The shop’s windows were small but colourful. What had attracted Jonas’ attention initially was the name, in a brass and wood plate. “The Professional’s Life”. Unlike many gaudier establishments, this one didn’t spread out merchandise in the street but kept a few barely visible through its windows. Jonas remembered some of the stores in New York City, where you could pretty much find out on which side of the city you were based on how they were set up.

The Professional’s Life was certainly shooting for the upper scale feel despite its location near the docks, and Jonas didn’t really need that much effort in persuading his three comrades to enter and see what it was about before going to the docks proper.

Inside, there were mannequins displaying clothing, a huge weapon rack, lots of shelves with drawers. The kid behind the counter at the back of the room startled when they entered and immediately came around.

An instant, later, Jonas realized that he was probably close to his own age. A clerk, or maybe the store owner’s son. But, to one who lived the Professional’s life in truth, he felt instantly like a kid.

For once, he wondered how Cowen might have felt when she and her team met them at the Othary Plaza. Young Londoners with barely a couple of months of Labyrinth, and they, tier six veterans of two decades of Professions. Did everyone felt like that kid?

“Welcome. Greetings. Welcome to the Professional’s Life, where you can show your inner Professional,” he blurted the store’s slogan, in a fresh and earnest manner.

Jonas immediately revised his estimation. A new clerk, a recent hire probably. The owner’s son would probably never sound as enthusiastic. Or would he?

As a leatherworker apprentice, he had almost never interacted with customers. M. Oakden did all the selling, and he and his fellow apprentices would only see a customer for some special order, and that was for measuring and making a model.

The clerk’s effusive manner could be explained by seeing four relatively well-dressed gentlemen enter his store. The six had left their normal gear and worn civilian attire on their trip to Somerset House, in order to avoid attracting attention. The clothing, made for their stay at St. James, still fit them even after one – or, for Jonathan, two – rounds of Adjustment, and would immediately make them as upper-class persons.

Which, in all reasonable measure, a Professional probably was.

“Just looking,” Ira said.

“Well, go ahead. We sport the best in Professional manner,” the clerk hastily replied.

Jonas’ interest was piqued. He went to one exposition mannequin, sporting a clean, nearly sober cloth vest and straight trousers. It looked almost like it could come out of the Labyrinth, and he reached to check the tunic.

Of course, there was no descriptor to be had. The appearance was a bit deceitful, and the clothing merely mundane. Still, under his finger, the slight half-silk, half-simpler cloth feeling told him that… yes, the vestments were almost certainly made out of cloth recycled from the Labyrinth itself.

“It’s not…”

“Oh, a connoisseur. Of course not. One cannot just wear Professional cloth. Our specialists tailor them until they’re useable,” the helpful clerk replied.

The cut and shape of the cloth and leather outfits almost made sense now. Someone had taken care to reproduce some common gear from the Labyrinth. Disassembling gear until it no longer sported a descriptor, then refitting them.

Jonas spotted both Jonathan and Alton peering at the back of the store. He joined them and noticed the framed newspaper clippings. There were many, in a haphazard order, and even a few yellowed and nearly faded ones that seemed to go back a long way in time.

“Strange Metal Hoop appear in the Queen’s Gardens; People Snatched by Strange Light”

“The Royal Labyrinth Company’s Comptroller indicted for Army Fraud!”

“British Skyship Commissioned – the Skies now belong to the Empire!”

There was even one slightly recent one from last year, referencing the six.

“Newest Professionals Restore British Gate! The Empire Saved!”

But one very old clipping attracted Jonas’ attention once he read the article itself.

“Royal Society Scholars Stymied – afraid of Losing More Members as Sculpted Mystery Swallows Them!”

… Royal Fellow David Carnegie was abducted by the strange lighted surface as he was investigating, confirming the rumour that the light pool picks people arbitrarily as none of the people around him suffered any mishap. His secretary, Ms Cowen, also got snatched as she was rushing to figure out where he disappeared…

“Hey guys, check this,” he blurted.

“What? No way? Cowen? Herself?”

“Know any other Professional of that name? I knew she was from the early days, but not that early”, Jonas noted.

The clerk looked at them checking the store, before switching to a different approach.

“We have lots of different fashions, from all corners of the Labyrinth. But you gentlemen may be interested in our weapon collections rather than a full suit?” he offered.

The weapon rack offered mainly short swords. A gentleman might decide to wear one for formal occasions, and the attraction of having an exotic one might be good, but few would pick other Labyrinth types.

One hammer, placed on a holding frame above the rack, attracted Jonas’ attention.

Manyfold Balanced Hammer

One-Handed

Heroic equipment

Requires: Level 2

Provides: 10 blunt damage (+17% FOR), INT+2, AGI+2, STR+1, PRE+1, CON+1

“Be careful. Those high-level ones are hard to hold,” the clerk warned.

