Dro: Wow, I've been so lazy lately. I get up at noon and don't start writing until 2:00, so now my stuff ends up posted at 4:00 instead of 3:00. Oh well. Anyway, this story is about to get a lot more complicated in terms of plot, so hang tight! And please do review! -cough-And if you like me enough and have a copious amount of time, I wouldn't mind some fanart too. I really want one of Feliciano from the prologue, dressed all in black with the umbrella.-cough- I said nothing!

Chapter Summary: Arthur has a revelation. Alfred is confused. Neither of them have any idea how to deal with it.

Warnings: Language

Disclaimer: Dro has no money to purchase APH. She just blew $70 on the first two seasons of Stargate SG-1 too, so I don't think she'll saving enough anytime soon to buy APH.

Alfred didn't return for three hours. Not that Arthur blamed him for it, by any means. It was his fault that Alfred's brother had gotten raped. If he hadn't been so obstinate about fleeing the base without saving the boy, then this never would have happened. But he'd been out of his right mind at the time, his body haggard and sore, his thoughts in shambles. That didn't make it right, of course. He should have listened to Alfred's desperate pleading, should have done something to save the other Matthew. But he hadn't, and the innocent boy had paid the price for it.

As he laid on the bed, arm covering his eyes, he wondered who would show up first. His own Alfred, the other him, and both Matthews were set to be back in Paris soon. He almost dreaded them more than he did Alfred. How could he face the other Matthew? How could he face himself? The man was probably going to eat him alive. And Alfred…his own Alfred, he would be so disappointed in him. And that wasn't even touching on the biggest problem he now had: explaining just what he'd done to Alfred.

And to himself.

He honestly wasn't even sure. He'd fully intended to die when he'd stabbed himself with the knife. He'd been a sacrifice to bring back Alfred. It was supposed to have worked the same way that Ivan's resurrection had. So what had gone wrong? Or right? Was it because he'd sacrificed himself instead of dying by another's hand? He groaned. He would have to research this heavily, and he didn't have the time for that. Alfred would no doubt come back angry and asking questions that he didn't yet have the answer to.

"What the hell did I do?"

"That's what I'd like to know."

He bolted up, spotting Alfred leaning in the doorway. He'd been so lost in his own head that he hadn't even heard the man return. Alfred clambered into the room and slammed the door behind him, stumbling until he reached the bed. He steadied himself on the bedpost. Arthur eyed him warily.

"Are you drunk?"

"The fuck does it matter?" Alfred's speech was slightly slurred. He'd been drinking all right. But to what extent, Arthur couldn't tell.

"Why don't you sit down?"

Alfred glared at him. "Why don't you explain what the hell you did to me?"

"Alfred, listen—"

"Arthur!" He yelled. "I don't want your excuses. I want the truth. Did I die?"

"Alfred—"

"Tell me." He commanded.

Arthur swallowed, his throat suddenly feeling incredibly dry. "Yes."

Alfred seemed to sober up over a matter of seconds. He sank down onto the mattress. "I died."

"…Yes." Arthur refused to look at him. "A…a sniper shot you in the chest."

"Oh." Arthur wasn't sure what Alfred had been expecting, and the younger man's face was unreadable. "So…how am I alive?"

Arthur shook his head slowly. "I…I sacrificed…myself…to bring you back."

Alfred's lips parted, and Arthur heard a sharp intake of breath. "You killed yourself…to resurrect me?"

"Yes." He whispered.

"But…" Alfred wringed his hands. "Then how are you still alive?"

Arthur pulled a pillow into his lap and embraced it tightly, leaning back against the headboard. "See, that's just it. I don't know how I'm still alive. I hadn't planned on it. I honestly though I was going to die."

Alfred sighed deeply. "I see." He gripped the bedspread. "Why did you lie to me?"

Arthur buried his face in the pillow. "I was afraid. I didn't know what had happened, and I was confused, and I didn't want to scare you…and…I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. For everything."

Alfred shook his head. "I've told you already, this isn't your fault and I don't blame you. I still don't blame you."

You should. And I wish you would. "I…whenever I figure out just what happened, I'll tell you, okay? I promise."

Alfred nodded. "Okay." He rose from the bed and stretched. "I'm going to take a nice, hot shower and clean up before the others get here. I feel like I'm going to need it. That, and a lot of coffee." He slinked into the bathroom and closed the door behind him.

