A time like no other

by Warks1999

It was an ever changing world, but a world that would soon be at War, with consequences that would devastate families forever... their family included. A new adventure, setting the characters back in time to World War II. Enjoy :)

70. Survivor

Chapter 70: Survivor 1st August 1942

August was beginning, though not as nicely as July exited.

The weather the day before was lovely and warm, but overnight it changed for the worse considerably. At first it was the wind that began to whip up in the early hours, which left conditions treacherous for those who were out at the time, which in truth was very few. For those up early, they could only watch the early light of day blighted by the presence of rain, which only increased in intensity the longer that it continued to fall. Anyone who went out between six and eight that morning was drenched regardless of whether they were wearing a jacket or not, in weather that was more likely to be seen in November than August. The warmth was sapped out of the sun too, tamely hiding behind the clouds that were cast over the city of Derry. In short, it was a horrible day.

The rain did finally begin to ease around ten o'clock, which saw an upturn in the number of people who were willing to leave their houses in order to do what they needed to. It was a good job that it was a Saturday, which saw fewer people at work as a whole, though some still did have to venture out in the atrocious conditions. The girls were lucky to not have to work weekends at the factory, only on rare occasions did it happen, as it would have been a damp, disgusting experience in the large somewhat open building. Gerry was one of those who did need to go to work though, out of his own choice as to make the following week easier, exiting the house in the middle of the worst of the weather, getting soaked in the process. Luckily, along with the easing of the rain, the sun appeared to increase in strength slightly to break out from the clouds. His jacket at least had a little time to dry.

However, the upturn didn't last for too long as just before eleven, the clouds covered up the shining light of the sun, the rain beginning to pick up once more. Many people were caught out without their jackets, leaving some absolutely drenched whilst they desperately tried to find some form of shelter. The girls made plans to go out for a long walk that morning, which was needed following the increased tensions of the week, but that plan was scuppered by the weather. Even if the rains did stop quickly again, they would only go and get their feet wet out in the country, to earn scolding's from their mothers. Or in Orla's case, Granda Joe. They still met up at the Mallon household anyway, though a second reason for them not going anywhere was quickly realised when they gathered there. Unsurprisingly, it was Clare that was missing, though Michelle was quite sure she knew why. Erin also believed she knew the reason for her absence; Sean wouldn't let her go out in the weather because it was too wet. He'd played a similar move before, on more than occasion, and it made sense when he controlled her life, that he would do so to such a minute detail.

"Classic fucking Derry… pissin' it down in August…". Michelle complained.

"Aye… I was looking forward to that walk as well…". Erin sighed. "Never mind, at least we can still have a wee chat between ourselves".

"Not without Clare we can't".

Michelle's point was a valid one, though after everything that had happened with her small blonde friend over the prior months, talking to her about the situation was not high on her particular wants even if it did need to be spoken about. Erin clearly wanted to speak about it though, her combined curiosity and inability to think about anyone else ensuring she would have her say from her point of view on just about everything. Instead, it was Orla that she looked to for inspiration in getting the conversation going, actually requiring one of her random trips to the verbal land of strangeness that the young mother could always find herself in. It was one of those days too, the task being completed immediately.

"Marie was asking if she could spend some time with ye, Michelle". Orla began. "She says yer her favourite Auntie".

"Hear that Erin… favourite Auntie…". She snorted. "I guess I am better than ye at some things aye…".

"She probably likes ye because ye make trouble. I'm too sensible".

The howling laughter that came from the young Mallon, quickly incensed her friend. Michelle couldn't help but find her statement amusement, Erin being far from sensible. She could certainly act maturely at times, but those times were not extended periods by any means. A lot of the time she was stuck in her own little world where she was the Queen, making all manner of rash decisions that always came with some sort of cobbled together explanation. Orla might have been the least sensible of their group as a whole, with Michelle herself not that far behind, but Erin was by no means up with Clare when it came to sensibility. Clare held her own in that category, truly the only properly sensible member of the group when examined. Most of that was down to her father's method of bringing her up, which the rest of them were glad not to have experienced in their own home's.

"Catch yourself on, Erin! Yer no more sensible than I am!" Michelle roared, still erupting with laughter.

"I am far more sensible than you, Michelle!" A protest was raised by the blonde. "Yer the same person that… recklessly!... shagged her way through a platoon one night. How am I anywhere near that!?"

Orla went to make a comment herself about an incident that happened long in the past between the two, until Michelle's hand stopped her. Her friend held a fairly reasonable idea of what she was going to say, having heard that particular story on many an occasion. Instead, she could think of one more recently that was far better, proving that Erin was definitely not sensible. Though slightly embarrassing for her friend to have to hear it again, sometimes Erin did need taking down a peg and Michelle believed it firmly to be one of those times.

"Ye thought ye were in a relationship with John-Paul O'Reilly because he kissed ye on the cheek to say thank you for sewing his shirt… at least I knew what I was gettin' with those fellas! You thought a kiss on the cheek was the last step before marriage!"

Having to defend herself against a memory that Michelle quite rightly believed would embarrass her, Erin was fairly livid that she'd mentioned it again. John-Paul was a distant memory, buried the moment she first laid her eyes on James, on an April day over three years earlier. Stood there in his brown, double breasted suit with slicked back hair and a look of almost royalty about him, her knees were weakened in seconds. He was such a beautiful first sight that it was often one of the fondest memories she held of him, alongside other ones which came later. When he'd kissed her hand that day it was if he'd set it alight with a fiery love that kept burning still that day, a passion that the young woman had never quite felt again. More and more she was thinking about him, coming to the eventuality that she would always lo-

"Erin!"

"W-What…". She nervously replied, caught out daydreaming.

"Drifting off thinkin' about ridin' Lance again…". Michelle tutted. "Christ alive, can you not keep it together…".

"I wasn't…".

"Sure ye wasn't… I don't believe ye. Anyway, I was sayin', yer no more sensible than me after ye thought ye had something serious with John-Paul…".

Trying to measure a reply to Michelle resuming that conversation again, was difficult for Erin, when she didn't want to talk about it. John-Paul was someone that she thought of rarely, knowing that there really wasn't anything between them despite the front that she put up to her friends. He was made into nothing when James came along to steal her heart, even showing a lack of care when talking to Clare about him following the church service where he was revealed as missing in action. No dead body had ever been reported in the city, by either the church or the paper, all including his parents losing the hope that he was still alive. The same story existed for James really, though she'd long accepted he wasn't coming back… sort of…

"Fine… whatever… so what, I didn't really have much with John-Paul. What does it matter? He's dead!"

"Is that you admitting you were wrong, Erin?" Michelle joked, pushing her luck.

"Aye that doesn't happen often".

Managing to incense her cousin, Orla didn't know the fire she was setting off within Erin, but Michelle did and found it highly amusing. There was more likely to be another appearance of Haley's comet than there was of Erin admitting she was in the wrong, but there was enough defeatism in her answer to suggest she was conceding for once. Annoyed that they were childishly chiding her for what was for the most part her admitting that she was indeed wrong, Erin briefly hoped she was somewhere else. When they'd started talking about the weather, she didn't envisage herself only a few minutes later having to rake over events of three years or more prior.

"Can we not talk about John-Paul? We should be talkin' about Clare if anythin'…". Erin pleaded, wanting to move on from him.

"Actually we should be talking about yer wee date last night Erin…". Orla once again spoke up, seemingly against her. "How did it go with Lance? Ye never said a word this mornin'…"

"Oh aye!" Michelle practically cried out. "Was she in last night, Orla… or did ye catch her sneakin' over the garden fence at three…".

Rolling her eyes and shaking her head, it was just about the response Erin assumed she would receive from the pair of them. It beat talking about John-Paul O'Reilly at least, although it was only just about marginally better. She did at least have a connection with Lance, though it was one which was still in its beginnings. When she'd got into bed the night before she was beaming with pride from her wonderful evening, her cheeks still feeling heated after her confident tiptoed kiss that she'd planted on his cheek. The inner confidence that never properly lacked for the blonde, at least not when around her friends, worked to ensure that she gave the Yank a permanent view of how she felt about him. Although she hadn't quite worked out how she felt either, her feelings awash with confusion as after shutting her eyes, images of James assaulted her mind. His memory was still in there, unable to escape into the open air.

"We had a good time". She smiled sweetly, trying to be diplomatic.

"And…".

"And nothing, Michelle. I gave him a peck on the cheek, and he went back to his ship. Nothing more to say".

Bored by the story, Michelle hoped that her friend might have gone a little further than she had done. She was hardly expecting her to mount him in the corner of The River, but a bit more of a kiss would have been better in her opinion. There was little to talk about when it was kept so clean, although she was also keeping her own relationship clean and could easily be called for her hypocrisy if she whinged too much. Sat above them in Martin's armchair, Orla's interest was completely gone when she noticed a couple of bees outside that seemed to be talking to each other. They were in her mind anyway, if not anyone else's.

"Are ye at least seein' him again?" Michelle enquired.

Wringing her hands, Erin was hesitant to reply for a moment, feeling her cheeks heat again at the thought. She couldn't deny that Lance was an attractive man that she wanted to spend time with, but the thought of properly being in a relationship with him was still new. A fresh start it was though, and to tell Michelle that she wasn't pursuing it would have been an outrageous lie.

"When he's next available… but I don't know when that will be…".

Noting dejection in her friend's voice, Michelle shuffled across the floor to put an unnecessary arm around her. Erin wasn't about to start bursting into tears, but her friend thought the opposite and didn't want to make her cry. After everything that she'd gone through with trying to move on from James, the Englishman's cousin was not prepared to reduce her to tears because of her prying questions. Ironically, unlike Erin, she knew when to stop when it came to such matters. The blonde's filter did not work the same way because of her narcissism, though it was not the time for that to be brought up.

"Don't worry Erin, he'll be gettin' hold of ye soon. He sounds like he really likes ye and you really like him I know…".

"I… I don't know, Michelle". Erin sighed. "He's a grand fella, so he is… but is he too grand for me? I already got lucky in finding a fella like… like James… surely I haven't found another one…".

"Ach yer just lucky… and good-looking".

