AI Harlow Quinn’s breath tore through her lungs. Rain lashed her face, a cold slap against her skin. Tomás Herrera, a dark blur framed by the neon glow of a late-night kebab shop, surged ahead. His curly dark hair, plastered to his scalp, offered no resistance to the deluge. He weaved through bins, a ghost slipping between the overflowing rubbish and the peeling paint of Soho’s narrow alleyways.
Her worn leather watch, tight on her left wrist, indicated a minute had passed since she first spotted him. Eighteen years on the force taught her to trust gut over clock. This wasn't a casual stroll. He knew she was there. His eyes, warm brown usually, had flashed with stark recognition when their paths crossed under the shimmering reflection of Rupert Street. Then he bolted.
Her boots slapped against the wet pavement, a rhythmic echo to her own pounding heart. The pursuit had dragged them west, then north, past the slumbering theatres, a silent ballet of pursuit and evasion. Tomás’s olive skin offered a stark contrast to the pale brickwork as he launched himself over a low wall. He landed light, a cat, then vanished into the deeper shadows of a service lane.
Quinn hurdled the wall, her movements economical, honed by years of training. A shard of pain flared in her left knee, a memory of a bad jump during an old raid. She ignored it. The alley reeked of stale beer and damp earth. Water streamed from blocked gutters, forming muddy rivulets that snaked towards a rattling drain.
"Herrera!" Her voice, rough with exertion, bounced off the grimy walls. "Stop." She grimaced. It felt amateurish, useless. He wouldn't. He never did.
Tomás appeared at the far end, silhouetted against a distant streetlamp. A quick glance over his shoulder. He saw her. His pace intensified, a desperate sprint. His Saint Christopher medallion, a faint glint against his chest, bounced with each stride. He vanished around the corner.
Quinn pushed harder. Her closely cropped salt-and-pepper hair was soaked , dripping cold rivulets down her neck. Her sharp jaw was set. This wasn't just about the case; it was about the missing pieces, the ones that kept her awake, the pieces Morris knew. Herrera always seemed to hover on the edge of her dark map.
The alley opened onto a wider thoroughfare, Camden High Street, a river of red brake lights and shimmering black tarmac. Tomás was already a block ahead, weaving through the sparse traffic, a dark phantom among the yellow cabs. He moved with a practiced fluidity, a man who knew these streets intimately.
Quinn dodged a bus, ignoring the driver's blare. The rain had intensified, a solid sheet now, blurring the world into streaks of light and shadow. The scent of ozone and wet asphalt filled the air. She angled her sprint, cutting through a narrow pedestrian alley, banking on local knowledge to shave off his lead.
He was fast. Faster than she predicted. He didn't look back again, a sign he knew his escape route, or that she was closer than he wanted. He hung a sharp right into a derelict side street. The buildings here were husks, windows boarded, graffiti claiming the brickwork. Lampposts flickered , casting long, distorted shadows that danced with the pounding rain.
This street sloped downwards, away from the hum of traffic, a forgotten artery leading into the city’s underbelly. The air grew colder, heavy with the metallic tang of damp concrete. Tomás reached what looked like a collapsed storefront, its iron gate rusted shut, then slipped through a narrow gap in the corrugated metal. Gone.
Quinn reached the gap. Her gaze scanned the entrance. No obvious signs, no security cameras. Just darkness beyond the metal. She squeezed through, tearing her jacket on a jagged edge. Inside, the space was an unlit antechamber, the ground uneven with broken glass and wet debris. The air was thick, still, an oppressive quiet after the street’s cacophony .
A faint, almost imperceptible tremor resonated through the floor. The scent of damp earth combined with something else, a sweet, earthy musk, unfamiliar, intriguing . Tomás was nowhere in sight. Only a deeper darkness awaited.
She took a step forward, her hand instinctively going to the grip of her sidearm. The chamber smelled of stale electricity, a ghost of the power that once coursed through these walls. She saw an opening, a black maw leading down a set of eroded concrete steps. The air grew cooler, carrying a new scent now – something ancient, earthy, and strangely alive.
She descended, one measured step at a time. The world narrowed to the beam of her flashlight. The steps ended on a platform. She was in a disused Tube station. Rusting tracks lay coated in a thick layer of grit and grime. Stalactites of calcium clung to the arched ceiling, reflecting the sickly yellow glow of her light. The space was enormous, desolate.
Then, she heard it. A faint murmur, a low hum of voices. And a strange, flickering light. Not a natural light. It pulsed with an alien rhythm from deeper within the tunnel.
Tomás stepped from behind a crumbling pillar, a hand on his chest, catching his breath. He saw her, his eyes wide. He held something in his hand, a small, polished object. He pressed it against a section of the tunnel wall.
A section of the wall, disguised as natural rock formation, slid inward with a guttural groan of turning gears she hadn't heard before. Beyond it, a vibrant, chaotic light spilled out. A cacophony of sound replaced the tomb-like silence : hawkers' cries, the clang of metal, the murmur of a crowd. The strange musk intensified, mingling now with exotic spices and something else, something primal, almost like freshly spilled blood.
Tomás looked back at Quinn, his face etched with a mix of defiance and exhaustion. He held up the object, a tiny, bleached bone, against the opening. As if a silent signal, the light surged, beckoning him. He slipped through the shifting wall.
Quinn stood at the threshold of the concealed entrance. The "wall" was now a doorway, open to a world she couldn't comprehend. She saw figures moving inside, not all of them human. Shadows stretched long and grotesque, not from any familiar light source. The air thrummed with raw energy.
The hidden market pulsed like a living thing. The sounds were overwhelming – conversations in languages she had never heard, the sharp clang of metal, the low murmur of what sounded like an animal . The smells were a riot: burning incense, cured meats, damp earth, and something acrid, chemical, like burnt ozone. Her training screamed danger. Every fibre of her being told her to stop. This wasn't a police operation. This wasn't the London she knew. This was something else entirely.
A hulking figure, more shadow than substance, moved past the gap in the wall, its eyes glowing with a faint, internal luminescence. Its head tilted, as if sensing her presence, though it did not directly look at her .
The bone token. That was the entry. She had seen Tomás use it. She didn't have one.
The opening, which had hesitated for a moment, began to slide closed again, slowly , inexorably , with the same grinding groan. Tomás was gone . Vanished into the market.
Quinn stared, her heart hammering against her ribs. Logic demanded withdrawal. Radio for backup. Explain this. But what would she say? "I tracked a former paramedic into a fantasy realm beneath Camden?" They would laugh her out of the force. Send her to a shrink. The memory of Morris, his frantic, desperate whispers just before he vanished, flashed in her mind. *There are things, Harlow. Things they don't teach you in the academy.* This was it. The edge of the map. The line in the sand. Every instinct, years of methodical procedure, urged caution. But a deeper, primal urge, fueled by the unsolved mystery of her partner's death, pulled her forward. This was where the answers were. This was where Herrera led her.
The gap narrowed further, a sliver of the chaotic market visible. She could still hear the distant hum. The decision hung heavy in the damp, subterranean air. To step in was to abandon everything she knew, to chase a ghost into an unknown darkness. To walk away meant Morris remained just a memory, an unresolved scar.
Her jaw tightened. Her hand left the butt of her pistol. She pushed her shoulders back, the military precision returning to her almost unconsciously, a shield against the fear. The stench of that market, that primal hum, drew her in. She took a deep breath.