The Dead Alone (Empires Lost Book 3)

by Charles S. Jackson

  Watson stared long and hard at Ritter before releasing a long, exhausted sigh.

  “Come on then…” he decided eventually, tilting his head as a sign the man should follow. “I’ll take you to see him. The great bampot’s bloody lucky to have any chest left at all, but I’ve stitched him up as best I can.” He stopped as an expression of shock and fear spread across the other man’s face, then realised that the German might not immediately recognise the exaggeration in his sarcastic tone. “He’s going to be alright, fella: it’ll take him a good few months, but he’ll be alright. Let’s go see him…”

  The hospital was surprisingly empty, with just one or two wounded prisoners lying here or there and glaring at Ritter in sullen silence through the open doorways of recovery rooms as he passed, and he wondered at the reason for the lack of patients as Watson led him down the central hallway.

  Schiller lay alone in a small room at the rear of the hospital, the sheets covering him clearly not clean but the best Watson had been able to find under the circumstances. A saline drip hung from a stand beside him, connected to his bare arm by a thin rubber hose and IV needle, and he appeared to be asleep, his expression almost peaceful despite his face having been marred by several superficial scrapes and scratches.

  “I thank you, for what it’s worth, doctor…”

  “Doctor Renne did most of the work,” Watson demurred with a humble shrug, “but he’s resting now. Been up half the night pulling shrapnel out of some poor fool’s chest, ye ken…?”

  “Of course,” Ritter nodded with a faint smile, this time recognising the man’s dry humour for what it was.

  “Do you have long?”

  “They said an hour…” Ritter replied with a grimace. “I will not wake him, but I should like to stay here and keep him company for that time, if that is acceptable?”

  “Be my guest, colonel… the bed next to his is free. I have other patients to attend to: call me if you need anything… no doubt your guards will come and collect you when the time comes.

  Left alone, he took a seat on the adjacent bed and stared at the sleeping Schiller for a few moments before deciding there was little benefit to such activity. Sliding to the top of the bed, he seated himself with his back to the bedhead, his head resting against the wall behind as he closed his eyes and tried to make sense of the insanity that had been the last twelve hours.

  He couldn’t have guessed how long he sat there, eyes closed and head back, as a myriad of wild thoughts whirled in his brain and he worried about the man beside him, Donelson’s life, his own… and of what might become of his family back in Berlin. It might have been a minute or it might have been most of an hour, so lost in thought was he, and he genuinely jumped with a start as a voice suddenly broke into his silent, thoughtful world and dragged him back to reality in an instant.

  “I’m still alive then…” Schiller croaked, managing a weak smile as a startled Ritter’s eyes flew open and he stared down at him. “You too, it seems… unless we’re both dead…” he added raspingly, coughing sharply as clutching a cautions hand to his bandaged chest as he cut short a weak, ill-advised chuckle.

  “The Reichsmarschall and I were concerned…” Ritter admitted after a moment of collecting his thoughts.

  “How is the ‘old man’?”

  “Not himself, strangely,” Ritter was forced to admit. “He’s been limping about all morning – not sure what they’ve done to him – and he keeps moaning on; something about the flying boat that came this morning: that we should’ve been on it. It sounds like he’s just given up, and it’s a little disconcerting, to tell the truth. I get it… I understand that we’re trapped here, but are we truly in such danger that it’s affecting him that much? He can’t stop going on about it.”

  “Mmmh… not like him at all,” Schiller agreed, frowning. “I know he’s old and all that, but he’s never been defeatist… not in all the years I’ve known him.”

  “At least you’re better, though,” Ritter observed, changing the subject to something more pleasant. “The doctor tells me you’ll make a full recovery, although it may be some months…”

  “‘Full recovery…’… really…?” Schiller repeated, a faint hint of sarcasm in his tone that Ritter found he didn’t like one bit. “That’s good to know.” Then he added, far more genuinely: “I’d not be here at all were it not for you throwing me from that Land Rover when you did. I owe you my life.”

