Chapter Text
It’s a week after formal Reunification, it’s five in the morning, and Prussia’s in West’s kitchen sipping coffee.
Instant coffee.
It tastes like dogshit in comparison to Old Fritz’s favorite blend of pseudo-latte, but Prussia hasn’t had that particular delicacy in decades, and his last hour of peace and quiet is too precious to waste on a coffee run, anyways.
The joys of living with sixteen states.
And West.
At least they’ll be moving back out once things start to stabilize, Prussia tries to reassure himself, taking another sip of lukewarm dirt-water, resisting his gag reflex because this will probably be his only source of caffeine for the day.
He glares at the damned cup in his hands, glancing to his side to check the label of the powder again, because where did West even get this? He’s had better shit over in the East, for God’s sake—
“Ost? What are you doing up so early?”
Brandenburg’s baritone cuts cleanly through his brewing rant, old Marchian echoing like a commander’s through raging battle.
His state’s standing on the other side of the room, early morning light casting shadows over his locked shoulders, tense posture— too stiff to fight effectively, deems the part of him that’s never stopped being a soldier.
Prussia sips his coffee again, makes a face.
“Can’t blame me for wanting some peace and quiet,” he says, finally, in one of the dialects they used to share. “It’s almost as fucking bad as Russia’s house.”
But Brandenburg doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge the great five years they spent crammed together in that old mansion in Moscow, before the stupidity of the entire thing finally hammered itself into Russia’s thick skull.
Rude, Prussia thinks, before—
“West’s still sleeping.”
Brandenburg really has a talent for crashing his train of thought into a wall.
Maybe it’s his voice, because West definitely got that from his old partner—
—and Prussia’s mind catches up with Brandenburg’s words; he doesn’t remember putting his cup down, but he does know that he’s halfway across the room between one blink and the next.
“He’s still not up?” Prussia says, only just catching his wince at the way his words came haltingly, the way Brandenburg’s stoic face tightens further.
“No.”
Prussia doesn’t fidget.
“It’s been a week.”
A week since they signed the The Einigungsvertrag, since West dropped like a rock at the Reichstag and didn’t get back up again.
“Ost,” his state starts, eyes flicking towards the dark stairs ‘round the corner, that tell of unease same as always, “Do you think West’ll…?”
“The treaty was very clear on who assimilated who, wasn’t it? He won’t.”
Never, Prussia wants to say even as his words linger in the returning silence, as Brandenburg’s lips press thinner, braces like he’s about to say—
“You’re still standing, Ost.”
You’re still standing while he’s not.
Prussia swallows again— not even bothering to hide it, because Brandenburg’s already breached that particular wall— and he forces himself to break a brittle grin.
“I’m sure a role reversal is in the works, then?”
His voice comes out sharper than he intends, but Prussia turns on his heel anyways, ignoring the twist of pain to nurse his lukewarm cup of shittiness.
Brandenburg’s disapproving stare burns a hole into his back.
He’s always been a hypocrite.
——
A week passes.
One week, then two, and they move West’s still-unconscious body from the old house in Berlin to Südstadt in Bonn, because even though Holy Rome deteriorated after they moved him back to Rome, they thought— Thuriningia and Bavaria, mostly— maybe West would do better in his not-capital of five decades.
But they wait, and he doesn’t, and Prussia finds himself neatly slotted into what should be West’s place, by people who hate this whole situation as much as he does.
It’s not… unpleasant, taking charge again; like shrugging on a coat that still fits, despite how it’s been thrown into a corner since the coup that took away his autonomy in 1932.
…things are going as well as they can, per the circumstances.
Chancellor Kohl and his merry band work with Prussia well enough through their differences, and the few nations that he sees at talks are generally under the impression that he and West are splitting responsibility.
For obvious reasons, West’s condition remains a secret sides’ from that need-to-know section of their government—
—but even as Prussia sits in the Reichstag’s consultation room, the burning of a dozen stares on his skin, the nagging thought that that was a misstep solidifies.
He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t fidget; just keeps staring at the meeting agenda like he’s been doing for the past two hours, eyes aching in the sterile lights even as he fails to process the highlighted words.
But isn’t this why they have a dozen contingency plans, why they huddled together and laid out what he could and could not do?
“You’re an asshole enough as is,” Bavaria says to his face, “Don’t fuck this up by punching America.”
Prussia laughed, then.
