The fact that they have used an
outdated
transport van this time, was just because only two prisoners
had to be transferred to Bonn.
had to be transferred to Bonn.
Orwell - 1984
Tac!
Tac!
Tad", it echoed through the small forest and
the four men continued to shoot at the windshield and the
tires of the vehicle.
With a loud clank, the windows of the transport van bursted
and it turned out in hurling. Then the damaged vehicle
stopped.
„Kill these rats! ", screamed a masked men and fired at the
driver's cab. One of the two officials in the forepart of the
van got a headshot and an enormous bloodstain spreaded
over the headrest of his seat. Another policeman was also
hit in the arm and tried to find cover behind the engine
mount, searching for his weapon in panic. The third tore up
the passenger door and fired wildly at the masked attackers.
A salvo of two assault rifles finally sent him to the ground.
Meanwhile, the four men had come so close to the vehicle,
that they could also fire from the side at the policeman, who
huddled between the seats. One of the men raised his rifle
and executed the official with an angry burst.
. . Destroy the detector! ", screamed one of the masked men
and the guy, who was called Sven by the others, jumped
forward and shot with his pistol at a radio-like thing in the
front part of the transporter.
„Bolt cutters! Hurry! Hurry! ", he yelled and the four men ran
to the backdoor of the vehicle.
The sound of gunfire, coming from outside, had not been
unnoticed by the two police officers, who guarded Frank
Kohlhaas and Alf Baumer. Even patient 111-F-47 seemed
to have briefly lost his mental confusion and looked around
with surprise.
51
„What the hell goes on there? ", said one of the officers,
loading his shotgun. Then he opened the door of the van's
back area. The other policeman followed him.
„Help me out! ", roared Baumer at the top of his lungs and
gave one of the officers a kick in the abdomen.
In the same moment, the door was broken up and light fell
into the darkness of the back area from the outside. One of
the guards fired out of the van and hit a masked attacker,
who tried to enter the vehicle. The head of the man
exploded like an overripe melon and Frank stared at a cloud
of blood and bone fragments, while he staggered to the
ground.
The remaining three attackers answered with fire bursts of
their assault rifles and killed the policeman, who stumbled
on the street like a bleeding sieve.
Meanwhile, Frank began to cry like a tormented child. He
shrieked in pain and wildly pulled, in an accumulation of
unrestrained rage, on his additional seat belt, tearing it out
of its holder. Then Frank hit the second guard's face with a
high kick and the man tumbled down.
Now the inmate squealed like a pig and started then to
laugh loudly. Finally, the laughter became an insane
screaming. Suddenly Frank's eyes were clear and gory, and
before the three other masked men had come into the back
area of the vehicle, he had sent the last policeman to the
ground with a headbutt. His hands were still bound on his
back, but he stomped on the guard's face and the man
broke down again.
Frank swooped down on him and bit in his cheek like a wild
animal. A shot from a handgun followed, which had almost
hit the crazy Kohlhaas - then also the last policeman was
dead. Frank howled and still kicked several times in the
head of the dying man. The other men finally pulled him out
of the van. His white dress was blood-smeared and Frank
52
reminded the masked men, who confusedly stood in front of
him, rather of a mad butcher than a prisoner. Now he
seemed to fall in a state of blankness again and sat down,
totally exhausted, on the metallic stairs of the transport
vehicle.
„Well, what's up now, man? Come on! Or do you want to
wait for the next policemen? ", asked Alf.
Baumer trailed him and followed the three other men into
the forest. Now it was important to hurry, because the
operation had lasted far too long and, moreover, such a
slaughter hadn't been planned.
Furthermore, they had lost a man and it was just luck that
no other car had come along the country road, otherwise
the bloodshed would have been much worse. The three
disguised men and Alfred, who was trying to propel Frank,
fastly ran through the thicket.
„Move! ", roared one of the three masked men. „Dash it!
What are you waiting for? "
Alf Baumer gripped Kohlhaas at the collar and ordered him
to run faster, but the confused young man still walked slowly
behind him.
„lf your buddy does not hurry a little more, I will shoot him,
Alf! I mean it! ", yelled one of the three men, who was
running ahead.
Alfred stood before Frank, vibrated him and growled: „This
is your only chance, you idiot! If they get you now, you are a
dead man! Come with me, trust me! "
Frank Kohlhaas hadn't been able to trust anyone in the last
months and the mental bleeding, the holo cell had
demanded of him, had been enormous. But the word „trust"
sounded like a gentle balsam in his ears, that had only
absorbed poison for such a long time. The fresh cold forest
air, he was inhaling now, slowly showed him that this
opportunity to attain freedom, should not be thrown away.
53
Suddenly he ran, ran and ran, catched up with the others
and disappeared with them in the thicket of the forest. The
five men reached a large field after some minutes, where
were an old looking and small airplane was waiting for them.
They jumped into the flier and shut a rusty door behind
themselves. All were totally exhausted and wheezed loudly,
while the plane took off.
„Who is that guy, Alf? ", asked one of the three liberators
with an unfriendly undertone and pulled the balaclava from
his face. The young man was blond, with short hair and a
boyish face.
J have no notion! He has been transported together with
me! ", answered Alf.
„Tell us your name, man! ", demanded the blond man and
regarded Frank with a searching look.
„Frank Kohlhaas, citizen 1-564398B-278843. . . . ", hummed
Frank and closed his eyes.
„Your citizen number isn't interesting for us, buddy! We
don't need to have this shit! ", hissed the young man, who
was called Sven by the others. „We are free men and no
slaves with citizen numbers. "
„Well, I think this man has been in a holo cell. That's the
reason, why he is so abstracted! " Alf tried to explain.
„Such a cell. . . ", stammered Frank.
„A holo cell? That thing, which is currently tested by the
GSA in all prisons worldwide? Really? ", asked one of the
three rebels with surprise.
