The first rocket-truppen shot in on a tail of fire, matching speeds with the S-1 airplane so that he could touch down on its back. Spikes in his boots and gloves dug into the airplane’s hull so that he could scamper across the fuselage like an insect. His head darted side to side, his thin limbs wobbled but carried him forward swiftly. He wore all black, but his mask’s round, bulging lenses and proboscis-like gas filter glinted in the night.

Kate threw open the side hatch and launched herself out and then straight up, spinning as she rose to face the unwelcomed boarder. She stalled her rocket pack at just the right instant so that she hovered in front of him, an angel in silver and brown reflected in his lenses.

He unclasped his cloves and went for his submachine gun; she already had hers out. The blast caught him square in the chest, swatting him away from the plane with such force that his spiked boots remained behind, lodged in place by their own spikes.

The recoil pushed Kate back and away from the S-1. She allowed gravity to cradle her for a moment before flattening out and slamming the throttle all the way open. Instantly, the force of the acceleration pressed against every inch of her skin. It squeezed her lungs and compacted her stomach into a tiny ball. The bitter wind pierced her jacket, and the air whistled against her helmet so loudly that she could hardly hear herself scream in delight.

Flight. True flight. Power, speed, freedom—this was her first test of the rocket pack, and she was now soaring higher than an eagle and faster than a hurricane.

Two lances of tracer fire probed the night around her, bringing her back to the problem at hand. She performed a tight roll and glanced back to see the two other rocket-truppen on her tail, guns blazing. It was time to see how her rocket pack compared to theirs.

“Take the stick,” Kate said to Reggie as she unstrapped herself.

“Wait… what?” Reggie sputtered. “I don’t know how to fly—”

“All you have to do is hold her steady. I’ll go take care of the rocket-truppen.”

“The what now?”

“The rocket-truppen. Rocket troopers. Our dear Professor Scrumtumbler accidentally designed the Nazis some rocket packs.”

The plane pitched forward as Kate swung herself out of the pilot’s seat. Reggie lunged for the stick. He clutched it with quaking hands, causing the plane to lurch and sway in its flight.

Good, Kate decided. That’ll make us harder to hit. Also, it’ll remind the boys to appreciate my expertise.

Gripping the railings to keep herself upright, she moved to a cargo locker just to the rear of the cockpit. From here, she could see Clem and Dr. Scott buckled tightly into the passenger seats, their eyes clenched shut, their faces fully green with air-sickness.

Kate opened the closet and unstrapped a footlocker from the bottom shelf. First, she removed her Tommy gun, snapped in a fresh ammo drum, and put her spare cartridge into the pocket of her flight jacket. Then she reached for the next object in the footlocker, a gleaming silver backpack consisting of a pair of thick engines strapped to short maneuvering wings.

“What are you doing?” Reggie yelled back from the cockpit. “You’re going to die and I’m not even going to get any good footage of it!”

“Scrutumbler designed their rocket packs,” she said. “But he designed mine even better.”

Kate jerked at the controls, throwing the S-1 into a barrel role to escape the Messerschmidt fire peppering its hull. There were two fighters on their tail and something else much bigger bearing down on them fast. She couldn’t outrun them and the S-1 was unarmed.

“What’re you going to do?” Reggie was strapped into the copilot’s chair and clung to the armrests with white-knuckled fists.

“Just watch,” Kate winked at him with her one good eye and then threw the lever that tilted their engines vertically.

The entire plane shuddered sickeningly and the metal hull screeched like a seasick condor. Their momentum continued to drag them forward, but now their engines wrenched them vertically into the air. As the change in velocity crushed them down into their seats, but Kate was gratified to see twin phosphorescent streaks of tracer fire ripping through the night below them, followed swiftly by the speeding fighter passing through the space they had occupied a moment earlier.

Kate guffawed. “Oh, how I wish I could see the look on that pilot’s face.”

She eased the plane right onto the tail of the fighter. Maybe five yards away, maybe three—it was hard to tell with only one eye. The fighter’s propwash created fierce turbulence, but at this distance the second fighter couldn’t gun for them without the risk of shooting down his partner.

Kate had the advantage of maneuverability, but the Messerschmitts were much faster, and she judged that her mid-flight vertical dodge was a one-time trick: try it again and she would shear the wings right off the S-1.

