Linda led her partner through the network of numerous drainage tunnels that made up the dreary, almost lightless, extensive sewer system of New Berlin City. It was a sewer system that had been newly built in the late 1940s after the old, American one had been destroyed in the war. The population of a city of rats called it home. Wayne and Linda came upon a large crevice, with a diameter wide enough to accommodate an average sized human, in the muddled, rocky ground. Linda got down on her hands and knees and, in a creeping motion, began to move through the crack.
“Are you sure you know where you’re going?” Wayne asked. He was feeling claustrophobic.
“I practically grew up here,” Linda said, her voice muffled since her head was already on the far side of the crevice.
Wayne unwillingly crawled into the hole, also. Halfway through it, he became stuck. “I can’t move anymore,” he fretted.
“Suck in your gut,” Linda advised.
“It is sucked in,” Wayne said frustrated.
Linda gripped each of his calloused hands. When she pulled on them hard, the pain in Wayne’s right shoulder intensified. He wiggled his torso, the minute amount that he could, against the hard surface that surrounded him. Linda pulled harder. He broke free of the crevice’s clutch.
They stood on a dilapidated platform in what was once a part of the famous New York City subway system. An aged Metropolitan Transit Authority train, at least half a century old, laid in silence on its tracks, partly covered in rubble. Human skeletons, wearing their outdated clothes from a bygone year, littered the area. A newsstand, once an outlet of free press and free speech, sat unguarded. A dusty sign, which had so often greeted freshly arriving passengers, hung from the ceiling by a lone wire and read: 26TH STREET.
Wayne took a good, hard look at the scene before him and had to hold back his tears. Witnessing the subway in its current, sorry state, he felt a bizarre sensation of isolation and loneliness come over him as he stood where he had so many times previously in his life during the afternoon rush hours, mobbed by strangers.
“You know,” he said, “it’s ironic. I was never really crazy about New York the way some people were. I always complained about the noise, the crowds, and the crime. But now I would give anything to be able to stand in a crowd of New Yorkers watching the Macy’s Day Parade. Hell, I’d even sit through a Yankees game.”
Wayne picked up a yellowed edition of the New York Times. He read from its front page, “As a result of Germany’s continually devastating attacks on U.S. military bases, including the site where the United States allegedly had the atomic bomb in development, the United States is trying to maintain some form of defense around the country while the Japanese continue to conquer more lands in the East.” He looked at the date of the newspaper. “March 30th, 1947.” Wayne threw down the paper. “Can you believe that this is all my fault, Linda? Can you believe what I have done?”
“Let’s keep moving, Wayne.”
“Linda, do you really believe my story? I know that you said you did, and I couldn’t have gotten this far without your help, but it’s odd. Why do you believe me? Or are you just humoring me?”
“Let’s walk a little more, Wayne. Then we’ll talk.”
Wayne stuck his hand in his pocket and ran his fingers along the vial of crystals. It gave him some comfort, at least.
Linda jumped down onto the rusted railroad tracks. Wayne followed close behind as she skirted around part of the caved-in roof and continued down the dark, endless tracks. Wayne remained silent, and in a near state of shock, as they proceeded through the war ravaged subterranean world. They climbed over a derailed Long Island Railroad train car. They moved onto a platform, passing a sign that read: UNION STATION. Wayne observed one skeleton “resting” against a wall with a cup in one bony hand beside it a cardboard sign that pleaded to passersby: BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME?
As they inched along on scaffolding above a station stop, Linda slipped. Wayne, feeling as dead as all of the skeletons he had been observing, helped her up. They crawled through a subway tunnel, barely passable due to the twisted wreckage of it rubble. Hardest of all for Wayne, was walking through a train that had the skeletal remains of a full batch of passengers intact on it. Most wore the business suits that they had on when the “big one” dropped.
Wayne thought of all the people that he knew who routinely used public transportation to get back and forth from work and school. A cold shiver shot up his spinal cord. On the train, a poster with a picture of a white bearded Uncle Sam advertised to the masses: BUY WAR BONDS, DO YOUR PART TO DEFEAT THE NAZIS.