„No wonder, that you seem to be on drugs. These things are
the worst instruments of brainwashing of our time. How long
have you been in this hellish cell? "
J think, since August 2027. . . leave me alone. . . ", hummed
Frank quietly and hid his face behind his knees again, as he
had done it so often in the last months. Then he turned to
54
the side and dozed in his usual half-sleep, although the
outdated airplane made a big noise and vibrated during the
whole flight.
In the year 2028, it was not easy to organize an operation
like this, because of the almost perfect air surveillance in
"Central Europe". However, this flier was inconspicuous,
because it had been registered as an outdated, but
nevertheless permitted transportation in the Baltic. If the
plane was scanned by the computer of a satellite or an air
surveillance station, it was just shown as the transport
aircraft of a man called Matas Litov, a Lithuanian farmer, in
the data bases of the European monitoring servers.
The chip card of the plane had been changed by a highly
gifted computer hacker, who had made it perfectly
inconspicuous. But even the arts of this man had their limits,
and one day the constantly improved monitoring could
probably also recognize his tricks.
Anyhow, the authorities hadn't been prepared for such a
brutal attack on a prisoner transporter. And it was also just
luck, that the operation had finally been successful.
Frank Kohlhaas, whose citizen number was no longer of
importance, flew with the others over Poland towards the
the former Baltic states, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Meanwhile, the three abolished national states had been
summarized with other former countries of Eastern Europe
to a single administrative sector.
In Eastern Europe, the complete monitoring of the
population and the entire public life was so far not as perfect
as in North America or in Western Europe. Many states of
Eastern Europe had refused to blindly obey the instructions
of the World Government for a long time. This new power
had been established in the western regions at first and so it
55
just took longer, until a complex monitoring network of
western standards could be installed there.
But the World Government also planned the same extensive
system of total control for Eastern Europe. And it did
everything, to build it up, as soon as possible.
In the year 2028, the British islands were the most sharply
supervised area of the world. Here, the doom had built up
its first strong bastion in the past, from where it had come
over the rest of mankind.
In England, the World Government already tested and
introduced the next steps for global domination. For
example, the complete prohibition of sexual contacts
between men and women, the total destruction of any family
structures, and even a breeding of the population after the
defaults of economic necessity.
Who wanted to fight against this tyranny, was really a
dreamer and had to have a good relationship to his maker,
because the propability to meet him soon, was very high.
Like Alf and his fellows, who apparently thought, that they
could change something. Anyhow, Frank Kohlhaas was with
them now - and enjoyed it. He was just happy to breathe
fresh air and had the feeling, that he had been born again.
How often he had begged the Grim Reaper to come, to end
the torture of the holo cell. But the Gevatter apparently did
not want him yet. Now, everything had changed. . .
56
Outsourced
. . Outsourcing" was one of the infamous terms of
globalization, which had broken loose with all its power at
the beginning of the 21th century. Now Frank had also been
outsourced somehow. He had left the administrative sector
. . Central Europe" and was "stored" elsewhere.
The old airplane flew over the area of the former state of
Poland, over the city of Kaliningrad, the old Konigsberg,
which had meanwhile fallen into ruins, and finally was on its
way to the Southern Baltic, in order to land in a rural area
north of Vilkija, in a little village called Ivas.
The five men were exhausted and hardly noticed the
landscape below them beyond the windows. Frank was still
disturbed and could only occasionally understand, what was
happening to him. He suffered under strange muscle
cramps and was, despite his constant fatigue, not in the
condition to sleep for longer than half an hour.
His eyes were always half open and he felt, as if someone
had put a bag full of cement on his head. After the airplane
had landed, Alf helped him to step out and led him to an
rundown house.
„Can I sleep somewhere, or just lie down? ", asked him
Frank.
„Yes, don't worry! I have found a place to sleep for you! ",
answered Alf and pulled the young man into the building.
„We have to discuss something, Frank. You can rest here -
see you later! ", said Alf and showed Kohlhaas an old bed in
an untidy and halfdark room with a dark red, peeling
wallpaper. Frank turned to the side and tried to sleep. He
hardly made it, but nevertheless, the young man had the
feeling that he already felt better. After he had been in a
57
condition of dozing for some hours, he finally nodded off. He
did not dream about anything. It was just black in his head.
As black as it had always been in the holo cell, in the eight
artificial hours of the night.
Next day. . .
„We have escaped the next cops by the skin of our teeth, as
I think. I feel sorry for Rolf Weinert, a good man, only 29
years old", said Alf to the others. „Thank you, that you have
delivered me from this hell. I know, I always seem to be
hard and tough, but I was also close to the end in "Big Eye".
That other guy is simply wasted, but it would probably be
the same with us all, if they would cage us in a holo cell for
eight months. This Frank is a poor creature! "
„We haven't planned the liberation of a second man, Alf! ",
remarked a young man with red hair.
„So what? What should have been done? Would it have
been right, to let this Frank just die? He would not have
survived one more week in "World Peace", got it? ", returned
Baumer.
„Well, actually the fate of an unknown man is not interesting
for us. The only important thing is our own thing, okay? ",
said another man sternly.
J will care for him. What will he do? Call the fucking
Lithuanian police? ", grumbled Alf with an angry face.
„This is a real problem, Baumer! If the guy becomes a
safety risk, we must kill him. You know about our rules! ",
said a blond man.
„l know that, little boy! You don't need to tell me our
principles! I have already joined our fight in a time, when
you were nothing but a panty wetting baby! ", hissed Alf in
the direction of the young fighter.
58
„Peace, people! You were successful and you are still alive!
Meanwhile, only the big armored busses are used for
prisoner transports since two years. This has been an
exception!
The fact that they have used an outdated transport van this time, was just because only two prisoners
had to be transferred to Bonn. And a bus would have
exceeded the budget for such an unimportant trip. These
new tank-like monsters are not so easy to stop. You need a
rocket launcher or something like that, to bring them to a
halt! ", said a tall man in the background. He was perhaps
about fifty years old.
