Post by Lorpius Prime on Aug 28, 2008 0:18:47 GMT -5
It only took a second for Martin to realize that his precaution had been unnecessary. The shells detonated several hundred yards away, in the middle of the air station's empty field, too far from anyone or anything to cause any appreciable damage. Margaret stopped trying to kick Martin away for a moment when she heard the explosion. Then, after catching her breath, she gave a forceful shove and Martin allowed himself to roll to the side.
"Forgive me," he grunted, without much regret in his voice.
"Yes, well…" Margaret did not sound terribly offended as she sat up, brushing dust and wrinkles out of her skirt. She looked a question at him.
"Stay low," Martin said, keeping in a crouch and looking across the station at the soldiers who were dashing towards trenches and loading machine guns all along the perimeter.
More shells whistled in and detonated in the distance. Martin could only count three or four, so the enemy didn't have very many guns. Or they were ranging their target before letting loose with a full barrage.
A third volley struck within yards of the Apollo's looming bulk, and Martin made his decision.
"That's done it," he said.
"What?" Margaret glanced around, obviously still a little dazed. Martin grabbed her by one hand and started pulling her away from the explosions.
"We're going, now," he said simply, and tugged at her arm again, trying to spur her into a faster pace.
"Shouldn't we wait for it to stop? We could—"
"They're not going to stop," he said without looking back, moving as fast as he could manage while crouched and dragging along a reluctant accomplice.
"Then how—"
The next volley was dead on target, and Martin could see the Apollo's gas envelope catch fire at the corner of his vision. It did not explode, however, the crew had thankfully vented all of the gas. Shortly thereafter, the first machine gun opened fire and Martin broke into a run.
Martin was taking Margaret southwest towards the station boundary. The attack appeared to be coming in direct from the south; and one by one machine guns opened fire on Martin's left. He couldn't actually see anything except the long flames from muzzle flashes, but he assumed Colonel McGuire's men wouldn't waste their limited remaining ammunition on ghosts. Martin veered slightly more to the right as a precaution. Ahead was a broad avenue, the road to Dachau which cut one corner of the otherwise square landing field into a shortened fifth side, and beyond that were the low-lying buildings of Munich's wealthier palace district. If they could only get out of this flat killing field, Martin knew they would find safety in the city. But that was not proving as easy a task as it should have been.
"What are they shooting at?" Margaret asked, craning her neck. "Colonel Holland, what is it they're shooting at, I can't see a thing."
"For God's sake, woman, move!" he growled, jerking her forward by the arm. Was she really that oblivious to the danger they were in?
Margaret looked irritated, but she quickened her pace until she was running nearly even with Martin. "Really, though," she hissed from beside him, "there's nothing there."
Martin shook his head. He wasn't going to worry about it now, the battle for the air station wasn't his concern, getting away from the air station was. They were nearing one of the slit trenches which had been built to cover the southwestern approach. A couple of grim faced soldiers were squinting out at Margaret and him. Martin noticed appreciatively that they had exchanged the red coats of their uniforms for less visible brown ones.
"Who are you?" the machine gun's loader asked when they reached the little sandbag fortification. The gunner himself was wise enough to keep scanning the perimeter which he was responsible for defending.
"Colonel Holland, Security Service," Martin said simply. He decided against trying to explain Margaret as well, figuring he could get away with it under the circumstances. Mercifully, the loader simply nodded. "We're going through," Martin continued, "try not to shoot us in the back?"
The loader, his rank was concealed beneath his civilian jacket, raised an eyebrow, but again exhibited enough discretion not to ask. "It's not us you'll want to worry about." He nodded towards the shooting behind Martin. "Besides, Mac here never hits anything he's aiming at." Suddenly, he blinked and turned towards the gunner, "Say, Mac, maybe you should try shooting them in the back."
Mac, however, ignored this. "Do you see anything out there?" he asked tersely, still not looking away from his weapon's sights.
The loader shook his head, "I can't see a damn thing—er, sorry Miss." He screwed up his face in apology when he turned back and noticed Margaret again.
"There's nothing there," Margaret crossed her arms and looked over her shoulder.
Martin didn't argue, just nodded, they had paused long enough. The loader looked at him for a moment, then back at Margaret, shrugged, and pulled a cigarette out of one of his pockets.
