Jötunheimr, Neuschwabenland
Hilde made her way down the hallway to the dinner she had been invited to with Reichsführer Hauppman, adjusting the collar on her dress uniform as she did so. After the situation several days ago in the hangar Hilde could only speculate on what the evening was going to include and most of her thoughts went to dark places. Dinner with the SS. The idea of it had turned her stomach when she had been with the Luftwaffe and it didn't feel much different right now.

She didn’t necessarily feel the same way about the Waffen-SS, though. They were ridiculously tough bastards, professional, and they fought almost to the bitter end. Some were fanatics and some were idealists like her, just fighting for what they believed was a just cause. They were ruthless, yes, as the vanguard of National Socialism and the cream of Aryan warrior society they projected an aura of supreme arrogance and near-invincibility but there was no denying their combat abilities and their battlefield victories; they were the equal of the Luftwaffe’s best ground combat units, the Fallschirmjäger and the Herman Göring Parachute Panzer Division. As a soldier, she counted several Waffen-SS men as her comrades, and yes, even friends. True, some of their members did come from Himmler’s concentration camp system, especially his pet project, the Totenkopf Division and they were involved in some acts considered war crimes, but generally the Waffen-SS were nothing like their other dreaded SS-Empire brethren, and combat leaders like Paul Hausser, Sepp Dietrich and Kurt Meyer rightfully treated the rear schwein with contempt, uniformed thugs hiding behind the iron shields of the Waffen-SS  and the Heer (Army) while committing unspeakable atrocities against defenceless civilians in the territories occupied by the German armed forces. This caused the Germans to be hated, where once they had been welcomed as liberators by the oppressed peoples of the Soviet Union. Maybe she should start polite conversation with Ilsa by complimenting the Waffen-SS’ combat record, try to find some common ground between them, but Hilde had her doubts; Ilsa was undoubtedly a killer, but she didn’t seem like a frontline combat officer. 

Still, Ilsa had been more or less courteous with her and treated her with respect befitting her talents and ranks. Where Germany had thrown her service and sacrifice back in face, Ilsa had countered with expensive wines and praise for her accomplishments, given her access to new technologies and more importantly to new aircraft. She enjoyed herself the most when she was working on the aircraft, talking with the mechanics and learning about all the new advances in aeronautics since she had been put to sleep. Hilde doubted anything ever remotely relating to aircraft would be discussed tonight, but she accepted that she was going to smile and try her best to enjoy herself. As she approached the dining hall, the tones of the Heyn Quartett's "Das ist Berlin" began to sound louder and louder. The twin oaken doors were opened and flanked by two of Ilsa's genetically enhanced soldier women, dressed in their pitch-black Hugo Boss uniforms. The twin Aryan women held aloft twin flags of crimson, adorned with a white circle and black swastika in the center, the symbols of Hitler's empire and the Nazi party. Hilde swallowed hard, ran her hands down the front of her uniform and strode inside, her head held high. The room as truly a magnificent dining hall, the center of which was a large dining table, probably made of oak as well. It was adorned with all manner of expensive dining pleasures, from German brautwurst piled high, to bratkartoffeln, to mouth-watering rouladen. A fine selection of wines was available as well as thick-headed, golden beers. The smell alone brought back a flood of memories for Hilde. The music was coming from a sophisticated looking sound system that played from all corners of the room, piping out classic German radio tunes that Hilde remembered hearing as well. It was like stepping back in time. A giant portrait of the Führer hung from one side of the chamber opposite an old painting depicting a scene from Wagner on the other side, with winged walkyrie swooping downwards.

Ilsa sat at the head of the table, dressed in a black SS mess uniform. A uniform generally reserved for men, something not even Hilde felt she was entitled to wear despite her rank and combat decorations. As Hilde entered the chamber the Reichsführer stood, the rest of her guests following suit. Ilsa saluted her guest with a warm smile that did not seem comfortable with her lips. The others saluted her as well and Hilde found her right arm going up almost instinctively. Brunhilda took a moment to look around the table at those gathered as Ilsa introduced them to her.

