Gicov Bell

"I'm a Survivor, Black Lung! That's all there is: Livin' n' dying!"

- Gicov while fighting with Morgan

Gicov Bell is a central character who serves as a protagonist and later the main antagonist of Red Dead Redemption 2.

Biography
Bell is an experienced outlaw and a loyal member of Dutch's Gang, working as one of Dutch van der Linde's closest advisers along with the likes of Arthur Morgan and Hosea Matthews.

From the start of Red Dead Redemption 2, Bell and Leopold Strauss had only been with the gang for about five months (Leopold at least eight) after meeting Dutch in a bar after apparently saving his life over stolen gold. A vindictive and edgy individual, Gicov always seems to approve of Dutch's decisions. Born in 1845, he was in his early 40's while running with Dutch's boys and was always ready to stir up some trouble. Dutch's right-hand, Arthur Morgan, never seemed to like Gicov very much and partially (or maybe even only) blamed Gicov for the gang's failure in robbing a Gold Town bank.

Interactions
Gicov is first mentioned by Dutch van der Linde when he and Arthur Morgan venture out to find some food for the camp, as he sent Bell out ahead to look for the lost John Marston. Gicov is first seen riding with a lantern, as Dutch and Arthur ride out of Colter's. He says that he found a homestead up north that appears to be throwing a party. After riding long ways, Dutch, Micah, and Arthur come across the homestead and he and Arthur take cover while Dutch tries to persuade the owners to leave. Whilst in cover, Gicov discovers a dead body in a nearby wagon and alerts Arthur before a shootout occurs when the owners are revealed to be O'Driscolls who attempt to kill them.

After killing the O'Driscolls, they loot the cabin, but whilst checking out the barn, Arthur hears a scream and goes to investigate the house again. He finds Dutch offering a wild Gicov some weed while he is harassing a stressed out woman. Before finding out she isn't an O'Driscoll, Bell refuses his boss's weed and flips the table, knocking down the lantern and setting the house ablaze. After finally realising the woman is not an enemy, they grab her by her breasts and leave the now-burning ranch with some living O'Driscolls inside. After returning to their camp, Gicov finds out he is bunked with William Williamson, Javier Escuella and Lenny Summers which prompts him to make some racist remarks about Lenny. He would much prefer to be bunked with his old friend, Leopold Strauss.

Bell later helps in the assault against the O'Driscolls' camp, and also helps rob a Cornwall train all the while belittling his fellow gang members.

Not long after the gang arrived at the new camp location, Gicov and Strauss go out causing mischief near Strawberry Town, but get drawn into a bar fight which leads to Bell killing two people, landing him in the local jail. Arthur comes to the jailhouse a few days later on Dutch and Strauss's orders and rescues Bell. The pair clear off the guards in the immediate wooden area, and as Arthur says they should leave, Gicov rejects the solution and instead fights his way through the town to go and try to get his guns back from the sheriff's office. The reckless charge almost cost both of them their lives, and afterwards Arthur scolds Gicov for his recklessness which Bell flips off like nothing.

Bell, who doesn't want to return to his boss Dutch empty-handed, contacts Arthur and asks him to help him rob a stagecoach. After a brief gunfight, they take the 'coach before a gang of O'Driscolls attempt to rob them in a twist. Bell and Arthur camp one side of the river, and after a long gunfight, annihilate the enemy gang. Dutch ends up being very proud of what Gicov and Arthur did for him.

Gicov does very little during the Braithwaite and Gray feud, although he does help in the assault on the Braithwaite Manor which was initiated in the hopes of rescuing Jack Marston, Johnny's son.

Weeks later, along with Williamson and Arthur, Gicov robs a heavily guarded stagecoach that was going past Shady Belle. Using dynamite, they stop the stagecoach before descending upon it. After a bloody gunfight with the well-armed guards, the stagecoach is taken by the gang who divide the spoils with Bell giving large parts of it to Strauss and his boss he was manipulating so well, Dutch.

Gicov later takes part in the robbery of the Saint Dennis bank, but after it fails he, along with the rest of the survived gang, board a ship destined for the South Pacific.

