1635: The Eastern Front (assiti shards) Read online

  Poznan

  "Torture me as much as you want," the American said, his shoulders squared, his expression resolute. "I said it before, I'll say it again. I won't tell you anything."

  Lukasz stared at him. Then, turned his head to stare at the two hussars and two Cossacks who were also gathered around the APC outside of Poznan's main gate. The city's walls were packed with people, eager to gaze upon the enormous war machine that Opalinski had captured.

  As soon as the grand hetman learned of Lukasz's exploit over the radio, he'd instructed the officers he'd left in charge of the soldiers still in Poznan to do whatever was necessary to bring the APC into the city itself. Or, should that prove impossible, to extend the city's walls to enclose the war machine.

  Either project would be massive, especially since the work had to be done before the worst of winter came. They still hadn't decided which one to adopt.

  But that wasn't Opalinski's concern. His instructions from the grand hetman had been to concentrate on the technical aspect of the problem. Could the APC be put in Polish service? If so, how soon? If not-better still, in addition-could the APC be used as the model for the construction of Polish war machines?

  Hence his interrogation of Mark Johnson Ellis, the only up-timer they'd found among the APC's crew when they captured it. All he'd told them initially was his name, his rank-that was well-nigh incomprehensible; what sort of preposterous rank was a "Speck"?-and what he called his "serial number." That was a string of digits that Lukasz had set aside for later study. Perhaps it was a code of some sort.

  Under further questioning by Lukasz as they made their slow oxen-hauled way to the east, the young American had become a bit more expansive, although not on military subjects. He claimed he was not a regular soldier but what he called a "reservist hauled back to duty for another stupid fucking war." He seemed quite aggrieved over the matter, perhaps because he'd recently been married.

  He also claimed-this might be subterfuge, of course-that he was what he called a "civil engineer," not a "grease monkey." He said the only reason he'd been assigned as the APC's "mechanic" was because he was the only one in the crew who knew a "crescent wrench" from a "phillips screwdriver."

  He seemed aggrieved over that issue also.

  Still, despite Ellis' very apparent disgruntlement with the foreign policies of the USE's political leadership-"how many fucking times do we have to refight the Vietnam War in another fucking universe?"-he insisted he was a patriot and would therefore provide Lukasz with no information that might harm his nation.

  As he had just done again. Since they'd been speaking in German, the two Cossacks did not understand what the up-timer had said. Had they understood it, they would have burst into riotous laughter.

  As it was, the two hussars both grinned.

  Lukasz didn't doubt at all that the up-timer would start babbling profusely if he was subjected to torture. But information gotten from tortured men was always questionable. More importantly, Lukasz was almost sure the grand hetman wouldn't want to torture any Americans for political reasons. Poland had done quite well in the war so far, but any realist knew that in the long run the USE was the stronger party in the conflict. Sooner or later, they'd need to seek a political settlement.

  Despite their small numbers, the up-timers were very influential in the USE. From what Jozef had told him earlier, it seemed they were not enthusiastic about the war with Poland, which they saw as the product of Gustav Adolf's dynastic ambitions rather any national interest of the USE itself. Mark Ellis' statements certainly supported that interpretation.

  Would it be wise, then, to infuriate the Americans? Which they most likely would be, if they discovered that one of their own had been badly mistreated by his Polish captors.

  Finally, it might all be unnecessary anyway.

  He turned to the last member of the small party standing by the APC. This was a young Polish nobleman by the name of Walenty Tarnowski. He was in his mid-twenties, about the same age as Mark Ellis, and had been a student at the University of Krakow. He was now teaching at Lubranski Academy right here in Poznan. The reason he was teaching here was because he and a few other young scholars in the Commonwealth were trying to establish a new academic discipline they called "Advanced Mechanics." The University of Krakow was the oldest and most prestigious university in Poland; and, like most such institutions, very set in its ways. It had refused to accept Advanced Mechanics as a suitable subject for scholarly study.

