Hellgate London - Exodus Part 40

Keep thinking that way,the demon encouraged.Hate will make you grow strong. And if you hate enough, I'll make you powerful enough to do anything you want to.

The poultice across Warren's wrist had been made from the slime of yet another demon that had been found within the parts of London where the Burn had caused alterations. That one had looked like a snail, but it had been three feet tall and equipped with a tongue capable of striking over a distance of ten feet. The tongue-strike carried lethal toxins. The Cabalists still didn't have the proper name, but they were calling them Death Darts at present.

Instead of a secretion, though, the Cabalists had learned to sc.r.a.pe the mucus-based body from the sh.e.l.l and mix herbs in with it. Then they used more arcane powers to blend the snail's body with the herbs and energy. They'd learned to use that concoction to enable host bodies to accept transplanted materials like horns. Evidently whatever property that protected the Death Darts from the toxins they carried also allowed the grafts to take.

No one had ever tried to graft a limb to anyone before Warren, but they had tried since. So far, those who had suffered the amputations to attempt to take on demon limbs had rejected their new appendages.

Warren's body never tried to reject Merihim's hand. Instead the scale line from the hand crept past the heavy scarring at the wrist, growing almost as Warren watched. The scales stopped at mid-forearm.

"I think the scales have added a layer of reinforcement," Dr. Metser told Warren on the morning of the seventh day. The physician was in his fifties and sported a white coat, heavy tattooing, and ram's horns that he'd had grafted on immediately following the invasion of the demons. "I'm certain that your body isn't going to reject it. How does it feel today?"

"Fine," Warren answered. That was what he always said. "Can you move it?" The physician always asked that.

"No." Warren never tried.

"Perhaps we could take off the halo." Metser referred to the hardware that encircled the demon's hand. Rigid metal spikes pierced the fingers, holding them straight and steady.

"No," Warren said. He didn't intend to let them remove it.

"I see." Metser struggled to disguise his impatience and his curiosity. "I think it's healed well enough to experiment with the range of movement you may have left to you."

"And I don't."

Metser sighed and nodded. "Have you tried to move it?"

"Yes," Warren lied. "I can't." In truth, though, he could wiggle each of the fingers a little. He never did so with anyone watching.

It's time,Merihim whispered in the back of Warren's head.The hand is healed. It's yours now. Then I can use it-or not,Warren replied.

Don't you want your revenge on the man that maimed you?the demon taunted. Warren didn't say anything. He tried not to let his thoughts betray him.

You want revenge, Warren. I know that you do. I can feel it burning inside you.

The physician was speaking. Warren tried to focus on the man's words but couldn't.

I've given you a gift,Merihim said,unlike anything my kind has ever given before. You don't even know the full extent of it.

Warren was afraid to find out. A demon's price was usually a man's soul.

I wouldn't want anything so tawdry,Merihim said.I want you to work for me. To do what?

To help me. This is a new place for us. There are kingdoms to be carved out here. I want everything that I can get, and you can help me. Warren tried not to think about that.

The Cabalists are proving powerful,Merihim said.They will be a deciding force in the coming struggles in this world. Most of the demons don't want anything to do with humans.

But you're willing to make an exception?

I am. I want you to lead that faction I will take from their ranks. You will grow strong among them, because I will help you, and then-when the time is ripe-you will lend your strength to mine. You will be my champion, and I will let no one ever hurt you.

Memory of the pistol shots that had ended his mother's life then wounded him and ended his father's life echoed inside Warren's head. They sounded so close that he could smell the gunpowder.

No one,the demon repeated.No one will ever be able to hurt you. Warren stared at the demon's hand.I've already been hurt.

It will be the last time. You will be stronger than any of them, Warren. You will bemine.

Warren closed his eyes. He heard the physician asking him if he was all right, but he ignored the man. The man that took your hand is fleeing the city as you sit here,Merihim said.Do you want to let him escape?

You're lying.Pain stabbed through Warren's temples and he knew the demon was angry with him. But as suddenly as the pain hit, it disappeared. In its place was a vision.

The armored man-He is a Templar,Merihim said-stood in an underground tube with other armored men. Around them were several homeless people dressed in ragged coats and huddled around small fires. The armored men-Templar,Warren corrected-and some of the men worked on the pulling engine.

What are they doing?Warren asked.

Working on their escape,Merihim answered. They're going to use the train?

Yes.

