Empire of Fu Manchu

London East End
British Empire
Monday June 3rd, 1940



The Docks district was never much to look at – rough, decrepit, dirty. But if some aristocrats and other well-to-dos had secretly dreamt of a cleansing fire, the Blitz must have disappointed them. If anything, the district was even more run down and dirty now than it had been before the short, depressing war.

Sir Dennis Nayland Smith, very proper in striped dark suit, bowler hat and an umbrella used mostly as walking stick, wrinkled his nose at the screaming mob walking down the street under red banners and banderols with angry red letters. It was mainly men, many in blue worker coveralls, most others in rough working class clothing. There were a few women too.

‘HANDS. OFF. RUSSIA! HANDS. OFF. RUSSIA!!’ they chanted, faces flushed with anger.

‘I say, James, this is nothing but a disgrace!’ Nayland Smith exclaimed indignantly. ‘This kind of behaviour…’

More up to date in his beige long coat and fedora of the style his father favoured, James Bond frowned, also looking at the enraged protesters. ‘I don’t know Sir, it does send a message… I know it’s not these fellow’s gripe, but if Hitler had only invaded Russia, well, there’s little to choose between him and Stalin, but what did the Latvians ever do to him or Germany?’

‘I deplore Hitler too!’ Nayland Smith blurted out. ‘But protesting over such things… well, it should be dignified, formal, especially with an old enemy like Germany! You know as well as I how it’s done; our ambassador marches up to the Chancellery to deliver a note expressing the grave concern, nay outrage of our government over the unprovoked aggression against Latvia and so on and so forth…. But this is just… unseemly!’

‘O tempora, O mores, I guess, Sir.’ Bond answered cryptically. ‘We should probably hurry up. Dad was most insistent.’

Their stroll took them past the protesters, on which bands of bobbies were beginning to converge. When someone produced a German swastika flag, a bottle of industrial alcohol and a lighter, the police pounced mercilessly. There was not going to be any burnt flags souring relations between London and Berlin. They could take little souring to begin with. The clamour of the demonstration instantly transmogrified into the cacophony of a riot which faded behind the two walkers.

With almost shocking suddenness, their stroll through the docklands had brought them into the London equivalent of the American Chinatowns; Limehouse. The area was small, housing no more than a few thousand Chinese and other Asians, and was declining since it’s glory days in the late Victorian Era, when Fu Manchu, acting as a local crime lord, had tested his wits against Sherlock Holmes and Dr Moriarty among its narrow alleys and dark back streets.

Dr Henry “Indiana” Jones peeked out of a certain tea shop and indicated with a furtive motion of his head that Nayland Smith and Bond should join him. Inside the small, dark establishment, the air was rich with the grassy scent of green tea leaf. There were a few customers aside from Jones, an older European gentleman and an Asian lady in fine European dress, with two small boys in tow.

‘So good to see you, Dr Jones!’ Nayland Smith said, shaking Indy’s hand and smiling broadly while the archaeologist exchanged a quick hug with his son.

‘What did you learn, dad? Did you find the lost tomb of Genghis Khan?’ Bond asked.

Indy smiled mysteriously. ‘I’ll tell you all about it at the debriefing, but first, some introductions are in order.’

‘Oh?’

The old European turned and smiled, his white wispy hair revealed as he removed his hat.

‘Sir Dennis, James, this is Professor Klaus Falken of the University of Freiburg. As you might remember, he was of great assistance to me in Antarctica and now also in China.’

‘Pleased to meet you, Professor!’ the Englishmen greeted the scholar.

‘And this…’ Indy declared grandly, with a dramatic gesture towards the woman and the boys who stopped browsing the different bags of tea and turned. The Asian woman was in her late thirties and very beautiful, with kind warm eyes, but was looking somewhat anxious.

‘…this is Emperess Nagako of Japan and her sons, Crown Prince Tsugu and Prince Yoshi.’ The boys were giggling uncontrollably now, unable to maintain the charade any longer. They only laughed harder as Nayland Smith and Bond stared wide-eyed and pale at the trio.

‘Are you pulling my leg, Dr Jones?’ Nayland Smith wondered, completely flabbergasted.

‘Are you quite out of your mind, dad?’ Bond protested, recognising the Empress from press pictures published after her alleged assassination.

Indy shook his head. ‘Now you’re embarrassing this poor colony boy, Gentlemen. Where are your manners?’

