The Idyll of the Rue Plumet and the Epic of the Rue Saint-Denis

into the house to catch the important people before they had a chance to flee into hidden passages dug into the mountains. The house Elfriede described was a stately manor, but one built over old mines, which the Lichtenlade family had kept as a refuge and escape hastch of last resort. They were so deep, she said, that they could survive a nuclear blast down there. So long as Reuenthal and his men could capture the family before they fled, after that, it was a matter of getting out alive, and bringing the captives back to a Braunschweig safehouse without Littenheim’s men discovering where they were.

Eva, despite saying that she wouldn’t understand any of it, was an intelligent woman, and when she asked questions, they were astute ones: often things that she or Kircheis had wondered about during their initial planning. The one part of the plan that Hilde unfortunately had to gloss over was Kircheis’s role, though only because it hadn’t been decided yet.

“We need a distraction,” she said. “Ideally in the capital, ideally at Neue Sanssouci itself, but anything that keeps Littenheim’s secret police occupied. I don’t know what that’s going to be yet,” she said. “That’s Sieg’s responsibility to figure out. Once we have that in place, that’s when we’ll strike.”

Maybe the hardness in her voice startled Eva, because she looked away. “When you know the date— can you let me know?” Eva asked. “I think… I don’t want to be alone that day.”

“Of course,” Hilde said. She took Eva’s hand and squeezed it in between her own. “Of course. I’ll… send a letter by courier, or come up here to let you know, or something like that.” She laughed, but it was grim. “Everything was a lot easier when the phones weren’t down.”

Eva let Hilde know when her cousin had finally woken up, and Hilde knocked on the doorframe of his room to announce herself, though the door was open and he could see her standing there quite clearly.

“So, you’re leaving,” Heinrich said. His voice was weak, and she wanted to beg him to drink some water, but that wouldn’t have done any good in this conversation.

“Did Eva tell you?”

“You’re dressed to say goodbye,” he said. This was true. She was already wearing her coat and boots.

“Oh, Heinrich,” she said, and came over to his side and sat down on the chair next to his bed. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” he said, though it clearly pained him to say.

“If it’s any consolation, I didn’t plan it and keep it a secret. It was decided after you went to sleep last night.”

He rolled his head towards her, and forced a smile onto his face. “That may be true on a technical level, but you’ve been wanting to leave since you got here.”

“Have I really?”

He laughed, which turned into a wheezing cough. “I’ve never met someone who’d rather be in the thick of things more than you,” he said. “I’m happy for you.”

She picked up his limp hand and held it between hers. “You must want it more than me. I think you always talked so much about what you wanted to do— you rubbed off on me.”

“I want things I can’t have,” he said. “I’m glad you can have them in my stead. I’ll imagine you’re having the greatest time in the city, changing the world.”

“I’m sure it won’t be anything that wonderful,” Hilde said. “Sieg says it’s been difficult in the city.”

“Stay well,” he said. “If it’s dangerous.”

“I should be saying that to you,” she replied.

“I’m a lost cause. You’re not.”

“Heinrich!”

He twisted his lips in an approximation of a smile, though it made the sharp edges of his skull protrude even more. “It’s true, isn’t it?”

“Don’t say things like that— you make me feel bad for leaving.”

“What good would you do by staying? There’s nothing to be done for me except pray,” he said. “But since I’m the only one here who’s the praying type, I’ll have to spend all that effort on you.” He was very sincere, and it deflated anything she might have said if his tone had been wry.

She pressed his hand to her chin, resting her head on it. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ll stay safe. And I’ll be back to visit before any of our plans begin— Eva asked me to come back for that.”

“I’ll look forward to it,” he said. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be alright. Eva’s been good company. As long as you’re not stealing her away with you, I really have no right to complain.”

“Hank would say it’s a human right to complain, and you’ve got as much of it as anybody else.”

“That’s a good maxim. I’ll have to say some prayers for him, too, as thanks for it.”

“Please,” Hilde said. “I think Hank’s doing alright, but maybe we can use all the help we can get.”

“Alright,” Heinrich said with a smile. “You should get going. I wouldn’t want to make you late for the city.”

“You’re so eager to get rid of me.”

“It would be really cruel for me to tell you to stay.”

“Would it?”

“I don’t think you’d listen to me, so you’d just have to feel bad about it the whole time you were gone. That would make everything worse, so I won’t.”

She laughed, and sniffled a little. “Stay well,” she said. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Of course.” He squeezed her hand with as much strength as he could muster, which wasn’t much at all. “Good luck.”

“Thank you.” She put his hand down on the blanket, patted it once in a meekly reassuring gesture, then headed for the door, rubbing her eyes though she wasn’t crying.

When she stepped out of the house into the driveway, she just stopped and looked around herself for a moment before she got into the car. She would be back, but she tried to fix in her mind the peaceful glistening snow on the pines, the dripping sound of it melting in the pale morning sun, and the clear blue sky overhead. She knew she was stupid to be leaving this place— even if nothing was wrong in the city, it was as idyllic as it could get, at least in its surroundings— but she saw Elfriede’s shadow pass across one of the windows on the lower floor, and an involuntary shudder crossed her. She passed it off as a shiver, but hastened to open the door of the car and drive away.

Hilde drove back to the city by herself, and she spent the entire journey ruminating. The further she drove from her cousin’s house, the stronger her relief grew to be away from it. Even aside from all the misery the house contained that she was escaping, she wanted to see Kircheis again. After everything they had done together, it felt almost unbearable to let him be alone in the city.

