Prologue: Part 2
…
Just as Elizabeth had promised him, it was indeed a cold reception. Perhaps even that assessment from her was an overestimation of the clear antipathy the King of the United Kingdom felt for the Kaiser.
Standing there in the center of the room was King George VI, dressed in a drab olive toned Field Marshal uniform belonging to the British Army. His face locked in a weary mistrust and directed entirely to the younger Kaiser standing in close proximity of his heir.
Neither man was really prepared to make any sort of contact with the other. Louis could not show any sort of weakness any more than George could. So instead of a civil introduction, the two men stood there locked in strained silence with poor Princess Elizabeth forced to watch on, unwilling to break the silence out of respect to her father. Louis knew better than to assume that both George and he were going to click right away. So he used the momentary lull to take in his cousin.
The reports which Louis received about George were not flattering. It painted him as an apparently very insecure man, quick to bouts of hysterical anger if someone challenged him, or made him doubt himself. Reading the assessments he received, Louis assumed there was embellishment on the part of the Abwehr. However standing in the room with him, Louis could see what the intelligence service saw.
To call him insecure was not to say he was weak by any stretch of the imagination. He had prepared a life as a secondary figure in his family. He wanted to be a father more than a king, which Louis empathized with. Thanks to his useless elder brother, Albert - or George as he was now known as - was thrust into a role he was not prepared from birth to take over. Considering the position he was placed in, the King had done an admirable job. So much so Louis was prepared to overlook the character flaws reported to him.
So here the reluctant king was, placed as head of a country that failed to win the war thanks to alien intervention, and now his daughter was trapped into the role, as would her own children be. An entire line of people had their lives altered forever thanks to the very real weakness of Edward VIII.
There was a very peculiar sense of connection which Louis felt to his distant cousin. Like him, George had resigned himself to a bit player in a distinguished family, only to find himself as successor to head of the family. A father not only to his children, but to an entire nation, now disillusioned by losing a war they would have inevitably won.
For Louis it was a tad different. The Hohenzollern line was not head of the Germany when he was called to assume the absent throne. Like the rest of the inactive royal lines the best they could do was seethe and socialize, and hope that one of the active royal families would stoop just enough to take in one their children.
After the madness of Kaiser Wilhelm and his own father's delusional behaviour, Louis felt this was what the Hohenzollern deserved. That was until Weimar totally crumbled and the national socialists came to absolute power. Suddenly the fickle behaviour of his father and grandfather seemed almost quaint.
As for the inevitable irrelevance Louis had looked forward for his family, it all changed the moment he was brought in so that the rebellion against the national socialists could be legitimatized. The relatively quiet life he had planned with his Duchess and the children was over forever. His son – one of his sons - would likely be the one to take command of the people as they reached out into the stars and took the war to the quarians nemesis: the geth.
Together the two men – Hohenzollern and Windsor – were trapped into their positions outside of their control. They had this much in common. They were both men who had accepted and started their adult lives as ordinary men, only to have destiny thrust them into heads of states. Why not build off that?
There was something else that nagged him about George. It was just how… unhealthy he looked in real life. He knew better than to trust pictures and news reels about the King, but this was something altogether different. It seemed as though even standing was becoming a burden to the King. The man was in the prime of his life, so whatever it was had to been serious.
"This may not come as a shock to you, but this is my first visit outside Germany and the Mandate," Louis broke the ice, his voice high and casual. "As you can imagine, the rest of the world is not exactly clambering to be friendly to the new Kaiser."
The King did not speak, he did not even acknowledge the presence of his daughter who was now standing at his side, her hand touching his forearm; it was her way of a gentle insistence for her father to speak up. Still George remained silent, but likely not because of a lack of words. No, Louis knew that the man likely had plenty to say to him. He likely had expected of Louis to show up in his private study, dressed like his grandfather, screeching and ranting about Jewish and Anglo conspiracies.
Louis, realizing the King was not about to break the ice, decided it would have to be him. He stepped forward, his hands buried into his jacket pockets. He paid little mind to the furrowed brow the King had.
"I suppose you expected that I would show up in a pickelhalbe, a Prussian uniform and speaking only in German. Perhaps with a full company of men from my personal guard…" Louis spoke, inking his words in a sly tone. "Tell me, sir. Would you prefer I start chewing the scenery like my Grandfather? Should I shake my fists hissing 'Gott Straff England!' at you? What exactly would make you comfortable with me?"
