the gray division

So far, escape plans A through E had failed.

"And I do tell you—F will be our best performance yet!" Francis declared, posing in a look he thought was confident, desperately trying to ignore the chainlinks wrapped tightly around his waist and arms, holding him to the chair—for if he acknowledged the chains, he also acknowledged that they hindered his confidence. It wasn't a kink.

"As long as Antonio can keep his thicc ass awake enough to go through with it," Gilbert grumbled, hunching forward in his own set of chains like a disgruntled gargoyle. There was an itch on his nose that he would have killed to scratch. His wrists were already rubbed red.

"Wh...what?" Antonio yawned. He had been caught in the act, and immediately straightened up as much as he could in the chains when he saw the dead gaze Francis and Gilbert were giving him. "Oh. Heh. What can I say? It is siesta time!" He paused. "I think."

Francis nodded towards Gilbert, his unwashed blond coiffure plopping sadly onto his shoulder. "What day is it, again?"

Gilbert scrunched up his brow in intense concentration. "Well, judging from the angle of the lightbulb light onto the linoleum and the smell of your breath, I would estimate roughly that I have absolutely no idea."

After a beat of silence (silence didn't survive for long when these three were together) Antonio perked up. "We can just wait until he comes back with food and maybe he will tell us! Or maybe he will not, probably not, but we can judge from the course of meal!"

"Non, you forget; that is when we must escape!" Francis tilted his gorgeous head back at Antonio in pity. "It is obvious you think he has the—how you say—the sexy, my friend."

"Whatever it is," Gilbert jeered to both of them, "he sure has a lot of it. But let's focus on getting out of this dump first. Ya think they have cameras by those old refrigerators? Nein, more important: ya think they have beer?"

Before any of them could offer up an answer, logic-based or not, the door slammed open. A dark shadow appeared in the threshold. The three prisoners immediately flinched back. Antonio whimpered.

"You shithead assbutt failures of FBI better shut up the fuckeroni," the figure warned, "or I will gag you with a zucchini!"

Agent Ludwig Beilschmidt was an FBI officer for all the right reasons: his university grades were top-notch, he was self-confident, he had three dogs, and he had never been in love. He just knew he was the one that would defeat the Mafia and save Gilbert and Francis and Antonio but most importantly Gilbert—he had to be. However, the journey to do as such would put all of Ludwig and all of his reasonings to the test.

The day Feliciano Vargas was brought into the local police station was a real scorcher. Hotter than the last, even, and it bothered Ludwig's German climate-tempered body, but not Feliciano's. The man wore a cute polo shirt, bright red shorts, and a carefree smile that he occasionally turned at Ludwig in a villainous attempt to make Ludwig feel hotter. Feliciano didn't seem to be anxious that he was one warrant away from handcuffs, but then again, he didn't know the extent of the information Ludwig and Chief Elizabeta Héderváry had piled on him. He had met Ludwig before, when Ludwig had eventually approached him at his little produce market corner store, but was seemingly oblivious about just how long Ludwig had been watching him. "Wow, the weather feels just like home!" he was saying, spinning around before they opened the doors. "I do not want to go inside!" Ludwig's eye twitched. However on-edge he was now, though, was nothing compared to how perturbed he would become.

Chief Héderváry held open the door for them and began sly casual small talk—the foreplay of the interview. "You come from Italy, right?"

Feliciano nodded vehemently, that one little sienna curl of his bouncing. "Yes! I moved in college, and—wait, do I need a lawyer to talk?"

They entered the interview room and took their seats, Ludwig and Feliciano on one side of the small table and Héderváry on the other. "Not if you don't want one," she informed him. "You are not under arrest." Not yet, Ludwig thought.

"Oh, good," the Italian sighed. "I can't afford one."

Ludwig and Héderváry made awkward eye contact at that statement. Are you gonna tell him or…

"Do I also have the, 'the right to remain silent?'" Feliciano inquired.