The man had come later to the small group. His name was
Thorsten Wilden, a former businessman, who had fled to
Lithuania some years ago. Slender, gray haired, with an
oblong face and a remarkable pointed chin. The man
seemed to be very rational and impersonal, and gave the
impression that he had already gone through a lot of
hardship in his life.
. . However, the boy is right. Tomorrow I want to become
acquainted with this Frank. I hope, he won't make us
problems here, otherwise we have no other choice than
silencing him", said the tall man, who apparently had a
leading position is this group of men.
„He won't make problems! Nevertheless, the boy is totally
exhausted! ", meant Alf and rolled his eyes.
„Where is he now? ", asked Wilden.
„ln my house. Thus, I mean, in John's house. He is
sleeping! ", muttered Alf. "I will keep him in sight and I will
also bain for him. Is this enough now? "
"Okay, men! ", shouted the leader of the group. "In the next
days, the good old routine in our village will return for you
all. We have to resow and to do a lot of other work. Alf can
help this new man to recover and I want you, to leave him
alone with this task. By the way, HOK told me, that the
59
release operation has been on TV in "Central Europe",
yesterday evening. We should watch this report, HOK has
recorded everything! "
"Yes, have fun with it, I go home now and want to be alone
for the rest of the day", groaned Alf and left the room.
Dusk was falling and Frank lay between some unwashed
pillows. A great burden slowly fell from his soul and his
mind, which had swollen like a red, throbbing growth. Now
the pain began to fade away. In the next room he heard a
rustle, shortly thereafter loud smacking and the sound of
cutlery on a plate. Some minutes later, his sponsor entered
the room. „You must eat something! Here! " Alf presented
him some slices of bread and two fried sausages.
„Thanks! ", said Frank and ate slowly and leisurely. „You
don't have to worry. Nobody can find us here. We are in
Lithuania. Far away from Germany and this „One-World"
cage called "Central Europe". Eat, and then I let you sleep
again", whispered Alf, trying to calm him down.
It was a weird situation. If Frank would have seen Alfred
Baumer in former times on the street, then he would
probably have gone to the other side. This tall man really
looked boldly and violent, what he surely was, if it had to be.
He gave the impression of the typical criminal, who had
received a life sentence.
Brawny, with a dark, pointed beard, a tattoo at the neck and
a keen look. Frank Kohlhaas looked, however, rather
harmless and even still juvenile at first sight, although his
body was also sturdy. He had a dear face with a button
nose and his good-natured smile was characteristic. Mostly
Frank was kind and peaceful.
But in the production complex 42-B, he had lost control over
his feelings and this time had been one time to often. His life
had almost been destroyed by the consequences of this
60
incident. Compared with Alf, whose face always showed
latent rage and frustration, Frank's countenance could
change, in a case of extreme excitement, from good-
natured to psychopathic. If Frank was really furious, his
green eyes started to gaze into space and he threateningly
perked his dark, broad eyebrows up. Then he looked like a
fanatical preacher, somehow mentally absent, with an
indestructible will and ready for everything.
Only a few people had ever faced this sight so far, but
Frank's angry outbreaks had increased in the last years -
slowly and constantly.
Now, however, the former citizen 1-564398B-278843 was
just glad to be with Alfred Baumer. Although it was a man,
he didn't know at all, but who seemed to be a trustable
person.
Despite Alfs aggressive appearance, a honest core
seemed to be under his hard shell. A feeling of hope
sprouted in the heart of the young man. He clung to Alfs
broad shoulder and murmured quietly: „Thanks, man!
Thanks that you have liberated me! You have saved my
life! "
Some minutes he mutely cried in Alfs arms. Then Baumer
pushed him back gently. „lf s okay. You are welcome here! ",
said Alf, who was simply overwhelmed with so much
sentimentality.
"The others have freed me from this damn prison too. "Big
Eye" would have been my doom as well. They put me two
years in incommunicado detention, luckily, I had not the
pleasure to get a so called "therapy" in a holo cell.
I would have gone to hell there, no doubt. Apart from this,
they don't let you just go, when your time in jail is over. One
or two are also liquidated, if their behavior analysis is too
negative. These damn holo cells have once been an
experiment for perfect conditioning and brainwashing. The
61
former "Mind Control", which the NSA, when it still had this
name, had developed together with many other methods",
declared Alf. "These holo cells will be used against all
prisoners with politically incorrect tendencies one day. You
have been one of the first human guinea pigs. It has just
been interesting from them to analyze, how long you would
suffer this torture. Of course, they knew that you would not
survive this procedure! "
"Fuck these rats! ", said Frank and tried to banish the
thoughts about the terrible time in the holo cell.
"The entire political and historical background can't be
explained in two sentences, above all, if you have never
thought about it before", ended Alf his small speech.
Frank signaled by turning around and pulling the cover over
his head, that he wanted to sleep now. It was 21. 16 o'clock
and the young man was still exhausted and weak. He dozed
for a while and examined the shabby, dark red wallpaper,
then he fell in a deep and restful sleep.
On the next morning, Frank Kohlhaas felt unusually
recovered. He had slept over 13 hours and for the first time
since months, he had not awoken with a start in the middle
of the night. He yawned and noticed that Alf had put some
fresh dresses beside his bed.
Kohlhaas still wore his white prison clothes, which smelled
of sweat and were still covered with dark red traces of the
policeman's blood.
Frank plodded out of his room and noticed that it was very
quiet in the house. Nobody sat in the kitchen, so that he
could look around without ruffle or excitement. Everything
looked very poor. Dirty dishes were piled up in a rusty sink
and in the corner of the room, an ugly mold spot was on the
wall. Indeed, Alf lived in a hovel - if it was his house at all.
