Horst shrugged back. Oberstgruppenführer Alfred Ruengeler had a good reputation, but he’d never met the man in person. He might easily be one of Holliston’s supporters, playing along with Forster until he was in position to have all of them arrested. And yet, Horst had watched the man, from a distance, as he was shown around the training ground. Ruengeler was distinctly unhappy, his expression suggesting he would rather be somewhere — anywhere — else. Perhaps he could be trusted…
And if he can’t be trusted, his own thoughts mocked, we’re all about to die.
His uncle had assured him that they should get word, if Ruengeler went straight to Holliston and betrayed the entire plan. He had a couple of his clients in the Reichstag and several more in the Waffen-SS. But Horst had his doubts. He’d switched sides, after all. His uncle’s clients might decide that Holliston, rather than Forster, was the better bet. Or they might just tell themselves they owed their allegiance to the Reich…
“It’s a gamble,” he said. He still shivered when he recalled just how close they’d come to complete disaster. “But I don’t think we have a choice.”
He looked up as the door opened. His uncle stepped into the room, looking remarkably dapper in a Volkssturm uniform that had clearly been specially tailored for him. Horst felt a flicker of the old contempt for the Volkssturm, even though he knew his uncle had been a soldier before his father had called him home and put him to work. And he’d had a promising career too.
“The Oberstgruppenführer appears to be willing to cooperate,” Forster said, sitting down in one of the hard chairs. “I feel he can be trusted, at least for the moment.”
Kurt looked doubtful. “Did he supply any useful information?”
“Enough,” Forster said. He gritted his teeth. “We may be stuck with the original plan.”
Horst scowled. He’d hoped they could get enough papers to get an assault force into the Reichstag itself, but his uncle had pointed out that there were too many security departments charged with protecting Germanica for them all to be subverted. Karl Holliston’s paranoia would cause all sorts of problems, if Germanica came under conventional attack, yet… for the moment, it seemed to be working out for him. Any attempt to move more than a handful of men into Germanica would trigger an alarm…
…And getting the papers to actually get into the Reichstag was impossible.
“Then we have to make it work,” he said. “Do you have a solid lead on the transmitter?”
“There’s two,” Forster said. “One in the Reichstag itself — that can be taken out fairly easily — and another, located in a hidden base near the city. We might be better off cutting the cable rather than trying to take out the base itself.”
“If we can cut the cable,” Horst pointed out. “It will be underground.”
“Getting down to it may pose a problem,” Forster agreed. “But if we attack the base itself…”
He allowed his voice to trail off, suggestively. Horst understood. Any attack plan that depended on everything going right — particularly when there were more than two or three moving parts — was a recipe for disaster. Attacking the base ahead of time would alert Holliston; leaving it intact, when the Reichstag itself came under attack, would run the risk of Holliston managing to send the launch commands before it was too late. But there was no choice. They were running short of time.
And if the reports from the Reichstag are accurate, he thought, Holliston might be jumping right off the slippery slope.
It was impossible to tell how many of the reports were accurate or simply nothing more than rumours — or wishful thinking — but it was clear that Holliston was losing his grip. His rages had already become the stuff of legends, while his long speeches on the subject of his inevitable victory were worrying his subordinates. And he’d had a private discussion with Gudrun without witnesses, something that bothered Horst more than he cared to admit. If Holliston had taken his frustrations out on Horst’s wife…
I’m coming, he promised Gudrun, silently. His imagination offered too many possibilities for what could have been done to her. And if you’ve been hurt, I’ll make sure he’s hurt worse.
“I know the risks,” he said, out loud. “And, once we know more about what’s going on, we can probably mitigate them.”
“Let us hope so,” his uncle said. “Too much is at stake for any mistakes.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Front Lines, Germany Prime
12 November 1985
The ground felt like solid rock.
Hennecke Schwerk cursed inwardly as he lifted the shovel and brought it down, trying to push it into the soil deep enough to start digging a hole. The ground resisted him, forcing him to push harder and harder just to make a hole large enough to bury a grenade. His strength seemed to fail a moment later, leaving him leaning helplessly on the shovel as he fought for breath. Whatever had happened to him — and the doctors had been no help whatsoever — clearly wasn’t over yet.
And to think I’m one of the lucky ones, he thought, bitterly. It was hard, so hard, to care enough to keep going. Others went to sleep and never woke up.
He gritted his teeth as he forced the shovel back into the ground. He’d been ordered to dig a trench large enough to bury the next set of dead soldiers, but alone… he doubted he could actually do it. His skin hurt, his head was pounding like a drum… he had the nasty feeling that he’d dig the grave, then become its first victim. It was all he could do, at times, to remain standing. Walking was almost completely beyond him.
Pointless, he told himself. Just… pointless.
He glanced up as he heard the sound of an aircraft flying overhead. A rebel aircraft, no doubt, the pilot looking down and sneering at the stormtroopers as they struggled to survive the cold. Part of him hoped that bombs would fall, putting him out of his misery, but nothing happened. He ran his hand through his hair — cursing as he saw more strands start to come loose and drift to the ground — then turned back to his work. The officers — damn their black souls — had made it clear that he wouldn’t be fed if he didn’t work. They were determined to get as much work as they could out of the injured before it was too late.
An impossible task, he thought. They really hate me.
It felt like hours before the trench was deep enough to qualify as a grave. He sat down, wishing for a cigarette or a drink or something to keep him going. His entire body felt hot and sweaty, despite the cold. He wasn’t sure what it meant if he was sweating in cold weather, but he doubted it was anything good. And the surges of fever that threatened to overcome him couldn’t be a good sign.
He was tempted just to stay sitting down, staring into the grave until one of the officers — or the cold — put him out of his misery. His world had shrunk to nothing more than a constant struggle to remain alive and breathing, despite the throbbing headaches and bouts of sweaty fever. He no longer cared about the Reich, or about his remaining comrades, or about teaching the rebels a lesson. All that mattered was remaining alive one more day…