Black Sun Reich (14 page)

Deitel suddenly looked pale.

“Mein Gott,”
he said. “I've been flying across the country with a man who failed the first day of flight school five times.”

Tracy smiled.

“But he passed the sixth. Come, Doctor, let's go and greet Mr. Benjamin.”

L
ysander Benjamin and his most talented Difference Engine technician, a bookish little man by the name of Jonathan Biel, brought the two crates of materials that Terah requested by radio. With an hour before Terah would be ready for her briefing, Deitel, Lysander, Tracy, and Biel took an early tea together on the westerly observation deck.

Benjamin, Deitel learned, was a Jewish immigrant to Texas from the CSA. His great uncle, Judah Benjamin, had served as president of the Confederacy from 1868 to 1876. Lysander, incidentally, was named after President Benjamin's successor and close friend, Lysander Spooner.

Lysander attended Oxford and then the Sorbonne in the late 1880s. As a mechanical engineer with a decidedly entrepreneurial bent, Lysander had built and sold several successful small businesses in the CSA. He retired relatively young and traveled the world for more than five years. When it came time to settle down, he chose to emigrate to the Freehold. Asked why, he said the women were the most pleasing.

Lysander had a much larger perspective than most men his age, who usually have minds in the process of contracting. Lysander thought that Rucker had been only half right when he'd explained why the Freehold and its sister nation of Brazil had remained neutral in world conflicts over the past seventy years. There was far more to it, he argued, than the ugliness and guilt after the San Marcos Massacre.

It came down to money.

“Freeholders want customers, not subjects,” Lysander said.

“And yet your sphere of influence is called the Tropical Empire,” Deitel said.

“They do have irony in Germany still, yes?” Lysander asked with a twinkle in his eye. “In the last days of the nineteenth century, a company out of Lamar, Texas, called Cactus Jack's Tropical Sun Goods and Sundries, started opening franchises in just about every country on the far horizon. He'd go anywhere people wanted fresh tropical goodies and had the money to pay for them.”

Cactus Jack's wasn't the first franchise exporter or global delivery firm. And Cactus Jack himself wasn't a native Texan or Brazilian—he was an immigrant from Corsica, of all places. He was just a genius at branding.

“An orange is an orange and a mango is a mango. But when you couple that exotic taste with that distinct pith helmet and palm tree logo, customers start asking for you by name. And hence his competitors started complaining about the Freehold and its ‘Tropical Empire.' ”

To Deitel's mind, Lysander's take was rationalized mythology. But then he weighed it against the appalling New Order beliefs his own countrymen had embraced recently, when only fifteen years before Germany had been at the forefront of Western philosophy, scholarship, culture, and art.

Conclusion: Deitel had no high ground on which to stand.

Of course, the whole of this New World perspective with its emphasis on moneymaking was hard for the European mind to grasp. To most Europeans like Deitel, wealth was morally suspect and economic mobility even more so.

Economic stasis was considered desirable for the stability and security it provided. It ensured less rootless mobility, and protected against disparity between the classes, neither of which seemed to concern the Freeholders. The European model ensured a sense of community and unity that the Freeholders, the Brazilians, and the French couldn't conceive of or appreciate.

All this time Tracy was politely silent. Biel, who had been tapping at his portable Difference Engine throughout tea, never looked up. About then Chuy and Rucker sat down—their flight check complete. Terah entered the café and walked to the head of the table.

“Gentlemen, if you'll join me in the conference room, I'm ready. I know you're worried about Nazi transgenic engineering and these cannibal creatures. And you should be. But the scenario we're actually facing? It's far, far worse than you think.”

“It usually is,” Rucker said.

L
ieutenant Otto Skorzeny joined Hitler's movement a year before the Beer Hall Revolution of 1922 that brought the Nazis to power. It was a quick end to the nascent, weak Weimar Republic. An engineer by education, Skorzeny had shown a remarkable talent for planning and executing unorthodox military tactics in his early days as a noncommissioned officer in the Sturmabteilun Brown Shirts.

When he transferred to the newly created SS, Skorzeny's daredevil attitude made him a pioneer in paratrooper and glider tactics. His ferocity and incorporation of eastern martial arts into small unit training led to his creation of the first independent SS commando unit, created from the combat engineering team he had originally been assigned.

His superiors noted that Skorzeny's brilliance and ruthlessness in intelligence work made him more dangerous than a full company of elite soldiers. His devilish good looks and very non-German nonchalance made him a favorite in upper Waffen-SS circles.

