Disclaimer: The characters in this story don't belong to me.

A/N: Hellstrom/Stiglitz was begging to be written, after that whipping scene, but I wanted to write more than just torture-porn. I wanted, don't hit me for this, I wanted to write a tragic, beautiful, profound love story. Yes, between two (ex-)Nazis, who hate each other in canon. So I came up with the idea that they were childhood friends, became lovers later, and eventually things turned really bad until they reached the state of affairs we see in the movie. How? That's what I'm trying to explore here. The first chapter is pretty tame, but the fic itself will contain explicit slash, sometimes gentle, sometimes extremely violent.
The prison scene in this chapter is set in 1935. Hugo is in prison for some minor breach of regulations, not for the murders we see in the movie.
I wrote this chapter in German, then translated it into English. That's why the style is rather different from how I usually write. For those of you who speak German, I recommend you read the German version, which I've posted on my livejournal: linndechir(dot)livejournal(dot)com/11205(dot)html (this site doesn't allow direct links, sorry). Personally, I think it's better than the English translation.

Chapter One

"Let me tell you today how much I love you, how much you have always meant to me, how rich you have made my life. My life has been poor in love; I have lacked the best of life. If I know nevertheless what love is, it is because of you. I have been able to love you, you alone among all men. You cannot imagine what that means. It means a well in a desert, a blossoming tree in the wilderness. It is thanks to you alone that my heart has not dried up, that a place within me has remained open to grace."
- Hermann Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund

A gentle summer breeze moved over the ankle-high grass, a quiet rustle in the afternoon silence. Soft music like a lullaby, hummed only, wordless, underlined by the occasional rippling of the lake's water. Even the birds stirred only rarely in the summer heat; nature itself seemed to be asleep.

A small paradise, taken from poems. The grass was greener than it should have been in midsummer, the sky was as blue as in a child's dream, an innocent blue broken by fleecy clouds. The air was hot and dry, not oppressive like in the cities, but pure and pleasant.

It would never have occurred to the two boys to destroy this paradise. They weren't intruders, not even guests. They fit so seamlessly into the idyllic picture that it would have appeared empty and incomplete without them. The innocence before the fall. Naked and blissful in paradise.

Two slender youths, one of them still frail like a boy, the other already showing the first signs of a man's strength. Both of them were blond, dark blond bleached by endless hours in the sun, their fair skin was tanned. Their bodies, wet from their bath, had already been dried long ago, but a few drops persisted stubbornly, unwilling to abandon such beauty.

Hugo grinned when he saw one of those drops on his friend's chest, only an inch away from his nose. He didn't lift his head when his left hand slid up from Dieter's stomach to his chest. Warm fingertips wiped the drop away, and his hand stayed there, tender and protective.

Their eyes met, and Dieter smiled. He had put one arm around Hugo; and the other one, idle until now, found its way into Hugo's hair. It had grown longer during the holidays than was allowed in their strict boarding school. Dieter gently combed through the wet strands.

"I like your hair much better this way," he said quietly, almost dreamily. His voice had become deeper over the past few months, but it was still incredibly soft. Many years would pass until Hugo first found out how hard and cold it could sound. But for the moment, and for all of his youth, it was the voice of friendship, intimacy, tenderness.

"My father would be outraged if he could see me like this," Hugo replied, and his smile faded. It always did when he thought of his father - a strict man, unapologetic, full of love for his eldest son, and full of disdain and indifference towards the younger one, Hugo.

"Don't think about him." Dieter tightened his embrace, and Hugo pressed his face against his friend's chest. "He isn't here. Nobody is here except for us. This summer you're mine alone."

"Not just this summer, but always." Hugo only whispered the words, as if his innocent mind already suspected that they implied something secret and forbidden.

"You do know how much I love you." Dieter looked at him, raising his voice a little at the end of the sentence as if it was a question. Seeing how serious those pale eyes could be made Hugo shiver sometimes, as if they foreboded the depths this bright, studious boy would stumble into one day. Or maybe it was only the grown-up man who shivered when he remembered how innocent Dieter had once looked.

"Just like I love you," a younger, carefree Hugo replied. He lifted his hand to caress Dieter's cheek. "We are going to stay friends, even after school, right?"

"Of course." Hugo's doubts seemed to disappoint Dieter. "You are my best friend. And you only get one best friend in your life. Things like that don't change, ever."

Hugo turned in Dieter's arms and nuzzled closer against him, until their bodies were entwined, their faces almost touching. And they did what they did so often when they were alone - they kissed. A soft, chaste kiss, lips caressing each other shyly.

