The next day Harry and Neville dressed in black suits, black vest, and black ties over their every day dragon hide vests and undercover shoulder rigs with their Operative handguns. They pulled on their gun belts with their six shooters,black wide brimmed hats, and black leather dusters. They loaded up their bags with their gear and ammo, and headed out in search of adventure. They walked into the Marshal's office and John greeted them with a big grin.
"I see you boys want the jobs after all. Good, we got a list of shit a mile long from the telegraph that came in over the last few day. Here." He said tossing them each a round silver marshal star punched out of a silver dollar from his desk drawer.
"That's it? Don't we have to do something? Pass a test? Sign something? Swear an oath?" Harry asked looking at the silver star in a circle.
"Not really, I mean, you're going to do the job to the best of your abilities right?" John asked.
"Yes." Both men said.
"Well good, that's all I need to hear. Now we got three requests and two wanted posters. None of it's inside the city, you boys have horses right?" He asked.
"We have flying brooms if that's okay?" Harry asked.
"I guess. I've got to be straight with you two, I've never had magicals working for me before. So if you say brooms are as good as horses then by all means, us them. Now how familiar are you with the town and the surrounding area?" John asked.
"Not at all but we have a lot of magic that can help us get around. Now what are we looking at boss?" Harry asked pinning the star to his vest.
"Well we got reports of walking dead on the road from here to Ely. It's a little town about 70 miles east of here on the road, if you're flying then it's a lot closer I guess. Can you two handle that?" He asked pointing out the town and the road on a map hanging on the wall.
"We killed three dozen of them a few nights ago getting here." Neville said.
"Good while you're hunting those down to Ely, just north of there is a hideout we think. This gang of outlaws are a crazy bunch, they like to hit stagecoaches heading between bigger towns like Ely and Eureka from Salt Lake CIty. There could be as many as ten of them. We don't know because they don't leave witnesses by choice. They're lead by Wally Stokes and his brother Ricky. Both of them are bat shit crazy, they and their gang are wanted dead or alive, $300 each for the two brothers and $50 a head for their gang. They also took a Wells Fargo stagecoach and a shipment of silver certificates worth a lot of money. The certificates are numbered and anyone trying to cash one is going to be in trouble with the law but Wells Fargo is willing to buy them back for ten cents on the dollar. I'm also sure they have some ill gotten gains you can keep." He said.
"Sounds easy enough. Anything else?" Harry asked.
"There is but that's a good four days of work. And it's dangerous out there. But if you think you can handle more there's a request for assistance from the WIlliamson Mining company. It say's they got a goblin infestation in their mine north of town and they're willing to pay $2,500 to clean it out and $5 a head for every goblin you find. Also to the south east of here is a small settlement called Hamilton. It's a small old mining town with about a hundred people. They spotted more of those big ass spiders and they've been hiding in the town hall since last night. There's no real money in that one boys so I don't expect it to be high on your to do list." He said handing them the pieces of paper.
"We should go do that one first. I saw a bunch of those big suckers yesterday. They're no joke. We'll follow the road to get to Hamilton and see if we spot any undead. After we save the town we'll continue to Ely and on the way back we'll swing up north and get this gang. We'll scan the road for undead on the way back to town too and then after lunch we'll hit the mine." Neville said pointing the roads out on the map on the wall.
"Agreed. We'll see you in a few hours boss." Harry said copying the map as they walked out of the office and pulled their out brooms.
Soon they were in the air and heading south east following the road fifty foot off the ground, flying at a good pace, and scanning the area for undead. They found a few undead and they took them out from the air with their revolvers. Smith was right, the guns shot as accurately as their Sig226s. They were getting head shots a fifty feet on the first shot. They stopped long enough to take any guns, gun belts, coin, or blades off the dead before they torched them with a fire spell.
For the most part it was easy to spot the undead. They shambled down the road headed towards Eureka. Harry felt sorry for these poor souls. They were mindless, decomposing, lost killing machines. The only drive they had was to feed and even that was a challenge. They could barely walk, these zombies, unlike the ones they killed in the mine were not as fresh. They were older, and dried out. Their movements looked pained, and sad. You would have to be asleep and ten of them would have to attack you at once for them to take you down. These were scavengers. They ate long dead things on the side of the road. As he killed them he found himself saying. 'Go with god' under his breath. He was not hunting these undead horrors, he was providing the dead with a chance to rest.
