Eric Olafson, Neo Viking Vol. 01

-""—

Gretel almost died, she had not found Bendixen Rock, nor seen any other land. She could not even see Olafson Rock anymore.

She had lost count of the day and nights she bopped in rough sea. While the boat had a power cube with enough energy to steer that boat at least two times right around the globe, it wasn't very fast, had no cabin, and was used to go relatively short distances over the open water so fishermen could attach air hoses to harpooned Tyrannos and Three Fins.

Finding one of the small islands that dotted the otherwise featureless ocean of Nilfeheim was almost impossible.

By now she was dehydrated and so cold she didn't even shiver anymore.

She had spent at least six or seven days at sea, cold, hungry, and completely dehydrated.

But then there was a bright floodlight.

What happened next, she remembered only in dreamlike, vague images.

She found herself in a clean bed, in a shiny and strange place with friendly faces and mechanical things with hands floating in midair.

A man came to her bed with a warm smile and said, "I am Dr. Capers and you are at the Clinic on Union Island. We have treated you for hypothermia, dehydration, and a host of infections. The school bus flier who spotted you saved your life young lady."

Gretel started crying.

The doctor said. "We are short on Psych Staff, but I can request an Avatar if you like to talk to a female counselor."

Another man in white came into view. "You still need to learn a lot about Nilfeheim, she hasn't understood a word you said."

The man sat on the bed next to her. "You are a Lowman's girl, right? That would also explain why you were found trying to cross Nilfeheim oceans in something akin to a nutshell."

She nodded. "I am Gretel Hemstaad of Olafson's Rock. Please don't take me back. I cannot pay for anything, but I can work."

"No worries, Gretel. No one will take you anywhere against your will. All services are free. You are on Union Ground and not even the Circle of Elders and all clan Chiefs can harm you here."

She made big eyes. "They can't?"

"No, they can't. While the cursed Nilfeheim Exception is inhumane and forces us to close eyes to terrible things, here you are a free sentient being."

"What is to become of me?"

"You relax, take it easy for a while. Eat and sleep and watch GalNet. Social can get you a space bus ticket to any place you like. You can then take steps to become a Union Citizen. I can also run your DNA against the CITI if you permit that. Maybe there are relatives of yours out there."

"I don't understand what that means."

"Every Union citizen has a copy of their biological data inside a huge library of sorts, not all but many have permissions on file, allowing social services to find family ties."

"Lord Volund has killed everyone."

"It is not advertised and forbidden by these Elders, but there are Lowmen every year who manage to leave this world. It is a long shot, but who knows."

She felt like a different person, everything on this Union Island was clean, sparkling clean. There was wonderful food in a seemingly endless variety. It came out of the machines and no one asked her to pay for it.

On the third day, the old doctor came to her room and commented on her good looks and how pleased he was to see her doing so much better. Then he said. "I have great news for you. You have a sister who lives on Holstein, a planet only a few lightyears from here. She awaits your call."

"A sister?"

"Why don't you speak to her? I show you how to make a GalNet call."

She did have a sister. Her name was Lora and she did remember Lora from when she was still very young.

Lora, so her family told her, had simply vanished one day.

This was not unusual. Lowmen, especially pretty women were raped and abused by the Lords and then murdered and disposed of in the endless oceans. No one openly talked about it of course. But when she started to develop and begun to fill her simple dresses in an appealing way, her mother had warned her to keep it hidden as best as she could. She knew about the whispered stories when the women scrubbed hides or stomped them into vats of revolting liquids.

It was then she also learned that her looks and boobs could be used as a means to get things from men.

This is how she caught the eye of Isegrim and seduced the foolish brute.

Now she had learned that her sister hid among leather bales aboard a freight skimmer and escaped in Halstaad Fjord.

Lora managed to reach the spaceport and Union Social Services provided her with a Non-Cit travel permit and a space bus ticket to Holstein.

Holstein, so Lora told her, was the destination of many Lowmen who managed to leave Nilfeheim. There they could go to Union school and none of them ever looked back.

Lora had stayed on Holstein and was hired by a dairy farm.

After the long GalNet call, Gretel too left Nilfeheim aboard a space bus.

Everything was scary at first. She saw beings that weren't human. Things that moved and talked. Appearing to her like living nightmares, but no one seemed to even notice. Humans acted as if these monsters were people.

