‘Pretty okay so as long as no one fires a rocket at us.’
‘Good.’
Silence and darkness. My senses are wide open. A faint clattering reaches my ears. ‘What’s that?’ I ask and the next moment the cab door opens and a draft ruffles my short hair. I pull my hood over my head.
‘Our mute friend,’ Garth says, somewhat amused.
I look down and see the dark outline of Katvar holding his rifle and his longbow, the quiver on his back is full of arrows.
I growl in frustration. ‘We are not hunting rabbit here, Katvar. Get back with the dogs and keep your head down.’
He lifts his head slowly. And then he holds up his right hand, his middle finger erect.
‘Fuck you, too,’ I say and focus on my job.
The thought of my low ammo reserves gives me a headache. When I escaped from headquarters, I could only pilfer two boxes with twenty rounds each. Now, I regret using some of my limited ammo for target practice and hunting.
Fifteen rounds are now in my left arm strap, one is in the chamber of my rifle, and the remaining two are in my breast pocket. I can’t win a battle with this, but I might be able to scare off a handful of men. Ahead of me are more than a hundred well-armed soldiers. On my side are three men — not counting drunk Oleg in Mischa’s coal box — and none of them are a good shot as far as I can tell. And even if they were, their ancient collection of weapons is laughable.
‘We have to take it slow here,’ Garth says and I can feel the pull of inertia.
The train slows. A bridge appears — an outdated construction of metal and concrete. The small, red numbers in my scope tell me that the bridge stretches over two hundred metres. The river is a broad, lazy mass of slush. My stomach churns. I don’t trust this bridge, it looks far too tattered and its metal arches provide too many hideouts for sharpshooters.
‘Heads down!’ I warn and scan the entire construction through my night-eye. There’s nothing but icicles and a bunch of dozing, fluffed-up crows. I inhale a slow breath. We cross the bridge at a snail’s pace. The screeching and groaning send shivers over my skin. I try not to think of drowning in the icy water below. As we reach solid ground, I exhale.
‘Is this the only bridge here?’ I ask.
‘Aye. Speeding up now.’
Buildings rise up left and right of the track. They look like decomposing molars — their roofs are crumbling, their walls blackened by naked vines, aged lichen, and soot. Between them, in what once were streets, grow tall trees without foliage, their branches clawing one another. Grey snow covers everything. The wind sings between abandoned houses.
The buildings creep me out — too many potential hiding spots for the enemy and only one escape route for us: forward.
I focus on what lies ahead: the metal tracks, the city centre. The factory is hidden behind the numerous buildings. Occasional movements draw my eyes into the maze of concrete claimed by wilderness. People are running parallel to us, keeping a distance of approximately one hundred metres. The hairs on my neck rise. Their silhouettes speak of danger — hunched posture, packs on their backs, muzzles pointing to the ground.
‘Armed men at three o’clock,’ I say. ‘Speed this machine up, Garth!’
We move around a gentle bend and then I see it: a bulky black mass eight hundred fifty metres ahead of us, right in the middle of the tracks.
‘They know we’re coming. Artillery at twelve o’clock! Full speed now!’ I hiss at Garth, lower my eye back to the scope, and exhale. Six men, one heavy machine gun. Inhale, hold, curl fingers. The machine gunner falls and is quickly replaced by the man at his side. The muzzle flashes of the machine gun interfere with my night-eye, half blinding me. Bullets ricochet off the steam engine.
Breathe. Focus on the target. Shut off distractions.
I slip in another round and squeeze it off. After the third man is down, muzzle reports come from nine o’clock and twelve o’clock. ‘Stay flat on the floor!’ I shout and fire.
My prickling skin reminds me that I’m in an extremely vulnerable position. I’m right atop a train — easy target for anyone with half-decent shooting skills. There are at least five men with rifles firing at me from the buildings to my right.
A hole is punched into the window. I feel a dull impact on the right side of my hood and shoulder. Time slows. I take out the last of the men ahead of us, then shout, ‘Can’t this fat bitch go faster?’
My voice sounds odd. Kind of hollow.
