Fic: New skies, new harbours for us all
Fandom: Axis Powers Hetalia
Characters: Germany/Italy, Prussia and mentions of other characters
Rating: PG-13 for Gilbo's swearing
Warnings: Fail!German None really
Summary: Hetalia, the space opera!
Note: This is the fic Nations in space from the kink-meme, I just thought that title was really boring even for me so I changed it. There are also very minor edits from that version
New skies, new harbours for us all
Neu-Deutschland was coming along nicely, Ludwig thought, as he looked out over the rolling hills. If the sky had been less purple and the trees not all fern-hybrids bred to fit the foreign soil of a new solar system, he could almost have believed he was in his old house.
Germany had been one of the last of the nations to leave Earth behind. Only when pollution and lack of resources had finally become too much, had he followed a large group of his children into space.
There were already many human settlements by then and of course he'd been to visit his young siblings before. Among them he was closest to New Berlin, a shy little planet-nation who looked a lot like grandfather Germania; Holstein II, a slightly scatterbrained multisettlement in a planetary ring system and Marienthaler Station, whom Italy for some reason found unaccountably cute. Apparently the kid looked like someone he’d known when he was younger. It had been much easier to go visit his young siblings than to uproot himself, though not all nations had felt that way.
England was better known as the Royal Fleet Union these days. He had happily dumped the country in Wales's lap (much to Scotland’s fury) and told his bosses that he’d never liked that European Union anyway. Anything that demanded him to be in a union with France could go bugger itself.
Then England, laughing merrily and telling them all to come over for a cuppa if they ever got off this rock, set off for the unknown sea of stars with many of his more adventurous people.
That one of the princes had led the charge probably made things simpler, but it had still been an unprecedented move by a wealthy old nation. And Ludwig has serious doubts as to whether it was the prince or England's idea to increase their supplies by deep-space piracy. The RFU had mostly stopped with that now, officially, but there were still rumours about what happened if you took the wrong turn in a worm-hole and met a red-and-blue space ship where no-one was looking...
Or take Hong-Kong, apropos surprising emigrants. That he had brought nearly all of many of his children and broken off from China again was one thing, but that he was the first to leave Earth?
Most of them, Germany included, would have guessed for America to be the first one to go, if any of them were to leave at all and not just send the youngsters. But though America had sent more kids and siblings out here than most of them, he had clung to Earth and his country with a surprising dedication.
In the end, a teary-eyed America had only agreed to leave together with Canada when he realized that their remaining loyal people would starve to death otherwise. The brothers had headed to a planet officially called The Fiftyfirst State of the Re-United States of North America, but which everyone knew as Hero’s Harbour.
After Earth became uninhabitable, it was the only place in the galaxy where you could still find maple syrup; trust Canada to have his priorities straight on what kind of plants ought to be gene-engineered first to thrive on the new world.
“Ve~! Germany, where are you?”
Ludwig turned towards his husband and nearest neighbour, Italy, and smiled warmly at the shorter nation. It had been a blessing to find a solar system with two hospitable planets where they could both settle.
While Ludwig didn’t think he’d stand sharing a house with Italy (or anyone, to be honest) it would have felt very lonely to be the only nation for light years. Somehow, it had been the most natural thing in the world to formalize their good relationship in a peaceful union once they were there.
Though why everyone insisted on calling them the Holy Roman System, he would never understand...
“Look, look!” Italy said and held up something for him to look at. “Cheese! It’s the first batch made all from Tricolore products!” The nation was jumping with excitement, his hair-curl bouncing in a way that made a warm blush spread over Ludwig’s face. “And you know what I want to make with it? Do you, Germany?”
“Of course,” he said and then did what had taken him so many years to dare. Finally, he could make Italy shut up by kissing him. Which he did. For quite some time. Because once Germany, whether new or old, decided to do something, he did it properly.
“Ahem,” he said once he’d finished with the slightly breathless Italian, “I assume you’re going to make our solar system’s first proper pizza?”
Brown eyes blinked prettily for a moment, and then Italy (he just couldn’t get used to call him La Republica Tricolore, but the Vargas brothers had been adamant that there was to be only one country called Italy around, thank you very much) returned to reality.
“Yes, proper pizza again! Veveveee~”
Ludwig squeezed his husband’s shoulder fondly. “Shall we get started then? I would like wurst on mine, I think”
“Madre di Dio! Wurst on pizza?” Italy looked as if he was about to cry.
“I can call it salami, if that makes you happier?”
“Sa- Oh! Germany is joking! Don’t scare me like that, ve,” Italy admonished and pinched him. “When I’m so happy that we finally won’t have to eat yeast-powder products all the time!”
The pizza had been splendid, both Germany and everyone else that came to the improvised party agreed.
Since they had both started over as very small nations and everyone lived in everyone else’s pocket during the eleven-year long trip to star 452-K Beta or, sigh, the Holy Roman System, there hadn’t really been a way to keep their identities secret.
According to the oldest nations, no one used to do that until the populations exploded and the rate of communications grew too fast for comfort anyway.
As such, neither Ludwig nor Feliciano worried when someone called for the countries to come over to the communications station.
“What is it?”
“Someone is hailing the border station,” their host, the local baker (who had an oven suited for Italy’s pizza experiment that he was more than happy to share) said.
“But, uh, they can’t understand who it is. So they asked to patch it over to you, Germany.”
Ludwig felt a slight shiver. Hopefully that didn’t mean...
“Are they talking a language you don’t know?” he said hopefully.
“Well, the accent is a bit strange, but no. They think he’s, uhm, drunk. And uses some weird words.”
Ludwig groaned.
“Maybe it’s just Ru- Ivan?” Italy suggested with a tense smile. “Er, though on the other hand I think even your brother would be better than him...”
That was such obviously true that Germany didn’t feel a need to answer. Instead, he took the comm-set. “Hello, this is Neu-Deutschland speaking.”
“Ey, Bruderchen!” a familiar, obnoxious voice answered, “long time no see!”
“Hello Gilbert,” Ludwig said. Just his luck, why couldn’t it be one of the kids, or even Roderich? Of course, they wouldn’t hail his space station while drunk.
Italy’s warm hand seeking his gave him some comfort, but he still had to steel himself for the questions that must be asked.
Not that he had anything against his brother, but every time Gilbert turned up, he turned their beautiful, steadily developing planets upside down. And he always seduced away at least a dozen youngsters and then guess who’d be left to try and comfort the grieving parents? That’s right.
“Why have you decided to come here this time?”
Gilbert hiccoughed, and managed to sound both drunk and wounded. “What, can’t ein Land decide that he wants to see his little brother without being accused of all kinds of things?”
“Every time you show up, you want something! If you’re at war with the RFU again, I’m not hiding you again!” Oops, that wasn’t what he had meant to say.
“Du mieser kleiner Wichser! I raise you up, I save your ass from the tentacly things, and that’s all the thanks I get?”
“No, Gilbert,” Italy interjected hurriedly, “Germany doesn’t mean it like that! He’s just worried about you!”
