Train Ride from Hell

[Wilhelm Schlegal]

Location: Cherbourg, France
Date: June 1944
Time: 3:00 PM

Fortress Europa had failed to halt the Allies from invading France. It was something that would instill fear into the Allies and force them back to the sea. It had failed. The Germans began pulling back from the beaches and began retreating further inland and regrouping with other units. Further inland, the Germans had formiddable air defenses, tanks, anti-tank guns, and plenty of infantry to hold off the approaching Allied advance. It was only a matter of time before France would fall and the war would be brought to Germany.

Wilhelm Schlegal held off 3 Allied tanks and 40 Airborne troops with his contingent back in Normandy until the Allied planes ruled the skies. He was one of only 10 survivors that made it back to German lines. Schlegal was now at one of the few German train stations that was still up and running. The train he would be taking contained troops, civilians, and the wounded. It would be unprotected from any Allied planes, but it'd be tough for their planes to go deep into German territory, due to the heavy flak inland. One of the things that trains were vulnerable to was sabotage on the train tracks by the French Resistance.

The train Wilhelm would be taking would take him to Paris, where he would switch trains to head back to Germany. Although he was already assigned to the 21st Panzer Division, he had to go back to Berlin to meet with a contact and change his name. He was a man on the run from the SS, but nobody noticed anything while in the defense of Normandy.

The train was being filled rather quickly, as many Germans began piling onto the train. Cherbourg was a key objective to both sides. If the Allies capture Cherbourg, they can use it's deep water port to resupply the armies and push further inland. Wilhelm boarded the train and took a seat in one of the empty rooms in the car. He placed his rifle against the wall and put his helmet down on his left. He looked out the window and saw wounded and dead soldiers waiting to board the train. Wilhelm knew that the war for them was over and they would find peace back home. They'd have to deal with the horrors that they have experienced and suffer through pain and agony.

[Anton Maas]

The stuffy office air was more unbearable then usual, the thick smoke from the fires outside had wafted into the building. But the busy officers and secretaries that fed the fires ignored it as they searched through desks, shelves and filing cabinets for every last sheet containing information that they could not bring to the Fatherland and would not allow to fall into Allied hands. The truth, half-truths, and complete fabrications lay in piles around the Regional Headquarters, waiting to be thrown into oblivion as everyone worked tirelessly to erase what they did.

Except for Kriminalinspektor Messer, he had no regrets, at least not while he had been stationed in Occupied France. He couldn’t care less about evidence of his work the Allies captured, as long as he himself escaped. Which he would, he already got himself a pass back to Germany on the evening train. Now he just had to wait until then, just lounge behind his desk, with a glass of brandy and an American cigarette to flush out the stench of burning documents.

“MESSER!”

Gus ceased his day dreaming and opened his eyes. The dark form of his administrator loomed over him from the other side of his liberally disorganized desk. ”Kriminalassessor.”Messer gave him a toast. Which was ignored “Did you tire of sorting through your papers?”

Gus shook his head and patted the leather satchel that sat among his pile of papers, then pulled the cigarette from his mouth and laid it on an ashtray, ”I’m done, everything important I’m taking with me.”

“Then dispose of the rest.” The Kriminalassessor ordered. Gustav shrugged, took the ashtray, his case and the bottle of brandy beside it, and sat them on the floor. Then in one simple sweep of the arm, pushed the rest of the items from the desk and into his waste bin. As his administrator silently looked on with contempt, Gus took one last sip of the sweet calvados before dumping the rest of the glass into the trash. Then, as a coup de grâce, flicked his cigarette into the metal bin, setting it’s contents ablaze.

“Dammit, Messer, if there wasn’t enough smoke in here already,” the Kriminalassessor exclaimed as he quickly grabbed the trash bin, “For once, you couldn’t make my job any easier, could you? Go, take you and your shit back to Berlin, at least give me some time of peace before the British come in and blow the place up.”

For once, Messer followed an order to the letter, and as the administrator left to dispose of the trash, Gus packed the half empty brandy next to the unopened bottles in his satchel, grabbed the rest of his uniform from the coat rack, and then went down to the garage, where he had a car and a driver already with his luggage to take him to the train station.

