Countryhumans Oneshots

The Meaning of Freedom

Philippines oneshot, requested by solosunset.

Philippines had been raised to hate the idea of tattoos. Sure, they were an important part of many of the cultures within his land, but old beliefs are hard to shake, especially when you are a colony trying to gain respect as a country.

The tattoo the Japanese Empire forced on him only made it worse.

Philippines didn't like thinking of that time, the pain, the humiliation, and the systematic destruction of himself and who he was, ready to be created into a glassy-eyed doll for the Japanese Empire to play with. Even when she...

If the puppet state wasn't bad enough, that bitch Laurel put him under martial law, only furthering the destruction. He lost his body, then his mind.

It was the kind of complete control he never wanted to feel again.

Philippines had been healing from it, relearning his identity, especially as an independent country. He got Hawaiʻi to burn the tattoo off. He remade friends; he talked to replacements about coping with being a shadow of a person who once was. He was healing.

Then Marcos put him under martial law, and the hell started all over again.

At least Marcos was different. He wasn't trying to destroy who Philippines was and rebuild a new person tailored to fit his own interests. He just wanted Philippines to be docile and agreeable. Supportive of his agenda.

It sucked, but it was different. Philippines got to stay Philippines. It also helped that he still had access to his support system. Kentucky, Hawaiʻi, all of them were still there to help him through it. They helped make sure that he wasn't too far gone, that he wouldn't have to rebuild his personhood again after barely succeeding last time.

Philippines hoped he would get to keep his mind for a little longer than twenty-seven years this time.

But having his mind restored and given back to him was still a cause for celebration. He got together with a few friends to drink, both country and human, but he felt he had to do something more personal as well.

Philippines wasn't sure what to do, but his mind had wandered back to tattoos and the scar that marked all that was left of the one the Japanese Empire had given him.

Maybe he could get one to replace it.

The tattoo the Japanese Empire made him get read でくのぼう. Puppet. The figurative description, of course, the one that relates to a person or groups of people. That was what he was to her—a puppet.

As much as the Japanese Empire claimed to love him, something was deeply wrong with her. She claimed to love and care for him, claiming that she was better to him than New Spain, Spanish Empire, or America.

Sure, none of those people were great to him, but under them, he had his own mind. If he wanted to, he could yell at them, punch them, or even go to war with them. The Japanese Empire gave him none of those solutions. She enslaved his body and mind and took away his ability to speak, to fight, and to think.

He was her puppet. Nothing more than a mindless slave, a toy for her to play with.

Philippines wanted to get a new tattoo to replace that one, right on top of the scar or around it if putting on the scar wasn't possible. He wanted a new one that reflected who he was at this moment.

Not a puppet or a slave or a mindless government drone.

A free man with his own mind and will.

There was a word that he thought fit that.

Kawas.

There were lots of ways to translate it.

Deliverance from servitude or slavery; emancipation; liberation; freedom; release.

It fit.

Philippines had his mind back. He had been emancipated. He had been liberated, due in no small part to his friends in America.

He had his freedom.

His country's freedom and his own.

He had his mind back. He was free again. And if that ever got fucking taken from him again, he was going to make sure he had a physical marker that showed everyone he was a free man.

He was the Republic of the Philippines, and he would rather die before he was made anyone's puppet ever again.