Liverpool Street Station

  The aboveground of London these days – even in the most generous estimates – was often compared to an empty battlefield. Infrastructure lay crumbling with no one to maintain it for months on end, long since abandoned by those few still alive in search of greener pastures. A ruin sequestered from the outside world, held in place by a Shroud that defied almost every chance to study it under the pale glow of an everlasting full moon. At times when the world fell still, and nothing moved but the faint breeze that kept the fog rolling, one might even be forgiven for considering it to be peaceful.

  But the shadows always held another danger. Ready, willing and able to claim another victim, at any time.

  With few options remaining, survivors had needed to band together in hideouts and strongholds to protect themselves from the horrors that crawled through the night.

  Friction in these earlier gatherings was practically inevitable. The high stress living conditions and constant threat of harm brought humans to each others throats as often as it convinced them to work together. The problem being that humans are naturally biased towards negative interactions, leading to grudges that far outlasted the problems that caused them.

  Eventually, the only settlements to stand the test of time were the ones with absolute rulers who maintained order at the cost of the freedoms of those in their charge…

  Or the ones that had been crazy to begin with, and found a way to function in spite of it.

  The latter category neatly fit the dwellers of the Liverpool Street underground temple. After all, nobody sane would painstakingly quarry beneath the surface of London to build a monument of all things. Certainly not one of this scale.

  And yet, as crazy as the idea seemed on paper, there was a thin thread of reasoning behind it. In the absence of the order magic’s widespread acceptance once brought, the self-proclaimed Morlocks had instead turned to religion. A cult of their own making, aping the druidic flourishes of long-dead practices. Naturally, with a large enough congregation, they felt the need for proper facilities.

  Though, truth be told, the resemblances those facilities held to their inspiration were loose at best. The crude stone temple that filled the station’s main platforms dwarfed the original Stonehenge several times over. It felt like someone had pulled the architect through time, gave them amphetamines and instructed them to recreate their masterpiece using only reference images of Soviet-era apartments. Only to realize that safety precautions hadn’t been invented in the time period you pulled them from.

  A building of this scale simply had to have been made by magic. Between the vast concentration of borderline insane mages, a general lack of available space otherwise, and their seemingly total aversion to crawling back above ground, it was the only explanation that could reasonably fit the time frame of the short few months they’d had to make this.

  That same population of mages which was – eerily enough – now very pointedly missing from their site of pilgrimage. The only movement in the whole area came from Henry and the other members of their exploratory party, currently slowly mapping out the abandoned structure.

  “Ye- Hello? No, I said we’re at Liverpool Street Station. The station. Underground.”

  To call their ragtag group a sight for sore eyes would be an understatement. Henry had a mess of bruises from the crash peeking out from under the edges of his clothes, and the only member of the Gentleman’s Club to survive that same incident wasn’t looking much better. Ironically, the one who was currently in the best physical condition was their so-called prisoner.

  Overhead, the Harpy hovered beneath the high vaulted ceiling of the platform, keeping an eye on the rest of them above as well as covering search area quickly. Down on the paving stones below, the GC thug took point, peering around corner after corner with his trigger finger itching from suspense. Their recent captive once again donned the guise of ‘the Shroudwalker’ and brought up the middle of the formation while Henry kept an eye out for anything that might be trying to sneak up on them.

  “No, I- what? Say that again? I’m sorry, but you’re breaking up.”

  Or, at the very least, partially kept an eye out. As he glanced around the abandoned megalith, the phone he had looted from the other non-Henry corpse in the wreck struggled to punch a signal through to his clones above. As he juggled between watching his prisoner, watching his back and watching his step, the little bit of patience he had for the effort was wearing quite thin.

  “Six? Did I hear that right? Six hours left?!”

  He listened intently as their path led them up a staircase made of haphazardly placed stone blocks that jutted out from a slab wall. His eyes were glued to his feet as he listened, balancing carefully so that he wouldn’t fall through the sheer gaps between the symmetrical footholds.

  The response from the other end was slightly jumbled, but managed to come through clear enough to confirm his fears. Their unfortunate detour on account of the subway train’s curse had lost them time, a commodity in short supply that he desperately needed to keep on his side.

  If he ran out, his little ruse he’d given to Guillaume would be unearthed. Because, as he’d told him earlier, he was supposed to be dead past that point. Which in turn meant that he’d supposedly failed to do his job, and the old greasebag would make good on his word.

  Something that was now trivial for him to accomplish, with Layla in their custody already.

  Henry growled in frustration. “Right, well, we’re about ready for pickup soon, anyways. Whatever transport you might’ve figured out, have it ready for us by then. Four passengers. Ye- no, no that’s four. Four. Fo- hello? Hello?”

  The phone gave a soft monotone chime, indicating the signal had been lost entirely. Sighing, he put it back in his pocket, returning his divided attention to more important duties. Like not slipping and cracking his head open.

