The brandy went down like fire. “Thank you, sir. We certainly paid for it.”
“You lost good men.”
“We also left the Germans to die.”
The colonel fixed him with an icy stare. “That concerns you, does it?”
Wilkins remembered sitting near the doorway of the Skytrooper transport plane as it bucked its way to altitude. A front-row seat to what would surely be the destruction of the remaining Fallschirmjäger in Berlin.
The Germans had formed a battle circle north of Tempelhof Airport. On the west side of the circle, the draugr had gotten close enough to fight hand to hand. The entire formation broke south. The soldiers rushed toward safety, shedding a delaying rearguard that was overrun and destroyed.
Even then, Wilkins thought they might make it. They were withdrawing in good order, showing the excellent discipline one expected of elite light infantry. The soldiers poured fire and dumped their stick grenades to buy space.
Go, you buggers, he’d thought. You can do it.
The plane had banked and cut off his view, leaving him only with a bare hope the Fallschirmjäger would survive.
Then he’d glimpsed the draugr host.
A massive horde coming from the south. These were the undead that had bloodied the Americans and driven them out of Berlin.
Wilkins had suddenly found himself grateful he couldn’t see the rest.
Still, sitting in Colonel Adams’ warm office drinking his brandy, he had to wonder if the Red Devils could have done more.
“We won’t win if we don’t stop fighting the last war, sir,” he said.
“Sergeant, I’m afraid I must place some unpleasant facts on the table. One is we would have left our own in Berlin if it meant getting the Overman serum and those documents you hauled back even a single minute sooner.”
Wilkins frowned in disbelief. “Sir—!”
“The ghouls broke the line at the Meuse, Sergeant. While you were gone. That’s the second part.”
He sagged. “Christ.”
“The Americans are dropping into northern France to stop them. The same men who got mauled in Berlin volunteered to go straight back out. We sent them. We had nobody else. Do you understand, Sergeant?”
In a week, the undead would be feasting on Paris.
The horrors of his mission, the loss of his team, his wounding by the harsh lieutenant, the justice of killing Adolf Hitler—none of it mattered. If the world survived, historians would care, but right now, the past was pointless.
The only thing that mattered now was the next hour.
“I suppose you’ll be sending the Red Devils back out, sir,” he said.
“We will. They go tomorrow.”
“Right,” said Wilkins and grunted as he stood. “I’ll get myself sorted for it.”
“Sit down, Sergeant,” Adams protested. “You’re excused from duty.”
“With all respect, sir, you’re not keeping me from this party. You need every shooter you’ve got. If we don’t stop the bloody draugr from reaching Paris, we’ll lose all of Europe. We’ll lose it all.”
Europe would become a vast sea of the undead, and all the men who’d fought and died in Berlin would have died for nothing.
He hoped Jocelyn would understand. And forgive him.
“Well,” Colonel Adams said with a hint of amusement, “then you’d better get some rest and have that leg tended. I’ll be glad to have you with me.”
“With you, sir?”
“Everybody’s going, Sergeant. Any man who can shoot a gun. We’ve taken so many losses, all airborne will now operate as a single unit under American command. One way or the other, this is it. The final battle.”
“I hope the eggheads do their part, sir.”
“We’ve got our best minds on it already. They’ll crack it.”
“Until then…”
“Until then, we’ll do ours.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
TOTAL WAR
Jäger Muller lay a clinic bed wondering how he’d gotten here.
In full kit and with his scoped K98 slung over his shoulder, Schulte smiled down at him. “You’re at Martlesham Heath, kid. You made it.”
Muller touched his chest, though he knew the Overman serum wasn’t there. He was in a bed, wearing pajamas, his guts throbbing with a nagging dull ache.
It all came back to him. The beautiful smiling maid caressing his stubbled cheek with her nails. Her mouth opening wider than he thought possible, revealing teeth clotted with rotting meat.
Her head exploding on the snow, followed by an endless pilgrimage through purgatory that ended with him lying moaning on the deck of a plane.
“Mama,” he said.
He’d gone back for her, hadn’t he?
He’d stayed on the motorcycle, resolved to help Schulte deliver the Overman serum. He was going to go find his family after.
Now he never would.
“Rest,” the sniper said. “Enjoy the morphine and the nurses. I’ll see you and your impressive scar when I get back.”
Muller looked around the room. The clinic and its beds full of wounded soldiers swam in his eyes. He tried to speak but had difficulty forming words.
“Where… going?”
“It’s back to the front for me, kid. Paris.” The sniper shrugged. “The life of a German soldier, eh? We always seem to win big until we lose it all. Who knows, maybe we’ll get lucky this time.”
“That bad?”
“The draugr broke the line at the Meuse. The Allies are throwing everything they have at it. In Germany, Leipzig is under siege. The Wehrmacht formed a new government in Munich and is trying to form a southern front. Dresden went dark. Don’t tell Steiner about that. It’s bad enough for him as it is.”
“He’s…?”
“Alive, ja. And more dachshaden than ever. They let him keep his machine-gun.” The sniper ruefully shook his head. “They’re desperate.”
“Anybody else…?”
“Nein. As far as I know, we’re all that’s left of the 3FJR.”
“Jesus.”
“Ja. Keep calling him. We need all the help we can get. Speaking of which, here comes Steiner.”
The machine-gunner strode into the clinic toting his MG42. “Mules led by lions, Erich.” He looked down at Muller. “How are you, Yohann?”
The soldier looked ghastly, his face red and raw, his jacket charred black in spots. But he was grinning. Dachshaden.
“Wish I was going with you,” Muller said.
“You’re crazy,” said Steiner.
“Heroes usually are,” Schulte observed. “You and Steiner both. Thanks to you bringing back the Overman serum, Allied scientists are now working on a way to kill the draugr. Maybe produce a vaccine for the rest of us.”
So maybe it all meant something. Muller hoped it did. It had to.
He raised his hand. “Glück ab, comrades.”
Schulte smiled and clasped it. “Glück ab, jäger.”
He liked that, being called jäger.
Steiner clasped it next. “Glück ab. Get better soon, Yohann. We’ll need you when we return to Berlin.”
The men tramped out of the room, returning to this new, horrific, total war which could only be won through absolute victory.
Muller hoped Steiner was right. They’d win, and he’d go back to Berlin to help put Germany to rights. A better Germany, a strong Germany, a righteous Germany. A Germany of art and freedom and peace.