sThe Quiet Wart

by The Quiet War (ARC) (epub)

  ‘I guess we’ll be here for a while,’ Clive said, as Anna’s car pulled away from the door.

  Agreeing with Clive, Dorsch quickly hopped out of the car and returned with some cold drinks and sandwiches, but they didn’t need to wait as long as expected for Anna, as within minutes, she ran out of the front door of the hotel and turned left towards the gate, wearing her jogging clothes.

  ‘We can’t follow her there. It’s pedestrianised. We’ll have to go to the other side. You stay here in case we lose her,’ Dorsch instructed the other car, as they sped away from the gate to a road that cut through the buildings, out to the western side of the wall.

  When they arrived on the other side, tour buses were blocking the view back to the gate. They scanned the area for Anna, but she was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘We’ve lost her,’ Clive exclaimed.

  ‘Wait. Is that her getting into that green Audi?’ Sean pointed to a green car on the wide street by the park.

  ‘Yes, it is. She’s being cautious. She’s up to something,’ Clive commented.

  *

  When the Audi pulled away, they followed as it headed north on the road towards Rostock. After about half-an-hour’s driving, Dorsch’s phone rang. ‘Wagner’s just left Leipzig in a helicopter. We can’t follow him,’ he said, after the call.

  Returning to his phone, Dorsch then made another call and spoke in German. ‘My guys are checking out her room in the Adlon. She can’t get back there to surprise them now,’ he said, following the call.

  Thoughts of what Liz would make of Dorsch’s lack of respect for the law crossed Sean’s mind, but he decided to just let it go.

  Another hour and a half passed before they reached the Baltic seaport of Rostock. When the Audi pulled over by a small roadside café, Anna got out carrying a bag and went inside. The team waited, out of sight in the Range Rover. After about twenty minutes, Anna emerged, but she was no longer wearing her running clothes and had changed into a traditional dirndl, topped off with a long blonde wig. If it was a disguise, it was good. Sean would have walked past her in the street.

  The Audi soon sped away, but Dorsch told the driver to wait a minute or so. ‘I don’t want to be seen, and anyway, I think I know where she’s going.’

  ‘Where?’ Sean asked, as the Range Rover started to move again.

  ‘Jamel. It’s not far from here, but we can’t go there.’

  ‘Why not?’ Clive said, surprised by Dorsch’s sudden caution.

  ‘Because it’s a town for Nazis: only Nazis live there; and only Nazis are welcome there. We’d stand out like, how do you say it… the testicles of a dog.’

  ‘We could get some pictures of Anna dressed like that,’ Clive said.

  The comment made Dorsch laugh. ‘Every woman in Germany has a traditional dirndl. I’m guessing that she’s wearing it because it fits with the mentality of the Nazis’. They like tradition, anything which harks back to the old Germany,’ he said.

  With the Audi now well out of sight, they were soon out into open countryside, passing through quaint towns with traditional buildings. When they arrived at the small village of Gressow, Dorsch told the driver to stop, and they parked the car behind a café, hiding it from the road. ‘This is as close as we get,’ Dorsch climbed out of the car. ‘Jamel is less than two kilometres up this road. We’ll catch her when she leaves.’

  When they entered the small café, the owner said something in German to Dorsch, who in turn, seemed to be asking questions of the elderly man.

  ‘That’s odd. He says that a lot of cars have gone into Jamel this morning. It must be some kind of meeting,’ Dorsch relayed.

  As Sean was about to speak, the propeller noise from a nearby helicopter disrupted them, smothering the conversation. Sean immediately ran outside and took a photo of it, before it disappeared over the tress, seemingly landing in Jamel. When he returned to his seat, he quickly pulled the photo up on the screen and passed it around. ‘I’d bet that’s Wagner. What flag is that?’ Sean asked about the black, red and white flag with an iron cross in the corner, which was painted across the bottom of the helicopter.

  ‘It’s the flag of the Kaiser. Nazi symbols are banned in Germany, so they’ve adopted this instead. I think you’re right. The only person wealthy enough to own a helicopter and bold enough to paint it this way is Wagner. It must be an important meeting,’ Dorsch said.