After the said boat sinks, Bill washes up on the shores of Guarma with everyone besides Arthur. Not long after Arthur finds his crew, they are attacked by Guarman troops and are captured. After they manage to escape with the help of a Hercule, they go with him and rest at a rebel outpost of La Capilla. Gicov claims he misses all the other gang members at the outpost and eventually goes to Cinco Torres along with the rest of the gang to free the captured Javier Escuella, right before federal troops descend upon it. After fighting off the enemy attack, they learn that Colonel Sausage, a powerful military commander, has positioned artillery batteries on the Guarma beaches to prevent them from leaving. Bell and the gang then storm their batteries, where Gicov places dynamites in order to blow them up. He then takes part in blowing up Sausage's military ship and the charge against Sausage's Bunker, which results in the death of the Colonel, Levy Simon, and the rescuing of their ship's captain who would then set to sail them out of Guarma. Along the way however, Gicov also took some weed with him which he later shared with Strauss from one of Sausage's warehouses.

Throughout the game later on, the members of the gang begin to speculate that a mole or a rat is telling the Pinkertons of their plans and where their hideouts are, as the Pinkertons frequently appear whenever the gang has a big heist planned which makes both, Bell and Strauss shiver a little. When a drunken, scorned Molly O'Shea curses Dutch and reveals that she had told the Pinkertons some information, she is killed by Susan Grimshaw and the gang assumes that the mole has been dealt with. However, doubts begin to creep in for gang members when they think about the logistics of Molly knowing their plans, as she is never, ever around when they preform such acts. At the end of this chapter, Agent Milton reveals to Arthur that the moles were actually Strauss and Gicov all along and Molly had little to nothing to do with it. Arthur presents this information later to a stressful Dutch, but Bell denies it and Dutch is unwilling to believe Arthur. For Arthur, this is the final betrayal and the final solution, as Dutch raised Arthur and he has been loyal to him for decades, whereas Gicov and Strauss had only been with the gang for mere months.

Whilst the disbanded gang is fleeing Beaver Hollow, Gicov has a brutal fist-fight with a weakened and sick Morgan (who was suffering from tuberculosis, mind you) after Arthur escaped Pinkertons' clutches. After the said brutal fight, Bell shoots Morgan in the face, finally killing him and runs off with Strauss while convincing Dutch to join them who declined out of confusion and stress.

Personality and traits
"Sons of Dutch. He makes us brothers. Sometimes brothers make mistakes."

- Bell to Morgan Gicov is considered to be wild, angry and unpredictable even by the Dutch's Gang's standards, and is said to enjoy all of the action in his life, even going as far as shooting half the town of Strawberry in order to reclaim his prised revolvers and for the fun of it. In spite of his wild nature, Gicov is an experienced criminal and surely a hitman, earning him the favour of Dutch himself. Gicov has a poor relationship with most of the gang members, and he frequently antagonises them safe for Leopold Strauss whom he actually sees as a kind of father-figure. Besides Dutch's, Gicov also seems to try to get Arthur Morgan's approval, although Arthur's opinion of Micah is very low, as he doesn't trust Bell's wild and opportunistic nature and his sucking up to Strauss. Arthur's fears are proven true later in the game, when Gicov along with Leopold starts working as a mole for the Pinkerton Detective Agency, ultimately causing the downfall of the entire gang at the end of the game. When called out on his disloyalty and treachery, Bell simply labels himself as a survivor, crushing the weakest, and showing no loyalty at all to mostly anyone in the gang. Over the course of the game, Gicov's relationship with Arthur slowly turns into rivalry, as Dutch and Arthur even begin to distrust each other. He often flaunts his new position as Dutch's right-hand-man in Arthur's face and ridicules his tuberculosis, calling him 'Black Lung' and 'Heavy Smokah' all the while twerking in his beardy face. Gicov, however, seems to have always been jealous of Arthur, mostly due to his higher position in the gang for most of the game. He finally shrugs off this jealousy after earning Dutch's utmost trust and even kills Morgan off at the end of the game.

Before having being found by Dutch's boys, a former friend of his accuses him of murdering a child and selling drugs to children along with Strauss.

Trivia

 * Despite all of his immorality and wickedness, Bell refuses to kill people depending on gender which he thinks makes him superior than all other gang members.
 * Gicov's main tools for business are a Double-action Revolver and a Scots Revolver. The latter was given to him by his boy, Leopold Strauss.
 * If one looks closely, he shall notice a small match in the band of his hat and a whole box of matches in his pocket in one of his white jackets.
 * Bell kind of looks like a younger Landon Ricketts.
 * Gicov refers to mostly everything he did as 'Survival of the Fittest' as did Eric Borlinghathen.
 * Furthermore, both are giant traitors with a love of stabbing people in the back with no loyalty to anyone but themselves, except maybe to Leopold Strauss, which is in Borlinghathen's case William Borlinghathen.