7/24/26: r/SketchDaily theme, "Free Draw Friday." Scene from my anthro WWII story, Nixie runs across Ludolf Jäger, just covered in runes and hanging from a tree, nothing weird about that.
TUMBLR EDIT: Please first see THIS ENTRY and THIS ENTRY for some context; you can see related art HERE. Picking up from there, the scene that popped (still heavily a WIP) into my head, occurs much later in the story as you can see from Nixie's appearance (her hair has grown back); much of the context is still missing, but here it goes.
Nixie, for some indeterminate reason, is wandering around in the woods of the fictional foothills of the story. (This takes place near the German/Polish border in the northeast, the unnamed city of the story is most likely a v-e-r-r-r-y loose version of Berlin, as far as I'm aware there is no low mountain range in this area but there is in the story, surrounded by a vast karst-landscape forest called the Great Wald, or previously, Zierenwald.) I know her home is at the edge of the Wald though not why she'd end up in the foothills. Anyway, it's nighttime and growing dark, and partisans and rogue Wehrmacht units and snipers and all kinds of spooky things lurk about in the woods, so Nixie is quite nervous and becoming even more so as she wanders. She thinks she spots a faint light in the distance and ponders heading that way, but gets a bit lost trying to reach it, there are so many trees and boulders and whatnot in the way. She peers uneasily over her shoulder more than once, suspecting she's being followed. It doesn't occur to her until the last minute that something might be ahead instead. She turns just in time to see a face staring back at her--upside down--eyes as wide as hers surely go when she gasps and jerks back. She actually tries running backward from whatever supernatural being this is just floating in the air, but her ankle catches on a root--right as she falls she notices at last this is nothing supernatural, it's a man literally suspended from a tree by a rope tied around his ankles, and already he's reaching to grasp the rope and pull himself up, but that's all she gets to see before she lands hard on her back and the breath is knocked out of her.
Nixie has to take a moment to blink away the dizziness and catch her breath before pushing herself back up. A few more confused blinks, and she sees someone walking toward her, though it's too dark to make out details. As soon as the figure steps into a clearing the dim twilight hits him and Nixie finally recognizes who she's looking at. The man who'd been hanging from the tree is the same SS major she remembers from when she was at Projekt Weltuntergang headquarters--the one who flew into a rage at the information Nixie provided and shot a Wehrmacht official. She seems to recall his name was Jäger, hunter. She'd had no idea what happened with him after that as he'd declared the experiment into her abilities over, and she'd been shuttled off to a camp. All she knows for sure is how startling it was to see him switch from rather prissy, buttoned-down bureaucracy to a murderous fury, so to see him approaching her now is alarming. As if that isn't enough, his appearance is bizarre--gone is his pristine SS uniform, now he's dressed in trousers but nothing more, and runes are painted all over him in red. His eyes are wide and despite the darkness his pupils are pinpricks. Given his looks, Nixie is understandably anxious (see Turquoise's entry above), and she turns herself over and starts trying to get up but doesn't accomplish much, as her ankle is too badly twisted for her to do much else than awkwardly hop. She collapses again and draws in on herself just as Jäger reaches her and stops, looking down at her with those pinprick eyes.
"I remember you," he says in a musing tone. "You're that girl with the second sight."
The two stare at each other briefly--Nixie's heart hammering in her chest--before he steps even closer and leans down. She scrabbles at the ground, seeking a rock or a stick or something, when Jäger says, "I'm not going to hurt you." She has no real reason to believe him, but she can sense his emotions--there's no malice, no lust, no fury, only curiosity. The moment she realizes this, he seems to pick up on her realization--"You believe me, don't you?"--only it's hardly a question. He holds out his hand for her to take and help herself up.
Nixie hesitates--only a second. Reaches out for him. He notices her hesitation, however, and abruptly withdraws his hand, wariness flitting across his face--no, not quite wariness, but a look that seems to warn, Ah-ah, not so fast. She knows he remembers what happened when she took Private Klemper's hand, even though he didn't seem to be paying attention--and now she wonders with a twinge of unease if he has the sight, too, since he appears to pick up on everything she's thinking just as she thinks it. "Whatever this is," he says, "it passes through the hands? Does it work through anything else--? Don't lie to me, I'll know," and, believing him, she shakes her head--"Only...only the hands. I can't explain." He doesn't appear interested in an explanation right now, however, and offers his elbow; Nixie grasps it and pulls herself to her feet, wincing and lifting her foot. "There's a spot to sit over there and I'll look at your ankle," he says, and she leans on his arm as he leads her back toward the tree he'd been suspended from.
