Kapitän Heinemann paced the stead yard angrily, fuming as he strode between buildings and knots of busy airmen.

There was, not surprisingly, very little of value within the walls of the remote farmstead. Oh, had the high command shown the foresight to have built Katzbalger using tractor parts and allox dung, they’d have been in fine shape! Of course, the engineers had foolishly used high quality aircraft engines and highsteel components instead.

The sun was heeling over towards evening and they’d been in this squalid mud pit for entirely too long already. Nor was anything they’d learned in that time encouraging.

Engine three was a dead loss. The engine block was cracked nearly in two — well beyond either the skill of Katzbalger’s mechanics or the welding equipment on hand to repair. There was nothing available they’d found in this benighted hog wallow to replace it with either, aside from the aforementioned tractor engines. And you couldn’t replace radial diesel engine parts with inline wood gas engine parts no matter how motivated your men nor advanced their skills.

Engine one might work again or not, depending upon whether the oilers could cannibalize enough parts from three and/or fill the single crack in that engine’s block well enough for a seal with the scavenged cylinder heads. They insisted that they could, but the machine shop they’d captured lacked a certain... finesse to its equipage.

Engine two ran more often than it didn’t, and since they hadn’t the luxury of trying to refit it in this makeshift drydock, it would have to continue to run or not as it was now rigged.

Four and five remained upon their sponsons while crewmen raced to flush fuel lines and replace electrical connections. It remained to be seen whether those engines were damaged at all, or if they could be made to run again. One way or the other, it would be several hours at least before anything positive could be determined.

Gunners mates, bridge crew, and members of the shakedown party were busily stripping the local vehicles of anything remotely useful in the way of hydraulic lines, fuel lines, or electrical wire.

“Herr Kapitän!” the call came from the stead holder’s house, sounding urgent. “Herr Kapitän!”

Heinemann halted and faced the onrushing radioman. That worthy drew up to a messy halt before him, saluting anxiously. The Kapitän returned the salute and waited.

“There is radio chatter, Mein Kapitän,” the radioman announced. “From some place called Plubbetton. They know that we are here!”

The kapitän narrowed his eyes. “I should think that our shelling of their policemen would have told them that,” he said.

“No, no, no, Mein Kapitän,” the radioman told him. “Somehow they know that we’ve eliminated the Englisher Destroyer and made off with the ore freighter!”

“What?” the response wasn’t quite a shout. “How could—?” but he stopped himself. How would the radioman know? And an officer did not expect of his men the obviously impossible. Instead, “and you know this how?”

“They are radioing for assistance, Mein Kapitän,” the radioman said. “Someplace called Royal Naval Air Station Bigsby, Eastmarch. And they are radioing that the ore freighter has been taken and the destroyer... ah... destroyed.”

Eastmarch. Nearly eighteen hundred kilometers distant, if he had his charts properly memorized. “Was there a response?”

“Nein, Herr Kapitän.”

“And who is monitoring now?”

“Er...”

“Schnell!”

The radioman bolted, forgetting to salute. That was alright for the moment, so long as he did his job properly.

The kapitän stood there, seemingly oblivious to the turmoil around him as his mind raced. Eighteen hundred kilometers. They could have fighters here in a little under three hours, but they’d be out of fuel. More likely to send a group. Three to five corvettes. Perhaps a destroyer or two, with whatever HTAs were assigned to them.

At full combat power, the best the Royal Navy could send at them might make one hundred-fifty kilometers an hour. Twelve hours, then, once they were under way. Probably closer to nine, as they’d no doubt launch fighters well before they arrived — and these fighters would still have fuel when they appeared over the horizon.

Of course, that was once they were under way, and if there were any ships available in Eastmarch ready to go. Which, if his intelligence were worth half a pfennig there weren’t. There were a coal tender, three coastal patrol boats, and a crippled heavy cruiser under repairs.

They might send the patrol boats, but they were outdated, slow, and lightly armed.

