Slightly shorter chapter this time,

Please sit back, und ENJOY.

Arthur bandaged his hand again, muttering some unintelligible words to himself during the whole process. He truly did not understand what was wrong with the Italian's hand. While the Italian's head wound had healed completely, the thing on the hand had not changed in any way during the weeks since Feliciano's arrival at the Rock.

"I still don't get it, Feliciano." He finally blurted out as soon as he was done with the new, clean bandage.

"Hm? What?" The Italian asked, turning his attention towards the medic.

"I don't get what's wrong with your hand. I've read every medical book I still possess, every manual I have about Nightmares, which admittedly aren't that many, but still… I even checked all REDs information we gathered in this year too. But there is nothing with symptoms like this, not even remotely! I wish I could be more helpful." Arthur sighed, brushing a hand through his already messy hair.

Feliciano smiled, realizing this was a doctor's frustration of not being able to help a patient. "Hey, don't worry, Arthur. It doesn't hurt, so it's fine for me."

The Brit seemed to calm a bit down at that. "Thank you. Still, I need to find out what the bloody hell it is. And I sure will, I promise you that. Otherwise, what kind of raggedy doctor would I be?" he chuckled.

Feliciano nodded and gave a thumbs up for encouragement. "I believe you can. Uh, by the way, can I go now?" He sure appreciated Arthur's efforts, but having almost the same rant with every check, every day... it started to become a bit boring.

"Yes, of course."

The Italian was already almost out of the medical room when he noticed Arthur was not following him. "Aren't you coming?"

The Brit shook his head while smiling faintly, leaning on a table in the back. "No, Feliciano. I'll stay here and do some more research and study a bit. After all, I'm the only medic here, so need to be a good one. Please, could you make sure the curtain is closed well? Thank you."

Feliciano did so, and then went for a stroll.

It was almost midday, so the sunlight was falling perpendicularly into the caves who had the tiniest hole in their ceilings. Observing and randomly following the light patches on the stone floor, he decided to head to the cave with the hanging mirrors. It was like a garden in their home. It was the place where the vegetables they ate were grown, and there was always fresh air and sunlight, two things of the outside world that Feliciano had started to miss surprisingly quickly.

When he arrived, he saw Kiku reading a book in a corner, Berwald and Ludwig digging and turning over some ground in the field, working in almost complete silence.

Feliciano looked up, remembering what Mathias had told him some days earlier. The Rock gang had had many difficulties in the beginning in trying to grow something. For instance, the first problem was the obvious scarceness of light in caves and tunnels. That was solved first with the ridiculously lucky find of a cave with a hole in the ceiling, and then by hanging mirrors to improve its potential. Then, the second problem turned out to be the ground. The reason was that in the Rock's caves the floor was only rock and sand, not really qualified for growing food. So the stony floor had been broken with pickaxes, and then soil and ground from elsewhere had been brought there. It had taken weeks, of course, of harsh labour. "I have never been more tired in all my life!" the Dane had said, laughing. "And don't underestimate agriculture, growing food is almost as important and tiring as fighting Nightmares."

Feliciano smiled. Maybe he could help out with such a harsh job. Sure, he did not possess as much muscle as some other Rock inhabitants, but he could still be of some use, at least.

He approached the two working blonds, walking across the ploughed field. "Hello there! Everything okay? Can I help?"

Both men stopped working, one hoe and a shovel dropping deeply into the earth as they straightened up their backs to look at him. Berwald massaged the muscles of his neck a bit, while towering over the Italian. Ludwig glanced at him and cast him an unfriendly look, before concentrating on the ground again, resuming the work with the shovel.

"Hallå, F'liciano. Yes, yoo c'n help, 'f yoo want to. W' need s'me wat'ring in th't corner ov'r there." The tall Swede replied in his usual heavy accent, pointing at a corner of the field on his left.

"Sissignore!" the Italian replied grinning, saluting like a soldier but with the wrong hand.

Berwald nodded, the corners of his mouth twitching a bit (which meant he was smiling) as he grasped his hoe again with both hands. "Take th' watering can, it's there."

"Sure thing, boss." Feliciano replied, before making a beeline in the general direction of an old green watering can that leaned against the wall of the cave, together with other general gardening supplies. After picking it up, he started walking to the neighbouring cave, the only one that had some water: there was a small stream about ten centimetres deep and a meter of width, in fact. This cave was unusually dark compared to other caves of the Rock, where it was normal that at least a couple of sunrays could shine through cracks in the ceiling every now and then.

It was mostly because of that stream that the gang had decided to settle in the Rock. It was a constant supply of water, perfect for drinking, eating(soup) and washing either clothes or bodies. For these actions one had to gather the water from upstream, where the water was the cleanest. Downstream the water made a convenient turn behind a rock, and there was where people could relieve themselves of nature's obligatory bodily calls.