Nixie looks around, takes in the details; there are runes painted on the tree's bark as well, a smoldering fire that's been extinguished, several small statues and painted amulets at the tree's base, what look to be food offerings in bowls and cups. Jäger sits her down against a large protruding root and stretches out her leg, carefully feeling her ankle as she winces. "Nothing broken, only bruised," he says, "a cold pack and a tight wrap should help. I can offer only the latter, I'm afraid," and he rummages around, picking something up and starting to tear it into strips; she realizes this must be his shirt. She blushes a little but says nothing as he wraps up her ankle.
"You..." Nixie finally ventures, then stalls; he glances up at her, open curiosity again. "You are...like me?" she asks. "You see things...?"
Jäger stares at her briefly before the corner of his mouth twitches. "Nein...not like you," he says, "unfortunately. I see things only in the fire, when I seek them." He gestures at the smoldering fire pit. "But...I did grow up with a mother...a grandmother...six sisters...a wife...seven daughters...an office full of Helferinnen. I know how your kind thinks. You all have your own tells. Nothing supernatural about it. You, on the other hand..." His eyes light up a little, and Nixie belatedly realizes why they look so strange--he's obviously drugged. "You do have an ability...one I'm afraid I wasn't quite in the right mind to appreciate, last I saw of it. I realize now what an oversight this was, and I do apologize for my reckless actions that nearly got you killed. I'm genuinely glad you made it. You believe me?"
Nixie swallows, trying to figure out just how honest or not she should be. She decides to take her chances: "I...I believe you," she murmurs, "but...you're not glad that I wasn't killed. You're glad that my power wasn't killed."
Jäger blinks. Nixie braces herself for the fury--yet there isn't any. He simply sits back on his haunches, giving her an appraising look. "Fascinating," he says, "either you really do have the sight, or you're as experienced at reading others as I am. And no offense intended, but given what I've learned about you, I doubt it's the latter. Where does this ability come from...? Can you say?" He tilts his head. "Did you practice to achieve it, or..."
"I've always been this way," Nixie says quietly. He says nothing at first, seems to be waiting, so she adds, "My family...my family, my mother said it ran in the family, it skipped her, but it came to me."
Jäger's face lights up again. "Ah...it's in your blood! Fascinating! I was indeed so thoughtless brushing off your abilities before...but not a second time. My family is similar to yours, you know...? Perhaps your mother never told you, but this talent, it comes from the gods, they bestow it on us. Only a handful of us, I'm afraid...as I said, I wasn't born with the ability myself...but my Oma saw things, much as you do, and my Opa, and my Leopoldine...she's not my blood, but she may as well be. And someday, everyone will have this skill, we just need to keep working toward it, working hard." He gestures upward at the tree. "This is what you interrupted, by the way, I imagine my appearance rather frightened you...this was unintended. I don't normally hang myself from trees! But it seemed fitting...yet I get ahead of myself, of course you're not here to listen to me prattle on about such things. I apologize. I can see I've rather overwhelmed you."
He moves back slightly, pauses, then stands and goes to fetch something from the foot of the tree. He offers her a small cup. "Mead," he says, "you must be thirsty after all that running," and when she hesitates he adds, "It hasn't anything in it, I didn't drink this myself; this is an offering. I doubt the gods would mind terribly!"
He's still being honest, as far as Nixie can tell; she takes the cup and sips from it. "I don't understand why you hang yourself from a tree," she says, just to give him something innocuous to focus on, because something about him unnerves her; she knows he's telling her the truth so far, but still, it's like there's something lurking under the surface, just barely keeping itself from emerging. It's almost like the Jäger she's talking to is...a mask, a facade, over something darker and more sinister.
"Ah...let me guess, you grew up a Christian." His voice takes on a pitying air.
