by Ben Stevens
Schroder gave a hoarse cry as he truly understood.
26
Mayer, the three other soldiers and the five Poles looked on in silence at the wretched scene unfolding in front of them. As Schroder cried out, covering his face with his hands, the soldiers shuffled awkwardly. The Metal Man stood impassive, only his head moving slightly, from side to side.
The woman holding the baby was still stood close to the Metal Man. She glared across at Mayer and the others, clearly communicating her hatred of the SS men. Now that she’d informed the camp’s other inmates that the Metal Man was a ‘friend of the Jew’, more people were appearing, circling around the group of outsiders which included the four soldiers. They were not afraid of them anymore – not with the Metal Man here.
He would protect them…
Mayer felt the hatred emanating from all the inmates stood gathered around. Even the few children had set, stern faces. The five Poles looked uneasily at one another, and then at the soldiers.
‘Best to get out of here, I think,’ muttered Mayer.
‘Yes,’ nodded Bach. ‘Let’s start heading – ’
One of the two Polish women – members of the group stood by the soldiers – suddenly spoke. Something loud and impassioned, in her own tongue. She addressed the inmates, looking around at them, and then pointing at the soldiers.
‘What is this?’ murmured Amsel.
‘She is saying how you save us from other soldier in the wood,’ explained Arnold.
He listened a little longer, and then continued –
‘She says you stop us from being shot. She says you are not like other German soldier. That you good men. That you also think camp like this is hell.’
Those inmates who were Polish now appeared confused. To those other inmates who didn’t speak that language, they attempted to explain what had just been said, in snatches of rough German presumably learnt during their time at this camp.
Mayer decided that it was time he said something –
‘You people,’ he began, loudly. ‘This… place… It has nothing to with us…’
Then his voice abruptly fell into silence. Whatever he said just seemed so… ineffectual – empty and hollow in contrast to the sheer horror of this camp…
‘Then why are you here?’ demanded one inmate, who was obviously a German Jew. ‘The soldiers guarding this camp all left just the other day, first shooting everyone in the sickbay – and now you are here, carrying your guns.’
‘We are part of the retreating German general army, that is all,’ said Mayer. ‘We didn’t know places like this even existed, until we came out of the forest behind it a short while ago. I mean, we came across it by chance.’
One of the inmates was staring intently at him, Mayer realized. He met the eyes that were a startling blue, the boyishly handsome but still somehow hard-looking face…
And he remembered. It was one of the Jewish guerilla fighters, from back there in that ghetto. Maybe two weeks before. That time when the Metal Man had silently refused a direct order coming from Ackermann, and had crushed Baer’s larynx…
Clearly, this guerilla fighter of about thirty remembered Mayer too.
There were now approximately two hundred inmates stood around them. Looking away from the blue-eyed man, Mayer asked loudly –
‘How many people are… here?’
Mayer glanced at Arnold, who nodded and repeated the question in Polish.
But the same German inmate then replied –
‘Maybe three hundred, perhaps three-fifty. But they shot about the same number, before leaving here. Blew up some of the buildings, too.’
Mayer swallowed thickly, and then said –
‘Where are the… bodies?’
The man pointed over towards one of the large, brick-built buildings. A sign over its front entrance read: Infirmary.
‘In there,’ said the inmate. ‘They were machinegunned and left as they lay, in bed or on the floor. They took pot-shots at us as they left, by motorbike and car. They killed a few more that way – women and children as well as men. They didn’t care; they never have. We collected the bodies, later, and put them in another building.’
Mayer heard Bach swear softly. Mayer opened his mouth to speak, but found he couldn’t say anything more. He glanced at Weber, his eyes almost imploring.
‘The Russians are coming – they’re perhaps only a day away. You’ll be safe then,’ declared Weber.
Then, in a quieter voice, he told the other three soldiers: ‘We should go now. There’s nothing we can do here.’
‘Wait,’ said Mayer, holding up his hand. He walked up to the small, Jewish-looking man, who still had his face in his hands. He appeared to be weeping.
Mayer put on hand on his shoulder. Instantly there was a whining sound as the Metal Man turned its head to look down at the soldier. Again, Mayer stared upwards for a few moments at the black goggle eyes, trying to see through them…
Then, in a low voice, he addressed the scientist.
‘I’m sorry for… what’s happened,’ he began, not really knowing what to say about the loss of the man’s mother. The gas-chambers… and those chimneys… And Arnold had said there were other camps the same as this one…?
Jesus thought Mayer. How many people have been –
Determinedly cutting off this thought, he forced himself to continue –
‘But this – this creation of yours. It addressed me by name… It said something that someone I used to know very well said often – but that person has been dead for months…’
The scientist turned slowly around to face the SS soldier. Schroder’s eyes were red with tears, but also now held a wild light which made Mayer somehow uneasy.
