Sebastian walked the short distance to the university quarter, greatcoat buttoned against the lingering chill. The translated pages from the morning’s work were folded inside his tunic pocket, crisp and precise in their Japanese renderings. He needed an expert eye before forwarding them up the chain.
Professor Heinrich Müller received him in the cramped office behind the main lecture hall of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität. The room smelled of pipe tobacco, old books, and the faint metallic tang of ink. Müller—late fifties, wire-rimmed spectacles perpetually sliding down his nose—took the sheets without preamble and scanned them under the green-shaded desk lamp.
Minutes passed in silence broken only by the scratch of Müller’s fingernail along the margins.
“Fantastic translation,” the professor said at last, setting the papers down. His voice carried the dry amusement of a man who had graded too many student essays. “Accurate, idiomatic, elegant even. Whoever did this has a scholar’s command of both languages.”
Sebastian inclined his head. “Good.”
Müller pushed his spectacles up with one finger. “But the handwriting…” He tapped the page. “Sauklaue. Truly abysmal scheißhandschrift. Looks like a child wrote it with mittens on. Next time tell your translator to slow down—or at least use a ruler.”
Sebastian’s mouth twitched—almost a smile, gone in an instant. “Noted.”
He left the office with the documents approved for forwarding, the professor’s faint chuckle trailing after him like smoke.
The rest of the afternoon passed in routine: a briefing at the regional command post, signatures on requisition forms, a brief exchange with a supply officer about delayed coal shipments to the eastern front. Then came the summons he had half-expected.
A discreet note, delivered by courier: Lebensborn assignment. 1700 hours. Same facility as before. Your presence required.
Sebastian read the words once, folded the paper, and tucked it away. No emotion crossed his face.
The Lebensborn home stood on the outskirts of Munich, a converted villa screened by tall pines. Inside, everything was clinical and orderly: white walls, starched linens, soft lighting meant to soothe rather than seduce. The assigned woman—blonde, blue-eyed, twenty-four, carrying the approved Nordic profile—was already waiting in the small bedroom when he arrived. She wore a simple white shift, hair braided neatly, expression calm and expectant.
Sebastian closed the door behind him.
The woman made her movements. No warmth rose. No spark kindled. The motions were correct, efficient, dutiful—yet empty. He withdrew almost immediately, stood up and pushed the woman away.
She looked up at him, brow faintly furrowed.
“Is something wrong, Herr Oberleutnant?”
He buttoned his tunic without answering.
Later, in the anteroom where several other officers waited their turns, the mockery came—low, good-natured in tone but sharp in intent.
“Still nothing, von Brandt?” one lieutenant asked, smirking over a cigarette. “What’s the matter—too much Nordic ice in the veins?”
Another laughed. “Maybe he prefers the other side of the barracks. You know what they say about some of these pure types…Warmduscher…”
The slur was old, crude, Bavarian-accented. Sebastian did not flinch. He simply met their eyes until the laughter died, then gave them each a hard blow in the face and walked out into the evening without a word.
The cold air outside tasted clean. He walked the long way home through Schwabing’s quiet streets, boots ringing on wet cobblestones. The quiet storm inside his chest had not returned during the encounter—not even faintly. Only duty. Only absence.
He let himself into the house just after dusk. The blackout curtains were already drawn; Frau Huber had lit the kerosene lamps in the lower rooms. From the study came the soft scratch of pen on paper and the faint glow of the desk lamp he had left burning earlier.
Aiko was still working, but she already had a night gown on. Blue, all covering and loose fitting, made of cotton and lace. She had rolled her sleeves to the elbow—modest, practical, revealing only the slender line of her forearms as she wrote. Lamplight caught the faint sheen of ink on her fingers, the delicate curve of her wrist. Her hair, still pinned but slightly loosened from the day’s labor, framed her face in soft shadows. She did not hear him at first; only when he stepped fully into the doorway did she look up.
The surge came without warning—fiercer than before.
Heart slamming once, twice. Warmth uncoiling low and swift, like flame catching dry tinder. The world narrowed again: to the quiet rise of her breath, the small smudge of ink on her cheek, the way her dark eyes widened just fractionally in surprise.
Sebastian’s hand tightened on the doorframe.
“Why only you?” The words escaped before he could stop them—low, rough, almost accusatory.
Aiko blinked. “?”
He took one step into the room, then another. The distance between them shrank until he stood beside the desk. She did not move away.
He reached out—slowly, as though testing the air itself—and let his fingertips rest against the back of her hand where it lay on the paper. No more than that: four fingers, light, unmoving. Yet the contact burned through him like live current. He felt the faint tremor in her skin, the warmth of her pulse beneath the surface.
She did not pull away.
For a long moment neither spoke.
Then Sebastian exhaled—once, sharply—and withdrew his hand. He stepped back, breaking the spell.
“Finish the translations,” he said, voice steady again, though quieter than before. “I will review them tomorrow. And... try to write them a bit more neatly.”
He turned and left the study without another word.
But the ember inside him no longer smoldered.
ns216.73.216.141da2
and then Add to home screen.