Christopher Nuttal

AXIS OF EVIL

Prologue

From: War Premier; the collected notes of Sir Charles Hanover. Pub 1970PT. (Note; these notes were apparently written in early 1941PT, and remained unpublished for twenty years. They appear to be in the correct order.)

None of us expected that Britain would somehow fall back in time to 1940. Had we expected it – and not laughed the prophet out of our homes – we might have made more preparations. As it was, we were lucky to survive. The Nazis were every bit as viscous, clever, treacherous and evil as we had been warned by history – they managed to adapt better to the Transition than we did. Despite some truly stunning military victories in North Africa, and a successful defence of Singapore, the strategic problem hasn’t really changed at all.

No one could have predicted all the changes to the world. The loss of the Americans from 2015, officially to a German strike, brought the Americans in on our side. Unfortunately, they were even more unprepared for war than we were, and they were torn apart by problems. Roosevelt might have won the battle for re-election, with Truman as his Vice President, but America is deeply divided on the issue of the war.

On the other hand, the first American troops should be arriving soon; arguing over strategy should be fun – not! The America military doesn’t want to believe half the things we tell them, even the judgement of future American historians.

Hitler, of course, had no doubts. Correctly deducing that we were the main threat, he forged an alliance with Soviet Russia and Spain, confronting us in the Middle East. For once, the Jihadis are on our side, as the Holy War rages across the desert. Even the single nuclear strike of the war (so far) failed to deter Hitler, and the purge of the German resistance means that none dare to resist him.

In the meantime, Japan went on a rampage against us (and the Dutch and the French, the Vichy French now Germany’s allies) in the Far East, striking at the remains of our Empire. The plan to give India independence at once faltered as the Japanese storm raged against Burma and Singapore; we won in Singapore, but at the cost of losing Burma and Siam to enemy control. Australia now cowers behind its defences, waiting for the invasion that many believe is inevitable. Even the Battle of the Indian Ocean, where four Japanese carriers were sunk along with four battleships, failed to reassure them.

No one knows how close Hitler is to a nuclear device. He has the services of a number of passengers on a jet that came down in German territory, as well as a complete electronic encyclopaedia, but there are many fundamental problems that remain to be solved. In Central Asia and China, a number of unexplained outbreaks of various unpleasant diseases have swept through the population – thank god they lack any major transportation network. Something called Tularemia (Rabbit Fever) got loose in Afghanistan, infecting thousands of people. Something worse called Q-fever appeared in China. For the moment, we’ve prevented the Germans from field-testing their biological weapons with a nuclear deterrent, but as the tide of war swings against Hitler, he may change his mind…

The war’s already worse than it was in OTL. The Germans have enslaved the Spanish, the Italians and the French. The Germans and Soviets have begun exterminating the Polish population, as well as many of their other future enemies. I can’t see Stalin hesitating from introducing a biological weapon into Afghanistan – he might well have started the outbreaks – and there is evidence that the two powers are cooperating on nerve gas development.

Like it or not, we’re in the war to a finish. Do I have the ruthlessness to do what must be done? I’ve already ordered one act that will haunt me for the rest of my life, and it’s become easier as time goes by. We don’t have a choice; we have to hammer our way to Berlin, to Moscow, to Tokyo, or let Hitler develop the atomic bomb and set the world ablaze. We have to do it with an uneasy coalition that could fall apart at any moment, and if we don’t do it right we’ll be fighting the war again in ten years – or an even worse one with the enemy we don’t want to fight.

I can’t help, but think that Winston Churchill had it easy…

Chapter One: Council of War

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

23rd March 1941

As he had done every day since becoming Prime Minister, when his predecessor had fallen ill with a heart attack, Sir Charles Hanover checked the report of the confidential Alpha Black Project; the research team into why Britain had suddenly appeared back in 1940. As it had said every day for the past six months, the research team had found nothing; there was no sign of UFO activity, unusual supernatural encounters or anything else that might provide a clue as to how the Transition had taken place. Every priest and medium, fortune-teller or wise woman, had attempted to provide the British with a reason, but science had failed to provide any solution – or any hint as to how the Transition might be reversed.

“It might as well be alien space bats,” Professor Bumblebee had said.

Hanover shook his head absently, staring up at the big world map. British and Allied, Commonwealth and American, units were marked clearly; enemy units, German, Soviet and Japanese, were marked at their last known position. The map was constantly updating itself as the war in the Middle East surged backwards and forwards. Turkish units, reluctant participants in the war against the British, were trying to hang back, avoiding combat as much as possible.

I wish we could have done something for the Turks, Hanover thought absently. The combination of threats and blandishments from Germany had done something that had never happened in the original timeline; bringing Turkey into the war. Using Turkey as a base, the Germans had hammered the Syrians into submission, ending the brutal civil war that had consumed the nation when French rule collapsed. The full weight of German power had fallen upon a Contemporary force in Palestine, operating at the end of a logistical shoestring, and run riot until the RAF smashed their supply lines. In the middle of a five-way war, the Soviets had completed their invasion of Iran and punched their way into Iraq.

There had been victories too, Hanover knew. The Battle of the Indian Ocean, the defeat of the Japanese carrier force that had prevented an immediate attack on Australia. Admiral Turtledove, the victor, had been castigated by the Board of Enquiry, but Hanover had suppressed the report. The public needed heroes as the war darkened, even as the Opposition went back into Opposition. Thanks to Turtledove, the war in the Pacific had stabilised, even though the ANZAC units in New Guinea were being evacuated from Port Moresby.

Behind him, the War Cabinet began to file into the room. There were changes; Kenneth Barton, the Leader of the Opposition, had been forced to leave the War Cabinet. The empty seat for Howard Smith, the former Prime Minister, had been filled by John McLachlan; Smith had passed away just after the news of the successful attack on Plosti had come in. Hanover had attended the funeral; they all had, even his political opponents.

“This meeting of the War Cabinet is now called to order,” Hanover said formally, nodding to the guard at the door. There had been a suggestion that the SS had infiltrated strike teams into Britain; the guard around the places of Government had been doubled, along with the RAF and Army bases within the United Kingdom. Just another necessary political duty, like keeping an entire force of forty thousand soldiers and their equipment in Britain, waiting for an impossible invasion.

Hanover suspected that the German infiltrators were a rumour, nothing more, but it was far too important to show that the Government was Doing Something, or Parliament would ask them hard questions and MPs would consider switching their allegiance. Such was the reality of political life; decisions made for political reasons affecting the conduct of military operations.

“Major Stirling,” Hanover said, “you may begin.”

Stirling was one of Hanover’s favourites; a young officer who’d proven his adaptability in the face of the Transition. From working with the Oversight Committee, he had the knowledge to operate on Hanover’s behalf and a wide-ranging brief.

“There are two items of note today,” Stirling said. “The first one is that the British Space Centre, and the Americans we recruited through Mr Oliver, has finally managed to draw up a production plan for a basic launching booster. Next week, we’ll launch the first reconnaissance satellite in the world – this timeline – and orbit it over the Reich.”

He passed around briefing folders. “The rocket, a Trident missile removed from one of the boomers and stripped of its warheads, will blast the satellite into orbit. It won’t be a stable orbit and we’ll have to replace it in a couple of years, but it will serve. Now that we have a procedure for building the satellites, and secure lines of supply, we can develop a full reconnaissance and relay network fairly quickly, perhaps within six months.”

“Excellent,” Hanover said.

“The only problem is political,” Stirling admitted. “We hired a number of Americans to aid with the project, and some American generals aren’t happy about it.”

“That would be MacArthur,” Hanover said. History had judged him harshly for abandoning his men in the shadowy other future – and it had nearly torpedoed his career. Roosevelt had recalled him to the United States after he was nearly killed – fragged – by one of his own men.

“Yes, sir,” Stirling said.

“Screw him,” Hanover said, after a moment’s thought. “If the Americans don’t make use of their skills, I don’t see how they can blame us for Oliver’s good sense in recruiting them.”

He nodded to himself. Jim Oliver, a former German prisoner, had been recruited to work in the United States by the Bracken Consortium, and had proven himself to be capable, a formidable ally for the British.

“The second, grimmer item of note is this,” he said, passing over a reconnaissance picture. “That’s a modified V2, one modified according to a plan drawn up in 1960 by the MOD when we were looking into developing a tactical rocket of our own. You’ll notice that it doesn’t have a nose cone? It has this instead.”

Hanover felt his mouth fall open. “What the hell is that?”

Stirling’s face was grim. “We’re not quite certain,” he admitted. “At first glance, it appears to be a prototype spaceplane, such as the Mir-class craft the Russians finally produced in 2010. We’re looking into producing them ourselves now. The Oversight Committee is unwilling to predict that it’ll work as a spaceplane – it may be a way to take the war to America – but it’s not beyond possibility.”

“Fat chance,” Admiral Grisham, First Sea Lord, muttered.

Stirling nodded. “The Oversight Committee majority opinion is that it’ll blow up when they try to launch another one; the RAF blasted this one on the ground. Strategically, the only motive for building one is to place a rocket in space – and the implications are disturbing. Prime Minister, the Germans did have an idea like this, but only towards the end of the war.”

Hanover felt his blood run cold. “One of the hostages suggested it?”

“Quite possibly,” Stirling said. “However, its not impossible that they have… agents within the nation here, or within America.”

“Who would work for Nazi Germany?” Hanover asked. “It’s not as if they were communists.”

“I don’t know,” Stirling admitted. “MI5 is looking into it, but very quietly. The last thing we need is a witch hunt.”

Hanover nodded. “We’ll discuss this later,” he said. “John?”

John McLachlan, Foreign Minister, nodded to the table. He was Hanover’s… ally, if not exactly friend; both men wanted a renewed Britain. “As you may have heard,” he said bluntly, “the Americans are preparing to send troops here to attack the Germans, as well as their first bombers. They believe that with the massive firepower of the new aircraft – they think that they have worked out all the bugs of the B-29 – they can crush Germany.

“For the moment, they want to know what we can supply them in the way of bases and support,” he continued. “They don’t want to carry the weight of an Operation Overlord on their own.”

“It’s still too premature,” General Cunningham, the Chief of Joint Operations, protested. “We are heavily engaged in the Middle East, and we have commitments to India and Australia. Even if we only provide the bases and RAF support, we will be dangerously exposed. The new Hawk aircraft are very useful for air defence, but we need tactical support in the Middle East.”

“There are also problems with providing the logistical support they will need,” Armin Prushank, the Minister for War Production, droned. His dull voice was one of dust and eternal dryness. “While production of tanks and aircraft is increasing, there are other requirements to fulfil. We need to open up the lines to Saudi, for we need more oil.”

“Not exactly easy,” General Cunningham commented. “At last report, the Soviets were shelling or bombing the oil wells from time to time, and of course the Mosul wells are in Turkish hands and were destroyed to prevent the Germans using them.”

Prushank scowled. “The department has prepared a plan for a hydrogen-powered Firefly tank, which the Americans can put into mass production, but I was given to understand that that was a bad idea.”

“There are also social issues involved,” Noreen Adam, the Public Affairs Representative, said calmly. A scarred Asian woman, Noreen had been given a Cabinet post in exchange for support in what had once been Saudi Arabia. “You know; in 1943 America was the rich land, and we the poor. Now… the positions have been reversed. We might want to keep them in their camps.”

“That will really do wonders for their morale,” General Cunningham muttered. “Prime Minister, they will want rest and relaxation, and of course there is the little issue of who does what. Would it be so bad if we left the liberation of Germany to Rommel and the Americans?”

“We need a political and military presence,” Hanover said mildly. The firmness in his tone was velvety. “Unfortunately, we have other problems; how long will it be before the American are a formidable fighting force?”

McLachlan coughed. “Some time,” he admitted. “They haven’t fought a war for quite some time, so they think that it will be a while before they can land. Some of their politicians are talking about landing in 1941…”

“Fanciful,” Cunningham interrupted.

“That’s what Bradley thinks,” McLachlan agreed. “That plan depends on us doing a lot of the work. More practically, they’re thinking about mid-1942; they want to train their soldiers and put them in with our forces for experience.”

“The Middle East might make a good place for that,” Cunningham said. “Perhaps they could take on the Soviets as well and…”

“I’ll discuss the matter with Roosevelt,” Hanover said. “For the moment, we won’t be launching any invasion ourselves until the new regiments are ready, and we have peace in the Middle East. Speaking of which…?”

“General Flynn is in command,” Cunningham said. Hanover nodded impatiently. “For the moment, he’s holding a line running from Jordan to Baghdad to Basra, so the Republic of Arabia – which is providing some of the rear-area defence – is safe, for the moment.”

Hanover smiled at the look of relief on both McLachlan’s and Noreen’s face. Both of them, for very different reasons, were very emotionally attached to the new republic, positioned in the heart of Islam.

“The problem he is facing at the moment is two-fold,” Cunningham continued. “For the moment, the flood of Jewish refugees from Palestine has abated slightly, but Egypt is making a fuss about accepting more. We really need a long-term solution to the problem, particularly if we want to avoid creating a second Israel. Both Australia and South Africa are willing to accept them as immigrants, but our shipping is still limited.”

“Once the Americans start mass-producing Liberty Ships, that will change,” McLachlan injected. “They’re due to begin the first models in a few weeks.”

“The second problem is logistics,” Cunningham said. “Quite frankly; both sides have piss-poor logistics. At presence, we are dangerously exposed; if either side got their act together enough to launch a joint attack, we might be in trouble. In fact, Flynn has come up with a plan to abandon Baghdad and fall back to Saudi – sorry, the Republic – if the defence lines crumble.”

“That would abandon Iraq to the Soviets,” McLachlan protested.

“They don’t have the logistics themselves to overrun all of Iraq,” Cunningham said. “The good news, at least, is that we’ve been making real progress; both in fitting out new regiments and divisions, and in stockpiling resources in Arabia. Give us a month or so and we might be able to launch a counter-offensive. It won’t be as spectacular as the American victory in 2003, but with some luck we might be able to force the Soviets back out of Iran and the Germans out of Iraq. We might offer that role to the Americans; give them some real practice.”

“Good thinking,” Hanover said. “And Australia?”

The comment was aimed to the room at large. McLachlan spoke first. “The Japanese have conquered the Dutch East Indies,” he said flatly. “Even with Admiral Turtledove’s assistance, the attempt to hold toeholds on the islands has failed; they’re now pulling back in a second Dunkirk. Fortunately, we can provide escorts for their ships and keep them safe from Japanese submarines.

“Politically, this has cost Menzies, our ally, in their Parliament. They’re scared, and following the reports of Japanese atrocities in Burma and the Indies, it’s hard to blame them. In essence, they are reluctant – read utterly unwilling – to release any of their forces for duty elsewhere – and they want as much as we can pour in.”

“They already have the largest force outside here and the Middle East,” Cunningham muttered. “Admiral?”

“The submarines have been having reduced successes recently,” Grisham admitted. “Partly because of the overriding need to protect the evacuation convoys, but also because of the Japanese developing some counters for our torpedoes. They came up with a device that makes a speedboat sound like a battleship; we think we blasted four before we got a radar scan from the AWACS. That let the cat out of the bag.”

Hanover met Stirling’s eyes. “Someone is helping them,” he said. “Whom?”

“Perhaps a neo-nazi organisation?” McLachlan suggested.

“Perhaps,” Hanover said. He cleared his throat. “So… we have to hold the line in the Middle East, defend Australia and India, and somehow assist the Americans in invading Europe.” He chuckled. “Aren’t these meetings fun?”

“No,” McLachlan said flatly, and the others muttered agreement. “Perhaps we should try to speed up preparations for the Middle East.”

“We can’t finish that war by invading through the Caucasus,” Cunningham said. “Later, Major Stirling will brief you on the war plans, but fighting in the Middle East is a holding option, at best.”

The room quietened. None of them had wanted to acknowledge a grim truth; to end the war they would have to hammer their way to Berlin and Moscow… or go nuclear.

* * *

“At least we can now recruit openly for the Bundeswehr,” Stirling said afterwards, once the meeting had been concluded. “That should allow us to swell their ranks up to a hundred thousand or so, and we can arm them now.”

Hanover nodded. The Bundeswehr, the Free German Army, commanded by General Rommel, would be needed desperately in the days to come. It was currently working up in Algeria, being trained on the new equipment from war stocks.

“Yes,” he said absently, with other matters on his mind. “You are going to tell me about the war plans now?”

Stirling chuckled nervously. “The PJHQ and the Oversight Committee were divided,” he said. “Unless we commit everything to the effort, it would be difficult to launch a direct invasion of France, and then march into Germany. They wanted to postpone a direct invasion until 1942.”

“Approved,” Hanover said. “It might be tricky to convince the Americans, but I’ll do it somehow.”

“There are two plans for the remainder of 1941,” Stirling said. “Basically, we can hammer away at a corner of the German Reich, either Norway or Sicily, or we can fight it out in the Middle East. Norway offers the advantage of trapping a German army, but our logistics would be bad, even though we’ve now made contact with the Finnish Resistance. Communications are bad, though.”

“We’ll have communication satellites up soon,” Hanover said. “Carry on.”

“Sicily offers the advantage of bad German logistics, particularly since there are only two German forces on the island itself, and a lot more Italians. If we can convince the Free Italians to join in, they might just join us and fight the Germans, but…”

“It seems a lot to risk an adventure on,” Hanover observed.

“It is,” Stirling said. “The Free Italians are hardly under our control, sadly.” Hanover nodded; the Free Italians were the remains of the forces that had been trapped in Ethiopia when Libya had fallen to General Flynn. “Personally, I favour the Middle East option; sooner or later Stalin is going to make a grab for India and the chaos of the Northwest Frontier must be a constant temptation to him. If we do it properly, we might also embroil the Americans…”

“Not something to be discussed,” Hanover said sharply. “Carry on.”

“Japan offers the least chance for changing the war, although we can push forward the submarine program and send non-nuclear submarines to Australia. Given our bad logistics, I would recommend against attacking the Japanese in Malaya; we don’t have the strength to throw them out at the moment.”

“And, of course, any major concentration affects the other theatres,” Hanover said. “Tell me; can the Japanese invade Australia?”

“I don’t think that they have a choice, but to try,” Stirling said. “It’s a major base of operations and it will become a major industrial centre. They have to take it out.”

“Any decision will have to wait for a while,” Hanover said grimly. “You know; we have an entire 2015 industrial base here – you’d have thought that beating the crap out of the Germans would have been easy.”

“Prime Minister,” Stirling said, “blasting them to radioactive rubble would be easy. Building a better world is not.”

“True, true,” Hanover said. He studied the map for the moment. “This would be a lot easier if America had come through the Transition instead.”

Chapter Two: It’s Not All Black And White

Redemption Church

Texas, USA

23rd March 1941

Darkness cloaked the church, built at some distance from the village nearby, allowing the men to move up, unseen. One of them had some army experience, ordering the others to remain behind while he scouted out the region. The church was brightly lit; the smiling pastor stood outside, smiling at the visitors.

“Nigger filth,” the leader muttered, and waved a hand at his men. Quickly, neatly, they pulled on their robes and then lifted their weapons; baseball bats and coshes, canes and whips. One of them cracked a whip and laughed horribly; the leader slapped him across the face.

“Quiet, you fool,” he muttered. “You’ll be the unmaking of us!”

He watched as the last black man entered the church and the doors were closed, before leading his team forward. Their approach was unobserved; no one noticed them as they surrounded the church, pouring petrol around the wooden building.

“Can I help you gentlemen?”

The leader glanced up sharply, to see a young black man looking down at them. His army experience sounded an alarm; the man didn’t seem frightened or scared of their white robes, more amused than anything else. His hands were concealed behind his back; he showed no fear or submission.

“You can die, nigger,” one of the team snapped. The leader’s mental alarm bell rang louder; the black man was acting like a soldier. “Die!”

“No, Willy,” the leader snapped, but it was too late. Willy lifted his whip, brought it up, and the black man produced a weapon from behind his back. The leader stared at it; it conveyed a sense of… deadliness, far more than any of the weapons that had been used in the Great War. Before Willy could take another step forward or run for his life, the man shot him neatly in the forehead.

“You are named after a dick?” The man asked, as Willy’s head exploded. “I could take you prisoner, but quite frankly… I can’t be bothered.”

The leader hadn’t told anyone about the pistol in his belt. He grabbed for it, too late. The weapon, whatever it was, hissed, and a stream of fire lashed across the Klansmen. The leader died quickly, without ever knowing what had killed him. The others took longer to die.

* * *

The man who, in another world, had been Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson carefully secured his weapon before deactivating the camouflage unit in his suit. It was one of a handful of suits, and he had no way of recharging the batteries, and who knew; it might come in handy again, later.

“Well, that was fun,” he said, as soon as the weapon was safely away. “Grandpa?”

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Jackie Robinson said. He looked younger than his future grandchild. “You enjoyed that, didn’t you?”

Jones shrugged. “Back where I come from, the shackles on brothers are very different and far harder to throw off,” he said. “Shooting scum like those is much easier.”

“I’m sure,” Jackie said. “They’re all here; the young men of three villages.”

“Thanks, Grandpa,” Jones said. “It’s time to deliver the message.”

He stepped inside the church and nodded politely to the pastor. The church was packed with young man, mainly black and a handful of Mexicans. They’d heard of him, heard of the message he brought, despite the efforts of the Klansmen to stamp it out.

“Brothers,” he said, as he took the pulpit. “I believe that you all know who I am; I was carried backwards in time by whatever force transported all of Britain back in time. Of the religious factions, some believe – and I believe –that this is an opportunity, a second chance, if you will, to change the mistakes of history.

“Where – rather when – I come from, the world is very different. For a man to shout, ‘hey nigger’ is a criminal offence. To discriminate on behalf of someone or against him, purely on skin colour, is an offence. Incidentally, this applies to the sisters as well; anyone who wolf-whistles can go to jail as well.”

This brought some chuckles. “It’s not heaven,” he said. “Many of us are trapped in slums, unable to break out of them; we are dependent upon handouts from the government and drugs from further south. It has become impossible, for fear of being called racist, for anyone to point out that we need more than simple handouts; we need education and opportunities, something that we cannot get because of the mindset that prevents us from realising that there is a problem.”

He grinned. “Hopefully, that won’t mean anything to you,” he said. “My grandfather” – he waved a hand at Jackie – “will play major-league baseball in the future, and he will deserve the awards, but that will change. In 2015, some people get jobs – because their employers are scared of being accused of racism! We go from one extreme to the other; objects of hatred to objects of resentment!

“Is this the way you want it to be?”

“No,” they shouted. Jackie led the shout. “No!”

“There is a war on,” Jones said calmly. “Already, many of us are receiving the call-up papers; historically, we will fight and bleed to grant people liberties that we do not enjoy! I ask you; is that right?”

“No,” they shouted again.

“If we had arrested the men outside, the police would have let them go,” Jones said. “I killed them, merely to teach their followers a lesson. I’ve been moving around a bit, from place to place, building a network of people who will stand up for their rights. Will you join me?”

“Yes,” they shouted. Jones smiled; some hadn’t joined in the shout, others looked doubtful. Still, they had listened.

“Here, in the US of A, we are entitled to vote,” he shouted. “We are entitled to elect our own representatives, and do we? No! We don’t – because we are threatened and intimidated and we’re not going to take it any more! Never again shall we submit to tyranny; we will not be overcome by the remains of an evil that was blasted away during the civil war!”

* * *

“A powerful speech,” Pastor Williams said, afterwards. “Many thousands will go to the Lord because of it.”

“I know,” Jones said. “We have to resist, we have to make a stand now, before it’s too late.”

Pastor Williams ran a hand through his dark curly hair. He was old enough to remember slavery, to remember being a slave-child. “You’re talking about starting a war,” he said.

“The war has always been fought,” Jones said. “Their greatest weapon was fear and terror; I had to show them that we could fight on equal terms.”

“And can we?” Pastor Williams asked. “They have the Army, do they not?”

“We have some soldiers of our own,” Jones said. “This has to be mainly peaceful; domestic uprisings rarely end well.”

Pastor Williams narrowed his eyes. “Then why the weapons training?”

Jones frowned. “Just in case they insist on making it violent,” he said. He chuckled. “You can normally rely on racists to do the stupid thing.”

* * *

Sheriff Lewis stumbled into his house later in the night, almost morning. It had been a long night; the bodies of nine white men had been found in a field. They had all been killed, executed, with a very strange weapon. Lewis, who had fought in the war, suspected that it was a machine gun.

He stopped, gasping. Ahead of him, with her back to him, his wife was tied to a chair. Their children, the two young girls, were also tied to the table, their hands helplessly secured. Cursing, fearing that they had been violated, he stepped forward and felt cold metal at his neck.

“Good evening, Sheriff,” a voice said. “I trust that you like my gift?”

“What are you doing?” Lewis demanded. The cold metal of the gun pressed him forward. “What do you want with me?”

The voice sounded coldly amused. “In the last months, you beat up five black people for stealing, despite the total lack of evidence. They were helpless against you… and you are helpless against me. I could have killed your children, raped and then killed your wife… do you understand?”

Lewis shuddered with sudden fear, feeling his bowels loosen. “Yes,” he said.

“Not so brave now, are you?” The voice said. “I can smell you from here.” Lewis felt shame and fear. “You understand my message – and I have one for you. Over the next few weeks, you will be hearing reports of black people registering to vote and doing all the things the white population reserves to itself, such as weapons training. If you do anything, even though inaction, to act against them, you will be forced to watch as your family suffers. Understand?”

“Yes,” Lewis gasped, though tears. “Why me?”

“Why not you?” The voice asked. It sounded vastly amused. “Because you are part of a system designed to hold black people down; preventing uppity niggers, in your terms. Because you’re the one on the spot. Because you acted against helpless people. Because… does it matter?”

Lewis thought desperately. “No,” he said finally.

“Then understand, I’m quite convinced that people will demand that you take action,” the voice said. He still hadn’t seen the face of the man. “You will do nothing, or your family will be killed. Understand?”

“Yes,” Lewis said. “Who are you?”

“Naughty question,” the voice said. He felt a tiny prick on his neck. A great tiredness swept over him. “Do not forget; leave the black folk alone…”

The White House

Washington DC, USA

23rd March 1941

Ambassador King watched grimly as the seven generals and three admirals argued over the plans for the war. He scowled; he would have expected more… unity in the face of the future, rather than outright disagreement. They were in the White House, because the President would be meeting them later, but it wasn’t helping to keep everyone calm.

“We have to proceed at once to a jet bomber,” LeMay said. The burly future commander of SAC clearly wanted to get his bid in first. “History tells us that the jet bomber is the weapon of the future, at least until…”

“But it will take us some time to develop a bomber, even if we work directly from the plans that we gave you,” Colonel Palter said. King smiled; the colonel had been given a job that showcased his talents and alienated the entire Pentagon. “We have to have the weapons now, such as the Firefly tanks and the LSTs.”

“However, we have the problem of prosecuting the war,” General Bradley said, as calmly as he could. “We need to work on tactical air support, and we need to build up an army.” He scowled across at Admiral Kimmel. “We have to move at once to mass-production of the Hellcat, Admiral, both as a fighter and torpedo bomber.”

“Yes, well if we had proper training facilities, and enough factories grinding out the weapons we want…”

King tuned them out and headed out of the room. Palter nodded and took over the meeting without hesitation; he enjoyed the argument. Back when they’d been planning the upgrade of American forces for the repeat of the Second World War, they hadn’t expected resistance from the military, many of whom would end up with an obsolete force if they weren’t careful. Even though no one, but the British were armed with guided anti-ship missiles, there was no guarantee that the Germans would not manage to produce one of their own.

You’d think that the Battle of the Indian Ocean would show them that the day of the battleship was over, he thought, and scowled. The British had sunk four Japanese battleships; that should have demonstrated just how vulnerable battleships were to missiles. Palter had advocated, with King’s enthusiastic support, a carrier and submarine construction program. Politics had interfered, of course; why would the politicians let something that was so… important get in the way of politics?

I guess the Navy is just enjoying its victory, he thought grimly. The first six months of the German War had been mainly fought by the navy, as destroyers and cruisers fought it out with u-boats for control of the seas. Despite some determined efforts, no operation to attack German soil had even gotten off the ground; Roosevelt had been determined to build up a fighting force before committing it to battle.

“Good evening, Ambassador,” Roosevelt said, vanishing from King’s mind to the room in front of him. The private room was equipped as a meeting room; Roosevelt had once told King that he came here to think and occasionally to meet with friends. Roosevelt had told the Secret Service that King could see him any time he wanted, but with his worsening condition, it had been harder to find time to visit. The stress of the political war and the real war was pressing down harder on Roosevelt; he looked more skeletal than ever.

“Good evening, Mr President,” King said, taking the chair Roosevelt indicated. The President sat in his wheelchair; he’d once joked that it made certain that he got a comfortable seat. “How are you this evening?”

“I survive,” Roosevelt said. He sounded as spry as ever. “The children are still arguing?”

“I’m afraid so,” King admitted. “They want AK-47s, they want an American tank design for pride’s sake, and they want them yesterday.”

“I suppose I should make decisions,” Roosevelt said. “The last Roosevelt President formed his own army, but matters are a lot more complicated here. We have nearly one hundred thousand men now, and we need more, a lot more.”

“They also need training,” King said. “Quite frankly, Mr President, the idea of striking cross-channel is nonsense until 1942.”

“A shame,” Roosevelt said. “Even though the Germans dealt us a heavy blow, holding the agreement together to fight the war is proving hard. We have to do something, and do so before Congress decides that internal affairs are more important.”

King felt a twinge of guilt, and then wry humour. The joke would have fallen flat; congressmen in 1940 were not watched 24/7. “Now that there is a proper sonar network up and running, only one German u-boat has managed a successful attack on a ship,” he said. “That’s not a small success.”

“It’s also not very dramatic, as it is not entirely our work,” Roosevelt said. “Without the British, the battle of the Atlantic would have been a lot more dramatic.”

And would have been in 1942, King thought coldly.

“We can’t just sit on our behinds,” Roosevelt said wryly. “The army has to do something; it has to prove its value.”

“Doing something too early cost us before, at a place in North Africa,” King said. “If we have to conduct an attack, we need to pick a better location. Has Congress budged on the issue of Japan?”

Roosevelt shook his great head. “Not since MacArthur was recalled,” he said. He scowled. “I hate setting that kind of precedent, but this is a free country and if men don’t want to serve under a particular general…”

King shrugged. “It was unfortunate,” he said. “If we can’t fight Japan, or Russia, that leaves the Middle East, or Spain. If you want an operation that’s entirely American, Norway is the best bet. Our logistics would be bad, but so would the German logistics. Colonel Palter put together a plan for such an attack.”

Roosevelt blinked. “Why haven’t I heard about such a plan from my generals?”

“I don’t think that they wanted to discuss it,” King admitted. “There are far too many things that could go wrong, from messing up the convoy timings to failing to get the carriers in position for air support. We would need a little support from the British, mainly in the air; the Germans will know more about taking on carriers now than they did in the original timeline.”

“Tell… that guy in the planning office that I want it worked out as soon as possible,” Roosevelt ordered. “In fact, I’ll discuss it myself with Harry, and then work out the details. Politically, it won’t be a hard sell; the Germans have been making themselves as obnoxious there as elsewhere.”

He chuckled. “On a different topic, what do you think of the new Internet?”

King’s mind went to the very special mobile phone in his pocket. The new Internet, a jury-rigged system based around laptops that had been intended for the Third World, and a series of relay stations that created a haze of electronic bandwidth, wasn’t anything like as capable as the one in 2015. Still, it was so much better than what everyone had had before that everyone was delighted, particularly the people running it. They were coining it in; millions of dollars going towards the British war chest.

“It could be improved,” he said dryly. “I like it, on the whole. There is a certain charm about it that the one we left behind lacked, and with the new patent laws it should continue to keep that charm. The bandwidth is slow, and I think it will remain slow until we get some landlines laid down, but it’s so much better than anything we had before.”

“Hoover wants it shut down,” Roosevelt said bluntly. “He thinks that it’s a nest of subversives.”

King smiled. The laptops for the Third World had been designed with avoiding the attention of a series of corrupt governments; it was difficult for 2015 technology – and impossible for 1940 – to trace a particular user. Since someone – he suspected the very personable Jim Oliver – had re-introduced Wikipedia, thousands of people had started to use the future knowledge for themselves. Some technical data had been censored; nothing social had been removed at all. Countless people now knew that Hoover was – perhaps – a homosexual, among other effects.

“Not everyone disagrees with him,” Roosevelt continued. “It’s amazing how quickly some members of Congress joined up with him. Anyone would think that they were concerned about their reputations. What happened to MacArthur could happen to anyone.”

King laughed. “The march of progress, Mr President,” he said. “They need to develop more upstanding and neat lives.”

“Perhaps,” Roosevelt said. “What about the dangers of subversives?”

“Hoover saw them everywhere,” King said dismissively. His mobile phone bleeped once. He ignored it. “It was never a serious danger, even in my time; if they are talking, they are not plotting.”

Roosevelt smiled. “I’d get back to the meeting, if I was you,” he said. “You might be making lots of money off the Internet” – King smiled sheepishly – “but you will need political clout. Official Washington might have got used to you, but hardly anywhere else has.”

King shook hands and left the room, wandering back down towards the meeting room. As soon as he was unobserved, he pulled out his mobile phone and checked the message; it was simple and – as a codeword – would mean nothing to Hoover’s FBI. He wiped the message anyway; Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson’s mission was too dangerous to risk exposure.

How much do they know? He asked himself, before putting a relaxed smile on his face and wandering into the meeting room. Did they know that he had forced forward the new – unreadable – Internet? Did they know where most of the funds went? Did they know anything about Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson? Did they know that the Black Power movement was supported by some of the future people?

King smiled grimly. He had no doubt that if they did know, the reaction would not be kind. At best, he would be thrown out of the country; at worst charged with high treason. He grinned; if the game was easy and safe, everyone would play.

Chapter Three: Holy War

Salaam

Nr Mecca, Republic of Arabia (Saudi Arabia)

24th March 1941

The small town was a shambles. Buildings, some complete, some incomplete, were scattered over the small port, which was modern. Tents and mobile homes were lined up neatly as thousands of Muslims sought to build a new city near the oldest city in Islam. It was a harder time than Shahan McLachlan had expected; the remains of the Saudi tribesmen were still raiding outlying outposts.

“The Russians are supporting them,” General Flynn commented. The British Army had a large presence nearby; a monstrous military outpost that had been designed to support entire armies and air forces. With the war in the Middle East heating up, and the thousands of refugees flooding into the Republic, the outpost was more important than ever.

Flynn waved a gun in the air and passed it over to Shahan. It looked… rough, unfinished, but it was clearly deadly. “What is it?” Shahan asked finally. “It reminds me of something, but I can’t put my finger on it.”

“It’s a proto-AK-47,” Flynn said grimly. “The Russians or the Germans must have captured one, probably from America or the East Indies.” He hesitated. “More likely the Americans; the East Indies only had a handful. It’s a good thing they still follow the Inshallah method of shooting.”

He was trying to bait Shahan, who didn’t rise to the bait. “Then we need to strengthen our own patrols around the new farmland,” Shahan said. Being mayor of the new community was harder than he had imagined. “Damn it; we have limited manpower and thousands of things to do.”

“Assimilating people into a community is harder than it looks,” Flynn said dryly. Shahan glared at him; Flynn gazed back evenly. “Still, the intellectual tradition hasn’t been completely destroyed, as it would have been later.”

“True,” Shahan agreed, forgetting his annoyance. “Can you spare extra men?”

“Not and fight the war at the same time,” Flynn said. “We’re training some of your people and the younger Arabs as warriors, but the former warriors can’t fight for shit. If we give them advanced tanks, their first response is to charge at the enemy – and if the Fireflies were a little less armoured it would have quickly wiped them out. As it is, I may have to pull out the infantry brigades.”

Shahan scowled. “Is it that bad, up north?”

“Oh, yes,” Flynn said. “The Soviets, I think, are preparing for an attack on Baghdad, and the Germans might be joining them. Failing that, they might be going west instead… and you know what happened the last time they did that.”

Shahan scowled. The German raid on Palestine had been beaten off, ironically by a combination of Jewish and Muslim fighters, but not before it had slaughtered indiscriminately. Many Arabs had wanted to welcome the Germans; their reward had been merely to be slaughtered first.

“Either way, our lines are too long,” Flynn said. “Even though we now have the new regiments, particularly the ones that were formed from Contemporary personnel and some of your people, the lines are too weak. I imagine that Stalin is licking his lips and considering a two-prong attack to seal us in Baghdad. That’s what they did in Stalingrad, after all, and I’m sure that he’ll think that they can do it.”

Shahan blinked. The Germans and the Turks had levelled Tikrit, the hometown of their later enemy, around one hundred kilometres from Baghdad. Did they know that they were wiping Saddam from history? He thought absently. Did they mean to do it? Saddam’s future hometown was just inside the area of German control – nominally under Turkish control – and the Soviet lines started just eastward of Tikrit. As the crow flew, the Russians were within fifty kilometres of Baghdad.

“Failing that,” Flynn continued, “they might try to make their occupation of Iran permanent by forcing us out of Basra. If they do that, they will fall upon Kuwait and chase us into Arabia.”

Shahan thought about the nightmare of Soviet tank columns getting within his new country and winced. “Can they be stopped?” He demanded. “Can we do nothing?”

“It depends,” Flynn admitted. “We keep smashing their logistics with air attacks, and of course we’ll keep doing that. Of course, they’re persistent… and they’re getting better with their own radar-guided guns. The longer they delay, the better-prepared we will be – and it’s not as simple a task as the map suggests. My own inclination is to attempt to hold Baghdad if possible, and then to counter-attack.”

Nr Damascus

Syria

24th March 1941

The day was hot, far too hot for Captain Dwynn as the small SAS team headed towards the city. It had fallen to German occupation after a short battle; exhausted by civil war, the inhabitants had hardly been able to put up a defence. A chunk of what had been Israel in 2015 was in German hands; Dwynn had heard about what happened to the inhabitants, those that hadn’t fled or died fighting.

“I think that’s our target,” Corporal Chang muttered. Dressed in Bedouin robes, the SAS team were blending in as much as they could. Chang’s face, very Chinese indeed, would have revealed far too much; he wore his face-cover almost as completely as a woman would.

“I never would have guessed,” Dwynn muttered back, as the German base came into view. It had been built around a small town; the inhabitants had been forced to assist in the construction of defences before being shot or enslaved. A woman’s scream drifted though the warm air; the Germans had clearly found ways of keeping themselves occupied.

“Bloody bad terrain,” Sergeant Vash said grimly. The Germans had camped out in the middle of a vast flat plain; sneaking up on the base would be difficult, if not impossible. Dwynn had no doubt that the Germans had mined the approaches; it was what he would have done.

“Remember, this is a simple raid,” Dwynn said. He picked up his scanner and held it up. “Only fifty or so Germans… probably SS scum.”

“What do we do if they still have some of the villagers captive?” Chang asked. “We can hardly kill them, and they have nowhere to go.”

“We’ll decide that when it happens,” Dwynn said. He glanced around, looking for a place to make camp. “We’d be better off attacking in the night, I think; we’ll set up camp a few miles off, and then come back at night.”

“You’re the boss,” Vash said. “I’m sure that there’s somewhere to hide on this godforsaken desert.”

* * *

Night fell quickly over the desert; the stars came out and glittered brightly in the sky. Unterscharfuehrer Jagar, a young SS recruit, shuddered as he saw the results of their handiwork. Nearly a hundred people had lived in the village; now they were all gone – apart from the pretty girls – and they had new defences.

I never signed up for this, Jagar thought. He’d listened to Radio Free Germany, even though it was banned and there were heavy penalties for doing so, but he’d never believed. The Fuhrer, one of the greatest Germans that had ever lived, who’d revoked the accused treaty and made German strong again – surely he would never have allowed mass genocide. It wasn’t until after basic training that Jagar had realised that the SS had special rights – and one of them was the right of access to the camp whores.

Jagar had been sick, the first time, and no harsh words from the Strumscharfuehrer had been able to make him go back in. His assignment to the construction unit ordered to build a forward base in Syria – intended as a punishment – had been almost a relief, until it had started again. He’d been forced to take a turn with the women – the Hauptsturmfuehrer in command had been… quite insistent – and it had revolved him. The fear and revulsion in the woman’s eyes haunted him; she’d seen her husband killed in front of her when she refused to suck the Hauptsturmfuehrer’s cock.

There was a spark of light in the darkness. Jagar jumped forward, lifting his new assault rifle, and smiled in relief. It was only the Hauptsturmfuehrer; lighting a cigarette. There was blood on his hands and Jagar realised with a sickening certainty what he must have done.

“There will be better whores,” the Hauptsturmfuehrer said cheerfully, as if he was discussing the weather. “Wait till we return home Henie; I’ll take you to a really high-class brothel, one where the heroes of the Reich get quality service.”

“Thank you, Herr Hauptsturmfuehrer,” Jagar said, wishing that he could just return home. This was no life for an engineering student, even one with impeccable Aryan blood.

“Or, if you’re lucky, you might qualify for the breeding program,” the Hauptsturmfuehrer continued. He wiped the blood off his hands on his jacket; the old training Strumscharfuehrer would have been horrified. “Think about that; a blonde Nordic beauty, willing to do her duty with the hero of the Reich.”

Jagar’s disgust must have shown on his face, for the Hauptsturmfuehrer slapped him on the back and continued on his way, back to the mosque. It was now thoroughly desecrated; it provided a communal sleeping room for the soldiers and the worker team. He turned to stare out into the darkness… when a streak of light shot past him and slammed into a building. A massive explosion shattered the building, blasting through the mosque and killing most of the SS troopers. A second explosion detonated near him and a chunk of wood struck him on the head. Darkness.

* * *

Dwynn was not bold, in the sense that he would risk everything on one throw of the dice. If he’d had the time, he would have arranged for reinforcements to be brought in by helicopter, or even asked the RAF to take out the village without the SAS being involved. Time was limited and resources even more so; it was the SAS that had to do the work.

“Attack,” he muttered into his subvocal communications equipment, and watched grimly as the two rockets picked off the main concentrations of German life. Considerable work had been done on increasing the yield of the new anti-tank weapons; they were now almost capable of damaging a Centurion’s frontal armour. Dwynn had, like many of the soldiers, favoured a weapon that could take out the most powerful British main battle tank, but ultimately had to agree that there were dangers in using a weapon that could fall into German hands. There was no point in giving them instructions on how to take out the so-far invincible tanks.

“Forward,” he yelled aloud, and ran forward. The Germans were shocked; the handful that were grabbing for their weapons had no time to react before the SAS were on them, depending upon speed and skill to defeat the SS. A German’s head exploded as Dwynn double-tapped him; another was coming out of a hovel buttoning up his fly when Dwynn shot him.

“Shit,” he muttered, as he looked into the hovel. A woman lay there, crying; her torn legs akimbo. “Don’t worry,” he said, and cursed his mistake before repeating it in broken Arabic. “We’re friends.”

He stepped back out of the hovel and looked around. The shooting seemed to have died down, so he lifted his radio. “Roll call,” he said. “Any live Germans?”

“One dude who’s been knocked out,” Chang reported. “We haven’t seen any others left alive.”

“This should force them to concentrate on defending their territory,” Dwynn said grimly. “Bind the one you do have; we’ll have him carted back to base. Plummer, there’s a woman in the hut near me and…”

“You want some pepper-up to put iron in your rod?” Plummer asked quickly. “I thought that danger did it for you…”

“Shut up,” Dwynn snapped. “She’s been raped and injured; you’re the medic, so medic her.”

“Yes, sir,” Plummer said, subdued. Dwynn walked back through the burning town, hardly more than a hamlet, and checked around. There was no sign of a German vehicle, not even a jeep, and he smiled. The RAF’s policy of shooting up as many German vehicles on the ground as possible must be having some affect somewhere.

“Control, this is Team Dwynn,” he said, into his radio. “We need pick-up, and a doctor. We have one prisoner and one rescued person.”

Vash joined him as soon as the team had checked the remaining buildings. “This is a mess and a half,” he said. “Were they this bad in the first time line?”

“Worse,” Dwynn assured him. He’d been researching the Germans in the Second World War; he hoped to meet Otto Skorzeny someday. The German was one of the few German heroes from the war. “They did this in Russia; doubtless they would have done it here as well.”

“We should just burn them off the planet,” Vash snarled. Dwynn winced; ever since one nuke had been used, the debate had begun; should more be used? He knew that some senior figures within the army wanted to use tactical nukes in the Middle East, and only resistance from Hanover himself – the Army respected Hanover – had prevented that debate from becoming public.

“We’ve had that argument before,” Dwynn said, suddenly very tired. He hadn’t caught enough sleep before the attack. “How are our guests?”

“Plummer thinks that the woman will be fine,” Vash said. “The German hasn’t woken up yet.”

“I see,” Dwynn said, as the CV-22 tilt-rotor came in over the horizon. He could hardly see it, but he could hear it and the low roars of the three Harriers escorting it. The Germans had based a handful of their own aircraft in Turkey, using them to conduct low-level raids of their own.

He lifted his radio. “Have you got everything?” he asked. “Don’t leave anything behind, children.”

“Yes, dad,” Chang said. “We have everything.”

“Good,” Dwynn said. “In that case, place the demolition charges and move out. This place has to be totally wrecked before the Germans realise what’s happened.”

“You mean more wrecked,” Vash said. Dwynn didn’t bother to argue.

* * *

Unterscharfuehrer Jagar’s first thought was that he’d been rescued by the SS, and then he realised how unlikely that was. He was clearly in a tent, but one equipped with wonders, from a television to a number of computers. Jagar knew what a computer was – he’d seen one in the SS training sessions – but he’d never been so close to one before. Only the most loyal officers were allowed near any of the handful that the Germans possessed.

“You’re in very big trouble, young man,” a voice said, in fluent if accented German. Jagar turned his spinning head carefully around, to see a British uniform. Dimly, he realised that there was a voice attached, and then a person inside the uniform. He winced, his head was so sore; the man seemed to have a voice of thunder.

“I am Sergeant Kettle,” the man said. “You get one laugh at my name; just one.” Jagar tried to laugh, and failed; his head was pounding. He felt dizzy, out of control, as if he were floating. “You have been taken alive from a German force; what were you doing there?”

It never entered Jagar’s mind to lie. “I was ordered to assist the preparations for creating a forward base,” he said.

“And what did you do to the people there?” Kettle asked. “What happened?”

“We rounded them up,” Jagar said. “They resisted; we shot those who resisted, and we set the others to work. The Hauptsturmfuehrer insisted on keeping some of the women; he said that he was a long way from his wife. We built what we needed and then…”

He was suddenly, violently sick. “They shot the men and used the women,” he said. “We waited and waited, but we were never allowed to leave and…”

“Why did your commanders want a forward base?” Kettle asked.

“They want to launch an offensive somewhere,” Jagar said. “The Hauptsturmfuehrer boasted that we would wipe out Palestine, and then move on into Suez.”

Kettle’s voice softened. “Tell me, how did you feel about what happened to the women?”

“I hated it,” Jagar said, though the strange haze that seemed to be covering his thoughts. “I wanted to die, I wanted to end it all, but I couldn’t… they made me take her and use her and…”

The strange haze rose up and swept him away upon a balmy sea. Before he lost any awareness at all, he thought he heard Kettle’s voice, at a distance.

“Perhaps we can offer you a chance for redemption, young man…”

* * *

General Flynn studied the report the morning after the attack. The SAS team had been flown to Cairo, where they would have a few days leave. They deserved it, Flynn was certain; they had perhaps answered a very important question for Flynn – and for Britain.

“So,” Flynn said, to his war council. “We think that we know where the Germans plan to hit. Palestine, all the way to Suez.”

“We think,” General Higgins pointed out. The burly man had served under him in the defence of Singapore, before being promoted and given command of some of the new regiments. “The young man could have been lied to.”

“That’s possible,” Sergeant Kettle said. “Psychically, he might well have been telling the truth – he seems to have felt revulsion at some of his acts – but we cannot guard against the SS simply lying to their own people.”

“And I assume that the drug was perfect?” Flynn asked. “Can we trust it?”

Kettle, who was an experienced interrogator for MI5, nodded once. “He was kept out of it on the flight back here, and then we ran the drug into his bloodstream while he was unconscious. All of the vital signs matched; he was born Gunter Jagar in 1920, which makes him twenty-one now. I’ve sent a request back to London, but I think he’s not in the history books.”

“Which is either good or bad,” Flynn mused. “I’m going to have to discuss this with London; tell me, do you want the young man for the Bundeswehr?”

“I think that General Rommel will want a look at him, yes,” Kettle said. “He certainly shows a great deal of remorse for his crimes.”

“I still think that we should shoot him,” Higgins muttered. “This is going to come back and bite us on the behind.”

Chapter Four: In the Heart of Darkness

Fuhrerbunker

Berlin

26th March 1941

The video was grainy, nothing like the modern videos he’d seen from the future, but Roth was unwillingly impressed anyway. The rocket, a scaled-up version of a V2 built from plans provided by their ally in America, had exploded. It had been on the pad one moment; the next it exploded in a blast of fire. Seconds later, the camera heeled up to catch the fleeting black object travelling across the sky, far faster than any possible pursuit.

“The British caught the dummy spaceplane,” Roth said. It wasn’t his first briefing, not even his first in front of the Fuhrer, but he had never gotten used to it. “The mock-up was destroyed in the ground and blasted to atoms.”

“Then the British have become convinced that we have rockets and the ability to access space,” Himmler said. The schoolmaster-like man still chilled Roth, whatever the fact of their long acquaintance. “This will serve to intimidate them more.”

“And then the rockets will sweep Britain with a brush of fire,” Hitler said. The Fuhrer, a short man with an impressive glare, had become more… unstable lately. The unquestioned ruler of Germany had not been happy to learn of his own fate in the shadowy alternate future, nor of how his current subjects would react to the knowledge.

Roth sighed. The V2, even the ideal design that Von Braun was working on, would lack the capability to haul the warheads the Fuhrer would need for his grand plan. The V1s, small jet-propelled cruise missiles, were far more capable, and they would force the RAF to keep some of its units in Britain, instead of in the Middle East.

“Thank you, Roth,” Himmler said. “You may go.”

Roth saluted the Fuhrer, and left the room. As soon as he had passed Hitler’s formidable secretary, he allowed himself a moment to catch his breath. He’d had a good war, so far, but Himmler was finding more and more work for him to do. Fortunately, he’d been able to pass responsibility for the atomic program to another of Himmler’s protégées; that, at least, had been taken from him.

I wonder why Goring wanted everything, he thought wryly, as he moved purposefully along the corridors. The former head of the Luffwaffe, Herman Goring, had been active recently, snapping up estates in the remains of Poland for his cronies. Poland, now being settled by proper Nordic stock from Germany and Norway, had been purged of the subhuman primitives who had used to live there, growing fat off the Reich.

Roth shuddered and hoped that the omnipresent cameras hadn’t seen the motion. The exact amount of 2015 technology in the Reich was a state secret, but Roth knew just how much had been pulled off the plane, and then smuggled in from America, courtesy of Jim Oliver. The British… criminal had been more than willing to supply the Reich with equipment; Roth had been sent to encourage him to cooperate himself. It was a shame that he hadn’t been able to obtain any nuclear equipment, but that was apparently kept under strict controls. The British were scared of their own weapons, Stewart, his lover, had told him once.

Roth shook his head. The single nuclear strike of the war hadn’t been targeted on the Fuhrerbunker, or even the German or Soviet invasion forces within the Middle East, but on a single oil-producing complex. It had cost the Reich, hurt it, but it hadn’t crippled it. With the aid of the Soviets and the Turks, the Reich had managed to survive… and there were other options for extracting revenge.

Smiling, Roth entered the suite he shared with Stewart – with Himmler’s permission – and blinked. His lover wasn’t there. After a moment, he remembered that she had been invited to visit the hospital, where children injured by the latest air raid had been taking. Shaking his head, he sat down in front of the laptop and opened the hidden compartment, reading the latest files from Oliver. The Americans, it seemed, were finally getting their act together… and once they had managed that, then they would come for Germany.

* * *

“We are running out of time,” Kesselring, master strategist and commander, reported. “If our sources are accurate, then the Americans are preparing their army for a move to Britain, or to the Middle East. Either way, we have to make our gains in the Middle East permanent.”

He spoke urgently, convincingly, hoping that Hitler would listen. The gains in the Middle East were remarkable, particularly given the shoestring logistics, but they were illusionary. As long as the British could fall back to their Republic of Arabia, they would be able to mount a counter-offensive… and spies within Arabia suggested that that was what they were doing. If they managed to get back on their feet, and defeat the German commander in the Middle East, the Turks would switch sides. He was as certain of it as he was of his own name.

“What can such a mongrel nation do against us?” Hitler demanded. Kesselring winced; the Fuhrer had read of the future, of the defeat, of the Soviet occupation – and of the nation called Israel – and discarded it. He refused to accept it as a very real possible outcome.

“They can provide weapons to real fighters,” Himmler said. Himmler believed; that was why SS Einsatzgruppen forces had provided weapons to the Arabs, weapons that had been turned on the German forces in some cases. Germans from Bavaria and Prussia could hardly tell the difference between a good Arab from Palestine and an evil communist Jew from Palestine. Naturally, the Arabs had declared a truce with the Jews, while even working together to fight the Nazis.

“In any case, working from the history files, we can expect them to be weak and untrained for the first few battles,” Kesselring commented. “In the Battle for Kasserine Pass, for example, they were soundly thrashed by a German general.” Himmler twitched; the general in question was the arch-traitor Erwin Rommel. “Unfortunately, they improved rapidly after that… little debacle.”

Himmler smiled wryly; Kesselring shuddered. Those who knew the truth about Rommel found it prudent to believe that Rommel had underestimated the Americans on purpose. It was hard to use the history files if everything had to be filtered through what Professor Horton referred to as Political Correctness. He’d sniggered after explaining it to the Field Marshall.

“Therefore, our priority should be to fight and defeat – utterly destroy – the first American force to take the field against us,” Kesselring continued. “Fortunately, their options are limited; they can only attack us in the Middle East, Norway, or by direct invasion across the channel. From our point of view, the Middle East would be the best option, but unfortunately the Americans get a vote in the matter.”

Hitler chuckled at the weak joke. “From our agents in America,” Kesselring said, nodding at Himmler, “we know that their commanders are working on drawing up plans for all three. As yet, they themselves haven’t made any decision, at least not one that we know about.” He coughed. “Given what they did to us in the other timeline, we will have to prepare for all three options.”

Himmler smiled darkly. “The Americans want to have the war over and done with,” he said. “If we can lure them into a killing zone, they will lose heart and leave the war. Naturally, we will offer them good terms; nothing too onerous.”

“I do not believe that the Americans will be capable of jumping across the channel this year,” Kesselring said. The strategist smiled. “As it happens, we have several more divisions in France, and of course Petain will fight for us. Spain is a possibility – our logistics would be dreadfully complicated – but it would provide a rallying point for the Spanish.”

He nodded to himself. The Spanish had regained their lost fortress of Gibraltar, but at a stiff price; the British had picked off some of their Atlantic territory and had systematically smashed up the Spanish navy. Spain had become dependent upon the Germans, and some of them resented it.

“The other possibilities are Norway and the Middle East,” Kesselring said. “As we have been preparing a major offensive with the Soviets, we can expect, I think, for the British to press for that option. Although it means that they will be unable to dictate a peace settlement that suits them, it will at least save them from inevitable defeat. I suspect that they will be offered the Egypt-Palestine-Jordan region as a base; they would probably be unwilling to provoke an incident with the Soviets.”

“Useless subhumans,” Hitler snapped. Kesselring nodded grimly; neither Stalin nor Tokyo had declared war on America. “We have to work to make the war wider!”

“That would be solved by convincing the Americans to attack the Soviets, in either Norway or the Middle East,” Kesselring said. “If we do it properly, the two sides will bump together and…”

“The war will become much bigger,” Hitler proclaimed. “Already, the Americans are doubtful; will they have the stomach to fight both us and the Slavs?”

“That is unlikely,” Kesselring said. “For the moment, we can pull some of our troops out of Norway and allow the Soviets to take over some occupation duties. That will make President Roosevelt really wrestle with a difficult choice; and, of course, our allies will be quite happy to make his position worse.”

“Excellent,” Hitler said. His moustache twitched. “Now, what about the plans for a joint offensive?”

Kesselring winced. He had advised against Operation Mass when it had first been proposed; it was too reminiscent of the disaster at Stalingrad in the other time line. The war plan, designed by Manstein and Hitler himself, called for simultaneous German and Soviet thrusts west; into Palestine, Iraq and even into Kuwait. The Soviets had built up a ponderous mass of manoeuvre in Iran, after putting most of the population to work building defences.

Kesselring shuddered. Unlike most Germans, he knew the price of their success – and the effects of the knowledge of the future. Millions had been slaughtered already, merely because their descendents would become a threat, one day.

“We have continued building up the forces in Syria,” he said. “Despite some determined efforts by the British to interfere with our supply lines, we have managed to amass a powerful force, including one armed with the new weapons. Thanks to the recent intelligence coup” – he smiled a genuine smile of admiration at Himmler – “we have improved our own doctrine; we will be deploying the new anti-tank weapons and storm trooper tactics against the British, aided by the Luffwaffe. Even though we don’t have any jet fighters in the field, we have dozens of the new modified tactical bombers.

“According to our liaison officers, the Soviets have continued the same build-up, using their camouflage techniques” – it would hardly do to mention that they were better than the German techniques – “to hide the build-up, although the British are clearly better at spotting hidden things on the ground. Despite that, Stalin is confident that a two-prong offensive, one towards Baghdad and one though Basra into Kuwait, is possible.”

He chuckled. “Personally, I believe that the offensive will manage to take Baghdad, and perhaps the other city, but will run out of steam just past there. The Russians have improved a great deal” – something else that Hitler had ignored – “but their logistics still leave something to be desired. The British have gotten better at wrecking their logistics at the most inconvenient moment, as well.”

He tapped the map. “The Soviet offensive will seem more threatening,” he said. “It will be aimed at two vital cities, the ones that the British have promised the subhumans that they will defend, and they will swing their own forces towards the Soviets. A couple of days later, we will launch our own offensive, one intended to punch through Palestine and take the Suez Canal. If we plan it properly, we will manage to trigger off a revolt in Egypt; the British aren’t half as careful as they might be of anti-British agents.”

He scowled. If the SS had listened to him, instead of sending for the Einsatzgruppen forces, the Germans might have had Arab units fighting with them. They did have agents, allies, including Ibn Saud, but few of them were willing to work completely with the Germans. Switching sides at the right moment was a time-honoured tradition in the Middle East, and none of their allies wanted to bind themselves too closely to Germany.

“And then we will punch over the Suez and into Egypt,” Hitler said.

We’ll be lucky if we reach the Suez, Kesselring thought grimly. “In the event that the taking of Palestine is successful, we will secure the Suez and head south, into their new Republic of Arabia, and their major base in the region. Once the base is ruined, it will take them months to put together a counter-attack, time enough to secure our position and even punish the Free Italians, if we want.”

“They will pay for their failure to support the Duce,” Hitler said. Kesselring wanted to giggle; Mussolini’s troops had been fit only for target practice. If Hitler had truly understood that, would he have committed Germany to an alliance with the popinjay? Italy served as Germany’s slave now, her people worked for Germany’s success in the war… and they were much more agreeable. After what they had cost Germany, Kesselring found it hard to care.

Hitler tapped the table. “Now, what about Operation Typhoon?”

“Mien Fuhrer, is that wise?” Himmler asked. Hitler’s favourite, he could get away with anything. “I agree that stamping out the Jewish conspiracy is important, and Stalin must be destroyed before he becomes a threat, but should we not wait until we have forced the Americans back out of the war they entered so imprudently?”

“We are dependent upon that Jewish fool,” Hitler snapped. Kesselring winced; Germany was indeed dependent upon the flow of materials from the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. “If Stalin decides that he wants some more of our knowledge, he will turn off the tap until we’ve sent him everything; atomic designs, jets, missiles… everything. And then he will turn on us!”

He glared around the table and none could meet his eye. “Now, what about the plans?”

“We have begun stockpiling the new tanks and guns in Poland,” Kesselring said, reluctantly. “Ideally, we want to launch in May or June; the sooner the better.” He scowled; it would be a very chancy matter indeed. “The more involved the Soviets are in the Middle East, the better. We could also send some aid to the Finnish Resistance; they could tie down a few Soviet brigades.”

Hitler rubbed his hands together. An entire Soviet army group was in Finland, officially running the country. Outside the cities, the countryside belonged to the resistance, Mannainheim’s Men. The Russians would have been losing ground, if they hadn’t had an almost unlimited supply of troops.

“Production, according to Speer, is increasing sharply now we have some of the bugs worked out of the tanks,” Kesselring continued. The Reich Minister for War Production hadn’t been able to attend. “The Panthers and King Tigers cannot be deployed in great numbers to the Middle East, so they can be massed in Poland, under the strictest security. They are capable of matching the best that the Soviets have, and we have covered the bases of our… future mistakes.”

He coughed. “Thanks to Professor Horton, we now know some of the weaknesses in our own weapons and plans, and have moved to correct them. We will have far more tanks, weapons, anti-tank weapons, lorries and other items than we had in the original timeline, many of them produced by the Soviets for us.”

Hitler chuckled at the joke. “When we hang Stalin in the Kremlin, the British will be unable to defeat us, even with the Americans to help. We will develop our own atomic weapon, and then the British islands will be turned into a radioactive slagheap.”

* * *

Jasmine Horton was still beautiful, Professor Horton knew; her long blonde hair falling over her swelling chest. She glowed with life; her womb held their third child. It would have been perfect except for one little detail; they were prisoners of the Nazis, who regarded their marriage with the kind of horror that had previously been reserved for Indian-Pakistani marriages.

“It looks like a fine baby,” Irma Grese said. The teenage girl would have been gorgeous, to anyone who didn’t know her legend. She was – or would have been – the most merciless female concentration camp guard in the Third Reich. “I can’t wait to see it.”

Jasmine smiled tiredly. “It’s not due yet, Irma,” she said. She didn’t know; Horton hadn’t dared to tell her. She might have attacked Irma, rather than risk her near her children. Irma was a fine nursemaid, Horton admitted; Himmler had picked her out on the basis of the future knowledge.

“At least another two months,” Doctor Koch said. Horton had worried about Josef Mengele being assigned to them, but Koch didn’t seem to have had a history. “Other than that, a healthy pregnancy so far.”

“Thank you, Doctor,” Horton said. Koch bowed, picked up his bag, and left the room. He hadn’t seemed to care about Horton’s colour, but Himmler had issued strict orders; as long as Horton continued to produce the goods, he was to be treated well. The one guard who had tried to feel Jasmine up had been executed by Himmler’s blue-eyed boy, Herman Roth.

“Now, I have to get back to work,” he said, and kissed Jasmine on the cheek.

“Take care,” Jasmine said. It was almost a domestic scene and it tore at Horton’s soul; were they getting used to living in Nazi Germany? He kissed his wife one last time, and then headed into his study, a well-fitted out room deep below the ground. The Germans had given him a supply of books they’d recovered from somewhere, all history texts; nothing technical. Himmler had refused to tell him where they came from, which suggested that the Germans had allies in Britain.

“One of the BNP?” He’d asked, and Himmler had refused to comment. Instead, he’d given him yet another set of exam questions – or so he’d come to think of them – on the invasion of Russia in the original timeline. It made a certain kind of sense, he supposed; Himmler and Hitler wouldn’t want knowledge of their future failure to get out to the general public, and if he did all the work, Himmler would receive the credit for it.

How can Stalin’s morale be weakened sufficiently, or his grip on power be weakened sufficiently, to enable the invasion to succeed? The question ran. Horton considered; the only decent thing about his position was that the Germans shared all of their information with him, such as genuine war information. They didn’t share the news about Rommel forming a resistance army with their public, but they shared it with him.

Now, what can I write? He asked himself, and chuckled. It was just like an exam question. It had been hard, hard to provide advice for the Middle East that sounded good, but had been anything, but. The invasion might have succeeded if they’d had more time to prepare, but they didn’t. Now, he had to do the same for Russia; he had to convince Hitler to send Germany down the path to destruction in the icy wastes of Russia.

The invasion needs to be focused on Moscow, he wrote finally. If Stalin had lost Moscow, it would disrupt the centralised planning bureaucracy enough to damage the Soviet Union…

Chapter Five: The King’s Navy

Crete/Malta

Mediterranean Sea

26th March 1941

HMS Warspite wasn’t his ship anymore.

Admiral Somerville paced his stateroom and scowled mightily. His face was grim; no rating, past or present, would have dared to disturb him. The massive battleship had been… outdated, certainly by the standards of the smaller ships that made up the 2015 Royal Navy, but it was needed. The Germans were growing better at swarming the 2015 ships with thousands of planes, and the older ships were still required.

He glared over at the computer screen on his desk. It had taken American yards – with a great deal of help from a Britain that no longer possessed a dry dock large enough for Warspite – four months to modify the battleship, then nearly another month to return to the Mediterranean. He’d hoped to serve in the Far East – he’d lost friends when Hong Kong had fallen almost without a fight – but the PJHQ had decided that his talents were better used in the Mediterranean.

Damn it, he snapped. It was coming to pass, as Lord Linlithgow had predicted; the 2015 British were using their comrades from 1940, without being willing to allow them to return to Britain. The wonderland of the future, or so 2015 Britain seemed, had no place for them. After the last riot, only small groups were given leave on the mainland; most of them had to go to Ireland, which was in a state of upheaval. Warspite had even escorted several shiploads of Irish Protestants, fleeing to South Africa. He supposed it made sense, after civil unrest had begun in Ireland, but it didn’t seem fair at all.

“I suppose that not all of this is bad,” he said, as Warspite nosed its way through the Mediterranean. The sea was calm and, since the rocket attacks seven months ago, free of Italian surface ships. The new radar and the sonar were picking up traces of German aircraft, or perhaps they were French aircraft, but they didn’t come out for a battle with the small fleet. They had learned hard lessons about tangling with the picket destroyers, to say nothing of Warspite, Resolution and Valiant.

He chuckled. Perhaps their technology wasn’t so bad; it was just their attitudes. Warspite now carried tons of extra-strong armour, made by a process none of the Contemporaries understood, which was capable of resisting even a direct strike by a kamikaze aircraft under the best circumstances. The radar and sonar now made Warspite the deadliest battleship on the surface of the sea – and she might even have been able to stand up to a missile attack. The guided torpedoes had destroyed the three Italian submarines that had dared to try to attack the ships on their long transit to their new home, when they had duelled with the German batteries mounted near Gibraltar.

And they don’t trust us, he thought. His mind returned again and again to that point. The British Army of 1940 had lost most of the crack troops when Churchill and Ironsides and all that was good about Britain had vanished forever; only the weakest units had remained, for they were all that could be spared from an invasion threat that now seemed like a joke. The men, not all of them happy with the newcomers, had responded with violence. The ensuring bar brawls, in a multitude of bars, had damaged relationships; not all of the Contemporaries had the mental flexibility to embrace change.

Still, there was the ever-present worry about Nazi Germany, and without the Nazis there might have been a civil war. Somerville shook his head; he was thinking nonsense, and he supposed that the Indians would be happier under their own government as well. He smiled grimly; even with the Japanese Army camped out on their borders, the Indians were still arguing about the form of their government. Would the Princely States maintain their unique status? Would there be constitutional provisions for minority rights?

“And it doesn’t matter without beating Germany,” Somerville said. The plan that Force H – they’d been allowed to keep the name – was about to execute was a step forward, although not a particularly dangerous one. His radio buzzed; the bridge was trying to call him.

“Admiral to the CIC,” Captain Jameson said. Jameson had been promoted in the wake of the confusion that had followed the Transition. Somerville nodded and left the cabin; the door hissed shut behind him. That was yet another uncomfortable thing in the old/new ship.

“Attention on deck,” the duty officer said, as Somerville walked into the Combat Information Centre, yet another new innovation, although one he vastly approved of. The screens and radio beacons allowed his small fleet near-perfect command and control, allowing him to move his ships like pieces on a chessboard.

“As you were,” he said, and his eyes gleamed as he looked down at the screen. The fleet was moving due east from Malta, heading towards Crete. The Germans had landed paratroopers on the island in the final action of their invasion of Greece, defeating and capturing the final remnants of the Greek Government. Since then, the island had been slowly converted into a German airbase… that was now going to be wrecked.

And taken, if we can do it, Somerville thought, and he smiled. Two of his ships were fast troop transports from 2015; modified small passenger ships that had been rigged up with basic weapons and packed with Contemporary troops. The PJHQ hadn’t been confident at all about the possible success – knowing how close Crete was to German air cover – but they’d finally agreed to give him discretion.

“Heads up,” a radar operator said suddenly. One of the RAF’s ultra-precious AWACS, as yet irreplaceable – was orbiting over the sea, close to Egypt, and escorted by a flight of Harriers. Its radars could see right over Crete and Greece, and it was transmitting the information to Warspite.

“We have bogies, probably German Stuka-II,” the radar operator said. The Stuka, the feared German dive-bomber, had been modified extensively by the Germans. It still possessed the limited range that had limited its deployment, but armed with torpedoes, or warheads for an SS suicide squad, they were still capable – and deadly. Tension rose in the CIC, even as the Germans turned away.

Somerville blinked. “Did they see us?”

“Uncertain,” the radar operator – who Somerville now remembered was called Tom – said. “I don’t think that they came close enough to see us, and there’s no sign of a swarming process being formed up.”

Somerville shook his head. “Keep the radars and sonar active,” he said. “They might be coordinating submarines.” He thought for a long moment; the supersonic Jaguars based in Egypt could intercept the aircraft over Greece, but even for those aircraft it would take too long. “Keep watching for surprises.”

* * *

General Kurt Student read the report, flashed to him through a line laid on the bottom of the sea, and smiled. He hadn’t been happy about his part of the grand strategy, but he had to admit that the high command had called it right; the British were trying to re-take Crete, even though they had only held it in the other timeline.

Student was glad of that; the casualty figures from the other timeline were appalling. Almost all of his elite paratroopers had been, or would have been, wiped out. Instead, he’d taken the island against almost no opposition, and then secured it against attack. The new weapons had to be tested… and where better than on an expandable island?

“Herr General, radar is picking up signs of enemy ships,” the technician said. Student frowned; he disliked the use of British terminology, even with the modified technology. “At least five large ships.”

“Good,” he said. “Any sign of a carrier?”

“No, Herr General,” the technician said. Student sensed the suicidal desire to reprimand the general; intelligence placed all of the British carriers in the Far East. Student, who knew better than to count on intelligence always getting it right, smiled; the technician had a lot to learn.

“Excellent,” he said, instead of biting the poor man’s head off. “Order the ready flights to launch and attack.”

“Jawohl,” the technician said. Crete was now covered with landlines, ones carefully hidden from the air. The Reich had been forced to learn hard lessons about computer-decryption after reading some of the history files. No radio transmission was safe; and landlines could be cut if the enemy tried hard enough.

Student struck what he liked to think of as his contemplative pose; arms held behind his back, face calm and composed. Inside, he was bubbling with excitement; an opportunity to deliver a blow to the enemy had come at last.

* * *

There weren’t any surprises until the ship reached Crete. The Germans finally deigned to notice their presence, launching a swarm of fighters and torpedo bombers. Somerville watched dispassionately as the electronic icons swooped low, coming in low just above the water, and trying to avoid the machine guns. One by one, they fell; swatted out of the sky by the anti-aircraft weapons. The only damage was taken by the destroyer Darter, which was hit by a torpedo and damaged badly by the explosion. Somerville ordered it to return to Egypt, something that would have been suicide in the pre-Transition days, and watched as the German planes retreated finally.

“Curious,” Somerville mused. It didn’t make sense at all; German patterns now were to press the attack as hard as they could. “Order the battleships to target the airfields on Crete.”

“Aye, sir,” Tom said. One advantage of attacking an island was that there was nowhere on the island that could not be hit by the battleship’s main guns – and with some of the new rounds, precision gunnery would be easy.

“I still think that these things are cheating,” Somerville muttered, as Warspite opened fire. Seconds later, there was an answering blast of fire – far too early.

“Incoming fire,” Tom said, as Somerville realised what it had to be. The Germans hadn’t focused on duplicating the gigantic waste of effort in fortifying the Channel Islands, but they had placed some guns to cover their airbases. Somerville wished that Warspite carried one of the Metalstorm units, but they were only being fitted onto the thin-skinned modern ships.

“Admiral…” Tom began, and broke off. A new flight of planes had appeared from Crete, homing in on the warships. Homing was the operative word; they were zooming in at a massive speed. The artillery rounds were slamming into the warships; their targeting was precise.

“How the hell are they doing that?” Somerville snapped, as one of the strange planes slammed into a destroyer. It must have been packed with explosive; the destroyer was blown right out of the water. The strange kamikaze planes were homing in on the ships, even as the machine guns started to chatter again. Resolution’s icon started to flash red as one of the strange planes slammed right into its superstructure. The noise of the explosion could even be heard in CIC.

“I think that they’re homing in on our radars, or theirs,” Tom said grimly. Bright sweeps of red and green light washed across the screen, zeroing in on the location of the enemy radars. “Recommend that we…”

“Kill them,” Somerville snapped. Warspite’s main guns began to fire again. The red sweeps vanished moments later, but the shells and aircraft were still coming in. “How the hell are they still doing that?”

“I don’t know,” Tom admitted. “I honestly don’t know.”

* * *

“I like this kind of war,” Student said, as another of the V1s slammed into a British ship. They were running out of the missiles, and the shells were not doing the kind of damage he’d hoped for, but the new system was working wonders. One battleship was already limping out of the line of battle; another was hit and burning.

“This device is a wonder,” the technician agreed, patting the stolen piece of future technology. Some modified radio systems gave them the ability to steer the V1s; the passive sensor array allowed them to home in on the British ship’s radar emissions. Best of all, if the British caught on and shut down their own radars, the Luffwaffe could descend on them again. Planes were already forming up over Greece, awaiting their turn.

“Fire more shells,” Student commanded. The powerful cannons were targeting using one of the stolen laptops to compensate for the targeting; by combing the two systems the targeting was far more precise than had been possible before.

“Firing,” the technician said. The screen changed. “Sir, I think they just caught on; their radars have been deactivated.”

“Crease fire,” Student said. “Order the Luffwaffe to start the attack.”

* * *

It had become obvious the minute a small cruiser had been struck – directly on its radardome. Tom couldn’t understand it – British radars operated on a far more advanced system than the German radars and should have been practically undetectable – but there was no doubt about what was happening. The German fire fell away as the radar net was weakened; everything depended upon the AWACS radars now.

“Here comes the Luffwaffe,” Tom said. Somerville cursed; he’d wanted to take Crete back from the Germans. As a base, it would really mess up the German supply lines, to say nothing of the ongoing attempts to repair Plosti. The Germans were using prisoners from the Balkans to do the hard work of clearing the radioactive ruins, using information that some of the British had provided to him.

Somerville cursed again. Who in their right mind would tell the enemy how to clear up the ruins and get their oil back? He didn’t understand it at all; the future seemed to be scared of its own weapons. Now… nearly a thousand German aircraft were bearing down on the small fleet, which was already battered with the V1 attack.

At least I know when to cut my losses, he thought. “Order the fleet to withdraw,” he said. There was still time before the German aircraft caught up with the fleet. “Time to leave, I think.”

“Aye, sir,” Captain Jameson said. “Now leaving Crete behind.”

“We’ll be back,” Somerville vowed, and wondered why Tom was smiling. He ignored it; after such a defeat, it really didn’t matter. At least the future British were more forgiving of failure than Winston Churchill had been, before he’d vanished.

* * *

General Student watched grimly as the British fleet fled in the face of the Luffwaffe. He scowled; he’d hoped to do more damage to the ships than he had done, even though he’d nearly crippled the ships. The new armour, which spies in Alexandria had quite happily reported upon, was tougher than it looked; one of the battleships had been struck with enough explosive to sink it – and remained afloat.

Still, it was a victory, and it should serve the main purpose, as well as the ones that Student was not meant to know about. The supply lines through Turkey would remain intact, and the grand plan could go ahead. That all of the new weapons worked as planned was a bonus… and one that Student found both delightful and chilling. War wasn’t meant to be this way, not when someone could just push a button and condemn thousands of people to death, people who had no hope of ever seeing their tormentor.

He shook his head. It wasn’t his concern any longer. Now that they’d proven themselves, his paratroopers had another mission, one that would have to be launched without much in the way of preparation. It would be difficult, dangerous… and honourable. He was quite looking forward to it.

* * *

Right after discovering what had happened to Britain, Admiral Somerville had found reporting to a woman… strange, if not outright ludicrous. Women were bad luck on a ship; everyone knew that – except the Royal Navy of 2015. And most of the other navies of that era, if the future British were to be believed. Six months later, he had revised his opinion; not even Churchill could have diverted Admiral Grisham, First Sea Lord, from whatever she wanted. She was a very formidable person indeed.

Somerville had wondered about the crewmen and women; how did they get along in a professional manner? After the Battle of the Indian Ocean, when some of the feared Japanese fleet had been sunk, he knew that they were professional, maybe more professional than his own people. Their way of fighting was different, less rough, than that of the Contemporaries, but the finest traditions of the Navy were maintained.

Except the Damn the French toast, Somerville thought wryly. Perhaps, given how close Vichy France and Germany were now, it would be brought back. The Contemporaries still used it, and the 2015 crewmen joined in with gusto.

“So the fleet was badly damaged,” Grisham said thoughtfully. Her bulldog face scowled through the video link. “Exactly how many ships were lost?”

“Four destroyers and a cruiser were lost,” Somerville said. Somehow, she always reminded him of his teacher. “Resolution was very badly damaged; her Captain and most of her command crew are dead. If it hadn’t been for the new systems, we might have had to abandon her. The other ships were all damaged to some extent.”

“It rather reads like a trap for our ships,” Grisham said. “Your fleet, Force H, is the main force in the Mediterranean. They wanted to sink you, making the task of harassing their supply lines much harder.”

“It certainly seems that way, madam,” Somerville agreed. The Germans had been known to launch attacks across the Mediterranean from time to time; knocking out Force H would have been a step to regaining control of the disputed sea-lanes. “Now that they’ve secured Gibraltar, they have to be thinking about placing an attack right across the Mediterranean.”

“It would seem suicidal,” Grisham said. “Except… they’ve clearly progressed faster than we dared fear. These radar-homing weapons, they were developed by the Nazis, but only towards the end of the war, and they should not have been capable of tracking our radars. MI5 is going to have to work on it.”

“You think that we have a traitor somewhere?” Somerville asked. “It might be just a rag-head from Egypt.”

Grisham frowned. The Royal Navy of 2015 wasn’t keen on what they called racist language. Somerville, who knew that the Egyptians would have quite happily have knifed Britain in the back, didn’t care two figs.

“Perhaps,” she said finally. “Or perhaps it’s a source in America; we have given them a lot of our technology to study.”

“Foolish, in my opinion,” Somerville said.

“Perhaps,” Grisham said again. “Still, keep your eyes on the ball; the war will be over before you know it.”

She signed off. Somerville allowed himself a chuckle, before heading out of his stateroom. There was work to be done, and he couldn’t stay in his room forever, no matter how much he wanted to do so.

Chapter Six: Those Who Stand

Free Germany Army Base

Nr Algiers, Algeria

28th March 1941

The room was air conditioned, with all the computers and equipment that a techno-geek could possibly want. It was an oasis of modern technology in the desert of primitive – formerly French-occupied – Algeria; it served as a duplicate command centre for the Free German Army. General Rommel, the commander of the army, hated it on sight.

Shaking his head softly, he picked up the printouts – he’d never learned to read off the screens – and skimmed though Somerville’s reports on the recent battle. He scowled; contemplating fighting other Germans was… unpleasant, even though he knew that it had to be done. Ever since the SAS had rescued him from the SS, after he’d been arrested for a crime he hadn’t yet committed, he’d seen too much of the true face of the Third Reich. Hiding wasn’t possible; the only option was to fight.

He glared down at the reports. Grand strategy wasn’t his best subject – he’d always been more of a tactical commander – but he was certain that there wasn’t much worth the effort of defending on Crete. What was there? Some sheep and the inhabitants, most of whom were now in secured villages. Why would the Nazis put some of their main guns – and at least one of their bits of modern technology – into Crete? If Somerville had decided to try to take the island, it would have been lost forever.

Oh Lu, he thought sadly. His wife and son, and his illegitimate daughter, had vanished beyond the ken of British Intelligence. The British Intelligence was a puzzle; in some ways, such as decryption and reconnaissance, it was a soldiers dream. In other ways, such as human intelligence, it was very weak. He had supposed that they could have picked up their former web of spies that the Gestapo had hunted, but apparently most of them had been wiped out by the SS, following the Transition.

He scowled and stared down at the reports again. Whoever was commanding the forces in the Middle East had done a good job; not only was Turkey properly subservient, but their supply lines were reasonably capable. He’d expected that the Turks would have fought, after the nuclear warhead had gone off, and instead they’d submitted to the dread of a joint German-Soviet invasion.

And if Hitler isn’t beaten soon, Germany might end up being destroyed, he thought, and sighed. The use of one nuclear warhead had prompted calls for using more; on Germany, on Russia, on the troops massing in the Middle East… and to use them to win. Ambassador Ernst Schulze, the former Ambassador to the United Kingdom from the 2015 Germany and now the effective political head of the Government-In-Exile, worried constantly about that; the Free German Army was perhaps the only reason why Germany hadn’t been already destroyed.

Or at least Ernst thinks so, Rommel thought, and smiled bleakly. The British seemed to be scared of their weapons, a fear he couldn’t imagine Hitler or Mussolini or Stalin showing. If Hitler ever developed a nuclear warhead, it would be used on Britain… and the world would be set ablaze.

“Good afternoon, Herr General,” a strange voice said. Six months after meeting the German colonel who’d served as the military attaché to Britain, Rommel wasn’t certain that he liked his accent. It wasn’t… German; it was strange, softer, and yet harsh. Colonel Muhlenkampf was a former officer in the 7th Panzer; it had given them something in common once they’d gotten over the hero-worshiping phase.

“Guten tag,” Rommel said. Colonel Muhlenkampf clicked his heels. “How goes the training?”

Colonel Muhlenkampf bowed slightly. “The 1st Panzer should be ready to see action in a month,” he said. “The Fireflies are junk compared to the Leopards, but they’re good and simple vehicles. We’re currently practising moving both tanks and infantry together; that’s an important part of military skill.”

“As the Soviets have proved for us,” Rommel said. The Soviet invasion of Iran had outrun its logistical lines – and its infantry units – more than once; the tanks had taken an object, and then milled about waiting for the infantry. “What about the other two divisions?”

“The 2nd and 3rd should be ready in two more months,” Colonel Muhlenkampf said. “We streamlined the recruits who did have military experience into the 1st; everyone else is starting from the same point. As for the armoured infantry, they’re making good progress – and should be ready in a month or so.”

“Good,” Rommel said, wishing once again that he had a proper secretary. “Any major weaknesses?”

“Logistics,” Colonel Muhlenkampf said, who’d been brought up on lessons on logistics. “We don’t have a proper logistics train and…”

“I know,” Rommel said. “Under the circumstances, its quite understandable.”

He sensed Colonel Muhlenkampf’s quiet indignation on his behalf. After finding a couple of SS spies among the ‘deserters’ from Germany, the British had been reluctant to turn the Free German Army into a fully-mobile combat group; it was one of the reasons why they were training up in Algeria instead of in Britain itself.

He tapped the table sharply, passing over a PDA. Colonel Muhlenkampf, at least, could use the advanced computers. “Those are the intelligence reports,” Rommel said. “Read them… and tell me what you think.”

Muhlenkampf read quickly and efficiently. It didn’t take him long to notice the same discrepancy that had interested Rommel; there weren’t enough tanks being moved though Turkey.

“They should be capable of deploying more tanks,” Muhlenkampf said finally. “They have the logistics, even as bad as they are, to deploy more of the newer tanks… and more of the older ones.”

“Exactly,” Rommel said. “So… where are the tanks that should be in Turkey, or Iraq or Syria?”

Muhlenkampf considered. “I suppose that they could have been missed,” he said, and sounded as if he didn’t believe himself. “It’s quite easy to hide tanks if you know what you’re doing.”

“I suppose,” Rommel said. He didn’t believe it. “No German general ever born – and who served in Poland and France – would have less Panzers than he could have, and unless the bombing campaign has done more damage than we thought, then they should have more of them.”

“Perhaps they just want more supplies,” Muhlenkampf said doubtfully. “The RAF has done well at shooting up some of their supply dumps.”

Rommel nodded, even though he felt it in his bones that the Nazis still had enough supplies for what they wanted to do.

“Or perhaps they want the tanks for something else,” Muhlenkampf said thoughtfully. “Do you think that they might be planning an invasion of England?”

Rommel shook his head. Not only were the best units in the British Army tied down near Dover, but if their homeland was invaded, and perhaps falling, the British would cut loose with their nuclear weapons. Still… where else could they go? America? The concept was even more laughable than England. Iceland? Perhaps… but they would hardly need more than a Mountain Division to take the Ireland, if the British let them land. Oh no, he thought suddenly. The thought refused to go away; it had the ring of truth.

“Russia,” he breathed. “They’re going to try for Russia.”

Muhlenkampf gaped at him. “They’re out of their heads,” he said. “Look, how could they maintain their logistics…?”

“No one thought that they could maintain an offensive down here as well,” Rommel pointed out. “I know Hitler, I know how he thinks; this is his one chance to jump on Stalin… before the Americans can join the war properly.”

“It’s madness,” Muhlenkampf objected.

“Hitler is mad,” Rommel said grimly. He paused, considering. “The other option, of course, is that he thinks that Stalin is going to try something… and is getting ready for it.”

“Perhaps,” Muhlenkampf said. “He must be mad to even consider the possibility, with the Americans in the war… and us preparing to take back our government.”

“True,” Rommel said. He gazed down at the paperwork. “I have a new task for you,” he said. “I expect that the British won’t want us hanging around here for much longer.”

“Indeed, and some of the men are getting restless as well,” Muhlenkampf agreed.

Rommel nodded. It had amazed him how eager many of the recruits from America had been to kill Germans. He supposed that many of them had fled Germany as young men, or had been born in America and didn’t entirely think of themselves as German.

