The one unspoken rule of the office was that you didn't say anything unkind to Joey's sisters if you wanted to live.
This was an antiquated rule; Kirsty did good work as a writer for the station, and Tiffany was one of the best when it came to finding hidden information quickly, online or looking at evidence. The three were a force to be reckoned with; Doc had deemed them "the Hoaxbusters", and it seemed to stick. They were a respected trio in the little local news station, and for the most part, they were happy.
Kirsty ran into the building with her purse under one arm and a tray of coffees in the other. The strap had snapped on her old bag, but she couldn't replace it, so she marched up the stairs with her bag clutched to her side like a lifeline. She turned the corner and swung through the doors with her shoulder.
"I made it!" She said, a little breathless. Joey looked up from behind her reading glasses.
"… Kirsty, did you rush here?"
"… yeah?" Wedges were only marginally easier to run in than heels, and she was still catching her breath. "Was I not supposed to…?"
"I mean, I'm glad you're here," Joey got up and took the coffees, setting them on the desk, "but we're not leaving for another half-hour."
"… oh." Kirsty let herself laugh, just a little bit, and adjusted her purse in her arm. "More time for me to fix this, I guess."
"I guess." Joey smiled and shook her head. "Is Tiffany alright?"
"Yeah, she's going to text me if she needs anything," Kirsty nodded. Joey handed her the right coffee, and she sipped before continuing. "She's excited about finishing that book."
"Good, she deserves to enjoy her day off," Joey said, drinking her own. Milk and two sugars - Kirsty never got her other wrong. "Why don't you go catch your breath and relax a bit before we go? I'm just doing one last check on everything we need."
"Alright." Kirsty smiled at her sister, and made her way to her office.
Kirsty's desk was always almost perfectly clean. There was usually something out of place - today it was the leftover papers from yesterday's work, which had never quite made it to the trash. Kirsty dropped her purse over them and turned her attention to the strap. It had broken right where it connected to the metal loop on one side - a cheap but easy fix. Kirsty tied the torn strap through the metal ring and tugged it. It held.
That saved her a trip to the store.
Kirsty sat down and looked to the side of her desk. A small wooden casket the size of a matchbox sat in its own corner, etched with her father's initials and the words "In Memory".
He'd never gotten a proper funeral. It was the best she could do when he wasn't legally dead. She felt terrible that she could only find one at a craft store, but she'd etched and varnished it and for what it was, it was enough. Kirsty ran her fingertips over it and sighed. She missed her father. She hoped he'd be proud of her now.
Part of her hoped he was, too.
"Shit." She opened her purse and rummaged through it, finding the orange bottle among her other belongings. She held it up to the light and frowned.
One pill left. She'd completely forgotten to get her Hypnocil prescription refilled; she'd have to do it tomorrow, or on her way home if Tiffany didn't mind ordering dinner online. She felt lousy; it was Tiffany's day off, and dealing with the delivery guy was always a chore.
"I can wait one more night." She had a pill left; enough to last until she refilled it tomorrow. She was trying to wean herself anyway, wasn't she?
"You ready?" Kirsty looked up at Joey, who looked ready to go. "We might as well try to beat the lines."
"Oh, yeah," Kirsty said, and got up, shoving the bottle back in her purse as she did. "Maybe we can get some words with one of the staff."
"That's what I'm thinking." Joey dropped her empty coffee cup in the trash and smiled. "Let's get going."
It wasn't there.
The box wasn't there. She stared at the column, lips pursed, and for a moment she seemed calm.
Then she gave a frustrated shout that rocked the entire basement of the museum.
The column was useless to her without the box. Whatever resided within it could awaken, certainly, but it was no replacement for a gate to the Labyrinth. She glared daggers at the sleeping face etched in the stone, gridded and marked with pins driven all the way into the skull; it was handsome, certainly, and no doubt a sarcophagus such as this would exist only for one of Leviathan's favored.
No, not a sarcophagus. This was no coffin; it was an incubator. She had been gone long, but she remembered some of the stranger toys of her old realm, and this one…
Perhaps it could be of some use to her after all.
"Is everything okay down there?" The woman's gaze shot up the stairs. She'd had her chosen "lover" wait while she claimed the box, and for a moment she considered sending him away.
But she knew how this toy worked. Time to play, it seemed.
"Yes," she said in that rich voice her victim had given her centuries ago, "I'm alright. Please, come down." She watched the portly man stumble down, and barely suppressed her look of disinterest as he walked over, sweat clinging to his forehead. She could taste his desires in the air around him; bland and uninspired, the papery fantasies of a man who never risked more than he could afford to lose.
The Labyrinth's purpose was to teach, yes? Perhaps he would be grateful for the lesson.
"Could you take a look at this?" She asked, turning back to the pillar. He followed her gaze and grimaced, but covered it, obviously trying to impress the pretty lady before him.
"What about it?" He asked, taking a step closer. "It's an ugly looking thing, isn't it?" She could hear the faint hum from beneath the stone; it was stirring.
"There's something with the man's face," she said, "I thought it moved. It is stone, is it not?" Fake innocence was all he needed to take another step. She pushed him and the man collided with the stone, and then chains collided with him.
She watched in passive fascination as her pawn was torn asunder. His skin pulled away and he screamed, and the chains dragged him into the stone, now open like a gaping maw. He writhed and shrieked, looking at her with fear in his reddening eyes, and she could not resist blowing him a kiss.
And then he was gone and the column was closed again. Another hum from deep within it stirred the floor beneath her. she watched.
The pins in the gridded man's head slowly pushed out, until they all stood out about an inch from the face. It was only now that she noticed a detail she'd missed before - the one at the center of his forehead was missing. The stone eyes opened, and a voice like the very essence of the Labyrinth, deep and compelling, spoke.
"Angelique."
