Book 2 - Daemons Are Forever (53 page)

“You always were a big softy, Eddie Drood.” And she kissed me hard, right there in front of everyone. Some clapped, a few cheered. Molly finally let go of me and smiled sweetly around her.

Luckily Mr. Stab arrived at that point, strolling casually into the War Room like an unexploded bomb, with the Sarjeant-at-Arms marching right beside him. The Sarjeant had a gun in one hand and his gaze fixed firmly on Mr. Stab, who politely pretended not to notice. After his many exertions in the field, the Sarjeant looked battered and bruised, and somewhat bulkily bandaged here and there, but his back was still straight and his head erect. For him, weakness would always be something that happened to other people. And to be fair, he still looked like he could take on a whole army single-handed and send the survivors running home crying to their mothers. Mr. Stab, it should be said, looked…exactly as he always had. Calm, cold, and completely unruffled. Not a spot of blood on him, or the slightest tear in his Victorian evening wear. Even his top hat gleamed with a smug and civilised air.

I felt like throwing something at it, on general principles.

Instead, I beckoned them both over and explained the situation to them. Mr. Stab frowned slightly at mention of the Damnation Way, as though the name rang a bell with him, but he had nothing to say. The Sarjeant-at-Arms all but crashed to attention before me, his eyes brightening at the prospect of further mayhem.

“Anything, for the family!” he said. “And I have to say, the family’s been so much more fun since you got back, boy.”

He may be a psychopath
, I thought,
but he’s our psychopath
.

“This new mission,” said Mr. Stab. “Will I get to kill more people?”

“Almost certainly,” I said.

“And is there a good chance that I might be killed?”

“Almost certainly.”

“Even better,” said Mr. Stab. “Count me in.”

“
Incoming
!”

The shout cut across all the War Room chatter, and we all looked around sharply to see where it was coming from. One of the communication staff was standing over his workstation and pointing at it with a trembling finger. The communications officer was quickly at his side, slamming him back into his seat, and then scowling over the man’s shoulder at the information flashing across his screen. All the other communications staff were frantically checking their computers, crystal balls, and scrying pools, and chattering excitedly to each other. A wailing alarm suddenly went off, and the Matriarch immediately ordered it shut down.

“Can’t hear myself think,” she said sharply. “Ah, that’s better. Now, what’s happening?
Talk to me, people
!
What
exactly is it that’s
incoming
?”

“Is the Hall under threat?” I said.

“Looks like it,” said the communications officer. It was Howard Drood, efficient as always, come over from Operations to head the War Room during the attacks on the nests. “Something is trying to force its way into our reality, right here, pushing past all the Hall’s defensive shields. Which I would have said was impossible except for the fact that something is doing it.”

“Could it be Truman, or the Invaders?” I said. “Launching a pre-emptive strike against us?”

“Yes. No. Maybe. I don’t know! The screens can’t make head or tail of what’s happening.” Howard’s habitual scowl deepened as he studied the monitor screens. “I’ve never seen readings like these… Whatever this is, it’s coming at us like a bat out of hell. It’s already punched through the outer defences, and it’s heading straight for us.”

I flashed back to the old attacks on the Hall, when the Heart was still in residence. We never did find out for sure who was behind them. Had they chosen this moment to attack us again, while we were at our weakest and most vulnerable?

“Strange,” I said. “Talk to me. Do you know who or what this is?”

“No, Eddie.” His voice in my head was surprisingly tentative. “It’s coming from a direction I don’t recognise. From outside everything I understand as reality. It’s not very large, but it does seem to be very determined. And no, Eddie, I can’t keep it out.”

Giles Deathstalker had his long sword out, and was looking around for an enemy. Not to be outdone, the Sarjeant called up a gun in each hand.

“Put those away!” the Matriarch snapped immediately. “You can’t have weapons in the War Room! You might damage the equipment.”

Giles sheathed his sword and bowed. The Sarjeant-at-Arms made his guns disappear again, and folded his arms tightly with a definite
Look at me I’m not sulking even though I have cause
expression on his face. The Matriarch sighed audibly.

“Don’t just stand there, Sarjeant! Armour up! Everyone, armour up!”

