The Maltese Defence

by Simon Brading

  ‘Mind if I join the party, Goosy?’

  ‘Not at all, dig in.’

  ‘Very funny, Badger Two, now shift over a bit so I can have a clear shot as well.’

  Drake laughed, but it was Abby’s voice which filled Gwen’s ears and she glanced in the mirror above her cockpit to find Dragon directly behind her. She gave her rudder a touch to swing out of the way and saw flashes come from beneath Abby’s wings as she opened fire. Two more of the Barons tumbled away in quick succession.

  ‘Show off.’ Drake grumbled.

  ‘It’s not a competition, Three,’ said Abby with a laugh.

  ‘That’s alright for you to say,’ Gwen complained as she banked hard after a pair of red aircraft, ‘you always shoot down more than anyone else.’

  ‘I know. Maybe I should have said it’s no competition.’

  The rest of the Barons finally became aware of the threat bearing down on them and scattered. ‘Goosy, go make sure Gruber stays away from Dreadnought. Digger and I have got the minions.’

  ‘Roger, Leader.’ Gwen continued her dive as Drake and Abby peeled off to follow the Blutsaugers. She blocked out their voices as they continued their banter and concentrated on Hölle.

  For a moment, Gwen thought it was strange that Abby had sent her after Gruber instead of confronting him herself, but she quickly realised that, with Malta so close, he would only have time for one more run on Dreadnought before she made it to the safety of the coastal guns. There was no need for her to defeat him, or even drive him off, all she had to do was distract him for a minute. And if the room dedicated to her on Bertha was anything to go by, she was the one person who would be able to do that.

  Gruber’s full power dive had caused him to overshoot his target by a large margin and he was only just coming back around. He completed the turn quickly, though, and Gwen saw the nose of Hölle dip as he dived at Dreadnought. She put Excalibur on an intercept course, aiming for a point between the Baron and his prey. If things continued as they were she would have a very easy shot at him and he would have to fly through the combined fire of four cannons and six machine guns - she doubted he would survive.

  He must have seen her and worked out that he couldn’t continue his attack, because the profile of the aircraft changed as he pulled up. However, instead of banking away from her and retreating like she’d expected, Hölle’s wings became thinner and the fuselage shorter and shorter, until he was pointed directly towards her.

  Gwen couldn’t believe that Gruber would have the nerve to try a head to head pass with her; it was completely uncharacteristic - he always ensured the odds were heavily stacked in his favour before taking on an enemy. Yes, he had a slight height advantage over her and was fresh into the fight, whereas she was tired and running low on ammunition, but that meant next to nothing in this situation.

  In 1927 the Société Aéronautique had held its meeting in Japan. The hosts had put on an exhibition of Japanese culture, including such things as dance, music, automation and pottery, but there had been a couple of hours dedicated to the martial arts. While most of the members hadn’t paid much attention to the displays of martial prowess, their interests being more technical or mechanical, Gwen had found it fascinating, especially the demonstration of swordplay by a group of masters, who had fought duels with bamboo swords coated with red paint; their focus and concentration before they moved and their speed when they finally did, had been captivating. It had quickly become apparent, though, that there was almost no way for either of the swordsmen to win cleanly, as both usually came out of the fight with red streaks on their white uniforms.

  A head on pass between two fighters was very much like that - even if one of them did “win” it was very unlikely that they would come out of it unharmed, and by far the most likely outcome was that both aircraft would be destroyed and their pilots killed.

  The two fighters were closing at almost eight hundred miles per hour and would be within effective range of each other for about a second. The part which came after that deadly second was just as dangerous, though, because the pilots had to then carry out some kind of manoeuvre to avoid a collision and hope against hope that the enemy didn’t choose to do the same thing.

  So many things could go wrong and not a lot could go right but Gwen was determined to go through with it and do what she could to make sure Gruber didn’t survive, even if it meant her own life as well. Her death would be insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but so many of the Prussian hopes and so much of their morale, was dependent on the continued success and survival of the leader of the Crimson Barons.