“I suspect that we’ll be sent east, to oppose the invasion of the Middle East,” Rommel said. “Draw up a movement plan; I want 1st Panzer and 1st and 2nd Armoured Infantry to be prepared for a move to the Middle East at a day’s notice. The Bundeswehr needs to be ready for war.”

“Jawohl,” Muhlenkampf said. He saluted, and left the room. Behind him, Rommel looked down again at the map… and knew that he would have to kill some of his former comrades before the year was out.

* * *

Gunter Jagar stared down at the camp as the aircraft dropped neatly out of the sky and landed at the small airstrip. A handful of the helicopters, armed and dangerous, were parked on the tarmac, but there were no other aircraft. The small airplane taxied to a halt and the pilot opened the hatch.

“This is your stop, kid,” the burly Sergeant Kettle said cheerfully. “Time to meet your destiny.”

Jagar hesitated nervously. The man he was going to meet was a legend; one that had been proclaimed dead before he’d begun regular broadcasts to Germany. Erwin Rommel, famous tank commander, favourite of the Fuhrer and arch-traitor.

“You’re not coming?” He asked finally. He’d hoped that Sergeant Kettle would come with him. “You don’t want to see him again?”

Sergeant Kettle laughed at him. “Oh, you’re a special case kid,” he said cheerfully. “You’re the first SS officer who have who wants to join Rommel; the other two we captured refused to have anything to do with him. He wants to see you in person, you see.”

Jagar gulped. “Don’t worry, I’ll walk you to the door,” Sergeant Kettle assured him,

Jagar flushed red. “That building over there, right?” He asked, waving a hand at a building flying a striped flag. “I’ll walk, thank you.”

The tarmac felt hard against his feet, the air was hot and dry. It was a relief to pass though the main door into the air-conditioned room; the cold air slapped into his face and he sighed with relief.

“Papers, please,” the guard said. Jagar looked around; it was like a bunker or blockhouse. He had the odd feeling that if a bomb went off in the room, it wouldn’t damage it at all.

“Here, sir,” he said, passing over the folder. “I’m here to see General Rommel?”

“But does he want to see you?” The guard asked, laughing at his own wit. Jagar bit down any number of comments as the guard made him press his fingers to a warm pad, and then checked the results on the computer. “Well, you’re you, Günter,” he said.

“I could have told you that,” Jagar said, the part of his mind that had once been an engineering student wondering how the device worked. It had clearly scanned his fingerprints, but how?

“Ah, but could I have trusted you?” The guard asked. The sealed door unlocked itself slowly; nuts, bolts, strange instruments that Jagar couldn’t recognise, and the guard waved him in. “Walk up to the last door on the left,” he ordered.

“Thank you,” Jagar said, and walked though the door. It was amazingly complex; far more complex than a safe, and he stared at it until the guard coughed meaningfully. He passed along a lighted corridor until he finally reached a door marked GENERAL ROMMEL. He tapped once.

“Come in,” a voice said. Jagar opened the door and peered inside; there was a man sitting at a desk. The man was older than he had expected, but there was no mistaking the famous profile that had been publicised across the Reich… until it turned out that he was alive after all.

“General Rommel?” He asked, in German. “I’m Günter Jagar.”

“Ah, the SS man,” Rommel said. Jagar started to salute, and then stopped himself; what sort of salute would Rommel want? “Have a seat.”

Jagar sat, wonderingly. “I confess that you are the first SS man to show a genuine willingness to join us,” Rommel said. “You held to this story even under the truth drugs, and Sergeant Kettle vouches for you. Tell me, why did you join the SS?”

Jagar was certain that Rommel would notice a lie. “My father insisted that I take up a military career,” he said. “This was during the Battle of France, and I wasn’t too keen on it, but he talked to a friend of his in the SS and they accepted me. And then I was assigned to one of the long-range groups and…”

He broke off, taking a moment to compose himself. “They were awful,” he said, feeling his helpless rage boiling to the front. “They took villages and towns and slaughtered them, putting the men to work and the women to…”

“I know,” Rommel said. “We were blind to them until it was too late.”

“And then the British attacked and slaughtered all of the men, except me,” Jagar concluded. He refused to discuss his own forced participation; it was too painful. “They took me prisoner and brought me here.”

“There was only one survivor from that Arab village, apart from you,” Rommel said. “A woman; she testified that you hadn’t raped her.”

“They made me take one,” Jagar confessed, feeling it burst out of him. “The leader made me do it, and they laughed and laughed and…”

“You will have to work hard here,” Rommel said, as if Jagar hadn’t spoken. “For the moment, you will be considered on probation. Tell me, what did you do in Germany?”

“I was an engineering student and part-time teacher,” Jagar said. “It was the only way to earn money with the call-up taking many of the older male teachers.”

“The veterans,” Rommel said. “Tell me, can you handle clerical work?”

“Yes, sir,” Jagar said. Rommel deserved a ‘sir,’ he was certain. “I used to keep my father’s books until…”

Rommel nodded thoughtfully. “I think that we’ll give you a quick course on this junk” – he waved a hand at the equipment on the table – “and start you off as a secretary and general assistant for me.”

Jagar felt his mouth fall open. He was speechless; he had expected to be assigned to a fighting unit, or something, not as a glorified assistant. “Sir, I…”

“Will not be trusted by the rank and file,” Rommel said. “I’m sorry, Günter, but your… history as part of the SS will not inspire confidence. As my assistant, you will have time to build up confidence and your understanding of the future technology. Eventually, we’ll find you a fighting billet, if you still want it.”

“Thank you, sir,” Jagar said.

“Sergeant,” Rommel called. A second passed, and then a man stepped into the room. Jagar studied his uniform with interest; it was neither Wehrmacht nor SS, but something different entirely. “This is Sergeant Brasche,” Rommel introduced him. “He will make all of the arrangements.”

He looked into Jagar’s eyes. “This is your last chance to back out and go into a POW camp,” he said. “If you stay here, you will go into danger and you will be expected to honour the commitment you’ll make to us.”

Jagar took a breath. “I’m staying,” he said.

“Right this way then,” Sergeant Brasche said. “Follow me.”

* * *

“Was that wise?” Ambassador Ernst Schulze asked. He smiled grimly at Rommel, who was pacing the room. The five other members of the Free German Government, two businessmen who had been in Britain and three intellectuals who had been in America, nodded in unison. They all had different ideas for Germany’s post-Nazi future, and Schulze found it hard to keep them all going on the same course.

“The kinder is not a Nazi,” Rommel said. “For the moment, I am convinced of his story.”

“You’re giving him very close access to you,” one of the businessmen interrupted. He’d set up in Britain to avoid the crippling taxes in Germany; his plan for Germany involved only the barest minimum of taxation. “He could poison you, or shoot you, or do anything to you.”

“You exaggerate,” Rommel said placidly. “He was passed, I might note, by one of the foremost interrogators in the British Army, who used truth drugs unmercifully.” He coughed meaningfully. “Now, at the risk of sounding impatient, have our backers worked out what they are going to do with us?”

There was a brief exchange of glances. Few of the 1940-born wanted to admit that they were dependent upon the British; few of the 2015-born wanted to risk the army before it was ready.

“The British want you in Palestine,” Schulze said finally. “All the evidence suggests that the Germans – the Nazis – are going to attempt to head west and cut the Suez Canal, before heading south and plunging a dagger into the Republic of Arabia. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prevent them from do so.”

He watched as Rommel studied the map. It made sense, he’d been assured; the British needed the Free German Army in action as soon as possible, even though his mind rebelled at the thought of becoming involved in Palestine. The Germans, ironically, were the smaller threat in the region; it was the Soviets who were the real problem.

Rommel finished studying the map. “How does this benefit us?” He asked. “I don’t think that the Nazis will get anywhere near the canal; the RAF can shoot up their supply lines with ease.”

“We have to do something to relieve the suffering in Palestine,” Schulze said reluctantly. He suspected that politics would not impress Rommel. “We could give Germany a better name in regions that produce a lot of oil…”

“Stuff and nonsense,” the businessman said. The other businessman nodded agreement. “With hydrogen-powered cars…”

“Which will take years to start, even with the technology well understood,” Schulze said, with some irritation. “We need the oil, and we need commercial interests of our own.”

“All of which is secondary to having Hitler defeated,” Rommel said, ending the discussion. “Our priority is to end the war as soon as possible, not to worry about the future. I’ll issue the orders to prepare for the move.”

Chapter Seven: The Final Frontier

Churchill Space Centre

French Guiana, South America

1st April 1941

The Trident missile, a multi-million pound dealer of megadeath under normal circumstances, was mounted neatly on its pad in the centre of what would have been the European launch site in the future. For the moment, the twenty square miles of jungle had been sealed off after the French colonial troops had been evicted back to POW camps in the desert. Wooden shacks and stone blockhouses housed the two thousand Royal Marines charged with defending the launch centre, as well as its famous staff.

Major John Dashwood, supervisor and Base Commander, looked across his domain from the watchtower and smiled to himself. He would have preferred somewhere not so… French, or with such a grim history, but there weren’t many excellent launch locations on Earth, particularly ones in reasonably safe areas. The plans to use Kenya had been brushed aside when the native revolt had broken out, and Britain itself was out of the question.

He chuckled aloud. The Churchill Space Centre, such a grand name for it at the moment, would become Britain’s gateway to the stars. He’d been one of the cabal within the MOD demanding that Britain put forward its own space program, after the ESA had collapsed and the Russians had outdone NASA with their commercial program, but until the Transition no one was interested. Britain simply couldn’t match American investment, but in 1940 there was no one in space… unless aliens had been responsible for the Transition. Britain had nearly a twenty years lead… and Dashwood had no intention of seeing it wasted.

“Bloody stupid nonsense,” he said, as he finished examining the intelligence reports. The RAF had been confident that the Germans had managed to build a spaceplane, but Dashwood was certain that it was a bluff; the Germans would never have been able to make everything required to launch a manned spaceplane. It was either a high-attitude bomber or reconnaissance plane, or a bluff. He supposed that they could, just, place a payload into orbit, but what could they do with it?

“I beg your pardon?” Commander Tempest said. The officer on loan from the Royal Navy knew everything about Tridents; it had astonished Dashwood to learn that even 1960s-era rockets needed considerable work before they could be reproduced. Whole generations of knowledge and experience had been lost; the people who knew how to build an Apollo rocket had died between 1970 and the Transition, and those who lived had been in America. The Royal Navy, he’d heard, would need years to build a battleship from scratch, even though they had all of the plans.

“The German spaceplane,” Dashwood said absently, and returned to the military digest. The Navy wanted to build more Type-45 destroyers, but armed with better anti-aircraft systems, and develop several new carriers from oil tankers.

“They don’t have a chance,” Tempest assured him. Dashwood glowered at him; Navy man or not, his experience with matters space was no more or less than Dashwood’s own. The flight simulations had confirmed that the satellite could be launched; now all they had to do was see if theory matched reality.

“Let’s hope so,” Dashwood said. The Germans were working hard on their rockets; the AWACS aircraft had tracked a V2 being launched from isolated woodland, although they hadn’t started to throw them at Britain yet. PJHQ thought that the Germans were trying to get their targeting down precisely, although it was hard to track German progress.

“Ah, Doctor Goddard,” Tempest said. Dashwood turned and nodded politely to the older man, the famous American rocket scientist. Recruiting him had been depressingly easy, once the Americans had jailed the Abwehr source recruited by Nikolaus Ritter. Goddard had been invited to work in Nazi Germany; Dashwood had made him a better offer. The Americans hadn’t been interested.

“A fine day for a launch,” Goddard said. Physically, he was short, bald and had a moustache, but his eyes gleamed with brilliant curiosity. He was brilliant, Dashwood acknowledged; for the moment he might be working on recreating old/new knowledge, but Dashwood expected him to make many more fundamental breakthroughs in the future. “These computers are remarkable.”

Dashwood had to grin. The computer, one of Britain’s finest, wasn’t that brilliant by 2015 standards. Both NASA and the Russians had developed more complex computers for the race to Mars, but Britain hadn’t taken an interest. Still, the Trident was a well-understood piece of technology, and if it had once been done with abacuses, it could be done with the system he’d brought.

After all, the program had been funded for a game, with all the attendant detail to realism, not a government project done on the cheap.

“Yes, sir,” Dashwood said. As always, he felt a mixture of awe and annoyance when dealing with Goddard’s bubbly personality. His gratitude for the treatment for throat cancer, which would have killed him back in the original timeline, had altered his personality. He’d once been a loaner; now he was more outgoing than Dashwood himself.

“And we’ll be launching bigger and bigger rockets soon,” Goddard continued. “Imagine, one large enough to put an entire space station into orbit. We can continue to farm out the components and put them together here, once we get a proper factory set up.”

He waved a hand around the site. Thousands of men and women, and a great deal of equipment, had been flooded into the compound, working to set up a proper compound. It would take at least three years, they’d estimated, but it could be done soon.

“And then we can just keep building and building,” Goddard said. “Imagine, we could see the first interstellar rocket before we die!”

Dashwood grinned. “Yes,” he said. “We might see that. The important matter, Doctor, is to develop the industry and commercial benefits first, you see. We can’t afford for people to start making cuts in the money.”

And we have to make this self-funding, he thought coldly. “We have to put the spy satellites in orbit soon, along with the communication relay systems,” he said aloud. Inside, he hoped that the new systems would work; Britain didn’t have that many spare Trident missiles, and they were almost irreplaceable. Once the first desperate battles were over, the Government had started a number of programs to replace some of the technology that had been largely made abroad.

“Yes, call me Robert,” Goddard said firmly. “Don’t worry; no one will ever claim that a rocket won’t function in a vacuum again.”

Dashwood chuckled. The New York Times had printed a grovelling apology to Goddard after he’d threatened them with legal action. Dashwood had rather hoped that the whole affair would have blown over – he’d wanted to get Goddard and as many other rocket scientists out of America before the Yanks realised what they had on their hands – but he had to admit that it had had its funny side.

* * *

Time went by, too slowly for Dashwood’s liking. Goddard bounced up and down, waiting for the test results, and endlessly designing new ways to break down the rockets into mass-producible components for the American factories. Apart from the guidance systems, the factories could crank out every component, without knowing how the entire system went together.

“The engineers report that the system is totally ready,” Tempest said finally. Dashwood stared down at the telemetry display; months of work were leading up to this moment. A network of relay stations across the globe would relay transmissions from the rocket to the base, as well as copying the data to Britain and Australia. If anything went wrong, their successors would have some idea of what went wrong.

Not that I plan to have any, of course, Dashwood thought wryly. He was confident of the missile; if he hadn’t been he wouldn’t have asked the BBC to send a team to record the entire launch. Like many serving officers, he disliked the BBC, which had sent a reporter into the heart of Nazi Germany, but he understood the need for public relations. Public support for the space program was essential.

“Excellent,” he said finally. “Sound the launch alert.”

Tempest pushed a yellow button on the console. A throbbing drumbeat arose; the constructors scrambled for the shelters and the watchtowers, hiding from the blast of the launch. Dashwood shook his head; normally the rocket would have been blasted out of the submarine by gas, before the rocket ignited, but there was no need for that now. Anyone more than ten or so meters away would be perfectly safe.

“Let them play,” Tempest muttered. Goddard was watching, his eyes wide. “Launch commit?”

Dashwood took a moment to pretend to consider. The cameras were rolling; some of the Government’s friends in the BBC would make a documentary out of the entire incident. It was vital that he seemed to consider, even if there was no need to do so; any problems would have appeared in the tests. After all, hadn’t the Tridents been tested only six months ago?

“I confirm launch commit,” he said, when he could wait no more. “I confirm launch commit.”

Tempest smiled wryly. Dashwood wondered if future watchers would understand. “I confirm Trident-1 loaded with Load-1,” Tempest said. “I confirm course and instructions loaded into computer core. I confirm flight simulations report success ten out of ten. Confirm; launch commit?”

Stupid technobabble, Dashwood thought coldly. Dotting every ‘I’ and crossing every ‘T’ seemed like a waste of time. “I confirm launch commit,” he said. “T-minus… thirty seconds, and counting.”

“Wow,” Goddard breathed. Dashwood watched; Tempest’s countdown was loud and irritating.

“You may launch the rocket,” Dashwood muttered. “At zero, hit the big red button.”

“Thanks,” Goddard said, a little sharply. He could still tell when he was being condescended to. “Push at zero.”

Dashwood nodded. Someone with a sense of humour had created a red button as large as a soup plate. “Launch at zero,” he said, just to make certain.

“Ten… nine… eight… seven,” Tempest said aloud. “Three… two… one… zero! We have launch, I repeat, we have launch!”

Goddard pushed the button. The Trident seemed to hang in the air for a long moment, then a plume of yellow fire and smoke appeared from its behind. There was a long pause, and the noise grew louder, and then the rocket started to climb from the pad, reaching up into the sky. It picked up speed as it rose up on a pillar of fire, heading upwards into the atmosphere.

“T-plus twenty seconds,” Tempest said, as the rocket climbed. “Everything is looking good from down here.”

“My god,” Goddard breathed. “We have to build more of these rockets.”

“We’ll try,” Dashwood said. An unearthly silence fell upon the watchtower. For a long moment, the dank steaming complex that might be a real gleaming launch centre one day was united in awe. Not even the birds were making a noise.

“Rocket now at separation-one,” Tempest said. “Destroyer Churchill reports that it has the rocket on its sensors; everything looks optimal… rocket has separated.”

“That’s the first stage,” Dashwood muttered into his throat mike, for the benefit of future watchers. “Second stage separation coming up…”

The rocket started to alter course slightly, heading for orbit. “Final stage separation coming up,” Tempest said. “Injection into low Earth orbit coming up… five minutes and counting.”

Dashwood took a breath. This was the most dangerous part of the mission. The Tridents hadn’t been designed for trans-LEO injection; rather they had been intended to launch an object into a re-entry trajectory. The orbit was a little more slanted than Dashwood would have liked; the satellite would orbit over the Axis powers, rather than directly following the equator.

“Injection successful,” Tempest said. “Satellite now being released from covering sheathes.” There was a long pregnant pause. “HMS Churchill reports receiving the signals from the satellite!”

The room broke into cheers. “Check the telemetry,” Dashwood ordered. “I want everything checked before we celebrate too much.”

“Working,” Tempest said. Down on the platform, an impromptu party was going on; the workmen taking the opportunity to have a break. “Telemetry reports total success; we have a direct communications link to PJHQ now… and we’re receiving imagery!”

“I think that we have had a success,” Dashwood said mildly. “Tell everyone I said that we’ll have a half-holiday, I think.”

There were more cheers as Tempest announced it over the loudspeaker. “As for me, I think I’ll talk to the Prime Minister… and use our new relay system to do it.”

* * *

Hanover’s voice wasn’t coming through perfectly, although as the technicians aligned the system it improved. Dashwood allowed himself a smile; after this, the PM would be a big space booster. It would need a full global network – the satellite would move out of position for the relay in half an hour – but now they knew how to do it… space was the limit.

“A splendid success,” Hanover said, after Dashwood had finished the report. “How long will it be until you can complete the network?”

“It depends upon production of new rockets,” Dashwood said, honestly. “For the moment, we’re building them on contract, using American factories to do everything that their science can handle, and supplying the guidance and control systems ourselves. Unfortunately, safety standards are not what they could be in this era… they’re not such wimps.”

Hanover could be heard to chuckle. The Americans had damaged their own progress with organisations like OSHA and EPA. Of course, with 2015 technology, almost all of the environmental pollution could be avoided – without the need for the green fascists. Dashwood smiled; he’d never liked them.

“And we’ll lose some of the satellites?” Hanover enquired. “How much delay would that cause?”

“We won’t be launching anything irreplaceable,” Dashwood assured him. “We could use the remaining stock of Tridents, but I understand that to be politically impossible.”

“I’m afraid so,” Hanover said. “The German nuclear program remains a dangerous unknown, and both the Soviets and the Japanese seem to have used biological weapons in Central Asia and China. People want to be certain that we can punish them several-fold over.”

“I understand,” Dashwood said. “Give us three to four months and we should be able to deploy a basic communications and reconnaissance network. Fortunately, we have BAE’s contribution to the American ABM system still; the ‘Brilliant Eyes’ can be duplicated fairly easily. And, of course, there is the other use for them…”

“Keep that to yourself,” Hanover advised. “Still, make all haste John; all of the reports suggest that all hell is going to break loose here, sooner or later.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said.

“I also want you to look to your security,” Hanover continued. “I may have to send you reinforcements; your base is perhaps the most critical outside of Britain itself.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. “You do realise that Brazil will have seen the launch?”

“And they’re not too happy with us, are they?” Hanover said absently. The government of Brazil had had designs – and a full set of blueprints – on the formerly French territory. The arrival of the Royal Marines hadn’t pleased them, particularly when French Guiana was given the beginnings of democratic government. Still, the political situation in Latin and South America was confusing enough to cause them to hesitate, and Hanover had offered them trade links.

“No, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. “They might decide to assist the Germans on the sly.”

“Perhaps,” Hanover said. “Still, I cannot tell you enough; don’t let anything from the base fall into anyone’s hands, including everyone.”

Dashwood nodded to himself. “Yes, Prime Minister,” he said, understanding the hidden message. “Sir, Doctor Goddard has plans to scale up the boosters to place the components of a space station in orbit.”

“High-orbit kill-devices would be rather useful, would they not,” Hanover mused. “Something else to keep out of everyone else’s hands.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. “Still, I’m not certain that we can get a safe personnel launcher out of the boosters.”

“This is wartime,” Hanover said dismissingly. “Still, aren’t there designs for a Bernard-class or a Graham-class SSTO around in the BSC?”

“Yes, sir,” Dashwood said. “We have been besieged by people suggesting their designs, dozens of them.”

“Have some of them offered the contract to build their particular designs,” Hanover said. “I don’t think that we could copy one of the Russian spaceplanes; we want something simpler, less spectacular. We’ll let them absorb the starting costs; we want commercial British activity in space if we can get it.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. A thought struck him. “What about their materials?”

“I’ll talk to the Ministry of Production and Supply,” Hanover said, referring to yet another newcomer from the Transition’s ever-expanding circle of effects. “Bureaucrats do hate being leaned on; they grow awfully tight-fisted. Still, I dare say that I can convince them to make some materials available.”

He chuckled. “At this rate, we’re on our way to developing a Ministry of Space,” he said. “I don’t suppose that you have a Dan Dare in your team?”

“I’m afraid not,” Dashwood said. “We might be able to convince someone to change their name by deed poll.”

Hanover laughed. “I think that would be beyond the call of duty,” he said. “I think we’ll see how things develop; once everyone realises that the test was a success the military will be leaning on me to get more satellites in orbit. Everyone is going to want one; we’ve got teams in places that radios don’t find it easy to reach.”

Dashwood nodded. He knew where Hanover meant. “We’ll push it forward as fast as possible,” he assured Hanover. “However, unless further Tridents are released, we’ll be very lucky to have a second launch before July.”

“Understood,” Hanover said. Dashwood sighed in relief; unlike some Prime Ministers, Hanover didn’t demand the impossible. “Still, push it as hard as you can.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. The signal started to fade. “Sir, we’re losing connection.”

“We’ll chat later,” Hanover said. “Good evening.”

“Good evening sir,” Dashwood said, before the connection broke for the final time. It could have been re-routed, but neither man wanted to talk on. Chuckling, Dashwood picked up his PDA to write his report… and decided to join the party instead. The report could be written tomorrow.

Chapter Eight: Reds (And Blacks) Under The Bed

Bracken Industries

Nr New York, USA

3rd April 1941

Cora Burnside, the secretary of Bracken Industries main headquarters in the United States, was a cyberpunk. The term, from 2015, had caught on in the United States as computers and laptops, designed for the Third World, had been mass-produced and sold remarkably cheaply. Developing an online culture hadn’t taken long – they’d been connected to the British Internet, after all – and thousands used the Internet to chat. Politicians, mainly older men, had been slow to recognise the implications, and then quick to demand that they be banned, but the new Internet was simply designed to be unstoppable.

She tapped her dark fingers across the keyboard of the new system. She didn’t understand what MICROSOFT had been, or why there was so much debate over opening its systems to examination, but she was reasonably grateful that the 2010 Microsoft Office had been taken as the default standard. While it was prone to irritating glitches, it had the benefit of being simple and easy to use. Computers, her boss, Jim Oliver, had assured her, were the wavefront of the future. His equal opportunities policy, one that was years ahead of its time, meant that both black and white men and women received training; and many were putting it to use.

Safely behind the anonymity of cyberspace, many posters were confronting the inequalities of the system. Cora could only applaud; the Ku Klux Klan, a name that sent shudders of fear down her spine, was being lambasted. A black poster – at least he claimed that he was black – from the United Kingdom was posting the names of known members to the Internet, inviting people to punish them. Several had been killed, although just who had killed them wasn’t made clear. Still, there were other posts, including posts by a man in the future called Martin Luther King…

Perhaps a more tragic recognition of reality took place when it became clear to me that the war was doing far more than devastating the hopes of the poor at home. It was sending their sons and their brothers and their husbands to fight and to die in extraordinarily high proportions relative to the rest of the population. We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools. So we watch them in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village, but we realize that they would hardly live on the same block in Chicago. I could not be silent in the face of such cruel manipulation of the poor.

Cora understood the point; other black men and women understood as well. Was it worth going to war, taking up arms to fight Hitler, only to return to second-class citizenship in the United States? Already, black unions were frantically trying to find a position… in the face of increasing radicalism by some of their younger members.

A chime at the door interrupted her musings. She glanced up at the camera overseeing the main door and felt her blood run cold; the two men were famous and infamous, particularly on the Internet. John Edgar Hoover and Clyde Tolson; FBI senior officers, best friends… and supposed lovers.

“Come in,” she said politely, and buzzed them though. Tolson had been scowling at the one-way glass; Hoover had been more thoughtful. Hoover’s eyes glinted with anger at her computer – she’d minimised the incriminating websites – and Tolson’s eyes glinted angrily at her. Despite her revealing dress, quite subdued by the standards of 2015, neither man ogled her.

“We’re here to see your boss,” Hoover said. There was little charm in his voice; he’d had a rough eight months. “Please inform him that we are here.”

Cora felt a flicker of wry amusement; clearly both men would have been happier barging through the door and catching Oliver doing something he shouldn’t have been doing. However… Oliver was a power in Washington, and even the Director of the FBI had limits.

“Mr Oliver,” she said, manoeuvring so that both men caught a glimpse of her cleavage, “your two o’clock is here to see you.”

Neither man reacted to the top of her breasts, not even a hidden leer. They did scowl in unison at being referred to by a time; they perhaps found it annoying. Oliver’s voice, welcoming both men, was more welcome; they straightened up. They’ve come to beg favours, she thought, and smiled at them.

“You may enter, gentlemen,” she said, and hid her reaction as Tolson glared at her. “Right through that door.”

Hoover tipped his hat to her and entered through the door. Tolson followed him and the door clicked shut. Acting with as much speed as she could, Cora activated some of the security systems on the computer, storing information in a private cache before wiping all evidence of illegal websites. After all, the security staff had reported an FBI car that was packed with agents, who were clearly packing heat.

* * *

Jim Oliver had been reading the news too, in his case the New York Times. As partial compensation for the monies he’d expanded on having the paper sued for its errors over Goddard’s theories, he’d been given a free lifetime subscription. The front page story was more remarkable than the one two pages ago, in which the New York Times had managed to use a confusing mixture of phases to imply that the New York Times had never questioned the use of a rocket for space travel.

NEW OUTRAGES IN SOUTH, the first story ran, and he read on grimly. A sheriff had blamed the poor treatment of his wife – the New York Times didn’t quite speculate that it had been rape – on the local black community, and arrested nearly a dozen known ‘trouble-makers.’ The resulting unrest, when local blacks had fired back at the posse that had lynching in mind, had seriously damaged the town… and left both sides badly injured.

Oliver shook his head. The New York Times blamed everything on Communist subversives, who were clearly trying to undermine the American war effort. Southern politicians were talking about calling out the National Guard, but many of the Guard regiments had been earmarked for training with the new weapons and service against Germany. On different notes, the New York Times noted that the FBI had blamed the growth of this ‘subversive conspiracy’ on the Internet, and that it would be seeking legislation to have the Internet shut down.

Oliver chuckled. The ‘laptops for all’ program had been designed to defeat the evil manipulations of governments that outdid even Hitler in sheer bloody-mindedness; they had lacked any clear plan beyond holding power as long as they could. Even J Edgar Hoover wasn’t a match for the forces of unleashed social change…

“Mr Oliver, your two o’clock is here to see you,” Cora said. Oliver smiled; speak of the devil.

“Send them in, Cora,” he said. He pasted a smile on his face, ones that had fooled better cops than Hoover and considered; did Hoover know about his work for the Germans? For a long moment, he considered using the defences in the room, and then changed his mind. Hoover might have something else in mind.

“Thank you for seeing us,” Hoover said, taking the chair that Oliver waved him to and taking off his Stetson Hat. His companion, Clyde Tolson, stood behind Hoover rather than take the other chair; Oliver studied them with interest. He didn’t know much about homosexuals, but the men weren’t reacting like long-term lovers.

“I’m always willing to cooperate with the forces of law and order,” he said, and relaxed. If they’d known about his other activities, they would have kicked down the door and taken him off for trial. Or tried to; even Cora didn’t know the full extent of the surprises buried within the building. Still… what sources did the FBI of 1941 have in 2015 Britain?

“It’s always nice to meet a patriot,” Hoover said wryly. “Particularly someone who seems to have chosen to become an American citizen of his own free will.”

Oliver’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly. He was still a British citizen, at least according to his papers. He hadn’t applied for American citizenship at all. His mind raced, considering the possibilities. What was Hoover up to?

“I meant a patriot to Britain,” Hoover continued. His companion smirked. “You’ve done great service for your country.”

“I do try,” Oliver said. “I’ve heard a great deal about you.”

“I have a problem,” Hoover said, abandoning the attempt to be pleasant. “As you know, the sales of… computers with Internet access are growing constantly, mainly from your computer. I have reason to be aware that subversives are using the computers to communicate, therefore avoiding any possibility of interception. Their messages… include many lies about American patriots, striving to demoralise us for the coming struggle when communism seeks to take over the world.”

Including you? Oliver thought. He almost laughed; even if Hoover had had his way, it would have been impossible to recover all the laptops and desktop machines. “I have yet to see any evidence of subversion,” he said carefully. Hoover waved a hand at the copy of the New York Times on the desk. “That… was what happens when you try to push Americans too far.”

Hoover didn’t react, much. Instead, he reached into his briefcase and produced a pamphlet. Oliver examined it with interest; it hadn’t been printed on any printer that his companies had sold. Its crudity suggested a cheaper system. Still, it was instructive.

BUTCHER HANOVER

Nuts and bolts clank into the ‘Help Britain, defeat Nazism’ collection boxes in industrial plants. “Not a dime for the imperialists,” say the boys on the assembly line. What guy would be dumb enough to lay his hard-earned dimes on Britain, when the nation of Imperialists is backed by the Hoovers and Fords and all the rest of the fanciest punks?

And their leader, SIR Hanover, a mass-murderer who personally ordered the mass slaughter of thousands of Romanians, instead of liberating them as promised, and who has killed thousands of workers and peasants fighting for freedom. This man is armed by the rich, the famous, those who want to end worker power and take the world back to barons in castles. And, least we forget, the man who slaughtered thousands of Americans, merely to bring the United States into the war against Socialism!!!

Today, the British Big Bankers are paying that price in full – the debt for the slaughtered Romanians!!!

“Who was it who said that three exclamation marks is the sign of a diseased mind?” Oliver asked. Hoover shrugged. “I thought they didn’t make them like this anymore.”

“That document was found in Detroit, in one of the automobile plants that is now turning out tanks for the army,” Tolson said. Oliver had wondered when he would speak. “During the Russian invasion of helpless Finland, the first invasion, there were similar posters… most of which were being torn down by the workers.” He chuckled. “The subversives were defeated by the sheer illogic of their arguments; how could tiny Finland pose a threat to giant Russia? Now… now, Mr Oliver, people appear to be listening.”

“You have seen some of the outrages in the South,” Hoover said. “This is clearly the result of carefully-planned subversion.”

“Perhaps,” Oliver said. Privately, he didn’t believe it; the Negro-related incidents were mainly caused by a sudden infusion of ideals from 2015… and the simple truth that things could be better. “Still… what do you expect me to do about it?”

“Is it not obvious?” Hoover demanded. “I want you to shut down your Internet!”

Oliver sighed. For a long moment, he considered simply saying ‘yes’ and then convincing Hoover that he had do so. It wasn’t possible, though, and sooner or later the FBI would catch on. If used properly, Hoover might be… helpful for Oliver’s own long-term plans.

“I can’t do that,” he said, and tried to sound regretful. Tolson banged the table; Oliver, who’d seen Kasper in a rage, wasn’t intimidated. Hoover seemed… annoyed. “It’s quite impossible,” he continued.

Hoover met his eyes. Oliver wondered absently what Hoover thought of the X-Files; he’d certainly been quite eager to have the FBI-based show displayed at cinemas and television houses. “Tell me,” Hoover said slowly, “why can’t you shut down your internet?”

Oliver smiled. The FBI clearly hadn’t gotten a proper webhead yet, or even an Information Manager. “Because it isn’t my Internet,” he said, and smiled at the looks on their faces. “The system is a distributed network involving a number of servers that jointly uphold the network that supports the Internet and is designed to survive even a nuclear war. The elements I do have control over, the servers mounted here and elsewhere, are only a tiny portion of the Internet in America… and nothing compared to the nodes in Britain.

“Even if I did take down the nodes I have here, it would only impede any half-way competent cyberpunk for a few moments,” he continued. “Each one of the laptops is designed to scan automatically for other nodes or servers; in order to prevent the system from working you would have to take down every node and communication circuit, including the ones in Britain, Canada and the rest of the world.”

He fought hard to keep from laughing at the stunned looks on their faces. “If you, by some dark miracle, managed that, you would take down every telephone, mobile phone, computer network and defence system in the world. You would give the war to the Germans and their allies; you would cause no end of economic damage… and I fancy that the world would be more than a little annoyed with you.”

Hoover took several breaths. “I don’t understand,” he confessed finally. “You are telling me that it is impossible to shut down the network?”

“The network is designed to be impossible to shut down,” Oliver said.

“So how can we catch them?” Tolson asked. “They could be up to anything!”

“Oh, there are ways,” Oliver said, “but tracing them would be very difficult. You see, the system is designed to be hard to trace as well.”

“Why?” Hoover demanded. “What sort of government comes up with an idea like that?”

“The United States of America, circa 2010,” Oliver said. “You see, the United States of that time was too… indolent to knock over the many petty dictatorships that existed, so the ‘laptops for all’ were designed to prevent people from… well, tracing the people who might have democratic ideals. The idea was that with communications and untraceable systems, they would be able to overthrow their governments.”

“I am really curious as to who thought that was a good idea,” Hoover said, with heavy sarcasm. “I imagine that their ancestors must be alive now.”

“It hardly matters,” Oliver said. This was it; the bait had to be prepared carefully. “However, there are other ways in which I can help the FBI.”

Hoover looked up at him, like a man clutching on to a lifeline. “There have been dozens of advances in surveillance technology, for example, in the years between now and 2015,” Oliver said. “Many of them, in fact, were perfected by your own people, under your leadership.”

“Then why haven’t we been given them?” Tolson demanded. “According to Britain’s own laws…”

“They don’t want to give you anything that might remove their advantages,” Oliver said dryly. He had no idea if that was true or not, but surveillance technology was on the restricted list. “It would limit their own options and…”

“I knew it,” Hoover said. “It was bad enough when they slandered MacArthur, a noted Anglophobe, out of his position, but now… do you mean to tell me that British Intelligence is conducting operations on my soil!”

“Possibly,” Oliver said. “I don’t have any knowledge of such operations. It is feared that I am too… pro-American.”

He waited to see if Hoover took the bait. “Can you get us some samples of that technology?” Hoover asked. “The department would be prepared to pay handsomely.”

“There are some payments that don’t come in pounds or dollars,” Oliver said carefully. “I would like some political… cover.”

Tolson glared at him. His role seemed to be that of semi-thug. “And why do you want that?”

“Some of the items I will… acquire for you are illegal,” Oliver said, “even though they can be purchased at a number of spy shops. If the Prime Minister demands my head…”

“The Bureau would be happy to provide some… protection,” Hoover said. “We do have a great deal of experience in the matter.”

“Then it’s settled,” Oliver said. “I will attempt to find you some… samples.”

“Excellent,” Hoover said, and held out his big beefy hand. Oliver shook it firmly, and then called for Cora to show the two men out. Once they had left the building, and the car of FBI agents had driven off behind them, he pulled a basic ELINT scanner out of his sealed safe and scanned the room. A bug, larger than any he’d ever seen outside of a museum, had been left down the back of Hoover’s chair.

“Now that was clever,” Oliver said with genuine admiration, after he crushed it. He hadn’t seen either of them place the little bug. He made a mental note to review the security camera records from his office; he’d catch who’d done it later. For the moment, he called Cora into his office.

“Yes, Mr Oliver?” Cora asked. Oliver took a moment to study her; her dark skin blended nicely with her white shirt – with two buttons undone – and knee-length skirt. She was very attractive… and available. Still, he needed her opinion.

“Tell me, what did you think of our new friends?” He asked. “Fairies or flics?”

“They didn’t find me attractive,” Cora said. She was also very bright; he liked that in his assistants. “That might not prove anything, but…”

“True, true,” Oliver said. It didn’t prove anything, but it was interesting. “I want you to run a full ELINT scan of your office and the corridor to the office, and then call in the security team. It’s time that they did something instead of standing around drinking my tea.”

Cora didn’t argue or ask questions. “Yes, sir,” she said, and left, allowing Oliver to contemplate his report to Roth. The Abwehr agent in the United States, Nikolaus Ritter, had been ousted during the Goddard scandal – and Roth had insisted that Oliver give him a hiding place. Fortunately, the man insisted on remaining well out of sight, instead of coming to the office everyday.

“With Hoover’s backing, there might be a chance to get out of this,” Oliver said, and felt real hope for the first time in six long hard months.

Chapter Nine: Black Fire and Ice

Nr Huntsville

Alabama, USA

5th April 1941

The men were not the Marines that Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson was used to working with, but the raw material was there. Their source had reported on the transport… and he was determined to put the goods to better use than they would have been originally. He’d hesitated in committing his foremost action brigade to the battle – although if everything went well there would be no battle – but this era seemed to take no security measures at all. Only a place that thought itself totally safe would transport hundreds of guns and thousands of bullets though potentially hostile territory.

Robinson shook his head angrily. The weapons, which were meant for the National Guard, would probably end up being pointed at black people. Several regions were quiet; black and white were living together almost peacefully, but in other places…

He still shuddered when he thought of the frantic gun battle in Texas. The Ku Klux Klan had decided to strike at a black church, one where voters were being registered to vote, and they’d come loaded for bear. The blacks had also been armed… and the mutual slaughter had been terrible. The ensuring outburst of long-repressed hatreds had nearly laid the entire town waste before it had burnt itself out.

Bet it was all blamed on us, Robinson thought grimly, feeling something inside him die. He’d never anticipated having to lead what amounted to a underground war inside America – no outside power had seriously threatened America with invasion since 1860 – but if violence was the only way that black men could get justice, then he would give the Klan all the violence it could take. Those who lynched in darkness with burning crosses were hunted down and killed; those who sought to pay black men less than whites were punished.

And if it was too much like the tactics the Viet Cong had used, Robinson tried to forget it, to push it aside. He was fighting for a higher cause, and the Klan deserved everything it got.

“Jones?” His grandfather said. “They’re coming.”

Robinson lifted his binoculars and peered into the darkness. This America lacked the interstate system that his America had possessed; it had been quicker to ship the weapons to the nearest coast and transport them overland. It reminded him of the old movies set in Prohibition times; the stream of lorries in the darkness, their lights probing ahead.

Idiots, he thought. If it had been up to him, he would have sent the weapons via aircraft or escorted it with a full regiment of infantry. For all of the recent unrest, the Contemporary Americans simply weren’t used to acts of… terrorism.

“Everyone get ready,” he muttered, and slipped on his night-vision goggles. The computer-controlled goggles, completely irreplaceable except in Britain, compensated automatically. The barricade across the road should show up clearly; the heat signatures of the black men and women would be invisible to all, but him.

The dull sound of the motorcade became a roar as the first of ten lorries and escorting jeeps moved along the road, and then saw the barricade. “Now,” Robinson snapped, and shot out the wheels of the lead jeep. It skidded into the barrier and the noise of screeching brakes drowned out everything else; the soldiers hopefully thought that the shot had been a simple blowout.

“Hands up,” Robinson snapped, into his tiny voder. His amplified voice screamed through the night. “Anyone without his or her hands up in ten seconds will be shot!”

A flare burst in the night, illuminating the scene. Robinson winced as the NVGs adjusted themselves for the light, revealing stunned GIs lifting their hands. His people, masked and garbed to hide their identities, stepped forward.

“Everyone out of the vehicles,” he bellowed. “Gather at the barricade. We won’t hurt anyone who will cooperate!”

He watched grimly as the GIs slowly climbed out of their vehicles. They were young, too young for what they were called to do, and pitifully under-trained for their task. Pussies, he thought coldly; none of them had the training to know what to do in such circumstances. The United States Army wouldn’t learn until after Vietnam took its bloody toll on the same young men.

“Into the vans,” he muttered, ordering the drivers forward. “You know where to go.”

“Yes, grandson,” Jackie said. The future baseball star jumped into one of the vans. Slowly, the lorries headed into the night.

“I’m sorry about this,” Robinson said, addressing the GIs. One of them was even crying; a boy who’d lied about his age. “We want to have the same rights as you, you see, and we’re prepared to fight for them. We’re going to leave you here; Huntsville is several miles in that direction.” He pointed. “Goodnight.”

* * *

According to tradition, Robinson thought wryly, the freedom fighters should have an underground base with all the technology they could ever want. Black Power, the organisation he’d founded with some help from his backers, had only a handful of hiding places that stored weapons and some wanted fugitives; most of the members worked in plain sight, as it were. Like the Vietcong, the movement would be hidden in plain sight – and would be quite happy to punish traitors.

“We got five hundred of the new Sherman weapons,” Jackie said. Robinson, who knew the ‘Sherman’ as the AK-47, chuckled. “There’s also nearly ten thousand clips, pre-loaded with ammunition, and thousands of spare bullets.”

“Excellent,” Robinson said. He reached over to the small laptop; the children of the small house loved playing with it and kept it fully charged with its flywheel. Every time someone span the wheel, it generated a little power for the laptop. He checked the battery – it would be difficult to get supplies for the system if something had gone wrong – and logged onto the new network.

“If you don’t mind, I’ll start showing the recruits how to use the weapons,” Jackie said. Robinson, halfway through a message to the world, nodded absently. It was a few minutes later that it caught up with him; Jackie didn’t know how to use the weapons!

“Hang on a moment,” he snapped. He jumped up and followed him. “Granddad, you don’t know how to use one…”

Jackie chuckled and held up a manual. It had been printed for the National Guard; it had all of the subtly of a child’s book, perhaps for people who couldn’t even read.

“Give me five minutes and I’ll show you,” he said firmly. “It’s a bad idea to be playing with deadly weapons at your age.”

The White House

Washington DC, USA

5th April 1941

“This is all your fault, you nigger son of a bitch,” Governor Frank Dixon bellowed at volume. Ambassador King, who’d been shouted at by experts, only smiled. “We lost thousands of guns to those nigger… communists!”

“You make it sound like an insult,” King said, half-hoping that Dixon would have a heart attack on the spot. He glared at one of his guards who had been moving forward, pushing him back. “Let me get this straight; you’re blaming me for people seeking to claim the rights of American citizens? I may have come from the future, but do I look like a founding father?”

Dixon’s face turned purple. A Democrat, he expected that the President would provide assistance for his state. “We have a god-damned nigger insurrection brewing,” he bellowed. “Franklin, I demand that you do something about this!”

Roosevelt looked pale. He’d been getting worse recently. “We have a war on our own doorsteps and you want us to send good old boys off to Germany,” Dixon snapped, sensing an advantage. “The niggers are turning on us…”

“And who can blame them?” King asked. “After all, you only deny them the rights of Americans. Dear me, what a reason to rebel…”

“They were happy until you came along,” Dixon snapped. “Happy and contented…”

“And now they’re getting uppity?” King asked mildly. “My dear fellow, they’ve seen the future… and why should they have to wait? They want to be free, and they are willing to fight for it.”

He turned to Roosevelt. “Mr President, if you signed into law the civil rights legislation and arranged equal opportunities, you could head this problem off at the pass. The last thing we need is a civil war and…”

“We’ll kick their black asses from one end of the playing field to the other,” Dixon snapped.

“One-third of your state is black,” King snapped, feeling something snap inside. “If they rebel, against you and your torments, you’ll have a fight on your hands that makes the civil war seem like nothing.”

“The War of Northern Aggression,” Dixon snapped. “They’re attacking honest upstanding…”

“Lynchers?” King asked. “You know; the kind of good old boys whose idea of fun is to hang the nearest nigger?”

Roosevelt chuckled. It defused the tension. “Governor, Ambassador, we do have a war on our hands,” he said. “Perhaps we could find them other targets for their aggression…”

Both men objected at once. “That would just give them the skills they need to kill white men,” Dixon snapped. King grinned. “So far, they haven’t faced a real army. Mr President, I propose federalising the National Guard and sending it in to hunt for the bandits!”

“Ever heard of Vietnam?” King asked. “The lessons are there; you cannot suppress an entire movement when you’re in the wrong. If you react with force, you will set the entire United States ablaze.”

“I agree with Ambassador King,” Vice-President Truman said calmly. “We do not need a second civil war, particularly one when we don’t know for sure who’s an enemy or not. We have one war on our hands; we should make it more worth the while of the black man to stick with us.”

“Eu Tu Brute,” Roosevelt said wryly. King felt a flicker of sympathy; decisive action was not one of Roosevelt’s traits. “Very well, we’ll see what we can do in the field of both law enforcement – all kinds of laws. It may be that the… ah, lynching craze will burn itself out with its victims shooting back and generally cutting down the numbers of crazies.”

King smiled thoughtfully. A sociologist would have found the infusion of 1940 and 2015 terms fascinating. Perhaps reasonable action would stop events before the United States of America careened into a second civil war.

“I cannot believe that I’m hearing this,” J Edgar Hoover said. King felt his heart sink; despite being semi-ousted – no one knew for sure – as a homosexual, Hoover remained a Power within the government. “we are talking about making deals with subversives.”

He waved a hand at the list of incidents. Firefights between the Ku Klux Klan and the new Black Power movement. Wildcat strikes that had led to racial violence. Thousands of black voters suddenly registering to vote. A black man trying to stand for the Senate in Texas.

“These are all part of a conspiracy,” Hoover said, “one started by your… missing Marine, Ambassador. A conspiracy to bring down the United States once and for all.”

He paced the room, words spewing from his mouth. “We are at war, even if we refuse to acknowledge it, with all three of the… Axis powers,” he said. “The Communists are working with the Germans, and are supporting them in the political battlefield here. Do you think that the Germans could have distributed communist literature? What about the Papal Bull?”

King shrugged. It hadn’t exactly been a Papal Bull; the Pope had spoken ex cathedra, with all the power of his office and the doctrine of Papal Infallibility. In short, he’d condemned both Vatican II and Vatican III as heretical and evil – and ordered all Catholics to return to the old ways or face excommunication, calling upon the British Government to enforce it as the only true way, “as thou knowest well, my sons.” From his sources in Britain, the only response had been howls of laugher from the other religions, and an embarrassed silence from Catholics.

“This is nothing more or less than an attack upon America,” Hoover said. “The only solution is to root out the subversives and restore America to the innocent state she once was.”

“You can’t put the mushroom cloud back in the bomb,” King said, and caught Roosevelt’s look of alarm. Everyone knew about nuclear weapons now – the newspapers had reported on the single use of a bomb with a mixture of awe and fear – but the scope of the Manhattan Project was a closely held secret.

Roosevelt tapped the table sharply. “Our choice seems to be between… allowing the Negro some equality…”

“Complete equality,” King said, knowing that Roosevelt was kinder to the black unionists than that.

“Or to run the risk of race war,” Roosevelt continued. “Ambassador, can you assure me that they will be good citizens?”

“If you allow them the opportunity to be good citizens, then yes, they will be,” King snapped.

Dixon banged the table. “Perhaps you have forgotten,” he said. “They will want revenge and power – political power. This… proposal will not be greeted warmly; anywhere!”

* * *

“Governor Dixon wasn’t happy,” Roosevelt observed later. The two men were sitting alone in the Oval Office. “Anyone would think that he was planning a second secession.”

“Don’t even joke about that,” King said. “No, unfortunately racism and idiocy don’t always go together. Governor Dixon has figured something out that the Ku Klux Klan has known for years; blacks voting means that white control gets voted out of existence up and down the belt.”

“Dear me,” Roosevelt mused. “Ambassador, don’t get me wrong, but I’m sorry that you people arrived. I would have been President again, we would have thrashed Japan, and…”

“I wish I wasn’t here too,” King said. “Mr President, you can’t put the genie back in the lamp. America came all to close to civil war in the 1960s; your task is to try to drain the poison away before it brings America crashing down.”

“And fight a half-hearted war with Germany,” Roosevelt said. “Tell me, what will become of us in the future?”

“We win the war and establish a better world,” King said. “Mr President, we can correct all the mistakes of the past.”

Roosevelt grinned weakly. “But tell me, Ambassador – Jackson – what happens when people don’t want to change?” He chuckled. “Anyway, I’m meant to be meeting the British Prime Minister in a week or so, so I’d better get read up on what the War Department thinks we can do to the Germans.”

* * *

No one had been quite certain what to do with the handful of future military personnel from Britain. Almost all of the corporations had offered vast incentives for people with real skills to come work for them, most of which had been terminated when the Queen Elizabeth and its escort had gone under the water. The handful that remained – and had been willing to return to America – had been scooped up by the War Department, led by the very able Henry L. Stimson.

“I confess, Colonel, that these new training methods are very instructive,” Stimson said, examining the report from Lieutenant Colonel Omar Bradley. Simple equipment meant for games, such as paintball, gave the United States a chance to train its soldiers under very realistic conditions.

“It’s only a shadow of what we had before,” Palter said. His exact position remained resolutely unclassified; he seemed to be filling several roles, but only drawing one paycheck. It didn’t seem fair, somehow.

“So you keep saying,” Stimson said wryly. “Virtual reality helmets, live-action replays, improved medical training… holograms – whatever they are – it seems like a wonderland.”

“It was different,” Palter said. The young GIs of 1940 didn’t have the institutionalised cynicism of their descendents. The planned million-man army might take more time than they’d hoped; black men simply weren’t signing up or responding to their draft papers. Only a few thousand had shown up for basic training – and more than a few had deserted after being serenaded with racial taunts.

“And the army is very pleased with the tanks, even though they are insisting on putting an American-designed tank into production soon as well,” Stimson continued. “The Firefly might be miles ahead of what we had once, but it’s not American. The navy, of course, is annoyed at losing its battleships… the entire production plan has been scrapped.”

“I’m sorry about that,” Palter said, insincerely. “War will be based on the carrier and the submarine for some time to come, and missiles will make mincemeat out of any battleship or carrier. We need deployable units, and we need them fast. Given where we plan to attack…”

“Yes,” Stimson agreed. “Tell me, based on your experience; can the operation succeed?”

Palter hesitated. “It depends on our logistics,” he said finally. “Between us and the Canadians, we have a large merchant marine, which we can use to surge-deploy – ah, it means moving a lot of troops and their equipment – to the forward base. I’d suggest using the Shetlands as a launch point, if the Brits will let us. The main problem will be German air power; they have bases in Norway, France, Germany and Denmark.”

He considered for a long moment. “We’ll have to ask the British for more help,” he said. “Some precision strikes against the Germans, some air cover, and some cruise missiles for the German airbases.” He smiled. “It’ll be a lot like Afghanistan, except there won’t be a friendly force on the ground.”

“Politically, this has to be our operation,” Stimson said grimly. “Would the British accept an American commander?”

“They have before,” Palter said. “Someone they know would be best; Colonel George S. Patton, for example. The 2nd Armoured Division, which is fitting out with Fireflies at Fort Benning, would be ideal. Everyone knows that Patton is competent, even though tanks won’t be that useful in Norway.”

“You’re just favouring him because Patton approves your concept of sending in Special Forces,” Stimson said. “It would be a political decision, but even Patton’s detractors admit that he’s more than merely competent.”

“Perhaps Eisenhower as supreme commander, with Patton as field commander,” Palter mused. “Yes, that would work; Eisenhower is a diplomat, which will be vital, and Patton is a fighter.”

“He’s the guy who’ll be President later, right?” Stimson asked thoughtfully. “That would also be a political decision.”

“Blasted politics,” Palter said. Stimson didn’t disagree. “We have to fight and win this war, which is way to important to leave to the politicians.”

“Politics is too important to leave to the politicians,” Stimson said wryly. They spent the next ten minutes happily comparing notes on politicians they had known.

Chapter Ten: The Montreal Conference

Grand Hotel

Montreal, Canada

12th April 1941

Canada, Prime Minister Mackenzie King felt, had suffered more in the wake of the Transition than her fellow Dominion Australia. The Australians had the Japanese on the border, and lived with the threat of invasion, which kept them concentrated on the common enemy. The Canadians, particularly the French-speaking Quebecois, had a friendly and undefended border – the longest undefended border in the world – and nothing to stop anyone using the knowledge of the future for their own interests.

Mackenzie King scowled angrily. Canada was contributing several thousand troops to the Commonwealth force now being armed with modern weapons – the force that would have joined Churchill’s government in the defence of Britain having vanished into the time stream – but there was very little chance of them being able to send any more. Not only had the fact of a future Conscription Crisis arrived on the political landscape, but the Quebecois had woken up to the reality of their continued statelessness.

We won this country from their founders, Mackenzie King thought. He’d taken precautions to intern all the Japanese-Canadians when the war had broken out in the pacific, but even that had come back to haunt him. The Quebecois had started a low-level terrorist – a 2015 term – movement in Quebec, agitating for greater autonomy and an end to conscription of overseas soldiers before it was introduced.

Still, he was looking forward to hosting the meeting in Montreal. He’d fought hard to maintain an independent foreign policy, and having the meeting of the leaders of Britain and America in his country was a big boost, even if it did cause some problems. The protection services of both world leaders had insisted on securing the entire hotel, which had caused the police some annoyance.

The noise of a helicopter rose in the air as the small craft, one of a handful given to Canada in payment for food and fuel, landed neatly in the garden, ignoring the protests of the hotel manager. Mackenzie King shrugged; he didn’t think that either of the leaders was in danger from the Quebecois, or Nazi spies, but it was well to be careful. The civil situation in the United States might spread north, and that was the last think that Mackenzie King wanted.

He allowed himself a quick smile, then pasted a proper dignified expression on his face. At least Parliament had credited him with organising a very favourable technology-transfer agreement, one that would give Canada a boost forward that it clearly needed. The helicopter was only one of a number of craft and other items donated; the chart of mineral deposits would come in very handy in the future. The deployment of hydrogen-powered cars would only improve their ability to expand their settlements… and the nuclear power plant would improve their power generation capabilities.

“It’s a pleasure to see you again,” he said, as Hanover stepped neatly out of the helicopter and stepped up to him. He studied Hanover; he hadn’t changed much in six months. His hair was still dark; his face perfectly shaven. Brilliant blue eyes peered down a long angler nose, a face that was caricatured regularly in French-language newspapers.

“Likewise,” Hanover said. Like the other future British, his accent was more… American than British, in some ways. Hanover, who came from an old family, spoke with a more British accent, but the hints of America surfaced through his voice.

“I hope that you’ll enjoy your time here,” Mackenzie King said, leading the way into the hotel. “This is one of the finest hotels in the world, if we say so ourselves. There’s room for both you and the President.”

“Thank you,” Hanover said, as they stepped into a private room. Hanover’s escorts, neat well-dressed men with an air of unconcern – which meant they were bodyguards – were waved back, leaving them alone. “I was hoping to have a chance to speak with you privately as well.”

Mackenzie King nodded thoughtfully. “The discussion on the future course of the war?” He asked. “You must realise that Parliament is demanding access to the decision-making process in exchange for the use of our troops. If the British Commonwealth is to work, you have to be our… partners, rather than try to be our masters.”

One thing he’d learnt about Hanover was that he didn’t seem to think that everyone should be submissive. “I quite understand,” Hanover said. “As a matter of fact, I’ve brought some highly confidential documents, which outline for your War Cabinet the future scope of operations. Although they’re short on specifics for obvious reasons, they outline the plan of action.”

Mackenzie King lifted an eyebrow. “We have a spy somewhere,” Hanover admitted. “That’s between you and me, I’m afraid. Someone, probably in America, is trading information to the Germans.”

“Who would do such a thing?” Mackenzie King asked. The images of the death camps and the Polish Genocide had hit Canada hard. “And how do they communicate with their masters?”

“You know what the situation is like,” Hanover said. “The United States is not technically at war with Japan, so Japanese ships are still docking in America. Mexico and most of Latin America is also taking Japanese, or Spanish, or Portuguese ships in and trading with them, despite our blockade. Portugal is worst; we’re not at war with them and public opinion wouldn’t stand for trying to starve them into compliance.”

“I’m glad to see that your public has a sense of responsibility,” Mackenzie King said dryly.

Hanover laughed. “There’s also the small matter that cutting off their exports will force them into Germany’s arms,” he said. “While their armed forces would add little to the might of Germany at present, given time they would present a serious threat.”

“True, true,” Mackenzie King said. “For the moment, what sort of… power-sharing are you offering for the war?”

Hanover crossed his legs. “For the moment, we intend to concentrate in the Middle East,” he said.

“You’re not going to defend Australia?” Mackenzie King asked. He felt a flicker of worry; would the British abandon their most faithful dominion?

“We have two-thirds of our fleet in their waters,” Hanover said. “In hindsight, that might have been a mistake; we have to keep units pinned down that would be better expended hunting down the rest of the Japanese Navy. Still, should that show its ugly face, Admiral Turtledove has orders to destroy it and then the threat to Australia and New Zealand will be at an end.”

He chuckled. “We don’t expect that there will be a threat,” he said. “Even without the two infantry regiments we’ve sent to their defence, they would have to cross the water between the Dutch East Indies and Australia. They’d have to be crazy to try it.”

“I suppose,” Mackenzie King said. “So… back to the Middle East?”

“Well,” Hanover said, and outlined the plan. “Hopefully, we should manage to defeat the Germans and force them back into Turkey,” he concluded.

Mackenzie King’s mobile phone rang. “Sir, the President is here,” his aide said.

“Please show him to the conference centre,” Mackenzie King said. “I’m sorry to cut our conversion short, but its time for the real conference to begin.”

“It’s quite all right,” Hanover said. “This first meeting is the most important, after all.”

* * *

Hanover nearly stopped dead the moment he saw President Roosevelt, being wheeled in by his assistant. The President had always reminded him of his grandfather, but he now looked as the old man had, the week before he died. His skin was pale; he gave an impression of profound tiredness. His hair seemed to be greying – Hanover was certain that he detected the remains of dye in the strands – and his frame seemed somehow weaker. His handshake was firm, though, and his eyes were bright.

Mackenzie King, as host, took the chair. The other two world leaders, and their two companions, took their chairs. Roosevelt, Hanover was interested to note, had brought Eisenhower and Ambassador King to the meeting. His own companions, General Cunningham and Major Stirling, sat behind him. Both Roosevelt and himself had larger staffs to discuss the nuts and bolts, but this was the important meeting.

“Thank you for coming,” Mackenzie King said, greeting Roosevelt. “I hope that this meeting will lead to many important steps towards defeating our mutual enemies.”

“Thank you,” Roosevelt said. He nodded politely to Hanover. “I understand that you had something new to talk about?”

Hanover nodded at Stirling, who spoke quietly. “There are some signs that the Germans are preparing to jump on the Russians,” he said. “Reconnaissance, both through the aircraft and the… new methods…”

“It’s fine to talk about that,” Hanover injected.

“The orbiting satellite, then,” Stirling said. “There is evidence that Hitler is stockpiling men and their supplies in Poland, in a preparatory move for advancing east into Russia.”

“They must be crazy,” Eisenhower said. “Attacking Stalin, when they know that they’ll lose.”

“The history books say nothing about our arrival,” Hanover said. “Major?”

“Some elements of PJHQ are speculating that it’s a bluff,” Stirling said. “At the moment, the German Reich is very dependent upon the Soviets. Hitler might be reminding Stalin that he could launch an attack and… well, kick in the door. Alternately, they might expect the Soviets to take advantage of Hitler’s weakness, and are preparing a defence. Finally, they might want to be training units far from the fronts; either of them.”

“A shame they won’t start the fight themselves,” Eisenhower said. “Mr President, may I outline the operations plan?”

Roosevelt smiled. “Is that acceptable to you?”

Hanover smiled. Historically, the US War Department hadn’t had a good plan for the beginnings of their involvement in the war; Churchill’s people had outmanoeuvred them with ease. Eisenhower must have been reading his own autobiography. His alternate self had been quite vocal on the subject.

“I dare say that it is,” Hanover said, concealing his thoughts with the ease of long practice.

Eisenhower slotted a CD into the projector unit. The War Department had rather taken to the PowerPoint slides and CDs; they were far simpler than paperwork. Once all of the maps had been transferred to computer, they could be used to illustrate any plan, no matter how complex.

“For the moment, we’re calling this Operation Thule,” Eisenhower said. “Unfortunately, landing in France or Germany itself would require more troops than we have available until next year, and we can’t just do nothing until 1942. The objective is to liberate Norway from the Nazi yoke, by direct invasion. I must warn you all that this is top secret.

“Reports from the British… ah, Special Air Service confirm that the Germans have nearly one hundred thousand men in the country, mainly skilled mountain infantry and a handful of armoured units. As Norway is not good tank country, we don’t see those as playing an important role within the battle, at least until we reach Oslo. The main German forces are deployed in four locations; Narvik, Trondheim, Bergen and Oslo itself, along with a handful of smaller forces scattered about. Some parts of the country hardly ever see Germans; other parts have quite a large presence. Quisling’s government is in Oslo and is enthusiastically promoting Norwegian settlement in the remains of Poland. There are some Norwegian Korps units, mainly SS troops, but they are apparently undermanned.

“Air-wise, the Germans have several Luffwaffe squadrons at airfields throughout the country, and of course bases in Denmark and Germany itself. We lack proper estimates of their strength, but we believe that they have somewhere between five hundred to a thousand aircraft, as they’ve learnt that swarming your craft is the only way to win.

“Finally, they have a single destroyer, near Narvik, that won’t pose any problem at all since you sunk the rest of their fleet,” Eisenhower concluded. “That’s what we face, we believe.”

“Very concise,” Hanover said. “Can you land a force on Norway?”

“We believe that it is possible,” Eisenhower said. He displayed an overall chart of Norway; red arrows marched from the sea to Narvik and Bergen. “We have roughly 65’000 troops, armed with the new weapons you gave us, including some adaptations of our own weapons. We also have the capability to transport them to Norway, although I would prefer to avoid a long sea trip.”

“We are formally requesting that you provide a staging area for us,” Roosevelt said. “Launching the men directly from America would mean that they would be in no condition to fight afterwards.”

“We’ll see what we can do,” Hanover promised.

Eisenhower coughed. “The first task force will land at Narvik,” he said. “Ideally, we should be in position to prevent the Soviets from attempting to pinch off part of Norway before Stalin starts getting ideas. That force won’t be particularly large; only 20’000 at most. The second task force will land at Bergen, which is a compromise; charging into Oslo Fjord would be a good way to get a lot of men killed for nothing. Hopefully, we will take Bergen fairly quickly, then advance overland to Oslo.”

Roosevelt spoke next. He’d been Secretary of the Navy and was still keenly interested in it. “We have gathered four carriers and five battleships,” he said, “along with a supporting force. However, our air cover is not going to be perfect… and, put bluntly, we need your help.”

Hanover steepled his fingers. It was time to bargain. “What exactly do you want from us?” He asked. “You do realise that we have commitments in the Middle East?”

“We are not asking for an entire army, not like Operation Torch,” Eisenhower said wryly. Hanover hoped that the future President had drawn the correct lessons from the Torch near-disaster. “We need three things from you; bases, air support, and some of your commandos in Norway.”

He tapped the map. “From history, one thing that we are certain of is that Hitler will pour in reinforcements into Norway, and his logistics will be far better than they were in the other future, regardless of his actions with the Soviets. We will also face problems in reinforcing; we can get all of the first wave in, but we don’t have many more in the line for a few more months, particularly given the…civil situation in America.

“We want – need – you to make their logistics as bad as possible,” he said. “You can place a submarine in the Skagerrak, you can track and shoot down any of their reinforcement planes… and you can use your wonder weapons to make German movement difficult in Norway. While the carriers are good ships, we need better air cover than they can give us.”

Hanover absently wondered how much praising the Navy had cost him. “We were stockpiling the weapons,” he said slowly. “Why should we use them to support you when we have our own people dying in the Middle East?”

What’s in it for us? He meant. It wasn’t something that could be said aloud. “We would be willing to take a more… favourable view on the purchase of American goods,” Roosevelt said. “At the moment, you’re paying for them directly, trading your technology for what you need. We would be prepared to loan you…”

“No loans,” Hanover snapped. “We had enough trouble the last time around with loans.”

“Gifts, then,” Roosevelt said, unflappably. “We would give you a lot of products you need, such as weapons and ships, and we would detail an American division for service in the Middle East. This might lead to conflict with Russia, but we are certain that Comrade Stalin would not object.”

Hanover’s mind raced rapidly. Did Roosevelt hope that the Soviets would engage the Americans and start a war? He understood that Stalin would have to be fought eventually, didn’t he? Stalin was the long-term threat; Hitler and Tojo were minor nuisances compared to him.

“With certain caveats, we accept,” Hanover said finally. General Flynn would be glad of the help, if nothing else. “We insist on informing your people of our full capabilities in advance, so we don’t get asked to do the impossible. The force in the Middle East must be under our command.”

“Agreed,” Roosevelt said shortly. Neither other American reacted; Hanover guessed that it had been planned out in advance. “What do you intend to do in the Middle East?”

“Launch a pre-emptive attack,” Hanover said shortly. “The plan is to crush the German force and then move on to the Soviet force, using our advantages to prevent them from coordinating their response. We have enough problems with both of them encamped in the Middle East; evicting one or both of them would make our life a lot simpler.”

“A well thought out plan,” Roosevelt commented. “And what will you do after lunch?”

Hanover smiled. “I’m joking with FDR,” he said, half-wonderingly. “Sorry, there are times when it still hits me.”

“I’m afraid that this is not a dream,” Roosevelt said. “Anything else?”

“For this year, our objectives are to evict the invasion forces in the Middle East and knock Turkey out of the war,” Hanover said. “We’ll stand on the defensive in the Pacific until after we’ve secured the Middle East and built up our forces of SSK submarines. Once that’s done and there are enough of them, you can say goodbye to the Empire of the Rising Sun.”

* * *

“It’s always a pleasure,” Roosevelt said, afterwards. The two leaders were closeted in their own private room, sipping tea. Down below, the military and political staffers were arguing over strategy and tactics. They would carry out the grunt work, now that the main decisions had been made by the leaders.

“Yes,” Hanover said. “Tell me; how is your health?”

“The surgeon from the embassy has done wonders,” Roosevelt assured him. He still looked ill. “It’s just that I’m growing old, Prime Minister.”

“You could spend a week in a hospital in Britain,” Hanover said. “Even with all the copied medical textbooks and courses for doctors, it will be years before your hospitals are up to modern standards.”

Roosevelt shrugged. “I have a private question to put to you,” he said. “Tell me something; what would you do if the Germans used gas against us?”

“The official line is that Britain would view such a development with alarm,” Hanover said. “I would think after we used a single nuke, the Germans would be… reluctant to risk having a second one used on them.”

“I hope you’re right,” Roosevelt said. “This is all a hell of a gamble. I have to do something more… substantial than the occasional convoy battle before everything comes unwound.”

“It’ll succeed,” Hanover said, and wondered why he felt suddenly afraid for the future.

Chapter Eleven: Dead Man’s Hand

HIMS Yamato

Japan

20th April 1941

Admiral Yamamoto, commander of what remained of the Combined Fleet, stared down at the operations plan with a sense of doom. It hadn’t been drawn up by Genda, his trusted ally and subordinate, but by someone in the Army Department. Like a lot of Army plans involving the Navy, it looked good, but Yamamoto knew that it had serious flaws. He shuddered whenever he thought of the near-disaster that sending Marines into Shanghai had been, and whenever he considered the proposal for a direct sea-borne invasion of India…

He shook his great head, wishing for a moment that he could find happy relief and peace in suicide. Many of the moderates in the peace faction had done so – he suspected that a few had been helped on their way – and he was the only figure of any significance left. Still, he had little influence left – just enough to change the plan slightly – and after the Battle of the Indian Ocean he had very little influence left. The propaganda had claimed that battle as a victory, and they’d certainly hurt the British badly, but Yamamoto knew the truth. With four fleet carriers and several battleships gone, to say nothing of the ships that had been picked off as they straggled home after the battle, the Combined Fleet had almost been destroyed.

“You seem pensive,” a female voice said. Yamamoto relaxed into her massaging fingers as Ambassador Yurina dug her fingers into his shoulders. They’d become lovers after the battle in a private alliance for sanity, but both of them were realistic enough to know that they had failed – and badly.

“It’s going to be a disaster,” Yamamoto predicted. He waved a hand at the plan. “Even if we win, the cost will finish us as an organised force.”

He meant the navy, his faction. Even those in the navy that disliked him respected him. If the navy hadn’t closed ranks more than once, fending off army assassins, he would have been dead long ago. He wished, not for the first time, that he could just see the Emperor. If he had ten minutes alone with Hirohito, ten minutes with the Emperor, he was confident that he could convince him to end the war as he had done in the original time line.

They’re claiming he’s ill, he thought. The head of the militarists, insofar as they had a head, was controlling the Royal Palace with a battalion of infantry, defending it against all threats, internal or external. Japan had suffered a military coup – and no one had noticed.

“I assume that you still can’t get into the Emperor’s Palace?” Yurina asked grimly. She was his equal; a fact that few Japanese men acknowledged. His wife had been killed by an assassin’s bullet, aimed at him. “There’s no hope that the Emperor will intervene?”

“I don’t think he is receiving good advice,” Yamamoto said wryly. “They’re so determined to deal two blows, and aid our Soviet allies to deal a third, that they’re ignoring logistics or anything practical.” He waved a hand at the map. “This is the result.”

“You can’t simply disobey orders?” Yurina asked hopefully. “I mean… this is suicide, and suicide for nothing.”

Yamamoto stared down at the plans. Like all army plans, particularly after the revelation of the future disaster at Midway, it was simple. At a certain date, the force of the Japanese Army now being assembled in the Dutch East Indies, backed up by as much air power as they could maintain in the region, were going to throw themselves across the ocean and to Australia. If there weren’t nearly forty future warships in the region – the Australian government having been putting huge pressure on the British to keep them near Australia – it might have had a chance, once the Australian Navy had been destroyed, which it had. Yamamoto had planned that part of the operation himself, and it had been very successful indeed.

God bless democracy, Yamamoto thought with unintended irony. The Australian public, seeing their glittering navy destroyed with casual ease, had responded by pressuring their parliament to keep them safe – however it was done. Prime Minister Menzies had reacted in turn by pressuring the British commander, an Admiral Turtledove, into keeping his ships, even the thrice-damned invisible submarines, near Australia. Yamamoto shuddered to think of all the army’s tonnage that had been lost, ferrying troops to the East Indies, but they had succeeded.

“How do they plan to get around the fleet?” Yurina asked. He felt her firm breasts press into his back as she moved her hands lower, working out the kinks in his spine. “Sabotage?”

Yamamoto shook his head, relaxing into her ministrations. That had been his first thought, but the careful network of agents within Australia had revealed that it was impossible. The ships that had docked – and they were never docked for very long – were heavily guarded, by men who could see in the dark, like cats. A couple of attempts to steal uniforms and infiltrate the shipyards had failed miserably, just badly enough to convince Yamamoto that there was some way of identifying a person that Japanese science was too primitive to know about, let alone duplicate.

“Perhaps we could slip a few commando teams in,” he said, but he doubted it. Since November, Japanese submarines had started to vanish in the waters around Australia. It had taken several months to realise that the British had established a sonar network around the entire continent. No, the teams on the surface would have to work with what they had.

“Perhaps you should tell me what the Germans want,” Yurina said, as she pulled him away from the table. “It can’t be that bad?”

Yamamoto chuckled bitterly, thinking wistfully of the peace of the grave. “They want to launch a second coordinated offensive now that the Americans have joined the war against them.” He scowled. “It was all I could do to stop the army from declaring war on America on their own and seizing the Philippines and Pearl Harbour. They want us to hit the British in India and the Australians in their homeland, at the same time as they hit the British in the Middle East in conjunction with their allies the Soviets. The problem, of course, is that we’ll never get the invasion fleet into Australian waters undetected.”

He glared across the room in the direction of army headquarters. “Their solution is simple,” he said. “The Combined Fleet will make a divisionary attack against Canada – and if we get that close I’ll be astonished – and draw their fleet out of position by operating in enough strength to deter the submarines.”

He allowed himself a moment of pathetic pride. When the best that Japan could claim was the destruction of a submarine in the East Indies, the Combined Fleet had sunk very low indeed. The wreckage of the submarine had been sunk deep below the ocean, despite the best efforts of divers and salvage teams. He scowled; he lacked any information on British production, but the Germans had indicated that the British were building more submarines… enough to overcome their concerns about losing more.

“Of course, we won’t reach Canada,” he said. “The British will have studied the Battle of the Indian Ocean as much as we have, and they won’t repeat their mistakes. The entire fleet will be sunk after making a brave show of defiance.”

“And there’s nothing to do?” Yurina asked. “You could surrender…”

He lashed out suddenly, brokenly, knocking her to the floor. “I’m sorry,” he said, as she lat there gasping. “I can’t just… surrender the fleet. No Japanese warrior would surrender…”

“Your fleet will be destroyed,” Yurina snapped. She didn’t seem too worried by the blow; he admired her strength and fortitude. An ugly red mark covered part of her face. “They’ll all die!”

“I know,” Yamamoto said. “I know that, but there’s no other choice at all. I cannot surrender and I cannot go against the orders of the Emperor.”

“The Emperor might no longer be his own man,” Yurina said grimly.

“I cannot assume that as a basis for disobeying orders,” Yamamoto said, honestly shocked. “No one would dare to hide orders from the Emperor, or change them.”

“I hope you’re right,” Yurina said. If she’d told the truth, the Japan of 2015 was far less respectful of the Emperor – he even had a female successor – than that of 1941. The traditionalists had had fits when the Germans had managed to somehow acquire more information; the horrifying news had played a part in the militarists domination of the decision-making process.

“I’m certain of it,” he assured her, hoping that he wasn’t lying. He reached out and kissed her bruise. “I’m sorry about that.”

“Going to kiss it away?” She asked, holding him. For an instant, her composure broke. “You’re sweet.”

* * *

Commander Sato knew, without false modesty, that he was no match for Yamamoto’s former right-hand man, Minoru Genda. He’d known that Genda was a far better strategist than Sato himself, while his skills were more tactical than strategic. Still, Genda had recommended seeking battle with the British fleet… and Genda had killed himself with the shame of the defeat.

The problem was nightmarish, even challenging Genda’s faith in victory before it had killed him. The Japanese had almost no counters to the advanced weapons that had devastated Admiral Kurita’s fleet, and what technology they did have was partly negated by the British technology. Their sole advantages were numbers and battleship armour, and neither were as much help as he had hoped. Yes, reports suggested that stronger armour could deflect a missile, and the Japanese had started to armour up their new ships, but he was grimly certain that the British would have expanded their own weapons as well.

He stared down at the shipping table. One concession that Admiral Yamamoto had forced out of the army was combining the army’s supply fleet with the navy’s supply fleet, therefore increasing the amount of tonnage that could be used to convoy men and supplies across the empire to the bases in the Dutch East Indies. The army’s commander, General Homma, wanted six full strength combat divisions; Sato knew that that was utter nonsense. At best, four combat divisions could be moved across the Timor Strait and the Torres Strait, directly into the zone that the Australians had to know where the invasion force would land.

“If we’re lucky, we can move the other divisions afterwards,” he said, and knew that they would not be lucky. Even with the tricks the Germans had sent them, they would give the game away the moment they sailed; the British radar coverage was hellish.

“The Japanese solider can carry any burden,” Colonel Shindo snapped. The army colonel, a militarist down to his boots, had wanted to march right across the centre of Australia, a suicide trip for the army. Sato had talked him out of it, wishing that General Homma had seen fit to send someone more… adaptable.

“The Japanese soldier will have to live off the land,” Sato said. He tapped the map at the north of Australia. “They will seal this crossing, Colonel, and cut the men off. That’s why the priority is to get ashore, which is why we are not attacking Darwin directly.”

“If we engage the Australians directly…”

“We’ll lose time and the battle,” Sato said. Colonel Shindo gripped his sword; Sato prepared to fight. Pitched battles between army and navy were becoming more common. “The Japanese fighter has more soul than his counterpart, but he is also on the end of a long supply line that can be cut at several different points – and they will throw everything they have into cutting that line.”

He held Colonel Shindo’s eyes, pleading for him to understand. “You might take Darwin in a pitched battle, Colonel, but you would burn up a lot of your own ammunition, supplies and tanks – if we can get any ashore – in the process, and then they would destroy you on the ground. The priority is to get ashore in strength, and then prepare the march around the continent.”

Colonel Shindo glared at him. “If we do that, we will give them time to build up and redeploy against us,” he snapped.

Sato scowled. The hell of it was that Colonel Shindo was right; it would give the Australians and their British masters time to get ready. “We would face that in any case,” he said, and knew that he was right. “The army would have to defeat theirs in a pitched battle… and then take Australia and force Britain out of the war.”

He turned back to the navy’s plans. As Yamamoto had said, they were glorified suicide plans… and it was his job to make them… less suicidal. The plan was simple; the Combined Fleet would head for Canada and draw off the British ships, which would hunt the Japanese across the ocean. When the British got into firing range of their missiles… the partly rebuilt Combined Fleet would be blown out of the water.

“Perhaps we could charge at them,” he mused, before dismissing the idea.

“You navy men are cowards,” Colonel Shindo said. It was a common view among the army rank and file, who hadn’t been told about the defeat. It would have only upset them. “Why don’t you seek a glorious decisive battle?”

Now it was Sato who clutched his sword. “Because we would lose,” he said. Ignoring the army man, he studied the map; there were vast tracts of sea for the combined fleet to hide themselves in. If the fleet headed for Canada, making certain that the British knew that it was there, and then changed course, they might manage to stay under the British horizon. He picked up the German information and nodded; without the hell-spawned AWACS aircraft, the British were more limited in their radar.

“You could at least die gloriously,” Colonel Shindo sneered.

Sato ignored him, wondering if the rumours that the army had dreamt up the plan to get rid of the navy were true. The Combined Fleet had been seriously reduced in prestige, and it needed a victory. He looked up at the map again; one trick that he could pull would be to send some submarines down to the path that the British ships would have to follow to return, and then leave them without any engines at all. If the submarines were lucky, they might get just one clean shot…

“And you’re without your carrier aircraft,” Colonel Shindo said sharply, trying to refocus Sato’s attention. “What do you think you can achieve?”

“The carrier aircraft will be slaughtered on the decks,” Sato said. The best of the remaining Kido Butai pilots, including the now obsolete night-flyers, had been transferred to the East Indies. Some of the newer trainee pilots had been transferred to the carriers; the only two remaining fleet carriers and the handful of converted and escort ships. Sato knew that few of them had questioned the move, or thought to ask why the ‘winning’ Japanese Navy had seen fit to let them have the run of the carriers. They were too proud of their chance to serve Japan; none of them had anything like enough training.

He shook his head. It didn’t matter, he knew; the pilots were all doomed. The British missiles would destroy the carriers before they even got a chance to launch their aircraft; thousands of tons of carrier blown out of the water before they had ever had a chance to serve the Emperor.

“Poor men,” he muttered, ignoring Colonel Shindo’s snort. He felt sick.

* * *

Ambassador Yurina rubbed the bruise on her cheek and winced. She didn’t blame Yamamoto; she knew that the powerful admiral was feeling the stress. She also knew that he wouldn’t do the only thing that could stop Japan from inevitable defeat. Launching a Navy Coup was the only possible solution… and it was impossible.

Yurina smiled to herself, grimly, bitterly. The Japanese of this era refused to take a woman seriously – some of the army men she’d met had boasted of their ‘fun’ in Nanking – and it had allowed her some small success at building a network of intelligence. So few men believed that she could think that they were quite happy to discuss matters of national security with her, including the defences around the palace. A German had warned them that the British might send in the paratroopers… and so an entire infantry division was dug in around the palace, preventing anyone the Army Minister refused to clear from entering. Hirohito was a prisoner inside his own palace, she was certain.

She rubbed her cheek again. She knew one other fact; Yamamoto was intending to lead the final mission himself. She’d tried to warn him that even if by some dark miracle the Japanese did manage to take Australia, the British wouldn’t give up. She knew that the Japanese were unable to do what was necessary to win; take the British factories that produced arms and armour. She also knew Hanover, the new Prime Minister; a war would give him time to consolidate his own position.

And there was the final dark fact. Yamamoto had offered her the choice between sailing on the Yamato to certain death, or remaining behind. She knew that if she stayed, she would fall into the hands of the militarists – those who had already judged her a worthless traitor. Her fate would be nasty and brutal; rape and then execution. Enough militarists were angry with Yamamoto to wish to hurt him from beyond the grave; if they had killed his family they would certainly not hesitate at killing his lover.

Yurina hugged her legs, curled up on the bed, and stared into darkness. She knew that she’d made a mistake in coming; she wished that she’d protested more against the revisionist history that claimed that the entire war had been a misunderstanding. She ran her hands along her legs, knowing that they would not be so smooth after the army men had finished with her.

Alone in the darkness, Ambassador Yurina made her choice… and prayed for the strength to follow through with it.

Chapter Twelve: News from Golgotha

Adolf Hitler Orphanage

Berlin, Germany

20th April 1941

Kristy Stewart, star of stage, screen and Internet, was bored. The orphanage was the same as a thousand others she’d visited in her life; the only major difference was the big picture of Adolf Hitler in each and every room. The children, boys and girls, were taught a very pro-Nazi version of German history, including the ‘stab in the back’ legend and a tale of a glorious uprising in 1923 in Munich, the infamous Beer Hall Putsch.

Stewart had to smile. She hadn’t learned much about the Beer Hall Putsch in school, but she very much doubted that it had really been the glorious battle between the working class men and the police, backed by a shadowy conspiracy of big bankers, communists and Jews, that the teacher – a ridiculously fat woman with a paddle in one hand – was talking about.

“And then they wounded our noble Reichmarshall,” she said, referring to Goring. The children didn’t smile; there was no derision of Nazi figures in the room, not even the infamous Rudolf Hess. “He kept on marching, and marching, until it was clear that all was lost.” Her voice became sticky-sweet. “And then our Fuhrer, the great man who made Germany strong again, realised that the Jews had become too strong for the brave heroes…”

The children hissed at the mention of the Jews. Stewart shuddered; she’d read one of their textbooks, portraying Jews as evil, vile, stupid and… well, paedophilic. The textbook had avoided that term – perhaps child molesters were all in the SS these days – but the implication had been clear. The story about the Jewish dentist and the young blonde Gudrun had been straight out of one of the horror urban legends that had been making the rounds around Britain.

I wonder if I’ll find Kilroy here, she thought absently, as the teacher brought her paddle down on the behind of one of the boys, who howled and clutched his behind. The teacher whacked him again and he shut up, taking his place again in the classroom.

“And then the Fuhrer offered himself up to the enemy, in order to give the others time to retreat and regain their strength so that Germany could be strong again,” the teacher continued. Stewart racked her brains; hadn’t Hitler been captured the day afterwards? “They put him on trial, but the people were so determined that he would not be killed that they were unable to kill him, and the black-shirted noble warriors laid down their lives to protect him at his most vulnerable.”

The children cheered. Stewart recorded it faithfully, knowing that the images would be sent directly back to Britain. “Heinrich Himmler, the guardian of the Reich, the Fuhrer’s shining sword, faithfully recorded the words of the Fuhrer in the book, Mien Kamph, that we will be studying later today,” the teacher concluded. “Now, who can recite for me the leading words of the Fuhrer’s speech last night?”

“I am General Rommel,” a small boy began, before the teacher was upon him. The German public was forbidden to listen to the Free Germany broadcasts, but the transmissions were so powerful that they blanketed out the Radio Berlin signals. Stewart winced as the teacher pulled down his trousers and blistered his behind with the paddle, leaving terrible marks on his pale rear.

“Now, stand over there and don’t move,” the teacher thundered, with a half-scared look at Stewart’s escort. SS Hauptsturmfuehrer Thierbach, a young blonde man who had been assigned temporarily to her while Roth handled a separate mission, nodded approvingly. Stewart didn’t react, but felt sick; pressed against the wall, the marks on the boy’s rear were all too clear.

“Now, Anna,” the teacher said, speaking to a pretty dark-haired girl, who shrank back. Stewart knew that the teacher would quite happily apply her paddle to the girls as well as to the boys. “What did the Fuhrer say?”

“He commended General… Kessel…” Her voice broke off as she tried to pronounce Kesselring. “He said that he’d done great service and would get an extra iron cross.”

“Close enough,” the teacher said grudgingly. Stewart felt a tug at her sleeve as Thierbach pulled her out of the room. The teacher’s voice continued to speak as Stewart left, her camera already executing its ‘dump’ protocol, transmitting everything back to England.

“Those children were orphaned by your people,” Thierbach informed her, as soon as they were alone. “Not, I should add, the children of soldiers or seamen, but those of common workers who were killed in the factories. This next room is for those children who were caught in the blasts of your weapons.”

He opened a door into a darkened room. Stewart stared ahead of her; the room was filled with children playing, watched over by three jolly nurses. She felt a tidal wave of vomit rising up and forced it down desperately; all of the children were mutilated in some way. One had no arms; another was missing a leg. A third…

With a muffled cry, Stewart stumbled from the room. Cold logic suggested that the children were Jews or Poles or even candidates for the eradication programs that tried to exterminate people with birth defects, but cold logic wasn’t much against the sheer horror of the room.

