by G T Almasi
The shells finally stop exploding. Debris continues to drop around us. Patrick grabs me under my arms and moves us closer to the wall, where less junk is falling. Once again, my pistols remain stuck to my magnetic WeaponSynch pads.
“C’mon, Hot Stuff, wake up!” He shakes me.
My eyes flutter open. Brando watches me cough and roll onto my stomach. I vomit pale liquid onto the dust-coated ground, then shakily prop myself on my knees.
“Oh Christ,” I moan, and throw up again.
—AFTER-ACTION REPORT—
30 SEP 1981, 11:34 P.M. CEST
General Eisenberg,
Berlin’s Flak Towers have been neutralized. Please let me know how ExOps can continue to be of service.
Yours,
—RFK
45
THIRTY MINUTES LATER, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1:58 P.M. CEST
U-BAHN MAINTENANCE TUNNEL BENEATH TIERGARTEN, BERLIN
My stomach heaves and I throw up for the whateverth time since I pulled my Human Superball routine off the top of the Zoo Tower.
“Gehlgh.” I lean against the wall and spit sour stomach acid at the ground. “Brando, what’s wrong with me?”
Patrick pats my back, the way people do when you’re sick. He says, “Extreme anatomical compression plus acute distortion of your internal organs. This effect is most pronounced below your rib cage, in particular your stomach.”
I scowl at my partner. “Is that actually a thing?”
He smiles and tilts his head. “As of half an hour ago, yes.”
Great. I’ve invented a brand-new injury.
My sweaty clothing sticks to me all over. When I turn to check the passageway behind us, Li’l Bertha’s pistol harness pulls and pinches my sore ribs and backbone. The corridor swims and my feet stumble on the old flooring. Brando wraps my arm around his waist to keep me from falling.
Once the sky stopped raining concrete, we hotfooted to the nearest U-Bahn station. After some trial and error, we found the anonymous door to the Circle’s under-city warren. Our path has meandered south, away from the Tiergarten and under the Wilmersdorf area.
We resurface somewhere in the Schönberg district and cautiously ascend to the street. The battle-racket is muted in this area. A few industrious store owners have opened their shops for business. Patrick recognizes the neighborhood and confidently leads the way.
“Pretty quiet,” I say.
“Thank God,” Brando says. “I couldn’t even hear through my commphone earlier.”
“We’ll check in with ExOps?”
“Yah. Wanna listen in?”
I’m about to say yes when a warm waft of deliciousness floats into my nose. A bakery! My stomach must be feeling better.
“You do it,” I say, following the yummy scent around the corner. “I’ll get us somethin’ to eat.”
The appetizing aroma comes from a bakery called Ich Bin, which simply means “I am.” In addition to wonderful smells, the place emits a block-long line of customers waiting to buy bread. There’s no way I have time for that.
I march straight to the bakery’s front door. “Rücken!” Move outta the way!
The indignant civilians stare me down, refusing to budge.
Big Voice time.
“Rücken, mutterficken!”
The people in line cover their ears and quail from my deafening proclamation. I stomp into the doorway. Inside, five customers watch me invade their hard-won places in line. Two of them step aside when I jab Li’l Bertha at them. The remaining three customers prove to be incredibly stubborn. I draw my second pistol and unleash a howling string of German epithets.
They yield. I go to the front of the line.
Ahh, priority status.
I tell the young woman behind the counter to give me a dozen doughnuts. The or else is so heavily implied by my wild hair, my crazed demeanor, and my blood-smoke-and-sweat-stained clothing, she complies immediately. The girl gives me a big paper bag of pastries.
“Danke!” I bellow.
I shut off Big Voice, shoulder my way out of the bakery, and return to my partner.
He says, “Was that you screaming just now?”
“No-o-o.” I reach into my bag of totally nutritious carbo-bombs. “I was advising with authority.”
“Scarlet, I’ve been to Ich Bin a bunch of times. They’re good people.”
“Still are,” I say.
