AUTHOR'S NOTE:This was originally supposed to be part of a several-part series I was going to do, based on the general idea of an apocalypse and all that good stuff. But, I got lazy. As usual. So, I pulled out the only complete part I did for it (which is also the best, in my opinion). It's a generally angsty scene including definite RussiaxCanada, but of course, with dignity. It's told from Russia's POV. As always, enjoy!
(Also, this was done while listening to the song "Louder Than Thunder" by The Devil Wears Prada. Helps with the mood, if you'd like.)

Why must world end like this?

Why must I die so cold?

So alone?

But then...I have always been alone. I stare up at blank sky now, mingling with frozen ground. It is completely white all around me. All around me. All those years, all I had to stare at was emptiness. No wonder they call me a monster.

I move my hands a little, testing their maneuverability. So, I haven't completely frozen yet. Must be all those years of solitude, enduring this bitter cold. It bites at me now, threatening to choke me slowly from the tips of my fingers until it reaches my heart.

My slowly beating heart. It slows now. I can feel it. Sometimes I don't want to feel it. I hate what it does to me. Constant pain. It can't handle me. And I can't handle it. Sometimes it falls out...right out of hole in my chest...

When it hurts, I abandon it. And it abandons me. Until it freezes numb again in frigid air. Then it returns, like victims left to die in snow. They always come back.

My vision spins in front of my violet eyes, white mixing with the white. Snow mixing with the sky. Everything's the same in this world; everything's bleak, everything's hopeless. The corner of my mouth curls up ever so slightly, and my broken eyes blink as if in slow motion. My eyes see, but they don't see.

Why do I even try? What did all of it matter now? The thought plays over and over in my head, a whisper louder than thunder echoing in my skull. We are all destined to die. What was the point of all that suffering?

My heart pangs painfully in my mutilated chest, and I force my mind to go blank again. I can't even remember if I was referring to me. I don't want to remember. So I close my eyes and pretend the cold is seeping into me, deeper and deeper, like ice water leaking into my blood, spreading to my bones, into my core. That frayed center of myself, torn apart beyond recognition.

If the world was all the same...if the world was dying...so would I. Very soon. And I know it.

But I...deserve it...

My thoughts distort. I know it's almost time.

All the people...I've hurt...

I struggle to keep my eyes open, not even realizing I'd opened them again.

I've tortured...

I suddenly feel a stinging sensation against the corner of my eye, and I'm shocked into recovering the last bit of my strength.

W...what?

Slowly I bring my hand up to my face, trembling violently, and make an effort to focus my eyes on the single point in front of me where my hand is suspended.

A sparkling, frozen droplet.

What is this curiosity, I wonder. What could this be? I recognize it...yet I do not see it as my own.

Suddenly, before I can even collect my scattered thoughts enough to think properly, a stabbing pain at my chest causes me to tense every muscle in my broken body. Every single fiber of me is supercharged, fighting, fighting against this madness within me.

It's tearing me apart!

Its tearingme a PART!

STOP! STOP! STOP!

DONT! DONT! DONT!

Oh, but it's too late. The accursed thing has already slid out of its home and collapsed in my lap, slithering through my clothes like a demon. I don't even remember sitting up. I didn't know I still had limbs. But as I stare at it, I absently open my legs and it falls to the stiff ground like a dead thing. A cold, dead object that no longer has any meaning.

And as I stare at it...I grow angry.

You're in the way. You're ALWAYS in the way. I COULD BE BETTER! I COULD BE BETTER WITHOUT YOU! I COULD HAVE DONE SOMETHING TO SAVE MYSELF!

And in one fluid motion, it's lying on the ground ten feet away, my glove soaked in crimson, beating ever so slowly...ever so slowly...

And I can't take it anymore. I gaze up at the swirling mass of white above me, spinning like a blizzard though the air is as cold and still as an iceberg. Suddenly I can feel every single scratch on my tired body, my aching body...my shattered body...

I FOUGHT TOO! I FOUGHT TO SAVE MY WORLD, AND IT'S SNATCHED FROM ME LIKE THERE WAS NEVER ANY HOPE! WHY ALL THE SUFFERING?!WHY ALL THE PAIN?!

I can now feel the pain fading. It's still present, but...but it's going away now...maybe...maybe I can go now...

maybe i can be spared this pain...

maybe...

maybe now...maybe i can go to that warm place...

maybe the sunflowers will accept me..

But then. The most curious thing happens.

Someone touches me.

My eyes shoot open, somehow still alive enough to aid me in seeing. I can no longer move my body enough to sit up or even turn around, but...I can plainly see the shadow hunched over in the snow ten feet away from me.

Who...who would dare touch me...when I'm so close to my relief?

My vision begins dancing again, and the ground begins to rock and sway like the ocean...like a living thing breathing below me...

And then...intense warmth...

I look up with the last of my strength, sure my lavender eyes are cold and glazed already as my life slips away with every moment, every beat of my abandoned heart...which is now, somehow, safely in the hands of a stranger, who's now bending over me with some useless emotion in their sky blue eyes...

"I...Ivan?"

The voice is barely above a whisper, and one I know well. This is no stranger. This. This is a victim.

I swallow hard, and it takes a minute before I can even open my mouth to speak.

"What." My tone is as flat as the tundra I'm lying on.

"I-it's me...it's Canada..."

Ah. So that was it.

I turn my head ever so slightly to look up at him, knowing my eyes are as expressionless as they ever were. "Matthew. Go ahead. Today. Today, I can't stop you."

