The Last Survivor (A Wilde/Chase Short Story) Read online

  Nina put a hand to her stinging cheek. ‘I’ve done worse than that to him!’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘What do you mean? What happened to my father and the others? Where are they?’

  ‘You mean you don’t know?’

  Something about his shift in attitude told Nina that while he wanted answers, he was also afraid to hear them. Rather than ask directly, he said instead: ‘I left the Enklave aboard the train with the other members of the New Reich—’

  ‘Apart from the children you left to burn to death in a locked building,’ she said with disgust. She, Eddie and Zane had gone in to rescue them, delaying their pursuit of the Nazi forces.

  Kroll seemed not to care. ‘You attacked us – you, the Engländer and the Jew. Many of us were killed when the truck carrying our weapons exploded. I was thrown from the train, knocked out. When I woke, I found the bodies of my brothers around me – and the Argentine police moving in. I hid until I was able to make my escape, but I had lost contact with the leaders. I know that they reached Iran, but I do not know what happened to them there.’ He leaned closer, raising the gun threateningly. ‘You are going to tell me.’

  ‘You want to know what happened to them?’ Nina replied, with another surge of anger. ‘They died! They all died!’

  Even if he had been expecting it, he was still shocked to have it confirmed. ‘No! No, that cannot be true. Not all of them. You are lying!’

  ‘I’m not lying,’ Nina insisted. ‘They found the Spring of Immortality – after I did. They went in … and not one of them came out. They’re all dead.’

  Kroll stared at her, the muscles in his face and neck clenching ever tighter until he began to shake with rage. ‘No!’ he roared. He stormed away, circling the room in a rapid march before darting back to Nina and jamming the gun into her face. ‘You are lying, you are lying! Tell me what really happened!’

  ‘I’m telling you the truth!’ she shouted back. ‘The whole place was full of booby traps! Anyone who wasn’t killed by them was taken out by the Mossad, or my husband … or by me.’

  He shook his head. ‘You could not kill them. You are a woman.’

  ‘Oh, top marks for observation! But I did kill them. I led them into the biggest trap of all, the one they couldn’t resist – that your father couldn’t resist. He was so greedy and desperate to get his hands on the water from the spring, he never thought for a moment that the people who built the place might not have wanted anyone to have it!’

  Kroll straightened, struggling to bring his emotions under control. ‘What happened to the Führer … my father?’

  ‘He tried to kill me,’ said Nina, almost feeling the bloated Nazi leader’s hand clamping around her throat as he pushed her underwater. ‘I hit his head with something, trapped his leg under a sarcophagus lid … and watched him drown.’

  The blond man stiffened. ‘My father is dead?’

  ‘Yeah.’ She became horribly aware that the gun’s muzzle was still only inches from her face …

  But Kroll stepped back. ‘They are dead. They are all dead …’ A long inhalation – then he grabbed her by the throat and drove her backwards against a wall.

  She cried out, but the sound choked off as he pushed the gun hard up under her chin. ‘I will kill you! I will kill you!’ The last words were a spittle-flecked screech, his face so close to hers that she could smell his breath. She felt his hand strain as he tightened his finger around the trigger—

  Then he pulled away abruptly, shoving her to the dusty floor. Nina looked up at him. The Nazi was breathing heavily, trying to contain his seething emotions. She might still have a chance to talk her way out of the situation …

  ‘They … they know you’re still alive,’ she said. ‘My husband – he was in Little Italy, he tried to warn me about you. And the only way he could know is if the Mossad had told him.’ That was guesswork, but it seemed the most likely explanation. ‘They know you’re here, and they’ll hunt you down. If you hurt me, Eddie, my husband, he will find you. He’ll kill you,’ she added, more forcefully. ‘Trust me, I’ve seen him do it. It scares me, and I’m his wife! But you can save yourself, Ulrich.’ His gaze locked on to hers at her use of his first name. ‘Just get out of here, go. Your war’s over. Leave me here and run while you still can.’

  For a moment she thought she had got through to him. But then emotion returned to his face: cold hatred. ‘The war is not over as long as one soldier remains to fight it,’ he growled. Fear rose in Nina again as he advanced, looming malevolently over her. ‘You are still alive not because of grief, or despair, Dr Wilde. I did not shoot you because … it would be too quick.’

