Jon’s snow mobile troops arrived first. The General and Captain Fink led two dozen men onto the ‘island’ from the southern end. They wove through the rock maze heading north, hoping to deny the enemy a foothold.
To Jon’s dismay, the aliens arrived in greater number. Armed with a type of magnetic rail gun, the Vikings cut down two of Jon’s men. Captain Casey Fink responded with a fragmentation grenade that shredded three bad guys and their white ponchos with a blast of shrapnel.
Unfortunately, the aliens brought more manpower to bear. They swarmed down from the north side over sharp stone outcroppings and between mounds of snow and dirt.
Brewer’s advance team grudgingly gave ground, retreating to the very tip of the ‘island’s‘ southern end. There they made a stand, but the Vikings kept coming with no regard for the losses they suffered. Certainly the alien general knew the value of that rock and accepted the price to be paid. With the island in alien hands, they could decimate the human army from the only cover around.
General Brewer resigned himself to retreat but before he issued the order, a voice from behind changed the equation.
“Let the battle cry be heard in the land, a shout of great destruction!” Reverend Johnny proclaimed as he led the main body of human soldiers onto the rocks and personally dispatched four enemies with his favorite weapon, an M240-B heavy machine gun.
The surgeon-turned-holy-man’s strike grew into a counter attack. This time the Vikings gave ground until their main force arrived. At that point, the battle stabilized with each side hiding behind walls of rock separated by a flat, open stretch at the center of the battlefield.
“Okay, okay,” Brewer sat behind a boulder and contemplated the situation as shots from both sides flew back and forth.
“Squads one, two, and three on this line,” Brewer referred to the natural divider separating his army from the no-man’s land between the belligerents.
“Remember, General,” Reverend Johnny advised. “These fiends have proven themselves to be the cleverest of our adversaries. They seem to share our own species’ devilish love for the combat arts.”
Jon nodded and barked new orders, “Fink, get me a squad on each flank and keep the rest in reserve.”
Captain Fink radioed orders as he moved to personally oversee the deployments.
“Reverend, get the mortar teams organized. I want no more than three shots in a row from the same position. These son-of-a-bitches know all about counter-battery fire.”
“Let us pray,” the Reverend told Jon, “that they did not see fit to bring their own batteries with them to this snowy Hell.”
“Amen, brother.”
While Johnny saw to his orders, Jon Brewer hunted down three of his best snipers. As he led them to the front lines, two of those snipers went down with enemy fire in their foreheads. Apparently the Vikings trained sharpshooters, too.
He observed that the aliens did not sit and wait. They unloaded the cargo belts carried by their big furry lizards and removed gear from storage compartments on those giant, motorized tricycles. Just as the humans planned a strategy of attack, so did the aliens.
In fact, both species concentrated on preparing defenses and plotting assaults to the extent that neither saw the cloud on the western horizon; a low hanging twirling mass like a dust storm or a tornado, gray and white and slowly spinning its way toward them.
Brewer summoned his command staff.
“Reverend, what type of ordnance did we bring along for the mortars?”
“Standard high explosive and some white phosphorous. Would you prefer to blow them up or burn them?”
“I want to lay down some Willy Pete in front of their lines. That should give us a good smoke screen.”
Fink, rubbing his gloves together for warmth, said, “And heat things up, so there’s another plus.”
“Dear heavens,” the Reverend ignored Fink. “I do not think our foes will be fooled. A smoke screen means attack.”
“I reckon they won’t be,” Brewer said in his best Jerry Shepherd imitation. “But I don’t plan to go head on at them. You will.”
Reverend Johnny gulped.
“Relax, Rev,” Brewer smiled. “I want you to take one squad and make a hell of a lot of noise. Let them think we’re coming at them through the smoke. I’ll take a force around the eastern flank and try to get at their rear area.”
“Mr. Brewer, I believe your plan runs a very high risk not only to my own precious life, but in its success. They are well entrenched on their side of this redoubt.”
