“Where is the Bronx?”
“North of the City, near Yonkers.”
“Bronx?” The SS Captain questioned. “Was that not the name of an American city prior to the war?” he asked the Gestapo.
“I believe so, sir. If it was the city that I think it was, it would now be located in Quadrant F-42.”
“You are lying. I do not like liars,” Von Helldorf said aggravated. He slapped Wayne hard across the face. “TALK.”
“I told you the truth. I’m a college student at New York University. My professor there invented a time machine, sent me back in time to 1933 to kill Hitler, I did. And then I came back to this damn nightmare. That’s the whole truth and nothing but the fucking truth,” he raved.
“You refer to places that have not existed for over thirty years. Why? Who has taught you these things?”
Wayne didn’t answer the SS Captain; he just stared blankly.
Von Helldorf was becoming impatient. “The fun has begun to wear thin. Bring over the electrodes.”
A cart with a shock treatment device was brought over. The Gestapo cranked it up and attached the two electrodes to Wayne’s testicles, one electrode per ball.
“Let me tell you something, my naïve prisoner. Your kind, no matter what it is,” Von Helldorf worked himself up into a sweat, “Jew, Slavic, Pole, homosexual or any other of the inferior slave peoples that infect the Reich, will be crushed and destroyed. That is the Gestapo’s number one priority.” Furiously he said, “Tell me the truth.”
“I already did,” Wayne frantically said.
“Hochspannung.” Von Helldorf commanded.
The Gestapo manning the machine turned a dial a small amount to the right.
Wayne’s body became rigid and his muscles tense as electricity shot through his groin. He bit his lip hard, trying not to scream.
“Hohes tier!” Von Helldorf commanded.
The man turned the dial all the way to the right, as far as it would go. All of the three Gestapo men present clearly were amused and received a perverted satisfaction from the proceedings. These mindless robots had no idea of the pain actually being inflicted on their prisoner.
Wayne could not hold it any longer. He shrieked and it echoed off the walls.
Later that evening, the Gestapo men whom had been working downstairs would offer their congratulations for a job well done to their colleague and mentor, SS Captain Von Helldorf. After all, it wasn’t every interrogation when they were able to hear the victim’s screams through the ceiling above their heads.
The jail cellblock contained numerous small cells, however, the cells lacked the usual iron gates that kept a prisoner contained. Instead, the prisoners were confined by lines of red laser beams that ran from the ceiling down to the floor in front of each diminutive cell. If a prisoner tried to escape, that prisoner would be fried to a crisp by the intense heat generated by the laser beam. The Gestapo men always got a kick out of seeing a prisoner, who could not take being locked up anymore or any of the many forms of torture that would be perpetrated on him, commit suicide by throwing himself, or as the case sometimes was, herself, into the scorching red hot center of the laser beam. The small jail cells were devoid of any furnishings, windows, or even a simple piece of plumbing for a basic human need — a toilet.
The cellblock housed six prisoners, four men and two women. These once proud citizens were filthy and had been reduced, by repeated punishments back to a childlike state of mind. Why were some of the prisoners incarcerated? One poor man, a dentist, had an alcohol problem. Another prisoner was accused of embezzlement from his company. This was typical of the prison system in the Reich.
A seventh prisoner was added to the cellblock that night. The thick, steel entrance door was opened and Wayne was brought in by the Gestapo who had interrogated him. Captain Von Helldorf followed them in. Wayne, wearing only his underwear, was pushed into a vacant cell.
“You are to stand at attention with your eyes looking straight ahead, arms at your side,” Von Helldorf instructed the prisoner. “If you are found sitting, sleeping, or in any other position than what I just described, you will be shot like a dog. Let me assure you, that if you are foolish enough to try to leave, you will be cooked alive.”
The Captain took a remote control device out of his coat pocket. He aimed the remote control towards a sensor at the top of the jail cell and pressed a button on it. Lines of red laser beams appeared, running from ceiling to floor in front of the cell.
Wayne assumed the position of standing at attention.
Von Helldorf and his men left the cellblock, locking the door behind them.
To say that Wayne was a little in pain then would have been like saying the Grand Canyon was nothing more than a little hold in the ground. Wayne mustered the tiny amount of strength he had remaining to keep standing, a torture in its own way. He ached everywhere and wavered where he stood.
Later that evening, around midnight, SS Captain Von Helldorf was busy working in his office. His office was by no means extravagant, but was beautifully furnished with velvet furniture and ivory carved figures. Ivory, imported from Africa, was the latest craze among the SS elite.
Von Helldorf was sticking colored pins into a big wall map. The map was a representation of what was once called Manhattan Island, but the letters on the map indicated the area was NEW BERLIN CITY. There was a knock at the door.
“Who is it?” Von Helldorf asked, slightly louder than in his normal talking voice. He waited for an answer, but did not hear one through the closed door of his office. The Captain left the map, went to the door, and opened it. Dr. Lisa Hoffmann was there to see him. “Yes?”
“I am here for the release of a prisoner,” Dr. Hoffmann stated.
“Who are you?”
“Doctor Lisa Hoffmann: identity number D3847835. I am a tenured professor at New Berlin University.” She showed a work identity card, required of all employees in the Reich, to Von Helldorf.
“Come in,” the Captain said.
Dr. Hoffmann walked into the SS Captain’s office. She had never seen so much beautiful ivory in one place. Personally, she was appalled that the great African elephants were coming dangerously close to extinction because of certain bureaucrats’ insatiable appetites for the ivory, but that was not a subject she dare bring up.
“Please, sit down,” Von Helldorf offered.
Dr. Hoffmann sat down in a comfortable chair across from the Captain’s moderately sized teak desk.
“This is strange. Are you not the same Dr. Lisa Hoffmann mentioned in my report who had turned in the prisoner in the first place?” Von Helldorf questioned. “That is, if we are speaking about the same prisoner who had been picked up at NBU.”
“Yes, sir. I am the one who called the authorities and with good reason.”
“What authorization do you have for your request?”
Dr. Hoffmann handed some official looking papers to the Captain.
Von Helldorf scrutinized the papers. “This is very odd,” he said. “You are telling me that the mentioned prisoner here is part of an experiment?”
“Correct. A very important research study in psychological stress that could have far reaching implications for the Reich.”
Captain Von Helldorf did not understand. “How can this be, that a subject would put himself in such a dangerous situation?”
Dr. Hoffmann replied, “An advanced form of hypnosis was used.” She explained, “After the subject had volunteered for the project, all of the subject’s memories had to be temporarily erased and a new identity installed, so to speak, in its place. In order for me to gauge psychological stress accurately, the subject had to actually believe that what was happening was a real situation.” Dr. Hoffmann had rehearsed her lines well.