Xindii placed his jacket elegantly over the back of the chair which overlooked the two gurneys. This was where the Don would sit, overseeing the dangerous transition of living mind into coma induced Murk.

Pulling up the fine cotton of his shirt sleeves he pulled himself up onto the gurney opposite the still form of the Baroness.

'I still think you're mad,' the Don said lovingly.

'Well quite dear Tatterfox. That's been the problem all along. Madness if you live in it long enough becomes comfortable. Like a nice pair of shoes you don't want to give up. No matter how tatty they are.'

'I'll never understand your ways. But I respect that you live by them. This . . . this power you wield – Reverie. I can see why so many Mappers succumb to its gravity.'

'It's not like I had a choice.'

'You could have stayed in the army? Kept your power neutered.'

'It isn't so cut and dry. I was in the army. The army likes weapons!'

'What does that mean?'

The Mapper smiled. 'A story for another time.'

'Indeed?' The Don replied.

The Tatterfox reached over Xindii's forehead and placed some diodes to the left and right of his temple.

'You'll be alright, Tatterfox?'

'Me? Fine. I'll catch up on some reading. Some paperwork. Perhaps take a holiday myself.'

'I meant with this.'

'You are not the first friend I've said goodbye to, Xindii. Albeit the first who has committed an act of suicide.'

Xindii reached into his trouser pocket and produced a black felt box and handed it to the Don.

'You shouldn't have, Xindii.'

'I . . . I didn't my friend.'

The Don passed him a curious scowl and opened the box. 'Really? Your madness knows no bounds, sir. Suicide? Pah! You would ask this of me? Murder? The murder of my friend?'

'Tyke and I are not coming back from this, Tatterfox. Even if I find her the Flea King will not let me leave. This will halt its escape. Destroy it totally.'

'And you.'

'That's the bait. It will try and consume me with its gospel, yet the Reaper will already have begun its work.'

'You would ask me to euthanize you just so you could win the day?'

'Yes. This isn't some little murder in Eshreet, Tatterfox. This is the end of days. People will burn and the world will crumble to dust. The line must be met with steel before it gains a foothold. Every story ends . . . but it's up to us to see new ones begin. No more babies. No more friends. No more fine dining at Berazi's. No more laughter and sunsets and Cobalt sherry. What's one soul worth in comparison to that? One soul to bridge the dam. The boy from Jeppa, made good in the end.'

'Redemption? You've made good of that tenfold if not more, Xindii.'

'Not to me . . . will you do it?'

'No –'

'Tatterfox!'

'You think me a fool, sir? I will not send you on your merry way into the Murk and heartlessly fill you with Reaper. Trust . . . trust in me. Trust in my knowledge and my soul that I will do the right thing if deemed necessary. But I will not send you on a fool's errand and shoot you in the back. You know me better than this, Xindii. Don't shut out the light before you have already begun. But should it fall then you can count on your friend to do what must. I have been at your side for an age, offering counsel and well needed solidarity whenever needed. Do you doubt me now?'

The Mapper took in his friend's advice. 'No. Never.'

'Excellent. Now that the domestic is over can we continue?'

Xindii smiled. 'You are truly the greatest man I have ever met. My life does not deserve you, dear Tatterfox.'

'I am precisely what your life needs. Just in case you need a damn good ribbing or a clip around the proverbials. Like now.'

The Don made his way around to Gwendolyn's side and made sure the link was secure. The device at the center acted as a hub, monitoring Xindii's heart rate and synapses. Usually, the hub would measure those who were sedated for Reverie. This situation needed only the one, though the Baroness was still logged into the machine. She was clinically dead. Xindii refuted it. There was still energy in the brain, faint and gossamer traces of electricity that would soon wither. Such traces offered a map for Xindii, a chance to scout the land as it were. Once those signposts diminished the Murk would gather and shroud the path he had walked in on.

'We are ready. You better begin.'

'Let's do it. Together.'

'Good luck, Xindii.'

