The next several miles were quiet as Joseph was too focused to speak and Vlad was still in shock from his injury. The bullet that Vladimir took to his left shoulder caught his collarbone and came out through his armpit. Though it wasn’t fatal, it certainly was painful.
They drove through the German territory, passing citizens and soldiers everywhere but fitting in as if they were Nazis themselves. Joseph was in Berlin before he knew it. He tipped his cap to passing soldiers as he drove around the streets of Berlin, having no idea where he was going.
He reached for the glove box to find the yellow packet from his briefing. Inside the envelope was a picture of the factory. It was a large brick building with lit up red letters on the outside spelling out something in German. Joseph circled the streets over and over again looking for this building. He was starting to panic as he noticed that he was attracting attention of the nearby civilians. He pulled over to get a good long look at the picture of the factory.
He heard a German soldier yell at him and turned to see him walking towards the truck. Joseph’s heart started to race; it was like a beating drum. He was terrified and motionless until he heard Vladimir speak.
“Joseph, I can see the red letters of the building right over there.”
Vlad pointed down an alley where he could barely make out one of the letters on the building. Thinking Vladimir must have the vision of a hawk to catch that, Joseph looked over to the approaching solider. He shrugged and sped off down the passageway. The soldier stopped where he was and shaking his head, put the lighter back in his pocket. All he had wanted was a smoke.
Joseph drove down the alley until he was now on the side of the building. He parked the car and saw that two guards stood outside the building’s entrance. Joseph looked at Vlad who was staring directly at the two guards.
“We are right in the heart of Germany. You still up for this?” Joseph asked Vlad who never took his eyes off the soldiers.
“I’ll get the one on the right,” Vlad said. Joseph smirked.
“I can always count on you.”
Chapter Eleven
The two Soviets stepped out of the vehicle, attracting the attention of the guards. The four men locked eyes and all nodded their heads as if to show that they were all comrades.
Vlad and Joseph both grabbed their bags filled with guns, ammo, and explosives. The two guards lit up smokes and averted their attention elsewhere. Vlad and Joseph walked towards the two guards until they were all face-to-face in the dimly lit alley.
The two Germans looked shocked, and asked them something in German. But as one of them finished asking the question the cigarette in his mouth fell to the ground. The soldier let out a grunt and fell back into the wall, sliding down to the ground. Vladimir had shoved Sasha right into the man’s gut and sent it up so far that his own hand was inside the man’s abdomen. A river of blood spilled out onto the ground.
It was already too late for the other soldier when he looked over to see that his buddy was on the ground bleeding out. He quickly snapped his head back to look at Joseph who thrust his hands at the guard’s face. Both of his hands connected and Joseph began to gouge the man’s eyes. Before his screams could fill the air, attracting unwanted attention, Joseph pushed the eyeballs deep into the man’s brain killing him instantly.
Then Joseph pulled the man’s head forward by his eye sockets and shoved it back towards the brick wall. Once his head connected with the wall a loud crack ensured that the man’s skull was broken. Joseph let go of the man and he sank to the ground.
Vlad and Joseph said nothing as they opened the door to the factory and dragged the bodies inside, closing the door behind them. Locking the door, they looked around. Lucky for them the factory wasn’t running right now, probably a factor playing into the German’s defeat. But they didn’t mind; it made their jobs easier.
It was dark and very cramped in the building with machines and plane parts scattered on conveyer belts. The ceiling was so high up they couldn’t see it in the dark. It was an eerie place to be; the plane parts all around made it harder to see in the dark factory. None of the machines were running; it was so deathly quiet Joseph could practically hear his heart beating in the silence.
He opened up his bag to reveal explosives he had packed before they left. The sound of the bag opening echoed throughout the building.
“What the hell are those for? Attracting every damn German in Berlin?” Vlad asked. He was shocked to see explosives.
“No. Part of my briefing was to blow up the factory so that after I kill the factory’s owner, they couldn’t hire a new man to run it.”
“Why the hell do you even need to kill the owner if you’re just going to blow up the factory?”
“This way I get more satisfaction, and Viktor gets more hype as the officer who killed the man leading this plane factory.”
“I guess.”
“Do you think you can set these explosives up?” Joseph asked, his eyes staring off in the distance.
“What the hell are you talking about? You look just fine and I have a fucking bullet in me!”
“I have to go deal with the owner.”
“Sorry to burst your bubble there buddy, but this place is closed down right now.”
Joseph said nothing as he pointed into the distance where he could see light coming from a room at the top of a staircase. Through a window he could see a man shuffling around.
“Ahh, all right. You do what you have to do; I’ll set these explosives up,” Vlad said as he grabbed the Composition B charges from Joseph. Joseph didn’t say anything; he was lost in the moment.
He was again fixated on how this man was keeping him away from Maria. He slowly walked off towards the staircase at the end of the building. Each step he took sent a slight echo through the building. Joseph thought to himself the old saying “the quiet before the storm” fit the situation perfectly as he passed by the plane parts all around him.
Each time he passed one he had to glance back to make sure there wasn’t a person lurking behind him.
Vlad shrugged, threw the bag of Comp B over his good shoulder and started to look around for good places to set up the explosives in order for the maximum damage to be done. He would spend a lot of time feeling around with his hand instead of actually visually seeing where he was placing the charges.
Joseph’s mind was racing; thoughts were flying in and out of his mind, from the first time he had ever killed a man to the first time he met Maria. It was clear that Joseph was no longer the man he used to be.
He was almost possessed by something more powerful, something utterly bent on the destruction of this man who owned the factory in which he stood. One slow step after another Joseph made his way towards the staircase, his fists clenched so hard he was almost digging his fingers through the skin of his hands. Reaching the staircase, he stood on the first step and looked up to the lit room, mere feet away.
He lifted up his foot, set it down on the first step and was immediately hit by the memory of the day he was taken from Maria.
“Joseph! What’s going on” Maria screamed as she came running out from their home. She stood watching as three Russians were forcibly taking Joseph towards an army jeep. Joseph struggled enough to turn and see Maria running towards him. Before she could reach him she was grabbed and restricted by another soldier. This sent Joseph in a rage. He turned to one of the men carrying him towards the jeep, cocked his head back and flung his skull towards the man. Joseph had knocked the man to the ground by the force of the head butt. He had also broken his own nose. Joseph ripped his arm loose from the second man who was holding him. Joseph stood there, staring at the man as blood was rushing from his now broken nose. The soldier raised his fists ready to fight, but before anything could happen a loud crack interrupted the situation. The sound came from a man by the name of David shooting a gun into the air to avoid any more fighting. David was a short, stocky, muscular man dressed in a Sergeant’s uniform with a buzz hair cut. He had a scruffy goatee and spoke in a booming voice.