Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia.

A/n1: The past few chapters, I've noticed I've started rambling. Again. Just like I did in Bottoms Up.
Now I like to ramble, sure. I ramble a lot. This should annoy you, wonderful readers, but I am very lucky that you guys always tell me you don't mind my ramblings. However, I'm starting to mind it. It irritates the hell out of me when I've written a chapter like chapter 38 and realize I spent too much time to a fic within a fic. That's no good! I should stay focused on the plot!
So I'm going to do I've never done before: I'm going to cut the rambling crap and get down to business. I'm going to race through these three "oh-my-impending-doom-or-not"-months, hopefully in a way that doesn't even bother you.
Wish me luck, peeps!

A/n2: Thank you for all of your Shakepeare-help, dear readers! I didn't know so many people have read/seen Shakespeare! I'll follow your advice and try to get to know the world of Shakespeare better, I promise!

A/n3: By the way, I think I still rambled my ass off in this chapter. OTL…

~~ And Three Makes Five ~~

Chapter 39:

Children are living beings – more living than grown-up people who have built shells of habit around themselves.
Rabindranath Tagore
(Bengali polymath)

So.

After hours and hours of travelling, the Magic Homo Bus eventually arrived at the Turkish resort.

In the end, the whole trip had turned out to be not even half as noteworthy and/or exciting as I had feared (or hoped) it would be. Only when we got close to our resort – after passing dozens of large, beige buildings that looked pretty rich and awesome, and all had five to six stars as well as if they wanted to scream "LOOK, WE'RE LUXURIOUS AND FANCY AS WELL, PLEASE COME HANG OUT WITH US WE HAVE COOKIES"…

…only then, the people inside the bus finally seemed to wake up a bit and get all pumped up for the vacation that was going to happen.

As far as vacations can 'happen', of course.

The resort-entrance in front of which the bus pulled over, was yelling "EVEN KINGS AND QUEENS COME TO STAY WITH ME" just as loudly as all those other buildings had, with its high windows and elegant letters on the side of the fashionable-old looking side of the building. Everybody was at a loss of words when we stood there in that lobby with our puny little bags, trolleys and suitcases.

'Look at that ceiling,' the Netherlands pointed out as he looked up. 'It's so high. It just won't end. That ceiling goes on forever. If I wasn't so arrogant and Dutch, I'd be blown away.'

'You still seem very impressed though, Mr. Netherlands,' Liechtenstein smiled, averting her eyes and petting Bas' hair just when the tall Dutchman looked at her with a soft expression on his face that would have been weird if I hadn't seen it before.

France wanted to comment something saucy on that (just a feeling), but then he saw the lounge section of the lobby and he made a inhuman sound of happiness as he tucked his daughter under his arm and sprinted towards the cushiony goodness that was waiting for him right there.

Meanwhile, Germany and Austria were talking to the eternal grinning woman behind the counter that could perfectly speak and understand German, for some creepy reason, and most of the kids and Feliciano were running around the glittery floor aimlessly as they checked out the building.

Hungary and Femke had followed France and were curiously looking around themselves as well. Judging from their large, excited eyes and tired faces, I guess the women were more than happy to finally be here.

Antonio, Russia and I hadn't said much ever since we left the bus, so we acted like the tourists we were as well. While Russia read a flyer and got excited over the fact that it was written in Russian, I inspected the big pool that was just on the other side of the lobby, outside, close to the sea. It seemed to be very unusual to have a swimming pool with a view on the sea (that was just three meters separated from the actual swimming pool), but I suppose it was kind of cool to be able to choose between swimming in the sea and swimming in the swimming pool. Or jumping into the sea from the swimming pool.

'Lovi,' Antonio muttered at a certain moment, gently pulling my hand, 'you see that big, informative board right there? Seems like we're getting small houses – one house per family. I hope we get the one with the balcony.'

