“I believe we are slowing down.” Said OC-1,

“I think you're right.” Rook agreed.

Both men crouched behind some crates, which were stacked three high. The train came to a stop, the door opened, and a forklift started emptying the freight car. As soon as it was gone, Rook climbed on the crates, slithered over them like a snake to the door and checked if the coast was clear. Evidently it was, as he slipped out without delay. Moments later, another forklift came and went, and OC-1 crawled (feeling a lot more awkward than Rook looked) over the crates to the door. It was an abandoned platform, pitch-black except for the running lights and several dozen flashlights wandering around. OC-1 easily slipped across to take cover behind a rusted old freight trolley. It would have been nigh impossible to find Rook except for the fact that he could see in infrared.

“Ah, there you are...” Whispered Rook; he whisked away and dived behind a pile of crates that had been unloaded already, OC-1 following suit. It took quick wits to keep up to this old detective, the cyborg reflected.

“What is it?”

“Sh!”

Two men stopped in front of the crates. One wore the black armband with a red spider-wolf of the Red Wolves. The other looked like a train engineer.

“That's the last shipment for you.” Said the latter. It was a somewhat awkward conversation: since they were both wearing headlamps they had to make eye contact without facing each other directly to avoid blinding anyone.

“Excellent.” Nodded the Red Wolf, “We have your payment up in our office.” He waved a hand at a window one floor up that overlooked the platform, “With a small bonus for a job well done—and as a gesture of goodwill for a continuing partnership.”

“Oh? I thought you people weren't into that sort of thing. Profit and all that.”

“We aren't. But we're pragmatic enough to speak the language of business when we have to.”

“Well, in that case, it's been a pleasure doing business with you.” The engineer held out his hand.

“The pleasure's all yours.” Smiled the Red Wolf in return, shaking the hand, “We're in this for The People.” The capitalisation was evident in his tone of voice.

As they were talking, Rook took out a camera and was taking pictures—with the screen, flash, and all other lights turned off, naturally. The quality would be horrible in this lighting, but it would have to do. Once he had pictures of everything in sight, he put the camera in his coat's inside pocket.

Meanwhile, the Red Wolf led the engineer down a dimly-lit hallway and through a door. Following, Rook and OC-1 found a short stairwell with a door at the top.

“Get under the stairs, I'll find out what they're saying.” OC-1 said in a quiet but authoritative voice;

“Hey, this is my case!”

“I'm a cyborg, I can hear through doors better than you.” Replied OC-1, already taking the stairs two at a time. At the top, he put his ear to the door:

“You'll find it's all there.” He heard the Red Wolf say,

“You'll excuse me if I count it to be sure.” Came the engineer's voice. Silence for some time. “It's all here alright, and a very generous tip. Well, I think my people are almost done, so again, it's been a pleasure.” Finished the engineer finally. A short pause, then footsteps toward the door.

OC-1 launched himself over the railing, hanging from it for a second to stop his momentum before dropping lightly to the floor and diving behind the stairs with Rook just in time. As soon as the Red Wolf and engineer were gone, they went into the office.

“What are you expecting to find in here?” Asked OC-1 quietly when the door was closed.

“I don't know what kind of records they keep, but if they keep any they're bound to be in here.” They spent several minutes rummaging through the squeaky old filing cabinets. The office light was off, but OC-1's enhancements amplified the light coming in the window. He had no idea how Rook could see his hand in front of his face, but they had soon compiled a stack of papers.

“Looks like import/export records.” OC-1 remarked, flipping through the pages,

“It's way better than I was hoping for. I figured any operation this big was going to need to keep records of some kind, but I wasn't expecting to stumble across their main file storage. I suppose it is safer to keep them out here in the middle of nowhere than in their headquarters in Utopia.” Rook took off his coat, wrapped the stack in it, and tucked it under his arm, “Grab that map.” He waved at a map on the wall on which was marked what was presumably the route taken from the office they were in to the frontline staging areas where Red Wolves were waiting to launch the uprising.

Everything was going swimmingly until OC-1 opened the door back into the hallway. Directly across the hall was an open doorway with a Red Wolf frozen mid-step in it.

“What the—” The words froze in the Red Wolf's throat as OC-1 drew his tunnel gun and blasted the man away where he stood. The gunshot—and the scream—set off a round of frenzied shouting on the platform and OC-1 and Rook bolted. Rook fiddled with a flashlight as they ran into the dark, bullets whizzing past their ears, but OC-1 said,

“Don't bother with that—it'll draw attention to us.”

