I change hyperfixations like clothes so don't get attached to anything I make <3
THAT BEING SAID I STILL LOVE ALL THE MUTUALS I MAKE AS I JUMP FROM ONE FANDOM TO ANOTHER!!
I WILL ALWAYS BE CHEERING FOR YOU GUYS <3333
Arthur Morgan
The Confused Cowboy Chronicles
Read it on AO3!
Arthur Morgan ain't a good man - even if he does help out the odd stranger every now and then. But when he helps out one especially strange man named Francis Sinclair, who decides to reward him by sending him over 200 years into the future, he finds out just what kinda man he truly is.
Entry 1. Welcome to 2025
Entry 2. A Warm Cup of Tea
Entry 2.5 Stop! Shower Time!
Entry 3. Reap What You Sow
Arthur Morgan Calls You Sunshine
Arthur Morgan Comforts You
Arthur Morgan Welcomes 2026
Having a thing for dilfs and NOT having a daddy kink is like the fanfiction equivalent of being gluten intolerant. Gotta read through the tags like a fucking allergen list.
Guys I shit you not i saw a ddlc meme edit of rdr2 characters and it's lowkey inspiring me to get back up on the arthur horse???
Also the lovely, wonderful, inspiring @thorst made an nsft list for bede and arthur and it lowkey made me wanna write one for arthur and sunny and also finish off the smut i was working on π«£
also I don't think parents "these days" are uniquely terrible, I just think neglect is showing up in new ways as technology progresses. today's ipad kid would've been wandering around in a ditch alone all day and night before. parents not wanting to have to deal with children is not a new phenomenon.
That last point reminds me of this reel I saw that was a fan dub of sailor moon and the person dubbing her said that she was glad that Elon Musk exists. Not because she liked him, fuck no, but because he achieved every measure of success we're taught to aim for.
He's had like a bunch of relationships, a million kids, and all of them fucking hate him.
He has all the money in the world and he uses it for the dumbest shit.
He has met all of the people he looks up to only to be absolutely despised by them.
Everything he's ever created is utter garbage that people have to fight for their LIVES to defend even when they themselves admit all of it is absolute ass.
And its good that he exists because despite all his money, all his relationships, all his accomplishments, hes one of the worst, most inept, uncharismatic morons that the rest of us are cursed to endure. That man has achieved every possible merit of success we're told to reach for and he's still a miserable fucking asshole that the majority of the world's population absolutely despises.
You may not be successful by society's standards. You may not have a lot of money, or have made a lot of things youre proud of, or had many relationships. But none of that matters. Because the guy who has done all of that, the guy who is the MOST successful, has the MOST money and the MOST relationships, is sitting alone in his billion dollar mansion on his 100 grand sofa, logging into the social media app he somehow made even worse, furiously typing up another paragraph in defense of his AI bot that is hemmoraging money for churning out more child porn.
And you, simply existing as the person you are, will always be better than him.
Plot summary: You were one of the biggest video game nerds within your small friendship group, but one game held a special place in your heart, The Last Of Us. You'd played the first game in college when it came out and then when the pandemic hit and the world completely shut down, The Last of Us Part II had been a welcome, but devastating distraction.
Still though, it was a game you kept going back to, your comfort game. Joel and Ellie were your comfort characters. The night before the accident you'd just restarted the first game for the hundredth time, calling it a night just after Tess had lost her life.
Little did you know, that would be your last time playing the game, because after that night, you'd be living in it.
A/N: This fic is inspired by this Red Dead Redemption fic I read a while back, I loved the 'sucked into the video game' trope so much. I'd never played the Tlou games until just before Christmas when I decided to pull up my big girl panties and do it. I absolutely love the games now (even if part two broke my soul) and I'm now playing part one all over again while I write this.
So with that in mind I decided I wanted to start writing a fic based entirely on video game Joel Miller, even if Pedro Joel has my entire heart π« this story will be as canon complaint as possible while weaving in a growing relationship between reader and Joel.
Warnings for the prologue: MDNI, 18+ I'm a Brit writing about America, please bear with me if I get something wrong, I'm putting my trust into Google with this stuff. Mentions of loneliness, language (Swearing), car accident. Reader is not described in any way other than wearing lounge wear, sweater, jeans, vans sneakers etc. Reader is in her early thirties.
Find more of my works and other chapters for this fic on my Joel Miller Masterlist
Fade Into You Masterlist
Chapter One ->
Word Count: 1.7k.
Purgatory.
