Preword
Hello all;
Many years ago, I would write Hetalia fanfiction on my phone during school. I would RP over text and Skype until the wee hours, my head full of crazy ideas for my favourite characters - the Nordics & BeNeLux. I miss this part of Hetalia the most: the fanfics, the angst, the characters. Although it's been years since I've revisited this fandom, so much of it takes up a huge part of my heart and I am so happy to be back and writing for this fandom.
Længe leve Revolutionen, Danish for Long live the Revolution, is based on a dream I had.
Denmark: Mads
Belgium: Femke (in this AU she's not Belgain, however)
Stockholm, 1967
"Hey."
Mads grabbed her arm and she ravelled herself to face him.
"We're in this together, right? Saving our asses and all that? All our asses, that is?" he had a shit eating grin on his face.
Femke bit back with her own grin. Shiny teeth flinted as she raised one eyebrow, amused. "Yeah. Where'd you get the idea we're not? Was it when we fucked last night?" Blunt as usual.
Mads had adorable crooked teeth, a bit too much hair and broad shoulders. His arms were structured and muscled, he often let kids swing from them when he flexed. He was tall, ruffled, face pale from the often cloudy skies he hailed from. However, with Femke, he fit right in.
They were in love; young lovers, people would mutter, almost enviously, with a disparaging sigh.
"This revolution. It's going to be… Huge!" he gestured with his hands, before squeezing his lovers' butt. She slapped his hand away and reasserted herself on his wait. "We're going to be done of this-" he signaled to the poverty around them, grabbing her hand with the missing fingernails, and looking to the sky. "It'll be BEAUTIFUL!"
Femke wasn't your typical lady. She was tall, with blonde hair she kept tied in a bun. She dressed in shades of brown, her dresses usually torn, however a simple front for the breeches she wore underneath. Many years ago, she'd made a paid of boots from scraps of leather she'd bargained for at the cobblers, with the soles made of spare firewood. From a lifetime of sad, potato-sack socks lined with chicken wire, her wonky, unmatching boots were her greatest treasure, and the most luxurious thing she'd ever owned.
When Mads saw them hanging from her lifeless feet, he didn't have to look up. He dropped to his knees, screamed in anguish. He knelt there, screeching and sobbing like a banshee until a guard dragged him home. Those stupid boots.
The other thing she liked to wear was a scarf, again, homemade. It was blue with a white stripe. The blue was especially precious, as blue dye was hard to come by. She'd collected flowers, scraps of fabric here and there, picked a few rose bushes. She stole a few things; a pestle and a mortar when no one was looking, however she'd bought the cotton with her own money. It was on sale, of course, but this was harder to come by and guarded like it was made of crown jewels. She'd shown Mads how to knit, and the two of them would stay up, late into the night, sharing a pipe and swigging beer as they crocheted away, until a surprisingly impressive strip of knitted fabric came away. Mads wrapped it around her neck, and she beamed up at him.
He thought about that scarf that evening, when he was freezing cold on the desolate flags of their kitchen. The floor was made of stone, the two up, two down cottage they called home nestled between rows upon rows of houses. They had painted theirs bright yellow, "It'll bring the sun in," Mads had informed Femke when he came home with two tins of paint. She hadn't questioned the logic.
He sat, on the floor, sucking sadly on the pipe she'd fashioned for him, gnawing at it. It made his teeth bent, cramping them and twisting them. He didn't care. Loosely, he reached up behind him and found the aquavit.
He managed to get there the next day just as they were pulling her down. He stumbled towards them, nearly falling over as he staggered to the gallows.
"That one," he said in his work-voice. "I need the… The scarf." he informed the guards. He was dressed in his uniform.
Mads, despite everything, was a high ranking government official. Femke had been his way to the underground resistance. She was the one helping him, guiding his hand; together, they were making a new life for all these people. And now she was dead. And he was just a disgusting government official. The word traitor rang in his head as he looked at his dead sweetheart.
"Come on!" he barked, before beginning to laugh at them, the guards alarmed he'd even speak to them. They began to stammer as the rope was cut, and the lady fell to the floor. Dead. Mads continued, "It's cold, right?!" he forced a grin. "Get me that scarf! Is a man not allowed a scarf?!"
"Yessir," one of them uttered. They quickly unravelled it from around her neck. She hardly moved, and without touching Mads knew her skin would feel like clammy, cold marble. Nonetheless, he wrenched as she was moved forcibly, seeing her crumpled. Her eyes were closed, thank god. He couldn't look at her.
"Cheers, chaps!" Mads grinned at them both, and they visibly paled. The stink of booze and sleep and tobacco was rancid on his breath.
He walked home. Silent tears, unlike Mads in every sense, streamed down his face, splattering in fat, ugly droplets beneath him as he walked.
Somewhere along the way, everyone lost a part of themselves. Mads had just lost his.