Disclaimer: Nothing in this story (except maybe the plot, and that only halfway) belongs to me; Hetalia and its characters belong to Hidekaz Himaruya. Also, no offense intended to any country; this is Hetalia, after all. ;)

Chapter 01: ~Preußen~

If you asked Hungary last week what her plans for the evening were, she wouldn't have said it was killing Austria. In fact, it wasn't her plan for this evening, either; but as it was, she was going to have to if she found him. A bead of perspiration slipped down to her cheek, and her tongue darted out to wet her lips as she looked around, her broom clutched firmly in both of her hands. With any luck, the world's leaders would realize what a stupid game they were playing here and call it off, but she wasn't too hopeful.

Surely Austria wouldn't be that much of an idiot to play right into their hands, correct?

It had all started when that idiot America decided to play hero in one of the meetings; again. It wasn't as though it was him she could only blame; France had decided in his speech that the world needed to focus more on building museums all over the place instead of focusing on gas emissions from cars; after all, if you dressed up the world better, you would not see the pollution, no?

"France, you half-witted git-"

England started, glaring, but before he could go on any further, America stood up suddenly, spilling hamburgers all over the place. (The dolt had them on his lap, of all places.) He slurped his drink noisily before clearing his throat and pointing his finger at France. "You can't say that in front of the world's hero! The world is crying out for help, and I, the hero, will save it!"

"Oh dear Lord, here we go again..."

"Hero this, hero that, do you not understand the importance of beauty, or has being raised by England made you even that dull?" France retorted, surprisingly; Hungary looked from him to America, who just started laughing 'ho ho ho'. The entire hall was silent as everyone waited for something else to happen.

England stood up, whipping out a handkerchief and dabbing his cheek with it. "This is ridiculous. I don't know why we even bother coming to this sham." He stopped and tucked the handkerchief away in one of his pockets and fixed his stare on France before letting his green eyes sweep along the rest of the countries seated in the room; for one moment, he even looked at Austria and Hungary. "Let's admit it, the people of the world can make their own decisions. They don't need us to make their lives worse, at any rate." He turned to the side, not bothering to look at anyone anymore. "Sorry, but I'm leaving."

"Oy oy, England!" America called to his retreating back, but only got a dismissive wave in response. The door whined as it swung shut behind him; America looked around as people started shuffling and getting up. He rubbed the top of his head, clearly embarrassed. "Oh, come on guys, England was just being himself. You're not all thinking about doing the same, are you?"

France stepped down from the podium, running a careless hand through his blonde locks. "Meh, I do not like to agree with England, as that is in bad taste, however..." he paused, as if for effect; Hungary wouldn't have been surprised if that wasthe case. "He is right, unfortunately. We now have our leaders make these decisions for us. Coming to these meetings is really quite honestly, nothing but a 'sham'."

Hungary didn't stay to hear the rest; she found herself being pulled up by the arm by Austria and out of the room, but she didn't resist. She had no desire to see a fight or an argument break out. Later on, as she stood in his drawing room and heard him play Mozart, she couldn't help recalling what had happened. The music flowed between them like a wall of sound; Austria was always like that towards her. Distant. "Austria-san?"

"Hm? What is it, Hungary?"

"Do you think we'll be alright?"

Austria was never one for blatant answers, so he simply changed to Chopin and let the piece speak for itself, hanging between them. He always did like to express himself through music, did Austria. The problem, however, was precisely that he was only capable of expressing himself through music. He wasn't a soldier, or someone with a lot of power; he stuck to his hobbies and tended to let her do all the fighting for him; or at least, he used to. Now he simply clung onto Germany and let his brother handle all the rest; Hungary sometimes felt that even if she stopped paying attention to him, he wouldn't care too much.

Her eyes flickered towards the curtains as they lifted, resisting against the winds but failing. A storm. She'd need to go around and close the windows soon. She let herself glance back at Austria; he had stopped playing now, and it was silent for a moment, before she cleared her throat and smiled falteringly at him. "You know...I care about you a lot, you know that?"

