A Thousand Suns

Chapter 27 The Route

‘So then, from Lyon I’d suggest we make sure we give Paris a wide berth, duck down and cross over, say…’ Max’s finger traced across the map, ‘just north of Limoges.’

‘Okay,’ said Stef, scribbling down the course direction from the previous waypoint.

‘You got that?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Max yawned and stretched in his seat, arching his tired back. His wrist smacked against the bulkhead as he stretched his arms. ‘Ouch, shit,’ he said, rubbing it. ‘There are so many damn edges and corners in this thing. I don’t know how many times I’ve clumped my head or knees against something.’

Stef grinned and pulled his ginger fringe back from his forehead to show a small scab. ‘I forgot to duck climbing up the ladder into the cockpit.’

‘You idiot,’ laughed Pieter.

Max leaned forward once more to study the maps. ‘It’s basically a dog’s leg. South, out of Germany into Swiss airspace, and then a shallow north-westerly climb across France. What’s the total distance?’

Stef flattened the map out and measured the distance along the sequence of waypoints he’d plotted across the map.

‘About eleven hundred and sixty miles in total to Nantes.’

‘And we’re talking another four thousand and five hundred across the sea. That’s five thousand, six hundred and sixty miles all in,’ said Max.

‘We should tell Major Rall six thousand miles,’ said Pieter.

‘Agreed… let’s have a healthy margin.’

Max noted the figure and would inform the Major later on how much capacity the extra tanks inside the bomber would need to have.

‘Over France, we’ll fly at close to ceiling, then once we’re out to sea, we should take her down to about ten thousand to conserve fuel.’

‘All right,’ said Pieter. The Atlantic would be his part of the flight.

Max looked at both of them. ‘All right? That’s the route, then. I’ll take it over to Rall for him to look over. I’m sure he’ll be happy to give this his approval.’ He looked at his watch. It was gone one o’clock in the morning. The Major would be awake still and keen to get this information.

‘I’m going to piss off, get some sleep, I’m all in,’ said Pieter yawning.

Max nodded. ‘Fine, go get some rest. We’re doing another practice flight tonight.’

Pieter stood up and climbed forward through the bulkhead out of the navigator’s compartment.

Stef began inking in the waypoint headings on the map, tidily circling the clusters of numbers on the map and labelling each pocket of information with a waypoint number. He was a tidy, efficient navigator.

‘Good work, Stef.’

The lad looked up and smiled. ‘Thanks, sir.’

His gaze lingered on Max, as if there was something more he wanted to say.

‘What’s up?’ he said to the boy.

Stef put down his pen. ‘I was wondering, sir, do you ever get nervous? It’s just that you never seem to be worried or scared, you know, before a sortie.’

If only.

Every man felt it as the time ticked away, and Max knew he was no exception to that rule. The growing sense of dread, those pre-battle nerves, it affected them all… just in different ways. Some men it made feel nauseous, others terribly thirsty. Many of the men he’d commanded in KG-301 suffered a desperate need to shit just before the planes were ready to leave the ground; some of his men had even confessed to feeling sexually aroused just before it was time to go.

Fear really did seem to have a plethora of ways of expressing itself.

With a little knowledge of anthropology, one could explain away most of these symptoms of extreme stress as the body’s way of clearing the decks and preparing itself for danger. Nausea? — The body discouraging the ingestion of bulky food that might slow it down, or hamper its performance. Thirst? — A dry mouth was the body asking for water, hoarding it ready to be consumed after a burst of extreme physical exertion. Defecation? — The body ensuring that unnecessary body weight was quickly jettisoned.

Sexual arousal? — That was an odd one.

Max had a suspicion that it was the body’s desperate plea to procreate one final time, an attempt at some basic level of instinct to ensure the bloodline continued.

All of these stress-symptoms made sense. They were emergency systems designed to ready the human body to fight, flee or face death. Once upon a time, when men had fought with clubs and rocks, those stress-responses must have been invaluable. But war now wasn’t about brute strength, or swiftness of foot. It had much more to do with concentration and patience. And none of these damned symptoms helped at all.

They were made all the worse if there was nothing to do to fill in that dwindling time until zero hour. So he was thankful that for all of them there had been plenty to take care of and plenty more that needed doing in the next couple of days.

Do I get nervous? he asked himself.

More than he would ever let the others know.

‘A little bit, maybe, Stef.’

‘Oh. You never seem to look it, sir.’

Max smiled. If only you knew.

‘We’re going to be in good hands, thanks to Schröder and his men. We’re flying a tough old plane, we’re flying in secrecy and we’re heading somewhere nobody expects us to go. The wind’s in our favour, Stef. We’ll do just fine.’

‘Yes, I suppose you’re right,’ replied Stef.

‘Don’t be too hard on yourself, lad. It’s good to be a little jittery, just enough to keep you alert, keep your wits about you.’ Max slapped his back. ‘You’ve done us proud over the last year and you’ll do just as well tomorrow night.’