Forgiveness Comes With Patience (AmericaxJapan)

Chapter Three- If I Only Felt

Kiku's POV
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"Feliciano, vill you quiet down for just one second?" A tall, buff, blonde-haired, blue-eyed man tried to speak up over his chatty companion. Like always, the German's counterpart, a little Italian named Feliciano, was happily babbling away about this and that, interrupting the meeting and distracting us from the objective. Westerners are very loud and obnoxious, sometimes.

I sighed and continued to space out at the paper on the large circular desk in front of me, which had notes and strategies on them.

My two friends, the country of Germany and the country of Italy, and I were currently planning on how to get the last superpower, America, into war with the rest of Europe.  As far as the flashy nation of the United States and I go back, I prefer the quieter and politer duo of Germany and Italy over him. It's nothing personal, it's just that I'm choosing the lesser of two evils. Well, that, and my people are running out of resources on my island and we need to expand, and the rest of the world except Germany is against that. But when it comes to America, this is the part when I say I think he's nice, but I definitely mean rude.

But I am not a man, nor a nation, of war. All of the wars I've ever fought in personally have been between rivaling households hundreds of years ago; and those remained within my own country. The only outside wars I've had were minor territorial scuffles, and I barely did anything in World War I. I did get to sit at the winners table, though. I joined the Axis because we share viewpoints and can agree on lots of things. Well, except Italy and I have varied perspectives on sleeping naked in bed. Italians are too shameless! It's unacceptable, the way he runs around in his underwear all the time at his house. He even asked if I wanted to see his butt, once. I feel violated just thinking about it!

I shake my head, sending my limp black hair swishing about to get the thought of Feliciano naked on a beach out of my head.

Germany spoke up, "Japan, are jou quite all right?"

I stuttered, hoping that he wasn't reading my thoughts, "H-hai..."

Germany nodded sternly at me and suddenly was grave. "Listen, Japan. The reason we called togezher zhis meeting today was to discuss how we should take action to the rising Allied threats. But we also came here to discuss the terms of our treaty when we win this war."

So Germany already plans as coming out as the victor?

I wasn't surprised, not after the humiliating terms set forth by the Treaty of Versailles. If he lost now, it would make it twice that Germany has been crushed by the powers of the world. He was too angry, too motivated now to give up. In fact, I can see his anger seeping out of him like green tea in hot water. He's gotten paler, more sensitive to our opinions, and the scar on his face left by the treaty has become more apparent where it roped down his profile. Italy and I were too scared that denying any of his orders would make him snap open and unleash his nefarious, wartime counterpart. But despite us being as cooperative as possible, his humanity continues to fade as his boss worsens the situation.

All of us countries have this second person living inside of us, it's just a question of which of us are mentally strong enough to stave them off. War usually makes it harder for us to remain calm and collected, as our people scramble to prepare for battle and die in our honor. The sadness and rage of all of the families of the dead wells up inside of us until we morph, physically and mentally, into monsters.

Though I feel sane, when I look in the mirror, I can already see the change beginning to consume me. I've somehow gotten even paler than I was before, and the flecks of red in my eyes that I haven't seen since the last time my people have turmoiled were pooling around in my iris like how sakura petals slowly cover the ground in spring. I know I must hold it off as long as I can- for me, for my friends, and for my people. The alternate egos make irrational decisions that can hurt our honor. Not that they care, for honor is one of many things they lack besides mercy.