Aerospace I : The Lunar Cycle

Aerospace I - Lunar Ice

Aerospace I : The Lunar Cycle

Lunar Ice

Gordon Best

Chapter 1 : Youth

My name is Frida Thorsdottir, or that is the english version. I was born and brought up in a small town on the east coast of Iceland. Neskaupstadur in Nordfjord. My mother is a local girl. She is a daughter of an Indian girl, adopted from Calcutta, and an Icelandic seaman.

Otherwise, I am one hundred percent an Icelandic woman. My father is a TBM supervisor. A TBM is a machine that makes holes through mountains. Look it up. Tunnels for vehicles, railways, etc. But Iceland has no railways.

We had just one functioning machine back then. Every year or two it would be moved to a new location to shorten the route under a fjord or through a mountain.

I grew up always the big girl for my age. I was the one, that the girls made fun of and the boys secretively liked. It was a small town and they knew I could beat them, so they left me alone. With the girls, I had little in common. I am not blond but have brown hair with red tinges. My eyes are brown.

When I was twelve, my father started taking me and my mother with him. We lived near his work site over the summer holidays. That is four months in Iceland. There is always a town or village nearby where his worksite is.

The first summer, I spent many a day out in the valley walking the fields. I had the attention of the children in the town. I did not have their friendship. Often there is a trouble maker. In this village, there were these big boys. They were just young enough, not to be working in the fish processing plant. I noticed they were following me. This one day, I was willing to be friendly. I found a spot on the mountain slope to sit myself on a rock.

"You want to be friends?" I asked them. "You come here and speak to me nicely."

They looked at each other and smiled. The bigger one said, "We are friendly, girl. We like you to be friendly too."

Then they rushed toward me. Boys in Iceland are big. This one carried some weight. Much of it was in his head. I had dealt with stupid boys at home. I stood up with my advantage of height and ran, ramming him, with my elbows out. The big one fell and I plowed my hand into his balls. Then I rolled, so the other one could not grab me. I was up and jumping, as the slimmer boy reached me. Lifting one knee to get him solid under the chin. Blood squirted passed his lips. As he reached for the ground, I stamped on his hand and would have broken something, but the ground was too soft.

I walked back to my rock and tried to catch my breath. I sat and watched them. I wasn't going to leave. They would leave me. That evening I told my father, not my mother. He said that I needed better defense training. There could be more boys next time. He hired a woman from Reykjavik. She came for a month and trained me. She stayed at our house, in a spare bedroom. Every day, rain or shine, we were out there, me receiving most of the damage. Then she left. My father had limited resources.

I did find a friend. She was a little thing but very smart. We had one thing in common. No one else wanted to be friends with us. We talked much through that summer. I don't remember what we talk about, but we enjoyed each other's company.

In the last week, the boys tried to ambush me again. I was alone but I was ready. I used the same location, I often sat there thinking of my future. I let them approach. I was not going to hold back. I would be leaving soon and to hell with the parents.

They came from behind me. Three, four? One threw a piece of rope around my neck. I collapsed forward and pulled him over my head. He was protecting his balls, but I had other goals. I stomped on his face and broke his nose. Turning in a smooth circle, I knocked the next one down with a blow to the diaphragm. Then the smaller two were on me. I stuck my sharpened thumbnail under his chin and pierced the skin deep. The other had a rock and was ready to strike my head. I almost lost my will at that point. I rolled, pulling the lighter boy over on me. He got the blow. The boy with the rock ran and I got up, throwing the unconscious boy aside.