I am? Ludwig mouthed silently, but at Italy’s stern look, he decided to shut up.
“He is?”
There were benefits to have a brother who was the embodiment of one of the most powerful space fleets around, certainly.
For one, it kept the (still) eerily grinning Ivan and his nova busters well away from them. It was also nice how Italy and he could save resources and didn’t need to build an army. Which would have been mostly for show, anyway, since no new colony could realistically support a proper space-fleet for the first hundred years. But since Gilbert was more than happy to rent them a dozen star cruisers on discount, they had no worries there.
On the downside, the Celestial Knight was, well, Gilbert. More powerful and crazy than he had been even under Prussia’s heydays.
Gilbert had refused to die after Prussia fell, but hung around as a paler and paler spectre of living memory until Ludwig feared that his brother would go invisible before he finally died. He’d had nightmares about hearing a disembodied voice nag at him to touch Hungary’s boobies, now that his poor brother was discorporated and couldn’t do it for himself.
And then, whoops, someone discovered FTL-travel through wormholes and the world was in an upheaval.
Hong-Kong up and left, Sealand was quick to follow (with all of Arthur’s blessings and many tearful farewells from the Scandinavians) and then America, Russia, China and India were all racing to send off as many kids as possible into space with as big guns as they could build. That had been a very nervous century, even worse than the Cold War.
And Gilbert? He had invited Roderich and Elisaveta over to Ludwig without even telling him, damn the man. Ludwig had opened in only his underwear, since he thought it was Italy. They tended to lose their clothes rather quickly those days, you never knew if the final bomb would fall or not...
Once Ludwig was completely humiliated and Hungary had taken a dozen pictures, a slightly drunk Gilbert turned up, red eyes suddenly full of life again.
While handing out some truly foul rotgut, Gilbert told them that this was his going-off celebration because America was giving him a fleet of his own - imagine, a whole fleet! And he even got to keep it! - if he promised to train Alfred’s infant space colonies and slow down the other super-powers to the best of his ability.
He told Germany to take care of himself, pinched a surprised Hungary’s butt and kissed an even more surprised Austria goodbye, and was off for the stars, just like that. Though sporting some fresh frying-pan shaped bruises...
The years passed and what with environmental disasters and international tensions, Germany hadn’t really had time to do more than occasionally hope that his brother had made a new life for himself out there somewhere.
When Ludwig and Feliciano were on the move towards their new home, Gilbert had popped up after a few worm-hole jumps and scared the stuffing out of everyone with his giant flagship (named, for some unfathomable reason, The Amazing Five Meters) and a fleet of ten million ships.
Several hundreds of years had passed since they’d last seen each other. It actually took Germany a while to recognize his brother, though he blamed this mostly on the many “interesting” cyber-implants Gilbert had acquired. Gilbert blamed it on his brother being a forgetful sissy.
Turned out, Gilbert had followed America’s orders with enthusiasm. Then, once the great Earth powers began to make peace, and their fleets started to settle and become independent, he declared war on his own. Against everyone.
Cue the first proper intergalactic war.
“Didn’t your boss protest that?” Italy had asked with wide eyes from his position behind Germany’s back. His beloved’s big brother had grown really scary out in space!
“Nah,” Gilbert said and grinned, showing off his razor-sharp titanium teeth, “my last human boss wanted to ditch America and go live on some boring little colony way before that!”
“Your... last...” Italy just gaped.
“Yeah, real stick in the mud. So I spaced him,” Gilbert said with a shrug.
“You don’t have a boss!?” Germany yelped.
“Sure I do,” Gilbert had said, and fondly patted his computer. “Old Fritz, meet my brother.”
“Gott mit dir, Kind,” an artificial voice said regally. “I am the governing AI of the Fleet of the Celestial Knight. Most know me as Friedrich der Große, but since you are the younger brother of my knight, you may also call me Fritz.”
“...ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR BLOODY MIND, BROTHER?”
“Hm?”
As luck would have it, at least it was lucky for Germany and his younger siblings whom everyone assumed would side with the Celestial Knight(1) and thus wanted to blow up, a hostile and frighteningly powerful alien species showed up.
Humanity managed to stop bickering enough to drive them off, and from then on, Gilbert and his fleet had a new mission in life. Kill aliens - which they did with a rather obsessive energy.
Unfortunately, he still managed to get into scrapes with other human nations now and then, especially the larger and more expansion-minded ones.
Since Germany and Italy had carefully nurtured their diplomatic relations (because even if their people had mostly forgotten, they remembered Earth and what happened when Germany went to war, far too well) Gilbert thought it would be just awesome if they solved his messes. In those few cases he didn’t feel like doing it with his death-ray, that is.
As such Germany had come to dread his brother’s visit more and more. But to have him stop visiting as a brother-in-need and decide to just invade the place in hurt retaliation wasn’t exactly an improvement...
“Of course,” Italy said, sounding cute and cluelessly sincere in the way only he could pull off, “we don’t want anything to happen to you! But since brother Gilbert only shows up when he’s in trouble, Germany has to go around worrying for years and years and yeeeears between visits. Ve, you should come down and try my new pizza! We can talk business tomorrow?”
“Are you shitting me?”
At Italy’s sharp elbow, Ludwig swallowed his annoyance. “No, brother.”
The worst thing was, though Ludwig would rather have eaten nails than admit it, there was a grain of truth in what Italy so blithely revealed. But only a small one!
“You’re always fighting. And. And other nations come to visit just to socialize sometimes, so we hear about how you just beat another alien species or that the RFU executed a raid against your flagship...”
“Aww,” an amused voice cooed from the comm-unit, “that’s my kleine Ludwiglein! It’s like when you wanted to get into Italy’s uniform pants during that Earth war, but you just kept yelling at him to shape up.”
Oh God. There was reason number two he hated to have Gilbert come over for a visit. He always, bloody always, brought new embarrassing baby portraits or remembered another “amusing” anecdote from their younger days.
“I’m coming down then,” Gilbert said. “Did you say you have pizza? Like, the real shit?”
“Yes, made with all our own products!”
“Awesome! Stay inside!”
“Stay- Gilbert, what do you mean? Gilbert!”
“Mein Ritter has commenced the landing sequence,” Old Fritz’s voice informed them, “he shall be with you shortly.”
Feliciano and Ludwig exchanged a glance. He wouldn’t... oh, who were they kidding.
“Where is he landing?” Germany said.
“Didn’t he say? By you. In the garden behind the house, I think.”
“Ve! Everyone, down in the cellar!”
There was a general stamped down the stairs, but at least they could all fit in there. As a legacy from the time when the entire colony had lived in fragile biospheres, all houses on Neu-Deutschland and Tricolore were built with big, sturdy basements.
The whole house shook as his brother’s personal shuttle landed. Germany felt several painful blisters appear on his leg when the lovely garden and parts of the field behind it where scorched to ash. Goddamn thoughtless Gilbert anyway, it wasn’t as if they didn’t have a perfectly functional spaceport!