For a moment, and only the briefest of moments, the King's lips twitched. All of the pressure he put on the short noticed meeting eased somewhat. George eyed his daughter, and swallowed, his throat making an audible crackle.
"Had I… Had I known you would be this…" George started then stammered off, his hand flying out to gesture at the simple suit and tie adorn by the Kaiser. "I… I would have dress a little more causally. Kaiser's in Buckingham do not come here often."
Louis chuckled and nodded with a low bow of his head. That was such a different time he was referring to. Grandfather was always one to preen; especially when it came to his dealings with the English.
"No, they certainly do not. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the last time Wilhelm was here was the funeral of your grandfather, King Edward VII," Louis remarked, taking in his surroundings.
As George nodded, Elizabeth left his side and moved to her tense father. She seemed to whisper something to him and with a reluctant nod from the King, both of them took a seat together on the small couch, Elizabeth gestured to seat across from them. If he was correct, it was the seat in which their Prime Minister would take.
"On that topic, there is… some confusion I would like to clear up," George started again. "Your surname traditionally is Von Preussen, correct?"
Quirking his lips to a hint of a smile, the Kaiser inclined his head.
"I suppose that by the time of my coronation, I felt the surname was too decisive, too reminiscent of my Grandfather and the traditional power structure being stacked up in Prussia's favor over the rest of the German states. I decided to use the House name in order to clear up any idea of bias," Louis informed the duo as he stepped forward and sat in the seat opposite of them. "I am the representative to all German citizenry of the nation, and protectorate to the other nationalities still under German administration."
"I wonder what the Poles must think of their German Kaiser," George mused, sarcasm slinking into his voice, now steadier than it had been.
A small smile slipped on Louis' lips.
"And too I wonder what the Indians thought about their English emperor and their nearly a century of subjugation?" Louis bit back as hard and as sarcastic. "With half of Africa bowing to you, I am curious to know if they are thrilled to have you as their reigning monarch; and while we are at it, how about the Irish? I'm quite certain that our intelligence operations have been getting requests for armaments to be funnelled into the paramilitaries based in Dublin."
Louis watched as the mood shifted in the King as he absorbed the response.
"You are shackled to a corpse that is the British Empire," Louis observed, smiling as he stepped closer to the King and Princess, his finger wagging perhaps a little too much. "Do not throw accusatory stones at me. I am in your home, and thus far I see that is has been built of glass."
That was an admittedly dramatic way to shame the King, but it seemed to work. George looked to be livid, but seemed to be fully aware he had little recourse to the charges. Louis was quickly becoming convinced that the man before him was not built for the future that was just around the corner. He was stuck, living in the shadow of an empire built by his Great Grandmother Victoria and was merely curated by the men she left in her wake instead of bounding into the future.
More distressing to him was Elizabeth and his small window to influence her before she shut down and followed her father's path any further. Quietly Louis came to the conclusion that he might have to involve himself with Phillip a little more. As quarrelsome man as he was, Phillip had a pragmatic modern worldview compared to the family he married into. As much as wanted to respect Elizabeth's authority and role, it was clear that getting to her through reaching out to her father wasn't likely to be the correct path.
"But to answer your passive aggressive charge, I too wonder about the Polish reactions as well," Louis answered immediately, his eyes unblinking. "Which is why I promote their autotomy as soon as possible; the Polish people deserve their say."
"Daddy," Elizabeth spoke on his behalf without leaving a pause between the three of them. "It is clear that the Hohenzollern family is making serious efforts to step out of the shadow of Wilhelm II-"
"A move that is decidedly too little, far too late, Lillibet," George interrupted his first born daughter. "I would like for you to go and see to entertaining the Empress Consort. I should like to speak with Louis."
Louis held up his hand upon noticing the expression of dejection flashing over Elizabeth's face for the briefest of moments at her Father's dismissal. She was supporting him, so it was only right he returned the gesture of trust with his own loyalty to her.
"I would prefer it if the Princess stays for the duration of our business," Louis retorted, his eyes glancing to the Princess, who was struggling not to look put out by her father's dismissal. "There are matters which I feel that you and she will have to face together. Call it the first serious test of her future reign."
Turning away from the King so he did not have to look at the inevitable protest he was going to offer him, Louis instead looked to Elizabeth and offered her a smile.
