On the island of Malta four enhanced individuals are impatiently waiting to find out how they can leave and get back into the war effort. They are Mademoiselle Mimi Dubois, La Résistance fighter and mistress of skills; Miss Madeline Forsyth, SOE operative and a living shadow; Sven Hyse, Norwegian Resistance soldier and shapeshifter; and Doctor Jackal, timid physician with his less than timid friend Mister Hades.

Valletta, Malta, August 1942

Having spent our first day on Malta mostly sleeping and our evening enjoying what her eateries and bars have to offer, we all awake late into the morning and head for the mess hall to get some breakfast. Over our meal we discuss what we are going to do while we wait, and how long we think that the process will take. The one thing that we all agree on is that we will try and keep a low profile and stay out of the way of Lieutenant General Dobbie. That would prove to be difficult.

Henry says that he wishes to visit the library that we briefly glimpsed in the Parliament building when we arrived and Madeline, who wishes to carry out her own research, agrees to accompany him. Sven says that he is going to explore the area, that normally means that he is going to get up close and personal with nature. I decide that I need to work on my strength levels, I had discovered on our adventures that if you wish to make every knife blow count you really need some power behind them.

The library in Parliament House was a large and impressive room with the high windows common in ancient Mediterranean architecture, and it was being used as a typing pool during the siege of Malta. It was easy for Madeline and Doctor Jackal to gain access, when they asked another officer if they could look through some of the books he just told them to help themselves. They both spend a couple of hours browsing the shelves and leafing through the books, the majority of which are connected to the laws and histories of the island itself.

Doctor Jackal selects a number of texts and Madeline points out the large, leather bound tome that needs to be completed for borrowing items. They then spend the afternoon strolling around the town of Valletta looking for local book sellers, returning back to the barracks in time for an early dinner. I join them, my body aching from pushing myself all day, and not long after we have sat down Sven arrives in the mess looking very calm and relaxed.

It is obvious to any outsider observing us that we had finally begun to unwind from several weeks of back to back missions, we sat around in the mess laughing and joking while just enjoying not being at full alertness. Just after dark our calm is disturbed by the islands air raid sirens, some people run for the shelters. Others, including us, just sit and watch the ceiling while listening for the tell tale sounds of aircraft getting too close. Not long afterwards we can make out the sounds of carpet bombing in the distance, not our turn tonight then.

The following day we once again all sit down for a late breakfast and discuss what we are planning for the day. Sven is going to head out and about once more, while Madeline decides to join me in my exercise regime. Henry says that he is going to find himself a nice quiet spot and settle in to read. However, his plans are disturbed when we are joined by Captain Hurleman who asks how we are. Madeline makes a point of telling him that we are very keen on getting back into the war effort.

Hurleman says on that front that there is good news. Lieutenant General Dobbie has been convinced to let us leave Malta on a submarine that is based out of the island. The submarine is due to leave in three days time. Hurleman then wishes us well and leaves us to our breakfast. I look around the table and say;

Oh good! Doctor, how do you feel about travelling in a confined submarine. I suggest heavy sedatives!

Henry considers this for a moment, and then nods.

I shall head to the hospital and replenish my doctors bag!

When Henry arrives at Valletta’s hospital and introduces himself they quickly ask if he has any time to help out. As always, Doctor Jackal is more than happy to assist. By lunchtime he has dealt with multiple low level injuries and has consulted on a more serious case. It then becomes obvious to the hospital’s staff that Doctor Jackal is a very good doctor, and by mid-afternoon Henry is in surgery saving someone’s life. At the end of the day Henry heads to the hospital’s pharmacy to restock his bag, but he finds that they are very low on stock and so he does not take any supplies.

That evening we all meet up once more for dinner and settle in for another relaxing evening in the mess. Once again our relaxation is interrupted, but this time it is not the Luftwaffe but a very flustered Captain Hurleman. He informs us that there has been an incident and that Lieutenant General Dobbie has ordered our team to meet with him immediately. Finally, some action, after all it has been three days. We scramble to quickly grab our kit and jump into the back of Hurleman’s jeep. He drives us at speed up towards Parliament House.

