We're alive! This chapter gave us a spectacular amount of trouble, but we're alive and finally done with it! Which means moving on to the next chapter, which is considerably easier to write than this freakish thing.
Oh, and we don't own Hetalia.
Chapter 25: Priorities
September 22, 1940
Bern, Switzerland
France sat in his chair like a king on a throne, reveling in the attention and having entirely too much fun watching England, America, and Switzerland take in his spectacular array of injuries and try to find a way to react to them. It took a while; England may have claimed that he was only in this for himself and that he didn't care what Germany did to France as long as it didn't hurt England's chances in the war, there may have been centuries of arguing and warfare and anger that occasionally bordered on hatred, and England may have had a spectacular aversion to showing anything that could be perceived as weakness, particularly concern for his rival's well-being, but despite all of that, he was absolutely horrified by France's condition. There wasn't much that could make England ditch the I'm only in this for myself and all I care about is whether or not you're useful to me attitude he usually relied on to avoid having to deal with the idea that he maybe occasionally cared about his old rival a little more than he wanted to admit, but seeing France like this completely bypassed the pride that would usually prevent England from openly showing concern.
France looked like he'd been tortured. He may have pasted a cocky grin onto his face, but it didn't do a thing to cover the patchwork of bruises and dried blood, and England barely even noticed the look on France's face because he was too busy noticing other things, like how France had been limping and how his breathing suggested at least one badly bruised or only-partly-healed broken rib and how the splint on his arm wasn't wrapped up quite right, almost like it had been done by a badly injured person working one-handed in a hurry. His grin didn't do a good job of covering the spot where a tooth had evidently been knocked out, and while his mouth was grinning, the smile certainly didn't reach his eyes.
America found his voice first, but he only barely got it working properly. "F-France?" he said in something somewhere between a whisper and a squeak. England glanced over at him. The younger Nation looked like he wanted nothing more than to either give France a hug and promise that everything would be okay, or else maybe run out of the room and find a nice rock to hide under until the end of time. "What happened to you?" he asked instead of either of those.
France's grin faded a bit, looking less cocky and maybe just a tiny bit nervous. "It's not as bad as it looks," he said in what was evidently meant to be a reassuring way. It mostly just sounded like a really bad attempt at lying.
"You look like a giant walking bruise," America countered bluntly, drawing disapproving looks from both England and Switzerland. He didn't seem to notice, or if he did, he ignored it. "Has…I-I mean…" he stumbled over the syllables, not entirely sure how to get the question out. "Germany hasn't been doing this to you the whole time, right?" he finally managed to ask. "I mean, he hasn't been hurting you like this for the past few months…has he?"
"He hasn't," France promised. "This was the only time, and I don't think you could possibly say that I wasn't asking for it." What was left of his grin turned into something similar, but genuine, and this time, his smile actually reached his eyes.
"Just tell us what happened," England sighed. "You obviously want to, and being kept in suspense is getting annoying."
France explained the events that had led up to his dramatic entrance, spending a good deal of time on his gesture of rebellion and glossing over the consequences of it in as little detail as possible with an intensely uncomfortable look on his face, presumably mostly due to re-experiencing what was clearly a traumatic and entirely too fresh memory. And maybe, just a little, because of the humiliation of having other people (particularly other people named England) know about it. When he finished on a slightly more triumphant note, namely his successful escape by way of a tree outside his bedroom window and a stolen car, England found himself in the same position he'd been in when France had initially arrived. Stunned silence, horror, and an emotion that he refused to recognize as pity, partly because he refused to admit to pitying France, of all people, and partly because he knew that pity was the last thing France would want. Oh, and maybe just a little bit of grudging respect.
It took a while for him to find his voice again. This wasn't a problem that England usually experienced, particularly not twice in the same conversation, but he couldn't help it because now he knew what had happened and that made it a million times worse. Now he knew how France's arm had been broken, and now he knew why it looked like Germany had tried to beat France to death, and there was no more room for maybe I'm just misinterpreting something and maybe it looks worse than it really is because they had been shoved out of the way by what if it's worse than it looks and if it happened a few days ago, why hasn't it healed more than this and worst of all, what else did Germany do that France didn't want to say, because of course France wouldn't want to say all of it.
He didn't notice his hands curling into fists until his nails broke the skin.
"We'll make him pay for what he did to you," England promised. "I don't care how long it takes, what he throws at us…he will pay for this, for everything he's done, every cut, every bruise, every scratch…he will regret it; with every fiber of his being he will rue the day that he ever decided to lay a finger on you."
"Easier said than done," France noted. "We are still losing this war."
