Down and Dirty

by Sandra Hill

  “Okay, snuffies, here’s the deal,” the commander told them. “Next week we go to San Clemente Island again for survival training and Sims. The week after will be rock portage, the gateway evolution for SEALs and WEALS. Doesn’t mean you’re on easy street after that, but it is a major hurdle. Now I’ll turn the program over to Instructor Uxley, and I’ll see you early Monday morning.”

  “Yes, Commander, sir!”

  Chieftain F.U. waited till the commander was out of hearing range, then yelled, “I’m thinkin’ it’s time to play caterpillar, sweet things, and guess who’s gonna give head…I mean, be the head?” He winked at Britta. If ever a wink could be construed as malicious, his was.

  No doubt this would be another exercise in torture designed to make the women ring the quitting bell. Her assumption soon proved true.

  In truth, everything they did these days was torture. And the hollered orders all ran together. “A-ten-shun!” “Listen up!” “Run, run, run!” “Recover!” “Hydrate!” “You weak-as-piss maggots!” “A-ten-shun!” “Fall in!” “Fall out!” “A-ten-shun!” “Drop!” “Drop and give me twenty…thirty…fifty!” “Hydrate!” “Recover!” “On your backs, scruffies!” “On your feet!” “A-ten-shun!” “Up boats!” “Down boats!” “Hydrate!” “Hit the deck!” “You can always ring out!” In between, they kept hearing that blasted whistle and must needs react in the correct manner.

  Now they were going to be bloody caterpillars.

  Wearing heavy life vests and helmets, the trainees were forced to sit in the water in a line, breasts to backs, snugly placing the legs around the person in front, thus becoming a water-going caterpillar. They could paddle out to deeper waters with their hands but not kick their legs. The vests kept them buoyant, but they were nigh drowned after a half hour in this position. When they staggered back to shore, vomiting, several instructors helped those in greatest need. Chieftain F.U. just smirked. Three women wobbled up to the bell to ring out. Leaving only thirty of the original ninety-five, a number that did not surprise those in authority.

  The caterpillar nonsense was a not-so-great ending to a not-so-great week, with a two-day liberty looming ahead, but all Britta could think about was sleep. That plan was cut short when Commander MacLean intercepted her on the way to the women’s quarters.

  “Madrene wants to talk with you,” he said, handing her a telephone.

  “Greetings!” she said.

  “Britta, how do you fare?” Madrene asked. In the background, she could hear Sammy clamoring, “Let me talk, let me talk.”

  “How do I fare? I am sore. I am tired. I am dirty. I am hungry. And I smell. Other than that, I am just wonderful.”

  Madrene laughed. “Well, I can take care of one of those. Wouldst join me and Hilda for dinner tonight? Ian could drop you off here at Pretty Boy’s on his way home. I am watching Sammy today, but one of the guards will be taking over.”

  The thought of getting into a small vehicle space with the dour commander was daunting, but Britta relished the idea of meeting with these two old friends. Plus she yearned for news of Zachary, and going to his home might provide the information she wanted.

  Several hours later Britta braved the guards surrounding Zachary’s keep, whilst Madrene brought her two children out to the automobile for the grumbling commander to take home so she could enjoy a “girls’ night out.” She noticed that the commander kissed Madrene sweetly afore leaving, which made her think that mayhap he was not as bad as he appeared.

  Besides, on the drive there, the commander gave her news of Zachary and his comrades-in-arms. They might be home in a few days, she was told. Plus, she found out that they had not left the country but instead were fighting terrorists at a football stadium. Football was a ludicrous game in this country where grown men threw a leather ball and tackled each other with great force, often causing serious injury. Viking men would love it. In any case, Zachary could not be in such great danger at a game, she told herself.

  The second Britta entered Zachary’s keep, Sammy launched himself at her, arms wrapped tightly around her neck and little legs hugging her waist. He was sobbing and talking a garbled message that seemed to indicate he was lonely and scared and wanted her to stay with him.

