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It's the language closest to him, the language he finds when he's groping for sense at the blind edge of sleep. The language he's most likely to be careless in, to lose control. The language he talks in his dreams and if it's out loud, well – who's to know if it's meant, or who it's meant for. Utivich doesn't understand a word of Wicki's German.
It's also the language he'll fall into when all else is gone. It holds the words for when he dies and lately a small cave of sadness opens inside him when he thinks of this. He knows the chances are slim there'd be time for talk at all, with his brain coming to a dead stop in a silence so sharp and sudden that every thought in his head telescopes in on itself, lying scattered in dimly recognizable parts. It doesn't matter, but still. Utivich won't understand a word.
The cold gets to them all and they bundle together in a barn, safe from the worst of the wind. Utivich kicks in his sleep. In fright or in rage, it doesn't matter. Wicki stirs behind him, tightens the forearm spanning his comrade's waist and pitches his voice low, at the rumbly tone Utivich, like all the boys, seems to still for, no matter what he's saying.
"Shhhh." The heel of a boot catches Wicki in the shin and he leans closer, his mouth grazing the sweat-sharp skin by Utivich's ear as he growls softly, "Ruhig, Kleiner. Ruhig." An elbow strikes out from the wriggling body in his arms, jabbing him in the ribs. He pulls him back against his chest, hushing him again, until at last the fight slips away and with a muffled snort Utivich's body slackens. He rolls sideways a little, pinning Wicki almost uncomfortably, his back a dull weight on his chest. His ear's smushed up against his mouth and Wicki shifts only enough to catch a breath before he murmurs, nothing intelligible at first, just a sound to follow the splay and press of his fingers against Utivich's belly, then, "Hab' dich."
--
Utivich nearly loses it one day. Standing over a Nazi they'd shot in both legs, he's yards away but Wicki can read the speechless rage on his pale face. He gives a couple of preliminary kicks to the man's side then crouches, his knife drawn and held before the Nazi's eyes. Everything tumbles forwards in a flash, the adrenaline lunge that knocks him flat, the bloodied knees holding up an undead body, Utivich's wrist pinned in the dirt and the blade being turned, savage and jerky like a rusted lock, towards his neck. Wicki's stranded dry-mouthed and out of reach, he knows he isn't shot enough to draw his gun.
It's Stiglitz who reaches him, has the Nazi rearing back on his blade, letting him twitch before dropping him aside, landing a kick to his chin that audibly snaps his spine. Utivich sits up, dusting his legs with trembling hands and slowly getting to his feet. He takes a few steps back and stands, watching Stiglitz, grim-faced and steady-gripped as he scalps the corpse.
Even after, as they wash their knives and hands in a dull grey pond, watched by a solitary goose that no one has the energy to capture, Wicki can't take his eyes off him. Utivich holds his knife clear of the surface and lets it drip, as if he's watching for the last of the water to fall away before he sheaths it. He looks stunned - big-eyed and faintly, barely noticeably trembling, still.
Wicki wipes his own blade, then his hands on his trousers and says,"Ich weiß nicht, ob ich dich küssen oder dir einen Arschtritt verpassen sollte," cutting a glance at Utivich and giving him a small, tight smile before cuffing him over the back of the head. He snaps out of his trance, squawking in protest and shoving at Wicki's chest with his free hand. Stiglitz is in the middle distance, frowning into the air above Wicki's head. Wicki grabs at Utivich's wrist and calls him everything he can think of, stupid fuck, asshole, idiot little shit, goddamn stupid kid, some he's not sure what the translations would be, not loosening his grip when Utivich hisses and bites his lip, but holding the hand up between them until his curses run dry. His eyes are bigger than usual to Wicki's mind, the same blue shimmering surface, only broken now, Wicki thinks, the way a rock falls through.
He doesn't give a damn if Stiglitz is still glaring.
--
Stiglitz is a tight-wound mechanism of muscle and calculation, reliable but rarely loose enough for words, so Wicki is surprised to see him lurking beside him as he scrapes the last of Donowitz' not so badly burned stew from his plate. He'd sat apart for a reason, sure he wouldn't be able to stomach the food if he sat near the others, who weren't bleeding, weren't butchered, but still. Stiglitz regards him with a mild expression, like he hasn't anything he's especially interested in discussing. Wicki greets him politely enough, patting the ground beside him and setting his cleaned plate aside. Stiglitz accepts the cigarette he offers and they smoke for a while in silence, before he clears his throat, like the creak of a disused engine which, yes, Wicki supposes, it rather is.
