Epilogue
When I get older,
I will be stronger;
they'll call me freedom,
just like a waving flag.
=====o=====
England was exhausted.
And who wouldn't be, given everything he'd just gone through, everything he had to do, just to restore peace to the world. But even now, now that he was already seated on the ground, face covered in bruises and soot, breathing easily now that it was all over, he still wondered whether or not peace could really still be restored to the world.
They'd destroyed it. They'd destroyed so many nations and people so badly he thought it would never be the same, not even after everything was repaired. What good would fixing some crumbled buildings do anyway? It wouldn't justify their destruction in the first place, wouldn't bring back the lives that had been taken, wouldn't erase the fact that they had nearly plunged the world into ruin.
But then he caught himself, and let out a breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding back with all his brooding. He was a nation, and although they always tended to look at the bigger picture, they needed to be practical. No, the reparation of infrastructures wouldn't undo what had been done, but it would be the start to rebuilding the lives they'd put on hold. It was a chance for change, a new beginning, an opportunity to make up for lost time and wrong decisions.
That would have to come much later, he thought. Right now, he was torn between wanting to celebrate and wanting to take a nap that lasted longer than five minutes. Perhaps he could do both; sleeping was a wonderful thing, after all, and he owed it to himself to do so after so long.
Apparently, America had other ideas. From where England was sitting, the happy-go-lucky man could be seen, upper body poking out the mouth of a tank currently circling the town so that its citizens could watch him and his men smile and wave and basically act like complete...heroes. England rolled his eyes at the word. The self-proclaimed hero was probably very, very proud of himself at the moment.
At least the townspeople were too. England hadn't seen them so happy in ages. That was one good thing about America, he supposed. He ticked most nations off but the people seemed to really like him.
Watching him from his very comfortable spot on the floor, England felt exhausted already. How could anyone have enough energy to parade himself around town, all the while grinning genuinely like an idiot, after all that? Briefly, he wondered whether America was truly as jubilant as he looked. Did he have existential crises, like England? Did he ever just think, know, that he was wrong? At all?
England shifted in his seat when he realized that America's tank was heading in his direction; the last thing he needed was for his legs to get chopped off by his own ally after they'd already emerged victorious from the war. But the tank knew what it was doing, and what it was doing was stopping in front of England so America could smile at him before hopping off.
Now what did this exultant person want with someone as defeated as him? England could only guess but, tired as he was, he didn't even want to. "Done celebrating, America?" he merely asked, and he found that his voice was as dull and dry as his body felt.
"Done?" said America, and his voice was the exact opposite of England's—full of raw, positive emotion. "This party's only getting started! What you've just witnessed is Victory Parade part one. There'll be more, believe me, and you guys have to be in it too. Speaking of which, where is everyone?"
"Do I honestly look like I've moved a muscle since I got here, enough to know where the others are?"
"That tired already, huh?" America looked sympathetic for a single second, and then he grinned. "Geez, England, you're old. How are we supposed to party when you're that down?"
England frowned and would have told the bloody idiot to go spread his positive vibes on someone who wanted it, had he not suddenly taken a seat right next to where England was. Well, inevitably, they were going to have a conversation now. This would certainly end well.
He definitely wouldn't be the one to initiate it. England simply sat there, not even looking at America, waiting for him to start spouting stories about how he was the hero or making plans about Victory Parade part two, but to his surprise, none of that came. Finding it strange, England finally averted his gaze to the American's face, only to find that he wasn't as happy as he was just seconds ago. Not that he was sad or anything, but he was—dare England say—contemplative.
It almost made England answer his own questions about the nation. Maybe he did know he could be wrong, and maybe he did feel that they hadn't really won anything at this point. Maybe his happiness and high spirits were also just fronts at times and he was really good at hiding what it was he really felt. It wasn't likely; America had never really been one to conceal his ridiculous opinions. But people, much like the world they lived in, change. And their world had definitely changed a lot in the past few years.
