Tim’s group gradually grew in size as it steadily absorbed small clusters of emotionless guards who streamed in from the alleys and side streets. In the middle of the mass of bodies a softly muttering Tim ran alongside a panting Mavier, who had ran from the other side of the city as soon as Santet had reached him.

Mavier and Tim picked their way around and over corpses as the group swept down the street. “The bodies are thickening, but still no hero.” Tim said, as he ran his hands across the tin canisters of gas stored in the deep pockets of his fraying scholar’s robe. The motions, now unconscious, served to aid in calming himself as Tim traced his fingernails through every imperfect groove on the side of the canisters, all the while cautiously avoiding the two ends of the canister itself. Ignoring the blank-eyed soldier standing on a corpse, Mavier shrugged his muscled shoulders in response. He observed the dark doorway leading into the Blinder’s hideout. He didn’t like this one bit. The door was splintered open and the metal smell of new blood filled the air.

“It could be a trap.” Mavier said, easing his scimitar from its scabbard with a practiced grace.

Tim nodded. “Very likely. In that case, you and you,” Tim pointed at the emotionless face of Vort and a soldier next to him, both dressed in shining silver armor, “take ten guards each. Follow any trails of bodies, look for secret passages, and make safe any survivors. If you come across Adrian, prioritize getting survivors out first and make a ruckus. Mavier, I’m counting on you to handle him if he shows.”

Their eyes did not move, only their heads, as the group of guards turned to stare at Tim unblinkingly, yet Tim was unphased despite eye contact lasting far longer than two lovestruck teenagers would enjoy. Finally, finally the soldiers turned to move into the broken hideout with slightly lurching strides. One by one, each guard disappeared into the darkness, until Tim nodded and followed with his own squadron of guards and Mavier in tow.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Across the town, still in her house, Elena rested her aching head against the cool surface of her wooden table, disregarding the culprit, nearly empty bottle of whiskey laying against her singular right elbow.

“Uuuggghhh. Damn it all.” She groaned in abject misery, her hand alternating from clutching her pounding head and hitting against her stomach in a failed attempt to rid herself of the gnawing instinct that something was happening.

Something terrible.

Right on cue, almost as if he was waiting for Elena to be distracted by, as what she would sarcastically call, a ‘double whammy of fun’, Clarkson opened the wooden door to her house. Or hideout, as some had taken to calling it.

“Good evening, ma’am.” Clarkson respectfully saluted, ignoring her groans of pain as the bright moonlight only made her headache worse.

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Elena shot him the dirtiest look she could muster. “What now.”

“Well, there’s nothing much… other than that I offer my apologies in advance, Lady Elena.” Clarkson bowed, quickly stepping away from the door to reveal a grim-faced squad of soldiers holding buckets.

“Clarkson, what the fu-“ Elena growled, her words ending in a shriek of surprise as the soldiers, all shouting their apologies, rushed forwards and emptied the freezing cold water in their buckets onto her head. A moment of shock followed, and as Elena struggled to process what had just happened, the squadron of soldiers ran from the room like the devil himself was chasing them.

“Clarkson! What the fuck! I thought I told-“ Elena shouted, her cries dying out when she finally noticed the grim look on her trusted lieutenant’s face.

“Once again, I do apologize ma’am, but you’re just about the only person who can stop him. Or to be more specific,” Clarkson grimaced, “stop the hideous amount of collateral damage that Adrian is wrecking. He’s gone after a lead in the slums and… and I don’t think I even need to tell you what the reports say.”

Elena’s eyes widened, her earlier grief temporarily forgotten as she finally realized her own grave mistake.

“Damn it all, I left that psychotic nutjob unsupervised!”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Tim stepped deeper into the splintered hideout, walking past the gutted corpses of the two gnome brothers and the unmoving body of his steady dwarven lieutenant, Bert. It seemed to him each body he stepped over was still alive. It felt like each body reached up with their weapons, stabbing him through the heart. Though he kept himself upright, the nauseous grief he felt was in such stark contrast to this morning.

When his life burned.

He felt like the fires of glorious purpose in vengeance had been snuffed out, the embers scattered by the heel of one swift boot.

Still, there was work to do, and Tim’s skinny frame shuddered as he took those blades through the heart, freezing them in his minds eye to crush and bury. And when the time was right, when Adrian was cast before him and broken by an ordinary creature that used nothing but his wits, his luck, and the resources at hand, he would mix those blisteringly sharp edges into a ball to force-feed to the bastard.

But again, there was work to do first.

And…

Smoke?

“Philbert,” Tim whispered towards his pocket as his wedge of guards and demons made their way to an open sewer grate inside the house, “I’m hoping this is nothing, but do you smell smoke?”

Philbert immediately answered. “Yes, yes. A strong smoke. Wait, patience, patience! The lesser ones report.”

Tim shrugged his shoulders as he breathed as deeply as he could, attempting to filter out the stench of blood, organs, and other bodily fluids to find the answer.

Within a minute, a familiar monotone voice floated up into Tim’s ear.

“It is something, something indeed.” Philbert muttered, “A fire has started, a great fire. The lesser ones fear it, as they should.”

“A fire, you say?” Tim questioned, “I’m assuming since we can smell it, that this is one big fucking fire. Did that-“

Philbert’s monotone voice immediately interrupted Tim.

“Yes.”

Tim stared at his breast pocket for a moment.

“Well fucking hell, isn’t that ironic.” Tim snorted, before fear contorted his face into a grimace.

“Everyone, back to the archives! Split up in groups, don’t get followed. That crazy bastard Adrian just set the fucking slums on fire! You dawdle, you fucking die!” He shouted, before taking off in a sprint in the direction of the archives with Mavier, Santet, and Dimitre closely in tow.