The raiding flotilla had been promised that there would be no interference for two full days — fifty-two hours, minimum, even should the packet or destroyer have gotten off a call during the initial attack. Fifty-two hours, of which only twenty or so had passed.

If his intelligence was to be believed. The same intelligence which had assured them that Mk IV Lampreys would be the most significant threat they’d face.

“Schnell!” he shouted suddenly, lurching forward towards the tractor shed where his men were working feverishly. “Macht Schnell!” They’d be out of here in five hours or he’d know the reason why!

“Sergeant of the guard!” the call rang out from the east wall. “Post number six!”

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Sergeant of the guard indeed! The bootsmann fumed as he moved towards the eastern wall. As though they’d posted an official guard mount in garrison. He had better things to do than answer to every shadow on this god forsaken isle. God save me from inexperienced crew, he thought.

“What is it now?” he called up to the nervous airman upon the walkway.

“There are a number of animals moving this way from around that ridge to the south-west,” the airman called back. “As though someone were herding them!”

The bootsmann looked westward towards the setting sun. City boys. Bah! Back to the nervous airman, “do you see anyone with them?” he asked.

The airman looked back over the wall. “Nein, Herr Bootsmann!” he called down anxiously. “But there could be men crouched down behind them. The shadows are deep enough.”

“Ja,” the bootsmann called back up. “Or they could have full udders and want to be milked. Are they coming single file? Do they seem in any particular hurry?”

“Ja, Herr Bootsmann, they are, and no they do not. What shall I do?”

The Bootsmann scrubbed a meaty hand across his florid face, grumbling into his palm. “Unless you want to climb down here and milk them all, Lad, do nothing at all!”

“But, Herr—”

“If they start shooting at you, youngling,” the bootsmann grumped, “you have my permission to shoot back! Ist klar?”

“Jawohl, Her Bootsmann.” the boy’s face reddened. “Ist klar.”

* * *

Av peeled away from the bleat-screeching allox as the last of them reached the outer bounds of the hog pens, ducking behind the hog yard fence as the beasts continued on. Hunched beneath a heavy load, he joined his grandson and son-in-law who were already there, each of them bearing their own extra burdens. The stink of allox was everywhere — so foul that he couldn’t even smell the stench of the hogs whose crud he was kneeling in. He figured that if he lived through this ordeal, he’d have to take himself a lye bath and burn these clothes.

The allox kept going, expecting the gate to be opened. When it wasn’t, they tried to push it open. Those behind the leaders just piled into them. Then the next rank piled into those until the whole area beneath the wall was a mess of stinking, screeching, farting fur and meat, crying in pain to be let in.

The three islanders could see a head popping periodically over the wall to look down at them, but the gate didn’t open.

“Well, that’ll cover a multitude of sins, won’t it?” Av remarked dryly, shifting the long bulk of the Lewis gun more firmly across his back.

“I’d rather he didn’t keep looking this way,” Martin hissed.

“Ah, you worry too much.” Av chided. “Sun heeled over the way it is, that guy couldn’t see us in these shadows with a spotlight.”

Martin gave him an eye, but didn’t respond. Instead, he moved along the fence toward the south, looking for a gate. Shadows or no, he didn’t want to present anyone with an extra lump straddling the top rail for even a few seconds, not even with all the upright dragon stakes scattered around to confuse the image.

No such luck. But there was a slot between two of the sheds that blocked them from view of the wall pretty well, so he skinned over there. Dar followed close behind him, the Thompson he’d switched to in lieu of the larger, longer Garand held at high ready.

Martin motioned silently, and Dar moved to the north ten or twelve feet. Nearly abreast, they crept across the yard, easing between rooting hogs, moving steadily. It was dangerous, and not only because they might be discovered. These hogs were half wild, and would eat anything that wasn’t moving fast enough to stay clear. If a man went down among them, he might not get back up.

They brought up against the near fence, only twenty yards or so from the stead wall, its near side now completely in shadow. Martin looked around, but couldn’t find Av. He cursed under his breath. Then the old man hove into view out of the darkness, holding a coil of rope, the end of which he fingered speculatively.

