Soft brown eyes, a tender smile, the face of a mother. He had never known such a gaze, always left cold and abandoned in the vast wastelands of Russian winters. A land where sunlight offered only bleak warmth and for the shortest of times before the months of bitter snowstorms settled in once again. Ivan could not remember a day when he felt loved and needed. Not since the slaughtering of his babies, the royal children he was assigned to guard through their lives, decades ago. Since then, the Russian had been without life, without purpose, wandering through the cold snows alone chasing dreams of better times in order to hold together the only sanity he had left.
Yet illusions could only offer so much comfort and with every night he closed his eyes, Ivan felt himself slipping further and further into the point of no return. It terrified him. Utterly terrified him. The fear made matter worse, recalling to mind his days as a child spent along General Winter. The bitter old man with snow white skin and a heart carved from the coldest of ice. Winter had been his guardian and often accompanied him to meetings with the other Ancients. That, perhaps, was the first time he had ever laid eyes on China. Soft, beautiful China painted from the etheral masterpieces and breathed life from the gods of his land to rule his bountiful empire alongside the other Ancients. Ivan had been part of the second generation of nations to be born, a step down from their Ancient parents, the Origins of the modern world.
Like his father before him, Russia pursued the wild beauty beyond the southern mountains. For many years he watched quietly from the shadows, afraid to come to close to him and ruin any chances he would have with the other late in life. He saw many things in that time, many terrible truths that an empire faced. He knew them well already, but somehow it just seemed as if the crimes were all the more heinous because they afflicted something so much more beautiful than himself. It was the dirtiest of crimes to taint such a masterpiece.
Ivan's recollections of his past beyond the point of losing his royals became less determined by events at his home, for riots and revolution were too common to be of any significance anymore, and more about what happened in the lush land to the south. Like a loyal hound he returned to China's window whenever the oppurtunity allowed him. He was growing rapidly and before long did not have to stand on food crates to lift himself high enough to see into the beauty's bedroom. That was when he first laid eyes on him. Sick smells burned his nose, blurring his vision and clouding his head. Yet through all the haze Ivan would never forget what he witnessed that night. The conqueror. The pirate. Tainting the masterpiece. Ivan's masterpiece.
Now was the time.
"Aiyaaaa..." Yao heaved down into the rice fields, shivering as his bare legs hit the cold water. "How did this happen...?"
"Looks like you could use some help, da?"
China gave a shriek, falling back into the icy paddy as he gazed upon the newcomer. It took him a moment to realize who he was seeing. Ivan, Winter's child. He had not seen the Russian since he was fairly tiny and gazing upon him now Yao could barely believe he was witnessing the same boy. Yao lifted himself up pushing the blush from his face. The once proud man had been reduced to a servant to the western world and of all the people to see now, Russia, who now could snap one of the last living Ancients in half.
"No..." China waved him off, a tiny noise escaping him as the winds buffeted against them, chilling him to the bone. "I-I'm fine, aru. I have to get this finished for dinner tonight.."
Yao helped again as a heavy weight descended on him, darkening the bright noon. He stood upright once more, barely catching the Russian's coat before it tumbled into the paddy. He watched, dumbstruck, as the other eased himself into the cool water and knelt down to start leisurely picking away at the crops. It was with no malevolent intent. Ivan was.. genuinely helping him.
"R-Russia, y-you don't need to do this, aru. This is my job..."
"Nonsense, comrade." he waved it off. "It's the least I can do for you now. I'm not strong enough to kick them out, so let me do what I can. Oh! And one more thing!"
Yao shyly slipped on the cumbersome coat, starting on the picking. "What's that...?"
"Just call me Ivan, okay? We're.. comrades after all, aren't we?"
"I.. I suppose we can be.." Yao couldn't hold back the smile. "T-Thank you so much for this, aru..."
"No need to thank me." Ivan smiled. "Just.. be my friend. It gets so cold and lonely up there.. I've been watching you for a long time."
"Y-You have?!" A fierce burn settled on Yao's cheeks.
Ivan nodded. "I have. I was always hoping.. that once I was big and strong like you that you would.. want to be my friend. It looks like you could use a friend right now, da?"
Yao stood up, wincing as he stretched the ache from his back. He watched the other rise to tower over him but he could not find the will in him to fear the other. The words he spoke just now had been simple-minded but more genuine than he had heard for a long time. Yao was completely alone, none of his children were here for him out of fear of England. He would enslave them all and thus they hid, the only thing that they could do. Yao held no hate for his children, in fact, he envied them, but it did nothing to ease the loneliness in his chest. Now there was a friend here. Someone he could lean on as well.
"I could..." Yao set the basket on the bank, lifting his arms swallowed in the too-large coat to hold tightly to him. "I could.. really use a shoulder right now, aru..."
Ivan ran his fingers through the Chinaman's hair, blinking as he found it as soft as in his dreams. Silk threads slipping through his fingers. Soft. Gentle. His body trembled under the tears leaking out from those beautiful dark eyes, clinging to Ivan as if for dear life. They shone like little suns, casting light in the dark haze of Ivan's winter. It was here, in a chilly rice paddy in the middle of the Chinese countryside that Ivan would find his new purpose.
To protect his sunflower. At any cost.