For a non-Professional, it would probably be. Trying to hold any weapon above one’s level was very hard, just like wearing higher-level garments was horribly uncomfortable – and useless as you did not benefit anyway.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Jonas realized why that hammer had landed in that store. Heroic equipment might end up useable by any professional, even if that was rare. This one had ended short. Level 2. A relative waste for Professionals, as it wasn’t likely to be used for long. Although his own 2-Intellect dagger had been in his possession for nearly a year now, since that first completion of the badger lair in Ovildian. A normal company would probably have had much better in-store. He really needed to find something at the Faire, if the lairs of Outapis kept on stymying him.

The clerk’s eyes widened, as he saw Jonas casually flip the hammer, trying to get a feel for the balance hinted by the name.

“Hey, Jonathan, what do you think of this one?” he said, throwing in an arc the weapon.

The Calculating Defender caught the hammer deftly, turned it a bit before making a disappointed face.

“Too low, not enough potentials. That’s too bad,” he commented.

The clerk suddenly realized the source of his visitors’ casualness with the equipment.

“Oh. Oh! You are…”

“Tier three,” Jonas offered.

No sense outing themselves when you had newspaper articles on the wall about the team.

He offered some kind words to the clerk as the latter realized suddenly that the four were unlikely to purchase anything after all.

“Your sets look very realistic, though. That’s really something you’d see from specific lairs of tier two. Where do you get the bases, if I may?”

“Uh. We use Suthmeer Supplies. They do process a lot of Labyrinth materials, and sometimes, if they have things that match, they keep those aside for us.”

“Suthmeer’s? They give a fair price at the Gatepost store. Who knows, maybe some of what you purchased was obtained by us originally?”

“Although stuff from Outapis is probably a bit too exotic compared to the main tier two zones,” Alton noted.

“Yes. Ochre and black are the main colours there and the textures are usually different,” Jonas confirmed.

“Exotic?” the clerk asked, curious.

“Yes, we’re doing zones that are not… commonly used by others. Sometimes, you get a slightly different look,” Jonas replied.

“Maybe we could build a set of gear from there? That one would be very different-looking and very striking,” Alton offered.

The man was looking thoughtful.

“I’ll have to ask the owner if he’s interested. Maybe. I mean, people like to feel a bit different, but not too different. If it’s too exotic, it might not sell well,” he mused.

“Coifs would be hard to match, though. And we don’t have matching sets of anything, at least not currently,” Alton warned him.

“I’ll ask. If you gentlemen can come back later?”

“Maybe next Friday or Saturday. We still have lots of work in the depth of the Labyrinth,” Jonas warned.

“Thinking of something?” he asked as they left the store.

“Always pays to bypass the intermediaries,” Alton said.

“The people buying my salvage on the Thames made more than I did, most of the time. It would be a bit more wait to build some matching stuff, but we might be able to double our earnings. Or even more.”

“Can we? We’re going to be in the 100, so how long are we going to work Outapis?” Jonathan asked.

“Lairs in the tier three zones nearby start at 110 at the earliest. If we want to work several lairs in a row, we won’t go there until we’re mid-tier three, near 120 or 125,” Jonas replied.

“So, we have a couple of months and runs through Outapis’ lairs yet. We can try,” Alton confirmed.

Ira dropped the four tankards on the table. As evening neared, the four Professionals had decided to dive into a small tavern on the way back to the Gate. It was just another random spur of the moment when Ira spotted the name of “The Wasted Boar”.

“Not exactly comparable to the Frozen Boar,” he said as he took his seat.

Jonas took a small sip. He found himself agreeing with Ira’s remark. The ale wasn’t bad in itself. It was just a bit less tasty compared to the Boar’s usual or even the Four Elementals and its Belgian brewer production.

“The prices are something else, though,” Ira noted.

“Cheaper?” Jonas asked.

“Quite a bit,” he confirmed.

Jonathan gestured discreetly at the tavern. Although close to Covent Garden, it wasn’t a slum dive, nor quite upscale. They might be the best-dressed people around, although not quite to a level where they would attract too much attention.

“I’d say it’s a matter of work and supplies. Everything back there has to be done by Professionals or transported by one. Here, anyone can run a tavern.”

“That might change stuff quite a bit,” Jonas acknowledged.

At that moment, he noticed one of the patrons looking at them. Seeing as he was spotted, the man stood and came up to them.

“Excuse me, lads, but my friends are trying to figure out if you’re one of them, or not,” he said.

“If we’re who?”

“Them Professionals,” he elaborated.

“Oh. What gave us away?” he said, realizing that he’d answered the man.

“You feel a bit… off. Not to give insult but there’s something that none of us can’t quite figure out, but you don’t quite fit. I mean, you look like some rich merchant or something, but it’s not exactly that.”

Jonas was surprised by the question and then realized what the man was referring to.

