the sides of the human-occupied territories facing away from the Styx; Xisorixus harbored few illusions about the ability of his forces to storm through the magical defenses and emerge in enough strength to wipe out the humans on the other side.
But his eyes and ears had been busy gathering information. The overwhelming human defensive magic was indiscriminate, he'd learned; one of his spies had watched human mages preparing the spells, and one of the spells had accidentally exploded, leaving the human a bloody mess, screaming and writhing in pain on the ground. This had given rise to the beginnings of an idea: if he could somehow get across the Styx and gain the upper hand against the humans, he could drive them back and trap them against their own magic.
To make the situation even better, Xisorixus had learned that only a few humans watched the Styx. His demons were now able to show themselves in full daylight without earning the slightest magery in retaliation, save in a few places. Once, he'd tried restarting construction on the demolished bridge, but the humans had unleashed their magic on him and he'd lost nearly two hundred good demons.
He emerged from his tent into the bustle of Dis itself. This was the one place he could be assured that no humans would spy on him, so he'd asked permission to bring his legions here. Satan had absent-mindedly agreed – rather, one of the lower bureaucrats in the government had agreed – so his five remaining augmented legions had requisitioned, and were occupying, these few blocks of city. He'd attached to each legion a fifth-legion of flies, from the sizeable air force he had accumulated in his rise to power.
Today was the day he was going to test his plan. In the courtyard of his headquarters, by his tethered wyvern, were ten curious wooden bundles. Standing by them were three wyverns, to which the bundles would be attached for transmission. His air guard snapped to attention as he exited, and fell into escort around him. They would follow him through the air and to the testing grounds, at a wide, shallow part of the Styx between the human area and the waterfalls. There, a cohort of his troops awaited him. Xisorixus smiled. The floating bridges would almost certainly work, and from there it would only be a few days before he joined the battle.
Chapter Sixty Two
Incident Command Centre, Sheffield Airport, United Kingdom.
“I think me may have a little bit of a problem, Sir.” Colonel Mace said as he stepped back into the command trailer. “I’ve just been speaking to the Chief Constable and it seems that two of his officers along with their vehicle have gone missing.”
“The situation in the city is pretty confused, Colonel.” Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart replied. “I’ve been led to believe that the network that supports the emergency service’s radio network has been damaged, so it is hardly a surprise that officers may be out of contact.”
“Ordinarily that fact would not worry me, or the Chief Constable, Sir, but witnesses some of our men rescued in the city a short time ago have reported that the officers ejected them from their vehicle and placed a baldrick inside. Now no baldrick prisoner has been reported as being taken so…”
“Something was badly wrong.” Lethbridge-Stewart finished the sentence. “Intelligence does say that some baldricks may be able to exercise mind control by injecting their victims with some kind of poison. We’re overstretched as we are, but we better find this baldrick before it does any more damage. Put together a unit to go and hunt it down, I’ll ask Midlands Command if they can send us some Paras, or Marines to act as a hunter unit if necessary.”
“I’ll command it myself if I have to, Sir.” Mace replied.
The Brigadier turned slightly as Keavy McManus stepped into the Command Trailer.
“Ah, Doctor, how can I help?”
“It’s just Mrs McManus, Brigadier.” The vulcanologist corrected him.
“My apologies, Mrs McManus, a habit from a previous posting.” Lethbridge-Stewart replied. “How is your survey team getting on?”
“Apology accepted, Brigadier.
“I just wanted to thank you for your assistance. I understand that you are very busy with rescue and recovery duties, not to mention Law and Order and providing a cordon, yet you have managed to spare manpower and vehicles to escort my team.” Keavy McManus told him.
“Always nice to be appreciated by the best in their business, Mrs McManus.” The Brigadier told her. “Your work is extremely important; we need to learn how to deal with events like this. I Think you must have heard the news from Detroit, we can be sure that it won’t be the last attack of its kind.”
Western Sheffield, United Kingdom. The convoy transporting the survey team halted as it prepared to take more readings of the lava that covered much of the city. The army had managed to provide a rather eclectic group of vehicles from those it had assembled at the airport. Leading the group was a Land Rover SNATCH 2, carrying some of the RMP escort, which was followed by two Saxon Patrol APCs, which carried the personnel and equipment of the survey team; various aerials and sensors now poked out from the roof hatches; and a Fuchs Reconnaissance Vehicle, its NBC sensors adapted to detect the various products the portal was spewing out, the rest of the RMP escort was carried in a Vector armored patrol vehicle. Bringing up the rear was a Trojan Armoured Vehicle Royal Engineers, the engineer variant of the Challenger 2. It was there in case anything large and heavy needed to be moved out of the way, it also had a GPMG mounted in a Remote Weapons Station which might come in handy.
Staff Sergeant John Mann, Royal Military Police, was not in a particularly good mood as he watched the survey team, who were all wearing protective suits, dismount from the two Saxons and start taking readings, assisted by some members of 1st Royal Tank Regiment, who manned the Fuchs, from the Land Rover. Mann was a senior member of a Special Investigation Branch (known in the RMP as the ‘Branch’, and in the wider army as ‘Shit In Bulk’) team based in Midlands Command and felt that he should not be here; his job was to catch criminals in uniform, not shepherd civilian scientists. However he had been available and many of his team had been dispatched to the city to reinforce members of a Territorial Army Provost Company. What Mann had seen today reminded him of something out of a disaster movie, or one of those nuclear war docudramas that had been popular during the Cold War. One image that had stayed with him was the sight of a Traffic Warden cradling an old SLR as he guarded a group of looters Were they really so short of manpower that somebody had decided to arm the Traffic Wardens?
Mann put on his mask and stepped out of the Land Rover, intending to check on the troops under his command. He trusted his fellow SIB and RMP soldiers, but he was not sure about the men from the Military Provost Guard Service sent to bolster the escort. Although they were exclusively recruited from ex-servicemen they usually spent their days guarding base entrances and patrolling perimeters. He leaned back into the Land Rover and grabbed his L1A2 battle rifle; the TA and MPGS members of the escort still had L85A2s, L86A2s and Light Machine Guns, all 5.56mm weapons, but as regulars Mann and his team were entitled to the latest small arms.
“Anything interesting happening, Sergeant?” Mann asked one of the senior NCOs manning the defensive perimeter.
“Not a thing, Staff, apart from some poor moggy that must have been killed by something.” Sergeant Jo McDonagh, a fellow member of Mann’s investigation team, replied.
“I reckon everyone must have self-evacuated out of here long ago; it was a pretty well to do area so I hope nobody has been stupid enough to… Hey you three! Yes you, halt!”
Sergeant McDonagh flinched as Mann suddenly yelled at full volume. His was a voice feared throughout the whole of the SIB. She spotted that he was yelling at three youths who had emerged from a house just beyond the perimeter carrying some plastic bags, they looked over their shoulders, saw the soldiers and started to run.
Mann and McDonagh brought up their rifles, as did the other Red Caps present.
“Halt, or I fire!” Mann yelled.
The Emergency Powers only required that a member of the Security Forces give one warning before opening fire, and in extreme circumstances they could fire without a warning. Mann technically obeyed the instructions, his shot coincided with the implied exclamation mark at the end of his shout. The. 338 Lapua Magnum round inflicted terrible damage on the body of the looter. He was dead before he hit the ground. The other two stopped in their tracks, dropped what they were carrying and put their hands up. Mann strode up to them and delivered a swift smack in the small of their backs with his rifle butt, knocking them to the ground.
