War

By Jodi Jensen, L.N. Hunter, T.J. Berg and 10 more

War ravages through the ages, conflict is rife, battles rage, lives are lost, revenge is sought.

 

Fifteen international authors bring you their own take on the theme.

 

Drama, death, and loss in the trenches, across the dividing wall, at the end of time, and the end of the universe. Geriatric space heroes, swarthy no-man's-land soldiers, friends until the end, and witching warriors battle for land, love, rights, and empires.

 

The fight is hard, the rewards high, the loss of loved ones, devastating.

 

And in the end, who wins?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Black Hare Press
• Release date: Nov 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9798223797531

Book preview

War

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Black Hare Press

Jodie Angell • T.J. Berg • Zachary Finn • Stephen Herczeg • L.N. Hunter • Pedro Iniguez • Jodi Jensen • Bob Johnston • Alexander B. Joy • Steven Lord • John McNichol • Alexander Nachaj • Julie Sevens • John Taloni • Ann Wuehler

WAR title is Copyright © Black Hare Press

First published in Australia in November 2022 Year by Black Hare Press

The authors of the individual stories retain the copyright of the works featured in this anthology

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this production may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

A catalogue record for this publication is available from the National Library of Australia

Cover design by Dawn Burdett

Editing by Jodi Christensen & D. Kershaw

Formatting by Ben Thomas

Contents

1. Also available and coming soon

2. Company 33

3. House of Ash

4. Memory Like Sand, Broken Like Stone

5. Witness to the End

6. The Skittering

7. Eternal Soldier

8. An Abhorrence to all Flesh

9. Under Leviathan's Shadow

10. Revelations

11. Archangel

12. The Cherry of Her Lips

13. In the Trenches

14. The Butchering Block

15. Templar's Terrors

16. Neutronium Overdrive

17. Black Hare Press

18. Acnowledgements

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Also available and coming soon

from Black Hare Press

PUNK

GRIMDARK

WAR

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Company 33

by Julie Sevens

Atangled nest of barbed wire lay on the rocky dirt. A squirrel had snagged its smooth red fur on the barbs trying to climb on the fence, and each panicked movement had only tightened the trap around the doomed creature. Max snipped at the matted ball of blood, fur, and metal, trying to pull it free from the line of wire above it.

Can you hand me the other wire cutters, please? he asked the tall one standing over him, who had introduced himself with a name that started with a ‘p’ or maybe a ‘t’. He dug them out of the tool bucket at his feet and handed them over. With two last cuts, the squirrel was loose.

Rudi leaned over and wrinkled his nose at the poor thing. Well, the Wessis do call this the Death Strip, he said, sighing. And we need to get this fixed so we can turn the alarms back on. How else will we know when the next squirrel is caught? He started unwinding a new section of barbed wire to replace what Max had pulled out, kneeling in the dirt to attach it.

Peter, can you hold this? Rudi asked the tall one. Max made a mental note of the name, one more in the rotating cast to keep track of. This one, Peter, had heavy-lidded eyes that never stopped scanning the top of the fence even when he spoke. He was well-trained, a shepherd dog loyal to his assigned task. Max admired his focus; he knew he should be like that, but his eyes tired and his mind wandered.

Twisting the last bit of wire into place, Rudi patted the concrete fencepost. He pulled out his radio and said, All done on the signal fence. You can switch the alarms back on. A staticky confirmation replied. A green-painted Trabi, its roof replaced with canvas, puttered towards them.

Chuck the tools in the back, the driver yelled. You three are supposed to go back to patrol now. He barely paused long enough for them to load the spool of barbed wire and buckets of tools into the back, then whizzed on to the next watchtower, thick exhaust like a smoke signal behind him.

Max, Rudi, and Peter pulled their jackets down, rearranged their rifle straps, and fell into place on the pavement. Every few paces, they paused, pulled their binoculars to their eyes, and studied their surroundings. They were on a treadmill, each metre the same as the ones before. They could circle 140 kilometres around Berlin and see nothing new under their feet, only more concrete, dirt, razor wire.

But Max knew he wasn’t supposed to be looking at his feet. He was supposed to be looking up, studying both sides of the path, examining the walls on either side of the control strip, patrolling for any evidence of those who didn’t belong. It was Rudi’s turn to find disturbances in the raked dirt or the fencing: footprints, drag marks, broken wires.

