We all know Micah was the rat, the one selling out the Van der Linde Gang to the Pinkertons. Milton told us as much just before Abigail shot him at Van Horn BUT he says that they only picked Micah up after Guarma. That's PRETTY damn convenient. Out of everyone they could have picked up it was Micah. So was it just dumb luck that the Blackwater ferry robbery, the "peace talks" with Colm O'Driscoll, and the Saint Denis bank job all went wrong? That is an emphatic
no because I think Micah still betrayed the gang at each of those points because there's a factor most people, including myself, overlooked throughout the game: Edgar Ross.
I ask you, what was the point of having Edgar Ross in the game? He's always there standing in the background and doing
nothing. He had dialogue at two points in the story, one when he and Milton confront Arthur in Chapter 2 by the river and again during the final shootout at Beaver Hollow
after Agent Milton is dead. His presence is 100% pointless... unless it was ROSS dealing with Micah instead of Milton. There's no solid evidence to this, but hear me out:
1. The Blackwater ferry job was a trap. When talking with Dutch during the first mission about the robbery Arthur can ask if it was a trap, and Dutch tells him that the Pinkertons were on the scene so fast that it
had to be. Who thought robbing the ferry was a good idea? That's right, Micah Bell. The first job he suggested is thought to have been a trap. But hey, maybe Micah didn't know and the Pinkertons got lucky...
2. Micah's insistence on getting the money from Blackwater. Time and time again he is heard asking about it. Well, why wouldn't he, according the newspapers the gang stole the equivalent of
4.5 million dollars in today's money. BUT... in certain camp dialogues he will suggest that he and Dutch go and retrieve it
alone. Back to the town where, according to Javier and Charles, there are posters of Dutch
everywhere. For the entire main game even getting within sight of Blackwater will have a posse of pissed off Pinkertons chasing your ass down within a minute. And Micah thinks he and Dutch can just waltz in and walk off with millions? No, he was going to hand Dutch over to Ross and collect his bounty, then likely make off with the money himself.
In fact, if you return to Micah's camp outside of Strawberry after you rob the stagecoach with him you can find a torn wanted poster of Dutch promising a $1000 reward.
Here's a video for proof. This means he had to have been planning his betrayal from at least Chapter 2 if not beforehand, which already casts doubt on Milton's claim.
3. The O'Driscoll Betrayal. It's patently obvious here. Bloodthirsty Micah suddenly wants to talk peace with Dutch's most heated rival, when before he shot his cellmate in the face just for
being an O'Driscoll? No. He set it up to get Arthur, Dutch's right hand man and most trusted gun, out of the way so he could continue to scheme in safety. Arthur never liked Micah and the feeling was mutual. For bonus points, Colm mentions a plan to sell Dutch to the law
twice, once to Dutch himself during the meeting and then later to Arthur in his torture basement. Sounds awfully familiar, huh? But this isn't about Colm so I'll leave that be.
4. Saint Denis. Oh Lordy, the moment where the gang finally and truly broke. Hosea DEAD Lenny DEAD John CAPTURED and with jack shit to show for it. It's awfully convenient that the Pinkertons knew
exactly where the gang would be,
when they would be there, and
where and when the distractions would take place. Hosea and Abigail set off that explosion and less than five minutes later Milton marches Hosea into the street and shoots him. Somebody talked.
Micah talked. This setup was worse than what we hear about Blackwater. They were in all the right places at all the right times. And guess who's standing behind Agent Milton when the Pinkertons surround the bank?
That's right, Edgar fucking Ross. Quietly watching his scheme come to fruition. He appears at the bank but doesn't have any lines. But he's there.
Now why would Micah walk into such an obvious cluster fuck that he himself set up? This is more subtle but Micah
knew that he wouldn't be shot. I only noticed on my second playthrough but everyone who goes into the bank is wearing dark suits... except for, you guessed it, everyone's favorite snake. Micah is wearing a white suit that is almost
glowing in comparison to what everyone else is wearing. Makes him kind of stand out among the sea of black clad bank robbers, no? Unless that was the intention. If they can tell him apart from the rest he is far less likely to be shot.
5. The Epilogue. So much damn scheming and betrayal on that mountain in boggles the mind. Micah goes back and gets the money from Blackwater 8 years later, or at least some of it. He's up there with Dutch to join forces again. Dutch, when questioned by John, states that he's there for the same thing he is... and John is there to kill Micah. So Dutch probably planned on shooting him before John and the others arrived, and his only hangup in the end was whether he should shoot John too. Well, Micah was planning on betraying Dutch too. How can you tell?
