Thanks to ZadArchie and AquaEclipse for reviewing.
Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia.
Chapter 13
Quebec was drumming his fingers in boredom, trying very hard not to glare at the nations. They had called Texas earlier, and when they found out that she was only a few hours away in Minnesota, Russia had insisted that she come to them immediately.
And they had nothing else to do. Quebec didn't like having strangers in his personal house. It was one of the reasons why he preferred to stay in Montreal instead of his capital. There was an office in Quebec City where he would do official work, but he wanted to separate his personal life from his work life. The only exception was when Canada asked him to do something.
Quebec glanced towards Lithuania, who only gave a small shrug in return. Lithuania knew well that Quebec didn't like unwanted guests, but from what he could tell, Lithuania was walking on thin ice where Russia was concerned. He noticed that everyone would often give Lithuania a suspicious look. It might be necessary for Quebec to find out what was going on.
Everyone became alert when they heard a car up the driveway, and Quebec stood. It was probably Texas and Minnesota. Quebec went to open the door and smiled at the two.
"I'm glad you could make it," Quebec said. "Sorry for dragging you all the way here."
Minnesota waved him off, and Texas grinned.
"No problem," Texas said. "I was actually happy for the invitation."
Quebec frowned in confusion. It was only autumn, but he could see that she was shivering from the cold, despite the thick coat. He was reminded of the fact that out of all the people at his house right now, she was the one the least used to cold.
"Come on in," Quebec said. "Would you like me to turn up the heating?"
"If it wouldn't be too much trouble," Texas said.
Quebec led them to the living room, before he adjusted the thermostat. Texas and Minnesota looked a bit uncomfortable by the sight of Russia, but managed to take a seat on the couch next to Alaska.
"So, you're Canadian now?" Minnesota asked.
"That's right," Alaska said. "You're not upset, are you?"
"Why would I be upset? It's not like any of us are American anymore."
"And with everything going on, it might be best to be part of a nation, instead of being on your own," Texas said.
"Are we all comfortable now?" Russia asked, interrupting the former American states. "If so, I would like to ask Texas something important."
"Alright," Texas said, nodding hesitantly.
"Canada mentioned something about Mexico acting suspiciously. You wouldn't happen to know anything about Mexico that we wouldn't know, would you?"
Quebec was watching Texas, and he didn't fail to notice the colour drain from her face. Her expression didn't change, but her shoulders tensed up.
"I… I don't know what you mean," she said.
Quebec glanced towards Lithuania, who subtly nodded his head. Both of them could clearly see that she did know something.
"You're not very good at lying," Russia said. "So, why not tell the truth?"
Texas shook her head.
"I am telling you," she said, "I don't know what you mean. I-I don't know anything about Mexico that…"
"I don't like liars," Russia said coldly.
Quebec could see that Texas avoided everyone's eyes, and that her hands were trembling. She knew something, and it traumatised her.
"Perhaps I could have a word with her in private?" Quebec asked. "She's scared. I know how to get her to relax a little."
Russia shot him a look, before shrugging. Quebec held out his hand for Texas, who hesitated before taking it. Quebec led her to his study, and he closed the door.
"I don't know what you hope to achieve," Texas said. "I don't know anything."
"Requiem," Quebec said.
He was right. Upon hearing the name, Texas froze, and he was surprised that she still had colour that could be drained from her face. Eventually, she shook her head.
"I-I…" she stuttered.
"We told everyone that Mathieu is sick," Quebec said. "But that is not the case. He was attacked by Mexico. He learned about Requiem. And he's in hiding."
"He… he was attacked?" Texas repeated. "How… how did he escape? They… they don't allow…"
"He was lucky. But America wasn't. And if you know anything that could prevent more nations from sharing America's fate…"
Texas was trembling now, and she kept shaking her head, but it was less out of denial, and more out of an apparent attempt to shake off the thoughts.
"I… I should have warned him," she whispered. "Alfred might still be alive if I'd only…"
Quebec sighed.
"I can help you," he said.
"No, you can't," Texas said. "They're too strong."
"We don't know that. Please? Don't you think that they should know about the threat? America's not the only nation that was killed."
She bit her lip, before she nodded. Quebec gave her a small smile, before they went to join the others.
"Do you know something now?" Russia asked.
"Y-yeah…" Texas stuttered. "Mexico… She's part of a group called 'Requiem'."
"Requiem?" Ukraine asked.
"What does this group want?" Estonia asked.
"The short version: conquest," Texas said. "The long version: They hate how peaceful the world's become, and wish to start a war worse than both World Wars combined."
Everyone's eyes widened, and Russia leaned forward.
"How do you know this?" he asked.
"I… I used to be a state of Mexico," Texas said. "But… well, you've probably noticed that Mexico doesn't have any other states."
"Yeah," Minnesota said. "I always wondered about that."
"Well, you see… It's because they used their states for… for experiments."
"Experiments?" Russia repeated. "What do they do in these experiments?"
Texas shook her head, before she sobbed, the first tears escaping.
