GOETIA
Hellgate London - 02
Mel Odom
PROLOGUE
London, England
September 19
2024
Propelled by bloodlust, the Stalker demons scampered across the rooftops of the tall buildings along Fleet Street. There were six of them, all experienced slayers with a thirst for killing. They flung themselves across the rooftops. Legs bunched as they gathered themselves at the edge of one building to throw themselves to the next without hesitation.
Bright, hard moonlight burned down through the gray smoke that filmed the black sky. It left dangerous patches of light that would have revealed them to their prey, and other demons that would have killed them just for sport.
It didn’t matter that a whole new world lay before them to conquer. Thedemons weren’t equals. Their world didn’t operate on principles of honor ordiplomacy. Size and strength were the natural dividers among their kind. Creatures that were smaller or looked weaker became food or cruel diversion, and either was welcome at night when most of them were active.
Fear quivered through the demons as they regarded the light patches they had to navigate. It was just one of the tools in their survival arsenal that kept them alive night after night. Fear kept them alive and dangerous.
They paused on top of one of the buildings as the whirling gray smoke parted and left most of the rooftop exposed. Moonlight reflected in a silver sheen across the wet roof. The lead Stalker threw its ugly snout into the air and breatheddeeply. The rain had turned to mist and made the air heavy.
The acrid scent of the smoke burned the demon’s nasal membranes. It was anexperienced predator and was familiar with the smoke. It was a byproduct of the process called the Burn, which changed the target world into one similar to the demons’ homeworld.
This wasn’t the first world the pack leader had helped invade and decimate.It was long-lived compared to most of the others in its pack. Usually, they served as cannon fodder, though the demon had no concept of that. It was a flesh-and-blood machine bred to hunt and kill.
Tonight they had fed well and now hunted for sport.
Long-limbed and thin as greyhounds, the Stalkers had a vaguely human appearance but usually ran on all fours. The chitinous blades that stood out along their forearms and lower legs immediately marked them as different from anything human.
The blades were sharp enough to cleave flesh, and the Stalkers had a stylized fighting system that made use of those projections. Hard chitin covered their bodies and shielded them from danger as much as Kevlar armor. Their heads were small, and their faces were tight.
They lay in the shadows of the rooftop and waited for the gray haze to obscure them once again. When it did, they scampered to the edge of the building and peered down.
A few humans roved the street. When the Hellgate had first opened and the demons had been allowed into this world, the hunting had been easy and plentiful. Now times were harder.
Few humans remained in the city. The ones that had survived had learned to be wary and clever. Many had escaped in the early weeks of the invasion, but millions had died and thestreets had nm red with blood for weeks.
The pack leader of the Stalkers drew in another breath as the breeze changed. Humans occupied the streets below. They hunted at night now too, for food and water to live out in the shadowed holes they’d dug themselves into.
With another sniff of air, the pack leader singled out one of them, a small female huddled in the dark. In the demon’s vision, the female was a pulsing blurof orange and yellow contrasting with the purple-blue of the cool night. If the demon could have smiled, it would have. But it couldn’t. Instead, it quivered,but this time it was from the killing urge that thrilled through its body.
It slipped over the roofs edge, dug its claws into the side of the building between the bricks, and moved slowly as it closed in for the kill.
Stay calm, Heather May told herself harshly as she remained within the safety of the shadowed alleyway just off Fleet Street. Stay calm. You’regoing to find him. But it was hard to remain calm out on the streets of London these days. Too many bad things happened there. She’d seen them. You’re going to find him, and you’re going to get out of here.
Cautiously, she peered out into the street. Overturned cars scarred by flames littered the block. Nearly every window in every building was broken. Some of the building walls were shattered, either by the demons or the military units when they had tried to fight back. War, though brief, had broken out inside the city and so many of the areas Heather had grown up in lay in ruins.
Here and there, other scavengershumans, dogs, and catslingered in theshadows in the hopes of finding food that was still good and hadn’t already beenfound. Meals had gotten harder to come by. Every few days they had to change where theywere staying.
Weeks had passed since the last time Heather had seen sunlight. There were fewer demons in the streets and skies during the daylight hours, but there was almost no chance of hiding. Night was always filled with possibilities.
Twenty years old, Heather was slender and only a few inches over five feet tall. At a hundred pounds, she wasn’t big enough to fight the demons. She’dsurvived the last four years in London by embracing her fear and letting it be her greatest strength. Her fear had never left her.
But it hadn’t been like that for Neil. Her younger brother had gotten braverover the last four years. Or more desperate or numb. Survivor’s guilt may havebeen driving him too. A woman Heather had talked to a month ago had suggestedthat when Heather went scavenging with her.
Neil was taller and bigger than her now, and he wasn’t happy about takingdirection from her. Lately, he’d fallen in with a group of older boys