Now that he thought about it, there were a lot of instances when he'd found America had changed, though he couldn't say he remembered them all. But they lingered at the back of his mind, almost like blurry black and white images he couldn't seem to make any clearer. Closing his eyes to block out everything else didn't help either.
That was weird. He was a nation; they had excellent memory regarding things as important as this.
He looked at America's face again. His eyes were looking far away from here, almost not blinking, and his lips were almost one straight thin line. It was rare to see him this serious, but it made England remember something else: had America...gotten mad at him before? He was in his room and America was there too, holding...was it a book? He was reading? And he had made some sort of insensitive joke and America had gotten mad?
It didn't seem real, but he could somehow remember it. And if he focused really well, he could somehow hear America's voice. It was serious, a match to his current face, but England could barely make out what it was saying…
"What, any act of me helping you is really so out of this world that I need to have some different mental condition for it to happen?"
England blinked, gasped.
"Look, I know I'm younger, and less responsible, and I've been making it a point to mess around with you a lot, but I'm an adult too. No, not just that—I'm a person with a conscience. I can show concern for people; I can be a help to others. So if there's anything bothering you or something you want to get off your chest, you can tell me, and I CAN understand!"
"Whoa," said America all of a sudden, backing away, and it was only then that England realized how tightly he was clutching at his head and how rapid his breathing was. He slowly brought his hands down, looking around, taking in his current surroundings. "What the hell happened to you?"
"Nothing," England breathed out, trying his best to calm himself. "Nothing, just—" He turned to America, who had one eyebrow raised. "America, have you—have you read How Green is My Valley?"
America frowned. "What's that, a story?"
Of course, thought England, as he took another deep breath and let it out. Of course America wouldn't be reading anything in his bedroom, nor would he have said those things. He was—he was America, someone who England thought was insensitive, immature, self-centered, and yet someone who England realized he didn't know much anymore, someone he hadn't sat down and just talked to in ages. And this was his little brother—was, definitely, meaning it was all in the past and it was necessary to move forward from all that, but moving forward from it didn't necessarily mean he needed to pretend it never happened.
It was just part of some natural routine they had to disagree wherever they went, but England thought it wasn't very fair of him to personally judge America based on what he saw on the outside. Doing that would mean all of the time they'd spent together as people who actually got along was all for naught. They were close-knit before. Not that they had to be now, but if they were going to live for thousands and thousands of more years together, facing things like this together, they needed to start understanding each other again, didn't they?
England cleared his throat. He said he wouldn't be the one to start a conversation but America wasn't acting like he normally was and that made him uncomfortable. The conversation could be about anything, anyway. From the outcome of the war to something as casual as the weather. Anything he would say would be fine.
But then, like the idiot he was, his thoughts weren't as clear as he thought they were before he began speaking and the first thing he managed to utter was: "So, independence."
He stopped after that, partly because he hated himself so much and partly because America was looking at him like he was a three-headed monster that didn't have a very effective design. "The heck?" he said, and he leaned to rest his back on the wall, something he should have done earlier had he not been engrossed in his own thoughts. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"I—I was just…" England tried to explain, but what was he supposed to say? 'I was having thoughts about how we should get along more and so I tried to talk to you but I accidentally blurted out what it was that held us apart in the first place'? Well, yes, that was exactly what happened, but he couldn't tell America that. His little declaration of independence was still a touchy subject for him (England, not America) and he didn't think he was ready to talk about it.
He slapped himself. He wasn't ready to talk about it but it was his mouth that automatically spewed it out without context.
Surprisingly, America didn't make fun of him for it. Rather, he stared at England for a while with a quizzical expression, which quickly transitioned into something that made it clear he wasn't even looking at England anymore, but thinking while looking in his direction. America had been doing this a lot nowadays; it looked like he was recalling something, like England had been earlier.
Finally, America brought his gaze away from England and let his head rest on the wall as well. "So, independence."
