Good stuff. I like Suse and her determination to join the panzerkorps--and that line's perfect!
Kiki and Ben--interesting subplot--or would a subplot be when someone wants to join the u-boat service?
Stupid Luck and Happenstance, Thread II
- Thread starter Peabody-Martini
- Start date
Kiki and Ben--interesting subplot--or would a subplot be when someone wants to join the u-boat service?
Gah!!!
The size of the clue stick that is needed to pound something through Kiki's (admittedly damaged) skull sometimes!
Like the little fact that practically EVERYONE knows that Ben is her boyfriend AND THEY DON'T CARE!! Even her father is onboard with it. She is not going to be forced into that dynastic marriage that her mother was trying to arrange. All of the potential matches have mostly figured that out for themselves, the fact that she could easily slit their throats if they pushed the matter aiding in the thought processes.
AGREED.
Her bloody mother really did a number on her, didn’t she...
Someone - preferably Daddy dearest - is just going to need to tell her point blank. “Marry whoever the hell you want, even this guy. The world is changing, dynastic marriages are no longer a necessity’.
Y'know, at this point it seems that Kiki is the one most likely to mess it up rather than Ben.
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In Ben's corner, Kiki has less issues than Kat ever did, and Doug won that fight in the end.
It just takes a lot of patience on Ben's part.
"In life, there are assholes. These people live simply to take advantage of others and use them because that's the only way they know to exist. Fortunately, you are not one of these people, unfortunately, they will do there best to turn you into one. You will have to fight and struggle not to, but that doesn't mean you should allow yourself to be walked all over. Like people, do everything you can to help people, but when it comes to trusting them with so much as a pfenning, be certain first."
Not sure if that's even on Kira, most of Kikis neuroses seem pretty independent of her.
Isn't her Aunt on her Fathers side married to a "commoner"?
Reminds me of when we first brought the dogs at a old job down to the sheep after having lambs. The good news is, nobody got hurt, and the dogs were very understanding about the headbutts.
Funnily enough, the little Cocker Spaniel mix, who was up there in years, and more akin to the grand dame of the pack, got headbutted later by her counterpart in the flock. Her resposne was to growl and retalliate with a headbutt of her own. I barely believed it, and I was THERE.
That said, you can bring a dog into a sheep flock, if you know the temperment of both parties, have a good leash, and the breed isn't one to pick fights with bigger animals.
I have seen dairy cows, bred to be placid but had recently calved, gathering to trample a dog that a contractor had stupidly brought on-farm & let out of his vehicle. Idiot got upset when I told him to lock his damn dog in his truck before either the cows turned it into red mud or the boss came & shot it. Idiot then got ordered off the farm, his boss was told never to send 'that idiot' back ever again and he was practically blackballed by the farming community.
By the way, as placid as dairy cows may be, NEVER turn your back on a dairy bull, especially Jerseys', they can be evil-minded bastards. I have seen one go from happily chewing cud to actively trying to obliterate a co-worker in less than a second, then go back to chewing cud again as if nothing had happened. Co-worker was ok, but had to go home for reasons.
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I'm from Kansas, you don't turn your back on any Bull unless you know that one inside and out. The old joke about the bull being <insert time here>fast, how fast are you is not a joke.
Agree on that. Especially in rut, when they will even attack the pickup that's bringing them their food.
I am aware of that. Its just that too many assume that because the dairy cow is so placid, the bull must be as well. That said, turning around in the herringbone shed to cup the next cow & finding a bull standing in the pit behind me... damn near brown trouser time... luckily it ever so gently trotted past me & out the front of the shed, without dislodging a single set of cups. Took about an hour for my hands to stop shaking.
Part 102, Chapter 1646
Chapter One Thousand Six Hundred Forty-Six
5th August 1964
Near Bad Reichenhall, Rural Upper Bavaria
Although their hosts insisted that they observe propriety, they had allowed Ben to stay for a few days. It was an offer that he was more than happy to take. Kiki had wondered why he had. The truth was that between University and what had happened last Spring, they had hardly managed to have seen each other in months. The opportunity to see her without having to contend with all the stupid Royal protocols that he knew Kiki hated interfering was always welcome. Sitting on the back porch of the Rommel’s house listening to Kiki play her guitar as the sun set certainly counted as that.
