A/N Hope you like this one. It's the result of 10 redrafts, 3 of those were "delete and start over almost from the beginning" drafts (even in this draft, I wrote a whole 3-6 pages that I then deleted b/c they just didn't work). I plan to continue to translate in parentheses for my darling readers sake.

BTW the page/line break in the chapter is a POV switch from Ivan to Malika, just so you aren't confused (it should be apparent, but just in case . . .).

Ch. 10: Roses, Sunflowers, Folk Songs, and Honeypots

"Wo ist mein Regenschirm (Where is my umbrella)?" Malika asked as she put on her blue overcoat.

Ivan looked at the drying rack. Several black umbrellas sat in it. "How do you know yours is missing?" he asked her in German.

She looked back at him. "I painted a rose on the handle," she said, inspecting the rack again as if to verify that she hadn't overlooked hers. "I painted it there, so I could tell which one was mine from all the others."

Ivan looked at his own black umbrella in his hand. His sister, Katyusha, had painted a sunflower on its handle for the same reason. He hesitated for a moment. "You could take mine," he offered.

Malika turned to look at him and shook her head. "I couldn't, Herr Braginski. It's still pouring out. You'd get soaked."

"I'll be fine," Ivan said. "A little shower like this won't hurt me."

"But the drawings I just 'paid' you might get damaged," she said. "Of course, you're free to do with them whatever you want; they're your property now."

Ivan touched the pocket where he'd tucked the sketches. What should I do?

The couple from before walked past them. The young man picked up an umbrella, and after stepping out the door, opened it. The couple then stood closely together and walked under one umbrella.

Ivan watched them walk away. "Fräulein Fuchs, why don't we share?" he suggested.

Malika's eyes grew wide.

"Friends can do that," he stated. "I didn't mean it in any way like that couple."

Malika nodded. "Sure. Of course that's what you meant. No one said doing that was for lovers only." She blushed at her words.

Ivan gestured toward the door, and Malika walked outside. He opened the umbrella and stepped into the rain. Malika finished fastening up her coat and stepped next to him.

Despite what both of them had said, the air seemed to spark with nervousness. Walking so closely still felt too close for people who were "just friends". There were several minutes of no sound except the rain hitting the umbrella canopy, the pavement, and the street, broken with an occasional car splashing by.

"Where in Russia do you live?" Malika asked, finally breaking the silence.

"Moscow," Ivan said.

"Wow."

"Da."

"Why a rose?" Ivan asked, feeling like it was his turn to speak up.

"Mein Opa brought some from his home in England," she said. "It's like our family flower because it's also the national flower of Mama's home. But even if that wasn't the case, I still love roses because they smell wonderful."

"Da, that is true," Ivan said.

"What about you?" she asked. "Why do you have a sunflower on yours?"

Ivan scratched his nose with his free hand. "Similar reasons."

"I see."

They walked for another couple of minutes in silence.

Once again, Malika gave into the tension first. "Why did you want my drawings?" she asked, looking straight ahead.

Ivan glanced over at her. In the dim light, he couldn't tell for sure, but he suspected she was blushing again. "I was curious how I look to others," he said.

She let out a little laugh. "Well then you won't find out; my artistic ability isn't that good. Plus you assumed that I'd drawn you," she said. "What if I hadn't? You would have had a bunch of scribblings of nothing."

"Don't discount yourself so much," Ivan said. "If I didn't think them worthy as payment, I wouldn't have asked for them."

"This is the entrance to my apartment complex," Malika said, pointing to a building 100 yards ahead. It was an ordinary 4-story brick building, with a common entrance and interior stairs leading to the apartments. They walked again for a few moments in quiet awkwardness.

"Thank you for saying that about my art," she said quietly, finally acknowledging what Ivan had said. "Mein Papa always thought my drawings were good. It's just teachers and others who don't agree." They stopped in front of the entrance.

Malika looked up at Ivan and held out her hand.

Ivan shook it gently.

"Thank you for walking me home, Herr Braginski," Malika said. "What time would you like to meet at Karl's for my Russian lesson next week?"