England gave him an irritated look, annoyed at having his vows of revenge interrupted, even if the person doing the interrupting was the very person he was vowing to avenge. "I know that."
"Then maybe we should stop planning what we're going to do after the war and start figuring out how we're going to get to that point without losing," France suggested. "All of your righteous anger on my behalf is adorable, but it isn't good for much if Germany wins before you get a chance to use it."
"Right," England agreed, and glanced over at America, who had been uncharacteristically quiet. He found the younger Nation still staring at France's injuries in horror, trying to figure out what words could possibly come close to articulating just how wrong this was. "America, are you…?"
"I'm listening," America said in a way that gave England the impression that the teenager wouldn't be able to repeat a single word of anything that was said if someone asked him to. England moved on anyway, suspecting that nothing he said or did would change that anytime soon.
"Alright," he said, somewhat hesitantly. "France, what can you—" England began, only to be interrupted by America.
"Hey France," the younger Nation cut in. "Shouldn't you go to a hospital or something?"
England and France exchanged a look. France shook his head. "They're just bruises," he said. "They'll heal soon enough. The doctors wouldn't be able to do much for them anyway."
America chewed at his lip. "You could get a proper cast for your arm," he pointed out. "And medicine. Painkillers or something if it hurts."
"It doesn't," France said. England didn't believe him for a moment, and from the look on his face, neither did America. "Not all that much," France corrected himself. "Just a little bit. Not enough that I need medicine for it."
America didn't look especially thrilled by this answer either, or especially convinced of the truth of it, but England spoke up before he got the chance to protest. "Fine, but we're stopping at a hospital as soon as we get to London."
France took a deep breath. "About that…"
"What about it?" England asked, giving him a Look and trying to convey you had better not be about to suggest what I think you're about to suggest without actually saying it out loud.
"You know exactly what about it," France retorted.
England narrowed his eyes. "No. No, you are not going back there; you are coming with me and staying at my house so that this doesn't happen again!"
"It's not your decision," France pointed out. "We're losing this war, remember? We need any advantage that we can get." England started to respond, but France cut him off. "Having someone in Germany's house to spy—"
"Is too dangerous," England cut in.
France sighed. "No, it's not. It's dangerous, yes, but not returning would be worse: Germany would tear apart my country looking for me. People would die. And chances are, sooner or later he'd find a way to make me turn myself in, and then he would probably torture me until I told him all your plans, and he would make absolutely certain that I would never get the opportunity to run away or have any outside contact again. But if I go back now without a fight, we'll have a spy in Germany's house. I can get you information that we otherwise wouldn't have access to, I can sabotage his plans…there are endless possibilities, but none of it works if I don't go back."
"If you go back, he'll kill you," America pointed out. "He's got to know you're gone."
"Germany and Prussia are at Italy's house at the moment, and neither of them is going to be back for a while."
"And Austria?" England asked.
France just smiled. "He's home, but not a problem. Trust me, I have a plan."
England frowned, but let the matter drop for the moment. This was because he had more important things to discuss, certainly not because he didn't have an argument to beat France's point about Germany tearing apart Paris, if not the entire country, looking for France if he didn't return. "Speaking of information about Germany," he said, "what has he been up to for the past few months? Do you know what he's planning for the war?"
For some reason, this made France smile. "Ah, yes, his invasion plans." His lips twitched in amusement. "Let me tell you about the Operation Sea Lion drinking game…"
-o-
September 27, 1940
Near Tokyo, Japan
"I must have misheard you. Did you just say snails?"
Germany sat back, crossing his arms. He repeated, "Snails," with a small but definitive nod of conformation. "Apparently it's a delicacy."
Japan wrinkled his nose in distaste. "Snails are a delicacy?" He averted his eyes and tried not to think about the tiny snails in his garden and how cute and decidedly non-edible they looked.
"That's what I said!" Germany said with an enthusiastic shake of his head.
"Escargot!" Italy announced suddenly, to say nothing of unhelpfully, throwing an arm skyward and giving it a cheerful little wave. Both other Nations jumped; they'd been under the impression that their pizza, pasta, and white flag-loving ally had long since been fast asleep.
Germany sighed. "If you've tried it," he warned, "I don't want to know."
"Okay," Italy agreed, unperturbed, dropping his hand back onto his stomach. Judging from the sound of deep, slow breathing that he began almost immediately to emit, Japan decided, Italy had already gone back to sleep. Maybe he'd been asleep the entire time; you never really knew with Italy. The strange thing was, you kind of had to respect a man who could fall asleep so easily and so deeply, no matter what. If nothing else, it required an incredible amount of inner peace. That, or narcolepsy, anyway.
