Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMW3WPRPF7CW0JS98S8XSFF

The abandoned platform reeked of rust and decades of neglect. Detective Harlow Quinn descended the emergency ladder into the forgotten Camden station, her worn leather watch catching what little light filtered down from the street grates above. The Metropolitan Police had cordoned off the area after a body was discovered by urban explorers, but something about this scene gnawed at her with familiar unease. Her boots echoed against the cracked tiles as she surveyed the platform. The victim lay sprawled near the far wall, a young man in his twenties wearing clothes that looked expensive despite the grime. But it wasn't the corpse that held her attention—it was everything else. "Bit odd, isn't it?" Constable Peters called from beside the body. "No signs of trauma, no obvious cause of death. Coroner's preliminary says heart failure, but the lad's barely twenty-five." Quinn crouched near the yellow tape, her sharp jaw set in concentration. Three years of unexplained cases had taught her to look beyond the obvious, to notice the details that didn't belong in ordinary London. Her brown eyes tracked the scene methodically, cataloging inconsistencies. "The positioning's wrong," she murmured. "Ma'am?" "Look at him. He's not collapsed—he's arranged. Face up, arms at his sides, legs straight. People don't die that neat, Peters." The constable shifted uncomfortably. "Maybe someone found him first? Tried to help?" Quinn stood and began walking the perimeter of the platform. The official story was simple enough: urban explorers breaking into condemned Tube stations, one of them dies of natural causes, end of case. But the scene whispered of something else entirely. That's when she noticed the scorch marks. They weren't obvious—thin black lines etched into the concrete in patterns that seemed almost deliberate. Quinn knelt and traced one with her finger, feeling the rough texture where something had burned deep into the stone. The marks formed geometric shapes that hurt to look at directly, as if her eyes wanted to slide away from them. "Peters, when did you say this station was abandoned?" "1952, ma'am. Been sealed ever since the line was rerouted." "Then explain the fresh chalk dust." She pointed to several spots where white powder had settled into cracks between tiles. Some of it still clung to the victim's clothing, and more formed faint circles on the platform itself—circles that had been hastily scrubbed away but left telltale residue. Footsteps echoed from the access tunnel, and Eva Kowalski emerged into the dim light, her curly red hair catching the glow from Quinn's torch. The young researcher clutched her worn leather satchel with one hand while adjusting her round glasses with the other. "Detective Quinn? I came as soon as I got your message." Eva's voice carried the slight breathlessness of someone who'd hurried down several flights of emergency stairs. Quinn had called Eva because the researcher had helped her before—unofficially—when cases took turns the Met couldn't explain in their reports. Eva's expertise in historical oddities had proven invaluable, even if Quinn couldn't admit it in official channels. "What do you make of this?" Quinn gestured to the scorch marks. Eva approached carefully, tucking a strand of hair behind her left ear as she examined the patterns. Her freckled face paled as recognition dawned. "Oh no. Oh, this is bad." "Bad how?" "These aren't random burn marks." Eva knelt beside one of the larger patterns, tracing its edges without touching. "This is ritual scarring. The geometry is all wrong for normal fire damage—too precise, too intentional." Peters looked between them with growing confusion. "Ritual? Like what, devil worship?" "Nothing so simple," Eva said, then caught Quinn's warning look. The detective preferred to keep the constable's exposure to the stranger aspects of their work to a minimum. "I mean, it could be gang-related. Some kind of initiation gone wrong." But Quinn saw the worry in Eva's green eyes behind those round glasses. The researcher was holding something back, something she couldn't say in front of Peters. Quinn returned to the body, studying the victim with fresh perspective. His clothes were indeed expensive, but they weren't street clothes—more like costume pieces. The fabric had an odd shimmer to it, and the cut was subtly wrong, as if tailored for a different era entirely. "Eva, look at his jacket. What do you see?" The researcher approached and examined the garment without disturbing the scene. "The stitching is hand-done, but with techniques that went out of fashion decades ago. And this material—" She paused, glancing at Peters. "It's very unusual." Quinn's fingers found the small brass object that had rolled partially under the victim's leg. She lifted it carefully with a handkerchief, revealing an ornate compass with a face etched in strange symbols. The metal had a green patina that spoke of age, and the needle pointed not north but toward the deepest part of the tunnel. "Peters, bag this for evidence," she said, handing over the compass while studying Eva's reaction. The researcher's face went white. She tucked her hair behind her ear again, then again, her nervous habit in overdrive. "Detective, could I speak with you privately for a moment?" Quinn nodded and led Eva to the far end of the platform, out of Peters' earshot. The younger woman clutched her satchel tighter and leaned close. "That compass—I've seen descriptions of similar items in the archives. If I'm right, this isn't just a murder scene. This might be the remnants of something much worse." "Worse how?" "There are stories, old records the Museum keeps locked away. References to hidden markets that move through London's abandoned spaces. Places where people trade in things that shouldn't exist." Eva's voice dropped to a whisper. "The kind of places that would leave marks like these when they... relocate." Quinn felt the familiar chill that had haunted her since Morris died. Three years ago, her partner had been investigating similar oddities when he'd disappeared during what should have been a routine follow-up. They'd found his body a week later with no explanation for his death, no leads to follow, no justice to be had. She looked back at the victim, at the too-precise positioning and the ritual scars burned into concrete. At the compass that pointed into darkness and the clothes from another time. "What are you suggesting?" "I'm suggesting this man didn't die here naturally. And I'm suggesting that whatever killed him might have moved on to a new location, leaving nothing but traces behind." Eva's green eyes met hers. "The question is: do you want to know what those traces lead to?" Quinn checked her watch—11:47 PM. The platform felt colder somehow, as if the temperature had dropped while they talked. In the distance, she could hear Peters taking photographs, documenting a scene that would never make sense in any official report. She thought of Morris, of all the questions left unanswered, of the cases that had no resolution because the truth was too strange for the Metropolitan Police to accept. "Yes," she said finally. "I want to know." Eva nodded grimly and opened her satchel, pulling out a thick leather journal filled with pressed flowers and handwritten notes. "Then we need to track down where the market went. And we need to do it before they realize someone's found their trail." The compass in the evidence bag continued to point into the darkness of the tunnel, its needle steady and sure, as if it knew exactly where they needed to go.