Nikatu

Dear Lois

The odd, brown leather pilot’s cap and goggles made sense now with the mind-numbing, forty-five mile per hours that Josef had pushed the bike to. He wore it with clips undone, streaming in the wind and goggles deflecting the setting sun in away that made Josef appear eyeless. His lower face was covered in patches of stubble that made his face appear filthy. His teeth clutched habitually at a large, half-smoked cigar that had been unlit for hours. And he wore a dingy, brown-leather flight jacket that was adorned with the proper markings of a U.S. Regular.

David was a shocking contrast to Josef, his blond, short hair merely rustled in the torrent. His blue eyes watered constantly from the stinging dust and air. He kept his face incredibly clean of debris and was wearing the black uniform of a high ranking German SS officer. He clutched a packet of documents that were labeled “OBERES GEHEIMNIS” against his chest with both arms, like a man hugging the greatest thing in the world, or a life preserver.

They had been driving through the harsh dead land of Western Russia for nearly a whole day now, the Luftwaffe pestering them constantly with flybys and a whole Panzer platoon trailing neatly behind them. The Russian’s “Scorched Earth” policy had left the land dead and barren which was affecting the two lonely men much more than the well supplied troops behind them. The bike was spluttering, its fuel mostly fumes for most of the journey. The motorcycle rolled to its last coughing stop and the two men remained silent for a few moments, wishing for their escape to return to life.

Josef gave up the wait first, pulling out his trademark silver lighter which was engraved with a picture of the Reichstag in flames and calmly lit his cigar, dragging in a slow death that would take too long anyway. He slowly put his feet up on the handlebars and pulled the goggles down to his neck to watch the sunset.

David came out of his reverie with the first streams of smoke that fell from each of Josef’s nostrils. “So, that’s it huh?” David spoke with a sense of disbelief. The response was given by one of the Luftwaffe’s bombs; the almost casual whistle that was immediately followed by the deafening thunderclap. David ducked into the sidecar, his hands above his head in self-defense.

“You shouldn’t duck, kid. If they actually get close enough with those, duckin’ won’t do a thing.” Josef just stared off at the horizon, taking steady breaths through his cigar.

“Sorry” David replied sounding slightly out of breath. “What do you think the Germans will do with us when they catch us?”

Josef took a long drag of tobacco and exhaled as if his lungs refused to let the smoke go before answering. “They’ll torture us, kid. Get whatever information out of us they want and kill us.” His voice carried a strong, unworried tone.

“You sound as if you believe we’d both hold out.”

“No, kid. You already tear up at the sight of needles…”

“And you can’t keep your mouth shut when your drunk” jested David, hoping to lighten the mood.

The paper on the cigar burned back a little bit more as Josef took in the stale taste of his old cigar, and once more let it out. “I know kid, I know.”

David was made even more uneasy with Josef’s stoic attitude. “So,” he swallowed a hard lump. “Your wife has probably had the baby by now.” The cigar smoldered in calm retort, the man who brandished it, silent. “Lois and I always wanted kids one day.” The smoke clung to the air and distorted the sun making it a wavering dull ember, a reflection of the cigar butt. “What were you going to name it, the kid, I mean?”

Josef rubbed his eyes with both hands. As he replied he pulled out and checked his old colt revolver as if preparing for a last stand. “Holly if it was a girl and David if it was a boy.”

“Think we’ll ever get to meet him?”

“Maybe in heaven, kid.” And with a sudden patient movement he put the gun to the back of David’s head and fired. “I won’t be coming to heaven with you, though, so if you do meet them up there, tell them I love them, so very much.” He wiped away at the tears that streamed from his face now. “If you do that, I’ll make sure Lois knows you love her too, okay kid?” He sobbed slightly as he conversed with the still warm body of his best friend.
When the Germans found the two men, they were both cold from shots to their heads. And in Josef’s left hand he clutched a tear-stained letter that had only four words written on its front.
“Dear Lois, I’m sorry.”

U.S. Regular – A member of the U.S. army, a volunteer. The setting and description are based on World War II.

The S.S. – The brute of the Nazi organization. The S.S. were the soldiers, the police, and whatever else they wanted to be due to their power in Germany at the time.

“OBERES GEHEIMNIS” – German for “Top Secret”

The Luftwaffe – The name for the German air force.

Panzer – A very common WWII tank used by the Germans.

Scorched Earth Policy – After the Germans began their invasion of Russia, the Russians destroyed their own lands as they retreated in order to remove anything that could aid enemy troops. The called this “Scorched Earth” because it mostly involved burning homes, crops and livestock.

Reichstag – A sort of German capital building that was set on fire and became a signal for the larger beginning of Nazi power.