“That was your work,” Thierbach said, almost regretfully. Stewart forced her mind to work; was he telling the truth or was he lying, deliberately or otherwise? She knew that the BBC research teams would be studying the footage and attempting to determine the truth, but it would be difficult.

“I never did anything like that,” she said desperately, trying to hold down her gorge. He passed her a glass of water; only afterwards did she realise that the entire manoeuvre must have been planned. Thierbach squeezed her arm gently; she shook him off angrily.

“That’s what your people did to us,” Thierbach said. “If you like, you can meet with their mothers, those who survived when the factory was destroyed. Their fathers are away at the fronts, being killed trying to keep your people away from these people here.”

Stewart recognised the glint of fanaticism in his eyes and said nothing. “Your own history books claim that the Russians are going to rape, loot and pillage across Berlin – and we won’t let them. Whatever it takes, we’ll do it, just to prevent that from happening again.”

Stewart scowled as Thierbach led her out of the orphanage. She’d been to camps for orphaned children in Syria, where rewriting history was the rule, or would have been the rule before the Germans entered and crushed the country. She didn’t know as much as she should, but she knew that it had been Hess, not Himmler, who’d transcribed Hitler’s tedious book.

They’re rewriting history, she said, and saw clearly for once in her life. Her hand danced over her PDA, recording comments in Urdu, a skill she’d picked up from a former boyfriend. The transliteration would be confusing even to a native speaker, and she was confident that Germany had no Urdu speakers. If Himmler was rewriting history to make him seem more of a hero, what did that mean for Germany? Was it an attempt to build grassroots support… or was it something more sinister?

“In that carriage there,” Thierbach said, “our Fuhrer forced the French to sign the treaty that created Vichy France, and later bound General Petain to the service of the Reich after you people broke the agreement to leave the French Empire alone.”

Stewart allowed him to lead her into the carriage. It seemed older than a year; the sign on the front claimed 1910. The plaque was of interest, she decided, written in French, German… and English.

ON THIS SPOT THE CRIMINAL PRIDE OF THE FRENCH PEOPLE WAS BURIED FOREVER AND THEY ACCEPTED THEIR PLACE IN THE NEW ORDER UNDER THE FUHRER.

“Very… certain,” she said finally. The message rang a bell somewhere in her mind. “There’s no question that you’ll win, right?”

Thierbach smiled condescendingly at her. “Of course we’ll win,” he said. “The Fuhrer has decreed it himself.”

* * *

Not too far away, in one of the honeycomb of bunkers under the city, a troika met; Field Marshal Kesselring, General Galland, and Obergruppenfuehrer Herman Roth. It was a curious meeting; the men had little in common. Kesselring was there as one of the foremost strategists in the Reich and the author of the current war that was being fought in the Middle East. Galland was there as the fighter pilot turned Luffwaffe general and designer. Roth was there as the de facto Head of Future Technology Research, a task that called for an administrator, rather than a scientist.

“Thank you for coming,” Kesselring said. He’d explained the concept previously; even with Speer’s reforms there were still too many layers between the various departments within the Reich. By holding individual meetings, between people who really understood what was happening, they would be able to share information without too much delay.

“The ME-300 project has been proceeding slower than we anticipated,” Galland said. “Unfortunately, the plans we were provided with, I suspect, assumed a higher level of manufacturing technology than we possess. There have been accidents…”

Roth nodded. “As far as we can tell, the plans we were provided with were made by hobbyists; there was no government effort and apparently only a handful of production models. The designers… had no concept of the requirements of a real air force, or the resources needed to transform their visions into reality.”

“There is also the possibility that your source was lying to you,” Kesselring said.

“I don’t believe so,” Galland said, before Roth could reply. “The plans… should work, it’s just that we lack the ability to transform them into reality at once.”

Roth smiled thoughtfully. Germany had – and would have had in the years until the Reich fell the first time around – its fair share of people who had big dreams… and lack the ability to turn them into reality. With some of the future documents, it was possible to streamline the slender resources that Germany possessed into areas they knew would work, but not all of the workable ideas were worth developing.

“We do understand most of the principles involved,” Galland said. “The scientific information will keep the… scientists not directly involved in Project Kern busy for years, but they seem to assume that the people involved are stupid. There was even a warning about accidentally brining the hammer down on your thumb.”

Kesselring chuckled and Roth joined them. His… lover had once attempted to explain the legal culture to him, but he had to admit that it sounded crazy. If someone was stupid enough to hurt themselves, why should the company that had made the product – and in many cases given them what they asked for – make them independently wealthy for life?

“It’s the disparity between science and engineering,” he said, knowing that Galland understood, at least. “We know how to build a Eurofighter, one of the craft that waged war against us last summer, but we don’t have anything like the ability to build one. We lack, in many cases, the basis for understanding the construction methods involved; we lack the machines to make the machines… and so on ad infinitum.”

“I would be delighted to have a Eurofighter,” Kesselring said. “I suppose that the crashed planes were useless?”

Galland nodded. “They rigged small charges inside the plane’s systems,” he said. “Their pilots are brave men; I don’t think that anyone in the Luffwaffe would be happy to be flying in a bomb. We can’t learn anything from charred remains, and, of course, you know what happened to the pilots.”

Kesselring scowled. One Eurofighter – at least they thought it was a Eurofighter – had come down in France. Before the local commandant had realised what he had on his hands, the British had sent three helicopters in to rescue the pilot. A second craft had crashed in Germany… and the citizens had lynched the pilot.

“I suppose that we’ll have some more success with the new radar-guided guns,” he said. Speer had worked wonders producing more and more radar sets… and linking them to guns had taken only a week once the idea had been suggested. It was crude and difficult, but it worked, roughly. Even shooting at an approximate location could be fatal for the pilot of the British craft, flying through a stream of shells armed with proximity fuses.

Galland nodded. “The handful of ME-269s we have are quite useful,” he said. “They’re not matches for the British jets, not by any measure, but they have some advantages of their own. Of course, once we proceed to the ME-300, we should have planes that will be only slightly inferior to the British jets at close quarters, and they should still be more manoeuvrable than the Eurofighters. The downside is that they will still lack guided rockets of their own.”

“The ground-attack rockets cannot be adapted for the task?” Kesselring asked.

“No… seeker heads,” Galland said. He spoke in English; there were technical terms that German hadn’t yet developed. “Their rockets are guided by radar, or by heat sources,” he said. “We’re giving a lot of thought to a plane that can’t be detected by radar, but that’s years away at best. One… ah, problem with the ME-300 is that its hotter than a ME-109 by far, so…”

“It will be a better target,” Roth said, just to show that he understood.

Galland smiled wryly. “I fear so,” he said. “Of course, we also have some idea of how they counter their own weapons, and some of the methods we can install ourselves. We had some successes with flares during the battles over England, and we can now track their radar stations.”

Roth smiled. One of his successes, one of the reasons that Himmler thought highly of him, was that he had managed to smuggle some advanced technology from America to Mexico to Portugal to Germany. Not enough to tip the balance in their favour, but one of the commercial-grade sensor arrays, designed for a fishing boat, could track enemy radars.

“We have stockpiled a lot of V1s,” he said. “I assume that they’ll be deployed as part of the operations in the Middle East?”

Kesselring nodded. It had taken nearly a month to get everything set up – and thank god for the warning about enigma. Using landlines through Russia was a security nightmare – and likely to become worse if Hitler actually launched an invasion of Russia – but if they’d transmitted the signals it would have been known to the British within minutes. As it was, conveying plans for a coordinated offensive had been difficult beyond belief.

“They’re going to be mass-fired at the radar and RAF bases,” Kesselring said. He shook his head. “Who would have thought that the British would have only a handful of genuine fast-jet bases?”

“Certainly not the Luffwaffe,” Roth teased dryly. The Luffwaffe had flung away resources on attacking airfields that no longer existed.

“Meanwhile, we hit them everywhere again,” Kesselring said. “Their weapons are superb, but we have to destroy their army before they manage to create a bigger army.”

Roth nodded grimly. One thing his source couldn’t tell him was how well the British were doing at rebuilding their army. American production was rising, despite all the labour unrest in the country, but exact British figures were hazy. Of course, if the British chose to raise regiments from India, they could do it by the bucket load.

“I don’t like this,” he admitted. “I’m not a strategist, but aren’t we spreading ourselves too thin, particularly with…”

His voice trailed off. “Not at all,” Kesselring said. “The majority of the effort in the Middle East will be conducted by our noble allies the workers and peasants of Russia,” he said. “In the Far East, of course, all of the burden will be on the Japanese. By contrast, our own efforts in that theatre will be modest, and concentrated on Suez. The only real gamble is the… special operation, and we can afford to write that off if necessary.”

Roth nodded. “I hope you’re right,” he said.

* * *

Deeper within the bunker complex, Heinrich Himmler met with one of his most trusted officers. SS Obergruppenfuehrer Hans Krueger, a short bespectacled officer, wasn’t the iron-skinned officer of Himmler’s dreams, but his skill at organising the SS departments was second to none. He possessed the rare gift of convincing everyone to work together for a greater good – without force or threats. It was necessary for dealing with nuclear scientists, who were temperamental and immune to threats. Genius, even Jewish genius, had to be nurtured, not crushed under a jackboot.

“Heil Hitler,” Krueger snapped, saluting. Himmler returned the salute with a genuine smile; Krueger was someone he respected as well as trusted. “I come as ordered!”

Himmler smiled. Krueger’s only flaw was a tendency to overact. “Heil,” he snapped back. “Have a seat,” he continued in a more normal voice. “I need a full report on the project for the Fuhrer.”

Krueger bowed, and then took his seat. “It proceeds,” he said. “The new source of information is a wonder, Herr Reichsführer, but we have to make almost all of the equipment for the Kern project from new. Fortunately, we have some sources of uranium, and we hope to have a prototype reactor in six months. That reactor will be built at Plosti.”

Himmler nodded. One incidental effect of the British nuclear strike, which had confirmed even to Hitler that the weapon worked, was that the former oil refinery was contaminated with radiation. The SS’s researchers had been delighted to have a chance to examine the effects of the radiation on the workers who were slowly, carefully, clearing away the radioactive topsoil and dumping it into the Black Sea.

“If we have a leak, hopefully the British will mistake it for a leak from their own bomb,” Krueger said. “We lack enough data to be certain, and of course we’re breaking the project into a series of steps to avoid exposing the scientists, the Aryan ones at least, to radiation.”

Himmler steepled his fingers. “Excellent,” he said. “Tell me; when is the earliest that we’d have a bomb for ourselves?”

Krueger hesitated. “It depends,” he said honestly. “Now that we have a very good idea of what we’re doing, the problem becomes one of engineering and refining the material. We might be able to have one as early as next year, and then we can ramp up production. However, there is a possible interim solution.”

He told Himmler. Himmler smiled. “This is possible?” He asked. “It can be done?”

“Yes,” Krueger assured him. “We can make one of those weapons without a serious problem.”

Himmler nodded. “Then I want you to have one of them ready as soon as possible,” he said. His mind raced ahead, considering the history of the future. “Yes,” he said. “It might just be helpful, I think.”

Chapter Thirteen: Skulduggery At High Noon

Bracken Industries

Nr New York, USA

20th April 1941

Cora had been astonished to discover that security around the plants had been tightened. Grim-faced security experts from Britain, people who could have commanded extremely high salaries in the United States, had arrived overnight on one of the transatlantic flights, settling in before anyone was aware of their presence. They’d brought with them several boxes of equipment that was for Oliver alone; no one else was allowed to go near them. Cora had asked them – they were far more respectful of a black girl than anyone else in the United States – but they’d refused to tell her what they were. Even Oliver had been tight-lipped on the subject.

Shrugging in a small fit of pique, Cora finished her main tasks for the day and logged on to the new Internet. Streams of information from Britain had been arriving each day as Roosevelt’s offer was reported and details were finalised. She’d been responsible for contracting out work for the Consortium, including the purchase of thousands of miles worth of train track. They were to be loaded onto a ship for transport to Algeria, where they would be used to develop a trans-African railroad.

She chuckled; despite claims by the state governor, there had been no major recovery of the stolen weapons, which were now lost somewhere within America. In the timeframe, they could have moved around the world, a fact that Hoover was making very clear in his weekly press statements.

“The… so-called Black Power movement is a Communist plot,” he had proclaimed at a press conference, hammering the message home. Despite considerable differences of opinion between North and South America, the theme had struck home. The reports of Soviet collusion with the Japanese – who were splitting China between them – suggested a far-reaching Communist plot to take over the world. Never mind that the history books proved that such a conspiracy had only existed in the wet dreams of the communist elite and those who had feared them; it earned him attention and aided him to regain the power he’d lost.

“The British sunk the liner and the West Virginia,” General MacArthur had proclaimed, and there were many cheers. MacArthur might have lost his position in the Philippines, but he still had a following in America, even if it were not among the army. He’d even offered to lead regiments in a search for the Black Power movement; compromise seemed impossible.

She read – again – the message from Black Power, on their website. Hoover had gone crazy when he realised that even finding the server was impossible, let alone preventing people from visiting it. The message was clear and to the point; the blacks of America were taking their rights as citizens, rights that they had been denied. If there were any attempts to prevent them from claiming the same rights as white folk, there would be bloodshed.

“Idiots,” she said, and she wasn’t certain who she meant. Some congressmen had been calling for the use of the Civil Rights Acts that had been installed in the future, conceding most of Black Power’s demands. Others, mainly from the South, had resisted; they would lose most of their power base when blacks started voting in large numbers. There was even talk of running MacArthur as the Republican candidate in the next election, three years off.

“It’ll resolve itself before then,” Oliver had said, in one of their more peaceful moments. Their relationship was growing closer, and yet there was something that was bothering the Englishman. She didn’t think that it was her colour – even though there were many men with black mistresses – but something else, something that was worrying him.

A chime at the door brought her mind back to reality. She glanced down at the security monitors, her fingers dancing over the keyboard and hiding all the evidence of her website browsing, and winced. J Edgar Hoover and Clyde Tolson, the FBI men, had returned. Once again, they had a car of agents escorting them, waiting outside.

She smiled wryly – not all of the people who hated Hoover were black, but men who’d been proven to have been convicted unjustly – and hit the door unlock key. It clicked open and Hoover slipped in, followed by Tolson, who gave the impression of… annoyance.

“We’re here to see your boss,” Tolson said firmly, as Hoover took a seat. He didn’t quite say ‘nigger-bitch’, but the thought was there. “This is about the meeting we arranged.”

She gave him a charming smile, just because she could. “Certainly,” she said. “I’ll let him know at once.”

“At once,” Tolson said. Cora smiled at him again – noting that he showed no response again – and picked up the telephone. Five minutes later, she waved the pair of them into Oliver’s office, and let out a sigh of relief. She didn’t know if the rumours were true, but she would have sooner been leered at by a gang of Ku Klux Klan than endure their presence for a moment longer.

* * *

Oliver allowed himself a small smile before welcoming the two FBI men. “A pleasure to see you both again,” he lied smoothly. He was genuinely grateful; some of the bureaucratic tangles he’d faced had vanished, thanks to Hoover.

“And you also,” Hoover said, with what Oliver judged was the same amount of sincerity. “Your message said that it was important.”

“What, you won’t stay for tea and biscuits?” Oliver said, waving a hand at a well-equipped bar. A tea-machine sat neatly on the table in front of him; he poured himself a cup and waited for their orders.

“Bourbon, please,” Hoover said. Oliver smiled; he had thought that Hoover didn’t drink. Tolson refused a drink. “We are having enough problems with cyber crime.”

Oliver laughed. Who would have thought that someone would have reinvented the concept of copying records – and managing to place them online as MP3s? Hoover’s explanation was stumbling; the FBI still hadn’t managed to recruit a decent computer expert.

“Can you not rid us of the damned subversive Internet… stuff?” Hoover demanded, trying to avoid the word he’d clearly had in mind. He would have been happier bullying Oliver, but Oliver had too many friends in Washington. “It’s corrupting our children!”

Oliver was wryly impressed. Hoover, at least, was showing some mental flexibility. Most people who’d objected to Internet problems had focused on one issue, such as pornography. Some actresses who were already acting had had nude pictures of themselves splashed across the Internet, and the reaction of the Conservatives to some of the less tasteful Japanese porn had been severe.

“Unfortunately, they have a wireless server,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “It’s very difficult to track one down, particularly with the dozens of similar machines running around.” He smiled at the half-lie. “In effect, it can’t be done here without equipment that we don’t have.”

Hoover’s face purpled, but his voice remained calm. “Can you not obtain that equipment for us?”

Oliver shook his head, for once telling the truth outright. “Equipment that sensitive will have already been rounded up by the government. Unlike some of the commercial-grade equipment that might as well be military-grade here, its too rare and too useful for it to be allowed outside Britain without a very good reason.”

Hoover nodded, perhaps reflecting upon the small collection of equipment that had been sent from Britain to aid the American technology development program. Oliver smiled to himself; Hoover had taken a lot of the blame when a fire had erupted within the warehouse, destroying some of the equipment.

“They don’t consider tracking down the purveyors of that… filth a serious problem?” He asked finally. “That stuff is disgusting!”

Oliver was inclined to agree, although he knew perfectly well that that wasn’t Hoover’s real concern at all. The pornographic materials, ranging from normal sex to masturbation, to rape and even to death scenes, were disgusting. Still, he had been truthful; the equipment that the United States would require was needed for the war.

“They have other concerns at the moment,” he said. “Now, what about the equipment I’ve obtained for you?”

Hoover brightened up considerably. He’d been looking forward to it, even sending Oliver several emails demanding to know about progress. “I’d be delighted,” he said, cheerfully. Tolson leaned forward as Oliver pulled out a small briefcase. Hoover’s eyes narrowed. “That’s a bit small, isn’t it?”

“What’s the use of a bug the size of a Smartie?” Oliver asked, and then had to explain what a Smartie was. The United States would be hearing about them soon, along with the other Cadbury products. He opened the briefcase and pulled out a small box, about the size of a matchbox. A tiny silver glint came from the centre of the box.

“That’s impossible,” Tolson declared.

Oliver smiled. “This is a Mark XXI electronic surveillance device,” he said. “In this form, its good to pick up and record conversations for up to five days continuous running, powered by a tiny microprocessor the size of an dot. It’s not very smart, but if you ping it with the correct code, it’ll burst-transmit everything its recorded to you, and then wipe itself. When no one is talking, it powers down and stores energy; it can even draw energy from solar power and heat.”

Hoover picked up the box thoughtfully. “It’s tiny,” he said. “How do you plant them?”

Oliver picked up a pair of tweezers and a magnifying glass. Tolson laughed as he held it over the box, showing them the bug in more detail. “Basically, you attach it in a hidden place – I suggest you experiment with them to discover how much use they are – and let it go to work. If you want, you can even attach them to a person, although that has a maximum of seven days as power requirements will exhaust it very quickly.”

Hoover smiled for the first time. “Tell me,” he said. “Can they be detected?”

Oliver nodded. “Yes, and no,” he said. “A powerful ELINT scan will detect them, and an ECM suite will jam them from transmitting – and they’re not bright enough to notice,” he said. “Fortunately, there is no place within the United States – except the Future Embassy – that has such capability. I assume that the British Embassy” – Lord Lothian had passed away over the winter and had been replaced by a future Briton chosen by Hanover – “has the same capability, but I don’t know for certain.”

“Blasted traitors,” Hoover muttered. “None of them will join the FBI; they would sooner stay with the nigger.”

“Converting what they have into a viable technological base for developing these devices is far far beyond what you or I could do, let alone them,” Oliver said. He’d met Ambassador King; he even liked him. “Director, the process that makes that bug so tiny is nearly six decades ahead of America.”

“And they’re useless in Britain itself,” Tolson said, to save his chief from embarrassment. “We can’t place a few in Britain to watch sympathisers.”

“No,” Oliver said sharply. “These things are commercial-grade, not military-grade. Anyone with something to hide will have some counter-measures in place… and MI5 would stop at nothing to find out who’d been trying to bug government offices. It’s not the sort of thing they’d let slip past them; they’re good, tough, and in wartime they have more authority than you do.”

“They still lost a German from the first encounter,” Hoover sneered. Oliver, who’d been a prisoner of the Germans at the time, said nothing. “They might not find my people…”

“They’ll be trying to blend into a culture they won’t understand,” Oliver said. “I strongly advise you not to try.” He closed the briefcase and picked up a second briefcase. “These are webcams,” he said. “They’re basically tiny cinema cameras; your position one somewhere where you want to know who’s going in and out, and then just set it running. Again, it has a limited lifespan, around ten days at the current power reserves.”

He put the webcam down on the table and picked up a second camera. “This is a very tiny camera,” he said. “It works on the same basic principle; you take a picture and it stores it in its memory. When you want to review them, you simply burst-transmit them to a computer – I’ve given you ten of the basic laptop design – and review them there.”

Hoover grinned savagely. “We’ll put them to very good use,” he promised. Neither man mentioned money. “How long does it take to learn how to use them?”

“I’ve attached a book of instructions to the main list,” Oliver said. He smiled; now for the bait. “The main supplies have been moved to a safe house,” he said, and passed over the address. “You can pick them up at your leisure, as no one knows about it.”

He watched Hoover’s smile and frowned inwardly. As he’d suspected, Hoover had raised no objections to the underhandedness of the trade. That was… interesting; Hoover clearly didn’t want anyone to know that he’d gotten the little collection.

“There is one final matter,” Hoover said, as Oliver began packing away the webcams. “We are under threat by subversive movements, attacking the very foundations of American life.”

Oliver nodded impatiently. Hoover’s constant speeches on the matter were unbecoming the head of the counterintelligence service, even though the FBI wasn’t exactly a counterespionage service. Hoover saw… well, reds under the bed; an expression that had really caught on online. Absently, he wondered where McCarthy was; the future senator had drawn one of the darker cards of the verdict of history.

“You have hired thousands of workers, including a number of members of certain unions,” Hoover said. “Many… Unions have relationships with communists, including the NAACP scum and other black unions. Is that safe?”

Oliver nodded. “I have to build as quickly as I can,” he said. “I have no doubts about the loyalty of my people.”

“Many of them… will be getting ideas above their station,” Hoover said, with all the tone of an English aristocrat. “There are plenty of unemployed men who would be glad of the jobs…”

“I have to keep my reputation as a good employer,” Oliver said flatly. “I cannot simply… fire people merely on the grounds of their skin colour. I could be charged under British law for that, which would ruin the company.”

“But some of them might be transmitting information to the subversives,” Hoover protested. “That… secretary of yours might be reporting my presence to anyone!”

“Given that you had an armed escort, everyone who is anyone will know that you came anyway,” Oliver said. “I’m sorry, Edgar, but I can’t do that.”

“Humph,” Hoover said. Without saying goodbye, he stalked out of the room. Oliver watched him go, concealing his real thoughts until Cora had shown the pair out, then he clicked on the laptop. He hadn’t bothered to mention some of the bugs’ other capabilities Hoover; it would only have pointed his suspicions in unprofitable directions.

“That bastard was dictating to you,” Tolson’s voice snapped, clear as a bell. The noise of their car could be heard in the background; audio-discrimination programs began to sweep the background noise out of the transmission. “Edgar, he needs to be taken down a peg or two!”

“For the moment, we need him,” Hoover’s voice said, tired. “We have few sources for advanced technology, and Ambassador King is hardly going to share the pittance he has. With MacArthur involved with us, we need supplies of advanced technology, and Oliver is the best we have.”

Oliver furrowed his brow in puzzlement. What were Hoover and MacArthur doing in bed together? One idea suggested itself and he sniggered, before returning to the transmission.

“We’ll have to put everyone in those factories under watch,” Hoover said. “With these new tools, it should be… easier than it would have been otherwise. Starting with that bitch he has guarding his office.” There was a pause. “Now that troops will be moving to Europe, to Britain, we will have less time than we really need.”

“Of course,” Tolson said. The transmission started to hiss with static as they passed out of range. “Perhaps if we…”

The transmission cut out entirely. Oliver cursed the paranoia of the designers. Detection equipment was common in 2015 Britain, but non-existent in 1941 America. His mind raced; knowing that Hoover distrusted him – or some of his staff – wasn’t unexpected, but the link with MacArthur was unexpected. Why was he involved?

“Perhaps he wants revenge on Britain,” he mused, and decided that it made sense. MacArthur’s career had been ruined beyond repair by the future revelations; no matter the legalities of the situation it had been inescapable that he had – or would have – left troops behind to face Japanese captivity. Yes, MacArthur had good reasons for joining Hoover’s new bug-hunt; hunting black freedom fighters.

I wonder if I should warn Britain, he thought, and shivered. The last thing he wanted was anything that interested the British Government – to say nothing of the intelligence services – in him. Hoover’s determination to keep his latest purchase a secret boded ill; what did J Edgar Hoover want with surveillance equipment like that? Did he have any choice, but to tip off Britain?

“Is everything all right?” Cora asked, sticking her head in through the door. Oliver realised that he’d been muttering under his breath. “How was the meeting with the gay guardian?”

“I would really not let Hoover know that you see those sites,” Oliver said, without rancour. Cora would have blushed if she could have. “It could have gone better,” he said. “He wanted to know if I watched for subversives.”

Cora’s mouth opened in shock. It was remarkably attractive. “You mean us,” she said, waving a black hand around the room. “Don’t they think that we are good Americans?”

“They don’t know,” Oliver said. He hadn’t paid much attention to the Civil Rights Era in America. He made a mental note to email one of the universities that had opened a business for companies wishing to invest in America or the rest of the Contemporary world, one that provided a briefing on the local history and culture. “They look at your colour and think that you’re unreliable, and the craziness in the south only makes it worse.”

He shook his head. “I want you to get the security staff to quietly start running ELINT scans around all of our properties,” he said. “Check your home as well, just in case.”

“I’m living in one of the flophouses,” Cora said. Oliver winced; he’d forgotten. The new flophouses for the people who wanted to move to the big city, the Big Apple, but hadn’t yet found a job.

“Perhaps you should move into Park View,” he said, meaning the estate for himself and his senior managers. “You would be allowed to live there, and its totally secure. There should be some new bungalows there.”

Cora’s face shone like the sun. “Thank you,” she breathed, and kissed him. Oliver felt his body respond, but fought it down.

“Later, perhaps,” he said, and Cora giggled. “For the moment, we have a business to run.”

Chapter Fourteen: Culture Shock (Again)

Newcastle Airport/Camp Tommy

Nr Newcastle, United Kingdom

20th April 1941

The small aircraft had belonged to a millionaire who’d been in France during the Transition. Its speed, combined with unparalleled fuel efficiency, had led to its pilot – and default owner – offering to fly it for the Ministry of Defence in order to avoid combat service. The RAF had practically conscripted every pilot in Britain, particularly those with genuine military experience, for the new aircraft, and not every one of them had wanted to be conscripted.

As Stirling watched, it touched down neatly on the private runway, built by a different millionaire as a gesture for his home city. It taxied neatly to a stop near the terminal, followed by the equipment on trucks, until the ladder was connected on to the plane. Stirling checked his cap and stepped forward as Dwight D Eisenhower stepped out of the plane. The Supreme Commander of Operation Arctic, and Commander of Allied Troops within Britain – which meant American troops – stepped out of the plane, and stopped dead.

Stirling concealed a smile. He’d seen it before, on the now-dead Captain Townley of the Queen Elizabeth, and on Admiral Somerville and Admiral Cunningham, but it was different for the man who would have been President. For the American, suddenly the Transition was real; the old colonial master had grown powerful beyond hope of containment.

He saluted, sharply, and was unsurprised to note that Eisenhower’s salute was a little shaky. He tried to see the airport, a marvel of sophistication, through Eisenhower’s eyes and smiled. Eisenhower must have thought that he’d come to wonderland.

“Welcome to Britain,” Stirling said. Eisenhower shook hands weakly, still staring around. “I’m Major Stirling.”

“Pleased to meet you, I think,” Eisenhower said. They’d met before, but Stirling was too low-ranking for Eisenhower to notice him then. “Thank you for honouring my request.”

Stirling nodded. Under normal circumstances, a person of Eisenhower’s statue could expect to be met by a whole host of dignitaries. He’d requested a low-key introduction to Britain, and to Camp Tommy 1, and Hanover had sent Stirling to meet him. Formal meetings and introductions could come later.

“This is Newcastle,” he said, as he led the way into the car park and headed towards a limousine. The security guards, staying out of the way, moved to blanket them in a protective envelopment; enough pre-emptive-revenge cases had appeared to convince the Government to insist on an armed escort, although no one had been able to think of a reason to hate Eisenhower that would have lasted sixty years. “Newcastle and Aberdeen are going to serve as the main staging posts for the troops.”

Eisenhower was reeling. “There are so many cars,” he said, as their own vehicle opened its doors. “Who owns them all?”

Stirling grinned. “There are fewer here than you might expect,” he said, knowing that Eisenhower wouldn’t have expected anything like as many were parked there. “Although we have managed to get a fairly steady line of petrol supplies, we are short on reasons to come to airports, these days. The flights back and forth don’t always attract people.”

He invited Eisenhower to sit inside the car and sat down beside him. He’d insisted on bringing along a driver, simply so he could try to answer Eisenhower’s questions as they left the airport. The American still seemed stunned as the car drove onto the main road and then moved onto the motorway, heading north.

“What is that?” Eisenhower asked, as a large building passed by on the left. “What on Earth is that for?”

Stirling hesitated. “It’s an office block,” he said finally. “There was a big trend towards monstrous glass and iron structures a few years ago. You should see some of the ones in London.”

“I see,” Eisenhower said. He remained silent as they drove off the motorway and headed into a series of side roads, finally reaching a fenced-off complex.

“This used to be a MOD complex – that’s the Ministry of Defence – before the army was cut, back in the 1970s,” Stirling explained, as the guard checked the papers their driver extended to him. “It was designed to hold five thousand troops in reasonable comfort, if cramped conditions. It was renovated during the first conscription period and hosted the newer divisions, before they went to the Middle East. It’s a bit rough and ready, but it’s the best we have.”

He tapped neatly on the driver’s window. “Just pull up by the main building,” he ordered, and nodded in the direction of Eisenhower. The American was studying the complex without the disdain that Stirling had half-expected; in fact he seemed to be nodding in approval.

“Time to get out, sir,” Stirling said, and opened the door. Eisenhower followed him, more the General now that he had something familiar to get his teeth into. “This is the main common room.”

Eisenhower stepped inside the bulky room and examined the collection of electronic toys and equipment. “What are… they for?” He asked. “What good are they?”

“Quite a bit, actually,” Stirling said, unflappably. “Even soldiers need some time to unwind. Those tools are used for entertainment – there’s a cinema in the next room that seats five hundred – and emails to home. Unfortunately, I am legally obliged to warn you that any email they send will be read while its in the buffer.”

“I suspect that the censors will want to do the same,” Eisenhower said. “You consider this just… adequate?”

Stirling lifted an eyebrow. “Is it that obvious?” He asked. “Yes, this is pretty basic; there are none of the advanced training facilities that get used at Sandhurst or the RAF bases.”

“It’s more than they will expect,” Eisenhower said. “It’s cleaner than most United States barracks as well.”

“Sanitation is important,” Stirling said, leading the way into one of the barracks. Hundreds of bunk beds stretched ahead of them; Eisenhower poked one of the mattresses thoughtfully. “We expect our soldiers to clean their own lockers and make their own beds, I’m afraid.”

Eisenhower gaped at him. “You seem to be expecting us to be… well, prissy-boys.”

“You would be amazed at the fuss the 3rd Infantry made during the exercise we held last year… sorry, sixty-odd years in the future,” Stirling said. He led the way into the washing rooms. “Hot and cold water is always available here,” he said. “The underground tanks are kept perpetually heated and are available to anyone who asks. Showers are either public, over there” – he waved a hand at the row of open showers – “or private, over there. Legally, we have to provide both options when not at war; its something to do with having female soldiers.”

Eisenhower snorted. “Women would go to pieces on a battlefield,” he said.

“They fight very well,” Stirling said. “About a third of the RAF and the Navy are women. The only department that has only a handful of women is the SAS; while women can join, they need to be ultra-fit and strong.”

He led the way back outside, allowing Eisenhower to see how the building worked; a gigantic cross on the ground. “There are five barracks, arranged like a five-side of a dice,” he said. “Each one can hold a thousand soldiers, and there are more complexes like it in the region. We can accommodate your soldiers, you can train them on the fields or in the woods, depending upon what you want to do.”

“Thank you,” Eisenhower said finally. “These buildings will suit us fine.”

He tried to put a note of lofty condensation into his voice and didn’t quite make it. “What about the ships?”

“We have something of a problem there,” Stirling admitted. “Some of them will have to be based in Ireland until D-Day, but fortunately the Irish have agreed to that in exchange for some assistance in ending their civil war.” He shook his head; the war in Ireland had grown to the point that thousands of Protestants were heading to South Africa, which was accepting all the white men it could find. “The facilities at Scarpa Flow will require years to get them back into what they were, but they won’t be needed for this, I think.”

Eisenhower nodded. “Tell me something, young man,” he said. “If the force in Norway does get into trouble, will your people help out?”

Stirling’s brain whirled. He might work directly for the Prime Minister, and the Oversight Committee, but that hardly qualified him to issue any promises. Rather the opposite, in fact, and he was certain that Eisenhower knew that.

“I imagine that we’d do what we can,” he said finally. “I’m not in any position to…”

“Relax,” Eisenhower said. Stirling lifted an eyebrow. That expression wasn’t contemporary. “I know that you’re not in any position to make promises, but I would be interested in a soldier to soldier discussion.”

Stirling nodded slowly. The entire discussion was being recorded. The Oversight Committee could dissect it later. “We have limited resources,” he said. “I know that a great deal of contingency planning has gone into a rescue mission, but just how feasible it is? I don’t know.”

Eisenhower scowled. “I do know that the RAF is perfectly capable of cutting off Norway from the rest of the German Reich,” he said. “The terrain in Norway favours you more than them, as they won’t have many tanks. You should be able to win, General,” Stirling continued.

“Thank you,” Eisenhower said. “Now… when do we go to London? The first troops are supposed to arrive tomorrow on ships.”

Stirling waved a hand at the tilt-rotor sitting on the helicopter pad. “Right this way,” he said. “They have a formal reception planned; I hear that the King himself will be coming.”

“Oh goody,” Eisenhower said sardonically. Stirling thought of all the homage paid in the future to Kings and Princes, and said nothing.

Camp Tommy/Newcastle

Nr Newcastle, United Kingdom

28th April 1941

The original plan had called for launching the operation in early May, but events had made that impossible. Private Max Shepherd, 1st Marine Corps, didn’t mind at all. The future Britain, if he understood the briefing correctly, was fascinating; it was so… rich. The people seemed to be happy and contented; they had toys and games – and almost everyone had a car – that even the richest people in America lacked.

Shepherd shook his head with awe. Born in Tennessee, he’d rarely used a bathroom and had gone to the toilets in the woods, and the super-luxurious barracks were fantastic. From what he gathered, not all of the Americans were accommodating well to the new situation; expecting to be worshipped by the women had moved to disgust. The women of Britain simply weren’t that impressed with the Americans, those who weren’t paid for the pleasure.

Still, their first week at Camp Tommy wasn’t bad, insofar as the Marine Commander had ordered a full training schedule. Captain Caddell kept them on their toes, forcing them through constant repetition of drills; drills and more drills, practicing loading and unloading the LSTs and their small flotilla of craft on the Newcastle beach, before staggering back to the barracks to catch some sleep. The British had offered them buses to transport them over the five miles to the beach, which had been rigged up as a primitive landing site, but the Commandant had refused.

“We need to remain tough,” he said, and had insisted on the Marines marching to and from the beach, unless they’d been injured. Crowds turned out to gawk at them; shopkeepers tried to sell them their wares. Without a proper exchange rate, the British had settled for loaning each man £100 per week, which was used for private activities. Apparently, a racket had already begun; men trading their pounds for goods from America.

Shepherd checked his barracks as the men climbed into the lorries. This day, at least, was different; they were finally going to practice an amphibious invasion. Shepherd had heard – a lowly private was not encouraged to know such matters – that several islands would have to be secured, and that some of the Marines were practicing the techniques up in the Shetlands, where most of the invasion force was being assembled.

“All aboard?” Sergeant Pike called out, ignoring the whiffs of cigarette smoke from some of the men. Smoking in public places was banned in Britain; a couple of men had been fined for the offence. “Driver, go!”

The lorry wasn’t British-made, but one sent over from America. It made a stink as it passed along the motorway, along the corridors designated for military use, and entered the city itself. The men gawked themselves; Newcastle seemed grander than New York, which had been the most glamorous city in the world to many of them.

“Niggers and wogs,” Private Buckman muttered. Shepherd blinked; there were black men, and Indians with dark brown skin and weird clothes, wandering freely through the streets. Some of them waved at the lorries, others jerked their fingers up at the Americans. “Almost as bad as the dagos.”

“Silence in the ranks,” Sergeant Pike thundered. Shepherd smiled openly as the lorry fell silent; Pike wasn’t a man to cross. Shepherd had once seen him half-strangle an imprudent Private. Black men weren’t allowed in the Marines, but there were Italians in the Corps.

“Hard luck,” he muttered to Buckman, who glared at him. Before a fight could break out, the lorry stopped inside a large harbour; a Marine transport sat there docked neatly.

“At the double, everyone out and form up!” Sergeant Pike bellowed. Shepherd hurried to obey as the men jumped off the lorry and onto the tarmac; they’d performed the same manoeuvre dozens of times before. “Line up!”

“At ease,” Captain Caddell said, as the men saluted him. Shepherd regarded him with respect; the officer, who always gave the impression of being bespectacled, was known for taking care of his men. “Stand… at ease!”

The regiment – Shepherd noted that several more men had assembled behind him – relaxed, but remained in their rows. “Our mission is to take a beach,” Caddell said. “We will be launched in the small LSTs from the transports, and then run to the beach. There will be a bottle of wine for the one who hits the shore first.”

The men chuckled. Caddell was an officer you could laugh with. “Once we’re on the shore, we have ten minutes to knock out the mock-ups of German guns and kill all of the Germans defending the place” – there were more chuckles; the British produced little mannequins of German defenders that were very realistic in bad light – “and clear the beach for the follow-up forces. Watch out for mines; the person who gets covered in purple ink is buying the drinks tonight.”

“We’re finally getting liberty?” A young Marine with more courage than discipline asked. Shepherd winced as Pike started to stalk towards him.

“Yes, we get a night on the town,” Caddell said. “There’s an entire district that helps sailors find what they want… and now will have us as well.”

* * *

Half an hour later, all enthusiasm had faded as another wave of cold water splashed against the LST, drenching Shepherd with vigour. The murky grey sky was more like winter than summer; the Marines had already lost one LST.

“Move, you bunch of poofs,” Pike screamed, as the Marines piled into the little transport. Some of them were green to the gills; it was rocking alarmingly. “Move it!”

“All aboard,” the driver shouted. Shepherd suspected that he was trying to drop Pike in the drink, but the wily old sergeant moved too quickly. “We’re off!”

The LST lurched as it spun away from the bigger ship, before turning to face the shore. It looked very realistic; smoke and flames were already billowing from positions where battleship shells would hit in reality. Shepherd took a breath to steady himself; the LSTs were moving into formation and racing towards the beach.

“Move,” Pike shouted, as the LST hit sand and the bow came down. Gamely, the Marines raced forward, splashing through the water and onto the beach, firing all the while. A German rose up in front of Shepherd, lifting a Mauser, and he fired once, seeing the plastic of the head folding away under the impact.

“With me,” Pike ordered, as they jumped towards a bunker. Buckman was already lying on the ground, pretending to be dead. The dummy Germans were firing tiny blobs of paint. “Now!”

Pike kicked open the door of a bunker; two Marines tossed in grenades and jumped back. The explosion shattered the bunker. More explosions followed as the Marines mopped up, taking no prisoners, and the scene fell silent.

A whistle sounded. Slowly, reluctantly, the ‘dead’ got back to life, covered in ink that indicated how they’d been ‘killed.’ The Marines formed up into lines again, gratefully sipping water from their flasks and wishing for something stronger.

“Good work, all of you,” Caddell said. “We’re going to have to move faster and make more use of the mine-hunting equipment, for we have to take the islands.”

Shepherd nodded. The British had supplied them with some equipment that was designed to hunt mines, even buried ones. What it wasn’t, however, was convenient; some of the Marines had left theirs behind in the LST, trusting in the preliminary bombardment to clear the beach of mines. This time… there hadn’t been such a bombardment.

“For the moment, we’re going to the bars tonight,” Caddell said, and a great cheer rose up. “Take the maps, be on your best behaviour, and have fun. Tomorrow… we do it all over again!”

“Three cheers for the captain,” some toadying Marine shouted, from the rear. The Marines cheered anyway; nothing cheered them up like rest and relaxation.

* * *

The bar was one massive room, filled with people. Bright lights flashed as loud strange music played, inciting the dancers to dance. The Americans, for the most part, had been sucked into the dance, staring at the teenage girls and their revealing clothes.

“I never knew you could dance like this,” Shepherd shouted at Private Manlito. The swarthy Italian-American smiled back, unable to hear. The girl he was dancing with, a blonde girl with wide-open breasts, smiled at him and said something. “What was that?” Shepherd shouted. She caught his hand and brought him outside the dancing floor.

“Want some raw sex?” She asked. Shepherd’s expression must have been comical, for she laughed and passed him a tablet. “Raw sex,” she explained, as Shepherd examined it doubtfully. “It makes the night go quicker.”

Shepherd peered at the little green pill. “Are you certain?”

“Big bold soldier scared of a little pill?” She asked, and balanced one on the tip of her tongue. She swallowed it in one motion and smiled at him. Shepherd saw her expression, and her body, and swallowed it in one gulp.

“Wow,” he breathed, as… something happened. Her body seemed far more desirable; her smile one of welcoming invitation. He reached out for her, to kiss her, and her lips opened to meet his. Unaware of his surroundings, he pulled her closer and…

“Get your filthy hands off my girl,” a black man bellowed. Shepherd, lost in his drug-induced gaze, saw only a rival. The man lashed out with a chair and struck Shepherd’s shoulder.

“Fuck off, you nigger bastard,” Buckman shouted, and threw his glass of beer at the man. It shattered on his face and blood started to trickle down, just before Shepherd struck him with a haymaker.

“You bastard,” someone shouted, and the entire room went mad. Several dozen fistfights had broken out and alarms were sounding. Shepherd, wavering on his feet as the drug worked its way through his system, saw dimly the fire start as someone smashed a bottle of alcohol against the fire, before the girl started to pull at him.

“We have to get out of here,” she snapped, for once losing the breathy tone in her voice. “The pigs will be on their way right now and if they find out that you took that pill, you’ll be stuffed in jail.”

“They can’t put me in jail,” Shepherd said, as his mind fought to stay awake. “The Captain would kill me!”

Chapter Fifteen: Setbacks and Promises

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

29th April 1941

“Thirty-two reported incidents of rape, thirteen deaths, one hundred and forty people wounded and millions of pounds worth of damage… General, would you care to explain how this happened?”

Hanover’s voice was cold and hard. He watched as General Eisenhower flinched nervously; the sheer violence of the incident had stunned him. The BBC had been having a field day so far, reporting on the violence that had erupted in Newcastle; in many ways it had been worse than the violence in France of 2011, when the streets had risen against the National Front Government.

“Apparently, a soldier thought that a girl was being inviting,” Eisenhower said. Hanover felt a flicker of sympathy; the Americans clearly had even less idea of what had happened than the British had. Given the almost spontaneous nature of the… riot, it was possible that there had been several incidents, or just one that got blown out of hand.

“Americans are not used to being made to feel… inferior,” Eisenhower continued, scrambling for words. “This place is so… rich, and there’s so much bad feeling that…”

“Parliament is going to be asking questions,” Hanover said grimly. “I confess… we expected some trouble from mixing people together, but nothing like this.”

“And then the MPs overreacted,” Eisenhower said. “They started cracking heads, as per standard procedure, and then your police turned up and…”

“At which point a general anti-Americanism had erupted,” Hanover said wryly. “I do not recall giving your military police authority to… crack heads.” He sighed. “At the moment, there are fifty-seven Americans in jail, facing various charges from rape to manslaughter.”

“Some of them might have been innocent,” Eisenhower protested.

“Half of them were caught in the act by the police, once your military police had been rounded up,” Hanover said. “Others had left… traces of their presence on the girls. This does pose something of a problem; under the Status of Forces Revised act we have jurisdiction over American servicemen in such matters.”

Eisenhower steepled his fingers. “They’ve annoyed George Patton,” he said, and Hanover nodded. Patton’s obsession with getting the offensive off the ground was becoming a legend at the PJHQ and the MOD. “I would not imagine that they’re getting away with it. Still… what would happen if they were convicted and found guilty?”

Hanover scowled. He’d been arguing with the Supreme Court over that matter. “They should be flogged,” he said. “Unfortunately, that would be illegal. If they plead guilty, the murderers would be looking at ten to twenty years in jail, and the rapists five to ten. If they plead not guilty, it might be more than that.”

“We need them for the offensive,” Eisenhower said grimly. “We’re building up forces for Norway before…”

His voice trailed off. The invasion had to go ahead – and it had to be a success – before American support for the war vanished utterly.

“I am going to lean on the police,” Hanover said. “The police unions hate being leant on; they go terribly moralistic. It’s not good politics, and it could rebound really badly, but we should be able to get your guys out of jail on bail.” He smiled at Eisenhower’s expression. “However… they will have to wear escort tags and be confined to the barracks except when escorted. They will also have to face a court after the war ends.”

“I was thinking of ordering all of the troops confined to barracks,” Eisenhower admitted. “Everyone was expecting your people to be pleased to see us and…”

Hanover nodded. In the first history, American troops had been warmly welcomed to a Britain that was poor and desperately in need of help, rather than the self-confident Britain of 2015, or 1941PT. The British of 1944 had been more than willing to tolerate the Americans – at least the women had – but 2015 had different attitudes. Subconsciously, Hanover realised grimly, they’d expected the refined and capable Americans from 2015, rather than the semi-trained mob that had arrived.

“I think that’s a bit extreme,” he said. “I imagine that we could put together escort parties, if we tried. However, your MPs have no authority outside the barracks and might end up getting sued.” He shook his head. “This is going to be a pain.”

* * *

Parliament had agreed to convene in the afternoon, prompting the burning of tons of fuel to gather the MPs back together in London. The debate was due to begin at 2pm, but Hanover had one last meeting first. While waiting, he discussed the matter with Newcastle’s city councillors and MPs, and then discussed other matters with the head of the police force.

“Your one o’clock is here,” his secretary said.

“Ah, good,” Hanover said. “Send him in.”

Major John Dashwood entered and saluted. Hanover saluted back and then waved him to a chair. “It’s good to see you again, John,” he said. “How’s events with the Ministry of Space?”

Dashwood grinned. “So you’re calling it that too,” he said. “Everything is going well enough, I suppose.”

Hanover smiled as Dashwood lit up a cigar. He’d never acquired the habit himself, but didn’t mind others smoking in his presence. “Excellent,” Hanover said. “Now… I had Patton in here begging for a single satellite of his own, and Ike and the others want some as well. PJHQ is very impressed as well, although they would like more coverage of Germany and Japan.”

Dashwood shrugged. “At the moment, we haven’t put anything up in geo-stationary orbit,” he said. “The single satellite we did launch follows a slightly eccentric orbit; it passes near Germany, over Russia and then loops back over South America. Once we have the new boosters worked out – or you sign over the spare Tridents – we’ll have complete coverage within the month.”

Hanover smiled. Dashwood was a fanatic; a space-lover who’d always wanted Britain to have a proper space program. In the days after the Transition, he’d finally gotten his wish.

“Everyone is delighted with the one you did put up,” Hanover said. “While it’s not perfect, there is no sign that the Germans really understand what it means, so they’re not taking extra precautions.” He nodded down at Dashwood’s report. “Now, what about the future?”

“We have a three-pronged program,” Dashwood said. “Next week, we’ll test-fly the first rocket built mainly in America, using American resources. It’s a great deal cruder than a Trident, but it should be able to launch a satellite into orbit and leave the second stage in a decaying orbit.”

Hanover narrowed his eyes. “Won’t it crash-land somewhere?”

Dashwood shook his head. “No,” he assured Hanover. “It’s not made out of solid rock, so it’ll burn up in the atmosphere. However, if our further plans go ahead, it’ll provide building materials for a space station.”

He opened the briefing paper. “The second prong is a launcher that can put cargos in a stable orbit, including people,” he said. “We hope to have one of those ready by early 1942; there are so many other things to check. Finally, we have teams exploring duplicating the Russian spaceplane or the American SSTO designs. Unfortunately…”

“Those have to be made in Britain,” Hanover concluded.

Dashwood nodded. “The craft were designed to be very simple,” he said. “We can build one here, but the Americans can’t for some time.”

Hanover scowled. “The problem, for the Americans, is the choice between improving what they have, or to move directly onto 1960s-era stuff, like the B-29. For us, we have to build enough Hawks to ensure our own safety, and then prosecute a strategic bombing campaign against Germany. Rather makes you wish we were back in the Bronze Age, right?”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. “We can put together a couple of test models without absorbing too many resources.”

“I hope so,” Hanover said. “Now… first second satellite in a week, then…?”

“We have forty satellites,” Dashwood said. “Assuming that production stabilises, and there are no unforeseen problems, we should be able to lift them all in two-three months. We’re prioritising reconnaissance satellites for the moment, but we should put up a couple of communication birds as well.”

“Good thinking,” Hanover said. “Everything is going to blow… I can feel it in my bones.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Dashwood said. “Sir, give us six months and we’ll begin lifting entire space stations.”

Hanover lifted an eyebrow. “Well, in bits and pieces,” Dashwood admitted. “You’d be astonished how many volunteers we had from the RAF, including a handful of people with real space experience.”

“After the Transition, I’m not sure that anything would astonish me any longer,” Hanover said. “Still, make sure that they are volunteers.”

“Hell, we’ve got civilians getting in on the game as well,” Dashwood said. “Did you know that if you can reach LEO, you’re halfway to anywhere? They came up with some devices on the cheap, such as an MMU, that would be far cheaper than anything the Ministry ever came up with. Sir, these people are prepared to invest their life savings in the project!”

“Enough, I surrender,” Hanover said, holding his hands up. He chuckled, remembering the war bonds fight in Parliament, a battle he’d lost. “Major, if they’re investing, will they want to go to space?”

Dashwood nodded. “They’re even talking about limited companies and so on,” he said. “Prime Minister, we need them to do this.”

“Then use them,” Hanover said. “I’d better work up some protective legislation to distract Parliament. One thing; don’t get too much bureaucracy involved, that’s what fucked the ESA.”

Dashwood relaxed slightly. “Yes, sir,” he said. “I’ve also taken the liberty of arranging waivers for the civilians on the project.”

“Good thinking,” Hanover said. “Good luck, Major; get us into orbit.”

House of Commons

London, United Kingdom

29th April 1941

Kenneth Barton, Leader of the Opposition, stood up to speak. Parliament was in a grim mood; the MPs from Newcastle and Aberdeen had been talking about the Newcastle Riot at great length. Aberdeen hadn’t seen any riots, at least not yet, but it was hosting a sizable American force nearby. The Orkney MP, where the new American base was being built, had no complaints; the islands hadn’t seen so much development since the Second World War.

Barton smiled. That statement had drawn chuckles. In hindsight, he suspected that that had been the reason that the old Scot had made the statement. Still, there was a lot of bad feeling in the air; Parliament had become used to thinking of itself as a power again, once the Blair era had ended, and the collective body knew that the new government was asserting itself.

“To ask the honourable member,” he said, “why the riots happened, what will be done to the perpetrators, and what steps will be taken to prevent a reoccurrence.”

Hanover stood up to answer. As always, he was clad in a neat suit and tie, wearing a white jacket that contrasted with his dark hair. Barton frowned; the collapse of the coalition government had been expected to weaken Hanover’s government, but after both the BNP and the Muslims had joined Hanover… well, his position was as strong as it ever had been. Barton shook his head in amazement; the mere fact of the Transition made the Prime Minister the most powerful man in the world – and Hanover was living up to that.

“In short, my honourable friend, the riots happened through a series of misjudgements and mistakes,” Hanover said. “We… did not anticipate American reaction to our largess and standards of behaviour. In some cases, American servicemen took drugs they were unused to, and thought that some… female actions were an invitation. Under the influence, some of them committed crimes.

“To add to the confusion, the American military police thought that they had the right to take action against both their servicemen and some of our people,” he continued. “Their methods were not very restrained, and caused some more casualties – and some of those were among our police, which had also responded to the growing chaos.”

An ugly muttering ran through the room. “Finally, police SWAT teams restored order and arrested a number of people, including Americans and British men,” Hanover continued. “Some of them were innocent and released, several rapists remain at large.”

He looked around the room. “For the moment, we have placed almost all of them on bail, on certain conditions,” he said. “We could arrest and charge them, but it would cause a diplomatic fight that we don’t need, and they would be going into danger anyway. We have insisted that any known perpetrator remain in the barracks; if they survive the war they’ll face charges afterwards.

“As for preventing a reoccurrence, future American visits will occur only under escort,” Hanover concluded. “Hopefully, as they become more used to us” – for a moment, he seemed to be struck with a realisation – “there will be fewer incidents.”

He sat down. Barton noticed that he was tapping away on a PDA. The MP for one of Newcastle’s districts, a grievously fat man, hauled himself to his feet.

“With all due respect, Prime Minister, that is intolerable,” he said. Barton winced; the man might be a member of his own party, but after the riots he’d probably move over to Hanover’s party policies. “At the very least, those who raped the flower of Newcastle’s womanhood should be seriously punished, to say nothing of those who killed.”

Hanover snorted as a ripple of amusement ran through the room. “Every American who landed in Britain had their DNA recorded,” he said. “Every rapist – every American rapist – was weeded out. Unfortunately, they don’t have a monopoly on the crime.”

“And then will the government see to providing emergency support for rebuilding?” The MP demanded. “The damage is substantial….”

“You’ll have to knock off the cookies,” someone shouted, and the chamber laughed.

Hanover glared around him until the room quietened. “The government will take up the matter of composition with the Americans,” he said finally. “That issue requires some further exploration.”

* * *

Hanover was too practiced a politician to let out a sigh of relief as the session finally ended, but he left the chamber as soon as decorum permitted. As per his command, Stirling met him outside and accompanied him back to his office.

“Some of the Americans might have caught AIDS,” Hanover said flatly. “Not all of the… trysts were rapes, after all; some prostitutes slept with them willingly. Hell, they might have left behind some war babies.”

“The prostitutes would have used contraception, surely,” Stirling said. “Prime Minister, did you see the bit on BBC about the American who found the transvestite?”

“An inadequate male who turned himself into a fake female,” Hanover said. He chuckled. “Was that where one of the fights started?”

Stirling nodded. “Of course, we don’t know if that was the incident that started it, of course,” he said. “Still, he wasn’t expecting that.”

“How true,” Hanover said. “Can you see Ike? You have to convince him to have every American who went to Newcastle checked for AIDS; it can be stopped if we act quickly.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Stirling said. “Shouldn’t you see him yourself?”

Hanover shook his head. “I think he’d be tired of me,” he said. “Hell, I’m tired of him. The sooner we get this war over, the better.”

Camp Tommy

Nr Newcastle, United Kingdom

29th April 1941

General George Patton was a soldier’s soldier. Everyone said so, and looking at him Private Max Shepherd understood; Patton extruded magnetism and determination to win, whatever the cost. Today, however, Patton was not smiling. His short form radiation anger and disappointment, and he slapped a riding crop against his leg as he paced to and fro, talking at a level volume that cost a great deal to hold.

“You men have disgraced the name of America,” he snapped, and the soldiers recoiled. Patton’s disappointment was worse than facing enemy shellfire. “How can we trust you to defeat the blasted Germans, the scum who have disgraced the name of war, if you ruin an ally’s town?”

Shepherd shuddered. He’d been lucky; his girl had sheltered him and helped him to get back to the camp after they’d made love against a wall. She hadn’t been forced, and she clearly hadn’t complained – the British had some way of identifying a man who’d slept with a girl – and she’d even given him something called a ‘mobile number,’ so he could call her again. He wanted to be sick; the drug was slowing working its way out of his system, but at a cost.

Patton was speaking louder now. “And you,” he snapped, swinging around to face the military police, “what were you thinking?” Some of the soldiers smiled, enjoying the sight of the MPs in trouble for once. “Using your clubs against girls, some of them barely out of their first decade? Attempting to fight the British Police?” He glared at them. “If I’d had my way, you would have been left to rot in those cells; they were better than you deserved!”

Some of the soldiers were now openly nudging one another and grinning. Patton’s glare froze them in their tracks. “Those of you who were accused of a crime will be confined to camp, except on training and the war itself,” he snapped. “After the war, you will be sent back here to face charges… and if you try to desert I’ll shoot you myself! If you want to face charges now, instead of fighting the war, just say so; I’m sure that the British will be less dangerous than the Germans.”

He glared around the camp. “We have only a short period of time to get ready for our role,” he said. “From tomorrow, we will be training harder and harder… and God help the man who slacks!”

Patton stalked off into his office. Captain Caddell stepped up. “The following men are confined to barracks,” he said, and read out a list of names. Shepherd blinked; the list included Private Buckman and Private Manlito.

“What did you do?” He muttered out of the corner of his mouth. “Kill someone?”

Buckman glared at him. “There was this… hooker who agreed to let me do her if I paid, and then she said I didn’t have enough money,” he said. “I offered to come back, but then she started screaming and the fight was still going on and the police grabbed me.”

“Well, don’t run away,” Shepherd said, only half-joking. “There’s a war on.”

“Women like that should be locked up, not their victims,” Buckman groused. He kept on grousing until the rest of the Marines realised that it had been his fault. After the third ‘accident’ he shut up. There was far more training to do, after all, and the Marines were building up a good head of steam for the Germans.

He suspected that they were going to need it.

Chapter Sixteen: Out of Time

Nr Bergen

Norway

6th May 1941

Captain Dwynn hadn’t been too bothered by Britain; unlike the situations in the books recommended by the Oversight Committee, Britain was intact and almost exactly the same as it had been in 2015. Arabia hadn’t looked too different, and he’d never visited Malaya and Singapore before the Transition… but Norway was very different. In a future that might never be, NATO had kept a supply deport near Bergen… which was no longer there. There was a quaintness about the Norwegian city that it had lacked, seventy years in the future, and it brought home to him what had happened.

“I came her with a girl once,” he said. “She loved visiting the museum.”

“At least you get to go into the town,” Corporal Chang said, watching through the binoculars as the German patrols marched through the town, backed up by brown-shirted Norwegians carrying Billy clubs.

“You’re lucky,” Dwynn said, watching through the sensors. Chang’s face, so oriental, would alert any German with half a brain that he didn’t come from Norway. “It’s bloody terrible down there.”

He shuddered. He’d gone down to the town from the remote hut in which they’d made their main base, in the company of a Norwegian fisherman who’d been discovered by a British submarine six months ago. That near-disaster had cost the SAS one of its insertion submarines, but it had given them the beginnings of allies among the Norwegians. The resistance movement was tiny, but aided by radios the Germans couldn’t track and probably wouldn’t recognise them, they could supply information to the liberators.

“That bad, huh?” Chang asked, checking the screens again. “What’s it like?”

Dwynn scowled. “Oh, on the surface its very civil,” he said, “but there’s an air of… fear around the town. The Germans are polite – Hitler seems to think that the Norwegians are worth keeping around – but very firm. Quisling can boast all he wants of pan-Aryan solidity; the people know who’s in charge.”

“And, of course, the Royal Family has gone,” Chang agreed. The Norwegian Royal Family had been in Britain when it had been replaced by the 2015 Britain, and had vanished. “There’s no focus of resistance.”

“I suppose,” Dwynn said. He made a face as he stared down at the maps; the Germans hadn’t defended too much of Bergen, but what they had defended would make a formidable obstacle. Bergen wasn’t a town – city – that you could just sail up to and attack; it had a gigantic island blocking the direct approach. Dwynn snickered; some of the PJHQ staff had been plotting the attack based around bridges that hadn’t been built yet – and wouldn’t be until 1960.

“They’re going to have to be careful,” he said aloud, and cursed. The need for on-site intelligence was great enough to risk the SAS team, but their capture would be disastrous. The Germans would have no need to honour the Geneva Convention if they caught the SAS out of uniform – not that they would have done anyway – and anyone could be made to talk, given the right incentive.

“They’ll have to take a battleship up the fjord,” Chang said.

“Tricky unless the forts are taken out first,” Dwynn replied thoughtfully. A battleship could go up the fjord – if the captain was willing to risk a torpedo attack. The Norwegians had done that to the Germans in 1940, and Dwynn saw no reason to assume that the Germans could not do the same. “They’ve probably mined the fiord as well.”

“Not very well if they’re still letting fishermen out,” Chang said. “Didn’t the Sergeant find a job on one of the ships?”

Dwynn nodded. Forging the German identity papers had been easy. “Yes,” he said. “They might just be testing the minefields.” He chuckled. “If there are minefields, but I don’t think that we can rely on them overlooking that little detail.”

Chang jumped as a warning tone sounded. The little hut was isolated, but the team had taken care to scatter sensors around, watching for intruders. Dwynn grabbed his rifle, preparing to fight, before Chang chuckled. “It’s just Corporal Plummer,” he said.

“Good,” Dwynn said. He glared at the map. “I think they’ll be landing directly on the islands, which is going to be hazardous enough, and then marching overland to Bergen… except there are no bridges.”

“Send the first troops to clear the islands, then send in the minesweepers,” Chang suggested, as Plummer entered the cabin. “Morning, bastard.”

“Up yours,” Plummer replied. If he’d said anything else, the two men would have known that something was wrong. “Nothing much to report; there’s been no major change in German dispositions.”

Dwynn nodded. They’d estimated that the Wehrmacht had roughly an infantry division – around 17’000 men – in the region, but it had been parcelled out over the islands and Bergen itself. Hitler clearly didn’t consider Norway important; he’d used an older unit, with 1939-era equipment.

“Then we’d better inform the PJHQ,” he said. One of their first actions had been to set up a rely network; they could now transmit directly home. “You’ve been dumping all the data to them?”

“Teach grandma to suck eggs,” Chang said wryly. “Yes, sir; I have transmitted everything the sensors have recorded back to him.”

Dwynn grinned. How could the Germans possibility imagine the horde of high-tech gadgets that they’d been deploying around Bergen? Even if they had obtained some intelligence through their spies in America, how could they find them? The Germans might have been proud of the landline running through the Danish Sea – which had an unpronounceable name – but how could they know that the line had been tapped under the water?

“Excellent,” he said. “Let them know what we’ve found… and perhaps we can get back home.”

The Kremlin

Moscow, Russia

6th May 1941

Visiting the office of the man hailed as the saviour of communism was always a strain, but today it was worse than usual. Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov, Foreign Minister of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, had come to dread entering the room.

“The Finns are proving intransigent, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich,” Stalin said, without preamble. The invasion force in Finland had been cut down sharply as soon as the Finnish Army had been crushed – and then reinforced as the size and power of Finnish resistance became clear. “The British are aiding them.”

Molotov kept his face impassive. It was far more certain, he felt, that it was the Germans that were keeping the Finns afloat, working through their Swedish allies. After all, the Germans would hardly allow the British to sail supply convoys through the Baltic, would they?

“They must be punished,” Stalin said, and Molotov felt his heart fall. After the British had used a nuclear weapon in Romania, territory the Russians had long eyed, Stalin’s paranoia had reached new heights. Countless people who might have committed treason in the future had been executed, or sent to the gulags, and the efforts to exterminate the Muslims in the south had been intensified. The NKVD had even worked with the SS, exterminating… unwanted populations in the most brutal ways. Zhukov’s road, the massive logistics chain leading down through Georgia into Iran, had been built with the blood and sweat of the natives.

“The dialect will triumph,” Molotov said finally, aware of Stalin’s growing impatience. “Georgy Konstantinovich is preparing the new offensives now, to be launched in a week.”

“I want them launched today,” Stalin said, and Molotov quailed. “The Americans are in the war against the Germans, but how long will it be before the capitalists turn their attention to us?”

Molotov allowed himself a worried frown. Stalin’s intelligence was more rat bastard cunning than analytical, but there was no denying his ability to see patterns. The Americans knew that Stalin would have gotten the bomb – and would now get it earlier – and their Polish and Finnish lobbies were screaming for action against the Soviet Union as well as the Reich. Once Germany was defeated – with Adolf Hitler running the Reich Molotov had no doubt that that would be the outcome – the capitalists would have bases right at the frontiers of the motherland. It had been the motive behind seizing Iran… until the British had used a nuke.

Molotov shuddered. If the British weren’t scared of their own weapons, the war would have been over within weeks… and the Axis would have lost. It was the reason why the offensive had been slowed down – officially it was for logistics reasons and there was no denying that Zhukov’s logistics had been helped terribly – and why Stalin had dilly-dallied for three months.

Georgy Konstantinovich had been furious about it, although no one expressed such sentiments openly. A quirked eyebrow at the wrong time could get a man in the gulag; what would questioning Stalin’s judgment openly do? Still… if they’d pressed their own offensive, instead of focusing effort on exterminating the forerunners of the mad mullahs, they might have snatched all of the Middle East. Instead of using the German Ally, Subhas Chandra Bose, they could have marched into India themselves and smashed the Raj forever.

“Well, Comrade Vyacheslav Mikhailovich?” Stalin enquired. Molotov hastily dragged his attention back to the discussion. “How will the Americans react to our offensive?”

Molotov hid his sudden concern. “I hardly think that they will care, Comrade,” he said, knowing that the presumption of equality was nonsense. “The Middle East is strictly a British preserve, while the Indian… morass is even more so. The Americans are not yet dependent upon the oil wells” – and may never become so, he added silently – “and are nervous about the British rebuilding their tottering empire.”

He chuckled. “And as for the Indians, they haven’t been able to decide anything since the future arrived and the Japanese launched their offensive.” He didn’t bother to discuss the essential Japanese failure, or the forces being built up in the Far East for the day of reckoning. “They won’t have time to take action, will they?”

Stalin smiled. “Without the Americans, we will force the British out of their empire,” he said. “By now, some of our more… unpleasant weapons will have found their way into India. They should add to the panic and confusion… don’t you think?”

Molotov nodded. Inside, he was panicking. The British had been very clear on the subject; any use of a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ against them would draw a nuclear reaction. It had been the reason why Hitler had refused Stalin’s offer of some biological weapons to use against Britain, and the reason why he was scared. Biological weapons were uncontrollable by definition, and the invasion of Afghanistan had forced millions of people south, trying to flee the Soviets, often carrying their deaths with them.

“Now, what about production?” Stalin asked. “How long until we have jets, and space rockets, and atomic bombs?”

Molotov felt himself flinch; Stalin’s snake-smile grew wider. Sticky speaking, it wasn’t his responsibility, but the scientists had used him as their go-between for the months since the Transition. Stalin, having learnt of it, had added ‘Chief Scientist’ to Molotov’s titles – and expected him to know everything about science.

“Quite some time,” he admitted finally, having learnt the price of making false statements to Stalin.

“Hitler will be at our throats,” Stalin snapped. His face contorted with rage. “He’ll use the atomic bomb on us!”

“That’s not too likely,” Molotov said, and Stalin’s face purpled. “His science is almost as far behind the British as ours is. They must be facing the same difficulties as our own people.”

Stalin scowled. “Which are?”

Molotov kept his face impassive. They’d discussed the problems several times before. “We have to build a working reactor to make the… elements involved into elements that can explode, something very difficult,” he said. “There are several ways of doing this, but we don’t know which one is best, so we have to work through trial and error. Atomic science is something we don’t know much about, and the British have been careful to keep those secrets to themselves.

“Fortunately, we have supplies of the materials needed, uranium for example,” he continued. “We do have to build the massive facilities required for refining it into bomb-material, and then we have to produce the equipment needed to make the weapon detonate. All of that, Comrade, has to be accomplished under a cloak of secrecy, both from the fascists and the British, who will not want us to develop a nuclear weapon.”

Stalin stared at him for a moment longer than was comfortable. “We are expanding our own production of the material,” Molotov said. “With distributed sites in the Urals and Siberia, we will be able to produce a bomb in two years, perhaps less if we work at it.”

“See to it,” Stalin purred. “Now, about the other production?”

“Military rockets such as the Germans are developing are about a year away,” Molotov said. “We cannot use them to any tactical use; they are rather inaccurate. The scientists are working on refining their guidance system, but for the moment we’ll have to use them as city-hitting missiles, and they can’t carry enough explosive to really do damage.”

“We’ll have to merge them with the atomic bomb,” Stalin said thoughtfully. “Jets?”

Molotov smiled. “We will have our first fighter jet within six months, thanks to the technology transferrals from Germany,” he said. “The Red Air Force is convinced that they will make us equals to the British.”

“Excellent,” Stalin said. His moustache twitched alarmingly; Molotov knew that someone in the Red Air Force would pay eventually for what he was certain was a lie. “Now, Comrade… we have a parade to watch.”

Molotov scowled. Stalin’s new habit of appearing at windows to watch the military machines march past was distressingly Tsarist. Still, it was reassuring… to anyone who had not seen the British tanks in action.

* * *

The man looked down as the tanks rumbled by, showing off Soviet might to the citizens before being sent to the front with Germany. British Intelligence suggested that Stalin would be sending the new T-34s and the even newer JS-2s to the German border, just in case. A handful would make their way south, but the Soviets seemed to have decided to swamp the far more advanced British tanks with sheer numbers. He bowed his head, knowing that few would recognise him without his trademark moustache and famous dark hair, now greyed by British science. Still, this was Stalin’s Russia, and care had to be taken.

It had taken a chain of events out of a science-fiction novel and a scheme worthy of the worst spy novels, but Leon Trotsky had finally returned to Russia. The story of his escape from the NKVD hadn’t been published by any newspapers, and not just because it hadn’t had big tits. The crypto-communists – they called themselves socialists – who had rescued him had expected him to lead them to glory, but Trotsky knew better. Once he’d gotten over the shock of knowing that he would have died in August if they hadn’t rescued him, he’d plunged into researching the USSR under Stalin – and knew that it had to be destroyed.

The bastard has betrayed the Revolution, he thought again, as Stalin appeared at the window. Trotsky wished for a weapon, something that could be used on the Georgian, but his handlers had been very clear on the subject; Stalin was not to be harmed until everything else was ready. He lowered his gaze again and stood at attention as the crowds sang the National Anthem. It wasn’t the tune he remembered, but something new, something darker.

Sheep, he thought, as the crowd dispersed under the glares of the NKVD personnel. He headed back to his own flat, dodging old women with food and fuel, slipping through the streets he had once known perfectly. Stalin’s new economic policy, breaking up the collective farms and allowing limited free enterprise, seemed to be bearing fruit. Trotsky cursed, wondering where the idea had come from. If all the farms were producing food, there would be less incentive for the Russian peoples to riot.

The flat itself was one of a block of flats that had been erected in 1930 for one of the industrial plans. Trotsky remembered some of the plans they’d had, back before Lenin died… and left Stalin in power. Stalin’s focus these days was on his own power; the army would be strong, the NKVD would be strong… and the people could live and die for Comrade Stalin.

He pushed open the door, feeling a tingle run down his spine as the electrostatic field reacted with one of the small devices he’d been given, signalling that it was fine to come in. Soviet field craft was good, but MI6 had developed it to a fine art… and as long as the Russians didn’t develop computers, they would have no way of knowing that there were more than a few forged identity papers running around. The flat looked normal, and even if the NKVD launched a midnight raid, they would find nothing.

Trotsky walked up the stairs, noting how they were crumpling under the impact of lack of maintenance and tapped on the door. The silent man who opened it – Trotsky had never heard him speak once – looked him up and down, before standing aside and waving him into the flat. It was a large one, designed to hold an entire family, and provided plenty of room for the headquarters.

The bedroom had been designed for the husband and wife and perhaps some of their children. There was only one person in the room, an older woman dressed like a Babushka. She wore a shawl over her hair, her darkened skin made her seem frail. She’d been introduced to him as Natasha Yar, the only name he’d been given for the head of station. Naturally, the British Embassy of 1940 had been shut down when the war began; no one knew what had happened to the ambassador and his staff.

“Mr Trotsky,” Natasha said. He’d never been able to convince her to use his first name. Her Russian was perfect, she’d adapted far better to Stalin’s Russia than she had. It had been a nightmarish trip from Leningrad to Moscow, but it would have been a lot harder without her smoothing the way.

“The sheep were on the streets again,” Trotsky said. “Miss Yar, I don’t think that we’ll be able to trigger a revolt any time soon.”

“Perhaps,” Natasha said. “We have been recruiting some of the street children.”

Trotsky felt his blood run cold. The street children were considered criminals; if the NKVD caught them, they would not be gentle. “We have also been printing the new leaflets at the other base.”

Trotsky scowled. He didn’t know where that base was. He wasn’t certain if Natasha knew. “They won’t care,” he said. “They won’t care about the Poles” – he’d led the campaign against them in 1921 – “and they won’t care about the black-asses in Iran.”

“They might care about Romania,” Natasha said. “Look, I know what you mean, and I do understand. However, we have very little choice, until the war ends, we have to play the cards we have.”

Trotsky nodded reluctantly. “They’re being well fed for the first time in ages,” he said. “Perhaps they’ll start thinking about something else.”

Chapter Seventeen: Red Storm Rising

Red Army Headquarters

Nr Abadan, Iran

7th May 1941

Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, General of the Armies and Hero of the Soviet Union, shifted uncomfortably inside his uniform in the blazing heat. It had been one reason why he’d been pushing for the invasion to begin; his men became far less effective as the heat rose for summer. According to his history files, the Red Army would have launched a similar campaign – with the aid of the British – later in the year, but he was suspecting that that would have been a disaster. The files grew vague once the Great Patriotic War began.

Zhukov scowled. The NKVD, the Army Commissioners, the GRU and Stalin himself, all of them had vetted the information that had been provided to lower-ranking people – and even a General was low-ranking compared to them. He knew better than to grumble openly – the NKVD had spies everywhere – but it was annoying. His laptop, one of thirteen within the USSR, would have been far more effective if it had been left with all the files it had once held.

At least I got into the history books, he thought. The NKVD had smuggled a handful from America to Russia, including one written by Zhukov himself. How Stalin had laughed before passing it on with a few pages torn from the end. Still, the months of delay had allowed them to consolidate their position and strengthen their logistics – which had been the reason given to the Red Army for the delay.

“Comrade General?”

Zhukov nodded politely at Commissioner Petrovich. The Political Commissioner – a tall vampire-like man with pale skin and a mouth like a slapped arse – was unhappy. He’d been unhappy ever since the Politburo – which meant Stalin – had removed most of the Commissioners powers. It was no longer within his abilities to tell Zhukov to attack or to retreat, only to give the men their political indoctrination.

“Is the attack finally ready?” Petrovich asked. His voice worked its way up and down the scale. He’d been just as bored as Zhukov, and he’d had less to do. There was no need to indoctrinate the Iranians, not when Comrade Stalin had decreed their enslavement and extermination.

Zhukov nodded. He’d argued against that policy as much as he had dared; the Iranian resistance was growing stronger, even with the hordes of Russian soldiers that were moving in daily as the Red Army grew stronger and stronger. Russia had almost limitless numbers of untrained men, suitable only as occupation troops, and they were enjoying Iran, particularly the Iranian women.

“We’ll move as soon as dawn breaks,” he said. He would have preferred to move at night, but even the improved Red Army didn’t possess the amount of equipment necessary to make that work without making a complete fuck-up of it. “The scouts are out now.”

“The dunes are alive with the sound of shooting,” Petrovich said. Zhukov looked at him; he would have never figured Petrovich for a romantic. “Won’t they know we’re coming?”

Just for a while, Zhukov would have liked one of the Commissioners who’d fought in the Civil War, ones who had really understood warfare. Petrovich knew very little beyond Communism – and he would never make a theorist.

“Perhaps,” he said finally. There was no such thing as a ‘front’ in the desert war; the British had their bases and the Russians had theirs, and there was a giant strip of No Man’s Land in between. Every day or so, there would be a skirmish; ground troops on patrol running into each other, tribesmen clashing with one side or the other, spies and sabotage teams… and even the occasional air battle between both sides aircraft. Zhukov scowled again; the British had won all of those so far.

“They won’t know that much is happening,” he said finally. “They have very good reconnaissance, but we have successfully hidden some of the main force of tanks, and we have massive patrols around our bases. At dawn, when I give the signal, the advance will begin.”

Petrovich nodded. He’d given his approval to the plan, but both men knew that it had been purely formal. In effect, the entire South Iranian Front was to advance to Basra and Kuwait, taking the ancient city and securing Iran, before plunging a dagger into Iraq. If the Germans joined in, a joint attack could be mounted against Baghdad, ending the Iraqi Government. Iraq wasn’t the easiest place to attack – and the British had had experience of fighting there before from their perspective – but Zhukov had learnt three things from the war. The first was that the British had limited resources and they were reluctant to use them too much. The second was that they were scared of causing civilian casualties; hardly a concern of either of their opponents. Finally, they had superiority in many fields, but superior numbers and an unflinching refusal to be bullied into making mistakes could offset them to some degree.

“Yes, Comrade General,” he said finally. “Are you going to make a speech to the troops?”

Zhukov shook his head. “That’s the responsibility of the sergeants and their captains,” he said. “We have to develop some small-unit initiative; the British act faster than we do.”

“I suppose,” Petrovich said, who didn’t think much of the concept of giving anyone additional authority. “They might make the wrong decisions.”

Zhukov smiled. “You remember when they blanketed our radios?” He asked, referring to the Battle for Abadan, the local oil centre in Iran. Unlike the Germans, the Russians used few enough radios… and when the British had jammed them, the entire attack had almost collapsed. “I would sooner have them firing at the enemy than milling around waiting for orders.”

Petrovich nodded. Nearly three thousand infantrymen and thirty tanks had been lost when they’d just stopped and waited for orders. The British aircraft had struck them on the ground.

Zhukov checked his watch. “Only two hours, Comrade Commissioner,” he said. “Better get some sleep. Once it begins, the attack won’t stop for tea and biscuits.”

* * *

It was what the RAF called a target-rich environment. Countless tanks and lorries, all built to clumsy Russian specifications, were moving along the desert, along roads that were almost none-existent or off the roads altogether. Sergeant Adams noted their presence from his hiding place, far too close to the Russian base for comfort.

Not very subtle, the Russians, he thought, as yet another patrol tramped past his hiding place. The little cave was very comfortable – he could even listen to music – and there were plenty of sensors scattered around, monitoring the Russians. A transmitter, concealed in a rock, relayed his reports and the sensor recordings.

“Stupid tank,” he muttered, as a stream of weird tanks glided past, puffing up smoke. The T-28 carried no less than three turrets, spinning independently to give it a complete coverage of the firing region. It would be a nightmare to attack with Contemporary technology – indeed; the online database reported that it had given the Finns nightmares. A dull roar split the air as a massive flight of aircraft darkened the sky, roaring over Basra and Kuwait. The dull pounding of long-range fire could be heard, pounding the defence lines of the cities.

Shaking his head, he rolled back over to the computer and began tapping out a report. General Flynn would have already been alerted by the FLASH signal he’d sent when the Russians began manoeuvring, but he had to know as much as he could. The storm was finally about to break… and the British had to react.

Forward Command Post

RAF Habbaniyah, Iraq

7th May 1941

No one could understand how it had survived, but survive it had; an oasis of British power in the centre of Iraq. The RAF had flown Harriers and Jaguars from the base before the Germans advanced into Turkey, and it was now serving as the centre of military control. Only a handful of ground-support and troop transport aircraft were based there now; it was too risky. If the enemy – either one – managed to get within artillery range, they could shut the base down within minutes.

General Flynn pulled himself to his feet as the klaxons sounded, alerting the base that the war was about to hot up again. A flurry of electronic signals were already flickering out, alerting the commanders of the various army deployments scattered around Iraq, watching for the Soviets. Others went to the forces closer to the German fronts; alerting them in case of a simultaneous offensive.

“Report,” he snapped, as he strode into the situation room. It had been extensively modified, even though it was mostly for show; some of the equipment was back in Arabia. The danger of some of it falling into German or Soviet hands was too great.

Privately, Flynn thought that it was nonsense, but the Germans had already shown themselves way too adaptable for British peace of mind. Even seeing a British item could inspire them to solve previously unsolvable problems, and God only knew what would encourage a German genius to create a new and deadly weapon.

“We have a major Soviet offensive developing,” Major Gatling reported grimly. The former SAS officer who now limped around as a result of a mission in the Balkans he refused to discuss waved a hand at the screens. “The drones are overhead now, spying on them and reporting their movements.”

Flynn nodded. “Where are they going?”

“Basra seems to be the first target,” Gatling reported. He glared down at the display. “The Iraqis are already taking fire from long-range guns moved up overnight.”

Flynn scowled. He’d hoped never to have to work with Arabs again; at least the British-born Muslims understood some of the rudiments of modern war. The remains of the Iraqi Government had gone all out building a series of defence lines around the city that could have been cracked in an hour by the British.

“The Iraqis are screaming for our help,” Captain Margaret Flannery said. Assigning the gorgeous Captain – who had very impressive skills in unarmed combat – to liaison officer had been intended as revenge for Iraqi incompetence.  She short-circuited their thinking processes; they were almost grateful when Flynn ‘rescued’ them.

“Bother,” Flynn said mildly. The majority of the British force in the region, Force Basra, was stationed near Basra, at the old base ten miles south of the city. The Iraqis themselves had nearly ten thousand men – mainly conscripted refugees from the north – in the city themselves, but few of them were worth anything. The Arab Legions that the British were training, as part of their citizenship for the Republic of Arabia, were nowhere like ready.

“They’re saying that they will implement your plan now,” Flannery said. Flynn chuckled; his plan, which had involved defending Basra with minimum force and outflanking the Soviets, would take more time than they had. The marshes north of Basra would have made a formidable obstacle – if the Iraqis had listened and prepared them for defence. It was the eternal problem of the Middle East; the governments dared not appoint strong and competent generals, because they would be overthrown.

“Tell them… tell them to suck them into the city,” Flynn said, knowing just how many would die. “Tell them… we’re sending what help we can.”

“Yes, sir,” Flannery said.

“Air Commodore Cromwell on line two,” Captain Ransom reported. “Here, sir.”

Flynn took the phone. “Flynn,” he said. “I need you to get in the air.”

“Wilco,” Cromwell said, without arguing. “Do you have any particular targets in mind?”

Flynn stared over at the display. The Soviet air formation was heading towards Basra, far too many to be swatted out of the air. It was one of the odder details of their strange war; the RAF, which had far superior aircraft, needed landing strips, while the Red Air Force could land almost anywhere. On the other hand, the RAF had far better coordination and was almost invulnerable – as long as the missile supply held out.

“Hit their guns, and then the tanks,” he said. Not for the first time, he wished that he had been able to convince the Prime Minister to authorise the use of gas; that would have shut down the Soviet airfields. A thought struck him and he tapped his PDA, issuing orders to the submerged submarine in the Gulf; ordering it to fire its Tomahawks at the airfields, when the Russians were trying to land.

He closed the connection and stared up at the German icons on the map. They remained where they were, unmoving. Scouts and some of the SAS troops reported that they didn’t seem to be preparing for an offensive. He gave orders to have them watched, wishing that the space program would hurry up and give them some more recon satellites.

Another phone rang. “Sir, it’s the Prime Minister,” Captain Ransom said.

That bastard finds out everything, Flynn thought, with genuine admiration. “Put him through.” There was a pause. “Yes, Prime Minister?”

Over Iraq/Iran Border

Nr Basra

7th May 1941

Flying Officer Mick Eccleston sucked in a breath as the scope of the Soviet offensive became clear. Little else had quite the same scope; even the American Invasion of Syria hadn’t been so… impressive. There were thousands of tanks and thousands of lorries and thousands of aircraft, and even though none of them matched his Harrier, he wondered if there weren’t enough of them to make good the difference.

I wonder if Stalin made his famous quote about quantity having a quality all of its own yet, he thought, as he banked the Harrier high over the battlefield. Smoke and flames were already rising up from Basra as the Soviets began bombing and shelling the city, aiming more at random than at any particular target. The Soviet planes had no way of knowing that he was here; the Russians hadn’t deployed a radar station to Iran.

A good thing too, he thought, as the Harrier turned slowly, its flight computer receiving updates from the sensors scattered around Basra and the AWACS, far to the south. The Harrier was carrying a new weapon, one that few in the MOD approved of, and it was handling sluggishly. The bombs it carried were very sensitive; a single lucky shot and the Harrier would explode violently.

“Alpha flight, your targets are at the following location,” the AWACS said, and read out a series of coordinates. Eccleston nodded; the location was only five miles away from Basra. “Alpha-one is to engage, Alpha-others to wait for result.”

“Understood,” Eccleston said, and swooped over the battlefield. Even handling sluggishly, he found his target within minutes, a massive line of guns, spread out over the desert.

“Now that’s clever,” Alpha-two muttered. At least twice during the war, the counter-battery fire from the Army had triggered a chain reaction among the Soviet guns, destroying entire regiments with a single shell. The Soviet NKVD had been busy, installing so much fear that the guns were spread out… and the ammunition far to the rear.

“Designating targets,” Eccleston said. “Target one; main gun position, centre hit. Target two; ammunition supply, centre hit.”

The Harrier steadied itself, high over the battlefield, its laser designator defining the target. “Releasing weapons,” Eccleston said, and the Harrier dropped the weapons. The two bombs fell away, tiny rockets on each guiding them towards the two targets. “Weapons on target.”

There was a sudden blast of fire. The thermobaric weapons, sometimes referred to as a fuel-air explosive, detonated, forcing a wave of fire forward across the Soviet position. Triggering the ammunition supplies only added to the chaos; the blast was hot enough to melt steel. Before they could react, an entire artillery regiment was destroyed.

“Target destroyed,” Eccleston said dispassionately, watching as men ran screaming, flames licking at their bodies. They’d been lucky; they’d only gotten a little of the volatile liquid – they hadn’t been told what the fuel was – on their bodies. They might survive…

Guess not, he thought, as other men shot down the men. He guessed they were NKVD; they certainly had the right attitude for the task. Didn’t the Russians take any care of their men?

