Warning: Character death. On this day, 1947, Prussia died…
Alone, Together, Always
Russia's stance was wide, cloak billowing. He held a gun with one bullet. It pointed at my chest.
The rest of the Allies stood watching, or in France's case, turned away. I had no doubt that tears shimmered in his eyes.
England was the orchestrator of this, me dying at the end of WW2. The rest simply had to go along. Russia had been the one chosen to fire the bullet. He had loved torturing me so much… but I couldn't help remember…
England shouted the word. I closed my eyes. Waited for the shot, God taking me…
I opened an eye to see Russia's hands trembling on the gun. So he has a memory…
"See you in Hell, bastards!" I shriek, and step three paces forward to wrap my hands around the trigger and finish what no one else could. Damn it, I was tired of living in this world of traitors and betrayal anyway. France screamed. Russia gasped. I wrapped my hands around the nation if snow's and squeezed.
A split second of pain and the hands of God pulled me from Earth.
As I walked to the judgment, was it weird that I only thought of how cold Russia's hands were?
Ice…
I'm probably going to Hell. I've betrayed people. There was that whole Hungary thing. I've murdered. I've gotten really drunk way too many times to count, so there's really no telling what I've done.
And I'm bi, but that seems so minor right now.
So what a surprise it was to find out there is no hell…
Yeah, because I'm a country…
We just all get put in the afterlife for countries.
That's strange.
Now I look on Earth, and I see Russia standing over my body. My limp form is picked up by him. I am draped in his arms and god I look small next to him. As the countries file out of the room, England bends to pick of the gun.
Typical. He still cares about the stupid weapon instead of my body, or the still-crying France, or America's shock. America knows the feeling of being at the wrong end of a gun, but when England failed to shoot him, he didn't finish the job.
Me, I have no people to continue living for.
So I died.
Russia hides behind his creepiness, I think. Spain hides behind a smile. France, well, he'll whisper words as smooth as silk, words he doesn't believe.
England has no mask. He's just an uncaring tyrant.
Why does Russia need a mask?
"Freak!"
The shout followed the young albino.
"You freak! You have a demon in your eyes and a curse upon your hand! You are Hell-sent to us!"
I stumbled in the snow, cursing that I was a left hander albino. What the woman had shouted is what they all said. It didn't matter that I was the goddamn personification of her country. It was another reason I was different.
And it really didn't help that my first crush was a boy.
The prissy personification of Austria was kinda cute. I didn't say anything, though.
So when I finally ran out of energy and fell, exhausted, in the snow, I honestly hoped to die.
I woke up in a house. The house was fairly large for the time. I looked around the walls of the room I was in. A single sunflower was delicately painted on one wall, cowering beneath the blizzards on the other three. As I continued to look, I noticed that one of the corners was painted to look like it was broken, and sickly sweet roses peered in.
"Do you like it?"
I jumped as a voice sounded behind me. I turned to see a boy much taller than me, wearing a coat and scarf. His eyes were purple, and his hair blonde. His accent was Russian.
"Roses, they are pretty, da? But they hide their thorns. They are distant. They do not care about the single sunflower in the storm."
"Who are you?" I choked.
"I'm the sunflower."
"No, I meant your name, idiot."
"Russland, as you say in your language."
"Russ-Russia?"
He smiled with his eyes, though his lips did not move. "Who are you?"
"A freak," I replied. He is a lonely sunflower, I am a demon. "I'm Prussia."
"You nearly froze. Why did you run?"
"I told you. I'm a freak."
"Will you be my friend? It gets lonely here, because it is very big. My sisters, they do not even like me, sometimes. I scare Ukraine, but I am afraid of Belarus. I am a disappointment."
"We will be freaks together, then, huh?"
That afternoon, we outlined a white sunflower on the wall. It stood jauntily next to the yellow one.
Russia and I basically grew up together. Best friends, ja? However, I managed to meet more people. I came to know France and Spain really well.
I couldn't be left alone again, now, could I?
I clung to that friendship. I clung to it even when that meant not speaking Russian anymore. (We had taught each other our languages. I decided that I liked the strange letters that seemed like relics of a much older language.) Now I learned Spanish, and French. French was a lot like the roses in its sickly sweetness. They taught me how to write right-handed.
I missed Russian and the freedom of writing with my left hand. I started a diary. Its cover was Prussian blue, and I wrote in German and Russian. All of it was with my left hand.
Years passed. Wars were fought. I forgot about a white sunflower painted on a wall, except when I wrote in my diary. Outwardly, I learned (from Spain and France) how to hide any weakness under a mask of pride. Maybe this was the time I forgot how to laugh properly, and learned to say "kesesese" instead. Maybe this was the time I forgot how to introduce myself as anything other than "The awesome Prussia". It probably was.
One day, I accidently wrote a word in my diary with my right hand. I crossed the word out so many times, I ripped out the page, but it didn't work. I broke. I stopped writing in my diary. I actually tried to be what everyone expected. I got so good that everyone, even France and Spain, forgot the insecure, quiet, left-handed boy I used to be.
I thought Russia did too.
I could kill myself (again) for not seeing the sadness behind Russia's purple eyes.
Nobody else could have, so it was up to me, and I failed.
That is why Russia needs a mask.
Never, in all those years, had Russia given up. The sunflowers never changed, and I knew how symbolic that was for him. I wrote in my diary with my left hand, and he painted his beliefs in flowers.
Today he ran back to his house as North Italy planned my funeral. (I was glad it was North Italy. Anything by bruder would be too stuffy and organized. The Italian has a flair for artistic stuff.)
Well, as that was happening, Russia ran back to where we first met, his scarf flowing out behind him. He knelt in the basement, and repainted the sunflowers.
The white sunflower stood between a yellow sunflower and a yellow sunflower slowly becoming a rose.
Russia whispered to himself, "Prussia… you protected me from killing you. That's me, the sunflower influenced by the roses. But you saved me. You saved me from myself."
He then stood, and touched a black-tipped paintbrush to the ceiling.
In Russian, he wrote, Prussia.
In German, he wrote, Russia.
In both languages, he repeated, Alone. Together. Always.