  She took a deep breath and settled herself into her seat, scooting down slightly to put herself just a little bit further behind the armour plate in front of her cockpit. She centred the dot of her deflector sight over the nosecone and the blurry circle of Hölle’s airscrew, then covered the firing button on Excalibur’s yoke with her thumb, tightening her grip at the same time, not wanting the vibrations of the guns to put off her aim.

  Two miles. Ten seconds.

  Steady Gwen.

  The urge to turn away from the threat was almost overwhelming, but she forced herself to hold still and sent all of her awareness reaching out towards the red machine, feeling the path her bullets would have to take.

  A mile.

  Ready...

  She blinked, surprised, as bright flowers bloomed on the enemy aircraft’s wings and had to consciously stop herself from reflexively pressing the button and returning fire.

  Far too early!

  A couple of sharp bangs betrayed the fact that Excalibur had been hit, but the bullets were spent and didn’t penetrate the Duralumin skin.

  Hölle still wasn’t in range when the points of light winked out and the aircraft pulled up sharply.

  Gwen couldn’t believe her luck, or Gruber’s stupidity, but she wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth and she gently pulled back on her stick, leading the aircraft with the red dot of her sight.

  Less than two seconds later she was in range and opened fire.

  Excalibur juddered as her ten guns spouted lethal metal, but, after only a split second, first her cannons, then her machine guns fell silent.

  Gwen glanced at her ammunition counters and found that every single one of them was showing nought.

  She cursed, but instead of breaking off and returning home she grinned and throttled back a touch so that she could slot in behind the slower Hölle.

  The sound of cannon fire didn’t quite drown out Drake’s laugh. ‘One more! That’s three!’

  ‘Well done.’ There was a slight pause, then Abby’s voice returned. ‘But I’ve got five.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’

  In spite of the ease with which the Misfits were shooting them down, the Barons were some of the best pilots the Prussians had to offer and they had quickly recovered from their surprise and regrouped, turning to push back at the two British pilots.

  That only prolonged the inevitable, though, as Drake and Abby flew rings around them.

  Eventually, elite pilots though they were, they’d had enough and, at some signal, they broke off and fled.

  ‘Let them go, Digger.’ Abby said, already turning away from them and towards Malta.

  ‘Why? We've got them on the run!’

  ‘Because I want to pick up another load of meltbombs before those ships reach Gozo.’

  ‘Oh. Alright.’

  The disappointment was clear in Drake’s voice and she understood it perfectly, nevertheless it was the right thing to do and he fell in on her wing.

  ‘Erm... What’s Goosy doing? Three o’clock low.’

  Abby peered over her right wing. A couple of miles away her wingmate was playing with Hölle, staying a couple of hundred yards behind Gruber, in an easy firing position, following him as he twisted and turned, frantically trying to get away from her.

  ‘She’s had half a dozen opportunities to kill him already.’

  ‘More.’ A
bby clicked the selector on the radio panel next to her from Drake’s number to the Misfit frequency. ‘Two, this is Badger Leader. Check in, please.’

  ‘I’m out of ammo, Leader.’

  ‘Then what the hell are you doing still chasing Gruber?’

  There was a moment of silence during which Abby saw Gwen’s face turn up towards the two Misfit aircraft.

  ‘I’m letting him know that he’s not the best pilot in the world, but just a very naughty boy, Leader.’

  ‘Jolly good. But he’s going to realise something is up when you don't shoot him down soon. Break off and return to base, please.’

  ‘Spoilsport... Returning to base.’

  Abby gave the still-approaching ships a last, concerned glance, then turned her eyes upwards. The Spits and Harrys had lost quite a few aircraft, but seemed to be just about holding their own now. They didn’t have to any longer, though.

  ‘Badger Leader to all aircraft, Dreadnought is clear and so are we. Heading home. Suggest you do the same. Over.’

