"Well, you can't expect all babies to be the same, especially since they're not related by blood.", Wendy said. "I know... but something's bugging me... every time I see her with that wolf...", Carl admitted as he bit his lip.
Wendy replied, "We don't know how long she had been with that kidnapper, so it's possible that she saw wolves in a zoo or something. After all, her parents would have as well took her to one of the New York zoos as there's wolves there.".
"Yeah... I know... it just... I don't know, just... that moment... it seemed so real. Like it wasn't a hallucination or anything. And then how Susan was acting... no fear.", Carl obviously couldn't shake that something was off with the whole situation; though it was doubtful he'd ever get any more information. He hadn't seen that agent since the moment they parted ways, and he knew he'd probably never find that man.
"Maybe you're just overthinking it again...", Wendy gently rubbed his leg. Carl nodded, "I suppose I am, but I can't help it. After all, it isn't every day we find a kidnapped baby in a forest, and now, look at her...She's somehow brave with the wolf stuffy yet without it, she's shy for a bit before she gets used to strangers, and she hadn't even undergone a nightmare unlike Tara...".
Wendy sighed, "How was we supposed to know that she saw a bad part of the Halloween movie we were watching the day before? I had to reassure her that werewolves weren't scary, well, when they are human, at least.".
"Well, depends on the story.", Carl chuckled. "But we are not going to watch An American Werewolf in London again while she's in the house.".
"I hear that. I'm just glad she didn't see the transformation part. She'd probably wouldn't stop screaming for weeks.", Wendy shook her head as she kissed Carl's cheek. "It'll be alright, we have Tara, we have Susan, and that's all that matters.".
Carl smiled, "Yep. And Tara is already trying to be the best sister to Susan, it's really sweet. Boy, can you imagine Susan's face when she finds out that she has to wait for pre-school, kindergarten and so on as Tara is older than her by a year and half?".
Wendy chuckled, "Ah, that would be something to see, but you have to admit that we won't have empty nest syndrome with Susan in the house.", with a smile.
"At least until she starts too, then I don't know what you'll do.", Carl teased as he kissed Wendy's cheek. "Carl!", Wendy playfully slapped his shoulder.
Susan giggled as she kept trying to stand, bouncing a little, determined yet watching Carl and Wendy with fondness and growing love...Yet for a moment or two, she saw her parents in place of them, giving her proud and tender smiles, with small, sad tears in her mummy's eyes.
Having hated to see her mummy cry if there's something sad, she instinctually started to cry, missing her parents, "Muma, Dada...".
Both Carl and Wendy turned back to look at her, completely shocked to hear what she just said. "Did she just call us...?", Carl pointed to himself.
Susan shook her body in a 'no', as she cried out, "Susu Muma Dada!", squeezing her wolf stuffy. Wendy replied, "Carl...I think she means her parents...I mean, in the documents, her mom was from Britain before she moved here and met her husband in New York City...", before leaning down, shushing Susan, caressing her hair, "Do you miss your mummy and daddy?".
Susan squeezed Wolfy as she was trying to tell them yes. Wendy gently brushed the young girl's hair, "It's alright, Susan... it's okay to miss them... you still know we're not your real ones... but we love you all the same.".
Susan looked up at her with tearful eyes, "M-Mama, Papa?", and Wendy smiled, "That's right. You can call us Mama and Papa. After all, your parents deserve to keep being called Muma and Dada...They loved you, honey...You might forget about them over time, but we will try to tell as much as we can when you want to find out about them...".
Carl joined her, smiled with a nod, "That's right, sweetheart. After all, you will have questions when you look at yourself in the mirror, and of course, us.", and Susan blinked, trying to understand before giving a gummy smile, "Mama, Papa!".
"There we go.", Carl smiled as Susan seemed to be happy again. "Come on, let's get you into the crib, you're probably tired from trying to stand there before.".
Susan rubbed her eyes, yawning, and Wendy chuckled, picking her up, "Let's go, sleepyhead.", and the small family headed to the nursery room, having been a guest bedroom before, as Tara has her own bedroom, and of course, the master bedroom.
Carl tuckered her in while Wendy smiled as she adjusted Wolfy in the corner of the crib, "Sweet dreams, darling.", kissing her forehead, and Carl nodded as he kissed her on the temple, "Yeah. Sleep tight, Susie-V.".
Susan smiled, yawning, and blinked sleepily as for a moment again, she saw her parents next to Carl and Wendy, looking happier with her mummy smiling with no tears, and her daddy holding her mummy in his arms, kissing her forehead as they held hands. Susan babbled quietly as she fell asleep, feeling better with both sets of parents watching over her.
"Come on, let's enjoy some time together before she or Tara wake back up.", Carl chuckled as he kissed Wendy's neck.
