Sie sind frei.

Basch opened his eyes, looking around the barrack. No one was awake yet. The Spaniard next to Basch was still sound asleep, and he spoke little German. In fact, the nearest person who spoke fluent German was two bunks down, too far away for Basch to hear. He swore the voice was right next to him. And he recognized the voice.

You're free.

"Antonio," he whispered, giving the man next to him a nudge. "Antonio, this is serious."

Antonio slowly opened one eye. "No, mi perrito. Sleep," he mumbled, turning away from Basch.

"No sleep. Did you hear that voice?"

"In your head, perrito. Sleep."

Basch sighed, giving the man another nudge. "The voice said we were free. Um…Libros? Libera?"

"Books?" Antonio looked back at him. "You readin'?"

"No, no. Freedom. Liberty. Not prison," Basch said, searching his mind for the Spanish word. Antonio didn't teach him "freedom", because he thought they would never be freed. Both expected to die in the camp. What was the point in learning a word he wouldn't use?

"Libre?" Antonio said, his face lighting up.

"Ja, ja! Libre, or whatever. The voice said that we were free."

Antonio shook his head. "No, mi perrito. No libre." And with that, he was done listening to Basch.

Basch groaned, wishing he spoke Spanish. The language barrier was an ugly thing that kept him from being understood by most of his work group. While Italian was similar, there were lots of words that didn't translate and earned him strange looks.

Perhaps Antonio was right, though. The voice could have just been in Basch's head, which would explain why he recognized it. People heard voices all the time in the camp. However, they were usually the people who were dying or being tortured. Basch didn't feel like he was dying, not yet. And he was almost positive no one was torturing him more than usual.

But there was a nagging feeling inside Basch, an urge telling him to listen to the voice. Something felt different with the world.

He sat up, starting the slow climb down to the floor. Several people gave him angry looks – not that he cared anymore. Basch reached the dirty floor, walking down the thin line of space between the bunks to the door. As he went, he heard people start calling him by his nicknames. Perrito, Ladrón, Schweizer, they used everything to try and stop him. Hands reached out, grabbing at his clothes and his arms. Every time he pried himself free, continuing to the door.

"He's going to get killed," a German voice said.

"Fine, let him. It's not our fault if some kid is suicidal," another replied. "Let him die."

"He'll get our whole barrack in trouble. Remember what happened to 20?"

Basch went up to the door, giving it a gentle push. He braced himself for the gunshot, for a kapo to drag him out into the yard and beat him to death. He was met with nothing more than early morning silence.

He pushed open the door a bit more, listening to the swirl of voices behind him. So many different languages were being spoken, and yet everything was about the man who was brave enough to open the door.

Taking a deep breath, Basch pushed the door completely open.

Sie sind frei.

He heard the familiar voice in his ear again as he took a step outside. Basch looked up at the guard towers, wondering why the searchlights had been turned off. There were no guards in the towers. He looked down the row of barracks. There were no black uniformed men, no guns, no blood, no death. He looked over at the gate. Not one person stood guard in front of the Mauthausen gates.

Basch took another step, waiting for the gunshot or the sirens. Was this another one of the commandant's sick games, a way to lure prisoners into their deaths? Part of Basch wanted it to be the end, so he could let death take him away from it all. And yet, the other part of him wanted the voice to be right.

"There's no one out here!" Basch shouted into the barracks, in case anyone was brave enough to join him. Sure enough, Antonio appeared a second later, his green eyes scanning the huge yard.

"Trap," Antonio said unsurely, coming out to where Basch was. A few barracks down, someone else opened a door. Before long, more prisoners were filing out into the yard, looking around for machine guns or a SS man.

Basch shook his head. "Safe, I think." He took another glance over the yard. Seeing no guns, he started walking towards the gate.

"Ay, mi perrito," Antonio groaned, running after him. "No. No gate."

"Yes. I've got to try, at least. Even if I do die."

"Stupid. Stupid kid."

It took Basch forever to get to the gate – he hadn't ever had reason to walk there before, so he didn't realize how far away it was. Other prisoners were walking to the gate with him, curious to see if they would meet their deaths or if they really were free. Basch heard Antonio say at least forty Spanish prayers in the time it took him to get to the gate.

A crowd of people gathered around him, wondering if the kid was so mad that he would open the gate. But Basch didn't need to. The gate was already open, just a sliver. Enough for an emaciated person to slip through.

"Go back, yes?" Antonio asked, pulling on Basch's arm. "No more."

"No, we've got to try. Who wants to go first?" Basch asked, turning to the crowd behind him. A few people stepped forward, Spaniards and Russians and Germans. He recognized someone from the International Committee, one of the people who was supposed to be running the camp.

Antonio came to Basch's side. "You are mad, mi perrito."

"It's a good sort of mad, isn't it?"

