My feet jerked hard. I gave an involuntary yell as I slid backward clear up to my chest. My legs dangled in empty space. Even without looking, I could sense how long a way it was to the bottom. Bjornssen screamed and cursed and hung on by my bootlaces.
Then he was gone.
The light faded swiftly below me. His screams echoed, dropped rapidly away until I couldn't hear him anymore.
For long moments I hung absolutely motionless, halfway to falling to my own death. Then, in the process of scraping myself painfully forward, gasping and flailing until most of me was on solid rock again, it occurred to me I hadn't even seen a hole big enough for a man to fall into.
I scooted backward until my back touched solid rock, and wished there'd been a way to back up even farther. That hole hadn't been there. It couldn't have been there. I listened for a moment to my heart pound in my ears. I thought about letting go of the rock floor to strike the sparker on my helmet; but my lizard brain wouldn't let my hand relax its deathlike grip. Okay, I thought, I'll just sit here and think for a couple of minutes. My thoughts weren't pretty.
I'd seen men die before. Had killed a few, myself. But this... I felt sick all over, like I'd tricked a puppy into the jaws of a killer wolf. Dammit, I hadn't liked the man much; but he had been a good spelunker, a loyal guide, and a decent enough human being. He certainly hadn't deserved to die, especially when he didn't have the faintest idea what I'd dragged him into.
I was hunting Odin by my own choice. My own pride, combined with the recognition that I needed to hire spelunking expertise, had contributed to Klaus' murder as certainly as though I'd shoved him down the chimney myself. Guilt ate up whatever comfort could be found in the knowledge that I'd always done better when hunting alone in the dark.
I swore bitterly and breathed deeply for a moment; then listened to my pulse rate gradually slow down and fade from the foreground of my awareness.
Klaus Bjornssen had doubtless gone to his death convinced I was the biggest asshole this side of hell. I snorted. If I were right, he was there right now, probably still calling me every name he could think of, to every poor, dead soul who'd listen. I hoped it made him feel better.
No more innocents in the way. Odin had another think coming if he and his buddies thought they could stop me just by pulling the ground out from under my feet... .
Well, it wasn't going to be the last time he'd try it. And he had at least as much to lose as I did; maybe more. I swore aloud; then grinned, although the wobbly effort felt a little sickly. I might be shaken, but I must have managed to put a serious dent in Odin's confidence. That counted for more than a little in the deadly game I'd found myself caught up in.
And since the only score which mattered was survival, that left me on top. So far, anyway. Somewhere at the bottom of this cave, Odin must be spitting ten-penny nails.
Gary would've been proud. Well, maybe he would; then again, maybe not. Gary Vernon had wanted me to go Stateside when my discharge came, find myself a decent job and marry some freckle-faced kid with a down-home Cracker accent. But if I had, I would never have been able to look myself in the eye again. Gary Vernon was the reason I was here, stranded on the lip of a bottomless chimney in a freezing Norwegian cave. And no one-eyed, oath-breaking, cold-blooded killer was going to divert me. Of course, nobody'd ever accused me of having too many brain cells; but Randy Barnes wasn't, by God, a quitter.
I can't speak for the rest of humanity; but having my life wrenched inside-out by assholes really pisses me off. I never could tolerate an asshole. (Despite a sneaking suspicion that I was one.) I let out a bark of laughter. They do say the only creature on this green earth stupider than an infantryman is a Marine. Not even a leatherneck would have walked into this mess.
There were only two things I could see that I might have done differently. I should not have opened my big, fat mouth and told Gary Vernon to go to hell. And I certainly shouldn't have made a pact with Odin.
Hindsight is a mother.
It's also a waste of time. I muttered something ugly into the darkness and my words echoed oddly in the close air. I growled out something even nastier, hopeful the curse followed my dead guide all the way to Odin's ears. I'd learned the hard way that you never knew who—or what—might be listening when you cursed, or took an oath, so I cursed away, because sure as worms eat little green apples, nothing I said now could possibly get me in deeper than I already was.
"Okay, Barnes," I muttered. "What next?"
My lips and throat were dry. I fumbled for a canteen and swallowed a sip. I didn't dare drink more; no telling how long this half-full canteen would have to last. Once it was secure again, I leaned back and blew out my breath in a gusting sigh.
"What a mess."
Most people in my shoes would've had the sense either to go quietly mad, or to forget the whole thing had ever happened. Johnson would have cracked—and, in point of fact, had. Nobody else involved had even come close to admitting what was going on, probably not even to themselves. Gary...
I swore again. Gary might have believed me. Had believed, in fact, even before I met him.
Not that it had done him any good.
Regret was also a waste of time. I needed to get my carbide lantern relit, see what I was up against. I hadn't just spent three years guarding nuclear missiles—and playing pussyfoot with half the terrorist groups in the world—for nothing. I had survived everything the Army and the ragheads and Odin could throw my way. I owed myself—not to mention Gary Vernon—something better than sitting in the dark.
I owed Gary Vernon an apology. And my life.
Chapter Two
Of all the gutless wonders, greenhorn newbies, dopers, and fools who joined the Army and somehow got themselves assigned to Pershing, only a pitiful few were competent to handle the job of guarding nuclear missiles. Among those few were guys like "Wally" Wallenstein, and Charles "Chuck" Norris, and Crater, who, as far as I knew, had never been called anything else (although I'd heard it rumored that his real name was Haversham).
They'd been among my closest friends.
But head-and-shoulders above the whole crowd—in everyone's opinion—was Gary Vernon. The best of the best. An all-around nice guy, who'd lend you beer money when you were short, and watch your back on patrol. Which was good, since he was generally acknowledged to be the luckiest man alive. And since his luck seemed to rub off on whoever pulled patrols with him, everybody wanted to be teamed with him.
Gary always laughed it off, attributed it to a pact he'd made with Odin. Whatever the cause, it seemed to work. And the closer I got to discharge, the happier I was that Sergeant Brown and Lieutenant Donaldson teamed us up a lot. We worked well together, and nothing got past us.
Being teamed with Gary got a whole lot more attractive once the brass sent down their no-ammo-on-patrol policy. The official explanation sounded like an updated version of Mom's "You'll shoot your eye out" excuse for never buying BB guns for Christmas—and made just about as much sense. We were sitting on several megatons of nuclear warheads, and incidents with terrorist groups running "training missions" in our area had been up at least three hundred percent over the previous three months. Yet brass decides out of the blue we ought to go sneaking around in the dark with empty rifles? Go figure.