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Chapter Text

18^th May 1935

The Blytonbury Palace cinema was mostly empty as Akko and Diana carefully edged their way along the narrow row of leather lined wooden chairs. Despite the matinee being less than a tenth full a haze of cigarette smoke hung in the air, illuminated by the projector's beam which shone through the darkness. 

A darkness that was, for the two young witches, a welcome sanctuary that hid their illicit date from prying and judgemental eyes. Theirs was a forbidden love, made illegal by law, so dates had to be disguised as trips out with a friend, and public displays of affection kept at nothing more than a linked arm or held hand, nothing that would arouse suspicion. But near the back of the dim, nearly empty cinema they could be together as their true selves and enjoy an hour or so where they might simply be two lovers.    

And as if to prove the point, as soon as Diana had taken her seat next to the excitable Japanese witch, Akko had grabbed a hold of her cloak and pulled her into a deep kiss. Diana's eyes went wide with panic as she feared someone might see, but after a moment she let her worries go and relaxed into the kiss.  

They had arrived just in time for the newsreels as a cockerel appeared accompanied by the title BRITISH PATHÉ NEWS. 

The first story, something about the chancellor of Germany, passed by virtually unnoticed so enraptured in their secret tryst were they, but as that reel ended Akko quickly broke off the kiss with an excited, breathless gasp of, 

“It's on, it's on!” 

Puffing slightly and feeling more than a little flushed, Diana sat back in her chair and tried to focus on the film. 

A title card flashed up on the screen; ROYAL NEWS; A MEETING WITH MAGIC. 

The title cut to footage of a Rolls Royce flying the Royal standard pulling up at Blytonbury Town Hall, then of the Prince of Wales, dressed in a Royal Naval uniform, stepping out and returning the salute of the awaiting Lord Lieutenant of Somerset. 

“At a reception held at Blytonbury Town Hall, His Royal Highness, Edward, the Prince of Wales, met seven of the nine witches who so heroically endeavoured and succeeded in thwarting evil earlier this year,” reported the narrator in his clearly trained precise RP accent. 

The screen cut to footage of Akko and her friends all lined up, awaiting the prince. Akko squealed with excitement at seeing her friends on the big screen. Diana tried to roll her eyes, but instead broke into a chuckle at her girlfriend's expression of happiness. 

“The young witches, all students’ at the most ancient and prestigious Luna Nova Academy, were each introduced to the Heir to the Throne, who thanked them for their services in securing world peace.”

Akko grabbed her arm and pointed at the screen as Diana watched herself, dressed in her formal school uniform appear in the footage, curtseying for the prince. 

“The introductions were led by Lady Diana Cavendish, whom upon reaching her majority shall inherit the title of Countess Wedinburgh and was one of seven who rode in pursuit of the infamous Noir Bomber.”

“Working his way along the line, the prince met each of the witches in training, all of whom hail from different corners of the world and truly represent the best of the female race.”

“From the United States, Ms Amanda O'Neill; from Germany, Ms Constanze Amalie von Braunschbank-Albrechtsberger.” 

With each name read out the screen showed first the prince shaking hands with the individual witch and then a separate shot of them looking into the camera; Amanda smirking, Constanze frowning. 

“From the Soviet Union Ms Jasminka Antonenko; save some for the rest of us comrade!” 

This time Diana couldn't help but roll her eyes in annoyance. Of course they had to film Jasminka when her plate was heavily laden with food from the generous buffet that had been laid on. 

“And from the frozen northern lands of Finland Ms Lotte Janson.”

Lotte gave a timid wave to the camera.

The soundtrack then changed from a generic piece of rising grandiose music full of pomp and ceremony, to a stereotypically “Asian” piece of music that was deliberately brooding. It was a style of music that Akko said was used by Westerners who couldn't differentiate between Japanese, Chinese or Korean cultures and saw East Asia as one homogeneous civilization that should be regarded with both intrigue and mistrust (well, Akko hadn't actually said homogeneous herself, in fact Diana doubted she knew what the English translation of the word meant, but the inference was there). 

“The Asiatic Peoples were also represented. From the American Philippines, Ms Sucy Manbarvaran whom the prince feared might turn him into a frog. And from the mysterious Far East Ms Atsuko Kagari of Japan who, along with Lady Cavendish, fired the arrow that destroyed the bomber, truly bringing honour to her ancestors!”

A cut in the film took the screen from Akko bowing genuinely for the prince, to a set up shot of her giving a deep bow to the camera. Her girlfriend's on screen counterpart was smiling broadly, however Diana recognised the awkwardness of her expression and the rigidity of her movement. 

“Surely with such bright and charming young ladies spread around the world we may look forward to a future of international cooperation and understanding.”

Cut to the Prince climbing into the Rolls Royce, waved off by herself, Akko, Lotte, and Jasminka. This shot of them waving had been staged after the prince had already departed as it was felt by the director that Sucy's lacklustre wave during the real departure was ill fitting in a piece of royal news, and the less said about Amanda and Constanze's gestures towards the prince the better, except to say they were hence forth banned from any further meetings with royalty. 

“After the reception the prince travelled to Devonport where he attended a dinner aboard HMS Valiant.”

Another title card flashed up, but Diana had turned to Akko whose stony face told her all she needed to know about her response to the film. 

“Wow, could they be any more patronising?” muttered Akko. 

“Hmm, yes, they were rather unkind weren't they...” agreed Diana. 

“I mean, “truly bring honour to her ancestors?” what do they think this is, the Edo Period?!” 

“And I felt that they were most rude about Sucy and Jasminka,” reflected the young heiress, remembering the narrator’s comments on Sucy like she was something out of a bad fairy-tale, or Jasminka and her laden plate. 

“I know, right!” Akko threw her hands up in the air in exaggerated exasperation, then slumped back into her chair in a huff. After a moment however, she turned to look at Diana, a smile on her face again.

“Still at least someone looked good in her robes, Lady Cavendish,” said Akko with a coy smirk, placing a hand upon Diana's knee. 

“And you didn’t look too bad either, Ms Kagari,” replied Diana as she leant over to meet her girlfriend’s lips. But no sooner had their lips brushed against each other than Akko once again pulled away and faced the screen. 

“Hey, hey, it's starting!” said Akko, her exuberant enthusiasm returning once again. 

The brunette witch sat forward in her seat, eagerly watching as the title card appeared on the screen.

“THE LITTLE WITCH AND THE WRONG BROOM”

On screen a cartoon character, the titular Little Witch, appeared riding her broom towards a zoo across a landscape of looped drawn backgrounds. The witch had shoulder length hair which framed her face, a distinctive fringe, and a half ponytail on the top of her head. Her face was round, buck toothed and perpetually happy and, despite her cartoon like design, undoubtedly based upon the real Akko. 

How the Japanese witch had managed to get her own series of animated shorts was beyond Diana, but some Hollywood executive, after seeing the excitement caused by the return of magic, had chosen Akko to be the basis of their new cartoon character. Akko was, needless to say, over the moon at having her likeness chosen for a series of short films (her parents even more so for the royalties that they were paid). 

Akko adored the animated films being produced by both America and Japan. She was fascinated by the production process and how they used exaggerated expression and physical movements to tell the story. She loved how worlds could be created that were fantastic or whimsical and how animation allowed stories to be told that would otherwise be impossible to portray with live action films. 

However, she did have complaints about the Japanese animation industry; namely just how militarised and jingoistic some of her homeland’s productions were. In order to compete with the American produced films, Japanese animators often had to turn to the government, or even the military, for assistance to make their films viable, and in return for that help the government wanted propaganda.

Still, all thoughts of politics seemed a million miles away to Akko right now as she sat on the edge of the seat watching her animated counterpart navigate her way through a fairly predictable conundrum.

The Little Witch, whilst ordering an ice cream cone, had put her broom aside for a moment only for it to be taken by a zoo keeper mistaking it for a mundane broom. Cue a monkey stealing the real broom and an ensuing chase through the various pens, Akko transforming into the appropriate animal that inhabited each enclosure until at last she had recovered her broom.

The cartoon was undoubtedly cute, but Diana soon stopped paying attention to the film and instead looked at her girlfriend. 

The real life Akko was entirely engrossed by the animated short, happily gazing at the screen with a beaming smile, her eyes wide as she watched the onscreen antics. Seeing her gleeful expression, Diana could do nothing but smile lovingly in return, more than content to bask in her girlfriend’s happiness. 

The cartoon version of her girlfriend was adorable, but Diana couldn't help but feel indifferent towards her. That Akko belonged to the world; her films distributed to hundreds of cinemas and movie theatres throughout the UK, the empire, and the US where thousands would no doubt fall in love with the animated Japanese witch. But to Diana there could only ever be one true Little Witch, and she was sat beside her, and that witch and that witch alone commanded her heart. 

In the darkness of the cinema, Diana rested her head upon her girlfriend's shoulder and wished this moment of bliss would never end. 

3^rd September 1939

It was 11:09. A heavy hush fell over the drawing room of Cavendish Hall as all waited with bated breath for 11:15 to arrive. Earlier in the morning news had been spread via the radio that at 11:15 on that warm summer’s day, a message would be broadcast by the Prime Minister informing the British public whether or not his promise of ‘Peace in our Time’ had held true, or whether the Germans would press on with their invasion of Poland regardless of Anglo-French demands.

Diana wanted to believe that the Germans would see sense and that they would back down. No one in Britain wanted another war, not so soon after the supposed “War to End All Wars”, so surely the Germans must likewise want to avoid more needless and pointless death and destruction. She then thought of Constanze, of her stern but kind nature, and wondered whether she too was listening for news from her Führer. Constanze worked for a German aviation company providing aircraft to the Luftwaffe, so the idea of her friend being a part of an enemy war machine was equal parts ridiculous and saddening.

She and Akko’s one relief had been that Constanze had assured them after the Munich Crisis last year, that she was no party member and that she considered the Nazis a vile blight on Germany. But at the same time, she had acknowledged that her company’s work would have floundered were it not for state sponsorship of their designs and research.

Constanze may not be a National Socialist, but she was a German; and an unbidden voice inside her head reminded Diana just how stubborn and proud her German friend could be. Once Constanze had worked her way into a situation it was nigh on impossible to get her to back down or admit fault. More worryingly, if Constanze’s feelings had been hurt, or she felt wronged in anyway, she would take this extremely personally, and Diana had seen the wrath of the silent German played out on her fellow witches many a time.

But could the attitude of one witch really be exemplary of an entire nation? Diana could see the pride with which Herr Hitler had instilled the German people, something that came naturally to Conzy, and knew that this national pride had taken a beating since the end of the Great War, but surely even pride could only drive someone so far.

11:13. The tension in the air by now was palpable. No one said a thing; even the normally chatty Maril and Merrill were silent, sat next to each other on the chaise longue, their hands resting gently on each other’s and their faces fraught with worry.

The twin’s mother Daryl on the other hand sat by herself, sunken into a wing back chair, a glass of whisky and ice in her hand and a stern, hardened look on her face, but even Diana could see the pain and worry. Daryl had worked in an Army hospital in Sussex during the last war and had seen first-hand the human cost of war, even on those who had survived.

Thinking of the losses inflicted by the war of 1914-1918, Diana Looked over to the large oak sideboard on the other side of the room, and stared at a photograph which she had always treasured, but one which made the potential outcome of today’s announcement all the more painful.

Even without looking at it Diana could have described the family portrait in minute detail. Her father, dressed in the uniform of a Coldstream Guards officer, cradling a two week old Diana and cooing to her whilst her mother looked at the pair with adoring eyes. Her father had been wounded during the German Spring Offensive of 1918 and sent home on leave to recuperate, thus allowing him to be present for the birth of his daughter. There was such happiness in both her parent’s eyes, yet it was not to last. The photograph was taken two weeks before her father was killed during a German trench raid when Diana had been less than five weeks old.

Her mother had never fully recovered from the loss. Her health already ailing, she had fought on for another seven years, time enough to build lasting memories for Diana, something Bernadette had so desperately wished to do, but in the end the war claimed her mother as well. War had already taken away enough from Diana and her stomach turned as she thought what else it might rob her of.

She felt a squeeze on her arm.  Turning to her immediate right she found herself looking directly into the gleaming red eyes of Akko, who having seen the faint tell-tale traces of worry spread across her girlfriend’s face, offered her a soft, calming smile. Wordlessly she asked if Diana was alright, and Diana nodded, even if she didn’t feel it.

The Grandfather clock chimed quarter past, and as it did so, a voice issued forth from the radio.

“This is London. You will now hear a statement by the Prime Minister.”

Looking directly at the wireless, as though Neville Chamberlain himself would appear, Diana reached for Akko’s hand and felt a momentary tug of relief as the Japanese witch interlaced her fingers with Diana’s, gently enclosing their hands together.

“I am speaking to you from the Cabinet Room of 10 Downing Street,” The radio crackled with the softly spoken, yet clearly weary voice of the Prime Minister. Daryl noticeably shifted in her seat, sitting slightly more upright, as Akko’s grip on her hand tightened in nervous anticipation.

“This morning the British ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note stating that unless we heard from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us.”

There seemed a momentary silence, in reality probably less than a beat, but still heavy with meaning as the magnitude of his words sunk in and the world as Diana knew it balanced on a knife edge.

“I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany.”

Maril let out a stifled gasp, as Akko leant against Diana.

The Prime Minister continued his speech, explaining why they were at war and how Hitler had left Britain and France with no option but to face the bully tyrant head on, yet as he spoke he seemed increasingly broken and saddened. And as his voice drained of energy and optimism, so too did the room slowly succumb to the weight of the news. Daryl sagged and silently took a sip from her whisky, letting the scotch dull the news, whilst the two twins held each other, silent tears running down their faces.

Diana closed her eyes as she felt her shoulders drop in resignation to the inevitable. Then, just as all seemed lost, Akko released her hand and instead wrapped her right arm in a loving and reassuring embrace. Diana looked at her girlfriend, into those red eyes that were so comforting and calming and all her dread vanished. It was the same look that she had seen in her eyes as they rode the Shooting Star after the Noir Bomber; the same mixture of fierce determination and unwavering hope that had caused her heart to flutter happily and allowed Diana to believe in a happy ending.

The future was uncertain and frightening, yet Diana knew that, as long as she had this wonderful and eternally optimistic girl by her side, everything would be alright.

7^th December 1941

Diana sat alone in her bedroom, desperately clutching the fabric of her dressing gown, and willing the tears she felt pricking her eyes to stay inside her head. She had heard excited rumours begin to spread through the castle of an attack that would bring America into the war on the side of the British, yet she prayed that they were false. She had to remain calm. She told herself that this was only hearsay and that everything would be alright; that this was only the latest rumour of US intervention in the war and that the news would dispel it. Yet she knew deep down she was just in denial. She had seen it in patients and their loved ones, when she had delivered bad news, but had only once before been on the receiving end of such life altering news, and even then she had only been a child.

Looking at the clock on her vanity she saw it was almost the hour, so leant forward to switch on the wireless. The last of the pips marking the hour echoed through the room to be replaced by a man’s voice speaking in a clear, precise tone.

“This is the BBC Home Service. Here is the news, and this is Alvar Lidell reading it.”

Diana held her breath, praying that what he was about to read was not the news she feared, the news that would not only turn her world upside down but take away from her the last thing she held so very dear in this life.

“Japan’s long threatened aggression in the Far East began tonight with air attacks on United States Naval Bases in the Pacific.”

“No… no…” she whispered to herself as she began to feel cold.

“Fresh reports are coming in every minute. The latest facts of the situation are these; Messages from Tokyo say that Japan has announced a formal declaration of war against both the United States and Britain.”

…and Britain… Diana’s heart dropped and at once she felt as though everything around her was unreal, as though she were in a dream; a nightmare which warped and distorted the world.

“Japan’s attacks on naval bases in the pacific were announced by President Roosevelt in a statement from the White House tonight. The first statement said…”

Diana turned the radio set off, unable to listen further to the news which, within the space of less than a minute, had taken what happiness and joy she felt in the world, and smothered it with despair. Scrunching up and twisting her gown in her hands, she felt like she wanted to scream, yet when she opened her mouth all that came out was a broken, ragged wail. Tears ran down her cheeks and she gasped for air as snot began to block her nose. Everything was gone, everyone she loved scattered, and for the first time in so many years, Diana felt alone; so truly and soul crushingly alone. The room, which had moments ago felt so snug and homely, now felt giant and cold, as though all the colour and warmth had drained away.

She had no idea how long she sat there, her head buried in her hands as she sobbed uncontrollably, but eventually she felt her body will her to move, to do something, anything besides just sit there and mourn.

Getting to her feet, she began to wander aimlessly, seeing yet not knowing where she was walking until in a state of shocked delirium she found herself stood at the mantle of her fireplace, leaning on it as she fought to control the sickening feeling consuming her, replacing the sorrow with the realisation that this was indeed reality and not some nightmare. Her heart, pulsing rapidly with pain and fear, felt as though it wanted to force its way up her throat which constricted and strained with each sob.

Taking a ragged gasp of air, she lifted her head and immediately felt a tingling sensation as the first thing she saw was a photograph. Everything stilled as she picked it up with a shaking hand and studied it. Diana choked at the image and the two smiling faces looking back at her.

Stood before a shrine in Kyoto, the name of which she couldn’t remember at that moment, she looked at the youthful and joyous faces of Akko and herself; both dressed in Kimonos, both with parasols over their shoulders as they leant on each other, arm in arm and smiled at the camera.

This moment of perfect joy and happiness, captured in sepia tones, had once brought out memories of adventure and youthful, innocent love. It had made Diana’s heart soar and wish to fly away to Akko in that distant land where so many happy memories had been made. But now looking at the photograph Diana felt bitter, and the frame weighed heavy in her grasp. She looked at herself in the picture and an angry voice told her she should feel foolish for allowing herself to be dressed up like some porcelain doll for a visit to a shrine… to dress like the enemy.

She let go of the frame, and barely registered when it hit the wooden floorboards beneath her, the glass pane cracking and the wooden joins separating.

Japan was the enemy. Akko… no, Atsuko Kagari was the enemy. She told herself this and that it was now her duty to forget her. She told herself that she must steel her heart, forget what they once had and instead do her duty for the war effort by focusing on her patients.

Yet her eyes drifted to their shared bed and to the blue silk pyjamas laid carefully out on the duvet on Akko’s side of the four-poster. Diana wandered clumsily over, and lay down atop the cover, curling into a ball as she took the fine silk shirt in hand and brought it to her nose. It smelt of perfume; it smelt of Akko. Clutching the shirt to her chest she breathed in the aroma of her girlfriend as she curled tighter into herself, cursing the vast distance between them, and the men who would divide the world for nought but their own personal gain.

Alone in her despair she barely heard the sound of a car pull up on the gravel drive outside, nor the sound of a hand banging heavily against the wooden front doors of the castle. Instead, she just whispered sadly to herself, in the hopes that her words might transcend the distance between them,

“Akko…, Akko…”

Chapter Text

7^th February 1945 – Cavendish Hall, Kent

The shrill clinking of metal against porcelain resounded throughout the study as Diana tapped her spoon against the rim of her teacup. She gazed into the cup and watched with contented satisfaction as the milk swirled for a moment, turning the tea a lovely light brown hue as it settled and diluted. Taking a calming sniff of the brew’s subtle aroma as she lifted it to her lips, a part of her daily mid-morning tea ritual, Diana reminded herself just how grateful she was that, as her home was now serving as a temporary military hospital, Cavendish Hall was not subject to rationing, thus allowing her to continue enjoying her one minor indulgence in this time of making do with less.

Sat in her private study, well away from the rooms of the house that had been converted into wards for the convalescence of wounded airmen, Diana took a moment to relax and enjoy this brief respite from her duties as head nurse.

This study had once belonged to her mother, and after Aunt Daryl had moved to Scotland during the invasion scare in 1940, Diana had appropriated it for herself. Filling the few gaps in the already well lined bookshelves with medical texts and journals, along with personal belongings and mementos, she had created a haven that was solely her own in a house almost entirely given over to the war effort. Thus, it was with a certain degree of consternation that she found the tranquillity of her morning routine being interrupted by a knock against the wooden doors.

Placing the cup of tea onto its saucer, she bade the knocker to enter, and was surprised to find, not Anna, her head housekeeper, but one of the Voluntary Aid Detachment nurses, who stepped through, looking rather sheepish at intruding upon Diana’s own private sanctum.

“Ah, Nurse Carmichael, how can I help you?” asked Diana, affecting a pleasant tone. Despite being mildly perturbed by the interruption, Diana saw no need to be rude to the young nurse and wouldn’t dream of letting her petty frustrations show.

“Sorry, ma’am, I know that you’re on your tea break, but there’s an officer here…” said the nurse nervously, nodding her head backwards to indicate that the officer in question was waiting in the corridor outside.

Diana sighed and leant back in her leather chair.

“If he’s here to visit one of the patients, tell him that our visiting hours start at midday,” she said flatly, feeling annoyed, not at Carmichael, but at the frequent stream of officers and airmen on leave who seemingly couldn’t read notices about opening hours at the hospital.

“Actually, ma’am, he says he’s here to speak to you…”

That moderately garnered Diana’s attention, so she told the young nurse to show the officer in, at which point her attention was fully grasped by the appearance in the doorway of a familiar face she hadn’t seen in some months.

“Hanbridge!” said Diana, pleasantly surprised to see her distant cousin step through the door. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Andrew Hanbridge smiled as he entered the study, removing a maroon beret which he rolled up and tucked under the left epaulette of his tailored battledress blouse.

“Purely business I’m afraid, Cavendish,” he said, stepping up to the desk to shake Diana’s extended hand, neither of them particularly keen on the notion of politely kissing the other’s cheek. Diana nodded in understanding and beckoned him to take one of the comfier chairs by the unlit fire.

“Tea? I’ve just brewed a pot,” she asked as he sank down into a soft green wingback chair, but the young peer politely declined, thanking her but making excuses of limited time. “So, I take it therefore that you wish to get promptly to whatever this “business” is that you’ve come to see me about?” 

“Yes, I’m afraid that this is only a flying visit,” he said as she took a chair facing him, then turned to look at the door, seemingly reassuring himself that Carmichael had firmly shut it behind him and that they were alone. Seeing Andrew, whom she knew was now serving with special operations, behave so furtively at once set Diana on alert, suddenly keenly aware that she may soon be party to information of a restricted nature. And sure enough, when he turned back to face her, his gaze was intense, his brown eyes regarding Diana with an unusual ferocity, as though he were about to subject her to interrogation.

“What do you know of the Abteilung Geheimwissenschaften?” he asked, his Public School education showing as he pronounced the lengthy German title with the ease of a native speaker.

Diana cocked an eyebrow as she tried to recall the rumours about the secretive German organisation she had heard spread through Britain’s magical communities.

“Hmm, well the name translates as the Department of Secret Sciences, and I have a feeling from rumour that they may be involved in magical research, but apart from that, not much I’m afraid.”

“Correct, from what we understand they’re a branch of The Anhenerbe, itself a part of the SS, dedicated to the study of magic,” confirmed Andrew. He then leant forward in his chair, and his pleasant expression suddenly grew heavy and dour, his voice matching the shift in mood. “What do you know of Ettersberg?”

Diana blinked in surprise at the sudden change in her cousin’s countenance. “Never heard of it,” she answered bluntly, watching his expression closely for any tells that might reveal where this was going.

“Hmm, that’s just as well, as the operation that took place there was just as secret as it was disastrous…” His candid response was oddly bitter and tired, and his eyes dropped to the ground, whether in shame, mourning, or anger Diana couldn’t tell, but hearing his tone shift once more made Diana sit forward in her chair with concern.

“May one ask how disastrous? Or is that need to know?” she asked, letting her voice drop to a near whisper.

“Secret,” he answered, then sighed as he sat back with an air of resignation. “But word will no doubt reach you soon enough. It was an Op involving nearly every wizard in military service, and it went wrong, terribly wrong.”

Diana’s pulse picked up as faces of wizards she knew flickered through her memory.

“How many?” she asked, dreading the answer. She didn’t need to quantify the question, as Andrew at once understood the awful meaning.

“We don’t have precise numbers…” Andrew looked back at her and his eyes seemed hollow. “But the Army believe that of all wizards of fighting age, three-fifths now lie dead in German forests…”

The horrific news hit Diana like a ton of bricks. Three-fifths… that was impossible. There were thousands of male magical practitioners of military age across the United Kingdom and the Empire. For three-fifths to have been killed would put the death toll… Oh god. Diana could feel a cold, sickening feeling sweep over her as the enormity of the terrible news hit home. But before she could dwell any further, Andrew spoke up, interrupting her trail of thought.

“But we’ve got a problem. You see, intel gathered there revealed the existence of a second research site, one used to combine magic and technology to create what the Germans are calling Wunderwaffe.” Andrew’s tone was leading, and despite still reeling from the news of the massacre of so many of her magical brethren, Diana could tell he was about to ask something major of her, and she had a horrible notion what that something might be. “We need to stop this project, and my regiment has been tasked to do it, but right now we haven’t the magical support to do so...”

“Just spit it out Hanbridge…” said Diana, suddenly feeling drained and no longer in the mood for word games and subtext.

“We need magical troops on a raid to knock this site out, and I would like you to lead them,” replied Andrew, straight and to the point, leaving no room for misinterpretation.

Diana blinked at him in surprise, before giving him the instinctive answer that at once sprung to mind.

“No.”

Andrew, on the other hand, appeared in no way surprised by her response. “Look, at least hear me out, please Cavendish?”

Diana sighed, folded her arms, but waved a hand, indicating that he could continue with his pitch.

“We’re lacking magical manpower, both literally and metaphorically,” continued Andrew, sitting back, his voice returning to the normal calm, cool and considered tone of a politician. “Those wizards who survived are now deployed elsewhere, helping to combat the increasingly desperate use of magic by the Nazis to defend the Reich. But we need magical assets with us on this op to advise and assist. So, some bright spark in the War Office suggested using witches.”

“We’ve been aware of the effectiveness in battle of the so called Russian ‘Night Witches’, who have put entire German battalions to rout, for some time… Including your friend Jasminka Antonenko, who has been called both the shield and the hammer of the Motherland,” he commented, cocking a knowing eyebrow as Diana started at the mention of her Russian friend.

How the war changed people, thought Diana ruefully. When she had last seen Jasminka back in early ‘39, she had been her normal friendly and caring self, who looked incapable of hurting a fly. But now even Diana had heard of the ferocity of the wrath of the Russian witches, and the merciless power that they unleashed against the invaders of their homeland. Still, she prayed that Jasminka was alright, but she was unsure how anyone could ever truly be alright after the horrors of the Eastern Front.

“As you can imagine, the idea of deploying women, let alone witches, in any form of combative role was met with nothing short of outrage and derision amongst the top brass,” continued Andrew. “But then it landed on the desk of the Prime Minister. As well you know, I have a lot of opinions on the PM, not all of them favourable, but I’ll say one thing for him, he’s willing to take chances when others see only fantasies. So, he’s signed off on it.”

“The deployment of witches?” interrupted Diana, wanting to confirm the meaning she wasn’t quite sure she was hearing correctly, so used to the condescension of men in power was she.

“Yes. So, as I’m going to be leading the mission and I’m known to have contacts in the magical world, my CO tasked me to see about raising a unit.”

“How large will this force be?” Diana enquired shortly, at once envisaging row after row of graves containing her fellow witches, further depleting the magical community of Great Britain.

“Small. Women in combat is still a touchy subject for most of the old school of officers…”

“I see. Thus, if a small team of women fails, it’s easy to cover up, but if a larger unit fails, or gets wiped out, it’s harder to hide and the War Office fears a backlash,” surmised Diana with a knowing smirk. “Am I correct?”

Andrew nodded his head in unspoken confirmation. He had long been aware of the injustices and uphill challenges that women, both magical and non-magical, faced, and whatever Andrew may be, he wasn’t a chauvinist; at least not since she had entered into his life.

“So, I’m to lay the foundations of this unit, and honestly, I couldn’t think of anyone better than you to lead it,” he said.

“I’m a healer, a doctor in training, I’m not a killer…” started Diana, but before she could continue Andrew stood up and walked towards her.

“Do you think I would be here if there were any other option?!” he cried, dropping to one knee before her, seizing her hands, and looking her determinedly in the eyes. “There is no one else! Finnelan is in a reserved occupation and neutral, Nelson is retired, Ursula or Chariot, or whatever she’s calling herself these days is away with SOE, and Meridies stayed loyal to Mussolini when Italy capitulated! You’re the only one I consider capable of the task…”

“A-Andrew…” stuttered the young countess, taken aback by the sudden reaction of the normally calm and composed nobleman’s son.

“I’m leading this Op whatever you say, but I need to know that I can trust whoever is accompanying me on this …” There was desperation in his gaze, a weariness from the weight of expectation and the responsibility of command and leadership. And when he spoke, there was pleading in his voice. Pleading mixed with fear.

“Please, Diana, you are the only one I trust on this!”

Hearing the young officer break from their normal petty aloofness and refer to her not only by her first name, but coming to her in desperate supplication, suddenly drove home how serious this situation was.

For a moment, but for the ticking of the clock on her desk, there was silence in the study as Diana met Andrew’s anxious gaze, a thousand thoughts running through her head. Then the junior peer seemed to remember himself, and apologised as he let go of her hands, standing up and straightening out his uniform, before returning to his seat.

Diana took a deep breath, before continuing, still shocked at the sudden burst of desperation from her normally poised cousin.

“Andrew, answer me this. How vital is this mission of yours?”

He paused for a moment, considering his answer carefully.

“If we don’t do it, if we don’t hit them soon, then there is a very real threat that not only could the war, which is likely only months away from ending, be dragged on for years to come, but that the rot of Nazism could spread exponentially, let alone what might happen if the Soviets get there first.”

Then, for the first time since he had first sat down, a brief, warm smile flickered across his face.

“Diana, for you to stand by your convictions makes you a better person than me, I will admit that. I am a diplomat, I have always believed that the pen is mightier than the sword, yet I have lost count of the lives I have taken…” His warm expression dropped as a heavy air of guilt seemed to drape itself over him. “But right now, I’m coming to you, not as a soldier or a politician, but as a friend, as your cousin, asking you to please, help me make just one thing right in this mess of a war. Please…”

As she began to weigh up the proposal, Diana looked away from Andrew’s seat by the fire, and to the large portrait that hung from the chimney’s breast. There, Beatrix, the ancient founder of the House of Cavendish, stared down upon them, as though surveying her and Andrew from across the void of time with a face that was simultaneously stern but gentle, noble yet humble, regarding them with unmoving interest. Beatrix had been the first of her line to use her powers and wealth to aid and heal those in need, the very embodiment of the Cavendish motto of Compassion unto Others. Diana had even met her once, her spirit kept alive by the tree in the vast subterranean vaults beneath the castle. But now Diana wondered what she would have done in such a position.

And as she stared up at the painting, the motto laid plain on a scroll around her ancestor’s head, Diana pondered one trail of thought; could she take up arms, could she take a life, and still be worthy of the title of Head of the House of Cavendish?

And more to the point, could she live with herself?

Tick-tick-tick. The clock on her desk filled the tense silence as she felt the gazes of Andrew and Beatrix weigh heavy upon her as nervously, they awaited her decision.

Chapter Text

7^th April 1945 – RAF Manston, Kent

Diana closed her eyes and tried to shut out the world around her, focusing on her breathing. All day her pulse had been up and as she slowly inhaled through her nose, she willed it to slow down, but her nerves were playing on her mind. The night before she had barely gotten more than an hour or so’s sleep, her thoughts racing as fears and hypothetical scenarios, all relating to those under her command and the mission to come, played out in her mind, and when she had awoken the lack of rest had made itself known. She had tried to eat earlier, but she had found herself with no appetite and there was a constant cold feeling of dread that shook her. Now all the witch turned soldier was running on was adrenaline.

She was sat in the hallway outside of the station’s gymnasium, her foot nervously tapping, waiting for the briefing for tonight’s mission to begin.

Waiting; that was the worst part about this operation and military life in general, the waiting. It allowed thoughts to intrude and worries to manifest. She preferred it when she had a task to do, something to keep her mind occupied, instead of simply sitting around anxiously and thinking of all the ways in which the night’s operation could go wrong.

 “This is ridiculous,” she thought to herself with an exasperated sigh. “You’re a Cavendish for pity’s sake, get a grip…” But try as she might, the intrusive thoughts would not dispel.

She was so focused on trying not to think about her own personal fears that she nearly jumped out of her seat in surprise as a hand came to rest on her shoulder, snapping her out of her stupor. Looking up, she was met by the familiar brown eyes of Andrew Hanbridge.

“You alright, Cavendish?” he asked, his face softening as he looked at her.

“Just thinking, that’s all,” she answered, trying to put on an air of serenity.

“You know, it’s alright to be nervous…” he said, at once seeing through her façade of calmness.

“Indeed, I, I must admit that I am really quite apprehensive,” replied the blonde haired witch slightly bashfully. Andrew nodded understandingly. Once the thought of being so open about even the slightest of vulnerabilities would have been unthinkable to the young countess, but times had changed, they all had, and after his own uncharacteristic outburst of vulnerability back in February, she knew that Andrew understood her crisis of confidence.

“This is your first show, isn’t it?” he remarked as he stepped back. “You’re bound to be nervous.”

Diana nodded, then looked the young heir in the eye.

“How do you do it?” she asked, trying to keep her voice level. She had spent months preparing for this one mission, but now that it was finally here, she was, quite honestly, scared. “How do you lead your men, your friends, into battle knowing that they might die because of a mistake you make?”  

She had faced life or death situations before, particularly when she had ridden in pursuit of the Noir Bomber atop the Shooting Star, but then it had been a group effort, a group decision. The weight of responsibility had been born on no one person’s shoulders, and the rapidity of the crisis had left no time for doubt or fear to weed its way into her mind.

Andrew stepped away and looked along the corridor towards the double doors through which their troops were gathered.

“I just have to remind myself that they chose to be here,” he said with a shrug. “Each man in my battalion could have stayed with his parent unit, but they all volunteered to join the SAS. They knew the risks; about the Commando Order and that it was kill or be killed, but they still chose to come. And so, I know that they would expect nothing less of me than to lead them no matter the odds.”

He turned back to her and reached into his pocket, from which he produced a wooden pipe. He didn’t bother to light it, but instead kept it in his hand, running it through his fingers like some form of lucky talisman.   

“At least, that’s what I tell myself. But honestly? I too worry that I’ll let them down; that I’ll cock up and get them killed. I worry that I’ll get myself killed. Truth be told I’m worrying every second I’m on ops.” He looked up from the pipe and smiled. “The trick is to both distract yourself by focusing on the situation around you and learning to mask and control that terror, to make sure your men think you’re invulnerable. Of course, and please forgive my vulgarity, they know you’re bricking it as much as they are, but if they see you panic, then they’ll panic. I know you know how to hide fear, just use that trademark Cavendish stoicism your aunt taught you and you’ll be fine.”

Diana was about to further question the veteran of so many secretive missions behind German lines when she heard the clicking of approaching hobnail boots. Down the corridor strode a group of five officers; three in their camouflage smocks and maroon berets, a Royal Air Force officer, and at their head, the operation’s overall commander, Lieutenant Colonel Fielding, busy checking over sheets of paperwork in his hands as they walked.

Diana snapped to attention as Andrew stuffed the pipe back into his smock’s pocket. The party of officers stopped, and the colonel looked up from his paperwork.

“Ah, Major Hanbridge, ready for the offing?” he said, smiling fondly as he looked him over.

“Yes, sir,” replied Andrew, squaring his shoulders, and immediately dispelling any shades of doubt that Diana might have detected a moment ago.

Fielding then turned to look at Diana, and his warm smile soured into a shallow sneer.

“As much as I understand the importance of this op, I still fail to see why we need magical elements attached, let alone witches,” he said, the disdain clear as he commented on the presence of women in the operation.  “However, the PM seems to think that this gamble is worth it. Let us just hope that he is not mistaken in placing his trust in the hands of witches with barely any combat experience…”

Diana had expected this, yet still she was disappointed. It didn’t matter in what capacity she tried to serve her country, be it as a nurse or as an officer with the Auxiliary Territorial Service; wherever she looked there were men who saw women as weak and inferior. They considered women fit only for administrative roles and filling the places of men who could be otherwise engaged at the front, doing “proper” war work. Thankfully some, like Andrew, took a much more pragmatic approach and saw the potential that they offered. But most, especially those in the top brass, regarded them with nought but condescension. They treated them like children; all praise and support when it suited them, but dismissal and doubt behind closed doors. Diana had faced it her entire life, but still, it stung just that bit more.

“I can assure you, sir, that whilst my unit and I may have little experience engaging non-magical threats, we are very well versed in combating the magical and fantastic,” replied Diana, her eyes remaining fixed to a point just above the senior officer’s head, trying not to display her frustration.

“Sir, I too can personally vouch for them, having seen them in action on several occasions,” interjected Andrew. “And besides, we still don’t know what magical resistance we might encounter, and after the disaster of Operation Spatchcock at Ettersburg, having Lady Cavendish and her troops present is the best chance we have of success.”

Frustratingly it was Andrew’s testimony that seemed to sway the Colonel, but he still seemed less than happy.

“Hmm, we’ll see.” With that Fielding turned back towards the hall and strode off, the party of officers trailing him.

With a sigh Diana came out of her position of attention and turned to Andrew.

“I thought that the purpose of the SAS was that it was to engage in unconventional warfare,” she commented as they began to follow on.

Andrew smiled sympathetically.

“He’s from the old school. Brilliant tactical leader and one of the few of his ilk who could see the merits of the SAS, but he’s also rather conservative in his views…”

“A sentiment sadly all too common in the British Army,” replied Diana coldly. Andrew nodded, but tellingly, didn’t say a word.

Ahead of them Fielding pushed open the double doors and as the party of officers walked into the sports hall the soft murmur of idle chatter was silenced by a cry of “Room, Rooooom, SHUN!” The hall echoed with the scraping of chairs on the polished wooden floor as all present at once stood to attention.

Diana followed her fellow officers (something she doubted they’d refer to her as) up onto a small stage on which were set several chairs, a lectern, and a roll down projector screen. From this elevated position Diana had a clear view over the gymnasium. The large hall was filled with soldiers; all stood rigidly to attention, all dressed in their camouflage Denison Smocks and wearing their maroon paratrooper’s berets with pride, which made her unit all the more obvious.

Occupying the front two rows, to the right of the hall as she faced it, were the members of Luna Nova Detachment of the Auxiliary Territorial Service, the British Army’s all female corps. All were stood at attention, although what Sucy would call attention Diana would call slouching, whilst to her left stood Amanda (who now served on attachment from the US Army as a Sergeant and, God help her, Diana’s number two on this operation), whose hands were jammed firmly into her pockets. Diana looked at the American and flared her eyes. Amanda, spotting Diana, gave her a smirk, untucked her hands, and stood rigidly upright just to prove the point that she could. How, after all these years, did that woman still manage to aggravate her so much?

“Alright everyone, sit easy, lids off,” said Fielding, stepping up to the lectern. In the central aisle between the two blocks of seats a soldier appeared pushing a projection lamp on a small metal trolley which he began setting up. With a bit of time before the briefing was likely to begin, a gentle susurrus of excited chatter arose in the hall.

