by Mark Woods
“You don’t understand,” Rogers told him, doing his best to try and explain. “But then, I suppose I really shouldn’t expect you to. You’re a civilian now, despite all that you’ve achieved during your time as a Hunter. You’re not a soldier anymore and because of this, you’ve stopped thinking like a soldier.
“What we’re doing here is just one small part of a much bigger plan – a part of something our employers call ‘The Project.’
“For that’s the other thing, you see.
“My employers are the same ones that employ you. They helped create The Hunters, just as they helped fund this ship.
“We work for the same people, and when you break it right down, we’re essentially both on the same side.
“You probably don’t keep in touch with any of your old army buddies, do you? Those who survived that is, so you’ve probably never heard of ‘Operation Paperclip’?”
Wilfred shook his head.
“A few years ago, just after the end of the war, the American government, under the guise of something called the Joint Intelligence Objective Agency, started rounding up some of the German scientists the Nazis had employed during the war to do their evil bidding. They approached them, just as Herr Doktor here was approached, offering them the opportunity to swap sides and begin working with us instead of against us – giving them a chance to continue their research, but working for us instead of what little still remains of The Third Reich in exchange for a full pardon for their crimes.
“You see, after the war, The Allied Forces saw that despite what had motivated them, many of the scientists working for the Nazis had achieved some pretty significant breakthroughs in their fields and so, just like that, Operation Paperclip was born.
“‘Operation Paperclip’ is just the first step towards something much bigger; something that has since gone on to become known as ‘The Project’ – a whole series of different research projects, all designed with one single goal in mind. To help us eliminate the Preternatural threat posed to all Humanity by Vampyre, Lycanthropes, and all manner of other preternatural creatures once and for all, and prevent our future extinction.
“The secret organisation you now work for, that helped create ‘The Hunters’ as you have come to know them, they are a part of all this. They are the same people who employ me – employ people like Herr Doktor here. You guys are like the foot soldiers as it were, fighting on the frontline of the war, and us, here on-board this ship, we’re like the Generals standing at the top of the battlefield, directing you and looking out over everything happening below.
“That’s how you happen to be standing here now – for it was only on my recommendation that you were ever approached to join The Hunters in the first place. I thought it would be good for you – and I thought that you would turn out to be good for The Organisation, but as it happens, it looks like I was wrong.
“When our employers first heard about The Bellastaria a few months ago – heard about the werewolves’ plan to use the ship as the location for a series of peace talks between their two species, during her maiden voyage – it seemed like too good an opportunity to miss. A chance to eliminate a whole host of our enemies in one fell swoop, along with the very strong possibility of gathering up more Vampyre and Lycanthropes for our experiments from any fortunate enough to survive. We arranged for a group of Hunters to infiltrate the ship and blow it up, and then began following The Bellastaria at a safe and discrete distance to pick up any possible survivors, but you – you were never supposed to be a part of all this.
“When I saw your name on the list of Hunters and heard you’d volunteered to be chosen for the mission, I pushed for you not to get involved but apparently you were insistent.
“For unbeknownst to you and the rest of the Hunters sent on-board, the whole thing was a suicide mission – none of you Hunters were ever meant to survive; only a handful of Lycanthrope and Vampyre that we could then come along and pick up to use in our experiments.
“That’s why the bombs you and your fellow Hunters all planted went off much earlier than planned. The idea was to catch the Lycanthrope and Vampyre all off-guard, and sow chaos and discord on-board. We didn’t want either species knowing who was responsible and were hoping, if we were lucky, that they might just blame each other for the destruction of the ship. But at the same time, we also didn’t want any traces of what had happened being linked back to our organisation, or risk our Operation here on The Daedalus being exposed, which is why we made the decision to sacrifice you and your fellow Hunters as well.
“That way, if word did somehow ever manage to get out that any of you had been on-board, we could deny all knowledge and responsibility for the explosion – for after all, what possible reason could we have for sacrificing our own?
“And it all would have gone off without a hitch too, except for you…you only had to go and play the hero, didn’t you, and try and save some of the passengers? Same old Wilfred...that’s the whole reason I never wanted you on this mission in the first place. You never could see the much bigger picture…”
“You? You sent us all in to die?” Wilfred said accusingly. “Just like our superiors did, all those years ago, back when they sent us behind enemy lines to take on The War-Wolves without any proper briefing or warning of what it was we were up against. You, you were responsible for killing all those people? Not just all those human passengers you let innocently walk on-board with no idea what it was they were walking into, but all of my fellow Hunters as well? Men who were just blindly following orders and doing what they were told because they trusted those people giving them their orders had their best interests at heart?
“You, you’re as bad as him!” Wilfred pointed back towards Adalbert Mengele, still standing behind him. “Every bit as bad as the people he worked for. The same people we were supposed to be fighting during the war because we wanted people to know we were better than them. Because we wanted to make a difference and show people that they, they were the bad guys and we, we were the good guys.
“Only, as it turns out, we’re not, are we? We’re not the good guys – or rather I should say, you’re not. You’re just as bad as them, the ones we fought so hard to defeat all those years ago.”
