Jack Yeovil - Demon Download

"By the way, Maria Concepcion told me to say "hi!" What a hot babe, Father Drunk, eh? Who'd a think you had it in you to hook up with such a primo quality, Grade-A, slut-featured, hot-to-trot, itchy-underwear, if-yo-so-large-there-ain't no-charge, roundheels, unholy rollin', freakpig, 99 and 44/100ths per cent ratskag sex machine!"

"…thy will be done…"

He wasn't afraid any more. He hadn't noticed before how like Maria Conception's the face on the St Werburgh's Christ was.

"Coming through!"

"…on earth as…"

The spike shoved O'Pray back, shearing through his black robe, pinning it to his chest.

"…it is in Heaven…"

The cruiser pushed, and the spike went through him, displacing bones and organs, penetrating the altar. There were sparks all around, and the radiator was pressed up close against him, stinking of burning oil.

He spat blood up over the hood.

"…amen!"

Connnnn-TAKKKKT !!!!

The solid spike slipped easily through the dead priest, meeting no resistance, and rammed enthusiastically into the altar.

This was the moment the demon had been summoned for, and it relished its victory.

The spike brushed circuits inside the altar. Sparks flew. Currents crackled. Circuit-breakers blew out. Fuses melted. Microchips took on new configurations.

For a full minute, the systems melded. The steel spike lost its hardness and became malleable, durium turning to mercury. The demon let its consciousness flow out of the cruiser through the bridge of molten metal, into the body of the altar.

It was unprepared, unprotected. The menu up on the screen had given O'Pray the option of throwing up a SANCTUARY barrier around the terminal, but he had been distracted.

That was a shame. It had heard a lot about the SANCTUARY block, and would have liked to flex its muscles by penetrating one.

The cruiser's central computer pumped into the altar terminal. It downloaded all the information the demon had accessed, plus a lot of garbage it had picked up along the way.

Inside the rolling blobs of metal, the demon seed wriggled. The interstices of the altar were filled, connections were made, codes were broken, blocks were negotiated, standing orders were superseded.

The old body had nearly outlived its usefulness. That Uzi had done a lot of damage. The engine block had hairline cracks, and the fuel leads were holed in several places.

Before it left, the demon tidied up by burning out all the cruiser's circuits, and wiping the memory tapes.

Then, nestled in the altar, it began to spawn again, to send its seed down into the datanet, to explore the nearby channels, to establish contact with the independent systems it had already colonized.

It liked to think of itself as a disease with a genius-level intellect. The Black Plague, smallpox, malaria and AIDS were random blunderers, spreading haphazardly through carelessly chosen vectors.

It was nice being the only bug on the block with an actual purpose in life.

The Summoner had charged it with a task, and it existed only to fulfil that task, and to procreate until it was the only thing within its field of perception.

Soon, it would be shooting down the line. Soon, it would be about the fulfilment of its purpose.

Soon.

The cruiser had been here. Stack could recognize the signs by now. Burning buildings, wrecked ve-hickles, dead people. But his tracer was down. An hour ago it had cut out and gone cold. He had been on a mountain road that only led to this place, so he hadn't had any trouble keeping on the track.

The sign at the town limits said "Welcome, Ariz" and there was a statue of a grinning Indian with his arms outstretched by it. But nobody was in a welcoming mood when Nathan Stack showed up on his requisitioned hog.

There were a few people in the streets, dragging corpses and extinguishing fires. This looked like the aftermath of a fair-sized firefight. Walls were scarred with fresh bulletmarks. The smell of cordite was in the air.

Most of the activity seemed to focus on a saloon. The Silver Byte. There was a row of motorsickles chained to the hitching rail. The machines bore the Gaschuggers' colours. Not a few of the citizens mopping up wore the distinctive overalls of the 'chuggers, patchworked with the badges of dozens of car and gas companies. Slack hoped the gangcult would be too busy binding their wounds to blame him for the mess his cruiser had made.

A dark-skinned man with a Zapata moustache and a gold tooth was directing the salvage operation. The wounded were being triaged. One group were carried into the saloon for medical aid. The other were being hauled to the local Boot Hill, presumably for a merciful bullet.

Stack parked his motorcyke, and addressed the foreman.

"Did a driverless Cav cruiser do this?"

The man sneered and spat. "Si, Trooper. Thees ees so."

"Where is it now?"

He nodded fiercely. "Thee chorch. Eet keell thee padre."

Stack pulled off his borrowed helmet. His ears were tired of Wagner. He was coming down from all the juju he had been shooting, and was beginning to feel his lack of food, drink and sleep. This was the end of the trail for a while.

"Is there anywhere to get a meal and a bed around here? The state will pay."

The man grinned bitterly. "Wee do not accept loncheon vouchers or cashplastic, Trooper. Seelver dollars or pesos."

"I have metal money."

"Een that case, I serve you best cheellee you have in your life. An' yiu can get a room over at Tiger Behr's motel. I am Pedro Annindariz. Seence Meester Cass lose hees head thees afternoon, I guess I am Mayor of Welcome, Areezona. Thees ees my saloon."

"Trooper Nathan Stack, at your service. Out of Fort Apache."

"Yiu a long way from home, yellowlegs."

Stack stretched, trying to dislodge the pain from his lower back.

"You're telling me. It's been a hell of a patrol."

"Theengs ain't been so good roun' here thees week, neither."

Shots rang out. Permanent anaesthetic they called it on the Cav training courses. Stack had never had to apply the treatment, but had seen it done. It wasn't pleasant.

"Start your chilli boiling, Pedro. I guess I better check out the church."

"Yiu can't meess eet. Jost follow thee holes een thee houses."

He could see what Annindariz meant. The cruiser had ploughed through the whole town. One family were standing around, looking at half of their perfect home, salvaging pots and pans from the rubble. Stack followed the tyre tracks through the town to the church.

After he had checked out the scene there, he should try to find a phone or a radio and report in. He knew Major General Younger would be having Siamese kittens over this patrol. He wouldn't be surprised if a Cav helicopter gunship were combing the mesas looking for them. If tradition was anything to go by, Tyree would get a posthumous medal, and he'd be quietly court-martialled out of the service. He needed some explanations.

St Werburgh's was a little way out of town. It stood in its own plot of land. There were people digging in the graveyard, and a pile of bodies stacked against a fence. A Gaschugger with his right forearm replaced by what looked like a giant iron lobster claw was scooping earth out of a shallow grave.

"Looks like the well's up for grabs," someone said. A couple of Gaschuggers were emerging from the church with sloshing buckets of water slung peasant-fashion on wooden yokes.

He climbed the ruined steps and went into what was left of the church. There were people there, standing still, but they weren't praying. They were staring.