Blushing at the compliment, Erin allowed herself to relax into Michelle's comfort as they embraced for a moment. Michelle could be a real mouth at times, a lot of the time in fact, but she could equally find an encouraging comment for her friends when it was needed. Although there were a lot of her stories and actions that could be questioned for their legitimacy, she could never be questioned about how much she cared for her friends. All of them cared for each other immensely anyway, the four being such strong friends that they constantly overcame the challenges in life thanks to each other. At the same time though, they were facing a challenge that perhaps was beyond that strength, which was about to blow up in their faces once more.

"I suppose ye should probably start thinkin' about s-".

"Sorry to interrupt, love".

Deirdre's voice suddenly sparked up from the entrance to the living room, pulling Orla from her bee watching haze, though far too quickly as she slid off the armchair, faceplanting the carpet. Ignoring the antics, passing them off as typical Orla behaviour, Deirdre turned her focus on her own daughter and Erin when he spoke again.

"Clare's walkin' up the street… just thought I should let ye know".

Differing reactions was what the woman received to her news. Expecting them both to at least be happy to hear that their friend was coming, she could only find any sort of happiness upon Erin's face, though that happiness was tinted with the thought from Erin that there would probably be an argument between them of some kind. There always were petty ones, but the fallout from Clare's revelations of a few days prior were still biting away behind the scenes at work. They were all far too immature to discuss anything between each other without it causing some form of argument, working together making it even more difficult when they were constantly in each other's presence. Michelle's face was the one that shocked her mother the most though, seeming almost… withdrawn… upon hearing the news. When her daughter was hiding something, Deirdre knew, but also knew when it was best not to ask, leaving it to the girls to sort out between themselves. It was definitely one of those times.

"Thanks Deirdre". Erin answered on their behalf, also wondering what was wrong with Michelle.

Turning to her friend to enquire, the chance was taken away by Martin, who was clearly the first to have spotted Clare, sending Deirdre to tell them.

"She looks like she's ragin'… face on her like thunder, so she has!"

"Oh great…". Erin muttered.

Still trying to work out why Michelle had gone so quiet, Erin's second attempt at questioning her also went awry, interrupted once more before she could get her say. It was her own fault for not speaking quick enough, using the time instead to make a comment on Clare which was really not needed at all. They would find out the diminutive blonde's issue soon enough, but Orla's was one which she announced quite loudly to the two of them. It was probably loud enough for Deirdre to hear too, though she'd walked off trying to channel out the sounds of the girls when she really couldn't care for whatever it was that was going on.

"I think I've burnt my nose!"

Removing her hand from where she'd been rubbing it, her nose was hardly even red let alone burnt. With a raging Clare inbound and Michelle being deceptively quiet, Erin found herself once again in control of her cousin's antics. She could really tire of Orla at times, especially when there were vastly more important problems in their lives than her inability to remain seated on an armchair for more than five or so minutes. Hoping to nip the problem in the bud rather quickly, she moved to silence her when it came to her nose.

"Ye haven't done anythin' of the sort, Orla… ye've barely even scratched the skin! Be careful next time!"

"That fella who lives in that tent down by the Foyle's nose got burnt!" She argued back.

"No!". Exasperated, Erin put a hand to her forehead. "Orla, he had his nose blown off in the last war. I've told ye that at least three times!"

"What! Oh no, these carpets aren't safe then Erin! They explode too!"

Trying to work out how her cousin managed to become a mother before she turned twenty, and somehow cope as a single mother afterwards rather successfully, Erin's patience with Orla ran out quicker than usual at the Mallon house that morning. There was very little she thought that she could be surprised by when it came to Orla, but she was so again that morning. Their conversations could turn around within an instant on the best of days but going off on a tangent from John-Paul O'Reilly to exploding carpets was something else entirely. At various points throughout Erin wanted to change the topic of the conversation, yet again only finding other discussions that she didn't want to have whenever that she did.

Clare appearing in the Mallon's living room in the seconds after should have been the best tonic for distraction from Orla's madness. On any other day it would have been, however, Martin seemed to have never uttered a truer word in his life when she walked in. He was dead on. She was absolutely seething; wild eyes of fury being directed to one of them in the room. The eyes also did not hide the fact that there'd been tears their previously, for the red streaks on the eyeball were not all rage. There was upset too, no doubt growing into rage at some point further on that morning. Erin was almost scared of her when she glanced over to see her, though it was not her that Clare found herself glaring at. Neither was it Orla.

Michelle's trepidation of a minute earlier was soon answered.

"WHAT. HAVE. YOU. DONE!"

Her shout was done at a whisper, to ensure that Martin and Deirdre did not involve themselves but was done so with an incredible amount of venom. More venom than even Michelle was expecting it seemed, as she recoiled at the words spat in her direction. Concerned with her nose rather than Clare, Orla wasn't too worried about what was said, although she did keep herself focused for a changed as she wanted to know what was going on.

"Clare, what's the craic?" A worried Erin enquired.

Scowling at Michelle, Clare was imploring her to admit to the story that both were aware of. A look of guilt flashed across her face to replace the one of shock, Erin noting the change immediately, frowning at it. Looking at each of her friends, Michelle tried to see if any of them would offer her any leniency in the situation, but even Orla seemed to want to know what the problem was. An inquisitive Orla put pay to her hopes of blagging her way out of the corner that she was in, having to face the music as she suspected she would have to whenever Clare found out exactly what she'd done.

"Look Clare, ye said ye wanted me to help ye… so I… ye know… took a more radical approach!"

"Radical approach!" She hissed. "Killin' the fella!? That's yer idea of a radical approach is it!?"

"Shit!" She angrily whispered at herself in return. "I knew I should have been more specific when I told those fellas to take care of him…".

Erin's mouth was agape at what she assumed she'd heard, though she was not quite sure that she'd heard it correctly. The Bishop's nephew, she presumed it was him anyway, was dead according to Clare, with Michelle seemingly suggesting she'd gotten someone to do it, though it may have not been Michelle's intention to let it go that far. Clare's persistence in trying to get them to do something to help her certainly touched Erin, but not as far as to hire someone to rough up the fella that her Da was getting her to marry. Beating the fella up and forcing him to leave Derry must have been the dark-haired woman's plan, a plan which seemingly went off course very rapidly.

"Oh my god… Michelle! What is wrong with ye!?"

"I didn't know they were goin' to kill the fella, Erin!" She answered, keeping her voice down so that her parents couldn't hear her.

"That makes it alright then does it!?" Clare rounded on her again. "The both of us will be goin' to prison! Maybe Erin and Orla too!"

"I've always wondered what it would be like behind those wee bars…".

Ignoring Orla's comment about life behind bars, Clare's rage still wasn't subsiding. She couldn't believe what Michelle had done, not at all, crossing lines that should not have been crossed. Although she didn't want to marry the fella, she didn't want him dead either, but Michelle's brain decided that he was best off that way. Even if it wasn't her intention for him to be killed, the fact that she was willing to see him led to serious harm was bad enough. If the cops could track the crime back to her, and then to Michelle, the young Devlin would certainly be out of the life that she did not want to live, swapping it for a life that was just as bad. Her heart wouldn't be broken in being forced to live as a married woman, but all of her freedom would be taken to ensure it. The family's reputation would be destroyed, and the knock-on effects would harm Erin and Orla, who were both completely innocent. Her life was in turmoil once more, but not from a threat that Clare thought of in advance.

"Relax, Clare. The cops won't know…". Michelle tried to offer an olive branch, though it was torn down immediately.

"And how can ye be sure!? If these fellas ye got to do it are found, they'll name ye won't they? Or what happens if the cops come to me first… how could I sit through that without tellin' them!?"

"They won't… for the record, it was the Thomas brothers that did it".

Clare's eyes were already wide but like Erin's and even Orla's, they widened further at Michelle's mention of the brothers. They were fellas that nobody said a bad word about, having a habit of ensuring that anyone who dared to speak out about them was silenced very quickly. Such was the extent of their reputation, they dwarfed even the equally rough Scanlon's when it came to fear. They notoriously hated the English as well, though like the rest of Derry, none of the family appeared to have a problem with James. They'd interacted with him on one occasion too, though the young man didn't know who they were, even if they were well aware of who he was. Michelle utilising them for the task of giving the Bishop's nephew a good beating, was all the more surprising when she'd admitted in the past of being afraid of them.

"The Thomas brothers!?" Erin screeched. "They're feckin' criminals, Michelle!"

"That's why I hired them ye great eejit! I thought they'd do a grand job but… obviously they were a wee bit too heavy handed".

"A bit too hea… Michelle, they snapped his spine!"

Swallowing loudly, as much as she was trying to play it off, Michelle was beginning to realise the consequences of her actions. It was still Clare's fault for begging her so hard, but in hindsight, asking two of the city's most violent criminals to conduct the beating was not the best plan possible. There'd always been rumours that they'd killed before, and thanks to her there was evidence that firmly said they were killers, even if no copper could be sure whether the Bishop's nephew was their first victim. Trying to play down her own involvement, and to some extent guilt, she continued to put up a fight against Clare's protestations.

"Well… he… ye know… maybe he had a weak spine".

"A weak spine!? A weak spine!? They beat him up and snapped him in half, Michelle! I don't think it would have mattered how strong his spine was!"

"The cops won't start sniffin' anyway, not around those boys, so we've… ye know, nothin' to worry about. Everyone's too focused on the war anyway…".

"I think they might take notice of a dead fella with a broken spine…".

"Shut it Erin, yer not helpin!"

Going to say something snarky in return, Erin was stopped by Orla putting a hand over her mouth. Listening in closely to what was being said, her cousin's trademark attempt at metaphorically clambering aboard her high horse was thwarted. It wasn't going to help any of them if she started mouthing off with her range of opinions on it, when they needed to come together rather than start drifting apart. A rare day when she was the only level-headed member of the group, Orla knew that the cops would not investigate if they found any suspicion of those lads' involvement. They were at least somewhat professional when it came to leaving clues, as they hadn't managed to leave any at the scene for the cops to go on. Background checks on the fella would have to be done, which would no doubt cross towards the Devlin house when they found out he was to marry Clare. She didn't know how she would cope…

"My Da was almost heartbroken!" Clare continued to moan. "Do ye know how much he liked that fella!?"

