After the powerful blow from the young barber's sword, the coyote neatly collapsed to the ground in a pile of rotten flesh and bones. Their growls were low, rumbling, and lacked the strength of most normal animals, but they continued to fan out, moving in slowly at first. At the last, they rushed in, vicious looking teeth glinting in the limited lantern light as they lunged for their victims with mouths that looked as if they longed for nothing more than the taste of blood. Seeing the abject terror in Randolph eyes only seemed to draw one of them, while another closed in on the local lawman. The third one dove right for Caleb after he missed his shot at it.

"Randolph!"  While not scared witless at the sight of the gruesome creatures, Coraline hesitated, unsure what to do.  Until the beast went after Randy.  The lantern swung in her hand as she whirled, fan flipping open in her hand.  Phantom cards appeared twice over behind the scant cover, though only one gave her what she needed.  Ghostly white light, barely visible in the mine, shot from her hand toward the beast that harried Mister Darling.

Randolph cries out as the foul beast hurls itself against him, its dingy fangs snapping at his face. He manages to get his arms up against the noisome body to almost hold it off, but feels one tooth rake along his jawline.

Screaming at the slash of agony, he sinks to his knees, his hands seeking the creature's throat. The pale luminescence envelopes the undead beast and its yelp of pain is music to his ears.
This message was last edited by the player at 12:43, Wed 17 Oct 2012.

The beast that attacked the young writer ended up howling in pain as something seemed to singe the flesh on its legs. The sickly smell of burning, rotted flesh seemed to soon permeate the room, overwhelming even the stench that fouled the stagnant air in this mine chamber when they had entered.

The coyote that previously lay on the ground cloven in two by Daniel's sword began to rise to its feet. The two halves of its body seemed to have knitted themselves together and it emitted a low growl, turning its gaze on the sword-wielding barber.

Daniel was perplexed at the instant-knitting ability of the wolf. It seemed quite peculiar to him for something that appeared sewn together. Was it somehow magically imbued with that capability?

He didn't ponder it very long, instead opting to split its skull asunder with a well place overhead chop with his blade. Satisfied that the thing was mortally wounded, he moved over to where Randy had been harassed by one of the devil's dogs, but the blasted thing dodged his attempt to sever its head.

Coraline wasn't about to let the mangy dog attack Randolph again.  While Daniel slashed at the beast, she let loose another stream of demonic energy, albeit very weak.

"Hell and damnation," Morgan muttered as he noticed the wounded coyote mending itself after being hacked in two.

Returning his attention to the decayed beast that attacked him, Morgan fired another round, aiming for the creature's skull.

Gabby puts the thoughts of his own faithful hound away and takes aim at one of the snapping things. "Make sure to aim fer the head, Marshal!" He shouts back to Phelps, and takes his own advice, carefully aiming at the one going after Danial, but also trying not to hit the boy. He fires, but the cursed thing moves as he does, and his shot is wide. "Consarn it!"

The brave Marshal whips his own Peacemaker out, taking aim for one of the critters, and squeezes off a round, but peing used to fighting human-sized foes and aiming for the center of mass, he finds it much trickier to aim for something shorter, shaped wrong, and in motion. His shot goes wide.

When the coyote bit into his arm, Daniel allowed the beast to remain attached to Daniel for long enough that the thing couldn't defend itself against the length of metal that went slicing through their air and then its skull. Daniel shook off the part of the beast that remained attached to the barber's arm and went over to where Coraline was now being harassed by one of the things.

An overhead chop into the things skull make it crack open as if it were nothing more than an overripe melon.

"Coraline!" shouts Randolph, rousing from his stupor. With one hand pressed to his bleeding jaw, he steps to the young woman and kicks the corpse of her attacker. "Are you alright?"

Morgan grimaced, leveling his Colt at the last of the decayed canines. Taking aim at its head, he squeezed off another shot.

"I'm completely fine," Coraline told Randolph, reaching for him as he neared.  "Oh dear, you look a bit worse for the wear, though.  One of those creatures got to your pretty face."  She grinned and peeled his hand away to get a look at the scratch.  Pulling a handkerchief from her satchel, she pressed the cloth against the cut to help stop the bleeding.  "You should ask the barber to take a look at that."

"I cannot wait to find the sonovabitch who done made those things." Gabby grumbles. "Oh yes, he and I shall have words."

When all was said and done, the local law man knelt down to examine one of the dead canines. "Damn," he said. "These are coyotes for sure, though they look like they been stitched up something fierce. And these teeth don't look right. They ain't coyote teeth or dog teeth. Never seen nothin' like 'em. Don't look like there's any sign of rabies though, so you should be okay," he offered to Randolph.

Daniel whirled toward the last of the beasts just as Caleb finished the thing off with a solid shot to the temple. He looked at the beasts for a few seconds, watching to see if any of them began to knit back together. When they failed to make any such movement, he slipped his sword back into its sheath. "Nice shot, Caleb."

He looked around at the others, and seemed not to mind the puncture wounds and blood that marred his left arm. "Ooo, Randy, Lemme take a look at what that critter did ta ya."

He scratched his scruffy chin and looked down at the little hand, which had been cowering in the corner. "Well, I s'pose any chance o' gettin' in quiet-like is gone now that we done fired our guns already. Not that there was much of a choice in it all." He followed the mineshaft as it went along, going a bit ahead of the others, and leaned cautiously forward, pulling back and returning to the rest of the group.

"I see some kinda light further down there. That's probably where some folks are, or that's what my gut tells me leastaways. Anyhow, I suggest that we proceed with caution and quiet, and assume they're ready for us. Once y'all get patched up, whoever still feels up to comin' on with me, let me know."

"Wilder, you crazy-ass son of a bitch." Gabby mutters as he pulls one of the odd teeth free. "What we have here is someone who is deranged. This here tooth comes from a nasty sort o' fish. These things were kilt, cut up, and sew back up as fuckin' weapons. We got a reg'lar Frankenstein on our hands."

Morgan nodded at Daniel's comment. "Thank you kindly, Daniel," he replied, "You sure show a helluva lot of courage with that sword of yours. I haven't seen someone fight with one of those things like that since the war."

He listened carefully to Phelps and Gabby. "Weapons. I wonder who Wilder was planning on unleashing them on...or selling them to? Maybe this Radcliffe fella was a buyer who couldn't meet Wilder's price and tried to take his wares by force."

Randolph draws away from the barber's hands. "That's alright, Daniel, I won't die from this anytime soon. You can put a patch on me when we're through down here."

He takes a step back and nods to the others, "I'm ready to go on."

Daniel nodded at the man's request and touched the brim of his hat, "Sure thing, Mister Darlin'. Jus' lemme patch meself up a bit 'fore we move on." Daniel tore apart some of his ruined trousers and started dabbing at the long gash on his left arm.

Moving past the dead animals with his gun in hand, he wanders down towards the tunnel the chamber that they were in seemed to lead to. He stopped part of the way down, and kicked at something. "I guess that weren't a light after all. Just some scrap metal reflectin' the lantern light. Might as well check down this way anyhow."

After a short walk of about a hundred feet, the tunnel came to a dead end. The law man cocked his head to the side, and turned to the others. "Y'all hear somethin'?"

Morgan frowned, glancing around. He looked to the right hand side of the tunnel, studying the wall. Shaking his head, he said, "I could've sworn I heard...well, it sounded like a scream. Coming from this direction."

He placed his hands on the rock of the wall, attempting to feel for anything out of the ordinary.

Gabby went over to the odd section of wall.

"Look here!" he says, and starts pulling at the false wall. "Plaster an' canvas!"