Her thoughts turned around and around, trying to attack the problem that she and Kircheis had been assigned to think over. What distraction would keep Littenheim’s military police occupied enough that they wouldn’t notice an attack on Lichtenlade’s safehouse? Although Reuenthal had said that he was near certain that he had evaded detection by the MPs so far, Kircheis himself was under some kind of surveillance. This was why the distraction had been handed to him, since whatever he did— if he didn’t go to extreme efforts to hide his tracks— would draw the MPs like flies.

The problem was manpower, of course. Braunschweig’s forces remaining on Odin amounted to fewer than a hundred men, all currently dispersed and in hiding. It would be enough to take the Lichtenlade safehouse, since Elfriede had provided them with plenty of information about its security, but there wouldn’t be enough for anything else.

The simplest thing would be some kind of act of terrorism. Between the two of them, Hilde was sure that they could rig bridges to explode, or find one of Littenheim’s storerooms and burn it to the ground. The trouble was that neither she nor Kircheis wanted to suggest anything that would be extreme enough to actually draw the MPs out in force. They were both somewhat wary of hurting the civilians in the capital city, who were already suffering a great deal of deprivation. The other problem with terrorism— and Kircheis could deny it, but it was true— was that it would almost certainly be fatal for the perpetrator, especially if it was being done specifically to draw the ire of the MPs.

More than anything, this was the reason that Hilde had asked Kircheis to let her come back to the city. She didn’t think that Kircheis wanted to put himself in danger, but if he was under pressure, and saw no other way, he might talk himself into it. There were things in this world worth dying for, Hilde thought, but a distraction was not likely to be one of them.

Hilde left the car on a street in the suburbs, a ways away from the city itself, near to where one of her family’s servants’ families lived. She pulled her jacket tightly around herself, then began her long walk. There was a guarded border around the city, one that she didn’t want to try bringing a vehicle through, and she would have to meet Kircheis on the other side of it. The easiest crossing would be through a frosty little patch of greenbelt between two stretches of highway.

The roads were completely empty, so she didn’t feel any hesitation in hopping over the barrier, jogging across the road, and ducking into the barren brambles in the center of the split highway. From there, she made her way through the trees, watching carefully to make sure no one spotted her as she crept past the small guard encampments on the road. She was well hidden by wood, and no one was paying attention to the greenbelt, so she made it past easily. When the two sides of the highway lifted up off the ground to join a bridge a little way down, Hilde slid down the snow covered slope of the greenway and ended up on familiar city streets. A little ways away was the park where she was supposed to meet Kircheis.

This was still the very outskirts of the city, and the park was completely empty. She passed the time sitting on some children’s swings with her bag in the snow near her feet. Even with just the watery noonday sun, the snow was beginning to melt, and for the first time in months, Hilde felt a stirring of hopefulness that this was almost over. She ran the math in her head— how long would it take for Hank’s ships to get from Iserlohn to Odin? A month or so. They might arrive before spring did, but spring was coming nevertheless.

She wondered how Elizabeth was doing. The plan had always been to leave her in fortified Geiersburg, so that was likely where she was, with her mother. She was sure that Hank would have left them with enough ships and supplies to defend themselves, so she wasn’t exactly afraid of the idea of the Imperial fleets attacking, despite the order from the defeated Iserlohn forces. Although she wouldn’t want to be Elizabeth, trapped in a lonely fortress, Hilde still felt a pang of regret at not being allowed to accompany her. It was better that she was on Odin with Kircheis— but she couldn’t help but wonder about the alternative.

She was shivering from how long she had been out in the snow, and her pants were all wet from tromping through the brush, but Kircheis finally pulled up. He was driving an unmarked pickup truck and had a woolen hat pulled down tightly over his ears. Before he could even get out of the car to help her with her meager luggage, she was already halfway inside, dragging her bag in after her and tossing it at her feet.

“I cannot wait for spring,” she said by way of greeting, flopping back in her seat and luxuriating in the car’s warmth. She turned her head towards him and grinned— something about the situation and what she was doing suddenly striking her as funny. Kircheis’s face crinkled up in his usual beatific smile.

“It’ll come,” Kircheis said. “How was your drive— and getting into the city?”

“Oh, it was fine,” she said. “I’ve just been thinking a lot.”

“It’s hard not to do that.”

“You’d be surprised,” Hilde said. “If you told me I couldn’t come here, I’d have to try to turn my brain off for the next month.”

“You wouldn’t have listened to me if I said that,” Kircheis said. “I don’t think you’re capable of it.”

“I don’t know if that’s a compliment, Sieg.”

“It is.”

“Have you been alright? I feel like we haven’t gotten a chance to really talk in ages.”

“We’ll have plenty of time now,” he said.

“Well— tell me.”

“What do you want to know?”

He was being evasive on purpose. “Have you seen Martin?”

“No.”

“Spoken to him?”

“No.”

“I’m sorry, Sieg.”

“It’s alright,” he said. “He made his choices.”

“I don’t believe you,” Hilde said. “You haven’t really given up on him, have you?”

Kircheis was silent for a long time. In fact, Hilde wasn’t sure if he was going to answer at all, but she waited. “No,” Kircheis said. “I suppose I won’t, until I’m not given a choice about it.” He stared straight ahead of them down the road— empty of all cars, except for a few abandoned ones on the side of the street. “He just thinks I don’t have that choice anymore. I can’t change his mind about that. I can’t make him.”

“I am sorry.”

“I know.”

They drove some more in silence. Hilde kept glancing over at Kircheis, wondering what he was thinking, but his face was quite impassive. Before they left the city’s outskirts, Kircheis glanced over at her.

“Are you sure you want to come with me?” he asked. “I could tell you where the safehouses are instead, and how to get there without being noticed. You wouldn’t be under surveillance there.”

“I want to stay with you,” Hilde said. “That’s why I came.”