βA place or condition of suffering or torment, especially one that is temporaryβ
///
Detroit, Michigan. January 2025.
Your life before the accident, had been a blissfully dull one. Well aware that it was a privilege in that sense.
You have loving parents, your childhood was a good one. Youβd left school with a GPA of 3.0 which had allowed you to attend the college of your choosing.
In adulthood, youβd settled into a steady, (if not tedious at times) career in IT working for a big pharma company who had offices all over the Mid-West. It was good pay and you got to work with computers. It was a win-win in your book.
On paper your life looked ideal. Perfect wasnβt the right word for it, nothing could ever really be perfect, after all. But you knew you had it good.
The only caveat?
You were lonely.
Youβd had a handful of romantic relationships, but they all kind of fizzled out naturally. Nothing overly dramatic happened, they just never went anywhere and you were okay with that, for the most part.
Your friends had all settled down, the three of them were in serious long term relationships, two of them were moms now, a part of you was longing for the same, but something had made it feel unattainable.
They kept you sane though, your girls and their babies that you'd come to adopt as family, were your saving grace. The four of you had met in college and been inseparable since, you went through it all together.
And then there was your first love. Video games.
You enjoyed a range of genres, old and new but at the heart of it, The Last Of Us was your favourite. Your safe place.
So much so that it was a big part of your personality too, youβd considered getting a replica of Ellies tattoo at one point but youβd chickened out before you could even schedule the appointment.
Instead, you channelled your love for the game into your home. Decorating your cosy apartment in a way that would transport you to the overgrown wasteland the moment you stepped through the door.
Fake ivy climbs the painted sage walls of your living room, entwined with warm Β fairy lights that fade in and out every so often. Youβd spent hours cross-legged on the living room floor, carefully hot gluing the vines to the wires. Meticulously hanging them from the corner of the room, until they were creeping out across the walls to the left and right, like they were growing right above your TV where you immersed yourself in the game.
Memorabilia that youβd collected over the years, sat proudly on shelves beside your TV unit, along with framed artwork pulled right from the game, hanging there like a shrine to your favourite piece of fictional media.
It was home.
Not everyone understood, a grown adult being obsessed with video games? Itβs definitely a generational thing, your friends are all accepting of it, every Christmas and birthday you usually receive something related to The Last of Us in some shape or form. Your parents though? They didnβt quite understand, coming from a generation that was told to stay out until the street lights come on, they couldnβt fathom why youβd want to spend hours in front of a screen. The escapism it brings you is something theyβll never experience, but youβre grateful it exists.
Even at work you find yourself daydreaming about the games, perhaps consuming a fanfic or two on your lunch hour.
Today had been no different, the day was dragging on and while you were monotonously placing code, your mind began drifting. It had been a while since youβd started a new game, the last one had been a speed run that youβd streamed to your followers on twitch, all five of them!
But you were getting that itch again, to start a new save file, to play in a different way, to see if you can find anything you might have missed in previous playthroughs.
So thatβs exactly what you did. The moment you got home, you shredded your work clothes in favour of lounge wear, cosied up on the couch with some snacks and your favourite drink.
It was like real life would cease to exist and fade into the background the moment the main menu was on screen.
You spent the next few hours in your cocoon, just you and the game. Taking in the post apocalyptic wasteland, the sights, the sounds.
Admiring Joel.
That was something you chose to omit whenever you geeked out about the game to your friends, they were supportive of your obsession but none of them would be able to wrap their heads around crushing on a pixelated man, not when you rarely crush on real ones these days.
It was funny to think about, that Joel had been the only consistent male in your life since 2013 and not in a βhahaβ funny, kind of way either.
Limerance was in full swing for a fictional character. Almost all the fics you read were some form of βJoel Miller x Readerβ these days. It was ridiculous but you could see yourself with him, if he were real, or at least the delusional part of your brain could. The rational part of your brain tells you that you actually have nothing in common with the grizzly old man, though you did learn how to play guitar in lockdown, mostly due to boredom, but also because of Joel.
By the time you looked at your phone, it was just after midnight and you had to be up for work tomorrow. Tess had just died and you were out of the subway, now was a good time to switch off for the night and go to bed.
You were deep in sleep the next morning when your alarm went off at 7am, coaxed awake to the tune of βTake On Me.β
Your morning routine was normal, take a shower, get dressedβ itβs casual Friday so youβre dressed down in a light sweater, jeans and your favourite pair of vans.
