Chapter 12

I am aware, that the last survivor was pulled from the rubble only 27 hours after the collapse, and there were only 20 survivors altogether, but hey, this is not real history. I am allowed tweaks, with the rescuers having Alfred help them find them. And I really think, that some of the victims were definitely alive beyond the 27 hour mark, but… they just couldn't find them. Bud don't worry, I wont make it too unbelievable.

It was already two days after the twin towers fell. Or more specifically it was 44 hours after. And Alfred was working on locating survivors since 4 in the morning. The firefighters actually found a safety helmet that could fit him and some protection clothes, so that he could go under the rubble with them and get a better look at the situation.

Alfred rubbed his eyes, stinging from tiredness and strain to see in the low light of the underground parking lot where they were walking.

"Care for a break?" came a calm voice from behind Alfred.

The American nation whirled around and saw tired looking Austria. He was wearing protection gear as well, with thermos box in one hand and a some kind of rope which was trailing behind him in the other.

Alfred looked confused at the rope.

Roderich looked down, "Oh this? No way that I am getting lost here. This place is eerie even knowing I can easily get back up."

"Oh," Alfred nodded understandingly, "And thanks, but now thanks, I am not hungry."

Roderich rolled his eyes, "Alfred we have been over this. If you collapse, you are no use to anyone."

Alfred wanted to say something back, but Roderich stopped him, "Stop. Besides, look around, everyone is tired. You ALL need break. Five minutes won't kill you."

Alfred blinked and looked at the men, that were with him. Their tired faces, eyes that saw better days and dirty clothes. Then he nodded.

"Yeah, maybe a few minutes… I… actually didn't eat today yet," said the American sheepishly.

Roderich opened the box and offered everyone sandwiches and bottled water.

"It's nothing fancy, but at least its food," Roderich said apologetically.

"We are grateful Mr…" said one of the firefighters.

"Austria," Roderich quickly said, "I guess there was not time for introductions."

The firefighter nodded, "So you are like ."

"Yes," Roderich sighed, "But I can't help in the search… Trust me, I tried. I can only sense my own people, and there is nothing. So, there was no one, or they are all…"

"Hey, didn't you say, we are taking a break?!" America yelled at them pissed, "So stop talking!"

Roderich rolled his eyes, but let it go. He knew there was more than one reason that the blonde boy was on edge.

The group ate in mostly silence. The tiredness clearly showing in everyone.

Alfred basically inhaled his food and started bouncing his leg in nervousness.

One of the firefighters, a shorter man with dark hair hidden under the helmet, smirked, "The faster you eat that, the slower WE eat. You really should take a break, Mr. America."

Alfred ran his hand through his hair, "Not you too… We are so close."

Few of them chuckled.

"Looking around, it will probably take another hour to get through this rubble," said another man thoughtfully.

"AAAARGH," Alfred stuck his hands in the air as he let out his frustrations.

Everyone chuckled, but Alfred's eyes suddenly widened.

"Quiet," the boy put a finger to his lips.

An older man put a hand on his shoulder, "America, I know you are anxious, but if you overexert yourself…"

"NO. LISTEN!" Alfred hissed and everyone quieted down.

Few second flew by in silence. They were starting to wonder if it was the nerves or if it was America's power that let him hear something.

But then everyone heard something. It was really faint, but it was there. A human voice.

Alfred quickly grabbed a torch and ran in the direction from where they heard the voice.

"Alfred, careful!" called Roderich, however he headed after the younger nation with the rest of the group.

Alfred shined light through gaps in the rubble, "HEEY, you there, right?"

They heard the voice again and Alfred quickly crawled inside.

"Mr. America!" called the older firefighter, but Alfred was already inside.

The blonde boy carefully crawled under some stone and steel pilar.

"Hey, we are here!" called the voice again.

"I am coming!" Alfred called back, "Others are near and they will get you out soon!"

Alfred finally saw a man lying under what looked like a part of wall.

"Hey, I found you," the small nation grinned.

The man covered in dust and blood looked at him, "A kid? W-wait… ALFRED?!"

Alfred blinked and then he realized that he just found his dad, almost unrecognizable with all the dirt on his face and hair, and face swollen with only one good eye.

"Oh my god," tears started flow down his face , "D-dad. I found you. I w-was so w-worried. We a-all were…"

"Alfred what are you doing here?" asked Adam, "Shouldn't you be in Europe?"

"I was c-called here," Alfred tried to wipe away his tears, but more and more were coming, "You know, to help look for survivors…"

"Oh," Adam nodded.

"Mattie c-came with me, but he went h-home," Alfred hiccupped, "But n-nobody was there."

Adam was confused, "What? Marion and Claudia should have been there."

"Speaking of Mom Marion," Alfred sniffled, "She had a message for you."

Adam blinked, "What message?"

