The Unfortunate Circumstance of Us, P. 2

Author’s Note; This is a continuation of Part One, it’s not a stand-alone narrative like most things I write. It’s also fits into a short story format so there’s not much of a self-explanatory background and is short on the details I like to include in longer tomes. If you haven’t read Part One, you’ll more than likely be left with a bunch of questions. For everyone else the definition of ‘Hunky Fit’; A person of Slavic ancestry that’s been enraged or provoked into a fit of rage that borders on a psychotic episode. Related to the German word, kinepschen. Really. So, we return to Czechoslovakia where Satan’s Whore has been found….

We discovered her barely alive locked in a steel gang-box along the wall of the manor house. When I saw the padlock, I found a rock as the rest of the witches beat on the lid screaming her name. I forcefully removed the lock, ripped the lid off as the medics pulled her out and dragged her to the courtyard entrance. The witches left the courtyard and stood off to the side praying.

I stood back and watched. As four more medics brought over additional experimental equipment, this time a heavy stretcher with built in life support-bare in mind this is 1987- that later as in today, is now standard equipment. Satan’s Whore at this time, took a heart attack. The medics hit her with shock paddles again, a novelty at the time and adrenaline. I lost my grip on it, big time.

I threw what the locals where I live would call a ‘Hunky Fit’. I pick up the steel gang-box throw it around, kick it and beat it with the rock while frothing at the mouth. I figured she was dead and guess who I blamed? Me. If I got there faster, if I broke ranks and just did what I wanted, what if, why didn’t, so and so forth, it’s my fault. I don’t like failure and this is the nuclear grade failure. My sister’s dead because I screwed the pooch.

Unknown to me Combat Camera recorded it and one of the medics who saw it too, went and got one of my other still breathing sisters, the Bavarian Fox. She see’s what’s going on and says I quote, ‘Naw…He’s okay that’s just a Hunky Fit…He does that all the time when he’s upset’. Then smiles for the camera.

Mortician and Slut walk over watch me beat the gang-box up with a tree I pulled out of the ground and after staring blankly say, ‘What’s the problem? He’s just pissed off.’

They smile for the camera too.

The medics revive Satan’s Whore, attach her to the portable six-man carry life-support stretcher and take that to the middle of the road. Then there’s an argument over who wants to get close enough to me to tell me that.

Slut does. She marches into the courtyard, grabs me by my BDU lapel and smacks me across the face and orders me to calm down, my other sister is still alive. After a few deep breaths the Hunky Fit passes into oblivion. We go to the road and encounter another problem. The experimental device is too heavy to be lifted by the incoming Chinook helicopter.

To detail, the helicopter has a davit crane and electrical winch that can pull up about five hundred pounds. The object is to get my sister inside to the onboard surgical hospital. The Devil asked if they could use the cargo hook…They stared at him like he just had a brain cramp. The cargo hook would mean she’s flying underneath the helicopter back to Wiesbaden, not happening. Between my sister and the equipment, the only thing keeping her alive right now, the weight is twenty-pounds over limit.

I’m on.
They then attach more portable man powered life support to me. I don’t know what it was called but as stated in Part One, it killed three out of the four guys before me. It looks like a life vest, and acts like a placenta. Essentially, I become Satan’s Whore’s lungs, heart, liver and kidneys. They try to give me the option to back out of it. The power unit on my back malfunctions and a medical technician moved into hotwire it. They then slap a respirator mask on me and plug an appliance into my left fore arm.

As this is happening, the other medics are attaching ports to Satan’s Whore’s inferior vena cava and one of her iliac arteries…I think. I watch my blood fill up and begin to pass around membranes on the two chest mounted sacks via rotary pumps and then one of the medics asks me if I was sure I wanted to. When I said ‘Beyond doubt’ he asked why.

My answer that she was my sister floored him. His comment ‘You really love your sister…’

Damn right I do.

I’m now attached to Satan’s Whore who transfers over well enough. After a few minutes, the Chinook helicopter is hovering overhead, she’s put in the wire basket that they lowered down and we’re lifted into the cargo bay. Then the real fun begins. I’m shoved off to the side and get the life scared out of me again as she dies three more times. Three times with the shock paddles and moments of real panic as they attach her to more machines. As we fly off, she stabilizes and they screw a halo neck brace onto her head, give her a trachea and leave me sitting there for the most part.

A medic came over and checked me out and a cameraman took a still of my heartbroken forlorn mug as I pray for the courage and strength, I think I’m lacking.

Meanwhile on the ground…

“Okay we wait,” Mortician announces as the Witches Coven finishes a prayer circle.

Mortician is now wearing her vestments, the ones she got from her grandmother. The clothing is a family heirloom that’s over six hundred and fifty years old. Her hat has two cones on it, one on each side and it was the first time I’ve seen something called a gŷrelā. Its like a fancy apron that was popular during the Middle English period. The shoes weren’t that old, but the brass buckles on them were several centuries ancient. Now, from a back pocket in the gŷrelā she produces her privately owned .22 LR caliber Ruger Mark III pistol, locks and loads. It still has the packing grease on it.

