War Mountain

by Jerry Ahern

  The problem with mass extermination was the manpower required to carry it out. If those who were about to be exterminated could provide this manpower, what a savings there would be. And, he had such a plan, where portable crematoriums would—

  The buzz came.

  Anton Gabler twisted round in his chair and reached for the receiver as the second buzz started. “Doctor Gabler here.”

  “It is a fine day to begin the future.”

  “Although we must never forget the past.”

  “Firestorm.”

  “Yes, Herr Doctor.” Gabler hung up, activating the mission clock in the same instant.

  He stood up from his desk, walked across the room. He called to his subordinates, “The center is sealed. The countdown has begun! To your stations!”

  Men and those few women who were capable of the work moved quickly to their posts.

  Anton Gabler began the admission sequence into the transparently walled room at the far end of the laboratory, retinal and palm identification sequences under way as his fingers punched the buttons in secret to activate the master locking device.

  With an operation like this, nothing could be left to chance.

  “Firestorm,” Anton Gabler repeated. And, when he said the word, the feeling stirred within him again.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  By a different car, this one driven by Croenberg’s personal chauffeur, James Darkwood and Manfred Kohl traveled to the same spot where they had arrived. The aircraft would be waiting, as planned. Darkwood was beginning to have considerable faith in this arrangement with Croenberg. After all, simple revenge was easy to understand.

  The sun was up. Darkwood would have preferred to leave, as they had arrived, in darkness.

  That was impossible. Their discussions had consumed the night and to have waited, losing another twelve hours, would have been unconscionable.

  Croenberg’s chauffeur interrupted Darkwood’s thoughts. “Gentlemen, forgive me, but we are being followed I think.”

  James Darkwood twisted round in the car seat. The rear window defroster had been at maximum capacity, but from the center it cleared and on the highway behind them there were two cars. The cars drove abreast, and were closing fast.

  “Your Gruppenführer may have been found out,” Manfred Kohl told the chauffeur.

  “I hardly think so, sir. These will be agents in the Gestapo, who work independently. They monitor everyone. They will approach our vehicle and, if they feel that there is something amiss, they will ask to see papers.”

  “Will our papers pass?”

  “It would be better for the Gruppenführer if these men were not allowed to file a report.”

  “Understood,” Darkwood nodded, press checking the slide of his .45. It was the same Lancer copy of the Colt Government Model he carried whenever the mission allowed.

  Kohl’s pistol was more modern, but Darkwood was wedded to the older design and the big bullet it threw.

  “May I suggest, gentlemen,” the chauffeur began, “that the situation would best be served if I were to stop the car after the two of you were already out of the vehicle? The pursuit cars have not launched remote video probes yet and there might be a chance. I believe that there is a curve just ahead. I could stop the car and then go on for another few hundred meters.”

  “Just be careful yourself,” Darkwood advised. But the plan sounded viable, all right, however hackneyed. The highway along which they drove was somewhat elevated over the surrounding terrain. If Croenberg’s driver stopped for just a second or two, he and Manfred Kohl could be out, flip over the highway guard rail and hide along the embankment while the Gestapo vehicles passed. “Do what you think is best, Unterscharführer.”

  “Yes sir.”

  They were starting into the curve, Croenberg’s driver speeding up as they entered it, leaving the two Gestapo cars well behind.

  As they rounded the curve, the chauffeur warned, “I will stop now!” Darkwood and Kohl braced themselves, the car making a hard panic stop. Manfred Kohl threw open the door and was out, Darkwood after him into the brisk morning air. Manfred jumped the railing, Darkwood right behind him, but flipping it instead, going into a roll down the embankment, the sound of Croenberg’s limousine already disappearing.

  A second later there were the sounds of two cars speeding past on the road above.

  Darkwood lay perfectly still, catching his breath. “James?”

  “Fine, Manfred. You?”

  “Ready?”

