Every time the room shakes to the thud-thud-thud of the Stalin-organs, that dim little lightbulb flickers off-on.
Feliciano thinks it's a miracle they even have a lightbulb- it'd be better to leave them in total darkness, so that whenever they get taken out for interrogation they'd be blinded and disoriented- but he won't complain. Even if the constant flickering light makes him lose track of time, he can still keep it by the closer and closer boom of artillery and the unstoppable tramp of the soldiers' boots.
He stares into Ludwig's eyes, half-closed and hazy, across the small room and the artillery thuds again and this time dust falls from the ceiling it must be right above them and Feliciano doesn't know whether to thank God or scream.
Time passes.
The room shakes.
The light flickers.
Feliciano pulls experimentally on the handcuffs in case it'll work (but it hasn't the thousands of times before when he was stronger and well-fed or fed at all) and glances at Ludwig again. His eyes are all the way closed now and his mouth moves but no sound comes out, and Feliciano doesn't know if this is better than the times he tried to talk but sounded like his throat was full of ash and his lungs had been burned, and his leg is healing much too slowly for a nation. He's barely moved since his boss died and Feliciano doesn't blame him, when his own was killed it felt like a shell to the stomach with every kick even though he kept thinking yes thank you-
Another thud, huge, and that must have been a building nearby, and somewhere in Italy there's another battle beginning and machine guns rattle along his bones, and Ludwig's breathing roughens and becomes shallower.
The last words Ludwig said to him (or near him, he wasn't lucid at all) were I'm sorry I remember don't go and Feliciano had just stretched as close to him as he could and tried to shush him but couldn't through a healing jaw and what if that's the last thing Ludwig says ever-
Feliciano has to distract himself somehow.
He closes his eyes.
"You know what I'll do when I'm out?" His voice startles himself, it's scratchy and he hasn't heard it since the last interrogation when they said where's Lovino Vargas for the thousandth time and he said as if I'd tell you and then they broke his jaw.
Ludwig moves his head the tiniest fraction.
"I'll— I'll have a picnic." Feliciano squeezes his eyes shut and tries to imagine- himself and Ludwig, healthy and outside and not handcuffed to hooks in a concrete room underneath Berlin, in the sun in- in- "Big brother Francis has a house in Provence, he'd let me go there."
Feliciano tilts his head back to rest against the concrete wall. He can see it, almost, the stone house covered in climbing plants and Francis coming out to greet them, leaving his limp and his scars and the flickering on his face as he and Henri fight for control somewhere far away, and the lavender in the garden. "I'll bring wine, and— and seafood risotto," that would be good, he could buy the shrimp and the scallops fresh, and "Lovino could come too, he'll bring more wine, probably, and, uh, maybe panzerotti di ricotta? Yeah, he likes sweets." Lovino would be happy too, as happy as Lovino got anyway, because "And Antonio and Lotte will be there too, with gazpacho and chocolate."
Another thud, and the clatter of masonry.
"You could bring Königsberger klopse, you make really good ones." Feliciano should stop talking about food, he's so hungry and so are his people and his stomach feels like it's trying to eat itself, but if he shuts his eyes really tight and strains he can nearly taste the Kartoffelklöße Gilbert would bring, and Ludwig's breathing is evening out a little which is good because earlier it had sounded like bones in his throat.
The sun would be warm, beautiful weather, and Alfred and Arthur would be there as well, eating Francis's cassoulet and Arthur would bring Yorkshire pudding which maybe wouldn't be burnt and Alfred would bring cornbread, and Feliciano can almost not feel the artillery through his veins and the shaking of the room.
He keeps speaking, voice hoarse from no water and dust and the lead in so many of his people, about how he'll invite Feliks and Tolys and they'd bring šakotis and paczki and be mobile and cheerful and not skeletal at all, and Herakles's dolmadakia and moussaka would taste amazing in the outdoors and the man himself would be clean and able to sleep without shaking from hunger, and the thuds and bootsteps above grow closer and shake their bodies and it's getting harder to talk.
There are bootsteps inside now, coming closer closer closer, and the light is almost out and Ludwig's breaths are coming quick and harsh and Feliciano can hear a few faint whimpers and then the light goes out.
Left in the complete darkness, Feliciano tries to reach out with one of his legs and touch Ludwig, reassure him that he's not gone, but he can't reach (he knew that, anyway, but maybe this time it will work) and strains and strains and tries to think of lavender bushes and Erszébet's goulash and he aches all over, so much, and the room stinks to high heaven and there're people right outside the door.
Russians, Feliciano thinks, and then I wonder what Ivan would bring?
Thud, thud, and the door opens and light floods into the room and there stands Ivan, tall and bloody and looking faintly horrified.
"Hello," Feliciano says, and then everything snaps off but the thuds throughout his land and body and the last thing he sees is when someone takes the cuffs off Ludwig and he slumps to the floor and doesn't move.
(Seventy years later, they do eventually have a picnic, and it turns out Ivan brings pelmeni, and afterwards Feliciano lies on the grass with Ludwig and chatters at him just to hear him reply and the sun is very warm indeed, and it is finally, blessedly still.)
history notes:
mussolini died april 28th by shooting, his corpse was dragged through milan, strung up on a lamppost, and generally abused by anyone who wanted to
hitler died april 30th from either shooting himself or taking cyanide
berlin fell may 2nd and germany surrendered may 8th, so did the isr (puppet italian state)
famines struck in most nazi-occupied countries because of how the nazis would take the food back to germany, also blockades were a problem and fighting is not a good climate for crops
henri is francis's split personality of vichy france
food notes (aka oh god kill me i want these):
panzerotti di ricotta: a calabrian dessert of fried ravioli filled with ricotta
königsberger klopse: meatballs in capers, a prussian specialty and comfort food
kartoffelklöße: potato dumplings
cassoulet: rich meat casserole
šakotis: a lithuanian/polish cake
paczki: polish donut
dolmadakia: basically dolma, stuffed grape leaves
pelmeni: russian snack dumplings with meat
miscellaneous notes:
provence is the province of france containing marseilles down near italy and the alps and it is really fricking pretty and there's lots of lavender and fresh seafood and i wanna go there
This is partly because of a headcanon I sometimes have, which is that after the formation of the Salò Republic Feli ended up under house arrest as soon as they got hold of him, and once Lud found out he raised a stink and was imprisoned as well, and since Lovino and Gilbert managed to avoid/escape the authorities they'd try to get info off Lud and Feli.
By the way, "Stalin-organ" is a nickname for the Katyusha artillery rockets, so called because they make a very loud whistly-screechy-hell noise that reminded the Germans of probably a badly tuned musical instrument and the Russians of the crescendo in the song Katyusha.