With that being said they did run into a few fresher zombies. They were faster and more alert. They moved at a good walking pace and they could smell them as they approached. They also had the motor function enough to fire the guns in their hands but not enough to aim very well. It was like they knew from their old lives what the gun was and how to pull the trigger but not how to work their arm to aim well enough to get hits. They still dropped like a sack of hammers when you shot them in the head but you did have to dodge a few wide shots while you got them.
The thirty mile trip to Hamilton took about a half hour because of the twenty stops they made to kill the undead. The town was small. About 500 foot long and 300 foot wide and a good bit of that was taken up by a twenty foot tall thirty foot around rock formation sticking out of the ground with a mine shaft carved into it. The town had a few big buildings like a town hall building, a general store, and a small saloon. Around those buildings were 14 small shack style houses. The spiders were easy enough to spot as they approached the town.
Four big dark brown hairy tarantulas the size of SUVs were attacking the main building in the middle of town. They both came in closer but stayed a few hundred feet up. They pulled out their winchesters and Harry started off the attack by shooting the biggest one in the head. The round hit hard and it stunned the arachnid causing it to turn and look at them. He pumped four more rounds into it's head before it fell. As he was working on that one Neville was taking out the next biggest one. That one took three shots to bring down. The last two fell to three and two shot respectively. Harry scanned the area for more spiders as they reloaded and when he felt no more he flew down to the town hall building that looked like it was on it's last leg and only being held together by magic. He knocked on the door.
"Hello?! US Marshals out of Eureka! Anyone alive in there?! The big ass spiders are dead!" He called out. A few seconds later the door cracked open and he saw a bunch of scared haggard faces looking back at him.
"Hello. I'm deputy marshal Harry Steel, that there is my brother and partner deputy marshal Neville Blackwell. We took care of your spider problem. It looks like they did a number on your town hall, hell it looks like they did a number on your town. Here let me fix some of this." He said pulling out his wand and waving it at the building. In seconds the broken stone and mortar walls and cracked wood roof fixed itself. Neville flew around the town casting the spell at the damaged houses.
"Hello, I'm Roy Reed, I'm the town Mayor of Hamilton. We can't thank you enough for coming to our rescue. We don't have much in the way of money…" The old man in his sixties with salt and pepper hair and beard dressed in an old but well taken care of suit started to say but Harry cut him off.
"No need for that, we're just happy to help. It's terrible you all had to be stuck there all night. Are any of you wizards? These are good wards but you could use an upgrade." Harry said.
"My wife cast those wards. She put up all the wards around the town before she passed. She was the only real trained witch in our town." Roy said looking sad.
"Sorry to hear about that. What you folks need is a portkey to Eureka. It's a way for you all to get out of a situation like this. If we would have showed up an hour later there would be no one left in this town. Do you have a good strong rope about twenty foot long?" Harry asked.
"I got one. I have a few in the mine." A bigger younger man said.
"Go get it and I'll turn it into an emergency portkey to the front gate of Eureka." Harry said and the young man ran off.
"Again we can't thank you enough the portkey spell is extremely hard to cast and I know this is a heavy feat of magic." Rot said looking at Harry with wide eyes.
"It's not that hard for me. I'm kind of a powerhouse when it comes to this stuff I don't have much in the way of spell knowledge but I can do this.
Well I am extremely grateful to you for your help. I can't believe you two got those huge spiders so fast." Roy said looking at the big dead spiders.
"Does this happen often?" Harry asked looking at the town's people. They were all well worn and haggard looking. Sad broken eyes, bad teeth, worn out faces. They looked frail with hunger and overworking to just scrape by.
"Once or twice a month we get attacked by spiders. But they usually come one at a time. The wards can hold one of them at bay long enough for us to kill it before it eats one of us. The wards and walls might not look it but they can hold back a lot. We just got overwhelmed this time." Roy said.
"No doubt your walls can hold back a lot, but you could really use an upgrade. I'm no expert, but my sister is. I'll talk to her about it. She might be able to set up another set of wards to form an inner ward line as a fall back point. Do you want us to remove the dead spiders or is there any value in their dead bodies? Venom? Teeth? Silk? Something you can get out of this?" Harry asked.
