Mark shook his leg, trying to dispel the pins and needles that he had only just noticed had been building up as he peered out of his new bedroom’s window and onto the street outside. His movement didn’t even jostle his view of a cargo container just visible inside a garage down the road, which visibly rocked back and forth due to something inside while several Servants tried to stabilize it, all of whom were casting nervous glances around at the surrounding area while they worked.

Mark thought he could see the bar securing the container’s door slip a little, revealing a sliver of its interior. He leaned forward to try and get a better angle, but the motion was interrupted halfway through by Waia slamming the door open.

Mark reflexively jumped to his feet, hit his head on the top of the windowsill, and slid down to the floor with his head cradled in his arms. “...This had better be good.”

Waia winced slightly at the sight of Mark curled up on the ground. “I did a thing. Sorry, by the way.”

Mark curled up tighter. “Nobody starts an enjoyable conversation with ‘I did a thing’.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever you say.” Waia pulled Mark to his feet. “Seen anything on your end?”

“Just a shipping container with something very mad inside it.” Mark absent-mindedly rubbed his head and set the binoculars down on the windowsill.

“Oh, guess they’ve brought more Orsinus monsters here, then.”

Mark contemplated lying back down in the ground.

“Okay, my turn.” Waia took Mark by the arm, giving him just enough time to grab his backpack from on top of the bed, and led him out of the room. “Attics are great for these kinds of things.”

Mark winced even harder, his eyes barely open enough to let him see where they were going. “Please don’t be what I think it is, we don't have enough spare time to deal with something new, please don’t be what I think it is…”

“It’s what you think it is.”

Mark let out a barely-restrained groan, only trying to muffle it to avoid alerting anyone who might have been in the entrance.

“Okay, shush. There’s a ladder out back.”

One of the Servants was lounging on one of the couches in the common room, head dangling off the armrest. He waved lazily at Mark and Waia as they crossed the room to a door on the other side of the room. Mark stuffed his hands in his hoodie pockets and nodded curtly in response, while Waia averted her eyes and picked up her pace.

The backyard of the building had had half a dozen rusted barrels stacked up against the gray brick walls that made up three sides of the concrete cube of the yard, then painted with target symbols and riddled with bullet holes. A small ladder was built into the building’s rear wall, leading twenty feet up to an empty doorway, presumably the attic in question.

The instant Mark entered the yard, he got the inexplicable urge to look at the ground. Halfway between the door and the ladder, a small puddle of dried blood was spread across the concrete, soaking into the tip of a barely-smoldering cigarette.

Waia noticed Mark wince. “I take ‘em where I can get ‘em, don’t judge. Up you go.”

Mark snuffed out the cigarette with his boot before climbing up the ladder. “How did you even get them up there?”

Waia snorted as she followed Mark up. “Look, I’m sorry you don’t have enough gains to climb a ladder with only one arm, but you don’t need to act so surprised that I do.”

“...Alright?” Mark scrambled up through the raised doorway. “Hey, why does this place even have a door so high up?” He turned around and reached down to help Waia up.

Waia gently pushed his hand to the side and pulled herself up. “It’s a colonial thing, they used a pulley to hoist things up into the attic for storage. What matters is that there’s a door up here, and it makes it a lot easier to stick someone in the attic without anyone noticing.

She stuck her arm out towards the far side of the room. “Case in point.”

One of the Servants lay in a heap in a corner of the dark attic, face planted into the thin wooden floor. Mark sighed at the sight. “Okay, so now–” He stopped and looked down. The wood beneath his feet really didn’t look like it was particularly soundproof. He decided to lower his voice. “So now we’ve got a dead guy in the attic. One down, likely several hundred to go. Now what?”

“Well, he’s not dead…” Waia’s gaze briefly flitted towards the body before returning to Mark. “I’m pretty sure. I did figure he would be up by now…” She strode over to the far side of the room and slapped the bloody-nosed captive in the face, eliciting a barely-audible moan. She turned back to Mark. “Nah, we’re golden.”

Mark sidled up next to Waia and examined their prisoner, wincing at the sight of a large bruise on his face. “Okay, how do you want to do this?”

Waia shrugged. “How about Good Cop, Bad Cop? That’s pretty standard.”

“I don’t think either of us can do a convincing ‘good cop’.”

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“...Bad Cop, Worse Cop?”

“That’ll work.”

“Nice.” Waia slapped the prisoner considerably harder, the sound of which was not too far away from a whip crack.

The prisoner squealed in pain before Mark clamped a hand over his mouth. With one hand, the prisoner cradled his stricken face, and with the other, he pulled his legs close to his chest.

Mark took a deep breath. “Okay, here’s how–” He felt the palm of his hand get licked. Instinctively, he yanked his hand away and groaned in disgust.

No longer being held down, the prisoner suddenly pushed away from the floor with his legs, launching himself forward and past his two captors. He was on his feet seemingly in an instant, sprinting straight towards the doorway.

Waia lunged backwards and just managed to wrap her hand around his angle, sending him plummeting back to the floor with a loud thud.

Both Mark and Waia were dead still for several seconds, their gazes rotating between each other, the prisoner, and the floor. After what felt like several minutes, Mark relaxed his posture somewhat.

