It's Your Age


Authors Note: This is a slight, short what-if drabble on if Russia and America both had gone to war during the Cold War and if America had lost. Thank you for taking your time to read this!


You're too complicated, we should separate it.
You're just confiscating, you're exasperating.
This degeneration, mental masturbation.
Think I'll leave it all behind, save this bleeding heart of mine.
It's a matter of trust.
Because you don't care about us...
You Don't Care About Us - Placebo

Sometimes, he sneaks into Alfred's room when Ivan was gone, or when Ivan chose not to play with Alfred that day. Sometimes Feliks liked to lay down with the other nation and simply talk, nothing else, nothing like what the other nations probably thought was going on. They would talk about anything and everything; freedom, love, hate, friends, fashion, food. Most of the time Poland would remain quiet when it came to anything about "love" or "friends", instead just listening to what America would have to say and marveling over it.

He had never felt anything like that. He didn't quite think it was possible for him. He was pretty empty.

Tonight they were silent, both staring up at the ceiling as they listened to the cries of Toris that seemed to echo through out the silent house, the too big house. Feliks knew they were fake because Toris was just as fake as he was. And he knew how the game was played, too, because he had played it a few times before with other nations (but never Ivan because the idea that Ivan struck that much fear into Feliks made him laugh out loud. Ivan trying to fuck him made him laugh out loud, too). But he never said this aloud, only thought it, kept it to himself.

He could feel Alfred's eyes on him.

"Doesn't it hurt you to know what's happening?" the other nation asked, shifting his gaze back onto the ceiling.

Poland felt blank.

He knew his face was blank, too.

He knew, inside, that, yes, it did bother him but this was the quiet voice that said this. This was the Feliks that never spoke anymore, the one that was sensible and smart and thoughtful. This was the Feliks that he had locked away a long, long time ago, this was the side that no one was ever allowed to see.

"He does it to himself." is all he said, closing his eyes. He didn't even break his sentence with "like" or "totally". That was an accomplishment.

Alfred doesn't say anything.

They breathe.

They sigh.

"Doesn't it, like, bother you to be in love with Ivan?" he says the name with a cruel, callous tone, spitting it, before he laughs as if he's amused. He laughs because it would make it better, it would make it seem like he really hadn't just said Russia's name so bitterly, so angry. It would make it seem like he was joking.

He laughed a lot of things off just to make it seem like he didn't take it seriously. Just to fool people because they were so easy to manipulate, anyways, but no one would have ever thought that of him. No one would ever try to see past his facade, either, and that's just how he liked it.

Because to delve deeper would cause too many problems.

It would make him think too much and he was doing that enough as is when he was stuck alone in his stupid, ugly room.

He hated thinking, he hated the emotions that came with it because it was all too complicated for him. Not in the sense that he was too stupid to understand, no, it was just more like he didn't want to deal with them and what came with them.

And he hates Ivan, but everyone knows that. Everyone also knows that the younger nation was certainly not the least bit afraid of Russia. And maybe this made him stupid, maybe he really was stupid, but, honestly, Ivan was nothing. Ivan didn't scare him because Feliks had figured him out a long, long time ago, around the first time Ivan had taken his country over, along with Prussia and Austria.

Another funny thing was that he had fucked Ivan, too, just like every other nation. But unlike most nations, it was Feliks who was pushing Ivan down onto the bed, Feliks who was taking control and laughing right in his face, saying, "Well, if you, like, want me then you'll, like, have to try harder than that, won't you~" Russia was still somewhat soft then, Russia wasn't like how he is now. But that was their secret, that was something Feliks didn't brag about because he never liked talking about his sex life.

He can hear Alfred sighing again.

"Yes." the other nation laughs slightly, too.

"It, like, bothers me, too," he teases, grinning over to the nation, who just flashes him a feeble smile.

There's a slam of the door. The cries have stopped and Feliks laughs quietly to himself.

"Aren't you and Toris friends?" Alfred tries, watching as Poland sits up.

"Mmhm," he got asked this a lot. He lied a lot, too. To be honest, he wasn't sure what Toris was to him anymore, anyways. But he lied and said Toris was his friend because he liked the thought of having friends. It amused him.

"Why don't you help him then? That's what friends are supposed to do!" Alfred sits up too, frowning, looking genuinely concerned. Feliks looks at him, smiling, the laughter in his eyes. He has to remind himself that he's still older than little America, that America is still innocent and had these cute little ideals and beliefs on how the world worked. Feliks vaguely admired that about him because he could remember a time when he was like that, too.

"He doesn't, like, want it," he answered slowly, tilting his head slightly, as if thinking. "He would, like, rather suffer and be tortured and, like, call it happiness than be helped by me. And to, like, be totally honest... I don't want to help him. I'm.... tired." he can't tell if that's a lie or the truth anymore, either.

He's tired of caring, he wants to stop, really, but he doesn't think he can. But that's also his little secret, that's the other Feliks talking, the tiny little voice that didn't have much place or say anymore. He doesn't want to care because, obviously, Toris doesn't want him too. So, on the outside, he doesn't. On the outside Feliks doesn't worry or care or even glance at Toris when he knows the other nation is injured. And he barely even worried on the inside either, but there was still that tiny voice in the back of his mind, the one that wouldn't shut up.

He sighs and smiles, as if it's all okay. Because it would be okay, everything would be okay, at least with him. He could rise back so easily, even after being defeated so many times. And his nation, his people, they would come right back with him. Many of the nations thought Feliks didn't care for his people, his country because he certainly didn't act like it. The truth was, however, he just did what he knew would benefit them the best, he did what wouldn't cause a mass genocide, he did it until he knew he could reach up and snatch at his freedom again.

Just because he didn't cry over them didn't mean he cared.

No, Feliks couldn't even remember the last time he cried.

"I'm sorry," Alfred was saying and Feliks just gave him a smile, one that was bitter and amused all wrapped into one.

"Nothing to, like, be sorry for," he stands up, shrugging. He musses at his hair as Alfred looks at him, that look that everyone gave him, the one that just screamed disappointment and confusion. Yes, he supposed that he and Toris did have a rather confusing relationship.

So Feliks leaves without saying a word, just giving Alfred another smile, a superficial one. And he passes Toris's door quietly and he looks at it for a moment, hesitating, as if he's going to open it and check on the other nation.

But he doesn't.

Because he keeps telling himself that he doesn't care and he's starting to believe it.