England nearly choked, but took a deep breath and managed not to cough and splutter. "Really?" he said as casually as he could. "You're really doing this?"
"You started it."
"Well, I stopped it midway, didn't I?"
"Can you just—" said America, exasperated, leaning forward and balling his hands into fists before relaxing them again. He looked at England again, calmly this time. "I need to tell you something."
Oh no, thought England. He didn't think he liked where this was going. Oddly, he remembered a similar situation—a situation wherein he was sitting on the floor with someone, like this, and they were about to tell him something personal about their life. He didn't like it either, but they continued anyway, and...he ended up offering to do something? He couldn't quite remember.
"I'm always—" America started, and England was brought back into their humiliating, awkward as hell conversation. "I'm always saying how you're an idiot and I'm always making fun of you and calling you out on the most ridiculous things, but...well...you know I don't hate you, right?"
No, England definitely did not want to hear this.
"When I tried to separate from you—it wasn't anything personal. Well." He made a face. "It was kind of personal, I mean, wow, you were awful." England made a face at this. "But—wait, what I mean to say is—just because I kind of pulled out of being your little brother or whatever, that doesn't mean I didn't think you were cool back when I lived at your house, and that I didn't like any of the time I spent there, and…that I don't like you now."
England kept his lips pursed and his eyes focused on some other brick wall two hundred feet away from where they were, lest the urge to cry ever arose and caught him by surprise. "America, why are you telling me this?" he said.
There was silence, but he could hear America breathing, hesitating. "I—okay, this is going to sound weird," he said, and from the corner of his eye, England could see him scratching at the back of his neck. "Earlier, I kind of...when you mentioned How Green Was My Valley—"
"—Is My Valley," England corrected.
"Whatever! When you mentioned that, I kind of got this...can I even call it a vision? No, something like an old memory. Like, really old. Even older than the ones from my childhood, with you cooking me things. But it's weird, because even though it felt really old, I was already around this physical age, and you were too." He sounded uneasy. "And...I was in your room."
England felt chills running through his arms as America continued. "I was on a chair, holding that book, watching you sleep? Creepy, I know, but that's what happened. I was watching you sleep and you were kind of tossing around, like you were having a nightmare. And then you said...you said something like, "America never knows", and, "He'll never understand. He'll never even try to understand", and...I don't know if it's real or not but...it made me feel bad."
The last was said with a soft, almost ashamed tone, and England was so taken aback his head involuntarily snapped to America, to look at him. "I kind of felt like...I was never really that nice to you, and if I ever was, it was never in a way that could actually let you feel it. So I thought: 'it's only natural for him to think something like that'." This time, it was his turn to look two hundred feet away in the opposite direction. "Sorry."
This was odd. England didn't know if it was the war ending or something else that was making both him and America very, very, irrationally emotional, but it was happening and he didn't know how to deal with it. The urge to cry was still kind of there but he was stable enough not to let it take over. The real problem, though, was how he was going to respond to everything that had been said to him.
It was rather touching that America would finally admit all this just based on an almost imaginary memory that simply made him guilty. England supposed he would have to meet the embarrassed nation halfway this time. He owed America that much, at least, since he was never really the kindest person ever.
But if America could do that, could throw away his pride and dignity even for a while just to apologize, England found that he couldn't. Not now, anyway. It was awkward, he was tired, and he didn't have the capacity to think about how many things he had to apologize for. So instead, he stood up, and walked around.
And when he came back to sit beside America, what he had in his hands was a rock (or what looked like a rock. Maybe it was from a building that fell apart. England himself didn't know; he'd only found it) with the colors of the American flag colored onto it with what seemed to be chalk. He hastily gave it to America without looking at him. "Here."
America stared at it, nonplussed. "What the heck is this?"
"A present. From me to you." England glanced at him briefly before he found that it was, again, too awkward and that he couldn't do it. "Just a congratulations. You know, for being your own nation. And a pretty okay one, too."