"Ja...though we never went to church much...you didn't?"
"My family is Christian on paper only. The Jägers are from a very old line of the heidnische tradition. We dedicate ourselves to the old ways. So of course, you'd be unfamiliar with the story of how Allvater Wotan gained his knowledge of the runes. I can't blame you for your ignorance, the church has been perpetuating this darkness for centuries, but again, that will change someday." He shows her a small silver pendant he's wearing. "You see? This is Mjölnir, the hammer of Donar, my patron. We often find the gods reach out to us in times of trial; I know you've been through much, tell me, have you ever felt, or sensed, a call--? Something reaching out to you?"
Nixie bites the inside of her mouth and slowly shakes her head. "N...nein, I never have...not from any gods."
He of course notices her phrasing and frowns a little. "So...you've sensed a call from something else? Don't lie to me, I'll know."
"Ah...? Who?" Nixie doesn't answer. Jäger stares at her for a moment, pinhole pupils boring through her, then says, "Ah...the Trench Rat, the other one with the sight. He's the one whose call you felt, ja?"
"Bitte, don't condescend, I already told you I know how your sort thinks, and your feelings for him are obvious. Of course the two of you would be drawn to each other, the more evolved move toward the more evolved, just as the riffraff move toward the riffraff."
Nixie's brow furrows. "Riffraff...?"
"Of course, Liebling, the Untermenschen." He waves a hand dismissively; "No need to look like that, the term should lose all meaning sometime soon, if all goes well. I've realized something my fellows have not, that everyone has the potential within them to become an Übermensch, absolutely everyone, and from there it's only a short step to godhood."
Nixie blinks. "Godhood--?"
"Of course! I told you. Everyone can develop the skill you yourself were born with naturally, that is, after they work for it. Like Herr Wotan hanging himself from Yggdrasil, sacrifices must be made, but humanity will get there. Granted, most of them will need some convincing first, and it won't be easy, or bloodless--no sacrifice is. But it'll be worth it for such knowledge and power. You, I doubt you need to do much more, as you're already so close. To be born with such talents! It's just a shame your family neglected to pass it on as mine did, yet if you looked back far enough, I'm willing to bet a god has already blessed your bloodline as one did mine, sometime in the distant past, you've just forgotten. Yet it's in your blood, it's part of you, you're simply of the Übermenschen and don't need to work quite as hard." His face lights up again and he reaches out, almost grasping her hands, before catching himself; he clenches a fist instead, though not threateningly. "You! You can play a part in this, you can help lead others out of the darkness and toward wisdom. This must be the reason you lived! Your purpose!"
Nixie shakes her head and leans back, away from him--the faint but distinct fanatic glint in his eyes unnerves her. "Purpose...? Helping you? I...I have no such interest! I'd never help you! No matter what this...this plan of yours is! Untermenschen and Übermenschen--? Gods and riffraff? You talk like you're so--so enlightened--but--you're just like all the rest of your sort! Madmen! Murderers! Plain and simple!"
Jäger says nothing, just looks at her. At first there's no reaction to speak of...but then his eyelids lower a fraction. Nixie takes in a breath and shrinks in on herself. Jäger's appearance doesn't change any, yet it's as if a shadow settles over him, or...as if the eerie mask she thought she saw earlier has slipped a little bit. His eyes, already light blue, almost seem to glow even as the rest of him dims; even eerier, a burning glow fades into view around him, as if the fire has returned to life. She's seen auras before, but she's never seen something like this.
"You should rethink your decision," Jäger says, only strangely, it sounds like he's speaking in two voices, his regular one and another, lower and more like a whisper. Nixie takes another breath as now she understands what she's seeing, even if not what it means--the fiery glow just behind him is a perfect duplicate, a Doppelgänger, and it's what she sensed lurking behind that carefully cultivated mask this entire time. Even as she takes in this detail, the image shivers and superimposes over Jäger; Nixie blinks rapidly, feeling the need to fix her blurred vision, only she knows it's not her eyes that are the problem.
