Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia nor the characters. Even if this is Human Au, I do not own them, they belong to their owner.
Note: Please remember this is a WWII based story, so somethings in this my be a trigger. You have been warned.
Chapter two
The latches of the truck door were unlocked and upon the doors opening, a blinding spotlight met Gilbert from the outside. The light striking his eyes after so long in the darkness was almost painful, and he squinted out of the truck to try and make out the figures of the soldiers there, eyes not yet adjusted by the time they climbed into the truck. Two men climbed in, grabbing his forearms and dragging him out of the back. Lucky they didn't throw him out, but instead passed him down to another two men that held him upright, still in front of the spotlight. His legs were stiff and aching after so long without moving them, and he nearly collapsed when he was pulled up to his feet, stumbling to get his footing as he was pulled upright again.
As the two soldiers held Gilbert up, another searched his person, checking for anything he might have on him. Unbuttoning his clothes to his bare chest, checking every layer of clothing. Patting down his pants, checking his shoes, and as the soldier did so, he removed anything that wasn't clothing. Any buttons or patches, watches, credentials, pictures, medi-pack. If Gilbert had anything, it was removed.
The night air was cold, and Gilbert was already chilly from blood loss. The hands searching him felt icy as they searched inside his clothing. They removed anything and everything from his person, the Soviet still holding him upright while he shivered and tried to turn his face from the spotlight shining blindingly into his eyes. There wasn't much; a mostly-empty pack of cigarettes in one pocket, a small penknife in another, and the medals off his clothing. The Iron Cross at his throat and the combat medal and wound badge pinned to his uniform jacket. His dog tags were removed as well, and his watch. He allowed that much without protest, despite cringing a little when the medals were taken away, but he did almost argue for a moment when they discovered the faded family photo in his jacket pocket and removed that as well, eyes following it with something close to desperation.
After they had finished searching him, they dragged him to a close-by building with Ivan leading them in front. The place was dimly lit as they went through the hallways, passed other soldiers and even prisoners, bringing him to a closed off room. The room had no windows and only one light hanging over a medical bed. Around were medical instruments that made the place look like either an operating room or a torture room. Ivan had the soldier dragging Gilbert hoist him onto the bed and without another word to the poor German, left. Leaving him in there by himself.
They removed the handcuffs, his wrists were bruised and red beneath the metal, leaving before Gilbert could try and speak, or voice any of the hundred questions still in his mind - not least of all, whether or not he could get his photo back, for they didn't return any of the items after they'd finished searching him.
Then the door was closed, and he gave up on trying to call through the heavy metal. He explored the cell briefly, looking over the medical tools with distinct discomfort, then turned away again, limping over to the bed and curling up. Pulling the thin blanket over himself, and tried to sleep.
Enough hours passed that one could guess it was probably morning. Gilbert had never been quite so grateful for the sheer exhaustion that let him have at least a few hours of sleep that night. He hadn't slept well, though, and he was still sore and aching when he awoke in the morning. Sitting up in bed, blinking blearily when the door was open and a tray was placed on a stool-like table that was next to the door. On it was a bowl of...something that was supposed to resemble some kind of thick soup, a cup of vodka, and a piece of bread, that was probably, safe to say, more like a block of wood than bread. After the plate was placed, the door was closed again. Here in the windowless cell, he didn't have much sense of how much time had passed, or of what time in the day it was. He wasn't even at all sure how long he'd slept, or what time he'd arrived here. With an effort, he forced himself out of bed and retrieved the tray placed on the table by the door. Porridge, maybe, or soup. A cup of what he'd thought was water, and nearly choked on when he took a too-large gulp, and a chunk of bread, mostly stale by now. He was hungry enough that he ate all of it, dipping the hard bread into the soup to soften it a little and eating carefully over the tray so that the breadcrumbs - and there were a lot of them, stale as the loaf was - wouldn't fall on the ground and be lost. He ate the rest of the crumbs as well, and then sipped slowly at the vodka until all of that was gone too. It didn't entirely assuage his thirst, but it did warm him up, and he was able to fall asleep a little more peacefully once it was all finished, and the dishes set back neatly on the tray on the table by the door again.
