Deathstalker 08 - Deathstalker Coda

to do. She couldn’t save anyone, and she and the Sluts couldn’t maintain the barrier indefinitely. Sooner or later the sheer number of thralls would overwhelm them. So Diana dropped the shield, and she and the Psycho Sluts flew silently back to the Rookery. The one place she thought she could still be sure of defending. Delta City was left to its own defenses, and fell.
    Later, she reported back to Douglas Campbell. I can keep the Rookery safe, she said.
    What about the Parade of the Endless? said Douglas.
    What about them? said Diana.

    The Rookery was now the only place on Logres immune to uber-esper possession. The combination of human and esper and alien minds had always frustrated the uber-espers’ grasp, and the new protective field set up around the expanded territory of the Rookery made everyone there safe from any and all forms of mental attack. And the uber-espers had good reason to be wary of Diana Vertue, also known as Jenny Psycho. They had worked together to murder her, over a century before, and yet here she was back again; and they had no idea how. Even they didn’t think they could bring themselves back from the dead. And there was always the chance Diana might make contact with the departed but still hated oversoul, wherever they had got to on their city of New Hope. The uber-espers thought they could probably take the oversoul, but they weren’t in any hurry to find out.
    The only way the uber-espers could hope to crack the shield around the Rookery would be to lure Diana and the Psycho Sluts out so they could be ambushed, or for the uber-espers to turn up at the Rookery in person. And they sure as hell weren’t ready to try that yet.
    They would wait, until they had overthrown and possessed all the cities on Logres, and then they would come and take the Parade of the Endless, and then . . . oh yes, and then . . .

    Douglas Campbell called a meeting in his hotel room. All the really important people came, while two Psycho Sluts stood guard outside the door so they wouldn’t be interrupted or overheard. Douglas looked tired and harried, as well he might. He hadn’t slept or rested properly since the emergency began. There was panic inside and outside the Rookery, and everyone was looking to him for answers, for hope and salvation. No one expected anything from the Emperor, but Douglas was the acclaimed King of Thieves. The man who could do anything. And there in his crowded hotel room, Stuart Lennox, Tel Markham, Diana Vertue, and Nina Malapert all looked to Douglas for answers he didn’t have. He couldn’t tell them that, of course. He had made himself their leader, so he had to lead. Even if he wasn’t sure where he was going. Douglas sighed inwardly, and did his best to look calm and certain as he sat back in his chair to hear the reports his people had brought him.
    “Let’s take things in order,” he said flatly. “The Emperor is no longer our main enemy, and can no longer be the main target of our energies. He has his own problems, so we needn’t worry about him. All our old plans and strategies are hereby scrapped, or at least postponed indefinitely, until we’ve dealt with the menace of the uber-espers. Diana, let’s start with you. Tell us about Delta City.”
    “The whole city has fallen,” said Diana. She looked and sounded smaller than usual, beaten down by the things she’d seen, and couldn’t prevent. “The girls and I watched it happen, from a safe distance. The city’s population is now either dead or possessed. No one got out alive. Anyone too old, too young, or too sick to walk was butchered on the spot. That’s what the uber-espers will do to us, when they come here. We can’t negotiate, even if someone was dumb enough to suggest it, because we don’t have anything they want that we could use to buy them off. And I don’t know that we’re strong enough to keep them out. The best we can hope for is to hold the thralls off long enough for the uber-espers to get impatient, and turn up in person. There are a few things I could try then. If they were stupid enough to put themselves at risk. Which they aren’t.”
    “You sound scared of them,” said Stuart, frowning. “I didn’t think you were scared of anyone. I mean, you’re Jenny Psycho! One of the legends of old Empire!”
    “Aren’t you a bit old, to be believing in legends? The last time the uber-espers ganged up on me in an ambush, over a hundred years ago, they killed me.” Diana shuddered