by Tom Kratman
Interlude
Grosslangheim, Federal Republic of Germany,
1 October, 2022
Amal didn't have to wear a veil at home. She wore it anyway because every time her mother looked at her face, Gabi broke down in tears.
They'd moved to Grosslangheim for protection. The boys had been caught early, but the judge, an Islamic judge, had released them on bail. About this the police could do exactly nothing except to advise Gabi to take her daughter someplace else for safety until the trial.
Not that there was going to be a trial. The boys had no sooner been released on bail then they'd fled, taking advantage of both the informal network of blood relations in Germany and the fact that German police had retreated from the Muslim neighborhoods, leaving them in the charge of German-funded Islamic police who were, in effect, an arm of the very mullahs and imams who counseled that the responsibility for rape fell entirely upon the female.
The police had warned Gabi this would happen and warned her, too, that despite the boys' practical immunity from prosecution, they would still kill her daughter, if they could, as a matter of "principle."
She'd thought of returning to her home town of Kitzingen but that, the police had also advised, was large enough and had enough of a
Muslim community now that she and the girl would be in danger there as well.
"Better a small town," they'd advised. "One where there are none but Germans. You'll find a lot of us are abandoning the cities as they turn into foreign enclaves. No one will find you and Amal too remarkable. It will be better in a small town, too, since the welfare benefits are being slashed all over."
The welfare payments had become more important, too, as Gabi had found herself unable to sell much of her art. She, after all, concentrated on the human form and selling pictures of people had become a rather dangerous, as being against the Sharia, activity. Though she'd never encountered it, she'd had friends who had had their stalls and galleries ransacked by Islamic mobs.
In the end, she'd decided she must emigrate and take Amal with her.
American Consulate, Zurich, Switzerland, 5 March, 2024
After the retaliatory nukings, only Switzerland, in all of Western Europe, had maintained diplomatic relations with the United States— now, since the occupation of Canada, rapidly morphing into the American Empire. Thus, it had been to Switzerland Gabi had had to go to apply for a visa to immigrate into the U.S.
She took her number, and waited impatiently for it to be called. Her initial application had been submitted months before, shortly after she'd realized that no place in continental Europe was going to be safe.
Once her number was called, Gabi proceeded to a private office where a consular officer invited her to sit while perusing her file.
"I'm sorry, Ms. von Minden," the official had said. "Your application has been disapproved."
"But . . . but why?"
In answer, the official began taking from the file documents and photographs, sliding them across the desk. Gabi saw herself in the photographs, standing on rostra while speaking to crowds, standing in crowds while carrying signs, signing petitions while being photographed.
She didn't understand. Her face said as much.
"We still take some immigrants from Old Europe," the consular explained. "But we don't really need them. We get plenty of high quality applicants from Latin America, India, Japan, China, Vietnam . . . all over. We not only don't need Europeans anymore, we don't really want them.
"I'm sorry to have to say it this way but . . . you're diseased, you see . . . politically diseased. You're in the process of losing your own homeland. You brought it on yourselves and it's become irreversible now. So ask yourself: Why should we accept into our country people with a history of destroying the country they live in?
"You're diseased, Ms. von Minden, and you're contagious. We had a long bout with the disease that's afflicted Europe, and it killed millions of us. Why should we allow any more contamination?
"Europe abandoned its future for a short period of comfort in the present, and you . . . you personally"—the consular's hand waved towards the pictures and documents on the desk—"encouraged this. Europe stopped having children, who are the future—because it was too uncomfortable, too inconvenient. Europe began taxing the future to buy comfort in the present. Europe let in millions of inassimilable, and therefore inherently hostile, foreigners to do the work that the children which you did not have could not do. And thus you have no future—you sold it—but only a past. Why should we let you take away our future? What do we owe you that we should risk that?"
"But my daughter? Her father was an American citizen!"
"We know. But he was not a citizen until well after your daughter was born. Thus, she is not a citizen. Worse, you raised her and she probably carries the same political disease you do. We don't want her either.
"For whatever it's worth, I'm sorry for you both."
Chapter Twenty
The grandchild, far from being incidental, is decisive. Civilization persists when there is a widespread sense of an ethical obligation on the part of the present generation for the well-being of the third generation —their own grandchildren. A society where this feeling is not widespread may last as a civilization for some time—indeed, for one or two generations it might thrive spectacularly. But inevitably, a society acknowledging no transgenerational commitment to the future will decay and decline from within.
—Lee Harris, "The Future of Tradition"
Flight Seven Nine Three, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
The first thing Hamilton noticed when he entered the cockpit and stood beside the pilot was that Ling (he knew, at some level, that Ling was being teleoperated but still thought of the body as Ling's) was crying, tears coursing down her cheeks in an endless flood. Retief was sitting next to the pilot in the copilot's chair.