Max did not feel like an expert at long watches of boredom; his skills were with his rifle, and he had several ribbons on his jacket to prove it. He could calculate the angle against the wind for long-distance targets like Galileo, could follow moving targets like his gun had heat-seeking capabilities. His mind could be hard to steady, but his hands and his eyes were statues on command.

Hey, Rudi said. Max could hear the grin on his face without putting down his binoculars, and he groaned.

Alright, let’s hear it, Max relented.

Don’t encourage him, Peter said, pausing his lenses on a section of the wall.

Why did the kosmonauts have to turn around? Rudi asked.

They probably ran out of gas, Max guessed, zeroing in on the same section of the wall as Peter. His response probably would have earned a sharp glance from Peter if he weren’t focused on something; it skated perilously close to the edge to imply the Kosmodrom wouldn’t be able to supply enough fuel for a space mission.

Because the moon was full! Rudi laughed.

Max gave him enough of a bemused grunt to be an answer, but not enough to get him to tell another. The trees outside the wall shook as they stared at them, leaves shuddering on the disturbed branches. He held his rifle, ready for problems.

I think it’s a squirrel again, Peter said. The tree stilled, and Max didn’t bother finding the tufted red ears of the little nut-eater’s head.

They danced their waltz for a couple of hours: walk, walk, look, walk, walk, look, walk, walk, look. Rudi hummed under his breath, earning him increasingly irritated stares from Peter as the time ticked by. Max didn’t mind it, though; it was better than being paired with someone who kept trying to chit chat.

The sun glided below the wall, a brilliant pink and orange sky illuminating the buildings the men were sandwiched between. Sallow lights flicked on in the lampposts that lined their path every few paces, and soon they’d be on a narrow river of lights through the city.

Peter froze again, the binoculars on something at the top of the wall. The sinking darkness made it harder to see this time, but Max tried to find the spot too. The three patrolmen stood under the lights, owls with their enormous lens eyes. The apartment block set back from their side of the wall was still, most of the shutters rolled closed. An old woman released puffs of smoke into the air on her balcony as she watered the plants. The water dripped onto the balcony below, slowly watering a pair of chairs.

A strand of barbed wire pinged against a fencepost behind them, setting off a string of alarms on top of the fence, the green sirens standing sentry at the top of the fenceposts spinning in time with the blaring sounds. Max lowered his binoculars and pulled his rifle off his back in one liquid motion. The butt of the gun was nestled against his shoulder before his eyes had finished searching.

There was a problem.

Halt! Peter barked at the interlopers in the control strip. A man and a woman had made it over the wall and through the signal fence. The woman was dashing as fast as she could, her legs vaulting her through the air like Marita Koch breaking the sprinter’s world record.

The bottom two lines were cut, but the man wasn’t as small as the woman and he’d snagged on the middle line as he tried to sneak through, the waistband of his pants ripping as he stumbled. He floundered across the control strip after her, trying to catch his stride. The woman didn’t look back, flying through the dirt without looking back.

She was nearing the finish line where the shoot-to-kill order stopped, where the shot risked leaving the control strip and penetrating West Berlin. No single escapee was worth making the Cold War hot. Max followed her in the sight of his gun, waiting to catch the pace of her run. Then he pressed the trigger, let the bullets go, chasing her like hunting dogs. The woman dropped to the ground, her body bouncing as she came to a stop.

The man stopped, wobbling on one knee. Then he lunged in the direction of the shots that had felled the woman. The anguish on his face switched to rage, sparking in his eyes like a lit match. He barrelled up behind Rudi, finally sure-footed, with a rock in one hand and something else glinting in the other.

Max blinked. Holding his rifle steady, he waited for Rudi to get out of the way, to get out of his shot. Rudi stood there, asking something, unaware that a bull was charging at him.

Move! Max demanded.

Rudi’s eyes went wide, his back arching as the man crashed into him. The man smashed a rock into Rudi’s head as his knees buckled and his arms went limp. Max screamed as his rifle fired several times at the man’s chest. The man fell on top of Rudi, the blood from his wounds soaking his t-shirt in splotches, a poppy field blooming in the dirt.

Max rushed at them, trying to yank the man off Rudi. They were both slippery with blood, and Max kept falling backwards, failing to separate them. Several other border guards reached them, finally, grabbing the man’s ripped pants, his arms, his head, heaving them apart. The shears the man had used to cut the signal wires were buried in Rudi’s back; his skull visible where the man had bashed him with the rock.