  “You’d have done the same,” Ritter shrugged without a moment’s thought on the matter.

  “Would I…?” Schiller asked weakly, fear showing in his expression momentarily as he remembered the terror he’d experienced as the ambush had been sprung. “I’d – I’d like to think I would have the courage… I’m not so sure… They captured the woman – Donelson?” He added quickly, making a serious effort to keep any intent from his tone.

  “The woman, yes… the doctor, you know about, of course…”

  “And the other one – the officer… Lloyd…?”

  “He was separated from the rest of us,” Ritter shrugged, trying to sound uncaring. “Of his fate, I know nothing.”

  “A shame if we lose him,” Schiller conceded, grimacing, “but not so bad in the end. To have her in their custody is not good however.” He almost grinned then. “You heard the overflight this morning, of course,” he stated matter-of-factly. “They are clearly feeling their loss, if they’ve risked one of their jets to come find us.” He hissed suddenly and arched his back as a sharp pain lanced through him from waist to shoulder, drawing a long, muffled grunt from him through clenched teeth.

  “I’ll call the doctor!”

  “No…It’s all right,” Schiller shook his head, waving him back as Ritter made to rise from the bed. “I’ve been getting these occasionally through the morning.” He pointed vaguely at the drip hanging from the stand beside the bed, and Ritter noticed for the first time that his words seemed to be slurring slightly. “They’re giving me morphine for the worst of it,” he explained with a weak smile, “and they’ve thrown in some penicillin to protect me from infection.” He gave a soft snort of derision over the irony of it, and his next words almost bitter in their rueful intensity.

  “Oh yes… condemn the Nazis for all their terrors if you must, but no one thinks to give thanks to the same Deutschland that gave mass-produced antibiotics to the world!” He continued, that vague bitterness returning. “My idea, you know? Kurt hadn’t even thought of it, but I did… something so simple that might help so many if we had such medicines readily available just a few years earlier. How many Allied soldiers will they save this time from fever and infection? None who’ll ever sing my praises, I’ll guarantee you that…!” He gave a shrug and turned his head away for a moment, staring at the opposite wall. “Still, perhaps I have saved myself, if nothing else… we humans are good for that, at least: saving ourselves…”

  “You’ll feel better when you’ve had a chance to recover,” Ritter suggested gently, resisting the attempt to probe for information in spite of his better judgement. The man was clearly vulnerable, and there was something bothering him that Ritter couldn’t put his finger on: either way, it somehow seemed wrong to take advantage of that, although the desire to do so was nevertheless almost overwhelming.

  “Shall I? That’s a relief…” Schiller muttered drily, not bothering to turn his head, then stiffened briefly as another spark of agony tore through him, this one slightly weaker. “How surprising it hurts to have your chest blown open,” he added with self-deprecating sarcasm. “Such an irony, yes? I can’t even so much as catch a bloody cold, but a few wayward pieces of shrapnel almost did for me well enough.”

  “What does that mean?” Ritter asked quickly, turning to sit at the edge of the bed now and leaning forward as his curiosity and desire for intel finally overriding his overbearing sense of honour. “Why can you not catch cold?”

  “Oh, you should hear the story of that…!” Schiller exclaimed with a croaky chuckle, a
nd from where he sat, Ritter couldn’t see the expression of dark intensity that flashed across his face in that moment. As Schiller shifted in the bed and turned back to face him, it was already gone; replaced by something far more pleasant and utterly convincing. “Shall I tell you a story, then? The story of a complete and utter fool caught up in the grandest lie in the history of history itself…?”

  “I have forty minutes before they take me back…” Ritter remarked as he casually glanced at his wristwatch, trying desperately not to sound too eager or excited. “You may begin any time…”

  “Then let me give you your money’s worth!” Schiller grinned toothily, little real humour in it.

  He began to speak then, laying out a life story and a wild, incredible tale that might’ve been unbelievable, had it not been for the fact that both men already knew it to be the absolute truth. And as Schiller opened up and unburdened his soul of a decade of guilt, shame and secrecy, he found that the most interesting part of the entire scene was in realising that both he and Ritter were watching each other with equal intensity.