Japan and Germany's eyes met and they shared a worried look. Italy's response, after all, had not exactly been a denial on the snail-eating front. Japan took a deep breath and, trying to beat back the thought, gave a slight shake of his head. Of course he hasn't eaten snail, he told himself. After all, in Japan's experience, Italy was something of a picky eater, and besides, he probably found snails to cute to cook. Didn't he?
"Italy?" Germany asked, albeit hesitantly.
Internally, Japan panicked. What was Germany thinking? If Italy actually admitted to eating snails, Japan would never be able to look at him the same way again! Surely Germany felt the same? Japan twitched an eye warningly at Germany; the bulky blond Nation didn't notice.
"Italy?" Germany asked again, reaching out to give his ally a little shake on the shoulder.
Japan twitched again and, failing once more to get a response, he gave up on that apparently useless tactic and tried radiating an aura of Please Don't Ask Him, You Don't Want To Know across the kotatsu at Germany.
"Hey, Italy, wake up!"
Please Don't Ask Him, You Don't Want To Know
"This isn't naptime, you know." And, as an afterthought: "Also, it's rude to randomly fall asleep in other people's homes!"
Please Don't Ask Him, You Don't Want To Know
"Italy!"
Italy's response was a long and strangely high-pitched yawn which, frankly, sounded more like the dying moan of a squeaky-voiced cartoon animal than anything that should come out of the mouth of a personified country.
Alarm bells went off in Japan's head.
"Finally," Germany grumbled. "I was just wondering…"
Please Don't Ask Him, You Don't Want To- "Ah, Germany-san?"
Attention thankfully averted from the newly-awakened member of the Alliance, Germany looked up and asked, "Yeah, Japan?"
Japan breathed a nearly imperceptible sigh of relief. Crisis averted, it seemed, at least for the time being. "Ah," he said, wondering what he ought to follow that up with. He hadn't quite planned that far ahead, you see. He stared down at his hands, at the table, at the completely uninteresting blank wall to his right, even. "Ah…"
Germany stared at him expectantly with an expression on his face that was somewhere between politely stretched patience and, "You do know that you said that already...?"
Japan opened his mouth, came to terms with the fact that if he said, "Ah," again he would officially and irrevocably lose all credibility as someone capable of holding at least a half-decent conversation, and settled for, "I'm sorry; where was it that I needed to sign again?"
After a few moments of confused blinking, Germany caught up with Japan's train of thought and hopped aboard. "Oh, right," he said, leaning forward so that he could scan the document in front of his ally, or at least attempt to, considering that, from his point of view, the document was upside down. "Let's see," he mumbled, mostly to himself, still skimming through the jumble of neatly-printed words. "All right, here it is," Germany announced after a fashion, pointing to a short line with a small x at the beginning. There were similar lines to its left and right, the former of which already bore Germany's neat signature. "You can sign on whichever line you like, really," the European country explained. "Just make sure that you keep signing on that line throughout the rest of the document, so it looks neat." Japan nodded his assent, smiling very slightly as he did so; neatness would be Germany's primary concern.
"Of course," he said, choosing to sign on the middle line, the one Germany had initially pointed to.
"Now if you could just do that seven more times…" Germany said, flipping through the pages to the next spot where he needed his ally to sign, shooting him an apologetic Ew, Paperwork face as he did so.
Japan expertly stifled a sigh and hunted down another beckoning little x. Oh, there was one of the little devils, sneakily hidden on a page with lots of numbered sentences so that it fit right in. At least they weren't talking about snails anymore, he reasoned, adding his signature to the line and flipping over a few more pages with a newfound sense of serenity.
As if he'd somehow heard, right on cue, Germany said, "Oh, before I forget, Italy…"
Japan stared down at the document, signed his signature on the waiting line with more intensity than was strictly necessary—so much so that the indentation was clearly visible throughout the next several pages, in fact—and did his level best to tune his friends out. He didn't do a very good job of it.
-o-
September 30, 1940
Berlin, Germany
France did not, in fact, have a plan.
Well, technically, he did have a plan, it just wasn't the Get Out of Jail Free card he'd implied at the meeting. It was more damage control than anything. There was no possible way that he was going to completely talk his way out of trouble. Germany knew that he'd left, after all, so no matter what France did when he got back, Germany was going to kill him. What mattered now was what story France told before Germany got to the killing part.
Telling the truth about where he'd been was out of the question, obviously, as that could only lead to France being painfully interrogated until he told Germany everything. Besides, Germany didn't know about the Allies' monthly meetings yet, and France had no intention of changing that anytime soon. The easiest lie would be that he'd gone off to do some sort of resistance thing, but that would lead to an interrogation as well, and France wasn't too big on the idea of being tortured for information he didn't possess in the first place, particularly in a situation where even false information would probably get somebody killed.