The Don sat in the middle and reached out with his left paw. Xindii held it. Painfully, the Don pulled his right arm from the sling and his shoulder screamed as he placed his hand onto the cold texture of Gwendolyn's. The Tatterfox acted as the rock, the stepping stone to Gwendolyn's id, and Xindii followed with his mind, bouncing from stone to stone across the still lake. He could see it through the Murk. The same island he had witnessed before. The craggy slate island that had led to his first encounter with the Mutter-Sloth: The Flea King

Fog drifted across the glass surface and he looked back, his pathway degrading already, swallowed by the Murk. He didn't have much time. Xindii jumped across the wet stepping stones and made his ascent up the slippery crags of the jagged island.

We shouldn't be here . . .

This should of ended centuries ago . . .

We exist on borrowed time . . .

'So you have returned little Mapper man . . . I am so glad. Come, delve. Lose yourself. Gwendolyn has so much to show you.'

'Her name was Tyke. She was my friend. And I'm taking her home.'

'Fascinating. You are an interesting little creature. Deluded to the hilt. I like you and your empty promises. You should not have come . . . You won, fair and square. You could have buried her body in the deepest well. Cremated the remains and my power would have withered, yet you choose to come here, to save an iota of her soul. Why?'

'You would never understand.'

'Try me.'

'Because you showed me too much! You knew of me back when Hadigan harboured us. You were always there behind his eyes weren't you? You knew what you were doing when you showed me Tyke's past. You wanted me to feel pity. Remorse. Well it worked.

'She was running from a monster when Hadigan found her and the man of pockets offered her the hand of friendship. Warmth, succour. Gained access to his inner council and that is when he defiled her, told her your gospel, laid the egg which would become a worm and there it nestled.

'That girl has been running all her life. Tonight, she stops running. Tonight your gospel ends.'

'You should not have come . . .'

'That's just humanity. We follow our hearts. Never thinking about the bigger things. Some of us would climb a tree to rescue a cat. Jump in a frozen river to save a dog. Travel a thousand miles for a kiss and a cuddle. Talk all night and laugh all day. We are foolish and stupid . . . We are human and we will outlive the end.'

'Go. Go to your Tyke. But stay clear of the Murk dear Mapper.'

He ran over the slate and mud and found the door. He was going further this time and the Murk was already closing. He descended the staircase and his feet sunk, submerged by lost thoughts and ideas half baked. The stench was high, coarse, and the Mapper ploughed on further through dangling black ivy and moist air.

Darkness gave way to steel and glass and he moved it aside, opening the carriage door and stepping through. The monorail was sparse. A few commuters left at Gas Town and only one remained. Xindii walked up to her. Her mustard yellow jacket and green slacks, boots that shone with a purple haze and a black top hat to top all hats.

'Tyke?'

'Xindii, what kept you?'

She was young. Probably younger than their first encounter all those years ago on the monorail. Her innocence fractured, yet glimmers remained of a girl tempered by the street. Her features akin – almost – to that of a young boy- androgynous.

'I'm sorry. My time keeping is lacklustre at best. What are you doing?'

'Finding myself. They say if you travel far enough on the monorail you'll find yourself. I don't know who I am anymore. Tyke? Gwendolyn? The Baroness? Mouse? Mouse? They called me Mouse long ago. Long ago. Who am I? You must know?'

'It's for you to choose. No one else.'

'It's so hard isn't it? I've been going round and round for years and I can't seem to find myself.'

'I don't think you are supposed to take the proverb so literally, Tyke.'

'Tyke. You call me Tyke?'

'Well, I would. That's the name I knew you by when we first met.'

'Yes. Yes of course. I'm sorry for shooting your friend. He must think ill of me?'

The Mapper looked perplexed for a moment and then realised. 'The Don? He's a tough old stick. I'm sure there is no ill feeling.'

'He seemed a nice man. I wish I could have got to know him more.'

The Mapper swallowed hard. 'Perhaps one day you will.'

She looked at him with dark green eyes. 'You and I know such things are an impossibility, sweet Mapper. Even now you live in a fairytale like the days of old.'