They soon came to a small, enclosed area. Linda begun feeling around for something near the wall. Within a minute, she had found what she had been seeking — an old kerosene lamp. She lit it, shedding an eerie orange light on the tiny area “decorated” with the makeshift furniture of a couch made from train seats pushed together and an ancient mattress resting on the floor with a thin, blue blanket full of holes on it.
“Cozy little area,” Wayne said. He attempted, unsuccessfully, to lighten up the mood when he asked, “Did you do the interior design work yourself?”
“As a matter of fact, I did,” Linda replied in an earnest manner.
“Well, it’s nice enough,” Wayne said. It was nicer than Hollenburg anyway.
“Nice compared to the ghetto. I found this area down here by accident when I was a child; started crawling through pipes, the sewers, anywhere I could escape the ghetto. And then, one day I crawled through a sewer pipe and it kept on going and going, until I ended up down here.”
“Don’t the Germans know about this area?” Wayne sat down on the homemade couch.
“Most of them aren’t even old enough to remember the war. This place has long been forgotten. Probably considered by those who do remember it as just a casualty of the war. Let me have a look at your shoulder.”
Wayne, barely able to move his right arm without pain, slowly tugged his shirt off. The tissue around his shoulder had swelled considerably. Linda took her knife and sterilized the blade by holding it above the kerosene flame. Wayne, wincing at the sight of the cutting tool, queried his new doctor, “You ever do anything like this before?”
She answered, “I’ve done my share of treating wounds, delivering babies — you name it.” Linda started to cut the bullet out, making her patient flinch.
“So, what do you do around here?” Wayne asked attempting to occupy his mind with something other than the sharp pain he was experiencing in this shoulder area.
“I like to meditate. And read. I found a bunch of pre-war magazines and books down here. I like to read about how the world was before the war and about what it was like to live in a democracy. Also, it’s interesting to me to read about the different places around the world that I would’ve loved to have seen. But most of all, this has been a place to get away from the crowded ghetto and spend some time alone. Everybody needs that now and then, I think.” Linda made a deep cut in her patient’s shoulder. Wayne screamed.
“Hold still,” Linda requested of him. “You’re the first person that I ever brought here. This place has always been my little secret.” She held up the lead slug. “Got the bugger.” She grabbed a rag, a brown shirt from a long time past, and bandaged the wound.
“I’m glad that’s cover,” Wayne said with relief.
Changing the subject, Linda said, “My mother used to believe that she possessed special powers.”
“Special powers?”
“Psychic powers.”
“Psychic powers, like ESP?”
“Yeah, like that. She would have what she’d call visions and then she would sketch pictures of those visions.”
Wayne yawned, “That’s some weird shit.”
Linda went to a tall stack of worn reading material in a corner of the confined area, and, from the bottom of it, slid out a small purse just as worn as the books and magazines that it sat underneath. From the purse, she pulled out a handful of old drawings, done in pencil, and flipped through them. She pulled one out.
“There is one sketch she drew that I thought of instantly when I first set eyes on you.” The penciled sketch, on notebook paper tinged with the yellow of time, showed the face of a young man that was a near perfect mirror image of Wayne’s face. It was a crude drawing, but not without artistic merit. On the top of the page, letters had been scribbled in a sloppy handwriting that formed the words: THE SAVIOR.
Wayne looked at the sketch, but wasn’t impressed, “I’ll admit it; that’s quite a coincidence.”
“I don’t think it is a coincidence,” Linda said defensively. “My mother was positive that a man who she had seen in a vision — a man who would look like this — would one day come along and change the world for the better. And I think that the man in this picture is you, Wayne. And when you told me your story, it all made sense to me. You are here for a reason, Wayne Goldberg.”
“I don’t know what to believe anymore,” he shrugged. “I do know that I’m exhausted, though, and I need to get some sleep.” He sprawled his body out on the well-worn mattress, “It’s not exactly the Hilton, but it’ll have to do.” He shut his eyes.
Linda turned off the kerosene lamp and laid down on the mattress beside Wayne and ran her fingers gently over her guest’s forehead, “Wayne, what is a pimp?”
Wayne opened his eyes, surprised by the question. “Why do you ask?”
“You said something about a pimp on the plane. I’ve never hear the word before.”
“It’s a, well, a…” Wayne fumbled for words, “a type of person, in a way. A sleazy type of person.”
“Do you know any of these kind of persons?” Linda asked.
