by Brad Murray
“Move! Quickly!” shouted Wicker. He prodded and pushed and punched the prisoners every step of the way. The rays of the early morning light shone down upon the group as they reached the entrance to the brick building. Two guards heaved open the heavy steel doors which served as the only entrance or exit and exposed a single, solitary room bordered on all sides by thick concrete. There were no windows, no furniture, and nothing adorning the walls - nothing but gray, unyielding concrete. A lone light bulb dangled solemnly in the center of the room and produced a dim yellow glow, which somehow only made it feel all the more dark inside.
Benjamin felt an overwhelming sense of dread. The only life he’d ever known was spent under the domineering rule of the Nazi. He’d lived a meager, tortuous, inhumane existence. There had been death all around him; each day, every day. He was but a child, and yet he was wise enough to realize that once he entered that concrete chamber, there was no coming out.
Benjamin’s mind raced as he desperately sought an escape. But just as he was about to bolt for the thick growth of trees that surrounded the building, Wicker’s powerful hand clasped around his neck. He flung the little boy into the chamber. Benjamin tumbled head over heels and onto his back, casting a light cloud of dust into the stagnant air. One by one, the other prisoners were thrown in after him. The guards laughed as they slammed the doors shut, sealing them off from the outside world. Benjamin scooted on his rear into a corner of the chamber, wrapped his arms around his knees, and lowered his head in between.
There were subdued whispers amongst the prisoners at first – an initial irrational fear that the guards might return and beat them for talking. Some had even reassured themselves that Wicker would eventually return to set them free, and that rumors of the gassings were just that. Still others held onto the thread of hope that the booms in the distance meant the Allies would be storming the camp at any moment and would free them from their tomb. But deep down, all fifteen prisoners were resigned to their fate. They were as helpless as the day they were born. It was a resignation that had settled within them over time and cannot be fathomed by those who have not been beaten into submission. Like a whipped animal, the prisoners had been indoctrinated into an acceptance of their fate being held totally and completely in the hands of another.
The ceiling above them began rattling. Their whispering stopped.
Benjamin searched the ceiling for the source of the noise. He could just make out, through the dull light of the single light bulb, half a dozen small black openings that were spread throughout the ceiling of the chamber. The rattling grew louder. People began to whimper and backed themselves against each other into the concrete corners. Small white pellets began to fall from each of the openings and bounced onto the floor amongst the prisoners. The rattling stopped, and there was stunned silence as the tomb’s occupants eyeballed the pellets.
“What is it?” one prisoner cried.
“Is it food?” hoped another.
Suddenly, an elderly man began to cough. Soon after, another man joined in and within seconds the concrete room echoed with coughing, gasping, wheezing. There was panicked shouting and crying and people clawing, pushing, and climbing over each other in a desperate and useless attempt to find air. Benjamin covered his ears and grimaced as he tried to block it all out. He strained to remember his mother’s face, to recall her voice and the tiny details of her smile. He cried out for his mother, but she did not come to him.
***
Josef sprinted down the fence line toward the chamber with Dr. Wagner panting woefully behind. He could hear voices and laughter through the trees and as he rounded the corner he came upon Wicker and a handful of guards standing outside the brick building. The guards were bent over, hooting and snorting with Wicker waving his hands in the air, regaling in some juvenile story. One of the guards noticed Josef approaching and his eyes widened as if Hitler himself had just popped out from the trees. The others scrambled to attention, and Wicker’s eyes narrowed as he saluted.
“Where is the boy?” demanded Josef.
“Which boy?” asked Wicker.
“You know damn well which boy! Is he in the chamber? Have you already…”
“Sir, I don’t understand,” Wicker retorted. “You ordered me to liquidate the camp. I thought it natural to start with the infirm. If you didn’t want me to execute the boy you should have…”
“Stop the gas!” interrupted Josef.
Wicker exchanged quick looks with one of the guards. “I’m afraid it is too late. The Zyklon was introduced more than twenty minutes ago. I was just preparing to start the ventilation unit...”