“Does it burn much, Germany?” Italy asked as the noise and shaking had stopped.
“Hardly anything,” Ludwig lied, “he must have upgraded his engines again.”
The two nations lead their nervous people upstairs again. Gilbert really had upgraded his engines, Ludwig realized, the house didn’t even seem a little bit scorched.
Maybe he finally listened when I tried to choke him for burning down a recreation centre during the last visit?
All of them carefully went outside, where the sleek shuttle Ehrgeiz stood, still glowing slightly from its rapid descent.
Ludwig heard a dismayed moan from their host as he saw what had happened to his garden and Italy hugged the man comfortingly and said, “Remember, this is why we instigated the Brother-tax.”
Then they were both nearly tackled to the floor by the madly grinning pale-faced conqueror of planets, solar systems and entire species.
“Feliciano! Bruderchen!”
“Ve!”
Ludwig gingerly patted his brother’s back; one eventful visit, Feliciano had set of a flame-thrower when he hugged Gilbert a bit too fondly.
“Hello, brother,” Ludwig said once he’d regained his breath and balance. “You look,” computerized, no, pointy, no, I’ll have to sleep on the couch if I almost set of a conflict again, “well. Is that a new arm I see?”
“Yep, is’ voll geil! Look!” Gilbert took a step back and sharply pumped his arm twice. The hand opened up like a (probably man-eating) flower and a gleaming sword emerged.
“You put a sword in your arm?”
“Oh, it can shoot antimatter bombs too,” Gilbert said with a shrug, “but this looks a lot cooler, doesn’t it?”
“A- an- antimatter bombs?”
“Pizza!” Italy dragged the two larger nations inside, with a strained grin on his face. “Ve, ve ve~ Come now, the pizza will get cold!”
The two Germanic brother’s willingly allowed themselves to be led. “So you’re finally moving away from yeast and algae?” Gilbert asked, and made his sword disappear again.
“Yes! We have wonderful grain nowadays! And big brother sent sprouts for a xenotomatoe, they’re really yummy. Er, though they are blue...”
“Oh right, I almost forgot! Ey, Old Fritz!”
“Mein Ritter?” The AI’s voice seemed to come from the blinking mini-computer on above Gilbert’s right ear(2) and was, as usually when speaking to its nation, fondly indulgent.
“Where’d we put that little piece of fluff?”
“The chickenlike alien? The main shuttle is bringing it down at Astrohansa spaceport at this very moment.”
“Have you found a new species?” Ludwig asked.
“It’s some fucking adorable bird-analogue,” Gilbert said, “I just know you guys are gonna love it!”
“Ah. What does it taste like?”
THWAP!
When your brother’s hand is made from polymeric-ceramic/titanium alloys, even a light slap to the head is enough to create a sizeable lump and a near-concussion. Germany crashed to the floor, taking a yelping Italy with him.
“You’re not supposed to eat it, you barbarian! Es ist echt niedlich!”
“’m sorry,” Ludwig managed to get out, despite his aching head. “I forgot that the big bad space fleet is verknallt in fluffy little things.”
“Hell yeah, bunnies kick ass.”
The next evening, all bosses and nations were gathered for a more formal meeting.
Italy had given Ludwig a cool compress for his head and several hot kisses for his bruised pride, so Germany felt up to dealing seriously with his brother again.
“Ve, Germany, what do you think that is?” Italy asked and pointed at a small green thing that was sitting at Gilbert’s lap.
Ludwig could only shrug; his brother loved bringing home weird souvenirs, as evidenced by the (alright, very cute) little chicken now roosting on Italy’s head.
They’d also been gifted with a truly lovely beer which had gone very well with the pizza and a generous load of brand new medical nano-bots. The last had truly surprised Ludwig, such kind of expensive items were usually something his brother sold to them (even if he often gave huge discounts), but perhaps they had been stolen from someone.
As long as Gilbert didn’t explain, he wasn’t about to ask, but he would have their scientists make sure they weren’t taken from Ivan before anyone was allowed to use them. Just in case.
“Mrple?” the green thing said and waved an antenna.
“Here,” Gilbert said and held the thing up, “what do you say of becoming a father, bruderchen?”
“...”
“Oh!” Italy bent closer to the alien, “Is it a baby nation?”
“That is correct,” Old Fritz said, “one of the few remaining ones from its planet.”
Though a large part of him just wanted to go hide somewhere, Ludwig managed to find his voice again. “What have you done now, brother?”
As it turned out, someone had started a rumour that the Chinese Federation was interested in a few previously unsettled systems near Betelgeuse. To beat Yao, Gilbert’s fleet had swept the area and found only one inhabitable planet.
“I made a miscalculation there,” Old Fritz admitted, “I believed the low level of radiation was a sign of very advanced technology.”
Since he was in a hurry to secure his victory before the Chinese fleet showed up, the Celestial Knights had carpet-bombed most of the planet. Only when they sent down infantry to pick up the pieces did they make a rather startling discovery.
“Ahaha, you know, this is kind of embarrassing,” Gilbert said and fidgeted, “but turns out they had only just discovered fire and metallurgy.”
“Oh no!” Italy’s eyes filled with tears and he reached over the table to pet the small alien nation.
Ludwig’s reaction was more focused on the perpetrator. “Gilbert, du Arsch!”
There hadn’t been that many aliens yet and their low developmental level meant that they lived scattered over most of the planet. Still, most of the tribes had been completely or partly wiped out. The disoriented survivors offered no resistance.
The ashamed Celestial Knights had easily herded them into a large survivor’s camp and then begun on the process of repairing the worst bomb-damage to the planet.
Then the research ship Tretton Kronor passed by, on a mission to measure background radiation in the uninhabited regions of the galaxy. They brought the unexpected news that the Chinese Federation were nowhere in the vicinity, since the old territorial dispute between them and the Neo-Imperial Coalition of True China a.k.a. the Imperials(3) had just blossomed into all-out war.
“Yes, yes, I know,” the albino held up a hand to stave off the furious Germany, “Gilbert issn Arschloch. I admit, I fucked up. That’s why I thought I’d try to make things better.”
“Why not just leave them alone?” Italy said. “Oh, look, Germany! It’s curling his, I think it’s a he, antenna just like my hair!”
Of course, once an inhabitable planet with fertile ground and a low-technology species had been discovered, there was no chance in hell that someone wouldn’t come along and claim it. Both Feliciano and Ludwig knew that; space was endless, but good real-estate was limited. Most of the older human settlements were full of young, spirited people and infant nations-to-be that wanted nothing more than to find their own place.
“You know I mostly just sell new places to the highest bidder,” Gilbert continued, “but I felt a bit bad since I didn’t even give these guys a fair chance.”
“And you usually do?”
“Sure. It’s one thing to crush a dude in a fair fight, but this is like kicking puppies. Fucking uncool.”
“Excuse me, Celestial Knight,” Neu-Deutschland’s chancellor interrupted, “but how do you engage a weaker enemy in a fair fight?”
