"Germany! I have some terrible news!"
Ivan Braginski, otherwise known as Russia, bursts into Ludwig's office, startling the tired German and knocking a stack of papers over.
Ludwig sighs, vein in his forehead twitching and pulsing, "What is this terrible news?"
"Italy is our only ally!" Ivan says, cheery smile dropped in worry, "What are we supposed to do?!"
Ludwig pauses, thinking, "Make sure we have pasta," he says, "And kitchen cleaning supplies, but the pasta is a priority. And hide the grenades!"
"What about his brother?" Ivan asks, cheery smile returning.
"Lock him in a crate and send him to Antonio," Ludwig says simply, "Make sure to give him plenty of tomatoes so he doesn't starve, and a few bottles of wine so he's too drunk to kill Antonio when the stupid Spaniard lets him out. And gottverdammt, keep him away from the grenades!"
"Can't we just kill them?" and smiles should not be able to get that wide.
"Ah… no, Russland, if they are our allies we have to treat them as such," Ludwig explains slowly, "There will be no killing."
"But I'm not your ally," Ivan says innocently.
"What?"
"I may or may not have lied. You must be tired, Germany, if you forget your allies so easily."
"What?" Ludwig blinks, "Allies? Ich hab' mit der Fiend verbrüdern! Out, verdammt, out! Get out of my house before I shoot you!" he pulls a Luger out of the drawer under his desk, loaded and meticulously clean to ensure immediate hitch-free fire.
"Your fault!" seriously, that smile gets any wider and his lips will be touching his ears!
"Well, if you'd told me you were…" Ludwig trails off, too tired to argue as stubborn and dangerously intelligent as Ivan, "You said Italy was becoming 'our' ally! As in you were an ally to the Fatherland! You tricked me!" the gun clicks as Ludwig pulls the hammer back smoothly
"The Motherland was allied with the Fatherland until the Fatherland tried to invade the Motherland, and then we had to separate," Ivan says cheerily, "The poor kids."
"You invaded Gilbert!" Ludwig snaps back.
"We shared Feliks!" and that smile gets even wider. How fucking strong can that guy's cheeks be?
"True," Ludwig admits, lowering the gun idly, "But Feliks, of course, preferred to stay with you so he could see his boyfriend, I mean Toris, verdammt Gilbert und deine porno."
"Da, Toris is Feliks's boyfriend in the same way little Feliciano is your boyfriend," Ivan says with a creepy giggle.
"I only let him sleep in my bed because he gets nightmares," Ludwig snaps, "That is all!"
Ivan sighs, smile falling slightly, "Germany, become one with me like Prussia did."
"Gilbert never became one with you, you just took over!" Ludwig snaps, raising the gun again, "Du bist ein Arsch, get out!"
Ivan skips off, slamming the front door loudly behind him, and Ludwig collapses back into his chair.
A few days later, Feliciano comes squealing and crying into Ludwig's office with "A super scary letter and somebody's going to kill me, save me Doitsu, Doitsu!"
"Feli, calm down!" Ludwig snaps, "And stop calling me Doitsu, I'm German gottverdammt! Give me that letter."
Feliciano hands him the paper. A daunting patch of blood stains one corner, the handwriting is small and spiky, and the paper stinks of vodka.
"If you do not become one with Mother Russia, I will make each of your friends and allies disappear until you have no other choice but to submit to Russia, starting with your little boyfriend Italy. The North one, obviously. ^J^"
"Braginski!" Ludwig howls.
"Da?" Ivan pops up at the window, and Feliciano jumps into Ludwig's arms, screaming at the top of his voice.
"I know this is you, Russland!" Ludwig waves the paper at him, Feliciano clinging to his torso, "The paper stinks of vodka, there's blood in the corner, and you're the only person to use that stupid J-emoticon."
"My emoticon isn't stupid!" Ivan protests, halfway through the window.
With an angry sigh and gritting teeth, Ludwig lifts up the window to allow Ivan through. "I am not becoming one with anyone, Braginski, Germany is and always has been an independant nation."
"Liar!" Ivan says with a creepy, knowing smile, "You became one with Italy!"
"Ve~" Feliciano snuggles into Ludwig.
