Run: 2026-02-20-01KHYA7GB4HY1B8VC3E4SXBWEE

The rain fell in sheets, turning the cobbled streets of Soho into a slick, reflective mirror. Harlow Quinn’s boots splashed through puddles as she pressed forward, her breath steady despite the adrenaline. The suspect—a wiry man in a long coat—had vanished into the labyrinth of alleys behind The Raven’s Nest, but she knew these streets like the back of her hand. Eighteen years on the force had taught her that desperation left tracks, even in the dark. She ducked beneath the awning of a shuttered boutique, peeling off her soaked jacket to wring out the water. The suspect had turned left, toward the old Tube station entrance, half-hidden behind a rusted metal gate. Quinn’s fingers twitched toward the holster at her side, but she didn’t draw. Not yet. The man was armed—she’d seen the glint of something metallic in his hand before he bolted—but she wasn’t about to walk into an ambush. Not again. A flicker of movement caught her eye. A figure in a dark hooded cloak emerged from the shadows, blocking the path ahead. Quinn’s pulse spiked. *Another one?* She’d already radioed for backup, but the response time in this part of the city was always slow. The hooded figure raised a hand, palm out—not in threat, but in warning. “You don’t want to go down there,” the voice was low, accented. Spanish, maybe. “Not alone.” Quinn’s jaw tightened. “Who the hell are you?” The figure stepped forward, the hood falling back just enough to reveal warm brown eyes and the faint scar running along a forearm. A Saint Christopher medallion glinted in the dim light. “Tomás Herrera. And you’re Detective Quinn, if I’m not mistaken.” She didn’t lower her guard. “You know me?” “Everyone knows you, *detective*.” The way he said it—like it was both a title and a warning. “You’re asking questions about the wrong people.” Quinn’s grip tightened on her jacket. “I don’t take orders from strangers.” “Neither do I.” He gestured toward the rusted gate. “But that man you’re chasing? He’s not just some thief. He’s connected to things you don’t understand.” A distant scream echoed from the underground. Quinn’s instincts screamed at her to move, but she hesitated. “What things?” Tomás exhaled sharply. “The kind that don’t play by your rules.” She should’ve turned back. Should’ve waited for backup. But the rain was coming down harder now, and the suspect was slipping away, deeper into the city’s underbelly. Quinn adjusted her watch—the one she’d worn since Morris’s last case, the one she’d sworn she’d never lose again—and made her decision. “Show me the way,” she said. Tomás didn’t argue. He turned and led her toward the gate, where a jagged bone token lay half-buried in the mud. Quinn’s stomach twisted. She’d seen these before—in evidence photos, in whispers from informants. They weren’t just bones. They were keys. The moment she stepped through the gate, the world shifted. The air was thick with the scent of damp earth and something metallic, like old blood. The flickering neon sign of The Raven’s Nest above them was just a memory now, replaced by the eerie glow of bioluminescent fungi clinging to the walls of the abandoned Tube station. The platform stretched ahead, but the tracks were gone, replaced by stalls draped in black fabric. The Veil Market. A woman with too many teeth smiled at them from behind a table laden with jars of swirling liquids. A man with eyes like polished obsidian watched from the shadows, his fingers tracing the edge of a knife. Quinn’s hand hovered near her holster, but she didn’t draw. Not yet. Tomás moved ahead, his voice barely audible over the murmur of the crowd. “Stay close.” She followed, her boots silent on the damp stone. The market was a maze of whispers and deals, of things bought and sold that didn’t exist in the light. A man in a tailored suit haggled over a vial of something that pulsed like a heartbeat. A woman with silver hair offered a deck of cards that shifted when she wasn’t looking. Quinn’s skin prickled. Then she saw him. The suspect. He was standing near the back of the market, his back to them, engaged in a hushed conversation with a figure cloaked in shadow. Quinn’s fingers twitched. She could take him now. Drag him out of here, back into the rain-soaked streets where the rules still made sense. But then the cloaked figure turned. And Quinn’s breath caught. The face was wrong. Too smooth. Too *old*. The skin stretched too tight over the bones, the eyes hollow and endless. The suspect’s voice rose, desperate, as the thing—*creature*—leaned in closer. Tomás’s grip on her arm was iron. “Don’t.” Quinn’s mind raced. She’d seen this before. In her nightmares, in the files she’d buried. The things that didn’t play by her rules. The suspect stumbled back, his face pale. “I—I didn’t—” The creature lunged. Quinn didn’t think. She drew her service weapon and fired. The shot echoed through the market, the sound swallowed by the chaos that erupted. Stalls collapsed. Figures screamed. The creature hissed, recoiling, but it wasn’t human anymore—just a blur of movement, slipping between the shadows. Tomás cursed, shoving her behind him. “You just made this worse.” Quinn’s hands shook, but her voice was steady. “He was going to kill him.” “And now they’ll come for *you*.” A horn blared in the distance. Backup. Real police. Real rules. Quinn looked at the suspect, now cowering against the wall, blood trickling from his lip. She could arrest him. Drag him out of here, back to the surface where the law still mattered. But then she looked at Tomás, at the way his fingers dug into his medallion, at the fear in his eyes. She holstered her weapon. “Run,” she said. Tomás didn’t argue. He grabbed her hand and pulled her into the crowd, deeper into the market, away from the light, away from the rules. And for the first time in years, Harlow Quinn had no idea which way was up.