Nordenham, western Bremerhaven - April 3
Angelica crouched below the window and checked her gun. It was an old hunting rifle the police had confiscated long ago. After her Athanatoi service pistol ran out of rounds, she decided to search the armory for an upgrade. It wasn’t a high-power assault rifle, and she didn't particularly like hunting rifles, although she had grown up with them, but it would have to do.
Her walkie-talkie crackled. “Heads up, Angie 2,” Annie said, “Kreuzies’re closing in.”
Not that nickname again.
“Can you please stop calling me Angie 2?” Angelica said.
“No can do,” Annie said, “It’s the truth, isn't it?”
“I think we can find a better codename for me,” Angelica said, “Like, I don’t know, Maus? Sounds like Haus.”
“Ah yes, you’re like a little mouse,” Annie said, “No wonder you’ve escaped so much.”
Well...technically all she did was hide in Bremerhaven for the last couple of years.
“Is that a roast or a compliment?” Angelica said.
“Can my big sister please stop taking up bandwidth with all this chit-chat?” Anna said.
“How about no?” Annie said.
“You literally just said they were closing in!” Clara said. “We need the bandwidth!”
“You’re the worst ‘girl in the chair’, you know?” Anna said.
“I never claimed to be good at it!” Annie said.
“Ladies!” Clara said. “Shut up! Please!”
Both sisters shut up.
“Thank you,” Clara said, “I’m not paid enough for this.”
“We’re not paid at all,” Angelica said.
“Even if we were paid, our currency’s worthless,” Anna said.
“What even would we be paid with then?” Annie said.
“Quiet!” Clara said.
Angelica turned her attention back to the window. She was on the second floor of an empty office building, facing a deserted street. Anna was on the ground level, and Clara was on the opposite side. Coming in from the east, she saw an approaching convoy of army trucks. Inside were soldiers wearing black combat fatigues bearing the Jerusalem cross, each carrying a buzzing walkie-talkie on their kevlar vests. These were the Crusaders of the Lord they had been fighting against for months now, but recently they had ramped up their patrols and applied greater pressure on the outer neighborhoods.
“A little more…” Clara said. “Now!”
Just as the convoy passed their location, the battery of an electric car exploded, blowing up the car and sending flaming shrapnel flying. The convoy stopped. Angelica stood up and began firing out the window, along with Clara, Anna, and the rest of their squad. Caught by surprise, the Crusaders began falling. Those who escaped the initial ambush aimed their assault rifles and began shooting back. The air was filled with the sounds of gunfire and men and women screaming in pain and shouting battle cries. Angelica ducked below the windowsill just as several rounds zipped past, punching holes in the roof.
A Crusader barged into the room. “DEUS VULT!”
Angelica spun around and ducked just as he fired, dodging his first volley. She aimed at him and pulled the trigger. Click.
“Merde!” she said.
She instinctively threw the rifle at her enemy, hitting him in the face. While he staggered back, she drew a knife and stabbed him.
“Take their ammo!” she radioed.
They couldn't take the guns, as good as they were. They were all biometrical locked anyways. But the ammo was fair game. Maybe they'd scrap the guns for parts, if they had time to come back for them.
“On it!” Clara said.
She reached the office lobby. Anna had taken cover behind a desk, taking the occasional shot at anybody who ran through the front door.
“How the hell did you miss a guy?” Angelica said. “I got ambushed upstairs!”
“Hey, I shot anybody who came through that door,” Anna said, “That one’s on you!”
“There definitely isn’t a back door!” Angelica said.
“As I said, it’s on you!” Anna said.
“Cease fire!” Clara said.
They stopped shooting. Angelica cautiously looked out the window. The street was quiet. All of the Crusaders had either been killed or retreated.
“Well, that was easy,” Anna said.
“Yeah, because you missed a guy!” Angelica said.
“That wasn’t me!” Anna said.
“Ladies!” Annie said. “We’re not done yet!”
“What do you mean?” Clara said.
“They’re sending reinforcements!” Annie said.
“Where?” Anna said.
She got her answer when a tank round exploded in front of them, throwing them back. Angelica slammed into a table, which shattered under her. Debris rained down around her. Her ears rang loudly from the shockwave of the explosion, dulling her hearing. But she could still hear the ground shaking as a tank approached. She got on her feet. Pain flared in her legs, and she used her rifle as a cane. Slowly, her hearing returned, just in time to hear a fighter jet scream by. Seconds later, two missiles slammed into the street and the building across from them, leveling it in seconds.
“Clara!” Angelica said.
Clara ran in through the door. “I’m here!”
“Oh thank goodness,” Angelica said.
They turned their attention to the tank rolling up the street. The machine gunner swiveled his gun in their direction and opened fire, raking the wall with bullets.
“Annie, I need solutions!” Anna radioed.
“There are no solutions!” Annie said.
“Why is it every time I ask for a solution, you don’t have one?!” Anna said.
