Part 22: Arctic Artemis

Rovaniemi, Finland

Second Universal Layer

April 12th, 2016

They used to say that this was the hometown of Santa Claus. Mickey MacFarlane could have believed it, what with the unusual cold and the thick snow blanketing everything, were it not for the patently pulverized condition of the place. The Rovaniemi he beheld now was a throwback to the near-total destruction wrought by the Nazis in 1944, and the last six weeks had earned it a new sobriquet: Stalingrad of the North.

The battle for control of the ravaged community was symbolic as much as strategic. Rovaniemi had been the nominal capital of Finland ever since the fall of Kaliningrad and evacuation of Helsinki, though the remnants of government had fled further into the Lapland wilderness two months ago. Now a ragtag mix of soldiers – Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, Russian and innumerable others – and volunteers from afar like Mickey himself pitted their strength against an enemy which was steadfastly assimilating the rest of the world.

Here, where two rivers met just below the arctic circle, the Arume faced the eternal foe which had undone Napoleon and Hitler in centuries past: cold. One of the lascivious aliens' diverse instruments of terror had altered the global climate, disrupting winds and currents deeply enough to bring about a rise in sea levels, but it also brought a miniature ice age upon northern Europe. Here the kaijin hardened into frozen statues outside their host waters, the gosta were chilled into pitiable squibs and the thought-materializing weapons simply failed to materialize. Facing a resilient enemy who fought with a solid home field advantage, the Arume now sent wave after wave of collaborator troops to crush one of the last nations openly resisting their new world order.

The lines of control had surged back and forth unpredictably since the start of the battle. At present the north and west suburbs were in the control of the defenders, operating from camps entrenched in the outlying woods, but downtown remained contested and mostly empty owing to a shortage of surface-to-air missiles. The Arume held a strip of land along the southern river, with a hazardous dead zone between the fronts. So it was that Mickey and his companions met only a handful of scouts and lookouts as they skied through the streets in single file, snug in their white parkas and thick gloves. They were led by a burly man named Aimo, a Russian woman called Yelena and an Australian of questionable sanity at his back. Mickey himself followed Phil in fourth place, with a second Finn, Erkki, bringing up the rear.

Their destination on this fine evening was the north side of Rovaniemi's railway station. It was relatively intact – the Arume at least understood the value of functional rail transit – but lay smack in the middle of no man's land. The five sank into a sort of hunched shuffle for the last leg of their advance, minimizing their profiles until they at last were sheltered by the twisted wreck of a bus – at the corner of the streets marked 'Ratakatu' and 'Tievakatu', if Mickey remembered the map correctly – overlooking the rail yard. Acting in silence according to the established plan, they removed their skis and crawled inside.

"Marjatta!" Aimo's voice was barely above a whisper. "What news?"

"Same as before," the heap of snow at the far end replied.

It seemed that the enemy intended to occupy the station under cover of dark, but their probing had not gone unnoticed... and now it would not go unopposed. Aimo had a terse – and to Mickey, unintelligible – radio conversation with headquarters before motioning for the others to set up.

"How many?" Yelena queried.

"One alien and nine men, holed up beside the flooring store... Is that the replacement?" the hidden woman added indifferently.

"Yeah, mate." Phil conjured up a pocket periscope and slowly raised it over the edge of an empty window frame. "Our dinkum Canuck prodigy."

"Hm."

Yelena stretched out with her Dragunov, aiming through a tear in the vehicle's bodywork. "We wait?"

"They will move soon," Marjatta declared. "We'll take them when they expose themselves."

"Roight." Phil mimicked the Russian, cheerily popping the rubber caps off his own scope. "Who's up for I-Spy?"

The others ignored him. Mickey looked around, saw that the best free vantage point was between Aimo and Marjatta, and crawled to it. "MacFarlane, was it?" the latter asked.

"Yeah."

There was a rustle, but the snowdrift moved not at all. "Accuracy International?"

"That's right."

"What's your backup?"

"Uh... Glock nine millimeter." Why the third degree right now?

"Not enough." Something emerged from the snow. "Take this."

Mickey unwrapped the rag to find it contained an ancient submachine gun with a gouged wooden stock and a barrel shroud that looked as if it had been hammered from sheet metal on a garage workbench. The contraption was accompanied by a stack of flat drum magazines in a threadbare canvas pouch. "Um..."