Help him! Max cried. Where’s the ambulance? He patted at Rudi’s chest, wishing he knew how to use his frantic hands to help him. He couldn’t hold his brain in, knew he shouldn’t pull the blades out and release even more blood. His useless hands ended up gently caressing Rudi’s cheek. Max hoped it had at least been quick, just a flash of pain and then floating nothingness.

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Come in. His commander’s voice rang from inside the office at the barracks. Max opened the door. The office was much quieter than most of the barracks, where the men lived stacked on top of each other, their ever-changing assignments and schedules meaning the halls never slept.

Comrade Max Vogt. The commander of Company 33 stood in front of him, and Max straightened every muscle in his body, raised his chin. You have the gratitude of the entire German Democratic Republic for your dutiful work in guarding our border. For your work, I will recommend you for the Medal for Exemplary Border Service, and you will also receive a bonus of one hundred marks. You have also been granted an extra leave to go home next week. Well done.

Pressing his lips together to hide his smile, Max waited to be sure the commander was done speaking. After a beat, he said, Thank you, Comrade Commander Zeidler. The man was already going back around the desk to his chair, a plate of almond cookies waiting for him next to his coffee.

Door closed, please, he said, dismissing Max. Crumbs fell to his shirt as he chewed one of the cookies.

In the hallway, Max let the grin break free, in his mind already on the Reichsbahn train chugging south out of Berlin. He’d heard of other border guards being rewarded for preventing escapees from making it across, but his awards felt particularly lavish.

He let himself feel proud for a moment as he walked back to his room, before the guilt lapping at the edges started to seep back in, flooding it out. He hadn’t been able to save Rudi, hadn’t been fast enough. Maybe he had chosen the wrong escapee to shoot first, should have gone for the man to start with. But Zeidler’s response would have been much different if he had suspected Max of hesitation; if he’d stopped the man first and failed to stop the woman.

His bunkmate, Felix, was sitting on the top bunk, his legs dangling into Max’s spot. An old copy of Das Magazin fluttered under his pillow as he heard Max open the door.

Reading the articles? Max teased him, his eyebrows raised.

"We can’t all just read Army Lookout every time," Felix razzed him back, jumping off the bunk and sending its coat hanger frame banging into the wall.

Peter was telling everyone at breakfast that you stopped the woman before he had time to hold his gun correctly. Felix patted him on the shoulder. I bet they’ll give you a medal. Especially for trying to defend Rudi.

Comrade Commander Zeidler just told me. And extra leave, too. Max tried to smile his thanks through the wince he made at the mention of Rudi’s name. To his relief, the door opened again behind him.

Oh, Kai’s back! We have three now. Felix welcomed another of the roommates. Do you want to play Skat? I’ll deal the cards. He wagged a bottle of liquor at them, and Max’s mouth watered. Max, you get the Vita Cola—I’ve got something for it.

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Max pulled the rake through the dirt, the tines leaving long stripes in the dust. Sometimes when he raked, he was a giant ploughing land for the tiny farmers below, or a master gardener tracing meditative patterns. Today, on his last shift before he would get to go home on leave, he was just a border guard with sore shoulders.

His hand guarding his eyes, he stared south down the control strip to the Sonnenallee border crossing in the distance. He and Lukas had been assigned to erase any imperfections from the dirt between here and the gates, to rake the dirt into a blank canvas that would reveal any evidence. They made slow progress in the sun, Max’s dry mouth making a talisman out of a bottle of sparkling water, its glass cool to the touch, the bubbles chasing away the thirst.

He shook the mirage away. If he let his thoughts take the wheel as he raked, he would careen off the edge of the road, smash deep into the forest, and end up in a bog of unwanted memories. The face of the man who had killed Rudi, the rock in his hand, the blood splashing as it hit. The way the woman had hit the dirt and left a drag mark from the velocity she had built up before he killed her mid-air.

Max could feel anger running hot, flushing his cheeks. They risked their families, they risked dying—they did die—and for what? All they had to do was follow the directions. Max’s life had been laid out for him. Get up in the morning and complete the day, follow the schedule, check off the tasks. It wasn’t that hard not to break the rules, not to say the wrong things, do the wrong things, think the wrong things.

Max kept raking, the fury flowing from his hands down the rake into the dirt. It was so stupid to risk it all for West Berlin. To go to the bars that don’t close, to buy shiny things. To get a job that could slip away any day, to live in an apartment they couldn’t afford. To leave the DDR, where everyone took care of each other, to live where nobody cared about anything. What would convince someone to die for a chance at that?

He looked up, surprised to see how much closer the Sonnenallee crossing was. The maze of shipping containers and gates cut across the control strip before them, and when they reached it, they could turn around. His shift would be over, and he could go catch his train home.

