Sigur Thormarsson (Part 2)

Sigur and I carry on the interview after a huge meal: a superb fish supper at a mass feast that seemed to involve most of the Island, although as my host explains, most are relatives of some sort or other. Sigur leaves his vast family drinking and laughing in the main room of the house, and ushers me into his study or "man room" as his wife laughingly calls it.

Books, weapons, hunting trophies, and even a narwhal horn decorate the walls of this beautiful wood-panelled room, the window at the back looking out over the ocean to the south.

Sigur pours me a massive shot of Schnapps, and we sit in companionable silence for a few minutes, watching the fire shoot sparks up the chimney into the night sky. After a few moments of contemplation, he rejoins his story.

"We party a lot these days. There is much to be thankful for, much to remember. One thing this war has taught us is to live for the moment and recognise the importance of friends and family. Yet we almost lost everything."

"I'm sure you saw the defences in the port as you came onto the island. We built the majority of those during the first few months of the War. Thankfully, we are a determined, tough, and hardy people. Our ancestors were bred for war and it seems, through bitter experience, that a lot of that is still true today.

"These islands are rocky. There are few inlets, few ports. As soon as we got back home from our horrific fishing trip, we set about warning everyone as to what we had seen, and the Island Government set in motion plans to defend ourselves.

"We shut the airport, refusing permission to most flights who tried to land. A few we allowed if they had run out of fuel, or were carrying supplies that could prove useful. I think we all knew we were in for a long haul. All passengers were put into quarantine on arrival, and once clear were allowed to stay and join in the general defence of the island. Those who were infected were offered the stark choice of waiting for the change or leaving the island. Most chose to leave, but I suspect some of them came moaning back to us later on.

"We started using dogs to detect the Infected; for some reason, they knew who was carrying the virus.

"Everything that came onto the islands was completely controlled. All ships trying to dock were warned away by the few naval vessels we had, and all around the ports and inlets, we put up fences, barbed wire, walls, and barricades. Anything really that would hold up the things that walked up out of the sea.

"Thankfully, we had our own power generation facilities on the islands. Because of this, we were still able to contact the remnants of some of the still functioning governments around the world, and of course the space station as it sped overhead, communicating whatever useful information they could. Brave men and women they were too. From our occasional communications, we learnt that Iceland was dead, that the British had retreated back to their little island off the south coast, and that the French were the first to get hit by a swarm, being virtually destroyed apart from those who had managed to retreat to the heights of the Alps or the Pyrenees.

"We stayed here and fought. What else could we do? We repelled anything that shambled out from the seas, and we kept our little islands Zombie free.

"As with most people around the world, we very quickly ran out of ammunition for guns and had no option but to resort to hand-to-head fighting. We worked out tactics to deal with them, depending on where we were on the islands.

"In the narrow coves and inlets, it was relatively easy. One thing we have here is lots of rocks. When you're at the top of the cliff and the Zombie is at the bottom, you could quite often catch them in the head with a rock and disable them before they even reached dry land. The kids on the islands are very good shots now, and we had a league table for years. My youngest daughter has many trophies.

"We set up coastal watches and made sure that island communications remained functional. Many of the islands teenage girls acted as lookouts, they're reliable and pay attention. The younger men and boys acted as rock collectors, suppliers of what limited ammunition we had, water carriers during battles and sharpeners of weapons.

"The ladies?

"Well, the women are Faroe Islanders; they fought alongside their men as they always have when the homeland is threatened. Never argue with a woman when she holds a weapon, particularly if she is defending her family. My Inga is a fearsome woman at the best of times when being moaned at. Zombies moan a lot, and by Thor that woman broke some heads!

"The main problem we had was defending the few low-lying areas and the ports. In the end, we had no choice but to evacuate some of the smaller island populations to the bigger islands. In the low-lying areas we built stockades, put up fences, or used defunct machinery as barricades. Over time, we used the island quarries to replace the temporary barricades or reinforce the stone walls with massive granite blocks. They're still there and will have to stay in place until we are sure that the world is free of the Infection.

"In the ports, we added to the natural stone and concrete walls of the docks and used them as defensive ramparts.

"And then, we fought.