  ‘If it is, they’ll all be there: all the leaders,’ Clive said, raising an eyebrow.

  Taking the hint, Dorsch quickly sprang to his feet. ‘Come on. Let’s see if we can get a better look.’ He ran out to the Range Rover and instructed the driver to stay with the car. Then he pulled out a camera with a zoom lens and two sets of military binoculars from the boot, before passing around three browning 9mm pistols. ‘Same rules; don’t shoot me,’ he said to Sean, grinning.

  ‘Won’t the café owner give us away?’ Clive asked.

  ‘I doubt it. He called them “fucking Nazi dickheads” earlier.’ Dorsch smiled.

  Following behind Dorsch, they ran out of the town, through a farmer’s field and into a small forest. When they made their way to the other side of the trees, the small village of Jamal came into view, about 300 metres away across open fields. Staying behind the last line of trees, Clive and Sean began to scan the area with the binoculars, while Dorsch assessed their position just using his naked eyes.

  A yellow tin sign for the town came into view in Sean’s binoculars, announcing it as Jamel, Landkreis Nordwestmecklenberg. Along from the tin sign and closer to the village centre, he saw another, more makeshift sign. It had a series of wooden arrows attached to it, giving distances to other places in Europe, similar to the tourist signs seen in major cities all over the world. When Sean read the arrow second from the bottom, it sent a chill down his spine: Braunau-am-Inn 855km. Beyond the signpost, painted onto a rendered wall, a large mural depicted a traditional Bavarian family; all with blonde hair and blue eyes. Even with his limited historical knowledge, Sean knew that it was a copy of a 1930s’ Nazi propaganda poster.

  The small village was filled with parked cars, and skinheads with dogs roamed around the perimeter of the houses. The irony of the fact that these vicious-looking bald-headed thugs somehow identified themselves with the people in the poster baffled Sean completely. But then Hitler himself was hardly the prime Aryan example, he thought.

  In the centre of the village, Anna’s green Audi was parked by a light blue-coloured house, which was surrounded by guards. Wagner’s helicopter sat in a small paddock on the edge of the village, also surrounded by skinhead guards.

  ‘I think they’re meeting in that building there,’ Dorsch said, pointing to the cream building closest to the woods that they were hiding in. He quickly pulled the camera up and set up a tripod below it, which seemed a bit extreme to Sean.

  ‘It’s a laser listening device. It has to be perfectly still and focussed on a window,’ Dorsch said, interpreting Sean’s expression.

  ‘Sorry, I thought it was a camera,’ Sean smiled.

  Lifting his eyebrows in a concerned way, Dorsch continued to play with the lens a few times, before stopping. ‘It’s no use. I need to get closer. Stay here,’ he said, before grabbing the equipment and edging across the trees. When he reached the end of the forest, he moved forward towards the town, using a hedgerow as cover.

  With Dorsch now so close to the village, Sean felt his pulse race, willing him to be careful. Then he stopped, just 150m from the building where the meeting was taking place and set up the listening device behind the hedgerow. After a couple of minutes of fiddling with it, he turned and gave the thumbs-up.

  ‘What are they saying?’ Sean asked.

  Pushing his headphones into his ears, Dorsch didn’t answer for a while. ‘They seem to be judging some kind of beauty pageant.’

  ‘Really? That’s it?’ Sean said.

  ‘Yes, they’ve just named some girl from Dortmund Miss Hitler, saying that she’s the perfect
Aryan.’

  ‘Fucking hell! Are you serious?’ Clive said.

  ‘Yes. Shhh,’ Dorsch replied.

  The radio went silent for a little while again. ‘Okay, it’s a meeting alright, they’ve moved on to the next agenda item.’

  ‘Anna’s speaking now. They introduced her as the Vizekanzler, so we were right about that,’ Dorsch laughed.

  ‘Wait a minute. How the hell did he get there? It’s Grossi.’

  ‘At least we know that he’s involved now. So we know three of the top four people in 4R18,’ Sean said.

  ‘Quiet, they’re talking about you,’ Dorsch said quickly.

  ‘What?’ Sean asked.

  ‘They’re saying that the Russian failed. They know about Koryalov. They gave him your location.’

  ‘So Koryalov is part of this?’ Sean asked.