The next easiest and most believable lie, the one France had decided to tell instead, was that he'd tried to run away to England's place and gotten caught partway there. It had taken a bit of work to make it a believable story, but he'd done it. And as a reward for all this hard work, he'd been locked in his room until Germany and Prussia got home to deal with him.
He spent the first day or so staring out the window, trying to see into the driveway (which simply wasn't possible; his room was on the wrong side of the house for that) and jumping at small noises which, to France's paranoid mind, sounded like a car pulling into the driveway or a key in the lock or Prussia's obnoxious laugh.
He was slightly less jumpy the second day, although slightly more hungry, since apparently Germany had told Austria not to give him anything to eat. Or maybe Austria had done that on his own. Either way, it was unpleasant, and France spent the third day of his imprisonment miserably staring out the window at the rain and trying not to think about how hungry he was. He could have kissed Belgium when she showed up that night with food, having managed to get her hands on Austria's key without him noticing. Actually, France would have kissed her, except that apparently this was neither the time nor the place for that.
On the fourth day of France's confinement, in the middle of a truly spectacular rainstorm, Germany and Prussia got home.
After several days of misinterpreting small noises as the sounds of Germany and Prussia's return, France felt quite foolish when they actually arrived and the sound of their arrival turned out to be quite unmistakable. After several days of worrying over tiny floorboard creaks, France suddenly realized that this had all been a colossal waste of energy; of course Germany and Prussia's arrival wouldn't be quiet. Prussia was involved, after all.
It started with the unmistakable sound of the front door slamming shut, followed by Prussia yelling "we're home, freaks!" There was more, something about basking in his awesomeness or some such nonsense, but France ignored it, having much more important things to worry about, like having a brief panic attack and looking frantically around the room for a way out. Obviously there wasn't one: the door was locked and the window had been nailed shut in his absence. And of course, even if there had been a way out, using it wouldn't have been an option. France had come back here for a reason, after all. He'd known what that meant at the time, and he'd accepted it as a necessary evil and a small price to pay to allow Team Allies to have a spy in Germany's house. He sighed and took several deep breaths, trying to calm himself as he waited.
He didn't have to wait long before he heard footsteps pounding up the stairs at a near run, Prussia telling someone to put his stuff in his room, then the sound of a key in the lock. The door was thrown open to reveal Prussia, his hair and clothes dripping wet from the rain and getting water all over the floor, wearing a grin that couldn't possibly be described as anything short of evil. "Hey, Francey-pants," he said, closing the door behind him. "I heard you tried to run away."
France sort of twitched his head in something like a nod, nervously wringing his hands and wishing he'd taken England up on his offer after all.
"So, you remember back in the Napoleonic Wars, when you occupied my country and dragged me off to your place? Remember everything you threatened to do if I ever tried to run away?" The evil grin got even wider. "Looks like it's time for some payback."
France swallowed hard. He'd forgotten about this. The regular punishment for running away, whatever that was, he'd known was coming, just like he'd anticipated, and accepted, that Team Germany's grudge against him for the last war meant that he'd almost certainly get something even worse than the regular punishment. What he'd forgotten to take into account was that he'd once threatened to hurt Little Germany if Prussia ever tried to run away, which meant that Prussia had probably been waiting for France to try it to make his revenge that much sweeter.
"You're awfully quiet," Prussia observed. "Don't you have anything to say?"
"Anything I say is only going to get me into more trouble, isn't it?"
Prussia gave a little shrug. "Probably. But you're going to have to talk eventually, to answer our questions. You may as well start now. Get to work on the crying and begging and frantic apologizing already."
"Priorities, Prussia," Germany cut in as he entered the room, followed by Austria. "Interrogation first, crying and begging and frantic apologizing after. Or maybe during. Either way, you'll get your revenge soon," Germany promised, before turning to France. "Hello France," he said with a very dangerous looking smile.
"Hello," France replied nervously, unable to stop his voice from shaking.
"I hear you tried to run away," Germany said, clearly enjoying watching France squirm. "What, you couldn't handle the consequences of your little rebellion?" France said nothing, so Germany continued. "Evidently you don't understand how this works. You see, you lost our war, and you signed the surrender papers that my country control of your country, which also gives me control of you, and that means that I own you. You don't get to run away because you don't like how I'm treating you. That's not how this works. The way this works is that you obey my orders without question and you don't rebel or argue or try to run away, and in exchange for that, you get to keep your pathetic life and I refrain from beating you to a bloody pulp whenever I feel like it and only hurt you when you give me an excuse. But if you try to run away, that causes some problems. For one thing, it breaks the terms of this little arrangement. And more importantly, it sends everybody else the message that if they don't like working for me, they can run away too. So this is what we're going to do about it. First, I'm going to ask you some questions, and you're going to answer them. If you don't, Prussia gets to do whatever he wants in order to make you answer. After you answer my questions, you're going to be punished for running away, and after that, we're going to go out and make an example of you so that everyone else knows what happens to people who fail to properly understand who's in charge here. Got it?"