Basch slipped through the gates of Mauthausen.

He was met with guns. And men in uniform. Lots of men in uniform. Basch took a step forward, putting on a smile even though he was half-dead. The men in uniform lowered their guns. Basch stood in the clearing for a long time, taking in everything. He'd taken his first free steps. He was no longer going to die in a prison camp. He would never have to climb the stairs of death again.

In the middle of those overwhelming things, Basch heard music. It didn't sound like swing or foxtrots or whatever was popular. The music was classical, like something he would hear in a symphony hall. Basch thought he knew the piece – was it Mozart or Beethoven?

And all at once, everything hit him.

The voice he heard earlier, the one he recognized, belonged to Roderich.

The music was the first piece ever played for Operation Edelweiss, on that Christmas of 1941.

Someone turned the radio off, and the music stopped. A soldier stepped out from the crowd of soldiers, coming up to Basch. On his arm was a band with a red cross. Like the inverted flag of Basch's home country.

"Sprechen Sie Englisch?" the soldier asked in a soft voice.

"Absolutely. What would you like to talk about?" Basch said, trying not to laugh. He was having a real conversation, a conversation that wasn't about food or death.

"Are you hurt?"

Basch held up his hands, showing off his bloody palms. Deep cuts crisscrossed over his skin, dried blood painting his palms rust red. "I carried stone blocks up 184 steps every day for the past five months. The people behind me have been here for years."

"How did you know to come out?" a voice called from the crowd, a young looking major shoving his way to the front. "We were about to come in there."

"Roderich Edelstein told me," Basch said. "I heard his voice this morning."

"Oh, God, he's delusional," another American said.

"I am completely delusional!" Basch said. "I walked out of hell. You'd be insane, too, sir, if you saw half the shit I saw in there."

The medic in front of Basch gave him something akin to a smile. "You're probably tired, ain't you? We'll take you and your people to a field hospital we got a few miles away. Give you a uniform and somethin' to eat. You people look like skeletons."

Basch didn't remember much after that. The rest of the day was a mess of hospitals and questions and Americans who spoke in broken German. Somewhere during the day, he lost Antonio and didn't ever see him again. The Americans took him to a different hospital or maybe just a different room, telling him there was something wrong with his pulse. There were lots of shouts and angry voices. People kept asking him questions, holding his thin hands, and pleading for him to talk about his sister or his mother.

His last memory of the day he was liberated was a medic begging him to stay awake and Roderich's music playing in his mind.

July 24th, 1946

For the last time, Raivis pulled himself out of Hell.

To an outsider, the steel mill wasn't a bad place. Upstairs, everyone worked in quiet tandem, exactly how the communists wanted. If someone did speak, it was in perfect, accent-free Russian. The floors where they made the slabs of dull steel looked like the idyllic factories in the propaganda films.

Beneath the perfection was Hell, where Raivis happened to work.

The proper term for it was the furnace room. Everyone called it Hell, except for the Russians. The Russians did not work in the furnaces, throwing coal into the flames for hours and hours. They weren't the ones who went home with burns up and down their arms. They were the guards, watching the workers suffer.

Covered in ashy smears and sweat, Raivis made his way up to the outside world. Behind him, he heard the roar of the never-ending fire. To anyone else, they would only hear the fire cracking and begging for fuel. Raivis learned to notice the soft whispers of Polish and Lithuanian, the forbidden languages. There was a Russian shout, and the whispers disappeared. That was the way everything ended in Hell – with a Russian voice.

Raivis took his paycheck from the hands of the rude foreman, mumbling something of a thank-you. He would have rather punched the man, but Toris told him to stay on his best behavior. If Raivis made one mistake, that would be the end.

Once he'd been checked over by the guards – as if Raivis was going to steal a handful of coal – he was free to go. Although he'd been working since ten the previous day, his day wasn't over. Raivis fished Toris' shopping list from his pocket, preparing himself to go into the Soviet grey town of Koźani.

Soviet grey was the unofficial name of the color the USSR painted everything. Raivis first saw Soviet grey when he got off the train in Vilnius, holding tight to Toris out of fear he would lose the man in the crowd. The station, which Toris assured him had once been colorful, was all one monotone grey. The countryside was Soviet grey. Their apartment was grey. Even the people seemed grey. Everything in eastern Europe looked like a black and white photograph.

The small store on the street corner was no exception. Raivis took his place in the small queue that had already formed, leaning up against the Soviet grey wall. He saw the woman next to him give him a sideways glare.

"Shouldn't you be in school?" she asked in a sharp voice. Raivis wondered if she was once a teacher; she sounded like one.

"I'm twenty," Raivis said, counting out the bills in his envelope. Once again, there were two rubles less than the bare minimum. Not that it would have mattered if he did get paid enough, as the cost of living was too high for any common person to pay off. "I stopped going to school a long time ago."