"Let's go," Martin said, and took Margaret by the hand again, "good luck, gentlemen."
The loader shook his head and muttered something into his cupped hands as he tried to light his cigarette. His partner nodded somberly over the sights of his gun. Martin pulled Margaret back into a run just as more shells started falling on the air station. He didn't look back to find out what sort of damage they were doing.
The machine gunners didn't shoot them in the back, either, for which he was grateful. They ran across a few dozen more yards before reaching the end of the field. It was separated from the big avenue on the other side by a large ditch, which much to Margaret's displeasure, they discovered contained about half a foot of water and mud.
"Oh, I cannot believe this, my shoes are—" Margaret's complaint was cut off by a gasp, and she stopped moving. Martin turned around to see what had happened.
She was frozen with one hand over her mouth, staring straight down at the ground. Martin followed her gaze to his feet. He had run straight ahead into the ditch without really paying much attention to their path, but now he wished he had.
There was plenty of moonlight to make out the corpse lying at Margaret's feet, face deep into the mud. Margaret shuddered, and Martin grabbed her by the waist and lifted her out of the ditch to set her down on the other side before she could vomit.
She did anyway, and Martin waited a minute for her to catch her breath. He shook his head.
"Colonel McGuire said they held off seven thousand last night. This must have been one of the lighter sides." There were only a handful of other bodies visible in the ditch.
Margaret glared at him as she wiped her mouth. Martin wasn't sure why the look made him feel bad. She had been the one who demanded to follow him despite the danger; she couldn't very well expect him to protect her from death.
He looked away from her eyes to the buildings across the street. "Come on," he said, "it'll be easier once we're in the city."
They made it across the avenue in a single long sprint, then took cover in the long shadow of some row houses to catch their breaths. Flashes of fire from the guns still sparkled behind them, but they'd slowed down and weren't nearly so loud in the distance. Martin hoped it wasn't because the defending soldiers were running out of bullets.
"All right," he said, pushing the thought out of his mind. "The Munich office is in our consulate, in Nymphenburg palace. It's about two miles that way," Martin pointed over his shoulder with a thumb.
"And do you really think your friends will still be there?" Margaret sounded more than a little incredulous.
Martin shrugged, "If not, it's forty miles to Ingolstadt."
"Palace first, then," Margaret agreed. Martin suppressed a smile; she might be far out of place for this work, but she bounced back quickly.
"We're going to hug the walls," he patted one hand against the brick of the row house. The darkness in its windows was remorseless. Its owners had not simply gone to sleep; they had abandoned it long ago.
"I need you to stay very close," Martin continued, "and keep absolutely silent." He looked into Margaret's eyes and waited for her to nod to be sure that she understood. "If you see something or need my attention, just tap my back. Any noise could attract attention, which we really don't want."
"Right," Margaret said gravely.
Martin nodded approvingly, then walked in a crouch to the corner of the block. The street on the other side looked empty, so he waved Margaret forward, and slipped around the corner himself. They didn't run flat out as they had in the air station, but darted forward in bursts, always staying as deep in the shadows as they possibly could. Martin stopped every few yards to glance around before continuing, and though neither of them could see a soul, he kept his guard up. They could both still hear the shells falling behind them.
They passed through two blocks of row houses that way, then across another big street before reach blocks of taller buildings, high-end shops and apartments which were at the heart of this district of the city. The two of them made it through five blocks in almost total silence before they saw anything other than empty buildings looming above them.
They turned the corner at the sixth block, and Margaret screamed.
Martin swore. He spun around before he could get a good look at it, and clamped a hand over Margaret's mouth, then dragged her back around the corner and into the dark. She had stopped screaming almost immediately, and Martin released her as soon as they were kneeling again behind the wall of a corner bakery. Her eyes were still wide, though, and she was shaking slightly. Martin held up a finger to his lips, then motioned for her to stay where she was. Very slowly, he peeked back around the corner.
All the other streets they had run along had been dark, with only the moon and the stars offering their meager light. But the tall gas lampposts lining the one around the corner were all lit and brightly burning. A body hung from each one, some still swinging slightly from a recent wind.
