The Metal Man: An Account of a WW2 Nazi Cyborg (11 page)

Reinhardt suddenly looked as though he might collapse. He put one hand on the edge of the large table the Metal Man was lying upon.

‘Your mother was arrested and sent to a concentration camp called Mittelbruck in Poland, near a town that is close to the German-Polish border. The letters you have purportedly been receiving from her are fake, written by someone who is skilled at imitating peoples’ handwriting. For the purpose of you continuing to assist the Third Reich with your creations, such a deception was deemed necessary.’

‘
What
?’ cried Schroder, now appearing as though he would collapse himself. ‘Are you mad? What are you saying?’

‘The
truth
, Jonas,’ returned Reinhardt forcefully, the expression on his disfigured face terrible. ‘And I had to go along with this gross deception – I had no choice. I had to lie to you, day after day after day.

‘But today, the deception stops – for all of us.’

‘What do you mean, Wilhelm?’ asked Schroder, his voice little more than a whisper. His hands were clenched into fists; at any second, it seemed, he would launch a physical attack on his superior.

‘I am a Jew, Jonas – a full-blooded Jew.’

‘You… what…’

‘Wait – hear me out. I was travelling with my original parents – my
Jewish
parents – as a baby, when there was that train crash I have previously told you about. The one that caused – this.’

With this last word, Reinhardt briefly waved his right hand in front of his face.

‘My parents were killed instantly, while I was rushed to hospital, not expected to survive. Two other people had been travelling in the same, first-class carriage as my parents and me. A young and prosperous married couple, who strangely managed to escape with nothing more than a few scratches.

‘But they took a distinct interest in my recovery, with the male – Mr. Reinhardt – even paying for a specialist in facial surgery to travel up from Frankfurt…

‘They’d been talking to my parents before the crash, you see. Had even struck up a fledgling friendship of sorts. And now my parents were dead and…

‘Well, the Reinhardts had been trying for years to have a child, but with a cruel lack of success. And it was becoming ever more apparent that the Spielmanns – my parents – had been a somewhat private couple, with no close relatives or friends...

‘Certainly no one who wanted to claim this baby of theirs, now no longer considered as being in danger of death but still so facially disfigured…

‘Mr. Reinhardt – who became the only father I have ever known – quickly and efficiently arranged my adoption. He considered that it was what the Spielmanns would have wanted anyway.

‘My new father was a wealthy man, my mother devoted to her new son. They almost considered this strange quirk of fate to be a gift from God Himself – excepting the death of my ‘original’ parents, as it were. To anyone they met who did not know them very well, they simply pretended that I
was
their own son – they did not even mention the matter of my adoption.

‘I have not yet said that I was only seven days old at the time of the train crash! Really, it is a miracle that I survived… In any case, my circumcision ritual – as a Jewish baby boy – was due to take place the following day. That is, eight days after birth, in accordance with Jewish tradition.

‘Obviously, it never happened – something that until today, along with my facial injuries, served to conceal what one might call my ‘Jewish identity’.

‘Anyway, my father had my name changed and such. There was only one document alluding to this, just one, until recently forgotten and dust-covered in the records’ department of Hegensdorf town hall. That’s a tiny, rural town in eastern Germany, by the way. Where my wealthy parents had one of their several properties.

‘Later, when I became a teenager, only then did my father inform me of who my real parents had been – and thus about my Jewish heritage. And already detecting the anti-Semitism starting to creep through Germany, he advised me never to speak of who my real parents had been.

‘But just recently, Major Fleisher of the Berlin Gestapo found that long-forgotten certificate concerning my adoption in the records’ department of that town hall. And was thus able to trace the name of my original parents back to their hometown of Ahlach – and have their Jewish ancestry confirmed.’  

‘You – you’re a
Jew
?’ Schroder could only stammer helplessly. ‘And my mother… This place she has been sent… What do you mean with all this, you are telling me…?’

The genius scientist’s face was red, his breathing fast and heavy. Reinhardt gave a faint smile and again waved his hand slightly, as though to calm him.

‘I have a map here, Jonas,’ he said, producing this from inside of his thick black coat.

He opened it up in front of Schroder, pointing with one finger at an area along the German-Polish border.

‘Across here, the river Neisse, is the town of Tornik. I believe I am pronouncing the name correctly. The concentration camp named Mittlebruck is to one side of this town. Really, you just cross over the bridge from the German side, and then follow the signs for a few kilometers.

‘There are many camps like Mittelbruck; it is hardly the only one of its kind. Situated in Poland and… elsewhere…’

The last word came out in a sigh. Again, Reinhardt appeared almost as though he might collapse.

Then, taking a deep breath, he continued –

‘Major Fleischer of the Berlin Gestapo – the one who previously had you under arrest, before your release was obtained at the behest of Adolf Hitler himself – previously took great pains to tell me the above information. To force me to share in your deception; as I say – to have to
lie
to you, day after day.’

