I'm alive! There's a long message at the end, just a warning now. Read at your own risk.

Berlin, Germany | Ludwig B.'s office

Dear Ludwig,

Become one with me, da?

Prussia uncapped his pen and scribbled down a large 'NO'. Then he wrote under it:

When my less awesome brother ignores you after the first twenty-three letters, it means NO, okay? He DOESN'T want to become one with you. Also, stop sending him Facebook friend requests. That's my job.

P.S. I'M AWESOME!

Gilbert stamped the paper with the parliament's official seal. Hopefully when Russia sees this, he would stop sending unification proposals. Gilbert moved on to the next set of documents that he quickly signed. He soon grew bored with the process.

For the next several minutes, Gilbert played around in the swivel chair, spinning in circles repeatedly until he got dizzy, and also racing himself to the other side of the room. It wasn't as fun as he hoped it would be. For one, he was competing against himself. Two, there was no one present to listen to his boasts of awesomeness.

He took a gander at Ludwig's office and decided he needed to awesomize it a little. Germany was too formal about the way his office looked. It needed some quality Prussia in it.

Speaking of the less awesome West Germany (in his opinion, anyway), it had been decided beforehand that Austria would work at Switzerland's office, and Germany would take over for Austria at his office. That meant Gilbert was stuck at his little brother's place until Switzerland could be found. Which wasn't anytime soon.

One time he brought in his drum set (seeing as since he couldn't practice at home, might as well practice at work, right?) but Germany's boss forced him to take it back. Or else. The or else was to destroy it. Gilbert begged him not to, and then finally promised to leave the musical instrument at home.

If you asked Austria, he would most likely deny drums being a musical instrument at all. At least at the hands of a certain Prussian. (1)

Not that Gilbert wouldn't go to work or do a favour for his brother, but . . . Come on. He could totally use the time to do other things. Like invade vital regions.

It had been several days since he arrived at the office. Most of those days were spent running between floors, faxing and filing documents, getting yelled at by his co-workers, and also getting high on caffeine. He usually went home pretty late, whenever Ludwig told him it was time to go. He was never informed of how long he should work and his schedule was way too tight for him to find out, so Ludwig served as his personal clock.

He briefly wondered how everyone else was doing. Where was France the last time he'd seen him? It didn't feel like he was in Europe anymore . . . And what the hell was Spain doing? The guy wouldn't speak to anyone and it was a mystery given the nature of the Spaniard. Prussia felt as though Antonio was punishing himself and waiting for some kind of retribution.

Gilbert opened another letter.

Dear comrade—

He fed it to the shredder-machine. The bin was filled to the brim with Russia's letters, and Gilbert had already emptied it once.

Gilbert got up with his files in hand and decided to get some photocopying done. He spent about ten minutes at the photocopier, trying to get it to work, but a man came by and told him it was up for maintenance. He ran into the elevator and decided to use floor 5's machine. They wouldn't mind.

It was a short ride down, but it was the longest thirty seconds of his life.

A man stood in the elevator with him, and his appearance was strange. There weren't a lot of hippies around anymore, right? And since when did hippies infiltrate office buildings?

Gilbert noted the long, blond hair of the man and was suddenly reminded of another person, although now lost in his memory.

"Hey," said the man.

Prussia looked behind him. Well, there were no other people in the elevator, so it had to be him he was talking to, right? Of course. Because he was that awesome.

"Yeah?"

"You don't know a Ludwig Beilschmidt, do you?"

"Er, ja, but he's not in the building. Do you need him for something?"

The man took a long time to reply. The elevator opened to the sixth floor.

"No," said the man. "It's fine." And he walked out.

Prussia tilted his head to the side and stared at the man's back until the doors slid shut. He stood staring like that until the doors opened to the fifth floor. He unlocked himself from his stupor and advanced on the photocopier.

There were about fifty copies he needed to print out, and Gilbert soon grew disinterested at the process. He waited around and drew on the whiteboards. He even doodled on the bulletin board and wrote THE AWESOME ME WAS HERE! all over it. One of the secretaries waved him off and yelled for him to do something useful with his life.

This happened about every day, three times a day. He was reported as being a nuisance more than once, and he had been more than once sent to the boss' office to await a long lecture about his immature behaviour. Immature? He was the Awesome Prussia, and his boss knew it.

