The crowd applauds heavily. Nemesis begrudgingly claps along, though the Chases’ applause seems far more genuine. Jing and Calloway both abstain from applauding altogether. The latter, he completely understands. The former, he finds much more curious.

Once the applause settles down, Sterling adjusts his glasses, smiling nervously. He gives Nemesis the impression of a schoolboy giving a speech he’s horribly unprepared for, with the sort of anxious disposition that would endear him to his professor and net him a high mark despite his lack of public speaking talent.

When he speaks, it’s with an audible stutter. Whatever bravado he had managed to generate for his opening statement has evaporated entirely. “Th-that is to say, um...we’re thrilled to w-welcome you to our humble exhibition! As is typical of the spring showcase, our major pr-presentations will not be from myself, or Sophronia, or any similarly established faces around here. Instead, today’s exhibit will c-center around the, um, the works of the next generation of artists! Th-three university st-students, all of whom attend the Institute at Catacumba!”

Again, the applause. Nemesis knows it would be rude to cover his ears, but he finds himself wishing it weren’t. The applause is just so unbearably loud.

It dies down again, though. It always does. And when there’s nothing left but a quiet ringing in Nemesis’s ears, Sterling speaks again.

“That b-being said, I w-would like to introduce our wonderful young t-talent!” There’s another smattering of applause, and he smiles sheepishly. “Thank you, thank you. Um...Sophronia, take it away!”

Ripley makes her way to the podium, clearing her throat. Her voice is surprisingly stern-sounding. “My name is Sophronia Ripley, artificer, clockworker, steamsmith, artist, and member of the Cabinet’s Board of Trustees, and it is my pleasure to introduce talented sculptress Katherine Blair!”

Blair waves. Nemesis can tell the act of being called by her full given name is mildly unsettling her. What is it, about people insisting on using a person’s full birth name even in situations where the person never uses it for themself? If no one recognizes her as Katherine, why not simply call her Kitty?

The societal focus on ‘real’ names is something Nemesis will never understand. A name is an identifier, an arbitrary series of sounds assigned to an individual. If an individual is known as one series of arbitrary sounds, there’s no reason to focus on what series of arbitrary sounds they should properly be known as. It’s all quite pointless.

Kitty Blair gets her applause, and Banks takes the stage next. “And my name is Gilbert Banks, president of Aurum Lux and member of the Board of Trustees.” His voice is more even, almost indifferent. He sounds almost less comfortable onstage than Sterling. Almost. “And I would like to introduce the prodigious painter Hugo Callahan.”

Hugo - the scruffy-looking, paint-stained boy - bows awkwardly. He, too, gets his applause, though it’s noticeably less than Kitty got. Something about marketability, Nemesis thinks to himself.

Sterling takes the podium again. “Regrettably, our third artist, the clockworker and artificer Elizabeth C-Calloway, cannot be here today. We pay our utmost c-condolences to her family and friends, hope that she may somehow find her w-way back to us. For the time being, we hope that it will bring comfort to those who know her to see her work on display, celebrated by all of us gathered here.”

Another round of applause, though this one sounds more confused than enthusiastic. It makes sense. Few people know what happened to Elizabeth Calloway. As far as Nemesis knows, this is the first public acknowledgment of her disappearance.

Next to him, Calloway visibly deflates. Nemesis wishes there were something he could do to comfort him, but it’s all too conspicuous, too attention-drawing. He settles for giving him a sympathetic look which he’s pretty sure isn’t so much as noticed.

“W-With all of that out of the way, l-let’s have a last round of applause for all of the talent on show tonight!”

He gets the requested round of applause, back to its full ear-shattering force. It’s almost as if the people in attendance have forgotten that Elizabeth Calloway is missing. Next to Nemesis, Calloway looks miserable and defeated.

“Before we b-begin our main event,” Sterling continues, “We’d like to p-present a short musical performance…introducing first, Tobias Fitzroy of the Theatre Obscura!”

Wild applause breaks out. Fitzroy, it seems, is more popular than Sterling. He emerges from the shadows of the hall, dressed just as fantastically expensively as he was at the opening of Edward and Lucia. He smiles wide, teeth bared like a predator. The crowd seems to adore it.

When Nemesis stops to think about it, his teeth remind him of a more subtle version of the effect given off by one Salem Riddle.

“Hello, friends!” He says, and the crowd explodes with cheers. It feels as if these people would applaud him for the mere act of being alive.

He waits for the applause to settle down slightly before continuing. “I am proud to be here tonight on behalf of myself and the Theatre Obscura, a long-time sponsor of the Cabinet of Marvels!”

“It’s not, actually,” Jing whispers to Nemesis. “The sponsorship is a new thing. Last five years.”

“Maybe five years is his definition of a long time?” He whispers back hopefully.

“Maybe he’s just an evil waste of flesh.”

“I mean, I agree. Just trying to be lighthearted about it.”

Fitzroy’s smile only seems to widen. “And I am proud to present the Obscura’s very own resident pianist, the virtuoso who has performed for countless performances of ours to ceaseless critical acclaim - ladies and gentlemen, Elias Fitzroy!”

“He didn’t even mention he’s his son,” Jing whispers to Nemesis. Their voice suggests an immediate desire to commit homicide, and not one which Nemesis can fault them for, considering he shares it.

Any response he might have had, though, is immediately cut short. Fitzroy gestures towards the hall from which he came with one arm, and the crowd begins to applaud wildly. He feels Jing’s attention fix on the shadows.

Elias emerges from the hall behind the stage, walking to it with a steady, almost robotic stride. He’s dressed far more formal than Nemesis has ever seen him, a red dress shirt and black coat trimmed with gold. He looks so uncomfortable, Nemesis thinks, beneath all that thick fabric. Elias has never liked to wear more than one layer if he can help it, but Nemesis supposes Tobias Fitzroy wouldn’t be sympathetic to that.

The applause must be horrible. The attention, overwhelming. Elias hates attention, and here he is, standing on a stage he didn’t choose.