Given that any other answer would have been monumentally stupid, France gave a quick nod. "Yes sir," he said, not entirely sure whether Germany was going to continue enforcing the honorific thing from their last encounter, but figuring that now was not the time to experiment with what forms of address he could and couldn't get away with. Austria raised an eyebrow at the honorific, and Prussia snickered, but neither of them actually said anything. France was still thoroughly humiliated, of course, but he didn't really have time to worry about it.
"Good," Germany said, the tiniest hint of a smirk beginning to form. He was obviously enjoying this immensely. "Now, why don't we start with something easy? Where were you going?"
France already knew that the answer to this, or at least what Germany thought was the answer, was pretty much common knowledge by now, and that the question was just supposed to get him talking. Given that his plan involved feeding Germany false information, and therefore would require a good bit of talking, France figured he may as well start now and save himself a bit of unnecessary pain. "To England's house," he said, keeping a wary eye on Prussia just in case.
Germany evidently believed France's first lie. Not especially surprising; it was probably something he'd been expecting to happen, just probably not so soon. He moved on to his next, equally obvious question. "Why?"
For a moment, France was tempted to say to fight you, but he supposed that a less-than-tactful answer was almost as likely to result in brutal punishment as a complete lack of answer was. "To help him in the war," he said instead.
Germany gave a miniscule nod of approval. "And how did you plan to get there?"
This was where things were going to get ugly. There was no way Germany was going to believe right off the bat that France couldn't give names of people who had helped him because he simply hadn't had help. Convincing Germany was going to take a bit of work, and going by the look on Prussia's face, it was going to be a very, very painful experience.
"I…" he paused and took a breath to try and calm himself a bit. It didn't help. "I don't know. I didn't have a plan, I just…"
"You thought you'd figure it out as you went along?" Germany finished for him, not looking remotely convinced. France nodded, bracing himself as Prussia walked over and knelt down next to him, seized his left hand and, not even hesitating, broke the first of France's fingers. It took everything France had not to scream.
"How did you plan to get to England's house?" Germany asked again as Prussia shifted his hands to France's second finger, knowing that France's second answer was going to be as unsatisfactory as his first.
"I told you, I didn't have a—" France started, only to be cut off by another broken finger. This time, he screamed before he could stop himself.
"I want names, France," Germany said when the screaming subsided. "Prussia, don't bother waiting; just keep going until he either gives us names or runs out of fingers."
"I don't have names," France protested. "I didn't—" Another broken bone, another scream. "Please, Germany, I—" Another sickening snap as the bone broke, another howl of agony, and this time, France found himself blinking back tears and fighting back panic, wondering how he was going to convince Team Germany to believe his story when Prussia wouldn't even stop breaking his fingers long enough to let him tell it. "Germany, please, just listen! I didn't have a plan! I didn't think it through; I panicked and—" he stopped fighting back tears, letting them flow freely. "Please just listen to me…
"Germany, Prussia," Austria cut in sharply. "I know you hate France, but this is a bit excessive."
France blinked, wiping tears off his face with his free hand, and stared at Austria in shock. The aristocrat wasn't really looking at him, and was still hanging back by the door, watching Prussia and looking a bit worried. France shot him a desperate, hopeful look, which Austria ignored. Germany and Prussia glanced at each other, coming to a silent agreement, and then with no warning, Prussia broke the last of the fingers on France's left hand. Most of France's mind was occupied with pain and screaming, although a tiny, distant part remained rational enough to vow never to get on Prussia's bad side to quite this degree ever again.
"Prussia, please…" France started, then trailed off, trying to scramble away as Prussia moved over a bit and reached for his prisoner's right hand. France only managed to hurt his left hand further as he tried to escape, and Prussia still captured his hand in the end, more roughly than he probably would have done otherwise. "P-please," France sniffled, trying to look desperate enough to convince Germany and Prussia that he really had just panicked and tried to run for it, or at least desperate enough to get them to hear him out. He tried to copy that ridiculously vulnerable kicked puppy look that Lithuania always seemed to have on, but going by Prussia's expression, it either wasn't working, or else trying for any sympathy at all was backfiring spectacularly.
