And... of course something goes wrong. Can you guess who walks into danger?

Warning: Angst, suspicion, dangerous situation, poking fun at China.

Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN HETALIA. I have fun manipulating their characters, though

The Eyes That Watch the Children

Nate insisted on coming, and when he was accepted along, Marvin was unceremoniously invited as well. Which was just great. But at least Marvin and Ivan were fairly matched.

Arthur was walking beside Ivan now, and he knew the man wasn't happy about it. Following their little spat in the woods less than a day ago, the Russian had been quite stony towards him. Arthur knew that he had gone way too far when he brought up Ivan's past, but he was just so angry… well, more frightened than angry. Ivan had been jeopardizing the whole group's safety by trusting Jeanne, despite him claiming to have sufficiently probed her mind. But he felt he had to resolve any issues with him, Ivan being so close to Alfred.

"Wise of you, not using magic to clear the road," Arthur said out of the blue.

Ivan did not look down at him. He was not quite happy with Arthur at the moment and wasn't about to relinquish his current dislike of him for petty conversation. "Da, I knew it would not help much. Not only would it drain me significantly, but I could only clear so much snow before being unable to do so anymore, which would only comprise of a mile or so. Even that at the cost of my valuable energy." He frowned and flexed his hands, hating this feeling. This weak, human feeling. His heart had started beating recently and he felt fairly warmer, and emotions manipulated his mind more so now than before. He was beginning to understand why the world was like it was currently. "Most of my magical might went with the loss of my title as a country. I feel… exposed. I hate it." More than anything. All those times he was weak and had been unable to defend himself was his ultimate bane. He hid behind his strength, because that was what mattered in the end. This end, though, wasn't at all what he had been expecting. No one had been expecting this.

Arthur sensed his unease and noted his tone. "I loathe it as well. I feel like anything could kill me now. I don't know how humans live with it, feeling as if they're walking a wire and every gust of wind could send them plummeting. But I suppose they never think about that."

"Humans are resilient," Ivan said. I knew better than anybody that they are.

Arthur took a deep lungful of icy air and shivered. He pulled his collar up to his nose. "Yes, but they're stupid. I feel stupid just thinking as one."

"They are more selfish than stupid," Ivan told him. "They view life within a limited scope of themselves and close friends and family, not the world. They barely even consider it."

"I won't lose that," Arthur promised.

They had trekked a few good miles down the road, the only sign that some sort of civilization had been established somewhere among the barren white hills being the hard road under their feet. They shuffled along, ankle deep in snow, watching the ground to make sure they didn't go off track and lose the road. Behind them, the vehicles had long disappeared despite their prominent coloration, and with them their group, the rest of the sane world.

"I feel like we're going into the maelstrom," Gilbert told Ludwig, studying the mounting thunderheads. He was so pale, he was practically disappearing into the landscape. At least his red eyes stood out. "Heh, someone should hum a funeral march…"

Ludwig punched him on the arm and Gilbert yelped. "Shut up. This is no joking matter."

Gilbert glared and rubbed his arm. "Jeez, stop being so uptight. I am awesome at finding things. We will get what we need and be back in no time, kesesese!"

"You two so busy arguing that you not see!" Yao shouted.

Both men turned to him. "See what?" Ludwig asked.

Yao pointed. "There!"

They all followed his motions and found themselves staring at a…

"A tractor?" Nate frowned. "Who the fuck would try to escape in that? It doesn't go very fast…"

"Who the hell cares?" Arthur flashed. He didn't much care for the reform school brat from all the crap he had been talking on the way. "It's here and I'm sure it has some petrol and… is that a snow plow? Wait a minute…" His gaze followed a line of white lumps sitting just behind the half buried tractor. "That tractor wasn't just clearing the road for itself, there were people following it!"

"Hmph," grunted Marvin.

"Marv agrees," Nate translated.

"Well, splendid," Arthur said almost flatly before he remembered how scrawny he was compared to Marvin and changed his tone. "We'd better get moving, then, before that storm arrives. Come on."

The wind buffeted them all as they made their way toward the line of hidden cars. Arthur was at the head of them, impatient to get back to the group. He still didn't trust Gerald and his companions, but at least they had the two who looked to be the biggest threat with them. Not that that was entirely a good thing, but still.