Bond and Nayland Smith closed their mouths, looked embarrassed too and then bowed deeply.

‘My most sincere apologies, Your Highness!’ Nayland Smith said, kissing Nagakos gloved hand. ‘Our lack of manners is inexcusable, but we were stunned by this most unexpected pleasure. I am Sir Dennis Nayland Smith of His Majesties Secret Service, and this is Lieutenant Commander James Bond of the same branch. We are honoured to be in your presence.’

Nagako nodded sligtly, indicating that the apologies were accepted.

‘Indeed we are!’ Bond agreed, and then casting a pointed look at Indy asked. ‘To what do we owe this great honour?’

Indy grinned at his friend’s discomfort. ‘The Empress has very kindly agreed to help us start a war. Isn’t that nice of her? But until it is time for that, we need to hide her from both Fu Manchu and the Si-Fan and the likes of Sir Hugh Sinclair. Where could we do that, do you think?’

Nayland Smith immediately understood the implications of what Indy was saying, and his head swam when he realised the stakes being played for. ‘You ARE quite mad, Dr Jones! Well, you took the Empress to the right place. There are some old safe houses here in Limehouse that the Yard used when we hunted Fu Manchu. I doubt the Secret Service knows about any of them. I still have friends at the Yard that I can trust. Sir Hugh will know nothing.’

‘Good, good. Then, as soon as Fu levels his accusations, Her Highness will be ready to step forward and prove him a liar.’

‘And plunge the Empire into another war. God help us, Dr Jones, but I can’t wait for it to begin either!’ Nayland Smith said, a savage light deep inside his blue eyes chasing decades from his wrinkled visage.​

Near Zhitomir, the Ukraine
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Wednesday June 5th, 1940



’Achtung, sewing machine!’

‘All vehicles off the road and stop!’

Although the Luftwaffe had cleared the skies of Soviet aircraft in the first two days of war, there was one air threat that wouldn’t go away; low sniffing Polikarpov U-2 biplanes who would hug the ground at night to strafe and bomb laagering Germans. Although thousands had been destroyed on the airfields with the other, more capable planes in the Soviet inventory, with a production run of close to 40 000, there were bound to be lots of the annoying little machines to spare. The "landsers" had quickly christened them as “sewing machines” because of the less than impressive sound from their engines. III Abteilung had received bombs and machine-gun fire every night since the invasion. It made for bad sleeping, even if they had taken no damage so far. Still, this was the first time the air alert had been given at day and when in road column.

Aside from the sewing machines, they hadn’t encountered any resistance at all since the second day of the war and the advance had been lightning-like. Following in the wake of Guderian’s 2nd Panzergruppe, the Leibstandarte would reach Kiev in a day or two, barring any surprises from the Russians. Guderian himself would cross the Dnepr north of the big city, while Hoth’s 4th Panzergruppe was driving into the Dnepr bend at breakneck speed.

Skorzeny jumped to his feet to have a clear view over his column of halftracks. The landscape was depressingly flat – green fields stretched far, far in all directions until they met the blue sky at some very distant point. He looked around for the approaching enemy plane, it would probably come from the west to hide in glare of the dropping sun – it was already late in the afternoon… there!

‘There!’ But there was something wrong with the engine noise, it sounded far to powerful for a sewing machine… He raised his Zeiss binoculars to take a look.

‘Hold your fire men! It’s a Storch!’

The Fiesler Storch was a German liason and spotter plane that was often used by higher officers for their personal transport. General Rommel was famous for personally doing his recon in his Storch.

The aircraft descended over the column, flying along its length, then past it at lowest altitude and kept dropping.

‘He’s going to land!’ Haputsturmführer Meyer shouted, pointing at the long stretch of straight dirt road ahead.

‘Evidently, but he’s an idiot!’ Skorzeny replied. ‘We haven’t gone there yet. There could be anything; mines, snipers, a battalion of Red Army troops waiting in ambush or a very horny babushka…’

The Fiesler Storch made a bumpy landing a little strech down the road and came to a stop. The little planes were famous for being able to land and take off on short runways. The door opened and a man obviously wearing a Feldgrau German uniform with an officers cap climbed out.

‘Let’s go greet this boy!’ the Austrian SS-man ordered, waving his own halftrack forward. The PAK 38 it carried in tow slowed it down until it was back on the road, then they made good progress and reached the idling Storch just as the officer lit a cigarette.

