Origins: The Reich (25 page)

Gallono rode in silence through the village until the car came to a stop near a grove of trees outside of town.  He felt a capsule pressed into his hand.  Next, he heard the other occupants vacate the vehicle and close the doors behind them, leaving Gallono to his own devices.

Once again, the urge to run or at least die fighting, wormed its way into Gallono’s mind.  The impulse was beaten back by the indelible memory of that final embrace from Manfred and that last look of strength and gratitude from  Lucie.  With that in mind, he swallowed the pill and five minutes later watched his world grow dark.  He slumped forward in the seat unable to control his body any longer and felt his hat fall from his head.  Then there was nothing: no thought, no pain, nor shame.

At last, Tomal
thought to himself on his way to a private meeting with the upper echelons of the Nazi political party and their paramilitary arms of the Gestapo and SS.  He had rid himself of the proverbial shackles around his wrists that Commander Gallono represented.  Now he was free to do things his way, and with the Red Army making impressive gains in the eastern territories, there was no time to waste.

Up to this point, the death squads and forced labor camps had eradicated only a million Jews.  The cleansing was going too slowly; it was now time to implement the Final Solution of the Jewish question.

After introduction to the gathering of nearly three hundred party elites, Tomal took to the podium and got to the point by using Hitler’s own words.

“Twenty years ago our Führer authored a book you may have heard of, Mein Kampf.”  Tomal paused for the light laughter to die down before continuing.  “In this text he openly spoke of his hatred for the Jewish people and their conspiracies to provoke another world war.  In his first draft, the Führer proposed a solution to the Jewish question, but our nation was not yet ready to hear it.  I now read to you these words which fell onto the editor’s floor back in those early days.”

‘Once I really am in power, my first and foremost task will be the annihilation of the Jews. As soon as I have the power to do so, I will have gallows built in rows—at the Marienplatz in Munich, for example—as many as traffic allows. Then the Jews will be hanged indiscriminately, and they will remain hanging until they stink; they will hang there as long as the principles of hygiene permit. As soon as they have been untied, the next batch will be strung up, and so on down the line, until the last Jew in Munich has been exterminated. Other cities will follow suit, precisely in this fashion, until all Germany has been completely cleansed of Jews.’

“None of the
Führer
's prophetic words has come so inevitably true as his prediction that if Jewry succeeded in provoking a second world war, the result would be not the destruction of the Aryan race, but rather the wiping out of the Jewish race. This process is of vast importance, and will have unforeseeable consequences that will require time. But it can no longer be halted. It must only be guided in the right direction.”

“To this end, eight extermination camps have been outfitted with gas chambers and furnace houses to industrialize the extermination of the vile and treacherous creatures all of us in this room know the Jews to be.”

The hatred of the Jews ran deep in this room.  Tomal was forced to pause in delivering his speech for the emphatic applause to abate once more before continuing.

“All of us in this room support the Führer’s final solution to the Jewish question, so we all must turn our efforts to its implementation and the effects it may have on those less knowledgeable of the Jew treachery than those of us in this room.”

“Extermination of the Jewish people. It’s one of those things that is easily said: ‘The Jewish people are being exterminated’, says every party member in this room, ‘this is very obvious, it’s in our program, elimination of the Jews, we’re doing it and it’s a small matter.’ But of all those who talk this way, none has observed it, none has endured it.”

“To see one hundred corpses lie next to each other, when five hundred lie there or when a thousand are lined up. To have endured this it is no small matter to remain a decent person.”

“Our soldiers in these extermination camps are serving a glorious cause, but it is a page of glory never mentioned and never to be mentioned. These men must be educated and come to know without a shadow of a doubt that they had a moral right, they had the duty to our people to do it, to kill those Jews who wanted to kill us.”

“As part of this, we are faced with the question: what about the women and children? The Führer has a clear solution to this problem too. Exterminating the men is not enough.  To kill them or have them killed and allow their children to grow up as avengers - no. The difficult decision had to be made to have these people disappear from the earth; entirely.  For the men who will execute this portion of the solution, it will be the most difficult which we have ever encountered.”

