An Occupied Planet
Flandry On Vixen
Dominic Flandry goes behind enemy lines on the occupied planet of Vixen in We Claim These Stars!/"Hunters of the Sky Cave"/"A Handful of Stars." Thus, there are similarities to occupied France during World War II.
Flandry reflects that hunting skills are transferable to resistance fighting. Another set of skills is even more appropriate. Some fictional heroes, operating outside the law, wage secret wars, whether plausible or not, against the criminal underworld. Then Dornford Yates' Richard Chandos tells us that:
"During the war I had paid flying visits to France - by sea and by night."
-Dornford Yates, Ne'er Do Well (Cornwall, 2001), p. 2.
And the Germans put a price on his head. Our heroes are known to their enemies' high commands:
Chandos to the Germans;
Bond to SMERSH;
Flandry to the Merseians;
etc.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I just now wondered if the Merseians were ever peeved enough at Flandry's repeated thwarting of their schemes against the Empire to put a price on HIS head! Or would Mersian Intelligence consider that childish and unprofessional?
Sean
Paul and Sean:
In David Drake's RCN series, the enemy Alliance of Free Stars is very aware, of course, of brilliant RCN officer Daniel Leary ... but Alliance officers, at least at the higher levels, also know the name of Leary's Signals Officer, Adele Mundy, the Mundy of Chatsworth, who has, as one back-cover blurb put it, "the latest in spy apparatus and the skills to prowl the most tightly guarded database."
One Alliance captain checks to verify that yes, he's talking to Lady Adele Mundy before he surrenders the squadron he commands ... which she's just demonstrated she could wipe out of existence with a few keystrokes (she's taken over a command-detonated minefield).
"I know who you are," said Varnell. "I don't know how you did this unless you really are in league with the devil, but I won't throw away the lives of my crews."
Lady Mundy has become a figure of legend among the enemy. I'm a bit surprised that the Alliance spy service, the Fifth Bureau, never sent assassins against her. Or perhaps it did; her bodyguard, Tovera, is a defector from the Fifth Bureau, which could give some advantages in spotting assassination attempts....
Kaor, DAVID!
Problem is, I think anyone can be assassinated if the people who want you dead are implacably bound and determined to GET you. So I think Lady Mundy was at serious risk if the Alliance's Fifth Bureau decided to TRULY go hunting her.
Sean
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