"No I didn't!" Ludwig snaps, blushing angrily, "Okay, yes I did, but I was drunk! Stupid Canadian beer."
"So you're not going to kill me?" Feliciano asks warily.
"Not yet, no," Ivan says innocently, and Feliciano screams.
"No!" Ludwig barks at Ivan, and Feliciano's wails escalate, "I will kill you!"
"Bring it," Ivan says, smile widening, "I'll just win like I won World War 2!"
"You only won because you abandoned me for the Allied Forces!" Ludwig snaps.
"Because you broke our pact," Ivan says calmly, "Just think; if you'd never tried to invade me, we could still have had that pact. Think how different history would have been."
"It would have been broken anyway," Ludwig says bluntly, "The pact was between Germany and The Soviet Union, and that's disbanded. But you're right, things would have been much different."
"We could have taken over the world together, little Ludwig," Ivan says, "But no. Such potential wasted."
"In my defense, it was Hitler who invaded you, not me," Ludwig says, carrying Feliciano, now calm, into the living room, Ivan following,"He may have been a great speaker, but he was an awful listener. It was his orders carried out, not mine, and would he listen to the nation with hundreds of years of experience, fich nein!"
"Sometimes following our leaders is not the right thing to do," Ivan agrees.
"You don't need to tell me," Ludwig sighs, putting Feliciano down in an armchair and prising the olive arms away from his torso, "But we don't get an option, do we?"
"At least you've got your friends," Ivan says bitterly, sitting down on the couch by Feliciano, "I had to invade my friends to get them to be allies with me."
"Forcing people to be your friend won't make them your friend," Ludwig sits down next to Ivan, "It only makes them your servant."
"I tried to be friends with Mongolia, Denmark, Sweden and Prussia by negotiating with them but it never worked," Russia says, curling into himself.
"By 'negotiating', what exactly do you mean?" Ludwig asks, "Because threatening, talking about torture, or glaring/grinning creepily do not come under 'negotiating'."
"Well, like Prussia; after I defeated him I wrote him a letter, asking him to become one with me."
"He'd just been defeated, humiliated, by you," Ludwig deadpans, "Why would he want to be your friend after that?"
"Because I am Russia," Ivan says with a stare.
"That is not a sufficient reason!" Ludwig snaps, hairs on the back of his neck standing upright.
"I warned him about the ice," Ivan says innocently.
"Ja, then strangled him," Ludwig retorts.
"It's okay. I got to take him over, so everything's fine."
"No, it's not fine! And I took him back! And stop staring like that! That's one of the reasons no one wants to be your friend!"
"But the Baltics-"
"Are terrified of you!" Ludwig interrupts.
"I'm not that scary!" Ivan says. Ludwig doesn't answer, and, annoyed at the silence, Ivan's glare intensifies until everything glass within the room spontaneously smashes.
"What in the hell?!"Ludwig bellows.
"I think that might have been one of England's curses," Ivan says.
"You should probably talk to him about getting that lifted," Feli chirps from behind his waving white flag.
"No, it's okay," Ivan answers.
"But, don't you want friends?" Feli asks.
"Da, but everyone seems to se scared of me when I try to be friendly."
"Just be nice! Don't stare at them, or mention 'becoming one', and talk about something nice like pasta! Or sunflowers, you like sunflowers, right?"
"Da, if I ever have a girlfriend I will call her my little sunflower," Ivan says, smile shrinking into something almost pleasant.
"That's sweet!" Feli chirrups.
"And then she will become one with me and the world will be mine and her's."
"This is why no one want to be your friend!" Ludwig bellows.
"I'm not very good at thinking of nice things," Ivan pouts, "My bosses have always encouraged me not to be nice."
"What in the hell kind of bosses have you had?" Ludwigs asks, half grumbling.
"Just read this," Ivan hands Ludwig a piece of paper covered in Cyrillic type.
"I can't read Russian," Ludwig deadpans.
"Oh. Well, I can't be bothered to read it all out to you," Ivan takes the paper, "It basically argues that a 'nasty' nation is better than a 'nice' one; they make better weapons. Especially since we can't die, and can take much more stress and work that humans can, and if we train right we can be much stronger and faster and smarter than any human."