"How about six o'clock in the evening?" Ivan proposed. "Tonight was a little late."

Malika smiled. "I'll see you then," she said before hurrying over to the entrance.

Ivan watched her walk into the building and go up the stairs. Her red dress was a little longer than her navy blue coat, and it reminded him of a rosebud about to bloom. This observation caused a flutter in his chest that surprised him.

His cheeks burning, Ivan turned and walked toward his Berlin house. He heard a sound filter up through the air. It startled him when he realized he was humming a folk song he knew from long ago: "Ya vstretil Vas (I Met You)". He laughed at his subconsciousness's choice and continued humming it all the way to his house.

Malika unlocked her door and set her keys on a little table beside the door. She sighed and shut the door. She'd felt embarrassed that Herr Braginski had asked for her sketches. She had spent a good hour alone just sketching him. His childish face fascinated her, especially since he had been looking sad. She felt he had a face that should always be smiling. She probably would have sketched him anyway, even if she hadn't been instructed to in order to memorize his behaviors and expressions so that she could read them.

"Good work, Amelia," a woman's voice rang out from across the room. "You made good use of your time with Herr Braginski."

Malika jumped. She squinted into the darkness and then let out a sigh of relief. "You startled me, Lena," she said as she flicked on the lights. "But I thought we'd discussed that, even in my apartment, you should call me by my operative name. How did you know my real name anyway?"

The waitress from Karl's restaurant was leaning against a small sofa. She walked over to a desk in the main room and picked up some files."It's in the dossier on you," Lena said, flipping through one of the files. She smirked as she read one of the papers. "Is this your real birthday?"

Amelia Jones's eyes grew wide. "What's written there?" she asked, sweating slightly. Is that my actual file from the President's office?

"March 4, 1961," Lena read. "I only ask because 20 is a little young to be working as a spy, even if you'll be 21 years old in 5 months."

What a relief. Amelia laughed. "Okay you caught me. I am older than 20. I just fudged the date a little because I'm also an actress and the industry demands youthful actors."

"That explains your convincing performance in the restaurant," Lena said."I don't know if I could cry on command about a family I just made up. And what a sob story I got to overhear." She held up the wire-tap headphones she'd been wearing at the restaurant. "A person would have to be completely devoid of any feeling to not feel for you."

"I didn't make it up," Amelia said, frowning. "My parents really were killed. I've only got my brothers now." Amelia blinked away the tears tingeing her eyes as she remembered her "parents", the non-nation couple she stayed with before the Revolutionary War.

It wasn't really a "car" accident, but people still die in roll-overs; it doesn't matter if it's a real carriage or a horseless one. She still remembered weeping in anguish in the rain as she had knelt next to the lifeless bodies of her "mother" and "father" and had tried to figure out why her adopted parents had died and not her.

Am I not human too? she had wondered when her tears finally lessened. She had examined her body and found no wounds except for a smarting pain and some blood along her hairline. I thought that's what we nations were. Was I wrong? Despite the downpour, Amelia had felt no desire to move away from her parents to find shelter. She must have sat beside them for hours before another carriage had come finally by and found them.

"What has happened here?" the driver of the carriage had called. The driver and his companion had jumped down from their carriage, ran down the ravine, and over to the overturned carriage.

Amelia, her dress still damp long after the rain had stopped, slowly turned her head and looked at them. "As you could see, the rain caused some of the road to collapse . . .the horse was spooked . . . our carriage flipped . . . my parents . . . they are dead," she said numbly.

"You are certain they are dead?" the driver's companion asked.

"Quite certain," she replied. "The accident happened this afternoon . . . they died a short while after we crashed . . . or maybe they were killed immediately . . . I do not know . . . when I awoke after striking my head on the rocks . . . " Amelia felt the sobs rise up in her chest again when she remembered what she had found when she had become conscious again after the accident. She choked back the tears. I have already wept so much; how can I still have any pain left inside me?

The two men looked at the dried blood on the side of Amelia's head and in her hair, then over at the sunset. "Why did you not find someone to help you?" the driver asked.

