A/N: More peacetime! Quick note, AdamantiumDragonfly has started uploading the rewrite of her LiebgottxOC fic, Casus Belli. If you guys would like to check it out, it's rated M, so make sure you enable that in search or find her profile. I 10/10 recommend her fic. I'm anxiously awaiting this reworked version. The first full chapter will go up on Saturday or Sunday, I believe.

Wickedgrl123, I just gotta say, the bit of the fic where Sveta and Guarnere do get along is some of my absolute favorites. It's going to be a little ways down the line, but I think you'll enjoy haha.

...all I long for...

Zhanna | AdamantiumDragonfly

Zhanna's stay in the hospital was longer than she would have liked. As the beds emptied around her, for transfer to the States or released back to duty, her only constant were the flowers that a nurse continued to supply her. She had learned how to press them from her mother, Agata having pasted the delicate, dried flowers to white paper and framed them in their home. Zhanna hadn't pressed a flower in years but as the bedside arrangement began to decay, she wanted to immortalize their beauty the only way she knew how.

She laid the daisies to rest between the pages of her journal, finding homes for them between her time in the Samsonov home and her journey to America. There, they waited for the weeks to take their toll. As they cured, safe between the paper, Zhanna's shoulder grew stronger and her fellow paratroopers, the only familiar faces in this hospital, left. Smokey and Talbert were discharged, Popeye was transferred to a different English hospital, and Blithe was wheeled away one day. No one knew his final destination nor his condition. For all they knew, Blithe was dead.

Zhanna should have been cleared to return to duty. She grew impatient, waiting on the formalities to be cleared up. There was some confusion, her being Russian, not American. The nurses weren't quite sure what to do with her or how to file her paperwork. The added confusion of her gender didn't make matters quicker. She was promised, "tomorrow," and then, "at the end of the week,". But it was wartime and with new patients arriving everyday, Zhanna wasn't sure if her time would ever come.

In that waiting period, where she had only her flowers and journal for company, Zhanna was surprised with a visit from Lieutenant Winters himself. He settled himself on a chair by her bedside, his hair neatly trimmed and combed back. The last time she had seen him had been in Normandy, some two or three weeks prior. He had pulled her back from the open field. His concern, etched into every feature of his face, had been burned into Zhanna's memory.

"Lieutenant, glad to see you are recovering," Winters said. He sounded stiff. Come to think of it, Zhanna had never heard him sound entirely relaxed with anyone. At least not in her presence. He was always starched and proper, like the collar of his uniform, neatly folded and pressed.

"It's good to see you, Lieutenant," Zhanna murmured. She had been laying in the same bed for nearly two weeks. Her arm was wrapped in bandages and hung in a sling. Her hearing, though returning, was still buzzing in and out at the most inopportune times. She wasn't sure recovering was the word she would use. "I am feeling better."

"I'm sure you've been keeping busy," Winters said, looking around the ward and it's bland walls that Zhanna had spent hours staring at. There had been little to know entertainment in their paint but she kept looking, in the hopes that something, anything would strike her.

"I've tried." Zhanna said. There was only so much to be done, in a hospital ward with limited use of all limbs. She had tried her best.

Winters nodded to her journal. "I'm sure this has been a good time to catch up on your correspondence,"

Zhanna shrugged, wincing in pain, and cursing herself at the movement. She still hadn't fully healed. "I suppose. And you, do you keep up with your correspondence?"

"I try." Winters said.

"Who are you writing to?" Zhanna was shocked at her boldness, at her ease. She didn't think he would respond. He was stiff and upright, and so different from the glimpse of a man she had seen by that supply truck.

"Someone from back home." To her surprise, Winters had responded to her openness with his own honesty. "You?"

"Someone from back home." Zhanna had surprised herself by responding in kind. Something had changed, a new found understanding between them. They were now on the same level, they had seen the same things. When Winters had asked her if the men were ready before D-Day, there had been a gap between them but now, it seemed they had bridged that. "Do you write to her often?"

"No," Winters admitted, almost sheepishly. Zhanna had assumed it was a woman, a wife or a girlfriend. It could have been a sister but from his downcast eyes at her assumption, she was correct. Definitely not family. "Not as often as she does."

"I don't receive replies," Zhanna said. She wasn't sure what made her say it. It was the truth but it was too sharp, too raw to voice out loud. "Send her something in your next letter,"

"Any suggestions?" Winters asked, though his eyes were wide in surprise. He hadn't expected to be instructed on his private correspondence when coming to visit the hospital. Zhanna wasn't quite sure why he was here but he was a willing audience and Zhanna was a willing giver of advice.

