Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia. Or the song by which this piece was inspired, Silhouettes by Of Monsters and Men.
-1523
He stands again.
The air around him is cold, as usual. The land is stark and harsh as befits a Viking winter. Yet somehow the world seems bleaker than ever before.
He studies the blood oozing from the last of the congealing wounds on his hand, like he's reading a story in the dirtstained lines snaking across his palm, putting it into words for a future generation. Even now, he can see the cuts sealing up slowly, can feel the regeneration deep in his bones, like he feels his people quieting, returning to their chosen lives, back to their circulation as the human lifeblood of their nation.
These physical wounds heal so fast, in a way that has always fascinated him. They heal as the people once again find themselves at peace, leave only the faintest scars that, one day, will also fade cleanly, leaving unblemished skin and vague memories.
And yet his heart still feels like it's beating erratically, hard and heavy against his chest.
And yet his eyes are wet again, letting warm streams streak across a dirtied face like forked lightning.
And yet it feels so hollow, so inadequate, to still stand upon this earth.
His family is falling apart.
Where he stands, he shakes, like a leaf about to fall loose and blow away into oblivion. He wishes to return home; only where is home? Certainly not the dark, mournful castle that he left behind to chase his brothers across a frozen landscape, not the hollow edifice that saw thousands of little family spats that he, as the eldest brother, chose to ignore and brush off until it was too late.
He's deluded himself, he realizes, into thinking they're all a happy family, into almost believing that they could find eternal peace on this earthly plane as brothers, into hoping his joys can last forever. For he saw light where others only saw darkness. He had been happy. Were they ever?
He should have given Sweden more of a say with the royal family.
He should have given Finland his own life in the union, rather than eternity as a proxy territory.
He shakes his head.
For now is not the time for should haves. Now is the time to keep walking and let the blood of his old wounds return to the earth and disappear into the strength of his people. For he has two brothers left. Two brothers, who he wishes to believe need him like he needs them.
Or maybe they, too have fled, haunted by the utter silence of the night and the deafening roar of memories that follow them through the now-hollow corridors.
-1814
He knows it isn't fair. To make Norway cross the border alone, without any hand to hold. To force Iceland away from the closest thing he'll ever have to a father, because he himself has never been good enough. To hate Sweden irrationally, for doing just what having power entails.
But since when has anything been fair? If that had been Fate's intended path for the world, beings such as him would never have existed, and not have to live in the eternal state of heartbreak he's found himself trapped inside.
Standing there, watching Norway walk into the horizon without looking back, wearing a face he knows is paralyzed with shock that mirrors his own, must be the most painful thing he's ever done.
But he'd thought the same when Sweden and Finland had cut themselves out of his picturesque happy family. Is this any different? Yes, he thinks, it must be. For surely he isn't foolish enough to make the same mistakes twice. Regardless of what his brothers might say.
Brothers? No, they are not his brothers anymore. He must stop thinking of them as such. The only brother he has now is Iceland, standing a good distance away with eyes made of glass and a face so carved with lines of despair he looks ancient. Even now, even in this time of need, Iceland does not move for comfort. He, like all the others, seems to prefer mourning alone, without him.
He's almost tempted to call out to Norway, whose form is now disappearing like so much else from his twisted labyrinth of a past, to tell him to take Iceland too. For Iceland, even with all the years he's lived with their dysfunctional family in their even more insane world, is still a little boy in his eyes. And he and Norway are the only brothers firmly cemented together in Scandinavia, siblings so close it would be cruel to separate them. But instead he says nothing.
How much of this does Iceland understand, he wonders. And how much more of this can they live through? Every day, the answer seems to be a little less; their souls a little more battered and beaten. He walks over to squeeze Iceland's hand. The boy flinches slightly, but doesn't move away.
He exhales softly, feeling the warmth of misty breath rise in front of his face, momentarily obscuring the world in a soft, safe fog. For a moment he returns to the battlefield, sees his own defense crumble and fall. He doesn't regret fighting the Napoleonic Wars. He has grown past the time where he would agonize over every war like it would be his last. What he does regret is letting conflict divide his family yet again. In a way, the exact same mistake as before.
Two pairs of eyes follow as Norway turns one last time and raises a hand in farewell. Two pairs of eyes struggle to hold back the same tears as two different hands - one callused, one small - return their love in the only way they can.
I love you, brother.
They don't say it out loud. He can only hope the message is clear.
-1944
Another war, another loss. This can't go on. He's prepared for this, knew it had to happen sometime.
Iceland is leaving, of his own volition. And all he can do is sit and watch as his brother packs in silence.
Really, as much as the boy hates the comparison, Iceland is so like Norway in that sense. Even when he was young, the largest emotional outbursts came at the strangest of moments, and what should be mourned is only met with silence. Silence that he must now mirror. Because what is there left to say?
