“I’ll armour up and tell everyone to leave,” said Eddie.
“What about the ones who won’t?” said Molly.
“Those are the ones I’ll make an example of,” said Eddie.
Molly made a brief noise, indicating that she wasn’t at all convinced. “Given some of the things that come to Strangefellows for a boisterous night out . . .”
“They’ve never met anyone like me,” Eddie said calmly.
“And then there’s Alex.”
Eddie looked at her. “That long streak of misery? What’s he going to do? Scowl me to death?”
“Don’t under-estimate him,” said Molly. “Alex is descended from Merlin Satanspawn.”
“Really?” said Eddie. “I didn’t know that.”
“There’s a lot about Alex Morrisey that most people don’t know,” said Molly. “You can’t run a bar like Strangefellows for as long as he has without acquiring some really nasty ways of restoring order. There’s a lot more to him than meets the eye.”
“There would have to be,” said Eddie. “Don’t worry. I can handle Alex.”
“Without killing him?”
“I don’t want to kill anyone,” said Eddie.
“What if John Taylor and Shotgun Suzie are there?” said Molly.
“I hope they are,” said Eddie. “I want to talk to them. I need to know what happened to Luther. There has to be more to his death than just the obvious. If we could only get to the bottom of that, I’m convinced we could still stop this madness before it gets really out of hand.”
“How are you going to stop your family,” said Molly, “when they’ve already gone to war?”
“By negotiating some kind of compromise with the Authorities,” said Eddie.
Molly pulled a face. “They’re not known for being big on compromise.”
“They’ll see reason,” said Eddie. “Even if I have to make them. Of course, that will depend on how complicit they were in Luther’s murder.”
“They might not have had anything to do with it,” Molly said carefully. “This is the Nightside. People die here all the time.”
“Do you honestly believe an experienced Drood field agent, in his armour, could be taken down without someone’s having carefully planned it in advance?”
Molly didn’t answer him. She couldn’t. After a while, she tried again.
“If nothing else, Strangefellows always has the best gossip. If you’ll just take the time to talk to some people before you boot everyone out the door, you’ll almost certainly find someone who can tell you what happened. And even make a really good guess as to who was behind it. Of course, getting them to talk . . .”
“I am fully prepared to offer major bribes with one hand and extreme violence with the other,” said Eddie.
“Well, yes,” said Molly. “That is the Nightside way. You’ll fit right in at Strangefellows.”
“Now you’re just being nasty,” said Eddie. He thought about it. “I let the crowd drive us out last time rather than put on my armour and blow my cover. But I can’t take it easy now, no matter what. Are you sure you want to come along? You might not be comfortable with some of the things I’ll have to do.”
“That’s what I usually say to you,” Molly said briskly. “This is my world you’re walking through now, Eddie. I was widely versed in being violent and unreasonable long before I met you.”
“You’re not telling me anything I don’t know,” said Eddie.
“And anyway,” said Molly, “you’re going to need me to watch your back. Strangefellows can be a pretty rough bar even at the best of times.”
* * *
• • •
There is an old military adage, that no plan survives contact with the enemy. The Droods hadn’t been in the more-populated areas of the Nightside long before all their carefully worked out designs and intentions went to hell in a hand-cart.
The Sarjeant-at-Arms led his column of armoured Droods down one of the main streets in the financial district, and was quietly satisfied with the way people gave them plenty of room. A few tourists came rushing up, wanting to take selfies with him, but he quickly sent them on their way. He’d been assured this was one of the main routes for Nightside traffic, and he was there to shut it down. To bring all of it to a screeching halt. Because if the Droods could stop the traffic that famously never stopped, that proved they could do anything. Wars were won in the minds and souls of the enemy as well as on the battle-field.
People crowded together to point and comment and try to film the golden-armoured Droods with their phones. The Sarjeant smiled behind his featureless mask. Let them waste their time. Nothing artificial could see or record a Drood in his armour unless the wearer allowed it. How else could the field agents do their work unnoticed in this surveillance-heavy age? People were chattering excitedly on their phones, describing what they were seeing, but the Sarjeant didn’t care about that. Let the word go out that the Droods had finally come to the Nightside and that the old ways of decadence and tolerance were coming to an end. Some of the tourists applauded the Droods as they passed, thinking it was all a parade laid on for their benefit.
The Sarjeant chose his moment carefully, then strode out into the middle of the road. He turned to face the on-coming vehicles and raised one hand with quiet authority, to bring the traffic to a halt. And every single vehicle on the road ignored him, merely swerving aside at the last moment. Anyone else they would have just run over for being dumb enough to get in their way, but the golden armour made them wary, at least enough to give it the benefit of the doubt. The Sarjeant stood there for a while, with traffic speeding by on either side of him, some so close he could have reached out and touched them . . . and then he picked one particularly large articulated vehicle and walked straight at it. The truck sounded its horn, and when the Sarjeant just kept coming, the truck swerved to avoid him. The Sarjeant moved quickly to block its way again, and the articulated vehicle decided enough was enough. It aimed itself right at the Sarjeant and put the hammer down.
