BLACK BRET'S RANSOM DEMANDS

By Mr. Black Bret, Exile, as dictated to Gruffwark, who has his letters, or otherwise he wouldn't be - no ya don't hafta write that part ya dumb cluck, nor that, damn it all to stars and back! Just stop writin' everything I say! No, dictatin' does NOT mean that. No it does not. It means ya have the damned sense to only write down what's part of this here ransom letter! Well why in hell'd ya write it in blood? Blood don't erase none, ya blasted idjit! Just gimme that paper. And stop wri

This here bein' the only paper we got, allow me, Threadmire, to take over the dictation duties, and I will not write down exactly what Black Bret says, I tell ya what. I saw what happened to Gruffwark, and I ain't lookin' to go down in such a fashion. Feller'll be eatin' through a straw and seein' through bot eyes 'fore he's well enough to take up a pen, or bloody finger as the case may be, again. Thing is, he was writin' this in blood, so's I can't really erase that part, so I reckon I might as well write plenty more'n I need to with this here handy plasma-quill. Also, Black Bret ain't got any letters, so he ain't got no idea how long a list'a demands oughta be, but he likes 'em to look all big and suchlike, so just bear with me on this part here. Frankly, folks, I'm just fillin' space while he rattles off a whole lotta threats.

He's gettin' to the list shortly. Trust me, right now he's goin' on about guttin' ya, and murderin' ya, and leavin' your corpses for the vulcarrion, but half of it don't make no kinda grammatical sense nohow, so I figure I might as well just recommend to ya folks that ya don't cause too much trouble, seein' as how it'll only get ya gutted, murdered, and so on. And ain't none of us wantin' that.

So here are the demands:
- All your treasures, seein' as how they'll sell real nice-like on the Cartel market.
- Half your money, so y'all can go and keep this little town goin', since we WILL be returnin' for tribute at a later time to be determined whenever we like, so don't get comfortable, but really folks, Threadmire here, it'll probably be a year or so, if that helps.
- The specific treasure what you're keepin' most hidden and secret from everyone, and you damn well better find it or it'll go bad for ya. And folks, Threadmire here one more time, he does mean that. Black Bret's a lotta things, but when it comes to this he's serious as a dad-blamed heart attack. He'll burn your little town to the ground, do... do what he says, won'tcha?

Yours Sincerely, and folks, speaking as Threadmire, I want you to know he really said that part out loud,
Black Bret
Bandit, Outlaw, and Exile

[The back side of the paper has another short message, this one also written in smeared, desperate blood.]We were fools. Evil was done here. Infected Bret. The town... town is dead. So many. And for what? They never told.

Should never have trusted Bret. Or any of 'em. Only a few left now. But I aim to die before I let 'em take the treasure away from me.
Threadmire