For a few moments, Warren watched the Templar work, crawling through the engine and attaching new parts.How long has he been doing this?

Since he took your hand.

The vision started to fade. Warren tried to hang on to it, feeling again and again the cold bite of steel slicing through his arm. That man-that Templar-had hurt him. He can be the last one to ever do that,Merihim promised.

What good is a demon's promise?

I gave you my hand. And you grew another.

I could have killed you. I could still choose another. Reject me and I will.

The vision faded away but Warren couldn't forget that the man who had hurt him so badly was getting away. He would be gone from London and then Warren would never see him again.

Warren couldn't stand that.

Take the hand,Merihim said.Make it yours and it will give you the power to destroy him.

Warren took a deep breath, scared of what he wanted so badly to do. Accepting the hand would mean crossing over to the darkness. Everything he'd read warned of that. But he looked at Kelli sitting by the door like a puppy, her mind almost a blank now, and knew that he'd already crossed over before he'd noticed.

What's one more step?Warren asked himself. But he knew that he wasn't stepping over because he'd already come so far. He was afraid. And he wanted the power that Merihim promised. If he had enough power, he could protect himself.

Even from the demon.

Opening his eyes, Warren stared at the demon's hand at the end of his arm. "Warren?" Naomi asked.

"I'm fine," he said, and even in his ears his voice sounded stronger than it had in days. In fact, it sounded stronger than he'd ever heard it.

The miasma that had gripped him since his maiming left him, like winter fog blown off a radiator-heated window. He stood up from the hospital table.

"Do you want me to take off the-"

The physician never got the chance to finish his question. Warren flexed his hand, then made a fist. The halo that had been protecting it snapped into pieces and dropped to the ground. Then the spikes that had been stabbed into his fingers shot across the room and stabbed into the wall. They quivered and smoked.

Warren turned to Tulane. "I want transportation."

"For what?" Tulane looked wary and irritated at the same time, obviously sensing things were beyond his control.

"I don't have time for your questions." "You'll b.l.o.o.d.y well have time for-"

Warren gestured without thinking, using his demon's hand.

Tulane suddenly stopped speaking. Then he held his hands to his temples and screeched in pain.

"Don't question me," Warren said. "I don't have time. Give the order for someone to bring a vehicle around to take me back to the city. Do it now and I won't explode your head like rotten grapefruit. Do you understand?"

Wracked with pain, nose bleeding, Tulane nodded. Warren lowered his hand.

Tulane fell to his hands and knees and started retching. "What are you doing?" Naomi demanded.

Warren looked at her, noticing that she unconsciously took a step back. "You can go if you want to, but stay out of my way." He walked toward the door, hearing Tulane rise and shuffle along behind him. By the time he walked out into the cave tunnel, Tulane was already calling for security. They arrived on the double, rifles drawn and aimed at Warren.

For a moment fear touched Warren, but he brushed it away, feeling the power surging within him. He drew back his hand and threw it. Liquid fire materialized and flew toward the ceiling, clinging there and dripping down in long burning ropes.

Warren turned to Tulane, daring him to say anything other than what he'd been told to say. "Take him," Tulane said, eyes filled with pain. "Take him wherever he wants to go."

Forty-Six.

Tired and covered in grease, wearing coveralls instead of his armor, Simon sat on the Virgin Cross Country's pulling engine's fender and spooned stew from the paper bowl he'd been given. Through eyes burning from lack of sleep as well as grit, he gazed at the homeless he and the other Templar had spent the last week gathering from the broken buildings and tube stations. They'd guided them from wherever they'd found them, promising food and a way out of the city.

After the first few days, some of the men and women they'd rescued went with them to help with the scavenging. In the beginning, Simon had been worried about them, not certain they could protect them from the demons. But in the end the extra help had become necessary to gather all the food and supplies they needed to take care of the intended evacuees.

At first, the survivors hadn't wanted to come with the Templar. They'd been more afraid of leaving what little shelter they'd managed to find than conscious of the inevitability that the demons would soon find them.

They'd found thirteen the first night who were willing to come with them. It had been an inauspicious number, and one that Wertham had considered unlucky. But they'd brought in double that number the next night. And the numbers had grown exponentially from there. Paddington National Rail station was in the heart of a residential area that also had a lot of hotels where people from other countries had gotten stranded.

