The Metal Man: An Account of a WW2 Nazi Cyborg (5 page)

The two men exchanged a brief, defiant grin… Then their faces again became set and hard.

Brucker gone – it hardly seemed real. There was the same aching sense of disbelief in all the four men. Almost the belief that even now, Brucker might rise Christ-like, shaking off that blanket and saying, as he so often had –

‘Move your ass.’

A veteran of the Eastern Front, and a survivor of numerous, bloody hand-to-hand battles, finally stabbed to death by a peasant woman he’d been attempting to save from a burning building…?

Mayer and the others failed to see how such a thing could even have
happened
…

There was the
crack
of a gunshot from nearby, and one of the two other men who were sat sharing a cigarette muttered a curse.

Two more gunshots quickly followed.

Then a woman screamed.

‘The man who apparently had this dagger found on him had two sons,’ muttered one of the men who were smoking. ‘So that bastard Ackermann has them executed too, saying they’re also partisans ‘by association’ – and one of them still a lad of fourteen. Guess that was the mother we just heard.’

‘We may be forced to follow Ackermann, now,’ said the other man, as he passed the cigarette to the soldier who’d just spoken. ‘But there’s no bloody way I was going to go and watch as they shot those three villagers in the square.’

‘Goes for all of us, Bach,’ grunted Mayer. ‘We shouldn’t even be in this village, full-stop. Best chance for us all now is to get back to Germany quick as possible and start building defenses against the Ruskies. Ackermann can tell the standard bullshit about how we’re ‘staging a tactical withdrawal’ and ‘preparing for a regroup’. Anyone else who hasn’t got crap for brains, or isn’t a full-blown Nazi, knows we’re in a full-on state of retreat.’ 

‘We have to stick with this unit?’ murmured the man sat next to Bach.

Mayer glanced over at him, and sighed.

‘What are you suggesting, Weber – that we desert?’ he said. ‘As extremely tempting as that option is, you can still get shot for desertion, you know. We may not like being stuck with Ackermann and his animals – to put it mildly – but we’ve got no bloody choice in the matter.’

‘Getting something,’ said Amsel suddenly, as the radio crackled into life.

‘You want to say a few words?’ he then asked Mayer.

‘Yeah,’ returned Mayer, getting to his feet and walking over to the radioman. ‘As it happens, I do…’

*

When Ackermann returned a short while later, accompanied by several of his troops (including Rudolf Baer, whose nose Brucker had broken barely two hours before), he found Brucker’s men crouched almost defensively in front of their fallen leader’s body.

‘I’ve given the order to clear out,’ Ackermann informed them curtly. Darkness was beginning to descend. ‘Might be space for you on top of one of the three tanks, otherwise you’ll have to walk. Usual thing.

‘You might want to…’ – he gestured at the covered corpse with his chin – ‘get him buried quickly before we move on.’ 

Mayer shook his head, staring steadily back at the SS officer.

‘Seems we’ve got to wait… sir,’ he said levelly.

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Ackermann snapped back. ‘I’ve just given an order, damn you!’

‘We were able to get hold of General Hirsch’s secretary on the radio,’ Mayer informed him. ‘Told him what had taken place here…’

Mayer allowed a brief but awkward silence to develop; then he continued, ‘We were also instructed to wait with the body of Lieutenant Colonel Karl Brucker, as they’re sending a vehicle to pick him up. Should be here within the next half hour, I believe.’

‘What?’ spat Ackermann. ‘Coming to pick his body up? What the hell is this – just get him buried, and get your asses –’

‘Those are the orders we received, sir – and those are the orders we’ll follow,’ declared Mayer, his right hand moving almost imperceptibly towards the pistol on his belt.

Again, for the sake of avoiding a possible mutiny, Ackermann considered he’d no choice but to back down.

For now – he wouldn’t forget what had just happened…

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘Let them come and pick up Brucker’s body. Maybe they’ll take it all the way back to Berlin, and give him the hero’s burial he so richly deserves.’

With that, he turned and walked away, followed by the men he’d brought with him.

Mayer followed him with eyes like flint.

‘I wonder what
did
happen in that room, with Brucker, the woman and that sod,’ he muttered, almost to himself.

The others looked curiously at him.

‘How do you mean?’ asked Bach.

‘I don’t know… I just…’ Mayer began; then he shook his head.

‘I don’t know,’ he repeated, continuing to shake his head with some vague, nameless suspicion…

6

The required daily report for Operation Metal Man having been made, Wilhelm Reinhardt left his department’s bunker, taking the large elevator to the surface.

A cobbled courtyard was formed by the surrounding, nondescript buildings, which housed several offices but also the garage for the large military lorry that was currently being converted so that it could transport the Metal Man to wherever this machine was sent.

Yes –
machine
, thought Reinhardt firmly. That parts of a human brain including the cerebrum and cerebellum would be required in constructing the Metal Man did not give it any kind of soul.