“Alpha-one, return to base,” the AWACS said. “Alpha-other, engage the enemy at the following targets, then return to base.”

“I’m not to engage the enemy?” Eccleston asked, and then looked down at his display. The Russians had thousands of planes in the air; what could one Harrier do against such a cloud? The ground-based weapons were taking a toll of the Russians, but there weren’t enough weapons to make a real difference and…

“I guess quantity does have a quality of its own,” he said, and turned the Harrier around, heading back to the base.

Battlezone

Nr Basra

7th May 1941

Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev trembled as he held his rifle, the strange future Russian weapon that had come back to the past, along with the detailed histories of those who had betrayed Stalin – and Stalin’s memory. Khrushchev shuddered; his meeting with Stalin’s henchman had been chilling.

“In the future, you will betray our great leader,” Beria had said, and read out articles that he had – would have – written. He was supposed to have served as a political commissioner, but instead… he’d been reduced to the ranks and sent to a penal battalion. His membership in the politburo had lasted only a year, before Stalin had learnt about the future. The only survivor had been Kliment Voroshilov, the utterly incompetent Marshal of the Soviet Union, who had apparently lived a charmed life after losing in Finland.

Perhaps someone will take advantage of his command of the 1st Guards, Khrushchev thought coldly, glaring around the lorry. At least Zhukov wasn’t making them walk to the front, as Voroshilov had made the heroes of Finland walk; he understood that even a penal battalion needed to be rested to be effective.

The lorry stopped with a jerk as the sound of the guns grew louder. “Out, traitors,” an NKVD guard snapped, opening the back of the lorry. He wore nothing on his uniform except the green tabs and his rank badge, who knew; the men who had been Great once might be Great again.

Khrushchev took a moment to check the terrain; it was all desert behind them, and some green ahead. Ahead of them, Khrushchev could see smoke rising from a trench, skilfully dug into the ground, with men watching the Soviets carefully. Behind the trench, there was a river, and then another trench and marshes surrounding it. He shuddered as some of his experience came back to the fore; taking the trench would be difficult even for young men, let alone the old men in the group.

“That’s your target,” the NKVD man said. “Take it, distinguish yourselves, and the Great Stalin will let you live. Fail and they’ll kill you; did you know that the last Russian to be caught by the black-asses was brutally murdered?”

“No,” Khrushchev murmured, as he shouldered his rifle and took command. The older men, those who were in their sixties, were useless – and he wondered what Zhukov had been thinking.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” The NKVD man asked. Khrushchev sighed and turned to his men. “Move it,” the NKVD man snapped.

“You four, head left around the trench,” Khrushchev ordered, thinking his way through the occupation. Stalin’s forgiveness was worth risking their lives for. “You five, head right. Everyone else, with me.”

He smiled as they snapped to attention. He’d sent the elderly on the suicide missions, while he’d kept the younger men with him. They weren’t young, not in the sense that the NKVD man was, but they were fit and had experience. Smiling for the first time, Khrushchev lifted his rifle and led the charge.

Chapter Eighteen: The Centre Can Hold

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

10th May 1041

Hanover had resisted calling a full meeting of the War Cabinet for three days, waiting to see how the situation would develop before the British made any decisions. There had been enough excuses; General Flynn was a competent officer and one who was trusted, and there were arrangements to be made with the Americans. Patton’s army had moved on to practicing against Scottish terrain that reassembled Norway, at least to some degree. General Cunningham, who’d laughed himself silly after the first drills, had grudgingly conceded that Patton might just know what he was doing after all.

Hanover shook his head grimly as the War Cabinet settled in. There was a difference in culture between the 2015 British and the Americans; who had expected that the Americans would make such a fuss about an interracial bar? It had nearly sparked off a second major riot, now that a handful of black support troops had arrived. British publicans let them in on principle – the principle of making as much money as possible – only to discover that white troopers were not amused.

He nodded grimly to Eisenhower as the American joined them. He’d asked Eisenhower here specifically, if only so that the American could see them at work. It had perhaps been a mistake. Still, the American had to see the war in the Middle East, the one being fought against an enemy just as dangerous as Hitler himself.

“This meeting of the War Cabinet will come to order,” he said. Eisenhower had been a hit up at the Palace; he’d been astonished to see the picture of his visit to the United Kingdom as an older man – and as an American President. “The most important item on the agenda is the situation in the Middle East. Major Stirling?”

Stirling took control of the main display. “Three days ago,” he said, without preamble, “the Russians launched a major offensive towards Basra, swinging round to Kuwait. There were a brutal series of tank battles near Kuwait, and then we forced them back with the loss of a handful of Chieftains and Arabian Fireflies. Post-battle analysis suggests that we killed upward of a hundred Soviet tanks, but in the confusion it was hard to be certain.

“Basra itself was hammered by the Soviets,” Stirling continued. “They breached the Arab lines – you will remember General Flynn’s remarks on the subject – and tried to force their way into the city. Resistance was brutal and continues; the Soviets are facing a Stalingrad in Basra. It’s nothing like it was in 2003; both sides are fighting tooth and nail. The main line seems to have stabilised on the Euphrates – we’ve rushed forward some anti-tank weapons and have managed to halt the main Soviet offensive from crossing the river. Unfortunately, given the way they’re hammering away with long-range guns, there won’t be much of the city left.”

“They’re trying to burn us up in close-quarters combat,” General Cunningham said grimly. “Prime Minister, we might have to abandon Basra and fall back into open territory.”

“The King has already fled to Arabia,” Stirling said. “In the air, the Soviets have taken serious losses, but there’s so many of them. We’ve lost seven Harriers and one Jaguar, although we’re not sure what happened to that one. It may not be possible to withdraw from Basra, and if we tried, we’d risk a panic in the Iraqi ranks.”

Hanover scowled. “What exactly do we have in the city?”

“We have the better part of an infantry brigade, equipped with anti-tank weapons, and a scratch force equipped with anti-aircraft weapons,” Stirling said. “As you know, the Iraqis insisted that they defend the city using our weapons, which, to be fair, they are doing a good job.”

“Prime Minister, if we put the troops in, they’ll be burned away,” General Cunningham said grimly.

“We won’t put more troops in the city,” Hanover said, who’d been thinking very rapidly. “Has there been any movement from the Germans or the Baghdad front?”

“None, sir,” Stirling said. “It’s weird; there’s a war going on in the south and the north is quiet. It’s like they want us to fight it out in Basra.”

“They do,” Hanover said. “Up there is perfect tank terrain; our advantages come to the fore. Who said that the Soviets were stupid?”

“They want us to commit to holding Basra at all costs,” Cunningham said slowly. “In a week, we could have fed upwards of ten thousand troops into a city where all their advantages are minimised. Then they move forward and stab us in the heart.”

“So… we don’t play their game,” Hanover said. “Options?”

Cunningham glared up at the map. He’d become a general when battles were planned out stage by stage. Still, he’d shown a talent for off-the-cuff improvisation and it was a British military trait. The original battle for Basra had been a cakewalk, even though both MI6 and the CIA hadn’t understood the real lurking dangers.

“We have two options,” he said thoughtfully. “The first one is that we withdraw from Basra, along with whatever Iraqi units will come with us, and set up a defence line north of Kuwait. Combined with the hammering we’re giving their airfields, we can hold them there and break them.”

Noreen Adam coughed delicately. Hanover smiled; Eisenhower had been puzzled to see a woman wrapped in a black headscarf. “What’s to stop them launching an attack across the channel?”

“The entire Iranian Navy, more or less, escaped before their ports fell,” Cunningham said. “We have it now, based in Arabia. They would need a major fleet to launch such an attempt and we’ve seen no signs that they have one.”

He looked across at Hanover. “The second option is different,” he said. “We can launch an offensive of our own at the Soviet forces near Baghdad. The terrain isn’t that bad for tanks, so we could do it… except that would wake them up for certain. We might end up being faced with two bleeding sores, instead of one.”

Hanover scowled. Whoever was in command of the Russian forces knew what they were doing. “Have we been jamming their radios?”

Cunningham scowled. It was a sore subject; the PJHQ had originally decided that that ability would be best kept under wraps until an invasion of Germany itself could be mounted, but the desperate battles around Abadan had forced General Flynn to order it deployed… stopping the Soviet attack in its tracks.

“Yes, Prime Minister,” he said finally. “Unfortunately, they’re showing much better tactical abilities than they were five months ago. We fucked up their radios but good in the battles near Kuwait, but they kept coming anyway.”

Hanover nodded. “I think we’d better stick with option one,” he said. “After all, we might just have jammed up the signal to attack. Tell Air Commodore Cromwell that he is to keep some Jaguars on reserve; if the Soviet divisions move, they’re to be stamped on as hard as possible.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Cunningham said. “The FAE weapons worked as advertised.”

Armin Prushank, the Minister for War Production, spoke in his dry-as-dust voice. “Production of the weapons should continue to increase,” he said. “Priority will be to send them to the Middle East.”

“Unfortunately, they might also be needed in Australia,” Admiral Joan Grisham said. She smiled wryly at the map. “The Japanese are preparing an offensive.”

Hanover scowled. “They’re doing it to us again,” he snapped. “Hitting us everywhere at once.”

“They’ve screwed up the coordination this time,” Grisham said. “However, we do have a problem in Australia. You see… we had a lucky accident and caught a Japanese courier ship.”

Hanover smiled faintly. “Does that make up for the lost sub?”

“Not really, but at least we now know what they have in mind,” Grisham said. “They’re going to jump on Australia.”

“They’re out of their tiny minds,” Stirling breathed. “A third of the Royal Navy is there.”

Grisham nodded. “The production of SSKs is coming along well,” she said. “By early next year, we can put an end to the Empire of Japan. This is their last throw of the dice, Prime Minister, and they’re going to put everything into it. The reports from Burma suggest that they’re building up there as well, as well as the… program in China.”

Hanover made a face. The Japanese seemed to be moving to China en mass, forcing the Chinese out of their cities and away from the countryside. It was bad enough with the diseases rampaging through China – and Hanover knew that Porton Down harboured suspicions about the origins of the diseases – but with the Japanese moving in as if the Chinese were intruders in their own homes…

“The linchpin of the defence is the fleet,” Grisham said. “The Japanese plan is simple; the remains of the Combined Fleet will sortie towards Canada. If they reach Canada, they will attack Vancouver and the RCN ships based nearby.”

Cunningham frowned. “I’m no naval man,” he said, “but they must know they’ll be seen.”

“That’s the point,” Grisham said. “The idea is that we’ll send the Royal Navy after them, seek a battle like the last one. While we’re sinking the Combined Fleet, the invasion force is landing.”

Hanover scowled. “They don’t stand a chance,” he said. “They must know that.”

Grisham nodded. “Admiral Turtledove took the liberty of devising a plan,” she said. Hanover scowled; the Admiral was something of a sore spot. “It’s one that will allow us to have our cake and eat it as well.”

She explained quickly. Hanover felt his mouth fall open. “Is he quite mad?” He demanded. “That would be…”

“It would work,” Grisham said. “In fact, it would work in our favour in the long run.”

Hanover gazed up at the map. It had been something he had been dreading, and Turtledove’s plan would solve one nasty problem. Still, if word got out… and with the American in the room, doing it under the table would be impossible.

“I’ll consult with Prime Minister Menzies and General Blamey,” Hanover said. “If they approve, then this mad plan can go ahead. If they disapprove, then we can send some submarines north and put the Japanese off the mad plan for good.”

Sicily

Italian Territory

10th May 1041

The toe of Italian territory had almost been stripped of Italians, particularly after learning of the role that various mafia factions would play in later battles, leaving only a token defence force of Italians, stiffened by Germans that would be more than willing to shoot the Italians in the back if they stepped out of line. As a result, the Germans were able to operate almost unwatched, except for the ever-present recon drones floating high overhead.

General Kurt Student, one of the Luffwaffe’s premier generals, stepped onto the tarmac of a hidden runway and nodded to the man waiting for him under the awning. Almost the entire 1st Fallschirmjäger Division, the paratroopers, was gathered here and in bases on Italy itself, preparing for their most desperate mission. They’d expected to have been used to take Crete, as they had in the original history, but Greek resistance had folded rapidly.

“Heil Hitler,” he snapped, forming a perfect Nazi salute. He dropped it almost as quickly, moving forward to give the man a hug. “Christ, Wilhelm; it’s good to see you again.”

General-Lieutenant Wilhelm Süssmann, commander of the 1st Fallschirmjäger Division, returned the hug. “You too, sir,” he said. “We’re ready and waiting for the command.”

“You go in an hour,” Student said. He tapped the Ritterkreuz, the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross, he wore. “The victory at Crete proved the superiority of the new tactics, and you know what you’re doing.” He sighed. “I wish I was going with you.”

Süssmann laughed. “I wish you were coming as well, sir,” he said.

Student chuckled. “I always knew you had it in for me,” he said. “Wilhelm, don’t lose this battle, ok?”

Süssmann nodded, suddenly serious. “We’ll do this or die trying,” he said. “Sir, will you address the men?”

Student nodded. Süssmann shouted a command and the men lined up. Student inspected them all proudly. “You are some of the finest men Germany has produced,” he said, and they cheered. “No, you are the finest men, and today you will make Germany proud of you!”

He paced along the lines, looking for a single error by force of habit. “Your task is to take the British Island of Malta and deny it to our enemies,” he said. “You know your mission, so understand; if you lose radio communications, or the commanders, press on anyway. Do not fail; this battle could decide the war!”

He sighed. They’d built as much redundancy into the system as they could, designating no less than fifty commanding officers for the 10’000-strong division. Every transport plane and glider that Student could scrape up was here, new planes and old, ready to descend on the tiny island. He knew he should be confident, but the future history told of the near-defeat of the commandos on Crete. The 7500 troops waiting in Taranto would be useless; despite the plans of the Kriegsmarine, Student knew that they would be unable to cross the sea unless a miracle happened.

“I know that you will all do your duty,” he thundered, and the men cheered again. “Go now and win glory!”

Malta

Mediterranean Sea

10th May 1041

HMS Warspite hung at anchor near Malta. In his stateroom, Admiral Somerville contemplated the reports from the Middle East, and the far more private report from Lord Linlithgow. The battles were punishing the British Army, sometimes quite badly, but it was also forging something new, a new camaraderie between new and old forces. Now that most Contemporary forces had been reequipped, their combat power could only increase, and they were becoming more and more equal to the 2015 forces.

I imagine Smuts will be pleased, Somerville thought absently. He scowled as his pager rang, and then the alarms started to ring. He jumped to his feet as the watch officer called for him to come to the CIC, and then the ship brought up its engines. Somerville, an old sea dog, had no difficulty in keeping his feet, but it added a new urgency to the situation. He made his way along the corridors into the CIC, cursing the sudden change in the ship’s motion.

“Report,” he snapped, as he entered the room. He caught sight of the big display and swore. Red icons were rising up from Italy, dozens of them.

“We have a major raid in progress,” Tom said. The young officer was already hard at work with his beloved computers. “So far, there are at least three hundred German aircraft forming up over Sicily.”

Somerville cursed. He’d read enough of the future history books to have a good idea of what the Germans were trying to do. “It’s an invasion,” he said grimly. “Alert Malta.”

“Already done,” Tom assured him. “They will have received the warning as soon as we did.”

Somerville shook his head. He wasn’t sure what he felt about the automated warning progress, but it was far more effective than telephone calls. “Order them to confirm that they’ve taken defensive positions,” he said. “Warn London and then warn the commander in the Middle East.”

“They’ll have picked up the warning, but I’ll forward it anyway,” Tom said. “Sir, the RAF is scrambling from Tunisia and Ark Royal is launching her Sea Harriers.”

Somerville stared down at the display. No one needed to brief him on the status of his ships; their computers kept his automatically updated. The Italians – he still thought of them that way – wouldn’t take too long to reach Malta, and when they did, they would try to land. He’d studied Crete; he knew why the British had lost in the original history.

“Tom,” he said slowly, “can your radars tell which German aircraft is what type?”

“To within a high degree of probability,” Tom said. “The radars can sort them out… ah, ten minutes until they get here.”

“Germans are very good on the ground,” Somerville said, more to himself. It didn’t seem sporting somehow. “On the other hand, if we designate their transports and gliders for the first targets… they won’t get near the ground.”

“Good thinking,” Tom said. Somerville glared at him. Tom didn’t notice. “I think there are fifty gliders and seventy transport aircraft,” he said. “I’m transmitting orders to the linked batteries now.”

Somerville nodded to himself. It was one of the reasons he liked the CIC; he could issue orders and they would be obeyed at once. Unless a ship was in serious danger, its anti-aircraft weapons would move automatically on his command.

“Fire,” he said. “Sweep the skies clean.”

* * *

General-Lieutenant Wilhelm Süssmann barely felt the warm trickle in his pants as a streak of light lanced up at his glider… and swept past them to slam into a transport. The massive transport simply vaporised in a blast of fire; the entire battle was rapidly becoming a nightmare. Strange aircraft swept past, firing madly at the Luffwaffe aircraft, which tried to fight back as best as they could.

They’re picking us off, Süssmann realised, as a burst of tracer fire swept through a glider. He shuddered and closed his eyes as the glider fell out of the sky and plunged towards the ocean before levelling off. The pilot, a Luffwaffe ace, knew what he was doing. Malta rose up ahead of them as the glider swooped down and crash-landed.

“Everyone out, move, move,” Süssmann snapped, grabbing his machine pistol. They had come down on a field; he drew in a breath as he realised how lucky they’d been. It was the last breath he took as the emplaced troops opened fire. Before he could react, the machine guns had fired, and ripped the glider and his troops from end to end. There were no survivors.

* * *

Somerville allowed himself a smile as the reports came in. Only a couple of hundred Germans had landed, pretty badly beaten up by the flight, and had been quickly rounded up or killed. The air battles were going well; the RAF was hammering the Luffwaffe, which was trying to cover the gliders. Seven ships had been hit, three quite badly, but the Mediterranean Fleet had survived.

“Admiral, I think they’re leaving,” Tom said.

Somerville checked his watch. The entire battle had lasted nearly thirty minutes, including the time it had taken for the Germans to reach the battlezone. Avenging RAF aircraft had swooped north over Italy, pounding German airfields and striking back at the Nazi oppressors. The Germans had attacked Algeria as well, using long-ranged bombers, but they’d failed to do much to the nation.

“It does seem that way, doesn’t it,” Somerville said. Part of him was recoiling; the Germans had been swept out of the sky with brutal efficiency. Another part of him was exulting at the victory – and it had been a victory.

“Admiral, the Germans have gone,” Captain Jameson said. “Permission to stand down?”

Somerville smiled. “Granted,” he said. He shook his head in awe. “I suppose I’d better make my report to London; this is the sort of news they like to have quickly.” He pointed a single finger at Tom. “Don’t tell me,” he said. “They already know.”

Chapter Nineteen: Good German, Bad German

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

11th May 1941

“The Germans attempted to take Malta,” Stirling said. Hanover nodded grimly, only half-listening. “It was a total defeat.”

Hanover smiled. “I dare say that the Contemporaries will be pleased,” he said. “What happened?”

“They tried to land a parachute assault like they would have done on Crete,” Stirling said. The Oversight Committee had warned of the danger almost from Day One. “The radars picked out the transports and they got wiped out of the sky. They must have lost almost the entire division.”

Hanover smiled. “How bad was it for us?”

Stirling glanced down at the report. “Malta got hammered pretty badly by the German bombers as our close-in defences were prioritising the transports. Several hundred people got killed; several thousand injured. Around two hundred Germans were captured.” He hesitated. “Some of them got lynched.”

Hanover shrugged, unconcerned. Malta had been spared the war until the Germans had tried an invasion. “They’re only human,” he said. Inwardly, he wondered if becoming desensitised was a cost of war. “What about the others?”

“They’re being flown to POW camps in Algeria,” Stirling said. “The Algerians are hopping mad; this might serve to unite them behind us. They got bombed a couple of times by the Germans during the struggle.”

Hanover nodded grimly. Even without the long and bloody war for independence, the Algerians were still arguing about their future government. The Provisional Government was having problems; not all the tribes, particularly the ones that had been French allies, were happy with the new situation.

“What is the situation now?” He asked finally. “Are they still trying to bomb Malta?”

Stirling shook his head. “We slapped them back pretty hard,” he said. “Some of the radio interceptions have been in clear.” He chuckled. “You should read some of the transcripts, sir; it reads like a Goon Show.”

“I keep meaning to go see Milligan,” Hanover said. “What happens?”

“Some German officer can’t believe the report, so he asks for clarification in clear, and then the poor bastard reporting tells him that we’ve destroyed over a million aircraft, and he has a fit in clear,” Stirling said. “I don’t think we took out more than four hundred at most, but that should really confuse the Germans.”

“I imagine they know how many they sent at us,” Hanover said. “How did Admiral Somerville do?”

Stirling looked uncomfortable. It was the closest that any of them had ever come to admitting that the 2015 personnel kept a close eye on the 1940 personnel.  “He did pretty well,” he said finally. “He’s made remarkable progress.”

“Unlike Wavell,” Hanover said. The former desert commander had been packed off to India as Governor-General. “Speaking of which, what’s happening in the desert?”

“No real change,” Stirling said. “The Soviets are still piling into Basra and spreading down towards Kuwait. General Flynn was preparing a defence line down there, and we might have more tank battles. Incidentally, he wants you to know that the Soviets have placed a high priority on capturing our equipment; a damaged Firefly was towed away and destroyed from the air.”

“Smart of them,” Hanover growled. “John?”

“It’s clear that they want to exhaust us,” McLachlan said. The Foreign Secretary looked tired. “Hammer us, keep hammering us, until they get their nukes ready. Learn as much about our technology as they can, duplicate bits, devise countermeasures… keep fighting until we lose our will to fight.”

“It won’t happen that way,” Hanover said. “Public opinion is behind the war. Everyone knows about the Nazis; despite that wretched Stewart woman they know what they’re doing and our ‘ham-fisted’ attempt at censorship just made it seem more real. There can be no compromise with Germany.”

“They haven’t offered to discuss terms with us,” Stirling said. Hanover started; he’d almost forgotten that the officer was there. “If they did…”

“What sort of terms could they offer that we would accept?” Hanover asked. “Have they tried anything in the Middle East?”

“Not yet,” Stirling said. “The Free Germans put forward the Operation Redemption plan.”

Hanover smiled. “Rommel is certainly living up to his legend,” he said. “Can we pull it off?”

Stirling hesitated. “General Cunningham believes that we can, but the cost will be heavy, particularly for the Marines and Turks.”

“We’re going to have to abandon the ridiculous fiction that we’re only in a state of semi-belligerency with the Turks,” McLachlan commented. “Would that cost us anything in the military field?”

Stirling shook his head. “The Turks are pretty much part and parcel of the German force,” he said. “The only danger is that this will put public opinion in Turkey behind the war.”

Hanover chuckled bitterly. “It’s not as if it could get any worse,” he said. “What steps do we have to take before we’re committed?”

“We have to take Crete back,” Stirling said. “Now that we’ve kicked hell out of the Germans in the air, they won’t find it so easy to oppose us. Unfortunately, we won’t be able to launch the real part of the operation until after the first stage of Operation Arctic goes ahead.”

Hanover scowled. “It would have been nice to hit them with a coordinated offensive,” he said. “They go high, we go low. Why can’t we?”

He caught Stirling’s sigh and smiled to himself. “We have committed ourselves to deploying considerable assets to support the American landing,” Stirling said. “We would also need them for Redemption. We can’t do both for at least a year. However, we could hit Crete – and this time take it – at the same time.” He chuckled. “If the Germans have studied history, they might consider it like Operation Torch; the attack that prevented them from reinforcing Stalingrad.”

Hanover nodded. “Tell Cunningham to draw up the plans,” he said. “Thank you for your time.”

It was a dismissal and Stirling was smart enough to recognise it. He picked up his papers and left the room, leaving the other two alone.

“What did you think of Turtledove’s plan?” Hanover asked. “Do we go ahead with it, with or without Australian cooperation?”

“Only if they agree,” McLachlan said thoughtfully. “Unlike the other thing we’ve done, it would be impossible to pull it off without them knowing about it. The last thing we need is Curtis in office instead.”

“I’ll talk to Menzies privately later, then,” Hanover said. “If it works, we destroy… what? Six Japanese divisions at a fraction of the cost of digging them out of the East Indies?”

McLachlan nodded. “If it works,” he said.

Hanover shrugged. “The Japanese don’t have the logistics to take Australia,” he said. “We’ll destroy them. If they last more than a week, I’ll be astonished.”

“We still have another problem,” McLachlan said. “Security leaks in America.”

Hanover nodded grimly. “They have Hoover on the case, but he’s more worried about the sudden rise in black militancy,” he said. “You’d think that they’d just agree to equality and let it go.”

“South Africa isn’t,” McLachlan said. “You know what they’re doing.”

Hanover nodded. The Smuts Government had not only started to recruit new white settlers from Italy, or the German prisoners who had refused to join Rommel, they’d begun a policy of using the new contraceptives on black tribes. Without the antidote, which the Smuts Government was keeping to itself, a lot of tribes would simply… die out. Those who refused to learn submission and white ways, as civilised humans and second-class citizens, would die.

He shook his head. Had they figured out what was happening? Did they have any idea of the doom that was befalling them? Hanover’s intelligence sources were far better than any Contemporary force – the outside world had no idea what was happening. Once the contraceptives were used in India, as Ambassador Homchoudhury was urging, they would know.

And how would they react?

“I know,” he said finally. How long before their technology was used by a repressive government? It had been the nightmare; that which brought freedom could also bring new unbreakable chains. “I know.”

Bundeswehr Forward Base

Palestine

11th May 1941

General Erwin Rommel knew that he had assembled a good command team. Each of the Bundeswehr – a name that Ambassador Schulze had insisted upon – divisions had a good and competent commander. After six months of hard training, he would have placed them against the best German division in the Wehrmacht – or even a division from 2015, given equal equipment. Colonel Muhlenkampf claimed that it meant that the British feared the Bundeswehr, but Rommel knew better. Some of the Germans who had been recruited might have been spies, or might have a change of heart… and the British had to be careful.

He wished he knew why he had a lump in his heart. Ever since learning of the crimes of Hitler, a man he had once admired, he had devoted his life to ending the Nazis before Germany was left a radioactive wasteland. Ambassador Schulze might prattle on and on about limiting commercial restrictions and avoiding French, American and Russian dominance, but that wasn’t the point. Germany had sinned; she had to pay.

He looked down at the refugee camp and shook his head. The largely Jewish population of the refugee camp, those who had been unable or unwilling to fight in the Jewish Defence League, had fled Palestine. Many of them would head to South Africa, when shipping was available, but for the moment they were stuck in Muslim lands.

They hate us, he thought, and he understood. The American and British-born Germans didn’t understand; to them the Holocaust was an abstract or something in the past. The Jews hated and feared the German force, and he’d barred his people from visiting the towns.

“Herr General?” Colonel Muhlenkampf asked. “Are you all right?”

Rommel scowled. Few Wehrmacht officers would dare to ask a general if he was all right. “Just contemplating the plans for Redemption,” he said. “Are we ready to attack?”

“No, Herr General,” Colonel Muhlenkampf said. “The Nazis are advancing along the coast. 1st Panzer is moving into position to engage.”

Rommel smiled to himself. “Waffen-SS units,” he said. Apparently Himmler didn’t trust the regulars against the Bundeswehr. “Has General Flynn said anything?”

“No, Herr General,” Colonel Muhlenkampf said. “I need to get back to 1st Panzer before they engage.”

“I think I’ll take personal command,” Rommel said. “In the absence of orders, find something and kill it.”

Colonel Muhlenkampf chuckled. “Jawohl, Herr General,” he said.

* * *

Gunter Jagar, now a brevet Captain to give him some authority, was finding working for Rommel a fascinating experience. As soon as Rommel burst out of his office, he was shouting for Jagar to get into the little plane, a VTOL craft that served as Rommel’s personal transport and spotting craft.

“Get us up to 1st Panzer,” Rommel barked at the pilot, who was already closing the hatch. The large tilt-rotor wasn’t cleared for engaging the Luffwaffe, but it carried missiles and cannons anyway. “Gunter, the laptop, now.”

Jagar was already logging into the divisional command network. A reconnaissance flight and then an SAS patrol had revealed that the SS Panzergrenadier Division Wiking, one of the multinational formations recruited by the SS after the conquest of Europe, was moving. Wiking, according to the Internet, wouldn’t have that many war crimes attached to its personnel, but it was clearly a different organisation than had existed in the first history. For one thing, it was at least four months ahead of its time.

“They’re moving,” he said, and displayed the map. “They’re heading into Amman.”

Rommel peered over his shoulder. “Desert, desert, more desert,” he said. “Show me our positions.”

Jagar displayed the location chart. 1st Panzer stood near Amman itself, moving into defensive formation. “That road would make a nice ambush site,” Rommel said thoughtfully. “I assume that the current commander is moving his anti-tank weapons forward?”

“I believe so,” Jagar said. One advantage of the command network was that every troop movement was reported on the computer network – and the Germans had no hope of tracking them down. “Yes, Herr General, they’re moving into position.”

“Excellent,” Rommel said. “Pilot, put us down near the tanks,” he commanded. “Well, Gunter, are you ready for your first major tank battle?”

“Yes, Herr General,” Jagar said. “I’m ready.”

* * *

SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner lifted his binoculars to his eyes and stared ahead into the distance. The strange terrain of Jordan was… uncomfortable, only suited for camels and mounted horsemen; the sand was getting into the tanks and making life miserable for the Germans. The Spanish and French units didn’t seem to be that bothered, but then, the men of the Foreign Legion had been in the desert before.

“Only an hour before we reach Amman, Mon General,” Colonel Picard informed him. The gaunt Frenchman hated the British and hadn’t hesitated when the Vichy Government had appealed for volunteers to go to the desert. “Then we can rest.”

“A good thing too,” Steiner said grimly. His men had stripped down to their bare chests; only trousers and caps were worn. In six months, the Germans had learnt a great deal about fighting in the desert. “I’m not sure how much of this we can take.”

“Oh, don’t worry, Mon General,” Picard said cheerfully. His bronzed skin shone under the sun. “We learnt to take it and so will you.”

Steiner felt like shooting the imprudent Frenchman down. Picard was right, of course, and he was competent; if all Frenchmen had been as competent as he France would never have fallen in 1940. Still, he was annoying.

A flicker of light ahead of them caught his eye, and then a Panzer IV exploded violently. “Guns,” he snapped, as the Panzers slowed and started to fall back. Three more exploded before they managed to escape.

“A professional ambush,” Picard said. he barked orders at the white-capped legionaries. “Down, and forward,” he commanded. “Take out the guns.”

“Open fire,” Steiner snapped. The Panzers began to fire, covering the Frenchmen. A rattle of machine gun fire told him that the tactic was unsuccessful. A contrail high in the sky told him that sneaking up would be impossible.

“Blasted Anglo aircraft,” Picard sneered, for once in total agreement with the German. “They might try to bake us like they did the uncouth Slavs.”

“Perhaps,” Steiner said, realising again why Picard hadn’t been sent to the regular army in 1940. More explosions billowed ahead as one of the Panzers scored a lucky hit on something; perhaps a large ammunition dump. “Forward,” he shouted, and the Panzers roared forward.

* * *

“They’re breaking through the guns,” Jagar said, examining the laptop and trying to keep it on his knees. You would have thought that someone as tall as Rommel would have balked at riding inside a Command Firefly, but Rommel hadn’t hesitated. It was worse than a sea crossing; the Panzer bounced backwards and forwards as it charged across the desert.

“That wasn’t quick,” Rommel said. His voice sounded faintly disapproving. “They must have a slow officer in command.”

“Firing range in three minutes, Guv,” the tank’s commander said. He spoke British, acted British, and yet had German grandparents who might be alive at the moment in Germany. Jagar looked up at the portal; the sea of sand dunes stretched ahead infinitely.

“They’re cloaked by the sand dunes,” Rommel muttered, answering his unanswered question. “Sergeant, give them hell.”

It happened faster than Jagar would have believed. Suddenly, the dunes fell away, exposing a line of grey tanks, prominent against the sand. “Fire,” the commander snapped, and the tank shook violently as it fired a shell. Explosions blasted through the German ranks, hacking away at Wiking’s numbers. Three Panzers exploded, and then a forth and then…

“Brace,” the commander shouted, and then the tank shook violently. A Wiking tank had begun to return fire, but its shells were useless against the frontal armour. “They’re useless!”

“Careful of the rear,” Rommel murmured, as the tank skidded around, its main gun rotating faster than Jagar would have believed possible. For all the primitiveness of the Firefly, compared to the modern British tanks, it was a powerful and capable machine. It shuddered again, and then fired once, blowing the turret of a Wiking tank right off. An explosion shook the tank violently as the remains of the 1st Panzer powered their way across the battlefield, firing violently at tanks without an IFF signature.

“Wow,” he breathed, as the Firefly came to a stop.

“Report,” Rommel said sternly. Jagar flinched, and then recognised the warmth within Rommel’s voice. “What’s happening?”

“We’ve broken up this attack,” Jagar said, examining the laptop. “There’re trying to outflank us.”

“Then let’s not let them,” Rommel said. He picked up his radio and started to issue orders. “Order the other tanks to move up and outflank the outflankers,” he said. “We have the speed advantage and I’m not about to waste it.”

“Moving out,” the tank commander said. “Now.”

Jagar shuddered as the tank leapt back into action, pulling backwards with a complete disregard for safety.  He took a breath, feeling excitement spreading through his body as the tank jumped over a dune and was back among the dunes. He looked up at Rommel and was astonished to see a smile on his face; the General was enjoying himself.

* * *

Steiner cursed violently as the new tanks, British, but carrying an Iron Cross, danced over the desert. They weren’t jamming his radios, but they might as well have been; he’d lost command of the various detachments. He heard a cheer as one of the 88s finally managed to destroy a British tank, knowing that it was futile. They’d been caught with their pants down, and it was costing them.

“Send the signal to withdraw,” he commanded, cutting his losses. “We’ll be back, with more and better tanks. Send a signal to the bases in Syria, order them to get ready for an attack.”

“Jawohl,” his aide said, talking rapidly into his radio. Steiner ducked as a bullet cracked past him and he laughed, he had survived. “Colonel,” he began, and then he realised that Picard had been hit. The Frenchman would never return to France; his blood stained the desert sands.

“Go with God,” he muttered, and then ran to join the retreat.

Chapter Twenty: Chapatti And Chips

Chamber of Indian Princes

New Delhi, India

13th May 1941

The room was ornate, decorated to a taste that only the very wealthy and the jaded could possibly stand. Gold and jewels, enough money to buy an entire fleet of battleships, were merged into the walls of the room, which was a sleeping bedroom. The owner of the room, His Most Gracious Highness Yadavindrah Singh, 8th Maharajah of the Indian State of Patiala, had other rooms for activities other than sleep.

The door opened soundlessly and a servant, a single turbaned Sikh, tiptoed into the room. Bowing once towards his master’s bed, where Yadavindrah Singh lay sleeping, he carried his single silver tray towards his master and set it down on the table. He stood up and glanced around the room, ensuring that everything was in place, from the row of tiger heads to the new mobile phone from Britain, and knelt beside his master’s sleeping head.

“Bed tea,” he whispered, with obsequious softness. Yadavindrah Singh’s eyes opened and he stared at the ceiling, decorated with golden leaf. The scent of the finest tea drifted across his nostrils and he sniffed once, loudly.

“Thank you,” he muttered. The servant bowed and left. Yadavindrah Singh sat up and picked up the single china cup, sipping the tea appreciatively. It was perfection itself; the drink was warm and arousing. Slipping out of bed, Yadavindrah Singh stood up and clicked the button on the laptop.

“You have thirty news messages in your inbox,” the tinny computer voice announced. “You have fifty-two messages from people you have added to your ‘block’ list.”

Yadavindrah Singh allowed himself a smile. He’d programmed the computer to speak in the voice of his favourite wife, a task it could do with ease. Some of the videos it carried were home movies, some recorded by his wives and mistresses. Other videos were Bollywood movies, an institution that might never exist now. Finally, there were videos that appealed to tastes that were truly degraded; Yadavindrah Singh disliked them on principle.

Still, he had to admit that the little machine was one of the blessings of the Transition. It helped him to remain in touch with his advisors, even as he travelled to New Delhi to represent his people. Not the common people; not even the folk he ruled in his state, which was one of the smaller princely states, but the Princes themselves. The 565 Princes collectively ruled over one third of India’s surface and a quarter of its population. Those Indian leaders who had been quick to bend the knee to the haphazard British conquerors, or had proven worthy foes, had been permitted to continue to rule in their own states. Some of them ruled lands greater than a European state; some commanded only a few square miles. All of them, without exception, had expected their rule to last forever.

And then they had gained the deadly power of foresight. In seven years from the Transition, nearly six years now, almost all of them would vanish into the ash heap of history. Yadavindrah Singh had been one of the Princes who had repressed both the Communist and the Nationalist movements; to know that the British would have, or had, abandoned them was… frustrating, to say the least.

The china cup, worth nearly a thousand pounds in 1940, shattered in his hand. The wave of pure anger that had gripped him was the same as the wave that had gripped the other Princes, from the largest to the smallest. Their first response had been defiance, defiance, only to discover that the future British hardly understood the issues at hand. They were used to dealing with a united India – almost all of them were apologetic about the Empire – and the Princes were regarded as a bothersome nuisance.

Yadavindrah Singh smiled darkly. His state might not be the largest – that honour was reserved for Rajputana – but he had a powerful army. Still, after reading the reports of battles in the Middle East and the Far East, he was no longer certain that he could defend his rights. The Princes were united as never before; they could fragment the country – and the future British seemed not to care. If the Provisional Government refused to honour their claims to power – and make a reasonable accommodation – India would dissolve into civil war.

He glanced down at the report. His recruiters had not only managed to expand his personal army, but to recruit a number of European – mainly British – officers from the Indian Army, which was supposed to be under the command of the Provisional Government. In reality, it was under the command of Sir Archibald Wavell, a Contemporary Briton, who was the only man everyone trusted. Wavell was a known factor and he had the respect of his men, particularly the reequipped Indian Divisions.

He shook his head. Wavell could be relied upon; the future British could not be, for the history books made that very certain. Carefully avoiding the crushed cup – a servant would clear the mess up later and replace the expensive carpet – Yadavindrah Singh began to lay his plans. The Princes would have a role in governing India – or they would tear it apart.

* * *

“All those lovely ladies, you must lay them all aside,

“I am the little gypsy girl that is to be your bride.”

When he had been younger, and first served as an Ambassador, Ambassador Homchoudhury had heard those lines in Britain, retelling a story of a gypsy fortune-teller who’d manipulated the local squire’s son into marrying her. Being imaginative, he’d created a whole mythology around the story; the girl had indeed foreseen her marriage, but she hadn’t seen that her husband was abusive. It had foreshadowed events ever since the Transition that he’d allowed himself to wonder, in his few private moments, if he had genuinely foreseen something.

Of course, he thought wryly, if I had foreseen the Transition, I would have made certain not to have accompanied Britain.

He scowled. He’d been taught in Calcutta, and the teachers had glossed over the period when India had been a restless state in the British Empire. There was something… unsporting about the British simply giving up and abandoning the nation, no glorious wars of independence, just the tired British lion slinking away. The single map had marked India as a simple pink spot on the map… and missed altogether the sheer mind-boggling complexity of British India. He’d known very little about the Princes, and still less about the seven-way arguments between the various Indian factions… and now he was expected to act as a neutral arbiter between the three major factions.

“We must proceed at once to full elections and democratic majority rule,” Jawaharlal Nehru said. His statement would have been more impressive if he hadn’t made it every second day for four months. “If we are to be a modern country, then we must be completely democratic.”

Mohammad Ali Jinnah, leader of the Muslim League, coughed. His body was damaged; the medical treatment he was undergoing to avoid the tuberculoses that would have killed him seven years later was ongoing. Homchoudhury sighed; in many ways the Indian National Congress could threaten to create Pakistan, which Jinnah wanted to avoid at all costs.

Homchoudhury felt a flicker of sympathy. It could hardly be easy steering a course between radicals on both sides of the divide. Jinnah’s life was a target for radicals of all strips; someone had already killed the Maharaja of Kashmir when news of his deal with Nehru, in the future, had reached the largely Muslim population of the state. Two regiments of the Contemporary British forces, units that could hardly be spared from the Burma Line near Imphal, were now tied down keeping the peace; Muslim unrest was a powerful force.

“We need, require, guarantees that the rights of the Muslim citizens will be honoured,” Jinnah replied, in his slow precise voice. Homchoudhury was unwillingly impressed; Jinnah had been a lawyer before returning to the independence movement and he knew how to make his points. “We have not suffered to create Hindustan.”

“Nor have we suffered to become a minority in both states,” Baldev Singh proclaimed in his booming voice. The Sikh would have become the first Minister of Defence in India, but there would not be a Sikh state, at least not in the original history.

Homchoudhury took a breath. The Princes had finally organised themselves – in between arguing over their course of action, panicking over the Kashmiri Crisis, and threatening civil war – and their delegation had finally arrived in New Delhi. Time had run out for the Provisional Government, and he thanked God for Governor-General Wavell. The unimaginative British officer might just have prevented an immediate bloodbath, but he wasn’t the type of man to save India now.

“Perhaps there is an intermediate solution,” he said, and noticed how all of the delegates looked desperately at him. All of them wanted an agreement, they just couldn’t decide on the terms. “I have been watching very carefully the attempts to draw up a single constitution for the Commonwealth, one that will reflect the new realities.”

There were some gasps, from people who had hoped to work on the constitution themselves, but mainly the room was quiet. “Partition didn’t work in my era and won’t work here, particularly given the knowledge of the future.” He noticed how the Muslim delegation glared at one another; the western Muslims and the eastern Muslims, Pakistan and Bangladesh. “We need a compromise that all sides can live with.”

He paused for a moment. “We have a Bill of Rights for the Commonwealth now, one that concedes the legal equality of all, provided they agree to live under the constitution and respect its provisions for others. My proposal is that we use the Bill of Rights as a template; we must become blind to the religion or colour or even sex of a person.”

“That would be an excellent step,” Gandhi said. The little man was bouncing up and down delightedly. Unlike many, Gandhi had been galvanised to learn of his future mistakes. “I would have no problem with accepting that as a basis of a unified India.”

The other delegates exchanged glances. Gandhi’s power was in his personality; he led and inspired while others did the hard work of building a power base that could rule India.

“Subject to the guarantees, we would accept,” Jinnah said slowly.

“The Commonwealth would be happy, I suspect, to appoint a neutral court to arbitrate such matters,” Homchoudhury said.

“Then we have an agreement,” Nehru pronounced. “We can move on to…”

“The matter of promises made,” a dark-bearded man said. Homchoudhury scowled; Yadavindrah Singh stood there, watching them all. “Promises were made to us and we will see them kept.”

* * *

Yadavindrah Singh swept his eyes across the council and dismissed them all with a single aristocratic sniff. He found them all wanting, from the ridiculous Gandhi to the man from the future. Small petty man, lawyers and politicians, men who knew nothing of making wealth, but would be quite happy to steal it. He bowed once to Wavell – the Governor-General was due some respect – and he stalked to the table.

“Ever since your people came to this land, you made promises and agreements with the Chamber of Princes,” Yadavindrah Singh said, addressing Wavell directly. The reaction from the other delegates would have been priceless under other circumstances. He glared at Wavell’s aide, a Foreign Office diplomat. “Now you are telling us that you will abandon us to these…”

Words failed him. He allowed his glare and shuddering long look of disgust to display his feelings. “These people will take the jewel in the King-Emperor’s crown and rip it to shreds. None of them had any glory; none of them have any higher purpose in mind, but power. They have done nothing to earn it; they only want to steal it from those who have worked and worked to earn it. We demand that the promises made to us when we allied ourselves with the Raj be honoured, or we will be forced to crease our support of the Raj and its improvements to India.”

There was a long pause as minds ticked over the threat. The Indian railroads ran through the princely states; the entire system could be brought to a halt if the princes refused to allow the trains to pass. There were army bases and airports, farms and resources – and there would be a famine in two years unless steps were taken – and many other things, all essential to running India in reasonable order.

Yadavindrah Singh allowed himself a smile as the silence lengthened. If Wavell joined him, with his control over the Army and the Indian Civil Service, which remained loyal to the Raj, the nationalists could be destroyed with ease.

Wavell met his eyes. “There remains a Japanese presence in Burma,” he said. Both men knew that it would have been far worse in the original history. “Distracting the army could be considered… treasonous.”

“Am I a loyal servant of the British Crown, who will be treated according to the terms with which he made his submission, or a Head of State in my own right?” Yadavindrah Singh asked coldly. The silence lengthened again.

* * *

The grey-suited Foreign Office diplomat – Mr Harriman Grey – spoke into the silence. “I have orders not to discuss this unless the council – and the Provisional Government – reached an impasse. I believe that that moment has now come.”

He looked around the room. “The British Government would prefer to avoid issuing an ultimation or a similar statement,” he said. “However, we are running out of time; the Japanese are knocking at the door. Historically, turmoil here nearly lost the war – and we don’t want to risk any repeats of that. Therefore, we have a solution to put forward.

“We propose the formation of a two-tied government,” Grey said. “One tier will be the civilian government, elected along the lines of the House of Commons, which will be the main centre of government. The second tier will be the House of Princes, one that will possess comparable authority to the House of Lords in Britain, and serve as a second chamber of government. It would be easy, but…

“Quite frankly, a war of independence won’t work,” he said, and noticed Wavell’s nod. “India is an integrated nation, it would be like the Lake District trying to declare independence. If you’ll pardon the analogy, all of you pulling in different directions will simply tear the country apart.”

He waited for the commotion to die down. “Ambassador Homchoudhury suggested using the Commonwealth Constitution as a framework for India,” he said. “I am authorised to offer you, on behalf of the government, major technology transfer and independence, which would boost India’s position within the Commonwealth. If you come to an agreement soon, along those lines, we will ensure that India becomes one of the most powerful Commonwealth states.”

“We might end up ruling the Commonwealth,” Homchoudhury injected. “If everything was stable here, we could easily attract immigrants from Britain to aid the development. Think what we could do with total literacy and no need to keep a watch on all of the borders!”

“Indeed,” Grey said. “However, there is one other point I have to make. Quite frankly, and I trust that you’ll forgive me speaking bluntly, the British Government does not wish to risk involvement in a Balkan-style morass. If you fail to come to an agreement, then I must inform you that Britain has decided that there will be no further involvement in India.”

Eastern Iran

Iran

13th May 1941

The man stood on a horse, looking up into the east, towards India. The horse, a good-tempered beast, didn’t seem to mind the indignity, choosing instead to crop at the ground. The oasis wasn’t such a bad place for the Russian cavalry and they had been happy to help the Indian party on their way.

“Good luck, Comrade,” Commissioner Petrovich said. Subhas Chandra Bose, the leader of the Indian National Army, nodded in return. “Bring the Indians to the glories of communism.”

Bose carefully didn’t show any of his real feelings. Defeating the British yoke was important, but his regime was going to be based more on Hitler’s, than Stalin’s. India wasn’t ready for communism yet – even the Moscow theoreticians agreed on that. For the Netaji of India, the entire situation provided a possible gain; would all of the Indians accept their place in a new British Empire?

“It’s a long hard ride,” he said, and shuddered despite himself. Not even the most dashing British officer, confident in his superiority and his special relationship to the natives, could control the tribesmen for long. They viewed their land as being in Purdah, like their women, and all interlopers must die. Their respect for the British was grudging at best, born of a series of battles in which they had been roundly thrashed. Unlike the Afghanis, they had never been able to convince the British to give up and leave them alone.

Bose shuddered. He’d heard rumours of what was happening in Afghanistan, and suspected he knew the cause. The Russians were driving south, building up their transportation network and military, and forcing the natives to work for them or die. His friends in Berlin, the Fuhrer’s lackeys, had warned him; the Soviets were unlikely to smile upon a fascist state in India.

“Let’s go,” he said, and made a mental note to have his words rewritten into something more heroic in the future. Himmler, the leader of the SS, had shown him just how the past could be rewritten. His companions, men captured in France during 1940, wheeled their horses around and prepared to start the long ride into India. Bose smiled; Kipling himself couldn’t have done better.

“The Army of Liberation will be coming soon,” Petrovich said. Bose knew that it was meant to be reassuring, but it was anything, but. The last thing he wanted was a Soviet Army in India, even on such a shoestring of logistics. The Russians might come as liberators, but they would never leave again.

“They won’t be necessary,” he said, and wheeled his horse to the east. “Onwards to India!”

Chapter Twenty-One: Unto Us a Child is Born

Undisclosed Location

Berlin, Germany

15th May 1941

The early-morning period in the bunker, as far as men who hadn’t seen the surface for weeks could tell, was broken by a baby’s cry. Heinrich Horton, Professor Horton’s child, was born at precisely 0930hrs, named for Himmler. Horton, who would not have chosen that name, made a mental note to have it changed once the nightmare was over.

“He’s gorgeous,” Irma whispered. The blonde bombshell stared at the child in Jasmine’s arms; the labour had gone very smoothly. The midwife, a pureblood German, sniffed in disapproval before cleaning up the mess and departing from the room with a final sniff.

“Yes, he is,” Horton said, looking down at the child. Heinrich’s skin was a very light brown, later it would darken as the other two children’s had. He felt a surge of love, combined with a surge of pure worry; Himmler now had yet another hold on him. His escape plans, ones that had relied upon the members of the German Resistance, had gone down with the resistance, and without them he knew that there would be no help. He’d known the Berlin of 2015, but not the dark eerie Berlin of 1941.

“My heartiest congratulations as well,” Himmler’s voice said from behind him. Irma’s face lit up with the kind of joy Horton had only associated with orgasm; the SS guards jumped to attention. “I dare say that the Fuhrer will extend his congratulations as well, later.”

“Thank you, Herr Reichsführer,” Horton stammered. “I would be honoured if he would agree to be the child’s godfather.”

Himmler led him out of the hospital ward into a private room. “After Fralein Braun broke down and demanded that he marry her, I suspect that the Fuhrer would not be happy at the suggestion,” Himmler said. “However, he did send a gift.”

He passed across a box of cigars. Horton saw them and blinked; the cigars weren’t Cuban, or American, but British. The date was 2015. His mind raced; clearly Himmler had managed to secure a pipeline into Britain itself. That was… distressing.

“They’re a bit weak for the tastes of my men,” Himmler said, “and I don’t smoke at all, but feel free to light up if you want to.”

Horton shook his head and took a seat. The tiny room wasn’t equipped as an office, more of a small common room. “What do you want me to tell you, Herr Reichsführer?”

Himmler smiled. It didn’t touch his eyes. “I have questions,” he said. “Are you aware of a man called Bose?”

Horton frowned. “Dudley Bose?”

“No,” Himmler said, lacking the background to recognise the joke. “Subhas Chandra Bose.”

“The Indian Nationalist,” Horton said.

Himmler nodded. “As you may have realised,” he said, passing over a folder from the little bag he always carried around with him, “the effects of the… Transition have gone all around the world by now.”

“The butterfly effect,” Horton said. Privately, he was aghast; if events were changing, he might be making mistakes and never know until it was too late. “A changed event changes the next event.”

“I assume that the Japanese were not defeated so badly by British forces when that war broke out?” Himmler asked. “Personally, I despise the little yellow men, but they have their uses.”

Horton shook his head. “The four carriers they lost in the Indian Ocean were supposed to be destroyed at Midway, a year in the future,” he said.

“Indeed,” Himmler said. He gave Horton a long calculating look. “We have sent Bose into India,” he said. “What effect will he have on the Indians?”

Horton frowned. Again, it was difficult to provide a mixture of accurate and misleading information. “Probably very little,” he said, and Himmler scowled. Still, the Reichsführer knew better than to demand the impossible. “In the original timeline, the Raj was shaken by a series of defeats, including Singapore and the original battles in the Indian Ocean. That damaged the prestige of the Raj – always a difficult factor to account for – and led to demands for increased autonomy.

“Unfortunately, the Indian Nationalists were divided,” he continued. “The Muslims, I think, remained outside the ‘quit India’ campaign, as did most of the Princes. The British still had overwhelming strength and crushed the few examples of armed rebellion that broke out.”

Himmler glared down at the floor. “Do you feel that Bose will be able to do anything worthwhile?”

“I don’t know Bose as well as I do some of the other figures,” Horton admitted. “Under the circumstances, with the British in a far better position, his only hope would be to recruit some of the princes. Unfortunately, they dislike both fascism and communism.”

“Perhaps they will have no role in the new independent India the British have promised,” Himmler mused. “Tell me, how will the British seek to use Rommel?”

Horton considered. “As a alternate focus of loyalty and as a commander,” he said. “The skills of the Desert Fox are not skills to be wasted.”

“And as the figurehead for the so-called government in exile, he could turn people away from the Reich,” Himmler muttered. Horton hid his annoyance; this was the fifth time they’d gone over this. “Thank you for your comments.”

As if I had a choice,” Horton thought. He stood up. “I may return to Jasmine and Heinrich?”

“Not yet,” Himmler purred. “I have a special task for you.” Horton felt his blood run cold. There was something in Himmler’s voice that was simply… terrible. “It involves our propaganda efforts.”

Horton blinked. He had thought that attempting to influence either 2015 British or 1941 American opinion a waste of time. Everyone knew something about Hitler’s crimes; it wasn’t as if Germany looked as weak and defenceless as Iraq had, twelve years in the past or sixty years in the future.

“As you know, we have had the pleasure of a reporter from your nation in Berlin,” Himmler said. “With Shieir’s arrest, she remains the only real reporter in Berlin. She has requested an interview with one of the people from the jet.”

Horton felt a sinking feeling in his stomach. “Me?” He asked. “Why me?”

“Because you have been the most cooperative,” Himmler said. “Captain Jackson was most unhelpful; we had to torture the mud person who was with him to get him to cooperate, and we have to check each and every bit of his work.” He smiled thinly. “Naturally, as a new father – again – you would be inclined to discuss the matter.”

Horton felt the glimmerings of a plan. “I assume that you want me to answer questions?”

“Of course,” Himmler said. “You can, I’m sure, think of a few questions that she might ask.”

Horton nodded. “What do you want me to say?”

Himmler beamed. “Only that you are here of your own free will,” he said. “I want you to invite others to come if they’ll come. We guarantee good treatment and payment.”

“I’ll get writing a few questions,” Horton said. “Do you want to read them first?”

Himmler shook his head. “I trust you not to do anything to endanger your children,” he said. “I’m sure that you can be trusted that far.”

* * *

Kristy Stewart grinned openly as she read the note from Himmler, written in his own hand. It had taken her several minutes to parse out the note – her written German was nowhere near as good as her spoken German – but as soon as she’d done it she hugged Roth hard enough to hurt.

“Ouch,” he complained, as she started to run kisses down the back of his neck. “I do have work to do.”

“Oh, who has time for work?” She asked, pulling the airhead persona around her like a shroud. “This is a time for celebration.”

Afterwards, Roth plucked the note from her fingers and read it with considerable interest. “You are to interview Herr Doktor Professor Horton,” he said. “You are to record an interview with him, which is to be reviewed by Herr Goebbels before it is transmitted back to the United Kingdom.”

Stewart leaned forward, allowing her breasts to drift across his chest. She found that that short-circuited the male thinking process. “I can’t wait,” she breathed in his ear. “This could really boost me into the top ranks of reporters.”

“You’d better get dressed for it,” Roth said. She felt the regret in his voice, smiled as he rolled over to watch her. His face suddenly changed. “Kristy, what’s to stop you getting pregnant?”

The alarm in his voice made Stewart giggle. “I have the full implant,” she said. “I’m good for five years of unprotected sex.”

Roth relaxed visibly, watching avidly as she pulled on her basic German outfit. A simple brown skirt, matching brown jacket, and yellow blouse. Her brassiere and panties, plain white cotton, were hidden under the clothes as she donned them; her hair was pressed back by a simple clip. She checked herself finally in the mirror; she looked stunning.

“Don’t you think you’d better get dressed?” She asked, as Roth stretched out on the bed. “We have only…”

“Two and a half hours,” Roth said, sitting up. “I think you’d better make certain that all of your equipment is in working order.”

Stewart picked up the first camera and checked its self-diagnostics. “I wish you’d allowed me to keep my cameraman here,” she said. “What happened to him anyway?”

“Sent him back to England, via America,” Roth said dryly. “Remind me to tell you sometime how much trouble that caused.”

Stewart laughed. “I’m sure that you found it easy,” she said. “Everything seems to be checking out – how is the offensive going?”

Roth blinked at the sudden change in topic. “The troops that were supposed to secure Malta were slaughtered by British infantrymen after they had surrendered to the Reich,” he said. “The troops had accepted a surrender and started to collect weapons when the British opened fire.”

“Bad British,” Stewart said. She didn’t believe him; the year that had almost passed since the Transition was hardly time for the British Army, so concerned about bad press, to acquire new bad habits. It was far more likely that the defenders had defeated the attacking force and killed most of them.

“Indeed,” Roth agreed. He glanced down at his watch. “Only a few hours left to go,” he said. “Are you excited?”

* * *

Professor Horton wasn’t sure what he had expected; a fat elderly woman or a young girl. Kristy Stewart managed to transcend the stereotype; she wore basic German clothes, but with long blonde hair streaming out behind her, despite the best efforts of a clip in her hair. She reminded him of Jasmine; she had the same basic air of competence.

“Professor Horton, I presume,” Stewart said. Her voice was warm and thrilling, but also professional. Horton realised that she understood the dangers as well as she did; they were acting out a play for their watchers. “My name is Kristy.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Horton said, offering her his hand. Doctor Goebbels’ experts had worked on his appearance, shaking their heads over his skin colour, but they’d worked wonders. The neatly-tailored suit was an exact copy of the Fuhrer’s, from before the period he’d sworn to only wear a uniform until the war was over.

It must be getting pretty rank by now, Horton thought suddenly, and avoided a giggle only by an effort of will. He waved Stewart into a chair, noting how the little camera perched on her shoulder continued to follow him with its unblinking eye.

“First, would you mind explaining for the viewers how you got here?” Stewart asked. “Enquiring minds would like to know.”

Horton remembered a Sherlock Holmes story when two men had passed secrets in Greek. That wasn’t possible here. “The air liner we were in – myself, my wife and our two children – crash-landed in France. After some confusion, the Reich decided that I could best serve them as a Professor of History.”

He saw Stewart’s eyes flicker; was she bright enough to understand the implications? “An interesting story,” she said. “What exactly do you do here?”

“I advise the Reich on finding a peaceful solution to the conflict between Britain and Germany,” Horton said, parroting the lines Himmler had given him. “The need to allow the Jews to leave peacefully means that we must have peace. If Britain recognises the Reich as the pre-eminent power in Europe, peace could come quickly.”

Stewart’s eyes narrowed. He wished for telepathy, for some way to talk privately. “Do the Nazis have a proper peace plan?”

Horton knew that the plan would be unacceptable to the British, no matter who was leading them. “The Fuhrer chooses to offer a truce in place, followed by a withdrawal back to the original lines, with the exception of the oil wells in Iraq,” he said.

“Well, that’s not one of my priorities,” Stewart admitted. “Tell me, what’s your life like here?”

Horton felt his pulse race. “It’s not bad,” he said. “We spend almost all of our time in the bunker here. My wife just had our first child.”

Stewart lifted an eyebrow. “And you’re here of your own free will?”

“Like those who went to Iraq in 2003, Andy McNab, John Nichol and John Peters,” Horton said. He relaxed inwardly; the dreaded words were out. “It’s an interesting life, down in the bunker with the Fuhrer and the others in charge of the Reich. It’s designed to survive a nuclear attack, don’t you know?”

Stewart smiled. She’d missed the keywords. “Any messages for the folks back home?”

“Just one,” Horton said. “The Reich wishes to invite anyone who wants to move to Germany to move here,” he said. “If a person has skills the Reich needs, payment will be good and forthcoming.”

* * *

The meeting of the inner inner circle of the Reich took place in a single meeting room, deep under Berlin. The engineers had been expanding the network of bunkers constantly, digging deeper and deeper under Germany, until nearly a third of the population could have sheltered underground. The Luffwaffe reconnaissance experts, although they were certain that the British had picked up on some of the digging, were confident that they would be unable to track the full extent of the tunnels. After all, they were designed to survive a nuclear attack.

“The attack on Malta was a complete failure,” General Galland reported grimly. He scowled; General Student had come close to shooting himself before his subordinates burst in and saved him. “The British destroyed almost all of the 1stFallschirmjäger Division, under General-Lieutenant Wilhelm Süssmann.”

“This is intolerable,” Hitler snapped. His fist pounded the table. “Am I always to be surrounded by incompetents?”

There was a long pause. “There is good news from the Middle East,” Kesselring said finally. “The Russians are taking the brunt of the British counterattacks, particularly with their raids into northern India. That allowed us to move closer to Baghdad and Amman.”

He didn’t mention Rommel’s successful counterattack. “Excellent,” Hitler proclaimed. “When will we take the Suez?”

Kesselring hesitated. “We need to strengthen our logistics first, Mien Fuhrer,” he said. It was a good a way as any of saying ‘not soon.’ “Our attack was glorious, and we destroyed a number of British tanks, but we took a beating ourselves. We need time to repair, time to scout out the enemy positions, and time to prepare.”

“No later than a month,” Hitler said. He had something else on his mind. “Speer?”

Speer coughed nervously. “Production of tanks and V1s is continuing,” he said. “I must caution against any plan to invade Britain that way, particularly after Malta. Not only were the elite paratroopers wiped out, but we took heavy losses in transports, even the older transports. Aircraft production is concentrated on fighters, long-range bombers, and transports.”

Hitler rounded on him. “You promised that we would be able to create craft equal to the British super craft,” he snapped. “Explain!”

There was sweat on Speer’s brow. “Mien Fuhrer, we have had problems in endeavouring to adapt modern technology – British technology – to our productive capabilities. We may have a complete… tech ladder, but it is still the work of years to move onto production.”

“Indeed,” Hitler sneered. His people’s eyes flickered nervously; the Fuhrer was no longer the man he had been. Some of them considered the possibilities for expanding their own power bases, others considered how bad it would be for the Reich if he fell. “So, burning out Britain is not an option?”

Himmler coughed. “At the moment, the British are playing host to a number of American troops,” he said. “Although they don’t know for certain, our sources suggest that they’re aimed at Norway.”

Hitler growled. “They will not take Norway,” he snapped.

“No, Mien Fuhrer,” Kesselring said. The Field Marshal had found it hard to keep track of Hitler’s newest schemes, each one crazier than the last. “However, we will have to… withdraw some of the infantry units from Poland and…”

“Then Stalin will grow stronger,” Hitler protested. His voice rose to a scream. “The Communists must be crushed…!”

“And they will be,” Himmler said, reassuringly. “I think what Field Marshal Kesselring means is that the combat power of Army Group Centre will not be reduced significantly if we send a few infantry divisions and their supports to Norway. Once we crush their invasion, we can turn on Stalin before the Allies can regroup their efforts.” He smiled darkly. “Indeed, they might end falling out with each other.”

There was a long pregnant pause. Kesselring shot Himmler a mixed look of admiration, gratitude, respect and annoyance. Himmler, who could hardly have cared less, ignored it. Hitler seemed to be lost in thought, his mind ticking over the details.

“I approve,” he said finally. “Naturally, I will work with you on the operations plan, but I will leave the general implementation up to you.” He glared around the table. “I want the American attack defeated before July, at which point we will head east,” he said. “I want to snatch the oil wells in the Ukraine before General Winter intervenes on their side, and then we will renew the conflict in spring. By this time next year, I expect to see German bulldozers levelling the Kremlin.” He smiled. “Once we hold the resources of Russia, we will bleed them white… and when we have our own bombs, they will have to make peace on whatever terms we desire.”

“Steig Heil,” they chorused in unison, chanting to hide their disquiet. They knew the verdict of history, and some of them knew that events would not unfold the way that Hitler demanded. In their hidden hearts, some of them began planning for their own survival… or for their own power.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Upside Down

Government House

Canberra, Australia

16th May 1941

The room was deathly quiet, with only four people around the table. Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, Prime Minister of Australia. Sir Thomas Albert Blamey, commander in chief of the Commonwealth Armed Forces (Australia). Admiral Sir Harold Turtledove, commander of the Eastern Fleet. Ambassador David Atwell; Ambassador from the future. Menzies put down the folder finally; it made a thump sound that echoed in the air.

“Are you… quite certain that this will work?” He asked. “Are you confident that we can handle the problems that might result?”

There was a long uncomfortable pause. Menzies knew, better than anyone, that Australia’s morale wasn’t high. After being bounced out of New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies, after losing so much of their fleet to the Japanese, and enduring weekly bombing raids, Australia was worried about the future. Even the new nuclear power plant, a gift from Britain that could be used to finally develop the interior of Australia, hadn’t lifted their sprits too much.

“Yes,” Admiral Turtledove said finally. Menzies nodded; he didn’t understand the controversy spinning around the Admiral in Britain, as far as the Australians were concerned he’d won the battle that had saved them from an immediate invasion. “The opportunity is too good to miss.”

Menzies sighed. “Explain,” he said finally, though a pounding headache. Elections were coming up soon and he had looked like a certain victor. Now… now he wasn’t so sure, not just because of the historical verdict.

“Prime Minister, the Japanese have shot all, but one of their bolts,” Turtledove said. “In Indonesia… ah, the Dutch East Indies, they have nine divisions; five fully worked up divisions and four of their scratch divisions, which are under-equipped and undermanned. They started with eleven full-strength divisions after China; we chewed one up pretty good in Singapore and two more were shattered in the Battles of the Indies.”

“They won that battle,” Menzies observed, without accusation.

“Yes, but it cost them badly,” Turtledove said. “The problem is now different; Japanese troops make very good defensive fighters and they will dig into the islands if we let them. PJHQ is still planning the counter-attack, but for the moment Japan still thinks that it holds the whip hand. If they start digging into the islands, we’ll have to dig them out at great cost.”

He waved a hand at the map, positioned on the wall. “The Japanese think they have one last shot at forcing Britain out of the war,” he said. “The Burma front isn’t going anywhere fast – we chewed up their logistics pretty badly – and here is their only logical target. We tracked them moving troops and supplies into the harbours on the southern side of the Dutch East Indies; we expect them to begin soon. However, they have one problem, the fleet in your waters.”

He marked out a line on the map. “There are nearly forty Royal Navy ships in a position to intercept the invasion fleet,” he said. “Against them, the Japanese have no chance at all, so they’ve devised a diversion; their fleet is going to attack Canada and provide an opportunity to destroy it that we are not expected to resist.”

Menzies looked up at him. “And you don’t want to resist it,” he said. “That’s the gist of your plan; you’re gambling on the army’s ability to defeat the Japanese on the ground.”

Blamey coughed. “Prime Minister, we could defeat the four divisions the Japanese could put on our shores,” he said. “The battleground, near Darwin, has been almost completely evacuated, except for the military. There are no less than twelve divisions of ours there, four of them armoured, as well as the special units from Britain.”

“Four divisions is the worst case scenario,” Turtledove injected. “Despite all their attempts to extend the range of their air transports, we don’t believe that they will be able to pose a major threat to us, or to even provide a division with enough to fight for a day. The Japanese were noted for ignoring logistics, but if they can put more than four divisions across in a single wave, I will be astonished.”

“Once the Japanese first wave lands, and gets comfortable, they’ll send the ships back for more troops,” Blamey said, warming to his topic. “The fleet reloads and sets out again and…”

“And the submarines move in,” Turtledove said. “We have ten SSNs near Australia; I’ve called them all back except for the Trafalgar. The Japanese load up again, and set out, and we slaughter them.”

Blamey nodded. “In the meantime, we move in on the ground and throw them back into the sea,” he said. “We would have air support and the tanks from America; we’ll win with ease, hopefully.”

“Hopefully,” Menzies said.

“In the very worst case, we’ll still cut the army off near Darwin and they won’t have anywhere to go,” Turtledove said. “They’re not going to conquer Australia with four divisions, are they?”

“What happens if they land elsewhere?” Menzies asked, thoughtfully. He had to admit that it sounded good, but it would be dangerous. “Like at Brisbane, or even New Zealand.”

“They can’t put too much stress on their equipment,” Turtledove said. “If they try to land on the east coast, their lines get longer and longer. If they do try for New Zealand, the submarines will kill them all before they even get close. No, if they have any sense at all, they’ll try to keep it simple and head for the north coast.”

Menzies scowled. “And where will you be when the battle is being fought?”

“Sinking the Japanese fleet,” Turtledove said. “I’ve ordered the Trafalgar to head north to Hashirajima, where the Japanese have based the carriers of the Combined Fleet. They’re assembling the fleet there, and the Trafalgar will watch developments from a safe distance.”

“Will it really be safe?” Atwell asked. The loss of an SSN – although the future British seemed certain that it had been mechanical failure rather than Japanese action – had dented RAN confidence in their new allies slightly. The survivors were in the United Kingdom, learning the ropes of their new SSKs, the non-nuclear submarines that would sweep Japan from the sea.

“We believe so,” Turtledove said. “We’ve thought about attacking the carriers there, but unless we get lucky, the bastards will be able to do unto us what the Americans did in 1941OTL; re-float the ships.” He chuckled. “In deep water, we will take our position with much of the fleet – except the submarines – and start firing from well outside their own range.”

“And that’s the end of the Japanese part in the war,” Menzies mused.

“The aggressive part in the war,” Turtledove said. “We will still have to roll them back, but once their fleet is gone, we can sweep them from the seas and stave them out if necessary.” He shrugged. “Perhaps they’ll see sense and surrender.”

“Not bloody likely,” Atwell muttered.

“The operation is approved,” Menzies said finally. “May God help us all.”

HIMS Yamato

Hashirajima, Japan

16th May 1941

The departure of a major fleet in three days is a difficult task at the best of times, but the Japanese Navy had developed the skill over nearly sixty years of modern warfare. Veterans from as far back as 1904 were drafted back into the service, assisting the handful of carriers and battleships to prepare for departure. Behind them, on the army compounds of Japan, young draftees drilled constantly, waiting for weapons and transport to one of the battlegrounds.

“I trust the plans are prepared,” Admiral Yamamoto said, without turning around. His eyes gazed over the preparations for war in the harbour, and a cold fear gripped at his heart. Not for himself, for he didn’t fear death, but for his people. He’d been able to convince the Army to start preparing defences in Japan itself, but there was so little time left to prepare. In a week, the fleet would be sunk… and then Japan would lie open to naval attack.

“Yes, sir,” Commander Sato said. “We have supplied ourselves with escorting oil tankers and transports, we could even effect a landing near Vancouver if we had the troops.”

“We won’t get anywhere near Vancouver,” Yamamoto snapped, scowling across the vision of powerful Japan. He knew that it was an illusion. “Commander Sato, we will be sunk midway between the two.”

“I have prepared plans for the battle,” Commander Sato said. “If we use the main guns, we might be able to knock down some of their… cruise missiles.”

Yamamoto’s eyes flickered with a new hope. He forced it down ruthlessly. “Then they send another, and another,” he said. “Our only hope is the new armour, and the new radar system from Germany.” He glared. “And as the British have shown themselves to be perfectly capable of jamming it whenever they choose, it’s not as useful as it seems.”

Commander Sato nodded grimly. “We have at least modified the sonar Jammer,” he said. “With some of the equipment that the Germans have sent, and some of the data they’ve supplied, we should be able to confuse their submarines.”

“It won’t be as useful as you think,” Yamamoto said, and he felt a new flicker of pain within his heart. “What about our own submarines?”

“We’ll have an escort, along with some of their tenders,” Commander Sato assured him. “They can seek out the enemy carriers and…”

“And get blown out of the water,” Yamamoto said. “We are in the position of using our bodies to hold back a machine gun, Commander Sato.”

Commander Sato bowed. “Hai,” he said. “Admiral, then why do we fight?”

Yamamoto chuckled bitterly. A new wave of bile rose up within his chest. “We have a duty to die for Japan,” he said. “We have a duty… Commander Sato; I was on the bridge of Admiral Togo’s ship when we defeated a European power for the first time, and…”

A strange dimness arose around his eyes. He was grimly aware, at the very edge of his perception, of Commander Sato’s cry of alarm. “And now we are threatened by barbarians with weapons out of those novels I used to read,” he said, and darkness swallowed him up. He never felt his body hit the deck.

* * *

Ambassador Yurina didn’t react openly as the Japanese commander, one of Yamamoto’s allies, gave her the news. Yamamoto had made it clear that she was his unofficial aide, and she was to be treated with all courtesy. Still, Japanese women were not expected to show emotion in this era, and she kept her face calm as Commander Sato reported that Yamamoto had been taken to the navy Hospital to have his stomach pumped to remove the poison.

“Admiral Chuichi Nagumo has taken command of the fleet,” Commander Sato reported. “I expect that the Admiral, and yourself, will remain in the anchorage.”

“He would have wanted to command the fleet,” Yurina said flatly.

“He can’t command in that state,” Commander Sato said nervously. “There are three battalions of Naval Infantry based here as well.”

Yurina felt a flicker of pity for the young officer, caught up in a web of politics that would have defeated an older man. Yamamoto had fought many battles with the army over the Naval Infantry, finally securing the right to command them as he saw fit. It was curious and part of her would have loved to have watched how it developed; no other country had such cooperation and enmity at the same time. They would have developed a civil war by now…

Only in Japan, she thought, as Commander Sato bowed and left the room. She watched as the door closed behind her, half-expecting to hear the lock click. It didn’t, but she might have well have been a prisoner anyway; the lower decks knew nothing about her and might have tried to use her. There were times when she heard the screams, drifting over the still waters, and she shuddered in the night.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, as the night grew darker around her. The bed was cold and hard. She knew she’d done the right thing, for the right reasons, but it wasn’t a consolation. For the first time since falling into bed with Yamamoto, she knew just how alone she truly was.

They should be able to save you soon, she thought, thinking about the poison. It was a common Japanese poison, but one that was only fatal in large doses. Yamamoto had only infested a small dose, just enough to make him ill – she hoped. She wouldn’t know for a week, after the fleet had sailed.

For the first time since she’d been a teenager and had her heart broken for the first time, Ambassador Yurina cried herself to sleep.

10 Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

16th May 1941

“Horton, Professor Adrian,” Stirling said. A picture of a middle-aged black man appeared on the screen. “Born, 1980, Edinburgh. Went to Boroughmuir High School then Cambridge, majoring in modern history and geopolitics. Wrote The Balance of Global Powers, a description of the war on terror, in 2004, at twenty-four. He followed this up with a series of books on World War Two, and married Jasmine Brocklewich in 2005.”

An image of Jasmine Horton, nee Brocklewich, appeared on the screen. “Two children, Stuart and Emma, and now a third if the video is telling the truth. Became interested in post-Holocaust history in 2010 and appealed to the German Government for release of some of their documents. The request was refused, and then refused again and again, and he went onto other sources until 2015, when some achieves were opened.”

“And that’s why he was on the plane?” McLachlan asked. “What’s he doing helping Hitler?”

“His wife and children are in German hands,” Stirling said. “Does he have a choice?” He coughed. “And besides, we have proof that he’s held against his will. Did you catch the people he named as examples?”

Hanover lifted an eyebrow. “Enlighten me,” he said. “Peaceniks from Iraq?”

“He said they were, yes,” Stirling said. “However, they weren’t; I looked the names up. Two of them were RAF servicemen who were supposed to have been captured and tortured during the Gulf War, the first one. Some of them were forced to broadcast messages from Baghdad, while Andy McNab claimed to have taken part in the Gulf War. Obviously, the first two weren’t there of their own free will.”

“And neither is Horton,” Hanover said. “Where is he?”

“In Berlin somewhere,” Stirling said. “Past that? We know he’s in a bunker somewhere, and he let slip that it was designed to survive a nuclear attack, but we don’t have a precise location.”

“And a rescue mission is out of the question,” Hanover said reluctantly.

“I’m afraid so,” General Cunningham said. “Berlin is a big place and we won’t have a target place to search.”

“So… how does this change our strategy?” Hanover asked. “How can this guy affect the course of the war?”

“I’m not sure,” Stirling admitted. “There was a historian called Tony Williams who wrote a book on the changes he would make to both sides, but God only knows how much of his advice Hitler is taking. The problem is that historians, the good ones at least, wonder endlessly about how they would have done things, were they in command at the time.”

“Wonderful,” Hanover said. “I suppose we’d better see to protection for the family.”

“Yes, sir,” Stirling said.

“Get the Oversight Committee working on what effects this may have,” Hanover ordered. “Now… Joan?”

“I received a FLASH signal from Admiral Turtledove a few minutes ago,” Admiral Grisham said. “The Australians have agreed to the plan for destroying both the Combined Fleet and the invading army.”

Hanover smiled wryly. “That’s good news,” he said. “Why can’t all my news be like this?”

“Because then we’d be lying to you all the time,” McLachlan said. He was the only person in the room who would have dared to say it. “Incidentally, Major Dashwood believes that we can launch the next satellites in a few more days. There’s three up now, and we’ll have five more in a month.”

“That’s better news,” Hanover said. “Incidentally, are the Germans doing anything in Norway that we ought to be alarmed about?”

“It’s hard to be certain,” Stirling said. “JARIC – the Joint Air Reconnaissance Intelligence Centre – has been charged with studying the imagery from the satellites. The Germans don’t seem to be moving more troops up north, but they have stopped the movement to the east. They must suspect something.”

“It’s not like there are many targets,” McLachlan said grimly. “The American Press has been speculating rather enthusiastically about a landing in Europe, and MacArthur has been ranting on about us trying to take over the world.”

“Poor man,” Hanover said. “It must be a nasty shock to know you had achieved your dream, and because of it you never would succeed. What’s he doing now?”

“We’re not certain,” McLachlan admitted. “Ambassador Quinn sent that MacArthur has offered himself to the Republican Party as a candidate for the next elections, in three years time. Given all the trouble in the United States, some Governor may snap him up as a National Guard commander, even though it might cause a mutiny.”

“Overrated crisis,” Hanover muttered. “John, keep an eye on the situation. The last thing we want is America leaving the war.”

“Of course, Charles,” McLachlan said. “For the moment, I’m fairly certain that the Republicans won’t touch him with a bargepole. It would be politically disastrous.”

“Now, Admiral,” Hanover said. “Is Admiral Turtledove ready?”

“He says that he’s as ready as he would be without making it obvious he’s ready,” Grisham said. “The fleet is fully loaded and warned that it might have to leave in a hurry.”

“Good,” Hanover said. “Now… all we have to do is wait.”

“And see,” McLachlan injected.

Chapter Twenty-Three: Deathcloud Rising

HIMS Yamato

Hashirajima, Japan

18th May 1941

In a very real sense, Admiral Chuichi Nagumo was Japan’s most successful commander of the war. While Kurita and Ozawa had been disgraced or killed in action, Nagumo could and did claim the victory of the Battle of Malaya, even though his ships had been driven off after a dual with Singapore’s main guns. After all, he had sunk three British ships.

Commander Sato watched as Nagumo issued his orders and felt his heart sink. Despite his work with the aircraft carriers between the wars, Nagumo had no… talent for carrier work. Unlike Genda or Yamamoto, Nagumo cared little for the flyers; he had wanted to use the carriers as battleships! Even though the carriers carried far more potent weapons in the form of their air wing, Nagumo had wanted to allow them to close with the enemy!

He shook his head. If the recovering Admiral Yamamoto had been able to convince the war cabinet to call off the strike until he had recovered, Sato would have felt a lot more confident. The fleet that Nagumo had assembled looked powerful, but against the British forces, it was almost nothing. Six months of desperate improvising had given the Japanese some countermeasures, but he knew they were not enough. The ships were protected against a single torpedo hit, but the British could just keep striking them… and of course the carrier decks could hardly be protected.

“You look pensive,” Nagumo observed. For a moment, the two men stood alone on the bridge. “Do you not feel that we will win?”

“We will take heavy losses for the Emperor,” Sato replied dully.

“So Yamamoto kept saying,” Nagumo said. He smiled. “That fool Kurita gave up our chance at a strategic victory, but we will not.” He waved a hand over the fleet. “Ten battleships, battlecruisers, cruisers, destroyers, submarines… and seven carriers. A force far greater than the one that Kurita had, and one that can absorb more damage.”

Sato sighed. Nagumo didn’t understand. The seven carriers were two fleet carriers, two conversions and three converted freighters. Even if they had all been fleet carriers, Sato knew that there was no way that they could put up enough fighters to stand off the British missiles.

“Kurita’s ships were older vessels, with inadequate armour,” Nagumo continued. That was true; the weaker armour on the Kongo and its sister ships had provided the British with a convenient target. “The Yamato and her comrades have had extra armour and torpedo protection loaded on.”

Sato bowed once. Nagumo might have been right, but he didn’t believe it. After all, the British had plenty more missiles to use.

Nagumo swept over to the radioman. “Transmit the signal,” he said. “The fleet is to begin sailing upon command.”

Sato took his station at the air control station, which was meant to transmit orders to the carrier planes. He suspected that he would have no time to use it before the missiles arrived. He scowled; if the British got lucky or smart, they would take out the tankers once the fleet was in the middle of the Pacific wastes, and strand them helplessly.

“We are about to embark upon a glorious adventure for His Majesty,” Nagumo said. “His Most Imperial Majesty expects that each and every one of you will do his duty.”

There was a long pause. Cheers rang through the massive ship. “Send the signal,” Nagumo ordered. “Take us out.”

* * *

The Japanese didn’t know that she was there, a massive SSN lurking just outside their main harbour. If they had known, they would have tried to sink her, but they didn’t even have the slightest idea that the ship was present. Some Japanese officers, aware of the true purpose of the fleet, might have suspected her presence, but they gave her no thought. If they were observed… well, they were observed.

“Some mighty big bastards in that force,” Captain Tyson observed. The Trafalgar had been watching the harbour for months, carefully noting what the Japanese were doing. “Anyone would think they were serious about going somewhere.”

“Canada, perhaps,” Lieutenant-Commander Davidson said. On the surface, the Japanese started to emit a hail of sound pulses, disrupting passive 1941 sonar. It was a nuisance, even for 2015 sonar, but active sonar could still pick out the ships. “They’ve certainly got enough supplies.”

“Those tankers might be empty,” Lieutenant Hawthorne said. “They can’t have much fuel left after the mess we made of the refineries before they took the Indies.”

“You’ve been reading up on this,” Davidson said wryly. “Do you know whose in command?”

“Yamato was Yamamoto’s flagship during this time period,” Hawthorne said thoughtfully. “That might be him onboard now in command, one of the best admirals in the war.”

“We could sink it now,” Davidson said. “Sir, we could bring most of the bastards down with a few torpedoes, or launch a Tomahawk attack from…”

“Admiral Turtledove’s orders were clear,” Tyson said. “We observe only, no attacks unless they see us and open fire.” He nodded grimly at the helm. “Follow them, slowly,” he commanded. “Exec, send a contact report to Australia. The fleet has to sortie soon.”

“Aye, sir,” Davidson said.

HMS Dasher

Nr Australia

18th May 1941

HMS Dasher had been in construction, along with three others, before the Transition. The MOD had taken the ships over as soon as the Navy remembered that they existed, but then had taken the decision to halt construction until resources could be allocated. In the month between the Transition and the decision to commission them as Royal Navy ships, the Battle of the Indian Ocean had been fought and won, and hard-won information and experience had been worked into the new ships.

Admiral Turtledove smiled as he strode onto the bridge. The Dasher – named for a ship that had taken part in the original timeline’s version of World War Two – was perhaps the single most powerful naval unit in the world. While it lacked an air complement, its missiles and torpedoes were modified for additional power, even against battleship armour.

“Report,” he snapped, as he saluted Captain Patel. The young commander saluted back, waving a hand towards the big display. “Have they left Hashirajima?”

“Yes, Admiral,” Captain Patel said. The tall dark-skinned officer gave off an air of competence. “Almost the entire Japanese battleline, except two old battleships that probably can’t keep up.”

“Designate them for missile attacks later,” Turtledove ordered. “Bring the fleet to moving stations; inform them that we’ll depart in thirty minutes. FLASH signal to London and Canberra, inform the Australians that phase one of the plan will begin in thirty minutes.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Lewis said. “Sir, what about the Japanese invasion fleet?”

Turtledove scowled. “What about it?” He asked. Privately, he was impressed, but Lewis wasn’t cleared for the entirety of the plan. “It’s not like they stand a chance, is it?”

“Dasher is ready to depart,” Captain Patel reported. “The ship is fully at your command.”

Turtledove smiled. “Tell me,” he said. “How long will it be until we can begin shooting at them?”

He saw Patel and Lewis exchange glances. His obsession with destroying the remains of the Japanese fleet was well known. “At their present course and speed, seven days,” Lewis said finally. “They’re heading… well, not quite towards us, but more towards Latin America than Canada.”

“Odd,” Turtledove said. “Still, there’s no reason why they cannot change course, after all. Is the fleet ready?”

There was a short pause. “The fleet reports that it’s ready,” Lewis said. “Australian Sonar Command reports three possible submarines, hanging back along our probable course.”

Turtledove smiled grimly. He could hardly question the bravery of the Japanese submariners; hell, he would have liked to have been so brave himself. It was just stupid, though; the Japanese had only managed to torpedo a handful of Contemporary merchant ships, their attempts to take a shot at his ships had failed utterly.

“Ignore them,” he said. “Inform the ASW ships; the Japanese are not to be fired upon unless they move into attack positions.”

“Aye, sir,” Lewis said. His voice betrayed his bafflement. “Sir, the fleet is ready.”

Turtledove looked down at the display. Forty-one ships; Royal Navy, converted freighters, even some new construction. Five carriers; two real carriers and three converted oil tankers. It was the largest force that the Royal Navy had deployed since Suez, and for a far better cause.

“Order the fleet to set sail,” he said. “Take us out.”

* * *

When a ship is moving along the coastline, it is easy to tell that the ship is moving; the land glides past at a rate of knots. In the empty ocean, there is very little sign that the fleet was not alone in the world, not even birds and islands can be seen. The only excitement was on the second day, when a shoal of whales swam past.

“We have to get the conservationists moving into action sooner in this timeline,” Turtledove observed, relaxing for the first time since the war began. “Think how many species we could save.”

“The Indian tigers would be glad of it,” Patel observed. He’d been disturbed by news from his family; their return to India had been distressing. “All the princes hunting them down.”

