Jarv Messim had been a researcher, a dreadlord, and a fugitive. That he was now a covert agent trusted to operate on his own in another world was a testament to the rehabilitative power of Drek'thelamagne's criminal justice system. That, or somebody in Records had really fucked up.
A year ago their first Ogrigg Gate had opened out at the east end of a country called Canada, twenty chains away from a city known to the locals as Thunder Bay.
In the regular written reports he was forced to write for imperial intelligence on pain of final death, Jarv had transliterated the country as Can'Naddahla, which in archaic Drekalchan meant Wet-Place of Freezing to Death. Jarv was happy with that, both as a fair description of the place during winter, and as a successful linguistic exercise.
Interestingly, in the local language the word dreck was a synonym for shit, which would make Drek'thelamagne –Holy Nation of the Revered Emperor– into Shithole of the Revered Emperor, a fact he hadn't highlighted in his reports, which might one day be read by the Revered Emperor; may his name echo through history.
Thunder Bay was a fine name for a city, if not meteorologically accurate, but it hadn't been an auspicious beachhead from which to launch a quiet invasion. The size was wrong for a start. Too big to easily take over in a single decisive strike, and too small to allow someone with a less than perfect understanding of this new world to easily fade into the background.
Canada itself was probably the wrong country to start with. Back on Dron'alon a country that size –ten thousand chains long at its spine– would be an empire in its own right. Here, it wasn't even the biggest nation on the continent, nor the most corrupt, nor the most violent.
Which was why Jarv had come south, to a larger, noisier land, to set up a new Ogrigg Gate in a place where a stranger and criminal might go unnoticed – to the sprawling city of Chicc'coargoah.
"Here we are, man. Chicago, Illinois."
Jarv stared out of the vehicle's window. This place didn't look like a city. It looked like a hitching yard for the huge wagons the natives moved their goods around in. There were dozens of them, parked up in tidy rows.
"That's the city?" Jarv asked.
"Just over yonder," the driver of this particular huge wagon said, pointing out through the front window.
Jarv followed the gesture, looking out into the night.
At first he didn't recognize what he was looking at. He thought it was an optical illusion, or a spirit-light display, or maybe somewhere in that direction somebody had set the world on fire, but as he looked closer he began to see more details.
Colossal buildings lined the horizon, each one lit up like a decentennial spirit candle. They had to be half a chain high, but were so thin he couldn't believe they were staying upright. The sight set his teeth itching with the inherent tension of it. It all looked so brittle. It was a city of needles, all stabbing at the sky, each one begging to fall.
"There's a bus route from the truckstop, or I guess you could get a cab," the driver of the wagon was saying.
"Right. I should get out here, then," Jarv said, half stating, half asking. He turned to look at the driver. "Do I pay you?"
"No payment required, buddy. I appreciated the conversation," the driver said. "I can tell you seem a little down on your luck."
Jarv let out a breath. The wagon driver had that right. If he'd been lucky, he'd still be ruling that little valley out in West Dun'galgogh. All of that construction on the castle, wasted. All of those minions dispelled before their time. Half the strength of his soul confiscated by Lightseekers who were worse than him behind closed doors.
He shook his head, mournful, speaking quietly to himself.
"It doesn't matter how many peasants you feed or Infestor invasions you personally stop, you unearth one ancient horror and the Empire..."
"What was that?"
"Nothing," Jarv sighed. "Just indulging in some- what's it called? Ennui?"
"I feel you, man," the driver said, then his voice changed tone. "Listen, I know it's not my place, but if things aren't going great maybe you should think about, you know, getting right with Jesus. He helped me get through some pretty bad times."
Jarv rubbed at his forehead, feeling the start of a headache. Jesus was one of the local deities, and Jarv was not looking forward to running into him. Nothing would complicate the infiltration more than the native stellar beings getting involved.
"No, I don't want to get any closer to Jesus, or Thor, or whatever you've got going on here."
"Hey, no pressure," the man said raising his hands. He reached into a compartment of the wagon and pulled out a rectangle of stiff paper, offering it to him.
Jarv looked down at it, not willing to touch an unfamiliar card. It looked superficially similar to the soul tokens that were the core of most draurcraftyc practices, but instead of an image or symbol, the card was printed with a single large number and a name.
"It's just a phone number," the driver said. "There are people you can talk to, no matter what's going on."
"It's just a regular card?" Jarv asked.
How quaint.
"Just a regular card. None of the tracking chips or chemicals the government puts into some of them."
"They what?"
"Here just take it. Take it in case you need it."
Jarv let out a breath and took the card, sliding it into his pocket to humour the man. He didn't want to cause offense or stand out too much to someone he wasn't going to kill.
"Thank you for the journey," Jarv said, feeling at the door of the wagon for the release catch. He managed to operate it after a minute, and the door popped open.
"No problem," the driver said, giving him a wave.
Jarv climbed down to the ground and pushed the door closed. Behind him the wagon rang its bell twice, an enormous sound like the blowing of a battle horn, before its engine hissed like a beast and the vehicle began pulling away.
The smell of this world hit him before the wagon had even made it back to the road. Burning and dirt. Tar and pitch, and other industrial smells he didn't have a name for. The air here was thick with fumes from the fuel the locals used to power their great vehicles.
Ingenious the explosion engines might be, but the filthy things would be illegal in any land he ruled over. If people wanted to move ridiculous amounts of goods around they could use rail wagons or canals as was proper.
Another blaring wagon-bell alerted Jarv that he was standing in a transit area, so he started making his way towards a cluster of buildings.
Stolen story; please report.
He squinted as he approached a large, low building with glass walls.
He had a basic understanding of the local written and spoken language from the procedures performed on him at the Thunder Bay base, but even after weeks in this world he still struggled to process the visual noise of the settlements here.