"I 'ope that ain't wot I think it is," Phil muttered.

Mickey was on the verge of asking what he meant when Aimo pulled the thing from his grasp, glanced at the serial number and handed it back. "It is."

Yelena made what might have been a sound of pity. "What count now?"

"Eighth," was Marjatta's only reply.

"Eighth?" Mickey looked to one side, then the other. "Eighth what?"

"You are the eighth to possess that weapon since the Arume reached Rovaniemi," Erkki intoned solemnly. "Five of ours and two of the enemy have carried it... Every time the bearer was killed, and every time someone found the weapon and brought it back. Some of the men say it's cursed."

"You're making that up."

"No, mate... Oy, so wot 'appened to Sven?"

"Dead," Marjatta answered bluntly. "The skirmish at Cafe Tivoli."

Phil swore under his breath. "Another good bloke gone... I owed 'im a crackin' big drink, too."

Mickey, meanwhile, could find nothing obviously wrong with the purportedly jinxed firearm. "So... does this thing work?"

"Of course."

Marjatta's tone suggested that the newcomer was impertinent to question her recommendation, so he let the matter drop. Minutes crept by while the watchers lay still and observed as the sun dipped to touch the horizon. Nights were short at this time of year, and soon there would be almost no darkness at all.

The coarse brown stubble on Mickey's face was beginning to itch under his balaclava when the situation changed: "They're moving." There was a crisp click-click under the snow heap. "The Arume is mine."

Mickey snugged the stock against his cheek and lightly rested his finger on the trigger. He could see the enemy on the far side of the tracks, moving right to left at an acute angle without zigzagging or bounding from cover to cover. The collaborators he'd faced in Scotland and Norway were smarter than this... Or maybe it was because they hadn't been stuck with an impatient, demanding Arume right in their midst. Nobody could mistake that diminutive figure striding at the front, her every move radiating arrogance.

Then there was a short, brisk crack and the diminutive figure folded like an accordion. Mickey was aiming for the apparent squad NCO when he heard a sharp bang from Yelena's direction and the man plowed into the ground. He swung his reticule to the left, locked onto the form of a soldier scrambling towards what might have once been a minivan, and squeezed. First kill in three weeks, the Canadian congratulated himself as he chambered his next round. Good start.

Phil's voice could be heard over the scrape of bolts cycling: "One glass." Boomph! "Two glass." Boomph! "Three glass." Boomph! "Floor!"

"Targets eliminated," Marjatta reported efficiently. "Cease fire."

Aimo topped off his magazine. "No movement."

"Roight, now let's..." Phil trailed off as a buzz of compact gasoline engines grew in the east. It was answered by a slow, chattering burst of machine gun fire. "Ooh, fuck me sideways," he groaned. "Toime ter bug out, mates!"

"What's – ?"

"Enemy raid," Yelena explained before Mickey could finish asking. "They attack the outpost at jeweler."

"Not just the jeweler." The snowdrift shifted as a short figure in an extra-large parka rolled out from under the tarpaulin hidden beneath it. "They're coming for us as well. Fall back to the guard line."

Taking his cue from the others, Mickey brushed the snow off his front, packed up his rifle and grabbed the submachine gun. He followed Erkki out of the bus as Aimo radioed HQ. Only when he was back outside could he hear what Marjatta's keen ears had picked up: the whine of additional engines coming from the southwest. He was still struggling with his skis when Marjatta and Aimo came out. "Leave them," the man ordered, kicking his own set into the snow beside the bus. "Let's go!"

A bullet whizzed overhead, coming from the direction of the railway station. "Enemy reinforcements!" Marjatta barked. "Take cover!"

Phil did no such thing. "Leave 'em to me," he said, slapping a full magazine into his automatic rifle and flicking a drawstring cover over its telescopic attachment. "KILROOOOOOOYYY!"

The Australian took off, heading for an ice-crusted tanker truck ninety meters to the east. Aimo ignored him and led the others across the road to the relative shelter of the parking lot there. He and Erkki each produced an Uzi from under their parkas and prepared to intercept the motorized intruders. Yelena dug in between them, struggling to install a bulky night sight on the SVD's side rail. Mickey again found himself beside Marjatta, who was already methodically firing at the wave of collaborators across the rail yard.