Arthur wondered how he was coping with the news about Matthew, and he figured "not well" didn't even begin to cover it. He pressed his face harder into the pillow, dreading every second that passed. He couldn't face them. He just couldn't. How could he explain that he helped Yao? How could he explain that he let Matthew get raped? How had his life spiraled out of control so quickly? Just two weeks ago, he was sitting in his own home sipping tea and reading the paper. Now his home was gone, and his relationships were heading toward ruin, and he'd helped bring back the greatest enemy the world had ever known. God, how had he become such a failure?

"Ow!" He wrenched his hand away from the pillow, watching as a stream of blood ran down his arm from a deep cut in his hand. "What the bloody…?" He examined it closer and then turned the pillow around and around, looking for anything sharp sticking it out of it. But there was nothing there. So where had the cut come from? Magic? Was someone attacking him? He slipped out of the bed and headed to the bathroom, hoping Alfred hadn't locked the door. He needed a cloth to stop the bleeding. He knocked gently. "Alfred, could I come in for a second? I cut myself. I need a washcloth."

Surprisingly, the door opened, revealing a dripping Alfred in a low-hanging towel with a washcloth pressed against his palm. "What now?"

Arthur eyed the cloth, watching an obvious blood stain form. "Um, what happened to your hand?" A suspicion had weeded its way into his mind, and he was actively trying to fight it.

"I accidentally broke a glass bottle of some kind of fancy lotion or something." He laughed sheepishly. "Anyway, what did you need?"

"Just a washcloth." His voice was oddly dull and steady, even to his own ears.

"For what?"

Arthur held up his bleeding hand, and Alfred's eyes widened. "Oh, shit! Why didn't you say something sooner?" He turned away from the door and trudged across the room, grabbing a clean cloth from the towel rack. When he returned, instead of handing the cloth to Arthur like the man had expected, Alfred wetted it at the sink and began to meticulously clean the blood from Arthur's arm, trailing the cloth up to the still bleeding gash on his palm. Arthur felt like an immense pressure had come at him from all sides, freezing his body in place.

Alfred pressed the now bloody washcloth against the still oozing wound, applying pressure for several seconds. He dropped the cloth over his own cut into the sink. Then he paused, his eyebrows scrunching in confusion. Arthur couldn't move. He honestly couldn't. That sneaking suspicion had quickly infected his entire mind, and now the idea had consumed all his other thoughts. Alfred slowly removed the soiled cloth from Arthur's outstretched hand and raised his own, placing the two palms side by side.

The wounds were exactly the same.

Their eyes met.

"Arthur…what…what's going on?"

Arthur's mouth opened and closed and opened and closed, but he couldn't get a word out. Now it made sense. Now it all made sense. He knew exactly what happened, and he had a theory as to why. But this…this ruined everything. This was going to blow up in both their faces. His mind flashed forward to the uncertain future. He saw anger and yelling and tears and sadness. This was going to destroy them. This was going to tear all their relationships apart. If somehow they actually managed to defeat Russia again…this would still be hanging over their shoulders.

"Arthur, what's happened?"

"I…I didn't meant to."

"You didn't mean to what?" Alfred was visibly panicking, his blue eyes wide and fearful.

"When…when I sacrificed myself to bring you back…I...I think I…"

"Just spit it out, Arthur! What did you do?"

Arthur didn't know how to say this in a way that wouldn't be utterly devastating. So he just said it in the simplest manner he knew how.

"I bound us together."

They sat across from each other, Alfred's forehead pressed against the table. "Explain it to me again." He said. Arthur had already explained it three times, but Alfred was still dazed and lost. He could grasp the concept. In fact, he could completely understand. But he didn't want to accept what it was this Arthur was telling him. He couldn't. Not this. Anything but this.

Arthur fidgeted in his seat. "I believe that, when I tried to sacrifice myself to bring you back, that the spell instead split my own life force in half and gave one part to you instead of giving it all like I meant to. I don't know exactly why that happened, but I'm pretty sure it did."

"So what does that mean? For us?"

Arthur sighed. "It means we're bound together. We share the same the life force. If one of us is hurt, the other one is. If one of us dies, the other one does. Two halves of the same whole. One half can't continue without the other."

Alfred's throat felt dry, and he felt drained. He really needed to go get some coffee. He pressed his fingers into his temples. "So where does that leave us? What do we have to do, you know, to fix it?" He sat back in his chair and gazed at Arthur, silently pleading.

But Arthur just shook his head. His response was a barely comprehensible whisper. "I don't we can."

"What? If you could do this to me, you should be able to be reverse it, right?"

"Alfred, you're living off my life force. If I take it back, you die."