Elias sits down gingerly at the piano bench, and Nemesis realizes that, with the way it’s positioned, he’s looking directly at him. Their eyes meet for a moment - or is that Nemesis’s imagination? Is his mind playing tricks on him, or is Elias’s stare locked on him?

“This is a song of my composition,” he announces. The wording is so un-Elias it makes Nemesis cringe. “Love Letter in E-Flat Minor.” A title which Nemesis would also consider to be distinctly un-Elias. Forget that, he’s never so much as heard him name a piece before.

The audience stirs, seemingly intrigued. Next to Nemesis, Jing wears a completely inscrutable frown. Nemesis, though, finds himself stone-still, unable to so much as breathe for fear of interfering with the music. He wants to hear every note as clearly as he would if he were there, sitting next to him on the bench.

Elias lays his fingers over the keys, carefully finding his starting position. He inhales sharply, and then opens.

For all the buildup, the opening to the song is soft and sweet. The sorrowful melody gracefully floats, building and then fading away. And Nemesis is sure of one thing - that this isn’t the song he heard at the Obscura.

Why would Elias change his song last-minute? Nemesis looks at him, and he finds, curiously, that Elias is staring right back. For a moment, their eyes meet. And then he looks back down at his keyboard as the song begins to pick up pace.

All night, the crowd has never been fully silent. Even during Sterling and Fitzroy’s speeches, one could hear whispers in the background, gossiping or commenting or any other number of things. But now, listening to Elias, the crowd is completely, eerily silent. The only audible thing in the room is the music. No one even dares breathe.

Nemesis understands fully why. He’d experienced it himself, the first time he ever saw Elias sit down at a piano bench. Watching Elias play is the only thing Nemesis has ever experienced comparable to the majesty of the stars themselves. His every movement is measured and yet natural, graceful and yet with a distinct jerky quality to it, like a hinge which has gone perhaps a bit too long without oiling. His hands fly over the keys with inhuman speed despite the fact that his fingers, long and bony, shouldn’t be suited for it.

He transitions abruptly into a new section, and the tone couldn’t be more different. Far removed from the morose, melancholic, slow tone of the opening movement, this is far more excited. Not quite gallant, not quite cheerful, something in-between, something that makes Nemesis’s heart pound so hard it threatens to burst out of his chest and gallivant about the room, which makes him want to get in a swordfight or to run along a rooftop or to kiss someone in secret out of view of everyone else.

Elias’s hands are moving at incredible speeds, slamming on the keys faster than Nemesis can follow them. Where he normally leans in and out with the ebb and flow of the music, he’s instead hunched over the keys, as though magnetized to the piano. Nemesis rarely sees him play pieces that sound like this.

Elias plays like a man possessed. Were it anyone else, Nemesis might find it frightening. Instead, he finds it beautiful, enthralling. His arms seem to bend at angles that are almost inhuman, and the music only increases the effect.

Up close, Nemesis knows the joints of Elias’s fingers are knobby, some of them looking as though they were put on at the wrong angle. Playing for eight hours straight has consequences, no matter what Tobias Fitzroy might want. As Elias calms down to a more morose tune again, a wave of guilt washes over Nemesis. He’s destroying himself for his art, and here Nemesis is enjoying the result.

The slow pace suits Elias far better, in Nemesis’s opinion. He’s far better at it, and from what he’s told Nemesis, he prefers it as well. He’s precise and careful, approaching it in a methodical and measured way which Nemesis always thought was so elegant. The Elias who sits at the piano might as well be a different person from the Elias of everyday, but Nemesis thinks both of them are wonderful in their own subtle ways.

The slow variation on the opening movement grabs Nemesis’s heart by the throat. It’s poignant and overwhelming, making his muscles tense and his joints stiffen involuntarily. He wants nothing more than to fall to shreds, allow himself to be absorbed into the music and consumed in his entirety.

Even in the cold, mournful notes, Nemesis finds a strange warmth.

Typically, in Nemesis’s experience, when a song is primarily unhappy and minor throughout, it will end on a slightly more positive note. A major triad for the ending, a single shift from a flat to a natural, something to make it end off happier than it began. Love Letter in E-Flat Minor does no such thing, Elias finishing on a dissonant tritone chord which feels as though it rends the ear of the listener. Unlike the rest of the music, which ebbed between pianissimo and mezzo-piano, this chord is shatteringly loud. It almost feels as though it was designed to cause as much pain to the listener as possible.

Despite this, the applause is even more earthshaking. Nemesis glances around, trying to re-familiarize himself with all the parts of his surroundings which aren’t Elias. Easily half of the room is in tears. At his table, Calloway is sobbing too much to even stand up for the ovation. Percy has tears silently flowing down his face, and Evie’s cheeks are streaked with the remains of the same. Even Theory has the barest hint of tears building in the corners of her eyes. Nikita Morozov seems less affected, but even they are applauding furiously, on their feet before the last note even ended.

Nemesis, too, is on his feet, hands threatening to shatter from the force of his applause. He whistles loudly - Elias meets his eyes. Is it just him, or does he look a little sheepish? One thing is certain - Elias, too, has eyes brimming with tears.

Next to Nemesis, Jing is cheering loud enough that he can only imagine their throat will be horribly sore in a few minutes. They look perhaps the most affected at the table, next to Calloway, wiping tears frantically away from their face using their shirt sleeve.

Elias bows once, stiff, all the elegance and grace faded. Elias who sits at the piano might as well be a different person from the clumsy, awkward Elias who always looks frozen stiff with anxiety, who Nemesis knows on more than one occasion has whacked him with a billiards cue from an improbable distance. He quickly gets off the stage, visibly uncomfortable now that the music has stopped. Instead of remaining with the artists and the Board and Fitzroy, he escapes back into the hall.

Sterling - who has been dabbing rapidly at his eyes with a handkerchief provided by Banks - claps his hands, settling the crowd down into science. “That was, th-that was, uh, w-wow. Another round of applause for Elias Fitzroy, everyone!”