'Your body is repairing itself as we speak.'

'Circumstances beyond my control. It will take years but he will regenerate the body and start the gospel once more. You should have burned my body.'

'That's not my way.'

'Then it needs to be. You risk your life and soul for me? Why? You hardly knew me.'

'It doesn't matter. It showed me your life before the monorail. The abuse? The neglect? What you have been through? No one should have to suffer that?'

Tyke pulled herself back, the sway of the carriage a little too strong. 'What exactly did it show you, Xindii?'

'Your life before the monorail. Grox Eve. The night they came for your mother. The night they abused –'

'My mother died in child birth delivering me . . .'

'What? But that can't be?'

'Elaine Ruth Pendragon. My mother.'

The surroundings seemed to melt, bleed away. 'But, you were adopted by the Pendragons?'

'No. I was returned to my father after Hadigan's death. My memory fractured. My body broken. It took me years of recuperation to recover fully.'

It felt like Xindii's lungs had been punctured, leaking air that deflated his resolve. 'But . . .'

'You've been duped, Xindii. Shown a fiction parallel to your own upbringing. Felt a kindred spirit in her plight. It fed you lies because it knew you would come. It's been watching us all for too long.'

Everything shrinked from him. Tyke, the floor, the sense of feeling in his hands. 'But –

Tyke took him in her hands and shook him. 'Xindii? You need to run.'

'Not . . . not without you?'

'I'm not going anywhere, sugar. I'm just gonna sit here for a bit. Find myself.'

'You can't, Tyke. You must run. With me.'

'I'm not going anywhere, Mapper. You can't outrun this.'

The train steadily started to pull up to what looked like Eshreet and the doors opened. A well-dressed young woman in patchwork olive entered the carriage. The brown leather bag clutched to her right complementing the clothes beautifully. Her brooch sparkled in the faint fake light of the carriage and then the young woman turned, her face blank, literally.

Xindii noticed the clothes and the gait, one which he had seen before at Varosium twenty four hours previously. 'Gwendolyn.'

Tyke turned to look at her and stood.

'Well, it looks like you have found yourself, Tyke,' the Mapper quipped

'Is this what I became? What was left after the gospel embraced me? A hollow shell?'

'Of course it was, darling,' Gwendolyn chirped. 'You ran from White Lillies at such a young age, knowing nothing of birthright and responsibility.' The voice was sterile, computerized. The blank canvas of the face heaved. The mouth shrouded and bound by the boundary of flesh. 'Yet greatness discovered you on the streets of Testament, the man of pockets gave you a seat on his council, bolstered the righteous blood in your veins. Now this is how you thank him?'

'It is not at all courtesy to turn down such greatness, Tyke.'

Xindii and Tyke both turned about and saw the young and smug form of Godrich Felstrom walk into the carriage. 'Hadigan offered you the world and you failed him.'

'He had me shot. A pawn in a game. Nothing more.'

'Yet the gospel nurtured you. Kept you safe. Repaired your broken self.'

'Tyke died that night at the bottom of the Lillius. What returned was what I ran from all those years ago.'

'Yet the gospel returned you home. Safe, succored.'

The Mapper sighed. 'Yes, well. Then you came along, dearest!'

Godrich looked the Mapper up and down. 'I don't like your tone, Mapper.'

'I don't like you, full stop,' Xindii replied.

The Mapper pulled himself up. 'So there we are. What power Hadigan took from the Flea King's gospel he returned to you, Tyke. Used you as a vessel, a lifeboat to mend himself. Seeking his opportunity to return.

'He set his sights on the Felstrom boys, twisted little degenerates with a passion for violence and the abuse of women. Appetites wholly befitting the man of pockets. Two little monsters acting as his catalyst to return to the world. You disgust me.'

The other twin followed suit. 'We can't help where we come from, Mapper. House's codex was corrupted. We are mutants for sure. Shameful productions of an ancient House driven mad.'

'Well that may be but it wasn't House's fault. What caused the corruption is beyond my purview, for now.'

