"I will fuck off in that direction."

"...You can do that if you let two of us walk right behind you, alright?" If only to get rid of him so they won't be distracted.

"Yes." Off he continues to attempt to fuck.

He gets past that one block. The next one is in the middle of an active fight between two gangs. Looks like defenders are losing. Something's on fire. The area's getting less dense though, this should be the last significant blockage.

There are loud stomping sounds coming from behind him; Those twelve foot high constructs are on the move.

The last thing he needs is a steel golem. ...can he get around this blockage by going into the building which is on fire? He doesn't have an air bubble but you can pull a lot of smoke out of the air with a fine mist of Create Water and it's not like it's not lethally dangerous to walk through the combat itself.

He can go into the building! It contains a kitchen and the same sort of trays the hothouse at the old wreck did and people trying to snuff the flames.

...Create Water and on out the back door before they can ask him any questions about that.

They seem too busy for that.

There's more shacks and people guarding their shacks but no more fully street-blocking gangs. Looks like a lot of people had the same idea and are hiking out into the snow.

He cannot prepare enough Endures to save any significant fraction of these people but hopefully they can keep moving to stay warm and come back when the town's settled as it gets. Tromp tromp.

People steer away from each other and him, except when he sees, distantly, what is probably a robbery in progress.

The windswept plains are quiet, in a way, at least in how the wind shrouds the screams and fighting.

Okay. So. That was bad.

He retraces their steps. Their Endures won't run out till a few hours into the next morning, which gives them a while to get out, if they can, and hopefully this is the obvious place to return to. He'll prep more Endures but - maybe not enough for everyone, they do have coats and can load up one person with extra coats if the rest of them have Endure Elements on (and that's assuming they all make it out alive), if he can think of first-circle spells he'll need in place of the Endures that might be useful for extraction. Tomorrow's supposed to be a Create Food day but they can all go hungry for one day without it being the end of the world and then eat heavily the day after tomorrow to make up for it, if he needs the third circle spell. At second he will definitely want Calm Emotions, maybe more than once.

A group of twelve people including three kids stumbles upon the meetup site.

"Ho stranger! We're going north, to high pass- There's a safe place beyond! Safer than that shanty town anyway!"

"Thank you, I have other plans."

"If you're sure? Very well. Good luck in the cold."

Off they go. Not much else happens for the rest of the afternoon and evening. Just some motion on the horizon as various groups move around.

He waits. He prays. He builds a little snow shelter, nothing much but enough to keep the wind off. When night falls he sleeps in it.

Nobody turns up the next morning. The little shanty-town has visible activity around it- Less than before. New London's cablecar setup, easy to see now that you know not to dismiss that odd line, is running constantly.

Okay. In that case he needs to go in and get them.

He... does prep a Create Food. Channel Vigor is great, but this might be a diplomatic situation rather than a combat one, and if oranges and pie will buy his party out of whatever they're in, it would be terrible not to have it. But he wants another Grace, two Calm Emotions - oh he has another slot at second circle, he'll add an Eagle's. And three Endures - he can do without, he has Worldwound clothes - and an Air Bubble in case things are on fire again.

He tromps back down into the settlement.

Steel golems with sharpshooters standing atop them and uniformed men and women with truncheons and the occasional gun are posted on intersections and patrolling the streets, twitchy and wary and hesitating to get very far from one of the giant machines. A woman on the outskirts warns him to just leave, they're locking up everyone who looks like they're looking for a fight and he looks like he's looking for a fight.

"I do not want to fight. I was separated from my group here yesterday. I want to find them."

"I don't think New London is trying to kill more people, if they're the type to surrender and they didn't get away I'd guess they're alive still, in one of the improvised lockups."

"It was not in New London that we were separated, it was here in this town."

"Yeah? Those who didn't die throwing themselves at the automatons or in the stampede and fires are all locked up in improvised shelters near the center of town now. They flattened the whole place and put up rowhouses and kitchens and hot baths and everything." She spits. "As if they couldn't have done that at any damned time."

"I don't think I understand."

"You were here yesterday, right? The fires, the fighting?"

"Yes."