Grayson Wolfe's study was a sanctuary of order.
Textbooks on neurology and biomechanics stood in precise rows on the shelves.
An articulated human skeleton stood in one corner, not as a decoration, but as a reference tool. Here, there were no disguises. He was simply Dr. Wolfe.
He sat in a deep, comfortable chair, a glass of amber whiskey in his hand, his mind conducting a post-mortem on the meeting.
_The Lonely Saviour. He's melodramatic and his alias is indicative of a martyr complex or a profound sense of isolation._
_His accent is deliberately neutral, I'm afraid it's manufactured. It suggests a need to obscure geographic or class origins. He presents theoretical problems rooted in specific, tangible anomalies. The "perfect silence" is not a philosopher's hypothetical. it is a technical specification._
_The founder has firsthand encounter with the phenomena he describes. His motives are multiple and unclear, likely involving personal vendetta or survival instinct. He is the unpredictable element. And his risk factor is high._
_The woman with a blank alias. She's a young female, probably in her late teens. Her apparent socio-economic status can be pointed to the Upper middle class._
_Her behavior included attempted formality that was atop a natural, unguarded enthusiasm. Her engagement is present but untrained. She observed the social dynamics of the room but lacked the experience to decode them._
He scoffed.
_Hmph! She's like an accidental tourist in the club. A potential liability due to naivete, but she's a source of unconventional insight. She holds no significance but a moderate risk to herself._
He swirled the glass of whiskey in his hand.
_The Quill. It's obvious his alias is theatrical. It suggests a literary or artistic self-image._
_His speech began with affected projection which he consciously subdued. His residual posture indicates ingrained habituation to an audience. The slight raise of the shoulders before correction, is a tell of someone constantly under scrutiny, expecting deference._
_The archaic flavor in his diction, though muted, is not an affectation or strategy to mislead, it is native._
_There is a high probability of him being a scion of one of the city's old, noble families or an offspring of a powerful political figure. Being deterrent for intellectual stimulation or personal rebellion._
_The threat he poses is low to the club, but high to himself if his identity is discovered._
Grayson took a slow sip of whiskey.
The Oxford Club was an organism he had just inoculated himself with.
Its components were volatile and ill-matched.
The founder was a wounded predator.
The girl a bright-eyed fawn.
And the noble a peacock.
A dangerous, unstable chemistry.
And yet, it was fascinating. The Lonely Saviour had presented a symptom—the engineered silence, and Grayson's mind, the mind that solved the unsolvable puzzles of the human brain, could not let it go.
It was a pathology in the body of the city, and he needed to understand it.
He was not there for camaraderie or intellectual diversion.
He was there for data. For information.
The club was a petri dish, and he was the pathologist.
He would observe, he would analyze, and he would determine if this strange new strain was something to be cultivated, contained, or eradicated.