Tread Lightly – Among Monsters And Men

I went to bed that night with a broken jaw, broken nose, and broken right hand. And definitely with some amounts of internal bleeding, but I didn’t lose any of the four fights that came afterward and ended the night with ten dollars, a warm bed, and a meal. I turned off Adrenaline Surge before I went to bed and I instantly passed out because of the exhaustion it left me with.

The woman with the scarf tried to get my attention after the fights, but I ignored her to go to bed early. Early to bed, early to rise. I need to somehow find my friends and explain. I wanted to do it when there was a good time, but it never seemed to come up.

The sleep was phenomenal and without disturbance, even from within my mind. The first time I slept in a bed since I stayed at Edmund’s small little cabin that wasn’t so small. The covers were soft and the chill was kept out despite there being a window to the outdoors at the end of my small room with a desk, bed, and two chairs.

There is only one small hiccup. I wake up to a persistent and angry banging on the door. Sleepily, I stand and walk towards the door with a hand on my head as I notice the bodily pain I went to sleep with is gone.

The Bloody Palm removed all my physical pain in return for nourishment, both from food and me. The painful sting of Ether in my mind is still present, albeit a bit lighter from the dozen nails that were in it previously from overuse. I went a bit too far yesterday when using the Bloody Palm to recover and using Daydream throughout my sleep kept me from recovering entirely, making me start the day on a backfoot with a pounding headache.

The banging continues as I shuffle towards the door and place my hand on the doorknob. Probably just Roy waking me up for breakfast or something. The bar owner is quite kind, even if he enjoys watching people beat the shit out of each other for entertainment.

“Chill out, I’m up. Give me a sec.”

I twist the knob with a squeak and pull it open. What lies on the other end of a door is not Roy. What lies is a cold barrel of a gun that is placed into my open and yawning mouth. This instantly wakes me from my drowsiness. My heart starts thundering while I take in who is about to blow my head off. It’s probably the last man I’d ever expect.

It’s Johnny. The Gunfighter. The sixth Sigiled man with the long coat. Why is he here? He smiles at me and pushes me back into the room with great strength as he speaks like he doesn’t have a gun in my mouth. I oblige to his forceful actions and move back without resisting because of the obvious. But I do notice he gives me a look as his eyes turn turquoise from his normal brown. His smile disappears as nothing appears to happen.

“Nice to meet ya, Wendigo. I happened to meet an ex-associate of yours and he let me know that you were in town. Wasn't too hard to find you. He seemed quite worried that you’d act up here, though.”

My eyes go wide. What does he mean by ex-associate? Who told him? I don’t have any associates at all, let alone not here. I wish to talk and ask what’s happening but he twists the barrel in my mouth as I try and pushes me into a chair.

“Ah, ah, ah. I’m asking the questions here, kiddo. I don't care what you have to say besides the answers to my questions. I’m here to see if you’re a loose cannon or monster that needs to be put down. Rustbank won’t allow any who cannot control themselves within its bounds. I only have one question that you need to answer, and your answer determines whether your brains are splattered against that wall, comprende?”

I nod, well, as much as you can nod with cold steel in your jaw, to show my understanding. He pulls a chair nearby with his foot without even looking or the gun in my mouth shaking and sits on it facing me.

“Great. Why did you kill Edmund Dudley? He was one of the last good Hunters left, and I was about to recruit the old man.”

As he asks the question, he pulls the barrel out of my mouth, but the threat of it doesn't fade in the slightest. His six-shooter just stays at his hip pointed at me. I speak slowly and carefully so as to not say anything that might end with an instant bullet between my eyes. I’m pretty sure the Bloody Palm can’t bring me back from that.

“I did not mean to kill Edmund. He recruited me a few months ago after my Ma died to train me to be a Hunter–”

He stops mid-sentence, seemingly skeptical.

“Edmund recruited you? I knew the man personally many winters ago. He hasn’t taught a student in a very, very long time because of how many of his students are killed by other Hunters and the tragedy with his family. I find it quite hard to believe he taught you, what a random farmer boy?”

I continue speaking once he stops, even more carefully this time. But I do try and reason why he chose me.

“He chose to teach me because of who I am. My Ma sent me to him when she passed. Edmund knew my father many years ago, I’m Wyatt Graves, the son of Killian Graves.”

I stop talking once I say that I’m my father’s son as the Gunfighters eyes tighten and finger trembles on the trigger. He looks at me and asks for confirmation.