As we enter Dobbie’s command centre we find him leaning over a map table and tutting loudly. We get closer and throw up a salute, from nearer the table we can now tell that he is looking at several maps of Sicily. He turns around and looks us up and down;

Well! Major Hoffman rates your team's abilities. I, personally, have my doubts about women and foreigners. But I am in a bind and I don’t have any other options at the moment so you can bloody well do your duty for me!

I believe that we were all keen to get back to being useful, but I would be much happier if it wasn’t for this blustering buffoon!

One of our planes was shot down over the coast of Sicily. It was a Bristol Blenheim with a crew of three, and more importantly it was carrying some specialist photography equipment. It was tasked with capturing images of potential landing zones for a future deployment. These images can not fall into enemy hands. One of the crew was able to radio their approximate location prior to their crash landing.

Dobbie went on to explain that he does not believe that there are any Axis defences close to the area, but that they will undoubtedly be converging on the crash site. The Blenheim went down approximately forty minutes ago and therefore speed is of the essence.

Lieutenant General Dobbie tells us that he has a Blackburn B20 Flying Boat ready to fly us to the mouth of the river that leads inland to the approximate crash site. Once dropped off we are to take a boat upriver and locate the plane, we are then to recover the film, cameras, stabilise any crew still alive and get out. In that order! When we have made it back to the mouth of the river we should radio for the Blackburn to pick us up. He tells us to give a list of any equipment that we might require to Captain Hurleman and waves us out.

Hureleman makes a quick call outside of Dobbie’s command room to the Quartermaster and tells him to get everything that we have requested to the dockside immediately. He then ushers us back to the jeep and we race down to the harbour. We pull up next to a large seaplane where a man is fastening a large dinghy to the underside of the plane. He stands up and introduces himself as Captain Almond, our pilot. I ask him about the finer points of sailing the dinghy and as he is pointing stuff out I gently touch his neck and ‘borrow’ his ability with boats.

A few minutes after we have arrived a military truck pulls up and our requested kit is unloaded from the truck and loaded onto the plane. Just over an hour since the Bristol Blenheim went down we are taking off from Valletta harbour with myself in the co-pilots seat and Madeline, Henry and Sven prepping the kit in the back of the plane ready for our drop off.

Twenty five minutes later we are coming in to land on the sea approximately a mile south of the coast of Sicily. As we are descending it is obvious that there are no lights along this part of the coast, it looks like we may well have made it before any Axis search parties. Once we are down I unleash the dinghy and we all climb onboard, I start to row for the mouth of the river but it is hard going. We hear the Blackburn take off behind us and as soon as it does, Sven slips over the side of the boat and transforms into a dolphin. He grabs the mooring rope in his mouth and begins to tow the boat forwards. With myself rowing and a dolphin powered tow we start to make good time and are crossing the sandbar at the mouth of the river in no time.

Once we are on the river proper Sven transforms once more and climbs back into the dinghy, as I continue to row, he transforms into a hawk and leaps into the night sky. Hawk Sven follows the river as it winds its way inland, and about two and a half miles upriver he spots the wreck of a plane on the sandy foreshore of a bend in the river. It is obvious even at a distance that the plane has nose dived into the sand and has come to rest with the tail up. Sven flies in for a closer look and lands on the skywards pointing tail fin of the plane. He spots that there is definitely a soft light coming from inside the planes fuselage.

Sven lands a little way down the riverbank and transforms back into himself, he then approaches the plane very carefully. When he is within earshot of it he calls out to the occupants, he is greeted with the business end of a rifle and the question;

Friend or foe?

Sven issues the correct response and approaches the plane, the man holding the gun is Airman Smith, the crews gunner. As soon as Sven gets close enough he can see that Smith’s leg is badly damaged. Airman Smith tells Sven that Captain Hamish died in the crash and that Navigator Jones sustained a serious chest wound that Smith has tried to patch up. Sven tells Smith to rest easy and that help is on the way, at which point Smith passes out from blood loss.