But the clear clack of dress shoes echoes through the room like a gunshot, and he finds himself staring up into Britain’s stony face, forced confidence cracking further underneath him.
“What are you doing here, East?”
God give me strength.
Narrowed green meets blank red, the clock strikes ten, and the interrogation begins.
——
Britain says Prussia’s newest name with a disdain he fucking despises.
It reminds him too much of Potsdam, of Versailles, those years of humiliation that they all try to forget yet remember, because no matter how it hurts history loves repeating forgotten stories.
The fact that Britain started this conversation in English on Prussia— West’s turf— is just more gasoline on that particular fire.
“What, you’re saying I can’t be here?” Prussia grits out; in German, because this is Berlin.
Just Berlin, for once in too-fucking-long, and Britain’s scoff makes Prussia really want to punch the bastard in the face.
“We dissolved the GDR—“
“—like how you dissolved my kingdom, I know.”
He doesn’t need another reminder of how much of a say the entirety of Europe has had in their Reunification.
The table is cold under his palms, and Prussia’s brain takes a moment to catch up with how his legs feel too weak under him, how their surroundings have gone quiet like the dead silence of his flat in the East.
There’s a glint of satisfaction in Britain’s glare, and Prussia meets it with a crooked grin.
“What do you want, Britain?” He asks, carefully peeling his hands away from the table to let them rest at his sides, pointedly refusing the urge to fidget.
Britain’s frown-sneer dips further downwards, hair shining wheat-gold under harsh light, designer suit beautifully, obviously expensive.
“Where is Germany, East?”
He’s still using English, the arrogant bastard.
“Germany’s not available right now.”
“He hasn’t been available for the past month. You’re telling me he’s tending to things more important than the first World Meeting after Reunification?”
Prussia really doesn’t want to have to repeat the news five times in the span of an hour.
“You think I don’t know that?” He says, after a moment, finally breaking eye contact to stare off into the growing crowd of nations, some part of him idly comparing it to the congregating armies that used to be so commonplace. “If you’ve read the agenda, you’ll know that there’s an hour put aside for that subject alone.”
Britain shifts from beside him, the rustle of cloth telling Prussia that he’s glancing back towards his seat a little away from Germany’s— probably where his copy of the agenda is.
They’ve put that particular announcement in the preface, the pre-meeting notes, before the important bit that everyone skims even if they skip the rest.
“I expect a good explanation.”
“It will be nothing less.”
——
America kicks the door open at ten-fifteen.
Russia sweeps in at ten-twenty.
France will come at ten-fifty, if his fashionably late arrival time stays consistent.
Later arrives.
——
“Germany is incapacitated,” Prussia tells America, when it’s his turn to grill him on West.
“Wait, incapacitated?”
Golden eyebrows rise, and said superpower yanks at his newfangled jacket, nylon from a fashion that Prussia’s never particularly understood rustling loudly in the sudden quiet.
“Incapacitated— as in, he’s… literally unable to come?”
A pause, as he considers the merits of being blunt.
“Yes.”
Prussia’s never been more grateful for the fact that America tends to show basic courtesy more often than not— he has all the power not to, and this conversation could have easily been held in English if America wanted— but he’s been sticking to German so far, even if it was imperfect and closer to the dialect that Prussia taught him all those years ago in his Revolution.
…thank God, he doesn’t have to fight another superpower on this.
“It’s been a month.” America frowns, eyes narrowed even as he shoots him a glance. “You’re just telling us this now?”
Prussia can’t help his grim grin.
“Is it really that unthinkable?”
A pause, as America opens his mouth like he’s gearing up for a retort— but something clicks in the kid’s eyes, and Prussia watches as he closes his mouth, exhales.
“…no, it’s really not.”
——
“I am not calling you Germany.”
“Britain, man, you can’t call him East if he’s substituting—“
“We can’t just use Beilschmidt, either!”
Silence.
“…Prussia, then. Call me Prussia, and let’s just move the fuck on—“
“—Prussia? There’s no more Prussia—“
“—exactly.”
——
There is no more Prussia.
Logically speaking, he’s in the same boat as Holy Rome.
But it’s a month after Reunification, West isn’t waking, and Prussia has no clue how he's still standing in the conference room.
The ache where Prussia used to be still digs like barbed arrows in flesh— why wouldn’t it?— but the ache doesn’t grow, doesn’t sap his energy away like it did the few years before Reunification, the treasured years before the Wall went up.