  “Yes,” Darkwood answered, nodding. Darkwood pushed himself to his feet, swinging his left hand across his trousers to loosen the decayed leaves and pine needles and snow, then moving in a crouch up toward the guard rail.

  About three hundred yards further down the road, Croenberg’s limousine was stopped in the middle of the road with a Gestapo car in front of it and one behind, these parked at an oblique angle, preventing the car at the center from moving in either direction.

  Unless there were more men in the cars, he and Kohl would have six Gestapo personnel to deal with. Their cars were equipped with video, of course, but the video was not broadcast to headquarters as a matter of course. So, with any luck, killing the men and destroying the videodisks would leave things in such a manner that no finger would point at Croenberg.

  Darkwood thumbed back the hammer on the .45, upping the safety, his right thumb beneath the safety as he worked his way along the guard railing. Manfred’s whisper was a harsh rasp as he said, “I will cross over to the other side.”

  “No, because if they see you prematurely then neither one of us will be in position. That Unterscharfuhrer who’s driving’s no imbecile. He’s got a gun ready, too. I figure he can take the one approaching the car door, and we get the other five.”

  “Who placed you in charge, James?”

  “Nobody, but I’ve been in more shooting situations than you have.”

  “Agreed.”

  The driver’s side front door of the limousine opened and Croenberg’s chauffeur stepped out. There was the sound of a shot, then another and another. The Gestapo agent nearest the Un-terscharfuhrer went down.

  Darkwood thumbed down the safety and fired from where he was, double tapping, putting down the man nearest to Croenberg’s driver.

  Manfred ran into the road, dropping to one knee, firing.

  The four remaining Gestapo agents were moving, one of them running for the nearest of the cars, the other three aiming their weapons. Manfred fired again. One of the three went down.

  Darkwood flipped over the guard rail and ran into the road, firing again, missing. Bullets tore into the pavement. Darkwood dove behind the nearest of the Gestapo cars. There was gunfire everywhere now, Darkwood losing track of whose. He edged along the side of the car, threw open the rear passenger door near him, looked inside. Nobody. But, indeed, the windshield video mount was humming.

  Darkwood threw open the front door, slid across the front seat and threw the car into drive, stomping the gas pedal.

  Another of the Gestapo agents went down. Manfred and the chauffeur were chasing after the last man as he went over the guard rail and tried to flee.

  The other car was starting into motion.

  Darkwood stomped the accelerator to the floorboard and rammed it, throwing himself down across the front seat just in the last second, striking the other car in the left front fender and the driver’s side front door.

  Darkwood crawled out, half falling to the pavement.

  As he looked up, the man who’d run for the car, been driving when Darkwood crashed into it, was out, running up the road.

  There was no sense shouting to the man to surrender. If the man had any brains, he knew that this was the sort of gunfight where losers wouldn’t be allowed to live.

  Darkwood thumbed down the safety of his .45 again. Lying prone, supporting his shooting hand with his cocked left elbow, James Darkwood fired once. The Gestapo agent’s left hand clasped to the small of his back, a gun fly
ing from his right hand.

  The man stumbled forward. Darkwood fired again, the Gestapo agent’s body rolling right, sprawling across the highway.

  James Darkwood got to his feet, changing magazines for his pistol as he advanced.

  From the woods below the highway, he heard shots and the sound of a man screaming.

  Darkwood kicked the man he’d just shot. No movement. That was good, because if the fellow had been alive, that problem would have needed to be resolved. Hopefully, they were all dead.

  Darkwood started back to the cars, looking down over the guard rail as he did. Their guns at their sides, Manfred Kohl and Croenberg’s chauffeur were returning.

  James Darkwood slid behind the wheel of the car he’d driven and began sabotaging the video disk.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  There was a certain feeling of refreshment after the experience, a cleansing of self like nothing Deitrich Zimmer had ever imagined possible.

  Drained, emotionally and physically, he sat in the silence of his command center, eyes closed, reveling in the feeling of peace.