When Ben had first called to see how Kiki was doing, he had learned that there were only a handful of people who were allowed to see or speak to her while she was recovering in the mountains. He had been prepared to be disappointed, but to Ben’s surprise his name was on the list. There had been a bit of trepidation when he realized that he was on the phone with Generalfeldmarschall Rommel. It didn’t matter if he was retired of not, he was the former head of a Service Branch, nor it didn’t matter if Ben was in a different Branch. He could squash Ben like a bug if it suited him to do so. That was why it was a bit of a relief when Rommel had mostly been curious about who exactly he was and what his involvement with Kiki was. Ben had told him the truth, minus a few details that weren’t anyone else’s business. That he and Kiki had been in a relationship, he had not been able to see her as much as he liked, that he, along with everyone else had seen her collapse and that he was worried about her. What followed was a series questions about veracity of what Ben was saying. He was certain that there must have been calls to the First Foot and possibly Kiki’s father. The thought that the Emperor might get reminded that Ben was still in the picture was the sort of thing that filled him with dread. It wasn’t as if he would ever forget what happened last time.
The look of surprise on Kiki’s face when she had walked in and had seen him at the table on Sunday night had been worth the trip so far out of his way. Still, it was nice that his presence here didn’t involve a lot of sneaking around. Even if Ben didn’t need to presume that a mouse didn’t fart here without Erwin Rommel knowing about it, he had seen how destructive Kiki’s habit of doing that had been back home. The worrying part was that Kiki seemed to enjoy employing subterfuge even if it wasn’t really needed. It wasn’t a game he wanted to play anymore.
“That girl doesn’t pay much mind to that which she leaves behind” Kiki sang the first verse of the song She walks in Sunshine in accompaniment of her guitar. She had told Ben many times that her singing voice was awful. While she wasn’t classically trained like her sister Vicky, her voice was more than adequate for singing the sort of pop song that she was currently playing. She progressed through the verses until she reached the chorus. It was funny how Kiki playing the song this way changed the emphasis. When the Moondogs played it, people heard the poppy chorus as opposed to the verses.
“No wonder Zella hates this song” Ben said to Kiki who stopped when he said that.
“She made a point of ignoring the band the next time they came through Berlin, not putting the announcement of their show ahead of time in the Berliner” Kiki replied, “It made for a boring show, apparently. I wasn’t there, hardly anyone else was either.”
“Remind me not to anger her in the future” Ben said.
“Zella’s bark is worse than her bite.”
“Having her run over my foot with her motorcycle is quite a bite” Ben said.
“That was an accident and she did feel bad after that happened” Kiki replied, “She was actually worried that she might have seriously hurt you. There is a side of Zella that few others get to see.”
Ben wasn’t sure that he believed that. Kiki’s best friend seemed to revel in being the ultimate bad girl rocker. Somehow, the two of them had maintained a friendship for more than a decade though they seemed to have little in common.
The conversation was interrupted by Rauchbier barking excitedly as one of the Rommel’s grandchildren chased him around through the trees. The four-year-old boy was perfect for this. Kiki had been reluctant to let Rauchbier off his leash for the last week because of the sheep that were around. There was no end to the sort of trouble that he might get into with them. Tonight, she was able to let him play with the children in the house.
Looking up, Kiki looked at the mountains that the sun was setting behind.
“That mountain is Hoher Göll” Kiki said pointing towards one to the south-west. “When I was learning Mountaineering, it was one of climbs my cadre did. There is this subpeak where you can look down on the valley that is spread out below you like a map, it is an incredible view.”
“And what is the drop off like?” Ben asked.
“You are at the top of a cliff” Kiki replied, “About hundred and fifty, two hundred meters. I don’t know. You obviously wouldn’t want to build a house up there but it’s something you ought to see some time.”
“No thanks” Ben said.
“An Ace Pilot, afraid of heights?” Kiki bemusedly asked.
“That is completely different” Ben replied.
5th August 1964
Near Bad Reichenhall, Rural Upper Bavaria
Although their hosts insisted that they observe propriety, they had allowed Ben to stay for a few days. It was an offer that he was more than happy to take. Kiki had wondered why he had. The truth was that between University and what had happened last Spring, they had hardly managed to have seen each other in months. The opportunity to see her without having to contend with all the stupid Royal protocols that he knew Kiki hated interfering was always welcome. Sitting on the back porch of the Rommel’s house listening to Kiki play her guitar as the sun set certainly counted as that.