However, his housemate seemed not to be here. The young
62
man walked over some old wood stairs to the upper floor,
where he found only a few empty and poorly furnished
rooms. One of them was full of cardboards and wooden
boxes, almost up to the ceiling. But Alf Baumer was
nowhere to be found.
„Where am I here at all? ", thought Frank and scratched his
head.
Since the escape from "Big Eye", he hadn't been in the
condition to think about these strange men, who had
rescued him. Who were they?
He opened the entrance door of the house and stepped
outside, left it open a bit, so that he could come back again,
because he had no key for the ramshackle door. When he
looked down the street, in which Alf s house was, Kohlhaas
saw a lot of further hovels on each side. Some of the
houses seemed to be empty, others had weathered fronts
and in the gardens, a sprouting, uncontrolled growth was
spreading everywhere.
Some of the windows had been nailed up with rotted
boards, probably long ago. One house had even a
collapsed roof. In addition, here and there, one of the
houses had been renovated again and Frank heard the
voices of children out of a side street. He could even
understand their language, it was German.
Nevertheless, the sun shone on all the roofs, whether
desolate or repaired again. But many people didn't seem to
live in this rundown village. Finally, Frank saw two men, who
unloaded crates out of a delivery van. A tractor rattled
somewhere in the distance and a mature woman leaned out
of the window in the house opposite to him.
Frank walked down the road and came to a square, which
probably must had been the center of the small village in
former times. Weed sprouted out of the cracks between the
63
cobblestones, which covered the whole place. Here, in the
center of this ghost town, Frank could see three old houses
with big shopwindows. Two of the large windows were
broken and the buildings looked dilapidated. The
shopwindow of the other house was completely plastered
with yellow cellotape. In the center of the square was a
memorial stone, completely overgrown with all sorts of
grass and bushes. It was surrounded by a wooden fence.
Kohlhaas could hardly recognize the memorial stone and,
apart from this, the inscription on it was in Cyrillic, so that
the man from "Central Europe" could not read anything.
On the stone, a soldier with a helmet and a rifle was shown.
Nevertheless, Frank had already seen this helmet from the
old time in a history book. Furthermore, he was able to
decipher the years, which had been engraved on the
memorial stone: 1941 and 1989.
The young man continued his walk and regarded a
moldered church, which stood next to the village square. Its
roof was damaged and had enormous holes, bricks covered
with moss and lichens lay in front of the rotten, wooden front
door, that was adorned with a hardly recognizable picture.
On the tower was a rusted cross of iron. The winged thing
on the door of the church, which was completely overgrown
with lichens, was probably an angel, that had symbolically
welcomed the people at the entrance of the church in the
old times.
But in a world, that had been left alone by God, perhaps
even this angel had lost his "job" one day. Frank pushed the
large wood door to the side and climbed over a pile of
planks, in order to reach the inner part of the old church.
Dried out leaves, dirt and dust were everywhere on the
ground in front of him. The benches of the old building were
dirty and everything made the impression of being lost. The
altar was also damaged and had small tears and cracks,
64
probably because of the cold of a hard winter. The visitor
finally turned his head towards the ceiling and examined the
wooden frescos on the walls, which also showed traces of
decomposition. Frank beheld some angels, that were
fighting against strange looking demons or something like
that - creatures from hell. Other frescos depicted mother
Maria and Jesus Christ.
"The superstar of Christianity. . . ", said Frank to himself and
smiled cynically. This church appeared old and somehow
also sublime. The chapel had possibly been built in the late
Middle Age, but Frank did not know it for sure. He knew
nothing about history.
But the young man didn't care about the age of this church.
Only one thing was true - the building touched his inner
self, although, he never had believed in anything.
Maybe just because it was beautiful and old. In his previous
world, he had never beholden an old building. Gray
plattenbauten, dirty streets, underpasses and factories were
nothing new to him, but he had never looked at old
churches or castles. This house of God was just like a
memorial of a forgotten time. A time far beyond this dark
age.
The church had probably been the heart of this village for
many decades or even centuries. At this place, the people
had prayed to a higher power, begging it to take care of
them. But in the end, it all had come differently. In the year
2028, mankind was alone, and Frank had never noticed a
higher power, that wanted to protect its children.
„Father, if you exist at all, why have you left us? ", said Frank
quietly to himself and looked at the fragile ceiling of the old
building again. Then he went back to the square.
He walked through the hopeless village for several hours.
Again and again, up to the other end and back. Around the
65
locality were fields and forests, and only a muddy street
seemed to connect it with the rest of the world. The young
man sat down on a bank and looked at the sky, when three
little children, probably those, who he had already heard
before in the side street, ran across the road in front of him.
They briefly examined him and smiled, but Frank didn't take
heed of them.
Somewhere a dog barked in a house, which looked
inhabited. He stood up and passed some vacant, rundown
houses. This village, the renegate citizen had already
forgotten its name, was a bleak place, as Kohlhaas thought.
Nevertheless, he prefered this village to the rotten, former
FRG capital Berlin, his old home. He wouldn't miss the
criminality, the cultural and racial tensions and all the decay,
that was typical for the shabby metropolis, where he had
grown up. Now he was here. In this strange hicktown. . .
„lvas! " Now Frank remembered the name of the village. Alf
had said it several times. Ivas, somewhere in Lithuania. But
what was this for a strange village? Frank Kohlhaas was
puzzled.
Meanwhile, he was tired and his shoes were completely
covered with mud. He finally decided to return to Alfs
house, because the front door was still open, although it
was improbable, that the other villagers would steal from
them. It was not like in Berlin. Soon the day came to an end.
Frank didn't know yet, where he was here.
„ln three days we must leave this house, Frank! I must leave
it too, because it is doesn't belong to me", explained
Baumer after a meager lunch.
„As I already guessed. Whose house is it? "
„lt belongs to another villager, who is currently in Minsk to
buy some things", answered Baumer. „Wilden has said, that
we can live here for a few days. If the owner comes back
66
home, we can surely move to one of the other vacant
houses in the village. "
„What is that for a odd village? ", murmured Frank.
