by P. W. Child
“Brittle,” Nina smiled. “I remember they said that the original panels had become brittle from age by 1944 when they had to be removed by Heeresgruppe Nord.”
“Da,” Kiril winked. “He is telling about how they cheated the crew of the Wilhelm Gustloff and made away with the amber panels to make sure the Germans would not take those panels with them. But he says during the trip to Latvia, where their mobile units waited to pick them up, something went very wrong. The crumbling amber set free something that went into their heads – no, captain's head.”
“Excuse me?” Purdue perked up. “What went into his head? Does he say?”
“It may not make sense to you, but he says something was in the amber, trapped there for centuries and more centuries. An insect, I think, is what he says. It went into the captain's ear. None of them could see it again, because it was very, very small, like a gnat bug,” Kiril relayed the soldier’s account.
“Jesus,” Sam mumbled.
“The man says when the captain made his eyes white all the men did terrible things?”
Kiril frowned, thinking over his words. Then he nodded, satisfied his account of the soldier's bizarre statements was correct. Nina looked at Sam. He looked stunned, but he said nothing.
“Does he say what they did?” Nina asked.
“They all started to think like one man. They had one brain, he says. When the captain told them to drown themselves, they all walked onto the ship's deck, and without looking worried about it, they jumped into the water and drowned just off the coast,” the old Russian declared.
“Mind control,” Sam affirmed. “That is why Hitler wanted the Amber Room to be taken back to Germany during Operation Hannibal. With that kind of mind control, he would have been able to subjugate the world without much effort!”
“How did he know that, though?” Detlef wanted to know.
“How do you think the Third Reich managed to turn tens of thousands of normal, morally sound German men and women into uniformly thinking Nazi soldiers?” Nina challenged. “Haven't you ever wondered how those soldiers were so innately evil and irrefutably cruel when they wore those uniforms?” Her words echoed in the silent contemplation of her companions. “Think about the atrocities committed on even small children, Detlef. Thousands upon thousands of Nazis were of the same mind, the same level of cruelty, unquestioning of their despicable orders like brainwashed zombies. I bet Hitler and Himmler discovered this ancient organism during one of Himmler's experiments.”
The men agreed, looking shocked at the new development.
“That makes a lot of sense,” Detlef said, rubbing his chin, thinking about the moral corruption of Nazi soldiers.
“We always thought they were brainwashed through propaganda,” Kiril told his guests, “but there was too much discipline. That level of unity is not natural. Why do you think I called the Amber Room a curse last night?”
“Wait,” Nina scowled, “you knew about this?”
Kiril returned her reproachful look with a glare. “Da! What do you think we have been doing all these years with our numbers stations? We are all over the world, sending out codes to warn our allies, to share intelligence on anyone who might try to use them on people. We know about the bugs that were trapped in the amber because another Nazi bastard used it on my father and his company a year after the Gustloff disaster.”
“That is why you wanted to dissuade us from looking for it,” Purdue stated. “Now I understand.”
“So, is that all the soldier told the interrogator?” Sam asked the old man.
“He is asked how come he survived the captain’s order and then he replies that the captain could not come near him, so he never heard the command,” Kiril explained.
“Why couldn't he come near him?” Purdue inquired, taking notes of the facts on a small notepad.
“He does not say. Just that the captain could not be in the same room as him. Maybe this is why he gets shot before the session is over, perhaps by the man’s name they shout. They think he is hiding information, so they kill him,” Kiril shrugged. “I think maybe it was the radiation.”
“The radiation of what? As far as I know there was no nuclear activity in Russia back then,” Nina said as she poured Kiril another vodka and herself some wine. “Can I smoke in here?”
“Of course,” he smiled. Then he answered her question. “First Lightning. You see, the first atomic bomb was detonated in the Kazakh Steppe in 1949, but what nobody will tell you is that nuclear experiments have been going on since the late 1930’s. I imagine this Ukrainian soldier lived in Kazakhstan before he was drafted into the Red Army, but,” he shrugged indifferently, “I can be mistaken.”