"For many months, we only had minor activity, single Zombies, or small groups that occasionally wandered moaning out of the surf. We used them to hone our skills and tactics. We knew bullets worked. We knew strong enough single strikes or sufficient repeated blows to the head worked. We tried all sorts of things, experimenting on the Zeds by holding them away with long poles, or tying them down and using different weapons. Blades were good, but we noticed that if you cut off the head, it kept snapping away at you for quite some time.

"Heavy blades like axes were excellent, as they pulverised as much as cut. Hammers worked. Crossbow bolts and even nail guns worked, but you had to be very accurate and like guns they relied on ammunition. Fire was not good, as all it did was turn the things into a walking fire hazard. We noted too that they responded to noise and would head towards sounds, presumably thinking that noise was a source of food.

"In the end, we, like many others around the world resorted to brute force, combined with whatever else we could use.

"One of the kids came up with the idea of the catapults. It gave the youngsters who we would not allow to fight in the front lines something to do as well. They practised incessantly with them, working out a series of pulleys and winches that could reload them incredibly quickly and allow them to be moved so that they could change aim and effective projectile distance. They had different sized ones that had different ranges too.

"Never underestimate the destructive power of children in groups. They were amazing and contributed hugely to the defence of the island. We got ourselves in order and waited for the inevitable.

"The warning sirens went off one morning as the sun came up. One of the girls on watch just to the north of the main port had noticed odd movements in the clear waters. She raised the alarm, and one of the defence co-ordinators had been with her in minutes to check out what she had seen. Soon, we were getting reports from all the watchers on that side of the island.

"The sirens had the dual effect of raising the islanders to readiness and changing the direction of the swarm that was wading through the shallows. They all headed for the main port at Torshavn where the sirens were loudest and the cliffs gave way to a more gentle topography.

"We were there waiting for them as they dragged themselves out of the sea, their naked grey bodies lurching obscenely towards our defences. The catapults had massive stockpiles of stone next to them and were loaded and ready. We had munitions in the form of some heavy machine guns and cannons from the naval boats, and one of the quarries had supplied some explosives which could be set off at strategic points in the harbour if required.

"We stood, armed and ready on the top of the harbour walls.

"I don't know who started it, but singing broke out on the walls, and men and women from all backgrounds joined in the Island song: the song of our forefathers as they rode the waves into battle or defended against marauders from Finland or Norway. Ancient axes and war hammers rested on shoulders as we sang our defiance at a new enemy, roaring our hate at the horror that had decided to visit our tiny isles.

"As they came within range of the first of the catapults, the singing petered out in anticipation of the battle. There was a quick blast of a horn, the command "fire" was shouted by one of the older boys commanding the catapults, and baskets full of rocks were sent high into the air. The machine guns and small cannons opened up at the same time, and the front few ranks of the staggering Infected were mown down like wheat.

"For some time, nothing managed to make it through this barrage, and then, one by one, the guns fell silent as they ran out of ammunition. Although the rocks still arced into the cool morning air, some grey and moaning forms started to advance on us between the splashes made by the catapulted missiles. The second smaller rank of catapults joined in then as the zombies came into range, and again for a time nothing made it through. But, eventually in ones and twos, often crawling in part broken mindlessness towards us, the first of the Zeds started to reach the harbour walls.

"Then we fought as our forebears had fought. Anyone with working small arms, crossbows or nail guns were deployed to the flanks and the high walls to either side of the harbour, the rest of us stood on the causeway and battled for hours. Every now and again someone fell or was dragged out from the battle line screaming. We mourned every one of them after the battle, but at the time all we could do was scream in sympathy with them, and fight on.

"People I'd known all my life as peaceful farmers and fishermen turned back to their Viking roots. Screaming, grunting, swearing and fighting like bastards, we strained every muscle and sinew. We roared our defiance, cried our grief and laughed in berserk madness. We were all fighting for our very survival.

"In the end, we destroyed every godforsaken Infected bastard that came at us. We dredged the harbour of bodies, sending them back to the ocean from whence they'd come.

"Then, we collected the bodies of the fallen and had a massive burial service. We cleaned our weapons, re-stocked the ammunition for the catapults, got drunk and then waited for the next batch.

"We fought off three separate swarms in total, but that first one was the largest, and the worst.

"Even now, the odd Zed wanders up out of the surf. We have permanent watches set up at the weak points, and the new hydraulic ram gates at the harbour entrances have so far stopped any small groups that come up to cause trouble.

"We still fight, we still win.

"We still survive."