Those and countless other thoughts spun and raced through his brain. Then a planet of fire rushed up out of nowhere. It seemed to crash straight into the nose of the Messerschmitt and explode in a roar that shook the very heavens apart. Dave felt as though unseen steel claws were tearing strips of flesh from his bones, and hammering his brains to pulp. He didn't know what it was. He didn't know what had happened. He only knew that he was spinning down into a limitless void of roaring thunder and boiling flame. Down ... down ... down into the raging inferno of another world.
"Ox Face! Ox Face! Dave! Are you okay? Ox Face, Dave!"
Like a half drowned man he faintly heard the voice of Freddy Farmer in his ear phones. For a split second he thought he was simply hearing things in his dreams. Thought that he was dead and simply hearing the echo of Freddy's voice reaching across the great void between life and the hereafter. But he wasn't dreaming, and he wasn't dead. Far, far from it, in fact. The Messerschmitt was in a crazy spin, but it was slowly spinning down through clear night air. High above him the sky was splashed with red, orange, and yellow fire. And as he snapped a glance up toward it he realized what had happened. By accident ... or perhaps Nazi anti-aircraft gunners below had spotted the moving silhouette of his plane against the faint light of the stars ... the Messerschmitt had been caught cold in the bracket fire of several bursts of the famous "flaming onion" type of anti-aircraft shell. The crazy sea of colored flame, the roar of sound, and the terrific concussion of the shells exploding practically on the propeller hub had thrown him haywire, and tossed the plane into its crazy spin.
The Messerschmitt, however, still had plenty of flying in her bones. He realized that the instant he touched the controls and started to pull out of the spin. Then out the corner of one eye he caught the flicker of twin exhaust plumes etched against the darkness of night. And a split second later came Freddy Farmer's repeated cry in the earphones.
"Are you all right, Dave? Ox Face, Dave!"
"Ox Face, pal!" he roared into his own mike. "Down, and let them have it!"
Even as the last burst from his lips he kicked the Daimler-Benz into life again and stuck the Messerschmitt's nose straight down. The engine screamed out its song of power, and the wings shrilled their high note as they sliced down through the air. Body hunched well forward, and every muscle braced, Dave fixed his gaze on the ground below, and held his breath. Split seconds, infinitesimal periods of time ticked by, but it seemed as an agonizing life-time to Dave before he clearly saw the wide expanse of ground hangar camouflage below him. He snapped a glance at his altimeter and saw that the needle was at the five thousand foot mark.
"One thousand feet more, Freddy!" he screamed into his radio mike. "We'll make sure we don't miss with any of them. Luck, pal!"
"Luck, Dave!" came the faint reply in his earphones.
And then the altimeter needle was at four thousand feet! Dave tore his hands from the controls for a brief instant, grabbed up the hand grenades, jerked the little strings that freed the detonating pin, and hurled, the lot over the side. The split instant they left his hands he grabbed for the controls again and started to haul up out of the vicious power dive.