After that you pack your lunch for the day, make breakfast and decide to check the group chat as you eat.
As you lean against the counter taking bites of toast, your phone is in the other hand, catching up on what you missed:
Just us gorls gc
11.43pm
Imi: having a time settling the baby tonight, anyone else still up?
Tiff: u know it, got this fkin report to finish up before I can even think about going to bed, hope Lil M is okay?
Imi: Yh sheβs ok, think sheβs picked up a bug from daycare
Ash: same here, Caleb is running a fever so weβre up watching Bluey. Again.
Tiff: Srry babe, but bluey is elite.
Imi: Says the person with no kids.
Ash: Haha yeah, this will be you someday Tiffy if Sophia ever makes an honest woman out of you.
Tiff: Idc, bluey will be on 24/7 lol.
Imi: your kids will have Australian accents, calling it now... Whereβs our resident nerd, donβt tell me sheβs already in bed? Lucky bitch.
Ash: Nah, Iβll bet you 5 bucks sheβs gaming.
Tiff: Iβll bet you 10 that sheβs playing that fkin game again
They know you too well. You send a quick reply apologising for being AWOL last night along with a meme:
You: Pls accept this Pedro offering as an apology. ;) Tiffy, I just venmoβd u 10 bucks, spend it wisely. Facetime tonight?
Imi: She lives! You know, you only get to use our Pedro thirst against us in emergencies, Iβll let you off this time. Also that sounds good hun, been too long, the kids miss seeing their Aunty Boop.
βAunty Boopβ never failed to make you smile, you didnβt have siblings of your own but your girls were family and that extended to their babies. Aunty Boop came about when Ashβs son was just starting to walk, youβd taught him to boop people on the nose and each time heβd run away on little legs, in fits of giggles. From that day on you were Aunty Boop to their kids.
Tiffy: Knew it! I hope whoever marries u knows theyβll always be second best to a video game lol Iβm down for FT tonight, gotta run now tho, ily all!
Ash: Iβll call off the search party. where have you been bitch, where have you bloody been? I can do tonight sure, say around 7?
Imi: thats good for me too
You: I can do that, see you guys then. Love and kisses to the littles. <3
Youβre smiling to yourself as you slip the phone into your pocket, catching the clock out of the corner of your eye, youβd been so caught up, not realising how soon you needed to be out of the house otherwise youβd hit wall to wall traffic βOh shit..β
You bite the toast between your teeth as you hurriedly stuff your lunch into your bag and head for the door, swiping the car keys off the coffee table on the way.
Hoping and praying that traffic isnβt too much of a nightmare this morning as you get behind the wheel, shoving the last bite of toast into your mouth as your buckling up. The drive isnβt usually that bad, but you hated being late for anything and you needed that time first thing in the morning to grab a coffee before you settle in at your desk for the day.
Youβre about halfway to work when the radio starts to crackle, interrupting the song that was playing with static and familiar lyrics...
βTake on me...β
With a frustrated huff, you smack the heel of your palm against the centre console, as if that would do anything βOh cβmon you hunk of junk what are you doing?β
β...Take me on...β
Distracted by the radio, you donβt see the car thatβs just blown through a red light at the intersection, if you did, youβd have been able to stop in time.
β...Iβll be gone...β
When the initial impact happens, time slows down, everything hits you all at once, the screech of tires on asphalt and the deafening crunch of metal folding in on itself. The car is in a disorientating spin, you think you hear yourself scream but you canβt be certain that it came from you. It feels like youβre spinning for hours but in reality it was seconds.
Your mouth fills with the metallic taste of blood when the car eventually collides into a street lamp, the horn blaring as youβre slumped over the steering wheel, fading in and out of consciousness.
The last thing you hear before your eyes close in this world for good, is the radio static, approaching sirens, distant calls for help and a the last few words to the song.
β...In a day or two...β
Tagging those that interacted with the first post:
So a few days ago I did this little poll to help me decide which of the two Cowboy/Hellcat AUs I was going to evict from my brain so I can knuckle down and work on the story and this one won! I will naturally share the other one (Modern AU) eventually but this one is first. It all began when @blueberrysquire sent me Paris Paloma's song Hunter and my brain worms reshaped themselves around it, as brain worms will. Er, as you can see I can't do anything succinctly. Which is why I gotta yeet the idea out into the universe now?
