Chapter 3: Vikings?

The three helicopters were the first group to return to the base on Cudlow B; they were dropped onto the road just to the east of the base. The prisoners, so terrified to get on the helicopters in the first place, were now terrified to get off. One by one they were pulled off and pulled to the side. Watchdog Three lifted off first and returned to the Cudlow B landing pad.

Colonel Fowler spoke on the intercom to Captain Jones. “After you drop us off head over to the landing pad. We’ll replace the ammo you fired, simplify the paperwork.”

“Sounds good to me, Colonel.” The paperwork in having the Brits fire in support of the Americans, and transferring the costs around, would be a nightmare.

Then it became a nightmare for real. Colonel Fowler sent as many trucks as could be had to the west, to pick up the first group of prisoners. A medic came up to him and Captain Kowalski immediately afterwards. “Sir, we have a problem.”

“What’s that ... Sergeant Harris?” He didn’t know the man, but he read his name off his uniform. He could also see he was a medic.

“Sir, are these really Vikings?”

Kowalski shrugged and gave a perplexed look. “No idea, Doc. Why? Trying to figure out how time travel works?” replied Kowalski.

“Sir, I flew out and in with Raven Two. I had a good look at a few of the ... whatever, prisoners, Vikings, who knows. Sir, they have fleas and lice.”

Fowler began to get a bad feeling. “And?”

“Sir, if these guys really are Vikings, from the Middle Ages and all, we need an immediate quarantine! Fleas are carriers for bubonic plague, among other diseases! We need to wash up immediately, them and us, and disinfect anything they might have contacted.”

Fowler stared at the medic for a few seconds, and then swore under his breath. He turned to Captain Kowalski and said, “Joe, get over to the landing pad and keep them from lifting off. Bring that helo pilot back. This just got even more complicated.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And get some trucks after those other prisoners or whatever.”

“Yes, sir.” Kowalski took off before the colonel could give him any more jobs. He got to the helipad as the two helicopters were getting some ammo cans to replace what they had fired earlier. They had fired some NATO standard 7.62mm with tracers mixed in to cut the road behind and in front of the second group; they had been suitably cowed into submission. It was vastly simpler for the Rangers to replace the rounds fired from their own stocks, which could be listed as ‘Used in training’, than to go through the rigamarole of having the Brits report the usage and then bill the US Army.

Kowalski flagged down Captain Jones before he had the chance to go anywhere. “You need to come back to see Colonel Fowler before you can leave, either of you.”

“What’s up?”

“He’ll explain it, but you can’t go yet.” Kowalski didn’t want to be the one to tell Captain Jones that he and his crews were now quarantined for plague!

Jones shrugged and told his copilot, then climbed into Kowalski’s Humvee. He got back in time to see the first trucks begin trundling down the gravel road towards the first group of prisoners. Jones did not take well to the idea of a medical quarantine. “You’re telling me that my guys might have fleas and lice with disease now?” he asked incredulously.

Sergeant Harris answered for his colonel. “Maybe, but we can’t be sure. Captain, I am sure that the British Army inoculated you just like they did all of us, so you are probably quite safe. However, fleas and lice tend to jump around a lot. If they were on the prisoners, and I can tell you I saw them, they are now in your birds. You fly home, they will jump onto the next sorry bastard who climbs on board.”

“That’s if these people really are time-traveling Vikings, right? You do realize how crazy that sounds,” Jones commented.

Fowler nodded and said, “Better safe than sorry.” He turned to Kowalski and said, “Captain, did you go on that ship or whatever it is?”

Kowalski looked around and caught the eye of one of the troops who had flown with him and motioned him over. “I looked it over, but Specialist Beekman actually climbed in to look for anybody trying to hide.”

Specialist Walter Beekman nodded and said, “I mean, I don’t know what a real Viking ship looks like, but I can tell you this thing didn’t look modern. It looked hand-made, for one thing.”

“What do you mean? I’ve seen people build boats. You can buy kits,” replied Fowler.

‘Yes, sir, but those kits have regular lumber, you know, cut with saws in a lumber mill, everything a standard size. The boards and wood I saw looked irregular and had tool marks.”

“Huh.”

“Another thing, sir. I was looking everywhere. I didn’t see any engine. A boat that size, even if it’s a sailboat, wouldn’t they have an emergency engine?” asked the Specialist.

Kowalski and Fowler looked at each other in confusion, but it was the British pilot, Jones, who answered. “No engine of any kind?”

“Not that I saw. Maybe they were hiding an outboard somewhere, but I doubt it. And if they had one, why not use it? They had only part of a mast, and what looked like a lot of water in the bilges. If the motor was for emergency use, wouldn’t that count as an emergency?”