Martin stared at the macabre display for a long time. Most of the dead were women, most with their clothes torn to bits and many with curses carved into their skin like brands. One of the closest bodies to Martin, however, was a fat man wearing the crimson red uniform of a British Army officer, his insignia showed the crown and three pips of a Brigadier. Below his corpse, two women were tied to the lamppost with barbed wire. A wooden sign was nailed to their chests: "Das Shicksal der Dirnen." Martin felt his own stomach beginning to churn violently, and he forced himself to look away and withdraw back around the corner.
Margaret was slumped back against the wall of the bakery. It was a reasonably warm night, but she had her arms wrapped around herself, shivering. Martin knelt down in front of her and put a hand on her shoulder.
"Yeah, it's bad," he said.
"Is that what they're going to do to us?" her eyes were as big as crown pieces.
"No," Martin shook his head. It was probably exactly what would happen to them if they were captured. But they certainly wouldn't be captured alive, and what did it matter what happened to them after they were dead? Better to just not think about it.
Martin watched her as she nodded very slowly, then closed her eyes and took a couple of deep breaths before starting to get up. Martin put a hand on her shoulder.
"Wait," he said. She sat down again, and Martin took the rifle that he had carried from the air station off his back.
"Right," he went on, holding the rifle against the ground with one hand like a walking stick, "we might still be able to get through, but the lights are going to make this more risky. We could barricade ourselves up in one of these buildings for the night or a few hours to see if things calm down before pressing on."
"No."
"We would probably be safer than at the air station actually, less con—"
"No," Margaret said more emphatically. "Colonel Holland," she put a hand to her forehead and rubbed her temples, "maybe you think you can stop that… horror from happening to us. But you think my brother is still out here. Can you promise me they won't do that to Jay Thomson?"
Martin licked his lips. It would certainly make his job much easier if Margaret's brother was among those strung up to hang from a street lamp. He had one mission, and it didn't matter how it was accomplished, so long as the result was the same. Dead was dead. But no matter how much he told himself that, it didn't ring true. There was such a thing as going too far, and there were fates that he would not wish on anyone. Martin was a killer, he could not pretend otherwise. But he was not a monster.
"I didn't think so," Margaret said, and Martin blinked to notice she was looking straight into his eyes. "So we'll keep going, whatever," she shook her head, "whatever we have to walk through."
"All right." He stood up and held out a hand. Margaret took it and he pulled her to her feet.
When she was upright again, Margaret seized him by the upper arm. "But we don't have to walk through that street, do we?"
Martin tried not to chuckle, "No, we can go around."
"Good," Margaret said. She let him go and walked around him. "Which way?"
"Well we do need to veer north," Martin recalled the map he'd seen in Colonel McGuire's office. "But we can just try again at the next street. Probably still another mile to the palace."
They crossed the intersection quickly. Margaret kept her eyes locked forward, but Martin walked while half turned, to keep a lookout down the street as they passed by, rifle at the read. But there was nothing to see except the collection of corpses and the full, silver moon hanging in the black sky above them. Martin's stomach started to tighten again, and he adjusted the stock of the rifle against his shoulder, making himself concentrate on street.
They walked two blocks before cutting north on a short boulevard, then turning west again on a road that Martin thought should take them most of the way to the palace. The scenery around them changed from high-end business establishments to gardens and small manors presumably owned by the customers of the high-end businesses. Not a one, however, showed any sign of life, not a single light in any window.
Three blocks east, much longer blocks than those in the center of a city, and still they had seen no more trace of anyone, living or dead. The noise of the battle at the air station had ceased too, whether through distance or resolution Martin could not be sure. All Martin could hear were his own and Margaret's footsteps. All he could see was the barren street, the empty houses, and moon in the sky looking back at him, a memory he did not need right now.
Something touched his back, and Martin froze. He quickly regretted it, because Margaret ran into him and made a lot of noise grabbing his coat to steady herself.
"Sorry," she whispered, "but I saw something."
His eyes narrowed, "What?"
"On one of the roofs there," she stepped beside him and pointed, "something was up there."
Martin tried to line up his gaze with her arm, she was pointing down the street where it curved slightly to the right, obscuring their view of the road beyond. He swept his eyes very slowly across all the rooftops he could see out there, but nothing caught his eye. Martin was fortunate enough to have never needed glasses; but he had passed into his thirties now, and after years behind a desk reading fine-printed documents rather than doing field work, he could no longer count on his eyes the way he once did. Margaret might have seen something that he simply could not. He grimaced.
