Eine Grausam aberSchone Welt (Teil Zwei)

Friedrich had always been a sensitive child. When they were four years old, Liesel had been the one to comfort him when they found a dead baby bird lying in the park. Children had teased him and bullied him for his schwester had been the one to defend him from the hurt words and the mockery. One time Friedrich had found her in tears, hiding in the bushes. His blue eyes had widened seeing his sister in such a state. Tears pelted down her face, and her lips trembled. "What's wrong?" he had asked her. Liesel had never cried in front of him. Friedrich would cry if she would cry, and she wouldn't have that.

"It's your protective instinct," her oma had stated gently after Liesel had explained her true feelings. "Alfwin was the same way." Sadness pooled into her eyes at the mention of her son. It had been a month since the burial, and Friedrich was still crying. Her mother didn't speak, and little Isabel was always asking when her father and uncle were coming back. Liesel's tears had only fallen at night when the night was dead and no one was looking. Since she could remember, Friedrich had been the one she would protect. If he ever saw her weak, then he would truly see that she was not the strong child her brother had perceived her to be.

"Although five years older than your uncle, Alfwin was the one that cried the most. He could never stand for someone to be hurt or to see a wounded animal eaten by another one." A small smile graced her oma's face, making the wrinkles across her face disappear for a moment. Her gnarled hands went through her short gray hair as she thought of the memories of her dear sons. "Your uncle Erik could never see your father cry, so he would always comfort him and make the tears go away by a distraction or another. Music was both their favorite distraction. You should have seen him on the violin, Liesel." A proud smile, only seen by the girl when she or Friedrich had gotten a good grade on their exams or when little Isabel was born shortly after the war began. She still remembered her oma combing her fingers through her youngest grandchild's fine blond hair. "It was pure magic. The notes seemed to flow freely from him, as easy as breathing. Your father was the pianist. Did I…tell you that when they were young college students, they raised money so that your father could marry your mother?" Liesel had nodded. She had heard the story many times from her father and mother both, but since her mother had warned her and her brother that their father was prone to exaggeration, neither of the children paid attention to the fine details. "They would have concerts every night. With the most…beautiful music." Silver tears streaked down her cheeks, and somehow to Liesel, her oma had never seemed as strong as she did now.

"Ich…" Liesel whispered. I… She swallowed. "I always wanted to protect you, but…I'm afraid that…one day I won't be able to anymore." She was too ashamed to look into his blue eyes, so identical to his own. I'm so weak, she thought. Soon I won't be able to protect him anymore. Suddenly she felt herself being lifted up from the bushes, and felt arms around her shoulders. Her brother, the one that as always needed her comfort in the past, was holding her in his arms. "Ich werde dichimmer beschützen," Friedrich whispered to her as tears continued to flow from her eyes. His blue eyes echoed into her own.

"Ich…verspreche." That moment had been in the first year of the war, when their father had been drafted. The solemnness that Friedrich had shown her would only come to light again when they were both of the age of fifteen. The Friedrich that Liesel knew and loved had steadily disappeared into the reality of war as the days and nights became longer. It was she who now had to be comforted as they were drafted into war. The strength Liesel thought she had collapsed when she first seen the dead body of a comrade lying next to her feet. How many tear had she shed since the first time she and Friedrich had gone to the battlefield? The lullaby of the bullets piercing into flesh and the song of the screams of the dying as the battle was done echoed in her dreams. It was always Friedrich that held her as she cried and as she clawed as his chest during a raw terrifying nightmare.

Liesel never told him that she dreamed of him dying with a bullet lodged within his chest with his gaping staring eyes dark against the falling rain. She didn't yet know that the dream spoke the truth. They had been drafted in 2149 when the Traitor's Creed had been passed. The training had been brutal and swift; only two months of intense mind-numbing training including weaponry, hand-to-hand combat, and marksmanship did they finally go into the battlefield. It was hell. Liesel thought she knew war from the food shortages and the bombings across Germany, but she was wrong.

Although there was more food and a bit more warmth, it did nothing to wash the warm blood across their hands and of the broken body parts splattered across the land. Eyes of gold, blue, green, and gray had never seemed so frightening when they belonged to the dead. Liesel and their comrades often went to bed without sleeping despite their bodies exhausted and their limbs crying in pain. Their minds were crying in grief and horror. How many people had they killed today? How many lives had they ended simply because they were fighting the other side? Liesel and heard about the conquered nations of the Russian Republic being forced to fight. The former Lithuanians and other peoples were forced to die for a war they feared and the man they hated. As bombs rained out of the planes and blood soaked the dead ground, Liesel half-wondered if Germany and their allies were any better.

