Good morning, good afternoon or whatever time you will read this.
It might be one of my first english written fanfiction at all, so bear with my poor english.
I also might write it more french-sided, since I am a France rp'er and know way more about France than of Scotland.

Pairing: Scotland x France

Rating: T

Genre: Historical.
As I imagine how it all went down. I might miss events, but that's a minor loss in my opinion.

Disclaimer: France and Scotland belong to Europe, Francis Bonnefoy belongs to Himaruya and Alasdair Iain Angus McKirkland (Scotland, and I gave him this name) belongs to a user in pixiv.

_

The weather was miserable. At any time the rain would start to beat down and drown the fighting soldiers underneath those rain-heavy clouds.
Francis had abducted a very confused Scotsman from the battlefield. As long as he wasn't getting beaten by the redhead, the Frenchman hurried his horse to fly faster and faster over the crops to a forest in which there surely would be no soldier. It was too far away.

It started to rain lightly.
"Cuid ye tell me how come ye teuk me awa' frae thaim? wha urr ye anway?"
Being heartbroken for a moment, Francis stared at Alasdair. The redhead looked actually very good… thinking of what he had been through. Perhaps it was due to his beard, but he didn't look like he had been starving a lot anymore. Then his uniform looked good and still kind of clean and with no holes or anything.
"D-don't you remember me? I … I am your wife! I mean, I had been your… your wife. Or husband…", Francis murmured.

"…Francis?", Alasdair frowned. That man before him didn't look like anything from his memories. That man before him was taller and wore a blonde beard (well, actually only stubble on his chin). Besides that a uniform with blue top and white pants, it was obvious that the Frenchman had been suffering from starvation. Also the voice was different than from what he remembered. Yet… the eyes and the hair was almost the same. "Francis!?"
"Oui!", Francis smiled.
„ But… ye huv a fluff. ", Alasdair frowned and it looked like he wondered if this person standing before him was even real.
"Ugh.. oui. Thanks to Napoleon I have aged again. …This bodyhair won't stop growing.", Francis blushed. For now he didn't want to brag to his husband where he had this hair also. "I have abducted you to save you from hurt. Or to be killed. ….And I wanted to talk to you! I have seen you for such a long time not! I have missed you so badly! I was even wondering that if behind Angleterre's wall you would be still loving me anymore…"

Alasdair kissed Francis firmly onto the mouth.
"Does that answer yer quaistion?"
"…O-oui.", he answered with a hoarse voice as the rain soaked through the leaves of the trees. Francis quickly returned the kiss.
"Ah huv an' a' worried a lot ower ye. Whin th' Laki drow cam, whin th' French Revolution cam ower ye… Matha is wi' Sassenach 'n' me noo. He is daein' weel. 'n' he keeps speaking French even though that wee runt doesn't lik' it. Bit Arthur is stowed wi' bein' dowie fur o' th' loss o' America anyway. … Ye keek tairible! ah huv some fairn, if… ugh. Mah horse! Ah left it behind wi' what's ben th' saddlebags!"
"Oui, that had been hard times indeed. On some times I thought I'd be dying. I am not dying. I have just… been in Russia. It is a very hard land. Hard to survive with no food. I am not hungry now. And it was me who took you from your horse. … I am sorry it died."
Both nations knew that they didn't have much time. So information had to be exchanged quickly.

"Dae ye think we kin catch up wi` again?", Alasdair asked. In his mind he already calculated a way out, despite he didn't want to leave his lover yet. Now they were politically enemies together in a battle.
"I don't know. But we have to be careful that we won't be captured.", Francis felt very unsure in the English language. He didn't have time to think about sentence structures. "I would have said… depending on how this battle goes out… if your team wins, I'd be your captive.. and the other way around."
Alasdair thought about this. Would they be able to spend the following years together like this? With Alasdair being captive with the French… Arthur might either not care or just abduct him like he had done before the Act of Union. And with Francis as being a hostage to the British, Arthur might do with him what he wants instead of just leaving him be. England hasn't said something about being hostile towards the French in a while, despite he now fought them… So much depended onto the little runt! Why did it have to be him who was pulling the ropes?

"Na, it is… awfy much risk. We better pairt as quickly as ye can, as muckle as it hurts. We aye loue ilk ither. That's whit counts.", Alasdair decided. „ I'd ower bide in constant patience 'n' hauld yer horses fur th' day ah kin bide wi' ye freely than tae see th' chance that ye micht be tortured by mah brother. "
Francis thought for a moment. The Scotsman was right. Anyway, Arthur would still be able to torture both of them. So being separate was the most bearable among these tortures, possibly. And their love was unbroken even after one hundred years. England could not harm their love. Nothing could.

„…Tha gaol agam ort (gael.: I love you), Écosse (frz.: Scotland) .", Francis said in gaelic with tears in his eyes.
"Je t'aime aussi (frz.: I love you too), wee (little) prince.", tears also came from Scottish eyes. But thanks to the rain they hardly were visible…
In the background, the noise of arriving soldiers was already heard. It was the Prussian that came to help the British troops. The lovers parted after a passionate kiss and a heartfelt hug.

