Hey ya'll!
So here's chapter two! (Sorry it took so long… school is crazy right now. Blah blah blah, *insert more common excuses here*)
Thanks to those who have commented, favorited, and followed! 'Tis greatly appreciated!~
*I DON'T OWN HETALIA, OR ANYTHING FOR THAT MATTER.*
He sat there for an eternity, frozen in shock, and reread the parchment countless times. Each time he read it, his heart seemed to sink further and further and he grew more repulsed by the paper. He gazed at his love's likeness, the doll, and only felt the growing dread inside of him get a deeper hold on his heart. There was no way to see him now. His Yao was-
He couldn't even finish the sentence in thought, and even the possibility revolted him so much that he barely made it into the bathroom in time to wretch up his small daily rations. Even in his grief, he felt slightly remorseful to see the food go to waste. He was one of the lucky ones who were even given rations, and the memory of those millions starving in the countryside made his stomach turn with dry heaves again. He slid weakly to the floor, for once giving up his aura of power and stability, and began thinking of how this could have possibly happened.
Had he been overworked? Ivan immediately ruled this possibility out. He had known Yao had had it as hard as he did by his letters filled with incessant rants and quite colorful language, but he never thought it would even be a possibility to work the young man to death. They were countries, after all, and they didn't die that easily.
Had he been assassinated? Impossible, the young man was very careful and could defend himself quite well despite his fragile façade. He didn't even eat anything unless he made it himself, and he knew where every cow, rice grain, and apple had been grown, how it had been grown, who grew it, and how it was picked or butchered.
Ivan was running all of these possibilities through his mind, when he remembered a little-known fact about the nations: They could only truly die by their own hands. More often than not, this meant the actual country itself and its political, environmental, and social conflicts, but every so often a country would off themselves. That was why some countries had representatives and others didn't, and the subject of these countries' deceased representatives was never discussed. Russia knew that Yao wouldn't do that from the many late-night discussions he had had with the small man, and the country surely didn't kill Yao because it was doing pretty well at the moment.
This meant one thing: Yao was still alive.
Many miles away, a small man was heaving with heavy sobs and gasping for breath while sprawling out on his dingy, twin-sized bed. His doll-like face was flushed from his cries, which had been going on for hours since the arrival of the letter. His jet-black hair was messy and filled with tangles from his stress-induced act of balling his hair up into his fists in frustration. He ran his fingers through the strands that were supposed to be his bangs for the thousandth time that day, making the normally cooperative strands stick out in a dozen different directions.
Yao was one of the oldest and strongest countries, but he was a very heavy griever. He looked to his small shelf right above his small desk lamp to see his doll. It was a nesting doll, completely comprised of Russia in varying ages and stages, dressed in everything from rags to robes to traditional wear to a panda suit. The small doll was the only colorful thing in the room, and Yao felt his eyes drifting toward it every time he tried to look away.
He eventually gave in and snatched the doll from the shelf to examine it more closely. The doll looked so much like him that he found it nearly unbearable to look at, and the doll's eyes held an unknown emotion that even after all this time, Yao had never been able to figure out. He had asked Ivan about the eyes when he was given the doll, but had received nothing but a mischievous smile and a murmur of a: "I'll tell you next time." There had always been a next time for them back then, but they had run out of them all too soon.
"And now, I'll never know."
Yao fell asleep with salty tears dried into lines down his face, completely unruly hair, flushed cheeks, puffy eyes, and a small, colorful doll, tucked underneath his arm.
AND SO THE PLOT THICKENS!
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Peace and Wubs!
~Misfit