Simple... after Micah dies and everyone leaves the first person to discover this shootout on top of a remote mountain is Ross. It doesn't make sense for him or anyone to be up there... unless he was already on his way. And what reason would he have to meet with Micah in 1907? Because Micah had found Dutch Van der Linde again. He was going to hand him over to Ross just like he planned in 1899, only John, Charles, and Sadie showed up and killed him before he could. So Micah brought Dutch back to betray him for the reward and Dutch planned to betray and kill Micah for what happened back in the day. Well, unfortunately this puts Ross on the trail of John Marston and we already know how that ends.
6. Finally, the first point centering around Ross himself. If this is all true, then it means that in 1899 Ross was using Micah (One of Dutch's outlaws) to bring down Dutch and the gang while sitting back and reaping the glory from it. Sound familiar? Well, in 1911 Ross ended up using John (One of Dutch's outlaws) to bring down Dutch and the gang while sitting back and reaping the glory from it.
It's his same exact plan from Red Dead Redemption 1. But when it fucks up in 1907 he's forced to find a replacement for Micah and he picks John.
The TimelineSo, the timeline of events as I see it: Micah plans on betraying Dutch in Blackwater by sending him into a suicidal heist on the ferry. He finds a Pinkerton as twisted and slimy as he is, a disgusting glory hound named Edgar Ross, and promises him Dutch's head in exchange for the reward, a cool $1000. It's an obvious trap but everyone in the gang is a badass and, despite their losses, the gang gets away with a
fortune which Micah didn't expect. Seeing now that he can cash out BIG TIME Micah keeps giving information to the Pinkertons through Ross so he can make off with the Blackwater money in addition to Dutch's bounty. Ross meanwhile conceals Micah's involvement to make it seem like Ross himself is the one uncovering these leads, unaware that the money was under their noses the entire time. Knowing Ross, he plans on betraying Micah after getting Dutch and getting the glory for TWO bloodthirsty outlaws instead of one.
The two keep playing each other, and their bosses (Dutch and Milton) until Saint Denis and the return from Guarma. Micah heads straight to contact Ross about the gang's escapades in the Caribbean, only as chance would have it Milton is with him too and Ross has to deny their former association if he wants to keep his glory and, likely, his job. He claims that he "captured" Micah and that the criminal is willing to rat out his former gang in return for leniency. Milton agrees while remaining none the wiser and Ross is forced to bring him into the scheme. Then Milton dies at Van Horn, Ross is now left in charge of the Pinkertons, and things happen as we see them. Arthur dies, Dutch sees Micah for the rat he is and the two go their separate ways as Ross continues his hunt for the last great outlaw, Dutch Van der Linde.
In 1907 Micah manages to get hold of the Blackwater money, finally, but it's not as much as he thought. Assuming equal shares of the money among John, Sadie, and Charles, Micah was only able to recover $60,000. Adjusted for inflation that isn't even quite $1.8 million, less than
half of the original sum. It's still a lot but Micah is a greedy bastard and losing $2.7 million is going to sting. Well, Dutch went back for it too, needing capital for his war on civilization, only to find that someone took it: the only person it could be is Micah. Word gets around about Micah's score and when he realizes that he can have his revenge on him Dutch tracks him down. When Dutch shows up Micah contacts Ross again and says he has Dutch on top of Mount Hagan, and he'll hand him over for the reward, a sum that's likely grown since 1899. Ross agrees and brings Agent Fordham (His sidekick from RDR1) with him, planning on capturing or killing Micah once he finally gets his hands on Dutch. Dutch, with his nihilistic insanity rending him a shell of the man he once was, is so far gone he only wants to kill Micah now, money be damned. This is the final showdown of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, a Mexican standoff with plots instead of pistols.
Unfortunately our timely and unknowing intervention ruined the entire scheme and Dutch was the one who
technically won. Micah died and he was able to evade the law for another four years. Ross spent much of that time tracking down whoever killed Micah and one day in 1911 stumbled upon Beecher's Hope and began to scheme once more.
So there you have it. The greatest story never told. A whole sequence of events, betrayals, and schemes sitting their under the surface if you can just piece together the details. It's one of the many reasons this game is so fucking great.
Or maybe I've just been playing it too much. Yeah, probably that.