by Matt James
“His collection? You mean the train?”
“Ja.”
“So,” Jack continued, “you think the entrance to some hidden tunnel system is inside the Death Block?”
Emma smiled. “No,” she turned and entered the popular tourist attraction, “not exactly.”
Oookay.
Gunter ordered one of the men to stay put outside the door. Jack’s chances of survival had just gone up. Now, his odds were four-to-one.
He was shoved along behind her. As they moved indoors and out of the public eye, the four gunmen ditched their tactical masks, opting for a more comfortable approach. Gunter kept him moving with the help of a pistol. Emma continued down the steps into the basement level, the Cellars. This was where some of the most abhorrent tortures had occurred at the hands of Nazi scientists and physicians.
It’d make sense to hide a secret access point down here. It was said that some of the soldiers that had been stationed at Auschwitz didn’t have the stomach to step foot in the Cellars. Even now, decades later, the place gave Jack the chills. Emma stopped and turned again, once more producing the Himmler journal.
She thumbed it open and stopped at a middle page.
“Himmler didn’t want just anyone to find the train, so he left somewhat cryptic clues for a worthy person to follow. For instance, it starts with ‘Death is absolute. No one is above death.’”
Jack looked up at the ceiling, visualizing the building he stood in. “The lower levels of the Death Block.”
She nodded. “Very good. Not terribly difficult, but still, he didn’t just give it away. He made sure that the reader would have to be on-site to understand it properly. Plus, the bunker would be easiest to defend if he were forced to fall back.” She smiled. “And so would the secret.”
“Not if the Allies had done what they should’ve and bombed the shit out of this place once it was emptied,” Jack said. There were very few places of immense historical value that he wished had been wiped off the map in their heyday. Auschwitz was one of them. “Oh, and this doesn’t feel very secretive. Feels kinda lazy, if you ask me. What’s the next ‘clue?’”
The jab at Himmler, a man that Emma obviously admired, caused her face to tighten. With a clenched jaw, she said, “Iron will lead you to your destiny.”
Jack stretched his back and shoulders the best he could while he took in the corridor. To his right was a secondary hallway that held a series of isolation chambers. On his left was a similar passage. It housed the suffocating standing cells.
Further down the corridor, past Emma, was one of three gates, but there was only one that was locked. Jack’s tour guide, Kasper, had said that the only thing beyond it was a series of offices that were dilapidated and too dangerous for visitors to enter. There had been an attempt to rebuild them at one time, but the long-time director of the museum canceled the restoration for fear of doing more harm than good to the rest of the building.
“Hmmm,” Jack muttered, thinking.
“Yes?” Emma asked.
“The gate behind you is locked, and I’m pretty sure it’s made of iron.”
She turned and looked, mumbling something in German. Another of the other mercenaries handed Karl his carbine and quickly removed his backpack. He removed a blowtorch and moved off with Gunter in tow. The two men swiftly went about cutting through the antique partition. Jack was left alone with only Emma and Karl. The latter’s face was a mess. His nose was swollen, and both of his eyes had already started to bruise.
Jack winked. “Lookin’ good, my friend.”
He knew Karl wanted nothing more than to beat him to death, but they needed him. Keeping the guy annoyed was not only amusing, but it was also part of Jack’s plan. It’d keep at least one of Emma’s goons off-center and more susceptible to mistakes. That’s what Jack hoped, anyway.
Something about this whole thing bothered Jack—besides the zip-cuffs, guns, and Nazi militants. The clues Himmler left behind were simple. Emma should’ve been able to figure this out without him. It begged the question…
Why am I here? Jack asked himself. The only thing he could think of, besides being a hostage, was something even more terrible, like a boobytrap of some kind. Not that he was complaining, in the least. They could’ve simply put a bullet in his head and left him to rot inside the crematorium.
So, he watched and waited for the real challenge to show its ugly mug. Something awaited them—something that Emma wanted him, not one of her men, to take head-on.
