Chapter 9: Creeping death.

Hans Landa looked up from the paperwork he was doing when he heard a knock on the door of his spacious office, located in the Nazi headquarters in Paris, where he was currently residing.

"Come in." he said, putting aside a file he had just finished reading.

It was his secretary Anna Schneider, a short, brown haired young woman with pretty blue eyes, who was a little too shy for her own good.

"Um… Excuse me, sir, but there is a phone call for you." she informed him.

"Who is it?"

"Standartenführer Steinberg, sir. He wishes to speak with you immediately."

Landa had to try his best to not let a scowl break through on his face. Steinberg again. His fellow officer had seen it as his own personal mission to catch those Americans known as the Basterds, since they had attacked his base. Landa had found it a bad idea, especially since pretty much everyone was looking for the Basterds. It was only a matter of time before they were found, and Steinberg would've had his revenge in the end. But the man was impatient, and let his foolish impulses get the better of him. Which meant he only realized the mistakes he made when it was too late. He had been calling Landa on almost a daily basis for the past months, to tell him about his progress, and asking for his advice. Steinberg was one of those people that got everywhere by depending on others to get them anywhere they wanted. It irritated Landa to no end.

And yet, he would listen to Steinberg, and tell him what to do, just for the fun of knowing he would screw up. And of course, he had always missed the Basterds whenever he had a lead on them. It wasn't that Landa didn't want the Basterds to be caught, but it was just much more fun to watch Steinberg squirm.

"Put him through." he told Anna, waving a hand at the phone on his desk. She left, and within the next minute, his phone rang.

"Hans Landa."

"I have them. The Basterds. I finally found them." Steinberg's voice was all enthusiasm. Landa frowned. Now that was a surprise.

"You do? That's great news." he replied, trying to sound genuinely impressed. It was probably his ideas and advice that had gotten Steinberg this far in the first place.

"Another victory for us." Steinberg said. Landa rolled his eyes. That arrogance was so typical. Steinberg was convinced Germany was going to win the war no matter what, and that it was capable of overcoming all obstacles. Pretty much everyone in the Nazi top did. Landa himself wasn't so certain, and sure as hell didn't plan to go under with the rest of the Third Reich when it did, and it definitely would. That was also just a matter of time.

"Where did you find them?" he asked, his curiosity kicking in, as he wondered how Steinberg had managed his feat.

"In the woods near Evreux. It was easy as soon as my men located them. They're here in prison now."

"Good." Landa responded. "Do you mind keeping them alive? I'd like to have a chat with some of them."

"Very well." Steinberg didn't sound so excited anymore.

"Do me this favor, Max. I will be there by tomorrow." Landa said, getting quite eager about finally having a chance to meet the Basterds. Their reputation was about as legendary as his own.

"Till tomorrow then." Steinberg said, and disconnected the line before Landa could respond.

Landa felt this day started out to be a good day, and phoned Anna, to tell her to get a car ready for him by the morning, for a 50 mile trip to Evreux, which lay west of Paris.

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"What are we gonna do, lieutenant?" Wicki asked, at last breaking the endless silence that had fallen in the basement since Steinberg left. Raine didn't immediately answer. He was leaning against the wall, lost in thought. It was only now he fully realized the seriousness of the situation. They were caught, with hardly any possibility of escaping, even if three of them were still free. He didn't think Omar, Kagan and Hirschberg would have a chance to come rescue them. He hoped they didn't try, for their sake. Things were bad enough as they were without Steinberg knowing they were still outside somewhere. It was up to them now.

Raine wouldn't blame them if they left France. It was probably the wisest thing to do. As for him and the rest… The situation was pretty much hopeless.

"Lieutenant?"

"I don't know." Raine answered, the irritation clearly audible in his voice. "I'm out of ideas. We're done for."

There. He had said it. He could feel the incredulous looks of his men, but he didn't look back at anyone.

"You're giving up?" Utivich said disbelievingly. Now, Raine did look.

"If you have an idea of gettin' our asses outta this mess, speak up. But I doubt there's any way we could escape now." he said. He took a deep breath, hating it to say what he was going to say, but he didn't have a choice.