“What name do they shout in the background before the soldier is killed?” Purdue asked out of the blue. It had just occurred to him that the identity of the shooter was still a mystery.
“Oh!” Kiril chuckled. “Yes, you can hear someone shout as if they try to stop him.” He softly imitated the shout. “Kemper!”
Chapter 23
Purdue felt a twinge of terror claw at his insides at the sound of the name. He could not help it. “Excuse me,” he apologized and darted for the toilet. Falling to his knees, Purdue disgorged the content of his stomach. It perplexed him. He had by no means been nauseous before Kiril had mentioned the familiar name, but now his entire body was shaking from the menacing sound.
While the others jested about Purdue's ability for holding his drink, he was suffering from a dreadful sickness in his stomach to a point where he fell into a new depression. Perspiring and plagued by fever, he clutched the toilet for the next imminent purge.
“Kiril, can you tell me about this?” Detlef asked. “I found it in Gabi’s communications room with all her intel on the Amber Room.” He stood up and unbuttoned his shirt, revealing the medal pinned to his vest. He removed it and passed it to Kiril, who looked impressed.
“Bloody hell, what is that?” Nina smiled.
“This is a special medal that was given to soldiers who took part in the liberation of Prague, my friend,” Kiril said nostalgically. “You got this from Gabi’s things? Looks like she knew a lot about the Amber Room and the Prague Offensive. It is a remarkable coincidence, hey?”
“What is?”
“The soldier who gets shot in this audio clip was part of the Prague Offensive, where this medal comes from,” he explained excitedly. “Because the unit he was with, the 4th Ukrainian Front was involved in the operation to liberate Prague from the Nazi occupation.”
“For all we know it could come from that very soldier,” Sam speculated.
“That would be unnerving and awesome at the same time,” Detlef admitted with an accomplished grin. “It has no name on it, or does it?”
“No, sorry,” their host said. “It would have been interesting though if Gabi got the medal from this soldier's descendent while she was investigating the disappearance of the Amber Room.” He smiled sadly, remembering her fondly.
“You called her a freedom fighter,” Nina remarked absentmindedly, propping her head up on her fist. “That's a good description of someone trying to expose an organization attempting to subjugate the whole world.”
“Exactly, Nina,” he replied.
Sam went to see what was ailing Purdue.
“Hey, old cock. Are you alright?” he asked, looking down at Purdue's kneeling frame. There was no answer and no sound of sickness coming from the man hunched over the toilet bowl. “Purdue?” Sam stepped forward and pulled Purdue back by his shoulder only to find him limp and unresponsive. At first, Sam figured that his friend had knocked himself out when he passed out, but when Sam checked his vitals, he found that Purdue was in severe shock.
Trying to wake him, Sam kept calling his name, but Purdue was unresponsive in his arms. “Purdue,” Sam beckoned firm and loud and felt the tingling in the back of his mind. Suddenly energy flowed, and he felt recharged. “Purdue, wake up,” Sam commanded, forming a tether with Purdue's mind but he
failed to rouse him. He attempted it three times, each time increasing concentration and intent, but to no avail. “I don’t understand it. It should work when it feels like this!”
“Detlef!” Sam called. “Can you help me here, please?”
The tall German came racing down the hallway to where he heard Sam yelling.
“Help me get him to bed,” Sam groaned as he tried to lift Purdue to his feet. With Detlef’s help, they got Purdue into bed and gathered to figure out what was wrong with him.
“This is strange,” Nina said. “He wasn't drunk. He didn't look sick or anything. What happened?”
“Just puked his guts out,” Sam shrugged. “But I could not wake him up at all,” he told Nina, indicating that he even employed his new ability, “no matter what I tried.”
“That is reason for concern,” she acknowledged his message.
“He is burning up. Looks like food poisoning,” Detlef hypothesized only to be dealt a nasty look from their host. “I'm sorry, Kiril. I don’t mean to insult your cooking. But his symptoms look like that.”
