The next few rooms held a severed hand that was trying to grow itself a new body; a Time Agent whose latest regeneration had gone terribly wrong, turning him inside out; and a sorry-looking werewolf with mange. Takes all sorts, I suppose.

I peered cautiously around the end of the corridor, and there was Mr. President’s room. An armed guard was sitting right outside his door, for the moment concentrating totally on his muscle man magazine. I checked carefully, but that was it. One armed guard. They weren’t even trying, really. I walked straight up to the man, and he didn’t even know I was there until I squeezed a particular nerve cluster in his neck, and he went straight to sleep. I sat him back in his chair, after moving it away from the door. I peered in through the window, and there was Mr. President, sleeping fitfully on his back, his swollen belly pushing up the bedclothes. Pregnancy can be very tiring, or so I’m told. Mr. President’s wife was snoozing in a chair beside his bed. How very understanding and supportive of her.

I reached under my armour for the gun holstered on my hip. The Armourer has supplied me with many different guns down the years, but this one really was rather special. A needle gun with a pressurised gas cylinder that fired slivers of frozen holy water. Very quiet, very efficient.

I didn’t bother with the Hand of Glory for the locked door, just kicked it in with one golden foot. It crashed open, and Mr. President sat up in bed and looked right at me. The baby he was hosting must have boosted his senses. He took one look at me in my golden armour and started screaming that I was there to assassinate him. I aimed my gun carefully and shot his wife while she was still half up out of her chair. The ice needle hit her square in the jugular vein, entered her bloodstream, and melted down into holy water; and Mr. President’s wife convulsed as the demon possessing her was forced out.

She’d been my target all along. The demon had hidden itself inside her while her husband was out playing patty-cake with the ladything, and then waited undetected for Mr. President’s baby to be born through a caesarean. The demon could then possess the unnatural baby and assume a permanent physical form, safe from all attempts at exorcism. Who knows what its plans were after that? My family hadn’t felt like waiting around to find out.

We’d all seen The Omen.

The wife went down on all fours, shuddering and convulsing, while her husband looked on, shocked into horrified silence. Black slime burst out of her mouth and nose and ears and even ran down her face as viscous black tears. More and more of the stuff spilled out of her, faster and faster, forming a widening pool of black tarry stuff on the floor before her. And from this dark ectoplasm the demon made itself a new body, its last desperate attempt to assume a physical form in the material world.

A squat, powerful shape thrust up out of the black pool; first long, muscular arms, then a broad chest and shoulders, and finally a horned head with coal red eyes. I shot it with another holy-water needle, and it howled horribly but kept on growing. Determined little fellow. It pulled itself up out of the black pool, towering above me now. It grew long claws on its hands, and a wide smile split the dark face to show me row upon row of needle teeth. It looked like what it was: vile and evil and terribly strong. I put away my gun and grew thick golden spikes on my armoured fists. Some days you just have to do things the hard way.

The demon surged forward, lashing out at me with a clawed hand. Sparks flew as the claws skittered harmlessly across my armoured chest. I punched the demon in the head, and thick chunks of black ectoplasm flew away as my spiked knuckles ripped through its pseudoflesh. I hit it again and again, beating it down and driving it back, while all its strongest blows slipped harmlessly off my armoured form. I grabbed hold of one flailing black arm, braced myself, and ripped it right off. The demon howled and its body just started falling apart, unable to maintain itself in the face of such punishment. The dark form collapsed into thick pools of stinking, rotting ectoplasm, and the demon fell screaming back into Hell.

I shook dripping black slime from my armoured fists and took a moment to get my breath back. One good thing about beating the crap out of demons from Hell is that you don’t have to feel the slightest bit guilty afterwards.

I looked around for Mr. President. He was out of his bed and cowering in the farthest corner of the room. He saw me look at him and whimpered feebly. I took out my needle gun and shot him too. The holy water would ensure that whatever was finally taken out of him would be stillborn and no threat to anyone. He gasped, his eyes widening as he felt the changes happening within him. He looked away then and cursed me feebly, but I was used to that.

"Did you really think you could hide this from us, Mr. President?" I said. "Next time, forget your pride and come to us first. Or better yet, stay away from the ladythings."

CHAPTER TWO

Alarms and Excursions and Getting the Hell out of Dodge

The demon’s manifesting had set off all kind of alarms. Sirens, flashing lights, the works. I paused just long enough to check that Mr. President’s wife was okay (unconscious, covered in black ectoplasmic gunk, but basically okay, poor cow), and then I slammed the door open and charged out into the corridor. The sirens were deafening, and the lights flared rapidly in time to the raucous electronic noise. Whatever happened to pleasant-sounding alarms, with bells? Ambulances are just the same. And fire engines. I think about things like that. It worries me sometimes. The moment I appeared in the corridor, concealed gun ports opened up in both walls, and heavy-duty gun barrels slammed out. I started running.

All the guns opened up at once, the roar physically painful at such close quarters, and the muzzle flare was dazzling. The heavy rate of fire chewed up the opposite walls behind me as I raced down the corridor. My armour was still in full stealth mode, so the guns couldn’t track me. As far as the security cameras were concerned, the corridor was empty; but the operators knew somebody had to be there, because they’d seen the door open. So they just opened up with everything they had and hoped for the best. The gun barrels swept back and forth, keeping up a murderous rate of fire, but even the occasional lucky hit just ricocheted off my armour. I didn’t even feel the impact.

I rounded the far corner just in time for a heavy steel grille to slam down from the ceiling, blocking my way. I didn’t slow, hitting the grille with my shoulder, only to lurch to a sudden halt as the heavy steel buckled but held. I grabbed the grille with both golden hands and tore it apart like so much lace, the steel squealing loudly as it sheared apart. I forced my way through the opening and raced down the next corridor. The armour makes me supernaturally strong, when I need to be. Wonderful stuff, this living metal. I’d left the guns and the sirens behind me, but now I could hear running footsteps and raised angry voices closing in on me from all directions. Time to hide out in another room and let the hue and cry run past me.

I ran down the stairs to the next floor, chose a door at random, forced the lock with one push of an armoured hand, and slipped into the darkened room, closing the door carefully behind me. The room was pleasantly quiet, and I stood very still in the gloom, listening as a whole group of people ran past the door, first from one direction and then the other. There was a lot of confused shouting, and I smiled behind my golden mask. First rule of a good agent: always keep them guessing. All I had to do now was wait for things to calm down a little, and then I’d just ease out of here and walk past the security forces in full stealth mode, and they’d never even know I was there. The room’s light snapped on, and I spun around, startled. The room’s patient was sitting bolt upright in bed and staring straight at me.