So I decided to turn one of the fills from the table challenge into a chapter fic
Title: When I disappear - Chapter 2
Character(s) (in this chapter): Austria, Prussia - South Italy
Rating: T
Summary: Roderich wakes up at a hospital but he's haunted by the past year being imprissioned by Lovino. Gilbert comes to visit him.
Note: Yeah, thanks to ichihara_mina and Top Magician on ff.net I decided to write a very long epilogue to this fill for the table challenge. I'm just afraid that I might haven't made myself clear when I talked about the pairings in this fic. One-sided PruAus didn't mean that Roderich would fall in love with Gilbert but the other way round. But I'm not sure with whom the main character's will end up yet. Mina and I talked some of the options though and my personal favourite is still Haus Habsburg + Prumano. But that can change. Even more so since I won't have much time for writing in the next 2 and a half weeks because I've got exams comming up. So (most likely) only few updates until I've written my Chinese exam (which is on February 6th) ...
When Roderich woke up, he didn’t know where he was or whether he was still dreaming or not. This place looked so unreal. There was light, light everywhere around him, on the ceiling, reflecting from the walls, even the floor seemed to be shining. Everything looked so clean. Though there was sound, he couldn’t recognize a spoken word and there wasn’t any music. He was lying in a soft bed, so soft that he could barely move.
Someone entered the room. Roderich instinctively flinched and tried to hide under the blanket. During the past year, someone entering the room had never meant anything good. And just because he wasn’t in that dusty attic anymore didn’t mean he was save. It could be just a trick. They had moved him to a hospital to keep him alive so Lovino could hurt him more. Or for whatever reason he had been kept alive during the last weeks.
The nurse walked over to his bed. Now he was hiding under the blanket and couldn’t see her anymore but he could hear her steps drawing nearer. He didn’t want her to, he wanted her to go away and leave him alone. He was better off alone. He still wished for everyone would leave him to himself so he could just die.
“Mr Edelstein?” the nurse asked. “Mr Edelstein, are you … why are you hiding under your blanket?”
“Leave me alone,” Roderich croaked. His mouth felt so dry he had to gulp. And then he gulped a few times more because it was still so dry. He didn’t dare to leave his hiding place, the world under the blanket felt somewhat safer than the outside. And he didn’t even know why.
“Mr Edelstein, you can’t …” she sighed. “Okay, fine. I’ll get the doctor but I will tell him that you aren’t very cooperative!” She made it sound like a severe threat. Then, she left.
Roderich didn’t put his blanket down before he heard the door shut. He was finally able to breathe again, even though his hearth still raced. Was he in trouble? Would that doctor punish him for hiding from that nurse? A doctor wasn’t allowed to hurt his patients, right? But if Lovino paid him, Roderich doubted that doctor would think of his oath in the first place rather than of his life.
The doctor arrived at the room half an hour later. It had been enough time for Roderich to remember a lot of bad and even worse things Lovino’s men had done to him. He was sure he wouldn’t let the doctor touch him. He would fight back, even though he didn’t feel like he had the strength to do that.
But the doctor didn’t touch him. He only sat on the chair next to Roderich’s bed and talked. He talked in a calm voice. At first, Roderich listened and just didn’t answer. The doctor questioned him about how his body felt, he talked about how he had treated him so far, told him that he didn’t need to hide under the blanket since he was now totally save. Roderich didn’t believe a single word about the last part.
Then, the doctor talked about the policeman who had saved him and Roderich stopped listening. He didn’t care about his saviour, he didn’t care that that man had held his hand during the whole ride to the hospital and even longer. He didn’t care that that man had stayed by his side all the time.
In Roderich’s opinion, that man wasn’t a hero. That man was the worst villain ever.
Eventually, the doctor left. But Roderich wasn’t alone for long. Soon, the doctor returned and some other man followed at his heels. But by the questions this man asked, Roderich assumed that he was a psychologist. Like he hadn’t responded to the doctor, he didn’t respond to the psychologist either. In the end, they left again and Roderich had some hours to himself again.
