Seborga's face is still round with youth as he sobs into his brother's chest. Italy strokes his brown hair softly, uttering assurances that thing will be all right, even though they both know that things never will be. Not really.

It'd be one thing if they could blame only the Germans, curse them, but it was their fault too. The massacre had happened because of what they'd done, just as Luciano had suspected. A reprisal against the Resistance, showing them just how much German lives were worth compared to theirs and how little any rebellion or dissent would be tolerated.

… Children had died in those caves. Women, too. Fathers, sons, mothers, all those lives extinguished for the lives of twenty-eight men who marched up and down the streets. Except, they all knew it wasn't really about the Italian SS policemen who had died. The German officers treated Italians like cannon fodder, anyway. It was the act, the show of defiance that was being punished. The Germans wanted the Italian Resistance to suffer until they shattered.

And as his brother shattered against him, Italy did his best to hold him together.

Once his brother was sleeping soundly, Luciano allowed himself a few hours to go on a walk into the nearest town. A crowd of people in the streets immediately drew his attention, but it was the scaffold with the noose tied around it that kept his attention. Standing at the center of the crowd, smack dab on the scaffold, his hands bound behind his back, was a grinning American with tawny hair and a stubborn cowlick sticking out of the top of his head.

When he saw Italy gawking in the crowd, he gave a cheerful wave.

"Hey, Italy" he said, then added, gesturing to the two German soldiers readying the noose. "Little help here?"

Luciano sighed. How many times could one nation get captured? Actually, France would probably know the answer to that question better than America would.

Thinking quickly, Italy decided on the best course of action, though he knew Alfred wouldn't like it. Still, it was better than exposing their immortality to the public.

Two knifes flew through the air, embedding themselves deep into the flesh and cartilage of the two soldiers trying to hang Italy's friend. They gurgled, choking on their own blood as their knees fell out from under them.

The screaming started when their bodies fell into the crowd.

Italy took advantage of the chaos to rescue Amercia. He plucked one of his knifes from the nearest near-dead soldier, ran up the scaffold, cut the noose, and then he released America's hands from their bindings. The ropes had been tied so tight Italy could see the raw, inflamed flesh around his wrists. It angered him for some reason.

America grimaced as he gingerly tried to restore the circulation to his hands. "Did you have to kill them?"

"There were no other options." Down on the ground a gasp and gag were the last they heard of the two soldiers.

"Sometimes, I think I liked you better when you were a scaredy cat."

Italy pondered this, and decided that he was not the Italy who had once been a scaredy cat, as America had so aptly put it. That Italy was currently in bed with a fever and had been for the past two years.

"America, we need to get out of here." Luciano gripped America's hand and pulled him off of the scaffold. He knew America liked to kill on a battlefield, the old fashioned sort of killing where you looked your opponent right in the eye, identified with him, and then shot him. But things weren't that simple anymore.

It used to be women and children weren't targets. Now everyone was a target and everywhere was a battlefield.

A/N: I should have just had this as a part of last chapter or something. Anyway, next chapter is the last one. I hope you liked this story. As for Carlino, you may have noticed he's a little less goofy than Hetalia portrays him. This is because he was originally meant to be the human version of Seborga, but I decided to scrap that idea and he became much more important to the plot as a result. I don't now when the next chapter will come out, but I know I want it to be perfect when it does, so that means no rushing

If you want more information about the massacres, look up Massacre of the Acqui Division and Ardeatine massacre. The purpose of this story was to get a feel for a 2P! character, but I also really wanted there to be fan fiction out there of an Italy who wasn't a Love Martyr (trope) for Germany, and I'm pretty sure I succeeded on that count.

Lastly, this may be obvious, but I'm a fan of Friendship! AmeIta. That's why America gets a pretty significant amount of screen time. Well, that, and I'm American^^