Gestapo

10

Rebecca was in pain. So much pain - more pain than that night with the overseer - and she was going to die now. The past hours flashed through her mind in seconds.

The officer had led her, along with a group of other men and women, down the straight hallways and around the sharp corners. If they were going for a walk, their group seemed to consist of the most capable bodies in the camp - all young and untouched by disease or severe malnourishment - but what kind of walk was this?

She realized soon that it was not a walk - of course it was not a walk - it was a mass murder. Her group joined with three other groups, and they were directed to a muddy river bank where they were instructed by a doctor to roll the legs of their pants up. No one dared question the orders, and the first person to scream as knives were slashed through their skin was immediately silenced with a bullet through the head.

When it was Rebecca's turn, her head was already swimming, and she didn't notice the sting of knife until it was over and the blood was rising up and pouring down her legs. She fell to the ground, knees oozing lower in the gooey mud. How long would it take to die? She now regretted that day when she had thanked God that someone else had been taken away to their deaths - maybe she had brought this fate upon herself.

There was another scream and another gunshot. Someone else had succumbed to the pain. And Rebecca was almost next - something was stabbed deep into her wounds and she whimpered before cutting off all sound by biting her cheeks until they bled.

What were they doing to her? This was an indescribable torture. Trying to listen to her surroundings, Rebecca could hear the doctor and officers speaking. "No anesthesia... bearable pain... only two... not fatal... more," and there was another stab at Rebecca's legs and her skin ripped out farther. She could not take it anymore - she screamed. It was quick, but it conveyed all her pain. The Nazis would show no sympathy, she should have known that, but she was not thinking anymore. There was nothing left on her mind but the pain. So she screamed again and again and again, some small part of her hoping to be killed, the rest of her not capable of sane thought.

Rebecca was cold. She was reduced to an animal now, only feeling raw emotions, no thoughts. The sudden cold felt good on her wound, but brought a terrible numbness and pain to the rest of her, so she clawed across the ground, connecting only with water until she reached the banks again, and leaped out of the river. But a crazed, wounded, animal is no match for a Nazi officer - she was merely tossed back into the river.

And that is where she stayed for an hour. She was not aware of the passage of time, she was only aware of the pain that was building, the terrible pain she did not know was possible. There was no more Rebecca - there was only this being, pushed past sanity, screaming it's throat raw.

Hilfe, Max! Help! Suddenly Rebecca was back. Somewhere, somehow, her mind had returned and she could think simple thoughts again. Max. She wanted to see him before she died. But she needed Peter. Peter was the one who had helped her, who loved her. Max did not love her that much - only Peter would save her now.

So she opened her eyes, and there he was, calling her name. A hopeless mirage hallucinated by a desperate dying girl.

"Peter!" She called for him, but the words did not leave her mouth. Again, she was surrounded by silence and water.

There was a high-pitched ringing for a moment before, suddenly, Rebecca was joined by other bodies. They were going to Hell, like the Nazis had promised for them so many times. They would fall together.

But no - one of them, a man, and by far the healthiest of the group, had seen Peter, had seen Rebecca. And he understood what needed to happen. Using his last ounces of strength, this stranger pushed Rebecca up, up, up - he was dead before her head broke the surface, but Rebecca shot up out of the river and saw Peter again, one last time before there was a bursting pain in her stomach.

It was tiny compared to what she had been through the past two hours, but she knew it meant the end for her.

"Let the boy see the girl," the Naxis knew it too. Peter's face would be the last thing she would see, and he would take away her pain for her so she could die peacefully. Would the Nazis allow it?

No, because where Peter had stood, there was now Max.