‘It’s like a dream,’ Chloe murmured to herself, staring around in awe and wonder. ‘A dream … or a nightmare.’
Most of the seven or eight thousand partygoers at this Halloween bacchanal were dressed up in costumes of varying degrees of intricacy, so neither the beastwalkers nor Chloe looked at all out of place in their respective outfits. Chloe stood on tiptoes to peer across the dancefloor at the bar where William was, and she saw him immediately; his motocross helmet was easy to spot. He was playing his part with ease; one arm was draped casually over the shoulder of a scantily clad Australian blonde who was dressed as a character from Mad Max. Sharaf, attired in a full Batman suit, was seated with a bevy of attractive young men and women on a plush sofa on a mezzanine level above the dancefloor. Zakaria, meanwhile, in his full suit of fifteenth-century plate armour, was engaged in an intense conversation with a man dressed as Trapjaw from TheMasters of the Universe at the opposite end of the bar to William. Kimiko, clad in her seventeenth-century samurai armour, was dancing in the middle of the dancefloor with a muscular, half-naked European man. Sweat was flying in glistening beads off of his smoothly shaven torso, and his too-white teeth glowed with unsettling brightness under the ultraviolet light.
Awang, who would not be in the thick of the fighting and who therefore did not need the same level of body armour as the others, was dressed in a lighter costume; he was drinking alone in a dark corner, attired in simple monk’s robes. Beneath these, however, he wore a bulletproof vest.
Only one beastwalker was near Chloe: Njinga, who was standing next to her at the ground-level bar, sipping on a gin and tonic, while Chloe was drinking a simple glass of water.
‘I can barely breathe inside this stupid helmet,’ Chloe whined. ‘It’s so fuckin’ hot and humid in this place, even with the aircon. I’m literally suffocating in here. Can’t I please take it off, just for a second?’
Njinga scowled at her, but all the teen could see of her face was a hollow of inky blackness inside a terrifying spiked helm of steel; the beastwalker was wearing an impressively frightening outfit modelled on the cloak and armour of the Witch-King of Angmar from The Lord of the Rings. She carried an oversized flail and a huge sword, but these were mere plastic props that she would discard later. The real weapons she would use tonight had been stashed inside the club, smuggled in by the Rebels’ allies hours earlier. Njinga couldn’t see Chloe’s face either, for it was hidden within the claustrophobic confines of a gleaming white stormtrooper helmet. She could picture the teen’s crumpled frown clearly enough in her mind, though.
‘I’m sorry kid,’ Njinga said, sipping slowly on her drink, ‘but you know damn well our faces are completely covered for a very good reason. The Huntsmen have detailed files on all of us, you included. There are biometric scanners hidden all around the club, an’ the Huntsmen have programmed absolutely every detail you can imagine about all a’ us into their systems. If you expose your face you’ll not only give yourself away, you could potentially give all a’ us away an’ ruin any chance this mission has of success.’
‘I know, I know,’ Chloe muttered, her voice muffled. ‘But couldn’t I have been something a little more bad-ass than a stormtrooper? And um, I dunno how many Star Wars movies you and your friends have watched, but at the rate stormtroopers literally get slaughtered, I uh, I don’t think this costume is gonna do wonders for my luck of surviving the night.’
Njinga had to have a chuckle at that, as grave as circumstances currently were. When she spoke after her laughter had subsided, though, her voice had a hard sternness to it.
‘That costume you’re complaining about ain’t no toy, Chloe. It’s been put together by our best engineer, an’ it’s been constructed with space-age materials an’ technology. You’ve probably got the safest suit outta all a’ us, you know. Bulletproof an’ light as a damn feather too, even if you’re sweatin’ your ass off inside it.’
‘I get it,’ Chloe grumbled, ‘and you don’t need to give me another lecture, all right? I just … it’s really hot in here, and, and … I’m, I’m freakin’ out a little. I … I’m … I’m…’
Njinga knew how much the teenager looked up to her, and understood how difficult it had to be for the girl to admit to her that she was frightened.
‘I’m terrified right now, Chloe,’ Njinga admitted, setting her drink down on the bar. ‘I might not look it, an’ I might not be actin’ like it, but inside, my stomach is twisted up into knots, my mouth is all dry an’ shit, an’ I can hear my heart thumping in my ears, even over the crazy bass they got in here. Why do you think I’m drinkin’ a fuckin’ gin an’ tonic, girl? You’d be insane if you weren’t feeling like this too.’
For a moment Chloe’s whole body seemed to stiffen within the glossy white suit of armour, but then her rigid muscles all slackened at once.
‘I’m really scared too,’ she murmured.
‘Come here kid,’ Njinga said, pulling Chloe into a tight embrace. ‘I know this is scary, hell, I know it’s downright terrifying, what we’re about to do. I get it, seriously, I do. Just remember, though, the suit you’re wearing, that composite is totally impervious to M-16 rounds, even at point-blank