“Yeah, but we still need to see!”

“Don't worry about it.” the cyborg grabbed Rook's wrist and led him through the black corridor. “I've got a flashlight that shines outside the spectrum they can see.”

“You better not be screwing with me!”

Following the map in his other hand, OC-1 ran down the corridor, taking turns as needed, the sounds of hot pursuit just behind them. Probably, the Red Wolves would have gunned them down by now had he turned his light on, Rook thought. Suddenly, OC-1 halted.

“What's wrong?”

“There's supposed to be a bridge here.”

Rook flicked his light on. To the right and left the darkness was impenetrable. In front of them was a natural ravine fifty feet across and so deep he couldn't see the bottom with his puny light, though he could hear the distant gurgling of a creek.

“We'll have to turn back. Is there another way?”

“No, this is the fastest route to Skarn station, which is practically a suburb of Ragnarok.” OC-1 looked up. The only part of the bridge left was a rickety spindle of metal less than a foot wide that extended across the chasm to the other side. Rook saw him eyeing it.

“No. There's no way—”

“There is no other way. They are right behind us, in case you did not notice.” OC-1 grabbed Rook, one arm supporting his back and the other under his knees. “Now turn off that flashlight.”

“I'm too old for this.” Rook complied and gulped. Given a choice between probable death and slightly less probable death...

“It's not so bad. I have electromagnets in my feet. We won't fall off.”

Not entirely what Rook was referring to. The metal was liable to break when they reached the middle. Besides, people tend to think wind doesn't happen underground. This is not true. Air moves when something prompts it to. According to the map, the train had taken them close to Ragnarok. Every time the big hermetic doors opened and closed the air flowed, and apparently flowed right into this ravine.

The spindle OC-1 was walking on swayed. To describe the feeling as terrifying would be an injustice. Even if the cyborg was practically glued to it, Rook could still fall if OC-1 lost his balance. Wind whistled loudly, chillingly, down the passage, causing the spindle to sway even more. It swayed and creaked with every step under the weight of two grown men. OC-1 rode it like a horse—he followed its movements, his joints swaying fluidly as the spindle swayed, leaning his hips into the movement, his shoulders against it to keep from losing his balance. All of this, and Rook couldn't see a thing.

After what felt like eternity had passed, Rook felt himself be laid on the ground and heard OC-1 slump down next to him.

“I... I just need to lay down for a while...” The cyborg muttered weakly.

“Yeah... me too.” Agreed the detective. He turned his head and saw lights flashing around on the other side. The Red Wolves couldn't see them lying down from this distance, but they had just barely escaped ahead of them.

* * *

“Where are they heading?” Asked Comrade Colonel,

“To the basement, with backpacks.” Kharlyria answered; she was not present, as the holographic projector was not in the armoury, but her voice spoke over the PA system. “I suspect they're trying to blow up the tower's foundation. My security currently have the ones in the lobby pinned down, but I don't have anyone to send to the basement.”

“Great. Any bomb experts in the building?”

“No. They don't let me test explosives inside the station.”

“Kyanite, you're coming with us!”

“Me? But I'm a mechanic, not a fighter!”

“Exactly, if we need someone to diffuse any bombs, you're it.”

“I'm not that kind of mechanic!”

“You'll have a better chance than anyone else here.” He tossed her a security vest and a submachine gun. “What about you, doc? You up for it?” the Colonel asked Travertine,

“With commies like you always popping out of some hole to attack the hospital, I got much better acquainted with guns than I would've liked during the war.”

“That's the spirit, comrade!” Comrade Sergeant grinned, “Now remember, we're down one member, so Comrade Doctor's kills count for our team.” He informed the Tunnel Dogs in no uncertain terms;

“This isn't a competition!” Snapped Immortal;

“Don't be so dour and take some time to enjoy life!”

Immortal growled as the group left the armoury, splitting up to go down in separate elevators. Power from outside the building had also been cut, but the elevators along with the lights were running on auxiliary power.

As the doors closed, Kyanite felt a strange sensation from somewhere in her chest. Running through the wolf-infested mine, she hadn't had time to think about the danger. This was the first time she'd ever have people shooting at her.

