Chosen of the Valkyries

Chapter Nineteen

Berlin, Germany Prime

16 September 1985

Horst followed Gudrun through a hospital, silently marvelling at just how well she was able to connect with the wounded – civilians and soldiers – who had been brought to the building for treatment. She stopped and spoke to all of them, from the soldier who had been shot in the leg by a sniper to the little girl who’d been wounded when flying debris broke her arm, her words – perhaps – making it easier for them to believe that they hadn’t been wounded in vain. Gudrun had worried over sounding fake, as if she didn’t really care, but her hesitations and moments of silence only added to the effect. She wasn’t a radio broadcaster, reading the script; she was someone trying her best to be real.

He kept his face impassive as a pair of wounded soldiers flirted cheerfully with her – they would never have dared flirt with anyone else on the council – and tried hard to resist the temptation to organise an extremely dangerous posting for both of them. They had been wounded in combat, true, and such wounds carried high status in the Reich, but they were flirting with his girl. And yet, they didn’t know Gudrun was his girl. How could they? She wore no wedding ring, nothing to suggest she was anything other than an unmarried young girl. Someone who flirted with a married woman would be in deep shit, but not someone who flirted with an unmarried girl…

You’re being an idiot, he told himself, sternly. She’s being nice to them and they are trying to keep themselves from falling into depression.

Gudrun looked relieved as the tour finally came to an end and they made their way back to the car. Horst felt relieved too, even though they were out in the open without anything like enough security to suit him. Volker Schulze or Hans Kruger would have had a small army protecting them, if they left the bunkers, but Gudrun had only two bodyguards: himself and the driver. Maybe they didn’t consider Gudrun that important, compared to the two older men… Horst knew, deep inside, that Gudrun would be a target. There was such a thing as malice and revenge. Holliston would definitely want Gudrun alive so he could make her death memorable.

“I think you need more security,” he said, once the car doors were closed. “You’re naked out here with only me.”

“I’m not naked,” Gudrun said. She glanced down at her jacket, which obscured the shape of her breasts. “Really…”

“You know what I mean,” Horst said. Three days of fighting had seen the SS slowly advancing forward, pushing the defenders back. He’d heard nothing from the stay-behind cell, but his training told him that it was merely a matter of time before they got back in touch with him. “You need more security.”

Gudrun shook her head. “I don’t feel so close to people” – she nodded towards the hospital as they drove away – “when I have a dozen men surrounding me.”

“It only takes one person to kill you,” Horst said. He’d been nervous all the time they’d been outside the car, although really the car was no true protection. It was bulletproof, but a single RPG or antitank missile would be more than sufficient to turn it into scrap metal. Or a carefully-placed IED. “He might be posing as one of your admirers until the moment he stabs you with a knife.”

He signed, knowing he was going to lose the battle. There was no way he could force Gudrun to accept more bodyguards, if she didn’t want to accept more bodyguards, any more than he could force her to stay in the bunker. And she had a point, he had to admit. None of the common citizens had ever seen the Reich Council, not without hundreds of bodyguards, detailed security vetting and a strip search before they entered the dome. Gudrun, walking the streets without bodyguards, was far more capable of making a connection with the common citizens.

“I have to take the risk,” Gudrun said, stiffly. “There’s no choice.”

Horst gave her a sharp look. Didn’t she know the danger? But then, Gudrun had always been brave, sometimes to the point of recklessness. Her family connections wouldn’t have saved her, if she’d been fingered as an underground leader, any more than they would save her now from a bullet through the head. A single sniper, perched on a nearby rooftop, could pick her off before anyone realised he was there. But hiding in the bunker would only undermine her connection to the rest of the city.

He said nothing as the car pulled into the underground garage and they made their way down to the bunker. The guards checked their names and faces, then waved them through without comment. Horst had hoped there would be a chance to pick up a briefing from one of the military officers, but the note waiting for them in their suite made it clear that there wouldn’t be another formal meeting until later in the day.

“I know you worry about me,” Gudrun said, once the door was closed. “But I owe it to myself to take some risks.”

“You don’t have to,” Horst snorted.

“That’s the point,” Gudrun said. “I don’t have to, but I’m going to take them anyway.”

She did have a point, Horst conceded, reluctantly. He wouldn’t have wanted to be a woman, not when a woman’s opinions could be easily dismissed – and her life ruled by the men in her life – but there were some advantages. No one in the west expected women to actually fight, to stand and die in defence of the Reich. Gudrun might stand up and tell men to fight, yet she would never be asked to fight herself. And while a man would be called a coward if he shirked duty on the front line, a woman would be spared that particular insult.

But she needs to prove herself to the men, he admitted, silently. Or they won’t take her seriously.