  He surveyed the room. Skeins of electrical wiring ran along the unfinished ceiling, markings on the concrete showing where light fittings were to be installed. Keeping his gun pointed at Nina, the Nazi hopped up to snag a dangling cable, yanking it down from its supporting bracket. ‘At the Enklave, the Führer sentenced you to be hanged. That sentence will now be carried out!’

  Eddie regarded the photo that had just been sent to his phone. ‘That’s the bastard who took Nina.’ He had only glimpsed her kidnapper, but it was enough to identify him.

  ‘Ulrich Kroll is the name on the fake passport,’ Jared Zane told him. ‘Probably a son or grandson of Erich Kroll.’

  ‘Being a shithead runs in the family, then.’

  ‘Yeah. And Eddie, there’s something else. We just learned that a man named Earl Hatchens was found dead at his home in New Jersey. Hatchens is on our watch list; we got his name from Kroll’s computer, via Leitz. He’s a neo-Nazi, a sympathetic contact. Or rather, he was. He was shot, but the cops didn’t find a gun.’

  ‘You think Kroll killed him?’

  ‘Possibly. He could have gone to Hatchens for support and information.’

  ‘Like where to find me and Nina,’ said Eddie. ‘Then he took him out to cover his tracks. Great, so now he’s armed.’ He spotted a street sign as the cab turned at an intersection. ‘Okay, Jared, I’m here. Got to go.’

  ‘Be careful, old man,’ said the Israeli.

  ‘Bloody right I will be!’ He disconnected as the cab arrived at its destination.

  The Yorkshireman knew even before he saw the abandoned delivery truck that he was in the right place: an NYPD Ford Taurus patrol car was parked at the end of the alley, red and white strobe lights blinking. ‘Let us out here,’ he told the driver.

  Natalia got out as he paid the fare. ‘I do not see Nina.’

  ‘Didn’t expect that you would,’ Eddie replied as he started towards the alley. A couple of uniformed officers came into view, guarding the empty truck. ‘So he dumped it here – where did he go next?’

  ‘He could be anywhere,’ she said gloomily. ‘I knew that New York was big, but I had not realised how big!’

  ‘He won’t be far away. He doesn’t know the place.’ He studied the truck until one of the cops gave him a distinct move along stare, then continued down the street. ‘He got out of the truck, then opened the back door to get Nina, but someone saw him and reported it to the cops. That means he didn’t go into any of these buildings here, or he’d have been seen. He must have gone to the other end of the alley.’ Natalia followed him as he jogged to the next side passage and went down it, emerging on a parallel road. He looked back towards the first alley, then at the neighbouring structures. ‘They’re in one of these.’

  ‘But which?’

  ‘Don’t know yet. I know how to work it out, though. To find him, I need to think like a Nazi.’

  Natalia made a sour face. ‘That is not a way that anyone should think.’

  ‘No, but a lot of people seem to be doing it lately.’ He shook his head. ‘So: he’s here for revenge, but he doesn’t know New York. Nina didn’t decide to go to Little Italy until this morning, so he can’t have checked out the area in advance. He’s improvising. And he’s kidnapped a woman in broad daylight – a woman who’ll take any chance she gets to fight back or kick up a stink.
Even in the worst parts of town, that’ll attract attention.’

  ‘So he will not have gone far,’ the young German suggested.

  ‘Nope.’ Eddie turned to survey the surrounding buildings. ‘He’s got to be in one of these. Question is … which one?’

  There were several possibilities. Manhattan was constantly changing, districts falling out of favour and becoming run-down before inevitably seeing an influx of new money as developers grasped the opportunity to cash in on a relatively underpriced section of the island’s real estate. The area south of Chinatown was on the cusp of one of these rises; many of the street’s buildings were in poor condition, a couple even appearing derelict, but there were also a handful in the process of being renovated, and in one case a brand-new apartment block was being constructed. As it was the weekend, building work was currently on hold, the sites protected only by far-from-impenetrable plywood board and orange plastic netting.