This left him finally some time to think about his situation. So, he had been rescued by a policeman and then brought to this hospital. He had been unconscious at that time. He couldn’t remember much of the past weeks. Maybe it had even months. He started to wonder why the nurse and the doctor had known his name. How had he been identified? And more importantly, who had identified him? He didn’t know and he couldn’t even guess.
Some hours later, when he had only been interrupted by the nurse bringing him lunch he didn’t touch, the door opened again and a young, uniformed man entered. His hair was white; he was well-build and had a moody expression on his face. This time, Roderich didn’t hide under the blanket. A police man couldn’t be one of Lovino’s men, could he?
The policeman scuffled over to the chair and slumped down on it. Then, he stared at Roderich. He didn’t say a word for a long time, he just stared.
And Roderich stared back. If that man was whom he assumed to be he wouldn’t say a word to him.
“So, you’re finally awake?” the man said.
Roderich didn’t react but simply kept on staring at his counterpart.
“Okay, you don’t talk to me?” The police man sighed. “Fine. I understand that. I saw the house, I was in that attic. I’ve seen you there. I understand that you don’t want to talk and that you don’t trust me. But at least, hear me out. I won’t question you about Lovino Vargas today, even though my boss would like me to. And actually, I want to question you so bad because I need a lead on this guy. But I won’t because if I stress you out, Elizabeta will kill me.”
Roderich furrowed his brows. Elizabeta? How did this guy know her? He felt tears well up in his eyes. He had missed her so much, all the past year when he hadn’t been thinking about Antonio. As the first tear rolled down his cheek, he hid his face in his hands.
The police man patted his back. “There, there,” he murmured. “Don’t cry. She’ll come to see you tomorrow. She promised. And I will see to it that she’s allowed to see you. You’ll have to thank her. And my brother. Because of them, I was searching for you. All this time, I was searching because they didn’t allow me to stop. They missed you. So get better soon, understood?”
Roderich nodded. He couldn’t look this man in the eye. He wanted to talk to him about everything, just because he’d said that he hadn’t been forgotten. He even forgave him the rescue - at least for now. “I wanted to die in that attic,” he finally croaked.
“Don’t,” the police man said. “Don’t push yourself. I don’t wanna hear it yet. It’s not that I can’t understand this. That place … try to forget it. I know you never will, because I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. But try. I don’t want to see Elizabeta cry anymore because that’s really really creeping me out.”
An awkward silence followed. They both thought about Elizabeta crying. Then, they shook their heads to get rid of this thought almost at the same time. They looked at each other. The police man laughed.
“I’m Gilbert Beilschmidt, by the way,” he then said. “I think you know my little brother.”
Roderich nodded. Of course he knew Ludwig. They had been friends in his other life, the life he had lived before … before he had met Lovino. Again, he couldn’t fight back his tears. It felt so unreal. He still couldn’t believe that he was finally free again, that he was still alive, that there still were people who cared about him. He didn’t dare to believe it. How many times had he already dreamed about being free again. And every time, he’d woken in that attic again.
“I don’t know where to go when I’m better,” he whispered. “I don’t know what to do. My life’s gone.”
When Gilbert finally left the room, Roderich had fallen asleep again. For the last hours he had sat by the bed and just patted the other man’s back, trying to sooth him a bit. There wasn’t much he could do for him right now.
He slammed his fist against a wall. Damn!
He wanted to make Vargas pay for this. For everything he had done to Roderich. But he needed prove to make him pay. He couldn’t just go there and shoot him. Not only because it was both stupid and suicidal but also because he was a policeman and policemen didn’t just shoot the bad guy, they arrested him and let a judge deal with him. That was how it was supposed to work.
He was afraid to tell Elizabeta and Ludwig about the horrible state Roderich was in. They should see it for themselves. He wouldn’t tell Antonio yet. He hadn’t told him and had asked both his brother and Elizabeta to keep Roderich’s rescue a secret for now. Deep down, he knew that he was angry at Antonio as well, that he was also a bit jealous of him.
