JET LAG!

by Ryan Clifford

  Todd was rousted at 1800 hours and given a German Air Force uniform to wear with the appropriate rank on the epaulettes. His father was accorded the same honour and they re-met at the small drinks reception at 1930.

  Todd was in shock, but his father seemed calm and resigned. He just didn’t seem to care about what was happening. He was chatting gaily to German officers – who were actually predominantly British – but with weird Anglo-German names.

  Todd answered many questions frankly and honestly about his adventures and previous life to the select audience, but at dinner he decided to get some answers of his own.

  ‘Herr Oberst, since I have been so co-operative, may I now ask you two questions?’

  ‘Please go ahead,’ answered the Commandant freely.

  ‘Firstly, can you assure me that my people are in good hands?’

  The Oberst smiled easily.

  ‘Off course, Todd, very commendable that you should think of your men - they are all now eating supper and will sleep tonight in comfortable beds. Of course, we had to take certain security measures to ensure that your party posed no threat, and of course we must keep their presence here a secret – for your and our sakes.’

  Todd smiled with some relief.

  ‘And your other question, Herr Oberst Leutnant?’

  Todd drew breath and then blurted out the question he'd been asking himself since he landed back at Marham.

  ‘What the hell has been happening here since 1940? Because this is not our world. In our time, the Nazis were defeated and America, Britain and its allies ruled the peace. What happened to change all that?’

  The Anglo-German dinner guests were ominously silent as they eyed each other round the table. One man, however, spoke out.

  ‘Herr Morrissey, I am James Himmler – you may recognise the name. My uncle was the great man himself and I am a senior official in the…er…… police service – shall we say. Perhaps I can explain.’

  Todd was aghast – Himmler – a great man! Never! However, he held his tongue – clearly this was a powerful fellow and everybody around the table meekly deferred to his presence.

  ‘Let me start at the beginning. In 1939, Britain declared war on the German people over the mutually agreed political takeover in France. It came to nothing and by 1941, Britain had been invaded and was a satellite state of the Third German Reich. Edward the Eighth ruled until his death in 1980, when the people decided to abolish the monarchy. Germany assumed control of the British Empire and we became great friends with the USA, who joined us in our struggle against the evils of Communism. President McCarthy was a particular ally and we have been able to contain this evil to a relatively small area around Moscow and Stalingrad. Our friends the Chinese control the Far East, where right wing policies have brought incredible growth and prosperity to many. Under the supervision of Nazi ethnic ideals, we have purified the parts of the world under our control. Hunger, poverty, sickness and political strife are things of the past. Our Fuhrer was correct in every way and we still mourn his loss, some twenty years after his passing in 1972.’

  Todd sat, mouth agape, with nothing credible to say.

  ‘I see you are somewhat shocked, Herr Morrissey. Shall I continue – yes, perhaps. The world has developed tremendously in the fields of technology – we landed on the moon in 1968 and currently, twenty-five thousand people live there in peace and harmony. We also reached Mars in 1990 and have great plans for its future. So you see, Herr Morrissey, we have done well. Indeed, I could carry on all night extolling the virtues and progress under the Party’s leadership.’

  What he didn’t mention was the ongoing extermination of anybody, world-wide, who didn’t subscribe to Nazi ideals. He didn’t mention the forced labour camps and the millions thrust into vicious slavery. He didn’t mention the totally dystopian society at large in the world.

  Todd gathered his wits.

  ‘What about Israel, Communist China, the Nuclear Arms Race and England winning the World Cup in 1966? Has none of that happened?’

  James Himmler looked puzzled. None of which you speak is familiar to us. And as for the World Cup – football I assume – Germany has won it six times in a row! Of course, we limit participation. Teams from Africa, Asia and South America do not play football to a sufficient standard.’

  Todd fully realised his predicament by now and said little more for the remainder of the evening, whereas his father joined in the conversation with enthusiasm. Todd was appalled by his behaviour and couldn’t bring himself to talk to him again.

  When the dinner and conversation/interrogation ended, Todd was returned to his cell, stripped of his uniform and spent a miserable night on a lumpy bunk. He guessed, correctly, that his team were being treated in a similar fashion.

  He hardly slept at all.

  ***

  At 0900 the next morning, a guard fetched him from his cell and escorted him to see the Gestapo officer he had met the previous afternoon. The interrogation was brief, but to the point.

  ‘Wing Commander, we have waited over fifty years for your reappearance and have damning and irrefutable evidence of your crimes against the State. You flew armed missions against the forces of the Fatherland and were responsible for the deaths of many loyal German citizens – in particular at an airfield in Denmark near Esbjerg in August 1940. For these acts against the Reich, you will be punished. The sentence is death, by shooting – to be carried out immediately. Take him away!’

  Todd was hauled away, numbed and silenced with utter shock; he was dragged, struggling violently through dark corridors, down three flights of stairs and into a dank and stinking basement room. He was pushed to his knees and shot unceremoniously in the back of the head.

