Rest In Power, sweet Django

It’s the holiday season once again, and I have a bit more time on my hands than I usually do, which means it’s an opportunity to get lost for a few hours in Red Dead Redemption 2.

And at this most festive of times, I wanted to tell you a little story from my time in the Wild West. Be warned though, as is appropriate (for some reason) at this time of year, this tale is full of tragedy – this is the story of how I lost my best friend, my dear Django, in RDR2.

My Django is not a real person – he’s something better. My sweet, sweet Django was a rare white Arabian horse with a level three bond that I had came by during the epilogue of Red Dead Redemption 2. Why wasn’t it a level four bond? Django left me shortly after I finished the epilogue – though our closeness extended far beyond the cold metrics of a computer game.

So, I had just finished the epilogue, I (John Marston) am now a newly wed and have a cool $20k in my pocket. All is well in the world. so why not start doing some side missions that ol’ Arthur Morgan had neglected?

I, a man of action and lover of gun fights, decided to take up a bounty hunting job. I pull up to the Saint Denis police station and like any other god-fearing and horse-loving man, I hitch my horse to a post right outside the station doors. I walk in to to obtain a bounty poster, for I must know everything about my target so that I may plan how to bring swift justice down upon them. The target is Anthony Foreman, a former leader of the Foreman Brothers Gang, wanted for: robbery, pandering, and blackmail. The reward: safety for my people, and $85.

After I’d accepted my mission I left the station and attempted to ride my trusty stead. This is when everything went so terribly wrong.

Rather than jump on to my horse – and either my big thumbs are at fault for this or there was a catastrophic glitch in the system – John decided it was actually better to rugby tackle a police officer to the ground. This resulted in all 20 police officers simultaneously try to gun me down.

I wanted to climb upon sweet Django’s back. I had failed. If the goal was to become a wanted man outside the police station I had just visited for work, surrounded by 20-odd trigger-happy police officers however, then I had succeeded.

But like in all great tragedies, it was not I who suffered for my mistake. ‘Twas the one I loved most. ‘Twas Django.

Django caught most of the bullets in the crossfire and instantly needed reviving. His pristine white coat stained red, and fear warped his majestic face. I, unable to let go of the officer I was assaulting, received a bullet storm of my own and died instantly. Shortly after, Django perished.

I respawned in a nearby saloon, and immediately the nervous sweats hit me. There was a horse on the mini map near me, but it wasn’t in my sights. I jumped from the second floor of the building down to the street. Plummeting to the street, I’m met by the horse, but it’s not Django. The horse from the map was actually Rachel, the bog-standard horse you get at the start of the epilogue. Great.

Rachel – you’re basic and no one likes you.

Sad, confused, and full of rage I went to a nearby gunsmith and purchased a top-of-the-range repeating shotgun (customised with varnished wood golden plates) with standard and slug ammunition. I was gearing up for revenge. My preferred weapons of choice are dual wielded M1899s, the Litchfield Repeater, and the bow, but these would not suffice. Not to avenge a creature as godly as Django.

On Basic Rachel I trotted back to the police station, slowed down for dramatic effect, picked up Django’s saddle and equipped it onto Basic Rachel. I learnt from previous experience that a horse should not be present in an intense gun battle, so I ordered Rachel to flee. She might be basic, but she doesn’t deserve the same fate as Django.

With Rachel gone, I pulled up my bandanna and got ready for the fight of my life. I shotgunned the the officer that started all of this and with the flick of the wrist I dual wielded my favourite pistols, activated Dead Eye, and wiped out good portion of the surrounding officers. With Rachel in close range I thought it possible to get back to her and hightail out of the war zone. Wrong, I was gunned down again. Who knew that so many police officers would be so close to the police station?

The lesson here is that revenge is a foolish game, and just like the overarching theme of the game – crime doesn’t pay either.

With these lessons now implanted in me, I spent the next 30 minutes of the game paying off my $345 bounty, tracking down another white Arabian rare breed, hunting in the snowy mountains, and – most importantly – soul searching.

And with all that being said meet New Django below, a rare white Arabian horse at level one bond.