Lukas, what are they doing to the cars? Max asked. The guards on the west side of the crossing were scanning a car with a metal box on a stick. They bent over, checking the tires, studying the box, marking down the numbers it gave.

Lukas squinted at Max, his mouth opening ever so slightly like he might reveal a secret. Then he closed it and gave a reluctant shrug. He went back to his raking, but looked over his shoulder at Max, shaking his head.

Will you just tell me? he said, a little brother trying to convince his sibling to share.

Lukas thought for a second, put his rake down, and came close to Max. He stood nearly at attention, his eyes on the guards on the West Berlin side of the border, and said, I believe they are putting on a show of checking for radiation so they can keep the Wessis in a state of anti-Soviet hysteria over the power plant accident in the Ukraine.

Max tried to decipher the tone of a soldier saying what he was supposed to say, wondering what underlying truth Lukas knew. He studied the West Berlin guards again, scanning a new car with their equipment. Why would they be worried about cars coming from the DDR, though? The radioactivity had settled to a low level in the month since the accident and wasn’t dangerous.

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Happy shrieking bounced from the windows of the house as Max walked up to the door of his family’s house. His niece came flying through the front door. Uncle Max, Uncle Max, Uncle Max! she chattered, each word louder than the last. He picked her up, hugging her tight. She was almost too big to hold, but not yet, not for him.

He picked up the corner of the blue neckerchief under her collar and asked her, And what did you do with the Pioneers today, my little Steffi?

We went to the lake on a hike. Lena fell and skinned her knee, and I helped her bandage it up, she said, breathless. And then we practiced using our compass. He spun her around in the front garden, then asked her which way was north. She pointed east, then south, then straight up with a devious grin.

His sister joined them, skipping the second step in her enthusiasm. She kissed him on the cheek, the hairspray leaving a fog of plastic-floral perfume. Her sweatshirt had a giant red stripe across the front that changed direction when it got to her sleeve, making a checkmark.

Sabine! How are you? This daughter of yours gets bigger and bigger every time. And you—you look super trendy, he complimented her. She gave him a wide smile as she patted his cheek.

Look what I have for you, Steffi, he said, crouching to get the present out of his bag.

Thank you, Uncle Max. Look, Oma! Steffi marvelled at the little submarine as she held it in her hands, displaying it for her grandmother in the doorway. The yellow of the submarine was the same colour their house had been, some time in the past when they had been able to get the paint.

Mama, I want to take a bath now, so I can play with it, Steffi asked Sabine. She still had dirt from the forest on her elbows and knees, but usually she would protest that she would just get dirty again the next day, so why wash the dirt-armour off?

Not too much soap this time, Sabine nodded as they headed inside.

He hugged his mother on the way in, letting her pick how tightly; sometimes her bones ached too much. She squeezed him to her, the way he had held Steffi, like she might pick him up.

Sabine elbowed him in the ribs as Steffi ran to the bath, yanking her clothes off and leaving a trail down the hallway. You didn’t have to buy her anything. She was so excited to see you, she could barely sleep last night, toy or no.

I traded for it. And look—she loves it. When’s the last time she asked for a bath? Max said. He had been sleeplessly excited to come home, too. The overwhelming smell of a lit match that hung over Vetschau from the power plant had made him feel like he was a child at his birthday again, blowing out candles.

He soaked in that feeling of home now, from the veneer on the furniture, the lace curtains, the thick Eastern carpet with its tassels. He could smell something cooking in the kitchen and breathed it deep, storing some of the smell to bring back later when he ate his thousandth meal in the barracks.

Any news on the coffee plantations in Vietnam? his mother asked, stirring a pot of soup on the stove. We won’t have any more Honecker coffee, will we? He had never heard her say a single word against the state until the coffee incident. It hadn’t been coffee, really, but then again, that was the problem with Kaffee Mix, wasn’t it—it was half burnt grains—and she had been so offended by it, she still complained all these years later.

Mama, I’m a border guard. They don’t tell me about the coffee. Max laughed as he said it, at the idea he would get special updates about the DDR’s affairs. But his mom always wanted him to know everything now that he was stationed in Berlin.

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Steffi ran down the hall to help set the table for dinner, her hair still wet from the bath. Max watched his father’s head bob across the window, home like clockwork. He got up to greet him as he came in, a little boy again, waiting by the door for Papa.