Then a flash of lighting from the cloud below illuminated something worse. It was a large airplane of a design she didn’t recognize. The fuselage was folded into the body in a way that made the whole thing look like a single wing studded with a series of sleek gun-turrets. Its four monstrous engines chewed through the air with a startling velocity, but Kate estimated that it was not nearly as maneuverable as the Messerchmidtts. In fact, this new plane looked like it must be a bomber, which meant she could fly circles around it. What good was a bomber in chasing down a fugitive aircraft?

The answer came a moment later when the flying wing’s bomb bay doors were opened and three small shapes dropped from its belly. An instant later, each shape flashed to life and became a red streak in the night. They swirled around each other like a swarm of angry hornets on their way to the S-1.

Another flash of lightning gave her a glimpse of what they were. They were men—individual men, each with a blazing rocket pack strapped to their backs.

Without being ordered to do so, Dr. Scott thrust his hands into the air and marched himself over to the wall, pressing his body flat against the cold stone. The Nazis seemed to like that idea and had Clem and Reggie follow the doctor’s lead, shouting at them to face the wall and keep still.

“Why’d you have to give them this idea?” Reggie moaned. “Up against the wall is where they like to shoot people, you know.”

“You signaled the pilot, right?” Dr. Scott said calmly. “I have a feeling that her bad depth perception is about to work to our advantage.”

At that instant, the nose of the Scrumtumbler S-1 Aircraft burst through the balcony’s glass doors. The engines were tilted up to allow the S-1 to hover, and the propwash instantly filled the room with a storm of glass shards.

The Nazi soldiers screamed and threw their arms over their exposed faces, but the Americans, pressed up against the wall to the side of the doors, were shielded from danger.

The S-1 pulled back slightly, and swung around, its side door bobbing open invitingly. Clem and Reggie wasted no time leaping aboard. Dr. Scott veered off course just long enough to grab two files from the floor.

A bullet cracked into the stone at his feet as Dr. Scott leapt for the airplane door, but the S-1 was climbing into the night sky before the Nazis could fire again.

As Dr. Scott sealed the aircraft door behind him, he saw that the Germans were scrambling fighters in their airfield below. They weren’t out of danger yet.

The klaxon blared throughout Castle Wewelsburg as the guards tore through the filing room in search of the spies. They pointed their flashlights and their machineguns under the desks and behind the filing cabinets, and then stormed through the stately glass doors to make sure no one was hiding on the balcony or the ledges surrounding the room. Their search was swift and efficient, but the castle was a large place with many other rooms to search, and the Nazis departed the room as suddenly as they had entered it.

As soon as they slammed the heavy oak door behind them, Dr. Mortimer Scott clicked on his pen light and began reading the files surrounding him. The three of them had tucked themselves away inside filing shelf cubby-holes and pulled boxes of files in after them. Reggie had grumbled about the tight squeeze, but the slender Dr. Scott found it almost comforting to be confined to such a small space with such important reading material. As luck would have it, he had stumbled across some very important information.

Clem was the first one out of hiding and he pressed his ear to the oak door to hear what was happening in the hallway.

“They’re a-crawlin’ all over this here castle,” he said. “Ain’t no way we’re getting past them.”

Reggie pushed and shoved and wriggled his way out from his shelf, making noises that made Dr. Scott think of a grizzly bear giving birth to overweight cubs. Dr. Scott, still clutching the fat file folder, was out on his feet before Reggie finished extracting himself. It gave Dr. Scott another moment to skim through the papers he held. His German was a bit rusty, but he felt a thrill as he read on.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “You won’t believe what I’ve found. It’s got to do with—”

Reggie shouldered past him to the balcony door where he threw back the heavy curtains and aimed his flashlight out into the darkness, covering and uncovering the light with his palm at regular intervals.

“What in the sam-hell are you doin’?” Clem whispered sharply. “They see that light in this room and they’ll know right where to come get us.”

“Relax,” Reggie said. “I’m signaling the pilot.”

“And what’s the pilot supposed to do? Last I talked to her, she ain’t got a ‘get out of jail free’ card that works at Nazi prison camps.”

“Gentlemen!” Dr. Scott raised his voice just over a whisper. “You need to see what I’ve found. This file contains the Thule Society’s information on portals into the Hollow Earth. Including  their suspected location.”

