Red Dead Redemption 2 One-Shots

↬A.M.↭UNTITLED (3)↫

The following morning, Arthur woke to an empty house. He struggled to his feet to shamble around, but the rest of it was just as uninteresting as the room he slept in. The wood was anything but comfortable but it beat the torture chair any day. Looking outside, he noticed the sun high in the sky and the girl's horse nowhere in sight. He realized then that he didn't even know her name; she was just a stranger.

He couldn't figure her out. There had to be a bigger reason behind her helping him escape, why else would she risk her life for a man she didn't even know? He had a feeling he wouldn't be able to pry it out of her. Though he supposed it really didn't matter, she saved his life all the same.

He leaned against the doorway, staring out onto the land. Everywhere he looked: dust. Wait, no, there was one tumbleweed rolling across the horizon. It faded from sight and he was left staring at what could barely be considered a view at all. He had no clue where he was.

A horse appeared down the road, cantering with the girl in saddle. She spotted Arthur at the door and watched him carefully, wondering if he was thinking of taking off. Then he waved and she slouched slightly in her seat.

(POV change)

I wasn't sure about leaving Morgan all alone in the house with ample opportunity to leave but it looks like he made the right decision. Although I guess in his current state he really couldn't have gotten far.

"I bought medicine and food," I said as I stopped just outside the house. I hopped off the horse and grabbed the saddle bags to bring inside.

"What's her name?" Arthur asked. I paused.

"Who?"

"Your horse."

"Oh, um..." I turned to look at her. "I didn't give her one." His eyes widened. I pushed past him into the house and he hobbled after me, incredulously asking why I didn't name her. "She's just a horse." I was puzzled why he put so much value in an animal. With the O'Driscolls it was practically a new horse every week, you learned not to get attached.

"You don't care about her?" He used the wall to slide to the ground in his corner as I set the food and medicine in front of him.

"I don't care about anyone." He was unsure how to respond to that. "If nobody cares about you, why should you care about anyone else?"

"Nobody has ever cared about you?" He asked it in a whisper as he looked me in the eyes, genuine concern in his expression. It made me uncomfortable.

"Well my parents made sure to remind me of that every day." I said it like it didn't bug me, after all it was 20 years ago I last saw them, but for some reason the sting was still there.

Silence filled the air as I worked on patching up Arthur's wounds and he ate. I was surprised he could eat with the smell coming off him. After a while, I sat back and surveyed my work. Other than the one on his abdomen I was done. I started popping buttons when he grabbed my hands.

"Whoa now-"

"Oh calm down." I brushed off his hands but he grabbed me again. I looked up at him. "I'm trying to fix you, not get frisky with you." He slowly let go, and for some odd reason, I missed the warmth of his hands on mine. Ignoring whatever odd feeling that was, I finished unbuttoning his shirt and grabbed the bandages. "You need to wash up after this. You stink to high heaven." He nodded in agreement and stood, hand on the wall for support. He was already doing much better than last night. I needed to seal the deal with Dutch Van der Linde fast or Arthur was going to be able to walk back fine on his own.

"Come with me, we're going to the stream." I led him outside to my horse, who was chomping away at some grass desperately trying to grow in this barren wasteland. I got on her back and held out a hand to help Arthur up. He took it, and after grimacing in pain, swung up onto the horse behind me. I could feel his chest against my back as I urged the horse to go. "Is there any specific reason you left your shirt open?" I didn't catch his small smile.

"I'm taking it off later anyway." I guessed that was fair, so I dropped it.

~~~

At the stream, I let him take care of washing himself with the little soap I had. I sat on my horse, pointing my gaze away from the naked man in the water. "Would Dorthy be a good horse name?" I asked, stroking her mane. It was weird showing affection to her but she seemed to like it, at least I was fairly sure that's what she was expressing.

"Storm fits her better."

I snorted. "She is not going to be Storm."

"Honey." I thought about that.

"I like that. Honey it is." I grabbed an apple from my bag and fed it to her. "Are you almost done in there?"

"Nearly." I heard some water splash then silence. "Why did you join the O'Driscolls anyway?"

"Because they had what I wanted, and I was desperate to belong to something." I wasn't entirely sure why I wanted to be honest about that; I was usually spinning lie after lie to protect myself, but with him it was like...I just didn't need to. "But they're all no good selfish thieves. I only stayed because leaving meant death."

"So why are you so sure you won't die now?"

"I'm not." I looked over at him. "You sure are taking a while." He rolled his eyes.

"I can't clean while you're staring at me."

"Fine. One more minute then I'm leaving you."

Once the soaking wet man stepped out of the water and his clothes were back on, I groaned. I hadn't thought about how he'd dry off. "Just...hop on." He settled behind me, his cold front pressing against my warm back. I shivered.

A fish jumped out of the water and startled Honey, causing her to rear. Arthur grabbed me tightly as I held onto the reins for dear life. Honey galloped off and only allowed me to calm her after she was a mile away. My heart slowed as I realized my entire back was now soaked because of Arthur. "Nice," I mumbled.

Two men on horseback rode by, then did a double take. I kept my hat low as I calmly led Honey in the other direction. The men came back, riding right behind me. "Morgan, get the gun." He slowly reached down to grab his rifle off Honey's saddle.

"Is that (Y/L/N)?" one of them asked.

"Me?" I asked, raising my voice to a high girly pitch.

"No, stupid. Are you blind?" The other knocked him upside the head and they both turned around and rode off. I breathed a sigh of relief.

"Those were-"

"I know," Arthur mumbled, wrapping an arm around me. I thought it was a hug before I realized he was just trying to stay on the horse. "(Y/L/N)?" He said the name out loud, trying to decide if it suited me.

"It's just (Your/Name) actually." I didn't want to associate myself with my parents anymore. "We should get back to the house. Not all of them are that stupid." Honey sped up.