"Take your job more seriously."

"I am taking it seriously. It's not even my job."

"Your brother is busy, so you're all we have. Don't screw this up."

Gilbert nodded reluctantly and left the room, closing the door behind him.

Afterwards he handed the papers off to the co-workers on the same floor and then returned to his office. There he sat, scratching at his eye.

His arm had been fully mended due to it being only partially wrecked. His right eye was a different case. It was nearly destroyed during the fight with his respective Frost Man and he had to wear an eyepatch to keep himself from scratching at it.

Ludwig said it was a psychological issue. He didn't scratch at his eye because it was itchy—actually, he often did it without thinking. This led his younger brother to believe that Gilbert secretly felt ashamed about his performance at the hotel and was hating himself for it.

That was a load of bull. He didn't hate himself!

Okay, sure, maybe his battle could have gone a lot smoother and maybe he could have done more than just fight, but . . . But they won, didn't they? Wasn't that what counted the most?

But they haven't won yet, that was the thing. Gilbert got up from his seat.

He headed into the public bathroom across the hall. There he lifted his eyepatch and studied his reflection in the mirror.

He was slowly reattaining his sight. Ludwig had said it was going to be a process. The eye itself had been healed, and the blood vacant, but the injury left an ugly scar running down vertical to his eye. Gilbert personally thought it looked awesome. Roderich said it was vulgar, Elizabeta said it made him look pitiful, and Ludwig sighed but didn't question the initial opinion. He was much used to his older brother's antics by now.

Gilbert stood back and straightened his tie. He'd never been comfortable with wearing a suit, and Ludwig had denied him his uniform, so he was stuck with this. Ludwig had insisted he look the part, and Gilbert wasn't going to disappoint his brother. Still, if he was going to wear a suit, he should be allowed Gilbird as company. Along with his drum set, Germany's boss had forced him to keep Gilbird at home. So unawesome.

Later into the day, right before Ludwig made his scheduled entrance, Gilbert obtained an important call. He wondered if it was really happening, but the claims appeared to be truthful. The Frost Men were back.

"Bruder." Germany pushed through the office door. "It's time to go home . . . What are you doing? Where's your eyepatch?"

Gilbert was feverishly shoving papers into his briefcase. He didn't look up upon Ludwig's entrance.

"West, I'm going to be unavailable for the next few days."

"What?" Ludwig stepped through the threshold and examined his newly 'awesomized' office. If he hadn't been so preoccupied in questioning Prussia, he would have demanded the reason for this renovation. "Gilbert, you understand we don't have anymore extra people to cover for you? You're going to have to stay. Tell whoever's calling you to postpone it to a later date."

"You don't understand, West. It's urgent!"

Prussia was a very passionate person, and Ludwig could see that now. His eyes were pleading and desperate, which didn't suit his boisterous personality. Ludwig grew concerned.

"What's this about, Gilbert?"

"I'm heading over to Bulgaria's place."

"Bulgaria? That's an odd choice of destination. Was he the one who called you?"

"No, but I need to borrow his magic." (2)

"Why magic? Bulgaria doesn't have much of it, you know that."

"I heard Norway wasn't around, so I can't use his magic. And it's not like I can ask England, either. Romania's one of the missing. Bulgaria's magic should be enough."

"For what?"

Prussia only shook his head. "This shouldn't be your concern right now. The problem is mostly contained."

"Mostly? Prussia, what's going on?"

"West, there was someone looking for you today. He didn't say much, though. Hopefully you could meet up with him soon, all right?"

"Brother, what are you . . . ? Why are you doing this?"

"You've got enough on your plate, West. I don't need to add anything more to it. Talk it out with Feliciano, okay? Settle your problems as soon as you can. Your big brother's going on a journey that he might not come home from."

Ludwig didn't like the sound of those words. It was almost as if Gilbert was saying goodbye. Permanently. Why was he so insistent on not telling him what was going on?

"Hey, Gilbert . . ." he said. "About the other day—I'm sorry about what I said to you. I know you were only trying to help."

Gilbert stepped up to his brother and laid his hand on top of his head. "I know you the best, West. I know that you'd be the least easiest to convince otherwise once your mind's set. So, do what you have to do. Make sure you quickly make up your mind, before Veneziano does choose to confront you first. As for me . . . It's the big brother's job to protect everyone, isn't it? It's what I have to do."

