Amerika

A green clad figure lies belly down with legs spread. I don’t like it, but have to take the chance. Low to the ground I traverse the distance and then see round eyes turn toward me. Too round. All the signs are there. Pale face and a tongue darting swiftly in and out of the mouth, even without a word having been exchanged.

“Talk to me.”

“Contact. Fi.”¹

“Distance?”

“Three hundred meters.”

Both of us peek over the leaf-covered earthen rampart we’re hiding behind. Across a relatively open forest floor I can see a large stone wall, surely built by some rich man of sorts. The situation isn’t acute if the contact isn’t located closer. Both of us move our firearms a little.

“How many are you?”

“That…I am not allowed to say by my Lord.”

“But you brought the entirety of the lodge?”

“Yes.”

I notice the traits. Pointy chin, despite the paleness still reddish cheeks, a little malnourished, which could explain the eyes that are larger than only fear should indicate. I don’t trust those I know, and trust strangers even less. But he didn’t shoot me when I arrived.

“When did this happen?”

“I know nothing. I was awakened, and we have been here since.”

“How many are they?”

“I…I don’t know.”

“Something you must be able to tell. If they are three, ten, thirty or a hundred.”

“I don’t know.”

We are interrupted by a booming salvo of shots. Soon the entire forest resounds with scattered shooting. They’re certainly here.

To my own unease I see tracers glide in our direction from the right and left. Low. Not high. That could indicate…The sound of heavy staccato follows the display of lights.

“That is a heavy machine gun,” I say. “Russian.”

Dutifully we add our weapons. The boy child I’m talking to has a simple rifle. I have a HK516 with a holo-sight. The digital rangefinder lets me lay each shot just over the edge of the wall. Enough to make anyone keep their knob down. But it worries me that I don’t see the position. And what if…what if it is us who are closest to the contact?

I grip hard around the collar of a field jacket and yank with all my might. The boy child comes with a gasp, and both of us slide down the tiny earthen rampart. Not a moment too soon. The earth is ripped up and thrown into the air by the impacts. No cover is enough against that caliber. Together we gasp for a while in a ditch, while new impacts dig in the rampart above us.

“They have sighted in on us,” I say. “You will remain laying here, and don’t try shooting again.”

“I understand.”

I leave the position. Crawling at first, then running. Everywhere the sound of rattling and blasts radiates. This entire forest is surely filled with the same green clad figures. I fear they by accident will shoot me down. But it was they who asked for help. By an opening behind a root, I find the opportunity I was searching for. I put the small spy binoculars to my eyes, and let an enhanced vision glide over the entire area by the wall. No system to it. For that I have no time.

The machine gun position is camouflaged by branches some distance behind the wall. Even from here I can see it’s standing on a tripod. Definitely Russian. The slow fire rate already gave me the suspicion. And I understand more of what’s going on.

Usually, most contacts are short-lasting. One gives what one has with all calibers before both parties withdraw. But Fi has come here with a small truck I barely can make out behind the housing belonging to the stone wall. That should indicate around twenty men. They cannot withdraw, because the country road leading away would make the vehicle an open target. And this is the territory of the lodge. They cannot withdraw. There is nothing to withdraw towards.

It is right before I’m heading back when the worst news arrive. A head pops up over the wall and disappears right after. I blink a little and consider what I saw. Green field cap and a large red beard. Now I understand why they’re shooting so well.

With this information I make my way back to the starting point. I find my own lodge spread out in a firing position on each side of the gravel road leading up here.

The most forward figure rises as I come in view. Cold eyes consider me.

“Report?”

“Contact. Fi. They have a heavy machinegun of a Russian type. Around twenty men.”

“Why have they not withdrawn?”

“They cannot withdraw. They are caught. The road they came here with goes through open terrain. “

In the small duration of time several more have positioned themselves around me, in addition to the tall grown man I’m talking to.

“Neither can we negotiate,” I say. “That’s because…”

“Why not?” I hear a voice from my side.

“I’m talking!” I sneer and whirl around with my fist. I hit and a broad face is cast to the side.

I know how to provoke those easily ignited and those far, far stronger than me. A bull’s neck is lowered and large fists are clenched, while the man comes rushing in my direction. My body clenches. Bullets are one thing. Being beaten like a dog is something else.

The tall grown one plants a boot in the man’s belly, so he falls to the ground and stays there crouched together.

“You were saying?”

“They are Chechens.”

Everywhere there is the sound of spread cursing. Africans are the easiest opponents. Those one can frighten with superstition, and their shooting is miserable. The same with Arabs, who will often stand with their weapons lifted over their heads and shoot blindly over walls and along house corners. Sometimes they have the occasional good sniper, most often a 12-year-old or a woman. Fear keeps them at bay. But Chechens? Many will say they are better than us. They are the best the enemy has.

The tall grown one paces back and forth with his arms behind his back. Listens while I explain where the machine gun position is located.

