Arthur Morgan did not intend to survive when he gave his hat to John Marston and stayed behind to gain his redemption. As he crawled towards his final resting place, he never intended to wake up again.
But he does wake up. Thanks to time travelers F...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
2022
"I've made my choice, Sister," Arthur said in a calm, firm voice. He sat with Sister Calderon on the rough-hewn porch swing that looked out from he and Tori's house towards Mount Shann at the other side of the valley. It was a beautiful day, and a flock of cedar waxwings flew overhead, twittering and chirping in the brilliant sunshine.
"Was it hard to make?" she questioned, looking at him intently with a kind smile on her face. "For you, I suspect it wasn't."
He shook his head, still refusing to look at her, content to stare at all of nature's beauty, deep in thought. "No. I had my mind made up about three seconds after the shock of it wore off. I loved Mary. Part of me always will, I think. But I love my wife more, not to mention my daughter and Jackson. I've built a home here. That was somethin' I never could have done with Mary, even if I'd run away with her and left Dutch and the others for good. There was too much anger and bitterness between us for me to ever truly be happy."
Sister Calderon nodded and thought for a moment. "I am so happy for you, Mr. Morgan," she said at last. "Men like you are the only thing that makes me believe in my work; that the world is not such a violent and evil place after all. As I said to you once before, life can hold lots of love and beauty, even in the midst of a world of pain. My brother and I are all that is left of our kind, and he is a cold, practical man. He holds little attachment in his heart. It is hard for me to love him sometimes, but you and Charles and Dr. Sinclair have given me the hope that one day he may learn to love and cherish, just as you have."
As her words died away, she reached into a pocket in her cloak and pulled something out. It was a small, golden pocket watch, simple in appearance, but if Arthur was quiet, he could almost hear it making a small humming sound, as though someone far away were running their finger over the edge of a glass made of crystal. She held this strange, otherworldly pocket watch out to Arthur expectantly as though it were a gift.
He took it with a raised eyebrow and a healthy dose of skepticism. It was curiously cold in his hand, as though it were made of ice, and it vibrated in a slight, almost unnoticeable way against his skin. A lightbulb went off in his brain. "Is this what I think it is?"
She nodded. "This pocket watch is what allows one to travel through time. There are several in existence; Dr. Sinclair has one, as does Mr. Smith. One belongs to me, and the last belongs to my brother. These five watches have been imbued with a mineral from my home universe that allows one to channel time in much the same way as a tuning fork channels sound. The cores are finite and will deplete eventually, especially if you use them to open especially large holes in time. A hole any bigger than one just large enough for a man to fit through will cause rapid decay of the core, and it will be unable to last longer than a few minutes. This is why Charles was unable to take his horse back here with him when he left 1899."
Arthur nodded. "I...I remember. But... what do you expect me to do with this thing?"
She sighed. "You cannot change the past beyond what I tell you to. If you do, you risk opening a rift in time that will unleash hell itself upon this place. You may choose to be a silent observer as Dr. Sinclair does, or you may choose not to use it, and to hide it away in a safe place in case I call for you to use its power to help me, as Charles does. Or, you may use it in a different way entirely. It is up to you, but I recommend you use it first to return to the year 1905 and gain the closure from Mary Linton that you so badly wish for."
