Ragnarok Rising: The Crossing (The Ragnarok Rising Saga) (31 page)

I awoke with a start to find I was still on the floor of my quarters. My watch was beeping. With only a glance at it, I pressed the button to silence it. I still felt disoriented from either the dream or from the fever that had come with the tattoo. Sitting in a chair to my left, Snake was sound asleep
and snoring contentedly. Someone, probably Karen, had covered us both with blankets.

16 May

With a sudden realization, I looked back at my watch. It was 0600 hours. That meant that almost twenty four hours had passed since we began the tattooing. Somehow, we had lost an entire day. How long had he been applying ink to my back? What had I gotten myself into? What exactly had happened? Hell, I could still smell the hot metal of the forge in my nostrils.

Snake began to stir as I sat up. He looked as bewildered as I did, glancing around the room like he wasn’t sure where he was at. He reached up and wiped his beard with his left
hand, then stood up, blinking rapidly.

“What the hell happened?” he asked, his voice still thick with sleep.

“I’m not sure,” I said, turning to reach for my shirt.

“Holy shit!” he gasped, behind me.

I spun around expecting trouble, only to find that he was staring at me.

“What!” I demanded, my heart racing.

“Your back…,” he said, his eyes wide.

“What about it?” I said, trying to look over my shoulder.

“The art…,” he stammered. “It’s amazing. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“You drew it,” I said, looking at him in shock.

“I don’t remember it,” he said. “It all became a blur sometime after about the sixth hour. I don’t know how long this took, but it had to have been a long time.”

I headed into the bathroom to look in the large mirror that was above the sink. I turned slightly and angled myself so that I could see. I couldn’t believe my eyes. The artwork was so vivid, it almost looked real. There, in shades of black, grey, and blue was the most magnificent piece of artwork I had ever seen. It covered my entire back from the base of my skull to my hips.
It surrounded and encompassed my Volknut on my back, without covering it. If anything, it seemed to make it stand out even more.

The center piece was a large Thor’s Hammer. The detail was striking.
It looked like it was made either of crudely forged steel or stone. The designs and knot work inlaid in it was so lifelike, it seemed to lift off of the skin. Behind the hammer was a wolf with glowing eyes. It leaned dangerously low and bared its teeth in a vicious snarl. The detail was incredible.

The entire thing was wreathed in a smoky flame that faded towards my sides. Inside the flames were nine rune stones, each one with a rune for the Nine Noble Virtues of my faith. There was: Uruz for Courage, Kenaz for Truth, Tiwaz for
Honor, Ehwaz for Fidelity, Dagaz for Discipline, Othala for Hospitality, Eihwaz for Self-Reliance, Naudic for Industriousness and Jera for Perserverance.
[17]

Hiding in the smoke on my shoulders were Odin’s twin ravens, Hugin and Munin. They were banking through the smoke at the edge of the fire on my shoulders. They were both done in magnificent details. You could even make out the individual lines on the feathers. Clutched in their talons were the edges of my Volknut. It was amazing.

I couldn’t believe how vivid the artwork was.
It didn’t look like something that could have been drawn with such primitive tools. I’ve seen less impressive artwork drawn by professional artists with months of work invested. This was just incredible. It was like nothing I had ever seen before. Snake's hand had to have been guided by the Gods. This was significant and it would take me a long time to fully understand the meaning behind it.

“Well, what do you think?” asked Snake, sticking his head in the door.

“How did you do this?” I asked, awe in my voice. “With a fucking homemade alarm-clock tat gun, no less.”

“I honestly don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve never done anything that good in my life. I don’t even remember doing it.”

“This is amazing,” I said. “I think it has to symbolize something more than just surviving the zombies.”

“It does,” he said. “I
t symbolizes Ragnarok. We are living through Ragnarok.”

“I’m not sure what to say,” I said, still looking at the image in the mirror.

“Well,” he said, slowly, “I guess this means that we’re building a forge.”

“What!” I exclaimed, turning to him. “How did you know about that?”

“I dreamed about an old man forging weapons,” he said. “He told me that we had to build a forge. I was to help create something called
Brjótanir.
I have no idea what that is.”

“It’s the name I gave to the hammer I want to make out of the Halligan bar,” I
answered. “I haven’t told anyone that.”

“The old man told me in the dream,” he said, looking slightly confused. “What does it mean?”

“It means
destroyer
in old Norse,” I explained.

“Alright,” he said, smiling,
“let’s find a place to build us a forge.”

“Let’s get cleaned up
and eat some breakfast, first. I’m starving.”

Snake headed out for his own quarters while I hit the shower in my own. I was shocked that the hot water didn’t hurt when it hit my new tattoo. There was no p
ain, no irritation, no bleeding. In fact, it didn’t even seem like it was fresh. It looked perfectly healed. It also covered up the scars on my back with the shading. You couldn’t even tell that they were there, unless you looked very closely.

I almost felt bad covering it with a shirt when I got dressed. Karen and the boys met me when I got out of the bathroom and we headed down to the kitchen to eat.
I could tell something was bothering her as we walked in silence.

“What’s the matter?” I asked, not sure I wanted to hear the answer.

“Nothing,” she muttered, not looking at me.

Uh oh. I knew what that meant. I was in trouble.

“Boys,” I said. “Go on ahead and let us talk for a minute.”

The boys headed off without argument and we waited until they were out of earshot before we spoke.

“What is it, babe?” I asked, trying to sound soothing.

