There may be an even longer break between chapters for my Hetalia stories because I've temporarily fallen out of the Hetalia fandom and right into the KagePro/MekakuCity Actors fandom (THE ANIME THE ANIME THE ANIME THE)(with several beautiful plot bunnies distracting me each way I turn), but hey, I'm not going to waste all the words I have stored up in assorted notebooks for this story, so don't worry about me discontinuing this. We still have a long way to go. ^^
This chapter also features a little personal headcannon of mine, that Hong Kong and Macau have a weird sort of mental connection with China at times because they're Special Administrative Regions and still rely on him a lot. I think. It sounds really stupid when I explain it here. But since China surrounds them, and they basically came from him (cue image of HK & Macau sprouting off China's arm like a tumor) they have a connection? That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
(Oh, and I refer to the other nations watching as 'the audience' for lack of a better term...even though it doesn't make sense OTL)
Language warning: Contains Romano.
Review! :D
The building was crowded full of nations.
Hong Kong sat at a table with the remainder of his family, tapping his fingers along the edge. The plan they'd cooked up was shaky at best, absolute suicide at worst, but it might work. If they were lucky. And nations were notoriously bad at cooperating, so this would probably end up with half the nations on "temporary leave". Because, you know, when nations died, they sure took their sweet time coming back. Springing fully formed from the depths of their land, they'd have at least a year of paperwork and information to catch up on.
And if any of them 'died' this go round, it'd be too late by the time they came back.
His tapping increased in speed, and Taiwan closed her hand over them. He turned to look at her, and she smiled gently. "Your tapping is driving me crazy," she said, and Hong Kong removed his fingers from the table, running over the hideous plan in his head for the umpteenth and coming to a conclusion: There was no way in hell they'd ever succeed. Probably.
And it was that probably, that little seedling of hope it inspired, that caused him to hang blissfully onto the idea. Some hope was better than none, right?
He thought about the fragments that'd come through to him while he slept and dreamed. It'd been years since the last one, so the fact that snatches of memory were getting through to him now was a very bad sign. He still was a part of China, despite being a Special Administrative Region, and the silent burden of the nightmares he shared with Macau was increasing.
Hong Kong had gotten a long snapshot of an obscured figure, garbed in a long bloody coat, holding a knife in one hand, with eyes dangling by the optic nerve from the other closed fist. The whole thing was silhouetted against a sunset orange backdrop. And after that scene, no visuals, but a strong feeling of sorrow and pure, unadulterated despair.
Obviously, things were getting worse.
After a short time, Estonia appeared, standing somewhat near the front of the room, nervously fumbling with a phone. "Lithuania's, ah, indisposed right now," he began once the room was silent enough. "So, um, I guess I'm taking over?"
General murmurs of assent, to the blonde's obvious relief.
"So, first, we have a direct link to those on the ship with Lithuania's phone." With a flourish, he flipped on a projection. Spain's thin face was on it, as well as most of the other taken ones.
"Hi, guys!" said the brunette cheerily if weakly.
"Spain, you fucking tomato bastard!" bellowed Romano, badly-hidden tears in his eyes. "You almost gave me a heart attack! I thought you were dead!" Then he subsided into a furious scowl and muttered, "That is, if I were worried about you anyway."
Spain grinned at him, to Romano's displeasure. "Sorry, Roma, but it's not as if I had a choice."
Estonia adjusted the phone so it could pan over the whole audience. The projector's image moved at the same time, so they could see everyone, and everyone could see their emaciated forms. All so thing...especially Liechtenstein, whose already small frame looked even more fragile under her tight skin.
"You shouldn't all be this thin, after only a few days!" called out Denmark worriedly. "What are they doing to you?"
"Is Iceland there?" asked Finland. "He's disappe-"
"He's fine!" interrupted Norway in an uncharacteristic show of emotion. "He's just late, that's all." The haggard look in his eyes sang with determination. He would not let himself belief Ice was taken. he'd be relegated to the status of worst older brother in the world. Doing that would be defeat, and he wasn't going down without a fight.
Ukraine's eyes were full of tears. "Ah, Bela, сестричка, what have they done to you? And where's Russia?"
