A New Adventure
Warnings: None
Word count: ~2300
**Author’s note - This takes place in Utah (for my own reasons). This one shot is to set up my modern reader x Arthur Morgan head cannons. I am open to requests and ideas! If you like what you read, leave a comment!**
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You’re walking in the park by your home. It’s something you like to do every day with your dog, not only to give her exercise but so you can get some too. After all, working in an office at a desk doesn’t allow you to walk around much.
The park is pretty and you’re lucky to be living just down the street from it. It sits at the foot of a mountain range in your home valley. Right now, there’s some snow on the ground from a big storm that came through a few days ago, but it’s already melting. Perks of living in the west. Sure, winters are cold and long and the snow sucks worse, but at least it only sticks around for a few days. You love living out here though. The mountains are beautiful, you wouldn’t trade them for hardly anything.
You walk along the west side of the park right at the base of the mountain. There’s a small cave there, it only goes back about twenty feet and the local kids like to go play in there, and sometimes the older kids go in there to smoke or drink. Luckily because you live in a small neighborhood that isn’t close enough to the big city, kids smoking is about the worst that happens out here. You’ve been inside the cave once. There’s a weird drawing on the back wall, but several people have left their artists marks behind in it, so you’ve never thought anything of it.
As you begin approaching, Sage, your Bernese mountain dog, begins barking at it. Strange. She rarely barks and she’s been past this cave pretty much every day since you’ve had her. Maybe there’s a racoon or a skunk in there tonight.
You tell Sage to shush and continue walking towards the cave. She settles down but still growls. You begin thinking of other things and forgetting about her behavior when a man steps out of the cave. You recognize him, not by his face, but his outfit. He’s dressed as Arthur Morgan from your favorite video game Red Dead Redemption 2. You smile at him. Cosplayers are a pretty big deal in your state, thanks to the rise of your local comic book convention. However, he’s dressed up for the wrong time for the con, it’s not until September. It’s only February. And why the hell would this cosplayer be in the cave dressed up? Weird.
You keep walking. Sage wags her tail at him but continues on with you, no longer growling. She probably could smell him and not see him, explaining the barking. She’s an overly friendly dog so you’re not worried about her.
The man looks around as though he’s no idea where he is. Maybe he’s on something. As you get closer, you think he’s an exceptional Arthur Morgan. He looks just like him. Not only are his clothes exactly like the character’s, even worn and dirty in the right spots, his face is exactly like him. Broad shoulders, tanned skin, light stubble on his jawline and unkempt hair under his iconic hat. You can even see the bald spot on his chin where Arthur has a scar.
He continues looking around, confused, and then he spots you. You’re too close to just ignore him so you smile.
“Nice cosplay!” you say.
“Excuse me?” he says. Man, he even sounds like Arthur!
“I said, nice cosplay! You going to a costume party or something.”
“A what? Lady, I ain’t got no clue what you’re saying.”
You’ve stopped by this point to look at him, giving him a confused smile. “Man, you’re really in character too! I gotta admire that. I’m a cosplayer too but I can never stay in character. Kudos to you though!”
You’re tempted to ask for a picture, but it seems perhaps a little inappropriate. He’s looking at you like you’re a freak, as if he wasn’t the one who just popped out of a cave.
“Well, have a good night,” you say, walking on.
“Uh, sure I guess. Hey, ma’am?” he jogs up to you and stops a few feet from you. He’s beginning to weird you out. Just because you live in a small neighborhood doesn’t mean you don’t know how dangerous people can be, particularly men. Besides, if he’s on something, he could be even more of a threat. You keep a tight leash on Sage. She’s not likely to attack him, but you don’t want him to know how much of a pushover pooch she is.
“Sorry, ma’am, guess I’m just a little lost. Um, maybe ya can help me?”
“Sure, I guess. What you wanna know?”
“Well, where the hell am I, for starters.”
You tell him the name of your town, keeping a hard eye on him.
“Where is that exactly? Are we in New Hanover? Or West Elizabeth maybe?”
“Oh boy, you really are selling this cosplay, ain’t you? Well, okay. I’ll play along. Mr. Morgan, you are in Utah.”
“Utah?” he says. He looks away and mouths the word. You know that Utah wasn’t a state until 1896, three years before Red Dead 2 takes place. Boy, this guy is really selling this.
“Yeah. Come on, dude, quit playing. Your cosplay is on point, in fact everything about you is on point. But… come on, man what’s your name?”
“Well, seems you already know my last name, miss. Name’s Arthur. Arthur Morgan.”
“Still playing, huh?” you say with a sigh. “Fine, have it your way.” You wonder if he’s one of those people with an illness that makes him believe he’s someone else. Like Teddy from Arsenic and Old Lace, who firmly believed he was Theodore Rosevelt. “Well, come on,” you say, wondering if you need to call the police or have him checked into a hospital.
“Ma’am, I promise you I ain’t crazy and I ain’t playin’ whatever you think I’m playin’. Tell me, is it still 1899?’”
“What? Dude, come on. It’s 2020.”
“2020!” he cuts you off. “What the hell?” He looks around again and towards the east side of the park where the rec center and playground is, and beyond that the main road, busy with cars heading home for the night. His look of confusion and even fear is so genuine that you wonder what’s really going on.
“Look, mister. What was the last thing you were doing before coming here?”
He looks at you for a moment before answering. “I was in Big Valley collectin’ orchids for some crazy feller. I walked into this cave and saw a dinosaur bone. Some lady, don’t remember what she called herself, said she’d pay me for locations of bones. I went over to mark it and I saw this weird symbol on the wall. I touched it and the mouth of the cave got wickedly bright, it got hot, and when the light went away, I stepped out here.”