"Can you still see it?" He asked quietly, and thumbed off the rifle's safety.
"I don't know," she said after a moment, "it was like something moved."
Martin nodded. "All right, we're going to walk the rest of the way down there, slowly. Keep looking and tell me if you see whatever it—"
Someone walked into the street, and Martin bit his tongue. Whoever it was had emerged from between two houses a block and a half down the road and was now turning slowly from side to side with each step. He was clearly looking for something, and whether he had Margaret and Martin in mind specifically hardly mattered. Martin took aim with his weapon.
The man in the street turned very deliberately towards them. There was a pronounced hunch to his figure, as his head was nearly level with his shoulders.
"Start walking backwards," Martin whispered to Margaret, "slow as you can."
The man started running towards them.
"Forget it," Martin let the rifle down as he spun around, "run! First side street you come to."
Margaret did not hesitate this time, but surged forward. Martin took off right behind her. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder, but could not easily tell how quickly their pursuer was moving in the dark. Too quickly seemed the likeliest answer.
They turned down the first cross street they came to, and Martin realized that his instructions had been a mistake. The next street north was a wide avenue that ran along a lengthy artificial lake which led to the palace. It was a big, open area, and there were dozens of people looming about. Several of those sinister figures turned as the two of them ran out onto the road.
Martin cursed vividly as these people also began to run at him and Margaret. All of them moved far too quickly to his eye, their legs pumping unnaturally fast.
"Back!" he shouted, and grabbed Margaret's hand as they both skidded on the pavement to reverse direction.
Martin cursed even louder as a gunshot rang out behind them, but that at least meant he no longer needed to worry about making noise. They made it back to their previous street to find their original pursuer still charging relentlessly. Martin leaned back and used a couple long strides to bring himself to a stop as he raised the rifle to his shoulder again.
Margaret cried out and clamped her hands over her ears at the noise. Martin's shot caught the runner in the knee just as he was planting that leg. It twisted gruesomely beneath him and the runner tumbled.
Martin's joy was short-lived; however, even as he worked the bolt of his weapon he could see more dark figures pouring into the street from the buildings behind the man he had just shot.
"Pick a building," he called. "We have to get inside!"
Margaret veered to her left, running across the street towards a relatively modest two-story house made of stone. Martin rammed a fresh cartridge into the gun chamber and sprinted after her.
They vaulted up the steps together, and Martin turned to kneel behind the stone wall of the stairs while Margaret tried the door. He fired once more into the little crowd of chasers, but with no visible effect.
"It's locked!" Margaret said, desperation creeping into her voice.
"Yeah," Martin nodded, trying to sound calm even as he felt panic attempting to creep in around him. He stood up and gently pushed Margaret aside to face the door himself. Then, making sure of his footing, he attacked it with a swift kick. The wooden door appeared much sturdier than it actually was, as Martin's kick nearly tore the handle out of the wood, and the whole thing flew open easily. Darkness beckoned them inside, and Martin allowed himself a small smile of satisfaction. But then Margaret shrieked behind him.
Martin spun all too slowly. He appeared to have gravely misjudged the speed of their pursuers, as they were already upon them. One of them, who seemed to be an elderly man with sickly skin and wispy white hair, had climbed halfway up the stairs to grab Margaret by the arm, and was now attempting pull her down. Martin gritted his teeth in fury. He shifted his grip on the rifle and drove its butt into the old man's face, which caved in with a crunch.
The old man released Margaret and fell backwards, but she had been unbalanced herself and teetered on the edge of the stairway. Martin tried to grab her with one hand, but another of their attackers leaped all the way up and over the stairs to tackle Martin, knocking him down.
Martin grunted as he hit the surface of the porch. He lost sight of Margaret as his assailant landed almost squarely on top of him. This one was much younger, but he had the same sallow skin as the old man, and the flesh of his face clung tightly to his skull like a ghoulish mask. He cackled softly and tried to pin Martin the ground. Martin, for his part, let go of the rifle and seized the man about his neck, but could not get enough leverage to do any damage. Instead, he tried bringing his knee up into the man's groin.
That stunned his opponent for a moment, and Martin attempted to roll free of the man's slackened grip. But before he could break away, the ghoul recovered, and seized Martin by the head with one broad hand across his face. Martin was helpless as his head was lifted up and slammed back against the concrete porch once, then again, and a third time. His vision filled with red, then faded into darkness altogether. The noise of the skirmish and the shouting about him became much more distant as he drifted away, and the last of his senses to accompany him into unconsciousness was the acrid smell of rotting meat.