Alfred slumped. "Oh. Right. Forgot about that." He tried to find a positive side to this. "Well…um…" He failed. It wasn't so much the idea of being bound to Arthur that scared him. It was more the idea of being bound to this Arthur and what that entailed. "You know, why don't we just keep this on the down low until this whole Russia thing blows over? We really don't need the added stress."

Arthur nodded. "Yes, I agree. But we'll need to be extra careful. If either of us is hurt…" He held up his cut palm to emphasize his point.

Alfred winced. "I'm really sorry about that, by the way."

"No, it's fine. You didn't know, and it was an accident."

Alfred bit his lip. He'd been thinking this over for the last several minutes, and he was still hesitant to ask this question. But he had to know the answer. "Um, Arthur…just how bound together are we? I mean, besides our injuries being tied together and everything?"

Arthur looked even more hesitant to answer that question than Alfred was to ask it. "Right now? Probably not very much. But things like this tend to be progressive."

"As in…what?"

"As in anything. Literally anything. The particulars of being bound in this way are uncertain. I'd have to do a lot of research that I just don't have the time for."

"So….anything. Like, what, mental connections? Other physical connections? I mean, when I go back home, what will happen to us?"

It was supposed to be a simple question, but Arthur began to pale as soon as Alfred asked it, and that was when he really realized the gravity of the situation. "Um, Arthur…I can go home, right?"

"Of course, Alfred." Arthur licked his lips, refusing to meet Alfred's gaze. "Just…not without me."

Alfred was sure he'd misheard. "Come again?"

Arthur sighed. "Alfred, we're running on the same life force. I'm not sure how far apart we can be in this world. For all I know, you could go across town and that would be too far and we'd both up in immense pain from being not being close enough. I honestly don't know. But I'm pretty damn sure that a dimension is too far. It would break the connection between us, and if that happened…"

"We would both die."

Arthur nodded silently.

"Holy…" Alfred clenched his eyes shut. This was a disaster. The entire thing. It had been since Yao had finished that damn spell to send them here, since Feliciano had interrupted at the last second. And it was just getting worse and worse and worse. When would it end? He was starting to doubt that it ever would.

"I'm sorry."

He slammed his fists on the table and stood up, sending his chair toppling over. Arthur gasped, staring up at him in fear. He marched around the table and grabbed Arthur by the shoulders. "For the last Goddamn time, Arthur, I do not blame you. So stop apologizing to me! This isn't your fault! Okay? Not even this bound together thing. You didn't kill me, and you certainly didn't mean for this to happen. In fact, I…I'm glad it did. Because the alternative was you dying in my place. And that…that would be much, much worse than this. We'll work this out, somehow, some way. But you being dead…that wouldn't have worked out for anyone except Ivan and Yao." He rubbed Arthur's shoulders gently. "Okay, Arthur? Look, I know you feel responsible for all this, but it's not your fault. So please, please stop blaming yourself. Please."

Arthur looked ready to cry. Alfred pulled him to his feet and hugged him tightly, and Arthur pressed his face into Alfred's chest. Alfred could feel him stifling sobs. Alfred cringed. He had yet to consider the possible mental damage that Arthur had suffered from his confinement and torture. Arthur was really at wit's end here, and he was starting to crack. Alfred rubbed his back, trying to soothe him. Arthur needed to rest. He needed to fully recover from this situation, and yet, he couldn't. Because now Ivan was out there again, the Ivan that Arthur had worked so hard to beat four years ago. All of that work…worthless. And Arthur had been a part of bringing him back. Alfred couldn't imagine the stress and guilt that was eating away at Arthur. And he had absolutely no clue how to make this any better.

Arthur stiffened in his arms, and Alfred looked worriedly down at him. "What's wrong?"

His voice was a whisper. "Do you feel it?"

"Feel what?" Was something happening?

"Our heartbeats."

"What about them?"

"Hush. And feel for them."

Confused, Alfred focused his attention on their chests, searching for their heartbeats. He only found one.

No. That wasn't right.

There were two.

And they were exactly the same.

"Arthur…holy hell…we really are…"

Someone knocked loudly on the door, and Alfred's own voice filtered through. "Arthur, open up! It's us!"

They stared at each other for a few silent, tense seconds. Arthur beat him to it. "Don't speak a word of this."

Alfred shook his head. "Wouldn't dream of it."

Dro: One of the biggest revelations in the entire story right there. The long-reaching repercussions of this development are quite impressive.

Next Chapter: The confusing reunion of three pairs of doubles. Alfred confronts Matthew about the rape. Parallel!Arthur and Parallel!Alfred have their own personal reunion, during which Arthur realizes something startling. Oh, and Ludwig and Feliciano show up!