Warnings! : AU. Human characters. Set in 1960s Eastern Bloc. Violence, language, insanity, gloomy themes, Stockholm Syndrome, character death, psychological manipulation/torture, etc.
Pairings : Russia x Germany, Austria x Hungary, a hint of Prussia x Lithuania. Other characters featured are Prussia, Austria, and Lithuania, and also some Hungary, Belarus, Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, and America. As always, Hungary goes by her proper Hungarian name (Erzsébet, not Elizabeta).
...did I mention everyone in this is fuckin' crazy? Ok.
Enjoy, and please review if you have a spare second. Thanks for reading, guys!
If you don't want to read through all 400 000 words or just want something to do, you can go watch the movie on youtube instead : www. youtube watch?v=t-9mRMZRBPo&t=3825s (an actual hyperlink is in my profile if you don't want to copy and paste)
ZACHEM YA
Prologue
Cкажи, зачем я жду звонка?
Зачем немые облака плывут ко мне издалека и тают?
Зачем любовь коснулась нас?
Зачем я плачу в первый раз?
Зачем хочу тебя сейчас?
не знаю...
The construction began in 1961.
It was early on a Sunday morning when the border between East and West Germany was officially closed. All friendly and familiar visits came to a grinding halt; only officials and diplomats could squeeze their way through the blockade, and the police were unmoving in their orders.
The first foundation blocks were laid on August 17th. Military personnel surrounded the perimeters with high-powered rifles and barking dogs that they held on leashes, and kept the Easterners at bay. The Westerners stood silently on the other side, watching their counterparts being slowly and deliberately shielded from view.
They came every day.
It wasn't so bad at first. Just a long, impenetrable stretch of the worst-looking barbed wire they had ever seen. The towers were already going up, and the riflemen had orders to shoot dead anyone who crossed into the moderately marked no-man's land. There were no vociferous protests; the Soviet-backed guards were not the ones that were to be crossed or harassed. The Westerners could only watch their fellow Germans in concern, and the Easterners could only watch the fence growing longer with quiet resignation.
Still, there was hope in seeing.
The wire got worse in 1962.
The guards were doubled in number, and the no-man's land was extended. The Easterners could barely distinguish the faces of known Westerners, but, at least, they were still visible.
Gilbert and Ludwig came every day.
Gilbert, prior to the birth of the fence, had been studying on the American side of Berlin in the field of criminal justice. Had been; he could no longer go to school. The border shut down everything. Including all jobs and studies.
For all it mattered, anyway. He'd ditched most of the time and had been flunking nearly every class when the border had closed. School had been a formality only; one to keep anyone from taking Ludwig from his care because he had been irresponsible. Going to 'school' sounded good and gave him clout at being a responsible adult when he was the farthest thing from. Gilbert hadn't ever had intentions of paying attention, and less intentions of actually graduating. He went only to meet people that he could cause trouble with and get high with. Why not? The course he had chosen was as ridiculous as could be for a man like him; a fuckin' cop. A man like him, reckless and violent and troublesome. In fact, when he had called Ludwig up and told him, the first words Gilbert had uttered had been, 'A cop, can you imagine all the shit I can get away with if I'm a cop?'
Ludwig had only sighed.
Didn't matter anymore. No more classes. No more school. No more work.
He was trapped here.
Like a mouse.
Without something to do and without hope, Gilbert had joined an underground band of students that he had met here and there in the street, not because he believed much in their cause so much as he wanted to cause trouble, unbeknownst to the Westerner that he came here to watch every day.
Ludwig didn't know.
Ludwig.
Ludwig was the tall, handsome, bright young man that Gilbert had the honor to call 'brother'. Even if he really wasn't. Not by blood. No; by something stronger. Didn't matter if he and Ludwig weren't blood. They were still brothers, in every sense. Everything he had ever done had been for Ludwig. Waking up every morning had been for Ludwig. Getting out of bed had been for Ludwig. Standing there and hating everything but still smiling for it all had been for Ludwig. Ludwig represented the best of his life. Really the only good thing he'd ever known. The only saving grace.
The only part of his life that had ever really been worth it.
Ludwig was everything. Ludwig, his little brother.
Everything.
Ludwig had left Gilbert's supervision at seventeen years old, when he had moved out and left Gilbert for the first time, if only by distance and not by legality. Gilbert had still been his legal guardian, or would have been, anyway, if the world had given a damn about Ludwig. Gilbert had stayed on the West side back then with Ludwig to take care of, but when Ludwig had moved out Gilbert had been angry and gone back to the East where his flat was and where he had grown up. He should have stayed put.
How unfair, that those old sons of bitches high up in the government hadn't cared how much it hurt, to see someone you loved being walled off across the way. To see, but not be able to touch.
Now, Ludwig just stood there, across the wire, back against a building and arms across his chest, and watched.
And, oh god, how Gilbert missed him.
Missed Ludwig. He missed everything about Ludwig. His deep voice, his calm attitude, his gentleness, his kindness, his patience, his pale hair, his paler eyes, his even paler skin, his stoicism, the feel of his hands, and Christ almighty, he even missed the way Ludwig used to berate and chastise him. Missed Ludwig arguing with him. Missed Ludwig's endearing looks of exasperation and annoyance. Missed fighting with him, even.
Missed Ludwig.
He couldn't touch Ludwig anymore. Missed the feeling of Ludwig.