"Elizabeth, could you do me a service and collect Admiral Canaris?" he requested of the Princess. "I feel both your Father and you would like to hear what he has to say."
Elizabeth looked put off by the Kaiser's request, but she seemed to understand why she was asked this and not Lascelles, who was likely at the door listening to every word spoken. Louis needed a private word with her father, just as he needed to speak to her.
Nodding, she pressed her hand on her father's arm for a moment before pulling back and stepping by the Kaiser, leaving the room to the two tense men.
With the absence of Elizabeth, both men returned to a state of tense silence. Deciding against dominating the King in his home anymore then he already was. Louis remained silent to allow the King the chance to stir up the conversation first.
"Would… would you like a drink?" George offered to Louis, gesturing to the whiskey cabinet located in the far corner of the room.
Louis, who never fancied himself much of a drinker, decided to oblige his host and nodded.
"Whatever you are having will be fine, thank you," he affirmed to the King.
A nervous twitch of George's lips broke through his reservation and slowly he got out of his seat to step towards the cabinet. A few moments past by before George returned with two glasses of whiskey on the rocks in his hand.
"I would like to drink in the memory of your younger brother," George said as he held his glass out. "You… you have my condolences for his loss."
The gesture was a small one, but Louis appreciated it. They had both lost a brother to the conflict. Wilhelm in France, the King's younger brother, Prince George, Duke of Kent was killed in a plane crash in the Scottish Highlands on their way to a patrol over Iceland.
"Thank you," Louis spoke in a low tone as he took the glass from the King. "I shall drink in memory of yours, if you do not mind."
George winced at the acknowledgement of the Duke of Kent, but nodded nonetheless. The two men touched their whiskey glasses together and sipped their drinks.
Over the rim of his own glass, Louis could see the wince. It appeared alcohol was not George's vice either. No, it was the cigarettes that were killing him; and as if on cue George set down his glass and reached into his jacket for his cigarettes.
"We do have something in common other than loss," George said as he lit up a cigarette and took a shaky inhale. "Our elder brothers chose to make their own path and gave up their positions for us to fill. I… suppose it would be a little looser in your brother's case after the dissolution of the throne. I - I cannot imagine you ever thought your family would return to… such a position inside the state."
Louis emitted a small laugh and took another sip.
"Outside the delusions of my father and Grandfather thinking Hitler would ever restore the monarchy, no," he confessed to the King. "I was ready to live a semi-normal life with a wife who taught me how to be in exile… and now here I am, making decisions to preserve my people from militarists."
A strange expression of sympathy crossed of George's expression. Perhaps for the first time the King finally saw something of himself in the Kaiser sitting across from him. The king crossed a leg and tapped his cigarette into the nearest ash tray.
"Believe it or not, I-I wish you no ill will," George murmured, momentarily choking on his words. "I just do not see any scenario where the two of us can possibly have a constructive relationship. I will be frank with you; there is no way which I can fix the damage between us. Even if I were, the public would not stand for another Hohenzollern having a close relationship with the sovereign."
Louis folded his fingers together; he looked the King dead in the eyes.
"If you will extend me the same sort of frankness: I know you are sick, sir," Louis revealed to him. "I do not know how bad it is, but I know you have downplayed it."
He watched as George's expression twisted into one of great mistrust. It was as though Louis had called his wife a Germanophobic bitch to his face. Now, Queen Elizabeth no doubt was that and more, but he would never say it aloud.
"Your physician, John Weir placed a telephone call to my personal physician, Dr. Yala'Raan to consult about your ailment. She insisted to him to offer her care to you, but Weir called again and cancelled it…" he informed the dead eyed King. "I suppose he was scolded for trying to provide you with the care you need, which he cannot provide."
There was an audible swallow from George as he attempted to compose himself.
"Let me guess, the lines were tapped," he managed to get out; he took another drag as his foot started to tap on the ground, emitting the ever growing frustration the Englishmen had.
Louis nodded and took another drink as George got out of his seat and started to pace uncomfortably. The idea of his personal state was now in the hands of his nation's greatest enemies was too much for him to just take coolly.
"The Abwehr keeps tabs on all officials and high profile figures they feel require monitoring… I, of course, am included," Louis informed him. "The second he telephoned my physician at Sanssouci, they knew."