Zhanna wordlessly opened her journal and found the bloom nestled next to the page dated August 15th 1942. She laid it in Winters's waiting palm and he looked at it for a few moments before tucking it into his innermost pocket, already holding something silver in it's khaki folds. She said. "Flowers are the way to a woman's heart."

"And what does a promotion lead to?" He asked.

Zhanna's brow furrowed, her stomach twisting at the sudden shift in subject. "I beg your pardon."

"As I'm sure Lieutenant Samsonova has informed you, I am now Easy's commanding officer," Winters said. She had.

"Congratulations," Zhanna said. "I'm sure you'll do wonderfully. Easy is lucky to have you."

Winters nodded, waving a hand to silence her compliment. His ears were pink at her words, not totally immune to the flattery. "Nixon is now a Captain, like myself. Colonel Sink wants to promote you, as well, Casmirovna," His tongue stumbled over her name, like most Americans did but he did it with confidence. Unabashed at his mistakes. "I have come to propose the change in rank from Second Lieutenant to First Lieutenant."

Zhanna was speechless. She couldn't be the same rank as Sveta. That was impossible. These Americans, even Sveta, couldn't understand the divide that they stood upon. Zhanna, no matter how close they were, would never be the same as Sveta. Not in power and not in title. So why pretend here, in the American military? It wouldn't matter when they got home. Sveta would be the Samsonov again and Zhanna would be the outcast. The roles they were born into. The lots in life that they were given. Zhanna had accepted it and it was time Winters did too.

"I can't do that," Zhanna said.

"What?" It was Winters's turn to be confused. "Sink finds your work in the invasion exemplary. He wants to reward you."

"I cannot be a First Lieutenant," Zhanna said. "I'm sorry Captain Winters, but it isn't meant to be."

"I see," he said, though he couldn't. No one ever could.

No one would understand the struggle for power that Zhanna had grappled with her whole life. Power wasn't just given to people like her. Power wasn't awarded for bravery or worthiness. Life gave power to those who already had it. Whose names and whose families knew what to do with it. Zhanna would never be one of those people and she had come to accept it.

"Second Lieutenant Casmirovna," Winters said. "We are promoting Lieutenant Samsonova as well, for her work on D-Day."

"She deserves it," Zhanna said. Sveta had worked hard, fought hard. She deserved to be appreciated for something other than her family name. Sveta had failed to mention this in her most recent letter, though.

"Would you reconsider your commission?" He asked. "Samsonova is being commissioned as a captain. If you are worried about your ranks clashing I can assure you-"

Even if Sveta was a captain. Even if they weren't the same rank. Zhanna couldn't take more power, her shoulders weren't worthy. This army didn't know who she was, truly. They already harbored suspicion for her adoptive country. If they knew she was a Pole and a Jew. Agata and Casimir, no matter the pride they felt for their home and their heritage, had taught her to hide it. This army and these men would never trust her for who she truly was. When she went back to Stalingrad, there would be no future for her but the one Zhanna had tossed to the side three years before; another tragedy lost to the NKVD.

"I'm not sure it would help," Zhanna said. "The commission, I mean."

"It is a well earned rank, Casmirovna," Winters said.

Zhanna knew that the rank wouldn't matter. Not in the long run. She would be going home and that safe place she imagined wouldn't have rank or title or the weight that power threw around. She had shed blood for a country that wasn't hers and while the little ribbon had shown the men's allegiance more than the officers' trust of her, Zhanna's hunger for recognition had been curbed. But Winters seemed insistant and if Sveta was a Captain, she would still keep that sacred divide in place. Perhaps it would help? Zhanna thought, for all her displeasure at first. Her parents would be proud. Casimir would be proud of the title his daughter would hold, no doubt drawing a connection from her success to Poland.

Maybe it wouldn't help once she returned to Russia but right now, deep down, something swelled with pride.

"Very well, Captain," she said. "I accept this promotion, at your insistence."

He nodded, his lips stretching to a small smile. "I'm glad you've reconsidered. Thank you for your time," Winters stood up. "And thank you for the suggestion. I shall draft up my reply tonight."

"Glad I could help," Zhanna murmured. She wasn't sure she was, truly. A part of her ached to see that little flower go.

"Can I help you in any way, Lieutenant Casmirovna?" He asked.

"Get me out of this hospital, Captain," Zhanna said desperately. She wasn't sure how much longer she could stay confined in these white walls, the smell of iodine and linen stuffing her nostrils. "If you want to help me, you have to get me out."

"I'll see what I can do," Winters promised. He stood, looking down at her on that hospital bed. Her blonde hair still had a stain of red from Blithe's blood that had pooled on the ground. He opened his mouth as if he wanted to stay more but he just patted the pocket where the dried flower lay and turned on his heel. His form disappeared down the aisle of the ward and Zhanna was alone again.