Klaus was leaning against a bookshelf, behind him, with his arms folded over his chest. Nikki, though, was nowhere to be seen. She was probably still asleep somewhere. She hated to be woken up, Mathias remembered. If someone had tried, to alert her to Bernhardt’s rescue, it was entirely possible that she’d gone straight back to sleep after muttering, “Nice…”
Mathias’ comrades were keeping their distance from Bernhardt. Everyone, the ones who were there at least, knew of his history with the Military Police Brigade and as an outlaw. With introductions out of the way, they were probably unsure as to how to deal with him.
A young man shrieked, upstairs. The voice had to be Gabriele’s. It was enough to tell Mathias that he had made it.
Unsteadily, using the bookshelves for support, he walked towards the gathering.
Bernhardt caught sight of him and lowered his mug.
“Excellent, glad to see you again.”
“You too.” Mathias glanced up at the ceiling. “How’s he doing?”
“Like I said, barely a flesh wound. They’re taking care of it right now.”
They could hear his voice. Ow, stop that, damn it!
“It doesn’t sound like he’s dying, at any rate.”
Bernhardt nodded. “He likes to exaggerate.”
“Here you go,” Derek said, placing a wooden box to use as a chair.
Mathias thanked him and sat down. He scanned the faces of the resistance leaders assembled before him.
Jodi hesitantly raised her hand and asked, “Sorry, but what happened to Amanda? We heard she was on the run with you, Mathias.”
“It’s likely Rita got her.”
As Mathias recounted the events from the underground reservoir, he couldn’t stop his voice from shaking. The resistance leaders listened with solemn faces. But none showed any extremes of amazement or shock. Comrades being captured was hardly a new experience for them.
Mathias bowed his head. “I’m sorry. I left someone behind again.”
“You did fine! You’re in charge of this organization, I do believe?” Bernhardt indicated their surroundings with one of his usual dramatic gestures. “You’re making progress. Why, that was a sound snap decision! Quite beyond you just half a year ago.”
Bernhardt no doubt thought he was paying Mathias a compliment, but it didn’t help lighten his heart.
“Still, this is a difficult situation,” Derek said, swapping a couple of misplaced books that had caught his eye. “Amanda was Rita’s closest aide. And we know she shows no mercy to traitors.”
“She might end up suffering the same fate as him,” someone noted, looking at Bernhardt.
“Which is why,” Jodi said next, “we should act as soon as we can. Now that we have…” She gave Bernhardt a nervous look as though the chained “plaza Titan” itself were in the room with them. “Mr. Bernhardt? Now that we have him on our side.”
“You’re right,” another leading member said, scratching his head. “We won’t be able to get her out with any of our normal tricks. They’re sure to have tightened their watch now that he’s escaped. No, the only thing we can do now is overthrow the regime. If we pull that off we can get the lass out too.”
By “the lass” he meant, of course, Amanda.
Loud stomping footsteps approached from above. The door to the stairs opened and Gabriele burst in with a bandage over his shoulder.
“The hero returns!”
Nobody responded.
Gabriele pouted, disappointed as he cast his eyes around.
“Nothing? It’s thanks to my valiant efforts that the old guy’s here. I think that deserves a little applause, a few whistles, maybe a speech in thanks─something, right?”
“You did well,” Mathias said in acknowledgment.
“Put some feeling into it!”
“Amanda’s been captured,” Jodi told him with a grave expression.
Even Gabriele’s darkened at this. “Really?”
“Really,” Jodi said.
“We were saying how it would be difficult to get her out via conventional methods. That it was time to do something big.”
“It was suggested, no more,” Derek corrected, studying Bernhardt out of the corner of his eye. “Personally, I’m inclined to agree. Our ranks have grown in the last few months. Killing the plaza Titan might be enough to set things in motion.”
“Well, I don’t like it.” Klaus unfolded his arms. “We should be the ones deciding whether or not we kill the Titan.”
Jodi’s eyes stretched wide. “We rescued your friend.”
“So? No one told me it was on condition of slaying the Titan.”
Bernhardt nodded at this, looking mischievous. “Indeed. I don’t remember ever making such a promise.”
“What?!” Jodi half shrieked.
Mathias knew not to be concerned. Bernhardt was eccentric to the point of pronouncing the idea of killing the plaza Titan as “compelling,” and Klaus was simply against the idea of people taking their assistance for granted.
Bernhardt swept his gaze around the room. He took his time, savoring the focus, the looks filled with anxiety, suspense, hope. Then he breathed out and smiled broadly.
“Not that I see any reason to say no. We could go right now, if you’d prefer?”
