“I see you remain skeptical,” Wolfensohn said. “We shall correct that.”
The projector began rolling film as the lights turned off. Even the toughest veterans among the Fallschirm gaped with wide eyes at the jerky, silent, black-and-white images of men being torn to shreds. Americans and Germans, allied in their undead state, hurling themselves at the living who fled in sheer terror.
In two hard years of fighting in Russia and Italy, Wolff had seen incredible barbarism and every kind of atrocity. He’d never seen anything like this.
“Entmenscht,” somebody muttered. Bestial, inhuman.
Some of the paratroopers were crying. A man vomited his beef and vegetable hash on the floor, followed by another. Then Wolff’s vision blurred, and he realized he was crying as well.
“God in Heaven,” he gasped. “What have we done?”
“Germany is under attack,” Wolfensohn told the horrified soldiers. “The Allies had enough men to stop the draugr’s advance, but every available combat-ready German unit along the front was committed to Autumn Mist. Many of them went east into the Fatherland as far as Cologne and Bonn. We also administered the Overman germ to troops on the Eastern Front, many of whom turned west into the Reich. As a result, we have lost contact with Berlin. It has fallen. The Reserve Army has been defeated. The fate of the Führer is unknown.”
Red-faced, Muller jumped to his feet. “You monsters! You fucking monsters!”
Many of the paratroopers echoed his outraged cries.
The jäger had family in Berlin.
Wolff grabbed the kid’s arm and wrenched him back onto the bench. “Alive or dead,” he hissed, “your father wouldn’t want his son in front of a firing squad.”
Muller lowered his head into his hands, sobbing. Wolff gripped the back of his neck and squeezed, hoping to share his strength. Trying to convey to the young soldier that he was with family right now, Germans who would take care of him.
“Achtung,” Oberst Heilman snapped. “We are no longer facing the possibility of defeat but extinction itself. The nation needs you to be strong.”
The colonel’s words calmed them long enough for Wolfensohn to go on. “I assisted the Wehrmacht and Allies in negotiating a cease-fire. Many of our comrades are right now fighting alongside the British and Americans at the Meuse. The government is broken, however, with Party officials giving contradictory orders. Some love the nation and humanity enough to work with our enemies to save it. Others consider us traitors and will do anything to stop us.”
As the SS battalion had tried at the airfield.
“The British dropped on Poland and found the camp where the experiments were taking place,” the SS officer said. “The next step is Berlin. There, we will find a pure sample of the pathogen and specialized antibodies synthesized to neutralize it. From this, we can create a vaccine to prevent its continued spread. Possibly even a cure for those infected not yet crossed into a mortal state. Maybe even a weapon to allow the dead to rest in peace.”
Heilman stepped in again. “For the next three days, you will train for Operation Valhalla. We will certainly see the hardest fighting of the war, but we will gain victory. Failure means the destruction of the fatherland.”
Wolff didn’t have to think about it. Whatever it took to save Germany from annihilation and prevent this disease from spreading, he’d do it. He stood with a fierce cry, raising his clenched fist.
The rest of the Fallschirm rose to their feet with a roar.
CHAPTER SEVEN
TRAINING
At dawn, the Fallschirmjäger awoke to calisthenics and training. Most of the men had to be issued British parachutes, lacking their own. These had four straps, not two like the German counterpart. As a result, the Tommy paratroopers could steer in the air, though it hardly mattered from a jump height of 250 meters.
Muller marched to the top of the wood platform and jumped into space. His stomach lunged into his throat as he fell the three meters toward the hard ground.
He struck the earth and went into a clumsy roll that left him on his back.
Sergeant Wilkins, the British trainer, clenched his fists. “I thought you were a bloody parachute unit!”
“No excuse, Herr Feldwebel,” Muller gasped.
Actually, he had an excellent excuse. Major airborne operations had all but ceased. He hadn’t received parachute training. Today’s Fallschirmjäger were elite light infantry, not true airborne troops.
It didn’t matter. He wanted to go to Berlin.
“Bloody ball of chalk, this is,” the British sergeant growled. “Get in line, craphat! Do it again.”
“Jawohl, Herr Feldwebel!” Muller cried as the squad groaned. They’d exercised, learned, ate, and trained without pause all day on the cold airfield.
“Good lad,” Wilkins said in German, though it didn’t quite translate. The next man went up to make his practice jump.
The Fallschirm didn’t mind hard training. They’d suffered worse in basic training and in combat. Paratroopers were expected to rush into battle, often against terrifying odds. Many times, they hurried to the front without orders, following a latitude for action unique in the Wehrmacht. They fought to achieve their mission objective until shredded, and even then they’d keep going until victorious or dead. For all this, they took appalling losses.
They were lethargic now, however, their once unquenchable spirit diminished. Few of them slept more than a few hours last night, if at all. They’d lost the war. Their country was being overrun by horrible creatures created by their own leaders, and now they had to make a drop on Berlin to stop the spread.
Aus der traum. The dream really was over, replaced by a nightmare.
“Remember,” said Wilkins, who’d fought the creatures in the Ardennes and Poland, “don’t let them get too close, aim for the head, and never, ever hesitate.”
It sounded simple, but it wasn’t. As the British sergeant had explained, this wasn’t going to be sustained, long-range fire between units moving through cover and concealment to pin and flank the other. In other words, what Muller and the other replacements had trained for, what the veterans knew of battle.
This was going to be getting close enough to fire a reliable headshot against an unarmed man loping right at you, a man who might be wearing a steel helmet. Barring that, a bayonet thrust under the chin up into the brain. The enemy could come singly out of nowhere or rush you in vast numbers.
Miss enough times, allow the undead to get close enough, and you’d find yourself both on the menu and drafted into the army of the undead. If you were bitten but left alive, you had anywhere from three to six hours before you turned, the sergeant had told them.
Colonel Adams sauntered over with his British riding crop to inspect the men. “How are they coming along, Sergeant?”
Muller had learned enough English in his year at university to follow the conversation.
“They’re good soldiers, the best the Jerries have, but we already knew that, sir,” Wilkins said. “I’ll make them good paras.”
The colonel twirled the end of his mustache. “They don’t jump anymore. More than one-half of these fellows haven’t even trained for it, I suspect.”