(1) If you don't remember, Russia's left shoulder had been injured. (2) The nurse's speech will be purposely incorrect, since she doesn't speak English well. (3) This is military time. 2300 hours means that it's 11pm. Another note that I forgot to add to the first chapter's description is that, when something is said in italics, that means that character is thinking whatever had been said in italics.

I've also decided that the story, as of right now and until further notice, is taking place between late February of 1917 and October of 1917. We'll just say it's March of 1917 right now. In mid-late February of 1917, the Tsar of Russia was overthrown after the military refused to listen to him. In late October of 1917, the new Soviet government of Russia withdrew from the war with a decree of peace. The months between February and October were very chaotic for the Russian government.

The next time the young violet-eyed general awoke, he was inside of a modestly sized room. As he dazedly shifted his head around to take in his surroundings, he noticed a few things. The walls were plain and devoid of color and design, as if whoever built this room wanted to do it as quickly as he could. There were no windows in this room either. The only thing that kept the room from darkness was a ceiling light. Strangely, there is a twin-sized bed up against the wall on the other side of the room, next to the door that allows one to enter the room. The bed is accompanied by two nightstands on it's sides. The rest of the room is quite empty. It has only the bare necessities. The lack of objects left the room with a very impersonal feeling, as if the user of the room would only come in when absolutely necessary. He noticed another thing that is probably more important than how the room itself looked. The Russian general realized that he was in another bed and that he could breathe fairly well now with little pain in his throat and nose. The man attempted to sit up, but quickly found that doing so caused him a lot of pain. Instead, he decided to lift the sheets of the bed with his right arm, as his left arm was painful to move(1). He looked over his body to find the source of the pain. Instead of seeing the military uniform he was once wearing, he saw several bandages across his chest, stomach, and his left shoulder. Well, that explains why he's in pain. He noticed that, although he had been stripped of his uniform, he was still wearing his pants and socks. "Well," the young man thought, "At least that means my legs aren't injured."

As the Russian began to think of why he's here and where he's at, the door to the room opened. The man shifted his head to the side to see who entered the room. He was greeted with the smiling face of a young female nurse. He smiled back to her, just as he would always do when somebody else is around him. He isn't trying to hide anything behind his smile, though. It's simply in his nature to try and be friendly around others. He knows that he looks rather intimidating, which only adds to his want to come across as friendly. He's rather tall, standing at about 6'2", his body is muscular, but due to his build his muscles can be mistaken for chubbiness if he is fully clothed. His face, however, is more rounded and childlike. His voice compliments his innocent face. When he speaks in English, his voice is sweet and soft. Though he has a noticeable Russian accent, it doesn't really add any negative effects to his voice. In fact, it makes his voice sound sweeter. However, he can easily make himself become scary and intimidating if the situation deems it necessary. Since he is Russian, he can speak Russian as well as English. His Russian voice is much different from his English voice. When he speaks in his native tongue, his voice becomes much deeper and much less innocent. This is due to how the Russian language is spoken. It's almost impossible to sound sweet while speaking Russian. Because of this, he refrains from speaking Russian in front of strangers. Despite his childish face and his attempts to come across as a good guy, the young man still finds that some people are afraid of him. The nurse didn't seem as though she was afraid though. She seemed friendly, but she still approached the man with caution.

"Hallo. My name ist Gisela. I am your nurse.(2)" The woman spoke with a very thick German accent. Her short sentences along with her pauses between words implied that she didn't know English very well.

Oh great. He is in German territory. Not only that, but he's clearly been captured by the Germans. "My nurse? But I do not need a nurse." His smile didn't fade as he spoke to the nurse. Although he knew he was injured and most likely did need a nurse, he didn't want to admit to his weakness. At least, not to a stranger.