"No. the venom is useless, they don't have silk, and we can't eat um. Hell we can't even burn them for heat because the smell is too bad. They just take up space." Roy said.
"We'll cart them away from your town." Harry said shrinking the four dead spiders down to the size of garbage can lids and banishing them into the desert as the young man came running back with a thick long rope. Harry turned it into a portkey and handed it to Roy.
"The next time something like this happens and you get overwhelmed fall back to the town hall, gather your people together, have them take a hold of the rope, and say 'Emergency Portkey to Eureka.' until then keep that rope safe and don't say that activation phrase while holding the rope. Was there anything else you needed? Anything we can help you with?" Harry asked.
"We can't ask you for anything else, we've already taken up too much of your time marshal." Roy said.
"Not at all, we're wizards, we've got plenty of time on our hands and we want to help. Hell one would even say it's our job to help folks seeing as we're marshals and all." Harry said with a charming smile full of white teeth.
"Well if you're sure, we could use some help. We sent a shipment of silver ore to Eureka a few days ago with Jimmy, he handles the deliveries for us, he hasn't gotten back yet. He had a list of supplies the town desperately needed. That was all the silver ore we could get out of the mine over the last two months and we need those supplies." Roy said looking worried.
"When we get back to town we'll look for Jimmy and make sure the supplies get back to you folks. I'll also talk to my sister about adding some more wards to your town like I said. Do you folks need any emergency supplies now? We could fly back to Eureka and get you what you needed now?" Harry said.
"We're doing okay for now. We have food stores and water from the well. I must say you're a lot more helpful than the last marshal." Roy said looking shocked.
"All in a day's work Mayor. If you need anything at all don't hesitate to telegraph the marshal's office and we'll come running." Harry said with a charming smile and a tip of his hat as he hopped on his broom and they flew off.
"He gave us a fetch quest!" Neville said with a big grin.
"I know! This is so much fun, now let's keep following the road until we get to Ely. Once we get there we can use the point me spell to find this gang." Harry said scanning the road with his eyes.
They followed the road for 45 minutes flying at a good pace. They spotted five more undead and took care of them. Again they only stopped to loot and burn the bodies. They followed the road for a few more miles until they got to the town of Ely.
Ely was a middle ground between Eureka and Hamilton in terms of how well off they were. The town was bigger than Hamilton in terms of size. It was butted up to a mountain with a mine and they had better outer walls made of heavy wood. They also had better wards. But they were nowhere near as well off as Eureka. The town had about 800 residents and most of them worked for the Harris mining company. In fact the mining company owned the, stores, the bars, the casino, and the local law. They didn't have a town marshal. Like most of the smaller towns they relied on the bigger town, Eureka in this case, to patrol the roads and take care of threats outside the town walls.
Harry walked into a few shops and checked the prices of goods to make sure the Harris company wasn't screwing its workforce over and he was pleasantly surprised that all Harris company employees got a good discount on all goods and services in the town. The town made up the difference by overcharging people passing through the town. For example the same shirt he was wearing now he paid $2 in Eureka, in Ely if you worked for the company the same shirt cost $1.25, if you didn't have the company discount the shirt was $2.75. A shot at the bar in Eureka was $.50, with discount it was $.25, without discount it was $.75 in Ely. And the miners made a good wage too. $5 a day. That was a dollar more than the WIlliamson company paid and they didn't provide discounts for things in Eureka.
Then again the the mine in Ely was a heavy gold and silver mine producing a good amount of gold and silver for every ounce of other metal that came out of the mine. They also had better smelting equipment and refining facilities that produced higher standard gold and silver then the WIlliamson company had. They also were closer to Salt Lake and the cost of gold and silver transport to the bigger city was easier and cheaper.
After checking out the town they checked in with the local law. The town sheriff was an old fat man named Steven Morgan. Steven was happy to see them and confirmed the location of the gang hideout north of the city. He introduced them to his five deputies that helped him run the town and provide security for it's residents.
