Prussia sat alone in her room. After what had happened, her bruder asked her who was dead and she couldn't answer. She couldn't answer over the grief and the shame, shame for caring so deeply about someone who was the enemy.

Not caring what had upset his sister only that she got better Germany gave her a safe, quiet room in his house for her to stay in until she felt better. So for weeks Prussia stayed cooped up in her room. What she was doing didn't really make sense to anyone, not even her.

Time flowed past Prussia in a way she didn't quite understand and the war ended. As part of the losing side she owed the winners. She was separated from her brother and sent to work for Russia. The result of that experience was her disliking Russia even more than she had previously and her being much more appreciative of her brother's personality. Russia made her do whatever stupid mindless task he could think of, she was like a slave.

It was a painfully long and cold span of time in Prussia's memory but everything felt a little bit too dull, as if her senses were a hunting knife that hadn't been sharpened in years. Of course, she still kept written record of everything as was her habit so the memories were always accessible but Prussia didn't think she personally would ever have much use for them.

Eventually, Prussia was reunited with her brother and retired as a country.

Prussia was unsurprisingly wounded by and slightly proud of the way in which she was retired. It was some official seeming meeting and everyone was really nervous. The concerned countries were all gathered together in a dimly lit and oppressive courtroom styled space. Nobody was sure what would happen. Most of the gathered had never seen what the end of a country did to a personification before and were understandably concerned. Prussia herself did her best to contain her own worry and project confidence. It helped that Germany hadn't quit fussing all morning and acting braver than she felt was easier if it was to help calm him down.

America took charge of the proceedings, listing off various facts and points and trying to be mature and serious. His age didn't help him achieve this in the slightest but everyone was already very on edge so it didn't matter.

Partway through when Prussia started to get bored, realising nothing was happening yet, she noticed that all the countries that had been involved in the war were gathered and for a moment a flower of hope bloomed in Prussia's chest.

It was swiftly crushed when she saw no sign of Canada anywhere in the room. Only France had hair anything like Canada in the room, she looked for his face in case he had changed his hair but still she saw no sign of him. A silent tear leaked from the corner of Prussia's eye and she jerked back into her present situation. Germany looked physically stunned by his sister's tears and Prussia realised that America had just finished speaking and the whole room had gone silent.

Momentarily she felt it. It was a slight shift but a life changing one. Prussia felt in her bones that she had lost something important, she felt a consuming despair, and she felt a pain that wasn't quite physical but that torn through her whole body so strongly that she thought it would have been better if it was. Then in the face of what she felt she had lost she collapsed on the ground.

Germany jumped to her side and immediately began checking her pulse. Prussia had the urge to push him off and tell him to go away but she couldn't summon the words. Tears began to stream down Prussia's face and she hid it in her brother's shoulders. Germany picked her up and with a curt nod to the assembled nations, left the room.

On the drive home Prussia sat curled up silently in the back seat of her bruder's new car. The feeling had faded to become a consuming ache. Germany's face was set into a tense half frown. Prussia watched his face with detached interest for a while until her thoughts strayed back to her retirement, as she decided then to call it, because she wasn't dead but she had no idea what she was supposed to do with herself. Now that it was over she wondered at how high her hopes had risen at the thought that Canada would be there and then how far they had fallen when he wasn't. Her heart gave a twinge at the thought of the blond boy she had once known and she felt that some of her heart ache could be attributed to absent blond.

At that moment Prussia felt deep in her heart for why she felt how she did. Deep in her heart she felt the change that had taken place. It was such a small change that she actually laughed and her bruder almost swerved off the road. She uncurled and stretched out on the seat thinking she wasn't any less Prussia then she had been before. The only thing that had happened was they had taken her official title away; her people didn't magically stop being Prussian. Yes there was a mentality change but it was slight and they weren't gone. She knew, with a saddening certainty, that there wouldn't be Prussian people forever but she supposed that meant maybe she's get to see all the Nations who had dissolved before her or maybe that she was like her people now and would grow old and die with them. Neither of those thoughts seemed too bad to Prussia.

Prussia smiled to herself happy that she was okay for now. Having assessed that though she was forced to look deeper for what had caused her the amount of pain she was in. Looking even deeper Prussia admitted, reluctantly, to herself that she missed Canada. Through all her battles she had never actually seen a nation be killed so she didn't know if Canada was okay. After the shock of watching him fall had worn off she had secretly harboured a small hope that he would be okay, after all, there were still Canadians. Not seeing him at her retirement had really crushed that hope. Upset by this apparent vulnerability Prussia rolled over to face the front of the car frowning.

There was no reason to be this attached to him, none at all. Besides she didn't know what happened when a nation's personification was killed so maybe she was curious. Maybe the nation just went on with itself without a personification or maybe the personification was reborn or replaced by a new personification. The birth of a personification was a very ambiguous subject too. Prussia thought maybe, just maybe Canada had healed, with whatever magic gave them extended lives. Prussia wanted to believe that but she couldn't let herself get her hopes up so she pushed the thought away and closed her eyes to sleep.

Prussia was woken up by her bruder shaking her with a mild look of panic on his face. After her nap Prussia was feeling much more like herself and gave her brother an annoyed look.

"West I'm fine! Quit shaking me," she scolded.

Germany drew back his hand and looked at her carefully. Prussia rolled her eyes at him and walked into the house. She supposed they would share it now. Not that she had slept in her own house since the end of the war anyways but it was weird for Prussia to think that it probably wasn't her house anymore.

*~*A/N: I think there's slang that shouldn't be there and issues concerning events that don't quite match up in regards to time frame. I don't even know what I just said. Man, just… I'm sorry. Really*~*