"Well," Henry began with a grudging level of weariness. "I'd reckon our work's cut out for us on this one."

Martin and Robb nodded grimly. While the rest of their little contingent of survivors got what rest they could, hunkered down in the remnants of some old commercial building, the three of them were saddled with an unenviable, yet totally necessary task.

Figuring out what their next course of action was going to bloody be.

"Understatement of the damn century, that," Martin mumbled in response to his words. "Because of her, our supply situation's gone from healthy to downright horrendous in a manner of minutes. Food and water will just barely last the whole trip, if we're smart about it and don't get bogged down anywhere. All our vehicles were in the garage. And don't even get me started on our equipment."

Henry sighed. "That bad?"

"Worse."

"Great…"

Somehow, it always came back to materiel for him. Or rather, a distinct lack of it. He was always scrounging for something or another, borrowing equipment from somebody else, or burning through reserves of it faster than he would have liked. The collapse of the Gentleman's Club had been the biggest windfall he'd ever known, both before and after the Witching Hours.

And now, he was back to square one. Worse, even, since he had more than thirty extra mouths to feed.

"Well, if there's one thing going for us," he mused, "We can rest easy knowing it's not going to be looted by anyone else any time soon."

Robb nodded, but with a look that implied he had more to add.

"For the perishables, that may be all well and good," he allowed, "But there's one rather important deadline that is still at the mercy of when she decides to pack up and leave."

"The radio transmission."

"Precisely."

Henry's copy, stationed at a window close enough to keep an ear to the conversation while he maintained vigil, stood perfectly still as he lazily observed the twilight outside.

The duplicate yawned. "She might move out before then, she might not. Do we really want to bet on possibilities, though?"

"Not really…" Henry gave the topic some thought, arriving at the conclusion his alternate likely already had reached.

"So you're thinking we should drag her away somehow? How on earth are we going to manage that?"

"Don't know just yet. We'll think of something, though."

Martin, who had been hoping for a direction to push in, pressed his lips into a thin line, visibly displeased with the non-answer.

"What?", Henry griped. "Cecil said he was looking for supplies and manpower, didn't he? One half of that request is shot for the moment, so let's address the other half and maybe get his assistance on the matter!"

Tension crackled in the air between them for a moment. It was mostly a product of their thought processes. Martin liked to have everything down on paper before committing to anything, while he himself understood just how flimsy that paper draft could be sometimes. Their ideas on 'staying flexible' didn't always see eye to eye, but the small bit of friction did often lead to a result that was a bit better.

For this reason, Martin let it slide, moving on to more productive topics.

"So, somewhere down the line, we need to sneak back into the GC headquarters and access the radio station. On top of everything else we were already planning to do. Am I forgetting anything?"

"Just anecdotal stuff, mostly," piped up Robb. "Both the Nobles and the Palatial Remnant are due for an influx of supply drops, and I believe Henry mentioned Walworth, too… tell me again, why'd you request they send stuff that way? Last I heard, it was in much the same state as Greenwich was."

Henry tensed, letting the question hang in the air just a fraction longer than would be considered normal. He'd been hoping that detail would go unnoticed.

Seemingly out of nowhere, he got cagey on the subject. "I've got a… friend… over that way. And she's got a bit of a group of her own. Wanderers, drifters, you know the type. Figured I'd throw them a bone since I had the chance."

"A friend?" Martin immediately jumped on the admission and pressed for more detail. "This isn't another Devil, is it? Last time you mentioned having a friend, it turned out to be Evelyn, after all. Mind giving us a little more to go off of than just that?"

Figured that that wouldn't slip past him. Martin wasn't stupid, just wasn't as up to date on the goings-on in the streets as he was. Though he was admittedly a bit better informed than most other survivors. Honestly, that was a real feat considering this group had been locked away from the world at large for a rather considerable amount of time. You'd think that'd make them all below-average informed in general.

The shrinking gap was mostly thanks to sharing his own knowledge in passing. A lot of his spare time had gone into giving others the crash courses on the lay of the land. Valuable stuff, if they were going to reach Kensington without issues.

All of this to say, it was unlike him to withhold information. Henry gave them something to work with.

"No, just a fellow Greenwich survivor from the second Witching Hour. Doesn't get out much, nowadays, but that's pretty normal for most people. I'd still be willing to trust my life with her lot if it came to it. Done it once before, actually."