After that they headed north following the road with Harry's wand pointing the way. The range of a point me spell was 50ish miles and at that distance the wand gave a general direction. So they headed north up the road with the wand pointing the way. When the wand pointed more sharply left they got off the road and followed the wand to a revin between two big rock formations a mile off the road behind another big rock. As they flew over they saw two men standing at the entrance to a cave next to a corral of a dozen horses. They dropped back before they could be spotted and landed on one of the big rocks that made the fifty foot wide thirty foot tall ravine.
"Let's try the stealth approach and see how far we get. I count a dozen horses, that could mean there are twelve of them in their and in a tight space a gun fight is going to suck. You take the one on the left I'll take the one on the right. Knives for now and if we have to shoot them we should use our Sigs. We're not leaving any witnesses anyways." Harry said pulling out a 5 inch drop point knife with a finger grooved wood handle from his bag.
"Cute knife." Neville said with a smirk as he pulled out a 14 inch long combat knife with a heavy two inch wide blade.
"It's not the size of the blade it's how you use it. On three." Harry said holding out his hand and counting down his fingers before they both vanished and reappeared behind the two sentries.
Harry grabbed his guy from behind with his left hand over his mouth, he ran the razor sharp blade across the man's neck and a shower of blood sprayed across the ground. Harry held the man to his chest for almost a half a minute until he stopped struggling. He glanced over and saw Neville watching him. His man was on the ground by his feet and his head was a few feet away.
"If you're done cuddling we can take care of the rest of them?" Neville said.
"Savage giant." Harry said with a smirk slipping into the cave. The cave curved to the right and as it got too dark to see the cave hooked left and there was a lantern on the wall, Harry checked the tunnel. It was clear but he saw it widened out up ahead and there was more light and talking. He was about to turn to tell Neville when a man walked down the hall heading towards them. Harry held up his hand and waited until the guy was about to turn the corner before he grabbed him by the arm and spun him around into Neville who took his head clean off with one swing of his heavy big knife.
"How many more are down there do you think?" Neville asked.
"I could go check under my cloak. Maybe even shoot them all before they know I'm there? Or we can just go in guns blazing? The room up ahead looks wider." Harry said with a shrug.
"So slow and boring or loud and fun?" Neville asked with a grin.
"That's what I thought. Old guns or new guns?" Harry asked holding up his revolver.
"Shiny." Neville said drawing his two guns with a smile.
"Blaze of glory it is. Big damn hero like." Harry said pulling his two guns. He walked down the hall with Neville close behind him.
He peeked in and saw six more guys sitting around the room drinking and laughing. He could see strong boxes in the corner. He held up six fingers and pointed left. Neville nodded. He smirked before rolling around the wall into the cave. The first gunshot echoed off the walls of the cave silencing everyone, but by the time they figured out was happening Harry and Neville put two rounds in each man's chest. Harry cleared the black powder smoke with a wave of his hand and they saw the dead bodies. Neville moved to the strong boxes but Harry whipped around and put two rounds in a man's chest as he came around the corner with a gun in his hand. Harry checked the room he came out of and saw an outhouse style toilet.
"There's always one fucking guy in the shitter." Harry said waving his hand to clear the air.
"There always is. Hey Harry, do you think we can keep all this loot?" Neville asked.
"I'm not sure. How much are we talking about?" Harry asked checking to make sure the outlaws were dead by kicking them in the kidneys.
"This strong box is full of coins, and this one has mixed bills of all denominations and coins. I also see the silver certificates and more mixed bills and coins, and a trunk with gold nuggets. Not pure gold but it's gold." Neville said.
"Shrink it all and we'll take it back with us, it might be like the silver certificates." Harry said looting the bodies and turning them into gold coins.
When they packed up all the bodies Harry cast a few detection charms around the room and found nothing else. They collected their first two kills and stunned and turned the horses into coins as well. They headed back to Eureka following the roads and killing anything that could attack travelers on the road. They landed and walked into the Marshal's office just before noon. When the Marshal saw them he looked like he was about to crap himself.
"Good Heavens! You two done with the spiders already?" He asked.
"The spiders, the walking dead on the road to Ely, and the gang. What do we do with the bodies?" Harry asked holding a sack of coins.
"Those are the bodies?" He asked looking at the gold coins.
