Germany kicks some ass.

Warning: Violence, gore, fight scene, weapons, sad stuff, GerIta.

Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN HETALIA. I have fun manipulating their characters, though

"The world is not dangerous because of those who do harm but because of those who look at it without doing anything."

—Albert Einstein

Voices

Ludwig wished with everything in him that he could speak to Feliciano. He could if he really wanted; just press his fingers to his earpiece and say the name he'd wanted to say aloud since they had departed the bunker. But he could not. The tunnels would echo his voice and render the guise of his black uniform useless.

He knew where the Italian was, but not knowing where he would be was agonizing. Feliciano's tendency to distraction hovered stark in Ludwig's mind. He knew Red had meant well by splitting them up—as surely all he would worry about was Feliciano and only him if he was closer—and Feliciano was in a relatively docile part of the tunnels, but Ludwig hadn't received so much as a semblance of understanding from Red. The girl was fatigued and had other things on her mind, to be sure, but even when confronted with an account of Feliciano's habits, she had practically brushed the issue off.

"Feli will be safe with me," Red assured with a brusque nod even as Ludwig stared with persisting unease. "It's pretty tame where we're headed. He'll also have an earpiece and his own guard. He won't get lost easily, I assure you."

Ludwig would have insisted on changing the plan to suit Feliciano's safety, but Red's eyes had lowered to the map of the sewer system and so did not see him open his mouth to speak.

"Now, Team Charlie…"

It had been a miracle that Ludwig could listen to the rest of the plan for his worrying. He knew his concern was beginning to gnaw at his wits whenever his eyes returned to the table after several glances in Feliciano's direction to see Arthur fixing him with an exasperated stare. From then on, Ludwig had listened intently to everything 'Checkmate' entailed, but though he listened, Feliciano's name would slip into one of Red's sentences and he would have to quickly backtrack to understand, all the while longing to confirm that Feliciano was all right.

Of course he is all right, Ludwig mused as he paced back and forth as the plan called for, trying his best not to wring his gloved hands that slid, sweaty, in the leather. He's as perceptive as a gnat. But even as he thought this and many similar things, Ludwig knew it was false. He knew, as soon as he'd witnessed Feliciano crying in the bunker from the voices, that the man was not oblivious at all to what was going on around them and what may happen. The Overlord had made sure of that.

Just the thought of the man made Ludwig's muscles bunch as if the Overlord was standing before him, smiling like the German knew he would, and he was going to give the bastard's face a permanent imprint of his knuckles. There was no doubt that Feliciano—sweet, innocent Feliciano who had himself barely done harm to anyone, not even known how—was being targeted simply because he was quite possibly one of the last pure things in the world. And, if the Overlord's past actions could attest, he sought to sully whatever he knew he could never be. Such purity was dangerous; it lay outside the reach of his power, he couldn't control it. And what the Overlord couldn't control must be destroyed without a trace. Breaking down Feliciano's fragile mind was only the first step on a staircase that spiraled into Hell, and at any time the Overlord's impatience could grow to the extent that Feliciano may be pushed down to arrive broken and unsalvageable at the bottom. It was one thing to impose tyranny upon a world that was too fractured to wholly agree or fight back, but it was a whole other matter to specifically target someone who had no burning desire to directly oppose the Organization, who had barely opposed anyone without crying. It was cruel, it went against the very morals of humanity.

Then again, what was humanity anymore?

The question kept resurfacing in his mind, becoming ever more prominent with each Organization soldier that passed him, all blank stares and assembly-line strides. He fought to control his temper as another marched by, as if a wound-up figurine bound for a place its owner had directed it to. And the man walked on without question or complaint, just as a mindless toy would.

Ludwig decided to go over the plan in his head to keep his mind off of Feliciano. After all, Red knew the tunnels, had been living in them for longer than any of them had. Surely she would know how to keep Feliciano out of trouble.

He was on his fourth recitation when he heard it, loud as a knife in his ear: the sound of far-off gunfire. The wind-up toys began to swarm a minute after, interspersed with traitors.

As soon as Ludwig saw the first flash of red, he entered a state where he no longer thought, just did. His trained body had flipped the switch, jumped into the cockpit, and taken the yoke in a matter of a few seconds. He blinked once, and his knife was in his hand, turning with arm extended to catch an unsuspecting soldier in the chest. He watched with cold eyes that sought to provoke passion in their counterparts. But the man only stared at him, as if a walking corpse, and then he dropped down to the stained cement floor, the rest of him dying as his mind had months before. Ludwig stooped to wrench his knife free with renewed disgust. He and his fellow nations had worked so hard to build society, and now it had been obliterated and the people who had once lived within it were now nothing more than instinct-driven animals. So much had been undone.

Ludwig was in a haze as he fought his way to the convergence of the tunnels, anxious to see if Arthur had made it. Several soldiers met him along the way, some struck down by his personal guard and others dispatched by him alone. No matter the numbers, the men were still the same: distant looks, expressionless, rushing at him more out of necessity than a desire to kill him. He gladly met them, putting them down and further drenching his knife with red. After a time, their hollow faces unnerved him. Desperate to see at least a drop of feeling from the men who looked so much like himself, Ludwig kicked one in the shin and snatched him up by his hair when he started to wobble.

