by David Bishop
"So that's what we're reduced to? Executing children to make life easier for ourselves?"
"Ralf's right," I interjected. "You know he's right. We all do."
Mariya glared at me, her mouth set in a grimace. "Grigori Eisenstein: he got bitten by Constanta but he didn't become one of them."
"He would have. Sooner or later, he would have turned. Remember how close he was when we were still in Transylvania?" I stepped closer to Mariya, reaching out a hand to wipe the child's blood from her face, but she pulled away.
"We should get moving," Hans said quietly. "There's another six hours before dawn, and the vampyr could kill hundreds, even thousands in that time."
As if to prove his point, fresh screams echoed into the night air from nearby, a woman howling for mercy. We hurried towards her voice, searching for the source. When another woman started crying out to the heavens for help, we quickly realised their pleas were emanating from beneath our feet.
Mariya twisted round, searching for a doorway or a stairwell that led into the concealed space below us.
"There must be a way down close by!" she said.
I hurried past her, determined to find the entrance. But passing clouds hid the moon and we were plunged into near darkness. I stumbled on a chunk of broken masonry and was pitched into the black. But instead of hitting the ground I tumbled forward, head over heels down a flight of concrete steps, and fell into a vision of hell.
Half a dozen women, all of them aged over fifty, were trapped in the basement of a building that no longer existed above ground. Twelve vampyr were feasting on the civilians, one each suckling on either side of their victims' throats. As many thralls were gathered in the basement, holding down the women to make it easy for the undead to gorge themselves. The ground was coated with a slick of blood, crimson and sticky to the touch. A few candles burned in hollows round the walls, throwing cruel shadows across the bleak tableau.
I'd been winded when I tumbled down the staircase and fell on top of my MP38, the machine pistol wedging itself beneath my torso. I tried to pull myself up into a crouch, but the floor was so wet with blood my hands slid out from under me. My chin crashed back down on the cold concrete floor and I saw stars, everything around me blurring in and out of focus.
The thralls laughed at me but the vampyr were too busy draining their victims to bother. One of the fiends pulled his mouth away from a bloodstained neck long enough to mutter a few words at his slaves.
"Deal with this intruder. Now."
The thralls let go of their captives and moved towards me, forming a crowded semicircle in the claustrophobically small space. I threw myself backwards, fingers scrambling for the trigger of my weapon, boots digging into the pool of blood, searching for traction. The thralls moved closer, fingers reaching for me, eager to paw my flesh.
I pulled the MP38 out of the crimson slick and opened fire, sweeping the barrel from one side to the other and back again, emptying my clip of ammunition into the playthings of the vampyr. The thralls fell backwards, crying out to their masters, my bullets stealing away their vile, pitiable lives. I kept pulling the trigger until the machine pistol clicked uselessly in my hands.
Most of the thralls I'd killed outright, but a few survived, wounded but alive. Urged on by the hissing of the undead, the thralls crawled towards me, clambering over the bodies of their comrades. I tried not to think what would happen if these creatures got hold of me, preferring to concentrate on removing the spent clip from my weapon. Once I'd ripped it free, I reached into my knapsack and extracted the only other ammunition I was carrying: a half empty clip of conventional rounds.
I rammed it into place as the first thrall got hold of my left boot. I blew his face off before turning my weapon on the others. Three short bursts sent them all to hell where they belonged. I fired the last of my bullets at the far corner of the basement, not at the vampyr but at their victims. Nobody deserved to live through that horror, I thought.
One by one the undead rose from their feast, hissing and spitting at me. My MP38 clicked empty once more, not that it would have done any good by then.
"Foolish creature," the closest vampyr snarled at me. "Did you think to stop us with that puny weapon? We are the undead, blood-drinkers, nightwalkers! We cannot be hurt by your bullets!"
"I wouldn't be so sure about that," Mariya said from the doorway behind me.
