21 Guns, Pale, Somewhere, Safe and Sound, Memories, Paradise, Written in the Stars.
Still not my fiiiic~ Still updating here because Happy Thursday everyone!
While looking for what the fandom usually calls Mexico, I discovered Nadiezda's Deviantart page and her design for him. I'd already written up my description of what he looked like (which, I'll be frank, is vague at best and more focused on personality), but the name Eduardo totally comes from her jaw-dropping art. Everybody check it out!
Walls
Part Two of Three
Needless to say, Ivan was not impressed when he came home to hear that Canada and America had left to look for France and England back in Europe. But more than that, he couldn't believe that they had gone by plane.
"The ash over Western Europe is no joke." He said simply, seated across from Spain in one of the sturdy canvas tents that made up the bulk of the camp's structures. "Fools, both of them."
"They're looking for their family, you know that."
It was dark out, the two of them seated at a table constructed out of an old crate, sitting on boxes Ivan knew were actually filled with supplies. Everything served a dual purpose nowadays, every inch of space that was sheltered from the elements was priceless. Taking a drink of the fresh water in his little tin cup- an old can, the Russian was craving vodka but, really, he'd been doing that for years. He focused on the sweetness of the purified liquid in his cup and listened to the whistling sound of the summer squall beating their camp from the west.
As frustrated as he was with Spain's news, Ivan was still happy to be home. When the Spaniard pulled something out of his pocket and slowly unwrapped it in the light of the battery lamp they had glowing next to them, Ivan immediately sat upright at the sight of something red.
"Is that a-?"
"First of the new world."
A tomato. Thick and- well, more orange than red, and more yellow than orange, but firm and filled with a fresh, clean scent as Spain split the fresh (fresh) fruit with his knife and quartered it. When Ivan, who had really never been too fond of raw tomatoes, reached out for the sprig of green still attached to the top, Spain let him grab and inhale the bitter scent of the plant.
"How?" Ivan breathed, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply. He'd suck it straight up his nose if he wasn't careful, but he didn't care. Green, green, green...
Ivan and Alfred had both buried supplies during the Cold War. Bunkers fit for hundreds, with seeds and grains and saplings for replanting in case of nuclear war. Many of those stockpiles had been raided in the chaos, but enough had survived both in America and over-seas to give the new colonies a fighting chance. What Ivan found so amazing now as he was handed an unripe wedge of wet, bitter tomato, was that the fruit was not a staple: it had never made its way into either American or Russian bunkers for genetic preservation because it wasn't a cornerstone of their diets. Potatoes, wheat, barley, corn, peas, beans of all kinds, soy, black pepper, different berries, gourds and diverse fruits like apples... Sun-soaked fruits like tomatoes and bananas had been canned and packed, but their seeds had never...
If America had hidden this information from him, Ivan was willing to forgive him as his teeth bit into the surprisingly bitter, but oh-so perfect jelly of the tomato wedge.
"Italy, if you can believe it." Really? Ivan couldn't. "He smuggled the seeds all the way from Rome after his bunker collapsed. Tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant, pomegranate, even grapes- his very best wine grapes..." Spain's eyes were so red around the edges that Ivan was careful not to swallow too many of the seeds as he took another bite. Seeds were precious. "Grape vines take years to grow, especially from seeds, but we've got them. But I couldn't wait and I put the tomato seeds in a pot an hour after I got them..."
"So that's what the new greenhouses are for." Ivan had seen them, the two plastic tents set up within the limits of the camp- the other buildings would keep the wind from knocking them over in storms like this one. He hadn't had a chance to ask what was in them when the weather turned foul. "I'm happy. Really I am. And the voices I heard when we arrived, it sounded like the beginnings of a choir: is that Italy's work too?" So much joy in such a short time, Russia had only been gone about four months.
"Ah, no. Lithuania and I have been working on that."
Ivan stared.
Lithuania?
Lithuania was teaching people to sing?
"I know we don't have any dogs, Spain, but surely you know that's a bad idea." He said, with all seriousness. "You could hurt someone."
"Hey! We're doing the best we can!"
"Your best would be Italy, or did Toris burst his eardrums just singing scales?"
Spain's smile vanished completely and Ivan stopped himself from reaching for another slice of tomato. It was the first time he noticed that the Spaniard hadn't taken a single bite. Wasn't this the first one?
"Where is Italy?" He asked. Ivan had been alright with not seeing him when he arrived, he'd hardly seen anyone except Spain and his sisters before the storm came rolling in. But Spain seemed uneasy now, taking a deep breath as he rubbed the stump of his missing leg, his long wool jacket open over the rough, sweat-stained grey of his shirt and pants.
