The chill winds of the north screamed through the mountains, coming down harshly from the tips of the hills and sweeping through the valleys, rustling between various trees and picking up the snow off the ground. The creatures living in this area were packed tightly to the landscape, shielding themselves from the weather. Amongst them was Ochenkov, wrapped up in the bed sheets from his hospital bed.
He clutched a needle in his hand, flipping it between fingers as he watched a small rabbit nibbling on a shoot that had poked through the snow. He determined the best point of entry for the needle to cripple the animal's leg before he would use the tubing he had to wrap it up and strangle it. The natural world was a cruel place, but he would have to step up to meet the challenge if he wanted to survive.
There was a faint shaking from a bush and both human and creature froze. Out bolted a feral dog and in a flash it had snatched up the rabbit and dashed away. Ochenkov shuddered from another breeze blowing through and he muttered a small prayer for the soul of the animal in his native tongue.
The large man returned to the small encampment he had made in a cave. The fire he had set earlier was down to the embers and he rekindled it quickly to restore warmth to his body. This was only a temporary stop on his trip. He hadn't gone very far from the hospital yet the surrounding area felt like a total wilderness.
Tomorrow the hardest part of his journey would begin; a trip through a cold hell that would challenge him in ways he hadn't encountered since his childhood in the tribe. He formed a little bed for himself and grabbed some food from his stockpile. He preferred to keep it for emergencies but he would need energy just to keep his body temperature up during the night.
* * * * *
The next day was surprisingly sunny. Cold, yes, but sunny at least. The winds had died off temporarily and Ochenkov had set out as quickly as possible upon seeing the favorable conditions. The snow could still get dangerously deep and difficult to pass through but he was finding his way.
He had no choice but to push on. The things that had been said to him, of the coming events, were too dangerous for him to keep them to himself. Were somebody not warned, if actions weren't taken, then the approaching state of the world would be a grave one indeed. He had been fortunate that is battle had been against Sigmeund and not another General of the Artisan Confederate, for they might not have been as kind on his body when they attacked him. Having been former comrades in a war, the two shared a mild bond of battle brothers.
Ochenkov thought back to that day when he had lost his men, the day he had fallen into a trap made by his own country...
"Ochenkov you don't make this very easy by resisting me," Sigmeund said as his Goliath danced around the slower Siberian Rhino.
"After I clip wings, we talk Sigmeund," Ochenkov grunted. He knew his time was limited in this battle. His toughness was not failing him but he understood the limitations of his machine. The critical strike to his shoulder had severely hampered him and left him exposed to more attacks by the Mongoose-class fighter and its expert controller.
Sigmeund bounded off the ground again and drove his foot hard into Ochenkov's chest, making sure to avoid the large horn that protruded from the Goliath's body. The blow rattled the pilot within the cockpit as he crashed onto his back and Sigmeund was above him in a flash, pinning him down in the snow.
"Now you kill me yes?" Ochenkov spat.
"No old friend. I need you to stay alive. In this great chess game of the cosmos, we are but mere pieces and yet we must live to serve our cause. You will be receiving messages instead, Ochenkov, ones I need you to relay to your superiors. Do you understand?"
"Maybe, maybe no. I do not have to listen to enemy."
"That's fine you belligerent old fool. I just have to deliver the messages. The first you will speak to will be the martyr, Christian. You must tell him that the sins of this war will ravage the landscape." Ochenkov tried to struggle but he was powerless under the general. "Then you will speak to your Kaiser. You will tell him that the base is in position and fully operational. The Jahari are willing to speak to him only after he brings them the agreed sacrifice. Do you understand Ochenkov?" The Siberian Rhino struggled a bit before nodding its head. "Good. I am downloading some files to your Goliath for those people I mentioned. Before you get a chance to delete them though I'm going to have to completely disable your machine and rough you up quite a bit. It's part of the deal you see."
"Set-up?"
"It's not a set-up, just a communication network. You happen to be a part of it. You should be glad I was picked for the job. Other generals would try to paralyze you for life if they had this kind of opportunity. I have not forgotten what we did in combat though and I respect it, and so I am truly sorry for what I am about to do."
Ochenkov had closed his eyes after that and had listened to the sounds of his machine being beaten and torn apart, not making any noise himself, even when pain ravaged his body as the cockpit started to collapse.