“Comrade Kyanite.” The Sergeant said, taking notice of her trepidation, “Keep your head down, stay behind cover, and leave the fighting to the professionals, and you might make it through this.”

As soon as the doors were open, the Comrades were out, taking positions behind the pillars near the elevator bank. The basement consisted of one big room filled with evenly-spaced pillars bearing the weight of the tower. Immortal and his zene, along with Travertine, poured out of their elevator to the right. Almost immediately, they all came under fire from several directions. It was abrasively loud, the sound bouncing off the pillars to assault Kyanite's ears repeatedly from everywhere at once.

“Listen up!” Comrade Colonel shouted, “The elevators are at six o'clock, where are we taking fire from?”

“Eighty-thirty!” “Eleven o'clock!” Came the answers,

“Sergeant, Mad Dog, and Nationalist take eight-thirty, Anarchist and Den Mother, we'll take eleven o'clock!”

“Yes, Comrade!”

Meanwhile, the Tunnel Dogs were dealing with their own problems. For her part, Kyanite could do little but stand behind a pillar next to Comrade Sergeant. The noise of the gunfire, the whizzing of bullets going past, the geysers of concrete chips as bullets buried themselves in a pillar... adrenaline coursed through her body as she struggled to maintain control of her breathing.

“Come on Comrade Kyanite, bullets are only dangerous if they hit you.” The Sergeant said in a soothing voice entirely incongruent with the current situation.

“Reassuring as always, Sergeant.” Replied Kyanite, trying to be witty,

“That's Comrade Sergeant, we've been over this.”

There was no point being here and just standing around, Kyanite decided. This wasn't the first life-threatening situation she'd been in in the past two days. Leaning slightly around her side of the pillar, she fired a rather uncontrolled spray in the general direction of eight-thirty.

“That's the spirit! Now aim a little better next time, and you just might contribute something.”

She tried. Couldn't say if she was hitting anything, but she shot at anything that moved and shot at her.

A thunderous boom assaulted Kyanite's ears, the shockwave jarring her brain and shaking the floor under her feet; her knees almost buckled and she was left confused and slightly dazed.

“Dammit!” Comrade Colonel cursed loudly, “The bomb at eleven o'clock just went off! They didn't even try to get outside the blast radius! These fuckers ain't fucking around!”

“Advance!” Comrade Sergeant ordered;

“Don't be reckless!” Shouted the Colonel, but the Sergeant ran ahead to the next pillar anyway, shortly followed by Mad Dog and Nationalist.

“Cover us!” Comrade Sergeant called back;

“Fuck it, cover them!”

Providing covering fire, Kyanite caught glimpses of the three Comrades as they moved from pillar to pillar, rapidly closing the distance between them and the Red Wolves. One bomb going was a serious problem for the tower's structural integrity. Another one could start the basement collapsing, if it didn't start the whole tower collapsing. The area around the first bomb had already partially caved in. Still, it was an incredible risk charging the Red Wolves like a madman. Like a wildman, even.

Kyanite counted three Red Wolves shooting at them, and assumed there was at least one more setting up the bomb. One was down already, a second went down to a burst from Anarchist. As Kyanite leaned around the pillar to let off another burst, she saw Comrade Sergeant go down. Moments later, the third terrorist went down as Mad Dog and Nationalist stormed their position.

“Medic!” Kyanite shouted toward the Tunnel Dogs and Travertine. However, as she did so, she saw a Red Wolf in the mid-distance on the other side of the Tunnel Dogs. He opened fire: the bullets missed the Tunnel Dogs, but Kyanite realised too late she was directly in their path. Two hit the armoured security vest she was wearing; one entered her arm, one the shoulder, and one the head.

* * *

They'd taken a few casualties, but the basement was secure.

“Your plan to destroy the tower's foundation has failed.” Kharlyria told the remaining Red Wolves holed up in the lobby; “You can hear the sirens coming—the gunfire told them you're here. Surrender now, your cause is lost.”

“Red Wolves drink zene blood!” Was the only response.

Comrade Colonel, Immortal, and their remaining men were waiting around the corner.

“A direct assault will rack up more casualties. We could just wait for the police to get here.” Said Immortal;

“We've got wounded and that doctor of yours said he doesn't have the medical equipment he needs to treat them properly. We gotta take them out now.” The Colonel replied,

“I don't intend to lose any more men today.”