George took a drag of his cigarette, his free hand rubbing his temple.
"If you're concerned about her qualifications, she spent four years learning human biology and the study of application of quarian methods to human physiology before she applied to my employment," Louis continued, hoping to keep the King thinking, rather than exploding. "I will not promise a miracle by any means. But perhaps she and her diagnostic team situated in the Mandate may be able to manage your condition-"
"No," George interceded, jabbing his cigarette out into the ashtray. "No, thank you."
Unable to stop himself, Louis emitted a low disbelieving huff. There were a dozen things he wanted to call the king for his willfully blind ignorance. Yet, he bit back the urge to devolve into the attitude of the Grandfather that still haunted him.
"I can assure you that she's qualified, and I highly recommend her practice," Louis reassured him, doing his utmost to maintain a cool tone. "Dr. Raan detected a blockage forming in one of the Empress Consort's heart valves. Kira was in surgery 12 hours later and recovered in a fortnight. It was minimally invasive, or so I am told. Whatever the case, it likely saved her life."
Across from him, the King was staring at him appraisingly for the story he had disclosed. Dr. Raan coming out of the surgery, telling him that they had corrected the blockage with ease when human sciences would have likely left her dead solidified his faith in quarian intentions. He was still trying to get her to cut down on smoking, but that was an altogether different challenge. Having Russian blood and a French upbringing, not smoking is a cardinal sin to her.
Nothing that he had said seemed to get through to the King. If anything, the idea that the Kaiser had allowed his own wife to be treated by the quarians was a concept unthinkable to him.
"You speak of the quarians like they're cousins on an extended visit and not an occupying force," George spoke up, his voice disbelieving as he stared down on the sitting Kaiser. "You and I should be well aware of how colonization works. How the technologically inferior always ends up on the wrong side. They came here to take land, exploit the planet resources and the people… your people. Yet you see them as friends. Why? Because they saved your country from being wiped off the European continent, as it ought to have been?"
Ignoring the total hatred George expressed at Germany's continued existence, the questions the King raised were good questions that the Kaiser himself had for quite a while. There were two things which the Kaiser had and the King did not, however. He had a constant relationship with quarians and through this; he had come to learn quite a bit about them. The second was an awareness of goals.
"I… appreciate the apprehension you feel to the quarians; but if they were conquerors, they would have conquered this planet in a matter of hours," he stated firmly in as reassuring tone as he could muster. "Even if they are a nomadic people, we possessed nothing approaching the firepower and technology they have. They could have built up the Mandate, placed enough defensive equipment that any attack would have been a minor annoyance; and thus far, they have only used overwhelming force once, and that was to kill Hitler-"
"-And the thousands of Italian laborers who were vaporized to kill him-"
"No more Italians died in the orbital strike than the average night in which the RAF deployed bombers over German civilian centers," Louis cut across the King just as the King had done to him. He was doing his best to hold back his growing anger.
"Modern wars lead to unavoidable civilian losses. You and I know this well with the respective aerial bombardment campaigns waged against our people - and to be clear it was against our people," Louis pressed forward staring at the angry King across from him. "The quarians are not immune to this, in spite of their technological advantages. They do, however, recognize the power which they possess and have consistently held back. Why do you think it took so long to take Moscow, Stalingrad and Leningrad from the Soviet? Our forces had to fight street by street; the quarian orbital based ordnance was deployed only to stop conventional Soviet counter-attacks outside the city limits, as to stop another Stalingrad disaster."
There was no response from the King. Clearly there was nothing that George wanted was another Stalingrad disaster.
"There is more to this then their ability to destroy, sir; their knowledge is leaps and bounds past ours," Louis continued. "They have begun an acceleration of the sciences, developed alternative fuel sources. We'll end our coal dependency in 15 years and oil in 20. Geothermal and high efficiency solar collection plants to power cities, electricity powering our trucks, planes and cars. We could end fossil fuel consumption worldwide by the end of the century…."
Louis closed his mouth as he noticed that across from him, George looked as though the Kaiser had suddenly starting speaking in tongues.
He had forgotten that George hadn't gone into engineering as he had. That was not to suggest the King was uneducated in the field. Like Louis he was not meant to be a monarch, so he went to Cambridge and was educated in economics and history. There was some overlap however. George and he were both pilots, and both invested in the interests of industry at a young age. Both men were fascinated by the ever increasing industrializing world.