Germans don’t really have doughnuts. Those are an American thing. What Germans bake instead are super-fattening bunlike pastries filled with jam and sprinkled with powdered sugar. These baseball-sized blobs of heaven are called “Pfannkuchen,” or “pancakes,” by the citizens of Berlin and “Berliners” by everyone else, because…well, actually I don’t know.
I cautiously eat a raspberry-filled Berliner while Patrick and I cross the street. My stomach keeps the food down, so I chase the first Berliner with another one.
Brando patiently looks on. “Hey,” he finally says, “got any for me?”
I try to say Sure but my mouth is so full it comes out, “Sthuh.” Crumbs and powdered sugar sail from between my lips. “Twy ha shrawbewwy.”
Patrick grins and grabs a pastry from my bag. He takes a big bite and jam bloops onto the corner of his mouth. I lean over and lick it off him. He curls his free arm around my hips.
We walk along the nearly deserted street. A police cruiser here, a military truck there. Otherwise we’ve got this road to ourselves.
“Man,” Brando says. “I never saw this neighborhood so empty.”
My partner and I pass a car-sized hole in the pavement. Chunks of blacktop lie scattered to the sidewalks. Farther along another shell hole overflows with water from a ruptured pipe.
Patrick leads me to the terrifically named Dudenstrasse. We follow it until we’re almost in the shadow of the Arch of Triumph. Next to a row of apartments looms a massive, sixty-foot-tall and fifty-foot-wide concrete column.
I ask, “What the heck is that? Another missile silo?”
“It’s a leftover from Speer’s building program.”
“Is it solid?” I ask.
“Oh yeah.”
“Cripes, it must weigh, like…”
“Fifty-eight thousand tons.”
Of course Patrick knows that.
As my partner and I can testify, the soil beneath Berlin is pretty sandy. This is why the Circle can dig so many tunnels. It’s also why Berlin doesn’t have many skyscrapers.
According to Brando, Albert Speer worried that his massive structures would sink into the city’s soft ground, so he had this monolith—or, as he called it, Heavy Load Bearing Body—placed near the proposed site of the stupendously heavy arch to see what would happen. It sank eight inches in a year, so Speer had to design a much more comprehensive foundation with concrete piers sunk hundreds of feet into the earth. Years later, the town’s civil engineering board tried to dismantle this concrete eyesore, but Krautcrete is forever. Dynamiting the stupid-looking thing would have taken the whole neighborhood with it. So they left it where it is, to be gradually covered in weeds and graffiti.
We walk down a flight of stone steps to the plug’s small undercroft. Yet another anonymous door leads us to the underground tunnel system. After this trip, I’ll never look at plain doors in public spaces the same way again.
Patrick and I enter Rachel’s subterranean headquarters below the arch. It’s taken us a little while to arrive, and news of my exploits has preceded us. Several of the Circle members congratulate me and slap my aching back until Brando shoos them away. He guides me through the long kitchen to our little gray cubicle. I nearly fall asleep on my feet. I dream that Trick tucks me into bed. He turns off the little lamp, tiptoes out, and quietly pulls the curtain closed behind him.
46
/> The broad expanse of a grassy field stretches to the horizon in every direction. It’s so quiet I snap my fingers next to my ear to check my hearing.
Snap, snap.
Bright-green plants sprout from the ground on either side of me. Long, pointed leaves sharp as double-edged swords. Before I know it, they’re taller than me. A faint brushing sound similar to silk sheets comes from the plants as they grow to twice my height.
The tips of the towering plants curl inward. The leaves lean toward each other until they form a roof over my head. The tips fuse together and spin like a top. The rotating roof coils the green cobras around me. The snakes crush me until my guts split apart. They drag me beneath the ground. I scream my lungs empty. The hole shuts over my head.
Snap, snap.
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 11:30 A.M. CEST
BENEATH SÜDBAHNHOF, BERLIN
“Scarlet!” Patrick shakes my shoulder and startles me awake. I snatch my pistol from under my jacket.
“Hey, hey,” he cries. “It’s me!”
