But then I finally saw Jürgen, his suit protected by a lab coat, clipboard in hand as he stood next to a rocket that seemed to be fully assembled. Aldo parked the car, as he gnawed at his lip.

Just then, Jürgen noticed me. He passed the clipboard to a man beside him, slapping it against his chest in a move that was close to aggression, and, without a word, strode toward me.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he hissed.

“I—I came to bring you these,” I stammered, extending the blueprints toward him. Jürgen’s nostrils flared. He grabbed me firmly by the elbow and dragged me to the cross tunnel nearby. Several workers in striped uniforms scurried from the space as we approached, dismissed without a word. When we were alone, Jürgen dropped the blueprints to the ground and he cupped my face in his shaking hands.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he choked out, staring desperately into my eyes. “Sofie, I never wanted you to see this.”

“I didn’t mean to come inside, I promise. But when I got here with the blueprints, I realized this was my chance to understand…” His throat was working as if he wanted to speak, but he didn’t say a word—he just stared into my eyes. “Remember? You said I didn’t understand. You said I didn’t know what it had cost for me and the children to live our lives in Berlin. I wanted to—”

“This isn’t a game,” he snapped, stepping away from me, pinching the bridge of his nose. He drew in a series of sharp breaths, then dropped his voice as he hissed, “Get out of here, Sofie. Please.”

I held myself together until I made it back to my car, out the gates, back onto the main road—but then I swerved to a shoulder and opened the car door just in time to be violently ill.

I spent the afternoon in a daze, trying to process what I’d seen at Mittelwerk—but the scale of the suffering was too great to “make sense of.”

I wanted to make amends.

There was no way to make amends.

Even if I could have personally freed every man in that tunnel, it still wouldn’t be enough. They’d endured conditions and pain and torture that were beyond anything that could be forgiven. Even if they were liberated right that minute, they’d be scarred for the rest of their lives.