"You look like you're twelve."

"I turned twenty last November."

"Are you sure?"

Raivis folded up the envelope, shoving it in his pocket. "Yes, I'm sure. I think I know when my own birthday is."

Before the old woman could continue, the queue moved. She disappeared inside the store, and Raivis was left standing on a dirty sidewalk in a Soviet grey town.

When he was younger, Raivis dreamed of doing something with his life. He wanted to be a movie star, one of the strong men he saw on the posters in Riga. Every day when he walked to the awful factory, he would stop and stare at Clark Gable and John Wayne. Raivis thought that by the time he was twenty, he wouldn't be working in a factory anymore. He would be the next star, working in Moscow or Paris or maybe even America.

However, Raivis was twenty and he was still working in a wretched factory and still a prisoner of the Soviet Union. Nothing had changed.

It was about to. Or so he hoped.

The queue shifted again, and Raivis was allowed inside the store. After a few more minutes of waiting – something Russians were fond of – he finally made it to the front counter.

"Good morning, Zuikuti," the woman at the counter said, using Raivis' Lithuanian nickname. The Lithuanians adored him, mostly because he spoke their language. "I haven't seen you for a long time."

"I started working nights," Raivis said, handing her the list. She nodded, understanding what was going on.

"You're so grown up for such a young boy." The woman took the list from him, turning and starting to pull things from the shelves. "And how is Toris doing? Darius told me he's still sick."

"He's getting better," Raivis replied. Toris taught him that it was wrong to lie; Toris wasn't always right. Sometimes, it was better to lie than to give someone the truth.

"Oh, good. Poor thing's been sick for a long time." The woman put everything down on the counter and Raivis handed her most of the rubles from the envelope. "Take care of yourself, Zuikuti," she said as she counted out the money. She slipped some of it back to Raivis.

Don't die, little rabbit.

"I will," Raivis said, gathering up the dull Soviet grey packages. As soon as he stepped outside, it started raining. Fat drops fell onto his shoulders and the packages, leaving spots on his clothes.

The apartment lobby was empty, thankfully. Raivis came in soaking wet, grey raindrops rolling down from his dirty face. The doorman gave him a peculiar look, but the doorman was a Russian and Raivis was used to getting looks from Russians.

After running up three flights of stairs, he came to the apartment door and gave it a gentle knock. If he knocked too hard, Toris would think it was someone else and Raivis would have to stand outside for hours. There was a delicate balance with Toris, one that had to be respected.

"Toris, it's Raivis," he called as he opened the door. "I'm home from work." Raivis set the groceries down on the table, looking around for Toris. He wasn't in the kitchen or the living room, leaving him with only a bathroom and a bedroom to hide in.

"Toris?" He went down the hallway, peeking into the tiny bedroom. Toris was sitting on the bed, a letter and a few photographs strewn out in front of him. An envelope was ripped open, tossed carelessly on the floor.

"You're home," Toris said in a not-good kind of voice.

"I am. I got paid today, and I went to the store, like you told me to." Raivis went over to the bed, climbing up beside Toris. "The lady at the store says she's worried about you. You haven't shown your face for a long time."

It had been a month since Toris last stepped outside the apartment. He spent the month curled up in bed, not saying much of anything. After so many years of being the parent and taking responsibility, Toris just stopped.

Toris shrugged. "Why should I? No one wants to see a mur–"

"When I was walking here, I saw a cat," Raivis interrupted. "It was a cute black one with white paws. Alfred told me he had a cat like that named Freedom."

"I thought it was Liberty."

"It probably was Liberty. Every American word sounds the same to me. And you've got a better memory than me," Raivis said, picking up the letter. It was in Polish, one of the few languages he couldn't read. "You're reading this again, aren't you?"

"We should go," Toris said, picking up the photos. "His name is Francis Bonnefoy. He says he'd like us to come visit him. He says he knows Feliks and Eduard."

Raivis tried to read the letter, understanding every other word. And sure enough, the name Francis Bonnefoy was at the bottom of the page. And he saw Feliks and Eduard's names thrown in between the scramble of Polish. Even though one or both were dead. "People lie, Toris. He's probably a Soviet spy."

"So what? He knows Feliks. That's worth it to me." Toris pointed to a word. "Znajomi. Friends. He's not holding them ransom."

"Did this Francis send the pictures, too?"

Toris nodded, handing the photos over to Raivis. The first one was of a small farmhouse in the middle of a huge wheat field. The second was a light-haired boy riding a dark horse, a huge smile on the boy's face. And the last was of a younger Toris, about Raivis' age, balancing on a fallen tree over a creek. A younger Ivan was behind him, his shirt missing and the pink scarf wrapped around his neck.

"Look at how happy he is," Toris whispered, taking the picture of him and Ivan. "He's alive. He doesn't look like every day is miserable. That's who I loved."