“Yay, me,” he mumbled under his breath. Karl overheard him and glared at him. Jack smiled. “I’m just super honored to be here.”
The brute rolled his eyes and shoved Jack forward at the shriek of a gate swinging open. The cry of metal made the group cringe, reverberating through the tight confines of the concrete Cellar walls as well as everyone’s spines.
Jack glanced at Karl. “Like nails on a chalkboard, huh?”
Karl growled and pushed Jack, causing him to stumble through the heavy iron gate and into the wall at the end of the T-junction. Grabbing Jack’s shirt, Karl pinned him there, drew his sidearm, and jammed the barrel into his temple.
“Keep talking, funny man, and I’ll take you outside and give you an up-close look at the Black Wall.”
“Karl!” Emma shouted, standing outside one of the four doorways. Two of the offices were to Jack’s right, where Emma stood now. Two others sat to his left. All of them were situated against the western wall.
“It’s this one.”
“How do you know?” Jack asked, joining Emma at the end of the short hallway.
There, she tapped the wooden door frame above their heads. Jack recognized the carvings. They were “mystic” Armanen runes, an alphabet based on the much older Scandinavian variation. It was partially adopted by Himmler, a member of the Thule Society of occultists, into the Nazi party. Accompanying the runes were a pair of stylized lightning bolts, the symbol of the SS.
Friggin’ nutjob…
Jack glanced at the door to his left. It didn’t have any markings at all. He counted to six Mississippi, and still, nothing. Emma was off somewhere else, mentally.
Jack cleared his throat. “Okay, so, why don’t you pretend I’m not an expert in Armanen Runes, and tell me what it says?”
He considered himself a highly skilled “Jack” of all trades. The only expertise he truthfully had was in modern warfare. He was well-versed in many things when it came to history, but was a little fuzzy when it came to Armanen runes.
“It says, ‘destiny.’”
Jack recited Himmler’s clue. “Iron will lead you to destiny.”
“The entrance is here,” Emma whispered, lost in the moment. She blinked, refocused, and stepped in.
Jack joined her, his wrists aching. The thick zip ties had started to saw into his flesh. With every movement, they dug deeper and deeper into his skin. It was only a matter of time until they bled. He needed to remove them before then.
The room was bigger than he figured it would be, maybe twenty-feet-deep by thirty-feet-wide, and it was empty save for a large, solid-looking table pushed up against the northern, right-hand wall. Hmmm. The office space extended further than the rest of the building above their heads. The far wall ran under the alleyway outside. Jack took the time to inspect the room, floor to ceiling, visualizing where the wall should’ve ended.
He stepped up to the table and nudged it with his hip, but it didn’t budge an inch. Geez… He stepped back and examined it further. Is it attached? The back of the tabletop was perfectly flush against the wall—too flush.
“Hey, Hans!” Jack called.
With a sour look on his face, Emma’s brother joined them, gun in hand. “Ja?”
Jack tapped one of the front legs of the table with the toe of his boot.
“Try to move this thing, will ya?”
Gunter’s right eyebrow rose, and he looked at his sister.
“Do it,” she said.
Gunter shrugged an
d holstered his pistol. In turn, Emma redrew hers. The German pulled at the piece of furniture as hard as he could, and even still, it didn’t move.
Hmmm. The add-on and table didn’t make sense.
“Why build an arbitrary space such as this?” Emma asked.
“Then secure a table to it,” Jack added. “Does the Himmler journal say anything about this?”
Emma faced the table and shook her head, running her hand across its surface. “None of this makes any sense.” She looked back up at Jack. “Unless…”
Together, they got to their knees and inspected the underside of the desk. The first thing Jack noticed was that it was, indeed, bolted to the wall. It still didn’t make any sense, though. The only time you fastened something like this to a wall was if it was in danger of tipping over, like Jack’s overpacked bookshelf, back home in Wyoming.
Emma dropped to the ground and rolled onto her back. Jack would’ve done the same, but his bound hands said otherwise. As soon as she was on the floor, her eyes lit up.
“You need to see this.”
