The Rotting
A five hour drive before the War had become an almost eight-hour drive, with the state of the roads and the roving packs of degenerate highway gas station warlords being primarily to blame. Eventually they reached the outskirts of Schweinfurt, a modestly-sized city. They slowed down as they rounded the bend of Highway 26 as it followed the Main river, the offramp declaring they were right outside Mainberg and encouraging them to stop at the rest stop at Schloss Mainberg. Hans could see the castle in question on the hill overlooking the highway, the main watchtower in the center collapsed in.
"Where to from here?" Friedrich asked, looking back over his shoulder at their Panzertrooper friends. Erich stood and peered out over the top of the half-track's bed, map in his hands. He looked at the map for a few moments, compared what it was telling him to the changes Mother Nature had made to the roadway over the years, and nodded.
"Continue along Highway 26 into Schweinfurt proper," Erich said, his voice filtered by his suit's helmet. "When you reach the end turn left onto Paul-Rummert-Ring and follow it and the river all the way to the end, where you'll turn right onto Oskar von Miller Strasse. At the end of that street there'll be a forest, and beyond that is Air Station Richardson."
"Very well, then," Friedrich said, and they got moving again. Hans was just glad that the highway had been intact and mostly free of obstacles, with only few cars left to eternally enjoy the sun. Friedrich moved them slowly through the slowly-thickening maze of abandoned cars, growing in size as they neared Schweinfurt proper.
Hans had seen this before, on other autobahnen in Germany; rows and rows of cars going out from the cities, left in place by their dead owners trying to flee The Bomb. What Hans hadn't understood at first was why. The autobahnen only ran from city to city. Anyone evacuating from one population center to escape The Bomb was just rushing to meet the next nuke before it hit. It wasn't until he was much older that Hans understood: blind fear. The same blind fear that, at age six, had compelled him to crawl under his bed at the sight of the first flash just seconds before the shockwave had shattered every window in his house.
Hans peered through the passenger slit of the half-track as they continued along A-26. Towards the end of the autobahn, as it narrowed into a city street, they came upon an intersection, the ruins of a hotel looming over it. "We turn left here, yes?" Friedrich asked.
"Yes," Erich replied. "Onto Paul-Rummert-Ring, like I said."
Friedrich turned the Hanomag's wheel and then they were on Paul-Rummert, the road sharply curving to the right to follow the river Main. Hans looked out the slit to his right at the buildings as they slowly passed them, keeping his eyes peeled for any threats. "Where did you learn to drive, anyway?" he asked.
"Berlin Jugend Autoschule, before the war," Friedrich said. "It was a Chryslus Highwayman I learned to drive on, an electric import from America. It was weird. Fast. Zero to 40 in under a second. Very alarming and difficult to adjust to. This Hanomag," he gestured at the half-track's steering wheel, "much different. Slower."
They continued along wordlessly, the only sound that of the wheels and treads squeaking as they slowly made their way through Schweinfurt. The route that Friedrich had them following saw them winding through the city alongside the river until they were forced to turn off onto a side road. Eventually they emerged onto a main street, Oskar-von-Miller Strasse, and turned right.
"Hmm," Hans said as they passed by a scorch-marked building, its golden dome marred by soot. "I've never seen a building like that before." There were a few skeletons outside its front door, faded and streaked white paint on the walls beside them.
"It's a mosque," Friedrich said, and stopped the vehicle. "A kind of church, for Muslims. Not many were left standing in Germany once the Resource Wars began."
Hans nodded. "I remember, vaguely. When The Bomb came, no one was safe anymore, least of all these people," he said. "Even though the Resource Wars had ended a decade before the Atomic War."
"Hate lingers. You should know that," Freidrich said, and Hans turned to look at him.
"Why are we stopped?" Erich asked, and Friedrich looked over his shoulder.
"The road's blocked. The building on the corner has collapsed, and there are a few cars in the way as well," he said. Erich stood, confirmed what Friedrich had told him, and crouched back down.
"Fine. We go on foot from here. The base isn't far."
The five of them disembarked from the half-track, weapons at the ready. So far Schweinfurt had been quiet, a fact that put Hans on edge rather than at ease. He checked the H&K CAWS to make sure it was loaded, staying low by the half-track. "Where to, Erich?"