Taking her seat, Diana looked back down to her odd little section who were beginning to relax once more. Having been given the task of raising the small detachment back in February, Diana had spent a hurried weekend flying the length and breadth of the UK on her broom, tracking down those whom she wished to recruit and were already serving in uniform. The hastily assembled unit comprised of nine witches (not the New Nine of course, but still an auspicious number within the witching community), and all of them were alumni of Luna Nova. As such she could at least guarantee the quality of their magical training, if not the quality of their character, she thought, looking pointedly at the reclining Sergeant O’Neill. 

On the other side of said NCO sat the ever unreadably passive faced Sucy Manbavaran who still somehow managed to hide one of her eyes behind her violet fringe despite officially being required to maintain a regulation hairstyle.

Sucy had been living in England when the Japanese had invaded the Philippines and despite her protests that she should be allowed to return home to help her fellow countrymen, she had, under persuasion, remained in the UK and eventually joined the ATS. Rumour had it that she had been headhunted by the secretive Chemical Defence Experimental Station at Porton Down, although any word on what she did there was hidden in a maze of red tape. Now she was staring blankly up at the stage, with a look that could easily range from interested to pensive, bored to enthusiastic. Even after a decade of friendship Diana struggled to read her, unlike Ak…

Diana stopped her trail of thought and, shaking her head to dispel that memory, turned to the rest of her section.

Besides Amanda and Sucy the unit was formed of mostly familiar faces from her time at the school. Also sat in the front row were Subaltern England and Section Officer Parker; Hannah in her khaki ATS uniform, Barbara in her Women’s Auxiliary Air Force blue uniform. The two women sat awkwardly in their folding wooden chairs, characteristically uneasy and unsure of their place amongst the others when removed from the immediate presence of Diana (although Hannah did seem to be edging towards the American witch sat beside her, Diana noted with a mental sigh).  

Amelia and Mary, both wearing their WAAF uniforms, were sat in the second row, whispering happily and ignoring their neighbour, Teresa, who even when sat easy kept her shoulders square and proud, looking with distain at her fellow other ranks who surrounded her, begrudging her lack of commission. Beside her was the final member of their small section, Morag Robertson.

Morag, unlike the rest of the unit, had not been a contemporary of Diana’s at Luna Nova, having joined the school in 1938, thus making her the youngest witch present. She had been recommended by Ursula as a highly gifted witch, but she spoke with such a strong Scots accent that sometimes it made her hard to understand, especially when she was in full flow.

The soldier setting up the projector gave a thumbs up to Fielding who nodded and called out to listen in. As the lights flickered off a map appeared on the screen covering the western extension of the Harz Mountains in northern Germany, an area of which had been circled with red ink. Fielding started by laying out the basic details of the mission, its purpose and a brief background to the operation, codenamed Op Hurlington. He then handed over to his intelligence officer, Captain Fenton.

“Most of what we know comes from an SOE agent embedded inside the base codenamed Noir,” started Fenton, looking out over the crowd. “The facility at Leipwald is technically a private commercial site run jointly as a research and development site for Messerschmit and Horten. However, due to the fact that this is being done for the war effort, it is under the protection of the military; both the SS and the Luftwaffe,” he explained, pointing towards the circled area of the map.

“While the Nazi research station at Ettersberg was established to test the effects of magic upon both humans and, well, other magical individuals, from what Noir has told us the main purpose of this site is the development of magically enhanced weapons and long-range aircraft, codenamed Project Sycorax.

“Specifically, they’re attempting to build aircraft that would be invisible to our Radar networks and have the range to reach the United States without sacrificing payload capacity for fuel capacity. Therefore, the War Office and the boffins at the Royal Aircraft Establishment Farnborough have decided that it is vital that any intelligence, designs, and technology either be secured or destroyed before the Russians can get their hands on it.” Fenton then looked to the soldier with the projector and asked for the next slide. The screen went blank as one glass plate was removed and the next loaded.

“There are two persons of interest who are objectives for capture during this operation.”

The photograph of a middle aged scientist with slicked back blonde hair dressed in a white lab coat was projected onto the screen. The photograph appeared to have been taken in a university laboratory, and the man wore an unpleasant smirk on his face.

“This is Steffan Seelmann, a Nazi scientist and an associate of the Abteilung Geheimwissenschaften, who ran the facility at Ettersberg,” said Fenton, somehow pronouncing the long German title without slip. “Despite not being a magical practitioner himself, he has a deep understanding of the applications of magic and is believed to have been responsible for, and overseen, the use of human testing at the facility. He’s a thoroughly nasty piece of work and is to be brought in to stand trial for war crimes. He shall be referred to as Target Number One. Next slide please.”

Again, the screen went blank, but as the next slide appeared Diana felt a sinking feeling as a cold shiver ran down her spine. In the crowd all of her fellow witches suddenly sat up, all more alert. Amanda in particular suddenly looked both far more confused and far graver.

Staring unseeingly down at them was a photograph of Constanze, still in her school uniform, stood holding up her leaver’s certificate from Luna Nova, a slight smile on her normally dour face that, for those who knew her, was comparable to the sun for its warmth. Seeing her look so happy made Diana’s heart ache at the thought that this friend now served the enemy war machine.

“This is our secondary target for the night; Constanze Amelia von Braunschbank-Albrechtsberger,” said Fenton, not looking up from his notes as he pronounced her name.  “Her name’s a bit of a mouthful so for the purposes of this mission she shall be referred to simply as Target Two.”

Diana watched her witches intently as almost all of them looked on in shock, yet predictably it was Amanda whose expression was the most telling. Even in the darkness, the American’s face was clearly drained of colour and looked close to tears. There for the whole world to see was their friend, Amanda’s best friend, vilified and reduced to simply a number.

“She is the chief aeronautical and magical engineer in charge of combining magic with technology, and the boffins at Farnborough are particularly keen to speak with her, so she is to be treated with care. However, her capture will be the priority of William Team, so the rest of you needn’t worry. But if you should come across her, she is effectively mute and easily identifiable by her short stature…”

“She’s short enough to be one of the Seven bloody Dwarfs, so maybe we should call her Frumpy instead!” came a shout from somewhere in the audience, drawing a laugh from the assembled male paratroopers.

Amanda was on her feet instantly.

“Who the hell said that?!” she demanded, turning to face into the crowd. The crowd stopped laughing. Her wand was drawn.

Diana quickly got to her feet and looked at her friend.

“Stand down, Sergeant,” she said, biting back the anger that also made her want to find the culprit.

“Who the hell said that?!” Amanda barked again.

“What’s it to ya, Yank? She’s just a bloody kraut!” said the first heckler, although he had yet to reveal himself to the vengeful American, still hidden amongst the crowd.

Amanda’s wand, held down by her side, began to glow.

“Sergeant O’Neill, Stand Down!” ordered Diana, but Amanda wasn’t paying her the slightest bit of attention, instead her eyes were scanning the crowd for the paratrooper who had insulted her friend.

“‘Ere wait a minute, they’re all bloody mates, ain’t they?!” yelled another heckler. “All these witches, they all know each other, don’t they? Why the ‘ell should we trust ‘em? Everyone knows witches are evil anyway!”

Diana could see that Amanda was about to do something rash, but before she could make a move to try and stop her, Hannah reached up and placed her hand upon Amanda’s wand hand.

“Please Amanda,” whispered the young redheaded officer. Amanda looked down and could see the imploring in her eyes. “Please…” Amanda looked back up, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath as she bit back her rage. The glow faded from her wand and as Hannah guided her back into her seat, Diana felt herself relax.

“That is enough!” said Fielding sternly, walking back up to the lectern. The boisterous crowd at once silenced as their colonel admonished them. “I had my misgivings as well, however the loyalty of these witches is in no doubt. Care to explain, Fenton?”

Fenton nodded and retook his place at the lectern.

“From what our source, Agent Noir, has told us Target Two is working at the facility under duress. Our understanding is sketchy; however, we believe that the Nazis have threatened the lives of persons close to her in order to keep her working. As such we believe that she will most likely be ready to surrender without resistance and cooperate. As for the loyalty of those witches involved in this operation, that is in no doubt and has been vouched for at the highest level of authority, on that you can be assured.”

This seemed to appease the rest of the paratroopers and the remainder of the intelligence briefing went on without interruption. As Fenton stepped away, Fielding got to his feet and took up the position at the lectern.

“This mission shall be led in the field by Major Hanbridge, who has been given operational command and discretion, but most of you have served under him before so I’m sure you’ll be familiar with him.” Andrew stood up and nodded to the senior officer. “But before I pass you over to the Major to brief you on the planned assault, I just wanted to let you know that for the purposes of this operation and to avoid needless confusion, from here on out all female ATS personnel shall be referred to by their equivalent regular army ranks,” said Fielding, indicating towards Diana. “Thus, for example, Junior Commander Cavendish here will be referred to as Captain Cavendish.”

He then passed the floor over to Andrew as aerial reconnaissance photographs of a collection of buildings surrounded by trees flashed up on the screen. 

Stepping up to the lectern, Andrew laid out the plan for the assault. There were two locations that needed to be secured; the main research and development facility and a nearby airfield used for testing, and three squadrons from the Special Air Service who would be deployed to secure them.

At precisely 22:30 the first Dakotas would begin taking off from Manston, flying over the North Sea until they reached the Dutch coast. They would then fly East-South-East into German airspace, headed towards the Harz region, avoiding any major urban centres or Luftwaffe bases.

At approximately 01:00 the three SAS squadrons would be inserted over their Drop Zones. Able and Baker Squadrons would then advance to the facility, whilst Charlie would secure the airfield for later extraction. Meanwhile Diana’s team, predictably codenamed William Team (William for W, W for Witch), would be dropped two miles to the west of the facility. However, unlike the rest of the units involved, their method of insertion would be different; instead of jumping from their Dakota with parachutes, they would be riding their brooms (this announcement of course drew a mixed reaction amongst the veteran paratroopers).

At Precisely Zero Two Hundred simultaneous assaults would be launched at both sites; these had to be exactly timed so that neither site could warn the other.

Resistance would be tough. From what information they had been provided with by Noir the German garrison was made up of one company of Luftwaffe Fallschirmjäger alongside a platoon from the Flakkorps. Of greater concern however was the presence of a Waffen SS company, a formidable and fanatical foe to face.

However, with the element of surprise on their side, Andrew hoped to tie down the enemy long enough to allow Diana’s team to infiltrate the base.  Once in they would secure what intelligence they could, destroying that which they couldn’t take with them, find Seelmann, Constanze and anyone else worth taking, including Noir, and look for any surviving prisoners. It was a tall order for Diana’s team, given there were only nine of them, but she was confident in them (if not herself). After all, it had only taken nine witches to stop war from breaking out back in 1935.  After regrouping with Andrew’s two squadrons, they would fall back to the airfield for extraction by Dakota at approximately 03:30.

To place the final nail into the site’s coffin two passes would then be made by RAF Bomber Command units. An initial sortie would be carried out by a squadron of Lancasters who would make a general bombing run, followed by a second flight of Lancasters carrying Grand Slam earthquake bombs. Their aim would be to destroy any underground structures and bury the site in rubble too thick to ever excavate it.

Once all personnel and recovered materials were loaded onto the transport aircraft, they would return to Manston, with an estimated time of arrival back in England of 06:15; a total mission time of 8 ½ hours. After the plan was laid out there was a run through of other details, a time for questions and a check of understanding, before at last Fielding brought the briefing to an end.

“Major Hanbridge, I’ll leave you to delegate duties to your squadron and troop commanders,” he said turning to address the seated Andrew. “The rest of you men, the time now is Seventeen Thirty-Two, I want you all formed up on the tarmac ready for embarkation at Twenty-One Forty-Five. So, rest up, get some scoff down you, check your kit, and be prepared for a prompt departure.” He then nodded to a Warrant Officer who called the room to attention and then dismissed the men.

Diana was just going to have a stern word with Amanda when Fielding called her over.

“A word, if you please, Captain Cavendish…” he said, emphasising the rank to ensure that Diana was under no illusion that him referring to her by that title was nothing more than a courtesy.

With a sense of deflation Diana followed after the senior officer, glancing at her team as she passed. Amanda, it seemed, was still angry about the treatment of her friend and was being talked to calmingly by Hannah. Diana was angry herself, both at the still unidentified paratrooper, and Amanda for her outburst, and she had a feeling she was about to be even angrier with the American witch once Fielding had finished with his dressing down.

As Diana walked towards the WAAF mess she was seething, the stern reprimand that she had been given still ringing in her ears. However, it appeared that she was not the only one who was agitated as, pacing up and down outside of the mess hall she spotted the redheaded American witch.

“Sergeant O’Neill!” she called out. Amanda looked up and began storming towards her, her expression as thunderous as Diana’s. “I've just spent ten minutes getting chewed out by the Colonel! Because of your hot-headed outburst he's once again of the opinion that we are not fit for this operation, and once again it was only the assurances of Andrew Hanbridge that have kept us from being grounded!” she said, berating Amanda.

“You heard what they were saying about her!” cried Amanda, throwing her hands up in exasperation as she squared up to Diana.

Diana, however, was still angry and not in the mood for insubordination, even from an old friend.

“Stand to attention when you're addressing a superior officer!” she demanded.

Caught off guard by her response, some of the anger disappeared from Amanda’s face only to be replaced by a look of derision.

“Really?” she said mirthlessly, cocking an eyebrow.

“Attention,” Diana replied slowly.

Amanda sighed and brought herself into a sloppy semblance of attention.

“Yes, I heard them, and yes, I felt angry,” said Diana curtly. “But outbursts like that make us look undisciplined and unprofessional. When they see us react in that manner it makes us, as both witches and women, look bad and gives them all the more excuses to say that we have no place fighting this war.” Diana felt her temper wane to be replaced by a feeling of mere irritation. “Do I have your assurances that you'll follow orders and not act so... rashly when we're in the field?”

“Ma'am...” Amanda answered flatly, still unable to resist a roll of her eyes.

“Good.” Diana was about to leave when she heard Amanda call out after her.

“Did you know?” asked the American, her eyes fixed sharply on Diana.

“What?”

“Did you know that Constanze was there, that she was a target?”

Diana stopped, suddenly feeling extremely guilty.

“I did...”

“Then why the hell didn't you say anything?!”

“It was on a need to know basis. My instructions were to keep all details secret until the briefing,” she said, trying to justify her actions, but even as she spoke, she knew that in the face of a close friend the argument seemed weak.

“You really trust me that little? Hell, I might have kept my mouth shut back there if I'd been prepared for it, but seeing my best friend suddenly called the enemy and insulted like that... how the fuck else was I gonna react?!”

The worst part was that Amanda didn’t even seem surprised that Diana hadn’t given her the trust she was owed. Theirs’ had always been a fractious relationship, and whilst both considered the other a friend, they still found themselves falling back to old habits. Diana knew that whilst she had indeed been technically correct in obeying her orders, she should have briefed her troops to avoid the pain of the public reveal that they had just endured.

“You're... You're right. I'm sorry; I should have told you earlier. I suppose I just followed instructions like I always have... And I do trust you; that's why I asked you to be my Number two on this. But we still need to show those men that we're just as disciplined as them.”

“You think I don't know that?!” said Amanda with a bitter laugh. “Look at my corps. The ATS is growing, but mine is getting smaller. Back home girls are being told not to serve as it'll make 'em look masculine and that boys won't want to date 'em 'cause they'll look like lesbians!”

“Says the pot to the kettle...” observed Diana before she could stop herself.

“Okay, that’s fair…” conceded Amanda with a smirk and a chuckle. Seeing the American smile Diana felt some of the tension in her shoulders ease.

“But right now, I've got as much as you to lose; in fact, I've probably got more,” continued Amanda. She then looked down at the ground, her smile waning. “If anything happens to Conzy and I knew I had the chance to rescue her, but I couldn't because I screwed up? Well, I don't know what I'd do.”

“I know, and I know you won't let me down. I just need you to do that so I can focus on not letting you down.”

“You'll be alright Di, you always have been...”

Diana gave her friend an appreciative smile then looked down at her watch.

“Right, we've got about three hours before we need to form up, so I want you to check up on the girls, make sure that they're eating, have water and that their equipment's ready, alright?”

“Can do,” said Amanda with a happy nod, before coming out of the position of attention and turning to enter the mess hall.

“Amanda!” Diana said, calling after her. “I know she's your best friend, but she's my friend too, and her safety is my priority. I want her safely here in England as much as you do.”

Amanda nodded to Diana with an understanding smile and then walked into the mess, leaving the young countess alone in the fading sunlight.

Diana went to check her watch again, but instead found herself studying her hand and the place on her ring finger where a golden band had once rested. The ring had not been a representation of anything formal, the law ensured that, but it had been a commitment; a commitment that had been broken by her once best friend and lover. Thinking of that woman, Diana felt a deep seated wave of anger swell inside of her again.

She took a deep breath, and instead decided to not let that traitor rule her mind. She needed to remain calm and focused on the mission. She looked past her hand to her wristwatch; still plenty of time before they were due to head off. She knew she should eat something, but honestly, she still felt queasy at the thought and the last thing she needed right now was more food to simply risk being thrown back up.

That said, a cup of calming tea might be alright.

Chapter Text

They must have looked an odd sight as they trooped through the darkness of the airfield, out towards the awaiting Dakota. In most regards Diana and her fellow witches looked much like the rest of the airborne soldiers that were stood awaiting embarkation; their helmets hiding their faces and their bulky camouflage Denison smocks smothering any curves that would indicate their sex. Likewise, they wore the same khaki webbing and equipment as the men, minus the parachutes, and carried their Sten Guns hung on slings in much the same fashion.

It was the brooms that they carried over their shoulders however that marked them out and drew the gazes of their male counterparts. Some appeared sceptical, but most seemed curious, watching in fascination as the nine witches passed them.

The Dakota to which they were headed was situated slightly away from the rest of the aircraft as it would be breaking off from the main formation once they got nearer their drop zone. They marched in silent order, the tension in the air stifling any urge to talk. The veteran troopers of the SAS seemed a lot more relaxed, laughing, joking and smoking cigarettes, but for the witches of Luna Nova Detachment this would be their first, and most likely only, taste of battle. Diana just had to remember what Andrew had told her, that the men were probably just as nervous as they felt, they just had more experience of disguising it.

Stopping close to the aircraft, Diana had them form up in a single rank, and then gave the order to carry out one final equipment check. In addition to their wands, each one of the witches had been issued with a Sten sub-machine gun to carry into battle. The exception to this was Amanda who carried an American issue Thompson Gun. How she had “acquired” this Diana had chosen not to question, although she suspected that somewhere a confused and extremely anxious G.I. was still wondering what happened to his surprisingly expensive submachine gun.

It was as each witch was checking her weapon and webbing that Fielding approached the team, followed closely by Andrew, his pipe tucked into his mouth, a slight warm glow radiating from the bowl. The senior officer was still in his carefully ironed service uniform, whilst Andrew was wearing his combat dress and equipment, his maroon SAS beret perched on his head, the badge well past the regulation position above his left eye and much closer to his ear.

Seeing the Lieutenant Colonel approaching Diana quickly called her team to attention, but he waved the formality away. Studying the witches with their brooms the senior officer seemed to do a double take, before shaking his head almost disbelievingly.

“You know, until I saw you with those brooms, I honestly thought that you were joshing about jumping using them and had expected to see you wearing parachutes,” remarked the Lieutenant Colonel with a half-smile. “You are able to fly those things, right? And you’re not just jumping to your deaths…”

Diana had finally had enough of being differential to rank.

“No sir, we’re actually a coven of suicidal women who are intent on wasting the army’s precious time, equipment and resources by throwing ourselves out of a moving aircraft without parachutes,” she said curtly, trying to remain straight faced. Now she was in for it, said the part of her brain that had, until now, stopped her from answering back to authority figures.

But to her surprise, Fielding actually smiled at her remark. Even Andrew seemed to approve, giving a lopsided grin through teeth clenched around his pipe’s stem.

“Your girls are all set?” enquired the senior officer. Diana confirmed that they were, and Fielding nodded approvingly, then looked curiously at her equipment. He seemed particularly fascinated by the broom she held in her left hand, studying the intricate design with an appraising eye, so Diana held it forward for him to carry out a closer inspection.

“Could anyone fly one of those things?” he asked with apparent genuine interest.

“If they understand the form and function of the incantation, and have a basic level of ingrained magical ability, then I see no reason why not,” answered Diana.

“And these things are silent?” Diana nodded. “How much weight can they carry?”

“Two persons with ease, three if needed, but at that weight it does cause extra drag and slow the broom down in flight.”

“But I bet that it’s small enough to be invisible to radar…” he seemed to ponder to himself. “And what with that whole Grand Triskelion thingy that you girls released, it should have no issue with range, correct?”

Diana confirmed that this was indeed the case, but kept her answer succinct as she was beginning to become uncomfortable with his line of questioning, sensing that the special forces commander was clearly judging the potential tactical capabilities of the broom for future operations. Fielding must have noticed her disquiet as he simply nodded to her that he was finished and stepped backwards, looking slightly more grim faced as he returned to seeing his troops off.

“Well then, good luck to you, captain,” he said, again emphasising her acting rank, but this time when he said it, there was no malice, instead it seemed more an acknowledgement. Diana thanked him, and then watched as he turned and went off to check the rest of those about to undertake the operation, leaving Andrew happily smoking his pipe.

“I think you might have got in his good books there, Cavendish,” remarked the young peer, taking the pipe from his mouth.

“I can’t quite figure him out,” Diana admitted, watching as Fielding started inspecting his men.

“He doesn’t really do rank or formality when he can avoid it,” said Andrew following her gaze. “He’s old fashioned, but at the same time he likes to feel challenged. You were too formal with him in your previous meetings, but you just showed him some spine, he respects that.”

Diana was still baffled as to how the officer who had reprimanded her about one of her soldiers stepping out of line could apparently also disregard rank, when her thoughts were interrupted by a shout from behind.

“Yo! Andrew!” The two officers turned around to see Amanda walking towards them. Even in the faint light and the dark shadow cast by her helmet it was clear to see that she was looking slightly awkward.

“O’Neill,” nodded Andrew in acknowledgment to the American Witch.

She stopped in front of them, but her expression was surprisingly down cast and thoughtful.

“I, look, I just wanted to say I was sorry to hear about Louis,” she said, offering him a sad smile, “really sorry. He may have been an ass the first time we met, but we got on after that and I liked the guy…” she looked down with uncharacteristic poignancy. “It really sucks…”

“It does…” agreed Andrew, also looking slightly more reflective.

“Wait, is this Louis Blackwell?” asked Diana looking between the two. She knew the man, not particularly as a friend, but through their shared social circles. 

“Ah, I take it you didn't hear?” said Andrew. Diana shook her head. “He was killed at Reichswald during Op Veritable. He was with the Guards Armoured, riding in the commander's position of his Churchill when he got hit by shrapnel. He should have been wearing a helmet, but he liked his beret too much...”

“Idiot…” muttered Amanda with a hollow laugh, but there was a tone of fondness to her comment.

The two shared a moment of reflection and remembrance, their eyes falling to the ground as they both thought about their friend. For her part Diana seemed to recall a brash young man; prideful and boastful, yet from her two companions there were looks of genuine remorse and sorrow. She hadn’t truly known the man that well, but then again, she supposed she had never really tried to get to know him, his boorish attitude making it hard to want to be a part of his company, especially given his previous behaviour towards Amanda and…

Thankfully, before she could dwell on faces from her past she would sooner forget, another soldier approached them. He was tall and carried himself with a rigidity that Diana normally only saw on the parade square. The soldier came to a halt in front of Andrew and stamped to attention.

“All men present and awaiting your orders, sir!” said the tall soldier with a Welsh accent.

Andrew thanked the soldier and then turned to introduce him to Diana.

“Diana, this is my RSM, WO1 Ted Hughes,” he explained. “His brother’s also with us this evening.”

“Corporal Owain Hughes, ma’am, and before you ask, no he doesn’t!” laughed the Warrant Officer with the tone of someone who assumes that the rest of the world is in on the joke, somehow missing the dour and incredibly unamused look on Amanda’s face. Confused, Diana looked to Andrew for insight, but he simply shrugged with a look of bafflement likely equal to hers.

“Right… anyway, thank you, Ted,” said Andrew before turning to Diana. “Well then, hopefully see you at the RV point in…” Andrew checked his watch, “just over five hours!” he said, before extending his hand, which Diana gladly took. “Good luck, Diana.”

“And you, Andrew.” The two distant cousins smiled for a moment, before letting go. Andrew, his pipe back in his mouth, set off towards the rest of his command, leaving Diana to hers.

“Well then, no point hanging around out here. I guess we might as well climb on board,” said Diana turning to Amanda. The American witch nodded approvingly and turned to begin loading the seven other witches onto the Dakota.

As the witches of Luna Nova Detachment began climbing up the steps onto the transport aircraft, Diana paused and looked around her. It was strange, she thought, that here she was on an airfield about to take part in a mission behind enemy lines, surrounded by professional soldiers in a world completely removed from that of her civilian life; yet only twenty minutes flight by broom and she could be at home at Cavendish Hall (not that it felt much like home these days). It was a strange sense of comfort to know that, even in the darkness of war, there remained some part of her old self that still lingered.

She took a deep breath and turned to the awaiting aircraft; it was time to go.

The formation of eight Dakotas flew through the night above a landscape of unending darkness; the line between land and sky barely distinguishable by only the slightest degrees of shade. Entire towns and villages passed unseen beneath them, unlit through blackouts or loss of power.

Somewhere out in the darkness vast aerial armadas of Allied bombers were carrying out bombing sorties against any number of targets across Germany, both military and civilian. That was why they had chosen tonight to carry out the raid; the Luftwaffe's night fighters would be busy elsewhere defending the urban and industrial centres of the Reich, hopefully leaving their planned route towards the target free of aerial danger. 

Diana wasn't sure when they had crossed over the German border or the front lines, but at some point, they passed over what she would later find out to be a village where a battery of Flak guns were guarding a railway junction. Diana gripped tightly to her broom as the aircraft was buffeted by the blast waves of shells exploding around them, shaking the Dakota violently, and causing the metal ribs and spars to groan and shriek as if in pain. 

The young noblewoman had always mistrusted flying in aeroplanes and to do so whilst in the midst of a barrage of anti-aircraft fire just seemed to confirm her worries. 

Flying a broom felt natural, indeed the very magical principles and energy that a witch drew upon for flight were born of nature itself; magic being as much an element of creation as the wind and the waves.

But these aircraft flew in spite of nature, using technology to climb into the heavens. Nothing about them was organic, from the methods of propulsion to the fabric of the craft; everything was artificial, everything was man made. 

Upon a broom Diana could feel the wind in her hair, the flow of the air currents and the magic of Yggdrasil coursing through her being; but inside the metal framework of the Dakota, she felt trapped and caged. And as each explosion rattled the aircraft, she looked around and thought that, should a shell strike the plane, then this metal flying tube would become a coffin for both her and her friends. 

The worst part however was that there was nothing she could do to help their present situation. There was no spell that could deflect the shells of the Flak canons, no way to stop death from stealing her friends away. The countess looked at her troops and felt helpless. She was the one meant to be leading them, making sure that they all returned home to England, but instead all she could do was sit here and pray that they would weather this storm of iron and lead. 

Another shell burst near to the aircraft, seemingly much closer this time, making the Dakota judder and causing one of the witches to cry out, although whether it was in terror, shock, or worse yet, pain, Diana could not tell.

Knowing there was nothing she could do, Diana gripped the edge of her seat tightly and screwed her eyes shut in grim fear as bright flashes illuminated the inside of the aircraft, highlighting the looks of abject terror on her friend’s faces (except for Hannah who had her face buried firmly in Amanda’s shoulder, the American clutching her close with sombre determination).

Time seemed to slow, as though the fates were toying with them, ensuring that at least one of the aircraft would be snatched from the sky, but eventually the guns stopped firing as they passed out of range. Thankfully all the aircraft had passed through unscathed, but the already tense feeling amongst Diana’s team was heightened. 

It was around 12:30, as they were drawing tantalisingly close towards their target, that the sky began to glow. At first it was just a faint orange hue on the horizon, but as they got closer it seemed as though the whole skyline was ablaze. Beams of search lights danced about trying to pick out the fleets of allied bombers overhead as the city below burned. There were tiny bursts of light as Flak exploded, and a couple of times Diana thought she could see trails of fire spiralling down towards the ground as a bomber was hit. 

Along the aircraft the witches gathered on the port side, watching with fascinated horror the scene of destruction playing out before them. 

“Where do you think that is?” asked Barbara having to raise her voice above the engines. 

“My best bet would be Hannover,” replied Diana. The Americans were getting close to the city and the allies were likely trying to soften it up before they tried to capture it. 

“I get that we need to break their defences, but that's a whole city we're bombing...” said Barbara clearly shocked at the thought, judging by the tone of her voice. 

Diana didn't respond, and instead leant her head back against the aircraft's body and swallowed back the sickening feeling that seeing those distant fires brought on. She thought of all the civilians in the city, scared and terrified as they huddled in shelters. And she thought of her former colleagues, the doctors, nurses, and medics, who would be fighting so hard to save lives in that hell. The British public, press and government had condemned the Germans for their blitz of London and the other major cities of the UK, but now they were retaliating in exactly the same manner, likely causing even greater casualties. 

Diana shuddered and closed her eyes, trying to block out the horror, but instead she made the mistake of letting herself remember. 

8^th March 1941

Diana wasn't sure why she had accepted her cousins’ invitation to join them on a night out in the West End. Night clubs were most certainly not her style of entertainment, and the thought of going to anywhere other than a shelter whilst a raid was on seemed preposterous. Still, the Café de Paris, the club where they were to meet, was 20 feet below ground and advertised as bomb proof, the bombers were seemingly some way off (hitting Docklands as best as she could tell), and honestly, Diana needed to distract herself from her work, so maybe just one drink with the twins would make a nice change.

Since becoming adults her relationship with Maril and Merrill had improved quite a bit, and whilst they were by no means close as family members, she considered them to be friends. And with her nursing work it had been several months since she had last seen them, so a catch up would be a nice way to let her hair down for an evening (or at least so Akko had insisted).

Walking along Irving Street she began to become aware of aircraft droning overhead, and she could hear the faint whistle of bombs falling. There were explosions and the ground shook beneath her, yet the crowd around her seemed unfazed. They kept walking calmly through the blackened city, although some, like Diana, did pick up their pace, even if only slightly. Everything seemed calm in London, despite the heavy bombing taking place.

It was only as she crossed Leicester Square that she realised something was wrong. Ghostlike, a group of people emerged from the darkness, coated in white dust and pieces of plaster, looks of terror on their faces. Led by a young Canadian soldier they walked in a dazed and disoriented manner and as they got nearer Diana saw one of them, a girl wearing ATS uniform, had a small trickle of blood running from a cut on her forehead.

Diana stopped them to check the girl over, and as she did so she asked what had happened. Only the Canadian had the voice to answer.

“A bomb… direct hit in front of the band...” he said with a raspy voice.

Certain that the wound was only superficial, and the others were only dazed, Diana hurried towards the Café, only to find Coventry Street filling with Ambulances and fire engines. People, just as covered in dust and plaster as those she had encountered in the square, were sat on the road being attended to by emergency service personnel. There were also military personnel, some of whom were aiding in the evacuation; others were standing around, keeping any crowds back. A number of the soldiers, both male and female, seemed to be just as covered in dust as their charges.

A soldier stopped her as she tried to approach the scene, but she quickly indicated her shoulder title and that she was a nurse. Having been let through the cordon Diana hurriedly surveyed the wounded. She knew she should have been attending to them, using her skills in healing magic and medicine to aid those outside, but her one thought was on finding her cousins. As she searched amongst the wounded and stunned survivors a horrible sickening feeling crept over her as face after face failed to be that of one of the twins. After a few minutes she was met with the horrible realisation that they were not on the street, which meant that they could only be in one place.

A group of rescuers were heading into the club, and so she slipped in with them. The stairs leading down to the club below were pitch black, the lights that should have lit them having been extinguished in the blast. Feeling her way through the darkness, following the half seen figures ahead of her, the stairwell felt cramped and claustrophobic as others pressed behind her.

There was a smell of burning; of ash and soot. And as she got further down these scents got stronger and mixed with other smells; more organic, bodily smells. Burnt flesh, singed hair and the metallic scent of blood carried on the air which was being drawn out through the stairwell.  

Emerging into the club proper Diana had a sense of stepping into a larger space, yet in the darkness it was impossible to tell quite how large. Electric torch lights shone through the room, their beams searching for the wounded and dying, but failing to illuminate the cavernous club.

Lifting her wand, she cast a light spell which illuminated the darkened room, and immediately Diana recoiled at the sight of death and destruction strewn before her. Bodies lay on the ground amidst the shattered remains of furniture and the band’s instruments, some were covered in coats which had been laid over them, but others were exposed, the fatal wounds terribly visible. Near to her lay a body, that of a young woman, her forehead had been cleaved open, with half her face masked by a veil of blood and pulp, the other half frozen in a look of shock.

Next to her lay a severed arm. Then another body and then another. The dance floor in front of the stage was littered with the dead, except for one spot where it appeared the bomb had gone off, and that anyone in that immediate area had either been blown clear away or blown apart.

Suddenly no longer working in the slim light offered by their torches, rescuers rushed to aid those whom they could now see were wounded, and as they worked feverishly, so too did Diana quickly set about scouring the wounded and dead. Each body she studied induced a nauseating wave of dread and momentary horror as she checked the dead, yet there was also a guilty sense of relief when each victim proved not to be one of her cousins.

“Diana...?” said a weak voice from somewhere near the stage.

Diana turned and saw Merrill behind an overturned table in a corner seating booth, tucked just out of sight of the rest of the rescuers. She was sat on the floor, clutching something in her arms.

She nearly tripped over a body as she rushed to her cousin's aid. It was only as she stopped in front of the pale faced woman that she realised what it was the twin was cradling.

“She... she's dead... isn't she?” whispered Merrill, looking at her sister who lay unmoving in her arms. She wasn't crying, as if she were awaiting the final confirmation from her cousin that her fears were reality.

Swallowing the sudden tightness in her throat, Diana knelt down and placed two fingers upon Maril's neck, but she knew before she even pressed down that the twin was gone. Her eyes were wide open and glazed over, and blood trailed from her mouth, nose and ears. A large black patch spread through her dress from her stomach and her skin was cool.

“I'm sorry, Merrill...” was all Diana could manage.

“Sister...” whispered Merrill. A tear ran down her cheek, and then another, and then no more. Merrill lifted her twin sister to her chest and rested her chin upon her forehead as with her right hand she tenderly cradled the face that mirrored her own.

The tightness in Diana's throat swelled, and she felt the first tears begin to creep into her eyes as she saw the heartbroken Merrill hold her sister close. They had been born together, lifted from the womb as one because they had been entwined with each other. They were joined in birth; they had grown up together, inseparable, and entirely beloved by the other. And now they were torn apart, one dead, the other alive.

“Kill me...”

Diana blinked and looked from the dead girl and into the face of her living sister. There was no hysteria in Merrill’s expression, only a calm and terrifying sense of clarity and purpose which shone in eyes that twinkled with unshed tears.

“Please, Diana, just kill me...” she smiled and laughed mirthlessly as she suppressed a gasp of sorrow.

“Merrill...”

“Let... let me be with her... please, don't make me live without her... don’t make her be without me…”

“Merrill... I can't...” Diana stared in horror as she realised that what she was witnessing wasn't just sorrow, but the fear of being alone, in both life and death.

“Kill me...” her voice was growing more determined as the tears began to overflow her eyelids.

Diana was terrified.

“KILL ME!”

Diana opened her eyes with a start. The aircraft was once again in darkness, the burning city now a mere glow behind them. She hated that memory and honestly, there were times she was tempted to erase it from both her mind and Merrill’s, but she owed it to the memory of her cousin to keep it, even if the pain it caused was sometimes overwhelming.

Trying to focus her mind back on the mission Diana checked her watch; Zero One Forty-Nine; in theory 11 minutes until they were due to make their drop, but given her momentary lapse of focus she wanted to be sure that they were still on schedule.

Getting to her feet she made her way cautiously along the aircraft, making sure to smile at her friends as she passed to try and reassure them, until she reached the cockpit. Leaning forward she tapped one of the airmen, the navigator, on the shoulder. The young airman, a Flight Sergeant, looked up and was surprised to see her stood above him.

“How long until we reach the DZ?!” she asked, having to yell to be heard over the engines in the unpressurised cabin.

“About 11 minutes!” he shouted in response, confirming that they were running to time. “But we’re a few minutes from breaking formation so I’d start getting your troops ready to drop!”

Diana nodded and returned to the cabin where all eyes were turned to her expectantly. Squaring her shoulders, she walked as confidently as she could in the moving and shaking aircraft before taking her seat once more. Picking up her broom she looked it over and ran her hand along its polished handle carved from an ancient yew and up to the metal head with its intricate snake detailing. She loved this broom dearly; it had belonged to her mother who had bequeathed that it should pass to Diana as a present upon leaving Luna Nova.

Perhaps that was why it almost felt wrong to be going to war on this object of beauty and peace. To repurpose it for conflict seemed a betrayal of all her mother had stood for and believed in; kindness and compassion unto others. But at the same time, her mother had taught her the importance of right and wrong and to stand by one’s convictions, and by riding this beloved broom into battle, maybe she was upholding those beliefs in right and wrong.

Suddenly the aircraft began to roll to the left side, banking as it moved away from the rest of the squadron causing all the witches on the left to brace and those on the right to cling on to the frame of the aircraft to stop themselves falling forward. For a few moments the aircraft kept this angle and Diana gritted her teeth under the pressure and strain of maintaining her position, until it at last rolled out of the turn.

As the aircraft entered into level flight once more, the red light which had remained unilluminated throughout the journey blinked into life, bathing the darkened cabin in an eerie crimson glow.

“Red light, everyone up!” Diana called out as she got to her feet.

Along the aisle of the cabin her fellow witches stood uneasily and turned towards her position by the door, brooms clung tightly to their chests. In the faint red light Diana could make out one clear factor on the faces of the members of her team; they all looked terrified. Even Amanda’s normally cool façade was broken with worry.

“Once you jump, remember you need to wait a couple of seconds before casting!” she called out to her troops. “Everyone ready?!” she asked, giving them a thumbs up, telling them that they were ready, even if they didn’t feel it, even if she didn’t feel it. No one looked especially prepared to fling themselves out of the aircraft, but they returned the thumbs up, nonetheless.

The red light blinked out to be replaced by a much brighter green.

“Green Light!” shouted Diana. “Number Two, Go!”

Amanda stepped up to the doorway where she hesitated for a moment, looking out into the blackness of the night. For a brief moment Diana worried Amanda might actually back out, and if she did so, surely everyone else would. But then, with a quick glance over her shoulder to give them a signature cocksure wink and a finger flick salute, she stepped over her broom and launched herself out of the aircraft, immediately being swallowed by the stygian gloom outside.

Sucy followed her next, giving a slight smile to Diana as she walked up to the doorway, but unlike the American witch, she simply stepped over the broom and walked out of the aircraft as though stepping through any other door with barely a moment's hesitation.

“Number Four, Go!” shouted Diana to Hannah, but the redheaded witch seemed frozen to the spot, clutching her broom, her eyes filled with fear. Diana beckoned her on, knowing that if she froze, then so would the rest of her unit, but in the end, it was a shove by Teresa that sent her moving. She edged her way to the doorway with uncertain steps and made a slight yelping noise as she arrived at the hatch. Diana walked up beside Hannah to try and reassure her, but as she looked out of the open door, she too felt her courage falter for a moment.

