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In Small Woods

Austria killed crudely. Everyone would expect otherwise from the way he talked and the way he walked, oh-so-full of elegance and aristocratic flair that it seemed impossible to imagine anything else. He had the air of a person who killed without getting his hands dirty; if he had to do anything more drastic than a cup of sweet-smelling poison, he'd use a sharp, finely decorated knife to slice a throat without getting a drop of blood on his fingers.

So that was why Prussia remained on his stump through the entirety of the fight. Austria noticed the interloper and reacted first; he had been disinclined to interfere. From his vantage point he couldn't see the look on Austria's face, but those pianist's fingers? Oh yes, he could see those very well. Those long, fragile fingers that Prussia or Russia could break at any moment, clamping on the agent's throat like a vise, his fingertips dug so far into his flesh that the man might as well bleed. He croaked something in southern-accented German, unintelligible to his ears at this distance, but it was probably something equally stupid. He could literally hear Austria frown. He could, of course, hear the snap. The man stopped kicking the air, and Austria let him drop down limply. By all accounts, he was probably dead.

It was not even close to a fair fight, but then again any interaction between the humans and their kind seldom is.

"Nice show, Specs," Prussia said, whistling in mock appreciation. "Wouldn't those strangling marks be especially obvious, though? Not many people around these parts who could snap a neck one-handed, especially with that kind of fingers."

The brunette gave him a tired look. "By the time they start looking, we'll be long gone from here. If you have made adequate preparations, no one will even know we were ever here in the first place." He nudged the corpse with one disgusted foot, as if for added emphasis. "And by the time the birds are done with him, all anyone will know is that his neck was broken. He could easily have fallen off a cliff and dragged elsewhere by the local scavengers."

"As long as I don't have to help you hide it this time!" Prussia agreed cheerfully. "Man, the last guy you killed was horrible. I mean he stank. You remember? Took forever to get it off, especially with how incredibly un-awesome the soap industry is right now. You'd think he came out of the fifteenth century or something."

"He was rather unhygienic, yes, and thank you for the help. I don't believe the NKVD ever turned up anything suspicious, although naturally Russia thought we had something to do with it."

Prussia snorted. "Considering how the agents his folks put on us tend to have a habit of disappearing, I don't blame the guy. He probably should learn; it's not like he himself would appreciate getting tailed more than we did."

"As long as he finds no proof," Austria answered mildly. Then his voice softened; the lines on his face contorting themselves into an expression just a little bit more concerned than it was before. "Has he been treating you well?"

He chuckled.

"Ah, yes, picking up the conversation where we left off. Missed you too, Specs, by the way."

In lieu of an answer to that, the brunette turned his gaze away from Prussia and into the nearby woods, staring at the shadows hanging in the middle distance. He was a little bit thinner than he used to be, Gilbert thought. Where his cheeks were once plump and fun to poke at, they now looked a little bit gaunt, accentuating the lines of his cheekbones. He also was not wearing the fine clothes that seemed almost like his second skin for all these centuries, but maybe that was because of what they were doing. Aristocracy had no place in the country these days, especially for these remote mountains.

Prussia wondered how he must have looked to the other nation. Probably not so great, himself.

"Why don't you have a seat," he said, tapping the space next to him on the rotten log. It was no substitute for a sofa, but beggars make do with what they find. It was better than sitting here and watching Austria stand, at least, and he had no intention of wasting the energy left in his legs with a standing conversation. God, has anybody ever told the priss that his mountains were annoyingly tall?

Austria eyed the log for a moment, probably calculating the amount of moss, dirt and fungal slime he was likely to get on his clothing. Then he shrugged and walked over to nonchalantly plop down beside Prussia, graceful as a maestro making his presence known on an ornate piano bench. Prussia moved closer to him, although he made no effort to touch. He was warm and the warmth was arresting. That was enough, for now.

