BERLIN, GERMANY
1945
AZNAR WAS CADAVER thin when the soldiers brought him out of his cell. His POW uniform hung on him like a scarecrow’s rags, and his face showed fresh bruises and welts.
For all of that, he walked proudly, his head up high. The two Allied soldiers who escorted him held his arms gingerly, as though they were touching a soiled rag.
Simon rose from the chair where he’d been waiting. It had taken many, many favors to get him into the provisional offices of the Allied command. In one pocket, he held all the passes signed by different generals he’d used to reach Berlin. He wondered again if it was truly worth the effort to do this face-to-face.
Simon had spent most of the war in Spain, and like Spain, the Council was officially neutral but sided with the Nazis in every way that mattered. Still, Simon and the others had never given up on any of their investments in the United States. They weren’t alone in that. Many of the biggest German industrial firms maintained strong ties with America even as their soldiers were killing Americans on the battlefield.
Simon had lived too long to put all his money on one fighter.
Aznar was the Council’s official representative to the Nazi leadership. He’d even been given a uniform and his own personal escort. At the time, Simon had assumed it was because the Nazis appreciated the financial help the Council had given them during Hitler’s march to power.
Then, as the war ground on to the Nazis’ inevitable defeat, a friendly colonel on Eisenhower’s staff had given Simon some of the photos taken as the Germans retreated farther and farther back. Photos from places named Treblinka, Auschwitz, and Dachau.
Simon, who thought he’d become untouchable over the years, looked at them and felt his stomach turn. In that instant, he knew what Aznar had been doing while serving the Nazis. He withdrew all financial support from the Nazis and their related regimes. He pressed his contacts in Spain’s fascist government to do the same. It didn’t take much effort. Everyone saw the writing on the wall. The war was almost over; the Thousand-Year Reich ended up lasting five.
The Americans got Aznar just before the Russians stormed Berlin, and a good thing for him, too. The Soviets would have tortured him, and eventually Aznar would have bargained for his life with the only asset he had remaining: the secret of the Water. (The Council had no real connection with the Soviets, which was an oversight Simon would have to correct. He never expected the Bolshevik revolution to last, or that the starving Russian peasants would become one of the victors in the bloodiest war the world had seen yet.) The Americans beat Aznar and starved him, but the Council, with its influence, was able to keep him alive.
Which is to say, Simon kept him alive. Again.
He suddenly felt very heavy, as if all those deaths Aznar had caused were suddenly heaped on his shoulders.
Aznar seemed just as happy as the last time Simon had seen him. If he knew how close he’d come to real death, he didn’t show it.
The American soldiers removed Aznar’s shackles and handed him over to Simon. They did not ask for any paperwork. There was to be no record of this.
“You can go,” Simon said. They seemed only too happy to oblige.
Aznar gave Simon his usual beatific smile. “I don’t suppose you have anything to drink?”
It was too much for Simon. He backhanded Aznar halfway across the room.
Aznar knocked over a chair and came to rest against the wall. He struggled to stand for a long time, and then finally remained on the floor.
It wasn’t from weakness. He couldn’t rise because he was laughing too hard.
“You think this is a joke?” Simon demanded.
“You don’t?” Aznar replied, wiping the blood from his split lip.
“I know what you did. The camps. The experiments.”
“I saw a chance to expand our knowledge, perhaps even duplicate the Water. If I’d succeeded you’d be kissing my feet now.” He looked at Simon, saw the rage there. “Well, no, never that. You have never given me my due respect. That would be too much to ask.”
Simon felt the urge to beat him again, to beat him to death this time, to throttle the life from him. He clenched his fists and forced himself to stand where he was. “Those were not soldiers. They were civilians.”
Aznar shrugged. “What of it?”
“ ‘What of it?’ ” Simon spat back. “You slaughtered women and children.”
“And not for the first time, either. You’ve grown so squeamish over the years, Simon. We once caught babies on our swords. ”
“No. I never did. There are limits, even in war.”
“There are no limits. Not in war, not anywhere on this planet. We are free to do whatever we want, Simon, without the fear of death. There is nothing holding us back.”
“What are you?” Simon asked. “This was inhuman.”
“Inhuman? You’re right,” Aznar said, finally getting to his feet. “I am not human. And neither are you. Humans are here to amuse us, to serve us, and to die for us. We left humanity behind a long time ago. It’s time for you to stop lying to yourself.”
Simon looked at Aznar’s face. Suddenly, he was sick of it.
He opened his coat and took out a wallet filled with cash. He threw it on the floor at Aznar’s feet.
“This is the last thing you will ever receive from us. The Council is done with you.”
That finally cracked Aznar’s good humor. “What?”
“You heard me. I have tolerated you for too long. We’ve lost far better men than you. It’s time for you to join them.”
To his credit, Aznar did not beg. He sounded almost regal when he said, “You cannot do this. The others have a say.”
“The others have already decided. They left it to me.”
“We live and die together. That was our oath.”
“What does an oath mean to someone who’s not human?” Simon said. “You believe you’ve gone beyond morality, beyond limits? Then go. Be on your way. See how far you get without the Water.”
Aznar’s face twisted into the ugliest mask of rage and hatred Simon had ever seen. For a moment, Simon thought he would be foolish enough to attack, to give Simon the excuse to put him down once and for all.
But then the trembling stopped and the smile returned. “You should have done it. You should have killed me here and now. But you can’t, Simon. You are still clinging to the illusion of humanity.”
“Good-bye, Juan. We will not meet again.”
Simon turned his back on Aznar and walked to the door. He was done.
“You’re wrong, Simon,” Aznar called after him. “I will see you in Hell, if not before.”
“You don’t believe in Hell,” Simon called over his shoulder.
“No,” Aznar agreed. “But you will.”