They had done jumps like this twice before; launching themselves from moving aircraft whilst mounted on their brooms, and both times it had worked without a snag. But those had been in the daylight and over the warm welcoming rolling green and yellow patchwork fields of the English countryside. Instead, there now lay before Diana naught but an empty black void and a seemingly bottomless abyss, as though the German forests below absorbed all light. By stepping out of that doorway she truly was setting out into the unknown.

But just as those doubts began to play at her mind once more, the figures of Amanda and Sucy, both astride their brooms, appeared flying alongside the Dakota. Amanda, apparently seeing the hesitation in the stalled witches stood in the doorway, flew closer and beckoned to Hannah. Whatever pull Amanda had over her friend seemed to work as, with a gulp, Hannah mounted her broom before she too stepped out into the night, plunging from sight as Amanda raced downward after her.

With Hannah out of the door, Barbara followed, seemingly assured to see her friend apparently complete the leap safely.

Amelia, Teresa, Mary, and Morag all followed on in quick succession until it was just Diana remaining in the aircraft. She looked out of the open door and once again the all-encompassing darkness seemed terrifying, yet she could see her friends flying below the Dakota, waiting for her to join them and lead them. Whatever fears she felt no longer mattered, all that mattered was that they were looking to her, and she had a duty to them.

“Well, no turning back now…” she whispered under her breath.

From the cockpit the Flight Sergeant Navigator emerged, possibly curious to see witches in flight, possibly to check that they were all away, either way he saw Diana and gave her a thumbs up.

Diana looked towards the airman and gave him a final nod of acknowledgment. Then broom between her legs, Diana took a deep breath, stepped out of the Dakota and into the dark void of the unknown.

Chapter Text

Launching herself from out of the Dakota, Diana gripped tightly to the broom clamped firmly between her thighs as she let herself fall through thin air. As soon as she felt the emptiness surround her a panicked internal voice instinctively screamed at her to cast the spell that would propel the inanimate broom into flight, thus ensuring her safety, but she knew that she had to wait.

Unlike when jumping from the walkway of the New Moon Tower at Luna Nova, Diana had to let herself free fall before casting the flight incantation or else risk being hit by the aircraft’s tailplane.

However, even though she knew the reason why she had to wait, and she had successfully completed such descents twice before on the practice jumps, it was still an unnerving sensation; falling through pitch black nothingness as the air whipped at her and roared in her ears. Remaining as calm as she could and reassured by the presence of her broom, Diana forced herself to focus as she counted down.

“Three… Two… One...”

Over the sound of rushing air, Diana could hear the Dakota’s engines grow fainter and, certain that she was now clear of the aircraft, she recited the spell.

“Tia Freyre.”

At once she was jerked to a halt, flinching as her descent was sharply stopped by the now animated broom. Regaining her composure and, unaware that she had been nervously holding her breath, taking a moment to breathe, Diana looked around her and spotted the Black silhouette of the Dakota cruising off into the night, the engines already a faint, distant hum, leaving only the sound of the wind blowing around her.

From above Amanda glided over, followed close behind by Hannah.

“Everyone alright?” asked Diana, looking about, her thoughts turning back to the mission at hand.

“Yep, everyone accounted for!” answered Amanda, nodding to her commander.

In the darkness, high above the German countryside, the eight witches gathered around Diana, each looking to her for orders.

“Alright,” she said, projecting her voice so that she could be heard in the emptiness of mid-air. “Everyone follow me down, then, when we get to the ground, I want an All-Round Defence on me, understood?” The team all nodded in return. “Excellent, follow me through!”

Diana pushed her broom into a sharp descent, aiming for a small clearing down below, marked only as a shade of grey amidst the sea of blackened pine trees.

Thankfully, the darkness of the night remained unbroken; there were no searchlights, nor sounds of Anti-Aircraft or small arms fire. Instead, the only points of light to be seen were those of the moon and stars far above which occasionally appeared from the clouds, only to vanish moments later. Their plan must have worked, she thought with a brief thrill of nervous excitement; the enemy had decided to remain hidden from what they had assumed were simply another wave of Allied bombers passing close by.

Passing below the treetops, Diana slowed her descent, pulling the head of her broom upwards, before guiding it to halt just inches from the ground. Lifting the broom until it was near vertical, and the straw bristles swept just above the forest floor, Diana simply stepped away from the small craft, the stock of her Sten already tucked into her shoulder, scanning the forest for signs of the enemy. But the forest remained still, the silence broken only by the faint whooshing sounds of her friend’s brooms as they descended to join her.

As soon as the rest of the witches had touched down in a ring around Diana, each one of them immediately dropped prone to the ground, bringing their weapons into their shoulders to create an outward facing circle of fire. For a moment there was silence and stillness as they watched and waited with bated breath, every eye flitting about, searching for the slightest indication that their position might be compromised. But there was no sound to be heard but the rustling and low creaking of the trees as they swayed and danced in a gentle breeze. Even though she didn’t hear it, Diana was certain that each witch around her breathed a half sigh of relief, yet there lingered a tense sense of alertness.

Kneeling down, from her position in the centre of the group Diana couldn’t help but feel mixed emotions as she regarded the members of her unit now spread out around her. When she had first met these women, they had been children, young witches eager to embrace the future and pursue their own destinies. But now they were soldiers, reacting on instinct inside a warzone. She was proud of her team; but she wished that the world was different, and that they could return to those halcyon days before those dreams of happier futures had begun to crumble.

But that was wishful thinking, she reminded herself, shaking her head, and right now, in the present and real world, she had a task to do and limited time in which to do it, and wishful thinking could get her, or worse those under her command, killed. Reaching into her smock pocket, she retrieved a paper map which she unfolded on the ground before her.

“Fire team ICs on me!” she hissed.

Scrambling up from their prone positions, Amanda and Barbara hurried over to Diana where they took a knee and huddled around the map. Producing her wand, Diana cast a dull ball of red light which hovered over the assembled fireteam leaders, generating enough light to illuminate the map but not so much as to dazzle their vision, which was slowly adapting to the darkness.

“The time is now five minutes past One. We have fifty-five minutes until we need to be in position,” stated Diana, recapping their situation as she checked her watch.

“Hey, can I make a suggestion?” asked Amanda, making Diana start slightly, having not expected an interruption.

“Of course,” she replied, finding the American’s tone to be surprisingly serious.

Amanda pointed to the map and traced her finger across its surface, highlighting the forested terrain between them and their objective.

“Look, if we try to go by foot, we’re gonna be real slow. Andrew and his men have further to go but they’re used to this sorta thing and moving in this kinda terrain, but we ain’t. And if we run into any trouble, I doubt we’ll be in position in time,” said the American sergeant, looking between Diana and Barbara.  “So why don’t we just move up by broom?”

“We’ll be more exposed,” replied Diana at once voicing the first concern that sprung to mind.

“But we’ll be able to move faster, quieter and have a better chance of avoiding any patrols,” countered Amanda, no trace of levity in her voice, only a focus on the task ahead of them, something Diana found oddly reassuring. “Plus, I doubt that any patrols we did encounter would even bother to look up when they’re in thick pine forest.”

It was a fair point Diana conceded.  

“Barbara?” she asked, turning to the young WAAF officer.

Barbara looked slightly taken aback by the fact that Diana, the traditional leader of what had once been the Blue Team, was asking her for input on a decision-making process.

“I, I think she’s right,” she said nervously. “That terrain’s going to be hard to see in the dark and we’ve only got fifty-five minutes...”

Diana began to chew on her lip as she thought Amanda’s suggestion over. As the unit’s commander she was under no obligation to follow the American witch’s idea, but she was in no doubt that it did indeed present merit and would undoubtedly mean that they would be in position in time for Andrew’s men to launch their assault.

Looking up at her second in command, another thought then occurred to her as she was reminded of their earlier argument when her friend had called her trust into question. Having witnessed Amanda’s horror at seeing Constanze’s portrait projected onto the screen at the briefing and the pain that it had caused her, Diana was under no illusion that, despite her assurances that she did trust Amanda, damage had been done to both their trust and their friendship. Now, perhaps, was the chance to put her words of reconciliation into action.

“Alright, Amanda, we’ll go with your idea,” said Diana with an air of finality. “Your team will take point. My team will go in the middle. Barbara: you will take up the rear… really Amanda?” Somehow, despite everything, Amanda was still snorting with barely suppressed laughter.

“What, am I supposed to not laugh at that?” replied Amanda, a smirk on her face.

“To be fair I’d be more concerned if she wasn’t laughing…” shrugged Barbara.

“Touché,” said Diana with a faint shadow of a chuckle at her friend’s lapse of immaturity, before returning to the matter at hand. “Right, Amanda, I want us to go at just above walking pace. Nothing too fast though as I don’t want us ploughing straight into an SS patrol, understood?”

“You can trust me, Di!” said Amanda with her trademark cocksure smile. Diana would have preferred a simple yet respectful answer of “Ma’am”, but despite her arrogant tone returning, she felt entirely confident that she could indeed trust the American.

Returning a quick smile, Diana reached into another smock pocket and produced a small brass compass which she set on the map. Having adjusted the compass she took a directional reading which she then gave to Amanda to pass on.

“Tell whoever’s on point that we need to follow a heading of eighty-seven degrees,” instructed Diana before quickly putting away her compass and folding up the map. Amanda nodded, then turned to face her fire team of Sucy and Mary.

“Baker, on me,” hissed the American, an order which was repeated by Diana and Barbara to their respective commands.

“Listen in, we’ll be advancing towards the objective by broom,” said Diana softly once they had regrouped. “We’ll move in line astern, staggered order, and I want silence at all times, understood? Right, Baker Fire team move out, my team follow, Charlie, you’re tail end.”

Remounting their brooms, the witches took off, climbing to just below the boughs of the pine trees as Sucy led the way. Amanda followed just behind her whilst Diana took up her position in the centre of the small column from where she would best be able to command and control the unit.

Skirting just below the foliage Diana lay low on her broom, as she might for rapid flight, but now it allowed her to create a smaller shape that would be harder for the eyes of any observers below to recognise as being a human form.

The faint breeze had dropped, and the forest was still as they wound their way silently through the thick trees, yet Diana’s ears were constantly pricking. The slightest creak of a branch, or rustle of a squirrel amongst the bows seemed to ring out in the night, sending goose bumps running down her arms and neck and filling her imagination with vast enemy patrols below, and with each noise she felt her heart pound ever harder in her chest.

Feeling the first hints of fear and panic begin to take root, Diana rubbed her fingers over the metalwork of the broom’s handle and thought of her mother once again, and the endless encouragement she had given her daughter. Bernadette had, in those last few days, told her that in her life Diana would face many struggles and there would be times when she would be afraid, but that she should always remember that her mother would be there to watch over her, as witches never really die, but return to Yggdrasil. Diana at times doubted this, but the thought that not only her mother, but all of her ancestors were watching and guiding her was strangely comforting.

Suddenly Diana became aware that Amelia, whom she was trailing, had come to a stop, her hand raised to signal a halt. Diana lifted her hand to pass the signal to Morag (who would in turn pass it down the column) then pressed her broom on to move along the line of now stationary witches to where Sucy was hovering at the front.

“What have you seen?” she asked, her voice barely more than a hushed breath as she exaggerated the movement of her mouth to ensure Sucy understood her.

The Filipino witch indicated down towards the ground below, to a point about twenty feet ahead of their position. Diana strained to see in the darkness; the thick pine forest robbing the night of what moonlight there was. At first, she couldn’t see a thing, but then she became aware of something moving in the shadows below them. A crunch of leaves coupled with a brief flash of light reflected off of a steel helmet drew her eyes and allowed her brain to fill in the rest of the information. There, walking slowly through a thick blanket of bracken was a German patrol of, as far as she could see, five men. They were patrolling in verbal silence, but were moving clumsily, their progress marked by the snapping of twigs and the heavy footfall of boots stomping on foliage. Again, it seemed that the Germans were complacent in their sense of security and thought themselves to be safe behind the lines. 

Sucy reached over and tapped Diana on her shoulder, drawing the blonde witch’s attention. Diana watched as the former Red Team witch slid two fingers across her throat, then raised a quizzical eyebrow to question what her orders were to be, but the acting captain shook her head. Even though they had the element of surprise and, thanks to the wands they carried, the ability to eliminate the enemy silently, engaging them would slow them down, and all it would take was for just one of the Germans to fire off a single shot to shatter the stillness of the night and jeopardize the whole operation.

Diana raised a finger to her lips, and then indicated for Sucy to move on.

The Filipino witch nodded, then silently and slowly drifted past her. Diana then signalled to Amanda, who was next in the patrol order to move up. Amanda in turn passed on the order to advance before following suit and soon the whole small section was once again underway, Diana dropping into her position in the centre of the group.

They were progressing slowly, but steadily, away from the patrol below and for a moment, a foolish stupid moment, Diana dared to let herself think they might have escaped without incident. 

Then, in a flurry of feathers, a crow burst from its cover within one of the trees, Diana’s heart nearly stopping in fright as the bird cawed and shrieked at Amanda, flapping its wings angrily as it tried to peck and scratch at her; the witches apparently having come too close to its nest. As the American tried to fight off the bird, Diana’s breath caught in her throat as her gaze fell down to the ground below.

The patrol had stopped.

“Oh god”, she thought as the Germans began searching for the source of the commotion. The whole of Luna Nova Detachment had likewise come to a halt; leaving them exposed and vulnerable in the air should they be spotted. Chancing a look at those members of her unit whose faces she could make out in the gloom, all looked as nervous as she felt. Reaching for her wand, Diana let it extend but didn’t power it up or ready a spell for fear that even the subtlest of glows might reveal their presence.

Meanwhile the bird continued to defend its nest, and Diana thanked each of the Nine Olde Witches that Amanda was managing to keep quiet, despite the angry crow determinedly attacking her. Looking back down Diana felt a cold sinking feeling as she could just make out that one of the Germans was looking up towards the canopy, directly at them, a momentary burst of moonlight reflecting on his pale white skin. For the time his eyesight would still be adjusting, but it would only be a matter of moments before his eyes were able to pick out the sight of Amanda silently trying to beat away the attacking crow.

“Lukas, was ist los?” came a shout from below.

There was nothing for it, with her second in command having her arms and face scratched to bits by the bird and the Germans becoming increasingly curious, Diana had only one option left. Readying her wand, she slowly moved it to just beside her head in the hope that its glow might be hidden from view and prepared herself to cast the spell that would either free them from this trap or move them from the frying pan and into the fire. With a steadying breath, she softly muttered the incantation;

“Eun Bhi Sàmhach.”

The end of her wand briefly shone with a dull orange glow as the spell charged up, before being loosed and sent swiftly flying towards the furious crow in front of her. She dared not breathe as the ball of magical energy dashed across the darkened canopy like a dim shooting star before colliding with its target.

The crow, a moment ago furious and determined to protect its nest, suddenly stopped its attack, and, after a seemingly quizzical sideways glance at the beleaguered American, returned into the tree and to its nest.

“Lukas?” the voice of one of the soldiers rang out again, sounding more agitated.

The soldier below still seemed to be staring intently in their direction. Diana shut tight her eyes and prayed to her ancestors that he would look away.

“Nur eine verdammte Krähe oder so!” replied the German with a dismissive tone. Diana opened her eyes and gasped in relief as she watched the German down below turn around and re-join his colleagues.

For a time, she could hear them thrashing through the undergrowth as they continued their patrol. It seemed like hours, but in reality was likely no more than a minute or two, until at last she was certain that they were far enough away for the witches to continue toward their objective. Once again moving to the front, Diana ordered Sucy to move on, and watched as one by one her friends slowly flew past, including a rather bedraggled and scratched, but overall relieved Amanda who gave Diana an appreciative nod and a wink as she passed.

They continued towards their destination, but this time the pace was even slower, barely more than walking pace, as Sucy at the front apparently decided that it was better to move even more slowly and cautiously than to risk running into another German patrol.

At their slowed pace it was about twenty more minutes of flight before they reached their target and Sucy dropped down to the ground at the edge of a large clearing in the trees. As the detachment landed Diana gave the hand signal for an all-round defence, before summoning her two fireteam commanders and then laying down. Amanda and Barbara scurried over to her, keeping low before falling onto their stomachs. The three witches then crawled slowly over the pine needle strewn forest floor towards the edge of the clearing, which was hidden by a bracken bush, trying their hardest to make as little sound as possible. Emerging from the other side of the bracken, the trio were finally afforded a view of the target facility.

They were laying at the foot of a tall, barbed wire fence sat at the top of a steep sandy bluff which dropped some 20 feet away to the facility below. From this position they could see, spread out before them, a complex of a dozen or so brick buildings and two giant metal aircraft hangar like structures.

In the middle of the site was a large central building with three floors and crested with a clock tower. This, Diana recognised from the briefing as being the central headquarters and office block, their objective for the night’s attack. Beyond the HQ building was a large open area, on the other side of which were a set of three identical long two-story buildings, the barracks, which were to be tackled by Andrew’s men.

The buildings were sat in a natural bowl created by a series of limestone cliffs, the northeast sides of which had been hollowed out and turned into a large set of concreted hangars, inside of which Diana could just make out the faint shadows of aircraft.

Surveying the site there was little sign of activity. All of the lights were out, either because of a blackout order or because most of the site’s occupants were asleep. A single sentry was stood beside the gate, but he was leaning nonchalantly against a stack of sandbags with his head semi bowed, probably only half-awake as he awaited his relief.

“Nothing much happening…” said Amanda in a hushed tone. “Let’s just hope Andrew’s men have gotten into their positions…”

“I’m sure Major Hanbridge has everything in hand…” muttered Diana as she went to check her watch, the dial face emitting an eerie luminous green glow that picked out the hands and numbers even in the darkness. The time was zero one fifty-two; eight minutes until the main assault was due to begin, and a further twelve minutes until the witches of Luna Nova Detachment would begin their infiltration of the site under the cover of the chaos the SAS would unleash.

Satisfied that she had time to plan, the young Countess studied the terrain before them once more, making note of where the nearest cover lay on the other side of the perimeter fence, and the layout of the research facility’s complex of buildings.

“Ladies, when we move in, we can’t very well take our brooms with us,” said Diana, looking at the brooms which lay beside them. Whilst the ancient mounts of witches were perfect for flight, training had proved that they were wildly impractical to carry when moving on foot in a confined built up environment. “Thus, I will suggest we leave them in the shelter of this bush and retrieve them when we extract at the end of the mission.” Amanda and Barbara both nodded their heads in agreement. “This position will also act as a rally point, should there be the need to make a rapid withdrawal…” she added slowly. She didn’t want to articulate why they should need to retreat to this position, but to do so would have been needless as the two other witches seemed to understand.

Diana then pointed towards a low brick wall which ran around what appeared to be an water tank raised up on a concrete platform. The wall sat at the confluence of several paths and offered a wide arc of fire.

“Amanda, once again your team will take point,” explained Diana turning to the American witch.  “However, I want you to take point this time. Once you’re over the fence and down the slope, I want you to head towards that wall. That’ll give you cover, as well as protecting any routes of approach until we’re all over.”

“Sure thing, Di,” said Amanda as her eyes tracked the distance between their current position and the low wall, plotting her path in her mind.

“Once we’re over, we’re going to move past those hangars towards the HQ building and see if we can find a back entrance where we can slip in without hopefully drawing too much attention to ourselves,” Diana continued. “I don’t need to tell you both, but make sure you stay alert in the HQ. It’ll be theirs to defend and the whole place could be one massive trap. Once we’ve found Seelmann and Constanze,” Amanda briefly grimaced at the mention of her best friend, “we’ll secure what intel we can from Conzy, and then, if everything’s quiet, join up with Andrew’s team. If there’s still fighting, we fall back to this position, then move around the perimeter and make our way to the extraction point.”

With the rough plan for their assault laid out, Amanda and Hannah withdrew back to fill in their teams, leaving Diana to look over the site once more.

The stillness of the night remained unbroken and for a moment she too wondered if Andrew’s men had managed to reach their position, as honestly, she couldn’t imagine that large a body of men advancing unchallenged towards so secure a facility. But then again, she reasoned that they were seasoned to operations such as this and, trying to distract herself from her worries, she lifted her watch hand back up to her face.

Four minutes to H-Hour. Her team were about as ready as they possibly could be, now she just had to hope that Andrew’s part in the operation would run smoothly.

Silently, the men of Baker Squadron stepped over the bodies of the fallen Flak gun crew.

There had only been a half dozen of the Luftwaffe gunners on duty and, believing that they were far enough behind the German lines that their only threat was from above, their alertness had been sloppy. It had been but the work of a mere moment for Andrew's men to creep up and silently eliminate them as steel blades had flickered in the night.

With this obstacle cleared the British now had a vantage point that, from the limestone cliff, overlooked the entire main site. The mortar section quickly began setting up their Two-Inch guns as a pair of Bren Gunners mounted their weapons on the edge of the cliff from where they'd be able to lay down suppressing fire.

Andrew, laying on his stomach at the precipice, surveyed the site through his field glasses. All was quiet down below; a few enemy guards were making their rounds of the facility, but on the whole, it appeared that everyone was safely asleep in their bunks, blissfully unaware of the tempest that his men were about to let loose upon then.

"Able are in position, sir," hissed a soldier who crept up beside him, sliding on one knee as he kept low. Turning around he recognised the nervously smiling face of Lance Corporal Nichols, a man who was somehow one of his unit’s fastest runners despite being gangly and tall.

"Excellent,” said Andrew softly, nodding to the soldier. “Return to your unit and reiterate to Captain McKenna that they are to await the mortar team before beginning.” Nichols confirmed the order then slid away from the cliff's edge before running off.

Andrew reached into his breast pocket and removed a silvered pocket watch. Clicking open the case he looked at the dial face and compared it to the time on his wristwatch; perfect synchronisation.

The watch had been given to him when he had enlisted in 1939. Indeed, it was now something of a tradition to present the watch to the eldest son of the house of Hanbridge before they left for war, as for three generations his family had carried this ornate Swiss time piece when leading men in battle. His grandfather had been given it before leaving for the South African War, his father at Gallipoli and on the Western Front, and now Andrew had taken possession of it, carrying it through Dunkirk, then in North Africa and finally in Europe once more.

01:58. Two minutes until H-Hour.

Below him, hewn into the limestone cliffs, he knew were a series of concreted bunkers and hangars in which the technicians working on the site developed their latest creations for the Nazi war effort. He simply had to pray that there were no emergency exits that would expel enemy troops behind their position.

01:59

As well as the two teams dug in with their Bren Guns, the SAS had brought along a pair of snipers and their spotters who had also taken place on the overlook. These four men, a curious mixture of ghillies, gamekeepers and poachers while in civilian life, lay a few feet away, adjusting their rifle's sites whilst the spotters searched for prey for their partners. The numerical odds were against the British, but with superior firepower, they might be able to tip the balance in their favour.

Tick-tick-tick-tick

Andrew studied the watch as the second finger moved closer and closer to the hour hand.

Tick-tick-tick-tick

He wondered if Diana and her team were in position. What about Charlie Squadron at the airfield?

Tick-tick-tick-tick

Did they have enough time to complete this mission before the RAF levelled the place?

Tick-tick-tick-tick

Click. H hour.

There was no more time to worry, only time to act.

Andrew looked over to the awaiting mortar section commander, nodded sharply, then turned back to observe the scene unfold. He heard the rustle of a smock as the commander dropped his arm, followed shortly by the strange sucking sound of the four shells being dropped into the mortar tubes, creating a short-lived vacuum, then the dull booms of the rounds being fired. There was a moment of silence, in which Andrew thought he could hear the sound of the wind in the treetops, before the four rounds all impacted on their target building, tearing holes in the barrack block's roofing in small bursts of dust and debris.

This initial salvo was immediately followed by a rushing sound as four PIAT rounds were fired at the brick posts of the metal barred gate which sealed the entrance to the site. Three rounds impacted on the post, sending the metal barrier toppling to the ground as the brick work crumbled, whilst a fourth round somehow sailed through the impossibly narrow gap between the bars and instead struck the corner of the wooden guardhouse, the walls and supports splintering.

For a moment there was silence filled only by the sound of broken tiles and rubble hitting the floor of the barracks. Then the air was alive with shouting and screaming as the confused garrison began to stir to life like an angry wasp’s nest.

A whistle blast sounded amidst the confusion. Looking off towards the road leading to the front gate, Andrew watched as, from their crouched positions in the ditches and bushes beside the roadway, the men of Able Squadron got to their feet and rushed the site's entrance. They ran as fast as they could under the weight of their equipment, yelling and screaming like devils as they covered the open space that, if they lingered, would become their final resting places. They moved swiftly, reaching the outer bar gate within moments of their charge beginning, vaulting it until one man had the sensible idea to simply lift the thing.

From the shattered wooden guardhouse, a couple of stunned and bedraggled enemy soldiers staggered forward, the expressions on their faces making it clear they were not fit to fight. But they wore SS uniform, so Andrew's men had no mercy, cutting the two dazed unarmed men down in a hail of bullets.

In reply a couple of shots rang out in the darkness, the muzzle flashes appearing from the barracks, but the charge kept on going. Less than thirty seconds since the whistle blast all of Able Squadron were within the perimeter and spreading out.

With the initial chaos of the mortar salvo worn off, the Germans finally appeared to rally to their defence as through the front door of one of the barrack blocks began to appear armed men, turning out to meet the attackers.

Andrew turned to the Bren Gunners and gave the signal.

The responding garrison members made it only a few steps before they were felled, the bodies of a dozen men choking the entrance way before the Germans realised that they were pinned there. In the mass of dead, a soldier writhed in pain, and one of his colleagues rushed from cover to rescue him, but he was torn off of his feet by a slew of fire, leaving the wounded man to die alone.

Trapped in their barracks, the Germans began to return fire, sending Able Squadron's men scurrying for cover. Tracer rounds flecked through the darkness and from this position overlooking the battle that raged below, the scene, for some reason, reminded Andrew of the firework displays of his youth; 5th November, Bonfire night, or the Fourth of June at Appleton.

“Medic! Medic!” the distant desperate cry snapped Andrew out of his moment of revery and dragged him back to the present.

Andrew clenched his eyes shut and groaned in frustration. Just for once he had hoped that maybe, just maybe he would be able to bring all of his men back home. Of course, casualties were inevitable, especially with these odds, but still, just once he wanted to come away without the feeling that he'd let down his men.

Two minutes had passed, and the fighting was now in full swing. The German garrison would soon begin to organise their defence, so it was now up to Andrew and his men to ensure that the pressure was kept on them. Slipping his binoculars back into their canvas case, Andrew got to his feet with a grunt as old wounds ached.

He turned around and gazed over his awaiting men, who crouched on the edge of the forest behind him, looking back with stern but expectant expressions. Other officers he had known from Appleton might have said something smart, something to try and rile up their men for the fight ahead or to inspire them. They might have quoted Henry V; “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more unto the breach.” But Andrew remained silent, unlike his school friends he had never been one for pointless dramatic gestures. Now there was no room for needless bravado and hollow words, because his men knew their trade; there was simply a job that needed doing and only a short time in which to do it.

Andrew took a firm hold of his Sten, walked past his squadron, and broke into double time, his men following suit. Bullets buzzed angrily overhead, and explosions rattled the night as he led their silent charge.

Fire and death, that was their business, and as much as the needless waste of life never failed to appal the young diplomat’s son, he was good at it; he just wandered how Diana, a healer, would cope were she made to do the same. Still, such worries were for her and her witches alone, right now, all Andrew cared about were his men, and seeing them through this tempest they had conjured for her.

Chapter Text

Chaos had erupted as the first salvo of mortar rounds impacted on the roof of the barrack block, sending the slumbering research facility into a confused state of pandemonium. Sirens wailed as the furious rattle of gunfire resounded through the hitherto still night, occasional stray bursts of green and red tracer dashing across the blackened skies above.

From their hidden position on top of the bluff, Diana could just hear amongst the cacophony of battle the faint echoes of shouting as those guards who had not been asleep rushed through the buildings below to meet the invaders. For three minutes Diana and the rest of Luna Nova Detachment lay still, waiting in apprehensive silence as the fighting near the entrance intensified.

Suddenly the night was illuminated by a series of flashes as another volley of mortar rounds crashed down on a second barrack block, sending a slew of debris cascading to the ground below, and adding to the panic of the garrison as the roof of the first block began to burn.

“Must be almost time to move in,” commented Amanda from somewhere behind her as the dust from the blasts dissipated.

Checking her watch, Diana noted that four minutes had passed since the initial assault had begun, so, if everything was going to schedule, then Andrew’s squadron should be about to join the fight. And as if on cue there was a noticeable increase in the volume of gunfire, and amidst the crackle of shooting, it was just possible to hear the yells of men charging into battle, heralding the arrival of Baker Squadron into the fray.

With both Able and Baker now distracting the enemy, it was time for Diana and her team to finally make their move, as hopefully any remaining enemy troops would have been lured away from their objective, making the way clear for the nine witches to begin their own much quieter infiltration of the base.

“William Team, get ready to move!” hissed Diana, turning to observe the rest of her unit. The red glow of the burning barracks highlighted how nervous their expressions were, but thankfully none showed any obvious signs of the fear that Diana could feel nibbling away at her own confidence. She then met stares with Amanda, who offered her a much more reassuring smile.

“Alright, Sergeant, you’re up!” she said, returning the smile, even if it felt hollow.

Amanda nodded, then scurried over towards the base of the wire fence. Swapping her weapon for her wand, she furtively scanned the area in front of them. Seemingly content that the coast was clear, she began to power up her wand, the tip casting an ethereal blue glow in the night.

Seeing the wand light up, Diana was gripped by a sudden surge of anxiety.

“Amanda, wait!” she said, lunging forward to grasp the American’s wrist.

The redhead turned to look at her in surprise, her face filled with confusion. Diana could feel the panic begin to grip her; a fear induced by the burden of leadership. She wanted to offer Amanda a way out, something that would allow her to shield her friends from all harm. But then she remembered what Andrew had said, his advice about remaining calm for the sake of her team echoing in her mind. Taking a deep breath to try and steady herself, she looked at Amanda and schooled her expression into a vision of stoicism she certainly didn’t feel.

“Remember, our role isn't to go looking for trouble,” she said, deciding that it was better to reiterate something her friend already knew, than risk revealing her own internal anxieties. “Our task is to make our way to our objective as quietly as possible, secure Constanze and Seelmann, and exfiltrate to our RV with Andrew's team. Any contact will just slow us down, so don't engage unless necessary...”

“Hey, Diana, don’t worry, I got this…” said Amanda with a smile that Diana knew was meant to placate her, but her cocksure tone was less than reassuring. The American then looked her directly in the eyes, and must have seen something there, perhaps the deep-seated worry, as the smugness left her face, replaced with a genuine, soft smile. “Seriously, Diana, it’s gonna be alright.”

Somehow, hearing her say that did do something to briefly numb the worry, and reluctantly, Diana released Amanda’s wrists and watched with bated breath as she once again charged up her wand, then stood straight upright.

“Tia Freyre,” she whispered. A glowing rune circle appeared below the redheaded sergeant’s feet, and Diana found her breath catching in her throat as gently, Amanda began to levitate off of the ground. Gradually, far more so than Diana would have liked, the witch floated upwards before clearing the coils of barbed wire at the top of the perimeter fence.

At the arc of her ascent, Amanda was at her most exposed and if any members of the garrison should have spotted her, the American witch would have been a sitting duck. Fortunately, and with many a sigh of relief, Amanda touched down on the other side of the fence without incident, the blue platforms that had borne her dissipating as she unslung her weapon and crouched down at the top of the sandy slope. 

“Piece a’ cake!” she smirked (Diana truly wished felt as cool as Amanda appeared given the circumstances), before hurrying down the hill to the chosen gathering point of the brick wall below, almost sliding down the steep incline as she dug her heels into the loose sand which shifted beneath her weight. Once in position, she squatted down by the wall, performed a quick scan of the area, then beckoned for the others to join her.

One by one the members of William Team made their precarious ascent over the barbed wire fence, before scurrying down the sandy slope to join Amanda, until at last it was Diana’s turn.

Standing up, Diana at once felt vulnerable in her exposed position, her mind populating the area in front of her with imagined snipers or guards who might cut her down as she began her climb. But there, waiting for her at the bottom of the slope were her friends and teammates, all of whom had traversed the fence without incident, and Diana just had to assuage herself that so far, their part of the plan seemed to be working.

“Well then, “Once more unto the breach…”” she quoted under her breath as she powered up her wand and steeled herself for this part of the assault.

“Tia Freyre.”

Diana briefly shuddered at the unearthly sensation of the magical platform congealing beneath her before it gently lifted her off of the ground. Her heart was pounding, and her legs felt giddy as she was raised slowly upwards, feeling increasingly naked the higher she climbed.  

Having cleared the rolls of barbed wire, she took a tentative forward step off of the first platform and onto another which formed in mid-air beneath her, supporting her as she began to descend. The short, yet nerve-racking journey over the perimeter fence seemed to take an age, but at last she felt her feet come to rest on the sand below. With a sigh of relief, Diana crouched down, legs shaking beneath her as they suddenly felt weak. Taking a brief second to recompose herself, she waved for the next member of the team to make their ascent, then made her way gingerly down the steep sandy slope.

It took approximately three minutes for the whole team to make their way over the fence and regroup at the bottom of the hill. In hindsight it might have been faster to have cut their way through the fence’s barbed wire strands, but the wire was taut, and the possibility of it suddenly snapping back and lacerating the witch who was cutting it was a risk Diana had decided to avoid, although overall it still might have been less dangerous and precarious than floating over it. But she was the leader, she had made the decision, and as such she had to stick by it.

Turning her mind back to their present predicament, Diana glanced down at her watch; 02:08, they were still running to time. Reaching into the breast pocket of her smock, Diana retrieved a small sheet of notepaper on which she had sketched a rough map of the site based on the aerial reconnaissance photographs.

“Sergeant O’Neill,” she said, beckoning the American over. As Amanda squatted beside Diana, the blond haired witch began to outline the route that they would need to take to navigate the maze of buildings. The intended path was snaking and indirect, but it would avoid any major roads where they might be exposed and more likely to encounter any resistance. Amanda nodded as she mentally noted the route she was to lead them on, then returned to the front of the small column to await Diana’s instructions.

For her part Diana was now keen to get underway, unable to stand the nervous anticipation of delaying any more. With one last smile of reassurance to her friends and teammates, which required less acting than she had anticipated now that they were already in action, Diana readied herself for the next stage of their mission.

“Alright, Baker Fireteam, move up,” said Diana, flicking her hand forward, instructing Amanda to begin advancing further into the metaphorical lion’s den. Silently, the members of Luna Nova Detachment followed on, their eyes scouring their surroundings as they cautiously made their way towards their target.

As quietly as they could, Amanda led the nine witch team through the warren of passageways that ran between the various workshops, moving through the shadows cast by the buildings that hid them from the glow of burning barrack blocks. At each corner or junction, she would pause, check in both directions and then swiftly cross the gap, forging a path for the others to follow. The route they were taking was empty, yet the sounds of battle grew louder and louder the further they advanced.

They were making steady progress towards the central headquarters, and Amanda was just approaching another junction in the alleyways between two hangar like workshops when suddenly she froze, raising her hand to halt the Column.

“Hier lang komm schon, beeile dich!” came a shout from the intersecting alleyway ahead of them.

Amanda slammed herself against the shaded brick wall of the workshop. With a swift downward chop of her hand, she signalled for the rest of the team to get to cover, but instinctively they had copied her, throwing themselves backwards against the wall.

“Auf diese Weise sollten wir in der Lage sein, sie zu flankieren!” came another shout.

Over the sound of gunfire, all could hear the thudding of running boots approaching from their left. Diana’s heart began pounding in her ears once more as, in silence, the nine witches huddled in the shadows of the building, waiting with bated breath, until the first German appeared.

He was running down the adjoining passageway with gritted teeth, a weapon clasped in both hands and in the gloom, Diana could make out the distinctive uniform that indicated that he was a Luftwaffe paratrooper. He was then followed by another paratrooper, and then another. The German guards ran past the entrance to the alleyway where they were hidden, all too focused on reaching their objective to check their surroundings and catch sight of the British witches lurking in the shadows.

Diana counted four guards run past the junction, and she was trying to guess if there were any more to come, when another ran past and as if in slow motion, she watched as the man glanced sideways, straight down the narrow alley towards them. With eyes flaring wide he stumbled to a halt and, without thinking about the threat they posed stared at the nine witches in shock. There was a collective stillness as everyone froze, the tension radiating off of them palpable.

At the end of the alleyway the German paratrooper eyed the witches, then let his gaze fall on Amanda who stood nearest to him, her Thompson raised at the hip. Diana could see the panic and fear in the man’s eyes as he stood alone and outnumbered.

Slowly, Amanda lifted her left hand from off of her weapon, and gently raised a shaking extended finger to her lips, as with wide, reassuring eyes, she tried to beckon the man to remain silent and simply pass them by. To Diana’s relief, the German appeared to calm down slightly, the terror leaving his face as he looked at Amanda, at the finger raised to her lips, then along the line of witches each of whom equally regarded him with trepidation, and for a moment Diana thought that he might simply let them slip by, thereby saving his own life, as well as potentially theirs.

“BRITISCHE SOLDA…!” the man screamed before being drowned out by a burst of gunfire.

In the narrow confines of the alleyway the sound of a weapon being fired was deafening, and Diana couldn’t help but flinch as her unprotected eardrums were audibly assailed. Yet looking back up her stomach dropped as she watched both Amanda and the German stumble backwards and crumple to the ground, the space between them filling with gun smoke and bloody spray. But to Diana’s immeasurable relief no sooner had Amanda collapsed than she was scrabbling back to her feet, seemingly only laid low by overbalancing whilst firing her weapon singlehanded at point blank range.

“CONTACT! OPEN FIRE!” she bellowed, then leant around the corner of the workshop to start shooting at the startled Germans. Mary ran up beside Amanda and likewise opened fire, shooting in controlled bursts as opposed to Amanda who held down her trigger without pause, a fierce expression carved on her normally cool features as she gritted her teeth against the kick of the gun and fought to keep it from pulling up.

Sucy meanwhile, crouched down beside the other two and drew her wand, casting a shielding spell that offered her friends some protection against the incoming fire. However, the spell could only do so much, and bullets began to break through the magical barrier, whizzing by with alarming proximity.

“Reloading!” shouted Amanda, ducking back into cover to remove her magazine.

At once her place was taken by Morag. However, instead of employing her weapon, the Scottish witch drew her wand and, callously stepping out of cover, let fly a fiery spell that tore down the alleyway before ducking back into shelter as a bright red light momentarily illuminated the bloody scene.

Reloaded, Amanda retook her position and opened fire, yet after only a couple of sharp bursts, the American stopped shooting.

“Forward area clear! They’re down…” she announced as she lowered her weapon, the sudden absence of deafening gunfire leaving a high pitched ringing in Diana’s ears.

“William Team, move… move up, check them over…” said Diana, opening and closing her mouth as she tried to relieve the shrill ringing.