"Forgive me," he grunted, without much regret in his voice.
"Yes, well…" Margaret did not sound terribly offended as she sat up, brushing dust and wrinkles out of her skirt. She looked a question at him.
"Stay low," Martin said, keeping in a crouch and looking across the station at the soldiers who were dashing towards trenches and loading machine guns all along the perimeter.
More shells whistled in and detonated in the distance. Martin could only count three or four, so the enemy didn't have very many guns. Or they were ranging their target before letting loose with a full barrage.
A third volley struck within yards of the Apollo's looming bulk, and Martin made his decision.
"That's done it," he said.
"What?" Margaret glanced around, obviously still a little dazed. Martin grabbed her by one hand and started pulling her away from the explosions.
"We're going, now," he said simply, and tugged at her arm again, trying to spur her into a faster pace.
"Shouldn't we wait for it to stop? We could—"
"They're not going to stop," he said without looking back, moving as fast as he could manage while crouched and dragging along a reluctant accomplice.
"Then how—"
The next volley was dead on target, and Martin could see the Apollo's gas envelope catch fire at the corner of his vision. It did not explode, however, the crew had thankfully vented all of the gas. Shortly thereafter, the first machine gun opened fire and Martin broke into a run.
Martin was taking Margaret southwest towards the station boundary. The attack appeared to be coming in direct from the south; and one by one machine guns opened fire on Martin's left. He couldn't actually see anything except the long flames from muzzle flashes, but he assumed Colonel McGuire's men wouldn't waste their limited remaining ammunition on ghosts. Martin veered slightly more to the right as a precaution. Ahead was a broad avenue, the road to Dachau which cut one corner of the otherwise square landing field into a shortened fifth side, and beyond that were the low-lying buildings of Munich's wealthier palace district. If they could only get out of this flat killing field, Martin knew they would find safety in the city. But that was not proving as easy a task as it should have been.
"What are they shooting at?" Margaret asked, craning her neck. "Colonel Holland, what is it they're shooting at, I can't see a thing."
"For God's sake, woman, move!" he growled, jerking her forward by the arm. Was she really that oblivious to the danger they were in?
Margaret looked irritated, but she quickened her pace until she was running nearly even with Martin. "Really, though," she hissed from beside him, "there's nothing there."
Martin shook his head. He wasn't going to worry about it now, the battle for the air station wasn't his concern, getting away from the air station was. They were nearing one of the slit trenches which had been built to cover the southwestern approach. A couple of grim faced soldiers were squinting out at Margaret and him. Martin noticed appreciatively that they had exchanged the red coats of their uniforms for less visible brown ones.
"Who are you?" the machine gun's loader asked when they reached the little sandbag fortification. The gunner himself was wise enough to keep scanning the perimeter which he was responsible for defending.
"Colonel Holland, Security Service," Martin said simply. He decided against trying to explain Margaret as well, figuring he could get away with it under the circumstances. Mercifully, the loader simply nodded. "We're going through," Martin continued, "try not to shoot us in the back?"
The loader, his rank was concealed beneath his civilian jacket, raised an eyebrow, but again exhibited enough discretion not to ask. "It's not us you'll want to worry about." He nodded towards the shooting behind Martin. "Besides, Mac here never hits anything he's aiming at." Suddenly, he blinked and turned towards the gunner, "Say, Mac, maybe you should try shooting them in the back."
Mac, however, ignored this. "Do you see anything out there?" he asked tersely, still not looking away from his weapon's sights.
The loader shook his head, "I can't see a damn thing—er, sorry Miss." He screwed up his face in apology when he turned back and noticed Margaret again.
"There's nothing there," Margaret crossed her arms and looked over her shoulder.
Martin didn't argue, just nodded, they had paused long enough. The loader looked at him for a moment, then back at Margaret, shrugged, and pulled a cigarette out of one of his pockets.
"Let's go," Martin said, and took Margaret by the hand again, "good luck, gentlemen."
The loader shook his head and muttered something into his cupped hands as he tried to light his cigarette. His partner nodded somberly over the sights of his gun. Martin pulled Margaret back into a run just as more shells started falling on the air station. He didn't look back to find out what sort of damage they were doing.