"I'm sorry if—"
—"I need you to set me down," Hamilton answered. "There's one of our team still on the ground, at an-Nessang."
"Not going to happen," the pilot answered. "I've lost so much lift that it's—no pun intended—up in the air as to whether I'll be able to make it across the lake to Switzerland. If I waste the altitude I've got I won't make it across."
"Fuck!" Hamilton exclaimed. "Parachutes?"
"Civilian airliners don't carry chutes," Retief answered. "Bad for passenger morale, don't you know."
"I've got to get on the ground," Hamilton insisted. "If things had gone according to plan I'd have driven away from the castle—"
"Things never do," the pilot said.
Retief thought about that for a moment, then said, "There is a way but—"
"What is it, man?"
"We've got the winches to hold the ship down when it's landed and the winds are high. But they don't have much cable to them."
"How much is 'not much'? Can they reach to the ground?"
"What's our altitude over ground?" Retief asked the pilot.
"About three hundred feet. It's staying pretty stable for now, since the ground is descending slightly."
"Not enough," Retief answered. "Can you make a thirty or forty foot jump?"
Shit, my knees.
"Not a lot of choice," Hamilton answered.
"Not a lot of time, either," The pilot commented, looking at the map on his navigation screen. "I'm having to balance lift from speed with loss of buoyancy from air pressure forcing lifting gas out. It's a bitch! Then again, I am the best. An-Nessang in . . . call it . . . oh, about five minutes . . . a little less."
"Fuck it," Hamilton said to Retief. "Let's do it."
"Any particular direction from the town you want to be dropped off?" the pilot asked, as Hamilton and Retief exited the cockpit.
"Right over it, if you can," Hamilton answered over his shoulder. "Maybe I'll luck out and find a soft roof about twenty feet below."
"Stand on the hook," Retief said.
Hamilton looked at the t
hing dubiously. Not that the hook didn't look strong; it was huge and solid. Rather, he was thinking of what it would do to his head if it ever connected on a free swing. Still, it was the only way down. Hamilton took off his armor—he was going to hit with more than enough kinetic energy as was; to allow that piece's weight to add to it was borderline suicidal—and passed it over to Retief. He then stepped off of the deck, placing one foot, and then another, on the hook. His hands wrapped around the cable. The cable was so thick that his fingers didn't touch his thumbs.
Hamilton threw his head back, then slammed his chin down to his chest, knocking the night vision goggles over his eyes.
"Let me down," he shouted to Retief, even as the latter opened the hatchway below to allow the hook to be lowered. Hamilton had to shout as the inrushing air drowned out normal sound.
The winch started with a squeal and a shudder. Fortunately, the Boer Republic of South Africa, whatever its other flaws, did maintain its equipment. After that initial shudder, the machine operated smoothly, lowering Hamilton into the blast. Unfortunately, however, the hook was free spinning to allow fixing at any angle on the ground. Hamilton spun and swayed without control. This was bad, very bad, as he needed to see ahead to mark his landing spot. The spin threatened to make him ill. It absolutely made him want to close his eyes but that would never do.
Fuckfuckfuckfuck. How do I control this?
Experimentally, and not without a certain feeling of terror, Hamilton took one hand off the cable—the hand opposite the direction of his spin—and thrust that arm outward. The spin reversed itself.
Oh, oh. Too much. He pulled the arm partway in, reducing the cross section. There; that's better. And there's the town and . . . ohhh, shit, we're moving faster than I thought.
Hamilton put both hands back on the cable and lifted his feet off of the hook. He began to scuttle his hands down the gable. After three such releases and regraspings, his left hand lost its hold and he fell.
"Ohhh . . . shshshiiittt!"
an-Nessang, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
Petra was slowly freezing solid. She was, in fact, certain she would die of the cold. Yes, she had her burka and, true, she was under a blanket. Yet there are some colds, and Germany's cold in the early autumn morning was one such, that no practical amount of insulation alone would help.
Intellectually she knew that she could start the car and get some heat that way. The keys were, after all, under the driver's seat and she had seen the car started before. It was just a matter of putting in the key and turning it. But an idling automobile was a guaranteed attention gatherer. Too, she could get out of the car and try to exercise to put some warmth back in her limbs. But if an idling automobile in twenty-second-century Germany was an attention gatherer, how much more so would be a woman in a burka doing jumping jacks? It was a formidable problem that she settled by simply remaining in the car and shivering as her limbs slowly went numb. The steel of the bolt cutters clutched in her arms didn't help.
Hamilton felt a wrenching pain in his left knee as he hit the rooftop and rolled to his left side. Almost, he screamed of it. For a brief moment, even, he felt the urge to cry over it.
