De-anon 3 out of 7. This was the only fill that I wrote for this "contest" that my roommate couldn't guess! Probably because I experimented a bit and wrote in present tense. Definitely not something I'm used to, but I kind of like how it worked for this.
I
Three months after the fall of the Berlin Wall have crept by, and the fading personification of Prussia is left to wander the halls of Germany's house. Hollow red eyes once so vibrant now carry a gaze weighted down by pain and too many things that cannot be unseen. He cannot meet the azures of Germany or the browns of Austria, but occasionally he can manage a grimace intended as a smile toward the innocent ambers of Northern Italy.
The two tend to spend a lot of time together, and Prussia will only accept food from the Italian as long as it is vibrant in colour and piping hot—nothing like Borsch or blini or anything rich that will send his stomach reeling. He cannot stand anything cold, and all windows must remain locked up tight lest a tiny chill take him and he's sent into a cascade of uncontrollable shivering. He sleeps with four or five blankets, huddled in the corner of a room, the mattress left untouched. He wakes as if he has not slept at all then wanders again during the day. He had been cut off too long. He knows he no longer has a place. He wonders when he'll finally die.
Everything reminds him of Russia's house. The daisies plunked into a vase on the table haunt his mind with images of sunflowers. The pure white of the snow that comes with January blemishes the land, makes it seem too much like the harsh cold of Russia. Children's giggling at the marketplace sends him running from spectres of Ivan, come to rape him against the cinderblock wall of his cell. He still hears that echoing laugh in the darkest hours of the night, feels the ghost of fingers pressed into his hips, and bruising lips seizing precious air from a sobbing victim who refuses to open his eyes lest he meets lust-clouded purple. Austria claims that Prussia is only imagining the black and blue and yellow that once mottled his limbs, face, and body. Prussia knows he's not imagining that or the pain still stabbing at his lower back when he tries to walk. He knows his jaw is still broken even when physicians had declared him more or less sound a few weeks back. He knows Russia will show up one night and take him again. He knows it will all restart soon. It's all some sort of trick, a false lull of security to make the next round more painful.
Germany fears for his brother's sanity. In him he sees an animal caged by fear and likely to snap at the hand that only wishes to nurse him back to health. It worries him how paper-thin skin is stretched too tightly over sharp cheekbones, too likely to bruise and break with even the lightest of touches. Prussia is hardly eating, and the German knows he's retching what little he does take in.
Sometimes Germany sits in Prussia's room after the other has drifted into uneasy slumber, but he knows any sudden noises will send his older brother bolting upright and pounding against the window, screaming, pleading, crying. The tears hurt Germany. They tell him that this man is not the confident, arrogant son of a bitch who had raised him. Shit-eating grins and laughter no longer bring chapped, motionless lips to life. He's empty. He's broken. He's no longer Prussia.
There are times when nightmares overtake the dying Prussian and he's thrashing and yelling out and cursing. It's the most alive that Germany ever sees him, but he stills his limbs and begs for him to stop.
When he can he collects him into his lap, holds the atrophied body close to his chest, and sings. His voice is low, but it blends with the silence and calms his brother without waking him. These words are no more than choked, sometimes incoherent snatches of German lullabies that Prussia once sang for him. They hover over the Prussian, crafted from trembling, tear-touched lips like broken prayers, whispered goodbyes.
"Please bring him back or please let him die. I can't bear to see him like this anymore."
II
Coming back from the dead is like waking up from a long sleep. The first time Prussia becomes truly aware of his surroundings is one morning in the late spring. He has been wandering as usual-looking and looking but never truly seeing. The marketplace does not offer much to listless eyes, but by then even the screams and giggles of children do not affect him so much as they used to. He has quit looking for Russia behind every corner, has stopped suspecting the kindly old lady walking her dog or a man trying to sell chocolate to him as he walks by. The snow is gone. Russia's chokehold on his land is ebbing away.
Still, he does not speak much save for a grunt at the woman offering Blätterteig, though he does buy it and nibbles absentmindedly, flakes fluttering to the ground like old skin. He's been eating again, but it is always a chore and cheeks are still drawn tight.
The sun has just started to rouse from slumber to streak its glow blearily across the sky when Prussia stops to rest, his pastry forgotten somewhere on the ground along his aimless path. He ponders curling up and sleeping by the lake he's found—just the remnants of a snowbank caught in sunken ground still soaking into muddy, fresh earth. But, as he sits, he catches a glimpse of some figure dancing beyond the ripples. He freezes and waits. The ripples calm and vacant eyes stare back at him. Red to red. Empty to empty.
He reaches up to touch his face, to dip fingers into hollow cheeks and trace the sharp contours of his jaw. It surprises him how pale he is; how cold his skin is to the touch.
"That's me." He murmurs to the water, brows furrowed at his reflection. "Holy shit, that's me. How…unawesome." It's then that hunger rips through his belly and he's racing back toward the market on shaking limbs-that image imprinted in his mind forever-even as he buys three more Blätterteig and tries to cram them down his throat all at once. Cold air finally pricks bare arms and he wishes he had remembered a coat.
Everything seems new but familiar. He only vaguely remembers the paths he had wandered down, or leaving the house each morning without so much as glancing at his brother. He knows where West's room is, but finds that he's not there and tries to remember if the other had told him where he'd be. He doesn't feel up to searching. Instead he finds his own bedroom and collapses on his mattress. The softness feels strange for him. He sees his blankets on the floor in the corner of the room and collects them before wrapping up on his bed.
He wakes some time later to a gentle rocking motion and his damp hair plastered to his sweat-soaked forehead. It's too warm and limbs are made clumsy from sleep. There's a low voice murmuring something somewhere in the distance, but when he tries to open his eyes they fall back shut as if made from lead. Still, that voice is soothing and strong even if desperate.
"West…"
The sound stops abruptly, but Prussia is already too far gone, fallen back into the darkness of sleep.
Prussia wakes the second time, encased with sweat but shivering. His harsh panting scrapes against the dwindling darkness of early morning. He turns but comes into contact with the rise and fall of a muscular stomach and the warm tremors that come from such closeness. Prussia sits up.
"West."
His brother had fallen asleep nearby him. Blond hair is in disarray and even a strong, square jaw looks somewhat pinched. He wears two iron crosses around his neck now, one stained pink with blood that won't seem to fade and the other chipped and scarred. One is Prussia's but he can't remember which.
"West." He repeats into the silence. "How long have I looked at you but not seen you…" He carefully presses fingers to the wet beneath the German's eyes and shifts so that his brother's head is in his lap. He works to straighten out ever lock of hair one by one as he absentmindedly continues singing the song he'd heard somewhere in another life, a mixture of German lullabies and prayers.