"Wait! You never told me were you were going."

Gilbert brushed past Ludwig, in the process of sliding on his coat. He didn't respond. Ludwig's eyes trained on Gilbert's back as he became smaller and smaller in the distance.

"Hey, West." He'd stopped walking. "Does my eye look okay?"

Ludwig sighed and nodded, though he knew Gilbert couldn't see.

That idiot.

"It looks fine."

And that was the last time Gilbert came home.

The first few steps down the street were long, fevered strides. As Lovino rounded the corner, he slowed to a brisk pace and then stopped altogether.

First of all, where was he going?

More importantly, what the hell was that?

Yes, what the hell happened back there? He didn't remember being that angry, certainly not angry enough to show his grandfather up in front of all those spectators. What was wrong with him?

It's the fact that you've just woken up, he told himself, even though he knew that wasn't it. You're a little confused after those dreams; you want to set the record straight. Gramps didn't . . . deserve those words.

No, he didn't, now that he thought about it. Lovino wanted to go back and apologize. He'd crossed the line and said too much to let it slide. Otherwise Feli would never forgive him, and Feli was probably the last person on his list that he wanted to be hated by. Next to Spain, maybe. Spain was a close second.

Speaking of which . . .

"I'm such an idiota," said Romano. "What the hell am I doing?"

Now that he was awake, he had to apologize to Spain. He couldn't simply wave aside what he said to Antonio back then. He needed to apologize to his family members first. That is, if they didn't hate his guts.

. . . That was a lot of amends to make. This was why he never regularly said sorry, because it was too much work. God, and it was an even longer drive to Spain.

"I'll call him, and that's all he's getting," South Italy decided.

That night, in the alley, he felt a similar anger towards Spain as he did his grandfather. Lovino couldn't make any connection as to why that was; he blamed it on his muddled sense of . . . well, sense.

He hated a lot of people. Sometimes he couldn't differentiate between the various levels of hate on his Hate-O-Metre. Big deal.

Something he was certain of. Ever since his accident, he had been aggravated towards the only few people in his life he would never intentionally swear off at, and even if anger propelled one to do things he/she would never do, Lovino was pretty sure that he felt like he wanted to, but at the same time he felt as if he had no choice.

His feelings just haven't been in his own control recently. What had been said was done; there was nothing he could do about it.

Whatever. He didn't want to think about this more than he had to. He checked off his mental list: first, apologize to Gramps.

Lovino rounded the corner and resumed his quick pace, retracing his steps back to the cafe. Hopefully Feli and Rome were still there and wouldn't shun him or something. He had too much shunning in the past thousand years, and even though he was used to it, it, coming from his family, would be too much to bear.

Romano was so anxious to get back that he didn't notice all the pedestrians he was bumping into. He quickly muttered an apology to an old woman and restarted his journey.

Italian streets were packed densely during midday, especially in the city. He was moving against the flow of the crowd, everyone shoving past him in the opposite direction. He considered crossing the street, but then again he was so close and also too lazy to make the trip.

However, he noticed, the closer he neared the cafe, the less he wanted to make an appearance. His heart knew he had to, but his brain denied the action. He was too ashamed to show his face, after the effort he went through to make sure that he didn't want to see their faces.

Lovino walked with his hands in his pockets, his head lowered. He failed to notice another figure speed past him before they both bumped shoulders.

"Sorry," Lovino muttered, having no energy to swear at whoever interrupted his stride.

"Sorry about that~" replied the stranger.

"Yeah, whatever, bastard."

"Roma?"

Hold on a sec. That voice was familiar.

Lovino wheeled around. "Bastard?"

"Lovi!" Spain could hardly believe it himself. He held his arms out, his face beaming. "I found you!"

"Bastard, what are you doing here?!"

"Came to find you!" Antonio lifted Lovino up, causing the other to swear profusely. "And I found you!"

"Put me down! Put me down!"

"Okay, okay."

He liked the ground, thank you very much.

Lovino straightened his shirt. "Mind telling me what you're doing here?"

"I came to find you."

"Why you're really here."

"I . . ." Antonio sighed. "I wanted to apologize."

"Funny. I was thinking of calling you to do the same thing."

"Really?" And Antonio's smile was back on his face. "So you really do care~!"

