The Ice War

by Anders Blixt

  Linda and I rested side by side in narrow bunks on top of a storage compartment for spare parts. During the afternoon, I had repaired radio equipment on the bridge. It had suffered a bad hit during yesterday’s clash. I had replaced parts of the electronics, rerouted cables and cleared the communications cubbyhole of shrapnel. At the same time, Linda had been assigned to the team that worked on the steam system.

  My sleep was restless with colourful dreams that sent me back to the city of my youth. The disconnected sequences mixed childhood and adolescence and twisted perspectives and emotions.

  Suddenly I, once again sixteen years old, hear my sister’s screams and I run on paths with clumps of grass in the cracked soil through the shadows of spruces. Jackdaws caw above me and I know I will be too late. Suddenly I am inside a ruined barn with a smoking revolver in my right hand. A shaggy marauder squirms in pain on the ground, slowly bleeding to death. My sister’s motionless body lies next to him. The marauder changes shape to a Juliusburgian soldier in white with a crushed rib cage.

  I woke with a shout in a rumbling cubbyhole with a steel bulkhead fifteen inches above my face. One or two seconds passed before I recalled where I was. Linda slept soundly besides me, being more used to the noise. An hour passed before my anxiety receded and I returned to sleep.

  Rays from the dawning sun reached across the bridge and touched the radio equipment in front of me. I sipped tea, feeling stiff, tired and nervous. The earphones pressed against my skull and filled my ears with ether cracklings. I slowly scanned the short-wave band in search of comprehensible broadcasts, mainly to give the impression that I was doing a serious effort.

  One frequency carried audible dash-dot signals, but when I jotted them down, it was only random letters. I put the measurements of the directional aerial on an ice chart. The resulting line passed close to Juliusburg so it ought to be enciphered military traffic.

  “Good morning, Mr Bornewald,” said Akhmatov behind my back. He had sneaked up on me with a sound.

  “G’d morn’” I mumbled.

  “I’m here to relieve you,” he said.

  “Thanks, major.” I removed the earphones and rotated the chair so I could get out of the cubbyhole.

  Akhmatov looked pale and dishevelled. “Anything to report?” he said while getting seated.

  “No news,” I said and walked to the side of the bridge to look at the world around us: a flat, white, lifeless cosmos. Grey clouds covered the sky in all directions.

  A voice behind my back bellowed: “Avrál!” – the Russian call for battle stations. A flurry of movements back and forth on the bridge, followed by shouted reports. I donned my helmet and stayed out of the way. The Sovremennyy’s commander, lieutenant-colonel Volkov, came out of the captain’s cabin next to the communications cubbyhole. He was still buttoning his leather jacket when he got into the commander’s seat in the middle of the bridge.

  The executive officer addressed me in German: “Mein Herr, Gefechtsstationen. Possible enemies at five o’clock. Assist major Akhmatov.”

  However, Akhmatov just waved me away. I found a quiet corner on the starboard side of the bridge, where I waited for new instructions. Looking abaft over the ice, I glimpsed two distant smoke plumes.

  Volkov issued a string of orders. The rhythm of the engines quickened as the Sovremennyy accelerated and her three functioning main turrets rotated to point their guns at the presumed enemies.

  The bridge was one of the least armoured parts of the juggernaut because of its many panoramic glass panes. I thought of yesterday’s grisly cleaning of the communications cubbyhole and hoped that Linda was in a safer place in the vehicle’s bowels.

  A lieutenant with a field-glass pushed me out of the nook. Akhmatov was busy clicking the signalling key. He shouted a brief statement at Volkov, who responded with: “Da,” and issued another string of orders. A soldier started lowering steel shutters in front of several bridge windows.

  I recalled the old military maxim war consists of ninety percent boredom and ten percent agony, filled my cup with tea from the nearest vacuum flask, and tried to summon some philosophical equanimity while the race over the ice continued. I failed.