He nodded, and they entered the city proper, moving from the vaguely industrial area into the region where shops and apartment buildings commingled.

It looked very different than Hilde remembered, though the snow did a lot to disguise the worst of the damage. Some buildings had burned down, storefront windows had been shattered, but the biggest change was how empty everything felt. Much like Hilde, everyone who could leave the city had done so. Some people couldn’t pick up their entire lives, but enough could that it was very obvious how far the population of the city had shrunk. There were no stores open either, and so little reason for people to be out on the streets. The few people they saw, shoulders hunched and walking with a protective, scurrying gait, all stopped to watch their car go by— one of the few vehicles moving anywhere. They stared at the car with hostile gazes, and some put their hands inside their jackets, reaching for hidden weapons. The first time she saw someone do this, Hilde looked over at Kircheis, looking down his side, and she saw the noticeable bump at his hip beneath his jacket where he carried his own sidearm— the one he had been given by Hank.

“Has it been bad in the city?” she asked. For some reason, she lowered her voice, though of course no one could hear them inside the car.

“Pretty bad,” Kircheis said. “There’s… not much food coming in.”

“Is there any?” Hilde asked.

“Some.” They came to an intersection, and he slowed the car to a crawl so that he could look around and decide which route to take. They were winding a very circuitous path through the city, following some intuition that only Kircheis had about where there was likely to be trouble. “There’s nothing coming in from space,” he said as he picked a direction and went off in it. “But there are still farms down south producing food— it’s just a matter of distribution. Minor nobility who own land on Odin— if they swear fealty to Littenheim he’s happy enough to use them and take their goods, if not, he’s happy to try to steal from them, if he can. But it’s easier to bomb a farm or a factory into nothing than it is to get it to produce for you.” He shook his head. “And what does make in— Littenheim doles it out as favors, or it’s smuggled in through the black market.”

“Have you had enough to eat?” Hilde asked.

“Yes, of course,” Kircheis said. “Braunschweig put plenty of supplies away, at least plenty for his agents on Odin. I wouldn’t have told you to come out here if you were going to starve with me.”

Hilde furrowed her brow. “It’s not like we haven’t done that together before,” she said, thinking about their several day trek across Castrop’s planet.

Kircheis gave her a little smile, but didn’t say anything.

They parked a ways away from Kircheis’s apartment, leaving the car in the lowest level of a parking garage. Vandals had already come through here, and the security gate was smashed apart. Kircheis covered the car with a dirty tarp that had been stashed inside the dumpster Kircheis parked them next to. It was overflowing with old garbage, and Hilde’s shoes crunched over broken glass as she got out of the car.

“Is that really going to deter anyone?” Hilde asked.

“I’ve been lucky so far. But it’s alright. I just need a place to bring it that isn’t the safehouse. This is fine.”

They walked together to Kircheis’s apartment. Now that they were outside in the streets, Hilde couldn’t help but assume the same wary posture as the other pedestrians they had seen. She looked around nervously, feeling like every upper story dark window might have someone unfriendly behind it. She didn’t really enjoy the feeling— she had always considered herself quite brave, and familiar with the city. She stuck close to Kircheis, and was relieved when they finally arrived at his house.

The stairwell up to Kircheis’s apartment was dark, except for the light that filtered in through the windows. There was no power in the building, and Hilde could see her breath rise in clouds.

“I have a solar panel on the roof,” Kircheis said, preempting any question, though she would have accepted any living condition. “It’s enough to live on.”

His apartment, despite how cold it was and the lack of lights on, was just like she remembered it, and she couldn’t help but smile.

“Home, sweet home,” Hilde said.

“I suppose I don’t need to give you the tour,” Kircheis said, but then he did anyway— giving her explanations of how he lived his life without running water (water to the building had been shut off to keep the pipes from freezing, and after that the city’s water supply had faltered in general), and where he kept all his food, and how to power the small hotplate from the battery connected to his rooftop solar panel, and how to stay warm in the cold house.

Kircheis had erected a makeshift tent-like canopy over the top of his bed, to keep the warmth in, by pulling the tall bookshelves to either side of the bed, and draping layers of linens over the top— a plastic tarp and then bedsheets scavenged from who-knows-where, all safety pinned together to hold their shape.

“I usually stay in here when I’m not busy with other things,” Kircheis said. “The ventilation’s not great, but it’s warm.” He held open the curtain of blankets so that she could get into the spacious bed, but she realized her pants were still soaking wet from crawling around in the snow. She pulled open her bag and discovered that her clothes, which had been wrapped around her computer to protect it, were not in much better shape.

“I hate to impose,” Hilde said, “but do you have anything dry I can wear?”

“You’re never an imposition,” he said. He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes like it usually did. “You’re about Martin’s size. He left most of his winter things when he left in the spring.”

“Last spring… Has it really been that long already?”

Kircheis didn’t answer— she hadn’t expected him to— but led her to the empty other bedroom. There were boxes of canned goods on the floor, and the bed had been stripped of linens so that Kircheis could use them for his tent. Kircheis bent down to look under the bed and pulled out a box of folded winter clothes: sweaters and heavy corduroy pants. Hilde picked up one off the top of the pile and hugged it to her chest. “Thanks,” she said.

It hardly needed discussion, but Kircheis asked it anyway. “Do you want me to set up this room for you?”

“And make us both freeze? I don’t think so.” She gently tugged on Kircheis’s sleeve, and they left the empty bedroom.

When she had changed into clothes that were at least dry, if not warm, she joined Kircheis on his bed, and although it was cozy and made her start yawning, they immediately got to work. She set her computer up in front of them, and he spread out a paper map across the bed, and they started to pick apart their options for a distraction in the capital in detail. Kircheis was more familiar with the state of the city than she was, since she had been away for so long, and he pointed out on the map all the major buildings that had already been destroyed, the bridges that had been toppled, and the infrastructure that had ceased to function.

