Seline sighed and pulled out a wooden box from behind her desk. “Not as much as I would have liked.”

Curious, John looked inside and saw a collection of parts. Parts that he recognized. He frowned as he looked up at her.

“My Uncle was correct, the one gun was unfixable, but I was able to salvage some parts from it. This is just what’s left over.” She walked over to a locked cabinet and opened it up. It had a nice selection of scoped rifles inside.

John had wondered where the rest of the rifles he had collected went and now he knew. Seline pulled out a rifle without a scope and handed it to him. He accepted the weapon and looked it over. While there wasn’t much left of his old rifle, he could tell that it was made from parts of both of them.

He looked at the small air tank that was tucked neatly under the barrel and mostly hidden by the front stock. “What’s that do?”

“You said you wanted more stopping power?” John nodded at that.

“Well, I wasn’t able to figure that part out quite yet. What I did figure out, is that I could use the escaping gasses to pressurize the tank. It works like Sally’s charger to give the pressure a little boost. I think eventually I can get it to increase the velocity of your bullets, but for now, it’ll allow you to fire standard pneuma rounds.”

“What? How?” John asked, completely confused.

“May I?” She held her arms out and John handed her back the rifle.

With a deft flick of a lever, she removed the entire firing section of the gun and slapped a new one in its place. John heard the unmistakable hiss of the pneumatics charging as soon as she pushed the lever forward, locking the mechanism into the gun.

“It's not an ideal solution. With the swap, you can’t use the tube loader, which is why I removed it and put the air tank there. But the case holds six shots. It can only fire three before the system needs to charge though.”

This did not seem like an improvement to John. In fact, it was a significant disadvantage. Unlike the bolt action of the pneuma rifles, John’s were lever action. And they held eight rounds in the tube. That meant he could fire nine times before needing to reload.

“I see that look in your eye, Smith. How bout you let the lady finish before you get all upset.” The Sheriff was right.

He looked at Seline, who seemed slightly taken aback. She had been so caught up in explaining her improvements that she hadn’t noticed John’s deteriorating mood. He took a deep breath and nodded. “Please, continue.”

“Right… I should have said this earlier. I figured you might want more shots, considering the type of rifle you had.” She handed him the part she had removed. “You see this part?” She tapped at a rectangular piece of metal sticking out in front of the trigger.

He had noticed it when she first handed him the weapon, but he just figured it was some component she added for her pneumatic parts.

“That’s a magazine,” she said happily.

John looked at her with a blank stare. She just smiled even harder. “Press that little bit there.” He looked to where she pointed and saw a small metal piece sticking off the front of the magazine. He pressed it and the thing fell out and onto the desk with a clink.

When it settled, he could see the distinctive color of brass sticking out from the top. He picked up the black piece of metal and looked at it in surprise.

“It can hold six shots. Simply push down the front and slide the bullet into the magazine.”

“Did you recover these from the other two rifles?” he asked.

She nodded happily. John sighed. The bullets would need to be disassembled and checked for damage before being reloaded. After a little bit of fiddling, he figured out how to extract the ammo from the magazine. He made sure to tuck the questionable rounds in a pocket before pulling fresh ones from his bandoleer.

Once he got the hang of it, it was pretty quick to reload. Not as quick as reloading his revolver, but he didn’t need speed as much with the rifle.

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He repeated this process a dozen times while the pair watched silently. Once he was happy he could do it without looking, he practiced loading the magazine and unloading it as fast as possible.

Seline started to look worried he might break it, but that was the point. If the thing broke in conditions like this, it may let him down when it really mattered.

Once he was happy the thin piece of metal that held the magazine in place wouldn’t simply snap off, he pointed to the other mechanism that he had removed while he practiced. “Shouldn’t that be able to hold more since bullets for the pneumatics don’t need casings?”

The Deputy shook her head. “While that is certainly true, pneumatics require a more complicated loading mechanism. That is what is taking up all that extra space. It ensures the rounds are loaded correctly. And that they can’t jam in the magazine.”

