by Ari Bach
They stepped out into the room, and Violet was suddenly glad her shoes had fallen off. The floor was shag grass—the softest, warmest pleasure a human foot could ever know. This place was definitely not like Achnacarry. Once her feet stopped hogging her attention, she saw the four who had come to greet them.
She took the eldest to be Alf. He couldn’t have been more than fifty, but he was weathered, covered in scars that accented his eastern features. One of his eyes was not an eye, but a cosmetically incongruous implant with several irises. Once she got over the obvious, she was surprised again by his expression. It was less like the expression of a man and more like that of a marble bust, the inhuman stoicism of an ancient face sculpted from a heroic ideal instead of a real, flawed being. He might have been Buddha if he’d reincarnated as a Hell’s Angel.
Balder, by contrast, had no scars at all and not a hair on his deep-ebony skin. He was tall and muscular and could have been forty or could have been twenty-five and handsome for any age. He was surely as tough and savvy as the best of the Camerons but was smiling, which the Camerons had never mastered. Unlike those drill instructors who demanded their respect, Balder earned it without asking. The gold light from above made him glow as if perfected in every way, past human and past superhuman, past Atlas in strength and Narcissus in looks. All the men she’d seen before who were overtly proud to be men had been something of a joke. This one made machismo look good for the first time.
They both wore armor like Ragnar’s team, which she could now see in the brighter light to be more than plain metal, but a heavily mechanized assembly of materials. Everyone’s armor was a different color, Alf’s a rich wooden brown, and Balder’s gold. R team’s members each had their own color. And there were two others present, people her age who looked eager to be introduced. After a life of introversion, for the first time she was eager to meet people.
“I’m Veikko,” said the boy in a thick Suomi accent. He had a warm complexion with fiery red hair tied back in a tail. He had a most mischievous smile that suggested a quick wit and cunning mind, which was quite an impression when all he had said was his name. He shook her hand with a palm that, after her brief time outdoors, felt very hot. His suit of red and yellow picked up the firelight to complete her sense of a flame living behind a human mask.
Next to him was a girl who embodied the opposite.
“Vibeke,” she said. “Call me Vibs.” Her voice was Norsk, something from the most northern reaches of civilization. She must have been at home in the cold. Her uniform was patterned like Veikko’s but in blue and green, cool colors under her icy-white face. She even let the platinum roots of her hair show under the false black. A hint of honesty, Violet thought, beyond fashion. Her face was youthful, cute, so subtly round and soft in the way her lips moved, pronouncing the hard letter C like a whisper, and her Vs like Fs. Violet realized how much she must have liked Norsk accents. If her new surroundings were full of such people, then surely she’d died and gone to—
“Velkommen til Valhalla,” said Alf.
She had no link, so she couldn’t look up the words. The last sounded vaguely familiar, but she didn’t know why.
“Valhalla?” she asked.
“Norse heaven,” he said. “It means ‘Hall of the Slain.’”
Hall of the Slain. Violet suddenly felt very cold, as if the surface air had followed her down. Her new friends were the monsters in her bedtime stories. Her dad had said the name once like it was forbidden. Lieutenant Cameron put it at the top of the feared list. It was the terror of the terrorists. And it was her new family.
Alf picked up on her shock immediately. “I see you’ve heard of it before.”
She swallowed.
“Consider whatever you heard and weigh it with what you know. We are feared by the worst. What do the worst fear? More evil? Certainly. But what they fear most is us, the untouchable opposition. Those owned by the cruelest corporations fear those owned by none because we are the only thing they cannot buy out, intimidate, or send running away. Rest assured, Violet, we are the good guys,” said Alf.
“But don’t worry,” Veikko added, “we still get to kill people.”
VALHALLA, THEY told her, was where the dead warriors went to fight in the battles of the gods. They called the men there “Einherjer” in antiquity, but time dropped the genders and kept the more sonorous terms. These warriors took the name of the gods’ daughters who brought warriors to the golden hall. They called themselves Valkyries.