They had been forced to fight as well. …But somehow it felt different. "Stirb nicht, bruder!" On the battlefield, there had been a girl that had pleaded for her older brother to not die. Her light brown hair and green eyes pleading with the dying boy holding her hand with blood pooling beneath his stomach echoed in Liesel's ears as she surveyed the scene around her. "Bitte...bitte…" Her screams harshly echoed in the sky as her fingers clenched on the bloodied uniform. The boy's glassy eyes did not seem to faze her as she continued to scream as tears streaked down her cheeks. "Gehen Sie nicht... bitt, mein bruder..." Those were one the countless scenes of the aftermath that Liesel had witnessed. How many times had she heard that lament? That song that had been nurtured into her mind until she could hear it every time she took a breath? How she hated that song. But Edmund had loved it. Or rather, he had mocked it. Now she would never hear that mockery, or his voice again.

Liesel desperately wanted to close her eyes, but the images burned in her mind. Claudia, with her intestines blown apart of the brown stink filling up her nostrils. The blood and the mucus mixing beneath her body. Erik, with his head halfway off his neck, the dark blood looking almost black. His brown eyes half-closed, fear still in his eyes. His glasses were cracked and broken. Nina, with her blond hair askew and hazel eyes closed as she was thrown halfway across the room from the blast. She almost looked as if she was sleeping. Her uniform betrayed the reality of death. The limbs across the room.

And then...Edmund. Edmund, who always seemed to know what do despite his foul mouth and equally foul attitude. Although he had been an adult when the war had started and tasted the fruits of peace, he didn't seem to be bothered with it. Or rather, he mocked the war's very existence. "Arschlöcher, that's what we all are. I don't give a fuck what people say about this goddamn war. All of us are doomed to die in whatever we do, and since we're all going to die anyway, let's fucking deny there's a fucking war going on and act like dummkopfs!" She remembered the moment now, when her squad had decided to celebrate another survival with a pint of beer. Her squad had acted like dummkopfs. Someone had been singing very badly as Edmund was chasing Nina and Claudia around for doing something stupid. "Arscholch!" he screamed at them as the two females laughed at his expense as the teased him about his pretty and little ginger-haired wide at home. "Schweine!" Erik was desperately trying to read a book with no success as Friedrich was aimlessly daydreaming. For once a peaceful coy smile graced his face. Then somehow Edmund began to drunkenly sing.

War had never felt as real as it did now. Edmund's body had been destroyed. He had taken most of the blast. There was nothing of their leader who had brightened up their miserable lives. Blood and bits of pieces of flesh was all that was left now. They had been ordered to stop the advancement of the Russian bombardment that had been about to destroy a village that had been miraculously untouched during the eight years of war.

They had been too late. Bodies of the dead had to be buried in mass graves and everything else to be destroyed. In days of ancient centuries of the past, soldiers had burned or destroyed villages they had sacked so that the enemy wouldn't obtain any desperately needed supplies, like food or clothes. There was almost nothing left in the village. Liesel's heart broke when she found a small child within a house that barely stood. A worn blue shirt was streaked with black, and blood coated the child's forehead, which clashed greatly with her dark red hair. She looked around two or three years old. In her hands was a doll. Liesel could see its hand-woven dark hair and homemade clothes across the body. Tiny beady eyes stared into her own.

The girl's tiny fingers held onto the doll, even when in death. As if it could save her. Liesel's hand came to the child's cheek. A sob forced through her throat. "Krieg ist die hölle. Deshalbhaben wirstärker alses zu sein." War is hell. That is why we have to be stronger than it. That's what he told us when we first met him, she thought as the agony seeped through her. There was nothing but death now. War had taught her one thing. Through the brains that had splattered her face when a nameless boy had been shot in the head and of the glassy eyes and wan faces of her squad after another day at war, it was that the world they lived in was cruel but beautiful. She had seen the smiles of Nina and Claudia as they read the letters from the mothers and fathers; she had seen the pictures that little Isabel had drawn her of their family. With their father.

Liesel and Friedrich had been so proud when Isabel had begun to write to them. I can't wait until you come home, she would write. Liesel remembered of how the three years with her squad had taught her how to love them. Nina, with her teasing and easy smiles whenever they talked quietly. Claudia with her stories about the history of their world. She had been about to graduate from college when she had been drafted into war. Liesel remembered of how she had raged when the news of that Japan, one of their allies in the war, had been completely destroyed from the nuclear weapons, and how she was unable to speak when the two Koreas had fallen after two years of warfare between each other one summer earlier.

Edmund had asked what the fuck was wrong with her. She had replied, "Three thousand years of civilization! All gone…in one instant!" The squad knew not to bother her. Erik had been the smartest of the group, and always seemed to have a book with him. He liked to quote lines from books and philosophers whenever he saw someone upset or "in a damn depressing hole that no one can get out of," as stated by Edmund. Although somewhat unusual with his obsession with books and words, Erik always listened and never said anything until the person under distress wanted him to. Although Edmund called him "shitty four eyes," the young man didn't seem to mind.