  Madrene, who had been watching him that day, just shook her head with dismay. “I don’t know what to do with the boyling. The longer Pretty Boy is away, the more frantic he becomes.”

  Madrene went to open the door for Hilda, who had just arrived. Britta sat down on a soft fabric, cushiony chair and pulled Sammy onto her lap, drying his eyes with the hem of his tea-ing shert. At the little-boy scent of his skin and the feel of his tightly clinging arms, Britta fought to control her tears…and a yearning for something she had never thought possible for herself: motherhood.

  “Stay with me,” he wailed.

  “I cannot, dearling. I must needs do my military training.”

  “All the time?” His words were alternated with hiccups.

  “Well, not all the time. Most times.”

  “Stay now.”

  “I am going out to dine with Madrene and Hilda.”

  “You’re leaving me here…alone.”

  That set off a new round of crying. And more aching in the region of her heart. “You are not alone. There is always someone here with you.”

  “But they are different all the time. The only one who’s the same is Madrene, and she’s a witch.”

  She and Madrene exchanged glances and grins.

  “Come into the scullery, my little man,” Hilda said, taking him by the hand. “I brought you a surprise.”

  She thought she heard Sammy mutter something odd—“It better not be more stupid underwear”—as they left the room.

  “What was that all about?” she asked Madrene once they were alone and her friend sat in a chair next to her.

  “The poor kid is distraught over his missing father. Thinks he’s never coming back.”

  “Has he not been told this is his father’s job? That he has every intention of returning?”

  “Yea, but the little boy has experienced much loss in his short life. He is convinced that Pretty Boy is going to die and leave him alone in this country. Plus he has had a parade of guards here to watch over him. They are good people but strangers. In time, I am sure Pretty Boy will find help that is steady and reliable, but for now at least the child is safe.”

  “How about you?”

  “I help when I can, but I have my own home and children to care for.”

  “And Zachary’s family? I have met Danny.”

  “They help when they can, but they all have jobs, too.”

  “And danger looms still from the grandsire?”

  “More so than ever with Pretty Boy gone.”

  “Why does he cling to me? I am almost a stranger, too.”

  “Methinks he senses your common backgrounds. Both lost in a new country. Both stumbling with the language. Both a little lonely. Both facing some danger. Both caring deeply for Pretty Boy.”

  Britta was about to argue the caring for Zachary bit but held her tongue. Instead, she pondered Madrene’s words and offered hesitantly, “I could stay with him tonight and mayhap tomorrow night. Try to calm him down and explain things to him. But then I would have to return to the base.”

  “Would you?” Madrene asked with great enthusiasm. “Praise the gods, would you, please?”

  “I would.”

  “I will be so appreciative, and so will Pretty Boy. I know this is cutting into the little free time you have.”

  “’Tis no bother.” And that was the truth. “I have no inclination to join my women friends in shopping for clothing I do not need. Who needs more than two pairs of braies and two pairs of shoes? Dost know, my friend Terri has twenty-five pairs of shoes back at her home? How can any one woman wear that many shoes?”

  Madrene smiled, no doubt having been as dumbstruck as her on first arriving in this country. “You will learn to love shoes, believe me.�
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  “Nor am I inclined to go clubbing again ‘to get lucky.’ I have been lucky enough, thank you very much.”

  At first, Madrene’s eyes went wide, then she flashed her a huge grin. “Now this is a subject we must discuss over dinner.”

  “Getting lucky?”

  “Sex.”

  “Ah. One and the same, am I not correct?”

  “Holy Thor, mayhap I could learn a thing or two from you.”

  “Mayhap,” Britta said, with a surprising lack of humility. She leaned toward Madrene then and whispered, “Dost know about multiple orgasms?”

  Madrene blinked at her, then burst out laughing.

  They were both laughing when a puzzled Hilda and Sammy returned to the solar.

  Sammy did smile when she told him she would be returning later to stay the night with him…and that she had a special bedtime saga to tell him. “The Loathsome Lout Prince and the Beautiful, Brave Viking Warrior Maiden.”

