by Boyd Brent
“That would be ill advised, David. The fence is electrified, and the expanse beyond it littered with mines. Should we make it to the forest they would hunt us with dogs. Our primary mission would be compromised. I need not remind you of its importance.”
“The alternative?”
“I am monitoring the brain activities … the fields of vision of the pertinent guards. There are nine in total, including the two in the watchtower. These have turned their attention to the new arrivals at the main gate.”
David glanced at the warehouse on his left. Five metres along, a drainpipe ran up to guttering. He looked ahead at the four guards outside the bunker. They were focused on the naked bodies filing past and down the steps. “They're distracted up front …”
“I know,” said Gull. “On my direction move to the drainpipe but do not climb it.” David felt a sudden surge of adrenalin – the biological equivalent of a jet-plane preparing for take-off. He picked Anna up and placed her on his back. “Hold on tight.” Anna clasped her arms about his neck like a little spider monkey. David darted to his left and stood before the drainpipe.
“Wait … wait… wait… now, David.” David climbed the drainpipe, hurled himself back from the wall and grabbed the overhanging guttering. Below him, several people stopped in their tracks to observe the human ape with a child on his back. The young man who had given David his coat was amongst them and whispered, “Move on! Move on now!” David pulled himself up and rolled into the guttering. He raised his head and looked down at the condemned moving forwards again. None were looking up now, and one amongst them held a clenched fist close to his head – a message of solidarity from a dead man walking.
“You cannot save him. You must content yourself with the child,” said Gull. David lowered his head, clenched his fists and moved forwards commando-style. When he reached the corner he turned left onto the back of the building. Just below him he could hear guards offering reassurances to people going to their deaths. A little boy started to cry, and the sound of his distress gradually faded as his father carried him down the stairs into the bunker. David felt Anna shudder on his back.
“Many of those people are aware they are to be terminated,” said Gull. “They have nothing to lose. Why don't they fight?”
David whispered his reply into the leaves. “They are broken. Starving. They have barely enough energy to stand. I know what that feels like, and a small part of them is saying their suspicions are irrational – that they must comply to get through another day. Where are the empaths, Gull? These people must be protected. Avenged.”
“The date is July 27th 1944. They are coming. In five months' time this camp and many others like it will be liberated.”
“Five months?”
“The Commander-in-Chief of one of the approaching armies is the man you spoke to aboard the shuttle craft.”
“You mean Winston? This is happening during Winston's war?”
“Yes.”
“Then we must get word to him. Let him know what's happening here.”
“It has been happening for many years. By this time the allies have inklings of the slaughter, and their armies are fighting their way across Europe. They will arrive here as quickly as they can. These armies contain the greater number of empaths, and they will be victorious. Those complicit in the orchestration and running of these camps will be executed.”
“Are you talking to God?” whispered Anna.
“Not exactly.”
“My best friend, Sarah … she believed in guardian angels. Are you my guardian angel?”
David was about to shake his head, then reconsidered. He glanced up at the arched brick fa«ade that ran the width of the building and hid them from the watchtower, then ahead to the building's top left corner. “I would advise remaining here until after dark,” said Gull.
David whispered over his shoulder, “We'll stay here a while longer, until it gets dark. You okay?” Anna slid off of his back and lay beside him. He placed an arm around her and over this arm he watched an SS officer climb onto the roof of the bunker. The bunker's roof was three metres below his own position. The SS man opened a hatch in the roof. He placed a bag on the ground, reached in and took out a gas mask. He put it on, secured it and removed a black canister from the bag. He pulled on white gloves, took a knife from his belt and stabbed the canister, then dropped it into the hatch. David hugged Anna's left ear to his chest and placed a hand over her right. He braced himself for the cries of the dying but heard only birds chirping in trees beyond the fence.
Thirty five
Night time fell like a shroud, bringing with it a damp humidity that smelled of charred human remains, and through this shroud stars began to glimmer in the heavens.
David shook Anna gently and whispered, “It's time to go.” She crawled onto his back, and David made his way along the guttering to the warehouse’s top left-hand corner. A narrow passage ran between their warehouse and the one next door. David told her to hold on tight, and he swung his legs over the edge and dangled by his fingertips. He dropped to the ground and landed in a space barely wide enough for two people. Forty metres away to his right the passage led into the camp's main courtyard, which was now floodlit. To his left was a fence that spanned the camp's northern boundary, and a narrow passage. Anna slid off his back, and David took hold of her hand. An alarm sounded. David looked towards the courtyard, and from that floodlit area a figure entered the passage and ran in their direction.
“It is a prisoner attempting to escape,” said Gull. David stood with his back pressed against the warehouse, and Anna did the same. A young man in civilian clothes huffed and puffed and ran past them, pausing at the top of the passage and then turning left away from the gas chamber. David looked back towards the courtyard and saw the silhouette of a guard and a dog straining on a leash. “Halt!” David scooped Anna up under his right arm.