With the help of the Prussian, the French were beaten easily. With the battle of Waterloo, the end of a hundred days reign of Napoleon ended. The former Emperor was only one captive among many French soldiers.
Francis was the happiest French Soldier of that day even though his people had utterly failed. He knew that he could not wish for a better lover than Scotland and really through all this trouble and all times, the other had remained like a rock in midst the surf. What could a man wish for more!?
Little did he know that Seychelles had been claimed British territory one year ago.

When Napoleon returned to Paris, he abdicated. On the resolution of the victiorious powers, the Emperor was sent to a lonely island on the south atlantic, St. Helena. In October, Bonaparte reached the island that he would never leave until his death in 1821. In the meantime where Napoleon awaited his death, the monarchy was subsequently restored with Louis XVIII. as the king again.

At the same time, all around the world another revolution was going on. First only subtle and very faintly, the people had decided to make their lives easier, or perhaps more adventurous. First there had been periods of enlightenment in which the people would recognise collectively or individually their surroundings and their role as human being in the middle of the laws of nature.
Efforts have been made to use these laws for themselves, for their benefits. It was the time of the industrial Revolution!
The topics over the Industrialisation were agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation and technology.
This Revolution began in the United Kingdom, and then eventually spread throughout Western Europe, Northern America, Japan and then to the rest of the world.

The first machines were rather rare and looked upon with a sense of fear. The inventors of course did not fear anything, the manual to their gadgets were in their heads after all, just like the danger possibilities.
Besides even crippling some of the inexperienced manufacturers and other employees that were to handle the machines, there was always a group that was against the machines. More machinery meant less human powered manufactures after all. Soon, the people lost their jobs as the machines could work faster and produce more. The negativities overweighed. Still, the owners of the factories were trusting into the new machines as they were earning more money in shorter time. It created a new kind of wealth: normal people that worked their way upwards – so much that they could easily be on eye-level with aristocrats in no time!

In November of 1824, an accident happened in Edinburgh. A series of fires broke out in the middle of the city. The inferno started, as experts stated it later, in a copperplate printing house, spread then to the roof and in less than an hour several adjoining tenements were ablaze.
Firemen were able to save the property on the eastward, but completely forgot apparently that the wind would blow the flames towards the west. The fire was constantly nurtured by the paper around. Furthermore, the fire wandered towards the cowgate where old wood-based buildings were crowded together, a vision of a filled plate of finest food for any fire.

The blaze was finally halted to the west of the Courant Offices, due to a neighbouring building which, one story higher prevented the flames from reaching its roof. On midday, one day later, the fire seemed to have burnt itself out.

The Tron Kirk, standing two hundred yards away from the scene where the first outbreak had been, was the source of the next outbreak. Just as the first fire was under control and almost put out, the alarm was given that the church was on fire. Long ladders had to be constructed right then to reach the rooftops of the chapel.
The structure, made of lead covered wood, could not be extinguished and soon came crashing down to the ground. A powerful engine, owned by the Board of Ordnance, finally subdued this fire.

The firemen had to take care of a third outbreak the same evening. This time it started in an eleven story building on Parliament Square. The great height of the structure made it impossible to bring the fire engines effectively to bear on the flames which spread in all directions consequently.
By 4 o'clock in the morning of the next day, the building was a mass of flame which quickly extended to the east of the square, destroying a brand new jury court room in its wake. This fire, which abated at 8 in the morning, had showered sparks and embers onto the residences towards the rear of the High Street and numerous other places, but these comparatively small outbreaks were soon brought under control.

Alasdair had experienced this time with an unusual heat wave over his body. It had begun in his heart, in his chest and had most likely acted like a very high fever. It was his luck that he had not been in Edinburgh at the time. He was still home in London with his brother and had simply collapsed on the street.
A kind person had brought him to a hospital where they had taken care of him.
One more thing that had been unusual was that Arthur had visited him and hardly had left once he had been there. It was like the lad had finally understood what it was like to lose an important person, when he had lost America.

In the mid-1840s, another crisis hit North-Western Europe hard. It was later called the 'European Potato Failure'. The famine was caused by potato blight, it was like the potatoes were rotting on the field. Potatoes had been a very important food source after the Spanish and others had brought it over from America. It had substituted the wheat that has been used as a primary source from that time. Also, the old Fritz had always told the german to eat potatoes to compensate their hunger.
Now there was even more misery in it, because many people starved due to lack of access to other staple food sources.

The highest death rates were in Belgium and Prussia with 40 000 to 50 000 deaths on account to the famine, the remainder of deaths occurred mainly in France with 10 000 deaths.
During the famine, also birth rates dropped as well as the chance of children to survive at all.
In the Scottish highlands and Ireland, where the crisis was the harshest, the people left the country in huge clusters to sail to North America or Australia. For Example in Ireland, over 1 Million people left (Back in the time, 1 Million was a lot more than to nowadays times where 1 Million people 'easily' live in only one city). Soon, the land was practically empty. As a side effect it brought attention to their situation in the United Kingdom as lower privileged people.