“Sir, please!” Cut in Stilwell. “I fully realize how important my job at the Athena Section is, but I am also dying to do my share in combat. I have not had a sea command for months now. Besides, who else has more combat experience on hovercraft than me, sir?”
“Hmpfff… The prime minister will kill me for this but what the hell. You can have Commander Stilwell as well, Brigadier.”
“Excellent! Thank you, sir! By the way, that sea command called for the rank of navy captain. I’m afraid that the good Commander will have to be promoted for the job.”
“Hell, do you have any more bad news like this, sir?” Asked Stilwell, grinning.
“No, that’s all I had for the moment.” Replied Armstrong. “I will ask you and your two officers to report back here in two days for detailed briefings.”
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“We’ll be there, sir.” Promised Stilwell before saluting Armstrong and leaving with Townsend. Once outside the building, both men screamed in delight and exchanged high fives.
10:26 (Berlin Time)
Friday, August 22, 1941 ‘B’
SS Corps barracks, Hamburg
Germany
“Hey, Karl, do you know what this is all about?”
“No, Otto. You will have to wait until the Obergruppenfuhrer9 speaks.”
Obersturmfuhrer10 Otto Skorzeni, divisional transport maintenance officer of the SS
Panzer-Division ‘Reich’, grimaced with impatience: the order to recall all the men on leave and to have all the officers attend a snap divisional briefing had caught him in the middle of a technical inspection. He however sat on one of the folding chairs in the briefing room and waited patiently, a notepad and a pen ready. He did not have to wait for long, though. General Paul Hausser arrived a few minutes later, making the dozens of officers present in the room snap to attention.
“At ease, gentlemen! Take your seats: this is going to be short and to the point.”
Hausser waited until everybody was seated and listening before walking to the big map of Europe hanging on the wall facing his audience. Using his command stick, he pointed at Norway on the map.
“Gentlemen, we and the SS-Panzer-Division ‘Wiking’ are to move to Norway as fast as possible while keeping the utmost secrecy about it. Intelligence reports state that the British are preparing to invade Norway. While these reports are not fully confirmed, the Führer is not willing to take any chances and has ordered Norway’s defenses to be reinforced. New intelligence has also shed some suspicions on the security of our Enigma encoding machines. All orders and directives about this operation are thus to go either via telephone line or by hand. That point is vital: anyone breaking this directive will be court-martialed.”
9 Obergruppenfuhrer: SS general
10 Obersturmfuhrer: SS first lieutenant
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“But, General,” protested timidly the divisional transmissions officer, “this will slow down considerably our communications. The Enigma machines are impossible to decipher: it would take millions of attempted permutations to find the proper code groups.”
“In normal circumstances, I would agree, Obersturmbannführer11 Lang.
However, a group of Luftwaffe helferinen held until recently in the Tower of London were extensively debriefed and revealed that the Canadian from the future, Nancy Laplante, had with her a small portable machine that could analyze data at a fantastic rate. By the way, those helferinen were brought back to Berlin by none other than Laplante.”
“Brigadier Laplante is working for us now?” Asked the divisional intelligence officer, stunned. “I thought that she had been killed in the British bombing of Colditz Castle. Besides, even if she is alive, why would she help us after the tortures she went through at the hands of the Gestapo?”
Hausser was silent for a moment as a wave of whispers went through the room. Nancy Laplante had gone in the recent past year from a despised enemy to be killed at all cost to an adversary that was both feared and respected. Many who had first dismissed her as a female trying to play a man’s role had quickly come to grief at her hands. The amphibious attack she had led on Hamburg a few months ago, where she had been severely wounded and nearly captured by SS troops, had caused immense damage and cost terrible casualties to the SS regiment that had previously occupied the barracks now used by the division. Hausser then took on him to reveal some of the information he had just got in Berlin.
“Gentlemen, I will now pass on some information that must be kept strictly to yourselves. First of, Nancy Laplante survived the bombing of Colditz Castle. Even more, she helped save hundreds of German civilians and soldiers there with the help of a ship from the future, transporting them to a safe area near Colditz just before the bombing. Before leaving for the future, she broke our helferinen out of London and brought back some of them to Berlin. The remaining helferinen from London followed her to the future. Now, you must all wonder why Laplante would do all that. The first reason is that she was mad, and rightfully so, at the British: they tried to kill her in Colditz, not hesitating to sacrifice the hundreds of allied prisoners of war held with her.
