Mechanical Failure

The crossbow was all well and good for Wayne's need of a grapnel gun, but in recent days it had become overly cumbersome for every day use. It was too heavy to carry on long scouting missions and it didn't have the conceal-ability he wanted to achieve. Many times he was forced to leave it behind during infiltration training, the Manbat already being to big to fit in most spaces and the weapon making it impossible for movement in air ducts and sewers. Recently Wayne had lost the crossbow out right after getting himself stuck in a storm drain he had wedged himself into. It took him two days to retrieve the weapon and he had spent a couple days at home after coming down with dysentery. He spent those days shitting himself and vomiting blood before the antibiotics finally purged the pathogen.

Wayne Bruzinski had come against a brick wall in terms of a solution to the grapnel gun. He was begining to think such things were impossible, a daydream of comic writers. He was about to give up when he tossed his crossbow in the closet and his paintball gun fell out. "Oh, fuck yeah, fuck fuckity fuck yeah!" He picked it up and laughed like a giddy school child with a sugar rush. It was light weight and was easily held in one hand. It could be concealed after a few modifications and wouldn't hinder movement like the bow. 

So, first things first, Wayne moved the air compressor canister to the top of the gun to cut down the length. Then he cold welded a barrel with a wider opening to the original barrel after cutting that down. He capped of the opening for the paint ball hopper as it wasn't needed any more. After some research on the internet Wayne discovered his existing grapnel hook would be to big for firing from the device. He went to his buddy Jason's house to have him make a smaller hook.

Everything was finally in place and Wayne was putting the finishing touches on his new grapnel gun (You know, bad ass black and yellow paint and a Manbat symbol) before test fire. He slid the new grapnel in the barrel, this one weighing in at the four pounds needed to fire long distances. Wayne was at home and had drug in a piece of a tree trunk that had been removed from behind the building as a target. He took aim at the wood more or less with a lack of scope and pulled the trigger. The air shot out and the hook just kind of fell to the floor about four inches away. "Back to the damn drawing board." Wayne complained.

After wrapping the hook in foam Wayne wedged the thing back in place. It was a tight fit and he was sure after the force exerted to put it in place it would give him a better shot. He looked at the gun and figured he needed some type of scope, so being the handy man he is, Wayne made a crude scope by bending a coat hanger into a loop. This is what the blue print for the scope looked like:

He used tooth picks for cross hairs and fastened it to the air tank with zip ties. So he was ready. He took aim, raising the scope to his face and aiming at the wood once again and congratulated himself on his little invention. He pulled the trigger and the tank exploded because of the choked off barrel. The sight shot straight back into his eye, penetrating his brain and killing him almost instantly. It wasn't until Wayne's landlord was forced to enter the apartment after he hadn't paid his rent for so long that his body was found.