Deviation Actions
Description
Detective Henri Momund was over fifty years of age, heavy-set and balding with jowls that caused his entire face to appear as if it was sliding slowly forward. Behind his portly, unremarkable exterior however was a sharp veteran whose brown eyes shone with a keen intellect, honed over his last three decades with the National Police. It was a particularly hot day when he ushered the Soviet Superwoman into his office, a tiny fan attached to the ceiling trying futilely to keep its occupants cool. He was wearing a rather disheveled looking navy blue suit and stood almost a foot shorter than the statuesque Russian woman who swept in behind him, bedecked in her familiar costume. He shut the door behind her, causing the glass pane set into it and bearing his name to shudder in its frame. The detective motioned towards a well-worn chair opposite his cluttered and busy desk for her to sit. The raven-haired woman gathered up her scarlet cape behind her and sat down at almost the same time Momund did. He reached over with his pudgy hands and grabbed a can of soda from behind a stack of unprocessed files.
"Can I offer you something?" he asked as he popped the tab, causing the beverage to hiss softly.
"No, I am good Detective, thank you." Olga replied in her best French. Momund smiled as he poured the dark liquid into a mug and took a long sip.
"Your French is quite good if you don't mind my saying so."
"I spent quite a lot of time here during the war."
Momund nodded, placing his mug back down. He had done a great deal of reading on her in the last few days, both from the case and later from what he knew was an going to be an inevitable meeting. "It would seem some time more recent as well, in a manner of speaking."
"Yes...the Soviet Valkyrie."
"So this woman was you?" Henri asked arching an eyebrow. "What I mean to say is that she shared your physical description, but your memories and abilities as well?"
Olga nodded. "Da, she was me from an alternate future, one that was no longer going to come to pass. She was trapped here, set adrift from that divergent timeline."
Momund thought on that for a moment, mentally chewing on the information she had just told him. "So did you know she was here, in Paris?"
"No...but it makes sense to me why she would. I...I mean she would have loved this city just as much I always had. It is a special place, full of memories. After the horrors she had witnessed and seen in her timeline, the things she had done, she simply wanted to vanish and relax. She wanted to live like a normal woman...grow her own vegetables."
"How many other people knew about her being in this time?" Momund asked.
Olga thought for a moment before answering. "I knew of course, as did my wife...another knew but he..."The Soviet woman paused for a moment to gather her thoughts. "He is gone and unlikely to have come back. Outside of that I do not think anyone else knew about her."
"So let us go on the assumption that they mistook her for you then." Henri stated plainly and gravely. "You have plenty of enemies. My question is which one of them could do this?"
He grabbed the nearest file folder with his meaty hand and slid it over to her. Olga reached out and took it, opening it up and steeling herself. Inside she saw the crime-scene photographs. The Valkyrie was dressed casually, in an outfit similar to the ones she herself liked to wear when she wasn't in uniform. There was blood everywhere, almost black in places. Spilled all around her were fresh groceries and produce, spattered and covered in gore. Her pale blue eyes were rolled up and back in her head, her mouth having fallen open as if she was about to say the name of her murderer. Her final expression was one of surprise and horror. A pang of fright suddenly raced up Olga's spine as she gazed at photos that essentially showed her as a bloodied, lifeless corpse. It was an end she knew could happen any day given who she was and she had always accepted that...until that moment, staring down at those horrible images. What if Maia came home and found her like that, twisted and dead on the rooftop of their apartment? What if it was the other way around...
"She was attacked from behind Mrs. Yezhov, stabbed with a long, bladed weapon. The best we could ascertain in the small time we had the body it must have been a spear or sword of some kind and it must have been somehow able to punch through her impervious flesh as easily as mine. She died very quickly and in shock as you can see. Do you have any foes capable of dispatching you so easily and efficiently?"
"Nyet." Olga said confidently. "I have a long list of enemies, but they would want to gloat and tell the world they were the one responsible. They would have signed their work and none of them are, how do you say...subtle."
"Ilsa Hauppman, the terrorist leader of the Reich even?"
"Especially Ilsa...if she found a way to kill me, she would be the first one to scream it from the top of that building."
"So no-one you can possibly think of?"
Olga leaned back in her chair, putting the photographs and the folder back on the desk and put her gloved finger under her chin. Ilsa could possibly have found a means to stab her, but she would never sneak up and she would have been the first to tell the world of her crowning achievement. She would never have made it look more like an act of meaningless violence either. The Voyevoda had escaped some time ago, but would have known that this wasn't the prey he sought with his mental powers and again, she didn't think he had the means to kill her so quickly and efficiently. The Iron Chancellor used science and technology to kill his opponents and always preferred a stand-up fight to stabbing someone in the back with what appeared to be an archaic weapon. Ultrawoman had been gone for a long time now and again, it didn't fit her profile. Dark-Star's either. Jane Smith's for that matter. The Soviet super-soldier couldn't find a single foe that met this description off the top of her head no matter how hard she thought.
"If not," Momund interrupted, "that also makes sense. Whoever it was seems to have possibly mistaken her for you. You say no-one knew she was here and that she was resigned to a quiet, peaceful life here and I would agree. In her apartment we found a number of wigs and colored contact lenses so that perhaps she could move about without attracting attention or pulling in the media. My thinking was originally that someone discovered her and killed her thinking it was you."
