The Age of Odin - James Lovegrove [8]
"So I've heard this rumour," Abortion said. We'd been silent ourselves for a while, eyes not meeting, two blokes who had less in common than they'd care to admit but very few others to call friend.
"Oh yeah? This the one about Beyoncé and Prince William again?"
"No, although I swear that's true. Heard it off a man who knows someone who works at the palace. Apparently the guy, he's a valet or something, and he's got the condom to prove it, and he's going to flog it on eBay."
"Ooh, a used condom with dried royal spunk in it. What's the reserve on that going to be? Twenty pence I'd guess."
"You could clone your own royal baby out of it."
"Like Jurassic Park, you mean?"
"Something like, only without the dinosaurs. No, I'm talking about another rumour. A whole new one. One that's got to do with people like you and me."
"Losers?"
"Ex-service. Discharged. Looking for work."
"I'm not looking for work. I have work. I have a job selling reconditioned printer toner cartridges and it pays handsomely, thank you very much."
"No, it doesn't."
"All right, it doesn't, but with that and my half pension I get by."
"And what about the child maintenance?"
"Okay, so I don't get by. I can barely makes ends meet. So what? Anyway, you have work too, so why would you be looking around for something else?"
"I sell dope. That's not work. That's a hobby with benefits. And the money's shit, actually. There's hardly any product coming in right now, what with the crops getting hammered by the bad weather, but people still aren't prepared to pay more than they're used to. Never mind that I tell them about supply and demand, they just won't wear it. So who's getting squeezed? Who's barely able to turn a profit? The middle man, that's who."
I refrained from pointing out that he would up his income if only he stopped smoking so much of his own stash and kept more of it available for purchase. No great shakes as a businessman, Abortion, bless him.
"But this," he said, downing a gulp of his Scrumpy Jack, "this is an opportunity. A solid gold opportunity to make some serious coinage. That's what I've heard. They're after blokes like us, you and me. Former servicemen. Government-trained. Still got all the skills, all the moves, but surplus to requirements. Old soldiers but still young enough to fight."
"Who is after us?"
"Dunno. Some people."
"And to fight in what?"
"Again, dunno. But like I said, and this is the main point: for a lot of money."
"How much?" I hated myself for asking it. Hated myself for feeling a scintilla of interest in what Abortion was saying. Not just interest. Stronger than that. Eagerness.
"Couple of grand a week."
"No fucking way."
"That's what I was told."
"Who by?"
"Bloke. Customer. Not a regular. Don't see him often. But he's ex-army too. The Regiment."
"Which regiment?"
"The Regiment."
"SAS."
"So he says. Well, not so much says as hints. You don't say 'The Regiment' unless you're referring to The Regiment, do you?"
"Or unless you're a prize bullshit artist. The SAS I've met don't speak about it at all. That's how you know they're SAS."
"Look, this fella's kosher, I'm sure of it. He acts like an SAS guy acts, all hard and gruff and a bit psycho. And the other day he came round to my place to buy an ounce of black, and we were just having a little test of it, you see, a little sample taste, and he let slip about these people, the Valhalla Mission. He read about them in a comment posted on some ex-servicemen's forum, which linked to a blog entry. It's a word of mouth thing, apparently.