"Prussia," Austria cut in again. "You've made your point. Now if you want answers, you should stop breaking France's fingers long enough to allow him to give them to you." France gave Austria a grateful look.
"He can talk whenever he wants," Prussia snapped.
"Could you talk with someone breaking your fingers every time you opened your mouth?" Austria retorted.
"P-Prussia," France tried hesitantly. "Just listen…"
"Something you want to tell me, France?" Prussia asked, his grin completely gone and a look of utter hatred in its place.
Of course. The key to this wasn't just to make Prussia feel superior by acting scared and vulnerable. Prussia wasn't in this just to feel superior. He wanted revenge for the Napoleonic Wars. This wasn't about Prussia winning; it was about France losing. France very nearly smiled as he realized just how simple getting out of this mess was going to be.
"Something you want to tell me, Prussia?" France asked. He already knew what Prussia was going to confess. He'd known what Prussia was up to for a while; that was why he'd recently started treating him particularly harshly in the first place, dropping hints that he'd found out and giving him a taste of what happened to rebels.
Prussia took a deep breath. "I was going to help Austria fight you," he admitted, his voice shaking. Another breath, trying to keep from panicking. "I'm sorry. I was scared, and desperate…look, the alliance is over, okay? I'll never talk to him again, just please, stop torturing me…"
"I was going to help England fight you," France said, echoing Prussia's words from back then as closely as possible. The reference would go over Germany's head, of course; Germany hadn't even been there at the time. Prussia would remember, though. You don't just forget being intimidated and all-but-tortured into breaking an alliance and showing weakness in front of a longtime rival. Particularly not when said rival loses his war as a result, and the peace terms involve handing your little brother over to the enemy and setting off a whole long chain of new desperate choices…"I'm sorry. I was scared and desperate..." It was working; France could see the smirk creeping onto Prussia's face as he thoroughly enjoyed watched his enemy effectively admit that the roles were reversed now, that Prussia had won and now it was France who was every bit as defeated now as Prussia had been back then. "The alliance is over, okay? I'll never talk to him again, just please, stop torturing me." France wiped a few tears off his face with the sleeve of his shirt, careful not to touch his injured. And now that the vindictive little bugger might be a bit more willing to listen... "I panicked, okay? After what happened…I didn't think ahead, I didn't make a plan or set anything up, I just tried to run to England because I was scared and I thought that since we were allies, he'd let me stay if I helped him.. I can't give you names of people who helped me because I never took the time to ask for help, and even if I had wanted to, I wouldn't have known who to trust. That's probably why I got caught so easily in the first place." More sniffling. "Please…I'm sorry…" For what happened back then. Not for fighting you now, France mentally added.
Prussia thought it over. "I don't know…" he said, frowning slightly, although from the way the corners of his mouth twitched, France guessed that he was having to really work to not smile.
"What more do you want from me?" France asked desperately. "I told you what happened. That's all I've got."
"Aww, poor Francey-pants hasn't got any bargaining chips," Prussia said, his customary smirk back in its rightful place on his face, although it looked a little more vindictive than usual. He let go of France's hand. France held his breath, cradling his injured hand to his chest. "At all."
Obviously.
"Absolutely nothing you can do to make me leave you alone…" Prussia watched France squirm for a bit longer before continuing. "But I guess I can believe that you just panicked. What about you, West? You believe him."
"I suppose I can see why he might panic after what happened," Germany finally said after an agonizingly long pause. France figured this translated to something along the lines of I have no idea what just happened here, Prussia, but I'll take your unspoken word for it that what France just said was sufficiently humiliating. (Which it was, by the way. More than sufficiently humiliating, really. A lot more.) "We'll talk more later, of course, but I suppose for now we can move on."
France, not thrilled about the talking more later bit, but glad that Germany and Prussia seemed to have accepted his basic story, which was the major hurdle he'd needed to get past, breathed a sigh of relief that had the unfortunate effect of drawing both of his tormentors' attention back to him. "I'm sorry," he said, figuring that he might as well get started on that now, since the frantic apologizing and promising to never do it again bit was going to happen sooner or later anyway.
"You're not sorry," Germany said. "You're just sorry that you're going to be punished."
France swallowed hard, shooting a desperate look at Austria, who just shook his head slightly, giving him a disdainful look in return. You really think I'm going to get you out of trouble? Think again.
Figuring that it wasn't like he could get any more screwed, given that Germany and Prussia were going to punish him no matter what he did, France just sort of shrugged. "Pretty much," he admitted.
