This is not a welcome.

Somebody has confirmed that you saw it, and that you did not lie about it afterwards. Both were necessary. Neither was sufficient.

There is work to be done.

There is no grand army waiting behind the ordinary world. There are hunters. People who keep the files. People who answer when they are called.

You investigate. You prepare. You go together. If you return, the record must be better than it was when you left.

The paperwork is not comic relief. It is the last piece of civilisation any of you are holding.

The conditions.

1. Do not tell.
2. Do not work alone.
3. Do not take what you have not earned.
4. Do not leave the file worse than you found it.
5. Come when you are called. Once.
6. The sixth is not written here.

It will be read to you aloud, in a room, by people who intend to keep it.

People keep taking the posting.

They have read the returns. They know the cost. They turn up regardless.

Not because the darkness can be made harmless.
Because someone still has to go.

For the people at the table.