Amelia gave them a weak smile. She gently touched her dead mother's forehead, sweeping the wet hair away from her closed eyes. "This is in the middle of the countryside. Who would I have gone to for help? There are not any houses for miles," she said. "My parents are all I have in the world except my three brothers, and I couldn't go to them for help; one does not live with us, and the other two do not even know I exist."

The two men looked at each other; the driver coughed to hide his discomfort. "Come with us," he said, holding out a hand to help Amelia up. "We will help you take your parents home. Lawrence, get some blankets from the carriage."

When he heard of Amelia's situation, Alfred came to her rescue. He paid for the funeral and tried to comfort Amelia at the funeral as best as he could.

"What are we?" Amelia asked after her "parents" relatives had left the grave site. "We can get hurt, but when it comes to dying, we . . . Molly and William . . . Mama and Papa . . . they died so easily. But I . . ." She trailed off as fresh tears began to stream down her face. Amelia covered her face with her hands and wept bitterly into them. Alfred pulled her into a hug, and gently patted her back until her crying had nearly stopped.

"Non-nation humans die, we do not . . . not easily anyway," Alfred said quietly, still holding her in the hug. "I haven't heard of any of us dying before, but I'm sure it's possible. I think the country and what it represents must die too." Alfred released her and looked around the graveyard until his eyes rested on a nearby gravestone that had a blanket of forget-me-not flowers growing around it and the name "Davie" etched in the stone.

"I have some friends here too," he said, swiping at the tears that had formed all of a sudden. "Our apparent immortality does not stop us from feeling the anguish of loss when they pass on. I am grateful for the pain, even if it kills me inside, because emotions like these prove to me that I'm human like they are." Amelia wiped her eyes, and he put his arm around her shoulders.

"Would you like to live with me now?" he said, looking into her eyes.

Amelia sniffed. What on earth is he talking about? I can't do that. "What about Arthur?" she said. "I thought you said I should keep out of his sight. He visits and stays with you all the time, sometimes for months. I cannot just live in your attic, and I have never been good at hide-and-seek. You know that."

"He won't be staying with me anymore," Alfred said. He looked away from her and scanned the horizon. His eyes looked distant and sad.

"What? Why? I do not understand," Amelia said. The summer evening air suddenly felt colder to her.

"Our people want independence from Great Britain. They voted on it a couple of days ago," Alfred said, glancing back at her. "So living with me will not be a problem."

"But most of our people are British. Why would we need independence?" she asked.

"Only part of our people feel that way now," he said. "Majority rules. Most want freedom."

"But Arthur is our brother," Amelia insisted, tears began to flow again for different reasons.

Alfred let out a small laugh. "No. Not anymore," he had said. "In fact, technically he never was truly our brother. We, you and I, are family. We do not mean anything to him except as an underling, or some trophy, or a source of soldiers and wealth. Nothing more." Alfred had released her shoulders and walked away from her, and Amelia had thought that he had looked very lonely. She had followed him to his home. She had nowhere else to go anyway.

"My apologies," Lena said, bringing Amelia back from the memory. "I didn't mean to be calloused."

Amelia shook her head. "It's understandable," she said, wiping away a tear. "Because of me, you've had to stop your regular operations and baby-sit me while I learn how to do this. I'm sure you felt that I was coming into this assignment completely unprepared."

Lena shrugged. "On a plus side, I get to use some of your new listening devices," Lena countered. "I could hear everything you two were saying through the wire you were wearing as if I was sitting right next to you. Although, you didn't have to mention that you knew me. I nearly knocked over the entire table when you said that." Lena closed her eyes, rubbed her right temple, and sighed. "No matter. I'll make it work to our advantage." She looked over at Amelia and smiled. "I still can't believe how lucky we were that Braginski had picked our restaurant to visit the other night."

"It wasn't luck," Amelia said quietly.

"What?" Lena asked.