"We can't think about this now," Raivis said. He pried the photo from Toris' hand, gathering up the other two and the letter. He shoved them in his pocket, wondering how this Francis got a hold of those photos.

"He was happy, once. We all were happy," Toris said. He fell back on the bed, his hazy green eyes looking up at the ceiling. "Even in the stalag, we were happy."

Raivis got up, grabbing his bag from where he left it on the floor. "Are you okay talking today? You were crying last night."

"When we stole Roderich's file, I spent the night in Ivan's room." So it looked like Toris was willing to talk. "We got in some sort of fight about…What am I saying, you're too young to understand these things." A slight grin tugged at the corner of Toris' lips. "Did you ever hear him laugh, Raivis?"

"No, not really. I wasn't around him enough."

"I miss that laugh more than anything. That morning, I said something to him before roll call and he laughed. I don't even remember what I said." Toris covered his eyes with his hands. "God, I don't remember what I said!"

Raivis put his hand on Toris' shoulder. "You're fine. Come on, we need to go if we're going to catch the train."

"What if I told him I hated him? What if I said, 'I hope Gilbert shoots you in the head' and he thought that was so damn funny because he knew it was happening?" Toris asked.

"I'm sure you didn't say that," Raivis said. "Let's go," he urged again.

"But what if I did?"

It was always a game of what-ifs with Toris. "Listen to me," Raivis said. "I'm very tired right now, okay? I worked nights just so we could do this. I don't want to miss our chance."

He felt Toris sigh beneath his hand. "I don't want to stay here anymore, Raivis," he said. "I can't stay here. Not with Ivan and you and everything else. I don't want to hear Russian anymore. It's making me go insane."

"Which is why we're leaving. Trust me, you'll love Paris. It's the city of romance, isn't it? And I can already say 'I love you' in French."

"Can we go to Vienna? Maybe this Bonnefoy person can help us –"

"No, Toris, I'm not taking you to Vienna," Raivis said. "That Bonnefoy person is trying to get us killed."

Toris paused for a moment. "I can handle Vienna," he said at last, as if that was the end of the conversation. As if he was still the parent.

"I'll think about it, alright?" Raivis said without meaning it. He went into the kitchen, picking up the groceries and shoving them into a second bag. Toris appeared in the entryway a moment later, his own bag slung over his shoulder.

"Ivan said Vienna is beautiful in the summer. He told me about it once when I was sick."

"That's nice," Raivis mumbled. "You can tell me all about it on the train."

"…Am I sick now?" Toris asked, his words thick with worry. "I heard you talking to someone outside yesterday. You said that I was sick."

Raivis looked over at Toris. He stood like a child waiting for his mother after school, his frail hands clutching tight to the straps of the bag. He reminded Raivis of the shades in Heracles' stories of the Odyssey. A pale ghost of a soul, waiting forever in the Underworld. Waiting for Ivan in Hell. While Raivis dragged himself up from Hell, Toris pushed himself down further and further every day.

"Yes, Toris." Raivis reached over and took Toris' hand in his. If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine that they were in the stalag. "You're sick. You'll get better in Paris. I promise."

Hollandstraße 3, 1027.

Gilbert stood in front of the building, clutching the scrap of paper in his hand. When he took the address out of his palm, the ink left ghostly traces of a Chopin piece on his pale skin. He wiped the notes away, cursing the dead composer.

Seven years after his first leave, Gilbert returned to Vienna. He liked to remember Vienna as a wonderful city where he met his wife, but the memories did nothing to fight against reality. Gilbert was the enemy in his own country, the hunted instead of the hunter.

Now, Gilbert prayed one thing hadn't changed.

The little bell over the door jingled when Gilbert pushed the door open. He stepped inside, fully expecting to be shot for showing his face. Instead, he was met with the gentle lilt of French. A young man sat in a chair beside the front desk, talking to another man behind the front desk.

Their half-conversation stopped when the man realized someone was standing in the entryway. He turned and looked at Gilbert, his hand already reaching for a weapon.

"Beilschmidt," the short man growled.

"Basch, right?" Gilbert said. "I'm happy to see you alive."

"I should kill you," Basch said without a hint of sarcasm. "You've got no damn reason to come here. Haven't you already done enough to us?"

Gilbert wasn't expecting anything less. He'd come prepared to run from the police. "I'm not here to interfere, if that's the idea you've got stuck in your head. I'm here because I'm trying to get out of this shit country."

"You don't want to get dragged off to Nuremberg for war crimes? How many people did you kill in your stalag? Hundreds? Thousands?"

"I never killed any –"

"Ivan Braginsky," Basch snapped. "You've mentally killed Toris Laurinaitis. You indirectly killed Roderich, and Lukas, and Natalya, and my sister. You almost killed me, my cousin, and Mathias here. Aren't you satisfied yet?"