Wayne chuckled, “Me? No, I don’t know any pimps.”
“You are a very handsome man, Wayne,” she said as she continued to stroke Wayne’s forehead and hair.
“Uh, thanks,” he responded to be nice.
“You were in Hollenburg a long time. Did you miss being with a woman?”
“A certain woman, yes.”
“That Lauren you told me about?”
“That’s the one.”
“Lauren isn’t here,” Linda whispered tenderly in his ear, “She might not be in this world at all.”
“I guess not,” Wayne answered.
Linda moved her hand from his forehead and began to stroke his thigh. “So why don’t we make the best of the situation?” She kissed Wayne lightly and affectionately on the lips.
“I am very flattered, Linda — and tempted,” Wayne said mildly. “But I can’t. Tomorrow, I’ll go to the lab and undo all this mess. It would feel too much like cheating.”
“Ah. Okay.” She abruptly stood up.
“You have to understand…”
Linda didn’t want to hear it, “Shut up and go to sleep.”
Wayne sighed and rolled over.
The train tracks of the former New York Metropolitan Transit Authority hibernated throughout the night, in their perpetual silence, like two huge dead snakes, the same way they had been for forty-eight years.
Wayne, after sleeping uninterrupted for half a day, awoke to the sight of Linda reading a book on her makeshift couch. It was a tattered hard-covered copy of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby.
“How long have I been asleep?” Wayne asked.
“I don’t know. A while?” Linda kept her eyes fixed on her novel. Rejection never was easy for a person to have to handle.
“That is one of my favorite books too,” he said as he stood up and stretched. Other than the pain in his arm, he actually felt pretty good. He hadn’t been this rested in weeks.
Linda looked at Wayne and stated, “I have never in my life heard somebody snore as loudly as you.”
“You’re not the first one to tell me that,” Wayne said. “Can you get me to the Center of Aryan Studies?”
Linda sighed, “I think so. It’s possible from down here.”
“Are you ready to go now?” Wayne asked, not wanting to waste time.
“It amazes me how people used to live,” she said and put the book down.
“Not all people,” Wayne added, “just some.”
Linda stood up, “How’s the shoulder doing?”
“Sore, but okay. Linda, I’m sorry about last night,” Wayne apologized, “I just can’t do that to Lauren.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about,” she hesitated. “Come on.”
They journeyed through the maze of railroad tracks and twisted wreckage of platforms, trains, and ticket booths. Wayne recognized some of the grim sights as ones he had seen on the previous day. He paused briefly to take a cleaner pair of jeans and a button down shirt from a silent train passenger. After forty minutes of moving, Wayne stopped at the beginning of a long sewage tunnel. At the far end of it, a small glimmer of light from the outside world was visible.
“I’m going to take it solo from here,” Wayne said.
“Why?”
“Linda, you helped me more than I could ever have hoped. I’ll always be grateful to you for that. But it will be less risky for both of us if I finish what I need to do alone. I hope you understand.”
“I will miss you, Wayne.”
“I’ll miss you too,” Wayne said. “Remember, Linda, soon your life will change dramatically for the better and you will have no memory of being here. You’ll be married to some wonderful guy and you’ll be very happy.”
“That sounds nice.”
Wayne hugged Linda, “You take care of yourself, okay?”
Linda’s eyes teared up, “I will. I promise.”
Wayne planted a kiss on her cheek, “Goodbye.”
Linda watched as he walked away from her, towards the glimmer of light.
New Berlin City was covered with swastika banners, parade decorations and confetti. The streets were crowded with its Aryan citizens, all of who were dressed in some type of official Nazi garb
Wayne walked quickly across a street, careful to avoid making eye contact with anybody, and into a back service alley. He looked at the large plastic bags and boxes full of garbage waiting to be hauled off by the trash collector. On top of one of the big boxes was a large brimmed straw hat. It had seen better days, but was still wearable. Wayne grabbed the hat, dusted it off with his hands, and put it on his head. He continued walking through the alley and entered Göring Platz, one of the various sparkling clean public parks in the city.
On any given weekend, one could watch many different city adult and youth soccer teams practice their skills in the Platz. It was also a popular place for families to hold barbeques or picnics. Wayne could see, overlooking the square, tall buildings that were a part of the huge Center of Aryan Studies campus. CAS offered comprehensive undergraduate and graduate programs in medicine, anthropology, liberal arts, education, and political science. Every course had been approved by the Reich Commissioner of Education in Berlin and was taught with the “appropriate and true German facts.”
