Run: 2026-02-25-01KJ954B1PC7BVFE7DFQ3M4WXB

Detective Harlow Quinn parked her nondescript saloon three streets away from the cordoned-off entrance. The usual bustle of Camden High Street faded behind the blare of distant sirens and the hiss of radio static. Her left wrist felt bare without the weight of her partner's old service watch, a comfort she no longer allowed herself. She stepped out, the late afternoon chill biting through her coat. A knot of uniformed officers milled near a hastily erected barrier at what looked like the mouth of a disused service tunnel, its metal door scarred and rusted. This wasn't the grimy alley the briefing mentioned. An abandoned Tube station. Beneath Camden. The Veil Market. Excellent. "Detective Quinn," Sergeant Miller called out, his voice echoing slightly in the cavernous space beyond the tape. He stood framed by the dim light spilling from the tunnel, his face pale and etched with fatigue. "Glad you could make it. Messy business." Harlow ducked under the tape, her eyes scanning the immediate surroundings. The air grew perceptibly colder, thick with the smell of damp earth, old metal, and something faintly metallic, like copper left too long in the rain. Miller gestured her further in, his hand lamp cutting a swathe through the gloom. "Victim's Silas Blackwood. We think he was running goods, deal went south. Found him about fifty yards in, near what looks like an old sealed access point." They walked deeper into the disused station. The flickering police lights cast long, distorted shadows across the graffiti-scarred walls and the skeletal remains of what might have once been stalls, draped in shadows and coated in a fine layer of grime. The echoes here were different, carrying the faint phantom murmur of countless voices, the spectral clatter of commerce. It was a ghost of a market, buried and forgotten, yet somehow still *alive*. "Cause of death?" Harlow asked, her voice a low rumble that swallowed the ambient whispers. Miller stopped by a chalk outline on the ground. Silas Blackwood lay depicted there, a morbid silhouette against the concrete floor speckled with unusual, pale dust. "That's the problem. No wounds. Forensics did a sweep. No trace of toxins, no signs of physical trauma. His clothes are intact, his skin... it's like it dried out, but fast. His organs, Detective. They're just... gone. Not removed. Evaporated, almost. Like something just sucked the life right out of him. Leave nothing but the casing." Harlow knelt, her sharp jawline visible even in the dim light, her brown eyes sharp as she surveyed the scene. The "old sealed access point" Miller mentioned was a massive, reinforced steel door, its hinges rusted shut. Nothing about it suggested a recent entry. The pale dust around the outline glinted faintly, not like ordinary dirt or concrete dust. It was finer, almost like powdered alabaster, and clung to everything in a thin, uniform layer. A faint shimmer seemed to hang in the air directly above the outline, a distortion that made her vision waver. She touched the worn leather of her watch strap. "And the market itself?" she prompted, her gaze sweeping over the ghostly stalls. "How did he get in here? Or whoever did this to him?" "That's the other bit that doesn't sit right," Miller admitted, running a hand over his tired face. "This whole section is supposed to be sealed. Walls reinforced, all tunnel access points secured from the surface. We found a secondary access point further down, a utility shaft. But it's old, not an easy way in or out. And whoever used it, made no trace. No prints, no tool marks on the shaft mechanism. Just Silas missing his insides and a lot of this weird dust." A low hum, so faint it was almost subliminal, vibrated through the concrete beneath Harlow's boots. She tilted her head, listening. It wasn't the distant rumble of a train, nor the groan of old metalwork. It was a resonance, subtle but persistent. She met Miller's gaze. "He looks like any other trader who worked the fringes. But this isn't a fringe job, Miller. This is... different." Just then, a figure emerged from the deeper shadows of the tunnel, her curly red hair unmistakable, round glasses perched on her nose. Eva Kowalski ducked slightly, navigating the low archway with her usual grace. A worn leather satchel, bulging with books no doubt, hung from her shoulder. She approached cautiously, her green eyes wide as she took in the scene, tucking a stray curl behind her ear. "Detective Quinn," Eva said, her voice soft but clear. "Sergeant. I received your message. Unusual location for a... scene." She paused, her gaze fixing on the chalk outline and the dust. "Silas Blackwood. He used to... acquire certain items for clients who preferred discretion. Items from here." "That's the general idea, Kowalski," Miller grunted, clearly not entirely comfortable with the woman's presence. "Except this time, he became the acquisition. Or the victim of one." Eva stepped closer to the chalk outline, her eyes narrowing. She didn't touch anything, but she surveyed the dust, the sealed door, the faint shimmer in the air. "The dust," she murmured, "that's likely residual ectoplasm, or something akin to phased particulate matter. It's left behind when certain... energies are released. Or entities pass through." She pointed a slender finger towards a barely visible scorch mark on the reinforced door. "And that's not a burn mark. It’s an aperture signature. Small, but present. From a localized dimensional shift." Miller scoffed. "Dimensional shift? Kowalski, we're investigating a homicide, not a ghost convention. We need evidence, not folklore." Harlow ignored Miller's dismissal. Her stare was fixed on the scorch mark Eva indicated. It formed no discernible pattern, yet it felt deliberate, like a scar left by a passing storm. She looked at the pale dust again. It reminded her, disturbingly, of an incident three years ago, a case she'd buried, a case that had cost her partner. "Where is the... primary point of ingress or egress for this market?" she asked, turning her back to Miller, her attention now fully on Eva and the peculiar evidence. "The market itself," Eva explained, her voice pitched low, "doesn't have static points of entry. It moves. It shifts. It occupies spaces for periods. But this area, the disused station, it's a known nexus for inter-dimensional transit. These old tunnels are like veins. Silas would have likely been here when the market was active, or he arranged a meeting. A transaction that involved... taking something. Or giving something away. Something that required such a drastic removal of biomass and energy." Biomass and energy. The words resonated with Harlow. She remembered the chilling cold, the feeling of emptiness that had pervaded her partner’s final moments. Not just death, but an *unmaking*. Silas Blackwood, not murdered in the traditional sense, but unmade. Taken apart at a fundamental level. And this place, this Veil Market, was the epicentre. The dust, the shimmer, the 'evaporated' organs – it all began to coalesce. Harlow pulled a small, brass object from her coat pocket. It was heavy in her palm, its surface cool and marked with a patina of verdigris. The face was etched with protective sigils that only she would recognize. The needle, usually steady, quivered erratically, twitching towards the sealed steel door. "This market," Harlow said, her voice barely above a whisper, her gaze locked on the compass, "is known for selling a lot of things. Enchanted goods. Banned substances. Information." She looked from the wildly swinging needle to the faint signature on the door. "And sometimes," she added, her jaw tight, "it appears certain energies are for sale too. Or perhaps they are a... byproduct."