“Dig a hole in that ice, there.”
Hans moved to the ice, then pulled a knife and began chipping into it with enthusiasm, his hands practiced and even. As the chips began to fly, Zofia thought about how cold it was, and not for the first time. It was drafty in the bunkers, and they had little in the way of blankets. Their mittens had become worn and ragged, their coats frail. She always got sick in the cold, and without her mother here to make her soup and keep her warm…
“All done,” Hans said, sheathing his knife.
The Bad Man turned to the others. “I'd like one of you to get Doctor Gloeckner and bring him out here. The walk is a little further than I expected. I think we might need a trauma surgeon close at hand.”
Zofia didn't know what a troma surgen was, but it didn't sound good. She remembered the doctor from their arrival, and she didn't like him. He wasn't nice like her doctor back home. He looked like the kind of doctor who would give you foul-tasting medicine and stick you with needles. The thought made her shiver again.
“Zofia! Lucja!”
She looked over her shoulder and saw her papa coming through the gates. He was walking quickly, but when he saw the group, he began to run. Her heart leapt. Her papa would protect her like he always did.
“Now, let's do some ice fishing! Do you have the Model-24 I requested? I would like you to drop it in, please.”
“Sir?” Metzger asked. He had remained quiet during the exchange, but he stepped forward presently, head cocked.
“Stand down, Sergeant,” the Bad Man said.
“But this behavior—”
“This behavior was not kept in check. Since it is here, we might as well take advantage of it. I'm not asking him to do anything that has not been done before. Now stand down.”
The young man spread his arms and air-pushed the small crowd back. The boy with the glasses reached into his coat and pulled out a long wooden stick with a ball on the end. Zofia had seen one before and knew they were dangerous. Very dangerous.
“Oh my god,” Lucja whispered.
Hans twisted the ball, then yanked the string beneath. Satisfied that he was in the right, he dropped the thing into the hole and backed away.
“Lucja!” her papa yelled. “Zofia!” He was close now, tripping over the rocks and stumbling.
Then suddenly, the grenade went off, showering the group with freezing ice shrapnel and cold, liquid mist. Lucja squeezed Zofia's face into her chest, stifling her. Had she been able to see the result, however, she would have seen a hole in the ice the size of a bathtub.
The Bad Man clapped, laughing that horrible laugh of his. “Quickly. Bring her to me.”
“Her?” the boy asked.
“Yes! Give her to me. Give her to me now!”
Before Zofia could look up, a pair of hands yanked her away from her sister and hoisted her into the air. As if in a nightmare, she felt herself being raised up, fingernails scraping and chewing into her skin. She was so stunned, so deafened, that she didn't even think to cry out. She could only flail. She had a sudden image of her father holding her as she walked the tightrope. In that instant, she suddenly understood she wasn't a real circus performer. In that instant, she knew it was her father who held in her place, and it was her father who kept her safe. Without him, she would fall.
“Zofia!” he screamed.
“Go ahead,” Richter said.
And then, the boy tossed her into the water, her head smacking into the ice chunks left in the wake of the explosion. The last thing she heard before going under was the sound of her sister screaming, and Mister Lieutenant saying, quite calmly, “Good God, man, is that necessary?”
5
“Strip her out of those clothes,” Doctor Gloeckner said.
Dominik looked at him, feeling tears run down his cheeks, but he did as he was bidden. She was inside now, next to the heat stove in the prisoners' bunker, and she was conscious. But just barely.
“Papa,” she whispered.
“Be quiet now, darling. Don't speak.”
He pulled off her sweater and shirt, then her pants and undergarments, and covered her with a towel and a blanket. He squeezed the water out of her hair, knowing that it hurt her and being unable to help it. She was freezing in his hands, her skin blue. Lucja was kneeling at his side and had a hold of her arms, rubbing them.
“We need to warm her!” Dominik shouted. “We need fire!”
Gloeckner only looked at him. “You don't want to warm her too quickly. Keep the blanket on her. Lay beside her if you wish, but don't bring her any closer to the stove. Trust me.”
“Trust you?”
And suddenly, Dominik was on his feet, grabbing the other man around the throat. He slammed the little man into the concrete wall. “You bastard! Do you know what you've done? All of you!”
The doctor's eyes bulged. Dominik's only thought was to choke the life from all of them, starting with the idiot doctor.
“Papa!” Lucja yelled.
Another man appeared behind him, pulling his arms away.
“Take it easy,” Jan said. “See to the girl.”
The tall man released Dominik's arms, and he felt a sob escape his throat, bursting from him like a sneeze. He snorted, choking it back before it could overpower him.
“I brought more blankets.” Ari stepped into the room, his eyes puffy and his hair in tangles. When Dominik had brought his little girl in, Ari had been the first to act. He was more in his right mind than Dominik, but he was just as distressed. They'd been together for months now (had it been months?), and Zofia had started to call him Uncle Ari. Imagine that. “Ettore gave me these.”
“Check the stove, Gloeckner,” Dominik growled. “Make sure it's as hot as it can get.”
Warily, but without delay, Gloeckner did.
“What about me?” Lucja asked.
“Just help me keep her warm.”
Wrapping her arms about the pile of blankets, Lucja laid on the bed next to her sister. Dominik could see she had her own bruises peppering her arms. He had seen how violently Zofia had been yanked from her, how violently they restrained her as she tried to stop them.
For the first time since they had arrived, Dominik felt his mind begin to fray. They had taken his wife from him. Now, they had almost taken his daughter. If they succeeded, what would he do? What would he do?
He had wanted to trust Dietrich, as foolish as that sounded. He had wanted to trust the mission. He had wanted to believe that eventually, they would be freed. In such a wondrous place, so far from civilization, so far from the madness strangling his home, he had wanted to believe they could survive. But even the lieutenant was powerless to stop his superiors. He was merely the mouthpiece, and men like Richter were the mind.
Curling up beside his girls, Dominik laid on the bed. He waited, hoping and praying Zofia would be all right.
6
Several hours later, Dominik found himself staring at the laboratory cages. Even with his daughter, they had made him come. “Just for an hour,” Richter's man had said. “Try to do something useful.”
An hour away from his little girl… as if he could even begin to think of anything else.
“Useful,” he whispered. “I will show you something useful.”
And before he knew it, he was smashing the glass, shattering cage after cage with a wrench. Let them free, he thought. You want something useful? Let's see how useful you find this.
He didn't know how long it would take for the tentacles to grow out into the lab. He didn't know how long before the place was ruined. But he knew one thing, and that was he never wanted to do anything for his captors again. If they had hoped to motivate him, they had failed. He would destroy this place, because it was the only thing he could do.