A thousand suns

The road had been used as one of the principal supply arteries leading east through Poland towards Russia. It had been widened and resurfaced to facilitate the movement of vehicles and supplies and had been a superbly efficient channel down which thousands of trucks had passed effortlessly since ’41 to supply the rapidly advancing eastern front. But now it was riddled with potholes and craters and caked with a thick layer of mud.

Hostner scanned the trucks as they passed by his parked VW Kubelwagon and the spare supply truck he’d commandeered. The men in the convoy stared contemptuously at him as they rolled past, seeing his uniform and instinctively reacting with thinly veiled hostility. Several men spat in his direction. Most of them were too tired to offer even that gesture. A year ago his SS uniform would have been intimidating to these men, four years ago it would have inspired admiration from many of them. Right now, Hostner felt like he was wearing a big bloody target.

It was cold. He’d been standing here for well over three hours, since first light, waiting for the column to arrive. He wasn’t sure exactly when it had ‘officially’ turned up. Since dawn he’d watched a sporadic trickle of soldiers on foot shuffle pass, which had gradually over the last few hours developed into the column of vehicles before him that extended as far as the eye could see. How the hell he was meant to find the men he was after amidst this flowing river of defeat he didn’t know. It was like trying to find a needle in a haystack. No, worse than that, this particular needle was on the move and could already have passed him by.

Hostner decided it was time to flag down one or two of these trucks and ask some questions.

Be careful of these men, Jan Hostner.

Hostner subconsciously felt for his gun holster, and allowed his gloved hand to seek reassurance from the grip of his Walther.

Things were beginning to fall apart. The authority of the junior officer ranks was rapidly failing amongst the enlisted men. They were far less worried about them and any issues of insubordination than they were about the Russian army snapping at their heels. These days, an officer was likely to have an order obeyed only if it coincided with the interests of the soldiers it was given to. It was unspoken amongst the men, but they all knew the war was just weeks away from ending. The threat of a pending court martial meant nothing now.

He watched them pass by, a procession of drawn, empty faces. Most of these men were veterans, professional soldiers who had spent the last two years fighting the most barbaric campaign of this war. And they had lost badly. Right now, there was no enmity between the men and their officers. After all, they had all suffered hell together. These men simply viewed what was left of the command structure now as, at best, irrelevant.

The SS, however, that was something different; they were still worth despising. Hostner was acutely aware that his uniform was going to cause him problems.

He made his way carefully down the muddy bank at the side of the road towards the slowly moving column. He watched several trucks rumble and clatter past, splattering his boots and the bottom of his greatcoat with mud. He could see the faces of the drivers through grime-speckled windscreens, drivers who Hostner could imagine were wrestling with the temptation to swerve their truck enough to ‘accidentally’ roll over him. No one here would care that much, accidents happen.

He decided he was tempting fate standing on the roadside inches away from those large churning wheels and quickly clambered up onto the running board of the next truck that rumbled past. The driver cracked open his window an inch, careful not to lose too much of the body heat he’d built up inside the cabin.

‘What do you want?’ The driver shouted through the gap.

Only a few weeks ago Hostner would have scolded the man for such an insubordinate response. He bit his lip — those days were long gone.

‘I’m looking for some Luftwaffe men. I’m told some men from KG-301 have joined the column.’

‘We’ve got men from all over.’

‘Have you got any in your truck?’

‘I don’t fucking know! Men climb aboard if they can see any space. I don’t have a clue who’s back there.’

Hostner decided the driver could tell him nothing useful. He jumped down off the truck onto the muddy road, and the truck slowly rolled away. He probably wasn’t going to have much luck with any of the other drivers.

As the next one trundled past, Hostner grabbed the tailboard and pulled himself up. He lifted the canvas cover at the back. Inside, sitting in darkness there were about thirty men. The smell struck him immediately, a mixture of body odour and infected wounds. The men nearest the open flap shivered with the blast of incoming air.

Hostner mustered his most commanding voice. ‘Any men from KG-301 in here?’

No one replied.

‘Has anyone seen any Luftwaffe personnel?’