Operation Norway

- 11 -

“What do you mean, it’s one of us?” Wiggins said when Banks told the squad what he’d read. “It’s a fucking monster.”

“And it wasn’t always one. The poor bugger volunteered for experimentation. He thought he was doing his bit for King and Country and look where it got him.”

“Aye, well, one of us or not, the bastard broke Wilkins’ leg and tried its best to get the rest of us. And you say it likes long pork? If it gets in here, it’s going down; I’m not having that wanker munching on my leg.”

Banks didn’t reply. He was starting to get another idea, an inkling of a plan.

“Davies, you said you’d found high-grade sedatives in the lab?”

“Aye, Cap. Enough to put an elephant to sleep.”

“How about a ten-foot-tall rock gorilla?”

Davies laughed.

“Aye, maybe one of them too.”

“What are you thinking, Cap?” Hynd said.

“I’m thinking, Sarge, that we don’t leave a man behind; we’ve been doing that too often recently to my mind. Yon thing out there is — was — one of our own. We owe it to him to try to put things right. We should at least try to sedate him and get him home to where the boffins can have a look at him. It might be reversible.”

“Have you gone soft in the head, Cap?” Wiggins said.

“That’s enough, Corporal,” Hynd replied sharply.

Wiggins didn’t look contrite.

“Aye, okay then. But here’s some other good news; the phone’s FUBAB, totally fucked. Looks like we’re waiting for the supply boat to notice we haven’t phoned home.”

“How about the old radio here?”

“Too far gone,” Hynd replied. “It was a crystal valve set and there’s not a one left intact.”

Banks turned to Davies.

“Will Wilkins be okay with a wait?”

“As long as we keep him warm, sedated, and off his feet, he’ll be as fine as can be expected, Cap. The leg needs reset though and soon, or he’ll have a limp for the rest of his life. The sooner we can get him to a hospital the better.”

More coffee, more smokes, and growing warmth in the room from the fire soon had them forgetting the rigors of their yomp across the snowy hills above the fjord. Banks quizzed Davies further about the sedatives.

“How would we dose the thing up, if we can get him up close?” he asked.

“Injection would be the best way. But you saw how little effect our bullets had; it looks like his skin’s like rock.”

“Not everywhere,” Banks replied, taking out the nub of tissue again and tapping it against the journal. “I saw fissures when I got a good look on the path out there; like cracks and with a lighter color in the deeper parts. The book says at one time the cracks wept, blood and fluid. Could be a soft spot? One we could get a needle into?”

“Aye,” Wiggins piped up. “A soft spot, seventy years ago maybe. The bloody thing’s been sleeping in stone since then if your theory’s right, Cap. We might be better off packing the cracked bits with C4 and standing well back.”

It might come to that yet, Banks thought but didn’t say out loud.

Banks had Davies prepare a long syringe full of sedative for each of them.

“I want to be ready if an attack comes. I’m sure it — he — is out there somewhere watching even now. When he comes, don’t shoot until I give the order. Is that clear?”

He was looking directly at Wiggins when he spoke and the corporal gave him a nod in return; Wiggins could be insubordinate at times but he was a good soldier when it mattered and that was all Banks could ask of anyone.

Even McCallum?

That was a question he was hoping he wasn’t going to have to answer.

He allowed each of the men another dram from what was left of the whisky and took his own mixed with more coffee. Young Wilkins looked to be out and far from any pain, and the rest of them were warm. It beat being huddled under a makeshift shelter back up top on the hill and by rights, he should be more relaxed, but Banks’ guts roiled with tension. They’d had their flight. Now every instinct told him that it wouldn’t be long before the fight.

Banks ordered Davies and Wiggins to bed down for a couple of hours. It was just after three o’clock in the morning; last night’s sleep seemed a long way away and it had been a long, wearying trek out on the hill. What with that and the wearing off of the earlier adrenaline rush, Banks felt tired to his bones. He asked Hynd to take watch with him; fearing that he might fall into sleep if left on his own.

“Did you mean that, John?” Hynd said as they had a smoke by the doorway once the others had settled down to sleep. “About him being one of us?”

“That I did,” Banks replied. “We lost McCally on Loch Ness, Brock in the desert, and we never got to bury either one. I’ll be buggered if I let another soldier go into the dark alone without trying to help.”

Hynd spoke softly, as if taking care with his words.

“Yon thing out on the hill didn’t look or act like any soldier I’ve known,” the sergeant said.

“That’s what I thought… until I saw how he reacted when Wiggins gave him an order. The soldier’s still there. Just like it’ll be in us, long after we hang up our boots and settle down to that pipe, those slippers, and a warm fire.”

“You and I both ken that our chances of making it that far get slimmer every time we come out. How many old retired lags do you know in this game?”

“Damn few and they’re all dead,” Banks replied, agreeing. “But I’ve got to try and save this one. He must be 90 if he’s a day and well overdue his pension. Will you help me at least try?”

“You know I go where you go, John, same as it ever was.”

Banks smiled thinly.

“I’ll remind you of that the next time things get hairy.”

The night wore on. The wind dropped away completely and snow stopped spattering against the windows but Banks didn’t feel like venturing outside in the dark. He stood with Hynd at the doorway, their conversation turning to old campaigns, battles long since fought but not forgotten but even that made him wonder.

Does McCallum remember his own soldiering days? How much of the Army man can be left in him after all this time… and am I just deluding myself to think I can save him?

“Penny for them, John?” Hynd said, noticing that the captain had gone quiet.

“Just remembering the men we’ve lost,” Banks said.

Hynd smiled sadly.

“Aye, it’s that time in the morning, isn’t it… the hour when they come back to ask why.”

“And I still don’t have an answer for them.”

“Aye, you do. We all do. We did it, do it, all of us living and dead, for duty, comradeship and the squad, for the man next to us. Same as it ever was. And they all knew that as much as we do. As much as you do.”

Banks smiled back.

“It never hurts to hear it said though. The first round’s on me when we get back.”

“Hell, if your plan works and we actually capture yon big brute, you’re on the bell all night.”

This time, they both laughed in unison — and were answered by a roar of rage from out in the night.