Now wearing the full Allergiene uniform, Gustav could feel eyes from every direction peer at him as he left the Mercedes for the train platform. He never liked the old out of date uniform, and couldn’t wait until he could starting wearing civvies in Germany again, but at least the uniform and the stigma attached to it gave him a path through the crowds of civilians and soldiers also escaping the creeping frontline.

The uniform affected Gustav in a similar way, making him feel more paranoid and menacing then usual. Every pair of eyes that glanced at him and his unique uniform could belong to a resistance fighter or an enemy agent. Cherbourg was now close enough to the Allied side that anything was possible. Gus would need to be on his toes until he got far enough away.

And in his panic of paranoia, Gus saw it, a face, a glance through the crowd. Not unique, not interesting, just different enough from all the looks of the rest of the crowd that Messer was intrigued. Maybe he saw them before. Perhaps they were a part of some old memory long forgotten, or in a report of wanted persons Gus had read once. He had no idea, there was just an animal like instinct that drove him to follow the person. And as Gus slowly stalked his prey through the station as stealthy as his uniform and two pieces of luggage could allow, he realized, he had little idea of what to do once he caught up with them. Fortunately, it seemed like they were both headed towards Paris, so he would have some thing to figure it all out.

[Gottfried Schmitt]

Greta shifted her way along one wall of the teeming train station, trying to keep away from the crowds of civilians and soldiers alike fleeing Cherbourg for safer areas. Today she was dressed in civilian garb as well, trying to blend in amidst the terrified populace shuffling aboard. She’d been a part of the German air defense recently, but the demand for planes in the face of the Allied assault far outweighed a quickly diminishing supply. Grounded for the moment until they could find birds to send up, even the pilots were evacuating to safer ground.

Greta took several deep breaths, pausing to look for an opening in the masses through which she could slip. Normally even pilots were given a respectful berth, but in street clothes she was just another bewildered German fighting for space on the terminal. She began to regret the decision to forego a uniform about the time the third man shouldered past her, sorely wishing she could pull off the forbidding stare she had seen her superiors employ on such occasions. Made to make her way by train alone, she had thought this the perfect opportunity to forego one disguise for another, opting out of using her uniform in favor of a summer dress and the convincing wig she had purchased many months before. She had hoped traveling as a civilian woman would decrease any hostility she might encounter over the course of the trip. If not for the worrying nature of the journey, this might almost feel like a holiday for the girl, so rare had it been that she got to embrace her feminine side since joining the war effort.

But what had felt like such a release on the trip over was quickly becoming a burden of a different stripe. The wig she wore tickled her neck, a constant reminder of the shorn locks that adorned her head beneath. The pretty dress, something she once might have worn out for a day in town, now left her feeling vulnerable and exposed. She had to constantly remind herself how to walk, how to talk, how to behave as a modest, well brought up woman would, and all the while behind that façade wonder at how much she had changed in the time since her enrollment. Gottfried was a mask behind which Greta hid, yes, but the uncomfortable truth the girl had begun to discover was that this woman she now played was little more real. Busy with that which should have been mechanical—navigating the crowds, finding her train—she tried not to think about the ramifications of this dawning revelation.

Instead she busied herself with watching her bag and trying to avoid being trampled, weaving her way through civilians and soldiers alike on her way to the train. And it was during this journey across the terminal that the crowds thinned for just a moment and she saw him standing, bags in hand. He was no different from any of the other military personnel scattered throughout the area, black suit impeccable even in the midst of all the turmoil, but as he turned he caught her eye and a chill ran down her spine. The next second the crowd had swallowed him again, and she retreated in the other direction, unsure exactly why she did not want to meet this man. Something about that look perhaps, or his bearing like some dark predator.

Regardless of the reason, Greta continued to walk away, scanning the platform before her for an area into which she might lose herself. Picking a small group of other women roughly her age, she attached herself to the fringe of their party and followed them toward one of the cars. Chances were it was just some small bit of paranoia driving her forward, and she mentally chided herself for her excitability even as she paused near the threshold of the vehicle. It was just a glance, after all, the same sort of look she could expect from any uniformed man in these grave times. You’ve a long ride ahead of you, Greta, she thought, no need to make it more difficult by indulging in these fancies of yours. With that, she boarded the train, now far enough behind not to crowd the girls who had already seated themselves at the farthest end of the car.