He ejected the magazine on that one and looked it over. While the ejection lever was the same, the magazine was mostly a hollow tube of metal with the bullets wedged up against the front portion. When he turned the firing mechanism over to look at it, he saw a lever with a strange bowed shape. It looked designed to slide into the actual magazine and cradle the back of the bullet. There was a series of small holes on the face of the bolt.

“Those are the air holes,” Seline stated when she saw what John was looking at. “The ones facing outwards cause the lead to expand, providing a similar seal as a firearm would. It also helps increase the pressure and accuracy.”

John nodded at that. He was well aware of how shitty smooth-bore rifles had been. But it wasn’t until the advent of rifled barrels and less-smokey powders that people realized you needed a certain amount of explosive oompf to make your shots seat in the rifling grooves. Being able to actually see what you are shooting at had a major impact on weapon design. But soon after that, pneumatics took over. And even the improved gun powders couldn’t hold a candle to only air exiting the barrel.

“Have you tested it?” John asked as he put the magazine back in.

“I tested the pneumatic portion. But I didn’t want to start firing off your ammo. I can’t imagine it’s easy to replace.”

“You would be correct. But I need to know how it will operate, so I’m going to go hunting.”

“Stay safe out there, John. We don’t know if the Harc’otti have scouts watching the city.”

He glanced over at the Sheriff, who was just shaking his head. While he appreciated the deputy's concern, he wasn’t too worried about the Harc’otti. “Thanks, but I’ll be fine. Why don’t you head down to Madam Cassandra’s place? I saw your friend there.” She looked confused by that before John continued. “I can see why you like him. He’s quite the talented individual.”

Seline’s face turned red and she quickly excused herself from the building. John watched her go before turning to the Sheriff.

“Don’t worry about her,” Blackwood spoke. “She’ll get over this little embarrassment.”

“It’s for the best,” John grunted. “Now, if you will excuse me, I’m gonna test out my new rifle.”

“Have fun,” Wyatt waved as he headed for the chair behind his desk.

***

John sat motionless in a little tangle of fallen branches. He had arranged them so they would cover his spot while giving him a clear view of the pond below. This wasn’t the ideal way to hunt, but he didn’t feel like traipsing across the countryside on foot looking for tracks. He simply found a nearby source of water and waited.

He didn’t have to wait too long. After about an hour, a small group of deer made their way down to the edge of the pond. They were skittish things, constantly flicking their ears and popping their heads up to look for predators.

Considering the huge group of wolves he ran into not too long ago, it was no surprise they were jumpy.

He waited and picked out the largest of the bunch. With careful moves, he raised the rifle and lined up the iron sights. He would admit that the scopes on the pneuma rifles had been helpful, but John didn’t need it, not for a shot only a few hundred feet away.

With a calm exhale of breath, John pulled the trigger. The rifle belched out smoke and fire while pushing hard into his shoulder. It was a welcome sensation.

The round hit the twelve-point buck and the thing jumped into the air in panic. The rest of the herd scattered at the sound, but the buck only managed a few loping strides before it crashed to the ground and went still.

John didn’t immediately go out there. Instead, he swapped the firing mechanisms, thankful that the process was rather straightforward. And the grooves made it so he couldn’t misalign anything. He threw the locking lever forward and in one swift motion, raised the rifle, held his breath, and fired twice.

The rifle was nearly silent this time around but there were two sharp cracks as the bullets hit their mark, shattering both antlers from the dead deer at the base of the skull.

A trophy hunter would be aghast at what he just did, but John didn’t much care. He would trade the antlers to the general store, sure they could grind them up or use them for something. All he cared about was accuracy, and the gun showed it still had that, even with Seline’s modifications.

He picked up the spent shell casing that had popped out when he swapped the firing mechanisms. He was used to it by now, but he still lamented that revolver-style rifles had never gotten any traction. Picking up spent brass was annoying but it was preferable to having your hand burned by the powder blast every time you shot.

After clearing away the impromptu blind, he went to retrieve his kill and head back to Ember Creek.

He was certain Seline would be happy to learn the weapon worked as well as she hoped. Considering she threw this together in a few days with cobbled-together parts, he was curious to see what she could do with a completely fresh platform. Her talents were certainly being wasted as a Peacekeeper.