Alfred sucked in air, and then yelled, "DON'T YOU FUCKING DIE BEFORE YOU MEET YOUR DAUGHTER! WE ARE BOTH WAITING FOR YOU IN THE HOSPITAL."

The silence after was almost deafening.

Then Adam's eyes widened.

"Y-you mean…?" he choked out.

"Yes, so you better get your ass back up and go see them," Alfred sobbed.

They were interrupted by a firefighter crawling behind Alfred.

"Mr. America, you shouldn't do that, it's dangerous," the man started to scold Alfred and then stopped as he saw Alfred's dad.

Adam grinned, "Stevenson is that you?"

That seemed to wake up the man from his stupor.

"J-Jones?! You are alive!" Stevenson exclaimed.

"Yah, and I am getting bored down here," Adam joked, "I just heard, that I have a daughter now, so can you guys hurry up and save me like the princess I am?"

Stevenson choked out a laugh.

"Yeah man," Stevenson nodded, "Your wife must be pissed, that you are lazying down here."

After that Stevenson called to others, who immediately started working on clearing the way towards Adam, Alfred and Stevenson, so when they rescue Alfred's dad from below the rubble, they can carry him out on a stretcher.

Alfred wanted to stay and be there when they carried his dad to the surface, but others told him, it will take hours and it will be too dangerous for him to be around, as they will be using welding machine and jackhammer.

Alfred reluctantly agreed to continue looking for more survivors. And so that he wouldn't worry, Roderich promised him that he would keep an eye on his father and accompany him all the way to the hospital.

- APH – APH – APH – APH –

Another two days went by. Just ten minutes before they pulled another survivor out, a young woman.

Alfred was standing on top of the rubble, in the middle. He had his eyes closed in concentration with his hands cupped around his ears. He tried to listen to any possible heartbeats coming from under him. But there was none. The only thing that greeted him, was silence. No matter how much he concentrated he didn't hear a single heartbeat coming from the rubble. All there was left was death.

After what seemed like an eternity Alfred turned to the rescue crew. He opened his mouth to say something, but he couldn't bring his voice to come out. So, he simply shook his head.

He didn't have to say it. Everyone understood. And nobody said a thing, holding a minute of silence for those, who passed away four days ago.

Alfred climbed down from the rubble, where Roderich was waiting to lead him to rescue headquarters, in one of the buildings nearby.

As they were walking, the rescuers parted, so that they could get through and saluted America.

When Alfred and Roderich arrived at the headquarters, Alfred sat down exhausted.

"Can you… can you all leave me for a bit?" he asked everyone in the room softly.

"Of course," Roderich sighed and motioned for others to leave.

After everyone left, and Roderich closed the door behind them, Alfred was left alone. He immediately collapsed onto one of the chairs there and slouched on top of the table. Tears streamed down his face, landing onto the wood table as sobs wrecked his body.

Ten percent. They managed to find alive and rescue just about ten percent of people that got buried under what not even a week ago was the World Trade Center. More than two and half thousand people perished and they still didn't know who was it, who crashed the planes into the buildings, and why.

It took about half an hour before Alfred let others back inside. And he was immediately whisked away into a black car that took him to a tv station. The president Bush wanted him to make a small speech now, that he wasn't needed at the site.

America quickly scribbled something down, he wasn't much for speeches after all.

After he was done someone from the tv came and took the paper.

"Ah, wait, I don't know it from head," Alfred tried to stop the man, but he smiled.

"Don't worry Mr. America, we will just put it into the reading machine so you can read it from there and on look at the table all the time," he pointed to the reading machine beside the camera.

Alfred nodded.

In a few minutes they told him, they will do a check before they go live.

"Let's do mic check in two… one…" a brunet woman with a head sat said and pointed to Alfred.

"Check one, two, one, two," Alfred said calmly.

The woman nodded, "And now check if the reading speed is comfortable for you."

Alfred nodded and looked towards the machine. And glared.

The woman raised an eyebrows as everyone waited for him to start.

"Why is it so small," Alfred practically leaned onto the table to get a better look at the monitor.

"Is it?" the woman looked at the monitor as well.

Roderich, who was standing in the back, sighed.

"Just give him back the paper," he told the woman, and pointed at Alfred, "And you, you will be visiting ophthalmologist."

"Huuuh?" Alfred exclaimed, "No, I will be not? There is nothing wrong with me…"

Roderich rolled his eyes, but Alfred was distracted from further fighting by his speech being put back in front of him.

"Okay so, live in three… two…" the woman pointed at camera.

Alfred took a breath. He was so not ready for this. It was put together in a rush, but it will have to do.

"Good afternoon," Alfred started talking, "Just a few days ago, we lived through the worst terrorist attack in modern history. The cost of human lives was unbelievable and the perpetrators thought they would cripple us for a long time.