"The base is just beyond this roadblock, in the forest beside the city," Erich said. He looked around, standing out in the open. "Through the mosque. We'll find a backstreet."
Erich and the Panzertroopers got moving, and Hans and Friedrich followed. The gate to the mosque opened on screaming hinges, the doors lying on the ground. Daylight poured in through the collapsed roof, the walls charred and blackened. There were a few skeletons inside as well. Hans stepped over one and frowned, wondering what Hilda would've thought. She'd never hated any Muslims. Or Jews, for that matter, but Hans was sure she'd never even met one. He never had, at least not to his knowledge.
The team stepped out the back of the mosque, a decaying grassy park behind it, hemmed in by houses. Left of the mosque's back door was an alley, littered with toys and trash. Hans followed the rest of the team down the alley, Erich at the lead. The alley ended in a T-junction, a poster-lined wall at the end.
Erich reached the end of the alley and was immediately accosted by a feral Rotter, which harmlessly scrabbled at his suit. He grabbed the creature by the arm and yanked, ripping it straight out of the socket. The monster stumbled and Erich backhanded it, his armored gauntlet shattering its jaw and caving in the side of its head. He stepped over its corpse and moved on, the others close behind.
"Both ends of the alley are blocked. Looks like we're going through this building," Erich said, and nodded at the poster-lined wall. The posters too were rotting, their colors severely faded. There was a metal door, slightly ajar, near the end of the alley. Erich pulled the door open and stepped in, the others filing in. Hans was last, and he shut the door behind him as best he could.
They'd ended up in a stockroom, shelves and shelves lined with wood boxes. The room was clear, and Hans checked the labels as they proceeded through it. Meat, ice cream, confectionaries, et cetera. A grocery store, if he had to guess. There was only one other door in the room, which Erich and the Panzertroopers stepped through.
The five of them emerged in a medium-sized room, most of the shelves and racks bare. What few crates remained were in the same vein as the stockroom; beans, corn, bread, and so on.
Not a grocery store, but rather a warehouse Hans thought. The team fanned out, moving quickly. Hans, Friedrich, and Irmina went right, Oskar and Erich left. They neared an open door and another Rotter came out, clawing at Irmina. She whacked it in the head with the butt of her PG-60, a few howls of alarm coming from somewhere deeper in the warehouse.
Irmina stepped through the open door, Hans and Friedrich stopping outside. He'd just looked to the left when he saw a Rotter quickly shambling towards him. He raised the CAWS and fired, the magnum buckshot blowing out half the creature's torso. The action recoiled smoothly, chucking the empty brass shell to the floor, the sound lost to the ringing in Hans' ears.
More and more howls of alarm rose up, telling Hans the warehouse was filled with Rotters. There was a deep *THWAAAANGG* as Erich's M72 Gauss Rifle discharged somewhere unseen, Oskar's Plazmagewehr joining in. Hans tightened his hold on the CAWS as the warehouse was filled with the blue glow of discharging plasma.
Irmina came back out of the room and got moving again, and Hans followed. A few Rotters came crawling out of their resting spots and were quickly put back to sleep by Irmina's PG-60, flesh simmering and drooling off the glowing wounds.
"Clear it!" Irmina ordered as they neared a bathroom. Hans went in with the shotgun, sweeping the stalls. A Rotter missing a leg began crawling towards him and he shot it, the blast shattering what little remained of the mirrors. The pellets skated along its back, shredding its flesh and smashing its spine. The rest of the bathroom was clear and he stepped back out just in time to see Friedrich drop one with a single shot from his G3, the body colliding with one of the shelves and knocking down a crate of oranges.
Hans looked right and saw a Rotter jump onto Irmina's back. She turned and rammed herself into the wall, crushing the creature under her suit. It peeled off as she stepped away and dropped to the floor, its limbs splayed at disturbing angles.
"This is the part I love," Irmina said, and continued on. Hans and Friedrich kept pace as the Panzertroopers slaughtered their way through the warehouse, completely untouchable by the Rotters.
"I'd never actually seen a Panzertrooper in action before today," Friedrich said. "Very formidable."