“This won’t hurt the baby will it?” Animal Mother asks as she stiffens and pulls Gustav of Bern’s housecarl axe closer to her.

“No,” she assures Animal Mother. “Neither you or Junior will feel anything. It will be like a loud snap and you’ll both be in Valhalla…Now we wait. Both Grace and Satan’s Whore are still alive and we have to see how our fate works out.”

“Did you tell him?” Slut snaps.

“Excuse me?” Atomic Blonde barks, whips around to her right and glares at Slut.

“You heard me and I’m talking to Animal Mother,” she snapped.

“You trying to avoid your duty?” Atomic Blonde goes on face reddening.

“You (*$@# *&! (*^$%! (yeah, she said that) heard me,” Slut barked, now standing on her hind legs. “I’m following Steinlitz because he’s my brother and I love him. Now you witches are going to hear it because I want to get this off my less than hairy chest. I’ve been living with that man for about a year since we met okay? He’s not an asexual! He treats you the way he does because he thinks it’s respectful and decent. I think he’s misguided because you’re all a bunch of no-account puke that act like the girl’s in the trailer park I come from! Stop calling him Grace! He hates that! He’ll never tell you that because in his misguided sense of decency he thinks you’re all real ladies! I know what you’re really like!

And you Animal Mother! You’re the worst of them all! Did you tell him who Junior’s daddy is? He knows by the way but he wants you to say it! At every meeting of the Coven you bring up wanting a husband and this and that! Steinlitz doesn’t consider third cousins’ fair game! Okay, most people do but he doesn’t! He would if you’d bend a bit! What does he tell you? Just that but you’re as deaf as a rock! He’s not ready for a wife yet! Look at his job! We’re standing here ready to follow our Beserkergog into eternity and you can’t talk to the man you want?

And you! Atomic Blonde let me tell you about yourself! You are far from pure! You like to kill people! You’re going to have to answer for that! Steinlitz knows that too! That’s why he keeps sending you to Mental Hygiene he knows that and thinks you’re sick! You’re not! You developed a taste for it! Warriors kill because they have too! You kill because you’ve learned to like it! I don’t know much about Odin or Thor or the goddesses but you know what? Nowhere does it say they like killing! In the stories I hear from the Holy Mother, they do what they have too, you do it because you want too!

Bavarian Fox, you live up to my name! Every man and a few women you run into you go New Orleans! …”

“What’s that mean?” Bavarian Fox asked totally stunned at the tirade.

“New Orleans…It’s also called The Big Easy!” Slut exploded. “Hey! I earned the name I have and I’m trying to change! I didn’t know any better until I met The Coven! Oh, one ever told me what I was doing was wrong…Acting like Mistress of the Sluttery seemed normal! It seemed fun at first! Now when I look in the mirror, I can see how wrong and broken I am! I’m attempting to change my ways and walk the path of enlightened honor and courage! And you know what I’m doing here? I’m acting like my brother’s Skjaldmaer! I have his back in this life and the next no matter what! How about that!” she then grunted disapprovingly turned her back to them and folded her arms across her chest. “All that and I love you too. I’m proud to be here…”

“Welcome to The Coven, Volva Azalea,” Mortician smiled warmly.

“You just earned your name!” Atomic Blonde erupted.

“What I earned my name?” Slut gawked as her eyes widened.

They then squealed joyfully and hugged each other. The Devil walked up behind Mortician and looked things over dumbfounded.

“Uh just what are you going to do with that?” The Devil asks. A cameraman stood back, far back and recorded everything.

Mortician didn’t say anything but stared at him.

“I though witches were basically passive. You know, harmless… Into herbal medicine and singing Kumbaya,” he shrugged. “It looks like you’re committing mass suicide and…”

“We are,” Mortician replied deadpan. She then aimed her pistol at the bridge of The Devil’s nose, who stood only an arm’s length from her.

“That’s a .22!” The Devil laughed. “Just what do you think you’re going to do with that?”

“Send you to Nifilheim to meet the Goddess Hel where you’ll fit in with the other scum bags. Hey maybe she’ll cut you a piece of rancid meat with the Knife of Despair and you can eat from the Plate of Hunger as you waste away on the maggot and lice infested straw in Eljudnir’s dungeon…” she then politely and thinly smiles maliciously. “Maybe Odin will take pity on you and let you go to Valhalla in time for the Ragnarök…Even though dishonorable warriors don’t deserve even an iota of anything, but who am I to speak for the All Father?”

“Huh?” The Devil replied confused. He seemed nervous but not afraid.

“We’re Volva and we are pacifist however, we are also Skjaldmaer. Steinlitz is our Beserkergog and the Berserkers and Skjaldmaer under him are duty bound to follow his lead. If Odin takes him and his Skjaldmaer, we follow. He’ll need us for the Ragnarök,” she explained calmly without a hint of jocularity.

“You’re serious?” The Devil burped.

Mortician slipped the safety off her pistol.