Several hours later the doors opened once again and a man was practically pushed into the room.
"No need to be so violent."
The person complained in his native tongue to the Soviet that pushed him in, though said in vain since the door was already closed.
The native tongue was German, but his pronunciation of it hinted that he was probably Austrian. This man was wearing clothes obviously given to each of the prisoners showing that he too was a prisoner of this place. The man looked around, squinting his eyes. He had just come from outside and his eyes were still adjusting from being used to the bright outside. Once he spotted the man, he spoke again.
"My name is Roderich Edelstein. I was a field medic and am a prisoner like you. The Soviets sent me in here to give you medical attention."
He introduced himself without moving from the door. Roderich still couldn't tell exactly who was was in the room with him, all he was told that it was a German soldier that Ivan wanted to be made healthy again.
"You were sent to care for me?" he repeated, a bit taken aback.
That was nice of them, he supposed, though right now he wanted the company more than anything else. "Come in if you want, I'm not going to bite you." He sat up straighter, watching the other warily. He did speak good German, although that wasn't any sort of indication of his sympathies, or a guarantee he wasn't also working for the Soviets.
"It's just my leg, I was shot... I'm Gilbert, Gilbert Beilschmidt."
Gilbert Beilschmidt. Interesting. Roderich could have sworn he heard that name before, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. He pushed it to the back of his mind, deciding at this moment that it wasn't important and proceeding with his duties was top priority.
"You're lucky, you know."
Roderich spoke as he started to look around at the instruments to find what he needed, only hoping that it all would be provided.
"The Soviets don't really have people treated. Once someone gets injured, they leave them and if they get injured passed being able to work, they get taken away or even just shot on the spot. Someone must really fancy you," he chatted.
Lucky was about the last thing Gilbert was feeling at the moment, but he nodded. It was good to keep the positive in mind, he supposed, even if the positives were things as small as not being taken out and shot for an injury, and he wasn't at all sure he wanted to know what was meant by someone fancying him. Whatever it meant, he had a feeling he would find out soon enough. His thoughts returned to the Soviet officer he'd surrendered to. If he was the one ensuring that Gilbert was kept alive, it was hard to say what his intentions were, and difficult for Gilbert to convince himself that those intentions weren't malicious.
"Thanks," he mumbled. "I hope so."
Roderich found enough medical supplies to get started. "I can't find anything to cut the cloth with so you'll have to remove your pants or rip it above the wound so I can treat it." He requested, looking expectantly at Gilbert. It was difficult to struggle out of his pants, his leg not wanting to bend without an effort, but he managed it, pushing them down until the Austrian could get to the wound. It looked bad, even now; the bullet had never been removed, and the injury had hardly been cleaned properly. The skin around it looking bruised and ugly beneath the cloth tied over it. He gestured at it, rather pointlessly, as if to indicate that this was the main injury that needed treating. The other bruises were visible on his leg as he pulled his pants down further, some of them fairly dark.
As Roderich looked at Gilbert, he could tell this German man was completely beaten up and battered. He couldn't tell if it was from someone or just from the war. Roderich could only imagine what battles were still going on within the month or so he had been here. If they were winning or still being pushed back, but from the battle, Roderich was taken from, the war wasn't looking good. Roderich's eyes softened with his thoughts.
"How is it looking out there?" He asked with genuine concern, "the last thing I knew was the surrendering of my country's capital. I was taken prisoner when Vienna fell and I haven't heard anything since."
At the question, Gilbert looked up, slightly uncomfortable. Roderich had been a prisoner since the fall of Vienna, and he'd had no information; that meant there was little chance Gilbert would get any information either. "It's... it's over, now. Or if it's not, it will be soon. The Soviets have taken Berlin by now."