“I feel obliged to you, as the most superior dignitary in this political order, this political instrument of the Führer, to also speak about this question quite openly and to say how it has been. The Jewish question in the countries that we occupy will be solved by the end of this year. Only remainders of odd Jews that managed to find hiding places will be left.  This must be accomplished before the Red Army, or their sympathizers can hazard upon these extermination camps.”

“I urge you to implore your men to stand together on this Final Solution to the Jewish question. Save your sympathy for the German people alone.  The Jews must be exterminated; the basic expectation is that the Jews will disappear. Liquidate them all for the good of the Führer and our Third Reich.”

**********

“By your own admission, one of your crewmembers implemented the most devastating act of genocide our civilization has ever known,” Mark said, his anger evident.  “He devised and oversaw the murder of over six million Jews!”

Dr. Holmes observed Hastelloy absorb the magnitude of Mark’s accusation, and the hit devastated him right down to his core.  He could not even bring himself to look up from his chest as Mark spoke.

“Tomal and his Nazi party’s acts of barbarism go well beyond the Jews.  Eleven million Soviet and Polish civilians were worked or starved to death inside labor camps.  In fact, the Soviet Union lost over twenty-seven million people during the war, and only nine million of those were combat deaths.  Other than Goron unleashing the bubonic plague upon the Earth, I cannot think of a more devastating act of pure evil in the entirety of human history.”

“And somehow I am supposed to believe that you are on our side?” Mark demanded, to no immediate response.

When Hastelloy composed himself enough to speak, it was with a cracked voice laden with emotion.  “I failed; plain and simple.  Tomal’s mental condition grew worse than I could have ever imagined, and Gallono was unable to contain it.  I took corrective action, but it only quickened Tomal’s deranged efforts.  It was an impossible situation for all of us.”

“Tell that to the millions who died because of that man under your command,” Mark spat with venom and leaned in to say more, but the soft touch of his brother’s hand gave him a moment of pause to unwind his outrage.

Terrance always prided
himself on being the picture of calm during high stress situations.  From afar, he had directed countless incursions into hostile territories that sometimes involved entire Army Ranger battalions.  He never even broke a sweat in those circumstances.

On one of those occasions, he stood across the street from an arms dealer in Yemen as a truck loaded with explosives leveled the building without his pulse going up a beat.  Coordinating the efforts of a few Navy SEALs on the ground and four radar evading aircraft in the air was nothing.  Why then were his palms clammy?  Why did he have to consciously work to keep his breathing and heart rate under control?

The fact that Colonel Azire and his men had broken free from their containment was certainly a factor, but deep down he knew the answer.  It was the stakes involved.  The life of every living thing on the planet depended on what transpired over the next few minutes. 

The ideal outcome was the world would lose two irreplaceable treasures that have endured in the Egyptian desert for ages in exchange for guaranteed safety.  If the B2s were detected, it could mean an international incident ranging from some harmless name calling to World War III in exchange for neutralizing the alien threat.  Worst case was the alien machine somehow survived the attack and the beings made good on their threat to end the world. Nothing to be nervous about he concluded.

Terrance glanced down at his Rolex while standing behind the communications officer.  It was as if the second hand was dragging Father Time against his will to progress forward.  Every tick drew out longer than the last.

“A watched pot never boils,” the communications officer said to lighten the mood.

Being nervous or impatient was a weakness, and Terrance detested being caught in his moment of weakness.  Fortunately, the only one in the tent with him was a lowly communications officer who had his own nervous tick.  The young man periodically removed his hat, smoothed back his hair, and then replaced the cap on his head.  It was maddening to watch and caused Terrance to direct his eyes toward the radar display instead.

Technically the B2s were invisible to all but the most powerful radar systems.  However, since his side had the Identify Friend or Foe transponder frequencies, they showed up as blips over the Mediterranean just like any other aircraft.  There they flew in circles with their devastating payload just waiting for the order.

