Jeremiah woke to a hard jab in the side, and in one rapid movement had Gliridae pinned to the ground with his arm behind his back.

“Get off, get off!” struggled the smaller man. Jeremiah winced when he realised what he’d done and climbed to his feet, sheepish. “Man, I thought Bill would be the dangerous one to rouse. Who hurt yeh, bud?” At Jeremiah’s flat look, he grinned and jumped up. “Anyway, clock’s a ticking, and we should get moving soon. Bill’s… wife? Girlfriend? Lady person is here, one room over and ready to give him the tongue lashing of his life when he wakes up, so I vote we hustle him out of here as quickly as possible. If that’s how you react to being woken up though, I’m going to have to leave yeh to deal with the rhino.”

This said, the tiny musician trotted away.

Jeremiah realised, watching him, that somehow Gliridae had found fresh clothes- at least, his jacket and hat were back in place and his button down was clean. He frowned, trying to make sense of it, then shook his head and instead turned his attention to Bill.

“Aw heck,” said the larger man on hearing of Mirabeth’s ire. “I should go talk to her- it’ll be okay, two minutes, tops. I swear.” He headed out the room, and within twenty seconds a verbal torrent erupted from the next room over, occasionally punctuated by Bill’s deep rumblings. “Please, I’ll explain everything in the morning. Just stay here- will you do it for me?”

Through the cracked door, Jeremiah saw Mirabeth embrace the enormous man; she was a towering woman, nearly as tall as him, but slender enough that she all but disappeared into his arms. Bill’s face showed such anguish, Jeremiah had to look away; he felt ashamed for having seen it at all.

He’d never quite managed to wrap his head around Bill and Mirabeth’s relationship- their intense love for each other seemingly barely balanced by frustration at the other’s way of being- but it touched something deep within. He’d never had someone to crawl home to in the early hours of the morning; never had someone to make coffee for, nor to exchange sleepy smiles with. Part of him envied Bill, longed for it as an extension of himself, while another part flinched away. Disgust? Fear?

A deep-rooted conviction that nothing good could come of anyone having faith in him?

“Pros and cons,” said Gliridae softly. Jeremiah startled- he hadn’t heard the tiny man approach. “You and I don’t have anyone to worry about; we also don’t have anyone to lose.”

“Is that better?” asked Jeremiah. Gliridae shrugged.

“Pros and cons is all I’m saying. Every silver lining has a cloud.”

Bill left with a final hug, and then the three of them- kitted out with a combination of medical gauze, adrenaline tablets, and enough ammunition to take out half the city- stepped into the evening air. They were able to take the tram most of the way, packed in among the last of the commuters.

Jeremiah hadn’t been on the tram in years- not counting the fight on its roof just a few days before- and found it touched the same yearning within him that watching Bill with Mirabeth had. There was a stability to his old life that he had been missing- a routine, a reliable income, a solid place in the world… but he shouldn’t go down that rabbit hole. Not now; that was for once this was finished, with a tumbler of whisky and all the time in the world.

Instead, he distracted himself studying the ads above the windows; like everywhere else in the city, they were mostly for the train project. These ones showed a map of the cities that lay close to Boravica, and diagrams of how the machinery was designed to fight through the dense jungle between them. Artistic renderings showed the eventual goal, of roads linking them all in a chain.

“I still don’t understand why this is better than the river,” a woman in a pencil skirt said, nodding to the posters. The man with her- a coworker, perhaps- shrugged.

“It’s meant to be good for the economy. I’ve heard there might be iron deposits out there, maybe that’s what they’re looking for.”

“Well then why not say that?”

“This is us,” said Gliridae, breaking Jeremiah’s focus and drowning the man’s response. They squeezed out of the train, Bill only knocking two people down in the process.

The walk to Cantankerous was brisk and silent, all lost in their own thoughts. Unlike before, the bar was dark, with only a single candle glinting through the window to show there was anyone inside at all. There was a small group inside, spread through the room, but in the centre sat the woman they were looking for. Julie Matthes smiled at the sight of them.

“I knew you would come.”

Bill growled but managed to bite back whatever reply he’d had waiting as the three of them slipped into the offered chairs. Julie was opposite them, a man stood at either shoulder; Jeremiah recognised the one on her left as the bartender they’d encountered previously. Gliridae gave a sheepish half-grin.

“Hey, Eddie; sorry about the other night. No hurt feelings, right?”

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Have we met?” asked Eddie.

Jeremiah didn’t miss the irritation that flashed across Gliridae’s face, but before the conversation could go any further the young man at Julie Matthes’s other shoulder leaned forward.

“You the guy that got my father put away?” he said, glaring at Bill.

“Easy now, Junior,” said Julie Matthes, voice low and dangerously saccharine. “Mistakes were made by all parties. Isn’t that right?” She levelled her gaze back at them.

“I can’t think of any on our end,” bit back Gliridae, and Jeremiah fought the urge to kick him under the table. The musician’s ego would be the death of them.

“You will once you’ve read this.” Julie Matthes pulled out a manilla envelope, similar to the one they’d given over to Avery Ward not five hours before, and slid it across the table to them. “You must be curious. Well, you’re in luck: I’m giving you full permission to read it… no threats of incarceration on our end. Unlike some groups, we have morals.”