  So, being just as stubborn as they were, Tarnowski had come to Poznan. The Lubranski Academy had been founded over a century ago but was still not recognized as a full university. The University of Krakow restricted that status jealously, and refused to allow Lubranski Academy the right to issue degrees. By accepting Tarnowski and allowing him to create a curriculum, the Poznan scholars were thumbing their noses at Krakow.

  Opalinski thought the University of Krakow was being very shortsighted. Be that as it may, for his purposes and those of the Poland's grand hetman it didn't matter what they thought. The man and the skills they needed were here in Poznan.

  "Can you do it alone?" he asked Tarnowski. Deliberately, he spoke in German, so the up-timer could follow the conversation.

  "The question is whether I can do it. Alone or not, doesn't really matter." He gave Ellis a dismissive glance. "He's a civil engineer, not someone knowledgeable in advanced mechanics."

  "The difference is…?"

  "He designs and build roads. Canals. Dams. Sewers. That sort of thing. Basically, he knows how to assemble dirt and rocks and bricks together in various useful ways."

  "Hey!" protested the up-timer.

  Tarnowski ignored him. "As to your question itself…?I believe so, yes. At least, so far as design is concerned. I doubt if we will have the technical skills and mechanical resources to actually make one of the things. We will have to 'gear down,' as the Americans say. Use what we learn to create something much simpler and more crude, but which will serve Poland well enough on the battlefield."

  The American was now glaring at Tarnowski.

  "Look at it this way," Lukasz said. "Would you rather be tortured?"

  A horse-litter along the Elbe river, in Saxony

  A covered litter carried by horses was a better form of transport than a carriage, anywhere except on the very best roads. Still, it had gotten pretty miserable once they'd passed out of Magdeburg province and entered Saxony. The former elector's realm had never been part of the CPE or the later USE except as a political technicality. Even that, John George had discarded as soon as he could, to his eventual ruin. The roads here were so bad that the litter lurched and threw Jozef about almost as badly as he would have been in a carriage.

  Well, no. That was hyperbole brought on by exasperation. Wojtowicz hadn't gotten a single bruise. In a carriage, he'd probably have broken a bone by now.

  Still, despite the discomfort of the moment, Jozef was in excellent spirits. The solution had come to him before he'd even left Schwerin's city limits.

  Dresden, of course. What better place for a Polish spy to hide in the USE at the moment? It would the last place they'd ever think to look.

  It would be pleasant, too. He'd been to Dresden on three occasions and liked the city.

  More than anything, Jozef Wojtowicz dreaded tedium. At least the time he spent in Dresden would be interesting.

  Linz, Austria

  Janos Drugeth lounged on the river bank, gazing at the Danube. He always found the sight of moving water soothing, for some reason.

  He needed soothing, at the moment. He'd decided to take a break from his exhaustive and seemingly endless round of discussions with the officers in command of the Austrian forces stationed in Linz. He'd forgotten how set in their ways garrisons could be. You'd think that sort of rigid and routinized thinking wouldn't infect soldiers who would be the first to feel the blows if Wallenstein invaded. But it did.

  It was probably the pastries, Janos thought. They were certainly d
elicious. An officer who ate such pastries every morning and evening of every day of the year-which most of them did, judging by their waistlines-was probably bound to lapse into a sugary view of the world.

  Surely the Bohemians would share that outlook, and not invade. They had excellent pastries in Prague as well.

  Janos had brought a tablet and a pen with him. Sitting up straight, he brought them out and began composing a letter to Noelle. He was doing so simply because he felt like it. He wouldn't be able to post the letter for a while since he had no idea where she was at the moment. Possibly Magdeburg, possibly Prague, possibly Grantville.

  That she might be in Dresden never crossed his mind at all. Noelle was a sensible woman. Why would she choose to be in a city that was clearly on the edge of chaos and ruin?

  Chapter 41

  Zielona Gora

  "It happened weeks ago!" Thorsten Engler was a very even-tempered man, but he was feeling decidedly peevish at the moment. You could even say, angry.

  "Weeks," he repeated.

