Until finally JC fought his way through to the last car but one; and there, at last, they stopped him. Because in the end, he was only a man, with a man’s limits. The demons blocked the way to the next car through sheer strength of numbers, their horrid shapes packing the car from wall to wall and floor to ceiling. They surrounded JC, coming at him from every direction at once. And so, finally, he was forced to a halt and stood swaying in the middle of the car: a ragged, tattered, and bloody mess of a man. His wonderful cream suit was ruined, soaked and stained with his blood and that of the demons. He had been cut and gouged and torn open, and a long trail of blood lay behind him. He had to keep spitting out blood because it kept filling his mouth. He could feel broken and splintered ribs grinding against each other with every breath, tearing into his lungs; and he was tired, so terribly tired. Every movement hurt him, and lifting his savaged arms was an effort that would have made him cry out if he’d had any voice left. But he’d worn it out screaming, several cars back.

The demons blocked his way, but still he lurched forward and struck out at them with stubborn fury. Because they stood between him and Kim. He was close by then; he could feel her presence. He was damned if he’d be stopped. Not after he’d come so far. He called out Kim’s name, a single breathy rasp of sound; but the demons howled and shouted him down, mocking him by yelling out her name in their sick and rotten voices.

JC swung his silver blade, and missed, and a demon surged forward. Its vicious jaws snapped together and bit off three of JC’s fingers. He hardly noticed the pain; it was one more, among so many others. He looked down stupidly as the silver blade fell from his mutilated hand, and blood jetted from the stumps of his missing fingers. And while he hesitated, thrown off-balance for a moment, a clawed hand came sweeping round and sliced clean through both his eyes.