I awoke suddenly. I was lying on the sidewalk, my head resting on something soft. Sarah’s face loomed above me, brown eyes sparkling with amusement. I flinched away instinctively and regretted it when my head slipped off her lap and onto the stone street.

“Welcome back hero,” Sarah said, laughing and grinning mischievously.

I rubbed my head, my cheeks hot. “How long was I out?” I asked to cover my embarrassment.

She leaned back against a stone building. “A few hours. What happened? It was like you were asleep, but nothing could wake you up, not even Scott’s smelling salts.”

I pushed myself up to join her. “They pulled me out of the game for a medical exam.” I explained my meeting with Dr. Hide. As I talked, I looked around. The Bitter Flagon was reduced to a charred skeleton. The fire had been put out, but there was no saving the building. Half a dozen testers meandered around the street looking lost.

“What happened here?” I asked when I finished my story.

“The Milladen surrounded the building. They didn’t even say anything, just attacked. We barricaded the doors and windows while Scott and Eva held them off with bombs and knives.”

“Eva?” I asked.

“The Harlequin,” Sarah said, pointing to the motley costumed woman. “Anyway, that worked right up until they lit the building on fire. So we forced our way out. That is, the other testers forced their way out, I wasn’t much help.” She said glumly.

“Hey, it’s not your fault. Nobody expects a non-combat class to fight.”

“Tell that to the Barber. His class is technically a healer, but that didn’t stop him from charging with just his straight razor and booze bottle,” she said. I remembered the dual wielding tester that had been run through and grimaced.

“But then our knights in shining armor showed up.” She jostled me and her grin returned. “I don’t know how Jim got a message out to you, but I’m glad he did. You two got here just in time. Any longer and I think I would have choked to death on all that smoke.”

“Not soon enough to save the Flagon,” I said, looking at the still-smoking ruin.

“No,” she said sadly. “I’m going to miss the old pub.

“How is Jim taking the loss? I know he had a lot invested in the building.”

Sarah made a sour face. “He’s being stoic about it, but I can tell he is worried. He paid a lot of rent up front and I doubt we’ll get any of it back. After making sure everyone was all right, he took off. Not sure where.”

I would have to talk to him, but that could wait. “So what happened after we got here? Things got a little fuzzy there at the end.”

“After you hit them like a blender, they were distracted enough for the Crusader to start landing some solid hits. He’s not fast, but that claymore can cut a person in half if it connects. With support from Eva and Ajax, it didn’t take long to cause a route. Most of them got away considering they couldn’t really be killed, just cut up.”

“And the ones that didn’t run?” I asked, looking around. The street was covered in drying pools of blood reflecting the light from gas lamps, but no Milladen corpses.

“We gathered up anything still moving and threw it into the Bitter Flagon to burn.” She cracked a smile. “You should have seen Ajax running around shouting ‘kill it with fire!’ while tossing around wiggling limbs.”

I looked around for the Inspector. “Where is Ajax?”

Sarah gave a shrug. “When we couldn’t wake you up, he said he was going after the Decoction Killer and took off.”

I frowned in confusion. The killer could be anywhere in the Old City, even assuming he hadn’t doubled back to the north side of the river. “Did you figure out where the killer’s safehouse is? From Slinger’s journal?”

Sarah shook her head. What was Ajax going to do, search every building? I glanced at the sky and the lit street lights. With the sun long gone, the Old City would be dangerous as hell. I waved over a message boy walking down the street.

“I need to send a message to Inspector Ajax,” I told the kid.

“Of course sir and where would he be?”

The question threw me for a loop. Not that it was unreasonable, but that none of the messengers I had sent before had thought to ask. I usually just dictated a message, gave them a few pennies, and they ran off.

“The Old City.”

“I can’t go there sir!” the messenger responded with an unconvincing display of horror. The boy turned around and went back to walking as if the conversation never happened.

“I swear, the messengers have the worst AI in the game,” I grumbled to Sarah as she stifled laughter at my expense. Well, there wasn’t much I could do to help Ajax for now. Even if I found a way to cross the river —the bridges would be closed at night— my chances of finding the Inspector were slim.

Remembering Dr. Hide’s final piece of advice, I opened up my journal and flipped to my quest log.

Quest Updated.

Inquisitor Main Quest: Bring the Decoction Killer to Justice

Details: A serial killer known as “The Decoction Killer” has been murdering London citizens. Over the last weeks he has killed six victims, and shows no sign of stopping. Investigate the murders and find a way to bring the killer to justice. He must stand trial before God and country.

Tap here for log history

Current Objective: Follow up on your lead about the Decoction Killer’s Old City Safehouse

Reward: You get to go home. Includes one complimentary memory alteration along with a full psychological and physiological workup. Pay to your company bank account proportional to time spent in game plus severance. A letter of recommendation from your fictional manager explaining why you were let go due to layoffs despite your high level of competence and dedication. Good luck and work hard, we will be watching. -The Management Team

I read the entry with confusion. It was basically the same as when I checked it the first time. Why did Hide remind me to double check it? I opened the log history, but it was just a bulleted list detailing our investigation.