"I'm about to kill you," he practically shouted, "give me something!"

The man kept his gaze forward, looking past Ludwig into the fighting behind, hanging limp, as if having had given up since the start of his conditioning, waiting to die. Frustrated, Ludwig snapped the soldier's head back and plunged his blade through one of the empty eyes. He felt warm, thick drops coat his face.

"There," he spat, feeling the soldier's muscles slowly relax with death, "now you truly can't see anything."

He let the man's boneless body fall to the floor in a heap, the dark pool of blood collecting in his eye spilling over across the bridge of the his crooked nose. And yet, despite seeing the corpse of their comrade more kept coming, as if they couldn't stop themselves. Once, Ludwig's foot caught on a body and he stumbled long enough for one of the soldiers to deal him a jab to the side, just past his rib-cage. As soon as Ludwig's legs regained stability, the soldier sent the knife slicing through the air at him again, but the German caught the arm holding it, twisting until there was a satisfactory pop in the man's wrist. Ludwig was appalled to see not an ounce of reaction, not even retaliation, just the same old stare that underneath begged Ludwig to finish him off. And Ludwig did s with a startling enlightenment.

They couldn't stop themselves. These men were trapped in their own bodies, slaves to the Overlord's wishes. Ludwig didn't know how, but the Overlord could control their minds, perhaps inflict them with the same painful voices that were plaguing Feliciano. The Overlord conditioned them to submit at the first blow, because then they were rendered imperfect, weak. They would be replaced with newer, better models. Ludwig felt like throwing up.

By then, Ludwig had spotted Arthur, engaged in a confrontation with an opposition soldier as the Resistance and Organization had it out around him, the Briton absorbed in creating an absolute decimation of his victim's body. In and out, the blade drove, in and out, an erratic rhythm, sometimes aimed for the sake of anger and sometimes to be readjusted, as if Arthur had only then remembered that he had others to fight instead of the one he was stabbing. Ludwig pushed through the melee, knives grazing, limbs striking out at all sides, from every angle, only then realizing that the man Arthur was holding had been long dead.

He approached cautiously, but even then Arthur nearly gutted him in his anger. Ludwig had no time to fully address Arthur's hate-clouded state of mind, and he felt he had no place to as his own was very much the same. He reminded Arthur of their mission, at the same time reminding himself, noticing that what was left of the Organization forces was dashing down the tunnels. Something was up, and Ludwig had a good idea what.

He relayed to Arthur his suspicion that the opposing troops had been called upon to regroup deeper within the tunnels. He suggested they split up to come at the gathering force from both sides, feeling the need to reiterate what they were here for. But no matter what he said, that spark of blinding hate still remained in Arthur's eyes, and, as the Briton made his way toward one of the tunnels, Ludwig wondered if he himself possessed the same spark.

Not having the time to contemplate, Ludwig located Shawn, who was leaning over one of the fallen Resistance soldiers. The man was dying, lungs rattling with blood, only the handle of the knife shoved into his chest visible, so deep was the blade embedded. Shawn was crouched beside him, holding his hand as the man trembled. As Ludwig got closer, he realized that the soldier was just a boy, no more than eighteen.

"It's all right," Shawn reassured in a low tone. It seemed to bring the boy comfort even as he observed Shawn's vest, which was covered with blood, similar to his own still leaking out of his body. "It won't hurt for much longer."

The boy's eyes were red and swimming. "Please. P-please, help my sister. She's in the—"—he paused here to cough up a dark glut of blood—"i-in the Women's Sector, p-part of the… the Expansion Program. Please. She's just thirteen."

Shawn nodded and said, "We will. She'll be safe."

But the boy continued to fret, dropping his head to the side, cheek pressed against the cold, blood-stained floor, staring into one of the tunnels as if he could see her standing there. "Sh-she has no one. Mom d-died, and… and I missed her b-birthday." Tears spilled over, cutting through the blood on the boy's face. "She should be fourteen now." He would have sobbed if his lungs had let him, too constrained by fluid to allow him the mercy.

Shawn didn't say anything more; he and Ludwig both knew the boy was nearing his last breath. "Liddy… Lidia. H-her name…" But then every muscle gave in, the chest constricting with a trembling breath, making it appear as if it were being sucked in. A long, feathery sigh later, and he was gone.

Shawn took a deep breath and placed the boy's hand on his chest, just below the knife that had killed him, before rising and meeting Ludwig's gaze.

"I am going to pursue the retreating forces," the German informed without pause. Time could make or break them now. "You will stay here and kill any Organization man who tries to enter the tunnel."

Shawn dipped his head somberly. "Will do."

Ludwig turned away and took two steps toward the tunnel adjacent to the one Arthur had chosen to go down when Shawn said, "His name was Leighton."