Yao was anxious to get going too. He could already feel the wind picking up, gusting from the direction of the approaching clouds with considerable force and chill. He was so busy studying the storm brewing in the distance that he wasn't watching where he was walking and his shoe caught on something. Yao gave a startled grunt and fell to his knees, snow wetting his pants, looking back to see just what had tripped him up.

"Yao," Ivan was behind him and picked up his pace to reach him. "Are you all righ—?"

Yao's eyes lifted from the ground, now revealed from his feet brushing away the snow, then peered up at Ivan. They both had the same thought at once, but Ivan was the first one to shout, "Everyone stop! There is something—"

But Ivan had spoken too late. Just when Arthur looked up to see what it was that Ivan was getting so worked up about, he took another step and his foot plunged down into the snow and just kept going.

Yao's foot had been caught in a small crevice and, from his position in the snow, he could now see where it led. The whiteness of the landscape had hidden a massive crack, but luckily for Yao, he had stumbled across only the beginnings of it. His eyes traced the crack, stopping at its widest point. This wasn't a crack, it was a ravine. And Arthur was falling through the widest part of it.

"Shit!" Arthur managed to yell before his leg sank rapidly down into nothing. He didn't have time to move his other leg to stop his fall and it painfully scraped down the lip of the rough stone. Arthur cried out, hands scrabbling for purchase, but the stone was slippery with snow. His legs flailed in the empty space below him, searching for footholds, but found none. His fingers were numb from his damp gloves and he was slipping. "A-ah, no!" Arthur screamed, his heart dropping into his stomach when his head dipped below the outcropping of rock.

His hands were burning with his past wounds and the effort to hold him up. His arms shook and threatened to give out. Then he felt hands curl around his wrists. He looked up.

Ivan and Marvin were staring at each other, both having grabbed him at the same time. After getting over their initial shock, they eased Arthur up through the crevice and out onto the snowy surface.

Arthur remained hunched over in the snow, catching his breath and waiting for his rapid heartbeat to subside. Suddenly everyone was standing around him.

"Hmph."

"Marv says he can carry you if you're hurt," Nate said.

"No, that's quite all right." Arthur shook his head, standing slowly and feeling what would soon be a prominent bruise forming in his thigh. "I-I can walk. Just a little slip."

"Damn, that's deep!" Gilbert exclaimed, studying the ravine, then he looked up and corrected, "Not whatever Marvin said. The drop down this thing would have been pretty bad!"

"Hmmmph," grunted Marvin irately.

"Hey, man, chill out," Gilbert said. "Your offer was awesome, if not a little sappy."

"Hmmmrrrgh."

"Again, no offense!"

"Shut up and get away from there." Ludwig practically yanked him. "I don't want to waste time trying to fish you out of there when we could be getting needed supplies."

Gilbert frowned. "Your concern for me is overwhelming, West," he deadpanned.

Ludwig ignored him. "Are you okay, Arthur?"

"I'm fine," Arthur insisted. Lady Luck doesn't favor me, it seems. Someone up there (or down) must have it out for me, because I seem to stumble into everything dangerous… what will it be next, a safe dropping on my head? He sighed. "Let's just get going. Yao, do you have the siphon?"

Yao held up the tube. "Shì."

He turned to address Ivan, but he already had his shovel out.

"Should I go ahead, comrade?" the Russian asked with a smile.

Arthur smiled back. "You'd better."

They decided they had gone far enough to make a fire without others seeing the smoke. Tinder was hard to come by, and what little they could find they had to wait for the wind to dry before even trying to set light to it.

When they finally did get a spark (after an hour of trying), they could see dark figures coming up the road.

Alfred had come out of the van for the food, but he was quickly staring in the direction of the approaching people.

"They're back," he announced.

"I know," Kiku told him. He was huddled up beside a front tire, taking shelter from the wind. "I was assigned watch."

"Oh yeah," Alfred said, blinking. "I forgot."

"Ve, do you think they found anything?" Feliciano asked no one in particular. "I hope so. I don't want to be caught in a storm."

"Che, those dumbasses weren't gone for long. If they gave up after only this long, I'm going to kick their frozen asses," Lovino grumbled, stomach rumbling as he fished cans of food out of a pack, setting them in a line around the fire.

Carter took a can and opened it, dumping the contents into a pot. "God, I hope they have at least something."

Jeanne sighed and set the pot on the fire. "I knew this area was going to be the worst. Nothing but piss-ant towns for miles…"

"Hey!" Alfred exclaimed, offended. Then he settled, "Meh, you're right."

