The posse was arrested, blindfolded, and chained. They were delivered to Washington D.C. by train, and brought into the depths of an unmarked marble building. One by one the posse was interviewed by a man wearing a dark suit, dark glasses, and a prosthetic mask used to cover some kind of deformity.
The posse eventually admitted that they were in Gettysburg to find the bullets that were pulled from Jasper Stone. Once the Agency understood what they were after, they wiped their minds. The posse awoke on a stagecoach in Louisiana, including their old friend Thaddeus Johanson. Inside Icie’s pocket was a note telling them where to find Dr. Elija Merton, the man who pulled the lead from Stone’s back.
The town where Dr. Merton resided was ruined. The swaps of Louisiana had swallowed the town whole, except for the church which was located on higher ground. A make-shift series of bridges went from rooftop to rooftop through the town to the church.
In the church the Posse found Dr. Elija Merton. His mind was in worse shape than the town. Icie found Dr. Merton’s journal and pieced together the past. After Cho had rescued them, Dr. Merton and his love, Dr. Katherine St. Lauren, had escaped to this town and assumed new identities. They never used their panacea again, knowing that it would bring unwanted attention from the Barons and their Knights. Dr. St. Lauren fell to some strange disease, and Dr. Merton used the device one last time to save her. The bog which the town was built on was killed and consumed in the process and Dr. St. Lauren drowned when the town flooded. Dr. Merton disposed of his device, made from the lead pulled from Stone’s back, by tossing it into the swamps.
When Dr. Merton stepped outside of the church to show the Posse where he had thrown the machine, five smoke-like creatures appeared. The Posse recognized them as the Angels from the Sanitarium, and the same Angels which had killed the clock maker in Kansas City.
The arcane tattoos on the Posse were able to conceal them. For some reason the mark on Thaddeus did not protect him. He was knocked down, and Dr. Merton was slain. Once Dr. Merton died, the smoke creatures disappeared.
Thaddeus took it upon himself to swim into the swamp to find the device, as he was the only member of the Posse who knew how to swim. Once he found the device, a gigantic undead alligator attacked. Arthur used his whirlwind powers to subdue the alligator while Thaddeus tried to reach the rooftops. The alligator broke free, and took one of Thaddeus’ legs below the knee. Percival summoned a strong metal rod and forced it into the alligators mouth, stopping him from biting. Icie grabbed the device and took off. The alligator pursued. Smokin’ Cho faced his fears of reptiles. He pulled out a stick of dynamite, lit it with his cigarette and tossed it into the open maw of the gator. The dynamite exploded, and chunks of undead reptile rained down on the posse.
The Posse was able to smelt the lead back into 13 bullets. Thaddeus acquired an artificial leg. The Posse figured out that Jasper Stone was outside of Billings, Montana – the site of an unusual astrological event where ten meteors had fallen. On board the train, the Posse found the mysterious Agent waiting for them. In Billings they found their old friend Zane Sharkey, who had just taken over a gang of harrowed gunfighters.
The Posse split up the bullets between themselves and Zane’s Wild Bunch. They surrounded Jasper Stone and took aim. Jasper fired first upon those who had the most bullets on them: Butch Cassidy and Zane Sharkey. They both took massive damage from two well placed shots. Things looked grim for the Posse, but they steeled themselves and one by one were able to put the 13 slugs back into Jasper Stone.
Meanwhile the Agent was working a device with a crystalline power source. He told the Posse it was a tool to keep Jasper Stone from using his full powers. It was a lie. In fact, the Agent was another Jasper Stone who had traveled to the present from a hundred years in the future. The death of the original Jasper Stone was enough to power the Heart of Darkness, the crystalline object in the device. The Jasper Stone from the future was using Icie’s gun and the Heart of Darkness to open a portal to the Hunting Grounds, where the Manitou and the Reckoners reside.
The original Stone shouted, “You son of a bitch, we had a deal!” He called out to one of the Posse and said, “The only thing that’ll kill him is his own hand.” He then took his revolver in his right hand and shot his left hand off. The left hand, still grasping his other revolver, dropped to the ground. Jasper’s body faded away into a ghostly form. The 13 slugs were left behind.
The Posse grabbed Jasper’s hand and used his powerful gun to stop the future Stone from completing his task. Stone was not able to complete his task, but his death kickstarted the portal in an unstable form. Demons were poised to enter our realm and turn it into a Deadland. Zane Sharkey and his Wild Bunch volunteered to enter the portal and seal it off from the other side.
The portal was sealed. The future Jasper Stone was dead. The only questions now were, who took Jasper’s gun, and would the present Jasper Stone return to take it back.