  The radio operator who'd handed him the message was looking simultaneously apprehensive and indignant, the way a man will when he can see he's about to get blamed for something that was no fault of his own.

  Jason Linn put a hand on Engler's shoulder. Not to restrain him, simply to remind him that there was an external world that had an objective reality outside of the swirling furies of his mind.

  "Captain, there's no sense in yelling at Corporal Schwab. He's just the one the message passed through."

  Schwab gave Linn a quick, thankful glance. For his part, Thorsten took a deep breath, held it for a few seconds, and then let it out slowly. He'd first discovered that technique for controlling his temper at the age of six.

  "Indeed," he said stiffly. Just as stiffly, he gave the corporal a nod. "Thank you for bringing me this message, Schwab. You may go."

  After Schwab left, Thorsten lifted the message sheet above his head, as if to slam it down somewhere. But, again, he took a deep breath, held it for a few seconds, and let it out slowly. Then, quite gently, he set the message down on a table in the officers' mess. The table was one of several that had been brought into the large main room of a house very close to the city's center. It was called the "officers' mess," but it was open to what you might call established sergeants like Jason.

  Shaking his head, Thorsten pulled out a chair and sat down.

  "I can't believe they didn't tell me right away. That was weeks ago."

  Jeff Higgins came into the mess. "What was weeks ago?"

  "Caroline was there-in Stockholm. When the queen was assassinated and Kristina almost was."

  Higgins frowned. "I thought you knew that already."

  "Of course I knew. But I didn't know what had happened to her. She was often at Kristina's side. Was she hurt? Killed? There was no news! And with those people in Stockholm, I could hardly assume that no news was good news." The term those people could have been milked for venom.

  Jeff pursed his lips. "Um…?Yeah, I see what you mean. They're still pretty traditional up there. That's a polite way of saying 'medieval.' If you're not royalty, nobility or at the very least some sort of official, nobody will think to mention that 'oh, yeah, and Joe the Butcher got killed too.' I take it she is okay? Caroline?"

  "Yes, she's fine. As it happens-thank God-she wasn't at the site of the crime when it happened. She was still in her room, packing."

  Like many down-timers who associated with Americans a lot, Thorsten was more relaxed about blasphemy than most. Eric Krenz had practically turned it into a art form.

  "So how'd you finally find out?" asked Jeff.

  Engler looked a bit embarrassed. He nodded at Linn, who had taken a seat at an adjoining table. "It was his idea."

  Jason grinned. "He was having the radio guys send queries every other day. Waste of time, of course, because he was sending them as 'Thorsten Engler.'?" Linn jeered. "Who the hell is that? Sounds like a peasant."

  Jeff laughed. "So you finally sent one as the imperial count of Narnia. Don't tell me. I bet you got a response the next day."

  Thorsten finally smiled. "The same day, actually. I sent it early this morning."

  Higgins took a seat next to Linn and folded his big hands on the table. "I'm lucky that way. The radio operators I deal with are CoC on the other end. You think you got problems, Engler? Where do you think my wife is?"

  He didn't wait for their guesses. "Dresden. Guess how she got there?"

  He didn't wait for their guesses. "Plane crash. Never a dull moment, being married to Gretchen."

  Berlin, capital of Brandenburg Province

  "So what's the verdict, James?" Mike handed Dr. Nichols a short glass filled halfway with some sort of clear liquid. Liquor, from the smell.

  "It's what passes for Korn in Brandenburg," Mike explained. "The wine's marginally better, but I figured you'd want something stronger."

  "You got that right." Nichols drank half of it in one gulp, then made a little face. "The stuff in Thuringia is way better. And it's not very good."

  Mike smiled thinly. "Welcome to Brandenburg. And I repeat: what's the verdict?"

  "Can I sit down first?"

  "Oh, sorry. Sure." Mike waved to one of the chairs in his suite. That was one advantage to being billeted in a palace. There was usually plenty of room.

  Nichols sagged into the chair. He looked pretty exhausted. He'd been at the king of Sweden's bedside all day, since early in the morning.

