Sometimes Kiku wondered if he was going crazy. After all no country had gone through what he had; so it would be perfectly logical to assume that he had lost or was in the process of losing his mind. With the return of him Kiku was certain. Standing in front of his full length mirror completely naked, he examined himself with none of the shyness that the other nations expected from him.
"You couldn't do it, could you? You can't protect our country! You were weak! Without me your country will crumble! Without us being together our children will die!"

Inclining his gaze to the left, Kiku met Kuro's gaze calmly before reverting his gaze to the mirror. Raising a slender hand he gently traced the swirling scar on his collarbone that ran downwards and circled his navel, being joined by another scar just below his ribs. The Mongol invasions: microscopic in the eyes of the world but important, oh so important to him.
"And I was there, holding your hand the whole time, my flower."
The Mongol leader, Kublai had thought he was so important: demanding that Kiku's country-
"And mine. Ours."
-Become vassals to the Mongol empire. However his government answered in what would become the traditional Japanese way or was it already their way. Kiku could not remember.
"I can"
They returned the ambassadors with no answer. Kiku remembered one of them who had squealed like a stuck pig as he was forcibly ejected from the room. He had cursed and swore at them in that strange Mongolian dialect that marred their pronunciation of his language. He had laughed at him or maybe Kuro had laughed.
"We both did flower. We were good together. Strong."

He invaded Korea, he had to. There was no other option left for him. China was… He tried to resolve it peacefully but after that had failed, he attacked. Or had Kuro attacked instead of him?
"All I did was try to help you, flower. But now you reject my help"
All Kiku wanted was to protect and help his family and the tributary system seemed to do that. But like many things since, it was false and fell apart. He had thought that China would understand why his boss had said those things: Idiotic mortal blustering, but he didn't and sided with Korea against Kiku. But he had Kuro to help him fight. Kuro made him strong.
"See flower? See what we accomplished together!"
Even with Kuro's help, Kiku's navy was weak but his army, his precious army was strong! (He always ignored the fact that he was in charge of the navy and Kuro was in charge of the army.)
Then his boss decided to attack Korea again! The soldiers were tired of the invasions; everyone could see that except apparently his boss.
"He wouldn't listen to us flower. He was bad for us, made us weak! I am not sorry for his death. And they tried to keep it a secret from us! They tried to trick their own nation!"
He followed the line of the scar on his hip with his nail, not noticing when blood started to trickle down his thigh.

Then he had to fight again China for the second time since he (Kuro?) attacked him, piercing his shoulder and watching as his blood ran down creating beautiful patterns.
"We always did like beauty, didn't we flower? That's why we are perfect together!"
And over Korea again, of all nations! Why hadn't China seen that Korea was dangerous to his nation, his people? He needed to control him, which was why the treaty was organised. His plan was perfect: Keep an eye on Korea and China and also gain access to Korea's resources that were desperately needed in his country. Even after the riots, support for him was still strong for him in Korea's people; however support was still strong for China too.
"He betrayed us. Don't you remember? He said that we would always share what we had with each other. If he had kept that promise, then we wouldn't have had to get rid of his troops when they chose us! Not him but us!"
Germany had been a big help in that war- not that he knew it of course. Kiku's army had been strong! China's had been weakened thanks to England's insistence on selling opium to China's citizens, weakening them.
"He did it for us. To make us strong! Why don't you trust me?"
The screams of the drowning men still haunted him though, whenever he tried to sleep on a boat. The rocking bringing back memories of the naval strikes that his boss ordered and because of this Kiku went along and watched them drown.
"I held you while you cried. Why do you still not trust me flower?"
Mei had been given to him by China as she had wept and tried to cling to him as he pushed her at Kiku. She had fought at first, but Kiku couldn't risk another war so soon after and they quickly put down the rebellion. And even then China helped the rebellion. He wanted Kiku to fail, for him to be proven right. This time he watched as Kuro's hand pressed against the faint handprint on his right forearm and felt the lingering touch as he traced the two identical lines that outlined his spine.