„Wilden will explain it to you tomorrow.
the four men continued to shoot at the windshield and the
tires of the vehicle.
With a loud clank, the windows of the transport van bursted
and it turned out in hurling. Then the damaged vehicle
stopped.
„Kill these rats! ", screamed a masked men and fired at the
driver's cab. One of the two officials in the forepart of the
van got a headshot and an enormous bloodstain spreaded
over the headrest of his seat. Another policeman was also
hit in the arm and tried to find cover behind the engine
mount, searching for his weapon in panic. The third tore up
the passenger door and fired wildly at the masked attackers.
A salvo of two assault rifles finally sent him to the ground.
Meanwhile, the four men had come so close to the vehicle,
that they could also fire from the side at the policeman, who
huddled between the seats. One of the men raised his rifle
and executed the official with an angry burst.
. . Destroy the detector! ", screamed one of the masked men
and the guy, who was called Sven by the others, jumped
forward and shot with his pistol at a radio-like thing in the
front part of the transporter.
„Bolt cutters! Hurry! Hurry! ", he yelled and the four men ran
to the backdoor of the vehicle.
The sound of gunfire, coming from outside, had not been
unnoticed by the two police officers, who guarded Frank
Kohlhaas and Alf Baumer. Even patient 111-F-47 seemed
to have briefly lost his mental confusion and looked around
with surprise.
51
„What the hell goes on there? ", said one of the officers,
loading his shotgun. Then he opened the door of the van's
back area. The other policeman followed him.
„Help me out! ", roared Baumer at the top of his lungs and
gave one of the officers a kick in the abdomen.
In the same moment, the door was broken up and light fell
into the darkness of the back area from the outside. One of
the guards fired out of the van and hit a masked attacker,
who tried to enter the vehicle. The head of the man
exploded like an overripe melon and Frank stared at a cloud
of blood and bone fragments, while he staggered to the
ground.
The remaining three attackers answered with fire bursts of
their assault rifles and killed the policeman, who stumbled
on the street like a bleeding sieve.
Meanwhile, Frank began to cry like a tormented child. He
shrieked in pain and wildly pulled, in an accumulation of
unrestrained rage, on his additional seat belt, tearing it out
of its holder. Then Frank hit the second guard's face with a
high kick and the man tumbled down.
Now the inmate squealed like a pig and started then to
laugh loudly. Finally, the laughter became an insane
screaming. Suddenly Frank's eyes were clear and gory, and
before the three other masked men had come into the back
area of the vehicle, he had sent the last policeman to the
ground with a headbutt. His hands were still bound on his
back, but he stomped on the guard's face and the man
broke down again.
Frank swooped down on him and bit in his cheek like a wild
animal. A shot from a handgun followed, which had almost
hit the crazy Kohlhaas - then also the last policeman was
dead. Frank howled and still kicked several times in the
head of the dying man. The other men finally pulled him out
of the van. His white dress was blood-smeared and Frank
52
reminded the masked men, who confusedly stood in front of
him, rather of a mad butcher than a prisoner. Now he
seemed to fall in a state of blankness again and sat down,
totally exhausted, on the metallic stairs of the transport
vehicle.
„Well, what's up now, man? Come on! Or do you want to
wait for the next policemen? ", asked Alf.
Baumer trailed him and followed the three other men into
the forest. Now it was important to hurry, because the
operation had lasted far too long and, moreover, such a
slaughter hadn't been planned.
Furthermore, they had lost a man and it was just luck that
no other car had come along the country road, otherwise
the bloodshed would have been much worse. The three
disguised men and Alfred, who was trying to propel Frank,
fastly ran through the thicket.
„Move! ", roared one of the three masked men. „Dash it!
What are you waiting for? "
Alf Baumer gripped Kohlhaas at the collar and ordered him
to run faster, but the confused young man still walked slowly
behind him.
„lf your buddy does not hurry a little more, I will shoot him,
Alf! I mean it! ", yelled one of the three men, who was
running ahead.
Alfred stood before Frank, vibrated him and growled: „This
is your only chance, you idiot! If they get you now, you are a
dead man! Come with me, trust me! "
Frank Kohlhaas hadn't been able to trust anyone in the last
months and the mental bleeding, the holo cell had
demanded of him, had been enormous. But the word „trust"
sounded like a gentle balsam in his ears, that had only
absorbed poison for such a long time. The fresh cold forest
air, he was inhaling now, slowly showed him that this
opportunity to attain freedom, should not be thrown away.
53
Suddenly he ran, ran and ran, catched up with the others
and disappeared with them in the thicket of the forest. The
five men reached a large field after some minutes, where
were an old looking and small airplane was waiting for them.
They jumped into the flier and shut a rusty door behind
themselves. All were totally exhausted and wheezed loudly,
while the plane took off.
„Who is that guy, Alf? ", asked one of the three liberators
with an unfriendly undertone and pulled the balaclava from
his face. The young man was blond, with short hair and a
boyish face.
J have no notion! He has been transported together with
me! ", answered Alf.
„Tell us your name, man! ", demanded the blond man and
regarded Frank with a searching look.
„Frank Kohlhaas, citizen 1-564398B-278843. . . . ", hummed
Frank and closed his eyes.
„Your citizen number isn't interesting for us, buddy! We
don't need to have this shit! ", hissed the young man, who
was called Sven by the others. „We are free men and no
slaves with citizen numbers. "
„Well, I think this man has been in a holo cell. That's the
reason, why he is so abstracted! " Alf tried to explain.
„Such a cell. . . ", stammered Frank.
„A holo cell? That thing, which is currently tested by the
GSA in all prisons worldwide? Really? ", asked one of the
three rebels with surprise.
