The Age of Odin - James Lovegrove [134]
We couldn't allow them time to come up with an answer.
"Paddy. Cy." I pointed to two diesel turbines the size of Transit vans. They were churning away deafeningly as they bullied Fenrir along. "You know the drill. Fifteen-second fuses. When you're done setting the charges, follow me out."
"Which way you going?" Cy asked.
"Which way do you bloody think? Through the septics. There's got to be an exit at the back for them to pile out of during an assault. That's our way out too. I make a hole through them. You follow."
"All on your own?"
I unhooked a couple of grenades from my belt. "Nope. I'll have some help from Mr and Mrs Pineapple here."
"And me," Odin added.
I was through second-guessing his participation, through querying his combat readiness. He wanted in? Fine by me. I'd no idea how much cop he'd be in a scrap, but hey ho, the more the merrier.
Three steps into the passageway, Odin said, "Gid, my ravens."
"What about them?"
"Someone must look after them, feed them."
"You're worried about your birds at a time like this?"
"If I don't survive..."
"Let's not go there, eh?"
"And Frigga. I want you to tell her -"
"Listen, Odin," I said firmly. "If you're not getting out of this alive, then I'm definitely not. So I'm not about to start promising to tell anyone anything. There's no point."
"I've been a poor husband."
"She knows that. She also knows you love her anyway. Poor husband? I wrote the book on it. But at least you and her are still together, unlike me and Gen. You stuck it through. That counts for a great deal. Now, there's a fuckload of mercs about twenty feet away from here, and every second we spend having this heart-to-heart is another second we give them to figure out how to deal with us. So let's forget the what-ifs and focus on the right-nows, yeah?"
"Blunt as ever, Gid," Odin said. "And in your own fashion, wise."
"Cheers."
I turned with a grenade in each hand and plinked out both pins with my thumbs, keeping the striker levers nice and flat with my fingers. Loki's men had withdrawn behind a steel door ahead. They'd gone quiet, which to me said they were braced to launch a counterattack. Charging down the passageway with guns blazing, two-by-two formation, one of each pair shooting high, the other low - that would be how I'd tackle it, in their position. Small arms rather than anything high velocity. Trying their utmost to keep casualties high and collateral damage to a minimum. Make each bullet count and for fuck's sake don't hole the engines.
Sure enough, the door swung open and two pistols poked out. High and low, just like I'd predicted. The men holding them emerged as I lobbed the grenades along the passageway and in through the doorway. I grabbed Odin and hurled him and myself to the floor.
"Oh fu -" one of the Americans managed to get out, and "Holy Mother of -" the other.
Then: Boom! Boom!
The near-simultaneous detonations of two frag-mentation grenades in a confined metallic space. Like gigantic gongs being rung in Hell.
Before the smoke had even begun to clear I was inside the hold, Minimi to shoulder. Odin was hard on my heels, and I briefly wondered what he was going to do, seeing as he was bare-handed. His problem, not mine.
The grenades had killed over half of the Yanks outright, injured plenty more, and stunned the rest. There were maybe a dozen left who were battle-worthy. They staggered to their feet as Odin and I burst in, and while they were groping for their sidearms I began putting them down with the Minimi. Nice and surgical.
But I couldn't neutralise every one of our opponents before return fire became a reality. Pistols started to spark, and I took shelter behind a heap of sprawled bodies.
I signalled to Odin to join me behind my gory barricade. He didn't see. Admittedly I was on his blind side, but it appeared he had his own tactic for handling the enemy fire, and that was to run straight into it.
Crazy? Oh