Wendy giggled softly, "You read my mind, rascal.", as they quietly left the nursery bedroom, closing the door tight, heading for the bedroom, unknowing that Steve and Peggy had watched Susan almost for the whole interaction.
Back in the other Earth, Peggy exhaled shakily as she watched Susan dream, "She saw us somehow...", and Steve sighed, "Maybe, maybe not...After all, she could think it was her imagination bringing up a memory or something...I mean, would you worry if you are getting crazy if you were her in her place? She's growing up already...".
Peggy nodded, "I know. I hope that at least she'll still somewhat remember us, but at least will tell the difference, I don't want anyone to think she's crazy.".
Steve kissed Peggy on the cheek, "She'll be alright, Carl and Wendy there seem like very good people; as good as we possibly could be for her.".
"At least with how she is now... not so sure they could handle her if she was our sense of normal.", Peggy joked.
Steve chuckled, "Now I can believe that, but all the same, Carl and Wendy are giving her the love she needs...One thing for sure, we will be sure to watch over her, to tell her that we never lost a chance to see her grow up, to say her first words...and dare I say, everything else...I mean, she's almost a year old already, and we have been watching her for six weeks already...It's like six months has passed for them...".
Peggy exhaled slowly, "That means seeing her go to school, to eat solids, to play sports, to grow older...", before giving out a sob..."God, I damn wish there wasn't a fucking war!".
"I know... I hate it too... all the death and destruction... it's ironically given us the most and taken away from us too.", Steve said as he wrapped his arms around her tight. "But it'll be over soon, we're still driving into Germany and will finally put an end to it all for good. It matters not what goes on in the Pacific, they'll finish that war without us, but it'll end too and then finally, we'll be at true peace.".
Peggy nodded shakily, "I know...Do..do you still want to get married on the day after the war ends? I know it won't be the same...But we need to be officially married to convince Carl and Wendy that we are parents and such when we get the portal working...".
"Despite everything that's happened...", Steve looked away and sighed for a moment before he looked back to Peggy and smiled. "I think it's even more important we do that... for us and our future. If we decide to postpone it or anything of the sort... we might never find the courage to do it again.".
Peggy nodded. He was right, if they waited longer, the grief and sadness they were having from what had happened might prevent them from taking that step.
Peggy smiled softly as she leaned on his shoulder, seeing Susan sleep on the movie reel stone, "I'm so proud of you, Steve.", before glancing at the clock, "Curfew time is almost finished. Let's grab some sleep.", as she reached out, smiling sadly yet tenderly, "I love you, my little miracle.", kissing the stone, just above Susan's cheek.
She then moved over to their cot, and Steve sighed heavily as he reached out, smiling softly yet lovingly, "I love you, my little princess.", kissing the stone, just above Susan's nose, and then removed the old wolf stuffy from atop the stone, and the stone turned black, heading to their cot, gently placing the wolf stuffy on the little drawer next to the gas-lamp, and went into the blankets that Peggy moved back for him, and they held each other as they fell asleep with good night kisses.
It was a fairly calm November morning in Enschede, Holland where the British 2nd Army's headquarters was. The advance had been continuing well and while the positions along most of the Ems River had been taken, the city of Munster was still holding out, but General Miles Dempsey wasn't concerned.
Elements of the Canadian 1st was to his north flank and moving to take the remaining parts of Holland back from the Germans while the newly activated US 9th Army was to his south along the Rhine with the cities of the Ruhr ahead of them.
"Major...", Dempsey sipped his morning tea. "Forward this message to the commander of the Guards, I want them to turn and move on Munster with the infantry.".
The major nodded, "Yes, sir. It will be done. I bet Munster will be ours before noon.", and Dempsey raised an eyebrow, "What did I say about betting, Major?".
The major smiled nervously, "Sorry, sir.", and Dempsey nodded, "You're dismissed.", watching the major leave, "And Major, on an unofficial note, I say Munster will be taken at 11 o'clock, and I wager 20 bucks on it.", with a smirk as he stopped the major for a second.
The major pulled a small grin before Dempsey raised an eyebrow again, and the major departed completely, heading to the radio room.
"General!", a Lance corporal quickly burst into the room looking fairly frantic. The general quickly stood up as the young man saluted. "Urgent telegram from London. Top priority!", he handed him the letter before he quickly left. Dempsey looked over the letter before summoning his general staff.
"Gentleman... we have a problem.", Dempsey told the group in the cramped master bedroom of the home that they had made their HQ. "ULTRA intercepts just came in. Apparently, it seems Jerry's not ready to call it off yet. Operation Herbstnebel, they're calling it. SS General Sepp Dietrich and General Erich Brandenberger are leading the 6. Panzer Armee and the 7. Armee against us. They've mustered nearly a dozen armored and mechanized divisions against us on the other side of the Ems. And in coordination with what really remains of the Luftwaffe... they plan to strike and drive us back across the Ijssel.".