Jeremiah glanced to Gliridae, who crossed his arms and turned away. He glanced to Bill, who shrugged but didn’t move. Someone had to play along. He swallowed down a sigh and met Julie Matthes’ gaze.

“Yeah, I’ll read it.”

The folder was a jumble, half of it official documents and half of chicken scratch diagrams and scrawled explanations. The official documents were all from the past few months, and were mostly addressed to Viola Crest, though there were a few of Douglas Scapper’s too. The other sheets were undated, but it was clearly written by different hands. The non-official pages were clearly written by different hands, and the information was out of order, haphazard, and- going by the presence of several large red question marks- incomplete.

However, it still didn’t compare to the worst of the new-recruit reports.

“Where’d you get it?” asked Bill as Jeremiah leafed through pages.

“Braum Wellington is a tight-lipped little bitch, but we got him to squeal eventually.”

Following communication with Mayor Cray on the low interest for volunteers for The Continental Rail project, Police Chief Grayson has suggested that inmates at Our Lady of Silver, Blessed Be, Holding Quarters For The Soon To Be Reformed should be incentivised with early release for this civic duty...

…tell the Police Chief that it’ll be a cold day in hell before I let my train be run by a load of criminals. Millions of clips poured into this and what, there’s no money for salaries? Plumb the depths of Lowtown, they’d work for a clip a day if you offered it to them…

…the council believes that this project will dovetail with the renewed efforts by Mayor Cray to reduce dangerous overcrowding certain slum areas…

Jeremiah frowned as Bill and Julie Matthes continued to snip back and forth at each other. Gliridae was stealing glances over and pretending not to, each glance lasting longer as his eyes scanned the words.

“Braum Wellington was our benefactor and owes us 300 clips; if you killed him, his debt passes along to you.”

…start with the Lowtown slums- debtors prison- prioritise wildings - they have special abilities which would make them better suited, – official position is that they’re all volunteers…

“Considering you’re pocketing coin from the Silvers, I feel no obligation on that front.”

…naturally, there is concern that if the wilding population were to find to find out there would be widespread unrest, if not full blown riots…

…Grayson planned to agitate the gangs in the lead up to the unveiling, but then the unveiling kept getting pushed back…

“Bill, shut up and take a look at this,” muttered Jeremiah. The enormous man blinked but leaned over. Jeremiah started passing him choice sheets, scanning through them as fast as he could, trying to make sense of what he was reading.

“Those bastards,” breathed Gliridae, snatching a page from the pile. He looked as though he might throw up. “They- they-“

“Yes,” said Julie Matthes. “They’re planning to kidnap wildings and force them into the wilderness.” She leaned back, watching them race through the pages in front of them. “It’s dangerous, pointless work; everybody knows it, that’s why no other cities have tried for the past hundred years.”

Jeremiah reached the end of the folder, sliding the rest to Bill and Gliridae and trying to understand what he’d seen.

“But why?” he asked. Julie Matthes shook her head.

“Midtowners aren’t happy in Midtown. They want more access to fresh air, to sunlight. So, the city needs to clear the space for more fresh air and sunlight. Roads and trade with other cities is just a bonus- a feather in the council’s cap. Once the wildings have done the difficult part, they’ll begin their colonisation inland- but how many will have to die in the process?” She stopped for a moment, staring down at the sheets strewn across the table. “Not that it seems to matter to those in charge. Wildings are expendable as far as they’re concerned.”

“According to this, we’re more than expendable- doing this is a form of pest control.” Gliridae seemed to be using all his self-control not to tear the page in front of him into a million tiny pieces. Julie Matthes gave him a tight-lipped smile, which softened into a look of pity. She continued.

“We’ve known about this for months, ever since Viola first got wind of what was going on. I did actually know her from when we were children- that part wasn’t a lie. I was the only one she felt safe telling, as I already exist outside of the law. We had it all planned out: she was going to bring me the file, and we were going to make copies to distribute it right through the city of Boravica.” Her hands clenched into fists. “But those idiots at the Props got wind of what we were up to and grabbed her before we ever got our chance. They didn’t even know what they had in their hands, and then they gave it over to you, and you waltzed away and handed it right back to the Silvers.”

She paused, tossing her hair back from her face and taking a moment to compose herself.

“But never mind. Because now’s your chance to make amends. The train is being unveiled next week: Viola was getting it delayed as much as possible, interfering where she could, but without her we didn’t have anyone on the inside. So me and the boys will be going to the Foundry, and one way or another creating as much havoc as possible. I want to buy time to warn people of what’s coming.”

She paused again, eyeing all three of them.

“If you’re too queasy for this, fine- go home. Tuck yourself in and pray the big scary Silvers don’t come for you in the night. But if you have so much as a single thought for your fellow citizens rattling around those empty skulls of yours, come with. It’ll be dangerous, but it’ll be worth it.”

“I’m in,” said Jeremiah, without hesitation.

“Same,” followed Bill. “I reckon I’m top of their list for ‘recruitment’: it’s fight now or fight later.” They both turned to Gliridae, who deliberately put the sheet back on the table before grinning. The flickering candlelight glinted off his strange teeth, making him look manic.

“Let’s burn this city to the ground.”