Mack Reynolds - Once Departed

He had no illusion now about Grete Stahlecker being able to control it, now that it was in the heat of mortal combat. Nothing could control it. Of that he was sure.

The monster came lumbering in, perhaps more slowly now, or perhaps that was Quentin Jones’ wishful thinking. He hit it with the eleventh Kata, Okinawa style, attacking the groin again, chopping its shoulder in a judo chop, then darting away.

The thing was shaking its head and staring at him stupidly.

The Doktor was screaming something else now. Something Quint couldn’t make out. He couldn’t stand this pace. The thing was heavy to work with. It must have gone well over two hundred pounds. And it was fast. He had to use top energies, razor edge reflexes, to keep way from it and still punish it.

He moved in again, feeling his weariness. He must take the fight to the foe. Must finish it off, or he was sunk. He could feel his strength melting. He tried the twenty-fourth Kata. Something he had seen professional instructors enact, but which he had never tried.

He screamed, “Zut!” throwing a left block against the other’s left wrist, grabbing the outside of its wrist and applying a temporary wrist lock. He kicked into its groin again with a left forward kick, and with his right hand came down hard with a judo chop to its neck. Still holding the wrist he pivoted behind the now squealing thing and stamped its left knee pit with his right foot, sending it sprawling.

He resumed his position, seemingly at his ease and awaiting further combat. The thing might not know, but Quint Jones was at the end of his resources. All his training told him that he had done sufficient to have killed two or three men. But the thing seemed still strong.

Grete Stahlecker, her face livid, her full madness upon her, was screaming at the creature. “Kill, kill! I order you. Kill him, kill him. It is your master who says, kill, kill! ”

It was on its knees, breathing deep, shuddering breaths. Its eyes went from Quint to the screaming madwoman, and then back again. It had ceased, long since, to mewl its pleasure. It looked into Quint’s face, looked into the easy karate stance he had assumed. Far, far down, he knew he had met defeat, that he could never conquer this new master.

“Kill him!” Grete Stahlecker shrilled.

Her voice irritated the thing. Could she not see? He could not obey. It was impossible to obey. This new master prevailed. Her high voice irritated him beyond bearing.

It lurched to his feet and came toward her.

“No,” Ferencsik said. The Professor had collapsed into a chair. Now he shook his head. “No. She is one of the world’s greatest—”

Quint’s eyes suddenly widened, as he caught the significance. He moved forward… too late.

She never knew. Her vision blurred by hate and hysteria, the thing was upon her and had finished with her, before her hate-fuddled brain could have comprehended. Its clawed hands ripped out her throat, beat in her skull, before she knew its purpose, could comprehend its purpose.

It turned away from her, and sunk to its knees, its hand out stretched toward Quentin Jones as though in supplication. As though supplicating a new master.

Quint, sickened, moved forward, his right hand went up and chopped down, in a single judo blow to the back of the neck.

Quint never remembered, later, how he got to the couch. Perhaps Nicolas Ferencsik had helped him there, half carried him there. All he knew was that reaction, a form of shock, set in, and the black ebbed over him.

He felt, eventually, a stinging of the face. Shook his head. Finally managed, “Cut it out, damn it!”

He could hear Mike Woolman’s voice. “He’s coming out.”

He felt another slap on his cheek, and opened his eyes. “Listen,” he growled. “You do that once more, and I’ll slug you.”

He sat up, and shook his head. “What happened?”

“That’s a good question,” Mike snorted.

Jose Garcia Mendez was there too, and a couple of what were obviously plainclothes men. In fact, Quint vaguely recognized one of them as having been in his apartment several days ago when he was being suspected of Digby’s death.

Garcia looked about the shambles of the room. He said, mildly, “We were hoping you’d tell us, Quint old chum. The professor has clammed up.”

Quint closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again. “Somebody get me a brandy, huh?” When it came, he downed it, stiff wristed. “Where’d you all come from?”

Garcia said, “Your American private eye stories to the contrary, the police do sometimes get results. We’ve been checking out everybody even remotely concerned with this matter. Even our square little schoolteacher, Marylyn Worth. So it turns out that not only does she rent this king-size apartment, supposedly just for herself alone, but the apartment down below as well. So what does an old maid school teacher want with this much space? So we took a look-see, and down below we found one of the most elaborate laboratories in Madrid. With some rather gruesome specimens in the deep freeze. So we thought we might ask Miss Worth a few leading questions.”

Mike bit out, “She was really Doktor Stahlecker, wasn’t she? And that thing…” he motioned with a thumb.

Jose Garcia said, “What a stink this is going to cause. For everybody. Everybody concerned.” He looked at Quint. “Believe it or Ripley, chum. We didn’t know these two characters were in the country. Obviously, they were both eligible for the nut factory.”

Quint rubbed a hand over his mouth. “Let me think.”

Mike said happily, “What a story.”

Garcia winced.

Quint looked at his newspaperman friend. “Considering all the ramifications, maybe the story isn’t quite what you thought. Not quite so complicated. There was a madman…” he looked at Garcia “… we can’t avoid that part of it Too many people are involved. Including his last victim, an American school teacher named Marylyn Worth. But the police caught him at that point and killed him when he tried to escape. That’s the story.”

“Hey, wait a minute!” Mike protested. “You’re not going to get away with that. What happened to Martin Bormann?”

Quint looked at the dead thing on the floor, and shuddered inwardly. “Martin Bormann must have died a long time ago,” he murmured.

“Oh, yeah? And Doktor Grete Stahlecker? You’re not going to louse up the story of the century.”

Quint looked at him. “You’d have a hard time proving that poor girl over there was actually a woman of some seventy years, Mike. Especially in view of the fact that not even Albrecht Stroehlein recognized her. Whether it was because her seeming youth threw him off, I don’t know. Perhaps it was plastic surgery. Whatever, you’d have a tough time proving to your editors this faatastic yarn of Bormann and Stahlecker.”

Mike was plaintive. “What’s your point, Quint? Why not back me up on this?”

The columnist looked at Garcia. “Brett-Home, Digby and Nuriyev were all wrong. They weren’t dealing with a potential try at getting Nazis back into command of West Germany. They were dealing with a mad woman, and a brainless creature, both of whom we ought to have the decency to pity. Both of them should have—and really did—die in that bunker with Hitler, Goebbels and the dreams of the Third Reich. Why give the world one more propaganda item to jitter over? And why louse up Spain’s reputation to the point of sending a few hundred thousand tourists looking for some other bargain paradise? I think you just better make the most of a Jack the Ripper type story, Mike. You’ll have a world beat on it.”

Garcia looked at him. “Thanks, Quint. I suppose you know we’ll be tearing up this persona non grata thing?”