All at once, Sam felt the hairs on his neck rise at a presence behind him, and stood up so suddenly that his chair toppled backwards. The four guards that had been outside the door had entered silently. They must have been well-trained. Even Sam with his extraordinary hearing had only just heard them. All four were pointing weapons at him. Before he could move, they fired. Eight taser darts flew out and struck him at various points on his torso. They must, he realized belatedly, have been tipped with iron barbs.
Almost two hundred thousand volts surged through him, causing his body to dance around like a puppet. On a normal man, this amount of voltage would be sufficient to kill, but Sam was not a normal man. Despite the pain, he was able to dislodge two of the barbs and unbelievably, take two shaky steps towards his attackers. Three of them drew iron batons with their free hands and advanced.
Through the pain, Sam could hear Jonah still carrying on talking as if nothing unusual was taking place. In his peripheral vision, he could see Grace and Joshua still sitting in their chairs, too shocked to move.
“The reason why the demons don’t molest us is because we have made a pact with them.”
As the three guards began pummelling Sam into insensibility, he could hear Jonah laughing.
When Sam came to, he found himself in a small windowless room. His body had been forced into a foetal position in order to fit within the pentacle that surrounded him. Jonah, he reflected, had been extremely well prepared and briefed by someone. He suspected he knew by whom.
He sat up, a groan escaping from his mouth as he felt the back of his head carefully. There were some serious bumps on it; clearly the guards had gone to town on him, not willing to take any chances. He had no idea how long he had been out.
As he began to take further stock of his situation, he heard a bolt being drawn and the heavy door opened in front of him. Jonah, accompanied by two of his guards, entered the room. Sam noticed they were very careful not to disturb the chalk marks of the pentacle, placing their feet precisely in the small room.
“Comfortable?” Jonah asked with a sneer.
Sam glared at him but refrained from answering.
“You don’t know how easy you’ve made it for me, just waltzing in here like you did. We’ve been looking out for you for some time now. My master is very keen to know of your whereabouts.”
“Your master?” Sam asked, already knowing the answer.
“The Antichrist, of course. He calls the shots around here and on most of the western seaboard. But then, you probably already knew that.”
“Where are my friends?” he demanded.
“Somewhere safe for now, although I can’t promise that they’ll stay like that for long. As soon as we’ve finished with you, their usefulness will be about exhausted I’d say.”
Anger boiled within him then. He jumped to his feet, hurling himself at the invisible barrier.
Jonah chuckled heartily. “You really are quite stupid, aren’t you?” He rolled up the sleeve of his right arm and showed Sam a mark tattooed on the inner wrist. Sam stopped pounding on the barrier and leant forward, suddenly filled with disquiet.
“You see this? This is his mark. Everyone in this city has this mark — and you didn’t notice?”
Sam could see the tattoo clearly. It was a stylized outline of a horned face. Inside were tattooed the name Abaddon and the number 666. The mark of the beast.
Sam should have expected this. He knew that with the rise of the Antichrist, all his followers would bear the mark. Why hadn’t he checked when he’d first entered Las Vegas? If he had, then he wouldn’t be in this predicament. Or Grace and Joshua. No wonder there were no demons in the streets — all the people here already followed Satan. What need had they to drag his faithful to Hell?
“What are you going to do with me?”
Jonah folded his arms across his chest. “I have my orders. We’re to conduct a few tests on you. There might be others like you around and my master wants to make sure that all your weaknesses are fully explored.”
“Then what?”
“My master wants to make damn sure that you and he never meet. After we’ve finished with our tests, he wants you gone.” Johah flashed his perfect teeth. “We’re going to kill you, of course.”
Sam paced within the tiny confines of the pentacle. After Jonah and his guards had left, he’d focused all his strength into freeing himself. It was no use. Somehow, there was absolutely no give whatsoever in the invisible barrier that contained him.He had no idea what he was going to do. All he knew was that he had to escape. Doing that, however, might prove difficult.
With no other option, he sank down to his knees in a meditative pose. He emptied his mind of all thought and calmed his body, feeling his heart rate slowing.
He was still poised like that when they came for him again. This time, there were four guards and another man dressed in a white lab coat. Of Jonah, there was no sign. The four guards were all armed with tasers. The technician held a modified straight jacket in his arms, reinforced with thick iron bands. Clearly, they intended to use that to confine him.
Their initial plan had been to taser him into submission. Now, seeing Sam already calm and possibly unaware of what was going on around him, the leader of the five men hesitated. “The tasers are unnecessary,’ he whispered. He gestured to the technician to move forward with the straight jacket while he and the other three covered Sam with their weapons.
The technician shuffled into the pentacle. One of his feet accidentally scuffed the chalk outline, breaking the symbol ever so slightly.
It was enough. Sam had been waiting for this exact moment, praying vehemently and gambling that they would not just taser him before restraining him. He felt the change immediately. Both of his eyes shot open. He moved as fast as he ever had in his life, his actions a blur to the wary guards, grabbing the technician around the neck and turning him around to face the other men in the room.
In shock, taken completely by surprise with the sheer speed of Sam’s actions, the four guards fired their iron barbs simultaneously. All they succeeded in doing was frying the technician that Sam was using as a shield.
As the man gyrated violently in his arms, Sam threw him at the first of the guards. The guard released his grip on the taser and tried to draw his baton but the technician slammed into him, and their two bodies dropped to the floor in a tangle of arms and legs.
The other three had drawn their batons, but Sam was already in amongst them. Hikari had trained him extensively in unarmed combat, especially in close quarters. The small room and the cluster of bodies worked to Sam’s advantage. The men were getting in each other’s way.
Sam attacked the guard closest to him. The guard was well-trained, probably an ex-soldier. He was also armed with an iron baton that should work well on someone like Sam. Unfortunately, he had not counted on Sam’s strength and reflexes.
Sam slipped under the swinging baton and punched the guard once, twice, three times in the chest before the guard even realized what was happening. The man was already out of the fight after the first punch. The second punch broke every rib in his chest. The third contained so much force that it lifted the guard off his feet and sent him catapulting into the guard just behind him.
The last guard still standing swung his baton in a sideways arc. If it had connected, Sam knew that it almost certainly would have shattered his skull. Sam stepped inside the swing, stopping the blow dead. Grabbing the man’s arm, he flicked it over his head and down straight onto his knee. The sickening crack of a breaking bone was almost as loud as the man’s scream of pain. Sam finished him off with a punch to the side of the head that floored him instantly.
He turned, picking up two of the fallen batons just as the remaining guards got to their feet. The two men faced him nervously. Sam could clearly see the fear on their faces. With a wordless agreement, they separated, one moving around behind him while the other attacked from the front.
The solid iron batons in Sam’s hands felt good. They weren’t his swords but they were effective weapons in such a confined space. After all, using two weapons at once was his speciality.
His right baton darted out and slammed into the face of the guard in front, knocking him off his feet. The guard hadn’t even seen the blow coming. At the same time, he lashed out backwards with the baton in his left hand, instinctively knowing where the other guard was. He was rewarded with a solid thud as it connected, and
