She looked past him and saw that the same thing was happening to the other black-clad men. All three of them were having some kind of fit. Their faces flushed as if their blood pressure were spiking. Foamy spit bubbled out from between the lips of the man in front of her.

Darmana backed up. First a single step, and then more, backpedaling as the fit grew more violent. Then all of a sudden, those tremors stopped, and the whole street in front of the factory went dead silent.

For two full seconds.

The men in black stared at her and through her and at nothing, and she saw to her horror that the tall man’s eyes had changed. The whites had turned a dark, vibrant red.

Blood eyes, she thought with the odd clarity of someone in terrible danger. He is a demon.

And that was her very last thought. Then, or ever.

The man in black struck her with such shocking, hideous speed that she never saw his arm move. She did not truly feel the blow that caught her on the side of the jaw. Shock buffered her mind from hearing the sounds of her jaw shattering, just as it masked the wetter snap of her neck vertebrae. She was dead before her heart took the next beat.

She crumpled to the ground, unable to hear the high and terrible screams of the rest of the protesters. Of the crowd of townsfolk who’d gathered to watch.

Or of the shrieks of horror and agony that followed as the three men in black moved through the village like a monsoon wind, killing everyone Darmana had ever known.

Stafford stepped over her corpse and walked over to the car, leaned against it, produced a silver cigarette case, and removed a filterless Roth-Händle, which he lit with a gold lighter. He dragged in a deep lungful, held it to feel the bite, and then exhaled. The blue smoke swirled in the air as all around the screams rose and rose.

He glanced at the two men with cell phones and drew a hand across his throat, telling them to cut the feed. They did.

“You get all that?” he asked.

“Every bit,” said one of the men.

“Sweet.”

Michael Augustus Stafford pulled his cell phone out, punched a number, and when it was answered, said, “Looked great from my end, boss. I think this’ll play well in your next ShowRoom gig.”

“Excellent work,” said Mr. Sunday. “The buses of replacement workers will be there first thing in the morning.”

“Right-o.”

Stafford ended the call and smiled. He loved days like this. Made him glad to be alive.

CHAPTER 23

INTEGRATED SCIENCES DIVISION

PHOENIX HOUSE

OMFORI ISLAND, GREECE

Dr. Jane Holliday sat with Church and Bug at a small table in the lab.