Once her arm was free, she slid her hand down to her aching hip, where the metal ring that held her long ax was attached to her belt. She secured a scavenged leather holster that kept the handle of the ax from swinging when she walked.
Her eyes felt as if they were bulging in her sockets from holding her breath so long. Her lungs screamed at her with all the profanity of the gods.
She had to breathe.
Val slowly sucked in air, and the rotting aroma of the creature’s breath nearly made her pass out, as her stomach wobbled and her vision narrowed.
Then two things happened at once.
The pine needle wall in front of her face burst apart, as the triple-jawed beast mashed its snout through the barrier. Its nose stopped just two inches from the rim of Val’s goggles. The shiny black eye of the creature stared right at her. Long splinters of wood pierced the thing’s face, suggesting that, in addition to knocking the trees in its path down, the mega-bear had also bitten through whatever branches or trunks had been near its face.
The second thing that happened was her hand reaching the holster, fingers scrabbling for the ax.
But the holster was empty.
11
The wave of stench was so thick, the air in front of her eyes shimmered like heat haze. The mutant bear lunged for her just as she rolled to her right, pulling her hand-ax from its front-mounted sheath with her other hand as she went. She struck backward with the blade, not even seeing where her arm went, and she felt the sharp blade lodge in between the teeth of the beast’s side set of jaws.
She released the handle of the blade, leaving it wedged in the animal’s mouth. She crawled forward through the wall of pine needles, until the barrier of green parted and she saw snow once again.
Behind her the monster roared, this time sounding irritated by the small sharp thing embedded in its face. Irritated, but it doesn’t sound hurt.
She scrabbled forward into the snow, trying to get her feet under her, but then she heard a human yell.
Val rolled onto her back in time to see mighty Trond, his huge double-headed broad ax behind his head, dropping from high up in the trees, and down into the clearing, heading for the creature’s back. He swung the blade over his head with all his massive upper body strength, and brought the edge of the blade down into the mega-bear’s spine as he landed atop the beast. The blade sank in deeply, and now the monster roared a high-pitched shriek of pain.
It quickly stood up onto its hind legs from where it had crouched to shove its long triple-snout through the fallen conifer. When it stood, it simultaneously dislodged Trond, throwing him backward, and lifted the entire pine tree that was still attached to its head. Now the beast had the whole tree horizontally atop its shoulders where its head should have been.
“Val,” Ulrik called.
She turned her head to the left and reached up in one fluid movement, catching her long ax, which Ulrik had spotted on the ground and tossed to her. With a weapon in her hand, and the revelation that the plan was to fight the creature, she stood and gripped the end of her ax with both hands. She rushed forward and under the suddenly swinging trunk of the pine tree. The branches were not long, and the needles dipped to just above Val’s head.
The bear spun in a full circle in the clearing, as it tried to dislodge the lengthy pine from its face and failed. Val rushed toward its leg and hacked twice at the back of the creature’s knee, which was now at her eye level. Blood arced from the wound in spurts of crimson, along with white pus.
Infection runs through the whole beast, she thought. She wondered briefly if whatever was making it sick was going to infect them. Was it a sickness, or was it radiation? She knew enough about radiation to avoid it, when she knew it was present, even though she did not understand what it was exactly or how it worked.
She ran past and took a swing at the other leg as the creature continued to howl and spin. She missed with her second strike, but was almost once again clear of the beast when it dipped its upper body, and the attached tree came crashing down.
A thick branch cracked into Val’s back, adding more pain to her already throbbing hip. She sprawled in the snow, just as Ulrik came rushing toward her and leapt up and over her, into the branches and up the trunk of the long pine.
The mutant bear growled and began thrashing with its long front paws, the multiple overlapping claws hacking and tearing at pine needles and branches.
Val rolled forward in the snow, a full somersault, then she spun around, ax in hand and ready to rush in again.
Ulrik raced along the spine of the tree to the monster’s face. It was crushed tightly against the trunk, interlocking branches behind its head, holding the tree fast. Val’s hand ax was still embedded vertically in one set of side jaws, the blade glinting in the seeping blood. He swung down hard with his long ax, cleaving into the beast’s uninjured side jaw, the teeth and distended side snout falling away into the pine needles below.
The creature swept an arm up. The jumbled claws missed Ulrik, but the bulk of the forearm’s backswing smashed into his chest and face like the trunk of a thick oak tree. Ulrik was there, and then he was gone, sailing through the air and passing backward, past the trees and right out of the edge of the forest. He crashed into the field of snow covered bones with multiple crunches and snaps.
Val hoped that none of those breaking bones were his.
She had an idea, but she needed a distraction.
Then it came, as Trond rushed back into the battle with smaller hatchets in each hand. Taking a cue from her earlier fight with Vebjørn, he slipped in under the tree and sliced both blades into the back of the animal’s muscular legs, attempting to climb the beast to his still-stuck double-bladed ax in its spine.