  The truth of it is that we’re both such liars, he thought darkly, keeping the thoughts from his outward expression. He lies to me as he pretends he knows nothing, and I lie to him as I pretend to believe in his ‘shock and surprise’.

  He almost laughed then, checking himself as he felt the great irony that in that moment, both of them were being equally false. After what he’d seen the night before – the way Ritter had spoken to Donelson in such a relaxed manner – that knew that the pilot must at least know some of the story already… must know something of the true origins of the Hindsight Unit. Yet Schiller too was hiding at the same time; pretending he believed every frown or gasp of surprise that was received as he told the tale… as if the man he was talking truly was hearing it all for the first time: as if he weren’t actually a spy working for their greatest enemy.

  Lying there in that Ambon hospital, loaded with morphine, his shredded chest riddled with stitches and swathed in bandages, Albert Schiller couldn’t have cared less.

  Lieutenant Oshiro Takeshi was feeling tired, dirty, angry and utterly humiliated as he rode back through Paso in Hasegawa’s personal transport, heading toward Ambon Township and the main Japanese HQ set up there. With no accurate maps or any intimate knowledge of the island’s terrain, and little more than a general idea of the appropriate direction back toward the Japanese lines, he’d wandered aimlessly through thick jungle for the better part of a day and a half, time and again forced to backtrack or make huge detours due to inconveniently-placed cliffs, hills or other unexpected obstacles of the local geography.

  He’d finally managed to reach Soewakoda, ready to collapse on the spot, only to find himself in the midst of the first day’s mass executions. Too exhausted to join in and also a little squeamish at the idea of beheading another human being – although he’d never have admitted it – he’d begged off any offers for him to join the growing queue of Japanese waiting their turn at the sword, and had instead managed to cadge a ride back to HQ with the major, who’d been intending to leave soon anyway.

  “You heard that terrible roar this morning, sir?” Oshiro asked cautiously, finding the silence a little uncomfortable.

  “I suspect everyone on the entire island heard that sound, lieutenant,” Hasegawa replied drily, shaking his head. “Some of the fools at Laha were calling it a dragon!”

  “Which… which, of course it isn’t…” the younger man ventured, not sounding quite as certain as he’d have preferred.”

  “An aircraft, of course,” he scoffed in return. “One of our enemies’ – a new, turbine-powered model of some type, no doubt. Both we and the Nazis are working on designs of our own: I find it unlikely either the Americans or the British would allow themselves to fall behind. Not sure what they were hoping to accomplish with cloud cover so thick, but no doubt it made them feel better. You’ve had a bit of excitement these last few days, haven’t you, Oshiro-san?” Hasegawa observed cheerfully, changing the subject. “Lucky to survive and lucky to make it back in one piece…” He gave a casual shrug. “The gods have smiled on you, it seems.”

  “I’ve had some good fortune, sir, yes…” the pilot conceded grudgingly, thinking quite the opposite in his own mind. The shame of having been shot down by a woman still burned like a torch within his psyche. “Such things build character… an honourable struggle…”

  “Mmmh,” Hasegawa agreed vaguely, not sounding at all convinced. “No doubt your family will be relieved to hear you’re alright…”

  “A day’s rest perhaps, and I shall be fine, sir… but something to write home about, to be sure.”

  “Oshiro Takeshi…?” The major asked with a sudden recognition of the man’s name. “Your brother is Oshiro Hisao… a captain with Kempetai…?” The younger man nodding in surprised response. “We served together for some time in China. You father is still with Akagi, yes?” He added as the open-topped jeep rattled its way along the uneven, muddy track that ran between Paso and Ambon town.

  “Yes, sir!” He answered, chest swelling with pride. “Fleet officer with Admiral Yamamoto’s staff now, sir. We’d not heard from him for some time because of secrecy, but we know now of course what they were all up to.” News of the great naval victory of Hawaii had spread throughout the Empire, and Oshiro was as proud of his father’s part as any dutiful son would be.