"Thank you, Hungary." Acknowledgement, nothing more; come to think of it, when was the last time he said he cared about her? She could barely remember, now. Since when had she been in love with him? Why had she fallen for him? These questions ran around and around in her head as she stepped out of the room, her head bowed; and Prussia was standing there, right in front of the room.

He didn't look even mildly surprised at being caught out. "'ello Hungary!" he said in his usual over-excited manner, like that of a child's, and clapped a hand on her shoulder. "Wanna go out hunting today? The weather's really great out there, and I know we'll catch a lot of stuff! Come on, you can't refuse my awesomeness today!"

She shrugged off the hand as properly as a girl was supposed to do and turned to the side, fiddling with her apron strings. "Sorry, I can't. I've got work to do today." She smiled at him condescendingly, but he didn't seem perturbed in the least; in fact, it only made him more insistent. He followed her all around the house, and when she closed up the last window, she turned to him and glared at him, daring him to go away. He was still grinning. "How do you get in here anyway?"

"Awesomeness is a talent, you know! It can find its way into whatever it wants!" Hungary rolled her eyes at him, but he went on. "That aside, I still dont get why you stay in here all day long! I mean. You're Hungary, you know! It's not fair that Austria gets you all to himself!" He suddenly grabbed her arm and started pulling her towards the door. "C'mon, you can't refuse me forever!"

"What's going on here?" Austria appeared, looking more than a little annoyed. Hungary half-wondered what it looked like, Prussia tugging violently at her arm and her resisting against being dragged away. "Prussia, what are you doing in my house again, for Franz's sake?" In his right hand was a music score; he'd probably been composing. "Get out!"

"You can't talk that way to me-" Prussia started, but when he saw the look on Austria's face, he let go of Hungary and stepped back, shrugging. "Fine, be that way." He sniffled to himself. "See if I come here again! I won't even if you beg me to!" He started whistling to himself as he walked off, albeit off-tune. That idiot never did have a good musical sense, Hungary thought as she rubbed the spot where he had been holding her. He did have a painful grip, though.

"Good riddance," Austria muttered to himself when Prussia had left; not that Hungary could blame him. Prussia did break in far too often and often stole things from the refrigerator when no one was looking. All the same, he was the only other company they had; even if he was a freeloader, he wasn't really the bad sort. "Hungary, are you alright?"

"O-of course..." Austria smiled at her. There were moments like this, when she could think that he would miss her if she left. That he still did care about her, a lot. Sometimes he sent her Valentines, sometimes chocolate, sometimes they'd walk together through the street holding hands. Except he always did his best to slip away before things got too serious like they did before; like he was doing now. He inclined his head towards her before he turned away and walked off, leaving Hungary staring at his back as he disappeared upstairs; leaving her standing all alone in the room.

The piano started up again.

"HUNGARY! COME FISHING WITH ME!"

The next morning was...wet. The ground was wet, at any rate, and the air felt heavy from last night's storm. But even so, Hungary wouldn't have complained-she was used to dealing with little things like this-if it hadn't been for a certain red-eyed German chasing her all the way to the market. Apparently, just because he said he'd never go into Austria's house again didn't mean he'd stop bugging her. In fact. it only got...worse.

"C'MON!" he yelled at her back. "Let's go hunting some deer or something!"

"There's no deer in these parts, idiot! And stop chasing me before I clobber you over the head with my broom!"

"NEVER!" He smirked, looking happy; in fact, Hungary had never seen him as happy as this for a long time. Prussia was slowly dying, she knew this and everyone else knew this. Even though he was still obnoxious, pushy and lazy, the fight had gone out of him since a long while back. She supposed arguing with her made him feel more alive. "C'mon, the market's completely boring! Shopping is dull!"

"Not to a girl it isn't!" She stuck her tongue out at him, to egg him on even further. But he stopped, looking at something; and she blinked, turning around to face whatever it was. Not what; who. Germany was standing there, looking up at both of them somberly. No, it was worse; she got the sort of feeling where you knew you were going to get bad news before you got it. "Germany-san?"