By what Roderich had told him, he could tell that Roderich still loved Antonio. It hurt to see, but he still loved him.
This made Gilbert want to get Lovino Vargas for all this shit even more.
~~~
When Lovino returned to that house and found the police standing outside, he was furious. How did they dare to meddle with his business? He stood on a roof some roads south and watched the cars come and go.
There had been no medics there in the time he had watched so he couldn’t be sure whether they had found the attic or not. If they hadn’t, maybe then his prisoner would finally get what he wanted and just die. But he doubted that. Beilschmidt - and Lovino was pretty sure it had been this wretched policeman who had started this - was too clever not to notice a hidden door. Not when he did want proof, not when he wanted to finally get his hands on him.
Lovino smiled to himself. That proof … he wouldn’t get it this way. Not from Roderich for he was a broken man. There were no traces Lovino himself had left in that house. The forensics wouldn’t find anything that pointed towards him. Maybe they would find enough to get their hands on one of his man, but they would never give them evidence against him. They knew what he could do. They had seen it.
Lovino left the roof. His bodyguards were waiting down on the street. They waited for his orders. Lovino hadn’t decided on what orders to give them yet. He thought about blowing the whole building up. That would teach Beilschmidt what happened to those who dared to cross him. He had to find out about the whereabouts of his prisoner. But that would sure be difficult for him. Beilschmidt would try to protect him in the best way he could. Maybe Lovino would only have a few days before his prisoner would get into some witness-protection program.
He gave orders to his men. They would see to it that everything worked out as planned. They had never let him down. Or at least not twice.
Lovino got into his waiting car. Now, he had other, more pleasant things to think about. He was heading for yet another date with his Antonio. He just hoped the news about his ex-boyfriend hadn’t reached Antonio yet. But on the other hand, if they had, it would be easy to find that whore again.
First chapter: Link
Next chapter: Link
Previous chapter: Link
Character(s) (in this chapter): Austria, Prussia - South Italy
Rating: T
Summary: Roderich wakes up at a hospital but he's haunted by the past year being imprissioned by Lovino. Gilbert comes to visit him.
Note: Yeah, thanks to ichihara_mina and Top Magician on ff.net I decided to write a very long epilogue to this fill for the table challenge. I'm just afraid that I might haven't made myself clear when I talked about the pairings in this fic. One-sided PruAus didn't mean that Roderich would fall in love with Gilbert but the other way round. But I'm not sure with whom the main character's will end up yet. Mina and I talked some of the options though and my personal favourite is still Haus Habsburg + Prumano. But that can change. Even more so since I won't have much time for writing in the next 2 and a half weeks because I've got exams comming up. So (most likely) only few updates until I've written my Chinese exam (which is on February 6th) ...
When Roderich woke up, he didn’t know where he was or whether he was still dreaming or not. This place looked so unreal. There was light, light everywhere around him, on the ceiling, reflecting from the walls, even the floor seemed to be shining. Everything looked so clean. Though there was sound, he couldn’t recognize a spoken word and there wasn’t any music. He was lying in a soft bed, so soft that he could barely move.
Someone entered the room. Roderich instinctively flinched and tried to hide under the blanket. During the past year, someone entering the room had never meant anything good. And just because he wasn’t in that dusty attic anymore didn’t mean he was save. It could be just a trick. They had moved him to a hospital to keep him alive so Lovino could hurt him more. Or for whatever reason he had been kept alive during the last weeks.
The nurse walked over to his bed. Now he was hiding under the blanket and couldn’t see her anymore but he could hear her steps drawing nearer. He didn’t want her to, he wanted her to go away and leave him alone. He was better off alone. He still wished for everyone would leave him to himself so he could just die.
“Mr Edelstein?” the nurse asked. “Mr Edelstein, are you … why are you hiding under your blanket?”