The applause is granted enthusiastically. Now that Elias himself isn’t here, Nemesis abstains, and Jing next to him does the same. He’s content to stand there, feeling the aftershocks of the music travel through him, giving him that wonderful empty feeling he’s become so used to. He would be more than content, he thinks, to do nothing but listen to Elias play for the rest of his life. He feels the absence of the music like a pull, and in the moment he would do anything to hear it again. He knows the lure of it will follow him even to his dreams.

There’s something to be said for Elias’s powerful knack, that whether he means to or not there’s a good chance he’s been artificially swaying the hearts of everyone who hears him play. But even if that weren’t the case, Nemesis knows he would think it were the most beautiful thing in all worldly existence.

“Well, th-then,” Sterling continues once the applause dies down again. “We’ll be officially unveiling the exhibitions. Each artist will g-give a presentation of their own art, in around an h-hour, beginning with Ms Blair. F-For the time, feel free to wander the galleries on your own, eat, and s-socialize.”

Some music plays, with the familiar phonograph scratching. After hearing Elias, it feels almost like an insult in comparison, but Nemesis supposes it’s fine enough music.

He looks over at Jing, sees them frowning. They wordlessly gesture with their head in the direction of the Obscura’s table. Walter is still wiping tears from his eyes, but Lusitania, who is conversing at high speeds with Morgana, looks thrilled. Fitzroy has returned to it, though Elias is nowhere to be seen, which gives Nemesis a quick burst of relief.

Is the relief because he thinks Elias is unhappy around the people seated there, or is it because Nemesis selfishly doesn’t want him to pay attention to his own family, fiance, and co-workers? Logically, he’s sure it’s the former, but the tiny bit of doubt is enough to deliver a stab of self-loathing. He must be a horrible person.

Next to him, Jing stands up. “Come with me to one of the old exhibits,” they tell Nemesis. It sounds less like an offer and more like a threat.

“Alright, if you insist.” He stands up.

Across the table, Theory and Evie stand as well, one after the other. Evie smiles at Theory, and slides her hand into hers. “We’re going to go look at the ancient Zemlyan art exhibit,” she tells Percy. “You hold down the fort here.”

He gives her a thumbs-up and promptly begins to attempt to engage a still-distraught Calloway in a conversation about famous pianists.

Jing and Nemesis take the least-crowded path, into an old exhibit labeled ‘Optical Wonders of the Clockwork World’ - Nemesis recognizes it as Sophronia Ripley’s work.

“She thinks the song was about her,” Jing growls the moment they’ve left earshot. “I can feel it. Her ego is so massive it fills the whole room.”

“If she really does,” Nemesis says, “then she should be aware the song is sad. Not precisely a glowing endorsement of their relationship. I refuse to believe she’s that stupid.”

Jing shrugs. “Elias’s songs make people feel things. That’s a fact. Who’s to say it didn’t make her irrational?”

“I dunno. Reckon the song definitely wasn’t about her, though.”

“No, it wasn’t,” Jing agreed. “I’ve actually never heard that song before.”

“Elias told me he wasn’t going to put his full effort into a song Fitzroy made him write,” Nemesis says, “but really, this is my favorite thing I’ve ever heard from him. It feels like...somehow, it affected me even more than his music tends to.”

“It was pretty good,” Jing agrees, and here he senses a note of bitterness. “Lusitania really is an idiot if she thinks he’d write something that nice about her. He’s never even written songs for people he actually likes.”

“I mean, it’s a big undertaking, writing a whole song. Makes sense.”

“But this one...a love letter.” Jing looks at him seriously. “So, what do you think it was for?

“What’s that bloody mean?”

“Exactly what it sounds like.”

The exhibit’s first room is wall-to-wall mirrors, all four walls consumed except for a small door off to the very side, designed to be as unobtrusive as possible. Nemesis turns his head, looking from mirror to mirror, several reflected versions trailing ever-so-barely behind him.

“Well, that’s interesting, I guess?” He’s of the opinion that seeing one version of himself was more than enough already. “Never seen a mirror reflected in another mirror before. Looks neat.” Indeed, the mirrors reflect each other in an endless cycle, rectangles within slightly smaller rectangles stretching back into infinite illusory space. The farther back they go, the greener they look. “Do you reckon what this means is mirrors have been green all along, and we just haven’t been able to perceive it?”

“I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about, Jones.”

“I mean, when you look at the reflections, it’s green, right? I thought...somehow, I didn’t ever think about what color a mirror really was, but they’re green. That’s fascinating!”

Their eyes narrow. “I have no idea what in the world Elias sees in you. You’re obnoxious, you know that? Completely impossible to talk to.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, maybe? I mean, actually, I reckon Elias would agree with you. What happened to us getting along?”

They pause, trying to take that in, then sigh. “You’re an idiot.”

“I’ve been told.”

“You - eurgh.” They yank sharply on the strands of hair framing their face, as if to focus themself. “You’ve been deflecting this whole conversation, haven’t you? I asked you a question and you’ve done everything in your power to avoid answering.”

“Maybe.” He shrugs. “If that’s what’s happening, it’s not on purpose.”

“Okay, how about this? I know your secret, asshole.”

That, now, that gets his attention. “That could be a lot of secrets,” he says, even as his hand reaches for his compass - why? It can’t help him in this situation, beyond discerning if they’re bluffing or not, so why is he immediately reaching for it the same way he reaches for his gun in violent confrontations? Is it truly that comforting just to know it’s there?

“Seeing you interact with Elias, I’ve figured out who you are pretty fast.” They take a sharp breath in, sounding oddly labored. “He wrote to me, you know. Every damned month, he wrote to me. And he went on and on about this one guy. It started a little indifferent. He only spent his time with you because he didn’t have anyone better for company. He thought you were obnoxious and a little bit scary.”

Nemesis nods. “I’d had my suspicions at the time.” He’s had his suspicions this whole time, in fact, that Elias only bothers with him out of obligation. To have them confirmed is a relief, even as he feels his heart wring itself.