A somewhat frightening amount of time later, after Austria got fed up and literally pulled his teammates off of France, earning France's everlasting gratitude in the process, Germany and Prussia hauled a thoroughly beaten and bloody France to his feet. France was in absolutely no condition to stand, let alone walk, unassisted, so Prussia just sort of half-carried, half-dragged him from the room, moving entirely too fast for France, who was having a great deal of difficulty just staying conscious and on his feet. Prussia brought his captive down the stairs and into the living room, where he shoved him forward and turned back to say something to Germany. France stumbled, his legs, perhaps inevitably, gave out, and he collapsed face-first onto the nearest chair.
Prussia made a little noise of irritation, hauling France up by the collar of his shirt and depositing him on the floor. "Don't get blood on our chairs," he chided in the tone one would use with an inconsiderate eight year old. France thought this was a little unfair, since Prussia had been the one who had shoved him at the chair to begin with, plus Prussia had done a decent amount of the damage that had left him unable to stand in the first place. But France supposed that it didn't matter all that much what he thought, since he couldn't do anything about it, so he said nothing and didn't bother to get up, since even if he was able to muster up the strength to pull it off, he'd inevitably collapse not long after. Besides, lying down hurt less.
"Everybody, get in here," Germany called in a voice more suited to a battlefield than to a living room. "NOW."
Given all the screaming that had taken place not long ago, it should probably come as no surprise that everyone dropped what they were doing and rushed to the living room when Germany called them. Nobody outright ran, as nobody really wanted to be the first one there, but everyone certainly hurried, as being the last one there would certainly be worse.
"Get up," Germany told France. "I want people to see what happens to runaways."
France, who had sort of curled up against the wall and started giving serious thought to actually running away to England's place as soon as possible, hesitantly uncurled, wincing and trying not to cry out as he did so, and tried to force his legs to support his weight. It didn't work, didn't even come close to working, until Austria finally got fed up and helped him out.
Germany, meanwhile, looked over the assembled Nations, all of whom were sort of nervously hovering as near to the exits as they could get without being too obvious in their desire to be somewhere else. He shot them a death glare. "This is not going to cut it. I want everybody lined up in front of the stairs and standing at attention. NOW!"
Once everyone was satisfactorily lined up, Germany paced in front of them, watching for any sign of disobedience and generally doing his best to scare everyone even more than he already had. France, meanwhile, continued doing his best to stay on his feet, something he was only able to manage at all by leaning on (and, if he was being completely honest with himself, clinging to) Austria. The aristocrat seemed mildly annoyed about this, but he didn't shove France away, so France figured he was willing to tolerate it if it got this whole drama over with sooner. (Evidently Austria hadn't yet noticed that France was getting blood on his clothes.)
"Now that I've got your attention," Germany began. "I'm sure that by now everybody has heard that France here tried to run away a few days ago. And just in case anybody was considering following his example, I want to make it absolutely clear to all of you that trying to run away is a very bad idea. For starters, you will be caught. Even if you manage to make it out of my country, there is nowhere you'll be able to hide. I will find you, even if it means tearing apart your entire country. You cannot hide from me. You will be caught, you will be brought back here, and you will be punished." Here he turned to give France a meaningful look. "And you will end up like France." He walked over to France, who tried very hard not to cringe away because that would only help make Germany's point, and France was not going to help Germany with that any more than he already had. "Understand?" he asked.
Everyone responded with some sort of "yes, sir." Some sounded a little more intimidated and others were clearly mentally specifying that yes only signified comprehension of Germany's words, not agreement, but everyone gave Germany the answer he wanted.
"Good," Germany said. "But just to make absolutely sure that you all understand the consequences of running away…" He turned to France and Austria. "Austria, you may want to move," Germany noted, and as Austria moved away, France noticed the look on the aristocrat's face as he noticed the blood on his clothes for the first time. France couldn't help but crack a tiny smile for just a brief moment before his legs started shaking and he had to lean against the wall and really work to not completely collapse. He wouldn't have bothered, except he didn't want to risk being punished further for passing out before Germany was done making his point.
"Everybody, pay attention. I want you all to see for yourselves what happens to runaways," Germany announced, then pulled out his gun and pointed it at France's head.
France supposed that he could be forgiven for shutting his eyes as tight as he could before Germany pulled the trigger.
Authors' Note:
Historical Stuff:
- So the Allies have a meeting. Good for them. Good for me, too, because I don't have to deal with historical notes for it, since it doesn't correspond to anything in particular.
- The Tripartite Pact. Was signed on September 27. Historically, it was signed in Berlin, but in Hetalia-land it was signed at Japan's house, which is probably a good thing, since the alternative would be Japan having to deal with all the crazy people at Germany's house being weird at him. Basically, the Tripartite Pact officially made Germany, Italy, and Japan allies, and they agreed that anyone attacked one of them, they'd have to deal with all three of them. Also, some other countries joined later, but we haven't gotten there yet, which is nice because Warsaw is threatening to play bad music at me if I don't finish this soon.