"It's not too bad back home," he started evenly, looking at the visible knuckles of Austria's hands. "I mean, Berlin's still in shambles plus looted to hell and back, but it's no worse than what we did while we were out conquering. Probably worse than what you got, but then again, it's the image problem." His eyes colored darkly. "How's the whole self-victimization plan going, anyway?"

The musician's fingers clenched into a fist. "Smoothly," he answered, after some length of silence. "I wish you wouldn't call it that."

"Why shouldn't I? It's the sort of wars you fight so well, the kids won't even know what hits 'em. Lies and tears and the fine, fine print. That and rewriting yourself. Comes with practice, doesn't it?"

"Prussia- - -"

"I'm not angry," he said quietly. "I'm kinda proud of it, in fact. You'll make some good come out of this whole dirty business."

"I don't need you to be proud of anything," Austria said, which was the closest thing he would ever come to saying 'I'm sorry'.

Prussia flicked a glance to the still-warm dead young man before turning attention back to the bones of Austria's fingers.

Nothing between man and their kind was ever fair. It went both ways.

"No, really, don't be stupid," Prussia said, patting Austria's back with what he hoped would be construed as 'good-natured'. "We Germans don't look so good right now, do we? It'll make everything seem a bit saner if there's someone who, let's say, didn't go along with it heart, body and soul. We know it doesn't work like that, but it's about giving the bosses something to work on, right? That's what the bosses want. Helps me and West, too, in the long run. We don't exactly have a foot to stand on, nowadays."

He didn't have to look to see Austria's wry smile. "Memories are so very fickle, aren't they?"

"I'm hoping it's not too fickle," Prussia scoffed. "How's Hungary? Have you heard anything about her?"

Austria flinched, and for the briefest second he, too, glanced at the dead spy. That one glance told Prussia everything he needed to know; that Austria had no idea what was going on with Hungary, that he was trying to figure out how to reach her, that the spy was placed there to monitor his actions towards the now communist state, that he was nearly out of his mind with worry, that the broken bone in the young man's neck was not just a mark of Austria's tiredness with himself.

He put his hand on Austria's and laced their fingers together. In better times, back when those pianist's fingers were simply there for the sake of music, Austria would have shoved him back and probably shouted something uncomplimentary. At the very least, he would make that cute, sullen expression of his and snatch the hand back. Now, he simply sat there and let Prussia squeeze it, and his fingertips were a little bit cold to the touch.

"It's okay," he said. "This is the frypan monster we're talking about. She's probably more worried about you than you are about her."

When Austria laughed at him, there wasn't really anything resembling mirth in it. It pained him that he understood that laugh much more than he wanted to.

How did they start meeting like this, Prussia wondered. Certainly he remembered when and where, and that was an entirely different time. That was when Austria went back in order to 'be there' for the Vienna Offensive, and when the city fell Prussia just jumped into a personnel transportation vehicle and raced all the way to the mountains without thinking much of anything. That was how it started. He just had no idea how it managed to become routine, let alone a routine where he would end up raising an arm and pulling Austria in by the shoulder. Whereas the former Prussia would have laughed and the former Austria would have yelled, they now leaned against each other. Quietly, just like old, tired men.

Maybe that was what they were. Old and tired.

"We're sending you some potatoes. West made enough, and America said it was okay," Prussia said. "Go put on some weight, Specs. At this rate you'll blow away with the wind before Hungary could get out of there, and then she'd have my head for not taking proper care of you."

It was Austria's turn to snort. "Who's taking care of who? I distinctly remember how you're using my water pipes."

Prussia smirked. "Sure. It's nice to know somebody's heavy industry survived. Sort of. It'll just be one more thing to laugh at when West and I get back to our feet, you'll see, because you're a sissy and we're more awesome than you."