‘Maybe – maybe I have the answer to your question… The key to the mystery…’ said Schroder, his voice toneless. ‘Why not? Maybe the Metal Man wants to know itself – or should I say, himself. Maybe what I gave the Metal Man has been a secret too long, now. All I need is to get something from the lorry. A simple hand-tool. I’ll return in a minute.’
And he walked off, heading back towards the camp’s entrance. The Metal Man stood silently, still with his back to the soldiers, staring further into the camp…
27
There were Jews here. The woman and man he’d been trying to save, when Ackermann had stabbed him, had been Jews too. He realized this now.
This place was a hell. He knew that, too. The woman holding the baby was stood close by him. That, at least, felt good. The warm feeling. The same picture again flashing up, another woman holding another baby, but he couldn’t…
The names – he just couldn’t think of the names. That made him feel almost like weeping, although he couldn’t weep. No way of expressing any emotion behind this mask.
His name? He was almost there with remembering that. But at the same time he realized that he almost didn’t want to. Because – because maybe it was better not to know too much about…
About the man he had once been.
A man who’d known Mayer. The others – Amsel, Bach and… Weber. Yes, those were all the names. He’d only addressed Mayer so far, the instruction to ‘move his ass’ coming out almost without conscious thought. As though it was something he’d often said – although he’d only realized he could talk shortly before arriving here in this…
Place.
He turned his head to look at the woman holding the baby. Her head shaved, her face gaunt but… A definite strength within her. Some force that had kept her alive until now. He couldn’t see any other babies. Some children – but not nearly enough.
Unthinkingly he stretched out his right hand towards the baby’s head, the many motors and parts within his mechanical arm making their usual whirring and whining noises as the limb extended. He stopped the movement the woman flinched; but then she smiled at him, and said in halting German –
‘Is…okay…’
Still he began to withdraw his hand, until she said again –
The same metallic hand that had once crushed the throat of an SS soldier – that was capable of crushing a grenade like an egg – now moved gently towards the top of the baby’s head. Carefully – oh-so-very-carefully – he used the same finger that pulled the trigger of his colossal gun (no man could have done this, even using both hands) and momentarily touched the head of the baby boy.
‘Name..?’ he heard himself asking. ‘What is your… baby’s… name?’
‘I not yet… think of… name,’ returned the woman, shivering as the icy wind again blew through the camp. ‘I think we die here and so name is not… matter…’
‘You will not die here,’ he said, making a… vow – that was the word. Promising the woman – and her baby – this. He suddenly thought: where is her husband? Then he heard the voice of his creator, that man approaching behind him. He turned around, instinctively recognizing that what this man held in his hand was intended for him.
28
It was a simple hand-tool with a socket on one end of it. Schroder instructed the Metal Man to set down his gun and to sit on a nearby, waist-high pile of rubble. Then Schroder fitted the socket onto one of the bolts that were on either side of the Metal Man’s head, above its ‘ears’. Painted jet-black like the rest of this machine of destruction, these bolts could hardly be seen.
Schroder’s face contorted with the strain of trying to loosen the first bolt. But all his efforts were futile. Finally, he handed the socket to Mayer. Who had a similar lack of success.
Finally, the Metal Man said –
‘Give it to me.’
His massive fingers almost hid the tool from view, as he loosened first the two bolts on one side, and then the two on the other. There was a hush, the only noise the slight ‘squeak’ as the bolts turned, and the wind that continued to sob its way through this camp of death.
The four SS soldiers and the five Poles now stood beside the massed inmates, watching in fascination as the Metal Man dropped the tool and brought up both of its outsized hands to its goggle-eyed mask.
Then it pulled this mask away, exposing a face.
‘Brucker!’ whispered Mayer hoarsely, his own face appearing suddenly shocked and drained of all color. The three other soldiers wore a similar expression.
‘Jesus…’ murmured Bach, his eyes wide.
With the mask removed, Brucker’s face was now slightly smaller in diameter then the back of his head. Six thick metallic struts – two just above the area of the forehead, and two more situated behind either cheek – served to lock the mask in position when it was in place and bolted.
The face itself was even whiter than those of the people watching. A death-mask. A shiny scar ran down from below the right eye almost to the corner of the mouth. The eyes were set, like those of glass. It seemed Brucker had to move his head in order to see around him; these eyes could not operate independently. The lips were extremely pale; bloodless. The mouth was closed.
Brucker moved his head, taking in the people gathered around him. Finally, Mayer stepped forward slightly.
‘It’s really you – sir?’ he asked hesitantly. ‘Lieutenant Colonel Karl Brucker, I mean?’