Hilde poked at the map where it indicated a block of power transformers. “Too bad power’s already down,” she said. “That would be my choice, if we had it.”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” Kircheis said. “The city’s been cut off from power, but it’s all nuclear— the plant itself is still technically operational, as far as I know. It’s the transmission stations that have all been interrupted.”

Hilde shivered, only half from residual chill. “And would there be a way to attack it without risking it getting out of hand? I don’t personally want to irradiate the entire city.”

Kircheis looked off above her head. “The MPs have as much reason— or more— to stop that from happening,” he said. “We don’t actually need to cause damage— we just have to get them to come out to stop us.”

“That’s suicide,” Hilde said pointedly. “The ideal distraction would be one where we create a problem that has to be dealt with after it’s happened, because that means whoever causes it can get out of the way, while still keeping the MPs occupied.”

“I know.” He looked back down at the map and pointed at the airport on the edge of the city. “Littenheim’s parked all his remaining ships there, except for a few in the country. What about that?”

“Probably the most heavily guarded place,” she said.

They discussed the merits of different targets for an hour or so, without coming any closer to a conclusion. When Hilde’s yawns grew too potent for even Kircheis to ignore, he stretched and said, “I should go run and get some water, and do my daily message exchange with Rear Admiral Reuenthal. Do you want to stay here?”

“Do you want me to come?”

“You can come tomorrow. It’s not that interesting.”

“If you see the rear admiral, please tell him I said hello.”

“I won’t,” Kircheis said. “I’m just going to a message cache.”

“Where are you getting water from?”

“Littenheim’s soldiers bring it in trucks to a couple places around the city,” he said. “Otherwise, we’d be boiling river water, and there’d be riots.”

“Eugh,” Hilde said. She almost asked where Littenheim was getting the water from, and if that would be a viable target, but then decided that attacking it would cause more problems for the city than it would solve. “Stay safe.”

“I will,” Kircheis said. “We can have dinner when I get back.”

“Sounds good.” Hilde rolled up the map, shut her computer, and then laid back on the bed, pulling the blankets up around herself.

She listened as Kircheis collected the huge empty water jugs, shuffling all around the apartment. He yelled a goodbye to her when he left, and then an eerie silence descended. The whole building creaked and moaned in the wind. Perhaps all old buildings did, but Hilde had never been in Kircheis’s house alone before. The coziness of the canopy bed nevertheless was soothing, and so the unfamiliar sounds washed over her without stirring up any anxiety about being here, in the city.

She drifted in and out of consciousness for some time, not aware of how long it was. She never had been good at napping, and so she didn’t fall into a truly restful sleep. And whatever sleep she had managed to fall into was interrupted by the click of the lock on the front door, and the sound of heavy footsteps that most certainly did not belong to Kircheis. Kircheis moved quite delicately— these steps were thumping, with short strides. The intruder paced around the kitchen, as if intending to wake Hilde up.

She cursed herself for not asking Kircheis if there was any other weapon in the house beside his sidearm. She thought that there must be, though peeking out through the curtains of the bed, she didn’t see anything. The door between the bedroom and the living room was also closed, another heat saving measure, so she couldn’t get a glimpse of the intruder. She crept out of the bed and gave as silent of a search of the room for a weapon as she could. She came up empty handed, not even finding anything suitable as a bludgeon. The only thing she had to hand was the long cable that emerged from the battery pack wired to the solar panel on the roof. She took it, holding it in both hands, hoping it might be useful as a garotte.

She turned the handle of the bedroom door silently, and looked out through the crack. The intruder was sitting at the kitchen table. He had helped himself to one of Kircheis’s cans of tuna, and was eating it with a fork directly from the can. Although he was facing away from Hilde, she could smell it. The man was in uniform— the uniform of the Military Police. He had taken off his hat and laid it on the table near his elbow, the eagle emblem glinting in the watery sunset light that was peeking its way through the kitchen window. At his side on the floor was a plain black messenger bag.

Hilde took a few steps forward, sliding her socked feet across the floor, trying not to breathe. She came within a meter of the man, and he made no indication that he had heard her coming until she raised her garrotte up, intending to lunge and strike, when he said, “Fraulein Mariendorf, are you aware that Lieutenant Kircheis leaves his spare key in his mailbox?”

Rear Admiral Bronner, though he also now only had a lieutenant’s stripes on his shoulders, turned around to face Hilde, who lowered, but didn’t unclench her hands from, her makeshift weapon. She had met Bronner at Leigh’s wedding, and had heard plenty about him from Kircheis besides that, but she didn’t exactly trust him.

“Did he tell you to come here?” she asked.

“Of course not. He’ll be very annoyed that I waited until he was gone to come and pay you a visit.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

“Let’s have a little chat, Fraulein,” Bronner said. He gestured magnanimously at one of the other chairs at the table.

“Are you an MP now?” she asked. She circled to the other side of the table, but she didn’t sit down.

“I’m exactly the same as I ever was,” Bronner said. “A person who likes information.”

“That doesn’t answer the question,” she said.

Bronner’s face was expressive like a mask was expressive, the expression it carried perfectly selected for maximum effect. He smiled. “The basement I usually work out of has found itself occupied, and I found myself temporarily out of a job, along with all of my subordinates,” he said. “I decided that if I wanted to remain on stage, and keep getting fed, I should pick up an understudy role.” His whole countenance changed, and he adopted a countryside accent, of the kind that Hilde recognized from visiting her family’s estates. “And, of course, my lady, when the esteemed Marquis Littenheim came to Odin, he needed someone from his estates to settle in to the Military Police and make sure there weren’t some lingering troubles in that department, didn’t he?”