"He left."
"Left?"
Another uneasy Spanish breath.
"He went to help Mexico survey the south coast. They left three months ago."
Ivan stood up.
"The south is dangerous."
"I know."
"The environment hasn't settled down yet."
"I know."
"Whatever America says, there are still rouges down there."
"I know."
"We don't even have a proper map of-"
"Russia we know, that's what they went for: to draw a map and survey the land for possible expansion."
Ivan sat down again, disgruntled, and looked down at the sectioned fruit on the table with a new sense of understanding. Spain followed his gaze and nodded.
"Three months you said..." Ivan repeated, watching Spain purse his dark lips slowly, his eyes focused on the fruit. "When do you expect them back?"
"Two weeks ago." Spain's words were hushed, all the Russian could do was lean forward on his seat slowly, one elbow on the table and a hand running through his grey hair. This... was not what he'd wanted to come home to. This new world was too difficult sometimes, Russia had grown used to the comforts of the Before.
"He'd been arguing with Canada and America for days about them moving him away from construction work," Spain began, and Ivan looked up so he could listen. Of course the Spaniard was upset, he'd lost the only other Romance Nation left in the world, the brother of his favourite and long lost colony. Spain's voice was thick, but at least his eyes were dry. "Mexico offered to take him on the expedition so they could all calm down. Italy jumped at the chance but America tried to shut it down, and instead of yelling Italy just pulled several vacuum-sealed pouches out of his shirt. He held them over one of the ovens and threatened to burn them if they didn't stop trying to interfere with him."
No. Impossible. Italy would never destroy something like that- not seeds from his homeland.
"That's what Belarus thought, so when she tried calling his bluff he threw the lemon seeds in. Two days after Alfred and Matthew left in that plane, Eduardo and Feliciano set out on foot."
The loss made Ivan close his eyes, running a hand back through his matted, oily hair again and again as he soaked in the information. Looking up again, he watched the lantern light settle over the glistening insides of the tomato, mentally counting weeks to try and connect with how everything had come together. It took a long time for a seed to become a plant and bear fruit, but the tomato was only so big, and it really was more green than yellow...
"That boy..." Spain said slowly, green eyes filled with something depressing. Ivan turned away in his seat until he could look back at the rows of cots filling up the back of the tent. He could just barely see Belarus' head where she was laying down next to Ukraine, both of them having fallen asleep waiting for him to join them, his tattered scarf wrapped around his little sister's shoulders. "Italy always could drive a hard bargain when he wanted to. He had Europe by the balls for centuries until Jan and Arthur started sailing around everywhere. Francis too..."
It certainly spoke of planning and intention on Italy's part; withholding something so valuable from the rest of them just so he could use it to his advantage when he needed to. Ivan would have been more upset if someone had actually been hurt though. It was cruel of Italy, but also very like him: he would rather attack someone's wallet or luxuries than the actual person. He'd always been that way. No one would die without lemons in the new world, they would just lose that part of the Before.
Silence followed the old, dusty memory. That recollection of the time when Italy had been a cultural player and Russia had paid astronomical prices for goods coming through Venice from the far-east. Eras of trade and exploration were so far gone now that neither Ivan nor Antonio could remember what a single colonial war had been about. But somehow, in some way, Ivan was okay with hearing how Italy had still kept that shrewd sense of value and trade. Being selfish was a way of surviving, and they were all survivors.
Italy would not die down south. Russia wasn't worried about Mexico either.
"Couldn't you..." But still, still there was a question Ivan had to ask. Even if Spain made it sound like the problem had just been between Italy and America and Canada, obviously Mexico had taken Italy's side, so what about everyone else? "Couldn't you have just found him work here?" He asked, not expecting much, but maybe Ivan would receive something for his trouble. "Laying bricks or tilling fields, even digging ditches would have made him happy."
When he glanced back up, Spain was staring at him.
"He... kept asking for things like that." Oh? That didn't surprise Ivan.
"Why didn't you listen?" Spain frowned.
"C'mon, Ivan, I shouldn't have to explain Communism to you. That's what we're living in, isn't it?" Oh? Oh were they really going to have this discussion? Ivan wasn't upset at all by the subject, he'd been waiting for it, waiting for almost two years and he was really quite thrilled. He drank his sweet water and popped another bite of tomato in his mouth while Spain spoke. "Each member does what they're best at for the benefit of the group. Italy has more skills than your average grunt."
Ivan lifted his hand right at the word 'best', but didn't interrupt. This was going to be a short discussion. How disappointing.
