Storm Front (Twilight of the Gods Book 1) (26 page)

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said.  He practically swallowed his tongue to keep from pointing out that Gudrun and Konrad would never have been able to have a normal life together.  A young man as badly wounded as Konrad was nothing more than a drain on the
Reich
.  Some bean-counting bureaucrat who had never met him would order the life support turned off, sooner or later.  “But I need to know.  Was your engagement ever formalised?”

“Not really,” Gudrun admitted, after a moment.  “We’d exchanged letters, of course, but we hadn't registered the engagement.”

Horst let out a breath he hadn't realised he’d been holding.  “So there’s nothing formal to tie you to Konrad?”

“No,” Gudrun said, miserably.  She looked up, suddenly.  “Do you think they might draw a line between myself and Konrad’s father?”

“It’s a possibility,” Horst admitted.  He’d gone through the files as thoroughly as he dared, but he hadn't been able to tell if anyone had reported an intruder visiting Konrad’s bed.  The SS already believed that the leaflets had come from the university; if they knew about Gudrun and Konrad, they’d certainly have grounds for hauling Gudrun into the RSHA for a long interrogation session.  “You need to consider the prospect of someone asking you a few questions.”

“Konrad wasn't a student,” Gudrun objected.

“They know the leaflets came out of the university,” Horst said.  He covered for his slip instantly.  “There wouldn't be so many spies in the building if they
didn't
know.  They must have figured out that the professor they arrested was innocent - or, at least, that he had nothing to do with the leaflets.”

Gudrun snorted, rather sourly.  Horst understood.  He had no idea who’d started the rumours about the arrested professor sleeping with some of his students, but they just wouldn't go away.  It was a standard tactic - undermining the professor’s reputation to make it harder for anyone to defend him - and it seemed to be working.  The students were still discussing the leaflets, but very few of them still respected the professor.

“I’ll watch myself,” Gudrun assured him, finally.  “And I won’t tell them anything.”

“Just stick to the basics,” Horst said.  He had no illusions.  If the SS had good reason to link Gudrun to the leaflets - to the
Valkyries
- it was unlikely she would be able to hold out for long.  There were plenty of ways to make someone suffer without ever laying a finger on them.  “And try to say as little as possible when they ask questions.”

“I’ll try,” Gudrun said.  She took a nervous breath.  “Do your parents think you should get married?”

Horst blinked in surprise.  “That’s... an odd question,” he said, finally.  “They do want me to find a nice girl and move back east, but I don’t think I want to give them the satisfaction.”

Gudrun looked up at him.  “Why not?”

“The east... is very strict,” Horst said, carefully.  “If you were born there, you’d probably be a farmwife.  You would live and die on the farms, while the menfolk go off to war or man the ramparts against terrorists.  There is very little to do beyond working on the farms.  I was lucky - very lucky - that I was able to sit for the exams.”

“I know,” Gudrun said.

“I might be expected to marry two women,” Horst said.  “Or more.  I knew men who had three or four wives, women who’d been married before only to have their husbands killed on deployment.  I’d bring up a flock of children and watch the girls marry soldiers and the boys march off to war.  And heaven help anyone who asked questions.”

“You make it sound awful,” Gudrun said, after a moment.

“It does have some compensations,” Horst admitted.  What he’d said was true enough, but incomplete.  “People are more... connected in the east, Gudrun.  Everyone knows everyone else.  You know who you can rely on in the settlements, who you can trust with a gun at your back.  And the SS is much less overbearing in the east, even though it is far more numerous.  But I wouldn't want to spend the rest of my life there.”

He cleared his throat.  “Why do you ask?”

“My father spoke to me yesterday,” Gudrun said, slowly.  “He wants me to marry soon, to choose someone even though Konrad is still alive.  I wanted to know if you faced the same pressure.”

“I do,” Horst admitted.  “But it’s a little different for me.”

“They don’t seem to nag
Kurt
to marry,” Gudrun said.  “It isn’t
fair
.”

“Kurt’s a young officer,” Horst pointed out.  “He might be in position to marry a girl with excellent family connections.”

Gudrun shook her head.  “I don’t know how long I can keep putting it off,” she said, reluctantly.  “It could turn nasty if father finds someone for me...”

“Say you need at least six months to mourn Konrad,” Horst said.  Part of him was tempted to push his luck, but it would only make her hate him.  “As far as they know, you only just found out what happened to him.  After that, you can start looking for someone suitable and promise to let your father offer suggestions if you don’t find someone within a year.”

Gudrun blinked.  “A year?”

“We may be arrested and brutally executed tomorrow,” Horst said.  Maybe, after six months had passed, he’d feel better about courting Gudrun himself.  “Or we may win.  Or the horse may even learn to sing.”

“My father’s singing is a deadly weapon,” Gudrun said, wryly.

“And if that isn't enough, find someone willing to pretend to be your boyfriend,” Horst added, after a moment.  “They’ll understand you rejecting someone after a few weeks of casual courting.”