England still wasn't looking so he didn't know what America's face looked like, but he took the rock at least, and grew even quieter. England guessed he was looking at it. A little later, he heard a soft laugh. "You know, France gave me an entire statue as a congratulations."
At last, they were back to joking around, thought England, and he was finally able to look America in the eye as he scoffed. "Sorry about that," he said sarcastically, "I'll be sure to hand-carve you one next time. There's plenty of rocks to go around."
"I'm kidding, I'm kidding," said America, and England was shocked to see him with his small smile, looking at the cheap American rock with—affectionate?—eyes. "Where'd you even get the chalk to draw this?"
"I always carry chalk around with me," England said, and to prove his point, he reached inside his pocket, taking out around seven pieces in different colors. "In case, you know, the need ever arises."
He was waiting for America to question what need that might be, but he didn't. He only further stared at the rock, smile never fading from his face. He laughed again shortly. "Cheap," he said, "but kind of appreciated."
England huffed, but he appreciated America's appreciation as well, and he would have told him so, along with another obligatory message of congratulations, if he hadn't suddenly coughed loudly, blood instead of phlegm or spit spilling out of his mouth, causing America to jump away.
"WHAT THE HELL?"
=====o=====
Somewhere on another side of the continent, years after the victory of the Allied Forces against the Axis Powers, two brothers were sitting on a hill, a basket of tomatoes in between them. One of them held a tomato in his hand, and took a bite out of it from time to time, savoring the raw, juicy flavor it put into his mouth. The other held a plate of pasta that came from who knew where.
The wind was chilly and as it hit his face, Italy shuddered lightly. He figured it was only from the cold, and looked down at his food. At this rate, the pasta would go cold before he got a chance to finish all of it. He picked up his fork, twirled some noodles onto it, before setting it down again.
Something wasn't right. It wasn't just that he couldn't bring himself to keep happily eating pasta either (though that was a major part of it). He felt...detached somehow. Like this wasn't where he was supposed to be, but that didn't make any sense because—well, where else was he supposed to be?
He'd been getting a lot of irrational thoughts like this since the most recent war, and though he'd voiced it out to Romano, he'd been told it was just an effect from the trauma and exhaustion they'd all experienced from the entire thing. Italy found that easy to believe, but he couldn't help but feel there was something else.
He could feel it when he looked at Romano too, and he did so now. His brother was kind but he was far from tame most of the time—or at least, that was what Italy remembered—but now, he was like this: sitting quietly on a windy hill, looking into the distance, chewing on a tomato. He looked like he was thinking, always, but when Italy would ask if he was, he would deny it and shove the question back in Italy's face.
Romano still yelled every now and again. He was still profane, still hated a lot of things and wasn't afraid to express his contempt for them. But he never yelled at Italy anymore. There was the occasional scolding, but never the kind that could actually bring Italy to tears. And somehow, Italy didn't like that. Romano yelling at him was something he'd always known, a trademark of sorts his brother had left on everyone, a mark either expressing their closeness or Romano's extreme abhorrence and nothing in between.
Now they just felt...distant.
Like they were still brothers, still close, but separated by some gap Italy couldn't see. He could no longer remember the last time they had a proper conversation where Italy hadn't left feeling empty or awkward or ashamed that he'd started one in the first place. He didn't like that.
Now more than ever, now that they'd just been through so much, they had things they needed to talk through. Romano definitely wouldn't be the one to initiate that, so Italy had to take that matter into his own hands. "Hey, Romano?" he began, and once again, it didn't feel right to start the conversation in such a way. He was struggling, figuring out how to speak to his own brother, someone he should know very well before anyone else. He bit his lip.
Romano turned to look at him with a questioning expression, before glancing down at the plate of uneaten pasta. "Aren't you going to finish that already? It's going to get cold and stale."
That was true, but Italy didn't really feel like scarfing down an entire plate of pasta while he was trying to make serious conversation. Pasta, for him, was associated with happiness, and he wasn't really happy right now. "I...guess I'm just not in the mood right now," he muttered, but Romano heard it loud and clear.