  ‘I don’t think so, they just seem to have been using him.’

  ‘But how did they know about us and Koryalov?’

  ‘Wasn’t it all over the news?’

  ‘Yes,’ Sean said sheepishly.

  ‘Wagner’s just said that he’ll deal with it himself from now on.’

  ‘Did he say that he knows where we are?’

  ‘Shhh,’ Dorsch said again. ‘They’ve just introduced the Führer.’

  ‘Who is it?’ Clive asked quickly.

  ‘Shhh,’ Dorsch repeated, as Sean saw him pushing on the outside of his ear phones. Then he suddenly lifted his head, peering over the hedgerow. ‘No, impossible. It can’t be… ’

  Author's Note

  The small town of Jamel, in Mecklenberg-Vorpommern, Germany, lies approximately 10km due east of the port of Wismar and is said to be completely inhabited by neo-Nazis.

  A sign at the entrance to the town gives its distance to Braunau-am-Inn and another declares it ‘Free, Social and National’: a slogan used to assimilate it with National Socialism (Nazism).

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Saturday, 13th February. Jamel, Germany.

  The loud crack of a single, high-velocity round fired from a sniper rifle made Sean dive to the ground. When he looked up to see what was happening, Dorsch was lying prone on the floor by the hedge where he had been crouching. Straining to see, Sean instantly drew the binoculars to his face.

  As the field glasses came into focus on Dorsch’s body, Sean gasped at the sight of the limp form on the fresh snow. A large patch of red blood had formed around him and the place where his head should have been was just a mess of flesh: the bullet had shattered his skull. Instinctively, Sean stood to run forward, but Clive grabbed his coat.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Clive asked.

  ‘Going to help. We can’t leave him there like that.’

  Reaching up, Clive pulled Sean down to his side and turned his head to face him. ‘He’s dead. There’s nothing we can do for him now and if we don’t get out of here now, we’ll be next.’

  Deep down, Sean knew that Clive was right, but it just didn’t feel right to leave him there.

  ‘Look, the only thing we can do for him now is live and bring his killers to justice. If we die too, then they get away with it,’ Clive said, without letting Sean’s coat go.

  The sight of dogs approaching from the village shook Sean back to his senses and he stood with Clive still holding onto him. When he started to move away from the tree line, Clive finally let him go, allowing him to increase his speed. The going was tough, as the ground under foot was filled with air pockets created by the snow. But they sprinted as fast as they could away from the village. Behind them and just arriving at the edge of the small woods, the dogs were making ground fast.

  When they exited the treeline, Sean glanced over his shoulder. He could see four dogs just twenty metres away. Digging deep, he mustered up all his energy and dashed across the narrow road. The small café where the Range Rover was parked was only 300 metres away. But it was too far: there was no way they could outrun the dogs.

  Sliding into the ditch on the far side of the road, Sean swivelled around and knelt on the floor as the first dog leapt in the air towards him. He pulled the trigger of the pistol twice in quick succession and jumped to the side as the dog dropped onto the road heavily, fighting for breath. In no time at all, the next two dogs were there and Clive was also aiming his pistol at them. The volley of rounds from the two pistols, felled the two animals before they could get to them. Then the fourth dog attacked from the side and clamped onto Sean’s leg. He fell to the ground trying to get a shot away, but missed.

  Three shots then rang out from Clive’s gun and the dog dropped, dead, with its jaw still clamped onto Sean’s calf. Its teeth felt like they were gnawing at his bone, even though it wasn’t breathing and Clive quickly ran forward tearing at the its head, trying to release its locked jaw.

  ‘Clive,’ Sean pointed, where a group of six skinheads had just emerged from the forest on the other side of the road.

  Leaving Sean to fight with the dog’s jaw, Clive let off two warning shots over the heads of the skinheads, watching as they dived to the ground. ‘They’re not armed,’ Sean said, when Clive scrambled back over to help him, pulling helplessly at the dog’s jaw.

  ‘There’s only one thing for it. Close your eyes,’ Clive said, as he pointed the pistol at the dog’s head, close to Sean’s calf.