“Ah, yes. It’s a Professional specific thing, a potential. It’s called Presence. It affects a bit the way we’re perceived. We’re not quite a high tier, but we all have some,” he explained.

Even more now with the Cores. They didn’t have their base gear, but both the Adjustment and their Cores added a lot to that potential. This boosted them to levels that you’d expect more from some tier four or five Professional, save for people with a Commander’s path based on that one.

“How does it feel, being a Professional yourself? Do you feel like that?”

Jonas team didn’t feel any special, he thought. There was familiarity as well, but they did not feel strange.

“Not at our level, no. But it’s a bit of the same. I know a few tier-six, and… well, yes. Sometimes it feels as if the world has to make room for them. Is that like that for us?” he asked.

“I think that’s a good way to say it. I like it. The world makes way for you. You’re lucky to be someone like that.”

The other two of his comrades stood and came along, seeing as their friend was pursuing the conversation. Pretty soon, more questions came, as Jonas, Ira, Jonathan and Alton all tried to answer the trio’s inquiries.

It helped a bit that they insisted on buying the next two rounds.

It wasn’t that late, probably, but in early March, the sun set early. A handful of oil lamps hanging from houses lighted the alleys nearby, but it was far from the more extensive Crystal-powered lights that would dot the Queen’s Gardens surroundings.

“We were once like them,” Ira said as they navigated the London streets.

“And we lucked into the Labyrinth. If we hadn’t… we’d probably be among the dead ripped apart by the Gate,” Alton reminded him.

Jonas nearly bumped into his friend as the other three suddenly stopped. For a fraction of a second, he couldn’t figure out why they’d stopped. Even gearless, all three of them had Focus in the 50s, while his own lagged slightly behind. But the reason was immediately obvious as half a dozen figures pulled out of the shadows to the sides of the street.

“Well, gentlemen, slumming late?” a rough voice rasped.

That was a kind of voice Jonas hadn’t heard in a long time, after moving out of the Covent slums. Voices broken by unsanitary conditions, voices belonging to men who never held a job long before they lost it. Voices of men he’d learned to avoid back when he was young.

“No, just heading home,” Alton sighed, realizing the same thing.

“Well, this street has a small toll. Right, lads?” the boss said.

“Never had when I was younger,” Ira said, instinctively reaching for his claymore, before realizing that he wasn’t carrying any weapon. None of them did – except Alton who probably never left his knives and dagger behind, and had his new Tantō from the Royal Society anyway.

The would-be robbers noticed the move and one of them tut-tutted.

“No need to be impolite. You’re covered,” the boss added.

Two of the figures moved out of the shadow, and Jonas noticed they held pistols. Old things, but probably functional. And certainly intimidating for most people.

Ira and Jonathan looked at each other and cracked their knuckles.

“Stupid? You should have paid.”

Both Defenders advanced and one of the men squeezed his gun’s trigger. The sound was deafening in the confines of the street, and Ira jerked slightly as the bullet hit.

Kinetic projectile hits. -41 health.

Ira reached to his shoulder, then squeezed and threw back the bullet, which hit the ground with a ting. The robbers looked down, incredulous.

“This coat is going to cost a fortune to repair. Those things don’t fix themselves,” he said.

“What…”

Jonas raised his hand and launched a small Fire Funnel in front of the team, between Ira and the frontline thugs. The boss looked at the flame swirl appearing out of nowhere before yelling.

“PROFESSIONALS! RUN!”

Jonas could have almost sworn they had some Professional skills given the suddenness at which the figures vanished into the nearest alley.

The two men exploded in laughter, and Jonas and Alton looked at each other, shrugging.

“How’s the shoulder?” Jonas asked Ira.

“Regeneration’s already starting. It’s just 41 damage, I get worse when those fucking beetle guardians try to pinch me. Nah, I’m furious, because that clothing isn’t going to repair itself.”

“There’s probably a tailor in Gatepost who can work that,” he offered.

“Maybe.”

“They got frightened easily,” Jonas noted.

“Thankfully,” Alton replied.

“Why?”

“I asked. Professionals bashing mundanes are… frowned upon. It’s very illegal, and you get a trip to the Tower if you wound anyone before they even try to figure out what happened,” he said.

“Wow. Didn’t know,” Ira said.

“They put in those laws not long after the Gates opened. Everyone was frightened about the amount of damage a Professional could do. So every offence done by a Professional against a mundane gets extra penalties.”

“They probably wouldn’t have run to a copper,” Jonas said.

“No, but if any had seen us, we’d be arrested. Well, they’d try to, at least.”

They started again toward the Gate area.

Jonas wondered. The gun wasn’t the best, and the damage was relatively poor. But the men had realized how outclassed they were and ran. Was that how the British soldiers felt when facing those Chinese teams?

No wonder the Americans soldiers shielded themselves in armour with such repeater guns. Even if they never faced Professionals.