She fumbled for something to hold on to, felt her hand sink into flesh like hamburger studded with shards of glass.
&nb
sp; “Now, now, now!” Dekka’s voice cried from far, far away, and Francis knew Dekka meant her, meant that she . . .
In an instant Francis and the wreckage of Shade were back in the helicopter, which had blessedly turned to match speed with the train.
“Shade!” Malik cried. He and Cruz knelt beside the gruesome horror of Shade’s barely alive body, yelling, “De-morph, de-morph, Shade!”
Sam was yelling something different. “Four seconds! Francis!”
“You have to do it, Sam!” Simone cried.
Sam staggered to the door and gripped a handhold, leaned out, and extended his free hand.
“Look!” Armo yelled, and tried to point with a hand that was not exactly obeying his brain’s instructions but wavered like a drunk pointing the way to his car.
Dekka looked. And saw.
00:04 . . . 00:03 . . .
A dark swarm was rushing toward Dekka, and she thought, If I have to die, I’m taking some of you bastards with me, and fired her shredding beams into the mass.
She was still firing when she suddenly found herself back in the helicopter, narrowly missing Sam’s head while shredding the sill of the helicopter’s door.
The train was well past the open space of the wetlands by the river. They were not a mile from the station, and now the train’s brakes were squealing.
A big freeway interchange to the right.
A college campus to the left.
Sam whispered, “Forgive me.”
CHAPTER 39
Gas Will Expand to Fill Available Space
VECTOR LOOKED THROUGH many eyes at once and saw the Capitol dome rising in his field of view. He had ordered his hostage train driver to begin slowing, not that the fool knew what to do, but she had hands, and hands, it seemed, were useful.
Seeing the Capitol and the Washington Monument ahead filled Vector with grim excitement.
I’m taking over the United States government!
He felt the brakes beginning to bite. He would survive a headlong crash into the train station, but it would disrupt his swarm, and who knew, he might want to use the train again someday. It changed your perspective, Vector realized, when you started to understand that everything belonged to you now. Everything! New York was his. Washington would soon be his. And then what of the Rockborn Gang’s resistance? Where would they go? Where would they hide when the US military and the National Guard and the Secret Service and FBI were all working for him?
President Vector? Or President Markovic?
Not that he would reside in the White House, that rundown dump. No, he could have any place he wanted, and the beauty of it was he didn’t really need a place at all. He could be anywhere or everywhere. The thought made him laugh from sheer glee.
He had seen the desperate efforts of the Rockborn Gang. It had been clever of Shade to remove the train’s engineer, but not, in the end, effective. He’d watched as a pillar of smoke had receded behind him, the burning of the Rockborn Gang’s last, faint hope.
Then to his shock he’d seen a newer, sleeker, and obviously faster helicopter come zooming overhead. It now hovered menacingly above the tracks. No question that it could fire missiles and derail the train, but he was so close to the city now that it would barely amount to a delay.
Blow up the train, fools, if you must: it will only kill the hostages.
Then a series of rapid-fire sounds, fast as a machine gun’s fire, followed by an impact that sent a shudder through the train. He had turned part of his swarm to investigate and had come upon the startling spectacle of three bloodied, stunned members of the Rockborn Gang . . . and one who was well beyond stunned or bloodied.
Shade Darby is dead!