By the time the Waffen-SS had put down the Brown Shirts and marched into Austria for the Anschluss, Skorzeny was heading up the entire SS special services division. He was a brilliant planner and field commander, and yet he was just as comfortable and capable of operating as a lone wolf or working undercover. A man of singular talents, he was putting them to work now tailing the Freeholders in the hope they would lead the way back to the threads lost because of the incompetence of Ahnenerbe agents.

This was how it came to be that he was executing a unique variant of the high altitude, low opening parachute jump called HALO by
fallschirmjäger
troopers. He'd jumped from about two miles above Airstrip One—fully four miles above sea level—and opened his chute barely two hundred feet above the tiny target that was the floating aerodrome control tower. It was one of only two blind spots on the entire upper deck. His target was the top of the control tower.

Just fifteen feet above the tower roof—and only seconds since he'd deployed his chute—Skorzeny cut it loose and dropped the rest of the distance. This allowed his chute to be carried away from the tower and out of sight in the strong winds.

He climbed down the side of the tower and gained access to the interior of Airstrip One through a vent shaft. Inside, he stripped off his jumpsuit to reveal casual civilian clothes.

It had never occurred to Skorzeny that this fantastic structure was a civilian aerodrome, not a Freehold military installation. He could simply have landed like any other flight, as any paying flight was welcome.

But the fact was, even if he had known, Skorzeny would have preferred this approach just for the excitement.

“Sehr gut,”
Skorzeny said to himself, then switched to near perfect English. If there was any trace of his German accent, he disguised it with a slight and faux Castilian accent.

“Now we play cowboys and Aryans.”

 

CHAPTER TEN

Airstrip One

Conference Room

“I
t's called the Spear of Destiny. We don't know how, but it could determine the very destiny of the world because the Germans seem to think it will make them invincible.”

Gone were the formal dress and the spartan flight coveralls. Terah was dressed for business in her fitted pants, black boots, and silky blouse. Her flowing hair was back to her usual, if not natural, dark red color with streaks of highlights. Gone with the blond hair was the cosmetic tint that made her naturally olive skin look pale. The reading glasses only emphasized the history professor side of her many personalities, but her ponytail said female athlete not lady librarian. Her long bangs gave her green eyes a smoky look.

Biel's portable analog computer—he called it a laptop Difference Engine—clacked and clicked away as Rucker, Chuy, Deitel, and Lysander sat like schoolboys.

Terah clicked the button for the first slide on the projector and the bespectacled, soft-chinned, sparsely mustached mouse-face of the Reichsführer-SS filled the screen.

Rucker booed. Chuy growled.

“Here's what we know so far,” Terah said. “As Lysander has told you, Himmler has sent Nazi spook squads all over searching for artifacts and magical icons from the ancient world—everywhere from Tibet to Haiti and all over the Near East, North Africa, and Scandinavia. They believe these artifacts to have power, and that they can shape the destiny of their Thousand Year Reich.”

Hitler has his own fascination with artifacts of power, but he's really obsessed with the Spear of Destiny. He wants to harness it and other magicks in a way no one has been able to.

The next slide was a painting of the crucifixion, at the moment recounted in the Gospel of St. John that a Roman soldier pierced Jesus' heart with his spear.

“The Spear of Destiny is the
pilum
used to stab Jesus Christ as he died on the cross. The
pilum
is the foot-long iron or steel element attached to a wooden shaft. Only the
pilum
survived the ravages of age,” she said, clicking to pictures and drawings of various Roman military spears.

“Supposedly, he who wields the Spear of Destiny cannot be defeated, and he who carries it masters the power of life and death. Or, according to some translations, the power of life over death.”

“Same difference?” Chuy asked.

“Maybe. The translations conflict. Anyway, it's in line with Hitler's own narcissistic, megalomaniacal delusions—he believes he was chosen by destiny to lead the German people to mastery of the world.”

Rucker and Chuy looked at Deitel, who just shrugged and said, “What? My family voted Christian Democrat. Back when we had elections.”

“Continuing: the Spear of Destiny, notably, is not even mentioned in the four Synoptic Gospels—only St. John. John 19:34 ‘ . . . one of the soldiers pierced his side with a lance, and immediately there came out blood and water.' ”

“Not just blood, huh?” Rucker asked. “Or is that fuzzy in translation?”

“No, ‘blood and water.' It's very specific. And it's very specific that He was already dead,” she said. “The Roman soldier in question was historically, and inaccurately, referred to as ‘Longinus' in the noncanonical Gospel of Nicodemus.”

She saw Rucker's confused expression.

“From the Apocrypha,” she said.

