After another day of observation and planning, the group was finally ready to act.
The three men, Heydrich, Paul and Michael, all wearing black jackets, moved toward the factory. The large building, right next to the water, looked old, many parts even rusty.
"Stay low," Heydrich whispered, slipping forward behind the cover of a parked truck.Suddenly, voices echoed from around the corner.
All three men ducked instantly, pressing themselves against the back of the truck.
Flashlights swept across the mostly empty dock, their beams growing closer.
Paul and Heydrich exchanged a brief look. Both pulled a combat knife from their breast pockets, their muscles tensing.
The voices grew louder, only a few meters away, until the flashlights suddenly turned. The footsteps faded, and the voices became muffled again.
"Didn't we determine their patrol schedule?" Paul whispered, confused.
"Perhaps they change it every day," Heydrich answered, shrugging.
"Perhaps," Paul muttered, creeping forward. The group circled around the building until they stood behind it.
"Only one guard," Heydrich said quietly. "Just as expected. I will take him out."
Heydrich straightened and walked calmly toward the unsuspecting man.
"Hey, is this the meeting point?" Heydrich asked.
The guard raised an eyebrow, instinctively taking a small step back.
"The meeting place? I don't think so, man. You will have to..." he began, but Heydrich's knife flashed before he could finish.
He moved with incredible speed, giving the guard no time to react. Dozens of cuts and thrusts landed in rapid succession. The man gasped helplessly, unable to resist, and collapsed, clutching his bleeding throat with wide, shocked eyes.
Paul and Michael emerged from behind cover and joined Heydrich.
"Good work," Paul said, searching the man for a key.
"Thank God, he had one," Paul added when he found it. He pulled a metal key from the guard's pocket and inserted it into the lock.
The heavy door creaked open as he pushed it, and the group slipped inside, Paul giving a quick gesture toward one of the large cranes in the distance before stepping in as well.
Inside, they found nothing. The entire first floor was almost completely empty. Tire marks on the concrete floor indicated recent movement.
"This is unexpected," Heydrich whispered, raising his pistol as he scanned a dark corner before turning back to the others.
Paul's forehead creased. His gaze shifted to the single truck parked in the vast hall. He stepped closer, eyes narrowed.
"Something is off," he said, reaching for the tarp covering the truck.
That was when they heard a voice coming from somewhere above.
They exchanged glances, then began moving up the rusty metal stairs, slow and careful. Paul gestured for Michael to stay behind and keep watch.
Michael obeyed, muscles rigid with adrenaline.
Again, Paul thought, hearing the sound of coughing behind a closed door.
The metal structure creaked loudly beneath their steps as they approached.
Then the voice came again, clearer now, from the room ahead.
"Nancy, bring me something to drink! Nancy!" the man shouted, followed by another fit of coughing.
Paul's eyes widened.
"That man…" he began, stepping closer. "That man is Klausemann. I'm sure of it." His eyes gleamed with murderous intent.
Heydrich raised his pistol as well, anticipation written across his face.
They opened the door.
Inside was a large office space, a massive table standing in the center. A man sat in a leather chair with his back to them, facing the wide windows overlooking the pier.
"Oh, Nancy, finally," Klausemann said, not bothering to turn around. He stretched out one hand, the other lazily turning a page of the book resting on his thigh.
Then he froze.
The book slipped from his leg and hit the floor softly. Cold metal pressed against his forehead, a sensation he knew all too well.
Slowly, he raised his hands and turned around.
When his eyes landed on the two men standing before him, they flew open in shock.
"This is…" he stammered, lungs seemingly refusing to draw air.
He forced himself to breathe, shallow and uneven, though the fear and fury remained etched into his face.
"How?" he asked, his voice barely holding together.
Yet Paul's face remained cold and unreadable.
"How?" he echoed. "You ask how, Klausemann?" He stepped closer and crouched, meeting him eye to eye. "What exactly do you mean? How I survived the first attempt? The second? Or perhaps the third? Or how we managed to get here, how we stayed beneath your radar and that of the CIA?"
Klausemann's gaze hardened with every syllable, growing colder, more desperate.