It wasn't fair.
Ludwig took this horrible oppression as he always took things, with calm grace and dignity, and just stood there across the wire, never saying a word. He wouldn't react as Gilbert did, by fighting back, and would only watch things unfold as they would. That was just Ludwig. As far as obedient Ludwig was concerned, rules were rules.
No matter how cruel.
But Ludwig was so patient—he could have waited until the end of the earth for all of this to be resolved and for that wire to be torn down, but Gilbert couldn't.
Waiting.
There was no passing. Not now. He'd missed his great opportunity, when the wire had been the shortest and lightly guarded. He could've jumped. He hadn't. He didn't know why. And so now he was stuck in limbo, lingering in the shadows and watching the world zoom by without him. Watching Ludwig was really the only reminder that he was still part of life. Because otherwise, he felt pretty damn dead.
Ludwig's hair gleamed in the sunlight, like a lighthouse for the weary soul.
Missed him so much.
Couldn't touch him.
They always appeared at high noon, always at the same spot. Gilbert sat cross-legged on the hood of an abandoned car that overlooked the construction zone, and Ludwig stood rigidly against the wall of a store front. At the beginning, they had sometimes had difficulty finding each other through the mass of people, but now...
The crowds were gone. Only a few stragglers like themselves remained. All the rest were either too frightened of the guards, or too heart-broken at the sight. Hard to watch it all unfold for most.
Gilbert's heart was too hard to break, and Ludwig was frightened of nothing.
So they stayed.
They sat in silence until they were just too tired to carry on, sometimes before dark, sometimes after. They kept only constant eye contact, but they never tried to speak. They were too far away from each other to even read lips, let alone hear. Gilbert just looked for Ludwig's pale gleam, and no doubt Ludwig did the same to locate Gilbert.
Watching.
The stillness of the afternoon was broken only by the sounds of construction, the barking of the dogs, and sometimes the whirring of a Russian-made tank. People talking.
Gilbert regretted now that he had not just stayed on the West side, as Ludwig had begged him to so many times. His pride had done him in. Had gone over so many times to visit, but had never stayed.
Gilbert had been too stubborn, too bitter.
That last day in the West. Those words that had been exchanged. Some stupid fight. He always started a fight. He had heard the rumors about a wall, of course he had, but he hadn't ever thought it would really happen. Ludwig had crossed his arms and turned his back as Gilbert tried to keep on arguing, as always, and he had gone back home feeling so angry and so hurt. When Ludwig had called him the next day (that long forgotten Saturday), begging him to come back because something was going to happen, Gilbert had hung up the phone, sat down, and stayed stubbornly put.
Just wanted to make Ludwig angry.
His pride cost him dearly.
Too late now, and all they could do was to keep their constant vigil, so that Ludwig would know that Gilbert was alive and well, and so that Gilbert would know that Ludwig had not forgotten him. He'd die if Ludwig ever forgot him. Ludwig was all he lived for.
They came every day.
In '63, some foolhardy, desperate Easterner thought he could break through the barricade. The young idiot stole, somehow, a Russian armored carrier and crashed it straight through the wire. It worked; he was shot, granted, but the Western police saved him from demise. He was, undoubtedly, living in comfort now on the Americanized side. Lucky bastard. It had consequences for the others left behind.
In '65, the concrete blocks came in. They started to stack them, and Gilbert realized with a pang that every day, his view of Ludwig was becoming increasingly compromised.
In two weeks, only their heads were visible.
Ludwig looked so sad. Couldn't stand the sight.
The last days dragged out the longest, and when Ludwig had to stand on his toes just to meet Gilbert's gaze, they forgot all hunger and exhaustion and stayed out until the sun rose the next morning.
The last time.
The next day, Gilbert came out, and felt the threatening sting of tears in his eyes.
He could not see Ludwig.
It was just too tall, and even when he stood straight up on the car, it was to no avail. And he feared to climb higher, as the guard's towers were higher too. They might have shot him if he started to look too suspicious.
He was not afraid of death, never had been, but he was afraid of leaving Ludwig behind. Of not seeing Ludwig again.
Ludwig was so vulnerable.
No. Not really. Certainly, at some level, Ludwig was vulnerable, always had been, but it was Gilbert now who felt the most vulnerable. No matter how much he denied it. He was afraid to die because if he did, then he would never see Ludwig again, and he couldn't bear the thought. He did not believe in heaven or hell, didn't believe in god, nothing. When he was gone, he was gone for good, and so he couldn't leave this world until he had had his fill. He couldn't leave Ludwig, not now, because if he did then they weren't ever going to see each other again.
Just wanted to touch him one more time.
Ludwig was everything.
For now, he would stay back, accept the fact that he had temporarily lost the only family he had, and try to think of ways to get out. Talking to Ludwig on the phone just wasn't enough. He wanted him back.
Days passed.
He tried to keep his head high, even as he found himself staring at the wall and wondering if Ludwig was doing the same. Couldn't see anymore.
A week later, Gilbert awoke in his tiny, bland flat, and when he sat up in bed, a strange sound caught his attention immediately. The sound of silence. There were no longer the noises of the construction workers shouting orders, the hum of the crane, or the ferocity of the jackhammer.
Just silence.
He knew what it meant.
Leaning forward on his crumbled bed sheets, Gilbert held his head in his hands, and gave a heavy sigh of begrudging acceptance.
The wall was complete.