  The same fate awaited every other member of the 1992 Flypast team – except seven circumcised men – who were assumed to be Jewish and were unable to prove otherwise. These were deported to labour camps in Morocco and progressively worked to death.

  AVM Sir Henry Morrissey took his own life. He hanged himself immediately after the reception ‘dinner’, in the bedroom provided in the ‘Kaserne’ or Officers Mess.

  The Nazi engineers crawled all over the two aircraft and within three years had designed and constructed a fleet of improved Tornado multi-purpose aircraft, and a superb variant of the C-130.

  Not a shred of human evidence of the ill-fated mission from the past remained. All documentary evidence – papers, clothing and personal effects – were boxed under the closest security and transported to Berlin for further inspection.

  The final words Todd Morrissey heard before he was shot, briefly and viciously confirmed the awful truth – ‘Winston Churchill was hanged in September 1940 – Heil Hitler!’

  ***

  55 - 3

  Norfolk

  8 September 1992

  ‘Affirmative, Purple Two, loud and clear. What now?’

  ‘I suggest you call Marham on ‘Guard’ frequency and see if we can get an answer? I think that we might be home.’

  However, Stumpy and Todd were struggling to see where they were going. The aircraft was engulfed in thick, dark grey cloud, which made visibility effectively zero. Stumpy was fighting to keep the Tornado straight and level and the vicious turbulence was tossing the jet quite violently. In addition, the engines were not performing correctly.

  ‘Purple lead is experiencing extreme air turbulence. I suggest we attempt to climb out of this weather. If we are still in the time-shift Cu-Nimb, then we could suffer major structural damage. Do you read my transmission, Purple Two?’

  The Captain of Purple Two was also fighting with the aircraft controls and the passengers were suffering grievously down the back end. Airmen were shrieking in alarm, vomiting and the freight was in imminent danger of breaking loose.

  ‘Roger, Purple lead. We are also undergoing severe turbulence and if we don’t get out of here pretty damned quickly, the aircraft is going to go down. Going to full power and climbing out. Be advised that we have navig
ational failures and our GPS is unserviceable. See you on top.’

  Todd replied and concurred.

  ‘Roger One, we are zoom climbing on a heading of 270 degrees and will circle above the cloud and await your arrival. Out.’

  Stumpy applied full power, pulled 3g on the control column and commenced the emergency climb out procedure. This was normally reserved for bad weather when flying at low-level, or at night when conducting operations using the TFR (Terrain Following Radar). It lifted the aircraft away from the ground as quickly as possible, thus reducing the chances of hitting a mountain or other high ground.

  The Tornado climbed through five, ten and fifteen thousand feet with no improvement in visibility or reduction in cloud thickness. At nineteen thousand, the cockpit brightened and at twenty two thousand feet, Stumpy and Todd broke into clear blue sky.

  ‘Thank God for that,’ murmured Stumpy, ‘I've never seen cloud like it. That must have been one hell of a storm. I don’t know about you, but the rear cockpit is covered in some sort of black dust.’

  ‘So is mine, it looks like ash,’ agreed Stumpy.

  Todd was straining to look behind the aircraft and was puzzled by what he saw.

  ‘There's something odd, Stumpy. That cloud should go up to forty thousand feet at least – but there's no sign of any anvil – just a flat surface of black cloud as far as the eye can see. It's weird! What weather system could cause these amounts of thick clouds and bright blue above. There's no sign of any cirrus above us and this sunlight is blinding. What do you make of it?’

  ‘I'm just glad to be out of that shit. Shall we give someone a call now?’ Stumpy was monitoring his engines very closely and to his great relief, all read-outs were reading normal again.

  However, Todd was still not totally satisfied, but nonetheless decided to initiate a distress call and get back to Marham ASAP - although he suspected that landing in this weather might pose insurmountable problems. If the cloud went down to surface level, then they may need to divert to a different airfield.

  ‘Let's check the fuel, Stumpy. My nav kit is all over the place. The GPS is dead, the Doppler won't lock on and the TACAN and Inertial Nav are playing up. The radar is useless through this cloud, so we might be diverting. Can you work out an endurance figure and I suggest we slow down to conserve gas. I’ll try the radio. Keep an eye out for the Herc as we circle – they should be through this murk pretty soon.’

  Stumpy agreed with Todd’s suggestions and whilst he came back on the throttles, Todd tried the radios. First of all he dialled up Marham approach. He estimated that they were about thirty miles north of Marham and should be well inside radio range. He suspected that all flying would have been abandoned for the day, and the crews could well be sat in the squadrons playing Clag, a card game similar to Whist popular with aircrew when flying ops were impossible – Cloud Low Aircraft Grounded sourced the acronym. How he wished he was back in his own crewroom.

  ‘Marham approach, this is Purple Formation, two aircraft requesting radar to radar recovery and landing.’