"They are. We'll drop the transfiguration to show you but they're going to be a bloody mess. Do we hand them off to you?" Harry asked.
"Yeah, go ahead and pile them in the cart out back and I'll take them to judge Hill, he'll give me the stamped wanted poster and then you can take that to the bank for payment." John said as Neville took the bag and followed his instructions.
"What about all the loot? Who gets that?" Harry asked.
"You do, anything on their bodies or in their hide out belongs to you. That's what I was telling you boys. It's the reason the pay is shit. You get first crack at wanted posters and you get to loot the bodies. There were what? Ten of them? You could have both been killed. Infact a few deputies from other towns have been killed trying to bring them down. Take the loot as a bonus. Did you find the silver certificates?" He asked.
"We did. Can we cash those in at the bank?" Harry asked.
"No, those have to be taken to the Wells Fargo in Salt Lake City. It's about 350 miles east of here but with your brooms that should be an easy trip." John said.
"Good to know. We're going to get something to eat, and head out to the mine after that." Harry said about to leave when Neville stopped him.
"Jimmy Harry, remember?" He said with a smirk.
"Jimmy? Oh Jimmy! That's right. Hey boss, the mayor of Hamilton said they sent a guy to Eureka a few days ago with a cart of silver ore and a list of supplies. Did you happen to see Jimmy?" Harry asked.
"No, I can't say that I have. A few days ago you say? You know we had a werewolf attack a few days ago and a few big spiders have been roaming the area between our two towns. Not to mention the goblins you two killed last night. You might want to check with the red saloon a few doors down. If he made it then that's where he stays in town. If he's not there the best thing you can do is look for his renames between here and Hamilton." John said.
"We'll do that, thanks boss." Harry said as they walked out of the office. They stopped off at the saloon.
"Marshal, marshal. What can I get you?" The bartender said with a grin.
"Hay Sam, nothing for us, we're here on a case actually. We were hoping you could help us. Hamilton sent Jimmy out a few days ago with Silver ore and a list of supplies. The marshal said that if he did make it to town he likes to stay here. Have you seen Jimmy?" Harry asked putting a small cigar in his mouth and lighting it with a match.
"No, I'm sorry to say I haven't seen Jimmy in over a month." Sam said looking sad. He knew what that meant.
"Is there anywhere else he would stay if he came to town?" Harry asked.
"No, he stays here because he's sweet on Kitty up there. He comes right here as soon as he gets into town." San said wiping his hands on a rag.
"Shit, I really don't feel like having to give Hamilton more bad news." Harry said.
"They can take it, Jimmy was a bit of a thrill seeker. He volunteered for the run because he liked the excitement." Sam said.
"Well, can you keep this quiet for now Sam? We're going to have to search for his body later and I don't want anyone to go out looking for the silver and end up dead." Harry said.
"Will do marshal, you'll tell me when you do find him so I can tell Kitty, she was sweet on him too." Sam said.
"As soon as we find the cart you can tell her. I just want to take the temptation away." Harry said puffing his cigar.
"I understand Marshal." Sam said nodding.
"Good man, for your time." Harry said leaving a $5 coin on the bar as they walked away.
They walked back to the cube at sedated pace. As they walked through the town people tipped their hats to them and said things like 'morning marshals' and people came out to greet them and shake their hand. They stopped off at the horse corral and sold the 12 horses for $50 each. By the time they got to the cube Harry finished his cigar and hushed it out. They walked into the cube and hung up their long coats by the front door. They saw the girls hard at work making a dozen magical lanterns. They looked up when they came in and both of them smiled when they saw the silver stars on their vests.
"Two days in the past and you're both lawmen again." Hermione said.
"Rich lawmen. This bounty hunter thing is a good job. Look at all the loot we got from half a day's work." Harry said opening the trunk with the old guns and added the new ones they just got today. "We need to see how much we can get for most of this junk. We also got all this." Harry said dumping the bag of coins and loose bills they found on dead bodies along with the cash from the horse deal on the table as Neville expanded the four metal crates they found.
"Where the hell did you guys get all that?" Hermione asked.