“Maybe we don't have to. I have an idea.” Comrade Colonel grinned; “Kharlyria, where's that walking frog-thing Kyanite brought with her?”

The frog walked out into the lobby. On the camera-on-a-stick poking around the corner, Immortal and the Colonel could see the terrorists staring at it. Their blank expressions were evident despite the masks covering their faces. One, seemingly the leader, raised his SMG and shot the frog. At that moment—with everyone still staring at the strange contraption—the flashbang went off, blinding and deafening the Red Wolves. A split second later, the lobby was crawling with Comrades, Tunnel Dogs, and security guards taking weapons away from the terrorists and cuffing them.

* * *

Rook put the phone back on the hook.

“They didn't miss the call, the line's just dead. Huh.” He remarked, scratching his head under his fedora.

“This has not happened before?” Asked OC-1;

“No. They must be having some kind of problems with the phones. We should get over there as soon as possible, I don't wanna sit on these documents any longer than I have to.” He finished by shifting the documents, still wrapped in his overcoat, from one arm to the other.

One train ride and a short walk later, the two were greeted by a rather unexpected sight. The entrance to Labyrintelligence Tower was surrounded by police cordons with stern-looking zene officers glowering at passers-by, arms crossed and their heads and eyes at a perfect ninety degree angle.

“Excuse me officer, but what has happened here?” OC-1 asked one of them.

The officer appeared somewhat taken aback at the appearance of a cyborg, and at the fact that it spoke the zene language, but quickly recovered: “There's been a terrorist attack.” He replied,

“What?!” Exclaimed Rook; “Is the CEO still operational?”

“I'm not at liberty to discuss the details of an ongoing case, sir.”

“Look, who's in charge here?”

“Lieutenant Bluescales.”

“I know him, I used to work with the man. Tell him Rook Pearlfolk is here, and that I have evidence he'll want to see.”

“Evidence? What kind of evidence, and how can you be sure it's related to this case?”

“Just go get Bluescales.”

“Alright, fine. I'll be back in a minute.” The officer went inside and returned shortly. “He wants to see you. He's in the conference room at the top of the tower speaking to the CEO.” The officer held the cordon line up so the two could walk under.

“Thank you.” Rook said, and they went inside. Bodies were still scattered on the floor, which was smeared with their blood. Police were wandering around taking pictures, but seemed to be mostly done with that phase of the investigation.

On the top floor, they found Kharlyria and Bluescales in the guest suite next to the conference room.

“Ah, Rook! So good to see you again!” Kharlyria greeted as they came in,

“Hello Kharlyria, Bluescales.”

“OC-1, I take it?” Kharlyria asked the cyborg,

“Yes. If you know who I am, my friends must have been here, but,” he looked around the room, “where are they?”

“Ah. Well, they all had things to do. Travertine had to go tell a hardware store mechanic that he'd found you. Immortal said something about going back to his company's headquarters and tell them to recall the armoured train they sent out to look for him. Kyanite was wounded and was taken to a hospital.”

OC-1 was going to ask about the Comrades, but then thought better of it. They were wanted criminals, after all, and they probably didn't want their name to be floated in front of a police lieutenant.

“Is that the evidence?” Bluescales asked, pointing at the bundle under Rook's arm;

“Yes.” Rook dumped the bundle on the table and unwrapped it. “Documents detailing the delivery of weapons from Dawnseeker Arsenal to Red Wolves in various parts of the warrens around Ragnarok in preparation for the uprising.”

“Amazing!” Bluescales breathed; “Where'd you get these?”

“I... well, we did a bit of spelunking.” Replied Rook with a sideways glance at OC-1, “Found them in a facility in some long-abandoned tunnels near here.”

“Yes, these will help build up our case nicely.” Kharlyria nodded, looking over Bluescales' shoulder as he flipped through them. She straightened and addressed both of them; “Gentlemen, I have a plan, and having both your cooperation will make it easier to implement.” She paused to make sure she had their full attention while OC-1 felt like a fly on the wall. “As I was telling the others before the Red Wolves interrupted us, the date for the final negotiation of the peace treaty is fast approaching. You're both old enough to remember the Line War.”

“We're both old enough to remember both Line Wars.” Rook muttered;

“So no one knows better than you do how destructive they are. If only there were a way to have everyone realise they have more to gain by staying at peace than by going to war. Maybe even a way to put some distance between the powers to diffuse tensions. A buffer state, they call it...”