Storm Front (Twilight of the Gods Book 1)

by Christopher Nuttall

  Word would spread, long before the official announcement. He’d make sure of it. His agents would even make the cuts seem worse than they actually were, although in truth they were probably painful enough already to cause a major protest in the streets. And then, the SS would be waiting. Blood would flow on the streets of Germany and the Reich would be saved.

  He glanced at Adolf Bormann, sitting silently at the head of the table. Who knew what he was thinking? Karl would never have accepted such a title without the power that went with it, even though the Reich was determined to prevent another Hitler, another lone man wielding supreme power over Germany. But the civilians and the military would no longer be able to stand in his way, after the protest was brutally crushed. He would be Fuhrer, in fact as well as name, and he would lead Germany back to greatness...

  ... And the civilians, who had drained the Reich of the vitality it needed to survive, would be ruthlessly wiped from existence.

  ***

  “So tell me,” Caius said, as they completed their shift and left the station. “How does it feel to have important relatives?”

  Herman clenched his fists in rage - and helplessness. It was bad enough that everyone at the station knew his wife was one of the protesters - he wasn't the only policeman whose wife had gone out onto the streets - but to have his daughter leading a student protest movement was unique. He didn't know what to do about it. None of his sons had ever caused this much trouble. He’d remonstrated with her, pointing out the dangers of being arrested (again) or simply being expelled, then he’d beaten her and then he’d finally threatened to withdraw her from the university for good. But Adelinde had told him, in no uncertain terms, that if he ever wanted to see her naked again, he had to forget about removing Gudrun from the university. Herman didn’t know what to do about her either.

  “Just you wait,” he said. Caius’s sons were in the military, if he recalled correctly; his daughters were still at school, too young to either marry or try to get into the university. “Your wife might be out on the streets too.”

  “My wife has too much sense,” Caius said. He pulled a packet of cheap cigarettes from his pocket and offered one to Herman, who took it with practiced ease. “And my daughters are too young to want to do anything more than keep their heads down and avoid the teachers.”

  He sighed as he struck a match and lit the cigarettes. “But they’re already talking about quitting the BDM...”

  Herman snorted, privately relieved that Gudrun had left the BDM last year. Kurt and Johan had both loved the Hitler Youth, but Siegfried hadn't found it quite so enjoyable. He had a feeling that his youngest son, like many other teenagers, would start demanding to be allowed to quit soon enough - and if the BDM had been hard on a policeman’s daughter, he was sure it would have been worse for many other girls. How many teenagers would demand to be allowed to spend the time elsewhere, instead of being taught how to serve the Reich?

  He breathed in the smoke as they walked past the front desk, through the armoured door and out onto the streets. Berlin felt different now, as if it were hanging on the knife edge between chaos and order, as if the population was no longer inclined to obey orders without asking questions and demanding answers first. It made him feel uneasy; he’d grown up in a world where saying the wrong thing could lead to jail or worse. Even spending most of his life in the military and police hadn't cured him of the corrosive fear that he could say the wrong thing, in front of the wrong pair of ears, and wind up dead. And, even though children learned to be careful of what they said at school, his daughter was still standing up for the right to free speech.

  She’s brave, he thought. And yet she’s naive.

  It was a bitter thought. Gudrun had endured so much more than the lash of his belt, yet she had no conception of just how bad things could become. Herman knew; he’d been a paratrooper before leaving the military and joining the police. He knew the savage horrors of war - and the worse horrors unleashed by the SS, intent on keeping the government in power at all costs. If she was arrested a second time, after opening her mouth in front of hundreds of witnesses, there would be no mercy. She'd be lucky if the rest of her family wasn't scooped up off the streets and marched into the concentration camps.

  “I understand how they feel,” Caius said. “I had to beat the shit out of one of the matrons, after she hurt my daughter. None of them signed up for the BDM.”

  And what happens, Herman asked himself again, to girls who don’t have powerful protectors?

  It was easy to push Gastarbeiters around. He certainly didn't feel any guilt about it. They were Untermenschen. No one in power would care if a handful got their skulls cracked, if they didn't obey orders or merely looked at the policemen the wrong way. But it was different when the people on the streets were wives and children, ordinary Germans who had relatives in the police and the army. Herman would have cheered if an agitator was taken off the streets, until he’d discovered that his own daughter was one of them. He remembered feeling angry when Gudrun had come home sporting bruises, after playing games with the BDM; it would be worse, far worse, if she was beaten bloody by the police. And he was the police.

  “I don't know,” he said, finally. “Just be glad they’re not old enough to cause trouble yet.”

  “Hah,” Caius said. He sounded bitter. “One of them is already suggesting a strike at school.”