Checking on Purdue every hour and trying to wake him yielded no results. They were baffled by this sudden onset of fever and nausea that he suffered.
“I think it might be late complications resulting from something that happened to him at that snake pit where they tortured him,” Nina whispered to Sam while they sat on Purdue's bed. “We don't know what they have done to him. What if they injected him with some toxin or God forbid – a deadly virus?”
“They did not know he was going to escape,” Sam replied. “Why would they have kept him in the infirmary if they meant to make him sick?”
“Maybe to infect us when we rescue him?” she whispered urgently, her big brown eyes fraught with panic. “They are an insidious bunch of tools, Sam. Would you be surprised?”
Sam agreed. There was nothing he would have put past those people. The Black Sun had near unlimited capacity to cause damage and the necessary malevolent intellect to initiate it.
Detlef was in his room, gathering information from Milla’s numbers station. The female voice read the numbers monotonously, muffled by the bad reception behind Detlef’s bedroom door down the hall from Sam and Nina. Kiril had to close up his shed and pull in his car before starting dinner. Tomorrow his guests would leave, but he was yet to convince them not to continue their search for the Amber Room. Ultimately he could do nothing if they, like so many others, insisted on seeking out the remnants of the deadly marvel.
After wiping Purdue's forehead with a wet washcloth to alleviate his still rising temperature, Nina went to see Detlef while Sam took a shower. She knocked softly.
“Come in, Nina,” Detlef answered.
“How did you know it was me?” she asked with an amused smile.
“Nobody finds this as interesting as you do, besides me, of course,” he said. “Tonight I got a message from the man on the station. He told me that we would die if we keep looking for the Amber Room, Nina.”
“Are you sure you got the numbers right?” she asked.
“No, not numbers. Look.” He showed her his cell phone. An untraceable number sent a text with a station reference. “I tuned the radio to that station, and he told me to quit - in plain English.”
“He threatened you?” she frowned. “Are you sure it is not someone else fucking with you?”
“How would he send me a text with the frequency of the station and then talk to me there?” he countered.
“No, that is not what I mean. How do you know it is from Milla? There are many of these stations scattered all over the world, Detlef. Be careful who you communicate with,” she warned.
“You are right. I did not even think about that,” he admitted. “I have been so desperate to hold on to things Gabi loved, the things she was passionate about, you know? It has made me blind to danger and sometimes…I don’t care.”
“Well, you have to care, Widower. The world depends on you,” Nina winked with a reassuring pat on his arm.
Detlef felt a renewed sense of purpose at her words. “I like that,” he grinned.
“What?” Nina asked.
“That name – Widower. It sounds like a superhero, don't you think?” he boasted.
“I think it is pretty cool, actually, even though it is a word that denotes a sad state. It refers to something heartbreaking,” she said.
“That is true,” he nodded, “but that's who I am now, you know? Widower means that I am still Gabi's husband, you see?”
Nina loved the way Detlef saw things. Through all the hell of his loss, he still managed to take his sad moniker and turn it into an ode. “That is very cool, Widower.”
“Oh, by the way, these are the numbers from the actual station, from Milla today,” he pointed out, giving Nina the sheet of paper. “You decipher it. I am terrible at anything without a trigger or a pull pin.”
“Alright, but I think you should get rid of your phone,” Nina advised. “If they have your number they can track us, and I get a very foreboding vibe from that text you received. Let's not lead them to us, okay? I don't want to wake up dead.”
“You know people like these can find us without tracking our phones, right?” he retorted, getting a firm look from the pretty historian. “Alright. I’ll dump it.”
“So we have someone threatening us via text messages now?” Purdue said, leaning casually against the doorway.
“Purdue!” Nina cried and lunged forward to throw her arms around him with delight. “I'm so glad you're awake. What happened?”