Jones looked at the others. “You said the Royal Air Force reported a cabin cruiser?”

“They said it was something the size of a cabin cruiser,”, said Kowalski, “and that thing is bigger than a cabin cruiser.”

“Maybe, but they were basing that judgment off a radar return. A wooden ship without any metal in it might give off the same return as a smaller boat with an engine,” replied the pilot.

Everybody was looking at each other in disbelief. It was Fowler who made the final decisions. “Okay, we don’t know what we really have here, but it sounds pretty strange. Captain, you and your guys are just going to have to stay the night, at least until we figure this out. Tell them they can’t tell anybody what they saw. I want a total blackout on this until we know more. I’ll call your Major Smythe when I go inside. For one thing, you need to tell us how to disinfect and fumigate a helicopter! Captain Kowalski, we need to figure out someplace to put these people where we can keep them under control. Right now, they are prisoners, but I don’t want them to think we’ve got them in prison. When they get here, we want to examine them and their clothing and weapons. Same for that boat. Send a crew out there and strip it bare, bring it back here.”

“Roger that, sir,” said Kowalski.

“Yes, Colonel, understood,” added Jones.

“Captain, I know you’re British and not under my command, but give me a chance to talk to Smythe. I don’t know what we have here, but if it is time-traveling Vikings, we have a major problem, don’t you think?”

Jones swallowed and nodded. “Yes, Colonel, I think that will be the understatement of the century!” Kowalski had a driver take the pilot back to the helipad to try and figure out how to fumigate three helicopters.

Helga Ingesdottir had never been so scared in her life. She had been left in charge of the small encampment while her father and the men had gone in search of whatever was on the island, but that hadn’t been a problem. No, the problems had started when the men hadn’t returned, but the dragons had come looking for them. One had flown in from the sea, but had then flown away, only to return later with two more dragons. Then men had come down to the beach and captured her small group and forced them up from the Frijhof to the bluffs above them. That was when she found the dragons sitting there, with more men around them. They had all screamed and tried to run away, but they were all herded towards the dragons.

Helga and her group were all thrown into the bellies of the dragons and were followed by the strange men. They wore green and brown clothing, and their faces were painted in strange colors. The men tied them up with odd white bindings and then tied them into the bellies of the dragons. The men weren’t cruel, but they spoke in a strange language that nobody had ever heard before and ignored the wails and pleading of the women and children.

Then the real fear grew! The dragons roared, and their wings began moving too fast to be seen, and the dragons lifted into the air and began flying. The cries became screams and the strange men had to grab some of the women who began struggling to escape. It was only a few minutes later that the dragons landed near some odd-looking buildings. The men untied the women and pulled them and the children and the injured men from the dragons. They were pulled to an area where more of the strange men were standing, and then the dragons flew away. Even though nobody was cruel to them, it was obvious they were prisoners and were to stay where they were put.

A short while later more dragons showed up, though these dragons crawled along the ground like giant wagons. They came from the west, and the women discovered the dragons were full of the men in the search party. All their weapons were missing, and the strange men were carrying a large green bag. The western group was turned loose and directed towards the women. Helga looked around for the leader of the group, Sven Halstrom. Sven was her father’s second-in-command and had been leading the western group. When she didn’t see him, she found another of the men and asked, “ Hvere er Sven?” {"Where is Sven?"}

Viggo Berg replied sadly, “Sven er ínn Valhalla.” {"Sven is in Valhalla."}

“Sven!” she wailed.

Viggo simply shook his head and gestured at the strange green bag the oddly dressed men were carrying. He told her what had happened, and then repeated it to Sven’s niece and nephew. The two groups mingled together and told how they had been captured.

The last to arrive was the eastern group, which included Torvald, Helga’s father. She ran to him as soon as he was unloaded from the rolling dragons and the groups mingled together, telling what had befallen them. Unstated but understood was that they were now surrounded by the strange men with the magical sticks that had killed Sven Halstrom, and that could easily kill them all.

When the first group of men were brought in, both Lieutenant Colonel Fowler and Captain Kowalski went over to the commanders of First and Second Platoons. “Gentlemen, how did it go?” asked the colonel.

The two lieutenants grimaced. Lieutenant Smith of Second Platoon explained what had happened with his sergeant being attacked by a man with a spear, who was then killed in turn by a young private. While both Kowalski and Fowler had already heard about the fatality, both still grimaced and shook their heads. It was Lieutenant Buckbottom of First Platoon who asked what everybody wanted to know. “Sir, are these really Vikings?”

Fowler answered, “Lieutenant, I just don’t know.”

“For what it’s worth, sir, my guys started talking to these guys on the ride back, in every language they could speak. None of them seemed to understand us.”