Allied operations report. January 5th, 1970.
Generalized timeline

June 6th, 1944—massive allied defeat at Omaha, Juno, Sword, Utah, and Gold beaches.
January 19th , 1957—Britain negotiates truce with Hitler; Hitler will stop expanding European empire.
March 22nd, 1957—japan and china agree to peace talks over land and trade.
April 9th, 1961—Hitler dies (natural causes), German power struggle begins.
December 1st, 1963—German power struggle ends, Josef Goebbels II takes power.

“We’ve been living in the shadow of that monster for too long. We must take action now, while the German leadership is still weak.”
“I wouldn’t advise reigniting an ancient war that, last time, killed millions, landed the largest naval force ever assembled at the bottom of the ocean, and put us in the deep hole we’re in now. Acting against them would be a suicide mission for our country, it would give them the long awaited opportunity to expand their territory and kill us all.”
“They would not, on the one hand, slaughter those with blonde hair and blue eyes.”
“What are you getting at, might I ask, sir?”
“That we declare war after we strike. They threw away the rules, I don’t see why we shouldn’t, either.”
“Ah. So we send every blond haired, blue eyed, German speaking paratrooper we can find into a meat grinder?”
“I was thinking Berlin, actually.”

It has been a long fifteen years. A hard fifteen years. And I am finally here, past the borders of the German province, through Switzerland. Switzerland is a horrible place, full of suffering, and disease, and death. The price to pay for resisting violence. But I am past that place, now, and awful memories will not serve me well. I have seen Paris, beautiful Paris, laid low by Germany. I would never have guessed that my home country could be so cruel. But French culture has been all but crushed. There are still nightclubs full of gangsters, criminals, gamblers, and, of course, the wierdos, who can get high, have fun, break the law, and nobody cares. I met Pierre in one of these bars. But we’ll get to that later. First you need to understand.
I am a born Berliner: My hair is a perfect shade of blonde, my eyes a vibrant blue gray color, my skin is an acceptable shade of off-white. My name is Thomas.
I live in the suburbs, and my family here goes back generations. My father can recall the days of his youth, when his grandfather would tell the tales of his own grandfather’s youth, back when people of all races were considered equal. Naturally, they scoff at the foolishness of people in that time, remind me to never return to their old, savage ways.
For a time, when I was young, I wondered how society progressed to such an advanced and civilized manner so relatively quickly. Surely they were not all bad, at the very least there were a few sensible people in the world, and perhaps they really were all good. Just… different. With different cultures, languages, and races, and they just didn’t care at all what color eyes the kid sitting next to them in class is. Perhaps, what matters to a 1979 Berliner carried no weight in their society at all.
When I told my mother my thoughts (I was nine at the time, still very young) I received a harsh slap across the face, and was told to go to bed without dinner. I cried myself to sleep that night. Unable to understand what I had done wrong, to deserve this cruel punishment. When I asked the next morning, my mother simply frowned and said that I wasn’t supposed to talk about what life was like before the great changes Hitler had made. I was upset, and it must have shown because she hugged me and slipped a cookie into my lunch. It was five years before I touched the subject again.
In those five years, I had come to understand the importance of my father’s job. He works for the government, for an agency called Sicherheitsdienst, or the SD, which controls security for Germany. He carries a gun, a handsome new French model Browning Hi-power, which he wears in a holster on his left hip. He belongs to a special force of officers designated to protecting high ranking government officials, he was part of a particular 15 man squad assigned to protecting the Governor of Berlin. I remember, once, seeing him clad in a black suit and dark glasses, escorting the mayor at an Independence Day parade with four other men. I waved, and he gave a small smile in my direction, before the serious and expressionlessness returned to his face, and the Governor moved on.
I began to notice things out of the ordinary, as I approached the end of my adolescence.
The market was never busy on Monday mornings. Most people, I suppose, would rather shop on evenings than in the early morning darkness. But I enjoy the peacefulness of this time of day, and while there is a curfew, nobody cares how early you get up, provided it’s after midnight. So I make my way through the market place, dressed in a heavy, gray winter coat, gloves, boots, thick pants and a stocking cap pulled over my ears. By the time I got to the grocery store, the ground is covered in a thin layer of December snow. My boots are the first to leave tracks in it, a lone set of foot prints, with a story to tell.
