-2-
Chris silently cried all the way to the commander's office. Over the years, she held back her emotions, but they all came rushing back when Trude arrived.
The office the sisters entered was elaborate, like what most of the witch squadrons would have. There were bookshelves along both walls, two couches and coffee table in the center, and an ornate wooden desk and red velvet chair sat in front of two large windows at the back of the office.
Trude sat her sister down on one of the couches. Looking around she found a box of tissues on the desk. She took it and handed it to Chris.
The 'younger' Barkhorn blew her nose and wiped her eyes and quickly filled up a waste basket.
Trude waited patiently for her sister to regain her composure when it dawned on her; no one had walked into the office.
"Chris, do you know where the commander is?" Trude asked gently.
Chris was in the middle of blowing her nose and she froze when she heard the question. After taking another tissue and wiped the tears from her eyes she answered.
"You're looking at her."
Trude's eyes widened.
"That's wonderful!" she exclaimed.
"No it's not," Chris said.
"What do you mean 'it's not'? You deserve it."
"I don't."
Chris curled her fingers into fists as her sister continued to compliment her.
"I know you must have worked very hard to achieve this rank," Trude continued. "After all, you're the sister of a very diligent-"
"NO! I don't deserve it!" Chris screamed and stood up. "I don't deserve it! I didn't earn it! I don't want it!"
Trude was taken aback by her sister's outburst and held up her arm to defend herself as Chris continued.
"I didn't earn any of this!" Chris said as she slammed her fists down on her desk. "I didn't pull strings, I didn't fake my way…. The only reason I am here is because…it's because…because there are no veterans left! There are no witches left! There is no one else left to take this spot!"
Chris's legs buckled beneath her. She tried to prevent herself, but her bottom hit the floor anyway. Her tears broke the dam once again, making Chris sob harder and longer than when she was reunited. Trude knelt down next to her sister and tried to comfort her, but she just got pushed away.
What the hell happened to her? What could she have possibly gone through to become like this?
"There's no one left," Chris said, her voice barely a whisper. "Not Minna, not Erica, not Hanna, Yoshika, Lynne…"
Her voice trailed off.
"I don't want this."
Each Barkhorn stayed in the spot they have landed in. Chris continued to weep. Trude's mind whirled with questions. So many questions that she had gotten dizzy.
By the time Trude decided to move, the sun was already making its way below the horizon. The witch crawled to her sister, each joint and muscle creaking with stiffness. As many questions Trude wanted to ask, she picked the one that would most likely answer most of her inquiries.
"Chris…"
Her sister looked up.
"What happened in the past seven years?"
Chris blinked with brief confusion.
"Seven?"
"Yes, from the day I disappeared till now."
"That's not seven years," Chris said.
"It's 1952, isn't it?"
"It was six years ago."
Trude's mouth hung open.
"It's 1958. A lot of shit…too much shit has happened," Chris said.
"But what happened?" Trude asked as Chris got up.
Chris walked back to the couch and sat down.
"Take a seat. This'll take a while."
1945
November 30th:
You know what happened. You came to visit me and you gave me this locket. The Neuroi attacked and you left to fight. But you didn't come back.
A day passed, then a week…a month…
You didn't come back.
1946
May 8th:
The war had ended in Europe. Nothing much to say, really.
August 15th:
The 508th Joint Fighter Wing, along with the Fusoan and Liberion navies eradicated the Neuroi in the Pacific.
The world was finally free.
There was conference later in the year for a disarmament treaty, held in Helvetia. Nothing notable came out of it except for the issue about witches.
They must have feared you guys.
They wanted to scrap all Strikers, get the witches out of the military, and maybe even forcefully have them break their contracts with their familiars.
Luckily, Adolfine Galland was there.
As you know, the war had come at a huge cost. There were not many with combat experience left, and most of those who were left were witches. Adolfine reasoned that the Strikers could be destroyed, but leave the witches be.
If they wanted to stay in the military, let them. If they wanted to go to school and conform back into society, help them.
As confident as the woman is, she had her own doubts of being able to adapt to civilian life. She went on and explained that war had consumed her life and that's all she knows. She didn't get to choose if she wanted to fight or not. She was forced into the role. She wanted the girls to choose and even went as far as calling the leaders of the world, in her own words:
"A bunch of useless monkeys who hide behind a desk and give orders, without knowing or caring what the people who do the dirty work want or think."
"You are one to talk, Air Marshal," she heard someone say scornfully.
Adolfine had stood up and slammed a fist down onto the table, responding:
"I've been fighting on the frontlines since I was fifteen! I know what happens out there on the battlefield, you dick-less coward!"
Apparently her outburst got a frightening response from her escort, who was also a Karlslandian witch. Adolfine's escort took her sidearm out of its holster and went as far as cocking the gun. Helvetian guards ordered the witch to drop the weapon at gunpoint, but the witch didn't budge until Adolfine ordered her to holster the gun.
1947
Karlsland, along with the rest of Europe were rebuilding. Kaiser Frederick IV and the rest of the royal family were on the way back to Karlsland. We started to rebuild our country, but our economy was in shambles.
