Odin's Wish

Stephen Easley

Description

Imagine a company of 250 U.S.Marines that wander through a different dimension to the Viking age of a different timeline. Now, imagine the Vikings are at war with another country. What would you do?

Sujets

• Time travel
• Fiction

Informations

• Publié par: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Date de parution: 29 novembre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781543772265
• Langue: English

Extrait

ODIN’S WISH






STEPHEN EASLEY








Copyright © 2022 by Stephen Easley.

ISBN:
Hardcover
978-1-5437-7227-2
Softcover
978-1-5437-7225-8
eBook
978-1-5437-7226-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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www.partridgepublishing.com/singapore



CONTENTS
Introduction
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Three
Chapter Twenty Four
Chapter Twenty Five
Epilogue



INTRODUCTION
It was 1982 when it happened. Being part of a MAU (Marine Assault Unit) participating in a joint operation in Denmark wasn’t so bad, as long as you could handle the cold. However, things didn’t go as planned, even with the officers in charge. When everything started going south on us, I decided to start writing this down in my log book. I had no idea it would actually go as far as it did with me and my men in the center of it all. The Skipper (a company commander in the Marine Corps is called this as a nautical term) seems to have lost his mind but I think he will come around again….soon I hope. The rest of my Marines are taking it well and trying to cope with our situation as best as they can. A few have had to be restrained to keep them safe from the locals or they would have been killed by these crazy people as being what I can only guess, a Devil or Demon. They seem to look a lot like Vikings, from the movies I have seen but these guys, and women, look a bit more, how can I say it…..Fantastic? The operation started around zero five in the morning with us being helicoptered in and landing a few miles inland for the ten mile hump forward. Our counterparts, the Danish Marines, humped out to our position the night before and were waiting for us to land. That’s when everything seemed to go astray in that the weather turned foul with snow and wind, our compass started spinning as if next to a strong magnet. Well...let me start from the beginning.
Our Company was tasked with humping ten miles inland to meet up with a Danish Marine unit, then making camp on a hill for the night. The next day we would hump another five miles with the Danish Marines and carry out an assault on a fixed position with them in a live fire exercise. Everything went according to plan, even setting our position up on the hill that was selected a few days earlier by the Battalion Commander and combining forces with the Danish Marines on the next hill (other than our compasses going nuts). We had about two hundred Marines in our company but the Danish Marines only had a platoon size unit of about thirty men and set up on an a joining hill. As we set in, it began to snow again so I went around to each man making sure they would not freeze to death during the night and to set the watch then went back to the center of our lines on top of the hill with the Skipper. The radio was screeching loudly with a lot of traffic from other units as the radio man sent and received messages from the rear.
As the night went on the snow stopped and a heavy fog set in that was so thick I yelled out to my Marines to stay in their holes so they wouldn’t get lost. When the sun began to rise it gave the area a strange glowing appearance from every direction. I guess from the sun shining off the fog but it looked really strange…..and quiet! I could hear when someone moved and crunched the ground under them, it was so quiet.



CHAPTER ONE
“What do you think, Gunny?” The Skipper asked from a few feet away, but I couldn’t see him.
“I don’t think we should move from this spot until it clears up, Skipper.”
I took a step back and tripped over the radio man, both of us cursed then laughed. We heard a pop up flair go off in the distance with a loud whoosh, probably from the Danish Marines on the next hill but we couldn’t see it. It ‘popped’ again once high enough in the sky and we all heard that too, then someone yelled from the next hill.
“Can you see it?” They yelled loudly.
“Can’t see a damn thing!” I yelled back.
“We will come to you. Stay where you are.” The voice said.
“Roger that!” I yelled back. “Skipper?” I asked into the fog.
“Over here,” he said in a low tone.
I heard the radio static as I took a few careful steps towards his voice. The operator was speaking into the handset every few seconds.
“This is Traveler six…any station on the net, radio check, over!” He said over and over with no response from anyone.
“There should be somebody on here, Gunny! What the hell is going on?” The Lance Corporal radio man said in a frustrated voice.
“Don’t know yet, Marine. Just keep trying.” I put my hand on his shoulder as I passed then found the Skipper and sat next to him.
After nearly an hour we heard talking and footsteps coming up the hill towards us then someone yelled out.
“Are you there?” They yelled from not far away.
“Up here!” The Skipper yelled then stood.
“Keep talking or whistle so we can home in on you!” The voice yelled out from down the hill.
The Skipper started whistling Dixie and I laughed. I could see him turn towards me but I couldn’t see his face. I would assume his face had a frown on it. At first we saw dark shadows moving slowly towards us as if they were ghosts, then as they came close we saw a long line of men tied together with a white rope that disappeared into the fog below. The lead man stuck out his hand and shook the Skippers hand in greeting then he put his compass back into his breast pocket, turned and motioned for the rest of his men to come up. As they passed by slowly and were led by one of my Corporals to an area they could rest, their Lieutenant looked at both of us with a worried frown.
“Do you have any clue when this fog will let up, Lieutenant?” The Skipper asked.
“I don’t know, sir. I have never seen anything like this before in my life. We never get fog this heavy, especially in the winter.”
The Skipper held out his hand again. “MY name is Captain Samson, Lieutenant. This is Gunny Stockton.” He shook the Skippers hand then mine.
“Lieutenant Eberhard, sir.” He said.
“Well,” the Skipper turned and sat. “I suppose we wait it out since we can’t raise anyone on the radio.”
“Lieutenant Eberhard?” The skipper asked in the thick fog. “How many men do you have with you?”
“Thirty-three, sir. One medic and one Senior Staff NCO, as you call them.” He said
“Gunny. We need a headcount. See if you can get the platoon sergeants to get one.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
I stood, cupped my hands around my mouth and yelled out as loud as I could.
“All platoon sergeants listen up!” I yelled. “We need a headcount. Once you have it, call it in by yelling. I still do not want anyone to move around too much in this fog.”
I heard several ‘aye, ayes’ from the distance with one Staff Sergeant yelling ‘Roger’. I turned and sat next to the Skipper and the Lieutenant then pulled a smoke out and lit it up. I noticed my ALICE pack next to me so I pulled out a small camp stove I had purchased last month for this operation with some sterno. Breaking out my canteen cup I started to heat up some water for instant coffee.
“Hand me your canteen cups and I’ll heat us up some coffee,” I said to the two officers.
After several very slow and agonizing minutes the water finally came to a boil and I poured it into the three cups. I could smell it in the still air and it smelled delicious. I closed my eyes and took the first sip.
“Lieutenant?” I asked.” Where did you learn to speak such good English?”
“AH!” He said in the thick fog. I could see his outline from only a few feet away but could not see the skipper sitting on the other side of him.
“I went to school in Boston for two years. Majored in the English language. I wanted to be a diplomat but things changed.”
“Well. You speak all most like a native, Lieutenant.” I said. “Almost sounds like you’re FROM Boston to tell the truth.”
“Thank you, Gunny.” He paused and I could hear him sip his hot coffee.
“I’m not really familiar with your Marine Corps. You guys don’t do what we do in the US Marine Corps. You’re too small of a unit.” I said to keep the conversation going.
“No! We are more of a, what you call recon.” He said. “Go in, find the enemy and move out or make small raids, etc.” He paused to sip again. “We also, like you, are on ships and guard naval bases.”
A voice rang out in the fog.
“GUNNY!” the voice yelled out. “Second Platoon all present!”
“Roger, Second platoon!” I yelled then wrote that into my sma