Russia had to pay for what he did however. That war was personal! And it proved to the rest of the world that they couldn't underestimate him.
"Us, flower. Why did you leave me? Why?"
Russia had underestimated him as well. Yao's little brother- too caught up in warring over Korea to prove any real threat to him. Kuro chuckled in his ear, the sound rich dark and dangerous.
"We proved everyone wrong my dear Kiku. Wasn't it so good to see the shock on their faces? Us! The little secluded island had beaten the mighty Russia!"
And then after losing more men than Russia and being forced to kill many of his precious brothers civilians again (When wold China learn? His pain no longer affected Japan. He hadn't seen him in so long now) Alfred, the almighty hero, had stepped him and taken away what was his. Sakhalin was the first one to recognise Kuro and Kiku as being separate souls and she did not tell Russia for which they were both grateful as when it was seen that Italy was two separate souls, they were separated and a country that may have become strong was weakened.
"You need me Kiku! You may lie and pretend as much as you wish but you know that you need me! ... And I need you."

1914, the war to end all wars as the mortals called it.
"Lord what fools these mortals be!"
Kiku and Kuro had enjoyed their alliance with Arthur and their continued friendship with the island nation who was so similar to them and yet so different.
"He sent his Captain away from him so he could be civilised. Don't send me away again flower! Promise? Please?"
Kiku watched numbly as Kuro wrapped his arms around his chest and buried his face in the curve of his shoulder. Warm breath gently fluttered over his freezing skin as he could do nothing but watch and remember. He had joined because of Arthur; the island nation had thought that Kiku could help them in the war, specifically to fight against Germany. It was going well in the beginning, and then Kuro went against him.
"Everything I did was to keep you safe! Alfred was and is not your friend; he will kill you, us as soon as he can justify it to the others and they will not mourn our passing!"
The towns had been captured easily and Kuro was not injured but Kiku was.
"I never meant to hurt you flower."
And to make matters worse because no one except Sakhalin had ever seen them as separate, Japan's boss didn't trust him, them and kept an eye on Kiku constantly. He realised that it was for the good of his country and that he should probably feel guilty for causing his boss so much stress when he knocked out his guard and disappeared but he couldn't be bothered.
"You might as well try cage starlight or a shadow. We were not meant to be trapped. Captain understood this, even if Arthur didn't."
He made his peace with Russia and managed to make some form of peace with America despite the fact that Alfred was extremely protective of China as he believed-
"Wrongly."
-That China could control Japan and therefore keep the Pacific Ocean under his control. Or maybe America's boss believed that. It was hard to tell sometimes with the younger nations if they were being sincere or not. The Roman Empire had been easy to read and this trait had passed onto his and Germania's descendants. It had only been practical to keep an eye on any growing powers just in case. He remembered most vividly the expression on Rome's face as Germania had struck him down and the whispered conversation he would keep secret to his grave.
"He was… interesting. How they never saw us is beyond me."
The parties were interesting to say the least Kiku mused to himself as Kuro's lips traced the scar on the edge of his hairline which curved down behind his ear and formed a cross on the nape of his neck.

"They were so proud to show us what they had accomplished flower. You could never deny them anything, even if what they were doing was wrong."
Kiku said nothing again even as a single tear rolled down his expressionless face as memories threatened to overtake him. His precious children, the personifications of his towns' not just Tokyo. Kuro was right he never could refuse them anything so when Hida, Morioka and Yonago begged him for stories of the Nazi run prison camps so they could run theirs better, he told them everything.
"They didn't know any better. They were just trying to help you, us. You forgave them as soon as you found out. The other nations would not have been so forgiving, even to their own children."
When the nations found out what his children had done in their camps, they had assumed that Kiku had ordered everything and his boss was quick to agree with them. Then came that day, which would be engraved in Kiku's mind forever.