Chapter IV: Tikari
VIOLET HADN’T eaten since she’d been in the military stockade, where, at 1300 hours, she’d feasted on half a bagel, two nutrient-enriched crackers, and a cup of water. At 2120 hours her stomach gave so loud a roar that Veikko asked if she wanted food or an IV. She chose food.
“This way to the cafeteria,” Veikko began. “Watch out for the minotaur. We got one new girl here a week ago, tried to walk three meters in the labyrinth by herself. Never turned up again. Found a severed ear, though.”
“Ignore everything Veikko says,” added Vibeke. “The whole place looks like a mess at first, but you’ll get used to it fast. It has a strange sort of logic to it. If you ever get lost in the ravine, just look up. Those lines all branch off from the central power system. They’ll lead you to the center trunk. You won’t get lost on the walls. It’s all one long spiral to the top.”
Veikko continued, “Yeah, yeah, seriously, the caverns are the hard part. The network of caves and cutouts goes about a kilometer into the rock in some directions. You can call up maps as soon as you’re hooked into the local network. They’ll do that tomorrow. But that’s not important. This is.” He stopped, turned to Violet, and spoke with the utmost sincerity. “Showers are sonic, sinks are still water, so don’t bring glass into the shower or use potassium soap in the sinks. Especially the soap thing. I learned that the hard way. The really, really hard way.”
He stared at her and nodded, and then his face broke back into a grin, and he led them deeper into the complex. Soon they were cutting through a variety of rooms and bays: a storage room full of small packets; a hangar holding what looked like giant mechanical legs; tunnels lined with steam pipes; and a rusty round vault that smelled strongly of organic oil. Near the trunk of the giant tree were three massive but apparently empty water tanks. The architecture showed a variety of styles, from parts that were carved into ice, to old stainless steel, to shiny plastic walls that appeared brand new. There were no crowds, but there was a substantial population. Mostly older people, in their twenties and thirties. There were a couple of groups of young men and women, but all looked over seventeen and under fifty.
“Is everyone in a team like us?” Violet asked.
“Not everyone,” explained Vibeke. “It’s a city and has a small population who, for one reason or another, didn’t complete training or came on as specialists, a few locals who found the place and never felt like leaving. Some people like Snorri and Valfar have been here since the terraforming experiments. This place used to be a big science lab.”
“Are people allowed to leave?” asked Violet.
“We do a full soul wipe,” Veikko admitted gravely.
“No, we don’t.” Vibeke scowled.
“Not just the memories of us, but all memories,” Veikko continued, “They have a programming bay set up for it. I’ve only heard of one instance. The girl they found turned out to work poorly with her team, so they rewrote her as a happy, well-adjusted lady, gave her a good job, and checked on her from time to time. She’s the CEO of a publishing company now. Of course, if you don’t work out, Vibs and I will have to stick you in south Indian sewage disposal. They use plumbing, you know.”
“Here’s the trick with Veikko,” whispered Vibeke, “if he says something horrible, it’s real. If he says something really horrible, it’s real. But if he says something so horrible it would be funny to a psycho with the worst possible sense of humor—”
“Then it’s still real. I am not
a psycho. I’m just not an artificial intelligence like Vibs. She lost her brain on our last mission, had to replace it with an old calculator program.”
“I’m not an AI, and we can do an easy shallow memory trick or two if you want to drop out.”
“Isn’t that illegal?” Violet asked. She felt stupid for saying it the moment Veikko laughed.
“Everything we do is illegal. If you want legal, join the cops.”
“I can’t,” she admitted. She realized as she said it that she had just told these two more about herself than she’d told her parents.
“Neither can we,” said Veikko. “Bad VVPS scores. I’m a twenty-eight and Vibs is a thirty.”
Violet was immediately at ease. She wasn’t afraid to ask Vibeke, “They didn’t make you get recalibrated?”
