Estonia had lost Latvia. This in itself was not too unusual an occurrence. In the seventies, whilst on a cross-country road trip, Latvia had fallen out of the boot of Russia's car and spent two weeks being taken care of by some strange but otherwise unassuming hippies. However, the current situation was far less convenient for Estonia.

He was in a terminal of London Gatwick Airport, having had a fairly good day. They had sailed through security without Latvia saying anything strange or offensive to anyone. This was bizarre, Latvia's special ability was usually having them detained and taken to a security room whereupon the home nation had to come and bail him out. This was despite their diplomatic passports and the fact that they had a clean travel record.

This was the reason that Estonia had left early. The ease of travel through the airport had given him a false sense of security. He had planned to relax in the business lounge and catch up on some e-mails but instead he had to spend his precious time searching for a childlike pseudo-immortal. It was rather bothering.

Estonia firstly walked to all of the bookshops in the terminal, Latvia had mentioned wanting to get another book for the plane ride. However, Estonia was not surprised in the least when he could find no trace of him. That would have been too easy. Estonia paused a few moments in order to think. According to past experience, Latvia would either be unaware that he was lost and would happily be shopping for snacks or at a bar, or he would have realised that Estonia wasn't with him anymore and would be panicking, most likely getting himself in trouble with security. Estonia sighed. He knew what he had to do.

"Hello," Estonia approached the help desk, "I've lost someone. Could you perhaps put out an announcement?"

"You look a little old to have lost your parents," the assistant, an older woman, half-smiled.

"No," Estonia gave a small chuckle "Just my friend,"

"Alright, what's their name? I'll need yours too."

This stumped Estonia for a moment, he wasn't used to calling Latvia by the name he had given himself.

"His name's Raivis Galante," Estonia continued, hoping that he got that right. "Can you just call me Estonia? It'll get his attention."

The assistant slowly nodded, raising an overly plucked eyebrow. She obviously thought Estonia was a loon. Still, being thought crazy was better than losing Latvia and missing his flight. The assistant put out the announcement, Estonia thanked her and then went to sit on a bench nearby.

Estonia ended up sitting down next to a young boy. He was similar to Latvia in appearance, perhaps a little younger looking.

"Lost your parents?" Estonia kindly asked. The boy nodded, staring at Estonia critically. Estonia ignored him, rummaging in his briefcase for something to read whilst waiting for Latvia to reach his location.

"Hey," the boy spoke up after a minute "You speak funny. Are you Polish?"

This made Estonia start. Although he acknowledged that he had an accent, he was proud of his fluency in English, he had worked hard to obtain it.

"No."

"That's good, my mum hates Polish people. Says that they're stealing all the jobs and shooting all the swans," the boy chatted nonchalantly.

"I did live with a Polish person for a while," Estonia replied, smiling "It was…" He really wanted to say that it was great, or fun, or some other combination of encouraging words designed to wash the boy of his mother's xenophobia, but he also couldn't lie. The smile faded away from his face a little.

"…interesting." Estonia concluded, looking a little crestfallen.

"You didn't like it?" the boy smirked, looking interested nonetheless. Obviously he enjoyed others' tales of woe.

"I had to stay with him for… work," Estonia replied, shrugging "I didn't have much choice in it."

"What's your job?"

"I work for the government," Estonia gave his rehearsed standard reply.

"Like a spy?" the boy was wide-eyed, looking excited.

"More like a politician," Estonia felt a little bad about extinguishing the boy's hopes.

"Oh," the boy collapsed back into his seat "My mum would really hate you."

Estonia was mildly amused, "Although it wasn't that bad, I had other people around me who I could rely on. Well, maybe." Thinking about it, spending time in the Poland-Lithuania household hadn't been so bad.

Estonia had travelled to Poland's house in order to become educated about his duties as a nation and also to be able to spend some time with others in the same situation. He had spent most of his early life either running around the woods or sailing around with Denmark and was keen to learn how to take his role seriously. Unfortunately, it turned out that Poland was not the nation who was most suited to teaching this.

In many ways Poland was ahead of his time. He spoke clearly and concisely regarding political matters, easily disarming opponents and managing to get his points clearly across. He had spread ideas; religious tolerance, pseudo-democratic elections, and the economics of his domain were things he passionately enthused about. Estonia had first met him during a visit from some important humans and was both impressed and a little jealous of his mannerisms. However, Poland was also cursed with a childlike shyness and a lack of common sense. Every day he would either declare that he was going hunting by himself, taking a horse and setting off for the day without any supplies, or shut himself in his room, proclaiming that he had to study and that he wasn't to be disturbed, which was usually accompanied by the slamming of a door. Estonia's jealousy quickly turned into annoyance as Poland displayed his immaturity.

