Dunleavy Down
The Nameless made enough of a mess to attract the ire of the Spirit Wardens. Rather than wishing to go to war against an influential and elusive organization of government ghost-hunters, the Nameless agreed to frame Captain Winslow Dunleavy (of the Leviathan Hunter Lightning) as a Spirit Warden himself.
A plan was hatched to drug the debaucherous captain, place him in the midst of a faked supernatural incident, and allow him to be seen by whatever interested parties were out for the Spirit Wardens.
This plan immediately fell through when the drugs administered to Dunleavy slew him nigh-instantaneously. Undeterred, the Nameless changed the narrative to imply (successfully, it would seem) that Winslow Dunleavy had given his life as a Spirit Warden fighting against an unspecified demonic threat. Thus, war between the Spirit Wardens and the Nameless was averted.
Veldren’s Companions
Veldren the psychonaut took a long drag of his pipe. The mixture was one of his own concoction, and would be the death of anyone else who took a puff.
“I still don’t understand why the Bluecoats detained me,” he remarked plaintively to Bonky Bill, who sat upon a throne of clouds nearby.
Bonky Bill nodded sagaciously, as was the wont of all humanoid frogs that frequented the recesses of Veldren’s mind. So far it was just Bonky Bill, but Veldren believed that any other humanoid frog on a throne of clouds would nod just as sagaciously, should they arrive.
“It’s a simple chestnut, old chap,” croaked Bonky Bill, “You were caught up in a machination to frame old Winslow Dunleavy as a Spirit Warden.”
Veldren furrowed his brow at this, reaching for memories that danced just beyond his grasp.
“Winslow Dunleavy, the captain of the Lightning? HE’S surely not a Spirit Warden, is he?”
“Not a hair on his head nor a nail on his toe. The Spirit Wardens paid your friends to falsify old Dunleavy’s membership to their august body, on account of all the fracas with Ms. Beasby, and thereby befuddle their foes as to the inner workings. I wouldn’t know, as I’m a frog, not a counterintelligence operative.”
Veldren nodded at this, and offered his pipe to Bonky Bill, who courteously declined. This was of secret relief to the psychonaut, as he did not want to know what phantasms Bonky Bill might conjure with the aid of his drugs.
“Right, well . . . what happened to Dunleavy?” he suddenly exclaimed, “Last I left him, he was going to go on a wonderful pub crawl, with sundry psychedelics and opioids aplenty! But I never saw him again!”
“Certainly you did not, old bean. Dunleavy died, don’t you know. Terrible business. Your friends concocted the wrong set of chemicals and he died on the spot. He’s with Jesus now.”
Veldren turned around and, sure enough, there he saw Dunleavy sitting with Jesus. Both men nodded companionably to the psychonaut. “Ahhh, that’s awful. Dunleavy, bosom friend through so many rambles through the psychoscape! Tell me, did they treat you with dignity after such a terrible tragedy?”
“Alas, they did not,” replied Dunleavy, “For no sooner was my spirit parted from my body than they did seed the latter with all the tokens of Spirit Wardenship and rig the room with sundry mechanisms to feign a great battle between ghost and ghost-hunter.”
“Calumny!”
“And that’s not even mentioning,” continued the deceased Leviathan Hunter, “the rigging of my own body with electroplasmic instruments and the tossing thereof upon a hated rival, to further falsify my own death in a lowly bordello scrum!”
“Ah, Dunleavy, thou hast been sore mistreated!”
“My hated rival, whose fist struck a noble bird clear from the air!”
“Damn her and blast her! And was your death in vain, dear Dunleavy?”
“You may rest easy that it was NOT, lovely Veldren,” proclaimed Jesus, the lines on his three-piece suit as immaculate as his conception, “For by the scrambling efforts of your friends, dear Dunleavy was positioned as a hero of the hour, and it was widely understood that this ostensible Spirit Warden had given his life in gallant defense of the city against a malevolent flock of demons. Some furtive figure obtained an eyeful of his body, sans mask, and has conveyed this false intelligence to the relevant parties.”
“Well then, be merry, old sausage, my dear Dunleavy!” exclaimed Veldren, “My friends are successful after all, and the Spirit Wardens will persecute them no further!”
“This is all fine and splendid,” rejoined Dunleavy with patient irritation, “But I am dead now, my spirit scrubbed away and my body burnt to cinders!” Jesus placed upon on Dunleavy’s knee a hand replete with patience.
“Such things are not to be regretted,” he rejoined, his monocle glinting with mirth, “For elsewise we should be flooded with ghosts, and the time-tables of trains would be far worse than they are now.”
Veldren and Bonkey Bill gave enthusiastic cries of assent to this, and the foursome settled into contemplation of the moral rubric required for a Free Skovland.
Outside in the hallway, Veldren’s landlord turned on his heel and walked away, deciding that now wasn’t the time to be asking for rent.