"Ja, your bosses are awful," Ludwig says plainly, Feliciano sobbing in the armchair, "I have to wonder what possessed them to do this to their own country."
"You could ask them," Ivan suggests.
"Most of them will be dead," Ludwig say slowly, as sarcastically as a German can get.
"Magic!" Ivan cheers merrily.
"I don't have enough faith in England to ask him to do something like that," Ludwig half laughs, "He'd start one of America's zombie film in motion. Except it wouldn't be one of America's zombie films, because it wouldn't be set in America."
"What about Russian magic?" Ivan suggests.
"I'd imagine your magid is better than England's," Ludwig admits, "And I'm not just saying that because I don't want you to curse me."
"Shall I try?" Ivan asks.
"Please don't."
"But my magic is much better than England's."
"Which is why I don't want to get cursed by you."
"Fine. I might just dig their bodies up anyway; use them to scare Italy."
"Don't you dare!" Ludwig bellows, and Feliciano starts screaming again.
"But it will be funny," Ivan says plainly, smile dropping into a stare, purple aura beginning to tentacle off Ivan's back like a really weird hentai creature.
"It's cruel!" Ludwig scolds, "Not just to the Italies, but to your past leaders too! Let them rest in piece!"
"But they were cruel to me," Ivan argues.
"Surely not all of them were," Feliciano pips up.
"Well, no," Ivan says, sighing, aura dropping, "Some of them were nice. Like Anastasia. She was only a teenager."
"Only a teenager?" Feliciano asks, "What happened to her?"
"She was killed in the Russian Revolution," Ivan says quietly.
"Oh," Feliciano gasps, "I didn't know, I'm sorry."
"I have to kill her myself," Ivan's voice cracks as he speaks, "I had to shoot her. I asked her to dance with me, and as her back was turned I shot her in the head. She thought it was strange that I would dance with my guns still on me, and I said I was in hurry and didn't have much time to dance but wanted to. She believed me. I lied to her, and then I killed her."
"But it would have been much worse for her if you hadn't," Feliciano says gently.
"You did the right thing," Ludwig pats Ivan's back awkwardly, "There wasn't really much else you could have done."
"But what if she had lived?" Ivan says quietly.
"Wouldn't she have lonely without her family?" Feliciano asks.
"And what would the citizens have done to her?" Ludwig asks.
"She could have been safe," Ivan doesn't seem to hear, caught up in angsty nostalgia and painfully happy memories.
"No, she wouldn't have been," Ludwig says a little more forcefully, "She would have been hunted by your citizens; she would never have been safe."
"She didn't care how creepy I could be," Ivan says, "She loved me, both as the Motherland and as Mister Vanya."
"You shouldn't get so attached to your citizens," Ludwig scolds, "She would have grown old and died eventually; such is the pain us nations live with."
Ivan sobs for several minutes, before straightening up, "Excuse me."he stands.
"Where are you going?" Feliciano asks.
"I am rebelling," Ivan answers plainly, stopping in the doorway.
"Against yourself?" Feliciano frowns.
"You mustn't do that!" Ludwig yells, "Don't you know what happens if you do that!"
Ivan laughs. The laugh is low, deep, and somehow even creepier than his usual laugh, jolting his whole body as the sharp sounds escape his jaw. His aura writhes on his back, spreading and growing until it practically cloaks his whole body. In a rippling twitch, the deep purple turns a deep red, before the aura, or magic for want of a better word, peels away, to reveal Ivan's signature white and purple clothing to have turned black and red.
"Oh, shit," Ludwig gapes dumbly, Feliciano trembling behind him. The second representative of Russia, Nikolai Braginski, stares back at him.
A/N:
This is something me and a friend (let's call him Redd Scarf) worked on for over a year. Redd Scarf was Ivan/Nikolai, and I was meant to only be Ludwig, but it sort of escalated. Oops. Therefore it's ended up pretty long, and I'll get it written up as and when I feel like it. There are a lot of characters, both canon and original, involved. I'll try to describe anyone 'new'.
It'll get a little gory at times, due to the fighting, and quite sarcastic because I did and will continue to lose patience and just get really sarcastic with everything.
Hope you enjoy this clusterfuck of whoknowswhat
I own nothing
-Laurel Silver