For this chapter:
Character(s), Pairing(s): USA, PruCan, France, Germany, Ukraine, Belarus, Britain. Background Can/Ukr, AmeriBela, mentioned: USUK and Franada.
Rating: T
Warnings: Angst: America's all aloooooone. Slash: some. Language: a fair bit I think. Talk of promiscuity. Violence. Possible OOCness (It's my first time writing Belarus, cut me some slack or something)
Chapter Summary: A mission begins and ends on the echo of a dream.
A/N: I'm having far too much fun beating these guys up these days, aren't I? When was the last time I wrote something fluffy? This thing keeps scrweing with my formatting, so I apologise in advance for words stuck together and whatnot. I don't know why it does it. OBSCENELY LONG CHAPTER (for me, anyway.) Notes at the end. Enjoy, my lovelies!
Chapter Two: Mission Control
It's quiet here, only the sounds of the waves lapping the sand, the clink of pebbles as they're tugged back with the foam. It's dark, midnight maybe, or just late night, early morning. It's a soft quiet, a gentle peace. Alfred knows he's alone here; he's always alone here. He comes here to think, muse over things he wouldn't give voice to even in the hands of the Company.
Moonlight glints off the horizon, off each crest of each wave, and still he stands there, thinking, arms by his sides, a hand on the knife at his belt, a hand on the holstered gun on his leg. He's armed, but not dangerous. Not right now. Right now, he's in the only place he doesn't need to worry.
Francis had sent them a town over to do their supply run whilst he decoded the files; there was no point in their hanging around, he'd said, no point in wasting time. Alfred didn't stand for it, of course, because what were they doing in that moment if not wasting time? Two-to-one shot his want – his need – down, and he had been forced to concede that yes, Matthew was a pandering little bitch, but he may have had a point.
Maybe.
It doesn't mean, though, that Alfred likes this. The waiting.
He suspects Francis didn't mind Matthew remaining behind, that he just wanted Alfred occupying himself so he didn't do something brash and unjustified, something completely mindless that would only get him into danger. That was fine with Alfred, because he needed to get out, get away and do something, anything.
He forgot Matthew's boots though, just to be an arse. It wasn't like it mattered all that much; Matthew would just use Alfred's spare ones when his eventually wore out, provided he didn't get his own or Kat didn't send some over for him. Prussia wouldn't do shit for him, so it would be Kat.
But he likes it here, this beach, because there's no one here to interrupt him.
The waves reach his ankles, some brush mid-calf, but Alfred finds it hard to care. He picks at the crease of his elbow, thinks about the warnings he'd been given, the concerns that had been raised. It was dangerous, what they'd injected him with, experimental at best. It was Company tested, not people tested. But Alfred had insisted, because how could he fight, how could he bring down the Company if he couldn't even sit up, couldn't walk or hold a weapon with which to fight?
It had been the desperation, the realisation that, yes, this was that important to him, especially in the wake of Britain's disappearance, that had convinced France to give him the drug.
And it worked, stopped his muscles deteriorating, and Alfred made a point to thank God every day that the strain he'd had in him hadn't affected him earlier, not really. He had yet to collapse, yet to have any side-effects of the drug, so all in all, it had been a good idea, an investment worth it.
There are hands on his hips, a nose pressed against the nape of his neck, the curve of a smile against his spine. He remembers this feeling, but it's not one he can place. The last time they were this close, he was the one five inches shorter, tucking himself under a chin with a five o'clock shadow and into warm, pliant arms. His breathing slows, relaxes even as his heart thumps in his chest.
"I'm dreaming," he whispers.
"Yes," Britain replies, sinking closer still, every breath of his body brushing against the skin of Alfred's back. Britain's skin is wet, like he's been in the water. But there is no feeling of the sea against his back, just the vague wetness of that day in the rain, and Alfred hums, takes his hands from his weapons to put them over Britain's own. "I'm sorry to disappoint."
"I love you," Alfred whispers after a pause that would have been stagnant with anyone else, but was just heavy between them. "I've always loved you."
Britain says nothing, but he smiles against Alfred's skin.
"Why did I never learn your name?" he asks, still staring off into the horizon.
"It would have put you in danger," Britain says, which is logical, Alfred supposes. It's something he already knows; it took him three years to learn Francis and Gilbert's names, and he's only recently learned Germany and Japan's. "You were already at risk."
"I'm a hero, now," Alfred protests, and he laughs when Britain digs his fingers into his hips, the edge of a frown pressed where the smile had once been. "I don't get into danger. I'm going to save you, I promise."