I cast a glance at the people around me. My lodge. How many names have we had? That I don’t accurately remember. There are three brothers, all similar of temperament and just as ill of mouth. One of them still lies struggling on the gravel road. Fortunately, they forget fast. All in all, thirty-three souls capable of bearing arms, in addition to our helpers at the home base. Usually we don’t let women fight, but a woman is with us. For the purpose she is crazed enough, and large and heavy of body. The long, tangled hair in red hidden behind a bandana makes her look like a troll. I know the names of them all. And there is of course the tall grown man who leads us. If I’m heartless, someone has filled the remaining hollow of his heart with concrete.

He finally stops.

“We’ll form a battlegroup. I will join in council with the leader. Most probably there will be a flank attack.”

To my surprise I’m not allowed to join the battlegroup of altogether twelve warriors. The troll with tangled red hair is of course with them. And the brothers, including the one who was flattened by a boot. The high-grown one takes the weapon with holo-sights away from me.

“You gave me it.”

“Now I take it. Do you protest?”

“No, Lord.”

Instead, he hands me a strange, large and clumsy weapon from the jeep. It takes some time before I understand what it is. An AG-3, what the Norwegian army used in the Utopian-time. When the globalists™ understood that the people would rise, they got the most part of such weapons melted down. Only a few criminals managed to hide away some equipment. Upon an improvised rail is a scope of primitive optics. Mild heavens. Not am I not allowed to join the battlegroup, but I have to fight with a relic from a museum.

“You are to cover us. Do you understand how the sight functions?”

I take out the magazine, see that it is fully loaded with some strangely large rounds. Take a glance through the scope and see the numbers float together.

The charging handle strikes back. “That I do, Lord.”

His voice resounds, so that everyone, including the enemy, must hear it. My voice could never carry this way, and therefore I’m not a leader.

“HOLD FIRE! HEIDRUN COMES!”

He brings the battlegroup with him. All us others go into position. I find my way back to the boy child, who looks a little surprised when he recognizes me and see I have a new weapon.

It takes its time. A messenger creeps forward and gives us updates now and then. There will be an attack. There will not be an attack. Finally, it is decided that there will be an attack. They know where the machine gun position is. When they have taken it out, we are to give covering fire, while the flank attack is initiated. To keep Fi from understanding that something is in the making, some give fire like idiots from one time to another. Something Fi must have understood, for they stopped answering with their own fire. Perhaps they’re saving ammunition.

But we can hear them shouting for their mongrel god.

A deep rumble announces that the high explosive missile has taken out the machine gun position. As I lift my snout over the earthen rampart, I see a black smoke cloud rise above the scene. I hurry to get the weapon in place and observe wall and landscape through old fashioned optics. The blasts from almost a hundred weapons are resonating. I and the boy child add our own voice. The bolt of his rifle goes back and forth. Click. Click. Click. I shoot far faster and have to change magazines. Even the rifle caliber most likely doesn’t penetrate the granite, but grey dust rises for each impact. It’s probably no fun being on the other side.

As in a dream I see the battlegroup nearing the flank to the left. I observe the swift, almost floating figures from my side vision, all the while doing my best to cover them. Crouched together they are nearing in. A hundred meters. Fifty meters. Twenty meters. They’ll soon be there.

Up from the edge of the wall rises the same Chechen and points towards them with an AK. His entire upper body is over. I don’t think, I see and let the scope glide swiftly over the figure and pull the trigger. A pink cloud stands up from the green clad head. A star hit. So much so I can never repeat the feat. Just after that, a dozen hand grenades ten fly over the wall toward the enemy. The detonations come one after the other. They run in and let automatic fire flash from the barrels of modern weapons.

What is a sort of silence lasts only a minute or so, but it feels like an hour. A barrel with the head dress of the troll appears over the wall, and swings back and forth. It is over, and we can come out. I am careful by nature and not the first to get up. My balls are drenched in sweat. But it’s finally over. Shivering I make my way over the forest landscape together with scattered flocks from two different lodges, both mine and those of the boy I encountered.

As I arrive, they’ve already had time to line up the bodies along the wall. They are all most definitely Chechens. All of them have large beards and the crude, primitive trait that belongs to that race of people. Twenty-five altogether, I count.

“It was you that fired that shot?” asks the tall grown one.

“Yes, Lord.”

He now stands together with the leader of the other lodge. This is a blonde man, with the same pointy chin and the same reddened face. I attempt to analyze the traits. Definitely quite farmer-like. This is probably a greedy and quite narrow-minded man.

“You do agree that we deserve the prey?”

“Yes,” says the farmer man.

“You know what you have to do.”

That is the starting shot for frantic activity. Everything resembling a usable weapon is lifted and tested, and then carried away. The truck starts and idles. Even the clothes and boots on the corpses are pulled off. What is holed through gets cast aside, the rest is put in a small heap. The Chechens have by and large the same uniform-clothing that we have, a holy mix of military effects in olive and camouflage patterns, unfortunately some of the idiotic coyote-color of the Americans that is not at all suitable here. None of us lacks clothing, but it can be nice to provide for those who come stumbling by. There are far more pants than field jackets and field shirts, I notice, but the redhaired one I took the head off of provides us with both.