The monster began to spin again, and Val thought Trond would be thrown, but the distraction had been long enough. Instead of getting close to the creature, she grabbed onto a low hanging branch of the spinning tree, and let it carry her away. The sticky pine sap cemented her grip on the bark. She slid her ax into its holster at her waist so she could use her other hand. Then hand over hand she climbed higher into the pine, as the massive animal spun faster. She could feel the force of the spin on her, but she moved closer to the center of the tree, which was her target anyway.
Trond shouted as he was flung away again, and she saw the man hit a tree at the edge of the clearing, before she saw the oncoming danger—she wasn’t going to make it up to strike down at the head as Ulrik had done. The bear’s spin had become erratic in the fight, and the end of the forty-foot long pine tree was getting closer to the wall of trees that ringed the clearing on one side.
Instead of continuing to climb, Val dropped down through the needles, her feet hitting the snow-covered ground and sliding out from under her. Her back slammed into the ground—a blast of pain shot through her frame, but she forced the pain down and gritted her teeth, rolling away just before the bear’s huge leg came stamping toward her position. The bundles of claws on the hind legs were mostly cracked and broken, but she had no desire to discover whether her lithe frame could withstand the behemoth’s weight.
Instead of aiming at its head, she aimed at its feet. She pulled her long ax and swung at the thick, two-foot diameter ankle as it came around. Another spurt of thick white and red confirmed her earlier assessment—disease coursed through the monster. Then she dodged out of the way as the spinning creature turned further. She was ready to strike at the other ankle when it came around, but she heard a booming crack, as the trunk of the spinning, horizontal tree struck an upright tree at the edge of the clearing.
She had been expecting that. She had not been expecting that the tree would come plummeting straight down when it happened. She was crouched to attack the monster’s ankles, but she didn’t have enough time to dart out of the way before she was once again coated with green needles. A branch the size of her wrist came thumping down on the studded leather plate of armor on her shoulder. The impact staggered her, forcing her squat d
eeper, until her bottom was nearly touching the ground.
The bear didn’t stand.
Val clawed her way upward through the sticky green, until she was on top of the long trunk. She was poised for action, but none was required.
The twisting tree had broken the creature’s neck, its strange front set of jaws now sideways to its shoulders under the branches. One thick brown branch had splintered and driven itself into the back of the animal’s neck. Her hand ax was still stuck in the teeth of the remaining side-jaws. The other side of the animal’s face had been cleaved away.
The amazing thing was the beast was still alive.
12
The bear’s single set of functioning jaws slathered and snapped, attempting to chew its way to freedom despite the loss of all function below its broken neck.
Val didn’t know how the thing could still be alive. The hairs on its huge two-foot thick head were all standing up like thin twigs, as if the head grew out of the tree—instead of being stuck in it. The creature’s huge body lay on its stomach, the long handle of Trond’s double-bladed ax sticking upward out of the greenery from its back, like yet another jagged branch. Val stepped onto the creature’s shoulder blade and tugged the massive weapon free. She almost dropped it when it popped out with a slurp. The weapon was incredibly heavy. But she lifted it above her head and simply let gravity take it down into the top of the mutant bear’s skull.
As if electricity from a lightning bolt had been keeping the animal’s hair standing on end—even on the tip of its functioning snout—as soon as the giant blade of Trond’s ax sank into the creature’s skull, the hairs laid flat and the head stopped thrashing.
Val fell backward, landing seated on the bear’s needle covered back. She breathed heavily. She glanced around and saw Ulrik standing, leaning with his hands on his knees, heaving big gulps of air, like her. A few feet away, Trond was rubbing a lump on the top of his head, but he looked as if the adventure with the bear had hardly robbed him of breath.
Swinging her head around to the other side of the clearing, Val could see the mechanic and the historian gawking at the carnage. She had not expected the men would come to her aid, but they were close, which meant they had at least thought about it. Anders also stepped into the clearing with his bow, and an arrow nocked and trained on the bear, should it move again. There was no sign of his bird. Seeing that the bear didn’t budge, he put the arrow back in his quiver and slung the bow over a shoulder. “Are you injured?” he asked.
Val barked a laugh. “Everywhere. Thank you for coming to our aid, Anders. I saw your arrows strike the beast.” Then she turned to Erlend and Nils. “And thank you both, as well.” She knew neither man had done a thing, but with them being unaccustomed to fighting, it meant a lot to her that they had come close to the battle. She suspected that had they seen an opening, each man would have entered the fray.
Conspicuously absent were Morten, Oskar, and Stig. Perhaps Stig was not as won over by Ulrik’s arguments as I thought.
They each collected their fallen weapons, and within a few minutes, heard three buzzing ATV engines. Morten led the charge, riding into the clearing with determination, as if there were still a battle in which to partake. When the three of them had come to a stop, Morten looked gravely to Val. “Thank Odin you are alright. We came as quickly as we could, when we realized the beast was no longer in pursuit.”
