“Meaning?” Kennedy paused at the top of the steps, a reed against the storm as many pairs of feet tramped around her.
“The anomaly presented by its age. It predates Viking history.”
“Well, that’s interesting.”
“I know. It’s displayed on the lower ground floor of the Denon Wing, near some Egyptian… Coptic… Ptolemaic… bollocks. .bollocks… whatever. It’s this way.”
The wide, polished corridors gleamed all around them as they merged with the throng. Locals and tourists of all ages filled the grand old space and brought it to life during the day. One could only guess as to its tomb-like, eerie nature through the night.
At that moment there was a thunderous boom, like a concrete wall collapsing. They all paused. Drake turned to Ben.
“Wait here, Ben. Give us half an hour. We’ll find you.” He paused, then added, “If they evacuate, then wait as close to the glass pyramid as you can.”
He didn’t wait for an answer. Ben was fully aware of the danger. Drake watched him shake his mobile free and hit a speed-dial number. That’d be Mum or Dad or sis. He motioned to Kennedy, and they proceeded carefully down the spiral staircase towards the lower ground floor. As they started towards the room that housed the Viking exhibition, people were starting to rush out. A thick cloud billowed behind them.
“Run!” A guy who looked like a Hollister model shouted. “There’s dudes with guns in there!”
Drake stopped at the door and risked a look inside. Total chaos greeted him. A scene from a Michael Bay action movie, only weirder. He counted eight guys in camouflage gear, with face-masks and machine-guns, clambering into the biggest Viking longboat he’d ever seen. Behind them, in an act of unbelievable recklessness, a smoking hole had been blasted through the side of the museum.
These guys were crazy. What gave them their edge was that they possessed the shocking directness of fanaticism. Blowing entrances into buildings and firing rockets into crowds seemed to be their norm. No wonder they’d chased Ben and him around Paris earlier. Car chases were probably just their wind-down-before-bed activity.
Kennedy put a hand on his shoulder and peered around him. “Jeez.”
“Proves we’re on the right track. Now we just need to get close to their Commander.”
“I ain’t getting close to any of those wankers.” She swore with a surprisingly good English accent.
“Cute. But I gotta find a way to get us off their shit list.”
Drake noticed more civilians running towards the exit. The Germans weren’t even watching them, just confidently executing their plan.
“Come on.” Drake slipped around the door frame into the room. They used the perimeter exhibits for cover and padded their way as close to proceedings as was safe.
“Beeile dich!” someone shouted urgently.
“Something about a ‘hurry’. Drake said. “Bloody bastards will have to be quick. The Louvre must be high on the French response list.”
One of the Germans shouted something else, and held up a slab of stone the size of a dinner tray. It looked heavy. The soldier was beckoning two others to help unload it from the longboat.
“Clearly not SAS,” Drake commented.
“Or American,” Kennedy noted. “I used to have a Marine boyfriend who could’ve tucked that trinket under his foreskin.”
Drake choked a little. “Nice image. Thanks for contributing. Look.” He nodded towards the gap in the wall where a masked man dressed all in white had just appeared.
“Same guy who robbed the Shield in York. Probably.”
The man briefly examined the sculpture, then nodded in approval and turned to his Commander. “Time to….”
Gunfire erupted outside. The Germans froze for a second, seemingly to stare at each other in confusion. Then bullets ripped through the room and everyone dived for cover.
More masked men appeared in the newly-blasted entrance. A new force, dressed differently to the Germans.
Drake thought: French police?
“Canadians!” One of the Germans shouted in disdain. “Kill! Kill!”
Drake covered his ears as a dozen machine-guns opened fire at once. Bullets ricocheted from human body, to wooden exhibit, to plaster wall. Glass shattered, and priceless displays were ripped to shreds and sent crashing to the floor. Kennedy swore loudly, which Drake was starting to realise was not exactly ‘fresh ground’ for her. “Where’re the fucking French for fuck’s sake!”
Drake’s head was spinning. Canadians? What kind of twisted hell had they stumbled into here?
The exhibit beside them exploded into a thousand pieces. Glass and bits of wood rained down on their backs. Drake started to crawl backwards, dragging Kennedy with him. The longboat was getting riddled with lead. The Canadians had advanced into the room by now and several of the Germans lay dead or twitching. As Drake watched, one of the Canadians fired point-blank into a German’s head, blowing his brains out all over a 3000 year-old Egyptian terracotta vase.
“No love lost between looney relic hunters.” Drake winced. “And all that time I spent playing Tomb Raider — it was never like this.”
“Yeah,” Kennedy shook shards of glass from her hair. “But if you’d actually played the game, instead of staring at her ass for seventeen hours you might actually know what’s going on.”
“Ben’s forte. Not mine. Playing the game that is.” He ventured a glance up.
One of the Germans was trying to escape. He ran right up to Drake without noticing him, then gave a start of surprise when his path was blocked. “Bewegen!” He raised his gun.
“Yeah, up yours too.” Drake raised his hands.
The man’s finger tightened on the trigger.
Kennedy made a sudden movement to the side, causing the German’s attention to flicker. Drake moved in and elbowed him in the face. A fist came swinging towards Drake’s head, which he side-stepped, even as he kicked out the soldier’s knee. A shriek barely covered the sound of snapping bone. Drake was on him in a second, knees pressing hard on his heaving chest. With a quick flurry he ripped away the soldier’s mask.
And grunted. “Uhh. Don’t know what I was really expecting.”
Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Solid features. Confused expression.
“Later.” Drake rendered him unconscious with a choke hold, trusting Kennedy to keep an eye out for his comrades. When Drake looked up, the battle raged on. In that moment, another German came barrelling around a falling exhibit. Drake shoulder-charged him to the side, and Kennedy kneed him in the solar-plexus. The man went down faster than a new boy-band on X-factor.
Now one of the Canadians was dragging the Odinic sculpture away from the dead and bloody fingers of his enemy. Another German outflanked him and attacked from the side, but the Canadian was good, twisting and delivering three deadly strikes, then heaving the limp body over his shoulder and smashing it to the ground. The Canadian fired three close shots for good measure and then continued dragging the sculpture towards the exit. Even Drake was impressed. When the Canadian reached his comrades, they shouted and laid down a hail of fire before retreating over the still-smoking rubble.
“Upsalla!” The first-class Canadian cried, and raised a fist at the surviving Germans. Drake detected arrogance, challenge and excitement in that one word. Surprisingly, a woman’s voice.