TIME June 30th, evening into July 1st morning LOCATION Chuza Collections, then the Section House
BACKGROUND:
A dog-headed thing had gone to ground in the sewers under the orphanage, dragging something with it. Ferret’s tip-off got them as far as a sewer grate and a wall of rats before they had to fall back. Chuza Collections, the outfit that actually mapped the tunnels, looked like the next lead worth chasing.
WHAT HAPPENED
Gusepi – a thickset, stocky man in a flat cap and full-length leather apron, chewing on a wedge of bread – was closing up the Chuza Collections yard for the night and the office with it, but he sketched a rough map of the Section from memory: grates that had been tampered with, landmarks vague or missing entirely. Not much to go on, but something.
“Someone’s been messing with the access grates! Occasionally workers disappear – gas pockets, flash floods, rats and other unsavoury denizens. Usually turn up in the harbour for the corpse fishers. But that’s three workers gone in as many weeks. Still, the filth must flow…”
Gusepi, Chuza Collections
Pressed on rumours of something living down there, Gusepi allowed that his crews called them ‘moles’ – a whole community of them, by his reckoning, sneaking about with pipes and bats, best avoided rather than provoked. Raven filed away the ‘flusher’ apparatus used to clear blockages as a detail worth remembering, and they set up an overnight watch on the alley where Ferret had seen the creature vanish. Nothing came of it.
Morning at the Port Inn brought a harder conversation. Pitr asked after Hawke.
“He’s dead.”
Raven, to Pitr
Pitr took it harder than the question warranted – he’d already set aside a packed lunch for Hawke that morning, out of habit more than anything.
“Has Agent Hawke taken a holiday – he doesn’t seem the type… Ohh, so sorry. Please accept our condolences. By Heironeous, that is sad news. Very sad news.”
Pitr deVries
The funeral itself stayed low-key at the Commissioner’s own request – held in the Section House’s main open office rather than anywhere public, though the turnout still filled the room. A brief, sombre gathering, and then the Clerics carried Hawke’s body off to the Section Cemetery.
The funeral was held at the Section House that same day. Kowalski, for what it was worth, confirmed the underground moles were people – whole communities living beneath Chuza – though he couldn’t point them to a map any better than Gusepi had. Chuza Collections again, he suggested.
The desk secretary there was rather more forthcoming the second time round, evidently flattered by three Agents taking an interest. Three sewer employees had disappeared in as many weeks – bodies, when found at all, tended to wash up in the bay, timing dependent on the season. She handed over the collection routes and maintenance schedule without being asked twice.
Following the map toward the abattoir district, Krusha had his doubts about finding anything useful in a maze that size – until he spotted one of his own snitches, Annie, working Talismonde Road for spare coins. She stopped to pick up a discarded teddy bear, fussing over its eye, and something about the motion caught Krusha’s attention: it looked exactly like the object pulled from the drowned boy.
Raven’s instinct was to check the toy shops. Cagney, running the nearest one, made the connection instantly.
“Haven’t seen these for years. I used to dabble in taxidermy. Looks like an eye. Possibly a small bird, or maybe a raven. Could be a rodent, like a vole. Or maybe a teddy bear.”
Cagney, toy shop owner
Three names came out of that conversation – Snuff n Stuff, Get Stuffed, and Life in Death, all taxidermists working the Section. Life in Death, nearest the market, confirmed the eye could easily belong to a small bird or rodent, though the owner had mostly given up taxidermy work since Get Stuffed cornered the trade. While they were in the area, Jimmy Gibbs came through with a Bumblebee lead: a dealer called Feydahr, six to seven that evening, at the Gauntlet Inn.
EXTRAS.
OPEN THREADS
- Three Chuza Collections sewer workers have vanished in the last three weeks.
- The glass object is a taxidermy eye – and Get Stuffed has cornered that trade in the Section.
- Bumblebee lead: Feydahr, the Gauntlet Inn, this evening.