"Yer Da has a heart…". Completely inappropriately, Michelle sniggered.

"What's wrong with ye! Have ye not gone any compassion for the fella! How do we move on from this… it could ruin us!"

Looking to Michelle to provide an answer to the mess that she'd created, Clare found that her friend did not have one to hand when it was required. The dark-haired young woman was too busy trying to understand that very mess, which was completely accidental. The Thomas brothers were meant to give the fella a good beating, tell him to never come to Derry again or they'd given him another, and see him on his way. At no point did she want to see the fella killed. From all that she'd heard about the young man, he was a decent enough lad anyway. He was completely undeserving of the fate that befell him the very night before.

"How did ye manage to get it organised so quickly…". A curious Erin asked. "I don't even know where the Bishop's nephew lives and we hear about him from Clare all the time".

"They're well connected… they're the fuckin' Thomas brothers!"

"Those policemen found that body quick…". Orla mused. "Are ye sure they've not told the cops, Michelle. Aye ye'll be in right bother then if they have…".

Anxiously, the other three all thought about the very valid point that Orla made. As quickly as the Thomas' brothers found the Bishop's nephew, and killed him, the cops were just as quick in finding the body. Clare hadn't said where they'd found the fella, but the criminals would never have allowed themselves to be seen when committing the act. Unless there'd been an almighty struggle that saw the fella put up a fight before he died, it was unlikely that they'd have been overheard either. Unable to come to a conclusion, none of them said anything further when it came to her point, but it was one that stuck fast in their minds. The next step for them all was what they were going to do, and as always, Erin thought she held the best idea. As always, it was hardly one that was without any risk…

"Look girls, we have to do nothing… say nothing…". She explained, frustrating both Michelle and Clare. "I know… I know it will be tough, but as far as the cops are concerned, we don't know anything. We should probably go to the funeral though…".

"We'll be goin' to our own before long!" Clare huffed. "I just… I wanted yer help, Michelle… but not this! At least I can find a reason to cry to make my Da think I cared for him…".

"Good!" Michelle, inadvisably, stood up with a determined look on her face as she nearly shouted. "Ye can convince him that yer upset and ye won't want to see a fella again while ye get over him. It took Erin ages to stop mopin'… the Thomas brothers have bought you a year!"

"In return for taking five off of my conscience! Do ye still not understand the trouble ye've caused, Michelle!?"

She fully understood what she'd done, finally realising that her own actions were the indirect cause of the death of the poor fella. The Thomas brothers might have held the full responsibility after they took things too far, but her order to take care of the fella was not a clear one. In their world, taking care of him meant seeing to it that the fella didn't breathe by the following morning, in contrast to her interpretation where he would simply leave Derry. He would still leave Derry, but it would be in a casket on his way back to Belfast where he would be buried. Being committed to the ground a lot earlier than he ever should have been, the poor fella would be leaving a gaping hole in his family, who all loved him dearly. The Bishop would be, and from what Clare heard from her Da, already was, inconsolable at the loss of the nephew he thought of so highly. The only positive, though Michelle would not voice it again, was that the wedding was off. Clare wouldn't have to live as a married woman with all the expectations that it brought with it… not that it could be viewed as a serious positive when a man died for it to be considered in that light.

"How did ye get them to do it anyway? Those lads would charge for that surely".

On another day, Michelle would have entertained Erin with the incredible tale behind how she'd afforded their services, most likely embellishing it with a false detail or two. However, when thoughts of spending her life in prison were swirling around her mind, she couldn't find it within herself to appease Erin's curiosity. Clare was not in the mood to hear it either, once again faced with a painful horizon where she was uncomfortably balancing herself, afraid of the past, present and future, at all times. The two of them were faced with demons that made the ghastliest of horror tales seem like tales from a children's book. All of it because Clare could not live in a world that would accept her, the lengths and depths they'd reached going to prove how difficult it was for her to contain the secret. Michelle couldn't go round making sure that each fella her Da matched her with died or was ran out of the city. The inevitable was simply being delayed yet again…

"That's a story for another day, Erin… not… not today".

That day would be a long way away if Michelle was able to have her way. Or perhaps it would be never…

---

Life at sea was rough, but sat in the docks on the River Foyle, the American servicemen could hardly complain about the conditions. The often-wet weather, as it was that morning, could be quite annoying, as could the winds that would whip into the side of the ship. They were nothing like the sea gales that could almost tear the ship apart, or at least make it feel that way, leaving the most squeamish of sailors throwing their guts up. The journey over the Atlantic was quite rough earlier that year, especially during one night where the crews were all on high alert thanks to a potential U-Boat sighting. The German submarine stayed away, though it was most definitely sat there watching the whole time, conducting intelligence rather than attempting to sink the convoy. The inexperienced crew wouldn't have stood much chance against it.

Lieutenant Lance Hamilton was not a man of the sea by any means, though he was beginning to warm to the idea of a life in the navy. Despite bemoaning to Erin about the family status receding, with the financial backing that was behind him, he held choices as to where he wished to serve. Enlisting before the attack on Pearl Harbour, seeing the war as likely from as early as a year earlier, he chose the navy to be different to his two brothers, who were both serving in the army. They were both still in America according to their last letters, continuing their training back in the south of the country where the family hailed from. Like him, the two of them were officers, though his eldest brother was already a Major, far outranking him. Although he was a Lieutenant in title, in reality Lance was one of the Junior Lieutenant's, lacking the experience and wisdom to be a higher-ranking Lieutenant. Even with all the money he could put towards trying to further his rank, the US Navy did not want to recognise him as anything more.

Stuck out on the deck inspecting one of the turrets, his watch during the late afternoon was complete. Above anything else he wished to get into the dry warmth of either his cabin or the officer's mess, having felt the full force of a wet afternoon in the North West. He was beginning to learn to expect such weather where they were stationed, but he usually managed to avoid the worst of it. Unfortunately, his luck was running dry that afternoon, ironically contrasting against the drenched state that he was in. Turret inspection wasn't meant to go on for that long, but thanks to other problems he'd found once he was out on the deck, it became an afternoon's job. His watch started much earlier in the morning, the Lieutenant's operating on a rotational basis as to when they would be on duty, which was often a long and boring exercise when sat at the docks. At least when they put out to sea there was a chance for some action.

Deciding to return to his cabin first, Lance couldn't wait to remove his jacket which was soaked through. As an officer, he was constantly having to remind his men of the dangers of staying around in wet clothes for too long, something which his Captain was keen to ensure they all were aware of. The last thing that the US Navy needed was an outbreak of illness throughout their units stationed in Derry, especially when some of them would be moving on at some point. One or two of the ships, which were already complimented with more experienced sailors, would be ready to serve wherever they were required sooner than the others. With a war around the world to win, there was no time to lose at all.

Going all the way into showering and putting his clothes out to be washed, a task to be completed by other men aboard the ship when he was an officer, the Lieutenant was glad of the wash to shake the cold off of him. Even though it was an August day that was far from freezing, the rain settling on him made him feel as if he was cold. Back home in Virginia, the summers would be far warmer than they were in Derry, allowing him to relax in the sunshine rather than stand around getting soaked in the rain. It was his duty to do so though, albeit his reasoning for completing that duty was not the same as a lot of men. Men like James and David went to fight because they couldn't stand by and watch other men dying for their freedom, especially the former when he was lucky to avoid being conscripted. Lance signed up to fight because of a lust for glory, wanting to make a name for himself rather than caring for the lives of others. He couldn't care less whether a few Brits were getting killed in order to protect the world; he wanted to be out in the field making himself into a hero to improve his standing back home.

Once he was dry, and dressed, he headed out in the direction of the officer's mess. Catching up with his fellow off duty officers was exactly the tonic he required after such a disgusting afternoon out on the deck of the ship. A couple of the officers were on duty at the same time as he was too, but as they were not out on the main watch, they would have avoided the worst of the weather. He was certain that they would mock him for being the one to be caught in it, but he would have done the same in their position too. The camaraderie between them all was brilliant, friendships having long been made and since built open. It was nothing quite like the spirit of defiance that ran through the hearts and minds of the British public, but it was still something to be proud of.

His fellow Lieutenant, Lieutenant Baker, was his best friend. Baker was stood outside of the mess, talking to one of the men. The man he was talking to was the officer's cook, a man that often faced plenty of abuse from the gaggle of men that found themselves in command of the ship. The Captain was respectful to him, along with a couple of the others, but the rest of them constantly enjoyed picking faults in the man. He was of Italian ancestry, an anomaly on their ship when most of the officers and men were from either Virginia or North Carolina. Baker was a proud Virginian like Lance was, coming across in the way that he was talking to the enlisted man.

"Why the hell did you not put up more of a fight! Those are OUR supplies, you wop bastard!"

"Forgive me, Sir, but the Lieutenant in charge of the supplies… he was not movin', capeesh?"

"Don't you give me all that foreign bullshit! Get our food supplies from the goddamn stores, before I kick your ass back to the Boston shithole that it crawled out of!"

"Yes, Sir!"

The officer's cook scurried off in the other direction, off to the far end of the corridor where the stairs to the next floor were located. Lance couldn't help but laugh at what he'd witnessed from a distance, leaving his friend with his head in his hands as he tried to get over the argument he'd held with the enlisted man. Baker was an angry man a lot of the time, certainly a lot more outwardly than Lance was anyway, often voicing his thoughts on a wide range of opinions that he held. His family were firm friends with the Lance's, a bond that was only going to be strengthened once they returned to the other side of the pond. Lance's older sister Christina, was engaged to the man that he called friend, the two having long been friends and lovers. Baker was in his mid-twenties, as opposed to the twenty-one year old Lieutenant, though they were just as firm friends, they could have been mistaken as being the same age.

"He must have really annoyed ye, Johnny!" Lance called out, continuing to close the distance between them. "I ain't ever seen him move that fast!"

"That jumped up fucking asshole! Who the hell does he think he is, coming back in here telling us that our meal will be a fucking half portion!"

