Overdrive (24 page)

Three figures were
waiting for them.

“Hi there," Derek said brightly.

◊

Thinking that the
presence of the local constabulary would be most welcome at a time like this,
Felix tried to gain access to the net. There was still no response, and lacking
other options considering the presence of a gun to his head, decided to wait.

He watched as
Logan clambered out of the trapdoor which was set into street level of the
small back alley. The Watcher Prince, if that’s what he was, calmly held
Logan’s gun and forced him back against the wall with the others who were
guarded by several Nephillim.

The Shepherds had
been disarmed and now stood in a group surrounded by more heavily armed
Nephillim.

“Okay," said
Asel. “Which one’s Felix?”

Felix, seeing the
subtle shake of Crystal’s head, kept his mouth shut. No one else volunteered.

“Right." He
grabbed one of the Shepherds by the robe and held the Afer to his head. Asel
felt a demonstration of his authority was in order after the debacle with
Tarquin’s ship. The Shepherd, prepared to die for his cause and a hardnut from
wayback, looked disinterested. The sweat he was rapidly producing on his brow
belied this. 

“I’ll count to
three and if the mysterious Mr. Felix hasn’t stepped forward, I’ll fry this
poor bastard here. One…”

Asel pulled the
trigger.

An Afer, although
designed to disrupt powerful fields such as those possessed by an upper echelon
Angel, packed enough force to easily kill an unprotected human.

Asel laughed as he
released the scorched and rather dead Shepherd. The body fell in a heap around
his legs.

“Fucking hell,"
said a shaken Felix, “if you’d have given me another second, I would’ve told
you. There was no need to kill him.”

The Watcher Prince
smiled and shrugged. “I know. I just wanted to make sure the gun worked. And it does. How about that?”

He grabbed Felix
about the neck and lifted him easily off the ground with one hand. “And this
must be what all the fuss is about." He made a show of looking Felix up
and down. “Don’t look like much, but hey, good things, I’m told, come in small
packages. Speaking of which…” He looked directly at Felix’s groin. Glancing up,
he gave Felix a wink.

“Fuck off.”

“That’s an
excellent idea. Its about time we got off this rock.” He turned to his
Nephillim, throwing Felix to two of the brawnier ones. “Get him, the sheep and
the Overdrive back to the ship. Kill the rest.”

“What?," said
Grand Shepherd Mattock. “That wasn’t part of the deal.”

The others looked
at the Grand Shepherd in horror.

Asel took a moment
to savor the moment before speaking.

“Well, the deal’s
changed. That’s what you get when you double-cross.”

“How could you?”
said Ram Terry accusingly, staring at his former Grand Shepherd.

“Forgive me Holy
One.” Mattock dropped to his knees and stared at his master beseechingly. “I
did it for the good of the church.”

“Your negotiation
skills aren’t too good there champ," said Logan.

Ram Terry, as far
as sheep went, looked forlorn. “You were my friend and advisor. I trusted you.”

“I know, your
Raminess. And I sought to repay your trust and friendship with a gift. I made a
deal with the Watchers here. They said if I gave them the Overdrive, they’d
support us against the Areopagites.”

“I’m sorry,” said
Asel with mock sadness. “I lied.”

Mattock broke down
and started sobbing around his masters hooves.

Asel sighed. “I
was going to kill you as well, but you’re so pathetic, I think it’ll be more
fun letting you live. As a matter of fact," he said thoughtfully, “I look
forward to hearing about your former friends and allies hunting you down and
killing you slowly. You can go.”

The Grand Shepherd
looked doubtful.

“Yes,” said Asel,
nodding encouragingly, “I do mean you.”

Mattock took one
hesitant step, and with a growl of animal savagery, made a leap for Asel’s
throat.

Too swiftly to
follow, almost impossibly quickly by normal human standards, Asel caught the
Grand Shepherd by the throat, twisted his neck and flung him against the wall
to land in a crumpled heap.

Ram Terry made a
small baaing sound.

Asel opened his
mouth to say something witty but was forestalled by the sudden shaking of the
ground and a blast of super heated air coming from the escape tunnel.

“What the fuck was
that?” said one of the nearby Nephillim.

Asel glared at
him. He’d stolen his line.

◊

Derek
eyed the dispensing machine threateningly.
“Give me a fucking hangover sniffer. Now.”

“I’m sorry sir,"
said the less than sorry sounding dispenser, “I am all out.”

The Polar Bear,
less than impressed, head-butted the wall mounted unit. It made a small zzzing
sound and didn’t reply. The display screen dimmed and went out.

“Well, that was
helpful," said Bruce.

Derek
rubbed his furry forehead. “I think it
cleared my head though.”

“I hate to
interrupt chaps, but we do have to get to the audience with Ram Terry.” Walter
smiled more cheerfully than he felt. He’d lived in hope of a cure for a
hangover which Derek had just dashed. The black eye he sported probably wasn’t
helping the state of his head either.

After obtaining a
release from the detainment centre, the two Transplanters and Walter had made
their way towards the discotech that served as the audience chamber of Ram
Terry IV. Just outside, Derek had spotted the generic dispensing machine.

“Shall we go in
then," suggested Walter.

“Why not?,"
growled Derek. “We’re not going to get much more from this useless shithead
machine.” He gave it a last kick before following Bruce and Walter into the
disco.

“Bit empty isn’t
it?," said Bruce. The place was empty.

Derek
shrugged. “Maybe they ran out of beer.”

“According to our
instructions, the entrance should be at the back.” Walter looked around finally
spotting the unobtrusive door. “Ah, there we go.”

They made their
way towards it. “Interesting," said Bruce.