“Let a corpse remain dressed,” I say.

“Let a corpse remain dressed,” says the tall grown one.

He turns toward the farmer.

“We have helped you twice now.”

“Do you want the compensation now?”

“Yes.”

Together with some of my comrades, we bring along the dead Chechen in the front seat of the jeep, with the seat belt prudently fastened, and drive a distance down the road from where they came. We bring along one of their typical AK-guns. In a suitable place, well visible, I put the dead body over the weapon which now is without bullets. I unpin a hand grenade, which I wedge underneath the chest of the dead one. All parties have by now learned that they are not to turn corpses haphazardly. It’s a very old trick. But I know that the temptation will be too great when it comes to fetching a functioning automatic weapon. Greed and eagerness take away care. Those who want to examine what happened with this patrol will probably get a surprise. All of ours will know we’re creating such traps.

There are three dead in the other lodge. Such skirmishes are unfortunately not without losses. It is the heavy machine gun that is behind all those who have fallen. It could easily have been me and that young boy. Now as that weapon is blown to the heavens, neither can we use it. Only one of ours were hit. One of the brothers in the battlegroup got a grazing shot over his arm. Not too serious. The tall grown one pours spirits over the wound, bandages it, and says his wife in camp will look at it.

No point in waiting. Our own dead are buried in a short ceremony. The conquered truck is loaded full with naked corpses. I know the grotesque purpose. In a gathered column we make our way to the main quarters of the other lodge. In the distance I see a black cloud grow toward the heavens in turning spirals.

~*~

Another encounter from another time: We are tightly packed like herring and too tired to even jest in the backseat of the jeep. He has not said a word to us for five hours. The front seat looks empty, but I know who is sitting there.

A long-stretched tone. The lamp is shining. This lasts perhaps a second, before the brakes dig in. Since we’re sitting without seat belts upon side benches, we’re pressed forward under the weight of the abrupt stoppage. Right after that we back up at an insane speed. Car and hanger disappear into a side road.

“Out.”

Nauseous and panting we stumble out into the free air, loosen the hanger, and are almost mowed down by the jeep that backs up onward. The cover is pulled off and heavy equipment is nearly lifted above the heads of the men. They are strong, I’ll give them that. I wince when someone pushes a jagged rail straight into my body.

“Faster! Faster! What do I have you for!” yells our Lord, who in sprint has appeared after having parked the jeep someplace out of sight.

The rails are folded out on jagged feet that dig themselves into the earth, and the gyroscope of fifty kilos with a glass eye is lifted unto it. To the right the missile is attached. To the left a seat is unfolded. Someone rolls out a wire to the computer unit where our leader already turns some knobs and listens with a headset held next to his ear.

“The dry batteries ought to function, else I don’t know what I will do…”

Apparently, he has gotten in touch with the unit, for his face straightens.

“Lord, who is to shoot?” someone asks.

“Scout.”

Immediately I’m surrounded. The weapon upon my chest is removed and I’m almost carried away to the seat. They unbutton my jacket and pull it off. Even rip off the shirt so I’m sitting there bare-chested. The cap disappears and is replaced by some huge earphones that close out the world. The hands over me even stroke away some hair from my face. Someone massages my shoulders. I know what this care means.

The world I find myself in is one of ticking, screeching sounds, and a hologram that swims before my eyes in what is at first incomprehensible lines. I have long since learned to focus upon the most important thing first, and find the tiny triangle that marks the target. Ten percent of the effort gives a hundred percent of the result. The rest are details. The sound upon my ear has become a howling.

A voice crackles. “Do you find the given direction?”

The missile is raised and points to a spot in the sky like a deadly finger. The directional tone gives me peace and have become just an expectant ticking.

I know how this weapon could be made better. There could have been a voice. They could have alternated the sound for each ear to indicate direction. And the steering mechanism? No error is tolerated before you lose contact with the missile. It is not enough to have the training. It is not enough to be ice cold. Focus must be preserved until the final end. The advantage is that no power upon the earth can decoy the missile.

Even capsuled inside the earphones, I can hear the cursing.

“Idiots! You are to scout in each direction!”

I know that behind me they are scanning in each direction with binoculars.

“The target is slow and small,” says the voice that is in touch with both the radar network and me. “Fifteen kilometers. Fourteen.”

The sky I see through the sights is grey and endless and swallows my thoughts. I feel a strange sensation of peace.

“Twelve. Eleven. The target ought to be visible soon.”

By one mile² they get the machine in their binoculars. After a while I too see a tiny spot through the sights. It takes a long time before we understand what it is, even though I should have been able to guess it from the slow speed and the modest size. A drone? Who can afford such things? Nobody produces them anymore.

“Fire at seven kilometers.”

The peace I’m feeling remains. In any case there’s someone’s eye hovering above. I wonder if the contraption has a warhead.

The answer provides itself.

“The target has increased its speed.”

The dot has dipped down and comes diving in an elegant half-arch. My earphones have started howling again. I desperately try to accommodate their distressed calls. The finger draws a line down the sky. Now I am upon the target again. Following, following the dive.

