Here we are again :3 With one of five chapters!


Poland's sleep-deprived mind took a second to process everything that was going on.
It was three in the morning, he had just realized he'd alienated his best friend, and now, said best friend's almost-adoptive-brother was sobbing on his doorstep.

Some instinct seemed to kick in as his mind mulled over the facts.
"Hey." He knelt down to the boy's level. "Latvia. It's Latvia, right?"

The boy nodded, giving him a terrified glance, still shaken by uncontrolled sobs. Despite this, however, he stood practically at attention, arms at his sides.

"Ssh… no… it's okay. It's okay. I, like, got you now. You're fine." He tried to put a hand around the child's shoulder, but the latter shrunk back as if he was about to slap him.
Of course. The kid had grown up as a part of Russia's household. He himself had known Russia from an early age as well, and knew very well that even the kindest-looking smile could hide stinging consequences. It was enough to break almost anyone.
Poland bit his lip, trying to think of something to do. If anyone was insane enough to be up at this hour, they would see what seemed to be him terrorizing an unknown youth.

Eventually, he settled for gently leading him inside by placing a hand on his back and shutting the door, locking it "na cztery spusty" (Untranslatable, colloquial- means to lock the door using an excessive or unnecessary amount of locks either to give the appearance of safety- as here- or as a symptom of paranoia.)

He waited patiently while the sobs faded to hiccups, tears still flowing down the shorter boy's face. "Hey, you're okay now. You're safe." Poland repeated.

The boy shook his head mutely, looking at him, round, scared eyes peeking out from beneath a fringe of messy bangs.
Poland realized how intimidating he must have seemed, especially to a person who had grown up with every ounce of self-confidence crushed out of him. With every passing second, he was more and more at a loss about what to do.

"You, like, probably know who I am, don't you?" He tried a different card, trying to get an answer from the frightened country in front of him.

A nod. Poland assumed he would, otherwise he wouldn't have shown up, looking as if he needed help but was afraid to ask.

"… All right, but you can call me Feliks, okay? That's my real name." Poland stuck his hand out toward the other person in the room.
"What's your name?"

"Ra-Ravis. Ravis Galante, sir." The boy whispered shyly, shaking the hand. Poland was surprised by how cold the small palm was.

"Jezus, Maria, it's, like, January! And you're not wearing a coat!"
A shout tore itself out of his mouth as he quickly grabbed the boy's sweatshirt off of him and hung it on the nearest heater, taking his own off and pulling it over his head while the latter cowered under his touch. If for just a second, Liet and Vilnius were pushed from his mind as he tried not to panic.
"Here- I know it might be, like, a little too big for you, but it's warm. I'll get you a blanket, okay?"

"N-no, that's-that's okay." Latvia stammered- albeit shaking from the cold, still giving him an anxious stare. "Th-thank you."

Feliks looked at him, shocked, and insisted on draping a thick, red-and-white folk-patterned blanket around the shivering child while mentally beating himself up for not having noticed earlier.
He definitely wasn't used to being around children, but that was no excuse for overlooking the weather outside. Running around wearing autumn clothes in January couldn't do anyone any favors.

"There. Hmm… can you, like, wait here for a second? Sit down on the couch or something."
He ran upstairs to his room and tried to find something dry that wouldn't look like it belonged to a grizzly bear on Ravis' tiny frame.
He eventually settled on a pair of old lounge pants that could be drawn together with strings and the smallest socks he had. They were pink and fuzzy, a well-meant Christmas gift from China, who himself had feet probably half of Poland's size.
He ran back to the hall to find Ravis still standing where he had left him stiffly. He didn't appear to have moved a muscle.

He thrust the clothes into the boy's hands, bidding him change into them.
"Here- I'll, like, turn around. Hang your wet clothes on the heater when you finish."
After a reasonable time, he turned around and nodded, satisfied that the boy wouldn't catch hypothermia.

"Great! Would you like some…" he bit his tongue as he was about to say "coffee."
"…Cocoa? Tea?"
He tried his best to sound upbeat and relaxed. In his mind, that was supposed to help the

Ravis nodded obediently. Feliks mentally slapped himself: of course he wouldn't refuse if he offered tea. He couldn't. That was also one of the things he had had to get used to around Russia. You just didn't refuse tea.
He himself had made a point of asking for coffee, even though he personally hated the stuff.

"Sugar? Lemon? Milk? Something?" The older man asked, pulling the items out as he said them.

"C-can I have sugar?" The Latvian blurted, then clamped a hand over his mouth.

"Sure, totally! No problem." Poland smiled in his direction encouragingly, then balanced the cups and saucers in a way that England would envy if he could see.

As he placed the things on the kitchen table, he gestured for Ravis to sit down and grinned inwardly when he saw that the kid was beginning to relax, wrapped up in the blanket over clothes that hung from his tiny frame so loosely that it looked comical- though he was still shooting pensive glances in his direction.
A ridiculous thought suddenly struck him. And people tell me I'm petite. It was the first remotely funny thing that had come to his mind since… forever.