‘As close as it… can be,’ returned Brucker, his lips barely moving, scarcely forming the words. They came from a grill situated where his larynx would have been, had he been wholly human. His voice was almost mechanically measured, and without discernible emotion. And yet still the words, somehow, sounded sad, regretful.
The mask removed, however, there was no longer that distant, radio-like feel to his voice. Now (noted Mayer and the three other soldiers), it was even relatively similar to how Brucker’s voice had sounded –
Before.
It was a voice Mayer and the other three soldiers had never imagined they would be hearing again – and yet it was wholly different. This was Brucker; and yet also someone – something – else entirely.
Mayer turned to look at the little man who’d arrived with the Metal Man. The SS soldier seemed to be wrestling with several strong emotions at the same time.
‘This is – this is Lieutenant Colonel Brucker’s own face?’ he demanded.
‘No – it is just a death-mask, made partially from silicon as well as… other materials,’ returned Schroder, with a shrug. ‘It sits on top of a multi-layered, flexible metal frame – a marvel of design, if I may say so – that allows this face to convey a limited range of expressions.’
‘But you – you took Brucker’s brain?’ interjected Bach.
Schroder sighed, and shook his head slightly.
‘Just parts of it; what I thought would be essential for the basic motor movements of this machine. I did not think it possible the subject I used would ever regain its – or his – memory, even partially. But, just in case such an eventuality was ever to arise, I gave it a face – so it would have some way of recognizing what it had once been, together with any memories. That is – a man.’
The scientist’s almost dispassionate description of what had been done to Brucker did not sit well with Weber. His fists bunched, he started forwards, saying –
‘You sick bastard! You’ve made a Frankenstein monster of my commanding office!’
Even as Mayer (despite sharing Weber’s anger) moved to intervene, Brucker’s dispassionate voice sounded –
‘A Frankenstein monster or not, Weber, it’s still me. Or as good as you’re going to get, anyway.’
That black humor… That slight smile twisting the bloodless lips… Weber abruptly stopped his intended attack on Schroder, and instead walked over to stand in front of his commanding officer.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he said quietly, at once wiping his eyes with the sleeves of his camouflage overalls. ‘It’s – it’s good to see you again.’
‘Yes,’ said Amsel instinctively. ‘It is.’
Brucker’s internal motors whined as he stood up. The woman with the baby now approached him, carrying a piece of shattered mirror she’d found somewhere. She hesitantly held it in front of Brucker’s face.
Brucker stared at his reflection with his artificial eyes. Again, a hush fell over the people watching, silencing the excited chatter which had started with the unveiling of the Metal Man’s face.
Then Brucker simply nodded, and the woman lowered the piece of mirror.
Brucker looked at Mayer and the three other soldiers.
‘What happened to Ackermann, and his men?’ he asked.
‘We deserted his unit, sir,’ returned Mayer. ‘He was going to shoot these five people here’ – Mayer gestured at the Poles stood nearby with his hand – ‘in cold blood. That old trick of claiming they were ‘partisans’. We took these Poles and just walked away.’
‘‘That old trick’…?’ repeated Brucker, the expression on his recreated face one almost of confusion.
Then – ‘Yes, I remember what you mean, now.’
‘Sir… One thing I have to ask…’ began Mayer cautiously. ‘What happened… in that room in the burning house? Ackermann said a woman – stabbed you…’
‘Ackermann stabbed me,’ returned Brucker, in what was almost a sigh. ‘My back was turned and he stuck the knife in once, twice… I don’t know how many times. It is one of those memories I am having trouble recalling exactly. There are many such memories.’
Weber again wiped his eyes with his sleeve. Bach swore softly. Amsel shook his head and spat on the ground, saying –
‘That son of a bitch… I knew it – I knew it…’
‘We can report what happened, when we get back into Germany,’ declared Mayer grimly.
‘You mean to leave these people behind?’ asked Brucker evenly, looking around him at the gathered inmates.
‘I can’t see what good we’re going to do them by remaining here, sir. The Russians will be here within twenty-four to forty-eight hours, in any case. They’ll look after these people better than we could hope to.’
‘Yes – perhaps yo
u’re right, Mayer,’ nodded Brucker.
‘The Russians mustn’t get hold of you, either,’ Schroder told his creation. ‘But – for me to return to Germany, now… I am a half-Jew. I mean, I may as well just remain in this camp…’
‘You can do as you please,’ said Weber curtly, who was seeing only the man who’d carved up his former commanding officer’s body, to use pieces of the brain and God knows what else as so many spare parts for…
For whatever Brucker was now.
The men started, the sound of squealing tank tracks coming suddenly from outside the front of the camp.