“The target has detected the laser beam, not us. Remain calm.”

The dive has become a free fall. The monster wishes to be right above the ground while searching.

“You have ten seconds before evacuation.”

It is impossible to track the target, shoot, and steer at the same time. I rip off the earphones and cast them away. The world comes swishing back, but the directional tone is gone. With full force I pull the missile down and unlock the switch upon my left hand. The gyroscope springs to life, humming and scraping, while a corridor of laser to guide it is cast low over the landscape. The target is not in sight. I press in the firing-button with my left thumb. A swish and a plopping sound comes when the missile leaves the tube.

The missile moves erratically in the rhythm of a removed logic, where the only parameter is the laser-corridor. Don’t look at the missile. Look at the sight, I think, while I squeeze my right thumb over the steering rod. That is the first and only commandment. My sight should be placed underneath the fall of the drone, but I have to make a guesswork of the distance. A determined will bound to me goes over the tree line. Now!

I raise the gyroscope and the missile makes a steep rise. My sights are dancing. Left. Right. Left. Obey! The tiny rectangle finds something with color and I force it to remain still. Right after this I see is a cloud of black smoke. It’s the proximity fuse that went off. It is…

I try to get up, but end up falling.

“Did I get it?”

The jubilant roar hits me at the same time as I’m torn down by ten wild horses.

“You got it! You got it!”

Together we watch the black cloud of smoke float over the landscape. The drone is gone. The proximity fuse goes off at the distance of ten meters and has thoroughly holed the monster with glowing wolfram-cores. It is fantastic. Such a small target.

I’m thrown to the ground and a large, drooling face is closing in. While I fight and flail, I’m being kissed by the troll. I’m lifted over the head of the roaring flock like a trophy.

“Well done, Scout,” says the tall grown one.

It is strange, for upon the sky I see two black birds wheel around, all the while I’m being turned in the opposite direction by countless arms. The sight is dazzling.

~*~

The camp of the other lodge is a large farm built reclusively in the flat landscape here in Hedmark. They are settled; therefore, they could not move. Why do they starve when they’ve got so much fertile soil? No matter, I know I prefer the woods.

As is expected, the news about the fallen is received by quiet mourning. To be considerate, we make sure not to joke around so much or being openly merry. We stroll through a scavenged fruit garden some distance behind our two leaders.

“Since you have little in the ways of food, you will get what the Chechens had. Is there anything you have much of?”

“Alcohol.”

“Then we’ll take that. All of it. I want one more thing.”

“What then?”

“A woman. The very, very best you have.”

“Will she be treated well?”

“That I will have to hope. She is to be married.”

We arrive at the generational dwelling. The farmer man opens the door and shouts.

“Daughter. Adorn yourself and come out.”

“Why?”

“Because I say so.”

Some time passes. All around there are quiet conversations. I’m aware that now and then faces are stuck forth to look at us through windows and from behind house corners. Children for the most part. A cat strokes itself along my leg. So, then at least someone is affectionate around here.

A woman comes out in the middle of the open yard. She is dressed in a bunad with large silver brooches. The long, blonde hair hangs in braids on each side of her head. I notice the traits. A tall brow. Absurdly tall, really. A narrow, pointy chin similar to both her father and that brother I got acquainted with. She has realized something is going on. When the tall grown one leans over her and lifts each of her braids, she quickly looks over to her father.

“Can she work?”

“Not in particular.”

“Is she a virgin?”

“Of course not.”

The tall grown one squeezes hard around each narrow shoulder.

“In that case…”

He hurls her so she falls backwards into my arms with a surprised scream.

“Yours now, Scout.”

The mood lifts a little now that the decision is made. People rather get focused on stacking the alcohol together. For the most part moonshine that has been stored in a cellar, as well as bottles of plum wine, hundreds in number. We remain in each other’s arms, both of us just as struck with shock.

“I’m sorry about this,” I say.

“No, you’re not,” she says.

~*~

We can’t wait long. She is to bring her rubber boots, everyday clothing and a toothbrush on the road toward the north. Gets time to say farewell and becomes a bit friendlier inclined when she hears I rescued her brother. But she isn’t exactly pleased with the situation.

Before we can leave, there’s something that awaits. The two lodges drive there in separated columns. There is very little traffic in the air space now, but one can never know. The tall grown one lets me sit in the car with him, even though it’s in the back seat. There are two benches turned lengthwise toward each other. One of them is stuffed full with equipment. On the other side there’s only me.

“I’ve got something for you when we get there.”

“Thank you, Lord.”

We park the car and stroll the last distance along the main road that leads to Oslo, enclosed by large trees on each side. What I see I’ll never forget. Rocking in the wind are white faces, blue faces, black faces, faces that are no faces at all. Thousands upon thousands, now made equal in death.

In the distance grows a black cloud, that turns, and turns, and turns.

When we arrive, the bodies of the Chechens are already unloaded. The woman is there and stands together with her father. They probably want to use their last time together. Somebody fastens ropes around the neck of each of the corpses.

The other lodge is silent and anticipatory. With us it almost bubbles over. The tall grown one positions himself in front of us and lifts his arms.

