by Doc Quantum
Uncle Sam was in a bad state. His coat, pants, and shirt were covered with dirt, and he looked very disheveled. He was also missing his hat, but it had been gone since he’d been captured. And he was weak — very, very weak.
The anonymous American soldier who had freed him led him to the basement of a farmhouse owned by a family sympathetic to the Allied cause, and it was here that he finally had a chance to rest after the harrowing adventure.
“What now?” asked Sam of the secret agent.
“Now? Now we wait until our friends arrive,” the man said, careful never to make eye contact with Sam or to let him see his bandaged face too clearly.
The downcast Spirit of America peered at the soldier, trying to figure him out. There was something the tiniest bit familiar about him, somehow. Sam had already asked him who he was, and the man would only reply, “A soldier, known only to God.”
“Who’s comin’ ta get me?” asked Sam, putting his face in his tired hands. He really needed some sleep.
“I think you can probably guess who, Sam,” said the soldier, mysteriously. “By now the Nazis have discovered that you’re gone, and they’ll stop at nothing to get you back. You’re too valuable to them right now to do otherwise. We must expect the worst.”
“Seein’ as how you won’t tell me your name, son, what should I call you?”
“Call me the Unknown Soldier.”
***
Adam Weishaupt Hitler knocked on the door of Dr. Ulla Minerva’s private quarters, which were adjacent to her laboratory.
She answered her door a few moments later, dressed in nothing but a towel. Her hair was wet. “Oh, it’s you, liebchen.”
“Ulla,” responded Adam. “I’ve come about my father. I must know what you’ve done to him. He’s young again, but he seems different, somehow.”
“Adam, you have nothing to worry about. The fire is back in your father’s eyes. He is more himself now than he’s been for decades. He has merely been revitalized, in his new body.”
“I did not think it was possible for a new body to be cloned for him. As far as I know, we don’t yet possess the technology to create a fully adult human clone. How then did you accomplish this?”
“You do worry so, my dear,” said Ulla, dropping her towel and pressing her body firmly against his as she kissed him fervently. She then pulled back. “Ah, but we must wait for another time. I am, unfortunately, busy at the moment. Come back later, and I’ll make it up to you.”
Adam smiled, suddenly forgetting all his concerns as she slowly closed the door, letting him see her in all her glory.
Returning to her bathroom, the now-virile Adolf Hitler, as youthful as the day he first became chancellor of Germany, said, “Who was that?”
“No one to concern yourself with, liebchen,” Ulla said, and she climbed back into the large bathtub with Der Fuhrer.
***
Happy Terrill opened his eyes and tried to adjust to the light. His head hurt. A lot.
“Hello, Mr. Terrill,” said a female voice from somewhere, although Happy couldn’t see clearly enough to distinguish a face in the dim light. “Or should I say, the Ray?”
There was no use denying it now. He should have been more careful with his disguise. His face was one of the most well-known on the planet. After all, he and the other Freedom Fighters were war heroes.
“Yes, I’m the Ray.”
“So tell us, Mr. Terrill, when were you planning on revealing your identity to us? Was it before or after you were planning on killing us all?”
“What?” exclaimed Happy. “No, no…”
“Or were you planning on just assassinating Ms. Tyler?”
“No, you’ve got me all wrong, I–”
“Don’t deny it, Mr. Terrill,” said another woman, who sounded older. “All of us have seen the shocking footage of your attacks on the British Resistance. You’re a Nazi collaborator.”
“Please, if you’ll let me explain–”
“You have nothing to explain,” said the first woman. “We’ve already figured you out.”
“But that other Ray — it’s not me, I–”
“Silence!” said the older woman. “We’ll not put up with any more of your lies.”
“Stop! He’s telling the truth!” another woman shouted suddenly, rushing into the room as all the women in the room turned to see what the commotion was all about. “Look!” she said as she turned on a television. On it was live footage of a figure identical to the Ray, who was blasting away at several soldiers in Northern England, on the crucial Scottish-English border where the Nazi armies had yet to penetrate.
Happy Terrill felt his bonds being released as the first woman spoke.
“I apologize, Mr. Terrill,” she said. “But we cannot be sure of anything in these dark days. Too many people we thought we could trust have been revealed to be Nazi collaborators.”
