Lovino awoke suddenly to the feeling of Antonio shaking his shoulder.

"What the hell Anto-" The usual dancing light was gone from Antonio's face. In Lovino's sleepy fuzz he struggled to grasp it... Fear. Antonio's face was stricken with fear.

"What's going on?" Lovino's voice was so quiet that he could hardly hear it himself, just Antonio's heart beat. But antonio heard. Or he knew the question was coming.

"Lovino, I need you to stay calm. Okay?"

Lovino didn't understand but he nodded anyway.

"There are people in the building, searching homes. I think it's a standard check, but you need to hide."

Lovino didn't move. People... Germans. In this building. Here. Antonio. Antonio is in this building. With them... Lovino tasted blood in his mouth. If the caught Antonio, if they found him...

"Lovino?" Antonio's voice brought Lovino back to reality, "You have to hide," Lovino was shocked by Antonio's tone. Lovino seemed to have little choice but to listen. "If they find you here with me they will kill you for certain. And there is no where for either of us to run, so you have to hide."

In the blur and rush of things Lovino grasped something missing in Antonio's rush of words, "What about you?"

"Lovino, I told you before but I'll say it again, I would die before I let anything happen to you."

"No..." Lovino desperately grasped for another solution...

"If I hide they might find you. You have to understand that... I can't let them find you,"Antonio pulled Lovino into a hug and Lovino hidin the crook of his neck for another moment. Antonio broke the silence, "Lovino, please, your promise, you said you would do as I said if we were in danger," That stupid promise, of course,"There is a window in the bathroom. It's through that door," Antonio pointed to a door directly across the room from where they were, "You can get onto the roof from there and then onto the ground. Go, to your house and don't turn back."

Lovino shook his head, no, he couldn't let Antonio go... no...

"Lovino please."

"...Fine."

"Thank you," Antonio whispered. He tilted Lovino's chin and wrapped his arm around his waist. The feeling Antonio nearly made Lovino cry then. Because he was doing so much for Lovino and Lovino couldn't do anything. Lovino was completely helpless.

Lovino quietly lifted the frame of the window and and sat outside and listened.

There was a hard loud knock on the door. And then the sound of the door opening. footsteps .

"Is there something wrong?" Antonio voice was oblivious sounding yet still fearful, it was almost believable, even to Lovino, that he wasn't hiding anything.

"We are looking for information. Information on the Italian resistance. You wouldn't happen to know anything?" Lovino took a sharp breath.

"No, I didn't know there was any sort of resistance," There was was a lot of scuffling and the sound of draws being opened and closed as papers were shuffled through.

"Hey, there are some letters and papers in here addressed to Antonio Fernandez Carriedo."

Lovino's heart stopped. They knew. They know who he was. Dio mio please no...

"Merda."

"So you don't have any information about an Italian resistance?" The German's mocking, condescending voice made Lovino's blood boil.

"I don't have any information about an italian resistance, for you. I do have a good deal of information about oppressive governments and mass murder," Antonio's words sent shivers down Lovino's spine but he couldn't tell if it was from the devotion he said them with or the intense chill in his tone.

"Let's go, this one's go more information the the whole rest of the resistance combined."

Lovino breathed slowly as he could and tried to stay calm, but he was losing it. He sid down the rest of the edge of the roof and jumped. He hit the ground and ran as hard and fast as he could to down the road. ONce the had turned a corner in the road Lovino leaned up against a wall and panted for air.Tears pricked at the edge of his vision. He had let Antonio go. No...

.

Lovino waited in the closet for what seemed like forever, to be certain that no german patrols remained. He ran across the wet ground getting mud all over his clothes. Antonio's clothes.

Lovino could hardly breathe. He had let Antonio get captured. It was his fault. He was walking home and had worked himself up to the point he was near tears. Antonio was with the Gestapo... more than once he had thought of turning back before he remembered his promise to Antonio. God damn promise.

Lovino walked into his yard, through the garden and threw open the door to find that Roma was sitting, hands in his head, at the table, defeated.

"Grandpa... Antonio... he was captured..." Lovino realized there was actually very little to say. As complicated and insane as this felt, it was really, very, very, simple. Antonio was gone.

Roma suddenly was on his feet, eyes wide, "What do you mean?"

"I was with him and the gestapo... they came and he told me to hide because they would find me if they had to look for him...and now they have him."

"This is important, Lovino, did anyone see you?"

Was Roma really asking that? Of all the things he could ask, he wanted to know has anyone seen Lovino? "No, that's not the point!! Antonio is with the Germans! We have to do something!!"