"Now, I'm not trying to discourage y'all, but this is it. We're done. No more Basterds. I want y'all to realize the truth. The Nazis got us, and we're completely at their mercy. We're gonna die, and we're gonna die soon. And it won't be pretty. But," and there was something in the way he said that word, that made them all look up, and listen even more closely. " We're not gonna go down just like that. I got a feeling the Nazis will want to know a few things about us. But we ain't gonna talk. We ain't gonna tell them shit. We ain't gonna give them a thing. No matter what they do to us, we ain't gonna crack. And we'll show them what we're made of. We'll show them that we ain't gonna let them mess with us. We'll spit in their faces, and we'll laugh at their pathetic attempts to break us. Yeah, they have us, but they don't have us at all."

"That was nicely put, sir." Utivich said, having not believed for one second Raine had really lost hope. The others in his cell nodded, Wicki and Stiglitz grinned, and Donny found the energy to whistle on his fingers.

"We'll show them." he said, still with a painful look in his eyes, but there was also determination.

None of them was aware of what Steinberg was planning for them.

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He took the item in his hands, and ran his fingers over the surface, studying the carvings in it. The filthy names of people that didn't deserve to thrive on God's planet, and the symbol that represented them. He saw the faded blood stains, and the thought of whose blood had stained it filled him with disgust. This was truly a cursed thing, and the person who wielded it had to be sent by the devil himself.

But no more. He would wield it no more.

Steinberg sat back in his chair, putting the item back on his desk. Its image reflected in his cold grey eyes. He averted them after a while, to gaze out of the window. It was getting dark outside. He blinked, and crossed his arms over his chest. He was growing impatient. He had told Landa he would wait for him, but he had already half decided he wouldn't wait until tomorrow. He wanted to taste the sweetness of revenge right now. He closed his eyes. Landa wouldn't be happy with it, but Steinberg was sure his excuse was good enough. He wanted to see the blood of only one of them, and Landa would have enough left to play with.

Revenge. Vendetta, as the Italians would put it. An eye for an eye. It was only fair. The Jew had it coming to him. He should have stayed in his country, along with the rest of his gang of brainless lowlifes. What had possessed them to think they could come here and destroy the fine men of the magnificent Third Reich unpunished? Such fools. So arrogant. But they would pay the prize now. They would all pay dearly.

His colorless lips curved into a cruel smile, the smile of a man that knew exactly what he wanted, and how to get it.

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"You okay, Donny?" Lt. Raine asked.

Donny, who was laying in the ground, breathing shallowly, opened his eyes. Raine was looking at him with a concerned frown.

"I'm fine." he said, trying to force a grin on his face. He knew he was lying. He was far from fine, and he could tell from the look Raine was giving him, it was very obvious. He didn't say anything, thought, and left his sergeant in peace.

Donny closed his eyes again. His heart was pounding too fast, and his shoulder throbbed and ached. He was sweating, but felt cold nonetheless. He felt absolutely miserable. He cursed faith for not having the mercy of letting him die in some epic gunfight, or a huge explosion, in which he could take many Nazis with him. A fucking bullet in his shoulder, and that was it. Wicki had asked if he should take a look at it, but there wasn't anything he could do, so Donny had declined. The guys in the other cell had asked if it was bad, and he had told them not to worry. He didn't want to seem weak in these times, when you needed to be strong.

He barely reacted when he heard the door of the basement open. Footsteps approached, and the door of the cell opened.

"You, on the ground. Get up." he heard a voice snarl. He opened his eyes, seeing that the others had been forced to stand with their faces to the wall. Three German soldiers stood in the doorway, their guns aimed.

"Make me." Donny said. He saw Lt. Raine grin. The front one of the three Germans grinned as well, stepped forward, and kicked Donny in the groin. His eyes widened as the pain shot up, making him momentarily forget about his shoulder. He let out a groan. The soldier laughed and said something to his companions. They stepped inside the cell, and at that precise moment, both Raine and Wicki turned around, attacking the soldiers, grabbing their guns. They weren't caught off guard though, and pushed them back. One of them punched Raine in the face, so he stumbled backwards against the wall, and the other managed to throw Wicki to the ground; Hugo Stiglitz then stepped up, and was joined by Raine, whose nose was bleeding. Donny ignored the pain he felt, and got to his feet, grabbing the soldier that had kicked him by the throat, pushing him against the wall, strangling him. He heard Wicki's warning too late. He felt something hard crash to the back of his head, and everything blacked out.