They were blissfully unaware that their kiss was about more than only friendship and trust. Even when they rubbed against each other, with reddened cheeks and quickened breath, they didn't think much of it. They felt that this should remain their secret, that nobody could be allowed to find out about this, but they didn't believe it was reprehensible. They were simply two friends who loved each other more than anything else in the world. Two friends who would never leave each other.

Ten years later the memories brought tears to Hugo Stiglitz's eyes. How naïve they had been, ignorant children who forgot all too readily that life wasn't always a green meadow in midsummer, where two boys could rest and love each other. Once the two friends were torn out of paradise and thrown into the real world, they were separated all too soon.

A rough voice broke through the soldier's dreams.

"On your feet, Unterfeldwebel, there's someone here to see you."

Unquestioning obedience was the first lesson he had learnt in his life, even at home and in school, and Hugo was on his feet in the blink of an eye. His posture was tense and upright, his face blank, his eyes a bit sad, regretful that he had been forced back into the real world so soon.

The door was unlocked, and the guard stepped aside immediately to let the visitor in. Hugo tensed up even more. Instead of one of his superiors an SS-officer entered the cell. Hugo saluted quickly, glancing at the rank insignia.

"Untersturmführer."

"At ease." The voice wasn't unfriendly, but cool and blank. An officer talking to a subordinate, nothing more, nothing less. Unremarkable, had it not been the voice of Hugo's dreams.

And only now did he recognise the pale face between the cap and the black uniform, a face that was suddenly lit by a smile, blue eyes glinting. The officer in front of him was no other than his childhood friend Dieter, the serious model student, smart and a bit insidious, so sharp-witted that he had even made his teachers feel uncomfortable.

He looked so impressive in the uniform, even Hugo hardly recognised the slender youth he had once been. But the open, amiable smile on his face was still the same as when they had last seen each other five years ago, when Dieter had left for university to study law.

"Oh Hugo," he said and shook his head. He walked over to his friend, chuckling softly. "The moment I let you out of my sight you get in trouble. Why am I not surprised?"

The playful words yanked Hugo out of his shocked stupor, and he finally laughed. How fitting that Dieter was the one to get him out of here; Dieter, who had always talked their teachers into letting Hugo go whenever he misbehaved.

After all those years they still didn't need words to understand each other. They moved at the same time, half crushing each other in their embrace. For a few seconds they simply stood there, breathing the other's scent, their cheeks touching. Every single detail of the time they had shared was suddenly vivid again in their minds. Hugo felt as if he had come home after endless years in the wilderness.

A single look into Dieter's eyes was enough to know that he was thinking and feeling the same. One single look was also enough to know that Dieter's thoughts had lost much of their former innocence.

"I put in a good word for you with your superior; you'll get away with a formal reprimand," Dieter said suddenly, and he made a few steps backwards. He blushed, slightly embarrassed, but he had too much self-control to lose his train of thought. "We have so much to catch up with after all these years. I missed you. Come on, let's go home. I want you to be my guest tonight."

He put an arm around his friend's shoulders and led him out of the cell. Hugo was more than willing to come along. Tears almost welled up in his eyes again, but they were tears of joy this time. Dieter's smile was like a promise to bring him back to the paradise they had believed lost so many years ago.

And once again two unsuspecting souls, blinded by their love for each other, forgot that the world they were living in was anything but a green meadow in midsummer.

A/N2: Since this is 1935, our dear "Major" Hellstrom is still Untersturmführer (~lieutenant). Concerning the SS-uniform: I did some research, and from what I've understood the Gestapo, being a SECRET police force, didn't have uniforms, they worked in civilian clothes. However, most Gestapo officers were also members of other organisations, mainly the SS. And to my admittedly not very knowledgeable eye the uniform Hellstrom is wearing in the movie looks like an SS-uniform. So, my theory was that's he's a member of the SS and wears an SS-uniform whenever he thinks a uniform is more appropriate than plain clothes. And since Hugo doesn't know that Dieter works for the Gestapo, he'd simply assume that Dieter is a normal SS-officer.

If any of you knows more about this kind of thing, feel free to tell me that this is all complete nonsense and that I got it all wrong. Not that historical accuracy matters much in a fandom like Inglourious Basterds, but I'd still be grateful for corrections.

The title of this fic is shamelessly stolen from one of my favourite authors, whose novel "Beneath the Wheel" inspired the flashback scene and the whole idea of them being childhood friends. The quote itself is taken from another novel by the same author: "It is not our purpose to become each other; it is to recognise each other, to learn to see the other and honour him for what he is: each the other's opposite and complement." - Hermann Hesse, Narcissus and Goldmund