A/N: Sorry I'm so unforgivably late, but my house burned down, I got pregnant, and a brand spanking new yellow Corvette convertible ran me down going 300 mph. So don't hate me. I love your reviews. Love them.

Deidara shifted the weight on his shoulder, trying vainly to keep his arm from falling asleep. The weight mumbled something in English and beat a weak rhythm on his mid-back with tiny fists.

It was just starting to flurry, he noticed as he looked skyward, and he picked up his pace a little, high-stepping through the old snow determinedly. If he had known the girl was this intolerant of alcohol, none of it would be happening. But, then again, he hadn't been prepared for her snatching the bottle from his hand, scarfing half of it down, pausing to choke and sputter, and then inhaling the rest while he sat gaping at her stupidly.

"Deidara?"

"Mmm?"

"Are you wearing underwear right now?"

"Mmm."

Most of the trudge back from the little shop consisted of little, nonsensical conversation fragments like that. It was just as good, because he'd known much more annoying drunken habits than this.

Again, he sped up, trying for a cautious trot. He needed to get that medicine in the plane before too soon; he certainly didn't want a feverish, babbling nurse on his hands. It would be so terribly…boring. Well, and it would be bad if something happened to her, of course. Deidara had a conscience, after all. A very, very small one, but it was there all the same.

The town must've been quite used to strange sights. No one had given him a passing glance, a German in a stolen uniform lugging about a blushing girl in a who-knows-what habiliment. Then again, it was easier to get out that way, and, in fact, an SS officer even gave him a thumbs-up. Well, that was just like Hitler's ilk, to totally disregard the safety of a young girl. To hell with them.

"Mmmph. Deidaaara?"

"Mmm?"

"Where are we going?"

"The plane."

"But…why? I dunno how to fly a plane. No…"

"I am going to get you medicine for your head."

"Okay."

"Mmm."

"…Deidara?"

"Mmm?"

"Where are we going?"

There it was! The treeline crept closer and closer, taunting Deidara with flashes of metallic sheen, glinting off the winter sun. And here he'd thought he might spend hours and hours searching for the thing. One small detail easy to forget when hiding a large, clanking object was that to hide it well often meant hiding it from yourself. That getting-lost ordeal in the forest still wasn't out of his mind just yet.

Trying to ignore the pressing sensation of delicate hands squeezing his posterior like it was the last piece of ass in the whole world, he stumbled over roots to the Lockheed, using the left wing to balance the extra weight, which wasn't helping matters by slowly licking his neck.

"Stop it," he growled, and flipped Sakura over on the wing. She lay there calmly, stroking the icy metal with a hand, quiet for now. The plane was surely freezing to the touch, and Deidara worried incessantly over hypothermiza, or whatever it was called, as he pried open the cockpit windows with gloved hands.

He stopped, looked back at Sakura, then at his hands. Wordlessly he removed the thin pilot gloves and crawled to her, took a wrist in hand, and slipped the glove over soft calluses. She smiled at him with hazy eyes and rubbed the soft leather with her naked hand. He took her other wrist and did the same, inviting himself to feel the thin, membranous skin below her palm with a rough thumb. It was rapidly cooling.

The back of her coat clung to the wing a little when Deidara took Sakura by the waist, bracing himself at uncertain heights as he crept towards the opening, praying that Lockheed had designed the plane well enough to stand a little extra burden at this temperature.

Leaning against the thin beams, he gently dumped the girl in the cockpit seat, where she immediately began to press buttons, at least until he snapped at her irritably and replaced them to their proper settings.

"I am coming in now. Move it, Liebchen."

"Huh?"

Feet first, planted on the edge of the seat, and then the rest of his torso, in a rather uncomfortable, cramped manner. But with some prodding here and there, he returned them to their usual: both facing the front, with her perched on top. Although she usually wasn't struggling to turn around in normal circumstances.

An icy breeze moved him to shut the window, and he plopped back down and sighed before reaching a hand behind him, trying to single out the canister in the gloom. The sun was setting fast, so he'd sit and watch her take the pill, and then they could leave. That was it.

Sakura had other plans, however, and began to rock back and forth on his lap.

"Stop it," he warned, pill bottle finally in hand. He braced hands on her chest, but pulled them back as if burned when Sakura stilled and stared at them intently. His face burned with lost intention.

"I was not—"

"'S okay."

She took up his hands and replaced them, bracing her own, covered hands on his shoulders and shifting from side to side in his lap, pressing down into his waist insistently. She paused swiftly to remove the gloves, and shoved them into his shirt. Deidara shivered and slid his hands down to her waist, a part of him wondering if this was another dream and the rest unconcerned at this point. He might regret it later, but later was a ways away.