But George, his interests stalled a decade back. For Louis the sheer amount of science and technology pouring freely out of the Mandate and into German hands was fascinating, mesmerizing even. So much so that he had brought on a rotating team of engineers and technologists from the Mandate to keep him up to date. To him, having unpresented access to these minds and the developments they were introducing to improve German society was one of the few perks of his job. It was these things that showed the people there would soon be a life of prosperity outside of the austerity they were enduring these past decades.
"Forgive me, the topics are a favourite of mine and I got carried away," he apologized as he took a drink from his whiskey. "The point I am trying to make is that these technologies are not just for Germany, sir, they are for anyone brave enough to take a chance and just talk to the quarians."
George went to the liquor cabinet and grabbed the whiskey bottle off the shelf. He returned to Louis and topped his drink off without asking. From where Louis sat, it appeared as though he was deep in contemplation.
"I heard… rumours… that you invited them into your schools as well," George spoke up casually as he set the bottle down. "That they teach children inside the major cities."
Louis stared at George for a moment before he inclined his head..
"Yes, the quarians have entered the public and private school systems as well," Louis said as he sipped his drink. "They've have begun to educate a generation of German students, expanding the quality of their education and learning to live in a new Germanic and quarian shared society."
He looked as though Louis had physically struck him with the casually spoken policy.
"You… You've handed them your youth, their minds and in the future their blood," George said in barely more than a disbelieving whisper. "Do you not see how dangerous that is?"
"There was no other choice in the matter. These are youths who have spent a decade under national socialist indoctrination taught by the teachers. We had to remove thousands of educators," Louis reminded the king. "School aged children have quarian instructors as well as German teachers with clean backgrounds as assistants to the quarian instructors for social and cultural cohesion. The quarian teaches the students, the quarian learns from the German teacher about the society they are aiding. Nazism must be purged from the new German state, the priority being that of our youth."
A strange little laugh escaped from the King as the Englishman shook his head.
"But not from your General officer class, or from your science community, your Armaments Minister Speer was best friends with Hitler, and if I have been informed correctly, not even from your personal entourage," George dryly retorted, barely concealing his disgust.
Remaining silent as he directed his attention to the drink in his hand, Louis was not willing to concede that George was right in his unspoken accusations of hypocracy. After all, Louis engaged in his Nazi repudiation, and on the other preparing to work with them. If he was being honest the idea of having his advisor's Waffen-SS husband and another Waffen-SS guard captain waiting downstairs left him feeling a little sick. Men like Joachim Hoch and Captain Waibel had proven time and time again that they held no love for their past lives, and proved themselves seeking redemption, but still they tainted with years of adherence to Nazi philosophy and a will to carry it out with violence.
No one in Germany could pretend to not have some sort of National Socialist taint, but there had to be a line drawn, otherwise most of the national would be paralyzed with trials.
"If being a Labour party member in Britain was banned tomorrow, would it be possible to remove all of them from their positions immediately and without damaging the country in the short term?" the Kaiser inquired from the King. "It is no different with the National Socialists. The National Socialists infiltrated so many facets of our public life that simply destroying them all would be a detriment to the society as a whole. We cannot start fresh. We have already destroyed the offenders and have started to weed out the lesser evils. The denazification of Germany is a long term project."
Germany was poisoned to the core, and a drastic move had to be made. The state could not afford a generation of national socialists ready to carry the torch on to the future generations. Thankfully, the King seemed to understand the logic which the Kaiser had offered.
"You have expressed your fears, and I as I said once before, I acknowledge that the trust just not there yet," Louis extended an olive branch. "The point I am trying to get across is this: the world is changing, and it will be up to individual states and those whom hold such way over the state's attitudes to engage with the quarians, or be left behind."
In a matter of a second, the strong confidence George tried to hold up vanished. He stared at the Kaiser with wide, searching eyes.
"You're not here to see me," George breathed finally. "You're here to see Elizabeth. I'm the annoying holdover you have to endure…"
Louis did not acknowledge the words. Not with the King looking like he was ready to throttle him. It was like a switch was activated in the King's mind. He had to hand it to George. He was quick to understand what he had meant by that.
So… he finally understood what he was: the relic of a past that would soon be if he did not start cooperating, or at the very least, take steps away from the maddening position of antagonizing the interstellar travelling species that wasn't going to leave Earth any time soon.