"I could've died!" Mathias added. "Do you know how miserable the world would be then?"

"I didn't come here to kill anyone," Gilbert said, matching Basch's tone. "I came here to get a visa. Tell me whether you'll give me one or not."

Basch laughed, taking his hand out of his pocket where Gilbert assumed a gun was. "I'm sure as hell not going to give you one. I'd rather give Himmler a pass than give you a pfennig." He stepped away from the desk, coming over to Gilbert. Said Prussian tried not to stare at the scar over Basch's exposed collarbone or the strange marks on his palms. Basch grabbed Gilbert's tie, pulling him in close.

"Let me put this simply for you," he said with a mock smile. "Leave and never return, you pathetic excuse of a Nazi."

"Are we having another fight?" someone called out from the hallway. "I'll put five marks on Basch!"

Basch dropped Gilbert, pinning the man to the wall. "God, Al, you have the most incredible sense of timing. Take Mathias out Francis so I can beat up this bastard."

"Don't treat me like a child," Mathias said. "I'm older than you."

"Would you like to introduce me to your friend?" Gilbert growled, leaning just enough so he could see the blond man standing in the hallway. Basch put his hand over Gilbert's face; it was too late.

"Hochstetter?" Gilbert said, his heart skipping a beat.

"I don't go by that name any –"

"Shut up!" Basch took his hand from Gilbert's eyes, moving it to his shoulder. "Just shut up and get out of here before you make a bigger mess. Don't let the Blond Crew come out here."

"Oh, right, Francis sent me out here to tell you about that," Hochstetter said, blatantly ignoring Basch. "You see, Eduard's heading off to Konigsberg tonight and needs someone to take him to the station. Francis is busy and Feliks has some meeting and Toris isn't doing too great, so I nominated you."

Gilbert saw Basch roll his green eyes. "If you shut up and leave, I'll take Eduard."

"I knew you had it in you to be a good person. Isn't that right, whoever is being strangled by Herr…" Hochstetter's voice trailed off. He looked like someone had slapped him. "Colonel Beilschmidt?"

"The one and only," Gilbert said shortly before Basch elbowed him in the chest.

"No, this is some other albino I pulled off the streets," Basch corrected. "Go back with Francis and forget you saw anything. And you too, Mathias."

Hochstetter seemed to be as bad at listening as he always had been. He came over to Basch, staring at the man pinned up against the wall. Gilbert gave him a little wave with his free hand.

"What are you doing here?" Hochstetter asked.

"I'm trying to get a visa. This country isn't safe anymore. I didn't realize you lot were so hostile, though," Gilbert replied, earning himself another sharp elbow to the ribs. Basch glared at him, asking for Gilbert to speak up again.

Hochstetter put his hand on Basch's shoulder. "Excuse me, Herr Zwingli, do you think you could let the colonel go? I want to talk to him for a few minutes. And then you can beat him up," he added, making Gilbert lose a lot of faith in the tiny man.

Basch looked from Gilbert to Hochstetter to the man who was sitting behind the front desk – Mathias? Was that his name? Slowly, Basch took his arm from Gilbert's chest. His hand went to the pocket where the gun was.

"Danke," Gilbert said, glancing over at Hochstetter once he was sure Basch wasn't going to shoot him. "It's been a while, hasn't it?"

Hochstetter nodded. "Two years. By the way, I'm not Albert anymore, even though Zwingli keeps calling me that. Tino Väinämöinen, pleasure to re-meet you," he said, holding out his hand.

"Likewise, Tino," Gilbert said as he took the man's hand. It felt wrong to call him by a different name, or even to see him out of SS uniform. "How in God's name did you end up with these brutes?"

Tino glanced over at Basch, as if asking for permission to speak. "Francis found me when they were rounding up Gestapo people. Hid me in his apartment for a while. Now I'm working here. I'm not too good with math, but I can manage," he said with a smile. "I'm like a second secretary, really. Mathias over there tells me everything I need to do."

"You're almost independent," Mathias said. "I'm sorry about Basch, Herr Beilschmidt. He's usually a moderate jerk, not a complete asshole."

"Don't go apologizing for me," Basch snarled. "Listen, Al, you have five minutes to get this, this animal out of here," he said, glaring at Gilbert. "I'll let you have your reunion for five minutes. I don't ever want him in here after that. Understand?"

Tino nodded. "Completely understood."

Basch shook his head, muttering something in French before storming off down the hall. Gilbert wished he would've paid attention in French class.

Tino waited until a door slammed, taking Gilbert by the wrist. "Mathias, if he comes out, tell him I've gone to walk the colonel here home. Don't let him go back to the boss."

"Got it. Good luck, Herr Beilschmidt," Mathias said. "You're going to need a ton of it."

Luck? What was Tino or Hochstetter or whoever he was dragging Gilbert into?