Furthermore, some of the allied prisoners in Colditz, apparently thinking that she was 11 Obersturmbannfuhrer: SS lieutenant-colonel
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some kind of traitor or collaborator, attacked her and beat her up badly. The second reason has to do with Laplante’s nature. As you know, she had no hatred of Germans per say and always fought cleanly. That side of her was, well, enhanced by a fantastic incident that happened in Colditz shortly before the British bombing. I myself had a lot of problems believing what I was told in Berlin but I spoke personally to the commandant of Colditz Castle, who confirmed everything to me. In short, a miracle happened to her there as she lay in an infirmary bed, crippled by Gestapo tortures: She was cured of all her wounds in an instant and also gained a number of supernatural powers via some kind of mysterious intervention. Those powers, which she demonstrated repeatedly to the German staff there, included touch healing, levitation and superhuman strength.”
“Who did that to her, sir? People from the future?” Asked the intelligence officer as the other officers present looked at each other in stunned disbelief. Hausser shook his head, his face grave.
“No! She said that a superior, immaterial being did it.”
The whispers changed to exclamations, forcing Hausser to ask for silence.
“Gentlemen, I know how hard this may be to believe, but you should accept it as a fact. Laplante is now gone to the future, however, and is no longer a factor in this war.
Let’s count ourselves lucky in that respect. Now, to come back to the main subject of this meeting. I want all combat vehicles to be fully fuelled and loaded up with ammunition and supplies before the end of the day. As for those under repair, tanks and halftracks will have absolute priority. All soldiers are to be issued three days worth of combat rations and two full ammunition loads. This will all be done today, on the strength of my oral orders. I don’t want precious time wasted in filling detailed orders and paperwork: any quartermaster or supply officer who will delay the issue of needed stores for this deployment on the pretext of not having written authorizations will be relieved of his position by me. The Panzer-Grenadier Regiment Deutschland will start loading up in two days on two heavy ferries who are due to arrive in the port here tomorrow. Our tank regiment will follow two days later, then our other panzer-grenadier regiment, again two days later. Our artillery and engineer train will be next. Our destination will be Oslo, which we are tasked to defend along with its airfield at Fornebu.
Gentlemen, you have your orders. I will not keep you longer.”
The excited SS officers, Otto Skorzeni included, waited for General Hausser to leave, then rushed out of the briefing room.
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Skorzeni, after spending a frantic day and a nearly sleepless night preparing his men and equipment for the oncoming move, went the next day to the divisional orders group, only to learn that he was going to be part of the staff’s advanced party, due to depart for Norway by air that afternoon with the task of securing proper accommodations and facilities in advance of the division’s arrival there. Swearing under his breath at having to leave his men at such a time, Skorzeni returned to his maintenance shop to brief his senior NCO, a crusty sturmscharführer12 who could find engine parts in the middle of a desert if need be. Having done that, he then packed his field kit and cleaned up and oiled his already spotless StG-41 7.92mm assault rifle before going to the officer’s mess for a quick lunch. At the assigned hour, he jumped in a military bus with his kit and weapons, along with the divisional commander and eight other officers, to go to the nearby military airfield.
Their aircraft turned out to be an old triple-engine Junkers 52. While slow, it was however dependable, which suited Skorzeni just fine. As they were boarding the plane, a staff car delivered a pair of Luftwaffe female auxiliaries who were seemingly in a big hurry. Skorzeni, who had a strong appetite for pretty women despite being married, smiled with delight as the two young women, out of breath and dragging bulging kit bags, presented themselves to the plane’s pilot, saluting him. The senior helferin, a tall and very beautiful blonde, showed the pilot a mission order as she spoke.
“Gruppenführerin Lisa Hartmann and Oberhelferin Barbara Holzberg, requesting permission to board your aircraft, Hauptman. We have been assigned to the Oslo-Fornebu Airfield and were told that you still had two seats available.”
“Well, I’m transporting a general and some of his staff officers to Oslo. Normally I would not take any extra passengers, but I will make an exception for you two. Get on board!”
“Thank you, Hauptman.”
The two women then approached the access ladder of the plane, still dragging their kit bags. Otto, still waiting his turn to climb onboard, smiled to them and bowed.
“May I help you load your luggage, Fraulein?”
Lisa Hartmann smiled back and quickly eyed the powerful, 194 centimeter-tall Austrian.
Even with his long scar on his left cheek, Otto always had a lot of success with women.
12 Sturmscharfuhrer: SS warrant officer
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“With pleasure, Obersturmführer. You are too kind.”