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A cold wind blew in the streets of Evreux. Fragments of mist danced in the breeze, stars shimmering through the thin haze. The three men hiding in the shadows of a few houses made no sound. What they were about to do was dangerous business, on the edge of suicidal. But they had agreed they would try. Their team mates, their friends, were here, inside the unwelcomingly looking prison building. They had weapons, and lots of extra artillery, but they didn't know if it would be enough. But they would go for it. They hadn't spend all this time together to let it all come to an end without a fight.

Getting into the city had been tricky. They had been lucky when they had found the German patrol, which had been driving a truck with enough weapons to start a war. They had attacked them, being fortunate enough to kill them all without getting a scratch on them. They had waited until nightfall, and had them rode to the city, of which they knew the others were. They had been clever enough to interrogate one of the soldiers they'd attacked. But then again, that was what they had been doing for months now. It was almost as a second nature to them. But never had their mission been so important. Never had more depended on it.

But they were more than ready.

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Donny slowly drifted back to consciousness. For a moment, he couldn't recall where he was, and how he got there. He didn't really care. He wanted to go back to sleep again, wanting to forget about the pain that now came back in all its viciousness. Then, he remembered what had happened, and his mind jolted awake, as if struck by lightning, and his eyes flew open.

He didn't recognize his environment. He was laying on the ground, his hands tied behind his back. The room he was in, was square shaped, with grey stone walls, dully lit by one lamp that hung from the ceiling. In the far right wall was a low iron door. Next to it stood a single wooden chair. There was one small barred window up high in the far left wall.

Donny guessed he had been taken to some sort of interrogation room. It didn't matter. Remembering Lt. Raine's speech, he didn't plan on saying one word to the Nazis. No matter what.

He had been awake for about ten minutes, when the door opened, and three men entered the room. Donny recognized the soldier with the scar under his eye, and the one who had kicked him before. They went to stand side by side against the front wall. The last man was colonel Steinberg himself.

"Well, well." he said, a small smile on his face. "Sergeant Donowitz, is it not? Or should I say, the Bear Jew?"

"The one and only. Scared?" Donny answered, deciding that if the Nazis were going to kill him, he might as well try to taunt them with words a little before he went. Steinberg wasn't impressed.

"You look a lot less threatening now, a wounded mess on the floor." he retorted.

Donny glared. Steinberg's smile widened. He closed the door, took the chair and sat down in the middle of the room, in front of his victim.

"You can torture me all you want, I'm not telling you shit." Donny snarled. Steinberg chuckled at his words.

"Torture you? That's a good idea. But you are wrong about one thing. This isn't about information. This is much more personal."

Donny raised an eyebrow. "What do you want then?"

Steinberg leaned forward in his chair, and Donny saw his cold eyes now shone with a sinister light.

"Why, revenge of course."

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Hirschberg landed on his feet, almost losing balance as he came down. He was soon followed by Kagan and Omar. They were inside the prison walls. The courtyard was deserted, which was a good start.

"Now what?" Kagan asked, turning to Hirschberg, who had pretty much taken the lead in this operation.

"We take our guns, go inside, and kill every motherfucking son a Nazi bitch we find." he answered, his usual trigger happy grin appearing on his face.

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"Revenge?"

Donny was slightly confused. He couldn't recall anything he'd done to Steinberg, aside from attacking his base, and aiming a gun at him, to which the guy had jumped out of a window. But what did that have to do with him personally? If Steinberg wanted revenge for the base, he should go after Lt. Raine. It had been his idea. Hell, he should go after all of them if that were the case.

"Yes, revenge, sergeant. Isn't that the drive behind your pathetic little mission?"

"What the fuck did I do to you?" Donny was getting impatient with this guy. If he was going to die, Steinberg had better make it quick.

Steinberg's glare now darkened, and he leaned even closer.

"You killed my brother." His voice was barely a whisper, but every word was emphasized. Donny gave him a puzzled look.

"Who?"

Steinberg's eye narrowed.

"He was captain Nicolas Steinberg. You had better remember him."

Donny remembered, but didn't feel like showing it just yet. He kept giving Steinberg a confused look just a bit longer. He could see the colonel wasn't too happy with it.