“Truly? You are the Undying’s son? I didn’t know he had one. How unfortunate. Your family just can’t seem to die out. Continue, what happened to Dudley?”

I try to ignore the bad faith statement from Johnny and keep explaining what happened.

“The break started just a single day after Edmund began teaching me. Together we ran from the break as he said it would be a massive one. We fought many different monsters and men while we made a run for it out of the Andreis.”

He stops me once more in the middle of speaking because he figured something out from what I told him.

“Ah, it all makes sense. I was wondering why the Headquarters started to go a bit mad about a month or so ago. And that the break is so massive this time. The wave of demons, monsters, and monsters in the skin of men reaches over two hundred miles. One of the most perilous breaches into mankind's territory in a hundred years. How else but your father being gone would your mother die? The confirmed disappearance of a man like Killian Graves and a sighting of his son paired with the Pillars not doing their jobs, besides Unyielding Travis, ought to do that. Yet another sign that the Hunters need to be fixed.”

I nod before continuing trying to explain, getting frustrated at how lightly this man takes my life and trying to ignore what he said about my father. He keeps interrupting me despite wanting information from me. Or maybe he doesn’t care. He’s just gonna kill me anyway. I will try nevertheless.

“We were attacked by a man while we were escaping. Alexos, the Phantom Pain. He was after me, saying that he wanted revenge on me because of my father. We tried to fight him together, but I was just a new 1st Sigil at the time and was very little help. The only thing I could do was fire the Colt that my father and Ma left for me. The Blooming Spider Lily—”

He cuts me off again while looking all over me, making me very agitated, but he doesn’t seem to care about my feelings.

“You had the Lily? Whoo, where is it now?”

I get fed up with him interrupting me, despite the gun that is aimed at me, and lash out a bit.

“If you would let me finish, I could tell you all at once.”

In hindsight, this was a terrible idea, and Johnny makes sure I know of that. So fast that I cannot even see his hand shift to aim or his fingers move to pull the trigger, two gunshots resound, and pain blossoms in each of my kneecaps. Blood, bone, and flesh go flying out everywhere as I scream out and hold onto my knees. A head peeks through the door, one I recognize. The lady with the pink scarf from last night.

“Everything alright Johnny?”

The Gunfighter replies back so calmly I’d swear he was speaking to his wife about dinner plans.

“Yes, dear. Just reprimanding a backtalker.”

Then he looks me dead in the eyes and gives me a warning. A final one.

“That is your one and only warning. If you show any signs of rebellion or anger, you die. I don’t care who your daddy is. Well, that’s not true. He just can’t and likely wouldn’t do anything to me even if he found out. Continue.”

I take a deep breath and try to steady my thoughts as pain wracks throughout my body. I consider Daydreaming to remove the pain, but the statement from Johnny earlier about control makes me think otherwise. I can’t risk the Bloody Palm lashing out.

A raised voice from Johnny full of impatience rips me from my painful thoughts.

“Now!”

“I tried to help Edmund who was struggling as he fought against Alexos for me. I took a shot with the Lily toward Alexos as he was in between me and Edmund. At what I thought was a perfect time. Alexos was wide open without the ability to dodge. But the Alexos I shot at wasn’t real, it was just a Phantom. It faded as my bullet went through it and it entered Edmund. From there, you probably know the rest.”

I watch Johnny put his open left hand on his chin and think for a moment. The whole time he just silently rubs his right hand’s trigger finger on the trigger of his gun. His gun that I notice still somehow has all six chambers full despite shooting two into me. After pondering deeply, he looks up at me.

Just the way he looks at me, I already know it’s something bad. Johnny looks at me the way one would about a dead bird or rat on the road. I try to speak up but he stands and starts his judgment before me.

“Rustbank has no need for psychopaths or those who would bring about chaos. I only freed this city from the Hunters to keep it from those two very things. You are free to leave, but I do not want to see you within Rustbank’s bounds ever again. And if you're not gone in an hour, Primrose will kill you for me.”

I sigh in relief. He won’t kill me, just banish me. But wait, that’s just as bad. I won’t have time to find Earl or make sure Elizabeth is alright. As Johnny steps toward the door, I call out to him. Foolish, I know, but I need to. I can’t lose the only friends I ever had.

“Wait. How about–”

Johnny whirls around and angrily addresses me without letting me finish.