“You made up a job for yourself?” Hilde asked, somewhat incredulous. “And nobody’s caught you?”

Bronner dropped the accent. “Of course they haven’t caught me. The MPs and Littenheim’s inner circle are all in complete chaos.” He laughed. “Even if they knew I was a fraud, I’m still more efficient than half the idiots over there.”

“How nice to hear,” Hilde said. She stared him down.

“You’re not as easy to bother as Leigh, are you?” Bronner asked. “Pity.”

“I’d like for you to tell me what you’re doing here in Sieg’s apartment— especially if you’re working for Littenheim— or Lichtenlade, if that’s who you’re spying on the MPs for.”

“I’m not working for anyone,” Bronner said. “Or, what was Leigh’s line— he’s working for the Empire’s people? So am I.”

“I find that very hard to believe.”

“Why?” Bronner asked. “If you can believe it from Leigh, aren’t I a far better actor?”

“Commodore Leigh isn’t a liar.”

Bronner let out a laugh— possibly the first genuine emotion he had ever expressed in his life. “That’s very funny.” But he looked at her straight on. “I’m offended that you don’t believe me. After all— Leigh was given to me after he returned from El Facil— and I am not stupid enough to not understand why he was banished from Admiral Merkatz’s tender care. I was supposed to reform him, for the good of this place. Find him a role where his particular talents could do well. And didn’t I? Didn’t I at every single step of the way give him opportunities to succeed, didn’t I vouch for him when he needed it, didn’t I keep him out of harms way when he could have fallen into the darkness? Didn’t I?”

“I don’t know why you did,” Hilde said.

Bronner briefly narrowed his eyes, then shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

They stared at each other from across the table. “What do you want?” Hilde finally asked.

“I came to give you some information, since your friend Lieutenant Kircheis seems reluctant to do anything with the information I have given him.”

“What is it?” Hilde asked.

From his messenger bag, Bronner drew a sheaf of papers. On the top was a photograph— in color, but the scene was so bleak that it almost appeared black and white. The picture showed naked corpses, all men, all ghastly pale and frozen, scattered across the dark asphalt of the highway. Behind them, blocking the road, were the shattered remnants of a road barricade, along with the burnt out husks of several vehicles. Darker smudges of burned rubber remained on the road, showing where someone had whipped their cars into motion. Hilde looked at the photo, trying to recognize any of the dead men.

“I’m not the only one who’s stealing uniforms,” Bronner said, after she had looked at the photo for a moment. “And weapons, and trucks full of Littenheim’s food supply, of course.”

“Martin did that?”

“At least some of Herr Bufholtz’s companions, yes. They’re probably going to use the uniforms to grab more trucks, but I also am certain that they’re planning something much larger, and soon.”

“How do you know?”

“I watch them, as much as I’m able,” Bronner said. “Unfortunately, they’ve made a crucial error.”

“Which is?”

“By attacking the MPs directly, it’s no longer just me who is forced to care about them,” Bronner said. “And don’t jump to the conclusion that I’ve simply reported what I know. I haven’t,” he said. “My information is my own. But someone other than me will be looking for them.”

“And what do you want me— or Sieg— to do with this information?”

“I don’t want the capital to become a scorched wasteland,” Bronner said. For once, his unflinching gaze broke, and he looked out the window at the sunset. “I think the conditions are right for it. Here, Littenheim is starving everyone who isn’t his personal friend. Out in the universe, the scattered Imperial forces are— I’m sure— going to start attacking the lands of Braunschweig’s allies, if they don’t think they can get to Odin. Everyone who heard it knows what that last order from the Iserlohn fleet meant. The people who are suffering from all that aren’t soldiers, aren’t nobility. People are angry, and it would not take much to set this city off, and the rest of the Empire with it.”

“I can’t stop Martin,” Hilde said.

“I don’t expect that you could.”

“So what is it that you want?”

“I want this to end before it spreads,” Bronner said. “I want the MPs to take care of it before it can get out of hand.”

“Is this really what you think Commodore Leigh wants?”

“No, of course not,” Bronner said. “I’m aware that he’s a republican. He’d be sympathetic to your friend’s cause.”

“Then why do you come here pretending like you’re helping him?”

“I am helping him,” Bronner said. “It pains me that you don’t see it, Fraulein. If your friend Herr Bufholtz is in any way successful here on Odin, that only means that it will become Duke Braunschweig’s— and Leigh’s— responsibility to cut him down later. It is far, far better to have this rebellion put down by Littenheim’s men, so that when Elizabeth takes the throne, her hands are clean of the trouble.”

“Commodore Leigh wouldn’t—”

“And if he didn’t, Braunschweig would kill him when he refuses that order,” Bronner said. “I agree that Leigh would have a difficult time putting down a republican rebellion. And that would be the end of him. I, personally, would prefer that not to happen.”

“And if Martin wins?”

“He probably won’t win here against Littenheim, and he certainly wouldn’t win against Braunschweig. It’s not a question of Herr Bufholtz winning. It’s a question of how many other people he drags onto the funeral pyre with him.”

The power cable, still in Hilde’s hands, was wrapped tightly enough around her palms that she had lost circulation in her fingers. Bronner was right, but she hated to admit it. She could see why all of Bronner’s visits to Kircheis had been in vain.

“And why do you think that I can do anything about it?” Hilde asked.