“It’s a goddamn tank!” Annie said. “Just run!”
“We are not vacating this block!” Anna said.
“And I’m not losing my little sister!” Annie said. “Regroup at base and let others handle it!”
“She’s right, we’ve got nothing to deal with armor,” Angelica said.
“Okay, okay!” Anna said. “Let’s move!”
Bremerhaven City Hall
Everybody crowded around a map of the city Julian laid out on the table. Chess pieces, toys, and cups had been placed to mark troop locations. Their red piece in Nordenham was outnumbered three to one by the enemy’s blue pieces. Annie took the last red piece there and moved it east across the river.
“We lost Nordenham,” she said.
“That’s an understatement,” Anna said, “We lost everything west of the Weser. With heavy casualties in Nordenham.”
“We’re slowly losing everything else,” Julian said, “We may have to abandon Wulsdorf in the south as well.”
“It’s a miracle we survived this long,” Angelica said, “We’ve got just a few cops and Imperial Guard units against thousands of professional troops with heavy armor and air support.”
“Not really a miracle, urban warfare’s just a slog,” Clara said, “Remember the sieges of Vienna and Constantinople in World War II?”
“I honestly didn’t pay attention in history class at the academy,” Angelica said.
“We’re slowly being overwhelmed,” Annie said, “The hospitals are at the breaking point; Eva's treatments have been delayed for so long. If we lose our last antiaircraft batteries, there’s nothing stopping them from just bombing us flat.”
“I think we should retreat from Wulsdorf,” Anna said, “We can’t hold it with our numbers.”
“But that will make Fischereihafen vulnerable,” Clara said, “And if they gain access to the waterfront through there…”
“I know, but we have no choice,” Anna said.
“I think we should withdraw our forces north, former a defensive line along Vieländerweg,” Clara said, “If we can pool our forces there, we may be able to stall the enemy.”
“That place is full of trees,” Annie said, “It would be a good place to hide and stall.”
“Quelle bonne idée,” Angelica said.
“No amount of stalling will be worth it if what we’re stalling for never happens,” Anna said, “We need to get that convoy going.”
“Scandinavia has been busy with its own food crisis lately,” Julian said, “We’ll have to wait until they fix that.”
“If the Ragnarokers want to get out of the committee’s pocket, that is,” Anna said, “The Kaiser has Chancellor Finnson by the balls.”
“Then we’ll have to wait until that is resolved, if it is resolved,” Julian said.
“Tell that to the people who can’t wait and are going regardless,” Annie said, “On the open sea, they’re sitting ducks for the committee’s ships and planes.”
“Welp, we’re screwed,” Anna said, “Might as well die now.”
“Come to think of it, why haven’t we been nuked yet?” Annie said. “Or blasted from space with SVI lasers? If they wanted to destroy us, they could’ve done so long ago.”
“I suspect there’s something they want in this city,” Angelica said, “Or they want to make an example of us.”
“Wouldn’t it be a better example if we were nuked?” Clara said.
“Perhaps they want to conserve their nukes and SVI ammo,” Julian said, “As if they wanted to use it on a more dangerous enemy.”
“Great, they don’t even think we’re dangerous enough,” Annie said.
“Well, none of us have actual battlefield experience,” Julian said.
“Or maybe they know my dad’s here,” Anna said, “And they don’t want to risk killing him.”
“They might be plotting to conquer the world with my dad the mad scientist, how generic,” Annie said.
“Not how I imagined spending Restoration Day,” Anna said.
“Yeah, a holiday for a country that either doesn’t exist or has turned into the exact opposite of what it was originally supposed to be,” Annie said, “Heard they're celebrating Restoration Day to commemorate the committee's rise to power now.”
“We have nothing to celebrate,” Clara said, “Only our impending demise.”
“I think we can still celebrate something,” Julian said.
“What do you mean?” Angelica said.
“Restoration Day celebrates the founding of the Reich, but also its values,” Julian said, “Romanitas, fairness, tolerance, pluralism, and humanism. Values that have guided the Reich and its people for the last nine centuries. Values that are now under threat. We are likely the last major city still free of committee rule. Toledo and Cordoba have been carpet bombed into rubble. Dublin is constantly on fire. Marseille is now mostly under regime control. We are the last ones who stand for the true values of the Reich. So we should celebrate the values we are defending. Because it’s not just the committee making an example of us, we’re making an example of them too. We need to show the people under their rule there are still people fighting the good fight. That there are those who haven’t given up yet. That there is still hope we can win.”
The room grew quiet for several seconds, nobody knowing what to say.
“My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty,” Clara sang, breaking the silence.
“Of thee I sing,” Angelica joined in.
“Land where our fathers died,” Annie sang, “Land of the Kaisers’ pride…”
“From every mountainside, let justice ring!” Anna sang.
---
That is most certainly a Roman edition of “My Country ’Tis of Thee.”
"Kruezies" is slang I came up with, from the German Kreuzritter, or Crusader.
