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itself, the old-school explosive in the shell was throwing up a storm of heat and metal shards, creating a tidal wave of destruction directly behind the gunmen who wished to hurt Johnny Alpha.
    The Gronk's tumble brought it upside-down again, and facing the gunmen once more, it saw their plight in a way that they never could. Even as their faces contorted in rictus snarls and their narrow eyes were focussing in hatred on Johnny Alpha, they were doomed. Just behind them was a ball of advancing orange fire and at the very least it was going to throw them off their feet. The Gronk sighed in satisfaction and permitted itself the closest thing to a smile that it could manage. Deep down in its bloodstream, the flow of juddermine eased a little, and the Gronk started to relax.
    It was thus almost back to normal when it was caught in the full-force of the explosion.
    "EEK!" said both its mouths, unhelpfully.
    Destructive heat pressed on the fur of the Gronk's back, an unseen force propelling it higher and faster in the air. Unable to scamper or crawl, its four arms and two legs flailed helplessly. It was heading up, up higher than any Gronk should be, and what goes up must come down.
    Its eyes swivelled in terror, focussing on the myriad sharp points of rock that jutted up from the ground. It was going to fall. It was going to come hurtling out of the sky onto the forbidding, jagged edges of the shattered rocks below. It was going to die horribly, flattened like a pancake and sliced like cheese. The mere thought released enough juddermine into its system to kill a Shetland pony. The Gronk floated in a world of torment and had plenty of time to think about how much it was all going to hurt.

POINTLESS
     
    Everything looked very different to Wulf Sternhammer. He had hardly noticed the last two seconds pass at all. He had been busy. It had been a long day.
    While Johnny had duly headed along the straight road, visibly "alone" for the meeting with the gunmen, Wulf had set off early. He had taken the long route out into the wilderness, and then began the slow crawl through the rocky terrain. The monolith was an ideal reference point. A regular shape set on high ground, it could be seen for miles around. Wulf found it strangely comforting, as if some ancient aliens had set a featureless runestone in the wilderness purely to entertain passing Vikings. When this was all over, Wulf might add some runes of his own to the rock. Maybe something like "Wulf Sternhammer smote his enemies here."
    He diverted himself during the long trek by thinking of extra phrases to add. Perhaps he would mention the Gronk, although he wouldn't call it a Gronk, of course. He would have to give it a kenning , a poetic turn of phrase - the fearful furry one, thought Wulf with a chuckle. And as for Johnny Alpha, well, there were too many possibilities for him.
    By the time Johnny met the five bandits, Wulf had been crawling for over two hours, his knees and elbows swathed in pre-emptive bandages, his face and beard dusty with Vaara dirt. It was the price of surprise. If they were going to save the Gronk, it was necessary. Wulf's planned rune carving had extended to virtual saga-length by now. He had a whole stanza about how it felt to crawl over hot rocks all day, and another one about how he missed snow.
    Wulf had sneaked through the rocks as stealthily as a giant Viking was able. He hoped that by crawling on his belly like a Saxon worm, he would get close enough to use the sniper rifle. But things had kicked off sooner than expected.
    Wulf had never been that good with rifles. He preferred the comforting heft of his mace-like Happy Stick; a hammer , he would have told his Viking associates, a hammer that he used among the stars. A stjärn hammar . How they would have laughed and stamped on the floor and called for more mead. It was a very funny joke for any Vikings left around, but a thousand years of both time and distance had depleted the audience. Now, the only