I sink back into my warm bed, muscles still tense. I'm practiced after a thousand years. Evading sleep for as long as possible. I can feel its snake like presence, trying to penetrate my thoughts. Determined not to give in to my eternal enemy, I reposition myself, thinking back to the past, forward to the future, busying myself with anything that could be a distraction, but before I am aware or can even react the darkness numbs my mind.

Fuck, I knew I should've left the light on, I think. Even after a thousand years, my tired and ancient body craves sleep. Cool, invisible hands press my eyelids together, firmly forcing them to close. I almost cry out, frantic to prevent the nightmares.

And then it starts. First, a sweet, cloying sensation that lures me into a false sense of security - praying, for once, to have a decent night's slumber.

Next a series of fragmented memories – I know they're coming but yet they startle me each time, horrific and a reminder of my evil past. Several stand out more than others – a young, tanned man with glowing green eyes on a burning ship, a boy who is looking at me, firecracker in hand…

I can feel tears on my cheeks – hot and salty, a sign of my weakness. But I push them out of my mind, as the last few images are what I dread each night.

Standing over a red-haired man, I can almost feel the wind around me. He's writhing on the floor in great pain, his face bloody, and his body red and swollen. I reach out to help him – but yet reflected in his eyes I'm turning away, leaving him there to suffer. His eyes are like green orbs, glistening with tears, filled to the brim with misery, suffering and worst of all, hate. He screams my name, I throw myself towards him… but he's gone, replaced with another scene from my mistakes.

This time a blond man is sitting with a young infant in his arms. The child has a bear in his lap, and is chattering away; meanwhile the man strokes his hair lovingly, with care. But suddenly the child is in my arms, the man's roaring at me, his hands clenched into fists, but his eyes are streaked with tears, betrayal, anger and unbearable sadness in those watery pools of blue. I thrust the child back at him, but they both fade into the darkness, like dust.

A small, sandy-haired child is smiling at me, grinning in a way that fills me with joy, even now. We're in a golden meadow, the sun behind us, and I reach out to touch his hand, Then, everything turns to darkness, and he's older, taller, rifle in hand, no emotion in the sky-blue eyes I love so dearly. He holds me at gunpoint, rain falls. He's yelling words of freedom and independence, but I am no longer listening, words drowned out by the knowledge he's leaving me, forever. I sob, regretting everything, wishing for the world I could go back and start over, because if I'd been a better nation, I may not be alone now.

Everything turns to nothingness. After a thousand years, nothing has changed. I'm still England, a sniveling pathetic child. I'm still alone.

Author's note – Hi! First fanfic, realized some things are maybe not clear, sorry.

Tanned green eyed man – Spain aka Spanish Armada

Boy with firecracker – Hong Kong

Red-haired man - Ireland aka Famine

Man and child – France and Canada

Sandy – haired boy/man – America