A van door slid open and Francis stuck his head out, smiling hopefully. "They're back."

"Yeah," Alfred said. "How's Mattie?"

"Asleep," Francis told him, jumping out and closing the door softly. "He didn't want to, but I made him—hey, amis!" He waved his arms, giving a questioning thumbs up. It took a minute for the others to respond, but he eventually got a confirming thumbs up from… who was that, Ivan?

"They found something," Kiku said, standing.

The group of scouts was practically attacked when they arrived at their little line of vehicles. They were pushed off and were presented with few good gallons of gasoline.

Gerald stared at it in awe. "How did you manage to get so much?"

"Not easily, I'll tell you," Arthur said, leaning on a van and smacking his lips. "Dammit, this taste won't come off my tongue for some time…" He caught Francis leering and he knew the man was just dying to say something perverted. He gave him the finger.

"Ja, it tastes like I've rimmed an engine, kesesese!"

Ludwig frowned in disapproval. "Shut up before I personally strap you to the roof of a van."

"I'll help you," Lovino said, glaring at Gilbert. The Prussian stopped laughing.

"Okay," Yao began. "Let's get this into the tank…" He picked up a gallon jug and headed over. But just as soon as he was about to pour it in, it was snatched from his hand.

He whirled around to see Nate hefting it and nudging him out of the way. "Step aside, old man, wouldn't want you to hurt yourself. I didn't get these guns bench pressing pillows." He gave a shit-eating grin and commenced the pouring.

Everyone started snickering… everyone that knew how truly old Yao was, anyway. "Old?!" Yao exclaimed, then rounded on the others. "Stop laughing! I just have experience!"

Nate finished pouring and said sheepishly, "Ah, crap. I'm sorry, I've been hanging out with so many dudes lately, it's just second nature. I didn't mean to call you 'man', shorty, heheh."

The snickers grew into full-blown laughter. "I'm not a girl!" Yao shouted, shocked.

Nate looked confused and surprised at the same time. "What… whoa, wait, man, you're not a chick?"

"We've confirmed that long before, bud!" Alfred laughed, tears in his eyes. "Hey, Yao, get in the kitchen and make me a sammich!"

Yao wrinkled his nose. "What is 'sammich'? Another disgusting invention of yours? Ai-ya…"

"Dude!" Alfred's stomach was cramping from laughing so hard. "You even complain like a girl!"

Jeanne rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "Ugh, men are all the same…"

"Ouais," Francis sniggered. "Except for Yao!"

Yao stopped shouting and resorted to just standing there, face red and glaring. He crossed his arms and tapped his foot. "Done yet?"

Kiku felt guilty for laughing, but he said nonetheless, "Do not be offended, Yao. We are only joking…"

"How many times you joke before it can be considered offensive?" Yao snapped.

Ludwig was laughing a little, but he was trying to hide it. He never laughed, but that had been too much. He righted himself and cleared his throat. "Ja, that is enough. We need to get the tanks filled as much as we can and leave before this storm comes through."

Alfred was still catching his breath. "Don't… ha, don't let Yao drive. He'll be terrible!"

Yao retreated to a van and slammed the door shut to drown out their raucous laughing.

They barely made it to Pine Bluffs, which was about thirty minutes away. At that point, they had almost run out of gas, and they pulled into town warily. Everyone was awake in all the vehicles, on the lookout for any signs of life.

Pine Bluffs wasn't a large town, Alfred explained. It was one of the first towns in Wyoming, being so close to the eastern border, and began as a popular cattle-shipping point on the Union Pacific and soon became the largest. There were barely 1,100 people residing in the town, but that didn't put them all at ease. Being isolated, some residents might have not been persuaded to leave. On the other hand, they were the first city travelers coming in from out of state would encounter on route eighty and may not be entirely safe.

"Not many people would be on the roads after this long without provisions," Arthur pointed out.

"Yeah," Alfred agreed. "But I'm damn sure the Organization has taken most of that for themselves. How do you think they plan to spread their influence?"

Ivan hated how negative Alfred had become. Every little building—whether it be a small neighborhood that they could pass through in the blink of an eye, a degraded farm, or just a lonely, abandoned wind pump—the American would always stiffen, eyes darting around the landscape outside, looking for potential dangers. He was so uptight, and everything they passed that gave even the slightest indication of civilization he would announce as a potential hideout for mobs or the Organization. Ivan supposed it was partly because Alfred's face was plastered all over the country and he had a fairly hefty bounty on his head, but he needed to relax a bit and let Ivan be uptight for him. After all, that was what he had promised.