The machine gunners didn't shoot them in the back, either, for which he was grateful. They ran across a few dozen more yards before reaching the end of the field. It was separated from the big avenue on the other side by a large ditch, which much to Margaret's displeasure, they discovered contained about half a foot of water and mud.
"Oh, I cannot believe this, my shoes are—" Margaret's complaint was cut off by a gasp, and she stopped moving. Martin turned around to see what had happened.
She was frozen with one hand over her mouth, staring straight down at the ground. Martin followed her gaze to his feet. He had run straight ahead into the ditch without really paying much attention to their path, but now he wished he had.
There was plenty of moonlight to make out the corpse lying at Margaret's feet, face deep into the mud. Margaret shuddered, and Martin grabbed her by the waist and lifted her out of the ditch to set her down on the other side before she could vomit.
She did anyway, and Martin waited a minute for her to catch her breath. He shook his head.
"Colonel McGuire said they held off seven thousand last night. This must have been one of the lighter sides." There were only a handful of other bodies visible in the ditch.
Margaret glared at him as she wiped her mouth. Martin wasn't sure why the look made him feel bad. She had been the one who demanded to follow him despite the danger; she couldn't very well expect him to protect her from death.
He looked away from her eyes to the buildings across the street. "Come on," he said, "it'll be easier once we're in the city."
They made it across the avenue in a single long sprint, then took cover in the long shadow of some row houses to catch their breaths. Flashes of fire from the guns still sparkled behind them, but they'd slowed down and weren't nearly so loud in the distance. Martin hoped it wasn't because the defending soldiers were running out of bullets.
"All right," he said, pushing the thought out of his mind. "The Munich office is in our consulate, in Nymphenburg palace. It's about two miles that way," Martin pointed over his shoulder with a thumb.
"And do you really think your friends will still be there?" Margaret sounded more than a little incredulous.
Martin shrugged, "If not, it's forty miles to Ingolstadt."
"Palace first, then," Margaret agreed. Martin suppressed a smile; she might be far out of place for this work, but she bounced back quickly.
"We're going to hug the walls," he patted one hand against the brick of the row house. The darkness in its windows was remorseless. Its owners had not simply gone to sleep; they had abandoned it long ago.
"I need you to stay very close," Martin continued, "and keep absolutely silent." He looked into Margaret's eyes and waited for her to nod to be sure that she understood. "If you see something or need my attention, just tap my back. Any noise could attract attention, which we really don't want."
"Right," Margaret said gravely.
Martin nodded approvingly, then walked in a crouch to the corner of the block. The street on the other side looked empty, so he waved Margaret forward, and slipped around the corner himself. They didn't run flat out as they had in the air station, but darted forward in bursts, always staying as deep in the shadows as they possibly could. Martin stopped every few yards to glance around before continuing, and though neither of them could see a soul, he kept his guard up. They could both still hear the shells falling behind them.
They passed through two blocks of row houses that way, then across another big street before reach blocks of taller buildings, high-end shops and apartments which were at the heart of this district of the city. The two of them made it through five blocks in almost total silence before they saw anything other than empty buildings looming above them.
They turned the corner at the sixth block, and Margaret screamed.
Martin swore. He spun around before he could get a good look at it, and clamped a hand over Margaret's mouth, then dragged her back around the corner and into the dark. She had stopped screaming almost immediately, and Martin released her as soon as they were kneeling again behind the wall of a corner bakery. Her eyes were still wide, though, and she was shaking slightly. Martin held up a finger to his lips, then motioned for her to stay where she was. Very slowly, he peeked back around the corner.
All the other streets they had run along had been dark, with only the moon and the stars offering their meager light. But the tall gas lampposts lining the one around the corner were all lit and brightly burning. A body hung from each one, some still swinging slightly from a recent wind.
Martin stared at the macabre display for a long time. Most of the dead were women, most with their clothes torn to bits and many with curses carved into their skin like brands. One of the closest bodies to Martin, however, was a fat man wearing the crimson red uniform of a British Army officer, his insignia showed the crown and three pips of a Brigadier. Below his corpse, two women were tied to the lamppost with barbed wire. A wooden sign was nailed to their chests: "Das Shicksal der Dirnen." Martin felt his own stomach beginning to churn violently, and he forced himself to look away and withdraw back around the corner.