  Herman laughed, then sobered. It would take a brave child to stand up to the teachers at school - the teachers had little compunction about inflicting corporal punishment on their charges, if they misbehaved - but his son was brave. Poor Siegfried had two older brothers - and now one sister - to emulate. And Siegfried already knew the teachers weren't particularly fair. Some of them lashed students because they enjoyed it, not because their victims deserved punishment.

  He shuddered. His perfect family was gone. The world was changing. He no longer felt comfortable in the city he’d patrolled for the last fifteen years...

  ... And, in all honesty, he had no idea what was going to happen next.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Berlin, Germany

  21 August 1985

  “This just popped up on the network,” Sven said.

  Horst glanced up, interested. He’d taken to spending more time with Sven over the last week, although the orders he’d received - after he’d made a carefully non-committal report to his handlers - had told him to stick close to Gudrun. Gudrun herself had claimed to be unconcerned, but Horst was fairly sure that was nothing more than bravado. She’d set herself up as a student leader, the student leader, and she couldn't really allow herself to show fear.

  And she keeps nagging me to teach her how to fight, he thought. But where can we do it without attracting attention?

  He pushed the thought aside. “What is it?”

  “It’s a note from a friend in the Finance Ministry,” Sven said. “Apparently, they’re going to cut the Mutterkreuz support payments completely.”

  Horst leaned forward. “Are you sure?”

  “The source has proven reliable before,” Sven said. “He was the one who provided us with the comparative price data.”

  Horst frowned. The upside of all the students involved in protest movements, on one level or another, was hundreds of minds studying the government’s official statistics and comparing them with reality. It hadn't taken long to realise that the real prices for everything from food to clothing were slowly creeping upwards, forcing families to spend more and more on basic necessities. Horst was no economist - it was a closed field to him - but he’d been taught the basics of budgeting at his stepfather’s knee. A person - or a family - simply couldn’t spend more than they earned.

  Or at least not for very long, Horst thought sardonically. A bank would be happy to give a loan to a farmer, if the farmers used their farm as collateral.

  It wasn't a pleasant thought - and it would be worse, he knew, in Berlin, where civilians couldn't live off the land. Growing one’s own f
oodstuffs, let alone rearing meat animals, was strictly forbidden within the city. A family of six, with the husband away in the military, would find it very hard to survive if the Mutterkreuz payments were halted. Indeed, there was no way the current system was sustainable without the payments. The more he thought about it, the more he wondered if it was a trick of some kind. But what sort of person would want the population to believe their throats were about to be cut?

  “It says here that the Reichstag will be meeting later today to discuss the cuts,” Sven said, breaking into his thoughts. He looked up, sharply. “They’ll... they’ll just approve it, won’t they?”

  “They will,” Horst confirmed. The government might have conceded free elections to the Reichstag, but none of those elections had been held - yet. He couldn't decide if someone was playing games or if they genuinely believed the Reichstag’s blessing would stop the backlash. “All the Reichstag does is approve what the government wants it to approve.”

  He looked down at his hands, thinking hard. Word would already be spreading, thanks to the hundreds of computer users - and experts - who were joining the protest movement. He wouldn't be surprised if the unionists weren't already being informed - their families would be threatened by the cuts - and it wouldn't be long before Hilde’s mother found out. She might not need any support payments from the state, but she’d hardly underestimate the threat to the rest of the city’s women. They’d be out on the streets within an hour...

  “I’m going to find Gudrun,” he said, rising. “Start spreading the word as far as you can.”

  “Jawohl,” Sven said.

  ***

  Volker Schulze had been expecting the government to do something - anything - about the unions, ever since the government had been forced into a humiliating retreat. He had no illusions. The only way to rise into power - civilian, military or SS - was to have a ruthless drive for power combined with a slavish loyalty to one’s branch. And even if the government had been prepared to let bygones be bygones, the corporate managers wouldn't let them. The thought of their workers actually standing up to them, resisting their demands and even shutting down the factories, would be too much.

  But he’d never expected the government to threaten to cut support payments.

  They had to be out of their minds, he thought. The government had been encouraging Germans to have large families since 1944, since the official end of the war. They’d been helping to fund the families too, awarding payments to women who had more than three children. How many families were completely dependent on those payments? Their husbands didn't bring in enough money to make up the shortfall. They had to be mad...

  ... Unless they’re deliberately planning to punish the women, he thought. The state had rarely seen women as anything other than mothers, daughters and wives. Indeed, there were only a handful of professions routinely open to women. They must have been horrified when the women went out onto the streets.

  “We can't let them get away with it,” Joachim said. “I have a wife and four appetites to feed.”

  Volker nodded in agreement. “Start calling everyone,” he said. “We’re leaving our work and going to the Reichstag.”

