by David Beers
German soldiers stood facing a massive cage in front of Hans. The metal fence was 15 feet tall, with long coils of razor wire wrapping around the top. A thousand prisoners were inside … Hans could only imagine what the rest of this place must be like.
“They appear as warm as me,” he said to the soldier on his right. “Is that a hat I see? A hat?”
“Deputy Commandant—”
“No,” Hans interrupted. “I will not hear excuses. I will not stand here and watch these swine wearing coats and hats while our men are being slaughtered on the battlefield. Everything on these people should be wrapped around a German soldier. Do you disagree, Lieutenant Engel?”
“No, sir. Not at all.”
“Then make it so,” Hans said. “These people here, I want them naked for the next 24 hours. First move this cage to the middle of the camp, where all can see it. I want the other prisoners to understand that things are changing, and that they will no longer be treated with such kindness. They are the reason our men are dying and our women are losing husbands. Because of their filth. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Deputy Commandant.”
Hans walked away then, leaving those beneath him to fulfill his commands. He was happy with himself, and planned on sending every last coat and hat to the frontlines, courtesy of Bogdanovka.
He went to his office and watched as the soldiers started executing his orders. The prisoners stripped naked, piling their clothes against the fence. The women held their children as the men tried to shield their families from the cold. The temperature outside was well below freezing, the ground the prisoners stood on frozen mud.
Something else Hans saw during this undressing—the fact that families were together. It made no sense, the groups should be separated into male and female, able bodied and disabled. There could be multiple distinctions made, all of them more efficient than this grouping. He’d start once the cage was moved. Men in one area, women and children in the other.
Perhaps children would be separated as well, Hans needed to think on that further.
He left at 6:00 p.m., heading home to his wife. He walked by the men exhausting themselves as they pounded the fenceposts into the frozen ground. He did not look at them, but kept his eyes on the prisoners. They stared back, their eyes dark and their bodies shivering. Naked as the day they were born. For those that survived the night, Hans would have to figure out how to clothe them. He would come up with something tonight, but anything was better than the clothes they’d been wearing. He’d make them don each other’s hair before he allowed them to put on the clothes he’d seen today.
Hans went home, ate a warm meal, made love to his wife, then went to bed.
The next morning he returned to the concentration camp.
The sun wasn’t up yet, but Hans could see that the soldiers had completed their work. He walked to the new centralized enclosure, the razor wire standing high above him. The mass of naked bodies was pushed to the back, as far away from Hans as they could get. No one was sleeping, and with the spotlights above shining down, he could see their breath puffing out as white fog. The group breathed almost as one, as if they were a single entity.
And if that was the case, then part of the entity had fallen.
Perhaps 20 people lay in an opposite corner. They’d been laid shoulder to shoulder, their hands moved to cover their groins. Hans was somewhat surprised that so few had died. Only 20, though the temperatures had dropped very, very low last night. The group had held strong, and as Hans gazed closer, he saw not a single child standing on the outside. They had been shoved toward the center, where it was warmer.
Herd animals, he thought with a bit of satisfaction.
Hans walked off, his briefcase in his right hand and his left arm swinging with the gait of his walk.
Later that day the cage was returned to its original spot, and Hans had the soldiers use potato sacks to begin clothing the prisoners.
Hans was sure he would find many, many more efficiencies.
He never once thought of the dead that had been thrown into unmarked graves—not then, nor as the years progressed. The dead bodies piled up though, and somewhere, a ledger was being kept. Hans Albrecht’s debt grew higher and higher.
He never considered such a thing, and would have laughed if told it existed.
After all, they were only discarded furniture.
Abel and Emi
Early 2000’s
“What is that?” the girl asked, though perhaps ‘girl’ wasn’t accurate. At 17, she wasn’t quite a girl, but not yet a woman.
The boy—again, 17 is an awkward age for classification—sat up. He knew what he’d heard, even if he didn’t want to say it aloud.
“Just wait,” he said, hoping that the silence now rolling through the house would remain. That the loud crash was an accident, or maybe only in his imagination. “Just wait a second. Someone might just be having a dream.”
The boy had hoped the silence would last, but deep inside, he knew it wouldn’t. Perhaps he’d always known this night would come.
Another crash rocked the house, large on the scale of planets colliding—glass and wood breaking as one.
“What’s happening?” the girl asked, scooting back on the bed. It had no headboard, just a mattress and boxspring.
“Hold on,” the boy said, standing up and looking at the small alarm clock sitting on the floor. Bright red numbers stared back: 2:07 AM. He was still wearing his jeans, though the summer heat had forced his shirt off.
He walked across the room, his feet silent on the thin carpet. He put his head against the closed door and listened; the house was silent again.
Slowly, not wanting to make any noise at all, he twisted the door knob. Once it was fully turned, he pulled on the door with just as much care. Even so, the squeak came just as it did every other time it opened.
For both the girl and boy, it felt at least as loud as the crash they’d just heard. It felt like everyone in the entire house—nay, the world—would hear it.
He didn’t stop pulling, though, not until he stared down the hallway.