Meanwhile, in Orussia, they were going through a similar crisis. The Communist party were tired of large economic differences and led a military coup and overthrown the Tsar. Their leader now is Joseph Stalin. He calls himself a president, but we all know he's a dictator.
1949
We now had the same problem. The National Socialist Workers' party had rallied enough support to start a rebellion of their own. The damn Nazis had supporters everywhere; soldiers, civilians…witches.
Insiders helped them break into our armories and stole too many weapons to count, tanks included.
Naturally, we fought back, but not without great cost. All the witches that participated were fine since they had their magic, but regular humans lined the streets, their blood painting everything red.
The rebels had also successfully assassinated the Kaiser. His son, Prinz Frederick V, the coward he is, fled back to Neue Karlsland and did nothing to help us.
1950-1951
Whoever had stayed in the Fatherland decided to create a new government. But there was a lot of debate about it. Some wanted to copy the Liberions and create a Republic, others wanted a Socialist type, and the rest wanted Communism.
Since we, as Karlslandians, are reasonable, we decided to try each type of government and then vote on which system to use.
We decided to try Socialism first, then Communism, and then Republicanism.
1952
If you thought the world was bad enough, this is what packaged it up into a nice little present for Satan.
I don't even know where to start…
Liberion, perhaps? Let's go with that.
That country was in full blown hysteria. Thanks to some politician named McCarthy, the Liberions were hunting every square inch of their country for Communists. Apparently McCarthy would have a new list of names every day of people who are Communists.
Chaos took the streets as regular civilians shot, lynched, beaten to death anyone who were on those lists. Of course it didn't take long for anyone to find out that those names belonged to witches, mostly.
One frightening report, a witch, Leah Archer, was hanged right on her front lawn in front of her husband and kids.
Others made a mad dash for Faraway Land or Mexico. Those who went to Mexico weren't bothered for some reason, but the Liberions went as far was trying to assassinate the witches who went to Faraway Land.
This brought the death of two Faraway Landian witches; Elizabeth Beurling and Jeannette Walker. In response, Faraway Land militarized their border and even went as far as placing land mines and destroying all transportation lines along the border.
As far as I know, the Liberion witches that escaped are safe.
But that country's insanity didn't stop there. They even wiped out one of their own carrier fleets that had a squadron of witches on it.
Not only that, they sent a saboteur to Fuso to destroy one of the Fusoan's power plants in Hiroshima.
What's so important about a power plant? This was a nuclear power plant. When that thing exploded, it took out the entire city!
Fuso has set up a blockade around their home island and restricted the entrance of immigrants and tourists greatly. There's no way anyone's getting passed that.
This is unconfirmed, but they might be sending a group of submarines to Panama to attack the Liberion base there.
Oh, and they did catch the Liberion who did it. They executed him with a beheading.
Who did it? Colonel Sakamoto.
Romagna was also going through some trouble. There was an assassination attempt on the Duchess. Francesca was at the palace during the attempt. She reported that a sniper tried to take her out, but she managed to evacuate the Duchess. The attempt sparked a rebellion in Romagna. Currently, the military and those loyal to the Duchess are still fighting the rebels.
Meanwhile, Karlsland was in the middle of testing out a Communist government. That's when Orussia attacked us. We didn't have the military strength and we were pushed back up to the Gallian border.
Fearing of losing their homeland again, Gallia helped us with air support and weapons. We received weapons from Britannia and Belgica as well.
With the help, we pushed them back all, almost out of Karlsland.
It was around this time that Stalin had died, but Nikita Khrushchev took his place.
We were pushed back again, but this time we held our own. The frontline now split our country down the middle with Karlslandians on both sides, most politicians on the east side. Our side, the west, became something that looked like a mix of Democracy and Socialism.
Minna was in charge of the sector that I'm in charge of now. She sent…scratch that…Johanna volunteered to sneak to the east to spy on them, as she was one of the few witches who secretly kept their magic.
What was that?
Oh, yeah. The final version of the Helvetian Treaty required witches to break contracts with their familiars. Those who didn't were subjected to extreme "testing" until they do. How they would now if you guys had magic or not is beyond me.
Yeah, so Johanna volunteered to go east under a fake identity. Must've taken some of the recklessness from her apprentice.
Johanna communicated through her familiar so she couldn't be as easily traced if she used a phone or letters.
What she reported was that the Eastern Karlslandians seemed content with their situation and that the Orussians were going to leave. It seemed like good news and we let our guard down.
Big mistake.
Johanna found out that the only reason Orussia was leaving was because there were enough Communist radicals in charge and they were planning to take the whole country by force. She got the message back to us and we told her to get back here as soon as possible.
She never got it though. Minna sent Krawatte to check on Johanna and found out that while Johanna's familiar was on its way back to her, it was killed. Krawatte was killed also after he sent the message to Minna.
And that's the last we heard from Johanna until you brought her back.
1953-Present
Nothing to say here.
The East attacked and we struck back. Border skirmish after border skirmish and the results were the same.
We are stuck in a civil war. The West gets weapons from Britannia, Belgica, and Gallia, while the East is backed by Orussia.
"So, does that answer most of your questions?"