“What do you think I had this sword made for, huh? Call for volunteers. Then we go down and kick their ass, Mann gegen Mann. Also, echt, what kind of a monster do you take me for?”
From the sharp tug in his heart, Germany realized he had just lost one young citizen to the Celestial Knight. Who..? Ah, young Lottchen, whose father had brought her along to the meeting to see a bit of the world. Her eyes were gleaming with that particular fervour Ludwig had come to dread. He knew that before Gilbert left, she’d have enlisted as a future Knight.
He only hope that she would one day be among the pensioned soldiers who came and asked to settle with Italy or him... too many of the Celestial Knights ended up as slightly radioactive space dust, but they still loved Gilbert passionately. Perhaps because he always lead the charge and was the last to retreat, or perhaps just because he loved them too, with all his wild heart.
“So you thought Italy and I should take care of them?”
“Yeah!” Gilbert began ticking points of his finger. “You’ll get a new colony, I have a place to refuel, the little dudes won’t like, get eaten by anyone nasty. Also, this place is where I found the beer, these guys look a bit strange but they already know what’s important in life, heh. And,” he licked his lips and looked down, “I think you’d do a much better job of teaching them all this civilization shit than I would.”
“Well, we could perhaps teach them how not to end up at war with everyone else in the galaxy,” Germany said wryly. “What do you say, Feliciano?”
A dazzling smile met him, and the shorter nation took his hand and squeezed enthusiastically. “Ve, I think Germany would become a great father! And it’s not nice to be occupied by someone who uses you as a maid and only feeds you horrible food!”
“As long as you are prepared to let go, once this little guy has grown up,” Germany said and carefully poked the alien nation. It said “wurpl” and burrowed deeper into Gilbert’s arms.
“Veveve, and I can teach them art!”
“And what do you say little... thing?”
“Mrrveve?”
That was more than enough to melt Italy’s heart (and Germany’s, not that he would admit it) and he bounced over to say hi to their adoptive “son”.
“So what should we call this place, then?” Germany wondered.
Old Fritz bleeped, the computer version of a polite cough. “We have registered the system 5249-RTG with all major starcharts as Prussia Minor.”
“What can I say,” Gilbert shrugged off Ludwig’s glare, “I thought they deserved a cooler name than Urplmeep or whatever it was called before.”
After the meeting was finished, several Tricolorean journalists came up and demanded a picture of Germany, Italy and the brand new Prussia Minor. Ludwig smiled until it felt as if his cheeks had frozen stiff.
When the reporters showed no signs of being done taking pictures and asking inane questions, he left with the excuse that he needed to speak to his brother, leaving Italy and the alien nation to bask in the spotlight. The journalists didn’t seem to care much and Ludwig ruefully thought that the two much cuter than him anyway.
Whether it was their new status as colonial forces over the alien, or just because Italy had an affinity for small and helpless things, his husband and the new nation had already managed to communicate slightly.
Unfortunately, little Prussia found Ludwig intimidating, which was really unfair considering that it even seemed to like Gilbert!
“Hey there. You’ll have to face a pretty heavy PR backlash from this,” Germany said when he finally found the Celestial Knight.
Gilbert had climbed up a ferntree and was looking out over the well-ordered pastoral city. In the sunrise, all the fields glowed amethyst and Ludwig felt his heart swell with possessive pride.
“Fuck them, it’s not like humans haven’t done nasty things to each other before.”
“Still... next time, perhaps you could try to talk to the new species before starting a war against them?”
A moment’s silence, then Gilbert did a sloppy salute. “Consider it done.”
“You could have settled there, instead of giving it to us,” Ludwig continued and sat down beneath the tree. “Wouldn’t a proper home planet be nice?”
Finally, his brother turned to look down at him. The space chicken was sitting on his chest and his flesh hand was tickling it between the wings.
So the thing was perhaps too cute to eat, Germany admitted, but once his brother was gone he would at least see if it couldn’t lay eggs.
“You really think that would be best for me?” Gilbert asked.
Biting his lip, Ludwig considered how he should answer to make his brother understand. “You seem so restless sometimes,” he finally managed. “It’s so lovely to see a planet grow into a home, to feel how it becomes your home. ...I just want to share this experience with you, I guess.”
“Moron. You and Feliciano make me all mushy inside, you know that?” Gilbert said fondly. “You don’t want to make war-“
“Well, everyone who wants to fight usually leaves with you first.”
“-you just want to make these little worlds perfect for you and the children. I can’t visit too often, I’ll get cavities,” he said and winked. “But... look at the stars. See how many they are?”
“Yes.”
“Das Weltall is einfach zu riesig. There're no fucking borders in space, no end. I can’t stop, Bruderchen. I can’t put up a wall around myself and say this is enough.”
“Peace isn’t a wall.”
“It can be, if all you want to do is climb it and see what lies behind.”
True enough. As his people grew and prospered, Ludwig too began to feel a whisper of desire for expansion. It was still slight, but sometimes when he looked at his children, the urge to grow, to settle new worlds, made him imagine a large fleet. His children taking off among the stars, looking for new adventures and he following them.
But they had all the time in the world and for now, the walls that held him were still the comfortable walls of home, of his own wonderful house.
“Just don’t forget to enjoy what you already have, Gilbert.”
“I don’t. There are no rules in space, but the ones we make.” His brothers eyes were still his own, untouched by implants and genetic tinkering, but sometimes Ludwig swore they glowed in the dark. “And that freedom I enjoy every day.”
- The End? -
Footnotes:
1) to Ludwig’s despair his darling little sister Freiheit-im-Himmel had become a big fan of cool Onkel Gilbert after he defended her planet from Tien-Lung, one of China’s many offspring.
2) Do you really need to have that many blinking lights and tubes sticking out of your people everywhere, Germany had once asked his brother.
Not really, but don’t they look awesome? was Gilbert’s fairly predictable answer.
3) The Imperials were represented by Yao’s very, very disowned little sister
Useful mini-dictionary:
I usually try not to include a bunch of foreign words in my fics, but here... what can I say, once I got started I thought I might as well go all out ^^; Sorry!
One of the point’s I’m trying to make is that the language has evolved, so Gilbert uses old-fashioned words, which the German-speaking (or perhaps German-Italian by now) people of the Holy Roman System don’t understand.
FTL - Standard scifi shorthand for faster-than-light
Madre di Dio - Mother of God
Du mieser kleiner wichser - You miserable little wanker
Ritter - Knight
Voll geil - Totally cool
Ehrgeiz - Ambition (to become powerful or famous)
Niedlich - Cute
Arsch, Arschloch - Ass, asshole
Verknallt - In love with
Das Weltall is einfach zu riesig - The cosmos is simply too huge
This German is pretty slangy, so the translations aren't exact. I hope I didn't do any linguistical faux, but I'm a bit rusty so *bows* apologies in advance!
This fic now has a sequel, called The song sung by those who remain which is a lot sadder and darker in tone... but still very much nations in spaaaaaace! There may be more snippets in this verse in the future.