“Well, they tried,” she said, “but I kept hitting them till they gave up.”
Violet laughed. She was laughing with friends, and the oddity of such a situation was both frightening and alluring. She had just met them. A thousand kilometers from Scotland and a world away from the familiar, she had friends, two more than she’d ever had before.
“Anyway,” Veikko said, “barely anyone wants to leave. This place is like heaven without all the rules.”
They came to the cafeteria, which was housed in a large dome. The interior was shaded with the same dark, warm colors as the first lounge. A massive fireplace stood in the center of the room with a tan chimney two meters thick. The whole area had a casual tone, more like a beer hall than a secret arctic installation. The chairs were bean blobs like those in her old cyberlounge, but the decor wasn’t what made it feel so unlike the military. Everyone spoke casually, lightly. There was no formality, no strict rules or structure. It was the exact antithesis of the military yet held none of the shame Violet saw when Achnacarry began to allow talking at meals. Something told her that these people had earned the right to relax, and relaxed they were. Only the occasional announcement over the intercom and the colorful armor reminded her that this wasn’t a civilian locale.
“C team departing pogo pad four,” it said. “Good luck in Lucerne.”
Violet wondered what they were going to do in Lucerne. She was going to ask when a more general version of the question occurred to her.
“So can either of you tell me exactly who or what we are training to fight against?”
Veikko considered what to say. Vibeke spoke first so as not to send Violet running.
“It’s not the Cetaceans or the West, if that’s what you mean. Not specifically. They’ll teach you all about it, but the basics are whoever threatens the status quo. Not people who want legitimate change, not political rivalry, but people willing to use extraordinary means to get their way. If the divisionists want independence, fine. If they would go to war for it or kill for it, then we stop them. But some fights we allow and some peaceful problems we fix. Mostly we just do what we wish, within limits…. And not everyone here completely agrees. But most of it’s pretty straightforward. Valhalla had a small war with the Orange Gang a couple years before we arrived. Now D team keeps an eye on them.”
Violet was going to ask why they didn’t end the gang, but Veikko spoke before she could ask. “Still, there’s more to it than that. No, no, honestly, there have always been rebels, but now rebels are obsolete. They’re a nuisance, not a threat. We’re the ones to keep ’em that way. The real threat is from groups like this one. People who operate outside the laws. This isn’t the only group of its kind. There are others that aren’t so….”
“Benevolent,” said Vibeke.
“Some are downright evil,” said a voice behind her. Violet turned to see four people, all in flat gray armor.
“I’m Tahir,” said one of them.
“I’m Violet,” she said.
“We know who you are, came to introduce ourselves,” said a woman beside him. “I’m Tasha, this fellow is Toshiro, and the huge guy behind him is Trygve.”
“Hi,” said Trygve in a soft, high-pitched voice.
“Just remember,” said Tasha, “Tahir’s Asian, looks like a Toshiro, Toshiro’s Dutch, looks like a Trygve, and Trygve sounds like a girl. I’m the only girl in the team.”
“T team is our immediate predecessor,” said Vibeke.
“Yeah, I came in about a week before Veikko,” said Trygve.
“We’ll leave you three alone. See you around the pit,” said Tahir, and they left. Their absence only revealed another man waiting to say hello.
“Uh, I’m Kabar. Kaunan team. Hi,” he said, and then he bowed, turned, and ran away.
“K team are the weapons experts: Kabar, Kalashnikov, Katyusha, and Katana,” said Vibeke. “They’ll do some of your training.”
Violet watched Kabar run away, then returned to her questions. “And you said we have no owner,” she asked. “No company to answer to? Who pays for all this?”
“Our enemies,” boasted Veikko. “We have plenty of ’em and no qualms about growing fat off their losses.”
“You’ll pick up the exact nature of why we do what we do once you do it.” Vibeke reassured her, “They’ll give you an assignment, and once you’ve done it, you’ll recognize why, if it were not done, there could be problems.”
“What kind of problems?”
