Mycroft's Statement...

"Truly, this is a desperate hour. I mean no hyperbole or misleading half-truth. Truly, if something is not done quickly, our fragile empire- nay, our fragile world will burst apart at the seams. First to the obvious, there are hostile nations out there that wish only to be supreme upon this earth. One need only look to the Mad Prussian Air Pirate Robur Mors and his frightening lieutenants: the Flying Circus of Rudolph Hitler in order to understand the threat of alien nations. Likewise, there are those, who despite wielding no political power, have such presence of thought and carry such influence with their eloquently chosen words that they become as gods on earth. The Devil Doctor, Fu Man Chu, is such a man. However, even they are not the ones that worry me.

Those that worry me have neither earthly power nor any need for influence; for it is occasionally great-, they have need of one thing: fear. They operate on the power of pure terror, taking everything into account before acting and ensuring that their results are the ones they planned for. And yet, now I believe that these self same purveyors of terror make no idle threats in the promise of it. Since the death of the great detective, Sherlock Holmes, at the cruel hands of Richenbach Falls, his presumed deceased adversary, Professor James Moriarty, and his Machiavellian Illuminati Syndicate, took up the icy sword of fear and plunged it deep into the heart of every Englishman and indeed the world itself. With the dread destructive force of Cthulhu behind him, Moriarty now wields the power of fear over half the world and as the pot boils, the scum rises, bringing to his call all manner of ruffians are degenerates to answer the pleas of the star-spawned menace. Among their ranks, a San Francisco based crime lord known to the public as Black Bradley haunts the rookeries and slums of the world using any manner he can to build an army of thieves and murderers to ransack the world by night. And even worse, the two thousand year old assassin who has, as of his most recent incarnation, taken up the name Quentin Andrews, lurks in the shadows of London's sewers, raising not an army, but honing his own personal power to perfection. There is even talk that Moriarty's own daughter, Quinn, has taken up the dark arts to expand the horridly magical into her father's covert empire.

There are dangers even who have not risen from Cthulhu's call but rather take the opportunity of his summoning to carry out their own schemes. The Colonel Moran and his newfound associate, Hawley Griffin, have found numerous uses of latter's invisibility serum and the former's ties to Egyptian lore. Others tell of the Count Vladimir Tepes, the son of the dragon or Dracula who conspires with the Mexican Emperor Maximillian to storm the western lands with an onslaught of their vengeful, blood-sucking brood. And the Mutineer, Nemo, from the East Indies remains hidden after what many thought was his death some thirty years ago. Even those who willingly gave up their freedom for the betterment of society (need I even mention the selfless acts of the tortured Henry Jekyll) have been loosed upon us what with the destruction of Bedlam Asylum. Speaking of which, the hunt for Bedlam's chief specialist, Dr. Byron Shelley, still continues as the poor soul's misguided quest for love lost turns him slowly from the kind soul that many once knew into his terrifying pseudonym, Jack the Ripper.

And who, pray tell, is to defend us in these times? With Holmes dead, Dr. John Watson is nothing more than vengeful shell of his former self. The alleged bane of Nosferatu, Abraham van Helsing, seems rather outmatched by his Baltic Rivals. London's finest, Chief Inspectors Lestrade and Gregson, have been reduced to pawns without Sherlock coaching them. Those chaotic magical forces like the Witch Queen, Morgan Absinthe, remain oddly quiet as do their orderly counterparts, the Knight's Templar. While the elusive geniuses, Verne, Challenger and Cavor plot scientific methods to no avail, others, like the mad Bear Flagger, John Carter, turn to less orthodox methods with equally fruitless results. And all this while, those who might help most, the staff of the Cthulhu obsessed Miskatonic University, close their gates to us, insisting that they research privately all the while the Great Old Ones they so fear move ever closer to shattering our reality. Finally, the source of the madness, H. P. Lovecraft, can only weep silently at the tragedy he has created.

So I call out to those who would save our empire and our world: Stop this madness! Surely there are some who can stand up to Cthulhu and the others. There must be brave men left in this world that can cross swords with Robur Mors and match wits with James Moriarty. With talk of Dwarves forging machines that think and Dark Elves that bring bone-chilling shamans across their lonely desert empires, we can only hope that help is out their. For it seems that Nyarlathotep walks hand in hand with Midland Manufacturing in this dark time and the smoke of steam and taduki make for curious bedfellows."

-Mycroft Holmes