He gave her a quick kiss, then walked out of the bunker, up the stairs and into his bedroom, hoping his habit of checking the room each day hadn’t gone unnoticed. The spy – whoever he or she might be – had to be keeping an eye on him. He worried, constantly, about finding the bastard, but a covert check of everyone in the building had turned up nothing. And yet, it wouldn’t. The SS would hardly have failed to make sure that their observers had genuine covers. Horst himself was proof of that!

His blood ran cold as he saw the note, positioned provocatively on top of his bed. He sucked his breath in, sharply, as he picked it up, unsure if he should be damning the spy for sheer lack of tradecraft or not. Putting the message in such a blatant position was stupid, but it was also a warning that he was under observation. He’d already known that, of course, yet the message rubbed it in. He wondered grimly just what the observer – and his handler – was thinking, then opened the message. It gave a location, a date and a time, two days in the future. That struck him as more than a little odd.

He retrieved the street map of Berlin he’d obtained from the library and checked the location, hoping his memory had failed him. But it hadn’t. The location the cell had selected was quite some distance from the Reichstag, a place where it would be easy for them to make sure that Horst was alone before he met them. Bringing a small army with him would be impossible, Horst conceded reluctantly. Even getting a pair of covert observers into position to watch proceedings would be fraught with difficulty.

Damn it, he thought. Schwarzkopf – or whoever had taken over, if Schwarzkopf wasn’t in charge – had picked a very good spot. And if I don’t show, all hell is going to break loose.

He sighed. It was time to talk to the Chancellor. Again.

Herman wasn’t entirely sure why he had been called off duty and told to report directly to the Reichstag. Ordinary policemen were never invited into the Reichstag, even when they were in very deep shit indeed. Gudrun was the only person who might have called him, but he found it hard to imagine his daughter summoning him as though he was her minion. She would know better, surely. And yet, who else would call him?

It has to be something to do with the missing refugee, he thought, as he passed through security. Someone has taken my concerns seriously.

He watched the security guards, gauging their performance. The security procedures were admirably tight, although they were more concerned with removing his pistol than anything else he could use as a weapon. Given just how innovative some suspects could become, when it became clear they were going to spend the rest of their lives in a work camp – if they were lucky – he rather suspected the guards needed a crash course. But that, thankfully, wasn’t his concern.

“Leutnant Wieland,” a man said, when he was shown into a small room. Another man – it took Herman a moment to recognise him as one of Gudrun’s friends – was standing by the window, watching Herman through bright blue eyes. “Thank you for coming.”

“I wasn’t aware I had a choice, Mein Herr,” Herman said, tartly. Even now, with soldiers and reservists joining the police on the streets, Berlin remained uneasy. “Why did you call me off the streets?”

“You have an interesting record, Leutnant Wieland,” the man said. He hadn’t bothered to introduce himself, which in Herman’s experience probably meant he was either SS or an intelligence officer. Hopefully, the latter. “You’ve moved from being a street cop to a detective and then back to being a street cop… may I ask why?”

“It’s in my file, Mein Herr,” Herman said.

“But I am asking you,” the man said. “Why did you choose to return to the streets?”

Herman took a moment to formulate his answer. “I grew frustrated with being a detective, Mein Herr,” he said, finally. “It was rare, very rare, to solve a case – and there were quite a few times when the perpetrator enjoyed political cover. There was no hope of bringing the guilty man to justice. I requested a transfer back to the streets and it was accepted without comment.”

The man lifted his eyebrows. “Why?”

“Policemen, as they grow older, often try to get off the streets,” Herman said. “An experienced officer who volunteers to return to the streets is a blessing.”

“For his superiors, I imagine,” the man said. “What did your wife say about it?”

Herman shrugged. “Kurt had joined the military by that point, so we didn’t need so much income,” he said. “But she wasn’t too pleased about it.”

He sighed, inwardly. That was an understatement. Adelinde had thrown a colossal fit, shouting and screaming in rage when she’d heard he was going back to the streets. A street policeman had a significantly higher chance of being injured or killed on duty than a detective, meaning that she would fear for his life every time he went on patrol. But he couldn’t remain as a detective. The work had crushed his soul.

“I don’t blame her,” the man said. He sighed, then pointed to a chair. “Please, sit. We have a job for you.”

He waited until Herman had sat, carefully not relaxing, then went on. “I read your report about the murder at the transit barracks,” he added, slowly. “Do you stand by your conclusions?”

“Yes, Mein Herr,” Herman said. Was this it? Was he about to be rebuked for writing an absurd suggestion into his reports? But surely his immediate superiors would have handled it, wouldn’t they? “I believe they fit the facts.”

The man frowned. “Why?”

