The Furred Reich (2 page)

“I did that bunch in, with one shot,” shouted a strong young soldier from the Grossdeutschland. But a burst of mortar fire forced them all down into the heap of enemy corpses. A shell hit the edge of the bunker, and earth and logs blew apart, falling back onto their heads. The fellow huddled between Hans and a dead Russian was hit. As his body jerked up and down from the impact, Hans tensed himself to run. Then another shell struck the shelter, disintegrating it. Debris poured down onto Hans’ legs and sent him reeling back. He howled for help, sure that his legs were broken. His trousers were ripped down the leg, but the bruised skin underneath was untouched.

Hans plunged back into the heap of Russian corpses and fell onto the fellow who had been hit. He let out a howl as an avalanche of rubble poured down around them.

“I’m wounded,” the fellow next to Hans groaned, “something is burning in my back. Call for a stretcher.”

Hans looked at him in a daze, then shouted, “Saenftentraeger!”

But his ludicrous cries were lost in the whine of yet another shell whistling down onto the now fully-exposed shelter. Instantly Hans buried himself back into the corpses, and then saw nothing but a white light. Then everything went silent.

Cough Cough

……… Screech!

The stillness was broken by the shriek of some bird of prey flying as low as an
Ilyushin.
He covered his helmet with both hands, forcing himself into the ground, expecting that shell to explode and rip into his spine at any second, but the only thing that hit his back were the rays of a suddenly intense sun. Was he dead? Once the feeling returned, he felt the grit of orange sand against his eyelids and in his mouth.

Hands trembling, he allowed himself to pick his head up a few inches, gradually open his eyes, and lift his head onto the horizon. What his eyes fed back his brain was hardly able to compute; a blue, cloudless vantage with a sea of sand all around him.

His mind must be playing a trick on him. It must have been unable to cope with the overload of trauma, and split off a second personality in response. Any minute now a soldier of the Grossdeutschland, maybe even that damned Prussian whom Hans called his best friend, would pull him out of this dream he was having, and he would be right back outside of the Tractor Works. Maybe the battle would be over, too. The idea of ‘sleeping’ through all of it was not an unattractive one.

The circling bird of prey reminded him of two German sergeants who once examined Hans’ glass-torn body after he flew through the windshield during a truck accident some months ago. Just as the bird was doing now, one officer quipped that Hans must have been dying, and in response Hans violently awoke and shouted, “I’m not!”

Jolting up onto his backside, Hans shouted at that bird that was mocking him.

“I’m not dead!”

For another moment he looked around. The distant smell of water and mud greeted his nostrils and returned his attention to his own choking thirst. Getting back onto his feet, Hans picked up his fallen Mauser, strapped it to his back and followed his nose, the sound of the battle-luggage strapped to his uniform making a strange clanging sound in the desert. It was a sound he’d noticed for the first time.

The desert waterhole was very close; only some three quarters of an hour by foot. Not too far for a specialized infantryman. When he got to the oasis, which looked more like a big water hole, Hans didn’t know whether to be relieved to finally get all the water he needed for once, or to be alarmed that his
kamerads
had not yet pulled him back into reality. His eyes took in that pool of dark water, lined with date trees, and a single, stone-lain road which looked as if the Romans had laid it themselves. Was he no longer on the steppes of Russia?

Seeing nobody else around, Hans began stripping naked, and as soon as he was done, ran right into the water. It felt like a warm bath. The water soothed his wounds: Deep frostbite from last winter, and especially the dislocated shoulder he suffered from that auto accident. He greedily gulped down the fresh water and rinsed off his filthy, blonde hair. Any minute now he’d be pulled back to Belgorod.

Hans sat in the waterhole for at least half an hour before his temples started to throb. A sharp pain returned to his shoulder from where it was once dislocated, and he felt a bout of nausea coming on. All his illness and injury was coming back to plague him now that his body sensed a shred of normalcy.

Staggering back to the shore, Hans wiped himself dry with his torn trousers and put them back on as quickly as he could before vomiting into the sand. His head was swimming. Deliriously, he picked up his tunic and buttoned it back on, lifted up his Mauser and prepared to keep walking until… Something.

