Germany tugged the luggage behind him as the Italian raced ahead of him into the building. A few of the other countries had arrived already and were unpacking their things into their respective rooms.

The lot of them were staying at the manor while the meetings were being conducted. The manor was an old building, but well-kept. It was a beautiful place indeed. Italy rushed on ahead to explore the large building while Germany struggled to get their luggage up the steps. He heard a soft thud and looked inside to see that Italy had knocked into England, who was downstairs getting tea already. The two continued to talk while Germany finally pulled the bags up the steps.

'Darn it, Italy, couldn't you have at least taken one bag?' Germany thought to himself. England had already gone, leaving Italy standing alone in the main hall of the manor.

"Which room are you in again, Italy?"

"Huh? Oh… #337."

"I'll take your bags up there now," Germany said, 'Unless you suddenly decide to help,' he thought bitterly to himself.

"Okie dokie, captain! By the way, what room-?" Italy paused mid-sentence.

"#221," Germany said, even though Italy had never finished the question. Italy gave an unusually quiet nod but nonetheless continued to explore the manor.

A few hours later Germany heard a knock on his door. He looked up from his book as Italy announced himself. 'Strange, he doesn't usually knock,'

"You can come in, Italy," Germany called out. He quickly finished reading the page of his book and bookmarked the page expecting Italy to have come in already. But strangely the door hadn't opened. "Italy?"

When Italy didn't respond, Germany got up to go and open the door. Immediately Italy collapsed sobbing into Germany's arms. The Italian's grip was tighter than it usually was as he buried his face into Germany's outfit, tears soaking the fabric.

"Italy? What's wrong? What's happened?" Germany asked as he tried to gently pry the Italian from him. It was no use. Italy just shook his head.

Germany allowed Italy to continue hugging him- secretly enjoying that the Italian had come to him opposed to anyone else. He eventually pulled him back to sit on the bed after growing tired of standing. The Italian's grip never loosened, although he wasn't sobbing as uncontrollably as he had been before.

"Italy? What's wrong?"

"Can we just stay like this for a little while? Please?" Italy finally said, his voice hoarse from all the sobbing. Germany didn't ask any more questions and Italy resumed his short bursts of sobbing. They stayed like that the rest of the night…

(The conference)

Germany's eyes slowly opened. He rose out of bed, the memories of last night's dream slowly returning to him. He had liked the Italian for some time now, and now and then he'd dream about him.

Sometimes the dreams would be happy dreams where they did nothing but kiss and sit on a hill all day, but sometimes he would dream of terrible things that caused Italy to cry or need his protection.

It was a funny thing, this love… Sometimes he almost wished for something drastic to happen that would allow him to be Italy's hero. Damn, now he was starting to sound like America…

Pushing the dream to the back of his mind, Germany got ready for today's meeting. There were going to be a long string of meetings every day for at least a month- maybe two.

The conference hall was located in the building across from the place Germany was staying. He walked across the lawn and entered the building- officially beginning the day. There were multiple floors of conference rooms, but they were only using room #18, although they were welcome to use any of the others as none of them were booked currently.

Germany turned the corner knocking into England rather harshly causing them both to fall down, the papers they were carrying scattered onto the floor in different directions.

"Sorry, England, I didn't realize you were already here," Germany apologized quickly. England was already standing up, offering a hand to the fallen German.

"This world is a nightmare-" England said.

"Excuse me, what?" Germany interrupted, now slightly cautious to taking the Briton's hand.

"-with only one means of escape," England continued as if he had never been interrupted, "Enjoy your sweet dreams now, Germany, for soon- even in them- you'll no longer be safe. If you wish to survive, there is but one thing you must do."

Germany was starting to get scared. England was saying the words in the same tone of voice he might recite a spell of some kind. He was almost worried that he might be trying to curse him for bumping into him.

"Kill the one closest to you; you cannot escape until he is buried deep beneath the ground. Kill the one who trusts you the most, for the key to your freedom is his blood. Do not breathe a word of this to anyone, or both you and your lover are dead."

Kill… the one closest to him? Italy? Kill Italy?! What the hell was England talking about?

"If you fail to do this, I'm afraid your life will end. Although I will warn you now, Germany," England's voice became no more than a whisper as he forcefully took Germany's hand and pulled him to his feet, "not everyone here is your friend."

"E-England?" Germany asked, his eyes wide with fear.

"No, it's quite alright. It's not your fault at all," he said, bending over to pick up his papers.

"W-what are you talking about?"

"I should have been looking where I was going, sorry, it's really all my fault," England said handing Germany his briefcase. Germany took it half-heartedly. "Are you alright, Germany? You look pale."

"No. No, I'm fine," Germany said, shaking the grim feeling from himself. He continued to the meeting room and set himself up in his respective chair. He was originally going to wait there for the other countries to arrive, but after… that, he needed a glass of water.

He went to one of the many break rooms and poured some cold water into one of the little paper cups. He managed to calm himself down quite a bit and returned to the meeting room.

Apparently he had been gone longer than he thought as most of the other countries- even Italy and Greece- were already there. He sat himself down awkwardly and not long after the meeting began.

The rest of the day passed uneventfully, but Italy and Germany kept stealing glances at each other during the meeting. Italy would blush a tiny bit and eventually advert his gaze, but Germany was staring for an entirely different reason.

'The only way to escape is for me to kill Italy?' was the only thought that ran through Germany's mind the entire meeting…

((Yeah, I think you guys see where this is going. Be warned, this is going to get REALLY sad. There will be tears from all of you but the most cold-hearted ones. Totally serious, if you are under severe emotional stress/depression, or can't handle character death please do not read this. As much as I'd love your reviews and such, I really don't want to send anyone over the edge.

My other story (The Secret in Russia's Basement) isn't going to be as tragic as I would have liked, so I'm writing this. I'm a sick and twisted individual who likes to kill off characters in the most painful way possible, so I write things like this. But don't worry, I AM continuing to write Russia's Basement and Vacationer's Delight, updates just might be a bit more slow because of this new project. So I hope you guys all enjoy LIMD(Lost in My Dreams) ))