Interlude

On the morning of Tuesday, June 14th, the investigators gathered to take stock of their battered condition following a night of shared, harrowing dreams. Their bodies bore the marks of recent ordeals, their minds frayed at the edges from the horrors they had witnessed, and their sanity worn thin by events that defied rational explanation. Despite their weariness, they resolved to press on, agreeing that their first order of business would be to visit their young friend and colleague, Alfie Quinn, who lay recovering in hospital from wounds that refused to heal at a natural pace. Before heading to the hospital, the party made a detour to Hamleys on Regent Street, the grand and storied toy shop that had stood since 1760, to find something to lift Alfie's spirits. Reverend William Grainger selected a small metal toy car, its little wheels spinning freely back and forth, while John Anderton arranged for his cook to prepare a dripping sandwich — a greasy, beige affair wrapped in translucent paper — as a more practical offering. Parker, John's ever-patient chauffeur, ferried them through the London streets and waited dutifully outside while the party made their way to Alfie's bedside. Alfie received the gifts with genuine warmth, delighting in the toy car and setting the dripping sandwich aside for later with the dry observation that it might serve equally well as a lubricant for the cot's rusty frame. The mood grew more serious, however, when Alfie mentioned that he had experienced vivid dreams the previous night — dreams in which he had seen the other investigators in a wartime setting, and in which he believed they had all perished. The investigators exchanged uneasy glances, for they had shared the very same dream, and the coincidence was far too precise to dismiss. Alfie also drew their attention to a fellow patient two beds down: a comatose war veteran named Wilson McKenna, who had collapsed while visiting London just a few days prior. With their visit to Alfie concluded, the party divided their efforts. Reverend Grainger boarded a train south to Epsom to check on Teddy Lockhart, who had been placed in an asylum following the traumatic events at the hotel. Meanwhile, John Anderton and Everett Reed set their sights on the Home Office, hoping to track down the elusive government operative Nigel Finley and his associate, the mysterious Mr. Huston. The Reverend arrived at the Epsom asylum with a hopeful heart, only to be met by a doctor whose grave expression told the story before a single word was spoken. Teddy Lockhart had died suddenly on Friday night, sometime between ten o'clock and midnight, for reasons the medical staff could not explain. There had been no sign of foul play, no deterioration that might have warned them — he had simply been there during the evening rounds and gone by midnight. The Reverend stood in quiet devastation, leaving his contact details and those of John Anderton with the staff, and requesting that Teddy's sister be informed and assisted. He then boarded the train back to London, staring silently out the window as the countryside rolled past, the weight of grief settling heavily upon him. Back in the city, John and Everett entered the Home Office and made inquiries at the reception desk, asking after both Nigel Finley and Mr. Huston. The receptionist could find no record of a Nigel Finley in the building but directed them to a Mr. Huston, listed under office supplies in the basement — a curiously humble posting for a man who had struck them as anything but ordinary. They descended to the lower levels and found room LG10, a plain door in a plain corridor, locked and silent. While wandering the basement in search of any useful intelligence, they stumbled upon the mail room, where two women named Beryl and Marjorie were chatting cheerfully over their work. John turned on his considerable charm, engaging the women in warm conversation about football, theatre, and the mysterious Mr. Huston, but the ladies, however friendly, were too cautious about their jobs to share anything of substance. Frustrated but undeterred, John and Everett regrouped and made their way to the hotel demolition site, where the sounds of pickaxes and rumbling carts filled the air behind a tall fence. Spotting an opportunity, the two men retrieved their work overalls from the trunk of Parker's car and changed in a nearby alley, presenting themselves at the gate as laborers transferred from a dock site. The foreman, short-handed and unsuspecting, waved them through and pointed them toward a pile of tools. It was not long before John spotted Huston on the far side of the site, dressed not in overalls but in his usual professional attire, speaking with someone in a manner that suggested authority rather than labor. Everett made his move first, walking directly up to Huston and confronting him about the whereabouts of Dr. Brandt, the German academic who had been a key figure in the hotel incident. Huston was cold and dismissive, informing Everett that Dr. Brandt had been sent back to Germany on the orders of Nigel Finley, and that the investigators would not be seeing her again. He made it abundantly clear that he had no interest in explaining himself further, and Everett, having extracted what little he could, walked calmly off the site and returned to the car. John, meanwhile, had concealed himself behind a pillar to observe, and after confirming Huston's movements, slipped away from the site and shadowed Huston back to the Home Office, watching him descend once more to his locked basement office before departing to rejoin the others. While all of this unfolded across the city, Alfie was visited at the hospital by a small, plump woman in her early sixties — Mrs. McKenna, Wilson's mother. She sat at her son's bedside holding his hand, her face etched with sorrow and exhaustion. Alfie offered her what comfort he could, and she opened up about Wilson's history: how he had volunteered for the war, how he had been the sole survivor of a patrol in which all his friends — including men named August Kirk and Alan Talbot — had perished, and how he had never forgiven himself for living when they had not. She described his nightmares, which had plagued him since his return: visions of a mountain, strange lights, and the deafening sound of guns. She also revealed that a telegram had arrived from her husband, demanding she return home to Canterbury immediately and abandon Wilson to the care of the hospital. Alfie gently encouraged her, promising to keep talking to Wilson in her absence, and she departed in tears, grateful for the kindness of this young boy she had only just met. That evening, the investigators gathered at John Anderton's house to share what they had learned. Reverend Grainger delivered the news of Teddy Lockhart's death, and the group fell into a moment of somber reflection. The timing of his passing — Friday night, the same night the portal had closed — struck them all as deeply significant, and they speculated that whatever supernatural force had been sustaining Teddy's fragile existence had been severed when the portal shut. Plans were made to attend his funeral and to reach out to his sister, and the Reverend resolved to handle the administrative arrangements personally. The group also discussed the troubling matter of Dr. Brandt, with some suspecting that Finley had not simply sent her home but had perhaps imprisoned her somewhere under the guise of deportation. A letter was drafted to her university in Germany to confirm whether she had truly returned. In the days that followed, the investigators allowed themselves a rare period of rest. Alfie remained in hospital, his unusual wounds stubbornly slow to close, while the others recuperated in the relative calm of London's June warmth. John Anderton spent time in quiet reflection and sought the counsel of a therapist to address the mounting toll on his mind. Everett Reed returned to his bookshop in Cecil Court, keeping a watchful eye on the mysterious bowl locked away in his strongbox and catching up on the business he had neglected. Reverend Grainger prepared for the funeral of Teddy Lockhart, scheduled for Saturday the 25th of June, and began making arrangements to travel to wherever Teddy's sister resided. By Friday the 24th of June, Alfie had recovered sufficiently to be discharged, and the rest of the party had regained their strength. A letter arrived from a German university, written in English, confirming that Dr. Brandt had indeed returned to Germany and providing her contact details — a small but meaningful thread that the investigators tucked away for future use. The funeral loomed on the horizon, and with it the promise of new leads, for the Reverend had a feeling that Teddy's passing would not be the end of the story, but merely the closing of one chapter and the opening of another. The investigators also turned their thoughts to the broader shape of their work. There was still the matter of a scientist in Epping who was rumored to possess a time machine, a lead that John found particularly intriguing from a scientific standpoint. There was Margaret, the woman from the museum, who had been on the periphery of their investigations and whose role remained unclear. And there were the dreams — the shared, vivid, terrible dreams that had visited them all on Monday night and that, they suspected, would come again. For now, they rested, gathered their strength, and waited for Saturday to arrive, knowing that the world they moved through was stranger and more dangerous than most people would ever dare to imagine.Note th