Martin waited for him to continue, but realized Henry would speak no more on the subject. He frowned, clearly puzzled but willing to let it rest for the moment.

"Walworth does make for a pretty decent rest stop on the route we planned out…" he fished out a worn-out travel map of the city, covered in hastily scrawled ballpoint pen markings that denoted the new territories that had been carved out of the city. "If they're getting more supplies, too, then we might be able to mooch a bit off of them. That would solve some of the strain, but not all of it."

"Well, if we need to be absolutely certain, why don't we swing by Hackney as well and see if the Nobles will trade with us?", Robb suggested. "It's a slight detour from what we planned, but if we're going to be in dire straits otherwise, shouldn't we take the opportunity to get ahead of it?"

Henry grimaced, conceding that there was a good point being made, but still tilting his head back and forth like he was on the fence.

"A bit of a gamble, but… not out of the realm of possibility. If we deal exclusively with the more mercenary groups on the outskirts and steer clear of any sign of Knights. They won't have much, will likely up-charge the shit out of us for what they do have, and to top it all off we'll need something to offer in the first place. Unless you feel like getting press-ganged so the rest of us can get a bit of extra jerky for the day."

"They do that?"

"And worse, sometimes. They're just typically more clandestine about it than the Gentleman's Club are."

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"...Well, damn."

Robb got lost in thought, trying to come up with something that they could possibly trade in exchange. The damp night air blew through the moldy screen mesh of the open windows, chilling the air but not quite forcefully enough to make anybody shiver. The fluorescent glow from the disposable light talisman they'd cracked at the beginning of this emergency session began to flicker, prompting Henry to prepare a fresh one while the other two weighed what their group had to offer.

The former radio host was the first to speak up.

"That artifact, maybe…?"

"Absolutely not," Henry declared.

"Well, why not? It's not like we have anything else that could be valuable enough."

"The Knights already regularly kidnap people to pad their ranks. How much worse do you think that'd get if they suddenly could pump out combat-level mages, to boot?"

"...Point taken."

Silence came back for a moment longer, before Martin threw his hat into the ring this time.

"Artifacts would be the best medium of trade we could make use of… that is, if we still had access to the Club's stash of 'em…"

His words trailed off, but they both understood where he was going with that train of thought. Any attempt to return to those overgrown buildings and the Dryad would read their movements like an open book. It was the same reason why they were steering clear of the webs covering the entirety of Westminster – you had to treat the whole area as hostile, because poking at any one point would alert the dangers lurking further in. Utter suicide.

As if finding a safe flat to crash in each night wasn't hard enough already. Now everyone had to cut out entire swathes of the city just to accommodate those few with the ability to claim territory.

Cavendish, for all his faults, at least was willing to share.

Though… hang on a minute…

"What if we could get more artifacts?"

The other two council members stared at him like he'd just grown a second head.

"Are you crazy?!", Martin whisper-shouted. "Stuff like that doesn't exactly grow on trees, you know."

"It does… sometimes," Henry countered weakly. "Just depends on the curse, really."

"That's beside the point. You want us to willingly enter curse regions looking for those things? Do you take us for those crazy scavs looking to bet it all!?"

"The only one I've ever seen is the one you passed off for us to use," Robb added. "And, as cool as suddenly being a Night mage is, being able to sleep less doesn't suddenly give me better odds at coming out of a curse region alive."

"You'd be right," Henry openly admitted. "Usually those zones, while small, are guaranteed to be lethal. Unless… you had a good idea of what to expect going in."

He unzipped a small pouch on his belt, pulling from within a few folded up sheets of paper that he'd been keeping close track of since he'd gotten them. He went so far as to make sure his duplicates burned their own copies of the paper, the information on it was that important.

"If there was ever going to be a chance of getting enough low to mid-grade artifacts to trade for what we needed, you'd need an entire organization at your fingertips to map out exactly where those areas were, and what rules bound them. As well as a willingness to sacrifice a fair share of low-level flunkies every so often."

He unfolded Guillaume's list of unclaimed artifacts, and laid it out on top of the map in front of them.

"It'd be a damn shame if we didn't make those lives lost worth at least something. So, I say, let's figure out which of these areas seem like they couldn't do too much harm checking out."

The other two gawked at the sudden treasure trove of information laid out before them. Surprisingly, Robb was the first to react. He retrieved a pen from his pocket, and began converting their travel map into a treasure map.

