Author's Note: I'm so excited to get started on my first fanfiction story here. cx Leave a review if you'd like. The next chapters should be longer. This sprang from an idea for a TLD crossover, as I really wanted to write a kind of story to it. A friend suggested I use Romano as the main character, so voila, here you go! Also inspired by stacyplays's playthrough of TLD, which is really great, by the way. Perhaps check it out, or play the game yourself?
When the dark-haired Italian finally came to, he found himself laying limp, and he was suddenly aware of the fact that it was very dark and very cold. He was barely able to make out the metal wreckage around him, hardly even visible in the near-total darkness. As he began to fully wake up, he realized he was aching all over and he groaned slightly, slowly pushing himself to his feet. Romano knew it would hurt a lot worse had he not been practically freezing. Where the hell was he, even? He didn't recognize his surroundings at all. Of course, the pitch black veil of night didn't help much. Were those trees all around him?
Realization hit him like a punch to the stomach.
The plane. He had been in the plane on the way to the next world meeting... He could vaguely remember the sudden tone of fear in the pilot's voice, the odd grinding of gears in the plane motor that Romano just knew couldn't be good. He hadn't even had the time to yell before the plane stalled and went down amongst a cloud of smoke. But it had been the late evening then, hadn't it? The sun was just going down over the horizon a little while ago, wasn't it? How long had he been out?
With a shudder, he looked around. A thick blanket of snow lay in all directions, and a breeze was sweeping past, sometimes threatening to increase to a full-on wind that would blow the snow into furious droves. Oh, man, this really couldn't be good. Assuming that by where they had been around the time of the crash, he was out in the Canadian wilderness, smack in the middle of winter. This really wasn't good at all. His teeth chattered a bit as he turned back to the plane. The front of it was totaled- he knew that there was no way the pilot had survived that much of a crunch, and Romano was actually glad it was too dark to be able to see whatever was there. Perhaps a broken limb, or blood. There was probably lots of blood...
Squeezing his eyes shut, he turned away from it again. A curse left his mouth as he checked his pockets for his phone, only to find it wasn't there. How the hell was he going to get out of this? The meeting was tomorrow, and surely someone would notice him missing, if he could survive out here that long? He could really only think of two that would maybe even notice. Or maybe Canada would be able to tell he was in his country?
"D-dammit," he growled, pulling his coat around his shoulders tightly. "It's fucking freezing out here." Romano searched the nearby pieces of mangled plane for anything useful, thinking that a warmer coat in particular would be very nice. All he found was a single flare. With a disappointed grimace, he stuck it in his pocket. A flare wouldn't even provide him with any warmth, and it wouldn't last very long, either. He figured he should probably save it, even though the forest around him was too dark to see clearly. With a shaky sigh, he picked a direction and began to move off, stumbling through the snow.
A far off howl sounded behind him, echoing off of what Romano assumed was some sort of valley, or gorge wall maybe. Oh no. No no no this was really, really bad now. His breath catching in his throat, he hurried his steps. A run-in with a wolf would surely leave him dead. Although while trying to put as much distance as he could between the wold and him, he wasn't focusing well on where he was walking.
"Shit-!" He never even saw the steep hill before him until he tripped over the edge, landing hard at the bottom. Romano let out a hiss, clutching at his ankle for a few moments, biting back a few tears at the corners of his eyes. He had hit a few jagged rocks during his tumble, but his ankle- that was most definitely sprained. Dammit, dammit, dammit. Forcing himself painfully to his feet, he pulled out the flare and lit it, watching the red-colored flames burst to life at the tip of it. At least there was enough light from it to see about seven or so feet away from him. Putting most of his weight on his uninjured left foot, he continued to limp in the direction he had been heading.
Another howl, this one seeming much close and somewhere off to his right. His eyes wide, Romano quickened his pace, ignoring the sharp, painful retort his sprained ankle was giving him with every step. Looking back, he thought he could see the distant gleam of eyes among the trees, but he shook his head and tried to tell himself it was just his imagination. He thought he could see a lake up ahead, anyway, and what seemed like ice fishing huts scattered about it. Now, if he could just make it to one of those...
A growl to his right. He whirled, holding the flare out threateningly. The eyes he had thought he'd seen earlier glinted, yellow and shifty, as the dark-furred wolf danced away from the edge of the flare. It eyed the Italian languidly as it skirted around the circle of light that the flare gave off, pacing patiently and deliberately.
Oh, god. This was it, wasn't it? He was going to die, and it was going to be out here all alone in the middle of the snowy night because of his carelessness and bad luck, and no one would ever find him. At least not until summer, anyways. Whatever the wolf left of him would probably be buried under snow. Would anyone even look for him? Most of the nations likely wouldn't care, or even notice. Romano was snapped back to his thoughts as the wolf took a cautious step towards him.
"Get t-the fuck back, you bastard!" He instinctively threw the flare at it, and the lit baton hit the wolf square on the muzzle. It yelped, jumping back and pawing at its nose before retreating, tail tucked between its legs. "That's right, dammit. And don't come back." The Italian was breathing quickly and heavily, and he immediately turned tail and half-limped, half-ran towards the nearest ice fishing hut out on the frozen lake. The wolf would probably be back soon, and he didn't want to be anywhere near it when it did. Staggering towards the hut, he lost footing on the ice and came crashing to his stomach. He held his breath, listening carefully. He didn't know how thin the ice was, and wanted to make sure he wouldn't hear any cracking. After a few, painstakingly slow moments worth of silence, he deemed it safe enough. His ankle hurt really badly now, though, and he resorted to pulling himself the last few feet inside of the open hut. Once he had, he leaned against the wall. It wasn't much warmer, seeing as there wasn't a door, but at least the cold of the wind couldn't bite at his face and chill him to the bone.
Freezing to death wasn't a much better fate than a fatal wolf attack, but all he could do was hope that he could survive out here long enough for anyone to notice his absence. Who knew, maybe his brother would happen to look over and see that he wasn't there at tomorrow's meeting. Maybe Spain would suspect something wasn't quite right upon noticing Romano hadn't shown up. The most he could do for now was curl up against the wall, shivering as he fought back tears and tried to ignore the hopelessness of the situation he was in.