"Where's Austria?" He glanced from her to Prussia and back towards her; an almost inquisitive look. "I need to talk to him-the two of you as well."

The news wasn't good. Because of Prussia's immature insistence that he wasn't going to ever put even one foot in Austria's house again, she had to call Austria out, and they wasted three minutes glaring at each other before Germany barked the rivalry out of them. "That's enough! If neither of you are capable of acting like adults I'll send you to the-"

"West!" It was Prussia's turn to glare. "In front of her? Really?" Hungary looked around at the three of them, taking stock of their expressions; from Germany's twitching eyebrow to Prussia's red face and Austria's calm glare. Germany sent a sidelong glance towards Hungary before clearing his throat and looking solemnly at the three of them.

"Alright. Stand still so I can get this across through your heads." Prussia, who was about to object, found himself fixed in place by a rather stiff glare. "It's really bad news, but...our leaders have all decided to make us participate in a Battle Royale."

From the confused looks on the faces of the older brothers, Hungary could see she wasn't the only one puzzled by the strange term. "Battle Royale?" she said, staring at Germany. He looked at her, and she suddenly realized the expression in his eyes wasn't merely that of someone delivering bad news; it was of someone extremely disturbed.

"Well...to put it simply...instead of a war, they decided to make us all fight to the death. All of us...are going to have to kill each other."

Prussia was the first to break the bewildered silence that followed. "West...stop joking. That has to be a lie, right?" he guffawed. "I mean, we don't even have reasons to be fighting right now...we don't even need a war."

"We don't...but they do," Germany spoke with awful finality. "It's because we left the decisions up to them. We don't have a choice anymore."

"But...why?" Hungary hadn't realized those frail words had tumbled out of her own mouth; she was in too much disbelief. Yes, they'd fought each other before; they'd hurt each other, even often made sure to break each others' bones. But they'd never really intended to kill each other. Countries weren't made to be killed, were they? "This...doesn't make any sense."

"It's the usual thing, isn't it?" Austria's voice was soft, unshaken as usual. "They all want to rule the world."

They all want to rule the world. Hungary thought, as she stood in this forest of tall trees. Somewhere an owl hooted; and she fancied she could see the sky getting just a little darker. She sat down on the ground and started striking rocks together in an effort to get a campfire running; and it took a few minutes before she could see a small flickering flame, trying to stand against the chill of the wind. She covered it with her hand and slowly fanned it into a bigger fire; it wasn't long before the clearing was bathed in light. She couldn't find it in herself to curl up and go to sleep, though.

How many countries had already died today?

The owl hooted again, and Hungary wondered if it was as lonely as she was right now. Maybe it was calling out for its nestmates; maybe it was calling out for its parents. What did she know? She sighed, drawing her knees up to her chest. At any rate, she'd have to go looking for Austria tomorrow, again. It had already been two days since the whole thing had started, and still she hadn't run into anyone she knew. With any luck she'd at least run into one of the Three Big Idiots-as she'd taken to calling America, France and England-and give them what-for.

Just as she was about to drowse off, sitting in front of the campfire, a twig snapped behind her. Before she even knew it, her old reflexes kicked in; she'd picked up the broom and stood up to face the intruder without even thinking. "Who's there?"

"Oh...Hungary...it's...you...?"

It was a distressingly familiar voice; familiar because it had been nagging at her only a few days back and distressing because it was cracking and fading away, as if it didn't have the strength to go on. The person appeared from behind a tree, panting. The voice was the first hint; his expression the second; and the large stain on his uniform the third. Hungary looked at him in horror as he stumbled into the clearing. "Prussia!"

He would have collapsed to his knees there and then if she hadn't rushed forwards to catch him. She placed him as close as she could to the fire-he was shivering-and tried to topple some water into his mouth. He only managed a gulp; the rest of it spilled onto the ground and he coughed violently, his shivering increasing. Hungary opened up his uniform; but if she'd thought of ripping up her own dress to bind up his wound, she was mistaken. The gash was too large and the blood was still pouring out; even as she pressed her own hand to the wound to stop the flow, he grabbed her arm.

"No...stop. It's...too...late."

