The Warriors were almost to the bins.
That was when men poured from the double doors, all of them firing at once.
Slayne and Montoya snapped off bursts but couldn’t drive the Aryans back. Montoya reached a bin and crouched. Slayne darted behind the other one so they had a wider field of fire.
One Aryan was barking commands and the rest were spreading out. The smart ones flattened and fired from prone positions.
Slayne did a scan and count. There had to be thirty or more.
The odds were much too high. “Grenade.”
Montoya quickly leaned the Jati-Matic against the bin and slipped off his backpack. He took out an M67, pulled the grenade away from the pin, and cocked his arm. “Frag out!” he yelled, and threw the grenade in a high loop.
Then he pressed against the bin.
Slayne did the same. He counted off four seconds in his head.
The M67 went off. It had a blast radius of forty-five feet but could hurl shrapnel out to two hundred or more. There were screams and curses, and in retaliation the Aryans poured a withering firestorm into the trash bins.
Slayne could hardly get off a burst for all the slugs pinging and whining past.
Montoya clipped a man running toward them and nearly had his own ear taken off. The growl of an engine caused him to glance toward the front gate and the street beyond. A pickup loaded with reinforcements was hurtling toward the factory.
“Incoming hostiles!”
“I see them.”
“God, I wish I had that battle suit you showed me back at the Home. I’d lick these bastards single-handed.”
Slayne’s mouth became a grim slit. Here they were, pinned down, one of them wounded, and they were about to be flanked.
They needed to get out of there, but they wouldn’t get fifty feet in the open parking lot. They needed help and they needed it now. He said out loud what he had been thinking for some time: “Where the hell is Thor?”
Soren was in motion before the words were out of the Aryan’s mouth. He smashed Mjolnir into the man’s face and was rewarded with a crunch and a spray of scarlet. Without breaking stride, Soren swung at a second enemy and caught him on the ear. The crunch this time was louder. A third Aryan tried to draw a revolver, but Soren pivoted and slammed Mjolnir against his skull. Now there were only two. Until now they had been too stupefied to move, but they started to bring up rifles just as Soren reached them. He shattered a knee, and when the Aryan screamed and doubled over, crushed a cranium.
The last man fumbled with the lever on his rifle. He looked up and bleated in stark terror, “No!”
Mjolnir was a streak in Soren’s hands. He stood over the five bodies, surveying them for signs of life.
“Dear God.” Space came over, holding Ben Thomas with both arms.
“Damn, you got moves, mister. That was slick.”
“We must hurry. My friends are in trouble.” Soren could hear the sounds of a firefight out in the parking lot. “Can you keep up?”
“Don’t worry about me. I’ll be right behind you.” Space hefted Ben, who mumbled something she couldn’t make out.
“What is the shortest way out the front?” “Down this hall and take a left and then a right and you’re there. But we’ll run into the Aryans.” “I want to run into them.”
Soren pressed the rune that activated Mjolnir. The hammer hummed to life and he felt the throb of its power. He set it to Arc, at two million volts. The gunfire grew louder. They met with no opposition, and when they rounded the last corner and he saw the open double doors, he broke into a run. “Stay back until I clear the way.”
The parking lot was a kill zone. Some Aryans were down but many more were converging on a pair of trash bins.
Soren stepped into the open. He needed to be closer. The Aryans were focused on the bins to the exclusion of all else. He raised Mjolnir aloft and gave voice to his battle cry, roaring at the top of his lungs, “Odin!”
Some of them heard. Some of them spun.
Lighting arced in vivid bolts that crackled and writhed. The very air flared bright. Men screamed, and died. Hearts burst.
Brains were fried. Blood boiled in veins.
Behind the trash bin, Robert Montoya felt his skin itch all over. “Madre de Diosl It’s Thor!”
“About damn time.” Slayne saw that not all the Aryans were down. He dropped two. Several others were fleeing. He ignored them and turned toward the front gate just as a pickup hurtled into the parking lot. There had to be a dozen men in the bed and three more in the from seat.
Soren pointed Mjolnir. He set the hammer to Bolt instead of Arc, at the same power level, two million volts. He didn’t know what effect it would have, but he thought it would at least stop the pickup. He pressed the rune and fired.
A white-hot bolt a foot wide leaped from the hammer to the pickup’s hood, and the entire vehicle was enveloped in a crackling corona. The pickup skewed and slowed as screams filled the air and the men in the front seat and the men in the bed went into spastic fits. Bodies sagged or slumped or fell over the side. The pickup coasted to a halt, smoke rising from under the hood and from the dead.
“Jesus,” Montoya breathed.
Soren switched off Mjolnir. There was no one left to slay. He turned, and the girl was in the doorway, incredulity on her face.
“Who are you?”
“I’ve already told you. I’m called Thor.”
Patrick Slayne lent a shoulder to Montoya. He was as impressed as they were by the spectacular display, but he was also simmering mad. “Where the hell have you been? We nearly bought the farm.”
Soren indicated the girl and the man she was holding. “This is Space and Ben Thomas.”
“Thomas?” Slayne could see