He saw nothing in the darkness. He heard nothing.
“Come back,” the girl said. “Come back. Maybe it’s done.”
The boy wished that was the case. He truly did—but something in him said nothing was stopping tonight. That perhaps 60 years of history had roared forward to this very moment.
“You need to go,” he said.
“What?”
“Go out the window. Go home and tell your parents to call the police.”
The only phone in the boy’s house was in the kitchen, and that’s where the crash came from.
“I’m not leaving,” the girl whispered.
Silence swarmed over them as her voice died.
“Dad?” the boy called into the hallway. “Mom?”
“They’re here. The dead are here.”
Both the boy and girl knew the voice. It was his father, but his words were impossibly everywhere at once. He spoke inside the boy’s room, the hallway, probably down in the kitchen too. It was as if he stood in every part of the house.
The boy stepped into the hallway, the moonlight from the window hitting his body as he did. He was thin but athletic looking—maybe a basketball player who had never touched weights before. His face was drawn into a mixture of concern and fear. He stepped from the moonlight and back into the darkness. The girl didn’t move from the bed.
“Where’s Mom?” he called as he went deeper into the hall.
He didn’t call for his sister, because he didn’t want his father to think about her. If he hadn’t thought about Mary yet, then the boy wouldn’t put her in his head.
“She’s down here,” his father said, though this time his voice beckoned only from the kitchen. The boy stopped, turned, and looked back into his room. He could still see the girl sitting there, her clothes on, but the blanket pulled up to her neck all the same.
Go, he mouthed, pointing
his finger sharply to the left, telling her to leave through the window.
She only shook her head.
The boy swallowed, staring at her for a second and not knowing what to do. If this was it, what he’d feared for so long, then she was in mortal danger. They both were, but he was okay with it happening to him. He’d known this was coming for as long as he could remember. She wasn’t a part of it, though. She shouldn’t be here.
And yet, if she wouldn’t leave, there wasn’t anything he could do besides go to the kitchen and try to stop whatever was happening.
He turned from his bedroom and walked further down the hallway. He passed his parents’ room on the left and a few steps later, his sister’s on the right. He paused there, gently leaning his head against the door. He heard nothing inside. The pit of his stomach grew cold, because he realized that his sister should have come to the door too.
Yet, she hadn’t.
She would have heard the same crash, but her room was still.
She’s being smart, he thought. She’s not coming out because she knows what’s happening. She’s doing what you always told her to do.
The boy pulled his head away from the door, not believing anything he’d just told himself. His sister would already be out here—no matter what he’d told her.
He kept walking down the hall, his feet quiet on the carpet.
“Come on,” his father said, his voice spreading across the entire house again. It spoke from above the boy, as if floating on a current. “It’s time. It’s past time.”
The boy heard his ancestry in the words. Most of the German accent had been wiped, but sometimes—when stressed or excited—his father reverted back.
The boy paused just at the end of the hallway, not wanting to take the last step, but knowing it had to be done. The rest of his family was already there, waiting for him.
More than your family is waiting, he thought. A lot more, because what did Dad just say? ‘They’re here. The dead are here.’
Another thought came to him, and his face grew calm as he listened to it: They’ve always been here though. Now go face them.
He stepped out from the hallway, showing a bravery that he wouldn’t reveal again until years and years later. Indeed, for the boy, his stepping into that kitchen was the last act of courage he would show for nearly two decades.
He rounded the corner, his feet moving from carpet to plastic tile.
His sister’s body hung from the ceiling. Her tongue protruded from her mouth and her eyes stared down at the ground, her legs and arms hanging lazily. Hot tears sprang to the boy’s eyes, hazing everything around him. He wiped at them immediately, knowing he needed to see clearly. If anyone was to make it out alive, he had to understand what was happening.
He looked away from the noose suspending his sister.
His mother stood on a stool next to her. A noose was around her neck too, her hands holding the thick rope. Far to the left was the crash he’d heard, a fallen armoire, but now nothing but shattered glass and splintered wood.
Next to his mother, another stool stood empty.
“This one is yours,” his father said.
The kitchen’s ceiling was old, made of tiles; the rope twisted up through them, hanging from something unseen.
The boy shook his head. “No, Dad. No, we don’t need to do this. They’re just dreams.”
He told his father the same thing he’d heard his whole life—they were just dreams.
That’s all any of this was, just a dream. His sister hanging dead to his right, his mother up next, and even the voice that had somehow traveled throughout the whole house. Just dreams.
“You don’t believe that,” his father said, “and we have to stop this now. I should have stopped it a long time ago. My father should have. But I’m not going to make the same mistake. They’re here and you know it. Just open your damned eyes.”
The boy heard the door to the garage open, but he didn’t look over to it. He knew what he’d see there, and he didn’t want to look at it. To see them right now might mean death for everyone …
Because his father was right … they were here.
The dead were here and they were calling his dad, calling him strongly now.
“Take that off Mom’s neck,” the boy said. “Let’s wait ‘till morning. You know it will be better in the morning.”