Cautiously, the nine witches crept into the adjoining alleyway where gun smoke and the smell of cordite hung in the breathless night air, and at once Diana felt a wave of dreadful nausea inducing guilt hit her. There, lying in the alleyway, were the bodies of the five German paratroopers, cut down by the withering hail of gunfire or bearing the distinctive scorch marks of having been hit by a destructive fire spell.

As the witches silently moved amongst the fallen, Diana was frozen to the spot, staring in horror at the scene before her. They were dead. These five men were dead, and it was all because of her orders, all because she had brought this team of witches to Germany. Their lives were cut short all because of her decisions; all because of her. Diana was a medic and a trainee doctor, but more than that, she was a Cavendish, a descendant of Beatrix, and it was her sacred duty to protect life regardless of whose life it was. And yet here there lay five souls that had been snatched away from the world. Diana felt a lump form in her throat, and her body begin to shake as she looked them over again, revulsion at her own actions and guilt whispering in her ear.

“This one’s still alive!” called Mary, whom Diana could see crouching down beside a body further up the alleyway, snapping her from her stupor. At once Diana broke away from her position in the centre of the group and hurried towards the casualty whilst instinctively reaching for her first aid kit, all thoughts of guilt and self-loathing vanishing, replaced by the singular purpose of preserving life.

Joining Mary beside the casualty, Diana batted the dark haired girl’s hands away, allowing her space to make a full assessment of the man’s wounds. In the gloom it was hard to make out the extent of the injuries against the camouflage smock’s muddle of dark colours, but Diana could tell one thing straight off the bat, there was a lot of blood soaked into the fabric of the smock: too much. Unclipping his webbing belt, and grabbing the smock’s zip, she pulled the jacket apart to reveal an abdomen and torso peppered with at least five open and haemorrhaging entry wounds.

Diana stared in horror at the devastation inflicted, trying to figure out where best to begin stemming the bleeding, when suddenly the man groaned, then let out a yelp of agonising pain as he tried to move. Diana grasped the man’s shoulder’s, trying to keep him still as with each movement he inadvertently caused the wounds to stretch, furthering the loss of blood.

“Blutige Hölle, scheiße,” moaned the man, looking up through eyes welling with tears into the faces of Diana and Mary.

He was talking and conscious, that was a good sign Diana told herself as she turned to study his face. He was young, much younger than herself, probably no more than 19 years old, and from his youthful countenance hazel eyes regarded her nervously.

“Wie heißen Sie?” asked Diana, as she began to sift through the contents of the first aid kit.

The German soldier hesitated. Diana could see the suspicion towards her in his eyes, despite being the one rendering him aid, and knew that if she wanted to have even a remote chance of saving his life, she needed to established trust with the young soldier.

“Mein Name ist Diana, ich bin Sanitäterin,” she said, trying to smile reassuringly despite how concerned she was by the extent of his injuries.

The man faltered for a moment longer, before relenting. 

“Mei… Mein Name ist Lukas…” he said. Diana paused in her work as she looked at first Lukas, and then at the fallen men that lay scattered in the alleyway. It was the patrol from the forest, she realised with a sinking feeling. Despite everything she had done to avoid conflict back there, here they still lay, dead or grievously wounded by their hands. “Oh Gott, es tut weh!” he gasped breathlessly, drawing Diana’s attention back to her patient.

“Du wirst in Ordnung sein,” she said, then looked him over, still uncertain where to begin with the mess that was his body. The only thing she could think of right away was to try and numb the pain, so she reached for her morphine Syrette and pulled the lid away. “Wo tut es weh Lukas?”

“Bitte, Ich habe Angst…” was all the young man could answer. Mary looked at Diana, before letting her hand slip into his. The blue haired witch flinched as she realised it was slick and sticky with blood, but nonetheless she squeezed comfortingly as Diana drove the small sachet of painkiller into the man’s abdomen.

“Keine Sorge, es wird alles gut,” said Mary, her accent less certain than Diana’s but her expression and tone far more comforting.

“Ich will nicht sterben…” his eyes looked imploringly into first Mary’s and then Diana’s. “Ich will meine Mama, Ich möchte nach Hause gehen…” he choked out as tears flowed over his cheeks.

“Schau mich an Lukas, ich helfe dir, ich lasse dich nicht sterben!” said Diana forcefully, which caught the young German off guard. Around them the rest of Luna Nova Detachment gathered, facing outwards to protect them from any of Lukas’s colleagues.

Diana quickly began to try dressing the wounds, but without rolling him over, she wouldn’t be able to stop the flow of blood from the exit wounds. It was going to hurt, but there was nothing that they could do otherwise. Gently, with help from Mary, Diana tried to move him onto his side, yet as his face lolled slightly, Diana saw just how pale he was, and how sodden with black gore the ground had become.

“Ich habe Angst,” whispered Lukas, squeezing Mary’s hand tighter. “Oh Gott, oh Christus, rette mich…”

“Diana, he’s a goner, we need to move,” said the voice of Amanda, momentarily drawing Diana’s attention away from Lukas, as she stood over her commander.

She returned Amanda’s stare with eyes filled with anger, not just for suggesting that her work might be in vain, but for what felt like the injustice of the situation. She knew nothing about this young man; she didn’t know where he came from, what his surname even was. He could be just another pawn of a dying regime, or he could be an ardent Nazi, but that didn’t matter as right now she was no longer a soldier, but a medic, and she had a duty of care, no matter who was before her. He was lying there, his head rested against Mary’s knee’s. He was young, just like Maril had been, and she had lost her; Diana refused to let someone else succumb to similar wounds. If she could do this, then maybe Beatrix would forgive her for her trespasses against the Cavendish name.

“I won’t leave him!” Diana retorted with a snap. “He’s my patient, it’s my duty to attend to him!”

Amanda didn’t even flinch as she snapped at her, instead she sighed and let her shoulders sag, clearly feeling that Diana was confusing her responsibilities given the circumstances, before checking the time impatiently.

“Bitte, ich will nicht sterben…” whispered Lukas, looking up at Mary with tired desperation. Diana applied pressure as she redoubled her efforts.

“Diana…” said Amanda, much more softly this time, her hand hovering just above the blonde witch’s shoulder.

“Bitte…” his voice was nothing more than a sigh as his body tensed, then loosened and sagged.

“I need pressure on the wound there,” Diana instructed, missing the gasp from Mary as she applied another set of dressings to the blackened wounds. “Amanda, hand me those spare bandages!”

“Diana…” cautioned Amanda once more, her tone was softer, more conciliatory.

“Lukas, ich werde versuchen, die Blutung zu stoppen…” he was still, yet Diana kept working.

“Diana! He’s gone Diana…”

“No…” she froze, hands hovering over the now blood soaked dressings.

“Diana, MA’AM, we need to move!” barked Amanda, as she let her hand come to rest on Diana’s shoulder, her fingers digging in tightly to gently draw Diana out of herself.

Looking up from the lifeless form of Lukas, Diana gazed along the alleyway, towards the dead enemy paratroopers, and felt an overwhelming sense of guilt that these lives had been snatched away, and that despite everything, she had failed to save the life of her patient. She knew that they were the enemy, just as she knew that it could just as easily have been her team lying dead in the alleyway, that it was us or them, but nonetheless Diana could not help but feel guilty. She then looked at her hands and at the blood which was beginning to congeal and stick on them. Her hands were just starting to shake, when cold water suddenly ran over them, washing the blood away. Looking up she saw, stood above her, Barbara, a dripping water bottle in her hands and a sympathetic smile on her face.

“We can talk about this when we get back to England, okay?” said Barbara gently, crouching down beside her. Diana knew what her friend wasn’t saying; that they needed to return to the mission, that they didn’t have time for mourning, but unlike Amanda, Barbara had seen Diana at her worst, and knew how to return her from that darkness. It was then that Diana remembered the advice that she had been given as a medical student.

“You will lose patients,” repeated the voice of one of her lecturers inside her mind. Diana blinked as she looked down at Lukas. “You will lose patients, that much is inevitable and part of the job. But what matters is whether you tried your best…”

Drawing her shoulders back, she quickly began patting down the young German’s bloodied smock, hoping to find something that could help identify him. Finding his pockets to be empty, she reached up to his neckline and, sliding her hand down his tunic, retracted two items, a dog tag on its string, and a crucifix hung on a silvered chain. Breaking the dog tag in two, she took half and slipped it into her zip up chest pocket. The site was about to be destroyed, his remains likely to be lost forever amidst the bombing and rubble, so the least Diana felt she could now do was to give his parents closure, as opposed to having to forever live with the uncertainty of a child listed only as “Missing”. She considered taking his cross along with the tag, but somehow, removing so personal an object seemed wrong.

When she got back to England, she would hand the dog tag over to the Red Cross who would contact the family, but for now, there was nothing more that she could do for her patient. Having taken one last rueful look at the young Paratrooper, Diana got to her feet.

“William Team, form up!” she said as she replaced her first aid kit back into its pocket on her webbing.

Diana looked pointedly away from the bodies that lay around her, and towards her watch. They had lost eight minutes, all due to her decision to treat Lukas, despite it ultimately being in vain.

Around her the nine witches retook their positions in the small formation, and with a nod to Amanda, who once again took point at the head of the column, Diana felt a slight sense of relief as they quietly left the alleyway, so filled with death, and proceeded on their way towards their objective.

It took them a further two minutes to reach the central headquarters building which they knew also acted as the accommodation block for the scientific and magical research staff. With the front of the building facing out onto the large open area that now formed the no man’s land between the besieged German garrison and the attacking SAS, their point of entry would be the back doors to the building. Once inside they would explore the headquarters, moving floor by floor, room by room, searching for their two main objectives, Constanze and Seelmann; all Diana had to hope was that her delay to treat Lukas hadn’t allowed them to slip through their fingers.

Skirting around the main building, Diana followed as Amanda cautiously led the way, her Thompson fixed into her shoulder. Keeping the building to their right, they used the shadows made darker by the burning barracks to mask their advance. Suddenly Amanda raised her hand to stop the team in its tracks, the whole unit dropping to one knee.

Creeping forward, Diana joined the young witch and watched as, through an open door, a group of people began to emerge. They were hurried, evidently keen to escape the building and the battle beyond, and they spoke in hushed but rapid tones.

Suddenly the sky was split by a red flare, presumably fired by the defending garrison to pinpoint their attackers, which climbed into the sky before bursting into a bright burning light that bathed the besieged facility in a red glow, illuminating the emerging group, some of whom briefly glanced skyward. They were a curious mixture of men and women fully dressed in lab coats and jackets, a couple of whom were armed with Schmeisser submachine guns, whilst others appeared to be wrapped only in their dressing gowns and pyjamas, evidently roused from their beds by the shooting. It was those in the lab coats that at once drew Diana’s attention as these demarcated them as scientific or magical personnel. These fleeing researchers and technicians were their potential targets for the night, and as luck would have it, they had just walked straight into their hands. 

With Amanda to her side and the rest of Baker Fire Team moving up beside her, Diana took a deep breath, brought her Sten into her shoulder, and, stepping out of the shadows, yelled

“Hände hoch. Jetzt. Schnell!”

At once the emerging researchers stumbled to a halt and turned to look in her direction, the expressions of panic on their faces making it clear that they had well and truly been caught off guard by the ambush.

“Lass deine Waffen fallen! Schnell!” barked Diana, looking apprehensively at the two armed men. Thankfully, both at once cooperated, letting go of their weapons which clattered to the ground before raising their hands in surrender.

“Nicht schießen, nicht schießen, bitte nicht schießen!” cried one of the male researchers, his face pale even in the flare’s glow. Diana repeated the order to keep their hands elevated and, as they all lifted their arms skyward, she began to feel a momentary sense of relief.

With a series of further commands, Diana ordered the group to move away from the door and against the opposing wall of what appeared to be a large double doored garage. The group huddled together, nervously eyeing the British as much as they were warily watching them, the glow of the fires illuminating their faces. It was as she inspected her new prisoners that she noticed that one of them, a witch whose face was contorted in anger, had already been restrained, apparently by her fellow witches, as cords which emanated a soft green glow bound her wrists tightly together.  And as she stepped closer to study the raging German prisoner, Diana understood why, as recognition dawned upon her.

“Cavendish…” growled Elina Bauernfeind, causing Diana to take an unconscious half pace backwards. Elina had been a contemporary of Diana’s at Luna Nova, a talented witch but, sadly, a proud, fanatical even, member of the BDM, the female wing of the Hitler Youth. She had frequently been in trouble with the faculty members for expressing her extreme beliefs in school, even going so far as to try and extol the “virtues” of Nazism to Diana (whom she had admired for her so called “pure Aryan” physique and ancestry), although she had quickly backed away when she had found out about the young heiress’ sexual orientation. Since then, she had treated Diana with disgust, and it seemed that the passage of time had done nothing to dilute that animosity.

Nervously studying the ardent Nazi, Diana was about to order Amanda to move up and search their new prisoners for any concealed wands or weapons, when a voice from her own ranks cut her off.

“Alma?!” said a confused voice.

Looking along the line of armed witches, Diana could see an astonished looking Teresa lower her weapon slightly as she gazed into the crowd stood before them. There, half hidden behind a pair of taller female personnel, presumably witches, was the distinctively squat, yet slightly thinner than Diana remembered, form of Alma, Teresa’s roommate from Luna Nova.

“Teresa?!” said the short Austrian witch in surprise, stepping out from between the crowd.  

It was at this point that all discipline apparently began to break down as the pair hurried forwards to meet, arms wrapping around each other as they laughed happily. There followed a slightly awkward lull as the others uncertainly watched the happy reunion between the two former roommates, but Diana knew that they couldn’t afford to let their guard down and had to be wary of their new prisoners, even if they did contain old friends.

She was about to issue a command for her fellow witch to return to formation, when Amanda suddenly spun around, returning her gaze towards the doorway of the building from which the group had emerged just moments before.

“Diana…” whispered the American grimly, her gaze fixed down the barrel of her Thompson as the light from the flare died away. Diana followed her gaze to the headquarters building. There, it’s beam dancing across the floor in the darkness, Diana could see a torch making its way along the emerging corridor towards them.

“Charlie Team, watch the prisoners. Able, Baker, about turn,” hissed Diana as a nervous thrill coursed throughout her being. Returning to the shadows that obscured their presence, Diana steeled herself to face down whoever might emerge from that doorway, be they witch or enemy soldier.   

However, of all the people Diana might have expected to have emerged from the darkened building and into their trap, it is fair to say that Lotte Jansson was most certainly not one of them, her sudden appearance drawing a small gasp of surprise from the Filipino witch stood close by. Stifling her own astonishment, Diana lowered her weapon slightly as she watched the Finnish witch stop in the doorway, pausing for a moment as her bespectacled eyes adjusted to the change in light. It was as she blinked her eyes that she spied the allied witches aiming their weapons directly at her, and starting in shock, gingerly she raised her hands above her head, then stepped to one side of the door as another figure emerged from the gloom behind her, revealing a face that at once caused Diana’s heart to skip a beat in nervous excitement.

“Conz!” cried Amanda.

Constanze Amalie von Braunschbank-Albrechtsberger, former member of the New Nine, secondary target for the mission, and most importantly, their friend, stood in the doorway dressed in a blue boilersuit and ski cap, looking with surprise at the group of Allied witches facing her.  

Diana’s breath caught in her throat as she too stared in disbelief at her long missed friend. But before she could say a word, Amanda broke ranks and tore her helmet from off of her head, letting the German witch get an unobscured view of her face. Constanze blinked twice, seemingly unable to believe her own eyes, then dashed forwards, practically throwing herself into the American’s awaiting arms. Tears of joy and anguish ran down both of their cheeks as Amanda wrapped her friend in a deep, loving embrace.  

Diana lowered her weapon and stared at the happy reunion. Constanze, officially their secondary target for the raid, but the one that Diana was most anxious to secure, was there, crying silently into her best friend’s shoulder. Thrills of elation and relief surged through her as she realised that whatever may come to pass with the rest of the mission, they had found their friend safe and well. Diana couldn’t help but smile and feel a sense of satisfaction, for as far as she was concerned, the most important part of their task was now complete.

Likewise, she couldn’t help but smile as beside her Lotte and Sucy also reunited, the teary eyed Finn happily wrapping her arms tightly around her best friend as the potions witch tried to maintain a stoic face, although the slight curls at the edges of her lips and the filling of her cheeks betrayed her feigned passiveness. 

The tension in the air seemed to ease as the witches of Luna Nova Detachment observed the joyous coming together of old friends, and Diana too allowed herself a brief interval to gather her thoughts and slurp some water from her canteen to slake a sudden dryness in her throat. The water was tepid and tasted of metal but was welcome none the less.

Her thirst now quenched; Diana found her attention being drawn back towards the doorway where, just jutting out of the building, there hovered what appeared to be a stretcher. In the dim light it seemed to be formed of bed sheets stretched between two floating brooms and on it there lay a recumbent, unmoving figure.

Medically minded as she was, Diana was at once curious as to what ailment afflicted this unknown patient. Upon a cursory inspection from her position several feet away, it was at once apparent that this person was thin, painfully so, and the young medic was just thinking of carrying out a more thorough examination when a sudden commotion snatched her attention away.

“Verräter! Ihr seid alle verdammte verräter!” screamed a voice filled with vitriol from amidst the first group of prisoners. Diana spun around to find Elina straining at her bindings as two other prisoners struggled to hold her back, spit flying from her mouth as she ranted and cursed at the new arrivals.

“Oh, do shut up!” said Diana drawing herself to her full height, sick of the German witch’s behaviour, annoyed at having this sorely needed moment of victory ruined, and finally free to act without repercussion from her professors. Extending her wand, she charged it up, aimed it at the livid Nazi, and incanted loudly “Dún D'aghaidh!”

Elina stilled momentarily, blinked in shock, then started pawing at her face as she realised that she was unable to speak, the spell having sealed her lips together. Watching the panicked expression on the face of the witch, so well known for being vocally outspoken in her fanatical beliefs, as she was rendered silent, the witches of Luna Nova, along with some of their prisoners, couldn’t help but laugh. Even Diana allowed herself a moment of smugness as she tucked her wand back into its holster.

“Diana?” said a quiet voice from behind.

Diana froze; she knew that voice. It was weak, and against the sound of the battle raging beyond the main building it was hard to hear clearly. But she would know that voice anywhere, for it was forever ingrained upon her memory and her heart.

As another flare bathed the night in a ghostly red glow, Diana turned around to find, there, stood in the doorway of the main building, was Atsuko “Akko” Kagari.

“Diana, is it really you?” Akko asked again, her voice quavering as tears of joy welled in her eyes, shadows dancing across her face as the red flare fell slowly above them. As Diana laid eyes upon the Japanese Witch for the first time in four years, she felt her heart, already beating rapidly, begin to drum faster and faster as the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.

“Diana!” With her face creased into an expression of utter happiness, Akko took an uncertain step forward, then another, then, arms reaching out she broke into a run.

Diana blinked and took a step back.

“Stay where you are…” she said as her body began to shake.

“You’re here! You’re actually here!” Akko cried euphorically as she closed the distance between them.

“Stay where you are!” barked Diana, taking another step backwards, before bringing her Sten into her shoulder. Looking down the barrel of the gun, she watched as Akko saw the weapon levelled towards her and came to a stumbling halt, her expression in an instant changing from one of unbridled joy, to one of confusion.  

“Diana?” Akko asked, her voice suddenly quiet as her eyes flicked between the muzzle of the weapon and the cold, steely eyes of the woman she had loved.

“Diana, what the fuck!” yelled Amanda, as she and the rest of the assembled witches looked on in disbelief at the sight of Diana threatening a weapon towards Akko.

“Hands in the air!” said Diana, her voice deep and foreboding.

“But, D-Diana...” the tears of joy that streaked down Akko’s cheeks were quickly turning into tears of anguish.

“Hands up!” repeated Diana, as she took a step towards Akko, jerking the muzzle of the Sten upwards to illustrate her desired action.

"Woah, Diana calm down, it's Akko..." said Hannah, as shocked as the rest of the group at how Diana was treating her once partner, but Diana ignored her. 

“Hands. Up.” She snarled, making the message clear and coldly precise.

"Diana..." said Akko once more, pleading to the young Englishwoman, but Diana kept the barrel of the gun pointed firmly at her. 

“Hands up!” she barked fiercely, tired of Akko refusing to obey her commands. “Stay where you are. Make one wrong move Kagari,” she growled through gritted teeth as rage and anger seethed through her body, “one wrong move, and I swear to God…

“…I'll kill you where you stand!”

Chapter Text

20^th October 1941

It had all started with a telegram sent from across the world.

          AKKO-CHAN. GRANDMOTHER IS SERIOUSLY ILL. DOCTOR SAYS SHE

          MAY ONLY HAVE WEEKS. PLEASE COME HOME TO CHIBA QUICKLY

          = MOTHER ++

As soon as she had read the slip, Akko had started frantically packing to return to Japan. Diana helped as best she could, reassuring her partner that the telegram said weeks and would only have been sent a couple of days prior. But for Akko, the very notion of being unable to see her grandmother before she passed on was unthinkable, and the young witch was on the verge of a panic attack as she hastily bundled unfolded clothes into a bulging canvas bag.

In the end Diana had had to physically take Akko by the shoulders and sit her down in an attempt to calm the frantic minded witch, running through breathing exercises to help give her a moment to gather her thoughts and plan carefully for the trip ahead. This moment of clarity, however, only served to heighten Akko's anxious state when she suddenly remembered her duties on the wards and her upcoming shows, but Diana had assured her that she would take care of matters, and encouraged Akko to return home, albeit at a more sedate pace.

Throughout this sudden whirlwind of activity and rapid preparation, the young countess had tried her best to remain calm for the sake of her girlfriend, folding and repacking clothes with a composed expression, but in her gut, she was wracked with worry, especially with the thought of Akko travelling back to Japan. The year prior her partner’s homeland had formed an alliance with Germany and Italy, and she knew from rumours that those in power in Whitehall were talking of the Far East as being the next front to open up. 

But for Akko there appeared no thought of the war, indeed all she could think about was returning to spend what little time she had left with the beloved matriarch of the Kagari family. Fortunately, the Ley Lines had remained open, free of the influence of the ongoing conflict, so what would for the majority of the population otherwise have been a long, perilous journey across a war torn world, would instead take Akko but a day and a half. However, the thought of her having a safe journey there did nothing to quell the fears that plagued Diana, and she knew she would not feel at ease until Akko’s return, whenever that might be. In truth, even with the looming threat of strife between their two respective empires, the temptation to accompany her beloved to Japan, so that she could remain by her side whatever may come to pass, was incredibly strong. But Diana’s duties lay here in the hospital that had been set up in their home, and so she had been left with no option but to remain in England and let Akko slip away.

In the end it had taken Akko just under two hours, from the moment that Anna had nervously handed her the telegram slip, for her to pack her bag and make herself ready for departure, and the sheer rapidity of the sudden upheaval of their lives was leaving Diana mentally reeling. But Diana knew that there was nothing she could, in all good conscience, say or do to stop Akko from departing to be with her family that would be anything other than entirely self-serving, so begrudgingly, she had escorted the still worried Japanese witch outside.

In the midday sun, as Akko had perched on her broom, her bulging bag slung precariously behind her, they had shared a brief parting kiss. Diana had tried to savour it, making the most of their last moment together for whoever knows how long, but she could tell that Akko was distracted and the brunette haired witch had pulled her lips away sooner than Diana would have liked, leaving her with a feeling of hollowness and loss.  

Then, with one last goodbye, Diana had had to simply stand on the lawn of the castle’s Inner Bailey and watch as Akko’s broom had climbed away into the blue sky with only a quick backward wave, her girlfriend becoming an increasingly small dot on the horizon until Diana at last lost sight of her amidst the distant trees.

For a good ten minutes she had stood stock still in the castle’s yard, her vision transfixed on the empty sky, secretly, selfishly, praying that Akko would return to her, and simply greave from afar. The thought of being alone again was torture and all she could do to placate her anxiety was remind herself that this was only temporary, that Akko had taken her crystal ball so that they could still talk, and that soon enough, she would be back in England and her arms again.

All she had to do was wait.

2^nd December 1941

Chiba, Japan

Akko shivered slightly as a cold wind blew in from off of the bay and through the open front doors of the house, but nonetheless she knelt patiently in the hallway as the elderly priest slipped his shoes on. The wake ceremony had concluded some time ago and he was the last nonfamily member who had attended to leave the Kagari household.

The scent of incense wafted through the house, carried on the breeze, giving a tangible whisp like manifestation to the emptiness that filled the house; the hole left by a loved one never to return.

It was strange, thought Akko as she watched the Buddhist priest wrap a scarf around his face to shield himself from the bitter breeze, that this man was nearly the same age as, if not older than, her late grandmother, yet here he was, slowly carrying on with his duties, whilst she had passed away, her body failing her as the years had worn on. The one comfort she clung onto was that she had made it back home in time to spend a few weeks with her before she died.

“Thank you again,” said her mother, joining Akko in kneeling at the Genkan’s step. “It was a wonderful ceremony.”

“Ah, it was my honour, Kagari-san,” said the priest with a withered smile. “Your mother-in-law was a force of nature,” he chuckled, then sighed. “Still, all must pass on, this is the way of things…”

He picked up the large walking pole that he had left by the door, thanked them for the tea that they had laid on, then stepped out of the house as the two Kagari women knelt forward and bowed once more. Mother and daughter then looked up and watched intently as the priest made his way down the garden path towards the road, nervously observing each step with bated breath, terrified that the elderly man might slip on the stone slabs made wet with snow. Thus, it was with a sigh of relief that they saw the priest reach the road.

“Thank goodness, now close the door Akko-chan, before anymore warmth escapes…” said her mother with a tired sigh, getting to her feet and retreating into the house.

“Of course, mother,” said Akko, playing the role of a well-behaved and dutiful daughter for the duration of her visit, but in all honesty, to be anything else felt wrong given the grief that filled the house, the sense of loss stifling her normally exuberant attitude.

It was as she got up that Akko noticed a pair of soldiers stood in the road, bowing for the priest as he passed, who nodded in response as he slowly made his way down the hill. Soldiers were not an uncommon sight these days in Chiba as it was a centre of military production, so Akko thought nothing of it and began to slide the door shut. 

The door was almost closed however, when a voice called sharply from beyond.

“Kagari Atsuko?”

Sliding the door open once again, Akko found herself looking into the stern face of an Imperial Army officer who was making his way purposefully up the path towards the house. He was wrapped up in a thick woollen green greatcoat and from a belt around his waist hung a gold inlaid katana in a dark black scabbard. The officer was accompanied by a gruff looking soldier, also wearing a thick woollen coat and Katana, however his sword was far less ornate and housed in a simple plain drab green scabbard.

But what at once drew her attention were the white armbands that the two soldiers wore on their left arms, and the red characters on them which read kenpei. Akko’s eyes immediately went wide, and she felt a cold sweat prick the back of her neck which had nothing to do with the chill breeze that gusted around her.

The Kenpeitai; the Japanese Army’s Military Police and the de facto secret police of the Imperial state.

They had a reputation for being draconian in their application of the law, and unforgiving of those who broke it, whether military or civilian. To cross the Kenpeitai was to take one’s life in one’s hands.

Keen to ensure she did nothing to antagonise the military policemen, she bowed respectfully for the strangers, and confirmed her identity.

“My name is Lieutenant Moriya of the Kenpeitai,” said the officer, stiffening slightly, his left hand coming to rest on the pommel of his katana, as he brought his heels together. He then nodded to his accompanying soldier, who reached into a pocket, and handed him a sealed white envelope, which Akko could see bore official government stamps. Moriya in turn passed the letter to her with a short, sharp thrust, which Akko nervously took from his hand. It was addressed to her, and the envelope was indeed marked as being an official government communication, the red seal of the Ministry of The Army clearly displayed above her name.

Curious as to why the Army would want to send her a letter, Akko was about to open the envelope, her fingernail slipping under the sealed fold, when Moriya began to explain its contents.

“The letter is a set of instructions,” he announced, his voice as severe and to the point as before. “You are to report to the Ministry of the Army in Tokyo in two days’ time, where you will register your services for the army and your willingness to serve your country.” He then took a half step forward and looked at her with a scowling expression. “Failure to do so will be treated as desertion and treason.”

A cold shiver ran down Akko’s spine as the meaning of those words sank into her mind. There had been a quiet buzz in the air throughout Chiba and Tokyo the last few weeks since her arrival, an electric anticipation that she had last felt in the brief days between the German invasion of Poland and the declaration of war. It was the nervous yet excited feeling of being witness to history in the making, and being certain that whatever the outcome, your nation would emerge the better for it. She had felt the feverish tension in the air, but until this moment, had been unable, or perhaps unwilling, to put a name to it. It was no secret that Japan had been pursuing a policy of aggressive expansionism, the brutality of her nation’s occupation of first Manchuria, then the rest of China, Korea and finally French Indochina shocking her as she watched events being relayed through the British press. 

It was then that she thought of England, and of Diana. For as much as she had wanted to return to Chiba to say goodbye to her grandmother, and then to be there for her parents as they mourned the loss of the family’s matriarch, she now desperately longed to return back to England, and be there for Diana as she too dealt with the fallout from the loss of a family member which, due to her war work, she had yet to fully process. To Akko, returning to England was not simply a matter of travelling to where she lived and worked, instead it was going home, for home was wherever Diana was.

“But, sir, I have to return home to England, I’m due to leave at the end of this week…” she explained as calmly as she could, her natural defiance of authority giving her the confidence to speak up whilst also trying to remain respectful, lest she give the two men, whom her brain had immediately told her were bullies in uniform, cause to act against her.

The officer, however, seemed incensed by the suggestion.

“Home?! You’re Japanese, this is your home!” he spat, his face contorting in anger as his voice dropped to a sneer. “I have heard about you and the magic shows that you put on. For too long you have served as a plaything of the gaijin, but now your emperor is offering you the chance to serve him, and to redeem yourself!”

“But I’m a pacifist…” she started protesting, as her heart began to race with fear of both the two soldiers and the implications of what he was saying.

In response the accompanying soldier stepped forwards, into the house itself, causing Akko to take a step backwards. He stepped closer, close enough that Akko could smell the stale stench of cigarettes on his breath.

“You have suffered one loss of late,” he said, his voice low but filled with venom. “I should hate for you to have to attend any more funerals…”

Akko’s heart stopped as a sickening feeling overtook her, leaving her physically shaking with fear. That was when she heard the sound of her mother approaching along the corridor.

“Akko-chan, what’s going on?” her mother called, uncertain as to why the door was still open as cold air continued to flow through the house.

The soldier raised an eyebrow, as if silently asking her what she was going to do now. Akko knew she could fight them, that she could run, that she could get on her broom and fly back home to England and Diana. But she couldn’t escape with her parents; they would be left to the cruel mercy of the Kenpeitai. Her stomach dropped as she realised that there was only one choice.

Her body was shaking as she closed her eyes and answered her mother.

“Nothing mother, I-I’ll deal with it…”

But it was too late, her mother had arrived and upon seeing the two soldiers, bowed respectfully. The two soldiers immediately lost their intimidating attitude and were suddenly the very picture of genial guests, bowing in return.

“We are most sorry to hear about your loss, Kagari-san,” said Moriya, offering the elder Kagari a smile of apparent sincere sympathy.

“Thank you, sir,” said her mother, her smile genuine as she failed to notice the fear etched into her daughter’s face.  “Is there something we can help you with?”

Moriya looked Akko straight in the eye.

“I, I’ve decided that I’m going to stay here… in Japan…” said Akko, trying to sound cheerful as her heart ripped apart. “In fact, I… these gentlemen have asked if I would be interested in working for the government…”

To say that Akko’s mother looked surprised was an understatement, especially given how regularly Akko had spoken of missing Diana and England. However, her astonishment soon turned to an expression of maternal relief to know that her daughter would be remaining in Japan for the time being, away from the war in Europe (even if Akko could see the next war brewing on a much closer horizon).

“Well, I shall leave you to discuss this further,” said her mother, bowing once more for the guests she didn’t know were unwelcome. Then, with an insistence that Akko invite them in and close the door, the elder Kagari woman retreated once again from sight.

“Alright, I’m joining the army,” said Akko bitterly, feeling defeated whilst remaining wary of the two men. “Surely there’s nothing else you need now?”

“I have instructions to seize your crystal ball,” said Moriya with a sly smile.

“My crystal ball?” Akko froze. That was her only means of communicating with Diana and they were due to speak this evening. Tonight would be the first chance she had had to speak to England since her grandmother had passed away, and she was desperate to hear her girlfriend’s comforting voice, even if from thousands of miles away. If they took away her crystal ball, then that would be it, there was no way that she would be able to speak with Diana directly.

“Yes, please fetch it, Private Yadama will escort you,” Moriya stated, his sly expression fading to a look of tedium.

“But why? What harm can a crystal ball do?!”

“Because you can use it to communicate with the enemy!” retorted the second soldier.

Once again Akko found herself mentally recoiling. “The enemy”. She was right, they saw Britain, including Diana, as the enemy. War was coming, and now she was trapped on the other side of the world, soon to be forced to actively serve against the homeland of her girlfriend. She wanted to run, to flee the war and return to England where Diana was trying to piece the world back together one wounded soul at a time. But then she heard the voices of her parents, and she remembered the menacing unspoken threats that the two soldiers had levelled upon her.

Reluctantly, Akko nodded her co-operation, and she began to lead the way towards her bedroom, her mind racing as it tried to make sense of the situation. It was then that she heard the thud of weight on wood and turned around to see the soldier step into the house proper. Akko watched in shock as Yadama walked straight through into the interior of the house, not pausing at the Genkan to remove his boots, which trailed mud, snow and slush onto the clean polished wooden floor of their house.

The harassed witch looked in shock at his feet, then up to his face, which offered a condescending smirk in response, as if challenging her to try and argue with him. Biting back the anger that she felt at having her home invaded by this brute of a man, she quietly led the way to her room where she grudgingly handed over the glass orb, at once severing her lines of communication with Diana.

Returning to the front door, Yadama handed the crystal ball to his superior, who carefully wrapped it in a silk cloth before dropping it into his great coat’s pocket.

“Finally, we are aware of your living situation in England,” said Moriya nastily, his voice filled with suspicion. “You may write a letter to the witch that you live with. In this you will announce that you are breaking off your affair, and that you shall be remaining here in Japan.” Moriya took a step towards Akko, who’s heart was somehow sinking even further as her body began to feel cold throughout. “Consider it a test of your loyalty,” he said with a wicked grin. “And remember, it shall be subject to censorship, so do not put anything in there that you might regret.”

With that the intruding Kenpeitai soldiers had turned and let themselves out of the house, leaving her with one final reminder that she was to attend the Ministry of the Army in two days or else face the consequences.

Akko watched them leave, then slid the door shut. Finally, the fear, heartbreak, and desperation that she had felt stirring within her during their visit burst forth and she collapsed to her knees, tears flowing from her cheeks as the magnitude of the situation overwhelmed her.

Hearing her sobs of anguish, her parents rushed to the hallway to see their daughter on the genkan’s floor. They tried to ask what was wrong, to find some way of consoling their daughter, but how was she supposed to explain what had just transpired, the threats that had been levelled at her and the gut-wrenching heartache she was being forced to endure. Instead, she blamed her tears on the loss of her grandmother, and excused herself, retreating back to her room.

She had to write a letter to break off her relationship with the love of her life, yet she couldn’t bring herself to do it, not truly. She had to find a way to let Diana know she still loved her, no matter the barriers and divisions that the world was throwing up between them. There had to be some way to convey her true feelings, she just had to figure out what, and so she found herself asking,

“What would Diana do?”

Chapter Text

20^th December 1941

“This is an outrage!” protested Diana furiously from a lonely wooden seat in the middle of her bedroom, watching with growing horror as her private sanctuary was ransacked by a band of suited men who tore through her house with all the care and consideration of a hurricane. “I am a peer of the realm, what right do you have to come barging into my house like this?!”

“The Emergency Powers Act 1939, and the Treachery Act 1940,” replied the smirking figure of the group’s leader; a repugnant, self-satisfied weaselly man named Cattermole, who spoke with all the confidence of one who had learned every bit of legislation that allowed them to carry out this invasive search of her home. “And you are indeed correct, you are a peer of the realm, hence why we are doing this discreetly, not making a real spectacle of this.”

If this was being discreet, then Diana decided that she would hate to see what an overt search of her house would have looked like as the seven men busied themselves. Feverishly, they tore their way through every draw, bookshelf, and wardrobe in her room, causing the detained witch to wince as precious items and keepsakes were carelessly cast aside, all in search of what Diana knew they would never be able to find; evidence that Akko was a spy for the Japanese Government.

They had arrived half an hour ago, these men from MI5, who burst through the large wooden doors of the castle like some medieval besieging army, and after restraining her, claimed that they had a warrant to search the house. Their justification was that Akko, a Japanese national now dehumanizingly referred to as an “enemy alien”, had been living and working at the castle and that this alone was enough to necessitate this intrusive examination and interrogation.

In spite of her humiliating situation, Diana remained as calm as she could, simply reminding herself that Akko was entirely innocent of their accusations and that they would eventually have to leave, their efforts frustrated by the simple, irrefutable fact that Akko was not a spy. Biting back any further challenges that she so wanted to make, Diana tried to take a deep, calming breath as she repeated to herself that this particular ordeal would soon be over, and that before long she could return to her life as it was before.

Yet as she watched these men work their way through her belongings, her eyes widened, and she felt her cheeks flush with anger and alarm as she realised that one of the men was about to open a drawer in which she kept her… delicates.

“Wait, stop! Not that drawer!”

The agent paused and looked at her before, with a leering smirk, he slid the drawer open, and having seen it’s contents, chuckled odiously.

“Hey, lads, take a look at what we got ‘ere…”

From her chair in the middle of the room, a horrified Diana moved to try and stop the man. But at once she staggered as a crushing weight pressed down upon her shoulder, accompanied by a sharp discomfort as a giant hand squeezed into her skin; fat, stubby fingers digging painfully into her shoulder blade, forcing her back into her seat.

Looking up Diana was met by the unpleasant sneer of one of Cattermole’s men, a hulking great gorilla of a man who loomed menacingly over her. He wore a suit that was ill fitting, and judging by his cauliflower ears, blotched skin, misshapen nose, and facial scars, the man had most likely been a bare knuckle boxer before the war.

Biting back the pain, Diana turned back to the man knelt before her chest of drawers and watched with dismay as, with exaggerated care, he lifted out a pair of her knickers, whistling slowly as he did so, drawing the attention of his colleagues who gawped and ogled the lace underwear like beasts in heat, cackling unpleasantly. Feeling their eyes then shift onto her with lecherous intent, Diana, for the first time in her life, felt unsafe in her own bedroom.

“Please! For pity’s sake, have some care!” she pleaded as she felt her dignity being stripped away from her. But the agent simply threw her a disgustingly smug smirk.

“Sorry, Milady, but you wouldn’t believe the places some quislings like to hide their secrets…”

Diana then turned to Cattermole, hoping that he might intercede and stop his man’s sadistic humiliation, but all he did was shrug and turn his back to what felt like a public shaming.

One by one, with wolf whistles and jeers, the contents of the drawer were carefully removed by the agent and shown for the consideration of his fellows, whose eyes would flit between the displayed garment and Diana with hungry stares, clearly imagining her stripped and then redressed in each item. Diana clenched her fists by her side and turned away as she fought to stop her emotions from boiling over, unable to take the degradation any longer until, at last, Cattermole intervened. However, his move to stop the spectacle was not born out of some sympathy for her plight, but a desire to get back to the task at hand.