"Don't lump it together like that." He said, lowering his hand. "Do you want the Marxist doctrine or the Stalinist?"
"Err, trick question?"
"Not really." Swallowing the last of his water, Ivan toyed with another slice of the tomato sitting on the dirty table. "America seems to like Marx nowadays, so everyone existing on the same level and trusting individuals to do what they can is what's been keeping us alive." Hobbes may have been king in Europe, but Marx had been adopted here. "Stalinism gets things done. It points to a leader who rushes the masses out of starvation by forcing everyone who can work, to work, regardless of the individual's feelings about the work they've been assigned. But if the doctrine of group survival isn't enough then the leader has to be able to use force: that is why Italy left. If you trust him like Marx says then he will do what he thinks is best for the colony. If you force him like Stalin then he'll push back and require force to keep in line."
Ivan was alright with explaining this, even if he was dramatically over-simplifying things. Communism could raise a population out of devastation and ruin and give them back their lives, but it would only work so long as the threat of external violence was still upon them: the ash, the sickness, the scarcity. It would take years for them to rise above this, probably an entire generation or two, but by then they would have to move on from the current set-up.
Alfred dreamed of a colony, of a world, without borders. Ivan knew that that dream would come, but only until people had good food to eat and warm beds to sleep in. Then they would talk, then they would think, then they would wonder. Whether it happened between individual colonies on this continent, or between colonies here and the ones they would establish in Europe, or even if it was as small as one block of tents in the camp resenting another block of tents, divisions would arise and people would turn on one another.
Ivan had been Communist for a long time, but there was a reason why he had not been a Marxist. And factions were the whole point of nations anyways: protecting those close to you from the others far away and surrounding you. Many of them had died in the Flashes and their aftermath, what else could you expect? But new ones would be born. Maybe not right now, but soon. In the next few years at least: little republics and brand new kingdoms, tiny principalities and duchies and communes. The same things had been happening for millenia and, terrible and traumatic as it was to lose the world of the Before, the fact that the change had come from space was not going to stop history or humanity from carrying on as they always had.
And that, like Italy's bold actions with the seeds, gave Ivan peace of mind. Everything, but not everything, had changed.
"Good God, Ivan, we weren't trying to chain him to an easel or forcing him to write propaganda." Poor Spain, missing the point as usual. "We gave him what he's always loved!" Missing all of the points, actually, not just the philosophy.
"Eat the tomato."
"What?"
"You've always loved tomatoes, Spain, and they're good for you: eat it." Spain squirmed in his seat, Ivan pressed the issue. The fact that Spain didn't demand an explanation for the change in subject told the Russian everything. "Why aren't you eating it?"
"Alright, I get it." Spain wouldn't look at him, he was rubbing his leg again.
"When did you last have a fresh tomato?"
"You've made your point, now stop."
"With whom did you eat it?"
"Ivan enough!" Anger and a touch of hurt, more than a touch actually.
"Is it? Because you don't seem to be catching on too quickly."
A long, uneasy silence stretched between them after that, but Ivan wasn't even sure if Spain understood him or not. He didn't want to have to spell this out for the Spaniard: he had a long history with Italy, North and South, he shouldn't need anyone to draw him a map. Sadly, Spain's next comment, several minutes later, told him no:
"So next is the North Sea... What did you see in Africa?"
Ivan sighed, placed his elbows on the wooden table, and ate his tomato.
"You know what we found? A river."
"I'm just glad you found your way home, idiot."
One of the many things Antonio had been grateful for since arriving in the Colony was Mexico. That was why it had been so hard to almost, almost lose him to the southern frontier, but a month after Russia came back for a long rest at home, his little brother made it back okay. Antonio didn't know how to handle seeing him again, how to handle talking to him again, and he was just happy that the fool didn't rush off or complain about getting him to shut-up for a moment.
It was so hard and he was so grateful because, no, Spain and Mexico had not always gotten along very well. And no, they had not always liked, or at some points even tolerated one another, but all of that was from the Before. All Antonio cared about now was that Mexico was alive, and all that mattered was that the only other person left in the world who spoke Spanish was still with him: that the last shred of Spain's family from the Before was back with him again.
And it didn't matter if Mexico's Spanish was weird and broken and funny-sounding, it was Spanish and in the murmur of voices gathered together enjoying their mid-day meal, Antonio was thrilled to hear it.
"Alright, a river. Do you know which one it is?"
"Judging from the erosion along the river bank, it's new, but it's there."
"Is it clean?"
"Check this out."