'Holy shit, you're right,' I said, staring at the pictures of diverse cute, beige, straight vacation houses with flat roofs and waving family's standing in front of it, all sun-burnt and happy. 'I wonder where they'll put us in, indeed…'

Antonio sighed and rubbed his neck, which had become kind of stiff during the long way to this place.

'Well, I hope we'll have a wonderful time here, Lovino. I think we really deserve it.'

'How long do you think we'll be here?' I abruptly asked him.

'Hmmmm?'

'Are we really going to spend three months here? In this resort in Turkey?'

Safely hidden from the outside world, with nobody from outside to look after us, having to depend on people we don't even know, people that'll probably do anything to keep us happy and relaxed and here, I wanted to add – but I didn't want to upset him, so I kept that last bit to myself.

Antonio's green eyes still eyed me cautiously, though.

'I don't know, Lovi, I… you think we'll have to stay here for three months?'

'I'm asking you.'

'And I'm telling you I don't know.'

I was getting a bit irritated. 'Let me ask you something else. Would you want to stay here for three months?'

'Maybe?' Antonio shrugged. 'I've never been on a vacation before, Lovi, so I really don't know what to expect. But I think I'll enjoy this resort, yes, so if they're allowing us to stay here for the following three months, I won't mind that at all.'

Of course I frowned at that. I certainly wanted to tell him that he shouldn't give in to whatever the PPSS-people (since they had arranged this holiday for us) had in mind for us. Surely I had a lot of mixed feelings about all of this.

But Antonio looked like I think we all looked like: grayish, exhausted, at the end of our wits, and not even because of all the traveling.

We were tired.

We were so very tired.

We wanted rest, some peace of mind, a place where we could recharge our inner batteries and have fun with our children – and lookee here, we could get all of that here.

Wasn't that what we wanted?

Wasn't that what we needed?

Wasn't that was I, too, wanted to experience, after all that madness of the past weeks?

Then why was I feeling like this? Why did I want to grab the persons I loved and run away from all of this as fast as I could? Why did this resort feel like a place where they stick elderly people that are no longer able to live on their own?

Did they want us to have at least one more nice experience before – were we going to die?

I felt the blood flowing inside of my veins cool down rapidly.

Were we?

'We have House 532, Lovino!'

I was instantly waken up out of my disturbing thoughts and stared at Antonio's bright smile. It was so very sunny and blinding that I literally had to squint my eyes a bit to be able to look at him.

'We have a house?' I lamely said, still a bit out there.

'Yes, a house! And guess what: according to that friendly Turkish man that's going to carry our bags – all of the couples have a guy or girl who are willing to do that, isn't that nice? – our house is going to have a balcony! A balcony, Lovino! I have always wanted a balcony!~'

'You have a balcony,' I peevishly pointed out. 'Our House in Spain, in case you've forgotten.'

'I know – but still!' He laughed and took my hand in his. 'It's pretty cool, right?'

'I guess.'

He just couldn't stop oozing happiness. 'Yay! Hey, Alejo! Matteo! Luisa! We're going to our vacation home, kids! Come on!'

The kids had gotten fed up with strangely waggling around the lobby like three hyper-ducks anyway, so it wasn't before long Alejo grabbed my hand and Matteo grabbed Antonio's, while Luisa walked right in front of my feet and couldn't stop pointing out that the toilets were very gross, very very gross, shit on the wall and everything, and that's why she wanted me and Antonio to come and check it out with her later.

Antonio and I laughed and promised that we would, when we would go investigate the resort later anyway. And the kids were chuckling and pulling our hands and sticking out their tongues at one another and all seemed to be well.

All was well.

For now.

\0o0/

A whole month passed, and I would be lying if I said we didn't have a great time at the resort.

Because we all had. Not just me, Antonio and the kids, no, we all had. The other countries that had come to the resort as well were having a fantastic time, too.

Each and every morning, all nations went to the main building – which was connected to the lobby and the entrance, or so we learned – and had ate on a beautiful, large, public balcony (you should have heard Antonio's delighted shrieks) with a beautiful view on a local fisherman's town lying just a bit further from the resort.