"Let me go," Britain sighs, sliding his hands around Alfred's chest to flatten a warm, sweaty palm against his heart.
It's that warmth that forces him towards wakefulness - Britain has always had cold hands, clammy from a lifetime longing to feel the rain on his skin. His skin was never chilly, from what Alfred remembers, but the pleasant cool of the fresh side of a pillow, the cool of a refrigerated drink. It's one of the few things he's had that has been able to stabilise an otherwise turbulent life.
"Alfred," and though he can feel Britain's lips moving, it's not the Yorkshireman's voice. It's a familiar one, it's British Columbian hinted with Québécois, and it's one he doesn't particularly want to hear. "Wake up; Francis has decoded the files."
He grumbles, rolls over, curses from under his arm at the other, and Matthew, the utter bastard that he is, just laughs, and dumps water on him.
Alfred leaps out of bed with an unmanly scream, staggers over a pair of trousers, trips over his boot and falls onto Matthew's bed.
"You ass!" he cries, rounding on the now-collapsed Canada, clutching at his ribs as he tries not to pass out. "What was that for?"
"I tried to wake you," Matthew gasps. "I did, honest, but you weren't waking. I had to do something."
"You dumped water on me!" He scrubs his face angrily, cleans the smears of his fingers from his eyeglasses and shoves Matthew, still laughing, out of the room, cursing him again.
As he changes into dry clothes, he asks what's so important he had to be soaked. He's buckling the belt to the too-baggy cargo pants he's had for god-knows how long when Matthew chooses to speak again.
"Francis decoded the files," Matthew repeats, and the way his muffled voice echoes suggests that he's resting against the door, maybe even using it to support himself. There's no laughter in his voice now. "And Ludwig was right. They were right, Al."
"Britain," Alfred whispers back, touching the rosary slung around his neck; another defiance of the Company. He doesn't much believe in God, but the idea that religion still exists when such things were banned after the War, it's enough to drive the Company nuts, and that's enough for Alfred. He yanks on a long-sleeved, tight, insulated shirt and calls, muffled by the cotton, "He's still alive?"
"Yes," Matthew says. "He's still alive. He's in London, underground, in the labs under the old parliament buildings."
"I thought those labs were destroyed a couple of years back?"
Alfred swings the door open in time to see Matthew shrug. "I guess that's what They wanted us to believe. I mean, think about it. If we think the labs aren't there any more, there's no one to go poking around."
"Britain did."
"Britain was a suspicious bastard," Matthew agrees as they begin the trek back to their intelligence room. "It's what got him caught, according to the files."
"Well, then," Alfred says, stretching his arms above his head, nearly snagging his fingers in one of the looser cables, and giving a pleased little sigh when his joints cracked. "Let's get going, there's no time to waste."
"They'll see us coming a mile off." The Canadian tightens the laces of his boots for a moment, cursing out the breaks in the eyelets. "Francis said to go through the Tundra and meet up with the girls. I've already called ahead to Kat and Natalya, they're expecting us. Kat says that she's managed to get her hands on fake IDs and Natalya's got us tickets on the Bullet."
Alfred casts the taller male a sly little look. "Expecting us, huh?"
Matthew punches him. Alfred's built up an immunity to Matthew's fists, but the strength in them is trained, honed through years in the woods, whereas Alfred's comes from chemicals. He hates to admit it, but Matthew's stronger than him, and he knows that that punch will bruise.
"You're such a pig," Matthew tells him, but tosses him his gas-mask and flight equipment anyway.
"Like you're much better," Alfred snorts, strapping himself into the harness and slinging an old, worn leather jacket over the top. "You're all over Kat the minute we touch down."
"Because unlike you, I actually appreciate what I have."
"Ah, well-played."
Matthew just rolls his eyes and flips the mains off, leaving them in a natural blackness uninterrupted by the usual hum of electronics, the buzz of power in the cables. Alfred likes this sort of darkness; it makes him think of how things should be. It makes him want to read a comic book, one he hasn't read for years, one he doesn't think exists anymore. Nothing like that exists anymore; there's no television beyond what the Company uses for propaganda, no movies at all, barely any music. There are no video games, no novels, no textbooks not endorsed by the guys up top controlling the system. But they make do, because they have to.