At last count this evening, they'd had one thousand eighty-nine people housed in the Paddington tube station. Lack of food and water was increasingly a problem. The Grand Union Ca.n.a.l was nearby, though the levels had shrunk there and Simon didn't trust the water, and they lacked the resources to purify any appreciable amount. So far the demons hadn't found them.

But Simon knew that was going to change. Their luck couldn't hold forever because there were more people awaiting rescue than he would have imagined.

Wertham walked over to join Simon, carrying a bowl of stew and a bottle of water. The old Templar popped his faceshield open, revealing his tired and haggard features.

"More volunteers arrived tonight," Wertham said as he settled in beside Simon.

Volunteerswere what they called the people that managed to wander into their sanctuary on their own, without being guided in by a Templar. It was good that people were hearing about theKnight Train, as it was being called, but Simon knew that such knowledge being so widely spread would mean their undoing as well. If that many people knew about them, the demons would discover them before long as well.

Simon gazed down the long tube. The people huddled in small groups around tiny fires that barely staved off the chill that permeated the ground even as deep as they were. Many of the people curled up in blankets or big coats.

"How many volunteers?" Simon asked. "Thirty-two."

"Did we have enough to feed them?"

Wertham nodded. "We did. But we can't keep scavenging enough by hand to feed a group like this. We're going to need a fleet of lorries before long. And go farther to get it."

"I know."

"If we don't run out of food, we're going to be found out." "I know."

"And we're running out of s.p.a.ce on the train."

Simon sighed and felt exhausted. Hopelessness flickered within him again. When the idea had first occurred to him-to update one of the abandoned pulling engines in one of the storage spurs in the Paddington Nation Rail line and use the train to take survivors from London-it had sounded easy. Now, with the successful arrival of every newcomer, it edged back toward impossible.

"I know that, too. Is there any good news?"

Wertham grinned. "We're still alive." He offered a toast with his water bottle. "To luck and pure hearts." Simon echoed him, touching his bottle to Wertham's briefly before they drank.

Knuckling stew from his beard, Wertham looked at Simon. "Have you slept?" "Yeah."

"When?"

Simon shook his head. Ever since he'd stopped going outside the tube and had concentrated on making the necessary adjustments to the pulling engine, he'd lost all track of time. He figured the HUD could tell him, but he couldn't remember the last time he'd been inside his armor, either.

"I can't remember."

"You need to get more rest."

"I will," Simon said. "As soon as we get these people out of here." "How soon before they have the engine converted over?"

"A few hours. A few days." Simon shook his head. "I don't know. McCorkleson doesn't know either."

Ian McCorkleson had proven a G.o.dsend. He was an old man, in his late seventies, but still had a mind as sharp as a tack. He couldn't do all the physical labor himself now, but they'd recruited able bodies from the volunteers to help with the engine refitting.

All his life, McCorkleson had worked on the trains as a mechanic. He'd even been one of the first to help design the MagnaPUSH electromagnetic engines that were supposed to be the wave of the future. j.a.pan and other countries had already started using maglev trains, but those depended on current running through the rails.

Instead of being powered by electricity, the MagnaPUSH engines operated by accessing the natural electromagnetic fields of the earth, cutting the operations costs dynamically. Plans had been in motion to start converting the pulling engines over the next ten years. The technology had still been on the drawing boards in the commercial shops.

But Templar technology had always been more developed than the rest of the world. The Templar had planned to fight the war against the demons if they ever came, and they'd enlisted the brightest minds to their cause. The Templar designers had been using NanoDyne technology a score of years before MagnaPUSH had become a reality.

Simon had worked with the NanoDyne engines, experimenting with them on skateboards he'd built. Some of the maglev skateboards had been released on the market, but none of them were anywhere near as powerful as the ones Simon had designed. But he had learned nearly everything there was to know about harnessing the power available through them.

The Templar had gotten the NanoDyne engines from some of the unmanned Templar Underground. After the ma.s.sacre at St. Paul's Cathedral, several of the area's Templar compounds were seriously undermanned. Or totally abandoned. That had been part of the intent as well, making sure there were enough supplies left behind for the survivors to be able to stretch over a period of years if they had to.

McCorkleson hadn't believed how sophisticated and compact the engines that Simon had provided had been. Part of the problem was figuring out a way to properly balance and place the engines so they wouldn't tear loose of their housings the first time they were powered up. They'd had to reinforce all of the structures.

"McCorkleson wants a few more days to test the engines," Simon said. "You had it up off the rails yesterday," Wertham said.