"I am not here to sooth the fears of King George VI. I am here to establish a relationship with the Windsor family following nearly three decades of neglect," he stated firmly, unblinking as he watched the King take a massive hit to his dignity at the revelation.
There was a lingering silence as the King absorbed the words. He looked close to having a meltdown. Was he finally able to comprehend after all this time that his own relevance was fading? That sooner than he would ever dare Britain, which stood proud as a stalwart power all these centuries, was on the verge of being a state subservient to their former colony?
It did not have to be this way, but the longer the British agitated the situation in Europe with their rhetoric when everyone just wanted to breathe and rebuild, the more they would show just how mortally wounded by two conflicts with Germany. The only reason Germany was still in a position of authority was quarian intervention, the British had no such protectorate.
"These old wounds between our families which you clearly remember more than your daughter does must be healed and if I can get through to you, sir, I would be happy to work cooperatively with you," Louis broke the silence finally. "If not, you have a very capable heir. And judging from the way you're burning your candle at both ends, I will not have to wait long."
Taking a deep exhale, Louis tried to redirect the bubbling anger.
"I would like to – again - extend to you the services of my physician," Louis urged, his voice strained to remain polite. "Meet with her. Get to the bottom of your troubles. You can engage with me properly, and give your daughter a chance to be a mother before she is a queen for a little longer."
The King once again shook his head.
"Thank you for the offer, sir," George repeated his earlier refusal. "I shall not place my health in the hands of their hands."
That was all the delusions Louis could stomach. He could not believe how willfully ignorant the man was being.
"And I suppose good doctoring is chain smoking and slapping on some make-up to cover the evident truth. My own father has done this because he too is reaching death's door and has refused a helping hand from the quarians for potentially preventable treatments…" he hissed at George, losing his composure at long last. "Give your daughter a chance to be a mother just as you were allowed to be a father to your children. Let her reign in her thirties, when she has had a chance to guide her own heirs, just as you did before her."
"Take my help," he insisted. "Do not make Elizabeth a queen in the next few months just to spite me."
It was clear cut emotional manipulation, and even George could see what it was. That was it, any mask the King had had finally slipped off.
"Y-you have quite the nerve to come to my home and declare me a fool for not trusting a Von Preussen… Hohenzollern whatever your insane, propped up little Prussian family is called these days, on his word!" George snapped back, his voice growing high as he struggled to keep his wrathful tone steady.
There was a knock on the door. The King answered it with a "Not now!" screamed at it. As the knocking silenced, George stood up, his hazy blue eyes, budged out as he looked like he was ready to throttle the Kaiser. Possibly for the first time in the man's life – at least since becoming a king – he had lost his composure.
"Your… your grandfather dragged the world into a world war, and then supported the activities of that lunatic Hitler into another… and you here you are now, treating these invaders as your houseguests!" George roared at him, pointing an accusing finger at him. "And to top all of this, you want me to place my health in the hands of a species that will use your subject's grandchildren as their cannon fodder; and now you have the audacity to try and use my family against- against m-me!"
George turned away from Louis as the stutter surfaced through the lack of control. Louis held his head low and sipped his drink to give the King his respect by letting him seize control over his tick. It took a few minutes, but sure enough George turned back to face his counterpart.
"How dare you lecture me on thinking about my future when you were so fast to sell out yours!" he finished in barely more than a strained hiss.
The final retort was kept short, but it was a brutally direct assessment. Perhaps even there was a grain of truth
"Very well, I said my piece. By all means, listen to your pride and die at your leisure," Louis idly spoke, it was the only tone that kept his own rage at a simmer. "It is very English after all and I am sure your subjects will be proud you chose premature eternity instead. My offer, however, shall stand should you see reason."
The knock on the door once again interrupted the pair of them from dragging this argument into a full blown row. This time George didn't dismiss them. The two men both set down their half-finished drinks and separated. George turned away and was muttering to himself, his hand patting his hair back down as he forced himself back to a state of decorum.
"You may enter," George spoke up; loud enough for those behind the door could hear.
The door had opened, and sure enough Elizabeth had returned. In her wake followed her husband, Kira and most amazingly Queen Elizabeth. She looked to be totally annoyed being here.