He raised an eyebrow. "Not in the mood? For pasta? That's new," he said, and it wasn't intended to be mean or insulting; it was just genuine surprise. "What's wrong with you today?"
It wasn't just today. In fact, it felt like forever. It didn't make any sense, but Italy felt like he'd been living his whole life incorrectly all of a sudden—but why would anyone even say that? There wasn't a correct way to live life. Things happened when they happened and most of the time, you wouldn't be able to control them.
"I feel weird," Italy admitted.
"Obviously."
"No, not just because of the pasta." Italy stared down at the noodles wrapped around his fork before bringing the thing up to his mouth and eating. Romano was right; they were already cold and stale. It really was too windy up on that hill. "Something feels different. I...I feel like this isn't how the days should be going by."
Romano sighed. "Oh, this again. Look, Italy, like I said, you're just in shock. We've been through a lot, so naturally, we can't just go back to the way it was that easily."
The same answer, as usual. Italy didn't really know how else to press forward with this topic. He was a light-hearted guy, everyone knew that. He wouldn't say there was something wrong unless there really was something awfully, evidently, painstakingly wrong. But Romano probably didn't know how to carry on from that conversation either. Perhaps dropping it altogether was the best for both of them.
Still, Italy wanted to hear Romano's voice. He felt he hadn't heard it in a long time, despite talking to him on the regular. "Do you think that if we won," he asked, and Romano stopped midway through a bite on his tomato, "we would be in shock, and feel like this too?"
Romano stared at Italy like he wanted to deny that he was in shock too, but he didn't bother. He only shook his head. "Probably not. We'd be really happy though, that's for sure. And we wouldn't be here on this hill; we'd be on other territories. Messing stuff up."
Italy almost smiled at how true the conjecture was.
"What do you think, then?" Romano suddenly asked, setting his hand with the tomato down on his lap. "Is it good that we lost?"
Good that we lost, Italy repeated inside his head, dissecting the phrase and mulling over it repeatedly until it had a significance to him. Of course, defeat was always upsetting, no matter what it was you were fighting for. It was too soon to give a verdict to it; the disappointment and humiliation were still fresh in his mind and of course, it wasn't good for them that they lost, but that probably wasn't what Romano meant.
He could only shrug. "I don't know. Maybe. The other people seem happy enough," he said with a small, forced, smile. "Anyway, I'm used to it, right? What's a little more failure to add to the collection?"
He had meant it as a joke, but how very real it was to him. Sure, he felt like he didn't belong in the world he was currently moving in, but if there was one thing that was consistent, it was his penchant for failing. He'd made so many mistakes in a single lifetime he didn't even want to talk about them anymore. He'd disappointed so many people, angered them even, and no matter what universe he was in, that probably wouldn't change.
Romano hadn't said anything, but when Italy looked up at him, he was glaring. "You know," he said, "for someone who's so happy all the time, you have a pretty fucked up self-esteem. Could you learn to not put yourself down so much? It doesn't help anybody."
Italy stared back at him with wide eyes. He didn't realize he'd been putting himself down often, but he must have been, for Romano to say that to him. "I—I'm sorry," he said quietly. "But it's true anyway. I can barely get anything right. It's always loss here and mistake there. At this point, I'd be surprised if I actually get something done—"
"Stop." Romano's voice was harsh and demanding, but not cold. "Okay, fine, you—no, we've messed up a lot in the past, I get it. Everyone knows, and that's bad. But don't even think about making any conclusions for what you can and can't do in the future. It can change easily for as long as you want it to," he said, and he seemed to realize how cheesy he sounded, so he looked away. "It's up to you how it's going to change, so believe in yourself a little, why don't you?"
It was the first time he'd heard anything of the sort come from Romano's mouth. He was right. All these years, he'd gone by a complete failure, but happy, because of that oblivious, positive outlook he liked to have. Even as a child, as a slave of Austria's, as a boy in a girl's dress, all he could do was tell himself: it would get better, and it would get better quickly if he helped it get better. All of it—the success, the failures, the outcome of anything—was up to him and no one else. How ironic it was that his highly-negative brother had to remind him of this.