He cared for Iceland, ended up overbearing and strict on everything his brother did in an attempt to give him a good childhood, and now he's leaving. And maybe it's for the best. He is no longer able to protect his only remaining brother - the Nazi occupation has proved that, beyond a shadow of a doubt. His pride left in tatters, his people splintered and afraid. There is no future for Iceland here. Perhaps not even a future for himself.
Does Iceland resent him, he wonders. He must, for dragging him into another pointless conflict.
All he knows for sure is that the old days are over. Caretaker, guardian, older brother - all names, old names, he will now have to shed.
He watches as Iceland finishes, leaving a bedroom bare and a home hollow. He says nothing.
He cannot even lift his head as Iceland nods goodbye.
Maybe, he thinks, maybe he has made the same mistakes after all.
-present time
How many years has he been alone, now? He cannot remember, cannot want to remember, because to remember is to remember that he was never wanted.
They are the Nordic Five now, the stronghold of the North. But they aren't one family. No one talks about that shared past. As if the time for family has passed, as if it meant nothing at all in the end. And he knows better than to bring it up, because all the others seem to remember it for is the darkness, the fight, the fall. They are united only when outsiders look in. And that has always simply been a defense mechanism.
And the others, of course, are united in an apathy he never thought possible. As if all of them have had the cores of their souls replaced with unyielding, icy stone. It would explain why he never seems able to reach them, and when he reaches in he gets frozen out.
He laughs, he jokes, looking - or perhaps wishing - for some sign of that old familiarity, but is met with blank stares and, in Finland's case, a weak little chuckle that peters out in a moment's passing. Like Finland sees the same things in the people they once called brothers, but cannot fight anymore, or does not wish so desperately to return to a past that seems golden to himself now.
Maybe memory is failing him, maybe that past world was never the happy place he recalls today. Still he keeps laughing, pretending. Searching.
He dreams of his brothers, laughing with him.
In this world, those dreams are all he has left.
He walks out of the meeting room, with the others by his side. For once, he is still and quiet. He is too tired to pretend today.
Some days his laughter has been real. Like the time they spent an entire week together hyping for Eurovision, when they responded to his prompting and life felt real again, he felt real again, and he thought his joy could fill the entire sky, simple joy so warm and pure it could reach Valhalla and send forth a dazzling array of color.
Today is not one of those days. Today is one of the days where Norway's brow seems permanently creased, Sweden's glare entirely intentional. Finland's smile a little too stiff, Iceland's indifference a little too forced. He knows he's crossed some line. But he can never tell, with them, where the breaking point will be.
Surely this will be the day they finally tell him they've outgrown him to his face. The day they'll get to see what's really left of him.
And suddenly he just desperately wants to know, to let go of all the pretense and let them judge him for what he is.
He turns to them. "Hey, what are we? Are we still family or what?"
He means for it to sound lighthearted, but he knows how he must look, without the usual firelight dancing in his eyes, without the usual laugh lines carved into his face. Four pairs of eyes in varying shades of violet and cerulean watching his every move, blinking just out of sync.
There is a blinding, crushing silence. He knows what's coming.
And then a flash of warmth, then another, and another. Four pairs of arms clad in thick winter coats wrapping themselves around him, almost seamless, in a way that hasn't happened in years.
And then he understands.
There are many meanings to the word brother.
One is the flat, dull technical meaning. A man or boy in relation to other sons and daughters of his parents. But he is that, they are that in quintuplicate. The whole world consists of brothers and sisters, born from the lifeblood of the same planet, same earth, same human race in the most minor of variants.
Another is an exclamation. Oh brother, one might say. And he's heard that a fair few times, a little verbal sample they've all picked up from American English. Annoyance, but playful and capricious in its manner, like an autumn gust, full of bluster, but no coolness. This is their way of laughing, through a minor scolding and a twitch of the lips.
And the last?
The last is everything he thought it was.
Protector. Defender. Comforter.
Hand-holder. Eye-roller. Punch in the shoulder.
And everything else under the sun.
It is here, wrapped in the warmth of his brothers' arms, that he realizes he never was the only one.
History:
1. The Kalmar Union was a personal union between the kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden (Iceland and Finland were under Norwegian and Swedish rule, respectively) that lasted from 1397 to 1523, when Sweden left the union after several previous (and unsuccessful) attempts to separate from the union.
2. Norway, which had been given provincial status in 1536 following Sweden's departure from the Kalmar Union, was officially ceded to Sweden in 1814 following Denmark's defeat in the Napoleonic Wars. Iceland had at this point become recognized as separate from Norway.
3. During World War II, following increasingly tight economic restriction and Nazi occupation in both the Danish mainland and in Iceland, which was used as a strategic military staging area, Iceland declared its independence in 1944.