  Give me an S, give me an E, give me an A, give me an L…

  Zach was standing in the empty press box at the Penn State Nittany Lions football stadium, preparing for tomorrow night’s homecoming game with Notre Dame.

  He was connected by lip mike and earpiece to the other eight members of his team scattered about the 110,000-seat steel edifice. They were all jacked up, but nothing was happening…so far.

  It was a great architectural marvel, situated here among the beautiful Nittany Mountains in Happy Valley, but it could very well be a bitch to empty if terrorists had their way.

  In addition, it was an especially attractive setting because of all the colorful hot-air balloons there in the near distance, part of the homecoming celebration. The ballonists, many of them Penn State alumni, met here every year to show off their latest babies to each other and the grateful crowds. The parade and pep rally had been held the night before.

  The government was keeping this threat low key, but the rumor mill had it that terrorists were targeting this stadium on this particular weekend. Americans in large numbers made a tempting target. If they could take down a hundred thousand people in one pop, it would make 9/11 appear like a minor blip on the terrorist tally board. Still, it was only rumors at this point.

  “Everyone in place?” asked JAM, head of this mission.

  “Roger,” said Cage, who was lying flat atop the roof of the VIP suites.

  Sly, Max, Geek, Slick, Scary Larry, Omar, Travis “Flash” Gordon, and Cody O’Brien also reported in from their various positions…in the two tunnels leading to the locker rooms, outside the concession stands, the massive parking lot, and even tailing Coach Paterno. They were all dressed to blend in with the expected crowds, wearing blue and white or blue and gold jerseys with school emblems, except for a cursing Flash, who’d picked the bad luck short straw. He was dressed as the Nittany Lions mascot, complete with sweaty lion’s head. It was a tradition at Penn State that every time a touchdown was made, the Nittany Lion had to go out on the field and do a push-up per point, including those previously earned. By the end of the game, the lion could conceivably do more than a hundred push-ups in that heavy costume, not to mention dozens of front and backflips. Occasionally, he was passed up through the bleachers by rowdy, sometimes drunk students. All in all, a pain-in-the-butt assignment.

  Geek was the only one who thought it was cool to hit on college coeds, although Cage had been eyeing one of the cheerleaders who had “a bootie to die for.” Cage’s words, not Zach’s. They’d been there all week, twiddling their thumbs, way too much time to think.

  And of course Zach was thinking about Sammy. And about Britta…way too much. But then, she’d given him a going-away present to beat all going-away presents.

  “You’ve got that look on yer face again, cher.” Cage had just slipped into the press box with him.

  “Would that be my ‘I’m bored to death’ look or my ‘I’m past ready to rumble’ look?”

  “It would be the love-struck look.”

  “Don’t you mean horny?”

  “Nope. I’m seein’ love, baby.”

  “Seriously, dude, I’ve gotta make some decisions about Britta when I get back to the base.”

  “Why?”

  “Because…I don’t know, just because.”

  “Dum-dum-de-dum.”

  “Please. It’s just that I feel responsible for her being here. And I do care about her. And…”

  “And?”

  He grinned.

  “Great sex, huh?” Cage prodded.

  “Really great sex.”

  “Let’s face it, you’ve been hooked on her since you met her two years ago.”

  “That’s another thing. Do you really believe this time-travel crap? Do you really think we traveled back in time? I know we don’t talk about it, but I got used to telling myself that it was our imaginations, that it was just some kind of reenactment crap.”

  “Me, I tell myself it was a joke that Max pulled on us, and one of these days he’s gonna say, ‘Gotcha!’ Except he hasn’t…yet.”

  Zach bit his bottom lip, then confided, “I’m thinking about quitting the teams.”

  “No way! You love being a SEAL.”

  “I do, but maybe it’s time to move on. I don’t think Arsallah is ever going to give up. Unless he dies—and I can only hope—but, barring that, Sammy is going to be in danger forever. Living with guards and babysitters is no normal way to raise a kid.”

  “Shiiiit! I kin see yer point, but, man, ya blindsided me. What would ya do? Would ya stay in the Coronado area?”