“Understandable,” he replied, standing up and extending his hand to the young woman. “Perhaps now we can be properly introduced. Happy Terrill.”
“Delilah Tyler,” responded the pretty brunette woman. “Apparently you know my father,” she said, holding up the note that her foster-father, Stormy Foster, had given Happy Terrill. “Come. We have quite a bit to talk about.”
***
Count von Stauffen, the Black Knight, was still angry. None of his men could figure out where Uncle Sam had been taken, and no trail could be found. But then again, they were complete morons. This new breed of Nazi was pathetic and only interested in power and money. No true loyalty to Der Fuhrer at all.
He concluded that his nemesis, the so-called Unknown Soldier, was behind this. Who else could have so easily impersonated him? This Unknown Soldier had been a terrible nuisance ever since the war began three months ago, and he’d been hoping for a chance to show this fellow his come-uppance. After all, he’d already embarrassed him before Der Fuhrer twice. He wouldn’t let him do so again, not when so much was on the line.
Thus, he kept the situation quiet. At least as quiet as possible. He’d bring in not only Uncle Sam, but also the Unknown Soldier, or die trying.
***
They all knew it was a risky mission. Any and all spies or saboteurs would be executed. That was plain fact. So, despite the time it took them to arrive at their destination point, the three Freedom Fighters tread ever cautiously through the German countryside. Security was pretty tight around here, as it wasn’t far from Hitler’s bunker, but they weren’t prepared for a woman who could turn herself invisible and intangible, a man who could shrink himself to a height of six inches, or a man who could soar through the sky far above the ground.
Thus, the Phantom Lady, Doll Man, and the Black Condor arrived at the very same farmhouse where the Unknown Soldier had brought Uncle Sam.
The reunion was all too brief, however. Time was of the essence, as the Nazis surely were by now aware of Uncle Sam’s disappearance from his cell, and had likely already issued orders to find him. They may have even been aware of the presence of the rest of the Freedom Fighters team, in which case they could be up for some trouble.
Uncle Sam was smiling, however, for he was once again with his friends.
“It is good ta see all of you, though,” he said, a weak smile on his face, once they had explained what had happened to each of them upon their arrival to this world.
“I only wish it were under different circumstances,” said Darrel Dane, alias Doll Man. “I’m very worried about Martha and little Violet. I need to get back to them as soon as possible.”
“Have any of you heard from Roy, yet?” Sam asked them.
“No, Sam. We don’t know where the Human Bomb is,” said Sandra Knight, the Phantom Lady, “but it appears that the Ray has returned to Earth-X.”
“Happy Terrill is here?” Uncle Sam said eagerly.
The others looked sad. “Um… Sam,” began Tom Wright, the Black Condor. “The Ray appears to have thrown his lot in with the Nazis. He’s currently terrorizing the Resistance in England and attacking the Scottish army in the north.”
Uncle Sam considered this for a moment. Then he spoke. “Don’t you believe it. We’ve known Happy Terrill for over forty years, and I cannot believe that he would turn traitor now.”
“Sam, I saw the news footage myself before we left America,” said Phantom Lady. “It was definitely Happy. It was his face, and he had his powers. Perhaps he’s being controlled by the Nazis’ mind-control rays or something.”
“I can’t accept that,” said Sam firmly. “Considering the way the Nazis have created their SS Supermen, or Ubermenschen, they could’a created a Nazi soldier who just looks like Happy into a super-powered agent.”
“I suppose he could’ve been cloned many years ago,” suggested Darrel. “It would’ve taken at least twenty years to grow a cloned human being into adulthood. There’s no known technology that can rapidly age a clone into adulthood in a short amount of time, at least not one that is molecularly stable.”
“I don’t know about all that,” said Sam, “but I do know that the Ray’s no traitor!”
“I just wish we knew where he is right now,” said Sandra, “so we can see for ourselves.”
“I agree,” said a voice from behind them, which sounded identical to Uncle Sam’s. “However, as you can see by looking at me, it’s not hard to impersonate someone.”
The Freedom Fighters looked at the man, who now looked completely identical to Uncle Sam, and just as disheveled as the former prisoner.
“Soldier?” asked Sam. “That you under there?”
“It is, Sam,” he replied. “To quote an old acquaintance of ours, I am a man of many talents.”