Wayne began to make his way towards the school. He noticed two Gestapo men walking towards him. He swiftly turned his head and pretended to be browsing in the window of a consumer electronics outlet. What he saw caught his eye.
A row of color televisions synchronously broadcast the same cartoon of a baseball team, each member dressed in a Nazi athletic uniform ready to play a ballgame. A player stepped up to the plate. But wait, he had no bat — and he could not find one! The player, drawn as a muscular, blond haired, blue-eyed type of Super Nazi, whistled to his Dog, a big German shepherd. The Super Nazi enacted a swinging motion, as if swinging a bat, with his strong arms. The loyal canine animal saluted his master and raced off. The Dog spotted what was obviously a caricature of an old Jewish man, with exaggerated Semitic features that included an oblong nose and Yiddish garb, which consisted of a yarmulke, flowing black robe, and sandals. The loyal Nazi Dog ferociously chased the man — only the Dog was running like a man on its hind legs, and the man like an animal on all fours. They passed a squirrel munching on an acorn, who held his nose as the Jewish man trotted by. They passed a truck with the words “CITY POUND” painted on it, which promptly started to follow the Dog chasing the man. The Jewish man looked behind him at the pursuer on his tail and POW! He smacked into an oak tree. The German Shepherd rambunctiously, with his sharp teeth, tore off one of the man’s legs and fled. The woman from the city pound, a young, bosomy, rosy-cheeked Aryan Specimen, tossed the robed elderly man into the back of her truck and drove off. The Dog arrived back at the baseball diamond with a human leg in his mouth and was patted on his head by his master for a task well done. Super Nazi took the leg and stepped up to the plate, swinging the limb as if it were a Louisville Slugger.
The Gestapo men uneventfully ambled by Wayne.
Wayne walked onto the campus. It was calm except for a small group of students sitting under the shade of a tree, talking amongst themselves. Wayne recognized none of the school buildings as he followed a campus path that ran along a line of mighty trees. Wayne thought about whether Dr. Hoffmann would be in her laboratory or not. He knew how much of a workaholic she was and came to the conclusion that, although it was a Reich holiday, chances were good that she would be in her lab, hard at work on some project as usual.
Wayne passed a three-story structure that had a striking gothic architecture. Below the building’s impressive pointed arch, a plaque read: REICH TEACHERS’ LEAGUE. The building housed the regional headquarters of the organization made up of teachers devoted to the ideals of National Socialism. High Nazi officials closely scrutinized the organization and it was mandatory that all teachers join it.
Coming upon a cluster of structures, Wayne had a feeling that he was nearing his destination. He looked at the name on a large building: “Engineering.” Wrong building. He walked, at a faster pace, the short distance to another cluster of buildings, and viewed the words, “Kukulstann Science Building”, on a sign at the front entrance at what appeared to be the cluster’s main building.
Wayne entered the unlocked science building. As he tiptoed through the building’s long, quiet hall, he glimpsed at the nameplates on the numerous classroom and laboratory doors. Nervous beads of sweat formed on his eyebrows as his mission neared accomplishment. He, at least once a minute, apprehensively touched the vial that sat in his pocket.
“Fuck,” he said to himself as he approached the end of the hallway. He glanced at the nameplate to his right.
“Berkerhofft.” He glanced at the nameplate to his left.
“Hoffmann.” Wayne was in ecstasy. He knocked on the wooden door. There was no answer. He pounded his fist against the door. Still nothing. He tried the knob.
It slowly turned; the door wasn’t locked. The time had come to stop dillydallying. Wayne bolted into Dr. Hoffmann’s laboratory and stopped short in his tracks, his mouth agape. Before him stood SS Captain Siegfried von Helldorf and five of his well armed Gestapo Nazis. Dr. Hoffmann was present, too. Two Gestapo men grabbed a hold of Wayne by his arms, showing no mercy in the way they handled him.
“Just as expected, my friend,” the SS Captain remarked, wearing a wide grin across his square jaw. “Ah, you underestimate the watchful eyes of the Reich Security Office, New Berlin Division,” He held up the letter that Wayne had sent to Dr. Hoffmann from Hollenburg.
