Relaxing at the Monkey-wrench that evening, the non-raving part of the party is approached by a well-dressed, handsome young man who is looking for Tobey. His name is Dawson Roe, and he is something of an agent - he finds people with skills to help people with needs. The need in this case is from one Dr. Allinora Morten, who needs someone with good aim and a special rifle to deliver her rattler-tranquilizer into a salt rattler. Dawson had heard of Tobey and her special rifle, and so...

Tobey is thrilled at the idea of a rattler hunt. They agree to meet the professional rattler hunter that Dawson is also contracting the next morning to ride his steam-wagon out to Lakepoint, where the good doctor lives.

The next morning they (minus Joseph who is convalescing for the entirety of this log) meet one Angus Tilson, "King of the Independent Rattler Hunters" and ride his steam wagon out to Lakepoint. He tells them something about hunting rattlers with steam wagons, gliders, and dynamite (his method) or with giant land-ships (the method of pansies). Tobey asks him about rattler intelligence, and though he credits them with being as smart as say a pack of wolves, he doesn't think they're really intelligent. Big Red, the personal worm nemesis of one of the land ship captains, might be an exception.

In Lakepoint they find Dr. Morten's house and lab. Tobey notes the dog pens out back, including one dead dog with something odd about it. Inside the house, they find the forgetful Dr. Morten, and once they've reminded her that she was going to hire someone, and mentioned that they are those people, she shows them to her lab and discusses the project. She has a rattler tranquilizer in crystalline form, but it needs to get into the core of a rattler to be effective. Then she can take samples from a living rattler. It is determined that Tobey's gun can shoot lead balls with crystals in the center, scored to break up on impact.

While this is going on, various of the posse are examining the lab. It contains a tank of lake hellions (a sort of hand-sized brine shrimp pirhana) and various cages of passenger pigeons, most looking a bit ill. In one case, one of the pigeons is eating the corpse of another. Dr. Vorpwhistle has a vigorous discussion with Dr. Morten, whose theory is that accelerated evolution is a result of extreme selection pressures, creating such amazingly well-evolved creatures as the lake hellion or salt rattler. Dr. Vorpwhistle thinks that it is more likely that ghost rock runoff has changed these creatures. Dr. Morten thinks that might be just part of the evolutionary pressures...

In any case, the reason for the pigeon's strange behavior is that she's injected them with extracted essence from the lake hellions in order to create hybrid creatures. Tobey puts two and two together to get ick, and asks if that's what happened with the dead dog, and what is going to happen with the rattler sample. Apparently yes - her essence from dead rattlers wasn't working right, it just killed the dogs...

Everyone is a little uneasy about this. Tobey mutters a quick prayer for guidance to herself, but only feels a strange uneasiness about how this whole thing was set up. They decide to go out on Angus's steam wagon for a dry run. Angus goes looking for another worm hunter on the flats, so Tobey can practice shooting at a real rattler corpse.

Unfortunately, on the way there they are ambushed by a rattler, and the dry run quickly becomes a wet run. Tobey is able to put down the rattler with her gun and the tranquilizer, and everything goes surprisingly smoothly, sample collecting and all. They dynamite the stunned rattler afterwards, since they've made it mad. Everyone gets paid, and they go home happy (although Tobey is covered with rattler blood, since she had to cut the big chunk sample).

Over the next few days, things are quiet. They wonder about how Dawson knew to look for Tobey, and upon finding him get the answer that he knows a Mormon who knows another Mormon who heard an account of Elder Tanner's debriefing. He doesn't think they should be worried about it spreading everywhere, except maybe in a garbled version without their names attached. Also on the Dawson front, he takes Cady out to dinner several times, and a good time is had by both.

"It was lovely, I was kidnapped briefly, but I escaped."
"You were... no you weren't." - Cady telling Tobey about her date

Doc works on ghost rock detector powder, and comes up with a formula that he is happy with to detect trace amounts of the mineral. Tobey goes shopping for a pack for Ginger, and discovers some rare skins available in one shop. In the end, the posse spends a good chunk of money on a young rattler skin, and has it made into protective collars and a pair of mitts for handling dangerous items. They also ogle the thick white furs of some strange creature from the Cascades, and the strangely prickly longhorn skull that Bart fancies is eyeing him.

Dawson comes to them later with a sensitive matter - a bit of a charity case. It seems one of Hellstromme's scientists is having a crisis of conscience. After her town in Montana was destroyed by unknown forces, a little girl (the sole survivor) was rescued by Hellstromme's forces. For some reason, he has imprisoned her at his compound and is doing strange experiments on her. The scientist has suddenly found a conscience over the whole thing, and wants to rescue her. Dawson thinks it's genuine, and the posse agrees to meet the scientist.

MM: The posse still needs to be convinced that the little girl is an innocent bystander. We're waiting to find out if she's blonde.
(The GM should note that Meg has played in other games in which a certain little blonde girl was very bad news.)