A muzzle flash off to the left marked Phil's position, not that he was in any way inconspicuous without it: "YER MUM TASTES LOIKE PRAWNS!" Boomph-boomph-boomph! "BIELEFELD DOES NOT EXIST!"

Mickey winced. "What is he doing?!"

"A favor." Crack! "Shoot, MacFarlane, don't talk!"

"Right..." The Canadian went to work, giving silent thanks to the quartermaster who had managed to find him a scope with a working illuminated reticule. It was hard enough even with that luxury, yet Marjatta seemed able to score consistent hits while lacking optics or even a free-floated barrel.

"Backup is coming," Aimo announced. "Orders are to hold the position as long as possible."

"Roger." Marjatta slotted a five-round charger into her rifle and stripped the cartridges off it with one clean stroke of her thumb. "Yelena, bogies?"

The Russian aimed along the westward road. "Two speeders, fast approach... Engaging."

Mickey heard three shots, then a whooshing noise. Glancing to the side, he saw a sheet of fire gushing towards the sky. The second speeder was briefly silhouetted as it passed in front of the burning first. It looked similar to the models the sniper had encountered in Norway: an oversized snowmobile with thin armor and fuel tanks placed where any competent marksman with a supply of armor-piercing incendiary rounds could light them up in a frontal attack.

A frontal attack was precisely what Yelena and the Dragunov gave it. The speeder left a comet's tail of flame and smoke as it slewed towards the team's position, coming to rest less than twenty meters away. The main threat was thus eradicated, but the wreck posed another problem for the defenders: cook-off hazards aside, the fire's brilliant glow negated both their camouflage and their low-light vision. "Displace," Marjatta ordered, shuffling to the left.

Figures in thick uniforms clambered from the flaming wreck as she moved, desperate to escape the blaze. The Finn fired without stopping, striking one in the gut, and he tumbled into the snow with a scream. Yelena tagged the second as he jumped clear of the speeder. The third hastily raised his hands above his head. "Nicht schiessen! Nicht schiessen! Ich – "

The PPSh spewed a stream of brass casings into the air, the tongues of flame from its crude muzzle brake drawing a stroboscopic three-leaf clover in the twilight. Mickey poured a couple dozen rounds into his hapless opponent, then hosed the ground until the bolt closed on an empty chamber and the cries of the wounded were extinguished. Aimo and company passed without comment.

Phil, meanwhile, was still alive and still the very model of a modern major maniac. "THAT'S FER ME BROTHER!" Boomph! "THAT'S FER ME AUNT MOLLY!" Boomph! "THAT'S FER ME AUNT MOLLY'S CAT TIDDLES!" Boomph! "THAT'S FER ME COUSIN FRANK AN' HIS – oof!" The rhythm of shots came to an abrupt end. "I'm 'it!"

"MacFarlane." Marjatta of course had seen it coming and planned accordingly. "Go help him."

Mickey rolled his eyes. MacFarlane, take this gun. MacFarlane, shoot those guys. MacFarlane, run over to McDonald's and get some burgers. He obeyed anyway, the lingering splotches burned into his retinas by his own shooting rendering him a less than fully capable sniper for the moment. Erkki took his spot as he scooted down the line, trading a depleted drum for another seventy-odd drops of death.

The Australian had dragged himself out of the line of fire by the time Mickey reached the tanker. "It ain't too bad," he offered, pressing a hand over the front of his lower right leg. "Spare a crutch?"

"Hold still," the Canadian muttered, searching his own pockets. Where's that field dressGUNSHIP RIGHT FUCKING THERE! A frigid blue-white light blinded him completely. There was no time to react before he felt a searing pain in his abdomen and lost all sensation in his lower extremities. He slumped backwards, the Arctic Warfare trapped underneath his half-paralyzed body. What the hell, he thought dazedly. They didn't do this in Norway...

The validity of his prior experience was justified moments later, when an ear-pounding blast followed by a terrific impact heralded the gunship's comeuppance. In the comparative quiet which ensued, Mickey became aware of Phil moving laboriously nearby. "Mickey," he called hoarsely. "Mickey, talk ter me!"

"Ugh..." Mickey shook his head from side to side, blinking weakly. "I can't... I can't move..."

"Shit." Click. "Hold on!"