“Hard to explain to someone who hasn’t seen what’s out there. But our first year or two won’t be dangerous material, especially not before we receive and train a fourth team member.”
She considered the implications of such things. The obvious question was how to know that these were the good guys, if there were good guys at all outside the boundaries of plain society. But that wasn’t nearly as important as the buffet ahead.
Violet recognized the food as all synthetic, which was no surprise in this climate. She was sure if there was any real food to be found, it would be fish, an animal she had tried to eat once on one horrible day and never again.
Veikko leaned in close as she perused the options and whispered, “There are fish eyes in the tapioca, and that green stuff… an awfully soylent shade of green, if you ask me. I think he was named Richard.” There were labels over each to disprove Veikko’s claims, but they were text. Without her link Violet was left to guess at what they said, so she gathered a colorful selection of substances and hoped one would prove edible.
After the trio had loaded their trays, they sat down at a table near the fire. Violet gave up the slow decorum she kept in the army mess and eagerly tucked in to the synthetic meal. The green cubes were okay, the red and brown cubes weren’t bad, but the yellow cubes were the best yellow cubes she had ever eaten. The pink cylinders and gray putty were also good, as was the tan lactose goo and orange juice.
“How’s Richard?” asked Veikko.
“Tastes more like a John,” Violet said, discarding the green stuff.
“That’s too bad. It might have made a good Stu,” he said, laughing and spraying a few bits of yellow her way. “You can get real food over at Pyramiden. It’s a ten-minute trip by pogo, but the schmoo-food here is the best I’ve ever had, and I’ve spent a lot of time under water, so I know.”
“Can we just leave any time we want?” Violet asked.
“You’ll need to wait for the link,” explained Vibeke, “so it can sign you in and out, and the lifts can recognize you, but yes, if you know how to fly. You don’t, so we’ll teach you next week.”
A man behind Veikko waved to Violet. “Hi, I’m Mortiis, Mannaz team. Welcome aboard. Don’t let me stop you eating. I remember how hungry I was when I came in. I had about fifty of the brown cylinder things. I love those. I think they’re supposed to taste like some sorta meat, but they don’t, but I mean they’re really good. You can even mash ’em up and mix them in with the fruit paste. That’s real fruit. I think they grow it in—uh, you eat, I’ll go. Hi, Violet!” He walked away backward, still waving, tripping over a chair before he turned around and left.
Veikko smiled and went on. “So, local travel, you
can come and go, but there’s not much to do on this island, and less on Spitzbergen. Vadsø is the nearest metropolis, and that’s a ways south.” Veikko stopped eating for a moment to talk clearly. “Everything’s south except the North Pole, about five hundred kilometers of ice water from here.”
Violet tried some of the purple spheres. They tried to taste like grapes but failed miserably. She had more yellow cubes.
“There really is absolutely nothing to do on Kvitøya,” he continued. “There’s Andréeneset point, bit south of the ravine. It’s a slab of rock with a smaller slab of rock sitting on it. And then Ostrov Viktoriya to the east, which is less interesting. The North Pole isn’t too far by pogo, but all they have is a McDonald’s.”
“I haven’t left for anything but off-site training since I got here,” said Vibeke.
“How long have you two been here?”
“Vibs arrived two months ago. I came a month before that.”
“Where are you from?”
Vibeke spoke first. “I grew up in Stavanger, then my mother left, and I went to Tromsø with my stepfather, who was not a good stepfather. I ended up killing him, and they took me in shortly after.”
“Oh, I’m sorry—”
“Well, we know your family history, so it’s only fair.”
“I’m from south of Espoo, Suomi,” Veikko added quickly, “one of the Itämeri colonies.”
Violet was surprised. “You’re a Cetacean?”
“My family was. My brother was all out, but I never got the gills or eyes. They all did, and I left for the surface.”
“Were they divisionists?” Violet realized that whatever Lieutenant Cameron had talked about, these people probably knew more. “Valkohai?”