‘Is she… alive, Wilhelm?’ asked the half-Jew plaintively, his expression anguished.

Reinhardt stared despairingly back at him.

‘I… I don’t know, Jonas,’ he returned. ‘All I can do is to show you this map; to tell you exactly where your mother is and to give you the
truth
at last…’

‘I am going to find her,’ said Schroder, his chin sticking out. ‘I am going right now.’

‘Then take this,’ returned Reinhardt, pulling something else from out of his inside coat pocket. ‘Whatever you plan to do – even if you aim to take the Metal Man himself with you – this will assist you greatly.’

‘This’ was a folded sheet of what was clearly high-quality paper.

Cautiously, Schroder accepted it. Then, opening it, he could not help but emit a small gasp of surprise.

‘But this is… Hitler’s signature…?’

‘Below which are also his words, stating that
anyone
who is shown this piece of paper, however senior their rank, must give the bearer of it their full and immediate assistance, however this is required.

‘I was given it before construction began on the Metal Man,’ continued Reinhardt. ‘How else do you think I was able to obtain some of the materials necessary, which are otherwise in such desperately short supply? Anyway, whatever you do and wherever you go now, this will prove invaluable.’

‘But you, Wilhelm…? What are you going to do…’ whispered Schroder, his right hand clutching his senior’s left shoulder.

Reinhardt gently freed the fierce grip.

‘I’m going to take a trip to number eight, Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse – Gestapo Headquarters itself. Major Fleischer oh-so-kindly permitted me two hours to get my affairs in order, before I have to present myself there for arrest. He knows that I will not escape, and as the only other option available to me is suicide…

‘But he also offered me a deal, of sorts. If I know of any other Jews in hiding, he said, I could earn myself certain… privileges, by telling upon them.

‘So I go to see him now, and pretend that I have a list of such people…’

‘Wilhelm – what are you saying?’

‘I say no more. You do what you have to do – and I will do what I have to do. This Gestapo man has destroyed everything; he devoted himself to yours and my own destruction – and, of course, he has shattered so many other lives. And delighted in doing so.

‘But tonight, I have something of a surprise in store for the dear Major. I go now to deliver it to him. And to, you, Jonas, I say – goodbye, my friend.’

For a few moments, Schroder seemed entirely confused. Then, his face hardening, he nodded and took Reinhardt’s hand in his own.

The two men shared a brief embrace.

‘Go with God, Jonas,’ said Reinhardt, as he started to move back towards the double doors leading into the cavernous room.

‘No such being, Reinhardt – but do your best,’ returned the half-Jewish scientist.

Reinhardt nodded, and then was swallowed by the dark, the sound of one door clanging shut behind him a few moments later.

17

It was the smell of smoke that gave away the five Polish farm-workers.

They were all of them wretched-looking, ill-clothed against the brutal winter, shaking with cold as several soldiers from Ackermann’s unit marched them out from where they’d been asleep in the woods that were on either side of a wide and snow-covered track.

It was Mayer who’d caught the faint whiff of smoke, marching alongside one squealing Panzer tank, and had given the alarm to Ackermann. There were immediately fears of an ambush. Ackermann had dispatched the several SS troops (not Mayer, or any of the three soldiers named Bach, Weber and Amsel), and moving quietly the men had surprised the five men and women who were sleeping huddled around the dying fire.

With shouts and kicks, the five were awoken and marched out onto the track.

‘What the hell have I done?’ sighed Mayer, watching as Ackermann stalked over to the cowering group. A strong moon was out in the cloudless night sky, illuminating the whole scene.

‘They might have been real partisans, Mayer, hiding out and ready to cut us to pieces with machineguns and grenades. You did what you had to do, as a soldier,’ returned Bach, the two other men who’d once been part of Lieutenant Colonel Karl Brucker’s unit nodding their agreement.

‘Do any of you speak German?’ demanded Ackermann loudly, glowering at the three men and two women.

The group began nervously chattering, in Polish. Ackermann immediately slapped one of the women around the face.

‘Jesus!’ hissed Amsel. He glanced at Mayer, who was biting his bottom lip.

‘I said – does anyone here speak German?’ reiterated Ackermann.

‘Yes, I do – just a little,’ declared one of the men.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Please, we not soldier, just the farm-worker. We leave farm, try live in forest.’

‘Why?’

The man appeared agonized, as though he didn’t know how to reply. Ackermann slapped the same woman around the face again. She didn’t cry out, but kept her eyes almost defiantly fixed on the SS officer.

‘Why?’

‘We work on German-run farm. Other day all German soldier go. Destroy all building and food-store before leave. We not know where to go. And nothing to eat. Just go into forest to hide from…’

‘Yes?’

The man gulped, and Ackermann slapped the woman around the face for the third time.

‘Fucking animal,’ spat Bach. ‘I can’t just stand here and keep
seeing
this kind of thing happening…’