Pyramid Power (ARC)

by Dave Freer

  Thor strained to look over his shoulder.

  "What are you doing?" asked Thrúd

  "Trying to look at my back," answered Thor.

  "Why?"

  "Well, I've seen my front," explained Thor, "And that's not the feminine side of me. It must be in the middle of my back where I can't reach."

  For someone without a feminine back-side he churned the wheel very effectively. Perhaps he had one after all.

  "It seems to have made them in all the flavors," said Liz, inspecting some of the jelly beans. They'd made an enormous pile—about thirty yards wide—and they'd barely set the wheels spinning.

  "That's a relief," said Loki, "as you said the ones that the ravens liked were revolting, and you have enough here for bribes for half the ravens in Midgard." He picked up one of the beans. "What are the other flavors like?"

  "Some of them are delicious. Lamont, lucky fellow, got Arctic cloudberry."

  Loki put the jelly bean into his mouth, and chewed. Then, nodded appreciatively. "Very good, these. This one is like fine rakfisk. Delicious! So what do the revolting ones taste like?"

  It was all a question of what you were used to and had been brought up with, Liz supposed. But she decided it would be wise to avoid answering Loki's question. "Well, we have bribes aplenty. I think I probably have provisions for an army."

  * * *

  A little later Jerry sat with Liz, on the cliff-top, their fingers entwined.

  "I need to work on Sigyn," said Jerry.

  "Why?"

  "Well, Sigyn and Odin are similar in a way."

  Liz snorted. "What? Is one of her eyes false?"

  Jerry grinned. "No, Odin would destroy everything rather than give up power and accept punishment. And Sigyn is just as implacable in her quest for revenge. She would destroy the entire universe rather than let Odin go unpunished. Loki wants vengeance. But if all the people in the world begged him... well, he might compromise. Sigyn, never. Odin must die. She might compromise on Heimdall, and she was prepared to let Skadi off the hook to a large extent. But Odin is non-negotiable. If the universe must die to kill him, so be it. So: Their reasons are vastly different, but the end result will be the same."

  Liz grimaced. "Classic African dictatorship dilemma. Compromise isn't possible, Jerry. Even if you could talk Sigyn into it, Odin would never agree. By the sounds of it, he's made so many enemies that if he stopped being top dog everyone would come hunting for a piece of his hide. Just like Mengistu or Mugabe or Charles Taylor, Odin either has to flee somewhere he can enjoy his ill-gotten gains in safety—or stay in absolute power. People like that will only flee if it is that or die, and they'll only go just before the absolute end with lots of dead bodies around them—if you manage to convince them that their precious selves will be safe and comfortable. Otherwise they'd destroy the universe rather than lose. They are the universe as far as they're concerned."

  "I suppose so," Jerry chewed his lip. "Megalomania's not exactly limited to Africa, for sure. No other lives have any value to Odin at all."

  "So what are you going to do?" she asked.

  Jerry shrugged. "Rattle some very large sabers. And then offer him a safe out."

  "You're going to find him a safe haven?" Liz shook her head. "Honey, this universe isn't big enough for him and Sigyn."

  "Offer him a way out of this universe, is what I meant."

  Home! Well, the US. Funny, since she'd recovered Jerry she hadn't thought much about it. Coffee, toilet paper and deodorant would be nice. But home for her was really where the heart was, and the trial by ordeal had given her a good idea just where hers was located. "Have you thought of a way?"

  "No," said Jerry grimly. "But he doesn't have to know that. He just has to know we've come from outside."

  "I suppose so. So now we need to raise recruits. Lots of them."

  Jerry raised his eyebrows. "Well, 'raise' is the right word. We're due to leave for a visit to Loki's youngest daughter. The responsible member of the family."

  Liz snorted. "Compared to Loki or Fenrir, that's not hard."

  Jerry gave her a wry grin. "Jörmungand and Fenrir refuse to go along because little Hel always preaches at them."

  "Jörgy is just misunderstood," said Liz defensively. "She's still very young, and having trouble with her emotions and her hormones."