“With the MPs turning more of their focus on Herr Bufholtz’s activities, my ability to watch them is going to become even more constrained than it already has been.” He flipped through his stack of papers and handed Hilde a photograph of a nondescript industrial building, some of the windows shattered. There was an address written in pencil below. “This is where they’re currently located, but they move about once a week, and spread out their leadership across a couple different buildings, just in case.”

Hilde hesitated, then took the photo.

“I want the day and the hour,” Bronner said. “Whatever time they’re planning to make their move, and what move it is they’re planning to make. Find that out for me.”

“Martin is my friend,” Hilde said. “Even if you’re right, I don’t know why you think I would betray him.”

“People have always managed to find their reasons,” Bronner said. “That’s a very old story. Maybe the oldest. Goodday, Fraulein Mariendorf.” Bronner stood, picked up his hat and settled it on his head. Beneath it was the spare key to Kircheis’s house. “You might want to put that back in his mailbox. Or keep it for yourself.”

Hilde scowled at him, and he left through the front door.

Kircheis returned about an hour later, hauling the full water jugs up the steps of the apartment. Hilde offered to help, but he just waved her off. She did at least help him assemble dinner from the stash of canned goods, though her hand kept going to the spare key in the pocket of her pants. They sat down at the table to eat their feast (canned corn, fried up slices of tinned ham, and coffee,) and Kircheis pulled out the letter he had picked up from his message exchange point. He passed it to her, saying, “Captain Oberstein wants to meet with you in a couple days.”

“Me? What for?” Hilde asked. She skimmed the letter that had been left for Kircheis— it didn’t say much other than that.

Kircheis gave a sympathetic smile. “I would assume he wants to lecture you, and ask how our plans for a distraction are coming. I’ll come with you,” he said.

“No, that’s fine, you don’t have to,” Hilde said. “I’m happy to talk to Captain Oberstein— I only met him for the first time at Hank’s wedding. Will Oskar be there?”

“Probably not.” Kircheis pointed at Oberstein’s personal signature on the bottom of the note. “Rear Admiral Reuenthal doesn’t object to you being here, as far as I know, so I guess there’s no reason for him to want to meet.”

“Does Captain Oberstein object?”

“I don’t know why he would.”

“Alright,” Hilde said. “Is it safe to go meet him? With the apartment being watched, anyway?”

“Yes,” Kircheis said. “Our meeting spot is outside the city, and it’s pretty easy to be sure you’re not followed if you’re outside the city limits.”

She nodded.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to come?”

“If Captain Oberstein wants to make sure I’m not being a burden to you, having you come with me would do the opposite of reassure him,” she said. “It’s fine, Sieg. I’m capable of going to a meeting.”

“I know.”

There was a moment of silence between them. Hilde clutched the spare key in her pocket so hard that the ridges dug into her fingers, and then she steeled herself and pulled it out, placing it on the table between them. A flash of instant recognition crossed Kircheis’s face.

“Rear Admiral Bronner also wanted to meet me,” Hilde said quietly.

“Oh.” Kircheis stared at the key, and didn’t say anything more than that.

“Did he also ask you to tell him when Martin is going to make his moves?”

“Yes,” Kircheis said. “But I don’t know why he thinks that I can do that. I haven’t spoken to Martin for a long time.” There was something off in Kircheis’s voice, though.

“Probably for the best,” Hilde said.

“Did he say anything else to you?”

“Not really,” Hilde said. “He tried to convince me, but that was it.”

“He really thinks—” There was a momentary flash of real anger in Kircheis’s voice and expression, one that Hilde had never heard or seen before. He stifled it before he finished his sentence, but it was enough to be alarming.

“Sieg—”

Kircheis collected himself. “Even if I marched myself up to Martin’s hideout, he wouldn’t tell me. Bronner knows that.”

“I don’t know that for sure,” Hilde said. “I think you could convince him to tell you, or find out. Martin— loves you.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Kircheis said. And he said it with such finality that Hilde couldn’t argue. Perhaps Kircheis was right.

Hilde looked down at the key. “Have you reported what Bronner has said to Captain Oberstein and Rear Admiral Reuenthal?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Enough that they know what Bronner has been doing. None of us trust him, but there’s no reason for me to stop talking to him, in case he does say something useful.”

Hilde hesitated. “Does Hank trust him?”

“Yes,” he said with a frown. “But he trusts far too many people.”

That rang true, but it had been the wrong thing for him to say.

Hilde found herself thinking about it that night, long after Kircheis had turned off the single dangling lamp hung in his tented area, and they had both settled down to sleep. Kircheis’s breath was irregular in his dreams, and the calmness he maintained when awake didn’t keep him from tossing and turning at night.

She wouldn’t have said she pitied him, but that was the emotion she felt watching him thrash against his nightmares. She wished that there was something she could do to relieve him of his burden, but she felt suddenly like an outsider, even as she curled up at his side. He couldn’t— or wouldn’t— share anything he really felt. She thought about his uncharacteristic momentary anger, and how quickly he had choked it down, and she thought about the pain in his voice when he talked about Martin’s love. Perhaps he thought it went without saying that he loved Martin still, or perhaps he simply didn’t want to say it to her.

Why had Bronner come to her? Was she really weak enough to be convinced by his arguments, where Kircheis wasn’t? Or was it the other way around?

She pulled the blankets up around her chin, and a terrible thought began to form in her mind.

Hilde went to meet with Oberstein two days later, out in the countryside. Their scheduled meeting time was early in the morning, which went against her instincts for clandestine encounters. She reassured Kircheis once again that she didn’t need an escort and went by herself, though she did take a gun with her. She was hyper-aware of it at her hip beneath her coat. In her nondescript clothing, she felt just like every other hunched-shoulder pedestrian when she walked the city streets, quickly trying to get to her destination without letting trouble follow her. She made it out of the city without problems, sneaking past the guarded border just as the weak winter sun was coming up over the tops of the buildings. She navigated to the address of an abandoned house, and inside the garage found a car waiting for her, which she drove most of the remaining distance. Even though the car itself wasn’t followed— the roads were empty as far as her eye could see— she was still paranoid enough to leave it a mile from the meeting place, and trudge the rest of the way through the snow on foot.

