A Mid-Winter’s Tale

A Mid-Winter’s Tale…Pt II

A Mid-Winter’s Tale… Pt III

A Mid-Winter’s Tale… Pt IV

 

‘Hello sir,’ Jagerin said, for want to anything other than the need to say something.

‘Ah Long Range Reconnaissance Unit 12,’ the man said to her, in her own tongue ‘We are honoured to be receiving your attention,’

Jagerin wrinkled her face in displeasure, it was bad enough being on the end of sardonic humour instead of delivering it, having your outfit identified although, considering the man’s badge was predictable, was still uncomfortable. Elites were not supposed to be so easily named. The man meanwhile went back to the Mitch. Good, he could deal with the fellow, she needed another smoke and time to think.

‘So Banner Sergeant, 5th Rapid Deployment Brigade. Are you authorised to explain the origins and rationale behind this unusual co-operation?’

‘The FDS is here to monitor the activities of and assist in forestalling any aggression by the SRD forces,’ he hoped the man was sharp enough to appreciate the monotoned official response was simply a way of getting out of giving a straight answer. He was relieved the fellow broke into a wry smile. Meanwhile the corporal was fidgeting again. Faigai shrugged at her.

‘I am going into the village,’ she said getting up ‘There is a mother and a new born baby who may need help,’ she tapped the pouch hanging from her belt ‘The BDD always come prepared,’

The two men watched her walk off, the local security officer sighed.

‘As well trained as BDD troopers of the their Long Range Reconnaissance Units are, I very much doubt if she has mid-wife skills. Still at this stage Propaganda and Hearts and Minds are the games to be played. I expect she will appear helpful and that is what matters,’

‘Sir.’ Faigai asked ‘I do not suppose you can tell me why this event is the concern of the local Security Services?’

‘Since neither of you are obviously stiff necked liaison officers but soldiers whose pasts are whereas not as murky as mine or my colleagues do not bear examination and your teaming appears to something caused by chance; that was a very good veiling you pair did along the road by the way, we missed you completely. The shepherds appraised us. Taking all those factors into account are you ready to have a long conversation? We have coffee. Your sort of course. Not our strong sort to be slowly sipped,’

Fergai’s experience of being out in The Wilds had taught him that initial civility was no bad tactic.

 

He looked upon his wife with love, pride and of course some concern, she was weary from the labour and yet she tenderly fed their child. Their beautiful child. How would he keep them both safe with the regime and now two hostile armies to contend with…. and the lack resources?

One of the women who had aided his wife through the delivery bustled back in, there had been some strong conversation going on outside, when it came to labour and birth men deferred to the women who care for and surrounded the mother. The woman, tough stocky and weathered gestured to the new entrant.

‘It’s alright,’ she said brusquely ‘Despite all appearances she is a woman and allowed in,’    

He knew enough to tell the difference between this darker green of the SDR slovosskian and the mottle of the FDS, and so greeted her in her own language.

‘May I ask your reason for being here?’ at this her unsure expression eased and she started to rummage into a small bag hanging from her belt, before stopping and looking about the candle lit room.

‘Is there water to wash my hands?’ she asked very politely, not the usual abrupt demand of those carrying weapons, in this case all manner of weapons it appeared. ‘I have some modest gifts but do not want to give them with these being filthy,’ she gestured a little embarrassed by the state of her hands.

‘There,’ he replied taken aback and pointed to a pot of still clean water, at which she glanced to his wife and babe then to the woman guarding the room solely by her presence, this done she knelt and at the pot and vigorously washed her face and hands. The village woman observed that free of dirt the girl looked quite presentable, if she wasn’t one of the interlopers she’d make a presentable bride, her hands certainly looked used to hard work.

Jagerin  returned to him, now confidently rummaging in the bag.

‘These,’ she said bringing out five small green packs ‘Are concentrates. Empty them into boiling water, stir,’ she started to make the movements ‘And they will make a nourishing soup, for your wife, replace some of the loss the effort of birth has taken out,’ she placed them into his hands ‘These,’ smaller blue backs with a white star on each ‘Are to ease pain. Place in cold water. Stir. Only one a day and only when the pain is very bad,’ she nodded for his understanding which he gave ‘And finally,’ three white packs ‘In here are wet wipes for cleaning and cooling the face,’ she glanced to the woman ‘And other part of the outside of the body,’ she made some brief, possibly immodest gestures, to which she received a matronly grunt of understanding. Jagerin had not felt so nervous since her basic training. The gifts seemed appreciated though.

‘Thank you,’ he said ‘Are all slovosskian soldiers so generous?’ catching on the hesitancy and despite of himself he grinned, then all attention was on his wife asking if she could see the visitor closer and speak with them.