  "Hel is younger. But she has both of them, and Loki too, doing avoidance. Fortunately, she likes Sigyn."

  "And is she a really yummy recruiting poster?" asked Liz.

  "In a morbid sense, yes," answered Jerry. "She is queen of the dead that do not die in battle."

  "Oh. So we're getting all the grannies armed with their zimmer-frames are we? Odin, quiver in your boots."

  Jerry shook his head. "Liz, you're the best proof I could ever find of the need to teach real history at schools."

  She reached over and gave him a one-armed squeeze. "We only ever did SA history. And there wasn't all that much of it, so we did the Great Trek many times. All right. Tell me what obvious thing I have missed."

  "That most people in history died young of things we now consider treatable. And that during wars a lot of warriors died from everything from septic wounds to diarrhea—far more than ever died in actual fighting. Hel's warriors alone outnumber those in Vallhöll by five to one, at least. And Hel is a ministering angel, laboring without the advantages of Odin and Asgard. She treats as well as she can."

  "I do remember someone telling me that it needs a multiple of people to the defenders number... could have been three, could have been five, to take a fortified position."

  "I imagine it depends on the fortifications and what you've got to throw at them," said Jerry. "Artillery, and the like, you know. And we have one thing that Odin fears most, by the way he was trying to find out."

  "What? Wisdom?"

  "Yes. Well, knowledge. We have knowledge that a Norse god could not have acquired."

  She pulled him closer. "Balloons again?"

  "Maybe. I must talk to those agent types. I wish they were as useful as Cruz and Mac were. Anyway, right now I'm finding hard to concentrate on such distant matters." He pushed back an errant curl from her forehead.

  She kissed him. "Good. Come and concentrate on something closer at hand. And don't get distracted!"

  "I wouldn't dare. You might spike my food with jelly beans."

  She pulled him closer, wrapping him in her cloak. "I'm not quite that cruel."

  * * *

  "Airborne?" Bott shook his head. The man was looking a little sickly, probably from his vegetarian diet. How the Scandinavians hadn't died of malnutrition, let alone had the strength to go off on Viking raids was something of a puzzle to Liz. Still, this presumably was their winter diet, and the fact that they ate whole-grain cereals and a lot of fish probably helped. In spring and summer some fruit and green things must have found their way into the meals, surely? But even here in a sheltered cove next to the moderating sea, this "Fimbulwinter" was robbing people of any other harvest. It was supposed to be summer. Global warming was a problem, but global cooling like this was a much faster disaster. It was supposed to continue, from what Thor said, for three years.

  "But tell us about your plans," said Stephens. "We are experienced men. We can probably help."

  "Yes," nodded Bott, like a mechanical doll. "Fill us in on the details. You are the experts at all this mythology stuff."

  "Unfortunately, my knowledge of Scandinavian myth is a little scanty," said Jerry. "Basically, we need to capture Odin. I wanted to find a way in past Asgard's walls. Last time we used hot air balloons as a feint. This time I thought we might just be able to do it for real."

  "Do you really think you could make a balloon?" asked Stephens.

  Jerry nodded. "We've got a secret weapon. Lamont Jackson. He's got more practical skill and obscure knowledge than is fair to have in the possession of any one man. And we've done it before. Asgard has pretty solid walls, which are certainly high enough to hold off most
siege attacks, but a balloon doesn't have to fly that high to get over them. It's silent. It's an unknown concept here."

  Stephens looked thoughtful. "But what are you going to do when you're on the other side of the wall? A balloon is very visible, and it can't carry many people."

  "We'll do it at night. Paint it black," said Liz. "On a cloudy night, it would be easy. No one would have a clue we'd arrived."

  "Yes, but what are you going to do once you have arrived?"

  "I thought you were going to advise us instead of just asking questions," said Liz, irritably. "What do you think we should do?"

  Someone bellowed off down the passage. "That's Thor," said Liz. "We have to go, Jerry."

  * * *

  "That's it," said Stephens, when the door was closed. "All we have to do is get it all set up. They'll walk right into it."

  Bott nodded. "Now we know what they're planning and who they're in bed with, yes."

