[CHALLENGE] all the same - Travel
Title: all the same
Prompt: Travel
Fandom: Axis Powers Hetalia
Characters/Pairings: Spain
Warnings: None. Just the usual vagueness. D:
Notes: This table challenge has made me write vaguely again. :( Anyway, I've been on a bout of Writer's Block ever since June came around, so the weekend challenge kind of pushed me to write again. Except that we don't have a long weekend. But whatever.
Antonio has lived on both his own soil and on Frances'.
He has lived across oceans and sailed past seas, his body heavy atop salty water. He has slept under tropical skies and under winter rain.
Once, Antonio had conquered about half a continent, making someone else's body his own. He had lived there, ravaging the Aztec temples and the South American jungles. He had lived there, setting up a new country, a new him.
Once, Antonio had conquered an archipelago, far off and a whole world away. He had lived there, his steel-toed boots sinking in white sand. He had lived there, giving holy relics as gifts and preaching of his one true god.
Now, Antonio only lives in two places: in his home (there is the one true Spain of today, the Spain where his people have been pushed to the streets and have lost everything and have proved that above all, they will still stay Spanish, because who else will embrace them?), and in the hearts of his people (although not all of them want to be a part of him).
Antonio doesn't live anywhere else. Sometimes he gets on planes and counts cities, towns, watches the shimmering water, nods off into sleep as his window is covered up in clouds and fills up with streaks of rainfall.
When he arrives there, it's always the same. Except it isn't his. He will smile. He will greet. He will embrace. But the ground beneath his feet is not his, perhaps not anymore.
Antonio's boots trample upon sacred ground. The Vatican, their spirit. Rome, the Italies' heart. Lisbon, Portugal's (forever Portugal's). Vitoria-Gaistez, all that Basque has left that he will allow (but he is sent away).
Antonio doesn't travel much anymore. Sometimes his excuse is that it's his economy. Sometimes he says that he's tired, and he prefers wandering through streets that he has memorized, a labyrinth at the back of his mind, his entrails. Sometimes he says that he can feel the country's beating heart beneath the cobblestones, weak and small, old and strong, everything at once, thumping to the rhythm of the organ that drums against his own ribcage.
The excuses comfort him, some less than others.
Antonio thinks it's tragic. But there is a new day, and maybe he will find another home again.
(Madrid, his heart, forever with him, beats solidly against his chest)
Prompt: Travel
Fandom: Axis Powers Hetalia
Characters/Pairings: Spain
Warnings: None. Just the usual vagueness. D:
Notes: This table challenge has made me write vaguely again. :( Anyway, I've been on a bout of Writer's Block ever since June came around, so the weekend challenge kind of pushed me to write again. Except that we don't have a long weekend. But whatever.
Antonio has lived on both his own soil and on Frances'.
He has lived across oceans and sailed past seas, his body heavy atop salty water. He has slept under tropical skies and under winter rain.
Once, Antonio had conquered about half a continent, making someone else's body his own. He had lived there, ravaging the Aztec temples and the South American jungles. He had lived there, setting up a new country, a new him.
Once, Antonio had conquered an archipelago, far off and a whole world away. He had lived there, his steel-toed boots sinking in white sand. He had lived there, giving holy relics as gifts and preaching of his one true god.
Now, Antonio only lives in two places: in his home (there is the one true Spain of today, the Spain where his people have been pushed to the streets and have lost everything and have proved that above all, they will still stay Spanish, because who else will embrace them?), and in the hearts of his people (although not all of them want to be a part of him).
Antonio doesn't live anywhere else. Sometimes he gets on planes and counts cities, towns, watches the shimmering water, nods off into sleep as his window is covered up in clouds and fills up with streaks of rainfall.
When he arrives there, it's always the same. Except it isn't his. He will smile. He will greet. He will embrace. But the ground beneath his feet is not his, perhaps not anymore.
Antonio's boots trample upon sacred ground. The Vatican, their spirit. Rome, the Italies' heart. Lisbon, Portugal's (forever Portugal's). Vitoria-Gaistez, all that Basque has left that he will allow (but he is sent away).
Antonio doesn't travel much anymore. Sometimes his excuse is that it's his economy. Sometimes he says that he's tired, and he prefers wandering through streets that he has memorized, a labyrinth at the back of his mind, his entrails. Sometimes he says that he can feel the country's beating heart beneath the cobblestones, weak and small, old and strong, everything at once, thumping to the rhythm of the organ that drums against his own ribcage.
The excuses comfort him, some less than others.
Antonio thinks it's tragic. But there is a new day, and maybe he will find another home again.
(Madrid, his heart, forever with him, beats solidly against his chest)