Title: Infinity Minus One

Genre: Sci-fi/Romance

Rating: M

Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia, any of the characters, or the plot of this story. Full rights go to Himaruya and milka121. The original story is called Nieskończoność Minus Jeden, and is in Polish. This first chapter was translated by her, but underwent some heavy revision and editing under my care. The following chapters will all be mine.

Prologue

Hello, my name is Arthur Kirkland and I am going to commit suicide.

Well, 'I am going to' is probably not the right expression – it suggests that I can do something about that… Well, no. And before you start telling me things like 'Life is beautiful, killing yourself is only running away from your problems, blah blah' I must tell you: there is a corpse in basement in my house. To be specific – my father. Yes, I killed him. I didn't want to, but…

God, I'm starting to talk nonsense. What I'm saying now doesn't really matter; I can't change anything now, it happened. The past is in the past, you know what they say. All I can do now is wait for the police to notice something is amiss, then they'll lock me up. Excellent.

I can't fix it. I throw my phone to the wall; the device breaking into millions of pieces.

"I don't want to know you anymore."

Damn, we know each other for years and he is sending me this?! I don't even remember what happened exactly… Eh, I'm straying from the subject again. Of course I know what I did – how could I forget it? - but I don't want to torture myself again. Besides, it doesn't really matter…

In the end I'm here, holding a gun and carelessly opening and closing the chamber. Click. Click. I see the cartridge, I don't see cartridge.

My mother and I were always complaining about dad keeping weapons in our house, but, well, it's worked out in my favour – I don't need to force down an abundance of drugs or break my neck hanging myself. She probably doesn't care about what is happening to me. She ran away and she's not coming back, that I know as a fact. If she ever finds out what I did, and what I'm about to do, she'll just have to deal with it. Besides, she's stronger than most people would suppose. But, well – as does everything, she has limits, and she sort of just… Broke. I have no idea what is going to happen to her. Will she live on her own now, or come back?

Why am I thinking about this? I'm going to die anyway. It's not my problem.

Eh, worrying about the future is a habit that will probably stay with me until the end. Just why?

Too many questions.

Click. Click. I see cartridge, I don't see cartridge. Almost reminiscent to the games of hide and seek I'd play as a kid… I'm here, there, and then…

My, what a mess. I'm brain is collapsing in on itself even before I shot myself.

I'm cocking the gun to my head. Or perhaps it's a pistol? Does that matter?

Of course it does. I would like to know what the cause of my death will be. This bloody detail will be the death of me. Does that mean I won't have to waste a bullet?

Okay, never mind. Now I should be focusing on pulling the trigger, right? And then – the end of all these problems. End of this fucked up day, week, life. Should I pray for a happy afterlife? It's very unlikely that I'll be sent to heaven or wherever the fuck you go for eternal happiness, but it's worth a shot.

O father who are in heaven, thank you for giving me the gift of life, but perhaps it was too generous a present. I'll be sending it back, although it may be badly repackaged. I beg you to forgive me for my sins, etcetera, etcetera, amen.

I'm pressing the trigger lightly. It's harder to push than I anticipated, if needs a lot more strength than I was prepared for. I'm not quite sure if it's physical or mental strain. But maybe that's for the better; I have some extra seconds to think. You know how in some films they say that "your life flashes before your eyes." Bullshit. I had been thinking far too much about my life to do it once again, damn, why is it so hard to pull the trigger…

I can't. It's just too silent. I need to have some background noise, something to drown my thoughts out.

I'm pulling away the gun (pistol?), metal greeting my plastic desk with a click. The weapon looks out of place, it does not belong here, amongst a dangerous teenager's crap. It should be hanging in my father's cabinet, its rightful position. Not here. Not atop scattered papers and empty chocolate wrappers. I send it a dark gaze.

I turn my head to locate the radio, find it, then flick it on. Hum, hum… I quickly switch on some local station; a woman with a happy-sounding voice states that the news will be announced after the advertisements. Will I live long enough to hear it, I wonder?

No, probably not. I've already been waiting too long for the inevitable. A minute more and I may change my mind. Best to do this now.

A repetitive, upbeat song fills the empty space in my room; a girl singing about a boy she likes. Did every song have to be about a girl in love? Really? Can't it be about a boy who is killing himself in his own house after his whole world collapsed?

Oh, that's enough of those philosophical thoughts. I really must do this now, otherwise I'll definitely back out.

I'm grabbing a gun and once again pointing it to my head. Will I hit and kill myself quickly? Or will I just bring massive damage upon myself and spend the rest of my life as a vegetable?