“Are you trying to negotiate?! I just did you a kindness out of respect for Edmund and you ruined it. You seem to be afraid of nothing, young Graves, not even a bullet between your eyes. So, instead of whatever you want or what I just offered, I’ll take advantage of your damn familial vice. Just like how the Hunters put your father on a leash, I'll do the same. I have use for a Deadman.”

A bad feeling enters my chest as I hear what he says. Maybe I should have just taken the offer and tried to sneak in to find the others. Johnny yells out into the hall where Primrose the lady with the pink scarf is.

“Primrose! Go get a desert pack! And a Deadman’s Pair!”

Then he turns back to me.

“Here's the new deal. You do jobs for me, and I won’t kill you. You’ll be doing good things for the people of Rustbank, even if forcefully. If you eventually prove to me you’re not an insane dog, like your father before you, or a tainted Hunter, and by some angel's grace you survive being Artificed, I will consider letting you go. I don’t care anymore what you have to say. My respect was short and fleeting and you tarnished it.”

Fuck. I really fucked up this time. I definitely should have just taken the first deal. Am I going to be a slave? What’s a Deadman’s Pair? What kind of jobs will I be doing? I have so many questions, but I have learned to not speak to Johnny.

He obviously either hates me or hates when people ask him questions. I learn the answer to a few of my queries, though, as Johnny spends a few more minutes speaking to me.

“You will work as a Deadman for me. You will do almost suicidal missions to help Rustbank. And there will be plenty of them with the break that is soon to arrive in probably a few weeks. That’s actually your first mission, though. You will go out and find where the break currently is, and you will fight a bit to determine their average strength. Then, you will return here to me and tell me what you found. As fast as possible. Got any questions?”

Yeah, I have so many, you dickhead. But the one I’m most curious about is why? Why not just trust me? What is wrong with me that he won’t just allow me to stay without these conditions?

“Why? Why are you doing this to me? I’m a good man. I promise that me killing Edmund was an accident. I’ve vowed to get revenge for him.”

Johnny looks at me and for a split second, a bit of sadness emerges in his eyes that is quickly wiped away. Then, he points at my left hand. At the Bloody Palm. And understanding fills me immediately.

“That. That right there. I believe that you didn’t mean to kill Edmund just by my gut, but I don’t know how you’ve made it this far without that damned palm taking you over. I heard from your former associate that you had a 4th Sigil artifact as a prosthetic hand. Most can only last a day who are implanted with an artifact of the same rank as them. How you are still standing and not a true Wendigo as your bounty states is beyond me. But one day, and definitely one day soon, your mind’s defenses will fall. When it does happen, I want you to either be under my grasp or long gone. I have sympathy for the weak or in need, but none for people who are walking time bombs.”

After saying that to me he twists and exits the room swiftly with boots clacking against the hardwood. I am forced to just watch as he walks away because of the holes in my kneecaps. Wanting to follow him, I push Ether into the Bloody Palm asking for it to heal me and it obliges. But it takes its due as it does so.

It eats both Ether and vitality from me to mend by kneecaps and regrow bone and flesh alike. I lose about a pound of weight that I just recently regained from eating so much last night from my fight winnings. It takes about two minutes before they are fully healed and I stand, but as I do so, Primrose in her pink scarf carrying a large pack and a small box walks in.

She looks at me standing, stunned. But she quickly returns to focus and tries to flirt with me. I try to ignore her and try to walk past to get to Johnny.

“Wow, kid, you sure do heal fast. I wonder if other things recover fast. Wait—Wait—Wait. Where do you think you’re going, kid? You’re a Deadman now, so you got some things to do before you have even a single day off. That is if you live long enough to have that day off.”

She stands in the doorway, blocking my exit. I try to brush past her, but she twists her body weirdly and stabs a single finger into my gut like a hot knife to butter. I groan as extreme pain, much more than a single finger from a small woman should create floods through me. A sense of paralysis from my neck down tingles its way to my brain as she smiles at me. I instantly know that the feeling of pain and paralysis is caused by a Sigil.

Then, she kneels beside me with a spotless hand that doesn’t show any sign of being used like a shank and opens the small box to reveal two pills and a small device.

“You got work to do deary, you ain’t going anywhere unless I or Johnny says so. Eh, you can listen to Levi too. But here, take this now, and this when you get back.”

