Oh, Wax, she said.You have never understood. You can’t beat me. You’veneverhad the vision for that. Whatever you try, I’ll always be ahead of you.
He slipped Vindication into a holster, then downed an extra vial of steel—one of the ones Harmony had sent him. Finally, he hefted the Big Gun in one hand. Ranette had warned him what it was capable of doing. So he put up his steel bubble, even though the enemy was armed with aluminum.
“Funny, Telsin,” he said, “that you claim to be the one with vision—when you’ve always underestimated me. If you’dactuallyhad foresight, you’dhave killed me when I first came back to the city seven years ago.”
Before you could learn what I was doing?
“Before I came to love the things you’re seeking to destroy.”
He ripped the earring out and tossed it aside, then walked into the hallway and looked inward, toward where it ended at a cross hall. Footsteps and calls sounded from beyond a doorway there markedSTAIRS. They went silent a moment later.
“Mate,” Wayne said, stepping up. “You’re sure about this?”
Wax raised his gun in two hands and strode forward. “Stay behind. Follow once I’m done. But don’t engage. It’s time for Harmony’s Sword to do his job.”
62
Wax strode toward the stairwell and slipped out the Steel Survivor, loaded with ordinary lead bullets. He shot—then Pushed—twice, drilling a bullet through the wood on either side of the door. He was rewarded with shouts of pain from soldiers hiding within.
Telsin assumed that if she stuffed enough soldiers between them, it would slow him. But Wax was a Coinshot. The more you put between him and his goal, the more debris you gave him to turn into weapons.
He ripped a fire extinguisher off the wall next to him, then tossed it and Pushed it forward—his weight increased—and ripped the door to the stairwell off the hinges, slamming it against the men hiding inside. Predictably, several others ducked through the opening to try shooting him. He downed them each with a bullet to the head.
Then he shot the fire extinguisher, blasting white smoke and chemicals into the chamber. Finally, he lowered the Big Gun in his left hand and launched a shot. The massive explosive shell detonated amid the white smoke, spraying shrapnel through the hallway and out around Wax—where his steel bubble Pushed it away. He strode through the storm of steel untouched.
It was a gun built just for him: a grenade launcher designed for maximum shrapnel. And those it didn’t kill, it would outline. Wax stormed through the doorway, tracing the lines of steelsight across the chaotic space, and downed shadows that tried to aim at him through the smoke.
Looking up through the smoke, he found a modern skyscraper stairwell. A straight shot to the top, assuming he could get past all the troops. Men and women fell on the steps as his gun flashed. Like those he’dfaced before, these were dressed in sleek uniforms and didn’t carry a trace of metal on them. But Wax had plenty to work with regardless. The stairwell had a metal banister and wrapped around itself, leaving a hole up the center. He almost flew straight up it, but he couldn’t afford to leave enemies at his back. Plus he needed to carve a path for Wayne.
So, Wax launched a grenade up through the center of the stairwell, which detonated in another hail of shrapnel and screams. He launched upward, then Pushed outward, forcing the metal banister out and away from him in a circle, pinning it to the wall—and taking any people still standing with it. Indiscriminate firing started from above, so he dropped back down, narrowly avoiding aluminum bullet hail. Another grenade—fired up through the gap and detonated in exactly the right position by a careful Push—made them curse and stop.
He dashed upward, keeping his momentum, and Pushed off a fuse box, then a metal sign indicating the floor number. Sweeping up the steps, firing—yes—but just as often using chunks of metal debris as weapons. Grim, he advanced, never touching down, building a wall of metal—bullet casings, shrapnel, debris—ahead of him as he continued to Push, constantly repositioning, soaring up the stairs and bounding over corpses.
Once, Wax had run from his calling. He’dseen a duty that required him to not just find answers, not just solve problems, but to become something terrible. Something that Harmony—manacled by the powers of Preservation—couldn’t do himself.
Tonight Waxillium embraced that duty. He became destruction incarnate. For to worship Harmony was not only to worship Preservation— it was also to worship Ruin, with all that implied. There were times for careful caution and empathy. And there were times when people pointed a weapon capable of killing millions straight at his home, his family, his constituents.
Wax ascended the stairwell as a tempest, constantly seeking upward. Toward the false heaven of a monstrous god. And as he did, he noticed mist trickling down the steps—there was a small vent to the outside on each floor. Enough for Harmony’s blood to spill in. It rarely came indoors, but it coated the steps tonight like a ghostly liquid.
Metal plinged. Metal he couldn’t see. He ducked back by instinct—and a second later another explosion shook the stairwell. He found himself bleeding from shrapnel along one arm; they’dfound grenades of their own. But as the resistance pressed forward to stop him, they found him still quite hale.
Vindication aimed true, dispatching aluminum death. The enemy bunched up with wooden shields and furniture to block his way, but Wax lobbed a grenade into it, then used the wood—now embedded with steel fragments—and a Push to force them back. When they went down, Wax landed behind the barricade and heard calls from above, giving him time to reload the Big Gun with another six grenades. He locked the weapon closed, then gritted his teeth.
These soldiers might have thought themselves prepared. They might even have fought Coinshots before.
But they’dnever fought Waxillium Ladrian.
He had to take another hit of steel as he advanced. He was using it faster than he expected. He dropped the vial as shouts above accompanied soldiers throwing lines and nets across the central column to prevent him from flying up.
Wax pressed on, relentless. Heavy as a truck at some times, light as a bullet at others, he drove himself upward. Allomancy made the stairwell tremble—the concrete was reinforced with steel he could sense and use. It bent beneath his will, the concrete cracking, stairs rupturing and throwing off the aim of those trying to fire at him.
Time seemed to slow as he hit the next batch of soldiers, and he avoided their gunfire, then increased his weight and lodged a bullet in one’s skull, then slammed that person back into the others. He crumbled the steps completely beneath the feet of the next group.
This wasn’t about a case. This wasn’t about a mystery. This wasn’t about questions. Hecouldn’tstop. He couldn’taffordto stop. If he did, life ended. He fought with grenade, bullet, and steel. He fought as the sword, put where it needed to be. For all he hated that it was necessary.
Finally—trailed by the mist, trailing death—he reached the top. The end of the stairwell. There didn’t appear to be a way up to the roof from here, but he’dreached the top floor. Breathing heavily, he glanced down through the center of the stairwell—flickering electric lights illuminating broken, crumbling concrete, ripped apart as if by cannonballs. Railings twisted and covered in wreckage.
Groans, like the hollow moans of the damned, echoed up from below. Wayne’s head popped out to look up at him from one floor down; he was covered in dust and chips from the broken steps.