Besides, Alfred loves flying. He rarely gets the chance to these days; it's not safe in the skies anymore and wouldn't be even if he didn't have a price on his head, because though the Company's managed to clear most of the radioactivity from the air – one of the few things They've managed to do right – the air's still thin, and it's still deadly. It's a dead zone up there, a world-wide Bermuda Triangle. It means they have to fly low, be in visual range, and be less than a second from total annihilation. The Company polices the skies more fervently than They police the streets.
But it's not like they have a choice. They have to take to the skies if they're going to get anywhere, and it'd take too long to sneak their way onto a commercial flight. It takes them a good two hours of walking to get to the lockdown where they store their planes, which is two hours too long in Alfred's opinion, but Matthew's learnt not to ask for it.
The radio in Matthew's cockpit begins howling the minute he flips the power on.
"Oh for – What?" he demands.
"Mattie, got some news for you."
Alfred groans, swings himself into his own cockpit and slams the casing down, shutting himself away from the irritating ass' voice. It's not that he doesn't want Matt to be happy, not that he doesn't want him to find the One, but Jesus, he's got one of the most gorgeous girls gracing God's not-so-green green earth hanging off his every word and he chooses Gilbert freaking Beilschmidt. Who did that? Who? Alfred knows Matt loves Ekaterina, knows that he loves her with everything he has, but he's not in love with her. They don't have a platonic love, there's no way it's that, but she's not the one for Matt, they all know it. How Ekaterina manages knowing that, Alfred's not sure. But he supposes he's not much better. He loves Natalya, sure, and he'll fall into bed with her if schedules and whatnot allow for it, but he doesn't love her. Britain's already stolen his heart, and part of him still hopes one day that he'll get to steal his heart.
He performs the basic checks over his craft, determined not to peek out over the hangar to where Matthew is sprawled in his own, laughing and grinning and looking like the fool in love that he was. He grumbles under his breath, and then his radio goes.
"What?" he snaps, and hates himself for making his dislike of Gilbert so obvious.
Matt's voice is still full of laughter. "Gil says he's got clearance to come with us when we go the parliament labs. He's got all the blueprints, and he says that Germany's coming with for back-up. Francis too."
"We don't need back-up," Alfred snarls, and slips his gas-mask on.
"Uh-huh," Matt doesn't believe a word of it, but continues regardless. "So how are you going to hack into the systems to take Britain out of the capsule-vat-tank thing they've put him in?"
"I'll think of something."
To which Matthew snorts with laughter, calls him a few choice names, and switches the radio off. Alfred stares at the blinking red light for a second, and then flips his own off. There's not much point in keeping it on anyway, it's not like he'll be able to use it after they take off, and all it does is drain the power.
It takes several hours, but they manage to pick their way across the land bridge and through the snow to touch down in an old field. It's been obliterated, of course, nothing grows there anymore, but the radiation there is enough that once they've rolled the planes into the waiting hangar, they won't be found. It would take days to get to Francis's base, if they were to go on foot. But they've got fake IDs waiting for them from Ekaterina, and Natalya was good enough to get them tickets for the trans-Europa bullet train.
The girls are waiting for them as they shove their planes open and climb out. Matt goes straight to where Ekaterina Braginskaya hovers, chewing her lip to keep her smile in check, but she laughs delightedly when he sweeps her into a hug that lifts her a good foot or so from the ground. He goes to spin her in a circle, but she touches his cheek with a delicate hand and says something to him that clearly confuses him, Alfred can see it written on his face even from here, and he sets her down, planting a soft kiss on her forehead. When she turns her face up, he follows it with one on her mouth, and she laughs again, her arms around his shoulders.
Alfred watches them, and smiles softly.
"It's so cute I think I might be sick."
He laughs and extends an arm from where he has them crossed. Natalya Arlofskaya tucks herself into the niche of his body as he leans against the warm fuselage of his plane, and leans her side into his. She's wearing that dress again; the dark one that's too modest and unassuming for her personality. It's a heavyweight dress, Alfred knows that, and Alfred knows why it is.
"Still got that knife on your leg?" he asks into the bow lopsided in her hair. It's such sheer platinum hair, perfectly straight and it runs through his fingers like silk. It smells like iron again.
She snorts with laughter. "Wouldn't you like to know?"
The other two join them after a moment. Ekaterina has a comely blush on her face Alfred thinks might be something other than Matt's arm around her, but the thought is jarred from his head by the dawning realisation that they're about to get Britain back.