“Who is our god?”

“ODIN!”

“SKULD!”

“SAGA!”

“THE GYGER!”

“FRØY!”

“FRIGG!”

“FRØYA!

“IDUNN!”

“THOR WITH THE HAMMER!”

The tall grown one hides his eyes. “Yes, yes, but who is the main god?”

“ODIN,” we scream. “ODIN! ODIN! OOOOOOOODINN!”

To the sound of the fanatical chanting, each of the corpses are in turn hoisted up into the trees, and are added to the great collection. You may say I’m a compulsive person. I counted on my way through the woods. And I am never mistaken about details. Nine thousand nine hundred and seventy-four hanged ones were placed on each side, as a warning that those ruined creates from the city are never to come here.

Our leader also knows the number.

“NOW HANGS NINE THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED AND NINETY-NINE BODIES FOR THE HONOR OF ODIN! THE NUMBER IS A SIGN! HE ACCEPTS US!”

Our bloodthirst rises to new heights, a little like how dead bodies are rising upwards. We shout upon the gods and what they give us. How was it again? Frøya gives us pussy. Saga reads for us. Idunn gives us food?

“No, it’s only apples.”

“Nonsense!”

Thor kills our enemies. Tyr kills our enemies. Odin kills our enemies. Do we have a god who doesn’t kill our enemies?

“Of course not,” says the tall grown one.

I know who travels with him in the car.

Some in the other lodge give themselves over to our wild roaring, others remain silent. So, we add that God is Odin and Odin is God, and that Jesus forgives us for everything. But all of us know it’s necessary. It isn’t just us who have been active with the great collection.

After the globalists™ and their accomplices destroyed the West and caused the permanent economic crisis, a great dark age began. The historians will always disagree about which events were the most important. But perhaps it wasn’t good that we lived in a near Utopia from the fifties and forward into the nineties during the last millennia. That at least is what the rumors say we did. This gave rise to a great weakness.

War was the natural result when millions were starving within the borders of Europe and America. Our cities had already fallen, our suburbs had already fallen, and hungry hordes made their way into the countryside to kill, rape, and plunder. Life became a question of survival. We had no other choice but to find our way back to each other, and find the way back into what we had discarded. Amongst it our deepest roots.

The globalists™ didn’t relent. The green shift. Agenda 2030. Covid I, Covid II, Covid III. The Great Reset. All this to retain control over something that could not be controlled. Something that wasn’t possible. It didn’t last long before UN-soldiers landed in Oslo and were to keep the peace in the country. The Americans made landfall in Finnmark. They were surely going to threaten the Russians. Endless hordes of Arabs and jihadists fought to take from us our land and our blood. This was always the purpose. It’s difficult to say which nations have fallen, and when they fell. Everything changed when the global trade system broke down. There is almost no industrial production. For that there isn’t enough natural resources. It is impossible to trade across continents. Neither is there anyone interested in buying.

The States was at one point darkened, and there never comes news from there now. But before it got dark someone had the time to push a button and delete Israel. That is something to be grateful for. The soldiers they landed in Finnmark were never retrieved. Most of them froze or starved to death, and those who remained, we killed. The Brits attempted to land commandos at our coasts. Those we cut off the heads of and put unto stakes along the edges of the beach in the honor of Njord. Any ship that closes in on our sea zone is fired upon with all weapons. There must be limits. Besides, we need the few remaining fish.

France has been divided into two parts. A Caliphate and an area for the French. Great Britain is a hell hole. In Germany and Italy, it is war-red, something that is true to tradition, if one is to trust the old books. And with us…

Oslo is ruled by Arab hordes and UN soldiers, most of them from the Congo. They never come to the countryside anymore. Because of the hanged corpses that are to be found everywhere strategically placed along the main road, the Africans believe we are demons. Something which strictly spoken isn’t far from the truth. Arabs are more pragmatically inclined and attack when they find signs of weakness. Cowardice is a quality of that race of people. But they’ve learned to fear us, and fear us more.

I know what is to be found in the great forests.

Trondheim, Stavanger, and Bergen are likewise subjugated by Arab hordes. But all of the land outside we possess, and we are slowly in the process of taking our ancient realm back. We only need some decades more. No new hordes are shipped here now. The UN and the EU have both disappeared. In Stockholm there is a Caliphate, and from there sometimes organized armies venture. They are the greatest threat.

The globalists™ managed to fill up the country with three million foreigners before the power dissolved between their hands. Therefore the entirety of our border, from Sweden in the south to Finland in the north, is cluttered with the corpses of the hanged. Three million of them, it is said. Two million foreigners and a million of our so-called own. Nowadays nobody much to the Left of Harald Hardråde is tolerated. This has again become the realm of Odin. The land of the gods. Even those who don’t believe that, can see that his ravens are present. It is said you can get lost in labyrinths of dangling corpses and never get out. So, the soldiers of the Caliphate seldom come. The wall we have created toward Sweden consists of the bodies of those we have beaten to death. An extension of Yggdrasil here upon the earth.

