The prince drove with fascio through northern Greece, his rolled-up shirt-sleeves luminously glowing from the searing mirage, smoothly conjoining with the truck’s edge. An invocation hit the prince in the face as he cocked his head to see its approach. The prince fell backward onto the floor, writhing from Bleistein’s attack, eye rolling back in to head, baby-tongue slithering around in exasperation, chin smeared with dribbling froth, blush in heightened red as if in shamanick fit of orgasm, leg dangling like baby, slamming down on floor in pain, jettisoning nervous jolt like a decapitated fish, knocking over oil-lamp, having a cat screech off a cart, down hole in floor. He saw in his drowning imagination the faint outline of the Lombard girl cyanine-naked in a lake, moonlight playing against blue of chest, baby-smoothing out to creamy, ivory chin, blushing, ripe youth wet with droplet as he was suddenly resuscitated back toward life by sexual longing, an obsession with finding his baby-soft kisser, fascio making sure he didn’t fall back down again, his rolling eye in epileptic spasm, rolling back into place as he vomited. Sitting in a decrepit, old shack the prince lit a cigarillo amidst black, floorboard creaking in wind, photograph of Lombard girl faintly lit by undulating blaze, sincere, baby-lipped face in black, white definition, pocketing it, moving over to half-broken window, flow seen by approaching Roman with lazily slung gun stumbling drunk toward shack, one kicking the other, pinning him down, slapping each other as they both laugh, his shirt revealing war-scar, sitting upon the other’s back as he crawls like dog toward shack, crashing through half-broken door, launching him up the wobbling staircase, having him crash head-first through the tapestry, bloody forehead lolling backward down the stairs, crashing through the floorboard in to the cellar, scaring away groups of rodent-like, Lovecraftian cellar-creatures, broken radio droning white noise from foot of cellar, lifting himself bloodied to broken door, blood smeared against neck, shoulder, wiping blood from eye with finger, descending from black in to golden luminosity of oil-lamp, cat entering door behind. Boxing with a Roman the prince was knocked backward onto creaking, wooden floorboard, photograph of Lombard girl spilling onto plank, picked up by Gia who laughed, showing it to others, the other boxer pinning the prince down, putting out holocaust of cigarillo on the prince’s writhing, cyanine chest, baby-face writhing also, flax in smear of creamy forehead, ribbon around neck tickling wobbling chin, Roman kicking him across room, grabbing him by the neck, launching him against wall, spittle dribbling from his mouth, chest punched by gloved fist then launched on to floorboard, kicked, radio droning folk-verse barely audible from the ringing sound in the prince’s ear, lifting himself dazed up, nosebleed smeared against handkerchief, flying out of hand as he is kicked again, rattling oil-lamp off suitcase as he lands, cat screeching in middle Italian, crashing through an already half-broken window. Departing from the fascio the prince headed toward the centre of Rome, his Lombard girl waiting hopefully near his apartment, smoking cigarillo from an extended mouth-bit, serpentine smoke besetting baby-cyanine glare of eye beneath fracas of flaxen fringe, silken hood dropping down to shoulder, swastika-etched lighter in other hand. Strolling along Rome’s cobble the Lombard girl cocked her head toward the approaching prince returning from the barrack to his apartment, oil-lamp swinging in silky glove, lighting Lombard’s alabaster, cyanine neck with luminosity, red lip against milk of teeth, baby-blushing, baby-soft, blouse’ collar revealing canvas of shoulder. Leashing epileptic hound Roman fascio stood amidst near-black of rainfall, hand undulating back, forth to rhythm of animal, wet-limbed, leather chafing neck-fur, radio blaring folk-verse, truck screeching to halt at gazebo, teenager filing out with rifle slung, sheen of dagger, clambering out like an orgy of beast, boot copulating in mess of liquid earth, oil-lamp flickering spasmodically, olive face wide-eyed with bloodlust, clambering over to black, Tyrol, invisibly puddle-deep, geometry of hill spasmodically heightening in fracas, invisible under black, slime-wet, interrupted by occasional fit of lamp, its basilisk of light skipping along terrain. Open-air trucks sped across Italian, Croatian soil, mud bubbling at edge of wheel, Roman teenager’s open shirt revealing olive sheen of chest, rain lashing against martial hat, revolver cocked in silky glove, radio playing crap music, truck bumping up, down in undulation with comic bouncing of teenager, golden swastika on truck, other truck barely visible from behind, mist-covered, head-lamp in fracas of dying battery, bloodlust rising in the teenager, wet fox squealing out of way of wheel in to endless, Croatian black, truck continuing in to continent, toward Bavarian soil, epileptic geometry of road increasing in its illness, teenage eye under curtain of black, decapitation-ready, head-lamp like blazing holocaust of cigarillo, ray of light forming serpentine geometry against rainfall, undulating to rhythm of truck’s epilepsy like witch-eyes in heraldic silhouette. Dagger-wielding fascio reached the western coast of Swabia, the prince with blazing cigarillo between lip, smoke writhing like epileptic basilisk, eye covered in curtain of fringe, silhouette of teenage gunmen at his side, skull-helmeted like Iroquois witch, heraldically tattoo’d, hound at leash, rifle slung, leaning against tree, baby-cheek blushing, girly bob of white, gold brushed aside by glove, dagger-wielding, cat-eyed, ship leading