Feliciano knelt down and filled the can, absentmindedly whistling a tune, the origin of which he could not remember. He then walked back, and watered the sprouting plants, humming the tune still. The water finished very quickly, Feliciano noticed with a small bit of disappointment, so he walked back to repeat the operation. He did this several times, until the corner Berwald had pointed at was all done.

"Done!" he said triumphantly, putting the can down and saluting again, once more with the wrong hand. Berwald looked up, sweat dripping from his brow and his glasses threatening to fall from his nose. "Hn. Bra. N'w do th't corner, okay?" he said, pointing at another corner.

"Oh? Well, sure," The Italian was a bit surprised his job was not finished yet. But then again, it made sense that he should water the whole field, not only a corner.

Humming the nameless tune while the can was filling, he finally remembered a couple of words. "…Hm-hm-hm…Oh bella ciao…hm-hm-hm-hm…" it was a rhythmic and repetitive song, but still good. If he could only remember the words, or where he had heard it from, maybe he would feel less... well, memory-less. He felt a little bit as if he had a hole in his chest sometimes, and it scared him to think about how much information he had lost with his memory. Memory that somehow still seemed to be there sometimes, because he could remember some things, but they were always random. Sometimes his brain would decide to remember, most times it did not. And when he did remember something, it was usually something trivial, not really anything major. Like knowing what and where Finland or Italy were. What he asked himself was more important, but of course his scumbag brain would not find any information concerning those questions. Did he have a family? Friends? A gang like the Rock's? What did he do before and after the Disaster, how did he react to it when it had happened? What did he like and dislike, and were those things different from what he liked and disliked now? Was he still the same person, was he different all together from before or were there similarities? It was thoughts like these that sometimes popped up in his head in moments like this, or accompanied him to his sleep. He sighed. He would find out, maybe, one day, who he had been. Even he knew that it was useless to dwell on the past, especially if he did not really have one to dwell on right about now. He had made new friends, who would undoubtedly help him out, and he would help them as well when they needed it.

The sloshing sound of the full watering can suddenly almost slipping from his fingers snapped him back to reality. He stood up while shaking his head, deciding to stop thinking about all that, it made him uncomfortable.

He went back and forth multiple times. Fill the can, hum or whistle, water the earth, hum or whistle, fill can... again and again.

Slowly, bit by bit like a very difficult puzzle, he actually started to remember some words of the song, one by one. But even so, he somehow knew it was only one of the many refrains.

"Una mattina, mi son svegliato…

Oh bella ciao! Bella ciao! Bella ciao, ciao ciao!

Una mattina, mi son svegliato,

e ho trovato l'invasor."

He smiled triumphantly. You see, he had recovered something from his stupid memory. Optimistically, he told himself that one day he would remember everything.

He repeated it over and over like a broken record, although he lowered his humming to a low tone when he was walking in the mirrors cave, because the two blonds were working in almost absolute silence: he didn't want to shatter it so drastically.

Almost without noticing it, he spent the whole afternoon watering the earth, humming and singing all the time. Everything proceeded smoothly: Kiku kept reading, Berwald and Ludwig kept working.

He then made a clumsy mistake. Of course.

It was one of his last trips back to the mirrors cave, and he tripped over a rock he had not seen. With a short exclamation of surprise, he fell comically, almost face-first after losing grip on the watering can, which got thrown in the air with a graceful arc. He groaned, with his face in the ground, before propping himself up on his elbows to see where the can had landed.

However, when he looked up, he witnessed something both hilarious and terrifying at the same time. Ludwig, not too far from the place he had fallen, was soaking wet, with the watering can on his head. That was the funny part, mostly because of the stunned look on his face. His usually sternly slicked-back hair was now a mess, blond bangs were glued on his forehead and he was literally dripping. But then his face took on the shade of dark red, and the surprised look was replaced by a furious glare.

"Why you little-!" the German snarled, enraged, dropping his shovel and slamming the watering can from his head. He took a couple of threatening steps towards the fallen Italian, before brusquely pulling him to his feet by grabbing his shirt's collar.

Feliciano would not want to admit it, but he squeaked, suddenly very afraid and noticing just how tall and freakishly strong the German actually was. He would not have any problems bashing his face in with a well-placed fist, making him lose a couple of teeth in the process. "I-I-I-I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Please don't kill me! I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry!" these words started rolling of his tongue surprisingly fast.

Ludwig still glared at him, then growled and released him, muttering something German under his breath.

Feliciano had never felt more grateful to have both his feet on the ground again, and coughed a few times just to see if he could still breathe. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed two people approaching.