Estonia had almost given up on Poland. Sure, Poland's occasional streaks of brilliance were inspiring, and he was being allowed to live in a huge mansion house, very unlike his own one roomed home, for free, but the whole point of his trip was to learn how to be professional and organised, things which Poland clearly wasn't. He had wanted an inspirational father figure, not a grumpy toddler. It had taken Estonia months to travel to Poland's house and he was getting increasingly homesick. He was going to announce his departure when another nation arrived.

Estonia had met Lithuania before, they had met briefly to discuss matters detailing Livonia. It was actually one of the reasons as to why Estonia wanted to come to Poland. Lithuania talked using phrases which Estonia had never heard, gave off an air of authority, and despite looking rather dainty and feminine, moved with a sense of power and precision which left Estonia awestruck.

The mood in Poland's house changed overnight upon Lithuania's arrival. Rooms which were gathering dust were aired out, staff who usually silently slunk about were giving away cheery greetings like free gifts, even the nearby town seemed to pick up on the good mood. The biggest change, however, was in Poland himself. Instead of sulking about all day he was openly cheerful, laughing and singing all day. The very evening that Lithuania arrived, Poland had offered to help Estonia with studying Polish and Latin, and from that week on Poland took him to political meetings, happily helping him to understand what was going on. Poland changed from bratty annoyance into the inspiring teacher which Estonia had hoped to find. All thanks to Lithuania.

Estonia wasn't completely sure of what exactly Lithuania's relationship with Poland was. From his knowledge of political events, the two had effectively been given no choice but to communicate with each other. Knowing Poland as he did now, Estonia was fairly sure that Lithuania should have become fed up of the child who he was forced to partner with. But he didn't. Somehow the two gave each other caution and confidence; perseverance and imagination; ideas and experience. The two halves came together to make more than a whole.

All through this, Lithuania sat in the background. He cautioned, warned, and stood up for Poland when needed, but never took any credit. Estonia was confused at first. Although both Poland and Lithuania were supposed to be equals, Poland took all the credit. When Estonia had confronted Lithuania about this, he had just shrugged it off, laughing. That was Lithuania's only weakness, he was too nice. Estonia had never known anyone, human or nation, who could be so effortlessly kind. As he sailed through the centuries, and Estonia came to know Lithuania better, his opinion didn't change. There had been times where they had been forced to live together for political reasons, firstly at Poland and Lithuania's house, then later at Russia's; and times where they were at loggerheads, where their personal feelings had to be put aside for the wellbeing of their state, but despite all this, Lithuania had remained constantly kind and thoughtful, never belittling Estonia or gloating over victories. He stayed a welcome presence in Estonia's life, almost like family, comforting and never asking for anything in return.

Until now.

Estonia felt uneasy. Despite all the things that Lithuania had helped him with, he had brushed aside the only favour which Lithuania had ever asked of him. Sure, it may be an idiotic idea, but Estonia trusted Lithuania and had been helped out countless times over the years. For Lithuania to even mention his plan showed its importance.

"Hi there," a voice called. Estonia looked up.

"Where have you been?" he asked the rather sheepish looking Latvia.

"Well, first I wanted to go get something to eat while you were finding somewhere to sit, but then this woman came up to me and asked me to do a survey, so I did that. And then I thought you would be in a shop so I went looking, but then I knocked over a display of make-up and had to spend ages picking them up," Latvia happily chirped.

"Why did you think I would be looking at cosmetics?" Estonia was almost amused.

Latvia just shrugged,

"Well, you are quite sparkly. But I got you something to eat, so forgive me," he smiled "I might have sat on it, though." Latvia handed Estonia a very sad looking sandwich. "Should we go to the lounge?"

"Not enough time," Estonia replied, cheerfully waving goodbye to the receptionist and the small boy, the sandwich had put him into a slightly happier mood, "We'll just go to the gate. I have a phone call to make before I go, though. Please don't wander off while I'm making it."

Estonia kept Latvia within his sights as he found a slightly quieter corner of the airport and took out his phone to dial a number, hoping that the recipient hadn't boarded his flight yet.

"Hello. Estonia?" Lithuania's voice came from the phone. Estonia swallowed.

"I'll do it."

There was silence on the line for a few seconds. Estonia wasn't sure whether Lithuania was shocked, surprised, or perhaps was trying to figure out what he meant.

"I'll see you at the World Meeting." Lithuania replied sharply before lowering his voice to a whisper. "Thank you."

Estonia felt a strange rush of pride from those words. Lithuania was actually thanking him, not the other way round.

"Goodbye," Estonia smiled.

"Goodbye."

Three weeks until the World Meeting in Russia. Estonia wished the day would never come.