'Don't blame those boys for their misdemeanors, blame me.'

Xindii turned about and noticed the Hadigan of old. Shuffling through the carriage with his walking stick.

'You all have a part in the blame, Hadigan.'

'It was survival, boy. Nothing more.'

'Survival?' the Mapper shouted, 'you were dead. You've had your time, twice over.'

'And we will have it again. I'm here aren't I? What power and magics the Flea King offered me I took. Yet the Ravnor reigned. My only hope for me was to die. And leave my own gospel – a story within a story – residing in Tyke. I carved it into her soul with fire and blood so I may return and it worked.'

Kiko and Mensch walked up beside the man of pockets. 'And like all good stories the narrative must flow. The twins became infatuated with Gwendolyn. And like all boys, they both wanted her so they played their wicked games but unforeseen was that little hiccup that gets us all . . .'

'Love,' remarked the Mapper, 'Gustaf fell in love.'

Godrich gave his brother a scowl and shook his head. 'Idiot.'

Hadigan cheered. 'And out of that love a seed was born, moi.'

The Mapper shook his head. 'You hijacked an embryo like a petty thief stealing a car and shot the driver.'

Gustaf leaned over. 'Two cars,' he stated.

Xindii actually smiled. 'Of course. Twins. As if one of you wasn't enough.'

Hadigan shrugged his shoulders. 'I was an only child. If you had the chance to do it again, wouldn't you?'

'Death is there for a reason. The Auditors originally dispatched me to find the soul of Godrich Felstrom. But it wasn't his that concerned them was it? It was yours. Their calculations didn't tally. They knew you had escaped them?'

'It was only a matter of time before those transient mathematicians realised I had escaped their computations. My death at the hands of those leviathans in the abyss kept me under their radar for a while. It was only a matter of time before their curiosity got the better of them. I knew they would come prodding one day. But to send a Mapper, that I didn't foresee.'

'Well, I imagine their calculations will soon balance out with two of you in the engine.'

'Well yes, of course. But . . . here I still am. Alive, in a sense.'

'With no chance of escape.'

'Not for a while. But alas. I am a very patient man.'

'Not if I deliver your address, of course. I imagine such travel is not beyond their remit.'

'Possibly, old friend. But –' Hadigan laughed, 'how do you propose to get out?'

'The same way I got in.'

The old man shook his head. 'No. No. You knew you had a one way ticket, Xindii. You can't pull the wool over my eyes remember. You are in a very dangerous place, son. You should have listened to Tyke and burnt the body. Everything would have been swell. Sherry in the study, supper at Caravaggios. You silly boy.'

Xindii smiled. 'Curiosity. I had to save Tyke. I refused to believe that her essence was dead. That her true self was shackled in her id.'

'No, no that's not it. You came to find it didn't you? You want to know what it is. The spider in the web.'

'I'm a sucker for knowledge.'

'It will devour you whole before it tells you anything.'

'That's what I was hoping,' Xindii smiled.

'Unless, of course. We rip the flesh from your bones first!'

Xindii felt Tyke's fingers squeeze his hand.

Hadigan looked to his left and the painted features of Kiko fell from her face, falling sand, her bare expressionless face akin to that of Gwendolyn who made a gradual step to the Mapper and his friend. Gustaf and Godrich pulled themselves from the seats, their faces fell away into a canvas of wriggling flesh, pincer like teeth sprouted from the bare skin in a clockwork manner, the circumference of the fangs giving way to a bruised hole that stretched and snapped to reveal a scarlet maw of jagged tongues tipped with sharp bone.

'Xindii?'

'Time to get the running shoes on I think.'

'You can't run. Wherever you run the sentinels will never be far behind. Or worse.'

'I think we will take our chances,' the Mapper responded.

'That's just what I was hoping, dear Xindii.'

He pulled the Beat into his palm and threw it at the carriage window separating the metal and glass and creating a gash through which to jump. Xindii tossed Tyke through it and followed thereafter falling into limitless black.