to the Cup immediately, almost as an instant reflex. The Nazi official took the Silver Cup from Wayne’s tray and placed it delicately in front of the Fuhrer.
Hitler wrapped his right hand around the bottom of the Cup and held up the Cup in toast position for all to view. Wayne quietly moved to the back of the room. He was now ready to go back home to 1995.
The Nazi leader commenced his toast. “To my German comrades. To a Deutschland that will be the most powerful nation in the world.”
With his dog-like devotion to Hitler, Rudolf Hess, as was his wont, shouted out “THE FUHRER!
The audience, in a mighty roar, repeated the slogan, “THE FUHRER!
Adolf Hitler drank heavily from the inscribed cup.
In the rear of the room, Wayne said to himself “Okay, Doc, get me the hell out of here.”
At the speaker’s podium, directly after ingesting his champagne, Hitler grabbed at his throat, as if gasping for air. The Fuhrer appeared to be trying to speak at the same time. No words came out.
“
Hermann Goring put down his overloaded plate of food and yelled, “Something’s wrong! Doctor! We need a doctor here right away!” Nobody stepped forward as a doctor.
The Nazi leader collapsed down onto the floor with his left hand locked in a position of still grabbing his own throat.
The guests became silent and gathered around their leader. Hess felt Hitler’s neck for a pulse. There was none. Hess cried out, “THE FUHRER IS DEAD! THE FUHRER IS DEAD!”
The crowd let out a collective gasp. Everyone was flabbergasted. How could such a thing happen?
Goring, acting more perspective than he usually was, spoke to SS Officer Werner, who was present. “Something seems suspicious. Find that waiter who brought the Fuhrer’s cup over here. I have got a feeling about him.” SS Officer Werner, a devoted man who had been with the Party since almost the very beginning, saluted Goring and walked away to collect his men.
Wayne watched the proceedings from the back of the room alone. Many guests were crying. Some had fainted. Some others even screamed in shock at what had happened. The room was getting noisy. “Mission accomplished,” Wayne thought to himself. “Have a good time in Nazi heaven, Adolf.” Wayne removed his swastika armband from his person and dropped it. He was itchy to get out of there.
SS Officer Werner gave instructions to his men to lock the place up. The armed Nazis drew their guns and dispersed.
Wayne became nervous. “Come on, 1995,” he said and closed his eyes tight. He reopened his eyelids, and saw that he was still where he was. “Shit.” Wayne was sure that any moment he would arrive back home. But still, what was Dr. Hoffmann waiting for?
An SS Nazi fixed his shifty eyes on Wayne. The Nazi pointed his pistol at his prey. A bullet fired in Wayne’s direction. The bullet impacted with the wall a fraction of an inch above his head. The crowd of guests ducked down. Far be it for an SS man to be concerned with the safety of innocent people. The SS Nazi was about to fire on Wayne again.
“Oh, shit!” Wayne jumped away quickly. The lead projectile fired at him narrowly missed him. “Fuckin’ hey — it’s not supposed to happen this way,” he muttered.
Wayne started running, having to hurdle over ducking guests as he did so. He eyed another Nazi with a firearm pointed at him dead on. Wayne dove under a grand oak table.
The Nazi fired. The bullets hit the table, splintering part of it right off.
Wayne would have to get out of the Chancellery. He had never been shot at before, and it was an experience that he could have definitely lived without. There was no time to think about a strategy. “Just keep moving, get the fuck out of this damn place,” he told himself, over and over.
Wayne made a dash for the front door. No luck. SS men were guarding it.
SS Nazis were closing in on him. Wayne saw a Nazi about to fire on him. Wayne snatched a guest, a well- dressed man of about sixty, and held him in front of his own body. The bullet pierced the guest in the head precisely between the eyes. Other guests shrieked. “Sorry, buddy!” Wayne said to the now-deceased man as he dropped the body. Better that a Nazi sympathizer takes a bullet than him, Wayne figured.
Wayne kept on moving, running smack into the area where the orchestra had been playing. The musicians had put their instruments down when Hitler died.
Another Nazi had Wayne in range. These guys were relentless. Wayne tripped over a set of large brass gongs lying next to the drum set. It was a trip that would save his life. He picked up one of the gongs, and positioned it in front of himself as a shield.
Wayne felt the powerful vibration of a bullet as it ricocheted off the large gong. He also heard a cry of pain. The bullet had, ironically enough, ricocheted off Wayne’s “shield” into the arm of the Nazi who had fired the shot.
A Nazi came up from behind Wayne suddenly and grabbed him. Wayne had taken karate as a kid, so at least he had some fighting abilities. This was about to pay off. Wayne elbowed the Nazi hard in the kidney area, causing the Nazi to let go of him. The Nazi took his gun out. Wayne screamed and did a high kick, which knocked the gun out of the Nazi’s hand.
He rushed Wayne and punched him hard in the gut and then gave him a hard jab to his face. Wayne had never been punched that hard in his life. He dropped to the floor. Not even bothering to pick up his firearm, the Nazi came again at Wayne.
Wayne grabbed two large gongs off the floor and clapped one on each side of the Nazi’s head, forcing his head to involuntarily waver and fall.
With a group of SS Men swiftly closing in on him, Wayne became desperate. If he were lucky he’d be captured; Wayne didn’t feel lucky. He looked around. There was only one place he could now go. He remembered seeing something that would be his only chance.
Wayne bolted into the kitchen. Thank God, there was nobody in there. Wayne surveyed the thick ventilation shaft above the main stove. The outer opening to the airshaft was covered with a tin grating. He climbed up onto the big iron stove. He removed the grating, which came off easily enough, and then crawled into the ventilation shaft. If he had been a little heavier, he would not have fit in, for Wayne had only a minute amount of breathing space. Wayne placed the tin grating back on the opening of the ventilation shaft as best he could from the awkward position that he was in.
Wayne put his hand behind him in the darkness of the shaft to better situate his body. He heard a loud squeak and felt something squirming around. “Ow!” Something had bit him. Wayne’s eyes had adjusted to the darkness, much as one’s eyes do when turning off the light to go to sleep. Wayne looked down to see what had bit him. It was a large black rat. Wayne lifted up his hand to his face. His hand was bleeding. Not profusely, but it was a good size cut. Wayne never knew that rats had such sharp teeth.
Wayne started crawling deeper and deeper into the filthy airshaft. He began coughing incessantly. There was very little oxygen in the shaft to begin with, and all the dust, grease particles, and dirt in it didn’t help matters.
Wayne was terrified. That same fear of death that had gripped him on the Hindenburg overcame him again. What in the world was Dr. Hoffmann doing? Why did she let him stay in Nazi Germany so long?
At the other end of the air shaft, in what seemed like at least 60 suffocating feet to his lungs, Wayne arrived at a grating partition that led to the outside of the Chancellery.
Wayne kicked hard at the grating, which caused the weathered plaster holding it in place to begin to crumble. He kicked harder with all of the strength that he could muster in his legs. The grating finally separated from the plaster. The grating was jerked free.
Wayne crawled out of the ventilation shaft. He was breathing heavily, and his clothes carried a filthy appearance and a foul smell.
The streets of Berlin were alive with the sound of marching boots. A procession of SA Nazi Stormtroopers, the organization originally designed to protect Nazi mass meetings and oppose political rivals, wearing their brown uniforms marched to German military music while they carried torchlights. Joseph Goebbels, head of propaganda, had organized this impressive march on just an hour’s notice. The news of Adolf Hitler’s demise had not been made public yet.
