Author's Foreword—
This is my eighth submission to Literotica and my second to the "Sci Fi & Fantasy" genre. If you like what you read, you're invited to visit my profile to see the archive of my previous postings.
Enjoy!
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Most people believed Gwen was a stranger person. Gwen herself believed it too. From the age of three, she told whoever would listen that she had memories, which were not from her own experiences. She spoke about flying aboard a huge olive-drab airplane as part of the crew. Before she knew about books, she described this airplane as having four huge propellers mounted on the wings, just in front of red-painted round cowlings. She clearly remembered climbing up to look over the top of this airplane in flight, looking out of what she described as "a large upside-down fishbowl." Two pipes stuck through the fishbowl into the cold screaming wind on the other side, and there was a similar but more spherical fishbowl mounted to the airplane's belly. A friend of hers operated that underbelly fishbowl during the many important missions that airplane saw.
She also secretly knew she had died aboard that airplane returning from one of those important missions.
Gwen believed this because of the crescent-shaped birthmark on her chest. It was about two inches above and to the left of her heart—right where she had been hit by something during the course of the strange memories she had. She remembered lying on the deck in extreme pain and bleeding all over the place, longing to see and hold his darling Rose again. Whoever Rose was; Gwen didn't have a clue. She only knew this "Rose" was very much loved.
Her parents thought she'd merely seen a movie or pieced together events from overheard conversations in public. Gwen couldn't get
anyone
to understand what she was remembering was absolutely real! But she did not have the vocabulary at the age of three to describe things in detail. Her parents told her to forget her "memories" and get on with her life. She obeyed but not completely—she stopped talking about the mystery airplane but kept an eye out for clues that might surface during the course of growing up.
Her mystery was partially solved at age eleven. She was at the school library watching a World War II documentary about the Allied air raids on Nazi Germany. An image suddenly flashed past on the screen and Gwen jumped to her feet. "Freeze that!" she screeched urgently. Her teacher, startled into thinking something was wrong with the movie itself, jumped up and stopped the projector. Gwen demanded the film be run backwards; the teacher obliged, still thinking something was wrong with the movie. The image she had seen reappeared and she called for it to be stopped. The teacher did so and Gwen stared at the frozen image with wide eyes. "What is that?" she asked, her voice hushed in awe.
"It's an airplane, you ninny," sneered a classmate.
Gwen could see it was an airplane—but it was
the
airplane from her unknown memories!
"That's a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress," her teacher answered. "They flew from bases in England to do bombing raids on targets in Germany."
"What are those fishbowls on the top and bottom?"
"They're the gunner's turrets," the teacher explained, wondering why she wanted to know so badly. "A man stands behind the pilots to man the top turret, while another man actually sits down inside the ball turret underneath." Gwen nodded thoughtfully and apologized for the outburst. The movie was resumed while her classmates wondered if she was nuts.
Using her new tidbit of knowledge as a toehold, Gwen researched the B-17 Flying Fortress in her spare time over the next twelve years. She also discovered information about the concept of reincarnation and began to wonder if she had been a crewman aboard a B-17 in a previous life. It made complete sense. Her memories of manning the top turret in defense of her ship during bombing runs over Germany were still quite vivid. They were also confirmed by documented historical facts—facts she hadn't been aware of or had access to as a toddler.
Gwen began visiting aircraft museums in her late teens. She visited Grissom Air Force Base in Kokomo, Indiana. There was a small outdoor museum there, and she presumed she would be less likely to be discovered and arrested upon going aboard the B-17 on display. Gwen felt an overwhelming need to assume her duty station one last time. Unfortunately, the B-17 at Grissom was sealed to prevent the intrusion of nesting animals and birds and the damage that would cause.
On her twenty-first birthday, Gwen visited the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. It was the world's largest airpower museum with over one thousand airplanes of all types and vintages on display. She made a beeline for the Flying Fortress, ignoring for now the other aircraft and artifacts on display. It was like she knew something was waiting for her.
Gwen arrived at it and stood there, just admiring the old bomber. It was a long-lost friend. She still bore the 91st Bomber Group markings and the "232076" tail number on her rudder, and the sexy lass still adorned the nose with the name
Shoo Shoo Baby