"Al, you really ought to do something about this thing you've got with Nat-Belarus," Matthew says as they hunker down in their assigned seats on the train. There's an old lady next to them, but after a cursory glance at the armed boys next to her, and then at the ID cards slung around their necks, she proceeded to ignore them. He gives her a glance as he speaks and abruptly catches himself so he can use their – they aren't code names, Alfred supposes, but they're as good as.
Alfred ignores Matthew for a minute, pretends to tighten the lace on his boot. Then he says, "I don't know what you mean."
"Oh, bull," Matthew calls, his voice low. He leans slightly towards Alfred, shutting everyone else out. "I'm not stupid, America. I've seen the way you look at her."
"Yeah, and?" Alfred shrugs. "It's no different from the way you look at Ka – 'Kraine. Christ, Can', it's not like we've got a moral code to uphold here. You can't talk about who I sleep with – you've slept with France!"
"Once!" Canada hisses, kicking his shin.
The old lady next to them raises an eyebrow and they give her reassuring grins that don't feel real to either of them, but she turns away again.
Matthew rounds on him again, and America pretends not to listen.
"America, it's one thing for me to – America, the difference between you and me is – well, for one thing Prussia knows about me and 'Kraine, and he doesn't care – but I know why I go to her bed."
"Are you saying I don't know why I go to Bela's?"
"Yes, America, I am. You haven't realised why you're doing it, but you need to stop. Christ, America, it's her twenty-third birthday this year."
"So?"
Canada looks at him like he's being particularly stupid. "'Merica, Britain's twenty-three this year."
A solid minute of silence passes in which Alfred watches his best friend in disbelief. "You're serious."
"Yes."
"You think I'm only – you think I'm sleeping with Belarus 'cause she reminds me of Britain?"
"Yes, America, I do. I also think it's going to tear you apart when we get him back."
"Can', the last time we saw each other, I was fourteen. To him, I'm still a child. Hell, we're still underage in some countries according to the old laws. You think that just 'cause we're getting him back, he'll just accept me as all grown up? Not a chance."
Canada watches him, his eyes narrowed. The scenery speeds past them, growing darker as it does as they head backwards along the time zones. There's this look on his face that America doesn't like, but he doesn't have a name for it, it just is. And it frustrates him, but there's nothing he can do about it, so he ignores it and turns his attention to the trees, cities, lakes zipping past him, a blur of colour and a silence stretches between them.
"Well, well, well, you two took your time."
Matthew laughs and shakes his head. Alfred turns on the spot, tries to locate the bastard, but he's too good at what he does and he can't see him until he's right there, and Christ, he'd forgotten how small Gilbert Beilschmidt really was, how much of a psycho he really was.
"Bastard," he says at the same time as Matthew apologises.
They've both got a good head on him, but it could just be the way he plants his feet, the bend in his knees that loses him another couple of inches. He likes to think he's clever, wearing a fedora and a long coat, and Alfred supposes he could pull off the ordinary worker when he's got the collar up, but he's not wearing boots and he's got that damnable mask on again.
Alfred's not jealous. Not at all. He doesn't think that the specialist suit that Japan made him after they realised that any natural sunlight would burn his skin to the point it blistered looks cool. Not at all. He thinks it looks stupid, like he's trying to be a superhero.
He can almost feel Gilbert's grin behind the white and black of the visor covering his face.
"Did you have to bring him?" Gilbert asks, jerking a thumb in Alfred's general direction, and flinches a little when a hand clamps down on his shoulder. Alfred grins at it, and feels the scowl directed at him.
"Brother," comes the voice attached to the hand, and damn if Gilbert hasn't been a dick whilst they've been waiting, because Germany is seething. "Shut up."
Germany is a freaking bear of a man, all muscle and it's like he's been cut from marble or something, because Alfred doesn't think, as he gestures for them to follow him out of Dresden and into the sanctity of their base underground, where the first thing Gilbert does is lose his clothes and pull his mask off.
Ludwig, of course, rolls his eyes, and tunes both his and Alfred's brothers out, asking Alfred about their journey.
Alfred, likewise, ignores his brother's noisy reunion with the Company experiment, and they wander off down the tunnel a little ways. "It was alright," he says. "Cramped."
"They are efficient though," Ludwig reasons. "It would have taken a much longer time frame for you to reach here if you had taken a more free means of travel."
"True," Alfred concedes. "I just want to go and get Britain as soon as possible, you know? I mean, it's what, three am now? And it'll take another two, three hours to get to Francis and another three to get to the Parliament labs. It's just… I've never given up hope of finding him, you know? And now there's just numbers in front of me. Endless hours blocking me from my goal."