Austria rolled his eyes. Then he relaxed a little bit more and let his frame sink into Prussia's, so they were close enough that the albino could smell the grease in his hair and the sweat on his skin. Just a little while ago Austria letting his guard down this much would make him want to pull his cheeks or his hair, just doing the little things that would anger him enough to reveal more expressions that made Prussia smile. In another glance, the nape of the brunette's neck was clearly visible through the summer clothes, as white and unspoiled as it ever looked. Just a little while ago this would make him thirst for the rest of the story, for the chance to unravel that smooth whiteness and run his hands over it and see how far he could go.

Now, the way things were, he just grabbed Austria's jaw and pulled him into a rough, sloppy kiss. Their mouths practically crashed against each other and Austria only gave a muffled protest once, probably out of surprise, before Prussia slid his tongue in and drowned his voice out of him. Austria's mouth was warm and wet and his tongue seemed to struggle against Prussia's as he deepened the kiss and let loose with all the desperation and need that he didn't know he had.

Prussia wasn't sure if he liked kissing Austria like this. The brunette was attractive, yes, and he'd be lying if he said he didn't feel the least bit attached to him, but something like this had the aftertaste of mistakes you don't mention ten years down the line, and he didn't have much care for that.

It was just that whenever they did this, both Austria and himself felt much more alive.

When they finally broke apart and grasped for air, the brunette wiped his mouth on his sleeves and gently disentangled his fingers out of Prussia's hand. Then he stood, eyes neither on ground, air, nor his fellow nation, but seemingly fixed onto a distant point in time.

"Prussia."

"What, Specs? You want seconds?"

"You take care of yourself, too."

Prussia stared at him for a moment, then grinned so brightly that he could probably outshine the sun. "Hey, who do you think you're talking to? This is me.The awesome me. I'll be fine, and I'll be back up stealing your regions before you know it."

"Assuming they let you have a standing army," Austria snorted, then glanced at his watch. "It's almost time, Prussia. I think you'd better go."

He paused. The dead spy was likely not there without reason, there was only so much time Austria could spend in the countryside before people started wondering where he went. The same applied to Prussia, though being much more unpredictable he had the 'what the hell is that man thinking today' factor to his advantage.

Therefore, Prussia crossed his arms. "You go first."

"But this is my territory," Austria frowned. "It may be partitioned and occupied, but it's still mine. You, on the other hand..."

"Since when didn't I make it my business to be in your land without your consent?" he flashed a grin, before erasing it away and replacing it with the most serious expression he could find. "Specs. This is my request here. You go first. Really."

Austria opened his mouth as if to ask why, but then he shook his head, sighed, and turned back so quietly and naturally that it was like the albino was never there.

Prussia watched him as he walked down the small pebbled road leading away from the mountains, probably to wherever he kept his vehicle concealed. His back was straight and his posture graceful; it was no different than the way he walked when he was stepping up the dais to conduct an orchestra. So very much unlike the Austria who snapped the a young man's neck, oh-so-full of elegance and bleeding aristocracy through the pores, anybody else would have trouble imagining them as the same person. Still, there were days when those pianist's fingers would kill a man and there were days when they used to dance on a piano, and he thought there wasn't much better proof that the world had always been full of shit. In so many ways.

By the time Prussia prepared himself to leave, the birds were already descending. Prussia only stopped to give one a mock-salute before he, too, disappeared into the small woods that led home.

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Notes : The title and indeed the entire fic idea came from the thought that Imperial Eagles, the kind Prussia and Austria used to have as their heraldry, are almost nearly extinct and can only survive in small woods. Useless factoid, but now you know! Maybe it'll be on Jeopardy!

Also, I intentionally left this vague and will leave the rest for your interpretation, but let me assure you of this : in this timeline, at least, neither Prussia nor Austria were very enthusiastic Nazis. Were they guilty as charged? Of course, they're nations. Was it right or wrong to feel sorry for themselves? I'll leave that up to you. As for the Anschluss, Austria's consent of that has always been a little ambiguous. His opinion and Prussia's, I hope, remains ambivalent here.