Well, only one way to find out.

I'm taking deep breath and closing my eyes. I must calm down, because if I miss, it'll be bad. Must move quickly, so fast that I'll be dead before I hit the ground.

Now.

It takes a lot out of me, finally pulling the damn trigger, why is it do damn hard to…

I hear the shot, feel the pain, my body hits the floor…

Wait, what?

If I'm dead, then why can I feel the cold wooden floor against my back? Did I really actually shoot wrong and didn't manage to kill myself? Or maybe the opposite – I'm dead, and when I open my eyes, I'll see my own dead body?! I really do have an overactive imagination. In a moment I'll be seeing pink, fluffy unicorns everywhere. God, I swear I'll never do drugs again…

Okay, but what happened? And I'm not holding my gun. I dropped it? When? And where? I'm turning around, scanning the floor. I don't have a clue where it went. Poof – and it disappeared. Not a trace of what once was.

Whilst wildly looking around, I accidentally catch a glimpse of my reflection in my grubby mirror. Tousled blond hair, green eyes – nothing to worry about, no wounds, blood, absolutely nothing that indicates what I did. Or what I think I did.

Maybe I took a bad batch of drugs and I'm having hallucinations. Maybe after killing my father I turned insane, and none of it really happened? Even the radio is off – switching it on must have been an illusion too. Does this mean that I must have to break into my father's cabinet (again) and kill myself all over again? God, why…

I carefully stand up, noticing my phone on the bed – still untouched. I can clearly remember throwing it and breaking it. It couldn't have been a figment of my imagination… Could it?

Pitter-patter. Footsteps. Someone is moving in the next room, near the front door. The police? How could they have found out so quickly? Did somebody hear the gunshot? No, wait – it was a delusional fantasy, yes? So what's going on?

I exit the room on unsteady feet – the adrenaline has left me, I no longer feel the stimulation and excitement like before. Now the only thing that guides me is the feeling of slight interest – i.e. barely caring enough.

Step by step, slowly, not too fast…

The corridor is squeaky-clean, everything in it's place – my mum had always been a perfectionist and it drove her mad when there was no ideal order, so my father and I had no choice but to clean everything routinely, arranging trinkets in perfect symmetry and sweeping the house down until there wasn't a speck of dust in sight. It was normal.

But not how things were supposed to be. Less than ten minutes ago I removed the beautifully carved letter opener from the glass cabinet and stabbed my father to death. And now everything looks unaffected, like a horrific murder never took place.

There's a clatter, as if someone is rummaging through cupboards in the kitchen. What is he or she looking for? How could they choose today of all days to break into my house?

Another step, and another; and I can see who is in the kitchen. My eyes widen, my heart pounding furiously in my chest. No. How could this be?!

Beer sloshes out of a glass bottle and into a mug, droplets splattering on the tabletop like rain. My father, casually standing in the kitchen like nothing happened. My body is frozen in shock, hairs prickling on the back of my neck at the eeriness of the situation. I had killed him with my own two hands, piercing a knife through his ribs and coating my hands with sticky red. Yet here he was.

He scowls at me with swollen eyes.

"What?" he barks. I'm just shaking my head. What I am supposed to do now? How should I act? What happened? How is this possible?

I approach him, running a finger down his flannel shirt. All I feel is flabby flesh, nothing abnormal.

"What are you doing?" My father rotates, looking at me with anger. "Go to your room."

"I'm sorry," I apologise quietly. I'm sorry for what?! For killing him?!

My father raises a bushy eyebrow. He didn't catch that either.

"Showing mum the pictures," I try to clarify. Ah, yes. If I didn't do that, none of this would have happened; my mother wouldn't have run away, father wouldn't go berserk and I wouldn't have killed him… Only the latter doesn't seem to qualify anymore.

"Oh," he mumbles, sipping from the mug. "Arthur, go to your bedroom. It's been a long day."

You don't say, is the thought that swirls around my head. I nod curtly, and politely retreat back to my room, locking the door. I take a seat on my bed, grab my phone and inspect it.

I did something. I don't know what, but I definitely did something.

All of a sudden my mobile vibrated, and I almost threw it into the wall for a second time. A message. From who? Unknown number. Error? Maybe, but…

Contents of the message:

« You are not going insane. You are just waking up. »

A/N: Gosh, I'm so excited for this. Thank you again for giving me this opportunity, you're such a sweetheart. I really adore this story, and hope those who are reading this enjoy it as well!

Please note that a lot of the wording is different from the original; directly translating it would make it sound strange. Also, this is my first time translating something so large, so updates may be slow!