But even if we were brought to our knees, we immediately jumped back on our feet. Dozens of first responders flooded the ground zero and immediately started rescue mission to help any possible survivors. New York will be forever in debt to those brave men and women who even in the face of danger selflessly came to help. With their aid we were able to retrieve more than three hundred survivors from below the rubble.

However… with great regret I have to inform you, that as for today… the rescue attempts are stopping and from now on we will start on clearing out the rubble and retrieving bodies for their close ones.

We saved three hundred. But we lost almost ten times more. Countless people lost their mothers, their fathers, brothers, sisters, sons, daughters… friends. I was told that the attacks were religiously motivated.

But as I see it, every religion lost something on that day. Don't let yourself be blinded by act of a group that hides behind the veil of religion and don't turn your back to a neighbor in need just because they might be catholic, Muslim or Hindi. Now especially we need to be unified and forget the differences in skin color, religion or economic background.

Only then we can fight the real enemy. Thank you."

The red light on the camera dimmed, indicating that it was off.

"I hate public speeches," Alfred sighed, "How was it? I didn't really know what to say… But I wanted to tell everyone not to fight among themselves…"

Roderich put a hand on the younger boy's shoulder, "You did good. Given how they practically sprung that onto you, it was great."

Alfred tiredly smiled.

"Come, I arranged for someone to take us to the hospital," Roderich said and started to lead Alfred out.

They got into the car and they didn't even close the door, when Alfred's phone started ringing.

Alfred sighed, but pushed the call button, "Hello?"

"Hello America," came the voice of his president, "I just saw the speech. Thank you for your help."

"It was nothing. And I am sorry, I couldn't find more," Alfred said with calmly.

"Don't say that," the president said, "If you weren't here, we wouldn't probably find even that many. Don't count those that died. Count those that you saved."

Alfred smiled softly.

"Alfred? You speech… was interesting," said the president.

"Wait, was it that bad?" Alfred asked worried.

"No, no, don't worry," assured him the president, "It was good idea to remind the people to be unified and not to discriminate. My speech quite lacked that."

Alfred sighed in relief, "Oh okay. You told the people what they wanted to hear, I told them what they needed to hear. Two sides of the same coin. We are here, to help each other dude."

Roderich's eyebrow twitched. Only America could call his president "dude".

"Yeah, thank you again, and I am sorry I rushed you here from the school," president sounded amused, "Rest now, I am sure, you didn't get much of that in the last few days. Goodbye."

And with last bye Alfred ended the call.

"Dude? Really?" Roderich deadpanned, and Alfred just grinned.

In the hospital Roderich helped Alfred find where his father's room was. What he didn't tell him was, that he actually with Mathew's help, or rather the government agent's who was shadowing Mathew, managed to arrange that Alfred's stepmother was transferred into the same room in the ICU, so he was in a nice surprise.

Roderich stopped in front of the room, "He is in this room, but you are going there alone, I am going back to hotel, you can manage right?"

"Eh? Why?" Alfred asked confused.

"Your dad is in ICU, they are letting in just the family," Roderich patted Alfred's shoulder, "We wouldn't want to overcrowd him, you know?"

Alfred nodded.

They said goodbye and as Roderich was leaving Alfred entered the room, and half a second he heard Alfred's happy yell, which made him smile.

Alfred quickly found himself in a hug from Mathew.

"Alfie, you are finally here," Mathew exclaimed.

"Mattie!" Alfred grinned excitedly, "And mom Marion! How come you are all here?"

"Heeey buddy, you decided to grace us with your presence?" Adam grinned, but that earned him a smack on his arm from his wife, "Ouch… Marion, I am injured you know?"

"Sure, but not injured enough to tease your son," Marion rolled her eyes and turned to Alfred, "That young man… hmm, oh yeah, Austria, arranged for this room."

"Oh, that clever bastard," Alfred muttered.

Matthew took Alfred's hand.

"Hey come, I will show you our sister," the Canadian said and dragged Alfred out.

"Hey wait, I don't want you to get lost," Marion sighed and walked to the door.

She was already halfway through the door, when she turned back to her husband, "And you! Don't you dare to leave or something."

"How can I even leave?" Adam asked confused.

Marion's eyes softened, "I know… but… just in case… don't disappear on me."

Adam smiled, "Never. I will be here, when you come back, don't worry."

And with that Marion followed the boys, to accompany them to the NICU.

They couldn't actually get very close, as they would need nurse's permission to enter the room with the incubators, but they could still watch the little girl from a big window.

Alfred blinked, "Wow, she is so… red… and wrinkly."

Marion snorted.

"Silly, you were like that too," she patted Alfred's head.

Marion put a hand on the window, "You know, we haven't decided on her name before, because we thought we would have a little more time… But then she came. Mattie came with a nice name for her, saying it will bring us good luck. I guess he was right."

"So, what's her name?" Alfred asked curiously.