Before Gilbert could ask, he was being led down the hallway. At the very end of the hallway, Tino came to a stop and knocked on the last door, and Gilbert had no chance to object to whatever torture he was about to face.

"We need two visas for America or some seriously good name changes," Tino said, shoving Gilbert into the room.

"Oh, mon dieu."

In the small office, there were five people that Gilbert had met at some point in his life. Raivis was sprawled out over a couch, a French pinup magazine in hand. Toris was sitting on the floor beside Raivis, along with Feliks. Dozens of papers were laid out on the floor between them. Eduard was sifting through a file cabinet – he'd started to pull one from the mess. And sitting at the huge desk, the crown jewel of the room, was Francis Bonnefoy.

Gilbert assumed this was the aforementioned Blond Crew, except Toris' hair was nowhere near blond. He wondered Basch was colorblind.

"Basch tried to punch his face in," Tino explained, giving Gilbert a nudge forward. Francis sighed, mustering a sad smile.

"I'm sorry you had to be greeted with that, Herr Beilschmidt," he said. "Everyone except for Herr Beilschmidt, please leave. Make sure Basch isn't punching another hole in the wall."

"You never let us have any fun," Raivis muttered as he got up. "It's good to see you, Commandant. Toris and I were –"

"Leaving," Toris finished for him. He gave Gilbert a look, one that told the Prussian that he hadn't forgotten June 6th.

When the room was empty, Francis got up from the desk and came over to Gilbert. "He doesn't mean anything rude," he said. "Toris is just, well, he's not always right in the head."

"Because of me," Gilbert said, looking down at the floor. He'd only met Francis once, with Elizabeta. Even then, Francis had a sort of power about him that made Gilbert feel small. That feeling was a thousand times worse at the moment.

"We're all at fault in this," Francis said.

"You're not going to blame me?" Gilbert asked. Everyone he used to know seemed to hate him or be rather mad at him for something he did years ago. "Because I was the one who messed this up."

"Pinning the blame on someone solves nothing." Francis went to his desk, motioning for Gilbert to join him. "Visas to America, right?" he asked. "Or Argentina? Tino doesn't know the difference between the two yet."

"America. And you call him Tino?"

Francis nodded. "He doesn't want to be Hochstetter anymore, and I respect that. Let bygones be bygones. Now, listen, visas to America are hard to get," he said. "Especially since you have a German name and a bit of a history."

"I don't even need to get to America. Anywhere outside of Europe would be fine," Gilbert said, hating himself for sounding so desperate. But it was the truth, wasn't it? He hadn't come all the way to Vienna, spent a month in the house of a Nazi sympathizer, and risked his life to walk to Hollandstraße.

"And you've got such a unique look," Francis said to himself. "A name change won't work." He pulled open a drawer in his desk, taking a stack of papers out. "So, how's Elizabeta doing?"

"She's fine, I guess. Still a bit torn up about everything."

"Everyone is. It's only been a year. I do have to apologize for Roderich's behavior, even though he's…" Francis trailed off, taking a paper from the stack. "I don't know what got into him that night. I told him not to go, and he ignored me."

"It doesn't matter. I'm sorry about what happened with everyone," Gilbert said, feeling the guilt creep into his words. "I know an apology's not going to fix anything, but I truly am sorry."

Francis put the rest of the papers in his desk, starting to fill out the first one. "No, mon cher, don't apologize. You were doing what you thought was right."

"Um, I brought something for you," Gilbert said, reaching into his pocket. He took out the little swastika pin, handing it to Francis. "It's Roderich's. I found it at the stalag."

Francis turned the gold pin over in his hand, his smile wavering. Gilbert wondered if he did the right thing, bringing it to him. "You keep it," he said, putting the pin back in Gilbert's hands. "I already have too many of Roderich's things. And in a few years, you could sell that for thousands on the black market."

"This belongs to you. I mean, you're what's left of Roderich's family. I feel wrong having it."

"Keep it as a reminder. So you never turn back." Francis handed him a few papers. "That will get you to London with a different name. After that, it's up to you where you go on to. All I ask is that you never tell anyone who got you your papers and you don't turn back. You have the chance to get out of here. Take it."

Gilbert looked down at the forms in his hands, the forms that would get him across the English Channel. "Why don't you leave?" he asked, looking up at Francis. "You have the power to. If you can get me and Elizabeta to London, you could get yourself to New York."

"I have an obligation to this job. I've been doing it since I was seventeen and decided to make myself a fake name for fun. I figure if I can help whoever needs it, I'll be happy with my life," Francis said. "I don't know if I'm making that much of a difference in the world. I'm making a difference in a few lives. And that's all that matters to me."

"Even if you're making a difference in a Nazi's life?"

