The Beginning Of The End | Pt. 1

Sicily | 1943

6:38A.M

Giving thanks for being responsible, and making sure everyone drank one glass of water for every glass of wine, Garret awoke refreshed. His body still ached from the numerous injuries he sustained from the crash, and his arms, neck, and hands were still bruised, and burned, but his energy was high, and his adrenaline was rejuvenated.

He checked the hands on his watch, and grunted at the time. It was eight minutes past six-thirty. It was an hour later than he had hoped to have gotten moving. The fault, however, was his own.

After they finished the first bottle of rich, fruity red wine - which was stronger than she anticipated - Rosalie suggested that they all claim a bed, and retire for the night. Garret, feeling the influence of the alcoholic grapes, insisted that they drink the second bottle.

“You bought up two bottles. We’re going to drink two bottles.”

That’s the last thing Garret remembered saying before waking up in the middle of the night to use the facilities. He laughed at himself for the foolishness of his drunkenness, then began preparing himself for the day.

They had each chosen a separate section of the house to sleep in, yet still all remaining on the first floor. Garret slept on a thick mattress of sheets and blankets, which turned out to be more comfortable than it appeared. Rosalie, and Corrado both slept on actual mattresses they took from the second floor bedrooms.

Garret entered the living room quietly, as not to disturb them. He knew time was of the essence, and they were already an hour behind schedule. He cleaned up the bottles, and glasses, and struggled with the idea of waking them. They were just kids, and so was he. That was something he could reason with.

He peered back down the hands on his watch, and made the decision to allow them to sleep for another twenty minutes. When the hands reached seven, if they were not already up, he would have no choice but to wake them.

He picked up his M1 rifle from the kitchen table, then took up a vigilant position by the main door.

Watching the road, and the hands on his watch.

…

7:25A.M

Ulrich downed his morning antibiotic, and split half of a pervitin pill with Nadine. They were hiding out in the finished attic of an old leather repair shop around the corner from The Church Of The Holy Spirit. They were waiting for the man to return.

Forty-eight hours ago, the man with the wounded neck helped lift Ulrich, and Nadine into the rear bed of a tarped pickup truck, then brought them into the heavily occupied town center of Canicatti.

The man had smuggled them through two military checkpoints before reaching their final destination. Nadine could only hear broken bits, and parts of the exchanged conversations their mysterious driver had with the armed officers stationed at each of the checkpoints, but she kept hearing them say, Father. It was odd, but she didn’t care because whatever he was saying was working.

Nadine, and Ulrich were then ushered from the truck bed by a group of men dressed as Sicilian priests, through the leather shop’s fortified loading dock. They were brought to the building’s attic, which was set up as an intelligence headquarters. The room was dank, yet spacious, and filled with typewriters, radios, weapons, maps, and tired men chain-smoking cigarettes.

A deep voice, speaking English yet thickly accented with Italian, startled both of them as it came from behind.

“You two will wait here until we are ready. You will be given plenty of food and water, and there are two sleeping cots set up for you both at the opposite end of the room.”

“Who are you?” Nadine snarled.

“A friend,” the man with the neck wound, who was now also dressed as a priest, responded.

She turned to provoke Ulrich to back up her stance, but he was too busy shoving a plate of croissants down his mouth to be of any use to her.

“Do not worry, Nadine,” the man said as he exited the room, closing the door behind him, “You will have your prize soon enough.”

That was two days ago, and Nadine had reached her limit of playing cozy prisoner. Ulrich’s wounds were improving thanks to the antibiotics, and the pervitin was keeping his spirits light and enthusiastic, but she was about ready to kill every single fascist Italian spy in the room. The pervitin was helping her to remain calm.

The door to the attic popped open, and the tall, bearded man who brought them here stepped inside in a hurry - donning a sinister smile which clashed against the priestly garb.

“It’s time. Come with me now.”

“We’re not going anywhere,” Nadine barked, quieting all of the typing fingers in the room with her sharp German accent, “Now listen to me very carefully. You are going to tell me your name, and the reason for why you have brought us here. If you do not, I will kill every Sicilian human being breathing in this room.”

The bearded man cautiously stepped closer to the lioness.

“The time for that will come. Right now you need to trust my instructions.”

Nadine slid to her right with blinding speed, and tore the edge of her dagger through the throat of one of the seated typists.

The rest of the men in the room scrambled to defend themselves with their firearms, but Ulrich had beaten them to his, and had the barrel of his Carcano M1891 bolt-action rifle - which he found in the attic’s armory - pointed at all of their skulls which were nestled between raised arms.

“How many will you allow to die?” Nadine asked as she stepped towards another man.

Sensing that he had been backed into a check-mated position, he wisely divulged just the right amount of information.

“I am a friend. I have brought you here because we seek the same thing.”

“No friend keeps another friend locked inside of an attic for two days,” Ulrich said.

“What is it you believe we seek?” Nadine interjected.

The man stepped closer, keeping his palms held out in front of him.

“The clue to what lies beneath the ash at Mount Etna. We know you’ve been tasked to find it by your Fuhrer. We’ve been tasked by Mussolini to assist. I apologize for the delay, but we’ve been hunting.”

“We do not need your assistance, nor that of Mussolini,” Nadine said.

“We have been watching you. Trust me, our help wouldn’t hurt.”

Ulrich laughed, then lowered his gun. He stepped forward and picked up a still steaming cup of black coffee from one of the desks of the scared typists. He sipped it three times, gurgling after each sip, then gracefully placed it back down onto the desk.

The desk to his left had a buttery slab of brioche bread melting on a ceramic plate. He sank his fingers around the bun’s sticky edges, then stuffed it between his teeth - slapping his tongue off the roof of his mouth with every chew.

Looking for a napkin to clean his fingers, he defaulted to wiping them against the uniform of the man whose throat Nadine slit.

Stepping through the fresh stream of blood on the floor, and past Nadine, Ulrich met the priest eye-to-eye.

“What is it you're hunting?”

“Rosalie Tutino. Corrado Tutino. And that music sheet,” The priest said, “We spotted them in the crowd here during yesterday’s morning procession at The Church of the Holy Spirit. They were being helped by a third man, an American soldier dressed in plain clothes. From there we tracked them to an abandoned home just up the hillside. Unfortunately, because of their escape from the American’s detention, and word of Rosalie being wanted for the killing of an American soldier, the streets were crawling with soldiers. We had no choice but to hold back our operation.”

“The children are here?” Nadine asked with vile excitement.

“Yes. They’ve just left their hideout, and are currently on foot heading northwest. If we leave now, we can cut them off before they get past the checkpoints.”

Nadine turned to Ulrich, who was plucking a cigarette from the pack he stole from the dead soldier’s chest pocket, “Can you hunt?”

Ulrich filled his lungs with nicotine, then blew out the smoke into a thick, silver cloud above everyone’s head. While all eyes ominously watched the shifting, and morphing cloud of tobacco, Ulrich unsheathed his own dagger and brutally stabbed it three times through the chest cavity of the man whose bread he ate.

He walked back over to the priest, wiped the blood from his hand off onto his robe, then stepped past him out into the hallway, “That was for making us wait two days.”

......