He glanced at his watch, then rose.  “I have a lecture in ten minutes,” he said.  He watched as she rose and unplugged the jukebox.  “I’ll see you later.”

“You too,” Gudrun said.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Reichstag,
Berlin

8 August 1985

Hans Krueger wrinkled his nose as he stepped into the council chamber and took his seat at one side of the table, facing the
Reichsführer-SS
.  Several ministers and military officers were smoking, a sure sign of their agitation, while the
Fuhrer
was looking around as if he thought he was actually expected to direct the meeting.  Hans gave Adolf Bormann a nasty look, then eyed the
Reichsführer-SS
.  Karl Holliston had called the meeting and, judging by the papers in front of him, it was going to be a long one.

“The meeting is now called to order,” Holliston said, taking control as soon as the last councillor was in his seat.  “
Heil Hitler
!”

“
Heil Hitler
,” the councillors said, in unison.

Holliston didn't give anyone else a chance to override his control of the meeting.  “It’s spreading,” he said, simply.  “Our failure to put a stop to this right from the start” - he threw Hans a nasty look - “has encouraged others to defy the
Reich
.”

“You speak of the trade unions,” Hans said, calmly. 
Someone
had to be the voice of reason at the table.  “Or is there something I’ve missed?”

“The trade unions are not the only problem,” Holliston snapped.  “There are hundreds of little groups springing up everywhere, discussing the leaflets and comparing notes.  We have this piece of shit” - he took one of the papers from the table and waved it in the air - “to tell us just what imprudent demands these... these Valkyries demand!”

“The Choosers of the Slain,” Hans mused, as he took the sheet of paper.  “Odd choice of name for a dissident group.”

“It’s a deliberate insult,” Holliston thundered.  “Something must be done!”

“We know who the ringleaders are, at least in the factories,” Luther Stresemann said.  The Head of the Economic Intelligence Service leaned forward.  “We could round them up and arrest them - or simply order them fired.”

“The problem isn't that simple,” Hans warned.  “Each of these...
ringleaders
is a symptom, not the disease itself.  We’re pushing our industrial base to the limit and our trained workers are finally pushing back.”

“Forming a union without government permission is flatly illegal,” Holliston sneered.  Hans would have privately bet good money that Holliston was feeling the heat from industrialists who were closely connected to the SS.  “Every member of each and every union should be thrown into the camps.”

Hans resisted, barely, the temptation to sneer back.  “You are talking about arresting two-thirds of our trained workforce,” he said.  “Good luck getting the damned
Gastarbeiters
to run a modern manufacturing plant!”

“The
Gastarbeiters
are not permitted to do more that dig ditches and plant crops,” Holliston pointed out.  “Such jobs are reserved for good Germans!”

“Yes, the Germans you’re talking about throwing into the camps,” Hans said.  Holliston was right; the training for industrial jobs was reserved solely for Germans, although a handful of non-German Aryans might be allowed to join if they showed promise.  “You put even a tenth of our total workforce out of work and our economy will go straight into the shitter.”

Holliston took a moment to gather himself.  “We cannot allow them to defy the government like this,” he said, in a markedly calmer tone.  “And that set of demands” - he jabbed a finger at the paper in front of Hans - “is unthinkable.”

Hans looked at the paper and was tempted to agree.  Some of the demands were reasonable - he would happily have agreed to end the war in South Africa if he could - while others... others were impossible to grant without undermining the
Reich
beyond hope of repair.  The whole concept of free elections was absurd.  It wouldn't be long before the population started electing politicians based on who could make the best promises, not on practical matters like experience, understanding and common sense.

“And we cannot act against them openly, either,” he said.  “If even the most optimistic report is accurate,
Reichsführer
, word is spreading too far too fast.  The unions can bring the country to a halt just by going on strike.”

“Then we clobber them,” Holliston snapped.

“And who will run the industries afterwards?”  Hans snapped back.  “We’re going in circles!”

“This is all your fault,” Holliston said.  “Bringing in
American
ideals...”

“We had an industry before the start of the war,” Hans pointed out, smoothly.  “Those Panzer tanks that smashed Poland, Denmark, France and Russia didn't just spring into existence, you know.  And we had to do whatever we needed to do to keep up with the Americans.  A Panzer III wouldn't last two seconds on a battlefield facing the latest American tank!”

He took a breath.  “This situation has gotten badly out of hand,” he said.  “Right now, our falsehoods about the war have been exposed and so the population no longer trusts us.  They are forming private groups and discussing discrepancies between our words and reality.  It will not take them long to find other times when we lied to them.”

“For their own good,” Holliston said.

Hans met his eyes.  “We tell ourselves that,” he said, although he doubted it was true in Holliston’s case.  “But I don’t think they agree with us.”

“I will not see us going all the way back to the days when Germany was stabbed in the back by the Jews and Americans and stamped into the ground by the French and British,” Holliston said.  “And I will not hand power over to a bunch of anarchists who don’t have the faintest idea of how to form a government, let alone make the hard decisions!”