“Leave me alone,” Roderich croaked. His mouth felt so dry he had to gulp. And then he gulped a few times more because it was still so dry. He didn’t dare to leave his hiding place, the world under the blanket felt somewhat safer than the outside. And he didn’t even know why.
“Mr Edelstein, you can’t …” she sighed. “Okay, fine. I’ll get the doctor but I will tell him that you aren’t very cooperative!” She made it sound like a severe threat. Then, she left.
Roderich didn’t put his blanket down before he heard the door shut. He was finally able to breathe again, even though his hearth still raced. Was he in trouble? Would that doctor punish him for hiding from that nurse? A doctor wasn’t allowed to hurt his patients, right? But if Lovino paid him, Roderich doubted that doctor would think of his oath in the first place rather than of his life.
The doctor arrived at the room half an hour later. It had been enough time for Roderich to remember a lot of bad and even worse things Lovino’s men had done to him. He was sure he wouldn’t let the doctor touch him. He would fight back, even though he didn’t feel like he had the strength to do that.
But the doctor didn’t touch him. He only sat on the chair next to Roderich’s bed and talked. He talked in a calm voice. At first, Roderich listened and just didn’t answer. The doctor questioned him about how his body felt, he talked about how he had treated him so far, told him that he didn’t need to hide under the blanket since he was now totally save. Roderich didn’t believe a single word about the last part.
Then, the doctor talked about the policeman who had saved him and Roderich stopped listening. He didn’t care about his saviour, he didn’t care that that man had held his hand during the whole ride to the hospital and even longer. He didn’t care that that man had stayed by his side all the time.
In Roderich’s opinion, that man wasn’t a hero. That man was the worst villain ever.
Eventually, the doctor left. But Roderich wasn’t alone for long. Soon, the doctor returned and some other man followed at his heels. But by the questions this man asked, Roderich assumed that he was a psychologist. Like he hadn’t responded to the doctor, he didn’t respond to the psychologist either. In the end, they left again and Roderich had some hours to himself again.
This left him finally some time to think about his situation. So, he had been rescued by a policeman and then brought to this hospital. He had been unconscious at that time. He couldn’t remember much of the past weeks. Maybe it had even months. He started to wonder why the nurse and the doctor had known his name. How had he been identified? And more importantly, who had identified him? He didn’t know and he couldn’t even guess.
Some hours later, when he had only been interrupted by the nurse bringing him lunch he didn’t touch, the door opened again and a young, uniformed man entered. His hair was white; he was well-build and had a moody expression on his face. This time, Roderich didn’t hide under the blanket. A police man couldn’t be one of Lovino’s men, could he?
The policeman scuffled over to the chair and slumped down on it. Then, he stared at Roderich. He didn’t say a word for a long time, he just stared.
And Roderich stared back. If that man was whom he assumed to be he wouldn’t say a word to him.
“So, you’re finally awake?” the man said.
Roderich didn’t react but simply kept on staring at his counterpart.
“Okay, you don’t talk to me?” The police man sighed. “Fine. I understand that. I saw the house, I was in that attic. I’ve seen you there. I understand that you don’t want to talk and that you don’t trust me. But at least, hear me out. I won’t question you about Lovino Vargas today, even though my boss would like me to. And actually, I want to question you so bad because I need a lead on this guy. But I won’t because if I stress you out, Elizabeta will kill me.”
Roderich furrowed his brows. Elizabeta? How did this guy know her? He felt tears well up in his eyes. He had missed her so much, all the past year when he hadn’t been thinking about Antonio. As the first tear rolled down his cheek, he hid his face in his hands.
The police man patted his back. “There, there,” he murmured. “Don’t cry. She’ll come to see you tomorrow. She promised. And I will see to it that she’s allowed to see you. You’ll have to thank her. And my brother. Because of them, I was searching for you. All this time, I was searching because they didn’t allow me to stop. They missed you. So get better soon, understood?”