Characters: Germany/Italy, Prussia and mentions of other characters
Rating: PG-13 for Gilbo's swearing
Warnings: Fail!German None really
Summary: Hetalia, the space opera!
Note: This is the fic Nations in space from the kink-meme, I just thought that title was really boring even for me so I changed it. There are also very minor edits from that version
New skies, new harbours for us all
Neu-Deutschland was coming along nicely, Ludwig thought, as he looked out over the rolling hills. If the sky had been less purple and the trees not all fern-hybrids bred to fit the foreign soil of a new solar system, he could almost have believed he was in his old house.
Germany had been one of the last of the nations to leave Earth behind. Only when pollution and lack of resources had finally become too much, had he followed a large group of his children into space.
There were already many human settlements by then and of course he'd been to visit his young siblings before. Among them he was closest to New Berlin, a shy little planet-nation who looked a lot like grandfather Germania; Holstein II, a slightly scatterbrained multisettlement in a planetary ring system and Marienthaler Station, whom Italy for some reason found unaccountably cute. Apparently the kid looked like someone he’d known when he was younger. It had been much easier to go visit his young siblings than to uproot himself, though not all nations had felt that way.
England was better known as the Royal Fleet Union these days. He had happily dumped the country in Wales's lap (much to Scotland’s fury) and told his bosses that he’d never liked that European Union anyway. Anything that demanded him to be in a union with France could go bugger itself.
Then England, laughing merrily and telling them all to come over for a cuppa if they ever got off this rock, set off for the unknown sea of stars with many of his more adventurous people.
That one of the princes had led the charge probably made things simpler, but it had still been an unprecedented move by a wealthy old nation. And Ludwig has serious doubts as to whether it was the prince or England's idea to increase their supplies by deep-space piracy. The RFU had mostly stopped with that now, officially, but there were still rumours about what happened if you took the wrong turn in a worm-hole and met a red-and-blue space ship where no-one was looking...
Or take Hong-Kong, apropos surprising emigrants. That he had brought nearly all of many of his children and broken off from China again was one thing, but that he was the first to leave Earth?
Most of them, Germany included, would have guessed for America to be the first one to go, if any of them were to leave at all and not just send the youngsters. But though America had sent more kids and siblings out here than most of them, he had clung to Earth and his country with a surprising dedication.
In the end, a teary-eyed America had only agreed to leave together with Canada when he realized that their remaining loyal people would starve to death otherwise. The brothers had headed to a planet officially called The Fiftyfirst State of the Re-United States of North America, but which everyone knew as Hero’s Harbour.
After Earth became uninhabitable, it was the only place in the galaxy where you could still find maple syrup; trust Canada to have his priorities straight on what kind of plants ought to be gene-engineered first to thrive on the new world.
“Ve~! Germany, where are you?”
Ludwig turned towards his husband and nearest neighbour, Italy, and smiled warmly at the shorter nation. It had been a blessing to find a solar system with two hospitable planets where they could both settle.
While Ludwig didn’t think he’d stand sharing a house with Italy (or anyone, to be honest) it would have felt very lonely to be the only nation for light years. Somehow, it had been the most natural thing in the world to formalize their good relationship in a peaceful union once they were there.
Though why everyone insisted on calling them the Holy Roman System, he would never understand...
“Look, look!” Italy said and held up something for him to look at. “Cheese! It’s the first batch made all from Tricolore products!” The nation was jumping with excitement, his hair-curl bouncing in a way that made a warm blush spread over Ludwig’s face. “And you know what I want to make with it? Do you, Germany?”
“Of course,” he said and then did what had taken him so many years to dare. Finally, he could make Italy shut up by kissing him. Which he did. For quite some time. Because once Germany, whether new or old, decided to do something, he did it properly.
“Ahem,” he said once he’d finished with the slightly breathless Italian, “I assume you’re going to make our solar system’s first proper pizza?”
Brown eyes blinked prettily for a moment, and then Italy (he just couldn’t get used to call him La Republica Tricolore, but the Vargas brothers had been adamant that there was to be only one country called Italy around, thank you very much) returned to reality.
“Yes, proper pizza again! Veveveee~”
Ludwig squeezed his husband’s shoulder fondly. “Shall we get started then? I would like wurst on mine, I think”
“Madre di Dio! Wurst on pizza?” Italy looked as if he was about to cry.
“I can call it salami, if that makes you happier?”
“Sa- Oh! Germany is joking! Don’t scare me like that, ve,” Italy admonished and pinched him. “When I’m so happy that we finally won’t have to eat yeast-powder products all the time!”
The pizza had been splendid, both Germany and everyone else that came to the improvised party agreed.
Since they had both started over as very small nations and everyone lived in everyone else’s pocket during the eleven-year long trip to star 452-K Beta or, sigh, the Holy Roman System, there hadn’t really been a way to keep their identities secret.
According to the oldest nations, no one used to do that until the populations exploded and the rate of communications grew too fast for comfort anyway.
As such, neither Ludwig nor Feliciano worried when someone called for the countries to come over to the communications station.
“What is it?”
“Someone is hailing the border station,” their host, the local baker (who had an oven suited for Italy’s pizza experiment that he was more than happy to share) said.
“But, uh, they can’t understand who it is. So they asked to patch it over to you, Germany.”
Ludwig felt a slight shiver. Hopefully that didn’t mean...
“Are they talking a language you don’t know?” he said hopefully.
“Well, the accent is a bit strange, but no. They think he’s, uhm, drunk. And uses some weird words.”
Ludwig groaned.
“Maybe it’s just Ru- Ivan?” Italy suggested with a tense smile. “Er, though on the other hand I think even your brother would be better than him...”
That was such obviously true that Germany didn’t feel a need to answer. Instead, he took the comm-set. “Hello, this is Neu-Deutschland speaking.”
“Ey, Bruderchen!” a familiar, obnoxious voice answered, “long time no see!”
“Hello Gilbert,” Ludwig said. Just his luck, why couldn’t it be one of the kids, or even Roderich? Of course, they wouldn’t hail his space station while drunk.
Italy’s warm hand seeking his gave him some comfort, but he still had to steel himself for the questions that must be asked.
Not that he had anything against his brother, but every time Gilbert turned up, he turned their beautiful, steadily developing planets upside down. And he always seduced away at least a dozen youngsters and then guess who’d be left to try and comfort the grieving parents? That’s right.
“Why have you decided to come here this time?”
Gilbert hiccoughed, and managed to sound both drunk and wounded. “What, can’t ein Land decide that he wants to see his little brother without being accused of all kinds of things?”
“Every time you show up, you want something! If you’re at war with the RFU again, I’m not hiding you again!” Oops, that wasn’t what he had meant to say.
“Du mieser kleiner Wichser! I raise you up, I save your ass from the tentacly things, and that’s all the thanks I get?”
“No, Gilbert,” Italy interjected hurriedly, “Germany doesn’t mean it like that! He’s just worried about you!”