He looks confused, which surprises me. I didn't even know I had surprise left in me. "W...what?"

"Crush it." I look away again, gritting my teeth in preparation for the pain. I know it will come. That damned thing always brings me suffering.

"W...w-what?"

He adds an extra syllable. That's it. Once again, surprise. What is with all these useless emotions?

"Do it. Crush that wretched thing. I'm going to die anyways, even if I could stop you."

There is a long silence. Then, I feel something I have never felt in my life. Ever.

Shocked, I snap my head around with surprising speed and gape at the teenager, my mind ablaze with questions that can't seem to formulate into sentences or even words.

"W-w-why?" Finally. That is the word I am able to choke out.

The intensity of his blue gaze sears into my flesh like flame, as he stares me down, as he waits for me to strike. What he doesn't know, I wouldn't do a thing even if I could.

After a long silence, he lifts his chin boldly, more boldly than I've ever seen him, and replies in a fierce yet quiet tone, "Because I can't sit here and watch anyone die at my hands."

Another pause, one that seems to stretch on forever. Then: "T-then leave it, leave it in the snow. It will freeze. I will die. You needn't be disturbed."

I hate the tremor in my voice. I loathe it with a burning passion that seems to keep me warm enough to stay alive just a minute longer.

It finally registers: my heart is in his shirt.

"I won't."

I turn to him again, unable to keep the surprise out of my dying eyes. "W...what did you say?"

He is still glaring at me with true anger. "I said I won't. I will not sit here and watch you die."

I spit out my next words like poison, my eyes cold as my home again. "I am going to die. You are going to have to watch me die. Now leave it where you stand. Do me a favor, boy. I am in pain."

To my deep shock, he doesn't even react to my words. Instead...instead he crawls closer until he is right beside me, close enough for me to touch if I moved just an inch.

But nothing prepares me for his next words, spoken in a frigid but hushed tone.

"I'm not going to leave you. I'm not going to leave anything."

And he reaches out, and he touches my arm.

I try to swat him away, but my arm ends up flopping uselessly aside, the nerves already dying inside me. I realize how lucky I am that my heart has already fallen out. I knew if it hadn't, I would be in the worst pain I've ever felt.

"WHAT. DO. YOU. WANT." My bitter hatred bubbles up inside me, threatening to burst out in a volcano of rage. "I invaded you. I tortured you. You almost died at the sharpened edges of my pipe. Why would you help me?"

Then, suddenly, it hits me, and my eyes narrow in undisguised fury. "You want to torture me back, da? That is why you are here. You are here to tear my heart out. You are smarter than you look. That is the best way to torture me." Every word leaves my throat like a blazing coal left in the fire far too long, and I pray they burn him. At least let him feel some guilt. It is the worst thing in the world.

And to my satisfaction, that seems to work. He flinches deeply, his eyes losing their passion by at least half, and it is replaced by uncertainty. I turn away again.

"Please. I'm begging you. Just crush it. Don't let me die this way."

I wait.

And wait.

And wait.

But nothing happens.

I glance back at him. He hasn't moved.

My tone grows fierce as I snap at him, "DO IT! DON'T HURT ME LIKE THIS, DON'T LET ME THINK THAT ANYONE CARES WHAT HAPPENS TO ME! I CANNOT TAKE IT! KILL ME!"

He interrupts me mid-sentence, inaudibly mashing up our words, but it doesn't matter; I am afraid of what he said.

My curiosity is a relentless wild boar.

"What did you say?"

Yet another long, long silence. Time slips away, into the cold, time I don't have to spend. I am already in debt to time as it is.

"I said..." His grip tightens on my arm, though I can barely feel it, and his voice cracks into a broken whisper. "I said...I care."

I stiffen; every single fiber of my being goes rigid, even more so then when my heart fell out. Every bit of strength I have left leaves me at once, and yet I cannot relax my body. I lie there, broken, crumpled on the snow, as if struck by lightning.

Then. Then I explode.

"YOU CANNOT CARE!" I whip my head around again, smacking it hard onto the packed snow uncaringly. Nothing hurts as much as those words. "STOP TORTURING ME! YOU DEMON! I WAS WRONG, YOU ARE WORSE THAN ME, TO TAUNT ME LIKE THIS, TO TORMENT ME! YOU ARE NOTHING BUT A LYING LITTLE WRETCH!"

And there is more stinging, and my face feels frozen solid before long, and I can barely breathe.

So much pain...

So much hurt...

I...I had caused this...

Once again, I can see every haunted face flashing before my eyes, every cold pair of eyes hunted and fearful and traumatized, brown, red, blue...all mingling to a gray, an ugly, dirty gray...

Once again, I can hear every one of their cries echoing in my ears...whimpering, pleading, painful, scared...utterly, utterly scared...

And I know I am a monster. They are right.

And I know I am crying.

"B...b-because...because no one cares about Russia..."

I lie down. My face is stinging. I don't care.

My heart is slowing against his. I can feel it. I don't want to feel it.

So cold.

So alone.

So fearful.

Suddenly, I feel a warmth on my side. Not much warmth. But a comforting warmth that seems to seep through my whole body, heating my blood and my bones and my core enough to keep me alive a minute longer...

I lift my head just a little, and I find his eyes inches away from my own. Deep blue pools...overflowing with sorrow...and some other useless emotion...

And I hear a whisper.

"I won't leave you...I promise...

"...you don't have to die alone..."