But it did not take her long to see that no one was afraid and there weren't any clan lords anywhere.

The flight to Holstein was short and her sister greeted her with a long hug right after she had landed.

Her sister was a full citizen, even served her twenty-two-month citizen service as a Union court clerk.

Lora used to be a hide scrubber just like her, but now was a shift manager at a large industrial farm. She was responsible for 20,000 dairy cows and 200 workers, robots and earned 6300 credits every Union month. She owned her own home on the outskirts of Neu Itzehoe, a picturesque town of 300,000 surrounded by rolling hills and meadows full of green grass and light forests.

From Lora's veranda, there was a wonderful vista across the town and a small spaceport in the far distance.

Lora was dating a local Manure Management Engineer and had serious plans to marry and get kids.

To Gretel, Lora looked more alien than the non-humanoid beings she had seen on the bus. Her sister did not wear braids but had a modern haircut with bangs and shoulder-length hair. Instead of linen dress, apron, and bare feet, she wore a pantsuit, coveralls and short dresses, cute looking shoes, and even had her own flier.

All this happened almost a year ago now.

Gretel too had changed since then; she had gained weight from all the good and seemingly unlimited food and after she was introduced to Virtu Reality she was addicted to it.

Lora tried to get her into Union school and a young adult class, but Gretel did not like school. She didn't really like anyone telling her to do things.

It was a Wednesday almost exactly a year since she had arrived; she had herself hooked into Dream Maker and enjoyed the carefree life of a simulated princess. Just as she wanted to join her Avatar friends at a party, the virtual world flickered out of existence and she found herself on the Dream Maker couch and her sister standing by the GalNet terminal, Lora's finger still resting on the shut-down sensor. "Gretel, we need to talk."

Gretel blinked. "Could that not wait till later? I was invited to a Bubble tree party."

"No, it can't wait. Because I know the horrors and conditions back at Nilfeheim, I let you do whatever you like but I can't have you stay in Virtu for the rest of your life. I see you didn't go to school again. How do you plan to become a Union Citizen and get work?"

Gretel sat up and glared at her sister. "I don't want to learn useless things about other planets and I never want to work again." She cupped her breasts. "I can get anything I want with these."

"This is not Nilfeheim, Gretel. The Union will provide you with every opportunity and with endless chances to become whatever you want to be, but the Assembly decided long ago that every individual has to work for it. Freeloading is simply unfair to all the others that do work."

Gretel clenched her fist. "All I want is revenge and kill Volund, kill that blonde Ragnarsson bitch and make every Olafson pay for what they have done to father and the others and for every Hemstaad who had to work as a slave.

I want to be Isegrim's wife and become a Lady of the clan and make them all do whatever I say. That is what I want, not learn useless things and become the Lowman slave for another clan chief you call employer."

Lora slowly nodded. "I understand that better than you think, little sister. I too had dreams of revenge, but here I am free. I am a woman and equal to men.

All this I have earned on my own. I need not to ask anyone for anything. This freedom and my new life is more important to me than to brood over revenge. Revenge that would take me back to that cold world of ours with little chance of success." Lora sighed. "You chose whatever destiny and path you want. I gave you a chance to do the same as I did. Now I am going to sell this house. I have signed a marriage contract with Heinz, my fiancée and we move together. I want kids now and a family of my own.

You may change your mind and get on the track of becoming a citizen and a way to support yourself and I will help you with that, or by Sunday you need to find your own way and do whatever you like."

"I will return to Nilfeheim, but not before showing you how grateful I am for what you have done. Let me show you what the Union Post office delivered this morning. You see I did not reject all schooling and learned quite a lot from GalNet shows."

Gretel revealed a thin spray bottle and released a faint cloud of liquid mist right into her sister's face. "It's quite illegal so I was told and the Shaill call it Will Bender. It was awfully expensive, and I had to use much of your Credit savings, but it is the next best thing to that fabled Psionics and just as effective."

Gretel laughed as she stared in the suddenly blank expression of her sister's face. "This stuff will make me the queen of Nilfeheim.

