Fireworks in the Sky
Series: Axis Powers Hetalia
Words: 490
Characters: China; Italy; (mentions of Japan and Germany)
Rating: G
Warnings: n/a
Summary: Written for hetalia_contest’s week 014 prompt, “sky" But it went way over the word count limit, so I'm not going to submit it. China and Italy talk after WWII. Concerns the Marco Polo Bridge incident and memories.
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Title:
Stupid stupid stupid I should turn back I should go home.
But he doesn’t, and his footsteps take him even faster than ever, past the collapsed brick, past the houses without doors that gape at him as he races past them.
China is there.
Italy’s footsteps slow to a halt when he sees him, leaning- sagging- against the bridge, ignoring the shallow water. He is looking up at the sky.
So he remembers.
That night, as his fireworks exploded over the sky, a treat and comfort for the little Italian who had been heart wrenchingly and terribly homesick, sobbing messily for brown soil and dark skin again.
Yanhua, flowers of smoke, raining down gold and red like fluttering kisses. And China, comforting and laughing at him at intervals, magnificently robed in silk and the smugness of an untouchable world of wonder.
Different from the China now, dressed in a ragged army uniform, arms bandaged clumsily, a rifle leaning next to him, staring up into the grey sky.
“Over this river there is a very fine stone bridge, so fine indeed, that it has very few equals in the world,” Italy says. China looks down sharply, hand half reaching for his gun, before he recognizes the quote.
Italy offers him a tentative half smile, “Do you remember?”
“You,” China hisses. “What are you doing here?”
Before the war, Italy would have cried at his voice, cold and ripe with accusation, like a gash made of glass. But the war- that crazy terrible war- is over, and Italy stands his ground. There is not enough time in the world to delay it anymore.
“I’m sorry.”
China stares unrelentingly at him. “Of course you are. Of course Germany and Japan are. All of you are sorry, terribly regretful of your actions, won’t ever do it again. But you can’t erase what you’ve done, not even by fighting on our side. You’ve ruined the memories of my country, you and your grasping fascism.” Tears eke out of his eyes, dignified and solemn, like the death of a phoenix. “This bridge, I took you out here to look at the fireworks. And Japan destroyed that memory. The fireworks that night were beautiful, didn’t you think so? Why did you do it? Why didn’t you stop Germany? You destroyed my bridge, my beautiful, beautiful bridge. And the fireworks…” He is sobbing now, thin frame shaking with the cruel weight of war, clutching wildly at Italy.
And truly, Italy does not know why he did it. Why he did not repaint the world that ran in streaks of red, white and black around him with the skill that birthed a renaissance of art. All he can do is promise,
“I’ll make the fireworks bloom in the sky again for you."
**
A/N
The Marco Polo Bridge incident is what many consider to be the start of the second Sino-Japanese war, which signified a full scale Japanese invasion of China in Japan's part. Japanese manouvers were observed near the bridge, and Chinese troops fired several warning shots, which were misinterpreted as an offensive. When one Japanese officer failed to return to his battalion, Japanese troops staged an invasion. Many people believe that to have been an excuse to invade China
"Over this river there is a very fine bridge..." the quote is from Marco Polo's diary.
The inspiration for this fic was Italy and China's interaction in the past. There's a surprising lack of Marco Polo references in the comm., and I just wanted to write about how WWII effected not only the social structure of the currently existing society, and how it felt as a nation to have memories that you cherished ruined by invasions etc. Italy and China's past interactions are pretty ambiguous, but he was one of the European nations that did not make a significant stake of claim on him while all the other countries were doing so (though it was probably because he didn't have the gunpowder to do it). But I think that China and Italy have a fairly good relationship bases on the fact that Italy was the first European nation to recognize China's then-superiority, and introduce it to the rest of the fairly disbelieving world. Not to mention that Italy essentially behaves like a child, and China has a major big-brother complex
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