 

‘I expect you will be wondering how to explain this to your officers. If you try and leave out the cop-operation with a slovosskian elite scout the more experienced of them will notice certain gaps not usual in a man of your experience,’ and enjoying some sort of private, not so jolly joke the man left him. 

Fergai prided himself in a small way of having some political knowledge, not so much of this land, yet; but of how things worked in the broad way. This situation should be one of those you reported straight back followed by the expected interrogation by the bright intense eager young folk the colder sharper of The Cloaks liked to send out to test the lands. You would probably have to accompany your interrogator out into The Wilds and try to keep them alive. ‘Should be one of those’ . Here there were twists though and he would have to consult. Consult? The full weight of his twenty-six years, eight in this gig, dropped on his shoulders; he was definitely getting too damn old for this sort of…

She was wearing the sort of overwhelmed expression universal amongst soldiers on receipt orders. Not the stupid sort which caused sourness or the very complex ones that left the ranks in a derisive ‘Yeah, like that’s going to go well’ mood. She’d been told, something he reckoned similar to him, when someone actually bothered to sit you down and give you the whole picture, one which despite all previous experiences might just work… 

‘You look as I feel,’ she said drawing alongside of him ‘We need to exchange information,’ there was a fumbling amongst the nest of pockets, followed by a soft swearing ‘You have any of those dainty sticks you Mitches like to call smokes,’

‘I’ve got some vapes. Clear as a stream, will flush out those tars you’ve been coating your throat and lungs with,’

‘Like inhaling kettle water. Still, they will do,’

Together, left alone they sat against a shed and smoked, looking to the clear bright moon for inspiration to start.

To be continued…    

A Mid-Winter’s Tale

A Mid-Winter’s Tale…(Pt II)

A Mid-Winter’s Tale… Pt III

‘Small to Middle-sized village,’

‘With deference to your rank Sergeant, why do you Mitches have to be so precise?’

‘It’s the small details which keep you alive corporal,’

‘And being fretful over the unnecessary can get you distracted and thus killed. It’s a village,’

From the rise with the aid of binoculars the pair had studied the possible source of so much interest to travellers and locals alike. Aside from the occasional animal sounds usually the villages would be silent and mostly dark, folk at their beds. You could expect a few muted watch lights and some nocturnal comings and goings. Here with nearly every habitation illuminated and knots of people in communal discussion the pair agreed there were more noteworthy facts than scrapping over the official area designate of the neighbourhood. Corporal Jagerin concluded the particular part of the observation with a brief and humorous puff of breath.

‘Now I am pressed on small details. Most of the attention is going on around a small place, almost a barn,’

‘Perhaps those elders are in closed council discussing if the villagers should move before the fighting starts,’ as soon as he had made the suggestion Faigai was dissatisfied with it ‘Although why would they wait for visitors to make up their minds for them is another matter?’

‘Maybe local priests or similar,’ she scratched the back of her neck ‘When you live out in The Wilds or even just the farming lands you grow up accepting all sorts of conventions. You have to in order to get by. Poor folk, Life is hard enough without us,’ she gestured between them ‘Turning up,’

‘It could have been worse. We could have come in from opposite sides and started a fire-fight,’

She looked at him very thoughtfully, chewing on one lip.

‘Some maybe Sergeant,’ and shook her head ‘Not us, though. Not on this narkomanskiy night. Rogue star shells, old fellows out riding, shepherds quitting their flocks. Narkomanskiy,’ she repeated shaking her head again.

He had to admit she had a point, and maybe the freakiest part was the two of them acting as if they were on the same patrol with the same concern not for their own lines but a remote village and locals wandering across their paths. The situation had fixed them with an uncertainty, and he could not figure out the whys of it either. Something was nagging at their differing instincts born out of the experience of these nocturnal patrols.

‘It’s unusual,’ he concluded ‘We should look closer,’

And they made their way crawling down the slope and into welcoming cover which led to the trail into the village, the trail being guarded by four men, two of them the shepherds. Both soldiers kept their own opinion to themselves, one they shared. They could drop those four with barely any effort. Her hands shook at the fleeting thought, his stomach clenched. Neither dared look at the other for fear of somehow giving away a thought once a simple assessment now turning into a reminder of what they had become. The nerves had their say and Jergain whispered.

‘We will have to be careful. We don’t want to scare them off into shooting into the night,’

‘No. The sound would carry too far. Make our own think we had made hostile contact,’

A conversation which once would have been a laughable gallows-humour parody acted as a communal balm and the pair slipped into a settled observation, once more uncertain of themselves.