Once the other officers were inside the plane, Skorzeni effortlessly carried both his kit and the two women’s bags, storing them in the plane’s central baggage compartment.
He then sat down opposite Hartmann’s seat, near the back of the plane, while Barbara Holzberg took the seat behind him. Otto next presented his hand to Lisa.
“By the way, my name is Otto Skorzeni.”
Both women reacted to this in a way that stunned Otto and made the other SS officers snap their heads around in surprise.
“You’re the famous Otto Skorzeni?” Exclaimed Lisa, while Barbara stared admiringly at him. “Nancy Laplante told us that she admired you as a soldier.”
“Uh, wait a second, Gruppenführerin. How could you have met Die Wolfin13 and why would she say that? I’m just a transport maintenance officer.”
“She brought both of us to Berlin with nine other helferinen from the Tower of London, where we were detained as prisoners of war for nearly four months before she made us escape. In London, she visited us regularly to help our morale and provide distractions such as films, futuristic music and books. We also had many conversations with her, during which she confided to us that, in her history, you were going to be the most famous German specialist of commando raids in this war. She admired both you and Hanna Reitsch, our famous civilian test pilot, since her teenage years.”
As Otto sat with his mouth open from the surprise, General Hausser left his seat and went to Lisa, crouching in the aisle besides her seat.
“You said that you spoke often with Laplante, Fraulein? How well did you know her?”
“Fairly well, Herr General, but not as well as I should have.”
“What do you mean?”
Lisa Hartmann lowered her head, apparently embarrassed.
“I mean that I kept underestimating her and doubting her friendship, Herr General. Even though she planned the operations where we were captured, she always made sure that we were treated as humanely as possible. I believed at first that she was doing that in order to get military information from us, but I was wrong. She knew everything about our units and us anyway. She even recognized Flugkapitan Hanna Reitsch, who had been captured as well but was disguised as a simple oberhelferin.
13 Die Wolfin: The She-Wolf.
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Laplante kept that to herself and never told the British about it. Then, she secretly adopted one of my captive helferinen, a fifteen years old girl who had lost all of her family in a bombing. She was a formidable soldier, but she also had a heart of gold.”
“What else do you know about her?”
“That she is now in the year 3384, with Hanna Reitsch and twelve of my helferinen. She left the British in disgust after they tried to kill her in Colditz by bombing the castle to rubble. I told all this and more to our military intelligence, Herr General. If you want, I could tell you about it during our trip.”
“I would appreciate that, Fraulein. Keep this to yourself but know that we are expecting the British to attack Norway soon. Anything that you could tell me about their new equipment would be very useful.”
“I will do my best, Herr General.”
“Then, come sit next to me in the forward section.”
That left Otto Skorzeni alone with Barbara Holzberg. While much smaller than Hartmann, she was a beautiful young woman in her own right. Otto gave her his best smile.
“So, Die Wolfin told you about me. You have me at a disadvantage now, since I know nothing about you.”
Barbara blushed and timidly lowered her eyes.
“There is little to say about me, frankly. I was raised on a farm near Hamburg and received a very basic education, then helped run the family farm. I married a young farmer just before the war, only to find out on my return from captivity that he had been cheating me with my own sister.”
“Ouch! What did you do then?”
“I divorced the bastard and slapped my sister silly. Then I requested a posting outside of Germany. How ironic: Laplante helps capture me, then makes me escape.
Now, I realize that I asked and got a posting that could get me captured again…or killed.”
Otto then patted her shoulder reassuringly.
“Do not worry, Oberhelferin. The SS-Panzer-Divisions ‘Reich’ and ‘Wiking’ will soon be in Norway to protect you.”
Barbara smiled then while eyeing Otto with appreciation: he was exactly as she had expected him to be according to Nancy Laplante’s flattering descriptions of him.
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06:11 (Berlin Time)
Thursday, August 28, 1941 ‘B’
Message room, Luftflotte 5 headquarters
Oslo-Fornebu Airfield, Norway
Barbara Holzberg paled as she listened with alarm on her telephone headset at the message she was scribbling down frantically. Thanking quickly the helferin in Germany that had sent the message, she then shouted at Lisa Hartmann, who was in charge of the helferinen in the message room.
“Gruppenführerin! Urgent message from Berlin: 400 suspected British bombers have been detected approaching Hamburg from high altitude. All of our fighters are to attempt to intercept just Northwest of Hamburg. They can then land and refuel at out airfields there.”