'Kiku sighed as he leant back wards in his chair, rubbing his hands against his eyes. Alfred had kept ordering him to surrender. But he couldn't just yet. A few more days and his economy would be stable enough for him to surrender with minable damage to his country. He frowned slightly. An American air squadron had just entered his airspace with a bomb, a new kind of bomb. Numbly he watched through the eyes of his citizens as it fell downwards towards the town of Hiroshima, whose personification was just down the hall with Nagasaki and Tokyo. White letters were scrawled across the side in Alfred's familiar handwriting: Forgive us. Then everything went black. Kiku was lost, trapped, doomed to hear his citizens' screams of pain for what felt like eternity. He though that he could feel hands shaking him desperately, feel the slickness of blood as it ran down his left leg.
Then he heard Kuro's voice screaming frantically in his ear, "Flower? Can you hear me flower? Our boss won't surrender flower! Please don't die! Please don't!" before the darkness took him again. A little while later he opened his eyes. A second American plane squadren had entered his airspace heading towards Nagasaki. He screamed for them, but his warning came too late. He managed to stay conscious long enough to hear Tokyo wails of horror before collapsing. When he next awoke, he would be in an entirely new world one where he couldn't do so much as stand on his own as his legs were still being slowly poisoned by the radiation, one where he had surrendered to America soon after, one where Kuro had disappeared.'

"Do you want me to tell you what happened flower after our sweet Hiroshima was bombed? Tokyo came running into the conference room drenched in blood, dragging Nagasaki with him. He punched our boss in the face and dragged me back to where you were lying. You looked like you were dead flower. I couldn't think couldn't breathe. I just started shaking you and screaming. Hiroshimawas dead and it looked like you were as well. Our bosses couldn't make up their minds to surrender or not; you were in a coma; I was… useless. Tokyo had to run everything and keep the children out. Then Nagasaki was bombed and you became worse, so close to fading… I took one of your spare uniforms and I surrendered to America and the others. It was the most humiliating thing I had ever done, but I did it for you."

Kiku could see it. Kuro walked into the middle of no man's land, unfurling the white flag Italy had made for Kiku and had knelt by it in the dirt, blood and other unrecognizable liquids and waited. And waited; until they came. Alfred had gloated and wrapped his gloved hands around Kuro's neck, squeezing until he was nearly unconscious. They had toyed with the idea of shooting him but instead they told him to walk. And walk he did. The Allies were murmuring behind him, unable to comprehend how he seemed so uninjured when he just been bombed by an experimental weapon, the first one of its kind to be used in warfare.
"They got me to do things flower. Terrible things. The children found me after and darling Tokyo bound my soul to yours. England isn't the only one with magic. We shared the pain, but you couldn't see me. Now you can. I don't know what this means flower… but if you need me then call and I will always come. Because I never truly left you flower."
And with that Kuro pressed a last kiss to Kiku's cheek and faded from the mirror.
"Mama?" A voice came from behind the door, "Mama are you okay?"
"Hai, I'm fine Tokyo."
"There's been an emergency meeting scheduled at the formal house. What should we do?"
"Get everything ready." By that he meant hide everything that shows that anyone other than Kiku worked there. "Did they say what it was about?"
"No… Some of us are staying to watch. We don't trust America."

"It has been voted on by our bosses, that any personifications of town, cities, villages or settlements that are not the capital of their respective country shall be killed. The vote was almost unanimous with 4 voting against."
No! Kiku couldn't concentrate. Couldn't breathe. They knew! How did they know? He whispered under his breath frantically and glanced up after hearing sharp intakes of breath. He saw every set of eyes fixed on him or rather behind him.
"Hello again flower."
And this time the soft kiss pressed to his cheek was oh so real.
000ooo000

This is my exploration through my headcanon with the help of Wikipedia and Yahoo!Answers so I apologize for any historical inaccuracies. I am still unsure how this turned into a proper fic, but there you go. Please review and tell me what you think! :)