‘Günther! You black-hearted son of a bitch, what in the name Satan’s iron-shod dick are you doing here?!’ Skorzeny shouted down from the halftrack. ‘I thought you were in Arabia?’

Duhrn smiled. ‘Lovely to see you too, Skorzeny! Well, I was in Arabia, but I had to leave in a hurry when I heard of the speed you men were moving with. I don’t believe anyone expected you to reach Kiev in the first week.’

‘Well, there are no Russians to stop us, so why the fuck not? What do you want anyway, Günther? We’re a bit busy, if you know what I mean.’

‘What I want from you is very simple. What I hope to gain… well, that’s more complicated.’

‘Make it quick. You’re holding up our advance.’

‘Right. Have you ever heard of the State Historical Museum of Kiev?’

‘Not bloody likely.’

‘Didn’t think so, it's brand new. Anyway, it’s on Starokyivska Hill, one of those neoclassical monstrosities Stalin seems to be so fond of where they've collected all kinds of “Relics of the Russian State”. And there is one in particular that I’m interested in.’

‘O boy, here we go again!’ Skorzeny sighed, rolling his eyes. ‘What is it this time? A magical amulet from the Great Horsefuckers of Old? The mummified Schwanz of Ivan the Terrible? What kind of disgusting old trinket do you lust for now, you sick fuck!?’

‘Nothing so exotic’, Duhrn answered, repressing a smile. ‘It’s a book, an ancient tome. I believe it was brought to Kiev either by survivors of the Rus-Byzantine war of the X century or by refugees seeking shelter in Kiev after the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453 AD.’

‘Rare, eh?’

‘Very. You see, it is a Greek translation of an Arab manuscript going by the name of “Al-Azif”, although the translated version is more well known as the “Necronomicon”. It was banned in Byzantium already in 1050 AD, and it is said not a single copy of this edition is known to exist since the Salem witch trials in the XVII century.’

‘But… then they can’t very well have one here, can they?’

‘I have sources that say otherwise. Anyway, when the Russians realise that the city will fall, they’ll probably stuff the best things from the museum in a railway car and park it somewhere “safe”; the objects could be lost forever! Before that happens, I need a company of elite troops to drop on the Red Square, occupy the Museum and hold it until our troops arrive. Then I can search for the book in peace.’

‘No. Absolutely no fucking way in Hell, Günther. Each time I give you a hand, a whole lot of my boys end up dead. But we’re at war now, and I suspect it will be a long one, we can’t afford that kind of waste. I’m not doing it.’

‘Maybe this will make you change your mind?’ Duhrn said, casually giving Skorzeny a document.

Skorzeny read it. ‘The Reichsführer-SS orders that all aid should be extended to bearer of this document… blablabla… signed: Heinrich Himmler. Not bad Günther, I had one of these myself some time back, but it was signed Adolf Hitler.’

‘Well, you don’t have one now. What do you say?’

Skorzeny crossed his arms over his chest in a stubborn gesture. ‘I’ll help you, but my men won’t. If you have any troops of your own, I’ll lead them for you. Deal?’

‘Good enough. I had a company of Sonderkommando Hexen troops flown in from Wewelsburg just in case you took that position. They’re holed up in an airstrip at Novohrad, waiting for us. Jump in and let’s do it!’

‘Right, like those pansies will fight like Waffen-SS troops! Are we going in with parachutes?’

‘Glider.’

‘Crap! Meyer! Let go of your pecker right this instant!’

‘Yes, Sturmbannführer?’ The PAK platoon captain was in the same flatcar, just inches away from his abrasive commander. To judge from Skorzeny’s bellow, he had forgotten about that entirely.

‘You’re in command until further notice. We have orders to move into Kiev and secure the city, so you come look for me and Sturmbannführer Duhrn at the State Historical Museum on Starokyivska Hill right in the middle of the city. Odds are we’ll need your help rather desperately. Questions?’

‘None.’

‘Fine, now go like the clappers and don’t stop for anything, and if some Russians try to stop you, then rape their asses and move on, you get me?’

‘We’ll make you proud, Sturmbannführer!’

‘See that you do. Heil Hitler!’

Without more ado, Skorzeny grabbed an MP-38 and some ammo from a weapons box and jumped down from the halftrack. Within minutes, the green fields of the Ukraine shrunk below him as Duhrn piloted the Storch back west towards Novohrad.​