Francis smiled, twisting one of his curls around his finger. "Everyone deserves a second chance. I'm not like my dear cousin. I believe in forgiveness, and I believe that people can change," he said. "Of course, you could walk out of here and turn me in to the Russians. You could very easily break my trust. I don't think you will."

"Why do you trust me?" Gilbert said, not quite understanding the man. "I'm the one who killed half of your family."

"We're humans, Gilbert. Humans make horrible mistakes. However, you can get past your mistakes and do something great with your life. And I feel like you have a great future ahead of you."

Gilbert looked at the forms and the pin in his hands. His past and the key to the future. "Thank you so much," he said. "Is there something I can do to repay you?"

"Please stay in touch. Send me a letter once in a while telling me you're not dead. Will you be leaving tonight?" Francis asked.

"No, it'll take us a while to get everything together. We'll be gone by August."

"Good, the sooner you leave, the better." Francis smiled once again, but the grin quickly faded as he glanced at the clock. "Oh, mon cher, you did drive here, didn't you?"

"No, I walked," Gilbert said. "I'll be fine going home. It's almost dark."

"Get Tino to take you home," Francis said as he opened the door. Basch was waiting outside, his arms folded over his chest. He locked eyes with Gilbert, running a finger over his throat. "I don't want you getting arrested," Francis continued without regarding Basch. "I don't think there's many other people roaming around Vienna with white hair and red eyes."

As Gilbert walked down the hall, he heard Basch and Francis go into the office. They didn't close the door, as if they were inviting him into their conversation.

"You're going to get us killed," Basch hissed.

"He was innocent and scared. I couldn't say no."

"Innocent? He's the one who killed Roderich!"

There was a long pause before Francis continued. "I'm giving him a chance, Basch. You should give him one, too."

One person brought together so many people with different stories.

Basch noticed this the day everyone left.

That morning, everyone showed up at Basch's house for breakfast. Francis was up at three in the morning to start cooking for everyone, which drove Basch insane. He went out to the kitchen to tell Francis to calm down and somehow got drafted into the cooking army.

The kitchen table was nowhere near big enough to hold ten people; they made it work. By seven, everyone was gathered around the table, talking about the future and America and so many other hopeful things that Basch couldn't help feeling positive for once. They were ten people with some of the worst lives, and they were laughing and joking with each other.

For a rare time in his life, Basch felt everything was okay.

After breakfast, they walked to the station. A year ago, Basch got off at the same station. He came back from the dead, found his family, and struggled through the losses of so many. Everyone came to Vienna through that train station, and now they were leaving.

The first person to say goodbye was Tino. Little tiny Tino, the ex-Gestapo agent who was off to start a new life in Mannheim.

"I'm really sorry about everything," Tino said for the thousandth time to Gilbert. "He was my best friend."

"Don't beat yourself up, kid. Have a good life, okay?" Gilbert said, pulling the man into a hug. "Do the opposite of what Ludwig wanted you to do. He was too strict."

Next came Mathias, the man who ran the biggest Underground operation and watched his best friend get shot on a street in Copenhagen.

"Call me if you're still interested in buying the Kübelwagen. We could go on a road trip together," Mathias said with tears in his eyes.

"Where are you going to find a Kübelwagen in Denmark?" Basch asked.

Mathias shrugged, wiping at his face. "You never know. Maybe someone left one layin' around."

Feliks, Eduard, Toris, and Raivis all left together, on one train headed for Paris. From there, they had no clue what they were going to do.

"Thanks for everything, Basch," Feliks said, clutching his box to his chest. The box Basch kept like a dark secret for years, full of letters to Toris. "You saved my life."

And lastly, Basch said goodbye to Gilbert and Elizabeta.

"I still hate you," Basch said with a half-smile. Gilbert returned the smile in full.

"I hate you too, Zwingli. I'm glad we can all come to terms on something."

"I do want you to have this, though," Basch said, holding up the violin case he found under his porch. "It's Roderich's Stradivarius from Hitler. I don't have any use for a violin, so I figured you two should keep it. Carry on the legacy."

Elizabeta took the violin from him. "Thank you, Basch," she said. "I'm surprised you kept it so long without selling it."

"I should've, but I've got a good heart. There's some pictures and music in the case, too. Things I thought you should have. Oh, and Beilschmidt?" he said, looking over at Gilbert. "Thanks for arresting me in 1941. It was one of the best damn things that happened to me."

"Thank you for letting me arrest you," Gilbert said with a laugh. "I hope something goes right for you sometime. I almost feel bad about the shit life you've got."

"He'll be fine, as long as he's with me," Francis said. Somehow, Basch believed him.

They said a few more goodbyes to the Beilschmidts, and that was the end of it. As the people Roderich Edelstein brought together scattered to start new lives, Basch and Francis were left in the same place as before.

"Do you want to go to your house or mine?" Francis asked as they walked out of the station.