  Abject terror filled Sean’s mind as he closed his eyes and tensed his muscles, waiting for the pain that would surely come from the move. Then he heard the dull click of Clive’s pistol. ‘It’s empty,’ Sean said. ‘You’re out of ammo.’

  ‘No, it reloaded it can’t be, it’s just a dud round. Give me yours.’ Clive said reaching out.

  Turning the muzzle around, Sean passed his pistol to Clive and tensed again, ready for the pain. The loud bang was followed by a shattering feeling, which seemed to reverberate through his whole body. Immediately, Clive was pulling at the bits of loose bone and teeth, getting it out of Sean’s leg.

  Before he could clear the wound, a burst of machine gun fire came out from the woods on the other side of the road and bit into the ground next to Sean.

  Suddenly, two men in paramilitary uniform came out of the woods, brandishing small machine guns. ‘They’re not very accurate. Move around,’ Clive instructed.

  Fighting the pain in his calf, Sean rolled around in the grass, as Clive dived to one side and took aim. The three shots from Sean’s pistol missed their target, as the paramilitaries took evasive action.

  Seconds later, the next volley of machine gun fire hit the spot where Sean had been lying, just milliseconds earlier.

  ‘Damn!’ Clive exclaimed as he discarded Sean’s pistol and started to fiddle with his own, trying to get the jammed round out of the chamber. Sean looked at the protruding metal bulge on the end of the barrel of his own pistol… it was out of ammunition.

  The gap in hostilities didn’t go unnoticed by the paramilitaries and they must have sensed what was happening. Rising to their feet, they started walking forward towards Sean and Clive, weapons at the ready.

  While Clive was still trying to unblock his pistol, a shattering burst of machine gun fire suddenly opened up, tearing against the trees behind the skinheads. Confused, Sean turned around and saw the Range Rover speeding in their direction. The driver was holding a machine pistol out of the window and firing indiscriminately in the direction of the attackers.

  Seconds later, the car screeched to a halt alongside Clive and Sean. As a second volley of rounds left the machine pistol, they jumped up and opened the doors, scrambling into the front and rear seats.

  Before they could pull away, a hail of bullets ripped into the side of the Range Rover and the driver slumped back into his seat, with a trickle of blood running out of his mouth.

  Without hesitation, Clive dived across the car, thrusting head first into the well of the driver’s side and pushed the accelerator with his hand. The Range Rover shot forward and he shouted to Sean. ‘I can’t see anything. You steer.’

  The
Range Rover was veering quickly towards the edge of the road, as Sean pushed the top of his body through the gap between the driver’s and passenger’s seat. He grabbed the steering wheel, just managing to correct its course in time.

  As he straightened the wheels up, another volley of rounds hit the rear of the car, but Sean felt nothing, not even the pain from the dog bite, as he struggled to steer the speeding SUV down the narrow road.

  When they came to a junction, he turned the wheel as best he could, but the car was going too fast and it lifted onto two wheels. Clive suddenly pulled his hand off the accelerator, letting it right itself, before they swerved into a ditch.

  With his body hanging between the front and rear seats, laying across Clive’s back, pressed down by the dead body of Dorsch’s man, Sean grappled uselessly with the steering wheel, as the car bounced through the ditch and then ploughed through a hedge. The bump caused the dead body of the driver to bounce on his back, wedging him tightly between it and Clive, making it difficult for him to turn the steering wheel.

  When the car finally stopped bouncing around, Clive suddenly forced the accelerator down again.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Sean shouted.

  ‘If we’re in a field, we need to keep moving or we’ll get bogged. Aim back for the road,’ Clive shouted as best he could, still jammed in the footwell.

  Fighting with every ounce of strength he had, Sean managed to point the steering wheel at the hedge on the other side of the field, hoping that there was a road on the other side of it.

  It was almost impossible to hang on as the car bounced from left to right over the bumpy ground, and the three bodies clattered together painfully, but he gripped his fingers around the wheel and shoved his arm into the spokes.

  When they hit the hedge the car lurched into the air, leaving the ground, then it battered heavily into a turf bank on the other side, smashing the bonnet open. The brief glimpse of the road that Sean had been afforded before the bonnet blocked his view, made him think the road was to the left. He pulled sharply on the steering wheel, swinging the car violently sideways.