She fired a series of short, controlled bursts at the monsters, her ammunition more than enough to deal with these bloated creatures. One by one they exploded, howling with tormented rage. The last of them cried out before it died, the same sort of cry we'd heard earlier when Constanta was summoning his soldiers to the railway station.
Mariya's silver-tipped ammunition caught short the call for reinforcements, but the sound of the vampyr's voice seemed to echo around us for several seconds afterwards, mingling with the dust and ashes choking the air down there.
"What took you so long?" I asked as Mariya helped me up from the blood-soaked floor.
"Eight more of them were close by. They came running when you opened fire."
She pulled a pistol from her holster and handed it to me, jerking her head towards the women in the corner. "You'd better finish them off. I know it's necessary, but I can't bring myself to do it."
I nodded and took the pistol from her. She went back up the concrete steps while I dispensed a merciful death to the two women still breathing in that basement. I forced myself to look in their eyes as I pulled the trigger, imprinting their faces into my mind. They deserved to be remembered by somebody after this was over, to be mourned by someone. I activated a stick grenade as I walked out of the basement, tossing it over my shoulder on to the bloody floor. The explosion sealed the doorway, entombing the remains of the women and their murderers.
The vampyr summoning cry may have been brief but it was still effective. Within a minute of my emergence from the basement, all four of us were fighting a running battle against a growing crowd of undead and their thralls. In the darkness, it was difficult to know which of our enemies was which, so we fired conventional bullets at all the shadows pursuing us through the moonlit streets of Berlin.
Wounded and dying thralls went down screaming, but the vampyr simply cursed us. It didn't take long for our standard issue ammunition to become all but useless. It was clear to the four of us that most of the creatures now stalking us were vampyr. They seemed content to keep us on the run, always moving, never allowing us any time to pause for breath or thought. The fiends would make a feint from one side before striking at us from the opposite direction, their numbers growing larger all the time while our supply of silver-tipped ammunition was steadily dwindling. It was Ralf who realised what was happening.
"We're being herded!" he shouted between staccato bursts of gunfire. "They're driving us towards the Brandenburg Gate. These undead bastards must have something special waiting for us!"
"Probably Gorgo or Constanta," I yelled back. "What should we do?"
"We've got to make a stand," Mariya called out. "We need to get ourselves barricaded into somewhere we can successfully defend and try and hold them off until sunrise!"
"That's hours away," Hans shouted. "Our ammunition won't last that long."
Ralf paused to throw a stick grenade at our pursuers. It exploded among the vampyr, scattering them temporarily and providing us with a brief respite. We sprinted round the next corner where Ralf gathered the rest of us close to him.
"Hans is right," Ralf said, panting. "We haven't enough bullets to keep fighting like this. We need somewhere the vampyr won't find quickly. While they're busy searching for us, they won't have the time to attack any more civilians."
"Where can we hide?" Hans asked, watching warily for the vampyr.
A wry smile split Ralf's face as he pointed to a nearby sign: Kaffee Keller. A doorway to the underground cafe was standing ajar, beckoning us to come inside.
"Quickly, you three go in there. I'll run on ahead and lead th
ese godless monsters away from here before circling back."
"No, it's too dangerous," Hans protested. "You'll never-"
Ralf aimed a pistol at his brother's face. "Go. Now!"
Mariya ran towards the cafe's entrance while I dragged Hans after her. He tried to fight me off but the sound of approaching vampyr was clearly audible. Finally, Hans turned away from his brother and ran in through the door Mariya was holding open. I glanced back to see Ralf already sprinting away from us, cursing the vampyr at the top of his voice and firing wildly into the air, drawing as much attention to himself as possible.
Mariya pulled me inside and hurriedly closed the door, ramming home both bolts. The three of us held our breath as the vampyr surged past, their feet making little sound as they ran lightly along the street. We waited until we'd heard no sounds outside for more than a minute before venturing down a rickety wooden staircase into the cafe. Weak shafts of moonlight filtered into the basement from street-level windows high in the walls. It was enough to assess our surroundings while we got accustomed to the darkness.
