A Devilish Plan

Rating: T (just to be safe)

Disclaimer: The characters don't belong to me. I am focusing on the fictionalized characters of HBO and hope no one will take offence with this story. It was created purely for fun, I do not receive any money for it.

Summary: Nix has a devilish plan: getting Dick drunk on V-E Day. Will he succeed? What is the outcome? No slash, only friendship.

Author's Note: First, I'm not a native English speaker, there will be mistakes. No matter how many times I go through the text, there still are mistakes. Sorry for that. Second, hard to believe, but I only discovered "Band of Brothers" about three months ago. So I'm new to the fandom. Third, I haven't written fanfiction for ages, but it's fun to be back. :-) Fourth, this story will be only about three chapters long. I've got it planned until the end, so I'm definitely going to finish it.

Criticism is always appreciated.

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"All for me?"

Nix stared incredulously at the never-ending rows of liquor and wine stashed in the room, trying to count the shelves, but giving up after a short while. Göring must have had an even bigger obsession with alcohol than he had. Who would have thought that even possible?

Dick just smiled that small smile of his as an answer, already turning on his heels and intending to leave Nix to the "gift" he gave him.

"O'Keefe?", Nix called out to the private on duty, who was timidly waiting on the doorstep. "I've got a task for you. Find me some Vat 69 bottles in all this booze. It might take days to find it for one man alone."

At this, Dick turned around and rolled his eyes at Nix.

"Come on, you can't employ him to find your liquor for you."

"Why not? We have peace now, and soldiers still need solid tasks in peace time. Just trying to keep him out of trouble by keeping him occupied", Nix answered lazily, slowly walking down the shelves.

Dick just snorted and addressed O'Keefe, "Private, you don't have to do this. Just grab some bottles for yourself and your friends. You're off duty now."

O'Keefe had followed the conversation wide-eyed and now hesitantly took some steps towards the shelves.

"Isn't this against regulations?", he asked shyly, not being able to look the Major into the eyes. "I don't think we are supposed to drink alcohol right now."

"Didn't you hear him?", Nix clipped in helpfully, while inspecting a bottle he had pulled out of a shelf, "you're off duty."

"O'Keefe, it's fine", Dick tried to reassure him as best as he could. "This is a day for celebrations. You contributed to that, so don't worry about regulations and just enjoy yourself."

"Yes, sir", Private O'Keefe answered. He grabbed some bottles without really looking at them and hurried out of the door.

Dick looked after him, forehead all wrinkled right up to his red hair.

"Am I somehow scaring him?", he finally asked his friend, disbelieving.

Snorting, Nix answered, "Well, your holiness and righteousness, not to forget your constant sobriety can be scaring sometimes for us lower folks. Try and loosen up, Dick, and the men would certainly be more at ease around you. Maybe you should take your own advice and celebrate today. There are reasons, world peace and all that crap."

With that, Nix opened the bottle of whiskey and took a deep swig. It was not Vat 69, but it burned down his throat very nicely and warmed his belly. Yes, that stuff was good. Then, for the hundredth time, he held out the battle to Dick, thinking his friend would refuse, like he did the last ninetynine times before. All the bigger surprise when Dick actually accepted the bottle, looking at it sceptically, as if it would jump at his throat at any moment.

"Maybe I should", his friend murmured slowly, still staring at the bottle, then suddenly taking a swig from it. Nix did not believe his eyes, Dick was actually drinking! Sputtering and coughing, his friend lowered the bottle, all red in the face.

"How can you drink that?", he asked breathlessly, shoving the bottle back into Nix's hand. "This tastes like pure poison!"

Nix just laughed.

"Believe me, it gets better with every draft. Try again."

He gave the bottle back to a very doubtful looking Dick, who – surprise again! – took it back. After taking a smaller sip this time, his friend shook his head, resolutely shoving the bottle away from him.

"No really, I can't understand what you see in this. And it has not gotten any better the second time around."

While Dick still scrunched up his face because of the taste of the alcohol he had just drunk, a plan was forming into Nix's mind. If there had ever been a chance to get his friend drunk, it was right now. Dick was just too virtuous for his own good, so the only way to get him to drink would be to make him think it was the proper thing to do. Like now. Everyone would think that celebrations are connected to drinking.