Oops. I wasn't supposed to let anyone know that. Oh well. "I had inside information that his chances of visiting this restaurant were very, very good," Amelia said, hoping Lena wouldn't press for more information. How could she tell her handler that President Reagan (her Hollywood idol) and her brother, America, had been planning this for a while and planted her in East Germany (using some other spies) months in advance before the World Conference? Or that her brother had overheard "Prussia" and "Germany" recommending Karl's restaurant to "Russia" and then passed the information on to her? Even if I could share top secret information like that, who would believe such a story?

"Was tonight really okay?" Amelia asked, cringing. "I didn't say too much too soon, did I?"

"So long as you don't tell him everything, mein lieber Honigtopf," Lena said, "you should be fine."

"Wait. What did you call me?" Amelia asked. "I only spent 4 months in Kirchberg before I came here, so I still don't know a ton of German yet." She furrowed her brow and tried to translate.

"My dear honey pot," Lena said impatiently in English.

Amelia raised an eyebrow."What's that supposed to mean?" she asked in German.

Lena rolled her eyes. "Gott. You really are new to espionage," she said. "A honey pot is what you are to this Ivan Braginski fellow. You seduce him and either steal information from him or get him to spy for you. The Russians use this method all the time." Lena closed Amelia's file, opened the other folder, and scanned the information inside.

"Right. I knew that," Amelia said, blushing.

"I still don't understand what kind of information Braginski has that one of us regulars can't get from any government official," Lena said, reading the information Amelia assumed was on Russia. "Or why a novice like you has been assigned to seduce him. But this assignment comes from much higher up than I've ever seen before."

"Yeah, well," Amelia said, scratching her head. "I guess they figured that if I get caught, there's a way for me to escape that's easier than if a regular spy got caught."

"And that is?" Lena asked.

"I can't really say," Amelia said. Nations have options you don't have. The right side of her chest ached when she remembered of one of those options.

Lena shrugged and tucked the two folders in the satchel that she had with her.

"Do you really need to take those with you?" Amelia asked, feeling anxious that her information, even if it was fake information, was accessible to a non-nation.

Lena nodded. "I'm your handler. I need them." She studied Amelia's face. "Don't worry. I have strict instructions to destroy them as soon as this assignment is over."

Amelia bit her lip. Al didn't say anything about giving out information about me or Russia. What else didn't he tell me?

"Well, then I guess we're finished until next week," Lena said. She held up a business card. "Here is the address of a ceramics factory I've arranged for you to work at to help with your cover story. You start tomorrow at 6:00 a.m. Try to stay out of trouble until we talk again." She walked to the door. "By the way, you did fine for your first time." She set the business card on the little table next to Amelia's keys, grabbed an umbrella, and nodded toward where she'd retrieved it. "Tell him you got another one."

Amelia looked down where Lena had indicated and saw her umbrella, a rose unfolding gracefully on the handle. "You stole—"

"It got you two closer, didn't it?" Lena said, winking as she opened the door. "I'm just getting started too. You may be good at getting his attention, but this is my profession. You'll have what you need in 6 months or less." She walked out the door and closed it.

Work had been hard lately. Even after five months, Amelia still wasn't used to painting ceramics all day long in a factory and was always grateful to go home. Pulling off the bandana she wore over her hair, she started to undo her braid as she walked up the stairs to her apartment.

How long has it been since I had a real physical job like this? she wondered as she rubbed her aching shoulders and neck. Acting as a representative of your country is certainly easier than this factory job or even the spy business. Amelia walked in and set her bag on the table in the main room. A light shone from the hallway into the rest of the darkened apartment. She shivered slightly; spring had just barely come to Berlin, and it still wasn't warm enough at night yet.

"We need to speed things up, Malika," a voice said from the darkness.

"Scheiße!" Amelia screeched. She looked over where the voice had come from and let out a sigh of relief. It was Lena again. Stupid ninja waitress. "Lena, how many times have I told you to stop doing that?"

Lena ignored her. "You've been working on Braginski for five months now, and you've managed to get nothing out of him."

"I have new information," Amelia said, defensively. "Russia is definitely going to leave Afghanistan. He—I mean—the Russian army is losing against the rebels."