Before Val could open her mouth to reply, Trond rushed across the clearing, pulled Morten from his ATV by his neck, and carried him the distance to the nearest tree, where he slammed the Laplander’s body against the peeling bark of a birch. “Where were you, scum?” The big man’s voice boomed like thunder, and Val thought he looked more like a god than a man. Rage filled his face with blood and his normally pale complexion became nearly purple. “Where were you? We are companions. We are fighting for all of humanity. You will not desert us again, or I will wring your neck.”
Morten clutched both hands to the big man’s fingers, trying to pry them away. The Laplander’s face broke out in a sheen of sweat, and his color began to match Trond’s.
Oskar pulled his knife and pointed it at Trond’s back. “Let him go.”
Trond swung his free hand backward and smacked the smaller Laplander down into the snow, as if he were waving away a pesky black fly.
“Trond, please,” Val said, walking toward the two men.
The second he heard her words, the big man let the Laplander fall into a clump at the base of the tree. As Morten slid down, he dislodged some of the paper-like bark, which fluttered down to land on his head.
Val leaned in close to Morten’s face. “If it happens again, Trond will have to wait in line after me. Are we clear?”
Morten busied his hands, running them over his bruised neck. He did not reply.
Faster than the others could see, she slid her knife from its sheath and into the dirt between his legs, a hair’s breadth from his groin. “Do you understand me?”
“Yes,” the man growled, but it was soft and hoarse.
When Val stood and turned, Stig and Oskar stood by, their horrified faces nearly comical.
She stared at them. A beat of silence filled the forest, until both men understood at the same time.
“Yes,” they both said.
One of the ATVs—Ulrik’s—had sustained some damage, and Erlend and he set out to fix the vehicle’s front left tire. The plastic fender had been snapped off, but Erlend assured them the piece was merely cosmetic. A new tire was needed, but they carried a few spares.
Within half an hour, they were ready to depart the area, and each person was eager to be away from the bone nest and the dead beast that had made it.
After leaving the forest behind, they set a slow pace on the road. The snow had stopped, and the sky was overcast, but no longer threatening. Still, the battle had sapped them of their zeal for the day’s travel. Val needed to rest, but wanted to put a few miles between them and the bone nest before stopping for the day.
The battle had tested their mettle, and they had prevailed, but the entire incident raised a lot of concerns. She had known Morten—and more so Oskar—to be a backstabber, so their lack of aid in the battle had been little surprise. But she was disconcerted to see Stig flip sides again. Also, although he had been there, Anders had done little to help them. She would need to keep an eye on him.
But the group’s dynamics were the least of her concerns. The battle showed her just how dangerous the world—and the creatures residing in it—could be. Halvard had warned her that it had been many decades since anyone had successfully traveled these lands. Anything could be awaiting them. Another mutated bear could be the death of them. A pack of the things would offer exactly zero chances of survival.
And then there were the ATVs. If they broke irreparably, the group would need to walk. Even if they did not, they were terrible in the snow. Never mind a simple storm. What happens when winter comes? Will we need to sit it out in some abandoned village somewhere? She remembered what Halvard had said the weather was like further south—in the days of the Old World, at least. If the south remained the same now, there would be no snow in the winter, except in the higher mountain passes.
If it was the same. Weather could alter drastically between single seasons, never mind over hundreds of years.
The men with her were the last hope for the whole world. They would need to learn to fight together like a unit, instead of as individuals, cowards or turncoats.
She was the right woman for this journey. She felt confident she could make it to the destination—and back. If she had to do it alone, she might be able to manage. But with the group of fighters at her side? She was less sure. Less sure she could keep them alive. Less sure she could keep them from trying to wrest control from her. On my own, I worry only about the threats in nature. With them, I worry one of them—probably Morten—will try to slit my throat when I sleep.
She spent the rest of the night wondering if she should leave
them all behind.
13
“What in the name of Odin is that?” Morten asked.
It was night, but they had been traveling on a section of road that was mostly flat, with only the occasional ripples in it and tufts of soft sea grass growing up through the ancient asphalt. They had decided to continue well past dark when the roads were good. The need to get south and out of potential storms drove them through the night.
But now they had stopped to sleep, the thick air full of the salty, crisp smell of the sea, and the night lit up as if the sea to their right was on fire.
In the distance, a long line of golden orange light stretched out into the water, some several miles long, with two immense spikes of yellow light stretching up A-shaped towers in the middle of the horizontal, curving line. Val and the men were all looking at their first examples of electronic light since being introduced to the ATVs’ headlamps.
“I had no idea it would still be here—let alone lit up,” Nils said, his voice filled with awe. “What you see before you is the Øresund Bridge. They lined it with large panels in the Old World. The panels would collect the sunlight during the day and power the lights at night. It still works after all this time. Amazing.”
Val noticed that there were gaps in the light, and she hoped that was a result of broken panels and not a broken bridge. If they couldn’t get the ATVs across the water to the land formerly known as Denmark, their journey would become a very long walk. That or they would need to camp here for months and attempt to build a sturdy boat with which to get across the Øresund Strait, which separated the Baltic Sea and the North Sea. On the other side, the tantalizingly close ruins of Copenhagen. She would go crazy waiting months.
Viking Tomorrow Page 6