  ***

  Gudrun couldn't help a flicker of fear as she led the tidal wave of students out of the university. There was strength in numbers, strength in the certainty that hundreds - perhaps thousands - of people were behind her, yet there was also a sickening nervousness that made her want to throw up. Horst - and her father - had told her, in great detail, what would happen if the SS decided, truly decided, to crush the students. Machine gun bullets, her father had said, would go through flesh like hot knives through butter. Part of Gudrun almost wished she’d let her father beat her into submission, but then she looked at the students and knew she couldn't let them down. It might have been a mistake to stand up and declare herself their leader, it might have painted a target on her backside, but now she’d done it she was committed.

  “The Reichstag believes we will accept its judgement,” she'd said, when she’d assembled the students. Most of the tutors had made themselves scarce; the SS spies - the known spies, at least - had been isolated. “We have to show them that we will not tamely accept their rulings any longer.”

  She kept walking forward, feeling her heartbeat starting to pound as she led the way towards Victory Square. They’d spread the leaflets there - it felt as through she’d done that years ago - but now, now she was going there openly, with thousands of others at her back. Whatever happened, she promised herself silently, there would be no more hiding. The state would no longer be able to hide its crimes under a facade of respectability.

  “No cuts,” she shouted. “No cuts!”

  The students took up the chant. More and more people - workers, women, even ordinary civilians - were flowing out of their homes and joining the march. Gudrun wished she’d thought of producing a handful of banners, but it hadn’t occurred to her before the march had begun. Horst had advised her not to plan a march and she’d listened to him. She caught sight of a handful of policemen, staring in horror, and winced inwardly. Was her father watching her as she marched towards Victory Square?

  We need some better organisation, she thought, as the crowd swelled still further. She’d wanted to set up a network of student leaders, and march stewards, but Horst had warned her that the regime would have no trouble targeting them. Better to avoid having many known leaders, he’d said. We have to put women and children to the front.

  She glanced to the left as Horst appeared beside her. He had to shout to be heard over the din. “What do we do when we reach the Reichstag?”

  “March in circles,” Gudrun shouted back. There were armed SS guards defending the colossal building. They’d shoot, she was sure, if the marchers tried to break into the Reichstag itself. “March and shout ourselves hoarse.”

  Horst didn't look happy, but he held his tongue.

  ***

  “There are thousands of people on the streets,” a frantic messenger reported. “They’re advancing on the Reichstag!”

  “Call for police reinforcements,” Voss suggested. “And the Berlin Guard!”

  Karl smirked inwardly as the Reich Council started to panic, hastily issuing orders and countermanding them seconds later. By his calculations, the marchers would be at the Reichstag within twenty minutes at most, although the growing stream of newcomers would slow them down. No one had any real experience with unplanned protests in the Reich, not when the only permitted mass movements were parades and ceremonial marches. Some of the students would probably trip, fall and be crushed below the marching feet before they had a chance to escape.

  He took one last look at the council, currently issuing more orders to the Berlin Guard, and slipped out of the chamber. Sturmbannfuehrer Viktor Harden was on alert - the police unit had been ready to move ever since the first rumours had been allowed to leak - and his men would be on their way within minutes. And then the protesters were in for a nasty surprise.

  And the Berlin Guard can keep its hands clean, he thought, nastily. The Guard would be purged when he was Fuhrer. They can walk straight into the concentration camps after they help us clear up the mess.

  ***

  “They want us where?”

  “There’s a crowd of marchers heading towards the Reichstag, the CO bellowed, as soldiers hastily grabbed weapons and equipment. “The Reich Council wants us in place to turn them away from the building, if necessary!”

  Kurt shuddered as he checked his rifle while heading down to the vans. They’d anticipated deployment onto the streets, but now the call had come chaos reigned supreme. He couldn't help noticing that many of the soldiers under his command were exchanging nervous glances, clearly unsure of themselves. They’d been preparing to fight barbarian terrorists in South Africa, where it was kill or be killed, not German civilians on the streets of Berlin. They all came from Berlin, Kurt knew; their friends and families might be their targets, not Untermenschen.


  And Gudrun will be out there somewhere, he thought. He’d taken a great deal of ribbing from his fellow officers about his sister’s role in the university protests, although - thankfully - his superiors had either not made the connection between him and Gudrun or chosen to ignore it. They had too many incidents of mutinous chatter to worry about a junior officer with an unfortunate relative. What do I do if they order us to open fire?

  He sucked in his breath as he looked at the men. The younger ones looked eager - this would be their first taste of action, although it couldn't compare to a battlefield - but the older ones were clearly concerned. Many of them had wives and children... how could they bear the thought of firing into a crowd of protesters? German protesters. As God was his witness, Kurt honestly didn't know which way to jump. If the CO ordered him to open fire on the crowds, what should he do?