“Where in hell did you find that?” Martin whispered.

Av grinned a happy grin. “Hangin’ from the wall over to th’ hog shed.”

“Why on earth would there be a lasso hanging from a hog shed wall?” Martin wondered.

Av’s grin grew. “There ain’t no tellin’ what a buncha bored cowboys is likely to get up to on a long Sunday afternoon when there ain’t nothin’ better to do,” he said. "Ropin’ hogs can get right sporty."

“And what are you planning on doing with it?” Martin demanded, voice clipped.

Av chucked his chin towards the wall. “Got an idee fer dealin’ with that one,” he said softly.

“Which is?”

Av pulled a strange looking revolver from a tanker’s style rig strapped to his chest. Ugly and ungainly, it was made even more so by the long, fat muffler that he was twisting onto the end of the barrel. “What d’ya suppose would happen did somebody plug him in th’ knob?” he asked.

Martin’s eyes narrowed, although Av couldn’t see it in the dark. “He’d probably fall off of that walkway and into the yard with a helluva racket,” he growled. “I’d rather that didn’t happen.”

“Which is where this comes in,” Av raised the elbow over which the lasso was draped. “We wait until he looks in the other direction and I dab a loop on him to keep him from falling the wrong way. Pop ‘im in the grape so’s he don’t yell, and drag him over the wall on this side where they can’t see or hear him.”

Martin looked up at the wall and the narrow crenel through which the rope would have to go. “Are you sure you can get a loop on him from down here?” he asked.

“Can you pee standin’ up?”

Martin scowled, but held out his hand. “Fine. Give me the pistol.”

Av shook his head. “When was the last time you even held a pistol like you meant it, Marty?” he asked. “Fifteen years? Twenty? This shot we only get one chance at. It has to be on the money.”

“Well you can’t shoot and throw the loop. And I sure as hell can’t throw like that.”

“I know,” Av said calmly. “On the other hand, Dar, here, has not only held a pistol like he meant it recently, he shot this very one a week ago Tuesday.”

“Wait.” Dar hissed. “Me?”

Av held out the revolver. “Gotta be you, Dar,” he said. “From right here, twenty yards, fifteen feet elevation? You could do it in your sleep.”

“But....” But the old man was right. It wasn’t an easy shot, dark as it was getting, and Pop hadn’t, to the best of his knowledge, held anything more dangerous than a shovel in his hands as in as long as he could remember. He gulped hard and reached past his father to take the big Nagant revolver from his grandfather’s hand.

“Dar?” Martin asked quietly.

“It’s alright, Pop,” he said. “I know. I’m okay.”

Av had unslung the Lewis gun and set it aside for the moment, leaning it up against the upper fence rail. He was uncoiling the lasso, playing with the coil, loosening it, getting its feel, all the while watching the wall.

The head was appearing more frequently than it should if whoever owned it was walking the whole wall, so he was probably there to keep an eye on the barred gate. So who, if anybody was watching the rest of the wall?

“Marty?”

“Just him,” Martin seemed to be reading his mind. “They must be pretty sure of themselves.”

“Pshaw!” Av snorted. “And why shouldn’t they be? “They took out the constables neat as you please, and when the militia showed, they ran ‘em off without firing a shot. all they got to worry about now is RN showing up to spoil the party, and RN ain’t gonna be hiding in no hog pens any time soon.”

The head disappeared again, and Av rolled over the fence, heading for the deeper shadows at the wall’s base.

They waited as the sun continued its journey to the horizon. The shadows raced eastward, throwing the wall’s echo far out onto the plain. The head of the pirate guard was no more than a black silhouette now. Just like at the range. Dar gripped the Nagant in both hands and carefully pulled the hammer back to full cock. The double action pull on the revolver was atrocious, despite the considerable time Av had spent tuning it over the years. Even at such short range, Dar dared not chance it.