His expression didn't change.

“The collection of works excluded from the Bible by the early church at the Council of Nicea.”

Nothing.

“Oh, Jesus Christ. Read a damn book, already. Not every answer is in
Popular Mechanics
,” Terah said, looking death at Rucker.

“Children,” Lysander said admonishingly.

Terah closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She couldn't let him get to her like this.

“So,” Chuy said, “Hitler thinks this spear was imbued with magic powers because it touched the heart of Christ and was washed in His blood?” He crossed himself. “That's peculiar, because the Christ died as a man, and nothing more than a man, before he rose from the dead after three days.”

Terah nodded.

“Hitler is not the only one who thinks it has power. The spear has become a holy relic in the eyes of many Christians,” she said. “Church fathers, holy men, and madmen throughout history have sought its power.”

She went on to say that over the centuries, the story became its own legend. “Longinus” was made a minor saint in the Roman Catholic tradition.

“Now whether you believe in Jesus Christ the messiah and the son of God, or simply in the historical Jesus who was a revolutionary rabbi put to death for crimes against the temple elders, the fact is, there is extra-biblical historical proof that Pontius Pilate did order the execution of a young rabbi named Jesus in what we now call 33 A.D. And there is an extra-biblical account of how this rabbi was stabbed by a Roman soldier before he was taken off the cross,” she said, slides of ancient historical texts in the original Greek, Latin, and Hebrew illustrating her point.

The next slide showed a collage of photos, sketches, and paintings of various spear tips.

“The first historical reports of the spear tip are by Cassiodorus in the early sixth century and Gregory of Tours in the mid-sixth century,” Terah said. “Also, around 520 A.D., Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator, a Roman statesman and writer, said he saw the Spear of Destiny in Jerusalem. The Catholic Encyclopedia says St. Antonius toured the holy places of Jerusalem and claims he saw it and the crown of thorns Jesus was forced to wear.”

Rucker raised his hand. Terah shook her head.

“Sometime later the spear was secreted out of Jerusalem when the city was captured by the Persians under King Khosara II. The Church's agent, Nicetas, took it to Constantinople and secured it in the Church of Hagia Sophia.”

Rucker, pouring coffee, said, “So we're off to the Ottoman Empire?”

“Not even close. If it was the original, it disappeared for a while—and several claimants later popped up,” Terah said.

“What?” Rucker asked.

“There have been several artifacts that were claimed to be the true Spear of Destiny,” she said.

She clicked another slide—showing a thirteenth century painting of the French monarch.

“The first was the so-called French spear. It was enshrined in Sainte Chapelle in Paris until the French Revolution. Republican forces seized it from the royalists and deposited it in the Bibliothèque Nationale, where it resided until five years ago,” she said.

“The Surété suspected German agents stole it in 1923, killing twelve employees of the Bibliothèque Nationale, five Paris policemen, and four soldiers at a border crossing. The crime scene was an abomination.”

The next slide was from the French national police files. Chuy retched. Deitel, a medical doctor, almost followed suit.

Another slide: St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome.

“Then there is the Vatican lance. This was said to have likewise ended up in Constantinople, where it fell into the hands of the Turks. According to Pastor's
History of the Popes
, Sultan Bayazid II sent it to Innocent VIII in 1492. Even at the time, the authenticity of this spear was in doubt, and although the eighteenth century pope Benedict XIV suggested the Vatican spear matched historical drawings of the Spear of Destiny, and it's kept in St. Peter's Cathedral, the Church makes no claim to its authenticity.”

“So we're not going to the Vatican or Paris, either?” Deitel said.

“Hold that thought. Needless to say, the Vatican believes but cannot prove that in 1922—mere months after they seized power in Germany—Nazi agents broke into the cathedral, took the spear, and killed four altar boys, two priests, and a night watchman.”

Terah's slide showed crime scene photos “borrowed” from the Vatican Guards' investigations office. The victims were hung from the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, eviscerated.

“My God,” Chuy said, and crossed himself again. “Was all this ritualistic slaughter tied to the spear?”

“We don't know. Maybe. Or it may have been how the thieves got their kicks.”

The next slide showed the propaganda pictures of the Austrian people welcoming regular German army and Waffen-SS troops into their cities.

“Now, you're all familiar with the Anschluss, the annexation of Austria into the Third Reich on March 12, 1924. But guess what Hitler's first act was the next day?” Terah asked.

“Arresting art school administrators,” Rucker said.

“Hunting for the prostitute who gave him syphilis,” Chuy said.

“Destroying the birth records that list his grandfather as Jewish,” Deitel said, joining in.