Holy Rome collapsed much like West a few days after the formal dissolution of his Empire, and though he didn’t fade immediately the years afterwards were a slow, grueling death.
Not that he was much better, before. The dissolution was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back.
But Prussia is weirdly fine where West’s strangely not, and that implies something that he really, really prays that he’s gotten wrong.
——
“…Feliciano? What’re you calling for, it’s three in the fucking morning—“
“Why didn’t you tell me about Ludwig?”
“…West? He— oh.”
“Yes. Ludwig. Who Anhalt has been consistently telling me is busy, but is in fact in a cazzo di coma, and has been for a month. A month. I had to find out from Liechtenstein, Gilbert, because I wasn’t at the meeting and you didn’t tell me!”
“…hectic month?”
“…”
“…yeah, uh, fuck, that’s not a good excuse.”
“It’s not. Maybe don’t expect me to let you into my house for a while.”
“…fair enough. When will you be coming over?”
“My flight just landed. Expect me in a half hour.”
——
Veneziano’s as much a whirlwind as always.
That’s really the only judgment Prussia’s able to make, half-asleep and reeling from the disappointment in his once-ally’s voice, low and tired and worry leaking all over the somewhat messy kitchen.
It’s humiliating and embarrassing and it makes Prussia want to bite, but he supposes he does deserve it, somewhat.
After he’s finished berating Prussia for his stupid decisions— the Pope’s Vassal talking down to a lowly Order— he finally pauses to ask,
“Where?”
A moment, as Prussia’s sleep-deprived mind takes a beat to catch up.
“Upstairs. Second bedroom to the left.”
His voice cracks way too audibly— though it probably doesn’t matter, Prussia thinks as he points towards the stairs, because this is Italy Veneziano and when has Veneziano not been disgustingly emotional and sentimental and understanding whenever things like these happened?
Never, probably, and that’s also when he realizes the kitchen is empty.
…the cold shoulder really shouldn’t sting as much as it does, but Prussia exhales anyways, glancing over the unscrubbed tabletop, the messy dishes, the half-open cupboards.
Maybe it’s about time someone took care of that.
He’s not sure he can go back to sleep, anyways.
——
Bang—bang—bangbangbang—bang.
The loud rap of fist on wood echoes through the kitchen like hailing gunfire, like crashing artillery; it comes from the hall, and the familiar rhythm has Prussia pausing in the middle of wiping the counter clean, wet towel leaving somewhat numb fingers.
“Let me in, Gilbert!”
The Priss’ voice remains as loud and annoying as ever— even moreso in that Austro-Bavarian dialect he prefers to use, but courtesy means that Prussia leaves the counter anyways, wiping wet hands on his pants as he makes his way towards the entrance hall, unable to keep from rolling his eyes.
“Wolfe! Andreas! I— agh—”
His hand reaches cool handle, and then he’s staring up at Austria’s constipated face, squinting in the brilliant morning sun because his eyes have always been shit and he’s still running on seventy percent capacity.
“Here for West?” He asks, after an awkward moment; in a brand of Prussian that used to be spoken near Königsberg before the Wars, if only for the fact that the Priss has always whined about how grating its lilt is.
West’s probably why the Priss himself is gracing their household with zero notice— and bingo, Austria closes his open mouth, adjusts the prissy glasses he’s had since the 1880s.
“I— yes. May I come in?”
“…Feliciano’s with him. Help yourself.”
Fuck it, the other states can deal with this. The kitchen still needs cleaning.
——
Prussia doesn’t follow Austria upstairs, but he does hear the ensuing chaos from deep inside the kitchen— the Priss’ voice has always carried, and it sort of feels like he’s in Schönbrunn Palace again, arguing voices echoing off the walls like a particularly loud orchestra.
…eh, it’s not like he hasn’t had experience with it; the noise is easily tuned out with more focus on the familiar polish of the dishes in his hands, the quiet clinking of porcelain as he stacks them neatly in the cupboard.
He’s always liked the staff there, the few times he’s barged into the Hapsburg’s summer home; prissy like the Priss, but less pretentious and they didn't give off an air of I-am-above-you every single fucking minute of the day.
In all honesty, it used to remind him of his own people back in Königsberg Castle— their harried protests as he insisted on joining their cleaning because what else has he to do, when the tide of politics receded for the day and he’s gone through his drills dozens upon dozens of times.
Just the memory makes his heart sting, and he blinks back sudden tears to slam the cupboard door shut with more force than is probably wise, because 1968 is not fucking far enough for the final destruction of his beloved Castle to stop hurting so much.
