Germany tapped his fingers on the side of the phone booth as he listened to ring after ring on the phone. He side glanced to Italy, frowning a bit as he saw the impatient look on his face. What was taking him so long to answer?
"Hola! Soy Espana! Que pasa?"
Finally!
"Spain, it's Germany. Get Romano on the phone."
"Que—Germany? Uh… Romano's not here right now! I-"
"Give me the phone you retard, he knows I'm here."
"A-are you sure he's safe?"
"Yea yea, move!"
Germany furrowed his brows as he heard noises over the phone of shuffling; figuring Romano was literally pushing Spain away to grab at the phone.
"All right, what is it?"
"We've run out of time, we need to get out here and we need to go now. Prussia is trying to lock me in an insane asylum, and if he does we won't be able to find Italy."
There was a pause on the phone, Germany frowning at this as he thought the phone might have broke. He looked back between Italy and the phone as he waited for an answer.
"Your brother's fucking nuts. But fine, meet me at the docks. I'll meet you there and hand over the keys, the boat is called 'Grande Tomatoe'. It ain't hard to find."
"I'm the one who named it that!"
"Shut the fuck up, this is serious! Go warm up the car, this is an emergency! … I will be there in fifteen minutes."
Click.
They both glanced at the payphone at the sound of change being deposited into the machine with the call being over. Germany hung up the phone and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. This was still so much to take in. But they had to do this… they had to do this…
He let out a shaky breath as he looked to the vague direction of where he knew the docks were. It wasn't too far away from their current location. He took a step away from the booth but faltered, just looking down again as he just felt warmth gathering in his eyes.
He was practically becoming a fugitive now, he was leaving everything behind. Going out into the big blue yonder… alone…
"Germany."
Germany looked up as he felt a hand on his shoulder, looking over to Italy, seeing a light shimmer of concern in his eyes. He wasn't alone, was he? Italy was there with him. He was always with him, both living and even in death. Right now was no different. And just like all of those other times, he had to be strong for Italy's sake.
"I'll be all right. We just need to get the docks, Romano will meet us there."
Italy nodded in understanding before floating up for fast travel as usual, waiting for Germany to take the lead. With a deep breath, Germany took off jogging in the direction of the docks, doing as best as he could to keep a look out for Prussia or those two other guys. After a little while, Italy had noticed him doing so and decided to go up further than Germany to make sure they weren't going to get ambushed.
But thankfully during their trek to the docks, there weren't any difficulties with anyone. Really, there didn't seem to be anyone out and about at all.
Germany slowed his pace as he looked out to the several boats stationed at the docks. Grande Tomatoe was the name of the one they wanted. His eyes narrowed as he tried to find the name of the boat, stepping off the sidewalk onto the planks to try to find the one they wanted.
"Germany, Germany! It's that one!"
He looked over as he heard Italy call out to him, seeing him point to a smallish cabin cruiser tied up nearby. It wasn't really deserving of the name "Grande", but it was definitely what they could need. Now all they had to do was wait for—
"Stop right there, West!"
Germany stiffened up as he heard his brother's voice call out to him, his eyes widening in panic of him behind caught. He turned around to see the albino standing up on the sidewalk of the street, actually having his pistol out and pointing it at him with a bit of a shaky grip. Cautiously, Germany raised his hands up to try to show he was unarmed to try to make sure Prussia wouldn't shoot him.
"… I can't be locked away, Prussia. Italy will never be found without me."
Prussia's breath quickened a little, raising his gun up and cocking it back despite Germany not moving back or forward.
"You need help. Helping you is more important than Italy, what part of that do you not understand!?" He practically screeched at his younger brother, it being very apparent that he was at his limit of stress. He didn't want to do this, not at all. "You're a danger to yourself. I don't want the next call I have to be about how you splattered yourself against a building! I've… I've seen you collapse into ruin, West…" He hiccupped a quiet sob, his grip tightening on the pistols base.
"Please, Prussia. Please… just let me go."
The pistol shook more, Prussia's chin almost matching at the same speed of trembling as he quietly simpered, blinking away some tears.
"Nn… Never… NEVER!"
"Prussia! Please! You're my brother, you know what's best! And this isn't it!"
"Yes it is! I… ICH LIEBE DICH, BRUDER!"
"PRUSSIA!"
Screeeeeech
Just in that moment, time seemed to slow down for everyone as tire screeches echoed down the street.
Germany opened his mouth to try to yell.
Italy gasped as he put his hands to his mouth.
Prussia turned his head to look at the source of the noise, only to widen his eyes as a front of a car then rammed into him. The car revved up faster as it hit the body, carrying the damaged person even further to hit full speed into the side of one of the warehouse buildings nearby, pinning the body against it with quite gory results.
The empty street was silent as the crash settled, red splattered against the wall and a higher section of a body limp on top the hood of the car, white hair being messy with now red and some rubble from the crash and the gun that was in its hands moments ago now far away and useless.
The only thing that moved of Germany's was his head, just staring at the wreckage not that much further down the street, not even fully registered about what exactly was the red that was skidded on the street and the walls. Slowly his arms dropped, his eyes remaining wide as he just took a single step towards it, not knowing what to exactly do.
"Isn't… that Spain's car?" Italy asked aloud, moving forward as well to try to get a better look. He squinted as he tried to get a better view of the wreckage. He gently gasped though, the driver's door suddenly kicked open and the man responsible stepping out of it.
"Bluck, this is going to be a pain in the ass to clean."