Stiffly, Trude nodded.
"Anything else?"
"Yeah…You mentioned a couple names of witches. W-What happened them?"
"Shot down. Dead," Chris answered.
"But why Miyafugi? Shouldn't she be in Fuso?"
"We started hiring mercenaries. Yoshika was one of them. She came here to heal, not to fight."
"That sounds like her," Trude said.
"Nice girl. She taught me some Fusoan. On her way back to Fuso, her plane was shot down."
Silence settled between them.
"Anything else?"
"No…I don't think so," Trude whispered.
"Then I'll show you to my room."
"Where are you sleeping?"
"On the couch."
Chris showed Trude to her room. Like her office, it was a spacious room for a military base. The floor was carpeted and red velvet curtains hung on the large windows. The bed was not anything too special, but it was evident that Chris did not make her bed every day. Chris also had her own personal bathroom which she pointed out to Trude so she could clean herself up.
After Trude finished bathing, she stepped out into the main room with a night gown that Chris lent. It was made of a thin, light-blue cloth that almost made it transparent. Trude's face was flushed red at the thought of her sister seeing her in it, but when she looked around, there was no one there. Chris had already gone.
The witch got ready for bed when she spotted a group of photographs on the well-worn mahogany dresser. Trude made a quick glance up and down the row and it seemed that the pictures were in chronological order.
There was a picture of their parents on their wedding day. The frame was beaten and the glass was cracked. Trude remembered dumping the picture into a cardboard box soon after she had received the news of their parents' death, which was around the same time Chris fell into a coma. She had shoved the box into the basement of the base she was stationed at. Chris must have dug it out of storage sometime after the war.
The next one was the small family portrait that was at Chris's side ever since she entered the hospital.
Much to Trude's dismay and surprise, Der Stern von Afrika, Hanna-Justina Marseille was the next picture. And the picture was signed.
I thought I lost that bet.
There was a leap in years as the next picture showed Chris going through basic training in the military. Chris's face showed signs of maturity that has been embedded in her very soul for quite some time. This was a trend that was evident in the following pictures.
Then the pictures were interrupted by a certificate. A pin of silver wings sat in front of it.
I was right. She did work hard to reach the rank she deserves.
The next picture caught her off guard again and for the same reason as the first.
Chris was in a different type of Karlslandian military uniform than Trude was used to seeing and she was covered in snow. The other person in the picture was, again, Marseille, also covered in snow. The two had their arms around each other and gave big smiles for the photographer.
The next picture had Chris kneeling on the wing of a jet. On the fuselage below the canopy were five kill marks. Chris smiled as she posed for the picture.
Finally an ace. You've become a wonderful pilot.
Upon closer inspection, Trude could see the silhouette of a dog's head pointing forward on the nose of the aircraft.
"Die Vorstenhund" seemed to be the nickname of the squadron Chris was in.
The next item was not a picture at all. It was a pair of goggles that sat on top of a handwritten letter.
…
Dear Chris,
I hope this letter gets to you. I don't even know if I'll be the one to send it.
I heard the news. Congratulations on becoming a wing commander. You definitely have the experience to be one. Dreadful way to attain this rank though. I know you must be grieving and my departure will make it worse, but I know you can pull through this. As my student I expect you to pull through this. My habit of not caring should have rubbed off on you, and maybe for the better given the shit the world's in. Not to mention that you've been trained by Ev too. I don't know if that's good or not.
Anyway, you can have my goggles if you want. I don't know what you'll use them for, but I don't need them for where I'm going. Stay strong and live long for all of us; me, you, your sister, and every man, woman, and potential witch who will fight and die for our Fatherland.
You have been my best and only student.
Goodbye until we meet again on the other side.
Much love,
Hanna
…
The letter was written messily. Unusual, especially with Marseille's handwriting. But the reason could be quite clearly seen with the smudges of red all over the paper.
Trude turned off the lights and used the dim light of the moon to retire to the bed. She stared at the ceiling as she thought about the relationship Chris and Marseille had. Given that Trude did not like Marseille, she was the one that taught her sister what she knows about flying.
What concerned Trude was Marseille's personality and how it could have infected Chris. So far Chris seemed to be herself, as much as a Chris hardened by war could be. But taking the tone of the letter, who had a greater influence on the other?
Trude's mind continued to work until the weight of much needed sleep closed her eyes.
A/N: Bit of a grim past Chris had to go through in Trude's absence. There was supposed to be more to this chapter, but I separated it into two chapters given the combined length it would have been.
Since SW is a fictional world, I've taken liberties on the history and governments of the countries. I stated in the summary that this was a slight AU anyway.
I am usually very lax when it comes to the content of reviews and comments, but please, do not talk about politics or anything that could provoke hostility.
Onto other things. The signed picture of Hanna was from Season 2, Episode 10. Hanna had asked Minna (I think) to give the picture to Chris. Also, "Vorstenhund" is another name for the Karlslandian (German) Shorthaired Pointer which is the breed of Trude's familiar.
Please leave a comment or review. I am curious on what you think of the continuation of what was originally supposed to be a one-shot. Anyway, take care and I hope to catch you guys and gals in the next chapter.