Antonio, Matteo and especially Alejo loved gazing at the ships that floated by on the water. We'd have an open buffet during breakfast, lunchtime and dinner, what meant that we could eat whatever we wanted to eat. Same story for the drinks. It wasn't unusual for the kids to eat French fries and drink sugar-loaded softdrinks during breakfast.

We'd go swimming a few hours after breakfast – in one of the several swimming pools or in the sea. Antonio and I taught the kids how to swim and had we were so damn good at that that Matteo almost drowned when he tried to swim a bit without his tubes on. Afterwards, when we got Matteo an icecream to stop him from crying and Antonio an ice-tea to help him regain his consciousness – the wuss had kind of fainted when he saw his darling son was getting swallowed by the merciless waves – and we decided to stop teaching and just attached tubes to all three of them. Oh, and we told ourselves we'd made them follow swimming classes, when we got back from this vacation.

If we got back.

After swimming, we'd have lunch and a chat with some other countries. We'd chuckle and comment on how tanned we all slowly were getting, except for Russia and Germany, whose skin only became redder and redder by the passing day, no matter how much sunscreen Femke and Feliciano squirted over their hurting bodies.

Then we'd go for a walk with the kids, you know, visit one of the many playgrounds and watch Luisa glide off the slides, observe Matteo's happy swing-time with Mia and see how Alejo dug pitfalls around the playground with his trademark slasher smile on his face. Antonio and I would most of the time join them, but we also sat down on benches a lot. We sat, and watched the kids, and talked, and held hands and felt generally happy to be here.

Near the end of the day, we'd go back to the main building for dinner and we'd spend some time in the lounge room until the evening program would start, and then we'd listen to some music and go to live-acts and smile proudly whenever one of our kids was picked out by one of the animators to do a little dance with them.

By the time we finally got back into our vacation shack, the kids were dead tired and slept before their heads even hit the pillow, and since the kids slept in the same room as Antonio and I, we'd just lie there consumed with sexual frustration for the rest of the night until we eventually fell asleep.

And the very next day, everything would be repeated again.

And again.

And again.

And then an entire month had passed and I found myself thinking that I was fucking fed up with it and wanted to go home. As soon as possible.

\0o0/

'I want to go home,' I told Antonio that morning, when he was tickling Matteo and making the kid snort and squirm in such a cute way that even the several charmed waiters could barely handle it.

He stopped tickling right away and looked at me, making me feel funny in lots of ways since that bastard had only gotten more handsome the past weeks, now that his already tanned skin had gotten even more tanned and sexy and ugh I wanted him wanted him wanted himmmmmmmm.

But ditching the kids near a pool/the sea/a playground full of pitfalls just to go have sex somewhere nearby was pretty damn irresponsible, so I was forced to masturbation-sessions in the bathroom and quick ass-grabbing moments whenever the kids weren't looking, and you know what, that grows old pretty fucking fast.

'You want to go home,' Antonio repeated me and nodded. 'So do I.'

'You do?' I said, relieved, because I had thought he was having so much fun at the resort it could be considered criminal.

Antonio smiled faintly at me and put a hand on one of my legs and I instantly wanted to do him, because that's just how my body works.

'These were nice weeks,' Antonio said in the meantime, gently stroking my leg, 'but I've had enough. The food's always the same, just like the pools, the weather, the shows, the playgrounds, the sea, the rhythm of the entire day. The kids are fed up with it, too.'

I blinked at looked at the three children sitting at our table – and I saw he was right.

Now that Matteo wasn't laughing anymore, he was poking his pet-cactus with a plastic spoon, his cheeks flushed from too much sugar and not enough rest. Luisa stared at her plate with scrambled eggs like she was going to throw up and Alejo let a fly sit on his wrist without even attempting to kill it.