“Follow the runner, David.” David ran around the corner and saw the prisoner turn left thirty metres ahead. David covered this distance in seconds and rounded the same corner, just in time to see the prisoner turn right and disappear. David followed him into a small courtyard lit by a single, flickering bulb. The prisoner crossed the courtyard and vanished into the darkness beyond. From the area to their left came the sound of jackboots hurrying over concrete.
“Proceed into the courtyard and scale the second building on the left, David.”
“The guards are coming from that direction.”
“Then be quick.”
A container for dirty linen sat below a window. A light was on inside, and shadows moved beyond the blind. With Anna under his arm David stepped onto the container, leapt up and grabbed the roof's guttering, then pulled them both up. He crouched on the roof as guards came running into the courtyard below.
“Jump to the next roof,” said Gull. On bare feet David sprinted across the roof and leapt four metres to the roof of the adjacent building. “Now climb down on the other side.” David dropped silently to the ground. “Enter the door behind you.” David shouldered open the door and walked into a stench that froze him in his tracks. He placed his free hand over his nose and whispered, “Where are we?”
“In a latrine.”
“I don't see another exit in here.”
“There isn't one.” A raised bench ran down the back of the latrine. Ten holes had been cut into its lead top, each the size of a man's backside. The sound of jackboots came from outside, and barking dogs. “Hide in the pit beneath the stalls, David. The aroma will throw the dogs off any scent.”
“Aroma? Smells like it's already full. Another option?”
“All other options will compromise our presence here, and would doubtless lead to reprisals for the prisoners.” David moved towards the line of stalls. “You're all heart, Gull.” He looked down into one of the ten holes cut into the lead top. “We won't fit.”
“We must raise the shelf,” said Gull. “It weighs a thousand pounds. In the interests of time, may I?”
David lifted Anna onto his shoulders and muttered between gritted teeth, “Knock yourself out.” His eyes rolled up and he heaved up the lead shelf, climbed in and sank to his neck in human waste, and lowered the lid. The darkness raged with flies that burrowed at their ears, eyes and noses. David's eyes returned to blue, and he waded forwards with his hands outstretched to a wall. He turned and pressed his back to it.
“You could have remained oblivious to the stench and the flies, David.”
“And leave Anna to it? That would have made me a real hero.”
“I surmised as much. And have subdued your gag reflex.”
As Gull spoke, Anna vomited on David's shaven head. It ran down his face, and the flies found another level of hysteria. Anna blew a fly from her nose, closed her eyes and patted her cheeks. When next she opened her eyes they had turned as black as the flies that now vacated her face. Her head moved left and right as though controlled by the hand of a ventriloquist, and her mouth opened and closed, opened and closed. Finally, she gazed straight ahead and in Goliath's voice she said, “It pleases me to see you that you are moving up in the world, son.”
David stared into the swarming darkness. “Get out of her.”
“I am of course aware that humility is a stable part of an empathic way of life. However, your current choice of habitat suggests you have taken this conceit a mite too far.”
“Don't harm her.” The flies swarmed close to Goliath's face, but none landed. He sniffed at the air and said, “If you ask me she'd be better off dead. It could be that by choosing such a humble habitat you imagined I would not visit. I will never stop visiting you, son. And now I've located you, my agents will not be far behind. That's right. Agents. Plural. But you sure are making us work hard, I'll grant you that.”
“Keep your damned voice down.”
“Hasn't Gull told you? The guards have checked the place already. Even their dogs couldn't stand the stench, and dogs are commonly known to eat their own faeces. You know, in the early days of these camps, they used to find adults hiding in similar places – that's why they added lead tops. Which explains why this one can only be opened with a crank – or by a couple of sons-of-bitches from an altogether more enlightened future.”
David closed his eyes. Not only did he have the stench and the flies to contend with, he now also had Goliath's voice, and he did not think he could put up with all three for very much longer.
“These death camps,” continued Goliath. “They sure were something, and this in an age when empathy was commonplace. Makes you wonder. Nazis. They acted more like machines than people, switching off their human sensibilities and carrying out murder on an industrial scale. Seems to me these people aspired to be more like me than you.”
“Agreed. And these people are going to be defeated.”
“Yes, they are, but they are no less giants than those whose shoulders you imagine you stand on. My own existence is testament to that, which I gather is why you're here – to prevent the conception of one such giant in particular. I wonder at the folly of it, not to mention the conceit. You really think you can alter me sufficiently to make a difference? Hell, son. Seepage only accounts for a fraction of my actions and general outlook on things. I possess the accumulated knowledge of mankind, and you can't deprive me of one iota of that data.”
“Then why do the Shadow Strands exist?”
“To mock you, as your kind have always been mocked. Take a good look at yourself: stood neck-deep in shit with a very small person on your shoulders. The Shadow Strands provide an illusion of hope where there is only an abundance of excrement. And while we're on the subject, as much as I appreciate your carrying a vessel down here for me to inhabit … just what in the name of Jehovah and all his witnesses is she doing here? Six million people are terminated by these people, and you've taken it upon yourself to protect one little 'un? What is that? Some grand empathic gesture? Damn, son. You might just as well become a nursemaid to one of these flies.”