  In a moment, he would open his eyes, give the appropriate orders to his pilot and the command center would be airborne over the battlefield, but only briefly. Anton Gabler’s device would be launched in only moments, taking precisely sixteen minutes and forty-three seconds to reach the target.

  The aircraft would be into atmospheric insertion flight by then as assurance against ElectroMagnetic Pulse effect harming the instruments. Zimmer wondered, absently, what would be the effect if an EMP event were to take place while one were recording the mind? The idea was worthy of exploration at some time in the future.

  Zimmer opened his eyes now.

  He turned back the protective covering on the panel in his lap and flipped the toggle switch beneath it. The diode reader above the keypad cleared to zeros and Zimmer tapped in the proper alpha-numeric sequence, then opened the second protective cover. He depressed the button beneath it and leaned back.

  The recording he had just made was now being transmitted via one of the Trans-Global Alliance’s own communications satellites, to the redoubt in what had once been the Himalaya Mountains, its location known only to himself and to Martin.

  Now, if anything were to go wrong, he would survive, even if this body were to be reduced totally to atoms.

  It was magnificent to be immortal, to know that death held no dominion.

  He reset the controls, the transmission complete, setting aside the transmitter and standing. He walked forward, opened the door and stepped into the aircraft’s main compartment. He told the copilot, “We are to be airborne at once. There is a flight plan marked ‘Fireflight’; this is the plan that will be used. See that it is done.”

  “Yes, Herr Doctor!” the copilot responded, his body already in motion toward the cockpit.

  Deitrich Zimmer returned to his command center, seating himself. He powered the microwave transmitter and spoke into the microphone. “This is Deitrich Zimmer. The hopes of the Aryan peoples of past, present and future go with you. Attack. The word is ‘Firehunt.’ Attack! Acknowledge all commanders.”

  He sat back, listening to the litany of their voices.

  As soon as his forces moved, the Trans-Global Alliance forces would move to interdict.

  There had already been the warnings that such people as the leaders of these weak-willed nations liked to give, to withdraw, to fall back, to step down from attack posture. He had done none of this, but enjoyed the fact that they had been foolish enough to try. While they tried, they built their forces, ready to counter him, little realizing that they were sealing their own doom. Had he acted at once, invaded this community within the mountain, fewer of the Trans-Global Alliance forces would have perished.

  “Such fools,” Zimmer said to no one but himself.

  He could feel his plane going airborne.

  He looked at the mission clock on the wall . . .

  Gabler could do nothing but sit, and was too embarrassed to stand. The erection which had begun even before the call came through from Dr. Zimmer was stronger than ever. When he actually depressed the launch button, he’d thought for a moment that he would explode.

  Instead, the experience was like nothing he’d ever known. Women could get orgasm after orgasm, he knew, but men did not. Yet, the sensation did not leave him as his eyes followed the course of the missile on the computerized plotting screen.

  Perhaps, in the instant that the missile’s warheads detonated, he would come. Alone in the transparently walled room, no one would see, no one would know.

  Meanwhile, the exquisite feeling remained with him . . .

  Emma Shaw had slept fitfully, getting six hours in all, and not the sort of sleep that really did any good. John was off in the middle of nowhere maybe getting killed, her father and her brother were fighting saboteurs in Hawaii and all she was doing was munching snacks and watching videos. This was insanity.

  Only about a half dozen pilots remained awake in the ready room.

  Except for her, they talked or played cards.

  She had read a book, played three different types of solitaire, consumed half a bag of pretzels, even considered scrounging around to see if any of the other women among the group had any crocheting materials.

  She sat down in front of the large vidscreen and watched MTV. All of the videos were ones she had seen before. “Hey, guys? Anybody mind if I change channels?”

  Nobody answered, so Emma Shaw took the remote from its nest on the wall beneath the screen and began flipping. The base had direct satellite downlink, which meant that programs from everywhere there was any broadcasting going on were possible. she found Eden’s channel 1, the official government station and was about to flip past when she saw a face she had thought she would never see again.