Obersturmbannführer Anna Holt sat at Ilsa's right, a somewhat short woman, with jaw-length, straight blonde hair and a small nose. The woman Ilsa identified as only as Jörmungandr was truly a sight to behold. hHer head was completely serpentine, complete with a forked tongue that lashed in and out as she gazed at Hilde through golden-slitted eyes. She wore a combat suit of some sort that showed off an acre of cleavage, covered at the top with crimson colored scales. Her arms appeared to be cybernetic, sleek, polished and deadly. Truly the serpent that coiled around the world tree. Hilde began to wonder just what kind of genetic freak-show Ilsa had put together here under the banner of the "Master Race".

Scharführer Irma Grese was an example of Aryan perfection with her blonde hair and sapphire blue eyes, a bit beefy. She looked to be about in her late twenties or early thirties. Gute Nacht, Mutter began to play over the sound system as Hilde nodded and took her seat, having met everyone. Several white tuxedo clad attendants began to move quickly as everyone took their seats, serving up the food and beverages in a quick, but carefully deliberate manner.

Ilsa invited her guests to partake of the sumptuous feast before them.

"I've been doing some reading on you… Todesengel." Anna Holt spoke up, "You won the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with special distinction in downing allied bombers. Quite the impressive feat. Would you say that perhaps the only reason the Reich lost, given your contributions, would be the interference of that swarthy harlot Freedom and other costumed Allied agents?"

Hilde almost winced when she heard her foewoman referred to in such a derogatory manner. She did her best not to glance at the life-sized portrait of Hitler as she answered. They hadn’t wasted any time before tearing into her, so much for pleasantries!

"No, I wouldn't say they were the only factor in the German defeat."

"You do realize that she's here don't you? In Angel Falls?" Jörmungandr asked, taking a sip of her own red wine...or at least Hilde hoped it was wine.

"Who is?"

"Freedom, though she is going by the ridiculous title of ‘American Mom’ now," the reptilian woman mused. “What a terrible influence on the minds of horny young American boys, this flag-draped hussy pretending to be a maternal figure! American MILF more like it!” She chuckled to herself.

Hilde's hands wrung at her cloth napkin as she took a moment to control her breathing and steady herself. Freedom was alive and still active after all these years! It was too much to be mere coincidence, it had to be destiny that found both of them alive and still fighting for their respective nations after so much time. Deep in her heart, she knew that she would have to face her opposite and equal in glorious combat once again. Yet the thought did not fill her with dread; after all, despite being surrounded by fellow Germans who claimed to still be fighting for the Cause, Freedom was perhaps the only familiar face from the days of the Struggle, and someone she counted almost as a friend. As strange as it sounded, she always felt comfortable around Freedom despite them being sworn enemies and could sense when she was near. Certainly, Hilde trusted her more than Ilsa's Fourth Reich...
 
The red-haired woman swallowed her flood of emotions and smiled softly. "Well perhaps I will have the opportunity to cross swords with her again." she replied.

Jörmungandr held up her glass  in a mock toast to Hilde, and took another sip.

"I would be more interested to see how you fare against that Soviet Superwoman." Grese muttered as she ate a mouthful of oysters. Ilsa shot her a withering glare that was either missed or ignored.

"So, what do you make of the Soviet Superwoman? Do you think you can take her in a one-on-one battle?" Holt asked.

"I have been studying footage of her battles, as well as those of other metahumans. She is truly formidable, and her fighting style is fluid and adaptable. But then again," Hilde paused for effect, "So am I. I've been running hard combat drills against the flieger robots programmed to simulate these metahumans' flight patterns and combat skills. Solo missions and against multiple foes. Our new jagdfliegers are also adapting quite well with the new upgraded fighter aircraft."

"Good against machines is one thing, good against the living..." Irma let her statement trail off.

"I assure you, the Luftwaffe kampfroboteren are nothing to sniff at. In 1944, a single schwarm (flight of four) downed 64 viermots and 20 P-51s in a few minutes. They were only thwarted when Freedom arrived. Had we more over Normandy... with upgraded avionics, weaponry and processors, what we have now can easily destroy anything in the air today." Hilde said with some pride.

"Except a high level metahuman," Jörmungandr interjected.

