Yo! Hikou no Kokoro here! Hopefully, this will be the first chapter of the two chapters posted for this week, to make up for the week that I missed.

Special thanks The Gemini Phoenix and LemonySweet1127 for following this fic!

Disclaimer: I don't own Axis Powers: Hetalia. I merely own the AU plot and setting. Additionally, I am not an expert on blindness and teaching. Most if not all information on those subjects are theoretical speculations. Do not use as reference.

Enjoy!

Nihilism

"Surrealism is destructive,
But it destroys only what it considers to be shackles limiting our vision."
—Salvador Dali

After Arthur's first class, words about the new teacher spread throughout the school like a wildfire. People talked about how Francis was good looking and how he was surprisingly chill compared to his prickly colleague Arthur. But the dominating subject was Francis' blindness. Everybody knew that Francis was a fine arts teacher, since that was how Arthur introduced him, but nobody knew what type. Some speculated that Francis was only Arthur's assistant. Others thought Francis originally intended to be a music teacher, and he turned into a mere second hand due to circumstance. The rest of the students just didn't bother to predict; they were just grateful that Francis wasn't in another department, such as P.E. But none of them realised that Francis was a visual arts teacher, and the "grand revealing" came as quite a shock.

Francis only taught two classes. They weren't much, but they were all he had since Arthur, who wasn't particularly dedicated to the visual arts, didn't advertise the class as much as he should have, so all the students only took one year of art class to fulfil the required credit. The baton was being passed to him; he had to leave a good taste in his students' mouths. Francis had no room to make mistakes; even with an incapacitating disadvantage, he needed to amaze.

Nevertheless Francis chose to step away from the tried and true.

He started off with roll call. Arthur offered to take over that part, but Francis refused and asked the students to say something instead of merely raising their hands. Arthur stepped back, hands held above his head as he allowed Francis to do whatever he wished if he believed it would do any good.

Arthur wished he hadn't though. Instead of explaining himself or how the class was run to the batch of mostly freshmen, Francis jumped into a lesson.

His voice that rang in the room, bouncing off of the mess of materials stacked on tables and cabinets. He spoke with a flurry of hands waving around. "Art is a history," he said. "It's like math and science; giants come before us, and we collectively, as a whole race, get progressively better, even if we ourselves aren't alive anymore."

He paced around the room, his hip bumping into the corners of the tables and feet kicking the legs of chairs. The area was tight; even the use of his cane didn't help his manoeuvrability. Nevertheless, he continued, as if there was nothing in his way. Arthur stood right to his feet, and tapped on Francis' shoulders to get his attention and to get him to stop bumping into things, but Francis didn't care.

"So first, I want to talk about great artists, and how their new techniques and styles revolutionised art into the way it is today. And by looking at the examples of these giants, we gain a sense of what's aesthetically pleasing and how the world works and is perceived, and most of all, develop a particular style that you'll perfect for the rest of your life. But don't worry. We won't only talk about artists, and I'm not expecting you to memorise anything and spit them back out at me. I'll spread that throughout the year, and at some point, we'll emulate some famous paintings on the ceiling tiles, instead of traditional testing."

Francis moved to the side of the classroom where posters of famous artists hung. A previous art teacher had put them up there years ago, and they always seemed gleam under the sun rays filtering through the windows on the other side of the room. During the time before school started, Arthur had shown where the posters were as part of the tour, and it seemed like Francis remembered where they were, even though he couldn't see them. Arthur thought everything was safe there. Francis could simply stand there to demonstrate.

"As we can see here, we have examples of works from Da Vinci, Picasso, Dali, Gogh, and Michelangelo." He pointed at the posters in order they were on the wall—Da Vinci, Dali, Gogh, Michelangelo, and Picasso. "Of course, this is a very, very limited spectrum. There are plenty of other famous artists around, and modern art has a certain flair that should also be celebrated, and they aren't all men either, but these are the posters we have at the moment, and I'll try to find new posters to hang up so we get to see a wider variety of what art can be. But in the meantime, this is all we have. If any of you want to suggest artists, we can create our posters about them."

Francis sidled along the wall. Luckily, he noticed the box in front of him with his cane, and he kicked it aside before he slipped and fell. Then he placed his hand on the Picasso poster. "Let's start off with Da Vinci."

Snickers filtered into the air. But Francis seemed to ignore them and continued talking. At the side-lines, Arthur became antsy. His eyebrow twitched, and his green eyes shifted from the students to Francis and back. It almost seemed like Francis had no shame. He was setting off a terrible example, and it was humiliating to even look at him. Arthur quietly slinked behind Francis and pushed Francis until he was touching the right poster.

Then Francis moved his hand, pointing at a batch of words and captions. "This is his famous of the Last Supper."

Arthur reached over Francis' shoulders and jerked Francis' hand down so it was pointing at the painting.

"Notice the perspective on the painting, and how all the corners of the walls lead to the centre, where Jesus is."

Francis moved his hand again, pointing at the painting of Mona Lisa. Arthur inwardly groaned, hanging his head and massaging his eyes with his fingers. The students started snicker even more and began whispering amongst each other. Arthur's nose turned a bright red.

He was never going to win.