Turtledove had shrugged as the days slipped by almost unnoticed. He spent most of the day brooding in his cabin; he’d been blamed for the Battle of the Indian Ocean, despite having won the battle. He knew that the Board of Inquiry had suppressed the report, and with good reason, and it boiled away inside.

Not given to self-introspection, Turtledove flumed angrily. The Royal Navy hadn’t fought a major sea battle since 1941; who would have thought that the Japanese would have been crazy enough to continue on into the teeth of the task force’s superior firepower? Even the awards and medals piled on the navy didn’t take away the sting of the armchair admirals questioning his decisions.

Even worse was the news from Australia. The Japanese had landed, as he’d expected. The war wasn’t going well, even for them. Turtledove had ordered that news kept from the crew; enough crewmen were questioning the decision to continue after the Japanese fleet already.

They think we’re on a wild goose chase, Turtledove said. He knew that that wasn’t true; Trafalgar continued to send regular updates. The Japanese were moving southeast, heading on a dogleg towards the United States. Absently, he wondered if they meant to strike at Pearl Harbour, but then dismissed the thought. The Japanese hadn’t moved anything into position to strike at the Philippines, and they would hardly want to risk the Americans tearing their interior lines to shreds.

We need the new submarines, he thought. The British shipyards had begun producing dozens of diesel-powered submarines, most of which would be transferred to Australia and Canada. Their navies would crew the new ships, and Japan would starve. Days passed and he kept repeating that to himself. Japan will starve.

* * *

“Admiral to the Combat Information Centre, Admiral to the Combat Information Centre,” the loudspeaker bellowed. Turtledove jumped up from his bed, where he’d been dozing, and grabbed his cap. There was only one matter that it could be; the fleet had been detected.

“Admiral, we’re about to enter the range of the Japanese fleet,” Lieutenant Lewis reported, as Turtledove strode into the CIC. “The Captain wants you to issue orders.”

Turtledove looked down at the display. The Japanese fleet had been sighted by a drone launched from Ark Royal, which was now hovering high over the fleet. They didn’t seem aware of the British ships. They’d left any Japanese submarine behind long since, and whatever primitive radar detection systems the Japanese had would be unable to detect them at extreme range.

“Any sign that they’ve seen us?” He asked, studying the display. The only real danger was the Japanese launching a massive air strike and swarming them under by force of numbers.

“No,” Lieutenant Lewis said. He hesitated. “Hang on, sir, they’re launching aircraft.”

Turtledove blinked. “What the hell?”

“It looks like a standard CAP formation,” Lieutenant Lewis said. “Sir, they’re not launching a strike, but they must have had a sniff of us.”

“How?” Turtledove said. “They can’t have seen the drone?”

“It’s supposed to be very difficult to see, even on radar,” Lieutenant Lewis said. “Perhaps they just caught a glimpse, or maybe the drone’s radars confused theirs, which also shouldn’t be possible.” He scowled. “Sir, they’re also launching recon seaplanes.”

“Bring the fleet to general quarters,” Turtledove snapped. “We’ll ask any survivors afterwards.”

* * *

The device proclaimed itself to be a ‘Sierra-Foxtrot Emissions Detector, capable of detecting even low-level active sensors.’ Commander Sato, who’d been ordered to learn about the new technology, wondered where the hell the Germans had gotten it before they’d shipped it to Japan across the Soviet Union. According to the manual, the device was designed to save energy on radars by tracking other radars… and was coy about the uses to which the device might be put. Sato, who had spent time chasing Chinese smugglers, expected that its real purpose was to watch for other radars, ones attached to navy drones.

Such as the one hanging overhead, he thought, staring upwards. The Japanese hadn’t even had a hint the drone was present until it activated its radars and began to probe the task force. It wasn’t as helpful as he’d hoped; the drone was well out of range of anti-aircraft guns and there were still no traces of radar from the British ships he was certain were around in the vicinity.

“Launch recon fighters,” Admiral Nagumo ordered, as the Zeros kept on permanent standby launched from the carriers. “Prepare for a shipping strike, using the new tactics.”

Sato bowed. The new tactics were kamikaze; attempting to slam an aircraft into a British ship. Given how untrained the new pilots were, he suspected that that would be the best that they could do… unless…

“Incoming,” a watchman shouted. Sato looked up to see the streaks of light and the sky and knew that time had run out for the Imperial Japanese Navy.

* * *

The Japanese fleet had no secrets from the drone. It floated overhead; calmly dissecting the Japanese ships and transmitting the information back to the fleet. It noted the launch of the Japanese reconnaissance planes calmly; it would be at least half an hour before they could find the British ships, even if they flew directly towards them. With the search pattern they were beginning, they would take hours to locate the British.

That was what old fashioned carrier warfare was about, Turtledove thought absently. The two sides sneak around trying to locate the others first… and he who sees the other first wins – normally.

“Designate the first salvo of Harpoons,” he ordered. Not only had the missiles been modified with extra explosive and penetration power, but the fleet now carried more of them, even if they couldn’t all be used at once. “Launch CAP, launch AEW aircraft.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Lewis said. The RAF had modified a Gulfstream transport for AWACS-style duties, and loaded it onboard one of the converted oil tankers. The scream of aircraft engines echoed through the hull. “CAP launched.”

Turtledove smiled as probing radars began to illuminate the miles of empty water. “Launch Harpoons,” he commanded. “First round; designate enemy carriers and tankers.”

Dasher shuddered as the first missiles erupted from her batteries. “Missiles launched,” Lieutenant Lewis said. “Impact in thirty seconds.”

* * *

The Shokaku was the finest Japanese carrier that had ever been produced; fast, powerful, and lethally effective. She had served in the battles near the Dutch East Indies, even though she had missed out on the real battle that had cost the Japanese four older carriers. With her sister ship, the Zuikaku, she carried a powerful combat force around – and the British hadn’t dared to tangle with her. It was a source of some pride to her Captain; the almighty British were too scared to go near his ship.

Captain Yokokawa Ichibei had only seconds to realise that his ship had been targeted and no time at all to react. The first missile slammed into the flight deck; the second into the conning tower. By fortunate chance, most of Shokaku’s aircraft were already in the air, but that didn’t save the ship. The Harpoon warhead detonated, tearing a mighty hole in the hull of the carrier, and then the Shokaku’s stockpile of bombs and torpedoes detonated. The carrier literally vanished in a tearing blast of light.

* * *

Commander Sato wasn’t looking at the carrier when it was destroyed. He was staring down at the future device, which was finally tracking a high concentration of radar emissions, miles away. They would be barely within carrier range – except the Japanese carriers had already been sunk. Only one hundred and fifty aircraft were in the air, not all armed for the task.

A strange… oily explosion billowed up as a tanker was hit. More followed as the entire transport fleet was destroyed, stranding the main fleet far from home.

“Admiral,” Sato muttered. Nagumo was staring at the burning Zuikaku. “Admiral?”

“I should have listened,” Nagumo muttered. Sato committed the dreadful crime of shaking the little admiral. “What?”

“Admiral, we can get to them,” Sato said. “We have to order the fighters in now!”

“Do so,” Nagumo said. He sounded dazed. “Do it now.”

* * *

“Five carriers and seven transport ships, just blown out of the water,” Lieutenant Lewis reported. “Japanese fleet coming about.”

“They’ll be able to follow the missile trails,” Turtledove said. “Are their fighters incoming?”

“Yes, Admiral,” Lieutenant Lewis said. “They’ll be on us in half an hour.”

Turtledove smiled. “I see no reason to wait,” he said. “Contact Dragon.” The Type-45 destroyer was the only one carrying the experimental weapon. “Order them to fire the Deathcloud.”

He chuckled. The MOD would probably end up giving it a more family-friendly name, but it would remain Deathcloud to the Royal Navy. He grinned as a new missile launched from the Dragon. The Japanese fliers would have no idea what was coming their way.

* * *

The Japanese prided themselves upon their coordination of fighter aircraft. For what the pilots knew would be their final mission, they formed up into a single large formation and headed along the missile trails. Remaining together, they had learnt, meant that the enemy would have to fight the entire force at once, rather than fighting one on one. The pilots only saw the missile when it was too close to avoid… and the handful of pilots who had the presence of mind to fire at it were too late.

Deathcloud detonated in the centre of the Japanese formation. Like a conventional FAE bomb, it blasted out a wave of burning fuel, which was far too hot for the wooden and metal aircraft to stand. Burning, their wings ablaze, the Japanese force fell out of the sky. None of them had any chance to abandon their planes; they all died bravely, unaware of what had killed them with ease.

* * *

“May God forgive us,” Lieutenant Lewis breathed. The fiery remains of the Japanese force fell towards the sea; there was a silence in the CIC. No one had ever seen a force simply swept out of existence, not even during the Battle of Malta.

“Send the signal,” Admiral Turtledove ordered. “Transmit it now, all frequencies.”

* * *

Commander Sato had seen the blast that had exterminated the aircraft. His first thought was that it had been one of the atomic bombs that Yamamoto had warned him about, but then he realised that it hadn’t been; the blast had been too small.

“Admiral,” a technician said. “We’re receiving a signal.”

“Let’s hear it.” Nagumo said. “Put it on the speakers.”

“Attention, Admiral Yamamoto,” a strange voice said. It spoke Japanese, but with a strange accent. It reminded Sato of Ambassador Yurina, even if the voice was clearly male. “Attention, Japanese fleet. Your carrier ships lie broken, your aircraft wiped from the sky. Without our help, you won’t ever make it back to Japan.

“What sort of sacrifice is it? We can destroy your entire fleet with ease, unless you surrender. You will be unable to make even a dent in us; we will not allow you to close with us. Your young men, the hope of Japan, will die here alone and forgotten about, save only by the fishes. Admiral; surrender, for the sake of your men.”

“No,” Nagumo said. His voice was curiously flat. “Increase speed,” he commanded. “We will sink that fleet!”

* * *

“They’re still coming,” Lieutenant Lewis reported. “They’ll be on us in only five hours at that rate.”

Turtledove shook his head. “I wanted the fleet intact,” he said. “May history forgive us for what we must do.”

He reached out once and held his fingers above the representation of a button on the main screen. It was big and red, marked FIRE. He pressed it. Dasher shuddered as a second salvo of rockets launched, coordinated with the other ships in the fleet. One hundred and fifty Harpoon missiles, lancing out at the Japanese fleet.

* * *

The explosion slammed against Yamato as the Harpoon detonated against the rear of the ship. Commander Sato cursed; the accursed missile had penetrated through the deck armour at the rear of the ship before detonating, blasting the rear of the mighty battleship clean off.

“Admiral?” He asked, and then swore. Nagumo lay on the deck, blood streaming from a head wound. One glance was enough to tell Sato that Nagumo was dying. He made his decision quickly. “All hands, abandon ship, I repeat…”

The second salvo of missiles arrived. As the largest ship still on the ocean, Yamato received the attention of three of them. Commander Sato died without realising what had hit him and the fleet.

* * *

“Admiral, that’s them all sunk,” Lieutenant Lewis reported. The display was empty, except for the wreckage drifting in the water. “They’re all gone.”

“So many young lives,” Turtledove breathed. “Inform Captain Rashad; his ship and Task Force 5 are to remain behind on SAR duties. Any prisoners are to be treated well.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Lewis said.

“And for the rest of the fleet, its time to return to Australia,” Turtledove said. “And, on the way, if we hit the Japanese bases in the Dutch East Indies, I dare say that they’ll be grateful.”

Chapter Twenty-Four: Nippon Down Under

HIMS Tintin

Nr Australia

20th May 1941

Private Fumihiko had lost all sense of timing, wishing with all his heart that the nightmare voyage would just end. HMIS Tintin, a captured large fishing boat, was one of thousands of ships, not all of them remotely seaworthy, that had been pressed into service. Fumihiko had once been proud to be part of the infantry group that would make first landfall on Australia, but as the long voyage wore on through the night, he had lost interest.

A private vomited; a sergeant slapped him across the face. Fumihiko concealed his own vomit, grateful that he was no longer the newest man in the platoon. Sergeant Hitoshi ruled the platoon with a rod of iron, and he was hardly the worst in the army.

“Land,” the pilot shouted. Fumihiko looked up as best as he could; sure enough, a dark shrouded land could be seen. Suddenly, a streak of light sliced through the air, blinding the platoon, and slammed into a larger transport. The explosion blasted the ship out of the water.

The platoon gasped as the boat rocked wildly. Sergeant Hitoshi said nothing; perhaps they were allowed some concern when it seemed as if they would all plunge into the cold waters. Another streak of light appeared, then another, but they all missed the tiny boat, out for bigger targets. A green flare flickered in the sky and Fumihiko saw Australia for the first time. It was a beach, just a beach.

“Out, now,” Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed, forcing them out. Warm water lapped around their ankles as the platoon jumped overboard, holding their weapons high, and splashed through the water to reach the beach. A single gunshot rang out, and another, and then they stopped.

“Forward, don’t stop,” a Captain shouted. The man needed no urging; they ran forward and headed into the land beyond the beach. There was very little light and no sign of Australians… before a hail of fire pinned them down.

Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed commands. Fumihiko jumped up and fired a burst from his rifle, the new weapon that the armouries had been turning out, and then ducked as a machine gun focused in on him. An explosion rang out as a grenade detonated, blasting the machine gun and its user away.

“They’re running,” someone shouted. Fumihiko smiled, convinced that the man was right. How could the cowardly white men hope to stand against the steel of Japan? Sergeant Hitoshi blew a whistle and the platoon reassembled. A great deal of confusion ran through the ranks until all of the platoons were carefully sorted out.

“Get unloading,” Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed, as the first of the transport ships sailed up to the beach. They were tiny lifters, moving back and forth from the big ships hanging off shore. An explosion illuminated the beach as a missile struck one of the transports and destroyed it. “Move, damn you!”

Fumihiko jumped to obey. Once the supplies had been unloaded, they could proceed overland towards Darwin. He smiled; he’d heard stories about white women and couldn’t wait to see if they were true.

* * *

No Japanese tactical commander worth his stripes would dream of not being in the first wave, even with the new and deadly weapons available to the enemy. General Masaharu Homma, the victor of the Dutch East Indies, knew more about the new British weapons than most of his people, and had decided that being on the ground was safer. His staff, which had been dispersed among five different ships, was being reassembled and he’d set up a command post in a commandeered hotel.

He scowled. Why did he have the feeling that events were not going according to plan? They’d landed against less opposition than he’d expected and the Australians had run…

He shook his head. They hadn’t run; they hadn’t been there at all. All his troops had encountered was a small number of troops, fighting to slow the Japanese down. All three of the main landing sites were reporting the same; an almost unopposed landing. Homma didn’t like it at all; he knew the westerners and knew their strengths. The AEF in the First World War had been one of the toughest forces in the trenches, and nothing had really changed there. They should have been capable of putting up a better fight than this.

The night wore on. Thousands of troops came ashore, along with a handful of small tanks. After their disastrous defeat in Malaya, Homma had been reluctant to bring them along, as the German-provided weapons would provide sufficient anti-tank firepower. The War Cabinet had overruled him; the tanks might just remain useful, and besides, they weren’t doing anything just sitting back in the East Indies.

New reports came in and Homma started to understand what had happened. The small collection of towns had been stripped of anything that might prove useful, including transport and fuel. Almost all of the civilians, those who hadn’t attempted to remain and defend their property, had been evacuated from the town. There would be no slave labour to build defences like there had been before, in the Philippines.

“We have to march on Darwin at once,” Homma said finally. Certain radio signals were dispatched through the confusion, ordering the second force east of Darwin to begin its own advance. “We need to keep them running, prevent them from forming a proper defence line.”

His colonels bowed and set off to get their regiments moving. Homma felt a centre of cold ice form in his heart; he knew that events were not going to plan at all. For a long moment, he thought about abandoning the beachhead, or even digging in, but he had studied the last attempt to try anything as big as invading a whole country – Gallipoli. No, speed was of the essence; they had to act before the enemy regrouped and counterattacked.

He glared into the terrain revealed by the rising sun. Somewhere within that wilderness, he was certain; Australians were watching him, and waiting…

* * *

Philip Orozco and Samuel Broderick were not Australians, but otherwise Homma was correct; there were people watching all the likely landing sites. Unlike the Australian defenders, who were now retreating in good order, the two SAS men were under orders to observe only – no heroics.

“Bastards,” Broderick snapped suddenly. One of the sensors, a robot bird that was undetectable to Japanese technology, had picked up on the fate of the only Australian to be taken prisoner. The Japanese summarily beheaded him. “They’re worse than the fucking ragheads.”

“Now, now,” Orozco said. “What sort of example is that for the young men we have to educate?”

Broderick fixed him with a deadly glare. The twenty-two strong SAS reserve force had been sent to Australia to train a new group of Australian SAS; they hadn’t expected to be at ground zero of an invasion. The SAS had been parcelled out across some of the more likely landing zones, just to watch and see what the Japanese were doing.

“We’re supposed to bring them up to be killers,” he snapped, and transmitted orders to the drone hanging high overhead. They’d been ordered to act under 2015 stealth protocols – acting on the assumption that the enemy had the same detection equipment as they did – and the burst transmission was almost impossible to detect unless someone was looking out for it. The drone relayed it up to the satellite, which bounced it back down to Canberra.

“It’s going to be a long time before anyone says nice things about them,” Orozco said calmly. “Think we should just melt down the swords this time?”

“No argument there,” Broderick said. He glared at the transmitter; the Field HQ hadn’t given them any instructions. “How long do you think it will be before they reach Darwin?”

Orozco considered the matter thoughtfully. The Australian transport network wasn’t anything like as capable as it had been in 2015. The Australians had also removed any transport that might have been found along the coastline, hopefully. Given the size of Australia, it was hard to be certain.

“Two, three days?” He guessed. “They’re only… what? Fifty kilometres from Darwin?”

“I suppose,” Broderick said. “I wish that they had GPS up and running at the moment.”

“They’re supposed to be working on it,” Orozco said. He peered through some of the sensors. “It looks like they’re getting organised.”

“Finally,” Broderick muttered. “None of them would pass Selection.”

“To be fair, they’re landing an entire army with three jetties and a shallow beach,” Orozco pointed out. “I’m amazed that they’re not in more trouble.”

“Perhaps they’ll click their ruby slippers without any help from us,” Broderick said. He nodded as his communicator hummed. “We’re to remain and observe, nothing else.”

“Bastards,” Orozco said. “Inform them that we’ll continue to watch.”

Government House

Canberra, Australia

20th May 1941

The map looked grim, grimmer than the situation really was, or at least Menzies hoped so. There had been questions in the House the day before, and now the Japanese had spent most of the night digging in. He scowled; four Japanese divisions and assorted hangers-on had arrived almost overnight, and the fleet was still on its way, heading for its rendezvous with the Japanese Fleet.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Colonel Philip Hawkinson assured him. The British liaison officer nodded politely to the Prime Minister. Menzies didn’t take offensive; he’d learnt fairly early on that Hawkinson was devoted to his equipment, the rest of the world made little impact on him.

“It’s going to look bad when I stand before Parliament and try to explain why the army is not immediately counterattacking,” Menzies snapped. He scowled. “Look at the bastards expanding their control!”

“They’re not expanding,” Hawkinson said. “They have three beachheads; one on each side of Darwin and a third at Cape York. None of them are going to go much further.”

He waved a hand at the map. Australian units were positioned in locations that would allow them to seal off the enemy lodgements. RAF units were preparing for yet another raid on the enemy positions; a Japanese attempt to set up an airfield was going to be ruined.

“Except Darwin,” Menzies said. “They’ll concentrate on taking the city.”

Hawkinson nodded. “That’s what they’ll do,” he said. He tapped the map. “They’re not going to have an easy time of it; they’re not set up to be a mechanised force. They’ll concentrate on taking the city, and we have four infantry brigades in the city itself… and by the time they realise they’ve been tricked; they’ll have been starved out. Then they can surrender or drop dead.”

Menzies smiled wryly. “I don’t suppose that they can live off the land?”

“Not enough to feed them all,” Hawkinson assured him. “Even if they try… well, guns and bullets don’t grow on trees.”

“A serious problem,” Menzies said dryly. “I don’t suppose that your technology can make things out of nothing.”

Hawkinson shook his head. “It’s supposed to be possible to transmute elements in a reactor,” he said, “but I don’t think that it was ever made practical.”

* * *

Three hours later, Menzies stumbled back into the headquarters and summoned Sir Thomas Albert Blamey at once. The Prime Minister was haggard and worn; sweat was running under his suit.

“They just put me through the wringer,” he said. “I managed to convince them from doing anything stupid, but they’re in a murderous mood.”

“How is civilian morale taking it?” Blamey asked. “Has there been panic and rioting?”

“A little in the east coast,” Menzies said. “The evacuation wasn’t hard to miss, after all. If it wasn’t for the nuclear-powered desalination plant, we would have been unable to water them all, let alone feed them. What’s the latest?”

“Japanese units are slowly poking their way towards Darwin,” Hawkinson said. He nodded towards the computer display. “The air force wants to launch strikes against their armour.”

“Approved,” Menzies said. “The fewer Japanese tanks there are, the better.”

“We might be better targeting their lorries,” Blamey said. “They don’t have anything like enough anyway.”

“We can do both,” Hawkinson said. “We can launch a series of strikes – its not like they can hit the Harriers. The only danger is aircraft from Papua New Guinea, and they won’t have much time to loiter around, even with drop tanks.”

“Order the RAF in,” Menzies said. He scowled; the RAAF had been destroyed on the ground in the opening days of the war, the handful of aircraft that were left had been lost in the battles around Papua New Guinea. The new RAAF was being reequipped with Hawk aircraft, in Britain, and wouldn’t be available for months yet.

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Hawkinson said. He tapped a control on the console. “The orders have been sent.”

Nr Darwin

Australia

20th May 1941

Private Fumihiko felt his sprits life as the tanks appeared near the end of the column, moving past the infantry, who cheered as the intimidating iron monsters clunked past, emitting smoke and flumes. He cheered with the others; it was a good way to avoid being hit by Sergeant Hitoshi. Still, he had decided he hated Australia; it was hot and uncomfortable and filled with flies.

He wished he could pause, if only for a few minutes, but the sergeants were keeping the men moving, using their clubs with gusto. The men in the tanks were lucky, he decided; at least they didn’t have to walk. The flasks of water that they’d been provided with were almost empty; several men had fallen ill after drinking water from streams. Sergeant Hitoshi had blamed it on poisoning, but Private Fumihiko privately doubted that the Australians could have poisoned every stream in the continent. Australia was big, he knew; it had looked so simple to conquer when he’d seen the map.

A scream split across the sky as two black shapes roared overhead. He looked up, expecting to see Japanese Zeros, but instead, they were different planes, nastier-looking ones.

“Stay in the ranks,” Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed. Fumihiko gasped in pain as the sergeant’s club slammed into his back. He focused on the back of the man in front of him and marched on… until the aircraft swooped low over the force and dropped some bombs. Fumihiko threw himself to the ground along with the other men as a series of explosions ran up the column and overran the tanks. One by one, they exploded; the aircraft vanished into the bright sky.

“Halt,” a colonel bellowed. Fumihiko was glad of the rest as the senior officers muttered to themselves, trying to see how many soldiers had been killed. He winced; the entire tank force had been destroyed – with ease. Shots rang out; three officers died. Under the command of the sergeants, the Japanese returned fire, tearing through the foliage and hitting… what? Nothing, as far as Fumihiko could tell.

This isn’t as easy as we thought, Fumihiko thought, as the column began to move again. He thought about pointing it out, and then decided not to bother; it would have only led to kicks and blows.

* * *

General Masaharu Homma cursed as some of the strategy became clear. The Australians – and their British masters – had intended to allow the force to land, choosing to avoid concentrating in a position where the Japanese could defeat them. Instead… instead, they were concentrating somewhere over the horizon, and waiting for the Japanese to run out of vehicles and supplies.

“We have to push faster,” he said. His colonels bowed; they didn’t understand, not really. There were limits, even for the finest Japanese fighting men, and Australia might just be just across the limits. They could not maintain such a pace for ever, even for the two days that would be required to reach Darwin. The port had the facilities they needed, but the port would be no good if they could not muster the strength to take the city.

For a long moment, he considered simply surrendering; he knew the west and he didn’t expect that his men would be slaughtered as soon as they were disarmed, but he dismissed the thought. It would be dishonourable to surrender, not when they could fight to the finish. It wasn’t as if the fight was hopeless… wasn’t it?

HMS Astute

Coral Sea

23rd May 1941

HMS Astute was one of four submarines of her class, the most advanced submarines in the world after the Transition. The Japanese had literally nothing that could touch her; the only danger was mechanical failure. Despite the torrent of propaganda coming out of Tokyo, the Royal Navy was fairly certain that it had been mechanical failure that had caused the loss of a submarine in the Dutch East Indies.

Along with eleven other submarines, deployed to the west and east of Australia, HMS Astute had been waiting for the signal to engage. The only excitement had been a Japanese destroyer stumbling into the kill-zone, which had been duly blown out of the water with a single torpedo. While HMS Astute’s commanding officer, Captain Patricia Orison, had heard about the Japanese anti-torpedo measures, she’d never actually seen one of them work, and personally blamed it on human error.

“Captain, we’re receiving a burst transmission, FLASH-level encryption, from fleet command in Canberra,” Lieutenant Vanderlinden reported. “It’s decrypting now.”

Orison nodded. She wasn’t convinced that there was any need to encrypt signals – the Japanese couldn’t hope to intercept them – but she agreed with the Oversight Committee that it would be a bad idea to develop bad habits. Sooner or later, someone, most likely the Americans, would develop quantum computers and equal decryption abilities.

“They’ve sent the attack order,” Lieutenant Vanderlinden said. The atmosphere in the submarine’s control room suddenly became a great deal tenser. “They want us to attack.”

“About bloody time,” Orison muttered. “Helm, ahead full. Let’s see what we can find.”

The more complex orders had been simple. There were no allied vessels – apart from the submarines – in the region between Australia and the Dutch East Indies. Everything in that region was a target; they were to sink all the Japanese ships. Orison waited patiently as HMS Astute deployed its radar tower and performed a quick radar scan. There were three Japanese transports heading from Papua New Guinea, directly for Cape York.

“Load torpedo tubes,” Orison ordered. She waited for the acknowledgement. “Fire!”

HMS Astute shuddered briefly as it launched three torpedoes in quick succession. The Japanese had no idea that they were under attack; the three ships exploded with more force than Orison had expected.

“They must have been carrying ammunition,” Lieutenant Vanderlinden commented. “Even fighting men don’t explode like that.”

Orison nodded dispassionately. “That should slow down their conquest,” she said. “Time to tighten your belts, boys; we know how to strangle shipping in ways you can’t even dream of.” She studied the results of the radar scan thoughtfully. “On to the next target,” she said. “The Japanese won’t sink their own supply lines for us.”

Chapter Twenty-Five: The Stage is Set

Future Embassy

Washington DC, USA

23rd May 1941

Ambassador King peered at the tiny magnifying box. Straining his eyes, he could make out a tiny silver splinter at the bottom of the box. No matter how he peered, he couldn’t make out any more details; it was just a silver glint.

“All right,” he said finally. “I give up; what is it?”

“It’s a bug,” Marine Lieutenant Bosco said. King blinked; he didn’t know the uncommunicative Marine very well. “More to the point, its 2015 technology.”

King put the box down on the desk. “Who put it there?” He asked. One suspect came to mind at once. “Is it a British design?”

“Yes and no,” Bosco said. He picked up the box and glared at it. “That’s what I thought at first, but I checked it against the database, the one prepared for embassy security, and… well, if it is a British plant, then it’s a very odd one.”

He paced around the room. “This design was formalised in 2010 and superseded in 2011, by the NSA. MI5 and MI6 were allowed access to the technology as a quid pro quo for something else, but by 2012 the designs were public anyway and you could get them on the black market. Furthermore, NSA’s willingness to allow this to develop was pushed forward by the development of ELINT sensors – like the ones we were equipped with – that could find the bugs.”

He scowled. “So why would the British use a bug they would know that we could detect?”

“Which suggests that whatever’s happening isn’t entirely official,” King said. “Someone else is using British technology.”

“Hoover,” Palter said. “Who else would have means, motive and opportunity?” King lifted an eyebrow. “Means; there are thousands of Britons here who would be delighted at a chance to earn some money through smuggling. Motive; he hates you and blames you for the black rebellions and his own personal disgrace. Opportunity; there are thousands of people who come here every day and 1941 doesn’t have anything like the kind of databases that we enjoyed back home.”

“And won’t if some congressmen have their way,” King observed. “Despite my ancestor, I am in favour of people holding guns, but some of their security limitations are just…”

“Treasonous?” Palter asked wryly. “These people don’t have to plan for terrorists or sneak attacks.”

“They’re refusing to allow black people into certain places in the south,” King snapped. “I think they’ve got the idea, its just misapplied.”

He scowled. The series of incidents following incidents was expanding across the south. A National Guard platoon had been wiped out after attempting to disarm a crowd of black people; someone had blown up a white school. All of the poison was coming out onto the surface – and it was hurting.

Palter nodded. “What are we going to do about Hoover?”

“I’ll talk to the President about it,” King said. He scowled. “Coming to think of it, what’s to stop Hoover from having the White House bugged?”

Palter blanched. “He’s already supposed to have thousands of blackmail files,” he said. “If he’s bugging the White House…”

“We don’t know yet,” King said. I’ll request a meeting with the President at once. Your team can survey the White House and look for unwanted insects.”

“Yes, sir,” Palter said. “We’ll get on to it at once.”

* * *

There were times when Ambassador King questioned the wisdom of the path he had chosen, a month after being dumped back in time. The process of social engineering wasn’t open to him; he simply lacked the resources, even with the investments and patents, to engage in such efforts. Knowledge of the future was open to all; the history books had been spread across the United States.

He picked up the mobile phone and scowled. Like a handful of similar phones, it seemed normal, but it was designed to read his bioelectric patterns in particular. Unimaginable to 1941 technology, for anyone, but him it would only produce a standard phone system. For him, it accessed a quantum encryption microcomputer, which encoded his transmissions beyond any hope of decryption. The number wasn’t a long one; there were only ten numbers in the secure store.

“The black eagle is sitting on the red flowerpot,” he said, as soon as the phone was picked up. The code phase was ridiculous, for who in 1940 could hack into the system, but he’d made the decision to work under 2015 protocols a long time ago.

“The flowerpot isn’t happy,” the voice said back. “Sir, it’s good to hear from you again.”

“I keep hearing about you in the papers and the Internet,” King said. “Anything in particular happened recently?”

“Only a couple of skirmishes,” Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson said, for it was he. “I have the feeling that both sides are preparing their strengths.”

“And arming up with modern equipment,” King said. “Listen, you have to watch for modern bugs, using the equipment you have. If you need more, let me know and I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you, sir,” Robinson said. “Unfortunately, we have a stalemate at the moment.”

“The Southern Governors are screaming for help,” King said. “They want the new regiments, even the black ones, deployed against you.” He snorted. “If they tried, it would be worse than Vietnam. As it happens, the Northerners are laughing their heads off, as they haven’t had much trouble compared to the south. They are focused on beating Germany, not fighting you.”

“That may change,” Robinson said. “There are black men working in sweatshops up north, you know.”

“I know, but one enemy at a time,” King said. “The purpose is to get them to recognise us as equals, remember?”

“I remember,” Robinson said. “I’m keeping events under close control, but if something should happen to me, all hell is likely to break lose.”

Bracken Industries

Nr New York, USA

23rd May 1941

Jim Oliver hadn’t been looking forward to the coming meeting, even though he’d done most of the work involved in setting it up. The quiet room, the room that was kept permanently in a bug-free state by means of security devices, had been prepared for the meeting; everything had been swept out, leaving clean walls and a single table. He winced, scratching his ear; one of the jamming fields hurt his ears, setting up a pain in the depths of his eardrums.

“Ah, Mr Oliver,” the suave American voice said. Nikolaus Ritter, the Abwehr agent who had been forced to flee before the Transition revealed his other life, spoke English like a native. “How good to see you again.”

Oliver said nothing. Ritter followed him back into the quiet room and waited until all the doors were closed and the fields re-established. “It’s good to see you too,” Oliver lied. “I was under the impression from Obergruppenfuehrer Herman Roth that I would not be contacted again, unless it was urgent.”

Ritter lifted an eyebrow. “So, you know he got promoted,” he said. “I would be… fascinated to learn how you did that.”

“I’m sure you would be,” Oliver said. “As it happened, he informed me himself.” He smiled. “What can I do you for?”

“Our intelligence within this mongrel nation of Jews and homosexuals and mad black men is not perfect,” Ritter said. Oliver, who knew that the Abwehr – now part of the SS – had very limited sources within America, said nothing. “Indeed, although we have read with interest the reports on the movement of troops to Britain, we do not know for certain where they are going.”

Oliver considered. His sources in Washington were clearly better than Ritter’s were.  He did know where the Americans were going to land, and he also knew that the Germans could not be allowed to know. He smiled to himself; this would require care and considerable effort.

“We want you to identify the landing zone,” Ritter said, confirming his fears. “I need not discuss the consequences for failure.”

Oliver shook his head. “My dear fellow,” he said, affecting a superior accent, “you need me more alive and active. Unfortunately, I cannot answer your question; you see, I don’t know where they’re planning to land.”

Ritter glared at him. “Someone will tell you, for the right amount of money,” he said.

“They don’t know either,” Oliver said. “I admit that I have been researching the question myself, but the answer is known only to the President and his cabinet. I can tell you that the general feeling is that they’ll be going directly into Europe; they want the war over as soon as possible.”

Ritter gave him a sharp look. “They haven’t told people where they’re going?”

Oliver shook his head. “You know what American papers are like,” he said. “If they announced that the target was France, everyone would know about it the day afterwards and you would have plenty of time to arrange a welcoming committee. It makes a certain amount of sense; the only people who are in the know are the ones who can be accounted for. Hell, they might just have a plan to hit everywhere, and only choose at the last minute.

“Personally, I believe that they’re going for France, or perhaps even Germany directly,” he continued, lying. “They do want the war over quickly and combined with a British force, they would be more than capable of defeating you in the field and ending the war quickly.”

“Perhaps,” Ritter said. “Still, you will inform us, via the secured channel, if you learn anything.”

Oliver, who doubted that the secure channel was anything like as secure as the Germans believed it to be, nodded. “I will attempt to find out what I can,” he said. Ritter bowed once and left the room, striding out of the building without a care in the world. Oliver followed more slowly, thinking hard.

“Good meeting, Mr Oliver?” Oliver glanced up to see Cora frowning at him. “Did it go alright? Did we get the contract?”

Oliver dimly remembered that he’d concocted a cover story of a school wanting to be reequipped with modern computers. Under the post-Transition conditions, part of the Anglo-American agreement had been that they could see their technology during the war; no loans or American monopoly zones this time around.

“I don’t know,” he said, smiling tiredly at him. It had been astonishing to learn how many businessmen had black mistresses; Cora was certainly the most capable of them. He grinned as he remembered the night before. “I dare say we’ll have to wait and see.”

Entering his office, he opened a secured channel of his own and issued a handful of orders. He’d been careful to make contact with some of the local mob; they could handle Ritter for him, without leaving a trail back to him and his business.

The White House

Washington DC, USA

23rd May 1941

President Roosevelt greeted Ambassador King and Colonel Palter with a smile, although he lifted an eyebrow at the three Marines accompanying him. King made small talk while the Marines swept the Oval Office for bugs, finding only one planted on the wall. Marine Lieutenant Bosco removed it carefully and placed it inside a box, deflecting its signals from escaping.

“Excuse me,” Roosevelt said, “what is that, young man?”

He sounded older and tired every meeting. “It’s a bug,” Marine Lieutenant Bosco explained. “Sir, I don’t think that there are any more in the room.”

“Can they check the White House?” King asked. “Mr President, I’ll explain in a moment.”

Roosevelt studied the box, fascinated. “Yes, yes,” he said. “I’ll have the Secret Service set up the escort.”

As soon as the Marines and their escort were out of the room, Roosevelt rounded on King. “Ambassador, what the hell is going on?” He asked. The effort seemed to drain him. “Who has planted a bug in my office?”

He looked stunned. King didn’t blame him; thousands of secrets were discussed in the White House. “The prime suspect is Hoover,” King said. Palter nodded. “The technology is derived from civilian technology, rather than military-grade.”

“That bastard,” Roosevelt hissed. “He’s a law unto himself! He’s up to something, but what?”

“Perhaps he wants to blackmail you,” Palter suggested. “Have you heard anything on the grapevine?”

“Not much,” Roosevelt said. He seemed older than ever. “He seems to be working with the House Committee on Un-American Activities, and with several influential Senators, mainly from the south. They’ve been eating up his Negro subversion theory with gusto; they want to believe it. They’ve even got that insufferable prig MacArthur lined up as the opposition candidate for 1944.” He scowled. “Whatever happens when he faces military men seems not to matter in front of a crowd, and whatever else you can say about him, he is a brilliant self-publicist.”

“So… perhaps he wants to force an impeachment,” King suggested, after a moment’s thought. “Can he do that?”

“I don’t know,” Roosevelt admitted. “Did you know that the British have been asking us to move up the timetable for Norway?”

King shook his head. “Because of the war in the Middle East and Australia?”

Roosevelt nodded. “The Japanese seem to have a secure foothold,” he said. “The British are proclaiming that they’ve cut the supply lines, but so far there hasn’t been a decisive battle.” He scowled. “I was going to invite you to the strategy meeting before you called. Colonel Palter, haven’t you taken part in something like this?”

“Only in Iran,” Palter said. “Very different terrain and enemy forces.”

“Come anyway,” Roosevelt said. “You might know something useful from the future.”

* * *

King asked Marine Lieutenant Bosco to sweep the meeting room before the meeting, but it turned up negative. He deployed a white noise generator anyway, just in case. The generator should have been undetectable, but he could have sworn he saw some of the younger officers looking around for the source of the strange semi-noises.

Eisenhower opened the meeting, having flown back from Britain on one of the handful of 747 jets. “The British are being sorely pressed in both Australia and the Middle East,” he said. “They want us to move up the operation for Norway, with a provisional start date two days from now.”

“Their own stupid fault,” Admiral King proclaimed. The commander of the Atlantic Fleet was known for his hatred of the British. “They just had to send their fleet off on a wild goose chase.”

“Enough,” Roosevelt said sharply. “General, you’re not President yet.” There were some chuckles. “Now, can we launch the invasion for the 25th?”

“Yes, Mr President,” Eisenhower said. “George has worked wonders with the infantry forces; we’ve even managed to work out a joint Army-Marine doctrine.” He grinned mischievously at Admiral King, who glared back. “The only question is that of the Navy; can it do as it has promised.”

“You get the transports loaded up and ready to go and we will do our share,” Admiral King said icily.

“Thank you,” Eisenhower said. “The British have suggested that the carrier aircraft be used for escorting the invasion fleet, they have promised to handle the task of attacking the German forces on the ground for us. There are three target sets, to use their terminology; German bases and troops on the ground near the invasion zones, German forces elsewhere in Norway, and possible sources of German reinforcements in Germany itself and Denmark.”

Admiral King glared at him. “They want all the glory for themselves,” he sneered.

“Actually, they warn that it’s hard for their systems to tell the difference between our planes and the German planes,” Eisenhower said mildly. He looked up at Roosevelt. “We have four carriers and seven battleships in the fleet,” he said. “In the waters around Norway, it won’t be a contest. The only question is can we make a beachhead before the Germans counterattack?”

“And can we?” Roosevelt asked. “This invasion must succeed, Admiral.”

“We have practiced the invasion in the Scottish Islands,” Admiral King said. “We can do it, particularly if the British manage to keep their promise and knock out most of the Germans from the air. Once we get established, the main thrust east will be launched from Bergen; we’ll head over the mountains and into Oslo.”

“This is important,” Roosevelt said. “It is imperative that we win this quickly; Norway must be taken to serve as a bomber base” – LeMay looked pleased – “and a Naval Base for future attacks against Germany. Admiral, General, America is counting on you to provide a victory.”

* * *

“It seems as if it will work,” Ambassador King observed later. A messenger came in and passed a slip of paper to Roosevelt. “Once Norway has fallen, we can dislodge Sweden from the German alliance and then…”

Roosevelt chuckled, interrupting. “This is the news from Australia,” he said. “The British fleet just destroyed the Japanese fleet.”

“That’s good news,” King said wryly. “At least there won’t be any Pearl Harbour in this timeline.”

“We can move the ships back into the Atlantic now,” Roosevelt said. “Once the new fleet is built up, we’ll have a navy second to none, except the British.”

“We’ll develop the technology ourselves,” King assured him. Marine Lieutenant Bosco entered the room. “Yes, Lieutenant?”

“We just finished the sweep of the White House,” Lieutenant Bosco said. He picked up a map of the building. “There were five more devices; three in meeting rooms, one in the President’s bedroom, and one in the kitchen.”

Roosevelt blanched. “I’ll have him put on trial,” he thundered. “That rat bastard has gone too far for whatever cockeyed reason he’s come up with and…”

“Wait until after the Battle of Norway concludes,” King suggested. “That way, you can handle him on the wave of popularity.”

Roosevelt nodded. “I suppose a couple of weeks won’t hurt,” he said. “I’ll put out feelers anyway, just to find out what the bastard is up to.” He picked up a sheet of paper. King recognised it as the order authorising the offensive. Roosevelt signed it with a flourish and sealed it in an envelope.

“In my time, the signals were electronic,” King observed. “I wonder how Eisenhower would feel about that.”

Chapter Twenty-Six: The Northern Offensive

Over Norway

25th May 1941

“Ah, darling, I think I’d better pull out now,” Flying Officer Victor Abernathy said, as the Eurofighter’s fuel tanks completed their refuelling. “I don’t want to fill up too much.”

“Can’t keep it up, eh?” Flying Officer Sheila Dunbar asked dryly, holding station nearby. Her Eurofighter had been refuelled already; the RAF had deployed nearly thirty Eurofighters to the mission, along with a small fleet of Tornados. “ I knew there was a reason why you refused my offer.”

“Oh, shut up,” Abernathy sighed. The night before, Dunbar had invited him to bed with her; he’d declined. “Sierra-five, Charlie force is ready to go.”

“You are cleared for your mission,” the distant voice of the AWACS operator confirmed. “Godspeed.”

“Let’s take it deeper,” Dunbar said, and kicked her Eurofighter forward. There was no need to stay in formation, just to remain close together for mutual support. “Any target in particular?”

“The radar stations, then the troop barracks,” the AWACS operator said. “Targets have been sorted already by the SAS.”

“Spoilsports,” Dunbar groused, as the islands near Bergen drew closer at an awesome rate. The Eurofighters had been equipped with laser-guided weapons, as well as they standard load of ASRAAM missiles. “Anyone would think that they didn’t want us to have fun.”

“I don’t call this fun,” Abernathy said. “Hang on, look at that…”

“I read a German plane… probably a seaplane, rising from Bergen,” Dunbar said. “It’s not a serious nuisance.”

“Yes, it is,” Abernathy said. “It’s emitting a radar signal. It’s an AWACS.” He scowled; German experiments with airborne radar had been proceeding smoothly, despite the RAF’s interference.

“Charlie-two, cleared to engage,” Dunbar said. “Permission to open the umpteenth round of hostilities?”

“Granted,” Abernathy said wryly. Dunbar fired a single ASRAAM at the German plane, which didn’t manage to dodge in time. Seconds later, it vanished from the radars in a blast of fire.

“Take that, you Jerry bastard,” Dunbar cheered. “Any more of you out there?”

“I knew it was a mistake to have those war films shown in the common room,” Abernathy sighed. “It’s given you bad ideas.”

“Got me hot as well,” Dunbar said. “Perhaps combat will do it for you, eh?”

Abernathy flushed. “Target designator is reporting the first laser pinpoints,” he said. “Targets designated” – the laser sensor chimed as it locked onto the series of targets – “and weapons deployed.”

The Eurofighter shuddered as it released its cargo of small laser-guided bombs. Abernathy banked away over Bergen as the bombs fell down towards the German bases, exploding within the buildings the Germans had appropriated. Black puffs of smoke began to appear below the planes as German antiaircraft guns struggled to bring one down. With HARM missiles already having knocked down their radar, they could only hope for a lucky shot, a golden BB.

“We confirm all targets struck,” the AWACS said. “You are cleared to return to base.”

“Wilco,” Abernathy said, banking the Eurofighter into a western turn, heading back to Britain. “My God, Sheila, Look at that.”

Down below, against the water, the American fleet was moving, heading for Norway. Four carriers, their air compliment patrolling the air above the fleet, were hanging back, while the battleships were moving forward. Primitive radar pulsed out from the fleet, almost drowned out by the powerful radars from the single British carrier present, HMS Invincible.

“They don’t make them like that anymore,” Dunbar said, her voice hushed for once. “I wonder what landing on one of those beauties would be like.”

“Dangerous,” Abernathy said. “I want to fly the new SSTO craft.”

“You’ll be lucky,” Dunbar said, as the formation headed away from the American ships. “Besides, it’ll be at least five years before they get built, so you might have your ticket punched before you get up there.”

HMS Invincible

Norwegian Sea

25th May 1941

Captain Barton was beginning to regret accepting command of the small carrier. Admittedly, it was the most powerful ship in the fleet, but its CIC was far more capable than anything the Americans had invented yet. That meant that the fleet command staff, including Admiral King, had to be onboard. Officially, USS Enterprise was the fleet flagship; unofficially, it was the Invincible.

“The tomahawk strikes are inbound now,” Barton said, briefing the Americans. He tried to avoid King’s eye as much as possible. King hated everyone. “The air attack was a complete success.”

“And Jerry is just going to roll over and die?” Admiral King asked, as some of the Tomahawks vanished near Denmark, their flight paths terminating on top of German bases. The cold clinical display concealed thousands of dead or dying Germans. “How do we know that your missiles are working?”

Barton concealed a sigh. “The missiles are being tracked on radar,” he said. “They’re homing in on laser signals, or moving according to GPS signals from the new satellites. We delayed the operation slightly to allow them to get back into position, remember?”

Admiral King scowled. Being reminded of the satellites hadn’t pleased him. “And how can toy rockets help us now?”

Barton accessed the live feed from one of the satellites. “This is Denmark,” he said, zooming in on the image. A German base was burning brightly. “That was the home of a Luffwaffe anti-shipping squadron, but it isn’t any longer.”

“Well, what are we doing sitting around here?” Admiral King demanded. “Order the battleships to move in at once!”

“Yes, sir,” a harassed American rating said. He began to mutter instructions into his radio, sending the battleships into three different locations.

Bergen Region

Norway

25th May 1941

The small fortress was completely destroyed. Hauptmann Horst examined it with a stunned air; if he’d been inside the gun placement, he would have been killed when the British missiles had struck it. To him, the attack meant only one thing; the British were invading Norway.

“Contact Oslo,” he snapped, before the wave of jamming signals swept over the field radios. He swore; if the landlines were taken out…”

“The landlines are down, Herr Hauptmann,” an officer called. “Sir, we have to stand on the defensive…”

Horst shook his head. Out of the early-morning mist, two massive ships were appearing. For a long moment, he thought that he’d made a mistake and seen islands, and then he realised that they were battleships – British battleships!

“Get the guns up,” he shouted, trying to avoid a panic. “Load armour-piecing rounds… fire!”

His men worked splendidly, preparing the handful of smaller guns, unaware of the futility. Those were battleships out there, not destroyers, and…

“Hit,” an enlisted man shouted, as blasts of fire appeared around the battleships. Horst scowled; there hadn’t been time to fire, and he hadn’t seen one of the other coastal batteries fire, which meant that those blasts were…

Horst’s body, mind and gun position disintegrated as the first shells exploded onto the island. A tidal wave of fury passed over the German position, detonating shells and slaughtering men with casual disdain. The blast was so powerful that it renovated the entire island; in later years there would be complaints about vandals in battleships. This would be regarded as the height of ingratitude.

* * *

“Not bad,” Captain Macchiarella said, as the USS Maryland hurled a second salvo of shells onto the German position. “Spotters?”

“Three more German guns up north needing silenced, sir,” the spotter said, holding one ear to the intership telephone. “Other than that, it looks as if we’re in the clear.”

“Excellent,” Macchiarella said, as Maryland rang with the impact of a German shell. All of the big German guns had been silenced; now all they had was small pounders designed to work against aircraft. They were useless against the thick battleship armour. “Fire.”

Maryland shuddered violently. Flames and smoke blasted out across the waters. “I think we got him, sir,” the spotter said. “The smoke makes it hard to see.”

“The Marines are going in,” the radio officer said. “We’re to fall back and stand by for fire support if necessary.”

“Signal that we understand,” Macchiarella ordered. “God bless those brave men.”

* * *

“Fuck me,” Captain Dwynn breathed. The smoke and flumes rising from the valleys and fjords was awesome. Even with the advanced equipment, the battleships could only be seen through infrared. Their observation position, high over an ill-made road, allowed them a fine view.

“I’d sooner not, if it’s all the same to you,” Chang said. “They do know we’re here, right?”

“I don’t think they’ll take pot-shots at us,” Dwynn assured him. “We’re a bit below their notice at the moment.” He picked up his rifle and checked the equipment. “Come on,” he said, as the noise of a German convoy could be heard. “Time to go hunting.”

“The mines are set,” Chang assured him, checking the display. Dwynn nodded grimly, examining the road as it zigzagged along the sides of rocky mountains and lakes. There were twenty-five German vehicles, mainly troop trucks and one tank.

“Wait until most of them are on the mined bit,” Dwynn ordered, as the noise of vehicles came closer. “Stand by… now!”

Chang hit the detonation command. The explosion was deafening as it shattered the road, tipping most of the German vehicles into the fjord. The secondary explosions destroyed the German vehicles that remained; Dwynn sprayed bullets madly across the few survivors.

“Send in the contact report,” he snapped, as Chang hastened to clear up the equipment. “As of now, Bergen is cut off from German reinforcements!”

* * *

Brigade-Fuhrer Statler was panicking. The sudden appearance of the American battleships – now that their flags could be made out among the smoke – could only mean one thing; invasion. His radios were being jammed and he had only one landline leading back to Oslo, where reinforcements were supposed to be on call. Instead, the reports suggested that almost all of the roads had been destroyed, trapping his force in Bergen.

“Everyone into the shelters,” he shouted, as a new hail of shells came crashing down on Bergen. The Norwegians, he hoped, were cowering in their shelters; the Germans had built themselves shelters as well, but who had thought that they would have been needed?

“They’re moving in the troops,” a harassed officer said, trying desperately to coordinate the reports from three spotters who had taken field telephones and climbed to higher ground. “They’re going to land troops.”

Statler took a breath. “We’ll meet them in the town,” he said. “Everyone, get ready; if we can crush them quickly, we might throw them back into the sea!”

Swiftly he considered a counterattack and dismissed the possibility. Even if his formations had survived intact – which he was fairly certain they hadn’t – they would be seen to be moving into position and shelled to death. As he began to issue orders for a fight to the death in Bergen, he began to consider surrender.

* * *

The air was cold and smelled bad, as far as the Marines were concerned. Their little powerboats, as the British called them, were heading up the fjord towards the first island, a large island between the Americans and Bergen harbour. Private Max Shepherd smoked incessantly, waiting for something to happen. The sounds of war could be heard, but no one was shooting at them.

“Enjoy it while it lasts,” Private Buckman groused. “The higher-ups probably got the map reading wrong and sent us to the wrong side of Norway.”

“Land ho,” Captain Caddell shouted. The eerie atmosphere only grew; the Germans were making no attempt to stop the Marines. “Stand by to land!”

Shepherd checked his rifle and other items, including his bit of hair from a girl. It had been supposed to bring him luck. The boat shuddered as it hit an underwater rock, before they hit the… well, he supposed it was a beach. Rocky and desolate, the landing site was inhospitable enough even without Germans defending it.

A blast of profanity made him jump round, weapon lifted. Sergeant Pike had stepped onto an underwater rock, and then stepped off it and landed in the drink. The landing bay was treacherous enough as it was; several other privates were struggling to get ashore.

“Forward,” Captain Caddell bellowed, saving several enlisted men from the Sergeant’s rage. “Everyone who can, get up there!”

Shepherd finished pulling a fellow private out of the water and gaped at the cliff. It was sheer… except for a few handholds and a jagged path blasted by the battleships. He went for the path, pulling himself up with considerable effort, and finally made it to the top. A shot rang out and he fired back, grateful for the first time for the pack on his back. The German had heard him coming, but he’d fired into the pack side on.

He threw himself to the ground as a burst of American fire blasted over the ridge. “What’s going on up there?”  Captain Caddell bellowed. “Private, what’s happening?”

Idiot, Shepherd thought. “Captain, there was a German here… and a lot of dead bodies.”

He cast his eyes over the German position as the remainder of the Marines pulled themselves up onto the island. It wasn’t as big as it had looked on the map, but the battleships had made a real mess of the position, destroying almost everything that had looked like it could be dangerous.

“Secure the place,” Captain Caddell bellowed. Shepherd threw himself into the search as the Marines poked around, looking for German survivors. He glanced up as he worked; the harbour of Bergen could be seen now, almost a ruin after the battleships had done their work.

“Take five,” Sergeant Pike said. Shepherd blinked at such unusual benevolence, before realising the point; the sappers had to go to work on the German mines. Shots ran out as snipers picked off floating mines, while British-built MSVs made their way through the waters. Great plumes of water rose up as mine after mine was detonated.

“We’re doing well so far,” Private Manlito observed. “You think we’ll get a chance to score with Norwegian dames?”

Shepherd snorted. “It’s not as if we’ve had great shakes with foreign dames so far,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “The French girls have been putting out for the Germans for two years now, you know.”

Private Manlito chuckled. “I’m sure that they’ll put out for you,” he said. “Put you out the door, perhaps.”

“Bastard,” Shepherd said. “You know, wouldn’t it be nice to spend the rest of the war here?”

“Assemble,” Sergeant Pike shouted, blowing a whistle as the boats landed to pick them up and ship them to Bergen.

Manlito snickered. “You’ll have to be shot for that,” he said. “That son of a bitch isn’t going to let you stay here.”

* * *

“This is the best goddamned day of my life,” General George Patton exclaimed, watching events from the Maryland. He had wanted to go ashore with the troops, but Eisenhower had forbidden it. “What’s progress?”

Captain Jorge Nevin consulted his clipboard. He didn’t like the new PDAs. “We have troops on the ground and surrounding Bergen,” he said. “The aircraft report German movements among the town, but we don’t know how many are in there. The other landing zones report similar success.”

“There’s one in the eye for the old women, some of them young men,” Patton chuckled delightedly. “Order them to reduce the Germans and take over the towns, then we can start the real work of mounting an offensive against Oslo.”

Nevin bowed. He’d worked for Patton long enough to know that little details like logistics meant nothing to him. “I will send the command at once,” he said.

“And have my helicopter prepared,” Patton said. “I will go to the town in person.”

* * *

Brigade-Fuhrer Statler took a breath as the first Marines appeared at the docks, trying to land directly onto the Bergen harbour. An American destroyer – he’d been hoping for one of the irreplaceable British ships – was moving in behind them to provide fire support, unaware of his hidden guns, carefully concealed in the rubble. He might have lost touch with Oslo, but he was confident that a rescue mission would be mounted. The Fuhrer himself had promised.

“Closer, closer,” he muttered, as the Marines started to swarm up the beaches. They weren’t very experienced, even compared to the old-man battalions that were being raised from veterans of the Great War. They were acting like inexperienced troops; he had to remind himself that that was what they were. “Fire!”

Seventeen smaller field guns fired as one, accompanied by several machine guns. The marines fell to the ground as the machine guns swept across them, slaughtering them, while the destroyer was hit several times. On fire, it tried to escape from the fjord, but it was too late. With a thunderous explosion, the destroyer sank in the fjord.

Cheers rose up from the Germans, but Statler heard a noise and his heart sank as a strange black aircraft roared up the fjord. A single bomb fell… and Statler’s life vanished in tearing fire.

* * *

The wave of heat from the FAE bomb could be felt from half a mile away, or perhaps they were imagining it. The pile-up of shipping had saved their lives; Private Max Shepherd gasped as he saw the inferno. The flames had spread out over a good portion of an already ruined town.

“Burn, baby, burn,” someone shouted. Shepherd chuckled; their exposure to British culture, though its movies, had only confused everyone because half of the movies were American from the future.

“Bet they hate us in the future,” Private Manlito said wryly, as Bergen burned down. “Between us and Jerry, we’ve made one hell of a mess of their town.”

“Advance,” Captain Caddell shouted, leading the charge. Shepherd let out a rebel yell and ran behind him, ducking and turning sharply to avoid being shot. German resistance was furious, but uncoordinated; dimly, he realised that their commander must have been killed. He plunged into a maelstrom of fire and blood and sweat… and then there was no time left at all, for anything, but killing.

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Cornered Animal

Führerbunker

Undisclosed Location, Berlin

25th May 1941

The German High Command had been amused when the British had deployed a radio-jamming weapon against the Russians, watching the chaos though the lives of their attached officers with interest. Russian attacks had simply stalled when they lost contact with the commanding officers, who had howled and shrieked about the unfairness of it all with commissioners looking over their shoulders. It hadn’t taken long for the Germans to realise, however, that the same technique could be used against them, perhaps to even greater effect.

Under Speer’s pressure and Kesselring’s urging, the Germans had spent six months carefully laying out thousands of miles worth of landlines, leading all over the Reich. In a display of German thoroughness that would have surprised – and horrified – the British intelligence services, they had created a multiple-redundancy network that would have survived anything up to a nuclear attack, providing communications without relying on the radio. Still, it was only through the landline to Sweden that the German High Command first realised that the attack had begun… and by then it was too late.

Himmler moved as calmly as he could into the Fuhrer’s meeting room. Hitler’s behaviour had become more and more erratic as the year passed, ranging from supporting entirely sensible and prudent plans from the Wehrmacht to proposing and insisting upon monstrous plans that could not have hoped to work, even under pre-Transition conditions. His focus on Stalin’s threat – a threat that had not yet materialized – was proving a detriment to the German war effort; his insistence on preparing a two million man army in Poland was drawing strength away from the Middle East front.

Himmler smiled to himself and took a little pleasure in seeing how some of the senior Wehrmacht and Luffwaffe officers quailed. It didn’t matter about Goring still being the Fuhrer’s chosen successor, or how Rudolf Hess had proven so unreliable; Himmler was the second most powerful man in the Reich, almost a demigod. He grinned to himself; there was only one god in the Reich.

Hitler’s voice was sharp and questioning. He hadn’t been quite the same since the quack Doctor Theodore Morell had started to prescribe future medicines for him, although even Himmler was unable to say if they were genuine. He didn’t believe it; one of the few details he agreed with Goring on was that Morell was untrustworthy and probably a Jew.

“Well?”

There was a brief embarrassed silence. “Mien Fuhrer,” Kesselring said carefully, “the Americans have invaded Norway.”

“How dare they?” Hitler screamed. “The mountains of Norway will eat them alive!”

Himmler made a mental note to have Morell assassinated. “Have everything moved up to Norway at once,” Hitler bellowed. “Panzers, guns, men, submarines, move them all up!”

There was a second uncomfortable pause. “Mien Fuhrer, we lost most of our transport capability at Malta,” Kesselring said, and flinched as Hitler rounded on him. The Fuhrer hadn’t taken that news very well at all. “We can only hope to fly in a handful of troops.”

“We spent millions on those transports,” Hitler erupted. “You assured me that they were necessary.”

Himmler took a breath. Kesselring was needed in the war cabinet. “Mien Fuhrer, we have other options,” he said. “We have to punish the British for their imprudence, by using the new terror weapons.”

“Excellent,” Hitler proclaimed. “The new weapons will bring us victory!” He smiled around the room. “However, we need something else. I want the special weapon readied for use in Norway if necessary.”

“It will be done,” Himmler assured him. The special weapon could be prepared at once. “I’ll see to it at once.”

* * *

Information came in to the bunker in fits and patches as landline operators strove to reconnect the Reich together. Cruise missiles, unstoppable and highly dangerous, had struck at targets all across northern Germany, as well as several locations in Denmark. The new and terrifying British weapon, the firebomb, had been deployed; the British had used it against Luffwaffe bases in Germany and France.

The news from Norway, relayed through Sweden, wasn’t good. Himmler expected that the Swedes would switch sides as soon as they were convinced that the Anglo-Americans were unstoppable; they hadn’t been happy about working with the Germans in the first place. Only the dread of a Soviet invasion had forced them into Germany’s arms.

He watched silently as the master strategists put the new information on the map. He scowled, for the first time appreciating the sheer distance of the Reich; units on the map might well have been destroyed by now. Narvik had fallen silent; had they been attacked or were the communication cables simply destroyed? He almost wished that he were ignorant; the known landing sites were intimidating enough, even to him. A major American force had come ashore at Bergen, another near Trondheim. He glared at the map; whatever forces remained near Narvik had been cut off.

“A word, Herr Reichsführer,” Kesselring said. “In my office.”

Himmler followed the Field Marshall into his office. It was one of the few rooms in the bunker that didn’t have an SS listening device inside. The only other rooms were Hitler’s apartments, which he shared with Eva Braun, and his own office. The Wehrmacht experts regularly swept the rooms – under the pretence of searching for British bugs – and removed the SS bugs. It had become almost a game between the SS security experts and the Wehrmacht experts, Himmler knew, and he had tolerated it because it gave his people better training than anything the SS could provide elsewhere.

He shook his head. Perhaps it was time for that practice to end. The Wehrmacht might be a hotbed of subversion.

“Herr Reichsführer, we cannot withdraw the troops from Norway,” Kesselring said flatly, as soon as they were alone. “We have to order them to surrender.”

“The Fuhrer would not like that,” Himmler said, rather unnecessarily. “He dares not lose face in front of Stalin.”

“Herr Reichsführer, we do not have the air or sea transports required to either supply them or withdraw them,” Kesselring said. “Most of the air transport capability was destroyed over Malta. That little we have left would be totally exposed to British aircraft.”

“Then we will have to do what we can to divert British attention,” Himmler said. “Are the V1s not ready?”

“Yes, but you know how unreliable they are,” Kesselring protested. “Even with the improved targeting data, we still cannot guarantee that they will hit anything worth hitting.”

Himmler shrugged. “They are cheap and don’t cost a life to build,” he said. “I think that’s worthwhile, don’t you?” He smiled darkly. “These British are far too concerned about civilian deaths,” he said. “We’ll simply launch a handful of them at the British cities.”

Kesselring met his eyes. “The Fuhrer wishes to use gas,” he said. “You know what they’ll do in return.”

Himmler nodded grimly. “Ignore that order,” he said. “I’ll cover you; claim that the gas-armed missiles were shot down.”

Kesselring nodded. Himmler almost laughed; the poor man had to be wondering what the hell was going on. Kesselring being beholden to him would make life easier, in the future. A reputation for being reasonable might just come in handy, when the Fuhrer overdosed on something and died.

* * *

Professor Horton looked up from the book he was reading when the SS guard knocked on the door. After a quick and futile check for intruders or ambushers, the SS guard stepped aside, allowing Himmler to enter. As always, the Reichsführer looked like a dapper little schoolmaster, except his smile never touched his eyes.

“Good” – he glanced at the clock, having long since lost track of the passage of days – “morning, Herr Reichsführer,” Horton said.

Himmler scowled at him. “It’s not a good morning,” he said. “The Americans have invaded Norway. Why?”

Horton wanted to scream at the unfairness of the question. Even his extensive knowledge of history didn’t cover events that hadn’t happened. Still, Himmler demanded answers… and the lives of his family depended on the answers.

“Convenient target,” he said finally. “They have to give the army some experience, and diving into Norway is the only way to do it if they won’t want to risk a clash with the Russians as well.”

Himmler’s eyes glittered. “You feel that they would be scared of the Russians?” He asked. “Could we lure them into conflict with them?”

“Perhaps,” Horton said. “They won’t want to add to the enemy list with so much trouble in America itself.”

Himmler smiled. “Indeed,” he said. “We have been working on shipping supplies to the different factions in America, particularly the ones that agree with us, as well as selling guns through Portugal to the Mexicans.”

Horton blinked. Yet again, Himmler was showing that he was far more clever and dangerous than future history had painted him. “The French Canadians were more than happy to accept help from the Vichy French, but we have to smuggle the weapons in via Portugal again,” Himmler continued. “However, what about Norway?”

Horton considered. “Their logistics can’t be very good,” he said. “However, they’re likely to be better than your logistics, simply because they command the sea and the air. Once they overwhelm Norway, I think they’ll try and turn it into a bomber base.”

Himmler nodded. “And, where will they land the year afterwards?”

Horton considered. There weren’t many options, really. “Depends on what they want to do,” he said. “Landing in Spain would force you to fight on the end of long supply lines, but it would take them years to fight their way up through Spain to France to Germany. Italy wasn’t such a bright idea the first time around, even with more of your factories positioned in Italy, but they might want to lay claim to Sardinia and Corsica as more bomber bases. Once they have entire fleets of bombers, they’ll overwhelm you by force of numbers.”

“The precision weapons are bad enough,” Himmler scowled. “We’ve been building newer weapons of our own, but every so often they hit something vital by accident and we get tossed back a few weeks.”

“France is probably the most likely target,” Horton said. It occurred to him that a combination of modern technology and luck could put a force in Denmark, but he dismissed the thought. “It worked before.”

“We’ve been building defence lines for the last three months,” Himmler said. “They would have to be determined.”

“It rather depends on the outcome of the battles in Norway,” Horton said. “Can you resupply them?”

Himmler shook his head. “The Fuhrer has ordered that they stand and fight to the last,” he said. “They should tie up the enemy for several weeks.”

“I suppose,” Horton said.

* * *

Himmler’s next meeting was with someone totally different, the head of the German atomic project. SS Obergruppenfuehrer Hans Krueger heard the news with a grim face.

“The Fuhrer has decreed the use of the special weapon in Norway,” Himmler said. “How long will it be before the weapon is ready?”

“The weapon can be made in a week,” Krueger said. “It’s basically simple; we take the extremely radioactive rubble from the British site and pack it all into the container. Once we move it to the target, we detonate it, which will spread radioactive dust everywhere.” He coughed. “Unfortunately, it is impossible to predict the immediate effects – the British didn’t send us that data, after all.”

Himmler smiled at the weak joke. “Tell me, how can it be used in Norway?”

Krueger took a moment to think before answering. “Herr Reichsführer, I would advise against using it in Norway,” he said. “I have a strong suspicion that trying to ship one of the weapons to Norway would result in the weapon ending up at the bottom of the sea.”

“I know,” Himmler said. He’d been hoping that Krueger would raise that objection. “Do you have an alternative deployment plan?”

“Oh, yes, Herr Reichsführer,” Krueger said, and outlined it. Himmler had to laugh; the plan was delightfully simple in its cunning. “We can launch the mission right now,” Krueger said, “and hopefully hand the Americans a blow from which they will never recover.”

“I want all the arrangements made now,” Himmler ordered finally. “You have full authority to launch the mission as soon as possible.”

* * *

Kristy Stewart had once read a description of combat that characterised it as months of boredom, followed by moments of screaming terror. Her life in Nazi Germany was exactly the same; she spent days or weeks within the bunker recording interesting facts, or out on the streets of Berlin, recording how well the Germans were coping with the war. There were few interviews of any significance; she was only granted the occasional interview with the higher-up Nazis, all of which were edited before she was allowed to broadcast them back to Britain.

She smiled to herself. The Nazis hadn’t realised that everything the camera saw was stored and burst-transmitted back to England. Still, there was so little to send back that was of real significance – they kept her away from the real centres of power within the bunker.

“The Americans have invaded Norway,” Roth said. Much as she hated to admit it, she was becoming bored of the SS officer. She’d taken him to bed in a wave of fear and terror after meeting Hitler, and he was good in bed, which made up for a lot, but he wasn’t very imaginative. Still, there were compensations.

“They’ve landed the Marines?” Stewart asked, delighted. Perhaps now there would be real news. “What’s happening?”

Roth shrugged. “Reports are confused,” he said. “There’s talk of atomic weapons being used in Bergen, the city is such a wreck.”

“The government wouldn’t use atomic weapons in Norway,” Stewart said. “There are thousands of innocent lives there.”

“Perhaps it was the Americans,” Roth said. “They must have their own nuclear program.” He smiled and gave her a kiss. “I have something special for you today,” he said. “An interview with Herr Palmstron, the Norwegian Ambassador.”

Stewart thought rapidly as Roth led her though the corridors. In theory, Norway was an independent country under the rule of Quisling, who had invited in the Nazis. In practice, it was ruled by the Germans though Quisling, who had almost no power at all. It was a very tricky problem for all involved; she suspected that the Germans regretted having come up with the legal fiction.

“Here we are,” Roth announced, opening the doors. “Herr Palmstron, this is the English reporter.”

No blow job for you tonight, Stewart thought angrily, as Palmstron examined her breasts. They must have passed the inspection, because his eyes wandered all over her body, swaying in a way she had come to understand as being caused by drunkenness. Why was the Ambassador drunk?

“A pleasure to meet you,” he slurred. “I hope that you will take back the statement of the legal government of Norway, as headed by Prime Minister Quisling.”

He had been drinking. Stewart caught a whiff of the fumes as he talked. “Naturally, I will relay your statements to the British people,” she said. She made a show of setting up her camera, aware that it had been recording from when she entered the room. “Now, you may speak.”

Palmstron pulled himself up into an upright position. It would have looked impressive if Stewart hadn’t known how much he had drunk. “From the Government of Norway to the British Government,” he said, and Stewart saw Roth’s frown. Doubtless the idiot was reading the message as it had been written. “You have illegally entered the territory of a state that was not at war with you. Your weapons have wrecked great devastation on our soil, slaughtering thousands of our citizens, our troops and the forces deployed to protect us from Soviet invasion.

“We demand that you withdraw your forces at once from Norway, or we will be forced to wage total war against you,” he continued. He was starting to sway on his feet. “We will use each and every means at our disposal if you refuse to pull out. End communication.”

“Thank you,” Roth said quickly.

“A few questions, if I may,” Stewart said quickly. Perhaps the Ambassador was too drunk to notice, or even to care. “What do you think about the rumours of British forces – or American forces – using atomic weapons?”

“Totally true,” Palmstron said, swaying. His eyes focused in on her breasts. “What else could destroy the small town of Bergen so completely?”

“I have no idea,” Stewart said, pressing her luck. The SS minders didn’t seem to know what to do. “Do you feel that your government is accepted by your people?”

“Of course it is,” Palmstron bellowed. “Prime Minister Quisling is a great man and…”

He slumped to the floor, passed out. “I guess he can’t take his ale,” Roth said. “I’m sorry about that; he’s been drinking all day.”

“Pretty disgusting,” Stewart said, carefully unimpressed. “Is there any chance of an interview with the high commanders?”

“I’m afraid not,” Roth said. A distant explosion echoed though the bunker. “The British air force is back,” he said. “We have to go deeper.”

“You always do,” Stewart said, and was rewarded with a blush. “Where are they targeting?”

“How should I know?” Roth asked dryly. “Could be the Reichstag, could be one of the barracks for the troops, could be a factory… could be some children’s home that didn’t get blasted before. All I know is that they’re striking at anything that might be useful in reaching Norway; Luffwaffe bases, communication centres, everything that might be even slightly useful.”

He scowled. “We heard from Japan,” he said. “They lost a battle against a British fleet, although they claim to have inflicted heavy losses on it.”

“That’s interesting,” Stewart said. He didn’t pick up on her sarcasm as they headed into the deeper bunkers. “Do you think that they will succeed in taking Australia?”

“I don’t think so,” Roth admitted. “Still, the ultimate victory of the Reich is assured.”

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Return to the Forbidden Island

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

27th May 1941

The room was packed for once, with nearly thirty people around the table or standing at the back. Under unwritten protocol, Hanover had been forced to invite the Leader of the Opposition and the Shadow Cabinet, provided that they agreed to honour security restrictions. Fortunately, most of the people who would break such an agreement had never been sullied by being offered a place in Government – and the Nazis were far more of a clear-cut enemy than the enemies of 2015.

Hanover tapped the table firmly, taking control of the meeting. “This meeting will now come to order,” he said. “God Save the King.”

There was a brief embarrassed muttering. The one thing that almost all of the men in the room would have agreed upon was that the King was useless. Hanover, who knew that more than a few had supported the former King Edward’s attempt to reclaim the throne, had often considered making a republican move. He shook his head absently; there was no time to risk the upheaval that would result.

“We have been called here today,” he said, more formally than usual, “to hear the report on progress of Operation Arctic; the invasion of Norway by largely American forces, with support from ourselves.” The table, less disciplined than usual, buzzed for a long moment with conversation. Hanover scowled around the table until he finally achieved some silence.

“General Cunningham will present the report,” Hanover said shortly, and sat down. The General stood up and displayed a chart of Norway, covered with tactical icons, on the main display.

“This is Norway, two days ago,” Cunningham said. He tapped the remote; new icons appeared on the display. “The American forces, a combination of Marines and regular army units, went ashore at three separate locations, attempting to overwhelm the Germans by weight of numbers. Prior to this, two locations were softened up by American battleships firing at long-range and coordinated strikes by our navy and the RAF were aimed at German forces and lines of communication throughout Norway. The net result was that the Germans were forced to abandon any hope of reinforcing their forces on the Norwegian coast.

“The main landings were at Narvik and Bergen,” he continued. “Trondheim, which was playing unwilling host to a German battalion, was not considered a main target, but the opportunity of removing it from the battlefield proved too great to resist. Narvik, an operation aimed at discouraging the Soviets from pinching off upper Norway, was the only one to come close to disaster; the Germans pinned the Marines down and shot hell out of them. Fortunately, American carrier support and RAF units turned the tide and the Germans were defeated.

“Bergen presented a similar problem, but between the Marines and a FAE bomb most of the resistance was quickly crushed,” he concluded. The map changed to show icons taking up positions around Norway. “The main focus of the American effort has been to reinforce their commanding positions and march down to Oslo from Bergen and Trondheim. This operation, which looks good on the map, won’t be quite as easy as it seems – it reminds me of Afghanistan.”

He chuckled. “To be fair, the Norwegian resistance is coming out of the closet and providing us with considerable assistance,” he concluded. “With Patton in command, the advancing infantry columns are making their way southwards along passages that the Germans didn’t know so much about. Moving armour, however, is a very slow progress, even with the communication devices we’ve provided them with. Incidentally, certain American admirals who will remain nameless are blaming us for messing up the Norwegian roads, such as they were before the RAF took a crack at them.”

General Chapman, Chief of the Air Staff, coughed loudly. “This is from the people who bombed some of our tanks in the Gulf War and then refused to hand the pilots over,” he said.

“Future history,” Hanover injected, before an argument broke out. A ripple of laughter ran around the table. “General can Norway be taken then?”

“Oh, yes,” Cunningham said. “It’s only a matter of time. I’d be astounded if it takes more than a month.”

“Good,” Hanover said. “Admiral Grisham, what about Redemption I and II?”

Admiral Grisham glared impartially around the table. “We can launch Redemption I right now,” she said. “We have most of the units required for the mission already in the region, and after Malta the Germans have stepped down their air operations in the Mediterranean. Admittedly, Redemption I is a prerequisite for Redemption II, and the Germans will try to stop us, so launching it now would be the best chance we’d have to do it this year.”

Cunningham nodded. “Admiral Somerville has shown himself to be capable,” he said. “All we’re using for the mission is two units of the SBS and two Marine divisions. We can spare them; there won’t be a threat to Suez any time soon.”

Hanover steepled his fingers. One of the problems with the rapidly expanding British Army was that they had a shortage of trained officers. In the Middle East, they’d been forced to use the older units as firemen, trusting the newer units to hold their own. Crete was a bigger target than it looked on the map, far too big to be taken quickly, unless the Germans were pounded into submission first.

He scowled. The armed forces had spent most of the winter building up stocks of advanced weapons, some of which had already been expended in Norway and Germany. He didn’t begrudge the Americans their assistance – it was important to keep the alliance going – but it was costly. The economy might be doing really well for the first time in a decade, relatively speaking, but weapons were not something that could be sold.

He picked up the outline document. “I authorise Redemption I,” he said, knowing that between the two Redemptions and Norway almost all of the war stocks would be expended. “Admiral, I have every confidence that we can proceed with Redemption II as soon as it becomes practical, but for the moment we cannot proceed.”

Grisham nodded. “I understand,” she said.

Hanover smiled. “Any other business?” He asked. There was a long pause. “No? In that case… meeting adjourned.”

He allowed them all to file out, staring at the map. Redemption I was fairly conventional, in its way, although he suspected that Somerville would not have thought of it that way. Redemption II, however, was the kind of scheme that armchair generals came up with; a scheme that couldn’t hope to succeed against technologically-equal opponents. It had been Rommel who’d pointed out that the Wehrmacht couldn’t hope to react as fast as the British, and that a daring stroke might just shorten the war.

So could losing the force involved, he thought grimly, and understood how Pitt and Churchill must have felt. Steeling his mind, Hanover took one last look at the map… and strode from the room, turning the light out behind him.

HMS Warspite

Malta, Mediterranean Sea

27th May 1941

The message had the same imperious tone as many of the messages from the Admiralty that Somerville had been familiar with; it was good to know that some things had never changed. The message was also simple; PROCEED WITH REDEMPTION ONE, it read.

“We’re going back to Crete,” Somerville said. “This time, we’re going there to take it from the Germans and keep it.”

The room, the captains of the task force, cheered. They were an odd lot; ten Contemporaries, ten future personnel, and Somerville himself. A Marine General, dressed in a Marine uniform, Contemporaries dressed in Contemporary uniforms, future people dressed in their snappy uniforms – and a tough merchant skipper who had refused to don a naval uniform. Sooner or later, once the war was over, Somerville was certain that the Royal Navy would get around to instituting a single uniform, but for the moment everyone wore what they felt comfortable in.

“We will depart as soon as the Marines and supplies are loaded onboard the transports,” he said. The Marines had been stationed on Malta, but after the Battle of Malta, when so few Germans had even managed to land, they had been released for other missions. He pointed his cane at the map of Crete; he didn’t like computer-generated maps very much.

“As soon as we get within ten miles of Crete, the Daring will open fire on the pre-selected targets,” Somerville said, blessing the chance that had spared the Type-45 destroyer from the Pacific. “Its targets are German bases in Turkey and Greece; given how fast the missiles move, they should knock the German air cover down sharply. We’ll move slowly, in the night, and reach Crete at dawn.”

He chuckled. “Once we get near Crete, we’ll blast hell out of the German emplacements with the two battleships main guns, then land the Marines,” he concluded. “Once we’ve cleaned up the German troops, we can declare the island secured and bask in the glory.” There were some chuckles. “One note, and please explain this to your men.” He nodded at Brigadier Hampton. “The Germans have been deploying some new technology, and the boffins want to examine it.”

“Yes, sir,” Brigadier Hampton said. The burly marine grinned. “We have plenty of experience in taking equipment intact.”

Somerville, who’d read of their battles against Jihadis, believed him. “Good,” he said. “Let’s get on with it then.”

Crete Theatre

Mediterranean Sea

28th May 1941

Dawn broke over Crete, showering waves of sunlight across the beautiful island. General Kurt Student picked himself up from the floor and looked blearily at the bottle in his hand. It was cheap Greek wine, Retsina, and he hated it. It was, however, the only kind of wine available to him, so he drank it to forget.

The noise of an Italian playing a horn solo, awakening the Italian troops, echoed through the base. Student scowled; his forces were not what he would have chosen, being mainly Italian troops deployed around the island, and a handful of Germans at the base itself. According to history, his forces would have taken Crete… but instead the island had been scooped up during the march to the Middle East.

“Shut them up,” he bellowed, though a haze of drunkenness. The noise of the SS sergeant, assigned to watch the Italians, shouting at them was worse. The troops on Crete were the dregs of the Italian armed forces – which meant that they were truly more dangerous to their allies than to the enemy – and he knew that they’d been sent to Crete as punishment. The only question was who was meant to be punished by the experience.

Me, probably, he thought grimly, splashing his hands in the sink. He splashed cold water on his face, and then started to shave. Three cuts later, he pulled on his jacket and admired himself in the mirror. Cursing, he rubbed the blood off his chin and headed out to give someone hell.

The guard straightened to attention as Student entered the main building, hidden within the mountains of Crete. He’d been here once before, when he’d commanded the defence, and he’d hoped to never see it again… but that had been before Malta, before the elite Fallschirmjäger had been swatted from the sky like bugs. A wave of dizziness came over him again and he swayed against the wall.

“Herr General?” His aide asked. Student glared wordlessly at him and stomped into the command centre. He was mildly surprised to see the piece of British technology remained in its place; after Malta.

“Report,” he bellowed, at the hapless radar controller.

“Nothing to report, Herr General,” the SS officer reported. “There has been nothing on our radars, and nothing on the passive system.” He waved a hand at the radar screen. “Only our own long-range flying boat, Herr General; there’s nothing out there.”

“You are dismissed,” Student said to his aide, and sat down in the command chair. Nothing would happen, he was certain; he’d been exiled from any chance at gaining revenge for his slaughtered men. “Another day of boredom ahead.”

* * *

The radar signal swept across Crete – and the image of the German flying boat refused to disappear. “It’ll see us if we come much closer,” Lieutenant Covarrubias warned. “I suggest downing it now, with a missile.”

“We could get it without setting off a warning,” Captain McTavish, commanding officer of HMS Daring, mused. He scowled; his ship’s archenemies, the crew of HMS Dauntless, had taken part in the world’s greatest and most one-sided sea battle, while they were stuck in the Mediterranean. “Program the Tomahawks for launch sequence; we’ll have to move quickly.”

“Aye, sir,” Lieutenant Covarrubias said.

McTavish picked up the microphone, instantly connected to the fleet five miles west of Daring. “Admiral, we can splash that bastard, but we’ll have to launch at once,” he warned. “Permission to open fire?”

“Granted,” Admiral Somerville said. “Fire at will.”

“He’s much more likely to be called Wilhelm,” McTavish muttered. “Lieutenant, you are cleared to open fire.”

A streak of light lanced away from the Daring. “Missile away, sir,” Lieutenant Covarrubias reported. “Tomahawk launch sequence confirmed; satellite downloads confirm GPS, targets set and tracking…”

“Fire,” McTavish ordered. Daring began to shudder as it launched Tomahawk after Tomahawk into the air, distributing death all across the German positions in the Mediterranean.

“German aircraft destroyed,” Lieutenant Covarrubias reported. “No sign of any signal before they were hit.”

“Excellent,” McTavish said. “Inform the flag; they can move in when ready.”

“Confirmed,” Lieutenant Covarrubias said. “Impacts registered at primary targets; satellite observation data reports that we hammered them hard. Only a handful of German aircraft, mainly fighters, on radar.”

* * *

According to what the Reich claimed was false history, Maleme Airfield would have been the site of a bitter battle seven days ago. The Luftwaffe had moved a couple of squadrons in when they’d taken the island, but half of the planes – and all of the better pilots – had been pulled out again for the operations in the Middle East.

A single Tomahawk missile slammed down on the airfield, detonating a FAE warhead just above the ground. The wave of fire blasted across the airfield, destroying older German aircraft and slaughtering German pilots and Italian troops. Other Tomahawks smashed into Italian barracks across the island, but ignored the main base. Even so, the destruction of an Italian barracks close by shocked the defenders.

“Get down,” General Student howled, shocked sober by the sheer violence of the attack. Ignoring his own advice, he peered out of the windows, scanning the island quickly. Half of the island seemed to be burning; he could see fires where his defence positions had once been. “Get me the Luftwaffe!”

“We’re being jammed, sir,” Rottenfuehrer Krause reported. “We’ll have to send up smoke signals.”

Student glared at him. He had very little command authority over the SS, but he knew that one German officer had pointed a revolver at an SS officer and offered him the choice between obedience or death. “I would have thought that the burning island would alert them,” he snapped. “Why haven’t they killed us yet?”

It was a more relevant question than it sounded, he knew, and Rottenfuehrer Krause gave it serious consideration. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “They should have blasted down the radar stations, at least. They did it in Norway.” A chime sounded from the future piece of equipment. “Uh oh,” he said.

“What is it?” Student snapped, running out of patience. His pounding headache didn’t help; he wanted to kill something. “An air raid?”

“It’s an invasion,” Rottenfuehrer Krause said. Student stumbled to the window and stared across the seas to the west. The looming shape of a battleship could be seen in the distance. “They want Crete for themselves.”

“Sound the alert,” Student said. Now he had something to kill. “We’ll give them a reception that they’ll never forget!”

* * *

“We hit the Luftwaffe pretty badly,” Tom assured Admiral Somerville. He waved a hand at the big display. “They have only five aircraft in the air, and none of them are coming this way.”

“Excellent,” Somerville said. He was more than a little stunned; he’d grown too used to watching swarms of German aircraft descending on him. “Land the landing craft!”

* * *

It had taken General Student nearly twenty minutes to collect together a scratch force of German and Italian soldiers, and ten more minutes to confirm the sheer devastation of the British attack. Of the ten thousand troops he was supposed to have, nearly half of them had been killed and more wounded by the attack. He allowed the seriously wounded what medical care he could, while press-ganging the remainder into the defence force.

He watched grimly as the British battleships plastered Sphakia with blast after blast from their main guns. It had been one of his main defensive positions, but after the missile attack there was hardly anything left of the defences, but the British had no way of knowing that. Explosions walked all over the town and shattered it, bit by bit.

“They’re on their way,” Rottenfuehrer Krause muttered, as the shape of landing craft began to appear out of the smoke. They were odd vehicles, some were normal boats, others seemed to move above the water, driving right onto the beaches before their crew jumped out, weapons ready.

“Just get comfortable, you Tommy bastards,” Student muttered. The black-clad British moved carefully among the town, perplexed by the lack of resistance, landing more and more troops until they had spread all over the town. As he watched, they formed up into groups and slipped carefully up towards the radar station, high on the hills. Time passed, and then…

“Fire,” Student snapped, firing madly with his weapon. The others joined in, pouring fire down on the British. Two British collapsed… and then crawled back, sparks spewing from their armour. “What the hell?”

“Bullet-proof armour,” Rottenfuehrer Krause said. He sounded fascinated. “It’s supposed to be able to stop bullets. Aim for the head.”

“Jawohl,” Student muttered, as a black sphere flew through the air towards their position. Student had only seconds to realise that it was a grenade, before the world went away forever.