He slowed as he approached and drew up the right sleeve of his white shirt. Running his fingertip up the skin of his forearm, Jarv gently pulled open the eyelid of the analysis spirit he was guesting just below his right elbow.
The eye twitched, looking around. Its pupil narrowed as it focused, then it began scanning the area in front of him.
Information started flittering into Jarv's awareness. Alien thoughts, inexpertly communicated. He'd known that buses were the communal conveyances used on this world, and he'd known they stopped at pre-scheduled points along a fixed route. He hadn't recognized that the open counter built into the wall of one of the buildings was the point of sale for tickets, which was one of the connections the spirit had helped him make.
He now recognized the points that marked the places where buses would stop, like little spirit beacons built to draw the large vehicles down from the road, and the numbered plates that interacted somehow with the schedules and route layouts.
He brushed his arm and closed the eyelid, letting his sleeve fall back down to his wrist.
Jarv was wearing silky black pants with a clean white long-sleeved shirt, and a coarse-woven open-fronted jacket over the top; an outfit that the operatives in the Thunder Bay outpost assured him was part formal, part casual, unlikely to offend, and very likely to go unremarked.
He tried to not let the amount his outfit differed from the clothes of the people he'd seen on the journey bother him. If he hadn't been briefed otherwise, he might think that the omnipresent coarse blue pants and short-sleeved shirts were the less conspicuous option.
As he walked towards the counter he reached into his bag and pulled out a leather-bound journal.
The Empire had two outposts on Earth, beyond the arrival facility at Thunder Bay.
One was in the town of Pain Court, Ontario; a safe-house created in an abortive attempt to contact an Earth-native power whose interests might align with the Holy Nation, and maintained only so that the strategist in charge of that project could avoid admitting an embarassing mistake. The other was in Chicago.
Jarv read off the address listed in the journal, comitting it to memory before sliding the book back into the bag hanging over his shoulder.
He approached the ticket booth wearing a smile he'd last worn when being taken into custody.
"Good evening. Beautiful night tonight, isn't it?"
There was something off about hearing polite words spoken in his gravelly voice, even to him. He'd gone for so long without needing pleasantries that using them again was almost like speaking an alien language.
The woman turned dull eyes to look at him, then moved her hand to a position under the counter.
She looked to be in her sixties, in the latter half of her life by the meagre span humans attained on this world, but still with bright golden hair. She wore piercings through her ears like the draurcraftysts of Elem'legni, but the jewelery fixed there was obviously mundane, if richly appointed. A slim plate of translucent material fixed to her shirt announced her name to be Shannon.
"Can I help you?" she asked.
Jarv leaned forward, resting his arms on the counter. He let the politeness drop from his voice, relieved that this transaction wouldn't require the usual song and dance of dealing with officials. If the universe had any mercy she might not even need a bribe.
"I need directions to an address. It's called The Tickled Pink Inn, on North Avenue, Washington Park."
"Route's stopped til' morning," she said.
"You mean there's no bus tonight?"
"Yeah. That's right. Sorry."
Jarv took a deep breath and blew it out. He looked around at the bus station. It seemed like an inhospitable place to spend any length of time, likely by design. He turned back to the woman in the booth.
"I've got money. Can I charter a bus to make a special trip?"
"Well, you could get a cab, sure. Phone's right over there."
He glanced in the direction she'd indicated, spotting a device fixed to a wall a few paces down.
"Many thanks."
Jarv turned from the woman and headed towards the device she'd indicated. It was different from the phones he'd trained on in Thunder Bay, but he could still see the similarities between them, and was confident he could get it working.
The numbered keys were of a different style, but in the same layout. Not that he was sure what number he needed to press.
"Just pick it up, it'll connect you straight through," the woman called, leaning out through the counter and looking at him.
He raised a hand to her in thanks, then lifted the handset.
The phone handset rang for several beats, the sound a buzzing, warbling thing, more like the call of an exotic frog than a bell. Eventually the sound ended, and a human voiced echoed from the handset.
"Waukegan Cars. Destination please."
"The Tickled Pink Inn," Jarv rasped.
"No problem, and is that for right now?"
"Yes."
"That's fine we'll have a car with you in ten minutes. Have a nice night."
There was a click, and the handset began emitting its neutral tone, indicating that the communication channel had been cut.
"Didn't even ask where I was," Jarv mutted, hanging the handset back onto the phone terminal.
He wandered back to the loop of road that at a different hour would carry the buses from the fast-moving main road above down to their individual stopping points.
He stood looking out at the lights of Chicago and took a deep breath.
No. I'm never getting used to that smell.
With nothing to fill his thoughts but the dull buzzing of the bus station lights and the looming city in the distance, Jarv's thoughts wandered to his mission. He turned a page in his journal, finding the spot where he'd copied down his briefing.
Travel to Chicago and take control of the outpost there. Once you have secured your position, construct a second Ogrigg Gate and await further instructions. Take any opportunity to acquire additional resources, strengthen the position of our forces in the area, or claim victories in the name of the Revered Emperor; may his name echo through history.
The task was monumental enough on its own. A new city, a strange land, subordinates he didn't know if he could trust. An Ogrigg Gate was a colossal work of engineering, and the rest of his brief was so vague that it would be easy for someone set against him to conjure up things he could have done, but didn't; an easy opportunity if someone wanted to arrange for him to fail. But it was worse than that. The mission wasn't the only thing he had to worry about.
His eyes strayed down the page, to a note which had been delivered to him after his briefing, quietly and confidentially, which he'd copied down.
Messim. The Empire hierarchy isn't the only group with an interest in Earth. There's at least one other faction who we believe has their sights set on Chicago.
We don't have any details on who or why, but expect to find sharpened blades waiting for you.