[centre][hr][hr][img]https://fontmeme.com/permalink/190625/510841177d255c971d60a5ef83220df5.png[/img][hr][hider= Image][img]https://i.pinimg.com/564x/ec/48/3f/ec483f8b0be28e0dfd5e3c6d0c367897.jpg[/img][/hider][Hider= Background][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9bz6_n1-i8[/youtube][/hider][hr][color=ffe4e1]⯎ Location: Armadillo Saloon ⯎
⯎ Mentions: Temp[@c3p-0h], Seven[@RedVII], Erik[@ONL], Roz[@Berlin] ⯎[/color][hr][/centre]
Penny had been in Armadillo almost a week now, and each day of that time had been spent, diligent, as she smoothed out the creased bit of paper on shop counters and against windows, the same questions passing her lips time and time again. Each time, the same reply - variations upon the theme of a solid and resounding [i]no[/i]. 

Fortunately, no one had outright asked her to leave yet. [i]Un[/i]ortunately, the woman with blood on her skirt and no husband was starting to draw attention, and so, Penny had decided the previous night it was better to leave of her own volition than to be chased out with pitchforks, or worse, bullets, at her back. She’d come up with a plan. 

 Evenings at the Armadillo saloon were always loud and full. Bounties and bets and promises, lifelong loyalties and bitter rivalries, made and kept and broken, all over the course of a stiff drink. It was a place of birth, and it was exactly where she needed to be. 

 A bright red sun hung low in the sky as she made her way down the main high street, it was a quiet day, people going about their business as calm as they ever did in Armadillo, and Penny drank it all in. She’d never considered herself much of a talker, but there was something comforting about being around people, even the weathered sorts you found all the way out here. It was calm, until it wasn’t.

 Footsteps pounded behind her, the sound of a young woman shouting loudly for someone to [color=crimson]"For fuck's sake, [i]move![/i]"[/color]. It wasn’t directed at her, but Penny found herself shifting hastily, long skirt rasping against the dusty ground as she pressed herself against the nearby window of the general store. Her eyes widened, just a little, as a short whirlwind of a woman barrelled past.

 She was gone within seconds, but Penny continued to stare at the spot where she’d been long after. It wasn’t an uncommon sight; a disconcertingly large portion of the population moved about Armadillo as if the devil himself was coming for them, but Penny was in a reflective mood, and for a moment, she allowed herself to wonder. 

 There was only one thing in Penny’s life she had anything approaching that level of certainty about, and it was nowhere to be found in a place like this. What was important enough in Armadillo for someone to be quite so intent on getting to it? 

She didn’t get chance to dwell any further. 

Gunshots rang in the distance, the closest thing to a church bell Armadillo had; it sent a chill up Penny’s spine nonetheless. As always seemed to be the case now, her memory betrayed her, awareness leaping to the revolver secreted away in a makeshift leather holster wrapped about her thigh. When she drew close enough to see the poor men who’d fallen victim to the violence, she saw six bodies instead of four, and the little red holes picked in their foreheads had been put there by her hand alone. 

It perturbed her, yes, but it did more to spur her onward. Armadillo was a breeding ground for the easily tempted, the violent and cruel. It brought out the worst, and whilst she didn’t know the whole of it, Penny had a feeling she had a lot for it to take. She had to move on. The sooner she found her husband the better, and that meant leaving with the first group who’d have her. 

 She walked into the saloon. 

There were several figures who drew her immediate attention. A man who’d walked in shortly before her, downed his glass and called for the sheriff seemed to have the eye of most patrons, something which allowed Penny to enter mostly undetected. Perhaps almost as intriguing was the young girl, a child really, sat, forthright at the bar, as at home as any one of the couple dozen grizzled looking men in varying states of sobriety. A woman stood by a different man, looking like she owned the place, meaning that she probably did.

 And then Penny saw her - the woman from earlier, the one who’d been in such a rush, stood behind the bar, serving drinks. Late. She’d been late, that was all. Penny almost laughed aloud at the mundanity of it. It was hard to imagine caring so much about something so… [i]normal[/i]. That probably said more about Penny than it did about the woman, but still, her attention had been caught, and she needed to start somewhere.

 Carefully, she slipped through the crowd towards the bar, before sliding into a free spot. Arms folded delicately on the varnished counter top, she waited patiently, attempting to draw attention with little more than the slightest amount of eye contact. 

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