“But,” they say, cutting into his misery, “he cares about you. After a while, the letters got longer, more flowery. He wouldn’t shut up about how smart you were and how nice you were to him, and how he was only happy when you two were sneaking out somewhere. When you got your apprenticeship he was devastated, you know?”

“I didn’t-didn’t know that, no.” It feels like a punch in the stomach.

“But he didn’t tell you. He couldn’t tell you, because he wanted you to be happy.” They scoff. “Can’t imagine why, considering you up and abandoned him! And even then, he wasn’t mad at you - because, you know, he’s almost never mad at anyone, even when they’re being awful to him! I don’t understand that! I’m mad at everyone, all the time, and I’m mad at you!”

They poke Nemesis in the chest, and he flinches. “Bloody hell, keep your voice down. Chew me out if you need, but let’s not air Elias’s feelings - which he expressed to you in confidence - to the entire gathered menagerie, shall we?”

They pause and sigh, lowering their hand. “You’re right. But I’m still mad at you.”

“Never implied otherwise, or that you couldn’t be.”

“He wrote to me more often after that. Every single weekend, when he got to see you, he’d write to me about it. Talk about how happy he was, as if he wasn’t miserable the other five days of the week.” They scowl. “And now he’s miserable again, more than he has been. And I can’t help him.”

That sentence went somewhere Nemesis hadn’t at all expected it to. Slowly, he nods. “I know he’s miserable. But what makes you think I can help him more than you can?”

“Because you’re the one he cares about.” They wrench their face away from him, but the pain on it is apparent. “Because I haven’t ever been enough for him. He calls me his best friend, but I know you’re the one he really cares about. And if anyone can get him to call off the engagement and get away from the Obscura, it’s you!”

Nemesis laughs humorlessly. “Oh, believe me when I say I’ve tried. He gets horribly defensive. And...I don’t want to assume anything, actually. What if this is what he wants, and I’m trying to take that away from him because I selfishly want him to...to…” he trails off, unable to say aloud the thought which has been rushing through his head the entire evening.

“You want him to…” Jing rolls their eyes. “You’re an idiot. You’re so worried about doing something wrong that you’re ignoring the fact that he’s clearly suffering. He hates Renwick, he hates performing, he hates the Obscura, and he hates Fitzroy. He’s told me himself.”

“He...he has?”

“Because he doesn’t have anyone else he can trust around, because you’re off being Dick Remington while he’s shutting himself in his room because he can’t stand the people he’s surrounded by.” Their voice dips up in pitch, just barely, and they immediately clamp their hand over their mouth before continuing in a harsh whisper. “And that’s why I don’t like you. Not because he likes you more than me.”

Out of all the things they could possibly have said, that’s about the hardest to formulate a proper response to. He can only stammer indignantly. “What in the world does that have to do with - first off, he probably doesn’t, but also - what does that-”

“You’re an idiot.”

“We’ve well covered that!”

“Right, well, clearly not enough.” They glare at him. “Do I have to spell it out for you?”

“Apparently so.”

They sigh, shoving their hands into the pockets which he wasn’t even aware they had. “You’re the person Elias cares about the most. Not me. About a year ago, I...I told him, I…” They trail off. “No, I can’t say it, can I? Eugh. Fine, I told him I loved him.”

In retrospect, it was obvious, but their sentence knocks the wind out of his sails. All he can do is stare at them with what he’s sure is a rather stupid-looking expression. “You...ah. I see. And he…?”

“Didn’t reciprocate. I think that goes without saying. And it’s not like that’s the part that hurts me. It’s just…” They sigh. “...well, maybe it does sting a little. But what I’m more concerned about is that with all the time he’s spent away at school, he’s drifted away from me. He doesn’t feel as close to me as I do to him, because he had you, and I never had anybody like that except for him. And because he’s not as close to me, he won’t listen to my advice on the subject. But if you talked to him, maybe…”

“If you insist,” he agrees, though he thinks to himself that if the person who has known Elias the longest hasn’t gotten through to him his mind is probably made up. “You...you mentioned knowing my name, you shan’t...tell anyone, will you?”

“Probably not.” They shrug, trying to play off the emotional nature of the conversation. Jing, Nemesis thinks, doesn’t strike him as the sort of person to deal with feelings very well at all. He can only imagine how much it must have taken them to be forthright with Elias to begin with.

Confrontation comes easier to them than confession. That’s something he can relate to.

“Right. Er...thank you for that, at least?”

“Don’t give me a reason to change my mind.” They sigh. “And stop this. At the end of the day, I just don’t want Elias to get hurt more than he has already.”

“We can agree on that, at least.”

“Right.” They exhale, calmer, if barely. “...sorry for going off at you in the middle of a museum gallery. I mean, I’m not actually sorry. It needed to happen. But you’re not allowed to think I’m a bad person for this.”

“I’m allowed to think you’re whatever the stars I want,” he responds indignantly, almost on reflex. “But I don’t think you’re a bad person, no. Just very emotionally high-strung.”

“Yeah, that’s what Elias says, too.” They glance around them, watching their face’s reflection distort in the mirrors. “I don’t want to be in here anymore. It’s making me sick. Just keep what I told you in mind, Jones.”

“I will do, yeah.”

They’re almost to the door when they look back over their shoulder at him. “I can tell you do care about Elias. So don’t let this go on longer than it needs to, okay? I don’t think you’re an awful person.”

“High praise, that.”

“Don’t start being sarcastic with me after I’ve said something nice!”

“Awful loose definition of nice there.” He laughs. “Ah, though, sorry. I appreciate the conversation, even if I’m not exactly sure what I’m meant to do now. I’m here to investigate a murder and all. Tracking down a guy who’s probably halfway home by now wasn’t on my to-do list.”

“He’s not on his way home. Renwick would never let him go like that. So you can find him, if you look.” They stop and smile. “By the way, he’s always admired you. He told me once he dreamed about helping you with cases.”

“He could’ve done any time, though. I’m sure Mr. Jones wouldn’t’ve stopped him, and I surely wouldn’t’ve minded.”

“But he’s not smart like you,” they say, more somber. “That’s what he always said about you. That you’re smart. Well, I don’t see it. I think you’re an idiot.”