Gilbert laughs, too loud and too enthusiastic, from behind them. They both ignore him.
Ludwig shifts the rifle slung over his back, and casts a too-blue, too-serious look at Alfred. "You are still young," Ludwig muses. "But Britain has been waiting for five years. Another day will not worry him."
"You're only a year older than me," Alfred grumbles. "You're still young too."
But Germany just shrugs. "If you wish," he says, and not for the first time, Alfred feels like a bumbling fool next to him. Like Britain, Germany's movements are smooth, economical. He doesn't waste words, doesn't expend energy. He lives and breathes his work, is a master of his craft. Alfred thinks he might vote that Ludwig runs Germany when they win this war. He'd be good at it; he keeps the rest of the rebels on task, even if he thinks that he's using some kind of creepy mind control on some of them and physical violence on others.
"So it's just going to be us?" Alfred asks after a few minutes of silence. "I mean, me and you, Matt and Prussia, and Francis? Is that enough? Or is it too many? I'm not that big on Britain's labs."
Germany looks ahead, and runs a hand through his hair. "We are each suited to our role," he says, and his voice is low, steady and even, and Alfred knows he's saying it just to be placating, because he knows he hates Prussia and they're going to be in close quarters for a good forty-eight hours yet. "My brother is… He is good at what he does, and he has the blueprints of the labs burnt into his mind. He will be able to get us through without alerting the guards."
"And France? Matt? You? What are you doing?"
"Francis is an adept hacker, as you know. He and Gilbert both will be able to break any security codes we encounter, and they will be able, most likely, to break through the security guarding Britain, of which, I have no doubt, there will be plenty. He is a high security matter, America, and has been since his capture. Security will be tight. As for myself and your brother, we are mostly there as precautionary back-up. I have no doubt that alone you have strength enough to tear down buildings – it was you, was it not, that once punched a hole through a wall? – but to go in alone with those two is… well, it's stupid, really."
Alfred laughs. "I hear you. Lightning bruisers all the way."
"I don't understand you," Ludwig replies, but he doesn't sound put out about it. If he were the sort for it, Alfred would say he sounded fond, almost. "But yes. They are not the strongest of us; they have speed, but not brute force. That is our department."
"Well, I don't know about you," Alfred grins, nudging the other man with his elbow. "I mean, you're into some weird shit. Might have lost your touch."
"We recently found an Iron Maiden in what remains of Berlin," Germany says idly, and there is a twitch at the corner of his mouth, as though he's biting back a smile. "Would you like to spend a night in it?"
Alfred laughs. "Hell no."
They continue in this vein for the rest of the walk, Matt and Gilbert trailing further and further behind. Alfred can't say he'd be surprised if they'd just jumped each other there and then, but no, they're still tagging along, lost in their own little world of soft words and easy touches. He's kind of jealous, because it's unlikely – if not impossible – that Britain will reciprocate his feelings and allow that kind of contact.
"Home sweet home," Gilbert sighs happily when he tumbles through the hatch into the base some ten minutes after Ludwig and Alfred.
Matt follows him, seals the hatch, and crosses automatically to the computer terminal where the other blonds are gathered.
"What's the plan, then?" he asks.
Alfred looks at him for a second. "We've got to rely on Gilbert to get through the systems and sneak us through."
Gilbert makes a noise of protest. "Why me?"
"Because you're tiny."
"I'm five eight, gigantor. I'm not tiny."
"You're pocket-sized," Matthew coos, giving him a filthy little grin and tweaking the now-albino's cheeks. Gilbert slaps his hands away.
"I hate you all."
Alfred snorts with laughter and puts a finger on a room on the on-screen blueprints. "There."
Matthew looks. "Of course it's the deepest room in the labs."
"It's not," Ludwig says, and points to a different room, the other side of the map. "This room is. But Britain's lab is the most heavily protected. They will have their work cut out for them."
Gilbert makes a vague noise. "Don't we always?"
They all nod at that.
It takes Germany a moment to force the doors open, but he does, and they tumble through and shove them shut immediately, glancing around for any Company troops on patrol. There's nothing, so they take a second to catch their breath before getting back to their job.
The room is brightly lit – so bright in fact that all five of them flinch back and cover their eyes until they've adjusted. It's as though they've stepped into the heart of the sun, but it's so cold in here Alfred can feel his flesh prickle with it. The walls are lined with consoles, a desk stacked high with papers, the white tiles on the floor and walls and ceiling impeccable, each shining like an individual star. Alfred is vaguely aware that his boots are caked with mud, that he's got a tear in the knee of his trousers, that the lining of his gas-mask is soaked through with sweat, that his clothes are in desperate need of a decent wash. A glance at the fidgeting Matthew suggests he feels just as unclean and awkward.