'I thought they enjoyed it here,' I muttered as I shooed away the fly and stroke Alejo's head. He smiled weakly at me and I couldn't help but think he needed a haircut, before his eyes would completely disappear behind his curly bangs.

'We did enjoy it,' Antonio said. 'We all enjoyed it very much. But this has been more than enough, Lovi. Look around, sweetie – we're not the only ones looking like they're exhausted from having too much mindless fun.'

I did as he said.

Germany and Feliciano were sitting a table next to us and it seemed like their whole little family had fallen still at the table. Germany read a newspaper without looking at the words, Feliciano was fucking sleeping, and Mimi put little pieces of French fries in her mouth with a disgusted face.

Hungary, Austria and Wolfgang were sitting a few tables behind us and attempted to talk about something, but both Hungary and Austria just stopped talking mid-sentence and even allowed Wolfgang to drop his bread into Austria's coffee.

Femke and Russia were sitting a bit in front of us and ate from their plates in slow-motion, while Anya stared into the distance.

France had just finished eating – but instead of loudly pronouncing he was going to have a skinny dip in the sea, he just wobbled around the balcony, followed by an equally wobbly, dressed Desiree.

Liechtenstein en the Netherlands were the only ones that still seemed to have a good time, but that could also be because both of them weren't really good at expressions. Liechtenstein lazily leaned on her elbow and watched Netherlands' giant plate, filled with free food, that he eventually just shove away from him. Bas was playing on his gameboy and seemed the most emotionless one of the three of them.

It was a fucking depressing sight, dammit, and yet, we all still sat here. As if we didn't know where to go or what to do. It was shameful.

'And you know what I consider one of the most awful things?' Antonio's voice sounded desperate, almost just as desperate as his hand clawing at my leg did.

'No, what?' I asked and bit my lower lip. His nails hurt my sun-burnt skin, but I was way too happy he was finally touching me, so I gladly let him.

'I can't be myself.' Antonio swallowed heavily. 'I'm just acting. I want to act like I'm having a great time, for the kids. But they're acting as well. We're all acting. What I really want is… have some peace of mind. Work in my garden. Cook. Go to town. See my friends only at times I want to see them. Enjoy my quality time with my kids. Get surprised. Get sad. Get angry, for Pete's sake. Get some privacy. Get you.'

I gulped as well, but didn't say a word.

'This vacation is suffocating. We can do anything, and yet we can't. I like being a parent and I like spending time together with our little family like this, but I don't love it – and I don't want to love it. I want to love the kids. I want to love you. I want to love and hold and touch you without having to hold back so, so much it's getting painful.'

Antonio took in a deep breath.

'So shall we leave, my love, before we'll dry up and turn into dust?'

He said this a lot louder, so that the kids could hear. They all looked up.

'Are we going home?' Luisa asked.

'Yes,' I said.

'Oh. Okay.' Alejo nodded and sat up a bit more.

'So it's fine with you three?' Antonio wanted to know.

'Yea.' Matteo yawned. 'I wanna go houme.'

'Lovino, you can't go home!' A familiar, adult voice suddenly spoke that wasn't mine or Antonio's. I looked up and there Femke was, her green eyes dull and lifeless, her lips dry and clapped. She had placed her hands on the table like she was scared to fall over and in a way, I think she really was scared to fall over.

I snorted. 'Of course we can go home. We're just going, end of story.'

'But…' she hesitated, '…but we're allowed to stay here, in this nice, clean resort for two more months.'

'You can stay here – I don't mind. But we are going.'

Antonio, the kids and I got up from our chairs. We all seemed to recover a little bit more energy now that we had made the decision to go home.

'I wonder if Peeping Rosita's cat has ruined my tomato garden…' Antonio mused in an upbeat voice as he scooped both Luisa and Matteo up in his arms.

I chuckled and did the same with Alejo. 'Well, I wouldn't be too surprised if little tomato-corpses are all that's left of your precious tomatoes.'

