Sorry I haven't updated in a little while, have been busy. But I hope you're still reading and enjoying the story!
We left off where Jasper had pulled Eleanor out of the army mess tent after their speech...
Jasper is pulling her along with him as if his life depends on it as they rush back towards the fence, and slide under the barbed wire. The others are hot on their heels and there's shouting in the backround.
But Eleanor doesn't dare look back, and her brother's words are ringing in her head.
Never look back and never surrender, he'd told them only this morning his words a half echo of a famous British Prime Minister a generation ago.
A few minutes later she's groping for the door handle and wrenching it open, there's a seconds delay as three others slide into the back seat while Jasper waits with not even barely veiled impatience and then he slams the car into gear and it shudders forward.
Eleanor adjusts her seatbelt, and it takes a while to buckle because her bloody hands are shaking like a leaf.
She looks over at Jasper, and his hands are gripping the wheel tightly and his mouth is set in a grim line as he pushes the accelerator down hard.
The city is only 25 miles drive but it feels like half a world away, and she wonders what the hell they're going to find when they get there.
Everything seems normal for the first ten miles.
But once they reach the outskirts of the city, there's an eery calm about the place.
Eleanor leans forward to peer out the window. They drive down two streets and she doesn't see a single soul.
"They put a curfew in place," one of the others whose name she can't recall informs her from the back seat. "Everyone's either in the square if they left before that was announced or at home."
As the enter another deserted street, her sense of foreboding grows, and the fact that Jasper hasn't said a single word in the past ten minutes isn't helping calm her nerves.
She breaks the silence, "If there's a curfew they'll probably have roadblocks in place."
Jasper nods his head. "Yep."
"In a minute we'll turn down a side street and take a less direct route to avoid the main roads," the same one who spoke before informs her from the backseat. "That was agreed yesterday," he adds.
"Thanks," Eleanor replies briefly, thinking he's unusally chatty - in sharp contrast to the normally uncommunicative types that fill the ranks of the resistance.
True to the words of the stranger in the back seat, the next moment Jasper turns sharp left and heads off into a quiet residential street.
They can hear the crowd before they see them.
As they get closer the noise is almost deafening, and then up ahead suddenly people swarm into view and they reach an impasse as people fill the road, blocking their progress.
Jasper seems to have already anticipated this before it happens.
"We'll have to walk from here on in," he tells them, parking the car up near a footpath, and pulling the keys out from the ignition.
Eleanor unbuckles her seatbelt and steps out of the car and in the back the others follow suit. They stand outside the car in a half circle.
The three men from the back seat peel away from them. "We're to head round to the east side and rendezvous with some of the others there," one of them tells the two of them, and they disappear back down behind them, heading for an alleyway to cut through and away to the east.
The day had dawned clear and bright, but now it was gloomy grey, with the promise of rain menacing the air.
Eleanor has turned toward the crowd, trying desperately to listen so she can get some sense of what's going on, and whether her brother is alive or dead. Whether they managed to prevent the army from turning up to follow the orders of the Reich which could very likely lead to a bloodbath.
But when she turns to look back at Jasper - he who is normally so cool, calm and collected and wholly focused on the mission, is looking at her.
Looking at her as if she is the centre of the world, and whatever is going on out there doesn't matter.
"What?" she questions, sharply, afraid that something is wrong.
"You're beautiful," he tells her, placing a hand on her cheek.
And she is quite perfect - all slender arms and legs, glossy dark hair and cat green eyes lit up with a mix of trepidation and fire.
For a moment she lets herself lean in to his touch, and then she steps back. "We have to go now. I've got to know if Robbie's still alive. We have to help them," she tells him, urgently.
He nods and takes her hand in his and they walk forward, towards the crowds and the chaos.
At the edge of the crowd, things are more orderly and they make better progress.
Everywhere people are yelling and screaming, and when they round the corner into the far corner of the square finally Eleanor catches a glimpse of her brother, who is, thank God, apparently still of this world.
He is standing up high on one of the statues yelling and shouting at the crowd, but they're too far away to be able to hear his words.
And as they move further towards him and further into the square everything becomes more chaotic, because there are too many people, and whatever her brother is saying is making people go crazy, pushing and shoving and almost trying to stampede towards where he is pointing, in their excitement.
"This is dangerous," Eleanor breathes, and she knows she sounds just as high strung she feels.
And then another sound fills the air, and Eleanor freezes as Jasper's mouth tightens.
They both know that sound. Sirens.
The police are coming.
And this can't be good.
A minute later a row of black uniformed officers appear and position themselves on one of the Luftwaffe heroes statues on the west side of the square.
As she watches the Kommandants hand rise and them fall again everything seems to shift into slow motion.
Because she knows - and so do the thousands of others who fill the square - that that is the order for the police to open fire.
Almost immediately Jasper's grip on her hand tightens and he's pulling her away and down, sheltering her from the line of fire with his body.
Everyone has started screaming, pushing and running.
Three thousand people lose their minds as shots ring out in the air, and blood pools crimson on the ground.
Someone is forcing them apart and trying to push through between the two of them.
And then that person became a surge of people, pushing, pulling and forcing their way through trying to get to safety.
Somehow, somewhere in amongst the terror and chaos, her hand had been torn from his hand.
And then she was lost, washed away by the force of the crowd like a wave crashing into the shore, even as he is desperately calling her name against the deafening roar of the crowd.