"Prussia, you idiot!" She ripped up parts of her own skirt anyway and pressed it to the wound. A drop of water fell onto her hand; rain? He smiled up at her; it was frustrating, provoking. How could he smile like that? "You...you idiot...I hate you so much..." More drops fell; and she realized they were her own tears.

"I...know. I...hate...you...too." He grinned even more broadly, if that was possible. "Don't worry...I'll be...alright. It's me...after all..." He coughed up blood and twitched in pain. She glared at him, terrified and furious at the same time.

"Shut up! And who'd...worry...about someone like you? Huh?" she yelled, her voice breaking up. The tears were running off her cheeks now; there were too many. "You idiot...you can't die...not like this..." Why him? She thought numbly as she tried to stop the blood from all spilling out. If it was someone like France or Switzerland it wouldn't have hit so hard to home.

But Prussia was...even though she didn't want to admit it, she cared for him. It wasn't supposed to happen this quickly, dammit; she should've had at least another decade before she had to mourn him. Mourn him.Why did she feel so empty, looking at all that blood spilling out? Why wouldn't the tears stop? Why wouldn't they stop, dammit? "You're not going to really die, right?" she whispered. "Please tell me this is just one big joke..."

"Austria...he...did..." The German coughed up even more blood, and stopped speaking, but Hungary understood. She understood too well; that Austria had fallen to all the talk about glory. Her own boss had done the same; tried to sway her. Why, Austria-san? Why?

After a while, the blood seemed to start slowing down; she immediately tore up a big part of her skirts and wrapped his chest up in the fabric, binding the wound up tightly, and propped him up against a tree. As she rose to get more water, he grabbed her arm. "Don't...go...please..." He smiled again; that inexplicable smile, that told her he wasn't scared at all. "We...haven't...really spent a lot...of time together, have we?"

"We can't talk about that now!" She stood up, dusting off what remained of her skirts. "I'll get you some water and then we can-"

"No...really." He wasn't grinning anymore. "Please."

She stopped and knelt down. "Prussia?"

He pushed himself up against the tree, not asking her to do it. Trying to salvage his pride? "I...Hungary...could you..?" He looked up at her, for a moment; and Hungary understood. She wrapped her arms around his chest and hugged him tightly; there was a brief pause, and he shuddered.

Then he was no more.

It was ironic to think that he'd died in her arms-a girl's arms. Prussia, so proud of never having married-so proud, in fact, that the boast itself brought tears to his eyes, or so he said. The first person that let her know that she was, in fact, a girl and not a boy. He'd never been around girls; for all the times he said he was 'awesome', she knew that he was really just a typical religious nuthead. And now he was dead in her arms; his eye closed and his platinum-blonde hair matted with red. She began singing in Hungarian, not knowing any German songs to sing.

"Szerte a világon
Szerte a világon
Szerte a világon megyünk
Mit hoz a holnap
Senki sem tudja
Amit tegnap hozta
Jobb, ha nem kell aggódnia
Menjünk körül
Szerte a világon
Világszerte megyünk,
És lássuk egymás kezét
Ezért közösen tudjuk építeni
Egy jobb jövőben."

It was a silly little ditty she often sang to herself; compared to Austria-san's soaring orchestrations, it was nothing. But Prussia often stood and listened to her, even only if to bug her later on about his own terrible singing. Singing she would never hear again. Singing she would miss, no matter how many times she nearly throttled him to death for offending her ears.

Did countries have graves?

And there you go! ;D In my opinion, that death scene wasn't really all that good, but oh well. Next chapter will probably come up sometime this week, if I can help it; meanwhile, constructive criticism is always appreciated. :3 Also, about the Hungarian song; it's pretty much a silly ditty I made up on the spot and then used Google Translate to turn it Hungarian, so if my Hungarian grammar's atrocious, help would be appreciated. :P Also, before I post the next chapter, I want to hear your thoughts on who the other main character is. :P I know it's not obvious, but I'd like to hear all the same. :D

(Prussia: Not even a single word for me? I officially hate you.

Me: Sorry...)