Uhhh so this is like. A somewhat unfinished bit of prose and then bullet points at the end because help me I don't know what I'm doing! One day I'll revisit it. And commit to writing a proper low-honour Arthur. Originally this wasn't going to have any supernatural/multiverse hijinks in it but then I thought it would actually be more fun this way. If the characters are not natural-born yearners I will force their hands
Mature 18+ idk adult themes I'm not the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
You woke from the dream with a start, shaking your head irritably as you roused yourself. One of those, again. Your lips twist bitterly, even as they remember the feel of tender, whiskered kisses pressed against them.
It always happened, when you chased this mark. You'd been hunting him off and on for years, never getting quite close enough to close the bag around his head. But the money was good β astonishing, at this point. Five thousand dollars for a single man. A man you knew well enough often moved alone, for all you also know his gang was large and dangerous.
You tried not to dwell on the dreams. They were pleasant enough.
That was a lie. The dreams were more spectacular even than the promised payday from riding this man in alive or dead. Sex, mostly. Better sex than you'd had in your life, if the way you moaned and cried in your dreams was any indication. The way you throbbed between your legs when you woke had you finding it hard to disagree.
It was the dreams which weren't sex that made you sullen about having them, however.
Because those were stupid. And if there was one thing you weren't, it was that.
Arthur Morgan was a dangerous, violent man. A killer and thief. The price on this head astronomical, and earned by equally outrageous deeds. Handsome enough, sure; so you could forgive your mind the dreams where you rode him like a bucking mustang or the ones where he folded you in half, fucking you till you screamed in ecstatic release. Wasn't like you were getting that attention from any man in waking hours; you could understand your mind linking the object of your obsession with baser needs.
But in the other dreams he called you Bede. Hellcat. In those, he watched you with soft eyes and helped you braid your hair. He held you gently to himself as the two of you drifted off to slumber in a shared bedroll under the stars. He groomed your horse as carefully as he did his. Worse, the dreams played into that deeply-held and long-abandoned desire to be seen and valued for your skills. A girlish yearning, really, and one you thought you'd long set aside as nothing more than childish fancy. Yet these dreams crept into your unconscious mind, and in them, you knew. He saw you as an equal. A partner. One valued and respected.
It was those dreams you couldn't forgive your mind for tormenting you with. It was those dreams that sat so bitter in your soul when you woke in a cold bedroll, and brewed your coffee alone.
You knew you could leave it be. The dreams only came when you got on his trail; in a way, they let you know when the intel was good and he was close. You might've. The dreams were not good for your focus or your clarity. It was dangerous, would be dangerous on any hunt, and with a mark like him⦠But the money. The money had been too good to ignore when you'd first plucked his scowling face from a board back in '98. It'd increased fivefold since then.
I feel honour-bound to tell you all that my instinct was to describe this AU as "an Alternate Universe AU" pray for me fam I need it. But you know how AUs are often wildly different to the source thing? This one I am like "what if I only changed one thing". And that one thing is Arthur & Bede both ending up hunting Joe Kelly. In this version of event, the game's story progresses unaltered. I suppose the other thing that changes is that Arthur is low honour. He's pretty much mid-high in Company proper.
Bede took on the Ambarados alone and was injured in the process, and she took Kelly in dead.
They are both harder, more jaded versions of themselves. LH Arthur we know. Bede (justifiably, I feel) gets weighed down by years and years of doing good work and not being taken seriously. She already will shoot first and ask questions later on a bounty hunt, because she's pragmatic about how things would go for her in a fistfight, so she doesn't let it get to that. But in the main story, she might spare a bounty she had pity for, or not pick up ones that she thought didn't really deserve to die for whatever they did. This version of her has no real compassion for anyone anymore.
Bede finds a handbill for Arthur in 1898 for a thousand dollars and she's like, well shit. This is worth a go. Obviously she's warned not to go after him, but nobody ever thinks she can take on any bounty, so she ignores it.
The idea is that the first time they find themselves in the same place & time as their alternate selves are in the main story, that's when the dreams start. The idea without the dreams is that they're surprisingly evenly matched in skill to the point that they've had encounters and not managed to kill each other several times to the point where they build a grudging sort of respect for each other, while also being aware that the other will kill them if they make a slip.
They each have a time where they get close enough to land the killing blow but don't- either because of the interruption of another outside factor or because up close they're disarmed by realising something from the dreams that they couldn't possibly have known is true.
They are mutually deeply unsettled by the dreams. Hellcat feels disgusted with herself for wanting to be seen so bad she's apparently projecting that desire onto a dream version of the most dangerous mark she's hunted.