Guilt stabbed him at Shawn's words, as if the man was accusing him of neglecting to address the death of one of their own soldiers. But Shawn's tone was not bitter; it was expectant.

"Leighton," Ludwig repeated, a promise, before continuing on.

Boots scuffed against concrete, a dozen men at his heels, ready to defend, and Ludwig was willing to accept their guardianship if only he could be at the head of the group. It was only then that Ludwig realized his earpiece had been humming away for quite some time. Explosions burst around him, some distant, some close, to the extent that Ludwig felt as if he were playing a game of Five Finger Filet. One in particular blasted in a tunnel adjacent—the one Arthur had chosen—and Ludwig hoped that the Briton had vacated long before as his own tunnel rocked and cracked from the force, bits of concrete spilling down from the ceiling. Then Ludwig heard his name through the earpiece.

"Ludwig, lead your forces down the next tunnel, quickly!"

Ludwig did so but not quickly enough; he had barely run a few steps before he was upended, violently somersaulting beneath a rain of rock and dust and stifling heat. He stopped rolling when he ran into one of the curving side walls, aching and bruised, eyes red with dust, hacking with it. He used the wall to help himself to his feet, waiting for the dust to clear before he confirmed, with great shame and sorrow, that all of his force had been taken out by the blast and those that had survived it by the falling rubble. Ludwig hadn't been that far ahead, and sure enough he saw that one man was wriggling at the foot of the pile. The German rushed over, observing limp arms and legs alike jutting out from between the jagged slabs of concrete. Sickened, but not deterred, he crouched down.

"M-my legs," the man whimpered. "They're stuck." He held out his arms. Ludwig took them and pulled with all his might, but the rocks refused to budge. The soldier began to hyperventilate, but even then he flashed a desperate look toward Ludwig and said, "Go. This will take you too long, and even if I do get out my legs will be useless."

Ludwig shook his head, wanting with everything in him—everything he knew that was right—to remain with the soldier that had vowed to protect him but also knowing that such insistence would put the whole plan and his fellow nations in jeopardy. He had, after all, made a promise.

"I'm sorry," were his parting words.

As Ludwig jogged with great discomfort down the tunnel he listened keenly to the earpiece, not to hear when he would have to make turns to avoid being blown up by defenses, but mostly to hear Feliciano's name. He hadn't so far, which could either be a good or bad thing. Then again, the blast could have drowned out the Italian's name from his hearing entirely.

Ludwig's legs burned, still shaky and aching from their tumble, and he knew that it would be in his best interest to stop and recover, but then there was the terrific sound of a blast sending an entire tunnel collapsing, and with word of Matthew's disappearance supposedly behind (or, in the most unfortunate circumstances, beneath) the rubble that had fallen Ludwig was running faster than he had been, the image of those arms and legs sticking out from between the rocks providing the fuel to his legs. Expansion Center, Expansion Center, he kept thinking, even as he was contemplating the possibility of Matthew's death and how that could affect the plan, even as he knew Matthew could still be alive, waiting for a rescuer, expecting one, desperate for one, Ludwig included on the list potential saviors. He took a deep breath and kept on going while the world fell down around him.

As much as he knew he needed to continue, Ludwig also knew continuing to the point that he arrived in such a weakened state he couldn't properly function would be in no way helpful, so he located a tunnel that seemed to be already damaged from an explosion (ensuring, hopefully, that no other defenses would go off within it) and entered, sliding down the wall to rest on the floor, legs splayed and chest heaving. After he managed to regain his breath, Ludwig bent down, pain screaming up his back, to gingerly roll up his black pant legs, seeing an equal amount of black beneath. He was more battered than he'd originally thought.

Disappointed in himself but not discouraged, Ludwig concluded his rest and placed a hand against the wall to help his ascent, legs wobbly and sore with protest after relaxing for a time. It took Ludwig nearly a full minute to convince his limbs to function how they should, at the end of which he noticed black boots standing before him, a yard or so away, and his eyes trailed upward, over puffy black pants, black vest and turtleneck, to the gun pointed at him with leather-bound hands, up the black-clad arms, and to a face surrounded by messy, flyaway brown hair.

The smirk on that face was overly wide, as if it didn't fit, and Shawn said, "I thought I would never find you."

No translations

A Word From the Writer: So, don't freak out if you see no 'Next' button. It's not a trick of the eyes, it's just me having procrastinated on this and on my school work, and school work ultimately comes before Hetalia, so... I don't like it, but there it is. I only managed to get this chapter done for now, but I won't leave you hanging! The next chapter will (hopefully) be posted Sunday. As for this chapter... Germany gets all violent and shit. Awesome. But it seems like everyone is running into problems at the end of each chapter: Russia got fried, England's knocked out from a wtf fall through the floor, France doesn't know what to do since Todd is gone, China has been taken captive, and Germany here has been confronted with a turncoat. Oh yeah, and we mustn't forget that Matthew and Alfred have gone MIA. Could it get any worse? Well, of course!

Until tomorrow~! :D