Mickey couldn't hear anything from Aimo and the others, but raising his head gave him a murky view of the Arume craft which had dropped onto the street in front of him like a huge white brick. It lay not quite on an even keel, its undercarriage indisputably pulverized. The sight gave him a surge of hope, as it signaled the approach of reinforcements with superior firepower. Not a moment too soon, either: as he watched, a hatch on the side of the gunship was knocked loose from the inside.

Phil promptly took aim. "Rack off, yah bleach-'eaded wankettes!"

This time Mickey was alert enough to close his eyes before the huge silver pistol in the other man's hands discharged. Turning his face away, he located his submachine gun and did his best to shake the powdery snow off of it. Phil might have the crashed craft covered, and the tanker offered considerable shelter, but they could still be overrun by the enemy if they weren't relieved soon. The very real danger that Mickey might bleed out in the meantime was lost in the hubbub.

A shrill whistle filled the air, the sound of rockets passing overhead. They reached apogee over the heads of the collaborator troops, each deploying a piercing white parachute flare. As the flares drifted, throwing long, sharply defined shadows around Mickey, he heard the buzz-saw roar of machine guns to the east. It was a distinctive and familiar sound, but not a reassuring one – both sides used the same model extensively. "Our side or theirs?" he wondered aloud.

"Ours," said Phil solemnly. "Our savior who art belt-fed, in steel be thy form, smite thine enemies not less than twelve hundred times per minute..."

"Heh... Heh-heh..."

The humor soon fizzled. Phil seized his rifle by the barrel, planted the butt on the ground and pushed himself upright. "Ngh..! Hrrrrrngh! ...Okay, Mickey," he panted, discarding it as he limped towards the hatch, "watch me back!"

The only answer was an incoherent groan. I feel tired, Mickey thought blearily. Not good... Rousing himself, he sluggishly reached for Phil's abandoned longarm. Gloved fingers hooked its sling and drew it closer, leaving a wide furrow in the snow. Having extended his engagement range, at least for a few shots' worth, the crippled man gingerly braced himself and twisted until he was lying on his side. The hand cannon's blasts rang loud in his fatigued ears. Stay awake, stay awake...

"Geddowt!" The shout was followed by a muffled impact and a feminine cry. When Phil emerged from the gunship, he was dragging a waif of an Arume by her long pale hair. Mickey caught a glimpse of white blood smeared on the magnum's butt before the other man shoved the alien girl into the lee of the tanker. "Got a slurry fer the inquisition," he said coolly. "If she runs, aim fer the legs."

Mickey nodded, surrendering the AG-3 to its owner before taking the 'cursed' Shpagin in hand and propping himself up on one elbow. He noted with surreal detachment that the cold seemed to have reduced his bleeding. "The others..?"

Phil shook his head without taking his eyes off the prisoner. "It's just you an' me, mate."

"Shit..."

The prisoner wore the standard bodysuit of her race, a garment laughably inadequate for this climate. She stood with her arms wrapped around her slender body, her legs pressed tightly together and her wide blue eyes downcast. She lifted her head slowly as a Russian armored personnel carrier advanced towards the tanker, its boat-shaped green hull carried on eight massive tires. In the glare of its floodlights, Mickey glimpsed a tear on her cheek.

All three knew what her fate would be.

"Nnn..."

"How do you feel?" a gentle voice asked. "You've had a rough ride... The scanner didn't show anything wrong, but take it easy."

Marjatta blinked. Her heavy outer clothes were gone, leaving her feeling oddly lightweight. She was lying on a circular bed, in a room not designed according to terrestrial aesthetics. "Wha..?"

"That was way too close... Sorry about the knockout needle – I had to get you out of there fast."

The sharpshooter sat up with a jolt. The girl sitting at the desk in front of her had jet-black hair, but her eyes were those of an Arume. "..!"

"Hey, calm down." The stranger raised her hands. She wore some sort of close-fitting armor suit, the helmet of which sat beside the computer terminal on the desk. "I'm on your side, I promise, so please hear me out."

"...What do you want?"

"To make sure the Arume don't kill you, Marjatta Tikkanen... Or shouldn't I say, Wakatake Mari?"

'Marjatta' stiffened. "Who are you?"

