When Feliciano and Ludwig visits Kiku, Feliciano finds a soup bowl that has special abilities. Kiku has purposely forgotten about this bowl in an attempt to cut off his past, but is confronted by it when Feliciano comes running to him for answers.
September 20th, 1940.
"Japan, Japan!" Feliciano came sprinting down the hallway excitedly. "This thing is amazing!" In his right hand, there was the bowl he gave to Feliciano the other day.
Kiku winced at the loud man's hollering. "What do you mean?"
"When I sat down with it, it filled with soup that tasted off," "But I feel more happy now," "I think there's some Chinese writing on it!"
Feliciano thrust the bowl into his hands. "What does it say?"
Closely inspecting the bowl, there were light-blue flowers on the side, which appeared to be hand-painted. Turning to the other side of the bowl, Chinese characters were etched in light blue.
"Thinking of you," Kiku spoke out-loud, his face softening as he gazed upon the bowl.
"Did I upset you?" "You look more scary than usual," Feliciano exclaimed, recoiling back in fear.
"I'm fine Italy," His feelings were opposite of fine, more turbulent. A gift from Yao. He hadn't thought about the other man in ages.
Kiku stared again at the middle of the bowl. Looking closer, a barely readable message was painted inside.
'Ti amo, mio nipote,'
"Italy, have you seen this?" Kiku handed the bowl over to Feliciano, pointing at the faded writing.
A few seconds of silence rang through the hallway, as Feliciano slowly read what was written.
"Grandpa Rome?" The usually ditzy man seemed to have been caught off guard, his energetic smile fading into something unreadable.
Kiku opened his mouth to speak, but quickly shut it. It was becoming increasingly uncomfortable waiting silently as the Italian man processed whatever he was feeling.
"It feels almost real, like he's here," Feliciano's eyes widened, still staring at the message inside the bowl.
"It is real Italy," Kiku muttered, though he doubted that Feliciano heard him.
"Ah, Kiku!" "There you are!" Yao's cheery voice interrupted Kiku's train of thoughts. The older man was covered in leaves from trying to find Kiku's hidden spot.
The young boy stared up at the man, who excitedly smiled down towards him.
"I have a gift for you, today was when you became a nation!" "You've grown so much, but your still so adorable," Yao squeezed the young boy's shoulder affectionately. "Follow me!" He waited for the small fingers to wrap around his large hand.
Kiku took Yao's hand, no expression coming upon his face. Though, he was curious at what Yao was going to gift him.
After a while, they were out the garden area. Yao brought him to another building, inside it smelt of pond-mud. The smell of horrible, but Kiku was instantly excited. They were at the pottery shop that he and Yao would often frequent.
Yao would either come here to order custom made dishes and bowls or make some himself. Once the chinaware had been made, Yao always allowed him to paint it, something that Kiku quite enjoyed.
Painting was peaceful, bringing a sense of tranquility in his normally chaotic life.
"Close your eyes," "It's a surprise,"
Kiku shut his eyes with his hands, Yao guiding him with a hand on his shoulder.
"You can open your eyes now," On a table near him was a white ceramic bowl with pretty blue flowers patterned on the sides.
'想着你'
"I like it," Kiku replied flatly, a small smile appearing upon his face.
A wide grin of joy came upon Yao's face, "You'll love it even more!" "This bowl automatically fills with soup whenever you sit infront of it, you don't even have to cook anything," "And it will always leave a message behind from me if I'm ever too far away,"
Kiku glanced again over to the bowl, "Really?" "How does it do that?"
Yao knelt down to whisper something in his ear.
Sitting down at the table, Kiku watched as the the ceramic bowl instantaneously filled with noodle soup, chicken, mushrooms, and an array of vegetables. It smelt heavenly, compared to the rations he received nowadays.
Once he ate some of the noodles, it tasted incredibly stale, bitter, way too salty. A nauseous feeling pooling at the bottom of his stomach.
He gagged in disgust, shuddering as he abruptly stood up from his chair. It took all of his strength to not vomit all over the floor.
Why was the bowl responding like that to him suddenly? He'd not ate from it for ages, and the last time it only tasted stale. Now, it outright was attacking his stomach.
Suddenly, it filled with water. More water that seemed to have came out of nowhere. It overflowed it's edges, unable to contain itself as water trickled down to the wooden floor.
Panicking, he hurriedly grabbed the water-logged bowl and dumped to contents in the nearby sink. He spat out the horrid tasting soup coughing as his eyes watered.
Though blurry eyes, he could see something written in the bowl.
' なんで？'
A/N: I'm back from the dead with slightly better writing