It’s nearly 7:30 before I hear the yells. I am heading out of the grocery store when a vendor’s stand topples outside with a crash. I see a man, probably in his twenties, wearing a thin black jacket with a short brimmed cap, his face roughly shaven, the bristles of his beard catching a few snowflakes. He has a worried look on his face, and his suspicions are confirmed when the owner of the shop yells for him to come back, thief, you will pay for this vandalism. He runs, disappears into an alley.
The curiosity on my face must have shown, because the vendor speaks in my direction:
“Blasted thief. Took a couple of bread rolls and ran, knocked over my cart in the process.”
This is unusual. There is hardly any crime in Germany, and if there is, police crack down quickly and brutally. This tends to encourage would-be bank robbers, shoplifters and burglars to find an honest line of work. There have been about two incidences in my whole 13 years that involved crime, neither of which had to do with me. One was a break in at a home not too far from me, about a mile away (the perpetrator was caught, and for all I know is still in prison, or dead), and another involving petty shoplifting in an old store about a block down from the vendor’s cart.
I glance at my watch: 7:41 am.school starts at eight. I need to hurry.
I weave through the irregular network of streets, turning right, left, or something in between, hurrying, hurrying… The man in the thin black coat shoves past me, as if he is in a hurry, as well. The man in the thin black coat! The very same one who had just robbed a vendor of his bread, just this morning. What is he doing here? I don’t think. I just follow him. And that is a very stupid thing to do.
I follow him out of downtown, past the school—I hope the teacher on patrol doesn’t notice my odd behavior—into a section of the suburbs that I don’t know, and into an alley. Suddenly, I realize that he might have noticed me, given that I have been trailing him for the past ten minutes, and that we are the only ones left on the street.
“Aren’t you going to be late for school, kid?” He seems calm, given that he’s just committed the second greatest atrocity in berlin. Then I see the knife. And, of course, I run.
I am still alive. That is not normal, when I spent the morning cornered in an alley by a menacing looking man with a knife. So I take a stupid risk, and return to investigate. He is waiting for me.
“I figured you’d be back eventually.” I nod, slowly. “First things first, kid, I’m not a Berliner. I’m not even from the Germany.” He pauses, and I wonder. I am surprised by his openness. But only for a moment. “I’m not from Austria, Switzerland, France, or Spain. I am not from Portugal. Nor am I from Czechoslovakia, Hungary, or Romania. I am not from Bulgaria, And I am not from Croatia. In fact, though my papers say I’m from Poland, I am not. Yes, you must be confused, as I have just named every province in the known world. But I tell you this: There is more.” I can hear footsteps, now, heavy boots thudding on the pavement. A worried look crosses his face.
“behind the dumpster! Now!
They ask no questions. Just a clean shot through the head. The noise resonates throughout the alley, echoing against the tall brick apartment buildings that for the walls of the alley. Only two things are on my mind right now: that he is dead, and that what he said must be true. Why else would he be dangerous enough to kill, if not for knowing too much? There is more. There really is more. I will find it, I swear. For him.
In the meantime, I run.
And here I am.
I am not Thomas anymore. My eyes are still blue, but my hair has been dyed a shade of mahogany, to match Pierre’s. I am no longer an Aryan. I gave up a high position in a feudal society, to go to a low caste, where I have few rights. I do not need my rights given to me by a man who does not give equal rights to my brothers. So I gave up my rights, and took only the ones that god would give me. I have no regrets.
We leave tonight. Pierre and I, we will row across the vast expanse of water separating France from England. England. We are going to be free. We have planned this for months, setting up backups, and more backups, so that we always have a way out when something goes awry. Like the last three times. But tonight. We will not fail. Paris is better than Germany. Because here, we have hope. No true Berliner knows what that is. And hope is all I need.
There is one last thing that I need to do. I have carved the headstone myself, for the man who gave me hope. I plant it into the ground now, in the early morning light. The sun is just peeking over the horizon, and by its light I can read what it says:
Unknown British Agent
Remembered
For he gave me
One thing:
Hope
As I leave the graveyard, I am followed by the shadow of a man in a thin black coat, with his cap pulled low over his head.