Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTXNHK87G0003DDMV41XFA4

The rain hit the pavement in sheets, turning the London street into a river of reflected neon. Detective Harlow Quinn's boots splashed through puddles as she rounded the corner onto Greek Street, her breath coming in sharp bursts that fogged in the cold air. Twenty metres ahead, the figure in the dark jacket ducked between two buildings, vanishing into the narrow gap. She didn't slow down. Her hand found the wall, steadying herself as she swung into the alley. Her heart hammered against her ribs. The salt-and-pepper crop of her hair was soaked through, water dripping down the back of her collar, but she barely felt it. Three years since Morris. Three years of dead ends and cold cases and that gnawing feeling in her gut that something was wrong with the world, something just beyond the edge of what she could see. Tonight felt different. The alley opened onto a courtyard behind a row of shuttered shops. Steam rose from a vent, obscuring her vision for a moment. She pushed through it, her brown eyes scanning the shadows. There—a flash of movement near the far wall, a door slamming shut. Quinn sprinted across the courtyard, her worn leather watch bouncing against her left wrist. She reached the door and found it locked from the other side. A fire escape ladder hung just out of reach above her. She jumped, caught the bottom rung, and hauled herself up. The metal groaned under her weight. Second floor. A window, cracked open. She slid through it into a dark corridor that smelled of damp concrete and something else, something sharp and metallic that she couldn't quite place. Her torch beam cut through the darkness. The corridor stretched ahead, lined with pipes and electrical conduits. Somewhere in the distance, the rumble of a train. She moved forward, keeping her footsteps light. The corridor angled downward, leading her deeper into the building. Or under it. The walls changed from brick to curved tiles, and she realised she was in an old service tunnel, probably connected to the Underground. The fluorescent strips overhead flickered and died. She clicked on her torch again, the beam catching graffiti on the walls—strange symbols she didn't recognise, painted in colours that seemed to shift in the light. A sound echoed from somewhere ahead. Footsteps? No, more like the shuffle of fabric against stone. Someone moving carefully. She pressed on. The tunnel opened onto a platform. An old Tube station, abandoned by the look of it, the tracks rusted and the advertisements on the walls faded beyond recognition. Camden, maybe. Or somewhere close to it. But the platform wasn't empty. Stalls lined the edges, constructed from makeshift materials—canvas sheets draped over poles, wooden crates stacked to form counters, glass cases lit by candles that burned with an unusual blue flame. People moved between them, their faces obscured by hoods and masks. Quinn stepped back into the shadow of the tunnel entrance. She counted at least two dozen figures. Some carried cloth bundles under their arms. Others examined objects laid out on the stalls—bottles filled with swirling liquids, jewellery that caught the candlelight in odd ways, what looked like animal bones carved with intricate patterns. A market. Down here, in an abandoned station, a market was operating. She'd heard rumours, of course. Every detective in the Met had. Whispers about underground trading, about places that didn't appear on any maps, about goods that couldn't be explained. She'd always dismissed them as fantasy. Or as cover for ordinary criminal operations—drugs, stolen property, forged documents. Things that made sense. This didn't look like ordinary crime. A figure emerged from a side tunnel to her right, and she pressed herself flat against the wall. Close. Too close. The figure passed within arm's reach, and she caught the smell of ozone and burnt herbs. The bone token around their neck caught the light. Quinn waited until they'd moved away, then risked another look at the platform. The suspect she'd followed was nowhere in sight. They'd disappeared into the crowd, or into one of the side tunnels that branched off from the station. She had a choice to make. Her training said to call for backup. To observe, document, report. To follow proper procedure and let the system handle it. That was the right way. The safe way. But the system hadn't helped Morris. She touched the watch on her wrist—a habit, a comfort, a reminder of things she refused to forget. Three years of searching for answers. Three years of hitting walls, of being told to let it go, of knowing in her bones that the official explanation was wrong. And now she'd stumbled onto something that felt connected. She couldn't explain why, but the same wrongness she'd sensed that night—the night Morris died—hung in the air down here like smoke. A woman at one of the stalls turned her head, and Quinn saw her eyes catch the torchlight. They reflected it back, golden and luminous, before the woman looked away. Quinn switched off the torch. She could turn back. Return to the surface, file a report, pretend she'd lost the suspect in the alley. No one would blame her. No one would even question it. But she'd seen where the suspect had gone. Or at least, she'd seen the direction. One of the tunnels on the far side of the platform, marked with a symbol she recognised from the corridor—same strange design, same colours that shouldn't have been possible. The rain had washed away any trail she might have followed up top. Down here, she still had a chance. Still had a lead. Her jaw tightened. She stepped out of the shadow and onto the platform. The nearest stall holder looked up at her approach. An older man, his face weathered and his eyes sharp, watched her without speaking. On the table in front of him, rows of small glass vials glittered in the candlelight. "You're new." His voice was rough, accented with something she couldn't identify. Quinn met his gaze. "Looking for someone." "Aren't we all." He didn't ask who. Didn't ask why. Just waited, his fingers drumming on the table in a rhythm that matched the distant rumble of trains. She reached into her pocket and found her warrant card. Old instinct. She started to pull it out, then stopped. Something told her that showing credentials down here would be a mistake. "Man in a dark jacket," she said instead. "Came through here five minutes ago." The drumming stopped. "Describe him." "Average height. Thin. Moving like he was hurt." The stall holder's eyes flicked to something behind her. A tunnel entrance, half-hidden by a stack of wooden crates. "You don't want to go down there." "I didn't ask what I want." He smiled, and it was not a kind expression. "First time in the Market, yeah? I can tell. You've got that look. The one that says you think the rules still apply." He leaned forward, lowering his voice. "They don't. Not down here. You follow that tunnel, you'd better have a reason worth dying for." Quinn thought of Morris. Of the reports she'd read, the witnesses she'd interviewed, the dead ends she'd chased. Of the feeling that had brought her out tonight, chasing a suspect she'd been watching for weeks—a suspect who might, finally, lead her somewhere useful. "I do." The stall holder studied her for a long moment. Then he reached into his coat and pulled out a small object. A bone disc, carved with the same symbols she'd seen on the walls. He tossed it to her, and she caught it reflexively. "Entry token. You'll need it for the deeper levels." He settled back, the warning clear in his posture. "Don't say I didn't tell you." Quinn looked at the token in her palm. It was warm, though she couldn't imagine why. The bone was smooth, almost polished, and the symbols seemed to shift slightly when she wasn't looking directly at them. She raised her eyes to meet his one last time, then turned toward the tunnel. The darkness swallowed her whole.