Well, the likes of me do not get lost in such places. I smile a little. We talk to the gods, seen through the eyes of the dead.

The Swedes that remain have themselves fled to the forests, and it is said they have taken up our customs. Some also live by their coast, and upon the islands. With time we shall help them clear the mess. In Denmark there aren’t so many forests. They prefer to drown the intruders in marshes. Germany has perhaps returned to an even more primitive level, all the way back to the bronze age. There the pyres are lighting up. The Holocaust never happened, but now it happens. The smell of fried Turk isn’t nice. The French in their divided country mark their borders with bodies impaled upon poles. Continental peoples probably take after Vlad Tepes.

As a people we have changed. We have become as we always were. I’m halfway mad, that I know. But now those I see have become equally mad. And I know from where it derives. Wotan Id Est Furor.

The last body is hoisted up. The whooshing around me grows. The cloud we have seen at a distance is a great gathering of ravens that now circle endlessly around us. The swish is that of ten thousand feathers. One of them land right at my side, so fat it’s barely able to walk.

“Scout, here is my gift to you.”

The tall grown one holds forth two gold rings that I receive. Together we walk to the woman and her father.

“I want to marry your daughter,” I say. “For that I need your and her permission.”

The farmer-man considers me. “It is up to her to say yes or no.”

“How many men have you killed?” she asks.

“With today, four.”

“Only four?”

“But he has made sure far more have been killed,” says the tall grown one. “This man is skilled. He is my best scout. He is the best man I have.”

“Is that true?”

“Yes. I never lie, and neither does he.”

“In that case,” she says and looks at me. “I say yes.”

There is no purpose in waiting. There is a short ceremony after that. Under the tree with dangling corpses, I grant her a ring which she puts upon my finger. I put the other ring upon hers.

“Now you are mine,” I say.

The tall grown one raises a simple tool hammer over his head.

“In the name of Thor, I consecrate this couple! Do you accept the marriage?”

Hand in hand we turn towards him.

“Yes,” I say.

“Yes,” she says.

“In that case I declare you to be married!”

He rubs the hammer towards her lap. “May this womb carry forth many strong children.”

The hammer glides over to me. “May this man always be strong.” He swings the hammer over his head. “It is done!”

The applause is thundering around us. The troll is the one to clap the loudest and most enthusiastically, I notice. Perhaps she’s trying to compensate for having raped me, once.

“You are now to kiss the merkin.”

In the cheering there are nobody who hears it.”

We bend forward and kiss each other. It’s the first time our lips meet. She tastes even better than I thought. She tastes like a rainbow. One kiss becomes another, and another. We keep at it for a good while.

Around us more ravens have landed, I see. Hundreds of them. All of them just as fat. They waddle around, turns towards us and lift their glistening black wings up. Puts up a violent croaking and hails us food givers with shrill cries. The sound rises in a giant quire and resounds over the whole area.

It’s really quite romantic, the whole thing.

~*~

The story doesn’t end there. We find ourselves on the road northwards. I rest my head in the lap of my wife aboard the jeep.

“My butt is itching,” she says.

“I’ll have it ventilated when we get there.”

“It’s because of all of the wool, stupid.”

The engine hums and chugs along. The tall grown one has as usual not said a word in the course of the entire trip.

“Who is he, really?” asks my wife. “And why is that seat empty?”

“He just appeared one day. Out of nothing.”

“Who was the leader then?”

“I was. But it didn’t go so well.”

“What about the seat?”

“Someone’s sitting there. Don’t you see?”

She turns silent.

“Yes…yes…I do see.”

I turn comfortably toward her belly.

“If I had a knitting needle, I would stick it in your ear.”

“Wake me when you do.”

~*~

We have taken a break by a waterfall. Both of us lean over the bridge and look at the roaring cascades of water. In the distance are the remnants of some windmills the globalists™ had put up. Most of them were torn down by angry locals, but the concrete blocks still create deep wounds in the landscape.

From her neck there hangs a golden cross, I notice.

“You are a Christian?”

“Yes.”

“Not anymore.” I rip the cross from her neck and toss it into the water. We follow the spinning journey all the way down.

“The Fossegrim can have it and give a blessing in return.”

She turns in my direction in disbelief. While I confront the thoughtful brow and the eyes that in their roundness expresses it all, I fasten a Thor’s-hammer around a woman’s neck.

“You are to act according to my wishes.”

“I wish I could hit you.”

“You can. You are a pagan woman now,” I say and fondle at her breasts.

She lets loose upon me with her small fists. Enough to make me topple and start laughing. The Valkyrie ends up above.

“Oh, you…you…”

Then it goes as it had to go. One of the savage blows hits me straight over the nose.

“Oww…” I touch the place, where blood has started running.

“Oh, I’m sorry …Oh…Oh…Oh.”

She has gone from the attack into tender care. Gently caresses my cheeks and have taken my head in her lap.

“Wipe up the blood and get in the car.” It is the tall grown one that has passed us by, without even slowing down.

She helps me to my feet. Carried upon the wind is the sound of distant roars of laughter, to be heard even above the noise of the waterfall. It’s the others who have parked somewhere down in the valley.