“Are you quite done?” Rogers asked, and then without waiting for a reply, “I told you, you were never supposed to be a part of all this. I tried to keep you out of it! You weren’t supposed to be here, right now – you, you were the one who chose to get involved.”
“And how exactly does that make anything better?” Wilfred insisted. “How does that make anything you’ve done here in the last twenty-four hours, anything you’re still doing now, right?
“Where are the others?” he asked. “The women that were on the lifeboat with me when you picked me up? Where did you take them, and what are you planning to do with them?”
“They’ll be above us, one deck up right about now I presume,” Rogers said. “Probably being processed while their blood tests come back to confirm whether they’re Human or Preternatural. And then, depending on which they are, they’ll then most likely be taken down either to one of our other working laboratories on-board to take part in our experiments and research, or to a holding cell.
“I’m sorry, I really am, but though you might not want to accept it, all this…all this happening around you…is a necessary evil. It’s progress, that’s what it is. It’s a means to an end, the end of them, and you know what they say – the ends always justifies the means. Those Humans who lost their lives back on The Bellastaria, your fellow Hunters, those people you helped save on that damned lifeboat of yours, they’re all just collateral damage.
“This is a war we’re getting ready for, a war we’ve already been fighting for centuries without even realising it, and as you well know yourself, in war there are always casualties.”
“Fuck you,” Wilfred spat out. “Fuck you, and fuck him,” he indicated back behind him again at Doctor Mengele, or at least Doctor Mengele’s e
ven more evil twin. “Fuck you and fuck everyone involved in what’s going on on-board this ship. You’re wrong, you’re so wrong, all of you, and you know the worst part? You can’t even see it.
“No Human should ever be considered ‘collateral damage - that’s not how it works and knowing the distinction, that’s the only thing that separates us from them.”
“I’m sorry, Wilfred, my old comrade,” Rogers said. “I stuck up for you, I really did. I thought you would see it more clearly than this, I really did. I thought if I explained it to you, then maybe, just maybe, for once you might be able to see the bigger picture, but there’s no middle ground here I’m afraid. You’re either with us, or against us, so which is it? I’m giving you a choice here. You can join me, work together beside me, help me out here, or you can die here. There are no other options, I’m afraid, but I need your answer – it’s why I brought you down here – and I need it now.
“You asked me what my role here was earlier, well this is my role - I’m a recruiter and the truth is, I want you here by my side, but the decision has to be yours.
“So which is it? Are you with us, or against us?”
“Fuck you,” Wilfred spat out, feeling physically disgusted that this man, this man he had fought and almost died alongside, could ever possibly sink this low.
“I’m sorry,” Rogers said. “I mean it, I’m really sorry - I really never wanted all this to come to this, to have to end this way…” and drawing out a blade, swiftly stabbed his former comrade hard in the stomach.
Wilfred fell to the floor, seemingly bleeding out, just as a klaxon and siren began to sound from the corridor outside.
“What the fuck?” one of the guards cursed, even as his companion readied his weapon.
“It’s a breach,” Rogers said, stating the obvious. “Either one of the experiments, or one of the specimens we brought on-board off The Bellastaria, has somehow managed to break loose. You,” he said, pointing towards the guard standing furthest away from him.
“Dispose of that,” he indicated Wilfred, lying there presumably dying on the floor. “Take him, and throw him over the side for the sharks. Do we even get sharks in these waters? I don’t know, doesn’t matter; toss him overboard anyway. You,” he said, pointing to the other guard, closest to the door, “come with me back up top on deck. We need to rally the troops, start containment procedures, and make sure protocol is observed.”
“Who put you in fucking charge?” the guard grumbled, only half under his breath.
“Technically,” Rogers told him, “I out-rank you, so until the Captain tells you otherwise, I suggest you just do as you’re fucking told.”
“And what about me?” Doctor Mengele asked, the terror in his voice sounding as he started to panic at the situation he now found himself in.
“Close and lock the door behind me,” Rogers told him, “and don’t open it up for anybody until you hear the all-clear, you understand? You are far too important to this Project to lose right now.”
“Ja,” the doctor said, and waited until both men were out of the room before moving to secure the door.
The first guard stooped to pick up Wilfred’s body.
“Hold up,” he said. “Let me get this guy out of here first…”
As he reached down for Wilfred, Wilfred reached up at the same time and drawing the guard’s service revolver from his unbuckled holster, placed it under his chin and pulled the trigger three times.
The man’s head flew back – bits of his brain and his insides coating the back of the door, Mengele having stepped away at precisely the right moment to avoid being covered.
Wilfred staggered to his feet. At the last moment, unseen, his prosthetic hand had moved down and deflected the blade Rogers had stabbed him with slightly, altering the angle of attack, otherwise the wound he had sustained would have already proved fatal. As it was, Wilfred knew all he had done was delay the inevitable. Unless he did something, and quickly, to try and stem the flow of the blood even now pouring out of him, he knew he had no more than a few minutes at most.