"R… Romano?" Italy asked to no one, floating down to be back on his own two feet as the both of the nations on the dock watched the living Italian walk over to the docks, grinning triumphantly.
"There, now we're even," Romano said in his usual smartass manner, almost getting kicks out of seeing Germany's horrified face. "You killed my brother, I killed yours. At least this was a time where he needed to be out of the way, huh?" He snickered to himself as he glanced over to the body one more time before he jumped down onto the docks, fishing the key to the boat out of his pocket to hand over to him. "Consider that a bonus."
Germany stared at the keys in his hand for a moment, almost not even able to comprehend why he was being given that metal object. His gaze went back to Prussia, remaining silent for a moment before reeling back and lunging forward, landing a big punch across Romano's face. The man screeched in a terrified manner as the force of the punch sent him off of the edge of the dock to send him into the water. Of course, while the key flailed out of his hand mid fall, Italy was sure to grab it and to put it in Germany's hand.
"The fuck was that for, potato bastard!?" Romano yelled, spitting out water as he just trekked water from his spot. "I just saved your fuckin life!"
"After murdering me twice. Consider that a bonus."
Germany turned on his heel to get into the boat at that, not hesitating to just start preparations to get them going. Italy looked down to Romano with a small frown, jumping off the dock to get down to his brother and to lift him out of the water, which pretty much earned him a terrified girlish shriek from the confused Italian.
Once he was back on the docks, Romano coughed as he was finally free from the supernatural hold. He looked up with a small smile, looking around as if trying to find the spirit who saved him.
"Grazie, Veneziano!" He called out, grinning even more as he felt a force take hold of his hands to help him onto his feet and to turn him around to get him going off the docks. "Heh, at least someone appreciates what I do! Don't worry, Veneziano, you'll be back to life soon and it'll all be like before. I—" He suddenly yelped, feeling a very swift kick against his ass, making him lurch forward further off the dock. "Chigii! God dammit, you too!? Tccchh, that fucking smarts!" He whined loudly as he rubbed his butt sorely before stepping back up to the street. "I'm going I'm going. You didn't need to kick my ass!"
"Yes I did!"
Romano looked up as he heard a vague whisper of his brother in the air, he frowned and grumbled more before sighing. He tensed up though, feeling a warm force constrict his body lightly, feeling almost like one of Italy's clingy hugs. He moved his arms a bit to have the force go away, very lightly smiling as he had a pretty good idea what that was.
"Fine, fine, I deserved it! What the fuck ever!" He called out to both of them, rolling his eyes before raising a hand as a farewell. "Good luck getting Veneziano back, don't come back without him, you fucking hear?!"
"That's the plan." Germany called out before turning on the motor, grinning at it starting up fairly well. He motioned for Italy to come back onto the boat, waiting until Italy floated down onto one of the benches on the lower part of the boat before taking off into the sea, leaving the town behind.
Within a matter of hours, they were on their own out in the vast nothingness of the sea. They had no idea where they were going or what they were going to do next.
"… What are you going to eat?"
Germany perked at the question, snapping out of his train of thought to just lightly smile as he knew he has that covered.
"Thanks to your brother, there is prepackaged food in here and a kitchen along with a bathroom. I'll be all right until we find land again."
Italy grinned and nodded at knowing they won't have a repeat of last time. He looked around the ship for a while, humming to himself as he wandered around the cabin and on the smallish deck that they had. It wasn't very large but it was enough for two, surely.
"Mm, remember when we shipwrecked for the first time, Germany?"
Germany tensed up at the question, but slowly untensed, turning the boat on auto to just keep heading straight. He stepped away from the controls, heading down to the deck where Italy was and sat next down on one of the benches.
"It's been so long, I can't even remember how we crashed." He muttered, leaning forward to rest his arms on his knees. "How long has it even been since we were rescued? … Around six months, hasn't it?"
Italy glanced up at the question, thinking about it for a moment before nodding, "It'll be seven next week."
"Seven months.. wow." Germany muttered the exclamation to himself before he leaned back a bit. "No wonder Prussia wanted to lock me away, I guess I haven't really been that productive most of the year." He wryly chuckled, but it slowly faded as he just stared down at the ground, thinking about what had happened in that long of a time. There was a silence between them for a while before Germany stood up.
"I'm going to take a nap, we'll be out here for a long while. Wake me up if something happens." He said before heading into the cabin.
"Yes sir!" Italy chirped, waving him off before he went up to the control panel to just watch the oceans front.
He blinked though, seeing a dark patch of clouds far into the distance. Hold on, this was raising a red flag for him. He felt… like this was familiar. They had done this before.
"Hey, Germany?"
"Mm?"
Italy opened his mouth to tell him about the storm, but he closed it, continuing to stare out to the clouds. He could feel something in that direction. Something strong, something important. They needed to be over there.
"Ah… Nothing! This cool seagull flew near the boat, but it went away! Go back to sleep, so sorry for bothering you!"
"It's all right. See you later."
Italy nodded, waiting in his seat very quietly for a while before he heard the soft snores of the German down in the cabin below him. His ears perked as he heard them, knowing very well Germany couldn't hear him any more at that point. He reached over and set his hand on the lever that controlled their speed, pushing it upwards to the highest option it could go to without making too much of a racket along with changing the steering wheel position just a little to head straight in the direction of the dark clouds.
He didn't know what was over there, but he knew Germany wasn't going to like it.
Just like the last time he did.