On another read through, a passage caught my eye. Stand trial before God and Country. I had been so focused on stopping the killer, I hadn’t given it much thought. Was Dr. Hide hinting that if the Decoction Killer died I would fail the quest? Because he wouldn’t get a chance to stand trial? The game wouldn’t be that pedantic, would it?

I needed to talk to the Archbishop. No way am I going to stay trapped in this game because of a technicality. But first I need to talk to my friendly neighborhood Plague Doctor. I stood and turned to Sarah.

“I’m going to figure some stuff out, you going to be ok here?” I asked the Archivist.

She waved a hand dismissively. “I’ll be fine. I was only sticking around to make sure you woke up.” I helped her to her feet and she gave me a quick hug before heading off towards her apartment. When she turned the corner, I went to find Scott.

The Plague Doctor wasn't hard to find. He had set up a portable alchemist station in the street and was busy boiling a multicolored mixture. The array of beakers, spiral tubs, burners, powders and solutions sat on a small folding table. Had he pulled all that out of the Bitter Flagon while it was still burning?

“How’s it going, Scott?” I asked, keeping a wary eye on the bubbling liquid as the red and green mixed into a grey-brown.

“You’re awake, excellent,” the Plague Doctor said. He pulled two more vials of the grey-brown liquid from a rack and handed them to me. They were warm to the touch. “Once this last one cools, you will have three doses to work with. I can make more, but will need to restock on supplies.”

I stared at the vials blankly. “Three doses of what?”

“The Milladen killing decoction of course. I started working on it after all the wounded were tended to.”

Mentioning the wounded reminded me of all the injuries I had taken during the battle. I should be in all kinds of pain, but felt fine. Inspecting my various cuts I found bandages, stitching, and alchemical powder scabs. They were so skillfully done and unobtrusive, I hadn’t even noticed until now.

Seeing my inspection, Scott commented, “You will need time to recover the blood you lost, but you should be fine. Your wounds, while numerous, were fairly superficial.”

“Thanks Scott, for everything,” I said. It was hard to get a read on the soft spoken man, but he kept helping me without asking for anything in return.

The Plague Doctor nodded and took the last decoction off the heat with metal tongs. “The decoctions will lose potency over time. There is a reason the killer made them on site. They should remain lethal for at least six hours, but not long after. I assumed you would want to pursue the Milladen immediately. Either way, I can make more tomorrow after stocking up.”

“You thought right. I’m not going to wait for them to come to us again. Do you have any sedatives?” I asked, a loose plan coming together.

Scott nodded again and handed me a large flask of light-brown liquid. “The numbing agent is the cheapest ingredient in the decoction, I have plenty.”

I thanked the Plague Doctor and headed for the church. Hopefully the Archbishop wouldn't be too upset by a late night visitor.

A bleary-eyed Curate Ben led me to a bleary-eyed Archbishop’s quarters. It wasn’t that late, but I guess when you got up at dawn for prayer, you had to go to bed early.

“What do you need, Inquisitor Silver? Curate Ben said it was important. Could it not have waited until morning?” the Archbishop asked wearily.

“Unfortunately, evil never sleeps Archbishop.” The Archbishop nodded crisply at that, his zealotry overriding his exhaustion. “My companion and I are hot on the Decoction Killer’s trail, but we have run into complications and could use your guidance” I continued.

As quickly as I could, I explained what we had discovered about the Milladen.

“So you think this killer is not in fact hunting God’s flock, but monsters from damnation? London being potentially infected by hellspawn is troubling indeed. I will contact Rome to seek guidance in this matter. In the meantime, your orders stand. Finding the Decoction Killer and bringing him in for questioning is more important than ever.”

“And if the Milladen get to him first? Or he can’t be brought in alive?” I asked. I needed an out. I didn’t know what Axeton and Hide would do if I failed my quest, but the best case scenario was another few weeks of excruciating pain, false memories, and unregulated drugs. By Dr. Hide’s own admission, if they wanted to suppress our memories and send us back out into the world, we could only be in the game for a month at most.

That said, it would take only one obscure, untested code path to pump us with a lethal dose of drugs. Every day we spent in-game increased the likelihood of finding a ticking time bomb.

“If the killer can’t be brought in, then we will need to gather information from other sources. Witness testimony, journals, specialist intel. We need to know where this threat came from, what it wants, and how to annihilate it,” the Archbishop said. “Hopefully it won't come to that. Bring the Decoction Killer in alive. Once we know everything the killer does, we will be better equipped to face these creatures.”

There, I had my backup plan. Even if the Decoction Killer got torn apart by zombies while hiding in the Old City, I could still complete my quest. As for how exactly I would gather said information —I would burn that bridge when I got there.

“One more thing,” I said. “I may need a space where I can interrogate a prisoner. Does the cathedral have a jail or something I could use?”

“Inquisitor, this is the most respected church in London!” the Archbishop scoffed. “Of course we have containment cells. I will have Curate Ben reserve one for you.”

I left the Archbishop writing a letter to Rome and slipped into the night.