One of them was Kiku, who had stood up and was silently walking towards them with a look of concern.

The second one... "Hey, what's happening here? Ludwig, is that you?! Hahahahahahaha! What happened to your hair?! Did it finally start a revolution against all that gel you use? Bwahaha!" Mathias had walked in by pure chance, and promptly earned a murderous glare from the soaked blond.

"This idiot threw the watering can at my head." Ludwig snarled at the Dane, visibly aggressive, while pointing at Feliciano.

Mathias put his hands up in defence. "Man, it's just some water, calm down. You needed a shower anyway."

"I'm really sorry, Ludwig!" Feliciano blurted out, wanting nothing more but to be swallowed by the earth, as long as he could be as far away as physically possible from the German.

Said German turned to face him and stared him right in the eye. He opened his mouth, and started talking with what sounded like a forcefully calm voice: "And you. You… You are acting as if this all were a joke. We already have a clown here and that is Mathias, but even he is at least clever enough to understand when to quit joking. But you treat this situation so frivolously! We are hiding, verdammt! We are all trying to survive a world-wide apocalypse and you just keep frolicking around these caves singing and whistling as if it were a lovely Sunday afternoon." At this, Ludwig's voice dropped to a whisper, before yelling at the top of his lungs. "Well, let me tell you something. It's not, understand?! And let it be clear! To all of you! Because you all seem to have forgotten!" he ended up bellowing it to everyone present, and the caves' excellent echo carried his voice to all Rock inhabitants' ears.

The whole cave seemed to freeze. Ludwig was done shouting, he was slightly panting while his cold eyes slowly looked around at everyone. Kiku was standing at a small distance, but did not move at all while maintaining his poker face and intently observing the scene. Mathias and Berwald both simply stood, while Feliciano was slightly hunched, as if expecting to be hit any moment.

Surprisingly enough, Berwald was the first to un-freeze: he neared Feliciano and stood between him and the German, acting like a shield, ready to prevent any action against the Italian.

"Hey, st'p it." The tall Swede said.

Mathias also suddenly jumped into action, joining the Swede's side.

"Yeah, stop being such a bully. Look, you're scaring the hell out of the guy!" He said, pointing at the Italian.

Feliciano had not noticed it himself, but apparently he looked very scared. Well, he felt very scared, that was for sure, and he could almost swear his legs were made of spaghetti, barely managing to hold up his weight.

Ludwig blinked, astonished, looking at the two Nordics confronting him. "You... you are…defending him? Why? Can't you see there's just something wrong with this guy?! Can... can you even trust him?" he was visibly baffled, and was struggling to find the words to explain what apparently was very obvious to him.

Mathias stepped forward, for once with a serious look on his face. "Listen, Ludwig. I know you have trust issues, but if Feliciano wanted to kill us he could have done it more than a dozen times already. He cooks every evening for us, and judging by the skills he has, he could have easily poisoned us if he really wished to. Seriously, just listen to yourself for once! Sure he's a bit weird but he has to adjust a bit, he has lost his memory, remember? And really, does he seriously look like a killer to you? Dang it, of course I trust him!"

Ludwig's face morphed from a confused frown into a disgusted snarl. "...You can do what you want. But know that at this rate, he's going to get us all killed. Don't come crying to me when it all starts going to hell." He then shook his head, turned around and walked away without another word. Had there been a door, he would have slammed it.

The two Nordics exhaled in relief.

Kiku suddenly appeared beside the trembling Italian. "Are you okay, Feliciano-kun?"

"Oh god, Kiku, that was so scary...!" the Italian blurted out, grabbing the Japanese's shoulder for support with two hands as his knees finally buckled under him. He looked up at the two blonds. "Thank you for sticking up for me, Mathias, Berwald. I was really afraid he would pound my face in the dirt..."

"Hey, don't worry about it, big guy," Mathias jokingly replied, "And especially don't worry about him. He has always had a stick up is ass, especially for new people."

Berwald smacked the back of the Dane's head, resulting in an "Ow!"

"He j'st needs to g't us'd to ya." The Swede explained.

Mathias grinned. "And until then, we won't let him bully you, 'kay?"

Feliciano smiled weakly, still feeling a bit faint. "Thank you, guys."

…Later, that evening…

"Goodn'ght ev'ryone."

"Oyasumi nasai, minna."

"Feliciano, you need to stop cheating. It's nearly impossible to play games normally now!"

"Oh come on, cut the kid some slack, I have never had so much fun playing cards before he came around."

"Shut it Mathias, it's not how the games work, they have rules for a reason!"

"Yeah, boring rules. Anyway, goodnight, 'Artie'."

"Do not call me Artie, you wanker! I hope you have nightmares tonight and choke on your own drool!"