“What?," said
Derek.

“There’s no guard
on the door. I would’ve thought their security would be a little better.”

“Perhaps they’re
on a break,” offered Walter hopefully.

“Hmmm,"
grunted Bruce.

Bruce led the way
and carefully opened the door. Finding the antechamber empty he gestured for
the others to enter. The bodies of two Shepherds lay slumped against a wall.

“Looks like they
took a permanent break," said Derek.

Bruce walked over
to the far door, and after listening for a moment, opened it a fraction and
peered within. Finding nothing to concern himself with, he opened it further
and walked in. The other two followed him.

Walking into the
middle of the audience chamber, they spotted the headless corpse of a Martian
in a doorway at the far end of the room. Debris lay scattered around the body
and wisps of smoke were leaking from the doorway.

Bruce was about to
investigate when a Templar and four Martians jumped over the corpse and entered
the audience chamber at a run.

Bruce and Derek recognized him immediately as the Templar Knights Captain they had run into on the
Dirty
Little Minx
.

“Hi there,” said Derek.

The Templar and
his Martian cohorts had come to a sudden halt about 10 meters away.

“Oi,” said Bruce.
“Don’t I recognize you lot?," he said looking at Captain Zoltan. “Didn’t
we save your green arses from being sucked off?”

Captain Zoltan
looked away, embarrassed.

Tynan’s already
foul mood wasn’t improving. “Look. We’re in a bit of a hurry. I don’t know who
the fuck you are and why or how you keep getting in my way, but I’ve had just
about enough of you.” He raised his cannon and looked at the Polar Bear. “I
think I owe you this.”

“Wait," said Derek.

“Why?," said
Tynan, about to pull the trigger. “In case you haven’t noticed, we’ve got lots
of guns and you’ve got none.”

“Ah, that’s what
you think. The reason I think you should wait is because I’ve got a bomb that
will detonate if you shoot me.” He grinned. “That’s why.”

Tynan frowned and
lowered his cannon slightly.

“I don’t believe
you.”

“Fine. Pull the
trigger then. Nice knowing you Bruce, Walter.”

Tynan’s head was
rapidly filling with doubt.

“You see, I’ve
programmed it to go off if I should I be shot.”

“When did you do
that?”

“Just then.”

“What’s stopping
me from hitting you with my gun or stabbing you?”

Derek
’s grin grew broader. “I’d like to see you
try.”

Tynan continued to
hesitate.

Seeing this, Derek decided to capitalize on his advantage.

“I’ll tell you a
little story, shall I?” Tynan didn’t reply so he continued. “After I became a
Transplanter, I thought that I would never have children. Then I became a
mercenary and realized that life is very fragile…”

“Is there a point
to this?” Tynan said, struggling to keep his temper. Holding the cannon with
one hand, he was surreptitiously trying to remove another crawler bomb from the
belt behind his back.

“Getting there. If
you’d shut up for a second, I might make it. Anyway, I realized that life is
fragile and precious and that it would be remiss of me not to at least give
myself the option of having children. To that end, I put one of my nads…”

“One of your what?,"
said Tynan. He’d reached the bomb but was struggling to detach it from his
belt.

“Testicles,"
Bruce provided helpfully.

“I put one of my
nads in storage should the opportunity ever arise for me to procreate. But that
created a problem. What to replace it with? It would look a bit silly if I had
an unbalanced plum sack now, wouldn’t it?” Derek went through the motions of
looking thoughtful. “Oh that’s right,” he said looking Tynan dead in the eye.
“I replaced it with a nova bomb.”

“It was a good job
too," said Bruce. “Looks pretty natural.”

The others in the
room looked at him strangely.

“What?," he
said defensively. “It does.”

Tynan had detached
the crawler from his belt and activated it with his AI. Derek saw the motion,
judged the distance between himself and the Templar and told Bruce and Walter
to run. Bruce picked Walter up, threw him over his shoulder in a fireman’s
carry and sprinted for the entrance.

Derek said his
prayers, gave his nova bomb a three second delay – long enough, hopefully for
Bruce and Walter to get out – and then charged towards Tynan. “I’m coming
Mother," he roared.

The Knights
Captain, realizing that the mercenary was unlikely to be bluffing about the
nova bomb, threw his crawler up in the general direction of the charging Polar
Bear and then ran into the adjoining room.

The Martians stood
their ground, firing at the large Ursus Maritimus bearing down on them. Two
shots struck him – one on the chest and the other on the leg, but they may as
well have been rubber bands for all the effect they had.

Derek had just
reached the first Martian and was in the process of tearing of its head when
the crawler caught up with him, attached itself to his leg and prepared to
detonate. It needn’t have bothered. A moment later, Derek’s nova bomb went off,
incinerating his furry body and those of the remaining Martians.

A fire storm
filled the room, roaring into both the antechamber and Ram Terry’s personal
quarters.

Bruce had made it
to the antechamber, ducked behind the wall and threw himself and Walter to the
ground a moment before the detonation. A heat wave swept over them, singeing
their clothes, Bruce’s fur and Walter’s hair.

Bruce stood,
dragging Walter to his feet. For the first time he noticed five burning bodies
dressed in the uniforms of Templar Knights lying on the floor. Five meters away
from the door and directly in front of it, the blast wave would’ve hit them
head on.

“You all right?,"
he asked the shaken man, patting down bits of his clothes that were still on
fire.

“Yes, I think so,”
Walter said uncertainly. “What about Derek?”

“He’s dead,"
the Gorilla said flatly. “Let’s go.”

◊

Gabriella watched
the Two Transplanters and Walter enter the antechamber.

“Who are they?”
she asked Sammael.