  ‘One of those empty ones,’ he decided. ‘He won’t have taken her somewhere with people in the next apartment – too much risk of someone calling the cops.’

  Natalia peered at one of the condemned buildings. ‘He may have gone in there. Look, the wood covering that window is broken.’

  Eddie considered the possibility, then dismissed it. ‘You’re not thinking like a Nazi. They think they’re superior, they’re the master race, the rulers of the world – he’s not going to be grovelling about in a rat-infested shit-pit. ’Scuse my French.’

  She gave him a small smile. ‘That was not French.’

  ‘No, but I don’t picture him hiding somewhere that’s been used as a toilet by a load of homeless guys and druggies. I’ve seen where these arseholes lived. They were like …’ His eyes went to the building under construction. The steel frame was complete, along with most of the outer walls and even some windows. ‘Barracks,’ he concluded.

  ‘That was not French either.’

  ‘No, barracks, not boll— Never mind.’ He headed for the construction site, Natalia following. ‘The inside of that place won’t be that much different from the barracks him and his mates grew up in. It’s where he’s most likely to be hiding.’

  ‘But what if you are wrong?’

  Eddie gave her a grim look. ‘I just hope to God I’m not.’ He reached the barricade, noticing that a tall grillework barrier seemed to have been pushed back. A quick check of the ground revealed recent footprints in the sand and dust spilled across the sidewalk. Some were noticeably smaller than the others: a woman’s shoes. ‘Don’t think I am, though. Look.’ He indicated the prints, then pushed through the gap.

  Natalia started after him; he held up a hand. ‘No, wait out here,’ he told her. ‘If he’s inside, go and get those cops.’

  ‘Eddie, I can help you,’ she insisted. ‘I can talk to him – in German. If I can convince him that our country has rejected everything the Nazis stood for, he may give up without violence.’

  ‘Wouldn’t bet on it,’ he said. But she had a point. He was unarmed, while Nina’s kidnapper had a gun, so if there was any chance of rescuing her without anyone getting hurt, he had to take it. The coldly tactical part of his mind also pointed out that if the Nazi was listening to Natalia, he would be distracted …

  ‘Okay,’ he said finally, ‘come on. But stay behind me, and when we find him, keep in cover. I don’t want to risk you getting shot.’

  ‘Nor do I!’ she replied, with a faint smile. Eddie grinned, then headed into the building.

  There was little light inside the unfinished structure, but still enough for him to find his way to a stairwell. He doubted that the kidnapper would be holding Nina on the ground floor – instinct would compel him to find safer, higher ground, and the young man was unlikely to have enough real-world experience to overcome it. Nevertheless, he still paused at the foot of the stairs to listen. There were no noises nearby.

  ‘All right,’ he whispered, ‘follow me up. Quiet as you can.’ Natalia nodded.

  They ascended the stairs, stopping briefly to check each landing. ‘Eddie!’ Natalia hissed on the third floor.

  ‘Yeah, I hear it.’ Bangs and thumps were coming from somewhere above—

  A voice. He couldn’t make out the words, but knew instantly that it was Nina’s.

  He continued upwards, taking the steps two at a time. Natalia scurried along behind him. The noises continued; the Nazi didn’t know they were coming. At the fifth floor, Eddie pressed himself against the wall beside the exit from the stairwell and glanced around it. A hall led deeper into the building. Apartments lined it – but which one held his wife?

  Faint daylight came into the hallway through the gaping doorways. All the patches of illumination were steady – except one. A shadow drifted across the hazy light from the sixth door along, at the end of the passage.

  ‘Wait here,’ he told Natalia. ‘I’m going in.’

  ‘You promised your friend that you would tell the police if you found Nina!’ she said, somewhat accusing.

  ‘Yeah, but I didn’t say I’d do it straight away, did I?’ He gave her a quick disarming grin, which vanished as he became all business, ready for action. ‘If we wait for the cops, he might hurt Nina – and our baby,’ he explained. ‘I’m not gonna let that happen. If I wave like this,’ he held up his left hand in a particular gesture, ‘then call out to him, try to keep his attention. Otherwise, stay back and keep quiet.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ll work that out when I get there!’

