((Merry Christmas! Sorry for the super-long wait! I had a pretty big block with this. But I finished this for Christmas. Yessss. Anyways, I couldn't find much information about a few things so I'll probably go back and fix this once I actually go to Berlin over Spring Break and know what I'm talking about, so I'm sorry for inaccuracies for now… I had way too much fun with this, though I feel slightly bad for the Baltics. I'm sorry Lithuaniaaa))
Elizaveta continued along the parade route at a canter, about twenty soldiers following her lead.
"So, say I believed you this time," Gilbert grunted angrily, keeping pace with her, "What's your plan? You do have a plan, right?"
"Nope." Elizaveta allowed herself a slight smile. "That's why I needed you. The two of us used to be experts at getting out of tough scrapes when we had no idea what we were doing."
"... Great."
"Hey, try thinking of it another way, instead of saving the Kaiser, we're sabotaging Braginski."
Antonio gave a chuckle from the other side of Gilbert. "We are quite good at sabotage, si?"
They abruptly halted as they approached the front gate of the Reichstag. Ludwig rode forward to speak to the guards about letting them through. They hesitated in the face of the general, but didn't seem to want to budge. Elizaveta started to get anxious as she heard his voice rise. Of course the guards would never believe the word of one soldier, even if they didn't know it was an ex-soldier and a woman. But they were running out of time.
Suddenly there was the loud clinking of steel and sounds of a scuffle from behind the gate. The guards whirled around, but Ludwig pushed past them impatiently while motioning for the others to follow.
Elizaveta urged her horse inside and came into sight of the enormous, ornate front doors just as they slammed closed. A few bloodied bodies lay sprawled nearby.
Ludwig and a few others immediately rushed forward, dismounting, to try and pry the doors open with their considerable strength. After a few minutes without success, Ludwig yelled at his soldiers as well as the guards to form a perimeter and prevent any attempts at escape. This time, they hurried to obey without question.
Elizaveta turned to the trio of men behind her as they dismounted, the only ones ignoring the order. "So, how are we getting in?"
Gilbert and Francis both grinned and looked at Antonio. The Spaniard clapped his hands excitedly, grabbed a coil of rope off his horse, and ran off towards the grand building.
Francis answered her look of bewilderment as they jogged after him. "The reason we're able to get into anything is largely due to Toni's neat little skill of being able to climb just about anything in existence."
She watched in awe as Antonio reached the base of the building and kept going, hardly missing a beat. He found handholds easily on the magnificently carved walls, and continued on upward until he was able to pull himself up to a sitting position on a window sill three stories up. He kicked his legs and waved down at them, then unsheathed his sword and smashed the hilt into the glass behind him.
Elizaveta, Francis, and Gilbert waited as he disappeared from view for a moment, then returned to throw the rope out for them, which he had obviously tied to something sturdy inside. The three of them made it up quite quickly due to Ludwig's vigorous training, and set off at once down the hall to look for the living quarters.
As they sprinted unceremoniously past incredibly beautiful room after incredibly beautiful room, Elizaveta wracked her brains to come up with some kind of plan as to what they would do when they actually found the Russians. They passed the body of another guard every now and then, which made them quicken their pace.
Too soon, Gilbert abruptly put out an arm to stop them in their tracks, a finger to his lips. Elizaveta peered cautiously around the corner he was indicating to see three of Braginski's soldiers standing protectively in front of another set of doors even more grand than the ones around it.
The four of them ducked back around the corner to discuss possible strategies in a low whisper. It was four against three, but they didn't want to cause a huge scuffle at the risk of alerting whoever else was inside.
Elizaveta was distracted from her thoughts as Francis suddenly straightened and looked down the hallway curiously. His lips were pursed and there was an odd glint in his eye.
The two other men stopped their frantic whispering as well to watch as the blond wandered slowly down the hallway and opened the closest set of doors. His face broke into a wide, mischievous grin.
"I have a plan."
"Voila!"
A few minutes later, a beautiful, golden-locked, long-lashed, graceful woman twirled in her magnificent floor-length dress in front of Elizaveta's eyes, asking for input. At least, if Elizaveta hadn't known any better, she would have bet her sword that it was a woman in the dress.
But she did know better.
And it was more than a little unnerving.
The room Francis had found seemed to belong to a woman, maybe the Kaiser or Chancellor's wife or daughter, who was very fond of clothing and other accessories. Without another word, he had rushed to the bathroom to quickly shave his stubble and apply makeup, then proceeded to raid the occupant's closet.