The pill container dropped into his jacket, forgotten; his hands roamed upwards again, holding her face softly, running cold fingertips over her peach-soft cheeks, and he felt her smile underneath her skin. She brought her hands up to his hair and twisted strands of it idly, waiting with that smile. Why did she have to smile like that?

He closed his eyes and kissed her. He didn't want to look at that smile. The girl responded just as he expected, and as if from a haze, he felt her lean in to him, her inexperience terribly evident, and her jacket flew to the floor and the thin shirt underneath lost a button on its way to the instrument panel.

They kissed again feverishly, and he put his hand behind him, on the window above, trying to find something solid. She clung to him as though desperate and cried out softly, something he couldn't recognize, and he pushed her skirt up, discovering after a confused moment that her tights were already tossed somewhere in the darkness.

It wouldn't be romantic, but at least he wasn't expecting anything of the sort. Deidara pressed the girl to him roughly with one arm, wriggling out of passionate grasping to struggle out of restricting pants, just as much room as he would need. This wouldn't be a mawkish display, and there was no reason to pretend; it would all be very straightforward, because that was the way it always happened.

Solemnly feeling for direction with one hand, Deidara used the other to guide her waist, and then used both to return her embrace following a strangled cry.

He let her lead as much as possible, allowing her to stop for breath every time she choked on a sob, and then started up a halting pace again. Little bruises from her nails through his jacket started to form on his shoulder, but he ignored them, tried to ignore the sounds she made; they were so pained, and almost sad. It was even sadder that, despite it all, he thought he might even love her.

It was over very quickly, and Sakura sank forward, exhausted and trembling with her fatigue. One last time, Deidara pulled her towards him and kissed her softly, not entirely surprised to find she was already asleep.

Methodically, he gathered her clothes and replaced them slowly, wondering to himself if he was trying to erase what had happened with a simple brushing off. It wouldn't be that easy, and there was no way she wouldn't know tomorrow morning. But later was a ways off.

He replaced his own clothing as slowly as possible, even though he knew she wouldn't wake, patted the pocket with the pills, now past their purpose, and watched the storm pass over. Brilliant flakes covered the little squares of struggling light overhead until everything reflected the glow of the new snow, but Deidara felt smothered underneath their covering.

When she awoke, Sakura found herself in quite a predicament. After jerking awake in the hotel room, wearing nothing but her old, ratty underwear and a light shift, the first thing she'd felt was an ache below her waist, a pounding sensation somewhere between her ears, and then an overpowering surge of nausea.

She stumbled into the bathroom, drawing her feet back in discomfort at the freezing marble before dropping to her knees and depositing her dinner from last night, and then all that came up was bile, again and again. The pain in the back of her head was excruciating, and all she could think of was desperation, wanting it to go away but not comprehending a means.

Stumbling back with a sway of delirium, Sakura sunk to the floor on hands and knees, and lay there, panting. She stared at the floor, mesmerized with patterns in the stone she'd never noticed before. In some places, it would be smooth and clear as glass, and in others, a starburst of soft cracks littered an area with an array of pinks and grays.

Her hands appeared a pale white against the ruddy pink and dirty white stone slab, and she lifted one, trembling, to her face. Crisscrossing scars lightly blemished the surface of her palm, and she saw calluses that had never been there before, and the skin itself was mottled, a symptom of extreme dehydration.

An overpowering thirst drove her in a mad dash to the sink, where she turned on the faucet and scooped up handfuls of water, drinking and drinking until her stomach felt likely to burst from the pressure. But the headache lingered, so she crawled back into the bedroom and collapsed, exhausted, on the oval rug in the center of the dark room.

"Sakura."

There was a petite, extravagantly furnished fireplace in the center of the wall opposite the bed, and Sakura stared at it with half-lidded eyes. The mantle was some manner of dull, black metal, and carvings of birds and abstract designs embossed the whole of it. The dark shadows and the shifting of the curtains made the fowl nearly come to life. Sakura thought for a moment that, given a chance and a cracked window, the birds might fly away forever.

A heron grasped a struggling frog from a still pond in the lower left corner, just like the one in her lost quilt, and in the upper right corner, a large bird of prey cried out warning over a grassy crag. Between them, there were sparrows and merry larks of sort, but the artist clearly intended focus upon these two creatures, unalike in nearly every way.