“Turn on the vents!” shouted Dr. Wagner. He had finally caught up to Josef and was doubled over, his aged lungs pleading for air. On cue, one of the guards dashed to the rear of the building. Immediately a low-pitched noise hummed mechanically, signifying the ventilation had been activated to rid the chamber of gas.
Dr. Wagner was the picture of anguish; complete and utter misery. His balding forehead was sprinkled in beads of sweat, his cheeks flush. The boy was dead he thought to himself, shaking his head in disbelief. If only Josef had listened to him earlier; if only they had taken the boy and left Haasburg the night before, as he had wanted in the first place. The war had but been all lost long ago, but to Wagner the boy had represented a bright ray of hope. Hope that his career would ultimately be something more. Hope that he had discovered something truly miraculous, and with it, hope that his name would be forever remembered, praised, exalted. But the vehicle of all those hopes - the miraculous eight year old boy who had landed in Wagner’s lap, here at Haasburg of all places - had just been executed. And now, most certainly, all hope was lost.
Dr. Wagner envisioned the inevitable scene inside the chamber. He had personally witnessed the gassings of hundreds of prisoners and knew all too well what would be found when the chamber doors were opened. There would be a mass of humanity, a pile of arms and legs heaped against the door.
They always clamored for the door.
There would be the bluish-pinkish skin, and the blood oozing from the nostrils and ears. At the bottom of the pile would be the children and the elderly. It was always that way - those who were strongest would pull themselves up only to die lying on top of the very people they had trampled.
Josef stood glaring at Wicker, fuming. Half of his fury was for Wicker, the other half reserved for himself. Wicker had killed those in the medical building first because of the boy – that much was a certainty. Wicker hated the boy’s notoriety within the camp. Even more, he hated the boy because Josef and Dr. Wagner had exalted him as some miracle cure for what ailed the Reich, and had the audacity to blame him for killing his father and sister. Josef had noted Wicker’s demeanor when he and Dr. Wagner had introduced him to the boy; how his eyes narrowed and how his jaw had tightened. No doubt, Wicker had taken great joy in gassing him. But as much as anything, Josef was angry with himself. He should have listened to Wagner. Josef had convinced himself that the vial of blood would be enough, and for too long had closed his mind to Wagner’s appeals. He had hidden behind the excuse that saving the boy would jeopardize the safety of his family, when in reality not saving the boy would jeopardize everything he believed in and had spent his career working for.
The Reich.
Josef took several steps forward until he was toe-to-toe with Wicker. Just the sight of him at the moment was repulsive. His hatred of the man radiated through each and every cell in his body. Josef’s core was a furnace, and his inner boiler had become a pressure cooker that needed a release. The men stood nose-to-nose, unblinking. The corners of Wicker’s lips turned up slightly in a repugnant grin. Wicker appeared energized, as if welcoming the confrontation. In truth, both men welcomed this moment; each had daydreamed of choking the life out of the other, of pinning the insolent bastard on his back and squeezing his neck while he begged for forgiveness.
But just as Josef opened his mouth to begin berating him, an enormous expl
osion reverberated from the mountain above. Josef, Wicker, Wagner, and the guards ducked instinctively and covered their heads.
“Oh shit!” yelled one of the guards. “That was close! Have the Allies broken through?”
Josef looked up the mountain, half-imagining he would see the Americans storming over the horizon. Time was running short; priorities had to change. Brawling with Wicker seemed inconsequential now, the explosion refocusing his priorities. He grabbed Wicker by the collar.
“Get the men back inside the camp,” said Josef through his teeth. “See if Müller has been able to discern anything about what is happening in Frommberg.”
Wicker shrugged away from Josef’s grip. He met Josef’s eyes and for a moment Josef thought he was going to swing a fist. Instead, he spun abruptly and began barking orders at the men.