  “Are we close yet?” Henry shouted up toward the Harpy above. “How much further we got left to go?”

  While he wasn’t given an immediate verbal response, the silhouette of the winged cyborg took note and glided down towards them. It halted just above their heads, so that it could both be seen and heard better.

  “Take the bridge up ahead, then turn left,” it instructed from above. “From there, it’s a straight shot to the artifact’s most likely location.”

  The angular form of its body cut through the thick mist, the details on its machine parts much sharper now that the distance had been shortened. If he craned his neck back far enough, he was even able to see it face to face.

  “Hope you’re right on that guess,” Henry responded. “This place is giving me the creeps even more than the last time.”

  “Last time?” The thug on point – Gordie, the normally quiet one from before – called back over his shoulder with telltale football hooligan diction. Albeit laid on ridiculously thick, bordering on unintelligible.

  “You’ve been ‘ere before?”

  “Once… But only through pure chance. Didn’t stick around for long. They seemed just as likely to stone me to death as they were to put me under the microscope.”

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  “Huh? How come? Doesn’t that crystalmabob fing o’ yours give ya a Domain t’ work with? Thought those crazy mage types woulda been all ova that…”

  “You’d think. But the problem is that it’s the wrong type of Domain magic. They all had a collective chip on their shoulder about me being ‘removed from the natural order’ or some other excuse they’d make up on the spot…”

  The guard gave him a blank stare before returning to his navigation of the stony expanse. Rolling clouds made it hard to see a thing past a short distance, but it was just barely enough to get by.

  Before they knew it, they had left the hazardous staircase behind them and returned to solid ground once again. The Harpy soared off to continue keeping an eye to the sky, and they walked down the middle of the bridge in single file, wanting to keep as much space between themselves and the cliff-like edges as possible.

  “Bloody ‘ell, it’s hard to see down ‘ere,” Gordie grumbled. “Ey, da Shroudwalker ‘as some tricks to clear out fog, right? Git ‘er on that, will ya?”

  “You mean, why don’t we give her a chance to use an Exotic Domain behind your back and trust that she has your best interests at heart? Noooo thank you. I’d rethink that strategy quickly if you don’t want to be the one to explain how we ended up returning short a prize to your boss.”

  “Oh, would you two shut up already!?”

  Layla, evidently, had had enough of being stuck between their back-and-forth bickering. Despite her previous agreement to go out on a limb to humor Henry’s deception, in practice she’d effectively volunteered to take his place on the pecking order. It hadn’t even been ten minutes, and she was already sick of it.

  Henry took a split second to weigh his options, thinking he’d need to deescalate the situation. It came as a pleasant surprise when Gordie did so first. With an icy glare, a brief muzzle-flash and a nod, he clammed up, giving Henry an easy out for the moment. He rolled his eyes at the power play and kept his head on a swivel.

  He could empathize with Layla’s frustration, but that didn’t change the fact that her attitude had him in a bit of a bind as well. There was a fine line he needed to ride between making sure she stayed on board with the plan, and keeping the others from getting suspicious about his loyalties.

  Although, if anyone looked too closely, the red flags were already there. The zip-ties he’d used to hold her wrists behind her back looked almost comically flimsy compared to the toned arms they were binding. It was a blessing that the Harpy wasn’t looking too closely, for the moment.

  Keeping up appearances is going to end up a full time job, at this rate…

  The three of them reached the main structure of the temple without any further excitement. Only the light from the point man’s light talisman illuminated the area.

  Hazy shadows betrayed the presence of a variety of stone plinths, altars, and benches that looked suspiciously like pews. The whole room was arranged in a circular formation, with attention being drawn to a rough stone pillar that dominated the center of the hall. The pillar was an almost perfect pitch black, seeming to absorb all light cast its way and only obvious due to its sheer size and outline.

  “So, this must be their place of worship, then…”

  Layla, having never seen the heart of the Morlock encampment for herself, took a moment to drink it all in. There was a hint of reverent awe in her words, reminiscent of the same state of mind Henry had felt when he’d first laid eyes on his place.

  That is, the ones he felt in the few short moments before some of them attempted to crucify him on the pillar. The words ‘expel the tainted magic’ or some other such nonsense had been bandied about frequently at the time. It had kind of killed the whole mood past that point, so he’d made his escape shortly after.

  “Right,” Gordie declared, taking point as the technically highest ranking member. “You lot keep an eye ‘round ‘ere, while I do some gen’ral investimagation of this ‘ere naff lookin’ rock.” He pointed a thumb over his shoulder at the monolithic black pillar. “And don’t either of ya try any funny business! Or ye’ll have the Harpy to answer to…”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know what I’m doing…” Henry griped a bit, but played along. “You got a spare talisman so that we can actually see what we’re doing? Mine burnt out while we were climbing around outside.”