I am? Ludwig mouthed silently, but at Italy’s stern look, he decided to shut up.
“He is?”
There were benefits to have a brother who was the embodiment of one of the most powerful space fleets around, certainly.
For one, it kept the (still) eerily grinning Ivan and his nova busters well away from them. It was also nice how Italy and he could save resources and didn’t need to build an army. Which would have been mostly for show, anyway, since no new colony could realistically support a proper space-fleet for the first hundred years. But since Gilbert was more than happy to rent them a dozen star cruisers on discount, they had no worries there.
On the downside, the Celestial Knight was, well, Gilbert. More powerful and crazy than he had been even under Prussia’s heydays.
Gilbert had refused to die after Prussia fell, but hung around as a paler and paler spectre of living memory until Ludwig feared that his brother would go invisible before he finally died. He’d had nightmares about hearing a disembodied voice nag at him to touch Hungary’s boobies, now that his poor brother was discorporated and couldn’t do it for himself.
And then, whoops, someone discovered FTL-travel through wormholes and the world was in an upheaval.
Hong-Kong up and left, Sealand was quick to follow (with all of Arthur’s blessings and many tearful farewells from the Scandinavians) and then America, Russia, China and India were all racing to send off as many kids as possible into space with as big guns as they could build. That had been a very nervous century, even worse than the Cold War.
And Gilbert? He had invited Roderich and Elisaveta over to Ludwig without even telling him, damn the man. Ludwig had opened in only his underwear, since he thought it was Italy. They tended to lose their clothes rather quickly those days, you never knew if the final bomb would fall or not...
Once Ludwig was completely humiliated and Hungary had taken a dozen pictures, a slightly drunk Gilbert turned up, red eyes suddenly full of life again.
While handing out some truly foul rotgut, Gilbert told them that this was his going-off celebration because America was giving him a fleet of his own - imagine, a whole fleet! And he even got to keep it! - if he promised to train Alfred’s infant space colonies and slow down the other super-powers to the best of his ability.
He told Germany to take care of himself, pinched a surprised Hungary’s butt and kissed an even more surprised Austria goodbye, and was off for the stars, just like that. Though sporting some fresh frying-pan shaped bruises...
The years passed and what with environmental disasters and international tensions, Germany hadn’t really had time to do more than occasionally hope that his brother had made a new life for himself out there somewhere.
When Ludwig and Feliciano were on the move towards their new home, Gilbert had popped up after a few worm-hole jumps and scared the stuffing out of everyone with his giant flagship (named, for some unfathomable reason, The Amazing Five Meters) and a fleet of ten million ships.
Several hundreds of years had passed since they’d last seen each other. It actually took Germany a while to recognize his brother, though he blamed this mostly on the many “interesting” cyber-implants Gilbert had acquired. Gilbert blamed it on his brother being a forgetful sissy.
Turned out, Gilbert had followed America’s orders with enthusiasm. Then, once the great Earth powers began to make peace, and their fleets started to settle and become independent, he declared war on his own. Against everyone.
Cue the first proper intergalactic war.
“Didn’t your boss protest that?” Italy had asked with wide eyes from his position behind Germany’s back. His beloved’s big brother had grown really scary out in space!
“Nah,” Gilbert said and grinned, showing off his razor-sharp titanium teeth, “my last human boss wanted to ditch America and go live on some boring little colony way before that!”
“Your... last...” Italy just gaped.
“Yeah, real stick in the mud. So I spaced him,” Gilbert said with a shrug.
“You don’t have a boss!?” Germany yelped.
“Sure I do,” Gilbert had said, and fondly patted his computer. “Old Fritz, meet my brother.”
“Gott mit dir, Kind,” an artificial voice said regally. “I am the governing AI of the Fleet of the Celestial Knight. Most know me as Friedrich der Große, but since you are the younger brother of my knight, you may also call me Fritz.”
“...ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR BLOODY MIND, BROTHER?”
“Hm?”
As luck would have it, at least it was lucky for Germany and his younger siblings whom everyone assumed would side with the Celestial Knight(1) and thus wanted to blow up, a hostile and frighteningly powerful alien species showed up.
Humanity managed to stop bickering enough to drive them off, and from then on, Gilbert and his fleet had a new mission in life. Kill aliens - which they did with a rather obsessive energy.
Unfortunately, he still managed to get into scrapes with other human nations now and then, especially the larger and more expansion-minded ones.
Since Germany and Italy had carefully nurtured their diplomatic relations (because even if their people had mostly forgotten, they remembered Earth and what happened when Germany went to war, far too well) Gilbert thought it would be just awesome if they solved his messes. In those few cases he didn’t feel like doing it with his death-ray, that is.
As such Germany had come to dread his brother’s visit more and more. But to have him stop visiting as a brother-in-need and decide to just invade the place in hurt retaliation wasn’t exactly an improvement...
“Of course,” Italy said, sounding cute and cluelessly sincere in the way only he could pull off, “we don’t want anything to happen to you! But since brother Gilbert only shows up when he’s in trouble, Germany has to go around worrying for years and years and yeeeears between visits. Ve, you should come down and try my new pizza! We can talk business tomorrow?”
“Are you shitting me?”
At Italy’s sharp elbow, Ludwig swallowed his annoyance. “No, brother.”
The worst thing was, though Ludwig would rather have eaten nails than admit it, there was a grain of truth in what Italy so blithely revealed. But only a small one!
“You’re always fighting. And. And other nations come to visit just to socialize sometimes, so we hear about how you just beat another alien species or that the RFU executed a raid against your flagship...”
“Aww,” an amused voice cooed from the comm-unit, “that’s my kleine Ludwiglein! It’s like when you wanted to get into Italy’s uniform pants during that Earth war, but you just kept yelling at him to shape up.”
Oh God. There was reason number two he hated to have Gilbert come over for a visit. He always, bloody always, brought new embarrassing baby portraits or remembered another “amusing” anecdote from their younger days.
“I’m coming down then,” Gilbert said. “Did you say you have pizza? Like, the real shit?”
“Yes, made with all our own products!”
“Awesome! Stay inside!”
“Stay- Gilbert, what do you mean? Gilbert!”
“Mein Ritter has commenced the landing sequence,” Old Fritz’s voice informed them, “he shall be with you shortly.”
Feliciano and Ludwig exchanged a glance. He wouldn’t... oh, who were they kidding.
“Where is he landing?” Germany said.
“Didn’t he say? By you. In the garden behind the house, I think.”
“Ve! Everyone, down in the cellar!”
There was a general stamped down the stairs, but at least they could all fit in there. As a legacy from the time when the entire colony had lived in fragile biospheres, all houses on Neu-Deutschland and Tricolore were built with big, sturdy basements.
The whole house shook as his brother’s personal shuttle landed. Germany felt several painful blisters appear on his leg when the lovely garden and parts of the field behind it where scorched to ash. Goddamn thoughtless Gilbert anyway, it wasn’t as if they didn’t have a perfectly functional spaceport!