“If my quest is so hopeless, then why do you insist on following me everywhere?”
“Well, listen to you. Quest. You must be talking about a quest to stand neck-deep in shit with a foetus on your shoulders. You want to know what I think led you to this delightful spot?”
“I want you to stop talking and get the hell out of that foetus.”
“For such a tiny person she sure is putting up one hell of a fight. It seems I am to evicted, but before I go, consider this, son. Man shares 98 per cent of his DNA with pigs, so it occurs to me that cause and effect has led you here to get reacquainted with your inner …”
Anna's cheeks puffed out, her eyes flooded with blue and a child's scream pierced that stinking void like something escaped from a crack in hell. David lifted Anna off of his shoulders, hugged her and told her everything was going to be alright. “Hush, Anna, hush. It was only a dream. Just a dream.”
Thirty six
At 3am, David climbed out of the cesspit with Anna on his shoulders. He lowered the lid back into place. “We need to get cleaned up, Gull. And we need clothes.”
“There is a barracks on the other side of the courtyard. It houses two German officers. Only one is present, and his vital signs suggest he is sleeping. Most likely he is inebriated. I have accessed the building's original plans. They have a washroom with hot and cold running water.”
“Good. Very good.” David took hold of Anna's hand and led her to the door. “The coast is clear,” said Gull.
David and Anna walked across the courtyard on bare, shit-stained feet. Their shadows were cast intermittently upon the ground by the flickering bulb. The officers' quarters had a white-washed fa«ade and a black door. Above and to the left of which was a darkened window. David turned the handle and the door opened. He whispered, “Monsters imagine they don't need locks …” The door opened onto a narrow flight of stairs.
“The Nazi is sleeping soundly, David. I would recommend suffocation. He can be strung up and his death made to look like a suicide.”
“Alright.” David closed the door and knelt in front of Anna and whispered, “Wait here. I'll come and get you when it's safe.”
“Is there a Nazi up there?”
“Yes there is.”
“Are you going to kill him?”
“Yes I am.”
“Will he go to hell?”
“If there is one.”
Anna nodded and sat on the bottom step. The wooden stairs creaked as David went up. At the top a small landing went left and right. “The bedroom is around to your left, David. It faces onto the courtyard. The washroom is to the right and looks out over the rear of the building.” David felt a pang of guilt. He begrudged the Nazi the time it would take to extinguish his life – time that kept him and Anna from running water. And maybe soap. His guilt vanished when he entered the room and saw the man sprawled across his bed in his underpants. On the bedside table stood an empty bottle of Schnapps, and beside that an ashtray full of cigarette butts. A pistol dangled from the bedpost inside a holster, and on the wall hung a portrait of a severe-looking man with a moustache. The man asleep below it appeared to be enjoying his dream. David picked a pillow up off the floor. He loomed over the SS officer, pressed a knee into his chest and the pillow into his face. The SS man struggled for a minute and then went limp. David heard the creaking of a floorboard behind him and turned to see Anna peering around the door. “Has he gone to hell?”
David nodded. “Let's get you cleaned up, and then we'll find some clothes.”
“A man is crossing the courtyard outside,” said Gull.
David glanced at the second bed by the window. He turned to Anna. “There's another …” Anna dropped onto her stomach and slid under the bed, below the dead man.
“It appears she's done this before,” said Gull.
David closed the bedroom door and stood to one side of it. The door opened, and a barrel-chested SS officer stepped in. The man placed a hand over his nose. “Jesus. You shit yourself?” David
stepped forward, took hold of his chin and snapped his neck. David looked down at the corpse and scratched at his stubble. “A double suicide?”
“So it would appear,” said Gull. Anna slid out from under the bed.
“Another man is headed in this direction,” added Gull.
“Well, I doubt he's coming here.”
“It would be wise to assume that he is.” David opened his mouth to warn Anna but closed it again as she disappeared back under the bed. David picked the dead man up off the floor and placed him on the bed below the window. He closed the bedroom door and stood beside it. From downstairs came the sound of the front door opening and closing. David whispered, “Are we destined to wait here and eliminate every damned Nazi one at a time?”
The door opened and an officer of the SS entered the room. “What is that smell?”
“That would be me.” The man turned and David laid him out with an upper cut that shattered his front teeth.
Showered and scrubbed, David sat on the edge of the bed, dressed in the black uniform of an SS officer. Anna came into the room wrapped in an enormous towel. The unconscious officer was secured to an upright wooden chair with belts. A pillowcase had been stuffed into his bloody mouth. Anna stood before the seated man, a head shorter, and observed him as a child observes a closet she suspects contains the bogeyman. Then she looked up at David and asked the following as though murder and death were as common as ice cream and cookies. “Why haven't you killed him?”