  The juggernaut’s engines reverberated at maximum power and the hull creaked under ensuing strain. The long studs of the steel wheels tore chunks out of the ice sheet as the Sovremennyy rushed forward. The pursuers still gained on us. My binocular showed two long and sleek juggernauts, smaller than the Sovremennyy and each with only two main gun turrets. Two sudden flashes of light from the foremost enemy – instinctively I crouched.

  A nearby thunderclap followed by steel shrapnel and ice fragments rattling against the Sovremennyy’s port side. The unprotected glass panes on the bridge’s port side suddenly sported constellations of pockmarks, but they did not shatter. No second explosion – that shell must have been a dud.

  Thunder rolled through the vehicle when the Sovremennyy’s three main guns fired a salvo. I rose and looked for the pursuers. Three blasts of ice shards surrounded the leading juggernaut, but she maintained her course and speed. A triple miss.

  The Sovremennyy’s secondary armament rattled, small-calibre auto-cannons that put strings of shells in an arc between us and the enemies. Thick smoke billowed from the impacts in the ice – an opaque screen that provided temporary concealment.

  Volkov issued an order to the helmsman, who rotated the steering-wheel clockwise with great force. The Sovremennyy turned starboard with a harsh screech. The manoeuvre increased her angular velocity vis-à-vis the pursuers, which ought to reduce the risk of being hit.

  The smokescreen obscured us for about twenty seconds, after which the enemy juggernauts came into view once again. Their column had also made a starboard turn, so their commander had assessed Volkov’s intentions correctly. Meanwhile the Sovremennyy continued turning. I instinctively grabbed the nearest firm support. The Sovremennyy’s guns thundered first. Two projectiles struck the foremost pursuer, whose silhouette disappeared behind flames and smoke. The third grenade exploded in the ice. The rear pursuer’s two heavy guns flashed.

  It sounded like a brigade of blacksmiths slammed their hammers all over the Sovremennyy. Two sharp flashes momentarily illuminated the interior of the bridge. The juggernaut tilted forward to the starboard in a convulsion that tossed me in an adjacent officer who lost his footing and fell. Panic-stricken I held on to the nearest porthole handle and struggled to stay on my feet. Loud screeching of metal against ice filled my ears. Something struck my back with a force that pressed the air out of my lungs.

  When the Sovremennyy had lost all speed, two of her main guns fired. Half a second later, an enemy projectile crashed through the hull near the stern. An enormous double blast followed and the vehicle shook from one end to the other: a magazine explosion. The juggernaut’s death throes knocked me down. My left elbow slammed into the deck and I screamed with pain.

  Crack! A small-calibre armour-piercing projectile burst through a metal shutter and sprayed glass shards and steel splinters across the bridge. Something struck my chest near the heart. My eyesight flickered.

  My eyes started working normally. The screams of the wounded drowned the hissing in my ears. I lay on my right side and saw a man eight inches away. His head, covered by a helmet, was twisted in an unnatural angle. My left armpit felt sticky. Pain pulsated in the muscle next to my left nipple – a long glass shard extended through my coat.

  I pushed at the deck and got into an awkward sitting position, grimacing with pain at every move. Icy air leaked through the tears in my clothes. The battle seemed to be over. I looked around. The men that still were on their feet were busy saving wounded comrades’ lives. The second hand on the bridge clock still moved even though the glass cover had been cracked.

  Akhmatov appeared at my side with a medikit. He was dirty but seemingly without injuries. “Bornewald, how are you?”

  “I don’t know.” My voice was barely audible.

  “Lay down
and I’ll check you.”

  I rolled onto my back and looked at the ceiling. A huge red blotch caught my eyes. What could have caused that?

  Akhmatov’s hands moved along my torso and arms. “Nothing seems broken, but you are badly bruised. Now I’ll remove the shard.” He unbuttoned my clothes. A giant icy hand grasped my ribcage. Akhmatov pulled out the shard and smeared carbolic acid on the wound. A fierce burning sensation on top of the pain. My teeth gnashed when I clenched the jaws and stifled a scream. Akhmatov closed the wound with band-aids and buttoned my clothes.

  “Make sure that a corpsman puts some stiches in that gash later today. Anyhow, you’ll get an ugly scar. Maybe something to show Miss Connor. Now, remain on the deck for a while.” Akhmatov moved to another wounded man.