“I’m rather inclined to agree with you, actually,” Nemesis admits, sighing. “...right. I’ll find him.”

“You’d better.” They close the door behind them, leaving Nemesis alone in the mirrored room. The longer he stands here, the more he hates it. Assaulted by images of himself from all sides, the massive room begins to feel unbearably claustrophobic.

He finds Percy back at their table. Calloway seems to have gotten just barely more functional, sitting up and with mostly dry eyes, though the tear-streaks are strikingly visible against his pale skin. Nikita Morozov has left at some point, no doubt to look at the various exhibited works.

“The exhibit over there is pretty interesting,” Nemesis says, sliding into an empty seat at the table.

“I imagine it is.” Percy looks at him. Somewhere, in-between the serious expression, Nemesis can sense worry. “You’re back awfully quickly. Did something happen? Where did Jing go?”

“They’re fine. I’m fine.”

“Not what I asked, but okay.” He puts a hand on Nemesis’s shoulder, and Nemesis flinches at the sudden touch. “Why are you back here?”

“I needed to touch base with you,” he admits. “I don’t want to run off without informing my investigation partner, so-”

“Partner?” Percy interjects, brightening momentarily. “I, uh, I mean, that makes sense. So what’s up?”

“Should I be leaving you two to this?” Calloway asks. “Personal relevance aside, I don’t want to listen in on confidential talks.”

“That’d be lovely,” Percy replies. “Why don’t you...go get something to eat, and I’ll come get you when we’re done here?”

“Sounds fine to me,” Calloway agrees, getting unsteadily to his feet and walking, in the direction of not the buffet, but the bar.

Percy frowns after him. “He worries me.”

“Me as well. He’s in a bad way. Not that I don’t understand why he is, but it’s a little alarming nonetheless.” Nemesis sits down, sighing. “I’m a private investigator, not a psychologist, certainly not a grief counselor.”

“Right. I’m not that either.” Calloway gone, Percy fixes his stare directly on Nemesis. “So. As we were saying: what happened?”

Nemesis groans recalling it. “Jing and I had a...talk.”

“As I’ve observed.”

“I need to track down Elias...Fitzroy,” he tacks onto the end hurriedly.

“You don’t have to pretend it’s less personal than it is. I know you two are friends, don’t worry.” He pauses, then mumbles: “Still need to get that interview.”

“There’ll be time for that later. For the time being, I need to track him down. And I was thinking...if that ends up taking up the timeframe of the presentation, I might stay here through the night. They can’t stop me sneaking around the place then, can they?”

Percy laughs quietly. “Oh, that’s such a you thing to say, Nemesis. I’ll cover for you, if that’s what you want, and I’ll make sure to tell Theory you’re not dead.”

“I feel dead, honest. And it’s been, what, two hours?”

“About.”

“Well, I appreciate the help, mate.” He claps him on the shoulder.

“Of course.” Percy’s gaze seems to linger on Nemesis’s arm just a moment too long. “Uh...Nemesis?”

He raises an eyebrow. “Chase?”

“Yeah, that’s my surname, I guess.”

He sighs. “You doing alright?”

“Oh, yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” His speech is far too hurried.

Nemesis shakes his head. “There’s something on your mind.”

“They’re called thoughts, Nemesis.”

“And you have a lot of them, huh?”

“Oh, all the damn time, Nemesis.” He taps his head. “You have no idea how many thoughts’ll fit into this bad boy.”

“Is that you calling yourself smart?”

Percy laughs. “Would I be wrong to do so?”

“Probably not. I’m not the Institute, I don’t get to decide how smart you are.”

“I think I’d value your opinion on the matter, though. Definitely more than the Institute's.” Percy raises an eyebrow, looking Nemesis in the eye with an almost uncomfortable directness. “Partner?”

“Partner?” Nemesis repeats.

A little bit more hesitant, he continues. “You called me that earlier.”

Ah, so he’s still thinking about that. Nemesis shakes his head. “Not really. I called you an investigation partner, which is different.”

“It doesn’t make much of a difference to me. I guess I’m just…” he laughs. “...sorry, it’s really awkward to talk about myself, isn’t it? It’s so much easier to talk about the news or conspiracies or cases. I just didn’t realize you thought that highly of me.”

“Is that truly such a high compliment to you? I’m just...stating facts, you know. We’re on the same team, we’re trying to unravel the same mysteries, and really, we’re after most of the same goals.” It feels like it should be common sense, but Percy looks painfully earnest. “You work with me on investigations...partner with me on them even. Thus...investigation partner.”

“I suppose all of that makes sense.” And yet, he doesn’t look particularly cheered. “I just worry, Nemesis. I’m not a detective.”

“Neither am I.”

“Well, you know what I mean.” He sighs. “I’m not a private investigator, I’m a reporter, and I’ve only been a reporter for a couple years now. It’s a wonder I got this job at all, actually. I’m pretty young for it.”

“Admittedly, I had just assumed that meant you were some sort of prodigy,” Nemesis says, resisting the urge to wince after he finishes. It’s easy to forget that not everyone is like him. Not everyone gets singled out and told that they have potential. Not everyone has potential.

He thinks Percy has potential, he thinks to himself, with almost an edge of anger. But people in Omen, where everyone who's anyone is up to their eyes in espionage, have markedly higher standards than the people in Citrea Viridia.

Nemesis is nothing special here, either. Scary thought, that.

“I mean, that’s what people say, but I don’t just want to report things.” He smiles at Nemesis. He supposes that might be Percy’s default facial expression, regardless of what emotion he’s feeling. Except for that time at Burke’s, he’s never seen Percy without that smile for any significant length of time. “I want to be the one figuring out what’s happening. That’s the Sun’s thing, right? We were founded on the principle of telling the news that nobody else wants to and uncovering the secrets the other papers won’t.”

“I mean, that’s what the front of papers say, yes.”

“And that’s what I always wanted to do!” Just briefly, Nemesis thinks, he looks upset. “You know, a lot of people accuse me of only getting the job I have because my mother used to be a photographer for the Sun?”