"He's prolly just a lazy bastard".

"Oh he is, for sure. They all fucking are".

Docked in a country that would almost die for the size of their half portions, the sailors were coy on exactly what they were eating. Although they were subject to rationing too, the officers at least, secretly held other supplies upon which they feasted. Fresh meat should never have found its way onto the ship, but one of the other Lieutenants made one of the local farmers an offer he simply could not refuse. Profiting from the Yanks was a no brainer for the man, and for the officers of their ship it meant fine eating. Some of the sailors did start rumours about what they were doing but were silenced by the otherwise caring Captain. Even a man as honourable as he, wanted to safeguard the luxuries that they were having on a daily basis.

"Enjoy your watch?". Baker scoffed. "Did you get your fucking hair wet?"

"Fuck off…". Lance shook his head, rolling his eyes. "That was one of the shittiest days I have ever had. I signed up to kill these goddamn Nazi bastards, and all I get is a watch duty, where I stood around getting fucking drowned. This ain't the life I thought it would be".

"Cheer up, Lance, we'll be out there fightin' those Nazi boys soon enough. The Captain told me earlier that he thinks we'll be on a Russki convoy in the winter".

"Really?"

"Yeah… it'll be cold as shit but it won't be here".

Laughing to each other, the two soon headed in to join their fellow officers, who were engaged in a game of cards. Nearly all of them in there were smoking, a habit which the Captain detested and tried to stop them from, but none of them listened. The officer's mess was hardly full, but there were enough loudmouths in there to make it seem so. The highest ranking of those in the room, Lieutenant Commander Reeves, was perhaps the most vocal of all. His main mission, at least in Lance's eyes, was to undermine the Captain at every opportunity. He was a man that was relied upon by his Captain too, but Reeves saw a man ahead of him in rank rather than ability, wishing for the roles to be reversed. Along with him there were the two lowest ranked members of the room, Ensigns Hill and Scott, who were part of the card game along with the most senior of the Lieutenant's, Lloyd. Sat at a table on his own in the corner, Lieutenant Masterson cut a lonely figure away from the others, but it wasn't unusual. He was closer to the Captain and the enlisted men than he was to them, the only officer to reject the fine dining in favour of the rations that the men lived on.

Judging by the reactions of three of the players at the card table, there was a clear winner of the card game. A winner who soon vocalised their achievement.

"You boys are getting shittier by the day". Reeves bellowed. "Your momma's are goin' to have to send you some more of the family account to bet with soon".

"Shut up!" Hill moaned back at him. "Where'd you get those four fucking aces from anywhere! I've never seen a man pull four aces like that before".

"That's because you ain't even out of your teens yet boy! But I reckon you might know anyway… seein' as you found those four queens from somewhere".

"How the…". A stunned Hill couldn't believe he'd been caught.

"Those weren't the cards I dealt you, boy…".

Reeves might have cheated to win, but as Hill was cheating anyway, he could hardly make much of a complaint. The older of the two used all of his guile to pull his move off, having his suspicions from the last game they'd played that the Ensign was enhancing his own hand at times. The other two at the table, along with the newly arrived Lieutenant's Baker and Hamilton were chuckling away at Hill's misfortune, the youngest in the mess left shaking his head in frustration. It was a lesson that he would learn though; when cheating at cards, make sure there isn't a bigger shark in the water. Looking at the two men who'd just walked in, Reeves soon found his attention drawn to them as the other three at the table cleared the cards away, deciding to call it a day.

"Look who it is… the Baker's fucking dozen and the drowned rat…". He addressed them in his charming demeanour. "Dry now Lance? Ye didn't get yer precious hair wet?"

"Yeah and fuck you too! You boys should go try standing out there in the pouring rain… it ain't no fun let me tell ye".

"Sounds like that hair did get wet…".

Some of the others started to snicker at Reeves' additional comment about Lance's hair, a fair colour which was arranged into a thin cut. It was nothing special at all, but the Lieutenant was always found fussing with it before any parade, despite the fact that they wore caps during it. The reputation that Lance was bothered about his hair began from there and he'd never quite been able to shake it. It was all in good faith though, another extension of the camaraderie they held as officers.

"You told him about Lloyd's new section?"

"No… no I thought I'd let him hear your version of events first, Lieutenant Commander".

There was a strange amount of sass, or at least to any outsider it would seem so, in the way that the Lieutenant addressed his slightly more superior officer. As with all of their other banter though, it was all taken in good jest. Reeves didn't mind his fellow officers talking back to him, it was only if the men started acting up, he became riled. Clearly keen to impart the story onto Lance, as the rest of those in the officer's mess were already aware of the information, he wasted no time in relaying it. Grinning wildly before he spoke the first few words, the young Lieutenant that Erin thought so much of, was equally excited to find out what.

"He's been given command of… the fucking kitchen staff and the servants!" A bellyful of laughter escaped Reeves, the others apart from Lloyd and Masterson all joining in with jeers at the former. "He's going to be standing to attention with the asshole that boils the fucking spam!"

With even Lloyd himself finding it highly amusing that he was going to be overseeing the most undesirable section of the ones available, all of whom were still properly trained for combat, the mess was alive with the sound of revelry. The command was one which was with another Lieutenant from the moment they'd left the shores of the states, but there'd been some changes since. They were all aware of the reason why; the Lieutenant in question was being shipped back across the water on charges of disobeying orders, a new one to come in to replace him. The Captain decided to change their duties around, leaving Lloyd to command the undesirable section rather than the new Lieutenant who was drafted.

"Just my luck". The Lieutenant moaned.

Before any of them could mock him further, movement could be heard from behind them. Lieutenant Masterson appeared to have heard enough for one night, having already heard the rest of the story that was no doubt going to be told to Lance. He didn't like it all, not when he was a respectful man that was only there to do his duty. His duty was to his country, rather than to his fellow officers who did not represent the image of the country that he wished to see. A liberal at heart, he also didn't come from the southern gentry, only having found himself in Virginia for work purposes rather than being born and bred. He was from further north himself, making it a rod for his own back when it came to certain jokes that some of the southern officers were more than happy to make about him.

"What's up Masterson…". The ever-vocal Reeves immediately turned to him. "Can't handle what has to be said?"

"No…". He replied, sighing with a clear anger. "I have no interest in listening to your bullshit all night. I will be in my cabin if anyone needs me".

Walking out quickly, brushing past Lieutenant Hamilton, who didn't appreciate him nearly barging into him, Masterson's footsteps were fast and heavy, indicating how quickly he'd left the mess. Shaking their heads, as well as tutting at him once he'd walked off, Reeves held a smug smile across his face like Baker did. Neither of them really liked Masterson, who was far more interested in engaging with the sailors at their command rather than his peers. The man appeared to find them more to his liking when it came to socialising, constantly making his fellow officers wonder if he should hold command. None of them would dare attempt to make that point to the Captain and couldn't risk calling him an inadequate officer when he might turn out to be incredible in battle. The rest of them might have been loud and brash, but none of them deep down were that confident of their own abilities in a live combat situation.

"Asshole…". Scott muttered.

"Typical… his granddaddy probably fought for the Union… and the family are still up on their fucking high horses after all this time!"

"Union boys are always soft hacks, Reevesy…". Baker complained to him. "He'll probably drown the first time we see a Nazi battleship!"

Another round of laughter ripped out across the room, with everyone in it joining in since Masterson's departure. With him out of the way, the others could continue on with talking about the nightmare section that none of them wanted command of, the largest talking point of all for the officers. The Captain would never get himself engaged in such gossip, not even if it was mentioned around him by the men when they ate together. He did know of the tendencies of his most trusted though, keeping himself out of matters of opinion too, leaving them unaware of whether he agreed with them or sided with Masterson. He definitely favoured the kinder of the Lieutenants to the rest of them, though it was most likely because he gave him less trouble.

"Run us through what you got in there again, Lloyd…". Baker joked. "I'm sure with the Hamilton family history, Lance would love to know what you have. Maybe bring about the older generations in him, you hear".

"Fucking… alright alright… fuck!" Lloyd cursed. "Well I got myself a fine mix of niggers, spics, redskins and a couple of fucking Boston wop boys as well. Bunch of fucking no good pieces of shit, all of them".

"I got two niggers in my section as well…". Baker moaned. "The state of the fucking world when they get to be fucking engineers. It ain't what my family fought for!"

"Mine neither". Reeves grumbled. "I got a jumped-up spic in mine too. The idiot thinks that he should be treated like the other boys because he can speak English just as well as them. He forgets they didn't walk into his territory… fucking asshole…".

The attitudes and opinions of the officers were shared by many in America, though not all. The power of minorities was weak, especially when forced into the command of men like the Lieutenants who were more than willing to discriminate against them for the colour of their skin or their country of origin. The men that they spoke of were amongst some of the hardest working aboard the ship, working even harder to gain even the slightest amount of respect in some cases. There was a clear hierarchy to the ship, so much so that, whilst it wasn't supported by the Captain, it was one which men of all ranks knew and understood. The white, mostly southern officers were in charge, and everyone listened to them or faced the consequences. There would be consequences faced for disobeying any officer anyway, but for them the punishment would be even worse. Equality was something that simply did not exist. The Lance that Erin knew though was not one of those who was critical of men because of their colour, valuing everyone equally from what she'd seen of him. A handsome, honest and decidedly decent fella, he was the exact opposite of men like Reeves or Baker in her eyes.

The Lance that she knew. The reality… spoke for itself.

"What's the problem with that Lloyd…". He sniggered. "Get yourself a few more niggers and you can have a plantation goin' by March!"

The biggest howls of laughter yet were generated at the despicable comment that Lance made, the one that if Erin would have heard, would have told her that he was a very different man to what she saw of him. He was just as racist and discriminatory as the rest of the officers in the mess, the only decent one among them being the departed Masterson. He didn't mind who was in his section as long as they could fight and do their duty for the ship, a detail which his fellow officers enjoyed ignoring to satisfy their own convictions. Leaving the room before the vile outburst from the others, he'd already heard Lloyd's complaints about the men he was forced to have at his command, not wishing to hear them again. The rest of them added details similar to Lance at the time too, greatly offending a man who held no ill will against a man on the basis of his skin colour.

