Dawn: Haltern, Germany
Matthew couldn't sleep.
For the past hour, Felice had slipped through byways and back roads in Belgium and Germany that Canada would have never believed a vehicle less than a tank would survive- but the little car had done it.
It was Francis' turn to snore on Canada's shoulder, and Matt wouldn't begrudge him that. Not with the little signs of occupation-related injuries that he bore without a complaint. (Quite unusual for Francis not to complain when he thought his beauty marred- but these were strange times.) Jean-Louis dozed in the front passenger seat, responding only when Felice asked him a quiet question.
It left Matthew a lot of time to think.
The sun was rising over a stand of trees, as Felice pulled the car onto a heavily rutted path— probably used by farmers to take their cattle to market, or something- and they bounced their merry way to a small barn, with attached small house.
A home-y place, and almost completely isolated.
Felice pulled into the barn with little hesitation, then, as she put the brake on, she pulled out a pistol from a hidden holster.
"Jean-Louis, wake up and get ready."
"Hmm?"
"What's wrong?" Matthew asked in a low voice.
"There were trucks here yesterday- they tore up the field. I need to make sure the family has not been compromised."
Matthew hadn't noticed. Sometimes he wondered if he was as unobservant as his brother- but then, his brother really wasn't that oblivious, and Canada was really really tired. Felice was gone before he could form the offer to go with her.
Jean-Louis tapped his hands on the steering wheel for the next five minutes, until Felice appeared at the entrance to tug the big barn doors closed again.
"The Nazi scum were here yesterday, and left just as swiftly," Felice delivered the news, "There's a crash site here, all right. Damned krauts let it burn all night."
"Which way?" Matthew was out of the car, leaving Francis to sleep peacefully in the back.
"Slow down, idiot-" Felice grabbed his shoulder before he could take a step out of the barn. "First, there will be a patrol in the area. Our hosts know more about it than I do, so they are the ones who will help us avoid getting caught. Second- the thing is still burning. Fuel might be a precious commodity around here, but even a Kraut knows better than to siphon from a tinderbox."
Matthew made himself calm down, shoving his glasses up his nose with a sigh.
"Third, our hosts saw and heard things we need to know. Two people were pulled out alive, one body was found, and they're still scouring the countryside for those chutes."
"Do they know where the survivors were being taken?"
"Berlin." A new voice said from a door that Matthew hadn't noticed before. Really. Really. Tired. "Come inside, children, I have breakfast, such as it is, and you are welcome to our home."
An ancient-looking man stood in the doorway, silver-white hair and wrinkled face telling of an age that was beyond what Matthew had seen in a human- at least not for a very long time. A sad little smile on the old face beckoned them to come in- as did the sudden odor of food, wafting out through the open door.
"Matthieu?" Francis murmured, as he popped out of the vehicle, stretching. "Do I smell-"
"Ah, France. I am honoured to have you under my roof. Come." The old man said with an almost impatient twitch of his hand. "My lady and I have much to impart to you to aid with your mission."
It took a good ten minutes before they were all settled around a heavy wooden table in the kitchen, served by an equally elderly woman, who smiled at them all, with only a faint hint of sadness in her brown eyes.
"Esther can't talk. Fever a few years back took her voice- but we understand each other well enough."
The food itself was good and plentiful. Better than good- and completely unexpected.
"Rationing only works if you're in a city. You should know that-" explained the man, Wilhelm, as Felice introduced him. "Those of us who live from what the land provides us can do better- almost got caught this time, but Esther found a way to hide our 'nefarious activities'."
Esther smiled, and passed Canada another glass of milk. Goat's milk, it seemed- and fresh.
"We do what we can to help, so when those bastards chose to drive through our fields, we were frightened-" Wilhelm ignored the chastising glance from Esther at his language. "If it hadn't been for the crash, we would have been completely unprepared."
"The crash-" Matthew said softly. "Can you tell us anything?"
