Chapter Five: War Planes

*The two companions eyed their surroundings with the highest speculation. Serena rubbed her eyes and blinked, desperately trying to convince herself that the machine had indeed transported them back into the 1950’s. “This can’t be real.” She whispered to herself.

Hiiro, on the other hand, looked around without allowing his facial expression to change. The fifties. Inwardly he cheered. After so long, after waiting for so long, he was finally in the fifties. Had that been real? He had believed in Quatre and the others to build a sound machine, but even the most trusted technology is only applicable to realistic theories—and the black hole theory was not considered to rank highly in the scientific world. Nonetheless, they had truly defied the odds and traveled time.

As they looked around, all they could see for miles was lush greenery; forest and fields lay in abundance. Small, chilling drops of water splashed down upon their heads, dampening their hair and clothing instantly. In the distance they could hear what sounded to be rounds and rounds of thunder going off instantly.

“What is our current location?” Hiiro glared at the mousy woman who had some with him. He hadn’t really needed an escort—she was going to be a nuisance to take care of—but he had also promised his comrades that if they found someone he would take them, and he always upheld his word of honor. For some reason, Hiiro had a feeling of guilt creep into his gut. He had known when he had given his comrades the time constraint it would be nearly impossible for them to find another person to go with him, and even when they had, he hadn’t accepted it right away, as he should have.

And he had to give the woman credit. As plain and weak as she may be, she had still chosen to brave possible death in the trial of the time machine. Well, she would have to learn to care for herself. He wasn’t going to spend all of his time waiting for her or taking care of her. This was his time, and no one was going to slow him down now.

“Our current location?” Serena breathed. “What?”

“Where are we?” Hiiro glared in annoyance. She was already becoming a problem.

Serena stared blankly at him. What did he want? Was he going to just glare at her all day? She hated it when people looked at her like that! Being put in the spotlight was not her forte. Perhaps if she asked him to turn around, so she could answer without him watching… or better still, she could write the answer and hand it to him! No. She had a strange feeling that he would most definitely not appreciate her requests. Clearing her throat, Serena gather the only iota of courage she had within her stone frozen heart and breathed in deeply. When she exhaled, she began.

“The Cinq Kingdom, where we were, was once part of the country known as France. It’s safe to assume we’re standing in the exact same place as when we left, just in a time before the house was constructed.”

“Understood.” Hiiro nodded. All right. According to Quatre’s floor plans, that meant the ocean would be a hundred or so miles in front of them, and whatever had been constructed of the Cinq Kingdom capital city would be to their left only fifty miles in the distance.

“Preventer Zero?” Serena blankly whispered.

“What?” Hiiro glared. He wanted time to think!

“Planes.” She gasped.

“Explain.” Hiiro blinked. Now what was she going on about?

“Above us, those planes!” Serena pointed meekly with one hand and pushed her thick glasses, which had been slipping down to the tip of her nose, up with the other. In the distance flew eight planes in V formation, all in the classic gray color.

“Fighter planes.” Hiiro muttered. His prussian blue eyes narrowed to dark slits, and he suddenly grabbed Serena’s arm. “Get into the brush, now!” He barked. Half throwing her, half pushing her, Hiiro flung Serena into tall shrubs that would provide decent cover for them both. Then he joined her. Crawling in on his belly, he then flipped onto his back and watched as the planes flew over the gray and black sky through the rainy weather.

“Those are American planes.” Serena whispered. “American planes are very different from any other planes that are flying in the air at the moment—they’re B-52’s, bombers.”

“What are Americans doing in France with war planes? The fifties are supposed to be relatively peaceful.”

“On the contrary.” Serena’s voice had suddenly grown a backbone. As long as she stuck with her facts, buried her head in her history, she felt as if she were invincible. She couldn’t be touched. “The Cold War between Russia and the United States was a major conflict, even if it wasn’t fought openly. The fifties were not perfect.”

“Hnn.” Hiiro knew that. He did. “France was not part of that war.”

“Yes, actually…”

“I meant, America didn’t have war planes in France during the fifties.” Hiiro clarified, before the historian could correct him again. He hated being told he was wrong.

“You’re right, it’s very—” Serena’s quiet agreement was cut short by loud, rapid, and successive cracks and discharges above them. Hiiro caught five planes out of the corner of his eye of a different make and color.

“Historian!” He curtly addressed Serena, trying to get her attention. “Which country’s planes are those?”

“Those are…” Serena had to pause. Quickly she took her glasses off and rubbed them in her shirt, trying to wipe away the drops of water that had beaded up upon them. Once again placing them on the bridge of her nose, she looked up and gasped. “German. German fighter planes. Faster and smaller than those B-52’s. But by the fifties Germany didn’t have any more planes. They were destroyed after the war, the Allied forces made sure of it. This is wrong…”

“Duo.” Hiiro growled. Pounding his hand into the muddy ground, he closed his eyes and breathed deeply, hoping that when he opened them he would be in a dream. When he flicked them back open, he watched as one of the B-52’s was hit in the wing. A large burst of yellow and orange, and then black smoke rose through the rain as the plane spiraled downwards. Shutting his eyes, Hiiro shook his head. This was no dream.