I am looking forward to dinner tonight! his dad said. He slid his feet into his waiting slippers, and they all crowded into the kitchen; dishes clattering, spoons banging, chairs scooting.

Enjoy, his mom said once they were around the table. She took a bite from a roll.

The lump in Max’s throat slimed its way up into his mouth. Papa, are you worried about the power plant?

"This soljanka is delicious, his father said, readying another spoonful of the bright red soup. No, Max, it’s fine. We’re not a nuclear plant, not like Chernobyl, remember? We burn lignite coal. We might have accidents, sure, but not any more than any other factory."

Sabine shifted uncomfortably, watching Steffi take a sip of milk. Mama, at the grocery today, did you—

Mama patted her daughter’s arm; one worried mom to another. Yes. I know. It’s boxed milk and dried mushrooms, and I had to fight for it. You should have seen the piles and piles of fresh produce. I’ve never seen anything like it at the store. And to think, nobody would touch it.

Max soaked up Steffi’s stories about school, and his father’s complaints about some new policy at work. His remaining nine months of duty loomed over him, a calendar hanging over his shoulder, demanding not to be forgotten, but he tried to enjoy the moment.

Steffi started to get up when she’d finished. Wait, he said, digging in his bag. I’ve been saving these from my meals. He put five squares of chocolate in his mother’s hand for her to pass out as dessert, his niece sitting right back down when she saw them.

The meals he’d saved those chocolates from had been overflowing with salads: fresh greens, peppers, tomatoes, radishes. This time of year, he looked forward to the thick white stalks of asparagus that sprung from the farms near Berlin and was surprised, instead, by this sudden excess. Max tried to connect the dots on why Sabine had been worried about the food, why his mom had assured her nothing was fresh. Every time something clicked it was like a scrambled Rubik’s cube, something else sliding out of place.

As Sabine cleared the table, Max fiddled with the radio in the front room. He spun the dial left and right, the thin red needle sliding over the numbers, trying to pull in DT64. A voice emerged from the static and he twisted a hair further until it was clear.

... is Lutz Schramm here for you on DT64, and I have something new for you. Something a little different.

Thank god, Max said, Not ‘Alt wie ein Baum’ again! He tickled Steffi as she lay on her stomach next to him on the carpet. She giggled and tried to tickle him back, but he wouldn’t budge, giving her only a mischievous grin to prove she couldn’t tickle him.

The song started, a throbbing like a deep heartbeat. The throb was soon joined by a synth organ playing long, discordant notes. A man chanted in a low monotone, mimicking a monk in a high-ceilinged cathedral, but he was talking about a woman’s legs. Steffi squinched her nose at the song.

I am chanting. Chanting, chanting. I am chanting more. She attempted a robotic voice, but it dissolved into giggling.

Sabine lay on the floor between them in the laughter pile, her crunchy hair smashed against the carpet. Maybe Depeche Mode will come to East Berlin, and you can go to a proper concert, Max, she daydreamed. She wrapped her arm around Steffi, kissing her forehead.

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Max waited at the base of the boxy beige watchtower to trade shifts. He wondered if he could just stay outside while Paul talked the ear off whatever poor soul was still up there instead of his own.

No such luck, though, as the other guard came out the door as soon as Paul went in.

Read anything good lately, Max? Paul asked. He climbed out of the hatch door on the floor of the watchtower.

No, have you? Max had learned that it was less insufferable to let Paul talk than to try to answer his scattershot queries. He gave a lengthy book report about a detective story, making sure to tell him all the twists so Max would never want to read it.

The alarm sounded just as Paul was going to reveal the name of the murderer in the story, and Max picked up the radio to go through the motions. None of the other guards on shift could find the source of the alarm.

Verstanden, Max muttered at the receiver in his palm. Paul cancelled the alarms from the box on the wall. It was nothing this time. It was usually nothing, a malfunction in the signal fence like the one he had repaired the week before.

Alone in a movie theatre inside his own head, Max sat, a projector playing a reel. The squirrel struggled against the barbed wire of the signal fence, hoping to free itself, the wires tightening like a boa constrictor with every movement. Its furry chest inflated and deflated faster and faster and then stopped. The film reel ended, flapping against the projector, then started over. This time the little animal trapped in the wire had Rudi’s face. A gaping head wound cracked open to reveal the squirrel’s head inside, its dead eyes laughing at a joke. Max smacked himself, trying to get this movie theatre out of his brain.

I think it might rain later, Paul said, maybe to Max, maybe just out loud. We had such nice weather earlier today. I love being able to open the windows.