“This one is for you,” his father answered, touching the free hanging noose, “and then when you’re all gone, I’m going to put mine on too. I’m coming right behind you.”
The boy shook his head and looked at his mom, attempting another tactic. “Mom, take that off and step down. Come down and let’s ….” He couldn’t find any words to finish the sentence. Let’s what, exactly? Let’s get my sister down and then start making funeral plans? Let’s bake some cookies? The entire scene was insane.
The boy heard the door behind him slam shut.
“There’s more of them,” his dad said. “A whole army of them in my bedroom. They’ll be coming in here soon, too.”
His voice was calm but even through the kitchen’s gloom, the boy could see mania in his eyes.
“Mom,” he said, panic cracking through his courage and creeping into his voice. “Get down, now.”
She shook her head, tight and quick, but said nothing.
“Your mom is ready, too,” the man said. “See.”
He kicked the stool out from beneath her. Her body jerked down, the fall not hard enough to snap her neck but the noose immediately strangling her. Her hands fought uselessly at the rope, gasps and spittle flying from her mouth.
The boy simply acted, instinct moving him as much as thought. He rushed forward and slammed into his father. Both flew backward to the kitchen sink, his dad trying to sidestep and throw him off but unable.
The woman’s gasps were loud in the boy’s ears, as if they hung side by side. Her swinging body brushed him, letting him know that he was losing time.
The boy grabbed for his father’s head with his right hand, taking him by the hair and then pummeling it backward.
Whack, whack, whack—three hard hits in succession against the kitchen cabinet. His mother still swung, and with his father dazed, the boy turned. He grabbed her by the waist and lifted up, allowing her lungs to access air for a moment. He looked down at the scattered stool, knowing he had to get her back on it.
The boy let her down gently, the gasping resuming as soon as her weight pulled against the rope. He dashed for the stool, but his father threw himself forward, catching the boy’s legs and sending them both sprawling to the floor.
The boy lay on his chest, facing the garage door. He saw who had entered their house, at least partly. Pale, emaciated legs stood in front of him. Bony, knotted feet attached to calves that lacked even the semblance of muscle.
His father scrambled up the boy’s body, his arms flipping him over while simultaneously grabbing for his neck. Trying to get a hold of his windpipe, just as he had his sister’s and mother’s.
The boy was on his back, and though his father was above him, that wasn’t what he focused on. The thin calves had moved forward some, and as the father’s hands wrapped around the boy’s neck, he looked up and saw the rest of the body attached to those legs. A sunken chest and torso, ribs that protruded much too far out, arms that looked like bones. He looked at the face as his father’s hands tightened, cutting off the flow of oxygen to his brain.
A shaved skull, the dead man’s mouth hung slightly open. He had no teeth, only black and rotting gums. One eye missing and the other filled with cataracts, he stared down at the dying boy.
The boy reached to his side—not glancing away from the dead face above him—and felt the stool’s leg. He didn’t hear his mother anymore, didn’t know if she was alive or dead—only that he would die soon.
No air.
No breath.
With everything in him, the boy lifted. The short stool swung up and collided into his father’s head. Blood shot h
otly from the man’s ear, spraying across his head and then the boy’s face.
The father’s hands relaxed and the mania in his eyes died. He stared down blankly, looking shockingly like the one eyed man above.
He slumped forward, falling directly on his son.
Gasping for breath, the boy remembered his mother. He shoved his father as hard as he could, but it felt like moving a boulder. The body slowly slid off, splaying across the tiled kitchen floor.
The boy rolled onto his side, still sucking in air. Blood covered his face, but he hardly felt it, only thinking about saving his mother. He heard nothing though—not a single gasp.
He pulled himself to his knees and looked across the kitchen.
The girl was there, straining beneath his mother … but holding her up. Keeping her from dying.
The boy reached for the stool, grabbed it and then scrambled back across the kitchen, placing it beneath his mother’s feet. The girl released her hold, and the boy collapsed to the floor. His sister hung next to him, dead—his mother behind him, as silent as the dead. His father lay crooked, his ass up in the air, his head against the floor, blood still leaking from his ear and creating a red pool beside him.
The boy blinked, staring forward, only half understanding the rest of what he saw.
The dead were everywhere. Naked, emaciated, and staring at him. They filled the kitchen, so many that the boy couldn’t count them. Their numbers spread into the hallway, spilling into all of the bedrooms. They pressed forward, staring at him, and that was when the boy started screaming.
Surrounded by the dead, he didn’t stop until the police arrived.
Chapter Five
Present Day
Abel Ease hadn’t slept in three days, and he knew he couldn’t keep going much longer. Another day at the most, maybe. He would keep fighting sleep, but within the next 24 hours, he’d go under …
And they’re waiting. Every single one of them are waiting.
He sat on his porch—though his wasn’t the correct term and everyone at the hospital knew it. The patients might call the room they slept in ‘theirs’, or say they were watching ‘their’ TV, but no one at Sunny Acres Hospital owned a thing, and those who were aware enough to process such information understood it.