Lovino was unusually unresponsive. He just stared at the ground, visibly making an effort to suppress his irritation. Spain wondered what made him suddenly start trying.

"I realize being angry has its disadvantages. I want to start thinking more clearly."

"Why?"

"Because I was a jerk to you, bastard. And my nonno too."

"Nonno? Oh, you mean your grandfather? He's alive?"

"Yeah."

"That's great!"

Lovino didn't smile. "Sure."

Antonio, just this once, read the atmosphere. He didn't know what caused Lovino to act this way; he assumed it had something to do with Rome, and they'd recently had an altercation. He could guess that much.

He drew Lovino into his arms, and Lovino, being so out of it, didn't pull away at the gesture. Antonio realized just how much the Italian needed the hug.

"Does thinking more clearly mean I won't get to see my Roma anymore?"

"No," mumbled the Italian. "I'm still here. I'll still spit in your face, dye your hair pink, and load off at your house. I just won't blame you anymore."

"That's . . . that's good. Thank you."

Lovino shoved Antonio away. "Stop touching me."

"By the way," said the Spaniard, "how long have you been awake?"

"One—two hours ago. Why?"

"Hm, what a coincidence. Yesterday night I started driving here and before I knew it, I was in an accident. I was tired, so I slept the night in my car and hoped to find you in the morning."

"You were in an accident?! A-are you hurt?"

"Haha, it's no big deal~ Although, it's nice you're worried about me."

"I'm not worried about you! Least of all you!"

"Riiight."

"Drop dead, Boss. I swear."

Antonio laughed it off as he usually did, and Lovino tapped his foot impatiently.

"So how did you go about getting into a crash? Was someone drunk?"

"No, not at all! I was the one that caused the accident."

Romano wiped all expression off his face.

"No one died, right," he stated.

"No! No, of course not! Why would you think that? I'm a responsible driver."

"Good, because if you did end up killing someone, I would have to do the paperwork."

"Well, it's all been sorted out, so don't worry. Took five hours of my precious sleep." Antonio yawned. "This country is dangerous."

"It's not the country that's dangerous, bastard. It's your f—"

"Anyway, I'm glad that's over!" Spain stretched his arms. "Now I get to finally see you!"

"We are NOT hugging again."

"Aw."

Suddenly a high pinging filled the air. Antonio looked behind him and drew out his phone.

"Hello? Uh huh. Uh huh. Really?" The Spaniard frowned, and then continued on skeptically. "Uh huh. Yes. I'll meet him there. Okay. Just wait a few minutes."

"Who's that?" asked Lovino.

Antonio held a finger to his lips. "Secret. Duty calls, Roma. See you later."

"Wha . . . ? Wait!"

"Yes?"

"Er . . . I'm—" Lovino took a deep breath, straining the next set of words. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry about what I said to you before."

Antonio smiled. He straightened like a great weight had been lifted off his back. All this time it seemed as if he had been waiting for Lovino to forgive him. "It's fine. I'm sorry, too. Hey, do something for me? Say the same thing to your abuelo. I'm sure he's waiting to hear those words from you."

Lovino glanced at his feet. "I don't think so."

"Hey, don't worry, all right? If he does truly love you, he won't judge you."

"How can you be so sure?"

Because I didn't. "I just know."

South Italy didn't appreciate the vague response. "Can you just answer me straight for once, bastard?! These riddles are annoying!"

Antonio sighed. "I'm glad you're putting the effort into changing your habits, Roma, but remember this—" Spain kissed his underling on the forehead as a sign of farewell. "Despite your willingness to change, always be yourself. You wouldn't be you otherwise."

Lovino made a displeased noise in his throat. "What's this supposed to be? A parting message?"

"Something like that. It's true, though. It's what you're obligated to do. Now run along. They won't be standing around forever."

Spain pointed and Romano saw that, indeed, his brother and grandpa were waiting for him beside their vehicle. Feliciano was trying to put on a brave face, but his true sadness cracked through his smiling mask. Rome's face was understanding. Lovino felt a pang in his gut.

I don't deserve such clemency after all that I've said to him.

Antonio nudged him forward unexpectedly, causing him to stumble a step.

Lovino turned back around to say something more to Antonio, but the Spaniard was gone.

He brushed off their encounter (he'd rather forget that meeting with Antonio anyway) and crossed the street. He approached his family and took a deep breath. He could do this. Spain wasn't here, but just imagining the Spaniard by his side was enough to give him the courage to confront his mistakes.