Antonio gave me a joyful look – in spite of fearing the worst for his tomatoes – and wanted to say something sweet, no doubt, when his attention was captured by Germany, who had stood up as well and was now blocking our way.

'Just a moment, Romano – and Spain. And… um… offspring.'

'Germany.' I growled and clutched Alejo closer to me, as if I was scared he'd take him away from me. 'Are you going to prevent us from getting away from this… this Hotel California-esk resort?'

The blond German shook his head. 'Not at all.'

Antonio frowned. 'Then why—'

'Because,' Hungary all of a sudden said, also leaving her seat and walking our way – neatly as ever, 'we're not going to be left behind by you.'

'We'll come as well.' Austria firmly said, readjusting his glasses and finally scolding his son for 'polluting his lovely coffee'.

The Netherlands and Liechtenstein had apparently been waiting for something like this to happen and instantly joined our slowly growing-bigger group.

'I miss my brother,' Liechtenstein explained as she dragged Bas along. 'He wouldn't want me to stay away from home for such a long time…'

'I miss my brother as well,' Netherlands said. 'He still owns me 100 euro's. That'll teach that moocher to copy my hairstyle without my permission. I have a patent on that style.'

'Bon! I've seen enough of Turkey to know that it's a nice place for a vacation, but not so much when that vacation seems to be so…' France's voice died right there but he gave us an almost melancholic look that said 'you know what I mean'.

And we knew what he meant.

'So…' I started as even Russia, Feliciano and all of the kids started gathering around us, 'so we're all going home?'

Austria snorted. 'I'm afraid you leave us no option, do you, Romano? I suppose you and your family were planning to take the… vehicle we came here with. We'd be stuck here, and that's just not right. So yes. We're coming along.'

'I'll miss the food, though…' Feliciano sighed as he stared at the buffet table, filled with fruits and different kinds of cake.

Germany rolled his eyes, but smiled nevertheless. 'You'll get your food. You always get your food – and you know it.'

We all laughed, just like in those cheesy, lame-ass movies and we wanted to move along – we had to hurry up, too, we needed to pack our bags as well after all – and we wanted to walk off the balcony.

But this time, Femke blocked our way.

And judging from her face, strained, stressed and terrified, she wasn't going to let us pass.

'No,' she slowly said, attempting to control her exhausted nerves, 'we're not leaving. We're staying right here.'

'Bel?' Russia stammered.

'Femke, please.' Netherlands made a face as if he had seen his sister like this before. 'Not this again. Come on, it'll all work out.'

She shook her head determinedly. 'It won't. It'll be disastrous. We're safe here – they won't get us here.'

Who are "they", you'd probably think we all thought at that very moment, while Femke was being this close on having a mental breakdown. But at the same time, we all suspected we knew who these "they"-persons were.

So we didn't do or say anything – we just stared at her and hoped she'd stop talking about the subject we all wanted to avoid.

'I don't want my daughter to become a nation.' Femke took in a deep, shaking breath, trembling over her entire body. 'I don't want to be replaced by my daughter – not because I don't want her to live on forever, but because I don't want to… I don't want… it hurts so much… I don't…'

For some reason, Femke didn't say it. She was looking straight at Anya now, who was holding Russia's hand and watched her mother freak out in silence.

'Oh god.' Femke started to sob and laugh at the same time, allowing her brother to approach her. 'I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I was acting silly, wasn't I?'

'It's okay.' Netherlands awkwardly ruffled her hair. 'We're all a bit tense right now.'

'Mama?' Anya muttered.

Maybe it was the power of a mother's instinct or something like that, because Femke now really tried her best to stop her tears. She stopped sniveling and beamed a big, believable, feline smile at her daughter.

'I'm fine! I'm fine, lieffie, I'm fine. I'm just a bit… it's like uncle Daan said, I'm a bit...'

'Mama ate too many waffles yesterday,' Russia decided to tell Anya.

