THE HIGH TABLE

Norwegian FSK. Forsvarets Spesialkommando. "Hold deg våken, kompis," the voice said. Deep. Calm. Utterly unimpressed by the nightmare creature stirring in the wreckage. Stay awake, buddy. Sten rose from the broken wood like a demon from hell. His spurs clicked. His gauntlets flexed. Blood trickled from a new cut on his forehead. His smile was gone. "Norwegian," he spat. "You're a long way from home, fjellape." Mountain monkey. The Norwegian didn't answer. Just rolled his shoulders. Adjusted his grip on the collapsible baton in his hand. It was a simple weapon. Utterly inadequate against spikes and spurs and steroid-rage. But the way he held it said everything. I don't need more than this. From the shadows behind Sten, another shape emerged. Then another. Then another. Three more Norwegians. They had come through the roof. Through the walls. Through the floor. However the hell Norwegians moved when they wanted to be somewhere. They surrounded Sten in a loose semicircle, their weapons—batons, knives, one man holding a fucking tire iron—held low and ready. Sten laughed. Actually laughed. "Four of you? Four? Against me?" He spread his spiked arms wide. "I've killed better men than you before breakfast. I'll wear your guts for garters." The lead Norwegian—the one who'd saved Jaska—didn't flinch. Didn't blink. Just said four words that changed everything: "Vi er ikke alene." We are not alone. The warehouse roof exploded. Not with gunfire. Not with explosives. With bodies. Descending on ropes, dropping from the darkness, materializing like vengeful spirits. Danish special forces. Jaegerkorpset. Then the walls came down. Literally. Sections of corrugated metal peeled back like tin foil, and through the gaps poured more shadows. Icelandic Viking Squad. Sérsveit ríkislögreglustjórans. Sten's laughter died. He stood in the center of a growing ring of Nordic special operators. Finns? No. The Finn was down. But every other country in the Northern lights had answered the call. Norway. Denmark. Iceland. And now, pushing through the shattered main door, a final contingent. Sweden. But not his Sweden. These were National Task Force. The very organization Sten had once commanded. They looked at him now not with loyalty, but with disgust. One of them, a woman with ice in her eyes and a shotgun in her hands, spoke: "Commander Järvholm. You are under arrest for treason, murder of allied personnel, and crimes against the laws of war. Drop your weapons. Get on your knees." Sten's face cycled through emotions. Shock. Rage. Disbelief. "Treason? I avenged my men—" "You murdered allied operators," the woman cut him off, voice like frozen steel. "Erik and Tor were killed in legitimate combat. You injected a captured soldier with dangerous substances and attempted torture. You are dishonor. You are nothing." Sten looked at the ring of faces. Fifty of them. Maybe more. All armed. All trained. All focused entirely on him. His spurs clicked as he shifted his weight. For one terrible moment, Jaska thought the madman would actually charge. Then Sten's shoulders sagged. Just slightly. Just enough. His gauntlets hit the concrete with a heavy clang. He reached down, unbuckled his spurs, dropped them beside the gauntlets. Then he knelt. Slowly. Deliberately. His eyes never left the Swedish officer. "You'll never hold me," he said quietly. "You know that. I have friends. I have resources. I'll be out in a week, and then—" The shotgun pumped. "Shut up," the woman said. "Or I'll save everyone the trial." Sten shut up. Medics swarmed Jaska. Hands pressed bandages to his wounds. A voice in his ear, calm and professional: "You're going to be okay. We've got you. The cocktail in your system—we've got counter-agents. Just breathe." Jaska looked up at the Norwegian who'd saved his life. The man met his eyes and gave the slightest nod. "Du klarte deg," he said. You made it. Jaska tried to speak. Couldn't. Just lifted one bloodstained, gloved hand in a weak fist. The Norwegian understood. He tapped his own chest, then pointed at Jaska. Brother. As they carried Jaska out on a stretcher, past the kneeling form of the monster who'd nearly ended him, past the bodies of the two men he'd killed in fair fight, past the assembled might of every Nordic special operations force on Earth, one thought echoed through his chemical-addled brain: The North remembers. The North protects its own. And in the darkness of the warehouse, the spurs and gauntlets lay where Sten had dropped them. Waiting. Silent. For now. The first shot never fired. The Norwegians moved first. The one who'd saved Jaska—Bjørn, his name was—swung his baton in a vicious arc aimed at Sten's temple. Sten caught it. Caught it with his bare hand, the spikes on his gauntlets long since discarded. His fingers closed around the steel and squeezed. The baton bent. "Surprise," Sten whispered. Then he moved. The first Dane never saw the spur. It came out of nowhere—he'd kept them, the madman had only pretended to drop them—and buried itself in the man's throat. He went down gurgling. The second Dane fired his pistol. Sten was already gone, rolling across the concrete, coming up inside the man's guard. His hand closed on the Dane's jaw, fingers finding purchase, and with a single brutal twist—crack. The body fell. "One," Sten counted. The Icelanders came at him together, three of them, knives out. They'd trained together since childhood, fought together in Afghanistan, moved like a single organism. Sten met them head-on. The first knife glanced off his leather harness. His responding