The heron sported sleek, even feathers, and even in the hunt its every move was graceful and soft, but the osprey…hard, pointed feathers jutted out askew from a threatening profile, and wicked claws dug into the rock below.

But if you looked at it just right, the two seemed to appraise one another quietly, content with their separate worlds but wary of the space in between, where unimportant, phantasmal shapes flew among the trees, ignorant to the tension, the potential for friction.

Their struggle forever etched in coated masonry, they seemed to look right into her face, and when Sakura pushed up to perch precariously on her shins, she saw that their eyes had followed her even there. Now she felt a different set of eyes on her, and their gaze filled her stomach with careful fear.

"Sakura."

"You didn't even ask me," she began to cry softly, blankly regarding lifeless, iron stares.

"I cannot be ashamed. There is nothing I can do."

It was so simple, so cold and stiff. For a moment their understanding of what had happened captivated her; it was a rare instance where the both of them comprehended the other perfectly. She had no memory of it, while he did, but she knew nevertheless.

"I didn't want it. I hate you."

"I know. I am sorry for it."

"That doesn't matter. You can say all you want, but you can't take it away. You ruined me, you horrible, evil Nazi!"

An angry pause, colored with Sakura's panting, a creak of bedsprings, and then light, careful footsteps heading towards her. She braced herself for a slap, but the placating hand on her spine caught her by surprise. He didn't say anything, just breathed.

"Deidara?"

Just silence. Was he angry?

"You said my name before…what did you want?"

"Oh," he sounded relieved. "I was just wondering…if you want me to get something for you to eat. You should not—lieb—they have toast down the stairs. I asked them."

It was so out of place, so terrifyingly ironic, that she had to laugh. She laughed so loud he probably thought she was crazy, but that was all right. She probably was, after all that had happened since December sixteenth, when everything happened to bring her where she was today.

Here she thought this crazy German was about to slap her in the face, and probably take advantage of her again for good measure, and he offered her room service. To say it turned her upside down would be hackneyed, not to mention halfway presented.

She looked at him in the face, really looked at him, and for the first time in what was probably days, what she saw quieted her.

Deidara stood to her left, shifting his weight from foot to foot in a childish display of awkwardness. His head shifted from side to side with the slight motion, and when she looked into his eyes, he quickly averted them, evidently enthralled with the dark patterns of the floor tapestries.

Biting his lip, he scrunched up his nose and his mouth widened out into a discontented grimace. Not yet in the prime of his adulthood, the action revealed the roundness to his cheeks, but Sakura could see the promise of a very handsome man when he grew into them.

His hair, she saw, had been unevenly hacked off again, brushing the bottoms of his ears in all manner of angles and skewed ends. She remembered the scissors hidden in a pocket of her coat, hoped they had not gone dull in disuse.

"Do you want it?" His nervousness won out, evident by a faint tone of fretfulness.

Then he paused, blinking at the sound of his own voice, harsh and grating in the silence of the caliginous room.

"Want…some food? Well, I guess I do…please, yes."

The sound of her own voice seemed to relieve him, and seemed to have pulled him back from some faraway place.

"Yes," he interrupted her abruptly. "I…I will go get it. You stay here, okay?"

"Okay."

He left in a rush, leaving her with an odd feeling in her chest and a small gust of wind. Seeing nothing to do with herself, Sakura slowly approached the bed on the window side and sat serenely, stroking the plain quilt top and casting her gaze out the paned glass.

Whoever had decorated this room had a fondness for birds, notably the partnership between the osprey and the heron. It was almost uncanny, how the osprey had followed her so far to this place, and the cast heron gave her a sense of comfort after losing the cloth one not even a day ago.

It was hard to explain what they meant to her, but they were there nevertheless. Were they waiting for her to understand why? Was there anything to understand at all?

There was Deidara, the German, the sniper, the Nazi. But which one was he really, if any at all? She knew she didn't love him, couldn't—it would hardly be proper—but he remained a powerful force in her life, an enigma, a boy, really, in the inner recesses of his heart. Sakura knew that the kind of forgiveness for what he did to her came slowly, but for his sake she was willing to wait.

The spiritless, blank countenance that so often dominated his features was difficult to pass over her feelings. By her very nature, and the experience she had gained in working for the Army, she remained dutiful to her compassion in every turn, cried when a sparrow fell to the earth.

Maybe she could offer a peace to him as her gift; she certainly had nothing of value on her person. She wouldn't tell him, a stinging pride still refused to grant him any amnesty, but maybe she could change just a bit, just to show him that not everyone in the world hated the very sight of him.

