The Destruction of Pompeii
Summary: All Spain wanted to know was why the soils in Campania grew Romano's best tomatoes. Of course Spain wasn't to know what sort of effect it would have on him. Nobody knows just how badly the famous eruption of Vesuvius affected Romano.
A/N: Well hallo~. Most of this is explained at the end. It's kinda... well most of it is flashback. And poor little Romano. Well, read ahead~
Warning:...Romano kept his mouth rather clean this time!
=X=
Spain smiled around at the rows and rows of tomato plants, all covered in wonderfully plump, ripe tomatoes. He looked over to where Romano was picking some and placing them carefully in his harvesting basket.
"These tomatoes are really wonderful, Romano!" he exclaimed happily carefully plucking one from the plant and biting into it. "This field always gets some of your best! How do you do it?"
Romano scowled at having been brought out of his peaceful harvesting.
"What do you mean, bastardo?" he sighed.
"What makes this area so good for growing things?" Spain repeated, taking another bite and humming satisfactorily.
Romano's scowl lifted slightly and he looked uneasy, eyes shifting over the ground. He moved his weight from his left foot to his right and nervously rubbed his left side.
"The soils are really fertile is all. Campania has some of the best soil in my country. It's really good for growing crops." he said, trying to sound offhand.
"Why is that?" Spain didn't seem to be picking up on the fact that Romano was not enjoying this topic of discussion.
"...Volcanic soils. Volcanic soils are always fertile once they've worn a bit." The Italian replied eventually, quietly. He rubbed his left side again.
"Volcanic... oh! Of course, we're near Vesuvius aren't we?" Spain exclaimed.
Romano just nodded mutely, trying to go back to picking his tomatoes. However, this reminder of their location seemed to have excited Spain.
"Oh, we should go and see Pompeii after we're done! It's a really big tourist attraction, right? I've never been!" the Spaniard smiled. Romano froze instantly at the mention of Pompeii. Spain seemed to finally notice something wasn't quite right with the Italian. "Roma? Roma what's wrong?"
Romano didn't seem to hear him, just stared blankly at the ground in front of him.
Romano and Veneziano, or as they were usually known at this time, Poco Romano and Piccola Italia sat together, Romano watching his younger brother draw. Somewhere in their big house, their Grandpa Rome was attending to something or another. The two brothers were spending a bit of time alone for the first time in a while, since Rome was often out of the house and usually took Italia with him.
"Fratello, fratello, look!" the little Italian chirped.
Romano looked at the picture. Italia was only a very little child, but his art was exceptional for his age. Their Grandpa really loved how talented he was.
On the sheet of paper were three people – all labelled in a rather messy scrawl. Big 'Nonno Roma' was stood next to small 'Piccola Italia' and beside him was 'Poco Romano', and although the first two were smiling happily and holding hands, the latter seemed to be frowning about something. Romano scowled at his brother.
"Fratellino, that's stupid. Idiota." He muttered, screwing up the paper and throwing it away. Piccola Italia pouted sadly.
"Draw with me, fratello. Per favore?" he asked, blinking his eyes. Poco Romano scowled, then sighed.
"Va bene. But this time, draw something nice." He said.
"Si!" the youngest brother instantly set to work scribbling with his pencils. Romano looked at him for a moment, then set to work.
The two drew together for a while. Romano suddenly winced and flinched at a small pain in his left side, just above where his ribcage ended. He swore when he saw his flinch had made a line through his work, and he worked on trying to erase it.
"Are you okay, fratello?" Italia asked, looking worriedly at his brother.
"Fine, idiota." Romano muttered.
Romano continued drawing, and almost forgot about the strange pain – until it returned again, slightly sharper this time, causing him to suck in a breath.
"Ohi..." he muttered, rubbing the spot again.
Italia looked over again. Like children do, he started to sense that something wasn't quite right, and it worried him.
"Are you sure you're okay, fratello? Should I get Nonno?" he asked.
"Shut up Piccola." Romano snapped. "It's nothing."
It soon became apparent to him, however, that it wasn't nothing. He could feel an uneasiness, and a nagging ache in his side. Being young, the two countries didn't know much about their connection to their people and their land, but the natural sixth sense all countries have alerting them when something is wrong was kicking in. He could think what it was, but only far back in his head, out of his reach.
The pain came again, and again, becoming more frequent and painful each time it returned. By now Poco Romano had given up on drawing, simply sitting and waiting for the next stab of burning pain to come. Piccola Italia also abandoned his task, and sat close to his brother, desperately wanting to give and receive comfort.
Suddenly Romano gave a loud cry of pain and collapsed over onto his side, clutching his torso in pain and screwing his eyes shut. He kicked a few times and writhed, gritting his teeth. Italia stared with wide eyes.
"Romano! Fratello, Romano, what's wrong?" he cried, scared.
"Vesuvius!" the older gasped, eyes flying open and staring at nothing, fear shining in them. "It's – ah!"
Romano broke off with another cry of pain and he twisted viciously, trying to escape the burning. "Vesuvius has erupted!" he managed eventually.
Italia gasped. He knew enough to know that Vesuvius was a big volcano in his brother's land – in fact, all of the volcanoes were in his brother's land. But if it was hurting him this much, it had to be bad.
"T-they're all..."Romano shuddered, muttering to himself, eye clouded over as he was lost to whatever his connection was showing him. "Run...run! Don't...no... it'll-GAH!"
Italia let out a small scream as his brother gave a sudden convulsion and yelled loudly, screaming his pain – his people's pain – as loudly as was possible.
"Nonno Roma! Nonno Roma!"