When Ben had first called to see how Kiki was doing, he had learned that there were only a handful of people who were allowed to see or speak to her while she was recovering in the mountains. He had been prepared to be disappointed, but to Ben’s surprise his name was on the list. There had been a bit of trepidation when he realized that he was on the phone with Generalfeldmarschall Rommel. It didn’t matter if he was retired of not, he was the former head of a Service Branch, nor it didn’t matter if Ben was in a different Branch. He could squash Ben like a bug if it suited him to do so. That was why it was a bit of a relief when Rommel had mostly been curious about who exactly he was and what his involvement with Kiki was. Ben had told him the truth, minus a few details that weren’t anyone else’s business. That he and Kiki had been in a relationship, he had not been able to see her as much as he liked, that he, along with everyone else had seen her collapse and that he was worried about her. What followed was a series questions about veracity of what Ben was saying. He was certain that there must have been calls to the First Foot and possibly Kiki’s father. The thought that the Emperor might get reminded that Ben was still in the picture was the sort of thing that filled him with dread. It wasn’t as if he would ever forget what happened last time.
The look of surprise on Kiki’s face when she had walked in and had seen him at the table on Sunday night had been worth the trip so far out of his way. Still, it was nice that his presence here didn’t involve a lot of sneaking around. Even if Ben didn’t need to presume that a mouse didn’t fart here without Erwin Rommel knowing about it, he had seen how destructive Kiki’s habit of doing that had been back home. The worrying part was that Kiki seemed to enjoy employing subterfuge even if it wasn’t really needed. It wasn’t a game he wanted to play anymore.
“That girl doesn’t pay much mind to that which she leaves behind” Kiki sang the first verse of the song She walks in Sunshine in accompaniment of her guitar. She had told Ben many times that her singing voice was awful. While she wasn’t classically trained like her sister Vicky, her voice was more than adequate for singing the sort of pop song that she was currently playing. She progressed through the verses until she reached the chorus. It was funny how Kiki playing the song this way changed the emphasis. When the Moondogs played it, people heard the poppy chorus as opposed to the verses.
“No wonder Zella hates this song” Ben said to Kiki who stopped when he said that.
“She made a point of ignoring the band the next time they came through Berlin, not putting the announcement of their show ahead of time in the Berliner” Kiki replied, “It made for a boring show, apparently. I wasn’t there, hardly anyone else was either.”
“Remind me not to anger her in the future” Ben said.
“Zella’s bark is worse than her bite.”
“Having her run over my foot with her motorcycle is quite a bite” Ben said.
“That was an accident and she did feel bad after that happened” Kiki replied, “She was actually worried that she might have seriously hurt you. There is a side of Zella that few others get to see.”
Ben wasn’t sure that he believed that. Kiki’s best friend seemed to revel in being the ultimate bad girl rocker. Somehow, the two of them had maintained a friendship for more than a decade though they seemed to have little in common.
The conversation was interrupted by Rauchbier barking excitedly as one of the Rommel’s grandchildren chased him around through the trees. The four-year-old boy was perfect for this. Kiki had been reluctant to let Rauchbier off his leash for the last week because of the sheep that were around. There was no end to the sort of trouble that he might get into with them. Tonight, she was able to let him play with the children in the house.
Looking up, Kiki looked at the mountains that the sun was setting behind.
“That mountain is Hoher Göll” Kiki said pointing towards one to the south-west. “When I was learning Mountaineering, it was one of climbs my cadre did. There is this subpeak where you can look down on the valley that is spread out below you like a map, it is an incredible view.”
“And what is the drop off like?” Ben asked.
“You are at the top of a cliff” Kiki replied, “About hundred and fifty, two hundred meters. I don’t know. You obviously wouldn’t want to build a house up there but it’s something you ought to see some time.”
“No thanks” Ben said.
“An Ace Pilot, afraid of heights?” Kiki bemusedly asked.
“That is completely different” Ben replied.
The illusions of familiarity. There are people who rock climb & mountaineer for fun but are terrified of flying. That said, rope & rocks are a lot more primitive and are up close & personal.
The age old risk of being a bard/troubadour. Piss off your patron at your peril.
Looks like Ben's patience might be running out. It won't be long before he demands she make her mind up about their relationship, something the Kaiser is on his side about.
