Simon Green - Daemons Are Forever

“Unlikely,” I said. “We’d have heard something.”

“Could be the prime minister,” said the Armourer. “Expressing his displeasure at having his best secret agents sent back to him in boxes.”

“If they’d been able to capture me, then the Hall might have been next,” I said. “But after what I did to his best bright-eyed boys, he’s probably still hiding under his desk and whimpering. No, this could be any of the groups we were just discussing, keen to get their pre-emptive strikes in first. Look, save your breath for running, people. We need to know what we’re getting into before we show our faces outside.”

The Operations Room was way over in the south wing, so we were all seriously short of breath by the time we got there. The halls and passageways were increasingly deserted and abandoned, eerily silent. It was a relief to get to Operations, and hear voices talking in a calm, professional way. The Ops Room is a high-tech centre designed to oversee all the Hall’s defences, from sensors to shields to all our various weapons systems. It took the three of us a few minutes to get through the strict security protocols, and then Molly and the Armourer and I hurried into Operations and the great steel door hissed shut behind us, cutting off the clamour of the alarms. The quiet was a blessed relief, and I took a long, deep breath to steady myself.

I’d never been to Operations before; it was mostly put together after I left home. Unlike the War Room, Operations is a much more modest affair. Just a reasonably sized room packed full of computers and other assorted baffling high tech, tended by a dozen or so technicians, under the head of Operations. There was no hurry or bustle or sense of urgency here; men and women sat calmly at their workstations, doing their jobs efficiently and professionally. These people hadn’t forgotten what it was to be a Drood. They kept their heads in an emergency because that was what had been drilled into them; because decisions made in this Room could affect the safety of the whole family.

Holographic displays snapped on and off in midair, showing rapidly shifting images of the Hall, inside and out, and sweeping views of the grounds and all possible approaches to the Hall. I moved quickly from screen to screen, but I was damned if I could see any sign of an invading force anywhere. The skies were empty, the grounds were uninhabited, and all shields were intact and in place. Something must have set off the alarms, but what? I headed for the centre of Operations, and Molly and the Armourer fell naturally in on either side of me. I was glad to have them there. I was starting to feel well out of my depth. I listened carefully to the murmur of voices all around me as the technicians spoke quietly to each other in calm, professional, and utterly baffled voices.

I have rising power levels. All boards are green, all weapons systems on line .

Can anybody see anything ? My sensors are clear, right across the board .

Hold it; I’m getting something. A definite Infernal presence .

Infernal ? Are you sure ?

Hey, it’s not something you can easily confuse with anything else. There’s something from the Pit, right here in our backyard .

Get ready to switch the lawn sprinklers to holy water. And somebody put in a call to all our clerics .

Code Red. I repeat, we have Code Red. Shutting down all unnecessary systems for the duration .

Why weren’t we warned ? What happened to those wonderful and very expensive new sensors I spent all last week installing ?

Silent as the grave, the lot of them. Whatever’s out there, the sensors can’t see it. Even the gryphons didn’t see this coming .

Who’s got my Jaffa Cakes ? You know I can’t function without Jaffa Cakes .

All weapons systems on line and available. Just find me a target and I’ll blow big meaty chunks out of it .

“Over there,” the Armourer said quietly in my ear. “See that large, intense type in the button-down suit? That’s Howard, the new head of Operations. I used to have him down in the Armoury with me, but he didn’t have the patience. But he was a hell of a lot smarter than the average Drood, so we put him here, and within a year he was running the place. Oh look; he’s finally deigned to notice us, and he’s coming over. This should be fun.”

“Didn’t this use to be the old laundry?” I said.

“We contracted that out,” said the Armourer, “to make room for the new up-to-date Operations centre. The old one was constantly having to be upgraded, and was only held together with spit and sealing wax anyway. We’ve spent the last ten years installing the most sophisticated weapon systems this family has ever seen, along with the computers to run them. We could hold off a whole army from here.”

“If we could see them,” I murmured.

The Armourer scowled. “I don’t understand it. The grounds are jam-packed with all kinds of surveillance. A mole couldn’t fart without us knowing all about it. Ah, Howard! Good to see you.”

“Good?” he snapped, slamming to a halt right in front of us. “What’s bloody good about it? I blame you for this, Edwin.”

“Somehow, I had a feeling you might,” I said. “Hello, Howard.”

He sniffed loudly. He was large and blocky, with a red face and a prematurely receding hairline. His hands were clenched into frustrated fists at his sides.

“Hall security has been an utter shambles, ever since you and your girlfriend walked straight through all our best defences,” he said bitterly. “They’re very sensitive. You upset them. Took us weeks to get them calmed down and operating properly again, and now this! Are those more of your friends out there?”

“I very much doubt it,” I said. “And Howard, keep it down to a roar when you speak to me, there’s a good chap. Or I will have Molly turn you into something small and wet and squishy, which I shall then step on.”

“What am I?” said Molly. “Your attack dog?”

“You know you love it,” I said.

“Grrr,” said Molly.

I looked back at Howard. “Let us all keep very calm and professional about this, while we figure out what the hell’s going on.”

Howard sniffed loudly again. “Yes. Well…We’re doing the best with the equipment available to us. You try running a twenty-first-century defence system on a nineteenth-century budget. I told the Matriarch to her face; you get what you pay for.”

I began to like him a little better. “I’ll bet that went down well,” I said.

He smiled slightly for the first time. “I was escorted out of the War Room so fast my feet didn’t even touch the ground. All right, everybody, let’s try the sensors again. Boost the power and plug in all the options; see if we can scare up a useful image or two for our illustrious guests. As long as you understand this is all your fault, Edwin. Whatever happens.”

“Story of my life,” I said.

The head of Operations moved quickly back and forth among his people, encouraging here, cajoling there, getting the best out of them with quiet efficiency. The Hall’s defence systems sprang into life, searching for a target; enough firepower to blow a hole through the moon or blast it right out of orbit. I watched, fascinated, as the holographic displays showed hundreds of guns rising up out of the wide lawns, their long barrels sweeping back and forth as the fire computers struggled to lock on. Sonic weapons, particle beams, nerve gasses, stroboscopic lights, and hallucinogenic mists…And no, we don’t give a damn about the Geneva Conventions. If I’d known about all of this, I’d never have dared to break in Of course, I’d had the Confusulum then, to back me up. Hopefully our mysterious new intruders didn’t.