She folded her hands in her lap and listened to the flutter of the Christmas snow as it shrouded all the world with its pure whiteness.

Thankfully, the toast and venison sausage were easy to come by and the weight of it fairly shocked him, but the nice women in the kitchen seemed hell-bent on making him and his "darling little wife" just as happy as could be.

And that was all right. Sakura would need the food after… He set his chin and stomped up the narrow staircase. He had wanted her, but it hadn't been real. The thing was disconnected and empty, and he remembered the burning taste of the hard alcohol on her tongue. It made him angry to think about it.

She was so innocent, and he so worldly. He had seen everything and more, while she had been restricted to simple battle aftermath, and whatever had gone on in that fool American city she came from. But now she seemed tainted by whatever wisdom he had so carelessly bestowed her with.

There was no irony to the situation, because he knew that he had wanted her from the very beginning. So the eventual physical contact had been inevitable, in his perspective. The lack of an emotional connection, however, wore on him more and more as time passed. He wanted her to want him. He wanted to tell her he loved her and not feel a burning shame when she turned from him, embarrassed at his presence.

The stairs creaked mournfully under his boots as he reached the top and slouched down the long, dimly lit hallway. He held a plate in each hand, one covered in large sections of wrapped sausage, and the other four slices of suspicious-looking bread, with a thin spread of fruit jam on each. This, at least, might placate the girl long enough to talk, or at least sit in relatively contented silence.

When he got to the door, Deidara lowered a plate to the floor before slipping in, not entirely sure if a knock would produce any assistance from the resident within. He stopped on the rug, peering at her from behind as she gazed out the window from the bed; wondering what had captured her attention so completely.

He slowly walked around the footboard and passed quickly in front of her, hoping to avoid any further bantering, and then sat on edge of the bed beside her, but still a distance away. Distance just enough for two plates of food, anyway. They sat, motionless, for a while, in silence, watching the snow fall.

Deidara had always thought of wind chimes whenever he saw a winter blizzard like this at the farm. The first thing he always saw when he ran up to the front porch from his father's departing Chevrolet was his grandmother's wind chimes.

There were so many of them that it nearly sent his young mind into a frenzy trying to look at all of them at once. One was shaped like a cat whose legs and tail was painted, dangling bells that, when slapped together by small hands belonging to a healthy imagination, sounded not unlike a pleading meow. Another was an old hanger decorated with old, rusty keys clinging to the thin, metal rod by fraying sewing thread.

Deidara, as a child, always blushed with pride at the sight of that one, hung so prominently at the front and center of the overhang. That one his grandmother had led him make all by himself. She had even brought out her special key collection, the one that earned him a slap once or twice at the curiosity of his prying fingers, and let him pick whichever keys he wanted to string to her favorite hanger. It was uneven, and one of the keys was much rustier than all the rest, but his grandmother had assured him that it was the most beautiful of all her hangers by far.

Now, of course, he recognized that as a grandmother's bias, but at the time, it hadn't stopped him from dragging every visitor to the porch for an introduction by the artist himself. He smiled softly at the memory, a rare fond one, and turned to look at the girl beside him, smugly pleased to see that she was already eating the food that he had brought her.

A thousand years ago, he had talked to her in the shadow of their featherless flying machine, and a millions years ago he had asked her a question. He had asked her if she would ever think of staying with him, forever. She certainly wouldn't now, not after his mindless behavior.

But this girl…she sat on the quilt, barely denting the soft squares with her slight weight, bathed in blue light from the outside world. Her hair was soft and sleek, every strand in place, and still that awful shade of pink. She was so beautiful it almost made him want to abandon his art and write volumes and volumes of romantic poetry about her. Rather sad, really, in his opinion of himself.

She knew he was watching her. He could tell just by the way she hesitated to take a bite of her toast, a light blush coloring her cheeks while her eyes darted from the window to her food, repeatedly, in a nervous fashion. He wasn't shy to admit that this kind of virginal behavior attracted her to him; it was the thing that had captured his attentions in the first place.

After his recruiting, he was around any breed of lascivious women, who would do anything at all for some cash, or, more commonly, cigarettes. They would tell a man they loved him, they would beg and cry if you asked them to, all for a hefty fee. That was his life.

But this girl…how long had it been since he had seen a woman blush at anything? He shifted on the quilt top, drew a leg up to his chest, and braced it against folded hands. For a few minutes more, he continued to watch her eat, fumble with her food against his persistent stare, and dart her eyes up to meet his own periodically before returning to her food with discomforted rapidity.