The girl rose. "Call me Yui," she said, offering a curtsey. "I traveled a long way to meet you, very nearly in vain."

Mari remembered the blinding light. "The flier..."

"Folded into local space right over your head." Yui leaned over and tapped the terminal's keyboard. "Four-point-seventy-one seconds later, one of your friends' S-tanks got a lock and blew it away."

"The others..?"

"Going by motion analysis from the orbital imagery, the three beside you were killed in the barrage. One of the other two was badly wounded, but the first man who broke off was still fighting. As of last update, elements of Jaeger Brigade were securing the area... I'm sorry, we couldn't get a fix on you until the Arume made their move."

Mari winced. "How did they find me?"

"I'm not sure," Yui confessed. "Maybe someone spotted your face in a recon photo, or it could have been an infiltrator."

"Tch..." Mari's hands balled into trembling fists. Good people died because of me – again!

She was surprised when Yui sat down beside her. "It was a good disguise while it worked," the latter consoled. "The Arume didn't expect you to be there... We didn't expect you to be there." The alien cocked her head. "I mean, I heard you were an Arume's lover – "

"For one night." Resentment simmered in Mari's voice. "One night, and then she threw her life away in a pointless gesture."

Yui's eyebrow lifted just slightly. "And for that, you became a soldier?"

Mari picked up her rifle, which Yui had diligently laid beside the bed. "Not a soldier," she corrected, flicking away a bit of detritus, "a hunter."

"A hunter who broke Simo Hayha's record."

"No." Mari absently fiddled with the sight piggybacked on the receiver. "Hayha only needed a hundred days... and he didn't have a precision diopter."

"If you say so."

Standing abruptly, Mari reclaimed the Lahti pistol on the desk. "Enough chatter. How did you know where I was?"

"Originally we followed the string of contacts used by Sugawara Yuko," Yui recounted. "I was able to visit her office before Helsinki was overrun, but it was empty... After that, the trail went cold. We weren't even sure you were still alive until we learned the Arume were hunting you in Rovaniemi. Do you know what happened to her?"

Mari shook her head. "What do you want from me?"

"Like I said, we want to keep you safe... But considering your, er, talents, perhaps we should actually be enlisting your help in our operations." Yui went back to the desk and sat at the terminal. "Take a look at this."

Peering over her shoulder, Mari saw a photograph of a planet – a drop of blue floating in the dark void of space. "That's Earth... isn't it?"

"Not the one you know... This is the third universal layer, your next-door neighbors in the multiverse. It's a little beat up, as you can see, but we're pinning a lot of hopes on it."

"I've heard the rumors, but I didn't think it would be so..." Mari frowned, leaving the sentence unfinished. "What do the Arume want with it?"

"This." Yui pressed a key and the image changed. Now the pair were looking at a grotesque purple and green head, its shape reminiscent of a ceratopsid dinosaur. "It's a semi-organic super weapon, created using a type of exotic matter unknown to Arume science. The forime of the third layer call it an 'Evangelion'."

Mari wrinkled her nose. "It looks like a toy."

"Doesn't it?" Yui laughed briefly. "But its appearance is deceiving. According to the little information we have, a mere handful of these machines can lay waste to an entire world." She turned her face to Mari. "All the existing units were destroyed, but the knowledge and the tools which built them remain on that planet. The Arume want that power for themselves."

"And you want to stop that?"

"It's one of our goals." Yui rolled her head from side to side. "My friends and I are dissidents, in a manner of speaking. You wouldn't know it from the public image, but there are Arume who oppose their race's official policies... Until now they had no voice, no power." She pointed to the parallel Earth. "On that world, they are beginning to craft a better relationship with forime."

Mari would sooner believe in flying swine. "Secretly?"

"Oh no, they're quite open about it... Now, these three are the most promising." Yui brought up three smaller pictures. "Master Commander Mariel – created the theoretical basis for the new model of interaction. Assigned to central Asia, which is a flashpoint on third layer Earth... Master Commander Keldanil – studied with Mariel at the academy, was twice reprimanded over accusations of softness regarding her treatment of forime populations. Assigned to Denmark and the Netherlands, both in severe debt and geographically vulnerable... Group Commander Renaril – a novice, assigned to mainland China." The armored alien tapped the screen. "She's the important one."

"Why?"

