitant to starting a friendship with him. He listens more than he talks and she hasn’t really had anyone to talk to in some time. He’s evasive when answering what he does for a living, but while they talk, he does minor repairs that she can’t quite get to. He sticks to calling her Mrs. Stewart even after she asks him to call her Maggie, so she teases him by addressing him as Mr. Smith until they both laugh.

It’s only after he’s ridden off (and somehow snuck in fresh meat into the smokehouse without her knowing) that she looks at the somewhat emotionless, businesslike letters she gets from her husband and does the “oh no, this is bad” realization that she wishes she had met Charles before she had married Alan.

#maggie stewart #aaaaauuuuggghh AIRIKA this is your doing