Happy and Natasha forced their way through the blood, to stand facing each other. The vampire sharks were still circling, drawing steadily closer as hunger drove them on. Erik stabbed at one of them with his pointing bone, and the creature immediately rolled over onto its back and sank beneath the waves. Blood churned and frothed around it as the others moved in. Melody gaped at Erik.

“How did you get that bone out of my pocket?”

“Heh-heh,” said Erik.

“We can call the hell train,” Happy said to Natasha. “But will it come? I don’t think we have the power to compel it, even working together.”

“You want power, I got power,” said Erik. “Or rather, my marvellous machine does. Excuse me . . .”

Another vampire shark blasted up out of the blood, rising high into the air to crash down on the group from above. Erik shot it down with his pointing bone, and it was already dead in mid air when JC backhanded the body away. It landed some distance away, and several of the creatures went after it.

“How can they still be hungry?” said Melody.

“Flesh is good, but it doesn’t satisfy,” Happy said absently. “They want blood. Our blood. Hot and spurting, right from the source.”

“We’ve killed enough of them! Why don’t they take the hint and go away?”

“Feel free to ask them,” said JC. “Erik, get your damned machine out.”

“Way ahead of you,” Erik said smugly.

He eased the cat-head computer out of his back-pack. The pack was soaked in blood, but the machine was untouched. Erik held it carefully out before him, above the surface of the rising blood, and turned it on. The three Institute agents watched with varying degrees of horror and disgust as the cat head opened its eyes wide and howled miserably.

“It’s crying,” said Happy. “The whole thing, not only the cat head. It’s alive and crying all the time.”

Erik smiled modestly, as though he’d been paid a compliment.

“I do good work. Now, pay attention. Happy, Natasha, reach out with your thoughts and locate our elusive hell train, and the computer will boost your strength, for a time. Make you powerful enough to compel the train to come here and pick us up. But don’t take too long, or you’ll burn out the box. Or yourselves. We’re working in unknown territory here. Come on, come on, shake something useful. You don’t want the nice cat head to explode, do you?”

“Ignore him,” said Natasha. “I do, as much as possible.”