hetalia | [FANFIC] A fashionably late New Year fic

Title: First Light of the Year
Author/Artist: Emelethaine
Character(s) or Pairing(s): Canada, America, England, Germany, Prussia, France, mild France/Germany, and maybe America/Canada and Prussia/England if you want.
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Language, alcohol, hinted-at sensitive topics. Unbeta-ed, so all m
Summary: The year is ended and another is started, of course, with fireworks.
Notes: I swear I started this on the 1st! D:

Twenty.

"Twenty minutes to midnight!" America yelled to the skies. Canada sighed.

"How come you decided not to spend New Year's Eve in Times Square, Al?" he asked, looking around the empty field. They were surrounded by small trees and untrimmed bushes, not LCD screens and colorful buildings. "You like crowded places and noise, don't you?"

America looked at him funny for a moment before answering. "Yeah, but I thought it'd be nice to spend New Year's Eve together. Just the two of us," he answered, voice shaking a little. "Why? You don't want to?"

Canada sighed again. What was wrong with his brother? "No, it's just that—well, I guess that if no one's around then nobody can not notice me, eh."

His brother smiled a huge grin and walked over to throw his arms around Canada. "Thanks, Matt! Love ya!" Canada hugged him back weakly, replying with a "love ya too, eh," and America let go.

"But really, we haven't spent it just together in years! I mean… I like extravagance, but sometimes it's good to just… stick with the family, you know?" America said wistfully. "Start the New Year with family. Yeah, sounds right," he muttered, smiling. Canada smiled at this. Silly, sentimental America.

"You know you could have done this earlier, Al," he said quietly. "France isn't bad, but I like watching fireworks without being groped, thank you very much," he grumbled, and America laughed loudly, filling the empty space with his glee. Even with no one around, Canada felt like he was walking in America's shadow again, or his light. America, he argued, did not cast shadows.

And well, that was the problem.

The blue-eyed nation walked several paces and picked something up, what seems like a long, gray piece of that Japanese food—what was it called? Oh, right. Pocky. "Wanna light these?" he asked.

"What are those?"

America smiled, and Canada could almost see wistfulness, a sort of melancholy that crossed his face as he answered. "The kinds that don't blast off."

The smile broke, and Canada walked over to stand next to him, taking his hand.

--
Fifteen.

"Hey."

"Yeah?"

"Wanna play a drinking game?"

England stared at the bottle in his hand. Yes, it had alcohol inside—sweet Demerara rum, in fact, not that Prussia would know; the only drink that the no-longer-nation was well versed in was beer—but it would be an awful shame if they ended up too drunk to enjoy the fireworks and start enjoying something else entirely, something that could be done every night (but wasn't done), something that could happen more than just once a year (but never happened).

"No, Prussia," he answered firmly. "Too early. I'd like to see the fireworks before we get completely wasted."

Prussia cackled. "No, Prussia," he said in a mocking tone. "Blah blee blah bluh blah!" England punched him, and Prussia punched back. Soon enough, it escalated into a fistfight, them rolling on the ground, punching the hell out of each other.

"Just—stop it! At least until Germany and France light the fireworks," and until they come here to fetch us and take back to places where things make sense, don't let them do that, the world is so much better when it does not make sense, you and I should know more than anyone, do you agree with me?

"Yeah," Prussia mumbled, getting off England, who dusted himself off and looked at the sky.

England closed his eyes and breathed in the night air. "Just wait a bit, alright?"

We've been waiting forever. But hey, what's another fifteen minutes?

(That last bit could have been said with sarcasm.)

"Alright," Prussia said, choked out. "Alright."

--
Ten.

Germany thought that since it was New Year's Eve, he could have one night without problems. He even left the gel out of his hair, on purpose ("Germany, you must wear your hair like that all the time," France had purred, and Germany even considered it), but no, his brother had to disappear, with England, no less. "Where are—"

"Prussia and England?" France cut in for him, raising an eyebrow. "I expect that they're somewhere having the last sex of the year."

Germany felt his eye twitch. "I, ah, then maybe we should go and—"

"Spoil their fun? Ah, but England doesn't get enough these days, we should let them off for a while, don't you agree?" France said with a wink. Germany looked away, not wanting to know why his face was heating up. Ah, too late. Sometimes he cursed the human common sense. France could be quite handsome sometimes, no, most of the time, no, all the time. He coughed.

France walked over to him, matches and fireworks in hand. Germany hoped that France wouldn't accidentally burn them up-he hoped that France wouldn't accidentally burn him up. "Which one do you want to light first?"

"One that tells England and Prussia to get here fast," Germany said, turning to France with an exasperated look on his face.

France smiled. "I do not think that that would work," he said. "I know both of them very well," at this, his expression darkened a little, "and when they do not want to be found, they will not be found. They will not obey anyone's commands, save for their own."

Germany nodded. "So we should search for them?"

"If you want to."

There was a half-comfortable silence.

"Where is Italy?" France asked, almost conversationally. "I thought that he would spend New Year's Eve with you."

"He is in Spain, celebrating with Spain and his brother. They do not like cold weather."

"Hm."

Germany really could do with a problem-free night.

--
Five.

America bent the end of his Pocky-firework into the shape of a hook and lit it, so that it looked like he held a star on a stick. Arms of light reached out to grasp the darkness, to take it and turn into light, and although they seemed to strike America, he didn't flinch or cry out in pain.

"Come on, Canada! Light one," America said with a grin. "They don't bite."

Canada sighed. "Fine, fine, I will. Do I have to bend the end too?" he asked, picking up a stick and studying it. America nodded enthusiastically.