  I continued to look at the red blotch. My hands and feet trembled. My thoughts were chaotic, but I guessed that I had been knocked out for less than a minute. Cold gusts of wind danced through the bridge. The steam system wheezed and howled as it struggled with broken tubes. A thumping noise from below indicated that at least one engine was running – the Sovremennyy was not yet dead.

  One thought burned in my mind: What has happened to Linda?

  Chapter 9

  The funeral service ended with the chaplain’s mournful chant in Church Slavonic. The crewmen, wearing white polar uniforms and standing in formation, crossed themselves. Linda, standing at my side, did likewise, but I refrained; it is not a Wesleyan custom. My chest ached and it was hard stand in attention.

  “Ave Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae,” Linda whispered.

  Lieutenant-colonel Volkov had ordered the crew to assemble on the lee side of the broken juggernaut. The men had erected a cairn of steel debris and ice blocks for the fallen and it looked like it stand here forever. Beyond it, the glittering plain stretched to the horizon, where white met blue in a long straight line. The sun was behind us so the Sovremennyy’s wreck cast a jagged shadow over the ceremony.

  Looking to our right, I saw the smoke from the burning enemy juggernauts some miles away and thought: Do they also bury their dead now? We ignored them as they ignored us – a tacit armistice. It was obvious why, because the survivors had enough troubles as it was.

  To our left, a row of lanky white iceboats waited for their passengers. They had been folded and stored inside the Sovremennyy – her equivalent of lifeboats. Several had been ruined during the battle, but enough remained in working condition to carry all survivors.

  The funeral ended and the sergeants dismissed the men, who returned to work. Linda and I had no assignments for the time being so we headed for the medical station in a white tent on the lee side of the wreck. I wanted a corpsman to do something with my wound and after that I would get hold of a clean shirt and stitch the gash in my jacket.

  “How are you doing?” I asked her.

  She had been battered by a violent fall in the engine room when the Sovremennyy toppled, but at least she had suffered no cracked bones or deep cuts. “I can walk,” she said, “but I can’t run.”

  “My radio is broken. Can’t be repaired. We’re cut off from Leclerc.” I shivered. If we die out here, nobody will ever hear of our fate. “The rest of my gadgets seem to have survived, but I haven’t been able to test them.”

  “Kčortu! It only gets worse,” Linda grunted.

  The engine throbbed and the ventilation fan hummed as it pushed a stream of warm air onto my knees. The snowmobile’s interior smelled of grease. I sat comfortably astride the pillion and looked straight south over Linda’s shoulder. The ice sheet was flat, entirely without distinguishing landmarks. When she twisted the accelerator with her right hand, the engine responded properly. The pillion shifted slightly as Linda moved on the saddle.

  I turned my head to the left to check the other snowmobile that Akhmatov drove alone. If one vehicle broke down, the other would be able to carry three passengers but not four. He looked back and Linda gave him a thumbs-up. He nodded and drove off, being the only one who knew the location of our destination. Our vehicle felt sluggish when Linda accelerated to fall in behind him; after all, it towed a sled with a fuel barrel and extra equipment.

  I looked in the rear-view mirror: white sails burst like flowers from the masts of the ice boats, parked in two straight lines next to the Sovremennyy. The symmetry dissolved when the vessels started moving forward, leaning slightly away from the wind. They headed elsewhere and I presumed that I would never see them again.

  I hummed for myself while the snowmobiles cut fresh tracks through the snow. Since departure Linda had stayed a steady thirty yards to Akhmatov’s snowmobile. The sun now approached the western horizon. Maxidin pills kept us alert during the tedious hours.

  “I don’t trust that chap. He is too self-confident,” Linda said breaking the silence for the first time since our departure.

  “So … but why?” My thoughts had wandered off to faraway lands because of the monotony and it took me a moment to respond.