"It takes a jäger to down another jäger. Separate the Soviet-Superwoman from the others, concentrate our efforts on her. We made the mistake of concentrating only on the bombers while the Allies hunted our jägers, in the air and on the ground. By the time high command got the bright idea that perhaps we should go after their fighters they had 20-to-1 superiority against us. Bodenplatte was a complete disaster. Never enough fuel, sabotaged aircraft, poorly trained pilots..." Hilde said bitterly.
 
"And what of you? Surely nothing in the air stood a chance against you? You could have destroyed the bombers before they got clear of their bases in England. You could have taken the fight to the White House itself," Holt said, studying Hilde's reaction.

Hilde pursed her lips. So many mistakes. So many lost opportunities. Had they used her properly she could have made up for the Luftwaffe's lack of heavy bombers and denied Stalin oil from the Caucasus fields. But she was kept away from the Ostfront. That was the preserve of the fanatic Waffen-SS supersoldiers like Der Metzger. She could have destroyed the Atlantic convoys, but she was never ordered to do so. So many mistakes... and always Freedom was there to thwart her.

"That communist harridan is a Shturmovik, while Hilde is something altogether more agile and deadly, are you not my dear?" Ilsa purred.

"A Würger."

"If you're an FW-190, what does that make Freedom? A Mustang? No wonder you lost!" Holt said, savouring the pained reaction she was sure Hilde would exhibit.

"I hadn't realized your 'men' were such experts on aircraft, Ilsa." Hilde said directing her attention to the puppet master pulling the strings of these SS furies, testing Hilde's reactions, taking her measure as Chopin's Nocturne in E-flat major, Op. 9, No. 2 began to chime through the dining hall.

The woman known as Genocide smiled like the Cheshire cat. "You'll find my troops and I are expert on a great, many things Todesengel. It will be through my leadership and the contributions of everyone here that we will finally achieve final victory for the Reich and for the Fatherland!"

"But enough of politics and the Struggle, try some of the Nuremberg sausages my dear." Ilsa smiled. She noticed that Hilde had barely touched her food.

"Nuremberg can keep those awful sausages just like they can keep their Nuremberg laws, I'll stick to the oysters." Irma interrupted laughing. Ilsa held up her hand in mock surrender.

Hilde frowned. At the annual party rally held in Nuremberg in 1935, the Nazis announced new laws which institutionalized many of the racial theories prevalent in Nazi ideology. The laws excluded German Jews from Reich citizenship and prohibited them from marrying or having sexual relations with persons of "German or related blood." That it was still a topic all these years later to these women seemed ridiculous.

"It's been some time since I had last thought about those laws." Hilde replied politely, eating a forkful of lamb schäuferle.

"Well you were no doubt familiar with Göring's ridiculous 4 year plan then yes?" Grese continued pointing a fork at her and winking.

"Familiar yes, but I had my hands full with the Allied air forces than in dealing with what was a plan for economic reform. What did YOU do during the War?" Hilde challenged Irma.

"I was employed as Aufseherin at Ravensbrück, Auschwitz and later for Ilsa at Sajmište, continuing the 1,000 year plan." Irma winked. These Luftwaffe morons..!

"You were a concentration camp guard,” Hilde said in a monotone voice. “A thug and a bully,” Hilde disliked Irma on sight. Something snapped inside her. Here were these women who wore the dreaded ceremonial uniforms of the SS, not even wartime uniforms mind you- how could these over-glorified prison guards and thugs consider themselves the protectors of the German people? Abusing unarmed and starving inmates. They were far from the Waffen-SS, who at least had the guts to face the enemy on the front lines.

“I’m sure it was a very difficult and glorious occupation, abusing half-dead prisoners. But you are no Waffen-SS…” Hilde said sarcastically.

“The Waffen-SS? Hah! Rank amateurs. Do you know how many untermenschen the Reichsführer and Scharführer Grese here have killed between them? I’d say anywhere between three to five hundred thousand. Men, women and children. It was a pity that I wasn’t present during the Struggle or else our combined death toll would probably be in the millions,” Holt said, smiling wickedly. It sent a chill down Hilde’s spine.