"We killed a gang of outlaws hitting Wells Fargo stagecoaches. This was the spoils of their ill gotten gains. Now it's ours. I need you to count it and keep track of it. We have a box of silver dollars and two boxes of loose bills and coins. I can melt those gold nuggets into pure bars and those silver certificates have to go to the bank in Salt Lake City. I'm going to cook lunch and then we have to head out again." Harry said taking off his suit jacket and hat as he headed into the kitchen. Neville kissed his wife and sat down with a big grin on his face.
"You boys have fun today?" Hermione asked sorting out the coins and loose bills in the bag first.
"We did. It was great Mia. It was like a movie, we were the good guys coming to save the day. The brooms kind of killed the image but it's the best way to get to places. We need those horses if we want to ride around a bigger city like Salt Lake." Neville said taking off his hat and reloading his gun. When he was done he started helping the girls count the loot.
When Harry came in with the plates of chicken over rice with a cream sauce and a side of broccoli and carrots a half hour later they had most of it counted and Hermione was adding it up as they separated it.
"So what's the damage?" Harry asked.
"You have $16,793 in loose bills, $23,245 in coins and that box over there has $10,000 in silver dollar coins. All together you two made $50,038. Not bad." She said laughing.
"Also we made $1,000 from the warrants on the men we killed and that box has at least 50 pounds of pure gold when we strip out the impurities that's another $16,000 right there. We're racking up." Harry said.
After lunch they pulled on their coats and hats and headed to the office to check in with John.
"We're back from lunch boss, anything going on that we need to know about?" Harry asked.
"No and you boys don't have to keep checking in with me. You two are doing such a good job you're putting every other deputy I ever had to shame. Relax you two, you got the jobs, you don't have to be this fast everyday." John said laughing.
"Sorry boss, we used to be soldiers, and then we worked in a violent action filled job after that." Harry said.
"Well relax into it. There will be times where you'll be rushed out of bed to fight off some horror trying to breach the front gates. So take your time boys. Don't wear yourselves out." He said with and old wisdom.
"We'll try to slow down. We're off to the mining company and then to the mine. We'll see you later." Harry said leading them out.
From there they headed to the Williamson mining company office in town. They met with the owner Jim WIlliamson. They were expecting a boss hog character of a man but they found a older man with thinning grey hair. Dressed in a nice but not overly ostentatious suit sitting in a nice but not ridiculous office. In fact not only was John 'just call me Jim' WIlliamson not a bad guy he was a very nice man that was just trying to keep his family business going. His dad found the mine when Eureka was just coming together 50 ish years ago and ever since then the mine had been producing less and less gold and silver and more lead, iron, and copper then was profitable. On top of that it seemed like every month they had problems with the wild life.
The mine along with the ore processing refinery was located northeast of Eureka about a mile from the back gate where the Alice Rosewood's family farm was located. In fact the access road was carved through one of the mountains that made up the valley were Eureka was nestled. But the fact that the mine was a mile away from town meant it was out of the range of the wards and open to attack by all manner of things that roamed the mountainous desert around the town and mine. They had wards up but weak ones because of the distance they had to cover and the shape of the area. Like all things magical, ward advancement happened over time with breakthroughs happening at a glacial pace. Harry would need Hermione to look at all of this. As it stood the wards sucked and that lead to infestations and attacks every few weeks.
This time the mine was overrun by goblins. Jim wasn't sure of the numbers but his 10 guards hired to look after the mine fell back to the town when a group of 30-40 goblins ambushed the mine and refinery at night a week ago killing 6 of the men. With Eureka not having a Marshal and the loss of his best men he didn't have the firepower to take back the mine. As it stood he was losing a ton of money every day the mine was closed. After having to pay out death benefits to the guards next of kin and keeping up payments to his miners to make sure they stayed in town he was going broke. He hire a few teams of mercenaries but they all failed so far. As it was his last option was calling in the Army.
They promised him they would take care of it for him and left his office. With a renewed sense of vigor now that they knew this was so urgent they mounted up and headed north of town. As they approached the mine they saw the problem right away. They saw a dozen goblins camped out around a fire in front of the mine. They made quick work of them from the air and scanned the area to make sure there were no more goblins out of the mine before landing. Harry looted a few blades off of goblins and an old winchester rifle. He turned the goblins into gold coins and put them in a sack before they reloaded their rifles and put them away. They pulled out their MP5Ks and head lamps. These guns, unlike the gun he used before had a silencing charm and 300 round magazines. They turned on the headlamps and headed into the mine.