The comrades all breathed a sigh of relief.
“We appreciate it,” Mathias said, thanking Bernhardt again.
“It’s my pleasure. As I believe I told you outside the wall, I’m angry at them too. I’m a man who values respect more than anything else. They lack it.”
“Yes, I understand.”
“All right, then.” Derek got to his feet. “Mr. Bernhardt will help us slay the plaza Titan. Once this is done, we call upon Quinta’s population to rise up. Are we in agreement?”
Jodi’s chest was flushed red with excitement. “The sooner we do this the better.”
The others had fire in their eyes as well. No one showed any signs of opposing the plan.
Klaus was still moody with his arms folded, but Mathias suspected he would cooperate when the time came.
“Hey, you guys. I think someone’s here?” Gabriele held a finger to his mouth.
They all fell silent.
Someone was certainly knocking at the door. One knock, followed by a pause and three more knocks, another pause, and one final knock. It was the code of the resistance.
“I’ll go.” Always helpful, Jodi was the first on her feet.
She hurried through the bookshelves. They heard the door opening, and when Jodi returned, it was with Nikki in tow. Mathias was on the verge of taking her through the plan, but when he saw the expression on her face, he stopped himself. There was nothing of her usual easygoing manner.
“I just heard, on my way here.” Casting her eyes on the books piled up on the floor, Nikki drooped her shoulders. “They’ve scheduled a special public execution for this afternoon. They’re going to feed Amanda to the Titan.”
Five in the afternoon.
Mathias and the others stood hiding amidst the crowd under the powerful rays of the late afternoon sun.
After Nikki had delivered her news some ten hours earlier, Bernhardt had spoken up: “Perfect! This is exactly what we needed. We can butcher their authority if we’re able to kill the Titan during a public execution. There’ll be no more reason to fear the soldiers. And if I’m doing this anyway, I hope to do it in front of a crowd. It’ll be much more effective!”
Mathias saw his point, but it felt excessive to carry out their plan in the middle of a public execution. With so many people gathered there in one place…
“People will get hurt.”
“Your plan is to stage an uprising, yes? You can’t overthrow a regime without spilling a little blood. You’d do well to stop pretending otherwise.”
“We don’t have enough time to prepare!”
“It’ll work out if everyone pitches in. You have people throughout Quinta, I hear. It seems the movement has been growing rapidly. You have a hundred now? Two hundred? In any case, it’s better to work on a tight schedule.”
“But it has to be a trap. She’s baiting us!”
“That’s fine. We just need to make sure we don’t fall into it.”
The plaza was already packed full. It was suffocating just to stand there hemmed in on all sides. Vying to get a better view, people were leaning forwards, stretching up, squinting their eyes. There was little conversation but they were clearly fired up. Not for the first time, Mathias felt that things were abnormal. Quinta’s residents lived in fear of being informed on, of being arrested, yet attended public executions with great fervor.
Perhaps it was the need to feel reassured that they, at least, were still safe.
Only the semicircular space before the district hall remained, as always, empty of people. The Titan sat crossed-legged in the center. It wore its usual melancholic look. Even on its haunches, it was two floors tall.
Heavy chains circling its neck, torso, arms, and legs spread out in a radial pattern and connected to mechanisms like the one used to open and close a gate. Each of these was fixed securely to the ground by a number of stakes. There had to be twenty or thirty of the mechanisms. Some had soldiers standing at either side, others didn’t.
Wooden scaffolding, set up in front of the Titan, reached the district hall’s third-floor balcony, the notorious gallows.
Rita, along with her soldiers, had yet to appear. The windows were shrouded by curtains.
They would show themselves soon enough.
With Amanda in tow.
Ready to sentence her to death.
The soldiers had made a special effort to publicize the special execution. No doubt they meant to entice Mathias and the members of the resistance, but even if none of them showed up, such a salient instance of a rebel’s fate was bound to strengthen the regime’s hold over the masses.
In other words, the plan couldn’t fail.
“I must say I’m feeling the nerves!”
Bernhardt lifted his hands above the crowd and rolled his wrists. His handcuffs were gone. Craftsmen sympathetic to the cause had exercised their expertise. Still, and although his hair had been cropped short and his beard shaved as a disguise, anyone who knew his face might recognize Bernhardt.
“Well, it doesn’t show.”
If there was anyone still relaxed among them, it was Bernhardt. Concealed beneath his overcoat were the Vertical Maneuvering Equipment and the specialized blades.
They were some twenty meters from the edge of the crowd. Mathias would have preferred to get closer to the Titan, but that would risk revealing themselves to the Garrison.
“Remember what to do?” he asked Bernhardt.