“What do you mean? You…deliberately killed innocents?” Hilde’s eyes widened. The music seemed to have stopped.

“Innocents? What innocents- they were all enemies of Germany destroying us from within and they deserved to die!” Grese sneered.

Ilsa watched the proceedings unfold intently, measuring Hilde’s response. It was time to test her dedication to the Cause.

“You mean you honestly didn’t know? You actually didn’t know what we did in the death camps?” Holt said incredulously. “You naïve little tin soldier, do you always believe everything that your superiors tell you?”

“Concentration camps, Anna,” Ilsa gently corrected her, that Cheshire Cat grin still painted firmly on her face. She looked directly at Hilde with her cold blue eyes “But, I see there is no need to sugar coat things. Hilde, sweet Hilde, obviously did not know. The truth is we kept it all über geheime so that the soldiers could fight and the civilians would obediently support our war effort.”

“The Führer and my predecessor Himmler felt that it was necessary that the common Volk’s consciences be kept clean and pure to do what was necessary to win the war while we Schutzstaffel dirtied our hands purging Europe of the unclean. To protect the purity of our blood, to cleanse our nation of the filthy parasites that were slowly killing us from within.”

Hilde shook her head, her cheeks reddening, she could not believe what she was hearing “With respect Reichsführer, nein. Der Führer said that the Final Solution was to evacuate the Jews from Europe.”

“And send them where my dear? To Palestine? To a land whose people did not want them and would fight tooth and nail to evict these loathsome invaders? That ancient and troubled land is bathed in blood to this day because of these Talmudic Khazar impostors.”

“I…I thought they would be shipped eastward after the war, to someplace like Birobidzhan, or to Madagascar or Canada.”

“And what happens once we’ve conquered those places? Heute Europa, morgen die ganze Welt. Surely you don’t believe that we would go through all the time and expense of rounding them up and deporting them all over again? Once we conquered the whole world, what did you think we were going to do with these undesirables? Why do you think we built the camps, my dear?” Ilsa purred.

“To detain enemies of the state for their own protection until such time as they were no longer a threat to Germany.” Hilde said quietly. That was the official line.

“To concentrate them in one place and make it easier for us to dispose of them,” Irma said with a smirk.

“No, that can’t be. Slave labor, yes, they were used as slaves. Cruel but… unavoidable. We couldn’t have just killed them, it doesn’t matter if they’re less civilized than us, they’re still people. It was the Allied bombing that cut off food supplies to the camps, like they did to the rest of Germany. We all starved. It was the Allies who caused so much misery. I saw it with my own eyes…” Hilde said weakly.

Ilsa continued, delighting in just how uncomfortable and defensive Hilde had become. The proud Luftwaffe heroine was not so sure of herself now. “I suggest nothing, my dear. It is and was.  You did not see the insides of the gas chambers where we eliminated hundreds of thousands of Jews, Gypsies, Slavs, homosexuals, the very dregs of humanity; the interior of the cattle cars where thousands suffocated to death even before reaching the camps. I was there. I oversaw it. Their clothes and belongings were requisitioned for state use; even after death we made sure that they would serve a higher purpose than they ever could when they were alive.”

“Himmler had decided that shooting was far too inefficient a method of disposing of these rat-like vermin, so we built far larger facilities based on the gas vans we operated behind the front lines. We killed millions, right up to the final days of the war. It was glorious; we were so close to our goal of creating a racially-pure Germany and Europe! If it weren’t for those verdammt subhuman Bolsheviks and their Western Allies…” Ilsa closed her eyes, savouring the memory, the bitter regret of not having fully accomplished Der Führer’s dreams.

“Like Der Führer, I’ve already decided who lives and who dies; they continue to waste air and resources only because I have not put this decision into effect…” Ilsa said chillingly.

“You spoiled soft airmen knew nothing of what the SS had to do,” Jörmungandr hissed, her forked tongue flicking in and out. She transfixed Hilde with a deadly glare, as if preparing to strike. Hilde tensed. "You can't handle the truth!"