“And what good is that?” Clem said. “I ain’t packed any bags for a Hollow Earth expedition, you know.”

“Don’t underestimate the importance of this information,” Dr. Scott waved the thick file folder in the air. “This may be the key to finding the greatest scientific discovery of the twentieth century. More importantly, it may be the key to keeping that discovery out of the hands of the Nazis.”

The klaxon blared throughout Castle Wewelsburg as the guards tore through the filing room in search of the spies. They pointed their flashlights and their machineguns under the desks and behind the filing cabinets, and then stormed through the stately glass doors to make sure no one was hiding on the balcony or the ledges surrounding the room. Their search was swift and efficient, but the castle was a large place with many other rooms to search, and the Nazis departed the room as suddenly as they had entered it.

As soon as they slammed the heavy oak door behind them, Dr. Mortimer Scott clicked on his pen light and began reading the files surrounding him. The three of them had tucked themselves away inside filing shelf cubby-holes and pulled boxes of files in after them. Reggie had grumbled about the tight squeeze, but the slender Dr. Scott found it almost comforting to be confined to such a small space with such important reading material. As luck would have it, he had stumbled across some very important information.

Clem was the first one out of hiding and he pressed his ear to the oak door to hear what was happening in the hallway.

“They’re a-crawlin’ all over this here castle,” he said. “Ain’t no way we’re getting past them.”

Reggie pushed and shoved and wriggled his way out from his shelf, making noises that made Dr. Scott think of a grizzly bear giving birth to overweight cubs. Dr. Scott, still clutching the fat file folder, was out on his feet before Reggie finished extracting himself. It gave Dr. Scott another moment to skim through the papers he held. His German was a bit rusty, but he felt a thrill as he read on.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “You won’t believe what I’ve found. It’s got to do with—”

Reggie shouldered past him to the balcony door where he threw back the heavy curtains and aimed his flashlight out into the darkness, covering and uncovering the light with his palm at regular intervals.

“What in the sam-hell are you doin’?” Clem whispered sharply. “They see that light in this room and they’ll know right where to come get us.”

“Relax,” Reggie said. “I’m signaling the pilot.”

“And what’s the pilot supposed to do? Last I talked to her, she ain’t got a ‘get out of jail free’ card that works at Nazi prison camps.”

“Gentlemen!” Dr. Scott raised his voice just over a whisper. “You need to see what I’ve found. This file contains the Thule Society’s information on portals into the Hollow Earth. Including  their suspected location.”

“And what good is that?” Clem said. “I ain’t packed any bags for a Hollow Earth expedition, you know.”

“Don’t underestimate the importance of this information,” Dr. Scott waved the thick file folder in the air. “This may be the key to finding the greatest scientific discovery of the twentieth century. More importantly, it may be the key to keeping that discovery out of the hands of the Nazis.”

Is the new format for the ezine good or bad? comment on this post to let me know what you think.

Join me on Saturday, April 14th, 2012, 2:00 to 5:00 pm!

Davenport Cellars is one of the finest wineries in Washington state and makers of the award-winning R.H.D and Continuity red blends. If you’ve never been for a tasting at Davenport Cellars, do yourself a favor and come hang out with me on 4/14/12.

While you’re there, you can pick up a book, get your book signed, or just come by to say HI!

Davenport Cellars 

19501 144th Ave NE

Suite B600

Woodinville, WA 98072

425.457.4957

I hope to see you there!

Thelonius and Celeste ducked down behind the stoves as a pair of Nazi soldiers thundered through the kitchen. The instant they were gone, Thelonius popped up to rummage through the kitchen drawers. He softly hooted in delight when he found a tray of silverware, and he immediately tamped a pouch of black powder into his blunderbuss and crammed a handful of forks in after it.

“What are you doing?” Celeste demanded. “They’re going to be back any minute, and you’re stealing silverware?”

“I am not pilfering, madam. I am preparing a mighty weapon which will strike supernatural terror into our enemy’s hearts, just as it did before.”

“You fire that thing again inside this zeppelin and you could blow us all up, you know.”

Ignoring her, Thelonius jammed in a cloth plug to seal the blunderbuss charge, and his weapon was then fully ready for action.