"Grandpa. Veneziano," he greeted them awkwardly.

Feliciano's face brightened. He ve'd happily. "Fratello~ You're back~"

Okay. Typical answer.

"So, uh," he started, "what happened to the—" He gestured to the cafe.

"We got kicked out~" Feliciano replied.

"Oh. S-sorry."

"I see you're feeling better," noted Rome, smirking to the side. "Did you sort out your dilemma? Need Grandpa to cheer you up?"

Another typical answer.

Lovino scowled. "No. If I don't want the Tomato Bastard's cheer-up charm, I don't need yours either."

Rome shrugged, brushing off their argument like it was nothing. "Well, okay. If you say so. Anyway, let's start with the second part of the discussion. There's something I'd really like to share with you two—"

"W-wait!"

He was slightly disheartened that Rome treated their quarrel like a temporary block in his life. It wasn't that Lovino wanted him to feel bad about himself; it's just he assumed that his feelings were somewhat important to his grandfather. He assumed that Rome would care. And Rome just ignoring what happened reminded him of his error, of how much of a bigger deal it was compared to if Rome reacted more favourably.

"I'msorryforsayingthatstuff," he rushed out.

"Huh?"

Both Italy and Rome had tilted their head to the side at the same time.

"I said I'm sorry," said Lovino, face red. "Do I need to repeat myself again, dammit?"

Rome's lips pulled into a smile. Feliciano grabbed onto his brother's arm.

"Yay! You came through! I knew you would! Let's all enjoy some pasta now~"

"Get off of me!"

"I'm proud of you, Roma."

Lovino, distracted by the words, halted his attempt at prying Feliciano off of him. "What did you say?"

"I'm proud of you. You were able to accomplish what I couldn't. Despite what happened, you protected your brother, and you're still here. I wouldn't have been able to do the same. I could try, but—" Rome shrugged. "I disappeared. The only difference is, you didn't."

Lovino blinked a few times, trying to process Rome's compliment. It was a compliment, right? It felt alien to him, but he didn't hate it. Of course this wasn't the first time someone patted him on the back for his efforts; he just waved the other ones away because he couldn't understand the reasons for them. Coming from Rome's mouth, it was more than a simple job well done. It was acceptance.

Slowly, that loathing which caused him to fume so irrationally began to fade away into the deepest reaches of his mind. He knew it wasn't going to affect him anymore, hopefully, for a long, long time.

"You good, Roma?"

He nodded in agreement. "Yeah. Let's start again."

(1) I refer to Prussia as a Prussian because he's so awesome, he gets his own nationality. Yay. But I understand under normal circumstances he's actually German. (Don't tell him that.)

(2) The magic trio are England, Romania and Norway. In the Harry Potter universe, Scotland has a magic school, Norway has a magic school, and France also has a school. However, Bulgaria sends many of its students to Norway (or was it Sweden?) to attend Durmstrang, which is the magic school local to that area. That's why Bulgaria has magic, but not as powerful enough to be admitted to the magic gang. And France isn't in there because no one wants him there.

You might be thinking, "Why doesn't Prussia just tell Germany about the FM's return?"

Obviously because the problem is rather isolated, and Europe is in a state of disarray. Germany doesn't need another headache and since Prussia (isn't a nation), it's all right for him to disappear from the continent for a while. In conclusion, Prussia is a good big bro. He doesn't want to worry Germany or cause any unwanted panic. Plus they can't even do shit about the fact because they don't have the proper weapons to cause remotely any damage - AKA the EMP weapon. It's also unfinished because a certain someone decided to take a three week nap before he gave anyone his schematics to the transmitter.

In other news, Russia got hit by an asteroid! Okay, maybe it didn't actually impact exactly, but it came close...

Also, if any of you realized it yet, take the first letter of each of the BTT's first names, and then arrange them in a certain order. You can get:

Francis, Antonio, Gilbert - FAG

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. It's the FAG Trio.

Secondly! Take the first letter of their respective country names:

France, Prussia, Spain - FPS (First-Person Shooter)

Spain, Prussia, France - SPF (as in sunscreen, whatever floats your boat)

Why is Prussia always in the middle? (Because he's just that awesome!)

Thanks for reading!