„No wonder, that you seem to be on drugs. These things are
the worst instruments of brainwashing of our time. How long
have you been in this hellish cell? "
J think, since August 2027. . . leave me alone. . . ", hummed
Frank quietly and hid his face behind his knees again, as he
had done it so often in the last months. Then he turned to
54
the side and dozed in his usual half-sleep, although the
outdated airplane made a big noise and vibrated during the
whole flight.
In the year 2028, it was not easy to organize an operation
like this, because of the almost perfect air surveillance in
"Central Europe". However, this flier was inconspicuous,
because it had been registered as an outdated, but
nevertheless permitted transportation in the Baltic. If the
plane was scanned by the computer of a satellite or an air
surveillance station, it was just shown as the transport
aircraft of a man called Matas Litov, a Lithuanian farmer, in
the data bases of the European monitoring servers.
The chip card of the plane had been changed by a highly
gifted computer hacker, who had made it perfectly
inconspicuous. But even the arts of this man had their limits,
and one day the constantly improved monitoring could
probably also recognize his tricks.
Anyhow, the authorities hadn't been prepared for such a
brutal attack on a prisoner transporter. And it was also just
luck, that the operation had finally been successful.
Frank Kohlhaas, whose citizen number was no longer of
importance, flew with the others over Poland towards the
the former Baltic states, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Meanwhile, the three abolished national states had been
summarized with other former countries of Eastern Europe
to a single administrative sector.
In Eastern Europe, the complete monitoring of the
population and the entire public life was so far not as perfect
as in North America or in Western Europe. Many states of
Eastern Europe had refused to blindly obey the instructions
of the World Government for a long time. This new power
had been established in the western regions at first and so it
55
just took longer, until a complex monitoring network of
western standards could be installed there.
But the World Government also planned the same extensive
system of total control for Eastern Europe. And it did
everything, to build it up, as soon as possible.
In the year 2028, the British islands were the most sharply
supervised area of the world. Here, the doom had built up
its first strong bastion in the past, from where it had come
over the rest of mankind.
In England, the World Government already tested and
introduced the next steps for global domination. For
example, the complete prohibition of sexual contacts
between men and women, the total destruction of any family
structures, and even a breeding of the population after the
defaults of economic necessity.
Who wanted to fight against this tyranny, was really a
dreamer and had to have a good relationship to his maker,
because the propability to meet him soon, was very high.
Like Alf and his fellows, who apparently thought, that they
could change something. Anyhow, Frank Kohlhaas was with
them now - and enjoyed it. He was just happy to breathe
fresh air and had the feeling, that he had been born again.
How often he had begged the Grim Reaper to come, to end
the torture of the holo cell. But the Gevatter apparently did
not want him yet. Now, everything had changed. . .
56
Outsourced
. . Outsourcing" was one of the infamous terms of
globalization, which had broken loose with all its power at
the beginning of the 21th century. Now Frank had also been
outsourced somehow. He had left the administrative sector
. . Central Europe" and was "stored" elsewhere.
The old airplane flew over the area of the former state of
Poland, over the city of Kaliningrad, the old Konigsberg,
which had meanwhile fallen into ruins, and finally was on its
way to the Southern Baltic, in order to land in a rural area
north of Vilkija, in a little village called Ivas.
The five men were exhausted and hardly noticed the
landscape below them beyond the windows. Frank was still
disturbed and could only occasionally understand, what was
happening to him. He suffered under strange muscle
cramps and was, despite his constant fatigue, not in the
condition to sleep for longer than half an hour.
His eyes were always half open and he felt, as if someone
had put a bag full of cement on his head. After the airplane
had landed, Alf helped him to step out and led him to an
rundown house.
„Can I sleep somewhere, or just lie down? ", asked him
Frank.
„Yes, don't worry! I have found a place to sleep for you! ",
answered Alf and pulled the young man into the building.
„We have to discuss something, Frank. You can rest here -
see you later! ", said Alf and showed Kohlhaas an old bed in
an untidy and halfdark room with a dark red, peeling
wallpaper. Frank turned to the side and tried to sleep. He
hardly made it, but nevertheless, the young man had the
feeling that he already felt better. After he had been in a
57
condition of dozing for some hours, he finally nodded off. He
did not dream about anything. It was just black in his head.
As black as it had always been in the holo cell, in the eight
artificial hours of the night.
Next day. . .
„We have escaped the next cops by the skin of our teeth, as
I think. I feel sorry for Rolf Weinert, a good man, only 29
years old", said Alf to the others. „Thank you, that you have
delivered me from this hell. I know, I always seem to be
hard and tough, but I was also close to the end in "Big Eye".
That other guy is simply wasted, but it would probably be
the same with us all, if they would cage us in a holo cell for
eight months. This Frank is a poor creature! "
„We haven't planned the liberation of a second man, Alf! ",
remarked a young man with red hair.
„So what? What should have been done? Would it have
been right, to let this Frank just die? He would not have
survived one more week in "World Peace", got it? ", returned
Baumer.
„Well, actually the fate of an unknown man is not interesting
for us. The only important thing is our own thing, okay? ",
said another man sternly.
J will care for him. What will he do? Call the fucking
Lithuanian police? ", grumbled Alf with an angry face.
„This is a real problem, Baumer! If the guy becomes a
safety risk, we must kill him. You know about our rules! ",
said a blond man.
„l know that, little boy! You don't need to tell me our
principles! I have already joined our fight in a time, when
you were nothing but a panty wetting baby! ", hissed Alf in
the direction of the young fighter.
58
„Peace, people! You were successful and you are still alive!
Meanwhile, only the big armored busses are used for
prisoner transports since two years. This has been an
exception!
The fact that they have used an outdated transport van this time, was just because only two prisoners
had to be transferred to Bonn. And a bus would have
exceeded the budget for such an unimportant trip. These
new tank-like monsters are not so easy to stop. You need a
rocket launcher or something like that, to bring them to a
halt! ", said a tall man in the background. He was perhaps
about fifty years old.
