Part 36 (1/2)
Forty.
From the darkness of the Turnbull Museum, frightened eyes studied Simon. He stared back at them over the Spike Bolter, adrenaline surging through his system. All of the Templar stood ready to fight. ”Don't fire!” Derek shouted. ”Don't fire! These are noncombatant!”
Simon lowered his weapon, looking out over the museum. With the moonlight slivered through the swirling snow and the dusty windows, the fugitives hiding in the building would have been barely visible. Except for the night-vision capability of the HUD. But he was willing to bet that the people inside the building could barely see each other. He didn't know what the people must have thought of them as they came through the door.
The snow swirled in through the open door, white against the darkness, then disappeared on the floor as it melted almost at once. The cold came as well, more active and biting than it had been with the door closed. Several of the people taking shelter inside the museum pulled their coats and blankets more tightly around them. There were at least three dozen of them that Simon could see, but he felt certain there would be others scattered throughout the building.
Derek held his hand up, freezing the Templar into position. Then he cursed, frustrated by the turn of events that had put innocents in harm's way.
”What are these people doing here?” someone asked. ”Taking shelter,” someone else answered.
Derek stepped forward, dropping his hand. His voice broadcast through the armor. ”You people can't stay here,” he said.
Simon knew Derek was remembering what had happened at the Thornton house with the book. The hammer they were after was known to have powers. All of the people inside the building would be in danger if they stayed.
A thin man in his fifties, gray and bent with age, stood to face them. ”We can't go out there. This is the only safe place we've found. The demons don't come in here.”
Looking around, Simon noticed there were no dead bodies like there were outside the building. Nor did the museum show signs of violence or combat. Most of the exhibits were long gone, leaving only empty shelves and floor displays, but they were largely undisturbed. Maybe thieves had come in over the years to pick over what had been left, but not demons. There was plenty of room for the makes.h.i.+ft beds that littered the floor.
”The museum must be warded,” Derek said over the armor's privacy channel. ”Someone laid a spell over this place and invoked some kind of sanctuary.”
”Are you the knights?” the man asked quietly. He held a long kitchen knife in one hand, but he must have known it wouldn't have done any good against armor or the demons. ”Are you Arthur's Knights of the Round Table? Come to help us in our time of need?”
Derek didn't say anything, but he remembered the boy asking the same question. Those stories, though forgotten to some degree, had resurfaced now. He was surprised at that.
”I was always told that Arthur Pendragon would return some day,” the man went on hopefully. ”That when England was in her greatest need, he would once again take up Excalibur.” He looked at the Templar. ”Are you here to help us?”
Derek hesitated, then said, ”That's just a story. We're not part of that.”
”I see.” The man's shoulders rounded and he pulled a frayed blanket around his shoulders.
Demons screamed outside the door. Simon stepped back long enough to close the door and preserve what little heat remained within the museum. The people all looked so vulnerable.
”Do you have any food?” a woman asked. ”Food is always hard to come by.” Tears ran down her cheeks. ”I'm not asking for myself, but for my boys.” She moved the blanket and revealed two small boys hidden there. Both the boys looked frightened near to death. ”I hate watching them go hungry, and we've all gone hungry for days now.”
Simon sheathed the Spike Bolter and reached for the rations they carried out into the field in ammo compartments of the armor. They were primarily energy bars and soy-sub. The Templar only carried self-heats outside the city.
”It's not much,” he apologized. He added the water containers that fed through the suit's drinking tube as well.
The woman smiled her thanks at him, then quickly started sharing the meager amount with other parents with children. The rations went quickly.
Other Templar came forward and handed their rations over as well.
”You're a bunch of fools,” Mercer snapped. ”If we get pinned down somewhere and can't make it back for a few days, you're going to go hungry.”
”I can miss a meal or two,” Wertham said. ”I'll not knowingly leave children to go hungry.” Raw emotion twisted his words. ”That's not something I'll do. And it's not something I thought I would ever be asked to do.”
A few more Templar, shamed by the words, stepped forward and gave up their supplies as well. Derek put his in as well. Only Mercer and three others didn't volunteer theirs.
”You'd better hope High Seat Booth doesn't hear about this,” Mercer threatened. Derek turned to Mercer. ”If the High Seat does, we'll know who told him.”
Mercer held his commander's gaze for an insolent moment, then turned away. ”Can you take us out of here?” the man asked.
”Where would you go?” Derek asked.
”I don't know. Isn't there somewhere safe?” ”Not in the city.”
”We can't stay here,” one of the women said. ”The demons can't enter this place, but it doesn't stop them from waiting for us outside. When we go out to try to find food, they hunt us. Staying here is just a slow death.”
”The coast,” Derek said. ”There are still s.h.i.+ps that take refugees to France.”
The man shook his head. ”We'd never make it. Not as poorly equipped as we are for the winter, or in the shape we're in. We're too weak.”
Simon looked at all the people and felt torn. All of the people in the museum were doomed, trapped by their vulnerability and needs. Staying in the museum was going to be a slow, horror-filled death, and none of them would escape.
Unless they die in the next few minutes,he couldn't help thinking.
”I'm sorry,” Derek said. ”I wish we could a.s.sist you. But we can't. We've got our orders.” ”Are you part of the military?”
”No.” Derek paused, looking away from the man and the other unfortunates. ”It would be better if you leave now. Safer.”
”We can't. You can't ask us to do that. We've got old people and children among us.”
”I'm sorry.” Derek started forward then, aiming for the back of the museum. The schematic they had of the building showed the entrance to the bas.e.m.e.nt there.
Trying not to think about the people barely living through the freezing cold around him and the fact that they were about to possibly endanger them all, Simon followed. He wondered what his father would have done, then wished that he'd have been able to ask him.
”Do you think this place is warded?” Wertham asked as they descended the steps leading to the bas.e.m.e.nt.
”I don't know,” Corrigan told him. ”I've heard of such things, but I don't know if that's possible.”
Simon didn't either, and he wondered if that was part of the protection hiding the Templar Underground from the demons.
”Warding doesn't matter,” Mercer growled. ”Demons have ways of getting past wards. None that have ever been put up have remained effective.”
Trying not to think about that, Simon kept watch. The bas.e.m.e.nt was large, stuffed with boxes and crates that contained remnants of exhibits that had once filled the museum. A few more of the displaced Londoners squatted there as well, but they quickly gathered their belongings and headed up the steps when the Templar arrived.
They don't trust us, either,Simon realized. That troubled him more than he thought it would.
Derek spent some time at the west wall. ”There's supposed to be a trigger. Ah, there it is.” He pressed on a section of the wall.
With slow, easy grace, a ten-foot section of the wall pivoted to a ninety-degree angle, basically becoming two doorways leading into the darkened room beyond. The Templar followed a spiral staircase around and down, reaching the other door in short order.
The new door was filled with symbols. Even with his meager magical ability, Simon sensed the power locked into the door.