"Not here," said Prussia, whose stings oozed on his back. Five infinity-shaped brands, and his head still swam. But no one could tell how bad it was if he didn't call attention to it, and it wasn't in his nature to make others worry. Not if he could help it. "Those eight are kept somewhere else. They called us a few minutes ago."
"I recorded the conversation," said Spain, "and I'll send it to you. Don't watch it now, watch it after we're done."
There was a brief silence as Estonia's phone whistled the message received tone. "Okay," said Estonia, more to fill the silence than for any desire of his own.
"Why are you all so thin?" asked Denmark again. "It hasn't been that long, has it?"
The Spaniard shrugged. "There's no sense of anything up here, especially when we have to take care of the others." He pushed a lock of hair out of his face with one blood-stained hand.
"There was something hissing in the room once, while the rest of you were asleep," offered Liechtenstein. "I don't know what it was, though." She chewed her bottom lip.
Another short silence, and then Hungary called, "Are you okay, Prussia? I've gotten tired of only trying to concuss Romania. And he cheats, anyway." She glared daggers at the other nation, who stood across the room.
"I don't cheat!" said the Romanian with an air of professionalism. "I use some unique skills. If the idea of that escapes your little mind-"
Hungary hurled a sudden frying pan across the room. It nearly decapitated Romania, who ducked just in time, losing only his hat. He began a mocking laughter, ended only when Austria, who was standing nearby, prudently silenced him with a hand over his mouth.
On the screen, Prussia was smirking. "So even you miss my awesomeness? Howzabout you, Austria? You miss me too?"
Hungary interrupted, "The question is, are you going to be able to run again? It's no fun hitting a stationary target."
The albino blanched. "Er-"
"Let's have none of that," broke in Spain hastily. "We're trying to escape here, not kill eachother."
"Tomato bastard has a point," muttered Romano grudgingly. "I would like to have him back, even though he pisses me off."
"Thanks," said Spine dryly. "Thanks so much."
"Do you have any idea where you are?" asked Hong Kong, staring intently at the screen.
"We're in a spaceship. Duh," said Poland unhelpfully.
Hong Kong sighed and appealed to South Korea instead. "韩国. Same question."
"They dragged me in here passed out, which was uncool of them, da-ze."
"I know," interjected Prussia, looking warily at Hungary as if she might leap through the phone screen and brain him. "Well, sort of."
"Go on."
"Well, I got separated from the rest of the search party by accident, and I was down a few floors from them, probably. Anyway, there was this long factory room with some of the eight's stuff in it. I went to get it-" His eyes widened. "Hey, maybe I still have that pasta thing..." His face lit up with hope, and Gilbird, nestled in his hair, let out one of those strange annoying chirp sounds. Prussia reached for a pocket, and then flinched. One of the scabbed-over stings had burst, and it was now seeping blood and pus the consistency of mucus.
"Ow," said Prussia. "That hurt." Whoever had the phone now angled the view towards the albino, in case the audience might want to know what was going on. The assembled nations watched Liechtenstein tear another strip of cloth from the now-ragged hem of her dress and pressed it to the wound. Prussia tried to keep a neutral face, but the occasional wince was proof of his pain.
"Anyway," said Spain, "think of something. Please."
"Don't you have a plan?" South Korea was on the screen again. "Knowing you all, you probably have one, so spit it out, da-ze."
"Yes," said Hong Kong, leaning forwards. "Our idea is to-"
"Don't!" interrupted Canada, heard for the first time.
When the nations turned to look at him, he shrank in on himself a little bit, and said diffidently, "Couldn't the aliens be watching us? Even right now?"
"That makes sense," said Norway slowly.
Mumbles of assent backed his words.
"Oh, and in case Estonia didn't already tell you," added South Korea, "great plans originated in me, da-ze!"
Hong Kong swallowed the laugh that quickly solidified into a lump in his throat and merely said, "I suppose." That always managed to infuriate his brother.
It worked again this time. "No," began the Korean, "You're not supposed to 'suppose', you're supposed to acknowledge it as pure, unvarnished truth! Because it is!"
Prussia was snickering, despite his pain. "I can't believe I didn't know you well earlier. We're almost exactly alike."
"Location?" prodded Estonia.