Sven transforms once more into a bird and flies straight back to us, he tells us what he has discovered and suggests that we beach the boat and drag it upstream as it will be quicker. As soon as I beach the boat Doctor Jackal and Madeline leap ashore and run towards the downed plane. Myself and Sven tow the boat along the riverside making slower progress. Two hours have passed since the plane was shot down.

Doctor Jackal reaches the crash site first and begins to carry out triage on the crew’s gunner Smith. He takes a couple of minutes assessing Smith and then moves onto the navigator Jones. By this time, Madeline has arrived and Doctor Jackal requests her assistance as a nurse. Jones has a life threatening chest wound and needs instant medical attention if he is to live. Henry gets cracking.

By the time Sven and I anchor the dinghy and step into the wrecked plane Doctor Jackal is bloody up to his elbows but believes that he has saved Jones’ life. I step over to Jones, touch his forehead, and ‘borrow’ his photography skills so that I can locate and remove the planes camera rig. Meanwhile, Sven once more takes to the air and starts to circle outwards checking to see if any ground forces are closing in on our location.

I now know that the camera rig is located in the nose of the plane, and that is buried in the sand of the riverbank. Lucky that still have knowledge of digging for artefacts in the deserts of Egypt, I set to and start uncovering the planes nose from the inside. From the air Sven spots a large vehicle closing in on our location from the north, it appears to be searching the riverbanks as it drives along. Sven circles in closer and can clearly make out that it is a German troop transporter. He quickly flies back to the crash site.

Two and a half hours after the initial crash I have managed to uncover the camera rig, Doctor Jackal has moved on to set Airman Smith’s leg, and Madeline is rigging up a makeshift stretcher. I easily remove one of the cameras and its film, but the other has a buckled casing and I have to start knocking it back into shape to be able to get the camera out. Doctor Jackal finishes splinting the leg of the plane’s gunner and gives both of his patients a healthy shot of morphine just for good measure.

Madeline and Henry move the navigator to the dinghy using the stretcher and then lift the gunner aboard. Just as they are finishing I manage to free the second camera and begin to hoist them out of the plane nose. Sven lands and tells us about the German troops closing in on us, Madeline quickly checks with Henry that we have completed everything that Dobbie asked us to do, Henry looks thoughtful for a moment and replays the moment word for word in his mind before agreeing that we have.

Sven lifts the cameras onto the dinghy and then transforms once more into a dolphin. We all clamber aboard and Sven tows us rapidly downstream, as we go Madeline creates an area of darkness just behind the dinghy to hide us from view.

As we begin to clear the hills Henry grabs the radio and signals Captain Almond;

Swordfish calling Nut Cracker! Swordfish calling Nut Cracker! Come in Nut Cracker!

Captain Almond responds and gives us an ETA of twenty minutes. He also tells us to use the red flare for pick up and location.

It is just under three hours since the initial crash and we are moving quickly towards the mouth of the river, as we do Henry spots a Kübelwagen moving slowly down a hillside road towards the beach that is adjacent to the river mouth. Madeline angles the darkness in that direction and we all hunker down in the bottom of the dinghy. Sven continues to swim powerfully forwards, towing the dinghy behind him and we manage to put just over a mile between us and the shore. It is at that point that we see the motorised launch searching along the shoreline.

We urge dolphin Sven further out and we are approximately two miles out from shore when he finally climbs back into the dinghy shattered from his exerscion. For the last ten minutes of our journey we had been hearing the sound of a plane in the sky, but it wasn’t getting closer, Henry surmised that it was circling us at a distance awaiting the signal flare. So I passed him the loaded flare gun. He pointed it into the night sky and boom! The sky was lit up with a red flare.

It doesn’t take long for the motorised launch to spot the flare and turn towards our direction. As they are closing the plane comes into land on the water. I start to row towards it as Sven lifts his rifle to his cheek. He takes very careful aim. Just as he gently squeezes the trigger a large wave hits the side of the dinghy and his shot goes wild. The motorised launch is still closing.