To Steal a Secret

09.52---23rd-November-1014
Erich Rhine exits the forlorn building that was once an apartment. The flat is now covered in dust and debris, leftover from the fighting overnight. Crumbling stone walls and burning wood paints a scene of eerie melody.

He passes bodies of fallen insurgents littering the street, lined across the black asphalt and white snow. The bloody insurrection had burnt itself out, but the hunt is not yet over. Among the dead are missing a certain mathematician. His predators prowl the wasteland labyrinth below, tracking what remains of the enemy.

Driving in his car, he arrived at a barn not far from the eastern winter's market, where the supposed body of the fugitive is found. The Jäger were able to track their movement here, where they had made their last stand.

He parks his car under a tree, by a half-track and an armoured car. Their gunners eye the surrounding landscape, fearing an assault. The gate of the brown barn is wide open, soldiers dotted the scene.

Inside, unmoved from where they had fallen, lie the bodies of the fallen fighters. The farm building itself was littered with holes, no doubt from the parked vehicle weapons outside. There, behind a stack of hay stands two soldiers and two deer bodies, male and female.

He took out the photo on his jacket, comparing their faces. A match, he thought. The professor is dead, so is the wife.

Either fortunately or not, there is no sign of their daughter. No matter, he thought, such child would not understand the inner working of the machine. However, he takes no risk, ordering for the platoon to scour the nearby field and ordering the platoon leader to guard the area for three days.

He was however true, that the child did not understand the machine, for her age is nigh seven.