“Why are you even in this room?” she asked through gritted teeth, turning to Cattermole whilst fighting hard to stop herself from sounding as broken as she felt in the wake of that particular round of torture. “This is my room. If you’re looking for some imaginary evidence of treachery, then it wouldn’t be in this room, it would be in Akko’s!”

“Because we know that there is no difference between your room and hers,” he retorted, stalking over towards her, his bored expression at once replaced with one of utter revulsion as he loomed above her. “We know about you, about you and your… perversions…” he said, voice twisting, and face contorting in a manner that left no room for ambiguity as to his meaning, and, if Diana had been feeling worried up to this point, it was nothing compared to the sudden, gut twistingly cold fear which gripped her. He knew. This man from the government knew about her, and about how she felt about other women, about Akko.

Her breath became rapid as the weight of the situation, and all her fears of discovery, pressed down upon her in a single crushing blow.

She had always known the dangers that came with loving another woman, an act unjustly judged as perverse by a society too bigoted and narrow minded to accept that all she, and others like her, wanted was to simply be themselves and find love. And whilst the love that she felt for Akko had never been made illegal by legislation, she knew the revelation of her sexuality would have catastrophic repercussions for her; the loss of her position as a nurse, the loss of her place in society, even the loss of her home. And Diana was in no doubt that there were elements within the legal system that would try to move against her, to punish her for simply loving a woman as opposed to a man.

Silently, as Diana began to teeter on the edge of fear, Cattermole looked down on her as the activity in the room stilled and all eyes fell upon her, judging the restrained noblewoman for something that she knew she could no more help than she could breathe. Heart racing in terror, and feeling the crushing weight of their stares, Diana closed her eyes and let her mind drift towards Akko, picturing the woman who’s name they now used as though she were some bogeyman. And with her image there came a brief jolt of warmth as memories flooded back to her, particularly that moment when they had stood atop the Shooting Star and forged an unbreakable bond that had always given her the courage to be her true self. With renewed fortitude in her heart and fists clenched so tight that her knuckles whitened, the countess turned her eyes determinedly up to meet Cattermole’s burning gaze. For a moment the two locked eyes, neither blinking, until at last his cruel expression broke and he chuckled to himself.

“Still, that’s another matter,” he said with feigned indifference, stepping back slightly, “something I’m sure we can overlook, for now….”

The other men returned to upending her room as Diana felt her nerves begin to ease.

“What do you want?” she asked with a sigh, feeling slightly deflated by that loaded comment.

“We simply want to know whether or not Atsuko Kagari was using your house to gather intel to pass onto her masters in Tokyo…”

“But I don’t understand why you need to even search my house in the first place, indeed the very idea that Akko could be a spy is preposterous,” declared Diana confidently with the slightest hint of a smile gracing her lips as she thought of the young witch. “Akko is the least subtle person I know. She couldn’t do subterfuge to save her life!”

In spite of her confident tone however, Cattermole merely smiled.

“Well, Ma’am,” he said with false deference, “just think about it. This is the perfect setting for an enemy spy; posing as a nurse in an RAF hospital, building up a rapport with the men, setting them at ease in her presence, not even having to pry information out of them, just let it come through idle chitchat between patients and eavesdropping whilst on her rounds…”

Despite how definitively he spoke, not for one moment did Diana buy his story. Certainly, Akko had an excellent rapport with the officers and airmen that were being treated in the hospital, but she was like that with almost everyone, her displays of magic always a hotly anticipated treat for the patients. And she had never spoken with any of them about military matters, well… nothing beyond vague questions asked out of genuine curiosity towards the stories of her patients…

“Then, just a few weeks before Japan declares war and she’d be immediately interned as an enemy alien, she conveniently gets a telegram recalling her to Japan…” he continued, his tone suggestive.

But still, Diana refused to believe him. She had seen the sudden horror and panic that had gripped Akko. That heart-breaking look of fear had not been the behaviour of a spy receiving long expected orders, but the raw emotions of someone confronted with the news that a loved one was dying. Diana folded her arms.

“Nonsense, Akko’s grandmother had been ill for a long time, it was a shock but hardly a surprise. Besides, Akko’s a pacifist, she’d never serve any force that would make war on another, Japanese or British!”

“Well then, it seems you don’t know your friend as well as you thought,” he said, still placing an emphasis on any term regarding their relationship. Diana looked at him in confusion, unsure of his meaning. Of course she knew Akko well; indeed she knew her better than anyone else, in much the same way as it could be said that Akko knew Diana best of all.

“I suggest you have a read of this…”

Clicking open his briefcase, he removed an envelope which he passed to Diana. It was defaced by official stamps marked with Kanji symbols, along with an English stamp indicating that it had been subject to inspection, and bore her address written in what she at once recognised as Akko’s still untidy hand.

“Made it out with the last set of diplomatic letters to leave Tokyo before the Seventh,” explained Cattermole with a façade of coolness.

With shaking hands, Diana cast her eyes over the letter, but as she took in its meaning, so her heart began to sink and her whole being grew numb.

Diana,

After all these years, I am writing to finally end this sordid affair. The years that I spent at Luna Nova were the happiest of my life. Only one thing spoiled that, the misunderstanding of our relationship and my feelings towards you. So often I have wished to tell you that your feelings and romantic advances were unwanted, but I was scared about how you would react if I told you or tried to turn you away.

The truth is I do not love yo u , and never have and now, I have the chance to redeem myself in service to my Emperor. Readily I give my s elf and my magic to the righteous cause of my nation. Understand that my true love is for my family and my h o meland, not for you.

Goodbye forever,

Kagari Atsuko

カガリ   アツコ

“What was that you said about her not joining any military force?” quipped Cattermole with a smug tone. But Diana, blindsided by the contents of the letter, barely heard him, so fixated by it was she.

No, that wasn’t possible, she thought to herself as again and again she reread the letter. Akko would never say that, would never do something to break her heart so callously. She loved her. She would never do this…

Yet, that penmanship, it was undoubtedly Akko’s. As was the personalised Hanko seal below her name.

“I, I can’t believe that she would really write this,” stammered Diana, still trying oh so hard to keep her faith in Akko, even as the whispers of doubt began to niggle at her mind and cracks appeared in her heart. Cattermole merely quirked an eyebrow.

“But that’s her handwriting, isn’t it?”

Diana looked over the letter again, leaving her in no doubt as to its author. But surely…

“She… she can’t mean it…” whispered Diana to herself, as a tear patted against the paper held in her shaking hands. “I know her… she’d, she’d never just break our relationship off like that…”

“Well, I’m afraid that isn’t all she has had to say in regard to yourself…”

The senior agent reached into his briefcase and produced a sheaf of papers, secured by a paperclip, which he handed over to her. Through eyes that stung from the burning heat of tears, she scanned the top of the papers.

“What is this?”

“A transcript of an NHK radio broadcast our new American allies intercepted, a broadcast made by your friend Atsuko Kagari,” he answered with a knowing smile.

Diana’s heart skipped and skipped again as she began to read the transcript, apprehensive about whatever evidence of her girlfriend’s betrayal Cattermole wanted her to see.

“Womenfolk, children, and soldiers of Japan, my name is Kagari Atsuko. I am a witch who was born and raised here in our motherland, in Chiba prefecture on the shores of Tokyo Bay. From a young age I have loved magic and I wanted to bring the joys and happiness that it filled in me to others…”

“She goes on about her love for magic and Japan for quite a bit, so you might as well skip to the second paragraph on the next page,” commented Cattermole, leaning against the mantle above her fireplace and lighting a cigarette, something that, were Diana not more distracted, she would normally object to.

Skimming the text, Akko did appear true to form, spending most of the opening paragraphs talking about her love for magic and how she hoped it would help raise morale for the war effort. Seeing the familiar passion for their craft put to words seemed to confirm to Diana that this must have been written by Akko, as only she could wax lyrical about magic for quite so long.

Turning the page, Diana found herself then presented with a paragraph discussing her time at school where vague references to people whom she knew were made. Particular praise was paid to Constanze, but that was hardly surprising really given that Germany and Japan were now allies. Reading further on however, Diana found the tone begin to shift.

“At Luna Nova I learnt from great witches the ancient arts of magic and witchcraft. But there I was also able to witness the moral degradation of the West, how they had become corrupted by their years of stagnant power and decadence.”

“Yet of all those I encountered in England; none were baser in their corruption and lust for power than a girl who I once thought of as a friend. She was a prodigy, from an ancient line of noble witches, but her perverse desires sullied her family’s good name. This girl, who I believed I shared a deep and genuine connection forged in danger with, claimed to be my friend. Yet when I offered her my friendship in return, she took my believing heart and smothered it as she forced her perversions upon me. She claimed it was love, yet she was a powerful witch, and I was scared about what would happen if I tried to resist.”

Diana let go of the transcript as her hands began shaking once again. Her throat tightened as within her chest she felt a cold burning sensation.

“She… she’s saying…” whispered Diana, her gaze becoming unfocused as she stared absently off into space, reality seeming to fall away as her world unravelled around her. Cattermole crouched down and looked her straight in her eye.

“Rape, your ladyship. She is publicly accusing you of rape!”

“Publicly…” parroted Diana as her mind clouded over with shock.

When Cattermole spoke again, his voice was softer, little more than a whisper in Diana’s ear.

“To an audience of millions throughout Japan and beyond. The woman whom you loved just publicly denounced you to millions of people…”

Panic gripped Diana. To have had her sexuality exposed so humiliatingly was bad enough, but to then have that love twisted and bastardised into something so terrible, by the woman whom she loved so much burnt her very soul with cold, blinding fear. Terrified, she turned towards Cattermole, almost expecting him to produce a pair of handcuffs and arrest her on the spot, and at once pled her innocence.

“I never raped her!”

“And I believe you,” he said, crouching down before her and offering her a kind smile. “As much as your choices in partners do confuse me, I’m certain that whatever you did was consensual.” Diana looked into his softened face and felt some of the fear in her heart lift as other emotions began to take their place. “And I think that you are right, ma’am. I don’t believe that your friend was spying whilst living under your roof. But look at how fast she switched sides.” He stood up and, walking to the fireplace, stubbed out his cigarette on the unlit grate. “No sooner was she a world away than she tossed you aside as if you were nothing, all for love of her emperor.”

“You see, your Ladyship, these Japanese are a fickle race. They claim to love others, but at the end of the day, the only person they truly love is their emperor. He is, they think, the descendant of a god after all, so nothing else supersedes him.”

Cattermole crouched down once more so that he was now looking at her with eyes level, meeting her as if she were an equal, a philosophical expression now gracing his features.

“It’s this Bushido code that they live by you see; this idea of being indebted to their nation for providing them a good life, a debt which they must pay off through service to their Emperor, it’s rather admirable in a way…” he remarked with a quirk to his smile. Diana nodded along silently, unable to express or comprehend the myriad of emotions she felt inside.

“So, I think that, for now, my men and I can leave you and your household in peace…” Cattermole stood up and clapped a hand onto her shoulder in a show of feigned mutual understanding. “But of course, should you find any evidence that your lover has been acting against the interests of the crown, I’m sure you shall bring them to our attention. Won’t you, your ladyship?”

Diana nodded.

With a wide smile to confirm that he was happy with this response, Cattermole barked the order for his men to leave. Faces turned to look at her as they walked out; some sneering, some leering, all unpleasant, but at long last, they were gone, leaving just herself and Cattermole.

The senior agent wandered over to the fireplace where he regarded the photograph from Kyoto, now in a new frame. Whatever he was thinking, he failed to elaborate, but after a moment he turned back to Diana and smiled. With that he exited the room, closing the door behind him, leaving Diana alone in her desecrated sanctuary.

In the wake of their departure from the bedroom minutes passed silently by in which Diana did not move, did not think, but merely stared at the devastation in a state of shock. She felt numb, just as she had when she had learnt of the attacks on Pearl Harbour, yet somehow this time the numbness was more biting and the sense of betrayal more acute.

So disconnected was she that she failed to hear the first gentle rap of a hand against her bedroom door. It was only when the hand knocked again, this time with slightly more force, that Diana blinked back into the room to find a single tear running down her cheeks.

The latch on the door clicked open, and Diana hurriedly turned her back, as through the now cracked doorway leant Anna, her face etched with concern. The maid slowly stepped into the room, her eyes staring in alarm at the scene of carnage strewn before her, before at last coming to rest on the figure of Diana, stood silently with her back turned.

“My lady, are you alright?”

Ever since her birth mother had passed away, Anna had been a surrogate parent to her, raising her and giving her the comfort and love that Diana had needed so much, even if it was in her own, slightly formal way.

But right now, all that Anna’s presence in the room did was to serve as a reminder of the past, and of a future that she had longed for, now thrown away by the supposed love of her life. A love which now stung like a curse. 

“Get out, Anna…” said the countess with quiet, brooding authority, speaking in a tone that she would never otherwise dream to use with someone who meant so much to her.

This change in attitude must have caught the senior maid off guard, as instead of stepping back through the door, she began to make her way towards the broken witch, carefully stepping over the discarded debris of Diana’s life, until she was mere feet away from her young mistress.

“My Lady?” she asked once more, concern written across her face, and in a moment of familiarity that otherwise she would rarely dare to assume, she reached out to place a hand upon Diana’s shoulder. But the blonde haired witch spun around before her hand could come to rest and, with a face red with rage and fury bellowed,

“I SAID GET OUT!”

Anna recoiled at the sudden outburst of anger from the normally calm and collected young lady, and even through the seething fury within her soul, Diana could see the hurt that she had caused. But right now, she cared for no one’s pain but her own.

Anna took a couple of faltering steps backwards, then, with only one last quick glance upwards, bowed for the noble witch, hurriedly and silently retreating towards the bedroom doors, which shut behind her with nary a click, leaving Diana once again alone to her thoughts.

“How could she...” whispered Diana as tears of rage began to swell and bitter thoughts danced through her mind.  “How could she say that?”

But instead of the sorrow and heartache she had expected to feel, anger and betrayal began to fill the open wound in her heart. How could Akko, the woman she loved enough to risk everything, do this to her? How could she betray her and oh so publicly shame her.

Their paths and destinies were bound; they were meant to be together forever. But instead, the Japanese witch had not only betrayed her, but humiliated her, demonised her to the entire world. And as she thought about all the pain that Akko had chosen to inflict upon her, her heart did not break; instead, it warped and shifted, as sorrow and longing turned to anger and hatred.

Just thinking of that woman made her blood swell with rage.  She had shared everything with Akko; her heart, soul, bed, indeed even her very body; all of it she had given to Akko, and in return the Japanese witch had spat on her and used her love as a tool of treason. Diana felt her body begin to quake with a rage that was howling to be unleashed.

“Damn her… DAMN HER!”

With one swift movement, Diana snatched up the picture from Kyoto once more and, with only one bitter glance at the smiling faces looking up at her, mocking her from behind the glass pane, brought the frame shaming down against the marble edge of the fireplace mantle. Glass and wood shattered, tinkling down to the ground below, exposing the photograph, now torn, which Diana wrenched out of its frame, then tossed straight into the hearth as though it’s very touch was agony. Walking over to her desk, she picked up her wand, aimed it at the fireplace and, with a venomous curse, set the photograph ablaze.

Chest heaving with rage, Diana watched as dancing green flames consumed the printed image, its laminate surface bubbling and curling as she watched the smiling face of Atsuko Kagari melt and burn.

“Damn you, Akko,” she growled, her voice quavering with the anger and pain that battled for supremacy within her heart, and tears of anger ran down her cheeks. “Damn you to Hell…”

As the imposing sight of the ancient castle retreated in the mirrors of his car, Cattermole, lounging in the back, took a drag from his latest cigarette, then turned to one of his associates and smiled.

“That was a nice touch, by the way, that “smothered my believing heart” line. She bought it all hook, line, and sinker…”

His colleague, a bespectacled man with a pencil moustache and oiled hair, smiled at his superior’s praise.

“Well, aside from the original broadcast there’s plenty of Kagari’s material available, so writing something in her style was easy,” the agent explained, producing another copy of the altered transcript, and observing his handiwork. “It’s also fortunate that she has a simplistic writing style. But then again, one would hardly expect one of their kind to be the next Shakespeare or Tennyson, eh?”

Cattermole leant back in his seat and looked out of the window to the passing countryside beyond. “Now we just have to see what she’ll do, and most importantly, where her loyalties lie…”

Chapter Text

The ground shook and glass panes rattled as four more mortar rounds struck home against the stronghold of the besieged garrison, yet their impacts went unnoticed by the former witches of Luna Nova as all present tried to process the vindictive warning that Diana had just issued to the Japanese witch. 

“What are you doing? It’s Akko!” shouted Amanda in disbelief as she watched her friend and commanding officer hold at gunpoint the woman whom she believed to be her lover.

But Diana’s eyes were steely and determined, with no trace of warmth or love in them, and the American felt a cold shiver run down her spine as she realised that, despite everything that had passed between them, the noblewitch was serious, leaving her in no doubt that if Akko did one thing to push Diana over the line, she would pull the trigger without hesitation.

Hannah hurried over to her friend’s side and tried to place a calming hand on her superior officer’s shoulder, but Diana shrugged it off.

“Diana, please… calm down,” implored the redheaded officer, nervously watching the Sten that was clasped so firmly in her best friend’s hands.

But Diana ignored her, instead focusing all of her attention onto the figure of the Japanese woman stood before her, her whole body now shaking with anger.

“I said… hands up…” she growled. 

Akko took a faltering step backwards.

“Diana… what?… I don’t understand…”

“DO IT!”

Slowly, with hands that shook with fear and distress, Akko raised her open palms above her head. Diana at once strode forwards, and grasping Akko by the shoulder, roughly shoved her away from the door and towards the other group of prisoners, the stunned Japanese witch stumbling sightly, only to be caught by Lotte.

She then turned to Amanda, who was watching events unfurl with Constanze, their faces paling in shock at her actions.

“Move the prisoners against that wall,” Diana ordered of the American, but the sergeant hesitated, her eyes looking first towards Akko, and then down to the German witch stood by her side. 

“Diana…”

But the enraged officer was in no mood for insubordination.

“I said, move them against that wall, NOW, sergeant…”

Amanda slowly nodded. Without raising her own weapon, she began to quietly shepherd the two groups of prisoners away, grouping them together in a frightened huddle as a shellshocked Akko was gently guided by Lotte.

A moment ago, there had been a feeling of relief at a joyous reunion and a mission already half achieved. But now there was only fear and anger, and even Diana, in her aggrieved state, knew she had to regain control of herself. She was losing her temper in front of her command, and she could see from the looks of concern that the other members of Luna Nova Detachment, especially those whom she considered friends, were beginning to doubt her.

As one of the hanging red flares dropped behind the building, darkness returned to the alleyway, and Diana used this opportunity to turn her back to her troops.

Until that fated day when she had left Luna Nova to return home and claim the headship of her family, her whole life had been led according to principles of stoicism and calm restraint. Yet Kagari had trailed her and manipulated Diana into letting her emotions get the better of her. At the time she had welcomed this change as a blessing, but as it turned out, such a change was in fact a curse. And once again, Atsuko Kagari, the snake in the grass that she was, was finding ways to draw out the very worst in her.

She needed to calm down and reassess the situation. Having taken a deep breath through her nose, she let out a heavy sigh. What she would not give for a nice soothing cup of Anna’s tea at that moment. But all she had instead was the water in her canteen, which she hurriedly retrieved from her webbing.

Diana opened the lid and let the water pour into her mouth, slurping so quickly that she felt herself nearly choke. But it had the desired effect of cooling the burning fury within, and having replaced the bottle, she returned her attention to the matter of the prisoners, whom Amanda was still gently coaxing away from the building.

It was as the POWs uncertainly shuffled to join the other captives, and as another flare climbed up into the night sky, that Diana’s attention was once again drawn to the figure on the stretcher. Stepping closer, it was hard to call what she saw a human being, more a skeleton with skin on, so emaciated was the person. And were it not for the ragged rise and fall of the chest, Diana would honestly have thought the poor wretch spread out on the stretcher to be dead.

They wore the tattered remains of a uniform tunic, Soviet if Diana had to guess, but the sleeve of the right arm was torn off, revealing limbs so wasted away that she could make out individual bones beneath the skin pulled taut by malnutrition and starvation.

Walking closer, Diana could see that the lower buttons of the tunic were undone, exposing a stomach completely hollow, the skin resting tightly against the rib cage and pelvis, so devoid of muscle were they. And along the length of the abdomen ran a scar, which had healed, but the cut appeared to have been imprecise and the red mark was wavy. The face, by comparison, wasn’t as ghastly a sight, the muscles around the cheeks still visible, but the eyes were sunken, and their lips cracked and blistering.

The way this gaunt, supine figure rested so lifelessly reminded her of the cadaver tombs she had studied in various cathedrals, yet this was no medieval artwork designed to remind one of their mortality, but the result of the cruel machinations of perverted science. Indeed, this poor soul was as close to being dead whilst still remaining alive as Diana had ever seen outside of her medical textbooks.

It was then that Diana noticed the faded hue of the person’s matted hair, and a terrible, awful thought occurred to her.

As the red light of the flare faded, Diana turned instinctively to Akko, now stood anxiously with Lotte, Constanze, and the rest of the POWs.

“Who is this?” she asked slowly, trying her hardest to keep her voice from breaking as it so wanted to do. Akko looked up at her, opened her mouth as though to speak, but shut it again, just looking back with an unspeakable sadness. Diana felt her body begin to shake. “Akko… who is this?” Anger started to mix with the fear in her voice.

Another flare illuminated the night.

Constanze walked over to the figure on the stretcher, and with tears forming around her eyes, rested her head against the poor soul’s chest. The person opened their eyes, sensing the German woman’s head upon them, and with more strength than they seemed to possess, lifted a withered arm which they placed around Constanze’s shoulders, drawing them into a hopeless yet caring embrace, a wain smile creeping onto those worn features as they seemed to take comfort from her presence.

When she spoke, Constanze’s voice, already quiet, was barely audible above the distant rattle of gunfire and the roar of burning buildings, yet the pain, sorrow, and anguish she felt was clear for all to hear.

“Jasna…” whispered Constanze, burying her face into the tattered, ragged remains of the woman’s uniform. The assembled allied witches stood in horror as Akko and Lotte stared sadly at the ground, unable to look the others in the eye.

“Fuck off…” said Amanda, her voice quavering in frantic denial. “Fuck off… that… that ain’t Jasna…” She backed away, shaking her head, her shoulders quivering.

Jasminka Antonenko opened her eyes, looked past the ruffled hair of Constanze and over to her friends. “Diana… Sucy…” Somehow, she smiled. She then looked over to Amanda who stood half bathed in shadow and outstretched her other weakened arm. “Amanda…” her voice was almost happy. Before anyone could say anything, Amanda was at the stretcher, her hands clinging tightly to the arm of her once roommate. Diana watched painfully as the skin, so thin as to be near transparent, rubbed against bone, but it seemed the Russian didn’t notice. For the first time in as long as she had known her, Diana saw tears stream openly down the American’s cheeks as the three members of the Green Team embraced one another.

Diana stared in disbelief. How could this be Jasminka Antonenko, a girl renowned for having the hunger of a horse and the stomach to match, now reduced to nothing more than skin on a skeleton. She felt her body begin to quake, and she turned to Akko, her anger rising further and further.

“Who did this?”

More tears streaked Akko’s face as she looked from the distraught huddle of the former Green Team witches towards Diana, and, with a hatred in her voice that she had never before heard, replied,

“Seelmann…”

Ten months earlier

The door to the makeshift operating theatre burst open on a wave of concentrated magical energy.

Panting with incensed fury, Constanze, wand in hand, stepped into the blackened room which was lit only by a single low hanging bulbed lamp which dangled from the ceiling, casting a small pool of light that filled the edges of the room with dark shadows. Through eyes burning with rage, she studied the two men dressed in blood splattered surgical clothing, their faces obscured by the surgical masks that they wore, trying to locate which one of them was responsible for the horrific scene being played out before her eyes.

There, laid flat on the table, her arms and legs restrained by leather straps, was Jasminka, her muscles writhing and spasming in agony as the two men leant over her, a blood sodden sheet of paper marking where they were digging into her stomach.

"Ah, von Braunschbank-Albrechtsberger, come to join us I see?" said the voice of Steffan Seelmann with a chilling air of joviality, drawing her attention to the nearest figure, who stood over the operating table with a scalpel in his hand, his back turned to her. Seelmann hadn't even bothered to look up when she had forced the locked door open, as though he had anticipated her arrival.

The magical engineer merely growled in response, baring her teeth as she took another cautious step towards the centre of the room.

It was whilst approaching the table that she caught a terrible glimpse of the face of her beloved friend, red with suffering, tears and sweat, as she bit down on a leather strap clamped firmly between her teeth. In all of her life, Constanze had never seen a face so contorted in misery, and for the one to bear this unimaginable pain to be someone she cared so deeply for, she was unable to stand it.

Retracting her wand, from her pocket she produced instead a pistol, the loading mechanism of which she pulled back as she aimed it straight at the lead scientist with a shaking hand.

“Halt, stop!” came a shout from the hallway outside, as through the door burst a pair of SS guards, their weapons aimed at the witch. They barked more orders at her, but Seelmann, without looking up from his work, waved a bloodied hand, coolly shooing them away. The two guards shared an uneasy glance, then reluctantly retreated slowly out of the room, eyes and guns ever fixed upon Constanze.

Once they had left, a strange, awful vacuum of silence fell over the room, disturbed only by the muffled shrieks of agony as Jasminka strained against the pain and the sickening squelching of the knife cutting through raw flesh.

“You see, wherever your friend here has been held, this “demon of hunger” has been a considerable problem for my colleagues,” piped up Seelmann in answer to a question that Constanze had not asked, at least, not verbally, apparently undeterred by the pistol aimed directly at his head. “At least four of our Führer's finest have fallen to it, and it seems to be impervious to conventional weapons.” He then turned towards her, and from above his face mask Constanze could see his eyes narrow as he laughed a mirthless, evil chuckle. “She has also been a significant drain on the food supplies of the Reich…” he commented as if it was somehow more relevant. “Thus, I have volunteered to extract it...”

It was then that Constanze noted that there was a fourth person in the room, and at once, despite likewise wearing surgical clothing, she recognised Elina, who was stood with a drawn wand in one hand and a jar covered with seals and talismans in the other.

“But sadly, because the demon only appears when Ms Atonenko is in an unconscious state, in order to pacify the demon, we must keep the patient awake throughout the procedure…” Continued the scientist, before making another incision into Jasminka’s stomach, causing the Russian woman to let out another suppressed wail of agony.

Constanze felt sick, Scared, and angry. She tightened her grip on the trigger of her pistol. 

"You wish to stop me, do you? To end her suffering? But ask yourself this. If you kill me, or Doctor Totleben, then who shall be the one to complete the procedure or stitch her back up?" Seelmann looked back over his shoulder and even through the narrow gap between the mask and the surgeon's cap he wore, she could see the look of condescension in his blue eyes. "Do you have the medical training needed for such a procedure? No, I thought not. So, if you wish to end her unimaginable suffering here and now, then there is only one course of action..."

Keeping her weapon aimed at Seelmann, Constanze began to edge slowly towards the operating table until she drew close to Jasminka, who straining and convulsing, turned towards her for the first time. Her face was red and streaked with tears and sweat, whilst wide eyes, screaming silently with unimaginable agony, begged her friend for one thing, and one thing alone, to free her from the excruciating suffering that she was enduring. She knew what she had to do.

Constanze's hand shook violently as she lowered her aim away from the sadistic scientist, and gently placed the muzzle of the pistol to Jasminka's temple. As a cold, sickening feeling swept over Constanze and tears of despair and confusion marked her own cheeks, Seelmann watched on with amused curiosity.

"So, what is it to be, hmm? Because every second that you dally is an eternity of agony for your friend.”

Jasminka’s eyes pleaded for release, yet as she tried to find the resolve to pull the trigger, it proved impossible. With a clatter, the young witch let the pistol slip from her hand as she too crumpled to the floor, sobbing as she cursed herself for being selfish and unable to help her friend. Seelmann gently tapped the pistol away with the toe of his shoe, then turned to look down on the broken witch with a cruel smirk.

“Don’t worry, I shall let her live. She may yet prove to be an excellent bargaining tool…”

After what seemed an age, the two scientists and Elina extracted the demon using a combination of brutal medicine and magical power, placing it in the sealed jar, after which they began the process of repairing the damage that they had caused. With the demon exorcised, at last Seelmann allowed Jasminka to pass out, sparing her the misery of the rest of the operation. A small meagre mercy like crumbs of bread to a child already dying of starvation.

When at last they were done, and the incision into her stomach was sewn up, Seelmann, Totleben, and Elina left, the German witch offering her a brief, confused look, so that she was now alone with Jasminka. Getting weakly to her feet, Constanze stood next to her friend and gently removed the leather gag, and at once felt sick. The Russian’s face was deathly pale, but an angry red mark highlighted where the gag had dug into her flesh, and blood tinged the edges of her lips and gums from where she had bit down so hard.

To see Jasminka’s wonderful, cheerful face contorted and twisted like that was utterly heart-breaking, because at the end of the day she loved her. And even if she had never truly been able to express this either physically or even verbally, or even decern whether her feelings were romantic or platonic, as far as she understood its meaning, there was no other word she could think of to describe it but love.

But, when the woman she loved had needed her the most, she had failed her, and that deep-seated feeling of guilt and self-loathing overwhelmed her and once again, she broke down in tears. Yet even through the disgust she felt with herself, she began to think of Seelmann, and the pain that he had caused whilst wearing that odious smirk, and gradually anger began to take the place of her pain.

She did not know when, nor even how, but someday, she knew, she would take her revenge against the man who had so terribly hurt her beloved friend; of that she was certain.

The exact, awful details of the events that had transpired inside of that operating theatre went unspoken, the witnesses either unwilling or unable to divulge what they had seen, but Akko and Lotte summarised as best they could, yet even they knew that they had been kept in the dark about the true depths of the horror Constanze had seen. But what they told the newly arrived Allied witches was enough to make each of them turn near white with shock.

Diana looked away from the two Axis witches, and towards Constanze, who still clung to Jasminka with grim determination. She felt her chest swell once more with anger.

“Where is he?” she asked, addressing the gathered prisoners, but they all shook their heads, except for Lotte, who timidly raised her hand.

“I, I saw him…” she said nervously. “He was headed downstairs… he, er, looked like he was going towards his office…”

“Downstairs?” queried Diana, looking directly at the Finn, who nervously pushed her glasses up her nose.

“The, er, passageways underground. There’s three levels of offices and rooms beneath the main building. His office is on the bottom level…”

Then he’s trapped, hoped Diana, praying that there were no other points of escape through which he might have slipped.

Surveying her troops, she recognised as clear as day the incandescent rage that burnt upon Amanda’s features, for it was the same hurt and anger that she felt whenever her gaze landed upon the Japanese witch who had so wounded her heart. Therefore, she knew that if she took Amanda to capture this man, then in all likelihood, she would act rashly, just like she had been oh so tempted to do. Besides, if she was to leave her unit to apprehend the Nazi Scientist, that would mean she would need someone who was suited to fighting left in command above ground, to both oversee the prisoners and take control in case anything should happen.

“Alright, in which case I will lead Able team into the building to find him,” she announced, then turned to Amanda, who had once again taken a firm grip of her Thompson and was clearly baying for Seelmann’s Blood. Taking her into that subterranean labyrinth was definitely a risk she could not afford.  “Sergeant O’Neil, you will remain here with Baker and Charlie teams to guard the prisoners and protect our backs!”

Predictably, Amanda shook her head emphatically.

“I’m coming with you…”

But Diana would not allow herself to be moved on the matter.

“No, you’re to remain here with the prisoners and your fire team.” Diana could at once see Amanda’s frustration as she began to once again protest her decision, so instead of allowing an argument to develop she walked straight over to the American witch and looked directly into her now bloodshot green eyes. “Listen, as much as I trust Hannah and Barbara, you’re my Number Two. I need you here in case anything goes wrong as I would trust you to lead in a fight. Can I trust you to watch my back?” The sergeant appeared conflicted. “Please Amanda…”

“Fine.” Amanda reluctantly acquiesced, however something told Diana that this would not be the end of the matter. But that was a problem for another time, and time, she noted, looking at her wristwatch, was something that they were rapidly running out of, as with each moment that passed the force of heavy RAF bombers drew ever closer, ready to seal the fate of the site and anyone still inside it when they would make their bombing run.

Turning back to her awaiting team, she summoned over Morag and Amelia, designating roles as she prepared to enter the building. A building that was in total darkness, the only lights to be seen those of the flickering fires burning amidst the barrack blocks beyond. Looking into the gaping maw of the doorway, the emerging corridor was dark as pitch, and not knowing the layout of the unfamiliar building, Diana felt a wave of trepidation hit her. All she knew was that Seelmann’s office was down below. Who else, or indeed what else, lurked in the shadows was a complete unknown.

Taking a deep breath, Diana tried to recall expeditions into the vast labyrinthine dungeons that were to be found beneath Luna Nova, telling herself that this was superficially no different an exercise; delving deep into a subterranean unknown filled with danger in search of a prize. Yet now the stakes seemed so much more real. At school there had always been teachers to assist should things get too out of her control. But now real human lives were resting upon her shoulders. And worst of all there was the disturbing fact that, for all the viciousness of those creatures that she and her fellow witches had encountered on their youthful dungeon crawling adventures, there had never been any malevolence behind their actions, yet somewhere deep within the hidden recesses of this base awaited a man so evil that Diana found herself dreading the moment they would locate him.

Pushing such anxieties regarding her mission to one side, the English woman turned to Amanda to confirm that she was happy controlling the situation on the surface. The American witch was still visibly frustrated at being left behind, but nonetheless confirmed that she would be fine. Diana then looked at her watch.

“One last thing,” she said to her Second in Command, who likewise checked her own faintly glowing dial face. “If we’re not out before it’s time to RV with Andrew’s mob, I want you to take the girls, especially Hannah and Barbara, and the prisoners and go, is that understood?”

For a moment Diana could see Amanda wanted to object, but thankfully she simply responded with “ma’am,” making the effort of leaving all the easier.

“Alright, Able Team, move up!” she said. Morag nodded, then lifting her weapon into her shoulder, began to walk cautiously towards the doorway. But before the Scots witch had had the chance to cross the threshold of the building, a voice called out, checking their advance.

“Diana, Wait!” called Akko from her place amongst the group of prisoners. Diana paused and sighed.

“What do you want, Kagari?”

Akko seemed to momentarily wince at the sting in Diana’s frustrated tone, but nonetheless pressed on.

“If you’re going down there, then I’m coming with you!” she said emphatically. Diana shook her head.

“No, you’ll stay here…”

“But it’s a maze down there, you’ll need someone to show you the way!” bargained Akko.

But Diana again waved the offer away, simply muttering under her breath, “I’m sure I’ll cope…” as she retrieved her wand and prepared to cast an illumination spell.

Akko stepped hesitantly away from the group, and when no one stopped her, began to stride towards Diana, her eyes wide and her hand outstretched, as if appealing towards some latent familiarity.

“I just want to help you Diana…”

But the blonde haired witch could stand no more.

“ENOUGH!” she snapped viciously, making Akko flinch once again. The headache that she had already been developing since the brief firefight in the alleyway had been getting gradually worse, and her patience, already having been worn down by the Japanese woman’s incessant behaviour and insistence on treating her as if nothing had ever happened, was once again verging on breaking point. “Stay here and leave me alone!” She sighed tiredly, as memories of the unbearable heartache caused to her by the girl whom she had once loved resurfaced. “Just leave me alone, please…”

Turning her back to deftly ignore the stricken Japanese witch behind her, Diana began to follow Morag as she hovered by the entranceway to the building. She had barely reached the door however when Akko spoke once more,

“Jack in the box!”

Diana froze. Noir. That was Noir’s sign, the phrase that they would use to identify themselves. Spinning around, Diana joined the rest of her team in staring in disbelief at Akko, who had taken a slight step forward, watching Diana with nervous expectation.

“What did you say?” asked the English officer witch carefully.

“Jack in the box…” responded Akko, looking at her with as much gathered defiance and courage as the still teary eyed witch seemed able to muster. “Jack in the box!”

But that was impossible, Diana told herself, Croix was Noir. With a codename like that, surely it could be no one else. Indeed, all of their intelligence had pointed to the very same conclusion; that Croix Meridies was the SOE Contact within the secret Nazi lair. Yet there was Akko, the enemy and traitor, providing the classified countersign that only Noir would know.

Diana stared dumbfounded at the still crying witch, her heart and mind an uncertain confused mixture of conflicting thoughts and emotions.

“Jack in the box…”

“Pop goes the weasel…” responded Diana with barely a whisper, still entirely uncertain what to believe. Despite the hesitancy in her tone, Akko’s shoulders, a moment ago squared and tort, dropped as visible relief swept across her face. “You’re Noir?!” Akko nodded. “But I thought… Noir… I thought she was Croix…”

Akko’s expression once again fell, and she turned to look sadly at Lotte and Constanze.

“She was…” she answered before trailing off.

“But the military commandant found out about her,” continued Lotte picking up the narrative from her obviously distressed former roommate, melancholy heavy on her voice. “But before they could arrest her, she wiped her own memory…”

“Which made her useless to Seelmann, so he had her taken out to the forest and… murdered…” finished Akko.

Diana looked aghast at the two as a sudden sadness swept over her. For all of Croix’s faults and for all of the crimes she had committed, Diana had sincerely hoped to see her returned to England, especially as it seemed her quest for absolution had continued long after she was released from prison in order to further her research into the Wagandea curse. She then thought of Chariot, a woman whom she still admired, and she felt her heart ache for her former professor.

Diana looked at Akko again.

“Noir was discovered… so you, you took over?”

“We all did,” corrected the brunette witch hastily, apparently keen to give her friend’s equal credit. “Lotte, Conze, and I, we all gathered what intelligence we could to pass onto England!”

“But Akko was the one who took the risk, sending the information to London!” interrupted Lotte, as ever bashful under praise. The Englishwoman, stood in disbelief at the thought that Akko, this most hated of traitors, could be an apparent asset of the British government. Seeking confirmation that they were indeed speaking the truth she turned to Constanze, who nodded in silent verification.

Suddenly she felt a hand clamp down on her shoulder and spun around to meet the fierce gaze of Amanda.

“Do you trust her now?” she said, nodding her head towards Akko who stood forlornly alone, staring imploringly at her.

Diana looked at the Japanese witch and saw the glimmer of hope in her eyes. Yet despite knowing that Akko was not currently an enemy of the crown, Diana still found herself regarding her with deep suspicion. Just how long had she been on the Allied side? Her broadcast from ‘41, for all its patriotic fervour, was filled with the type of joyous and impassioned language that was unmistakably written by Akko. And even if she had defected, Diana now knew in her gut that the heart of the girl she had once trusted was as fickle as the weather, and that there was nothing to say she would not simply betray them again.

Diana’s eyes fell to the ground.

“No, I’ll never trust her again…” she said in a bitter whisper. 

Amanda scowled as Akko’s face once again dropped. But before either the American or the Japanese witch could make a further comment, the blasts of mortar rounds exploding close by brought them all back to the moment and reminded them of the ongoing battle raging close by.