That urge passed, surpassed by the greater need to find Petra and bring her to safety. He arose to hands and—oh, my frigging God!— knees, and then to both feet. His first steps were awkward. Very nearly he stumbled over. Still, by keeping his leg stiff he was able, if barely, to remain upright.
First thing is I've got to get off of the roof. Hmmm . . . no fire escape. There's that shedlike thing though; it may be stairs.
Hamilton walked over stiffly, wincing from pain, and determined that, yes, the shed covered some stairs. He descended one step at a time, careful to keep his left leg stiff. At the bottom, he discovered a latched gate. He opened and left, emerging onto a street he didn't recognize.
He had a fair innate sense of direction. Hauptstrasse's over there, he thought. And from there I can find the car and, I hope, Petra.
Flight Seven Nine Three, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
"I hope to fuck we can shake them," the pilot said to no one in particular.
"Shake who?" Retief, now returned to the cockpit, asked. He noticed that the pilot's cheeks were wet, but that no tears flowed for the moment.
"Shanghai informs me we've got four fighters inbound in a couple of minutes. There are more after that."
Retief shook his head. "Shaking them isn't going to happen. But they're going to have problems lining up on us without violating Swiss airspace." Sitting in the copilot's seat, he reached for a headset and put it on. Then he adjusted a dial on the control panel, flicked a switch, and began to broadcast.
"Swiss Airspace Control, Swiss Airspace control: This is South African Airship Lines Flight Seven Nine Three. We are inbound to cross your borders bearing about three hundred escaped slaves, mostly children, from the Caliphate. We demand sanctuary under the laws of God and man. We are being pursued by jet fighters from the Caliphate. If you are still true Swiss, help us."
"Think it will work?" the pilot asked.
"Think it will hurt?"
"No, but those will."
As the pilot spoke a dual line of tracers crossed in front of the airship, to be followed by the sharklike image of a fighter.
A voice came over the cabin's loudspeaker. It was a woman's voice, throaty and, for some other man, inherently sexy. "Flight Seven Nine Three this is Swiss Airspace Control. We cannot cross the border to help you. But if you can make it halfway across Lake Constance we will escort. Moreover, if the Caliphate fires across that border we will engage them to defend Swiss sovereignty. Understand, you will be interned once you land . . . if you land."
"Swiss Airspace, Seven Nine Three. Roger. Understood. But we're not going to land; we're going to crash. And"—Lee stole a glance at his altimeter—"there's a good chance we'll crash into the lake."
"Then crash on our side, Seven Nine Three. We'll send some boats out. Best we can do. Good luck and Godspeed."
The pilot spoke. "You better do better than your best, Switzerland. Escaped slaves aren't all we're carrying. Call your foreign ministry. Right about now the ambassadors from the American Empire and the Celestial Kingdom are explaining just why it would be better for you to declare war on the Caliphate than let us fall back into their hands."
Speechless, Retief looked at the pilot and raised one eyebrow.
"I'll tell you later," Lee/Ling said. Much later.
an-Nessang, Province of Baya, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
He was running late, very late. Running late, my ass. I'm staggering late.
Hamilton cursed at the knee, swelling now and badly, that held his progress down to that of a snail. He wondered at the absence of any policeman on the street. True, it's just a small town and, true, it's nighttime. But you would expect at least one cop. And, between the goggles and the weapon, it's not like I look exactly normal. Then again, I expected to be able to sneak into town, or to drive in a janissary truck. For this and other things, O Lord . . . thanks.
Flight Seven Nine Three, 24 Muharram,
1538 AH (4 November, 2113)
Retief heard screaming from the rear, even through the many bulkheads separating the cockpit from the passenger compartment and the lounge holding the mass of children. The airship shuddered with the impact of light cannon fire.
"Christ!" The pilot exclaimed. "Go back and see to the damage. See to the kids, for that matter, the poor little bastards."
"I'm on it," Retief agreed, then pushed himself out of his chair, turned, and ran for the rear. He didn't make it before another burst of cannon fire hit the airship, not far from where he ran. The force of the blasts, coupled with the shuddering of the ship, knocked him from his feet, leaving him temporarily stunned on the deck.
Claude Oliver Meara lay on one side on the deck, taped and trussed to his chair like
a Christmas goose. He'd shat himself when the cannon fire struck. This wasn't supposed to happen to him. What was wrong with these people? Didn't they understand that if he was unhappy, the world would be unhappy, that if he died the universe would end. Madmen! Devils sent to torment him!
Two children, one boy, one girl, crawled up to him. Meara recognized the boy as one of his favorite new toys. He breathed a sigh of relief; the boy was so grateful for his attentions he was going to free him! The children, their faces very serious, spoke to each other in a language he didn't understand. No doubt they were discussing how best to free him.