"Francis, cut it out with the eye-batting okay? It's creeping me out," Gilbert echoed her own thoughts.
Francis only raised an eyebrow and grinned more seductively. The albino grabbed a book off the shelf he was sitting on and chucked it at him.
The blond dodged it easily and grabbed Antonio's arm, who could hardly contain his amusement at the situation, and pulled him into the closet. A few moments later he emerged in a flamboyant red dress with an added long, brunette wig. A slightly more modest version of his goofy grin on his face, Elizaveta couldn't help thinking that he looked rather cute.
Francis flung another dress at her. "Put it on over your clothes, so we can change quickly once this is done with."
After she pulled it over her head he brought her a wig as well, seeing as her hair was still only about five centimeters long. He helped to pretty her up a bit more as she tried to call back her experience from living with Roderich that military training had erased.
She sat still as Francis applied a bit of makeup. "How do you know so much about-"
He smiled and winked. "I have a little sister. I love dressing her up to look pretty for the boys."
She caught Gilbert watching them. "Wow Lizzie, you actually look almost as much like a woman as they do."
Elizaveta flung the book he had used before, which he did not manage to dodge.
When Francis had finished with her, doing the best he could in the shortest amount of time possible, he then looked up to Gilbert and beckoned him towards the closet.
The albino sat there a moment before he realised what his friend was asking of him.
"Oh-ho-ho-ho no. No. You girls can play dress up all you want. You are not getting me in there. Not even for this. No."
Francis looked over at Antonio, pouting. "It's tragic really," he said dramatically. "It seems our poor Gilbert is simply not as confident in his masculinity as we are, so much so that he feels threatened by the act of wearing a dress for five minutes to save his country." He glanced back over at the man in question, cocking an eyebrow.
Gilbert's mouth dropped open to let loose an angry retort that never escaped. He clenched his teeth as Antonio and Elizaveta burst out laughing, his face going red. He chucked another book at the blond (which he again dodged easily) and stomped over to the closet.
They laughed even harder at the look of pain on his face when he came out a few moments later, Francis still tightening the back of his corset. He glared daggers at the two of them, trying in vain to keep the hair from his long blond wig - the lightest Francis could find - out of his eyes.
Elizaveta had to wipe the tears of mirth from her eyes and breathe a few times before she could take a good look at him. He did actually look pretty, though still nowhere near as feminine as Francis and Antonio. The fact made her laugh even more.
"Oh, shut up already," he growled, face going red again. "Let's get this over with."
Francis headed towards the door, stuffed chest thrust out. "Follow my lead."
As they came around the corner, in sight of Braginski's men, Francis started to giggle and coo flirtatiously, pointing over at them.
The soldiers raised their weapons to the alert when they heard the noise, but lowered them slightly when they saw the 'women.'
Francis skipped over to them in a disturbingly good girlish manner and peered innocently at the one with brown hair. "Bonjour, beau garçon!"
"Halt!" the soldier ordered, somewhat half-heartedly. "You can't go past here."
Elizaveta and the others approached, trying their best to look innocent.
"Mais je ne veux pas aller là-bas. Je veux rester ici avec vous," Francis cocked his head to the side, flipping his hair slightly and tugging gently on the man's sleeve. It was clear that he hadn't understood a word, but that didn't stop a light blush from spreading across the soldier's cheeks.
Antonio copied Francis, sliding up to the tall blond one and playing with the tassels on his shoulder pads, giggling between spurts of Spanish.
Elizaveta smiled sweetly at the last, shortest one, moving to touch his hair. He jerked away, though more out of shyness than suspicion.
When they were all close enough, Francis snapped his fingers. They each clapped a hand over their soldier's mouth, then pulled a dagger and held it against their throat. Gilbert moved to collect their swords, then set to tying them up with the coil of rope and gagging them with handkerchiefs. They struggled in their bindings after the daggers were removed, but Gilbert only yanked them tighter.
"I don't see why we don't just kill them," he muttered.
"We can use them for information later, and I don't want to make even more of a mess of the place," Francis reasoned, removing his dress.
Antonio grabbed a key off the tall one and unlocked the door, quietly pushing it open.
"Here we go..."
((Just fyi, if you wanted to know what France says but are too lazy to Google translate: ''Hello, handsome boy!'' and ''But I don't want to go over there, I want to stay here with you.''))
