A/N: I watched The Book Thief last night, and I'd say it was good, but I'm not sure that that's the right word to use for a film which made you start crying halfway through, and not stop legitimately bawling until the credits had finished rolling. I honestly had a physical pain in my chest, and I felt like my heart had leaked out my eyes. This fic isn't about The Book Thief, but the inspiration comes from a number of thoughts and one shots I created while watching it. It's about Matthew, mainly, (the car accident never happened) and him dealing with the return of war. In this Robert is dead (although rather recently) so he's the earl now. Also, Matthew and Mary are slightly younger than they would be by this point in canon; I'm thinking late forties. Just go with me on this one. Here we go; let me know your thoughts at the end, please.

The air at the party is stiflingly hot, and Matthew is just thinking of edging into the shade with a glass of lemonade, when the cry cuts through the air. "Attention, attention! Word has just been received that as of 11:00 today, Germany has failed to withdraw troops from Poland. The Prime Minister announced that, unfortunately, we are at war with Germany."

Joy and laughter evaporate from the air with a swiftness Matthew has only felt once before in his life, and the silence expands, oppressive, constricting, but even as he processes this, his mind is slipping away from the moment. It's supposed to be 1939 but he couldn't tell anyone that for certain, and panic sets in as his eyes scan the crowd for her, desperate to reassure himself of the truth, that all those years merely a painful fantasy he conjured in half a moment of longing, that his life does exist. He sees her, looking as beautiful as ever, and when her eyes meet his, despite the fear in them, he breathes a sigh of relief, because if this were still 1914, there would be no way she would have even looked at him. Immediately he begins to cross to her, still needing the solid reassurance of her presence, although he can feel his wedding ring now on his finger, and the world is seeming a little more right. He's beside her, catching her delicately gloved hand in his fingers, and he can see the relief flood her eyes, willing the tears back, and he knows his fears were mutual. He squeezes her hand, more tightly than normal, and doesn't let go, as if she might waft away into a cloud of memory if he slackens his grip at all, but she doesn't seem to mind. Only then can he return his attention solely to the present, to the dismal message which shakes the rest of the crowd.

War.

The word slips into his ears and he feels his posture tense, feels his throat constrict, with just a hint of the taste of bile in the back. He tries to swallow the awful feeling away, but it tugs on him, like a spectre. He slips into the recollections of a young man, and immediately feels a million times older. How many years ago were they waiting with bated breath, a breath they had been holding for years and could only finally let go as the clock chimed its final, eleventh bong? He can picture the great hall now, the entire collection of members of the great house lined up in two solemn rows. He remembers the deliberateness in his posture, even though he couldn't stand, as he squared his shoulders with the other soldiers; he remembers equally how it had slipped just a fraction with that final stroke of the clock, as they transformed, like cinderella coming home from the ball, but this was one life he remained forever glad to come home from. The others had cheered, had hugged, and kissed, or meandered somberly from the room, but all Matthew could remember was breathing out a "thank God."

Thank God he it was over, forever. He would never have to go back. For the first time, since he had returned home from the front with his broken back, he had felt the inklings of hope and freedom.

Thank God, no one else would suffer.

Thank God, no one else would end up like him.

Thank God, no one else would die.

And thank God, it would never fall to him again.

Except now, rivaling the sickest jokes he had heard since "your father is dead" and "you'll never walk again," he was going back. They all were.

Matthew had never known Mary to cry much, not in their twenty-eight years of acquaintance, nor their twenty years of marriage. Of course, he remembered guiltily, he hadn't been around much during the last war.

He had certainly never heard her cry like this. These were not the reserved, breathy sobs of that long-ago, ill-fated garden party, nor the full, hearty wails during her multiple pregnancies, nor even the angry snivels when he had refused Reggie Swire's inheritance. These were deep, trembling sobs, almost soundless, even as they shook her entire body. He tried to calm her, to still her as she buried her face and her tears deeper into his shirt, and his heart broke again to know he was partially (or perhaps mostly) the cause of these.

The letter had come in the mail that morning, and although it had stolen the very breath from his body when he opened it, and shaken him to the core, leaving him feeling weak and unanchored all day, he had only chosen to show it to her now, when they were all alone.

It wasn't conscription, per say. English lords didn't get conscripted, not really, certainly not this early on. It was merely an invitation, inquiring if he'd be willing to pick up his former rank and don the uniform once more. Despite the posh formality, the unmentioned assurance that it was really a ceremonial position (it had been for Robert, hadn't it?) he had felt his face go pale, felt his arms turn to jelly.

