The automatons of the London Authority could operate in airless conditions and extreme heat. The Hounds, clockwork dogs without eyes, could find their way through acrid smoke- it was said that they could sense fear. Prudence was only a mortal woman. Her face was flush as she billowed a sheet of clean linen out over the table for the patient, and once it was smooth, she succumbed to another cough. She was not even aware of the fire yet, and she was getting lightheaded, woozy. She exerted herself to accompany the doctor to the chamber, and free the fair volunteer from her medical bondage.<br/><br/>Ives was not affected. He was clockwork, like the tin soldiers of the Authority, like the Hounds. The rail-thin butler carried out Charlotte's instructions without difficulty. Amid the cranks and dials of the polished oak lab switchboard, a solitary light began to blink and click. But the air was slightly hazy, and Prue's vision indistinct, and she couldn't see whether visitors were being detected, or it was time to change the oxygen cylinders, or if the furnace was losing pressure. She looked to Charlotte for guidance, and saw her benefactor seem to take the vapours for a moment. There was something in the air.<br/><br/>Justine's skin felt cool against Prue's cradled arms, but maybe it was only the smoke making her flush. Her cheeks always turned a rosy pink when the doctor bid her to handle the test subject's naked body, and here, her hands seemed boxed by Charlotte's into compromising holds, pushed at first up Justine's flanks and up her toned thighs when they worked together to lift her from the chamber, and then ushered to the folded seat of the woman's hips when they went lengthwise to ease her onto the table. There was seldom a reason for her to be so close to another woman's secret areas, and her petite gloved hands were seldom so jittery. Justine's body was so silky and enticing.<br/><br/>No sooner had she helped set Justine on the table than a coughing fit took her down to her knees. Prue gasped to collect her breath, but what was coming in wasn't oxygen. It was hot, and tasted ashen. "Madam Doctor," she pleaded, hoarse. "Dr. DuPont, good heavens! I believe there is a fire!" Thin effluents of chalky gray crept in from the floorboards and behind the finely crafted switchboard. There was a tinny whistle she at first mistook for Ives' wordless voice, but it was not Ives. It was the conduits of the building, heated until they leaked pressurized steam like a tea kettle.<br/><br/>In the war abroad, millions of British soldiers had died in the trenches from floods of German nerve gasses. The good doctor had been one to answer the Authority's call for a practical countermeasure. And by Prue's estimation, she had succeeded brilliantly- but the Authority had not chosen her design. Too sinister, too hot. A gentleman soldier oughtn't be seen in a mask said to resemble a deep sea creature. But the air was growing poisonous, and Prue needed to breathe. Justine needed to breathe. Charlotte needed to breathe, even if she seemed to loathe to admit it.<br/><br/>There was no thought, as she opened the tinker trunk and fondled through the inventions therein, that this would be the last she'd see of any of them. She took out the first mask, glass-lensed goggles and taupe leather to keep toxins from the eyes and skin, awkwardly large filters for breathing which straddled the mouthpiece. Prue pressed the mask to her delicate features, and took deep, cleansing breaths. There was only the one. It had to go to Justine. If she were to die now, then by Charlotte's account, Britain would die with her. Prudence laid the mask gently over Justine's mouth and nose to help her with the clean oxygen she needed to awaken.<br/><br/>Outside, the Hounds strained at their leashes. The Authority need only wait.