Max wondered, idly, how poisonous the rain would be.

Max scanned the top of the wall like they were supposed to, ignoring Paul’s chatter. On the east, the shorter wall made it easy to see over, to examine the lives of the few who were willing to live next to the wall and see anyone hanging out too close to the border. The wall itself was punctuated by vertical beams and Max scanned his binoculars at an even tempo, let the beams count out a steady rhythm as they passed like a metronome.

The wall to the west had no metronome, just a high concrete wall with a round cap to make it harder to climb. He knew the other side of it was covered in graffiti, and sometimes they heard the spray paint. But Max had never seen the graffiti side of the wall, instead spending hours a day staring at this side.

He scanned along the western side. Down the street, two women sat at a little table on a recessed balcony. He watched them, the feathered hair flouncing on their heads as they nodded and chatted. Max wondered what kind of coffee they were sipping; what it tasted like, whether they would have a second cup.

The window they sat in front of framed the kitchen behind them. He could see their stove, the shelves above it filled with canned vegetables, jars of fruits, dry goods. Coffee. Max’s stomach rumbled with hunger; he had lost his appetite for the meals served in the barracks. His sister’s fear of Steffi drinking fresh milk had finally snapped into place on the train on the way home. He’d pretended to be asleep, listening to a couple in the seat behind him talk in hushed tones about the news they had watched coming in from their illegally west-pointing TV antenna. They had whispered of the cloud of radiation drifting over them, the poisoned rain falling on the fields where that excess of vegetables he’d been fed had grown. He hadn’t been able to eat since, each plate’s betrayal turning his stomach, the lie of those shiny tomatoes next to his hardboiled egg at breakfast making him nauseous.

On the street below the women and their safely-stocked kitchen, three people stood outside, talking and smoking. Their hair looks like birds’ nests, Max thought, faces smeared with ugly makeup. In East Berlin, the punks hid in church basements, waiting to be rounded up and interrogated by the Stasi when they left, but in West Berlin he sometimes saw them loitering openly.

He pulled his rifle up, watching the punks across the wall through the sight at the end of the gun, a thin iron path from his eyes to their chests. He followed one, a man whose clothes were ripped on purpose, as he sipped his beer, pausing sometimes to open his mouth wide and laugh. Max’s lip curled up in disgust.

It would be so easy to just press his finger against the trigger, watch the spring launch a spent case, then another. Sweat sprung from the back of his neck when he thought about it, his stomach swimming with queasy agitation, the same as when he looked down from a bridge over deep, dark water. Sometimes the water would call to him, invite him to surrender himself, just as the trigger did now.

Pow, he said softly, lowering the rifle again.

I used to play cowboys when I was a kid, Paul said, squirming to recast the uncomfortable scene. You can’t just aim the gun like that, though, he continued. Paul was right, of course. Max was lucky he was with a soft, vague man like Paul, who would gloss over problems instead of calling in a violation of rifle discipline.

Someday I want to have a son. And a wife who can make him a cowboy costume. Like the one I had, with a little neck bandana. Did you like to play cowboys, Max? Paul kept going, a bobblehead toy, its head wiggling on the dashboard of a truck.

Maybe someday. My niece doesn’t like cowboy games; they’re too loud. Max regretted mentioning Steffi the second the words left this mouth.

How old is your niece? Paul said, enthusiastic about this new opening.

She’s seven. About the same age as that little girl, Max gestured to a girl in a fuzzy blue sweater on the sidewalk in West Berlin, hoping to get Paul back to the task of surveilling the wall.

The girl did not just seem about the same age as Steffi. She had the same messy blonde hair chopped off at her shoulders, the same skinny arms reminding him of bird wings. He always wondered if maybe Steffi would fly off some day, high above the clouds over Vetschau, the farms and forest around it like toys in a train set as she flitted in the sunshine.

He watched the girl through his binoculars as she helped a younger brother ride a balance bike, his feet skimming the ground as he experimented with how fast he could go. They zoomed in and out of the courtyard of their apartment block. The girl’s bike had shiny red and white paint, and a set of playing cards shoved in the wheels to make noise. The tires stopped on command, never slipping out from under her, even when she jerked the bike sideways.

Max ran his hand along the greasy smoothness of the Bakelite handguard on the rifle in his lap. The trigger called him again, whispered how easy it would be to shoot from up here in the guard tower.

The open window at the side of the tower revealed the punks had moved on, huddling around their side of the wall further north.

His hands twitched as he moved to the window, pressing his body against the wall. He centred the group of