The sounds of conversations and unsettled animals were suddenly subsumed by a very loud scream scything into the night, at which Corporal Jagerin’s head would have shot up had not Banner Sergeant Faigai’s hand not stilled it.

‘Steady corporal,’ he warned ‘ I’ve never come across a helmet that was bullet proof at short range,’

‘Damn it Sergeant. Adjust your ears. That was the cry of a woman in labour. They’ve all gathered to witness a birth. An important event?’

He was struggling on how to respond to her question being a demand, bordering on an order form him to give his latest opinion in this tangled-up journey, when there came another sound, which still the murmurings in the village and caused the outpost of shepherds to turn.

A thin, but persistent cry of basic protest.

‘Birth,’ Jagerin’s certainty had her wriggling into a low crouch and fumbling into another of those pockets, one hand holding something, with the other she flipped a small stone a short distance. Before Faigai could reprimand her for this act of blasphemous giving away a position taking advantage of the light from the village, still tucked down she was waving one hand as the guards turned, only to turn the gesture into an index finger gesture of ‘wait’. What followed was something he could only describe as the dexterity of a puppet show without the characters as with only her hands raised and visible she tied a packet to a stick and threw it out. Slumping back down once more she pressed a finger to her lips.

‘What in hell?’ he nonetheless hissed at her, and was gifted with a blank face, until from the night came a local voice with possibly as much irritation as his but with a layer of bemusement, at least she seemed to find the challenge funny. ‘Corporal. You might enlighten me since you have picked up some of the local’s language,’

‘They said,’ she failed to stifle a snigger ‘Come out little sore arse,’

‘What?’

‘The name those shepherds gave me, when I made up the incident with thistles,’ she said, scrambling over the cover and walking out rifle slung again and hands raised, while whistling some tune of a jaunty celebratory air. He told himself the whole event was no more different than those times when filled with the fury of battle you simply charged the opposition, certain you could take the place, all rational thinking gone. Satisfied he had made the skewed sort of sense which only existed in places of conflict he slowly made himself visible, also with weapon slung and hands raised.

Not expecting for Corporal Jagerin to take off her helmet and shake loose shoulder length dark hair, while continuing to walk towards the group of men. Whatever expression the girl had chosen it had frozen the men’s collective response into one of surprise. Two more steps and she jerked back a thumb over her shoulder to him, stopped and sat down on a stone looking up at the group.

Not too sure whether she was a sharp reader of situations or simply prone to bouts of craziness he strode forward narrowing the distance to the group, two of whom were fidgeting with their guns, stopped by a loud click of the corporal’s tongue her index finger wagging slowly back and forth, her free hand resting on her still slung rifle. Fixing the men with a hopeless expression he nodded to her tapping the side of his head. This seemed to satisfy them as one said something to another who sped off to the village whose inhabitants’ voices were now drowning out some of the new arrival’s protests. Faigai meanwhile scowled down at Corporal Jagerin who was now wearing a faint smile and a wide-eyed look.

‘I would suggest Sergeant, they’ll be getting one of those elderly riders,’

‘You were chosen you to go out on single patrols because no one would work with you. Am I right?’

‘I am only required to give you my name, rank and military number,’ she replied ‘You should know that,’

He told himself he shouldn’t be that angry, everyone who spent too long out in The Wilds was prone to crazy spells. The hell of it was, she was right. Her performance had broken the ice. Of course it made a another piece of skewed sense. In this conservative land a skimpy girl soldier would defer to a tall well-built man, to them obviously her officer, she simply being the expendable one who sniffed the ground ahead. She’d effectively promoted him from Banner Sergeant to Officer on a liaison mission. Maybe she was actually from her own army’s military security the VRN and he was being played. What for, he would have to wait and see. Meanwhile she lit another of those foul smokes, sitting patient only like slovosskians could do.

He didn’t have to wait long, one of those elderly men was accompanying the villager and moving at a spry pace, attention on Fergai, giving him the feeling he was being reconned in detail.

‘Not a word,’ he warned the corporal.

‘Of course not sergeant,’ she replied with a sincerity so heavy it could only be mockery.

‘Banner Sergeant,’ the elder man said in Fergai’s native Brittonic and not so heavily accentuated as the corporal’s version ‘May I be of assistance to you?’

Fergai was about to open with a general civic address to anyone of some station when his attention was drawn to the man’s upheld palm, the frost of the clear night lending a sheen to the inlaid metal of the badge.

Now there was a badge of a security and intelligence outfit.

The local nation’s own Security police.

Jegerin’s eyes were of saucer dimensions and the cigarette dropped out of her open mouth, causing her to jerk one leg away from its descent.

After her recent antics Fergai was sorry he could not take some enjoyment from her surprise

To be continued…..