Roderich paused a moment when he had heard that Berlin was taken as well.
"Berlin." He breathed out with a sigh.
He took a cloth and wet it with alcohol and started to clean what he could around Gilbert wound.
"If it's not over now, it will be. The fall of Berlin, it would take a miracle to recover from that. With our loss, it's almost guaranteed that we won't get out of here. I'm going to die here, aren't I."
Roderich spoke sorrowfully, at least his work attending to Gilbert's wound was not hindered by his sad mood. Though tending to his wound properly would be a bit difficult. He didn't have anything to take down the swelling and nothing with a blade, not even a scalpel, to help remove the bullet or puss build up if there was any, which was a high possibility with how atrocious the wound looked. The best thing he found were tweezers.
"I suggest you lay back and relax. Removing the bullet is going to hurt more than it should." He warned, trying to concentrate on the task at hand rather than the imminent fate of being stuck in a prison from losing the war. He grabbed a tourniquet and fastened it above Gilbert's wound to make sure that if he had damaged the wound further, he wouldn't bleed too much more.
"Try not to make to much noise." He added before he started to clean the wound itself and examine exactly how far in the bullet might be.
Gilbert stiffened when the alcohol-soaked rag was pressed to the wound, inhaling sharply and pressing his lips together. That had hurt more than he'd anticipated, and he did his best to ignore it and to focus on the other's words instead. They were hardly comforting, granted; he supposed he couldn't really blame the other man for having a dismal outlook after so long kept here, and no escape or end in the foreseeable future. There would be no recovering after the fall of Berlin; he knew that.
For all he knew, Germany had already surrendered; once the Soviet commander returned, he would ask, he decided. There was nothing to lose by asking when he had nothing to begin with; the worst the man could do was refuse him information, or punish him for asking, and the latter didn't worry him much. He'd been through enough already, and endured it in silence - even if that resolve was faltering a little as the antiseptic stung and burned in the raw skin. God, he hoped there wasn't any infection there; the last thing he needed was fever and infection on top of everything else.
He pushed those thoughts away and lay down on his back obediently, staring up at the gray concrete ceiling and trying to focus on something other than his leg. The ceiling was dull, nondescript; there was nothing there to draw his attention away from the sickening sensation of the other prodding at and examining the wound. He was tempted to beg the man to just leave the bullet in, but it would have to come out sooner or later. Deep breaths. He reached up to press one hand over his own mouth, eyes closed, breathing slowly through his nose. It would be over soon.
"Maybe -" he managed, rather faintly, uncovering his mouth for a moment to try and speak; talking was a distraction, at least.
"Maybe they'll let you go eventually - if you were a doctor or something and you help them." He inhaled slowly and then let the breath out again shakily; he was beginning to feel dizzy. "Especially if you weren't a soldier... they might be more generous, right?"
"I don't want to make your morale any worse than it probably is, but I've been here long enough to know that chances of leaving are only high if your dead. And I'm going to be honest with you. I'm not even a doctor. Before the war, I was a musician, but I was conscripted and being a medic was the only position I could choose that didn't involve being a direct soldier. Fear not though, I've been doing it long enough to know what I'm doing." Roderick reassured.
'I'm not even a doctor' was about the last thing Gilbert wanted to hear, under the circumstances, except perhaps that they would both probably be here until they died, but he tried not to think about it too hard, focusing on gripping handfuls of the covers to steady himself while Roderick poked around in the wound. After the Austrian had located the bullet and cleaned the swollen area on Gilberts leg enough, he used a tool to open the wound a little more, though doing his best not to rip it, and reached in with the tweezers to grab it. Slipping a few times, but finally getting it out after a minute or so. Gilbert was definitely starting to feel nauseated by now, and the feeling of tweezers poking around in the injury, gripping the bullet once or twice and then slipping out again, was enough to make him reach up with one hand to cover his mouth again, muffling a cry of pain into something nearer a whimper. After the bullet was out, Roderick was quick to pour a saline solution in the wound and wrapping it up tightly to prevent it from bleeding. Gilbert was soaked in sweat and breathing hard by the time the process was over, and shaking like a leaf; he lifted his head to look down at the wrappings and then rested back against his pillow again, exhausted.