punch—bare fist, no gauntlet—caved in the man's ribs. He dropped with a scream. The second Icelander got his knife into Sten's side. Sank it deep. Sten looked down at the hilt protruding from his ribs, then back at the Icelander, and grinned. "Tickles." His elbow shattered the Icelander's skull. The third Icelander hesitated. One heartbeat. That was all Sten needed. He stepped forward, wrapped his arms around the man in a bear hug, and squeezed. Something popped. The Icelander went limp. "Two. Three. Four." The Norwegians had regrouped. Bjørn and his three companions formed a line, tire iron and batons and knives ready. They were professionals. They didn't run. They didn't panic. They died. Sten took a bullet to the shoulder from Bjørn's sidearm and kept coming. Took a tire iron to the face and laughed. Ripped the baton from one man's hand and drove it through his eye socket. Bjørn was last. He fought like a demon, landed three solid hits, opened a cut above Sten's eye that poured blood down his face. Sten just wiped it away, tasted it, smiled. "You're the one who saved the Finn," Sten said. "I'm going to make this last." He kept his promise. When it was over, Bjørn was alive. Mostly. He'd never walk again. Never speak again. His eyes would always see the face of the monster when he closed them. "Five. Six. Seven. Eight." The Swedes—Sten's own countrymen—broke. Actually broke. They'd come to arrest a legend. They found a demon. Three of them made it to the door before Sten caught them. When he rose, his hands were red to the elbows. "Seventeen," he counted. Then looked around the warehouse. Bodies everywhere. The best special operators the Nordic countries could field, scattered like broken dolls. At the center of it all, the stretcher. Empty. Jaska was gone. Sten's eyes narrowed. He scanned the darkness, the broken walls, the holes in the roof. The Finn had crawled, crawled or been dragged, escaped in the chaos. He walked to the stretcher, picked up a scrap of bandage stained with Finnish blood. Held it to his nose. Inhaled. "Little reindeer," he murmured. "Running through the snow. But I always find my prey. Always." He looked at the carnage around him. Fifty bodies. Fifty of the best. Slaughtered like sheep. And in the distance, sirens. Finally. More coming. More prey. Sten stretched, felt his wounds—bullet in the shoulder, knife in the side, countless bruises and cuts. Nothing. Flesh wounds. He'd had worse shaving. He picked up his spurs. Buckled them on. Flexed his hands. "Let's go hunting." The warehouse was silent except for the dripping of blood and the distant wail of approaching sirens. In the darkness, something moved. Something huge. Something that had just proven, beyond any doubt, that it was not a man. It was a massacre. And it was only beginning. roids, eploin in tetsterone aggro an massive erection! Jaska ran. Or tried to. His legs pumped, but the motions felt wrong. Too fast. Too powerful. The warehouse alley outside stretched before him like a tunnel of darkness, and he flew through it, his wounded thigh somehow keeping up, the gash not slowing him because the drugs—God, the drugs—had turned everything inside him to fire. He rounded a corner and slammed into a dumpster so hard he dented it. Stood there, panting, chest heaving, every muscle screaming for release. And then he felt it. The viagra. It had been in the syringe. Of course it had. Sten's little cocktail to keep him conscious, keep him feeling while he was butchered. But Jaska wasn't being butchered. He was running. And the chemicals were detonating in his bloodstream. His heart pounded like a war drum. His vision burned with hyper-clarity. Every sound—distant sirens, dripping water, his own ragged breathing—hit his ears like thunder. And his body. The steroids were working. He could feel his muscles swelling, tightening, growing with each heartbeat. Not visibly—not yet—but the power. Sweet Jesus, the power. His torn shoulder didn't hurt anymore. His gashed thigh felt like it could kick through a wall. His hands, still gloved in bloodstained tactical gear, ached to hit something. And the erection. Massive. Immediate. Impossible. It pressed against his tactical pants like a battering ram, straining the fabric, demanding attention. His uniform, already shredded in a dozen places, bulged obscenely at the crotch. The sensation was maddening—sexual pressure. Need. His entire being focused into that single, throbbing point of presence. Jaska looked down at himself. Stared. "What the fuck," he whispered. Behind him, a sound. Click-clack. Click-clack. Spurs on concrete. "You feel it, don't you?" Sten's voice floated out of the darkness, calm, amused, terrifying. "The surge. The power. The need. That's my special recipe, little reindeer. Testosterone cypionate. Boldenone. Trenbolone. And enough sildenafil to make a horse blush. You're not a man anymore. You're a weapon. A loaded gun with the safety off." Jaska turned. Sten stood at the end of the alley, silhouetted against distant flames. His spurs gleamed. His hands dripped. His smile was a white slash in the darkness. "Fifty of them," Sten said conversationally. "Fifty of the best. And I'm not even tired. But you? You I'm saving. You I'm going to enjoy." Jaska's fists clenched. His muscles screamed for action. His erection throbbed with primal, violent intent. He wasn't afraid anymore. The drugs wouldn't let him be afraid. Every cell in his body was screaming one thing: FIGHT. KILL. BREED. All mixed together, indistinguishable, overwhelming. 

Published: 2026-03-30, viewed 38 times.