None Can Die, Starvation, Tristan, Paper Stars.

This is the chapter Lovi got his claws in and refused to let go of. Tumblr knows of this chapter.

Also, for those of you willing to brave it, two scrapped chapters of Recovery were placed on my tumblr blog under the "Recovery Spare Content" button. These chapters contain the original plan for Feli's development and the GerIta subplot that has been very quietly not letting itself manifest in this version of the story. Check it out for cutie babies!

Right and: AUSSIE ANON I BLAME YOU. This is what happens when consistent reviewers make themselves known to me, I add content I didn't actually need because hey-why-not! Click-Clock and Reporter D get bonus points for catching the reference, because I was very very worried about it (although I don't know why...).

Recovery

Hellspawn

"So he's going to be okay? How?"

"Look, I don't know, okay?" Romano wanted these Micro-nations out of Italy. He'd boot them across the border if he had to, he just needed them gone. "I just came up from the god-damned morgue, give me a minute will you?"

"This is important to us too!" Having them follow him around the hospital cafeteria was not helping the throbbing pain in his skull right now. Who was the stupid British kid again? "My name is Sealand and I'm not British!"

"Should you really be eating after what you saw down there?" The other one, tall, dirty-blonde and wearing an obnoxious indigo cape, decided to peer right over Romano's shoulder as he unwrapped a stale hospital sandwich and shoved one corner of the so-called panini in his mouth. It wasn't even worth it to chew and swallow before turning around to look at the three of them: the black-haired American, the pseudo-Australian, and the short not-British kid.

"I haven't eaten in twenty hours, I haven't slept in thirty-six. You wanna help me?" Digging one hand into his pocket, his right hand maneuvered the dry food up to his mouth for another starved bite. Romano flashed a ten euro note at the three and watched the posh one with the bandage over his cheek fold his arms. "Go across the street and get me a not-shit coffee from that café." Not that caffeine would make his headache any better, unless it was just withdrawal he was feeling, but Romano wasn't holding out much hope.

"Don't you have soldiers to do that?" Australia's whelp needed to watch that attitude because Romano was in no mood to cater to him. He'd just spent all morning at his brother's bedside, it was just past noon and what had been waiting for him down in the morgue had done things to his insides that he wasn't quite comfortable with. It was hard to see someone with almost the exact same head-wound as Seborga, especially a human, especially a woman.

The man with three bullets in his back had made his blood boil though. Romano had almost ordered the tattoos burned off his corpse before throwing it in the sea- but they couldn't do that. As much as he wanted to, that southern son of his was going to find his way home and into a family plot. It made Romano sick just thinking about it, his skull was getting ready to split open from the stress.

"They're off doing useful shit, you three are just standing here bothering me." So if he didn't get that coffee then he'd choke on this terrible bread, and maybe a bottle of water would do more to help stop the throbbing.

"Fine- fine! I'll do it." The blonde boy with sad blue eyes and a wrinkled green sweater grabbed the money and turned to look up at his friends. The American in the black leather jacket just kind of shook his head, but it was that tall guy from the southern hemisphere the boy was worried about. "Hutt? Do you want anything?"

"No." Pissy little shit. Romano would have to call Australia later, which would be a pain because he was notorious for treating his Micro-nations like family. Not that they weren't, but…

The two of them stood there for a few moments just prodding the one guy with the cape, and Romano ignored them to go back to the little food stand and pick up a bottle of water.

He was waiting under the bright lights for the Sergeant to come back. The sun had already burnt through the clouds from that morning so there was sunlight streaming in from windows and a skylight over their heads, the rays bouncing off the pale linoleum flooring and washing out the colours on the food labels and hospital scrubs. Romano handed over a few more euros to pay for the liquid before he cracked the seal and gulped down several mouthfuls of water, the light was killing him.

The girl behind the counter didn't say anything, but when he got ready to walk away a tug on his sleeve brought him back around to a pair of sad brown eyes. He looked hurt and weary enough for a northern girl to reach out and unexpectedly touch his face, and South Italy was actually tired and shaken enough to lean into the affectionate gesture and close his eyes for a moment.

China was right and that scared him, but Romano had been too far away from the general Italian population for too long. They could sense it, and he missed them, and he didn't want to think about how much Veneziano must have been hurting from it too…

"Please be okay." She whispered, and South Italy's answer was to take her hand when it began to slip and gently turn it over, placing a kiss against the backs of her fingers before trying to smile. The emphasis was on try, because when he managed to turn around again and found that Australian Micro-nation standing in front of him, his strength and patience were wearing thin.

"Can we see him now?" Who did he think he was trying to impress with that stern look and hard-line mouth? "Please, we waited for you to come and now-"

"He didn't ask for you." So Romano wasn't even going to entertain the idea. "That's my rule: if he doesn't ask for you, he doesn't see you."

"I didn't want him to go in there." Well that was too bad. None of them had been close enough to stop it, so Romano wasn't going to hear about how sorry they were that it had happened. Drinking more of his water, he made himself chew and swallow more of the sandwich he'd bought. Romano looked past the desperate face of the younger man in front of him and saw his Sergeant come out from around a corner: time to go.

"Hutt…" The American, hmm, it was hard not to like him just because of his accent and origins, but that was a dangerous game to play with Micro-nations. This man was not "American" in the normal sense, so when he set a hand on his "Australian" friend's shoulder, Romano tried cutting away from both of them.

Then he stopped short, because something occurred to him.

"Hey, do those work?" Ah, he was being such a dick asking something like this right now, but both Micro-nations blinked and looked at him. He was pointing with one finger at the sunglasses perched on top of the almost-American's black hair. "These damned lights are giving me a headache, I might send your little friend to get me a pair."

"Sealand is not your errand boy!" Watch your mouth, Australian.

"And I'm this close to either having you thrown out of this hospital, or shoved on a plane back to your continent." His hands were full, Romano didn't get to gesture how close this close was, but he didn't have to. "I don't think you understand what it means to make yourself useful, so why don't you just shut up instead?"

"This wasn't our fault!"

"Hutt- Hutt stop it." The American jumped between them but Romano wasn't angry enough to take a swipe at the tantruming two year old. He wasn't angry at all, really. Of course he was irritated, but he just didn't have it in him to waste what little energy he had on someone who was completely and utterly insignificant. "Stop, please stop, you know this won't help." No it wouldn't, it hadn't, and it wasn't about to. "Here, Mr. Italy just-"

Romano watched and was surprised when the American whipped the sunglasses off his head and held them out to him. He'd mentioned wanting a pair, but that was a little excessive, no?

"If it's the only way to help then take them, please, we only tried to help." He took them, holding the light plastic frames by two fingers like they'd turn into a mouse and try to bite him. They were cheap things now that he actually had them close enough to inspect, he could find better in no time at all.

But putting them on instantly cut the harsh florescent glare down to something his exhausted eyes could handle. Downing the last of his water, Romano tossed the bottle into the bin next to him and wrapped up what remained of his terrible sandwich for later. It was nice to actually be able to open his eyes without feeling the drum beat on the sides of his skull. The slender black lenses didn't block all of the light, but they also weren't quite as opaque as Romano had mistaken them for.

"Sir, he's ready to see you." The Sergeant was next to him and Romano nodded, looking away from the two Micro-nations as the taller one, Molo-something, had his hands on his friend's shoulders and was fighting to keep him from losing his temper.

"Let's go." The Sergeant nodded and Romano had barely gone four steps when he heard:

"So southern mobsters attack and kill our friend, and South Italy blames us?" Oh.

Oh no.

Oh no, no, no.

South Italy was not playing this fucking game right now.

"Listen, I don't know who you think you are-" Ah, the Sergeant spoke English, that was nice. Romano set a hand on the man's shoulder when he turned around to confront the pair, cutting him off gently while he pulled his cell phone from his coat pocket and thumbed across the screen. He didn't turn around to look at the pair, he just heard the almost-American groan something about the other needing to just shut up.

There was a text message icon hovering in the corner, but Romano ignored it as he found a name and call button instead, lifting the device to his ear.

China said he didn't have a politically-savvy bone in his body, and Romano was okay with that.

"Hello? I was just gettin' to bed, Italy, what's-?"

"Ciao, Australia."

"Damn it, no!"

"Hutt! Christ, stop it!"

He didn't have to be political because being honest could take him just as far, and so could being firm, nevermind just not giving a fuck: "I want you to contact your officials in Rome and tell them one of your citizens will be waiting for them in an Italian holding cell."

"...Shit." Because honesty just happened to work on young nations like this one, and he didn't care what kind of racket the Micro-nation behind him was trying to make because Australia couldn't hear it and just got on with it. "Do you mean like citizen-citizen or something else?"

"Something else." Someone else. "Unless you can convince your loud-mouth son to bite his tongue and go home like a good little boy." Australia groaned, and before he could ask anything else or Romano could let the words he wanted to say bubble up through his throat, he ended the call with a light tap on the sensitive screen. He could practically hear the temper getting ready to snap behind him, but he didn't turn around.

"I am not a child-!" And there was the ring-tone he could guess was coming from the Australian's pocket. England's old colony worked fast when he wanted to, he had a parent's ear when it came to listening for his children in danger.

"No, you're a Micro-nation." Romano stated, scrolling through a few menus to find that message he'd skipped over. He still wouldn't turn around and look at them, it was beneath him to give them this much acknowledgement. "You're small and weak, you're barely recognized, and yet you seem to think you're more entitled than half of Europe." So if he didn't pick up that call and do exactly what Australia said… "Sergeant, they're your business now. If he doesn't leave, escort him. If he resists, arrest him."

"Yes sir."

"What's going on..?" The not-British boy was back, and Romano took the tiny paper cup out of his hands, waving off the change left over from paying for the drink. The boy's blue eyes were locked on the tension and fighting behind Romano, and the Nation just cared that there was liquid energy hiding under the plastic lid as he lifted the cup for inspection.

Espresso? Good choice. Behind him he could hear muffled English words with a heavy Australian accent pouring into a one-way conversation, and without a look back or an explanation for England's not-brother, Romano started walking again.

Black espresso was too bitter even for him, but Romano sipped the caffeine-heavy brew and moved quickly down the white corridors looking for the hospital's chapel. The stark colour wasn't lost on him, but behind the sunglasses he'd been given the environment was a bit easier to handle. There were several turns he had to make to get there, travelling to an entirely different wing of the complex, but he knew he'd be able to find his way back to Seborga's room as soon as he was done.

As frustrating as it was, Romano stopped again just as he was about to push the chapel door open, because he looked down at the text message staring up at him on the screen:

Is he okay?

He didn't know that number. It wasn't programmed into his phone, and Romano took another quick drink of his coffee before awkwardly sending back an answer. This message was only about ten minutes old…

Who wants to know?

…Shit, he couldn't just stand out here waiting for a ghost to answer him, there was a human just past these doors that he- the phone dinged:

I do.

Why was everyone intent on messing with him today?

And you are…?

He had work to do, damn it. This wasn't San Marino's number, and even if the Vatican ever got a cell phone he'd probably need a month to figure out how to make a call, nevermind text people. Romano held the device in the palm of his hand for a few moments, swallowing more of the intensely bitter brew in his cup and hoping the combination of bad food and strong coffee wouldn't make him sick. Ding.

Vargas.

No, no, no, stop. Just stop it, alright? He didn't need some joker sending his own name back at him.

That's it?

Hah, fuck you! No nation could just guess one of their human names. Romano only knew two others aside from his, but this strange person? If they sent back "Lovino" then he'd know it was someone trying to mess with him, and Luca's cell phone was dead and sitting on the table next to his hospital bed. He didn't know why he insisted on just standing out here though, so even if his phone went ding again, Romano slipped it into his pocket without checking the reply. He tipped his head back for the last of his coffee, and before the caffeine could crash on him he crumpled the cup in a fist and pushed open the swinging door.

The chapel was a quiet chamber, not a full church, with stained glass panels lit by electric lights, no candles, and simple white wood pews and a long black cross nailed to the far wall. There was probably a priest on duty somewhere, either a volunteer or hired by the hospital, but he wasn't here now and there was only one other man in the room.

Seborga's boss was kneeling in the first row in front of the holy symbol, Romano crossing himself out of simple respect before tossing his cup away in the trash and walking down the aisle. He didn't want this to take very long, he couldn't even remember what the human's name was supposed to be, and he just wanted to go back upstairs to his brother.

"Sir?" It was never easy to interrupt someone in the middle of a prayer, but Romano barely had to say the word before the man's head snapped up from where he'd bowed it over his folded hands. Seborga's boss was wearing a light grey suit, but it was wrinkled and looked like he'd been in it for more than a few days, his short hair slightly grey in the dim light. He wasn't wearing a tie when he quickly looked over his shoulder and then scrambled to his feet, but it surprised Romano when he left the row of benches behind and stood in the aisle in front of him, just a yard or two of distance between them.

"Tell me you aren't one of them." The nation kept his hands in his pockets and the human looked frightened. He sounded frightened, he was speaking with a breathless tone of voice.

"No sir. I'm from the Government." He was about half the government, actually. "I just need you to talk to me for a bit. I'm very sorry for your loss, but-"

"No, I mean one of them." Ah, what? Romano frowned slightly and almost forgot he was wearing sunglasses: it wasn't actually that dim in here. The man was shaking his head and took an uneasy step back, lifting one hand slowly like he could block him. "Please, you probably don't understand, just-"

"I'm sorry, one of who?"

"Them: the demons." Um. Demons. Right.

But this man had seen his wife and at least one other person shot dead right in front of him. Romano didn't know a lot about him, but something like that usually shook a civilian to their core. He could be patient with him, even if he wasn't really Italian he wasn't that damned Australian.

"I think you should sit down, sir. Have you had anything to eat?" The food here was crap, but the human was looking more wide-eyed and scared. Romano'd asked the Sergeant to make sure he was calm and could handle being spoken to, but if he was this unstable then he'd have to send someone else to work with him. Romano couldn't afford to take days or weeks trying to coax answers out of him. "I'm not a, ah, demon, but I need you to talk to me about the men who took your wife away."

"She wasn't taken, she was murdered." Well that was blunt. Romano flinched a bit and wondered just how much of his face the sunglasses hid. "But those men, they were taken." The human was rambling, this wasn't going to work.

"Taken by what?" But he had to try. "Sir, you can help this investigation by telling us what you know. How long have those men been visiting you? Do you know where they were staying in the area? Any information-"

"I can tell you that that beast lives alone in a house on the hill!" Wait, beast? There was no reason to shou- "I've worked with him for years, I actually believed what he told me! A nation in one little body? More like the devil dancing in a corpse!" Oh no- "You didn't see it! You think I'm crazy!" No he didn't, he just- "That headless thing- with blood everywhere!" Stop, stop- "A monster. They should burn that building, salt the ground so it can't rise again! They're keeping it in this hospital!" Romano lifted both hands and tried to show he meant no harm, staring through the tinted lenses at a look of pure horror staring him in the face, life-altering terror shaking the human being's tiny world.

"Sir, I need you to calm down!" Oh God, why was he reacting like this? Seborga had been running off pure instinct after he'd been shot. The Micro-nations and his brother had told him so: Seborga had barely any memory of what had happened, and that Aussie twit had the bruises to show how hard it had been to stop him from rampaging.

But this was Seborga's boss, his prince. He wasn't supposed to shout devil and demon like this, he should have been in awe, or just confused, maybe even grateful. He should have been calling him an angel, a guardian, an avatar of God sent to protect what was his. That was what Italian ministers and Kings had called Romano for centuries, even the Spanish officials who had ruled him for half a millennium had looked on him with respect, especially after the violence of a war or rebellion. Patriots always saw God in their Nations, why else would they fight for King and Country? Why was this the reaction he was having?

"The Principality was badly injured, but he's not dead, your highness." Romano almost choked on the title, but that was just what happened when you tried to flatter a foreign politician. Highness, Majesty, Grace, all of those got stuck in the throat. "Once he's recovered a bit more, I'm sure-"

"It should be dead!" He just found himself staring now, because the shouting wouldn't stop. "This is what a couple hundred idealists in the mountains can do? They can create some immortal super-soldier, summon it from hell itself to do their bidding? This isn't what I agreed to! A mascot, fine! Some boy to wear an old robe and sit in on council meetings, that's why I said I'd rule over. A demon? A devil? My soul is worth more than that!"

"It's an idea made real!" Calm down, calm down! "You can't kill a nation's spirit with a bullet, I'm sorry you had to see him like that, but- but it…" Romano was struggling to find anything he could say. How the hell was he supposed to explain their existence to a man who was obviously and completely rejecting them? Where was he from? Who had he belonged to before Seborga? He certainly wasn't Italian, that sounded like French he was-

"Where were you born, sir?" He got a stupid look for asking, but Romano pushed for an answer. "Where? You must be a citizen of someplace other than Seborga."

"Monaco- a beautiful place." Then it made sense why Romano couldn't feel that heat in his gut, he couldn't reach down for the power to calm and compel this man for some kind of result. Even one of Veneziano's people would have been easier to satisfy. "But what does that have to do with anything! Monaco is a real place, it's not some imaginary-"

"Don't!"