Ludwig turned to him. "You can always choose to remain—"

"Because I will probably not use it," he continued with a simper. "I am not very good at staying quiet. I get told this a lot."

Héderváry cleared her throat. "Well, glad that's established. Easier for us, I suppose. So, Feliciano, will you tell us more about yourself? Specifically"—she leaned forward suddenly—"exactly where you were last Tuesday morning?"

Feliciano blinked. "Um." He glanced at Ludwig for help. "Ludwig, was Tuesday the day you came?"

"Yes," Ludwig answered on instinct. Then he shook his head wildly. Feliciano wasn't supposed to know Ludwig had been spying on him on Tuesday. Communicating with him had been so much easier when Ludwig would just watch and didn't have to talk. "Nein—I mean, No—I mean—"

Feliciano raised his eyebrows somewhat...playfully. "Oh, really? Wow, I thought it was Wednesday!"

Ludwig blinked this time. "Um. It was Wednesday. That is what I meant to say. Not Tuesday."

"Hm. Well, then, I think that on Tuesday morning I was at home at my apartment," Feliciano clarified. "I work in the afternoon, you know? So I like to sleep late. I like to sleep. I love to sleep." He was grinning at Ludwig, all handsome and proud of himself, and Ludwig finally looked away in shame.

Héderváry nodded. She already knew all about Feliciano's whereabouts due to Ludwig's 'expert' reporting skills. "I understand you sell local produce at your market."

"Yes! Blueberries and tomatoes and watermelons sometimes and zucchini and strawberries and cucumber and peaches—I like peaches—and corn—there is so much corn in America!—and potatoes and tomatoes and onion and—"

"That's great, honey, that is quite a lot." Héderváry was writing quickly on a clipboard held out of view. This could have been a fake distraction and intimidation tactic, but for all they knew she was drafting a grocery list based on Feliciano's speech. "Please continue to describe your morning."

Ludwig knew this: once you got over the annoying part, Feliciano's voice was quite mesmerizing. The pleasantness of his lips could have been a trap, but whatever the case, Ludwig found himself watching and listening contently as he often did, as Feliciano described how he had had brunch that Tuesday. The letting-down of Ludwig's guard would soon become a major mistake.

"...And I had the tomatoes in a bag but then I found out one got squashed so we had to divide up the recipe and I could not figure out the math—"

"'We?'" Héderváry interrupted without missing a beat. "Who is 'we?'"

Feliciano stared blankly. "What? Oh, I mean just me. I live alone. So far. Anyway, I am pretty good at math if I try hard but I do not like to try hard for most things so I looked around for a calculator and when I was looking under the desk I hit my head on the chair and it hurt so very bad, very bad, and I ran to the freezer to get something cold to put on it and then I saw that in the freezer there was meat! And I forgot I had meat and so I said to myself maybe I should put meat in the recipe too so I can grow strong like you, Ludwig!" This was when Feliciano turned to Ludwig, and when Ludwig felt something touch his leg under the table. Confused, Ludwig looked at Feliciano. He was waving his left hand around in the air, gesticulating to nothing in particular, but Ludwig could not see his right hand. Which meant…

He gulped. This was it. Feliciano blabbered on, but his hand was still resting there. On Ludwig's thigh.

The effect was instantaneous. Ludwig sat up like his spine had been replaced with a wooden board. He cleared his throat but didn't move or speak or look anywhere except directly at the wall over the Chief's head. No one noticed his ears grow a humiliating shade of pink. Feliciano's hand was warm. And it was still there. Touching him. Over his dress pants, but touching him. Just resting there like it was nothing; like it belonged there. What if Ludwig had to cough or itch? Or say something? How was he supposed to move?

"...so I took out the meat and put it on my head, and soon I felt better and I could do math! And I did the math and then the meat started getting very warm and…"

How dare the stupid Italian just continue on completely unfazed? What if he had simply mistaken Ludwig's leg for his chair armrest? Did these chairs have armrests? Ludwig had forgotten and at this point was too afraid to check. What if Feliciano moved? What would Ludwig do then? He tried to ignore it, tried to keep listening and be professional and not think about the twisting in his stomach.