Margaret was slumped back against the wall of the bakery. It was a reasonably warm night, but she had her arms wrapped around herself, shivering. Martin knelt down in front of her and put a hand on her shoulder.
"Yeah, it's bad," he said.
"Is that what they're going to do to us?" her eyes were as big as crown pieces.
"No," Martin shook his head. It was probably exactly what would happen to them if they were captured. But they certainly wouldn't be captured alive, and what did it matter what happened to them after they were dead? Better to just not think about it.
Martin watched her as she nodded very slowly, then closed her eyes and took a couple of deep breaths before starting to get up. Martin put a hand on her shoulder.
"Wait," he said. She sat down again, and Martin took the rifle that he had carried from the air station off his back.
"Right," he went on, holding the rifle against the ground with one hand like a walking stick, "we might still be able to get through, but the lights are going to make this more risky. We could barricade ourselves up in one of these buildings for the night or a few hours to see if things calm down before pressing on."
"No."
"We would probably be safer than at the air station actually, less con—"
"No," Margaret said more emphatically. "Colonel Holland," she put a hand to her forehead and rubbed her temples, "maybe you think you can stop that… horror from happening to us. But you think my brother is still out here. Can you promise me they won't do that to Jay Thomson?"
Martin licked his lips. It would certainly make his job much easier if Margaret's brother was among those strung up to hang from a street lamp. He had one mission, and it didn't matter how it was accomplished, so long as the result was the same. Dead was dead. But no matter how much he told himself that, it didn't ring true. There was such a thing as going too far, and there were fates that he would not wish on anyone. Martin was a killer, he could not pretend otherwise. But he was not a monster.
"I didn't think so," Margaret said, and Martin blinked to notice she was looking straight into his eyes. "So we'll keep going, whatever," she shook her head, "whatever we have to walk through."
"All right." He stood up and held out a hand. Margaret took it and he pulled her to her feet.
When she was upright again, Margaret seized him by the upper arm. "But we don't have to walk through that street, do we?"
Martin tried not to chuckle, "No, we can go around."
"Good," Margaret said. She let him go and walked around him. "Which way?"
"Well we do need to veer north," Martin recalled the map he'd seen in Colonel McGuire's office. "But we can just try again at the next street. Probably still another mile to the palace."
They crossed the intersection quickly. Margaret kept her eyes locked forward, but Martin walked while half turned, to keep a lookout down the street as they passed by, rifle at the read. But there was nothing to see except the collection of corpses and the full, silver moon hanging in the black sky above them. Martin's stomach started to tighten again, and he adjusted the stock of the rifle against his shoulder, making himself concentrate on street.
They walked two blocks before cutting north on a short boulevard, then turning west again on a road that Martin thought should take them most of the way to the palace. The scenery around them changed from high-end business establishments to gardens and small manors presumably owned by the customers of the high-end businesses. Not a one, however, showed any sign of life, not a single light in any window.
Three blocks east, much longer blocks than those in the center of a city, and still they had seen no more trace of anyone, living or dead. The noise of the battle at the air station had ceased too, whether through distance or resolution Martin could not be sure. All Martin could hear were his own and Margaret's footsteps. All he could see was the barren street, the empty houses, and moon in the sky looking back at him, a memory he did not need right now.
Something touched his back, and Martin froze. He quickly regretted it, because Margaret ran into him and made a lot of noise grabbing his coat to steady herself.
"Sorry," she whispered, "but I saw something."
His eyes narrowed, "What?"
"On one of the roofs there," she stepped beside him and pointed, "something was up there."
Martin tried to line up his gaze with her arm, she was pointing down the street where it curved slightly to the right, obscuring their view of the road beyond. He swept his eyes very slowly across all the rooftops he could see out there, but nothing caught his eye. Martin was fortunate enough to have never needed glasses; but he had passed into his thirties now, and after years behind a desk reading fine-printed documents rather than doing field work, he could no longer count on his eyes the way he once did. Margaret might have seen something that he simply could not. He grimaced.
"Can you still see it?" He asked quietly, and thumbed off the rifle's safety.
"I don't know," she said after a moment, "it was like something moved."