The tribal man released the memories from his mind and replaced them with the walk at hand. He was indeed lucky to have come across Sigmeund, though unfortunate he had been picked to be used for the relaying of the information. He still didn't understand the message for Christian. Perhaps it was some sort of code, but he felt quite strongly about the one for the Kaiser. The Jahari were not something spoken of lightly. Stories of that ancient race had been passed down around the fires of his tribe for generations. For someone to actually believe them real and to be seeking them...Ochenkov could not go down that pathway of thought.
Instead, he speculated about Sigmeund. Was he a double agent for the Enian Federation? Or perhaps he was a double double agent? Ochenkov knew that Christian could not be trusted and the bizarre phrase stuck with Ochenkov's fears. Was Christian a double agent himself, thus making Sigmeund a triple agent? All the burly man knew was that his head hurt and that he could not deal with it himself. He would need to find help in new allies.
The sins of this war will ravage the landscape. The sins of this war. Maybe a warning against some sort of actions that the Martyr General had committed? Unknown for now.
Ochenkov pressed up against the trunk of a tree and peered around its side. Up ahead were two figures clad in black, soldiers it looked like. Each was holding a high-powered rifle and had munitions clipped to their belts. Their faces were covered to protect them from the weather and they seemed to be sharing stories as they smoked cigarettes.
There was a strange air to the two men. They were not lost, nor were they on patrol or searching for Ochenkov. No, they seemed to be doing something different, as though they were guarding something. An entrance nearby to some base? They had no markings on them for Enia or Artisan or anything else, just the black clothes. And Ochenkov didn't like it.
The barbarian withdrew a needle in one hand and pulled out some medical tubes to make them more accessible if he needed them. Enian men or not, they served a threat if they discovered Ochenkov and could stop his quest cold.
Keeping his weight low to avoid detection, Ochenkov crept along the ground in his approach. The two men gave out hearty laughs and he froze in case one of them took a look over their shoulder. He felt an old boil rising in his blood, something that he had left behind with his indigenous heritage. That feral, barbaric capacity for violence that could take him over, the very same one that had once led to him tearing a man apart at the limbs.
Could he control it this time? He thought his experience would help but you could never tell until it actually happened. Right now he had a hold over it, just letting enough out into his muscles to win this battle, but not enough to give him away.
With a ferocious leap, the warrior jumped onto one of the soldier's backs, driving the needle into the neck deep. It struck a nerve in the spine as it collided with the bone and the man went down in an instant. The other guard twisted and threw a right hook that Ochenkov ducked and then he caught the follow up left jab.
Ochenkov flew up again, this time straight over the enemy, landing softly in the snow behind him. The other soldier was standing once more and withdrew the needle from his neck in surprise and disgust. There wasn't much bleeding from such a tiny hole but the man was clearly shaken.
Before either of them could level their weapons, Ochenkov had lashed out with his foot and caught one in the knee, knocking him onto one leg. The savage fighter brought an elbow down on the enemy's head, knocking his face into the snow, and withdrew the tubes from his side.
Ochenkov rolled past the second soldier and left the tubing flowing behind him. It caught the enemy's wrists and they in turned snapped back, trapping the arms against the chest. Ochenkov stood up once more and grabbed the guard's head, saying another prayer under his breath before twisting violently until the neck snapped.
The remaining man, severely dazed, groggily found a way back to a standing position once more. He violently threw the butt of his rifle around in a foolish effort to strike Ochenkov. Caught unawares, the weapon collided with Ochenkov's chest and caused him to stumble back in shock.
With renewed vigor, the soldier struck again, this time with his fists, driving heavy blows against Ochenkov's body. The tribesman reeled from the last blow and pulled out another needle, tucking it behind his back. Ochenkov took the next punch hard into his gut and stabbed down with his weapon into the back of his opponent's hand.
The soldier screamed with pain but was silenced by a hard head butt that knocked him out. Ochenkov withdrew the needle and drove it into the enemy's neck once more, using it to tear up deep scratches that oozed blood. Ochenkov watched in the cold as the soldier bled to death before dragging the two bodies away and burying them. He returned to the scene and cleaned up the mess. As he did he uncovered a small metal latch in the ground, large enough for a man to slip into when opened, but otherwise blending in with the flat of the landscape. Ochenkov had to dig up the bodies to find an access card but soon enough he was back over top the doorway looking down.
The tribal man took a deep breath and held onto it, feeling his boiling emotions begin to die down a little. This was not a planned stop on his journey. But it would be a stop he had to make...
A/N: Ochenkov finding strange places in the snowy north? What could be going on in the world surrounding? Find out in the next Sigma/Star!