Almost immediately they ran into a pair of goblins. They cleared them out with two head shots and kept walking. They passed up silver ore, junk blades and guns as they headed deeper into the mine. The smell was horrible, the goblins turned the mine shaft into a home over the last week and their idea of home was a sewer. There was shit, literally shit all over the walls and floor and they ignored all of it as they made their way to the bottom of the mine. As they went they dropped goblins by the twos and threes as they fan into them.
After a few minutes Harry knew this was going to be a long drawn out process. One or two shots of 9mm was enough to drop these goblins and the bright light from the headlamps stunned and blinded them giving Harry and neville the chance to get the drop on them. It was slow going though. It only worked if they got all the goblins as they saw them so they couldn't alert the rest of their friends.
It took almost an hour to find the bottom of the mine. They found a big pile of silver ore with a fat goblin laying on it. The pile was being graded by ten goblins. They didn't even play around when they got there. They went full auto and sprayed the goblins with hot lead. They scanned the room and made sure that was it before they went about the process of collecting the gobins, coins, blades, guns, spent brass shell casings, and the loose ore lying around the mine. They made the trip back up to the surface turning the goblins into coins as they went. They weren't even sure how many goblins they killed until they counted the coins when they got out of the mine.
96 goblins. Harry kind of felt bad about killing them but they weren't the goblins he knew. These were little feral beasts that killed and ate humans. They made it back to the mining office by four. Jim was so happy he tried to pay them more than what he offered but they kept the ore they collected instead. Jim was all too happy to let them keep it. They saved his family legacy.
They collected their $2,980 and headed back to the cube. They dumped the 12 revolvers and 4 rifles into the trunk along with the 31 blades. Harry dumped the big box of silver, iron and copper ore into the gold ore. Harry cast a cleaning charm on the coins they found before handing them off to his sister. They loaded up on more ammo before they headed back out.
They installed two magical lanterns on the tops of the guard towers and they cast light out over the road and the surrounding area for miles. It was getting dark but the guys headed out on brooms looking for the cart from Hamilton. They figured it was easier to look for the cart then Jimmy. They were right. They frond the cart broken and tipped over a few miles from town. There was no horse or Jimmy to be seen but there was blood everywhere so it was easy to see what happened here. Harry fixed the broken cart, shrank it and put it in his bag. He summoned all the ore into a trunk and put it in his pocket as Neville scanned the area with his rifle out. They mounted their brooms and tried to find his body but he was gone. Not even a point me spell turned up anything meaning he was in so many pieces that the spell couldn't find a piece big enough to be Jimmy, or he was more than fifty miles away, either way Jimmy was gone. They headed back to town as the last bit of daylight faded and it got pitch black. They saw the lights as they approached the town and they landed just inside the gates and waved to John.
"We found the cart but no Jimmy. Jimmy's gone. You want us to take a turn on the wall?" Harry asked lighting a small cigar.
"No, you boys did more than enough for a whole week. You guys better call it a night." John said.
"Right boss, see you in the morning." Harry said as they walked away. Neville headed back to the cube and Harry walked to the saloon. He went inside and nodded to Sam and Sam nodded back to him with a sad look on his face.
"He didn't make it?" Sam said more than asked.
"We found the cart, the ore and blood, lots and lots of blood. Not even magic could find him. Jimmy's gone." Harry said puffing his cigar.
"Well shit." Sam said looking at Kitty.
"I don't envy you. Giving a death notice is the worst. You want me to do it?" Harry asked.
"No, I'll do it." Sam said wiping his clean hands on the towel.
"Buy her a bottle of something good to help her sleep on me." Harry said setting a $20 coin on the bar.
"I'll do that. Thanks Marshal." Sam said looking at the gold coin.
"Good luck." Harry said before walking out.
He walked into the cube and hung up his coat and hat. That night Harry cooked and they had a nice dinner and Harry watched Tombstone on the big tv before passing out on the couch. Neville woke him up when the movie was over and Harry dragged his ass to bed where he passed out with a contented sigh and smile. He might be stuck in a bizzaro past but he was loving every second of it.