The man had come later to the small group. His name was
Thorsten Wilden, a former businessman, who had fled to
Lithuania some years ago. Slender, gray haired, with an
oblong face and a remarkable pointed chin. The man
seemed to be very rational and impersonal, and gave the
impression that he had already gone through a lot of
hardship in his life.
. . However, the boy is right. Tomorrow I want to become
acquainted with this Frank. I hope, he won't make us
problems here, otherwise we have no other choice than
silencing him", said the tall man, who apparently had a
leading position is this group of men.
„He won't make problems! Nevertheless, the boy is totally
exhausted! ", meant Alf and rolled his eyes.
„Where is he now? ", asked Wilden.
„ln my house. Thus, I mean, in John's house. He is
sleeping! ", muttered Alf. "I will keep him in sight and I will
also bain for him. Is this enough now? "
"Okay, men! ", shouted the leader of the group. "In the next
days, the good old routine in our village will return for you
all. We have to resow and to do a lot of other work. Alf can
help this new man to recover and I want you, to leave him
alone with this task. By the way, HOK told me, that the
59
release operation has been on TV in "Central Europe",
yesterday evening. We should watch this report, HOK has
recorded everything! "
"Yes, have fun with it, I go home now and want to be alone
for the rest of the day", groaned Alf and left the room.
Dusk was falling and Frank lay between some unwashed
pillows. A great burden slowly fell from his soul and his
mind, which had swollen like a red, throbbing growth. Now
the pain began to fade away. In the next room he heard a
rustle, shortly thereafter loud smacking and the sound of
cutlery on a plate. Some minutes later, his sponsor entered
the room. „You must eat something! Here! " Alf presented
him some slices of bread and two fried sausages.
„Thanks! ", said Frank and ate slowly and leisurely. „You
don't have to worry. Nobody can find us here. We are in
Lithuania. Far away from Germany and this „One-World"
cage called "Central Europe". Eat, and then I let you sleep
again", whispered Alf, trying to calm him down.
It was a weird situation. If Frank would have seen Alfred
Baumer in former times on the street, then he would
probably have gone to the other side. This tall man really
looked boldly and violent, what he surely was, if it had to be.
He gave the impression of the typical criminal, who had
received a life sentence.
Brawny, with a dark, pointed beard, a tattoo at the neck and
a keen look. Frank Kohlhaas looked, however, rather
harmless and even still juvenile at first sight, although his
body was also sturdy. He had a dear face with a button
nose and his good-natured smile was characteristic. Mostly
Frank was kind and peaceful.
But in the production complex 42-B, he had lost control over
his feelings and this time had been one time to often. His life
had almost been destroyed by the consequences of this
60
incident. Compared with Alf, whose face always showed
latent rage and frustration, Frank's countenance could
change, in a case of extreme excitement, from good-
natured to psychopathic. If Frank was really furious, his
green eyes started to gaze into space and he threateningly
perked his dark, broad eyebrows up. Then he looked like a
fanatical preacher, somehow mentally absent, with an
indestructible will and ready for everything.
Only a few people had ever faced this sight so far, but
Frank's angry outbreaks had increased in the last years -
slowly and constantly.
Now, however, the former citizen 1-564398B-278843 was
just glad to be with Alfred Baumer. Although it was a man,
he didn't know at all, but who seemed to be a trustable
person.
Despite Alfs aggressive appearance, a honest core
seemed to be under his hard shell. A feeling of hope
sprouted in the heart of the young man. He clung to Alfs
broad shoulder and murmured quietly: „Thanks, man!
Thanks that you have liberated me! You have saved my
life! "
Some minutes he mutely cried in Alfs arms. Then Baumer
pushed him back gently. „lf s okay. You are welcome here! ",
said Alf, who was simply overwhelmed with so much
sentimentality.
"The others have freed me from this damn prison too. "Big
Eye" would have been my doom as well. They put me two
years in incommunicado detention, luckily, I had not the
pleasure to get a so called "therapy" in a holo cell.
I would have gone to hell there, no doubt. Apart from this,
they don't let you just go, when your time in jail is over. One
or two are also liquidated, if their behavior analysis is too
negative. These damn holo cells have once been an
experiment for perfect conditioning and brainwashing. The
61
former "Mind Control", which the NSA, when it still had this
name, had developed together with many other methods",
declared Alf. "These holo cells will be used against all
prisoners with politically incorrect tendencies one day. You
have been one of the first human guinea pigs. It has just
been interesting from them to analyze, how long you would
suffer this torture. Of course, they knew that you would not
survive this procedure! "
"Fuck these rats! ", said Frank and tried to banish the
thoughts about the terrible time in the holo cell.
"The entire political and historical background can't be
explained in two sentences, above all, if you have never
thought about it before", ended Alf his small speech.
Frank signaled by turning around and pulling the cover over
his head, that he wanted to sleep now. It was 21. 16 o'clock
and the young man was still exhausted and weak. He dozed
for a while and examined the shabby, dark red wallpaper,
then he fell in a deep and restful sleep.
On the next morning, Frank Kohlhaas felt unusually
recovered. He had slept over 13 hours and for the first time
since months, he had not awoken with a start in the middle
of the night. He yawned and noticed that Alf had put some
fresh dresses beside his bed.
Kohlhaas still wore his white prison clothes, which smelled
of sweat and were still covered with dark red traces of the
policeman's blood.
Frank plodded out of his room and noticed that it was very
quiet in the house. Nobody sat in the kitchen, so that he
could look around without ruffle or excitement. Everything
looked very poor. Dirty dishes were piled up in a rusty sink
and in the corner of the room, an ugly mold spot was on the
wall. Indeed, Alf lived in a hovel - if it was his house at all.
However, his housemate seemed not to be here. The young
62
man walked over some old wood stairs to the upper floor,
where he found only a few empty and poorly furnished
rooms. One of them was full of cardboards and wooden
boxes, almost up to the ceiling. But Alf Baumer was
nowhere to be found.