“My, my, my, hero boy, were you not aware that all mail into my jurisdiction is checked for subversive and traitorous writings. Your treacherous mail stood out as a thorn in a lovely German rose garden would.” Von Helldorf slapped Wayne hard across the face.
Dr. Hoffmann spoke, “Wayne…”
“QUIET!” von Helldorf commanded her. He addressed himself to Wayne, “Or maybe you did not know that the Gestapo censors all mail. I had a strong feeling, hearing the all points bulletin at Oberkoblenz, and to where that vermin would go. Congratulations. Last night you killed some of the best trained men in the Reich.”
“That’s right — men.” Wayne boldly stressed. “They were men. Living, breathing, thinking, human beings.”
“And do not forget expendable,” the SS Captain countered. “Too bad you chose to rebel. I believe you could have had potential as one of my soldiers. It fascinates me, why, when the State provides everything for its citizens, when we have the perfect society, would some degenerates still choose to stir up trouble.”
Wayne let his thoughts be heard, “Yours is a society built on hate. You program children’s minds to hate anyone different from themselves, as you yourself were programmed. Your society is nothing but pathetic, mindless, soulless robots.”
“I will take that as a compliment,” von Helldorf said. He ordered one of his men, “Search him.”
Wayne squirmed as a Gestapo man frisked him from head to foot, praying for his precious cargo to not be found. It was, however, rapidly discovered and handed to the SS Captain. Wayne kept his gaze stuck on the vial.
Von Helldorf held up the tube of greenish compound and viewed it curiously. “Well, what do we have here? Drugs? I am not surprised that your kind is involved in such nonsense. It is perhaps these things that have warped your minds.”
Wayne’s knees began to shake, uncontrollable, as his nerves got the best of him.
On an impulse, his lips moved and he spoke, “Be careful with that. It’s not what you think.”
The SS Captain moved to within an inch of his captive and shoved the small glass bottle in Wayne’s face, “You are telling me to be careful with this? Why? Is this your next high?”
Wayne remained silent.
“I asked you something,” von Helldorf said gruffly.
Wayne timidly responded, “No.”
Captain von Helldorf dropped the vial, shattering it on the ground. The emerald glowing Gadolinium Crystals sizzled as they oozed onto the tiled floor, eating away at the tiles.
As he stood speechless, Wayne’s heart sank and a salty tear rolled down his cheek. His efforts had been in vain.
Dr. Hoffmann said, “Wayne, the time machine has been destroyed and I had nothing to do with that, I promise you.”
“I correctly expected that you would have aided this criminal again, as you have done in the past,” von Helldorf stated. “For such treason to the Reich, you will pay with your life.”
He drew his pistol and aimed it at the back of the professor’s head. He pulled the trigger. Tiny fragments of skull and brain tissue splashed onto the late Dr. Hoffmann’s messy desk.
“YOU MOTHER FUCKIN’ BASTARD!!” Wayne painfully screamed out and lunged toward von Helldorf. He was immediately restrained by the two hefty Gestapo men.
“No more outbursts,” von Helldorf raised his voice and whacked Wayne in the face with his metal club.
Like water from a faucet that had been turned on, blood began to pour down from Wayne’s mouth as his gums bled profusely. Wayne, right there and then, fully wanted to die. With no more time machine and no more Dr. Hoffmann, there was no more hope.
Wayne was handcuffed, hauled out of the science building, and tossed into a waiting Gestapo paddy wagon.
In the bare Gestapo jail cell, Erich had been listening skeptically to Wayne’s tale.
“So, there you have it,” his cellmate said upon finishing the telling of his long story. “You wanted to know how I ended up in this shithole and now I’ve told you. I hope you’re happy.”
The cellmates heard the clank of the cellblock’s bulky, steel entrance door as it opened. SS Captain von Helldorf and three of his men approached the indigent cell.
“Ah, at last the time is here,” von Helldorf snickered. “Your day of judgment, my friend, has arrived.”
Wayne shot back, “I’m not your friend, dirt bag.”
Von Helldorf returned, “Watching you hang in public will be delightful. Did he give you any information?”
“Nothing that made any sense,” Erich, suddenly speaking in a pronounced German accent. “Just some bullshit tale that he made up.”
