Within five minutes, the Seekers hit the streets.

Take the second turning o the right. Damien's voice echoed in Tora's head. We'll take the alleyway behind the bank and save us forty metres.

The five of them sprinted past shoppers and school children on the road. Some of them gave the teens a curious glance before resuming their daily routines. Sunlight reflected off the windows on the buses. Everyone went about their daily business, totally ignorant of the significance of what was about to happen.

Past the small bungalows that lined the road leading up to the area highlighted by Damien's machine, they arrived at an opening. Cars passed them, pulling into the nearby car park. To the right was a high stone wall with leaves hanging densely over the pedestrian path, and a golf course was beyond that. The air was dense, crackling with nergy. Even without Damien's telepathy, Tora could feel the demonic presence. The veil was thin here.

None of the houses showed any disturbances. The roads showed no abnormalities. She swivelled around, frowning. Her eyes fell on a large white building about a hundred metres away.

"You've got to be kidding." Carlos voiced her thoughts.

"The hospital? But it's broad daylight!" said Tora, aghast.

"Tell me something I don't know," Ross said, tense. Her fists clenched and she spoke through gritted teeth. "This one's going to be messy, Markl."

"We'll have to be quick. Take one floor each after we've cleared the ground floor access areas. Damien, I need you to start turning people away once we've scoured the ground floor."

Damien nodded without a sound, his face pale. Tora felt a pang of sympathy. He was so little, with his fluffy blonde hair and anxious eyes, and had already gone through so much. He barely came up to her shoulder. With such a sweet, genuine face, how could anyone bear to kill him?

"Tora, can you cast a forcefield at the entrances in case the demons escape our pursuit?"

"I can try."

Tora braced herself for a snub from Ross about her poor telekinetic control, but the lieutenant was too busy grinding her teeth and formulating the next plans to notice.

"Carlos, go scout ahead. Report back to me once you've assessed and secured the perimeters."

"Right-o." Carlos shimmered out of sight. The nearby bushes rustled as he headed away.

Tora followed suit as the others made their way to the entrance, her heart pounding. The veil in the main city had always been fairly stable, and the breaks tend to occur most frequently at night. This mission was bad on so many levels. She swallowed.

Markl gestured and they spaced out once they entered the revolving doors. To their left was an open café area with a coffee bar, beyond which was a corridor leading to the clinic building. To the right, steps and lifts led up to the wards. The air was thick with the scent of demons, but none of the humans appeared to notice.

Tora flexed her fingers and then crackled her knuckles, her shoulders squared. Damien pressed his temple with two fingers, squeezing his eyes shut. She felt his probing senses wafting past her.

Nothing looked out of place. It wasn't visiting hour yet, so the place was relatively quiet. Patients mostly headed to the clinic building, accompanied by family members. A few nurses and students sat at the café, chatting over steaming cups of coffees. People moved in and out of the hospital convenience store.

A wind breezed by.

"Clinic building's clear and this floor's clear too," said Carlos from somewhere to her right.

"So that leaves the wards," said Markl out of the corner of his mouth.

"I can't sense any abnormal emotions or movement from upstairs, either." Damien opened his eyes, confusion written all over his face.

Markl was silent for a moment, his brows knitted. Tora looked at him for instructions.

"We may need to scan the roof, too. There's a helipad up there," said Ross.

"Wards first," Markl said. "There are patients there, hospital workers, doctors. They're all at risk if that's where the demons are. We need to cover as many floors as we can."

"Damien and I can take one floor each." Ross gestured. They marched to the stairwell. "I'll send an illusion to Damien if I find anything and Damien can reach our minds."

Tora glanced at Markl. He caught her look.

"I'll go with Ross. Carlos and Tora, you two go with Damien."

Feeling a flutter of relief, Tora set off for the stairs first. Throwing up a forcefield behind her, she kept expanding it with each step. Damien followed in silence, using his telepathy to keep humans at bay. Their footsteps echoed in the empty stairwell. At the first floor, Markl and Ross departed, with Ross sprinting to the wards at the other end of the floor.

"Come on," said Tora, leaping up the next flight.

"Ever ready for a fight," muttered Carlos, following suit.

She jumped to the door of the second floor and flung the door open. The stench of the demons was thicker than on the ground floor, overwhelming the smell of disinfectants. A group of humans walked by, stethoscopes around their necks. The consultant leading the group suddenly froze in mid-conversation.

"Dr. Storey?" The junior doctor peered at him, confusion on her face. "Did you want a neurological referral for the lady just now?"

"I think..." The older man's voice was wooden, his eyes glassy and unseeing. "I think we'll continue the ward round after a coffee break."

Damien kept very still.

"I think that is an excellent idea, Dr. Storey," said the junior doctor in the same wooden voice. The others nodded and followed the consultant down the stairs out of sight.

"Go," whispered Damien.

Tora moved forward, her trainers making squeaky noises across the smooth marble floor. Carlos pushed through the nearest double doors and Tora started with the wards furthest away. The doors swung shut behind her. Breathing evenly through her nostrils, she tested the tingling in the air. Demon presence was heavy, but it wasn't the heaviest here. There seemed to be some sort of downward gradient.