Romano barely registered his little brother running out of the room, crying for their Grandpa. The fearful cry of the other boy was drowned out by the pain as his land destroyed itself and his people were wiped out. He choked on the clean air that to him suddenly felt like it was clogging his lungs with ash and debris as he felt what his people felt –the sensation of suffocating and a flash of pure terror before their existence cut painfully from the living world, and there were so many people, and it overwhelmed the small Italian. They'd know the volcano was acting strange, they knew the ash rising from it couldn't have meant any good thing, some had been scared, maybe some small few had escaped, but others simply accepted it and went on as normal.
One person. One child had seen, in his last moment, the fire spew from the mountain, the cloud rise darkening the skies. That was all Romano could see. Vesuvius throwing out debris and burning fire, the thick ash descending fast on the people, many of whom were already dead from the boiling heat. And everything was buried.
"Romano! Poco Romano, can you hear me?"
Romano was snapped back to reality when his grandfather shook his shoulders, calling his name and frowning at him worriedly. Behind him, Piccola Italia watched fearfully, a few tears brimming in his eyes. Romano made a huge gasp for breath and grasped onto his Grandpa, sobbing with terror and pain and sadness.
"It killed them all. Pompeii is gone! They're all buried, under the ash, Vesuvius just buried them! Nonno, nonno..." the child cried, burying his face as best he could in his grandfather's chest. He shook badly, and just cried. He'd never experienced anything like that before.
He'd never forget it.
"Roma? Roma! Can you hear me?" Spain called worriedly. The Italian had started shaking and clutched desperately at his left side.
"Veh~, fratello, Spanga, are you-" Veneziano came skipping happily over to them, but stopped when he saw Romano. He blinked.
"Spagna? Is Roma okay?" he asked cautiously.
"I dunno! I just suggested going to see Pompeii and he just froze up." Spain told him, and his tone showed that he knew he'd done or said something wrong, but he didn't know what.
"Oh! Fratello!" Veneziano cried, running up to his brother. He took him by the shoulders and shook him gently. The shadows over his brother's eyes faded and he blinked, suddenly seeing Veneziano's face.
"Venezia." He whispered, allowing himself to be hugged. "Pompeii..."
"Shh, silenzioso Romano." Veneziano soothed him. "Let's go back to the house."
Spain sat on the Italies' sofa, head hanging. Veneziano came quietly down the stairs from taking Romano to his room to lie down and rest for a while. Spain looked up and immediately started apologising.
"Lo siento, Feli, I didn't know, I should have know really shouldn't I? I was really stupid..."
"It's okay, Spagna. You weren't to know. Veh~, not many people know how badly that affected fratello. Other countries have volcanic eruptions and they cope okay. It's just that we were little, I think that was the first time he had a strong connection to something like that happening, and it was so bad... It really hurt him. Really, it didn't last long, but it was so scary, seeing him like that..." Veneziano shuddered. "He's usually okay when he's here, but he's always a bit on edge I think, looking for any sign that it might happen again. I think you suggesting to go there just made him remember, is all."
"I'm really, really sorry." Spain insisted. "Can I go and tell him?"
"He might throw a pillow at you... but okay." Veneziano nodded. "Veh~, I'll start making some pasta for lunch."
Spain smiled and nodded then walked up the stairs. He approached Romano's room cautiously.
"Roma?" he asked gently as he opened the door a crack. Romano was hugging a pillow to his chest and staring at the wall, but his eyes snapped to Spain as soon as he walked into the room.
"Spagna..." he mumbled.
"I'm sorry, Romano, I didn't know." Spain said sincerely. Romano regarded him for a moment. Then he held out a hand.
Spain looked slightly surprised, but walked over and sat on the bed, taking Romano's hand into his own. The Italian used this to pull the older country down to lay beside him, and nestled himself into the Spaniard's chest.
"Stay with me for a while." He murmured quietly. Spain nodded, nuzzling Romano's hair.
"Of course, mi amor."
The two lay together, enveloped in silence, and Spain held Romano protectively to his chest. The Italian accepted the comfort wordlessly, and closed his eyes.
=X=
A/N: Oh Geography class. You and your plate tectonics and volcanoes.
Umm, I'll just tell you a bit about the flashback section shall I?
Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD and buried Pompeii and another town called Herculaneum. This eruption apparently lasted two days, and some people could have evacuated at some point – but a lot of bodies have been found at Pompeii, so obviously quite a few didn't. Some of it probably isn't Historically accurate, and might not even be accurate to the Hetalian universe. Romano and Veneziano would have been small children under Rome, since the Roman Empire was still strong at this time.
Their nicknames are 'Little Roman' and 'Little Italy'. Do I really need to explain it? (Since Chibitalia is in essence 'Little Italy' it makes sense right?). I've only just realised that since they're under Rome they'd probably be speaking Latin, so the Italian in the flashback shouldn't be there. But then their names would be Vetera Romanorum and Aliquam Italy, and that sounds kind-of weird. And Italy calling 'Frater, frater' doesn't sound quite as cute. So yes. That's inaccurate. Me sucks.
I can imagine that since Romano was so young, and still wasn't 100% with his knowledge on what he was, what that meant, etc etc, it was a real shock, and probably painful to him too, it could well traumatize him to some degree. I'll also say that he wouldn't normally react as badly as this, but due to the fact that Spain had started the topic on the volcanic soils and then gone from that to Pompeii, it just brought it back to him. He probably ended up thinking about exactly how that soil got there.
Campania is on his left side because it's in the west part of south Italy, and facing North that is left. Also because it's somewhere below Rome, which is Romano's heart. The first reason doesn't work well for some other countries like England, else London should in theory be on his lower right. I could go into a long explanation of how I'd figure out where places are but I honestly think you don't care and will be bored. So I'll shut up now.
Hope you liked it, I wrote it on impulse. First time I've just compulsively written an idea, but I really liked it and didn't want to lose it.
Okay then, CIAO~