"That's it, Lew", Dick said, again making an attempt to leave. "I'll leave you to your liquid friends. Just don't overdo it, Sink expects us back and working by tomorrow afternoon."

Right now, Nix saw his clever plan dissolving into air, so he called after Dick, "Hey, wait a moment! I know why you didn't like your drink. We went at this all wrong. Whiskey isn't really the proper drink for celebrations. We need to have champagne! You'll like it."

"Nix, really", Dick answered impatiently, but he had at least stopped walking. "I've got things to do. And you know, for a nondrinker I drank already too much today."

Nix, who had been swiftly searching the shelves for champagne, pulled out a dusty bottle that looked very expensive and very good.

"Here, I have it!", he exclaimed, coming back to Dick. "This is a bottle of Krug collection, which translates to you: the best and most expensive champagne you'll ever drink. You can't miss out on a chance to share it with me."

"I'm good, thank you very much", Dick replied curtly.

"Dick", Nix tried again, putting to work both his dark puppy eyes and a slight rich-kid-always-gets-what-he-wants whine, "you're my best friend. Probably the only true friend I've ever had. Together we just survived the most devastating war the world has ever seen. You know I respect your sense of responsibility and your attitude towards drinking. But this here is different, we'll never win a World War again, hopefully!"

After a short break, Nix added his last trump, "Today you should discard your aloofness and step down to the level of your men, the very men that even made this peace possible. Honour them by celebrating with them and like them."

Now Nix could only wait and hope. There were two possibilities, either Dick would just laugh it all up and tell him not to be silly, or he would...

"I'm not aloof", Dick answered slowly and indignantly.

Yes, he had taken the bait! Nix almost cheered to himself, but he knew he needed to tread carefully now. One wrong move and his skittish prey would flee into the woods.

"I know you're not", Nix said, opting for an earnest tone. "But you sometimes come across as a bit standoffish. You never make mistakes and you never let your guard down, it can be intimidating and lead to wrong assumptions, you know."

"This is the way officers should behave", Dick told him in such an upright tone that made Nix even more resolute in his plan of getting him drunk.

"Well, let's not think about that for today. We earned ourselves this break, let's just enjoy it", Nix declared, and popped the cork of the champagne. A stream of golden liquid flew from the bottle and Nix wanted to waste as few of the precious wine as possible. He drank a generous amount first, then giving the bottle to Dick.

"To peace!", Nix pronounced and lifted his own bottle of whiskey to clink glasses.

"To peace", Dick murmured and drank. There was no sputtering this time from his red-haired friend, so Nix concluded that he liked the champagne better than the whiskey.

Dick wanted to put the champagne down on the small table, but Nix did not give him the chance.

"To our friendship!", he toasted again, lifting his bottle of whiskey. Dick gave him a dark look, but obediently clinked bottles and drank again.

"That's enough, Nix, I'm not drinking anymore", Dick stated. Was there already a slight slur to his speech? Nix could not be sure. However, he was sure that he could not let his friend escape that easily.

"To Easy company!", he brought out another toast, but this time Dick refused to clink bottles.

"Come on, Dick, you can't reject a toast on your men, how would that look?", Nix goaded, still holding out his whiskey.

"There's no one else here", Dick stated with raised eyebrows. "So I guess no one could complain."

"You hurt me, my friend", Nix exclaimed dramatically. "I'm here and I'm Easy company, too."

Dick grumbled something to himself, then clinked bottles and drank. Nix had to hide his smile behind the bottle. Since he was now standing between the table and Dick, his friend had to bend over to put his bottle to the ground in order to finally get rid of the alcohol. To Nix's satisfaction, Dick had to take a slight misstep to right himself when coming up again. Without a word, his friend left him where he was and walked to the door.

Just as Nix was about to give up all his plans of intoxicating Major Holy any further, Harry, Speirs and Lipton came through the door. Speirs was leaning heavily on Lipton and Harry's grin was far too sloppy to be sober.

"Hey, my dear friends!", Harry exclaimed, taking in all the booze with big eyes, "I knew you were hiding something. This place is sick! And you were trying to keep it all to yourselves! Not very comradely of you!"

