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...
His Acting skill projected a terrifying duality, the utterly calm, almost bored practitioner of agony, and the faint, flickering ghost of a man who could show mercy if only the right words were spoken. "You don't have to be brave," he told Milton quietly. "You don't have to protect anyone. They won't protect you."
Milton's eyes fluttered, unfocused.
"They already left you here," Caleb continued. "Wounded. Hiding. You're disposable. You always were."
Milton shook his head weakly. "No… no…"
"They'll write you off," Caleb said. "Heroic death. Necessary loss. Meanwhile, you rot in this shack."
Another application. Another wave.
Finally, the dam broke. Milton's body, wracked by hours of unendurable torment, could no longer obey his will. His mind, battered by pain and Caleb's psychological siege, shattered.
"STOP!" he screamed, the word a raw, torn thing. "PLEASE! FOR GOD'S SAKE, STOP! I'LL… I'LL TELL YOU! JUST STOP!"
Caleb paused, the scalpel hovering. He carefully set it down. "Good," he said, his voice returning to its normal, measured tone. "We have reached a consensus."
He retrieved a flask of alcohol and carefully disinfected the wounds, not to drink, but to pour over the fresh, stinging wounds, not gently, but competently, preventing infection while sending a final reminder of pain. Milton howled again, but this pain was different, cleaner, a promise of cessation.
Caleb waited until his breathing steadied.
"Now," he said, "we'll try this again. Where does Angelo Bronte keep his real ledgers and his money?"
Milton sagged in the chair, weeping freely, every ounce of pride and defiance leached away. "He… he doesn't keep it in the city. Too many eyes. Too many rivals. It's west. In a fortified strongbox vault… inside a deconsecrated church. Near the Kamassa River, just north of Bluewater Marsh. The place is called Old Madonna Chapel. It's guarded by his most trusted men, Sicilians, not the local thugs. They rotate shifts… never less than six."
Caleb nodded, scribbling. It made perfect sense. A remote, defensible location, spiritually significant to Bronte's men, a day's ride from Saint Denis. "That makes sense."
Milton sagged in the chair, relief and pain warring across his face.
Caleb looked up. "Next. The main base of his operations here. The hub."
"The… the docks. Warehouse Seven, marked 'Pelican Imports.' That's the nerve center. The protection rackets, the smuggling, the girls… it's all coordinated from there. The books for the daily operations are there, but the real wealth… are hidden in the chapel."
"The politicians. The judges."
Milton hesitated only a second before continuing, listing them one by one. It was longer than Caleb expected. A police captain, two judges of the district court, the city's chief tax assessor, a state senator who chaired the transportation committee.
Their names, and in some cases, the specific amounts paid monthly or the favors done.
"And the evidence?" Caleb pressed. "You're a Pinkerton. You don't just gather names. You have proof. Documents. Testimonies. Where is it?"
A ragged sigh. "A safety deposit box. First Bank of Saint Denis. Box 147. Key… key is on my watch chain." He nodded weakly toward his vest.
Caleb retrieved it, a simple, sturdy key. This was a treasure trove. Blackmail material on half the city's elite, compiled by the Pinkertons themselves.
Finally, the last question. "Your backer. The government meeting. Who was it?"
A strange, broken laugh escaped Milton's lips. "Backer? There's no new backer. It was just… settling the account. The Agency's biggest client in these states. The man who pays for a third of our operations west of the Lannahechee. Mr. Leviticus Cornwall."
Caleb's pencil stopped. He looked up, the pieces snapping into a brutal, logical place. Cornwall. The railroad and oil magnate, a man whose wealth made Bronte look like a street peddler. Of course.
Bronte's grip on Saint Denis meant Cornwall's shipments were taxed by protection money, his workers intimidated, his efficiency compromised.
Cornwall wouldn't tolerate a parasite that large. He hadn't just hired the Pinkertons, he'd essentially bought a private army to surgically remove Bronte. The elite mercenaries, the renewed pressure, the government access, it was all Cornwall's money and influence.
"He wants Bronte gone," Caleb murmured, more to himself than to Milton.
"He wants the city efficient," Milton corrected, his voice a thread. "Bronte is… friction. Cornwall hates friction. He gave us carte blanche and a blank check. Ross's death… it just made it personal for me. For Cornwall, it's just a cost overrun."
