((All the flashback chapters are told from Russia's point of view))
It had been a stormy evening the night I met Ian. The wind howled like a pack of arctic wolves on the brink of a long-awaited hunt. I was such a little thing, barely a country. I was picked on a lot by the surrounding nations. I just wanted freedom from it all. I didn't have a single friend to speak of. My sisters helped me when they could, but for the most part I was all alone.
I trudged through the snow; with each step my boots were nearly stolen by the deep banks of it. My scarf- a gift from my sister- was as well-kept as I could manage. The soft fabric only had a few small tears which had been promptly sewn up. It was a shining article in comparison to the rest of my outfit, which was torn almost completely apart, allowing much of the Russian winter storm to lap at my body.
I was of course used to the cold; and, as a country, things like frostbite wouldn't kill me anyway. But it just added to the suffering of it. I had managed to make it to a small wooded area. The trunks and branches of the trees blocked some of the wind and my body felt less sore. I wandered deeper and deeper into the cold forest, until I hardly felt the wind on my back at all. The huge brown trees protected me from the harshness of the white storm.
The sun slowly sauntered down into the cold horizon, leaving the white snow a dark blue where the shadows crawled. The bitter cold twisted and turned over the land, leaving it to shiver in the dark of night. I was glad for the cover of the trees. Without them the wind-chill would have been enough to make even myself shiver violently.
The darkness spread quickly in the secluded forest, and soon I found myself without a light, lost in the frozen woodland. There was no way I would make it back home before morning. I deeply considered resting there in the snow, but then I saw a light. It was a tiny campfire, a ways away from where I was.
When I approached the fire, I found a young boy dressed in a dark uniform and a tattered black scarf. He was poking at the fire light with a blank look on his face. Apart from his red eyes, he was identical to myself. 'My 2p,' I thought.
"What are you doing out here in the middle of nowhere?" I asked him, wisps of fog sprawled from my mouth as I spoke. The boy just shrugged. I had quickly learned that Ian was a serious guy. He liked to keep things simple and never invited unwanted chatter. He allowed me to talk to him, but he would never give much of a response.
I told him about the other countries, how they picked on me, and how my sisters would take care of me sometimes. I told him everything about them. He seemed vaguely interested in each of their personalities, even asking a question or two here and there. I offered to introduce him to them, but he declined.
"No, that's unnecessary…"
There was another moment of silence. There were many of those during my conversations with Ian. Times when I didn't know quite what to say next and he refused to close the gap with words of his own. But this time I knew exactly what I wanted to say, I just couldn't find the courage to say it.
"Would… would you be my f-friend?" I finally muttered. Ian looked at me for a moment, his red eyes locking with my blue ones. He then looked away slowly without saying anything. He poked the fire a few more times.
"What do I get out of it?" he asked. I blinked at him in surprise. Was he agreeing? What would I have to do for him for him to agree? My mind was racing, trying to figure out what I could possibly say in order to make him agree. He ended up answering my question for me,
"What if you gave me partial control over the country?" Ian asked. I wasn't too sure about it. Partial control over the country? On a permanent basis? Was I allowed to do that? "Not completely of course, just allow me to make decisions and I'll share the weight of the country's citizens with you. In return I'll make us a more powerful country… and I'll be your friend."
Ian poked the fire again causing bits of burning ash to float up from the flame. I found myself wanting to agree with Ian's request. It wasn't really a problem. In fact it might even be better. "I'll make us a more powerful country," he had said.
"Okay," I reached out my hand to him and smiled. A tiny- almost unnoticeable- smile formed on his cheeks as his took my hand to shake it. And so it began.