“Duo?” Serena gasped meekly. “Preventer Scythe?”

“Preventer Scythe,” Hiiro paused, trying to withhold his rage, “was responsible for setting the time gage. The time input was designed to be 1954.”

“He entered it wrong.” Serena finished with a death whispered. “He typed in 1944 by mistake. We’re in the forties, in the middle of World War II.” Hiiro remained still, trying to come to terms with the gravity of Duo’s mistake. He was going to cut off that braided idiot’s tongue, and then his braid. He was going to use Chinese water torture on him. He was going to murder him.

The couple watched from under the bushes in awe as the planes finally finished duking it out in mid-air. Three of the B-52’s had gone down, while the Germans had managed to escape without a single casualty. Once the planes were out of sight, Serena shot up. Hiiro watched her with interest—this was the most active he had seen her since he had met the woman.

“We need to move, now.” Serena hissed. “We’re in occupied territory. Germans will be here within a few hours looking for those planes to make sure there were no survivors.”

“We can’t afford to be caught.” Hiiro agreed instantly. Well, at least she was helpful enough to know when danger was about. “Which way to Allied territory?”

“It isn’t that simple.” Serena shook her head, pushing her glasses up and grabbing her canvas bag. “If it’s forty-four, and it’s February, there aren’t any Allied troops here in France as of yet. They aren’t here until June.”

“Move out.” Hiiro grunted. He didn’t care about the dates. He knew Germans would be swarming around this place soon enough, and that was enough to tell his instinct to get moving. Out of one war and into another. The irony made him want to throw up.

Serena heard the anger and frustration in his voice and jumped. She didn’t like this man! He was too volatile. Even though he didn’t pay her too much attention, ever time he did was enough to last for hours on end. His voice had no warmth—in was completely dry and cold. His eyes were harsh, unforgiving, and all seeing, and his mind was dead set in his way and his way alone. Why had she come? Now she was stuck in the middle of a war!

“What about the French. Aren’t they on the Allies’ side?” Hiiro asked sharply as they trekked through the dense foliage.

“Occupied. The closest American troops are in England, and there should be some in Italy by now…”

“The French don’t have any pockets of resistance?” Hiiro narrowed his eyes. This was looking worse and worse. They needed to find a place to hole out until he could decide what further action to take.

“They do. In the south there are a few, but they’re constantly under bombing raids and patrol.” Hiiro snorted. At any rate, he’d been in worse situations. Suddenly he stopped. Serena, who had been walking behind him going over her World War II facts, didn’t see him stop and effectively ran into him from behind. Hiiro flinched, but stayed as still as he could, listening carefully.

“What?” Serena whispered, wanting to sink into the ground and die. She didn’t want to be here! German soldiers were known for their brutality!

“Stay here.” He motioned for her to climb underneath the bushes nearby, then reached into his waistband for his gun. Fingering the cold, wet metal, he immediately felt more comfortable. This was what he had been trained for. A sense of home washed over him, and he smirked. Seek and destroy was the title of this mission.

Carefully he waded through brush and trees, trying to make as little noise as possible to give himself the element of surprise on the enemy. Soon his nose could smell more than the wet smell of dirt; he could smell jet fuel and smoke from a fire. Slowly he crept up and stopped behind a large tree. Crouching close to the ground, he glinted around the trunk and managed to spy two men standing beside one of the B-52’s. Both donned greenish camouflage uniforms, and both were trying to collect guns that lay on the ground near the plane.

“We have to get out of here Jim!” One hissed. English Hiiro recognized.

“Kerry, grab that last gun and let’s get going before the plane either blows, or those damned Nazis come for us.” The men grinned despite their desperate situation, and Hiiro watched them set off. A glint out of the corner of his eye alerted him to more people coming out of the woods towards the plane—but this time he knew they were not Allies. If the men in the green camouflage were American, then these men in the gray with red armbands were not.

“Freeze!” Hiiro heard them shouting in German. The two Americans dove for cover just as the Germans opened fire on them. After four successive rounds of shot and retaliation fire, Hiiro knew this was getting them nowhere fast. The Germans outnumbered the two Americans with a ratio of three to one, and Hiiro knew that the guns the Americans had collected had not had enough extra ammunition to continuously fire forever. Quickly he slipped in behind the six Germans and made small work of the two who had been closest to him.

As he made for the third, the man noticed and began yelling to his comrades. Hiiro inwardly cursed, but grunted outwardly and easily dealt with the remaining four. As he stood from his finishing move, the two Americans stepped out from the trees and, holding their guns cocked and aimed at him, addressed him.

“Hey! Who are you?” *

~~~Have I surprised you? I hope so! Please review, it would mean the world to me! Much love, Vixen~~~