“So tell me,” Hans said.  “What
do
we do?”

He looked around the table, silently trying to gauge support.  So far, most of the other councillors were content to watch and wait for a clear victor to emerge, or to see who would make the best offer for their support.  It was frustrating, but in some ways it was almost a relief.  At least he’d be able to make his case without being interrupted or shouted down.

“The French were supposed to pay us their tribute on the 1st of the month,” he said, after a moment.  “That tribute has been grossly reduced because the French are having their own labour problems.  The stockpiles of food and raw materials they were also supposed to be sending to the
Reich
have also been delayed.”

“Send in the troops,” Holliston offered.  “Take the foodstuffs by force, then lay waste to the fields to teach them a lesson.”

Hans chose not to respond directly.  “Because of that, we have a cash shortfall,” he added, wondering how many of them would understand.  “We’ve been sailing too close to bankruptcy for years; now, without the French cash, we may well cross the line and find ourselves faced with massive painful budget cuts.  We simply have too many commitments and not enough cash to meet them.  For example, we owe the Americans millions of dollars - dollars, not
Reichmarks
- for our recent purchases.”

“So we delay paying,” Holliston said.

“And so they delay supply,” Hans said.  “The Americans are not the French,
Herr Reichsführer
.  They will not accept a promissory note drawn on a bank they know to be failing.  Worse, perhaps, they will not supply us with anything
else
until they are paid in full.”

“We don’t need anything they can send us,” Holliston insisted.

“That’s not the only problem,” Hans continued.  “Where do we make our budget cuts?  The military?  The war?  The support payments we make to mothers with more than two children or the pensions we grant to veterans?”

There was a long pause.  “We could cut back on our purchase of war materials,” Holliston mused, finally.  “We don’t need more tanks.”

“But we do need vehicles designed for counter-insurgency operations in South Africa,” Field Marshal Gunter Voss snapped.  “We spent years building up the largest tank force in the world, which is next to completely useless in South Africa!”

“And we can’t stop making payments to veterans,” Field Marshal Justus Stoffregen added, coldly.  “We made them
promises
.”

Which we haven't been keeping for a long time
, Hans thought.  There had been a commitment, a honourable commitment, to look after the dead and wounded.  But that commitment had been broken in South Africa.  Trust in the government, never high at the best of times, was almost certainly gone. 
But there will be riots if we start cutting the support payments
.

Hans tapped the table.  “We can cancel some of our long-term procurement,” he said.  “The planned sixth carrier can be placed on hold, if necessary” - he ignored the squawk from
Grossadmiral
Cajus Bekker - “and we can scrap the planned development and purchase of a replacement main battle tank.  We already have more than enough nuclear missiles to give the American ABM system a very hard time indeed, if it comes down to total war, and the Americans are unlikely to launch an invasion of the continent.  Our security is unlikely to be put at risk.

“The problem, however, is that this will have dangerous knock-on effects,” he added, wondering just how many of them would understand.  “If we stop paying for new tanks...”

“We would have more money,” Holliston snapped.

“Yes, and the corporations we would be paying
wouldn’t
,” Hans said.  “They would wind up with a cash shortfall, so they would either have to cut wages - again - or sack hundreds of trained workers.  And
that
will cause more social unrest at the worst possible time.”

“They could go east,” Holliston offered.  “We need more farmers...”

“There’s no shortage of farmers,” Hans snapped.  “They’re trained and experienced industrial workers.  We
cannot
afford to lose them.”

He looked down at the table.  “But even if we do, it will not fix the hole in our budget,” he warned.  “The really big expenses are the ones we don’t dare risk cutting.  Keeping the garrisons in position to monitor the French alone is quite costly; keeping Germany South a going concern is staggeringly expensive.  And the support payments may be the single worst item on the list.  We have
got
to stop handing out money to every woman who has more a child!”

“But we need to keep our population from decaying,” Holliston insisted.  “How will the women have children if they cannot afford to keep them?”

“Our population is not in danger of falling,” Hans said.

It wasn't entirely true, he knew.  Industrial societies - and Germany Prime
was
an industrial society - had significantly lower birth-rates than farming societies.  America had had a baby boom after the war with Japan, then the birth-rate had dropped sharply over the following decades.  The
Reich
had escaped the same fate through passing laws that made it easier to afford more children, both through support payments and public honours for women with many children.  But now, simply paying the women their monthly allowance was a major strain on the public purse.  Who knew what would happen, apart from massive civil unrest, if the payments were ever cut?

“The
Untermenschen
breed like rabbits,” Holliston said.  “We have to keep up with them.”

“The
Untermenschen
are unlikely to pose a major danger, at least for the foreseeable future,” Hans countered.  “Our current problems lie with the so-called Valkyries.”

“The corporations will not allow any independent trade unions,” Friedrich Leopoldsberger said, coldly.  The Industries Minister was their creature, Hans knew; the Ministry of Industry was, perhaps, the most deeply corrupt ministry in the
Reich
.  “There are corporate-sponsored unions to handle the workers and their concerns.”