"Oh, that guy!" Donny exclaimed, just as Steinberg opened his mouth. "Yeah, I got him pretty good, didn't I?"

Steinberg was shaking with contained fury, and Donny pushed him a little further.

"In fact, he's one of the best I've ever bashed the brains in. I was hoping to do yours too, you know. You look like you got the exact same skull. Not much in it, but sounds great when it cracks…"

Without warning, Steinberg leapt up from his chair, causing it to collapse on the uncompromising stone floor. He kicked Donny in the face, once, twice, and then started to kick him wherever he could land his boots. His eyes were wide and burning with a mix of rage and insane pleasure. He put the heel of his foot in the place he knew would hurt most, the shoulder where he had put two bullets in himself just the previous day. When Donny finally screamed, it sounded like music to his ears.

Steinberg finally stopped, went back to his chair, picked it up and sat down. His forehead was sweaty, and he was panting, his face split up by a wide grin.

Donny coughed, and spat blood out. Every inch of his body ached, and it felt as if his shoulder had been torn apart. The wound was bleeding again. He closed his eyes for a while, the temptation of the uprising darkness calling to him. But he resisted, and opened his eyes again. He saw Steinberg looking at him, grinning.

"Is that all you got." Donny managed to whisper, trying to sound as if he wasn't feeling any pain at all, and he laughed. Strangely enough, Steinberg started to laugh as well. For a few seconds, the two men shared a moment of morbid amusement. Then, the colonel got up, running a hand through his disarrayed hair.

"I'm afraid, sergeant, that this is now the end for you." he said.

Donny swallowed. He tried to pay no attention to the sudden surge of fear that rose in his mind. He'd never thought he would be afraid at the end of it all. His heart sped up, as if it desperately tried to squeeze in a few more beats before it would finally be stopped.

Steinberg was stalling. He didn't pull out a gun or any other weapon, and just stood there, watching his victim. Donny felt oddly impatient. Why doesn't he just… end it?

"What are you waiting for?" he asked. "Just get it over with and put a bullet in my head."

Steinberg smiled again.

"It will not be that easy." he said cryptically, and then turned on his heels and left the room. He had a little surprise up his sleeve.

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Hirschberg poked his head around a corner. No one. This was going all too well. They had gotten inside the building undetected, which was amazing given it was a German prison. He had expected to run into loads of guards. Little did he know this evening was coincidentally the night most of the soldiers present had gotten the night off, and were elsewhere getting themselves drunk. Steinberg had been so friendly, as he had something to celebrate. They all had, or so they thought. There were only a few people left in the building, to guard the only prisoners present at the time. Luck seemed to be on the Basterds side.

Hirschberg motioned for the other two to follow him, and they silently ran though the hallway, pausing at the door that lead to the basement.

"There's gotta be some down there." Omar said.

"Yep." Hirschberg answered, pulled the door open, and stormed down the stairs.

The few guards in the basement were completely surprised, and taken out quickly.

Raine and the others immediately jumped up at the sound of the gunshots echoing in the room.

"No fucking way!" Utivich exclaimed. Hirschberg grinned, and saluted.

"Damn good to see you guys." Wicki said as soon as everyone was out of their cells.

"Where's Donny?" Omar asked.

"They took him upstairs." Raine said, already halfway to the stairs. The others followed after him fast.

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Donny got tired of waiting. What the hell was Steinberg up to? Just as he thought this, the colonel entered the room again. He held something thin and long in his hand, something awfully familiar.

It was his baseball bat.

"Son of a…"

Steinberg stepped forward, and pulled Donny up to his knees. He took the bat firmly in his hands and ran the tip past the side of Donny's head.

"It is ironic, isn't it?" he said, grinning widely, nothing but emptiness and insanity in his eyes. Donny looked up, rage burning him up like he never felt before. Steinberg wanting to kill him with his own weapon made him see red.

He wasn't afraid anymore. He knew that, whatever Hell the colonel would be sent to, he would be there waiting for him.

Steinberg swung the bat over his shoulder, readying himself for the blow.

"Any last words?"

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And I'll end this chapter here. It's getting a bit long, and it's a great moment to split it, of course, giving you all a lovely cliffhanger to enjoy. Yeah, I'm an evil bitch, hah!

Thanks for reading!