“Why do you laugh all the time, really?”

“Do you not understand? It’s because we’ve found ourselves.”

“You laughed even as I hit you.

I smile.

“Well, the moment I fasten a Thor’s-hammer upon you, you start hammering loose.”

“But he doesn’t laugh.” She looks in the direction of the car.

“No, he is our leader.”

~*~

I find myself safely placed in the lap as before, and look up at her while the car hums along. In my nostrils she has stuffed some pieces of paper.

“You are named after him, you know.”

“I’m not named after Thor.”

“Your name is Trudhild Åsvang, is it not?”

“It is.”

“Trud means strength, and Trudheim is the dwelling of Thor. Your name means something like Battle-Strength-upon-the-Sacrificial-fields-of-the-Æsir.”

Her fingers create pathways across my face and brow.

“What can I say. You really live up to your name. You are a strong woman, and today you have sacrificed my blood in the honor of the Æsir.”

“You live up to your name, too.”

“That is true. I’ve always been a lucky man.”

The hammer hits my forehead. Then follows the prodding breasts, as she folds herself over from above.

~*~

We arrive at a deep place in a deep forest in the depths of Trøndelag. A remote farm where the toddlers run around the yard. Our appearance is expected and they have slaughtered a couple of pigs, which now are slowly turned on spits above the fire pit.

“I know you are tired, men, but no one is allowed to rest before the last effort has been done.”

Everything of equipment and supplies are unloaded, sorted in stacks and carried away. Our trade journey has been successful. Sacks of grain, potatoes, and beans can be added to the reserves. It was on this journey we were asked for help by the other lodge. Because of that we can now add some new firearms and additional clothing. A few automatic weapons were given to the lodge, as they seemed to lack that also. And we got the hold of alcohol. Hundreds of liters of potato spirits and plum wine.

My wife is met and greeted by everyone present. It takes its time. It is decided we are to get a small cabin not far away, something we can be happy about. Our Lord and his wife, children and nearest family possesses the farm house. Ordinarily the warriors sleep in the barn. That’s grim in the winter, but the livestock gives warmth. Neither do we have electricity. As part of a campaign all power stations and all larger forms of water supply, not only into the cities, but across the entire country has been ravaged and blown to the heavens. Where we suffer, the intruders suffer more. Where we are freezing, they freeze to death. It prevents them from multiplying. This is a hard land, so hard the laws must be. We are bred for this, and they are not. It often happens we shoot at those teams that are sent from the cities to gather firewood. Ammunition we do not lack. Countless small workshops across the whole country keeps up the production. Greater in number are only the lodges that have sprung up everywhere, and the Lords that rule over them. Every single man capable of carrying arms is a warrior under their Lordship. Some women too, when the truth is to be told.

By the long tables placed outdoors, we are handed a substantial piece of meat upon a plate, together with fat poured over potatoes and carrots. This moment is sacred. All of us dig in as if there was no tomorrow. My wife doesn’t hold back much, I notice, as she greedily eats by my side. She has probably been hungry a lot. Our Lord does not eat. He only drinks a glass of wine and consider us with burning eyes. His wife, a woman with grey stripes in her hair, comes up to him with a box which she opens. He looks for a while into it, and rises. Silence rules immediately.

“Warriors! You have done well. Our strength has increased, with new weapons and new supplies, without us having suffered losses.”

We give shouts of approval and hammer upon the tables. He raises his hand.

“Tonight, you are to celebrate, and celebrate well. Very few know what the future will bring, but it may be better than you can know. Tomorrow I have new plans for you, and then you are to be what you’ve always been. Ready. Armed. Strong. Have I made myself clear!”

“Yes! Yes! YEES!” we shout.

“You are to be just as ready as one man. Scout, arise.”

One thing is combat, but I handle social pressures very poorly. Shivering I get on my feet. Especially my wife looks straight at me, I notice.

“This man,” says my Lord, “is the best among you. His shots do hit, his mind is clear and he is protected by a hidden power.”

“What power is this, Lord?” I ask.

“It’s the deadlings he talks to in the forest,” someone says.

The Lord puts his fist slowly upon the long table.

“Me.”

~*~

It is presumed we won’t be capable of finding the cabin in the twilight darkness of wights, so we are given a temporary sleeping spot in the barn. That is not tempting now, so I take my wife by the hand.

“Oh, it’s probably best to get it over with,” she says.

Bottles have been put out in stacks for everyone that wants some. She takes a bottle of plum wine. I take a bottle of booze.

“He loves you.”

“I love him. Nobody else does. Come.”

We stride across the yard, where someone is already laying knocked out. Everywhere there are loud conversations. The summer is at its height. I find the forest path.

“Tell me this,” she says. “What do you really live off at this place?”

I tell her we grow rutabaga everywhere it’s possible in the surrounding terrain. This is used as fodder for the pigs we hold in the barn. We get milk from a couple of goats and cows. In winter we fish. If we are lucky, we’ll shoot a moose.

“Is it true you talk to a god?”