'What! No I did no… I mean, yes!' Femke nodded hastily. 'That's right, I ate too many waffles. Waffles are great, you know – but only the Belgian kind. All other kinds make you feel fidgety and stressed out. They're bad.'

'Even Russian waffles?' Russia pouted.

'After you made my country's trademark food almost the reason of my panic attack – yes, Russia. Even Russian waffles. Especially Russian waffles.'

Femke glared at him the way I usually glare at Antonio whenever I'm mad at him (but not really mad at him) and she huffed, fixing her headband.

'B-big-nosed dummy.'

Russia didn't know what to do or how to respond to that (he wasn't Antonio, after all – he didn't really know how to handle moody persons like Femke) so he just shrugged and told Anya mama was okay.

'Oh,' was all Anya said, but judging from her small smile, the weird waffletrauma explanation for her mother's behavior seemed to be convincing enough for the pale-haired girl. Makes you wonder what Femke really acts like whenever she eats an imperfect waffle.

But anyway, now that Femke had calmed down, Russia and the Netherlands managed to convince her it would be better to leave. Not only because they still had two months left before something would be revealed by the world leaders – something that would change everybody's lives forever, something nobody could run or hide away from anyway – but also because the chocolate and waffles tasted way better in Belgium.

To everybody's relief, that did the trick, and shortly after that, we all left the main building in a pretty decent mood.

And why wouldn't we be happy? We were going to leave the resort, just when it was time to go.

\0o0/

About a hour later, our big group of personifications and children stood next to the entrance of the main building, waiting for Germany to come pick us and our baggage up. Our mood had improved greatly ever since deciding to leave the resort and we laughed and made stupid jokes with each other.

'Okay okay,' Liechtenstein giggled, shortly after Antonio had finished his incredible lousy joke about what's big and kills you when it gets into your eye (answer: a train – ugh, so dorky, yet I still laughed, what does that say about me), 'does anybody know how wire was invented?'

'No?' Hungary grinned.

'It was the only logical thing to happen when two Dutchmen fought over a cent!'

Some burst out laughing, like Liechtenstein, Feliciano and Antonio (of course), others just chuckled politely, like Austria, Germany and France.

'Hey, I know that one,' Femke, who finally dared to smile a bit more, pointed out. 'It's a hilarious joke, no matter how many times you hear it.'

'Hilarious, yes,' Netherlands said. 'Let's make dumb blonde Belgian woman-jokes now.'

Femke folded her arms. 'I don't think there are such jokes.'

'Then let's think of some.'

'Ugh, you're being such a bore.'

'Still better than being a dumb blonde Belgian woman.'

'Screw you, Daan!'

Because of all of our loudness, we hadn't been able to hear the manager of the hotel, who had come outside the main building and was sweating like a pig. But now that the laughter had stopped, we all noticed the nervous, almost bold man all of a sudden.

'Wait a moment – please, ladies and gentlemen… can you please explain what's the meaning of this?'

He pointed to our bags and to our… waiting, I guess, and seemed even more hysterical than Germany would be in a dusty, dirty apartment that belonged to a lazy student.

'We're going home,' I dryly announced.

'Yes – I hope that's okay?' Hungary friendly added, although her tone revealed she wouldn't accept a 'that's not okay' for an answer.

The poor manager in his fancy suit started to panic even more. 'Y-you're leaving? But you can't be leaving! You mustn't leave!'

'Ah, don't annoy me. I don't like to get annoyed, yes?' Russia smiled even friendlier than Hungary, and I think the manager was this close to peeing his sticky pants now.

And then I suddenly noticed that Russia and Hungary didn't seem to be upsetting him, no matter how threatening they spoke.

There was something else.

'You are allowed to stay for two more months here,' the manager blabbered on, wiping his forehead with a damp piece of cloth, 'my resort was told to give you three wonderful final months! And I really want to give you those wonderful months! I know what's going to happen to you, and I feel so, so bad for you – so please! Stay!'