‘She’s heavy, she needs a little encouraging.’ Garth grunts and huffs, muttering a lot of fucks and shits.
I scan the perimeter. Lights are flickering in the streets and in a building ahead of us. I punch the stock of the rifle through the window and take the rest of the glass out. The cold air sharpens my senses. More shots are fired — tziiinks of bullets against the engine’s steel skin, the booms of muzzle reports follow.
Then a crash and I’m jerked forward.
‘That was the machine gun,’ Garth hollers through the screeching. A moment later, the noise ceases. ‘Okay, she pushed it aside.’
The train speeds up again and the wind slaps my face harder than before. I gaze down, about to shout at the men to shut the door because the draft is too strong.
And there stands Katvar, held at the back of his coat by Garth. He moves like water — drawing the string and letting go of the arrow. Fluid and focussed, back and forth.
I blink and check what he’s shooting at, but I can’t see anything from where I stand. I hear the cries of pain, though. And finally I get it — he’s not shooting at men in the streets, but at men who managed to climb aboard the train.
At once, I smash the back window of the dome and point my weapon at the top of the train. They are in full view and fall like flies. And just when I think we are winning, my ammunition is gone.
I pull my pistol and keep firing until I hear empty clicks. ‘Katvar!’ I holler and slide down the ladder.
He has a wild look on his face when he turns to me.
I point up. ‘Two. Very close.’
He’s up there in a flash. He can’t draw the bow all the way, because the space in the dome is too limited, but he takes the men down with two precise shots.
‘Get down,’ I bark when he gives me a thumbs up. He slides off the ladder and I jump up on it to scan the perimeter. No human heat signature in my night-eye. Not ahead of us, not on either side of us or at our back. The silence hurts my head. Did we get them all? Is it over already?
I take my time to make sure we are alone. The distance from Moscow grows. Feeling strangely calm and whole, I step off the ladder.
‘You are quite the rabbit hunter.’ I huff.
Katvar’s eyes grow big and he takes swift steps toward me. His fingers pick at my hood. ‘Blood,’ he signs.
I touch the side of my face, my hand comes away wet and sticky. My fingers don’t tremble. I feel great. ‘A scratch.’
He shakes his head and gestures, ‘Sit.’
I obey and he kneels down next to me, points to the lantern and to Garth, and, when the light flickers on and fills the cab, he lowers my hood, opens my coat and moves it off my shoulder.
‘Shards,’ he signs. ‘I’ll pick them out of your skin.’
A cup appears. ‘Home-brewed,’ says Garth.
I sniff. Sharp. ‘Thanks, but I puke every time I drink alcohol.’
‘So you drink like a girl and kill like a man?’ Chuckling, he holds his belly. Mischa, who has now joined us, chimes in.
I look at everyone in the room. ‘Considering that the only professional killer here is a girl, and that the only drunk person is male and lies unconscious in the coal box and two other men didn’t snap a single shot at anyone, while the rabbit hunter did an awesome job protecting us, I wager that I kill like a girl and drink like a girl.’
A hoarse chuckle pulls my gaze to Katvar.
‘Shut up,’ I say and grin. ‘Garth, give him the first aid kit, if you have one. And the booze. We
need a disinfectant.’
———
Garth’s buddy calls himself Pip. He doesn’t look like a pip, though. He’s a hunk of a man and I can’t keep my eyes off the hairy knees that peek out from underneath coarse, woollen shorts and above a pair of pink rubber boots.
Pip’s train looks just like Garth’s — a rusty thing that appears ready to fall apart with every cloud of steam it burps. They call it “camouflage.”
I’d asked Garth why he’s not armed, because that’s something I don’t get at all — unarmed people.
‘I’m a simple conductor,’ he’d said and smiled an innocent smile. ‘When the BSA comes searching my Matryoshka, they don’t find anything they want to have. No weapons, no pretty train, no nothing.’ He pointed at the broken pipe with the coat hanging from it. ‘Fake piping. I found it somewhere and put it up for…decoration. Pip and me, we hide our fat Matryoshkas in full sight.’ And then he laughed.