  He began to creep down the corridor. A look into the first apartment revealed that what he assumed would be the lounge of the finished residence was about twenty-five feet long, the windows in the far wall. The diffuseness of the moving shadow in the hall made him suspect that the Nazi was at the other end of the sixth room. It would take a couple of seconds to reach him – too long against an armed man.

  But there was something else: a narrow gap running from floor to ceiling in the side wall, a stack of rectangular ductwork sections ready to be installed nearby. He could see what he assumed was the neighbouring apartment through the opening, which was confirmed when he reached the next door to find a mirror image of the first flat. The third apartment also had a hole in the wall …

  A plan was already forming by the time he passed the fourth door. He slowed, listening to the sounds from ahead. A man was grunting with exertion, something heavy scraping over the concrete floor—

  ‘You don’t have to do this!’ Nina’s voice again: pleading, fearful.

  Eddie felt a fear of his own. Whatever the Nazi was doing, it was about to come to a fatal conclusion. He looked into the fifth apartment. There was another narrow gap in the wall, as he’d hoped. He glanced back down the hallway, seeing Natalia peering worriedly after him, and gave her his signal before ducking into the room.

  ‘You don’t have to do this!’ Nina said, with growing desperation. Kroll had forced her into a corner by the windows, keeping his gun in one hand as he used the other to pull down more electrical cables from the ceiling. He had spent the last few minutes winding the various lengths around each other, forming a crude rope … the end of which he had just tied into a noose.

  He shoved the crate into the middle of the room, then stepped up on to it to hook the rope over a metal pipe. She saw a chance to knock him down from his perch while he was preoccupied—

  The gun locked on to her before she had even completed the first step. The Nazi’s expression made it clear that while he wanted to fulfil his more grandiose plan, he would still simply shoot her if necessary. ‘Get back,’ he growled. She retreated.

  He let the noose drop from the pipe, then secured it about six feet above floor level. A chill ran through Nina. She was five and a half feet tall. The ceiling was not high enough for the fall from the crate alone to kill her; Kroll meant for her to strangle to death with her feet kicking helplessly mere inches above the floor.

  Just as his father had intended in Argentin
a. A nightmarish flashback: hate-filled faces screaming at her as the noose was tightened around her throat …

  The horrifying vision vanished as Kroll jumped down from the wooden box, replaced by one smaller in scale but no less terrifying. The makeshift hangman’s rope dangled from the ceiling, waiting for her. ‘Come here,’ he demanded.

  ‘Screw you,’ she said, trying to sound defiant, but her voice betrayed her fear.

  ‘You will walk to me, or I will shoot you in the knees and drag you. Either way, you will come.’ He lowered his aim. ‘I will count to three. One. Two—’

  ‘Herr Kroll? Können Sie mich hören?’

  A woman’s voice, from outside the apartment. Kroll whirled, darting into one of the side rooms and taking cover in its entrance as he aimed at the hallway. ‘Who is there?’ he barked. ‘Do not come any closer, or I will kill her!’

  The woman spoke again in German. Nina didn’t know what she was saying, her knowledge of the language limited, but she realised who it was: Natalia! That meant Eddie was here as well – but where? If he had let the young woman get this close, then he had to be closer …

  Eddie crept to the opening in the wall, peeking warily through.

  Nina was in the far corner of the room. She didn’t see him, looking towards Kroll, who replied to Natalia with a bark of ‘Nein!’ He followed up with an angry tirade, the Englishman picking out enough to get the gist of what he was saying – that the Nazis would never be defeated.

  Determined to prove him wrong, he leaned out a little further, both to survey the rest of the room and to try to catch Nina’s attention without drawing Kroll’s.

  A flash of horror at the sight of the noose. The Nazi was going to finish what had been started in Argentina three months earlier. But this time, Eddie didn’t have a gun or a Molotov cocktail to even the odds, only his fists and feet.

  He located Kroll in a doorway, seeing that he was armed with a Heckler & Koch USP Compact automatic, then looked back at Nina. His wife was still watching Kroll as he continued his rant – waiting for an opening that she could use to escape, he realised with pride. The redhead was stubborn even in the face of death. He risked waving a hand, hoping she would catch the movement in her peripheral vision.