“Does it burn much, Germany?” Italy asked as the noise and shaking had stopped.
“Hardly anything,” Ludwig lied, “he must have upgraded his engines again.”
The two nations lead their nervous people upstairs again. Gilbert really had upgraded his engines, Ludwig realized, the house didn’t even seem a little bit scorched.
Maybe he finally listened when I tried to choke him for burning down a recreation centre during the last visit?
All of them carefully went outside, where the sleek shuttle Ehrgeiz stood, still glowing slightly from its rapid descent.
Ludwig heard a dismayed moan from their host as he saw what had happened to his garden and Italy hugged the man comfortingly and said, “Remember, this is why we instigated the Brother-tax.”
Then they were both nearly tackled to the floor by the madly grinning pale-faced conqueror of planets, solar systems and entire species.
“Feliciano! Bruderchen!”
“Ve!”
Ludwig gingerly patted his brother’s back; one eventful visit, Feliciano had set of a flame-thrower when he hugged Gilbert a bit too fondly.
“Hello, brother,” Ludwig said once he’d regained his breath and balance. “You look,” computerized, no, pointy, no, I’ll have to sleep on the couch if I almost set of a conflict again, “well. Is that a new arm I see?”
“Yep, is’ voll geil! Look!” Gilbert took a step back and sharply pumped his arm twice. The hand opened up like a (probably man-eating) flower and a gleaming sword emerged.
“You put a sword in your arm?”
“Oh, it can shoot antimatter bombs too,” Gilbert said with a shrug, “but this looks a lot cooler, doesn’t it?”
“A- an- antimatter bombs?”
“Pizza!” Italy dragged the two larger nations inside, with a strained grin on his face. “Ve, ve ve~ Come now, the pizza will get cold!”
The two Germanic brother’s willingly allowed themselves to be led. “So you’re finally moving away from yeast and algae?” Gilbert asked, and made his sword disappear again.
“Yes! We have wonderful grain nowadays! And big brother sent sprouts for a xenotomatoe, they’re really yummy. Er, though they are blue...”
“Oh right, I almost forgot! Ey, Old Fritz!”
“Mein Ritter?” The AI’s voice seemed to come from the blinking mini-computer on above Gilbert’s right ear(2) and was, as usually when speaking to its nation, fondly indulgent.
“Where’d we put that little piece of fluff?”
“The chickenlike alien? The main shuttle is bringing it down at Astrohansa spaceport at this very moment.”
“Have you found a new species?” Ludwig asked.
“It’s some fucking adorable bird-analogue,” Gilbert said, “I just know you guys are gonna love it!”
“Ah. What does it taste like?”
THWAP!
When your brother’s hand is made from polymeric-ceramic/titanium alloys, even a light slap to the head is enough to create a sizeable lump and a near-concussion. Germany crashed to the floor, taking a yelping Italy with him.
“You’re not supposed to eat it, you barbarian! Es ist echt niedlich!”
“’m sorry,” Ludwig managed to get out, despite his aching head. “I forgot that the big bad space fleet is verknallt in fluffy little things.”
“Hell yeah, bunnies kick ass.”
The next evening, all bosses and nations were gathered for a more formal meeting.
Italy had given Ludwig a cool compress for his head and several hot kisses for his bruised pride, so Germany felt up to dealing seriously with his brother again.
“Ve, Germany, what do you think that is?” Italy asked and pointed at a small green thing that was sitting at Gilbert’s lap.
Ludwig could only shrug; his brother loved bringing home weird souvenirs, as evidenced by the (alright, very cute) little chicken now roosting on Italy’s head.
They’d also been gifted with a truly lovely beer which had gone very well with the pizza and a generous load of brand new medical nano-bots. The last had truly surprised Ludwig, such kind of expensive items were usually something his brother sold to them (even if he often gave huge discounts), but perhaps they had been stolen from someone.
As long as Gilbert didn’t explain, he wasn’t about to ask, but he would have their scientists make sure they weren’t taken from Ivan before anyone was allowed to use them. Just in case.
“Mrple?” the green thing said and waved an antenna.
“Here,” Gilbert said and held the thing up, “what do you say of becoming a father, bruderchen?”
“...”
“Oh!” Italy bent closer to the alien, “Is it a baby nation?”
“That is correct,” Old Fritz said, “one of the few remaining ones from its planet.”
Though a large part of him just wanted to go hide somewhere, Ludwig managed to find his voice again. “What have you done now, brother?”
As it turned out, someone had started a rumour that the Chinese Federation was interested in a few previously unsettled systems near Betelgeuse. To beat Yao, Gilbert’s fleet had swept the area and found only one inhabitable planet.
“I made a miscalculation there,” Old Fritz admitted, “I believed the low level of radiation was a sign of very advanced technology.”
Since he was in a hurry to secure his victory before the Chinese fleet showed up, the Celestial Knights had carpet-bombed most of the planet. Only when they sent down infantry to pick up the pieces did they make a rather startling discovery.
“Ahaha, you know, this is kind of embarrassing,” Gilbert said and fidgeted, “but turns out they had only just discovered fire and metallurgy.”
“Oh no!” Italy’s eyes filled with tears and he reached over the table to pet the small alien nation.
Ludwig’s reaction was more focused on the perpetrator. “Gilbert, du Arsch!”
There hadn’t been that many aliens yet and their low developmental level meant that they lived scattered over most of the planet. Still, most of the tribes had been completely or partly wiped out. The disoriented survivors offered no resistance.
The ashamed Celestial Knights had easily herded them into a large survivor’s camp and then begun on the process of repairing the worst bomb-damage to the planet.
Then the research ship Tretton Kronor passed by, on a mission to measure background radiation in the uninhabited regions of the galaxy. They brought the unexpected news that the Chinese Federation were nowhere in the vicinity, since the old territorial dispute between them and the Neo-Imperial Coalition of True China a.k.a. the Imperials(3) had just blossomed into all-out war.
“Yes, yes, I know,” the albino held up a hand to stave off the furious Germany, “Gilbert issn Arschloch. I admit, I fucked up. That’s why I thought I’d try to make things better.”
“Why not just leave them alone?” Italy said. “Oh, look, Germany! It’s curling his, I think it’s a he, antenna just like my hair!”
Of course, once an inhabitable planet with fertile ground and a low-technology species had been discovered, there was no chance in hell that someone wouldn’t come along and claim it. Both Feliciano and Ludwig knew that; space was endless, but good real-estate was limited. Most of the older human settlements were full of young, spirited people and infant nations-to-be that wanted nothing more than to find their own place.
“You know I mostly just sell new places to the highest bidder,” Gilbert continued, “but I felt a bit bad since I didn’t even give these guys a fair chance.”
“And you usually do?”
“Sure. It’s one thing to crush a dude in a fair fight, but this is like kicking puppies. Fucking uncool.”
“Excuse me, Celestial Knight,” Neu-Deutschland’s chancellor interrupted, “but how do you engage a weaker enemy in a fair fight?”
