DEFINITELY want to hear about Western Jewels (disappointed you're not still doing it, but I get the workload). Do you mind telling how Gem and Pearl's relationship would've developed throughout it, or what the overall story was after their first meeting?
Also, just out of curiosity, who else was going to show up in the AU and how?
It's not actually about the workload that wasn't what I was referring to lol (look up pitching maybe, am I being straightforward enough yet hm)
The way Gem and Pearl's relationship would have worked is that at first, they would start off as enemies and very reluctantly work together to escape the first set of sheriffs and bounty hunters
Later that night, they would have to attend to the wounds they had given each other earlier in their own fight
Since they escaped into the desert, they have to at least stay together till the next town and pool their supplies together, otherwise neither of them is quite likely to make it, since they hadn't expected to have to dash off
While travelling to the next town, Pearl would pester Gem with questions that she would reluctantly be answering, notably Pearl wouldn't offer much information about herself
In the next town, they would discover a large crowd surrounding new wanted posters for them proclaiming them to be a Duo, The Lawless Jewels, the bounty for the two of them to be brought in is very ,very high
After some vicious swearing from both of them and ducking around town trying to avoid the large crowd of people looking at the bounty signs, Pearl would sneak them into Big B's bar
In this AU Big B is a rather large informant for both the criminal underworld and the law; he plays to all sides, really, whatever brings in the money. To talk about some of the other characters that would be involved with him, Shebly, also known as Shubble would be one of his main informants; she infiltrates towns as a simple barmaid and overhears a lot of information.
Later on, Katherine Elizabeth would become one of his field informants, too, after growing tired of being belittled and underestimated by the people she had surrounded herself with because of being a cowgirl instead of a cowboy. She and Gem were meant to have a lot of talks and parallels to discuss/show gender disparity in this setting, but I don't have any solid writing to show for those, tho I wish I did
The story was less planned from here out, mostly just fun ideas I wanted to try to cobble together
The two would continue travelling together simply because it's now simply too dangerous to go alone
Etho in this AU is Gem's older brother, he took her in after their parents were killed by outlaws due to his own past
He's incredibly overprotective and parentified, and part of the reason she ran off in the first place
A sorta b plot/continuous backstory plot going on in the background would be around Etho's own past as an outlaw, his time with "the family" and his decision to abandon it all to protect the person he loves most, his baby sister
There is a BIG age gap between the two, so he very much sees her still as that traumatised child who had been hidden by their parents when they were attacked
Etho helps out a lot in the background to try to keep the jewels bounty as "Taken in Alive" instead of "Wanted dead", he's basically calling in every old favour he has to protect Gem and, by extension, Pearl
I think before I had talked about some characters who would definitely be in the au so I'll briefly go over everyone and what their roles would have been
Ah found the list okay
Gem Maple - Main character - outlaw - Pearl's partner - Etho's younger sister
Pearl L'escantmoon - Main character - Most wanted Outlaw - Gem's partner - Was scouted by Cleo for the Family once, it didn't go well
Etho Maple - Previous mysterious past as an outlaw, was a part of the family with Cleo/Bdubs/Scar - Gem's Older brother/stand-in guardian due to their parent's murder
Cleo - Leader of the family - Angry at Etho for abandoning them - Angry at Bdubs and Scar too, sends a lot of people after the jewels until he tracks her down to both beg for his sister's safety and explain himself
Joe Hills - Cleo's second in command
BDubs - A member of the family though distant, - Knew where Etho went, didnt tell Cleo - she's aware of this
Scar - Left the family but isn't antagonist to them - Y'allternative - Kinda travelling with this random chaotic bandit he found
Grian - Bandit - causes chaos and destruction - not particularly violent
Joel Small - the "mayor" of the town Etho and Gem are from - married to Lizzie
Lizzie Small (Originally Elizabeth Shade) - The Actual Mayor of the town - couldn't become it due to sexism, had Joel run instead and secretly runs things behind the scenes, he's very proud of his wife
Jimmy Shade - Sheriff of the town - Lizzie's younger brother
Scott Smajor - Bounty Hunter after the Jewels
Mythical Sasuge - Bounty Hunter after the Jewels
Miscellaneous folks would also be one-off hunters/town sheriffs involved in the chase for the jewels - hadn't decided those yet
Shelby/Shubble - Informant/infiltrator for Big B
Hannah Rose - Performer/entertainer at Big B's bar - a bodyguard/bouncer if things get dicey in the bar - past informant/bounty
Katherine Elizabeth - A foil to Gem, suffering from the misogyny of those around her - her and shelby were probably going to be a background pairing
False Symmetry - The Black Rose - a legend in the bounty hunter community - does she truly exist? - (A retired Lawless living her best life these days lol, she helps Pearl and Gem out a few times, and eventually was going to run into Cleo and help with her self-loathing)
The like main ends I had in mind were the jewels ending not even being known to the audience
Like Gem and Pearl ride off into the sunset together
Their whole ending is that we don't know their ending
And neither does anyone else
They become a myth, a legend, a tale told
And I love that for them
Katherine gets to end up in a place where she feels valued and important
The town always wonders what happened to those two siblings that left but dont worry about them too much
Etho lets Gem go. He understands now that he cannot keep her when she doesn't want to be kept or protected
He understands that their relationship fractured for a lot of reasons and that it's not fully either of their fault, but that he shouldn't keep pushing it
He goes home to his family (hahah puns) and explains himself, apologises and is let back in
Its sorta a happy ending all round, just sorta a tinge bittersweet
(And somewhere in between all that is a blossoming deep relationship between the girls lol)
Hope that's satisfying!!! kinda really glad to just get to fucking say it all
Been sitting on it for months haha only @solarockk got to know most things and even then I hid a few bits too
I'm very happy to have got to explore all this myself but it's just become, framework for something else, thats a little more important to me and so I'll start taking things down in perpartion for that eventually
In case anyone asks though I am putting this out here - No You Can Not Take These Ideas Yourself - I don't want someone continuing this au - I don't want fanfics made for this premise of mine
Be inspired and make a western AU for SURE!!! would love to see more wild west and cowboys/girls
But I dont want my story beats/character relationships and such to be copied
Please, I'm taking a risk in sharing all this, I can't control anyone But i can ask for you to be respectful of me and my creative works
Thank you to everyone who followed this idea though! It was a lot of fun
send more asks if you have them I'll probably answer any questions for a few more weeks
Wyv out~
