A/N: Recently I've been obsessed with Axis Powers Hetalia. So, this is the result of my obsession. Heh. Written for the Hetalia Contest Livejournal Community, for the week 3 prompt, mirror.

Warning: May be historically inaccurate. Please do not feel offended.

Critique is welcomed. Please enjoy!


Like Shattered Glass

"Queen, you are full fair, 'tis true, but Snow White is fairer than you."

As cries for help and screams of terror surround him, he is reluctantly, laughably, rudely reminded of the fairy tale originated from his own country.

As the flames lick near him, and a terrible excruciating pain tears through him, the only thing Germany has on his mind is but an innocent children's story.

Snow White.

Oh, but it had not been such an innocent tale at first, Germany thinks vaguely, head dizzy and pain consuming his body and mind in ways he has never felt before, not even in war, in defeat.

His people are being destroyed -- destroyed by their own.

Germany stumbles at the sudden clearing of his mind and hits a wall with his back, his eyes sliding to a close.

That makes it even worse.

His ears are now unwillingly concentrated on the clangs of breaking glass, the hiss of the unsympathetic fire; the beautiful synagogues, the businesses, the homes, the department stores, and the cemeteries all destroyed by the German soldiers – no, not mine, Germany thinks with a grit of his teeth, the Fuhrer's.

And they do not stop at that.

Germany's mind whirls and fades into a haze as he hears the sound of his people crying and begging, feels every agonizing moment of his people being beaten so ruthlessly for their resistance, to the very last breaths of their lives.

The heat from the burning fire destroying everything Jewish – German – away scorches his face.

Even so, he does not move away, and simply curls up against the wall, remembering his infant days, Prussia, and the glorious old times, Prussia's voice in his head as he recalls the old children's stories – the fairy tales that always end in happily ever after.

Against his will, Germany chuckles, laughing at the irony of all those fairy tales, laughing at how he used to believe in them, until he saw Prussia, beaten and bleeding but still flashing him that annoying trademark grin of his.

The sound is lost amidst the din of his terrified people.

Which is good, because he does not want to hear how demented he has become, to be laughing and thinking of children's stories at this moment in time.

He stays like that for the rest of the night, stays with his people as they are arrested and pushed into cars sent to carry them to their doom, stays until the fire burns itself away, leaving nothing but charred remains of what used to be beautiful synagogues, businesses, homes, department stores, and cemeteries; of what used to be Germany.

Then when everything has died down, when the sun has begun to push through the murky grey, when the pain has reduced to a dull bearable throb, Germany pushes himself up and away from the wall.

Across the grounds, there lies thousands of millions of broken glass shards. All gazing up like the reflections of his life, like the shattered pieces of his dreams, like those fairy tales, the cleverly woven lies torn apart at the seams in the end, the ones Prussia liked to tell him during sleepless nights.

As Germany walks past smashed pieces of glass and tin amalgam, he catches sight of his own, broken reflection.

And the queen liked to ask, "Mirror, mirror on the wall, who in the land is the fairest of all?"