The Sarjeant-at-Arms waited until the truck was almost upon him, lowered one golden shoulder, and braced himself. The truck hit him square on, and the whole front of the cab concertinaed as the golden shoulder sank deep into the radiator. The whole front of the cab collapsed in on itself, and the Sarjeant was forced back several feet by the impact. Sparks rose up from his golden feet as they skidded along the road, until the Sarjeant dug his heels in and forced the truck to a halt. It rocked back and forth, compacted to half its previous length. Dark smoke rose up from half-melted tyres. The Sarjeant tore himself free from the front of the cab, rending the solid steel with only the barest effort, and stepped away from the wrecked truck, entirely unaffected by the impact. Drood armour doesn’t take any nonsense from the physical world.
But still the rest of the traffic continued to shoot past, not even slowing as it avoided the Sarjeant and the wrecked truck. He gestured for the rest of his Droods, and they marched out into the road to take up positions blocking the way. People watching pointed and chattered excitedly. There’s nothing the Nightside likes more than a spot of free entertainment.
The traffic slowed down a little, but only to make it easier for them to dodge and dart around the standing Droods. The vehicles ignored all raised hands, waving of arms, or shouted commands to stop. The traffic had places to be and business to be about, and just kept going. The Droods looked to the Sarjeant for orders, and he gestured brusquely for them to leave the road and return to the pavement. He’d tried it the easy way; so now it was time for the hard and unpleasant alternative.
The Drood way.
He arranged his people in front of one of the biggest financial buildings. The uniformed flunkey at the door didn’t even deign to glance at them. The Sarjeant looked up at the building, then out across the open road. It would do.
“Bring it down,”
said the Sarjeant.
The Droods went to work with a will, smashing through the outer walls of the ground floor. Bricks shattered under golden fists, steel buckled, and windows blew apart, as the Droods destroyed everything that held the building up. The uniformed doorman looked on in horror, then ran over to grab at the nearest Droods to stop them. The armoured figures just ignored him, dragging him around like a doll. The doorman gave up and ran inside the building, to sound the alarm. The Droods tore through the outer wall as though it were made of paper, and jagged cracks raced up the face of the building. Windows blew out in their dozens, and glass shrapnel rained down. People who’d drawn closer to enjoy the destruction ran for their lives.
The Droods worked on, taking their time. Partly because they were enjoying themselves and partly to give the people working inside the building time to escape. The Droods weren’t trying to kill everyone. Not yet. The building lurched forward, leaning out over the road as its supports were eroded. People poured out of the main door, shouting and screaming and pushing at each other in their eagerness to escape the toppling building. Some of the staff realised they’d never get to the ground floor in time and threw themselves out of windows. Many landed badly, breaking bones and splashing blood across the pavements. One woman jumped from a top-floor window, even though it was obvious she would never survive the fall. One Drood stopped what he was doing just long enough to catch her and put her safely to one side before returning to his work. Some of the tourists applauded. One of the building’s owners identified the Sarjeant-at-Arms as the man in charge because he was watching while the others worked, and ran over to remonstrate with him, almost jumping up and down on the spot with incandescent rage.
“Stop this! You can’t just destroy my building!”
“I think you’ll find I can,” the Sarjeant said calmly.
“You have no right!”
“Of course I do. I’m a Drood.”
The owner put a hand on the Sarjeant’s shoulder, and tried to force the Sarjeant to face him. The Sarjeant clubbed him down with a single blow. Because people should know their place. The owner lay in the gutter, bleeding out from his crushed skull, staring unseeingly at what used to be his building as it leaned even farther out across the road.
The frontage was cracking and falling apart now, raining down bricks like jagged hailstones. This didn’t bother the Droods, safe inside their armour, but people watching drew even farther back. Most were leaving the area. The building let out a deep groan, as though it had suffered some mortal wound, and toppled slowly and remorselessly out across the road, slamming down like the fist of God. The impact sent people staggering back and forth, as though they’d been caught in an earthquake. The smoke slowly cleared, and the golden-armoured Droods turned to admire their work.
Rubble and wreckage blocked most of the road, but there was still a gap left through which traffic could pass. Drivers had to slow down to navigate the gap, but they kept going. Because nothing stopped the traffic in the Nightside. The Sarjeant shrugged. He’d tried being reasonable, but if the world wasn’t going to cooperate . . . He nodded to the waiting Droods.
“Go out into the road and stop the traffic. Whatever it takes.”
The Droods spilled out onto the road, and went eagerly to meet the roaring traffic. Now the vehicles didn’t have the speed or the space to avoid them, the Droods just grabbed hold of things with their golden hands and forced the traffic to stop. Sometimes the vehicles would accelerate, trying to break free or run the Droods over, and then golden hands would punch through bonnets to smash engines, or sink fingers into a steel door to flip the vehicle over onto its side.
The remaining traffic didn’t like that at all. Every single one of them poured on the speed and went to meet the waiting Droods, to knock them aside or plough them under. Their attitude was clear: Get out of the way or die. The first car to reach a Drood sounded its horn continuously, like a challenge. The Drood ran straight at it and punched the car in its radiator. The car slammed to a halt, flipped up into the air, and somersaulted over the Drood’s head, before crashing upside down beyond him.