Primrose shoves one of the pills into my mouth as I gasp in pain and clamps my jaw shut. I stare at her and don’t swallow it.

“C’mon don’t be like that. If you don’t swallow the Ether Killer, I’ll just stab you with my nail until you do.”

After hearing her threat, I painfully ask what it does first through bloody teeth before swallowing the pill. Who knows what it could do?

“What— Does it do?”

“It’s so that we can be sure you come back from a mission. Once you swallow it, you have twenty-one days before it bursts in your gut and releases a massive amount of Ether, enough to instantly kill anyone below 4th Sigil. So, if you don’t want to turn to a puddle of flesh, you best come back. The other pill makes the first inert, so it will keep you alive.”

Without much other choice, I swallow the damn pill. Maybe my incredibly high resistance to Ether will save me from the Ether Killer. I’d rather not test it out. I open my mouth to show that I swallowed the pill and Primrose nods at my actions. Then, she pulls out the device that looks like an armband.

“Good, now, this thing here is a Deadman’s Switch. If your heart stops beating for thirty seconds, it goes off and explodes. Imagine, umm, like a few dozen pounds of dynamite at once, that’s about roughly the same. If you're wondering where all this stuff comes from, Johnny stole a bunch before he left the damned Hunters. So, it’s all made by them. You best not waste it.”

After she tells me what it is, she clamps the Deadman’s switch onto my right arm. Then she pats me and stands up. She goes to walk away before remembering something and turning back to me. Primrose bends down and whispers into my ear.

“To be honest, I feel a bit bad, but I agree with Johnny. Any man who is Artificed is bound to die, in a hellish way no less both for them and others. Especially one as young as you. Best to give you a good, meaningful death and keep you on a short leash. Here’s your pack with the stuff you’ll need. I expect you back within two weeks. Just head west until, well, you’ll know.”

Then Primrose finally walks away, hips and scarf swaying the whole way with not a speck of blood or dirt on her as her heels clack on the hallway floor. She leaves me leaning on the doorway bleeding from the small hole she put in me with her nails and paralyzed from the neck down. I speak up before she disappears completely at the end of the hallway, the thoughts exiting my mouth as they come.

“W-wait.”

Primrose spins in a motion like a dancer and tilts her head at me.

“Why? Do you want to beg? No can do kid. Nothing you can say will change what's happening.”

“No… That’s not it. Can you tell my friends that I’m not a monster? That-that I’m sorry.”

She looks at me and squints her eyes. Then she turns back around and leaves me with a few words.

“Do it yourself. You’ll need that motivation if you want to live the next few days. All Johnny cares about is protecting people, so if you can do that and show you’re not a threat, things might just change. I doubt you can, but you've made it twice as long as I would with that thing attached to me. So good luck kid, you've got a chance.”

She finishes her bit of actually kind advice considering what she just did to me with a fingernail as she goes around the corner and exits my vision.

Once I hear her heels clack against the stairs, I take a deep breath as I marshal my Ether once more to heal myself. A few murmurs from the palm try to reach me as I do so, but I keep them out with Daydream and anger. Anger at myself, at the world, at Johnny, and even anger towards my friends. Earl betrayed me. It had to have been him. He’s the only one who knows in depth about the Bloody Palm being attached to me. He did it after all.

It’s hard to find the energy to hate him though. I did betray him first I suppose by lying to him. He probably thinks I’m a monster in human skin who’s just been traveling with them. Waiting for a time to strike. Or something of that nature. I got to make it up to them somehow. I just hope they don't leave Rustbank and that Elizabeth is alright.

After almost ten minutes this time, a bit slower as I’m running out of mass to use to heal and I think it’s harder to recover from paralysis, I stand. Sighing, I grab my things including the new pack, and head downstairs to the bar to get another meal before I leave.

I solemnly nod to Roy and ask for a meal before I leave. I use all my remaining ten dollars for a huge five-course breakfast that I scarf down to replenish what I just lost healing myself with the Bloody Palm. Roy and I talk for a bit, but my mood doesn’t allow for much conversation between the two of us. He tries to offer me more food, but I decline and decide to leave early.

As I walk out, I hear Roy call out to me.

“Come back, okay, Wyatt? You’re a good kid. I’ll try and talk to Johnny, he’s a stubborn man, but you gotta make it back alive.”

This little bit of kindness makes me smile wide. I turn back and nod to him as I heft my two backpacks and leave the Rusty Nail.