"There's the Hamilton family in you speaking, Lancey boy!" Baker, almost affectionately slapped his shoulder. "Your folk know all about putting the niggers to work, don't ye!?"

"Only thing they're useful for". Lance chuckled.

"Damn right!"

Reeves' loud shout of approval was all that the Lieutenant required. It was the Lieutenant Commander that he looked up to rather than the Captain, who he did not like as much. He didn't dislike the most senior officer aboard either, not when he often praised him for his work, but the man simply wasn't strong enough when it came to dealing with issues onboard the ship. He was perfect if it was issues with the local population of Derry, more than willing to come down hard on his men for their indiscretions on land. In Lance's eyes though, he wasn't tough enough on those of the wrong skin colour, whose value was far less. With his family's business being that of keeping slaves in generations gone by, having owned plantations out in the Caribbean in their heyday of a time long past, it was the only way he knew. The Captain didn't seem to see that those of lower standing needed to be punished more severely than their white counterparts, incensing the young Lieutenant who would always act far more sternly around those lesser than him. He was a far cry from the man who'd once stopped a young blonde Irishwoman from falling into the road…

For another ten minutes or more they all traded insults to those of colour, ignorant to the fact that when their enemy was the Nazi's, the same people they were insulting could very well be the men that saved them in combat. A wounded officer could very easily be carried to a medic by a lowly ranked man of colour, almost as likely as it would be for another white sailor to do so. Those of Italian descent who were castigated, could feasibly find themselves on one of the turrets in a desperate situation, fighting for the lives of all of those onboard. Lance and the rest of the officers in the mess didn't care about that though. They were not in combat that night nor would they be for the foreseeable future. Men like those in Lloyd's section were their primary enemy and would be until they put out to sea to fight the Nazi's.

"So Lance…". Reeves loudly changed the topic. "Johnny boy Baker here tells me that you have got yourself a little blonde in the city".

"Has he now?" Lance glared at his friend. "What the fuck have you told him, Johnny?"

"Oh Lance I told him everyyyything…". Baker put on a mocking tone, almost like a gossiping housewife when it rang out around the mess. "I told him all about little Miss Quinn and your little dinner".

Seething, with the want to tear the head off of Baker's shoulders, Lance did not appreciate his friend making the decision to tell the others. He could have been angrier, but their friendship negated the full onslaught of the wrath that would have otherwise been uttered. Erin Quinn was not supposed to be a subject of discussion in the officer's mess, nor were any of the women that any of them were seeing in the city. Lance knew he wasn't the only one to have dinner with a local woman in that room, witnessing Lloyd do so with at least one or two women since they'd first arrived. The more senior Lieutenant also went a lot further than he'd gone with Erin, though unlike some of the men from their ship and others, he'd not gotten any of the women he'd slept with pregnant. Upholding the Captain's orders for behaviour with the locals, Lance ended up being the man responsible for stopping the men from sleeping with women inland, like he had done with Orla and the fella she was with. With Erin though, it was not Baker's story to tell, but one day the junior Lieutenant knew he was going to have to tell the story anyway. The day just came around a lot quicker than he wanted it to…

"Yeah well, he's not lying, I took her to dinner last night. Got us a nice one too thanks to our friend at the farm". He began, scratching the back of his neck. "She enjoyed it and I… I even got a kiss at the end of it".

"A kiss!?" A shocked Reeves almost roared. "I bet that was nice for ya, when the only kisses you normally get are from your momma and your sister".

"Hey! Don't you talk about my woman!"

Holding his hands up in apology, forgetting that Baker was engaged to one of Lance's sisters, the Lieutenant Commander was soon focused on ribbing the younger of the two Lieutenant's. News of an affiliation with a woman was something that would always fly around the mess, ensuring that the man who'd been foolish enough to commit to one was reminded of it by his friends. It was another practice that Masterson avoided, one which he did not have the stomach for when he was a married man that loved his wife dearly. The conduct of his fellow officers towards women, local or back home, was unacceptable in his eyes.

"What's she like… you going to be sharing her with us?" The even younger Hill joked.

"Shut up Ben! I don't even think you've been with a woman!" Lance retorted, earning a chuckle from the others except Hill. "And no, I ain't sharing her with you bastards. She… she's the one for what I need… you know".

"Not this shit again…". Baker groaned, running a hand across his face.

"You two keeping shit from the rest of us?" Reeves questioned immediately. "What the hell you talking about!"

Lieutenant Baker knew exactly what his young friend was going to say, still trying to understand why he would not shake from his ridiculous view. There wasn't even any pressure from back home from what he knew, which was a great deal when his wife to be was the Lieutenant's older sister. Although the parents were tough on the children, bringing them up in the image of generations of Hamilton's gone by, they were far from demanding when it came to Lance's conduct with women. From what his friend gleamed before they'd set off for Northern Ireland, Lance's parents were more than happy to wait until the war was won until he found himself a woman to have a future with. In his own mind though, Lance thought it better to quicken the process… with his own parameters of a future rather than anyone else's.

"Miss Quinn has a purpose for our friend here". A frustrated Baker looked over to the Lieutenant Commander. "Some fucking ridiculous plan he has with her".

"Lance?"

"I need to make sure the Hamilton bloodline keeps on going…". He laughed, as Baker rolled his eyes "Erin… well she is just the right woman I need".

"Johnny boy's been porking your sister, she's gonna keep it going nice and fine". Lloyd interjected.

"She ain't pregnant yet…". Lance reminded the man.

"She will be when I step foot back home again…".

The muttered comment from the man betrothed to his sister nearly broke Lieutenant Hamilton's concentration, not wanting to hear of his sister spoken about in those terms. He was happy enough for his friend to degrade other women when they spoke, but when it came to family members, he was not willing to hear of it. She was certainly a better woman than any either of them knew, apart from other siblings, very much differing in her views to them despite being raised in the same home as Lance. She did love John Baker though, allowing herself to see beyond his opinions on the rest of the world when she was so in love.

"All I want to do, is get a baby in Miss Quinn before we ship out. I sure as shit ain't goin' to stay with her and I don't think we'll be coming back here after. Then if the worst happens and I get killed, the family lives on".

"Fucking ridiculous ain't it?" Baker enquired with them all.

"Damn right…". Reeves was the first to reply.

"I don't know…". Ensign Scott offered a differing view. "I think it's quite smart. She's just there to get a baby out of… fucking doing her job and letting you go and have all the fun while she has to look after your little bastard for the rest of her life".

"See, Lukey sees sense". Lance moaned at the others. "She ain't no woman to love anyway. You should have fucking seen her last night… must have used the makeup ration of the whole fucking country…".

As much as he might have said that he did, Lance did not feel anything at all towards Erin nor did he find her attractive. She was right to have put makeup on to impress him, not that she would ever know, as he would have found her completely repulsive if she hadn't. There were plenty of women back home that were far prettier than she was, with crisp, tanned skin that reflected the more favourable weather conditions that were found back over the other side of the Atlantic. All that she was to him was a means to an end, a vessel of pregnancy that would be discarded the moment he was done with her. The complete opposite of James, who loved Erin deeply from the bottom of his heart, wishing for a life of love and contentment with the young woman that he simply adored. Unfortunately, he was dead… as far as they knew at least…

"Ugly bitch is she?" Reeves, presence as large as ever, quizzed him.

"Let me tell you Reevesy, I am going to have to visit our friend at the farm again to see if I can borrow one of his pigs. Need to practice kissing one if I'm going to be kissing her all the time".

The officer's mess was ablaze with merriment for what must have been the fiftieth time in little more than half an hour. Sat in their shirts, looking completely different to their resplendent selves whenever they went out onto the top deck or into the city, the officers were a shabby offering from the country they represented. Although issues of race may have been a problem across the country, there were few worse than the sort of men that the ship called officers. Masterson and the Captain aside, they were a group of evil thugs that ruled through the fear of who they were and where they'd come from. Descending from the types of people who would happily torture those of colour whilst making them work for no reward, it was no surprise that the backdated views still existed. Giving the command to the men with those views however, was far from a smart idea, not when there were larger enemies to face. The Nazi's and the Japanese certainly wouldn't discriminate against them in combat. No matter what the colour of their skin was, if they dared to oppose them, they would die.

Back on land, Erin was blissfully unaware she was walking into a relationship with one of those men.

A world apart from the one she'd been with before.

---

The peace and serenity of the snow-covered mountains of the Pyrenees, did not change no matter what was happening. There were no birds chirping in trees at the summits of the peaks that separated France and Spain, the land covered with a veritable amount of nothing. The odd patches of vegetation that did stand out were only small, the often stone-like mountains simply rolling on all around the landscape. There were many peaks along the route of the border, some of which dipped down into places of civilisation, though these were few and far between right up close to where the two countries met. For some, the chance of peace was never greater than it was in those mountains, where few ventured.

For others though, there was little peace that could be found. It was strange to think that in a place where on a bright summer's day such as the one the area was experiencing, the skies were a perfect blue, untouched by clouds. For those up in the mountain range that day, they would have seen it to be true, looking upon the beautiful picture of their idyllic surroundings as they climbed the peaks. No matter which side of the border that they were on, they could see it for themselves clearly when the skies all around did not feature a single cloud whatsoever. Compared to the days in the winter where the presence of a human being that high up beyond the final villages on either side would have been absolute madness, the area could have been a hotspot for walkers, if it were not for the conflict that raged around the world. Although the Pyrenees might not have been within the thick of the fighting, many of those living in the area, still did not walk too far from home in case they did not see it again.

That was until the arrival of a certain man to the area, only a couple of days earlier. The Pyrenees held beautiful sights and animals aplenty, but at the beginning of the first day of August, it was also hosting Britain's most important asset. The man that could see the war ended by finding himself in the wrong place, under the supervision of the wrong people. Although the great evil was vanquished, by the man himself, Kurt Van Der Heijden had been so close to working out just what James was. Or rather, who he really was. His work was done for the good of his country, for the good of his regime, but for above all, the good of Adolf Hitler himself. The leader of the Nazi's that waged war across the continent and beyond, he held the Doctor in the highest of regards. Although he'd grown frustrated with the process of discovering the truth behind the man in his friend's care, hope was not lost. There was always another way.