  Gordie narrowed his eyes at the request. Which, fair response on his part, honestly. Henry had already proven on several occasions that he wasn’t above going behind people’s backs to make what he wanted to happen, happen. Not to mention he was probably more than a little pissed at him for being indirectly responsible for the deaths of his friends.

  …Okay. Perhaps a bit more than indirectly responsible.

  “Yer lucky the boss wants ya alive,” Gordie growled, cracking a spare disposable light talisman and rolling it along the ground towards his feet. “Make it count, this is the only one yer gonna get.”

  With a few last angry mutterings, Gordie began walking off towards the central pillar. Still keeping the pistol trained on Layla, Henry walked over to where the light had rolled to a stop and carefully squatted down to claim it.

  Slowly… patiently… taking his sweet time picking it up. Watching the other man’s back as he wandered off further into the hall.

  The thug finally turned the corner around the back of the pillar, finally allowing him to feel like he had some breathing room. No longer having to put on an act for an audience, he tucked the pistol back into its holster with a relieved huff.

  “Sorry about that,” he mumbled. “I… well, as you might have noticed they’re not very fond of me either. I’m stuck playing along for a bit if I don’t want to end up dead.”

  Layla tossed her head back, using the motion to remove the hood hands-free. “This had better be as worthwhile as you seem to think it is. Aren’t we just making things more complicated than they have to be by doing this?”

  “Well, calling it a plan would be a bit of a stretch, but… it’s definitely a list of goals that need to be met.”

  “A list of goals,” she reiterated crossly. “And somehow those goals can be met better by giving the Club what they’re looking for!?”

  “N-now, listen… I know that there’s plenty of bad blood to go around...”

  “Bad blood?!”, Layla hissed. “There’s a lot more than just bad blood at play here, Henry. I mean, for Christ’s sake! The Gentleman’s Club is a bunch of murderers and looters who jump at every chance to do those two exact things! They killed people I knew, that I wasn’t able to get to in time to save - They’d still be alive if I… if I…”

  She trailed off with a frustrated noise. “Why are you so damn insistent that we work for them?!” Resentment simmered in her voice as past grievances rose to the surface. “I had a chance to finish off the Harpy. Do you have any idea how many good people it’s killed!? Did you think about them before you decided to get in the way!?”

  “Layla, I-”

  “Was it that sob story it gave out? Or were you just thinking about yourself, like every other plan you’ve had since we stumbled into the Devil’s Dozen?! Because before that, I distinctly remember you having a distinctly opposite opinion of them!”

  “Please, I’m trying to-”

  “You’ve been trying to do something or other for months now! Ever since.. Since… since… that!”

  If she could have pointed, Henry felt she would be jabbing a finger at the crystal in his chest for effect. Instead, she was left with gesticulating as animatedly as she could with both arms tied behind her back, a hindrance which only deepened her frustrations.

  To her credit, he was feeling the emotional knife twist without the visual aid.

  She ranted in a similar vein for a short while longer, until the energy slowly bled from her words. “I don’t even know why I let you talk me into this…” she finished. “I guess… I guess I just still feel responsible for how you ended up after you came back.”

  Henry just accepted her words with a solemn nod. Neither of them were exactly psychologists, but it didn’t take one to understand that they were both very different people than they’d once been at the beginning. Even removing the sudden bestowal of magic from the equation, just surviving from day to day in the months prior had forced them to adapt. Like drawing a person from memory.

  People changed over time, simple as. But, that didn’t mean there was a limited amount of change that could happen. Or that it couldn’t be repeated for the better.

  “You have no reason to believe in me,” he replied softly. “I won’t pretend that my actions after I left the Nobles have been anything but self-serving, and it’s not like any sort of words to the contrary will sound genuine anyways. When I went off on my own, I thought I could justify it. All I thought I needed was to get my body back, everything else be damned.

  “It would solve so many problems, I told myself. It didn’t matter how many times I failed, didn’t matter how many bridges I burned or toes I stepped on… With this Domain you’d inadvertently helped me get, anything could happen, since I’d always have another chance so long as I got away.

  He looked down at his chest, where the crystal glowed its familiar dim blue.

  “I threw myself into a grinder, because I thought that nobody else should have to involve themselves in my issues. I cut myself off from nearly everyone, thinking that it would hurt less that way. Instead… instead it just hurt everyone else I knew. You most of all, I think.”

  Layla said nothing. She just listened.

  “And yet, despite all the bad calls and wrong choices, we stumbled across each other again and… well, here you are. Some part of you still sees something in me. I can’t imagine what, honestly. But, you would have just pushed me out of the way if you felt otherwise.”

  The light from the talisman illuminated his face as he reminisced on better times. Times that he still wanted to return to, but had also prevented him from truly accepting the world around him.

  Maybe one day. But not today.

  “I’m… happy that you still have even that little bit of faith in me to be willing to help. Because… I’m about ready to stop disappointing myself, too.”

  With his resolve steeled, he met her gaze. “So as bad as it might look, I won’t let you down again.”