"Oh, yeah...Anyway, I got caught and ran like hell. I think I was still heading down stairs, but it's hard to be sure. And then...um...then there were some blue doors, and then-" he pointed awkwardly at his back - "that."
"And speaking of the pasta thing, someone's going to have to reach in my pocket to get it. I can't."
"I nominate...Spain," said Canada, trying to turn invisible. He didn't want to go groping around in someone's pocket. Especially Prussia's, with his rumored "five meters". No thanks.
When it became clear no one wanted to volunteer, Prussia sighed. "Look, we're all starving here, even my awesome stomach is empty, and there might be food in my pocket, so could you all get over your secret desire to touch me and make that a reality?"
Right on cue, Liechtenstein's stomach growled. Small to begin with, now she was pitifully thin, literally skin and bones.
"I'll do it," said Poland, after a longer silence. "Don't, like, expect anything."
The blond reached into Prussia's pocket. His fingers brushed something that crackled, and he carefully began easing it out. "This totally isn't awkward at all." A few in the audience laughed. Then the packet of dried noodles finally emerged, and everyone crowded around eagerly as the spoils were divvied up.
The other nations watched in silence.
"How's Greece?" asked Turkey eventually. "Because you haven't mentioned him."
Spain flicked the camera towards the prone body of the brunette in question. "He's been out this entire time. We're not sure if he's really injured, aside from the scratches and bruises he's gotten already, or if he's just being typical Greece."
Turkey laughed - or made a choked sound that might not have been a laugh- despite himself. "Ha. Well, before you asked, I'm only asking cause I sorta raised the kid, even though he ticks me off now."
Spain returned to counting off the noodles, and deliberately pushed a slightly larger pile towards Liechtenstein, who frowned. "We should eat one or two now," said South Korea reasonably. "Save the rest for later, da-ze."
Poland, who'd already stuffed four in his mouth, looked up guiltily.
"We'll need these to last..." South Korea turned to Estonia, on the screen of the phone. "How long till the deadline?"
Estonia thought about it. It was hard to gauge the passing of time in this permanent twilight, but he guessed the answer to the Korean's question was about... "Three days?" hedged the Estonian uncertainly. "Give or take a day."
"Three days," repeated South Korea. "And since most of us have six noodles, that's two a day. No stealing from Greece, Switzerland, or Belarus's pile. Because they're unconscious and haven't been eating, they'll need this food as well. Da-ze."
The Asian turned back to the camera. "Whatever your plan is, I-"
Then, there was a hiss and the view spun crazily, showing two opaque, bluish doors sliding open, and then indistinct gray shapes marching in. There was a sound like a gunshot, and a voice Estonia vaguely identified as Prussia's crying out. "What's going on?" shouted Australia. "What is it?"
In answer, the camera swerved and juddered across a blurry shot of Poland facedown in a pool of silver liquid, focusing for a few seconds on Liechtenstein shaking her unconscious brother and then tilting upwards to catch a claw descending towards the girl.
"What is it?" yelled Taiwan, a frantic note creeping into her voice. Ukraine had already figured it out, and breathed, "Oh, no," eyes wide and overflowing with tears.
On the projection, Spain's lips - they assumed it was Spain's lips - were right next to the camera of the phone. "Help us," he breathed, and then the view jerked yet again as silver liquid spewed from his mouth, blurring the lens. There was a tumble of light and dark, and then they saw nothing but a view skittering over the floor, tumbling end over end. Dark and light and dark and light and red and silver and silver and red, and it came to a stop. Light warred with red, and red won. The color filled the screen.
The nations in the meeting room watched with horror, some with tears running down their cheeks, some shocked into stupefied silence.
After the longest time, the redness shifted. Light penetrated the murky depths.
A gray face, smeared across with the color they were so very tired of seeing, grotesque features stretched into a smile, mandibles clacking from the sides of their bristling-needle mouths. But those dark pearls of eyes boiled with hate, made darker by the pale skin stretched on either side, and as a collective group, they shrank back. The terrible smile widened.
A few other heads bobbed in the background before the camera view splintered, seemed to fold in half, pixellated, and went dark but for two flashing words:
Connection lost.
Translations:
сестричка- little sister
韩国 - South Korea