It was what James wanted to know the most.

He could understand why the Nazi's wanted him back, especially when even his mother could not hide that he was a more important figure than he even realised himself. An incredible pilot he was, one whose skill in flying combat operations was sorely missed, but no normal pilot would have a whole fleet being offered up as a sacrifice to ensure he was returned into allied hands safely. If the Nazi's could discover who he was, even he knew how important that would make him if it came to utilising him as a bargaining chip. He wasn't just a chip though, he was the whole stack, but to find the answer to why his value was so high, he would not be able to look in the Pyrenees. He just wanted to know why…

"Why John-Paul?"

The Irishman's silence since the moment James spotted the two men in the distance, was most revealing without words. Detail might have been what James was after more than anything, but the skeletal outline of what was happening was abundantly clear. Placing his trust in someone he'd known before the war, a man with a story that told of suffering and losing everything, it was the most naïve mistake of his entire life. Errors were not an unknown quantity to the Englishman, more than aware of some of the grave ones he'd made during his life, but he did not expect to find himself making one with John-Paul. He'd been drawn in though, attached to the tale of the brave Irishman that walked the length of France to get to safety, only to stay behind and help others to safety first. It was a tale most heroic… yet most untrue.

The gun prodded into his side, prompted a sigh from the Englishman, as the man he thought was his friend chuckled behind him.

"Come on now James… yer an Englishman… I'm an Irishman…". John-Paul justified his actions. "It's my duty to stop ye".

"Spare me that poppycock". James huffed, folding his arms. "You could have killed me the moment that you saw me if that was the case! What is the real reason?"

Turning to face his captor in the eye, James didn't find the smirk he would have found back when he was in Italy. Holding him at gunpoint did not satisfy John-Paul in the same way it did Kurt, but both were still denying him his freedom despite the differences in the looks on their faces. Worryingly though, John-Paul didn't appear to have any emotion at all. It was as if capturing James before he could escape was routine, nothing out of the ordinary or special. A job almost. The job in question required such a shocking betrayal of one's country, and above all, principles, that only the most callous of men could have done so. James didn't know enough about the Irishman's past to know what sort of a man he truly was. He couldn't even use the man not turning up to take Erin to the school dance three years earlier, because she'd made up the story of him saying he would take her. Still, he'd discovered that callousness but when it was far too late.

"Ye didn't listen to me back in the village, James…". He shook his head. "… money talks. Every man needs money, you, me or these two fellas behind us. Germans they are, by the way".

Germans… they were always going to be Germans. The part of the Pyrenees that they were stood in was still classed as part of Vichy France, where the Germans did not have the greatest of presences. French soldiers who were loyal to the Vichy government were the ones in operation in that area, the resources of the Nazi's not stretching wide enough to be able to cover every part of Europe with homegrown men. Trusting the French to manage their own area, it would be most strange to find a couple of Germans right up by the Spanish border. However, that prospect would only seem odd to outsiders who did not know of the Englishman that was up in those mountains that day. James Maguire was the man being held at gunpoint… a man that was desperately required by his country. Alive.

"You take orders from the Nazi's now?" James questioned, angered but not showing it. "Betrayal always ends poorly, John-Paul".

"Ach, it's not personal, James. I never asked you to trust me with everything… it was yer fault that ye decided to follow me up here".

"What about the others you've helped! Cashed in on them too?"

The Irishman couldn't laugh, lacking the darkness within him to find their plight amusing. He did what he did for the prize at the end, never stopping to feel for those he was betraying, at least in their eyes. He wouldn't have been as good at it as he was if he developed so much as the slightest conscience, though his circumstances were not as clear as they appeared to seem. Taking money from the Germans was the only way he'd survived, at the expense of many others who were killed thanks to him. Those people, before the ones who'd arrived at Mantet, were indeed betrayed though. He knew of the trust that they held in him, finding it difficult at first to accept that he was only doing what he must. A small part of the man's brain still held hope that he would be able to return home to settle with Ciara at that time, though that hope was long extinguished.

"They at least get themselves somewhere to stay that's safe. A German camp is better than a Spanish prison, James".

"I think you will find it is not, John-Paul!" He angrily retorted. "Neither are preferrable, but neither should ever be a man's destination. You are a traitor!"

"I am not! I am doing what I can to survive, James. I can't go back home now… all I have here is those back in the village and it doesn't pay that well to there. The Germans though, they pay nicely".

Too ashamed of the man next to him, James did not even comment in reply. John-Paul's reputation might not have been knowledge that the Englishman held, but he'd never heard the man's name being used much in slander when he was back in Derry. Apart from by Michelle once or twice, but even the Irishman's name meant more than his, despite Michelle being his concern. The fury within the young Captain rose during the silence that followed, which made him consider his options too. The two Germans were yet to move from where they were stood on the border that marked the end of France and the start of Spain. A border which did not appear to be open to him that day, just when he wished to pass over it. Fate was comically as cruel as ever, the story playing out in the same way as many others did.

"I don't know what ye've done James, but ye've pissed Hitler off, so ye have". Offering some form of an explanation, John Paul started to monologue. "Ye know, if yer managing to piss off Hitler so badly, you must really mean something to them".

"More than even I can comprehend…". James muttered. "But I am not your enemy, John-Paul… I am a friend. We should not be in this situation where you turn me in".

"Spare me yer thoughts, James. I know that we should be friends, but the Krauts pay a lot better rate than you do".

"Is that really all you care about? Money?"

"Aye… I thought I made that quite clear already".

John-Paul might have said it, but James was having a hard time accepting that he believed him. Although he might have enjoyed having the money, which he'd alluded to previously, the Englishman still was in disbelief with the man. John-Paul was not from a poor family in Derry, a moderate income coming into the household on the account of both parents working. To throw in with the Nazi's was an abandonment of his family more than anything, especially when he was hoping to collect the full reward to bring James in. Offers of the magnitude of the one that meant handing the Captain over, did not come along very often at all. When they did, they could not be left.

"Ye fetch a good price James… I can't be missing that boat, can I?" He laughed in the face of the man he was betraying, giving into the darkness. "The money has been put up by Adolf Hitler himself. If I give you to these two fellas, then I'll be set for life. I'm sorry James but to me… giving you to them is an acceptable sacrifice".

"Acceptable? What have I ever done to you!?" Furious, James only just resisted attacking the man, only doing so when he remembered the gun between them.

"Look at what generations of you English bastards have done to my home! Yer not the worst fella James, probably one of the best that England has ever had, but yer still English… yer still responsible. Think of yer journey to Germany as a way of apologising to Ireland for everything yer lot has ever done!"

Trying to use the troubled history between their two countries as justification once more, the second time far more seriously than the first, John-Paul's explanation was falling on deaf ears. James couldn't care for the sins of those in the past, not when there were far more important problems to be dealt with in the present. Together, the very men that John-Paul was willing to work for, should have been the men that they were hunting down. At the beginning of the war, it was exactly what they'd both done, volunteering to serve to defeat an enemy that was trying to strangle the world with its view of how the lives of everyone within it should be lived. The war's mark was left on both men, but James stayed true to his belief in his country despite all he'd been through; John-Paul decided to turn his back on those he'd set off to fight for.

After another moment of silence, the Irishman waved his pistol in the direction of the two men that were stood waiting, encouraging James to go all the way to the peak to be handed over to them. Judging by where they were stood, as he walked towards them, James calculated in his mind that they could have only been there if they'd spent the night out towards the peak or crossed over from one of the other peaks. They couldn't have been in front of the two of them when they'd set off that morning, or they'd have seen them given how clear the path to the summit was. Spending the night up in the snow would have hardly been ideal, despite the weather being somewhat warmer than the conditions suggested, which convinced him that they'd made their way up a different route. For a short time the day before, of around an hour, John-Paul went out into the village to help one of the locals, James staying behind in order to rest. When he thought of the prior day's events once more, he could only assume that the Irishman must have arranged his capture while he rested. A trust incredibly poor judged, misplaced terribly, he was disgusted with himself for trusting the Derry man so willingly.

There were other points that he could have raised with John-Paul, but there was little need to waste the effort. Throughout months of torture at Kurt's hands, he'd dreamt of returning home to those that he loved, to live the life he wished to live once again. Escaping Italy was a tonic to cure the lack of freedom he held and the hope that hung by a thread. Then reaching Mantet was almost the ticket to the life that was waiting, or at least he thought was waiting, back in Derry. Seeing Erin again… marrying her... watching and helping as she carried his child or children, doing his best to become the father figure that he sorely lacked during his own childhood. At the edge of freedom, with his hopes dashed once more, the time for asking any other questions other than why were at an end. If fate was telling him that he could not be free, James was accepting that its message was loud and clear. He'd given everything that he possibly could in order to escape the European hell he'd lived ever since the fateful night in Taranto. How he wished he could have David by his side, the two of them fighting on against the Nazi's tyranny. David was dead, long departed from the world and free from having to experience the same hell as his best friend was now facing.

Reaching the peak, James was made to stop for a moment, as John-Paul arranged what they were going to do with him. Keeping his knowledge of German to himself, James listened in as John-Paul clumsily attempted to instruct them of how he thought they should proceed. His plan was to take them back down towards Mantet, waiting out in a wooded area close to the village until nightfall. When darkness came, they would slip through the village and out to the other side, where another patrol of Germans, the rest of their unit, would be waiting. Frustrations were clearly held though, a drama which played out in front of the oddly humoured James. He hadn't expected to find being turned over to the Germans so amusing, but when they started to argue with John-Paul about what they were doing, the situation became rather hilarious.