"They were… they were researching ways to kill nations," she said. "And a bunch of other things. And… when they ran out of states, they would capture the states of other nations to continue their research."
"What?!" several of the occupants of the room exclaimed.
Texas flinched.
"I'm… I'm sorry that you found out like this," she said. "But… did you ever have states that just disappeared? Or… Were you supposed to have states, but they never manifested?"
The nations were silent. Quebec looked around, and saw that Lithuania in particular looked pale. Quebec remembered when Lithuania tried to have his counties take a life of their own, without success. But more than that, they all knew about Prussia's concern about the fate of his brothers. And as Prussia's lover, Lithuania was the one suffering from the revelation.
"Why wouldn't they have manifested?" Ukraine whispered.
"They did," Texas said. "But Requiem got a hold of them before the nations found them."
Russia had a flash of fury in his eyes. Quebec found it disconcerting to see Russia without the smile, absolutely furious.
"You used to be a Mexican state," Russia said. "How did you manage to get away?"
Texas flinched again.
"I relied on the will of my people," she said. "I used that to get away. And to gain independence. But Mexico tried to get me back. My only option was to become American."
"They never targeted America's states?" Russia asked.
"They couldn't. Alfred was hyper-aware of everything that happened to the states. An overprotective big brother. I… might have played a role in that."
"What do you mean?" Alaska asked.
"You know that his glasses represented my state? Well… I gave it to him, and I used it to channel some of my will. The will to keep the American states safe."
"And where did you learn to do that?" Estonia asked, intrigued.
"They performed experiments, remember? You don't suffer through all that without learning something."
"This is alarming, it's true," Russia said. "But… how do we know that all of this is real?"
Texas bit her lip, before turning to Minnesota and Alaska.
"Remember the state reunion last month?" she asked. "When Arizona made fun of me for dressing so conservatively?"
"Yeah," Minnesota said. "New Jersey made fun of you too."
"…I'm going to show you why."
She stood, shrugging off her coat. She hesitated for a second, before pulling her shirt up, revealing her stomach.
Quebec felt cold horror settle in his stomach. Texas's stomach was covered in scars. Some of them might have been made by a scalpel, but there also appeared to be gunshot wounds.
"What the hell?" Alaska demanded, looking pale.
"There's more," Texas said, turning around.
She pulled her shirt up as far as she could, revealing her back. Quebec hadn't thought it to be possible, but the back looked worse than the stomach. There were cuts, welts, bullet wounds, burns…
"No amount of warfare could have produced that," Lithuania said, looking towards Russia. "These had to be done personally."
Russia nodded, his eyes wide. Texas pulled her shirt back down, before sitting down again. She hugged herself and trembled, but Quebec knew that it wasn't from the cold.
Quebec was watching Texas closely. Physically, she appeared to be around fifteen. How old was she before she could escape her prison?
The room was silent for a while as they absorbed the information. Finally, Russia cleared his throat.
"You said that they're a group?" Russia asked. "Who else is part of this group?"
"I only know of a few," Texas admitted. "Argentina, Venezuela, Chile, Peru and Philippines. And… all of them are cannibals."
"Is everyone in Requiem a cannibal?" Russia asked.
"I'm not sure," Texas said. "I only know of them."
"What about their leader?" Lithuania asked. "Do you know who it is?"
"No. I'm sorry."
"It's fine," Russia said. "We have a list of names. We can ask one of them for more information."
There was a dark gleam in his eye, and his usual smile returned.
"There's also someone else from the American region," Texas said. "I've never actually seen him. I think he's one of the Caribbean islands. But… if you want to confront them… Be careful. They're stronger than they look. And they won't hesitate to kill you if they feel threatened."
Russia nodded.
"We're going to pay Canada a visit," Russia said, "and then we'll go to Mexico."
…
"I can't believe you did this," Newfoundland said, staring at Canada and Romania.
"Blame Olivier," Canada said, yawning. "Sorry for the disturbance, Lottie."
She rolled her eyes.
"At least you didn't wake me up," she said.
"Lucky you," Romania groaned.
Canada moaned, before he ran to the bathroom. Newfoundland raised an eyebrow, before turning to Romania.
"I thought he was lying about being sick?" she asked.
"I had to give him something to make it more convincing," Romania said. "And England did give me some scones when he came over a month ago."
Newfoundland winced.
"Poor Mattie," she said. "Why did you keep it?"
"I meant to throw it out, but forgot about it," Romania said.
Newfoundland shook her head.
"…If Russia's coming, then I guess you need to get out of here," she said. "We don't want more questions."
"I know," Romania said. "Tell Matthew that I'm sorry about the nastiness he was forced to ingest. I guess I was a bit upset when he woke me up."
Newfoundland chuckled.
"The ends justify the means," she said. "He'll understand."
…
Quebec saw the nations off, before returning inside where the three states were. Texas had calmed down substantially, but she was still in a state of shock. Understandable. Knowing what she knew, and being forced to relive it…
"I'll fetch you some hot cocoa in a bit," Quebec said. "But first, I need to make a call."
