Hetalia Deaths

Emil Steilson (Iceland) Theory 2

All of the characters belong to Himeruya Hidekaz and the theory was written by fanfiction's InfernoxPhoenix, so credit for this sad, but wonderful, theory must be given to them.

Moving ahead with the Nordics, I present Iceland. Emil was an abandoned child, who eventually died alone, which explains not only his withdrawn personality, but the way that he was found.

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tick-tock

It was something that was consistent in his life. The constant snaps of a clock, counting away the seconds, the minutes, the hours, of his life that were wasting away.

It was a steady, mechanical sound that distracted him from the ringing in his ears. The ticking of the small electric clock hanging on his wall was the only thing that kept him sane these days. Spider web cracks spun out from the nail hole, where Emil had haphazardly hammered the thing into the drywall a while ago. He couldn't remember when that was. It could have been ten days ago, it could have been ten weeks. Emil's memory became fuzzier and fuzzier around the edges with every passing day.

He couldn't bare to part with the clock anymore. He was so, oh so alone in this place, and any sound that filled the empty halls made him seem less by himself.

For the first long while, after any other life had left the house's rooms gaping and quiet, he would walk around from room to room. He moved freely, not shackled by the psychotic episodes that set in later. His daily routine was simple enough- mundane, but it was all he had.

The four walls that he was confined to stood in the middle of nowhere. He remembered when his parents would make a monthly trip to the nearest town for groceries, and it was a fifteen mile trip- one he wasn't strong enough to make himself. He was so weak, so prone to sickness; he would have collapsed within the first hour of the undertaking. So he never tried.

So he was here.

It was a bit ironic, for someone so obsessed with a clock, that he couldn't remember time at all- that it blurred together, day and night nearly indistinguishable. He did not count the ticks, he did not glance at the hands on the scratched glass face, he only heard the mechanical taps that rang out into the one room. It was the dining room, only occupied by an old, rickety oak table set accompanied by four creaking chairs that had tears in the pea-green fabric on the seats, and his crouching figure.

He had his back jammed against one of the walls, his knees drawn so close to his chest that they had locked up a long time ago. His gaunt, gaunt face was only illuminated by curtain-filtered rays of sun that shone on the storm of dust in the air. It used to make him sneeze, but he breathed it in with ease now.

His eyes were dulled with open blood vessels, his irises a nearly sightless heather. They were deep-set in his face, tired lines etched into the skin underneath. They were focused on something in the distance that he really couldn't see. He knew that. He did, he did. But his eyes never moved.

Emil never moved.

His mind was so full of empty things now. They swirled around, chaotically clashing with one another, fighting to occupy the narrowing space Emil allowed for thought. He remembered when the prelude to all of this had started.

Now, his parents had fought a lot. He hadn't really been around other children, let alone other families, living his isolated life, so he didn't know if this was normal or not. They fought a lot about a lot of things. Money, mostly. He knew that they weren't rich by any standing, but he thought they were all right. They had a house, and crops, and a dog, and that was how he measure their wealth.

One rainy night in September, he had heard them arguing about money again, but it was a little different. He heard his mother screaming something about keeping a roof over their heads, and his father had yelled back something unintelligible over the water pelting the windowpanes.