  "Do you know something I don't?" asked Stephens, for the millionth time fiddling with his helmet radio.

  "Well, I know enough to know that Odin was the main god of this Norse stuff. And this Loki they've sided with was the bad guy."

  Stephens nodded. "The sort that has no respect for authority."

  "Now we just need to get this information through to Harkness," said Bott.

  "And start arranging for a bolt-hole if this bunch gets wind of it all."

  PART IV

  When Hel freezes over

  Chapter 30

  The senior CIA official looked at the list and frowned. "Remember, Miggy, I never said this to you. But, these men... three of them were ours. They were... well, we were trying to get rid of them. They should never have made it through training. We had a bad patch a few years back."

  He made a face. "The truth is the agency was furious when the PSA was formed. We were asked to second some staff." He pointed to the list. "Guess who."

  Tremelo nodded. "Was Megane one of yours?"

  "Sad to say, he was. There's a story—I've never tried to confirm it, but I know the agents involved swear it was true—that when he was stationed in Venezuela he got the bright idea of publicly embarrassing the Venezuelan government. We haven't had good relations with them in a long time, as you know. So, the screwball put sugar in the gas tanks of several official limousines which were to be used in an official motorcade the following day."

  Miggy winced. "Oh, Lord. He got caught, I assume?"

  "No. But when the motorcade got stalled in Caracas, the Venezuelan government was not amused. Neither was the special U.S. envoy who was making a semi-secret visit to see if we could iron out at least some of the controversies. Not only was he stalled in one of the vehicles himself, but the Venezuelans immediately accused us—the CIA, I mean—of being responsible for the affair, and broke off the talks as a result."

  The official sighed. "Of course, we denied it vigorously. Even after we found out it was true. That was Megane's last overseas assignment. We were in the process of figuring out how to quietly ease him out of the company, when the PSA got set up and Garnett demanded that we provide her with some agents."

  He leaned back in his chair and gave Tremolo a considering look. "You'd better know one thing, though, Miggy. Whatever else he is, Megane's not a stoolie. Even if you nail him for something, I doubt you'll be able to follow it up any further. He's the kind of person who can get the goofiest notions of what constitutes his duty, sure enough—but he also takes it dead seriously. I guess you could call it part of the syndrome. He'll clam up and take the rap himself, even if it means a long prison sentence."

  "I can live with that. In a perfect world, I'd be able to get rid of Garnett and the PSA altogether. But I'm sure the best I can hope for is a much muddier conclusion. Garnett aside, there are a lot of powerful people and special interests who are backing the PSA for their own reasons."

  He shrugged. "So it goes. I don't really care all that much if the PSA would simply restrict itself to gathering intelligence about the Krim pyramid, even though they'll make a royal nuisance of themselves when they try to insist on their authority to 'co-ordinate' all intelligence activities. It's when the stupid bastards try to create intelligence that they became a real threat to the nation. Intelligence, yes, so-called 'operations,' no. We simply don't know enough to be trying to conduct operational efforts. None of us—me included—much less people who are so inattentive to the intelligence they're supposed to be 'co-ordinating' that they send some poor schmucks into the pyramid with fancy technical equipment that won't work."

  "Good luck," said his friend.

  * * *

  Common sense would have had PSA headquarters somewhere in Chicago. Political sense had the office exactly where it should be, in Washington. The meeting that was going on there right now, was anything but cordial. Agents Reno,

  Schmitt, Erskine were considerably the worse for wear, still, from the prequel to their visit to the cells at Fort Campbell. Agent Supervisor Megane and his two men were less battered, perhaps because the Greek hoplite outfits had protected them to some extent.

  But the only protection that would really have worked against the fury of Ms. Garnett would have been to be like Agents Sternal, Bormann, or Liber—dead.

  "This has turned into a complete fiasco," she said coldly, grinding her words out between gritted teeth.

  They all stood looking at her, like a bunch of dumb oxen. "Get out," she said. "I'll deal with you later."