Part of joining the Grosssdeutschland meant going through an unforgiving regimen of endurance training, so Hans was sure that he could walk to some settlement, no matter what his condition. But before he could take another step, Hans’ body rebelled once again and he collapsed back into the silty sand.

“Help.”

Adventurers

Kairah gave a long, dramatic sigh – probably because the lioness knew it would bug her friend, the deercat, who gripped tighter onto the reigns in reaction. The two women had been traveling southward, through the Sea of Sand, for a couple days now. This time they had a horse to save them from an endless walk, like last time they went on an adventure. Kairah was mounted upon the horse as her friend, and servant, Amalija, walked alongside the tall beast.

“Are we there yet?” The lioness teased, with a fat grin upon her features. The deercat turned her head to look up, and pouted a little in frustration at the 5'4" lioness straddled atop the horse.

Kairah was clad in a pair of pants, which did look a bit masculine, but that didn’t bother the adventurous feline. On her upper body was a business type shirt that men usually wore, but most of that was hidden by a thin, brown cloak that allowed a hood to protect her neck and features from the blistering desert sun.

Amalija’s race, deercats, were quite scarce in these parts. She was slender, stood at five foot eight, and was clothed a sleeveless dress with slits on each side of the hem that allowed air to flow up her legs. The servant was plenty used to harsh environments, and would not once dare complain about the oven-like weather today. Until Kai pushed her buttons, of course.

She turned around to swat at Kai’s leg, and in response the lioness slipped off the horse with ease and ran ahead with laughter, cloak flowing behind her. Amalija took up the cat and mouse game, and their chocolate horse continued walking loyally after them towards a ring of date trees encircling one of the natural watering holes along this jungle-bound trade route. Within moments the pair stumbled upon something curious, maybe even amusing: A human, wearing a camouflaged green uniform and with wavy, blonde hair, laying almost face down beneath a date tree.

“Do you think it’s dead?” Kairah questioned with a loud ‘whisper.’

“Poke it, Amalija! Go see if it’s dead!” the lioness prodded ’Lija forward.

Kairah was the brave one, though, and so she neared the skinny-looking, uniformed human. Once close, she crouched and nudged at the man. “Maybe it is dead…” Amalija muttered with sudden worry.

“Maybe he needs water!”

Amalija ran to the shore to gather some in an earthenware bucket.

“He looks cooked.” The lioness retorted, noticing his ruddy face, which was clearly not used to the environment. “It’s a shame you don’t like eating meat!”

“This isn’t a joking matter, Kairah!” ’Lija waved her arms around in panic.

Then the human groaned and stirred at the lioness’ feet. With a choked cough, he slowly got to his elbows and blinked up at Kairah. All the commotion seemed more than enough to wake him up. At first he seemed frightened, but he softened after just a few seconds. He blinked up at Kairah, slowly shaking his head in bewilderment.

“W… Water? Oh that would be… great. Kitty!”

The lioness chuckled. “You heard the man,” she cooed over her shoulder to Lija, who gathered the water in the bucket with an easy scoop. Their horse stopped by the water for a drink too.

Kairah’s hand reached down toward the eagle badge on his right breast, and thumb stroked along the wreath-circled swastika beneath it.

“Never seen this before…” She cooed. The human continued dazedly blinking at them. All this time she thought she’d seen everything.

Amalija came up behind Kai, sat the bucket down next to the lioness and crouched down on the other side of the man. “I think the sun got to him,” said Kai, seeming a bit more serious as she grabbed the bucket.

“Support his head.”

Amalija did so, and the human opened his eyes again. Kai heaved the bucket up and guided the water close to his mouth. “Drink up, buddy,” she said to the man.

The human opened his mouth to the bucket, readily drinking in the water but gurgling a “dank you” into it. He was conscious, but seemed ‘not all there.’

“Dank you,” he said again. “We’ll take the factory. We’re outnumbered as always, but we’ll get it. Could really use some more artillery fire over here.”

The human male blinked up at the lioness, seeming to go in and out of cognizance.

“Oh hi.” He smiled politely, as if they had somehow met before. “How are you today?”

Kairah looked over to Amalija as she lowered the bucket, amused by this all. Amalija cradled the human’s head, still concerned about him.