Roderich nodded. He couldn’t look this man in the eye. He wanted to talk to him about everything, just because he’d said that he hadn’t been forgotten. He even forgave him the rescue - at least for now. “I wanted to die in that attic,” he finally croaked.
“Don’t,” the police man said. “Don’t push yourself. I don’t wanna hear it yet. It’s not that I can’t understand this. That place … try to forget it. I know you never will, because I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. But try. I don’t want to see Elizabeta cry anymore because that’s really really creeping me out.”
An awkward silence followed. They both thought about Elizabeta crying. Then, they shook their heads to get rid of this thought almost at the same time. They looked at each other. The police man laughed.
“I’m Gilbert Beilschmidt, by the way,” he then said. “I think you know my little brother.”
Roderich nodded. Of course he knew Ludwig. They had been friends in his other life, the life he had lived before … before he had met Lovino. Again, he couldn’t fight back his tears. It felt so unreal. He still couldn’t believe that he was finally free again, that he was still alive, that there still were people who cared about him. He didn’t dare to believe it. How many times had he already dreamed about being free again. And every time, he’d woken in that attic again.
“I don’t know where to go when I’m better,” he whispered. “I don’t know what to do. My life’s gone.”
When Gilbert finally left the room, Roderich had fallen asleep again. For the last hours he had sat by the bed and just patted the other man’s back, trying to sooth him a bit. There wasn’t much he could do for him right now.
He slammed his fist against a wall. Damn!
He wanted to make Vargas pay for this. For everything he had done to Roderich. But he needed prove to make him pay. He couldn’t just go there and shoot him. Not only because it was both stupid and suicidal but also because he was a policeman and policemen didn’t just shoot the bad guy, they arrested him and let a judge deal with him. That was how it was supposed to work.
He was afraid to tell Elizabeta and Ludwig about the horrible state Roderich was in. They should see it for themselves. He wouldn’t tell Antonio yet. He hadn’t told him and had asked both his brother and Elizabeta to keep Roderich’s rescue a secret for now. Deep down, he knew that he was angry at Antonio as well, that he was also a bit jealous of him.
By what Roderich had told him, he could tell that Roderich still loved Antonio. It hurt to see, but he still loved him.
This made Gilbert want to get Lovino Vargas for all this shit even more.
~~~
When Lovino returned to that house and found the police standing outside, he was furious. How did they dare to meddle with his business? He stood on a roof some roads south and watched the cars come and go.
There had been no medics there in the time he had watched so he couldn’t be sure whether they had found the attic or not. If they hadn’t, maybe then his prisoner would finally get what he wanted and just die. But he doubted that. Beilschmidt - and Lovino was pretty sure it had been this wretched policeman who had started this - was too clever not to notice a hidden door. Not when he did want proof, not when he wanted to finally get his hands on him.
Lovino smiled to himself. That proof … he wouldn’t get it this way. Not from Roderich for he was a broken man. There were no traces Lovino himself had left in that house. The forensics wouldn’t find anything that pointed towards him. Maybe they would find enough to get their hands on one of his man, but they would never give them evidence against him. They knew what he could do. They had seen it.
Lovino left the roof. His bodyguards were waiting down on the street. They waited for his orders. Lovino hadn’t decided on what orders to give them yet. He thought about blowing the whole building up. That would teach Beilschmidt what happened to those who dared to cross him. He had to find out about the whereabouts of his prisoner. But that would sure be difficult for him. Beilschmidt would try to protect him in the best way he could. Maybe Lovino would only have a few days before his prisoner would get into some witness-protection program.
He gave orders to his men. They would see to it that everything worked out as planned. They had never let him down. Or at least not twice.
Lovino got into his waiting car. Now, he had other, more pleasant things to think about. He was heading for yet another date with his Antonio. He just hoped the news about his ex-boyfriend hadn’t reached Antonio yet. But on the other hand, if they had, it would be easy to find that whore again.
First chapter: Link
Next chapter: Link
Previous chapter: Link