Aeons strange. Shay herself leaned against the doorframe and shook her head into a smile, as Serib bounded over to give Woid a hug.

“I thought I was weird for not walking?” he remembered well. “Good to see you too!”

Serib looked back at the monks laying in such a state and said:

“They weren’t cool enough to get in.”

Woid had a good snort of laughter at this.

“Shay - let’s keep her in the crew. She knows how it is. You two look a bit gross though - did you fall over out there?”

Both Shay and Woid wondered why Serib was not more concerned or disturbed by the death around. Having walked over it. Hidden under it. The smell and splatter. Both worried then in their own way - perhaps she had seen similar things before. ’Foul was known the crown of dark Syryb, boiler of oceans.’ as Argus, The Ersecutor had said to them 'by decree'.

∞

“How did you get away?” Shay asked Woid, closing and locking the door behind her.

“I jumped down to the tracks and umbra-stepped right behind Ersecutor. That was enough of a fumble for me to find the exit - he’s more agile than his helmet gives away. Then things got strange…”

“It was sunny outside, right?” Serib thought she knew.

“You trying to be funny? It was mayhem out there. Monks fighting what I can only describe as ‘living statues’. Looked like angels. Creepy things. The horns were blowing for Arthur’s Knights-a-Legion to get stuck in. Imirka was all a siege, and the townships further too.”

Serib explained to Woid how this contrasted completely the calming peacetime they had run into outside the eighth platform.

∞

“Well…” he remarked. “I gave it a scurry back here and these monks had been tipped off where The Club was - but only roughly. The Dam’e put us all on guard. So far, they’ve found all the wrong doors. None of them made it through here as you can see - I avoided that leader of theirs with the blood-soaked sleeves; he was making new holes in the walls. You have the seeds?”

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Shay showed him briefly:

“They’ve changed into leaves without soil and far too quickly. I wouldn’t believe it otherwise. Let’s move.”

And so they did, with Woid appearing from one place to the next:

“Right - The Dam’e will be pleased you’re back. How’s the shoulder?”

“Patched up, but like a nail that’s drilling deeper.” She didn’t dwell on her wound for long. “The leader of these monks, Gargarensyr, walked-talked past us. We hid among the dead.”

“Smooth. Which direction did you come from? I avoided him… oh… many twists and turns back. Near that new bakery.”

“We saw… heard him not far from the room you were guarding. Straight line more or less.”

“How did I not see that? He’s getting closer, then.”

He knew these tunnels well and now as never before they felt more like a maze to him, as Timeless dimensions misbehaved.

∞

Woid had a good puzzle over that, and Serib explained:

“Going through doorways changes When we are.”

Woid had another puzzle and did not catch up for a while, eventually appearing from the gloom:

“So that’s how or why we both exited the station the same way, ending up in different elsewhere’s. Nothing changed leaving the room, though.”

“How do you know?” Serib poked, as to her a tunnel was a tunnel with not much that could change.

“Because up ahead, Gabs is still losing at cards to Lish.”

“What’s new.” Shay smirked.

∞

Serib walked cautiously past these two assassins, one of which looked angrier than the other. They were apparently supposed to be keeping watch. She ran briefly to catch up with Shay, whose stride was undeterred.

“Not your best disguise, you look ridiculous.” Woid said, tending to his slightly bleeding lip.

“Hey, I picked it for her.” Serib’s lightning eyes hid no warning but displayed it proudly.

“I hope you were in a hurry when you did.”

∞

A burly guard ahead was about to intercept Shay, not at all recognising her. They however recognised Woid and kept their distance, realising who this Shadow in disguise must be. Shock instead intercepted Shay, as through The Club’s open doors and beyond its walls that all were windows - she saw flame. Clouds burning not with sunrise or sunset, but all the human fires below. A skyline besieged as a sombre song was played.