But it was no surprise. No matter how negative and obscene he was, Romano wasn't mean, nor was he discouraging. At least, not to himself. He and Italy had almost the same situations and the same amount of failures, but he held his head up high, got embarrassed from time to time, and moved on shortly after. He believed he had control of his future, and he wanted Italy to know that too.
And right there, Italy felt so lucky to have these people by his side. Romano, Germany, Japan—everyone who never left him and bore with all of his antics, everyone whom he'd ever endured suffering and loss with, everyone who still supported and loved him in spite of everything he'd ever done. At the very least, though he wasn't of much use to any of them, he would never bring himself to harm them.
Suddenly something flashed in his memory and he could see Romano on a dirty jail floor, flailing and writhing and screaming like there was no tomorrow, and from the looks of it, there probably wouldn't be for him. He was covered in wounds, was pale as snow and extremely bony like he'd never been before. He could feel it too—a distant, almost imaginary pain in his gut; the loss of a brother, the loss of half of himself.
He felt responsible. Of course, that was impossible, seeing as he couldn't even rally his army well enough to fight against actual enemies. He would never turn on his brother; never! But still, he felt responsible. He looked at Romano, sitting peacefully, eating his tomato half-heartedly. If anything were to happen to him, if he were ever to be starved and killed on Italy's watch, he wouldn't ever be able to forgive himself.
And yet he felt as though it already happened. It wasn't real, Romano was here, but he felt the tears pouring out of his eyes anyway. It felt like such a long time since he last cried, and although he was glad for it, it was a feeling he missed. The feeling of allowing himself to be sad and knowing the recovery would come following after.
With that, he whined out, "Romano!" and practically pounced on his brother, causing him to yelp and completely drop the tomato.
"Veneciano, you made me waste a tomato!" Romano yelled, watching hopelessly as it tumbled down the hill.
Italy laughed as he sniffled. "But you have an entire basket here!"
Romano glanced at him and probably only now realized that he was crying again. "Even so, it's—every tomato counts—bah, whatever," he said, waving a hand before letting it scratch at his head.
"Romano," Italy said, after another short laugh. He wrapped his arms tighter around his brother's torso and nuzzled his cheek against his shoulder. "Thanks for never leaving me, no matter how many times I screw up."
Romano huffed. "No one's going to leave you for screwing up; we've all pretty much accepted that it's who you are," he said rather cruelly, but struggled to place a hand on top of Italy's anyway. "Anyway, people don't like people because of how perfect they are. There are plenty of other reasons to like you."
His hand on Italy's quickly left to strike his own cheek. "Gah, fuck, you're making me say stupid things. Get a grip already and let's go home. The potato bastard and Japan are probably already looking for you. You're all meeting with the Allies, right?"
Italy sniffed, nodded, and before getting up, picked up his plate of rapidly hardening pasta and scarfed it all down like he would after a hard day of training. Suddenly, everything felt as if it were in place again. He and Romano were the same, Germany and Japan were the same, even his 'enemies' were the same. He was where he was supposed to be, and he was who he was supposed to be.
And that would no longer change.
=====o=====
Draw a circle, there is earth!
Draw a circle, there is earth!
Draw a circle, there is earth!
I am Italy!
A/N: HOLY BUTTS I AM DONE. If anyone's still here, thank y'all for reading and bearing with 12 chapters + 1 prologue + 1 epilogue of disaster. Special thanks to everyone who reviewed (a special, SPECIAL thanks to Abc, the latest reviewer I wasn't able to reply to), followed, or favorited, or basically showed any form of support..
I actually decided to finish this while having a depressive episode and, what do you know, I actually got it done. Thanks again for sticking around, and until next time, this is the author, signing off!
I hope we all have a pleasant life ahead.