Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTXS57V8RT40T7M3Y0V20X8

The air hit Detective Harlow Quinn first. A subterranean chill, heavy with the ghosts of coal smoke and damp earth, a stark contrast to the humid press of a London morning. She descended the spiral iron staircase into the St. Giles ghost station, her sensible shoes clanging a rhythmic beat against the metal. Below, the sweep of halogen lamps bleached the curved platform, erasing a century of grime in harsh, white patches. Forensics, clad in paper-white suits, moved with a quiet reverence, their presence an intrusion on the station's long slumber. The platform edge crumbled away into blackness where tracks once ran. Tiled walls, their intricate patterns filmed with filth, sweated in the artificial light. Detective Constable Rob Miller detached himself from a small cluster of uniforms, his fresh face and eager posture a mismatch for the somber scene. "Guv. Thanks for coming." He gestured towards the centre of the activity, a still shape beneath a police-issue blanket. "Victim's a John Doe. One of the urban explorers found him an hour ago. Looks like a squatter who picked the wrong spot to kip for the night." Quinn slid on a pair of latex gloves, the snap against her wrist sharp in the cavernous silence. She bypassed the covered body, her gaze sweeping the platform. "Picked the wrong spot, or was brought to it?" Her question hung in the cold air. Miller shifted his weight. "Pathologist's preliminary is leaning towards heart failure. Possibly exacerbated by hypothermia, maybe a bad batch of something. We found a needle in his pocket." Quinn crouched, her sharp jaw tight. The dust here was a thick, pale carpet, undisturbed for decades. Except it wasn't. A perfect, wide circle was scribed in the grime around where the body lay. Not a scuff mark, not a set of footprints. The dust inside the circle was gone, sucked clean down to the pockmarked concrete, while the dust outside remained a pristine blanket. Her fingers traced the edge of the line, feeling no indentation. "Heart failure doesn't scour dust from a concrete floor, Miller." She stood, her military precision at odds with the station’s decay. "Where's his kit? Sleeping bag, backpack, anything?" "That's the other thing." Miller looked uncomfortable. "Nothing. Just the clothes on his back." "A squatter with no gear. A drug user with no stash, just a single needle." She walked the perimeter of the circle, her worn leather watch a dark band on her wrist. The halogen lamps hummed. Her eyes scanned the tiled walls, catching on sections where the grime looked thinner, smeared. Up close, she saw the faint outlines of what had been there. Complex, geometric shapes, recently and imperfectly scrubbed away. "Forensics check these walls?" "Said it was old graffiti, painted over ages ago and now the paint's flaking off." Quinn ran a gloved finger over one of the patches. A faint, chalky residue came away. Not paint. "Get them to check again. Test for chalk, ash, and salt." Miller sighed, a small puff of condensation. "Guv, with respect, we've got a dead vagrant. The coroner's going to rule it death by misadventure and the super will want it off the books by lunch." "We work the evidence, not the super's schedule." She moved to the evidence bags laid out on a portable table. A wallet, empty. A set of keys that fit no known lock. A mobile phone. She picked up the bag containing the phone. The plastic screen was crazed, the body of it warped as if it had been microwaved. "What happened here?" "Techs don't know. No sign of water damage. The battery's intact, just... fried. Every circuit is melted. Said it would take a massive, targeted electrical pulse." "Any power sources down here strong enough to do that?" "None that are active." Miller gestured to the thick, severed cables hanging like dead vines from the ceiling. "Whole station's been off the grid since the war." Quinn put the phone down. Her gaze fell on the last bag. Inside was a small, crudely carved object. It was pale, porous, shaped like a coin but thicker. She recognised the material. Bone. "What is this?" "Some kind of token, I guess. A good luck charm?" Miller shrugged. "Probably carved it himself." She stared at the token, a cold knot tightening in her stomach. It felt familiar, a half-remembered shape from a file she kept locked in her desk, a file no one else ever saw. The file on DS Morris. She finally turned to the body. "Uncover him." Miller nodded to the forensics officer, who peeled back the blanket. The man was young, thirties at most, with the waxy, gaunt look of a long-term addict. His eyes were wide open, locked on the vaulted ceiling. His mouth was a silent O of shock. There were no marks on him, no signs of violence. His skin was pale and dry, his lips cracked. He looked... drained. Quinn leaned closer, her attention drawn to his left wrist. Just visible against his sallow skin were faint, silvery lines, almost scars. They formed a pattern, not a tattoo, but a brand. A series of interlocking sigils that mirrored the wiped shapes on the station wall. Her breath caught. The memory ambushed her—another body, another strange scene three years ago, and David Morris looking at her, his face pale with a dawning horror she didn't understand until it was too late. The same marks had been on that victim's wrist. "Get the high-res camera over here. Now." Her voice was low, cutting through Miller’s easy assumptions. "I want detailed shots of his wrist. Every angle." "Guv, they're just old scars." "Do it, Miller." Quinn stood up, her brown eyes hard as stone. She looked away from the body, back at the clean-swept circle, the fried phone, the bone token. It wasn't just a dead squatter. It was a message. It was a beginning. Or for her, a continuation. The case she thought had been buried with her partner had just clawed its way back out of the grave.