Gisela chuckled lightly at his response. "You Russens don't show weak until dead, ja?" She's joking with him at least. That must mean she's not afraid. Yet again, she probably knew of his injuries and knew he couldn't even lift his left arm, let alone hurt anybody. Unable to think of how to verbally respond to her, he just continued smiling at her. By this time, she was standing beside his bed. "I know it is... how you say, awkward, but I need to look at wounds. You mind?" It took him a few seconds to understand exactly what she meant. Though, once he figured it out, he nodded his approval to her. He isn't very comfortable with somebody looking at him without a shirt on; after all, he'd always been left to care for himself in these kinds of situations. However, he figured it wouldn't be wise to refuse medical treatment if it's offered to him. The nurse carefully folded back the sheet that was covering the injured general after the man said she could do so. She unwrapped the gauze that protected his wounds as gently as she could. After doing so, she began the process of retreating and then re-wrapping his wounds with the gauze she had pulled out of the pockets on her dress. Due to most of the wounds being on his stomach and chest, the young man would sometimes have to strenuously lift his back up some to have the gauze wrapped around his back, and then back over the wound. All while she was doing this, he watched her. As he watched, he noticed his wounds didn't look as fresh as he would think they would be.

"Nurse, why don't my injuries look fresh?" The nurse glanced over at the man briefly, then smiled and returned to her work.

"You been asleep past two days. Injured too much." Her response was short, but he understood. The blood regeneration and energy spent on healing wounds must have been taking a lot out of him. He didn't go into a coma, but his body had to focus it's attention and energy on healing. Not to mention he was tired before this all happened. War is very exhausting, after all. This meant his body had decided to sleep until it could afford to spend energy on being awake. The nurse continued treating him until his wounds were covered with gauze. The man is in slightly more pain than he was before since his injuries had been agitated, but he didn't complain. "All done. I will check on you soon." The nurse smiled at him a last time, then took her leave out of the room.

After the general watched her leave, he took a few more minutes to take in his surroundings before letting himself drift back into blackness. It was hard to let himself sleep knowing that he's in enemy territory, but he is still very tired. His exhaustion meant that his people were tired as well, that is, tired of fighting. The Tsar of Russia had also recently been dethroned, causing chaos back in the Motherland. The general desperately needs to return home to hopefully restore order in his country before everything falls apart. He was set to return home after another couple of weeks worth of fighting, but it is now clear that he may be stuck here for a while.

A few hours passed before the Russian had the energy to wake up again. His waking wasn't by his own will though. His stomach had roared loud enough to wake himself up. Two days of not eating meant that he was incredibly, and painfully, hungry. Despite his hunger, he isn't that much thirsty. He supposed the nurse had came in every couple of hours for the past two days to put a little bit of liquid into his mouth, just enough to keep him hydrated. As he wondered how exactly this could've been achieved without him being woken up, his stomach interrupted him with a loud rumble. He really needed to eat soon. Though, it appears as if it's nighttime now. The chances of the nurse still being awake is slim to none. The room has no windows to verify what time of day it is, but the general assumed that, since the ceiling light in the room is turned off, that must mean it's past dusk. He lifted his head upwards a little, just enough to look around the room and see if there is anything he can do to get somebody's attention. His searching looked to be in vain though, the door to his room is closed and there would be no hope of him being able to stand up. Not without help, at least.

The general was about to give up and try to get more sleep when he noticed that there's an occupied chair at the end of his bed. "How could I of missed that?" He concluded that the darkness of the room masked the chair and the person sitting on it. The person in the chair certainly isn't the nurse. Although the man's vision is limited in the pitch black room, he could tell the outline of the figure sitting in the chair is male. That, or the person is a woman with a masculine body. Now that he has found somebody to help him, he just has to find a way to get their attention. The person doesn't look like they were actually watching him, it's more like the person had fallen asleep in the chair.

He really hated being in this situation. He hated being unable to do anything for himself and having to rely on another person to help him. He hated looking so weak and vulnerable. Despite this, he isn't going let his pride stand in the way of his survival, no matter how weak it made him look. The young man decided the best way to get the person's attention is to knock on the wall beside his bed. He moved his right arm up above himself, then he moved it backwards until his hand touched the wall that is behind his bed's headboard. He knocked gently, silently hoping to himself that the person didn't hear the knocking. The man waited for a few seconds, but after getting no response, he decided to swallow his pride and knock again, only louder. This time, his call for help caused the person at the end of his bed to stir. He remained quiet as he watched and listened to the other person. He saw the person's figure move their head back into an upright position while he listened to them yawn. He saw them move their head again after a couple of seconds, though he isn't sure if they turned to look at him or if they looked away from him. He decided the former was what had happened, considering the person stood up from their chair after turning their head.