"If we'd had more there's no way you and the Coalition would've won at the Eagle's Nest," Hans said.
"No one won that day, Herr Eckhart. But you are right. If there'd been more of these machine-men there that day it'd have been a disaster for us."
Irmina stepped through another door, a lightning storm of blue plasma backlighting her, and once again Hans could only watch in awe. The air stunk heavily of ozone, tinged only slightly by the sulfur from Hans' and Friedrich's ballistic guns. The two men followed Irmina through the room, stepping over the bodies. The room was already clear, the Rotters annihilated by her plasma rifle. At the end of the room, on the left side, was a door that opened back up on the warehouse floor. Elsewhere in the building Erich fired his Gauss Rifle again, the hypersonic blast knocking a few ceiling panels loose.
Their side of the warehouse was clear, so Irmina and the boys made their way across the floor to Erich and Oskar, who were finishing up. "There's one last door here. Sounds like there's a bunch of Rotters on the other side. Oskar, Irmina, be my guest," Erich said, his smile heard rather than seen. He yanked the door open and a Rotter immediately tried to charge out, its head and upper torso plucked off by searing orbs of plasma. Oskar and Irmina stepped through the door, their plazmagewehrs thundering, the room practically glowing blue. Erich stood by the door, facing Hans and Friedrich. There was nothing to see through the doorframe beyond the dancing and flashing light as the Panzertroopers drowned the Rotters in the roaring thunder of plasma.
After just twenty seconds it was over, and the warehouse fell silent. Oskar and Irmina stepped out of the room, blue vapors drifting off the barrels of their plasma rifles. They nodded to Erich, who nodded back. He walked over to the warehouse's front door and popped it open, peering out through the crack. After a moment he closed the door and turned back to face the group. "We're on track," he said. "Air Station Richardson is in the forest, like I said. Invisible before the nukes came, but since all the trees have died it's become a lot more noticeable. Unfortunately, that means a daytime infiltration is out of the question. We'll wait until tonight to go in."
"I'm guessing you've come up with a plan, yes?" Friedrich asked, and Erich nodded.
"The Panzertroopers and I will go up on one of these rooftops and take a look at their wall and defenses, then come up with a plan to get inside. Once inside, we'll stay undetected as long as possible, and then kill every Yankee fuck who gets in our way. The objective is the armory, for armor and ordnance. We'll grab what we'll need for the water treatment plant op, plus the assault on the park and the Reichstag," Erich explained. "Once we've got what we need, get the fuck out. We'll head straight for the mosque and drive out of here quick as can be."
Friedrich shrugged. "Very well, then. Is there anything we should do to prepare before then?"
"Rest."
"Fine by me," Hans said. He reloaded and slung the CAWS and sat down on one of the crates. The Panzertrooperd dispersed, the floor tiles cracking under their steel boots. Friedrich started walking around the front area of the warehouse, checking to make sure the door was closed and locked. He sat down by the door, rifle propped up next to him. Hans stared at him a moment, then thought of something. "The Eagle's Nest," he said. Friedrich turned to look at him. "The Final Order wanted to kill sane Rotters and Sturmutants, along with other threats. You were against that back then. What changed?"
"Nothing," Friedrich said. "Their mission to exterminate those of sound mind just because of their appearance was and still is wrong, Herr Eckhart. I'm here helping you get set up to eliminate the Sturmutants at the Spreebogenpark because they're a threat to the stability of Berlin. Other Sturmutant settlements, including the few Sturmutants we have living at Alexanderplatz, are not a threat, so I've left them alone."
"I still can't believe you're letting Sturmers live with you," Han said.
Friedrich shook his head. "You have to remember, Herr Eckhart, that Sturmutants aren't musclebound simpletons. They've retained their human intelligence and physiology, they've just suffered a rather strange skin tone mutation. Plus heightened aggression over normal humans. When they keep this aggressive behavior in check they're every bit as agreeable as the average person today."
"Which is to say not at all, right?" Hans said, and Friedrich smiled.