* * *

Brigadier Hampton had been expecting a harder fight, but the Germans seemed to have been broken by the air strike. Most of the defenders were Italian and they were more than willing to surrender, once the SS officers had been killed. Indeed, more than a few of them shot their SS ‘allies’ and surrendered.

The German base, he had to admit, was better organised than a Jihadi base; it was neater and generally more military. His gaze swept across primitive radars, radios, maps and…

“What the hell is that?” He demanded.

“It looks like a radar set, Brig,” one of his men said. Private Clough examined it thoughtfully. “Brigadier, its one of our sets.” He pointed at a bullet hole in the machine. “It’s useless now, it won’t work.”

Hampton glared at him. “That’s not the point,” he said. “The question is; where the hell did it come from?”

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Reactions Upon Reactions

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

29th May 1941

Hanover stared down at the images, relayed by the investigative team. Doctor Antoinette Stancil looked nervous and her voice shook; she hadn’t expected to be on the forefront of high politics and treason. As an expert in World War Two technology, her speciality hadn’t had any relevance – until they’d found themselves back in 1940.

“Explain it to me again, Doctor,” he said, more for the benefit of McLachlan, who’d just entered the room, than himself. “Exactly what have you found?”

“It’s a passive sensor suite,” Stancil said. Her voice shook again. “It’s a commercial system, one built in 2013 for ships sailing through Indonesian waters, which as you know…”

“Were almost less safe than they are at the moment,” Hanover said. “It’s definitely one of ours?”

Stancil nodded, trying hard not to show any contempt. Hanover understood; it had been a question born of desperation. How could the Germans have built it?

“I’m afraid so,” she said. “That’s really all I can tell you, but you’ll have my full report at the end of the day.”

“Thank you,” Hanover said, and cut the video link. “Explain.”

Anna Hathaway, the Home Secretary, coughed grimly. Behind her, MI5’s duty officer winced. “It came from America,” she said. “We got the serial numbers and compared them to the lists of devices sent aboard. This one, PSS4373-463-376373, was sent to America and was reported destroyed in a warehouse fire in January.”

Hanover sucked in his breath. “What else was in the warehouse?”

“Several more of them, some commercial-grade radars, and several computers designed to crack encryptions,” the MI5 officer said. David Berrios, a Jamaican who spoke perfect Cockney, scowled. “We must assume that all of them are in German hands.”

“Oh, wonderful,” Hanover said. “So… how the hell did the Germans get their hands on it?”

Berrios coughed. “I have been running an investigation into it,” he said. “The device in question was transhipped via the Bracken Consortium, which owned the warehouse. Sir, the person in charge of their activities over there is Jim Oliver, who you may remember was quite a celebrity some time back.”

“He was released by the Germans, wasn’t he?” Hanover said, and then he swore. “Perhaps we should have looked more carefully at him.”

“Perhaps,” Berrios said. “However, your predecessor was keen on making a public impact, and then, as you know…”

Hanover nodded. Prime Minister Smith had suffered a number of heart attacks. The last one, six months ago, had killed him. Hanover couldn’t bring himself to feel regret; Smith wouldn’t have had the imagination to see how to use the Transition to Britain’s best advantage.

“That he was a prisoner of the Germans doesn’t prove anything,” Hathaway said. “He was very vocal on the need for war when he was interviewed by that wretched Stewart woman.”

“Yes, the one who broadcast the claim that Norway was independent before the Americans landed,” Hanover muttered. “Yes, it could have been someone within his organisation, but he is the most likely suspect. Someone in his place could have told them anything.”

McLachlan snorted. “He didn’t let on about the Norway attack,” he said.

“If he knew,” Hanover said thoughtfully. “I wonder…”

“Sir, may I continue the investigation of Mr Bracken?” Berrios asked. “There are still a lot of unanswered questions…”

“Yes, please do,” Hanover said absently. “One thing; this is not to be mentioned to anyone without my prior authorisation, understand?”

* * *

“You’re not going to drop a hammer on him?” Hathaway asked afterwards. “In his position, he could be slipping the Germans anything, from missiles to nuclear science.”

“Perhaps,” Hanover said. “Rule something or other of intelligence; never cut off a conduct, on the grounds that its better the devil you know than the devil you don’t. Given how important he had made himself to the Americans, we can’t simply summon him home and throw him out of the nearest window.”

“I would have expected the BNP to be very keen on aiding the Germans,” McLachlan said. “I wonder if Oliver is a member.”

“That would explain a lot,” Hanover said absently. His mind was considering something else. “This does give us some extra options.”

“I still think that we should shut him down as fast as possible,” McLachlan said. “What about…?”

They exchanged glances. Hanover had already considered using C Section. “No,” he said finally. “I want to know what he’s told them first.”

The two left, leaving Hanover alone to work on his briefing papers. The food distribution network was working fairly well; everyone had enough to eat. There had been some celebrations after Norway fell, and Crete, but for the moment everything was surprisingly peaceful. Hanover smiled to himself; conscripting most of the unemployed youths into the army had reduced crime more than anything the socialists had suggested.

“They can take out their aggressions on the Germans,” he said, and chuckled darkly. The confidential report from Agent Yar, from Russia, was next; they were making progress, slowly. It had been a long shot, one of several that Smith would never have dared to try, but perhaps it would work. Now that there were some satellites in orbit, watching Russia and relaying messages, he could signal to them without fear of detection.

Darkness fell around the room as night cloaked the building, but he worked on, making his way through the paperwork that could not be delegated to the civil servants. Few of the documents were interesting – one covered the sudden number of private doctors who had applied to work in America – but they were important. An uninformed Prime Minister wasn’t a Prime Minister for very long.

A chime rang in the room. “Prime Minister, Mr Berrios respectfully requests an interview,” his secretary said. “Shall I give him the boot?”

Hanover thought rapidly. Normally, Berrios should have asked his superior, who would have relayed the request. Either this was very important, or Berrios was arrogant beyond belief. Either way, it had to be dealt with quickly.

“Send him in,” he said grimly, and waited for Berrios to pass through the security checks.

“Good evening, Prime Minister,” Berrios said. He didn’t sound too arrogant. Hanover decided to hear him out. “I found some interesting bits of information that had to be shared with you instead of…”

“Passing through the bureaucrats?” Hanover asked dryly. Each of the bureaucrats would have tried to add their own spin to the information. He swung around and waved the black man to a seat. “What have you found?”

“If Mr Bracken exists, he’s very well hidden or was left behind in 2015,” Berrios said. “I checked through every surveillance system we have; all of the reported meetings with him were through his substitutes. You know, the people who were linked into the Internet and relayed his words?”

Hanover nodded. If you were rich enough, you could do that. “Yes, I know,” he said.

“Sir, no one seems to have seen Mr Bracken in person,” Berrios said. “If he wasn’t abroad at the time of the Transition – and there is no record of him leaving before we did – then he must be still in Britain. Indeed, AIMworks reported that Mr Oliver had taken up work as one of Bracken’s substitutes, and had a link to him. So I checked further… and I am convinced that there is no such person.”

Hanover lifted an eyebrow. “How did we miss it?”

“His taxes were all paid and he owned a vast number of companies,” Berrios said. It wasn’t quite an answer. “However, most of the companies weren’t real, not in the sense that they made anything, but merely shell companies. Sir, I consulted with the Police departments – under strictest security of course – and it looks as if all Bracken was is a fat bank account – and a number of people who played at being him. However, recently, that changed; Bracken went on the market, snapped up a number of American companies over here that were about to fold – and a number of American businesses in this year – and manoeuvred himself into prime position in the transatlantic trade.”

“Bugger me,” Hanover muttered, ruefully impressed. “Talk about a powerful position.”

“Yes, sir,” Berrios said. “We’re unravelling the money trail now, and we’ll find out who was behind it quickly, perhaps some of the mobsters we have around. Sir, if he is working for the Germans, then he’s suddenly a very real danger.”

“That point has been made, several times,” Hanover said absently. “Clever bastard, if we drop a hammer on him, we tear apart the trading network with America.” He thought rapidly about assassination, and dismissed the possibility. It might have destroyed the trade relationship, even if their hand was never seen to have been involved. “What else was he doing here?”

“I’m not certain,” Berrios admitted. “His people bought a lot of books and technical machines, but all of them were accounted for at the last census. Still, all this does make it very likely that he’s our missing spy.”

“Humm,” Hanover said. An idea had occurred to him. “Mr Berrios, I want you to carefully, very carefully, work out everything that he’s been doing and inform me. This is your only priority; send your boss to me if he makes a fuss.”

“Yes, sir,” Berrios said, smiling. What officer would not be delighted to have a chance to embarrass his boss?

“You are to keep this to yourself,” Hanover ordered. “You are not to do anything that would alert him, whatever happens.” He opened a drawer and pulled out a card. “This is my direct line,” he said. “Should you see him doing anything that requires immediate action, let me know.”

“Yes, sir,” Berrios said. Hanover nodded, dismissing him, and then thought rapidly. The plans for Redemption were known to only a handful of people, none of them in America. Redemption was also the only major operation that would be conducted for the remainder of the year; Norway would absorb much of the American resources and the Middle East would absorb the British resources.

“At least Japan is no longer a threat,” Hanover said to himself, and headed for his bed.

Churchill Space Centre

French Guiana, South America

31st May 1941

The CAD-generated design was simple and cunning, exactly the sort of design that previous space programs had rejected, simply because they couldn’t see the point. If Major John Dashwood had squinted at it just right, he could have believed that he was staring at one of the Shuttle-C designs that NASA had invented, but never put into use. Two small booster rockets, built with designs that had been invented in the 1970s, were placed on each side of the massive external tank; a pointed cylinder that had been based on space shuttle technology.

Dashwood allowed himself a chuckle. No matter how impressive the space rocket was, it was empty. No mammoth amounts of fuel would be required to lift the light cylinder; it had been built from materials that were very light, relatively speaking. The first models were being shipped to Churchill Space Centre now, prepared for launch into Low Earth Orbit, and Dashwood hoped to be launching them in a week. Once enough of them were in orbit, the first stages of space station construction would have been completed; the astronauts in the SSTO or the space capsules would have somewhere to live in space.

He smiled again. It was amazing what American pressure could do; the Americans had loved the reconnaissance reports from Norway and were demanding more, offering all kinds of bribes in exchange. Even as American forces ground onwards to Oslo, the British were launching more satellites into space, completing the observation of the Earth.

“Once we have a space station, we can begin developing the space-based weapons,” he remarked to his second, Commander Troy Tempest. Churchill Space Centre had developed remarkably in the month since they had placed the first satellite in orbit; they now had a complete staff and entire factories. Everyone was benefiting, even the natives; some of them had expressed interest in incorporation into the British Commonwealth.

“We need the astronauts ready first,” Tempest reminded him. Only a handful of RAF personnel had ever been in space, but the former British Space Centre – now merged into Dashwood’s personal fiefdom – had had a handful more, and dozens of plans and concepts that had vanished into the bureaucracy and been forgotten. Now… now, people were discussing space guns, and rail launchers, and dozens of idea that had really caught the public imagination. They had had dozens of applications for astronaut training, from the RAF to ordinary students who had dreamed of space for years.

“True, true,” Dashwood said. “The SSTO should be ready for its test flight in January, but we’ll have to move to using the capsules for the rest of the year. It’s going to be extremely dangerous, but hell; they flew that way in 1960.”

“Yes, sir,” Tempest said. “We have continued their training at the British site.”

Dashwood nodded. “If something goes wrong from here, we can pick up from there,” he said. “Coming to think of it, the SSTO should be capable of launching from anywhere.”

Tempest chuckled. “So they keep telling us,” he said, referring to the collection of British aerospace companies that had contracted to build the craft. “I know that the Americans built one like it, but they only flew it from America itself.”

“We’ll be more adventurous,” Dashwood assured him. His watch started to bleep. “Ah,” he said. “Time for the launch.”

“Close enough to 0.23628 seconds past midday,” Tempest joked. Dashwood, who’d read the books as a child, chuckled. “I hope that you remembered the mice.”

“Should be just time for a cup of tea,” Dashwood said.

* * *

The Goddard-class rocket sat neatly on the launching pad, a combination of future and British technology. Like its predecessors, it carried a reconnaissance and communications satellite, adding another multi-function satellite to the growing orbital web staring down at Earth. Dashwood might have been imagining it, but there was a certain crudeness to its design, nothing like the Trident that they’d used for the first launch.

“I confirm launch commit,” he said, checking the telemetry. The observation units were in position, aided for the first time by two orbiting satellites.

“Launch commit confirmed,” Tempest confirmed. “Telemetry coming in at three locations; full data shunt and storage confirmed.”

“Don’t you get the feeling of déjà vu?” Dashwood asked wryly. Tempest glared at him; that wasn’t in the script. “Launch in ten seconds… five… launch!”

The rocket fired. For a long moment, it stood on the pad, and then began to rise on a pillar of smoke. Cheers broke out across the field as the reporters and crew stopped their work to gawk at the rocket, which was rising steadily across the sea. Dashwood smiled to himself… and then the alarms began.

“Heat rise in second stage booster,” Tempest snapped. “Sir, it’s going…”

The explosion echoed across the waters as the rocket disintegrated in mid-flight. Explosive packs triggered themselves, disintegrating the reminder of the rocket, which showered dust and components down on the sea. A dreadful silence fell over the base.

“Stand down from launch,” Dashwood said. He was amazed at how calm his voice was. “Everyone, back to work.” He hesitated. “Except the senior staff, who will join me for a conference in twenty minutes.”

* * *

Dashwood had banned both cigarettes and alcohol from Churchill Space Centre, except in emergencies. Reasoning that this counted as an emergency, he poured them all generous glasses of brandy, and set up the teleconference call with the Prime Minister.

“So,” he said finally, as they sipped their brandies. “What the hell went wrong?”

“The rocket’s shielding failed, I think,” Goddard said. Alone among them, he didn’t seem downhearted; Dashwood remembered that he had had many failures of his own. “The blast plume bored through the shielding and ignited the fuel for the second-stage, blowing it apart.”

Dashwood cursed vilely. Every time that there had been a space disaster, the program was shut down for years back in the old timeline. “We launched several more of those rockets without a problem,” he snapped. “What was wrong with this one?”

“Weaker structural integrity,” the rocket engineer said. “I did a check on all of the other rockets, looking for patterns. Every rocket from a particular company has weaker fuel tanks than the others.”

“A Bracken company?” Hanover asked sharply. “Who owns the company?”

“Not Bracken,” Tempest said, checking on his PDA. “One of the bigger American corporations, Dupont, I think.”

“So, was it an accident or sabotage?” Hanover asked thoughtfully.

“I don’t know,” the engineer said. “It could be just bad materials.”

“Perhaps,” Hanover said. “Major Dashwood?”

Dashwood took a breath. “I intend to resume launches,” he said. “I think that we’d return all of the Dupont rockets and demand that they improve their quality.”

“Good thinking,” Hanover agreed. “The BBC has already caught wind of the disaster; I expect that you can give a good press conference on it. I’ll inform Parliament that the rocket was lost through structural error and that launches will resume, once all of the rockets have been checked out.”

“They won’t shut us down, will they?” Tempest asked nervously. Dashwood grinned behind his brandy. Tempest sounded like a little boy.

“I won’t let them,” Hanover assured him. “Everyone is a big space backer these days; they’re just too useful to be ignored. Still, I expect a full report on your meeting with Dupont, understand?”

Dashwood nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said. “I won’t let them get away with substandard materials.”

“Indeed,” Hanover said. “If necessary, let me know and I’ll talk to the President directly. There’s no point in working on an SSTO if the main rockets explode, is there?”

“No, sir,” Dashwood said. “Sir, we intend to begin laying the first stages of the space station soon; should we continue with that?”

“Keep running, Major,” Hanover said. “Then you may stumble, but you won’t fall.”

Chapter Thirty: Race War

Salvation

Mississippi, America

31st May 1941

Sheriff Jefferson Buckley had lived in Salvation, a tiny town out in the boondocks, for years and thought that he was used to the heat. It rose up from the ground, even in the darkness, and tonight it carried the stink of something… rotten. The very air felt feverish, as if it were too hot for any kind of activity, even the one that they were about to engage in.

“Take care of yourself, Jeff,” his wife said. Buckley smiled down at his wife, who had once been red-haired and beautiful. Years as the wife of the local sheriff had dimmed her fire, but he could still see the innocent young girl she had once been. Her body was still trim, even after giving birth to three children, and he kissed her once on the lips.

No nigger is going to have you, he thought grimly, and prepared himself as best as he could. The remainder of the posse would be making themselves ready as well and he wouldn’t disappoint them; the local sheriff had to be there to make the proceedings nice and legal. Buckley chuckled as he pulled on his gun belt; it had been fine when the niggers kept their heads down and out of his way, but as soon as they started to get ideas…

“I’ll be back,” he said, aping a character in one of the new movies. Salvation had been lucky enough to have a travelling cinema come to town; the citizens – no niggers, of course – had watched the movies with interest. Picking up his rifle, he headed out to the barn, where the posse had gathered; thirty men, armed to the teeth.

“Good evening,” he said, using the accent from another of the movies; a stupid high-class Englishman. “How are y’all?”

There was a series of mutterings. Some of the men, he realised with annoyance, were drunk already, clinking bottles under their arms. “We are going to go into Darktown,” he said, using the local name for the black section of Salvation. “Once there, we are going to search it from top to bottom for guns, which niggers are not allowed to have.”

There were chuckles. One of the prime actions, after the civil war had ended, had been to keep weapons out of black hands. “If we find any, the nigger in question is to be arrested,” Buckley said. “Any resistance, shoot to kill. I’ll square it with the state; we all know what duffers niggers are with guns.”

“Probably shot themselves while trying to escape,” a clearly drunken man said, laughing unpleasantly. “Come on, Sheriff; don’t we get any fun with the dark women?”

Buckley scowled at him. Rape was an unacknowledged way of keeping the blacks down; surely it proved how inferior they were that no black man would go to the defence of a raped black woman? There were nearly a dozen mixed-race children in Darktown alone, proof of the policy.

“Later, perhaps,” he said, knowing that some would certainly take the opportunity. “Now, is everyone ready?”

“Yes,” they shouted, and followed him through the streets into Darktown. Buckley made a face; Darktown stank. It smelt of houses and of unclean people, pigs and swamps and Africa. Not given to self-honestly, Buckley couldn’t acknowledge that his side of Salvation smelt exactly the same.

“Niggers, come out,” he shouted, firing once into the air. “Come out or we’ll shoot!”

Some doors opened; black faces peered out. “Come out into the square,” Buckley bellowed. “Come out, now!”

Slowly, reluctantly, clearly terrified, they came forth, standing in the square in their nightclothes. Some of his men ogled the women; their tongues hanging out. Buckley glared at them until they resumed guard position.

“Under the authority vested in me by the state, I am here to search your premises for guns,” Buckley announced. “If any of you want to make it easier, declare your weapons now.”

One young man began to protest; he was shot through the head. The blacks shifted nervously – Buckley could smell their fear and urine – but they didn’t move under the noses of the weapons.

“Search that house first,” Buckley commanded, detailing off men. Four men had to watch the blacks; the others went in pairs. Some of them, he was certain, would see it as an opportunity to steal; by the looks on their faces, some of the blacks knew it as well. “Move it!”

A single gunshot rang out, followed by another. “What happened?” Buckley demanded, lifting his rifle. “Answer me!”

“Nigger bitch shot Dawson,” one of his men said. “She had hidden under the bed and…”

One of the black men threw a stone. Buckley fired without thinking; the entire posse fired. The fight was short and savage, but there was no other possible outcome. Five minutes after the fighting had begun, the blacks lay dead.

Dawson, clutching his shoulder, cheered. “We whipped them good,” he hollered. Buckley felt sick for the first time. “We own this place!”

“Check all of the other buildings,” Buckley ordered, keeping his gorge down with an effort. “Round the rest up, then torch the buildings.”

The White House

Washington DC, USA

1st June 1941

The headlines of the New York Times were clearly a mixture between two equally important subjects; BLACK OUTRAGES IN SALVATION and BRITISH SPACE DISASTER competed for space. For once, the paper made no excuses for the behaviour of the white inhabitants, despite taking a pro-white slant. The devastation was simply out of all proportion to any offence.

“We haven’t seen anything like this since the civil war,” Roosevelt said. He sounded vaguely stunned. Ambassador King felt burning rage growing within his breast; had he never considered some of the consequences of words compared to actions? What did truth; justice and the American way mean if you were black?

“The local sheriff was informed that the blacks were hiding subversives within their town and organised a posse to investigate,” Hoover said. His self-importance was more than King could bear at this time in the morning. “The blacks opened fire and…”

“And an entire population got slaughtered,” King snapped. “Do you have any sense of how important this is?”

Hoover ignored him, speaking directly to the President. “This is the direct result of a campaign of subversion,” he said. “All across America, subversives are meeting and plotting the fall of American democracy. Mr President, you must sign a bill authorising martial law across the South and end the insurgency once and for all.”

Without waiting for a reply, he swept out of the room, meeting Tolson outside for a late lunch. I hope that he bites your cock off, King thought with a sudden bitter anger, before turning back to face Roosevelt. The President looked older; his Vice President, Truman, was watching him with concern.

“How do we handle something like this?” Roosevelt asked. His voice was wavering. “Everything was nice and peaceful until you people arrived.”

“It was nothing of the sort,” Truman said. He’d been amused to discover that his actions on racial integration had made him a hero to the black population. “This problem has been growing for a while.”

“Did you know that the HUAC has started to plan inquires into shutting down the Internet?” Roosevelt asked. “Hoover – the faggot bastard – has been calling in every marker he’s owed, just to have the Internet attacked.”

The President’s sudden vehemence shocked King. “The Southern Governors – and some of the Northern ones – are demanding new laws to control…”

“Uppity niggers,” King snapped.

“As you wish,” Roosevelt said. “They want the entire region placed under martial law and the insurgency rooted out root and branch.” He glared down at the list of incidents; they were coming in with more and more violence, damaging lives all across the south.

“Not unless you can do it for the entire country,” Truman said wryly. The riot in Chicago had been brutal. “We have to win in Norway and then against Germany.”

“Hoover has been going on and on about communists,” Roosevelt said. “He thinks that the Russians have been supplying aid to the blacks.”

“There’s no proof of that,” King pointed out quickly.

“Who needs proof when Hoover is around?” Truman asked. “The fairy has a handle on half of Congress.”

“And he’s still talking to MacArthur,” Roosevelt said. “I have been thinking about offering him a combat command, rather than the training post at Fort Hood. Unfortunately… well, you know what the regulars think of him.”

King nodded. By now, the rumours had risen to MacArthur being in the pay of the Japanese, selling out his men for a comfy life in the future. “It would be one way of getting rid of him,” King said wryly.

“Then everyone would say that I’d sent him off to die, instead of leaving him in the training billet,” Roosevelt said. “Damn it; I wish I knew what they were doing.”

* * *

Colonel Palter, though no fault of his own, had found himself assigned to General Eisenhower as an unofficial aide. His experience at the countless little wars within the Middle East, and Central Asia, had been very helpful, although some of his ideas hadn’t been. No one in 2015, except the historians, had really understood just how limited their capabilities really were.

He smiled to himself. Eisenhower had been summoned back to the United States for a conference, something that would have been impossible before the Transition, or during World War Two, and he wasn’t enjoying it. Arguing with countless suppliers that he wanted more supplies heading to Norway now, not futuristic weapons in a year, was draining. Everyone was very keen to produce the B-29 design, ignoring the fact that it would be at least five months before one could be ready, let alone the hordes of bombers that LeMay was dreaming about.

“We need more aerial supply,” Eisenhower said grimly, and Palter smiled as the USAAF commanders collectively recoiled. “At the moment, we are not using tanks, but we’re slipping troops over the mountains and we need to supply them. The British can’t lift anything like enough for us, and we can build the aircraft required for it.”

“We have to win the war quickly,” LeMay said. “We can only do that by systematically destroying Germany’s abilities to wage war. A sustained, constant bombing attack could end the war within months, flying from bases in North Africa or England, perhaps even Norway…”

“What little airfields remain in Norway are being used by British close-support VTOL aircraft,” Eisenhower snapped. “What about our other supplies, eh?”

“Production of the Liberty Ships is only increasing,” a grey man said. He was from the Navy Department. “Almost all of the production ships have been earmarked for transporting supplies to Orkney, and from there to Bergen. You’ll have your supplies there, General…”

Palter smiled. The Navy was also keen on long-range bombers, although for different reasons. They wanted them to play a role in the antisubmarine role, and even the atomic role when that became available. They’d even begun planning a nuclear carrier, even though they were hardly necessary now.

“The problem is that Norway’s logistics are very poor,” Eisenhower snapped, not bothering to conceal his annoyance. “We’re spending too much effort trying to rebuild parts of their rail network – a futile effort in the time we have available – because you can’t drop supplies to us. This is not the desert; this is mountainous terrain that a few rock falls can totally block off.”

He waved a hand at the map. “Once we reach Oslo, we will need supplies to knock the Germans out of there,” he said. “The reconnaissance satellites” – Eisenhower had been among the approving crowd – “report that the Germans are digging in, gentlemen, digging in into terrain that makes Gettysburg or Cold Harbour look nice and easy. We have only forty thousand men there – and I can’t afford to lose many of them.”

“Could the British not bomb the defenders to hell and gone?” A man with a southern accent asked. Palter was puzzled; he didn’t know who he was. “We keep hearing things about wonder weapons, you know, and then there was the explosion in Romania.”

Eisenhower looked at Palter. “Precision weapons either require very good reconnaissance or teams on the ground guiding the weapons in,” he said. “The Germans have managed to surround Oslo with enough guards to make sneaking a team in very difficult, while reconnaissance is hampered as there are fewer obvious targets on the ground. There aren’t enough weapons to aim randomly.”

The Secretary of War coughed. “At least we are improving the number of troops conscripted into the military,” he said. “Black men are deserting in large numbers, I’m afraid, but we should be able to send you some reinforcements soon.”

“Blasted black propaganda,” someone muttered from the corner. “Don’t they know how lucky they are?”

“Reinforcements are not the problem,” Eisenhower said. “The problem is that we can only support a small number of troops at the critical points. We need, desperately, more aerial support.”

* * *

Ambassador King watched in silence as Eisenhower went through a dog and pony show on the results of the battles. He’d been relieved, along with Roosevelt, to learn that the invasion had succeeded, and that there was no chance that the Allied forces would be pushed back into the sea. Still, it had taken several days to sort out the situation on the ground, let along press the offensive towards Oslo – and the largest German force on the ground.

“At the moment, we hold all of Norway’s coastline,” Eisenhower said. He pointed at the PowerPoint display, which was displaying an interactive map. “I can confidently say that no major German force exists anywhere near the coast, although we cannot discount any stragglers from the Wehrmacht or the SS. Unfortunately, it took time to get the port working again, then we could ship in supplies and ship out the Germans to POW camps in the Shetlands.

“At the moment, General Patton has been probing towards Oslo, using infantry forces combined with British Special Forces,” Eisenhower continued. “As an aside, we have to have some of our people go through their training camp; we need more like them. Anyhow, it’s hard going for more than small groups; the road system has been wrecked by either the British airstrikes or the Germans in retreat.”

Roosevelt coughed. “Are you saying that we cannot get to them in Oslo?”

Eisenhower shook his head. “Of course we can,” he assured Roosevelt, and by extension the entire room. “It’s just going to be slower than we anticipated.” He adjusted the map. “We’re taking a two-tiered approach,” he explained. “One thrust will be mainly infantry and light tanks – very light tanks – moving overland. That thrust will subdivide; some will head directly over the mountains, others will go around the mountains. Whatever happens, we expect that we will be besieging Oslo within a week, perhaps two.

“At the same time, the Allied naval force will probe their way around the coast, eventually hammering away at the outskirts of Oslo itself,” he said, changing the map again. A big blue arrow advanced around Norway. “Although I don’t anticipate landing Marines like we did before, the Germans will have to be aware of the possibility – and they will have to take precautions against it.”

Roosevelt considered for a long moment. “What about the Soviet forces in the north?”

“So far, they haven’t moved,” Eisenhower said. “The Finns have been hitting them hard and that’s not good terrain for them.” He smiled. “Patton wants to challenge them anyway.”

“He would,” Roosevelt said. “Cordell?”

Cordell Hull, Secretary of State, spoke clearly. He didn’t often have a chance to speak on foreign policy. “We have been receiving feelers from the Swedish Government,” he said. “As you know, they are under German ‘protection’ from Stalin. If you are determined to avoid a clash with Stalin, we will have to decide on a course of action quickly.”

“Accept their feelers and move our troops into the country,” King suggested. “If we don’t make a deal with them, we will have to fight Germans moving up through Sweden.”

“That’s pretty much what Patton said,” Eisenhower injected. “Mr President, if the Swedes abandon Hitler, Stalin will walk in and take over the place.”

Roosevelt scowled. “Like Finland,” he said. Ambassador King nodded. “I suppose we could try to warn him off.” He nodded. “Cordell, see to warning Stalin that the United States would be most displeased if he did anything to violate the territorial integrity of Sweden.”

“I believe that Stalin will call our bluff,” Hull said grimly.

Roosevelt gave him a charming smile. “Who says I’m bluffing?”

* * *

“I feel almost like my old self again,” Roosevelt said cheerfully, over dinner. “I say, Ambassador; those medicines really work.”

“They are from seventy years in the future,” King said, sipping his wine.

“Now, you can sing for your supper,” Roosevelt said. “Tell me, will Stalin call our perhaps bluff?”

King smiled. “I don’t have a singing voice,” he said. “Depends on how confident Stalin is of ultimate victory. By now, he has to know that communism is a dead end – notice how he’s started privatising food production – but he won’t want his own power threatened. That’s what he was doing in Spain; a Republican victory might have been equally bad for the Soviets in the long run.”

Roosevelt smiled. “Why?” He asked. “Not that I doubt you, but…”

“Too far from Moscow,” King said. “Without a Soviet army in the nation, it might start having ideas, such as asking why Stalin got to make all the decisions? They might end up, horror of horrors, setting themselves up as a second centre of communism.” He chuckled. “Stalin might just be having plans to double-cross Hitler at some point, perhaps when we have him distracted and on the ropes.”

Roosevelt sighed. “Was it this complicated in the original timeline?”

King nodded. “No one dared to stand up to Stalin when he might have been stopped,” he said. “The world endured forty years on the edge of destruction because of that, Mr President.”

“You never crease to remind us of mistakes we haven’t made yet,” Roosevelt said finally, after a long pause. “Now we can make some new ones.”

Chapter Thirty-One: The War in the Outback

Government House

Canberra, Australia

1st June 1941

The red arrows crept along the coast of Australia, advancing on Darwin. They’d taken longer than anyone had expected to reach the outskirts of the city. Sir Thomas Albert Blamey had taken the opportunity of moving two more infantry battalions into the city, providing it with a powerful defensive force. Nearly eighty thousand trained men, backed up by some units of the city’s militia, would make a stand for their home. The advice from the British SAS had turned Darwin into a death trap – for the Japanese.

Prime Minister Menzies shook his head, knowing just how ghastly the casualties were going to be, on both sides. The Japanese, whatever else one could say about them, were brave; none had surrendered. The only prisoners had been picked up by the Bushmen, the SAS patrols operating in the Japanese rear; all starving and dehydrated.

“You would think that they’d know when to give up,” Colonel Philip Hawkinson said. In theory, the Japanese had landed around 100’000 men on Australia; in practice, most of them were far from combat effective. The division that had landed at Cape York was trying to march down to Cairns, but it was shedding men like flowers. By the time they hit the defence lines north of Cairns, they would not be in any state to punch their way through it.

“A pity we can’t poison the entire sea,” General Blamey had muttered, when it became clear that the only thing saving the entire Japanese force from dying from thirst was their impromptu desalination efforts.

“Bite your tongue,” Hawkinson had said wryly. “Clever bastards, aren’t they?”

Menzies scowled and brought himself back to the present. The icons for the four armoured divisions Australia had formed at great expense and effort were where they had been for the last two weeks; five miles south of Darwin. After the hammering the RAF had handed out to the Japanese air force, the Japanese seemed oddly reluctant to commit more aircraft to probing Australia. Darwin itself still got a bombing raid – and they had tried to airdrop supplies to the soldiers – but the back of the Japanese air force had been broken.

A shame that the army doesn’t see it that way, Menzies thought grimly. With a cold-blooded determination that no western army would have condoned for a moment, with an ignorance of logistics worthy of the worst of the armchair generals, the Japanese army hadn’t surrendered, even when the submarines cut their supply lines. The Japanese had only what they’d put ashore in the first wave… and still they came on.

“Bastards,” Menzies muttered, squeezing his coffee cup. He’d seen the records from the first time this war had been fought, and knew what the Japanese would do to his people. He’d evacuated Darwin en masse, just to avoid giving the Japanese new slaves, but if they somehow broke through the lines…

He shuddered. In the first time the war had been fought, Australia had never been invaded at all. Instead, the Japanese would wreck far more havoc on the world… and clear the path for American hegemony. Perhaps it would be better for Australia, after going through the experience, to be part of a new British Commonwealth, in the long term, but in the short term…?

“Perhaps,” Menzies said to himself, and headed down towards the meeting room.

* * *

“The Japanese will reach the outer defence line sometime today,” Hawkinson said. “I believe that it is time to activate the defence plan.”

Menzies lifted an eyebrow. “Is it time to launch the attack?” He asked. “Don’t you want to bleed them first?”

Hawkinson shrugged. “It depends,” he said. “If we move into their rear areas, we could break the back of their force without destroying much of Darwin in the process. If we wait for them to get really involved with Darwin, we risk their managing to take the city, which means that we will have to dig them out now.”

“I thought that the plan was to crush them in the city,” Menzies said. “What’s changed?”

“We planned a tactical withdrawal from Darwin,” Hawkinson reminded him. “The bastards took so long that we had time to move more troops in, which makes an organised retreat difficult, to say the least.”

Menzies considered. In the end, there was only one possible choice. “I authorise the operation,” he said. “Sweep them off my country.”

Nr Darwin

Australia

1st June 1941

The heat hadn’t stopped the Imperial Japanese Army, despite some of the soldiers collapsing from heat exhaustion. Private Fumihiko had wanted to collapse, but the blows and kicks of the sergeants had forced the platoon onwards to Darwin.

“Once we get to the city, we’ll see if they are blonde all over,” Sergeant Hitoshi said cheerfully. His fist made contact with a drooping private. “Move, onwards!”

Private Fumihiko ignored the sergeant as best as he could, trying to ignore the hail of shellfire up ahead. As the force grew closer and closer to Darwin, they were running into more and more opposition, ranging from men on bicycles with machine guns, to entire strongpoints. Those thrice-cursed aircraft kept sneaking in to drop a handful of bombs, even spraying burning fuel over unlucky platoons. Even Sergeant Hitoshi’s threats and kicks couldn’t stop the platoons – hell, the entire army – from throwing themselves to the ground as soon as they heard aircraft.

At least we got rid of the helicopters, he thought bitterly. The British had used their helicopters to attack the columns, but a brave private had used his mortar on the craft, teaching the British to keep their distance. The column was bleeding men left, right and centre… and there was no sign of any end to the march.

“Darwin ahead,” someone shouted. The men raised a ragged Banzai cheer. The roar of shellfire grew louder and Private Fumihiko realised that the ordeal was far from over.

* * *

General Masaharu Homma looked down on the Australian city and cursed. The Australians had been hard at work, digging trenches and building defences, and he could see some of their work. Rows of guns waited for his men, waited to send them into the outer darkness.

“We have to take the city,” he said, and his staff saluted smartly. Although he hadn’t told any of the enlisted men, who might have been upset, they’d lost contact with the other part of the pincer. Quickly, he issued orders for runners to circumvent the city, hopefully to meet up with the other half of his force, and then ordered a quick rest.

While the soldiers rested and prepared themselves as best as they could for the coming fight, Homma examined the defences. They’d been contrasted along First World War lines and he scowled; the ANZAC veterans had probably seen combat in France. The defences were powerful… and he didn’t have many field guns and only a handful of tanks. He was well equipped with mortars, with plenty of rounds, but he didn’t have enough main guns to knock out their defences.

“We’re going to have to take them on directly,” he said, passing his binoculars over the defence lines. The death toll was going to be horrendous. “Order the troops to stand by; we attack as soon as we hear back from Hirkada.”

A runner crashed through the bush and ran up to Homma, panting. “Sir, General Hirkada reports that he’s reached Darwin and is going to attack in twenty minutes…”

He broke off, panting. Homma waved a hand at the flask of water and considered. Perhaps a joint attack could succeed, backed up by the armour. They would conquer – or die trying.

* * *

“That’s Homma himself,” Philip Orozco said. The SAS officer was hidden in a tiny cave, dug underground, peering out through sensors the Japanese couldn’t even begin to imagine. “I wonder what he’s thinking.”

“He’s thinking Banzai, Banzai, Banzai; we can take those Aussie louts,” Samuel Broderick predicted. “Does he have any common sense at all?”

Orozco shrugged. The two officers were lying in the cramped cave, completely undetectable. If the Japanese had known that they were there, they could have dug them up, but they had no way of finding them, let alone digging down to reach them.

“I think they believe that faith conquers all,” he said, and chuckled. “They’re worse than the Jihadis; you have to kill them all to get them to break.”

“One should only use fanatics as cannon fodder,” Broderick said grimly. A mere handful of truly evil men in the Middle East had done that in the last years of the War on Terror, a war that would now never be fought. “Point them at the target and shoot.”

“Heads up,” Orozco said, as the sensors picked up the sounds of a whistle. The sensors continued to relay information; Japanese troops were forming up into lines. “I think the big show is about to start.”

“No kidding,” Broderick muttered. “Just look at them go.”

* * *

The crump-crump-crump of Japanese mortars erupted from the Japanese lines, pouring fire into the Australian defences. In return, bigger guns, kept out of Japanese range in the city itself, pounded back, using their heavier rate of fire to overwhelm the Japanese attempts at counter-battery fire. Handfuls of shooting near the front lines testified to the Japanese forces trying to move up under the cover of the shellfire, pounding away at the defenders.

General Sir Leslie James Morshead, commander of the Rats of Darwin, studied the advancing Japanese without concern. The Japanese were mainly infantry, unlike the Germans his duplicate had had to deal with, and they were unprepared for the sheer violence of modern war. The defence lines had been carefully designed and constructed as fast as the resources of an entire city could be deployed, turning equipment for digging drains into digging trenches.

“General, they’re advancing from both directions,” his radio burst out. He wasn’t sure how he felt about the radios – they allowed the High Command to interfere whenever they felt like it – but they were brilliant for commanding his forces. He’d wanted to lead from the front, but the British liaison officer had dissuaded him.

“Order the 4th Infantry to prepare to move east,” he said, considering. His handful of tanks – very light tanks – couldn’t be committed to battle yet. “If they break through, we’ll plug the hole with them.”

“Yes, sir,” his aide said. Morshead smiled; the Japanese had three lines to break before they could reach the city… and then they would be chewed up in the streets.

* * *

The whistle blew and the men advanced, jumping forward to avoid the lines of mines quickly laid by Japanese sappers. Sergeant Hitoshi, to give him his due, led the charge, leaving the other sergeants to force the men forward. There wasn’t any reluctance; the men charged forward, intending to win the city for themselves.

“Banzai,” they shouted, and charged. Private Fumihiko ran with them, shooting madly at an Australian bunker, and then threw himself to the ground as a machine gun poked its nose out of the slit in the wall. A stream of bullets passed through the platoon, slaughtering some of the men like pigs.

“Forward,” Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed. The experienced officer had hit the ground at once. “Fire!”

Private Fumihiko watched with genuine admiration as Sergeant Hitoshi jumped up to the slit, pressing himself against the bunker. A knife came out and slashed at the sergeant, but he caught it, tossing a grenade inside the bunker. The explosion blew the machine gun away.

“Forward,” Sergeant Hitoshi bellowed again, and moved carefully around the bunker. Private Fumihiko and the remains of the platoon followed him, absorbing the remains of other platoons as they advanced. A hail of shellfire fell on the bunker they’d killed; enough to blast it out of the ground.

“Missed,” Sergeant Hitoshi shouted, and led the charge to the next position. A hail of shellfire poured down on their heads and Private Fumihiko had only minutes to realise that the Australians had pre-targeted their guns, before the shells exploded. By some miracle, both him and Sergeant Hitoshi had survived, but there was nothing more left of the platoon. The men he’d marched with through China and Indochina, through the Dutch East Indies, had been slaughtered in one catastrophic attack.

A haze descended upon his vision, it was broken by Sergeant Hitoshi shaking him violently. “Forward,” the sergeant bellowed, ignoring the fact that they were alone. The main focus of the battle had moved elsewhere. “Get up, you lazy…”

Private Fumihiko lifted his rifle and squeezed the trigger once. Sergeant Hitoshi’s head exploded before he realised that his death had come for him. His body toppled over backwards, leaving Private Fumihiko sitting in the battlefield, looking at nothing.

* * *

“They’re coming in the west,” someone shouted. “We need fire support, now!”

“Order the guns to open fire, pre-set coordinates,” Morshead ordered. He studied the map grimly, imagining the scene. The first eastern attack had been broken, at heavy cost to both sides, and the trenches were awash with blood. The Japanese had fallen back, but he was certain that they would be back.

“Firing,” his aide said. The sound of the guns echoed through the buildings. The hail of Japanese mortar fire seemed to have slowed down. “Sir, the Japanese are advancing with their tanks.”

Morshead glanced up at the display and cursed. The Japanese might not have realised, but they’d given the eastern defenders quite a beating. Tanks might just tip the balance… except he had tanks too.

“Send in the tanks,” he commanded. “They’re to advance at once.”

* * *

Sergeant Mike O’Neal grinned openly as he received his orders. The Scimitar tank – technically classed as an armoured recon vehicle – had been upgraded for fighting against infantry, while continuing to possess a light anti-tank capability. The Japanese would have nothing to counter it.

“Advance,” he said, as the data package unsealed itself. The tank moved out of the garage where it had been hidden from Japanese prying aircraft, before heading down towards the battlezone. He grinned though his VR helmet; the interfacing with the tank’s sensors, which were in turn linked into the battle management software, was pointing him in the exact direction he had to go.

“We have around seven Japanese light pieces of junk,” he said, confirming that the other two crewmen had heard. The five other tanks in the force spread out behind his vehicle, preparing their weapons. Encrypted data bursts flashed between them, designating targets from sensor data.

“I see them,” the driver said. “Advancing onwards.”

O’Neal smiled to himself as the Scimitar moved on, around the defences, and onto the battleground. Australians cheered as the tanks moved on, British flags displayed on their sides, and waved cheerfully.

“I confirm targets as Japanese Type-95 tanks, active on the battlefield,” O’Neal said, recording for future studied. “Main gun… locked?”

“Locked,” the gunner confirmed.

“Fire,” O’Neal ordered. “Blast them to hell!”

The Scimitar shuddered once as it fired an antitank shell at the leading Japanese tank, which exploded with a billow of fire. The other tanks fired as well, blasting through other tanks, even as their companions realised the danger for the first time.

“They’re firing back,” O’Neal said, and the Scimitar shuddered. The Japanese shell hadn’t even dented the armour. “They can’t touch us!”

“Shame about the mud,” the driver muttered, as the Japanese tried to flee. It was too late; a hail of fire destroyed the remaining Japanese tanks before they could escape. A streak of fire lanced out from the Japanese infantry and splattered against the armour. “What the hell was that?”

“Some kind of bazooka?” O’Neal guessed. The tank’s sensors were already working on it; he took direct control of the machine gun and fired madly at the Japanese troopers, who were cut down in seconds. “It didn’t hurt us.”

“Better warn the Fireflies,” the driver said. “That was too close.”

* * *

The Australian 1st Armoured Division had been raised far quicker than it’s commanding officer, John Northcott, would have believed possible. The Japanese blockade was very determined around Australia, but one fact was clear; whenever the numerically-weak Royal Navy put together a convoy-escort force, the Japanese had no hope whatever of sinking her. Nearly a thousand Firefly tanks had been delivered from America, enough to rearm the Australians with proper tanks.

Major General Northcott peered down at the satellite map. The orbital reconnaissance wasn’t complete, according to the future personnel, but it was a dashed sight better than anything he’d seen in the Great War. The two Armoured Divisions, accompanied by lorry-loads of infantry, had finally been given the command to advance and wreck havoc in the Japanese rear. They’d been moving fast since then, along roads and across country they knew very well indeed, and the Japanese had no idea that they were coming.

They can probably see our dust trail, Northcott thought wryly. The convoy was raising enough dust to hide an entire… well, armoured division. He grinned; he didn’t know if he would ever be a Governor in this strange altered reality, but if he won the coming battle, then…

“Enemy ahead,” his radio buzzed. The handful of SAS men – one innovation from the future that he approved of – had been feeding him location details for the Japanese. It didn’t seem sporting, somehow; the Japanese didn’t stand a chance.

“All men,” he said, wishing that they’d had enough of the little radios to equip everyone with them. “Australia expects that each and every one of you will do their duty,” he said, and knew that it wasn’t enough. “The Japanese ahead are infesting our soil, infecting our land with their foul presence,” he said. “We are going to kill each and every one of them.”

The cheer, by rights, should have been heard in Tokyo. “Advance,” he bellowed, and his tank led the charge.

* * *

The runners he’d positioned in strategic locations hadn’t been able to get off a warning; the first that General Masaharu Homma knew about the Australian advance from the south was the sound of explosions ripping through the rear of the Japanese lines. As the sound mounted, and the desperate signals from the western prong grew as the jamming ended for a long moment, he knew that the battle was lost.

“Dig in,” he ordered, lifting his own pistol. An explosion sounded to the rear of his new rear and his spun around. Spearheaded by the tanks that had destroyed his tanks with no losses, Australian infantry were counterattacking, flushing Japanese soldiers from their foxholes and captured trenches with ease and skill. He cursed; the Japanese were caught in the open… and then the aircraft came back, bombing the Japanese positions with their deadly firebombs.

General Masaharu Homma had only seconds to know that the battle was lost… and then a FAE bomb swept him, his staff and their supplies into oblivion.

Chapter Thirty-Two: Encirclement

Allied Headquarters

Bergen, Norway

5th June 1941

“Where the hell is my goddamned support?” Patton bellowed, pacing around swinging his stick. “Blasted allies!”

“It’s already lined up for you,” Major Bloodnok assured him, ignoring the comment about allies. Patton had a lot on his mind. “We have precision weapons ready; they just need targets.”

“Splendid,” Patton said. “Explain this to me again; the RAF transport does what?”

“It’s a transport converted to a tactical bomber,” Bloodnok said patiently. Despite a great deal of effort, the only tactical support that the Americans had been able to scrape up were Dauntless Dive Bombers from the carriers, which had at least been fitted with Napalm bombs. “It orbits the battlezone, out of range of enemy fighters…”

“And yet you give it an escort,” Patton injected.

“And it drops one of its precision bombs on the target you select,” Bloodnok said, ruefully aware that Patton wouldn’t be interested in the technical details. The RAF Hercules had been spared from transport duty, simply to assist in the conquest of Norway. The weapons, American-designed MOABs, had been mass-produced for the invasion.

“Good enough,” Patton said. He waved a hand at the chart. “My troops are advancing across Norway, but very slowly. How many more helicopters can you supply?”

Bloodnok shook his head grimly. Patton had almost the entire strength of the 27th Reserve Squadron, one of the Operational Conversion Units, almost seventy helicopters that had been pressed into operational service, along with Puma squadrons and an entire deployed RAF tactical radar system. In all, nearly one hundred helicopters and twenty VTOL Harriers had been deployed to Norway, testing the supply logistics to the limit.

He shook his head again. Patton, to give the devil his due, had seen the importance of the airborne forces at once, assigning elite American forces to be transported behind German lines and hammering away at German strongpoints. The 1st Airborne Corps, as everyone was calling it, was the first joint formation in existence, although Bloodnok knew that Patton was screaming at the American factories to produce an indigenous helicopter version.

“Well?” Patton demanded, and Bloodnok realised that the American had been saying something. “When can the next round of attacks begin?”

Bloodnok checked his watch. “The bomber should be here in twenty minutes,” he said. “Have your teams designated the targets with the laser pointers?”

“Of course,” Patton snapped. “Your SAS has been doing that as well, remember?”

“Yes, sir,” Bloodnok said. “In twenty minutes, then, the attack can begin.”

Over Norway

5th June 1941

It was a cold clear day, perfect flying weather. Flying Officer Victor Abernathy held his Eurofighter on station near the Hercules Bomber, the massive transport that had been adapted into a heavy bomber. He’d seen the plans for real bombers, copies of the B-52 from the Cold War, and had been impressed, assuming, of course, that the strange war lasted long enough for them to be deployed.

“Eagle one, I read a flight of jets,” Flying Officer Sheila Dunbar reported. Abernathy glanced down at his display; nine German jets were rising from Denmark. “They’re coming our way.”

Abernathy considered for a long moment. The Germans couldn’t catch them if they decided to refuse engagement, and they had to be careful to avoid being swarmed, but otherwise they could kill the Germans easily.

“Cleared to engage with ASRAAM missiles,” he said. “Bomber one, adjust course to avoid meeting the enemy.”

“Acknowledged,” Flying Officer Clarence Paradise said. The pilot of the bomber adjusted course westwards, preparing to run if the worst happened. The Hercules was handling sluggishly; “God help us if it has to make an emergency landing” had been the considered opinion of the entire pilot force.

“They must have caught a sniff of the Hercules,” Dunbar said, as the two forces closed in on one another. “Cleared to engage?”

“Radar-guided missiles,” Abernathy said. “Clear to engage… now!”

His Eurofighter launched four ASRAAM missiles in quick succession. Beside him, Dunbar launched her own salvo, the missile trails heading off into the distance. “They’re launching flares,” he said, impressed. The Germans had reacted quickly, but it was useless; the radar-guided missiles couldn’t be fooled by heat sources.

“One plane left, beating a retreat,” Dunbar said, as the missiles found their targets.

“Let him go,” Abernathy. “We’re due over Norway in twenty minutes.”

The cold grey sea gave way to the green hills and mountains of Norway as the three planes banked in from the west. They flew over the American-held territory, before forming into loitering formation, waiting for orders.

“This is sector control,” a new voice said. “Bomber one; targets should be designated, confirm.”

“I confirm fifteen targets,” Paradise said. “Target relay in place; transmitting confirmation now.”

“Confirmed; all targets genuine designations,” the sector control officer said. “General Patton says you may fire when ready, Gridley.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Paradise said. “Bombs away… now!”

Telemark Region

Norway

5th June 1941

Telemark Region, Captain Dwynn knew, had had quite a history of involvement with World War Two, even before the Transition had disrupted the course of history. Quisling, whose proclamations of Norwegian independence – under German protection, of course – still filled the airwaves, had been born in the region, and the heavy water plant had seen one of the most daring raids of World War Two. Dwynn smiled; the heavy water plant had been conclusively demolished by Tomahawk missiles, back in 1940.

He studied the scene without apparent concern, wearing the garb of a Norwegian shepherd. The remainder of his team were further back, among the mountains, but he and Eric had been required to come out in the open. Down below, in the mountains and small towns, the Germans had been digging into the mountains, trying to put a cork in the bottle. Guns, mines and several hundred Germans, carefully preparing to hold off a force ten times their size.

“Bastards,” he muttered, carefully adjusting the laser pointer to angle down on the German fortifications. Patton’s advance could not be slowed, now that the Americans were finally moving in major reinforcements, and Oslo had to be surrounded quickly. That meant that the German attempts to hold them up had to be smashed as soon as possible.

His communicator chimed, vibrating a signal though his head. He’d never gotten used to the covert system, even though it was nearly perfect when against a foe that lacked any real ECM capabilities. It buzzed in his ear and rattled his skull.

“The bomber is in position,” sector control said. “Confirm target?”

“Target confirmed,” he said, staring into the sky. He didn’t expect to see the bomber; the RAF would probably have insisted on not sending it anywhere near the German-held regions, just in case. “Laser point locked.”

There was a long pause, just long enough for him to wonder if something had gone wrong somewhere… and then a massive explosion blasted through the valley. Three more followed as the other targets were struck, smashing the German position to rubble.

“I confirm targets destroyed,” he said. “When should we prepare for pick-up?”

“Forty minutes,” the controller said. “We’re moving 1st Airborne in now.”

* * *

The Army wanted helicopters, even though – with the exception of General Patton – it didn’t have a proper doctrine for their use yet. The navy wanted helicopters as well; they didn’t know what they wanted to do with them yet either, but they did know that they didn’t want the army getting their hands on all of the helicopters. The net result had been that the Marines of the 1st Marine division had been given a crash course in using the helicopters, assigned to the 1st Airborne – although no one expected that to last – and given orders to clear part of Telemark.

“I’m going to be sick,” Private Buckman muttered. His face was green; he held the bag to his mouth as the helicopter flipped around a mountain at a very dangerous speed.

“Keep your fucking eyes shut,” the co-pilot yelled at them, as the helicopter twisted again. For his part, Private Max Shepherd was fascinated; the mountains were passing by so fast that he couldn’t make out any details at all. “If you’re sick on my fucking helicopter you’ll be cleaning it up with your fucking tongue!”

At that moment, the helicopter flipped up over a mountain peak and passed over a tiny village. “Anyone see any fucking Germans, or even just Germans?” The co-pilot shouted. “Who forgot to include that fucking village on the map?”

“We’re landing in five minutes,” the pilot said. He seemed less excitable, somehow. “As soon as we touch the ground, grab your kit and run, understand?”

“Yes,” Captain Caddell said, glaring around at the small group. “We understand.”

Shepherd stared; he could see smoke rising from ahead. “We’re putting you down on a level plain,” the pilot said calmly. “There should be some SAS to greet you; take the target and wait for resupply, understand?”

Without waiting for a reply, the helicopter executed one last swoop and descended upon a grassy slope. “Go, go, go,” the co-pilot snapped, as the doors were flung open. The other helicopters landed near them, unloading their passengers, some of whom looked worse than Private Buckman.

“Follow me,” Captain Caddell snapped, leaping out of the helicopter. “Form up by rows, move it!”

“Move away from the fucking helicopter,” the co-pilot bellowed. “Didn’t they teach you anything?”

Captain Caddell didn’t say anything, but he beckoned for the men to regroup near an alpine stream, lower than the landing site. They could see a small town below them, typically Norwegian. Smoke rose from a number of buildings, some which were still on fire, but they could still see Germans milling about, pointing to the helicopters.

“Look, you can be sick all over them,” Private Manlito said to Buckman, who was still looking green.

“Shut up, you dago dirt bag,” Buckman snarled.

“That’s enough, form lines,” Captain Caddell bellowed. “Who are you?”

The man had popped out of nowhere. The Marines swung around to point their weapons at him, but he didn’t seem bothered. “Captain Dwynn, British Special Air Service,” he said calmly. “I assume you’re the Marines?”

* * *

Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter pulled himself out of the wreckage by sheer force of will, ignoring the Norwegians scurrying around. No matter what the Fuhrer, they were subhumans, unworthy of the farms in Poland that were now being prepared for their use, along with thousands of right-thinking Germans. He’d often considered the virtues of a breeding program, using SS men to impregnate Norwegian women while castrating the men, but Generalmajor Muller had argued against it.

“We like a peaceful life here, ja?” He’d asked, and Richter had submitted, although he had continued his breeding program with two Norwegian mistresses. Now… now Generalmajor Muller was dead, struck down by treacherous attack from the air.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” He demanded of an unfortunate Unterscharfuehrer, and then looked up at the hills. Seventeen flying vehicles had landed there, disgorging troops onto the hills; green-clad Americans. He swore, once, and started to issue orders. If the Americans wanted to recover Skien, the city he’d been ordered to defend, they would have a fight on their hands.

“Oh, and round up the civilians,” he ordered. “We don’t want them doing something stupid, after all.”

* * *

“We can take that city by frontal attack,” Captain Caddell insisted. Captain Dwynn sighed; the Marine had no sense of care. “We have two hundred marines and air support.”

“And if you let them get into position, the air support can kill more of them,” Dwynn said. “Once that’s done, you can just walk in and take over.”

“Sirs,” a private said, “look what they’re doing.”

Dwynn cursed. The SS force in the town were rounding up all of the Norwegians, guarding them with armed guards. “So much for any internal help,” he said, but he smiled. It was a glorified hostage situation, and he knew how to handle them. “Chang, you get your sniper rifle ready,” he ordered into his communicator.

“You have more men around?” Captain Caddell asked. Dwynn nodded shortly. “Where are they?”

“Around,” Dwynn said. “Captain, I’m designating their concentrations for MOAB attack,” he said. “Bomb attack,” he explained, realising that it meant nothing to the Americans. “Then you get to attack anyway.”

Captain Caddell started to bark orders. The Marines spread out, preparing their assault. Dwynn absently admired their bravery; they had no bullet-proof outfits, no chameleon outfits, nothing, but their courage. It was very impressive.

“Captain, bombs inbound,” the controller said. “Impact in ten… nine…”

* * *

Private Max Shepherd braced himself for the attack, lifting his rifle as he prepared to run towards the main German centre nearest him. The plan was simply; hit the Germans in the aftermath of the bomb attack, killing them all before they could start slaughtering Norwegians.

“Where the hell are those bombs?” Buckman asked, and then an explosion shattered the main German position. Shepherd jumped up and ran forward, trusting Buckman to cover his back, and skidded in the blood. The Germans had all been killed, except one.

“Surrender,” the German said, in bad English. He fell forward; Shepherd realised that he had no legs. “I…”

“Poor bastard,” Shepherd said, and then a hail of shots ran past him. Three Germans were mown down by Buckman, who’d seen them coming.

“Compassion has a price on the battlefield,” Captain Caddell said grimly, as they checked through the bodies. Most of the townsfolk were alive; their guards had been shot neatly through the head. “Check them all.”

“Of course,” Shepherd murmured, too tired to care, and then one of the Norwegian girls kissed him. He forgot his woes as the kiss grew and grew, before she finally broke the kiss and let him go. All of the Marines were being kissed.

“Control, Skien is secure,” the creepy SAS officer said. Shepherd shivered; the SAS had shot all the hostage-takers neatly, at far greater ranges than he would have imagined possible. “I think the Marines want a lift.”

“How about a night here?” Buckman asked, who was kissing a Norwegian girl. Shepherd noted with a flash of jealously that it was the girl who had first kissed him. “Ah, come on, Captain…”

“It’s a couple of hours until the pick-up anyway,” Dwynn said. He paused. “Now, what are you?”

* * *

Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter reached for his pistol, noticed that there were five weapons pointed at him, and froze. The American in the lead bent down and picked up his pistol, before planting a foot on his back.

“I claim this body for America,” he said. Richter glared wordlessly at him. “Who are you?”

“Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter, SS Wiking,” Richter said. He rattled off his serial numbers. “That’s all I have to tell you.”

“You attempted to use people as human shields,” the Englishman said. “Under the Washington Protocols of 2010, I am permitted to summarily execute you for crimes against humanity. Do you have anything you wish to say in your defence?”

“You can’t just shoot him,” one of the Americans said. Richter tried to look meek and mild. “He hasn’t done you any wrong.”

“They have to be taught that taking hostages is wrong and will lead to summary punishment,” the Englishman snapped. “Damn it, it took us five fucking years to learn that that was the only way to prevent it!”

“I can tell you things,” Richter pleaded. An eerie warmth spread though his underpants. “I know things that you would find useful.”

“We might need what he has to tell us,” the American Captain said. “I’m sorry, Captain, but we need him alive.”

“On your head be it,” the Englishman snapped. He produced a pair of handcuffs from a back pocket and slipped them on Richter, securing his hands behind his back. “On your own head be it.”

Over Norway

5th June 1941

“This is Bomber one,” Paradise said. “Ground Control, we’re running out of bombs.”

Abernathy nodded, waiting for the response. He’d expected that the Germans would seek to disrupt operations, but apart from the handful of jets, there had been no other challenge to their air superiority. Perhaps we finally killed them all, he thought, and knew that it was wishful thinking.

“Bomber one, Eagles, you may return to base,” the controller said finally. “Good work; General Patton was impressed.”

“Thank the Yank,” Paradise said. “Setting course now.”

There was a pause. “Eagles, do you have the fuel to recon Oslo for us?”

Abernathy blinked, and then remembered that there wasn’t a satellite in position at the moment. “That’s a positive, Ground Control,” he said. “We can buzz them, but we’ll have to meet a tanker in the air.”

“Or we’ll be landing in the North Sea,” Dunbar chimed in. “Would this be a good time to mention that I have a hot date tonight?”

“No, it wouldn’t be,” the controller said. “Eagles, we’re vectoring in a tanker now; confirm receipt of course data.”

“Confirmed,” Abernathy said. “Changing course now.”

Performing the calculations in his mind, he kicked in the afterburners and swooped high over Norway. He expected that he would have to make a low-level pass, but until specifically ordered to do so he would stay high; there was no point in risking a German scoring a golden BB. He looked down as they crossed over Oslo, German anti-aircraft fire bursting harmlessly below them, and smiled. Oslo was smaller than he remembered.

“Looks like they’re not happy to see us,” Dunbar said. “Think we could spend a missile on them?”

“We don’t have any bombs,” Abernathy reminded her. “Ground control, are you receiving uplink?”

“Yes, Eagle One,” the controller said. “Can you give us one last pass?”

“I wonder what that is?” Dunbar said, as they orbited high over Oslo’s harbour. A small warship floated in the fjord, defying them. “A battleship?”

“That’s a destroyer,” Abernathy said. “That’ll teach you to make eyes at the history teacher while he’s teaching us to recognise German craft instead of MIG-29s.”

Dunbar chuckled. “He wasn’t much good anyway,” she said.

“Far too much information,” Abernathy said. “Ground control, are we done here?”

“Yes, Eagles,” the controller said. “You are cleared to return to the tanker.”

Abernathy kicked in the afterburners again and left, trailing sonic booms behind him. Thoughtfully, he checked the location of the tanker and lifted an eyebrow; to meet them it was entering the zone that it had been banned from, just to prevent the Germans bringing it down and reducing the RAF’s capability to fly longer missions.

“I wonder what all that was about,” he said, and they spent a happy return flight speculating like mad. Even odder, particularly for sensitive missions, they weren’t ordered to keep it to themselves, or even only to discuss it with their fellow flyers.

“Curious,” he said, and left it alone for the moment. There were other matters to attend to, and all of them demanded his attention.

Chapter Thirty-Three: The Brutal Friendship

The Kremlin

Moscow, Russia

5th June 1941

As he did every time he entered Stalin’s personal rooms, Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov wondered if he would ever be allowed to leave. These days, the Kremlin was guarded by elite NKVD troops, commanded by the brave, loyal – and grossly incompetent – Kliment Voroshilov. They worshipped Stalin and would have had no hesitation in shooting anyone Comrade Stalin disapproved of.

Stalin’s face was dark, and Molotov’s nerves almost failed him. Only the certain knowledge that running would be worse than futile kept him in his place. There was no offer of tea, or anything else.

“Look at this,” Stalin snapped, passing over a piece of paper. Molotov cast his eyes across it; no wonder Stalin was mad. The message was stark, simple, and from the pen of a man that Stalin had ordered killed. In the aftermath of the Transition, the NKVD had lost track of him, until now…

COMRADES!

Do you remember the days when the Tsar fled Russia, when debate was the order of the day, and everyone had a voice? Do you remember how good it felt to be free, to be able to say what you wanted without a spy taking note of your words? Do you remember when there was no chance of the army being committed to wars against people, purely for the Tsar’s pleasure?

Comrades – the Revolution has been betrayed, by Stalin! Lenin himself warned against him, against the man that destroyed any hope of Russia becoming the worker’s paradise it could have been! Do you want another Tsar on the throne; Stalin is Tsar, in all but name. Soon he will declare himself Tsar of all the Russians, and then the cycle will be complete!

Do you want to be free? Join the Revolution today!

Leon Trotsky. Reports of my death have been lies spread by Stalin and his lapdogs!

“I thought that he was dead,” Molotov said carefully. “Even so… can he threaten the Dictatorship of the Workers and Peasants?”

“The NKVD found hundreds of those scattered around the subways,” Stalin said. His face darkened still further. “Trotsky is in Moscow!”

“And he’s got some powerful support,” Molotov said. “We chased him out before; he would not have returned without some support from outside.”

“The British, of course,” Stalin said. “And, of course, the Americans, who are pressing the Germans hard.”

Molotov swallowed. That had been what he’d come to discuss with Stalin. “Hitler’s bootlicker” – he paused to allow Stalin an appreciative chuckle – “has been in touch with us. In fact, he flew directly to Moscow, which alone shows how urgent it is.”

He waited for Stalin to nod slowly. Whatever Stalin’s internal concerns, he was still a devious political manipulator. “Hitler would hardly have his… Champaign salesman make a house call unless it was urgent,” Stalin said finally. “What does dear old Adolf want?”

Molotov hid his reaction as best as he could. He’d never trusted Hitler, even before learning how the German would have launched a massive invasion of the Soviet Union… less than seventeen days in the alternate future. Stalin, of course, had been willing to believe Hitler’s professions of new genuine friendship… while preparing the defences, just in case. Unfortunately, many of the best divisions were tied up in the Middle East, along with the remaining best commanders.

He scowled inwardly. The NKVD had reported on German troop movements near Poland, more than were permitted in the treaty and certainly more than were required to complete the extermination of the Polish people. Molotov had believed that history was going to try to right itself… and that Hitler would challenge the Soviet Union again. Stalin, however, had been deaf to his concerns.

“Hitler needs us as an ally,” Stalin had said, and dismissed his concerns.

“Comrade,” Molotov said, “the Germans want us to launch an offensive in the north.”

“To aid them in defeating the Americans,” Stalin said. His heavy brow furrowed. “That would mean war with America to add to our current problem.”

Molotov nodded, adjusting his spectacles. “The Americans have been reluctant to challenge us at the moment,” he said. “However, the Swedes are moving towards them, just to avoid German domination.”

“Or ours,” Stalin said. He could say such unpleasant truths. “Interesting point; certainly any attempt to ally with the Americans is against the treaty we signed with them, is it not?”

“Yes, Comrade,” Molotov said. “Of course, they will claim that the treaty was signed at gunpoint.”

“Which it was,” Stalin chuckled. “We don’t want the Americans beating the Germans too quickly, do we?”

Molotov blinked. “Comrade?”

“The Americans will be facing the best of the German military machine,” Stalin said smoothly. He smiled darkly. “The longer they’re pointed at the Germans, the more time we have to learn about the future.”

“And the more technology we can extort from them,” Molotov agreed.

“Exactly,” Stalin said. “The Americans will certainly be receiving a great deal of British technology; wonder machines, computers, those super-bombs, those aircraft… and we need to catch up as quickly as we can. They’re starting to fly rockets to space, and we haven’t yet managed to get a single rocket off the ground!”

“We are working on it,” Molotov protested. “The Germans have been quite cooperative, for once.”

“True, Comrade,” Stalin said, falling into his lecture mode. “We have to think about the future, Comrade, a future where we will face the Capitalists on the economic battlefield… and be destroyed. They now know that we are weak, Comrade; will they pause, or will they clamp their jaws around our throat?”

Molotov thought of the thousands of T-34 and JS-2 tanks rolling off the assembly lines, and of the MIG jets that were in an advanced stage of development, and of the hordes of normal propeller aircraft… and knew that Stalin was right. What did sheer numbers matter, compared to the blast of nuclear weapons and advanced tanks that the British could deploy? The NKVD had managed to have a close look at the Firefly tank – and they believed that it was more capable than the T-34.

“They paused in the original timeline,” Molotov said finally.

Stalin snorted. “In that timeline, they were scared of us and drained from the war,” he said. “In this… new future, they will not be scared, and they won’t be drained, not with the advantages that they could deploy against us. The Americans will have the Bomb… when?”

“1944, by our most pessimistic estimate,” Molotov said. “We should have ours the year afterwards…”

“A year too late,” Stalin snapped. “That crippled president will have none of the British scruples; he will use the weapons to dictate to us. No, Comrade; we have to play for the long term… so we will not force a war with America.”

Molotov relaxed slightly. “Then we will not press the Swedes?”

“Oh, them,” Stalin said. He stared up at the map, lovingly detailed, that sat against one wall. “I think we’ll prepare to move in,” he said. “If they don’t join the Americans, then fine; we’ll let them keep their independence, but if they draw too close to the Americans… we’ll storm over the border and take them by force.”

It was the best he could hope for, Molotov knew. He’d half-feared, half-expected, that Stalin would have ordered the Red Army into Norway. The spectre of cruise missiles ripping up their fragile supply lines, of re-supplied Finns launching more and more attacks from their forest bases, of the entire supply line simply disintegrating… had been on his mind. Stalin, however, seemed to be considering everything at this point… except one thing.

“Comrade, what about the supplies of war materials?” Molotov asked. “We are sending millions of tons of materials to the Germans, including some materials they need for their war effort. Should we keep sending it?”

Stalin smiled. “I think we should see how much more information and machine tools the Germans are willing to send us, before we have supply difficulties,” he said. “Now, it’s almost time for the meeting.”

* * *

‘Meeting’ was too strong a word; there were only three people present, apart from Stalin himself. Beria, Molotov, and General Zhukov, who had been flown back from the front on Stalin’s orders. Between them, they were the most powerful men in Russia… and all of them were nothing, without Stalin. Molotov shuddered; he’d half-expected to have been shot at dawn for his career after Stalin finally went to the fires of hell.

He glanced around the room. Beria, as always, seemed calm and composed; Molotov suspected that he’d been having fun with some of the teenage girls of Moscow. Stalin had laughed when a handful of people had dared to complain, but he’d refused to rebuke Beria, who was one of a handful of people who might be dangerous to him personally.

Molotov smiled; Stalin might just have run out of patience with his executioner, now that Trotsky was back. If he really was, of course; Molotov wasn’t sure if he believed it. It would be just like the old bastard – and even he wasn’t sure whom he meant – to have arranged matters just to scare people.

Zhukov, on the other hand, seemed impatient. The beefy general admired Stalin enough not to begrudge the time away from the front, but part of him knew that his subordinates would be messing the war up – or, worse, getting it better and impressing Stalin – and so he was desperate to return.

“Comrade General?” Stalin invited. Zhukov stood up and emplaced a map upon the table, running his hands over the Middle East as he spoke. Red and Green lines ran through Iraq; black lines ran through Palestine and Jordan.

“We have finally taken Basra and Baghdad,” he said, indicating the two cities. “The cost was higher than we expected, but we finally hold the centre of Iraq, which cannot help, but demoralise our opponents. Our noble allies, as it happens, have borne the brunt of British attacks in Jordan, so we haven’t faced a major counterattack. However, our allies report that the British are regrouping in Kuwait and will presumably counterattack as soon as they can.”

“One hopes that the German problems in Norway will keep them busy for a while,” Molotov said. “Give you time to strength your positions.”

Stalin nodded. “We don’t want any more offensives,” he said, and of course, what Comrade Stalin wanted, Comrade Stalin got. “For the moment, you have to hold your positions.”

“Yes, Comrade,” Zhukov said. He didn’t seem pleased by the decision. “What about the probing raids eastwards?”

“Oh, keep those going,” Stalin said blithely. “We may as well do what we can to keep the British busy elsewhere.”

* * *

The woman who called herself Natasha Yar – a joke that none of the Contemporary Russians would ever get – had been born in Russia, before moving with her parents to Britain when she was young. They’d returned twice to Russia, in 2010 and 2012, and she’d been struck by the sheer… zest of the streets, once the economy had begun to take off again. Western fashions, most of them copied without regard for copyright, decorated the streets; cars and bars were everywhere.

In contrast, Moscow of 1941 was a dark and grim place. Everyone moved in fear, guarding their words with care, even with the new food supplies. Natasha scowled to herself; Stalin had shown a flicker of real genius when he allowed people to start their own farms again. Moscow had more food than it had ever had before, and the regime was almost popular. ‘Almost’ – people still remembered how thousands of people disappeared every night.

Natasha scurried down a side street, pretending to be a simple old woman, trading what she could from the farms. Ironically, that conferred a degree of immunity upon her; Stalin had ordered the NKVD to break up the crime syndicates before they could ever form. The few that remained had hidden themselves carefully, scared of the power of the state. Still, there was a thriving black market… one that provided an opportunity.

She slipped into her flat and nodded politely to the man watching her from the door, pretending to ogle the young women who walked past. Her SAS escort was the first line of defence; there were others. If the NKVD broke their location, they would pay for it. The entire building had been carefully rigged to defeat an attack.

“Good evening,” the cook said. She was young; a young MI6 agent who had specialised in Russia. As far as the forged identity papers cared, she was Natasha’s granddaughter, living with her entire family. Natasha kept her in the flat, not just because it was the expected action of a Russian grandmother; Irina wasn’t quite perfect in her role.

“Russian,” Natasha snapped, aiming a Russian slap at the young girl. She ducked; a real Russian would not have. “Russian only!”

“Yes, grandma,” Irina said. At least she had the submissive pose down pat. “We had a message today, and Sergi has managed to get into one of the factories.”

“That’s good news,” Natasha said. Her faux son had been ordered to try to obtain a position within one of the massive factories in Moscow; his hidden communication devices would allow them to talk to him, even if he was conscripted. “What about the gentleman?”

“Oh, he’s still rabble-rousing,” Irina said. The gentleman, Leon Trotsky, had been attempting to visit old allies who had been placed outside Stalin’s power structure. Building cells of allies within Moscow was a slow process, even with the leaflets taunting the NKVD. “Don’t you want to know what HQ said?”

Natasha nodded. “What did they say?”

“They’re sending in more people to the drop zone,” Irina said. “They’ll have new supplies; they want us to start bugging the Kremlin.”

Natasha chuckled. British bugs were undetectable by anything the NKVD had; she was confident that they could have bugged Stalin in the bath. The only problem had been the tiny amount of bugs that they had been able to bring with them into Russia. Now that they had a secured base, they could proceed.

“They also want us to become more ambitious in recruiting new agents,” Irina said. “Apparently, the Americans have invaded Norway, and they want the Communists distracted.”

“The news reported massive British tank losses,” Natasha said. “Who would have thought it; Pravda doesn’t live up to its name.” She chuckled. “We’re working on it,” she said. “The problem, of course, is recruiting people willing to risk everything to challenge Stalin.”

Irina waved a hand around the room, taking in the entire city. “You’d think that thousands would be willing,” she said.

“You’re too young,” Natasha said, not tenderly. “Now, do try to look as if I’ve beaten you, dear girl. We have to look real, remember?”

Irina rubbed her behind playfully. “There is such a thing as trying too hard,” she said.

SS Moskva

Nr France

5th June 1941

It was one of the curious legal fictions that made war so difficult to fight when there were more than two nations around. The SS Moskva, a large freighter, was crewed by Russians and operated by the Russian Merchant Marine, but it was flying a Portuguese flag, simply to avoid being blown out of the water by the Royal Navy. It’s long voyages, from Archangel to Lisbon to America, kept it busy, transporting the handful of Russian exports and collecting some imports from America.

The Portuguese position on the matter was that the Moskva could sail where it liked, a position mandated by the presence of German allies in Spain. The British position was that they had the right to search the Moskva on general principles, and if it was smuggling anything they objected to they had the right to confiscate the ship. So far, despite several searches, the Royal Navy hadn’t found anything… much to the relief of the neutral Portuguese.

Captain Yuri Padorin lifted a single eyebrow as the lookout shouted a warning. They were far too close to France for safety – even though the Germans were allies of the motherland – but it was the only way to avoid the dangers of British torpedoes. The trans-Atlantic run was across empty ocean, but at least the British knew what they were and generally ignored them – after having made them run on the longest direct course.

“Captain, boats coming in,” the lookout shouted. Padorin glared into the semi-darkness; Moskva was brightly lit, as required by neutrality rules. The strange boats weren’t flying any flags… and he felt a sudden trickle of fear.

“Ahoy, Moskva,” a man shouted, in accented Russian. “Coming aboard!”

“Come about,” Padorin ordered. “Allow them to board.”

The boats closed in and he cursed suddenly, each of them was carrying a squadron of black-garbed storm troopers. As the SS men scrambled up the side of the ship, Padorin found himself held at gunpoint by the leader.

“I am Obersturmbannfuehrer Kortig,” the leader said. “You and your crew have been selected for a mission.”

Padorin glared wordlessly at him as the SS men rounded up the crew. Some of the Germans had clearly prepared for the mission; they were taking control of the ship very quickly. His crew were forced to kneel on the deck, their hands bound and tied to the side of the ship.

“This is piracy,” he managed to say, finally. “Our nations are allies.”

“Yes, and you have been selected for the mission,” the SS officer said. “You have a choice; you can obey lawful orders, or you will be handed over to the NKVD.

* * *

The French port had been worked over by the British RAF, several times, but there was enough left to allow the Russian ship to dock. Obersturmbannfuehrer Kortig watched as the crew – apart from a handful of people – were moved into shore barracks, where they would later be terminated.

Subhumans, he thought, as the Slavic features of the Russian captain grew longer and longer, watching what was being brought onboard his vessel. Apart from the required components for the special weapon, the Moskva was being loaded to the gunnels with high explosive, enough to make the vessel sink lower in the water. The bigger the blast, the better, he’d been told, and as a faithful follower of the Fuhrer, Obersturmbannfuehrer Kortig accepted his fate.

He chuckled, once. He was quite certain that the Americans would not prove quite so accepting of the costs of the war… once it had touched their motherland.

Chapter Thirty-Four: A Stillness Upon the Sea

Government House

Canberra, Australia

6th June 1941

The red blob on the computer-generated map in the conference room had started shrinking five days ago. Now, the red icons near Darwin had been removed into what Colonel Philip Hawkinson had described as the electronic equivalent of a rubbish bin. He’d spoken at great length about multiple rewritings and quantum disruptions, even something called direct hard drive virtual destruction, and attempted to explain why all the technobabble – a word that had caught on in Australia – meant that there was no way that the data could be recovered.

For Sir Robert Gordon Menzies, it meant that the largest Japanese invasion force had been removed from his continent. For the moment, everyone in Australia was grateful; they might even see their way to re-electing him in the coming election. It had been delayed for the war, but as soon as the final Japanese troops at Cape York were removed, his party would begin pressing for elections, hoping to ride the flush of victory. He’d spent a happy hour discussing the issues with Hawkinson, learning what the future held for democracy, and wondering about the republican movement that would appear in the future.

“The final count is in,” Hawkinson said, interrupting his musings. “We have destroyed nearly thirty tanks and countless lorries, at no cost to ourselves. In addition, we’ve captured nearly five thousand Japanese and shoved them in POW camps.”

“How many did they bring?” Menzies asked. “How many did we kill?”

“They brought around eighty thousand to that battle,” Hawkinson said. “The fools put them outside any possible logistic support.”

“You didn’t answer the other question,” Menzies said softly. “We killed seventy-five thousand Japanese?”

“Perhaps,” Hawkinson said. “We killed thousands of them, yes. Hundreds more died on the trek to Darwin, victims of their own criminal government. Hundreds died in the crossing; the Japanese didn’t believe in the submarines, or even sailing in convoy.”

Menzies shook his head. “We rampaged into their rear areas,” Hawkinson said. “We crushed them in their trenches, we dropped napalm and FAE bombs on them, we destroyed their supplies and trapped them far from any hope of succour.”

“They’re going to love this,” Menzies said. “You know; Parliament was thinking about passing an Act requiring all citizens of ours in the United Kingdom to return.”

“I’m not sure that the Government would go along with that,” Hawkinson said. “You do realise that many of them aren’t white?”

“It was pointed out to me,” Menzies said. “Nothing is certain anymore; what are we going to do?”

Hawkinson grinned. “Have a party,” he said. “Victory in Australia day. Free booze!”

Menzies smiled. It was a load off his mind. “All we have to do is finish off the last holdouts at Cape York, and we’re done,” he said.

* * *

“The 1st Australian Armoured Division is moving north now,” Sir Thomas Albert Blamey said. He scowled; he hadn’t been amused by the insistence that all Commonwealth divisions carried their country’s name with them. “Once they’re ready to attack, we’ll crush the last Japanese and end the war in the outback.”

“Good,” Menzies said. “So… what next?”

Ambassador Atwell smiled. “I believe that we have obligations to assist the war still further, just to prevent the Japanese from trying again,” he said.

“That will take some time,” Hawkinson said. “I have the latest brief from PJHQ; they don’t believe that there will be any major operations until the new naval and air units are ready for deployment.”

“That would be next year at the earliest,” Blamey objected. “Can’t we move sooner?”

“Not at the moment,” Hawkinson said. “I don’t have access to all of the secured data, but I believe that units are being earmarked for Norway and something else.”

Menzies lifted an eyebrow. “What?”

“I don’t know,” Hawkinson admitted. “It must be something important, but at the same time delicate; they won’t want to give the enemy any hint as to what’s coming.”

Menzies shrugged. “It doesn’t matter in any case,” he said. “We have to rebuild ourselves, Thomas, and we have to build up the army and the navy. Quite frankly, I would prefer for us to be impregnable first, then we can worry about forcing the Japanese off the Dutch East Indies.”

Blamey winced. “You know what they’re doing there,” he said. He scowled at the discs that contained the damming evidence of Japan’s experiments with ethnic cleansing. “You know what they’re doing in China. Can we afford to wait?”

It said something about the sheer horror of the situation that such an ardent enthusiast for the ‘White Australia’ policy could take such a line. “The bastards are colonising Korea and Japan,” Blamey snapped. “We’ll have to dig them out of there, you know. How long will it be before they start using those diseases on us?”

“We have warned the Japanese that we will retaliate with nuclear weapons if they use bioweapons against you,” Hawkinson said. “The Hanover Government is not the Smith Government; they’ll back up the threat with real action.”

“Perhaps,” Blamey said. “We can’t just sit here, doing nothing for six months.”

“Yes, we can,” Menzies said. “We have to clear up the mess, General, and we have to prepare for the next offensive. The bastards might even try again.”

“Only if they can swim,” Hawkinson said. It wasn’t as funny as it seemed; thousands of Japanese soldiers had drowned because of being unable to swim. “We sunk a lot of their transports.”

“True,” Menzies said. “General, please send… ah, John Northcott a personal good luck message from me. Let me know how the offensive proceeds.”

North of Cairns

Australia

6th June 1941

The Firefly shook violently as it hit a pothole, crossing over the ground at awesome speed, before landing hard on the ground. The driver didn’t stop for a moment, leading the swarm of tanks northwards as fast as they could move.

“Wow,” Northcott breathed, feeling his stomach settle. He’d thought for a nasty moment that the tank would overturn and crush him below its weight. “These tanks are clever.”

“You can say that again,” the driver called back. Northcott smiled; he’d seen how many British Generals commanded their battles in 2015, and he had no intention of copying them. They watched from overhead as the tanks advanced; he would lead from the front.

“General, Germans one and a half miles ahead,” the controller said. She was back in Cairns, well away from any Japanese threat. “Change course to intercept.”

“You mean Japanese, I hope,” Northcott said wryly. He glanced down once at his GPS; even without a full satellite system, the British had set up basic beacons for his forces to navigate with. “Any sign of those pesky rockets?”

There was a pause. The Japanese anti-tank rockets had come as a nasty shock, but fortunately they were unable to penetrate main battle tank armour. They could, however, damage the tank’s treads and strand it in the middle of a horde of angry Japanese.

“None detected on the satellite imagery,” the woman said finally. Northcott smiled; he had never placed much faith in the satellites. They were supposed to be able to measure the length of a Japanese unmentionable from so high above the Earth they could not be seen, but whenever he needed one, they were orbiting around the wrong part of the Earth.

“Excellent,” he said. “Forward!”

The breathtaking pace increased, and then they saw the Japanese force. It was clearly stranded as part of a fallback manoeuvre, but its lorries had run out of fuel. Instead of surrendering, they had set up a well-armed position… or at least it would have been in the First World War.

“Fire,” he snapped, and the tanks hurled a hail of shellfire into the Japanese position. Their lorries exploded at once, targeted specifically, blasting great waves of fire into the Japanese positions. They didn’t flinch; they fired back with machine guns, Northcott ducked sharply into the tank, feeling the wave of heat from the engine rising when he slammed down the hatch.

“Shit,” the driver breathed. Northcott stared; the Japanese were charging them, firing madly. “They’re insane!”

“Kill them all,” he snapped, and the tanks’ machine guns went into action, spraying bullets through the Japanese formation and slaughtering them like sheep. “Die, you bastards,” he heard someone yell, and only afterwards realised that it was his voice.

“I think we got them all,” the driver said dryly. The gunner, sickened, didn’t say anything. “Sir?”

“I’m all right,” Northcott said. He picked up the radio. “Any more of the little yellow bastards?”

There was a chorus of ‘no, sirs’ from the radio. Northcott picked up the GPS receiver, which was receiving something called a satellite download from the battalion HQ. The next Japanese location was marked in red; the other columns of the armoured units were marked in green.

“Head for the next bunch of them,” he snapped. “We have work to do.”

* * *

In the end, the battle only lasted two days. Northcott repeated the process, wincing inside as the Japanese charged madly at tanks they couldn’t hope to damage. Three tanks were destroyed by suicide tactics; the Japanese clearly hadn’t realised that they’d lost. They tried to concentrate, without the mobility that would have made the manoeuvre a success, and they died.

A flight of Harriers roared overhead, dropping napalm and FAE on the Japanese holdouts, blazing the tanks a path through horror. Northcott looked down on the damage after a napalm attack; the Japanese had been burnt to death. He almost felt sorry for them, watching the handful of survivors trying to crawl away. Even at the end, only a handful of Japanese tried to surrender; most just fought and died. Some surrendered… and then tried to kill their captors.

“This is a filthy war,” Northcott said, over the radio to the headquarters coordinator, whose name, he had learnt, was Melanie. “Is it always like this in your time?”

“Often its worse,” Melanie said. “Trust me, John; you’re fighting a clean war.”

Northcott looked down at what he had first taken for a charred log. It had only dawned on him when he’d taken a closer look that the ‘log’ was a human being, who had curled up and died under the wave of fire. “Pah,” he said. “Any more Japanese nearby?”

“Only the final holdouts,” Melanie said. “Only five miles to the north.”

Northcott led the tanks in silence, feeling his tiredness work away on him. He swallowed one of the stimulants from the future, feeling some of his tiredness fade away. He scowled; he’d been warned against using them in combat, but there was no way he was not going to be in at the death. The GPS led them directly to a small village on the coast, almost at Cape York itself.