  She pushed the throttle to the stops and put Dragon into a shallow dive towards Hal Far.

  Even though the loss of the Nelsons had been tragic, the enemy ships had been dealt with and the few that would be left after the meltbombs had done their job would be easy prey for the Misfits.

  ‘How many are left for us to sink? How many did our meltbombs destroy? And if you tell me I can’t paint markings on Hummingbird, I’m going to be extremely annoyed, and you wouldn’t like me when I’m annoyed.’

  ‘None. None of the ships that were only hit by meltbombs were sunk.’

  Scarlet’s expectant grin faded at Campbell’s answer and she stared at her in shock, open-mouthed.

  The Misfits had gone to their ready room to rest for a few minutes while their fitters prepared their aircraft for another sortie and the Irishwoman had leapt out of her armchair as soon as Dorothy Campbell had entered and confronted her eagerly. That eagerness had vanished in the face of the news.

  Abby leaned forward in her seat and stared at the Sky Commodore. ‘None? None whatsoever?’ When Campbell shook her head she turned to look at Wendy. ‘How is that possible?’

  The big woman sighed. ‘I was afraid of this.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Well, the Italians developed the acid in the bombs we’re using, so it just stands to reason they would have developed a neutralising agent. They must have distributed it to the ships after we used it on them before. Sorry, I didn’t think that they would work it out or distribute it so quickly.’

  There were groans at the news and Wendy looked down at her tea, ashamed.

  Owen put his arms around her and pulled her to him. ‘It’s not your fault, darling, it’s not as if we could have done anything differently anyway. Isn’t that right?’ He looked up at Campbell defiantly. ‘We had to try something.’

  Campbell nodded. ‘It was worth a shot, but now I’m afraid we’re done here.’

  ‘Done? What does that mean?’

  ‘It means that for the rest of the day you and the rest of the fighters are going to attack the ships and do what you can to destroy their equipment and delay their unloading, but tonight we are evacuating.’

  Epilogue

  The British fighters carried out half a dozen more sorties during the day, strafing the Prussian forces as they unloaded their ships, but they had known the whole time that, no matter how many men they killed or vehicles they left smoking wrecks, it would make no difference; the British were leaving Malta that night.

  The evacuation started after nightfall, under cover of darkness, and moved extremely quickly, the section heads having been briefed during the afternoon.

  Whatever that was going, including Hummingbird, was packed into wagons and driven to the Grand Harbour, where it was loaded onto the Arturo and the two remaining destroyers. Everything else, including the remaining Spitsteams and Harridans, was destroyed to deny it to the Prussians, except for the food and medical supplies, which were given to the local communities. Once that was done, the men and women followed the wagons to Valletta, most of them walking the few miles.

  As soon as the air bases were deserted, explosives were placed on the support columns of the bunkers and the mechanisms of the ramps by the RAC’s demolitions experts. Clockwork fuses were set for mid-morning and, after the demolition experts were out, the personnel entrances were filled in with several tons of concrete and hidden under turf.

  Wagons took the last few people to the harbour and at midnight the ships sailed. They turned east as soon as they left the harbour, then south, before finally turning west when they were out of sight of the island, describing a large circle in an attempt to avoid enemy detection.

  Dreadnought and Bloodhound took off an hour later and flew south for twenty minutes before turning west. The large aircraft had enough range to make it to Gibraltar on their own, where they would be dismantled and packed into crates, ready for the Arturo to transport back to England.

  The three Misfit fighters couldn’t make it that far, so they were going to take off a couple of hours before dawn and would rendezvous with the Arturo when she was well clear of Malta. Radio silence had been imposed, though, so as not to give the game away, and the Misfits didn’t know if the carrier would be waiting for them or not. There was a real possibility that it would be intercepted, sunk, or forced away and they might well be ditching into the Mediterranean, or landing in enemy occupied Africa a few hours after takeoff.