"But everyone knows I live in Angel Falls." Olga said throwing up a hand. "It is common knowledge where I live and where I have my meals and shop. Anyone reading about me on the interwebs or tabloid magazines would know this. Perhaps they spotted her here and took the opportunity thinking I was away on holiday, da?"
The veteran detective thought for a moment, taking another sip of his cola before replying. "True. I am now thinking Mrs. Yezhov, that perhaps this enemy of yours may not be your enemy at all. Could they be an enemy of hers perhaps, from this alternate timeline?"
"I suppose that might be a possibility, but I would not know who it was and she seemed to indicate that she was the only survivor since it was set right."
Momund signed and finished his drink, wiping the sweat from his head with his hands as he placed down his empty mug. "Then without a body to investigate I am afraid I am not sure how to proceed. It is bad enough that the French media was leaked the story by a member of the police but now we look even more incompetent with this theft right from under our noses!"
"Do you think the killer stole the body as well?"
At this Detective Momund threw up his hands. "I cannot say, but those that took the body were less than subtle and killed two officers and a member of the crime scene investigation. I fear that fucking media leak may have attracted your other foes to pursue the corpse. Perhaps the Fourth Reich or even the Russian government you had been at odds with for some time...for all I know it could have been the US government!"
Olga cringed at both of those suggestions and added about a dozen more equally unpleasant names to that list. A knock at the door pulled both their attention away. A young detective stuck his head in as the senior man scowled at him and glanced over at the caped superhero.
"Pardon Mrs. Yezhov, but there is a telephone call for you from the United States. They said it was quite urgent and private, which is why it was transferred to an unused office."
The Soviet Superwoman thanked the man and stood up to her full height. He opened the door for her and as she headed for it, Henri stood up as well. "Mrs. Yezhov, I will wait here and have some food brought up so we can continue our conversation."
Olga smiled at the senior detective, speaking to him briefly before she exited out into the hallway. "Of course and thank you Detective. I hope this will not keep me long or draw me away from our important conversation." Momund smiled back and picked up the phone on his desk as the door clicked shut behind her.
The amazonian woman followed the tall, younger man out into the network of cubicle offices that made up the homicide branch of the National Police. A few turns later and the junior detective led her into in an office similar to the one Momund used, but with no name on the door and a window that faced the opposite side of the building. As she walked over to the desk she noticed almost immediately there was no phone atop it. There was a tearing sound behind her. Turning around quickly, Olga found herself face to face with a smiling raven-haired woman holding a synthetic mask in her left hand and wearing a blue cowl of her own. The young detective’s shirt was now open to the waist, revealing a busty figure clad in the colors of the American flag. Olga recognized her immediately.
"You must be the famous American Mom!" the Soviet Superwoman said clapping her hands together twice.
Carol flashed a smile of perfect teeth and blushed. "And you're the famous Soviet Superwoman. I've always wanted to meet you; I only wish it was under better circumstances and not like this. I am so sorry to hear about the Soviet Valkyrie, Olga. But I need your help and I can't let anyone know so I apologize for this ruse. I knew you'd be here in France today and I saw it as an opportunity. Too many ears in Angel Falls."
"What do you need from me?" Olga asked genuinely curious.
"I need to know what you can tell me about Oberst-gruppenführer Der Waffen-SS Hermann von Trotha." Mom asked in a quiet voice.
"The Iron Chancellor. He is a very dangerous man, or what is left of him after our last battle. He is almost completely a machine now, a cold cybernetic monster. Analytical, calculating and ruthless. In my dimension he was responsible for thwarting and driving back the failed D-Day invasion. The blood of thousands of American, British and Canadian forces is on his hands. What is your interest in him? Has he shown himself in Angel Falls?"
"No," the American heroine began, "but I have reason to believe that he is in Berlin, or somewhere close by in Germany, right now as we speak. I was hoping perhaps that you could maybe recall if he ever had any bases of operation there in your dimension or places he enjoyed...anything that might give me a clue as to where he is holed up, as well as any other information you might have about him."
"Why do you wish to know this?" Olga asked point-blank.
"I can't tell you." Carol answered, frowning. Here it was her first time meeting someone she wanted to consider a friend and an ally and already she was playing the cloak and dagger game. She couldn't tell her about Hilde and she couldn't risk her coming along and making an already delicate situation worse, despite her best intentions. "But I will tell you that it involves saving the life of someone I care about very much. I wouldn't have gone through all this trouble to meet you if time wasn't a factor either, Olga. When this is over I will tell you everything, but until then I hope you can trust me despite having never met me. A leap of faith if you will."
Olga's thoughts began to drift back to the War and where one of her most dangerous opponents might still call home...
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This gorgeous piece of artwork and American Mom belong to my partner in crime, the ever talented
The Soviet-Superwoman, Soviet Valkyrie (RIP), Ilsa Hauppman, The Iron Chancellor, Jane Smith, Detective Momund and the story are my creations and property.
Honorable Mentions: Walkiria and Dark Star belong to
Ultrawoman belongs to
This story is set in and takes place in
.