"Hold on, I will turn on the lights." The person is definitely male. There is no way a woman could have such a deep, stern voice. The Russian general nodded his approval with a smile, even though he is sure the other man couldn't see him in the dark. He silently watched as the man walked over to the only door in the room. The other man walked at a fair pace with caution. After all, it would be rather embarrassing for the other man to trip over something in front of an enemy general, regardless of the amount of light in the room. Once the other man reached the door, he placed his hand onto the wall beside the door and began to feel for the light switch. He found it before his blind feeling of the wall became embarrassing, and immediately after the room was filled with light radiating off of the ceiling fixture. The sudden light was blinding to the Russian, who's eyes had become somewhat accustomed to the darkness. He had to briefly close his eyes to allow them time to adjust before opening them again. Once he did reopen his eyes, he saw a familiar figure sitting down onto the chair next to his bed's foot board. Apparently the few seconds he took to close his eyes was enough time for the other man to go back to the chair and sit down again. The Russian's smile reappeared after it's brief disappearance when he had closed his eyes.

"Privet, Germany! What are you doing here? I thought that nurse was here to take care of me." The young man certainly didn't expect to see another person who represented their country, like himself. The Russian general actually worked as a sort of ageless personification of his country. Though, except for those who were the same as he is, not many people knew that. Due to the type of life he lives, he's not allowed to make friends with those who are regular humans. The only friendships he can have are the ones with other representations of countries. During times of war, he's allowed to take the position of a high-ranked general under his human name. All of his kind have human names, though, they do not call each other by their human names. To keep things simple and formal, they are simply called by the name of the country they represent. Because of this, these people are often considered to actually be the country they are representing. Those who have personal relationships with other human representations will call each other by their human name when not at professional meetings.

"She is. She has to sleep too, though. She had told me you had woken up a few hours ago, but when I came into the room you were already asleep. I sat down in this chair and have been waiting for you to wake up again." The other man, named Germany, paused to sigh and briefly close his eyes before looking at him again and resuming his speech. "It's been a long day though, so I fell asleep too." While waiting for the Russian to respond to him, he made sure his hair had not become unkempt during his sleep.

"I see..." The Russian general paused to think about what to say next. "Why have you been waiting then? Surely you have more important things to do. This is war, after all."

"I wanted to know why you're still wounded." Germany waited before continuing, hoping that the Russian man would answer his question without needing more of an explanation for why he's asking him about his wounds. When he received no response from the other man, only a smile with a slight look of confusion, he continued. "Your wounds, why are they not healed? I know that those who are... unique, like you and me, can heal any wounds with relative ease after a couple hours. I didn't know if inhaling toxic chemicals could hurt you, so I set out to try and find you as soon as I had found out one of my men had detonated a mustard gas bomb. I wasn't too surprised to see that you were still covered in wounds, but it's been two days and you've barely healed at all. It's as if your like a normal human now. Why is this?"

The Russian man looked at him with confusion, then chuckled lightly when he realized. "You've never been in a war, have you?" His question's was answered with the other man moving his head side-to-side. He could tell that the other man was probably confused by this question, but confusion is a vulnerability and must not be shown when in the presence of a country that is bigger and older than your own. "That's right, your country is too young to have been in a major war..." The Russian was mostly speaking to himself. "You see, war doesn't just affect your people and country. If your country is winning a more serious war, then usually your strength will steadily increase. However, if you are losing, your strength will deteriorate. You don't physically lose any muscles if you're losing a war, but you'll find it harder and harder to do things that were once easy to do. Sometimes losing a war will have a greater impact than just a loss of strength. It doesn't happen very often anymore, but war can kill a person like me and you. It's a difficult concept to understand how and why it happens, but it can happen." He took a long pause to think about how he would try to explain to the younger man.

