I had an idea for Tiwaz's first true battle that I wanted to draw. Somewhat inspired by the Siege of Jadotville... Except that Tiwaz is on the side of the mercs getting slaughtered by the "Good guys". After washing out of his country's relatively toothless defence force, Tiwaz travelled straight to the hottest warzone in Africa and signed on with the largest mercenary corps in the region who took anyone willing to carry a rifle. Having military training, but no combat experience, he was placed in a "disposable" unit of mercs, a rabble of cut-throats and thugs to be hired out to local warlords the company thought could go and get themselves killed without affecting the geopolitical situation of the region.

Unfortunately for the company, fortune favoured the bold and thrown into what in any other circumstances could be considered a suicide mission, Tiwaz's mad charge smashed the defensive lines of a force of UN peacekeepers, resulting in a major diplomatic incident.

Incident report below:

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Secretary Sabu: Hey boss, we've got a big problem.

CEO Devos: What is it? Is this why they're trying to fly me out of the country?

S: Yeah, it's General Ferdinand. He fucked up big and our name's all over it.

D: Dammit, that lunatic, I thought we had risk management in place for him?!

S: We did but there was a breach.

D: What did he do?

S: Well, he attacked Robertstown with a company of our D-class personel.

D: Robertstown? Aren't the Canadians dug in there?

S: Yeah, a whole platoon of veteran UN peacekeepers.

D: Ok sure, so our guys would've gotten mulched, that's what we have D-class personel for right? Real desperados we rent out with no training or support to unhinged warlords like Ferdinand so they can play big man, conqueror and pillage unarmed backwaters. The UN knows we wouldn't have let a nutter like Ferdinand have any real troops without our sign off so we're good right?

S: Well not really, they uh... They won. Real bloody massacre, killed all of the Cannucks.

D: WHAT?!

S: Yeah...

D: How the hell did that happen?! Those Canadians were some of the best troops in the region!

S: The reports are rather crazy but I've had it confirmed from several sources. It all started out about how you expect. Ferdinand marched his guys across the open, Canadians fired some warning shots, mercs didn't fall back so they started letting them have it. Couple of machinegun nests, mortars in the back, trenches all around the town. Our guys were getting ripped up bad, our advisor there got Ferdinand's captain to call a retreat, would've been fine, we would've just billed him for the bodies and that would be that.

D: And then what?

S: Well there was this one mad wolf...

D: One?!

S: Yeah, he was new apparently, washout from some Nordic country's army. No serious prior combat experience. Anyway, the rest of them had given up, the ones left alive were scrambling back but this guy refused to retreat. They were shouting at him but he just kept pushing forward. Somehow he got up right in front of the trenches and lobbed a bunch of smoke grenades. The smoke blacked out the machineguns and he just charged in. Once the others realised what was happening, some of them started to turn back and follow him but by the time they got there, there wasn't much to do. Crazy psycho took a shotgun through those UN troops like a blowtorch through butter. No wounded, no prisoners, just killed all of them.

D: Shit... Just when you start to think Africa can't surprise you anymore. Well they're just D-class, can't we deny involvement and pin it on Ferdinand?

S: That's what I said, but apparently this guy wasn't done. He got on their radio and told their commander exactly who he was and what he'd done. Said it was fine because all the guys he killed "went to Valhalla" or something, actually thanked them for sending him a proper fight. UN and the Canadians are furious and the media's howling for blood.

D: Fucking hell. Valhalla, isn't that like some kinda Viking thing?

S: I think so, dude was from up there somewhere but no-one really knew him.

D: Shit... Well where is he now? Can we just turn him over to the UN?

S: Unfortunately not... That's the weirdest thing.

D: What could possibly be weirder than this?

S: He's gone. The guy just left. Didn't even wait to get paid or anything. Told Ferdinand's captain he was a coward for retreating, picked up a bunch of guns and ammo and wandered off towards town. No-one's seen him again.