He looked backwards and was suddenly sure of something else: the thing coming at him was no man. Maybe it had been, once. Maybe it had been an animal with a brain and a purpose, but now it was only… it was only a thing. It shrieked at him, the sound conveying a hate so black it matched his skin.
“Dominik!” Ari cried.
The pistol fired. The thing on the table fell backwards with a hole in its head. It lay still, dead for real this time, or so it appeared.
Five long seconds passed. In them, Dominik could feel the weight of an eternity bearing down on the pair of them. When it was over, he squinted towards the stairwell and saw the newcomer standing with the smoking pistol in hand. The man had not been pointing it at the pair of them after all. He tucked the weapon into his holster and sighed noisily. It was an oddly clumsy gesture, and as he began to walk towards them, Dominik could see his gait was just as awkward.
The man helped Ari to his feet, then extended a hand to Dominik. Dominik took it, and the man slapped him on the back.
“Make more like this? Ha! Mister Kaminski, you are most amusing. Of course we would not bring you here to make more like this. More like Captain Smit? The enemy is a different story, but not our own people!” He laughed at his own joke. “I am Doctor Kriege, Mister Kaminski, and I assure you this is not a weapon of our design. We are here simply to study it, to find where it came from, maybe. But as for you, Mister Kaminski, what we want is very simple. What we want is for you to help us destroy it.”
5
At the same time her father was exploring the laboratories, Lucja was being escorted across the grounds by one of the young soldiers. She wanted to tell herself that all the new men looked alike, but she couldn't; she knew his name just as surely as he knew hers, and that made things worse. Putting a human face on them would make her weak. It would make her hesitate, like her father had done on the deck of the ship. And she did not want to be like her father. Their chances of escape were worse than ever, thanks to him. But when you got right down to it, would she have done differently? Would she have really brought the ax down on top of that fat man, as disgusting and inhuman as he was? She didn't know. All she did know was she had been thinking about the moment nonstop since their arrival.
“You all right?” the boy asked.
She thrust her hands into the pockets of her coat. She could feel one of them had unraveled on the inside, allowing her to touch the shirt beneath. Beneath that, she could feel the bone outline of her ribs. In her other pocket, she could feel the screwdriver she had found in the bunker. It was not a good a weapon as an ax, but it would do. “I'm fine.”
“I don't mean to bother you. You just looked pretty, is all.” He was a strange one, this boy. Hans, she thought. Hans is his name.
His eyes peered at her through glasses too big for his face. His smile seemed genuine enough, but there was something off about it too. Maybe he was just slow.
In the guard tower, she could see the silhouette of the lieutenant standing at the top. Motionless, he blended into the gray light, as unassuming as a predator. Like a lizard, she thought, not quite remembering the word for the reptile that could blend into its surroundings. A lizard is all you are, Dietrich. Maybe he was a nice enough young man, and he hadn't ignored her pleas for help back on The Adalgisa, but she didn't have to like him, not after all that he'd done.
Hans stopped and pointed up the tower, smiling a strange smile.
The prisoners' bunker was hidden from her line of sight now, and it made her uneasy. Zofia was all alone back in the room. Little Zofia, who had managed to hold it together just as well as her. Maybe even better.
“Go on,” the boy said.
She moved one foot up on the ladder, then the other. The young man walked to help, and she suddenly found herself climbing at full speed, anxious to escape before his hands could touch her. Before she knew it, she was at the top. Then, a hand did grab her. She squealed, but Harald held onto her by the scruff of her coat and hauled her the rest of the way up.
“Careful. You almost fell.”
“I'm sorry, I… thank you.”
To her eyes, the lieutenant looked tired. He was wearing a hat — a new one, she supposed — but it seemed to shadow his face more than add to his height. “I'm sorry to bring you up here, but this place has eyes and ears. I suppose I'm not used to it.” He laughed bitterly. “I'm certain no one can hear us up here, though. Maybe we're not free from prying eyes, but this is the best I could do. The fact that others can see us is a good thing, I think. Certainly I am,” he searched for a word, then found it, “professional. Surely you know that.”
When it looked like he was waiting for a response, she nodded.
“I have something to ask you. You asked me for help once, and now I demand,” he stopped himself. “I'm sorry. And now, I'd ask for your help in return. This is very difficult for me, but I'm afraid this is not something I can share with anyone else.” He reached out and handed her what looked like a letter. She took it more out of instinct than anything else.
“With me?”
He pointed, directing her gaze to the text. She read the first line.
I've met someone, I'm sorry.
She looked back at him, and he turned to the edge of the tower, resting his elbows on the rails. Lucja herself had barely noticed how pretty it was up here. But the lieutenant was clearly waiting for her, and so she cast her eyes downward again.
It has been a month now, and I love him. I know how that must sound, and I wanted to tell you. But you were leaving, and I hoped this would be easier for us both.
You said you needed me Harald, but I know that you didn't. You just needed someone, me or someone else. You must think me a monster for having kept this from you, but you don't know how hard I tried. You are not an easy man to lie to, Harald, but you are not easy to be truthful with, either.
Please do not hate me. I wish you all of the success you deserve on your mission, wherever it is that your duties take you.
I tried.
— Mieke
When the lieutenant didn't move, Lucja read the letter a second time. It's meaning was clear enough, but she stood trying to figure out why he would show it to her. Then, she remembered something. “You had a picture of her. You were looking at it on the ship, isn't that right? Do you still have it?”
“I burned it,” he said.
“You burned it?”
“I burned it. Maybe it wasn't the smartest thing, because now, I miss her. I miss looking at her. I was just so angry. Thinking about her writing those things, saying those things when I didn't even know if she meant them. Do you know how hard that was, reading it for the first time? She must have mailed it right after I left. It arrived on a whaler this morning.”
“It did?”
“You women are all the same. I'm sorry, but you are. You get… emotional. Especially Mieke. She's not the kind of girl who can handle being alone.”
“And this girl, this Mieke. She told you that she'd wait for you?”
“Of course she did! She said she would be there when I returned, waiting at the docks. Now, I find this letter waiting for me, with some story about how she met someone before.”
“Maybe she did,” Lucja said cautiously.
“Oh please.” Harald spun, his face red. “She's probably making it up. And even if she's not, I doubt it's more than a passing fancy. I've been with Mieke for two years, and I can tell you she's not a… not a slut.”