them, spilling onto deck, head-light blaring in to eye, prince amidst roach, cigarillo-holocaust lighting centre of crowd, voyage beginning, spark of knive-sharpening bouncing from black, sea-wave in epileptic lash, rainfall kniving at gunmen, prince. Thames-bound, the prince sate upon the deck of a ship crossing from Swabia, holocaust blazing in the misty distance, remorseless bloodshed increasing as it spread, spark blazing amidst billowing smoke, corpse launching out in epileptic jettison, dagger slashing at mist, sacral vandalization of Catholic icon. As he fell Bleistein launched a Rosicrucian, basilisk-like dagger at the prince, kissing his chest, lodging, baby-ivory pierced by its cold, launched backward on to pavement’s cold in humiliation, shivering in spasmodic, nervous fear, sudden explosion of synagogue erupting, missile squealing, decapitated skull rolling along pavement, pierced by scimitar, parachute flapping, Bleistein picked off with revolver, half-naked teenager slitting neck from behind, cold kissing neck like death-sylph banshee, scimitar-wielding prince under trenchcoat gunman bearing golden swastika on chest, lashing fascio in order to remain obedient, decapitated head swinging in other hand, black curtain from hat shielding eye, smoke billowing along leg, boot playing with smoke like two copulating cats, pavement wobbling under march, folk-verse sung from proceeding crowd, marrying itself with Yiddish howl of mercy, death-whinge, lash-squeal, bone-laceration. Blood bubbled from the prince’s chest-wound, ivory baby-belly smeared crimson above cold stone of pavement dribbled with Pollock-like, creative spasm of red jettison, explosion faintly mumbled from distance, missile squealing through air, glint of scimitar revealed through mist, golden ray of Arabic symbol upon stave, parachuteer landing, scuttling toward fracas, teenager in frenzy of funereal hecatomb, culled rodent squealing in Yiddish at cold of blade, Muslim square of invocation magick smeared across wall under golden swastika, fascio at the front of the crowd in leadership, Paudeen’s decapitated head shivering in spasmodic fish-epilepsy, hole for eye, other head kicked like soccer in crowd of fascio, launched against wall of synagogue. An Englishman bandaged the prince’s writhing, crimson-painted flesh on the Thames’ quay as blood bubbled at the edge of his mouth, his eye writhing, fascio crowding around scene, crimson-spilling skull of Rosicrucian irrigation-dweller handled loosely, magi pleading in irrigational alley, whelping like hound in epileptic death-fit, prince fully bandaged, sate upright, smoking cigarillo placed between deep, red baby-lip, holocaust painting soft face with gold, effeminately posing silken glove, cheek becoming roseate with bloodlust, vendetta, infantile eye widening at prospect of bloodshed, sacral desecration of synagogue, church as he walked with fascio toward lodge, building tongued by holocaust, nervous jew scattering like cockroach, knived in spine as he fled. The prince’s knived body, bandaged stood in the doorway of London’s grand lodge in upright, remorseless preparation as its rabbi dragged sword along tiling, creating spark with its friction, his baby-cheek shivering with nervousness as the prince was accompanied by Englishmen, fascio with dagger, vandalizing sacral sigil. Sound of air-force machine beset precipitating cloud above invaded city, glint of golden script amidst mist, silver sheen, gem-propelled reflection, chaunt of Roman folk-verse below, howling of rabbi, whinging, pleading, lashing of holocaust, cracking of bone. Faint, golden explosions of yellow were seen by invading air-pilot, border of machine beset with Arabic heraldry, gold-leaved as scimitar-wielding, turban-wearing magian descended per parachute upon the pale, fascio filing through its crimson-smeared street like a funereal procession, its irrigation sanitized of vermin, Bleistein, Muslim recruit invocating numerology, avoiding however building, afraid of swastika-bearing swordsmen kniving native Irishmen in their wake, tying rabbi up, pushing them down stairs, launching against wall, alley smeared with crimson of Bleistein, dragged by rope along pavement, body in whinging fish-spasm as it was stoned by other Muslim, launched in to luminous holocaust, howling at its golden tongue, effeminate whinge to remorseless ear, charred flesh, bone, melting eyeball, charcoal skull. A flaming lodge blazed its holocaust in the wind at the end of a street in the pale as Roman fascio cleared it of vermin-like Paudeen, kniving them as they poured in to the street, Rosicrucian rabbi fleeing as they were knived from behind, head planted on elongation of fencing, clandestine Paudeen knived as they lunged from window, alley, spasmodically launched body writhing under spew of crimson, Grecian monarch marching along pavement with something smeared crimson in hand, holocaust besetting teenage blush with luminosity, effeminate, roseate hue heightened by bloodlust, baby-girl eye sparkling with reflection of flame, Catholic object of sacral veneration smashed as church, synagogue, governmental building were desecrated with golden swastika. Returning to the charred remains of the Rosicrucian lodge the prince held the decapitated head of London’s rabbi, tossing it in the flame as it also turned charcoal black, negro-like, deformed, a member of the church of Ireland, fascio standing in Swabian youth at the end of the marble staircase, filing out of adjacent governmental buildings kniving Paudeen, Bleistein, smashing sacral objects, placing heads on knives, reporters taking notes for the continental press.

Oskar Manzke is an unemployed military historian who occasionally composes literary prose.