  “He’s so bloody sure that we’ll find some leviathan hunters at that islet, but why the hell would they sit there like a herd of defenceless mlatsy. All sensible ursines within a thousand miles got out of harm’s way as soon as they heard about the war on the radio. I know how they think and I know what beasts lurk in the Juliusburg military.” Linda’s voice got shriller as she spoke. The horrors of the last few days had strained us badly and it sounded like Linda was approaching her breaking point.

  “Well, military people often get involved in conspiracies. Maybe those hunters have cut a deal with Novgorod. After all, everyone around here seems to hate Juliusburg,” I said.

  “Kčortu! We should have refused to work with him,” she said.

  “We had no alternatives, did we? He knew what he wanted to do and what people he wanted to come along. Anyhow, we’re heading away from the war, aren’t we?” I said.

  “Johnny, this is too much.”

  Her words surprised me. I searched for something sensible to say, but failed. “Together … together … we’ll make it.”

  We drove through the night on a straight course. Dawn came, beaming gentle orange light across the ice and snow. Far ahead, almost where the ice met the sky, I glimpsed a darker dot. “Land ahoy,” I said.

  Linda said: “That’s just a peak puncturing the ice sheet. It’s like a tiny island.”

  “Have you been here before?” I said.

  “No, but there are plenty of them and most of them look alike,” she said.

  This one may have looked like other from the outside, but it turned out to be something else. Akhmatov ended this stage of our journey by halting next to it. We unloaded the backpacks and other essential equipment after which Akhmatov disabled the steering of his snowmobile, filled its tank, started its engine and sent it away across the ice to create misleading tracks for any airborne pursuers. Then he covered the remaining vehicles with white tarpaulins taken from his sled.

  When that job was completed, he guided us between rocks and boulders to a place near the islet’s peak in the shadow of two crags. He rolled aside a small boulder and uncovered an uneven hole in the ground, less than three feet in diameter. “Ladies first,” he said. “Light the kerosene lamp when you reach the bottom. It’s in a niche to your right. Wait there for the luggage to come down. Mr Bornewald, stop halfway and pass the packs down from me to Miss Connor.”

  Linda descended with the help of footholds carved into the granite and disappeared out of sight. I followed her and, after we had handled the luggage, I continued to the bottom. Akhmatov stopped on the way down and I heard a few thuds when he covered the opening with the boulder.

  Almost ten yards below ground I reached a flat stone floor. The faint light from the kerosene lamp illuminated a man-made cavern, about 25 by 25 feet. No ursine would ever be able enter this hideout; it had been made by humans for humans. The air was surprisingly warm, perhaps +10°C. An enclosed heating stove of unknown design, p
ainted in red, occupied the middle of the room. Four metal bunk beds with mattresses and folded bed-linen stood along one wall. A primitive kitchenette in a corner had been stocked with canned food.

  “The Novgorod military seems to have made a lot of preparations,” I said.

  “We’ve expected war for years,” said Akhmatov as he removed his arctic clothing. His face was grey and haggard. “Let’s sleep, all of us. We’ll be safe here for a while. Soon we’ll be seeing friends.” He crawled into a bottom bunk, unfolded a wool blanket and fell asleep straight away.

  Linda mumbled: “Sleep well,” and climbed into a top bunk. I extinguished the kerosene lamp and got into bed, too.

  The aroma of hot soup and coffee filled my nose. I opened my eyes and saw the rock chamber illuminated by the kerosene lamp. Akhmatov was busy making breakfast in the kitchenette across the room. His face had regained some colour since yesterday.

  “Did you sleep well?” he asked.

  “Yes, and I’m hungry,” I said and got into a sitting position. My chest wound ached and my body was stiff. My wristwatch claimed that it was afternoon in the world above us, but my mind had a hard time accepting that. Judging from Linda’s soft breathing, she was still asleep in the bunk above me.

  “Soup is ready. Pork and vegetables,” said Akhmatov and handed me a half-full steaming Bakelite guksi bowl.

  The soup was bland and the coffee weak, but it did not matter – they quenched my hunger and thirst.

  Some minutes passed before Akhmatov, still being busy in the kitchenette, broke the silence. “Mr Bornewald, I think that you haven’t been truthful to me. Who are you?” He turned around and looked into my eyes.