- And finally, France comes home from his meeting and has Bad Things happen to him in the process of avoiding the Worse Things that would happen if he didn't. This one isn't overly historical, except for the Napoleonic Wars reference. Basically, after France had occupied Prussia, Austria was going to fight France, and Prussia teamed up with him, only to back out of the alliance before the war happened. As a result, Austria wound up fighting France alone, and losing. Given that it seems a little odd for Prussia to lose his nerve and back out of an alliance with Austria in a way that would make him look weak, we figured France had to have done something. So. The (non-historical; don't write this on your history test) reason Prussia backed out was that France found out, and dropped a bunch of hints about it while treating Prussia really badly until Prussia broke off of the alliance. Austria then fought alone and lost, and this was the loss that led to France getting his hands on Little Germany. In other news, I promise that I will do my best to stop letting the Napoleonic Wars take over France and Prussia's scenes. It started out as just a bit of backstory we wanted to cover and now I can't seem to shut up about it. But we're done with it, whether I like it or not.
Authory Stuff:
Warsaw and Vilnius's Note:
So. All kinds of crazy things have happened since the last time we updated. First, the week after we last updated, our parents randomly decided that we would celebrate our mom's birthday by going to a fancy restaurant. In Florida. We don't live in Florida! We live several hours away from Florida, in fact. Later that day, we were told that the two of us needed to spend less money on tea. (Yeah...a fancy restaurant and the gasoline for eight hours of driving don't put too much of a dent in the bank account, but the money we spend on tea apparently does...)
Speaking of tea, a (long) while later, we found a box of cheap teabags containing "100% pure white tea" in the pantry. Vilnius made some out of morbid curiosity, and discovered that the "white tea" tasted remarkably like weak black tea. Then she decided that she wanted to compare it with the awful Lipton tea that our parents buy despite the fact that no one in the family drinks it, and she discovered that they tasted only vaguely different. Next, for some reason that no one quite understands-we suspect that tasting the "White Tea" did something to her brain-she decided to mix the two to create some sort of über-evil, super-nasty hybrid of liquid doom. This was about as nasty as you would expect, and could obviously not just be poured down the drain like some non-doomy bad tea. No. Oh, no. It had to be exorcised. So Vilnius hunted down one of those decorative cross things, which Warsaw promptly plonked into the mug before busting out Supernatural's go-to exorcism (proof positive that she watches the show way too often-she knows it by heart). In other news, Warsaw would really like to know how the Winchesters manage to make the shortened exorcism work, considering where they cut the full thing...
So then we might have gotten this posted a little bit sooner had our parents not dragged us off on a trip to our grandmother's house. Ten hours of driving to get there, not much warning ahead of time, not much to do once we were there except for the one fun day of Six Flags, where Warsaw spent the day looking for Wile E. Coyote and obsessing over Harley Quinn.
THEN, we get home, and the roof on our house needs to be fixed, so the roof-repairing company comes and starts taking off the inconvenient bits, only for it to start raining at a bad time. Long story short, it rained in the house, which was every bit as interesting as it sounded, but fortunately, not much was damaged. Still, it took up a good bit of the day.
And throughout the road trip and roof-repair drama, we also got entirely too into the World Cup. Vilnius is quite happy with the result; Warsaw was rooting for Argentina, and both of us are confused as to why our mom thinks that football is a bad name for the sport known here as soccer, but is a good name for American football, which involves much less kicking. Also, we had entirely too much fun watching Switzerland lose to France, and didn't quite stop making fun of him for it until Brazil spectacularly lost to Germany.
So yeah. That was our lives for the past few months. And we are SPECTACULARLY sorry about how long it took for us to update. We had some epic writer's block, and a bunch of inconvenient interruptions, and also exams and Warsaw graduating high school(!). We are definitely going to get the next chapter up on time. (No, seriously this time.)
Warsaw's Extra Note: Does anyone else ever get really strong feelings about a random word in a translation? Like, every time I go to listen to "Guren no Yumiya," you know, the Attack on Titan theme, and I see someone talking about how the very first bit translates to "Are you the food? No, we are the hunters!" I get really, inexplicably, indescribably angry. Like, no, guys...context. Read what you wrote and think about it for a moment. Do you really think "Are you the prey?" is too much of a stretch? According to Vilnius, who's learning German, she would probably translate that as "prey", not "food." Like, really. "Are you the food?" "Are you the food?" What kind of question is that? "Are you the food?" "Yes, we are the cheese plate!" Really. Or, if you prefer, "No, we are the glassware!"