“Ah, she did?” Nemesis curses himself for not paying attention to photography credits in newspapers. “Is that why you went into journalism to begin with?”

“Nope. I…” He leans close to Nemesis, whispering. “...it was always what I wanted to do. It was also a convenient path to the Correspondents.”

Nemesis nods. “What drove you to it, before that was a factor?”

“I got tired of the news not actually reporting anything. I like knowing things, and when information isn’t available it makes me angry.”

Somehow, Nemesis can’t imagine Percy being angry. “That’s an admirable reason to go into it. And for what it’s worth, I think you’re probably the best reporter I’ve ever met. I can’t imagine nepotism played much of a part.”

“Ah...really?” And for once, Percy looks visibly uncertain.

“I don’t lie as a rule. So, yes, I’m serious.”

“Well, if you say so…” He laughs. “Sorry. Evie says the same thing, but she’d do just about anything to make me happy. You’re an unbiased third party, so it’s a lot easier to hear coming from you than my sister.”

“I dunno, your sister seems the brutally honest type to me. I don’t think she’d blatantly lie to you, especially if you’ve made it clear to her that you want honesty.”

“That’s the thing, I haven’t really.” He looks almost ashamed now. “See, I worry people will take offense if I make it seem like I don’t believe them. I...tend to worry about being impolite or hurting people’s feelings. Perhaps more than I should be. It’s not helping me, I know, but-”

“Nah, I get it. People get mad at me for questioning the things they say all the bloody time.” He sighs. “Let me tell you a story, Chase.”

“I feel like I might not have a choice in the matter,” Percy says sheepishly.

“Good, you’re catching on.” Nemesis takes a breath and continues. “As you know by now, I was not always the master investigator I am now. Back in the day...I was an apprentice investigator.”

“Of course.” Percy nods solemnly. “Even Nemesis Jones isn’t born perfect.”

“Especially not Nemesis Jones. You’ll be shocked to hear this, but as a child I was a little bit...rough around the edges, if you will.”

“Uhh...you picked a lock in front of me the second time we ever met.”

“Perfectly reputable people with no histories of criminal activity know how to pick locks sometimes. Not often, but sometimes. I’ve met a lot of rich brats who just think it would be oh-so cool and glamorous to learn things like that.” He grins. “None of them would ever be as good as me, though, you’re right.”

“This feels like a bit of a disorganized tangent,” Percy admits.

“Ah, right. Back to my main point, then.” He makes sure to lower his voice just a bit more. No one ever knows who might be listening in. “I wasn’t the sort of person people thought would ever amount to much. Scholarship kid at a private academy, sure, but no amount of high marks can get someone with my personality a job.”

“I like your personality.”

“You should’ve seen me at thirteen.” He chuckles. “Anyhow, I was given a rather amazing opportunity. A private investigator who was looking into something at my school met me, and he thought I had potential, whatever that meant. So he offered me an apprenticeship.”

“Well, what that means, Nemesis, is that he thought you were smart.”

“Not really. I mean, I reckon I am smart, seeing as I had top marks in my grade, but I don’t know that I’m actually very well-suited to this job in particular. I just...you know, I thought it’d be better than school.”

Percy shakes his head. “I don’t know, actually. School was pretty alright for me. I was actually valedictorian of my class. If it weren’t for the Sun, I’d’ve probably gone to university of some sort.”

“Well, let me just tell you that your experiences in that regard are not universal,” Nemesis says, before continuing. “Regardless, that whole potential thing, it never really fully set in that this adult actually thought highly of me. And at some point, I told him that.”

Percy looks blankly at Nemesis. If he had to guess, he doesn’t really understand where this is going. “So what did he say?”

“He said I was an idiot. Said he’d invested way too much in me to have been lying, and besides that, what’s the point of lying to a miserable teenager? I reckon I didn’t totally believe him even after that, just because of who I am as a person, but it sort of snapped me out of the mindset.” He looks seriously at Percy. “If you’re worried about people feeling obliged to be nice, I assure you that I have no such obligation, and I am rude constantly and to just about everyone. The fact that I think you’re pretty sharp has to mean something.”

“I...I think you’re right, yeah. I never...thought about it that way.” He nods. “Sorry for making this about myself, when you have things to be doing. But thank you. I agree. I think...neither you nor Ms. Alhazred seem like the type to lie to me, especially not about that.”

“Right. Khalida Alhazred. You two are close?” Khalida Alhazred...the editor of the Electric Sun, a known member of the Correspondents’ League - the one who Burke had said was at the heart of the original organization falling to pieces. A curious figure indeed.

“Yeah, we are. At least, I hope we are? I like to think I’m one of her favorite employees.” Percy brightens. “She’s my boss, and she’s the person who got me my job. She’s really stern, but she seems to genuinely think I have potential. I look up to her a lot, really.”

“It’s only natural to look up to one’s employer.” The way Percy describes Khalida Alhazred, he thinks, sounds eerily similar to how he would describe one Arthur Jones.

“I agree. But, for the record, I admire you too. Not just for your honesty.”

“Er...thanks?”

Percy grins. “I admire you. That’s why you’re my rival. But I’ve been keeping you way too long. Go and investigate, will you?”

“Will do.” He stands up, before looking back at Percy. “We really have to find a convenient way of communicating while doing things like this. Coming back to your table each time isn’t unfeasible, but in a different circumstance…”

“You’re totally right,” Percy agrees. “I’ll look into getting some walky-talkies or something. That’d be neat, right?”

Nemesis laughs. “I reckon it will be. I’ll be seeing you, then.”

Percy salutes. “Good luck, partner.”

It isn’t until Nemesis is a good bit away from the table that he realizes what the end of this conversation signifies. No more excuses, he has to find Elias.

The first place he looks are the galleries themselves. Currently, almost the entire guest body is crammed into Kitty Blair’s as she gives a presentation. From what he can see through the shoulders and elbows and fashionably massive hats, her sculptures look interesting enough, but what he can see is precious little.