He slapped Wayne hard, “That is for lying to me.”
The cell door was unlocked. Wayne was roughly escorted out of the cubical.
His hands handcuffed together painfully behind his back, Wayne was dragged by the Gestapo through the crowd lined streets that led into Grunder Platz. Citizens booed and the Hitler Youth pelted him with raw eggs and stones. An orchestra played German national music.
Wayne remained numb to what was happening around him until, out of the corner of his eye, amongst the sea of Germans, he caught someone’s eye.
“LAUREN, LAUREN! IT’S ME, WAYNE,” he cried out. The pretty, blond woman didn’t recognize him — they’d never met. Wayne broke down and babbled like a madman, “Lauren, don’t tell me that you’re a part of this fuckin’ nightmare! LAUREN…”
The girl, who had a petite silver swastika pinned to her sweater, turned to her friend and said, “That guy really is insane.” She hurled a stone at the prisoner, hitting him in the groin.
A gallows had been set up, to give an excellent view to all spectators, in the center of Grunder Platz, beside the large, pompous Adolf Hitler statue. Wayne would be perfect entertainment and propaganda tool for Victory Day.
Von Helldorf, well known to be populace of New Berlin City, had his prized possession placed in the middle of the gallows. Reich Marshal Ulrich and prominent provincial leaders stood beaming in front of the hanging apparatus. Führer Göring had earlier, from the German capital of Berlin, rhetorically spoken the words of his grandiose Victory Day commemorative speech. Later, in the evening, there would be the annual, dazzling display of fireworks.
The masses of citizens quieted down when Reich Marshal Ulrich stepped up to the microphone of the public address system that had been set up for him as the city’s Grand Marshal of the Victory Day celebrations. “What you see here,” he said “my good people, is what the scum of our society looks like.” The vast quantity of the men, women, and children that made up his audience contemptuously hissed.
He continued to play on the crowd’s agitation, “This type of disobedient scum must be eliminated from the Reich. For crimes committed against the Reich in a manner that endangered your lives and the lives and well being of all fine citizens of the Fatherland, and for his betrayal of the Führer’s ideals, this swine has forfeited his right to live.”
Ulrich, with a steel baton, struck the prisoner in the gut, causing him to double over in pain. The crowd roared its approval and applauded. Children of all ages, including some that still wore diapers, enthusiastically waved their little swastika flags in the air. The pretty girl that the captive thought he once knew clapped her hands together, as if applauding the performers in a superb play that had taken the stage one more time for an encore.
Ulrich paused, purposely letting the audience’s anticipation for his next sentence build. Finally, he said fervently, “I hereby sentence this filthy swine to death by hanging. To be carried out on this day here in Grunder Platz.” The sun’s bright rays bounced off his hairless head.
The crowd of Aryans cheered and began to repeatedly chant, “DIE, SCUM!”
“Herr von Helldorf,” Ulrich spoke as he signaled to the SS Captain to proceed with the amusement.
The SS Captain placed the noose around his foe’s neck. He got in Wayne’s face and said, “So long, you piece of shit.”
Wayne, his raw gums giving him a constant taste of his own blood, said, “At least I won’t spend eternity rotting in hell.”
“Every man creates his own hell,” von Helldorf solemnly said. “You are about to enter yours.” He pointed a finger at the orchestra’s drummer. The drummer started playing an upbeat drumroll and the career SS Captain stepped back from his prize catch of the week.
The audience’s chanting became progressively stronger, “DIE, SCUM! DIE SCUM! DIE SCUM!”
Wayne looked out amongst the ocean of Nazi followers and felt pity and sorrow for them all. They didn’t know any better; they couldn’t have. Wayne caught a glimpse of one boy who chanted for his execution with an ardent, almost inhuman zeal. It was for the children that Wayne felt the deepest regret. The string of sweat that covered his once handsome face made his skin sparkle. He heard a Gestapo man take a hold of the gallows’ release cord. He had never been one for religion, and he thought no more of it standing there on the gallows with the noose tightly wrapped around his neck. What kind of Supreme Being would have let the world become what it has? The gallows’ trap door was released; the prisoner’s body dropped. The noose performed its deadly task for the Reich. Wayne’s last earthly thought was of his parents.