Terah rolled her eyes. Lysander seemed amused..

“The Holy Roman Emperors in Vienna had a lance of their own, the Hofburg spear. It was wrapped with a silver band said to be one of the nails used to crucify Him. Charles IV went so far as to have a golden sleeve put over the silver one, inscribed ‘
Lancea et clavus Domini
—Lance and nail of the Lord,' ” Terah said. “It was taken, this time without a body count.”

Rucker, who was eating pistachios, spit out a shell and said, “Let me guess. That one's now in Germania, where Der Führer sleeps with it under his pillow.”

“Close enough. He could have it in his tailpipe for all we know,” Terah said. Rucker nearly choked on a shell. “Hitler has all three of these spears, and even he knows they're almost certainly not the real thing.”

“So none of these concern us?” Rucker asked.

“Not really,” Terah said.

“Oh for . . . then why are you lecturing us like you're some sort of history professor?” Rucker said.

Terah's eyes narrowed.

“She is some sort of history professor,” Deitel said quietly.

Rucker hissed.

Her eyes were Tesla death rays. “Context, sweetheart.”

“Ahem,” Lysander said with little subtlety.

“You need to realize how far Hitler and his occult minions are willing to go to possess the Spear of Destiny,” Terah said, “and how much history is wrapped up in this piece of steel. Even before he'd fully secured power in Germany, Hitler was willing to risk international incidents and even war. His agents murdered untold dozens in the Vatican and Constantinople. All for a biblical artifact.”

“I think we're all well aware how much respect Der Führer has for human life,” Rucker said.

“Yes, we are now. With his power over Germany absolute, he's drawn the Black Iron Curtain. But these events occurred when he'd just seized the government, and his hold grip on Germany was tenuous at best,” Terah said. ”He was not eager to reveal his aims quite so openly then.”

“It's true, Herr Kapitan,” Deitel said. “In the early days after the Beer Hall Putsch, Hitler was vying for control of his own party against the SA and rival party leaders. He also had to court the favor of the military leadership, the industrialists, the noncommunist unions, and the leaders of the corporate/public institutions. It was only in the last few years, after he and his SS secured their power, that Hitler showed his true face.”

“Such naked, murderous aggression in 1922 could have meant his ejection from party leadership,” Terah said. “Now he has his sights set on the last—and probably true—Spear of Destiny, and he has Germany in an iron grip. Imagine what he's capable of.”

There weren't a lot of sarcastic replies.

“Recently, a French historian has attacked the problem from an entirely different angle,” Terah said. “Professor Claude Renault of the Université de Cergy-Pontoise decided to study the Spear in a way no one else has—looking at the time back when the Spear of Destiny was just a spear.”

She clicked another slide. It showed a charcoal sketch of what looked like a true
pilum
. Measuring almost a foot long, it was utilitarian, clean, and deadly, wholly unlike the pointlessly ornate forgeries they'd seen in the previous slides. This was the spear tip of a Roman officer—a centurion.

“Professor Renault, we believe, is uncovering the story of the true spear even now. His work is virtually unknown. He contends the spear's story begins long before Jesus was condemned. The professor's early papers show that we are fortunate the Roman Empire kept such detailed reports on its military, and that the centurion who owned the spear in question was from a Roman patrician family that likewise kept fairly complete family documents.”

She had a monograph in hand but didn't refer to it.

“According to Dr. Renault, the centurion who possessed what was to become legend was a former cavalry officer named Cascus Antonius. He served with the Legio III Augusta in what is present-day Algeria. His legion saw action between A.D. 17 and A.D. 24, particularly in southern Algeria, against the rebel Tacfarinas, who had organized Numidian and Mauretanian tribes against Roman rule.

“The campaign carried them deep into West Africa, farther south into sub-Saharan Africa than any Roman expedition—south of what is French West Africa and into what we know today as Niger,” Terah said.

She explained that Cascus Antonius kept a detailed journal of his unit's expedition that went well beyond a military diary. He catalogued samples of various plants and sketched the exotic animals they saw. He wrote of the African tribes they encountered, describing their foreign customs. The first three-quarters of his service journal showed a keen, educated mind and a fair military officer.

“Sometime around A.D. 22,” she said, “Tacfarinas's rebels ambushed his unit, killing almost all of his men and capturing Cascus Antonius. He wrote later about his escape and journey north through the jungle. In particular, he describes the time he spent with a West African jungle tribe, where he used the tribe's own iron ore to forge steel weapons: a
gladius
—a short sword, and a
pilum
—a spear tip.”