Wilfred pointed the dead guard’s gun at Herr Doktor.
“Please,” Doctor Mengele was saying. “Please, don’t kill me. I am sorry, sorry for all I have done – but they made me; made me in the name of science. Please, I mean you no harm, don’t hurt me. I’ll let you go, I promise. I won’t say a word. Please, I’ll do anything, anything you want…but please, please don’t kill me.”
“I’m not going to kill you,” Wilfred said, still holding out the gun as he did his best to try and keep in his guts which right now, felt like they wanted to leak out all over the deck.
At least, not yet, he thought.
“I’m not going to kill you,” he promised, “but you’re a doctor, right?”
Mengele nodded.
“Then if you don’t want me to kill you, I want you to do what you do best.”
“Vich is?” Mengele asked, his accent sounding even stronger now the more stressed he got.
“Patch me up,” Wilfred said…
Six
As the klaxon and siren continued to sound, Lukaas and his wolf-brothers found themselves at the very bottom of the ship.
This deck was made up almost entirely of a whole series of caged enclosures, many of which appeared to contain Lycanthropes being kept in the poorest of conditions, imprisoned like caged animals. Many more cages further along this floor appeared to contain all manner of unnatural and unholy creatures for which Lukaas had no names for, doing their best to hide away in the shadows and the corners, out of the light, as though trying to avoid prying eyes.
Lukaas approached the nearest of the cages, and some kind of savage, half-crazed beast threw himself at the bars, snarling, sending Lukaas flying back, away from the sharp talons at the ends of its claws.
The creature inside was some kind of half-Lycanthrope/ half-Vampyre cross-breed, Lukaas noted, but with a pair of wings surgically attached to its back. The creature had a full pelt of fur, just like a werewolf, but tattered, leathery wings protruded from its spine like some kind of fallen angel, and its fangs were those of a blood-sucking Vampyre.
It had been driven half-crazy either by its imprisonment in such squalid conditions, or by the nature of the experiments it had obviously been subjected to and there was obviously no point trying to talk or reason with it, Lukaas thought..
There was nothing in those eyes, Lukaas saw. Just a harsh coldness, a vacancy, as though the lights were on, but no-one was at home; no sign of any kind of sentience or intelligence. The creature, whatever it had once been, had now been reduced to some kind of bestial, savage beast, nothing more than an insane killing machine. Any spark or indication of any life that might once have been there before now well and truly eradicated.
Lukaas swiftly moved along.
In the next cage, shrouded by darkness, was what could only be described as some kind of bizarre monstrosity that looked like a cross between at least a dozen different preternatural creatures. As he passed by the creature’s cage and drew close, the abomination inside stared at him with eyes full of sadness and hate, and let out a cry like a Banshee.
Once again, like the first creature, this new monstrosity had obviously been kept in less than sanitary conditions. The stench coming out of the cage was enough to make Lukaas, with his enhanced sense of smell, want to gag. He could see what looked to be old faeces in the corner of the cell, and matted in its fur, where the animal had obviously been left festering alongside its own filth for days at a time.
Lukaas saw Toneye, Scott, and Roman backing off, away from the cages, in the corner of his peripheral vision, as they followed him along the narrow walkway that led in front of the enclosures – many of which held Lycanthropes like themselves, but barely recognisable now because of all that had been done to them and the mistreatment they must have suffered.
None of these other creatures would even hold their eye, Lukaas noted sadly, and seemed almost afraid of them, as though
fearing these latest visitors to their cells might mean them even more harm.
“What…what is all this?” Toneye asked, speaking out loud, echoing all of their thoughts.
“Failed experiments,” came a voice from the other end of the hall, as Viktoryia stepped out of the shadows and into the light. Lukaas recognised her instantly as the Vampyre he had seen being led away, back up on the top deck earlier.
“Or at least, let us hope they are failures – for who, in their right mind, would want to create such abominations, such monstrosities as these deliberately?
“Tell me, have any of you ever heard of The War-Wolves?”
Lukaas nodded.
“I’ve heard tell of them,” he said. “Weren’t they an elite unit during the war? The result of Nazi experiments, part of Hitler’s plan to create his own preternatural army of Lycanthropes to use against his enemies, the Allies?”
“I encountered a couple of them once,” Roman said in a gruff voice behind them. “Back when I was behind enemy lines, doing my bit fighting in the war. They weren’t so tough, not like us real wolves, and you can probably imagine what happened. The enemy were still finding pieces of them days later, after I tore them limb-from-limb and scattered their body parts all across the battlefield.
“Like I say, not so tough…”
“I overheard a couple of soldiers talking earlier,” Viktoryia continued. “Apparently, a certain Doctor Mengele is on-board who some of you perhaps might have heard of, and these, these abominations are a result of him trying to recreate the same experiments that helped create The War-Wolves. From what I understand, and from what these soldiers were saying, apparently Herr Doktor was forced to flee in a hurry when the Allies attacked the concentration camp he was working at, leaving much of his research behind, and he has been struggling to recreate the same experiments ever since.