And Edmund with his rudeness and name calling, but who was kind to all the troops in his own way. The squad saw him as their friend and leader. They would give up their lives for him if he would although them too. "Ich schwöre...ich bin durchaufopferungs arschlöcherundverdammtbeschissen...narrenumgeben."Everyone had laughed despite his furious expression and screaming. Friedrich had held her as she cried at the body of the little girl, and held her hand as the small body was thrown into the mass grave. Liesel had watched as she and the rest of her squad had buried the soil on the numerous bodies that had ceased to take breath that day. Then, at the call of Edmund, they had begun to go back to the truck that had carried them there. It had happened too fast. Friedrich had stepped on a bomb. Her twin didn't even have enough time to be shocked. Edmund somehow found enough strength to move Friedrich away from the blast. Friedrich's blue eyes closing into unconsciousness was the last memory Liesel had until everything went black.

When she awoke, she couldn't see beyond the smoke. Her ears were ringing. Liesel tried to stand, but found herself unable to. Blood seeped into her eyes, and she cringed in pain from the sharp jolt through her back and head. For a moment, the young woman was motionless. Then, hesitantly she managed to stand. Dizziness almost overcame her as she tried to make a step. Liesel took a deep breath and tried to move her leg. She did, but found her feet against something wet and soft.

Liesel looked down, and immediately she almost choked on her own vomit. Claudia's intestines were against her heels. Liesel could sense the black and brown and wet organs against her feet, and tried to move. Instead she found herself looking at Claudia's face. Pale and wan, her mouth gaping and her eyes open in shock. Liesel thickly swallowed, attempting to not be sick on her dead friend. She squeezed her eyes shut, and braced herself to walk. Something inside her must have broken, for Liesel slipped and fell on top of Claudia. The intestines' drying juices smeared against her uniform and Liesel found herself looking into Claudia's eyes.

Vomit escaped from Liesel throat as she shuddered and gasped. Her hands desperately tried to find a way out. She pushed away from Claudia, clutching her hands as her knees almost collapsed. Liesel swallowed, feeling the acid taste of vomit go down her throat as she tried to breathe normally. Her eyes widened and gasp rose from her throat as she saw Erik lying on the ground. His head was halfway off his neck, the blood splattered across the floor and pooling beneath him. Bit and pieces of brain were stuck on his face, and Liesel bit her lips, drawing blood, as she turned away.

Nina was across the room, the wounds seemingly nonexistent as Liesel desperately tried to wake her up. It was only then did Liesel realize that her friend was dead from the missing right arm and the legs that were across the room. Liesel could see them now, the blood still soaking into the ground. Nein… Liesel whispered to herself as the scene of disaster came into focus. Nein…nein…bitte…Nicht dieses...nein...bitte... Her eyes hurt as sharp tears trailed down her pale cheeks. Edmund's entire body was destroyed.

There was nothing left. Nothing but…blood. She had found Friedrich, lying unconscious against a wall. He was alive. She felt his faint breath against her fingers. But somehow…that didn't make it feel better. "Verdammt it…warum? Mein ferunde…mein kader…warum? Halten sie bitte an," she pleaded as sobs choked from her mouth. The tears pelted onto Friedrich's face, looking like himself was crying. "Bitte..." she pleaded to no one as she held her brother in her arms. "Mein bruder…" an inhuman scream tore from her throat as she stroked his hair. "Mein bruder…"

Her brother tried to defect on in the spring of 2153. It was raining that day. The rain felt cold across her cheeks as she stood standing before Friedrich as his back was turned to her. Her breath came in uneven gasps as she had attempted to chase him. Now both of them were too exhausted to do anything but stand still. Liesel tried to meet her brother's eyes, but he wouldn't even allow her to see his face. Her breath caught in her throat as she remembered the pain that each of them had gone through since the day their squad had died. The war had become even more violent and gruesome if that was possible.

Many had died. Friedrich was prone to nightmares that caused him to sheer terror and throwing up every night. His eyes became dull and he never spoke of the demons that Liesel knew haunted his dreams. The world's population had decreased to ten million by the year 2152, with most of the nations in the east completely collapsing. As such, despite being his mentally unwell-being both Friedrich was ordered onto the battlefield and condemned to more demons and living nightmares that haunted his dreams. So many soldiers had defected. The Traitor's Creed that had been passed four years ago didn't matter to anyone anymore. The hangings and the burnings of those families burned and haunted Liesel. Those that defected were often found dead, collapsing of heart failure or exposure. Liesel had thought – had prayed – that her brother wouldn't be enough of an idiot to try to defect when so much had been lost.