Perad

No ones touched it so i thought that i would have a little look. It is pretty good, in your first paragraph you have a mistake. Miles per hour, not mile per hours.

The story itself is good and is soaked in realism, one thing i think you should do though is remove the air planes. An air plane would use machine guns on a bike as its a tiny target to hit with a bomb. Also Bombs are far more costly.

Also a whole Panzer platoon for one bike does seem like overkill, bear in mind a war is going on and it would be a waste of resources if a whole platoon was pulled away from the front line. Maybe a several armoured cars would give chase. This is must my opinion on the matter.

You may want to extend it by a line or two to explain where they stopped. I wasn't exactly sure, i wouldn't shoot myself unless the enemy were literally upon me, i would at least try to run a little.

It was an enjoyable read though and I hope you post a few more things here.

gohn67

Hey Nikatu,
I liked it.

Great Descriptions.

I liked the somber dialogue, like they knew the end was coming soon.

Plotwise, I guess they stole some top secret German papers, and they are running away. So they sent a bunch of tanks to chase them, which I agree with Perad, maybe a bit too many. And why tanks? They are slow. Why didn't they send guys in Jeeps?

And the ending. I guess he killed him because he knew that David, would object to killing himself, if asked to. And that was why he did it. I think you did a pretty good job showing that. Showing that Jacob is older more expereinced, while David is young with alot of enthusiasm still.
I don't know why he thinks he'll go to, I guess "Hell" because he did that.

Here are some comments as I read

Adj overkill here. Plus I think odd is a pretty weak and telling adj. How is it odd?
How do bikes go 45 mph? That's fast.
Nice starting sentnece though.

Very nice image.

Well, I assume you are writing this in an omnipresent POV, but if you weren't some of the details here would not work for third person. Say it was in Josef's pov, the detail of not being able to see his eyes, would not work, since there would be no way Josef could notice that. And also his facial hair, he would not notice.

But in Omnipresent this works though.
I like how you were able to make the story not feel so distant despite using an Omnipresent POV.

Interesting. Seems like a pattern from the first sentence.

You have to do one or the other.
IE - brown-leather or brown leather.

How would one keep their face clean of debris, driving on a bike at 45 mph.

Use one simile or the other.

Driving? AH motorcylces. I thought they were on bikes the whole time.

Yeah, I already know that the land is dead and barren from the previous sentence in this paragraph. Repetive.

second your = you're

Nice sentence. I like it.

Can remove this adj. It is useless in my opinion. Since I think that sob, is like slightly crying.

Nice foreshadow.

Good job. I liked this story.

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Nikatu

Thank you for your comments on this piece of course, and I can see where you are coming from on almost every one. I didn't relize i'd made some of those simple mistakes in my proofreading (the reason i try to have my friend edit my work before i submit it generally, he catches those things as well as you guys do).

But i do have some small questions on your comments.

Here you seemed to think that by bike I meant Bicylce rather than Motorcycle... I thought the 45 MPH would have made that obvious, but later you recant on your opinion. So more or less I was simply wondering if you had made an error or if it my word choice in the story's open needed some reworking.

What i meant here was that, unlike Jacob, David was cleanly shaven constantly. I guess I could rewrite that part but I didn't want to use the word stubble again. If u have any suggestions for it, by all means suggest.

As for the tanks, I do see your point (I was busy thinking about Hitler's general millitary foolishness), it would be fairly stupid to send out so many tanks after two men. And as for the Luftwaffe bombing... yeah, I know, I knew that when I wrote it lol. I just really liked the part when David ducks into the sidecar from a bomb's "retort." Any idea on how to edit that without losing the description or making it meaningless?

And lastly of course, I'm very happy you liked it. Of the three I submitted this was my favoritte piece to write. I felt it was the sadddest of the three (even though two little kids die in "The Third Bell" I never felt it was a personal death like in this one) and able to draw out the most emotional response. The Third Bell was actually my least favoritte... it was fun... but not as great as this one or The World on a String...

Overall I've always found a great liking for the characters I have in this story and I've toyed with the idea of writing other portions of it, other adventures of these two characters (all to come before this event of course lol)... Like explaining how David became a spy, how he got caught, the history of Josef, yada yada yada.

I've so far only had a chance to submit, though i can't wait to find something I would enjoy to review (haven't had much time yet to search, busy with many other things). I'll look forward to further reviews from you and will prolly go ahead and see if i can find anything of yours which is in dire need of comment, although I will stick to things that are lacking in comments first... everyone deserves a critic.

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gohn67

I think I just made an error in my reading. It seems like Perad understood that part fine, so unless other people bring it up, then I'd just keep it the same.

Maybe Clean Shaven? That's the best I can think of.

That'd be interesting. Something I would be interested in reading about.

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