Warnings: Rated primarily for language and some "mature themes." Overuse of an F-word, though not the usual one. No lemons kthx. I know roughly shit about Polish history, so...corrections welcome!

A/N: First installment in a series of maybe five? AU!High school fic. Even though I usually hate them, I read a good one...also, this was the first Hetalia fic I started working on and I had trouble beling like, "Poland did this. Then Poland did that. Poland sez, "Moar poniez!"" so I wanted to use human names and personas. For some reason I still attempted to use historical references...

A!N: Several reportages of illegal produced fan fictions stealing onto Interweb! Do not! Thinking that belonging to official property of Hidekaz.

Solidarność

Chapter 1: Words and Hair Clips

"A major theme in European history seems to be that everyone screws Poland over."

-TS, Ace European History Teacher

It was a simple thing, really. A hair clip. It had been so long ago that he'd first worn it, and yet it seemed like that day had been the beginning of the end. And today he was going to wear it again no matter what that son of a bitch Toris said.

Ha! Toris never said anything to him anymore! But he knew about the whispers that passed illicitly between buddies during class. He felt the stares in the hallway, the congealed groups of friends sending him wary glares in unison. He walked those same hallways alone, feeling the unfriendliness without a partner to shield him, feeling the swish of silk around his legs.

Slam! For the silk.

Flush! For the silk.

"Fag!" For the silk.

Feliks glared up at the broad retreating back from his position crumpled below his locker. Someday he was going to say it. Someday was going to come back with "You can suck it Ludwig cuz we all know you want to!" But whose case would that help? No one, that was who. It was simply fate that Feliks Łukasiewicz was going to be the butt of every joke, the recipient of every punch in this school. Everyone screwed Feliks over.

And they had to use that word. It was tossed around like popcorn these days. He could hear it circulating in the hallway even now, though no one glanced at the Polish boy crumpled on the ground. It was a common sight. People used that word like it was spare change, but every time they said it Feliks couldn't help but feel like crying. He would not cry. Not all mascara was water-proof.

"Hey, Al, do you have a fag?"

"What the fuck, Arthur?"

"You know, a cigarette. Do you have one?"

"Jeez, thought you were casting aspirations on my innocence there. Oh! Speak of the devil!"

"I am kind of good at speaking of the devil."

"It's the Pollack herself."

"Dear lord, what have I summoned?"

The two boys passed Feliks with matching sneers. A boot casually made contact with his side, sending the Pole reeling. The green-eyed Arthur wore a leather jacket and punky boots, while the blue-eyed Alfred (what a stupid name!) was dressed in the ever-fashionable tattered bomber jacket and jeans. All in all, they made a suspiciously coordinated pair.

"Like, somebody totally needs to get laid," Feliks muttered to himself, watching the pair slap a high five that lingered just a moment too long. "Gawd, the sexual tension between those two is almost tangible."

He waited for the soft chuckle, the chiding "don't be mean, Feliks", beside him. Sighing, he realized that would be a long wait. Stupid to think he would still be here, he sighed, fixing a lock of stray hair with that sparkling pink clip. Nobody is like me.

1795

The dissolution of the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth

"What is that, Feliks?" Toris's hand pushed gently through the blonde's flax-colored locks, removing a tiny sparkling hair clip. The brown-haired boy's brow furrowed as he stared down at the accessory in his palm. "Isn't this for a girl?"

"Like, don't drop it! It'd be, like, totally impossible to find!" Feliks snatched it back, restoring the clip to its rightful place behind his ear. "Like, finding a hair clip in a rye field. Isn't that, like, totally an expression?"

"Uh, no. Why are you wearing it?"

"Elizaveta gave it to me! She's, like, totally sweet!"

"Hmph. It's not exactly appropriate, Feliks."

"Whatevs. Isn't it cute though? It's pink cuz my favorite colors are red and white, but she couldn't find one in stripes so she got pink cuz it's totally a mixture of red and white."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah. She has a green one, but she's wearing this one, too, cuz red and white are like totally her favorite colors. So we'll be, like, matching! She's going to, like, totally wear her clips today too, like, in solidarity!"

Feliks dangled his legs happily over the side of the hay bale. Glancing at his friend, he saw that Toris's mouth was still twisted in a scowl, his eyes averted. This was a job for the Warsaw rule! Feliks turned and swung his leg over his friend's hip, kneeling over the boy's legs. It was a common threat in those days – "pay attention to me or I'll, like, totally sit on you!" – but for some reason Toris didn't respond with a roll of the eyes and a half-annoyed, half-humorous sigh. His eyes widened, a glimmer of fear deep in their forest-green depths. Feliks pushed on anyway. What the hell was wrong today?

"Liet, you should like, totally, wear one too! We could be, like, triplets!"

A chill went down the blonde's spine as Toris turned away, glaring off into the fields.

"Give it up, Feliks. I'm not like you. We are NOT the same."

And, of course, there was Ivan. He and Ludwig were the absolute worst. It was funny – they hated each other, but that never stopped them from ganging up on Feliks. It never brought them closer together, either. And somehow, everyone wound up being intimidated by those two bullies, so no one would ever stand up for Feliks.

Not even today. November 11th. His birthday – the day he was supposed to be the pretty pink princess, gracefully receiving gifts from the peasantry.

He wouldn't care, wouldn't give a shit about those losers, if he could just have Toris on his side. But somehow it was his oldest friend who had done a complete 180. He missed the Liet whose smile was soft and slow, the Liet who taught him how to ice skate, the Liet whose hair turned auburn in the setting sun.

Mass was the only time he ever caught a glimpse of Toris without the looming figure of Ivan Braginski. Yes, it was a technically a Catholic boarding school, but it hadn't been doctrinally Catholic for years and the student body was actually rather religiously diverse so non-Catholic students (Ivan practiced Eastern Orthodox) were not required to attend services. Still, Toris wouldn't meet his eyes, even without Ivan's posse around him.

1919

The Polish-Lithuanian War

"Liet! Like, where are you going? We totally haven't seen each other all summer!"

As soon as the other boy turned around, Feliks knew something was wrong. There was no sparkling little smile in Toris's eyes, no welcoming tilt of the head. His friend's eyes were hard and disengaged. Feliks looked down, put off by Toris's glare, nervously pleating the hem of his ambiguously-blouselike shirt.

"Feliks…"

Suddenly the light dimmed, blocked by the imposing entrance of Ivan. He'd come up, big feet silent in even bigger boots, behind Toris to place a large, protective hand on the boy's shoulder. Toris flinched slightly, but his iron stare did not leave Feliks's face. The blonde felt his cheeks color. What was this? The Inquisition?

There was an inexplicable exchange, Toris's brown eyes momentarily locked on Ivan's cold violet ones. Perhaps there was a barely-noticeable inclination of Ivan's head. Then Toris returned his attention to Feliks, his gaze running along Feliks's myriad glittering hair clips, his spice-glossed lips, his ever-so-slightly wedged boots, and that wonderful ambiguously-blouselike shirt that he had picked out especially for the first day of school.

"To be me," he'd explained to his doubtful mother, "without being frighteningly me."

"Feliks," Toris said now, that cold stare so piercing that Feliks could not meet it. "You look like a fag."

Up Next! Arthur reads Tennyson, Feliks figures out how much it would cost to pay Kiku to "do it for him", and boys bond over Prada and Roman Catholicism.