  The face was all but identical to John’s face, and the face of his son, Michael. But it was Martin Zimmer’s face. “Few of you know me by sight, but you know my image. I am Martin Zimmer, descendant of John Rourke, adopted son of Deitrich Zimmer. Citizens of Eden, I make this rare appearance before you today in response to the unprovoked aggression of the air pirates of the Trans-Global Alliance against our city. Thousands of you, my citizens, cannot hear my voice because you gave your lives for our nation.

  “But, in these next few moments, revenge against the Trans-Global Alliance will be ours, due to the resourcefulness of our National Socialist allies under the leadership of my adoptive father, Dr. Deitrich Zimmer. At the precise moment that this prerecorded message to you ends, a new age will dawn and the combined forces of National Socialism will strike a death blow to our enemies.

  “I speak, my citizens, of the power of the unleashed at our command.”

  “Oh, my God,” Emma Shaw murmured. Then she shouted, “Everybody! Listen up to this!”

  Martin Zimmer was still speaking: “. . . patiently, hoping against hope that our enemies would submit to reason. Yet, they have remained intransigent, forcing us to act before they can slaughter our peoples. Intelligence data have confirmed the fact that agents for the Trans-Global Alliance have been attempting to infiltrate Eden City with suitcase-sized weapons of mass destruction. Each one of these agents has been caught, and has admitted his or her crimes against the peaceful citizens of Eden and our gallant National Socialist Allies.

  “Yet, the specter of holocaust could not be so easily dismissed as the unscrupulous plotters of death and destruction could be captured. It became necessary for Eden and the Nazi forces under the command of my adoptive father to launch a preemptive strike against the numerically superior forces of the enemy, as a means of preventing your deaths and the deaths of your children.

  “It is, therefore, my reluctant duty to warn the enemies of National Socialism that their armies of death will be reduced to ashes. And, they have none other than themselves to blame. This message will end in a moment, as will the lives of vast numbers of the enemies of National Socialism. Be brave—”

&nb
sp; “Guys! Listen!” Emma Shaw shouted. “Eden’s going nuclear!”

  Already, words like “madman” and “insane” and “global suicide” were in the air around her.

  She couldn’t hear Martin Zimmer’s final words, but as the message dissolved into the Eden flag, the screen’s image crackled and the lights in the ready room flickered, died.

  Panic lights clicked and went on.

  Someone—it sounded like a man—began to cry.

  Emma Shaw got to her feet. “We’re getting everything we’ve got airborne in case he’s striking here! A lot of the ground stuff isn’t hardened against EMP so this is gonna be a fly-it-your-selfer! Let’s go!”

  Emma Shaw grabbed her helmet and other gear. Running for the double doors which were already open, the single thought that kept going through her head frightened her. The lights could have gone out for a wide range of reasons, but one of those reasons was an Electromagnetic Pulse, which meant that the nuclear device was very high yield, atmospheric rather than ground, almost certainly, and maybe quite close.

  She nearly stopped running, dropped her helmet, someone’s foot kicking it as the other pilots ran past her, her hands grabbing her abdomen.

  Emma Shaw knew the target. This was a trap, all along a trap. Deitrich Zimmer’s forces weren’t interested in the closed Aryan supremacy cult living inside a mountain in upstate New York.

  Zimmer wanted Trans-Global Alliance forces arrayed around him so that he could strike them down.

  That was where the nuclear weapon was detonated.

  She found her helmet, grabbed it and ran, holding back the tears. A lot of her friends would be dead by now, and a lot more were already dying.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  The time was still early, the morning young here, the sun in these northern latitudes at this time of the year always low. The horizon was grey, the sun a dull yellow orb. But as John Rourke looked toward the east where the Nazi headquarters lay within and atop a mountain of living granite, there was a sudden brightness greater than that of the sun, as if the sun were multiplied or reflected many times over.