"We already knew that," Lena said.

Amelia flopped down in a chair at the dining room table. "So how do you propose I speed things up?"

Lena reached in her satchel and pulled out a bottle of liquor and a bottle of pills. "The last few times that Braginski has visited, he's carried a briefcase with him," she said. "That means he's acting as a courier for the government. His dossier said he's dangerous, so he must be the perfect man for that kind of job. This is Karl's homemade cut brandy. Drop two of these pills in the bottle and give the liquor to Braginski. Make sure you don't drink it, though; two of these babies will put a full-grown man flat on his back in less than 20 minutes."

"But how will making him pass out at Karl's get us that information?" Amelia said. "I'm sure he'll know it was me who took his briefcase. You'll have to arrange for me to leave Berlin, possibly the country."

Lena pulled an odd-looking gadget out of her satchel. "You won't be taking his briefcase, just photographing the information inside with this equipment. Besides, if the information is good enough, then it won't be a loss if you are discovered as a spy and have to end your assignment," Lena said. "Since you need to take photos, you're not going to give that drink to him at Karl's," she continued, smiled slyly.

"But if not at Karl's, how—"

"You are going to invite Braginski to your apartment for your little Russian 'lesson'," Lena continued. "Then, once he's passed out, you'll take pictures of all the information inside the briefcase. Braginski will be none the wiser when he comes to in your apartment." She walked over to the table and set the bottle, pills, and a mini-camera that had strange clasps on it in front of Amelia.

"The camera attaches to your undergarments. The rest I'll leave to you; one thing, though," she said, smiling mischievously and patting Amelia on the shoulder. "Do your best to make it a pleasant memory for him, so he doesn't ask questions later."

Amelia felt her face grow hot. "But what if Ivan interprets my invitation to my apartment as an invitation to kiss and other stuff? What if he tries to do 'things' before I can get him to drink this?"

"Then let him," Lena said.

"I can't do that!"

Lena scoffed. "What did you think being a honey pot meant? That you sit around eating and drinking with a buddy?" She let out a small laugh. "'Doing things', as you put it, is part of the job. You're being naive if you think you'll make any progress with your tutoring sessions."

"But I only wanted to do stuff like that with Arthur," Amelia said quietly.

"Well you should have thought about that before you signed up for this assignment," Lena said as she put on her coat and grabbed her satchel. She walked across the room and opened the door to the apartment.

"Wait!" Amelia called, getting up out of her chair and walking over to Lena. She clasped her handler's hand. "What if Ivan won't accept my invitation?"

Lena stared, then gave Amelia a once-over. "You're kidding, right?" she said sarcastically. "If he's a normal man, he'll accept it. Any guy would. See you tonight at Karl's." She then hurried down the stairs and out the main entrance.

Amelia closed the door and walked over to where she'd left the bottle of brandy. She dropped 3 pills into the bottle of alcohol, just to be on the safe side, then slipped it into her bag.

"Добрый вечер Malika (Good evening)," Ivan said as he walked up to her table and sat down.

"Ah. Приветствуйте назад, Иван. Вы являетесь ранними (Welcome back, Ivan. It's good to see you)," Amelia said, looking up from her sketch and smiling. She put away her sketchbook, and they kissed each other on each cheek as a greeting.

"Your accent is getting better," Ivan said in German.

"Thank you," Amelia said. "You're a little early today."

"Is there a problem with my being early?" he asked.

"No, none," Amelia said. "It's just unusual for you." And I haven't had time to build up the courage to ask you what Lena told me to yet. She looked for his briefcase. Where is it? Panic welled up in her throat. What am I supposed to do now?

"Would you like to order dinner now?" she asked, signaling for Lena.

Ivan looked around nervously and cleared his throat. "Actually, Malika, I was wondering if you'd like to join me at my home for dinner," he said just as Lena walked up to their table.

Lena's eyes grew wide.

"It might be nice for a change of scene, da?" Ivan said hurriedly. "Plus you said that your birthday was this month, and I thought since I might not be here on the actual day—my servant is already there making dinner, so we won't be alone, but if you feel uncomfortable about it, I understand."