She takes a shaky breath, pushing down the fear rising in her throat--she's faced worse than this, and she lived, she tells herself she can face whatever this is too, even though she's not convinced--and clenching her own fists. She wishes she'd had the chance to grab his hand, see and figure out what exactly she's dealing with, but has to make do with intuition, same as him. "Rethink...?" She slowly pushes herself to her feet, having to balance herself carefully, having no idea how far she'll get if she tries to flee. "I have nothing to rethink. You're the one who should rethink. I don't need any special talent to say that you and everything you stand for will fail. Miserably! And a good thing, too!"
Jäger's expression turns positively unpleasant--she recognizes the precursor to the same rage he flew into at project headquarters, just before he drew his gun, and she's glad he has no gun on him now. The Doppelgänger image flickers and glows even brighter, making the same face. "You think weakness and darkness and ignorance are a good thing--?" he retorts, the hissing whisper-voice growing louder. "You're really that foolish--?"
Nixie makes the same face back at him. "I can't do much but I'll do everything I can to make sure you fail. The only weak and ignorant one I see is you."
The Doppelgänger's eyes flash; he and Jäger both bare their teeth, lips curling back, and there it is, the same terrifying fury she saw before. He grabs at the waist of his trousers and now Nixie sees what she somehow missed previously--his hand comes back clenching a black-handled Ehrendolch, its blade glinting even in the dimness. He surges toward her--not raising the dagger to swing down as one might expect, but lowering it to swing up and gut her instantly--Nixie has no understanding of knife combat, she has no weapon herself, she just curls over on herself and exclaims, "You!--you promised not to hurt me!"
Something sparking in the back of her mind, when Jäger had mentioned his family following the old ways--she doesn't know much about this--but she knows that oaths are important, beyond important, if you don't have your word then you have nothing, even the dagger itself hints as much, My honor is loyalty--she doesn't think this will matter much, promises are easily broken every day, yet it's the only defense she has. She braces herself for the blade but it doesn't come. She cracks open an eye--breath coming quick in her throat--and can see that he's stopped just before her, still gripping the dagger--knuckles white--yet he isn't attacking. Nixie lifts her head a little to peer over her arm. Jäger glares at her--two sets of eyes glowering--yet the Doppelgänger image is flickering and wavering. As she watches he makes himself take a breath and let it out, and the inhuman fury on his face lessens, shifting into human anger, and his tensed muscles relax just a little.
"I'm a man of my word," Jäger says, in that careful forced neutral voice of before, just one voice this time. He lowers the dagger, slowly straightens out of his crouch; Nixie follows suit, lowering her arms, tentatively standing back up. Jäger continues staring at her with hatred in his eyes, yet it's his hatred, the flickering double is weak and faint and almost gone, suppressed. He shoves the dagger back into the waist of his trousers and reaches for his neck. "Take this," he says, holding out the Mjölnir; Nixie hesitates, confused, before uneasily accepting it. "Over that way," Jäger goes on, gesturing in the same direction in which Nixie saw the light earlier, "is my family home. If you can make it there on that foot, ask for medical assistance, and give them this. You're then free to go as you choose." His eyes narrow slightly and the double flickers a bit more brightly, making Nixie grasp the Mjölnir as if it might protect her. "Understand," he says, once more in that unnerving double voice, "that the next time we meet, we meet as enemies."
He turns to the tree, retrieves a branch from near its base, tosses it at her; Nixie gasps, stumbles trying to catch it, and only realizes what it's for when she ends up leaning on it for support. She glances back up at Jäger but he seems to have already dismissed her, returning to the tree; she sees that he's adorned not only with painted runes, but with a tattoo on his shoulder, a broken sun cross, a rounded swastika. Nixie suppresses a shudder, grips the stick, turns herself around to hobble painfully in the direction pointed out. Jäger sits down before his statuettes and offerings and ignores her as she goes. It's a long painful trek through the woods to the sprawling Jäger estate, but Nixie runs across no further threats.
...Nixie almost surely does end up playing a role in the final arc of the series, Ultima Thule, and as previous entries have shown, both she and, ironically, Leopoldine Jäger correctly predict the outcome of Major Jäger's plans for a Fourth Reich. Needless to say it doesn't go as Jäger hopes.
[I Remember You Rough Sketch [Friday, July 24, 2026, 1:23:25 AM]]