  With the rest of the Misfits gone as passengers on Dreadnought, it was only Gwen, Drake and Abby left and they decided to spend the few hours they had before takeoff on the airfield with their aircraft instead of making their way to the empty house and back. They had brought cushions from the sofas of the ready room to lie on, blankets in case they were cold, some sandwiches, and a flask of tea each for the wait.

  Abby immediately lay down and went to sleep, but Gwen couldn’t and sat sipping tea, gazing into the night, towards Valletta.

  The wounded and sick from the hospital had been among the first passengers taken on board the Arturo, but some had been too injured to be moved, Kitty among them. The American hadn’t yet woken up and was still in a critical condition. The doctors wouldn’t risk moving her and she was going to be left behind.

  Gwen had been reassured that there was no danger of Kitty, the other patients or the doctors who had volunteered to stay behind, falling into the hands of the enemy. The underground facilities had been sealed off and the hospital building had been collapsed over it, as if it had been destroyed by bombing and there were concealed tunnels connecting the lowest levels with the sea, for when the time came to evacuate them. She couldn’t help but be worried, though, not least of all because the doctors hadn’t been able to assure her that Kitty would even survive her injuries.

  ‘She’ll be fine.’

  She turned towards the sound of Rudy Drake’s voice and found him propped up on his elbow, looking at her. The moon was almost full, something which had worried Campbell and Captain Hewer as they wouldn’t have the cover of darkness, but, to everybody’s relief, clouds had rolled in soon after dark and Rudy was little more than a shadow.

  ‘How? We’re leaving her on an island which is going to be crawling with enemy soldiers in a few hours. Even if she survives her wounds, she’ll probably end up being handed over to Gruber and... and...’

  She broke off and turned away from him to scrub the back of her hand across her eyes, grateful that the dark would hide her tears.

  There was a rustle as Drake stood, then the cushions under her bent as he sat next to her. An arm went around her and she let him pull her close and rested her head on his shoulder.

  ‘The Maltese know what they’re doing. They’ve been smuggling stuff on and off this island for centuries and a few people aren’t going to be a problem for them.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’

  ‘Of course I am! Now, come on, less talk about something else. Um, did I
ever tell you about the orientation flight they insisted on giving us in the University Air Squadron? No? Well, I took up the instructor, she was one of those old, stuck in the mud types, a bomber driver from the first show and she’d...’

  Even though she could barely feel him through her greatcoat and flightsuit, somehow she found the contact comforting and that, combined with his soft, familiar voice, soon lulled her to sleep.

  ‘Rise and shine, children, it’s almost time to go.’

  Gwen opened her eyes to find Abby grinning down at her. Like Kitty, it seemed that she was a disgustingly cheerful morning person and for a moment she wondered what the hell there was to smile about, but then something shifted behind her and her eyes widened as Drake’s voice came from right by her ear.

  ‘Do we have time for a cup of tea?’

  Abby nodded with a smile. ‘You’ve got time for a quick snack, but no more cuddling. Takeoff in ten minutes.’

  ‘Righty-ho!’ Drake said. He patted Gwen on the hip. ‘Fancy a cuppa, Goosy?’

  ‘Please.’

  Gwen held perfectly still as Drake unfolded himself from around her and waited until he was up before sitting. He winked and gave her one of his cheekiest grins, then turned his attention to the tea, using a tiny clockwork lamp to see what he was doing.

  Gwen scrubbed her face with her hands and groaned; as if it wasn’t enough having to get by on a few hours’ sleep, Rudy was probably going to be teasing her about dropping off in his arms for the whole flight.

  A rustling noise caught her attention and she hissed to her companions as she leapt to her feet and peered into the darkness.

  Abby and Drake stopped what they were doing and joined her.

  They eventually made out a silent host swarming in through the twisted wreckage of the gates.

  ‘Is it the Prussians?’

  Before Abby could answer Gwen’s question, a voice hailed them. ‘My friends!’