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John’s feet are heavy as he stumbles down the side of the mountain. He has to put a lot of conscious effort into making sure his feet don’t slip on the jagged rock. One hand holds a worn gambler’s hat to his head, gripping it like the last memory of Arthur will disappear if he lets it fall. Arthur’s satchel hangs heavily at his side, the strap digging into his shoulder. He knows he would never even consider putting it down now.
Every fiber of his being is screaming at him that he needs to turn around. He’s making the wrong decision. He really considers going back for Arthur at least once every ten seconds, be there for him til’ the end like they had always been ever since he was a boy. Arthur did make good on that promise. He might be the only one. John wants to believe that there’s still a sliver of time left to go back and save him, but he knows Arthur’s a stubborn thing, anyway. He won’t be convinced.
It’s hard to let go of someone like Arthur Morgan. He should know that better than anyone. He’d known him 14 years, and he was about as close to a brother as someone could get without being blood. John’s eyes sting. He keeps walking. He has to.
He is sure of one thing. He knows Arthur would have wanted this. Wanted to be a diversion, since he was in a bad way already. Would have wanted John to make his escape and go be with his family.
Go to your family. Get the hell out of here and be a goddamn man.
He’d always thought it would have ended for Arthur some other way, morbid as it was to think about. Shot dead by the law, maybe. Robbery gone wrong, maybe that too. A death staring down the barrel of a gun, fit for outlaws like them. Tuberculosis had really been the very last thing on his mind. Maybe he was a fool.
He most definitely was a fool. He’d done a lot of bad things to a lot of good folk in hopes they’d get to Dutch’s idea of a perfect world. A lawless world. Dutch, the man who’d raised John from twelve, saved him from dying all by his lonesome. Arthur the same, but fourteen. He’d raised them, alongside Hosea. Taught them everything they knew. He’d given them a new purpose. A second chance. It was hard to believe that was the same man who didn’t care if either of them lived or died now.
It had all been for nothing, hadn’t it?
He can’t bring himself to look back up when he’s on even ground at the bottom of the mountain. Arthur is alone up there, and he’ll die that way. John’s stomach churns something awful at just the thought of it. His feet carry him away like he’s taking a backseat in his own head, through the trees and away.
Leaving is the thing he’s best at.
There’s still a nauseous feeling in his stomach and a chill in his bones when he gets to Copperhead Landing. It’s nearly sunrise, but not quite.
By the ruined building he spots two horses hitched up, and three people sitting nearby. They’re all sitting closely together, obviously speaking, but it’s so hushed he can hardly hear a word they say. He can recognize them by their backs alone. Tilly, Sadie, Abigail. Sadie seems to hear him coming first, her hand moving for her gun until she realizes who it is. Something in her face softens. Recognition, pity, he doesn’t know.
The movement has the others turning around too. The quickest to react is Abigail. She’s on her feet in an instant, damn near tripping over herself as she hurries over to him like she’s been waiting all her life to see him here.
“John” she croaks out, half a sob as she crashes into him, just about. She’s crying as she holds him tight. He’s crying too, but he’s not sure if it’s for the same reason she is. When she pulls back to get a better look at his face, wiping away the dirt smeared on his cheek, she spots Arthur’s hat on his head. Her eyes flood with tears once more.
“Jack?” he hardly hears himself croak, and she waves to the group, and from behind Sadie and Tilly comes the boy, their boy, running on little legs to his ma and pa. He’s only four. He doesn’t know a damn thing about what just happened. He doesn’t deserve this life. John knows he has to do right by this boy. It’s what Arthur would have wanted, too.
Some time later, John gets word from Charles. Besides being relieved that he’s alive, he finds out that Arthur’s been buried in Ambarino. When the weather starts to get warmer, he makes the trip up near Bacchus Bridge, which he still remembers blowing to pieces with Arthur. The journey is long and lonely, but the destination makes it worth it.
It looks like the kind of place Arthur would have wanted to sit and draw at for hours. John sits in front of the grave and retrieves Arthur’s journal from the satchel. He sits there, listening to the birds, as he flips through the pages. The cliffs overlook much of Ambarino; he can see for miles. The snow caps the mountaintops. Arthur’s grave faces west, like he vaguely remembers him mentioning some time ago.
West, the way they were supposed to travel, but never quite made it.