A stretch limousine aimed itself squarely at another Drood, trusting to its extra weight to do the job. The Drood stood his ground, and the limousine driver lost his nerve at the last moment. He slammed on the brakes, and the limousine screeched to a halt a foot or so short of the waiting Drood. Who then strode calmly forward and tore his way through the car, ripping it apart as he went. He walked through the stretch limousine from end to end, crashing through it as if it were made of paper. The car fell apart into two halves, collapsing onto its sides. They rocked back and forth, slowly settling, while a group of shaken party girls emerged from the wreckage and staggered away. The uniformed chauffeur fought his way out from behind the air-bag and lurched over to confront the Drood.
“How the hell am I supposed to explain this to the insurance company?”
“Easy,” said the armoured figure. “Act of Drood.”
Some of the heavier trucks still hadn’t given up on the idea that they could run over a Drood if they just built up enough speed. They hit their accelerators for all they were worth and bore down on the waiting Droods. Who took that as an insult. They were only supposed to stop the traffic, but if people were going to try to kill them . . . They ran at the approaching trucks, their armour driving them on at inhuman speed, and hit the trucks like living battering-rams. Cabs broke apart, and drivers exploded out through their windscreens, to lie broken and bleeding on the road.
Other Droods picked up handfuls of rubble from the fallen building and threw them at the trucks with terrible strength. Just for the fun of it. Bricks and stones punched through windscreens, to behead drivers in their seats. Some Droods ripped up street-lights, tearing them out of their concrete settings, and threw them like javelins, spearing drivers behind their steering wheels. Some trucks still kept coming, so the Droods picked up whatever cars were nearest and threw them at the approaching vehicles. Trucks burst into flames, skidded off the road, and mounted the pavement. They smashed through watching crowds, sending bodies flying in flurries of blood, then buried themselves in shop-fronts.
The street was full of smoke and fire, the sound of crashing vehicles and the screams of the wounded and the dying. Golden figures sent cars flying sideways with sweeps of their arms, then high-fived each other. As far as the Droods were concerned, the Nightside had started it and so deserved everything it got.
Everyone who wasn’t hurt or dying went running for their lives. The remaining traffic slowed to a halt, on both sides of the toppled building.
The Sarjeant-at-Arms moved unhurriedly among his people, praising them for their efforts and calming them down. Although all Droods were trained in how to use their armour from an early age, unless the call to war came, most would never get the chance to leave the Hall and prove what they could do. The Hall had come under attack several times in recent years, and some Droods had gone out into the grounds to defend it, but this was the first time the whole family had been allowed out into the world to face an enemy. Many of them had dreamed about what their armour could do, and what they could do in their armour, and now they had been set free . . . they loved it. It helped that they had been told everyone they were likely to meet in the Nightside was a designated target, villains of the first order, worthy only of Drood contempt, so it never even occurred to them to feel bad about what they’d done. They laughed happily and cheered each other, boasting of what they’d accomplished, and in the end the Sarjeant just stood back and let them get it out of their system.
They’d been blooded, and that would help them when it came time to face the real horrors.
Everyone looked around sharply as a single massive truck came storming down the road towards them, weaving in and out of the parked traffic with deadly purpose. It was big and brutal, with no markings on its dully gleaming metal sides. Even the windscreen ha
d been darkly tinted, to hide the driver from view. The truck drew steadily closer, building its speed, the roar of its engine openly menacing. The Droods quickly broke off from their celebrations and turned to face the new threat. One of them marched up the road to face it, a short, stocky woman with blood already dripping from one spiked golden fist, courtesy of the driver in a stopped car who’d been stupid enough to point a gun at her. She went to meet the truck, and it changed direction to head straight for her.
The Drood stood her ground and waited for the truck to come within reach. At the last moment the whole front of the truck opened up to reveal a great crimson maw, lined with rows of rotating teeth like a living meat-grinder. The mouth engulfed the startled Drood in a moment and sucked her in. She didn’t even have time to scream.
The other Droods cried out in shock and horror and raced toward the truck, which had slammed to a halt and was now backing quickly away, content with its prize. The Droods grew long swords and heavy battle-axes from their golden hands and surged forward, driven on by the inhuman speed of their armour. They were already overtaking the truck when it suddenly slowed, and stopped. The Droods hit it from all sides, their impossibly sharp blades slicing through the dull metal, and the front exploded outwards, as the female Drood cut her way out. The truck might have been a living thing, but its insides were no match for Drood armour. She emerged clutching a massive heart in one golden hand and held it above her head as a trophy. She crushed the heart, and thick, dark blood rained down like a waterfall, sliding frictionlessly over her golden armour. The truck screamed once and died.
And that was it. The rest of the traffic had come to a complete halt, and there were no more acts of defiance. No more vehicles came down the road from either direction; word had got out, and everywhere else, the traffic was choosing other routes. But for the first time ever in the Nightside, the road here was still and silent. The Sarjeant sent his people to move among the stopped vehicles and persuade the drivers to show themselves.