“Ma’am!” called Morag from the doorway, staring into the blackened building with palpable unease. “We’ll need someone who can show us th’ way, ‘cause we cannae wait ‘ere much langer!”

Diana sighed. As much as it went against her better judgement, she guessed she was left with no alternative.

“Fine! Kagari, you can show us the way. But you’ll walk ahead of me, and if I think you’re pulling any tricks on us, I’ll…”

“Kill me? Yeah, you’ve made that abundantly clear…”

There was a deep, bitter sorrow to Akko’s tone, and Diana could see the way her eyes, once bright, now refused to look upwards to meet her own. An echo of something that might be called regret passed through Diana’s mind, but it was swiftly drowned out by the memories of the pain she had known at the hands of the Japanese witch, and with it trailed a desire to get the job done so that she could put all of this, Akko included, behind her, once and for all.

With the dubious SOE asset now safely held once more at gunpoint, and with the rest of her fireteam ready to begin this phase of the operation, Diana gave the command,

“Able Team, move up…”

Chapter Text

August 1943

The constant chirping drone of cicadas greeted Akko as she turned towards a nearby open window. Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to momentarily forget where she was and instead, she basked in the warming nostalgic glow of August in Japan as a light summer zephyr gently cooled the stuffy room. 

As much as she had loved her years in England, to the young witch raised on the shores of Tokyo Bay, the changing of the seasons there had always felt anticlimactic. The winters were too wet and grey, and the spring lacked the bright bursting pastel coloured blossoms of Sakura and the eagerly anticipated accompanying showers of petals. Similarly, Fall seemed to lack the rich, burning colours of maple trees in autumn that would annually set her homeland ablaze.

But of all the seasons, it was the summer that always seemed to fall furthest short of her expectations.  

The reason for this was less tangible than for the other seasons, but perhaps it was the gulf she felt between the summers of her youth and those of her adolescence through to adulthood that marked the difference. Summer for her was marked by childhood memories of bloody knees from failed attempts at flight, dressing in yukatas for the Tanabata festival, and lazy days spent under the warm Eastern sun. Maybe the feeling that something was missing from those summer months had simply been the result of growing older, or perhaps it was simply a desire to return to a more innocent time that kept her looking longingly to the past. 

Whatever its cause, being able to experience the pleasures of a Japanese summer once more was one of the scant few blessings that she had been able to enjoy since beginning her captivity within her homeland, even if familiar treats such as watermelon were now scarce. 

She therefore wondered what the summers would be like in Manchuria. After all it was on a similar latitudinal line to Japan, and their cultures were, whilst distinct, not so dissimilar as to be entirely alien.

Imagined summers filled with innocent adventures in an unfamiliar land were a brief if, even by her own admission, delusional distraction from the dread that she felt about her unit's upcoming deployment.

They were being sent to Manchukuo to join a specialist army research unit based there. A unit that, if the dreadful rumours she had heard whispered in quiet corners were to be believed, were involved in the most barbarous and cruel forms of human experimentation. The details sickened her, and forlornly she tried to stop herself dwelling on the thought of what she might be asked to do, but she knew that with the threat against her family’s lives still hanging over her like a sword ready to drop at any moment, she would have little choice but to comply.

Staring back out of the window as a cold, sickening feeling enveloped her, she watched a pair of swallows dart into their hidden nests beneath the gables of a nearby building, and wished for a moment that she were a bird, free of all human responsibilities, who could simply fly away, as opposed to constantly feeling tethered by the burden of fear.

"Kagari, my office!" barked Major Fujino, her commanding officer, his voice even more laden with displeasure and frustration than normal. 

Snapped from her reverie, Akko reluctantly dragged herself from her desk by the window to make her way over to the reclusive Major's lair with bated breath, preparing herself to face the man whom she knew despised her and every other member of her small magical research unit.

Major Fujino Norio was a middle aged career officer who had found himself placed in command of a group of conscripted civilians with magical knowledge or abilities. To Fujino’s irritation the small group, titled Unit 834, was sequestered away in a secret facility in the mountains of Akita Prefecture, far from the frontlines where he felt his destiny of death or glory lay. And so, deprived of what he saw as a fitting culmination to his years of service, he took his frustrations out on his charges. 

Having closed the door, she stepped in front of his desk only to be met with a bitter glare as the officer looked up from the desk’s immaculately polished surface, on which were spread the disassembled parts of his Nambu pistol.

"You wanted me, Major?" she asked with as much courtesy as she could summon, but the officer was unwilling to extend the same respect to her, addressing her curtly.

"Don't sit." He picked up a sheet of paper marked with various official stamps, looked at the document for a moment, his scowl deepening, then addressed the still slightly apprehensive witch. “Against my express wishes, it seems you are being sent to Germany...”

This news, as seemingly inexplicable as it was utterly unexpected, caught Akko completely off guard, and, for the first time since she had arrived at the base, she found herself wondering whether the Major was pulling some form of strange prank on her, but the complete lack of any emotion on his face beside hostility towards herself quickly dispelled that notion. 

“Germany?” she repeated, still uncertain that she was understanding him correctly. The Major casually discarded the sheet of paper.

“Yes, one of your old friends from your witch school has made a specific request for your assistance in a project. Apparently, you were most invaluable in the creation of a flying ship or some such nonsense…” he said dismissively, his tone heavy with familiar disdain for her craft, but at once Akko felt a thrill of excitement.

Constanze! She was being summoned by Constanze.

The Major continued. “I personally advised against your transferral, but General Yamashiro has approved the request.” He handed her a small envelope marked Top Secret. “We have agreed with our so called German “allies” that you will be loaned to them to help develop their magically enhanced aircraft, in exchange for which they will provide us with technical designs and a working example if they're able to enter into production.”

“You’re to report to the Submarine base at Kure in Hiroshima where you’ll board a submarine on which you will sail to France…”

“But sir,” she interrupted, causing him to blink slightly, “that’ll take ages, why not let me just fly there on my broom and use the Ley lines?”

Fujino lent forwards and affixed her with a heated glare.

“Because I do not trust you not to abandon your mission and run back to your English whore…”

The witch’s heart sank, as, like many, she knew the officer before her looked down upon the relationship she had with Diana, as well as her affinity for the West, and even if she was used to the judgment of others by now, especially Fujino, it stung nonetheless. But, seeing the chance to at least escape her upcoming hellish deployment to Manchuria, she stopped herself from letting Fujino see the sting his barbed comments had caused.

Having informed her that the rest of her instructions were sealed within the envelope she now clutched in her hands, the Major dismissed her, returning to his zealous daily ritual of cleaning his stripped down pistol, even though it had not been fired in months. Yet before Akko had reached the door, he called out to her. Turning around she was met with a surprising expression that, for the first time since she had met the man over a year ago, almost appeared vaguely concerned.

“One word of advice,” he said as he began to thread a stringed brush through the barrel of his weapon. “Do not trust the German Gaijin. They may be our allies now, but after what they did to Poland, mark my words, once they have finished their conquest of Europe, it will only be a matter of time before they turn on us…”

It was strange to hear the Major, who had so often been hostile towards her, offering genuine advice, even if it was loaded with his own brand of nationalistic rhetoric, thus she chose not to make any remark about how she trusted Constanze implicitly, and instead nodded appreciatively.

Hurrying back to her desk she eagerly tore open the envelope as the thought of seeing her German friend once more made her heart race with giddy excitement. Since arriving back in Japan moments of pure happiness had been few and far between, but now the thought of reuniting with one of her best friends from Luna Nova was finally something to look forward to in a world where notions of future happiness seemed futile.

“Kagari-sensei,” whispered a voice from a nearby desk. Looking up the brunette haired witch saw the curious expression on the face of Okano Miyu, one of her colleagues in the Magical Warfare and Research Unit. “What did the Office Troll want?”

Akko at once wanted to tell her fellow witch the good news, but then remembered that she alone would be making this journey, which was itself of a clandestine nature.

“Umm… just to let me know that my request for leave has been approved…” she replied, before turning studiously back to the sheets of orders held in her grasp, guiltily hoping to stave off any further questions, as in truth she felt sorry for the magical colleagues whom she would have to leave behind.

Almost all of them were younger than herself, and they regarded her with a certain degree of reverence, their latent magical abilities having been roused by the unlocking of the Seven Words of Arcturus by herself and Diana. The team of a dozen magical practitioners were good people, who for the most part had, like herself, been pressganged into military service with coercive threats against themselves and loved ones. She wished she could spare them the likely horrors that they would encounter across the Sea of Japan, but if she was being honest, the thought of an escape from this was something she could not pass up, even if it meant leaving her colleagues to their fate. For as much as the thought of working in Manchuria filled her with dread, there was one more thought that compelled her to eagerly take the European assignment.

Once, when she was still a student at Luna Nova, she had flown nonstop from Glastonbury to Constanze’s German home in under a day, meaning that she would at last be within striking distance of England, and the place she called home. All she had to do was find a way of removing the threat to her family, then at last she would be able to return to the woman she loved whom she was sure was eagerly awaiting her return with bated breath and loving, open arms. 

“Diana, we need to talk…” said Akko as she followed behind the silent, alert figure of Morag, the Scottish witch’s form picked out by a faint red glow from an orb that floated just above her head, the only point of light in the darkened subterranean hallway.

“Not now, Kagari…” muttered Diana frustratedly.

Despite the battle raging above, the corridor was eerily quiet. The cacophony of war was muffled, and the loud blasts of explosions and rattles of gunfire sounded distant, serving only to remind Diana of the pressing deadline of the RAF’s arrival as each dulled shot echoed like the ticking of a clock. And in the hushed corridor every footfall and scuff of a hobnail on the polished floor rang aloud as Diana found her gaze flitting warily between the various windowed doorways that lined either side of the hallway, each of which she feared could swing open at any moment, spilling forth death from some lurking foe.

Glancing backward towards Mary, the tailing witch offered her a brief, nervous nod. It seemed that all in her small team were aware of their precarious surroundings. All, it seemed, but Akko, who continued addressing her, far too loudly for the officer witch’s liking.

“Why are you being like this?” she complained, glancing over her own shoulder towards Diana, who sighed but kept pressing forward. “Why won’t you talk to me?”

“Because unless you haven’t noticed,” the noblewoman hissed, looking anywhere but at Akko herself, “we're in a war zone. I just need you to show me the way, nothing else…”

But her short tempered response acted only to frustrate the Japanese witch even more, as she stopped dead in Diana’s path and spun around to look her directly in the eyes.

“What's wrong with you! Why the hell are you being so... so mean to me? I was so happy to see you, it felt like all my dreams had come true, or like I'd just woken up from a nightmare…”

Time was against them and in spite of the pleading look born upon Akko’s face, right now Diana had no interest in dragging up the past; all she wanted to do was secure Seelmann and return to the surface.

“This isn't the time, Kagari…”

“You shoved a gun in my face Diana!” cried Akko, suddenly exploding with pent up frustration and pain. “I just wanted to see you again and instead you threatened to kill me! I think I deserve an explanation!”

At the front of the small column Morag paused and looked towards her commander with an uncertain glance, distracted from her task by the commotion taking place behind her.

“Ma’am?”

Diana felt her body shaking with anger once more that Atsuko Kagari, this face from the past she had wanted nothing more to do with, was still making her life a misery.

“Keep moving,” she said to the Scottish witch, then feeling her finger gently wrap itself around the trigger of her Sten, growled at Akko, “Lead on, Kagari, now…”

But Akko shook her head, her eyes desperate as she refused to budge.

“No, I’m not going anywhere until you tell me why you seem to hate me now!”

“Because you’re a fucking traitor who ruined my life!” Diana burst out before she could stop herself, any traces of dignity and decorum deserting the English witch in the face of pure, unadulterated rage, leaving Akko to stare wide eyed with shock.

“What?”

“Rape, Akko, you accused me of rape to the whole bloody world!”

“What, what are you talking about…?” Akko seemed genuinely shocked, but Diana was beyond caring for her tricks.

“That speech you made just after Pearl Harbour, where you addressed the people of Japan, you remember that?”

This call back to a moment that, thanks to the war, seemed a lifetime ago, caught Akko off guard, the witch furrowing her brow as she apparently tried to recall her radio address.

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“You said that I ‘forced my perversions on you!’ You told an entire empire of millions of people that I raped you!” Burning tears of incandescent anger and pain began to prick at her eyes, but Diana kept towering over the dumbfounded Japanese witch who looked up into her furious countenance with shock and confusion.

“I never said that!” she at once objected. “I, I never even mentioned you…”

“I read the blasted transcript, Akko, you made it very clear exactly to whom you were referring…” Bitterness crept into her voice, as she recalled the moment that Cattermole had handed her the transcript whilst leering over her with his oh-so-odious expression of superiority, as if he had gained some perverse pleasure from seeing her world begin to fall apart. But still the Japanese witch met her with a look of horror.

“Yes, I made a broadcast, but I swear, Diana, I swear upon my life and those of all the Nine, I never said anything about you or anything like that!”

Her former lover’s eyes were wide, and her expression and tone a mix of panicked sincerity, as if regarding Diana with apparently genuine disbelief. And in turn, from somewhere deep inside the blonde haired witch, a small voice, half smothered by the burning anger that clouded her mind, cried out, reminding it’s owner of one simple fact that she had always known to be true; Akko was a bloody awful liar.

Like being hit by a blast of cold water, Diana felt some of the burning rage in her heart being stifled as she saw the look of complete and utter confusion on the other witch’s face. But still, her heart refused to let go when, with her own eyes, she had seen clear, irrefutable evidence of Akko’s betrayal.

“Even if you’re telling the truth, which I fail to believe," she added, quickly correcting herself, even though the sentiment was hollow, "you still sent that letter…”  Akko’s face at once fell, telling Diana all she needed to know to confirm that the enemy witch knew exactly which letter she was referring to. “And don’t try to deny it. I know it was you because I recognised your hand straight away. Your penmanship always was distinctly sloppy, even at Luna Nova…”

"I didn’t want to send that letter…” whispered the beleaguered brunette haired witch, her voice weak as she appeared to reel at the biting remark. “I would never hurt you on purpose, surely you know that..."

"Then why did you send that letter? Telling me that everything, all my hopes and dreams, were over? Telling me that you... That you no longer loved me... That you never loved me…" despite the anger in her heart, Diana couldn't keep the grief from her voice as the pain of betrayal and humiliation turned to something far more personal. "Do you have any idea how much that hurt?!"

Akko looked wide eyed at Diana.

"I didn't mean it..." she said, her voice little more than a whisper.

But Diana wasn't in the mood for excuses, there was too much hurt and pain still burning inside her.

"So what?! It worked. And it hurt so bloody much! I thought you were my soul mate, Akko. The one I was supposed to be with for the rest of my life. Yet with one single letter you both break my heart and stab me in the back!"

"I didn't want to..." said Akko sadly, but her meek, sorrowful expression only served to rile up Diana’s anger once again, as if the Japanese witch was trying to portray herself as the victim of her own actions.

“Then why?! Why did you even write it if you didn't want to?!”

“I had to make sure that no one ever doubted you or I... That they never thought either of our loyalties could be compromised by being in love with an enemy...”

“Well, that worked out so bloody well didn’t it!” snapped Diana, the irony of Akko’s words not lost on her.

“What do you mean?”

“They came to my home, Akko. Not our home, MY home!” That cruel remark, designed to cut Akko out of pure spiteful vengeance, seemed to find its mark as the other witch winced slightly. “They tore my home apart looking through your belongings, trying to find any evidence that you'd been spying for Japan while under my roof or that I'd been in any way complicit.

“They made me sit on a wooden chair as they went through everything. My books, my clothes… my underwear…”

The legacy of the pain she had felt that day must have shown itself on her face, as Akko reached out to lend a comforting hand, “Diana…” but the aggrieved witch coldly shrugged it away, as the sorrow turned to anger once more.

“And they knew. They knew about us, about me being a lesbian, all because of your damned letter. If they had been the police instead of MI5, my life could have been ruined!” The countess looked heatedly into her eyes as she blinked back tears. “All because of your bloody letter!”

“I'm sorry...” Akko tried to plead, but Diana’s rage was in full swing, as for the first time since that fateful day she allowed herself to fully avail herself of the misery she had bottled within.

“Do you have any idea how humiliating and heart-breaking it was to have to read your letter while being judged a stranger? All while his bullies ransacked my room, my home, and looked down on me?!”

“I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry…” Akko continued to desperately implore. “I never meant to hurt you like that. I didn't want to write it. I didn't want to hurt you. Writing that letter was the worst thing I've ever done; to so coldly tell you that I didn’t love you...”

“Then why?! If it hurt you so much, then why the hell did you write it?! Why did you betray me?!”

“They came to your house? Well, they came to mine too!” cried the broken Asian witch. Now it was Diana’s turn to be confused.

“What?”

“A funeral, Diana, they came to my grandmother’s funeral! We had just cremated her that day, I had literally used chopsticks to pick out her bones, when the Kempeitai turned up to the wake. They told me that I could either join the army as a researcher and serve the emperor, or else...” Tears born from her own anger and humiliation began to well in Akko’s eyes. “They threatened my family! I was mourning my grandmother and they threatened to kill the rest of my family. You always go on about protecting your family name and reputation, but I had to protect my actual family. Not just their honour but their actual lives!”

“I couldn’t even talk to you on my crystal ball. They must have thought I was a security risk and that I'd tell you that something was up. That's why I decided to write that letter, because I had to prove my loyalty to the Kempeitai. I knew people would check it, so that way I could make sure that they’d never accuse you of being involved with an enemy. That’s why I wrote that hidden message in the letter, just like you taught me to, so you’d know how I truly felt. I wanted to protect you Diana... That's all I ever wanted, to protect my family... And you are my family, Diana... I love you... I never stopped loving you...”

Akko’s eyes were wide, honest, and sincere, and that small voice in Diana’s mind told her to listen to her and believe what she was saying, but the young noble witch turned her nose up at her entreaties. Even in the face of all evidence, Diana refused to forgive her, because deep down she knew that if she was telling the truth, all of the pain and anguish she had felt over the last few years would be rendered meaningless.

“It's not enough, Kagari,” she said coldly, stepping past the stricken Japanese witch to stand directly behind Morag, meaning that Akko could no longer see her face and the look of confliction that she feared it bore. “Once this mission is over and you’ve been handed over to our people, I never want to see you again.”

Had Diana dared to turn around she would have seen the look of utter heartache and despondency that had etched itself onto Akko's face. It was the familiar ache of being told by the one whom you love the most that, not only do they no longer love you, but that they never wanted anything to do with you again. Put simply it was the pain of having everything cruelly snatched away.

If she had turned around, Diana would have seen this, but she kept her back to her former lover, bitter indifference coursing through her as she pridefully told herself that as Akko had inflicted that pain upon her, it was only just that it was revisited.

So why then did she immediately feel hollow, as though she had done something so terribly and cruelly wrong that it hurt not only the target of her rage but herself in the process?

Before anyone in the confused and shaken fireteam could say a word however, a single gunshot cut through the silence of the subterranean complex, it’s crack echoing loudly as it was amplified by the earth surrounding them.

“That sounded like it came from Seelmann’s office!” said Akko as the repeating sound of the shot died away. Diana cursed under her breath, then tapped Morag on her shoulder.

“We need to move, now!”

Chapter Text

Having raced down another flight of stairs, and with caution thrown to the wind, the four witches hurried along another shadowy corridor.

“This way, come on!” said the Japanese witch breathlessly as she guided them through the seemingly endless subterranean complex until, from around an approaching junction, there grew a faint glow of orange light.

“Stop, wall!” hissed Diana, collapsing against the side of the corridor before they could emerge onto the interconnecting passage, the rest of the witches joining her as they formed a huddled queue. With a moment to compose herself, Diana looked around and took stock of the situation.

What could she hear? Aside from the rapid huffing of her fellow witches as they caught their breath, the only noises to be heard in the otherwise still corridors were the pipes that ran their length, rattling and creaking with a ghostly softness. And, as if many miles away, muffled by many feet of earth and concrete, the dampened sound of gunfire and strife, a reminder of the violence being wrought above. But down here, in the stuffy but still warren of tunnels, there was nothing to be heard and thus, as far as she could tell, Diana concluded that they were almost entirely alone, save for Seelmann, whom she hoped was not the victim of that gunshot.

Tightening her grip on the Sten she held in her now sweaty palms, Diana stepped out of the huddle and around Akko, their bodies brushing slightly as she passed closely by, causing the Japanese witch to momentarily start as, for the first time in several years, they came into physical contact. But the focused officer witch paid her no heed, and instead nervously looked around the corner and down the corridor.

The office at the end was lit like a flaring beacon in the darkness, and through the doorway she could see the figure of a man dressed in a white lab coat, his back turned towards them. He had slicked back blonde hair of which he clearly seemed to take some degree of care, yet a distinct bald patch was growing towards the back of his crown, and far from the rigid and proud bearing with which Diana had been expecting to see the scientist carry himself, he stood hunched over slightly, his shoulders rounded forwards. But, despite the difference in his appearance from her expectations, there was no doubt in Diana’s mind that this was Stefan Seelmann. And right now, he seemed to be stood, staring down at something on the ground before him.

“Kagari, is that him?” she asked, wishing to have her suspicions confirmed. Dropping back slightly to afford the Japanese witch a view of their target, Akko leant around the corner, and quickly verified that he was indeed their prize for the night.

Turning to address her team, her voice little more than a whisper, she could feel the tension in her voice as she spoke.

“Amelia, Morag, follow me, weapons at the ready. Kagari, I want you to stay behind us. Keep him in your sights at all times, alright? On my mark… now!”

Stens raised, the trio of British witches broke from cover and began to make their way down the corridor as Akko trailed close behind them. The distance was less than twenty feet yet with each step they took it felt to Diana that they were drawing no closer as she felt her heart beating faster and faster. A cold chill then ran down her spine as the bitter, acrid sulphurous stench of spent gunpowder, which hung in the unmoving air of the underground space, hit her nose.

They were less than five feet away from the doorway, beyond which Seelmann continued to be stood unnervingly still, when Diana noticed, with a degree of alarm, the pistol that he held in his limply hanging right hand.

Immediately she felt her body, already on edge, tense, and her heart skip. He was now a threat. Their mission objective was to take him alive, but if he turned around and tried to engage them, there was no guarantee that a member of her unit would not act to defend themselves and open fire, thus she had to act and take control of the situation before it deteriorated.

“Lass die Waffe fallen!” she barked at the scientist, who shook with a start, snapping out of whatever apparent stupor he had been in since before their arrival. Seeing the German jerk to life, Diana feared that he might panic and spin around, but instead she let out a sigh of relief as she heard the clatter of the pistol being dropped to the hard floor below.

Holding out her hand to stop the others in the corridor, she continued to study the scientist intently, analysing each movement he made for the slightest sign of danger.

“Hände hoch und langsam umdrehen…”

Seelmann complied with the command and, with hands raised slowly above his head, he turned to face them.

Since the time that the photograph in the briefing had been taken, he had visibly aged significantly, but, despite the bags that hung below them, there still shone in his eyes a glint of a cold, calculating mind, and his face bore a composed aloofness born of self-assured intellectual superiority that Diana knew could only spell trouble.

Edging their way forward slowly, keeping him always in their sight, the Allied witches filed cautiously into the office, fanning out to surround him. It was as she drew level with the desk however, that Diana noticed for the first time the grizzly scene that lay before her.

The wall beyond was painted with a large dark crimson splatter which, like some grotesque waterfall of viscera and gore, was slowly trickling down to where there lay slumped the body of a man in a grey SS officer’s field uniform, his head lolling to one side, revealing the bloody bullet entry wound in the middle of his temple, his blonde hair matted with congealing blood.  Thankfully, the exit wound faced away from them, but the sight was still unpleasant enough to see, and the fetid smell of death, a mixture of urine and faeces, made even the experienced medic blanche.

“Who is he?” she asked, turning to Akko who likewise was looking down at the body, her expression strangely unreadable.

“Oberstleutnant Drexler,” she replied. “He was the base’s SS commandant…”

“And a constant thorn in my side.” Diana looked up from the fallen officer and towards Seelmann who gave her a mirthless smirk. “Still, he shall hinder me no more…”

“You speak English?”

“Naturally.”

“What happened?” Diana asked, lowering the Sten out of her shoulder, but keeping it pointed towards Seelmann.

“When the commandant found out that I planned to surrender, he came here to stop me, to kill me if he had to, but I was not going to die so meekly…”

At once Diana became suspicious. Just why was this man so keen to surrender when he would be taken from here to stand trial for his crimes, crimes that if there was any justice at all in the universe, which she truly believed there to be, he would soon answer for with his life?

As if noticing her suspicious gaze, Seelmann peered back to study her. She felt his eyes look her up and down, before he flashed her a Cheshire Cat smile that both physically repulsed and alarmed the young noblewoman, as if he was eyeing her as some form of prize. “So, you must be the famous Lady Diana Cavendish…Which means that if you are here, then you, Fraulien Kagari, must have been Noir all along…” he said turning his gaze to Akko, who hung uncertainly behind Diana.

Akko genuinely seemed to fear this man, even when he was surrounded by armed witches. Just what was the power that this man held upon the inhabitants of the facility; the magical prodigy found herself wondering.

Meanwhile the blonde haired Nazi chuckled at his own lapse in judgement. “Whilst I knew you were unhappy here, for some reason I genuinely did not suspect it was you who took over from Signora Meridies…”

Hearing Croix’s name mentioned, Diana had to know the truth.

“Why did you kill her?”

Seelmann’s chuckle and bitter laugh halted at once, and instead, with a face of cold indifference, he simply shrugged.

“Because what was the point of keeping her alive?” he responded rhetorically. “Once she found out that we had discovered her she moved to deny us any intelligence we could have gathered, and so she erased her own mind! Thus, when we arrived to arrest her all we found was a comatose witch on the floor beside her wand…” It was faint, but as he spoke, a sickening, sadistic glee entered into his voice. “So, I had her tested. Oh, how she begged and pleaded, all the while maintaining her ignorance of anything to do with spying. In the end I simply had to conclude that she was, annoyingly, telling the truth, she had erased her own memory. And as that meant she was now worthless to me; I simply had my men dispose of her...”

“Bastard…” growled Amelia angrily as Diana felt her own blood begin to boil.

“What was I to do? She was dead weight and a waste of resources…” He then turned to Akko and gave her a sadistic smile. “You know, Frauline Kagari, I never told you what her last words were, did I?”

Diana sensed Akko move closer to her, as if hiding from his gaze.

“She spoke only one name… “Chariot”…”

A frigid sorrow swept across Diana as in her mind’s eye she pictured Croix, beaten and bloodied, whispering the name of her true love one last time before she was brutally murdered and her body hidden away, never to return to the arms of the redheaded Frenchwoman. A tear pricked her eye, but she fought to stop herself from allowing the grief of that situation to manifest itself lest Seelmann think that he could find a weakness he could exploit.

“Indeed, it is strange,” he said as he continued his smug monologue, “for those were the last words of my sister too…”

This remark, seemingly out of the blue, caught Diana off guard, and she could not stop herself from enquiring about this unknown sister who had spoken her former teacher’s name.

“Ja, her name was Frieda, and, had she lived, she would have probably been the same age as you,” he looked at the two witches and smiled, seemingly genuinely, which somehow made the expression of happiness all the more disturbing. “Indeed, I believe the three of you could have been very good friends, for like you, she loved Shiny Chariot, lived for her in fact!”

Any trace of mirth then vanished.

“But you see, for as much as she was a happy child, there was no point to her existence, for she was a cripple who lived in a wheelchair and had no use of her legs. And as much as I loved my sister, every breath that she took disgusted me, for with it she drew my mother away from the tasks that she should have been performing as a housewife so that she could care for her. So too she drained resources away from our nation, already corrupted by communists and Jews. And so, I knew that something needed to be done…”

Diana’s blood ran cold as a uneasy  sense of foreboding came over her.

“It was in the third year of my medical studies that Shiny Chariot came to Berlin. And so, I offered to take Frieda to see her perform. And for my süße Schwester it was the most magical experience of her life, please forgive the pun,” he added with another dry laugh.

“She was over the moon, she even got to meet her idol who doted upon her as if she were a normal child. And so, when she fell asleep on the streetcar home, her last words were Chariot’s name. It was then that I gave her a lethal injection that ensured she would pass away gently in her sleep. Of course, my parents wept and cursed God, but I knew that somewhere, deep in the darkest recesses of their hearts, they were glad to be rid of her burden upon them, and I knew that I had done the right thing…”

The gathered witches stood horrified at the story which he had just told them, relayed so casually, indeed he almost seemed jovial as he admitted to murdering his own sister. Diana had heard about the Nazi obsession with eugenics, but to actually hear of someone killing their own family and describing it near boastfully, made her feel sick, and her body begin to quake with anger.

“How could you?” gasped Akko with ragged breath, stepping out from behind her as she addressed the nonchalant scientist.

“It was the ultimate mercy that I could provide her,” he replied pointedly. “To end her suffering and her burden upon both my mother and the state…”

Diana recoiled in cold horror. Everything she held sacred as a healer and medical professional, the preservation and bettering of life; he, this so called man of science, was the antithesis of all she believed in.

“Human life is sacred…” she growled, the rage within her now barely contained.

“Some lives…” he countered as, in his prideful arrogance, he smiled at the crimes he had committed. At once he became to her the very embodiment of all that was wrong about the Nazi state which, like a cancer, had corrupted everything, even medicine, to the point where his actions were praised.

Images flashed across her brain of friends whom she loved like family being tortured, their bodies writhing and twisting in agony under the cruel, sadistic smiling face of Seelmann. And as she heard their screams echo inside her head, a fury like she had never known before gripped her, as if some primal part of her brain, long suppressed, was unleashed. She felt her heart's rhythm change, as if it grew heavier and more heated, and her body’s shaking grew ever stronger as the burning hatred coursed throughout her whole being, prickling her brow with a cold sweat as her breathing became laboured.

“You’re irredeemable… you don’t deserve to live…” the healer choked out as, before she could truly register what her body was doing, as if guided by instinct, she raised her gun and aimed it directly at the face of Seelmann as a singular thought flooded her mind, sweeping all inhibitions aside to leave only one burning desire.

“Go to Hell…”

Her finger closed around the trigger and the Sten shook in her grip as she readied herself to do it, to end this stain on humanity. She swallowed and tried to steady her breath. She could do this, Diana told herself trying to justify the action she was about to take; she could end a life, especially when the life she was ending was so evil.

Her resolve settled, she was about to pull the trigger when suddenly Akko ran in front of her, blocking her aim.

“Stop, don't do it Diana!” she shouted.

Diana looked up and blinked, momentarily caught off guard, before lowering her cheek back to the Sten's stock. Looking down the iron sights all she could see was Akko's torso obstructing her view.

“Get out of the way, Kagari,” she growled, but Akko shook her head determinedly.

“No, I won't let you kill him...”

“Akko, move!” repeated Diana, more forcefully this time.

Still the brunette refused to step aside.

“No Diana, please don't do this...” she said and this time her voice was weak, pleading.

“Why?! Why are you protecting him?!” Diana shouted in frustration, lowering the gun, and looking Akko straight in the eye as she tried to control her fury. “After everything he's done, after what he did to Jasminka, to his sister… to Croix, how can you protect him?!”

Akko turned to look over her shoulder, towards the Nazi scientist who returned her gaze with a sideways stare of amused curiosity. 

“I'm not...” she said looking back at her with an expression of concern.

“Then why?!” demanded the enraged witch.      

“Because I don't want you to do something you'll hate yourself for!” she snapped back at her.

Stunned by the Japanese witch’s response, Diana took a half step back and looked straight into her crimson eyes which were beginning to glisten with the first welling of tears.

“As long as I've known you you've always been kind and caring. You always dreamt of helping others and healing the sick. You're a healer Diana, not a killer. And if you kill him, even after everything he's done to deserve it, you'll never forgive yourself!” She was near shouting as she took a step towards her once lover. “When you calm down, when you’re your normal self again... I know you Diana, you'll see yourself as a monster and hate yourself... and I won't let you do that to yourself... please...” There were tears on her cheeks. Not for herself or the man she was guarding, but for Diana, a woman who had sworn a vendetta against her and less than half an hour ago had threatened to kill her.

Akko spread her arms, still trying her hardest to block Seelmann from Diana's view, a look of both terror and sad determination clear on her face as beads of nervous sweat formed on her brow.

“Please, even after everything that's happened today, I still love you...” There was a sensation in her chest, Diana didn’t know what it was. “I still care about you, and I don't want to see you hurt yourself...”

Her voice cracked to barely a whisper.

“Please...”

Speechless, Diana blinked as she felt her stomach twist. Then, for a moment, her mind transported her back to the greenhouse at Luna Nova and to the foot of the Jennifer Memorial Tree, and to a moment when she and the girl stood before her had been in almost exactly the same position.

That was a time when Akko had tried to stop her from doing something wrong and, contrary to what the brunette witch was now saying, she had not been kind. That had been a moment when her rash decision had led her to do something that deep within her soul she still regretted; something that she knew Akko’s back still bore the mark of like a permanent testament to Diana’s arrogance. In that instance Akko had been right and Diana oh so very wrong. Blinking back to the present, Diana stared at the Japanese witch and saw eyes filled with sorrow; a sorrow she could not bear.

She let go of the gun. The anger was still there, the hatred towards this man, but the burning edge was gone. She didn't say anything, instead she just nodded. The tension in Akko's body released and her shoulders sagged as she dropped her arms.

Without truly thinking, as if driven by impulse, Diana stepped forward towards the woman who had saved her from a terrible decision. A part of her wanted to hug her, to feel her familiar, comforting embrace, but she still felt enough bitterness and betrayal in her heart to check herself. Instead, she laid a single grateful hand on Akko's shoulder, which Akko promptly laid her own upon, taking it as if by instinct. The blonde haired witch couldn't help but look into those strange yet beautiful red eyes and feel a spark she had not experienced in a very long time; a warmth that seemed to fill an internal void she was unaware she had in her soul.

There might even have been a chance for reconciliation between them, but instead this moment was broken, and her gaze was drawn away by a nasty chuckle.

“Mein Gott, du bist eine verdammte Lesbe!” laughed Seelmann with a nasty sneer, shaking his head. “Ihr beide seid!”

Diana immediately snapped her hand away from Akko and looked at the scientist with a feeling of utter contempt as she fought to stop her finger once again reaching for the trigger.

“The only reason you're still alive is because of her, so watch your damn tongue!” she said, stepping slightly in front of Akko. Had she not been so focused on the evil before her, she might have wondered just why she had instinctively moved into a protective position to shield her former lover from this vile creature.

Seelmann smirked at them.

“It is typical of your sex,” he said, looking at the two witches with disdain. “You try to be like men, but in the end, you cannot do what needs to be done. You're too easily swayed by your emotions...”

Diana took a deep breath and purposefully moved her hand even further away from the dangling gun and the temptation to use it. She still wanted him dead, and each jibe riled her even more. But Akko was right, as in that instant she had stood at a precipice, and if she gave into that anger, that hatred, she would never be able to look herself in the mirror again. She thought of trying to bark something back at him, but it was pointless. So instead, determined to be free from his presence as swiftly as possible, she turned around and walked towards the door, instructing Amelia and Morag to begin escorting him to the surface, and as she exited, she could hear Akko follow after her. Yet as the two witches approached the doorway Diana heard a soft, derisive laugh from behind. It seemed that to him the matter of being captured by the Allies was a mere inconvenience and judging by the smugness of his expression he clearly thought little of Her, Akko, or even those who had suffered under his stewardship.

She tried to hold her tongue, but that grin made her blood boil, and it took all she had to not let the anger re-emerge.

“I advise you to think upon your crimes, for soon they'll come back to haunt you, and you'll answer for them at the end of a rope,” she said with a forced calmness, using all the lessons in decorum and civil debate she had been subject to to stop her hatred overcoming her once more. 

Seelmann merely shrugged, and whilst his expression certainly changed, it was impassive as opposed to fearful.

“We shall see…”

Taking a deep breath of air through her nose to try and calm herself, she turned towards the door once more but at once stopped dead, for blocking their path stood Constanze, and behind her, lurking in the shadows of the hallway, Amanda.

The magical technician stepped into the office, and at once Diana’s blood ran cold. Her face was red and streaked with tears, contorted in a mixture of determination, unfathomable anger, and heartbroken devastation. And in her hands, which gripped so tightly her fingers were turning white, she held an MP40 which was pointed past the British and Japanese witches and firmly towards Seelmann.

At once, she knew that she was here with the sole purpose of exacting revenge upon the man who had committed such unspeakable horrors against those she loved. She knew this because, mere moments ago, she had felt the same way, and it was an act of love alone that had stopped her. And right now, the woman whom Constanze loved was far above, her body a wreck because of this man.

Raising her hands gently, Diana tried to placate the German witch, but Constanze simply stepped closer towards the prisoner as she bared her teeth. Turning towards Akko, Diana hoped that, as she had done previously, the Japanese witch might intervene, but instead, Pilate like, she merely covered her ears and turned her back, and at once, the noblewoman knew that there would be no reprieve for Seelmann; he had inflicted too much suffering upon those she loved.

“Constanze…” said Seelmann nervously, his voice cracking.

Turning to look now at the scientist, for the first time since Diana had set eyes upon him, she saw his cool and aloof expression falter and fear sink in as he shrunk beneath the burning gaze of the wronged witch.

“Du hast mich in ein Monster verwandelt, Du hast meinen Freund verletzt…” growled Constanze. Diana blinked in surprise. That was perhaps the longest sentence she had ever heard her utter, yet each word was laced with anger and an unfathomable pain, as if each syllable had been saved throughout her life purely for this one moment. “Du hast die Person verletzt, die mir am wichtigsten ist…” She gritted her teeth. “Du hast Jasminka verletzt…”

Seelmann’s eyes went wide with a sudden fear. “Bitte…”

Constanze pulled the trigger.

Blood and dust exploded from Seelmann’s chest as the hail of bullets ripped through his body, tearing him from off of his feet and pitching him like a ragdoll against the already bloody wall. The sound of gunfire was deafening, but Diana could not close her eyes, instead watching with shocked fascination as her prisoner’s body was shredded by the merciless and relentless stream of fire as Constanze seemed to silently scream with rage.

Then, after only a second or two, the firing stopped, leaving only the clicking sound of Constanze still forlornly pulling the unyielding trigger and the ringing in their ears.

The weapon’s magazine now depleted, the German witch let the gun fall from her hand as she stared down at the body of her victim, and at once Diana ran straight up to her.

“Why? Why did you do that?!” she demanded, looking at Constanze but addressing Amanda, for she knew exactly who had given the German witch the weapon. “He was supposed to be returned to England to stand trial… He had to stand trial!” Tears were almost running down her face as she felt the emotional turmoil she had been through those few moments ago, and the strength it had taken to do the right thing, go to waste.  

Amanda stepped beside her former roommate and placed a supportive hand upon her still shaking shoulders, then turned to the awaiting officer with a bitter glare.

“You don’t get it do you? There was never gonna be a trial. He was gonna go back to the States and work for my government.”

“W-what?” Diana was caught completely off guard by this news.