"Have you killed all my men?" he gulped, his face turning ghostly pale.
"Your men?" Heydrich replied, sarcasm dripping from his voice. "You mean the single guard at your back entrance? Yes. I slit his throat."
"What are you talking about?!" Klausemann shouted. "Where are the rest of the agents? You're lying!"
"No more games," Heydrich said calmly. "You've lost, Klausemann. Disastrously and shamefully."
He grabbed him by the collar, tightening his grip on the pistol.
"No! No! No!" Klausemann shook his head violently, struggling against Heydrich's strength. Suddenly he coughed again, doubling forward.
Crimson splattered onto the floor.
Paul tilted his head, trying to understand.
Klausemann stared at the blood in disbelief, eyes wide with madness. Then, unexpectedly, he leaned back into his chair and began to laugh. Not with humor, but with raw insanity.
"No, Heydrich," he said, venom in his voice. "I haven't lost. We have lost. All of us!" He spat more blood, staining the chair and the ground beneath him.
Then he screamed in agony, clutching his thigh.
Paul crouched once more, pulling the knife he had buried there free.
"Speak clearly," he demanded, grabbing Klausemann by the chin and forcing him to look up. "What are you saying?"
"He," Klausemann gasped, laughing weakly through blood. "He played us all. Including me. I was disposable after all."
Paul clenched his jaw."Who is he?!"
"He was the one who initiated it all. The plan to kill you. Every plan. The man who took me in when I had nowhere to go. The man I trusted. And the man who betrayed me."
"The man's name?!" Klausemann roared, fully enraged, blood spraying across the room.
"WILLIAM CARRY!"
Paul staggered back, shaking his head as his cold demeanor finally shattered.
I know that surname, he thought, grabbing a nearby bookshelf for balance.
I KNOW THAT FUCKING SURNAME!
The words screamed inside his mind as books toppled from the shelf, crashing to the floor under the force of his trembling grip.
Several meters below, Michael stood unaware of the situation above when a dull beeping reached his ears.
He frowned, searching for its source.
The sound grew louder. Faster.
Then his eyes locked onto the lone truck in the vast hall.
His pupils widened.
He ran.
Nearly slipping, he tore the tarp from the truck. Sweat streamed down his face as horror froze his expression.
He stumbled back instinctively, his head shaking.
Inside the truck were dozens of large crates. One stood open.
The beeping was unmistakable now, rapid and relentless, coming from a metal device surrounded by countless red rods.
At that exact moment upstairs, Klausemann screamed.
"THE TRUCK. YES, THE TRUCK. HE WANTS TO KILL US ALL!"
In a cruel alignment of fate, both voices merged as Michael and Klausemann screamed at the same time.
"DYNAMITE!"
When Paul and Heydrich heard it, they moved instantly, though a fraction of a second of shock slowed them.
Klausemann's smile of madness widened, his eyes revealing a storm of emotions, foremost among them sadness. His gaze drifted to the open page of the book he had been reading, a single passage catching his attention.
Only when you meet a giant will you realise how tiny you truly are in this vast world.
Klausemann smiled faintly.
"A traitor being betrayed," he whispered. "A fitting end for an unfortunate life."
In that single heartbeat, Heydrich pulled the trigger.
Not as a decision, but as a reflex.
Paul's eyes snapped to the window.
They exchanged one final look, one that felt far longer than it truly was.
Then they ran.
Heydrich reached it first, launching himself forward. His body crashed through the fragile glass, shattering it as he was hurled into the night sky.
Paul followed immediately.
Two bodies flew through the air, the brightly lit skyline behind them stark against the dark, decaying factory.
Then the explosion came.
A devastating shockwave tore through the ground floor, swallowing everything in its path. Fire roared upward, devouring what remained as Paul and Heydrich were still falling.
A massive splash followed as they hit the water, dwarfed by the towering cloud of fire blooming behind them.
When the cold, wet embrace of the water swallowed Paul's body, he barely registered it. His thoughts spiraled in absolute chaos.
Fate is truly cruel, he thought, glancing upward. The bright glow of fire was still visible through the thick layer of water above him.
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