“I talk to all gods.”

The woods have changed. Here I have wandered all my life. Here my strength and insight were born. Here all is to return, and I am to be reborn from the trees.

Far in there I find the place. In an oak a Commissioner of Culture is strung up. You may say he represented a Marxist™ lack of cultivation. Now he and his family are swaying poetically in the wind.

“Here?”

“Yes, it’s more enticing, after all.”

“Oh, I’m going to need a sip to manage this.”

She puts the bottle to her mouth and takes a deep sip. Turns towards me and hoists her gown well in place.

~*~

She moans dutifully enough underneath me, when it comes to it. The booze helps me persevere. The clearing under the tree gives room for dark silhouettes as onlookers.

“So, you really did save my brother?”

“Yes, I did.”

Her arms come up and squeeze around me. Her moaning becomes more wholehearted. I like her forehead, so that I kiss. There many thoughts are contained.

She thinks it’s boring to be underneath all the time and in between each occasion. So, it goes as it must go, and I’m toppled unto my back to find myself between two thighs. What is irritating with women is that they can be very difficult in negotiations. Neither does it help to beg, but after a while I gain by struggle for her breasts to be out. They are firm, small and pale in the summer darkness. I look at this and look up, and see how the stary sky gives her a crown, encompassing her hair and head in shining, twinkling speckles. I can’t help it. Have to thrust the back of my head to the ground, while moisture leaves the corner of my eyes.

“Have you been very lonely?”

“I am always lonely.”

She bends down, caresses me, kisses me with warm, wet lips.

Suddenly she starts to scream and is lifted high into the air.

“Away, girl. Now it is I who is hungry for some digging bar!”

It is the red-headed troll, who dumps my wife unto the grass and takes place above me, even as I’m on my way up.

“What is the meaning of…?”

“Quit your squeaking!”

A fist as large as a ham hits me over the jaw and makes me so dazed there is no more resistance. Routinely she lowers herself upon me and rocks back and forth. So, she had taken off her field pants beforehand. That monster! The rhythm is greedy and merciless.

“Now, handsome. Do you like it?”

I want to protest, but the answer gives itself as I moan and squeeze my eyes shut.

She gets up with a mocking laugh.

“Now I have shown you how it’s done. Good luck.”

The troll disappears somewhere in the darkness.

I’m so rampaged and shameful I have no ability to get up. Have to gasp several times, while tears continue to stream. My wife approaches me.

“That there…” she says “…is some of the funniest nonsense I have seen for a long while!”

She slaps her thighs and laughs a heartfelt laugh.

“So…so you’re not mad?” I ask, while she lies by my side and kisses upon tears and a wet face.

“Not so much. But let us hope she leaves us alone from now on!”

I know what this is. We have all gone mad in each our way. It happened when we found our way back. It’s the type of madness which makes you not care about anything. Which always makes you laugh. I awoke it in my wife, perhaps by provoking her, perhaps by taking her here. It’s a milky white membrane surrounding the brain and filling one’s body with warmth. The milk of Odin. He pours and pours of this white milk to his people, now that he has awoken. We called to him in our distress with a sacrifice of dead bodies. He has opened his eye and heard.

She wants to make love again. Doesn’t even care about the moisture of another woman. On the contrary it makes it more enticing, she thinks. So, she takes place above me and lets the night sky spin for her star veils and a blinking silvery crown. And the forces that are present makes it so that the dark vault is unraveled. Green northern lights fling about with giant arms and give her face an inhuman gleam. She takes up the apparition of a gruesome elf, that looks upon me with an open mouth, eyes that are more open, while we make love, love, love underneath the tree of corpses…

She makes me cry out in her victory. I rise and fall back, my arms helplessly at each side. And then I see…

The northern light has withdrawn, opened up and unfolded, but this time as a dancing, white wall with a gleam of rosiness. Now and then the wall is colored by the bleeding thrusts of a lance. The wall grows, grows and fills the entire horizon in swaying white pillars. Green northern light is one thing. White is rare. Now it covers everything. The heavenly phenomena shouldn’t be possible.

“Oh…” I moan with wide open eyes. “Ooooh…!”

My wife turns her body, even as she’s placed above, and looks up.

The hymn we hear is the first and the greatest.

She lies down at my side. Together we watch the divine manifestation make its play, its song and its elfin dance upon the sky. The milk of Odin. The cold certainty that fills the body with warmth…

I know the connectivity of things, and tell her as much. The certainty and Odin’s All-Seeing-Eye is the galaxy. The warm and enchanting call is the light veil across the Milky Way, where we are to pass for an eternity. The eye sees and knows. The veil connecting it calls out in love. As soon as we have washed ourselves clean in the milk, he will receive us.

We find each other’s hand.

“Our son is going to be the greatest of all explorers,” she says.

She squeezes my hand. I can see the eyes underneath the tall brow, blink.

“The very, very greatest.”

---

¹ Fi is a military shortening for fiende, meaning enemy.
² A Norwegian mile equals 10 kilometers.

Tags: dystopia, fiction, odin, post-apocalyptic