She had a point. We all subvocalised the activating Words, and just like that the War Room was full of gleaming golden figures. It felt good to be back in the gold again, to feel strong and fast and sharp. Sometimes putting on the armour is like snapping fully awake from a long doze. Everyone not preoccupied at a workstation peered suspiciously about them, ready for action, golden blades and other weapons extruding silently from golden fists. There was a rising tension in the War Room, a strong feeling of something coming, pressing inexorably closer. We could all feel it, pressing in on us from all sides at once. Molly stood close beside me, her arms lifted in the stance of summoning, ready to throw seriously nasty magics at anything even remotely threatening. Mr. Stab looked…politely interested. And the Armourer, not surprisingly, had pulled a really powerful-looking weapon out of nowhere and was swivelling it back and forth in search of a target, while everyone else hurried to get out of his way.

Heaven help anyone who dares to face the Droods on their own territory.

A rising babble of voices filled the War Room as the various technicians struggled to understand what was happening. Whatever was coming slammed through layer after layer of protections, and the tension in the air was almost physically painful. Martha Drood, back in armour for the first time I could remember, moved from station to station, peering over shoulders and dispensing a cautionary word or a bracing murmur, as required. If she was reduced to rallying the troops, we really were in trouble. A rising tone rang out on the air, sharp and distinct, as though approaching from somewhere inconceivably far away. “It’s here!” Howard shouted. “It’s materialising!”

“Where?” said Martha. “Where exactly in the Hall?”

“
Here
!” screamed Howard. “Right here in the bloody War Room!” The rising note peaked, a shuddering vibration that reverberated inside all our heads, despite the shielding armour. We all clapped useless hands over our ears and staggered back and forth, and then we all flinched back as the world itself split apart in the very centre of the War Room… and Janissary Jane came through. She threw herself through the gap, her combat fatigues blackened and scorched and actually on fire in places. Explosions and brilliant lights and raised angry voices spilled out of the split in the air, and then all of it was cut off as the split slammed together again. The tension in the air was gone in a moment, and we all armoured down just a little sheepishly as Janissary Jane stood shaking and breathless before us. She was weeping violently, and looked like she’d fought her way through Hell itself to get back to us. She raised a bruised face, sniffed back tears, and glared at me triumphantly, and then she sat down suddenly on the floor, as though the last of the strength had just gone out of her legs.

“All right!” I yelled, glaring about me. “Everyone calm down! The emergency is over. I know who this is. Concentrate all your attention on reinstating our defences, and making sure no one followed her from… wherever the hell that was.” I moved forward and knelt down beside Janissary Jane. She was shuddering violently now, and breathing hard. Her eyes weren’t tracking properly. “Jane?” I said. “It’s me, Eddie. Are you all right?”

She did look pretty bad, up close. Her army fatigues had been burned away in places, and were soaked with blood from a dozen nasty-looking wounds. Parts of her battle armour looked to be half melted. Her face kept going slack, as pain and stress and exhaustion caught up with her. When the last of the adrenaline coursing through her ran out, she was going to crash, and hard. I needed to get answers out of her now, while I still could. I grabbed her by the shoulders, made her look at me, and said her name again, and her head jerked up as though I’d pulled her out of a deep sleep.

“Eddie. I made it back. Damn…”

“I saw the note you left pinned to your door with a knife,” I said, trying for a light touch. “So, did you find us some really big guns?”

“The biggest,” said Janissary Jane, trying for a smile and not quite bringing it off. “Remember, Eddie, I told you about the last demon war I fought in? The one where some damned fools accidentally opened a hellgate, and an army of demons came flooding out?”

“Yes,” I said, my heart suddenly sinking. I really didn’t like where this was going. “In the end, things got so bad you had to use a superweapon to destroy the whole universe, so the demons couldn’t use it as a base to invade other universes. I remember. I still have nightmares.”

“This is it,” said Janissary Jane. “The superweapon. The last resort. The Deplorable End.”