“The lengths we went to, to keep it secret, not from the world but from our own people. To keep them innocent and contented. The victorious Allies force-fed our defeated Volk these so-called crimes to poison the minds of post-war Germans, they divided our country to weaken us, flooded us with immigrant filth to pollute our blood, to ensure that the German people would never rise again. Today's Germans are a weak, pathetic shadow of their former selves, a cowardly timid breed...  Never again would they have pride in their own race, their glorious history and achievements.” Ilsa shook her head, a tinge of sadness creeping into her voice.

“We did it to preserve the purity and survival of the German people.  We did it for you.”

So it was true, Hilde thought. She almost gagged.

“As a scientist, I personally experimented on hundreds of thousands of Jews. To perfect a formula that would catapult our people to the next level of evolution, ensuring that we would continue to be the true master race. It mattered little that the test subjects did not survive, they were barely human anyway…”

As Ilsa spoke, her psychic aura grew stronger, the aura of sheer horror Hilde had felt when they fought before, far stronger in fact than the bestial murderlust of Genocide. It was more terrifying simply because it was cloaked in the form of this beautiful, insanely intelligent woman. That she could rationalize and justify the cold-blooded murder of millions made her far more terrifying than her monstrous form.

Hilde’s mind was reeling- had everything she fought for been a lie?

As if she could read her thoughts, Ilsa said, “No my dear, your sacrifice and the sacrifice of millions of our people was for the Fatherland, but you must realize what it was we truly fought for; the supremacy of Aryan bloodlines over all others- the next step in human evolution on our path to not only become the masters of Humanity, but of all Creation. If it entailed subjugating and destroying entire breeds of subhumans, then so be it. You, like the rest of the masses, could never deal with the truth, so we just kept it from you. It’s a pity we never got to finish what we started…”

“We are the Schutzstaffel, not only of Der Führer, but also of the German people. We protected you from the truth of what we did to ensure our race’s ascendancy and primacy. It was necessary, despite years of Party-sanctioned conditioning and indoctrination across all levels of society, we knew that trifling religious considerations and petty human morality would keep people like you from fighting and dying for the Fatherland if you knew the truth.”

“Don’t look so surprised my dear. Your beloved Reichsmarshall was more than complicit – he signed off on almost all the orders leading up to the Final Solution. From the order consolidating the German police and security services under Himmler, the Führer Decree of 1939 pertaining to ‘Strengthening Germanism’ and most of the orders relating to the extermination of undesirables right up to the end of the war. And you like millions of others, simply did not need to know. You saw what we wanted you to see, and believed what you wanted to believe.

“No….no Ilsa,” Hilde objected weakly, “we were fighting to rid the world of the evils of Judeo-Bolshevism, to free oppressed peoples suffering under the shackles of British Imperialism. To right the wrongs inflicted upon Germany by the cruelly unjust Treaty of Versailles- to give us our pride back, so that we might have our rightful place in the sun. I went hungry as a little girl, I saw the chaos engulfing our country. Der Führer changed all that, he made us proud to be German again… "
She was shaking, almost gasping for air. One last feeble attempt to justify it, if to no one else, then to herself, "We fought to protect Germanic peoples being persecuted in foreign lands. We fought to spread Pax Germanica.”

“Another name for Empire, my dear. Unser Reich."

"That’s what I like about you, Brunhilda, you’re an idealist. I deal with realities on the ground, and if it meant culling parasites infecting us so that our people could flourish, then so be it.” Ilsa spread her hands expansively, beaming. “Like you, we are all professionals. But we… we truly enjoy our work.” The others around the table nodded in agreement.

Hilde regarded the faces of the other dinner guests with horror; from Jörmungandr’s clearly monstrous visage, to the grinning masks of humanity stretched over faces barely concealing the evil lurking within- they were truly devils in human form…

‘What have I done?’ thought Hilde…

.............................
This story takes place in the fallsda: setting, and is a continuation of
johnnyharadrim.deviantart.com/…

This story was co-written by yours truly  and the awesome

Soviet-Superwoman

Brunhilda Adelar, a.k.a. Die Todesendel belongs to me.

Ilsa Haupmann, a.k.a. Genocide, Irma Grese, Jormungandr and the Fourth Reich appear courtesy of my good friend Olga.

Anna Holt belongs to