I squat to rummage through the bag at my feet. First I pop a couple of earplugs from their plastic envelope, then I select a Steyer Bullpup assault rifle with a 40mm grenade launcher slung underneath the barrel. And to think I almost didn’t go for the launcher option, but the dealer sold me on it. Hey, don’t take the launcher model, what do I care, but for a hundred bucks I can throw in two grenades. A hundred bucks! You telling me, Irish, that you can’t think of a single situation where a couple of grenades wouldn’t come in handy?

I could think of a couple of situations. This wasn’t one of them. Flying dogs and grenades in the suburbs.

I stick my head over the fence and peer through the branches just in time to lip-read the doorman’s fuck this and see him hurry in the back door. He slams it half a second too late to stop the Rottweiler making it inside.

That is a lucky bonus. I was hoping for the dog outside at the door, causing a distraction, but inside the house itself . . . Should be carnage. Hopefully.

Seconds later the consternation starts. Crashing, tinkling, shouts of surprise. A couple of gunshots.

They’re thinking, What the hell is going on? Where is this coming from?

Pack up the shit. Pack it up.

First rule of any factory: protect the product.

I pull the assault rifle into my shoulder and flick off the safety, and instantly I am a soldier again. It’s the click. Once the safety is off, it is no longer a drill.

I strafe the roof, knocking holes in the slates, leaving beams exposed and severing the power lines. If those guys don’t have a generator in there, surveillance is down. Even if they do, I have a minute.

Now they’re thinking, Gunfire. It’s a raid. We need to move out.

Gunfire is one thing, but explosions really light a fire under people. I feed a grenade into the launcher, close the slide and pull the secondary trigger, sending a silver 40mm egg of explosives through a hole in the roof. I hope no one was hiding their Christmas presents up there.

The explosion is not Hollywood big but it’s enough to reduce the attic space to so much firewood. The sound wave makes reality jump a frame or two, and a cloud of smoke and dust hang over the house, a marker for the fire brigade.

That’s all the destruction I need. I stuff the assault rifle back into my magic bag and drop over the fence into enemy territory. Maybe their cameras are out, maybe not. Either way, I have to act.