She held it out to me on the palm of a surprisingly steady hand. The weapon didn’t actually look like much, but then, the really nasty ones often don’t. The Deplorable End was just a flat silver box, dull and lifeless, with a red button on top. It barely filled Jane’s palm, but there was still… something about it. The more I looked at it, the more uneasy I felt, as though a large and dangerous animal had just entered the room. I studied the box carefully, and had enough sense not to try to touch it. The Armourer had come forward and was peering over my shoulder at it, breathing hard in his excitement.

“Now that is impressive,” he said. “You don’t see craft and workmanship like that often, these days. How many spatial dimensions has it got? I keep losing count. And the energy signatures are off the scale… You have got to let me get that down to the Armoury and take it apart.”

“No, Uncle Jack,” I said firmly.

“Oh come on, I’ve got this really cool hyper-hammer I’ve being dying to try out…”

“No, Uncle Jack! Have you stopped taking your medication again? Jane, what is that, exactly? What does it do?”

“Simple to operate,” she said, her voice dull and lifeless. Her eyes were drooping shut again as the last of her strength went out of her. “Just press the button, and…Boom.”

“No more tower?” I said hopefully.

“No more anything,” said Jane, blinking owlishly. “No more universe. And no, you don’t get a timer. The Deplorable End is a one-time-only deal. What I’ve got here is the original device, the prototype. We used a somewhat improved version to put an end to the demon war. What I’ve brought you is, therefore, technically speaking, untested. But it should work. No reason I know of why it shouldn’t.” She slowly lowered her hand, as though the awful thing squatting on her palm were getting heavier. “I stole this, from the Multiversal Mercenaries’ Black Museum. I had to kill a lot of people to get this to you, Eddie. Some of them were friends, once. But now I have closed the book and burned all my boats … I can never go back. So don’t you ever give me cause to regret this, Drood.”

“How does it work?” I said, because you have to say something.

“Like you’d understand, even if I could explain it,” said Janissary Jane, with some of her old force in her voice. “I don’t need to know how weapons work. I’m a mercenary, not a mechanic. But I’m told it’s a largely conceptual weapon. What we’ve got here is a hyperspatial key, activating the real weapon, which is hidden away in some other dimensional fold, just waiting to be unleashed. When pressed, the button on the box gives the weapon the target coordinates and…Boom! There you have it. Or rather, there you suddenly don’t. One less universe to trouble the gaze of God. The Deplorable End, for everyone and everything.”

“But, basically, it’s just an untested prototype,” I said carefully. “So there is a small but nonetheless definite chance that it might not, actually, work? As such?”

“It’s a last resort,” Janissary Jane said tiredly. “When you’ve tried absolutely everything, and the Hungry Gods are coming through to eat all there is that lives…then the Deplorable End is your last chance for revenge. Away to take the bastards down with you, and to make sure no other universes will have to face the horrors we did.”

Her eyes fluttered closed as exhaustion finally took her. I gingerly took the gleaming metal box from her hand and had her taken away to the infirmary to get some rest. By the time she woke up, I hoped, it would all be over, one way or another. Though, if things went really bad, it might be a mercy if she never woke up …

I held the end of the world on my palm. It hardly weighed a thing. The Armourer peered closely at it, but didn’t attempt to touch it.

“I wonder who made it?” he said, almost wistfully.

“Armourer!” said the Matriarch, and the sharp authority in her voice snapped his head around immediately. He moved quickly over to join her and she fixed him with a cold, implacable stare. “Armourer, I hereby authorise you to open the Armageddon Codex. We have need of the forbidden weapons. Bring out Sunwrack, the Time Hammer, the Juggernaut Jumpsuit, and Winter’s Sorrow, and ready them for use.”

“No!” I said immediately, and my voice cracked so sharply across the Matriarch’s that everyone in the War Room stopped what they were doing to look at both of us. I went over to join the Armourer and the Matriarch, carefully not hurrying. I stared directly into Martha’s cold eyes, not flinching one little bit. “Not yet, Grandmother. We can’t use any of the forbidden weapons against the Invaders until they’re actually in our reality, and a clash of such powerful forces would almost certainly tear our world apart. With no guarantee the weapons would destroy the Hungry Gods anyway. We save the Armageddon Codex for when all our plans have failed. And I’m not out of plans yet.”

“The Deplorable End would destroy the whole universe, not just this world,” said the Matriarch, not giving an inch.