"...it was benissimo!"

Héderváry had abandoned note-taking. She looked incredibly bored. "So. You are saying you could not have been at the scene of the crime because you were busy making lunch."

"Yes!"

Then she began to smile as sweet and sly as Feliciano, almost as if she pitied him. "Cute story, bro, but you realize that this is not sufficient evidence for an alibi."

Feliciano's lips fell to a frown. "What? No, I said I gave up and just borrowed a tomato from my neighbor! She saw me!" He turned to Ludwig again, and the pressure on Ludwig's thigh grew just small enough for it to not matter but just large enough for Ludwig to notice. "The pretty lady was not listening?"

"I. I thought I remember you said y-you were short a tomato." Ludwig made sure not to look at him.

"Yes, so I borrowed one when I realized my math was wrong!" Feliciano finally, finally, let Ludwig go by throwing both his hands in the air in the most distress he had shown yet. He pouted. "Did anyone listen?"

The Chief rubbed her eyes. "Well, luckily, we don't have to." She gave a firm pat to the recording box on the table. "So now, let's get to the real evidence. I will repeat to you the story."

As Feliciano recovered, Ludwig glanced quickly at their seats. There were no armrests. He silenced his mind and tried to refocus.

"It was discovered that early Tuesday morning, sometime between twelve and six—or five and seven if we want to be realistic about Francis's schedule—an individual was possibly abducted in the Downtown area on his way to work. We have no evidence but the individual's failure to arrive at work, his subsequent failure to arrive anywhere, a possible connection with other disappearances around town related to the individual, and now, one witness testimony." Héderváry reached into her bag and extracted a file folder. She and Ludwig had poured their hearts into this. It looked so thin and stupid now when Feliciano was here staring at it with his wide, beautiful eyes. She opened it, and a few informative sheets of paper slid out, along with the police sketch. "The witness describes hearing sounds of a struggle from an alleyway, and a minute later seeing a darkly-dressed young man dash around the corner holding a weapon of some sort in his right hand. This man is confirmed by description to not be the victim. The witness remained unseen but heard a squeal of nearby tires on pavement, prompting them to move away from the scene for fear of their own safety. They describe all of this happening at around just before six o'clock in the morning, at a time when you claim you were asleep. We do not know what happened after. The—"

But Feliciano was still staring at the file. More specifically, the sketch. He tilted his head and asked abruptly, "That drawing is supposed to be me?"

Ludwig, frustrated, snatched up the portrait. "Er, yes. It was done by witness description by an artist at the police station."

Feliciano let loose a peal of laughter. "It looks nothing like me!"

Ludwig grumbled to himself in indignation. With Feliciano right here, sure, it was easier to point out the mistakes in the likeness. Although the sketch was good and did resemble him, there were differences, namely the shading of the hair, the eyes, and the tightness in the jaw. Not to mention the absolutely murderous expression that Ludwig doubted would flatter Feliciano Vargas. The man in the sketch looked older, and more like a relative of Feliciano than Feliciano. Perhaps...a brother.

"And I would never wear black, especially in the morning," the Italian commented with a dismissive wave. "Black is out. Do you have a pencil and paper I could borrow? I can prove this is not me."

Héderváry and Ludwig glanced at each other. Ludwig wasn't sure what to do until something passed over the Chief's expression and she smoothed it over with calm decisiveness. "Of course," she mused, offering Feliciano items from her bag to use. "Here, sweetie."

"Thank you!" Feliciano smiled at her and swiped the paper across the table to rest in front of him, next to the police sketch. He stared at it for a second before picking up the pencil. Ludwig understood as Feliciano began to trace an outline—he was using his left hand. The police report and witness testimony specifically stated that the criminal had held the weapon with his right.