“Four hundred bombers?” Said Hartmann in alarm: her parents lived in Hamburg. Walking quickly to Barbara’s station, she took the note scribbled by her and scanned it. “The British never attacked with so many bombers at once before. This is major. I’m bringing this to the general. In the meantime, contact the Stade Luftgau and get an accurate position, speed and heading for these bombers.”
“Yes,
Gruppenführerin!”
Working expertly her telephone exchange station, Barbara had the required information by the time Lisa came back.
“Gruppenführerin, the British bomber pack was 195 kilometers Northwest of Hamburg at 06:10 hours, flying at an altitude of 8,000 meters and a speed of 750 km/h.
They accelerated to that speed after crossing the German coast.”
“Damn! At that speed they will be very hard to intercept. Good work, Barbara.”
Lisa then went out of the room again to pass on that information. The engine noise of dozens of aircraft taking off followed shortly afterwards.
The next forty minutes were long ones for the helferinen, who were awaiting anxiously for news on the interception of the British bombers. The growing noise of approaching aircraft then made Lisa Hartmann go to one of the windows of the message room.
“This is too early to be our aircraft, unless they turned around for some reason.”
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As she was looking through the window, a burst of automatic fire was heard, followed quickly by more bursts.
“Mein Gott! The British are attacking the airfield.”
The incredulous helferinen rushed to the windows as one. They soon saw dozens of transport aircraft hoverfly the airfield unmolested, the anti-aircraft guns of the base being either busy defending themselves from hidden attackers already on the ground, or were destroyed by now. The sky soon filled with parachutes, making a young helferin shout in near panic.
“We must go to the air raid shelters.”
“No!” Shouted back Lisa Hartmann firmly. “Everybody will take back its post. I want you to inform Berlin, the Stade Luftgau and the headquarters of our panzer divisions that we are under attack by British paratroopers. Now, get to it!”
Rushing back to their stations, the fourteen helferinen under Hartmann’s command started sending messages out frantically as the firing intensified around the airfield.
Many found however that their efforts were in vain.
“Gruppenführerin, the telephone lines are dead.”
“Damn! Barbara, get on the teletype, it uses an underground line. Pass the word directly to Berlin.”
“Right
away!”
Barbara made sure to grab her large service purse before running to the teletype station in one corner of the room: she had a 9mm LÜGER pistol in it, a gift from Otto Skorzeni.
The other helferinen were unarmed, as was the norm for female auxiliaries. She was halfway through her message when automatic fire was heard from inside the building.
Clenching her teeth, Barbara ignored it and kept sending her message. Machinegun fire suddenly burst a number of windows, sweeping the message room with a deadly hail of bullets. Three helferinen crumpled to the floor, while the others threw themselves flat on their belly, except for Barbara. Amidst the screams of pain and terror, the door of the message room was kicked open and a grenade thrown inside. At first, everybody could only look at the smoking grenade, too frozen by fear to react. Lisa Hartmann then did something Barbara thought she would never have the courage to do: she threw herself on top of the grenade just before it blew. Even muffled by Lisa’s body, the explosion was deafening and sprayed the horrified women in the room with blood and gore.
Barbara was taking out her pistol when two British paratroopers jumped inside the room, spraying it with indiscriminate fire from their assault rifles and hitting a number of the 268
helferinen. Being in a corner to their left, Barbara was at first unseen and untouched and used that chance to fire twice at the nearest paratrooper from a distance of three paces, hitting him squarely with both bullets. The second paratrooper reacted instantly and shifted his fire, cutting down Barbara. The British, pumped full of adrenaline and enraged by the death of an old comrade, then methodically shot the surviving women.
Three helferinen who tried to flee by the rear door were shot in the back. The British then went to Barbara, lying in a pool of blood, and finished her off with a bullet in the head before leaving the message room.