"Kid's careless." Stiglitz exhales a steady line of smoke. "Gonna get himself in trouble." His voice is low and uninflected, although their German is cover enough.
Wicki makes a noncommittal sound and leans back on his hands.
"Maybe if you talked to him," and Stiglitz hesitates slightly, ostentatiously on the you. "You should talk to him, educate him a little." Stiglitz pauses and looks pointedly at Wicki. "In English."
Wicki tips his head back and smokes, squinting into the last of the sun. "We're all gonna get careless." He shuts his eyes completely and takes a deep drag. "We're all dying." Stiglitz doesn't reply and into the silence Wicki says, "Sie wissen es."
Stiglitz gives a hollow, mirthless laugh and scrubs his cigarette out in the dirt before he gets up and heads back to the group of men. Wicki sits a minute or so longer before following him. When he looks, Utivich and Stiglitz are nowhere to be found.
--
"Darf ich?"
It's cold and late, harshly moonlit and they're bundled in twos and threes under trees and in ditches. Wicki can't sleep. The silence and the space around him feels dangerous. He tugs the blanket around his shoulders, around Utivich, and waits for the silence to slide its steel tongue between the small round bones of his spine. He has his hand in Utivich's hair, twisting the waves between finger and thumb. Utivich is in his light, fluid-limbed stage of sleep and Wicki's pull on his hair draws out a shrug of his shoulders and a twitchy laugh that drops into a sigh. There's a gentle kick at Wicki's ankle. He whispers again into the back of Utivich's shoulder, then sits up a little, leaning back so he can see Utivich's face. In the frosty blue light he can see the small curve of a smile, a sign of contentment, of safety. He runs his hand over the hair again and there – a little wider.
Wicki leans in again, his lips almost in Utivich's hair, so he can surely feel his breath as he repeats, "Darf ich?"
He turns in Wicki's arms, slow as swimming in quicksand, but when he fixes his eyes on Wicki's they're alert, hardly blinking and inescapable. It's like he's trying to read Wicki's mind.
"Are you saying it?" His voice is soft and clear.
"Was?"
"Are you saying –" He hesitates, makes a tiny, rapid clenching movement with his arms and chin, as if he's suddenly felt the cold, before pressing his lips into an almost straight line. "You want me?"
Wicki's silent and Utivich doesn't look away. He half-smiles, unable to resist playing a little longer. "Vielleicht."
"Fucker."
Utivich frowns and shoves both hands against his chest and Wicki would love to keep teasing, keep drawing Utivich out word by word, but he's still looking up at him. From the beginning of it all, those eyes have been Wicki's undoing, so he looks back and says, "Ja."
Utivich's mouth is half open, held in a soft shape of surprise as he moves a fraction closer to Wicki, returning his hands to his chest, not shoving but laid flat and barely touching, a light hover against his shirt.
"Ja?" he says, before he leans in and kisses Wicki.
Wicki kisses him back from the start, pushing him almost recklessly, daring the kid to pull away and finding instead that his mouth is pliant and open and his kiss is just as eager. When Wicki pulls back, Utivich is staring at him, breathing fast and lifting his fingers to his lips before speaking.
"Wicki, I only got one word of German, but y'know…" The fingers he's touched to his mouth are held in the air between them, not touching anywhere else yet. "Y'know you can ask me?"
So Wicki slides his hands behind Utivich's ears, thumbs stroking over his cheeks as he asks, almost into his mouth, "Darf ich? Bitte?"
Utivich's reply is smothered, but the foot he hooks around the back of Wicki's knees and hauls him close with, the hands fisting his collar, that's understood.
--
GLOSSARY:
Ruhig = Hush
Kleiner = Little One
Hab' dich. = I've got you.
Ich weiß nicht, ob ich dich küssen oder dir einen Arschtritt verpassen sollte. = I don't know whether to kiss you or kick your ass.
Sie wissen es. = You know it.
Darf ich? = May I?
Vielleicht = maybe