"This isn't a permanent fix. It could be infected so I can't properly close it. If there was any penicillin, I'd say you would need to take that to fight the possibility of infection. I can't do anything for your bruises besides say to go easy. As long as they keep you in here and don't have you do anything, they should heal."
"I don't care about the bruises," he mumbled. He reached down to pull his pants back up and cover the injury; they were far from clean, torn and bloodied and covered in dust, but it wasn't like he had an alternative.
"Still..." He trailed off, laughing rather weakly. "Somebody must really fancy me, you said, huh? Maybe I can get some penicillin that way, then. You think they'll have me do anything? Do you know what's going to happen?"
Roderick used a saline solution damped cloth to clean the blood off his hands since they seemed to be a neglected need of water provided in the medical supplies to clean up. However, Gilbert's question made him sigh.
"I don't have any idea what's going to happen. Gradually everyone gets too weak to do anything. Only few have been here several years." Roderick looked up at Gilbert. The Austrian's pessimism was beginning to grate on Gilbert's nerves, although he supposed that, by now, it was more accurate to call it practicality - Roderick had, after all, been here far longer than he had, and would doubtless have a more accurate sense of what to expect, given how many prisoners it seemed he had seen come and go since he'd been brought here the first time.
"I don't know what it means of someone here fancies you. You may get fed more and treated properly, but I don't see why you would just arrive and be favored; or you can be kept alive and healthy just so someone has the joy to torture you more than they already do here. Maybe they want information from you and are using the technique of good treatment to get you to talk. All are just guesses, but either way, it's either a very good thing or a very bad thing." Roderick spoke.
Maybe it was better to know, Gilbert thought, so he could keep his guard up and not get lured into a false sense of security if they were treating him well in the hopes of getting information - but right now, it felt like ignorance would have been bliss. A very good thing or a very bad thing. That wasn't in the least bit reassuring, and his leg was hurting so much that it was difficult to even think. The dark haired man knew that his guesses probably weren't the best for moral support, but he couldn't think of any other reasons why. Sure some of the prisoners befriended the Soviet soldiers to get a little extra food or knickknacks like cigarettes, medical supplies, or extra blankets; but Roderick had never really seen any other Soviets wanting to keep someone alive to a point of getting a medic to patch them up.
Roderick sat down against a wall and curled into himself, it was surprisingly cold in the room. The German watched the Austrian settle himself against the wall, not moving himself to get up from his reclining position. He was still feeling very dizzy. A shower sounded nice just then, even if it would be unpleasant trying to undress with his leg still hurting, and he had a feeling it wouldn't be the hot shower he was really craving. He was still so very cold.
"If you're on the same schedule as everyone else, you'll get to shower soon. They'll give you new clothes. If you shower make sure to keep the wrap on it and change it out once your done. Occasionally you'll need to lay in a way that lets the fluids drain from the wound. That will help it from getting infected if it's not already. You also need to let it air out every time you change the bandage." Roderick informed.
Relax, Gilbert told himself firmly, stay calm, think straight; he'd been injured before and he'd survived medical treatment with minimal anesthesia before, he would survive it now, and it was best to just be grateful for the unexpected act of mercy on his captors' parts, whatever the ulterior might have been.
"Keep the wrapping on to shower, then let it air out and wrap it again," he repeated dutifully. "Lay on my side to let it drain sometimes, to prevent infection. Okay, I can do that." He shivered slightly and reached up to grab the blanket, pulling it around his shoulders securely. It helped a little.
