‘Listen to me, if the lieutenant dies, he’ll come back. And your uniforms and allegiances and past histories will count for nothing. He’ll attack and—’
‘No, with all due respect, sir, you listen to me,’ Harris interrupted. ‘The lieutenant has seen me safely through many a scrape. I’m not going to turn my back on him now when he needs me most.’
Wilkins was ready to protest, but he knew it would do no good. He understood completely, but that didn’t make the situation any easier to deal with. He reluctantly stepped away from Henshaw, but kept his clasp knife gripped tight in his hand.
The group’s hasty entrance and subsequent bickering had aroused plenty of attention from the undead hordes outside, and whilst Steele had been able to draw many of them away, there were still a considerable number gathered around the front of the hut. ‘We’re blocked in,’ Barton whispered. He’d been looking out through a small window. ‘There’s loads of them out there. We either fight our way out, or we wait.’
‘We can’t wait,’ Wilkins reminded him. ‘There’s no time. If we’re not at the rendezvous point by dawn, I fear we’ll be spending the rest of our days here in Polonezköy.’
‘Here,’ Jones hissed from the other side of the shack. ‘There’s another door.’
He hesitated before opening it, fearing what he might find on the other side and picturing swarms more reanimated guards and prisoners emerging from the shadows and rushing towards him.
It was empty.
The connecting room was much larger than the first, and it was almost completely bare. Its purpose was immediately apparent. The stench of death hung heavy in the air, even stronger here than in the rest of this damned place. The remaining men left Henshaw and followed Jones inside. It was easy for each of them to stand here and picture it packed to the rafters with confused and frightened prisoners of war, brought to Polonezköy to be exterminated in their thousands.
With Henshaw wounded, Wilkins assumed command. He knew this would be a test of his diplomatic as well as his military skills. He stood with the others in the ante-room and cleared his throat to speak. ‘Let’s not forget why we are here, gentlemen. This camp, and other camps like it, are places of unspeakable horror where despicable acts are carried out with alarming regularity. The Nazis who operated this facility have shown no mercy to these innocent people, and now we shall show no mercy to them. If, in the hours ahead, you ever have cause to doubt what we are doing and why we are doing it, remember this room. Remember the awful feeling in your gut which I know you all have right now, just as I do. Remember the sense of dread that sits in your belly like vomit because you know you are in the presence of true evil.’
‘Well said, sir,’ Barton mumbled.
‘Keep your heads, men, and remember what’s at stake. We’d already been told that Polonezköy had fallen largely silent, and now we know why. What we have here is a microcosm – a scaled-down version of what will inevitably happen to the entire world if we don’t do the job we’ve been sent here to do. Do you all understand?’
Even though their collective responses were low and subdued, it was clear that they did.
‘So what’s the plan?’ Jones asked.
‘Given the importance to the Reich of what was developed here, I’m convinced that Doctor Månsson’s laboratory must be somewhere in the castle. Given the lack of human resistance we’ve encountered since arriving here, I suspect the Doctor himself has either been incarcerated or abandoned or both. I don’t know what we’ll find in there, but the castle and its keep is where we need to start our search. Once we have the doctor or, failing that, his research, we simply have to get out of this hellish place and make our way to the rendezvous site.’
‘You make it sound so simple,’ Barton said, barely managing to contain his sarcasm. Wilkins was not impressed.
‘Mr Barton, I am under absolutely no illusions, and nor should you be. I knew this mission would be nigh on impossible from the outset, and nothing I’ve seen so far has convinced me otherwise. However, as we all know, the importance of what we’re doing here cannot be overstated. Without us, the entire civilised world is as good as lost forever. The dead will inherit the Earth. Our families, friends and other loved ones will be slaughtered by the dead and will almost inevitably join their ranks. And if we are unsuccessful, we too face the same foul fate. We simply cannot afford to fail. The success of the mission must come first, no matter what the cost.’
As Wilkins spoke and the others listened, transfixed and terrified in equal measure, Lieutenant Henshaw gave out his last breath and died. Lying on the floor in the adjacent room, he became completely still.
‘I suggest we find an alternative way out of this building,’ Wilkins continued. ‘If we’re clever about this, we might be able to get out without those damn buggers on the other side of the door knowing what we’re up to. With any luck they’ll remain focused on this building in the belief that we’re still inside.’
‘Do we have any idea about the layout of the castle?’ Harris asked.
‘Barely anything,’ Barton said.
‘What’s where don’t matter,’ Jones added. ‘We just keep searching ’til we find what we want.’
‘Exactly,’ Wilkins said. ‘We just need to—’
He was silenced by a godawful clattering from the room next door. It had been less than a minute, but the deadly germ already coursing through the late Lieutenant Henshaw’s bloodstream had already caused him to reanimate. In his infected stupor he’d tried to support himself on his badly broken arm and had fallen heavily against a wall, riling the corpses outside still further.
Harris lifted his lamp and illuminated the deceased officer’s death mask. It was a terrifying sight; so completely unnatural. So familiar, yet so unfamiliar at the same time. Dead Henshaw picked himself up again and staggered towards the light, his mouth hanging open, ready to bite and spread the deadly infection he carried. Harris froze.
Wilkins grabbed Henshaw by the scruff of the neck and spun him around, pushing him back against the wall. Yet more excitement rippled through the ranks of the foul crowd amassed outside at the noise. He raised his knife and did what he had to do. Henshaw twitched and jerked for a moment on the end of his blade, then dropped heavily to the ground like a marionette whose strings had been suddenly severed.
Wilkins turned to look at the others, who gazed back at him with conflicting emotions. He’d saved their lives, but he’d also just hacked down the commanding officer who’d led them into and safely out of many a nightmarish scrape over the months they’d been under his charge. Wilkins completely appreciated the enormity of what he’d just done.
‘We have no choice in this, men. As I said, failure is not an option. And if I or indeed any one of us should become infected like the poor lieutenant, then I expect each of you to fight to be the one who ends the poor bugger’s infernal existence. Do I make myself clear?’
‘Yes, sir.’
21
There’d been an uncomfortable delay whilst they’d waited for the inevitable attack, but within minutes the dead had begun to slowly come at them from all directions at once, crawling out of the forest with a nonchalant lack of speed but unquestionable intent.
The company medic was still trying to do what he could for Private Willard; badly burned, shaking furiously with shock, not long for this world. They’d moved him to the hangar building while the rest of the men formed a defensive line around the top of the airfield. ‘This ain’t good,’ Captain Hunter said to Sergeant Hennessy.
‘We can hold them back, sir,’ Hennessy was quick to reply. He was spoiling for a fight, desperate to get his teeth into these damn creatures.