Summary: A fight with Micah leads to a lecture from Dutch. Loyalty is exactly what you've been raised on, but to what? To whom? The answer seems to be John every time.
Warnings: Knife violence, canon-typical violence, fish guts, strong language, Micah Bell's whole existence, sexist language/insults, Dutch being our fav little manipulator, blink-and-you'll-miss-it mild angst
Word count: 1,465
A/N: I've been waiting to write this altercation since I first started ghost story, so I hope you all enjoy it for this nice, short chapter 💕
Series masterlist • AO3
—
You miss out on a hell of a firefight. A lot of law dead. A lot of townsfolk dead. A run-in with Mr. Leviticus Cornwall himself.
You’re surprised that he deigned to show his face in the mud and the muck of Valentine, but if there’s one thing rich folk are good for it’s greed. From the sound of it, he’s none too pleased to have been robbed.
From the sound of it, it’s a lucky thing John and Arthur and Dutch and Strauss ain’t dead after all that.
The gang was quick to make a hasty retreat.
Now you’re camped outside a little town called Rhodes, farther south than you’ve settled in years. Arthur teases that you and Javier must be happy to be in warmer climes, but personally? You hate it. New Austin is dry heat and desert for miles. The air there bites, sharp and clean. Here it’s thick as molasses and wet with humidity. Sweat and condensation cling to everything. The very ground beneath you is mucky and muddy and lush with overgrowth, like the vegetation can’t stand it here, either. It claws and climbs its way out and onto everything. You’ve never seen undergrowth like this, swallowing trees and homesteads whole without discrimination.
Out of everyone, you figured Dutch would hate it most - you can’t count how many times he’s told stories about the Southern scum that put his daddy in the ground. But he seems in his element out here. The town is divided into factions he and Hosea have wasted no time playing against one another, and rumors of confederate gold have lit his eyes with that same gleam you saw before Blackwater. You know you won’t leave until he has it - he’s even got Bill and Arthur playing deputy while working leads.
Today they’re off with the sheriff chasing ‘shine in the hills, so camp is mostly quiet. Or it would be, if Micah wasn’t hanging around.
“Ghost,” he calls out, uncomfortably familiar. He approaches Pearson’s chuckwagon with open arms that are greeted only with a flat stare when you look up from the fish you’re gutting. You promised Pearson you’d take care of them while he does the shopping.
“Micah.” His name grits past the teeth you’re doing your utmost not to bare in warning; already he’s closer than you’d like.
“Haven’t seen much of you since I got back from Strawberry,” he says.
“I keep busy.”
“Not too busy for Marston.” He rocks back on his heels and raises his brows like he’s caught you out. Something about the way he says John’s name makes your hackles raise.
“Me an’ him are friends,” you chop off a trout head aggressively while making even more aggressive eye contact. “You and me, on the other hand, ain’t.”
“Aw, don’t be like that,” he wheedles. “I’m a real friendly fella. We oughta go drinking sometime and I’ll show you.”
It takes everything in you not to cringe at the thought. It’s one thing to work a job with him, when you have to, but spending quality time with Micah? It sounds like just about the worst thing you can think of. He has this slimy quality about him, and the way he talks about some of the others is enough to solidify your poor opinion.
Dutch can make nice with him all he likes. You won’t.
“We all heard what happened when you went drinking in Strawberry,” is what you say aloud. “Rhodes might not survive.”
He laughs through the fact that the joke was meant to be at his expense and leans closer. “You’re funny, Ghost. Real funny. I can see why John likes you so much. It’s too bad he’s so… Well, you know.”
“He’s so what?” If looks could kill, Micah would be stone dead.
“Useless,” he shrugs. “I mean, first he gets hisself half eaten, then he’s fleeced rustlin’ sheep— almost got his brains blown out in Valentine. Not to mention he let Morgan steal a two dollar whore right out from between his—”
All of the sudden you can’t hear past the ringing in your ears or see past the blood red of your vision. He’s snickering, leaning closer still, leering, and faster even than you can register you’ve grabbed him by the hair and smashed his face against the fish guts and the wooden table before you.
He cries out, somewhere between alarmed and disgusted and enraged.
Your filleting knife rests against his pulse point.
“Say it again,” you snarl.