It's not a big room, by conventional means. It's big enough for the five of them to move around comfortably, big enough to house a good ten or so others. It's big enough to house the glass vat at the end of it that houses an upright bed, into which Britain is strapped.
He is hooked up to numerous machines; an oxygen mask feeding him air, and intravenous drips pumping him full of god-knows-what. Modesty's been preserved, of course, in his boxers and with white thermal bandages wrapped up over his heart and left shoulder, over his forearms and hands, open over the needles, down his thighs. There's a mark on the skin on the right side of his chest. Dark, perfectly circular, as though he's been branded or tattooed. Alfred can't get close enough to see what the pattern in the circle is, but he doubts it's good. His eyes are closed – bruised, even – and there are ugly scars on his face that hadn't been there the last time Alfred had seen him.
Has he been tortured?
Gilbert doesn't say a word, just crosses to the computer terminal and begins hacking into the mainframe. He would know, Alfred thinks, swinging his rifle onto his shoulder and listening to the sound his boots make on the tiles as he heads to the glass. It feels impenetrable as he puts a hand on it, cold and impossibly smooth.
"Britain," he whispers, staring up into that blank, unconscious face, wishing those scars would disappear, the wires disconnect, those green eyes open and tell him to stop dirtying the glass with his grubby fingers.
There is silence still, surrounding them, choking him. Part of him wants to cry, another cheer, but mostly he just wants to touch Britain, feel his pulse under his fingers, the clammy skin of a man who lived to feel the rain on his flesh. It's been too easy, too quiet. Gilbert being able to kill the guards isn't anything spectacular, he's always had the ability to kill silently and now that he's equipped with poison so potent a drop is enough to kill a man he's unstoppable.
But for the bodies to have not been found? For the alarms to have not been raised? Something isn't right.
"Shit!" Gilbert spits, and kicks at the wall beneath the console. Francis echoes the sentiment at the other console.
Alfred turns, but doesn't take his hand from the glass. "What is it?"
"It's harder to get in than we thought it was," Francis admits after a beat. "There are too many passcodes required to unlock the tank. They really don't want him going anywhere."
"But," Matthew stammers whilst Alfred seethes, "There has to something you can do, right?"
"Right," Gilbert assures him, and promptly punches the console, smashing the monitor.
An alarm goes up, of course, because such things always do, and Alfred's about to turn and curse him out when he feels it.
The glass shifts, begins to rise. Alfred takes a step back to watch, and Gilbert grins smugly, victoriously. Matthew goes to the middle of the room, stands at Alfred's back, watching the doors. Francis and Ludwig join him whilst Gilbert slips into the shadows by the door, waiting to pounce. Alfred pays no heed to them; his focus is solely on Britain.
Who begins choking on air the moment the oxygen mask disconnects from him.
++End Chapter++
NOTES::
Alfred has Myotonic dystrophy, just FYI.
I have a height kink shut your face. No, uh, I played with their heights here, for fairly logical reasons. Mainly; Alfred's tanked up on hallucinogenic steroids (only not really, I'm messing. Am I?), Arthur's been locked in a tank for five years.
I also have a thing for Arthur and Alfred's spine. I'm sure I put him standing at his back in something else, not sure what, but I'm sure I've mentioned it before. I just love it.
Is that a hint of Can/Ukr with aside order of AmeriBela? Yes, yes it is. Who cares?
Yes, yes, I know that the bullet train is a Japanese thing, give over.
Oh, Gil, why do you have to put yourself in Grey Fox gear EVERY TIME I PUT YOU IN A REMOTELY MILITARISTIC AU? WHY?
I keep typing 'tracker jacker'. That's the last time I read the Hunger Games at three in the morning.
How many of you thought his eyes were going to open as the last line?
Oh, btw, Silence, Eva Cassidy's version of Time After Time. There's another one.
Oh, and just to let you know, because I've had a few messages about it and why do you guys care so much you're all so utterly lovely; regarding the riots, I'm alright, I'm not anywhere near them. There's rumour of the next town over (what am I? Medieval and rural? I suppose I am actually) kicking off, but it sounds like a lot of it's just rumour. But don't worry: I'm okay. I hope you've enjoyed my lovelies! ++Vince++