Murmurs of disgust, shock, fury, and annoyance rang around, and one of the men responded, "Is Captain Britain and Captain America coming to assist us? We cannot survive against armored divisions alone.".
"I'm sending word to Field Marshal Montgomery to get us whatever we need to fight them off. Hopefully we'll get much of the RAF and USAAF in the air to fight back the Luftwaffe and regain the skies as well as reinforcing divisions. The problem is, it'll take a few days before the reinforcements can start making a difference. And there's our quandary. How much territory and men will we lose before this attack can be blunted? And do we stand and fight or use the day we have to pull back to a better position?", Dempsey asked.
"The terrain is a mess; the autumn rains have turned much of our sector into a quagmire of mud. It'll be tough for the Germans to advance, but if they breakthrough our defenses, it'll be just as bad for the lads to retreat. We'll might even lose several whole divisions that way.", one of the officers said.
"And of course, the weather reports too, more rain and even snow coming, that'll ground much of the air forces. It's probably why the Germans are doing this; keep our flyboys from tearing them to shreds before they even make contact on the line.", another spoke up.
"General, I think it might be better for us to pull back the line from the Ems River and take up positions around...", a brigadier pointed at the map in the room. "Here at Enschede, Bocholt and... Wesel... those Germans in the north will probably also be joining in. If the Canadians and the Americans can hold our flanks...",
"The Yanks? The 9th Army has only just been brought online, most of those divisions have seen next to no combat yet. You can't expect fresh recruits to hold off a Blitzkrieg attack for long.", another officer who goes by the name of Weatherby, replied with a frown.
"Thank you for your observation, Weatherby.", Dempsey held up his hand. "They'll be all we've got for the time being until I expect 1st Army to transfer over more of its experienced divisions to the 9th's command. The 101st and 82nd Airborne divisions also might help fill in some gaps if they can get here fast enough. I assume Eisenhower and Montgomery probably already know of this attack so at least we might still be able to get on top of Jerry.".
"Not to mention our towering Captains, that'll be a nasty surprise for the Huns too.", one of the officers smirked.
The other officers nodded in agreement, and Dempsey nodded, "Yes. It will be. Captain Britain will be quite determined to help us out as we are part of her homeland. Just give her space if she's still grieving. There's nothing worse than a mother who is out for vengeance...Luckily, her paramour, Captain America will be there at her side to rein her in.".
"Bad time for Jerry then... of course, I suspect they're thinking that we still don't know about the coming attack.", one of the officers said.
"Indeed. Well, pass along the orders and set word to Montgomery. We're pulling back and making our stand here. We'll wait for the Germans to exhaust their offensive before throwing them right back.", Dempsey declared as the rest of the officers saluted. "Dismissed.".
And so, word got to Montgomery and the other Allied bases, and somewhere on the front line, from the area of the Ems River, one of the corporals under Montgomery informed Steve and Peggy about the planned attack of the Germans.
Peggy and Steve would find themselves once more going up Hell's Highway along with the men of the 101st Airborne Division were heading for Enschede as the city was a strategic crossroad that Germans would need if they wanted to push to the IJesel.
"So much for it being over before Christmas.", Peggy sighed as their truck they were riding in bumped up and down from potholes in the road.
"I guess Monty was just expecting the Germans to fold once we got across the Rhine. The whole counter-offensive does scream desperation, we're nearly surrounding the Ruhr... probably trying to at least buy some more time.", Steve shook his head as they watched the convoy of trucks carrying the airborne troops in front and behind them on the road.
Peggy replied, "Well, at least we can fix in trucks now, just watching our heads down...Far better to sneak in this way than let the Germans blow the horn if they saw us coming in our giant size.".
Steve nodded, "Yeah, and you heard the report. If we allow the Germans to wear themselves out, we will overtake them easily, but it's still risky for our countrymen...".
"It's better than the alternative of either letting them just take back everything we've gain or holding the line and getting devastated by full brunt of the opening salvos. Germans are running out of fuel, and both sides know it. This attack can't go for long.", Peggy smirked.
"Whole fields full of the best tanks left abandoned... now that's how I would like to spend Thanksgiving.", Steve chuckled as another bump tossed them quite a bit. "I'm starting to think maybe I should've just flown us.", Peggy gave a sheepish grin.
Steve replied, "Even in your Amazonian size, flaming on is still noticeable, just less imposing, and don't get me wrong, I love it when you go fast, Peggy, but we need to be subtle...", sighing as he remembered Bucky's favorite saying...
Peggy squeezed his arm, "Hey, we saw him last night, along with her, and they're fine. Yes, I wish Bucky was here to scout out in his canine form, but we got to do what we got.", smiling reassuringly.