"I'm sorry Tino, but what does 'wanker' mean?"

"Eeuh, I'll tell you another time, okay Feli? Hyvää yötä!"

"Buonanotte!"

They all went to bed, each with their own level of weariness and sleepiness.

Feliciano sighed as he plopped down on his mattress, his thoughts briefly stopping to wonder where Ludwig had been all day. He hadn't even shown up at dinner, and no one else had seen him the whole day after he had stormed off. He sighed again while laying down. He just hoped he had not angered him beyond the point of no return, so that the German would hate him forever after the accident. He did not wish to make enemies, or even only make anyone angry, he just wanted everyone to get along, especially in such a difficult time.

Staring at the ceiling while going over these thoughts, he slowly but surely drifted into a deep sleep, the tiredness of the day pulling at his eyelids and aching in his muscles.

His sleep was suddenly interrupted as he suddenly jerked up, sweating and panting as if he'd been running a marathon. He had had that nightmare again, the one in which he kept falling. He exhaled deeply, wiping his forehead while trying to erase the lingering scary feeling he got from that nightmare

As soon as the back of his hand made contact with his heated forehead, he winced, hand instinctively jerking away as if it had been electrocuted.

Wait. What was that about? He was still half asleep, so he stupidly repeated the gesture, wincing again. It was his right, bandaged hand.

He was fully awake now, and strained his eyes to observe what was wrong with his hand. It throbbed faintly, because it had apparently swollen under the bandages, but it only seriously hurt when the back of the hand touched something.

Feliciano felt a twinge of fear, a cold shiver ran down his spine. What if it really was a Nightmare infection symptom? Would he become one of those... things? Of course he would, there was no cure. And the Rock gang would definitely throw him out as soon as they discovered it, because no matter how much they liked him, they could not compromise everyone. And he would not blame them, they were right, it would be the logical thing to do. But then he would be alone again, all alone and dealing with the fact that he would soon become a Nightmare.

He shook his head quickly, wanting to get rid of those depressing thoughts. He was dramatising things, it could be something silly, maybe Arthur had tightened the bandages too much and that was why it was swollen. But he also had to admit that he did not really feel well, wither. The nightmare was gone, but he was still feeling feverish, and it felt as if something were stirring in his guts - nausea. He was still panting, and he decided he definitely needed some fresh air.

He slowly walked out of his room, plodding towards the mirror cave, where the air was the freshest. Once he got there however, he found out he still felt like chocking over the lack of oxygen. He guessed he had to get out completely, then.

He walked the long path that brought him through the dining cave, the cave where the jeep was parked and the long, contorted entrance, until he finally felt some cool, dry breeze on his face. He was finally outside.

A half moon shone in the night sky, and the stars twinkled merrily, far above him. The desert and occasional boulders around the Rock were tinted in blue and silvery hues, far below him.

He inhaled deeply, closing his eyes and stretching his back, feeling slightly better already. But something was still wrong, and this time it was not the already leaving nausea. For some reason he now felt tense, and nervous, even though he should have no reason to feel like that.

He decided he would sit somewhere to relax himself a little, but as his eyes scanned around for a suitable spot, he noticed, some meters below him, a familiar blonde head.

Ludwig was sitting on a rock, resting his chin on his palm, looking at something far away but not really seeing. hand. He looked tired. Not really surprising, since it was the middle of the night.

Feliciano thought about leaving without disturbing the blond any further, but then he saw something that mad the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.

There was a Nightmare, perched on a higher rock, aiming at Ludwig and ready to pounce.

Feliciano started running. "WATCH OUT!"

That's all, folks!
I hope you enjoyed it, I like how the re-writing is processing so far :)

See you next time!

...

Hallå: (Swedish) Hello.

Sissignore!: (Italian) Yessir!

Bra: (Swedish) Good.

Verdammt!: (German) Damn it!

Oyasumi nasai, minna: (Japanese) Goodnight, everyone.

Bella ciao: The song "Bella ciao" was sung by the anti-fascist resistance movement active in Italy between 1943 and 1945, the Resistenza. The author of the lyrics is unknown; the music and spirit of the song is based on a folk song sung by rice-weeders on the River Po basin in the early part of the 20th century – "Alla mattina appena alzata". In addition to the original Italian, the song has been recorded by various artists in many other different languages and is still popular - everyone in Italy has heard it at least once and knows at least a couple of verses thanks to their simplicity. [This is my personal reference to the first fanfiction I fell in love with, "Auf Wiedersehen, Sweetheart" by George deValier.]

Una mattina, mi son svegliato: One morning, I woke up,

Oh bella ciao (x5)! : Oh beauty bye (x5)!

E ho trovato l'invasor: And I found the invader.