“Incoming,” Melanie snapped, just as the tank shuddered. “The uplink is reporting a line of Japanese guns.”

“We took a round on our frontal armour,” the driver said. “I think they’re trying to build a defensive line.”

“I never would have guessed,” Northcott said wryly. “Forward!”

The tank leapt forward, firing madly into the Japanese lines. The driver crammed on the speed, charging the Japanese directly as fast as the tank could move, firing shell after shell directly into the Japanese position. Explosions wracked the Japanese position and the tanks crashed through, crushing Japanese under their treads or blasting them down with machine guns.

“The sea, the sea,” Northcott cheered, as they looked down upon the shore. Thousands of Japanese were milling around a burnt-out freighter, trying to re-float it. Even Northcott could see that it was futile; the ship could clearly never sail again.

He clicked on the loudspeaker. “Surrender or die,” he said, though the speaker. The Japanese flinched, and then some of them reached for their weapons, firing madly at the tanks. “Return fire,” he said, and felt some of himself die in the carnage. The Japanese never stood a chance; they fought and died like men.

HIMS Musashi

Hashirajima, Japan

6th June 1941

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto was an admiral without a fleet. With the exception of Musashi, which had been unable to accompany the fleet, almost the entire Japanese battle fleet had been sunk. Gingerly, Yamamoto felt his chest; the attack that had incapacitated him for a week had spared his life… only to allow him to watch the death of the Imperial Japanese Navy. He’d served at the battle that had secured its position as one of the foremost navies – the Battle of Tsushima – and now he had missed the battle that had destroyed his navy.

He stared down at the report, the one provided for public consumption. It claimed that a great battle had been fought and won, destroying seventy enemy ships for negligible cost. Yamamoto, whose most pessimistic estimate placed fifty British ships in the Far East, knew that the battle hadn’t been anything like a victory. If a single British ship had been sunk, he would have been astonished.

After all, no Japanese ship had survived the experience.

“They’re not going to admit to it?” Yurina asked. Her dark eyes were alive with worry. “The fleet was destroyed!”

“Of course not,” Yamamoto said bitterly. He scowled; his temper was short because of the recent meeting in Tokyo, where the navy had been roundly blamed for the defeat. Then the Army had outlined their latest Victory Plan, and his heart had sunk still further…

* * *

“Thanks to the incompetence of the Navy, we now are defenceless against an invasion,” the Army Minister had said. He glared at Yamamoto, who hadn’t had the energy to fight back. He was certain that his attempted poisoning had been an army plot. “They can trap us on the islands and destroy us, one by one, but we won’t let them do that to us!”

“And how do you plan to stop them?” Yamamoto asked coldly. He drew on the last of his energy. “Do you plan to produce ships from nowhere?”

“We will hold them up in the islands for the time it will take to produce new ships,” the Army Minister proclaimed. “We may have lost some of our forces in Australia” – deliberately understating the losses, which Yamamoto knew were total – “but we still have thousands of men available.”

His tone became sticky-sweet. “You will have time to build your ships, admiral,” he said.

“There is a stillness on the sea,” an older civil servant said. Yamamoto glared at him; his mind was going. His presence was only tolerated for the support of the civil service, which ran the Empire. “All the ducks are dying.”

“Very interesting, I’m sure,” the Army Minister said. “However, can we keep this a little more focused?”

Yamamoto sighed, gathering his resources. Agreeing with the Army Minister was not something that happened everyday. “General,” he said, “we don’t have the resources to produce the ships that you think are needed.” He sighed again. “Even if some kindly deity from outer space gave us the resources, we could not hope to have them built before the British fleet arrives.

“And even if we did build them, what would be the point?” He demanded. “They have massive superiority; the best we could hope for would be the use of suicide speedboats to attack their troopships! They can see everything we do on the ground! We have to end this war, now!”

“I assume that you are distressed by your recent illness,” the Army Minister said. “We have moved thousands of troops to Korea and we are moving new manufacturing complexes there, now that the Chinese are in disarray. Even if we lose the Home Islands, the fight goes on and on…”

* * *

“They honestly don’t see that it’s over,” Yamamoto said grimly. He waved a hand across the map. “They think that they can dig into Korea and China, move over enough factories before the British get their submarines into position, and stand off the British. They were going on and on about new tanks and new weapons; all the British have to do is arm the Chinese and let them wear us away to death.”

He scowled down at her. She had been very loving, the night he’d been released from hospital, but no one could be loving enough to make him forget about the fleet. The last moments of the fleet must have been nightmarish, with missiles blasting entire ships out of the water. If the Musashi hadn’t been completing its refit, the battleship would have gone down with the rest of the fleet.

She looked up at him. “We could leave,” she said. “There must be places here in Japan where we could hide out, get married…”

Yamamoto smiled. It was a pleasant thought. “No,” he said finally. He studied some of the reports; two British ships had launched cruise missiles against the air bases in the Dutch East Indies, softening them up for a later invasion. Another report, classified MOST SECRET, detailed the use of the improved viruses in China, viruses that might spread onwards to India… and provoke British retaliation. Yet another discussed the effects of the future medical knowledge from Germany. A final report, in cold clinical terms, discussed the shortages and the impact that they would have on the new building program.

He shook his head. The author didn’t quite say it, but Yamamoto was skilled at reading between the lines. The resource curve would not allow them to complete more than one of the planned building program ships, which called for ten aircraft carriers and several more battleships.

“And even if we did build them, they would be sunk easily,” he said, passing the report over to Yurina. She was naked, her nipples hard in the cold air, but he ignored it. He was too tired for sex. “On the other hand, I have a cunning plan.”

He chuckled as she giggled, although he wasn’t sure what she was giggling at. For a long moment, he felt like a young irresponsible man again, one who had nothing and no one tying him down. He no longer had a navy to devote himself to, he no longer had a family thanks to the Army, but he still had his duty to Japan. The plan spun in his mind, cunning, clever… and it might just work.

He reached for her and was surprised to feel a rush of arousal. The plan would take time to put in place, and time to activate, maybe even months, but he felt a rush of pure hope. He kissed her, hard, and pulled her over to the bed. Her body responded willingly and he lost himself in her. It was just like being a young man again.

Chapter Thirty-Five: Return to Salvation

Salvation

Mississippi, America

6th June 1941

It was, without a doubt, the most dangerous and unpleasant weapon the United States Marine Corps had ever invented. It had been sheer luck that Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson had even had a couple of canisters, they were normally kept under strict security, and with good reason. The Firelighter made the standard napalm or FAE bomb looked like a minor nuisance.

From his hiding place, Robinson gazed down at Salvation. The town was silent in the darkness; the black section of the town a burnt-out wreck. The newspapers had shrieked and moaned about the ‘black outrages,’ as Robinson had expected, but they had remained silent on the fate of the black citizens, who had been mowed down in the streets. It was as bad as the Soviet excuses for the invasion of Finland; how could unarmed and outnumbered blacks have committed the atrocities they had been accursed of, and then lynched without a chance to defend themselves.

Robinson sighed. This was the south, where the black man was a distrusted semi-animal in the eyes of the rich men who led the state, and the absolute bottom of the pole for the poor whites, who were at the mercy of the rich men and needed someone else to look down upon. Few of them had the courage to confront their beliefs; it was so much easier to hate and fear.

“Tell me, who do you think God punished?” Robinson asked himself silently, watching the town grimly. Weather prediction wasn’t as advanced as it had been in 2015, of course, but the British had made progress… and there was a surprisingly large amount of data in the files in Britain. There would be a strong northern wind tonight, according to the files, even though small changes had been observed already, mainly in the Balkans.

“Must have been the nuke,” Robinson muttered absently, before considering the quote again. The town in the story had lynched a black man and a white woman for falling in love… and then the town had been hit with a famine that had killed them all. It had been quite popular among children, but he doubted that they had understood the real message. What goes around… goes around… and bites you on the behind.

His grandpa had wanted to come along, along with some of the deserters from the Army, but he’d refused them. Their training was coming along nicely, but their stealth still left something to be desired. They would be hell on wheels when it came to fighting what he refused to admit was a terrorist war, but if they ever had to fight a stand-up battle, they would be in serious trouble. Not unlike the Jihadis, they thought of weapons as things that somehow made a man dangerous… and knew very little of strategy or tactics.

Worst of all, at least in his point of view, they were very eager to hunt down and hurt the people who’d hurt them. He didn’t blame them; it had been the constant barrage of racial harassment that had been aimed at Ambassador King that had started them along their dangerous course, but they had to be disciplined. When they finally achieved their political aims, they had to put down their weapons – although not to be disarmed, of course – and end the fight gracefully. Backing the enemy into a corner would only make the fight worse – and tear America apart.

How did I end up here? Robinson asked himself, as the wind finally changed, blowing north. Carefully, he set up the Firelighter, and then checked his body armour. If something went wrong, it would be his only protection. As soon as he was finished, he activated the Firelighter, which began to spray a mist into the air, drifting over Salvation. He glanced down at his watch, cursing; there was equipment for detecting the spread of the gas, but it was all back in Britain, or in 2015. Everything depended on him getting his sums right.

Five minutes passed, and then the Firelighter canister finished its task. An invisible cloud of gas was drifting over Salvation, settling to the ground. Carefully, he picked up the detonator and hurled it towards Salvation, throwing himself down on the ground as he did. There was a clang as the detonator hit the ground… and then a roaring blast of fire scorched over his head. The wave of heat was so powerful that he could feel it even though the suit, lashing away at his body before it faded slightly.

He pulled himself to his feet and stared into a scene from hell. Salvation was burning; the town had been almost destroyed. Every house and shack was burning and the fires were spreading out. He scowled; it was hot and the fire would burn for a while before it went out. He watched for survivors, seeing no one, before turning his face to the east and walking away from Salvation.

I’m going to burn for this, he thought, and felt something inside him die.

Bracken Industries

Nr New York, USA

7th June 1941

Cora walked into work with a new swing to her step, handling the day-to-day matters of the business with a new enthusiasm that came from having regular sex. Even without that, she would have been happier at Bracken; the business wasn’t having anything like the problems of some of the other companies around, now that the war had finally broken out.

She sat down at her desk and checked her inbox. Hoover – she muttered a curse as she read his message – had requested a meeting in surprisingly respectful terms. She made a note of his time, booked the meeting and forwarded the email to Oliver, who had gone on ahead. It still wasn’t socially acceptable for a mixed-race relationship to exist, even though everyone who wanted to had one.

She smiled; Oliver had quoted someone to explain the lack of consistency. “My position has been absolutely consistent,” he said wryly. “I’ve been a hypocrite all along.”

Quickly, she ran through the remainder of the emails. Several plant bosses, both black and white, were warning of increased racial friction in their plants, even though the firm had a strict policy of equal opportunity, if not equal outcome. It had been minor so far, they assured her, but one of them suggesting segregating the workforce. Ironically, that plant boss had been black.

Wonder what colour he is now, she thought angrily, and forced herself to keep working. She’d look at the Black Power site later. Instead, she brought up an email marked secret; the security patrol had found a whole collection of bugs, mainly 1941-constructed, within the various plants they owned.

“Fucking Hoover,” she muttered, and opened the Internet news site. It was based in Britain and reported mainly British news, but they were expanding into America and the Commonwealth. She smiled; the British had broken the back of the Japanese offensive and had forced them off Australia, into the sea. The bandwidth wouldn’t let her view the video, but she didn’t think that she wanted to see it all. The still pictures were bad enough.

“Anything interesting?” Oliver asked. Her heart quickened as he strode out of his office, dressed in a neat black power suit. Designers from all over America were working on copying the fashions of the future; she’d seen children wearing spacesuits from a television show called Star Trek. She smiled; copyright law was a real bitch when the designers hadn’t even been born yet.

“The Japanese have been forced off Australia,” she said, skimming the bill. “A handful of Southern Governors have called for Martial Law to be declared in the south, following the destruction of a town called Salvation.” She made a face. “There has been more lynching and shooting in the south.”

“That’s bad,” Oliver said. “I got the email about some of the plant bosses.” He scowled. “We’re not going to segregate anyone,” he said. “Everything that happens in the plant is recorded; if someone does try to cause trouble they’re out the door.”

“Thanks,” Cora said wryly.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Oliver said, gently squeezing her shoulder. “What do you think of life in the estate?”

“It’s great, much nicer than my former flat,” Cora said, giving him a radiant smile. “And it has other benefits as well.”

“Like me,” Oliver said wryly. He chuckled. “Hoover is coming again, I see.”

Cora scowled. “I’m afraid so,” she said. “What does he want from you?”

“I have no idea,” Oliver said. It was one of the few things he refused to discuss with her. “Anyway, I’m off to read everyone the riot act; chat later.”

“See you later,” Cora called after him, and returned to the computer. She clicked on the link for Black Power and read the news release grimly; Salvation had been destroyed as punishment for lynching the entire black community. The news release went on and on, warning the entire south that further repression would only result in more violence. It said nothing about the bombs in Detroit, but she knew that Hoover had claimed that ‘communist crypto-fascist subversives’ had planted the bomb, before arresting much of the black community nearby. The jails were suddenly overflowing; he’d had to release most of them hours later, simply for lack of space. Nearly a third of the South was black, she knew, and she was certain that they could not all be kept down, even by Hoover.

* * *

The question of what Hoover wanted bothered Jim Oliver though his meeting with the five plant bosses, laying down the law on race relations. Like many who’d lived through the War on Terror, Oliver had very little patience for concepts like multiculturalism, but the America of 1941 had few different black cultures. The entire crisis could be headed off at the pass… if everyone would take a few breaths and be reasonable.

“A black man has equal potential to a white man,” he snapped to the gathering. “We are not in the business of using colour as a way of choosing who advances and who doesn’t – merit alone determines advancement. If a black man is better at the job, he will advance; if a white man is better, he will advance!” He glared down at them. “Our factories provide important materials for the war effort,” he said, “which my country and yours needs desperately.”

He tapped the pictures on the walls. “We are not in the business of halting work for anything,” he said. “I do not care what racial attitudes you hold. I could hardly care less if you think that homosexuals” – which was ironic, given what everyone thought Hoover was – “are going to go to hell, or not. I… do… not… care!

“We are in the business of producing things we can sell for money,” he said. “If anyone jeopardises that by fighting with his co-workers, or by slighting co-workers, that person is out the door, understand?”

They nodded and filed out of his second office. He’d set it up on the plant so he’d have a place to work when he went there. It was nowhere near as nice as the one he had in the main building, even without Cora being there to divert his calls away from his thinking sessions.

The researchers entered the room and he gave them the same lecture. Their purpose was simple; they were in charge of developing new ways of using 2015 ideas for the company, ranging from the B-52 project to the microchip. They hadn’t caused any trouble, but he gave them the lecture anyway, before heading back to the main building.

He shook his head. His sources in Washington had suggested that something was up, that a group of politicians were planning something, but it was frighteningly elusive. If Hoover was involved, he was certain that he wasn’t going to enjoy it – even if Hoover did owe him a favour.

* * *

“Mr Hoover to see you, sir,” Cora’s voice said. He scowled to himself; he’d spent nearly two hours when he should have been working on the jet program worrying about the impending meeting. It was worse than knowing that you were going to get spanked in the evening.

No sign of Tolson? He thought, and tapped the switch. “Send him in please, Cora,” he said, “and hold my calls.”

Hoover entered, alone. The burly FBI director seemed more energized these days, which seemed like bad news; he was looking forward to something. He took a seat without being asked, tossing his fedora over onto the drinks trolley.

“Good afternoon, Mr Oliver,” Hoover said, leaning forward. “I read your latest statement to the Congress Subcommittee on Future Implications with some interest.”

“Yes, the torpedo problem does need to be fixed,” Oliver said. He lifted an eyebrow; Bracken was diversifying into arms, particularly the ones that needed improvement before the war expanded. “It was the cause of a lacklustre submarine campaign during the first round of World War Two.”

“You’d think that people would fix all the problems that happened in the future,” Hoover said absently. “Like all the subversives, like Henry Wallace, and those black subversives down south. Did you know that they are receiving help from the American Communist Party?”

“No, I didn’t,” Oliver said, who doubted it. “What sort of help?”

“Mainly funds and some propaganda,” Hoover said. “That crippled oaf in the White House refuses to stamp on them.”

Oliver shrugged. “I have to work on producing arms for the war,” he said. “I would like the entire problem to be deferred until the end of the war. Now that Oslo is being surrounded, the war is one step closer to being won.”

Hoover smiled. “I have a request to make of you,” he said. Oliver lifted an eyebrow. “I believe that you own the Quiet Room?”

Oliver blinked. The Quiet Room was a business meeting room, set on an estate not too far from New York. There was no secret about it; the building was protected from the most intrusive 2015 surveillance techniques and allowed businessmen to meet, confident of their absolute privacy. It wasn’t the sort of place he would have expected Hoover to approve of.

He said so. Hoover smiled. “I wish to hire it for the night,” he said. “The entire building.”

Oliver smiled. “I dare say that that can be arranged,” he said. “You could have just done that through their website.”

Hoover shook his head. “Yes, I could have, but then it wouldn’t have been a secret,” he said. “I want you to book the Quiet Room… and then I want you to attend the meeting.”

Oliver narrowed his eyes. “What is the meeting about?” He asked directly. “I’m a very busy man, you know.”

“I can promise you commercial opportunities beyond your wildest dreams,” Hoover said, almost whispering. “We’re going to retake our country.”

* * *

The Quiet Room was set in a quiet woodland estate, hidden neatly from view. Cars – some older American designs, some of the newer British designs – swept up to the house, disgorging their passengers and a small army of FBI agents, who took up guard positions and displaced the British staff of the house. Oliver had arranged overtime payments and a night on the town for the entire staff, just to reduce the number of possible eavesdroppers.

The recorder on his mobile phone buzzed once as the security fields jammed it up, inserting white noise into its receptors. All ingoing and outgoing signals were jammed, preventing anyone from calling for assistance or relaying a signal out to a watching spy team. Inside, the rooms were all tastefully decorated, including some artwork that would be very valuable indeed in sixty years.

Long-term investment, Oliver thought, and smiled. There were entire warehouses of such materials, collected by him and a handful of British art collectors.

“Ah, Mr Oliver,” a man said. It took Oliver a moment to recognise him as Field Marshal Douglas MacArthur, the disgraced military commander. He spoke in a booming voice that admitted no defeat. “How nice to see you here.”

“Thank you,” Oliver said, wondering what sort of small talk he could make. MacArthur solved the problem by wandering off and shaking hands with another newcomer, Congressman Martin Dies, founder and chairman of the House Committee on Un-American Activities, the infamous HUAC. Oliver blinked; Congressman Dies had refused to pursue the Ku Klux Klan, despite more than enough evidence of its ‘un-American’ nature.

Oliver stepped into the main meeting room and took a seat, counting heads and making mental notes. Apart from Hoover, there were other Congressmen and Senators, a couple of Southern Governors, a handful of figures that seemed to be military… and Douglas MacArthur. All were white, all were clearly rich and influential; he spotted several industrialists in the crowd. He was on friendly terms with a few of them.

“Thank you all for coming,” Hoover said. His voice instantly silenced the room. “Our nation is under threat, from without and within. From the outside, we stamp over Norway while our so-called ally, Britain, snatches the most valuable bits of land, and from the inside, a communist-dominated plot to unleash race war upon us all.

“I have it on good authority that there are communist agents close to the President, even in Congress,” Hoover thundered. “Henry Wallace, new decryption methods make clear, is a communist agent! The men he plans to appoint to the Cabinet, should he become President, Laurence Duggan and Harry Dexter White, are known traitors feeding information to Moscow! Look; did Wallace not take the lead in demanding that President Roosevelt recall the patriot Field Marshal Douglas MacArthur?”

Hoover glared around the room. “The history files make it clear that President Roosevelt ordered Field Marshal MacArthur out of the Philippines, but who mentions that? What sort of a soldier refuses to obey orders?” There were some chuckles. “Throughout our country, strong action is required… and we intend to take it!”

Oliver shivered as he looked around the room. Many of the movers and shakers in America were seated in the room, including the Speaker of the House of Representatives, William Brockman Bankhead. Oliver winced; Bankhead was third in line to the Presidency… if something happened to Roosevelt and Truman.

“We have no role in the war,” MacArthur said. “The war could be ended in a week if the British unleashed their hell-weapons. Why haven’t they? They want us to bleed for them, while they save their strength!”

“We have to return to isolation and put our own house in order,” Bankhead said. “Naturally, we expect your support for this.”

There was a long discussion. Oliver listened carefully without saying anything, except when an industrialist asked what he was doing in the room. Hoover’s mischievous explanation – that the British government would want his head on a platter if certain matters became public – settled some nerves. They actually believed that they could make a coup succeed!

Oliver considered some of the people in the room and swore. Given some luck and determined leadership, they might just succeed. Hoover was thinking several steps ahead; the British might just cut off technology imports if America left the war, but if Oliver was there to help them, America would catch up quite quickly.

Holy shit, he thought grimly, as the discussion went on and on. What the hell do I do now?

Chapter Thirty-Six: Preparations

Churchill Space Centre

French Guiana, South America

8th June 1941

The massive shape stood on the launch pad; a single massive cylinder, propped up by two rockets. It was basic space shuttle technology, modified in ways that only the truly innovative could have thought of, matched with the political will to make it work, whatever the cost.

“They made fun of this in the papers,” Goddard said. He’d been delighted by the proposal; the new computers made calculating little details like orbital paths and velocity easy. “They kept asking what was the point of sending up empty tanks.”

Dashwood chuckled. “Reporters only have imagination when it comes to imagining romances and scandal,” he said. “The very concept of building a space station in space from fuel tanks never seemed to occur to any of them, even though we’re launching three Goddard rockets a week.” He waved a hand at the rocket on the pad. “Look at it, Doctor; an Armstrong-class tank launcher.”

He grinned madly, pacing around the room. “It’s a very simple device to mass-produce and it’s cheap as anything; hell, you could buy a car for the cost of the rockets, now that I got some good accountants working on the budget. All that is needed is the tank itself, then once its in LEO, the team can build themselves living quarters.”

“We also have to continue the Goddard launch schedule,” Tempest reminded them, consulting his PDA. “Now that we have corrected the… bad quality control on the Goddard-class, we can continue launching satellites and complete the satellite grid.”

Dashwood scowled at the reminder of the launch disaster. The three successive successful launches hadn’t quite dimmed the concern that had spread over the Ministry of Space, even though the name was hardly official yet. Even so, the reconnaissance over the entire planet was improving steadily; the RAF, for one, had been delighted, even though MI6 had been working hard on sending agents into enemy territory.

“The main priority now is to get the station built,” Dashwood said. He glanced down at his own PDA. “By next week, I want all of the first tanks in orbit, just so they’re there for us. According to the manufactory, we should have the first Clarke-class heavy lift rocket in a couple of weeks, by which time we’ll have launched most of the supplies into space. How are the astronauts coming along?”

“They’re doing fine in the rigged-up water tank, although we did have to swear upon a massive stack of bibles that it wasn’t a trick,” Tempest said. “That dratted show really buggered up the public’s trust in space flight.”

“Bastards,” Dashwood agreed. “And the simulations?”

Tempest hesitated, forming his thoughts. In several respects, the space program was far more advanced than the first steps in the original timeline; they knew far more about space flight and space technology than their predecessors. Computer-generated simulations, for example, ensured that the entire operation could be practiced time and time again, with every contingency planned for and counter-steps devised.

Which, of course, didn’t change the fact that some of the technology was from 1941 and wasn’t always safe to the nth degree. If something had gone wrong on one of the designed SSTOs, the crew would have a good chance of making it back alive, but if the Clarke-class heavy lift rocket, which would carry a large capsule into space, went wrong, it would explode like a roman candle.

“They’ve been simulating for a long time,” he said finally. “They think that it will take two weeks to assemble the main core of the station once they’re in orbit, using the equipment we’re supposed to be placing in orbit. Once that’s done, we can start putting up a regular crew and expanding further.”

Dashwood nodded, smiling to himself. Once a person was in Low Earth Orbit, they were halfway to anywhere in the solar system. His plans, the ones that Hanover and himself had discussed, were boundless; war provided an excellent way to spend money without much oversight by short-sighted politicians.

He wants a silver bullet, Dashwood thought grimly. The prospects of a land war being fought all the way through Germany to Moscow were horrifying, even to the most enthusiastic proponent of the war. Orbital weapons could make the war shorter, even with the technology they were used to working with, and that was worth any price.

“I think we can clear for launch,” Tempest said, checking his watch. The informal air had dissipated with the first disaster. “The launch window is opening now.”

“Excellent,” Dashwood said, tapping a button on the computer. The launch sequence began, counting down the ten minutes until the launch. He watched grimly as the final checks were made and the crew hastened to evacuate the launch pad.

“I confirm launch commit,” Tempest said, as the counter ticked down. “Armstrong-class confirmed for dispatch. Launch telemetry online and downloading into secure storage.”

“Do you think we’ll ever get used to this?” Dashwood asked, as the counter reached zero. “Launching.”

The two boosters on either side of the tank began flaring in perfect unison, slowly pushing the massive tank into the air. It picked up speed as the power grew, lifting it into orbit without bothering with stage separation. The boosters, too, would be useful to the orbiting station, once it was constructed.

“Telemetry indicates stable orbit achieved,” Tempest said. He grinned. “We have laid the first stone of the first space station ever to exist in this timeline.”

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

8th June 1941

The roar of jet engines and the strange putt-putt-putt of the V1 pulsejets could be heard echoing over London as the air raid sirens howled through the streets. After nearly five months of peace, London was being raided again; Germany had launched nearly five hundred V1’s at the city, as well as other primitive cruise missiles at the RAF bases.

If they had launched them during the invasion of Norway, during those final desperate battles, it might have had a real effect, Hanover thought, watching out over London from the windows. His security staff had tried to convince him to go to the bunker, but he’d refused, not only from the best of motives.

“There are people out there who have no shelters, no security and no hope if we are attacked as badly as we were during the Battle of Dover,” he’d said. “I will share their danger, as far as I can.”

An explosion billowed up from the Docklands, sending a blast of fire into the air. Hanover shook his head; the Germans were concentrating on terror bombing, rather than strategic attacks that might have severely embarrassed the British. It would have made sense from the strategic point of view; even nearly a year after the Transition, Britain still had difficulties in replacing the Eurofighters, on the rare occasions when one of them was lost.

Should have concentrated on our airfields, Hanover sneered, even as he understood their logic. A V1 was not accurate by any definition of the term; a five hundred-metre impact near the target would be lucky. Still, if the V1s had been hurled at the airfields, and actually managed to hit something important… it could have been very bad.

The computer display, updated regularly from PJHQ, changed as he watched. RAF Tornados and Eurofighters swooped and danced across Europe, hunting down the launchers and destroying them. Others moved in a finely coordinated dance with the ground defences, knocking down the V1s as they headed blindly for their targets. The battle was unpleasant, but there could be no quarter.

“Message from Oxford, Prime Minister,” his secretary said. “The Royal Family is safe out there.”

“Oh, joy,” Hanover muttered. “Can’t that pompous twit get anything right?”

He returned to staring out of the window and thinking rapidly. His concerns over Norway, over the reports from Russia, blended into one; the team in Russia was reporting that Stalin was planning to expand into Sweden before the Allies could arrive. He scowled; the covert – very covert – support to the Finns wasn’t having the effect he had hoped. While the Finns were willing to fight, they wanted Allied guarantees for Finland afterwards, and Hanover knew that they were in no position to make such guarantees.

He shook his head. It was the Kurdish and Shia situation all over again. Why should the Finns fight against tyranny if the Allies could just cut and run at any moment? Even the handful of SAS teams in Finland, using satellite reconnaissance to warn the Finns, couldn’t convince them.

“Prime Minister, Major Stirling is here to see you,” his secretary said. “Shall I send him in?”

“Please do,” Hanover said absently. He nodded politely to Stirling as he entered the room, carrying the latest in intelligence from Norway. “Good afternoon, Major,” he said.

“Good afternoon, sir,” Stirling said. He looked more confident than he had the first time they’d met. “I have the latest briefs for you.”

“And has anything come in on the air attacks?” Hanover asked, placing the first thing first. “It’s rather important at the moment.”

“We seem to have broken it up,” Stirling said. “Strike Command thinks that the Germans were expecting to launch several more from each launcher, judging by the explosions after the RAF struck at them. The Germans have been experimenting with radar-guided systems again, to judge by some of the flak, but only one plane was damaged.”

Hanover lifted an eyebrow. “It made it back safely,” Stirling assured him. “There were only a handful of real piloted aircraft, heading down as low as they could across the sea. Fortunately, the AWACS saw it and the planes took them down.”

“I wonder what they thought they were doing,” Hanover said absently. “What’s happening in Norway?”

Stirling activated the display projector and displayed a tactical map of Norway. “The American 1st Army, under General Patton, is advancing on Oslo, something that they’ve been doing for the last week and a bit. The problem is that Norway is a very bad country to fight a land war in; the Germans launched sea borne invasions against all their major ports. We’re having to do it the hard way, marching across the country, and logistics are a pain in the ass, pardon my French.”

Hanover smiled. “Cheerfully pardoned,” he said.

“On the plus side of the ledger, we’ve demonstrated the success of the Hercules bomber, in fact we’ve done that so well that Patton has reinforced his demands for heavy bombers in the United States,” Stirling said. “The JDAM knock-off seems to have proven itself, along with the MOAB and the collection of dumb bombs. The Germans simply don’t have a good defence; in fact, they don’t have any defence now that we’ve cut most of their supply lines.”

He coughed, and then tapped a German tactical icon. “That force was moved into Sweden, and is now making its way north,” he said. “Unfortunately, the Swedes don’t seem willing to confront the Germans directly, particularly with the presence of the German division near Stockholm. I think we might end up having to support them directly, and the Germans are way closer to their government than we are. It looks as if Hitler and Stalin have agreed to divide Sweden between them.”

Hanover scowled. “Are there any plans for the situation?”

“PJHQ did suggest launching missiles against the Soviet forces massing on the border,” Stirling said. “We could move a submarine closer, if we had to.”

“True,” Hanover said. “Did Patton give any estimate of when he would take Oslo?”

Stirling nodded. “For the moment, they’re concentrating on exterminating the smaller German holdouts as they extend their logistical lines eastwards,” Stirling said. “We’re helping with that with precision bombing and some reconnaissance, but Patton is confident that he can get near to Oslo – near enough to launch attacks – within a fortnight at most.”

“You’d think that the Germans would surrender,” Hanover muttered.

“Spy satellites suggest that the Germans are digging in,” Stirling said. “Patton is expecting a hard fight, even with bombers ready to strike at Oslo.”

“A fortnight,” Hanover mused. “22nd June 1941. Wasn’t that the day that Hitler marched east into Russia?”

“Yes, sir,” Stirling said. Hanover allowed himself a brief flush of pleasure that he didn’t sound surprised. “Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa on that date.”

“Let’s hope it’s not a bad omen,” Hanover said. “Now, what about Redemption? Can we launch on the same day?”

“I don’t think so,” Stirling admitted. He changed the display; tactical icons flickered over the Mediterranean Sea and the Middle East. “We’re moving forces around as fast as we can, even after losing Baghdad to the Russians – fortunately that’s good defensive terrain – but we won’t be remotely ready to launch Redemption for at least a fortnight if we push it, according to Rommel. General Flynn is less eager to move fast; he wants to ensure that we have everything we need in place first.”

“I’ll go with Flynn,” Hanover said. He scowled down at the display. “How are the preparations going?”

“We’re launching air and cruise missile attacks on Greece from Crete, as planned,” Stirling said. “The raids have reached as far north as Serbia, or what would have been Serbia in our time. Sir, by the time this war is over, the ethnic makeup of the region is going to be very different.”

“I know,” Hanover said grimly. He’d considered threatening the Germans with nuclear attacks; only the sick certainty that Hitler would have called his bluff had deterred him. “We can’t do anything about it, Steve.”

“I know,” Stirling said. “They’re doing it everywhere, from Iran to Poland to Central Asia, exterminating peoples who would have posed a problem to them in the future. The ethnic makeup of the world is going to be a poorer place in the future.”

“I know people who wouldn’t have thought that that was a bad idea,” Hanover said grimly. “Still, we can’t do anything about it. Did the satellites plot out the German supply lines for us?”

“Yes, sir,” Stirling said. “They’re very weak, sir, and they can be taken out as part of Redemption. Once we have the RAF ready to sortie from Egypt and even Crete, we can utterly destroy their defence lines. Still, Egypt may pose a problem.”

Hanover nodded. Egypt was something of a problem; the nationalistic public wasn’t keen on the British. The new treaty had given them major trading advantages, in exchange for a peaceful rear area, and also a limited veto over British military operations from their territory.

“Once the benefits of being within the Commonwealth become apparent, they will be unable to leave,” he said, and smiled. They’d also given the Egyptians control over the Sudan, under the single condition that they treated both Christians and Muslims equally. As the Muslim Brotherhood was still trying to decide how to view the Republic of Arabia, the Egyptians had agreed to the condition.

“And the new railways are completed,” Stirling said. Hanover nodded; the American-built railways might be only 1941-era technology, but they were very simple and easy to use. Building a massive rail network throughout North Africa and the Sudan, as well as the former French and Belgium territories, had been intended to replace shipping through the Mediterranean Sea after Gibraltar fell, but they had grown into systems to pull the fragmented nations together. Egypt had agreed to the railways – on the understanding that there was no question of them paying for them – and they had found them very useful indeed.

“True, true,” Hanover said. “Finally, what about the Ministry of Space?”

Stirling smiled. Like Hanover, he’d been a big backer of the space program, even coining the term. “The latest report was that the first space station component has been launched into LEO – Low Earth Orbit – in a fairly stable orbit.”

Hanover narrowed his eyes. “Fairly stable?”

“In a hundred years, it’ll burn up in the atmosphere,” Stirling said wryly. He grinned, his enthusiasm showing though. “Major Dashwood believes that the entire station can be built in several months, once we have a team up there working permanently. He did ask me to ask you what the station should be called.”

“I’ll think about it,” Hanover said. “A question; if the tanks, as they seem to be called, are going up empty, what about the supplies?”

Stirling tapped the display, altering it. “The supplies will be launched into space using a number of Clarke-class and Goddard-class launchers,” he said. “It’s rather like the first space station, Skylab, where massive boosters push most of the supplies into orbit. Over the next few months, everything that would be needed will be placed in orbit, and then the first team of astronauts will be sent into orbit. They’ll do most of the work of assembling the station, mainly by moving all of the fuel tanks into one single mass, then they will pressure the station by filling it with compressed air.”

He tapped the display. “We don’t plan on doing anything too fancy with the first space station,” he said. “There’ll be solar panels for power, and a number of sensors for staring down at the Earth.”

“And there’s no way that the Germans can get at her?” Hanover asked grimly.

Stirling shook his head. “They might be able to launch a missile at it, but we’d see them building it on the ground,” he said. “Sir, with space-based weapons, we can win the war!”

“I have no intention of losing,” Hanover said dryly. He smiled at the young officer’s enthusiasm. “We’ll get the weapons built, and then we’ll get them into space, and then we’ll use them. Still, the Ministry of Space will be even more important in the post-war period.”

Stirling blinked. “You’re thinking that far ahead?”

“It’s a good habit to get into,” Hanover said. “The last time we fought this war, the post-war government fucked up badly. This time… this time there will be no mistakes. The nation that has the strongest presence in space will be the superpower of the new timeline… and Britain is going to be that power.”

He shrugged. “Not that it matters for the moment,” he said. “So… Oslo in two weeks, and Redemption as soon as possible after that. The war might just be within shouting distance of being won.”

Chapter Thirty-Seven: The Plot to Seize the White House

Bracken Estate

Nr New York, USA

12th June 1941

It was an open secret, in the housing estate that was sixty years ahead of its time, that Cora Burnside and Jim Oliver were lovers. Although they each had their own small house within the secure compound, they often spent the night together. Although some of the older residents had believed that she cooked for him – after all, that was woman’s work, they said – they spent too long together for that to be believed. Still, the estate had been founded and marketed on a desire for privacy, and wagging tongues were gently reminded that Oliver did hold a controlling interest in the company that ran the estates.

Oliver spent most of the night thinking, much to Cora’s concern. It wasn’t like him to worry endlessly about something, even after the recent news from the south. A race riot in New Orleans had gotten badly out of hand, and the newspapers were screaming about the black peril, and telling sensational stories about looting, rape and arson. The growing crescendo of news, all of it biased against the black population, kept rising, prompting demands for state intervention and a declaration of martial law.

Cora opened one eye and looked down at Oliver. His eyes were closed, but she could tell that he wasn’t asleep; his body hadn’t relaxed into a sleeping posture. One of his arms was holding her, but the other was flexing softly, gently, a sign of gnawing concern.

She kissed him once, on the cheek. “Jim?” She asked. “What’s the matter?”

Oliver’s voice was tired. “Go to sleep, love,” he said, turning over slightly. “One of us should get some sleep anyway.”

Cora held him gently. “What’s the problem?” She asked. “I’ll help you.”

Oliver shook his head. “You can’t help me,” he said. “All hell is about to break loose, and I don’t know what to do.”

Cora blinked at the genuine terror in his voice. “Sweetheart, tell me what’s happening,” she said. “I can help you to understand, if nothing else.”

Oliver chucked slightly, then gently let go of her and turned on the light. Electric light was hardly new in America, but she still found the brightness astonishing. “I’m going to get a cup of tea,” he said. “Want one?”

Cora shook her head, but sat up anyway, pulling on her dressing gown around her tender breasts, sore from their lovemaking. Oliver slipped into the kitchen, and returned a moment later, carrying a cup of tea. He sat down next to her, slipping into her arms.

“Hoover is planning a coup,” he said grimly. Cora’s eyes went wide as he outlined the details of the meeting. “I spent the last few days downloading information from Hoover’s bugs, the ones he doesn’t know about.”

Cora giggled. “You planted bugs on Hoover?”

“Sort of,” Oliver said. “The plan’s simple; they’re going to attack the White House and blame it on communist and/or black insurgents. In the confusion, their candidate becomes President, with MacArthur as his Secretary of War and Hoover as the new Secretary of Internal Security.” He snorted. “Idiots can’t even get the terms right; it should be Secretary of Homeland Defence.”

He sipped his tea grimly. “They’re going to abandon the war, taking Norway as their price for peace, and concentrate on repairing the damage to America. They’re going to purge the communists, the blacks, and the trade unionists… everyone who might oppose their vision of what America should be like. By the time they’ve finished, America won’t be recognisable anymore.”

Cora shivered against him. “You have to do something,” she said. “Can’t you tell Roosevelt?”

Oliver’s eyes brightened. “By now, some elements of the plot must be being seen by Roosevelt,” he said. “Of course, the dog’s not barking in the night time because the dog is Hoover and he’s involved in the plot up to his panty line. The FBI won’t see anything if Hoover tells them to ignore it, will they?”

Cora shook her head. “Jim, if the President doesn’t know, or can’t stop them, who will?”

“You’re too naive,” Oliver said. “If Roosevelt doesn’t know – and a lot of his enemies are involved in the plot – he’s sunk. The army is in Norway, mainly, and even if they do declare against the guy who becomes President, what can they do? Hell, some of them might agree with the anti-British feeling in the plotters mind.”

“If they’re anti-British,” Cora asked, “why did they invite you? Coming to think of it, why have an entire meeting?”

Oliver shrugged. “The problem with plotting a coup is that not all of the plotters will want to be involved until a clear victory occurs,” he said. “The people in the meeting, however, no longer have a choice, as everyone knows they attended – and didn’t blow the whistle.” He snorted. “As for me, I bet you a vacation in Paris that Hoover is thinking more than two steps ahead; they want – need – to match Britain, and I can help them do it.”

He chucked. “A different part of the plan,” he said, “and one kept secret from the industrialists who hate Roosevelt, unless I miss my guess. They won’t want to admit that they need me, but Hoover is smart enough to understand that forcing American technology as fast-forward as possible is urgent. The industrialists, however, will want to be rid of me, and of the trade unions, most of whom will be crushed ruthlessly.”

He sighed. “Which rather proves that the entire plot is doomed to failure, even if it succeeds,” he said. “Where do our interests lie?”

Cora rubbed her hands over his back. “With the best interests of the company,” she said. “You taught me that, remember?”

Oliver nodded. “It’s past midnight,” he said. “I’m going to sleep in today, and then I’m going to make a call to a man, one who might be able to take action.”

Cora smiled. “Good night,” she said, and kissed him gently.

Future Embassy

Washington DC, USA

12th June 1941

The secured phone had been taken directly from the embassy in London and transhipped to Washington, even though it’s use of British satellites meant that there was a very weak link in the chain. Ambassador King’s private number was known to only a handful of people, including the President, the British Prime Minister and Ambassador, and Jim Oliver, who’d been a healthy contributor to funds for the embassy.

“Good morning, Ambassador,” Oliver’s voice said. “I’m sorry for calling you like this, but I’ve sent you an urgent secured packet via email, using the TakTakChar protocol encoding. Read it, and then call me back. Goodbye.”

King finished listening to the voicemail and scowled. There was yet another meeting with the production committees to finalise plans for the next generation of landing craft, then the plans for producing the first proper jet fighter, years ahead of its time. The Navy was demanding that the full extent of production was switched to Hellcat fighters and dive-bombers, while the Army was demanding its B-29s and B-52s. General Groves was demanding more support from Britain for the atomic program, and it just went on and on.

And yet, he didn’t know Oliver that well, but it had sounded urgent. The man was a cunning worker; he’d not only started new plants, but he’d bought up a fair percentage of the moribund American manufacturing plants. As the sudden economic boost caused by the war kicked the economy forward, Oliver had made more money than anyone else had dreamed of, during the years of the Depression.

He opened his personal laptop and allowed it to scan his biometric readings before opening the email program. He went though another series of security checks before the system condescended to open the email, and then he started to read.

“Holy shit,” he breathed, as he read through the first few paragraphs. The plot was cunning and matched precisely some of the information he’d acquired, but without a framework to insert all of the data to make a complete picture. Now… now he had the framework, and everything slotted into place.

“He can’t,” he said, as he read on, the entire picture becoming clear. “Doesn’t he have any respect for America?”

He shook his head. Hoover had respected the America that had allowed him to become head of the FBI and then allowed him to run ransack over this era’s conception of civil liberties. Like any man faced with the future, he had attempted to destroy it… and had recruited MacArthur and many others to help him. People who agreed with him, outspoken protesters against the changing world… and people who he knew too much about, they made a formidable force blocking change.

He lifted the secured phone and tapped Oliver’s number. It was picked up at once; Oliver must have been waiting for the call. “Mr Oliver,” he said.

“I assume that you have read the message,” Oliver said. “It’s all true.”

“I don’t doubt it,” King said. “Listen, what do you want me to do about it?”

There was a long silence. “I expect you to stop it, somehow,” Oliver said. “The resources of my company are at your disposal.”

“Thanks,” King said wryly. “Still… you do realise that most of the plot will play out anyway? What’s to stop them plunging America into a second civil war?”

There was a second long pause. “I don’t think that they can win in the long run,” Oliver said finally. “If the attack in Washington can be defeated, the rest of the plotters will either sit on their hands or face the federal army, with their states in open revolt against their rule and treachery. Given how bad most of them would be for everyone without a high income…”

King thought rapidly. Oliver was probably right – a little imp at the back of his mind reminded him that he wanted Oliver to be right – but it still posed a serious problem. There were no forces near Washington that could be proved to be untainted; most of the army units in the country were being trained in Texas. The Secret Service would be loyal, he suspected, for it disliked the FBI and Hoover, but who else could be trusted?

A thought struck him. He recoiled; it could go very badly wrong… but the coup plot itself was bad. “I’ll discuss the matter with the President,” he said finally. “Mr Oliver, I may need your help.”

“Anything you want that I can give,” Oliver said. “Good morning, Ambassador.”

King put down the phone and sent a quick email to Colonel Palter, asking him to return to the embassy and start reading the encrypted message. Scowling, he picked up the phone again, and made an appointment to see Roosevelt, before typing out a final email.

“I hope you can help,” he muttered, as the email was sent. “I’m not sure what other weapons are left.”

The White House

Washington DC, USA

12th June 1941

“Did you see the plans for the jet bomber?” Roosevelt asked, delightedly. “The constructer believes that it will be possible to bomb anywhere in the world from here, and then get back for dinner.”

King shook his head. Roosevelt insisted on discussing unimportant matters first. “It’s a waste of time at the moment,” he said. “We can just build a B-52 at the moment, but we really need short-range tactical bombers, such as the B-29, which we can build in great numbers soon. Once we start equipping the new squadrons in Britain, Norway and North Africa with them, we can really start pounding away at the Germans.”

Roosevelt nodded. “Tell me, what sort of relations should we have with North Africa?” He asked. “The British have pretty much annexed it, and there won’t be any trading for us there.”

“I don’t think you understand,” King said, allowing his irritation to show. Roosevelt seemed oblivious. “The British have set up a provisional government, with full independence in 1950, for each of the African states. Mr President, the entire north of Africa will become a place for everyone to trade, once they’re finished. They won’t try to lock us out.”

Roosevelt lifted an eyebrow. “Are you certain of that?”

“Hanover is not an idiot,” King said. “They won’t let us damage their economy again, but they’ll encourage us to trade as long as they can do the same in Latin and South America.”

“Which you keep urging me to absorb into the United States,” Roosevelt said. “We don’t invade nations and add them to the United States by force.”

King shook his head. “Mr President, we have to act there to prevent the entire region from collapsing,” he said. “Hell, you know what the Texas Defence League is doing.”

Roosevelt nodded. The Texas Defence League, having heard about the massive coming waves of immigrants, had demanded that the borders were clearly marked and sealed before the waves could even begin. It was just another effect of knowing the future; New Orleans had panicked upon learning of the hurricanes that would strike the city, years in the future.

“It’s just another problem that we could head off at the pass,” King said. “However, there is another problem, sir, that we have to handle.”

He outlined the coup plan, as far as he knew. “Mr President, this is real.”

“Manure,” Roosevelt said. “Ambassador – Jackson – there have been threats of something like this for years, on and off. They wouldn’t be so stupid, Jackson; they’d bring the entire house of cards crashing down on their hands.”

King scowled. There had been a report of a plot in 1936, one that was supposed to have selected the wrong general to lead it, who had exposed it. It had been so nebulous that some writers – almost all of them – had questioned its reality. Roosevelt, with his allies, had either refused to believe it or decided to let sleeping dogs lie – the investigation had been a failure, some said to cover the entire matter up.

That might have been a very bad idea, he thought grimly.

“Their position isn’t strong,” Roosevelt said. “I have had bits and pieces, but why would they launch such a plot when they know that they would be defeated? They only represent the rich, Ambassador; what about the people who love the New Deal?”

“They also happen to be the powerless ones,” King said, knowing that it was futile. “Mr President, can’t you at least summon a regiment of troops back to Washington?”

“Not with the conquest of Norway going on,” Roosevelt said. “Public opinion would not stand for it.”

“I know,” King sighed. “Good luck, sir.”

Future Embassy

Washington DC, USA

12th June 1941

“The President doesn’t believe us,” Ambassador King said grimly. “He can’t believe that his fellow patricians could do something so stupid.”

“They’re desperate,” Colonel Palter said. “That explains some of the odd reports we’ve had; we were supposed to have lost several thousand AK-47s in a fire two weeks ago. Want to bet that they were just moved to a different warehouse?” He scowled. “Hoover promised to investigate and blamed it on the commies.”

“Wonderful,” King said. “Some rich men, an army, a lot of supporters in high places… and they’ll tear the country apart if we let them. Suggestions?”

“Assassination?” Palter suggested. “We’re Marines; we’re far more capable than any of Hoover’s guards.”

“He has massive protection,” King said. “The real problem is if Hoover falls, someone else might take his place in the plot. Tolson perhaps.”

“Perhaps,” Palter said. “I hate to suggest it, but could we not ask Ambassador Quinn for help?”

“The British?” King asked, who had considered that. “No, Scott; this has to be an internal American affair.”

Palter sniggered. “You did ask Oliver for help,” he pointed out.

“We’re going to need his help,” King said. “I have a plan.” He outlined it. “What do you think?”

“It could go badly wrong,” Palter said. “It’s not like we could put our own forces in the White House. Coming to think of it, where else are they going to seize?”

“Radio stations, the various departments… and here,” King said. “The priority, however, remains the White House… and the President. We have to move some of our forces to Washington.”

Palter snorted. “And where are we going to hide them?”

“Here and in Oliver’s warehouses,” King said. “We must plan for an attack here, and we have to hold out until our own forces can go into action.”

“Assuming we can get them here in time without being noticed,” Palter said. He thought rapidly. “We can do it, I think; we’ll certainly have an advantage in coordination if nothing else.”

King nodded. “And we have to convince Truman,” he said. “If we knew the exact date, we could arrange for him to come here, but we don’t…”

“Oliver can try to find out,” Palter said. He studied the map of Washington. “If we warn Truman ahead of time, we can get him here, or to the British Embassy.”

“They might attack the British Embassy,” King said, thinking of the western embassies in the third world that had been attacked without retaliation. “Here would be safer, don’t you think?”

Palter nodded. “I’ll contact him,” he said. “He’s on one of the committees I have to brief on a fairly regular basis, yet another attempt to invent the space shuttle before the jet engine. Once we let him know that it might happen, he might agree to go into hiding in Washington, if not come here for a week or so.” He grinned. “If he does come here, they’ll be sure to come for us.”

King scowled. “There are some other preparations we’ll have to make,” he said. “Oliver can help with some of them, so I’ll give him a call. Until then, you get Truman alerted, and then perhaps we can head this madness off at the passes.”

“Yes, sir,” Palter said. “Are you going to call Jones as well?”

“I suppose I better had,” King said. “If this is to work, he’s going to be needed.”

Chapter Thirty-Eight: No Surrender, No Retreat

Oslo, Norway

22nd June 1941

The end could not be long delayed.

General der Infanterie Hermann Hoth, commander of Army Korps Norway, studied the defensive positions and scowled to himself. His face, always pale, paled further; the Americans were pushing closer and closer to Oslo – and to the final German forces in the mainland. The Fuhrer had promised that some reinforcements would be sent via Sweden, but Hoth had no faith in them. The Swedes might be Aryans, but they disliked the Germans and hated the infringements on their neutrality.

Bastards, Hoth thought, as he studied the map. Oslo had been carefully prepared for a last stand, in accordance with the Fuhrer’s orders, but he knew that it wouldn’t be able to hold for long. Thirty thousand Germans had dug themselves into the city, along with countless Norwegians who dared not be taken by the resistance, and he knew that they were all doomed. The most optimistic estimate said that fifty thousand American troops were pressing in to surround them… and the cursed British bombing was continuing all the time.

He stared as a building, which had mounted some anti-aircraft guns, was blown apart. He’d considered using human shields, but the single message from the British had been clear; any German who tried that would not be treated under the Geneva Convention, but shot out of hand. They’d dropped leaflets to explain this to any Germans who wanted to try the tactic. Hoth scowled; he hadn’t wanted to even consider it, but there seemed to be fewer and fewer options all the time.

“Herr General, the American battleship is retreating,” his aide said. Hoth nodded, wishing that it were as good news as his aide made it sound. The Americans had been attempting to sail a battleship up the fjord, but after a long duel with the coast guns it had retreated. A series of explosions marked the death of some of the coast guns, killed by the British bomber, which was orbiting high above, far out of range of his anti-aircraft weapons.

“Have the Americans begun their advance yet?” Hoth asked. The noise of distant shelling grew louder. “Well?”

“Ja, Herr General,” his aide said. “They’ve started to press against the east defences.”

Hoth nodded. He’d expected that. “It won’t be long now,” he said. The aide, a devotee of Hitler, gaped at him. Hoth almost laughed. “Do you really think that we can win here?”

“We fight for the Fuhrer and for Germany,” his aide said stiffly.

“We fight to buy time,” Hoth corrected. Another explosion echoed, closer to the two men. “We fight to ensure that the wonder weapons can be used before the Americans get to Norway, to France… and to Berlin.”

His aide sagged. “Then all is lost?”

“We will be lost,” Hoth said. He allowed no trace of bitterness to cloud his thoughts. “The Reich goes on.”

* * *

The scream of jet engines echoed through the mountains and valleys as Captain Dwynn peered down at Oslo though his helmet sensors. The hills were alive with Americans moving their ponderous forces into position for the final offensive, with row after row of guns being prepared for shelling the city.

Dwynn scowled as the laser designator began reporting new targets. The SAS was operating more and more in the open now, as American control was consolidated, and he wasn’t certain that he liked it. Unlike the battles across Central Asia, the Germans were cunning, clever and far more disciplined. If they’d had the same technology as the Allies, Dwynn wasn’t certain what the outcome would have been.

A mammoth explosion blasted up from the outskirts of the city, on one of the German defence lines. The designator was providing targets to the massive bomber, systematically hammering away at the Germans, while Dwynn himself could only wait and watch.

“Captain?” Chang asked. For the first time, he wasn’t wearing what Plummer had snidely referred to as the Norwegian burka, a balaclava that covered his oriental features. “Are you ok?”

“No, I’m not ok,” Dwynn snapped. “Look; they don’t stand a chance, and yet we’re wasting precious weapons on them.”

“I imagine that PJHQ knows what it’s doing,” Chang said. Dwynn snorted. “It beats watching the Americans level the town, along with every citizen inside.”

“At least the Germans finally got the message about human shields,” Dwynn said grimly. The entire affair with the SS man had left a bad taste in his mouth. “There are reasons for the Protocols, you know.”

“You don’t need to remind me,” Chang said dryly. “How many Germans did we shoot on the spot?”

“Seventeen,” Dwynn said. “We should have made it eighteen.” Another explosion billowed up from the town. “We have to teach them that such behaviour will be punished.”

“I imagine that they’ll try Hitler rather than just shooting him,” Chang agreed. It was generally felt that the policy of shooting the senior terrorist officers on the spot had done more to reduce terror than show trials. “They should send us into Berlin, we could do it.”

“They have countless guards and a great deal of knowledge,” Dwynn said sadly. He’d proposed the mission himself. The laser designator bleeped; all of its targets had been hit. He chuckled. “They must be able to see us up here,” he said, when Chang asked why he’d laughed. “And think how pissed they must be, being unable to hit us at all.”

* * *

Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter found it hard to believe that the little American was in fact their greatest general, even though his captors had explained this at some length. Surely someone so short was a product of a breeding program, even if Patton wore the silver stars of a general.

“The British wanted to shoot you,” Patton snapped, smoking a cigar in the corner of his mouth. His jaw worked incessantly. “I’m not sure that they were wrong.”

Richter kept his mouth shut. It seemed the safest thing to do. “Still, I need you to carry a message into Oslo for me,” the American continued. “If your own people shoot you… small loss.”

“What sort of message?” Richter asked, finally finding his voice. “If you want me to tell them to surrender…”

“That’s exactly what I want you to tell them,” Patton snapped. He passed over an envelope and a white flag. “They’re trapped in Oslo and we can kill them all, for nothing.”

“I’ll carry the message,” Richter said finally. Patton nodded. “When do I leave?”

“Now,” Patton said, nodding to a pair of burly American marines. Before Richter could ask any more questions, they grabbed his arms and blindfolded him, before carrying him between them through the camp. He tried hard to count the twists and turns, but it was impossible with his eyes covered.

“That way,” one of the Americans muttered, pointing a hand. Richter pulled off the blindfold and stared down at a road leading down to Oslo. “Follow the black pitted road.”

“Thank you very much,” Richter muttered in German, as sardonically as he dared. If the American noticed, he gave no sign, just pointed down towards Oslo. Waving his white flag, Richter headed down towards the town, stumbling in the pitted road. Suddenly aware of the possibility of mines, he tried to walk lighter, and then saw a German patrol.

“Hands high,” the leader bellowed in German. “Who are you?”

Richter saluted. “Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter, late of the division near Trondheim,” he said. “I have a message for General Hoth from the American commander.”

“Oh, really,” the leader sneered. He examined the letter from Patton, but didn’t open it. “Very well; Dieter, you take Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter back through the lines, schnell!”

Dieter proved to be a small man with an air of competence, leading Richter through a series of minefields that were completely invisible from the front. They weren’t marked; Richter realised that if he hadn’t met the patrol he would have blundered into them. Once they had passed through several checkpoints, they reached the main command tent, erected well back from the lines.

“Identify yourselves,” the sentry bellowed. Richter noted that he was standing well under the covers. “Who are you?”

Richter sighed and explained again. The sentry passed him through wordlessly. General Hoth looked up as he entered, taking the document wordlessly. He opened it with a small knife and read it quickly. “Nuts,” he said finally, and dropped it on the ground. Richter picked it up as Hoth strode out of the tent and read it quickly.

To the German Commander, General Hoth. General, your position is hopeless. You have no way to escape Oslo. You have no way of receiving supplies. You have no way of defeating my forces when we finally come for you. You have no defence against the bombardment we can deploy against your positions.

I beg you to surrender now to avoid further futile bloodshed. If you surrender, fire a green flare above the town before 1400hrs. If not, then you will be crushed by the sheer power of my force.

Yrs – General Patton, Commander, Allied Forces (Norway).

“We’re going to fight,” Richter realised. He smiled as he headed out of the tent. Back under the SS’s control, how could they lose?

* * *

“The Germans just opened up on the American guns,” the radio said. “Designate their guns for the remaining JDAM bombs.”

“Understood,” Dwynn said. The designator was already at work, tracking the shells that were being launched from the German lines. “Targets acquired.”

“Launching weapons now,” the controller said. “Stand by to report on impact and…”

The explosion caught them all off-guard, blowing them down the hill, rolling until they crashed into a ditch. The SAS team picked themselves up; Dwynn stared back to see a burning fire, only fifty meters from their former location.

“My radios broken,” he said grimly. “Anyone’s working?”

Chang passed him his radio soundlessly. “Control, this is team one. The Germans targeted us on the hill; the designator is destroyed. I repeat; the designator is destroyed.”

“Understood, team one,” the controller said. “Evacuate to the drop zone. Further orders may be forthcoming, until then, head to the drop zone and wait for pick-up.”

“We’re out of the battle,” Dwynn muttered, as the team gathered themselves, before heading back around the hills. It was only a mile to the drop zone, but it felt like running away from the battle, even though he knew better.

* * *

The tank fired once, sending a shell crashing into the German lines. It advanced slowly, allowing the infantry to keep up, so they sheltered behind the tanks as the Germans fired burst after burst of machine gun fire at them. More shattering explosions blasted through the German lines, then a streak of light lanced out and struck one of the tanks. It exploded with a blast of fire, scorching the hapless infantry behind it.

“Kill those bastards,” Sergeant Pike bellowed, firing a blast from his automatic rifle at the Germans. The tank Private Max Shepherd was hiding behind began to move backwards; he threw himself out of the way, firing at the Germans.

“Keep firing,” someone shouted. He saw the German weapon; a long tube firing rockets at the tanks. One of them was hit by an American bullet and destroyed; the explosion knocked the Germans to their knees.

“Move it,” Pike bellowed, firing down at the few remaining Germans. Perhaps some of them tried to surrender, but they were mown down anyway. After losing the tanks, Shepherd found it hard to care.

“I guess that tanks aren’t as safe as they thought,” Buckman muttered, as the platoon regrouped. “Now what do we do?”

“Everyone watch,” Captain Caddell snapped, as the Marines regrouped. “The British are about to use a new weapon on the minefields…”

A strange vehicle moved forward, a small car with a loudspeaker mounted on it, pointed at the ground. Before Shepherd could work out what it was doing, it began to make the ground vibrate, moving forward slowly.

“What the hell is it doing?” Buckman asked, and then the explosions began, shattering the German minefield as the mines detonated. “Wow!”

“Forward,” Pike bellowed. He never spoke softly. “Onwards to Oslo; last one there buys the drinks!”

* * *

General der Infanterie Hermann Hoth allowed himself a moment of shock as the minefields detonated. He’d counted on them to hold the Americans back for a while, but they had failed; the Americans were pouring into the city from all directions, while the citizens were trying to remain out of the way. The constant shelling was starting to wear his men down, slaughtering them in their trenches. They never stood a chance.

This is my fault, Hoth thought. He’d hoped that he could hold out for weeks, but the sheer firepower that the British and Americans could deploy was too overwhelming. Strongpoints were crushed from the air by the monstrous bombs that the RAF could launch, the handful of small tanks he had smashed with Panzerfaust rockets that the Americans themselves had deployed, just like the Germans.

“Still, at least we know that our anti-tank rockets work,” he muttered to himself, as his aides busied themselves burning the files. Hitler had ordered Oslo itself burnt to the ground, but Hoth had chosen to ignore the order… although the sheer firepower that the Americans were deploying was destroying Oslo anyway.

“Herr General,” Hauptsturmfuehrer Richter snapped. Hoth looked up to see a massive explosion ripping through the defence lines surrounding his headquarters, which was totally invisible from the air. He wondered for a moment how they’d been found, but then he realised that it didn’t matter.

“Stand your ground,” he shouted, lifting his pistol. As the Americans appeared, he opened fire… and went down firing.

* * *

The fires were almost all out, with the aid of the citizens who had emerged from bunkers and basements, pumping water from the fjord to extinguish the fire. The stink of death; fire and rotting bodies, was still in the air, even with the American soldiers working to clear away the bodies.

“And move that German filing cabinet to intelligence,” Patton ordered, as Major Bloodnok hurried up to his side. “Ah, Major; how did your SAS fare?”

“They survived,” Bloodnok said. The Englishman looked over the wreckage. “We’re lucky that it ended when it did,” he said.

“You don’t say,” Patton said. “The fools that say war is glorious never see the cost.” He grinned suddenly. “Still, it’s a damn fine war.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Bloodnok said. “We had run out of bombs and missiles. If the Germans had launched another airborne attack, we might have been in trouble.”

“You worry too much,” Patton said. “Now, all we have to do is get into Sweden.”

“The bastards tore up the train line,” Bloodnok reminded him.

“Those helicopters of yours can move an infantry force forward,” Patton said. “I would ask you to start planning such a move.”

Bloodnok saluted. “I’ll see to it at once,” he said. “Sir, are you going to email the President?”

“I better had, don’t you think?” Patton said. He lit a cigar. “I’ll awaken the helmsmen of America with victorious news.”

SS Moskva

New York Harbour, USA

22nd June 1941

According to the future histories, which Obersturmbannfuehrer Kortig had been allowed to read to prepare him for the suicidal nature of the mission, a group of subhumans – who would be ground out of existence before they could ever threaten the Reich – would attack New York, their funding prepared by a group of Jews eager to expand their puppet empire into the Middle East. He studied the towers of Manhattan as the ship entered the harbour; they were wondrous in their own way.

“We’ll rebuild, when we win the war,” he said, checking the ship’s equipment. There were preparations to be made. “Start moving!”

Quickly, the SS men, now wearing the uniforms of the Russian sailors, started to move the boxes onto the deck. The harbour wasn’t ready for them yet – there were dozens of ships in the dock – and placing crates on the deck wasn’t unusual. After all, time was money, and Americans worshiped money.

Kortig chuckled. After the beating he’d inflicted on the soviet ship’s engines, just to get to New York as fast as they could, the ship would require a massive – and expensive – overhaul before it could ever make full speed again. Not that it mattered, of course, but it was the principle of the thing.

“Herr Obersturmbannfuehrer, the crates have all been placed on the deck,” his aide said. “They’re ready for use.”

Kortig nodded. His force didn’t know what was in the crates. Kortig, who did, had felt bad every time he’d passed close to one of them. The entire island of Manhattan was covered in docks; they were waiting for a pilot to guide them to the dock he’d booked earlier. No one had bothered to check his identification; Americans had no concept of security or the measures needed to ensure a safe homeland.

“Herr Obersturmbannfuehrer, here comes the pilot,” his aide said.

“No German,” Kortig snapped, signalling to the helmsman to follow the pilot’s boat. The Moskva glided through the water, heading into the harbour. Kortig smiled; the oil tanker nearby, shipping some oil to the United Kingdom, was right where he’d expected it to be. “Any sign of port inspectors?”

“Yes, Captain,” his aide said, as the Moskva came up to the dock. Five men in black suits stood near the gangplank, waiting for it to be connected to the ship.

“If they knew what we were carrying, they would never have allowed us to dock,” Kortig muttered. He checked the connection lines to the explosives; almost all of the ship was packed with enough explosive to vaporise it and send shockwaves throughout Manhattan and New Jersey.

“I think they want to come aboard,” his aide said, as the inspectors made impatient hand-signals.

“No shit,” Kortig grinned, making the final connection. “I die, but the Reich lives on!”

He pressed down on the button.

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Terror in New York City

RAF Oakhanger

Hampshire, United Kingdom

22nd June 1941

“Dear holy shit!”

It wasn’t the normal way to make reports to a superior officer, but Colonel Gardner let it past; only one thing set off alarms like that. RAF Oakhanger, one of the RAF’s satellite communications facilities, had several missions, but the most important was watching for nuclear detonations. Gardner remembered seeing the nuclear blast that had gone off near Panama… and now they had to watch for a Nazi or Soviet nuclear test.

“I confirm NUDET, repeat NUDET,” Captain Bacon snapped. Gardner hit the emergency button out of sheer habit; there was no need to institute the procedures prepared for nuclear war when a growing number of states possessed nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles.

“Location?” He asked, checking the threat boards. Everything was clear; neither GCHQ or MI6 had reported any evidence that any of the Axis powers – or the Americans, for that matter, were preparing to test a device. “Where is it?”

“New York City,” Bacon said. His voice was stunned. “It’s… I’m not sure what it is. The blast wasn’t hot enough to be nuclear, but spectroscopic analysis indicates some radioactivity within the blast, spreading out over New York.”

“Map display,” Gardner ordered, and cursed. The spreading blast would make 9/11 seem like nothing. He cursed again; the map was from 2015, not 1941. The maps they needed didn’t even exist.

“It’s a dirty bomb, sir,” Bacon said. “I don’t think there’ll be enough radioactivity for them to be really worried about it, but the blast was awesome. Most of Manhattan must be in ruins.”

The phone rang. Gardner listened quickly. “Yes, sir,” he said finally. “The weapon was a dirty bomb, not a conventional nuclear weapon. Yes, sir, we’ll stand down from red alert now.”

He put the phone down. “The Government is going to offer assistance now,” he said. “As yet, they don’t know who to point the finger at, but there’s only one main suspect.” He scowled. “Transfer all our readings from the satellites into disc, so we can forward them to the Government and the investigation team.”

“Yes, sir,” Bacon said. “Sir… are they going to nuke the Germans again?”

“I have no idea,” Gardner said. “I imagine that they’ll make their decision quickly.”

New York, USA

22nd June 1941

Sergeant Tom Williams, New York Police Department, gazed out at a scene from hell. The entire harbour complex was burning; fires were spreading all over Manhattan Island and Jersey City. Tower blocks were burning brightly, spreading further horror across the scene; the smoke was choking people as they tried to flee.

“Get out of here,” he shouted at a group of would-be looters. He lifted his pistol, grimly prepared to shoot them if he had to, but they fled, heading away from the fires. He checked his radio; there was still no signal. The shockwaves had devastated the Island, and God only knew when it would be repaired.

An explosion detonated as the fires reached something explosive. The waves of heat increased, pushing him back as his radio finally started to work. He cursed the new technology, even as he gabbled out a report, asking desperately what had happened.

“We have to get everyone out of the city,” the superintendent said. “Organise rescue efforts as best as you can.”

He sounded panicky. Williams guessed that his boss had been caught in the blasts, whatever they were. He headed towards the nearest group of people, wandering around stunned, and started to issue orders, forging them into an impromptu rescue group. The group worked for hours, trying to dig people out of the rubble, even as the fires continued to rage out of control.

He shuddered. Whatever had happened was…

“Get the filthy nigger,” someone shouted. “He caused the blast.”

Williams glanced around sharply; a group of white men was chasing an older black man, who was panting desperately from too much smoke inhalation. As he watched, the man collapsed on the ground and the would-be lynchers gathered around him, kicking at his body.

“Stop that,” Williams bellowed. “Help the wounded.”

“Fuck you,” one of the men shouted. “Kill the nigger-lover!”

Williams lifted his pistol and the man laughed. Williams never saw the man lifting a second pistol… until the bullet slashed through his head and darkness took him forever.

The White House

Washington DC, USA

22nd June 1941

“This is the work of subversive communists,” Hoover bellowed. “Who else, but they would have the idea of using a radiological weapon?”

Ambassador King watched Roosevelt with concern. The satellite pictures of the devastation, and the British news crew that had flown in via helicopter, were having an affect on the President, making him shake in his wheelchair. He didn’t look good at all.

“Was it a nuclear weapon?” Truman asked, watching Hoover watching Roosevelt. “Did the Germans deploy a nuclear weapon?”

Colonel Palter shook his head grimly. “No, sir,” he said. “It’s a dirty bomb, a weapon designed to toss some radioactive material into the air in tiny dust specs, contaminating a vast area. We’re awaiting the results of Geiger Counters now – we flew some in from General Groves – but I don’t think that it was very radioactive at all.”

“That blast was not minor,” Hoover snapped. “Have you any sense of proportion, man?”

“They stuffed the SS Moskva with explosives,” Palter said. “Sir, if it had been a nuclear bomb, the entire region for five miles around would have been devastated.”

Hoover sniffed. “And are you sure that the British were telling the truth?” He asked. “They could have just done it themselves – hell, why didn’t they stop the ship in mid-Atlantic?”

“Because of our stupid neutrality laws,” Truman said. “The Soviet Union has clearly launched an attack against us. New York was an important harbour for us; even if the contamination was non-existent we’ll still have to repair the facilities. Now that the news reporters are reporting on radiation, with all the scare stories in the papers, we’ll never get anyone to work there.”

“We have to declare a state of emergency,” Hoover said. “Sir, the Soviet Union has launched a sneak attack against us. We have to declare war and we have to retaliate.”

Roosevelt looked up tiredly. “We have to minister to our people, Edger,” he said. “I will speak to the nation in a few hours, asking people to help those in New York. Until then, take no action that will only make matters worse.”

Hoover gaped at him. “You don’t want to round up the communist sympathisers?” He demanded. “Mr president…”

Roosevelt spoke with great force. “That will be enough, Edger,” he snapped. “You may leave.”

Hoover turned on his feet and stormed out of the room. King and Truman exchanged glances as Hoover left, both men sharing the same thought. Uh-oh.

* * *

The communicator was sub-vocal only, inaudible to anyone who wasn’t wearing a communicator, and the microphone could pick up his throat movements, but King would have felt safer back at the Future Embassy. The White House had been swept of Hoover’s bugs – and they still didn’t know where they’d come from – but the sense of… imminence was overpowering.

“We have a number of trucks moving near FBI headquarters,” one of his men reported. “I’m not sure what they’re doing.”

“Moving people around,” King said wryly. “It seems as if its about to hit the fan, right?”

“Yes, sir,” Palter said. “Do you want me to pick up Truman?”

“Yes, please,” King said. “We have to keep him safe, at all costs.”

Washington DC, USA

23rd June 1941

“Today, we take back our country,” General MacArthur snapped, as the massed team leaders listened to the general. “No more will we slip towards the evils of nigger communism! No more will we let them ruin our nation! Today, we’ll throw out the nigger-lovers and the communists from the White House and the Government!”

Sheriff Jefferson Buckley listened with cold delight. He had been the only survivor of Salvation, escaping because of his pursuit of a criminal away from the town. The explosion that had destroyed the town, burnt it down to the ground, had been visible for miles away.

“You all have your tasks,” MacArthur said. “Team one” – he nodded in Buckley’s direction – “you are charged with getting the president away from his evil advisors. The other teams will purge the communists, the nigger unions and the other parasites upon our great nation. God bless America!”

“God bless America,” they shouted back, lifting their weapons. Buckley studied his weapon with considerable interest; the AK-47 was very different to his rifle he’d used back during the… no! His mind refused to consider it. The weapon was lethal, far more dangerous than any other weapon he’d ever seen, and he smiled.

“After New York, the niggers will get back in their place or die,” he muttered, as the teams raced out to their trucks. The teams were hidden in a warehouse on the outskirts of Washington; it was just a short drive to the White House. Then…

“You deserve it,” he muttered, thinking of Roosevelt. The man had done a lot of good, but only at the price of letting the niggers think that they could be good Americans. When they had finally tried to rise above their station, had Roosevelt done anything? No – the President had listened to his black advisor and allowed the niggers to run rampant.

“Take us out,” he ordered. As one of the few soldiers with combat experience – back in the Great War – Buckley had been placed in charge of one aspect of the mission. He knew why; if anything went wrong, it would be blamed on him, rather than on MacArthur, a good American who’d crushed rioters in the streets.

“We’ll be there in no time,” his driver said. The entire convoy had military plates, which should allow it to pass through any checkpoints that might have been set up. In all the confusion following New York, he doubted that anyone would be thinking about stopping military vehicles.

“Good,” he muttered back, checking his weapon. The plan was simple; shoot down the Secret Service agents if they refused to surrender, surround the White House and search the place from top to bottom. Everyone inside was to be arrested and held prisoner without any communications until after events had settled down.

“Nearly there,” the driver said. “Everyone’s ready, sir.”

“Good,” Buckley said. “Let’s get this over with and then we can all go home.”

* * *

Marine Lieutenant Bosco had taken up position near the White House, lying on a roof of a building that felt very cold, even with the warm day. One advantage the counter-plotters had; they could use radio bursts without having to worry about detection.

He watched grimly as a line of trucks drove up towards the White House. They were basic trucks, but they wore army plates. Rumour had it that the local police had been bought off, but if the men were armed with the missing AK-47s, the local police would be outgunned anyway – badly.

“They’re here,” he muttered into his radio. There was no reply, as per procedure, but he would have been glad of a reply, just to convince him that he wasn’t alone. He felt dreadfully alone, both with the tiny number of real Marines in America – and being positioned in a very vulnerable position.

“I’ve got to stop volunteering for things,” he muttered to himself. “Colonel, I count nine trucks and at least two hundred men.”

“Noted,” Palter’s voice said. “Continue to observe.”

“Yes, sir,” he said, watching as the men spread out around the White House. He shuddered; like all who’d spent time on the Presidential Protection Detail, he’d been through endless wargames and exercises – and watching a real coup happen was disconcerting.

* * *

The bullet cracked against the side of the car, glinting off the bullet-proof window. Cursing, Colonel Palter jammed on the accelerator, running away from the ambush force. Seventeen men, armed with pistols and rifles, trying to kill the Vice-President.

“I’m too old for this,” he screamed, as he swung the car into a tight turn. He silently blessed the foresight – and the KKK attempts to kill the Ambassador – that had led them to purchase a special car from Britain.

“Does this happen a lot in your time?” Truman asked, keeping his composure with a skill that Palter could only admire. “Political assassinations and coups?”

“This is the first one we’ve ever had,” Palter snapped, taking the car though a tight turn and running away from the assassins, breaking every speed law in the book. He smiled suddenly; if they’d been in 2015, they would have run into traffic by now, but Contemporary Washington didn’t have anything like as many cars, not with the war on. All the auto manufacturers had been converted to producing tanks.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Truman said, holding on to his seat as Palter accelerated still further. Habit kept Palter glancing at the sky, even though there were no helicopters around. “What about Franklin?”

It took Palter several seconds to realise that he meant the President. “I don’t know,” he said. “The last I heard was that the White House was being surrounded, so he might be a prisoner by now.”

Truman shivered. “Or dead,” he said. “He was never in very good health after the Transition suddenly shook up the world.”

“We never stopped apologising for that,” Palter said. He tapped his radio. “Report?”

“The FBI is moving in on the Progressive party headquarters,” one of his marines snapped. Palter kept one ear listening to him. “They’re arresting Wallace and all of his people… sir, there’s firing coming from the black union halls!”

“They must be killing them out of hand,” Palter muttered. “Sir, we have to stop this.”

“If we get out of this alive, the FBI is going to be ripped to shreds,” Truman muttered. An explosion billowed up from the official section of Washington. “What the hell was that?”

“Sir, someone blew up the Soviet Embassy,” the watcher said. “Sir, its madness out here.”

“I know,” Palter said, as he made the final turn and headed directly into the Future Embassy. He sent a signal ahead; the gates opened and he plunged in without stopping. “Over and out, for now.”

“It’s like a bloody fortress in here,” Truman said. “Can we retake Washington?”

“That’s rather up to our friends,” Palter said. “For now… we’re safe.”

* * *

The Secret Service man was carrying a pistol. It looked a toy next to the AK-47s that Buckley and his men were carrying. His air of grim determination completely failed to awe Buckley, who had seen worse from drill sergeants in the first war.

“What the hell are you people doing here?” The Secret Service man demanded. “Leave at once…”

He broke off as Buckley pointed his AK-47 at his chest. “This is your only choice,” Buckley said calmly. “You can surrender now, along with your men, or you can die.”

“Fuck you,” the man snapped, lifting his pistol. Buckley shot him once, the other men opened fire on the other Secret Service men. The battle was short, sharp, and preordained. Buckley lost only three men.

“Move in,” he snapped. “Gary, you secure the rear; Todd, Wally, you get the sides. Everyone else, you’re with me!”

He ran forward, crossing the lawn and kicking in the main doors with a grenade. The explosion shattered the doors and he forced his way forward, fanning the men around the ground floor. It was vital that it be secured before the upper floors could be taken.

“Secure the ground floor,” he snapped, and then a bullet cracked past him, striking one of his men. The Secret Service had rallied, sending men to fight him. He fired back madly; shooting bursts through the defenders, his men spreading out behind him. “Die, you idiots.”

“Grenade,” his second shouted, tossing a grenade up the stairs. The explosion shattered the stairs, blasting the hastily improvised barricade down and slaughtering the defenders. He ran forward, his men leap-hopping each other as they moved forward, using their grenades whenever the defenders built a barricade.

“The Oval Office,” his guide snapped. The final doors lay in front of them; the men fell quiet. Buckley stepped forward, watching for a trap, and pushed the door open gently with his weapon’s butt. It opened easily; the core of American power was at their mercy.

“You know, if you want to petition for redress of grievances, there are other ways to do it,” a man’s voice remarked. It was very familiar from the fireside radio chats he’d heard on the radio. It took them moments to connect the strong voice with the weak form sitting in a wheelchair, shaking his head sadly at them.

“President Roosevelt?” Buckley asked, stunned. Hardly anyone had known that Roosevelt was wheelchair-bound.

The dry voice was wracked with pain. “You were expecting Abraham Lincoln?” Roosevelt asked. You have to stop this!”

“You lead us to ruin,” Buckley’s aide snapped. “Why didn’t you send in the army to punish the niggers?”

“They had grievances against you too,” Roosevelt said. His voice was harsher, coming through pain. “You saw them as nothing, but inferiors, lynched them, raped them…”

He coughed. “I never wanted to abandon anyone,” he said, though hoarse breaths. “For America to progress, the entire people had to progress, even black folk. Yet it was hard; no matter what your fool of a general tells you, the President is not all-powerful. Press on one group, they press back. Tax the rich too highly, they go elsewhere and close factories. Tax the poor, who don’t have much money, and you get riots. Convince managers and unions to balance, instead of one crushing the other and destroying entire factories because of the demands.”

“My boss laid me off when he left the country,” one of Buckley’s men snapped. “You didn’t force him to give me a job.”

“And did you join a Union?” Roosevelt asked. He coughed; Buckley saw blood on his sleeve. “If you pay the employees too much, the employers have less money to invest in new materials and…”

His voice broke off. “Please,” he said, each word an effort. “Don’t destroy America and…”

He slumped in his wheelchair. By the time a doctor reached the White House, it was too late. President Roosevelt, President of the United States of America, was dead.

Chapter Forty: Twenty-Four Hours

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

24th June 1941

Hanover stared at McLachlan. “What the hell is happening in America?” He demanded. “They’re doing what?”

“It’s a coup,” McLachlan said. “They’ve confined our staff to the embassy.”

Hanover gaped at him. “I don’t believe it,” he said. “It’s not in the American tradition to have coups! They’re not some banana republic, are they?” McLachlan shook his head. “What’s happening over there?”

“I’m not quite sure,” McLachlan admitted. “All I know is that something went badly wrong in Washington, then a group attacked the White House… and then silence. Ambassador Quinn is panicking.”

“And we never had a sniff of anything,” Hanover said thoughtfully. “Shit.”

“Sir, you know how badly America has been suffering since the Transition,” McLachlan said. “This could be an attempt to prevent progress.”

Hanover nodded. “Perhaps,” he agreed. “So, what’s happening?”

“I don’t know, no one’s confessed to anything,” McLachlan said. “Our agents in place are reporting major confusion, but the coup masters haven’t shown their hand. There’s been no attempt to broadcast to the nation, or anything like that.”

“General Cunningham reported that General Patton is going spare,” Hanover said. “He was demanding that we ask the Canadians to tell us what’s going on.”

“Something’s gone off the rails somewhere, that’s for sure,” McLachlan said. “And there’s the radioactive debris in New York. Where the hell did that come from?”

“Our attack,” Hanover snapped. “We told them how to do it, for fuck’s sake!” His voice darkened. “Those blasted backbenchers!”

McLachlan scowled. The backbenches had staged a revolt, demanding that the British tell the Germans how to clean up a nuclear site, which had been done. As soon as the debris in New York had been checked, it had been proven to have come from a standard detonation signature from a British weapon, and only one had been used since the Transition.

Hanover paced angrily. “How bad is it going to be in New York?”

“It’s still burning,” McLachlan said. “The blast looked like a nuclear blast on the satellites. It levelled nearly three kilometres around ground zero, so that’s immense damage done to Manhattan and Jersey City. The death toll is going to be huge.” He made a face. “And, of course, there is the radioactive damage. It’s nowhere near as high as the attacks in Paris, or an neutron bomb attack, but a lot of people are going to be suffering in the future.”

“And the Soviets were involved,” Hanover said. “Well, well.”

“Apparently so,” McLachlan said. They exchanged glances. “Prime Minister, this is a weapon of mass destruction used against a civilian target, in one of our ally’s cities. Are we not obliged to retaliate?”

“Yes, but against whom?” Hanover asked. “The Russians or the Germans? If so, where do we hit?”

“The Russians,” McLachlan said. “They’re certainly the most guilty ones. It was their ship, after all.” They exchanged a second glance. “As for the target… Basra or Baghdad are both occupied by Russian troops, and they’ve purged most of the civilians from the cities. Either one would…”

“Ruin our relations with the Arabs,” Hanover said. “Tactically, yes; strategically, no. We need somewhere useful for strategic purposes.” He scowled. “Their oil wells, or their factories, might make good targets.”

“True,” McLachlan agreed. “What about that major staging post in Chechnya?”

“Still, its not a priority at the moment,” Hanover said. “The main priority is mounting Redemption before the Germans take advantage of the chaos in America.” He frowned. “They weren’t keen on moving it forward more than a few days, but if we launch it on the 28th we might get all of the deception plan in place first.”

Washington DC, USA

24th June 1941

Despite the summer heat, the darkness felt cold to the citizens of Washington, many of whom stayed home and prayed. The radio broadcast endless pleas for calm, but was unable to explain what was happening, partly because of the lack of clear leadership from the White House. Everyone knew, even though it had never been reported, that the White House had been attacked, but by whom?

Another crackle of gunfire echoed outside the Future Embassy. Ambassador King shuddered; the rebels – as he was starting to think of them – had moved up and tried to take the Embassy, but the reinforced Marines had held them off. A determined attack might have succeeded – or artillery could have been brought up from the federal armoury – but the rebels seemed curiously languid. King had been expecting them to be broadcasting demands for submission over all of the airwaves, but instead…

Instead, very little seemed to be happening. His spies in the city had reported an ongoing arresting spree, mainly communists, leftists, black union leaders… but nothing else. The treacherous Speaker of the House of Representatives, William Brockman Bankhead, had arrived at the White House – but nothing had come out of the centre of government.

“Something must have gone off the rails somewhere,” he muttered. “Any change?”

Palter shook his head. “No change at all,” he said. “Just small attacks against us… and some people going into the White House.”

King nodded. The waiting was terrible. “And the Internet?”

“We’re putting our story out now,” Palter said. “It seems to have had some affect, a lot of would-be plotters got lynched. Some other people, mainly the Governors, are sitting on their butts, waiting – I suspect – for clear signs of success.”

He scowled. “For the moment, the bastards hold the centres of power, and they’re not doing anything with them. Why?”

“I don’t know,” King said. He looked up at Truman. The Vice-President looked pale and wan. “We have to move soon, Colonel; we’re not in a good position here.”

Truman looked up at him. “Yes, Ambassador,” he said. “God only knows what they’re doing to the President.”

“They should have made him put a message out,” Palter said. He’d been studying coup techniques on King’s instructions. “An… abdication, in effect. Instead… we have silence and all the time we need to launch a counter-attack. It’s… odd.”

“It’s bloody frustrating,” King snapped. “What about Robinson?”

“His people are in position,” Palter said. “He said he could move at first light.”

King scowled. It was dawn, way too early for any serious activity. “Tell him to wait until the sun has risen, unless the situation changes radically,” he said. “I wish we’d bugged the White House; we’d know what was happening then.”

* * *

William Brockman Bankhead, Speaker of the House of Representatives, stared in horror at the body of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the man who had presided over the American political scene for so long. Beside him, MacArthur stared at the body as well, laid out on his bed.

“Where the hell is Hoover?” Bankhead snapped finally. “What happened to the President?”

“A heart attack,” MacArthur said. “According to his doctor” – they’d found the future citizen hiding in his rooms in the White House – “the man had a dicky heart. He was under a lot of stress recently and…”

“And we will be blamed for his death,” Bankhead snapped. It had been the single issue they’d argued over since arriving, late last night. Even a few hours sleep hadn’t made it look any better. “Where the hell is Hoover?”

MacArthur, not a coward by any means, no matter what was muttered about him when no one thought he could hear, flinched back. “He’s back at FBI headquarters, organising the round-up of communist sympathisers,” he said. “We have to move fast”

“But what do we tell them?” Bankhead asked sharply. “Do we tell them that the President is dead? Where the hell is Truman?”

“I don’t know,” MacArthur snapped back. “The FBI team that was meant to protect him” – he coughed – “reported that he escaped!”

“And those blasted Governors, even my Governor, are sitting on their hands,” Bankhead said. “What do we tell them?”