“SEAL team is in position.  All four targets are lit,” Commander Allen reported over the comm. channel.

“Acknowledged team leader, hold position and targets,” the communications officer responded and looked toward Terrance.  “Everything is ready.  General Austin is standing by to give the order.”

Terrance pushed hard through his hesitant impulse to speak confidently into the microphone.  “The mission is a go.  I repeat; we are a go.”

“Roger that,” came a flat reply from the general.

His eyes moved back to the radar display.  Owing to overlapping AWACS coverage, he had a real-time view to see the flight of four stealth bombers turn south.

“Patch through their communications,” Terrance ordered the comm. officer.

A few keystrokes followed which brought the sound of flight mask muffled voices coming through the speakers.

“Crossing into Egyptian airspace.  Target is four minutes out.”

“Distance to fighter patrol is thirty miles.  Come right to course 113 for optimal evade vector,” came a warning from US Central Command and control operator located in Tampa, Florida.

“Adjusting course,” a calm pilot responded overlapped by a frantic shout.  “Someone has a radar lock on us!  Missile inbound; break hard left!”

A harsh snap of static blasted through the speakers followed by the announcement, “Flight leader is down.  Two more missiles are incoming.”

“Drop countermeasures and reverse course back to neutral airspace,” the unmistakable voice of General Austin shouted over the commotion.

Terrance wanted to protest the order since hundreds of flares being discharged would light up even the most antiquated radar system, but he knew that no longer mattered.  Somehow, the Egyptians already had their positions pegged.

“Flares away, reversing course.”  A few silent moments passed and eventually gave way to a final report.  “Flares diverted the missiles.  All three birds are over neutral airspace again.”

“Any survivors?” General Austin inquired.

“Negative.  We saw no chutes,” came the grim response.

Terrance threw his headset across the room and yelled, “What the hell just happened?  There is no way their ancient radar network could have picked up those aircraft.  No one could see them coming.”

The comm. officer spun around in his chair to face Terrance.  “They were on our radar plain as day.”

“That’s because we had the IFF frequencies and encryption.  They would need to hack our encrypted communications channels, which is impossible to do,” Terrance countered while fighting the impulse to bust apart every piece of equipment inside the tent.

“What if there was a man on the inside?” the comm. officer pondered while looking thoroughly amused.  “Maybe a certain individual who set up all of the communications equipment in the first place?”

Terrance felt his face contort into a vicious snarl an instant before his brain processed the meaning of the words spoken.  More out of reflex than conscious choice, he drew the pistol from behind his back and leveled his two handed aim at the young man’s head.

“Just a thought,” the young officer laughed as he removed his baseball cap for the last time, then dropped the jovial act to make a deadly serious statement.  “You didn’t really think the Sphinx chamber was the only exit point from the Nexus for us now did you?  How uncharacteristically shortsighted of you.”

While the two men held their contemptuous stares, a dozen Egyptian soldiers kicked in the rickety front door of the tent.  Terrance stole a glance from the corner of his eye to see Colonel Azire duck through the entrance and declare, “You and your men are under arrest.”

Terrance didn’t move a muscle as his eyes ventured back to the communications officer still seated in front of him.  “This isn’t over.”

“I know,” the young man managed to say right before Terrance pulled the trigger, but only heard the anticlimactic sound of the firing pin hitting an empty chamber.

“Missing something,” his target mocked as he produced a full pistol clip from his left breast pocket and offered it to the nearest Egyptian soldier.

“On the ground, face down.  Now!” Colonel Azire ordered of Terrance, ignoring the communications officer for the moment.

“What are you doing, he’s one of them?” Terrance demanded on his way to the ground.  “Shoot him!  End this thing now.”

Colonel Azire walked around to stand in front of Terrance and knelt down to say softly, “Why would I do that?  He saved my country from you and your men.  That earns him at least a little trust with me, which is more than I can say for the likes of you.”