"Alright," Alaska said, eyes following Quebec as he made his way to the study.
He locked the door, before pulling out his phone.
…
The leader listened to the report from Quebec. He felt his blood boil and freeze at the same time. Just when he thought they figured out how Requiem operated, there was a new development.
Like this.
"How have they been able to get away with that for all this time?" he whispered.
"They probably have a master of magic with them," Quebec said. "That's all I can think of that would keep them under our radar."
"They have Egypt. We know of his magic. I'll ask Will and Vlad if they know of any other nations with strong magic, and then we'll investigate. Actually, I think Norway is also on that list of nations, along with the UK brothers."
"What about regions?" Quebec asked. "I know that Louisiana is a user of magic, and I think Massachusetts as well."
"For now, I think we should focus on nations. If we suspect that regions might be involved, then we'll investigate them too. Speaking of which… I think you might want to have a word with those states. Make them understand that Alvora is nothing like Requiem. That we've declared Requiem our enemy, and that we can protect them."
Quebec sighed.
"It's not going to be easy," he said. "After everything Texas has been through… I mean, you should see those scars."
"Just make sure that they realise that we mean no harm," the leader said. "I'm going to have to spread the word now."
"Good luck."
He chuckled wryly, before hanging up. His smile fell, and he turned to his bedmate.
"What's going on?" the other asked.
"We have more information on Requiem," the leader said.
…
"Olivier owes me big time," Newfoundland grumbled.
Russia and the others had come to see Canada, determining that he was, in fact, sick. Newfoundland was actually impressed by the potency of England's cooking after it was left for a month. And Russia and the others had thought it wise to inform Canada about Requiem.
Newfoundland was the one that pointed out that they should be careful who they shared the information with. Since they only had the identities of a few nations, it would be unwise to share the information with others unless their allegiance was assured. One could never be sure whether or not the one they were sharing the information with was a member.
And then came the part which Newfoundland hated. Since it was getting late, and because it would have been suspicious if they didn't, they invited Russia's group to spend the night before they set off the next morning to confront Mexico.
That didn't sound like a good idea either, to be honest. But it wasn't Newfoundland's place to question the judgement of nations.
But now she had to prepare the bedrooms. Thankfully, Lithuania was helping with the cooking. There was no way that Canada was in any state to do anything like that.
She flinched when she heard Canada rush to the bathroom yet again. It was seriously powerful stuff.
…
Malaysia had finally managed to fall asleep, only to be disturbed by the sound of his phone ringing. He jumped awake, glancing towards the window before he answered the phone.
"It's too early," he whined. "What could be so important?"
"We have new information on Requiem," the leader said.
"Couldn't it wait?"
"Philippines is one of them."
Malaysia was silent for a moment.
"She didn't come with us," he said. "Are you sure about this?"
"Toris and Olivier managed to get Texas to share her experience under Mexico's rule," the leader said. "And now Russia knows about Requiem as well."
"But… Not about us?"
"Matthew managed to place attention on Mexico, and suggested that if anyone knew the truth about Mexico, then it would be Texas. We just didn't prepare ourselves for the horrors of this truth."
"Is it that bad?"
"Asides from the cannibalism… They've been performing experiments on regions."
Malaysia was suddenly wide awake.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Do you remember how Germany was killed by a single gunshot?" the leader asked. "I think we now know how they knew that it could work. Not only did they perform the experiments on their own regions, but they've also been capturing the regions of other nations."
Malaysia couldn't speak. He recalled how his three federal territories had disappeared about a year ago. And a few months ago, five of his states disappeared as well.
"Akmal?" the leader said. "Are you okay?"
"Kuala Lumpur," Malaysia said, "Labuan, Putrajaya, Malacca, Penang, Sabah, Sarawak and Kedah Darul Aman."
The leader swore, and Malaysia knew that he understood what he was trying to say.
"Can you sense if they're still alive?" the leader asked.
"No," Malaysia said. "If I could, I would have been able to find them by now."
"We'll need to learn more about this as soon as possible. In the meantime, you should investigate Philippines."
"I think that everyone should investigate their neighbours. If they took the regions of other nations, then they would target their neighbours, or anyone else they're close to. Or pretended to be close to. And…"
Malaysia paused, remembering something that had happened quite recently at the meeting. Mexico wanting to discuss something with Philippines. And before that…
"Is something wrong?" the leader asked.
"Singapore," Malaysia said. "Philippines is like a less extreme version of Belarus towards Russia. She likes to cling to her. A lot like how Italy used to cling to Germany."
"But Italy is a member of Requiem as well. And Germany's dead. You think that something might happen to Singapore?"
"I'm sure of it."
"Then I suggest you go to Singapore tomorrow. Get her under your protection, whatever it takes."
"Alright. There's just something else we need to do tomorrow, but I promise, we'll go as soon as possible."
"Alright. But if Singapore isn't in danger… There's a possibility that she might be a member of Requiem as well."
"I'll keep that in mind."
Malaysia hung up the call, noting the time. He was worried about his missing states. And he knew that there was no way that he would be falling asleep now.