  Some of the doctor's weariness, though, was probably still due to the rigors of his journey here. That had ended two days ago, but Nichols was about sixty.

  The weather had made any sort of plane travel impossible to Berlin. Impossible, at least, for any aircraft with standard landing gear. There had been some days when the weather would have permitted flying, but there was nowhere to land.

  The elector of Brandenburg, George William, had refused let an airstrip be built anywhere in Brandenburg. He claimed that was to protect his subjects from aircraft falling on top of them, but the real reason was simply that he resented all of the side effects of the Ring of Fire. If he couldn't make the cursed Americans vanish, at least he didn't have to let them foul his sky with their cursed machines.

  As bad as the weather had been-and still was, half the time-there'd been no way to construct an airfield in time. And as it turned out, they couldn't use one of the planes with air-cushioned landing gear. There was only one ACLG plane in regular operation yet, because of a shortage of suitable engines, and it was undergoing major maintenance. Even if the airline had raced to put it back together, Mike would have gotten Gustav Adolf to Berlin by then.

  There'd also been a hovercraft used to ferry people and supplies on the Saale that might have managed the job, that Mike had forgotten about. But it wasn't available either. A few months ago, a minerals exploration company had chartered it for use somewhere in the far north.

  So, a horse-litter it had been, at a forced pace across rough terrain and with new rainstorms coming every second or third day. Mike had been exhausted when they finally reached Berlin. James' trip hadn't been as rough, but it had been rough enough for a man his age.

  The doctor stared moodily into his glass. "It's the head trauma that's really got me worried, Mike."

  Mike's eyes widened. "That's…?saying something, given how deadly peritonitis can be."

  "Yeah, but I can help that-some, anyway-with surgery. And the antibiotics we've got should help a lot too. Whereas the head trauma…"

  Nichols shook his head. "Honestly? There's probably nothing at all I can do. Or anybody can do. We'll just have to wait and hope for the best."

  "He's not in a coma, though." That was a statement, not a question. Mike had been with the king throughout the journey from Zbaszyn, and there had been times Gustav Adolf had been…

  Well. Not in a coma. You could hardly say "conscious," though. He'd seemed very delirious.

  "No, he's not in a coma. But there are l
ots of ways the brain can be badly affected that don't manifest themselves in a coma, Mike. He's suffered a serious traumatic brain injury from being clubbed half to death, essentially. The skull wasn't broken, but parts of the brain where he was struck were certainly damaged. Possibly other parts, too."

  Nichols set down his glass and held up his hands as if he were cupping something the size of…?Well, a skull, actually.

  "A live brain has about the same consistency as Jello. It sits inside the skull, which shields it, and it's also sheltered by layers of membranes that are called meninges. It's pretty well protected from most shocks you'd normally encounter day to day. But if your skull gets hammered really hard, then what happens-"

  The doctor suddenly jiggled his hands around, very violently. "-your Jello-y brain is essentially being bounced around against your own skull. The worst damage usually happens to the brain tissue nearest the source of the trauma but you can have damage almost anywhere. Call it ricochet damage, if you will."

  "All right. Assuming for the moment, though, that the damage is restricted to where he got hit, what's your diagnosis?"

  "?'Diagnosis' is way too strong a term, Mike. With this sort of brain injury, there's a lot of guessing at first-and would be, even if we were in the intensive care unit of a major up-time hospital. A lot of the diagnosis of brain injuries has to develop over time, since many of the symptoms are behavioral and-"

  "James. Please. This is not a time for all the complexities and all the details and all the maybes and the we-don't-know-yets and all the caveats or any of that stuff. I need whatever you've got right now, down and dirty. Give me your best guess, if you don't like the word 'diagnosis.' What is wrong with Gustav Adolf's brain?"

  Nichols sighed. "I think his right temporal lobe is damaged."

  "And that results in…?"

  "Assuming Gustav Adolf survives the next few weeks, he might make a complete and quick recovery." He took a deep breath. "What's more likely, though, is that it will take him months to recover, possibly years, and he may never recover completely. Probably won't, in fact, with that bad of an injury."