06:52 (Berlin Time)
Oslo-Fornebu road
Otto Skorzeni was driving a VW Kubbelwagen14 towards the Fornebu airfield, where he was to meet a Luftwaffe staff officer to resolve a problem with air shipment of critical spare parts, when he heard the first gunfire. Being still a good kilometer away from the airfield, he immediately slowed down and got off the road, driving his car inside the forest bordering the road before stopping and shutting off the engine. Heavy exchanges of fire could now be heard from the direction of the airfield as Otto grabbed his StG-41 assault rifle and jumped out of his vehicle. The big SS man then started jogging cautiously towards the airfield, using the cover of trees and bushes along the way. He slowed to a cautious walk as he approached the airfield’s perimeter. That proved a wise move, as he soon heard English words spoken to his left. Going down to a crawl, Otto peeped through a bush and saw a dozen British soldiers manning a roadside ambush position, complete with machineguns and anti-tank weapons. The British wore the green beret characteristic of commando troops. Backing away quietly, Otto then went around their position and continued towards the airfield. Once he could see the airfield through the trees, he turned right and followed the tree line to get close to the headquarters building, his objective. In the process, he saw a number of British paratroopers walking or running around the airfield. Most of the action however seemed to be in the hangars area, where there was still some resistance. Closing in to less than forty meters from the headquarters building, Otto crouched behind a tree and observed the area for a good two minutes, spotting only two British soldiers kneeling behind a 14 Kubbelwagen: military variant of the original VW Beatle
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parked truck and looking away from him. Taking his chance, Otto sprinted quietly across the open ground and crouched besides the rear door of the message room. Cautiously looking inside through a window, he saw no movement and quickly pushed the door open. To his surprise, something partially blocked it. He soon knew why once he was inside: the body of a dead helferin was leaning against it. Scanning the carnage in the message room, Otto couldn’t help swear quietly in anger: this had been a massacre, pure and simple. Reviewing grimly each of the dead German women, he was able to recognize Lisa Hartmann’s body by her rank insignias, blond hair and height. Her body was otherwise mangled beyond recognition. Otto also could figure out how it had happened and mentally praised her courage before continuing his search for Barbara Holzberg. He found her in a far corner, near the body of a British paratrooper. Grief briefly overtook him as he looked down at the body of the woman he had been dating regularly since their arrival in Oslo. The fact that she had made the British pay a price for her death was little consolation to Skorzeni. Gently closing her dead eyes, he then scanned the room one last time.
“The British will pay for this, I swear.”
Spotting a teletype station nearby, he went to it and felt his heart jump when he found it still operating. The last message received on it dated back from less than twenty minutes ago and was a request from Berlin for a confirmation of an attack on Fornebu.
Otto was reviewing the settings when he heard the noise of approaching aircraft. Going to a broken window and cautiously looking out, he saw at least a dozen British transport aircraft circling over the airfield, with two of them lining up for a landing. As soon as those two had landed, they slowed down and veered off the runway. Side doors were thrown open and dozens of soldiers jumped out, dispersing and taking hasty defensive positions as two more transports landed. Having seen enough, Otto went back to the teletype machine and started sending a message to Berlin.
TO HIGHER HEADQUARTERS IN BERLIN, FROM OSLO-FORNEBU.
FORNEBU AIRFIELD TAKEN BY BRITISH PARATROOPERS AT ABOUT 0655
HOURS TODAY, LOCAL TIME. BRITISH REINFORCEMENTS NOW LANDING
DIRECTLY IN FORNEBU. EVALUATE BRITISH FORCE IN FORNEBU AT ONE
BATTALION OF PARATROOPERS, WITH APPROXIMATELY ONE BATTALION OF
LIGHT INFANTRY IN THE PROCESS OF LANDING. MORE PROBABLY TO COME.
NO ENEMY VEHICLES OR HEAVY WEAPONS SEEN YET AT FORNEBU. FIFTEEN
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UNARMED HELFERINEN MURDERED IN COLD BLOOD BY BRITISH. SIGNED,
OBERSTURMFUHRER OTTO SKORZENI, SS-PANZER-DIVISION ‘REICH’. HEIL
HITLER.
Closing down the teletype machine, Otto left the message room after an ultimate kiss on Barbara Holzberg’s cold lips. The British never saw him as he made his way back to his car and drove off, speeding towards his division’s headquarters in Oslo.
08:17 (Berlin Time)
Headquarters of the SS Panzer-Division ‘Reich’
Oslo
Skorzeni stormed inside General Hausser’s office, ignoring the protests of the general’s Aide, and snapped to attention in front of his desk while giving the Nazi salute.
“Herr Obergruppenführer, the British have taken Fornebu Airfield. I just came back from there.”
Without letting time to his superior to cut him, Otto then quickly recounted what he had seen and done. Hausser listened on patiently, frowning only at the mention of the killing of the helferinen.
“The bastards! They will pay for this. We may not have our full division in Norway yet, but we have enough to throw these British back into the sea.
Obersturmführer, I understand that your maintenance section has not arrived yet from Hamburg and in fact will not leave for Oslo until tomorrow at the earliest. Die Wolfin seemingly had a high regard