“As soon as our briefing had ended, I was met by a US Intelligence Officer. He gave me new orders; bring Seelmann in alive and hand him over to the OSS so that he could be used for some top secret project,” explained the American, with angry resentment towards those who had given her the orders. “He was gonna get away with it, with everything; just because my government wanted another fuckin’ Nazi scientist to help them win the next war against Russia!” The redheaded witch then deflated.

“I couldn’t let him get away with it… after what he did, I couldn’t let him win…” Amanda looked at Diana with defiance, as if daring her to argue that she had done the wrong thing.

Internally, she knew that she should be angry, furious that her Second in Command had effectively just killed an unarmed prisoner. But what she felt was hollow. She had wanted him to die, to see him hang for his crimes as ruled by a court of law; but now it turned out that there would never have been a trial and he would never have faced justice. He would have lived a comfy life paid for by the American taxpayer whilst people like Jasminka and Constanze suffered because of what had happened to them in this cursed place.

She had wanted justice, true justice; but at least now he couldn’t hurt anyone else.

“Ain’t ya gonna say anything, Di?” asked Amanda, unnerved by the silence of the English witch, who instead looked down at the still stunned German woman and asked the first question that now came to mind.

“Are you okay, Constanze?”

The blue haired witch looked up, her expression haunted, before any strength she had crumbled, and tears burst forth as she shook her head.  Akko ran over and, crouching down, wrapped her friend into a comforting hug as with choking gasps of sorrow Constanze buried her face into her friend’s shoulder.

Diana watched the pair for a moment as Amanda joined them in their embrace, then looked over to where Seelmann’s body lay slumped beside the Commandant. His corpse still twitched, but there was no life in his expression anymore. Instead, the face that once had been so cruel and brazen in his arrogance, now lay frozen, and in his now wide, vacant eyes, there was only fear, as if in that final moment, he had realised that he was at last going to answer for all that he had done.

Diana sighed. For better or worse, Stefan Seelmann had been brought to justice.

But still the war raged.

“Come on, the bomber’s will be crossing the German border any moment now,” she said, gently resting her hands upon the shoulders of her friends. She took one last look towards the now lifeless, bloodied body of the Nazi scientist, and still, even in death she could feel nothing but revulsion towards this man who had inflicted such cruel suffering upon those whom she loved. “And with them, they’ll consign this place, and everything within it, to oblivion…”

The witches gathered what they needed, and silently exited the office to make their way to the surface, leaving Seelmann and the commandant alone and unremembered in the cold, silent depths of the base.

It was the sound of gunfire that roused her from her dreamless sleep. Looking around the tiny blackened room that formed her entire world, she tried to make sense of what was going on.

This room was all she knew. The last memory she had before the all-encompassing darkness consumed her was of being sat in her cell at Holloway, making notes for her research. But then, without any recollection of how or why, she was here, in this tiny room with no windows or light and only one exit which was blocked by a heavy metal door. How long she had been here was irrelevant, she could recall no beginning and could foresee no end. 

And she was weak. She had been beaten and starved for as long as she could recall, whilst her only sources of nutrition were a trickle of fetid water that flowed from one end of this cage to the other and the occasional scraps of stale bread that were thrown in after her brutal interrogations.

Despite the muffled sound of gunfire, a vaguely alarming break to the vacuous silence of this place, she was tired, she always was these days, and her eyes began to grow heavy. Sleep was her one consolation, and so she welcomed the exchange of one darkness for another. 

Voices. She could hear voices. Someone crying, someone comforting. She forced her eyes open as her dulled heart began to patter slightly faster. Those voices, why did she know them, why did they bring back the echoes of happier memories? Maybe they could help her, maybe they would save her from this unending darkness. 

She tried to cry out, but all that escaped her lips was a weak rasp of air. 

Maybe she could get to the door and bang against it. She tried to move an arm, to try and drag herself towards her possible salvation, but her body remained stubbornly still. However much she willed it she remained where she was, slumped against one of the four walls that held her here in this unknown place, as much a prisoner in her own body, limp and immobile like a dead weight, as of the man who violently demanded answers she could not provide. 

The voices began to move away, growing fainter with each passing moment until finally silence returned to her tiny, oppressive existence. 

Despite how little she had exerted herself, she suddenly felt drained. And as she closed her eyes which were too parched to shed the tears she felt pricking at them, she thought of the one memory that truly brought her comfort, and allowed her to escape this hell, even if only for a moment. 

"Chariot..." whispered Croix Meridies. 

Chapter Text

Andrew grimaced as another flurry of bullets flew over his head and stitched themselves across the already riddled wall opposite, sending puffs of brick dust sprinkling down upon him and his command party as they huddled behind a stack of sandbags.

The garrison were proving tediously hard to shift. His men had, as far as he could tell, managed to corral them into just the one barrack block, but now they were firmly dug in, creating a makeshift fortress. The defenders had made a couple of attempts to launch a counterattack, sallying forth to take the offensive, but all that that had yielded them were yet more dead bodies to clog the doorways.

So instead, the enemy had resorted to their most basic strategy, waiting. They didn't know that the site was soon to be levelled by a huge air raid, so as far as they were concerned, all they had to do was sit tight and await the inevitable arrival of reinforcements, and as long as they had a controlling position of fire across the route the British attackers would need to use as an exit, and enough ammunition, they would prove to be a deadly hazard to his men. And having already seen at least four of his men die so far, Andrew was unwilling to place them back directly into the line of fire without due cause. If only he could force them out of that damned makeshift stronghold.

Thus, he had called a hurried meeting of his squadron commanders to try and find some means of breaking this impasse. Having exhausted most options, the general consensus now was to smoke them out, like a fox from its den, but the question was how.

Turning to Captain McKenna, the commander of Able Squadron and his number two, Andrew sighed as he smiled in forlorn hope. “I don't suppose the mortar section have any more incendiary rounds left, do they?”

But the Northern Irish officer shook his head grimly. 

“‘Fraid not, they ran out setting the other blocks alight...”

Of course, it was too much to ask, thought Andrew, his smile fading at once.

“And no one's been able to get close enough to get a petrol bomb in...” added Captain Yates, the commander of Baker Squadron, his face painted with as much frustration as any of the others.

Andrew leant back and looked upward towards the skies above, hoping for some form of divine inspiration amongst the stars, but all he beheld were the churning plumes of battle born smoke that choked the skies and blotted out the heavens. Palls of smoke that rose from the fires which the RAF would, before too long, use to guide themselves to their target.

“What about the Witches?” suggested WO1 Hughes, his normally cheerful Valleys voice drained of any mirth and his tone distinctly tentative. “Maybe they've got some spell or other that could shift the buggers?” 

Andrew looked back down to his RSM and blinked, thinking he had been hearing things, before he suddenly remembered that, yes, there were indeed witches on this operation. He had been so caught up in the familiar, gruelling rhythms of battle that he had entirely forgotten the almost fantastical nature of their mission.

He looked about at the group of officers and men surrounding him. Their expressions were a mixture of emotions, but all seemed to regard Hughes' suggestion of entrusting the mission to witchcraft with some degree, lesser or greater, of scepticism. Even he was dubious. Lord knew that he had been reluctant enough to place Diana, his friend and cousin, in harm’s way in the first place, let alone ask her and her witches to now pull off a dangerous feat that they, battle hardened soldiers, had thus far failed to achieve. He didn't even know if William Team had reached their objective as they had carried no radios with them, he simply had to trust in his cousin's leadership abilities.

But time was critical, and each bullet fired from that barrack block could easily end the life of one of his men, so right now, he was prepared to try anything. 

His mind made up, he turned to a huddled group of paratroopers about ten feet away, spotted his man, and shouted, “Corporal Nichols, on me!” 

Hannah wasn’t sure exactly what was in the vial that Sucy held, but whatever it was, it immitted a disturbing hue of luminous green and was clearly intended for Jasminka, beside who’s stretcher the Filipino witch was now knelt, arrayed pots of reagents for potions spread out around her and mixed together in a small pestle and mortar.  

Seeing that the mysterious potion was ready, Lotte, who was knelt behind Jasminka, gently cupped the Russian's head, and lifted it, enabling her to drink the thick, gooey liquid as the vial was raised to her lips.

Jasminka made a face as she swallowed. Hannah had had enough of Sucy's tonics over the years to know that palatability was never one of the potion expert’s considerations, but like they had on those occasions, the strange concoction seemed to have the desired effect, nonetheless. Jasminka's ghostly pale skin swiftly regained some of its colour, and her expression at once seemed less gaunt as she closed her eyes, and her head was lowered back down onto a crude pillow of folded jackets.

Satisfied that Jasminka was as comfortable as she could be, given the circumstances, and deciding that there was nothing more that she could usefully do for the moment, Lotte thumbed her glasses up her nose, then, after an apparent moment of indecision, got gingerly to her feet.

Hannah, who's attention had moved back to her prisoners, jerked slightly at the sudden movement in her periphery, but breathed a sigh of relief when she saw it was only Lotte.

“How many did I miss?” asked the Finn timidly as she slowly approached Barbara, her demeanour one of nervous excitement. 

“Pardon?” asked a momentarily confused Barbara, her battle fogged mind apparently taking a second to catch up. 

“Volumes, how many volumes did I miss?” 

At once Barbara's eyes lit up and a gleeful smile crossed her lips. 

“Only two! She stopped writing in '42,” she replied excitedly. Lotte looked surprised. “Well, since paper is being rationed, she decided she'd wait until the war is finished so she doesn't have to curtail herself. But she’s started a new arc in which Edgar is conscripted and…”

“What are you two talking about?” Hannah interrupted, her gaze half on the two reunited friends. 

“Nightfall!” was the reply from the duo, regarding her incredulously, as if this was obvious and it was completely normal to have a conversation about, in her opinion, frankly subpar literature in the middle of a literal war zone. 

Groaning at her best friend's momentary lapse of concentration, Hannah turned nervously towards the group of witches before her; both those who were being guarded and those doing the guarding. Amanda had gone, vanishing with Constanze after Diana, Akko, and Able Team, leaving her to lead the depleted remnants of the Luna Nova Detachment as they oversaw their prisoners. She eyed her charges, and whilst the other prisoners seemed docile enough, Elina was looking furtively about, her eyes filled with anger at her comrades apparent betrayal, and despite being free of her magical gag, the German witch remained unnervingly quiet, as if silently plotting some means of escape, or worse, revenge.

“Barbara..., I mean, Section Officer Parker?” Hannah asked, calling over to her best friend, hoping to speak to her. 

Barbara acknowledged Hannah, and after excusing herself from her conversation with Lotte, side stepped over towards her, keeping her Sten levelled towards their prisoners, not that either woman felt fully confident in their resolve to use the weapons, the thought of taking life still weighing heavily upon them.

“You okay, Han?” she asked quietly as she stopped next to her friend. 

“We did check Elina to see if she's got any other wands or weapons on her, didn't we?” asked Hannah nervously. 

“Diana supervised, so I want to say, yes... Do you think she might try something?” Barbara replied, her eye also now falling on the blonde haired witch. 

Before Hannah could respond however, there was a subdued call from the alleyway behind them. 

“Broadsword!” 

The two witches turned around to see the edge of a drab green, net covered helmet poking out from around the corner of the building. 

“Claymore!” responded both witches in unison. 

A thin but slightly gangly British paratrooper, accompanied by another pair of soldiers who followed behind, ran around the corner before coming to a halt in front of the pair. Quickly looking at both of their epaulettes, he turned to Hannah as she had two pips on her shoulders, rank insignia he recognised, and stamped to attention. 

“Sorry, you are?” asked Hannah uncertainly, nodding to the young soldier in acknowledgment. 

“Lance Corporal Nichols, Ma'am,” he said with a strange air of breathless excitement. “Compliments of Major Hanbridge...” he relayed between deep breaths, “and he wonders if you might have anything that could help shift a rat infestation from that there barrack block?”

The two friends turned to look questioningly at each other. 

“Any ideaAAAAHH!” both officers yelped in unison and jumped sideways as Sucy materialised without warning between the pair. 

“I might have an idea...” drawled Sucy with uncharacteristic enthusiasm and a wicked grin of jagged teeth, patting the large canvas satchel rested upon her thigh. 

This witch is a right strange one, thought Jack Nichols, following the witch named Sucy as she wound her way through the shadowy thoroughfares of the facility and towards the melee that surrounded the barrack block. 

The darkness of night was, to him, a place of danger, where enemies lurked around every corner, and so he and Privates Jones and Pratt, who followed closely behind him, moved as tactically and as stealthily as they could, always alert for even the slightest indication of the Hun. But this witch seemed to own the night, walking, no, gliding confidently along the darkened alleyways without a care in the world, tall and proud. And in return the darkness seemed to envelop and cloak her, as the light from the moon and the fires seemed to fall everywhere but upon her, and Jack feared that if he took his eyes off of her for even a second, he might lose sight of her.

Indeed, even the way she walked was strange, for it seemed like she was covering ground faster than her feet could possibly propel her. He and his fellow soldiers were scurrying along, but she seemed to be moving as though she were out for a Sunday stroll.

Then there were her teeth, jagged and menacing. She had grinned at him as they set off, and in that frankly unnerving moment, he realised that this must have been what it was like to look into the maw of a recently fed lion. You know he has eaten, but you can’t help but wonder if he has saved room for seconds.

The noise of battle was becoming louder, and the cracks of rifle fire sharper, and now he could make out the barks of orders being given as they neared the skirmish’s epicentre.

And sure enough, as they emerged from around a warehouse they ducked down behind an abandoned car, the windows of which were now long shot out, and were presented with the chaotic scene unfurling on the site. Tracer was exchanged between the defenders and attackers, who had spread out in a ring surrounding the building, using what cover they could take, yet Nichols found his attention drawn to a group of medics who were working frantically on a soldier whose khaki battledress was black with blood, a slick trail of which marked where they had dragged him into cover. 

The witch took one look at the man, who's teeth bit into his lip against the pain, and shook her head. "He's not long for this world..." she stated offhandedly. Jack should have been angered that she was writing a colleague off so quickly, but there was no malice in her voice, she was speaking a truth, regardless of whether others wanted to hear it. 

 "So, the Germans are in there, huh?" She asked, turning back to him. Jack nodded. "And you want me to get them out?" Jack nodded again.

"The Boss gave you creative licence to do what you thought necessary..."

Sucy nodded and crouching down, opened up her satchel and produced a yellow fluid filled vial capped by a cork. Removing the stopper, she retrieved another bag of some unknown substance, took a pinch full, and sprinkled it into the vial, then resealed it. Reaching into the pocket of her trousers, she removed a metal rod which extended into a wand with two pronged ends and began to mutter something. The end of the wand glowed red, as did the contents of the vial. She then spun the glass vessel, letting the contents mix and blend, and as it swirled, Jack could have sworn he saw flames flickering within the spiralling liquid.

"What in god's name is that?" whispered Pratt over his shoulder.

"A sneaky little trick..." Grinned the witch, her shark like teeth, coupled with the sinister smile, once again making Jack's skin crawl.

"But how's she gonna get it in? The distance is way too far to throw..." hissed Jones.

"Magic you idiot," replied Pratt, whom Nichols had always regarded as slightly faster on the up take than his friend, rolling his eyes.

The conversation was abruptly silenced however by the horrifying sound of cracking bones from behind them, and spinning around, Jack gawped at the unnerving sight of Sucy rolling her head around at an angle that should otherwise be impossible for the human vertebrae to accomplish without permanent spinal damage. Having apparently sated whatever crick was in her neck, the witch’s head snapped sharply back upright, and then with an expression that he could only describe as somehow both excited and bored, she nodded to him, “Well, here goes nothing…” she drawled.

Then, without a care for the bullets that would occasionally streak over the ruined car, the witch stood up in plain view of the barrack block and began to move across the open ground between the car and towards the enemy’s fortress. For a moment Nichols watched her, as if in a daze, before his brain suddenly jerked him awake and he swore. “CHRIST! COVER!”

The Lance Corporal scrabbled to his feet and set off in pursuit of the witch, something telling him that, as he had been the one sent to fetch her, he should also make sure that she made it back to the CO (although another part of him was screaming that he was a bloody fool), whilst both Pratt and Jones brought their weapons to rest on the chipped body of the car and at once began to provide a vicious spray of bullets to cover his mad dash towards the witch.

A witch who, once again seemed to have nary a care in the world.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, almost irritably, as he caught up with her.

“Making sure you don’t bloody well get yourself killed!” he retorted. The witch sighed and nodded towards the wand that she held extended before her, and at once Nichols became aware of a strange sheen that seemed to blur his view of the barrack block towards which they were advancing.

“What is that?” he asked, both slightly unnerved to be in such close proximity to magic and trying to distract himself from the abject terror of being in open ground without cover in the middle of one of the worst firefights he had ever experienced. Again, the witch sighed.

“A perceptionary deflection shield,” she said, as if having to repeat a basic concept he should have known since he was a child. “It doesn’t make us invisible; it just renders us harder to see, and makes people’s eyes want to look elsewhere…”

So that was why she seemed to blend into the darkness earlier, he thought to himself.

Whilst he still could not claim to fully understand what she meant, whatever she was doing seemed to be working as, despite prolonged moments when they were completely exposed as they moved between the scant few features that could offer them even the most meagre amount of cover, the German defenders seemed to completely ignore them, instead concentrating their fire on the rest of the attackers.

The side of the building was getting closer; they were less than fifteen feet away, almost within touching distance, and still none of the garrison seemed to have even noticed them. But then, from a window directly above them, a German leaned around a corner with a rifle in hand and seemed to stare directly at them. Nichols’ breath caught in his throat as the German’s brow furrowed and he blinked, as if trying to refocus his own vision, his mind and his eyes fighting to form a cohesive thought, and very quickly, despite whatever magic the witch was using, it became apparent that he had become aware of them, even if he was still struggling to fully comprehend them. Sucy seemed to notice this as well, stopping dead in her tracks. The witch swore, and at once the blurring effect of the shield seemed to disappear, as if broken.

The enemy soldier’s eyes widened, and Nichols watched in horror as hurriedly the German brought the butt plate of his rifle into his shoulder, ready to aim, as he prepared himself to quickly push the witch to the ground. But no sooner had the German soldier rested his cheek upon the wooden stock, than his head was suddenly snatched backwards, and his body seemingly pulled away from the window and into the darkness. Turning around Nichols saw Pratt, still crouched behind the ruined car, give him a thumbs up, before quickly returning to providing them with covering fire.

Rid of this particular enemy, the two made a final dash towards the barrack block where Nichols collapsed with a sigh of relief against the comfortingly solid brick wall. No one else seemed to have noticed them, and luckily, with the charm now broken, he thought he heard above the constant tumult of gunfire an order being given to concentrate fire to the upper floors, lest any errant rounds hit them by mistake.

“What’re you gonna do?” he asked slightly breathlessly as he crouched down beside the witch, his Lee Enfield aimed upwards towards a window close by.

“This,” was her reply as she lifted the vial to her lips and began to whisper something. He could not divine the meaning of the words being spoken, but he recognised her tone which had the same cadence as a prayer or mantra being recited by heart, and he knew for certain that he was witnessing true magic at work. And sure enough, the vial, which already had an ominous fiery hue to it, began to glow with the warm light of a raging inferno, and indeed the liquid within the glass tube now looked like a fire storm as it swirled inside, the burning liquid seeming to lash out as though it was trying to escape its narrow confines.

Satisfied with her product, the witch looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “Have you got your gasmask?” she asked, a question which Nichols really did not want to be hearing right now, but he nodded anyway. “Then I suggest you put it on…” she replied with another one of her wicked grins. Jack did not need to be told twice, immediately dropping his weapon to hurriedly dig his respirator from his webbing. He removed his helmet and had just finished tightening the rubber mask around his face, when the witch threw the vial high into the air, then aimed her wand at it. Horrified, Jack’s eyes followed the vial upwards and then down as it began to fall back to earth, but before it could reach them, it suddenly halted in midair beside a shattered window on the second floor as if caught by an invisible floating hand, an ethereal blue glow enveloping it. Sucy flicked her wand, and the vial responded, vanishing from sight as it flew through the partially open window. And amidst the sound of gunfire, Jack could just hear the faint tinkling sound of glass breaking as the vial shattered.

For one rather anticlimactic moment nothing seemed to happen, and Nichols was about to ask what should be happening when a panicked voice yelled from above, “Feuer… FEUER!” Terrified shouting erupted from the second story as chaos seemed to take hold of the defenders. What the hell did she do? Jack wondered to himself; his field of vision restricted by the panes of the mask.

Suddenly, another second floor windowpane about five meters away from them exploded outwards, sending a shower of glass shards flying as through it flew the body of a man who fell screaming to the ground below, hitting it with a tremendous thud and a sickening crackling sound as he landed on the glass shards.

Collapsing backwards away from the man, and into the witch, Nichols swore in surprise, before instinctively aiming his weapon at the new arrival. But the man, a Luftwaffe officer, did not comprehend them, and was certainly no threat as he instead writhed about on the ground, screaming incoherently, seemingly oblivious to the dagger like glass that dug into him as he rolled around, batting at himself with bloody shredded hands as if fighting invisible flames, whilst his face contorted into a visage of utterly unimaginable agony.

Then, before Nichols had a chance to even think, the officer reached down to his waist, tore his pistol from its holster, placed it to his temple and, without a single moment of hesitation, pulled the trigger, at once stilling his frantic spasming as the ground around him was covered in viscera.

For a moment the two Allied soldiers stood stock still, shocked to have just watched a man so hastily kill himself.

"What happened to him?" said Nichols, looking down at the still twitching dead soldier. 

Sucy passed him, leant down and, to his surprise, sniffed the corpse, before studying his face.

"The vial contained a neurotoxin that alters the victims perception of reality; in this case making them think that there is now a raging inferno in front of them, even though there isn’t. And of course, because it isn’t real, no matter how hard they try, they cannot put it out…” she explained with a slightly smug air of triumph. “He must have been right next to the vial when it shattered and inhaled too much of it, making his brain believe that not only was there a fire…" she carried on calmly as she continued to study with particular interest the man's head. "But that he himself was on fire, and his brain then told his nervous system to feel the pain of burning alive, and so his brain was left with only one way to stop that pain; kill itself." Sucy looked up from the dead German and stared at Nichols with an unnerving smile. "I just tricked a man's own body into killing itself... Fascinating!"

Nichols stepped back, a sickening feeling sweeping over him as she so coldly spoke of death. He had seen death many times, and many times he had inflicted it. But that was just part of the job, he took no pleasure from it, he did not like the knowledge that he had ended a life, but that was the reality of war, kill or be killed. But this witch seemed to treat this death like the death of a lab rat, a necessary sacrifice in the pursuit of personal knowledge. And that cold, unreadable smile chilled him to the core.

"W-what the fuck is wrong with you?!" he gasped breathlessly with the filter.  

 But the witch merely shrugged her shoulders. The sounds of panic within were spreading from one floor to the next as the men inside manically fought to escape the fire which they believed with all their hearts was raging on the second floor. The gunfire from the defenders had all but ceased, and instead most were shouting, jostling as officers and NCOs tried to regain some semblance of control before, they too succumbed to the effects of the toxin.

“Well, judge me however you want,” said Sucy, getting to her feet and brushing the dirt from off of her knees as Jack Nichols took another nervous step backwards. Her wand was still extended. “But I’d say that that’s your rat infestation dealt with…”

“What in God’s name is going on in there?” asked Yates as the group of officers watched on in confusion.

“I have no idea…” replied Andrew, transfixed by the sudden development within the barrack block. “But I just heard one of them scream fire, so I’d wager that there’s suddenly more pressing matters within than without!” The sounds of gunfire dropped away as all began to watch, and through the almost deafening silence that the sudden cease fire left they could hear the fear that had gripped the Germans.

Men were shouting incoherently, some almost madly, as the occupants milled around, like the swarm of a beehive set alight. Andrew heard the whooshing sounds of fire extinguishers being discharged. And as if to confirm the notion that there was a fire, an alarm bell began to ring out, apparently activated by one of the defenders.

Yet strangely, Andrew could see no sign of a fire within, no more flames than those that already wreathed the building from those barracks already set alight, and at once he knew that somehow, something magical was afoot. He had seen two figures move from cover towards the building, and whilst he could not make out the individual who had moved in front, he had recognised the gangly figure of Lance Corporal Nichols, and therefore deduced that he had successfully found the witches of William Team, and that one of them was now in charge.

The commotion continued, but despite the efforts of the garrison to suppress the apparent fire, they seemed to be losing the battle, indeed, it seemed to be spreading. A man appeared at the door of the barracks, only to be met with the sight of dozens of weapons being aimed at him, and in an act of desperation, tore his white shirt from off of his back and shook it in front of him in a pitiful display of peace, scared to step over the bodies that clogged the doorway as more terrified faces appeared behind him. 

Andrew felt a dozen eyes turn to him from within his own ranks.

“Let them out!” he shouted as loudly as he could. “But if any man comes out of there with a weapon, drop him!” He then turned to the Germans and barked “Komm mit erhobenen Händen heraus!”

The German’s face was awash with relief as he nodded, and with his makeshift white flag still in hand, hurriedly rushed through the doorway, followed by dozens of others, as the garrison began to egress to the apparent sudden safety of the area that, until a few minutes ago, had been a killing zone.

“Able Squadron, move up and secure the prisoners, Baker cover,” ordered McKenna beside him, and Andrew breathed a sigh of relief as, one by one, the remaining Germans made their way out and into the custardy of the awaiting SAS. It was only once the Germans, many of whom were still dressed only in their pyjamas, were a good distance away from the building that they looked back, and even across the distance of twenty foot or more, in the light from the burning buildings beyond, Andrew could see the faces of the now prisoners turn from looks of relief, to confusion, and finally horrified comprehension as they realised that there was no fire, and that somehow, for some reason, they had just fled from a perfectly safe strongpoint, and into the arms of the enemy. But even as a few spun around to stare into the faces of the British with defiance renewed within themselves, Andrew could see the fight leave them as the soldiers of the SAS, the sworn enemies of the Nazi Reich, and especially the SS, surrounded them, and gradually, reluctantly, the crowd of confused prisoners became a forest of raised hands as one by one, they all surrendered.

There was still much to do; wounded to treat, ID tags to recover, Charlie Squadron to contact, prisoners to sort and possible pockets of resistance to mop up. But for now, Andrew felt some of the tension lift from his shoulders, for the fighting was over, and for the most part, the battle was done.

Chapter Text

The mood was sombre as the six witches, Diana, Akko, Amanda, and Constanze, along with Mary and Morag, silently made their way up the stairs and back to the surface.

To say that Diana was conflicted was to state the obvious, yet as to what she was most conflicted over was much harder to pin down. Her mission was to extract and bring to England both Constanze and Seelmann, yet she had stood by and watched as one killed the other in cold blood, in an act of vengeance that was nothing short of an extrajudicial execution.

Through long sleepless nights she had convinced herself that, if it came to it, she could take a life if it were in self-defence. But in that moment, the man killed had posed no immediate threat to them, unarmed as he was, and instead he had merely taunted them, making a mockery of the misery he had inflicted.

Every bit of her being that believed in justice, true justice within the eyes of the law, had mentally screamed out to stop Constanze, and yet she did nothing. Worse, as she had watched the bullets tear his chest to shreds, she had felt glad, relieved even, as if some evil had been lifted from the world. Surely that in itself was wrong, to revel in the death of another, no matter how much they deserved it.

And then there was Atsuko Kagari. For the best part of four years, anger towards the woman had built up in her heart, no matter how much she had tried to forget her. It manifested itself as a loathing that had festered and grown like a cancer, corrupting any happy memories, until all that remained was cold, bitter hatred. A hatred that had in turn become the fuel that had stoked the fires in her soul, driving her to become someone whom she barely recognised, a soldier who carried not a wand into battle, but a gun, a weapon made with the sole purpose of ending life. She had hardened herself and shut away the foolish notions of romance and of being soulmates that she had once so naively believed. And yet this woman had unabashedly declared her love for her in the face of evil, stopping her from crossing a line from which there was no returning. And in that moment, when all she should have felt was rage, a flame she thought was long snuffed out seemed to flare, even if only for a moment.

Everything was a contradiction and she felt as though she wanted to scream. But she did not, because she knew that if she did, she would be unable to do what needed to be done, which was to forget about herself, and to get her team, her friends, safely home to England.

The climb up the stairs seemed to take an age, and by the time they reached the ground floor Diana was feeling both physically and emotionally drained, meaning that it was only as they stepped out of the headquarters building and into the alleyway, that at last she noticed the absence of gunfire. Maybe it was because she had been so distracted by her own inner turmoil, but most likely, she decided, it was because of the continued dull ringing in her ears from Constanze’s bloody fusillade.

Hannah and Barbara appeared at once, gathering around the newly emerged group.

“What’s happening? Is it over?” Diana asked, looking around with uncertainty. The members of Luna Nova Detachment had now been joined by a section of male paratroopers. The Special Forces men hung back slightly, away from the witches, regarding both them, and their prisoners, with apparent suspicion and unease, but whatever may have transpired to cause this attitude, Diana was thankful to see reinforcements at hand.

“Andrew sent some Lance Jack to find us, and he went off with Sucy…” Hannah began to explain.

“…Then a few minutes later, the shooting stopped and now the Germans have apparently surrendered!” finished Barbara, with a sense of relief.

Hannah then looked around at the freshly resurfaced group and frowned. “Did you find Seelmann?” she asked, clearly noticing his conspicuous absence. Diana nodded grimly. Hannah then looked apprehensively over towards Amanda, who had joined Constanze beside Jasminka’s stretcher, and any sense of relief vanished as she swallowed nervously, pausing for a moment before asking with a shaking voice, “did Amanda find him too?”

“Yes…” Diana answered slowly, at once eliciting a pained look from Hannah. “But it was Constanze who pulled the trigger…”

“Right, Constanze…” Hannah trailed off distractedly. Some of the worry had left her eyes, but she still looked unconvinced.

Diana frowned. Perhaps she had seen Amanda provide Constanze with the weapon used to kill Seelmann, or perhaps she simply did not believe her. There were a lot of unknowns about Amanda’s time after Luna Nova, but it was common knowledge that her family were involved in organised crime. And there were rumours. Rumours about the American’s role within the New York crime family which even a girl as smitten as Hannah England could not easily dismiss.

Fortunately, Barbara also seemed to notice Hannah’s disquiet, and came over to speak quietly with her, taking her to one side so that they faced the wall and away from the rest of the unit, allowing Diana a moment to catch up with events.

Despite the death of their primary objective, they had achieved their secondary, which meant that all they had to do now was gather what technological intelligence they could, then prevent anything else from falling into either enemy, or Soviet, hands. Fortunately, with the fighting now apparently over, this task would prove easier to facilitate, especially with Constanze on hand to guide them, as it was her work in particular that military intelligence and the Boffins wanted. That just left the matter of the other prisoners.

Lotte and Akko she would keep with her. The Fin she knew she could trust implicitly. And as much as the hurt and angry voice inside her head told her not to, she was likewise reasonably sure that she could trust the Japanese witch not to try anything, although what that anything was, she was no longer quite so certain of. Indeed, many things about her former lover that, less than an hour ago, she had thought as true as the sky being blue, were now being called into question. Besides, even if Kagari did suddenly change attitude and tried to escape or fight her, she could easily subdue her, grumbled the unbidden voice of hatred from within, fighting to remain in control.

But then there was the matter of Elina.  

Taking a moment to observe her Diana was, like the rest of her team, under the distinct impression that she was planning something, and she doubted that, were she to send her away with the regular soldiers, they would be able to handle her if she did indeed try to use magic, even without a wand for casting. There was nothing for it, she would have to take the scowling witch with her.

Turning to the paratroopers, she spotted a corporal and called out, summoning him over.

“Corporal, you will take those prisoners,” she said, indicating towards the group of male technicians in their coats and pyjamas, “and bring them to the RV point, ready for evacuation. We will take the remainder and move to secure what intelligence we can.”

The SAS NCO frowned, clearly annoyed at the idea of taking orders from a woman, a sentiment that Diana was neither surprised by, nor willing to let stop her.

“The young Russian on the stretcher will also need treatment. Please take her with you and find one of my witches named Manbavaran, she will be able to tend to her,” she added officiously, falling back on her days as both the Head Girl of Luna Nova and head nurse in a hospital of young, and at times boisterous, nurses to control the situation. The NCO looked like he was about to say something, no doubt trying to test the limits of her authority, but Diana stifled him with a short, “Carry on, Corporal.”

With that she spun on her heel and, stepping off at a brisk march, began to issue orders to the members of Luna Nova Detachment, leaving the Corporal to shrug his shoulders and fulfil her directions, detailing a couple of the technicians to pick up Jasminka’s stretcher. However, no sooner had the two German prisoners picked up the ends of the brooms which formed the makeshift stretcher (and indeed, only two were needed as she was so terribly light), then it became apparent to Constanze that she was once again going to have to part from her Russian friend. Her shoulders squared and she looked determinedly at Amanda, as if challenging her to separate them.

Diana saw her desperate glare, and thought to try and intervene, to explain the situation and the need for her help, but without a moment’s hesitation Amanda was with her, and guided her towards the now carried stretcher, where Constanze at once seized Jasminka’s hand.

Diana could not hear what passed between the trio, or at least, she chose not to, as this was between them. Even the two technicians holding the stretcher tried their best to be elsewhere, despite having to remain awkwardly close to the three witch’s private conversation. Whatever was said had the desired effect however, as Constanze did not resist as she stood and watched Jasminka being carried away under the escort of the male paratroopers, the other prisoners, with the exception of Elina, following on. However, the pain in her expression as she watched Jasminka disappear from sight was obvious.

Elina on the other hand remained stood by the wall, glaring at the other witches, Constanze in particular, and once again Diana was struck by the premonition that she was going to try something dangerous.

“Sergeant O’Neil,” she said, attracting the attention of Amanda, who was still stood reassuringly beside Constanze, who’s gaze in turn remained forlornly fixed down the now empty alleyway, as if praying Jasminka would miraculously appear around the corner once more. Amanda patted Constanze on the shoulder, then walked over to Diana. “When we move,” said Diana. “I want you to keep a close eye on Elina, make sure she doesn’t do anything foolish…”

Amanda nodded, turned to face the other German witch, and gently let her right hand come to rest upon the top of her Thompson. One corner of her mouth curled upward, forming a wicked grin that said more than any threat ever could, and momentarily caused Elina’s stern demeanour to faulter. Diana did consider saying something snide about making sure that Elina made it back to England alive, but somehow the desire to make a flippant comment failed to materialise, thus she left the American to guard the defiant Nazi witch.

With the rest of her team now organised, and with Constanze, who seemed to understand what was being asked of her, at the front of their patrol, the members of Luna Nova set off through the site which was now well lit by the flames which had engulfed the barracks. British soldiers were starting to appear more frequently as patrols spread out to explore the site, checking for any hidden resistance, and so Diana had to halt the patrol several times to call out their security phrases, assuring the men that they were friendly. This slowed their progress slightly, but eventually Constanze led them to the side doors of a large, darkened hangar, at the entrance of which were already stood a pair of Paratroopers, who regarded Constanze with mixed curiosity and wariness, stood at the front of their column as she was. 

“She’s with us,” assured Amanda, stepping around her. This seemed to appease the two men, who confirmed that they’d done an initial sweep of the building and encountered no resistance. Stepping aside, Constanze pushed the two double doors open, and led them inside.

Without the lights on, the vast open space of the hanger was a void that left Diana feeling extremely exposed as Constanze led them across its smooth polished floor, the sounds from outside echoing in the strangely chilly air of the huge metal structure. And through the gloom, picked out only by the dimmed glow of the fires, Diana could make out the darkened shapes of aircraft. Some she could just about recognise from her aircraft recognition training; a Messerschmitt BF109, a Stuka, and a Focke Wulf 190, all of which were in various states of disassembly, stripped so that they might be infused with magically engineered components.

But there were other strange looking aircraft that she had never seen before, including a sleek, pointed aircraft that reminded her of a shark for some reason. They had an engine on either wing, yet no propellers, nor even the fittings for them, only large air intakes in their place. Yet of all the aircraft, there was one that looked the strangest of all. It had a single cockpit in the centre, flanked by two large engines, but only a single broad wing which swept backwards to a tail that tapered off without a rudder. It looked like nothing she had seen before, almost too smooth to look real, indeed, it looked like something from a fantasy film, otherworldly and alien.

“Jet fighters,” said Akko, following Diana’s gaze. “They’re fast, like, even faster than the Shooting Star!”

“I heard tell that they’ve been running rings around our fighter escorts…” muttered Amanda, her gaze likewise falling on the aircraft which, even when stationary, looked fast.

Passing the line of aircraft, Constanze led them to a side office which she unlocked, letting herself in first, before flicking on the lights, which clinked on in disjointed succession. Following her, Diana found herself stood in a workshop-cum-drawing office, where near enough every surface was covered with either lumps of machinery and tools, or layers upon layers of blueprints and technical drawings of aircraft components, with more apparently hidden away in stacks of flat draws. Curious, she glanced over towards one of the drawings on a nearby desk. It was titled: Zeichnungsnummer 6721D: Design für Schraubenkopf für Querruder.

The large paper sheet bore two drawings, both of a bolt head, one showing it from above, the other in profile. Around each of these drawings were a dozen or more annotations, presumably noting different adjustments to the design when compared to previous iterations.

Seeing that there were other drawings below, Diana lifted up the sheet to be presented with a drawing that was, to all intents and purposes, a carbon copy of the one on top of it, except that this time it was titled; Zeichnungsnummer 6721C: Design für Schraubenkopf für Querruder. It was obviously an earlier draft of the design, but as far as Diana could see there was literally no difference between the two technical drawings aside from a few different annotations.

“Constanze, are you alright?” asked the worried voice of Lotte behind them.

Diana turned around to find the blue haired German witch still stood by the doorway. Her breathing was noticeably controlled, and as she looked over the contents of the office, Diana realised why. This was her life’s work. For better or for worse what she had been doing here was her dream, to create machines that combined magic and technology, and now Diana was telling her to decimate it.

Stepping over to join her, she placed a hand gently upon Constanze’s shoulder. “I know this is hard,” she said, as sympathetically as she could. “But we have little time. Gather what you can, what you think is most important, and then we need to leave…”

Constanze took a deep breath, then at once snatched up an empty carboard folder and set about sorting through the stacks of papers.

Rattle, rattle, cling.

A tin can rolled out from behind a work bench in the corner, knocking against a wooden stall, and at once both Diana and Amanda’s guns flew up towards the source of the commotion. Her pulse began to race. Someone else was in the room.

“I’ll give ya ‘til the counta five…” growled Amanda to the unseen party, not bothering to even try speaking in German, instead letting the tone of her voice, which sounded increasingly like something out of a Western, do the talking. “One…” she began. At once an open pair of hands shot up. “On your feet!”

Complying without hesitation, a thin young man with ruffled blonde hair and an anxious expression, dressed in a set of oil stained blue overalls, slowly stood up from behind the workbench, regarding the intruders nervously until his eyes fell upon Constanze, who sighed with exasperation, then folded her arms.

“Stan?” said Akko, looking in confusion at the man, but his gaze remained fixed upon Constanze, who managed to simultaneously scowl and cock an eyebrow at him.

"Well I didn't know it was you!" He said rapidly, apparently in answer to an unspoken question from her.

Constanze began to tap her foot. "..."

"I know you told me to go home, but I just wanted to finish off those drawings for the starboard spar..."

"..."

