"What we observe as material bodies and forces are nothing but shapes and variations in the structure of space."

Erwin Schrodinger

Crossing the Line

Twenty Five

Their group moves to the side of a large lake. After a night discussion with voices as loud as burning wood, they decide to position themselves on the offense. Seras thinks of blue lips and gray, naked bodies in pits, and that's all the reason she needs. The castle, abandoned in the first Great War, hangs over the lake like a gargoyle. Misshapen and vicious, she never stops starring at its rippling reflection. Hans sits beside her sharpening his knife. Rust speckles the metal near the hilt. She notices a freckle on his wrist.

"Are their any survivors. At the castle, that is?" Seras asks, leaning forward, elbows wedged on her knees. Her hand rests against her neck. The skin is soft and thin, an interesting contrast to the flaking skin of her palm. She feels her pulse. When her hair was longer she didn't feel as exposed.

"Not any more," Girlycard answers. He stands with his hands behind his back beside the pebbly beach. His shiny black shoes sinking down. She wants to ask how its possible that he is awake and it's only late afternoon. Vampire, she thinks and wonders what that really means.

Behind them, Pip sleeps and shivers. His ankle, twisted and burned from the fire, is infected: red, pussing, hot. Hans predicts he would survive another week without medication. Girlycard promises it would be less. Any warmth provided from the day seeped away. Charged clouds rush forward, over the castle and towards them along with the darkness of the night. Hans knee presses into Seras' thigh. Again, she reminds herself this is all real. He is real along with everything that he is: hidden mysteries of a world shrouded in myths and fairy tales. The wind galvanizes the lake to stir up waves that crashed against the pebbled beach like at sea.

"Will you help me move Pip farther back?" Seras asks as the water stirs like a waking beast, shaking its monstrous head without care to what's around it.

Hans sheaths his knife and hands it to her, the hilt the same color as the rust still on the blade. "Of course," he says. She takes it and shoves it into her belt, even though she doubts she would use it. They ran out of Vaseline the same day Pip got his fever and her hands ache more than her empty stomach.

Girlycard stands at the shore with waves crashing and lapping at his feet, like subjects bowing before their king.

Rain comes and so does he. In shades of orange, he steps forward. Seras knows him. The boy who beat the Jew-sympathizer on stage, his smile still lopsided and sweet and hair gold as any ripe wheat field. She does not laugh or balk at the sight of pointed ears. Instead, she reminds herself this is reality, everything before was an illusion, except Hans isn't here to remind her. He left an hour ago to scout when he picked up something suspicious.

Knife drawn Seras crouches in front of Pip, who is propped against a tree, hair half braided and hat crushed beneath his butt to try to stave off the mud and water. Girlycard still has not come in from the shore and she hasn't bothered to check on him.

"I have a message."

Surprise slackens her shoulders. The leather hilt rubs the scabs of her palms. She can't feel the skin, but she still feels the pain.

"You are her, aren't you?" the boy asks, eyes wondering and wide and gold, so gold they glisten like an electric bulb. The fire hisses between them as it struggles against the rain. "I've wanted to meet you for so long," he gushes, moving forward. She squeezes the knife. He steps right into the fire and soon the damp, purple darkness of the storm is all that's around them. The wind echoes so long, so long, so long.

Seras reassures herself by reaching out for Pip. Her fingers find purchase on his boot, propped up to try to lessen the swelling in the ankle. He reassures himself by holding on to the back of her uniform. A flash of lightning snapped and a faint crash of thunder followed.

His gold eyes blink before her. "My name is Schrodinger," he says, ignoring the point of the knife Seras redirects the rest against his chest. Her grip on the knife is so weak that the tearing of his uniform as he edges closer threaten to rip it away from her.

Decorum forces her to nod in greeting and repeat, "Schrodinger."

He smiles. She knows this without observing it. He is pleased that she said his name. "I have a message for you Seras Victoria. It's from the Major," he says.

Pip wheezes. Water splashes into her eye and she blinks. And she is shoved back into the ground. Mud smears between her fingers as Seras tries to balance herself, her bandages ruined and sopping with water. A heavy mist shrouds everything and creates a strange glow to the forest, much akin to the deceiving light of a full moon. "What?" she whispers. It shimmers and condenses. Another crack of lightning.

"Mon dieu."

The animal growls. Its silver fur shivering as if every hair was alive and at the ready to attack, to defend, to kill. It perches on four feet, with the front ones appearing more hand-like. Its limbs are long, with its chest half the width of Seras' height and twitching muscles obvious beneath its coat. It crouches low, pressing her beneath its mass. Hans. Mud bubbles around his paws. She can see splatter marks along his stomach from running. His tail is matted and streaked.

"Kamerad!" the boy exclaims, apparently happy to have sharp teeth and black gums stretched out towards him. "Ich bin sehr glucklich! Der Major sagte mir, Sie wurden bald sterben. Ich bin dankbar, kannich sagen, auf Wiedersehen!"

"Sie wurden bald sterben," Seras repeats, mud oozing between her fingers and her burned skin cracking, a temporary salve. During meets in her flat where they would sit across each other trying not to stare and when the language lessons began to surround threats, warnings, and signs of danger she became intimately familiar with sterben (to die) and toten (to kill). Lightning, thunder, and splashes of the rain. Between the snap of a bullet.

Schrodinger collapses to his knees first before titling to the side and landing on the ground. His pointed ears slack to one side. A bullet hole the size of her thumb nail dribbles out blood. In this light, it looks like mud. His mouth is smiling and even with a human face, his teeth are sharp.

I shot a child, she thinks, as the mist and light return and disappear quick. The shivering silver fur is gone, but Hans crouches beside her, his hand on her thigh, a comfort for her as well as for him. A dependence formed during nights with their backs pressed to each other's and conversations in struggling English and German. Her hands smear mud on his white skin as she grapples in the darkness to hug him.

This is real, his breath seems to say as it comes out in heated puffs over her shoulder.

Girlycard singing wakes Seras up at dawn. Hans sleeps beside her, a hand stretched out. His face an orderly construction of lines and angles.

"What is that?" she asks. Girlycard is blue and purple next to her. His suit is pressed and his hair straight.

"Some ignorant German song I picked up."

She groans as she stands. Her back throbs from being thrown back by Hans. "You must like it though, you're singing it."

The boy purses his lips. The sun is stronger now and the shadows of his face are light bruises. "You are right," he admits. "I am partial towards it." She pulls up her collar, not to protect her neck from the cold, but to hide it away. "But I do enjoy stories where the devils win. It doesn't happen too often."

Author: So, I was going to write this epic scene where Rip and Girlycard have their battle, but I realized how ill placed it would be in this fanfiction. Instead, we know it happened because of the song Girlycard sings from the opera "Der Freischutz." Oh, he does love to gloat.

Thank you for reading and loving. Up next…a fast paced explosion of fights and revelations. Doctor. Major. And Schnochen. I hope I can continue to please you.