  After the agents had filed out, Garnett swiveled in the chair behind her desk and looked at Assistant Director of Operations James Horton. She was actually more furious with him than any of his subordinates, and was deeply tempted to order him out of the room also. But, at least for the moment, she still needed him.

  She had one satisfaction, though. "You're coming with me, Jim. No way I'm sitting through that so-called cocktail party this evening on my own."

  Horton looked alarmed. That made her feel a little better.

  * * *

  After the drinks were served, and the waiter withdrew from the private room in the very exclusive club in the nation's capital, Garnett looked around the table. The expressions on the faces of the four men and one woman who'd joined her and Horton for cocktails were subdued, of course. They were all long-time veterans of the Beltway, and, like experienced poker players, knew better than to wear their sentiments on their sleeves. Still, only someone a lot more obtuse than Helen could have failed to detect the anger, irritation—and apprehension. The room seemed practically saturated with those emotions, especially the latter.

  Nothing for it, as much as Garnett hated doing so. She had to start with an apology. These people were beyond her control, if not her influence, and she had to stay on their good side.

  "Sorry about this, everyone. But we'll get it straightened out soon enough."

  The Secretary of Defense exchanged a glance with one of the two senators at the table, Senator Andrews from Texas. Then, Secretary Antonelli said: "How soon is 'soon enough,' Helen? I warn you, you don't have much time. Tremolo's already arrived—and don't ever let that tweedy academic image he loves to cultivate fool you any. When it comes to Beltway knife-fighting, he's as tough as anyone."

  "Tougher, you ask me," chimed in Senator Andrews.

  Roger Delacorte, the lobbyist from the defense industry, made a face. "Yeah, he's a real shithead."

  The Texas senator gave him a hard glance. "Cut it out, Roger. I like Miggy Tremelo personally."

  His fellow senator from California chimed in. "So do I. And whether you do or don't, Mr. Delacorte, I'd advise you to remember that most Congressmen who've dealt with the man like him also—and so does the public. Unfortunately, while I enjoy it in private, Miggy's got a good sense of humor—which means the talk shows love having him as a guest. " Senator Martinez took a sip from her cocktail glass. "The problem isn't Miggy's personality, it's his policy. And since he won't budge on it—and, for the moment, has the confidence of the President�
��we have to do an end run around him."

  She used the glass to gesture at Garnett. "Hence, APSA and the PSA. But let's not lose the forest for the trees. If we could have persuaded Tremolo, I'd have had no problem at all leaving him in charge. God knows, at least he's competent."

  Helen did her best not to stiffen angrily at the sideswipe. There was no love lost between Paula Martinez and her, and never had been—not since they'd first encountered each other years back in the course of a clash over environmental policy, when Helen had been on the staff of one of the senator's opponents. But she simply couldn't afford to lose Martinez's backing. The big money on their side of the dispute came from the defense industry, and no senator in the country had more clout there than the senior senator from California.

  Roger Delacorte held up his hands in a placating gesture. "Fine, fine, fine. Professor Tremolo's the greatest guy in the world. He's still got his head up his ass when it comes to dealing with the alien pyramid—and let's also not forget that that's the name of the forest in the first place."

  * * *

  As he listened to the byplay, Melvin Steinmetz found himself wondering whether he'd backed the wrong horse in this race. Unlike everyone else at the table, Melvin didn't really have a personal stake in the outcome. True, if the policy he advocated were to be adopted by the administration in place of Tremelo's, his think tank would land a very juicy contract. So what? The Future Enterprise Institute was one of the three or four most prestigious and sought-after independent research and policy development outfits in the nation. They already had plenty of juicy contracts.

  He was simply convinced that Tremelo was wrong, dead wrong, and the consequences of his erroneous thinking were likely to be disastrous. As bad and probably worse than any major nuclear exchange—and Steinmetz's think tank specialized in studies of nuclear war. Whether he realized it or not, Tremelo's policy with regard to the Krim pyramid amounted to a revival of the Mutual Assured Destruction policy that had governed relations between the US and the USSR during the Cold War, when it came to all-out war. "You leave us alone and we'll leave you alone, because we can each destroy the other."