„Where am I here at all? ", thought Frank and scratched his
head.
Since the escape from "Big Eye", he hadn't been in the
condition to think about these strange men, who had
rescued him. Who were they?
He opened the entrance door of the house and stepped
outside, left it open a bit, so that he could come back again,
because he had no key for the ramshackle door. When he
looked down the street, in which Alf s house was, Kohlhaas
saw a lot of further hovels on each side. Some of the
houses seemed to be empty, others had weathered fronts
and in the gardens, a sprouting, uncontrolled growth was
spreading everywhere.
Some of the windows had been nailed up with rotted
boards, probably long ago. One house had even a
collapsed roof. In addition, here and there, one of the
houses had been renovated again and Frank heard the
voices of children out of a side street. He could even
understand their language, it was German.
Nevertheless, the sun shone on all the roofs, whether
desolate or repaired again. But many people didn't seem to
live in this rundown village. Finally, Frank saw two men, who
unloaded crates out of a delivery van. A tractor rattled
somewhere in the distance and a mature woman leaned out
of the window in the house opposite to him.
Frank walked down the road and came to a square, which
probably must had been the center of the small village in
former times. Weed sprouted out of the cracks between the
63
cobblestones, which covered the whole place. Here, in the
center of this ghost town, Frank could see three old houses
with big shopwindows. Two of the large windows were
broken and the buildings looked dilapidated. The
shopwindow of the other house was completely plastered
with yellow cellotape. In the center of the square was a
memorial stone, completely overgrown with all sorts of
grass and bushes. It was surrounded by a wooden fence.
Kohlhaas could hardly recognize the memorial stone and,
apart from this, the inscription on it was in Cyrillic, so that
the man from "Central Europe" could not read anything.
On the stone, a soldier with a helmet and a rifle was shown.
Nevertheless, Frank had already seen this helmet from the
old time in a history book. Furthermore, he was able to
decipher the years, which had been engraved on the
memorial stone: 1941 and 1989.
The young man continued his walk and regarded a
moldered church, which stood next to the village square. Its
roof was damaged and had enormous holes, bricks covered
with moss and lichens lay in front of the rotten, wooden front
door, that was adorned with a hardly recognizable picture.
On the tower was a rusted cross of iron. The winged thing
on the door of the church, which was completely overgrown
with lichens, was probably an angel, that had symbolically
welcomed the people at the entrance of the church in the
old times.
But in a world, that had been left alone by God, perhaps
even this angel had lost his "job" one day. Frank pushed the
large wood door to the side and climbed over a pile of
planks, in order to reach the inner part of the old church.
Dried out leaves, dirt and dust were everywhere on the
ground in front of him. The benches of the old building were
dirty and everything made the impression of being lost. The
altar was also damaged and had small tears and cracks,
64
probably because of the cold of a hard winter. The visitor
finally turned his head towards the ceiling and examined the
wooden frescos on the walls, which also showed traces of
decomposition. Frank beheld some angels, that were
fighting against strange looking demons or something like
that - creatures from hell. Other frescos depicted mother
Maria and Jesus Christ.
"The superstar of Christianity. . . ", said Frank to himself and
smiled cynically. This church appeared old and somehow
also sublime. The chapel had possibly been built in the late
Middle Age, but Frank did not know it for sure. He knew
nothing about history.
But the young man didn't care about the age of this church.
Only one thing was true - the building touched his inner
self, although, he never had believed in anything.
Maybe just because it was beautiful and old. In his previous
world, he had never beholden an old building. Gray
plattenbauten, dirty streets, underpasses and factories were
nothing new to him, but he had never looked at old
churches or castles. This house of God was just like a
memorial of a forgotten time. A time far beyond this dark
age.
The church had probably been the heart of this village for
many decades or even centuries. At this place, the people
had prayed to a higher power, begging it to take care of
them. But in the end, it all had come differently. In the year
2028, mankind was alone, and Frank had never noticed a
higher power, that wanted to protect its children.
„Father, if you exist at all, why have you left us? ", said Frank
quietly to himself and looked at the fragile ceiling of the old
building again. Then he went back to the square.
He walked through the hopeless village for several hours.
Again and again, up to the other end and back. Around the
65
locality were fields and forests, and only a muddy street
seemed to connect it with the rest of the world. The young
man sat down on a bank and looked at the sky, when three
little children, probably those, who he had already heard
before in the side street, ran across the road in front of him.
They briefly examined him and smiled, but Frank didn't take
heed of them.
Somewhere a dog barked in a house, which looked
inhabited. He stood up and passed some vacant, rundown
houses. This village, the renegate citizen had already
forgotten its name, was a bleak place, as Kohlhaas thought.
Nevertheless, he prefered this village to the rotten, former
FRG capital Berlin, his old home. He wouldn't miss the
criminality, the cultural and racial tensions and all the decay,
that was typical for the shabby metropolis, where he had
grown up. Now he was here. In this strange hicktown. . .
„lvas! " Now Frank remembered the name of the village. Alf
had said it several times. Ivas, somewhere in Lithuania. But
what was this for a strange village? Frank Kohlhaas was
puzzled.
Meanwhile, he was tired and his shoes were completely
covered with mud. He finally decided to return to Alfs
house, because the front door was still open, although it
was improbable, that the other villagers would steal from
them. It was not like in Berlin. Soon the day came to an end.
Frank didn't know yet, where he was here.
„ln three days we must leave this house, Frank! I must leave
it too, because it is doesn't belong to me", explained
Baumer after a meager lunch.
„As I already guessed. Whose house is it? "
„lt belongs to another villager, who is currently in Minsk to
buy some things", answered Baumer. „Wilden has said, that
we can live here for a few days. If the owner comes back
66
home, we can surely move to one of the other vacant
houses in the village. "
„What is that for a odd village? ", murmured Frank.
„Wilden will explain it to you tomorrow.