"What for?" he asked, and America grinned.

"You'll see."

It was always you'll see with America, but no, they never do see, because America doesn't let them, what with him and his blinding light that Canada doesn't, can't reach. He remembered when he said he was going to save Asia, that was you'll see too, wasn't it? And then the terrorists—you'll see.

No, they never saw.

Canada lighted one anyway. "What now?"

America walked over to a small tree and hung his Pocky-firework there, and for a moment it seemed to swing in the wind. He called out for Canada to come closer, and Canada did, sticking the Pocky-firework out as far as he could in fear of getting burned.

"Hang it on a tree, and then let's light some more." Canada did as he was told, (of course, he was always the good boy, even when America went and rebelled he asked nicely, and he still was, never was the favorite child) and it hung on the branch. He had to admit that it looked nice.

"It's not going to catch fire, right?" he asked shakily, because that would be a disaster and the authorities wouldn't be very happy with them, he thought. "We're going to be perfectly safe, right Al?"

America laughed again, sending ripples through the empty night. "Of course! Silly Matt, it won't catch fire."

And again and again they lighted the fireworks and hung them on trees.

"We're growing baby suns," America remarked. "When they're ready, we'll set them free and let them light the sky…"

They stood in the middle of a garden of light, and as America out his arms around Canada's shoulders, the light escaped the night, to glow in Canada's eyes.

--
This is the space between years, a moment between eleven-fifty nine and zero a.m., a moment so much bigger than the nations it falls on.

And it takes away with it the ties of time, the pain of the past, and leaves behind lessons, and memories, and love.

--
Germany pulled France back and they rushed away, hurriedly, as rockets, explosions flew up to the sky, exploding in color and light and noise. There were stars and palm leaves and red-white-blue and black-red-yellow, colors in the blank black canvas of the first night of a newborn year. They stained it, stained the black with manmade brightness.

He pulled his hand away from the other man's arm and looked up to the sky and cleared his throat.

France turned to him, smiling lazily, and Germany forgot everything he was going to say.

--
"Fireworks!"

Prussia whistled to the sky. "Some fireworks."

"Yeah," England agreed. "They are." He sat up, bottle in hand, and opened it, chugging it down, feeling it burn in his throat a little, as if he was drinking the fireworks. "Want some?" he offered Prussia, although he shouldn't have asked—he knew what the answer would be. He waved the bottle tantalizingly in front of Prussia's face. "It isn't beer," England said, "but it's pretty damn good."

"Bah." Prussia spat. "Nothing compares to beer. Fuck you."

England lay down again, sighing contentedly, smiling a little. He expected it of Prussia and yet—yet most of the time, England never knew what to expect, although he could rely on that. The man was predictably unpredictable, or better yet, unpredictably predictable, and every time they met England wasn't sure whether he'd come home with bruises or a grin on his face, or both. "Let's start the year sober. What say you?"

Prussia snorted. "There's no such thing."

"But we live to be exceptions to every rule, don't we?" England threw away the bottle. They wouldn't need it tonight.

The sound of the bottle smashing was drowned out by the fireworks, and they both laughed, like drunken men.

--
"Hey, America—"

America had released Canada and stood to watch the fireworks in the sky, the ones they didn't light, they ones they didn't let fly. Canada turned to see his brother look at them with a faraway look—and expression that was at the same time fearful, expectant, confused and sad.

"America!"

Canada smacked his brother upside the head and America seemed to sober up. "Yeah, bro?" he asked, grinning, but Canada wasn't convinced. America was remembering something, something that Canada wasn't sure he would like.

"Don't 'yeah bro' me, eh," Canada growled. "What were you thinking about?"

America shrugged. "Nooothin'," he answered, shuffling his feet, eyes to the ground. "I wasn't thinkin' bout' nothin', Matt." Canada narrowed his eyes, suspicious. Sometimes America forgot what a bad liar and actor he was, but Canada didn't. America looked up, an innocent look on his face. "Why?"

"You know you can tell me anything, Al."

"Those fireworks aren't the only things that can go bang, you know." His voice was quiet, breaking in several places, delicate.

Oh.

"I believe in you."

America took a deep breath, facing his brother with uncertain eyes. "Sometimes I don't."

Canada patted America's shoulder. "You have to, Al. This is justice you're fighting for. You're the hero, you know—you're gonna bring peace to the world, you can do it. You can do anything, eh," he said. Sometimes, at nights when it was dark and sad and rainy, at nights when Canada remembered how no one ever did, he wished that this was untrue. "Innocent lives lost in pursuit of a darker soul, it happens all the time, Al."

America smirked, chuckled. "You've been hanging out with England?"

Punch.

"Oh, shut up, eh."

"But really, Matt," America continued, "do I have to wage war to bring peace? Why does it all sound so… contradictory? Sometimes I wake up knowing, yeah, this is the only way, this is the right thing, but sometimes… I don't know." He looked lost again, and Canada sighed.

"It happens, Alfred. There isn't anything as gentle as real strength, remember?" he offered, faltering. Canada was terrible at comforting people, especially his own brother, whom sometimes he wasn't very fond of, sometimes Canada was even spiteful, but at the end of the day, America was his brother, and Canada knew he could only try to be there for him.

America smiled hopefully. "Thanks, Matt. I just—I just wish that my boys could celebrate here with me, you know. They're family too."

As Canada was again pulled into another, stronger, tearful hug, he prayed for a year that would finally bring peace—to the world, and to their hearts.

[FANFIC] A fashionably late New Year fic

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