"You see, your health is dependent on three different things. First, your people. If your people are young and strong, you will be stronger. Second, your military. The stronger your armies are, the stronger you are. Some countries don't have much of a military, but they are still strong as if they have a strong military. This is because they have the resources and the ability to make a strong army, but choose not to. Third is your government, which has three more things that make up the overall health of your country's government. The more stable your government, the better. It also helps if your people are happy with your government. The last thing is how much debt you have. Owing other countries is never a good thing. If any of those aren't doing so good, or if your country is in a revolution, then you become more prone to becoming more likely to die from a wound." The Russian sighed, his smile had slowly faded as he had been talking until it had completely disappeared. "Right now, my country is suffering in all of those categories. My people are young, but weak from war. My military is on the verge of being completely wiped out, even though I put my country into debt just to pay for my armies. My government is very unstable, the Tsar was recently overthrown, and my country is in a revolution. My country as a whole is very weak and might collapse if things don't start getting better, and so I am weak and I'm hurt more easily. I'm not in danger of dying though, not until my country collapses." At the end of his speech, the Russian man looked physically exhausted.

Germany remained quiet and listened intently as his Russian counterpart spoke. "So we are able to die?" He had always wondered if people like the Russian man and himself could die, but he never could figure out how it could be possible. He had told the young soldier who had informed him that there was a Russian general who had been injured and was in the center of where they had detonated a mustard gas bomb that the general would die without help, but he didn't know he actually could die. He only said that to get the soldier to understand the severity of his mistake. It was likely the soldier didn't even understand why the fate of an entire country rested on the shoulders of one general anyways. However, after the soldier gave him a description of what the injured general looked like and the clothing he wore, Germany knew the Russian man was more than just another general. After concluding his thoughts, Germany decided to ask the Russian another question. "Why are you telling me of this then? Why would you admit to being weak?" The German man was surprised by the Russian's honesty. If he were in his place, he would've denied any kind of weakness, whether he had it or not.

The Russian's smile returned with the German's question; he perked up as if he hadn't admitted defeat just a few seconds prior. "You wouldn't overrun my country and cause my government to collapse. That would be stupid." The German almost looked to be insulted, as if the Russian had called him stupid, but before he could voice his objection, the Russian continued speaking. "I don't know if you've noticed, but my country is big. In fact, it's the biggest country in the world!" His voice sounded very childish, almost as if he's a kid who's proud of having the biggest sandcastle at the beach. "If my government were to collapse, my land would be free to be overtaken by any country that wants it. Just think of all the wars that would happen over who owns what territory. This war we're in is supposed to end all wars, but if the country of Russia is to collapse by your hands, then the world will be plunged into more wars." Although he had been speaking seriously most of the time, his voice retained it's innocent tone.

Germany nodded at the Russian. "That is true. I have no intentions of overrunning your country, though. I've thought about what would happen if your country was to fall before, and I came up with the same conclusion myself. Where your country is now would just turn into a big war zone. I'm not looking to conquer other countries anyways; it would just be another headache for me." His voice sounded a tad irritated at the end of his speech, though he wasn't irritated with the Russian. His irritation stems from all the work that's been put unto him, thanks to The Great War. The mere thought of more work is enough to irritate him even more. He stood up from his chair. "You should get some more rest, Russia. It's already a few minutes past 2300 hours(3)." The man named Russia appeared as though he was going to nod his head, when suddenly he looked as though he had just remembered something very important.

"Wait! The whole reason why I woke you up was because I'm really hungry." How could he have forgotten? He must've been too distracted with talking to remember why he had woken Germany up in the first place. As soon as he had remembered though, his stomach growled loudly. It probably wasn't happy with the idea of going to back to sleep before being refilled.

Germany couldn't help but crack a smile and chuckle a bit after he looked back at the other man. He found how the man asked for food in such a childish tone to be funny, not to mention the loud stomach growl that immediately followed afterwards. "I'll go see what we have to spare." He looked ahead of himself, then walked to the room's door and proceeded to exit the room.