Jack snorted out a laugh. “Then, you need to cut these damn cuffs off.”
Emma didn’t respond. She slid her phone out of her pocket and took a picture. She climbed out and knelt next to Jack, smelling wonderful. Jack took his eyes off the stunning woman and focused on her iPhone’s screen instead. He was confused by what he saw.
“A padlock?”
She nodded. “Skillfully installed directly into the underside of the table.”
Jack stood and inspected the tabletop and saw no hint of the lock on the other side.
“But we have no key,” Gunter said.
Shit, Jack thought. Now what?
Emma’s eyes lit up. “But I know who does!”
5
Ten minutes ago, Jurgen, Karl’s partner, and Jack’s other prison guard, had left to find Emma’s mystery person. Whoever it was, they were here, and he, or she, supposedly owned a key that fit into their equally mysterious lock.
Jack made himself at home and climbed onto the wall-mounted table. It’s where he sat until an older man inched his way inside. The newcomer saw Jack defiling the relic and gasped in horror. It was clear to see who he was, even if Emma didn’t introduce him.
“Jack Reilly,” she said, “I’d like you to meet, Piotr Symanski. He’s been the director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum for nearly four decades…” she gave Jack a predatory smile, “and a Nazi sympathizer for even longer.”
“Charming,” Jack said, swinging his legs like a child.
“Does he have to sit there?” Piotr asked.
Jack shrugged. “I’d move to a chair, but you didn’t leave any out.” He pouted. “You’re a real shitty host, Pete.”
Piotr seemed to have the same sense of humor as Emma and her troops. That’s to say—none. Still, Jack waited for Emma to explain why the closeted Nazi was gracing them with his presence.
“Tell them,” Emma said.
Piotr nodded. “My father was a man named Klaus Wagner, and during the Second World War, he served as deputy commandant here at Auschwitz, a high honor. He was also the cousin of the camp’s first commandant.”
“Hang on, your father knew about this place?”
Piotr’s face softened. “He did, but my mother burned everything of his after he left us. As you can imagine, she wasn’t very happy with him up and leaving. It wasn’t until she passed away that I found a key in her safety deposit box. She never once mentioned its existence.”
Humanity dodged a bullet there. Jack appreciated Mrs. Symanski’s rage-fueled response to her husband walking out on his family. She had inadvertently saved mankind from Piotr, or anyone else, for that matter, from finding the train.
“Your lineage is just as terrible as Emma and Gunter’s,” Jack said.
Piotr’s eyes narrowed. “Says the American whose government sticks their noses in everyone else’s business.”
Jack wasn’t about to get into a political debate right now. So, he did the smart thing and silently shrugged his shoulders. He let the man have his small victory if only to keep him talking. Jack needed to know everything. Knowledge was power in this case. The more Jack knew, the more useful he’d stay.
“So,” Jack said, “how is it that no one has found out about you after all of these years? I figured a man of your stature would’ve been back-checked thoroughly.”
He smiled. “Who says that I haven’t been?”
Right, like Emma, there were still plenty of those that followed and believed in the old ways. It shouldn’t have shocked him that a person like Piotr would be one of them. Who knew how many were hiding inside the world’s governments? There could be thousands—millions—of them waiting for someone like Emma to emerge and lead them to conquest.
“And the lock?” Jack asked.
Piotr grinned, showing off a set of yellowed teeth. “It requires a key.” Carefully, he removed a necklace from around his neck. At the end of the simple knotted cord was an iron key. “After my father vanished, my mother and I fled to Austria. We changed our names and started over as refugees.”
Emma explained their relationship. “When I discovered who Piotr was, we formed a bond.”
“What’s your cut?” Jack asked, eyeing the man. This wasn’t only a noble endeavor. Piotr also wanted to get rich.
“One percent,” the director answered.
One percent of thirty billion dollars was a lot of money. Jack could only imagine what he’d do with the three hundred million that Piotr was promised. In the museum director’s case, he’d probably leave it to his existing family and donate a portion of it to his and Emma’s cause.