Instead, he squeezes through the crowds and into the next gallery over. When he sees its contents, he has to keep himself from gasping, but even then, he feels almost as if he’s been punched.

The late Elizabeth Calloway’s beautiful clockwork sculptures line the room. A city street, rendered in wrought-iron and steel scraps, shades of gray giving it a depth which one shouldn’t be able to expect from metal. It’s welded together in places, and attached less seamlessly in others. In the windows of each house, she’s put small lights, glowing brightly against the black-painted walls and ceiling. It’s a perfect recreation of an Omen street at night, and it’s beautiful.

In the street, she’s modeled carriages and automobiles that come to his ankle, and countless tiny metal people, making their way along the sidewalk. Each of them is painstakingly modeled - if he looks closer, he can see tiny faces, carefully burnt in. Artifice can do such amazing things. Sometimes, he really wishes he could do things like that.

But there’s no time for bemoaning the fate which hand has dealt him. He’s lucky to have the room alone to himself, but there’s no doubt that he won’t for long. Someone will mill in, and he’s best served getting all of his investigation done before that happens.

He procures the kinetoscope from his bag, having pre-loaded it with the eye-disc he’d taken from the statue at Calloway’s. He knows how these things tend to go - one clue leads to another. And indeed, he immediately sees movement, the people in the streets hurrying along towards their fictional destinations, the automobiles and carriages rolling along on their tiny wheels, immaculately sculpted, every individual spoke of every individual wheel in perfect place.

Slowly, they congregate at the center of the street, looking up at Nemesis with their tiny sculpted faces. There’s something so eerie about it, the soulless masses staring for him like Reverenti praying to their Divine, like travelers looking desperately to the stars.

And then they arrange themselves, one by one, into the shape of words. The individual people spell out, in massive letters, ‘HUGO’.

Hugo...Hugo Callahan, of course. There must be something hidden in his painting. Elizabeth and Hugo are - were, in her case - both assuredly involved with the Benefactors. They could easily have coordinated their messages to lead to one another.

He begins to lower the kinetoscope, but he stops before it can fully leave his field of view. In the very corner of the street, three tiny modeled people are isolated, standing together by the door to a building.

The building, he thinks, looks strangely like Calloway’s. In fact, the closer he looks, the more uncanny the resemblance is. And, upon reflection, there’s almost no chance it’s uncanny at all. The street which Elizabeth Calloway recreated wasn’t just any street, but the street on which her family lived.

He remembers the window in her room, covered by thick cloth like a funeral shroud. When she wasn’t working in darkness, he wonders if she would open the window and look out at this very street. After all, she would have had a perfect view.

And the people gathered by the door, he realizes, aren’t just people, either. He recognizes Elizabeth’s curly hair, Ophelia’s unsteady leaning on her husband’s shoulder. The three Calloways look up at the door of their home, together. On their iron faces, smiles are painted. There’s an unsettling glow pouring out from Elizabeth’s eyes.

Nemesis can’t tear his gaze away. Lizzie Calloway’s last memory of her happy family, preserved forever. It feels almost out-of-bounds for him. Another family’s life, torn apart, and here he is, looking at the remnants.

He hopes this is what Lizzy would have wanted. At least her final exhibition, her magnum opus by process of elimination, has this little tribute nested in it. A reminder of the happy life he’s sure she had, before it all came to a screeching halt.

As far as swan-songs go, he’s seen worse.

He lowers the kinetoscope, stows it in his bag again, but he can’t tear his eyes away from the sculpture itself. The corpse of Elizabeth Calloway is still stored in the freezer in Aleister Burke’s office, but her final memory is here, displayed for the world to marvel at.

It’s so strange, to look at a work of art and think about the fact that its creator is dead. It reminds Nemesis when he, far younger, would look at the newspaper clipping proclaiming his parents’ death, day in and day out, damn the consequences. It had boggled his mind, then, to think that those words were about people who were no longer alive.

Their memories faded with time. Elizabeth Calloway’s will as well. It’s only a matter of time. He can only do his part. He tips his cap to her final masterwork.

“May your memory be a blessing, Elizabeth Calloway.” He can’t stop himself from speaking aloud, but it’s in hushed whisper. It seems only appropriate. He is in a museum, after all.

The statue doesn’t respond, and Nemesis is mired in the deathly silence of the room.

He had been hoping the room housing Hugo Callahan’s works would be similarly empty, but he’s sadly and predictably disappointed. The room isn’t packed like Blair’s is, but it’s got a scattered number of people in it.

Of all the rooms in the Cabinet, this one is the simplest. A simple white-painted room, with paintings hanging on the walls, each with a tiny plaque next to them with the name and medium listed. Most of the paintings are either landscapes or still lifes, but none of them are content to simply recreate reality. Each of them has some sort of distortion to it, whether it be with the shapes or the colors, something not quite right.

He looks immediately to his left, at a garishly colored picture of horribly blurry fruit, painted with expert technique. The plaque beside it proclaims it to be “Fruit, 50x50, Oil on canvas”.

Well, that’s certainly one way to name a painting.

The space devoted to Callahan’s work is far larger than that given to Calloway’s. There are multiple rooms, connected by hallways, and it’s large enough that there’s even a small space in one of the hallways with a nice armchair and window, in case anyone wants to rest in the middle of their trip through the gallery.

He looks out the window. It’s cracked open, just barely, to let the cool air in. Outside, the dark gray evening sky greets him. Below the window, he sees the roof of the next building over, a solid fifteen feet below. The air is refreshing, and the wind is mostly blocked by the windowsill, but there’s just enough of it to lightly bounce his hair.

Enough of that. He traverses the rest of the hallway, finding his way to the end of the gallery. There, on the very center of the farthest wall, a single painting, composed in shades of blue, hangs. It’s rather small for a magnum opus, perhaps one foot by two, but the golden frame it’s in looks expensive and heavy. It’s clearly important, judging by the fact that it’s surrounded in a glass display case - the only painting to be given this treatment. Nemesis can’t imagine how expensive a work of art needs to be to get that treatment.