Arthur finds his dreams pathetic because in the dreams she chooses him over and over and accepts him as he is, which he feels is deeply pathetic of himself. Wanting shit like that. She's trying to kill you! Idiot
Also the mind-blowing sex. Mortifying. Makes it difficult to focus on the job for Bede, and since they happen whenever they're near each other, Arthur is always forewarned. They both hate or something else it
Bede backs off for a bit after this first starts because she figures she's losing her touch. Getting soft. Too lonely. Can't be having sex dreams about the guy she's planning to kill even if he is handsome. What
Then, after Blackwater, the bounty goes way, way up. And she's like, well. I'm sure I'm over those vivid and lifelike dreams by now haha. I'm so normal. and goes after him again. She messes up because of The Visionsβ’ and Arthur could easily have killed her but he doesn't because even though he knows this woman has been trying to get the noose around his neck for months... Those dreams. Maybe he calls her Hellcat in passing and Bede is like, that's some coincidence! He called me that in them dreams! I bet it's fine and nothing whew he's handsome though anyway moving on. Murder! Violence! Get your head in the game girl!
this continues for a while and eventually they each realise they're just sort of dancing around the other, no longer fully committing to killing each other. Lying about it to themselves. Some bounty hunters corner Arthur and she helps him to escape. Arguing that if anyone was going to get him, she's been hunting so long it has to be her. Anything else would be insulting; of him, to her. Does he understand her? He goes by her hand or not at all. Idk banter is deeply important in every universe
At some point, Bede has enough money saved to make a deposit on some land, but the bank won't approve her because she doesn't have a male guarantor. This is something that'll happen in different circumstances in the main story too but I think at a different time? Anyway. The legal question of a woman owning property and land and getting bank loans and so on in 1800s USA is very interesting and complicated so. Much to ponder and research. Anyway girl is pissed
she's much more reckless hunting Arthur after this but even so they don't cross paths for a long while. She knows she's close to him when the dreams start up again. Worse than ever, in her opinion, because she doesn't need nobody, especially not some man. And in her dreams they do everything together. And he clearly loves her. She gets quite mad at herself
Finally, she gets real close to Arthur without much effort and this sets off alarm bells in her head, it shouldn't ever be this easy
Arthur fell asleep at his little camp fire and when he wakes up he coughs terribly
she's like "you're sick? I don't want to catch you when you're sick, Morgan"
he's very grim and very amused all "it'll be sick or dead at this point, I reckon, Bede"
naturally she's like how the fuck do you know that name, nobody knows that name
This is when they figure out the dreams have been a mutual experience htis whole time. They each know things about the other that they couldn't possibly know.
Bede is like fuck it I'm sitting round your fire then what's the fucking point. Unloads at him about how she can't even buy a place of her own so it seems she's stuck doing this forever. And she was hoping to either get out, or...
and he's like "or"
a long, long silence
"well the thing is, I was pretty sure all you'd do if I fucked up was kill me. I found it⦠comforting."
awkward silence
The fire does the work of smoothing this over for a while, or Arthur has another coughing fit and Bede talks to distract them both from whatever that means. "Whoever she is, she's luckier than me."
"I been thinking that--whatever it is, dream, ghost-- anyway he's a soft-hearted fool, probably going to get himself killed. Despite all that," (he is saved (?) from having to complete this thought by coughing. yey. :C
Bede: let's do it
Arthur: (Making such a face) Do what
Bede: fuck. We know we're good at it
Arthur: Don't be a fool. I'll get you sick.
Bede: maybe. Way I see it, you've already got me sick. All these⦠damn dreams of you and me. Living a life it seems neither one of us ever has had in waking. Be nice to have something real.
Arthur just looks at her in a way he intends to be skeptically but he can't quite keep the hunger out of his eyes. He knows what he ought to say but by god. hasn't he denied himself enough things
Bede: You know, nobody's called me Bede in years and years. Most folks don't even know my name.
Arthur: You said your friends call you Bede.
Bede: That's so. Just. I ain't got none. Listen. The money ain't gonna do me no good anyway. And Iβ hell. I know a mark's gonna kill me some day. Why not have some fun. Roll the dice.
β¨And then they bang.β¨
Anyway I know this post is kind of a mess, but this is how I do notes, in terrible terrible dot points. So. \o/ I guess uh I hope you enjoyed it
@shapsara I believe you wanted to know about the bounty hunter au π
Image Credits: Dividers by @lobster-graphics thank you!
