Theme 1: Introduction

I was walking through a bamboo thicket, dreaming about days when I had room to breathe. So many political problems surrounded my country those days that I was always in some meeting or another.

The smell of the bamboo soothed me like I knew it would. I could feel my shoulders relax and my neck muscles grow less tense. It was such a relief to have a place to hide from daily trifles and unwind.

But today, I was not alone.

There was a small boy in my meditation spot!

He was facing away from me, but judging by his height he couldn't have been more than, say, six or seven. His hair was darker than ebony and twice as shiny, and he was wearing blue clothing that looked unfamiliar. As I approached him slowly, he seemed to hear my footsteps and he turned around, revealing a very young face (my age estimate appeared to be correct) and deep brown eyes that were filled with life, although they were expressionless.

I smiled, hoping that I wouldn't scare him off. "You must be a new country," I said. "How long have you been living here? Do you know anyone? It seems like it would be hard to live out here all alone." I tried to gain control of my mouth before I could scare him off. "I'm China!" I said with a smile, praying that he wouldn't run away. "What's your name?"

"Hello China, where the sun sets," he said quietly. He was speaking in a language I could barely understand. "I am Japan, where the sun rises."

This kid is rude!

I kept up my smile. "Okay, Japan!" I said. "Come on, let me show you around my country. I'll be your big brother!"

He was reluctant to respond, but eventually he said "Okay."

I offered my hand, and he took it.

I couldn't help but feel like this would either end very well, or very, very badly.

A/N: Yes, I'm committing suicide. I'm trying to finish the 100 theme challenge before the end of 2010. This cannot end well.

And do each of the themes have to be written in order? Like, chapter 1 is theme 1 and chapter 2 is theme 2 and so on? I don't know, and I really hope not, because I already have theme 86 written and I want to put it up ASAP because I love it.

And I am putting "Appeal to Reason" on a short break. I've been writing and writing so much, and I've gotten kind of tired of Rise Against, and I know what I want to do for the next 2 songs but I don't know how to write it. Plus I have to figure out what to do for "Audience of One," and I'm just totally lost on that because my original idea used Prussia for the THIRD time and I didn't want too much of one character.

So to the few people who actually READ "Appeal to Reason," don't expect another chapter for a few days at least. Hopefully I'll be able to find my muse soon.

And I'm still offering free oneshots, to anyone who wants one. I need to keep my summer busy so I don't go insane. Just give me the characters and a prompt (it can be as vague as "ice cream" or as specific as "Nation A takes Nation B out on a date which is then ruined by the Bad Friends Trio and then they go home and eat Ben & Jerry's ice cream because they want to"). NO SMUT/HARDCORE YAOI, please, I love reading it but I couldn't write it to save my life.