The compound held perhaps thirty vehicles of every make and type, but many were totally unrecognisable. All were wrecks recovered from accidents on this stretch of the autobahn. Some had burnt out; some were roofless where bodies had been removed. All were severally damaged.
“We’ll put it in the cab of that tractor unit.” Carson had to stand on a piece of wreckage to reach the door and tug it open. “A few feet off the ground will do a lot to enhance the effect.”
“Bugger the theory, lets just get it in place.” Simmons needed help from the other two in order to lift the bomb on to a burnt-out seat frame.
Lieutenant Andy had joined them and with Carson climbed in to the cab.
“Will this take long?” Far away in the night sky there was the faintest of glows. Hyde wondered if it was the first gas station they had burned. It was in the right direction.
“Five minutes, less if you stop interrupting.”
“What yield do we want?” Lifting a plate Carson shone a torch down in to the bombs interior. He could see a punctured and buckled bulkhead where a bullet had passed through.
Andy looked round. The site was several hundred metres across and right in the centre was row upon row of islands each holding four pumps. Between each pair was a steel beam that rose high to support a wide canopy. “There’s fifty pumps at least, I guess we can reckon on their being a queue lining up within thirty minutes and there will be a load more on the approach road and coming along”
“So how hard do we hit them. We going to try and get them all?” Hand poised over an open-faced dial, Carson’s finger rested on the red pointer that stood out against the white face and black division of the surround.
“Let’s do a thorough job, make sure the gas station owners can put in a real good insurance claim. Let’s go for point two of a kiloton. That should chuck the commies all over the landscape.”
“Point two it is.” Applying slight pressure to the arrow on the dial Carson moved it around until it indicated the intended setting, and then nudged it further. “If you’re going to do a job…” He muttered to himself.
“OK, check list.” Producing a clipboard Lieutenant Andy went down a page of single line instructions.
To each as they were uttered Carson muttered “Check.” He opened another plate, dropping and losing the fastening as it fell open. “So, just the timer to do, what do you reckon.”
“The Major wants forty five minutes.” Sergeant Hyde had stood and sweated with Simmons as the device had been worked on. “Will that get us far enough away from here?”
“That’s for sure, as long as we don’t have a break down.” Twice dropping the torch in the confines of the cab and having both times to retrieve it from among the exposed and soot covered springs of the seat Carson finally confirmed everything was done. “I gave it just forty. Ample if we shift and we’ve wasted at least five here anyway.”
“Then let’s not waste any more. Hyde thought he heard a vehicle approaching, but it was too soon for it to be the enemy. It had to be another idiot ignoring the ban on motorway traffic.
“Initiate sequence, now.”
“Doing it Lieutenant. We’re all set to spoil the Commies party. I bet that pretty little Andrea will be pleased we’ve got rid of the thing.”
“I reckon they all will.”
Carson still had his hand inside the panel, He looked up at Andy. “We have a problem. The trigger switch depresses but doesn’t engage. I can’t turn the bugger on.”
“How long will it take to fix it?” Hyde had been about to lead the way back to their transport. He could hear the engines already running up to speed and feel a waft of hot air from the exhausts drifting past them.
“No way of knowing until I lift it out and then I don’t carry any spares. To improvise a spring and put it back…maybe a half hour.” Carson was already unscrewing the switch housing.
Hyde calculated times and distances. “That’s about how long before the Commie advance guard arrives.”
“OK, no one gone off for a leak?” Revell looked about the interior to make a last check that every one was back on board. As he did the vehicle took a pounding hit from a cannon shell.
Equipment flew about and the craft went over at an acute angle before Burke managed to get it back on the level. Even as he did heavy machine gun fire smacked across the ride skirt at an acute angle, slashing holes in it.
The first of the Soviet reconnaissance armour had arrived. An APC clanked across the concrete surface of the gas station and its stubby gun barrel belched a long jet of fire as it snapped off a high explosive squash head round. Had the anti-tank round hit them square on it would have destroyed them, the concussion of its detonation pounding great scabs of metal from the hulls interior and killing them all.
Instead it struck at the joint between two reactive armour blocks, setting off both. Inside the Iron Cow the noise was colossal and again the craft was thrown sideways, almost turning through a hundred and eighty degrees.
From the turret Libby unleashed a stream of cannon shells and sent them in to the side plates of the Russian armoured personnel carrier. The turret had been swinging to bear on them again but now it stopped and the barrel drooped to a useless maximum depression.
From their co-axial machine gun came a long stream of armour piercing rounds and Russian infantry staggering from the Rardens victim were chopped down. Libby switched his aim and concentrated another burst from the cannon on a patch of armour just below the rocket launcher of a scout car that had rocked to a stop at the side of the buildings.
For an instant the metal glowed under the stream of impacts and then from inside came a muted explosion that burst up through the top of the vehicle to dismount the loaded launch rails and out of the front through the driver’s vision port
“The buggers are all around us.”
The turret guns continuous fire was matched by the storm of tracer that hosed from the gun ports along the sides. Two motorcycle combinations raced into the area and both spun and fell over as machine gun fire slashed their tyres and killed their drivers. The shaft drive machines bucked as the spinning wheels of bike and sidecar came down on the hard surface, throwing out the passengers.
Getting in behind the two low-loader trailers the weapons on the Iron Cow slugged it out with the increasing numbers of Soviet vehicles. Twice shells struck fuel pumps on the forecourt. Both times there were spurts of flame but no fire followed. A tungsten cored round from the hovercraft missed its intended APC target and went on to strike a scout car that drove around the side of a building straight in to it. Flame spurted from every hatch and an internal explosion sent its four missiles and their launch rails spinning away.
Tracer lodging in a huge spare wheel attached to the front of the closest trailer set it alight and illuminated the Iron Cow. Revell ordered their driver to back away in to the darkness. Shot and shell followed them and external fitting were smashed and torn away. Unequal from almost the first moment it was now becoming more so. Had they been a conventional vehicle with wheels or tracks they would already have been immobilised.
“Get us out of here.” Revell could see even more enemy vehicles arriving and fanning out to face them.
By the light of a blazing APC a line of trucks could be seen crossing the overpass from the far carriageway. Troops, many armed with rocket propelled grenades, were jumping down and being sorted into lines by their officers. It was Boris who had drawn the officer’s attention to the time. “Major, only eight minutes before detonation.”