When she finished, finally, leaving the bulk of the meal to his own disposal, he relaxed enough to kick off his boots and sit cross-legged across from her, chin in hand, still shamelessly peering at the flustered girl.

"Um, you can have the rest," she quietly ventured. Slowly, she pushed the plates his way, eyes glued to the hobnailed footwear in an ungainly pile below the side frames.

He tucked into the meal ravenously, polishing the rest off in a rather impolite manner for eating in front of a lady, but not wasn't exactly the time for manners and suavity.

"Is there anything else you want?" He asked her with a mouthful of nearly dry toast.

Her head snapped up at the sound of his voice.

"Well, some water would be nice, but I'll go get that from the sink."

And she did. He observed her venture from his stagnant position, slightly amused at her attempts at drinking from the faucet. At first, she tried to cup it in her hands and drink, but after a while, she all but attached her mouth to the faucet and choked the stuff down by the pint.

Deidara made a mental note to find some bottled water somewhere, if there was any, or at least boil some in the future, because there was no telling what sort of debris the water had picked up from the antique pipes down below. In fact, it was probably good to bring this to her attention. She certainly didn't look like she planned on slowing down any time soon.

"Sakura," he called sharply. "That water is dangerous, yes."

"I don't care. I'm thirsty."

He huffed and leered at her impatiently.

"Woman, you stop drinking that right now. You have no idea where that water came from."

She glared at him, but stopped drinking and shut off the handles.

"Well, if someone hadn't let me get drunk, maybe that wouldn't be a problem."

"Do not blame me for your impulses, woman. That was your actions, not my own."

"Oh? And I suppose what happened later was all my doing also."

"Yes, it was."

She started, and then narrowed her eyes at him, suspicious. Of course, he expected this, and in reality, he shouldn't have said anything at all, but it was true, wasn't it? She had initiated the whole conduct.

"I don't believe you."

"That is fine," he felt a prickling in his throat when he watched her shoulders scrunch up, and then alarm at the sound of her crying, eerily familiar sounds.

"I don't want to believe you. I can't."

Was her defiance all that she had left? In this strange country, with this strange man, wearing clothes that were not her own, it was dishearteningly plausible. It wasn't so bad for someone like him to cheat death at every turn, but it wasn't fair for her to be forced to do the same. She was far too innocent for such sudden conflict.

"That is fine," he whispered.

And then he pulled off his jacket and overshirt, opting to wear the simple tank top and pants in the privacy of the other's company. The pants were slightly uncomfortable, but there was no cause to alarm her again by taking them off. If she decided to dash out of the room, things might get confrontational downstairs.

She watched him mechanically remove his clothing before turning downcast eyes on her own attire, the plain nightgown gifted by the inn owner's wife. Appearing to be deep in thought, she walked towards the door—he stiffened—and turned the locks carefully into place.

Surprisingly, the next thing she did was crawl into the bed beside him and burrow under the covers.

"I'm tired," she yawned at him. "I'm going to sleep."

"When you wake up," his voice cracked, and he cleared his throat. "When you wake up, I will bring you some nice water, ja? Something boiled, or something in a bottle. We can go back to the tavern if you behave yourself."

He turned to look at her, agitated at the rudeness of his words. But her small smile reassured his confidence, and he thanked heaven for this rare sport of longsuffering.

"I will. Just water this time." She sighed heavily, and looked up at him. He looked back out of the corner of his eye, still not comfortable with that stare.

"Deidara?"

"…Mmm?"

"I'm sorry for yelling at you. It wasn't very polite of me."

She was berating herself for impoliteness? She deserved the opportunity to scream at him and pull his hair out, for God's sake. Where had all this humility sprang up from? He squirmed, wave upon wave of guilt threatening to strangle him for good. Maybe it would be better for her, then.

"I…I am sorry for—"

"Don't think about that."

There was a warning tone in her voice, and he appreciated it. But, no! She couldn't be better off. He knew as well as she did that he was her only way out of here, and what an adventure that would be. Tomorrow, he would tell her the news he discovered while she slept the morning away.

He still needed time to think that particular revelation over, and she would need considerable time as well, once she realized that all this time had been—well, it was useless thinking about it now. Tomorrow, he would tell her everything. For now, she turned over and away from him, unseen thoughts darting through her head at unimaginable speeds. About him? Were they nice things? Oh, but maybe that was asking too much.

Tomorrow, he would see if any of this had mattered at all.

"Merry Christmas, Deidara."

He smiled through the darkness.