  “I would need to go in hiding of some kind. New name, persona, job, everything. And I’d have to cut off contact with all my family and friends, totally. Like witness protection, except done voluntarily.”

  “Jist doan do anythin’ hasty. Talk it over with someone who knows somethin’ about this hiding in plain sight business. Your grandad, maybe, with all his government contacts.”

  “It was his idea.”

  Cage whistled. “I doan know what ta say, then. Let me ask ya this, wouldja take Britta with you?”

  He thought for a long moment. “I don’t know.”

  But deep inside, he knew. And the answer was no.

  Girl talk…same thing through the ages…

  Britta sat with Madrene and Hilda in Tony’s Bar & Grill where they laughed till they cried, then they cried till they laughed. The fact they were drinking pitchers of mead did not help the situation.

  Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, Britta glanced at Hilda. “I still cannot believe you lived in a place called Hog Heaven.”

  “How about me? I lived in a bloody harem for two years. Me? In see-through gunnas, with rouged nipples!” Madrene was a far-famed shrew—a nice shrew—who had a talent for nagging.

  Britta and Hilda put hands over their mouths to stifle their giggles. Britta could not imagine Madrene being subservient, which would surely be required in a harem. Or that she would stand still while someone painted her nipples.

  “And you both believe you have time-traveled?” Britta asked. “I cannot credit any sane person accepting such nonsense, and yet…”

  “Most of us have concluded that it is a miracle of some type. A God-ordained thing,” Madrene said.

  “But mostly we try not to think about it at all,” Hilda added. “Searching for logical explanations is a futile exercise.”

  “Tell me why…how…you decided to stay here in the future,” she urged them both.

  “I no longer had any family there. I had no desire to go back,” Madrene said. “Except for a need to avenge myself against that evil Steinolf, but then my brother Torolf took care of that.”

  “’Twas different for me,” Hilda said. “I was drawn two ways, wanting to stay here but believing I was needed in the past, at The Sanctuary.”

  “And what decided you?”

  “Love,” they said as one.

  Britta’s heart wrenched at that message. Partly because she suspected she was falling in
love with Zachary and partly because she feared he only lusted for her. “I am so confused. I do not want to go back, but I keep having these strange dreams. My father and brothers are attacking the abbey in some of them, and there is so much blood. But in other dreams, it is the nuns who are attacking my father and brothers, led by some warrior nun, and the ruthless men are the ones lying in their own sword dew. Either way, I feel almost a physical pull to return to the abbey.”

  Madrene and Hilda stared at her. It was a compelling dream…and obviously different from their own experiences.

  “Dost think the warrior nun is you?” Hilda asked.

  “Nay. She has coal-black hair. And unusually vivid blue eyes.”

  “How does Pretty Boy fit into all this?” Hilda asked.

  “Like a thorn in my backside.” Her flip answer garnered grins from her friends. Then she added, “’Tis his fault I am here. I think. He wish-prayed me here.”

  “My father believes he was wish-prayed here,” Madrene told her, “and look how well things turned out for him and Angela at the vineyard.” Madrene’s father, Magnus Ericsson, was married to a woman who owned Blue Dragon Vineyard somewhere here in California.

  “You say that you blame Pretty Boy, but you aren’t unhappy to be here, are you?” Hilda inquired.

  “I am content to be here. Mayhap I was destined to travel here to learn these new military tactics, as I originally thought. But what if Zachary is the reason for my being here?”

  “Would that be so bad?” Madrene asked.

  “Yea, it would. Who would I be then, except an appendage to some man? I have always identified myself as Britta the Warrior. If not a warrior, what would I be?”

  “Lover, wife, mother…or any job you choose,” Hilda said. “This really is a remarkable country for women.”

  “Lover? I am already that. I think. But wife…or mother?” She shook her head decisively. “Ne’er did I expect to see myself in those roles. I always considered myself too big and unfeminine, with none of the maidenly graces.” Although an image flashed into her mind of her holding Sammy earlier that night.