MacArthur sighed; Bankhead glared at him. He’d agreed to the plot because of the riots spreading through his native Alabama, but now they’d come so far… he’d almost lost his nerve. Nothing was going the way they’d planned it… and there was no sign of Truman.

A cough from the bespectacled FBI agent drew his attention. Agent Eastwood had been trained on the new-fangled computers in London; he was the closest thing the FBI had to an expert. Short and fat, he hung on in the FBI by the skin of his teeth – Hoover had come close to firing him more than once.

“Sirs, there is bad news,” he said. Both men glared at him. “Sirs, someone is putting out a pretty accurate version of what’s happened on the web.”

“Shit,” Bankhead swore. “What are they telling them?”

“That the New Deal’s enemies have taken the White House and intend to crush all the labour gains,” Eastwood said grimly. “Sir, there are riots going on in the South, and some very nasty incidents in…”

“Hellfire,” Bankhead swore, seeing his entire country starting to collapse around him. His dreams shattered. “What the hell do we do now?”

MacArthur glared at him. “We continue, of course,” he snapped. “It’s time we made a statement to the public. We can explain that Roosevelt and Truman were assassinated by communists, the same ones who blew hell out of New York, ok?”

Bankwood nodded grimly. MacArthur’s eyes were starting to flicker dangerously. “Of course,” he said. “Let’s do it now.”

* * *

Marine Lieutenant Jones Robinson knew just how dangerous the next step would be, and not just because of MacArthur’s troops, most of whom were white trash from the south. He wasn’t scared of them. The real danger, however, came from the citizens of Washington, who would see a black army attacking the White House. If they reached for their weapons, there would be a bloodbath. The best and brightest of Black Power, three hundred men armed with AK-47s and equipped with some other weapons from Jim Oliver’s warehouses, pitted against an army of unknown strength and power.

“Mount up,” he snapped, as the doors opened. Jim Oliver had provided them with enough trucks to move the army, but he knew that they would have to dismount near the White House; Lieutenant Bosco had provided them with images of the site. The bastards had dug into the grounds; it looked as if they were prepared to stand off tanks.

“A shame Oliver couldn’t provide us with any of those,” he muttered. He’d had some jeeps rigged up, as the Marines had done in Iraq, with armour, but if they had the new anti-tank rockets the jeeps would be lost quickly. “Let’s go,” he shouted. “Move out!”

The men responded quickly and well; he was pleased with them, particularly his grandfather. They boarded the trucks and moved out, the jeeps in the lead, heading down towards the White House. There was no traffic on the streets; the only bit of advice from the radios had been to ask people to stay off the roads. The handful of police on the streets gaped at them, saw their weapons, and decided that discretion was the better part of valour.

“They’ll have let the bastards know we’re coming,” Jackie said. Robinson shrugged. It had never been part of his plan to have surprise; he’d assumed that the coup plotters would have taken care to watch all the roads leading into Washington central. The first sign they saw of enemy opposition was the barricade across the road near the George Washington University.

“Fire,” Robinson snapped, as the jeeps lurched towards the barricade. Machine guns, welded onto the jeeps, poured fire into the barricade, shredding it with ease. “Everyone dismount, move out!”

His radio buzzed. “They’re moving up a column of troops from the White House,” Bosco said. “Permission to start sniping?”

“Granted,” Robinson said, as the firing began again. He smiled; the so-called troops would be picked off one by one by an invisible enemy, lacking computers that could track the bullets back to the sniper. “Forward!”

“Don’t you ever say anything else,” Jackie asked, tossing a grenade at the advancing troops, who seemed shocked to see armed black men coming their way. The explosion blasted the troops to the ground, blowing them apart. The force advanced, passing through the barricade, heading onwards to the White House.

“No, my drill sergeant was very hot on that,” Robinson snapped. “Bosco; what’s coming now?”

“I can’t see anything from the White house,” Bosco reported. “I’ve been picking off a number of officers, but I can’t see anyone important.”

“Hope someone is watching the FBI building,” Robinson muttered, as they passed where the World Bank would have been, in a different future. The White House had never been attacked in their timeline, not even by the terrorists. It stood ahead, gleaming with promise, even as the men lying in the bushes poured fire at them.

“Bosco, see how many of them you can pick off,” Robinson ordered. “Colonel, we need more snipers!”

“We’re working on it,” Palter said, through the radio. “They just got frisky outside here, Jones.”

Robinson hesitated. “Should we head to help you?”

“Fuck no,” Palter snapped. “You have to retake the White House.”

“Yes, sir,” Robinson said. An explosion billowed up from the White House gardens. “Bosco, was that you?”

“RPG shell,” Bosco said. “My only one.”

“We won’t waste it,” Robinson promised. “Forward!”

The assault team surged out of the street and into the gardens, forcing their way through opposition. “Surrender,” Robinson bellowed. “Surrender and we’ll let you live!”

There was no reply, just an increasing hail of fire from the windows. The snipers duelled it out, uncaring of the conflict below them, trading single shots for single shots. Robinson wasn’t worried; Bosco should have been well out of their range. More alarming were the shots that were hacking away at his men.

“In there,” he snapped, as one of his men brought up the bazooka. He targeted it on the rear and fired, blowing a hole in the side of the building. Robinson leapt forward, firing as he moved, forcing an entry into the house itself.

“We surrender,” a man shouted. Robinson glared at a middle-aged white man and his team, who were throwing down their weapons. “Don’t kill us, please…”

“Get down on the ground and stay down,” Robinson snapped. “If there is any resistance, we will kill you on the spot.”

He waited long enough for several of his men to take the prisoners into custody, and then pushed forward again. Resistance seemed to have been broken; more and more men surrendered as they realised they weren’t being shot on the spot. It was just like Iran had been; the first few to surrender had been testing the waters. A single shot rang out from upstairs, causing everyone to jump.

“Sir, that’s the Oval Office,” Jackie said. Robinson nodded; the door seemed to have been broken. He activated his helmet; two heat sources and one rapidly cooling one lay inside, well away from the door.

“Surrender or die,” Robinson bellowed. “Choose now!”

“We surrender,” a weak tired voice muttered. Robinson moved inside quickly; the treacherous Speaker and a young man, whose very air said computer nerd, lifted their hands as he pointed his gun at him. A body lay over the President’s desk; a single check revealed it to be General MacArthur.

“He took his own life,” the computer nerd said.

“Shut up,” Robinson snapped, as one of his men cried out. “What is it?”

“Sir, you have to see this,” Hobson said. Robinson moved into the next room and cursed; the body of President Roosevelt lay on the bed. For a long chilling moment, he thought that the President was asleep, and then he realised that there was no breathing. The President was dead.

“Round up everyone,” he ordered harshly. “I want this building secured before the new president arrives, now!”

* * *

Colonel Palter led the raid on FBI headquarters himself, once the people trying to attack the Future Embassy scattered. Resistance was almost non-existent; many of the FBI agents seemed to have disappeared. A quick and brutal search of the building revealed no sign of Hoover, or of his long-time ‘companion.’

Palter scowled as the first fire erupted in the records room. Thousands of FBI files were being burnt; he could only curse as FBI agents, under the guns of his men, fought to save what they could. The technology used to create the fires was modern, the question of where Hoover had gotten it a problem for another time. They burnt rapidly, despite all desperate men at gunpoint could do, and vanished into ashes.

He lifted his radio. “Ambassador, the bird has flown,” he said. “Sir, he’s destroyed his files.”

“The bastard must have realised that they were doomed,” King said. “What about the people Hoover rounded up?”

Palter put the question to one of the captives and recoiled at the answer. “The communists were shot,” he reported grimly. “Most of the black unionists were jailed, apparently for show trials later.”

“Understood,” King said. “Let them out, then secure FBI headquarters and take all of his remaining personnel into custody. We’ll sort them all out later.”

* * *

Harry Truman stood in the centre of the Oval Office, wondering what had gone so badly wrong with the plan. He hadn’t expected to have been selected as Vice-President, and now he was the President. He shook his head sadly; no matter what everyone said, he would have been happier with Roosevelt still alive.

The buck stops here, he thought, and felt cold terror spreading through his veins. Hoover – the twisted little fairy – had escaped; MacArthur had taken his own life. There had been thousands of things to deal with, before the entire country collapsed. For one thing, Congress – the members who had escaped Hoover’s premature purge – had been debating a declaration of war on Soviet Russia, and he was expected to support it.

He sat down in the old seat. Roosevelt had had little sympathy for him and had tried to keep him out of the limelight; it had been part of the old bastard’s style. Was anyone truly capable of handing the Presidency under such circumstances? Could the country be held together?

“Mr President, we’re ready for your broadcast now,” Lieutenant Bosco reported. Truman nodded; Bosco was in line for the highest award he could bestow, along with Robinson and his men, who would represent another problem for him. They would want full civil rights – and the need to fight the Axis made giving them those rights urgent – but some elements of Congress would fight against them, tooth and nail.

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” he said. The White House no longer felt the same; it would need a full refit and some better defences. He smiled; perhaps Robinson would consider becoming the near head of his close-protection detail. Mentally composing his speech, he followed the Marine to the radio room, linked to the big transmitters near Washington.

“Speak when the red light goes on,” the technician said. Truman nodded and waited for the light, preparing to speak.

“My fellow Americans,” he said, as the light came on. “Rumours of my death have proven grossly exaggerated. It is with heavy heart, however, that I must confirm to you the death of President Roosevelt, killed by the coup plotters who wanted to shatter our country and take us back to the dark years before the civil war. Those men, allies of the Germans and the Russians in spirit, would have sparked off a civil war for their own selfish benefit.”

He spoke on, growing in confidence. He warned the implicated governors of the people in their states who would rise up against them. He promised a conditional amnesty for those who might have taken part, as long as they confessed and resigned from public life, and branded Hoover as a fugitive and a wanted traitor.

“We have suffered badly in the last year,” he said finally. “Together, however, as one united country, we will fight the war against the evil of Germany and Russia, who attacked us so treacherously only two days ago. Goodnight… and God bless America.”

Chapter Forty-One: What Price Redemption?

Fuhrerbunker

Berlin, Germany

24th June 1941

Field Marshal Kesselring nodded politely to Himmler and saluted Hitler as he entered the main conference room. The loss of the main base in Norway, even though new German forces were inching their way towards the American positions through Sweden, had alarmed the Fuhrer, whose paranoia had risen to new heights.

“I have urgent information,” he said, before Hitler could begin an hour-long monologue. Few in the bunker could bear to listen to Hitler’s monologues, except a few die-hard SS men and Ribbentrop, who never had original thoughts of his own. Hitler, unfortunately, had too many.

“The Norwegians have revolted against our remaining positions?” Himmler asked. There were a handful of Germans along the Norwegian-Swedish border, nervously awaiting their reinforcements. “The Americans have left the war?”

Kesselring shook his head. Whatever had happened in America – and even the BBC didn’t seem to know – it hadn’t affected the American position in Norway. They had secured Oslo and were currently cleaning up the mess. Once they had managed to clear the fjords of mines and other unpleasant surprises, they would be able to resupply and make their way into Sweden, ignoring Swedish protests.

He scowled. The Russian attack on New York had only annoyed the Americans still further. They might head across Sweden; the British seemed to have had other ideas. He knew what they were doing, and God only knew how much time they had left. They’d certainly been unable to crack the British encryption methods, even with the information that the SS had obtained.

“Mein Fuhrer, the British are planning a landing in Greece,” he said, and had the pleasure of watching Hitler’s jaw drop. The Fuhrer hadn’t expected trouble from Greece; the Greeks had been fairly quiet recently. “They have been spending the last week or so systematically destroying the defences around Athens, using their new bases on Crete.”

He waved a hand at the map. “Mein Fuhrer, they have been building up their forces on Crete, some of their Marines and army units,” he said, silently blessing the SS officer who’d remained on Crete, using a sea cable to make his reports. “Mein Fuhrer, once they take Greece, they can supply resistance fighters all across the Balkans.”

Hitler’s brow furrowed. His doctrine, the nazi system he’d been largely responsible for inventing, considered the Greeks slightly above the Italians and far below the Germans. Common sense and future history pointed out that resistance activities were threats he could hardly ignore.

“More the reinforcements slated for the Middle East front to Greece,” Hitler ordered finally. “Once there, they are to secure Greece; we can hardly afford to lose another country.”

“Jawohl, Mein Fuhrer,” Kesselring said. “I can only hope that the reinforcements get there in time.”

HMS Warspite

Crete, Mediterranean Sea

26th June 1941

Admiral Somerville studied his new fleet with a mixture of dread and eagerness. Apart from Warspite, there were two other battleships, and almost every Contemporary cruiser or destroyer that had been left behind when their Britain vanished, and seventeen modern ships. It was the most powerful force he’d ever commanded and – not counting Admiral Turtledove’s fleet – the most powerful force on the planet.

He grinned like a schoolchild as he studied the display. Nearly every unit in the Mediterranean and the Middle East would be taking part in Redemption, Rommel’s brainchild. Thirty freighters and Marine transports lurked away from the battle fleet, and dozens of aircraft waited on Crete and Egypt, waiting for the command to transport their paratroopers to the target. He shuddered; it was the first time that they’d tangled with the Germans when the enemy had a good supply capability, even if the RAF was going to mess it up pretty badly.

“Sir, the captains are ready for you,” Tom said. Somerville nodded and stalked into the briefing room, where the captains waited.

“Good morning,” Somerville said, as they saluted. “As you may be aware, the plan was to hit Greece.” They nodded. More than a few of them had privately raised concerns about the plan. “I’m here to tell you that that was a bluff, a lie calculated to distract German attention, seeing that we could hardly count on our build-up here being unnoticed, could we?”

He activated the display and watched their expressions. “This is our target,” he said. “It’s the weakest link in their logistics chain, and we’re going to take it from them.” He scowled. “It’s not going to be easy – and I was here the last time we tried something like this – but with the new weapons we can tear up the German lines of communication.

“Gallipoli,” he said, as the map changed. “The Germans have to tranship through Istanbul, and we’re going to take the city. I have it on good authority that the Turks will switch sides as soon as they see us, but it’s not a pre-requisite for success.” He chucked. “For some reason, the Germans have limited the number of Turkish Battalions near their own capital, so even if the Turks fight against us we will have the advantage. Even so…

“The estimate of German forces includes one division near Istanbul, a second one that is currently moving into Greece, but they may send it back, and two divisions dug into the Gallipoli peninsula. Known Turkish forces include three infantry divisions at Gallipoli, defending the straits, and one more in reserve.” He frowned. “Unfortunately, we’re going to have to clobber them as well.”

He adjusted the display again. “The plan is basically simple,” he said. “The fleet will advance towards Gallipoli under cover of darkness, while the RAF will hammer the Germans into the ground. Every remaining cruise missile in the region is going to be used to utterly wreck their communications network; we’ve been told not to waste it. By the time the Germans work out what’s happening, we should have made it through the night, and the Marines will be landing on Gallipoli.”

Another slide. “We have been promised the help of a heavy bomber, which will use SBS men who will be infiltrated into Gallipoli to target JDAM weapons, blasting through the defences and allowing the Marines to land. We have to take them at a run, gentlemen” – he nodded at Brigadier Hampton – “and allow them no time to recover.”

He scowled. “I’m sure I don’t have to remind you of what happened the last time someone tried this,” he said. “I was there; many of you will have only read about it in history books.” There were a few grim chuckles. “We cannot get stalled; we have to get the Germans out and the Turks out, before they can muster a counterattack.

“The second prong will be landed at the end of the Gallipoli peninsula,” he said. “That’s the main attack force; the Marine division and the modern Army units. They are going to drive to Istanbul, while the fleet clears the passage through the Gallipoli peninsula. Once the fleet sails up to Istanbul, they can surrender and join us, or we’ll reduce their city to rubble.”

* * *

HMS Warspite shuddered slightly as her engines came to life, pushing her away from Crete. She hadn’t been docked on the large island, but some of her crew had been allowed shore leave; the Germans hadn’t attempted to toss them back off Crete.

“This is going to be tricky,” he muttered, as the fleet slid through the warm waters of the Aegean Sea. “All this way, on the advice of a damned German.”

“One of their better generals,” Tom pointed out. He passed Somerville a mug of coffee. “We can do this.”

“Never doubted it,” Somerville said. “Given whatever’s going on in America, we have to move quickly, before the Germans take advantage of the confusion.” He scowled. “It’s just the last part of the plan I’m worried about; if we cut off the Germans, they might decide to fight to the end.”

Over Turkey

26th June 1941

Dusk was falling over Turkey as the Harrier jump jet crossed the coastline, heading towards Konya. The Germans were moving an armoured division north, taking it back to Greece, and at the rate it was moving it might be too close to the attack point for comfort by the time the Marines went in.

Flying Officer Mick Eccleston checked the scope as the Harrier swooped high over mountains and fields, where Turks laboured under German semi-control. There was no sign of airborne opposition; HARM missiles had already been launched against the handful of German radar sets. Eccleston frowned; the daily information briefings warned that the Germans were constantly improving their sets, even if they were nowhere near the capabilities of a British set from 2015.

Bastards must have moved onto transistors by now, he thought grimly, as the dark German vehicles came into view. Puffs of black smoke appeared below him as the German anti-aircraft vehicle began trying to bring him down; he started evasive action, just in case. Losing a Harrier to such a piece of clapped out junk would be embarrassing.

“Control, launching FAE bomb now,” he said. The Germans had no counter to the bomb, even though they were very aware of what it could do; the men abandoned their vehicles and ran, not fast enough.

“Bomb detonation,” he said, as the wave of fire blasted out over the massive German force. The Harrier jumped forward as the weight of its first bomb was removed, he came around to see if the second bomb was required. Some German vehicles had survived. “Launching second bomb now.”

“Good work, Eagle,” the AWACS said. “Permission to return to the tanker.”

“Thank you, control,” Eccleston said. “Returning now.”

Gallipoli Peninsula

27th June 1941

The water was icy-cold near ANZAC cove, where an Austrian force had come to grief twenty-four years ago. The darkness would blind German and Turkish sentries, but the black suit Corporal Tom Williams wore contained night-vision gear that was literally decades ahead of anything the Germans might have deployed. He pulled himself out of the water, admiring how the suit changed colour to match its surroundings, and tapped his radio, sending a single burst back to the submarine.

Am ashore, it read.

Carefully, he pulled himself up the rocks and peered over onto the main peninsula. An infrared scan revealed no humans nearby; he slipped neatly across the peninsula without seeing anyone, finally reaching high ground and a German lookout point, on top of a small hill.

Idiots, he muttered, as he slipped closer. There were only two Germans present; one asleep, the other playing endless games of cards. He shrugged; Gallipoli probably wasn’t as important as the Middle East, or Norway, but surely the Germans could have spared some better men for the task of guarding it. The awake German spun around as he slipped into the lookout, but never made a sound as Williams shot him with the silent needle gun. The asleep German never woke up as his throat was being cut.

“I’m on the lookout point,” he subvocalised, picking up one of the German hats and placing it on his head. As long as he looked German in the darkness, they wouldn’t notice that his binoculars were hardly German standard-issue, but something far more complicated. With infrared sensors, picking out the positions of the German and Turkish positions was easy.

“Understood,” the commander said. “We’re sending in the rest of the team now.”

Williams watched as more dark-garbed men slipped up onto the peninsula, spreading out. Dawn was threatening to arise, and with it the Germans would become more alert. Quickly, he returned to watching the Germans, plotting out their positions and…

“The Admiral has given the order,” the commander said. “Have you targeted everywhere?”

“Yes, sir,” Williams subvocalised.

“Air strike inbound,” the commander said. “Get down and stay down.”

* * *

Captain Bertha Demimonde, RAF Reserve, sniggered to herself as the flight of converted cargo planes headed across the Aegean to Gallipoli. Unlike many others from Britain, she was enjoying the strange new world after the Transition, and her recall was a delight. Her plane, a cargo craft had had been used to deliver goods to Europe, had been converted into a bomber – it now carried twenty JDAMs.

“Bomber group, targets are being designated now,” the AWACS said. Electronic signals flashed between the group, designating targets for the bombers; only two of her JDAMs were assigned to targets.

“Understood,” she said, glancing out of the window. She’d never visited Turkey; Gallipoli didn’t look like much to her, just a muddy-brown strip of mountains and hollows. In the dawn, there was very little to see from her height.

“Bombs away,” the AWACS said. Two of her JDAMs fell on their command, laser-guided weapons heading down to Gallipoli. She watched; explosions flickered among the mountains. The tip of the peninsula had been designated for the single MOAB; that explosion was massive even from her distance.

“I guess that they’ll be complaining that we remodelled it,” she muttered, as she put the transport into a holding orbit. As new targets appeared, her weapons would be deployed automatically. It was a strange way to fight a war.

* * *

Admiral Somerville gasped as the MOAB struck the peninsula. The explosion was awesome; he thought that the entire peninsula would be destroyed for a long chilling moment. It was hard to imagine that anyone would have survived; the sudden disappearance of some of the telemetry indicated that some of the SBS hadn’t been lucky.

“Sir, we lost three of the troopers,” Tom reported. “The others are providing coordinates for follow-up strikes.”

“Order the planes to continue the attack,” Somerville said. It was astonishing; Warspite’s main guns couldn’t deliver such a battering. For the first time, he truly grasped that the era of the battleship was over. “What about the Marines?”

“Brigadier Hampton reports that they’re ready to move in,” Tom said. “Orders?”

“England expects every man to do his duty,” Somerville said. “That’s all.”

* * *

The fleet of landing craft approached the beach, carrying their Marines and their equipment, following the lights of the inserted teams. Bigger planes roared overhead, dropping paratroops onto Turkish soil, coordinating their efforts with Brigadier Hampton’s force.

“Sir,” Captain Manuel Amos snapped. “We have managed to establish a beachhead. The Germans are further along the peninsula, still reeling from the air attacks.”

“Excellent,” Hampton snapped. “Did we break them?”

“Don’t know,” Amos snapped. “They must have taken a pasting!”

“True,” Hampton agreed. He scowled as the Marines ran past, establishing a first defence line. “Drones?”

Corporal Wallace saluted. “Sir, we have coverage for as far as five miles, as well as access to live feed from the satellites. The Germans seem to be reeling.”

Hampton nodded as the first tanks rolled out of the transports. The 1st Royal Marine Division was landing, an awesome combination of firepower and mobility. Challenger tanks ambled up onto Turkish soil; he checked the map quickly, the Germans were on very bad terrain for tanks.

“Order the 3rd Reconnaissance Company to check it out,” he snapped, as the company formed up further along the beach. The Scorpion and Scimitar vehicles should be enough to handle any German resistance. “Attach an infantry group to escort them, just in case.”

“Aye, sir,” Corporal Wallace barked. Hampton headed quickly along the beach, watching as the sergeants and NCOs formed the men up, heading away from the beach. He smiled; the Germans would have been very capable of pushing them back into the sea, whatever their technological inferiorities, if they’d caught them unloading, but it looked as if they’d escaped that fate.

“Bring the main tank groups forward,” he ordered, as his command vehicle drove up to meet him. He wasn’t sure that he liked having a command vehicle, but it was the only way to coordinate his force; the Marines had learnt many lessons from their involvement in Iraq and later battles.

“Aye, sir,” Corporal Wallace said. “Sir, I think the Germans are aware that something’s up; we have reports of German aircraft rising from Greece.”

“I think they would have noticed the loss of an entire set of divisions,” Hampton muttered. “What about the holdouts?”

A buzz of firing echoed over the rocks for a long moment. “Sir, the 3rd Reconnaissance Company is reporting that the Germans want to surrender. They seem to be rather stunned, sir.”

“I’m not surprised,” Hampton said, as Harrier jets roared overhead. “Inform the air defence component that they are cleared to engage German aircraft if they pose a threat.”

“Aye, sir,” Corporal Wallace said. “Sir, the Harriers are kicking the shit out of them, if you’ll pardon my French, sir!”

* * *

The Royal Marine Armoured Brigade, led by the 1st Armoured Infantry Battalion, carefully advanced eastwards, hiding under the coverage of the drones. The blitzkrieg was proceeding slower than they’d expected; a handful of Germans had set up positions and fought desperately against the British. Turkish forces were not in evidence; they seemed to have vanished.

“I wonder if we killed them all,” Captain Yates muttered, as the Challenger II advanced, poking its way towards Istanbul. After losing a Scimitar to a German anti-tank weapon, years ahead of its time, they’d started to use the Challenger’s as scouts; they were still utterly invulnerable.

“Or perhaps they’re under arrest by the Germans,” Corporal Benton suggested. The driver of the Challenger adjusted their course slightly as the mine detector reported mines ahead. “They don’t seem to have invested in their defences.”

“They were counting on us not being capable of such an operation, according to the General,” Yates said. The tank rocked as the mine-clearing vehicle went into action; mines exploded all around them. “Blast it!”

“The drones report another German force ahead of us,” Benton snapped. “HQ is ordering us to advance faster.”

“Can they not see the mines?” Yates snapped. “We’re moving as fast as we can.”

The minefield completed its detonation and the tanks rumbled forwards. Yates gunned the engine as much as he dared, pushing the tank forward towards the German lines. Explosions billowed up ahead of them as the Germans opened fire with field guns, clanging off the Challenger’s armour.

“Return fire,” Benton insisted.

“One moment,” Yates said, carefully targeting the main gun. “Firing!”

The Challenger jumped as a shell blasted out of its main gun and slammed into the German ammunition supply. The other tanks opened fire, destroying the German lines in a shattering crescendo of explosions.

“The golden turrets and minuets of Istanbul lie open to us,” Benton proclaimed. “Onwards, Christian soldiers…”

“We’re not allowed to say that, these days,” Yates said, and then rather spoiled the effect by singing along with him. It wouldn’t be long now, one way or the other.

Chapter Forty-Two: Turkish Delight

Ankara, Turkey

28th June 1941

The Germans hadn’t exactly insisted on garrisoning Ankara, the Turkish capital. They had insisted on stationing an infantry division, Waffen-SS, outside the capital, merely as a pointed reminder to the Turks of the price of non-cooperation. The Turkish Government, utterly dependent upon German imports and aware of the dangers of German and Russian invasion, had been forced to withdraw many of their own units away from the capital, leaving the Germans in sole command of the field.

Oily smoke drifted across the city as the remains of the Waffen-SS division burnt. The British aircraft had struck at it the day before, using a horrific bomb that had burnt them in a tidal wave of burning fuel. The stench was appalling; the smell of burning bodies drifted across the city, forcing the citizens to cover their mouths as they went about their daily business.

President Ismet Inönü studied the message he’d received from the British. It had been clear and to the point; join us and throw out the Germans, or without your help your country will become a battleground for the next few months. He scowled; he had great faith in his men, but he also knew the crushing power of the Germans. Nearly half a million Germans had passed through Turkey to reach the Middle East – promising the Turks Mosul in exchange for their gunpoint cooperation – and the British didn’t have anything like as many troops. Except…

Except that the German forces across Turkey had been hammered. Turkish forces had been left alone – except near Gallipoli – and the German defenders of the entry to the Black Sea had been smashed. Their presence, an offence to Turkish pride, had been removed; only a handful of Germans and a Turkish force stood between the British and Istanbul. Any attempt to bring up field guns, as they had done during the last war, was smashed from the air.

“We could turn on the Germans in our motherland,” Marshal Fevzi Cakmak said. The Chief of the Army Staff had always feared the German threat. “That would not be difficult.”

“And then we would be at war against the Germans,” Inönü said. “Can we defeat the ones left in our country? The British are not to be trusted.”

“They have granted independence to North Africa,” Sukru Saracoglu, Foreign Minister, pointed out. He had always been pro-western; the Germans had demanded his removal on two separate occasions. “The choice is between allowing the Germans to turn our nation into a battleground, and capturing our fighting men in Iraq, or on gambling that the British mean what they say.”

“They are also allied with the Americans,” Cakmak said. “The Americans have stated that this is a war for democracy, not imperialism.”

They exchanged long calculating looks. They were not exactly friends, but they knew that they could rely on each other. “We support the British,” Inönü said. “Marshal, can we round up the Germans in our homeland quickly?”

“They are not at an advantage in our terrain,” Cakmak said. “Yes, we can do it, but we have to strike soon or the British will take Istanbul and we will have no bargaining power at all.”

Inönü nodded. It was ironic that Turkey was depending upon British help; he remembered that the British and the French had proposed using Turkish airbases to attack the Soviet Union. They’d rejected that out of hand; the Allies could not protect Turkey from Stalin. Except, perhaps, they could now. Inönü had seen the devastation after the nuclear strike and it had chilled him to the bone.

“Then get the troops moving,” Inönü ordered. “The forces in Iraq are to stay where they are; they are not to engage the Germans unless fired upon.” He scowled. “if we are to betray them, we could at least take care to avoid making them even more pissed off at us.”

5km west of Istanbul

Turkey

28th June 1941

Standartenfuehrer Kaiser had never trusted the Turks. They were ugly and dark-skinned, reassembling Italians more than the superhuman Germans. Their women were ugly and hid themselves behind enveloping ropes, hiding everything, but their eyes, except when watched by a member of the police. It made no sense to him; in his experience the police watched for indecent exposure, not the other way around.

He chuckled. The women were nothing to write home about in bed; they protested endlessly, even if they accepted the payments from the SS men afterwards. They went on and on about their God, even though their own government was attacking their religion and on and on…

He scowled. The Turks were untermensch, sub-humans, and the sooner Turkey was cleansed of their filth, the better. He shouted orders at his own people, and the countless Turks, commanding them to work faster on the defence line. The British were probing their way towards the city, and he hadn’t wanted to fight in a city. The British – an enemy to be proud of – were being more daring than he remembered from the Battle of France; there, they had fought bravely, but had had very bad leadership, nothing at all like his own people.

I wanted to capture Rommel, he thought. He’d requested that his own force be assigned to the Middle East, but instead the SS had sent them to Gallipoli. He smiled; maybe the headquarters had known what they were doing, although if they’d warned him of a British attack…

“Herr Standartenfuehrer, the British are closing in on us,” Oberscharfuehrer Jung reported. “Scouts report a Panzer column, less than a mile away.”

“They move quick, don’t they?” Kaiser asked cheerfully, feeling the respect for a worthy foe. He glared over at the Turks who should be handling the World War One-era field guns. “What the hell are they doing?”

“Who knows what untermensch talk amongst themselves?” Oberscharfuehrer Jung said, who’d served with Kaiser long enough to know the required answer. “I shall force them into servicing the guns.”

He headed off. Kaiser lifted his binoculars and peered west, until a gunshot echoed out behind him. He spun around, to see Oberscharfuehrer Jung’s body falling backwards, with his head missing. He had only seconds to realise that the Turks were turning on the Germans, before one of them shot him neatly through the head.

* * *

The Challenger picked up speed as it headed along the road. It wasn’t a very good road, but it was good enough for the massive tank, and the Germans seemed to have stopped their tiny attacks. Captain Yates wasn’t relaxing; it reminded him way too much of Iran, when the defenders had let the Americans and British into their country, and then tried to cut off their supply lines.

“Captain, up ahead,” Benton said. Yates peered through the range finder, to see a Turkish man waving a white flag. “They want to surrender.”

“Humm,” Yates said, who’d been expecting trouble. The satellites had reported the defences; the plan had been to bomb it just before the tanks arrived. He tapped the radio. “All tanks, hang back; we’re going in.”

“We?” Benton asked, but he gunned the engine forward, heading for the Turk. He was unarmed, wearing a fez and a basic army uniform. “I think he’s a colonel.”

“Is he?” Yates asked, as the tank stopped, a few meters from the Turk. A weapon swung around to point at him; his dark skin paled. Yates keyed the outside microphone. “Explain yourself!”

“We wish to… surrender,” the Turk said, in very bad English. “We killed the” – the next word wasn’t in English, but it sounded unpleasant – “and we have been ordered to mate with you.”

“I really hope that that’s a translation error,” Yates muttered, calling for a translator to drive in on a jeep. Minutes later, a jeep raced up from the main force, carrying three men. There was a long conversation in Turkish. “Well?”

“The Turks have turned on the Germans,” the interpreter said. “He wants to ally with us.”

“That’s good, but we can’t have them at our back,” Yates said. “What did the Brigadier have to say?”

There was a long pause as they radioed for orders. “The Brig wants us to take them into custody,” Yates said finally. “We can’t risk having them at our back until we know they can be trusted.”

There was a second argument in Turkish. “He’s not happy about it,” the interpreter said finally.

“Boo fucking hoo,” Yates snapped. “Those are our orders, and for once they make good sense.”

“He says that the force will surrender provided they get good treatment,” the interpreter said finally. “Can you promise them that on your word as an officer?”

“Of course,” Yates said impatiently. The interpreter translated that for the Turk, who headed back over the hills. Minutes later, thousands of Turks arrived, almost twenty thousand who had been press-ganged into defending against the British.

“Fuck me,” Benton breathed.

“I guess they really hate the Germans,” Yates said. He adjusted the radio. “Sir, we need some help to set up a POW camp.”

“It’s on its way,” the radio said. “As soon as it arrives, you head on to Istanbul.”

Führerbunker

Berlin, Germany

28th June 1941

“You have failed us,” the Fuhrer bellowed. “Traitor!”

Field Marshal Kesselring could only hang his head in shame. The sudden treachery of the Turks had completely torn open whatever hope there was of holding the supply lines to General Heinz Guderian, in the Middle East. Nearly half a million soldiers were in the Middle East, a disaster fully comparable to the Battle of Tannenberg in 1914. Unless Turkey could be recovered…

“Stalin will be at our throats,” Hitler bellowed. “He’ll take the territory that we have gained and use it for his own puny system.”

Himmler coughed. “Is there any way to salvage the situation?” He asked. “It can’t be as bad as it looks.”

Kesselring blinked at him. Support from the Reichsführer-SS tended to come with a price tag attached. “We have to reopen the supply lines,” he said. “The only way to do that is to order Guderian to attack Turkey, assuming that we can get the message through.” Hitler’s face twisted; they’d lost landline contact with Guderian as soon as Istanbul had fallen. The British jamming was preventing them from making radio contact.

“We could send orders through the lines through Russia,” Himmler said. He scowled; the lines through Russia might have been intact, but they were hardly secure. The NKVD would be reading each and every signal that went through them.

“The forces assembled in Greece could be used to launch a counter-attack,” Kesselring said. “If we re-take Istanbul, we could hammer the Turks into submission. We have had some success with air attacks, even through the British have given our aircraft a hammering, and we could pour everything into a relief effort.”

Hitler glared at him through strange eyes. “You had better succeed,” he said finally. “There are thousands of Germans depending upon you.”

Ten Downing Street

London, United Kingdom

28th June 1941

The war room was full again, with the Leader of the Opposition and several other politicians, all showing a united front. Hanover scowled at them all; they would be quite happy to claim credit for the victory, but they would be more than happy to discard blame for the defeats, should there be any.

“The Marines have successfully secured Istanbul,” Stirling said, using a laser pointer to indicate places on the map. “The Turkish switch of sides sealed their defeat; a lot of Germans were killed and others surrendered to us. The supply lines to the Middle East are cut.”

He adjusted the display. “The Turkish Government has requested our help on a number of different matters,” he said.

“They seem to feel that we owe them something,” Admiral Grisham muttered, from her seat. “As if the Germans could have done as much as they did without their support.”

“Enough,” Hanover said calmly. “Major, continue.”

“The Turks basically want us to help defend them against a German or Soviet offensive, rearm their army with modern weapons, give them economical support as the Germans will cut off their exports, accept their exports without tariffs and, most important, get rid of the Germans to the south.”

“Dear God, it’s like dealing with the French,” McLachlan said. “Charles, how much of that demand are we going to laugh at?”

There were some chuckles. “We’re going to have to help them defend themselves,” Hanover said. “As for re-arming them and giving them economic support, they can prove themselves first. General?”

“The 1st Marine Division has been dug into Istanbul,” Cunningham said. “Thanks to the RAF, it should be at least a week before the Germans can launch a counter-attack, which will give us time to establish the follow-up forces on the eastern side of the Sea of Marmara. Whatever the Turkish position – and I’m certain that they’ll demand that we liberate their western countrymen – we can prevent resupply, unless the Russians ship supplies to the Germans.”

Stirling nodded. “Rommel wants to wait a day, and then launch the offensive,” he said. “Apparently, that would be long enough for General Guderian to realise how hopeless his position is – as you know, Rommel’s plan was to try to convince them to come over to our side en masse.”

Hanover nodded. “He got this much right,” he said. “We’ll trust him a little further.” He looked around the room. “Any other business?”

General Eisenhower coughed. “There was an attack on New York,” he said. “You made certain guarantees to us – are they to be honoured?”

Hanover scowled. He’d hoped to discuss this in a private setting. “You refer to the attack on New York, which was done by a weapon of mass destruction,” he said, reminding everyone what the stakes were. “Opinions?”

“We are obliged to reply with a nuclear warhead,” McLachlan said, picking up his role perfectly. “There seems to be no doubt, but it was Stalin and his evil empire that launched the attack on New York.”

Barton coughed loudly. “How can we be certain of it?” He asked. “Could it not be Hitler pretending to be Stalin?”

Bastard, Hanver thought coldly. He might have shared Barton’s doubts, but it suited him to blame Stalin. “The blast was centred on a Soviet ship,” he said, repeating what he knew Barton already knew. “The weapon – an entire ship stuffed with explosives – came from Russia.”

“President Truman” – there was a slight sensation around the room as that news sunk in – “has formally declared war on Russia,” Eisenhower said. “This war is very popular and demanded in Congress; New York’s senators were very keen on it. The death toll is believed to be over one hundred thousand.”

There were sounds of horror. “The President has demanded, under the Weapon of Mass Destruction Protocols of the Anglo-American alliance, that you target a Russian city in revenge,” Eisenhower said. “This strike must be punished.”

There was a long uncomfortable pause. Barton broke it. “General… do you have any idea of the suffering a single nuclear weapon can inflict?” He asked. “We are talking about a crime without peer in this new world.”

“We have been hurt badly,” Eisenhower snapped, rounding on Barton. “We are asking you to keep your agreements.”

Hanover scowled at Barton. Not going to make this easy, are you? He thought coldly. “General, we made an agreement,” he said. “We have a target which will also be of prime importance for Redemption.”

He nodded at Stirling, who altered the display. “This is the main Russian supply centre and reinforcement centre,” Stirling said. “At this point, they run out of their main railway lines and have to cut down, a problem made worse by our attacks on their lines of supply. There are upwards of a million Russian soldiers here, along with some of their latest construction in armoured vehicles.”

Hanover nodded. “While this base lacks a civilian population, it is also the centre of operations for ethnic cleansing operations, as the Russians know that the Chechens will pose a threat to their empire in the future. If this base is destroyed, the Russian forces in the Middle East will be forced to fall back on their own resources, rather than pressing onwards in alliance with the Germans.”

He thought rapidly as Eisenhower considered it. He had wondered if Redemption could be expanded, but had thought better of it. As it was, there were far too many weak places in Redemption for a chess grandmaster to be comfortable with, and there was no opposition figure like Rommel for the Russians. Trotsky was a possibility, but he was needed in Moscow.

“You will not hit one of their cities,” Eisenhower said flatly. “The President will be most upset.”

“The President would be more unhappy when history blames him for the strike,” Noreen Adam pointed out wryly.

“History is in the future and dry dusty books,” Eisenhower said. “I assume that we can count on your help to develop our own nuclear weapons?”

“We already have an agreement along those lines,” Hanover said, knowing that it had already been broken. “Those are matters for me to discuss with the new President, once he’s settled in to his office and cleaned up the place.”

Eisenhower nodded. Patton had been ordered to send back several infantry divisions – the screaming had almost been heard in London – and operations in Norway had been suspended for the time being. British air raids were keeping the Germans from getting frisky again, but everyone knew it was just a matter of time before the Germans and the Russians forced the Swedes into the Axis.

“Then the Russian target will at least punish them,” Eisenhower said. “Thank you.”

Hanover scowled. “I wish I could say that you’re welcome,” he said. “Kenneth?”

Barton scowled at him. Hanover understood; the Liberal Democrats would be tarred with the same brush. Even if Barton made a real fuss, he would still be blamed – at least partly – by some of his party’s extremists.

“I wish it wasn’t necessary,” Barton said, and paced out of the room as the meeting broke up. Hanover chucked once to himself, and then went to order the nuclear strike.

“It’s about to get very hot in Russia,” he muttered to himself. “And now we’re dependent upon a German to pull off a great victory. What has the world come to?”

Chapter Forty-Three: The End of the Affair

Zek Base

Nr Grozny, Chechnya

29th June 1941

It was called Zek Base by its workers, the thousands of unfortunates who had been condemned by future history; a massive complex for servicing an advancing Russian army. The Zeks, the slave workers, would do the work, while the NKVD carried out its mission in Chechnya, exterminating the native population. Thousands had been enslaved and forced to work to death, blasting the roads and rail lines through the Caucuses and creating a logistics framework that provided Zhukov’s army with supplies and new regiments. Thousands of soldiers were based there, awaiting their passage down to Iran, or on leave enjoying the minuscule comforts of Zek Base. The only thing the base had was enslaved women for prostitution, but Zhukov had insisted; leave was apparently good for the enlisted men.

After all, the future said so.

The Trident warhead detonated over Zek Base at midnight, a time chosen with malice aforethought. Microseconds after it had detonated, the expanding fireball ravaged over the base, literally wiping it from the face of the Earth. Russians, slaves, Zeks… all perished in the blast. Although the supply lines didn’t entirely depend upon Zek Base, Zhukov’s army had suddenly lost most of their stockpile in one massive explosion.

In the future, the Muslims of the steppes, those who survived, would tell tales of the day Allah smote the infidels with his fire. The day became a holy day, one hotly disputed by almost every other Islamic sect, until the truth came out, years later.

Irbid, Jordan

29th June 1941

Gunter Jagar, now breveted as a Captain in the Bundeswehr, was finding life as General Rommel’s assistant, aide and general bodyguard more than confusing. Rommel simply refused to behave as he thought a general should; far from staring at maps and planning movements, Rommel was often to be found cruising around in his mobile command vehicle, or his personal CV-22, trying to direct attacks in person. Whenever Rommel arrived, the Bundeswehr bent over backwards to obey, sending new and dangerous attacks against the Waffen-SS.

Jagar glared at the map that had been spread out on the table in the middle of the small tent. Rommel himself stood at one end, giving orders to Colonel Lehmann, one of the Panzer commanders, through the radio telephone. The Waffen-SS, several divisions of the bastards, had been placed near Damascus, their commander, SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner, tasked with destroying the Bundeswehr.

“They don’t trust Heinz to do it,” Rommel had commented; when he’d asked why the Nazis simply hadn’t sent the entire Iraq Korps down to engage the Bundeswehr directly. General Heinz Guderian, the Korps commander, had been fighting a holding action, instead of launching an offensive of his own, apparently waiting for the Soviets to bleed themselves out in Baghdad.

“But the Soviets are allies of the Nazis,” he’d said.

“They’re never going to be friends,” Rommel had said, and ended the discussion.

Jagar swung his attention back to the map as Colonel Muhlenkampf strode in, knocking the sand from his boots, before saluting Rommel with a precision that Jagar couldn’t hope to match. The tall German from the future winked at Jagar, before taking a seat and waiting for Rommel.

“The British had carried out their part of the plan,” Rommel said. “The Nazis can no longer reinforce the Iraq Korps.” He scowled. “And, with the reported destruction of the Soviet supply base, Stalin can’t supply the Iraq Korps, even if he wants to.”

“Yes, Herr General,” Muhlenkampf snapped. “Are we ready then?”

Rommel nodded. “We have to get rid of the Waffen-SS,” he said. “As long as that force remains in the Middle East, Heinz will be unable to move. Tell me, what is the status of the Panzer divisions?”

“1st and 2nd are ready to launch the main attack,” Muhlenkampf said, tapping the map. “We have logistical support and air cover in place. 3rd Panzer Division is supposed to be launching the flanking operation, and Colonel Lehmann reported that they were ready to launch the attack.”

“Good,” Rommel said. He glanced at his watch. “I see no further version to delay, do you?”

Muhlenkampf shook his head. “No, Herr General,” he said. “We need to move before Steiner starts getting ideas.”

“Then send the signal,” Rommel said. His eyes glittered. “The redemption begins now.”

* * *

SS-Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner studied the massed ranks of his panzers, and the shining steel of the SS recruits, and refused to admit to the cold despair. Cold hard logic warned that the loss of the supply lines meant inevitable doom – and the loss of communication with Berlin meant that there would be no way to ask for orders – but his determination drove him on. The time for probing attacks was at an end; if the Reich were to lose in the Middle East, he would take the treacherous Bundeswehr down with him.

Swiftly, he considered the problem. He’d sent scouts out with the tribes of nomads who drifted across the entire battlezone like ghosts, and he knew where the Bundeswehr was based. There was no doubt that it was the Bundeswehr; the strange versions of German markings were clear to their eyes.

“Order the panzers to be ready to move,” he barked, and his subordinates jumped to obey. Steiner considered asking for help from Guderian, but dismissed the thought; the Wehrmacht was full of cowards. “Now!”

* * *

Steiner didn’t know – only a handful of people in the Reich knew – that the British had successfully completed a network of orbital satellites. Without that knowledge, he was unable to comprehend the possibilities of orbital spies looking down on him unblinkingly, or on the computer programs that flagged his movement for attention.

“Herr General,” Jagar said, “satellite reconnaissance reports that the Waffen-SS is moving. They’re coming our way.”

“Let me see,” Rommel said, ignoring the shaking CV-22 as it headed over the battlefield. The streams of Bundeswehr tanks passed under them as Rommel studied the laptop. The countless vehicles were analysed far faster than a human could hope to do, defined, classified, and designated for attack. Rommel studied the patterns for a long moment, noting the advancing British forces from the south.

“Is that wise with Stalin around?” Jagar asked, noting the small holding forces that had been left near the Russian forces. Rommel ignored him, weighing up the problems for a long moment.

“They’re going to clash headlong into us,” Rommel said, studying the breakdown of the Bundeswehr tanks and associated vehicles. “The question is; do we want to let them and fight it out tank to tank, or do we want to set up a trap?” He thought rapidly. “Steiner isn’t a fool,” he mused. “They won’t impale themselves on our guns.”

He smiled. “I think we’ll allow the tanks the pleasure of scrapping with the enemy,” he said. “Warn Colonel Muhlenkampf that the enemy is on the way.”

“Jawohl, Herr General,” Jagar said.

* * *

Colonel Muhlenkampf had been a tank driver himself before being sent back in time. The chance to serve under Rommel – a hero to the German Panzers, even in 2015 – had been irresistible, but the staff work had been difficult. He hadn’t enjoyed that while working at the embassy – and it was a thousand times worse in the new improved Bundeswehr.

He smiled. At least Rommel understood the need to get out and take command personally, even if he had insisted that he use a command tank, one that had more armour than the average Firefly. He chuckled, and studied the display; Steiner’s attack was coming in hard – and blind.

“He must be drunk,” he said, and snorted. Steiner’s panzers were aiming at the Bundeswehr’s forward base, unaware that the Bundeswehr was itself advancing. In five minutes, he guessed, the two forces would collide.

“Fire as you bear,” he snapped over the radio, to the 1st Panzer Division. “Give the bastards hell.”

It happened very suddenly. Before he was fully aware of it, the sand dunes parted… and the wave of SS panzers appeared in front of him. One of them skidded to a stop, stunned by the sight of the Bundeswehr, several others fired at once in panic.

“Idiots,” he muttered, taking personal control of a main gun. He fired, once, and had the satisfaction of seeing a Panzer’s turret blown off. He fired again and again as the closing speed brought them rapidly to point blank range, the SS firing back. One of the Fireflies exploded, another crashed into an SS panzer and exploded, taking the SS tank with it.

“My god, they’re everywhere,” his driver gasped. The command tank wheeled rapidly about to avoid a collision of its own, firing its machine guns madly at a Panzer III that had tried to ram it. He glanced down at the satellite display; it was impossible to tell the difference between the two sides… and then they were in the clear.

“Regroup,” he snapped, grimly aware that Steiner’s men were doing the same thing, having traded sides with the Bundeswehr. “Stand by to hold off attack!”

The Waffen-SS were brave, whatever else could be said about them. They brought their Panzers around and stormed back at the Bundeswehr, firing as they came. The exchange of shells was brutal, slaughtering both sides… and then the Harriers arrived. The remaining Waffen-SS Panzers died as anti-tank missiles dropped from the skies, destroying the enemy for good.

“Deux Ex Machina,” Muhlenkampf muttered, checking the display again. The Waffen-SS’s supply trucks weren’t far away, hauling resupply items for Steiner’s men. “General, we’re going to take them intact, if we can,” he said. Unsurprisingly, Rommel was quick to give permission.

* * *

Thirty miles to the east, General Flynn examined the display with considerable interest and a great deal of relief. The Wehrmacht didn’t pose a serious problem once the supply problem – the German and British supply lines – had been handled, the Germans having theirs cut and the British having theirs improved. Now… now the Russians seemed to have dug into the two major cities of Iraq and forsaken offensive operations, nearly the entire Desert Army had been brought west to face the Germans.

“I don’t know if Rommel’s mad plan is going to work, but Guderian has got to be more than a little upset,” he remarked cheerfully. “One way or the other, the German presence in the Middle East is about to be removed.”

“Yes, sir,” Captain Campton said. “Are you going to send the signal?”

Flynn shook his head. “We’ll have to airdrop it,” he said. “We don’t want old Adolf issuing any of his ‘stand and die’ orders, do we?”

* * *

Without false modesty, General Heinz Guderian knew that he’d done well; he’d fought a brutal battle for nearly eight months, ever since the Germans had forced Turkey into allowing them passage through Turkey into the Middle East. Still, it had finally come to an end – the sudden change of heart from Turkey had ensured that. The short and savage battles over the oil wells had evicted the Turks, but his scouts and aircraft – those that had survived the experience of meeting the RAF – proved that the Turks were re-concentrating in the southeast of their country… ready to attack the Germans in the rear.

Bloody Turks, he thought grimly. The Turks were tough, but they had very little armour. Under normal circumstances, he was certain that he could have handled them, but with the jamming… it was clear that something major was going on. The Waffen-SS division that had been in Jordan had simply disappeared, the last report had had them going to face Rommel and his band.

A roar split the skies as a British jet flew overhead, banking around the camp. It opened its bomb bay and started to drop leaflets, drifting down towards the camp. Guderian gave orders to have one of them brought to him… and waited. Finally, a private passed him a copy. It was printed in fine German.

To: General Heinz Guderian, Commander, Iraq Korps

From: General Robert Flynn, Commander, British Forces Arabia

General – as you may be aware, British forces have sealed your lines of supply and your lines of retreat. Even now, a Turkish force, reinforced by the 2nd Royal Marines division, is preparing to enter your area of occupation from the southeast, while my force and that of General Rommel is prepared to attack you from Jordan and Arabia.

General – we have deployed a second nuclear weapon against Russia, cutting their lines of supply. Even if you trust Stalin enough to take weapons and supplies from him, he will be unable to supply you with enough to keep your force going, assuming that you could overcome the thousands of little problems in converting your weapons and Panzers.

General – your position is hopeless. Further resistance will only prolong the inevitable; RAF planes stand by to crush you from the air. I ask you now to surrender your force. I promise you that your men, with the exception of those who have committed crimes against the civilian population, will be well-treated and allowed to return to Germany once the current hostilities are over.

In the event of you deciding to accept my offer, fire a single flare into the air. My units will arrive to accept your formal surrender. I must warn you that we can see everything you do; any attempt to prepare an ambush will result in your complete destruction.

I remain, faithfully yours.

Guderian allowed himself a long moment to consider. He had nearly half a million men, scattered out all over the occupied zone, and not all of them would get the surrender instructions. Resistance would be good for his pride, but nothing else; it would just get them all killed.

“Fire the flare,” he said, wondering how the British saw everything. One of the cursed drones, no doubt. As the flare flashed overhead, he waited grimly, ignoring the comments from some of his men. They knew their position was hopeless… the approach of the strange aircraft only proved it.

“Here come their panzers,” one of his men said. Guderian frowned, watching as the aircraft, which had seemed familiar at first, tilted its engines and made a neat landing on the sand. The man who climbed out wore a British uniform, his eyes focusing in on Guderian without worrying about anything else.

“Good afternoon,” the man said. Guderian almost laughed, half-expecting the Englishman to talk about the weather next. “I’m General Robert Flynn.”

“General Heinz Guderian,” Guderian said. “I believe that I wish to offer my surrender.”

“I gratefully accept,” Flynn said. “You fought well and valiantly.”

Guderian shook his head. “We would have beaten you if we had weapons like yours,” he said, as the British trucks arrived behind their tanks. Up close, the British tanks were far more intimidating than any German panzer. “So… what now?”

“We transport your men to a POW camp,” Flynn said. “You will assist us in getting the remainder of your force to surrender, and then… well, let’s just say that you have a choice to make.”

Guderian watched as his men were quickly and efficiently disarmed, their weapons being loaded onboard their panzers. “Do you have a use for the weapons?” He asked, noting the care that was being taken to recover them. “I would have thought not.”

“I imagine that they’ll come in handy for something,” Flynn said. “The priority is to keep them out of Saud’s hands; the bastard has been getting support from you and the Russians, just to carry on his little war.”

“He was our swinehund,” Guderian said wryly. “We needed him to scout for us and to help us locate sources of water. So… what now?”

* * *

The tent looked like a British one from 1940 – a Contemporary one, in their vernacular – but it had air conditioning built into the fabric, somehow cooling the entire tent. Guderian didn’t waste time wondering how it had happened; the photographs on the small table drew all of his attention.

“That’s what Hitler and his allies are doing,” a voice said. It didn’t take any effort to recognise the voice as Rommel’s. Guderian studied the former Wehrmacht officer with interest. “That’s what’s happening in our name.”

Guderian stared at a picture involving a young girl and two SS guards. “Nein,” he said. “The Fuhrer wouldn’t allow anyone to do that.”

Rommel met his eyes. “On our march to face the SS Panzergrenadier Division Wiking,” he said, “we came across countless villages that had been wiped clean by the SS. The extermination groups have been slaughtering their way across Poland and the Balkans, wiping out entire peoples… just because they will be troublesome, later. That’s what’s happening in Germany, Guderian; they’re killing everyone who does not meet their standards of racial purity.”

“And you want me to join you,” Guderian said. It was not a question. “Why?”

“More people in the Wehrmacht respect you,” Rommel said wryly. Guderian lifted an eyebrow; Rommel was a skilled self-publicist. His weekly broadcasts to Germany were masterpieces of skill and convincing information. “I won’t lie to you; we need all the help we can get.”

Guderian considered. “You’re asking me to kill Germans, just because of their – our – leaders,” he said. “My fellow Germans, people who I have served with and…”

“Serve an evil master,” Rommel said. “God help me; I loved the Fuhrer!” He picked up a picture and waved it under Guderian’s nose; an old man, beaten to death. “This, Guderian, is what we served!”

Guderian shook his head from side to side. “I won’t kill more Germans,” he said. “Rommel – Erwin – this sort of civil war, and that is what the outcome is going to be, will allow Stalin to take over. You know what sort of bastard he is.”

“Better or worse than Hitler?” Rommel asked. He scowled. “Guderian – Heinz – I wish I could change your views on loyalty, but that’s up to you. Heinz, there’s nothing more I can tell you. I can show you the videos long-range recon teams have taken in Poland, or of camps in Germany itself, if you want.”

Guderian shook his head again. “Erwin, I won’t make that choice, I can’t,” he said. He felt a tear fall from his eyes. “God help me – I can’t fight against Germany.”

Chapter Forty-Four: Interludes and Examinations

The White House

Washington DC, USA

12th July 1941

It wasn’t his house yet. In the attendant confusion following the defeat of the coup attempt and making as clean a sweep as possible of the criminal elements in the south that had nearly plunged the United States into a second civil war, Harry S. Truman hadn’t managed to move his possessions into the White House, let alone place his stamp on the building. To almost everyone in America, the White House was still FDR’s home – and everything that had happened in the coup a nightmare.

Truman shook his head. It had taken a great deal of luck – and Bankhead’s decision to make certain that he had records of everyone involved – to be able to make as clean a sweep as they had of those involved. For the moment, political opposition in the south was quiet; ironically, it was the north that was making the most fuss. The war against Germany and Russia was their priority; what did they care about social justice, even punishing those whose only crime was the company they kept?

Truman chuckled bitterly. Several thousand members of the southern governing class had been taken into custody to avoid them being lynched by both whites and blacks. Others – including Hoover and his so-called lover – remained underground, hiding from the revenge of his political enemies and those he had blackmailed. In the two weeks since the coup plot – the Wet Firecracker Rebellion – Hoover had managed to avoid all searches, no matter who was doing the searching.

“Mr President?” Truman looked up as his new aide entered. Captain Bosco, the former Marine, had been offered to him as a bodyguard during the first terrifying week, when the country had teetered on the brink of destruction. “It’s time for the ceremony.”

Truman nodded. The ceremony, the awarding of various medals to those who foiled the coup, would be unusual; for the first time black and white men would stand together as equals. Also – an Englishman would receive the Medal of Honour; the British Prime Minister had flown in for the ceremony.

“We will prevail,” he muttered to himself. Roosevelt – God bless his memory – hadn’t been able to take swift action to end the entire race crisis before it had almost destroyed the nation. Truman, in the middle of a war, knew what needed to be done… and was prepared to do it.

“Yes, Mr President,” Bosco said, passing him his speech. Truman smiled; it would be a while, he was certain, before a political opposition arose again in the south, resistant to change… and by then most of the hard work would have been completed.

“Let’s go hand out the awards,” Truman said. Bosco himself had declined an award, even with Truman had insisted. “We all have to remember our heroes.”

* * *

The Americans still think highly of Lee, Hanover thought, from his seat at the front of the room. The British view of those who had fought on the wrong side during their civil wars wasn’t anything like as accepting; with the exception of Monck, most of the senior officers in the Republic and Protectorate had been executed.

The thought made him smile, keeping him amused enough to keep smiling as Jim Oliver accepted his reward. The Bracken Consortium had it made; with the favour of the President, what could it not do? Already, there were new contracts for expanding into the south, developing new industries that would be turned against Russia, and contracts for redeveloping New York.

Bastard, Hanover thought, and altered his strategy slightly. He grinned; this was what chess playing was really like, moving pieces around until they fit the plans of the player. The thought amused him again, keeping him awake as Truman – and the much-reduced Senate – passed a new version of the Civil Rights Act, attempting to end the racial tensions in a stroke. Hanover doubted that it would be anything like as easy as Truman made it sound, but… well, he was allowed to be optimistic.

Tell me, how many masters have you served, Jim Oliver? Hanover wondered, as the other awards were passed out. Idly, he wondered if Ambassador King would be offered the post of Vice-President, but he doubted it; would the post-rebellion United States accept a black Vice-President?

* * *

Afterwards, the President and the Prime Minister sat together in Roosevelt’s old study. There would be time for formal war conferences later, for now the two leaders could renew their alliance and take one another’s measure. Hanover smiled; he’d met Truman before, but this was their first private meeting.

“Apart from Hoover himself, I think we made a pretty clean sweep,” Truman said. “It won’t be painless, but in a year the United States will be free of their evil.”

“Perhaps,” Hanover said, who knew that several thousand had applied to go to South Africa. Fortunately, the Smuts Government hadn’t sought the approval of His Majesty’s Government. “I’m glad to know that everything will be fine.”

“I’m sure you are,” Truman said sincerely. “Now… we have a war to wage, against Germany and Russia. The Generals were very impressed with your success in the Middle East.”

Hanover nodded. Nearly four hundred thousand Germans had surrendered; a handful more had tried to fight and died in place. The Turks were now allies of the British – and he was certain they would ask the Americans for an alliance as well – and the Axis position in the Middle East could be unravelled and mopped up in the rest of 1941.

“It had its price,” he said. “We’ve burnt through pretty much the entire war stocks of advanced weapons, from Tomahawks to JDAM bombs.” He smiled; the Turks had complained bitterly about the use of such firepower on Gallipoli. The famous peninsula had been completely renovated. “It’s going to take several months to build up again.”

Truman nodded. “So, no advanced weapons for Scandinavia,” he said. “We’ll have to win that one without the weapons.”

Hanover nodded grimly. Uncle Joe Stalin had finally decided on his response to the American declaration of war – an all-out invasion of Sweden. Between the Red Army in the north and the Wehrmacht in the south, the Swedes had tried to fight, but had been overwhelmed. Hanover cursed; the distraction of the coup and the need for some Americans at home had allowed the allied dictators to get a hold on Sweden, sending thousands of Swedes fleeing into Norway.

“We’ll press the offensive against Zhukov,” Hanover said. “He must be a little strapped for equipment since we nuked his supply lines; he’s not attempted anything clever for two weeks.”

Truman nodded. “So… what do we do? The General are divided; some say that we should concentrate on Germany, some say we should concentrate on Russia. What do your people say?”

Hanover smiled grimly. “Germany remains the dangerous threat,” he said, “even if they do have Hitler leading them. They’re the ones who are most likely to successfully develop atomics of their own, which they might use against you – or even us. They’re also behind in the bioweapon department, although Nazi ingenuity is better than I care for.” He snorted. “Given the logistical problems, Germany remains the easiest target, seeing that we’ll have to march to Moscow.”

“That’s pretty much what Patton said,” Truman said. “He wants a major landing in France in 1942 and a direct march to Moscow, taking Berlin on the way. It’ll be a nightmare.”

“It needs to be done,” Hanover said, refusing to discuss the space program. Perhaps it would provide an easier method of defeating Stalin, perhaps not. “By 1942, we should have enough advanced weapons and soldiers to make victory possible.”

“Let’s hope so,” Truman said. “Now, about the post-war world.”

Hanover smiled as they began haggling. It wouldn’t be hard to give up British interests in Mexico; there were hardly any in any case. If Truman was willing to expand American jurisdiction to the Caribbean, the British had few complaints. Edward might complain, but Hanover found it hard to care.

“A pleasure doing business with you,” Truman said finally. Hanover nodded in agreement; he’d gotten what he wanted out of the agreements. “I understand that you wanted to talk to Mr Oliver?”

“Ah, the new recipient of the Medal of Honour,” Hanover said. “I would very much like to meet with him.”

* * *

Jim Oliver gave Cora a chaste kiss on the cheek – he’d shocked Washington society by bringing her, even if Ambassador King was being honoured as well – and followed the butler into a single room, guarded by a man he recognised as being Special Forces. Expecting to meet the new President, he was astounded to find himself looking at Prime Minister Hanover, sitting on a chair facing him.

“Good evening, Mr Oliver,” Hanover said calmly. Oliver wasn’t fooled; there was a hint of cold ice under Hanover’s voice. “Won’t you have a seat?”

Finely honed instincts warned of the presence of other men behind him, cold-blooded killers from the SAS or one of the police’s SWAT teams. He took the seat quickly, studying Hanover; the Prime Minister watched him through cold blue eyes. His dark hair was longer than he remembered it; perhaps in all the planning needed for the battles in Turkey he’d forgotten to cut it.

Hanover watched him just long enough to make him very uncomfortable. “During your… imprisonment in Germany, you agreed to serve the Germans,” he stated. Oliver opened his mouth; Hanover spoke over him. “You sent them information on the future that allowed them to purge… rebellious elements from their own ranks, and you sent them information that allowed themselves to leapfrog forward.”

Oliver started to protest. “Once you came here,” Hanover continued, “you continued to work for the Germans, supplying information that helped them on their quest for world domination and supplying them with some of our technology. That technology cost lives, Oliver.”

He doesn’t know about Hoover, Oliver thought desperately. “I was sent here by Mr Bracken…”

“Who doesn’t exist,” Hanover snapped. “It was a good trick, Mr Oliver, but it proved far too thin under the concentrated gaze of MI5. Except… you’ve done something remarkable, Mr Oliver; you’ve made it real.”

Oliver felt, oddly enough, a flicker of hope. If the British had been able to charge him openly, they would have recalled him or asked the FBI to arrest him, or if they hadn’t wanted to risk the explanation, they would have sent someone to shoot him in the night. The mere presence of Hanover – the Prime Minister – indicated that they wanted to deal.

“You are in an interesting position, are you not?” Hanover asked. “You’re a hero to President Truman and Ambassador King. How pleased do you think that they would be to discover your work for the Germans? You probably cost them some of the lives in New York.” Hanover glared at him. “However, you have control over an important aspect of the American industry, something that we cannot allow to become disrupted.”

“Not with the Dupont Group being nationalised for their crimes,” Oliver agreed.

“This isn’t a debate,” Hanover snapped. “I have an offer for you. You will work directly for us. You will feed the Germans snippets of information and bits of technology that we will give you. You will assist us in penetrating the American economy still further.” He looked sharply at him. “This will, of course, depend upon your cooperation, but you would become very rich indeed, most of which will be funnelled into further development.”

Oliver blinked. “Of course,” Hanover said, “this offer does not apply to your allies in Glasgow. Most of them will be rounded up and sentenced to life in prison, or perhaps suicidal duties, under the Defence of the Realm Act. After all, they’re all traitors, like you…”

Oliver looked at him for a long moment. “What guarantee do I have you you’ll keep your word?”

Hanover laughed. “How many masters have you served?” He asked wryly. “Your guarantee is this; if you work for us, you will remain useful. It’s up to you.”

Oliver sighed. “I accept,” he said.

“Splendid,” Hanover said. “A few of my staff will meet you in your offices next week, where you will go through everything that was sent to the Germans with them. Beyond that… just keep expanding your business, I’ll let you know when we need you.”

* * *

Ambassador King was the centre of attention, now that President Truman had left for a private talk with the Prime Minister, and was enjoying it. Not all of the attention was friendly, of course, but it was attention.

“Ah… Ambassador,” Senator Griggs said. The Texan was trying hard to avoid calling him ‘Mr.’ “Can it really be proven that the bandits Black Power have ended their campaign?”

King smiled. “Well, there haven’t been any attacks, have there?” He said. “It’s been very peaceful for two weeks, right?” Griggs nodded. “Quite frankly, Senator, they started the campaign because they were being denied the rights of citizenship, but now that there are new laws in place, they’re willing to give them a fair chance.”

“It’s hard to trust them,” Griggs complained. “What with all the raping and looting and pillaging that was going on… the women can’t sleep soundly in their beds these days.”

“As you sow, so shall you reap,” King said, and swept away before Griggs could formulate a reply. He looked around for someone interesting to talk to and spied Colonel Palter, who was trying to escape the attentions of a woman who looked old and tough enough to have fought in the Civil War. “Ah, Scott,” he said. “Sorry to butt in, Madam, but I need the colonel.”

“That’s quite all right, young man,” the woman said, and she left.

“Thanks, sir,” Palter said. Some of the men closest to them were horrified at a white man calling a Negro ‘sir.’ “What’s up?”

“Nothing much,” King said. “It’s odd to be able to circulate freely again.”

“Yeah,” Palter said. “Did you know that some jerk in Britain is already producing counterfactual histories of a successful coup?”

King laughed. “No, I didn’t,” he said. “We have to worry about the future first. Tell me, have you been thinking about the war with Russia?”

“Only that we could sail across the Pacific and hit them in the rear,” Palter said. “It’s bloody stupid; the Japanese might engage us or they might not. It would be a lot easier if we were at war with them as well, particularly with the British having crushed their main fleet.”

“I tried to convince the President,” King said. “Bottom line; unless Japan does something suicidal and very stupid, which isn’t impossible with their militarists in control, we remain at peace with them, even as we supply arms to Australia and the rest of the British Empire.”

Palter nodded. “Speaking of which, is that going to stay around?”

“Looks like it,” King said. “The President was going to discuss the matter with the Prime Minister; bottom line there is that the British will recognise our primacy in Latin and South America, with the exception of territory they already control, in exchange for us making a similar agreement for the Far East.” He smiled. “China, of course, is likely to be open season.”

“I heard the Japanese were moving people over in vast numbers,” Palter said. “Can’t the British stop them?”

“Depends if they want to,” King said. He chuckled. “They have to be really worried; on one hand they can invade Japan, but at awesome cost, on the other they could start nuking Japanese cities until they surrender or become exterminated. I’ve seen some of the casualty figures; they’re horrific.”

“Sooner them than us,” Palter said. “Perhaps they’ll just let them starve.”

“True,” King agreed. “Our priority is to expand into the South American states and start building democracy before we end up with the same morass we had the last time around. The British can worry about the Japanese.”

* * *

Cora had had one of the most remarkable nights of her life. Not only had she been able to talk to Ambassador King himself, but also some members of the NAACP union and several businessmen, who didn’t look at her colour or her breasts. Making a handful of minor business deals, including an improved Internet system for the black union, had kept her busy, while she waited for her lover.

“Guess who’s back?” Oliver said. She glanced up; Oliver looked tired, but happy. “How are you?”

“Just been making some deals for you,” Cora said. “They don’t mind about the colour of my skin.”

“They care more about the colour of your money,” Oliver said dryly. “As the new Assistant Director of the company, your money and goodwill is worth more to them than your skin.”

Cora smiled. “So, what’s new?”

Oliver grinned. It was a strange expression, like a man who had been freed from a dreadful fate. “We have contracts to start mass-producing heavy bombers and fighters,” he said. “The USAAF wants jet fighters, but we can produce propeller fighters quickly enough to match the hordes of Russian aircraft, particularly if the Russians get some German aircraft designs.”

He considered for a long moment. “The Navy, not wanting to be left out, is going to be placing orders for carriers and more surface ships, and we’ll get some contracts to equip them. We may not build carriers, but we’ll build radios and radars and enough technology to give the USN a significant fighting force, even against a modern fleet.” He chuckled. “They’ll want missiles as well, of course, and seeing we’re building some of the rockets for the space program, building rockets for them as well should be easy.”

He gave Cora a hug and led her from the building. Above their heads, the stars glittered in the darkness. “I foresee an endless future ahead of us,” Oliver said, and kissed her gently as the night passed away. “All that matters now is the long hard road to winning the war.”

Epilogue

Führerbunker

Berlin, Germany

12th July 1941

If there was anything to be said about the strange 2015 concept of freedom of the press, which the British reporter had attempted to explain to him, it made conducting post-incident assessments a lot easier. The BBC’s coverage of the attack on New York, and the confused situation in Washington, had delighted Himmler. He’d dared to hope for a day that America would collapse and withdraw from the war, but instead Truman had taken over as President.

Himmler chuckled to himself. At least the Americans had declared war on the Soviet Union, expanding the war without thought for the consequences. Kesselring, his new ally, had risen again in the Fuhrer’s esteem, just for coordinating a joint attack on Sweden. Himmler chuckled again; the Swedes were Aryans, soon enough they would be part of the Greater Master Race of the Reich.

And if not, we can always have their children adopted by good Germans, Himmler thought coldly, as the door opened. He didn’t panic; there was no way an attacker could get into his quarters, he’d invited his guest himself. SS Obergruppenfuehrer Hans Krueger stepped into the office, saluting as he came.

“Heil Hitler,” Himmler returned. “How are you, Hans?”

“I am as well as I’ll ever be,” Krueger said. “Do you wish the report on New York?”

Himmler nodded impatiently. “The bomb detonated as planned,” Krueger said. “There was a great deal of devastation, fully comparable to the ammunition ship disasters in the last war. As for radiation… Herr Reichsführer, it’s hard to be certain. We sent the ground from the British strike – the first British strike – and some products of our research, but as for the effects…

“The BBC seems to think that the effects will be long-term, rather than immediate,” he continued. Himmler nodded; the BBC, even the open channels, seemed to put out more information than the Reich Ministry of Information would ever have allowed. Of course, they had no way of knowing that Germany had one of their reception sets. “We might have sentenced a few thousand Americans to early deaths, but its impossible to be certain.”

Himmler nodded. “Fortunately, the Americans blamed the Russians,” he said. “It was hardly a total disaster. The nuclear blast near Stalin’s own city” – he’d thought at first that Stalingrad was Stalin’s hometown – “will remind them of the potential of British weapons, which should make them more dependent upon us.”

He grinned coldly. “We can use the Slavs as cannon fodder, while we prepare our own weapons,” he said. “Has there been any major change in the nuclear production program?”

Krueger scowled. “We’ve started experimenting with fast-fission and several other angles,” he said. “Optimistically, we should have enough material to produce a bomb by late 1943, depending upon events.”

“This would be a great deal easier if everything went like clockwork,” Himmler muttered. He held up a hand before Krueger could start making excuses. “I know, even though we have jumped forward in many fields, we still have to build and test.”

“Yes, Herr Reichsführer,” Krueger agreed. “Even though we know most of the steps, we cannot assume that we know everything. The documents we managed to get our hands on assume knowledge that we do not possess; the scientists have to remain completely separate from the places of work.”

Himmler frowned. “And the American bomb?”

Krueger shook his head. “It depends,” he said. “The reports aren’t clear as to how much help the British are giving them. They also had to remove a lot of their top scientists as they were working for Stalin; we did try to recover them, but the Americans have them under tight security. Again, assuming that they hit no problems, late 1943.”

“And the Americans will certainly lack the British reluctance to hit our cities,” Himmler mused. It was odd; given even a handful of the weapons, he would have smashed all of the enemies and ruled forever. “Something to think about, I fear.”

“Radio Rommel certainly does,” Krueger said. Himmler gave him a sharp look. “It is part of my duties, Herr Reichsführer.”

“I know,” Himmler said. “You may go. Report to me if you hit any problems at all.”

Krueger left and Himmler returned to his musing. The Americans would overcome their problems… and then invade Europe. Hitting Stalin in the rear, or up from the Middle East, would present so many logistical problems that even the Americans would quail. That meant… prolonging, even expanding, the alliance with Stalin was of prime importance, whatever it took.

“I’m going to see the Fuhrer,” he said, as he picked up his jacket. He was one of the few people with instant access to Hitler, whatever the time was. “And then I think I’ll take a stroll.”

His guards fell in around him as he left his office, within the ever-growing network of bunkers and chambers, digging deeper and deeper into Berlin. He frowned; already, he looked paler than he’d ever been before. Himmler had never believed in vampires, but the pale faces were almost enough to convince him that they existed.

“I’m here to see the Fuhrer,” he said bluntly to Hitler’s secretary. She’d been spending more time with him of late, ever since he’d had to send Eva Braun away.

“You may enter,” she said, passing him into Hitler’s rooms. The Fuhrer sat at his desk, writing out his latest speech. He looked up as Himmler entered.

“I have prepared the movement orders for the three Army Groups,” Hitler said. His voice was surprisingly rational. “Army Group North will take Leningrad and trap the Soviet armies in Finland. Army Group Centre will hammer its way to Moscow. Army Group South will take the Ukraine. With our attack, the Americans will be willing to discuss peace… until our nuclear weapons are ready.”

Himmler felt his blood run cold. “Mein Fuhrer, we cannot fight both the Russians and the Americans,” he said. “We have to give them time to weaken one another first…”

Hitler’s face and mood changed rapidly, his face contorting with anger. Himmler cursed that doctor as Hitler began a torrent of invective. What had that fat fool given him?

“You will fail me too?” Hitler bellowed, after running through a torrent of rude words. “You, my most faithful…”

He stopped, seemed to freeze in place for a long chilling moment, and then he fell to the ground. Himmler cried out in shock and ran forward, catching the Fuhrer, even as blood poured from Hitler’s mouth. He shouted for a medical team – and guards to shoot the quack doctor – but it was clearly too late. Hitler tried to say something, coughed up more blood… and died.

To Be Concluded!

Appendix: The Wet Firecracker Rebellion

Although it wasn’t clear to Contemporary observers, by early 1941PT the United States was on the brink of civil war. Not only were economic disruptions spreading through the economy as a result of the sudden introduction of advanced technology, but there was a growing – and violent – black resistance movement. Black Power, as it was called, demanded nothing less than full equality for black citizens, and was willing to use extreme violence to retaliate against the daily discrimination offered to black citizens. In 1941, nearly seven hundred KKK members were killed in black attacks, or in the process of attacking black settlements.

To add to the problems, the United States was at war with Germany, a war caused by the loss of an American battleship and a British liner carrying future American citizens. While the war had been very popular for the first months, it took nearly seven months for the United States to actually launch an invasion of enemy territory, while the home front became increasingly disenchanted with the war. There would have been great enthusiasm for supporting a war against Japan, but in the absence of a suitable cause for war, the United States’ involvement was limited to supplying weapons to the British Commonwealth.

Under such circumstances, dissatisfaction with the war and with the President’s response to the new British challenge was widespread. Some elements believed that the British could handle the Nazis on their own, particularly after the first British nuclear weapon was deployed, other elements wanted the United States to remain in isolation and develop its own technology.

The situation seemed to be finely balanced, but in fact it was starting to tip over. In 1941, the sudden growth of black power – and Black Power – was starting to threaten the established power structures. If that wasn’t enough, the knowledge of the future was affecting individual lives, from communists to would-be fascists. While a small-scale war was going on in the south between racists and blacks, the President hesitated from taking any action. The ham-handed attempt at conscripting thousands of the most troublesome elements only added to the tension; black recruits deserted by the thousands and many whites were asking why they had to leave when the war was developing in their backyard.

In particular, there were three sections of American society that were willing to consider desperate measures, particularly in the light of the coming invasion of Norway. Calculating that direct ground combat between America and Germany would force the public to accept the war and bolster the President’s ratings – among the elite – they decided that they could wait no longer. The three sections were;

- Victims of the future: A large number of people, including General MacArthur and J. Edgar Hoover, had had embarrassing revelations made about them by the future Americans. Hoover was accused of being a homosexual – no direct proof was discovered – and General MacArthur was accused of deserting his men during the future war. By the time that he was finally recalled, the rumours had mutated and he had survived two ‘fragging’ attempts while commanding American troops in the Philippines. MacArthur, in particular, developed an obsessive hatred of the British during 1940-41. He was more than willing to lead an army to remove their influence.

- Industrialists: providing most of the funding for the coup were industrialists, including the Dupont group, which also engaged in sabotaging British rockets. They believed, probably correctly, that British products of a sophistication they could not hope to match would continue to flood American markets, ruining them. They needed isolation before they were ruined and they needed some time to recover from the growing power of the union movement. Providing funds towards a second coup attempt – the unproven Business Plot of 1936 would be the first – was a natural step.

- State Establishments: finally, the growth of black voting power – and the demand that black men and women be allowed to stand for election – threatened the established interests all across the south. The south had accepted retardation as the price of keeping the black men down – not always to the delight of whites either, who at least could take out their frustrations on the blacks – and now their comfortable Jim Crow system was being threatened. If blacks started voting for their own candidates – and the traditional methods of intimidation were no longer reliable – white control, their control, would be voted out of existence up and down the black belt.

Exactly who came up with the plan remains uncertain, although investigations pointed the finger at Hoover. Despite an awesome amount of influence within Congress, Hoover was unable to affect Roosevelt’s ‘coddling’ of what he considered a subversive movement, let alone shut down the communist-controlled Progressive Party. Aware of just how close the US was to civil war, Hoover convinced a number of people, including MacArthur, to go along with the plan to launch a coup.

The final requirement came with the Speaker of the House of Representatives, William Brockman Bankhead, third in line to the presidency under some interpretations of the law. (Hoover calculated that his supporters in Congress and the Senate would be enough to defeat any challenges.) A native of Alabama, where some of the first incidences of black resistance had appeared, Bankhead believed that Roosevelt would not handle the situation, refusing a demand by several Southern Governors to send in the troops to crush the blacks, and had to be impeached for the good of everyone. Once convinced that there wasn’t time to vote for impeachment when elections took place, Bankhead became the third member of the conspiracy’s troika.

* * *

Once funding and political support were organised, MacArthur was able to begin the task of assembling an army. Despite his position as Director of Training – regarded as a safe post for him personally – MacArthur was unable to recruit more than a handful of army trainees, turning instead to KKK and other white trash to supply the manpower. MacArthur adopted racist views at this point, although it remains a matter of debate if they were sincere or if they were used to create loyalty in the army.

The basic plan was simple. The army would move to Washington under cover and launch a strike against the White House, where both Roosevelt and Truman would be captured. They would be held at gunpoint until Roosevelt broadcast a statement resigning from the presidency and naming Bankhead as his successor, blaming both the White House attack and Truman’s death on communists. Once Bankhead was installed as President, Hoover and MacArthur would be able to purge the country of elements they didn’t like, ranging from communists to British allies. Black movements would be ruthlessly crushed, using very German-like methods, and they would be forced back down into second-class status.

(Post-Rebellion propaganda claimed that the blacks would have been forced back into slavery, but this is generally believed to be false, as the northern states would have probably refused to go along with it, to say nothing of desperate black resistance tearing the nation apart.)

The plotters were uncertain what to do about the war. MacArthur was very keen to fight it out to the last man, under his leadership, fighting a separate war to the British. Both Hoover and Bankhead would have preferred a negotiated peace.

* * *

As it happened, the plan went badly wrong right from the start. The sudden devastation of New York by a German attack, which was clearly not an act committed by Black Power, forced the plotters to launch the attack several days ahead of time. Although anti-communist sentiment was at an all-time high, due to the explosive materials being carried on a Soviet ship, it was clear that the fading Roosevelt would be unwilling to take the measures that the plotters believed necessary. If Roosevelt died before the plot, Truman, a tougher customer and future black supporter, would become President and the political support would have crumbled.

Seeing an opportunity in Roosevelt’s controversial dispatch of almost all of the troops in or near Washington to New York, the plotters launched their attack. All signs that something was in the works went through the FBI, where they were misfiled and lost. The White House was duly attacked, but some elements had warning of the attack, managing to save Truman from the hit squad that had been ordered to kill him. Worse, Roosevelt suffered his final heart attack during his capture, dying while in the hands of the plotters. Far from successfully installing Bankhead as President, the plotters didn’t have any legitimacy at all.

Without Roosevelt’s broadcast, the other plotters across the US didn’t move; some because they received no orders, others because they wanted to wait until a clear winner appeared. The Internet, a much underestimated method of communication, provided the legitimate resisters, under President Truman, the means to organise a counter-attack. While the FBI launched its pre-planned purge of communists and black leaders, many of whom were shot, most of their other allies sat on their hands. Once the counterattack was launched, the White House was retaken and the Rebellion collapsed.

* * *

It goes without saying that President Truman and his new allies were determined to avoid a repetition of the coup. It was also necessary to reward the black elements that took part in the attack to recover the White House, which would also serve as additional punishment for the Southern elements involved in the coup plot. Despite that, Truman waited until some units from Norway, under General Stillwell, were back in the United States before beginning what was regarded as the purge of the south.

The coup plotters were arrested and divided into three categories. The political leaders – and their entire establishments – that had surrendered in exchange for conditional amnesty were, by and large, exiled to South Africa. This, ironically, happened as a result of attacks launched against them by angry southerners, both black and white, who realised that what the plotters had wanted was VERY against their interests. The politicians who were unaware of the plot, but expected to support it and Jim Crow were stripped of their positions under martial law. Several tens of thousands accepted exile; a handful chose to remain and face trial.

The industrialists were generally tried for high treason. Companies that had funded the rebellion were stripped of their leaders and stock was sold to the workers, provided that all traces of segregation were removed.

Finally, the foot soldiers were generally offered conditional amnesty, with the exception of those who had committed crimes while they held the centre of Washington. The ‘condition’ was a long period in a punishment battalion in the war; many of them would go on to distinguish themselves in the long war against fascism.

Although some Southern fire-eaters talked of a second secession, their position was hopeless and enough were realistic enough to see that. This was not 1861, when the South had been reasonably united behind the CSA, but a small cabal of leaders attempting to use the loyalist factions to save their own hides. Once the coup had collapsed, their control collapsed rapidly in the midst of thousands of people settling scores of one kind or another.

* * *

Once the United States had declared war on the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the new Congress passed a series of amendments to the Constitution, intended to prevent such a situation from arising again. The most important elements were, in essence, the duty to bear arms, a law banning discrimination on racial or sexual grounds, a law banning any attempt to prevent people from voting and finally a law obliging the government to provide free contraception for everyone. A number of supplemental measures, adopted during the Truman administration, further cemented the reforms, although it was years before the dream of colour-blindness was realised.

For the heroes of the rebellion, there was a general amnesty, although it included the warning that further criminal action would result in the amnesty being withdrawn. The members of Black Power, for example, received amnesty in exchange for ending the campaign of terror. Although a handful continued to seek revenge, the majority accepted the amnesty and ended a bitter chapter in American history.

Content

Christopher Nuttal
AXIS OF EVIL

Prologue

Chapter One: Council of War

Chapter Two: It’s Not All Black And White

Chapter Three: Holy War

Chapter Four: In the Heart of Darkness

Chapter Five: The King’s Navy

Chapter Six: Those Who Stand

Chapter Seven: The Final Frontier

Chapter Eight: Reds (And Blacks) Under The Bed

Chapter Nine: Black Fire and Ice

Chapter Ten: The Montreal Conference

Chapter Eleven: Dead Man’s Hand

Chapter Twelve: News from Golgotha

Chapter Thirteen: Skulduggery At High Noon

Chapter Fourteen: Culture Shock (Again)

Chapter Fifteen: Setbacks and Promises

Chapter Sixteen: Out of Time

Chapter Seventeen: Red Storm Rising

Chapter Eighteen: The Centre Can Hold

Chapter Nineteen: Good German, Bad German

Chapter Twenty: Chapatti And Chips

Chapter Twenty-One: Unto Us a Child is Born

Chapter Twenty-Two: Upside Down

Chapter Twenty-Three: Deathcloud Rising

Chapter Twenty-Four: Nippon Down Under

Chapter Twenty-Five: The Stage is Set

Chapter Twenty-Six: The Northern Offensive

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Cornered Animal

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Return to the Forbidden Island

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Reactions Upon Reactions

Chapter Thirty: Race War

Chapter Thirty-One: The War in the Outback

Chapter Thirty-Two: Encirclement

Chapter Thirty-Three: The Brutal Friendship

Chapter Thirty-Four: A Stillness Upon the Sea

Chapter Thirty-Five: Return to Salvation

Chapter Thirty-Six: Preparations

Chapter Thirty-Seven: The Plot to Seize the White House

Chapter Thirty-Eight: No Surrender, No Retreat

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Terror in New York City

Chapter Forty: Twenty-Four Hours

Chapter Forty-One: What Price Redemption?

Chapter Forty-Two: Turkish Delight

Chapter Forty-Three: The End of the Affair

Chapter Forty-Four: Interludes and Examinations

Epilogue

Appendix: The Wet Firecracker Rebellion