The Kaffee Keller was aptly named, its air thick with the aroma of stale coffee. Broken tables and chairs were scattered round the cramped cellar, evidence of other illicit visitors before us. There was little doubt the cafe had been ransacked, probably by half-starved citizens of Berlin, and most recently by Soviet soldiers. A hammer and sickle insignia had been crudely carved into the stained wood floor, no doubt by someone using a bayonet tip, while a Russian joke about Hitler's testicles was etched into the cafe's broad oak counter. Mariya translated the words for Hans, who shrugged in response.
"That's nothing. You should hear the songs our troops sang about him during the long retreat from Russia."
"We've heard a rumour the Führer has committed suicide," I said.
Hans grimaced. "I wouldn't be surprised. Ralf and I were in Hitler's bunker a few days ago. The generals spent most of them arguing about who would take charge once our glorious leader was dead." He snorted in disgust. "As if it matters who surrenders for Germany! I hope the Allies hang the lot of them. If those spineless cowards had stood up to Hitler during the war, we might have won, or at least been able to negotiate a cease-fire with Stalin. Instead the country's being torn apart by the Bolsheviks and now vampyr have been let loose on the people of Berlin."
He stopped abruptly, realising to whom he was talking.
"Sorry, I didn't mean any of this was your... I mean... With both of you speaking in German all the time, I forgot-"
"Don't worry about it," Mariya said. "Our generals are no better than yours. I used to believe in them, have faith in their decisions. But they forged a pact with Constanta and his kind the first chance they got." She set a chair upright and sank on to it wearily. "Both sides are just as much to blame for this bloody war. Bojemoi, the things it's made us do..."
I felt an emptiness inside me and realised I couldn't remember the last time we'd had something to eat. Searching in the kitchen, I discovered two dented tins that had evaded previous visitors to the Kaffee Keller. Neither can had a label, so it was impossible to know what they contained. To my surprise the cafe's water supply was still running, so I filled a jug and carried it through to the others, along with bowls, glasses, cutlery and the mystery tins.
Hans opened one of the cans with his bayonet while I investigated the other. His contained ham, mine was filled with peaches in syrup. I emptied the peaches into one bowl and Hans sliced the ham into another. We shared the food between us, a rare treat in the midst of such madness.
Halfway through the meal my brain suddenly made a connection to something Mariya had said earlier. "How did you know about the golem? Are you Jewish?"
She nodded. "Once a Jew, always a Jew; that's what my mother used to say. Why?"
I pointed at the remains of the ham. "But doesn't that mean...?"
Mariya laughed. "You eat what you can find. I'll atone for it later, if I get the chance." She raised an eyebrow at Hans. "There don't seem to be many synagogues in Berlin."
He glared at her. "As soon as you said you were Jewish, I knew this would come up. I had nothing to do with the transit camps, and neither did my brother."
"Don't you mean concentration camps?" Mariya snarled back. "We've heard about what your comrades in the SS have been doing at places like Auschwtiz!"
Hans stood up, abandoning the remains of his food. "What about the Russian soldiers raping innocent German women and children? Aren't they your comrades?"
"Nobody is innocent in a war!" she replied, rising from her chair. "But that doesn't give you an excuse for mass murder in the name of the Fatherland!"
"I've spent the past four years fighting for my country, just like you. That doesn't make me guilty of every war crime and atrocity committed in the name of the Führer!"
"Are you sure about that?" Mariya demanded.
I stepped between the two of them. "Keep your voices down!" I said. "There could still be vampyr outside. Fighting amongst ourselves is not going to do anybody any good. The war is all but over, remember? We've got a common enemy now: the undead."
Hans and Mariya glared at each other for several seconds before Hans turned away, walking towards the stairs up to ground level.
"Ralf should've been back by now."