Caleb closed his journal. He had everything he needed. More than he'd hoped for. He looked at the broken man before him. Andrew Milton was no longer a threat. He was a ruined vessel, emptied of all useful secrets.
"Thank you, Agent Milton," Caleb said, his tone almost polite. "You've been very helpful."
He saw a faint, pathetic hope flare in Milton's eyes. The hope that cooperation had earned mercy.
Caleb stood. He walked behind the chair. Milton tried to turn his head, but he was too weak. "Wha… what are you…?"
"Friction," Caleb said quietly. "I hate it too."
His hands, strong enough to shatter wrist bones, found Milton's head. A sharp, powerful twist. A clean, decisive crack echoed in the shack, swallowed instantly by the croaking of frogs. It was, in its way, an act of mercy compared to the lingering death he would have faced from his wounds in this place.
Caleb felt no thrill, no remorse. It was a necessary terminal action. He spent the next hour meticulously cleaning the shack of any sign of his presence.
He wrapped Milton's body in the old canvas he found around the shack, then tied it with ropes that he have brought, and he then goes to put the body on the back of Morgan.
As the first grey light of dawn hinted at the eastern sky, Caleb rode away from the bayou. He did not return to Saint Denis immediately. He went to a secluded spot along the Kamassa, built a small fire, and burned his blood stained clothes, washing himself and his tools in the cold river.
He changed into fresh spare clothes from his inventory. McLaughlin was gone for now. Caleb Thorne needed to think.
He sat by the dying fire, his journal open. He now possessed.
1. The location of Bronte's fortune and master ledgers (Old Madonna Chapel).
2. The hub of his criminal operations (Warehouse Seven).
3. A list of compromised officials.
4. The key to a bank box full of Pinkerton gathered evidence against those officials and Bronte.
5. The knowledge that Leviticus Cornwall was the engine behind the Pinkerton war.
It was a arsenal of ruin, capable of destroying Bronte in multiple ways. He could sell the information to Cornwall for a fortune. He could use it himself to dismantle the empire from within and seize its assets. He could anonymously leak it to the newspapers and watch the chaos.
But he had also promised Bronte Milton's corpse for 15,000 dollars. And he needed that money now for Strawberry.
A new, audacious plan began to form, a high wire act of breathtaking risk. He would fulfill his contract with Bronte, collecting the bounty and solidifying his trust.
He would use that trust, and the chaos of Milton's disappearance, to access the very heart of Bronte's empire, to verify the ledger location, and to scout the chapel.
He would not act immediately. He would let Cornwall's money and Bronte's fury continue to grind against each other. And when both sides were bloodied and exhausted, he would move, like a scavenger turned king, to pick the carcass clean.
He mounted Morgan, turning her head not towards the rising sun over Saint Denis, but back towards the city. He had a body to deliver, a payment to collect, and a role to play. The ghost had done his work. Now the trusted lieutenant would return.
Caleb did not take the straight road back.
He couldn't afford to.
The body on Morgan's back changed everything weight, balance, risk. Even wrapped in canvas and tied tight, it was unmistakably human in shape, and Saint Denis was a city that noticed things. Especially now. Especially tonight.
Agent Milton had been gone for too long.
Pinkertons were creatures of routine and paranoia. Their leader disappearing without word, coinciding with the slaughter of his elite guard detail, a dead driver, and a doctor found unconscious in his own home? That was not a coincidence anyone with a badge and a pulse would ignore. By now, the Agency would be tearing through the northwest districts, shaking down informants, locking down roads, sniffing for blood.
So Caleb took the long way.
He kept Morgan to a steady, unremarkable pace, avoiding the main arteries, skirting the edges of the city's influence.
He followed dirt paths that only dockworkers, hunters, and smugglers bothered to use, where the air thickened with rot and brine and the ground softened beneath the horse's hooves. When he did merge briefly with a proper road, he made sure it was only long enough to avoid suspicion, just another rider heading out of the city, nothing more.
The canvas wrapped corpse rode behind the saddle, bound tight, concealed well enough that at a distance it looked like freight or a rolled carpet. Still, Caleb kept his head down, hat brim low, posture relaxed. The Acting skill hummed quietly beneath his skin, smoothing his movements, dulling anything that might draw the eye.