"One of the consequences of getting old- if you're a human, anyway, don't know about Nations-" Wilhelm gave a glance to France, "Is that you tend not to sleep as much, and when there's as much noise as those planes flying over, and the fighting echoing... well. We were awake anyway, and watching out the windows upstairs- Sometimes the boys find their way to us, sometimes they get sent- but anyhow. One of the big ones looked like it was going to hit the town- woulda been a real shame, nice people there, most of 'em don't deserve to have a bomb dropped in the middle- The Schmidts come to mind. They're always willing to overlook-"
Esther hit him gently with the side of her hand, and gestured to him to continue the story about the plane. Matthew wanted to thank her, but only managed to shoot her a grateful look, and kept his silence, so that Wilhelm could finish telling them what he knew.
"Well, whoever was flying that crate was pretty good- just when it looked like we'd be looking at a smoking crater come morning, he got the nose up, and it glided right over the city- think it took out part of the town hall's clock tower- but it missed the town, and hit the woods."
So Alfred had been saving a village. The connection to his twin had proved true- but that wasn't a comfort to Matthew, considering the rest of the things that he'd been dreaming.
"It didn't take but an hour or so for the damned SS to get on top of it." The old man shook his head, "They used our front fields as a staging ground- so I got a front row seat. Old folks often get overlooked, especially in this day- they weren't paying attention, while I was making like I was gathering firewood- at midnight, no less. They ain't too bright sometimes."
"Did you see any survivors?" France asked, and Canada was glad that he could voice the question. Matthew couldn't.
"I saw a body bag, a stretcher, and someone being hauled over a shoulder. They packed 'em all up in their two trucks. One of the soldiers- think he was a medic- was arguing about how they shouldn't really be moving the one on the stretcher too far- how General Beildschmidt should either stop and let them take care of the man now, or they should have left him at the crash site."
"Beildschmidt-" Matthew felt the frown forming. It had to be a coincidence- It had to.
"He just told his subordinate to work on keeping the man alive, because these were special prisoners that had to be delivered to Berlin- and if he wasn't, there'd be hell to pay. They left after that, driving real slow and careful."
"Francis-" Matthew gave the elder nation a desperate look. "What could he want with Alfred?"
"Mon cher, I-" Francis sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose, "If you do not know by now what it means to have a Nation as a permanent captive-"
"I'm not stupid, Francis," Matthew's face flushed, "But what will happen to America, now that Alfred is- or if he-"
Captured. Dies. Words too hard to say now, when faced with the reality of the situation.
"As a captive, Germany and his allies may find him to be leverage to force his people to only fight on the Pacific front- or worse, not fight at all. He can be used as a hostage and a proxy." Francis had never had a problem with talking about Nationhood in front of humans, and Matthew saw that it hadn't changed. The two with Francis probably knew anyhow, and the older folks- well, they were in the middle of insane times. "If Ludwig presses, he will become dependent upon his captor, and in danger of being dissolved and absorbed by Germany. It's a slower and somewhat kinder form of death."
"And the other?" The question wasn't from Matthew, but Wilhelm. "What happens to your country, and your people when a nation dies violently like this?"
Matthew totally didn't whimper at the thought. He wasn't fighting tears at the idea of not sharing a continent with his brother-
And that was a complete lie, but he wouldn't admit it to anyone.
"Chaos." France said grimly. "The government begins to slowly dissolve, as the country itself becomes more vulnerable to outside invasion. The people disassociate, and are absorbed into neighboring Nations' populations, or that of whatever Nation manages to invade and hold the country. It's far more difficult and unstable- and there are no guarantees for Germany that he would be the one with the power to hold that much of North America. It would be more likely that Matthieu-"
"I don't want the power. I want my brother." Matthew said, making sure his voice didn't crack by speaking low. "He may be obnoxious, rude, and act like a complete idiot, but he's my idiot, and I don't want to lose him."
A hand grasped his shoulder, and squeezed, Esther's sympathetic face hovered next to his.
"She and I have lost a few friends to this madness that's taken over our home." Wilhelm said quietly, "And we lost our son in the last war. We understand- family. That's why we do what we do."
"Cher Matthieu," Francis said, his eyes looking vaguely sad in the sunlight. "I understand. And despite his faults- their faults- I would not like to see either of them harmed. We will find them."