Mexico was lively, the Calamity had not changed that. He had been beaten down with the rest of them and with his southern territories mostly underwater or uninhabitable he wasn't as strong as he should have been, but he wore a patch over his missing eye with pride, and he'd started keeping his hair trimmed short since it was impossible to wash and tend to anymore- but obviously that kind of grooming hadn't been available to him. After four months of travelling around outside the camp the black curls were thick and hung long around Mexico's dark face, but they didn't seem to be bothering the other nation right now as he chattered.
The two of them were seated on the ground with their rations in one of the half-constructed buildings that had been slowly rising up in the middle of camp, just off the main square. It was a meal-hall without a roof, just canvas lengths running back and forth imperfectly to cover against the occasional spitting rain or falling ash, but most of the camp's cooking activities went on here instead of between tents. It was safer like this, fewer fires meant fewer risks of accidents. The smell of the food was enough to drive people insane, but the fact that there was enough for everyone to have at least a little bit kept tempers down and the mood calm, happy, maybe even a little excited.
Mexico was rooting around in the heavy bag behind him when Antonio's eye caught Italy scurrying through the crowd. The two of them had only just returned today, arriving through the haze an hour or two ago from the south. He wasn't sure where Italy had vanished off to since then, but he was here now, and Antonio got his attention with a sharp whistle and a shout.
"Oi! Feli, come sit with us!" Careful not to spill his food, and keeping his portion of fresh bread in the hand he waved with (so Mexico didn't steal it, because he would), Antonio made sure to grin widely and keep talking: "My little brother was just telling me about your great discovery! Get over here!"
Italy seemed to think about this for a moment, and Antonio was afraid that he'd just dart away somewhere to escape a conversation, but finally the Italian gave a brief nod and started towards them. Antonio was relieved, and Mexico scooted over on his ass in the dirt so there was room for him to sit. It didn't occur to Antonio until Italy was already down at his side that he had called out to him in Spanish, not English.
All three of them had the same meal, no more or less than the humans scattered around them: a thin piece of the rationed flat-bread that had been made without yeast or baking powders, and a hot tin of the hardy, easy-to-grow, easy-to-preserve, easy-to-boil-and-flavour-and-fill-up-on beans that made up the bulk of their diet. Meat was impossible to come across, but protein was important. Sometimes, more like only very rarely, they could find animal tracks somewhere around the camp, but no one had tried hunting yet. It just seemed like an unspoken rule that so long as they weren't starving the humans wouldn't turn on the animals just yet.
"You mean the river, right?" Italy asked quietly, nibbling on his bread as he looked at them, his thick, oily auburn hair beginning to spin itself into dread-locks after so many months without care. Spain had a spoonful of beans in his mouth when Mexico piped up with a laugh.
"Of course! But-" Antonio watched his little brother stumble from one language into the other while speaking to Italy, briefly reminded of both Canada and America when it came to bilingualism. "Hey, English or Spanish, which do you want?" Huh?
"Ita doesn't speak-" Antonio began, but Italy just gave a small wave with one hand, his threadbare gloves failing to hide his red skin where the fingertips had worn off.
"Either-or, I don't mind." What?
"Hah! This guy, 'tonio, we were out for a week before he bothered asking for English!" Antonio filled his mouth with food to keep from asking when or how North Italy had learned Spanish. But it was too easy: any painful memory of Lovino's temper held the answer.
"You were going too fast, I couldn't hear you..." For a moment he almost thought he saw worry crack Italy's scarred face, but he gathered himself up behind a shy smile. At least it was good to see that the two of them had gotten along well while they were out there: God protect anyone stranded with an enemy...
And they'd survived, that was what mattered most. It was easier to forage and survive here than it had been in Europe: plants were beginning, just barely, to live again, but Italy and Mexico had still been gone for so long that people in camp had not only begun to worry, they'd actually stopped wondering. Death was a given in this new world, their return was a miracle.
"The river, Mexico. Did you show him what we found?"
"Not yet. Here, look at the PH reading we got." Mexico beamed as he pulled out a crinkled, dusty plastic bag. A tiny square of paper, smaller than his pinky nail and a bright pink colour, was trapped inside a small glass bottle and a matching bottle holding cloudy water was sitting next to it. Mexico set the bag down between the three of them and wolfed down half the contents of his little bowl, speaking obnoxiously between big bites: "Strong as lemon juice and smells like piss, but if it's permanent then in a couple of years we could start drinking it, and we could run supplies up and down it to colonies and posts along the way. It's wide, it's deep, and the part we followed was free of any serious rapids.
"But there were rapids." Italy pointed out, his voice still hushed behind his blistered lips. Antonio just listened and nodded along as they explained, watching Mexico inhale his food.
