Deathstalker 03 - Deathstalker War

said Cyder. "I can still think."
    "If we end up having to make a run for it, you'll be no use drunk."
    "Make a run for it? Where would we go? The inn's surrounded by men with guns.
    The moment we leave this place we're dead. Of course, if we stay, we're dead, too. If the flames don't get us, the smoke will. Or that Psycho woman will finally fall apart and the gravity barges will blow the whole place into kindling. Have I missed anything?"
    "There's always the chance something will happen," said Royal. "Some lucky break, or opportunity. We have to be ready to grab it."

    Cyder shook her head. "It's too late, Donald. We're not going anywhere." She broke off, and frowned. "Can you hear someone singing?"
    And that was when one wall of the tavern suddenly collapsed. The bricks just fell apart, revealing the outside street and a hell of a lot of dead troopers.
    Flames swept toward the gap, but were somehow thwarted and held back by some unseen force. And there, right outside, singing, were Investigator Topaz and the woman who used to be known as Typhoid Mary. The two most powerful Sirens in the Empire, or out of it.
    "Told you so," said Donald to Cyder, grinning. "All right, people; we are leaving! Grab anything you absolutely have to have, and head for the hole in the wall. Madelaine, help me with Jenny Psycho. Cyder, put that bottle down and run or I'll kick your ass up around your ears."
    There were flames everywhere now. The air itself was hot enough to burn. Sudden stabs of energy smashed down through the ceiling as Jenny's shield splintered.
    Donald grabbed her by the arm and hustled her toward the hole in the wall. Blood was spilling thickly down her face now, and spraying from her mouth in time to her agonized breathing. Her skin was an unhealthy blue-white, and her hand in Royal's was cold and clammy. She looked like death warmed up and allowed to congeal, but somehow she was still maintaining her psionic shield, protecting the rebels as they fled from the burning inn. Her legs were stiff and unsteady, and Donald kept her moving by brute force, for she was beyond cooperating with him or anyone else now, even to save her own life. Her whole world had shrunk down to the simple need to maintain her shield, even though it was killing her.
    Donald got her to the hole in the wall, and all but threw her out into the cold night beyond. He clambered out after her, his chest heaving as he tried to cough up the smoke that had got into his lungs. He felt old and tired and his head was
    swimming, but he wouldn't let himself fall. Not yet.
    McVey helped Chance get his charges on their feet again, and between them they herded the half-mad children over to the hole in the wall and out into the street beyond. Chance kept counting them over and over, to make sure he hadn't left any behind. All the children were screaming or crying or just shuddering helplessly. Legion's never-ending howl rasping through their minds like burning barbed wire. McVey stayed by the hole, counting heads as the last of the rebel HQ's people filed past him. He came up one short. He forced himself as close to the hole as he could, and stared through the flames into the blazing barroom.
    The dwarf Iain Castle was still sitting beside Lois Barren's body, crushed under the fallen timber. He was holding her dead hand in his, and rocking slowly back and forth. McVey yelled his name, and Castle looked around almost absently.
    "Iain, get out of there! Leave her! There's nothing you can do!" McVey had to yell himself hoarse to make himself heard above the roar of the flames and the thundering engines of the gravity barges hovering overhead.
    "I won't leave her!" Castle shouted back. "I won't leave her here!"
    "She's already gone! And if you don't get out of there now, you'll be going with her!" McVey made himself stay by the hole, though the sheer heat was raising blisters on his unprotected hands and face. "Iain, please! I don't want to lose you, too!"
    Castle nodded slowly, got to his feet, and stumbled across the smoke-filled room to the hole in the wall. He plowed straight through the fiery sides as though he didn't notice them, and lurched out into the street with flames rising from his clothes. McVey whipped off his cloak and wrapped Castle up in it, smothering the flames. Beside him, Jenny Psycho sat down suddenly, as though all the strength
    had just gone out of her. Her mouth was slack, and her eyes saw nothing. Not far away, Typhoid Mary and Investigator