They met in a convenience store, one whose shelves had all been stripped completely bare. The windows and doors hadn’t been broken— either the proprietor had cleared the place out before there was any risk of looting, or any thieves had simply entered through the door, as Oberstein had. Hilde didn’t know if or how he had unlocked it, but it was propped open when she arrived. An aging Dalmatian greeted her at the door, wagging its tail with the sluggish enthusiasm of an old man. Kircheis had told her what to expect, so she scratched its head in greeting and called out, “Captain Oberstein, I’m here.”

The dog led her to a tiny back room, one with a table and chairs presumably for the employees to eat their lunches at. There were old workplace posters stuck up on the walls, and there was a frozen brick of old coffee in the carafe of the machine on the counter. Oberstein sat at the table. Although he was wrapped in a heavy coat, it didn’t make him appear any larger than he was, and his bony wrists showed in between where his leather gloves ended and his woolen sleeves began.

Hilde saluted at the doorway, and the dog wandered away from her to press its head into Oberstein’s side. Oberstein nodded, but did not return her salute. “Good morning, Fraulein Mariendorf.” He had a nasal voice, and no expression on his face whatsoever.

“Good morning, sir,” she said.

He gestured for her to take a seat, and she did. From her bag, she pulled out all the preliminary material she had put together with Kircheis, which currently amounted to a few proposed plans about bombing the nuclear power station outside the city, or attacking the airfield where Littenheim’s ships were sitting. Neither of the plans were ones that Hilde liked, but they had very few options available. She shuffled them around for a moment as she asked, “What did you want to discuss with me, sir?”

“Have you come up with a plan for a diversion?” Oberstein asked, cutting directly to the point. “When I last spoke to Lieutenant Kircheis, he expressed hope that your presence would be beneficial. Additionally, Commodore Leigh has spoken highly of your abilities. I would like to know if we have the issue settled, so that Rear Admiral Reuenthal and I can finalize our own part in this.”

She was somewhat relieved that this appeared to be a straightforward test from Oberstein, though she wasn’t satisfied with any of the plans she had on hand. “I’m glad to hear that Commodore Leigh is confident in me, sir. I hope that I live up to your expectations,” she said. “Lieutenant Kircheis and I have been working on it.”

Oberstein nodded again, and she laid out her plans on the table. “There are two major approaches that we’ve considered. Both of them have their downsides,” she said. She launched into a description of both plans.

Oberstein listened impassively, though he pointed out the flaws in the plans before Hilde could bring them up. She agreed with him that it would be difficult to coordinate the destruction of the ships, though that would be the better target.

“The power plant is a softer target,” Oberstein said. “But I would like to maintain infrastructure where possible. When Braunschweig arrives to take control, he will prioritize keeping necessities functioning.”

Hilde looked into Oberstein’s shiny, false eyes for a moment. “Will he, sir? Or will Commodore Leigh?”

“The latter, though the difference is immaterial at this moment,” Oberstein said. “I believe it is in everyone’s best interests to keep Commodore Leigh’s goals aligned with Duke Braunschweig’s until the end of the civil war.”

“Yes, sir,” she said.

“Were those the only avenues that you are pursuing?”

Hilde hesitated, then said, “Captain Oberstein— has Lieutenant Kircheis told you about Rear Admiral Bronner?”

“Yes,” Oberstein said. “He’s mentioned his position within the Military Police. A useful source of information, perhaps.”

“Did Lieutenant Kircheis tell you what he wants?”

“Yes. I advised the Lieutenant that even if he could be assured of positive results, which he cannot be, it would not be worth wasting his efforts infiltrating a rebel cell. It would be of little use to us, since they are unlikely to be our allies.”

“I see.”

“Why do you ask?”

She hesitated again. “Rear Admiral Bronner wanted us to find out the time when that group will be making their move. I assume it will be fairly soon. It just struck me that since this is going to be happening regardless, and will be a distraction to the MPs, that we might take advantage of whatever it is that they’re going to do.”

He stared her down, and she could see the glinting red traces of circuitry beneath the colored glass of his artificial eyes. “We would not be able to plan without a date,” Oberstein said. “We cannot have our plan resting on chance.”

“I could get a date,” Hilde said. “I might need to offer them something. But I could get it.”

“And this is not because Lieutenant Kircheis wants to help them?”

“No, sir,” she said. If Kircheis knew she had mentioned this to Oberstein at all— she wondered if he would be furious. What would that flash of anger look like directed at her? She steeled herself to face it.

Oberstein studied her face for a moment, then nodded.

Hilde didn’t have too much time. If Kircheis thought her meeting with Oberstein had run too long, he would start to be worried about her failure to reappear at home. She didn’t want that to happen, but she nevertheless had a mission to accomplish.

Back inside the city, she made her way to the address that Bronner had provided. She went there on foot, and waited across the street, lingering in the stairwell on the street that descended into the basement storefront level. It gave her a decent vantage point while remaining unseen. She didn’t think she could wait long, and she kept checking her watch to judge how long she could go before she needed to get back to Kircheis.

The broken windows had been boarded up with plywood, so she couldn’t tell how many people were inside, or what level of the building they were on, but here seemed to be plenty of people coming and going from the house, though this would only be apparent to someone like her, watching every movement near the grey stone building. People came and went one at a time, about every ten minutes or so, alternating which exits they used, and all dispersing in different directions. She didn’t recognize any of them, though she squinted into the dim winter sunlight and studied their faces carefully. The majority were young, her age, and there were more men than women.