Behind the group followed Admiral Canaris, calm and collected as always. There was an expression of obvious distain to be standing in this room with men and women who were his intellectual inferiors. The man had to deal with Hitler screaming at him every other week. All of this must have been trite to him.
"I see you found not only my dear Kira, but the whole Windsor inner circle," Louis greeted the returning Elizabeth. He glanced to the Queen consort and with a small incline of his head, he added. "Your Majesty, it is very nice of you to deign me with your presence."
"Be upset with me, not my wife, sir," The King warned the Kaiser, who merely faintly smiled at Elizabeth. Queen Elizabeth's brow narrowed to Louis but instead she remained silent as she observed the tension that permeated between the men.
Deciding against agitating the situation, Louis stepped over to Canaris and placed a hand on the older man's shoulder. The spymaster clearly hated it. He may have promoted the resurrection of the throne, but he was no fan of the Kaiser sitting on it.
"Sir, I would like to introduce to you to Admiral Wilhelm Canaris," Louis spoke to the King. "He is the head of the Abwehr, which is an intelligence apparatus inside the Wehrmacht."
"The one tapping into your phone lines, right?" George returned, eyeing the Admiral with nothing short of contempt; contempt which did not faze Canaris in the slightest.
"Someone has to keep an eye on all the Hitlerites and opportunists that are essential to the function of state. Better us, than other parties," Canaris answered the King's charge.
"He's been tasked with the unenviable task of monitoring collaborators and friends to the previous regime," Louis explained to the Windsor family. "They are not necessarily national socialists themselves, but they are fellow travelers whom had much to gain from their fellows inside the party-"
"Oh, don't look so sour, Phillip," Kira addressed the Elizabeth's husband in French. "This has nothing to do with your sisters."
Louis looked to Kira and then to Phillip, who looked like he was going to lose his patience. It was to be expected considering his sisters had married high ranking National Socialists.
"Kira, please, now is not the time for agitations," Louis chastised Kira in German and her attempt to rile up her future counterpart. He switched back to English, adding "We've had our own problems with Nazis in the family, what with dear Uncle August."
Louis turned his attentions away from his wife, who was muttering in French and Russian interchangeably as she dug through her purse for her cigarettes. He smiled at the Windsor's, all of whom had congregated around their King. Just behind him Admiral Canaris opened his briefcase and handed him the Kaiser an ashen toned folder.
"Uncle August joined the SA before the war. He's currently in Poland, a member of a penal labour battalion assigned to rebuild Polish infrastructure," Louis informed the family. "Now, he wasn't much more than a mouthpiece to the party… a mouthpiece for Dr. Goebbels to trick the public into thinking the monarchy was on their side. In the end he chose his side and this punishment is his cross to bear."
Louis reached down to where his wife was sitting and scooped the lit cigarette from out of her finger. He took a small drag of tobacco and immediately put it out.
"Now…" Louis said, exhaling smoke and turned to face the family now gathered in front of him, his eyes glancing through the folder. "There is someone else out there you should be aware of. Someone who so badly wanted to be king once again, that he took his wife and wandered off to Adolf Hitler and Joachim von Ribbentrop; suggesting that perhaps if something were to happen. Say… an invasion of Britain was to occur, with the right king and queen consort, the British people would lie down and accept occupation."
They looked at each other. All of them growing ashen faced as they watched Louis hand the folder back to Admiral Canaris, who stepped forward. His eyes like a hawk as he looked at each member with total distain. He extended the folder to the King.
"It's in German, however I took the liberty to transcript the contents of a duplicate in English," Canaris addressed the family in flawless English. "Should you wish to verify when we leave, you are free to take this to my counterparts in the MI6 to assess the findings. Should there be a pursue the case, you have my assurance that the Abwehr shall cooperate fully to investigate the accusations."
The King did not take the folder. He knew full well what it meant. He looked like he was about to pass out. Realizing his father-in-law was not in any state to react, it was Phillip who reached out and snapped the folder from the Admiral's hands. He did not read them; he instead placed them in Elizabeth's hands.
The young woman looked at the file. She looked like she had been personally betrayed. After all the man in the folder was the reason she was ensnared in the gilded cage that was heiress to the throne.
"Until then," Louis said, his words catching George's attention. "I think it's time to have a little chat about your dear brother, David and the extent of his affiliations with the National Socialist Party."
…
…
Decided to release this a little early; see you around in a weekish.