“After everything else,” she started, whirling to face me, “your first day back you spent getting a tattoo. What were you thinking?”

“That it wasn’t going to take nearly as long as it did,” I said, carefully. “Babe, there’s more going on here than I can easily explain.”

I took her by the hand and led her back inside our room. Once the door was shut, I removed my shirt and turned so she could see the back piece.

“That guy you call Snake did
this
!” she said, shaking her head.

“He doesn’t remember doing it,” I explained. “He says he blacked out. We both did. We also had the same dream. The old man who saved me told us both that we had to build a forge.”

She didn’t answer me. She just stared at the tattoo. Soon, I felt her fingers tracking some of the patterns. The runes, the hammer, even the ravens.

“Wylie,” she said, after a moment, “this is so unbelievable. I mean, are you sure that this means what you think it means?”

“I don’t know, babe,” I admitted. “But one thing is for certain. There’s no logical way to explain this. It just doesn’t make sense any other way. It’s a message from the All-father. Our path is being set before us.”

“What path?” she asked, almost in a whisper.

“I don’t know where it’s going to lead,” I said, shaking my head. “All I know for sure is that my work is only beginning. Ragnarok is just starting.”

We walked back out and into the kitchen. There was already a large crowd there, busily eating their morning meal. The boys had grabbed a table for us and saved us seats. We grabbed plates of food and
joined them. Elliott didn’t look any worse for wear and seemed in remarkably good spirits. He didn’t even seem to have any residual effects from his dislocated shoulder.

Spec-4, Southard and Gunny came over and joined us at our table. The
y slid into their own seats without a word and joined in like they belonged there. Well, they did belong there. I had shed blood with each of them. They were family to me. I think even Karen felt that way, too. She was even starting to accept Spec-4 as part of our extended family. There was tension there, but there was gratitude, too. Spec-4 had saved my life on more than one occasion.

Soon, we were all chatting and laughing. The camaraderie was contagious and it felt good to be a part of it. It was good to see them all laughing, despite the dangers we’d been through and would face before it was
through. Together, we’d face it and come through it. Gunny was the adopted grandfather my boys looked up to. Southard was like a brother to me. Spec-4 was…well…it’s complicated. More than a sister, but not a lover.

Around us, I could see that the new arrivals had been welcomed into the group with open arms.
Even Snake was sitting with a group. There were his two ladies from the boat and a group of the people that came in from the Underground. He was regaling them all with a story that had them laughing. When he glanced my way, he met my gaze and gave me a slight nod. It was odd, but I could sense that somehow our destinies were connected.

After we ate, I headed back to my quarters to gather my gear. They had already begun securing the perimeter before I made it back. I wanted to see how much they had done and what we needed to work on. Karen helped me put on my armor and made sure that my gear was all in place before kissing me.

I wondered what role she had to play in all of this, before Ragnarok was through. I knew that whatever my role was, she would be at my side through it all. I also knew that Ragnarok would take time. There would be several different stages. If this was only the beginning, then we really had our work cut out for us.

I headed out the main door with a group of our people. We had warriors and we had other people with other skills. Everything from equipment operators to mechanics. We would need them all and more before this was finished. Our job now was to make certain we had the defenses in place for us to survive. We needed to make this place safe if we were going to grow crops and make a life.

They had already sealed off the bridges and began clearing obstacles for the placement of a fence around the core area of the park. The river made a great natural boundary, but the
Stalkers
had already proven that the water wouldn’t stop them. We needed something better. Something solid that they couldn’t get through. The problem was that they could also climb. So whatever we made was going to have to be strong and hard for them to scale.

We had
plenty of rocks and earth, but no heavy equipment to move it with. Without a backhoe or a bulldozer, the task of building a solid wall was going to take a long time. I know the old expression was that Rome wasn’t built in a day, but the faster we secured our perimeter, the faster we could begin living a more normal life. We could move out of the bunker and into the housing that was already in the park.

We
had a lot of work to do and not a lot of time to do it. There was a forge to build, the perimeter fence to construct and a community to establish. With our little group having swelled to almost a hundred survivors, there was plenty of hands to share in the work. If we had a chance of pulling this off, it was going to take all of us working together.

In the tool shed, we found a wide assortment of landscaping and hand tools. There was even a small concrete mixer.
We had everything we needed to start building our new home and fortifying it. Well, everything except heavy equipment and construction materials. Those were going to take a little more work on our part. It would probably mean a supply run into the surrounding areas.

We already had crews working on getting the vehicles inside the bunker up and running.
Another crew was clearing the way for the fence construction to begin. We had plenty of food, for the moment. It would probably get us through the winter, but after that we'd have to start looking for other sources. I wanted to be ready to grow our own food, long before then.

More out of reflex than anything else, I kept my weapon in my hand the entire time I was outside. The Beowulf never left my hand, unless I had to use both of them for something. Otherwise, I was ready to shoot at a moment's notice. The
Stalkers
might be nocturnal, but the rest of the damned things weren't. If we let our guard down, people would die. That was unacceptable.

I was looking at a covered picnic pavilion with open sides when Snake caught up with me. I had already noticed that it had a central chimney for a fire pit in the middle. It could be used for cooking, even in bad weather. It would
also be perfect for use as a forge, with a little work.

"Are you thinking the same thing I am?" asked Snake, gesturing at the pavilion.

"Absolutely," I replied. "All we need to do is convert the fire pit to a fire pot and hearth."

"What are we going to use as a bellows?" he asked, frowning.