The former representation of Estonia frowned at a bruise on his arm as he sat and waited for his name to be called. Before, it would've healed in a matter of hours, but ever since he lost his status as a nation, his body heals only as well as a human.
When his name was announced over the booming intercom, he was in a daze. Even now, he couldn't believe any of this was real. Of all the horrifying things that he had seen in his lifetime, this had to top the list of the most shocking.
One of the backstage workers, a short and plump man with a reddish-brown beard, walked towards him and tossed a sword in his hands, giving him a sympathetic look.
"How old are you, son?" he asked.
"Seventeen," he answered without missing a beat.
The man before him grew even more somber. "Shit, you're even younger than my son was when he…" he shook his head. "It doesn't matter. I'm sorry, I wish you the best out there."
Estonia gave him a sharp nod, and adjusted his glasses.
His mind traveled back to how this all happened, back when the world was whole and the nations free. He remembered watching his country, the one he had waited for centuries and centuries to be independent, start to crumble before his very eyes. When Latvia first started to collapse, he offered his brother shelter in his own home. When his own country became victim to the same fate, his kind cousin Finland took them both in, along with the rest of his family. During that time, he got to know the Nordics almost as well as his brothers, and he was closer to being happy than he had in years. Until finally, when the soldiers came in the middle of the night, taking him and Latvia and Finland's entire family into custody and crushing any small amount of hope he had left for the future.
Now, the world was only one nation, lead by a monster who called himself President Miller, and Estonia and the personifications like him were only a distraction to his regime.
He stood up straight, squared his shoulders, and walked out into the arena. It felt like his stomach was being tied into knots; he wanted to scream, cry, and throw up all at the same time, but knew that if he wanted himself and his brothers to make it out of this alive, he couldn't.
Immediately, he was greeted with bright neon lights and a stadium filled with hundreds of thousands of people, some even his own citizens.
On all four sides, there was a gigantic TV screen focusing on his face as he entered into the arena. To his left, there was a glass window showing his brothers looking down towards him. In all the years he had known them both, he never saw that same look of fear in their eyes as they had now.
He waited awkwardly with the sword in his hand, trying to hold it the way Lithuania taught him so many lifetimes ago, to see who his opponent would be.
Please don't be someone I know, dear God please don't let it be someone I know.
But of course, like always, his prayers were never answered.
As he heard the name of his opponent announced and watched him come through the door on the other side, Estonia felt his stomach drop.
His opponent was Finland, the same man who took him and his brother in at the end of the world.
He watched as he walked out into the arena, an identical sword in his hands to Estonia's and look of shock.
Finland then peered up towards where Lithuania and Latvia were trapped watching from below, and then to where his own family was now trapped on the other side.
The short, purple-eyed man kept looking back and forth, from his husband, son, and brothers, to his cousin and childhood best friend.
He wore the same look of anguish that Estonia had, and he really felt like he was going to puke this time.
But before he got the chance, the referee blew the whistle, and the fight began.
The first blow came as a surprise. Estonia fell to his feet and looked at his older cousin standing over him.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "You know this is the last thing I'd ever want to do… but it's my family at stake-"
Before he could finish his words, Estonia kicked the nation off his feet, his sword firm in his hand.
"I know," he said, pointing the sword towards his throat. "But I have a family to think of too."
Finland nodded before using his sword to knock Estonia's out of his way. He sprung up on his feet and they began going back and forth, hitting and blocking, hitting and blocking.
Within a few minutes, Estonia was already out of breath. Unlike his opponent, he had never been much of a fighter. Other than a few lessons Lithuania gave him when he was living under the Commonwealth, he didn't have much fighting experience, since he never showed enough aptitude (or interest) for Lithuania to put him into battle.
On the other hand, Finland had been well-trained from an early age and it showed. While the bulk of his experience was with guns and other long-range weapons, he was still much stronger and capable in close combat than Estonia was.
"Listen, I know you love your family, but we both know I'm going to win," Finland said to his younger cousin as he pinned him against a wall. His eyes were filled with tears but he refused to let them fall. "I hate them, I hate this spectacle they're putting us through, but I have no choice. Just stop moving and I can put an end to this right now. I'll be quick, you won't feel a thing."
Estonia looked up to where his brothers were watching him from above, their eyes wide in fear. Latvia had tears streaming down his face as he watched the fight, while Lithuania's eyes were frozen onto his form. He was watching so intensely someone could set his hair on fire and he doubt he would notice.
He couldn't deny that part of him wanted to listen to Finland and let himself die. He didn't want to hurt his cousin, and he didn't want to watch the Nordics be killed. And if it was only his life at stake, he might've just listened to Finland's request and given up. But it wasn't.
Estonia grunted. "Fat chance of that happening," he shoved a surprised Finland off of him with his sword, using every drop of strength he had. "If you think I'm just going to sit back and let my brothers die, then you don't know me as well as you thought."
He lashed his sword out at his cousin, forming gashes in his arms. Finland's blood dropped to the floor as he winced.
Estonia allowed himself one moment of guilt before he continued fighting. The clank of swords rang out through the stadium as the audience cheered for whichever man they were betting on.
Through a strike of luck, Finland tripped backward on a stick, falling to the ground. Estonia immediately knocked the sword out of his cousin's hands and took it for himself, and held his own sword up to his throat as he stood over him. For the first time in years, he saw an genuine look of terror in his best friend's eyes.
"Please," he begged. He held his hands up palms to the sky to show he was defenseless. "Please, my family, my husband, my son. He's only twelve, Eduard, he has so much to live for. He's… oh god, please don't let them kill my son."
Estonia had known Finland for centuries, and during that time, he's known him to go from shy and sweet, to the cheerful outgoing older cousin who always had a joke to tell, to the scary sniper during World War II. And yet, in all those years he never saw him cry.
"I'm sorry," Estonia said, his own tears falling to the ground. "I have to, for my brothers."
There was blood, a lot of blood, so much he could feel it on his skin and soaking his clothes. Once the sound of his cousin's gurgling breath stopped he finally dropped his sword onto the ground.
The cheer from the crowd was just a buzz in his ears, a nuisance that he could ignore. Refusing to look at the body, he turned his attention to his brothers trapped behind the glass wall. Lithuania was holding Latvia in his arms, trying to cover his eyes from the gory sight. Of course, Latvia kept shrugging him off.
Despite his disgust with himself, he felt a moment of relief looking at their faces. He was safe. His brothers were safe.
It was only when he heard five gunshots in the midst of the buzz that his attention was drawn away from his family. He saw the look of horror on his brother's faces, and Latvia's tears. He turned his head slowly towards the other side, terrified to face the massacre he was responsible for.
He murdered his cousin and his family, to buy himself and his brothers another day of safety.