“Oh okay…” The Devil said and turned and walked quickly away. As he got back to his Hummer he turned back, waived, smiling and announced, “Good luck on your journey if it comes to that!”

“I think he got it,” Atomic Blonde, who still didn’t have her Coven name, observed.

“No, he’s still an asshole,” Animal Mother interjected.

“Hush,” Mortician ordered. “We can’t judge spiritual matters just guide…So let’s hope this asshole got guidance.”

“Excuse me, can I take some pictures?” one of the Combat Cameramen asked.

“Sure,” Mortician replied. “We came prepared for that…”

She put her pistol away stood off to the side as the others all smiles and giggles, pulled up a marching parade banner from the ground that read; The Coven of Wiesbaden-Mainz, 7th. Corps U.S. Army, Czechoslovakian Expeditionary Force.

Yeah, it said that.

“Hey!” the Devil yelled. “They’re good to go! We’re pulling out!”

He then got in his Hummer and drove off.

“A motorcycle!” Slut chirped as she walked off. “I’m getting a ride see you in the rear…”

“Hey you’re supposed…” Mortician was saying and then was interrupted by the repeated blasts from a .50 caliber mounted on a five-ton truck. She turned among shouts of ‘There they are!’ and watched the tracer rounds slam into a BMP that turned onto the dirt road about 150 yards/meters away. Along the sides of the armored wheeled vehicle Soviet soldiers wearing black uniforms ran alongside. The ground troops didn’t duck and cover, they did what Soviets were good for, they ran faster toward their objective.

Mortician drew her .22LR pistol aimed and fired.

About 125 yards/meters away one of the Soviets grabbed his crotch and began hopping on one leg.

“What!” the cameraman shouted as he ran behind Mortician. “You shot him in the balls!”

“Balls!” Mortician yelled as she threw her stick first into the back of a Hummer and then dove in after it. “I was aiming a foot over his head!”

At this point a whooshing sound overpowered the fifty-caliber as somebody launched a rocket from one of the Hummers. The ground shook as the BMP took a direct hit and then exploded. As Mortician’s Hummer sped off, the Cameraman recorded Slut sitting backwards on a motorcycle. As she stormed past what looked like three civilians standing in the tree line, maybe, she opened fire on them with her privately owned AK-47. There was more shooting as a second BMP turned onto the road, passed the burning hulk of the first and fired on the convoy.

Meanwhile in the air….

The Chinook is hiding in the trees, not hovering above them but in them. I had an elm branch stuck in the open door before me and leaves are blowing around the cargo hold. I looked out the window to my right and watched a plane fly by in the distance dropping flares and chaff. Looking into the cockpit I can see tree branches smack off the windshield, the co-pilot’s windshield has been cracked above the wipers.

On the dashboard are three lights, red, yellow and blue. They’re blinking as a buzzer sounded. The crew chief explains that’s a warning system for anti-aircraft artillery. The Soviets have their new Strela anti-aircraft system deployed, NATO nomenclature ‘Grail’, in the area. Its like our Redeye or Stinger Systems and that was causing the problems. He asks me if I can run in the vest. The medic then said yeah but I wouldn’t get very far. The flight surgeon is making good to abandon ship and drag Satan’s Whore back to Wiesbaden.

The decision was made to leap frog among the trees until the last minute and the run like hell before the fuel ran out. That’s what happened and we did it long enough that the convoy made it back an hour before we did.

Now looking back on it from decades later, I never had a good experience in a Chinook. The damned things are cursed.

The very second the hydraulic shock absorbers for the landing gear ‘thunked-bumped’ on touch down back in Germany, the engines died. No fuel left. You can call that a miracle, I call that the Coven’s ‘Magick’. As soon as everyone left, they let me stay behind with my sister I tickled her foot.

Her toes wiggled.

I’ve been around long enough at this point to know she’s going to be okay. Until then I was worried about her winding up a quadriplegic. I was holding her hand when the rest of the family showed up.

What amazed me is Air Dave and Little Brother’s apology for not being there on the ground. It seemed that Animal Mother told her brother Air Dave wrong and he showed up fifteen minutes late.

Well here’s Little Brother’s story. His sister Atomic Blonde tried to talk him into not going and when reason failed, she knocked him out with a hook-shot to the jaw and then duct taped him at the wrists and ankles, then locked him in an equipment cage. She had a roll of quarters in her fist when she nailed him.

After about ten minutes a nurse walked in and found it amazing that Satan’s Whore not only had family in theater but all came to see her. She made it known her brother stopped talking to her when she joined the Army. That’s a common story. I heard it so often I lost count.

Satan’s Whore recovered and returned to service. She had a dancing career in Hollywood, and did some run way modeling as a civilian. Her neck still gives her problems and she still has the psychological problems associated with that level of extreme violence.

The Witches of Wiesbaden are a sneaky bunch that would put most intelligence operations to shame. Mr. They turned a blind eye to it, denying everything since his underlings, assumed people, were done in by a gaggle of girls in Halloween costumes.

Don’t let this happen to you.