He'd been an odd pick for a leadership position, alright, but it was things like this that made him worth keeping around.

< -|- -|- >

"Well, it's not perfect, but I see no reason as to not go with this course of action. Shall I let the rest of them know?"

"Go right ahead. It's your idea, mostly."

It was what passed for morning in Hallow London. Naturally, permanent night made it rather easy to rest on an as-needed basis, but most everyone he'd met generally agreed that they preferred treating the hours like nothing had really changed. Currently, it was about 8 AM, and the rest of the mages were beginning to gather their things for the big move they expected to be partaking in in short order.

Henry cleared his throat. It was a bit funny, really. One-on-one conversations came to him almost naturally. He could talk all day, if he really wanted to.

But addressing a crowd of a few dozen?

For some reason, it was just as nerve-wracking for him as being completely alone was. His throat felt like it constantly wanted to squeeze shut.

"Right, um, hello, may I have everyone's attention?"

Oh, God. They're all looking at me now.

The murmurs of the crowd simmered down, all eyes being drawn to him for whatever speech he had in mind. Nothing to do now but soldier on, he supposed.

"Thank you. Ehm, so, hopefully, everyone's ready to do some leg work in the coming days, because… well…"

He took a deep breath out, trying to calm his anxiety before it got out of control. "There's about to be a lot going on all at once, though with any luck we'll be reaching our destination ahead of schedule. Well, ahead of the schedule luck's enforcing on us, at least… we'll probably take a few days extra to get there, on account of not having vehicles to work with…"

"Can you get to the point?", one of the more grumpy mages in the back muttered.

Henry winced. "Sorry, sorry… anyways, um… here's what's going to happen."

He cleared his throat again, sparing a discreet glance towards Martin, who was observing from the sidelines while he clearly struggled to deliver his prepared speech. Stone faced, the head mage waited for him to deliver his words, clearly intent on maintaining the sink-or-swim environment.

It was bitter tasting medicine, but Henry understood why he was doing it. He needed to learn this sort of thing, too, after all.

"First order of business, is we have a few errands to run. I know most of you aren't too familiar with curse regions-"

"We're going into a curse region?!"

The objection brought with it an undertone of panic. Henry held up his hands, motioning for everyone to calm themselves.

"Let me finish, okay? We're going near a curse region. I'm the only one who's definitely going in, though anyone crazy enough to volunteer is more than welcome to tag along. It's not any of the really bad ones like the Museum had, but it's enough that you'd need to stay on your toes if you decide to."

"But why?", another face in the crowd asked. "Shouldn't we just be hurrying our way to Kensington as fast as possible?"

"Our supplies will last for now, but will only get us there if we're lucky. We need to resupply long before that, and our best bet there is going to be Hackney."

"Then what-"

"No, I'm not finished yet. For them to help us, we need something worth giving them that isn't our lives. So, the plan is we spend at least a day or two in the area on this side of the river, snag a few unclaimed artifacts that won't be missed, then trade them off for what we need before heading out over the river to Walworth before finally heading upriver and back across to link up with the Remnant. It's a bit circuitous, but that way we aren't risking it with the Mad Prince or starvation. Understand?"

He rushed through his explanation a bit, slightly perturbed and trying to get his words out as quick as possible before someone interrupted him again. It felt a bit antithetical to his normal mode of talking. Usually, he was there to have a back-and-forth style conversation, not dump everything he had to say all at once. Not to mention maintaining a level of politeness when addressing the other person. He was a bit worried that that would leave him open to further questioning, but in practice…

It seemed like everyone followed, surprisingly. More shocking was the response he got from the members of the crowd that hadn't been outright detractors in the very beginning.

"Well, that makes more sense, actually…"

"I was wondering how we were going to manage with what we had… I'm already down to my last few cans of food…"

"Shit, you still have spare cans? I might actually sign up to tag along into that curse zone, depending on what it does…"

"Really!? Are you crazy, man?"

"Hey, we're the ones who suddenly have a lot more magic to play around with. How else are we supposed to figure out what's possible, now? Plus, I'm hungry."

They were… actively discussing the course of action constructively. Trying to find their place in things, or suggest ways of smoothing things out before they hit any serious bumps. In a move that completely caught both Henry and his now sulking hecklers off guard. There was a feeling in the air after his explanation that he never would have believed he could stir in a crowd like this.

Excitement.

Martin smiled, off to the side. Clearly, he knew something that Henry didn't.

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