"Designated disposable pawn." Yui's lip curled. "The Arume don't have the resources for another all-out invasion, but those at the top enjoy their power... In the third layer, China had been weakened by years of corruption and intrigue. Their plan was to appoint Renaril, then kill her in an attack which would be blamed on the forime. They thought they'd be free to sink their claws deep after that." A new image appeared on the screen. "Luckily for her – and for us – these two got in the way."

Mari scrutinized the pair intently. One was a woman in some sort of dress uniform sans jacket, the other was a large man with a missing eye. They were standing in front of a squat, badly outdated tank: judging by the angle, this telephoto shot had been taken from a rooftop or high window some distance away. "Who are they?"

"The one on the left is Kang Li. She was a colonel in the Chinese army when her government collapsed. Now she's the military brains behind the Sino-Arumic Liaison, which is reuniting the country bit by bit. Renaril is crushing on her big time... The ugly guy is Roland Schuhart, an arms dealer and an old friend of the colonel. After the attack on Renaril failed, Arume command tried to blame it on him."

"And..?"

"They sent in some troops." Yui smirked. "It didn't work out in their favor... They've placated him for the time being with an exclusive contract to supply the Liaison, but he's a wild card. That makes him useful to us."

Mari sat on the bed once more. "So... a power struggle on a new frontier. What's this have to do with me?"

"Remaining in the second layer is too dangerous. The third layer is... It's less dangerous, and you might be able to make a difference there."

"Really." Mari laid her rifle across her knees. "I spent half my life running, hiding and fighting because of your kind. Now you want me to dump my comrades so that I can help you save the Arume from themselves on a world that isn't mine? What good does that do me?"

"What good would it do you to stay here?" Yui countered. "Even if the Arume don't track you down again, what will you have achieved when your barrel is worn smooth and the ocean is at your back?"

"..."

"If the positions were reversed, I don't think Ekaril would hesitate to – "

Mari's eyes narrowed to slits. "What do you know?" she hissed. "What gives you the right to talk about Hagino? Did you even know her?"

"No," the other replied frankly. "I never met her." Suddenly she was right in front of Mari. "But if half the things I've heard about her are true, you have no right to waste the life she gave you in exchange for her own, just so you can satisfy your lust for revenge!" She backed away, her tone softening a little. "I didn't know Ekaril, but you did. You know what she wished for and you have a duty to ensure her death wasn't for nothing."

"I..."

"Maybe I'm pushing you too fast," Yui mused. "Do you want some time to think it over?"

Mari didn't answer immediately. "...If I did go, what would I do there?"

"You'll need a new identity, but the rest is pretty much up to you."

"And what if I wanted to keep working? Just to stay in shape?"

"It could be arranged." Yui sat cross-legged on the floor. "No front-line stuff, though."

Mari sat deep in thought for a minute. "You know," she said finally, "the man who gave me this told me it never saw combat before the invasion." She ran a gentle thumb over the characters stamped on the rifle's body, faintly visible beneath the layer of drab paint which protected the aged metal. CARL GUSTAFS STADS GEVARSFAKTORI, they read. 1901.

Yui's eyes wandered up the sturdy wooden stock to the dark steel nosecap which encircled the barrel. "Gyrojet weapons were the latest trend at home," she remarked curiously. "I don't know much about these things, but wouldn't a shorter model be more convenient?"

"There's always a tradeoff. I traded maneuverability for reduced flash and kick."

"I see." Yui reached over to the desk and picked up a loaded charger. "These bullets are rather small, though, aren't they?"

"Six-point-five millimeter."

The alien popped a cartridge loose, turning it over in her nimble fingers. "You use hollow-nose rounds. I thought there was a forime taboo against that."

"A hunter shoots to kill," Mari replied candidly, "not to let a wounded animal crawl away."

"I suppose," the other conceded. "What about your friend with the incendiaries?"

Mari shrugged. "She wasn't supposed to use them on soft targets."

"Because it's cruel?"

"Because they're expensive."

"You're pragmatic, I see." Yui returned the ammunition. "Have you made your decision?"

"I guess I have... It can't bring Hagino back, but nothing will get better if I don't try, will it?"

"That's right," Yui stated. "Ekaril is dead and one cannot undo what has already occurred." After a moment she added, seemingly to herself, "One can only create a world in which it never happened."