"Father? Is something the matter?" George had inquired, pausing in buttering his bread as his concerned stare fell on his father.

Matthew met his son's eyes, so much like his own, and shook his head with an overtly false smile. "Nothing, nothing at all. Excuse me," Matthew hurried out of the room, the letter clutched feverishly in his hand. He had always been an awful liar.

By the time he had sequestered himself in his study, he was shaking. The bitter taste had returned to his mouth, and with a groan he lowered his head into his palms as he propped his elbows on his desk.

He sunk again into 1914- it seemed more and more like he would never escape that year, these days- and he could picture his breakfast plate before him. Eggs, toast- two pieces, instead of one; he'd still been a younger, growing man back then. His mother had pressed the letter into his hands with questioning eyes, which he refused to meet, even as he ripped the envelope open.

What had flooded through him? Dread? Acceptance? Relief? A slight thrill? Matthew remembered his eyes skipping over the words that said war and solider, or perhaps just ignoring them. All he had seen was that he was getting away, he was escaping all their ludicrous notions of entails, and stupid rules about dinners, and inheritances, and mocking words about jobs, and the condescending gaze of Mary Crawley, whom he would never be good enough for. He was leaving it all behind, he was letting it all go, and for once, they couldn't stop him. He had played their game for years, floundered this way and that, trying to wriggle out of it, trying then to learn their rules, play with them, win, but it had never been his game, and now, now, he was finally out.

How foolish he had been. In 1914, this letter had been a ticket out of a world he had convinced himself (poorly) he didn't want to be a part of. In 1940, it seemed a death sentence, a damning conviction ordering him to let go of everything he once hated, and now couldn't live without.

And although he wanted to kick and drag his heels, and maybe even play the aristocrat card, and say no, no, there was no way he was leaving his wife, his children, his home, to risk going back to that slice of hell on earth, where young man were smited forever from the face of the earth in split second blasts, where he was forced to abandoned his humanity as he furthered their horrid quests, he knew - had known, really, since he heard the dreadful announcement a mere year earlier- that he wouldn't.

Matthew Crawley had never been very good at being selfish.

A trait- or fault- his wife, though she has long since loved him unconditionally, has never been very good at understanding.

Because Matthew has never been very good at being selfish, they both know he will accept the post again. And because they both know of his terrible notions of nobility, they both also know that there's no possible way he will stay in England, if he can.

Matthew remembers a conversation with Robert from one of his leaves. His mentor had asked Matthew about life on the front, and then expressed some wistful desire to be over there with him, sharing in the excitement, and although Matthew remembers staring politely past the man, he knows he had wanted to shout at Robert, to scream and shake him, "This isn't a bit of excitement, Robert! This isn't a game! There is no honor, no glory over there, just men, dying and crying for their lives and their wives and their mothers, and no one can even blame them, because there isn't a soul among us who doesn't agree as we watch our best friends blown to bits!" He remembers hating Robert for a moment, as the other man longed to go back where Matthew hated, but felt obligated to return.

Now Matthew is that man, the earl who doesn't have to go get his hands dirty, and yet will endeavor to. But Matthew doesn't do it out of need for a thrill ride or even a sense of purpose; Matthew will return to the continent, to war proper, because it's unfair for so many younger, more promising men to go die while he stays here, living the life they have never even had a chance to have. He will go for them, and, as he tells Mary, he will go for George.

"Don't you see, Mary? They'll already have their man from our household. If there's even a chance- the slightest chance-it will keep him out of the war, I have to risk it. I've been there before, I've seen; it can't hurt me anymore than it already has. But I can't-I won't-let any of our children go into that hell, not without a fight at least," he implores, and the tears are falling freely from both of their eyes as he chokes back the sob in their words, before they kiss.

So maybe he has learned to be a little selfish in all these years. After all, there's a certain brand of selfishness, and it's called love, and Matthew Crawley does know a thing or two about that.

The atmosphere in London matches his own emotions perfectly: tense, on edge, a little ragged, but doing its best to keep up appearance. He walks back from his meeting at the war office, needing the distraction of the mundane urbane sights and the feel of the breeze on his face to distract from the heavier matters he has just been made privy to. He enters Grantham House in a daze, and only when he's halfway into through removing his coat in the front hall does he realize it's fuller than when he left it.

"Mary!" he exclaims with a shock, quickly hanging his coat and trying to smooth his hair into a more presentable arrangement from the disheveled, plastered-down shape his cap has left it in. "What are you doing here?"

