Order of the black sun b.., p.33
Order of the Black Sun Box Set 2, page 33
part #4 of Order of the Black Sun Series
Herr Mueller’s son recoiled at the urgency of his father’s raging imploring, but their eyes stayed locked with one another’s and he could see the fear peeking out from deep within the old man’s flaring blue gaze. That was enough to shut him up. If his fearless father held this shard of apprehension inside, then it was official – they were in deep shit without a shovel.
Feeling the fool, he looked at both of his brothers, their eyes glinting with a similar apprehension while they ate silently.
As expected a clanking sound came from further away outside their home yard fence. It resembled the sound of a gong without the resonance, a blunt iron clang. Herr Mueller straightened himself, listening. He knew what made that sound. The perimeter around his home was cleverly fenced by thin wiring to which he had fixed iron lids from old oil containers in his father’s shed. They were very hard to perceive, especially in darkness, because the engineer employed some cunning in his camouflage techniques and colored them with shades of the encompassing grassland to blend them into the terrain.
Now one of those had been triggered.
It gave him a good idea of how far the radius of their stalkers reached and how far the closest creeper was to the house. But what Herr Mueller did not count on was the cunning of his opponent, the Captain who led the deadly team. He was himself an old acquaintance of trickery and construction and he skillfully devised a plan reminiscent of the oldest trick in warfare – misdirection.
The men in the house eyed one another, knowing exactly which one to do what. Briskly they deployed, each shooting off into different parts of the house. Loading their rifles in solitude each, they waited. There was not a sound outside their windows, apart from the whisper of the tree tops and the occasional hooting of an owl. Inside the house it became as dead silent as it was in the dead of night when they slept, with only the antique Gustav Becker mantle clock persistently ticking away each second of anticipation. Had it not been for the situation they may have found the calm atmosphere quite soothing.
Suddenly there was a knock at the front door. Herr Mueller and his sons frowned, shifting uncomfortably at the odd development. It was a civilized, gentle knock, not too loud, but clear. Then a woman’s voice from the other side of the door. “Hello? Is anyone home? I need some help please.”
One of Herr Mueller’s sons crept from the dark corridor to join him at the fireplace where he was crouching behind an armchair. The old man could see his other sons peeking from the spare room opposite the living room, their perplexed faces only slightly illuminated by the orange light of the dining room lamp and the fire in the hearth. He motioned for them to remain quiet. Women were far from weak and innocent in Herr Mueller’s opinion, something he learned quickly during the war. They were often the best assassins because of the assumptions held about them, or spies, as spies they employed that innate guile they possessed over the misogynistic opinions men had about them.
The knock was louder and more urgent the second time round, yet her voice maintained its soft and helpless tone.
“Please, anyone! I cannot get back to my car. My tire blew out and I…I am stranded here because…’cause…” she whispered against the door, “…there are men patrolling or something and they won’t let me get back to my car.”
The Mueller sons exchanged glances again and then stared at their father for a decision, but he looked as dumbstruck as they were. He simply shook his head and shrugged, mouthing ‘what shall we do?’ But his sons shook their heads in the mute atmosphere of the house. They did not know if they could trust the woman. Like their father they had no illusions about stereotypes and knew that she could be one of them.
“What is she is not one of them, Vati?” the youngest son asked, hardly making a sound as he spoke.
“That is the predicament we find ourselves in,” Herr Mueller answered. “How can we turn away a lady in trouble? It is not how we do things.”
“Unless she is a lady with a gun,” the other brother commented nonchalantly while he looked at the drawn curtains. He contemplated stealing a look at the caller to see if she was genuine and his father nodded in agreement, gesturing for him to go ahead.
“Be careful,” Herr Mueller whispered.
The woman knocked again, her beats more solemn and lost now. Her sobs provoked their sympathy, but their lives were at stake if they opened that front door. On the other side of the door they could hear her sitting down on the step, crying softly so that the men in the field would not discover her. Obviously she thought nobody was home and knew that she was trapped on the porch of an empty house in a barren wilderness where bad men barricaded her way with no help in sight.
At the window Mueller’s eldest carefully pulled aside the far side of the curtain, barely perceptible with his skill. She was as timid as she sounded – her blond hair was unkempt in the cold wind, but she looked by no means less groomed. Guessing her at about thirty years of age, he saw that she was wearing new jeans and leather boots with a leather jacket and scarf, clutching her bag under her arm. She looked around frenziedly, wondering what was in the pitch dark just outside the reach of the farm house porch lights. The only other light was the bright pole mounted trooper Mueller kept above the lock-up shed where he parked his vehicles. On the step the woman tried her cell phone, but it kept beeping to announce the lack of signal there while she had no idea she was being watched.
Mueller’s son checked the area where the darkness consumed the spreading beam of the front yard. The others waited with bated breath to see what the verdict was. He looked at his brothers and with a relieved expression he gave them a thumbs-up to open the door. As they rose to their feet and converged in the lobby the rain started pouring down outside, blown in sheets by the wind. The woman jumped up as the water started drenching her hair as Herr Mueller flung open the door and shouted for her to enter quickly.