He looks around again. “You seen a horse anywhere?”
You look at him sadly. This poor, deluded man. Truly believes he’s Arthur Morgan, picking flowers for that collector in Saint Denis and finding bones for the paleontologist lady. You wonder who this man identified with before Red Dead 2 came out in 2018.
“Mister, only rich people own horses. There’s some about a mile north, but they don’t belong to you I don’t think.”
He looks at you, confused again.
“Come on, mister,” you say, beckoning him to follow. “Let me, um… I think you need to see someone.”
You begin walking again but he calls to you.
“Still don’t believe me, do ya miss?”
“Listen to yourself!” you say. “Arthur Morgan is from a video game. A video game! He’s not real, but you are. Please sir, I think you need help.”
“Lady, I don’t know what the hell a video game is, but I can prove I am real and I am Arthur Morgan!”
He reaches into his satchel and pulls out a slightly ruffled looking orchid. The kind you know from playing the game grows in Big Valley in West Elizabeth, in the forest where the pigs and cougars spawn. He then pulls out a newspaper and hands it to you.
The newspaper’s called “Saint Denis Times” and it’s dated June 18, 1899. The top headline is reporting the bloody massacre of the Grey family in Rhodes. You’ve read the newspapers in the game once before and you remember the article. It’s exactly the same as the one from the game. He then pulls out his pocketwatch. It’s worn and dirty just like the one from the game.
He continues pulling out more objects, even some dried meat. As he shows you more things, you inspect the guns in his holsters. They look real. In his holster on his right hip, you see the double-action revolver with its gold barrel and white handle. You see the engraving of a stag’s head on it.
The more he shows you, the more you find it hard to believe he’s not the real Arthur Morgan. But how in the hell is this possible? It can’t be and yet here he is. He even pulls out his journal. He doesn’t open it, you’re not surprised. You’ve played the game enough to know he’d never show you what’s inside (even though you’ve already seen it). Everything he’s shown you seems so genuine, so real. Something inside you says he’s not making it up, but how in the hell can it be real? There’s no logic to it!
You tell him to put his things away as you try to think how this could have happened. Arthur, or whatever his real name is, asks to show you the drawing he touched in the cave. You say okay, but keep a firm grip on the pepper spray in your pocket (you never go anywhere without it). The man leads you to the cave and you pull out your phone and turn on the flashlight.
“What is that?” he asks to the slim device in your hand, trying to stare into the light, flabbergasted by it.
“It’s a phone,” you say, continuing on in the cave. Sage sniffs along the ground happily, but as you approach the back, she starts barking. The same way she was before the man came out of the cave.
“That’s it,” he says, pointing to it. The drawing looks like some strange symbol. Although you’ve studied some anthropology and symbolism, you’ve never been able to place the culture or meaning of the symbol and just assumed some kid did it. However, getting closer to it, you see it’s been carved into the rock and looks like it’s been there for a long time.
Arthur grabs your shoulder. “Don’t get closer to it, miss. I ain’t too sure what it is, but… well, it ain’t good I think. It’s what I touched and that’s how I ended up here.”
You heed his warning and take a few steps back. You take a picture of it so you can do some research. You aren’t too sure what to do at this point. Something tells you that you can’t take this man to the hospital, and calling the cops wouldn’t do any good. However, the sun’s setting and you have to work in the morning. All your logic says he can’t stay with you, this isn’t a Disney movie after all. He might be playing an elaborate hoax or something.
“You still don’t believe me, do you?” he asks.
“How can I?” you demand. “I mean, listen to yourself! You can’t be Arthur Morgan! He’s from a video game!”
The man sighs and walks over to the wall, placing his hand on the symbol. Sage begins barking like crazy and the opening of the cave becomes too bright to look at and the cave fills with hot air. After a few seconds, the light dims and it cools.
You step outside the cave and find yourself standing in Big Valley. You’re in awe. Somehow, you’ve been transported to 1899 into the game of Red Dead. A pig somewhere nearby squeals and you see, maybe 50 feet away, a huge Ardennes warhorse. She snorts at Arthur.
“You believe me now, miss?” he asks.
You nod, still unable to speak.
“Good. I… I have to admit, I wasn’t sure that’d work.”
You finally look at him understandingly. “I’m sorry, Arthur. I didn’t think it was possible.”
“I can understand why, miss. I wouldn’t believe it myself if it hadn’t happened to me.” He looks around and then begins to cough.
“Shit, Arthur. You okay?”
“Yeah,” he says, spitting into the grass and wiping his mouth. You see the small line of blood left away.
“Arthur, you have TB, don’t you?”
He looks at you, shocked. “How… how do you know that? I only saw a doctor for it two days ago.”
Where to begin with this, you wonder. “Um… it’ll take some explaining, but come on. Let’s see if we can go back and I can get you some medicine for it.”
“You mean… there’s a cure for it where you come from?”
“Well, sort of. We don’t have a cure, per say, but we do have antibiotics. They’ll kick your ass just about as much as the bacteria, but at least you’re more likely to live.”
He looks at you and you see a glimmer of hope. “Okay. I’ll go with you, miss.”
You head back into the cave and touch the symbol. It surprisingly works again and you’re taken back to your time and your park. You’ll take Arthur to a doctor, but you have to drop Sage off at your house and get a car. You have to smile to yourself as you tell Arthur to walk with you. What an adventure this is going to be.
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