"Why?" Liesel stated quietly. At thought of the deaths in his wake if he should do this, uncontrollable rage shook her. "Why? Why are you doing this, Friedrich?"

"I want to see them, Liesel!" Friedrich screamed. "I don't care if I die, or if they die! I…just want to see them again!" Sobs shook from him. "Please…I want to see them again before I die a miserable death! Can't you understand?" Her brother continued to plead. "I want to go home."

"You think I don't want to home either?" Liesel screamed. "You think I don't long for my mother's arms and the park we used to run around when we were children? You think I don't know?" Warm tears leaked from her eyes. "You think I don't know what you're going through? I know the agony and despair you have, Friedrich!" Her voice shook and stumbled as she stared into her brother's helpless eyes. "Come home with me…Friedrich. Please."

"No!" Friedrich's eyes turned frightened, and she could hear his heavy breathing. "I won't live in that living nightmare! I can't die…not like they did….not like the ones in my dreams? Can't you understand? I want to go home!"

"What about our mother? Our little sister, Isabel?" Liesel shouted, her voice becoming louder and louder with each word. "You feigling! Have you thought about our mother? Our mother, who waits for us to come home? Our little Isabel? You know what happens to traitors!" A raw sob screamed from her throat. "How about them, you bastard? You selfish hurensohn!"

"I don't care!" The words were like a slap in the face. Liesel held her breath as Friedrich looked at her with eyes of those that had fallen into a despair so deep they didn't care what happened to them. "I want to go home! Everyone will die, Liesel! Can't you see! No, you can't see! You've never had a moment of weakness, not since our miserable life began!"

"Weakness?" Liesel saw red. His hands buried beneath her clothes, touching, pinching…A hand closed around her throat. "Do this for me…please…" His tear-streaked brown eyes echoed in her mind. "Please…just this once. Pleasure me. I want to be happy before I…die." His hands stroked her wherever he could reach as a scream buried in her throat. She wanted to scream. Bits from teeth and bruises were across her body. Everything hurt. Extreme pain tore through her body as he thrust into her, the pain going deep within her very core. Blood coated around her legs, around her chin as she bit through her lips from crying out. "Please…" "You asshole! You know nothing of pain! You know nothing!"

"Shut up!" Her brother shouted. The rain dripped into his eyes, making his bangs against his forehead stick. "Ever since that day, it's been nothing but horror! Hear me? Nothing but horror and death and nothingness!" His eyes became hard when he looked at her. "Don't you understand? Everyone's fucking dead! Dead, Liesel! What are we supposed to do?" His last sentence grew into a scream. "Don't you want to go home? You hündin!"

That was the wrong word to call his sister. Liesel's eyes widened before empting. "You are my bitch, aren't you?" His fingers touched her breasts, and he kissed her nose, hard. "Yes, you are my bitch!" Her formerly pained eyes held emptiness as something inside her died.

"I want to go home, but not like this." Liesel pointed her gun at her brother's forehead. "If you move, I'll shoot you. I'm...going to count to three." How was it that no emotion stirred her? Her brother…

A hysterical laugh escaped from Friedrich. It rose into the rain. "You can't shoot me! I'm your brother! Your most precious person! There's no way you can do that!"

"Watch me," Liesel stated as a cold calm came over her." Watch me…bruder."

Friedrich started to run. She could see his back moving as he ran. Eins…zwei…Suddenly his eyes turned toward hers, and she could see his face with his mouth gaped open as she aimed. ..Drei…

A shot was fired.

"Why? You…want to go home…as much as I want to." Liesel didn't say a word. She aware of the tears mixing in with the rain. "Please…don't do this…please, sister." His blue eyes bored into her own. "I want…" he sobbed, "to go home. To Mother. To little Isabel. I…want to see them before I die. Please…" he pleaded. "I want to go home and see them again…" His tears matched her own. "Can't you….understand?" Blood was seeping from his wound. She could see the red soaking his uniform. "Sister…my dear sweet brave sister…can't you understand? I want to go home…"

Why couldn't she remember what she said? All she remembered next was the blood. She could see the blood beneath him. The bullet hole in his head. His eyes, the ones identical to her own, open and staring. Liesel collapsed onto the ground, the gun splashing into a puddle of rain. Her knees became coated with mud. Her eyes, staring and as dead as her brother, could see nothing except for the body before her. "Ich werde dichimmer beschützen." A long-ago promise entered her mind. She remembered her brother, his face unmarred by war and eyes not haunted as they had been. "Ich…verspreche." Both of them ten years old. "Ich…verspreche." I will protect you always. Liesel realized what she had done. I...promise. Her face crumpled, the tears warm against her still face. Her breath, hardly existent, and sobs aching from her very being.

"FRIEDRICH!"