  He waited twenty or thirty seconds but there was no reply.

  So he tried again.

  Nothing.

  ‘That's odd Stumpy.’

  ‘Best you try a few other freqs. I haven’t got the C-130 visual yet.’

  As usual, a circumspect Stumpy was unperturbed. So Todd selected a different pre-set frequency on the V/UHF radio box and tried again.

  Nothing. Nada. No response.

  So he tried another – and another and another.

  No-one was at home.

  This was now becoming a more than mildly disturbing situation.

  Just then, Stumpy spotted the Herc climbing out of the thick cloud and steered towards their position - about three miles away.

  Todd was relieved to see their compatriots safe and sound, and so gave them a call.

  ‘Purple Two from lead, we have you visual and are closing on your position. Suggest you reduce to endurance speed. We might have a problem.’

  The Air Marshal replied instantly from the co-pilot’s seat.

  ‘Roger Purple lead, what's the situation?’

  Todd explained the lack of contact with the ground, and his father again suggested calling on Guard – the international emergency frequency. Todd agreed and transmitted his contact call on UHF – 243.0.

  Nothing.

  So he tried on 121.5 – the Guard VHF frequency.

  Again nothing for about thirty seconds and then a weak transmission came through the cloud and ether.

  ‘Person calling on 121.5 megacycles, say your message again please?’

  This was certainly not standard radio procedure and Todd was mystified. However, he was just glad to have received a response, so attempted to clarify the situation.

  ‘Station responding, this is Purple Formation, you are weak and barely readable. Please identify yourself and your location.’

  There was a long silence, but then the voice broke through once more.

  ‘Hello Purple Formation, this is Bill Forbes and I'm at Peterborough in my shelter. How can I help you?’

  The AVM got straight onto Todd.

  ‘Todd, keep an open mind. I think we are in serious trouble. We might not actually be home – our home that is. See what you can get from this chap without alarming him.’

  Todd couldn’t believe his ears. Was what Jim Charles said actually coming true – were they in a similar but different reality? He needed to find out – and quickly. Their fuel was running low and they had to find a landing strip urgently.

  ‘Roger, Purple Two, understood. Break – good morning Bill, thank you for that. Are you saying that you are not at an airfield and do you know if the weather is bad all over the country today?’

  Poor old Bill Forbes was completely fazed by Todd’s requests for information.

  ‘Look, Mister, I don’t know where you’ve been for the past five years, but yes, the weather is like this everywhere – all over Europe – and has been since the war of ’87. And no, I'm not at an airfield – I'm in the community shelter in Peterborough. There ain't no airfields round here – or anywhere for that matter – not since ’87 anyway.’

  Todd was gobsmacked. Although he had half expected a reply revealing some new disaster for Purple – the shock was numbing just the same.

  ‘Oh fucking hell,’ muttered Stumpy – almost resignedly.

  The AVM broke in once again.

  ‘He can't help us son, no-one down there can. We are going to have to find somewhere to put down on our own. A large civilian airfield – the M1 or A1 – a strip of road. Find out what the cloudbase is?’

  Bill Forbes had been listening in.

  ‘Hey, mister – are you saying that you are in an aeroplane?’

  Todd tried to remain calm.

  ‘That's correct Mr Forbes. We are two aircraft, one Tornado jet and one Hercules transport and we need to land very soon.’

  Forbes was incredulous.

  ‘Who are you kidding mister. There ain't been NO aeroplanes since ’87. Ain't been no aeroplanes anywhere – except maybe in China – they got off lightly.’

  Todd was now getting the picture, but persisted.

  ‘Yes, Mr Forbes, we are aeroplanes and we NEED to land. Can you tell me how high the cloud is from the surface?’

  Forbes laughed.

  ‘How should I know Mister, I ain't been out for three years. No-one has. Got no masks or nuclear kit and I ain't going outside for you. It's five degrees below out there.’

  Todd’s sense of despair was growing with every word from Forbes. But he needed to know what had happened in 1987.

  ‘Mr Forbes, I can assure you that we are flying and you probably wouldn't understand my explanation as to how and why – but could you please humour me and explain what happened in ’87.’

  Forbes was becoming impatient, but decided to go along with Todd for the time being.

  ‘Can't stay on this radio for too long – the batter
ies are weak. Only speaking to you because you're the first folks we've had on this radio in over a year. Anyhow, in ’87 them Nazis started a war with America and Russia. Hitler had just died and there was some sort of power struggle, and everything just went crazy in a few days. Nuclear bombs and missiles just flew everywhere and Britain, Europe, most of Russia and the USA were destroyed. Millions were killed – and then those Arabs started to join in and China bombed them and that's all I know. It's been nuclear winter for five years and only a handful of people are alive. Many of us are sick and many have starved to death – it's so cold and dark that nothing will grow. And now you come up with this cock and bull story about aeroplanes. I've a mind just to cut you off, Mister!’