She smiles at him fondly, although there's a touch of sadness lingering in her eyes, which has been there ever since the day the letter came, and replies, "Well, it's been a while since the children have been to London, and," she steps closer, easily within arm's length, and her voice drops to a whisper, "I couldn't bear the thought of wasting our final days together, of letting you go through this alone."

"Oh Mary," he smiles sadly, and they embrace needily, messily in the hallway. It's not the need when they were first married- the insatiable desire to rip each other's clothes off and depart into the nearest bedroom (if they were lucky to get that far)- but a deeper, more passionate need, simply to feel the other, to reassure themselves that they're both still there, alive, together. Finally Matthew pushes them apart. "I appreciate the thought, but you shouldn't have come. The Germans have been flying raids all week on the nearby RAF fields. It's too dangerous."

"Please, Matthew," Mary says, clutching at his arms, smiling beseechingly at him, "it's just for one night. What's the worst that could happen?"

As he stares down at her beautiful, innocent face, and feels her tenuous grip on him, he wants so very badly to believe her.

Everything will be alright.

It's a beautiful sentiment.

From the day he has first put his uniform on again, Matthew has felt a slow resurgence of habits and memories from the army, as if he pulled them, too, out of the dusty box in the attic. Sleeping lightly, however, was one that never got crammed away in the first place. Indeed, ever since the war, Matthew has been a light sleeper, and while over the years he has found it both useful, and irksome, tonight he can only be grateful. The moment the siren first started its wail, like a dragon shaking off its slumber, he feels his eyes open and alertness flood his body. Beside him, Mary still lies, unmoving. Even as Matthew kicks off the covers, he shakes her. "Mary! Mary!'

She groans and begins to shift. "Mary, wake up!" Her eyes snap open, and he's unsure if it's because of the sirens, or the desperation in his voice, or the authoritative tone he thought he had left behind long ago in the trenches, but which, like everything else from that era, has suddenly returned to him. "The city is under attack. Get up! We have to get the children and get out of here!" He stares into her eyes until he's sure the message has gone through.

"Oh my God!" she screams, clasping a hand to her mouth, and for a moment he's worried she won't listen, that she'll stay there, paralyzed by fear. But then she rolls out of bed and hurries for her robe, and he wonders why he even expected otherwise. His wife has never been one for hysterics, and she's always been brave. "A storm-braver," he hears his younger self whisper even as he hurries to pull on his boots.

By himself, he would have pulled his uniform on. He can do it in a flash, and it barely takes two minutes. Now, though, he doesn't have even that time to spare; he must give it all to his family. He tucks his pajama pants into his boots and grabs his long wool military coat, even though it's September, and tightens it around his pajamas. He crams his hat onto his his head even as he flies out the door, as he takes the steps two, even three, at a time up to his children's bedrooms. At another time he'd appear comical, but here there's no time for laughter, no room to even entertain an amusing thought, just the direness of the situation.

George stumbles out of his bedroom in his bathrobe looking bleary-eyed. Violet joins them a split second later in her frilly night gown, although there's no sign that she's been sleeping. Her gaze is serious, the spitting image of her mother,and it'd be endearing in other circumstance. "Both of you, grab shoes, a coat, and hurry down to the hall to meet your mother," he orders, before continuing up to the next level where his two youngest sons sleep.

At thirteen, William is trying to look brave, and perhaps Reggie was attempting to emulate his brother, but the tears begin to spill as soon as the ten year old sees Matthew. "Papa!" he cries, sprinting from his bed, and grabs Matthew. "It's alright, my boy," Matthew says, and as much as he wants to linger and comfort his son, he knows there's no time. "Quick, grab your coats and your shoes," he says, more for William's benefit, because Matthew ends up collecting Reggie's for him. With the boy in one arm and the clothes in the other, he hurries down the steps, William right behind him. The rest of the family is standing huddled in the doorway, and all eyes turn to him as he finishes descending the steps. "Has anyone fetched the Bateses?" he asks, and George answers over the banshee like roar of the alarms, "Yes, Father! They're coming!" As if on cue, Anna and John emerge from the dark hallway, pulling on coats as they stumble out.