She was on the verge of giving up her stakeout when Martin emerged, finally. It had been nearly a year since she had last seen him, and although he looked different— leaner, with close cropped hair and an ill-fitting jacket— she still recognized him easily. It was something about the way he walked. Even though he adopted the same careful lookout for trouble as every other person in the city, he still moved loosely, his arms dangling and his step light. After the momentary elation of finding her target, Hilde found herself angry at him on Kircheis’s behalf. She tried to shake off the feeling as she crept out of her hiding place and followed Martin. It wouldn’t be useful to yell at him; she needed to make a deal.

He walked quickly, but she kept pace, gaining on him until he realized he had a pursuer, and then he broke into a run, dodging down an alleyway. Hilde barreled after him. Of the two, she was the more athletic, though he was more familiar with this area of the city. She chased him for a minute, until his stamina began to flag. She had cornered him in an alley, him standing far in the back near the dumpsters, unable to find a way out, and she silhouetted in the entrance. Martin turned towards her and reached inside his jacket for his gun.

Hilde held up her hands, even as he pointed the weapon (Kircheis’s gun, she remembered) at her.

“Been a while, Martin,” she said. “Put the gun down.”

“Hilde?” he asked. He didn’t lower his weapon.

“Who else would it be?”

“I thought you were in the countryside.”

“Why would you think that?”

“The Mariendorf estate is empty.”

“I’m staying with Sieg.”

“Since when?”

“Do you go by his apartment to check who’s there often?” she asked. “You know he still keeps his spare key in the mailbox for you.”

Martin’s mouth opened silently, but he shut it quickly, getting control of the momentary emotion that had crossed his face. Still, it was enough for Hilde to take pity on him.

“I’ve been there since last week,” she said. “We’re—”

“Planning to take the crown?” he asked. The sneer in his voice frustrated her once again.

“Braunschweig doesn’t have enough people on the planet for that,” she said.

“What are you doing here?”

“You know you’re being watched, right?”

“We’ll be out of this place in a day or two.”

Hilde shook her head. “Won’t help. What you did at the city limits the other day has gotten you much more attention.”

Martin stiffened. “I don’t care.”

“You’ll care when—”

“I don’t want to talk about this,” he said. “You shouldn’t have come here.” He stuffed the gun back into his pocket, and tried to shoulder his way out of the alley past her. Hilde grabbed his arm, and he tried to slip out of his jacket to get away. But she wouldn’t let him go, despite his efforts. She grabbed both of his arms behind his back and hauled him into the alley.

“We’re going to talk,” she said. “Since Sieg can’t, it’s my job to.”

“Let me go.” He tried again to pull himself out of her grip, but she didn’t let him go.

“Aren’t we friends?” Hilde asked.

“Let me go,” he said again.

“I just want to talk.”

“Let me go.”

“Fine. Don’t run.” She released him, and he turned around to scowl at her, but didn’t try to get past her, perhaps because he knew how futile it was. Up close, she could see how much weight he had lost— and he hadn’t had much extra on his frame to lose to begin with. He was quite gaunt. It was no wonder it had been easy for her to outrun and then grab him. There was a granola bar in her pocket, one she had been saving to eat for lunch. She held it out to him as a peace offer. He took it, but didn’t eat it, and instead put it in his own pocket.

“Eat it,” she demanded. “I’m giving it to you, not to your commune.”

“I can see this conversation you want isn’t going to go very well,” Martin said.

“It’s one granola bar. Not exactly easy to share. Come on, Martin.”

He smiled, but didn’t take the snack out of his pocket. “I’ll eat it later.”

Hilde just shook her head. “I should tell Sieg that he should be more worried about you starving yourself to death than getting shot by Littenheim’s MPs.”

“He shouldn’t worry about me,” Martin said.

“He does.”

Martin scowled and looked away. “It’s a waste of his energy.”

“I will do you the favor of not telling him that you said that,” she said.

He was silent for a moment. “What do you want?”

“I need to tell you something.”

“I’m not sure I want to hear it.”

“It’ll help you.”

“I doubt it.”

Hilde stared at him. “You’re planning to do something spectacular soon, aren’t you?”

“I’m not going to answer that question.”

“Alright. I don’t care if you do or not. I know it’s true.” She fished in her bag for her sheaf of papers, and pulled out the top sheet that showed the satellite view of the airfield where Littenheim’s ships were parked. She held it out to Martin, who took it warily. “Braunschweig needs to get rid of Littenheim’s ships,” she said. “Sieg and I are responsible for figuring out how to do that.”

“Why does that matter to me?”

“March fifteenth,” she said, picking a date that she thought could work. “Eight at night. If that changes, I’ll let you know.”

Martin looked her in the eyes. “Why are you telling me this?”

It was easy to lie about that, because the lie was true. “Because I don’t want you to die,” she said. “Whatever you’re planning, do it then. The MPs will be distracted. It gives you… a better chance.”

“And you.” He could have said that with venom, but he didn’t. She was grateful.

“Yes,” she said. “I won’t pretend it doesn’t. But you need the luck more than we do.”

“Does Sieg know you’re here telling me this?”

“No,” she said. “He’s probably wondering where I am.”

“Will you tell him that you’ve made this offer to me?”

Hilde hesitated. “Should I?”

Martin didn’t seem able to answer, so Hilde just held out her hand to him. He took it. Despite the boniness of his hand, he was feverishly warm.

“We are still friends,” she said. “Don’t think we’re not.”

“Good luck,” he said finally.

She nodded, and let him go.