---------------------------------------

Prelude Part 3: Isegrim marries

Prelude Part 3: Isegrim marries

4991 OTT

Not in the last five hundred years did the Olafson Burg look as spectacular as it did today. Gone were the rag-like remnants of cloth; replaced by brand new flags in vibrant red. But not only Olafson red waved in the stiff breeze of Longnight winds, but there were also black flags with the silver falcon of the Ragnarssons. The obvious cracks and patches of crumbling concrete had been filled with expensive Duro-Crete or were simply hidden behind a decorative banner.

A brand-new Hydrogen generator hummed happily in the basement right next to the burned-out 1000-year-old scrap heap of the old one and sent electricity to a thousand lamps or more.

Volund caressed the fine dark red leather he was wearing and found his long fur-trimmed cape quite regal.

The heavy golden clan chief necklace was around his neck and his right hand was on the hilt of Hevnen, the great broadsword of the Olafson clan. He once again felt like a clan chief should, proud, mighty in stature and looks. He stood by the window of his chambers.

This was the second year of this season's Longnight. Temperatures already dropped to -15 °C during the dim day and reached -20 °C at night. In another year, the ocean surface around Olafson Rock would be thick enough for a man to walk or drive across to the other burgs in the vicinity.

The temperatures were unimportant to the Lowmen, Bondi, and Freemen laboring outside to make the Burg fit to hold a wedding. It was tradition to hold the wedding at the groom's home, otherwise they could have already moved to the much bigger and well-kept Ragnarsson Burg.

Fortunately, this Burg was not small and there was ample space for all the guests. Erik Gustav had given him a more than generous advance on the bride's dowry. He had never seen such a sum on the readout of his Union Bank Account and the two coffers filled with Iridium coins standing behind him were to pay the local merchants and the workers. After all only clan families and members of the free families in town were Union citizens and had bank accounts. The rest of Nilfeheim still relied on good old-fashioned coin-based currency.

His son Isegrim stood in the middle of the courtyard, dressed quite similar like his father, but with the addition of a Nubhir wolf mask. These masks were tremendously popular among the Neo Viking warriors, as they gave them a fierce and frightful appearance and the leather and pelt kept their faces warm. In the bright light of the floodlights, he was an eerie sight as his breath steamed between the permanently growling fangs of the Nubhir mask and made it almost look alive. There were much cheaper alternatives and until recently the Olafsons were forced to tie a piece of Fangsnapper fur before their faces.

The Ragnarsson clan had the largest Nubhir wolfs and the biggest Nubhir farm. Ragnarsson leather and fur were far superior to Olafson leather and more expensive.

Volund watched his son order the workers around, making sure everything was perfect before the actual wedding would take place. Volund turned, took a pitcher set for him on a small ante table by the window, and filled his empty tankard with more of the warmed ale. His eyes fell on a two dee picture image, a traveling Image Taker and Knife Sharpener had made of his wife Grimhild. Many years ago. He raised his drink and said, "I wish you could be around to see all this. Thanks to the upcoming wedding of our son to the oldest daughter of the Ragnarsson clan I could now afford all the beautiful things a chief's wife deserves. Most of all I now could afford a flier and take you to the Union Clinic instead of seeing you die in child labor."

He drank and as always imagined seeing that special glitter in her eyes. "Our stubborn firstborn has seen the fair child of the Ragnarssons and he has forgotten all about everything else. I just wish our beloved Hogun would return. We Olafsons are fast to anger and fast to break all things around us, including the bonds that make a family what it should be."

He was glad that he was all alone in his chambers as tears dropped into his massive beard. "I have never treated you the way you deserved to be treated, and now that you are gone, I miss you and too late I realize how blessed I was. I pray to Odin to give Isegrim the wisdom to not make the mistakes I have made."

With a sigh, he took his own wolf mask and decided to visit the mount of rocks under which he had buried her and the stillborn baby girl that should have been his daughter.

—""—

HOGUN

Several light hours away from Nilfeheim and beyond the orbit of the systems outermost planet, a small ice ball called Hel with nothing on it but an automated SII - GalNet Repeater, a rugged, boxy-looking spaceship dropped out of quasi space. Not all that many spaceships made it to Solken System. Other than the occasional freighter and the monthly space bus, there was almost no traffic. The dull brown ship of finest Karthanian engineering was certainly not a space bus. Even though this Karthanian built Super Cruiser had freight bays, it wasn't a freighter either. The openly displayed weapon turrets pointing in every direction made it clear this was a ship of war. While the ship and the openly displayed weapons were perfectly legal, some of the hidden ones were not.