Almost in answer to Johnny’s observation, the first of the Vikings’ terrible artillery shells fell. A blast of concussion hit a few feet from two men pulling supplies off a dog sled. It seemed more an explosion of silence, a sort of anti-noise, followed by an unimpressive weak shockwave causing the men and dogs to topple over; but no shrapnel.
A half-second later, a glowing red singularity in the center of the blast radius sucked everything in like a vacuum swallowing air. The men, the dogs, and several heavy crates flew into that red center where every molecule of matter-flesh and equipment-disintegrated.
Fortunately, the big boulders and stone ridges filling the rocky ‘island’ mitigated the kill zone of the alien artillery, yet it was still a frightful sight.
Jon spoke with a renewed sense of urgency, “We can’t sit here and slug it out! We’ll just keep taking casualties and lose time!”
A gentle thwump-thwump-thwump signaled human mortars responding. Satisfying sounds of explosions and alien screams came from the Vikings’ half of the rocky plateau.
Brewer winked at Johnny and said, “I think you’re the best guy for this because you sure can make a lot of noise.”
“Like thunder, Mr. Brewer! Like thunder!”
Jon patted his friend on the shoulder and reminded, “Have your teams switch over to WP and lay down that smoke screen.”
General Brewer then summoned a force of thirty men and a half-dozen Siberian Huskies. They gathered at the eastern edge of the rocks.
At the center of the island, mortar rounds fell on the rough plain in front of the Viking lines. The white phosphorous shells exploded like brilliant white fireworks and simmered on the ground. A blast of heat swept over the battlefield; ice around the impact zone melted to water. As the shells burned, they released clouds of smoke, creating a visceral wall in front of the enemy’s eyes.
The Reverend and his men shot wildly into that cloud then proceeded forward, slow and low. The aliens answered with blind fire of their own.
On the eastern flank, Jon heard the frantic gunfire, his cue to launch the assault. His force left the rock and jogged across the frozen glacier at the rim of the island, moving north and staying low. He hoped to hit his foe on their flank.
Just as he dared dream the plan might work, enemy soldiers popped up from hiding spots along the stone walls. The Vikings had anticipated the attack and now unleashed a volley of merciless fire from cover.
The two men standing to either side of General Brewer fell. The rest of his team returned fire but held little hope of dislodging the defenders from the rocky battlements.
“Fall back! Fall back!” the General commanded as he threw a grenade to cover their retreat.
More of the Empire’s fighters died as they ran, even more suffered injuries. Jon grabbed and carried a young woman trooper when an alien round shattered her knee cap.
Two more Viking artillery blasts hit the retreating assault force, one a clean miss but the second sucked in four men. The Viking artillery was brutally efficient, allowing no middle ground. Either you were caught in the blast radius and pulled in to your death or not.
The enemy batteries stopped firing. Viking troops jumped from cover to pursue Jon’s force along the eastern flank, going from defense to offense.
Brewer and company reached the protective walls on their side of the battle where they were joined by reserve troops commanded by Captain Fink. This time the Vikings suffered the bl
oody nose and were forced to withdraw after losing eight of their number killed and several more wounded.
At that point, Reverend Johnny called off his diversionary assault. The lines settled and the combatants exchanged sporadic gunfire across the no-man’s land.
General Brewer gathered his two officers again.
“We’re in a stalemate here,” he told them between heavy exhales as he caught his breath. “We’re in the same boat, too. No re-supply out here. No more bullets and no reinforcements. We’ve got wounded now, and so do they. If one side bolts to head for the objective, they’ll be ripped apart by the other firing from cover.”
Casey Fink pointed out, “As long as both sides are hiding in these rocks, seems like the arty can’t do much damage. But we make a run for it and we’ll be creamed. Probably lose half our guys before we make it half a mile.”
Johnny added, “And I assure you, Captain Fink, that our mortar teams would do the same to those vile invaders if they attempt to make a dash.”
