Hello!!!
So sorry for not updating in AGES! I feel terrible about that. I had a spare hour (spare hour?!) and have been wanting to update for so long!! Exams, revision and school are just all out to get me, and all the teachers are sat there screaming at us that 'you have seven weeks to go, do you want to pass', which is helping tremendously T-T. So, yeah, update!!!!
MiddleEarth4eva

Matthew sat on a high silver stool with a blue blanket wrapped around his shoulders hugging a mug of hot tea. Somewhere in the distance, he could hear Arthur and Vladimir arguing, and Peter chipping in to their conversation every so often. When he'd turned up, he was given the blanket as though he was in shock, then the tea, then they'd all gone off to 'talk'. Well, not all of them, but Emil was asleep, so he didn't really count. He'd been left here with this blanket. He hadn't even got chance to tell them about Francis!

After a while, the raised voices dispersed. There was a minute of silence, then the door burst open and Peter careered in, the other two close behind.

"How are you faring?" Arthur pulled up a chair and sat down. "Not too... you know..."

"In shock?" Matthew frowned. "I don't know why you've given me a blanket, I'm not in shock."

"Okay then" Arthur nodded. "Do you remember much about it?"

"Everything" Matthew nearly snapped. Why they were acting like he was some sort of victim of amnesia. He could remember everything clearly, like it was any other day. A bad day... week at that, but that wasn't the point.

"Okay" Arthur said again. His voice had taken on a quiet, patronising tone to it, like he was talking to some sort of small animal or child who could scream or bolt at any given second.

"Where was it?" Vladimir asked, taking a step forwards so he was directly behind Arthur's chair. Matthew almost sighed with relief. He was talking normally, like nothing had ever happened. "Do you know where the base itself was?"

Matthew opened his mouth to reply and hesitated. Good question. He thought back to when he'd been trudging over open countryside. There had been a road sign when he'd met a road of sorts after about half an hour. A road sign reading... He strained to remember. No, not a road sign... there had been a blue strip of water at the edge of the horizon, and the sign had said...

"Ferries to mainland Denmark every hour."

Arthur blinked and glanced at Vladimir.

"So it was an island" Vladimir nodded. "And a Danish island at that. That's great, we know its whereabouts now, and they rarely have more than one ferry going from place to place if the island was as deselect as you said it was, so it'd have to be around half an hour away from it I'd say."

"It only narrows it down a little" Arthur frowned, then he turned the patronising voice back on. "Do you know which one the island was?"

Matthew shook his head. I don't think it was that big really, but it couldn't have been tiny."

"But that's still over four hundred islands" Arthur sighed.

"Only eighty are inhabited" Vladimir pointed out. "They wouldn't want to go to an inhabited one, so it narrows it down to just over three hundred."

"It's still three hundred" Arthur chewed his lip.

"The base itself wasn't hidden" Matthew said, hoping to help them along a little more. "It was pretty large actually. It looked like the conference buildings we used to have before the mess a while ago."

"So, fairly easy to spot?" Arthur asked, the patronising tone slowly fading again.

"There was a forest nearby if that helps" Matthew shrugged. Apart from that it was just field. Unfenced, untouched field."

"Okay" Vladimir grinned. "That's a lot less islands than we had before then. This'll be a doddle." He hesitated. "But why Denmark?"

"Why not?" Arthur shrugged.

"No I mean..." Vladimir glanced at Emil on the couch in the corner of the room. "I mean... it's a bit risky isn't it? Matthias is pretty well known for literally walking around his country in a day to make sure everything's alright. That'd include the islands. They must've known that right?"

"Y..." Arthur trailed off. "Yeah. They should've known that."

"Do you think it's on purpose?" Matthew asked. No one moved for a second before, without even looking at each other, Vladimir and Arthur ran from the room, Peter barrelling after them, clearly having the same thoughts.

"Stay there Matthew" Arthur yelled over his shoulder. "We'll be back in a bit."

"But I need to tell you..." Matthew shouted back, leaping from the stool and running to the door. Before he got there, it slammed shut and he stopped.  "... About Francis. He needs you." He stood staring at the door for a while before, grumbling, turning around to finish off his now cold tea and wrap the blanket around himself again.

"What was that?" Emil rolled off the couch and stood up, wobbling about a little. "What happened?"

"I don't know" Matthew admitted. "I don't know."