"Lovino, we will help him, but first; did anyone see you?" Roma said, sternly.

"No. But Antonio..."

"Lovino, we need time to work on this, we'll help Antonio, but..."

Lovino suddenly thought of why Roma was asking. He also feared that they would be captured. Captured and tortured and killed slowly... painfully. He was scared for Lovino, but Antonio would be torture for information... killed... kept hardly alive... Lovino snapped. He couldn't let Antonio die like that. He couldn't let Antonio die. The severity of the situation hit Lovino like a wall and he stumbled in his fear, "I have to go to him! I need to help him. Please Grandpa..."

"Lovino, we..."

Lovino realized he would be getting no help from his grandfather. He ran for the door only to have his shirt color, Antonio's shirt collar, grabbed by Roma and found himself pinned to the wall.

"Lovino, you can't! You'll be caught and killed!" Roma's eyes were firm, but still fearful.

"Antonio..." Lovino began struggling violently agent Roma's strong arms, his voice, permeated with his desperation, almost breaking.

Explosions sounded in the background, louder that any Lovino had heard in a long time, but they seemed dulled by the blood roaring in his ears, his senses dim to anything but the closing in reality of Antonio's consuming absence.

"Please stop, Lovino, you're going to hurt your..."

"NO! We have to go, we have to go now..."

Grandpa's voice was even, almost calm, but his face was strained, "Lovi, Lovi, calm down, listen to me, please..."

"We have to help him!" Lovino grabbed at Roma's shirt in desperation, "Please, Grandpa, please help him, please..."

"Lovino, I'm sorry, there is nothing we can do, not today..." Roma tried to comfort Lovino but Lovino cried out, his voice broken and strangled and pushed it way.

Nothing we can do... Antonio was being taken to the gestapo's headquarters... to be torchered, he was probably there already...

"No, NO! You don't understand, they're torturing him right now, they're..." Lovino thought again of what he was saying. How very possible it was, and what the words really meant, Antonio in strangling pain, as the Gestapo tried to get him to say words Antonio would never utter to them. Lovino felt faint and his stomach was tight with dread, "...Oh my God," Lovino cried out, as much to his own thoughts as than to his Grandfather, "...Oh my God, no..." It could be happening right now as Lovino did nothing to help him, "LET ME GO!!"

"What's wrong?" A small voice said quietly from the doorway.

Feliciano, Feliciano with his fucking German, who had told the Germans about the resistance...

"You. It's YOUR FAULT!"

Feliciano looked confused and scared, "What? What's..."

"Your filthy German boyfriend!" Lovino spoke with malice, "He turned him in, he must have, how else could they know so suddenly?"

"Is... is Antonio..."

"It seems the Gestapo received a tip off last night. They captured Antonio early this morning." Lovino struggled against Roma again.

"What else did you tell this German, Feliciano?" Lovino was screaming in his hoarse voice again, "What did you tell him about Antonio?"

"No! I never mentioned anything about Antonio, never, and it couldn't have been Ludwig anyway, not last night, that's impossible."

Roma closed his eyes. He looked so defeated by his grandsons, "Why?" Roma groaned.

"Because... because... Because Ludwig was with me all night." Roma seemed to sink still deeper. A roar of passing planes filled the room. Planes that were headed to attack the Germans. Germans that would be completely unprepared and unable to defend himself in weren't for Feliciano. Planes that would surely have brought Antonio's freedom, if it weren't for the tip off about the attack.

Lovino shook his head at Feliciano's words. He wasn't all too sure as to his brother's point but, Feliciano had been able to be out all night with his love. Lovino might never be able to see Antonio again... never see him smile, never feel his soft lips against his, and it was his fault. All his fault that Antonio couldn't save himself, all his fault Antonio had to be protecting him...

Lovino's knees gave out underneath him and Roma lowered him to the floor, a sob rising in Lovino's throat, "I never should have left," Lovino said, sobbing helplessly, "I never should have made that stupid promise, I never should have... oh God... Antonio..." Lovino still felt faint and he was struggling to breath through his silent sobs. Roma held him and Feliciano stood next to them, his face broken too, with his own pain.

"You did the only thing you could. You listened to him when he told you to go. You did the right thing."

Roma's voice was comforting but his words cut Lovino like a knife. He should have done something. He should have been able to help, "No. No."

Roma stroked his hair, and held him. "We will do everything we can for him, Lovino. Everything we can."

Roma rocked Lovino and tried to comfort him. Tried to fix a hole in Lovino that nothing would ever fix. Nothing but Antonio.