“I’ll need to prepare a few spells and protections,” he said. “That should take a couple of hours. If any of you have a hotline to God, we could use an archangel to wield the sword for us.”
“An archangel?” asked Stealth.
Max looked at her. “You know, a creature born from the radiance and divine will of God and shaped in his image. Think of all the stuff you think of when someone says ‘holy,’ and an archangel is ten times purer than that. I thought you were the smart one?”
Stealth crossed her arms.
“Sorry,” he said. “A bit tense. Barring an archangel, we need the holiest, purest person we can find.”
The heroes glanced at each other, then all turned to St. George. “I don’t think any of us are that holy or pure,” he said. “Especially after the past few years.”
“I’m not,” said Danielle. “You’re the one named after a saint.”
“Not by choice,” he said. “I just kind of fell into it.”
Barry shrugged. “I guess I’m an okay guy, but unless I’m going to fight the monster in my wheelchair I couldn’t hold a sword anyway.”
“I would be unfit,” said Stealth after a moment. “I have been an atheist for thirty years.”
They looked at Freedom. He shook his head. “I’m only human.”
Danielle looked at Max. “What about you?”
He snorted back a laugh. “With all the magic I’ve done? I may not count as evil but I’m a long way from pure. It’s the nature of the beast. No pun intended.”
“Father Andy?” suggested Barry.
Max shook his head. “Nothing against the good father, but he’s not the warrior priest we need, know what I mean?”
“Okay,” said St. George. “We’ll work on that one. Let’s start with the sword and go from there.”
“So,” St. George told them, “that’s where we are. We need a sword and we need it quick.”
The scavengers and every free Wall guard were gathered at the Melrose Gate of the Mount, across from Gorgon’s cross. Freedom and First Sergeant Kennedy stood nearby. She still dressed in her full uniform with her hair pulled back tight under her headgear. The surviving soldiers of the Alpha 815th Unbreakables stood behind her in tight formation, even if a few of them were missing one or two elements from their ACUs.
Danny reached up and tapped the hilt stretched over his shoulder. “You can have mine,” he said.
“No offense, sir,” said Freedom, “but this needs to be a real weapon.”
“It’s real.”
“Real in the sense of actually made to fight with,” said St. George. “Something that’s not going to break apart on the second or third swing. I’ve got Ilya and Dave going through the prop house right now. Does anyone else have anything?”
“What about a Marine officer’s sword?” asked Billie.
St. George shook his head. “Same thing, I think. It can’t be ceremonial, it needs to be something that’s made to fight with.”
“They’re made to fight with,” she said.
He gestured at the folding table they’d set up in the street. “If you’ve got one we’ll give it a try.”
Al held up his square-topped machete. “I’ve got this.” A man across from him held up a similar blade.
“Same thing. I don’t think it’ll work, but we’ll try it.”
Hector de la Vega cleared his throat as the crowd began to rustle with unsheathed steel. “I know where there’s a sword. Just what you need.”
St. George looked at him. “What?”
The tattooed man shrugged. “My grandpapa, he showed it to me a couple times. It was some old family thing. An heirloom or something.”
Paul gave him a nudge. “Is it some Mexican army thing you brought up here?”
“Fuck you, babosa,” he said. “My family had a ranch here before California was even a state.” He turned his attention back to St. George. “It’s an old saber from the eighteen hundreds or something. He told me once it killed over a dozen men.”
“That sounds perfect,” St. George said. “Is it here?”
Hector shook his head. “Never trusted my dad or me with it.” He smirked and shrugged again. “Mostly me. Think he was worried I’d hock it or something. Kept it all locked up in his house.”
“Which is where?”
“North Hollywood. Little place just past Universal City.”
“Might as well be on the Moon,” muttered Kennedy.
“We could put a small team together,” said Billie. “Go in fast with a truck or maybe even some motorcycles.”
“We could set up a distraction at one of the other gates,” said another one of the scavengers, Keri, with a nod. “Get the thing over there so they can slip out.”
St. George shook his head. “From what Max has said, it’s not possible to get past this thing. It’s got us surrounded, just the same way Legion does. We can’t go out past the wards.”
“I could get it,” said someone in the back.
The crowd shifted and parted. A few of them jumped away when they saw the speaker. Most of the guards and scavengers stepped back from her, and a murmur danced through the crowd.
Madelyn walked forward. She was wearing a black shirt that made her skin look pure white. Her sunglasses were pushed up on her brow, holding her hair back and showing off her dead eyes. “I could get it,” she repeated.
“You’re not supposed to be outside the hospital,” said St. George.
“She’s not supposed to be inside the walls,” said someone else.
The hero glanced at the crowd. “What was that?”
Makana shrugged. It made his dreadlocks kink and shift. “I thought that was one of the basic rules,” he said. “We don’t let her kind inside the walls, no matter what.”
“My kind?” said Madelyn. She gave the black man a look of disbelief that was clear even with her pale eyes.
“Look, corpse girl,” he said, “nothing personal, but you’re one of them.”
“She’s not one of them,” countered Keri. “She’s still got her soul.”
“Don’t use that soul crap as an excuse,” said Lady Bee.
“Let’s just toss her back outside,” said Al. “She’ll be fine and she doesn’t need to be in here