"Good, let's go!" Matthew calls, throwing open the door, and bolting out. The rest of the family runs to keep up with him as he hurries out onto the street down the pathway he only just examined the other day. The siren is everywhere, pounding into their heads, creating its own brand of demonic silence as it entirely dominates their hearing. Matthew is running for his life, and he feels cold sweat pour over him. The last time he ran this fast, this desperately was in France with William on that cursed patrol, and suddenly he's there again. He turns his head, glancing to see if William's still with him, because they both need to make it out alive, and he almost stumbles when he sees a different William, his son, struggling to match his pace. Back then he ran faster to see his family again, now he realizes if he runs too fast he will lose them. He pauses, waiting for them to catch up, and Reggie is still sobbing in his arms, but he sets him down. "Reggie, go with your brother!" he says, and it's an order, and when the teenager catches up, Matthew tells him, "Take him and keep going! Two blocks down and then take a left, and there should be a sign that says air shelter leading into a basement!"

He tells the same thing to Violet as she catches up, and then he hurries back to find the others. They're with John, and Matthew could kick himself for not thinking of the older man and his leg, and how was he ever supposed to run. Mary gives him a murderous look for his forgetfulness, but his heart swells as he sees George offering his shoulder to the valet as they attempt to keep up. "Here, I'll help. George, take your mother."

"I won't be taken, anywhere," Mary replies indignantly.

"Mary, please, just go," he says, and it's not an order, but a plea from her husband, which seems to soften her, even as she still protests.

"I have to be here for Anna."

"Anna, you need to go, too."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Crawley, but I'm not leaving Mr. Bates."

Matthew can feel the exasperation and the fear winning through. Don't they realize this is war? This is life and death? That there's no time for sentiments, for heroics?

The awful taste in his mouth is stronger than ever, and it's about to prompt him to say some awful things, but Bates beats him to it.

"Anna, I won't have you wait for me. Go with Lady Mary, I'll be right along. None of you wait for me."

"Don't leave the children alone." Matthew adds, and the combined effort of their words works as Mary, Anna, and George set off.

"I meant it, your Lordship," Bates says again as he and Matthew continue at a slower pace, as Matthew tries to lend his support.

"And I did, too," Matthew says firmly, looking the older man in the eyes. An understanding passes through them as John notes the lack of pity in his blue eyes. There's only resolve, and a steely respect between the two soldiers, and for that reason John consents and wraps his arm more surely around Matthew's shoulders.

Matthew can still feel Bates holding back, trying to remain dignified, but the man is older, frailer now, and there is no time for pride, and he shouts to him, "Bates! Don't hold back now and risk our lives on account of embarrassing yourself in front of me! You used to help lift me into bed when my legs didn't work! Don't believe I'll think any less of you!"

The words worked as he leans more fully onto Matthew, who is almost dragging him as they take off at a faster pace now. They reach the door of the shelter and hustle in, and Mary throws herself at him, and starts to say something, but the words are lost as the first bomb falls on the city of London. Matthew sits as a wave of nausea passes over him, he slumps against the wall and stares past everyone as the fear, which has been building since the first whisperings of another war, finally washes over him. He's limp but he's trembling, and as he stares into the darkness of the tight underground room, as the very ground shakes with the increasing impact of shells, screaming and roaring above him, he's sure he's back in France.

He's breathing, faster and faster, and as some dirt sprinkles onto his head, he is certain the trench is going to crumble around him and fall on him. He wonders what it will be like to die, buried alive, and the terrifying thought consumes him, it's the only thing he knows, and oh, God, he's sure it's coming. He's shaking terribly now-or are the walls shaking- he's going to be sick! Someone touches him and he barely holds in the scream. He expects it to be William, or Stevens, or one of the other chaps, but it's Mary- Mary! What on earth is she doing here? She can't be here! She's supposed to be home, safe in England, not here, never here! He tries to warn her, tries to shout that she needs to leave now, leave him before she's buried alive in this hell hole, but then suddenly she's kissing him, cutting off his screams… but he's engaged to Lavinia, and she to Carlisle, so why is she kissing him? How is she kissing him? Surely this is a dream…

And then he comes to his sense, realizes, that for once, Mary's not the dream, France is, and he almost cries for joy when he realizes, she's real, his wife, Mary, in his arms, but then suddenly he wishes he were in France.

Because they're here, his family, trying to seem brave, but looking terrified, and cringing at the sound of bombs in this cramped, dirty room, and it's something he never wanted for them. In all of his years in the trenches, his one relief, his one source of gratitude, was at least no one he loved was here. They were in England, they were safe from this kind of unrelenting fear, from these horrors, and they never would experience them; it would be his burden alone.

But war was here, in England, and Matthew had never felt more terrified in his life.