"I admit, they take after us," he said, and his smile faded. "Once this lot at the park is gone, though, Berlin will become a much more stable place. The stations and the Deutsche Kommunists will be in alliance, trade will be established, and the roads will be much safer to travel. All we'll have to fear then are the more animalistic mutants, like Rovers, Croakers, and Skullcrackers."
Hans nodded, and something else came to mind. "Hmm... Erich!" he called, and a few moments later the Panzertrooper lumbered up to the front of the warehouse, his helmet off. "I've asked you this before, and you didn't give me an answer. There's no harm in telling me now, right? Dahlem. The Molecular Genetics Institute. Why were you there?"
"Matter of operational security," he said. After a moment he smiled. "Just fucking with you. The Order had me and some Fieldmen there to test the viability of training Rovers. To act as guard dogs or, even better, attack dogs. Imagine a Rover that can obey commands."
"Jesus..." Hans said. "What did you learn? Would it work?"
"Too much of a pain in the ass. Rovers have a ridiculous appetite and an even more ridiculous libido. Keeping them sufficiently fed and fucked to make them willing to obey commands was way more trouble than it was worth," Erich said. "Now, if we had some kind of special collar, to keep their shit in check? That'd do the trick."
Hans nodded. "If only." Erich put his helmet back on and walked away, and Hans looked back at Friedrich.
"Trained attack Rovers," Friedrich said, and shook his head. "Maybe humanity ought to keep the insane science experiments in comics and pulp magazines, hmm?"
Hans stood. "We'd certainly all be better off if they had," he said, and he was about to walk off when Friedrich stopped him.
"Wait," he said firmly. "We need to talk."
"About Hilda, I'm guessing," Hans said, and Friedrich nodded. Hans remained standing and crossed his arms, not wanting to hear it.
"She was the Monster of Munich? Just what was Operation Atomsturm? How did a little woman like her get such an awful nickname?" Friedrich asked.
"A pogrom, to remove from our world the mutant trash. I found her in the courtyard of the Munich Residenz one day, behind the sights of an MG-34, gunning 'sane' Rotters down as Final Order Fieldmen marched them out. The mutants say she killed over 70," Hans explained.
"Mein Gott..." Friedrich said. "And you let this happen?!"
"Just what was I supposed to do? Take her ammo away? And really, fuck them and fuck you. You're old enough to remember what life was like before The Bomb; no mutants, no Rotters, none of the fucked-up shit we deal with today."
Friedrich nodded. "Mmm, sure, if you don't count the ones made in the labs before the war. I knew that what the Order was doing was wrong, but I never thought for a second you were a part of it. I always thought you and your little group had been in charge of finding material for Projekt Natursturm, not reenacting the Third Reich playbook."
Hans sighed and sat down. "It was just Hilda, really. I never killed except in self-defense, and Walter was strongly against the whole Atomsturm thing. Klara was neutral, as best I remember. When Walter died at the BMW headquarters it was like Hilda was freed. She did whatever she wanted after that, eagerly eating up what the Order fed her." He leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. "If Natursturm had actually fucking worked, if we'd beaten back your fucking do-gooding Coalition, then it would've only gone on from there. Nothing would've stood in her way after that, and she would've scorched every last inch of Germany to burn away the rot, and I'd have happily stood right behind her the whole way."
"Sounds like you were afraid of her, actually. Of the lengths she would go to, and the person she would've become, if given the chance," Friedrich said.
"Germany needs people like Hilda. People willing to make the hard choices to restore our nation," Hans said. "And I'll tell you what I told you back then: I'd do it all again."
"Sometimes, Herr Eckhart, I wonder if you actually believe that," Friedrich said, and Hans stood.
"For the chance to free Germans from the perpetual suffering we endure? There's nothing I wouldn't do," he said. "That's what it was going to take. That's what it will take, when one day someone picks up where the Final Order left off, but I won't be around to see it I'm sure. I'll be dead and buried long before peace returns to our world, and nothing I can do will fucking change that."
Friedrich looked up at him. "Long after the both of us are dead and gone man will still kill his fellow man in pursuit of some goal or another, because man never changes, Herr Eckhart. All we can hope for is the next generation to avoid repeating the same mistakes we did."
Hans scoffed and walked away, looking for a more comfortable place to get some rest before they moved on the American military base.