Slowly, Ludwig's stomach began to settle. He became more and more assured with every stoke of the pencil Feliciano made on the paper. He knew Feliciano was a phenomenal artist; back during the few weeks he had watched Feliciano through his phone, he had seen some of the pictures Feliciano had taken of his art. Now, watching live as Feliciano highlighted every difference between his self-portrait and the police sketch—Ludwig hadn't even noticed that the curly parts of their hair were on opposite sides—it became more and more obvious that Feliciano wasn't the culprit. Or he was just doing a good job of making them look like fools. Ludwig wasn't sure what to believe anymore.

"Do you like?" Feliciano said when done, holding up his paper. It was just as quick and rough as the police sketch, but was as accurate to Feliciano as a real photograph.

"Wow. How much time do you spend looking in mirrors?" Héderváry giggled, taking the two papers to study them closely. "You know, police sketches are never perfect…"

"And what do you think, Ludwig?" Feliciano asked, bumping his head against Ludwig's shoulder like a cat begging for affection.

Ludwig would have been lying to himself if he said he didn't have some affection for Feliciano at this point, but that was supposed to mean nothing. Feliciano was a suspected criminal who had Ludwig squirming in his seat. Ludwig wanted to move this along faster and be done. He felt like Feliciano was humiliating all their work and research. "I agree with Chief Héderváry," he stated, cold and calculated. "Police sketches are not perfect, but the one we have looks close enough to you to remain relevant. So, now, tell me." He met Feliciano's eyes without blushing and shirking away this time. "What do you know about the Italian Mafia?"

"Agent Beilschmidt, let's leave the questions to me," Héderváry chided, but Ludwig was fired up. Feliciano's face had gone white.

"Have you any connection with the organization?" Ludwig pressed, leaning forward. "Why did you really come to Washington?"

"Beilschmidt, this isn't—"

"I told you already," Feliciano responded. He was looking down, refusing to meet Ludwig's gaze. "I came for college. I would never be in the—the Mafia, even back in Italy. I would never want to hurt anyone."

"And what about your family, hm?" Ludwig narrowed his eyes. "Your grandfather and brother? Back in Italy? Are they in the Mafia?"

Feliciano's head shot back up, his eyes meeting Ludwig's in a flash. "How do you know I have a grandpa and brother? I did not tell you this!"

"Enough." Héderváry slammed a hand on the table. The conversation halted instantly. "This has gone from amusing sexual tension to blatant and ridiculous prejudice. We're not getting anywhere. I want to research more before we waste the rest of this man's day." She gestured at Feliciano. "See if his alibi stands. After all, Officer Williams did remind us that the Mafia thing was all speculation."

"But Gilbert…" Ludwig mumbled, at a sudden loss.

Feliciano scooted back in his chair, creating a loud squeak noise across the floor. "Does this mean we are done?"

Héderváry crossed her arms. "No. You're not off the hook. Of course you're aware by now that monitoring you was and is Ludwig's purpose; I'd like to have Ludwig keep visiting you, Feliciano." She didn't mention anything about the broken phone.

Feliciano strangely didn't acknowledge what he had thought Ludwig's "purpose" was. He didn't say anything. His expression was, for once, unreadable, and it made Ludwig highly concerned. Until Feliciano replaced it with his usual bright smile and chirped out an "Okay!" This made Ludwig even more concerned.

"Okay?" Héderváry smiled back, standing to gather her things. "This investigation is far from over, but for now, yes, we are done." She gave Feliciano's self-portrait one last bewildered glance. "And by the way, thanks for this."

Everyone stood. The two shook hands in a quite chummy fashion for an interrogation, and then Feliciano and Ludwig shook hands. Feliciano had a limp fish sort of handshake, but Ludwig didn't want to let go out of awkward determination. "We will get to the bottom of this," he said, trying to keep up a menacing, yet professional tone.

Feliciano snatched his hand back and had the audacity to do his cute little giggle-grin thing. "Don't worry! I am sure everything will come out on top!"

Ludwig closed down his embarrassment and opened the room's door. "You are free to go, for now."