Wondering how the Irishman knew any German anyway, before realising it was perhaps best that he did not know, James understood why the two soldiers were perplexed. John-Paul's grip on certain words was not as strong as it was on others, and some of his instructions about where they should go were confusing. Consistently he incorrectly referred to Mantet as a town, telling them that they would creep through the town in the dark. It confused the two soldiers, who only thought that it was a village, making them shout at him for passing on unclear instructions. Clearly, he'd ventured out from the village to make the arrangements the prior day, as they didn't appear to have seen the place, which was nothing more than a few houses cobbled together along a couple of streets. One of them appeared to be a little more understanding than the other though after a moment, but his friend, who looked to be the senior of the two, was concerned that they would be spotted and attacked by the villagers. Although there hadn't been any reporters of villagers attacking soldiers in Mantet, in other areas of France, soldiers had been killed by those who did not wish for them to be there. The younger one suddenly became agitated towards him in return, shoving the other man in the shoulder with force, causing the submachine gun wrapped around his shoulder to slip out of his grasp, falling to the floor behind him, sliding slightly on the rocky surface.

An irrecoverable error was made. Neither the two of them nor John-Paul thought to tie James up, dismissing him as a threat when they held a three to one advantage. James was no stranger to those odds though, having faced them in the air over the North Sea once upon a time. The three dead German pilots in the water served as testament to how he'd coped.

The younger of the two German was quick to spot the danger, which would have been lifesaving on another day. When James' finger found the trigger of the submachine gun though, there weren't any lives that were going to be saved… only taken. With the gun in his possession, James squeezed down hard on the trigger, caught by surprise from the recoil of the weapon. He'd fired guns of its ilk before but was more used to holding a pistol than a submachine gun. A man of his strength could handle such a kick though, which left the two German soldiers who believed they'd caught their regime's biggest target, dead before they could properly react. The younger man's hand was hovering over the trigger when the first salvo of bullets slammed into his torso, knocking him down instantly with fatal wounds. The three entry wounds in his chest were the ones that would kill him, one very close to his heart that oozed blood immediately. The older man, without his main weapon, was gunned down without as much as a flinch. James detested having to kill those without the means to fight back, but that day his conscience could not dwell on such beliefs. It was them or him as far as he was concerned. With his feet practically on Spanish soil, it might as well have been them.

As the two men were killed in front of him, John-Paul retrieved his pistol from where he'd holstered it upon beginning to speak to them. Wrapped up in his large grey coat, thinly kept beard hugging his cheeks, he stood like a gunslinger, in stance ready to fire but without doing so. James too was not firing, dressed in a large grey overcoat too, pointing the submachine gun directly at the Irishman instead. If either of them glanced to the sky at that moment they would have seen the change, clouds suddenly appearing overhead, ones that held plenty of rain amongst them. There was heat in the air but only the oily warmth of the tension that pierced the short distance between the two men.

"Now then, John-Paul… perhaps you would consider renegotiating".

James almost taunted him, reminded of how he took control over Kurt during his final hours in Rome. He'd won out there in the end, but unlike Kurt who he did not wish to see alive any longer, he was not interested in killing John-Paul. It was only a last resort.

"Why don't ye put the gun down, James… then we'll see what we can come up with". John-Paul diplomatically responded, though his voice was laced with uncertainty.

"I do not think that would be wise. Not that without you dropping that pistol first".

Shuffling a couple of paces to the left, John-Paul's uncertain tone was matched by his body language. In a different setting it would have been classed as shifty, but when it was just the two of them alone at the top of a mountain, miles away from the next village, it was fear. Watching him in the sights of the weapon all of the way, James took no chances, staring directly into the irises of the Irishman. Squeezing the trigger again might not have been his desired course of action, but he was not afraid of having to do so if it came to it. He was no monster; he just did what needed to be done, no matter how horrible the task at hand was.

"Why don't we both drop them at the same time…". Nervously, John-Paul made the suggestion. "… fight this out like gentlemen".

Unsure of whether to believe him, James circled his opponent, the two moving in synchronisation around the pivot point of the two deceased German soldiers. The closer he got to the men he gunned down, the more hesitant the Englishman was, in case either of them were feigning death, ready to attack him once more. Unfortunately for them there was no such chance when they'd both died very quickly upon being shot, the older man almost dying instantly. James' fire was wild from the submachine gun, one of the bullets ending up travelling higher, striking the man in the side of his head where it brought his death about far swifter. They'd both died on the verge of being seen as heroes by their country for capturing the valuable prize that was James Maguire, but like a certain Nazi Doctor, they'd found bringing him back to their master, one task too many.

"Alright…". James finally decided to accept, with his back now to France, John-Paul's to Spain. "Shall we say on three. Your count?"

"Aye…". A gruff John-Paul, composure regained responded.

Quickly, the pair of them were stood with brows furrowed, facing one another. There was no need to discuss the terms of what was to come. Just like the terms on offer to him in Rome, James knew that only one of the two was going to walk away. He still didn't want to have to kill John-Paul, but it was the likely outcome, also being the safest outcome for his own passage into Spain, and finally, home. For the Irishman, the price of delivering a deceased James was far closer to the price he would be given for handing any other man over alive, but it was money, nonetheless. He too was hesitant to kill yet was smart enough to understand that he'd came too far to allow any other outcome to play out.

One…

Their eyes were fixed onto each other, two hawks stalking their prey.

Two…

Breaths were shallow, intended to sooth and calm them through their intense staring match that neither was willing to lose.

Three…

They both turned out to be honourable gentleman. Not that James needed to prove it.

As they'd promised each other, they threw their guns aside at the end of John-Paul's count, to instead fight it out like gentlemen. Etiquette of eras gone by would have dictated that they fought a duel or duelled with swords, but those days were long over. In the absence of any other weapons, they were going to battle with merely the power in their muscles. James might have held a considerably larger advantage over Kurt when they squared up, but those margins were much tighter with John-Paul. During his time in Derry, James was probably the slightly less muscular of the two men, though the tables had turned over the course of the war. John-Paul was still a far more able fighter than the Nazi Doctor was though, possessing strength that would halt any attempt of James dominating him like he'd done so with Kurt. The Irishman could not be picked up and tossed aside like a child's doll.

That didn't mean that James was not in control though, not at all. As he launched the gun out his reach, his mind briefly flickered to an image in his head, one which gave him additional motivation to win one final battle. He saw Erin there for a moment, dressed in a simple blouse but with a beautiful smile slapped across her face. She was happy, waiting for him to come over to her to show her just how much he loved her. That would be the same woman that would be waiting for him at home when he returned, a path back to the shores of Northern Ireland that was blocked by a son of the very city that he was trying to get to. If John-Paul thought himself to be the final, heroic guardian that would stop him from seeing her again, he was going to be living the last minutes of his life in agony as he was beaten to a bloody pulp. James did not hesitate when he charged at him.

Too slow to react after thinking that James would stand up to fight with his fists, John-Paul could only brace for the impact of having the Englishman's shoulder slam into his body. Although they may have both been of similar muscular size, the momentum of James crashing into him was enough to send the Irishman flying back to the rocky covered mountain top of the Dona. Stunned, he could only brace for a second time once he made connection with the ground, a heavy thud only made worse as James crashed down on top of him. He'd once heard the man he was fighting's cousin say that the English were savages, but a passion-driven James driving him onto the floor was first hand experience that John-Paul did not want. It was the start that James needed though, proving to his opponent that underneath his gentlemanly persona, there was a young man who could battle.

The knocks to his system, at least the second one, jolted John-Paul out of the shaken haze that he was in after a couple of seconds. Just as James pulled back from him, fist clenched and ready to strike, the Irishman had other ideas. Using the power within his legs, he pulled up his knees towards his chest, proceeding to boot James off of him with force. The Englishman saw the move coming, trying to defend himself from the kick but finding it too strong to allow him to keep the awkward position that he was in. Knocked backwards, he stumbled to the ground further towards the French side of the border, allowing John-Paul a moment or two to get his breath back.

Dismayed by being fought off when he'd held the upper hand, James did not take long to find a second wind in order to charge at the Irishman again. Still on the floor where he'd landed, John-Paul hadn't rose to his feet, which gave the Captain the impression that he'd seriously hurt him when tackling him to the ground. Though the man may have been able to kick him off, he could have still been hurt without realising it until after he'd put the effort into removing James from above him. He could almost feel the wooden spoon begging to be released from the inside of his coat pocket, where it could be used to finish off an opponent once more. It worked when it was used upon Kurt, and he did not need to think too hard to know that it would work against John-Paul as well. He'd appeared to have rolled over too when James found himself stood over his opponent once again, groaning in pain from his apparent injuries. Reaching down to pull him back over by the collar with his right hand, James' left was already slipping under his own coat to retrieve the spoon. He would make it quick at least…

At the last second possible, John-Paul suddenly rolled back over, startling James who almost jumped out of his skin. Just as quickly as the Irishman began to turn, an object appeared in his hand, which glinted in the thin strip of sunlight that still shined through the now overbearing clouds. With only a half second to try to avoid it, James was never going to get away from it completely but hoped to avoid the worst of the blow from whatever it was. He didn't get time to make a positive identification of the weapon, which was almost certainly beneficial to him in the fleeting time he had to get out of its path. It was aimed towards his face, slicing into the skin when it made contact, digging in more deeply than he would have expected, as it was dragged along for a moment. Unsteady on his feet for a moment, his hand immediately went to where his body screamed in pain, only just avoiding allowing his lungs to join in as well. The skin around his left eye was where the pain, and more tellingly, the blood, appeared from.

Concealing a knife within his jacket pocket, John-Paul used a dirty trick that a formerly defeated opponent of the Englishman would have been proud of. Luring James in by making him think he was there to be finished off despite his prior display of strength, he was quick to renege on his decision to fight like a gentleman. Tackled to the ground with the breath taken from the back of his throat, he knew too well that he would not win the fight, without even being aware of the presence of the wooden spoon with James' coat pocket. Sensing that the other man was above him again, he'd slashed powerfully with the blade, digging it deep into the man's cheek with the hope of scraping his eye. James with one eye could be beaten, quite easily when he would be in absolute agony from the strike. He was going to make sure he received the money that he so rightly deserved.