"I got scared, I thought it might have been the Red Army...!" he cried. The young man sounded genuinely terrified of this notion, and seeing his feared expression, Diana realised that he could not have been a day over seventeen.

“Who is he?” asked Amanda, turning to Akko.

“His name’s Stanislaw Vilk, but we all call him Stan,” answered Akko. “He’s a Polish kid who kind of became Constanze’s unofficial apprentice…”

As the one sided conversation, which had transcended into fraught Polish, continued, Diana took the opportunity to further explore the workshop, almost every surface of which was covered in papers and mechanical workings. Yet tucked away in one corner, squeezed between filing cabinets, was a broken old couch on which were a few cushions and a rather ragged looking tartan blanket, all bundled together in a disorganised heap that Diana could describe only as a nest. This, Diana surmised, must be where Constanze came to rest when the long hours of designing became too much even for the fastidious mechanic. And there, above the couch, stuck to the wall by a few peeling strips of sticky tape, was a tattered old photograph. It’s surface was lined with creases from folding, but upon closer inspection Diana found it to be a group photograph of Constanze, Amanda, and Jasminka, huddled together on a summer’s day in the shade of the Glastonbury Abbey ruins, smiling joyously in the world, in the carefree days of their youth.

How often had Constanze, near exhaustion, looked at that photograph as she huddled on the couch, Diana wondered, and used it as a stimulant to keep herself pushing the point of physical and mental burnout further and further, desperately fighting to save her most beloved friend. All the while churning out new designs that would appease, not only Seelmann, but also her own innate and obsessive compulsion to strive for perfection. Looking then at Constanze, who was now busy gathering up a few papers with Stanislaw, she noticed for the first time the deep blue bags beneath her eyes, and wondered when she had last taken a day off?

She stepped back and looked at the worn photograph and the couch, the one item of comfort and humanity in the otherwise wholly utilitarian room. There was something overwhelmingly sad about the scene, especially when she imagined the German witch curled up under that tattered blanket, trying desperately to get just enough sleep to sustain her for a few hours more.

Diana turned and watched as Constanze frantically rifled through her papers and designs, quickly looking at one, then discarding it, before picking out another and putting it into the large folder which Stanislaw was now carrying. For a few minutes the pair hurried around, sorting through a lifetime’s worth of work, until at last Constanze deftly placed one final blueprint into the folder, nodded, and let Stanislaw close it, sealing away this chapter of her life.

“A single folder? Conzy, are you sure that’s all you need?” asked Amanda, looking at the folder, which wasn’t even bulging.

Constanze nodded firmly, but it was the type of definitive confirmation that a person gave when they really were not certain, but wanted the business over and done with before the pain became any worse. From her belt, Constanze drew her wand, and indicated to the others that they should leave the room.

“The designs she took,” explained Stanislaw, as they filed out, “those are the one’s she is proudest of. The others, they are for war. But those, they can be used for peace…”

Once everyone had left the office, Constanze walked over to the broken old couch, draped the tattered blanket over one arm and took the photograph from off of the wall, tucking it into her breast pocket where it would be safe, close to her heart. Then she stepped into the doorway, her wand extended before her. She took one look around, at the countless drawings and designs that she had crafted over years, and with one silent spell, set them all ablaze. Fire burst forth from her wand and like a whirlwind spiralled around the room, engulfing the papers in flames. Then she slammed the door shut, turning the sealed room into a furnace from which nothing could escape, and with her eyes fixed determinedly ahead, she walked away.

“Constanze, are you alright?” asked Lotte once again, hurrying after her, but the German witch simply nodded to the Fin, neither confirming nor denying how she felt.

Passing the sinister silhouettes of the experimental aircraft, Diana hoped she could breathe slightly easier as they emerged from the hangar, but the air was thick with the stench of burning wood and the skies above were orange as the glow from the fire illuminated the billowing clouds of smoke.

As they regrouped outside of the hangar, Diana spied the two male paratroopers who had hung around uncertainly. “You two will lead the way back towards the rest of your squadron,” she said, addressing the pair. One soldier turned to the other, shrugged, and began to lead the way.

A loud burst of gunfire rang out to their right, at once sending the whole group scurrying for cover. Diana could just make out voices, shouting in German, and could hear the distinctive chatter of a Schmeisser, which was soon joined by the rattle of Sten Guns. It appeared that not all of the enemy garrison had been either killed or captured.

“Should we engage?” asked Amanda, removing the magazine from her Thompson, and checking the ammunition within. But Diana shook her head.

“Andrew’s men are more than capable of dealing with them…” she replied. “We should move on.”

On their feet once more, the party were one by one traversing a gap between two buildings, when suddenly, Diana heard a commotion behind her, and turning around, watched in horror as Elina, her restraints destroyed and a wand in hand, broke away from the party and sprinted down the alleyway. Towards the gunfire.

“STOP HER!” barked Amanda, and at once the other witches drew their wands. But just as they readied to stop her flight with magic, Diana saw in her peripheral vision the muzzles of the two weapons of the paratroopers rise and take aim at the retreating witch.

“No, don’t shoot!” she quickly yelled, stopping the two soldiers who looked at her with shock. There was a burst of slashing sounds as the other witches began to loose off restraining spells. But the German witch threw up defensive spells behind her, deflecting each attempt to stop her. Then, twisting slightly and firing from under her left arm, Diana watched as a burst of yellow light flew from Elina’s wand and straight at her own, wrenching her familial wand from her hand, which felt like it had been struck by lightning. Diana winced, but the pain had already gone.

Looking back towards the increasingly distant figure of Elina, she was just in time to watch as a German soldier appeared at the end of the alley. He was wearing an SS uniform, and his face was fixed in a manic, demented expression as he held his MP40 at his side.

“Kamerad, kamerad, hilf mir!” shouted Elina, sprinting towards the enemy fighter. But where Elina saw salvation, Diana at once saw mad hatred.

“ELINA!” she cried out, but it was too late. The German swore, and gun swinging down the alleyway towards the approaching witch, he fired from the hip.

Elina, realising too late her mistake, screwed her eyes shut and yelled out as she felt the searing pain of a bullet passing through her body.

Yet only one bullet had hit her, for the rest hung in the air before the witch who now lay crumpled on the ground, clutching at the bullet wound that had torn her arm, caught in mid-air as if frozen in time. Beside Diana, Constanze and Amanda stood, wands aimed down the alley, their brows furrowed in concentration as they fought to maintain the spell against the onslaught of lead.

Click, click.

Despite the continued tugging of the trigger, the German’s weapon fell silent and for a moment he stared incredulously at it, before some remaining part of his training shouted through the fog of madness and told him to reload the weapon.

As the German hurriedly let the magazine drop from the weapon and he reached for a new one, the shield holding the bullets dissipated, sending the bullets clattering to the ground, allowing an opening which the two paratroopers swiftly exploited, gunning the SS soldier down in a hail of bullets.

“Clear!” came a shout from one of the men, and at once Diana sprinted towards Elina, who lay writhing on the ground, eyes streaming and teeth biting at her lower lip so hard that the skin was turning white.

“Let me see the wound,” said Diana, at once reverting to her medical training. Elina opened her bloodshot eyes and looked uncertainly at Diana, but the blonde haired witch smiled encouragingly. Thus, she removed her hand, sticky with blood, and allowed Diana to inspect the wound. To her immense relief, it quickly became apparent that, whilst the bullet had torn through her arm, it had miraculously avoided any of the arteries or bone, instead grazing the surface so to speak, leaving a gouge in her arm about half an inch deep.

“You’ll live,” said Diana, although it was apparent from Elina’s expression that she was not as confident of the prognosis.

“Will you help me?” she asked meekly.

“Of course,” replied Diana, almost, but not entirely, surprised by the question from the reluctant prisoner as she began to get to work treating the wound. The first thing she had to do was stop the bleeding, luckily with a combination of bandages, and a touch of magic to help congeal the blood in a localised area, she was swiftly able to perform treatment enough to last her until they got back to England. Then she gave her a half shot of morphine, just enough to stem the pain for now.

“Why are you helping me?” asked Elina as Diana worked diligently away, her voice filled with self-pity, her eyes on the ground, unable to look any of her sister witches in the eye.

“Because, whatever else you might be, you are a witch first and foremost…” replied Diana as she tied off the dressing in a tight knot and cut the bandage with the small pair of scissors from her medical kit. Elina looked at her, eyes still welling with tears. “And because once, I thought of you as a friend…” she added off handedly, letting the faintest glimmer of a smile crease her lips.

And that much was true. When they had first met back in 1934, she hadn't been a party member, instead she had been a timid but likable girl with great skill as a witch, skills which Diana had truly respected. It was only after the summer holidays of 1935 however, that had seen her transformed into an ardent fascist. Gone was the small smile, replaced by hate filled rhetoric. But here and now, she just looked like a scared young woman, no, girl, who had thrown her lot in with a bad bunch and was now reaping the consequences.

“Besides, it isn’t me you should be thanking, but those two…” she added, nodding her head towards Constanze and Amanda, who stood looking slightly triumphant. “They were the ones who saved your life, even if they had more cause to let you get yourself killed than anyone else alive…” her tone had become reproachful, and it seemed as though Elina was swiftly learning her lesson.

“Danke…” whispered Elina in a small voice, the embarrassment of her predicament clear for any who chose to hear, including Amanda, who smirked as she approached the pair, clearly enjoying the sight of the Nazi witch getting her comeuppance.

“Ma’am, we should get moving,” she said behind her, making no attempt to hide the amusement in her voice. Diana looked at her watch; it was indeed fast approaching the hour when they need to have evacuated the site in order to allow them sufficient time to make it to the exfiltration point at the airfield.

“Quite so,” she agreed, and got to her feet. Once up, she offered Elina a hand, but the other witch declined, getting to her feet, apparently unwilling to discard any more of her dignity, even if it did mean she winced in pain as she was forced to put pressure on the wound.

With all parties assembled and the two paratroopers once again ready to lead the way, Diana nodded at Amanda.

“Luna Nova Detachment, let us move.”

Chapter Text

Organised chaos greeted the witches of Luna Nova Detachment as they were led into the central plaza of the now gutted research and development site. Fires from the various buildings illuminated the open area almost as effectively as any artificial lighting ever could, and even the smallest of objects now cast long shadows across the tarmacked ground.

Soldiers hurried about, completing the myriad tasks being delegated by their various officers and NCOs, appearing only as fleeting figures that streaked through the flickering light and shadows. Yet of all the orders being given, Diana realised that the loudest were, oddly enough, being issued in harsh, if crude, German.

Following the direction of the barked commands, her eyes fell upon a large group of German soldiers who stood huddled in the centre of the open plaza, shepherded at gunpoint by the British soldiers. On their faces, which were illuminated by the fires of their defeat, Diana could just make out their expressions; some looked scared, others humiliated or dejected. A few looked angry, and in spite of the distance she could clearly see the seething resentment in their glares. Thankfully it appeared that the last of the fight had left them, and even if they were to try anything, the paratroopers were guarding them keenly with, she would guess, quite itchy trigger fingers.

“It looks like the whole damn garrison’s surrendered…” observed Amanda, stepping beside Diana as their guides rejoined the rest of the taskforce.

“Something that I will take full credit for,” said a smug voice from the long shadows beside them. All present started as, from the darkness, there materialized the smirking face of Sucy.

“I wish she’d stop doing that…” growled Hannah to Barbara as the Filipino Witch glided towards Diana.

“What happened?” queried the officer who, having been underground when Andrew had sent his runner to fetch magical reinforcements, was keen to catch up on events. Sucy began to brief Diana, but almost immediately found herself being derailed by Akko.

“Andrew’s here?!” she interjected excitedly.

Sucy glared at Akko for a moment, then, with a sigh, pointed towards a group of soldiers stood about one hundred yards away, observing the scene and issuing occasional commands. Sure enough, stood at the centre of the party was Andrew Hanbridge. His helmet was now strapped to his webbing, replaced on his head by his maroon Airborne beret, cutting a figure of martial calm and authority.

The moment Akko saw him she let out a small squeal of joy. And before Diana could even think to stop her, Akko broke from the group, running towards her friend, her face lit up in an expression of sheer happiness.

“Andrew!” she called, waving her hand as she closed the distance between them. The cry at once roused the attention of Andrew. Perhaps more worryingly however, her shout also drew the attention of his command party, who upon seeing the rapidly approaching stranger advancing towards them through the darkness, tightened their grips on their weapons. 

Yet where the other soldiers reacted as if to a threat, Andrew appeared entirely taken aback by the Japanese woman’s appearance, his face locked in wide eyed befuddlement. Like Diana, it seemed the young Major had assumed Akko to still be in the Far East, thousands of miles away, not here in Germany, and most certainly not re-entering his life in the middle of a top secret mission.

"Akko?!" he exclaimed, flabbergasted, as his expression morphed from shock to something approaching delight.

As the Japanese witch neared him, it looked as though she were about to wrap him in a deep embrace. But as she got within a hairsbreadth, she slowed down, at last noticing that surrounding him were half a dozen other soldiers, all of them large imposing men at arms who studied her with looks of either curiosity or intense suspicion.

Stopping just short of Andrew, she smiled meekly at him, now aware that he was no longer her childhood friend, but a soldier.

"I, um… It’s, it’s good to see you again Andrew..." she said awkwardly, as the intimidating sight of his comrades served to stifle her natural exuberance.

But the young nobleman, it seemed, had no such qualms and stepped forward to place a hand on her shoulder. He stared open mouthed for a moment, clearly unable to believe his eyes. Then, in a move so sudden it caught Akko off guard, he pulled her into a tight embrace, wrapping both arms around her as he drew her close against his chest. He squeezed her, and kept her close, as though if he relinquished his grip she might fade away. After a moment of surprise at the normally reserved young man’s behaviour, Akko returned the hug, and the two friends shared a moment of happy reunion.

She said something that was lost to the distance, but whatever she said, Diana watched as a tear of joy began to roll down Andrew’s cheek. Though they were surrounded by death and destruction, she realised that he looked far happier right now than he had in many years.

On the edge of hearing, Diana was just about aware of Sucy sighing, and then half-heartedly asking if she would like her to continue with her debriefing. But she did not respond. For the instant the two had embraced, her heart had sickeningly lurched within her chest.

She was, much to her own surprise, jealous. Not only at the closeness of the two old friends, but also, she thought with sudden regret, that their reunion had been so joyous and loving. Whereas when she had reunited with Akko, it had been played out down the barrel of a gun in a moment filled with malice and spite born from years of festering crushed hopes and dreams.

Theirs had been a reunion of happiness, whereas hers was a meeting of utter misery.

Guilt began to creep over her, as did a new fear. The fear that maybe, despite assurances that her feelings towards Diana remained unchanged, she had now hurt Akko enough that she would begin to seek solace in the arms of Andrew. And as if to cement this, she watched Akko bury her face into Andrew’s chest, who in turn cradled the back of her head, running his fingers tenderly through the strands of her hair. This act of intimacy would once have elicited in her a territorial bout of anger and jealousy, but now only served to deepen the pit of despair down which her heart seemed to be falling.  

You don’t deserve her… said an unbidden voice in her mind. You reunite with the girl you once loved more than life itself, and what do you do? You thrust a gun in her face and swear you’ll kill her. What right do you have to even be near her? You don’t deserve her. But Andrew, when he sees her, he unabashedly shows his love and in the midst of a battlefield makes her the centre of his world. Akko deserves love. Andrew deserves love. You don’t...

Her anxiety must have manifested itself on her face, as into her peripheral vision stepped Lotte, who placed a gentle hand on her own and offered her a slight smile.

“She does love you; you know that, right?” she said.

“If you say so…” was all Diana could muster in disheartened response. For a moment both witches stood silently watching their friends, before Lotte took a deep breath.

“It was awful working here. We were part of something evil. And even if we didn’t do evil things, we saw them, we were part of the machine that perpetrated them, and it was hell. So, we each had to find some way to escape. For me it was writing letters to Frank, even if I never got to send them…” her voice faltered for a moment, before pressing on. “But for Akko, it was you. She would talk about you, about a future after the war with you. And that smile, that love for you, it kept her, it kept us, going…”

Hope flared within Diana’s breast for a moment, before once again the seed of doubt raised its unwelcome voice. Like a serpent whispering in her ear, it reminded her that in the period Lotte was describing, Akko had still lived under the assumption that everything was the same in their relationship, and that the Englishwoman still loved her without hesitation. That was a time before she had so violently rejected her love.

“I always end up hurting her…” she whispered. Lotte frowned. “The first time she and I truly interacted, I hurt her, and gave her a scar I know she still bares…”

Undeterred, Lotte rallied to Diana’s defence, even when she could not do it herself.

“And yet she still fell in love with you, because she could see that the angry, pompous bitch who did that, was not the real you,” Lotte said with an uncharacteristic bluntness which did cause Diana’s eyebrow to raise (although she could hardly deny it).

“Akko could see past that mistake and into your soul, as you could with her. And if she can forgive you for that scar, she’ll certainly forgive you for pointing a gun at her. One which we all know you could never have used.”

Diana stared at her friend, who smiled reassuringly.

And then, as if to prove the point, she heard her name being called, and turned to see Akko, at last separated from a now flushed Andrew, waving happily towards her, beckoning her over.

“Truly?” she asked Lotte once more, feeling increasingly hopeful. However, this time it was Amanda who answered irritably.

“YES!” she said, rolling her eyes. “Now go and talk to her, Jeez!”

With that the American gave her a rough shove on the shoulder, pushing her towards Akko. Taking a deep breath, Diana did her best to hide the lingering emotional turmoil within and calm herself.

“Well, I see you two are busy getting reacquainted.” There was only the slightest hint of sarcasm in her voice, deployed to feign self-assurance, as she approached the pair. Andrew, now apart from Akko, seemed to have remembered both himself and the situation they were in, and was busy adjusting his beret, tugging the folded material with one hand and smoothing it over with the other.

“Quite…” he said dryly, then straightened himself out, raising one hand to his mouth as he cleared his throat. “A report if you please, Captain Cavendish.” In that moment when he had reunited with Akko, his quite openly known about unrequited love, he had forgotten himself as an officer and commander. Now, under the scrutiny of his men and brother officers (some of whom were quite clearly sniggering), he sought to regain some air of authority and professionalism.

Diana likewise adopted a more rigid stance before reporting to her cousin whom she had to remind herself was, in this situation at least, her superior.

“We have successfully located and detained Constanze… I mean, Target Two, and secured as much intel as we can carry, destroying that which we could not take, or was deemed surplus to requirements.” Andrew nodded.

“And Seelmann?” he enquired.

“Dead.” She looked Andrew directly in the eyes and added, “Sir.”

Silently she prayed that her response, as admittedly ambiguous as it was short and to the point, would none-the-less discourage further questioning. Thankfully, if Andrew was at all shocked by the news, he showed no sign of it, maintaining instead a stoic expression. Indeed, by all accounts he had understood her intent perfectly and let the matter of the head German scientist drop, instead turning to the welfare of her command.

“And your troops?”

“All present and accounted for, sir,” her tone softened as she relaxed slightly, glad that Andrew was not going to press her on the fate of the executed, whether justly or not, scientist.

“With some more witches in tow I see,” he continued, nodding towards Akko who wiggled her eyebrows with a beamish smile. “Speaking of which, here comes Miss Jansson…”

"Andrew..." said a soft voice made heavy with apprehension.

Diana turned to find Lotte stood behind them, shoulders tense as she wrung her hands. And now that the fog of her own fears had lifted, she could at last see a deep anxiety lurking behind those bespectacled blue eyes. Having, in her characteristic unassuming manner, clearly waited until she and Akko had had their moment, it looked as though she were about to burst with pent up worry, and Diana at once knew what Lotte was about to ask, as did Andrew.

"Frank, is he...?"

"He's fine, Lotte, he's absolutely fine,” replied Andrew without hesitation, before adding with a slight chuckle, “at least, he was when we spoke last week…" Like arctic ice before a fire, the tension melted from the Finnish witch's shoulders.

"Luojan kiitos..." whispered the Finn under her breath with a happy sigh, blinking away a tear which ran down her cheek. "How is he? Is he alright? I, I haven't heard from him since December '41 when..." she trailed off as thoughts seemed to fill her mind of the day when Britain had reluctantly been forced to side with their Soviet allies in their war with Finland.

“He's doing well, he even got the DFC from the King,” added Andrew, although this boast of pride in his friend’s martial achievement was evidently of little concern to Lotte, who cared only for the physical health of her long separated love. “And now he's the CO of a training squadron for new recruits up on the West Coast of Scotland, well out of harm’s way…”

Lotte breathed another ragged sigh of relief and smiled, which Akko took as her que to hug her friend happily as the rest of the witches, and Stan, wandered over to join them.

“Also, he talks about you, a lot. I know he misses you dreadfully…” he added, which caused further tears to well behind her round glasses.

For Lotte the war must have been even more confusing than for most. Finland had started 1939 as an ally of the UK, then joined the Axis in the face of Soviet Aggression, before finally going to war with the Germans after being forced into neutrality. Diana therefore wondered if Lotte was even here of her own free will at this point; had she simply stayed to support and aid her friends, or had she been forced to remain, a hostage or prisoner once the Fins and Germans had begun fighting. But in this time and place however, the minutiae were immaterial, as now Lotte knew one simple truth, Frank was safe, and soon, she would return to England, and to a much brighter future.

Presuming we survive the night that is, said the unwelcome cynical voice of disillusionment inside her own head, but she batted it down, taking heart instead from the joyful expression of Lotte.

The Finnish witch was just finishing thanking Andrew when Captain Yates, who had been busying himself with commanding the paratroopers in his CO’s apparent absence, at last required his attention.

“Boss, about the prisoners…” he said grimly, nodding over his shoulder to the huddle of German servicemen who looked back nervously, keenly aware that their fate now lay in Andrew’s hands.

The happiness which had for the past few minutes distracted them from the harshness of war, at once vanished as Andrew’s expression hardened. And as Diana looked into his face, a cold shiver coursed throughout her entire being, for in his eyes, which shone in the dancing firelight like those of a demon, she saw no trace of humanity nor love, only utter contempt and wrath.  

Chapter Text

Somewhere in France, August 1944

In his single-minded impatience Andrew did not wait for the Jeep to fully draw to a halt before he was already exiting the vehicle, momentum and fury carrying him as he began striding to meet the woman who had emerged from the barn, roused at the sound of their approach.

“McKenna, where is he?!” the raging officer demanded of the woman, who had stopped just before the doorway, blocking his path. He was seeing red and that was affecting his behaviour and judgement, he knew it. But right now, the entire world was his enemy, and he needed to know his Number Two, the one man whom he knew he could rely upon, was indeed still alive.

“He’s sleeping,” answered Chariot du Nord calmly. “We had neither ether nor chloroform to anesthetise him, so I had to use a sleeping spell. But to make sure he didn’t wake up mid surgery, I had to use a strong one, so he’ll be out for some time. Although that’s probably a good thing.”

Andrew looked down. In her left hand the red haired witch-turned-SOE operative held her wand, fully extended and smouldering in the late evening gloom with an ominous red glow, whilst in her right she clutched a captured German Walther pistol, her fingers tight around the grip. Evidently, she had been unsure if their sudden arrival outside her door had heralded friend or foe, and she had readied herself just in case. Chariot noticed his gaze and holstered her pistol, although he noted she did not retract her wand.

“How is he?” he asked, turning back to the issue of the grievously wounded Captain McKenna.

“He suffered several gunshot wounds to the arm and torso, but the doctor says that somehow the bullets all managed to miss the vital organs and arteries. It looks as though one of your men stepped in front of him at the last second, took the bullets for him…”

Andrew felt himself at last able to breathe, knowing now his friend was, to lesser or greater extents, well.

But after the initial relief came another stab of pain. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine the fortitude of the split second decision by one of his men who, despite knowing he was about to die anyway, chose to spend his final moment on Earth trying to save his brother in arms. In a strange bitter way, it made him feel incredibly proud. Yet any pride he may have had in his men’s devotion to each other only fuelled the deep sense of guilt he also felt.

Guilt that they had died, and that right now, he was alive.

He had been at a meeting that day with the French Maquis and SOE to coordinate a series of hit and run strikes against German logistical networks in the area. Whilst the meeting itself was not meant to have taken more than a couple of hours, the drive to and from its location, some ten miles away, took much longer than they had anticipated as they skirted around civilisation, avoiding the main roads where German patrols might be lurking.

Thus, knowing he would be gone for most of the day, he had left McKenna in command and taken just his driver, Lance Corporal Abbott, with him, knowing that his 2 IC, an experienced leader, could handle almost anything.

However, the meeting had overrun, and it was as the gathering was at last drawing to a close, whilst outside the world was turning towards dusk, that a boy on a bicycle had arrived to breathlessly inform Andrew of the attack on his team’s camp. Thus, of all the members of his patrol, it was just him and Abbott who had escaped the massacre. And that knowledge, that decision to leave his men and unwittingly deliver himself from death, now weighed upon him. He was their commander, their officer, their leader, and his place was with them.

In his old regiment that might not have been the case, but in The Regiment, things were different. The old order of things; rank, order and strict adherence to archaic orders of battle, had been discarded in favour of a close knit team where all were, whilst not equal, valued for their expertise, skill at arms, or even just their ability to cook a decent meal out of limited scraps. This had forged them into a fraternity like none he had known before. They were his brothers, and he had left them to die. 

Looking over towards Abbott, who lingered at the wheel of the Jeep, he thought he could see the same guilt in his driver’s eyes, even in the darkness.

“May I see him?” he asked Chariot, indicating to the barn door behind her, although it was less a request and more a subtle demand. She nodded and then led the way. The barn was like most throughout the world, filled with stacks of barley, straw, animal feed, and various formidably sharp looking farm tools, yet in the centre of the space, on a wooden table, was a white sheet. At least, it had once been white. Now it was stained with blood and other bodily fluids. The doctor was gone, his work done, he had left lest his absence from the village arouse suspicion. Although Andrew noted his bloodied apron hung from a nearby peg, presumably to ensure that whatever cover he had concocted to account for his journey would not be blown by such a soiled garment.

Leading the way past the makeshift operating table, they arrived in a small side store where on an old mattress sat upon a wrought iron bedframe, there lay the pallid faced McKenna. He was soundly, yet restfully asleep, which was a relief to see, as Andrew had imagined his friend’s face to be contorted in pain, as if fighting his wounds in his dreams. From an old coat stand which had been brought into the barn there hung a jury-rigged saline drip that ran down to the Ulsterman’s hand.

“Aucun changement,” said a voice, and at last Andrew noticed a man, presumably the farmer, sat smoking a pipe, which protruded from beneath a thick bushy moustache, whilst cradling an old bolt action rifle on his lap. A man with a weapon, that was the first thing he should have noticed upon entering the room, yet his reactions had been dulled by the internal turmoil of his mind, clouding his analytical abilities.

“This is Pascal, he is the farmer whose barn we’re currently in,” said Chariot by way of introduction as she inspected McKenna. “He took a real risk bringing your friend here…”

Andrew glanced up towards the farmer, who must have understood the concern in his eyes, for he cleared his throat, stood up, and brought himself to a vague semblance of attention.

“Sergent-chef Donnet, monsieur. I was a medic at Verdun. I can keep an eye on him.”

“Even if the Germans come?” asked Andrew.

Pascal held up his rifle. It was old, it’s wooden stock dulled, but the metal gleamed. “On ne passe pas,” he said gruffly, and in the elderly man’s eyes Andrew saw the rekindled fire of lost youth ignite within Pascal, who fixed him with a stare that had seen a thousand men die in the worst warfare imaginable and carried the guilt of living. “As soon as I received word of the massacre, I sent my wife to her sister. So, if the Bosche try to come, I shall sell my life dearly and finally join my comrades who left before me.”

Andrew was unsure if he should be heartened that his friend was in the hands of an experienced combat medic or concerned that the Frenchman had a battle plan that would end in both his death, and by extension that of McKenna. But his words had struck home. He longed to be with his friends who had fallen in defence of their homeland, and so now could Andrew likewise feel the spirits of his men calling out to him.

“Take me to them…” he said, turning to Chariot.

Chariot paused and looked uncertain. “Andrew, it’s a terrible scene…”

“Take me to them!” He snapped, his feelings of rage towards the whole world suddenly swelling within him. Chariot did not flinch however, and somehow, seeing her remain so still, helped to calm his momentary outburst. “I’m Sorry. But please, I need to see my men, I owe them that.”

He closed his eyes, yet he could feel the witch staring into his very soul, seeing him now for what he was, a broken man who had just lost a dozen of his closest friends and, like a wounded wolf, needed to lash out. A hand rested gently upon his shoulder.

“Of course,” said Chariot. “Nous reviendrons dès que possible,” she added, addressing Pascal who nodded, then retook his seat beside the bed.

With one last glance at McKenna, who lay blissfully removed from the worries of the world, if only temporarily, and a nod to Pascal, who saluted back, Andrew followed the witch out of the dimly lit barn, and into the darkness beyond.

Crows shrieked loudly through the night as their Jeep approached the scene of the massacre. It was dark, but their headlights remained off in case someone spotted them, relying on the occasional breaks in the clouds to illuminate the way. As such their journey had been frustratingly slow, and for every second Andrew's rage and grief had grown exponentially. 

When at last they arrived at the site, a partially filled in ditch that formed the boundary between fields and an utterly nondescript area of forest, Andrew found a group of men already there, shovels in hand. His hand at once flew to the cocking handle of his Sten, fearing they were Germans who had returned to hide their deed. However, a gap in the clouds illuminated the scene so that he could see that most were middle aged peasant farmers, so no threat.  

As the Jeep rolled to a stop Andrew quickly dismounted, and at once felt his boots slide slightly on a scattering of spent shell casings that lay beside the track. Clearly this was the firing point from where the makeshift execution squad had gunned down his men. Suppressing a shudder, Andrew made his way towards the edge of the ditch. A man was stood watching the labourers, and even in the darkness his long black robe and dog collar were easily recognisable. His head was bowed, and he held in his hands an open Bible. The night was too dark to read, but at once Andrew recognised the muttered litany of the Last Rights, recited from memory. At last, he stopped, caught off guard by the simple thought that only now occurred to him.

Were any of his men religious?

He was unsure if he had ever asked. He should have asked. He should have known. They were his men, soldiers whom he would ask to undertake the most dangerous missions against near impossible odds. And yet he did not even know something as fundamental and simple as if any of them believed. The odds were of course that they did, but still, he thought, he ought to have known something so basic. 

Stepping to the edge of the ditch turned mass grave, he was expecting to feel a wave of heated rage, nausea, or freezing sorrow. Instead, he just looked down on the ditch, filled with dead uniformed bodies, twisted and contorted in hideous dying poses, and sighed. He had seen any number of deaths before, but for them to be his own men, and for them to have died in such an honourless and pitiful manner, that stung far more than any other death he had encountered.

Of course, the word ‘honour’ had lost almost all of its meaning, he thought ruefully. These were men who killed without honour, and if he had once held it himself, he had long ago shed himself of the trappings such outdated notions entailed. They fought in the shadows, literally stabbing men in the back if the need should arise. This was not the sort of warfare of which his ancestors, all stiff upper lipped men who had stood stoically through both victory and defeat, would have approved, but it was what had to be done. His soldiers may not have been men of honour, but they deserved better, far better, than this.

“It’s not your fault,” said Chariot, stepping beside him.

“How do you know? I’d had my doubts about Berlioz for some time. If I hadn’t been at that bloody meeting…”

“Then you’d also be dead.”

“Then at least I wouldn’t have to live with the shame of failing my men!” Andrew snapped back. He did not want to be comforted and be told that he was wrong; that he should be grateful for being alive. Because in some strange cosmic sense, to Andrew that would mean his life mattered more than those of his men. He wished they were alive more than anything else he could wish for, but if they were to be dead, then at least let it be that he did not have to live with having failed them. “I am an officer, their officer. My place was with them…”

“Boss, you can’t blame yourself!”

Abbott was stood behind them, his beret wrung in his clenched right fist. Grief, anger, frustration and confusion, all these emotions were clear in his eyes which were misted with unshed tears. Yet, unlike Andrew, he had maintained his composure, acting like far more of a soldier than he was. And now he stood, looking at his own commanding officer, not with respect, but with pity, and Andrew felt cowed by his strength.

“You had to go,” Abbott continued through a voice on the verge of breaking. “You had no choice, you had to, it’s your op, so you had to be the one to plan it. You couldn’t take everyone with you, could you? That’d be just stupid. And we all suspected that rat, but we couldn’t prove it yet. So, the only person responsible for this is Berlioz. Him and no one else.”

He looked past Andrew to the bodies of his friends and visibly tightened the muscles around his neck as he fought to control his emotions.

“And if any of those blokes were here now, they’d say the same. So, Boss…,” Abbott paused and began walking towards him, a determined look upon his face. Andrew tensed, bracing against the hand he was sure would now strike some sense into him, just like his father had when he was younger. Indeed, he saw Abbott raise a hand, and Andrew involuntarily shut his eyes. A moment later his body flinched from the expected touch, yet he realised that it was not his face where the contact was felt, but his shoulder. And when he opened his eyes, the Lance Corporal was stood in front of him, tears nearly breaking the dams of his eyelids. “I’m so glad you’re alive!” his voice broke, and the tears came.

He pulled his Commander into an embrace which, even now caught the officer who had been brought up in the strictly hands-off world of the English aristocracy, off guard and patted him on the back. And as Abbott, a man whom he’d seen kill men twice his size in hand to hand combat, shed his tears, so Andrew felt himself shedding the weight of guilt. It flowed through his body, down through his feet and he felt absolved of the blame.

Abbott seemed to become aware of his own actions and quickly moved away. “Sorry, sir…” he said, quickly ruffling himself out.

Embarrassment took hold of both soldiers for a second, and Andrew let his gaze fall down to his feet, where something caught his eye.

There, glinting in the pale light of the moon, was a shell casing, 9mm if he was any judge, exactly the type used in a German sub machine gun. Yet it was the only one in this spot, the others being some distance away on the track. One round had been fired here. A pistol. A coup de grace delivered by hand to one of his men who had not died in the initial volley. And Andrew knew, without any guessing, by whose hand it had been done.

“It was Weninger, wasn’t it?” he said, looking to Chariot. The French witch nodded.

SS Sturmbannführer Mathias Weninger was the commander of a Waffen SS Company garrisoned in the nearby town. He had a reputation for cruelty, and rumour had it that he had previously served with the SS-Sonderkommandos on the Eastern Front where entire villages were put to the torch, their populations vanishing without a trace, although the mass graves were beginning to be found. And it seemed that on being deployed to France he had brought his old methods with him.

Andrew knew that their operations had been attracting the attention of the SS, and in a way, that was the purpose of the missions, as much to distract and divert enemy resources away from the frontlines as to hurt their rear. But what Andrew had not been prepared for were the reprisals. Without even attempting to distance himself from his crimes, Weninger had doled out punishments upon the local community, executing half a dozen French civilians for every German soldier slain, all to try and turn the local populace against them.

It had been a deadly game of cat and mouse as the British had tried to keep one step ahead of the enemy, constantly moving through the deep forested hills of the region to keep the enemy guessing, never staying in one place for more than three nights, relying on hidden caches dotted throughout the landscape. But now, it seemed as though their luck had run out and at last, the slaughter had been brought upon Andrew’s men. 

 Andrew felt himself shake. And he realised that with the guilt of survival now lifted from him, another emotion had taken it’s place. Hatred. Hatred for the SS, and most of all, hatred for Weninger, who in his mind’s eye Andrew could see stood above one of his dying men, smirking as he pulled the trigger, satisfied that his task was now done. There were no words for the anger that accompanied that thought.

Yet in the background of his imagination he could see another figure, the one whom he was sure had sold them out; the quisling Berlioz.

Some turned coat to save the lives of their loved ones, others their own skin, and in a way, Andrew could respect that. But some turned for money and power, and Berlioz was, they had all suspected, one of the latter. But he had been good at his role within the resistance, very good, and he had taken part in raids against the Germans, even killing them. So just enough doubt had been sewn as to his long suspected treachery to buy him a stay of execution whilst investigations were carried out. They thought they had kept their suspicions secret from him, but evidently, he had gotten wind of their enquiries, and decided to go whilst the going was good. No doubt he was long gone, most likely with the reward money he had been paid for his betrayal. Although unlike Judas, Andrew doubted he would have the decency to hang himself later.

“We’re already hunting Berlioz as we speak,” said Chariot, as if reading his mind. Sometimes witches, despite his long held fascination with them and his feelings towards one in particular, unnerved him in their ability to answer questions that one had not yet vocalised.

“The hunters, you trust them?” he asked.

“Absolutely.”

“Funny, you said the same thing about Berlioz…” Andrew remarked with a bitter laugh, then thought better of it. “Sorry, that was cruel…”

“But not unwarranted…” sighed the former teacher, her shoulder dropping slightly. A silence followed, filled only by the scraping of shovels moving loose earth and the continued prayers of the priest.

“What will they do when they find him?” Andrew asked.

“I’ve ordered him to be brought in alive. We’ll try him, and if… when, he’s found guilty, they’ll shave him, then string him up from the nearest oak tree.”

“Do you think the Bosche will retaliate if you do?”

“I doubt it. They know how much quislings are despised, and they know the risks of employing them. Rounding up civilians for killing soldiers is one thing, but for killing one of their own? For communal justice? They’ll leave that to the civil authorities, and I know the local gendarmes couldn’t care less.”

Andrew smirked at the image of Berlioz twitching at the end of a taught rope, but that was not enough. Even if they burnt Berlioz alive it would never be enough, not whilst Weninger was still at large.

“Weninger, I presume he has returned to his barracks?” Andrew asked. Chariot again nodded, extracting a frustrated sigh from the Englishman. To call the SS garrison a barracks was an understatement, their headquarters being a chateau, and this was not just some country pile with a couple of turrets, but an actual castle built to withstand even the most determined of attackers. And with his entire force now consisting of himself, Abbott, and the now incapacitated McKenna, even if they were to enlist the help of the Resistance, they would never be able to take the place without artillery and, preferably, the support of a squadron of tanks.

“I can feel him slipping through my grasp,” bemoaned Andrew who suspected that, now that the SAS threat in the region had been supressed, Weninger would soon be recalled to Berlin, ready to be unleashed elsewhere to places his particular brand of nightmarish cruelty could best be used to prop up the dying Nazi empire. “But even if he runs, we’ll find him…” Andrew locked eyes with Abbott, who nodded in grim agreement.

“And what will you do if you find Weninger?” asked Chariot.

Andrew reached behind himself and drew his knife. The weapon had a double edged blade that came to a sharp point which, in a moment of passing moonlight, gleamed wickedly in the night like the fang of a snake. It was subtle, but Andrew could see the witch recoil from the sight of the blade, and in a way, he was glad, because now he was back in control of himself.

Andrew was a diplomat and a sportsman at heart. At home he had always deliberately missed the pheasants that had soared over head during his father’s shoots, and his horse had always mysteriously become lame during the hunts. Yet this war had seen him be reborn as a killer, a man who could take life without hesitation, for to hesitate could be the difference between life and death, not only for himself, but for his men. Now Andrew felt himself restored to the killer he needed to be, because if he was to have revenge for his men, for his friends, he would need to be ruthless.

“If I find Weninger?” growled Andrew through gritted teeth. “I’ll gut him. Him and all his SS cronies, that I swear…”

The priest ended his prayers.