Two more hours passed without any sign or signal from Hans's brother. We heard screaming a few times and fleet-footed figures running past the entrance to the Kaffee Keller, but our refuge remained safe and undiscovered. Hans positioned himself at the top of the staircase, resting his head against the door to the street, listening for Ralf's return. Eventually he drifted into a fitful sleep, his breathing even and regular, his hands twitching sometimes.
Mariya cleared a space behind the counter as her resting place. I tried not to watch when she went into the kitchen to bathe, making use of rare access to running water. But my eyes wandered to her as she stripped off her tunic, my gaze lingering over the curve of her breasts, the small of her back, the arch of her neck. I'd fought the urge to notice her gender, and tried to treat Mariya as simply another soldier. Eisenstein was right. Having a woman in the unit complicated matters and brought to the surface feelings I'd rather have kept buried until this madness was over. But that was easier said than done when a beautiful woman was so close, day and night.
She emerged from the kitchen and smiled at me. "Did you like what you saw, Victor?"
I blushed, embarrassed to have been caught. "Sorry, I didn't... I wasn't..."
Mariya arched an eyebrow at me playfully. "Now it's your turn."
"Sorry?"
"You need to wash even more than I did. Now's your chance."
"Right. Of course." I hurried past her into the kitchen, peeling off my tunic and quickly dousing myself with cold water. A coarse bar of soap helped clean some of the grime from my face and hands, but there was nothing with which to dry myself. I pulled my tunic back on and went back into the main area of the cafe. Mariya was waiting for me, her arms folded.
"Not bad," she said appreciatively. "Not bad at all."
"You were watching me?"
"It was my turn to enjoy the view." Mariya moved close enough to whisper in my ear. "If we get out of this alive, you and I need to do more than watch."
I swallowed, trying to stop myself from blushing again. She stepped back, plainly enjoying the look on my face.
"You can take first watch. Wake me in an hour if nothing's happened."
No sooner had she spoken the words than there was a hammering on the cafe door. "Hans, let me in! It's Ralf! Let me in, for God's sake!"
Hans had jerked awake immediately, scrambling to his feet. Mariya and I hurried up the stairs to join him. We leaned closer to the door, listening intently.
"Hans, are you still in there? If you are, let me in before the vampyr find me!"
The voice was definitely that of Ralf. He sounded tired and breathless but still like himself. Hans reached for the bolts on the door but Mariya stopped
him.
"How can we be sure your brother hasn't been captured and turned by the vampyr?" she whispered.
"We can't," Hans replied. "But I can't leave him out there, either."
I remembered the small, engraved silver flask I'd carried with me for months. Gorgo had let me keep it when I joined his deep knife unit on the condition that I emptied it of holy water. I'd obeyed his order but refilled the container a few days later when I got the chance. The liquid inside was not enough to kill a vampyr, but it would hurt them. I showed my flask to the others.
"I could flick holy water in his face. If Ralf is one of the undead, we will know instantly."
Mariya relented, letting Hans get to the bolts. But she took several steps back from the door, aiming her MP38 at the entrance. Hans slid the bolts sideways and opened the door a crack. Through the gap I could see Ralf waiting outside, three livid scratches down the left side of his face. As he hurried inside I sprayed holy water on his face. He was startled at the dousing, but his skin did not burn at the liquid's touch. Hans shut the door and fastened the bolts once more.
"You won't need that," Ralf told Mariya, who still kept her weapon trained on him. "It took forever, but I finally shook off the vampyr." He touched a hand to the gouges on his face, wincing in pain. "Had a few close scrapes along the way."
Hans pointed at our abandoned meal. "There's food if you want it."
"Good, I'm starving," Ralf replied, pushing past Mariya and taking the stairs two at a time.
"Did you see Constanta or Gorgo?" she asked, following him.
Ralf shook his head. "Plenty of vampyr, but none of the upper echelon. The monsters are gorging themselves on Berlin's civilians; it's a bloodbath outside."
Hans hurried down the stairs to talk with his brother. "How long until sunrise? Now the moon's set, it's impossible to tell down here."