Operation Norway

- 9 -

They stopped only long enough to check on Wilkins — they got another thumbs-up although the lad looked gray in the face, his eyes sunken deep in their sockets. They switched pulling duty. Davies and Hynd took over the litter. Banks took the opportunity to light up a cigarette; the smoke felt warm in his throat and chest and he was welcome of it. If there had been any sign of shelter, he might have stopped and got Wiggins to break out the camp stove for coffee. But there was only the plateau, with not even a large enough bush to huddle behind.

And besides, that fucker might be right behind us for all we know.

He looked out into the snow, hoping for the sight of a landmark, a reminder of the paths they’d taken to get here, but visibility, although improving, was still little more than ten yards in any direction. He knew the wind was coming mainly from the north and that they needed to head west so he made a turn slightly right of where he was facing. The snow whipped into the side of his head now, spattering against the outer fabric of his hood. Hynd and Davies were going to be pulling the litter into a crosswind coming straight at them across the flat terrain.

But it can’t be helped. The situation is what it is and the sooner we get across this, the sooner we’ll get back to some warmth.

He led the squad out onto the plateau.

Walking was easier now that he wasn’t pulling Wilkins along behind him but the earlier effort had taken its toll and he felt weary down to his bones. He tried to pick a point twenty yards ahead of him, keeping the wind coming from his right and hoping that they were going in as straight a line as possible. At one point, he retrieved the sat phone from his pocket, hoping to check the GPS… and that’s when he found that it hadn’t survived his rough treatment in the earlier attack. Something had got jumbled in its works; the power refused to come on, giving him only a dark, blank screen. He had no time to stop and fiddle with it; that would have to wait until they got back to sea level and shelter. If he couldn’t get it working, they were going to be reliant on the supply vessel skipper getting concerned and sending somebody looking for them; Banks knew that wasn’t a given.

But worrying about it now isn’t going to get me anywhere.

They trudged on through the storm.

He judged they must be almost halfway across the plateau when they came across tracks running from his right and across the front of their chosen route. They’d only recently been made, just beginning to fill with snow; large, eighteen-inch-long footprints, spatulate with no visible toes and pressed deeply down as if they’d been made with great weight.

The fucker’s got in front of us.

Banks had them up their speed to almost a trot and now he wasn’t looking straight ahead but tracking his gaze from side to side. The range of his vision still wasn’t much more than ten yards and he knew if an attack came, they’d get little warning.

When it came, it came, not from in front but from behind, and their first indication was a startled yell from young Wilkins and the rat-a-tat of three shots as the private fired at something to the rear. Hynd and Davies reacted immediately, dropping their hold on the litter and Banks and Wiggins joined them in wheeling, weapons already raised, as a huge lumbering figure came out of the snow.

They got their first clear look at it even as they pumped a rapid volley, three shots each, into it, shots that sent it turning away with a roar that was soon lost along with it in the snow. Banks was left with the impression of something nearly ten feet tall, almost gorilla-like — barrel-chested and heavy-bellied, with short legs and wide, muscled shoulders. But instead of black or silver hair, the thing was gray and grainy, almost rock-like, what passed for skin riven with lighter-colored fissures.

“What’s this now, the fucking Incredible Hulk?” Hynd said as the ringing in their ears from the shooting started to fade.

“Wrong comic, Sarge,” Wiggins replied. “We’re in Fantastic Four territory here; it’s the fucking Thing.”

“Whatever the fuck it is, we know we can keep it at bay,” Banks said, peering in the direction where the thing had gone and seeing only more snow. “So eyes peeled and move out, lads. We need to be somewhere we can defend.”

Hynd and Wiggins took up the litter this time and Banks and Davies ploughed the road, all of them fully alert now, the adrenaline from the attack masking their tiredness as they headed as fast as they could muster for the clifftop and their path down to shelter.

They found the path more by luck than judgement only twenty feet to the left of where they ended up at the cliff edge. Banks used his rifle light to check ahead; there were no fresh tracks on the trail but just looking at it made him weak at the knees. Although it had a gentle gradient in the main, there had been steep portions in places coming up, especially at tight corners, and now it was covered with more fresh snow. It was still blowing a gale and they were going to have to get the injured Wilkins safely down without the litter and the private on it careering off and away down to the harbor far below.

And that’s even before we worry about the fucking rock gorilla at our back.

“Easy does it on the way down, lads,” he said. “There’s coffee and a dram waiting for us down there. Let’s make sure we all get there in one piece.”

They took it slowly. Where they were able, all four of them took a corner of the litter but at some corners the trail was only wide enough for single file and those spots they took even slower still. The wind threatened to toss them off the path at every exposed point and twice they had to hug the cliff face and get Wilkins up on his feet to negotiate particularly sharp, windswept corners. On the second of these, a gust of wind caught the private, setting him off balance and by instinct he put his weight on the broken leg.

His wail of pain was answered by a roar, like clashing rocks, from high above them.

Banks turned to the others.

“Sarge, Davies, get Wilkins down off this fucking cliff ASAP. See what you can do to make one of yon huts defensible for the rest of the night. Wiggo, you’re with me. We’ll hold here, give the others time to get down.”

It was only a minute before Banks and Wiggins were alone on the track, the others having become lost to sight in the storm. The angry roar came again from above them.

“I think somebody needs a Snickers,” Wiggins said.

“It’s a boot up the arse he’s needing,” Banks replied. He pushed in his earplugs and Wiggins followed suit then Banks knelt on the path, with Wiggins standing above him, both aiming up the trail towards the clifftop.

“Will it come?” Wiggins said.

“We pissed it off. It’ll come,” Banks said and as if in reply, the huge gray figure came down the trail at a run towards them.

Wiggins shouted, even as Banks was taking aim.

“Stop. Why don’t you just fucking stop.”

To their amazement the thing came to a halt, standing still in the wind some ten feet up the slope above them. Banks saw that its eyes were little more than deep black pits in a craggy face but there was nothing unrecognizable about the way it cocked its head to one side, listening. Wiggins didn’t waste any time, putting three shots into its face as Banks put three in its belly. They didn’t to do any discernible damage, although Banks thought he saw something slough off the body where his bullets struck it.

And there was also no mistaking the look the thing gave as it roared again and wheeled away at speed, heading away into the storm; it was a look of confusion — that and betrayal.

They waited for several minutes but there was no sign that the thing might return.

“Cover me, Wiggo,” Banks said. “I think I saw something.”

He went back up the slope to where the beast had been standing. There, in a hollow made by its giant footprint, he found a lump of tissue the size of his thumb. One end of it felt hard, like cold stone but the other end was soft and when he touched it, the fingers of his glove came away bloody.

He showed Wiggins his fingertips and the corporal smiled grimly.

“Well, at least it bleeds. That’s a start.”