  “He’s brought great honour to your family and to the Emperor,” Hasegawa nodded approvingly, both men seated in the rear of the vehicle, their driver struggled with a contrary steering wheel as the jeep bounced and wobbled over heavily-rutted, sodden roads already churned up by the passage of far too many trucks and tanks.

  “I wanted to take part in the executions, sir…” Oshiro said softly, turning his face away in sudden shame. He’d taken the remark entirely the wrong way, fearing perhaps that the officer was comparing his father’s exploits to a clear lack of his own. “I just needed some rest, first…”

  “You may be surprised to know this, lieutenant, but I personally see little honour in the killing of defenceless prisoners…” Hasegawa assured, immediately recognising the man’s embarrassment for what it was “…particularly men who could be put to better use as labourers or for any number of menial tasks. I took no part in these killings for this reason, so do not think you need to explain yourself to me. There are far bigger issues to deal with here than some random acts of pointless vengeance,” he continued, shaking his head faintly at the inefficient waste of it all. “Perhaps these damned Germans need some perspective also. Again and again this morning, the old one has been bailing up my men with ridiculous demands. Do they not understand that there is more at stake here than some stupid request for a radio that will never be granted?”

  “They are causing trouble, sir?”

  “Trouble enough to drag me away from my normal duties to deal with it; the engineers can’t even get the bloody fencing up around the camp without being accosted. And still, life inconveniently goes on elsewhere. So much to do, still…” he muttered, almost to himself now as he considered his own personal problems. “A sizeable Australian force still at large and active on the Latimor Peninsula... a beached freighter to protect... this damned female officer to look after…”

  “A woman, sir?” Oshiro asked sharply.

  “Yes, yes,” the major dismissed casually, for once completely missing the intent behind the younger man’s question. “It’s not enough it seems for our enemy to keep them at home in their kitchens, or even working in their factories as has been happening of late: apparently they make officers of them now, would you believe?”

  “A woman officer…?” Oshiro probed, suddenly filled with a combination of excitement and humiliated rage. “A gaijin woman…?”

  “This is what I said, did I not?” Hasegawa grumped, lost now in his own world and getting nothing of any significance from the other man’s tone. “Actual military officers…!” He repeated, shaking his h
ead once more, almost in disgust, as he considered the insanity of the idea. “Not to my taste, but attractive enough, I suppose… if you like the appearance of those gaijin whores. A naval captain, would you believe? Clearly they are shouganai… a lost cause!”

  “Indeed, Hasegawa-dono…” Oshiro answered thoughtfully, staring out at the passing jungle as the unexpected possibility of vengeance began to consume him “…shouganai, indeed…!”

  Japanese Army engineers were already setting up fencing and barbed wire around the near perimeter as Ritter was brought back down to the quarters they’d been assigned near the beach. The hospital lay inland, near the eastern edge of the site, and the barrack lines between weren’t yet guarded well enough for him to be trusted to return without escort. Until there was contiguous fencing around the entire compound, no prisoners held there would be permitted to roam about unchecked.

  There were few prisoners as yet – perhaps a handful of Australian and Dutch and, ironically, perhaps a dozen crewmen left over from Kormoran, each nationality so far keeping to themselves and avoiding the others with surprisingly little friction. Ritter suspected that wouldn’t last: that the current, sullen sense of defeat that appeared to have affected even his own CO would undoubtedly turn to antagonism and conflict soon enough once the initial shock of imprisonment had passed. A large number had been taken away that morning, as part of a work gang at Laha, they’d been told, and he thought it a good idea to keep them all active rather than left idle.

  Their captors had been smart enough to keep the officers and other ranks separated in any case: they were taking no chances on collaboration on some kind of escape plan or other offensive action. While Donelson and the two of them had been confined down near the beach, the rest of the few enlisted prisoners they did have were being housed in barrack lines up near the hospital itself, with regular armed patrols in between.