Pip has the same laugh as Garth’s. He laughs at everything and everyone. When he chuckled at Katvar’s hand signs, I was ready to punch his broad face. But then he signed back and that surprised both Katvar and me.
The sign language he uses is very different to what I’m learning, but close enough to lead to confusions and mix-ups that send Pip into recurring bouts of amusement.
Oleg — still nursing a bottle of something that smells like petroleum — bade his farewell when we changed trains. He made good on his promise and, together with the ammo Garth and his buddy “organised,” I’m now one hundred sixty bullets richer. Katvar has to wait until we reach Syktyvkar to barter pots for arrows. We might even trade his rifle, because he trusts the accuracy of his bow more than the rusty old thing from way back when.
The dogs still hate trains. They’ll have to deal with three more days of being cooped up in a wagon. At least they have straw to sleep on and the remaining half of a moose to eat. They’ll be fat and eager to run once we arrive in Syktyvkar.
Since we defeated the BSA in Moscow and boarded our second train, I feel as if nothing can stop me. I will not think about the sea ice yet. The people of the north will tell us how to cross it, Katvar said.
I wonder where Sari is and if she’s returned safely to her people. When I look at Katvar, I wrack my brain on how to best send him back home. Sometimes I wish he weren’t brave and proud. It would be much easier to get rid of him. Just being the asshole I am plus the danger that lies ahead would be enough to repel anyone with a healthy survival instinct. But he seems to believe I have a soft core.
Naiveté doesn’t suit him.
For three days, the train was surrounded by snow-covered woods. Although Pip’s machine had no problem with the snow, it couldn’t blast through all the fallen trees that littered the tracks the farther north we got. We often used these breaks to let the dogs out of their enclosure and give them much-needed exercise. Their straw bedding had begun to reek and aggression was running high. Katvar was busy telling every dog that he’s king and they have to shut it.
When Pip announced we’d reached Syktyvkar, we all peered through the windows, seeing nothing but more snow and more forest.
‘Are you sure?’ I asked.
‘Used to be a city here, now it’s just…end of the tracks,’ he said.
‘How do you know this is the right place?’ To me this didn’t look any different from the snowy forests we’d ridden through the day before.
Pip pointed through the trees. ‘Because, look: Vychegda River. As unpredictable as it is beautiful. Be careful when you cross it.’
His words of caution now ring in my ears as we cross the river. Katvar is tied to the other end of the rope. The dog teams are lined up behind him. The ice is moaning its song of doom.
I can hear the powerful gurgling of water beneath and fight the urge to run. The dogs, sensing our fear and feeling their own, tug at their lines, their harnesses digging into their thick fur. Katvar’s signing and huffing keeps them in place, but their nervous howling echoes across the ice. Heat races over my skin when the animals fall silent. Ears are pricked. I look back at Katvar, who seems frozen to the spot.
An eerie howl sounds from afar. The dogs go crazy. Katvar growls and lunges at the first team, but loses control of the dogs only a moment later. They race across the river and toward me.
‘Anchor!’ he hollers and the sound of his ruined voice makes my own throat ache.
The rope is taut and Katvar and I have to move simultaneously so I can cut into the dogs’ path. The stupid snow anchor is at the back of the sleds, hard to grab when the dogs pass me at a high speed. It’s risky to move quickly— a forceful step might break the ice. But if I can’t grab the anchor, the handle or the lines, anything, both sleds and dog teams will be gone and we won’t get anywhere.
I ski as fast as I can. My heart hammers and my throat hurts from the cold air that rasps in and out of my airway.
I keep one eye on Katvar. He’s running, too. The rope around my waist slackens, giving me enough room to manoeuvre. I lunge at the first dog team, growling deep in my throat. Aika, the lead dog, snaps at me and I punch him. The second team with Balto is only a few metres behind the first. He’s a smart dog. His eyes flick to Aika who now curls his tail under his belly and barks at me. Balto changes direction to get past me. I hurl my ski poles at him, which slows him for a second — enough time for me to throw myself on him and push him to the ground. He whines loudly at once, letting me know my dominance is established and I can make decisions for the pack. About time.