Inside Agent Ludwig Beilschmidt's head there was chaos. The stupid Italian wouldn't stop sending out mixed signals—why? Why did Feliciano do this? Why did he sit here looking so good and sweet and touch people's legs under tables and talk for fifteen minutes about the excruciating process of last week's lunch while being interviewed for a possible connection with one of the most infamous criminal organizations in the world? And why did Ludwig deep down want so badly for him to be innocent?

Gray division Chief Elizabeta Héderváry knew why. She shook her head to herself and walked out of the room, following the others, but beginning to question her own place. She and Ludwig couldn't run the gray division themselves for forever, and the more Gilbert, Francis and Antonio were gone, the more she felt herself doubtful that they would come back. She didn't even want to think about whatever shit was going down in the black division.

Feliciano Vargas, as often, tried to stay happy and positive. Just before leaving, he turned to Ludwig and gave his complete absolute most sincerest of winks. "I can't wait to see you again!"

"I can't wait to get rid of you!" Lovino Vargas screamed, halfway across the city in a rotting cellar to three chained-up idiots. He had had enough of this, but was in too deep to quit now. They were FBI, though they didn't act like it.

"I just wanted to know what time it is," Antonio whimpered. "So we could escape."

"You weren't supposed to tell him that!" Gilbert whispered, as if Lovino couldn't hear him. "Remember the plan!"

"Ah, yes, the plan!" Antonio sat up and put on a fake smile. "Mr. Vargas, it is really dirty in here, and we were wondering if you could let Gilbert loose to clean up a little, and we promise he won't do anythin—"

"Oh, save it." Vargas held up a hand that couldn't be bothered.

"Non, non, non!" Francis hissed, leaning forward to reach Antonio's ear. "You were supposed to seduce him first, Toni!"

Lovino glared, his hands on his hips. "As if. There will be no seducing here, you perverts. At least not while it's so dirty."

Antonio was stressed. "And, and that is why you should let Gilbert clean!"

Lovino stared at him. "Guess what? No!"

The three FBI agents sat back in their chairs, defeated. Francis sighed dramatically. "At least give me a shower, then. Douche."

Lovino wheeled on him, insulted. "Not with that attitude! Watch your mouth, you fucking bastard child of a baguette."

"Can we just have our food, then?" Gilbert whined. "The food is the only good thing about being locked up with no memory or reason why I got here. Still the last thing I remember is getting my arm stuck in the bowling ball return, and frankly, that is not a very manly memory."

"No it is not," Francis ruminated.

"Shut up, you douche."

Lovino's frown turned into a snarl. "Oh yeah? It is just as bad for you as it is for me, assholes! Having to deal with you. Ugh. I am starting to wonder why I go along with this whole scheme."

Antonio, in a moment of divine realization, tried to pry more information out of that distracted philosophical statement. "And...why is that?"

Their eyes met. "Because life is stupid, dipcunt!" Vargas sassed. "Now close your dumb mouth and eat your dumb spaghetti!"

Antonio looked sad. "But I cannot eat with a closed mouth."

Lovino looked into the camera like he was on The Office.

paparazzi - gaga

AIGHT Y'ALL THERE'S THE RUB WOOO DO WE HAVE ANY THEORIES YET? BECAUSE I'M ACTUALLY PLOTTING OUT SOME THINGS NOW YAYy hah fun

ALSO VERY IMPORTANT BECAUSE HERE'S SOMETHING WE DO HAVE: ART! YES THAT'S RIGHT FOLKS, YOU HEARD ME, WE HAVE ART, TRUE AND VALID!

VISIT MY TUMBLR PAGE, rebels-advocate, TO SEE THE WONDERFUL GLORIOUS FABULOUS DRAWINGS BY derevosky (derevoskymusor on tumblr) AND marine-wvs (on tumblr)! GIVE THEM LOTS OF LOVE!

Still reeling from this guys I'm so happy you're all here. I would not have made it near this far without you and we're still on chapter 6 lol.