It would be an automaton, obeying every order it received without any extraneous thought, designed and created purely to kill…

Reinhardt almost shuddered. Despite his enthusiasm for the project as a whole, he’d trouble accepting that the Metal Man would not be entirely mechanical.

But Jonas Schroder had informed him, right at the start, that there was no other way. For this project to be successful, parts of a recently-deceased soldier
had
to be utilized.

Sections of the brain, mainly, but also…

Reinhardt shook his head, refusing to think about this matter any further.

He approached the barrier, beyond which was a busy street, and perfunctorily showed his identification card to the soldier manning the small booth as he passed through.

It was evening. Slowly getting dark. Again, Reinhardt had worked a twelve-hour day. He was exhausted. He’d get a couple of drinks and something to eat at an excellent little café he knew, and then return to the apartment nearby where he lived alone.

Like most Berliners, Reinhardt was alert to the possible sound of the air-raid siren as he walked the city streets. Bombing attacks by the British were coming more frequently now; and there was muttered talk of the Russian and American forces, who were steadily retaking foreign territory previously occupied by the Germans at the same time as they made their slow, but determined advance towards Germany itself…

Reinhardt entered the café, and gave his coat to one of the attractive waitresses. She showed him to a small table and presented him with a menu. Reinhardt ordered trout with asparagus and new potatoes, and a large glass of white wine. Rationing didn’t even apply in a place like this – not if you could afford the prices.

There were a few other customers occupying the several other tables. Reinhardt recognized one or two of them by sight – they were all regular, equally well-heeled patrons – and he nodded his greeting.

He liked to come here, where everyone knew him. This in turn meant that this was a place where his disfigured face didn’t attract any attention. He’d suffered his injuries when he’d still been a baby; but whenever he met anyone for the first time, he was conscious of them noticing his face and thus secretly wondering what had happened to cause such damage…  

The bell attached to the door of the café rang as another customer now entered. Reinhardt looked idly towards the source of the sound – and then felt his blood freeze.

A skull-like face gave a tight smile in his direction. The other diners quickly looked anywhere but at this man, who was wearing a black coat and hat.

The waitress approached him with barely-concealed reluctance, but the man simply waved her away as he advanced on Reinhardt’s table.

‘
Heil
Hitler,’ he greeted as, unbidden, he sat down opposite Reinhardt.

‘Fleischer,’ said Reinhardt, attempting to keep his voice even. ‘What can I do for you?’

For several seconds, the Gestapo member said nothing and just smiled. It was a smile that turned many a man’s guts to water, and Reinhardt was no exception. The smile somehow carried the impression of deep, soundproof cellars… The ones which had a solitary chair in the middle of the stained, concrete floor, and a meat-hook hanging close to the harsh, naked light-bulb…

Everyone
in Germany had heard such rumors by now. You just tried not to think of them – that was all.

Suddenly, Reinhardt found that he had absolutely no appetite.

‘Captain Reinhardt,’ said Fleischer finally, his voice soft and with a very slight lisp. Just the sound of it caused Reinhardt’s testicles to tighten.

‘I am… disappointed,’ continued the Gestapo Major, his eyes small and bright as they stared into Reinhardt’s face.

‘In what?’ returned Reinhardt curtly.

‘In
you
, my dear Captain,’ said Fleischer. ‘Yet again, you have forced me to release one of my suspects.’

‘Only one – and this time the order comes directly from the Fuhrer,’ said Reinhardt, forcing himself to meet Fleischer’s stare. ‘Perhaps you would care to take it up with
Herr
Hitler himself?’

‘No, no – of course not,’ said Fleischer, as Reinhardt found himself wondering if the Gestapo member smiled that damn smile even in his sleep.

‘But several times now, you have… interfered… in the performance of my duty,’ said Fleischer in his soft, chilling voice. ‘The Nuremberg Laws are quite specific – and yet, once again, you find a way for one of your… employees… to be able to circumnavigate them.’

‘Major Fleischer,’ said Reinhardt, forcing a note of tired irritation into his voice. ‘I have already said that Jonas Schroder was released upon the orders of Adolf Hitler himself. So, do you really wish to continue this conversation?

‘Also,’ continued Reinhardt, ‘this is not the first time you have accosted me in this manner. I’m still ignorant as to why you should have informed me of the exact whereabouts of Jonas Schroder’s mother, for example. This simply will not do, Major Fleischer!’

Fleischer rose slowly from the table, his eyes never leaving Reinhardt’s face.

‘My dear Captain! I’d no idea you object so vehemently to what I thought were these friendly, informal chats between the two of us,’ he declared. ‘But I have to say… I do not like to be made to look like a fool.

‘And again, you have caused me to look foolish – no matter who it was who gave the actual order to release the half-Jew. It came about at
your
instigation; of that I have no doubt.

‘So I say to myself, maybe I can only… tolerate… so much…’

Fleischer chuckled, low in his fleshy throat.

Then Reinhardt almost gasped as the smile abruptly disappeared and he founded himself staring into two hard, hate-filled eyes that were moving steadily closer to his own.