“We can’t stay here forever,” Brewer said. “We need something to change the equation. A weapon…a tactic. Something that either forces them from cover or covers us while we get out of here and continue on to the coordinates for the objective.”
Reverend Johnny changed the conversation: “Good God, what in Lucifer’s name is that?”
Aggravated, tense chatter rose like a chorus from the soldiers guarding the western flank.
A whirlwind of gray and white bore down on the island. A wall of spinning air pushing across the snow now within half a mile of the battle. It moved with a whoosh, not quite the roar of a twister.
Brewer raised his binoculars.
The whirlwind slowed…slower; and became less a cyclone and more a cloud.
Jon doubted his eyes as he watched what happened next. The cloud sort of pulled back-collapsing in-as if it were a fog machine set to reverse.
As the mist receded, the particles of the cloud meld together and forms took shape, not exactly walking through its vapors, but being born from them.
A line of figures…an army…materialized.
Humanoid and wearing hooded gray cloaks they marched forward across the glacier slowly but deliberately as the cloud continued to evaporate.
Jon watched through his field glasses. Most of their bodies were covered by those heavy cloaks but he could see their faces, or what passed for faces: skeletal with black eye sockets and elongated jaws.
“Wow,” he mumbled but even that word did not fit what happened next.
The cloud sucked rearward and evaporated, revealing one more monstrosity.
A giant. An eight-story tall giant with a skinny body, a slack jawed humanoid face, and eyes devoid of both sanity and intelligence. It dragged two dangling, extremely long arms the knuckles of which scraped the snow as the thing lumbered forward behind the mass of robed foot soldiers.
“Lord have mercy on our souls,” Johnny prayed.
But mercy was in short supply on the frozen flats of the Arctic Circle.
“I need guns over here!”
Fink did not respond; the approaching line of horrific creatures mesmerized the man. They looked more like demons than aliens.
Jon grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him. “Get me four squads over here, now! Double time, Captain!”
Fink blinked and stammered, “What about…what about the Vikings?”
“Keep firing on them, too!”
Fink raced off.
Reverend Johnny gasped, “What are these creatures? Some kind of wraiths from the depths of the underworld, I fear.”
“Whatever they are,” Brewer answered, “they’re coming for us.”
“Dear heavens, yes, I see we are now fighting a two-front war!”
Screams of shock, barked orders, and scattered exchanges of fire with the Vikings reverberated through the human side of the rock island, reaffirming Johnny’s fear.
The army of Hell spawn split into three groups. One body remained out of range. One phalanx each headed toward both groups on the rock formation. The giant sort of stood between the two, looking dumb.
“They’re going after the Vikings, too,” Brewer said loud enough for Johnny to hear. “I guess they’re not part of the happy family.”
“I take some solace in that, General. I also am comforted in that unless my eyes are failing, these wraiths do not bear any weapons.”
Through his binoculars, Brewer confirmed the Reverend’s observation but noted, “That only makes me more nervous. What exactly are they bringing to the party?”
Fink returned with the extra squads. They assembled on the western flank. Most of the men did not fire; they stood or knelt and watched the approaching horde with gaping jaws.
“God damn it! Fire!” Brewer shouted.
The first round of shots missed wide. However, the pop and bang of gunfire attracted the attention of the giant.
Enemy troops parted to make way for the tall beast. At first, Jon thought it might march right over to his men and step on them. But no, it stayed a good three hundred yards away.
A bullet from a Viking sharpshooter whizzed by Jon’s head. He dove to the ground, crawled to cover, then shouted for Fink’s attention.
“Get over to the northern perimeter. Do not forget about the Vikings. Hold that line.”
Fink nodded absently.
Jon repeated with more emphasis, “Captain. hold the line.”
“Yes…Yes Sir!”
Fink scrambled off.
Someone on the western wall yelled, “What the Hell?”