“I’m good, thanks.” The lioness responded, eyes still on Lija.

“Let’s get him dressed, covered, mount him and take him to the town east of here. We’ll hire a room so he can recover.”

Amalija smiled and nodded, glad that the lioness was one to take care of even a stranger. The pair started to prop him up a bit more, when Kai took off her cloak and draped the man in it to shield him from the sun.

“Take it easy, buddy.” The lioness said gently.

“We’re going to take you to safety, alright?”

Troika

“Oh ok, sounds good. But hey. Watch out for the low-flying aircraft.”

By the time he felt himself being lifted off the ground by the two girls, Hans began to question his perception. His mind was playing a trick on him, yet the reality was too crisp to be a dream.

Dreams usually came from somewhere in the recesses of one’s mind, yet the idea of animals talking and walking on two legs was nothing he’d ever pondered. Still, Hans felt too exhausted, mentally and physically, to think much about it. Hans helped the girls put him atop the horse, and all his belongings were now tucked into the horse’s carrier bags.

“I’m Kairah, and that’s Amalija. What’s your name?” The lioness sat behind him to hold him up better.

“Hi Kairah and Ama… Amalija. I am Gefreiter Hans Hepner of the Grossdeutschland…”

“It’s a pleasure, Gefreiter Hans.” Kairah greeted him officially while the servant continued to walk the horse. It seemed the lioness didn’t recognize any of his titles.

“Have you heard any planes in the sky today?”

“…No. Only birds.”

As their little caravan moved forward, short, golden grass began peeking out of the ground. A desolate, sand-covered horizon occasionally gave way to scrub brush. Before long, a town stood ahead of them. It only a collection of square, white, brick boxes. Kairah found the only inn, and the horse was taken out to a barn nearby. Their temporary abode was just another one of the white boxes, but this one had two floors. Their room was on the top: A small but comfortable place, with the bright but waning desert sun shining through the window.

Hans’ temples throbbed in pain, but he did his best to hide that from the girls. They must have noticed, anyway. While Amalija was out gathering food and water, Kairah laid Hans down on the bed and sat next to him with a small hum.

“You need to rest,” she explained, hands dunked into a bucket of water with a damp rag, which she rinsed out and placed along Hans’ forehead and back of his neck. He blinked as peaceful, damp darkness covered his blue eyes.

“Ah, you think so?” He smiled, “I haven’t had a full night of sleep for awhile. Never been in a bed since then, either.” His hands rested on his thighs.

Kairah’s ears flicked and she reached forward to run her fingers through Hans’ hair, probably out of sympathy. “We’ll stay with you until we are confident you are fine.”

The lioness stood up and moved to the edge of the bed to undo his boots. Amalija came in with a tray and set it down upon the table to the side, kicking the door shut behind her. The deeercat took a seat next to Hans, occupying the space Kai once had, and reached a hand over to feed the German some freshly baked bread. “Here,” the servant said. Within just a few short minutes, he fell fast asleep.

For Hans, sleep was a black hole lost in time, like death. Besides, dreaming within a dream would have been impossible.

Hans awoke to feel the lioness’ plantigrade hand in his hair once again, eyes opened slowly to see the sun had given way to bright desert moonlight which poured into their room. Sleep gave Hans a firmer sense of reality.

“…Wait… Where am I?” He recognized the two furred females, but just wasn’t sure exactly what happened or how he got here. Kairah sat on one side of the bed, Amalija on the other, and both were staring right at him. Hans was naked from the waist up. They must have removed his tunic.

“Surrounded by lovely girls?”

Amalija smiled at the compliment, and looked over her shoulder to him as she placed down whatever object was in her hand.

“We brought you here,” Lija said. “We found you outside in the hot sun. You didn’t seem to be in a good state. So we brought you here and treated you.”

Kairah nodded and dropped the bucket off to the side. Lija leaned in closer to him.

“Are you feeling better now?” Kai asked quietly. It seemed the two of them were trying to keep their voices down to avoid a disturbing the neighboring rooms, even though some embarrassing noises were already coming from next door.

Hans let out a sigh of relief. “Yes. So much better. You are both really considerate. I was sent to this division before I was old enough to fall in love, too. Haven’t been close to girls since then, either.”