I catch Germany like a Pokémon… Can I get Elon's number?

Germany is the first one to wig out whenever I show off my powers, which makes sense because he is Ludwig. But Ludwig's wigging is not excited wigging. It's freak-out wigging. When Ludwig wigs, his wig is wigged. Wiggy.

If there's anything that gets Ludwig wigging, it's when I try to explain how I can see other dimensions.

The typical 3-D world floats and bobs under a 4-D one. When I died, truly died, my consciousness traveled to this wondrous place. There, little 3-D pockets serve as "checkpoints," where characters may be sorted into archetypes, catalogued, and then sent off to become new ones.

Except for me, apparently, because I can just bounce over to a different world the same as Germany zooming to France.

Picture this. One strand of yarn is tied around my ankles, tethering me to 3-D Earth. Another strand is tied around my wrists, tethering me to 4-D afterlife. Now, imagine that instead of yarn, it's bungee cords. I'm tethered, but not pulled in either direction. So I can easily bounce up and down, or left and right, in whatever direction I want. Naturally, I can see in more than three dimensions if I wish.

4-D was mind-blowing, I can't deny that part, but since my mind only processed 3-D at the time, all I could tell you is it looked like a bunch of poorly-rendered 3-D animations floating through a thick cosmic soup. Worms and faces and shit. Like if outer space was populated by glitchy computer game characters from the late nineties, and most of them were worms and disembodied heads. Don't get me wrong, they're super friendly beings. They always remember birthdays and practice a fair bit of astrology. I can see them better now, if I allow myself to see in four dimensions, but then my body bloats up into 4-D, too, (not a pleasant sensation, I should add,) so I don't like doing that.

How many dimensions are there in all? I think ten? No, eleven. Eleven dimensions, base thirteen, and the four states that matter are solid, liquid, fire, and Prussia.

"I really worry about you sometimes," Germany tells me from behind his Eszet Schnitten toast. It's "healthier than Nutella," he said last week. Little does he know, I have a pocket dimension full of the Nutella he won't let me buy.

"You're not worried. You're just confused. It's a confusing thing to explain. Even if I don't allow myself to see more than three dimensions, I can still see little pockets of others floating around us. They're everywhere! I saw a wormy friend just the other day while I was brushing my teeth, and she taught me how to get around the corners! At least, I think it was a she. But those are just the dimensions you know about from physics. Boring crap. Dimensions, as in pocket dimensions, are even more numerous! I can create them! Here! Watch this!"

I spread my fingers outward and hold my hands like I'm going to form some badass laser between them. I let my consciousness expand, just a tiny bit, until the world around me looks a bit wobbly. As easily as if I were grabbing a pile of jello, I wrench my fingers around a sphere of space-time and shape it. It's like bunching up a 2-D blanket to create a pouch, only I'm working with a 3-D material, in this case, air and other useless particles. I squeeze and fold until small tremors rock the room. My hands start glowing from all the paradoxical energy staining them like pollen.

"Prussia, please don't make a black hole in the kitchen."

"It's not a black hole! It'd have to be a billion times larger. Look, see? A pocket in space-time! I can cut it off from the cosmic material around it and put it in my pocket! Pocket in a pocket!"

I put it in my pocket, and a few wine glasses break in the cabinet from the cosmic kickback. Then I take it out again and plead Germany to notice it. It's like a little shimmery, cloudy, undulating sphere of substance floating above my palm, all warm like the sun.

He shakes his head. "I can't see whatever it is you're seeing."

"Are you kidding me? You can't even see a shimmer? It's right there! Look, I can put stuff in it! It should be the size of a potato sack within!"

I rifle through the silverware drawer and grab a few forks, then toss them into the pocket. They disappear entirely from view.

"You saw that, right?"

This interests him. His eyes widen, and his brows narrow in that disturbed-yet-intrigued way. That look is the essence of who Germany is. "The forks are gone."

"Exactly! And look, I can take them out again," I say proudly, slipping my left hand down into the pocket and fingering around until I feel them. I pull them out and toss them back in the drawer, completely unharmed.

"So that's… what is it, exactly?"

"Just a bit of 3-D space I folded up into a bundle. The same principle as a wormhole, really. Ooooh, look, I found all the butter knives! Better put these in a safe place," I coo, waving them in his face before dropping them into the pocket. "Ach! Oh no, we're all out of butter knives. You'll have to sort out your sheet-folding problems on your own."