Martin nodded. "All right, we're going to walk the rest of the way down there, slowly. Keep looking and tell me if you see whatever it—"
Someone walked into the street, and Martin bit his tongue. Whoever it was had emerged from between two houses a block and a half down the road and was now turning slowly from side to side with each step. He was clearly looking for something, and whether he had Margaret and Martin in mind specifically hardly mattered. Martin took aim with his weapon.
The man in the street turned very deliberately towards them. There was a pronounced hunch to his figure, as his head was nearly level with his shoulders.
"Start walking backwards," Martin whispered to Margaret, "slow as you can."
The man started running towards them.
"Forget it," Martin let the rifle down as he spun around, "run! First side street you come to."
Margaret did not hesitate this time, but surged forward. Martin took off right behind her. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder, but could not easily tell how quickly their pursuer was moving in the dark. Too quickly seemed the likeliest answer.
They turned down the first cross street they came to, and Martin realized that his instructions had been a mistake. The next street north was a wide avenue that ran along a lengthy artificial lake which led to the palace. It was a big, open area, and there were dozens of people looming about. Several of those sinister figures turned as the two of them ran out onto the road.
Martin cursed vividly as these people also began to run at him and Margaret. All of them moved far too quickly to his eye, their legs pumping unnaturally fast.
"Back!" he shouted, and grabbed Margaret's hand as they both skidded on the pavement to reverse direction.
Martin cursed even louder as a gunshot rang out behind them, but that at least meant he no longer needed to worry about making noise. They made it back to their previous street to find their original pursuer still charging relentlessly. Martin leaned back and used a couple long strides to bring himself to a stop as he raised the rifle to his shoulder again.
Margaret cried out and clamped her hands over her ears at the noise. Martin's shot caught the runner in the knee just as he was planting that leg. It twisted gruesomely beneath him and the runner tumbled.
Martin's joy was short-lived; however, even as he worked the bolt of his weapon he could see more dark figures pouring into the street from the buildings behind the man he had just shot.
"Pick a building," he called. "We have to get inside!"
Margaret veered to her left, running across the street towards a relatively modest two-story house made of stone. Martin rammed a fresh cartridge into the gun chamber and sprinted after her.
They vaulted up the steps together, and Martin turned to kneel behind the stone wall of the stairs while Margaret tried the door. He fired once more into the little crowd of chasers, but with no visible effect.
"It's locked!" Margaret said, desperation creeping into her voice.
"Yeah," Martin nodded, trying to sound calm even as he felt panic attempting to creep in around him. He stood up and gently pushed Margaret aside to face the door himself. Then, making sure of his footing, he attacked it with a swift kick. The wooden door appeared much sturdier than it actually was, as Martin's kick nearly tore the handle out of the wood, and the whole thing flew open easily. Darkness beckoned them inside, and Martin allowed himself a small smile of satisfaction. But then Margaret shrieked behind him.
Martin spun all too slowly. He appeared to have gravely misjudged the speed of their pursuers, as they were already upon them. One of them, who seemed to be an elderly man with sickly skin and wispy white hair, had climbed halfway up the stairs to grab Margaret by the arm, and was now attempting pull her down. Martin gritted his teeth in fury. He shifted his grip on the rifle and drove its butt into the old man's face, which caved in with a crunch.
The old man released Margaret and fell backwards, but she had been unbalanced herself and teetered on the edge of the stairway. Martin tried to grab her with one hand, but another of their attackers leaped all the way up and over the stairs to tackle Martin, knocking him down.
Martin grunted as he hit the surface of the porch. He lost sight of Margaret as his assailant landed almost squarely on top of him. This one was much younger, but he had the same sallow skin as the old man, and the flesh of his face clung tightly to his skull like a ghoulish mask. He cackled softly and tried to pin Martin the ground. Martin, for his part, let go of the rifle and seized the man about his neck, but could not get enough leverage to do any damage. Instead, he tried bringing his knee up into the man's groin.
That stunned his opponent for a moment, and Martin attempted to roll free of the man's slackened grip. But before he could break away, the ghoul recovered, and seized Martin by the head with one broad hand across his face. Martin was helpless as his head was lifted up and slammed back against the concrete porch once, then again, and a third time. His vision filled with red, then faded into darkness altogether. The noise of the skirmish and the shouting about him became much more distant as he drifted away, and the last of his senses to accompany him into unconsciousness was the acrid smell of rotting meat.