As he scooped more silverware into his pocket for later use, he noticed a set of dials. Unable to restrain his curiosity, he gave one a twist. Nothing happened. He gave the others a twist, but he still noticed no effect. Then he saw that a red light blazed within a small chamber beneath the knob. When he opened the door to the small chamber, heat washed over his face. He could see no open flames, only two red bars glowing like miniature suns.

“Amazing,” Thelonius’s brows furrowed in concentration. “The Na-Tzee tribe must worship fire, and this must be a religious altar.”

“It’s an oven,” Celeste commented dryly.

Thelonius nodded. “I will remember that in your primitive language, the word ‘oven’ is synonymous with ‘altar.’ But there is no more time for this. What we need is a distraction…”

A devious idea struck the chimp-man’s brain, and his domed lips pulled back into a smile. Swiftly, he took out one of the gourds in which he carried his blasting powder. He popped it inside the oven and closed the door.

“What was that?” Celeste eyed the oven suspiciously. “Is this how you gorillas cook supper?”

“A distraction, my dear monkey-woman,” Thelonius grabbed her wrist and led her at a run out the door. The gourd would insulate the powder for a short time, but soon the heat of the oven would cause it to explode. Fire, shrapnel, noise—it would make an entirely satisfying distraction.

“By the way,” Thelonius asked as they dashed through the hallway. “Earlier you said I shouldn’t fire my blunderbuss inside this zeppelin. Why was that?”

“Well, because it’s a blimp,” Celeste said as if he would know what that meant. “It floats because it’s filled with an explosive gas, for crying out loud. If there’s a leak somewhere and you make so much as a spark—BOOM! The whole stinkin’ place could burn to a cinder and fall right outa the sky.”

Thelonius peered back over his shoulder in the direction of the kitchen, where his gunpowder-packed gourd was currently roasting in an oven.

“Oh dear,” he allowed.

Thelonius tried to keep his hands steady on his blunderbuss as he stared down the Nazis. Humans, he realized, looked a bit more like chimpanzees than he would have cared to admit, which would make shooting them in cold blood feel too much like murder. He prayed that these primitive savages would have the sense to recognize his superior weapon and back down.

No such luck.

They chattered rapidly at him in their strange, fricative-laden language and then one of them suddenly lunged at Thelonius’s throat with his knife. Now it wasn’t a question of murder, it was a question of self defense, and his finger seemed ready to pull the trigger of its own accord.

With a boom and a cloud of grey smoke, a pattern of tiny black holes opened up across the soldier’s chest and the wall behind him. The other soldier, evidently unaware that Thelonius’s weapon held only one charge, turned and ran down the hall, shouting for his peers.

“You shot a gun inside a zeppelin?” The female hollered at him. “What kind of crazy monkey are you?”

“I am no monkey, madam, I am a chimpanzee,” Thelonius decided to be forgiving because the poor thing was no doubt frightened by the loud bang and flash of his highly advanced weapon. Still, manners must be considered. “A thank-you might be in order, as I just saved you from your enemies. My name is Thelonius, and you, if I may be so bold, are named Celeste?”

The female’s eyes widened in amazement.

“Professor Limefellow informed me of your name,” he explained in hopes that she wouldn’t be too in awe of his more highly evolved mind. Humans, he had observed, were notoriously superstitious creatures and he didn’t want any of them to start worshipping him as some kind of god.

Boot-falls and angry voices echoed down the hallway.

“We gotta scram,” Celeste said as she grabbed his wrist and pulled him into a run. In his opinion, this was a most impertinent and un-ladylike action, but it seemed best to follow her nonetheless.

Their aimless dash took them into the ship’s mess hall, where they took cover behind a row of ovens. Their pursuers sounded like they were everywhere behind them, but Thelonius needed a moment to catch his breath. Celeste seemed none the worse for their short sprint, by which Thelonius surmised that her long human legs were better adapted for running than his. Perhaps human beings were not inferior to chimp-kind in every way.

“What was your plan, monkey man?” Celeste whispered to him.

“Your kind more closely resembles monkeys than mine,” Thelonius bridled. “To answer your question: I gained access to this vessel by climbing the tether. Unless you can climb down a few hundred feet of swaying rope, we will need to find another route.”