Seeing her partner’s movement, Waia immediately leapt forward and pinned the prisoner to the floor. “You listen here. If I see you move another inch, I’m gonna turn you into ground beef and feed you to those monsters of yours. Call for help, and you’ll be dead before you can finish the second word. Are we clear?”

The prisoner grunted, but didn’t move.

“Glad to hear it.”

Mark unslung his backpack and set it on the ground. “Hey, bring him back here. I told you rope was gonna come in handy.”

“Right, sure. You just got lucky.” Waia yanked the prisoner to his feet and pushed him back against the wall, then shoved him down onto his knees.

While Mark got to work tying his legs together, the prisoner began to indistinctly mumble while blankly staring at the floor. Waia noticed his lips move and cuffed him on the ear. “Stop that. Either let us hear it, or shut up until we get to the questions.”

The prisoner glanced up at Waia and continued in English. “I am a Servant of their reckoning, and I will live to see their kind gone from this world. The crimes of the Primoi will be undone, and humankind will step forth into a new world free of that which would see them cowering in the darkness. The broken remains of the world will be remade into a new paradise for us, and our children, and their children. I am a Servant of Reckoning, and I am humanity’s savior... I am a Servant of their reckoning, and I wi–”

Waia shut him up with a right hook across the face. “I heard you the first time.” She looked across at Mark. “You’d think that they’d at least try to act like they aren’t a bunch of complete lunatics, but here they are with their manifesto mantras. That they memorize.”

Mark got up from his work, but didn’t respond to what Waia had said. He slowly stepped around the prisoner, who was visibly continuing his mantra based on his lip movement, but wasn’t speaking loud enough for either of them to hear. “Okay, let’s figure this out. What do we already know?”

“The Servants are crazy and want to kill us all.”

“Yup. You remember this guy’s name?”

“I don’t remember a single thing about these people.”

“Right…” Mark crouched back down. The prisoner was back to staring at the floor “Hey. Hey, l–” He snapped in the prisoner’s face. “Look at me.”

The prisoner raised his head slightly. “I am a Ser–”

“No, we’re not doing that. Keep that up, and this will get real bad, real fast.” Mark pulled up a corner of his hoodie, revealing the bowie knife tucked into his waistband. “I’m not gonna get all choked up from torture, and my friend here is probably gonna enjoy it.”

“He’s right.”

“Yeah, so you’d best stop with the cult stuff.” Mark pulled the knife out and placed it vertically on the floor, keeping it stable between his hand and the plank. “Question one: What do you and the rest of your friends know about getting everyone back from the Nabbing?”

The prisoner chuckled. “So that’s what you monsters have been calling it? Just one little word and you’re done with it? Checks out, seems like just another day for you all.” He glanced up at Waia. “Trying to make us feel bad for you so you could slip under the radar like that? Low blow. Some of us have actually had to deal w–”

Waia thrust her leg forward, slamming the sole of her boot into the prisoner’s gut. He wheezed in pain and toppled forward, just barely keeping himself up by pushing against the floor with one arm.

Waia pushed him all the way down with the same leg, making his arm buckle to the side. “Keep talking like that and Mark will have to find someone else to get answers out of.”

Mark held a hand up towards Waia as he pulled the prisoner back up. “Just a little more. He’s certainly starting to get on my nerves too, but let’s not jump the gun here.” He pushed the prisoner back up to a kneeling position. “Start answering or I won’t tell her to back off anymore. Is this Torch of yours just telling you that they’ve got a solution, or are they backing their claims up?”

Another chuckle. “Doesn’t matter what I know, not to the ones orchestrating your deaths. The new Huntmaster of North America is the most experienced Primus-hunter in the world, that’s why Torch brought him all the way out here. It doesn’t matter if I tell you even the things that only Torch knows, because your fate has already been sealed. The Servants will achieve their ultimate goal in a few months. Weeks, even. But you will both be dead by day’s end, and your disgusting perversion of this entire city will be quickly forgotten.”

Waia put a hand on Mark’s shoulder. “Forget it, Mark. He’s not saying a word.”

The prisoner smirked. “Like I said, no need. There’s no hiding in this place. You can start running now, perhaps. Might make things a little more fun for the city’s Huntsmen. Because they certainly don’t plan on giving you a head start themselves.”

In the distance, half a dozen air horns went off at once, the shrill siren reverberating through the city’s streets. The prisoner snorted. “Right, of course. You know, it completely slipped my mind that Torch was arriving today, in the flesh. I give you two hours. Three, if you’re l–”

Waia lunged forward with her elbow, striking the prisoner’s temple and making him collapse to the floor, instantly unconscious. “Shut it.”

“Okay, that one was definitely too hard.” Mark got up and took a step away. “Well, that went sideways… The Servants here seemed a lot more relaxed before. They really have it out for u– for you, huh?”

“Didn’t expect anything less,” mumbled Waia.

Something thumped against the floor from the other side, followed by one of the other Servants calling out from the ground floor. “Hey! New guys! We can hear you up there, take a break from whatever you’re doing and join everyone else in the assembly! We gotta give Torch a proper greeting.”

Mark glanced at Waia, who nodded grimly and turned back to the door. “Guess we’re going in blind.”

Waia nodded once again in response, not turning to look back at Mark. “I always do.”