Proviso Five

Sun Lee gripped Anhalt's arm as they listened to Ballard choke and spit water, her clenched jaws resisting the next wash of salt water. The cave mouth's window of light pinched ever smaller as the tide level rose with each new wave. Anhalt cringed at Norden's voice sounding a hundred echoes along the cave walls.
"Can you see her, Anhalt," came the yell from behind a boulder of sandstone. It was about five ankle-breaking seconds away, across the rock-strewn ledge.
Their eyes swung back to the pillar of stalagmite as Ballard gagged on a wave that washed nearly to her eyes then receded level with her chin.
"What do you think, Anhalt," Norden's words clattered off of the walls. "Another minute or two?" The echoes silenced as Norden took a small plastic packet of white powder from his shirt pocket, carefully opened it, tilted his head back and sniffed the contents into a nostril. He shuddered, straightened up and smiled playfully over at Ballard.
"Shit!" Anhalt shook his head at the ground.
"It may he'p, Stephan," said Sun Lee. "The cocaine wi'r make him think he is more efficient than he is."
"I think Anhalt makes plans," jeered Norden at Ballard's terrified glare. The crashing, rapid-fire booming of Norden's automatic rifle sent them ducking from richochets Norden only laughed at.
"I'll break a leg trying to jump him from here," Anhalt said. With Sun Lee, he peered into the dregs of light from Norden's beam, trying to imagine a path through the rocks.
"Here comes the next one, Tracy Ballard," Norden yelled jovially, as if she were frolicking in the surf.
The reporter took a deep breath and closed her eyes as the wave rolled up and over her face, covered all but floating strands of hair, then pulled back only to her jaw.
"Ooooh … that was a nasty one, Ja, Fraulein," came a vicious chuckle. "Such friends," Norden gloated. "I think they have left you! … you … you," agreed the cave.
Ballard's eyes blazed out at him.
"What's this!" His words sounded out like an uncle's reprimand. "Still don't think you're going to die, ehy, Ballard! Well, I tell you a thing - it looks preddy much you are, püpchen. The crabs 'vill eat you op! Just like those kits did to us." The weary words came in weary reminiscence.
"The older ones ate the lilla' vuns. Each week one of uns became the menu … jus' like 'dis. Drier, of course," the voice said with a giggle.
"What are you doing," Sun Lee whispered frantically as Anhalt moved forward.
He spoke over his shoulder. "The next wave or two'll finish her," he said. "If I can just get a few feet closer…."
"Each 'veek one of the Kellerkinder became die Menü." Only the tide and Norden sounded in the silence. "If Straachan and his MP's hadn' come, I might haf' been next, Ja?"
Frozen against the rocks, Anhalt and Sun Lee heard him weeping crazily. The cosmonaut rose to her elbow from where she'd dropped to the ground, the recorder case clutched to her stomach.
No one should have to face this, he thought. You can't do this to a person! Anhalt gathered his legs under him.
"The Americans bombed us," Norden's voice came shrilly, "the Russians shelled us, and our Kameraden ate us! Some schtuff, ehy, Fraulein! Mein vater was dead, you know - kaput! Norden explained reasonably between manic sobs. "In his Mezzerschmit. Down in flames … down in flames. Mama dead, too. The camp at Sachsenhausen. "They took her away, the Gestapo. They said she vas mit die Schwarze Kapella, da Fueherer's enemies. Aber she deserved to be gassed. Mama …" he whimpered, "sleeping with other men while Papa fought for the Reich."
"Motherfucker!" Ballard's curse caroomed off of the walls, bringing Norden up short.
"Vha-a-t!" The voice rose in anger. "VH-A-A-T!"
"You were just jealous, Norden," came Tracy's gasping derision. "You wanted her all to yourself! And my name is Teresa Bachmann!"
Nice try, Ballard, Anhalt thought, but it wasn't going to work. Instead of infuriating the man into shooting her, the reporter's words had sent him into some funk of memory, or maybe his animal wit, even crazed, was considering how to use this new information.
The next wave covered Ballard by several inches, stayed long enough to float her hair above a struggling head before it pulled back, releasing her choking intakes of air. The water receded only to her lips.
"Vell, mine Juden," Norden yelled jubilantly, as if he had suddenly snapped out of his drugged reverie, "I v'ud ask you to say hello to Papa," he said with a laugh, "but I don't think Valhalla takes Juden!"
"Anhalt, for godsake ! … sake … sake," she and the cave implored.
Anhalt was about to leap forward when he was pulled backward by the collar. He landed on his buttocks and turned angrily. Sun Lee raised a finger to her lips. "A diversion, neh?" she whispered urgently. "I wir' swim submerged to the other side and cause noise - then you must attack!"
Anhalt hesitated, nodded at the good sense of it as Sun Lee scuttled off. He turned to Norden's form stretching out from concealment over Ballard's agony. The air-sea rescue man crouched for his spring.
"They filled my mouth with fire ants, those VC did," Norden said, almost whimpering but still enraged. "They sewed my lips shut and tried to make those ants eat their way out my asshole! Some fun, ehy!
"So a liddle 'vasser is better than that, ehy! Lucky for me mein Kameraden rescued me jus' in time, ehy! Not like you, liddle Teresa. No one to rescue you, I guess."
Norden's voice lifted in cheery derision as the next wave submerged Ballard for nearly a minute before retreating. Her strangling gasps could be heard above even the tide and Norden's shrieks of laughter.
"The next one stays, my liddle Juden," Norden yelled in mock sadness of farewell. He stood fully exposed now, an audience of one looking down on her. "But not to worry, liddle Theresa, the tide v'ill turn, ja? All you haf' to do is hold your breath for six hours!" Norden burst out in shrill, high cackles.
Anhalt watched her face begin to shred into lines of hopeless agony and readied himself for the spring out at Norden.
"Shema Yisrael, Adonai …" she gasped, trying to raise her face above the water, then gagging. Anhalt watched the man's face fall in bewilderment as the next tidal wave rolled toward them. Norden was only a few feet from her, bent over the rim of the cave ledge.
"Adonai, echad …" The next wave smothered her prayer, backwashed briefly for a final glimpse of trembling lips and whitened face, then surged forward over brown eyes screaming out, and stayed.
A choking growl of rage rising in his throat, Anhalt yanked the Randall knife from its sheath and leapt just as Sun Lee shrieked out. Norden jerked up and fired a wild burst across the cave at her echoes as Anhalt managed two steps before he stumbled to his knees, dropping the knife, losing it in the dust and dark. Norden heard his surprised grunt of pain and whirled with the gun just as Anhalt recovered and rammed into him.
Both men tumbled off of the ledge into the water, the gun flying into black water as Norden struggled to break Anhalt's stranglehold. Distracted by the thrashing form on the pillar, Anhalt took a knee to the groin, huffed out in pain as Norden gave a choked scream and jabbed at his eyes with stiffened fingers.
Anhalt dodged the move, feeling the hand jam into the side of his head. He pulled both men erect and aimed a roundhouse right that hit Norden in the shoulder, jolting the man back against the wall.
Anhalt jumped forward and lashed out with another right to the jaw that missed - and hit Norden in the throat. It was a Sunday knockout punch, twisting Norden down and away, gagging