"How many lumps? Two?" He asked, further trying to relieve the tension.
Latvia again nodded obediently, gripping the cup in both chilled hands and taking a cautious sip.

He observed the boy in silence for a while. He still seemed to be thoroughly intimidated by Feliks, and must have had a serious reason to come to him after what he'd done to Liet.
He wondered if Ravis had heard of him as a back-stabbing false friend. Most likely so.

He seriously hated bringing this up, especially since the kid had just stopped being totally terrified of him and actually begun to look (slightly) calmer (though his eyes still darted toward him nervously every few seconds), but whatever it was had to be important.

"Hey… Ravis?" He tried to imitate the soft-spoken tone he had heard Liet use so many times.
"Sorry to bring this up like this, but how come you're here? Is everything, like, okay and everything?"
He posed the question as softly as he could, but Latvia instantly broke back down into tears.

"C'mon, now… You have to tell me." Feliks said in as gentle a tone as he could muster while remaining insistent.

"It's-it's Toris. And- and Eduard. And even Natalya and Katyusha. They're…" He broke down into uncontrollable sobs. "W-we n-ne-e-ed he-lp!" He choked out between gasps for air.

Poland shifted seats to put an arm around the Latvian and pull him to himself, rocking gently while he released all the pent-up emotion. He still had no idea what he was doing, but it seemed to be helping some.
He didn't recognize all the names (he and most of Eastern Europe were on country terms), but he had the good sense not to ask again until the youth had calmed down some, though he still rested his head against his shoulder trustfully. Poland briefly wondered what his previous life had been like if he was this obviously starved of affection, but he didn't allow himself to get distracted. If something had happened to Liet and the others…
"Can you tell me what happened? I can do my best to help you out, but I need to know what's going on."

"I don't know." He whispered quietly, and Poland could feel him shaking in fear at the mere memory. "Someone attacked us at night. I mean, they had guns and they knocked down the door, and-and everything!" He stopped talking for a second and squeezed his eyes tightly. Poland rubbed his arm comfortingly.

"Trust me. I know what that's like," he said sympathetically, and Latvia sniffled. It was true. He was one of the few people who could say that without exaggerating.

"Eduard said you would. He… he distracted everyone so I could run out the window. And now… Now… They're all go-o-one!"
Tears started flowing from his eyes again and Feliks tried to place himself in the boy's shoes, but it simply escaped his imagination- despite the fact that he had lost count of all the times he had been invaded (several times at inhuman times of the morning).

"I heard a- a gunshot when I ran… I think… I think it wasn't a warning shot. It was because I got- I got away." The flood of words that came from his mouth still hitched because he was crying, but at the very least he was talking.

"Do you-" Poland started but decided to let him talk. In some odd way, the kid realized what he was going to ask.

"I don't know who it was. They were wearing black and I didn't see faces. I think- I think they were men, some of them, older than us. I'm sorry." He apologized meekly, looking back up.
He seemed to have suddenly retreated back into his shell, jerking out of Feliks' grasp and sitting up stock-straight like he had before as he stammered a string of apologies.
"I tried, I really did, but it was so dark, and I just…"

"Why are you sorry?" Poland was once again shocked by the extent of the lack of self-regard that he had noticed a bit of in Liet. If he had thought that his former best friend had been bad about it, this child was a thousand times worse. It just didn't seem right.
"I didn't expect you to notice like anything at all. If I were in your place, I'd probably not notice half of what you did. "
He didn't add what he thought at the next moment: I'd have probably stood in front of my friends and most likely have been shot first because I'm, like, stupidly stubborn like that.

Latvia shook his head, inconsolable.
"I… was supposed to… g-go and get help! Eduard told me to make it here and I'd be safe. But I made it too slo-owly. And n-now they've probably been taken away! All because of me! It's all my fault!"

"I don't think you could have done any better. They would have been taken away anyway, and you not only managed to avoid them and get out, you managed to warn me of what happened."
Poland wiped the younger boy's tears away with his hand, forgetting his usual affected speech pattern in favor of a serious tone. "Look at me."

Latvia looked up nervously, flinching as if expecting to be hit. His violet eyes shone with fear and barely contained tears but also stifled curiosity.

"I promise you, I will find them. And I promise you that you are safe as long as you're with me."
For a second, he didn't see the expectant face of Ravis, but that of a much younger Toris. His own words echoed in his mind, spoken by a child Feliks.
"You're safe as long as you're with me, yeah? So stop crying."

"…Because everything will be all right." He finished, not meeting Latvia's eyes.

The last time that that promise had been spoken, he had broken it because of bad judgment and sheer idiocy. He was determined not to break this one.

"For-for real?" The disbelief in Latvia's voice tugged at his heart.

"For real." Poland gave him the warmest smile he could manage.
"Come on, we have to go to bed. It's been a long night for both of us."


=_=" Brilliant, all three of you. Let the kid go parading in 20cm of snow without a coat on?
And genius, Feliks, for thinking of it immediately...
My characters are
idiots! But then again... that might just be me...

But review for cutesy LatPol moments? (Not a ship! Got more coming your way!)