“You really should get rid of your phone, Detlef. The people who killed your wife might be the ones who contacted you,” he told the widower. Nina felt a little neglected by his seriousness. She promptly withdrew. ‘Suit yourself.’
“Who are those people, by the way?” Detlef sneered. Purdue was not his friend. He did not like being dictated to by someone he suspected of murdering his wife. He still did not have a real answer to the question who killed his wife, so as far as he was concerned, they were only getting along for Nina and Sam's sake – for now.
“Where is Sam?” Nina asked, breaking up the looming cock fight.
“In the shower,” Purdue said indifferently. Nina didn't like his attitude, but she was used to being in the middle of testosterone-driven pissing contests, even though that didn't mean she liked it. “Must be his longest shower ever,” she scoffed, pushing past Purdue to get into the corridor. She went into the kitchen to make coffee to defuse the brooding atmosphere. “Are you clean yet, Sam?” she teased as she passed the bathroom where she heard the water clattering on the tiles. “Going to cost the old man all his hot water.” Nina intended to decipher the latest codes while savoring the coffee she had been craving for over an hour.
“Jesus Christ!” she screamed suddenly. She stumbled back against the wall and covered her mouth at the sight. Her knees buckled as she collapsed slowly. Her eyes were frozen, just staring at the old Russian who sat in his favorite chair. Before him on the table sat his full tumbler of vodka waiting while next to it rested his blood stained hand, still gripping the shard of a broken mirror he had slit his own throat with.
Purdue and Detlef came rushing out, ready to fight. They faced the horrific scene and stood stunned until Sam joined them from the bathroom.
As the shock set in, Nina started to shake profusely, sobbing at the heinous incident that must have taken place while she had been in Detlef's room. Sam, only wearing a towel, approached the old man curiously. He scrutinized the position of Kiril’s hand and the direction of the gash across his upper throat. The circumstances were consistent with suicide; he had to accept that. He looked at the other two men. There was no suspicion in his gaze, but there was a dark warning there that provoked Nina to distract him.
“Sam, once you are dressed, would you help me clean him up?” she asked, sniffing as she got to her feet.
“Aye.”
Chapter 24
After they had taken care of Ki
ril’s body and wrapped it in sheets on his bed, the atmosphere in the house was thick with tension and grief. Nina sat at the table, still sporadically shedding tears over the death of the sweet old Russian. In front of her, she had Purdue's machine and her laptop, deciphering Detlef’s number sequences slowly and without enthusiasm. Her coffee was cold, and even her pack of smokes was untouched.
Purdue joined her und gently pulled her in a sympathetic embrace. “I'm so sorry, love. I know you adored the old man.” Nina said nothing. Purdue affectionately pressed his cheek against hers, and all she could think of was how quickly his temperature had returned to normal. Under the shelter of her hair, he whispered, “Be wary of that German, please, love. He seems to be a damn good actor, but he is German. Catch my drift?”
Nina gasped. Her eyes found Purdue's as he frown silently demanded an explanation. He sighed and looked around to make sure they were alone.
“He is adamant to keep his cell phone. You know nothing about him, other than his involvement with the Berlin assassinations investigation. For all we know he could be the kingpin. He could have been the one who killed his wife when he realized that she was playing for the opposing side,” he stated his case softly.
“Did you see him killing her? At the embassy? Are you even listening to yourself?” she asked in a tone full of resentment. “He helped save you, Purdue. If it weren't for him, Sam and I would never have known you were missing. If it weren't for Detlef, we would never have known where to find the Black Sun's Kazakh shit hole to rescue you.”
Purdue smiled. His expression conveyed his victory. “Exactly my point, my dearest. This is a trap. Don’t just follow his every direction. How do you know he was not leading you and Sam to me? Maybe you were supposed to find me; supposed to get me out. All part of the grand plan?”
Nina did not want to believe it. Here she was preaching for Detlef not to be blind to danger out of nostalgia, but she was doing precisely the same thing! There was no doubt that Purdue had a valid point, but she could not process the possible betrayal just yet.