"I'll just give you a couple more minutes," Lena said as she did an about-face.

Ivan watched her walk away and then looked back at Amelia with a sheepish expression. "Maybe I assume too much. Five months once a week for a few hours might not be enough time to feel comfortable—"

"I'll go! I want to go," Amelia interrupted, "but may I pay my tab before we leave? I'd ordered something earlier and was going to pay for it with my meal."

Ivan smiled and nodded.

Amelia stood and walked over to Lena. "Pretend I'm paying you for that brandy," she told Lena, plopping some Marks in her hand. "What should I do? The briefcase—"

"Is probably at his home," Lena interrupted. "My guess is that he hoped you would accept his invitation, so he probably stopped there and dropped everything off first. Go. You'll be fine. Just remember to not let anyone see you take the pictures. In fact, give some brandy to everyone there if you can."

"Good thing I carried that camera with me," Amelia said, patting her bra where it was hidden.

"Good luck, honey pot," Lena said.

Amelia gave her a crooked smile. "Thanks, beekeeper," she said sardonically, then turned to give Ivan a big smile.

A/N

Please note: At the beginning of 1982 (the time period when this chapter ends), Russia really was losing the civil war the Russian army was helping the Afghanistan government to fight. By 1982, the Mujahedin rebel forces controlled 75% of Afghanistan despite fighting the might of the world's second most powerful military power. Secretly, the US was helping the rebels . . . how ironic b/c one of the groups fighting Russia at that time was Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden (and we helped him =_=). The US wanted Russia to have its own "Vietnam". . . (who would have thought it would become the United States' problem so many years later?) Russia didn't remove the last of its troops from Afghanistan until 1989 (9 years of a bloody and pointless war =_=)

Translations:

Wo ist mein Regenschirm? = Where is my umbrella?

mein Opa = my grandpa

Ya vstretil Vas = "I Met You" (Russian Romance). A beautiful Russian folk song (you can find several versions of it on the web, all gorgeous). This song applies very well to the mood I wanted Ivan to be in at this point. See the translated lyrics below.

mein lieber Honigtopf = my dear honey pot

Scheiße! = Shit!

Добрый вечер Malika = Good evening, Malika.

Приветствуйте назад, Вы являетесь ранними = Welcome back, Ivan. It's good to see you.

Ya vstretil Vas = "I Met You" (Russian Romance).

Translated Lyrics:

I met you and the past
Came back to life in my dead heart.
Remembering a golden time,
My heart became so warm.

Just as in late autumn
There are days, the transient hour,
When suddenly spring wafts again
And something stirs within us,

So, winnowed within by the breath
Of fullness my soul knew in those years,
With a rapture I thought I'd forgotten,
I stare into your dear face.

As if we'd been apart for ages
I stare at you and think I'm dreaming,
And suddenly sounds unsilenced in me
Could be heard within me, but louder!

That was more than reminiscence:
My life began to talk once more,
As did in you that very same charm,
As did in my soul that very same love!

So were you surprised? Or did my hint from last time give the connection to the main story away? I'm sure all kinds of speculation about Amelia & Ivan can now commence. I got the idea for this subplot when I saw that Malika was a Slavic variation for the name Amelia. I thought "What if Alfred asked Amelia to spy for him during the Cold War?" And out of that came the "history" between Amelia & Ivan. I hope the sub-plot has been interesting to you so far. ^_^

Once again I'm sorry that Ivan's story is so dramatic and serious.

Ivan: "What does that mean? You don't want to take my past seriously?"

Me: "I never said that. I take you very seriously."

Ivan: "Da, that's my good little author." *grabs me, pulls me close, and kisses me on the cheek* "You will be one of my pets when everyone becomes one with Russia."

Me: *giggles nervously* "You are a lot hotter than I expected you to be." (*unsure whether I mean in temperature or sexiness, or both*) *swoons again*

Ivan:*catches me and raises an eyebrow* "Why do you keep reacting that way to me?"