“And yours?” the museum director asked.
Jack laughed. “Oh, man, Pete, you must also moonlight as a stand-up comedian!” His eyes flicked to Emma. “You think I’m willingly helping this scum?”
“Watch yourself, Jack,” she warned, raising her gun.
Jack didn’t flinch. Instead, he just rolled his eyes and hopped off the table. “Come on, Pete, let’s get this over with.”
He nervously handed over the family heirloom to Emma, and she did the honors.
“Why haven’t you done this already?” Jack asked. Piotr had the key in his possession this entire time.
Emma sighed and pushed past Jack. She got down on her knees and rolled onto her back again. “Sadly,” she explained, “we would’ve approached him long ago had we know who he really was.”
“And you?” Jack asked, looking at Piotr.
“I have no way of doing this on my own at my advanced age. And until now, I didn’t know who to trust.”
Careful what you wish for, Pete. Jack suspected that there were few people Emma wouldn’t kill if she felt the need to.
There was a beat of silence in between Emma and Piotr’s explanations. Then, a clunk resounded from somewhere behind the wall. Even after everything Jack had been through, the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He was excited to see what happened next.
Emma climbed out from under the table and stood next to Jack. Gunter stepped up next to him as well. Like his sister’s eye, his were also bursting with excitement. Piotr had yet to move again since handing over his key. Even now, he stood hunched, nervously fiddling with the keyless cord. Karl and Jurgen, who had remained outside the room the entire time, had since moved to the doorway. Everyone was curious as to what would happen next.
Nothing.
“Um,” Jack said, looking around.
But then, barely above a whisper, he heard it. There was a muffled clicking somewhere behind the wall. It reminded Jack of a kitchen timer buried beneath a pile of pillows. He skirted around the table and placed his left ear and shoulder against the wall. Leaning in, he pressed himself as flat as possible and listened.
Without warning, the section of wall in front of him dropped straight down into the floor. Thrown off-balance, Jack spilled to the floor of a hidden room. Except he didn’t hit it. Along wit
h a rush of air, Jack continued down a set of spiraling metal stairs. He went round and round for what felt like minutes. Jack had no idea which way was up, nor how deep he was traveling. Eventually, the battered and bruised park ranger came to an abrupt halt, landing flat on his chest on a hard, dusty, concrete floor.
Everything had happened so quickly that he didn’t see what else, if anything, was behind the false partition. Regardless, the Nazis had built a secret passageway beneath Auschwitz. It connected to what must’ve been some sort of natural cave system. The area around him was too dark to confirm his theory. And all he cared about now was catching his breath and waiting for the pain to subside.
Jack stayed put until he heard the banging footfalls of his captors closing in. Moaning, he gingerly rolled onto his side and tried to get a better look at where he was. All he saw was the aura of a flashlight as it came down from heaven to greet him. Emma was the first to appear. Then her brother, who was closely followed by Karl and Jurgen.
None of them moved to help Jack.
The foursome conversed amongst themselves in German while shining each of their lights around the room. Jack figured its size was reasonably significant since they sounded excited about what they saw—like, a Victoria’s Secret BOGO sale kind of excitement. He’d read about Nazi bunkers being found all over German-occupied Europe.
As part of his plan to foil an Allied invasion, Hitler commissioned army engineers, as well as Dutch slave laborers, to build a line of covert bunkers. They were known as the “String of Pearls.” It was an arm of his Atlantic Wall that reached from the Netherlands all the way to the Bay of Biscay in France, nearly 1,000 miles in distance.
Jack turned and watched as Emma hugged Gunter. The two were ecstatic about something Jack couldn’t see yet, and it pissed him off.
“Hey…a little help here?”
Emma didn’t verbally answer. She just motioned to Jack, and Karl and Jurgen did as directed. He was lifted roughly off the ground, placed on his feet, and was then let go without making sure he could stand on his own. Luckily, Jack didn’t feel anything broken, though he hurt in several places—too many to count.
