Ben woke up in bed back at his house and had the fleeting luxury of thinking that "It Had All Been a Dream". Only that almost never happened to him. Except, of course, for the extraordinarily vivid nightmares that brought him screaming into wakefulness. Usually he'd dream something, wake up with absolutely no memory of it, and three hours later it would seep through to his conscious mind and he'd be left wondering whether he dreamed it or if it really happened. It didn't help that his usual recall was maddeningly dreamlike anyway.
Ben levered himself out of bed and staggered out into the lounge room, where Shade sprawled on an arm chair reading a magazine.
"You need to lose some weight," Shade said. "You're freakin heavy!"
Ben was too zonked out to even try and be witty. He felt like someone who had been woken up for work after a big night out on the piss.
"How are you feeling on this bright and wonderful afternoon?" asked Shade. As bright and chirpy as ever, damn him.
"Like I'm growing a dog on my tongue. What time is it?" The sun slanted in through the window in a way that could have been mid-morning or mid-afternoon, depending on your perspective. Ben's was noticeably skewed right at that particular moment.
"It's about one-thirty."
Ben pressed the button to turn the TV on. Nothing happened. He blinked at it with bovine stupidity.
"Power's out," said Shade.
"Great."
Ben dropped into the other armchair. "What do we do now?"
Shade shrugged. "Now that they've hidden from us I'm not sure. Last time they came after me."
"Then why haven't they done that this time? What's keeping them away now?"
"Because," said Shade. "Last time I beat them."
Allan paced back and forth along the aisle as he considered their next move. Neil and a few of the others sat about on milk crates.
"Where do we go now?" said Allan aloud. He didn't really expect an answer from any of the walking vegetables surrounding him. And, more to the point, he didn't want one.
They'd done this town, it was finished with. Over. Most of his army had departed to spread the darkness. The only thing now was those damn Lightbringers. The older one, that bright bastard who had pursued them from Wungla, was strong, there was no doubting that. And he had the experience. But the new one, he had potential. A lot of potential. If the old one was 250 watts then this other one was one thousand watts. Or, hell, two thousand. He was a potential sun. All Allan knew, was that if this young one were to unleash the full extent of his power, it would burn Allan and all his ilk from the face of the planet.
They would stay. He wasn't about to abandon the town now, not when they were becoming entrenched. All they had to do was take care of the older one, the one who had been a thorn in their side in so many towns. Take him out and the other one, with no one to train him, would quickly follow.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN