His body slumped against the brick wall and slowly slid down to the cold ground.

So what if it was covered in chewing gum and cigarette butts? So what if it probably carried more germs than month-old sushi? So what if he was next to a dumpster that smelled like something had died in it? He was outside, wasn't he? Out in the fresh air, and the wide, open…

He was getting too old for this.

"Sir?"

It was the store attendant, viewing him with a concerned expression. Of course. He had run out rather quickly, hadn't he?

"Sir, are you feeling alright?" asked the attendant. "You looked a little panicked back there."

"Hai, I am fine," Japan replied. "I apologise most sincerely if I startled you, it's simply that I was in desperate need of fresh air."

'And the walls,' he added in the privacy of his mind. 'I could have sworn that the walls were closing in around me…'

"Will you be alright?" the attendant inquired.

He didn't want to reply for fear of making himself look like a fool. Japan stood up, gave the attendant a bow of farewell and started to make his way back home.

The evening air tasted fresh and clean on his tongue and he breathed as deeply as he could, savouring every last ounce of it. Alright, there was probably some much purer air out in the country, but anything was practically cleanliness incarnate compared to the cold, stale air of… that place.

No. He had sworn not to think about it ever again.

But still…

He didn't dare mention it to anybody. As far as he knew, most of the other nations were fine. Or at least, they were recovering. He knew Italy-kun had been discharged from hospital a few days ago and was currently trying to adjust to life pushed around by his bitter elder brother (in the literal sense) and Germany-san appeared to have found a way to move without dying of blood loss. He hadn't made much contact with any of the others, preferring instead to remain inside his home.

Even then, it was never for very long. Ever since he had returned to it, the house had felt tight and cramped. Had somebody shrunk it while he was imprisoned? If so, they were a serial shrinker: every building he entered, at least the ones with corridors and small rooms, had felt as though they were gradually getting smaller and smaller the more time he spent in them.

And just then, in the shop, he could have sworn the aisles were closing in on him, coming to crush him and grind him into dust-

He shook his head. This was foolish.

This wall seemed awfully close. Would he get into trouble if he walked down the middle of the road? It was the most spacious part of the street, after all, and the notion of wide open spaces was an extremely pleasant one. Better than a cramped alleyway or a tunnel, where the walls and floors were so close to each other-

Japan stopped momentarily. He thumped his head.

'What is wrong with me?' he thought.

A streetlamp flickered on overhead and bathed his body in yellow light as the sun dipped below the horizon. The dark haired man looked out at the street and sighed: he remembered, as though it was only yesterday, when this place was all tall trees brimming over with cherry blossoms and rolling hills and plains of fresh green grass. Such big plains, nothing blocking his view of the brilliant blue sky, nothing coming in from above and below and to his sides to crush him into nothing more than a lifeless gut-strewn pulp, just like the ground and this wall were right now-

This wasn't NATURAL!

He pinched his brow and rubbed his forehead, trying to work some sense back into his mind. Why? What was with this fear of walls? Well, not so much walls as the small spaces they surrounded… the small, cramped spaces… which were definitely always getting smaller the more he looked at them, the more he thought about how they were shrinking…

"Call yourself a nation? A useless little piece of shit like you couldn't even represent a goddamn anthill…"

His hand wandered down to his right cheek, running his fingertips along the thin cut which still had yet to heal completely. It was little more than a ridge now: it rose about half a millimetre above the rest of his skin and was a little darker in hue, but to Japan it was like having Mt. Fuji stuck to his cheek.

Surely it was supposed to have gone by now, right?

At least he wasn't the odd one out anymore. Now all former members of the Axis Powers had scars: Italy-kun on his arm, Germany-san on his back and now Japan on his face.

"You worthless scum make me sick to my core… if Her Ladyship didn't need your soul so much, I'd carve you to pieces right here, in this tiny cell where nobody can hear you scream…"

He winced, swearing he could feel the needle-sharp corner of the razor piercing his skin.

"…but I'm feeling generous, so I'll leave you with a reminder of who's in charge around here…"

And then it was dragged along his cheek, carving his face open and spilling blood all over his dirty white and gold uniform, and then the stranger whom he had never even seen before turned away, and the door grew closer and closer-

-and stopped, just before it hit him.

"Get out of the road, you idiot!" yelled the driver of the car, who thankfully had hit the brake in time. It was the screeching of his tires on the road which had snapped Japan out of his trance, and he was thankful for it.

"H-hai," he stammered, "I apologise, w-watashi wa ayamaru, I'm sorry, w-wata-watashi o yurushite k-kudasai." He stepped back onto the pavement and watched the still angry man speed away.

Then he looked back up at the suburban area he had somehow wandered into. Was he getting so old he had no idea where he was going?

Maybe he should take a break.

And he knew just the person for it.

Japan pulled his mobile phone out of the depths of his coat pocket, knowing that it would still be around lunchtime in Europe, dialled the number and held it up to his ear, waiting anxiously for somebody at the other end to pick up.

Eventually they did, and it took all of the elder nation's self-control to avoid sighing into the mouthpiece.

"Hello?" was the sleepy reply he received. Why was he never more than half awake?

"Hai, Greece-san?" said Japan. "It's Japan. I apologise if I have called you at a bad time."

"No, it's fine," answered Greece. "You don't usually call me like this, are you alright? I heard about what happened with Atlantis. It must have been rather traumatising."

Japan gulped, hoping the noise wouldn't be audible along the phone lines. These were memories which he would like to have erased from his mind.

"That is in fact the purpose for my disturbance," he explained. "I was only wondering if it would be possible for me to visit you and maybe stay in your home for a few days. I apologise if it would be inconvenient and of course, you can feel free to decline."

There was a long pause. Several more cars drove past, Japan was thankful that he had no idea where the nearest phone booth was, and he began to wonder if his friend on the other end had fallen asleep.

"Of course," was the eventual reply. "I would enjoy that."

'I'm certain you would,' said Japan in the privacy of his mind.

"Perhaps I could give you another private lesson?"

But… but that was supposed to have been a dream!

"I'll think about it," Japan replied. "Arigato, Greece-san."

"It's nothing, really," said Greece. "I'll see you on the next plane from Tokyo."

And with that the conversation was over, and Japan slipped the phone back into his pocket.

Now he just had to find his way home. He would need to pack, and to find somebody to take care of Pochi while he was gone, and get to the airport before the next flight to Athens left without him.

He couldn't wait to be back there, with the beautiful and fascinating ruins of days long past, the cats which seemed as though they were magnetically attracted to the nation with the perpetually messy hair and eyes as green as the sea…

…and, of course, enough wide open areas to satisfy his thirst for space.