I lower my gun and snap her out of my palm.
“Bad dream?”
“Yeah.” I holster Li’l Bertha then hold my hand out. Brando pulls me to my feet before silently escorting me to the kitchen. A group of people sit on the edge of the platform, eating breakfast. Their legs dangle into the trench where the U-Bahn trains traveled before this old station was bypassed for a new one.
I grab a mug. I drop the mug. It thunks to the platform. The handle breaks off. The row of breakfasters look over as I try to pick up the broken pieces.
The fingers of my left hand hang limply from my palm. I can’t make them do anything. I shake my left arm to get them working again. My right hand still does what I tell it to, but suddenly I get a monster head rush and tip forward into the counter.
Patrick grabs the collar of my jacket to prevent me from falling face-first into the coffeemaker. He turns me around then sets me on my backside. Sweat pours from my scalp and stings my eyes. I can’t catch my breath. My tongue feels like a lump of wool.
“Brando,” I comm, “what the hell is happening to me?”
“Stress,” he comms. “Take some Kalmers.”
I release a generous helping of downers into my bloodstream. The narcocktail soothes my rattling nerves and unclenches my lungs. Patrick pours coffee into another mug then holds it to my lips. I slurp the hot coffee and swish my tongue around in it before gulping it down.
Goddamn post-traumatic stress disorder! Dr. H has warned me about the symptoms a hundred times, but when I’m actually suffering them I never remember why.
Patrick offers me more coffee. “You all right?”
I shake my head. “How do I keep that from happening?”
My partner’s face shifts to something between a smirk and a grimace. “Quit the business.”
Oh, fuck that.
Patrick sees my absolute resistance to his ludicrous suggestion. “Or,” he comms, “maybe for now you adjust your neuroinjector to give you a constant trickle of chems.”
“What do you mean ‘for now’?”
“Until we can get you some rest and a Med-Tech.”
“ ’Kay.” I override my Nerve Jet’s normal dosage pattern and tell it to give me a slow drip of everything; Madrenaline, Kalmers, and even some Overkaine for my back, torso, head, knees, and ankles.
The people along the lip of the platform finish their breakfasts and bring their dishes to the sink set in the wall. A couple of them ogle me as they pass by.
“Better?”
“Yeah,” I mutter. “Let’s go. These folks keep gawkin’ at me.”
Brando helps me up. “It’s not because you almost fainted just now. They’re looking at you because you’re the American agent who neutralized the Zoo Tower.”
Oh.
Well, fine then.
I smugly slide my arm through Patrick’s as we retrace our steps out of the kitchen.
My commphone activates. It’s Rachel, using one of the comm-sets we gave her. “Darwin, Scarlet, are you there?”
“Affirmative, Rachel, go ahead.”
“The enemy has breached our entrance at Tempelhof Airport and entered the tunnels in force.”
My partner and I glance at each other. “We’ll take care of them,” we both comm.
“Be careful, you two.” Rachel’s comm-voice pauses. “Our scouts say the enemy has brought flamethrowers this time.”
My naturally optimistic nature compels to me to imagine what’s going to happen to these yokels when I shoot the tanks off their backs. I pat down my pistols. “Don’t worry, Rachel,” I comm. “We’ll smoke their asses big time.”
“Sorry, Scarlet, what?”
Patrick jumps in. “Scarlet says she’ll terminate all the enemy troops.”
“Ah,” Rachel replies. “Gute.”
47
THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 12:09 P.M. CEST
BENEATH TEMPLEHOF AIRPORT, BERLIN
“Here they come.” Patrick comms.
“Yep.” I reply. Both Li’l Bertha and Punx lie clicked into my palms, anxiously waiting for the first competitor to come into view. My body heat is stoked by a heavy dose of Madrenaline. This warmth is especially welcome because everything below my chest is submerged in cold water. My partner placed us in this half-flooded tunnel so we could hide underwater in case—
“Down!” Brando comms.