Stark, killing hate reflects back on your knife blade with the whites of his eyes. “Goddamn you!”
“Not so funny now, huh?” He struggles in your grip. “Say it again.”
He opens his mouth and bares his teeth, likely to spit more profanities, when approaching footsteps stop you both in your tracks. You glare up at the intrusion to find Ms. Grimshaw. Her face is even more severe than usual.
“What exactly is going on in my camp?” she demands, hands on her hips.
“Micah was just apologizing,” you say. Your smile is a feral show of teeth.
He squirms in your grip, claws at your hands. “Get this goddamn lunatic off me!”
She purses her lips, unimpressed. “Ghost, unhand Mr. Bell.”
You let him go reluctantly, pressing the knife to his skin just a little harder before shoving him back. He staggers away and you wipe your hands down your pants and grimace.
Micah’s hands fly to his throat, like he’s checking it’s all still intact. His cheek shines slimy red with fish blood.
“You’re crazy!” he accuses.
“Ghost is plenty of things,” Ms. Grimshaw says before you can cut in, “but crazy ain’t one of ‘em. I suggest you learn from this particular mistake, Mr. Bell. Now go on, the both of you. Get! Before you make another mess for me to clean up.”
You murmur a chastised yes, ma’am under your breath.
Micah stalks away, glaring over his shoulder without another word.
All that’s left is the thunk, thunk, thunk, of your knife against the wooden table. You let yourself imagine each unfortunate fish is Micah, instead.
—
Dutch finds you later. You’re sat on a log overlooking the lake, glaring out across the water like it’s somehow responsible for everything that’s happened up until now. He sits beside you and lights a cigar.
“Ms. Grimshaw tells me someone tried to kill Micah today.”
His tone is neutral, but a quick glance out of the corner of your eye reveals a tightness in his posture that’s never a good sign. He lets out a puff of smoke and watches it fade into the horizon with squinted eyes.
“She tell you he had it coming?”
“Now, Ghost—” he starts to chastise, but you cut him off.
“I never pretended to see what you do in him.” His eyes widen and flash with wounded pride, but your face is set in defiance. “Maybe we’re all nasty killers and degenerates, but he’s worse. I ain’t gonna stand by while he runs his mouth about any one of us.”
His face is all severity and rough-cut gemstone. “Any one of us, or just John?”
Outrage flares your nostrils and twists your mouth into something ugly. “That ain’t fair! And it certainly ain’t the point.”
“Isn’t it?” His hand on your shoulder, so often a comfort through the years, rests heavy and threatening. Your pulse jumps. Your mouth feels dry. “We don’t have the luxury of doubt - not between any of us. Haven’t I taught you loyalty? Don’t I deserve your trust?”
That’s all it takes for you to deflate. “You have it. You’ve always done right by us, but—”
“There is no but,” he says. “Faith, Ghost! Faith.”
“Faith, then. Fine. Faith.”
The words taste bitter on your tongue, but his eyes soften all at once into that familiar, sparkling brown. “I knew I could depend on you.”
“Sure. Always.”
He leaves with one last squeeze of your shoulder and orders to look into the Braithwaite family - something to do with prize horses. After all, who better than the infamous Ghost Rider? The Van der Linde Ghost?
—
You stay on that log for a long time. Thinking. Smoking. Stewing in the not-quite-anger left in Dutch’s wake.
—
That night around the fire you and John gravitate to one another like always. He brings you a plate of fish and sits beside you; a little too close for friends, a little too friendly to be anything but.
Somehow it aches more than usual.
He chatters on about his day, but all you can hear is the sneer of Micah’s voice, and all you can feel is the burn of Dutch’s knowing stare. The sweat on your brow has little to do with Lemoyne’s oppressive heat anymore.
It’s not a sudden change, but a change nonetheless...
~100 word excerpt under
Sova looked at his phone one last time before turning it off. There were so many better things to do other than watch his phone for any updates from Breach. He wished him a good night before he left for his mission, but thirty-six hours later, there was still no response. He sighed as he waited one extra moment just in case he texted right before he turned it off. There were moments when Sova wished that he had taken Breach’s offer and stayed. This was one of them. Maybe it would’ve fixed everything. After that night, he replayed his response a million times in his head, any moment where he didn’t need to think about the blackmailer.