Part 102, Chapter 1647
Chapter One Thousand Six Hundred Forty-Seven
6th August 1964
San Francisco, California
Sitting on a pier, Ritchie was nicely drunk as he sat in the shade and watched the ships putting to sea. According to the Sailors who Ritchie had talked to, the Navy ship out there in the Bay was the USS Maddox. Like him, she had been preparing for service in the Far East and was departing now. He would beat her to China because he would be flying there in a few days.
He was more than happy to drink to the great festering sore that was China, where everyone and their brother seemed to have an agenda there, and no one was up front about it. The United States was just one player among many over there in that geopolitical chess game. The 1st SFG was first in line among the US Army to get sent over there and Ritchie was starting to regret his choice to stay in the Green Beret as opposed to going back to the 82nd Airborne when he had the chance. Either way came with the promotion to Specialist 1st Class, just in Ritchie’s short-term thinking, holding that rank in the 1st SFG seemed to mean a whole lot more and he was an Assistant Squad Leader. In practice that meant that he no longer needed to haul the Squad’s Browning around.
A few weeks later, they had learned that they were going back to China. Ritchie remembered that he had been selected for the 1st SFG because he spoke Spanish fluently. Back then, everyone thought that Cuba, Mexico and Central America were going to be the Global hot spots where operations would be conducted. Instead, it had been China and Korea. Places that had been on no one’s radar a few years earlier. For what it was worth, Ritchie had picked up quite a few words in Chinese. They typically were not ones that one would care to use in mixed company though.
Where it took on a completely surreal aspect was that when Ritchie had mentioned the prior times that he had been in China he had seen people’s eyes glaze over. Or worse, his brother telling him that it was this great adventure. Somehow, listening to Captain Parker having to kiss the ass of an overt chauvinist like General Pan Yong and knowing that all of their “Allies” would happily plant daggers in each other’s backs in what was the asshole of the globe didn’t seem like any sort of adventure, or at least not one that any would ever make a movie about.
The Great Game, Part 2, Ritchie thought to himself cynically. Except this time if someone fucked up nukes would fly and the whole world would burn. So, there was no pressure at all.
Wunsdorf-Zossen
The meeting of Heads of the Service Branches, the Heads of the relevant Divisions and the Commander in Chief of the Military High Command had just gotten out. Hans had attended at the right hand of the Inspector of the Panzer Corps. Everyone knew that he was being groomed for the top spot in time provided that his career wasn’t diverted by unexpected events. The meeting that he had just attended had suggested that unexpected events were exactly what was coming.
The subject had been a plan to reopen the overland railroads through China. Hopefully before the Russians recognized that the current crisis represented an opportunity for them to realize their long-held ambition of grabbing Manchuria and the Pacific ports long held by China. It was somewhat of a miracle that hadn’t happened yet. Everyday over the previous spring, Hans had been expecting the news to roll in that the Russians were massing in the Far East. It hadn’t happened yet but waiting for the Chinese to get their shit together seemed like it was a guarantee that it would eventually happen.
While the OKW was just talking about how they needed a plan at the moment, Hans wasn’t stupid. Buried somewhere in the blizzard of papers that the High Command generated were probably several sets of plans covering every contingency. One of the things that Hans had discovered his job entailed was keeping the men who generated those theories from putting them into practice. Or in failing that, making sure that the men under his command would survive the experience. Kurt Knispel had told him about how during the Second World War, Field Marshal von Wolvogle had waged a war just as bloody and ruthless as the one that he had fought on the Russian Front with official bureaucracy. In the end, the Old Wolf had been able to clean house, sacking or reassigning everyone who he regarded as being the “dead wood” which he had gone after with a proverbial flamethrower.
The trouble that Hans had with the entire process was that he had been on the other side of matters as the Heer had been pushed out of Ukraine and Poland. According to Kurt, officialdom had been more focused on not looking bad as opposed to winning the war. Kurt had suggested that the culture that existed in Berlin and Wunsdorf had become very similar to the one that had existed during the first part of the Second World War.
It was a troubling thought.
If they suffered the same sort of reverses the field as they had back then, Hans would be extremely tempted to go through Wunsdorf with an actual flamethrower this time. Waiting for the other side to overreach or having someone like Manfred von Wolvogle to pull off a miracle was beyond stupid. And that was without even mentioning the sort of stupid things that always happened that couldn’t be planned for.