“What do you think I had this sword made for, huh? Call for volunteers. Then we go down and kick their ass, Mann gegen Mann. Also, echt, what kind of a monster do you take me for?”
From the sharp tug in his heart, Germany realized he had just lost one young citizen to the Celestial Knight. Who..? Ah, young Lottchen, whose father had brought her along to the meeting to see a bit of the world. Her eyes were gleaming with that particular fervour Ludwig had come to dread. He knew that before Gilbert left, she’d have enlisted as a future Knight.
He only hope that she would one day be among the pensioned soldiers who came and asked to settle with Italy or him... too many of the Celestial Knights ended up as slightly radioactive space dust, but they still loved Gilbert passionately. Perhaps because he always lead the charge and was the last to retreat, or perhaps just because he loved them too, with all his wild heart.
“So you thought Italy and I should take care of them?”
“Yeah!” Gilbert began ticking points of his finger. “You’ll get a new colony, I have a place to refuel, the little dudes won’t like, get eaten by anyone nasty. Also, this place is where I found the beer, these guys look a bit strange but they already know what’s important in life, heh. And,” he licked his lips and looked down, “I think you’d do a much better job of teaching them all this civilization shit than I would.”
“Well, we could perhaps teach them how not to end up at war with everyone else in the galaxy,” Germany said wryly. “What do you say, Feliciano?”
A dazzling smile met him, and the shorter nation took his hand and squeezed enthusiastically. “Ve, I think Germany would become a great father! And it’s not nice to be occupied by someone who uses you as a maid and only feeds you horrible food!”
“As long as you are prepared to let go, once this little guy has grown up,” Germany said and carefully poked the alien nation. It said “wurpl” and burrowed deeper into Gilbert’s arms.
“Veveve, and I can teach them art!”
“And what do you say little... thing?”
“Mrrveve?”
That was more than enough to melt Italy’s heart (and Germany’s, not that he would admit it) and he bounced over to say hi to their adoptive “son”.
“So what should we call this place, then?” Germany wondered.
Old Fritz bleeped, the computer version of a polite cough. “We have registered the system 5249-RTG with all major starcharts as Prussia Minor.”
“What can I say,” Gilbert shrugged off Ludwig’s glare, “I thought they deserved a cooler name than Urplmeep or whatever it was called before.”
After the meeting was finished, several Tricolorean journalists came up and demanded a picture of Germany, Italy and the brand new Prussia Minor. Ludwig smiled until it felt as if his cheeks had frozen stiff.
When the reporters showed no signs of being done taking pictures and asking inane questions, he left with the excuse that he needed to speak to his brother, leaving Italy and the alien nation to bask in the spotlight. The journalists didn’t seem to care much and Ludwig ruefully thought that the two much cuter than him anyway.
Whether it was their new status as colonial forces over the alien, or just because Italy had an affinity for small and helpless things, his husband and the new nation had already managed to communicate slightly.
Unfortunately, little Prussia found Ludwig intimidating, which was really unfair considering that it even seemed to like Gilbert!
“Hey there. You’ll have to face a pretty heavy PR backlash from this,” Germany said when he finally found the Celestial Knight.
Gilbert had climbed up a ferntree and was looking out over the well-ordered pastoral city. In the sunrise, all the fields glowed amethyst and Ludwig felt his heart swell with possessive pride.
“Fuck them, it’s not like humans haven’t done nasty things to each other before.”
“Still... next time, perhaps you could try to talk to the new species before starting a war against them?”
A moment’s silence, then Gilbert did a sloppy salute. “Consider it done.”
“You could have settled there, instead of giving it to us,” Ludwig continued and sat down beneath the tree. “Wouldn’t a proper home planet be nice?”
Finally, his brother turned to look down at him. The space chicken was sitting on his chest and his flesh hand was tickling it between the wings.
So the thing was perhaps too cute to eat, Germany admitted, but once his brother was gone he would at least see if it couldn’t lay eggs.
“You really think that would be best for me?” Gilbert asked.
Biting his lip, Ludwig considered how he should answer to make his brother understand. “You seem so restless sometimes,” he finally managed. “It’s so lovely to see a planet grow into a home, to feel how it becomes your home. ...I just want to share this experience with you, I guess.”
“Moron. You and Feliciano make me all mushy inside, you know that?” Gilbert said fondly. “You don’t want to make war-“
“Well, everyone who wants to fight usually leaves with you first.”
“-you just want to make these little worlds perfect for you and the children. I can’t visit too often, I’ll get cavities,” he said and winked. “But... look at the stars. See how many they are?”
“Yes.”
“Das Weltall is einfach zu riesig. There're no fucking borders in space, no end. I can’t stop, Bruderchen. I can’t put up a wall around myself and say this is enough.”
“Peace isn’t a wall.”
“It can be, if all you want to do is climb it and see what lies behind.”
True enough. As his people grew and prospered, Ludwig too began to feel a whisper of desire for expansion. It was still slight, but sometimes when he looked at his children, the urge to grow, to settle new worlds, made him imagine a large fleet. His children taking off among the stars, looking for new adventures and he following them.
But they had all the time in the world and for now, the walls that held him were still the comfortable walls of home, of his own wonderful house.
“Just don’t forget to enjoy what you already have, Gilbert.”
“I don’t. There are no rules in space, but the ones we make.” His brothers eyes were still his own, untouched by implants and genetic tinkering, but sometimes Ludwig swore they glowed in the dark. “And that freedom I enjoy every day.”
- The End? -
Footnotes:
1) to Ludwig’s despair his darling little sister Freiheit-im-Himmel had become a big fan of cool Onkel Gilbert after he defended her planet from Tien-Lung, one of China’s many offspring.
2) Do you really need to have that many blinking lights and tubes sticking out of your people everywhere, Germany had once asked his brother.
Not really, but don’t they look awesome? was Gilbert’s fairly predictable answer.
3) The Imperials were represented by Yao’s very, very disowned little sister
Useful mini-dictionary:
I usually try not to include a bunch of foreign words in my fics, but here... what can I say, once I got started I thought I might as well go all out ^^; Sorry!
One of the point’s I’m trying to make is that the language has evolved, so Gilbert uses old-fashioned words, which the German-speaking (or perhaps German-Italian by now) people of the Holy Roman System don’t understand.
FTL - Standard scifi shorthand for faster-than-light
Madre di Dio - Mother of God
Du mieser kleiner wichser - You miserable little wanker
Ritter - Knight
Voll geil - Totally cool
Ehrgeiz - Ambition (to become powerful or famous)
Niedlich - Cute
Arsch, Arschloch - Ass, asshole
Verknallt - In love with
Das Weltall is einfach zu riesig - The cosmos is simply too huge
This German is pretty slangy, so the translations aren't exact. I hope I didn't do any linguistical faux, but I'm a bit rusty so *bows* apologies in advance!
This fic now has a sequel, called The song sung by those who remain which is a lot sadder and darker in tone... but still very much nations in spaaaaaace! There may be more snippets in this verse in the future.