"Faith," Mathew said softly, "Faith Dubois-Jones."

Alfred raised an eyebrow, "Kinda cheesy… But in a good way. Hm… I kinda like it… but why not Faith Jones-Dubois."

Mathew sighed, "Because it's in alphabetical order. So Dubois-Jones."

"But I like Jones-Dubois better," Alfred whined and Marion laughed at the antics of her boys.

She slid her hands into her sons', one in each hand and pulled them back to their room, they can visit Faith again later.

In the room Alfred and Mathew plopped themselves on a bench and talked to their parents. But soon Alfred's head started to droop. He leaned on Matthew's shoulder, still trying to be part of the conversation. However not even a minute later, when Matthew turned to him, asking question, he was out like baby.

Their parents smiled at that.

"It must have been tiresome the last few days," Marion whispered, gently picked Alfred up, despite protests of Adam and Mathew, that she shouldn't carry anything heavy so soon after giving birth and put Alfred into her own bed, "Shh, it's just a few steps."

She then pulled the blanket over Alfred, and sat down, gently stroking the American nation's hair.

- APH – APH – APH – APH –

It was already almost midnight. And yet four figures were standing outside in the chilly night. They were looking up into the distance, waiting.

And finally, what they were waiting came. They actually heard it before they saw it. A care came out of the darkness.

"Finally," one of them said in an impatient tone.

It was Prussia, the ever impatient one. He hated to be so still, especially as the chill was starting to get to him. He was tired and cold.

"Amigo, it was your idea to wait for them," Spain sneaked his arm around Prussia's shoulder.

The car stopped, and the driver got out and started pulling out baggage from the trunk, But nothing else happened.

"Mein Gott, did they fall asleep," Gilbert frowned and opened the back door, only to find awkward looking Roderich sandwiched in between sleeping Matthew and Alfred, who now, after much protesting, was sporting a new pair of glasses.

"I see you are in a pickle mon ami," chuckled Francis, who came from behind Gilbert.

"I told them to get different flight, so that we would fly overnight and sleep, but America insisted," Roderich sighed, "Really now, when he will learn to account for time difference?"

Francis and Antonio carefully extracted the younger nations, putting them onto their backs, in a piggy back, so that the Austrian could get out.

As soon as Roderich exited the car, the fourth figure came towards Roderich and pulled him into surprise hug. It took the Austrian a second to recognize Hungary, but then he pulled her closer to him.

"Welcome back," Hungary smiled, raised her hands, put them on Austria's cheeks and pulled him into a quick kiss.

"Get a room you two," Gilbert, who was now dragging all of their bags said irritated, "I want to get to bed somewhere in this century. So you had a two week break from school and now you are snogging all over the place."

"Hello to you too, Prussia," Roderich said, ignoring the albino's irritation, as he knew his young self didn't deal with sleep deprivation very well.

Well, it was late and everyone was tired to bone. So they quickly escorted the youngest nations into their respective dormitories, until even Hungary left for her room, leaving only Prussia and Austria, who were both in German dormitory alone.

As they got to Austria's room, Prussia put his bag in front of the door and awkwardly stood there, fighting with himself.

"You know," he said quietly and raised his hand in a loose fist, "It's good to have you back…"

Austria blinked in surprise. He knew that Prussia and him had some differences, but in the end, they were friends for a long time. Even if they didn't show it often, hiding it underneath a hard surface. But sometimes, it was nice to actually show it.

"I am glad to be back too," he smiled softly, raised his own hand and fist bumped the albino.

"Okay okay, let's not get too mushy with each other," Prussia smirked and hurriedly left.

I will put some worldbuilding notes for those who are interested. I don't want to spoon feed them in the actual story, because who wants that much exposition… I would rather have an interesting story that has needed information and put the heavy exposition in and Author's note so only those who really want can read it and the rest can move on.

Anyway, I know that it is said that America's glasses are Texas… but really? What if he breaks them? Will he lose Texas or something? As you can tell, I am not a fan of removable objects being a representation of part of the country.

Rather nations might gain something on their body because of significant events. Lets say that two nations fight and the battle is really significant in the history, they might have a special birthmark in the next generation. Or multiple next reincarnations. Or it doesn't have to be birthmark.

Alfred's glasses are a result of the attack. The tragedy was so significant that it literally damaged his sight. Because even thought he wanted his people not to discriminate against anyone, people started to fear the Muslims. They… became shortsighted so to speak.

Mathew needs glasses ever since the Battle of the Somme in WWI, which is regarded as the bloodiest battle in Canadian history.

Austria actually doesn't really need glasses, he needed them from around 15th century up until his last reincarnation and got so accustomed to them, that now he doesn't need them he still got a pair of glasses with non-description lenses (like that glass that is in your glasses before they put there lenses specially for you). That and Hungary really likes him in glasses.