The Ship Master of this hulking ship was a massive Petharian. The rest of the crew were, with few exceptions, members of the physically strong and extraordinarily strong species of the Union. There was a Maggi Sauron, two Oromarls, three Purple Throat Shiss, Four Triple Strongs, and a former Plato Slave. They had all gathered on the bridge of the ship they called the Great Dame. In their midst stood a human, he was neither the smallest nor the weakest aboard.

The Ship Master said to the big human, "We are here, this is Solken System." To the Purple Throat Shiss at the Comm Panel, the Petharian said, "Go and hail the spaceport and call for landing instructions and make sure you transmit our transponder codes. I don't want them to call any Navy asset to check us out."

The Shiss did what he was commanded to do and hissed to the Sauron sitting next to him, "That is something we should avoid indeed."

The Petharian again addressed the human, "Hogun; I sure hate to see you go; you have been a true brother in arms. Are you sure you want to leave us? I gladly increase your share, but I have offered that before."

The big man had a strange expression on his face as he looked at the planet they approached. "Rathuur, no man could ask for better friends as I have found in the ranks of Rathuur's Brigands, but I am going to marry the girl that is waiting for me for so long. And then I want to settle down, take over that little inn she inherited, and have some kids. No amount of credits could change my mind."

The Petharian put one of his arms on the man's shoulder. "I have never met a man more honorable, more dependable, or being able to best me in a contest of arm wrestling."

The ship belonging to this famous, barely legal mercenary outfit dipped through the planet's atmosphere after it received landing permission.

It took Hogun almost an hour to shake all the hands, claws, and similar appendages as he made his way to the landing ramp, but finally he had said his last goodbyes, shouldered a big Duroplast box, and made his way to the passenger terminal while the Grand Dame reversed her Arti Grav and climbed back into space. Hogun could not blame them for their haste. While Rathuur's Brigands were a legal registered mercenary outfit, with a solid reputation and no federal rap sheet, some of the weapons both the ship and the mercs used were everything but legal.

While the outfit would never do anything that could harm the Union or go against Union interests, having a Petharian outfit leader almost guaranteed that, they weren't as law-abiding as perhaps they should have been.

Most of the contracts they fulfilled were targets outside Union Space and laws had little meaning there, however some of their jobs could be called acts of piracy.

Hogun turned and raised his head to see the ship disappear into the lead-gray sky. Then his gaze scanned across the mountains of snow that had been piled to the sides of the spaceport landing field.

On the other end stood a Meteor freighter loading densely packed blocks of ice and snow. The freighter had the logo of the Silver Hawk Emporium on its side. So, rumors were true, the Ragnarsson clan was associated somehow with Silver Hawks Inc. The company logo and the heraldic hawk of the Ragnarssons were almost identical. Silver Hawks Inc. was not the biggest Company out there, but even he who had spent most of his off-planet time in the fringe regions or beyond Union Space had heard of the Silver Hawk Emporium stores that seemed to spring up at every spaceport.

He grinned and shook his head. His father Volund would never get the idea to ship worthless snow by the shipload off-planet, not knowing that a shipload of clean water ice would be a sellable commodity on any desert planet. Desert planets far outnumbered water planets after all and ninety percent of all Union citizens needed water in some form or another. The spaceport seemed bigger than it had almost twenty years ago when he had left Nilfeheim, hiding as a stowaway in a much smaller freighter than the bulky Meteor.

It was freezing cold, and the wind had a nipping bite to it, but here gravity felt exactly right, and the air tasted wonderful. He reached the terminal and the Customs Inspector must have been a local Freeman. He had all the hallmarks of a Neo Viking but was cleanly shaven. The man did not display any clan insignia or colors of any particular clan. The Customs Inspector wore a laughable Thompson E-Blaster in a similar unpractical covered holster, but Hogun was sure the man probably had never any reason to pull his sidearm. The man was a Neo Viking and as such not a small person, but he had to tilt his head back to look into Hogun's face and he said, "We usually never get any private ship traffic, so don't mind me asking what kind of business do you have here?"