I growl at Aika and Balto, and shout, ‘Down! Down!’ until all the dogs reluctantly plop into the snow. Their eyes and ears swivel north, where the wolves howl, and back at me to wait for orders.
‘Move!’ Katvar croaks. He doesn’t dare get any closer to us. And that’s when it hits me: I’m at the centre of the river, the ice cover’s weakest point. Two laden sleds and twenty-four dogs are with me — too much weight on one spot.
Gingerly, I pick up my ski poles and slide backwards, toward the far side of the river, telling the dogs to stay. I line us up, keeping a few paces between me and the first dog team, the second team, and then Katvar. We move with great care. The ice groans. I have no clue how far we have to walk to reach solid ground.
My neck, shoulders, and back ache with tension. I keep telling myself to relax, to show the dogs I have everything under control and no one will die. You guys can trust me, is what I should communicate to them. I chant the words, ‘Okay, one step more. Okay, another step. Good boys. Good girls,’ trying to sound confident. They don’t look one hundred percent fooled. They keep glancing back at Katvar, who signals them the same message I’m trying to convey with words. All is good. Good boys. Good girls.
When we reach the river’s far edge, I drop to my knees and rub my frozen face with snow.
A moment later, Katvar and the dogs are at my side. ‘You okay?’ I sign at him. He’s been coughing since he shouted at me.
He nods and points at my sleeve. Aika has torn it pretty good.
‘I’ll fix it tonight,’ I sign.
‘That was scary,’ he adds.
‘Not as scary as you breaking through.’
‘Why are you signing?’
‘Oh? I didn’t notice,’ I say out loud. ‘Weird.’
He shrugs, walks up to the dogs and pats their necks. I’m not quite ready for that yet. They scared the shit out of me today.
———
The small flame spreads its warm light through our snow cave, bounces off the white walls and falls onto soft furs. I take off my boots, knock off the small icicles that glitter in the light, brush snow from my pants, and make to slip under the covers.
I don’t get far. A hand comes down on my wrist. ‘Did you change your plans yet?’ he signs.
‘What plans?’
‘The killing of children in the BSA camp.’
‘I usually only kill men. Children are collateral damage.’
He pales. Air leaves his lungs i
n a growl. ‘Are you really that cold?’
‘Yes.’
He lifts his right hand to sign, but drops it before one word has been conveyed. After a moment of staring at me, trying to figure me out, he stands and leaves the hut.
Good. He can go outside to get that sentimental shit out of his system. I roll up in my furs and think about satellites, programs, and the Seed Vault.
When he doesn’t return, I grow worried. I don’t want him to wear a scowl the rest of our journey. I don’t want him to hate me. Odd. Why do I even care?
Groaning, I leave the snow cave.
He’s standing in the moonlight, his shoulders stiff with anger.
‘Katvar?’
He turns around and lifts his right hand. Not quite certain what to say, he drops it again. A sharp intake of breath, collecting himself. Then he bares his teeth at me. His fingers are flying. ‘You are a damaged, angry, scared woman who cannot distinguish between peaceful people and the enemy. So many of us want peace! So many have never lifted a finger to hurt someone. So many don’t want their children to die, don’t want their wives to be raped, sold, enslaved. There’s one, only one man who seeks to destroy us all. And what do you want? You want peace, that’s what you say, but to get there you make war! You will not burn down BSA headquarters and kill innocent children and women. You…’ he takes a step closer, putting his face very close to mine. ‘You will not kill them. They are peaceful. If you don’t come up with another plan, I will not let you reach Svalbard. You will die before you get there.’
He is breathing hard and his face is dark with fury. I could point out that I never asked him to come with me and that I don’t need him at all to get to Svalbard. But I know he believes otherwise.
‘Will you try to kill me, Katvar?’ I ask softly.
He clenches his jaw. One nod.
‘Are you not afraid I’ll kill you first?’
A smirk and a shake of his head.
I almost laugh at him. ‘You are wrong. All these peaceful people, as you call them, are irrelevant.’
Ice: The Climate Fiction Saga Page 11