"If you can fold space-time, you can fold a fitted sheet."

"What if I just take a normal sheet and fold that into a fitted sheet? You don't have to sleep under a sheet. We're not living in a hotel."

Germany stops himself from inflating with anger. He has to save it for other more important things, like bureaucrats and dog piss. Instead, he calmly goes to put his plate in the dishwasher, ignoring my pocket dimension entirely.

"If I could make these visible to mortal eyes, I'd have the monopoly on both declutterers and hoarders. Maybe I make a shell for it with some kind of activation device… "

"I'm off to hike with Italy and Japan. Make it your productive project after vacuuming."

"Vacuuming! Yes! I'll pass it off as a new vacuum seal technology. Hmm, I'll need some economic projections."

"Don't forget environmental and safety concerns. You can't sell black holes."

"It's not even black! It's kind of rainbow-silverish, like a mirror."

"They're called black holes because they're invisible."

"Well, it's not invisible. You're just not advanced enough to recognize a cosmic knot when you see one."

"I've recognized plenty of cosmonauts. They deal with real science."

"This is real science! Look, I can sell it to middle-schoolers, too! It's a hands-free pantsing device!"

I chuck the pocket dimension at the back of Germany's trousers. It sucks them clean off, all right, along with the rest of his body. He gives a great pained cry as his mass and volume are altered and he squishes down one misshapen piece of flesh at a time into the pocket dimension. It swells a bit at its new fullness and sags on the kitchen tile like a bloated slob.

"Germany? West? Luddy?"

I scramble to pick up the pocket. It's still light enough to sit comfortably in a pocket. I bring it up close to my eyes and boost up my dimensional content awareness scale even more. I feel sick. My head starts throbbing, and I whine when a few bones become unhinged. I see the grid of reality. Astronomia blasts in my ears. Gravity flux and synthwave are the first signs I'm changing dimensional form, but I have to see just how my brother is curled up in there. If he's nothing but a mass of guts, that's an uh-oh on my part, and I'm going to have to bungee up to 4-D anyway so I can ask for his soul back and get some assistance reconstructing his body.

I mean, I've put his soul in a dead body before, but that was a long time ago.

Just when I feel the void caressing my shoulders and tugging at my spine, I see him! I can't see all of him, but I see his hands folded around his knees. He must be curled up pretty snug in there. Some parts look a little squished, but I imagine the pocket folded him up just like I folded up the pocket. If he's alive, this is marvelous!

I toss the pocket up and catch it in my hand again.

"Poké Ball," I whisper.

But as cool as it sounds that I caught my own brother in a screwy sphere of physical improbability I'm daft enough to compare to a cartoon, I should probably let him out.

I reach two fingers in and grasp what feels like an ear, then tug a bit until it emerges. I shake the pocket a bit, then toss it across the room. It slams into the carpet before utterly disintegrating. A wave of compressed matter and energy smacks me straight in the face. Another wine glass breaks, along with the lightbulbs, and… yep… the whole neighborhood power grid is knocked out.

Germany groans on the carpet. He's lying face-down and surrounded by scattered butter knives. I go to shake his shoulders.

"Germany, hey, Luddy? Ludling? Chirpy chick? Are you okay?"

A sinister bubble of liquid escapes his throat, and he coughs up a bit of bile before rolling on his back. All his body parts seem to be in the right places, so unless his organs are all jumbled, he's still never seen a 4-D worm friend.

"I think I swallowed my own feet," he chokes out.

"Well, we know Poké Ball technology may not be so far in the future."

"What!?" Germany pushes himself up on his elbows, but his body still has a strange, rubberlike quality to it, and he sags a bit before inflating fully back to his normal dimensions. "Even if our world did have magical creatures, it's not ready for the power to carry them around in a pocket! I could barely breathe in there!"

"It needs adjustments, but that's all it is! A pocket-sized pocket-dimension shrinking things to pocket-size… Mmm, pockets! If you're meeting Italy and Japan today, bring one home for calzones and the other for weird sciency brainstorming!'

I'm giddy and grinning, but my hopes falter a little when I feel the serrated edge of a butter knife pressing into my beak of a nose.

"Fold the sheets."

~N~

I guess we're lucky his pocket dimensions are primarily for toilet paper and Nutella. What a nice man. XD

Updated by Syntax-N May 29th, 2020. Reposters cursed.