Of Bruno’s eight brothers, all had served in the military at some point in their lives. Though none other than Bruno had actually taken part in combat operations, that is, until the Russian Civil War where the three youngest siblings of the family fought together in Ingria and Volga.
As for the three oldest brothers, Franz, Christoph, and Maximilian, they had all had very brief military careers, serving the minimum years on their contract upon becoming Commissioned Officers before exiting from the service altogether and instead pursuing careers in the private sector.
Of the nine children that Bruno’s father and mother had brought into this world, only one of them had ever served in the Kaiserliche Marine. The rest were all army brats through and through. This brother was named Wolfgang, and he was the fourth youngest of his siblings. Initially, like his other brothers he had served for the minimum amount of years following his commissioning as a junior officer. And even made it to the rank of Kapitänleutnant before retiring from the service altogether.
However, at the outbreak of the war, the man quit his high-paying job within the family company to re-enlist, and found himself quickly granted his old rank once more. He had the dangerous “honor” of serving on board a submarine, of which after less than a year at war he found himself serving as the Executive Officer of.
In Bruno’s past life, submariners during the Great War and the Second World War had an extremely high casualty rate, hence the usage of the term “dangerous honor”, however these submarines were virtually undetectable, and had more or less fixed every mechanical flaw on the ones found within the designs they were based on from Bruno’s past life.
Because of this, they might very well be the safest vessels to be stationed on within the Kaiserliche Marine. Currently, Wolfgang von Zehntner was currently in the midst of discussions with the commanding officer regarding their next target when the comms operators was quick to speak up, and grab their attention.
“Sir one of our tankers from Kamerun has sent out a distress signal. It appears that they have been surrounded by French vessels, and are being detained. What should we do?”
The submarine which Wolfgang was currently serving on was one of the members of small Wolfpack patrolling waters between the Mediterranean and the German colonies in Africa. Upon hearing that the French Naval forces had begun to harass their shipping, the commanding officer patted Wolfgang on the back with an energetic smile on his face before giving the order not only to their particular vessel but the wolfpack as a whole.
“Well, let’s go teach those frogs what happens when they decide to pick a fight with the German Reich!”
Orders were conveyed, and the Wolfpack began speeding off at full speed while also submerged well beneath the surface of the ocean’s turbulent waves.
The French Frigate, which had picked a fight with German oil tankers heading from Kamerun to the North Sea was sitting with its guns raised at the innocent merchant ship hands. On board the tanker was the Captain of the French military vessel, and a compliment of armed guards who sneered at the German merchants with disgust as they confidently boasted of their victory.
Frankly speaking, capturing an unarmed oil tanker with a naval frigate wasn’t exactly something to boast about, but the French Republic had suffered losses after losses at the hands of their enemies in this war, and any victory at this point was one worth taking.
The contempt, bitterness, and smugness in their voices as they commanded the crew to more or less jump into the sea was disdainful from the perspective of the merchant sailors.
“Now… Captain… I will be seizing your boat. Unfortunately for you and your sailors, there is no room on our vessel to ensure your safe passage back to civilized lands. Because of this, I’m afraid you are all going to have to make a swim to African shores!”
A swim to African shores? That was insane! They were well over thirty nautical miles off the coast of Kamerun. No human being could possibly make such a swim and survive! It was a death sentence, and for what? They were civilians transporting oil from German Kamerun to the Austrian Littoral! What crime had they committed? Let alone a crime worthy of such a harsh sentence?
The truth was, they were guilty of one thing and one thing alone, being German, and the pride of France had repeatedly been soiled since 1871. Causing a deep sense of hatred and bitterness within the French people, especially its military.
War crimes? What are war crimes? It was not a crime if they did not get caught? Right? And good luck finding the bodies of men dropped into the ocean well over thirty nautical miles off the coast of Africa!
Even so, there was no arguing this point, the French were armed, and would simply shoot them if they did not comply… Because of this, the Captain of the German tanker sighed heavily, as he nodded his head, quickly accepting his fate, and choosing to jump first.
Hopefully, in doing so, he could buy enough time for the German navy to come to their aid! Though that hope seemed to become slimmer and slimmer as time passed. Because of this there was a heavily defeated tone in the Captain’s voice as he unwillingly complied with the demands given to him.
“Very well…. I will do as you ask….”
After saying this, the Captain was pushed forward by the muzzle of a rifle towards the edge of the ship. Almost like he was a pirate who had broken the code and was now being forced to endure one of the most horrific executions of all time.
“Walking the Plank” or being “keelhauled” was not what Hollywood had portrayed it to be in Bruno’s past life. It was a punishment reserved for the most severe of traitors to the brotherhood, and resulted in a man being bound, tied, and forced to “walk the plank”, where he would fall beneath the ship, and be dragged beneath its keel until he either died of the brutal impact to his spine and body, or drowned.
Staring upon the vast depths of the ocean beneath the edge, the Captain could not help but think of such things as he performed a sign of the cross while gazing up to the heavens. Saying a silent prayer to God Almighty to have mercy on his soul and that of his crew.
He was evidently of South German heritage as performing such a gesture was most certainly a sign of the Catholic faith. A few sneers and jeers were cast his way in the French language by nearby soldiers laughing at his final moments.
The man cast them a nasty glare, not because he understood what precisely was said, but rather the nature it was said in. He was just about to take a step forward when something miraculous happened.
The Frech Destroyer, which had intercepted their merchant vessel suddenly exploded after a series of torpedoes precisely struck its bow in strategic locations designed to ignite the weapons and fuel on board.
The soldiers who had boarded the Tanker began to panic and shout as they pointed at their rapidly sinking vessel and the men on board who ironically enough dived into the African waters hoping to survive their doomed frigate.
The French Captain had turned around and began shouting orders at his troops, trying to get them to help their comrades in the sea, and doing so shifted his sight from the eyes of the captive German merchant men behind him. One of which pulled out a small pocket knife he kept on him at all times as a tool aboard the ship and stabbed the French officer in the neck.
The French officer gasped in shock, and struggled to get away from his assailant, but not before the man could grab hold of his holstered sidearm and use it to shoot the two nearest French marines who were accompanying him.
With these three men dead, the German merchant sailors, many of which were veterans of the Kaiserliche Marine quickly began to revolt and murder the French military personnel who had boarded their vessel and tried to kill them.
It was a total massacre for the French Marines as only a squad of them boarded the German oil tanker, and had suddenly come under assault during a time of crisis which drew their
attention elsewhere.
By the time the German subs raised from the depths of the sea to reveal themselves and boarded the German Tanker they found that the merchant sailors had killed all of the members of the French boarding party and tossed their corpses into the sea, while denying the slightest aid to those French soldiers who had jumped into the ocean. When the German Captain in charge of the Wolfpack heard of what had happened, and France’s attempts to commit war crimes against German civilians, he gave an unthinkable
order.
“Sink the life rafts! Not a single French soldier will escape from the judgement of the lord
today!”
With this, a French Frigate was lost off the coast of Africa, along with its entire crew. And nobody, other than those German merchants and sailors who had been witness to the event knew what had happened here on this day, nor ever would.