"I have a question," Dred asked as they abandoned the window to join them by the chairs and sofas."How do we know we're not being spied on?Cameras, listening devices, everything we do online."
Merlin shrugged one shoulder."We don't.All we can do is our best and keep going."
"So what's the plan?"Lancelot asked.
"Scouting," Merlin said.
"We can do that," Dred said, motioning to themself and Lance."We're far more forgettable looking than the two of you, though I guess at this point, we're all priority number one for the spybots."
"I can mitigate that," Morgan said, her eyes rippling with shadows."Get ready and then come find me in the kitchen."
"Milady," Lancelot replied before striding off.
Several minutes later he and Dred stepped into the kitchen, where Morgan was enjoying a glass of wine with Merlin wrapped around her and nuzzling into her neck.
Lancelot rolled his eyes."May we interrupt you for a few minutes?"
Morgan smiled and gently dislodged Merlin."Give him some leeway.He's been starved half-to-death for most of his life because he didn't have access to the right meal."
Dred snorted."I will refrain from making jokes about eating you out."
Merlin laughed as he refilled Morgan's wine.He turned more serious, though, as he turned to face them directly."Be careful.If you have to abandon the mission for your own safety, do it.We can reconvene and try again.Guinevere is the one person in our group he won't kill."
"We'll have a care," Dred said."Not our first time doing this."
"I know."Merlin cast his own protections, and then stepped aside for Morgan to add hers.
She frowned in concentration as she wove her shadow magic, spells to hide and obfuscate."If Maleagant sees you, he will see right through the shadows, but I assume camera watching is something he delegates to minions.His own attention will be wholly on finding Gwen first.He'll be using all the same methods as us, so have a care, because he may very well beat us to her the same as he got to me first."
"He might be looking for Gawain first," Dred said quietly."The three of you are deadly, no mistake, but Gawain is our guiding light, and he may see that as worth sacrificing the chance to secure Gwen."
"I'll start looking for him," Merlin said, "and keep you posted on findings and any actions we take."
Lancelot nodded."We're off then."
They walked to the transport station in silence, but once they were waiting for the metro car that would take them downtown, Dred said, "This isn't going to go well.We won't be lucky enough to get a mere scouting mission."
"Be interesting to see if we get her back in the real world, or if we'll be compelled to go into the game.Hopefully the game.Some of the shit we'll get into is going to be impossible to get away with here."
"Maleagant won't let the authorities or anyone else interfere."
"Unless it benefits him to do so.We're pretty fucked if any of us wind up in the workhouses."Prisons had given way to outright workhouses decades ago, any attempt at pretending they'd ever been anything else cast aside.Arrest meant slavery, meant probably never seeing the light of day ever again.Working down in the bowels of the city keeping systems running, or down in the ocean cleaning and harvesting where machines simply couldn't go, or controlling the machines where they could be used.Most people didn't last long, killed by the general danger of the jobs or by their own hand.
"Morgan and Merlin won't let that happen, but it's true I'd rather it not become an issue at all."Their transport came to a stop, and they stepped out onto the platform of City Station 3, also called Fountain Station.Most stations were underground, but Fountain was one of three that was above ground.
From there, it was only a few blocks to the grimy area known as the Gear-bolt district, where all manner of machinery was manufactured, from mass-production level work to delicate handwork that couldn't be done by machines.
Lancelot pulled up the address they'd been given."Clockwork street."
"Grade A mechanic, that fits," Dred replied, and led the way out of the station and down the street.
Most watches were made by machines, cheap and easily repaired, used by the working classes to keep track of time in places where they didn't have internet access: mines, high in the mountains, in the depths of thick forests.Even now Dred wore a watch on their wrist, though it looked to be a fine one, not the cheap one they'd been wearing when Lancelot had first met them in person.
The fine watches were still made by human hands, the work too delicate to be trusted to even the best machines.Real metal, real gems, realeverything, instead of the faux-everything used in cheap watches.There weren't many places that did such things anymore, not more than two shops in a single city.There was only one in theirs.
Guinevere must be absolutely miserable.
"Here it is," Dred said.