6th August 1964
San Francisco, California
Sitting on a pier, Ritchie was nicely drunk as he sat in the shade and watched the ships putting to sea. According to the Sailors who Ritchie had talked to, the Navy ship out there in the Bay was the USS Maddox. Like him, she had been preparing for service in the Far East and was departing now. He would beat her to China because he would be flying there in a few days.
He was more than happy to drink to the great festering sore that was China, where everyone and their brother seemed to have an agenda there, and no one was up front about it. The United States was just one player among many over there in that geopolitical chess game. The 1st SFG was first in line among the US Army to get sent over there and Ritchie was starting to regret his choice to stay in the Green Beret as opposed to going back to the 82nd Airborne when he had the chance. Either way came with the promotion to Specialist 1st Class, just in Ritchie’s short-term thinking, holding that rank in the 1st SFG seemed to mean a whole lot more and he was an Assistant Squad Leader. In practice that meant that he no longer needed to haul the Squad’s Browning around.
A few weeks later, they had learned that they were going back to China. Ritchie remembered that he had been selected for the 1st SFG because he spoke Spanish fluently. Back then, everyone thought that Cuba, Mexico and Central America were going to be the Global hot spots where operations would be conducted. Instead, it had been China and Korea. Places that had been on no one’s radar a few years earlier. For what it was worth, Ritchie had picked up quite a few words in Chinese. They typically were not ones that one would care to use in mixed company though.
Where it took on a completely surreal aspect was that when Ritchie had mentioned the prior times that he had been in China he had seen people’s eyes glaze over. Or worse, his brother telling him that it was this great adventure. Somehow, listening to Captain Parker having to kiss the ass of an overt chauvinist like General Pan Yong and knowing that all of their “Allies” would happily plant daggers in each other’s backs in what was the asshole of the globe didn’t seem like any sort of adventure, or at least not one that any would ever make a movie about.
The Great Game, Part 2, Ritchie thought to himself cynically. Except this time if someone fucked up nukes would fly and the whole world would burn. So, there was no pressure at all.
Wunsdorf-Zossen
The meeting of Heads of the Service Branches, the Heads of the relevant Divisions and the Commander in Chief of the Military High Command had just gotten out. Hans had attended at the right hand of the Inspector of the Panzer Corps. Everyone knew that he was being groomed for the top spot in time provided that his career wasn’t diverted by unexpected events. The meeting that he had just attended had suggested that unexpected events were exactly what was coming.
The subject had been a plan to reopen the overland railroads through China. Hopefully before the Russians recognized that the current crisis represented an opportunity for them to realize their long-held ambition of grabbing Manchuria and the Pacific ports long held by China. It was somewhat of a miracle that hadn’t happened yet. Everyday over the previous spring, Hans had been expecting the news to roll in that the Russians were massing in the Far East. It hadn’t happened yet but waiting for the Chinese to get their shit together seemed like it was a guarantee that it would eventually happen.
While the OKW was just talking about how they needed a plan at the moment, Hans wasn’t stupid. Buried somewhere in the blizzard of papers that the High Command generated were probably several sets of plans covering every contingency. One of the things that Hans had discovered his job entailed was keeping the men who generated those theories from putting them into practice. Or in failing that, making sure that the men under his command would survive the experience. Kurt Knispel had told him about how during the Second World War, Field Marshal von Wolvogle had waged a war just as bloody and ruthless as the one that he had fought on the Russian Front with official bureaucracy. In the end, the Old Wolf had been able to clean house, sacking or reassigning everyone who he regarded as being the “dead wood” which he had gone after with a proverbial flamethrower.
The trouble that Hans had with the entire process was that he had been on the other side of matters as the Heer had been pushed out of Ukraine and Poland. According to Kurt, officialdom had been more focused on not looking bad as opposed to winning the war. Kurt had suggested that the culture that existed in Berlin and Wunsdorf had become very similar to the one that had existed during the first part of the Second World War.
It was a troubling thought.
If they suffered the same sort of reverses the field as they had back then, Hans would be extremely tempted to go through Wunsdorf with an actual flamethrower this time. Waiting for the other side to overreach or having someone like Manfred von Wolvogle to pull off a miracle was beyond stupid. And that was without even mentioning the sort of stupid things that always happened that couldn’t be planned for.
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