Chapter 2 - Arrival at Death's Door
The two young guards approached me quickly guns in hand, they shouted at me to get up, I wearily got to my feet balancing myself against the side of the lorry. They grabbed me by my arms and pulled me towards them. They bundled me out of the back of the lorry, I stood in a puddle soaked from head to toe as the rain lashed down upon the road leading to arbeistdorf. One of the guards hit me in the back with his gun, a strong aching pain began to run from the bottom of my spine to the top. I was in agony, the guards laughed as I collapsed to the ground gasping for breath.
I sucked in the cold night air as they verbally abused me, they dragged me to my feet and slammed me against the side of the lorry like a rag doll, my head smashing against the metal. I felt a sore pain against my forehead. My head began to drip with blood, I tried to wipe blood off my forehead with my hand but one of the group of guards grabbed my arm and pinned it behind my back. The earlier back pain came shooting back, it was immense and lasted until he loosened his grip on my arm.
Two guards grabbed either of my arms and quickly walked beside me, I looked across at the one of them in the hope of getting a little bit of sympathy. Instead I received him spitting in my face, I couldn't wipe it off as my hands were forcefully pinned behind my back. The spit began to run down my face, mixing with the rain that dripped from my hair. The thought of having someone else's spit on me disgusted me but there was nothing I could do. If I tried to fight back, i'd either be brutally beaten or shot like the poor woman.
The guards began to scream at me to start running, one hit me in the back. The pain from before once again exploded down my back, I tripped forward, my legs weak and tired from the beatings. I caught myself just before I was about to fall onto the stoney road. The guards laughed at my difficulty with being ordered to run as they knew my body was failing slowly. I began to run slowly up the road, they shouted for me to run faster. I tried to pick up my pace but my legs began to buckle and pain began to develop in my knees. I cringed at the pain but I had to keep going. I feared I would be shot or beaten up. I kept running up the road into the damp, dark night. The road had no lights and looked to be in the middle of no where. The journey on the road was long enough for it to be in another country.
Pain had now began to ache over most of my body, cramp had now developed in my legs as well as the pain in my knees and my back. I could also feel that I was bruised from the beatings. I could hear the guards laughing and joking a bit further down the road. They were enjoying the sight of seeing a man being pushed to the limit in such harsh conditions. They ordered me to stop where I was, they caught up with me and again grabbed my arms. Both guards squeezed tight as I felt my bicep ache. We continued on walking up the stoney, heavily wooded road for what seemed like eternity.
The guards directed me into a bunch of bushes beside the main road. We walked through a small smelly forest for a minute or so until a opening appeared the other side. The dark figures of what looked like people appeared in the distance. We trudged across a muddy, damp field. The grass was up to my shins and the field was in the middle of nowhere. We approached the groups and the guards put me into a line.
I looked around at the dirty, damp faces of children and women. They stood silent, weary of the german guards, flinching if one of them got close. The men stood upright, almost dignified that they weren't going to let these guards treat them in such a bad way. There were five guards to each line of prisoners. They stared at the prisoners like they were animals, showing no respect or remorse. They were inhuman.
The guards shot their guns into the night sky. As they did so women screeched in terror and children began to burst into tears. The guards laughed and snorted at the prisoner's terror. The groups began to be led away through the field. They walked silently in single file, women first then children, then lastly men. They were ordered to walk faster and threatened that if they couldn't keep up they would be shot. All the prisoners began to increase their pace, they crossed a bridge over a small river.
I was at the very back of the group as we walked briskly through farming land. I didn't dare look behind me or risk being hit by the guards. They demanded me to start running, I could hear the groans of pain from the front of the group of women. Two shots rang out in the night air, it must be coming towards early hours of the morning by now, I thought to myself. We carried on running, I saw the bodies of two women laying lifeless on the side of the muddy path from the front of the group, how could someone who used to protect us turn against us and kill us so indiscriminentely?
We kept running through different fields and even some farm land. Every now and then we would hear a shot ring out and another lifeless, bloody corpse would lay across the path. We had lost a fair few priosners since they ordered us to run. We had been running for what must have been near enough an hour now, there wasn't a sense of when we were going to stop, just constant orders shouted by the guards to run faster or be shot.
The majority of the dead were women who weren't able to keep up with the pace that they wanted us to run. If they stopped to gasp for breath, they would be taken to one side and shot in the back of the head, then left on the side of the path for the birds and wildlife to feed on.
Children began to tire and stop. The guards didn't waste time, they began to pull them out of the line. They shot at them. The group of prisoners wails and screams echoed the fields, bodies began to fall simultaniously and prisoners began to trip up over corspes. They were then shot for being on the floor.
We got to a thick wet bush on the farside of a random field. Noone could find us if they tried... were in the middle of nowhere, I thought to myself. The guards ordered us to stop before the bush, some prisoners looked around to see how many of us were left. I looked down the line, there were a couple of women left, about half of the children and only a few men had gone.
The guards pushed us forward into the bush. The smell of damp and rotting was overwhelming, it was darker in the bush than it was outside. Leaves scattered the floor of the forest, groans of children could be heard from the front of the group, the guards silenced them by whacking them or punching them. We had walked through this forest for what seemed like 10 mintues when we reached the other side. We were led out into another small field this time it was very different......