Ivan sighed and stared out the window, trying to figure out just what the hell it was that Alfred was looking at this time. Stubborn American…

"Ve, there's no one here…" Feliciano muttered as they drove on through, looking for vehicles. They had finally gotten to the residential area of town (which wasn't very far from downtown) and pulled up alongside some abandoned vehicles. Of particular interest (and hope) were the cars parked on the curbs that looked as if they hadn't moved in a while. Everyone got out to walk around as Nate and Marvin dealt with siphoning the gas and filling up the tanks.

They had driven through the storm, and it hadn't been as big as they thought it was going to be. Gerald had attached the snow plow to the bumper of his truck and had gone ahead of them all, cutting a path for them through the snow. The going was slow and their journey to Pine Bluffs ended up being longer than they had initially predicted. Arthur was thankful to walk around for a bit, no matter how hard the wind was blowing or how chilly it was. Anything to get his mind off of what they had found whilst inspecting the buried vehicles back on the interstate.

There had been gas in the cars and the tractor, but that hadn't come without implications. Some of the vehicles had been abandoned, but the others… they had people still in them. People that had thought it wise not to venture out into the cold to search for a town or fuel. And those same people had died in their vehicles, starved and frozen. Ivan had jumped when he uncovered them. Ivan actually jumped. The cold had preserved them almost perfectly. Their skin was pale, their lips blue, and ice crystals grew on their hair and crusted their eyelashes. Those whose eyes were open were the worst. Arthur had seen many dead bodies in his lifetime, but the worst part about them was the lifeless, glazed look in their gazes. It reminded him of how very close they were to their own deaths.

They had siphoned the gas nonetheless and did not open the vehicles. They left the dead where they were. After all, they only wanted their fuel. Of course those who had remained behind did not have much fuel to offer, quite possibly from running the engine to keep warm, as much good as that had done them. But the other abandoned cars had a good amount when combined. Arthur didn't want to know what had happened to those who had left the motorcade, and they hadn't bothered searching for them.

Arthur and the others who had seen those frozen corpses had not mentioned them, but he knew he wasn't the only one thinking about them. Ivan maybe occasionally, but the others were plenty affected. Even Gilbert had gotten a bit quieter since.

"This town seems sad." Jeanne was beside him.

"What makes you say that?"

Jeanne shrugged. "I don't know… I think this place has been abandoned for a while."

Arthur could have searched the whole town magically with his mind, but he was no longer strong enough to do that nor was he willing to expend the energy to do so.

Nate walked up to them and spat on the road. "Ugh… we're ready to go."

"Did you manage to get all the tanks full?" Jeanne questioned.

Nate nodded. "For the most part. Gerald says we're gonna be good till Omaha, but we should probably stop to get more before then."

"When will we stop next?" Arthur asked.

"Outside Gothenburg, Nebraska."

With that, their little outing was over, and they all crammed back into the vehicles. Lovino, Gilbert, Kiku, and Yao tried to get people to switch with them, but no one was willing to with Marvin in the same van. They eventually gave up and returned to their original seats, and they all began to head out of town.

They were almost clear of the depressing place when Feliciano tugged on Ludwig's sleeve. His attention was directed to where Feliciano was staring out of the window, and he gaped.

They were going past a large, white statue, something he had never expected to see in a town this small. It was of a woman garbed in flowing robes, her arms outstretched and her gaze lowered.

"It's Mary," Feliciano said quietly and started to cry. The figure had been so unexpected and so beautiful a sight. "D-do you think she's watching over us?"

Ludwig took his hand. "Ja, how could she not be?"

Translations:

Shì-Yes

A Word From the Writer: It's weird, because I wasn't really planning on having the itinerary include a town that had such a statue. I just happened to choose Pine Bluffs because it's small and historic, and then I searched the images and I saw this statue of Mary on the edge of the town. A sign? Hmm...

Anyway, just some good comic relief to chip away at all the angst going on in every chapter. Can you believe most of this fic has taken place in only two states? When I figured that out, I decided they needed to get their asses moving, thus the addition of the OCs and their vehicles. And, really, I'm getting a bit ridiculous with the whole "England always in danger" thing. I don't know, he's just fun to mess with. But seriously, I'll stop now... maybe.

Onward!