Nurses went about their jobs, some of them throwing glances at the girl dressed in sports attire. Tora took no notice, blue eyes flickering up and down the corridor. Bits of conversation floated over to her. All of them acted like normal humans.

"...lady in bed five wanted some analgesia. Can you ask a doctor to prescribe her something?"

"...said she's been feeling sick ever since the IV flucloxacillin started. I'm wondering if it's a side effect..."

Convinced nothing was out of the ordinary, Tora checked the ward next door. The same sight greeted her: doctors strolling up and down the corridor, nurses hurrying to and from bays with medications and notes, patients shuffling around their beds.

The gradient in demonic stench was clearer the moment she left the ward. She wrinkled her nose, making her way back to Damien. Halfway there, she stopped just outside the lifts. She turned her head, curious, sniffing. No doubt about it, it was strongest there. It wafted from the top, spilling gently onto the ground, making her nose hairs curl.

"It's clear this side."

"Here, too," said Carlos, materialising. "That means..."

"Yeah, can't you smell it?" She wrinkled her nose.

"It's clearer now that I could filter most of that gunk from my nose." He sniffed. "It's making my eyes water."

Tora looked at Damien.

"I'm sending them a message. Don't distract me."

"I was just going to ask what's upstairs. Is it another ward?"

Carlos peered through the glass doors at the signs in the stairwell.

"Two wards. Orthopaedics and Medicine of the Elderly?"

"Sheesh. How many ill humans can they cram into one place?"

"How long's a bit of string?"

Tora snorted, rolling her eyes. "Don't play smart, Carlos. It really doesn't suit you."

"Demons are about all over us and you two are bickering at each other?" Ross scowled at them the moment she pushed her way through the door. "The first floor's clear. Damien said there's nothing here, either."

"Third floor it is, then," said Markl, coming up behind her. His face had become more pinched since half an hour ago. Tora hadn't seen such a worried look on his face in many months.

"It's going to be hard getting people out of the wards upstairs, Markl," said Tora, running after him. "It's a bunch of old people and broken legs there."

"Then we'll have to find an alternative," he said, grim.

The third floor corridor was empty.

"Spread out." Markl stood by the nearest ward, 33. "One per ward. If you see demons, do not engage. Find either Ross or Damien and we'll all attack them together."

"Remember what he said, hothead," said Carlos with a grin just before he vanished.

"Shut up, assface," retorted Tora, smirking back, her hand on the door of ward 34. It was going to take a lot of restraint not to dive headfirst into combat, but judging by the serious look on Markl's face, he wasn't going to take kindly to disobedience in these circumstances. Fun would have to come after rules.

"Go."

She pushed the door open. It swung shut behind her. The stench of demonic presence washed over her in waves, making her nauseous. Ugh. She could never understand how humans could remain so ignorant of the demons' presence. Surely at least the stink would have alerted them to something fishy. She guessed they really were dumber than Carlos.

The first nurse's station was empty. Stacks of files lay strewn across the worktop. The telecom device on the wall showed the front door of the ward. Tora glanced into the first bay. Four beds contained four patients, all of them sleeping. Sunlight coursed in through the windows.

Next bay. Same thing. Four beds, four asleep patients. Not one of them stirred despite the squeaks of Tora's trainers and her impatient footsteps. No nurse came bustling out to shoo her away. No doctor came and gave her suspicious looks. Even the single bed patients were asleep, tucked in bed, with only the matted wispy white hair visible. A drip continued to run, beside the bed.

The next bays were exactly the same. Nothing was out of place, yet the whole scenario was eerie. Taking the opportunity, Tora paused and adjusted her forcefield, drawing it closer until it hovered between the second and third floor stairwell. It took quite a bit of concentration to keep it there instead of letting it flare out. Taking a deep breath, she continued checking all the rooms. No doctors, no nurses, no cleaners, no hospital workers. Just patients all in their own beds, still sleeping despite the sun being up, in silence. The stench of demons remained, making the air thick and stuffy.

She paused outside the second bay, frowning. Something was amiss. Her intuition had always been reliable, but she couldn't see what was so strange.

Then it hit her. It was too quiet. She couldn't even hear them breathe.

"Um..." She approached the nearest bed in the bay. The top of the old man's bald head peeped out at the head of the bed. His body curled beneath the white blanket. "Hello?"

He didn't answer.

"Er, mister?" She touched his shoulder. He didn't move. She grasped it and shook him. "Mister? Hello?"

Her fingers were wet. Frowning, Tora withdrew her hand. No, there was no mistake there. A dark palm print was where her hand had been just now.

Sucking in a breath, Tora grasped the edges of the sheet and, in one move, flung it away.

A grotesque caricature of a human lay on the bed. His skin was grey and his eyes unseeing. His body had bulges running up and down, some of them festering at the apices, surrounded by dilated veins. The shoulder Tora had grasped had the indent of her hand on it where the skin had sunken. The stench of rotting flesh then hit her, making her gag. The stink of demons had been so strong she hadn't noticed what lay beneath.

The bulges started to move from side to side, rippling with life. Tora swallowed.

"Oh, flipping hell."

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