He had no idea when or how or where or why, but damn it if Mexico didn't sound and act a lot like Prussia. Antonio knew, he knew he got his energy from living so close to America. He knew that Mexico was so headstrong because he'd been born in the new world, that he was so talkative because he'd tried to be a leader for all his long-gone siblings in Latin America. He knew that, but all the Spaniard could think of was Prussia, and it hurt.
He was glad that Gilbert had never learned Spanish. It would have been too uncanny if he had.
"We could do all of that, unless it's just run-off from up north." Antonio pointed out, and Mexico scowled at him in a way only he knew how. "It could dry up."
"That's why I said if it's permanent." Mexico shot back, filling his mouth with bread this time and chewing sharply. "We've got sketches and dimensions of several prime locations along the river too; Feli here drafted us like half a dozen new maps."
"That's great! Woah- slow down?" Antonio's cheer faded into the suggestion when he looked over and found Italy already beginning to stand up, the last of his bread in his mouth and his bowl wiped completely clean of any remaining broth. The Italian glanced through matted red hair, and even without a brow to knit together it was clear between the look in his eyes and the pucker on his lips that he was asking what was wrong. When Antonio didn't say anything, Mexico filled the silence:
"You headed back out to the fields?" Back out?
"Yeah."
"Drink something first." On command, Mexico pulled half a bottle of water out of his bag and held it out, Italy shifting into a crouch and dutifully draining the contents in a few long, steady gulps. Before Antonio could get a word in edgewise, Italy was on his feet again and gave a small wave, carrying his spoon and bowl away through the crowd and vanishing in the dust.
Antonio almost got a word out before Italy was completely gone, but Mexico kicked him first.
"Don't."
"What the hell was that?" And don't kick him! Antonio only had one leg left!
"Spain, I said don't."
"You two have been gone for four months, and your just gonna let him-?"
"Work? Yes. Yes I am." Mexico finished his meal, Antonio flipped.
"He'll collapse!"
"He'll be fine." No! "'tonio I just spent almost half a year with him out in the ash with the rebels, I know what he can handle." Four months, which was a month and a half too long for starters, and second of all:
"You don't walk thirty kilometers in a day and then go out into the fields for ploughing!" He let the sharp words fire off his tongue without hesitation, and Mexico fixed him with a dark, one-eyed glare over his dish. "Don't give me that look either; you came just as far as he did and look at you! You're exhausted. You can talk all you want but you can barely stand."
"I just feel it differently."
"You feel it normally." Antonio shot back, frustrated, irritated, worried: he could keep listing words but he'd rather just hear an answer. "What's wrong with him? Is he sick? I haven't seen him coughing-" Mexico just shook his head, setting his bowl down on the dirt between them and looking up at him, elbows on his knees and back hunched over, his dirty face crowned with filthy black ringlets.
"He's grieving, 'tonio."
"Well he should be sleeping." The two of them sat there and stared at one another in the dirt, Mexico fixing him with such a harsh look that Antonio just had to glare right back at him, not sure why they were doing this. The conversation had killed his meagre appetite, but he knew he still had several spoonfuls left in his bowl- and he wouldn't let them sit, he just needed his brother to make some sense first.
Finally, Mexico broke eye-contact, dropping his head and scratching his tangled black locks.
"No, I'm the one who needs to sleep." He grumbled, using a colloquialism Antonio wasn't familiar with before the Spaniard caught the meaning and, still irritated, nodded slowly, looking around for his crutch. "Just leave him be, Spain, he's not hurting anybody. He eats his rations, drinks his water, and does more work for this camp than three men his size. Let him have a bit of peace."
"Did he tell you what's wrong?" Antonio was remembering a discussion he'd had with Russia, who was thankfully still at home. The submarines would be leaving in another month but until then...
"Parts of it, I think."
"You think?"
"You Europeans are complicated, and he's not stupid." No, no Feliciano had always been a lot of things and stupid was not one of them, but closed off and evasive shouldn't have been on that list either.
"He's not hurting anyone, Spain."
"That doesn't make it right."
"Nothing's right anymore, Spain." Yes...
Yes, he knew that. It was almost impossible to forget whenever he looked at what was left of Lovino's little brother, and between Feliciano's scarred face and his bleak outlook Antonio couldn't find a shred of the nation he'd known from the Before. That was just how the world worked now, he understood that, he just hated it.
"Go get some sleep..." He just really, really hated it...
I wasn't sure about whether to include this chapter or not, but the jump from the first one to the last was too extreme, I think, so this felt necessary. I'll give you guys the third chapter on Saturday, so look out!