The giant raised its long arms over its head with clenched fists where they hovered for a moment. Without a roar. Without a scream. Without any emotion, the giant swung its long arms down and pounded its fists onto the snow
An earthquake poured forth. A focused channel of underground energy rumbled and rolled across the glacier like a subterranean cruise missile pushing a comet’s trail of snow above and behind.
“ Mother fucker…incoming!!”
The seismic ordnance slammed into and through the rock formation. The ground there shook like San Francisco in ’89. The earth ripped open in a crevice cutting into the plateau.
Three men toppled into the newly formed hole as did a dog sled, pulling six yapping K9s with it. Jon himself tottered on the brink only to be steadied by Reverend Johnny’s firm grip.
The line of hooded demonic attackers continued to approach.
The human soldiers regrouped along the defensive wall and fired with renewed enthusiasm.
Bullets slammed into Wraiths one after another. Instead of falling, their bodies evaporated into dust that blew off in the wind leaving behind empty cloaks fluttering to the ground.
“They are as fragile as fine china!” Reverend Johnny shouted. “Let us smash them!”
One of the fiends slightly tilted its head, opened its mouth unnaturally wide, and let out a sound to make Mephistopheles tremble.
‘wwwwwhhhHHAAAAAAAAAAAAA”
A shimmering, focused cone of scream traveled through the air and enveloped a soldier. He dropped his rifle and clutched the hood of his parka just before his head exploded, splashing red gore on the man’s white clothing. His lifeless body hovered for a moment then flopped to the ground.
“For this is what the LORD says: I will send terror upon you and all your friends, and you will watch as they are slaughtered by the swords of the enemy!”
Reverend Johnny stood on the defensive ledge and let loose a lethal wave of machine gun rounds, evaporating two then three of the skeletal beings.
Yet they moved forward.
‘wwwwhhhhhhahhHHHHAAAAA”
Another…then a second Imperial soldier suffered Wraith screams. Two more heads exploded.
The Vikings, meanwhile, continued to fire at the humans but also faced the new threat. They turned their catapult-like artillery on the Wraiths. The first shot smashed into a wave of enemies crossing the glacier toward the Vikings’ position.
Then the creatures unleashed their song of death on the Vikings. The tops of two ponchos popped like sick balloons; bloody goggles went flying.
Another Viking artillery round hit the Wraith formation.
The giant took aim at a new target. Its massive arms swung toward the sky, hovered for a moment, then crashed to the surface once again. The earth moved as if the monster had flicked one end of a jump rope.
The Vikings scattered as the earthquake hit amidst the artillery battery. The crew and the machine wobbled then fell into a new fissure in the ground. Artillery shells burst on their way down causing an explosion to roar from the crevice.
While both sides battled the Wraiths, Captain Fink and his counterpart on the Viking side continued to exchange fire. Sharpshooters plugged enemies, machine and rail gun rounds raced back and forth between the two camps. Smoke from expended cartridges joined frosty exhales to create a fine white frost hovering over the pandemonium.
Military tactics deteriorated into mayhem in this three-way battle.
Explosions. Screams. Dirt and snow, rock and bloody body parts flying through the air; soldiers running to and from cover, firing and hiding, reloading and gasping for breath.
On the western wall of the human camp, Reverend Johnny stood tall in defiance of the demons, wielded his machine gun and cursed, “You crushed the heads of the wicked and laid bare their bones from head to toe!”
His bullets blasted to pieces two Wraiths, but a third dropped its jaw and focused on the loud man with the big weapon. Its scream took form and shimmied directly for the Reverend.
Jon Brewer tackled him, machine gun and all. The cone of noise hit the rock formation he stood upon a split second before and it shattered into pebbles.
Jon poked his head up from cover.
Most of the first wave of Wraiths had been dusted by both the human army and the Vikings. Yet a substantial number of the things remained, clustered near their giant hundreds of yards from the rocky plateau. No doubt they could stay out there and launch earthquakes, inflicting casualties and a loss of supplies that Jon could not afford to lose.
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