Standing beside it, Gilbert Banks’s arms are crossed. When he sees Nemesis enter, he looks up. Nemesis figures he’s probably been here for a while, doing absolutely nothing, waiting for guests to arrive.

“Hello,” he says pleasantly, crossing the room and leaning towards the painting so he can get a proper look at it.

With gorgeous and miniscule brushstrokes, Hugo Callahan has painted out a vision of the Omen skyline. In particular, he’s painted the area surrounding Catacumba. With such a tiny canvas, the amount of detail he’s painted in is impressive - though the vast majority of the image is taken up by Catacumba itself, rendered in a deep midnight blue, lighter shades of the color carve out an immaculate imitation of the surrounding area. He can only imagine Callahan has spent many hours observing it. In the sky, the clouds seem to almost form a face, zoomed in on the left eye.

“Ah...hello,” Banks responds. He seems distinctly awkward in person, not the sort of person one would expect to own a department store empire. “This is Hugo’s favorite work from the collection... “Shadows Over Catacumba”, oil on canvas.”

“It’s beautiful,” Nemesis says. “Really, he’s amazingly talented.”

“Hmm. Yes, well, he makes money, I suppose.”

Nemesis looks at Banks, and the man stares back. For once, no compass is required to tell that there’s something beneath the surface here.

“Where is he? Blair’s by her exhibit, shouldn’t he be by his?”

“Blair is giving a presentation. He’s got no reason to be here.”

“Then why are you here?”

Banks frowns. “Because I want to be. Is a teenager about to tell me I’m not allowed to loiter in the exhibit I sponsored?”

“I’m not about to tell you you’re not allowed to do anything. I’m just curious, is all.”

Banks’s face scrunches up. Nemesis isn’t sure if that look is annoyance or scrutiny. He must be coming off as rather rude, he supposes.

When Banks doesn’t say anything, Nemesis asks: “Is a businessman about to tell me I’m not allowed to be curious when it’s literally my job?”

“Your job?” Banks frowns, before muttering something completely unintelligible. “Right, Hugo’s just getting some air. It’s fine, don’t worry about it.”

“I wasn’t worried. Just curious.” He gestures to the painting. “Since he’s not around to answer questions, would you mind doing it for him?”

“W-Well,” he grumbles, “I could try, I think. But I’m not an artist, so if you ask me about his techniques I won’t be able to answer.”

“Of course. I don’t know anything about painting techniques either, so I’d have nothing to ask.” Nemesis grins, hoping he’s putting Banks at ease, even as he suspects that the man is hiding something. Is he a society agent? Well, of course, he’s on the Board. But does he know who Nemesis is? Hugo Callahan is obviously a part of their plans, but where is he?

Abruptly, he’s hit with the realization that Banks is probably here for a very specific reason. He would have no incentive to loiter by this painting unless he was guarding it. There’s no doubt in Nemesis’s mind that this is what Elizabeth Calloway’s work was directing him to. And that means there’s probably no chance Banks will ever leave him alone with this painting.

“Well?” Banks is annoyed by his momentary silence, clearly. “Ask away.”

“Did he paint this at the actual location?” It seems a fairly simple first question.

“No, no. He took photographs for reference, mostly.”

“I see. That would make sense.” He struggles to think of more questions to ask. “Er...did he have any specific reasons for choosing the subjects that he did, or would he simply paint whatever he fancied?”

“Mostly whatever was on hand.”

“Hmm, I see,” he repeats.

Before he can think of a third question, he hears the sound of clicking heels behind him, and hears a familiar voice.

“Oh, goodness. So this is the last room...what a shame. I should have liked to see more.”

He turns around, barely managing to keep his face from displaying the anger he feels when he hears Lusitania Renwick’s voice. Thankfully, keeping him from managing anything except what he’s sure is a look of complete shock, Elias is standing next to her.

His eyes widen when he sees Nemesis, but he doesn’t say anything, remaining five or so steps behind her.

“Oh, my!” She walks through the door, looking calmly around her, and Elias takes the opportunity to lock eyes with Nemesis before dashing away in the other direction, so eerily silent that even Lusitania apparently doesn’t hear him.

Is he running from her? Is he running from Nemesis? There’s no way to tell, and Lusitania doesn’t even seem to so much as notice that he’s gone.

She does notice Nemesis, however, turning to him with an expression that reeks of disgust. Normally, he would be offended, but he can’t find it in himself to even remotely care what she thinks of him.

“You again,” she says. She seems to note Banks’s presence, though, because she mitigates the clear antagonism of her statement by adding: “are you enjoying the exhibit?”

“It’s nice, aye. I’m just on my way out.”

“I see…” She nods. “Well, have a lovely day, Mr...James, was it?”

“Jones.” He looks at her, meaning to gauge her reaction as he says: “If you’ve not seen it yet, I rather recommend the Calloway exhibit. Stunning, it is.”

“I haven’t yet.” There it is, the tiny bit of strain in her voice that indicates that she’s certainly lying. “But thank you for the recommendation.”

“But of course. Good evening, Ms. Renwick.”

Once he’s past the door he walks briskly, surely alarming some of the more civilized patrons. But he doesn’t stop until he’s nearly out of the gallery, where he sees Elias leaning against the wall, arms crossed and remarkably long, stick-like legs folded.

And Elias, against all odds, smiles when he sees him, oddly suave. “Hello, Nemesis.”

“Ah...nice to see you, mate.”

Really, he’s not sure what he’s meant to say, though he certainly feels, for once, like the less stylish of the two.

Elias laughs, though it’s still quiet. “Follow me...mate.”

“Ah, can’t turn down a suggestion like that, can I?” Nemesis smiles.

Elias pats him on the shoulder. “Nah, you can’t.”

He leads Nemesis out of the gallery. For a moment, Nemesis is so caught up in the excitement of being this close to him again that he forgets why he’s here - that he’s a bad friend, and that he needs to help Elias, and that, try as he might to concoct a strategy, any strategy, he has no idea how to do so.