Josef turned to Dr. Wagner. “We must evacuate. We’ve run out of time.” Wagner nodded his head despondently. “Please take the car, pick up Ava and the children and meet me back here. We must make haste.”
Wagner looked perplexed. “What are you doing Josef?”
Josef thought for a moment, looked again at the mountain in the distance, and said, “I have one final duty before I relinquish my post.” Wagner gave Josef a concerned look but said nothing. He marched away briskly towards the camp entrance, following closely behind the five guards Wicker had ordered back inside.
All that remained behind with the brick building in the early morning sunlight were the lengthy shadows of two men. Despite the bone wrenching reverberations of war that had occurred a few minutes earlier, there was an odd stillness in the air; an ironic aura of peace. A slight breeze tickled the backs of their necks; the ventilation fans hummed. Hans Wicker and Josef Schwarz stood in silence, sizing each other up. It was the calm before the storm, and both men sensed it.
“Why are you still here? I thought I ordered you back inside the camp…Untersturmführer,” growled Josef.
Wicker sneered. “You ordered my men back inside the camp - not me. Perhaps you should make your orders more clear. I assure you, I am a great many things, but a mind reader I am not.”
“There are many things you are not,” snapped Josef. “I can assure you of that. And might I remind you, these are my men, not yours…”
“Are they?” Wicker cut in. “I do recall your very specific decision to abandon this camp and leave your men behind, whilst you save your own ass. I wonder how you could possibly conclude these are still your men. You are a coward, a traitor, and should be executed for treason for disloyalty to the Fuhrer!”
Wicker’s eyes boiled insanely and spit flew from his lips as he shouted. Josef was somewhat taken aback by his boldness. Though he had thought about it often over the last few weeks, never had he wanted to choke Wicker so badly - to wrap his fingers around his skinny, arrogant neck and squeeze the life out of him. But he did not have time for this fantasy; confronting Wicker was not why he stayed behind. Josef took a deep breath to calm himself; there were more important things to focus on.
“Open the door,” said Josef coolly. Wicker couldn’t have looked more mystified. He remained motionless, studying Josef’s face.
“Open the door, Wicker! Now!”
Wicker scoffed. “Why? So you can mourn the loss of your precious ‘Superjunge’? No. The fans have not been on long enough to remove all of the gas. If you want the door opened, do it yourself. But do it at your own peril. It would be fitting for you to die from the gas, just as these rat Jews...”
Josef didn’t listen to Wicker’s blathering. He shouldered past him, knocking Wicker back a step. He strode to the chamber, unlocked the door, and turned the handle. But he need not pull it open; the weight of bodies pressing against it from the inside thrust it forward and shoved Josef onto his backside. Wicker snickered as Josef collected himself. He stood, dusted off his uniform, and surveyed the bodies of two dead men who were lying at his feet. They were contorted awkwardly, half in and half out of the brick chamber. They had been pressed against the door and had literally tried to claw through it, as evidenced by their bloodied and missing fingernails. A crimson trail wound from their ears, down their cheeks, and caked at the nape of their necks. Their tongues hung disturbingly from their mouths.
Josef squinted, trying to see past the glare of the sunlight and into the darkness of the chamber. He had decided a few minutes earlier, when he sent Dr. Wagner away, that he would collect the boy’s body, find a way to preserve it for the journey to Switzerland, and safeguard it for future study. It would be a difficult undertaking and an enormous risk, no doubt. He hadn’t even had time to think through exactly how he would accomplish it. Getting his family out of the country with fake papers was going to be difficult enough, but sneaking a dead body over…that was out and out insanity. As outlandish as the idea was, Josef had come to believe that the Reich’s future depended on it.
