Free Body Count by James Rouch

fight.

    TWELVE

The sniper fire from the area of the Karlstor Gate forced on Revell the decision to detour through the Stachus underground shopping, mall. They lost two men in the dash from cover to the nearest of the pedestrian ramps.
    It sloped gently. The textured non-slip surface rasped beneath their shuffling feet as they edged down towards the entrance.
    Revell kept a grip on the handrail, straining his eyes to make sense of the shapes that loomed ahead. He could hear a growing noise, like a magnified restless murmur.
    “What's the hold-up?”
At the bottom of the ramp, the major caught up with Carrington and the scout section. The corporal was in a heated argument - conducted in hushed undertones - with an armed civilian wearing an auxiliary-police armband.
    By the faint illumination of a well-shielded flashlight, Revell saw the German energetically shaking his head. While he did so, he managed to keep a rifle levelled at them, blocking the way through the heavy blackout curtain.
    “This old fool says we can't go in. He says the place isn't an authorized shelter, and it's his job to keep everybody out. Shall I knock him down?” Carrington edged closer to the man as he asked.
    Sensing rather than seeing her beside him, Revell told Andrea to speak to the sentry. “Tell him we know it's not a shelter. We don't want to stay in there, we simply want to cut through to reach the gunmen.”
    Though she spoke too fast for Revell to catch all that she said, he knew she was putting the point across more brutally than he had dictated. The German took a nervous step back, but still kept the weapon aimed. He was opening his mouth to speak, when a fist caught him on the side of the face. His head cracked hard against the tiled wall, and he went down without uttering a sound.
    Carrington caught the rifle as it fell. He rubbed his knuckles. “Boney little runt. I could have hurt my hand.”
    “Keep the rifle. Search him for ammunition.” Revell took hold of the corner of the screening material. “Pass the word for every one to keep their wits about them. This place may be deserted, but it's like a rabbit warren. I've gotten lost when the lights were on.”
    Pushing through, Revell led the way into the complex of stores, and into a scene that could have come straight from a horror movie.
    By the faintly glowing emergency lighting, he could see that every inch of floor space was occupied. Families and individuals sat or lay or slumped, as space about them dictated.
    The air was hot, and stale with cigarette smoke and the reek of lager, vomit, and urine. Close inside the entrance, the floor was slippery with blood, and several imperfectly shrouded bodies lay there.
    In a nearby corner two men were propped against a poster-decorated wall. Improvised bandages swathed their bare chests and supported their smashed jaws. Both were moaning and whimpering in pain.
    The strangely sibilant sound that Revell had been only partially aware of, now grew in volume as the huddled masses of civilians recognized the newcomers.
    From one woman came shrieks of fear as she mistook the NATO battle dress and weapons for Russian. Others hissed her to a sobbing silence.
    “What the bloody hell was that old fool on about, not letting anyone in.” Sergeant Hyde surveyed the crowd. “There must be thousands here.”
    “But they didn't get in through his entrance.” It was a peculiar mentality that Revell had encountered before in West Germany. It seemed to be compounded of devotion to the rule book and pigheaded stubbornness.
    As they moved forward, they were bombarded with questions and pleas from all sides. Further in, the press about them became worse, and Revell had to call Dooley up to the point, to force a way through.
    In the confined space the hubbub grew to a head-aching din that nothing could quiet. The plate glass storefronts and their bright goods reflected such slight il- lumination as there was, mostly from ornate candles looted from a