A tongue of fire sails from around the corner ahead, bounces off the wall, and billows directly at us. I duck beneath the chilly surface of the water. The stream of blazing fuel brightly illuminates our watery confines. The submerged floor is littered with cigarette butts, disposable lighters, a shoe, and a collection of bullet shell casings.
After a few seconds, darkness returns to the tunnel. We poke our heads above the waterline like a pair of alligators.
“Not exactly stealthy,” I comm.
“Maybe they know we’re here.”
Fat lotta good it’ll do ’em. I hold Li’l Bertha close to my face to peer through her targeting sensor’s infrared filter. Usually, people are red and walls are blue. However, being toasted by liquid fire makes the walls glow orange. Slightly darker silhouettes move around the corner.
“Light ’em up, Hot Stuff.”
I rise out of the pool. Dark water cascades from my hair and clothes. Three jarheads approach my position. The first wanker carries a flamethrower at the ready.
My arms extend as my fingers squeeze the girls’ triggers. The super-dense disks from Punx slice through flesh, bone, and, most important, canisters of wildly flammable chemicals. Li’l Bertha sprays Incendiary bullets into this volatile mix and ignites the vapor leaking from Wanko’s flamethrower tanks. His scream is drowned out by the roaring combustion of the fuel strapped to his back. He’s instantly reduced to assburgers. Clattering boots echo from around the corner, quickly followed by shrieks and gasps before the fire burns all the oxygen from the air, smothering itself.
I hold my breath, race past the pile of roasting flesh, then zip around the corner. The rest of the SZ patrol stumbles away up the corridor. The no light down here, but the men’s body heat gives Li’l Bertha plenty to work with. She spins her gyros from target to target and exterminates the schmokels in nothing flat.
Patrick joins me. We run by the pile of dead soldiers, moving fast for two reasons: The air here is unbreathable, and we want to bring the fight to these patrols while they’re still some distance from Rachel’s headquarters.
We dash into a pocket of fresh air, inhale deeply, then press forward. Our passage opens onto a larger tunnel. Heavy wooden railroad ties sit embedded in the ground, but the steel rails have been removed. I pause at the opening and amplify my hearing.
I hear another group of lardasses sneaking around,
but the walls echo sound so sharply I can’t tell what direction they’re coming from.
I comm, “Do you hear that?”
“Yeah,” my partner comms. “It sounds like more than one.”
I turn my head from side to side, listening carefully. Two distinct groups warble from the cluttered soundscape.
“You’re right,” I comm. “Back up a little.”
Brando retreats into the smaller passage. I stand in the middle of the larger tunnel then activate Big Voice.
“Achtung!” Look out!
My enhanced bellow echoes off the solid walls and jumps through the tunnel in both directions. The approaching groups falls silent, then each of them begin running toward me.
I stand with my pistols in my outstretched arms, one pointing in each direction. When the glowing soldiers appear around the tunnel’s long curves, I bang out a short volley at both patrols.
“Hilfe!” Help! I shout. “It’s the terrorists!” I scoot back into the smaller passageway to dodge the opposing storms of gunfire. I holler over the rattling firefight, “They’ve captured one of our flamethrowers!”
Both teams respond by lighting up their own flamethrowers, filling the tunnel with hellish light and acrid fumes. Clouds of bullets flash through the roiling balls of fire. I can barely hear the screams of the wounded. The teams are so close together one side begins throwing grenades. One of the bombs flies directly into an oncoming rush from the opposing flamethrower. The pressurized inferno stops the grenade in midair and pushes it back where it came from.
Patrick and I turn away from the tunnel battlefield and haul ass. The confined quarters make the grenades sound like they’re blowing up in reverse—quietly, then very loudly. The explosions from the fuel tanks are a different story.
The shrieks of the burning flamethrower operators are underscored by low-pitched, stomach-shaking quakes that rattle the ground like baseballs panging off a bass drum.
Wind rushes through my hair and flows toward the fight. We pass a narrow tunnel. Patrick grabs my arm. “Come on,” he comms. “This air feels fresher.”