Dooley did a little dance of celebration in the road “I think it’s all clear to cross the road now Major.”
Slewing sideways but raising the minimum of dust from the road material depot, the Iron Cow swept over the tall weeds, across the momentarily empty road and into the plantation of young spruce trees on the far side. The slope became steeper and Burke had only to keep the engines at a power level sufficient to keep the skirts partially inflated for them to maintain momentum. At the bottom they splattered across a muddy stream and then collided with a close spaced plantation of mature firs that resisted the hovercrafts weight and power. Burke turned the machine and they began to run along the edge of the tree line.
“Is the bomb OK?” Simmons watched Andy checking the straps that restrained both the thermite pack and the bomb, keeping them lashed against the edge of the seats.
“Our Russian friend here,” he indicated their prisoner, “is a bit ham fisted and it is now a tad more fragile than it was, but its what a couple of bullets did to it rather than anything else I’m worried about.”
“Will it make the journey back?” Major Revell had watched Carson as he regularly made checks on the bomb, taking readings from a small liquid crystal display beneath a buckled inspection cover and regularly checking the temperature of the casing with the back of his hand. He kept the Geiger counter on the floor between his feet and it didn’t escape any ones notice that he kept it turned on. Every few minutes it gave a weary ‘tick’.
“Earlier I could have given you a definite answer.” Carson straightened up after his second inspection in ten minutes. “Now though I am beginning to think that there may have to be a change of plan. If we can get back within the next ten hours though, then no problem.”
“And if we are likely to take a bit longer than that?”
“Well I hate wasting a good bomb.” Carson began to deal out a hand of cards on top of the thermite pack, to have a game of poker with Dooley and Ripper and Samson. “Major, can you contact NATO HQ and see if there is a target of opportunity any where in the vicinity.”
“I take it they would never give you that sort of decision making opportunity.” Revell handed Carson a slim cross head screwdriver that had rolled beneath his feet.
“Thanks. No, they don’t give us that sort of discretion.” Carson refastened the thin metal of the hatch, ramming the screw in at an angle to get it to bite and hold.
“So what is the position with the bomb? Are we in real danger that it might become unstable?” Watching Lieutenant Andy dealing with practised ease, Andrea sensed there was much the specialists were not telling.
“Actually we’d all like to know.” It was a question Revell had been on the verge of asking for himself. “They may have trained you two to consider yourselves expendable but me and my men are not, not to our way of thinking.”
“OK,” Carson caught the almost imperceptible nod from Lieutenant Andy. “The Russian was clumsy. Some of the stuff in here is pretty basic engineering, springs, levers, and clockwork. Some of it works to slap the critical mass together when the time is right, but there are other bits that are working to keep them apart. They damaged some retaining devices. The clock could start any time and there is no way of controlling the point from which it starts so I don’t think I would be able to control the duration of the mechanisms run.”
“I get it.” Dooley had heard. “We’re back to your five seconds to what ever. Can’t you just wedge some stuff in there, lock it up solid?”
“Not that easy…”
The hovercraft made a heavy impact, a collision with a derelict piece of farm machinery parked in the corner of a field. They had demolished a rotting gate and then struck the old combine, tipping it over and spilling air from their ride skirt so that the craft went down on one side.
Using all his skill Burke kept the craft level and brought it to a halt under the shelter of several tall hedgerow oaks and behind the machinery with which they had collided. Using the front exit door in front of his position Burke got out to inspect the damage. He returned within a minute. ”Not too bad. It will take an hour at most. One of the reinforcing ribs has been lifted. It’s buckled and hauled up a couple of skirt panels with it. Sledgehammer would be too noisy, we’ll have to do it the slow way.”
A momentary relief the rest of squad enjoyed at the announcement the damage was not worse was stifled by several sharp ticks from the Geiger counter. Carson went down on his knees and working intently on the mechanism beneath an inspection panel on the bomb. There was a sudden silence in the cabin, no questions, no comments. Collectively they shared the moment of ignorance and anxiety.
“It’s OK. All under control.” Carson and returned a calliper-like tool to its place in a tool roll. “But I don’t think it will take another jar like that.”
“You mean boom, as in mushroom shaped boom?” Dooley felt his guts churning. For the first time, as he got up from the floor, beads of perspiration showed on the young specialists face. Carson wiped it away with the back of his hand. It was a gesture not missed by the others. “The timer is now unstable. All I can do is keep an eye on it, intervene if the timer is triggered. When, if, that happens I will be able to see how long we have but not control over it.”
“That’s it then, what ever the length of the count down you will not be able to stop it.” Revell shared with the others the fear of uncertainty. It was one thing to be in a fire-fight, where you knew the risks, felt you had some control over them. But riding with this unpredictable atomic bomb was another matter entirely. He could not expect the others to live with this nerve shredding risk for another thirty or forty kilometres through enemy territory and then likely have a fierce fire-fight to break through the opposing lines to reach safety. Certainly Andrea wouldn’t. Her face was white, so white that even her lips had paled. She looked to be on the verge of fainting.
“Then we burn the thing. If you screw up and it goes off out here it won’t do any harm, there’s only a few farms and chances are those have been evacuated.”
“The orders are to take it back. The decision to destroy it is down to me alone.” Lieutenant Andy prepared to stand his ground. An interruption from Libby in the turret broke what had the makings of a standoff.
“You better take a look at this major. What on earth are the Russians up this time.”
From the deep cover of the broad leafed trees Revell stood half out of the hull top and watched a column of slow moving civilians snaking across the fields a hundred metres ahead of them. Russian guards with Tommy guns and some with growling, teeth baring dogs on short leashes flanked the column. Revell would never have seen them in the dark except for the fact that the escort had powerful torches, with shielded lens, that they occasionally and briefly flashed to pan across the straggling line.
Using night vision binoculars Revell saw the column tramping quietly and wearily. It was composed of a thousand or more civilians, both sexes and all ages. A babies cry would occasionally float across the field but was instantly stifled by a barked command from a member of the escort and a thin flicker of light would sweep across the civilians seeking the source.