I’d started to give my full attention to the closed elevator doors when the building’s main security systems finally kicked in. Great sliding panels opened in the corridor walls, and I had to blink a few times. I would have sworn they weren’t there a moment before. Really large gun barrels emerged from gun emplacements inside the walls, and turned quickly to orient themselves on Molly and Isabella. I ran forward and put myself between the gun barrels and the witches just as the guns opened fire.
The bullets pounded away at me, targeting my head and chest and gut, and while my armour easily absorbed the bullets, the sheer intensity of the fire meant I daren’t move, for fear of exposing Molly and Isabella. This was serious weaponry, pumping out bullets in a steady stream. They chewed up the walls behind me on both sides, blasting jagged holes in the doors and blowing them off their hinges. Some hit the dog’s body and blew the dark flesh apart in a series of explosions. Meat confetti blew everywhere, and dark liquids splashed up and down the corridor. The smell was appalling, as the bullets blew away muscles to reach the organs within.
Wave after wave of bullets slammed into me and were absorbed, doing no damage. I was starting to feel a bit cocky, a bit Is that all you’ve got? when the gun barrels suddenly fell silent and retreated into the walls. To be immediately replaced by even bigger new guns, firing explosive flechettes at thousands of rounds a second. The dead dog blew up, blown to fragments in a moment. I stood my ground, bracing myself and leaning slightly forward into the solid stream of bullets, my armour sucking up the bullets with continued enthusiasm. When I was sure my armour could handle that much concentrated punishment, I advanced slowly forward into the pounding fire, grabbed each gun barrel in turn and ripped them right out of their emplacements. I tied the last few in knots, to make a point, before throwing them on the floor. Suddenly it was very quiet in the corridor. Followed by a wild round of applause from behind me, and a wolf whistle from Molly.
Another panel slid open in the wall beside me. A gun barrel started to roll out. I grabbed it and forced it back inside. The gun emplacement exploded, flames and black smoke belching out into the corridor. None of which troubled me inside my armour. Back down at the other end of the corridor, the Satanists were all bunched together, maintaining a safe distance from Molly and Isabella and me. They’d given up on guns. Something in their faces seemed to suggest that they felt that what I was doing was somehow unfair. I shouldn’t have been able to shrug off their no doubt very expensive weaponry.
I was so busy looking for more sliding panels in the walls, I was completely caught by surprise when trapdoors started dropping suddenly open the whole length of the corridor. Great squares of flooring fell away, silently and without warning, and apparently at random. I braced myself, legs akimbo, and looked quickly to Molly and Isabella.
I shouldn’t have worried. Several trapdoors opened beneath the two witches as they strolled unconcernedly back to join me; but Molly and Isabella walked right over the open spaces as though they weren’t even there, tripping lightly across the deep drops without even looking down. Isabella sniffed loudly as she rejoined me by the elevator doors.
“Trapdoors? What is this, amateur night?”
“Right,” said Molly. “I mean, please. That’s one of the first tricks I learned.”
“Can you walk on water, too?” I said, honestly curious.
Molly laughed. “Hell, sweetie, I can tap-dance on swimming pools! For a while, that was my favourite party piece.”
“A great improvement over the old one,” said Isabella. “And a lot less trouble cleaning up after. You always were a show-off. She was the same as a girl, Drood. She and her precious unicorn.”
I had to look at Molly. “You rode a unicorn?”
She grinned briefly. “Not for long.”
I looked back up the corridor. It seemed safest. The satanic business types had regrouped, many of them now carrying really big guns, and what looked like grenade launchers and flamethrowers. The only reason they hadn’t already come after us was that they were too busy arguing among themselves as to who should have the honour of approaching us first. Everyone seemed very keen to give that honour to someone else. It’s nice to feel appreciated. Some bright spark produced a grenade, pulled the pin and lobbed it along the floor towards us. The trapdoors immediately snapped shut, one after another, to help the grenade along its way. I waited till it had almost reached us, to be sporting, and then bent over, picked the grenade up and held it to my chest with both hands. The grenade went off, and my armour absorbed all of the blast and most of the smoke. I looked back up the corridor and waved cheerfully to the one who’d lobbed the grenade; and he actually stamped his foot in frustration, turned away and had to be comforted by the other Satanists. I don’t think they’d encountered Drood armour before. Certainly, it wasn’t doing their self-confidence any good. Several looked like they wanted to burst into tears.
“Stop showing off and open the elevator doors!” said Isabella.
“No sense of fun,” said Molly. “She was the same as a girl. She and her enchanted motorbike.”
I turned back to the elevator doors and considered them thoughtfully. And while I was doing that, a horrifically bright light flared up in the corridor: a fierce, incandescent and definitely unnatural glare brighter than the sun. Almost bright enough to overpower my armoured mask, which had to cloak my vision in darkness for a few moments to protect my eyes. Molly and Isabella cried out in shock and clung to each other, momentarily blinded. And while we were all disoriented, new panels slid open in the corridor walls, revealing dark, concealed places full of things very like trapdoor spiders.
Large, hairy things the size of cats, with far too many legs and eyes, and snapping fanged mouths. They came swarming out of the walls, poison dripping from their mouths, eager to get at us while we were still helpless. But my mask was already back to normal. I moved quickly forward to block their way, and they swarmed all over me, clinging to my armour with their sticky legs, trying to force their fangs through the strange matter. I shuddered and squirmed inside my armour. I’ve never liked spiders. I made myself stand still till they were all over me, surging and pushing and pressing their deadly mouths against the outside of my mask; and then I seized them in my golden hands, crushing their pulpy bodies and tearing them away from my face. I slapped at them, and they fell away dead. Some dropped off and tried to run, and I stamped them all underfoot. When I finished, I was breathing hard, and my heart was going like a trip-hammer. Never liked spiders. I looked at the openings in the walls, and they all slid swiftly shut. Molly and Isabella blinked gingerly around themselves as their vision cleared.
“What the hell just happened?” sad Isabella. “What’s all this mess on the floor? And what is that dripping from your hands, Drood?”
“Trust me,” I said. “You really don’t want to know.”
“I’ve had enough of this place and its nasty little surprises,” said Molly, knuckling one watering eye. “Time we were leaving. Open those elevator doors, Eddie, and don’t be polite about it.”
“Love to,” I said.
I jammed one set of golden fingers between the two doors, making a gap big enough to get both hands in, and then I forced the doors apart. Metal shrieked and crumpled under my armoured strength. I looked down what should have been the elevator shaft, and swore mildly. I hadn’t expected the elevator to actually be there; I’d been thinking more along the lines of grabbing one of the elevator cables and then sliding down it with Molly and Isabella hanging on. I could do that. Unfortunately, there were no cables and no shaft. The whole mechanical business was gone, and the shaft itself had been replaced by a long, pulsing pink throat, complete with thick purple veins, a handful of staring eyes and several rows of swiftly rotating teeth. A curling acidic haze filled the throat, suggesting some kind of stomach at the bottom. Dropping into the throat would be like passing through a meat grinder. And a hungry one, at that. I was pretty sure my armour would survive, but I couldn’t say the same for Molly and Isabella. A series of low sucking sounds drifted up the throat. Something was feeling peckish.