"Nah, I hope there are no hard feelings", Nix answered with a grin. "Ranking officers have the privilege of serving themselves first, so to say our 'ius primae noctis'. But since Dick is about to leave on some very important business, more important than to be together with his friends on such a memorable day, I can use your company very well."

Dick shot him another one of his dark looks, murmuring something about "these rich brats" and "pity his parents".

"Did you say something, Dick?", Nix asked, trying hard not to laugh at his friend's exasperated look. It seemed like peace time wore harder on Dick's nerves than war time.

"No, I didn't", Dick answered, now definitely with a fine slur to his words. "I just have to be somewhere, I'm sure. Off... or so."

His behaviour now attracted Harry's attention, who approached him carefully.

"Wait, wait, wait", Harry said, eyeing Dick closely. "You, my friend, are tipsy. You've been drinking."

"I'm not tipsy", Dick denied vehemently, shaking his head with a little more force than necessary. "I'm perfectly normal."

"Yeah, he drank whiskey and champagne with me", Nix clipped in helpfully. "Seems like it was already a bit too much."

Dick's protestations went under among the shocked gasp of Speirs, who was waking a bit from his stupor, and Harry's exclamations of "I knew it!". Only Lipton remained silent, smiling beatifically to himself.

"But what really hurts me, Dick", Harry finally declared in a wounded tone, "is that you resolutely refused to drink with me some hours ago, but now chose to drink with rich boy here. Is it just our company that wasn't good enough or was it the expensive booze?"

Nix could have kissed him for that remark. His plan was not totally disbanded yet, since there were new players in the game now, who seemed to be on his side.

"I didn't want to drink in the first place, he talked me into it", Dick tried to defend himself, looking at Nix accusingly. "And if it makes you feel better, I'll drink with you, too. It'll show you I'm not drunk."

In the blink of an eye, Nix shoved the champagne back into Dick's hand, while the other went through the shelves, looking for their own favourite liquor.

"To Toccoa!", Nix toasted, when everyone had a bottle at hand.

"To Toccoa!", Speirs, Lipton and Dick responded, then drinking.

"Wait!", Harry complained. "You all know I wasn't in Toccoa. To Victory in Europe!"

"To Victory in Europe!"

After some more toasts, from D-Day and Holland to their survival of the English food in Aldbourne and Colonel Sink's mustache, Nix saw that Dick had almost emptied his bottle.

"I think I need to sit down for a moment", his friend murmured and sloppily sat down at the table. All the fight against more drinking and his excuses of having to be somewhere else had fallen away. Nix had seen him drinking even in between the toasts. Seemed like his friend finally took a liking to it.

The other followed Dick's example and sat down at the table as well.

"Dick", Harry slurred and clapped Dick's back, "no way in hell I'm going to believe you're not drunk. But I think it suits you well, makes you more likeable. Not all aloof and stuff anymore. No offense... Ah, what I wanna say, you're just a good drinking buddy, that's all."

"Ah, shut up, Welsh", Speirs said finally, trying to weave a finger in Harry's direction. "He's fine when he's drinking, and fine when he's not drinking. Just a fine officer, so stop your blabbering."

"Aye, aye, Captain", Harry mock-saluted to Speirs, and for one moment Nix was not sure if he went too far with Speirs, but the Captain had already withdrawn in his very own world of drunken stupor again and did not react anymore.

"Hey, I've got an idea", Lipton piped in, looking at least partly sober. "We should go to the V-E Day party they're holding in the hotel hall of the Berchtesgadener Hof. We could bring along some of the booze for the men, they would love that. And they've got music, as far as I've heard."

"Sounds good to me", Nix answered and Harry nodded his approval. "You're coming, too, Dick."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea", Dick protested slowly. "I'm feeling a bit dizzy, maybe I should go and lie down for a while."

"No, Dick, believe me, the dizziness just gets worse as soon as you lie down", Nix explained patiently, as if to a small child. "Now you're coming to the nice part of this all. Just enjoy it, you'll have music, company and some more drinking. And besides, you should congratulate the men to their victory personally."

Dick just sighed.

"I'm not going to have a say in this anyway, have I?"

"Nope", Nix smiled.

"Then let's go!", Harry prompted.

- TBC -