"Let's go to your house. I want to stop in Rudolfspark first. I found a half bottle of rum and figured no one was going to drink it."

The walk to Rudolfspark gave Basch plenty of time to think over everything. Mostly the people he said goodbye to and their stories and how they all came back to Roderich Edelstein. One man who wanted to play music brought the strangest people together in one city, and then sent them away.

The two reached the grove in Rudolfspark where the small tombstone lay in the overgrown grass. Few people even knew about the grove, so it rarely had visitors. Basch took the bottle of rum out of his pocket, laying it down next to the headstone. It wasn't so much a headstone for one person, but for several.

Roderich Edelstein died at barely twenty-seven.

Lukas Bondevik died just offshore of the freedom of Sweden.

Natalya Arlovskya was put in front of a firing squad in Warsaw without a blindfold.

Lilli Zwingli never made it to the Swiss border. The Gestapo took her off the train and she was sent to somewhere to die.

"I didn't even know him," Basch said at last, looking over at Francis.

"Neither did I. Just when I thought I knew Roderich, he surprised me."

Basch kicked at the dirt, wondering what it must've been like for Roderich on June 7th. "I told you about how I heard his voice in Mauthausen, right?"

"Ja. Do you think it was him?" Francis asked.

"I don't know. Maybe it was his voice because that was the only one I remembered. The whole time while we were walking from the labor camp, I thought about how much he would be complaining," Basch said with grin. "Probably kept me alive."

"I think he kept everyone alive. Feliks told me he was going to kill himself at one point. He stopped because he thought about how Roderich would react. He stayed up for hours talking with Mathias. He helped me put together the missions for Operation Edelweiss. He did Lilli's homework for her. He told you to walk out of Mauthausen. That man saved us."

Basch swallowed hard. "What do you think it would've been like if he didn't die?"

"Awful. Everyone today stopped hating each other because they all had one thing in common: They knew Roderich and they were part of how he died," Francis said. "He made peace in the most Roderich way possible."

"Do you think people are going to keep playing his music?"

Francis nodded. "People aren't immortal. Music lives forever. And his was so different, so beautifully different."

Just like us, Basch thought as he looked down at the grave. We're beautifully different.

"When I was a kid, I used to flip to the end of books and read the last couple of pages," Basch said. "I wanted to make sure everything turned out okay."

"I don't think you understand how books work," Francis said with a bit of a laugh in his voice.

"No, hear me out on this one. If the book ended with a funeral or someone getting shot, I didn't bother to read it. If it ended with cowboys riding off into the sunset and things like that, I read every word," Basch said.

"Where are you going with this?"

"I thought my story was going to end with a funeral when I was in Mauthausen. Even before then, I thought everything was going to end with the war. And look at where we are now. We're standing in front of a grave talking about peace and harmony."

Francis looked over at Basch, his blue eyes twinkling. Basch used to dream about seeing those blue eyes one more time. "Is this the happy ending that you wanted?"

"No, this isn't anywhere close to it. But we're okay. We have each other."

Francis put his arm around Basch, holding him close. "Thank God for Roderich," he said. "He must've got to you if you're being so optimistic."

"Ja," Basch said. "Thank God for our alcoholic composer."

A/N: And so, our story comes to a close.

I cannot express how much I despise this story. There are no words for it.

And yet, I love this story.

When I first started writing this, I had no plan. I just went with it. Everything you have been reading thus far is the first draft. There was almost zero planning put into every chapter. I went with what I felt like that day. Only the last five chapters have had actual plans.

In part, that is why I hate this story. It could have been something so better if I put the time into it. But I didn't, and it is what it is. If I truly did have the time, I think this story would have turned out much different.

This story is also largely based on real events and real people. Excluding the obvious, the reason I skipped from 1941 to 1944 is a man I know who was telling a story and skipped four years. I asked him why, and he said, "Lord, do you really want to hear about a boring old man's life? You got to cut right to the action and skip over the bullshit." So you all can thank my grandfather for how the story fell into place.

Art mimics life, though. And ARS mimics a lot of what was going on in my life at the time. If you reread some chapters, you can see my biases and thoughts slipping through. Don't go do that. This story is too long for that.

Even though I hate this story, I have no plans to rewrite the fanfiction form. I am, however, working on a real, non-copyrighted book. Don't know how well that'll go over, but I'll give it a good try!

Thank you to everyone who stuck with me through this! You all are amazing people, and I can't ever thank you enough.

Please come back and check out my profile once in a while! I have a lot of things planned, and I can't wait to show them off.

Thank you's go to HetaRosFangirl, browsofglory, ABCSKW123-IX, everythingisdragons, exca314, Bob and co, Deadlynightshade41, Hinotorihime, Zeawesomepasta, NordicsAwesome, Raihannn, and my beloved Swing-Stole-My-Heart! You all are awesome!

See you hopefully soon!