He didn't mean to scream the word, but he had to. It pushed the criminals and their webs out of the picture completely, because something even more terrifying and wrong than the syndicates burrowing into his brothers' flesh flashed in front of him, and he had to stop that first.

"He is not imaginary." The human was staring at him and Romano tried to bring his voice back up to a proper pitch, swallowing air and filling his lungs with dread. "He's not some joke, or a prank, God wouldn't have given him life if that was all he was." Seborga had had many chances to slip away into the annals of history. He'd almost done it a few times, and there had been events where maybe Romano or Veneziano had sort of hoped he would just vanish, because that was what consolidating one kingdom out of many just required sometimes. But things were different now. In this century industries worked differently, money moved in new ways, borders didn't have the same meaning anymore: why else would the bloodbath of Europe have slowly started consolidating itself into one large Union? Seborga didn't have to die the way Genoa, Tuscany and Piedmont had been put to rest, he'd been too small during the unification and almost inconsequential since then.

But he was still real. And he was just too small to have his own monarch tell him he wasn't worth letting live. He was a Micro-nation, not big enough to feel the effects of most crises, but too small to survive the rare few that worked from the ground up to destroy a society. Between corrupted networks of theft and intimidation on the bottom and hateful, dismissive words spewed from the top, even San Marino or Lichtenstein would have had to worry about their health. For Seborga…

"You're one of them-" This human thought his brother didn't deserve to live? Did he think his precious Monaco was any different? If Romano put a bullet through her head did this human think Monaco would die out and collapse the way his precious wife had? He would never do something like that, but the thought occurred to him, and it stuck. "Oh God, you're one of them!"

Yes he was, and Romano was no puny Micro-nation either. With the sunglasses hiding whatever was burning in his eyes, the nation set his lips together firmly, chin up as he kept his tongue between his teeth so he wouldn't clench and grind his jaws together. He made his hands relax inside his pockets so they weren't bulging out at his hips, letting the black wool fall straight and narrow around his body.

The human was backing up slowly, panic clear on his face as he scrambled up the two shallow steps to get from the chapel floor to the low dais with the cross hanging high on the wall. Romano let him go and didn't chase after him, just shifted his stance so he knew he was taking up the middle of the aisle, blocking the only available exit.

Fuck you, China. Rome had taught the Vatican everything he knew about commanding attention and respect. In the Roman way it was all the better for it if respect bled into fear, so he seized both.

"I am." He'd said no when he'd thought the man meant mafia, or camorra, or any other crime organization sinking their claws into his brothers, but Romano would cut off his own arm before denying who and what he really was. And he would never be ashamed of using the power or authority he was calling on now: "And you will be held by the Italian authorities, for your own protection, while you co-operate with a federal investigation into the corrupt practices of the Seborgan administration."

"No- no which one are you? No!" Yes. Romano wasn't going to let this man go, and God help Monaco if she tried to fight him on this. God help France if he thought for a moment of getting involved on her behalf.

"You will be bound by a gag order concerning this investigation, barring you from speaking publicly on any topic referencing the Principality of Seborga. I don't care if you talk about me, sing to your heart's content, but you will leave my little brother alone or suffer for it in one of my prisons." He hissed the words without moving, back straight and voice carrying clearly in the quiet sanctuary. The human was terrified, animalistic fear weeping off his body like a heavy musk, too much emotional strife and physical exhaustion robbing him of all presence as a professional and politician.

Good.

Romano didn't give his name, the man could barely take in enough air to keep himself going, nevermind gasp the question again. But right now he was the Italian Republic, and as he turned and strode sharply out of the room, his ears were roaring with the blood surging through his veins. He needed to find one of his officers and make sure the man in the chapel couldn't get away, Romano wouldn't let anything happen to him: the only people who would be better protected were his family members.

Speaking of whom, it was only as he came back out into the hall and felt the light needling him over the rim of the sunglasses that he heard the soft ding in his pocket. It had taken the ghost writer this long to answer him, and South Italy pulled out the device with indignation ready to burst. But instead of that satisfying crescendo, he was met with:

General Feliciano Vargas of the San Marco Quarter, of the city of Venice, of the region of Veneto, representative of the Northern Half of the Republic of Italy. Now answer me.

Romano stared down at the message and punched in the only thing he could manage:

About damned time.

I am no closer to finishing 32 than I was last week, except for the multitude of scrapped scenes settled between 32 and 34. I was not panicking before. I am panicking now.

Please review? next week, chapter 30!