Herman took a breath. “As I stated in my report, Mein Herr, an experienced police officer would not allow a male refugee so close to him without preparing himself for the possibility of a fight,” he said. “The refuges have not been happy about being uprooted from their homes and there have been a number of violent incidents. A female refugee, on the other hand, would have seemed harmless until it was too late.”

“And less worrying in general terms,” the man agreed. He turned towards Gudrun’s friend. “Horst?”

Horst stepped forward. Herman studied him, feeling the odd twinge of disquiet he’d felt when Konrad had asked his little girl out for the first time. Gudrun had been seventeen when she’d started to date Konrad, but Herman had found it hard to forget that she was no longer a child. He’d even had a stern discussion with Konrad, promising blood and pain if he hurt Gudrun in any way. And he’d liked Konrad. He wasn’t quite so sure about Horst.

And he’s been too close to Gudrun, he thought, darkly. Adelinde might not have noticed, but Herman had. The two youngsters had been standing far too close together, even in public, to be just friends. Is he planning to marry her one day?

“We have a problem,” Horst said, bluntly. “There’s an SS stay-behind cell somewhere within Berlin.”

Herman’s eyes narrowed. “A stay-behind cell?”

Horst nodded. “Their normal mission is to wait until the advancing spearheads have moved onwards to new targets, then come out of the shadows and engage the enemy,” he said. “I suspect this cell intends to cause chaos within the city when the SS attacks from the outside.”

“A reasonable suspicion,” Herman said, carefully. Horst spoke with authority, but he was just a university student… wasn’t he? No, there was something fishy about Horst’s background. “How do you intend to track them down?”

“The uprising caught the SS by surprise,” Horst said. “I… have reason to believe that their command network within Berlin was badly disrupted, perhaps fatally. They didn’t have any contingency plans for actually losing control of the city, let alone the RSHA. The person responsible for the murder, the person who vanished into the city, may well be a commando sent to assist what remains of their network.”

Herman eyed him for a long moment. “You have reason to believe…?”

Horst hesitated, then made a very visible decision. “I used to work for them,” he said. “And they think – I hope – I still do.”

The whole story spilled out, piece by piece. Herman stared. He was no stranger to crazy stories – he still smiled whenever he remembered the man who’d accidentally driven his car into the painting of a tunnel someone had placed on a wall – but this one was particularly absurd. Horst had been working for the SS all along? Except… he’d switched sides? Did Gudrun know?

“I told her,” Horst said, when he asked. “It was right after I got her out of prison.”

Herman scowled, torn between gratitude and a deep simmering anger. “And you didn’t think to warn her that she could get into very real trouble?”

“She knew,” Horst said, flatly.

He went on before Herman could muster a response. “We don’t know how many people we can trust,” he added. “The counterintelligence networks have also been shattered. I’ve done my best to go through the files, but an SS observer wouldn’t be easily noticeable… we have to isolate and destroy the cell before it is too late.”

“I understand,” Herman said. “What do you want me to do?”

“I think we can trust you,” Horst said. “Help us find the cell.”

Herman nodded, although he knew the task would be far from easy. Berlin was hardly Paris or London, somewhere where a group of Germans would stand out like sore thumbs. An SS commando, even one from Germany East, would pass unnoticed in Berlin. Hell, the commando might even be a Berliner. As long as they were careful, they might just be impossible to locate.

“I’ll do my best,” he said. “Who can I call upon for help?”

“There’s a handful of people who have been cleared,” Horst said. “And if there’s anyone you trust from the police, feel free to ask for them to be vetted.”

Herman scowled. “How do you know you can trust me?”

“I imagine Gudrun would be dead by now or shipped off to Germany East, if you were working for the SS,” Horst said. There was an airy tone to his voice that made Herman’s temper flare. “And we’re short of people we can trust.”

“Only people who could have betrayed us are trusted now,” the man warned.

“I see,” Herman said. He scowled at Horst, daring the young man to look back at him. “Do you really think I would have betrayed my daughter?”

“You would not be the first, if you had,” Horst commented. “A number of the women I knew in Germany East were exiled, after taking part in the feminist movement.”

Herman scowled. He’d been a teenager at the time, but he remembered it all too well. The feminists had sought to change the eternal relationship between men and women, without realising just how far the Reich was prepared to go to maintain its power. Their cells had been broken, a handful had been executed for plotting against the state and most of the remainder dispatched to Germany East to become good little housewives. His mother had been on the fringes of the movement and its failure had made her very bitter…

“I would not have betrayed my daughter,” Herman said.

“And there are some who would say you have betrayed the Reich,” Horst countered. “And that’s why I think we can trust you.”

“Yes, you can,” Herman said. “You can trust me on this. If you hurt her, I’ll kill you.”

“Good,” Horst said. He sounded oddly relieved, rather than amused or fearful. “What self-respecting father could do more?”