Vision restricted, the control that he'd hoped to maintain was evaporating around James. John-Paul must have been carrying a knife or some sort of small blade with him, he assumed, the only sort of weapon that could have caused such damage to him, that could have also been concealed so easily. Unsure of whether he could even see out of the eye that appeared to be bloodied, he could only watch from his right eye as John-Paul rose to his feet with what looked to be a smile on his face. Although the Irishman might not have taken pleasure from having to go through with the act of killing the man he was facing down, the rush of adrenaline from their brief scrap was already flowing through him. Losing his grasp of the reality of the situation for a moment, James then made another terrible mistake, which was not his first since he'd encountered John-Paul. Swinging wildly towards him with a hooked punch from his right fist, James got nowhere near to the Irishman, who was able to dodge the blow effortlessly before lunging forward with the knife. Without the full use of his eyesight, the pilot couldn't avoid him in the same way.

The knife was plunged deep, buried into James' left shoulder, almost identically in the same spot that a bullet lodged into on the night he'd been forced to land in Taranto. He yelped out in pain, a pain that he could not contain, unlike the various tortures he'd been through in his time in Italy.

John-Paul, looking at the beaten man in front of him, realised that he was the winner.

He was the man who would end the story of Captain James Maguire.

James did not fall to the ground immediately, though the power of the stab nearly brought him down anyway at first. His Irish opponent took a couple of steps back, now firmly over the border into Spain, analysing the last moments of the Englishman that in truth, he hadn't wanted to kill at all. Money talked far too loudly though, and for a chance of a new life in France with a new woman, perhaps a family, John-Paul required money. To get by, he could not choose the sources of income that were in front of him. He had to take them.

One glaring similarity between John-Paul O'Reilly and Kurt Van Der Heijden was soon apparent though, this time discovered on the partly snow-covered peaks of the Pyrenees, as opposed to a room under the ground in a compound outside of Rome.

They didn't get quite know who they were dealing.

Slashes of a sharp blade could not stop James from fighting on any more than five hundred lashes of a whip or an evening on the rack could. Slowly but surely, he was picking himself back up, the knife still sticking out of his shoulder, to stand up straight before the man who was about to begin to celebrate and savour his victory. Instead, John-Paul's mouth hung wide open. He stood there for a minute, trying to regulate his breathing with the wounds that his body was nursing. Stood up in the thin air of the mountains, the Englishman's mind was still working quickly despite the oxygen levels not being the same as they would have been further down the mountain. The hacking wound that John-Paul gave him across the face did draw a sea of blood, but none of it was from his left eye. In the half a second he was granted to avoid the blow, James turned slightly away from the original path of the blade, which instead left cuts just under and just above the eye. The blood was trickling down his face steadily, one small stream deviating towards his mouth, a coppery taste on his lips. All the while, the confused Irishman remain frozen to the spot in awe. He was waiting for James to either finally collapse or say something.

He got the latter.

"You missed the ball…". James' voice was weaker than usual, but there was still a hint of defiance in it. "… terrible aim, John-Paul".

James didn't need to be told to know that it would be a one-way conversation when the other man evidently did not know how to respond to a turn of events that he did not expect at all. In another part of the man's body, the knife wound would have finished him off far more quickly, seeing him crumpling to the ground like the Irishman wanted him to. A drawn-out death was not something that either of them wanted, James not wanting to experience it and John-Paul nowhere near sadistic enough to joyfully watch a painful passing from a man he held few personal qualms against. There would always be a problem when James was English, but the truth that the Irishman was not willing to admit, was that he honestly wasn't that bothered about it. Money was what mattered.

"You know…". James began, coughing for a moment before returning to his monologue. "I spent months, many… long, arduous months… being tortured by the Nazi's, John-Paul. I… do not know what they have told you about me or… what they did to me, but… but they taught me a lesson that they did not intend to, throughout all of that. Do you know what it was?"

A miniscule shake of the head was given in response.

"It was how to cope with pain, John-Paul". He began to smile. "A man begins to understand pain when he is… locked away from the world and shown the rack…".

Kurt might have brutalised him, accompanied by his willing Lieutenant Hans, but in turn he'd allowed James to realise just how strong he was internally. The young pilot's pain threshold was alarmingly high, able to withstand incredible amounts of torture and recover quickly from each session. His body was an asset that any other man would be jealous of if they knew about how tolerant of pain he was. It was a tolerance that John-Paul O'Reilly was slowly beginning to realise, blindsiding him that much that he didn't even notice when James took a couple of steps forward to close the gap between them. Within a metre of each other, the air was thinner for the Irishman, whose breathing exposed a man who was starting to panic.

"So this…". He gestured to the knife, where his right hand was gripping the handle, starting to pull it out of his shoulder. "… this is nothing, John-Paul... this does not hurt me".

There was no doubt about the internal, and external, chaos that James was creating in the mind of the man opposite as he pulled the knife out of his shoulder. After all he'd done since escaping Northern France, at a time when he was finally dreaming of settling away from the war forever, John-Paul faced a problem that he could not overcome nor battle to win. He thought he'd done so, like any man would when they'd plunged their knife into their target, but of all of the people in the world to be up against in such combat, he'd been allocated James Maguire. The very same Captain of the Fleet Air Arm who'd achieved spectacular successes in the air, responsible for the impressive Taranto raid and who'd seen off one of the evilest Nazi's that the regime could offer. It was almost unfair to him that fate would deal him a poor hand at the most inconvenient time, but he'd utilised plenty of luck over the years. Luck would always desert a man somewhere.

Wincing at every slight movement from the blade inside his wound, James could not stop some visual signs of pain, but he would not cry out or show any verbal weakness. John-Paul might have come a long way in his own journey in the war, but the Englishman's journey home to Derry was the greater one. In his time fighting in France, the Irishman was a good soldier in the same vein that James was a fantastic pilot when he served in the Med. Yet there was more to the latter than just that, an importance that was unknown to him, even withheld by his loving mother who'd died to give him the chance of freedom and a way home. For Britain's sake, but more importantly his own, he was going to return to safer waters, hopefully to discover that truth. That was wanted to do, second only in importance to his plan to live the rest of his life with Erin who would be waiting for him back home.

"You have lost John-Paul… because… I am a survivor and I am not going to give up nor stop until I am back where I belong, where you should have gone a long time ago! And this…".

Now holding the knife in his right hand, there was a grimace on James' face but also a glare of complete control over the frazzled John-Paul. The Irishman's eyes were wide, but he was not moving at all, watching the blade in the hand of the Englishman with a look that spoke of a petrified man that was about to be dealt another poor piece of luck by fate.

"This is going to hurt you a lot more than it hurt me".

Summoning all of the power and fight that his body could spare when it was trying to combat his wounds too, James brutally drove the knife down into the chest of the Irishman. John-Paul did not even attempt to stop him, his hands not moving instinctively to block the strike until the very last second when it was already past the point of stopping the other man. He couldn't deal with pain, not like James could, crying out as the blade went through the fabric of his coat and his clothing underneath, careening into his chest. His cry echoed out around the peaks of the Pyrenees, but James was the only member of the audience sat along the rocky, snow topped mountains that were the backdrop to their struggle. James' struggle to clear the final hurdle on his way home, to be more precise.

John-Paul's legs buckled quickly, though he fell onto his knees rather than backwards. In front of him, James took a step backwards so that the man didn't slam into him, leaning down a moment later in order to remove the knife from the Irishman's body. Another scream could be heard in the mountains the moment that he did, John-Paul suffering greatly from the agony of being stabbed then having the blade removed sharply from the wound it created. A taste of his own medicine when he'd done the same to his opponent a couple of minutes prior, he was overdosing on that medicine rather than dealing with the side effects. Not for the first time where James was concerned, there was a smell of death in the air, but once more it was not his own that would be conjured that day.

"I… just…". John-Paul fought to try to speak, with some thoughts still on his mind. "… wanted… a new… life…".

"So you thought you would take mine. How noble". James scoffed. "You are nothing but a traitor, John-Paul, that is all you ever will be. You turned your back on your army… your country… on Ciara…".

"Look at you!" He spat blood in return, but still managed a laugh. "You… you fuckin' love bein' the hero, don't ye James? I… I know… I loved it too... but… but ye… ye can't be the hero forever, James… so take that knife… and put it in yer own chest".

"What?"

"Because James… because up here, at the top… of this mountain…". The Irishman was now wheezing, life draining from him. "… yer the hero… but ye… can only go down from here. Ye'll… be me… one day".

"Oh do shut up!"

Control slipped from the grasp of the Englishman briefly, but not to John-Paul who was nursing a vision that was starting to go blurry. He lost control through the anger of the words of the traitorous man that was knelt before him with a bloodied chest. The gentleman within James was incensed with the comment, but he was brushed aside when going to return a gentlemanly answer in favour of a different man. The side to himself that he did not want to see, the killer that lurked in the dark spaces in his mind after being unleashed in Italy. He could kill, kill anyone that he needed to if it meant being able to return home. His focus on his aims meant that the murderer within could take his moments where necessary, a slate that was dirtied with the blood of more than one victim.

In his momentary loss of control, he slashed the Irishman across the throat. He did not wish to talk to the man any further and after the stunning betrayal that he'd enacted, John-Paul deserved the fate in James' eyes.

James could not afford to wait around as the Irishman slumped to his death, moving out of his way to continue on into Spain. He could see the rocky path that led further down into the new country that was sprawling out ahead of him, a road to freedom that he wished to explore. Where he would go or how he would survive, were questions he would have to answer on the road, but he'd made it through a hostile France. He would make it through Spain, where there were no German troops waiting to capture him. Hitler's plan to have the young man brought back to him was a failure, James slipping loose of the noose that tied him to the Nazi's. In a war where valuable assets were gained and lost, the Nazi's lost a golden chance to complete the most precious gain of them all.

They were not on his mind though. His days of thinking about what the German High Command thought of him were long over.

His thoughts were on a young woman in Derry who he loved so dearly. She'd been used against him through the course of his torture, to be shown as his weakness when he would do anything for her. To James though, Erin was his strength. His great love, the greatest of his life.

"I am coming home, Erin… coming home for you".

The words drove him on as he began to descend into Spain, rain starting to fall, unaware of the true situation back home.

She'd been made to wait a wee bit too long…