He peeled off near the northwest edge of Saint Denis, where the buildings thinned and the city gave way to grassland and clusters of twisted trees. From there, he cut right, off the road entirely, guiding Morgan through uneven ground until the distant glow of gas lamps faded behind foliage and moss draped branches.
Ahead, half hidden through the trees, the opulent spires of Bronte's neighborhood rose to his left, separated from the festering bayou on his right by a high stone wall and a thin strip of neglected land.
Caleb slowed.
This was the delicate part.
He brought Morgan to a halt well short of the walls, dismounted, and rested a hand against her neck. "Wait here," he murmured softly. The horse flicked an ear but stayed still, trained, obedient.
Caleb turned back to the burden.
With ease born of strength far beyond the norm, he hoisted Milton's body onto his left shoulder. The dead man weighed nothing to him now, just another object, another task.
He adjusted the canvas, ensuring Milton's face remained covered, then moved.
To his left, the immaculate, vine draped wall of Bronte's estate. To his right, just a few feet away, the swamp began, a soup of murky water, twisted roots, and lurking shapes. The air was thick with the smell of wet earth and rotting vegetation.
Caleb walked it steadily, boots sinking slightly into damp earth, every step measured. The sounds of the swamp masked his own. Frogs croaked. Insects buzzed. Somewhere, something large shifted in the water.
He followed the wall until the small dock came into view.
The back of Bronte's mansion was not meant for visitors. This was where supplies arrived quietly, where servants moved unseen, where bodies, if necessary, disappeared without ceremony. He then gets into the docks.
A few gardeners were working nearby, trimming hedges even at this hour, and two guards stood watch, rifles slung, eyes scanning lazily over the water.
They noticed him immediately.
"Hey!" one of them barked, leveling his repeater. "You, stop right there!"
The other guard drew his revolver, posture snapping from bored to lethal in a heartbeat. "Don't move. Not one step."
Caleb stopped.
He shifted his weight just enough to settle Milton's body more comfortably on his shoulder and spoke calmly, voice steady, unhurried. "It's me," he said. "McLaughlin."
The guards hesitated.
"What?" one of them said. "Drop whatever you're—"
"Sorry for the backdoor entrance," Caleb continued, cutting through the tension with practiced ease. "But I'm carrying a package Mr. Bronte asked for personally. Bringing it through the front would attract attention I'd rather avoid. I imagine you'd prefer the same."
...
Name: Caleb Thorne
Age: 23
Body Attributes:
- Strength: 7/10
- Agility: 7/10
- Perception: 8/10
- Stamina: 7/10
- Charm: 7/10
- Luck: 8/10
Skills:
- Handgun (Lvl 4)
- Rifle (Lvl 4)
- Firearms Knowledge (Lvl 4)
- Past Life Memory (Lvl MAX)
- Knife (Lvl 4)
- Blunt Weapon (Lvl 1)
- Sneaking (Lvl 4)
- Horse Mastery (Lvl 4)
- Poker (Lvl 4)
- Hand to Hand Combat (Lvl 4)
- Eagle Eye (Lvl 1)
- Dead Eye (Lvl 3)
- Bow (Lvl 2)tp
- Pain Nullifier (Lvl 3)
- Physical Regeneration (Lvl 2)
- Crafting ((Lvl 4)
- Persuasion (Lvl 4)
- Mental Fortitude (Lvl MAX)
- Cooking (Lvl 4)
- Teaching (Lvl 2)
- Trilingual Language Proficiency - G, I, & C (Lvl MAX)
- Inventory System (Permanent - 10x10x10)
- Acting (Lvl 4)
- Alcohol Resistance (Lvl MAX)
- Treasure Hunter (Lvl MAX)
- Drugs Resistance (Lvl MAX)
Money: 3,471 dollars and 10 cents
Inventory: 77,892 dollars and 61 cents, 11 gold nuggets, 65 gold bars, 1 Double Action, 1 Schofield, 2 Colm's Schofields, land deed (Parcel), 1 Mauser, 1 Semi Auto Pistol, 1 Lancaster Repeater, 1 Old Wood Jewelry Box, 1 F.F Mausoleum small brass key, 1 Ruby, 1 Braithwaites Land Deed, & 1 Broken Pirate Sword
Bank: -