Josef looked about for a gas mask and just as he turned to demand Wicker’s help in finding one, a rustling noise came from behind him. Josef turned in the direction of the rustling – towards the open chamber door. Wicker heard it too. He soundlessly moved a few steps closer, shading his eyes from the sun in a vain effort to see inside. Both men stood utterly still, staring breathlessly into the blackness. There was silence for several seconds but then, again, something inside stirred. Was it possible someone was still alive inside the chamber? Such a case would not have been unheard of – extremely rare, but not unprecedented. Josef recalled hearing the reports of Nazis finding an occasional gas chamber survivor, but those cases were prior to the Nazis perfecting the killing process. He hadn’t heard of a single report of a survivor in years; and none during his entire time at Haasburg. The same thought occurred to Wicker as well, who caught Josef’s eye and muttered, “Not possible. ”
Josef moved forward towards the open chamber door, but halted in his tracks as a figure emerged from out of the still darkness. Simultaneously, both men’s jaws dropped, their hearts stopped. Their eyes must be deceiving them, they thought. The sunlight cast a yellowish-white radiance over the figure, encircling its head and illuminating it in a divine glow. And the men were dumbfounded; struck momentarily as though the creature who stood in front of them were an angel of death, having floated out of the darkness seeking revenge. But it was not some apparition, not the spirit of one of the freshly slain whose body lay behind in the death chamber. The figure was alive; a living, breathing being.
A little boy.
The little boy had just endured a gassing that no human being could have possibly survived. And not only was the little boy alive, he appeared to be none the worse for having endured it. He had walked out of the building on his own two feet, just as casually and effortlessly as any perfectly healthy eight-year old boy. There was no blood trickling from the ears or from the nose, and there was no tongue dangling disturbingly from the mouth. His face was smeared with grime, black with a thick film of dirt and excrement. A trail of tears that had meandered down each of his cheeks had cleansed away the muck in their path, and with it created narrow channels of contrasting white skin. A tear formed a dark droplet and hung momentarily from his chin before splashing to the dirt at his feet. His reddish-brown hair was tangled and knotted, resembling an abandoned bird’s nest. His hair stirred slightly in the soft breeze, and the boy looked up at the men wearily, first at Josef and then at Wicker.
The sight of Wicker was petrifying. This Wicked Man who had haunted him, who had killed his father and his sister, and had marched those who could walk to their deaths in the gas chamber, was standing over him yet again. Benjamin could not possibly take another moment of torment at the hands of this monster. His knees gave out and he crumpled against the brick facade of the chamber. He sobbed uncontrollably, wailing for his mother. His battered little body convulsed in misery and his filthy striped uniform trembled in rhythm with his cries.
Wicker looked down with revulsion. This disgusting, wretched rat, exulted by Schwarz and Wagner was now ly
ing pathetically in a heap at his feet. Worse yet, his high-pitched cries were like nails on a chalkboard. It was nauseating; infuriating. The rage that was always present, stewing inside of him at a constant simmer, began to boil. His wrath was stoked by the realization that his efforts to kill the little bastard had failed. Wicker instinctively reached for his Walther, palming its handle at his hip. The boy had somehow survived a gassing but he wouldn’t survive a bullet to the head. He flicked open the holster strap and withdrew the gun. He saw red, and the only way to quench his fury was to put an end to its source. He raised the weapon and took aim. Squeezing the trigger slowly, deliberately, he braced himself for the kick and for the ensuing explosion of crimson that he relished so much.
A sudden sharp blow to his wrist knocked the Walther from his grip just as the trigger was pulled. The blast from the gun fire tore through the air, and shards of brick exploded as the bullet smashed against the building, missing the boy by mere inches. Wicker felt his body crash to the earth in a blur, the full weight of something heavy forcing him down. On his way to the ground, he caught a glimpse of the S.S. silver eagle, its wings spread gloriously.
Schwarz. The traitor had kicked the gun from his hand and tackled him.
Wicker’s rage was at full boil. All the pent up frustration, all the anger from the times he had forced himself to bite his tongue when Schwarz had demeaned him had come to a head. He had always known this day would come; the day he would show Schwarz once and for all who was truly superior. The fact that Schwarz held rank over him had always been maddening but lately had become intolerable. Schwarz was a coward - wholly unworthy of such an important position.