The barge docked with a shudder that traveled through every timber, a final, weary sigh before the silence of the island absorbed it. The light that greeted them as they were shoved onto the pier was not the vibrant blue of the open sea, but a dull, pervasive grey, as if the world had been drained of pigment. Kamaten Island stretched before them—a monochrome nightmare of ash and pumice.
Everything was built on a scale that dwarfed them. The pier was not wood, but the same grey, porous stone as the island, worn smooth by countless heavy footsteps. The air was still and carried a faint, acrid tang of sulfur, undercut by something older and more metallic. In the distance, a relentless, whispering chorus filled the air: Chiku-taku. Chiku-taku. Chiku-taku. It was the sound of millions of rusted clock gears spinning on their poles, a maddening lullaby for the slumbering horror beneath their feet. The landscape was a barren plain of ash, broken only by towering, precarious stacks of massive, perfectly round boulders that gleamed dully under the grey sky. Looking at them too long made the mind rebel; their surface was wrong, not stony, but something organic and long-fossilized.
Their Ogre guard, a mountain of grim muscle, grunted and prodded them forward with his cudgel. They marched past other labor crews—silent, hollow-eyed Ogres and a few human-shaped wretches, all moving with a slow, grinding rhythm. The guard led them to a structure that looked less like a building and more like a cavern carved into the base of a colossal bone-white cliff. A solid door of banded iron and petrified wood stood shut, flanked by two more Ogre sentries who watched with the impassive stillness of stones.
A nod from their escort. The sentries stepped aside, and with a grunt of effort, their guard hauled the door open just enough to shove the three new prisoners through. "Be ready to work at first bell!" he barked, his voice swallowed by the dense air. The door slammed shut behind them with a final, echoing thud that felt like a tomb sealing.
Vesta stumbled, her chains clattering. She caught her balance and her head tilted back, her jaw going slack. "Holy…" she breathed, the word barely a whisper.
The chamber was an Ogre-sized barracks cell, meaning its ceiling was lost in shadow high above. Bunks were carved directly into the living rock of the wall, each one a shelf large enough to hold a giant. A single, high slit window let in a miserly blade of the grey outside light. The air was cold and carried the scent of cold stone and unwashed bodies.
From the gloom near the far wall, a sharp, deliberate sound cut through the silence. "Ahem."
Vesta, Galit, and Atlas spun around.
Seated on a low stone bench with perfect, stiff posture was Charlie Leonard Wooley. His pith helmet was miraculously still in place, his khakis were filthy but intact, and his wire-framed glasses gleamed in the dim light. He looked like a professor who had accidentally wandered into a dungeon. "I must say," he began, his voice echoing with academic pomp, "this is an unexpected, though statistically predictable given the Genroshi's consolidative prisoner policies, surprise."
There was a blur of movement from one of the upper bunks. Ember dropped down, landing in a silent crouch. Her neon-pink space buns were askew, her mismatched eyes wide and glinting. She didn't speak, just watched them with the intensity of a feral cat, one hand absently stroking the charred ear of the plush rabbit at her waist.
A moment later, Aurélie Nakano Takeko descended not by jumping, but by stepping off the bunk ledge with a quiet grace, her silver hair a cascade in the shadows. She landed without a sound, her minimalist black attire making her seem like a piece of the darkness given form. Her steel-gray eyes scanned them, lingering on Atlas's pained stance and Galit's assessing gaze.
Vesta's fear evaporated in a burst of sheer, disbelieving joy. A grin split her face. "I can't believe you're here!" she squealed, the sound absurdly bright in the grim cell. Forgetting her chains, she shuffled forward as fast as the heavy links allowed, throwing her arms around Aurélie in a clumsy, heartfelt hug, then bouncing over to Ember, who stiffened but didn't pull away.
Atlas and Galit shared a look—a raised eyebrow from Galit, a pained smirk from Atlas. They closed the distance with more measured steps, the chains around their ankles scraping the stone floor. "Fancy meeting you in a place like this," Galit said, his voice dry. "The décor is… oppressive."
Aurélie gently extricated herself from Vesta's embrace, her expression unreadable. "Your arrival accelerates the timeline," she stated, her voice low and calm. "I suspect you have much to tell."
Galit nodded, his long neck twisting as he glanced at the solid door. "Yeah. A real fun story. Involves a Sovereign who hits like a tsunami, a ruined temple, and a complete and utter tactical failure. The short version: Marya's mission to get us failed. We're all she caught. Don't know where the others are."
The news landed in the cold air like a stone. Ember flinched, her fingers digging into the plush rabbit. Aurélie's eyes narrowed slightly, the only sign of her concern.
"Ahem." Charlie cleared his throat again, the sound a punctuation mark in the heavy silence. He adjusted his glasses, a beam of grey light catching the lenses. "While your narrative of woe is no doubt gripping," he said, a hint of his old, insufferable superiority creeping back in, "as do we. And you will be happy to know, despite our admittedly suboptimal circumstances, that we have formulated a plan."
All eyes turned to him. The pedantic archaeologist, surrounded by warriors, assassins, and a pyromaniac, sat with his spine straight, a flicker of something that wasn't fear in his eyes—it was the fierce, stubborn light of academic resolve. In this grey hell, the man with no fighting skills and a satchel full of notes had become the bearer of their only hope.
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