“Oh thank god!” she cried, cowering in under the big old man’s arms to get into the shelter of the house. Her big blue eyes ran over the occupants in the immediate area and they stared back at the pretty woman with no small amount of attraction.
Herr Mueller closed the door and asked her what her name was. The small blond smiled shyly and checked her phone again, but it looked slightly different from the one she had been struggling with outside. She pressed the green button and exclaimed “Vier Männer!”
A split second later the window where the eldest Mueller son stood shattered, splattering his blood all over the drapes and lace curtains. Herr Mueller knew instantly that they had been betrayed and now the enemy knew their numbers. Without inhibition he landed a devastating left jab on the small woman’s jaw, dislocating it on impact. She fell limply against the mantle, the blood oozing from her nose and mouth. He shouted for his sons to drop to the floor for the ensuing firefight about to rip their home apart. But nothing happened. Instead they heard the kitchen window breaking. Herr Mueller cocked his gun and stole towards the kitchen, his two other sons in tail. The thunder showers outside clouded the all-important noises Herr Mueller needed to determine the position of his enemies and made it very difficult for him to hear from what direction they progressed.
As he and his youngest stepped through the kitchen doorway, his son was met by the jaws of a ferocious Rottweiler that came from the darkness like a living shadow, sinking its teeth into the soft flesh of his freshly shaven throat. Herr Mueller pulled his hunting knife and shoved it swiftly into the animal’s heart. With a yelp the beautiful black creature sank to the floor, pulling its target down with it. But Herr Mueller did not have time to dislodge the dog’s jaws from his son’s neck before the next one leapt through the air and landed hard on them.
Gun shots sounded loudly from the other room as the third brother stood his ground against two intruders who passed Herr Mueller and his fallen son.
It was all a haze to the old man who suffered a brutal blow to the back of the head. Unable to focus, unable to stand up, his vague vision found the bleeding woman who had betrayed them. He was pleased to see that she wasn’t moving anymore.
10
The Train to Weimar
Nina arrived in Germany after a two day trip from Edinburgh. To get to Weimar, she elected to take a train trip to get a feel for the country without looking down on everything. It was surprisingly cold in the mainland of Europe, but Germany was clearly having an early peak. Nina expected to see snow, but so far the towns she had passed were just prone to frigid winds and occasional downpours.
In her travel luggage, and she always travelled as light as possible, she had her best insulated boots and way too many pairs of socks. Some would say at a glance that Dr. Nina Gould was perhaps obsessed with her knitted footwear. Of all things, she preferred the alpaca variety sent to her by Padre Loredo from New Mexico, a gift which became habit after she helped him locate some old Mexican archival scripts on the Apocrypha.
Leaving the breathtaking historical churches and architecture of Erfurt after only a night of rest at a modest Bed & Breakfast, Nina embarked on her railway travel to meet Sam in Weimar. Regrettably she could not stay longer to do some sightseeing, because she had been unable to establish contact with her German friend, who she was hoping to ask to hold on to Sam’s camera until she could get there. It did not bother her that much, though, as she needed to see him, whether she wanted to admit it or not, and this was the perfect excuse. After all, did he not summon her?
Erfurt had more churches than houses, she thought. The brilliant ancient structures were definitely an architect’s wet dream, not so much more than it gave anthropologically inclined historians like her a bit of a boner. Nina smiled at her own thoughts. It was true what they say – one never really grows up past the slang and expressions of college life or youth in general, no matter what age you are or what profession has made you a community snob, an esteemed member of society.
The train’s steel on steel clacking was remarkably hypnotic, compelling Nina to lie back in her private compartment and enjoy the passing outside world through her square window.
She did not want to doze off, for fear of another nightmare or one of those annoying bouts of déjà vu she seemed to endure more and more of late. Her meds had her sleeping too much, nightmares included, so she ditched them. Thirteen hours of sleep a day was simply counter-productive in every way, she reckoned, and with or without the bad dreams, she still had to deal with the horrendous time lapses that somehow made her psychic. Like Groundhog Day, as Nina thought of it, she kept having episodes of déjà vu so vividly that she could almost pass herself off as a precognitive professional by now.
A woman’s hand appeared on the doorway of her compartment and a friendly plump face greeted her a moment later.
“Guten Tag!” the woman said cheerfully.
“Good morning.” Nina smiled wryly, not really in the mood for company.
“Do you mind if I sit here for a while? There are two men in my section who give me the creeps and I am getting off at the next station. I won’t be a bother,” she pitched to Nina in a sincere tone. A horrid turquoise windbreaker hugged her full figure, which looked comical to Nina.
“The next station is over 25 kilometers away,” Nina reminded her, more to cordially protest than to share information.
The woman sat down gratefully and replied with a smile, “I know.”
“Okay, well…I’m a smoker and…” Nina started to snap at the stranger, attempting to put her off.
“Me too! But we are not allowed to smoke on the train, didn’t you know?” she told Nina in the most patronizing tone she had ever heard.
