Red Devils

35

Wilkins barely had time to get himself clean and his wounds seen to before he found himself in front of Colonel Adams again. ‘Good job, Wilkins,’ the colonel said. ‘It appears that strange little girl you brought back with you might just be the key. Our scientists believe she carries enough information to enable them to understand this abhorrent condition and put an end to it. She’s infected with a variant of the germ, by all accounts.’

‘Doctor Månsson gave his life to protect her.’

‘Then let us hope his sacrifice wasn’t in vain.’

The colonel seemed downbeat. Broken, almost. Wilkins tried to focus but all he wanted was to go out into the operations room and look for Jocelyn. He thought he’d caught a glimpse of her through a window a few moments ago. There’d been times in the last few hours he’d thought he’d never see her again.

‘The news from the front isn’t good, Wilkins. The situation is at tipping point. Between the Nazis and the undead, our forces are being beaten back. We’re struggling to hold ground.’

‘So the sooner our chaps can produce a cure, the better.’

‘If only it were that simple. As quickly as we’re trying to tame the disease, the Nazis are doing everything they can to increase and harness its power, to rid themselves of its unpredictability. By all accounts, we understand they’re close to cracking the problem too.’

The news was like a hammer blow to Wilkins. ‘Good Lord. What can we do?’

‘We believe an all-out assault on the bunker in Berlin where the work is being carried out is the only option available to us.’

‘A bunker? In the German capital? The very heart of the Reich’s stranglehold on power? Such a mission would be suicidal.’

Colonel Adams gestured for Wilkins to follow him. ‘Come with me.’

He took Wilkins down into the bowels of Pocklington Hall again, past the guarded door to the room where the undead remains of Raymond Mills continued to be held (and Wilkins could hear Mills crashing about in there even now). They came to another door in another corridor, guarded by two imperious-looking, black-suited troops. They exchanged salutes, then the colonel waved them away. Working in perfect synchronisation, the guards both turned keys in the door then slid across bolts and released latches.

It was more like the door to a bank vault than a prison cell, and inside it looked more like a hotel room than a gaol.

The relatively luxurious looking room had a single occupant. SS-Obergruppenführer Jakob Wolfensohn stood to attention, clicked his heels and saluted.

‘It appears we have a way in,’ Colonel Adams said.