Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTRB6C6BF21ZV22K664NRPN

Detective Quinn's boots splashed through puddles as she pursued the hooded figure down D'Arblay Street. Rain pelted her face, and her leather jacket grew heavy with water. The suspect darted between late-night revelers, knocking over a bin that clattered across the wet pavement. Quinn vaulted over the obstacle, her worn watch catching the neon glow from the Raven's Nest as she passed. Three blocks of chase had her lungs burning, but she couldn't lose this lead. Not when she was this close to answers about Morris. The figure cut down an alley, their footsteps echoing off brick walls. Quinn followed, hand brushing her holstered weapon. The suspect's hood fell back revealing dark curls - Tomás Herrera. The former paramedic who'd been spotted at three separate crime scenes involving suspicious deaths. "Metropolitan Police! Stop right there, Herrera!" He glanced back, warm brown eyes wide with recognition. Instead of surrendering, he picked up speed and descended a set of stairs that Quinn hadn't noticed before - steps that led to a defunct Underground station entrance. Quinn paused at the top of the stairs. Morris had disappeared investigating rumors of an underground network. Following suspects into the Tube system alone went against protocol, but protocol hadn't gotten her any closer to the truth in three years. The stairwell reeked of mold and stagnant water. Her flashlight beam caught Herrera's back as he reached the bottom. He pressed his palm against a section of tiled wall, and to Quinn's shock, it slid aside with a grinding sound. "Last chance, Herrera! Don't make this worse for yourself." He slipped through the gap, and the wall began sliding shut. Quinn cursed and took the stairs three at a time. She wedged herself through the narrowing opening, squeezing past just before it sealed with a decisive thunk. The passage opened into a cavernous space that had her questioning her sanity. What had been a standard Underground platform was now a sprawling marketplace. Stalls constructed from salvaged materials lined both sides of the tracks. Strings of mismatched lights crisscrossed overhead, casting everything in an eerie glow. But it was the people - if she could call them that - that made her grip her gun tighter. Figures in elaborate masks moved between the stalls. Others had skin in impossible colors or too many limbs. A woman with moth wings haggled over a jar of glowing liquid. Herrera weaved through the crowd, his Saint Christopher medallion flashing as he ran. Quinn followed, trying to ignore the hostile stares from the market's denizens. Glass bottles crashed behind her. Someone hissed - actually hissed - as she passed. "Mortal law has no authority here, Detective." The voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Quinn's training warred with her instincts. This was exactly the sort of place Morris might have stumbled into. But she was outnumbered, surrounded by things she couldn't explain, and her radio wouldn't work this far underground. Herrera reached a cross-section where four tunnels met. He paused, looking back at her with what seemed like genuine concern. "Go back, Detective. Please. Some questions are better left unanswered." The crowd closed ranks behind him, a wall of inhuman faces and glowing eyes. Quinn stood her ground, though every nerve screamed to run. "This is connected to Morris, isn't it? To what happened three years ago?" "Your partner made the same choice you're facing now. Don't follow his path." Herrera backed into one of the tunnels, darkness swallowing him. Quinn raised her flashlight, illuminating the strange market and its even stranger occupants. The crowd watched, waiting for her decision. Her sharp jaw clenched as she thought of Morris, of all the dead ends and unanswered questions. The weight of her gun offered little comfort against the unknown that waited in those tunnels.