“Yes,” Nina grunted passive aggressively, “I know that.” Irritated beyond control, Nina narrowed her eyes at the indifferent intruder and folded her arms over her chest like a disgruntled teenager and sank back into her bunk. She pulled her extra coat over her, a thick long angora wool number that made her look like a Womble when she wore it, and she gave the woman a steely look.
“If you don’t mind, I have not slept in a long time. I will be taking a nap for a while. Is that okay?” the petite historian lined her announcement with sarcasm, but the fat chick with the thick skin did not respond to her in turn with some snappy comment.
“Of course that is okay with me,” she smiled warmly and reinforced her unbearable obtuse manner with a firm grip on Nina’s forearm. The historian ground her teeth behind her closed lips, but she chose to ignore the unwelcome guest in her compartment and sleep it off. She hoped that, when she woke, they would have reached the next station and she’d be rid of her.
Two hours later, they had entered the province and Nina woke from a dreamless sleep, for once not plagued by nightmares of things she would rather have forgotten.
“Oh thank fuck for that,” she sighed through a half smile when she saw that she was once more alone in her quiet first class compartment. Learning from experience as a young university student, Nina had a habit of sleeping propped up against her baggage on the trains of Europe. It did not matter to her that she was now using proper luxury transport as a professional adult and regarded herself as a snob, no less, she still slept like this on public transport, no matter what extravagance they slapped on their menu’s.
Through the window she could see nothing but the black of night and she wondered what was hiding out there in the cloak of darkness. Staring into the reflective surface of the black square, Nina wondered what Sam was messing with this time. For all his experiences, for all his attempts at being less reckless, he always ended up stepping in dog shit – whether he was lured by money or simply had too much of a sense of adventure. It sounded serious and the fact that Sam was shot had Nina very worried for the degree in which he must have been involved in this one. It made her remember the weapons smuggling ring he exposed years before which cost him the loss of the love of his life, when he barely escaped with his own. This job must have been something similarly big, equally dangerous, for him to once more end up in the sight of a rifle.
“Excuse me, dear,” a woman suddenly said from the doorway, where her thick fingers locked around the door. Nina saw her reflection in the window she was staring at and her heart sank when she turned her head to face the woman and saw that it was the exact same woman she had tolerated in her compartment before.
“Come in,” Nina invited without any enthusiasm, if only to not endure the woman’s whiny voice or indifference to blatant insult. By now Nina had grown so accustomed to the constant repeats of events hitting her at least once a week, so much that she now treated the stubborn time loops as personal psychological flaws she would have to chalk up to some sort of post-traumatic stress bullshit.
The woman was going to speak, but he petite historian interrupted her.
“I know how annoying it must be for you, those men in your section,” she sighed matter-of-factly just to spook the overweight irritation in the ugly jacket. And it worked.
“Are you a physical person?” she asked Nina.
“A physical person? Well, I would think so. I keep in shape, although I’m a smoker, like you…” Nina tried to humor the woman by actually engaging in the conversation as the odd rows of street lamps and occasional yellow security beams started showing outside in the dark, slowly passing from one side of the black square to the other.
“You know I’m a smoker!” the astonished hen exclaimed, slamming her stubby hands together. “So, you must be a physic!”
Nina almost threw her head back and erupted in laughter, but noticing that they were approaching the station lightened her mood and she decided not to be a condescending bitch.
She smiled, “You mean, I’m psychic.”
“Yes, of course. That’s what I said, wasn’t it?” the woman frowned abruptly.
“Oh! Look! Weimar, we have arrived,” Nina smiled suddenly and pointed at the window where the central station came into view. It was almost 10pm, but Nina had made reservations at a hotel near Sam’s hospital. She could not wait to see him again, to look into his soft dark eyes and feel his essence envelope her once more. She always felt so safe around Sam Cleave – not in a survival way, but in an emotional way, as if she could tell him anything and he would never judge her, never hate her, never care about her flaws. Her feelings for Sam compelled her to throw herself into an unknown and potentially dangerous situation again, but she would not have it any other way.
11
Curiosity
Sam looked around so he would not be discovered. It was past lights out in hospital ward C where he shared a room with a junior patient and one other man, older than Scotland, who never opened his eyes. If anyone in the room had farted, Sam would be convinced that the old man was indeed dead and beginning to reek. That was the extent of his inanimate existence, but Sam thought that perhaps the living corpse was awake whenever he was asleep, and vice versa. Nevertheless, it creeped the journalist out and he tried to never really look in the direction of the emaciated old patient.
Instead, the child intrigued him with his dark, exotic looks and his infatuation with the playing card he insisted on keeping with him at all times. Now Sam’s curiosity had gotten the better of him and it was well before his sleep threshold, so he got up and snuck over to Radu’s bed. Sam, always the professional, had cultivated the ability to remember names and therefore knew the boy to be one Radu Costita and something about the child told Sam to memorize his name. Somehow it seemed important. He came out of nowhere, had no relatives and spoke Romanian in his sleep. He was not German and he seemed to be homeless, two things that made Sam curious.