Inhale, exhale, focus on the freezing counter under his hands and not the mix of presences at the back of his mind, the ones that’ve been growing suspiciously the past few weeks—
—don’t think about that.
Prussia blinks back a breakdown in the warm light of the kitchen, and moves on to rinsing the sink.
——
“I’ve never understood why you like cleaning so much,” is the first thing out of Austria’s mouth, when Prussia finally steels himself enough to step out into the living room.
He doesn’t want to think about Parliament or NATO or the million other things they need to address, and he instead notes the mid-morning sun shining through the 50’s curtains West never replaced, feathery light lining Bavaria and Saxony as they crunch month-old lebkuchen on the couch, two rascals beside the prissy proper Priss.
“It’s a hobby,” Prussia mutters, falling onto the leather couch at Austria’s side— and Austria winces, probably because of his lack of socks, but this is the 20th century and social equitette can go fuck itself.
“I guess I can understand that.”
Of course you do.
Prussia sinks further into the soft couch, rolling his eyes because this is turning into something too diplomatic for his tastes; he’s not here to listen to Austria dance around the topic like he’s performing Swan Lake.
“Cut the crap, Priss. We all know who you’re here for.”
Bavaria leans forwards at the edge of his vision, handing off her biscuit tin to an enthusiastic Saxony.
“Weren’t you just upstairs with Andreas, Rodereich?” She asks, swallowing her stale gingerbread. “You’ve already seen West.”
Austria’s face twists.
“…I suppose that is true. Feliciano seemed… worried.”
Worried is an understatement, Prussia thinks. He hasn’t seen Veneziano so non-politically harried since— well.
Not exactly Holy Rome, but maybe Italian Reunification; before they hashed out terms for co-representation as Veneziano and Romano.
Which they didn’t do, for him and West.
And it was a consious decision in spite of West’s protests, because the GDR was to be assimilated into the Federal Republic, and no one really liked him, and Prussia hasn’t had true land since the Soviets forced his people out— he was supposed to fucking die, wasn’t he?
He was supposed to die like he should have done in 47’, not in glory or battle but nameless and forgotten—
—and his thoughts halt like a tank in a ditch as Bavaria’s stare turns to him.
“Finished hiding in the kitchen, Ost?”
Prussia shrugs.
Ost still stings, but he supposes it’s better than Ossi and Wessi— drawing lines in the sand, and all that.
“Good,” Bavaria huffs. “Andreas’ been taking your shift. Go switch.”
Austria startles, snaps his head to Prussia like an eagle seeking prey.
“You were hiding to avoid looking after Ludwig?” He says, incredulous— and wow, thanks, Prussia never knew that he has such a low opinion of him, but as horrendous as the accusation is he really doesn’t have the energy to argue.
“Isn’t Feliciano still upstairs?” He shoots back instead, pushing himself up from the very comfortable cushions, narrowing his eyes at Bavaria.
She snatches another piece of lebkuchen from Saxony, biting a piece off like she doesn’t know what she’s implied— Saxony doesn’t say a word, just continues to watch the exchange like this is a particularly interesting drama, and not an exhausted Prussia trying to fend off two supposed allies at the same fucking time.
“Stop pretending that you’re halfway decent, Ost. Just barge in like you always do and force Andreas to get some rest.”
Oh, fucking hell. “Monika—“
“Wait,” Austria cuts in, fixing his glasses like the priss he is as he leans forward into Prussia’s line of sight. “Am I— missing something?”
Prussia opens his mouth to answer, but Saxony finally pipes up around a mouthful of gingerbread.
“Veneziano’s pissed at us. Gilbert especially,” he says, nodding at Prussia as crumbs fall everywhere— goddamnit, he’ll have to clean that— “‘e’s ignoring him. Andreas is substantially more tolerable, so he’s been taking Gilbert’s shift.”
The couch creaks as Austria blinks; once, twice, and he says, haltingly, “I— ah. That is… understandable.”
Which means that Austria is also somewhat pissed at them for hiding West’s coma.
Prussia’s known the Priss long enough to read between the lines, and the other states tense as well, the dim sun backlighting their suddenly still bodies.
“Well,” he says to Austria, after the silence starts getting too awkward. “See you later, then. I guess. Maybe.”
There’s a triumph in Bavaria’s stare that he doesn’t like, but she does have a point— and though he hates it, he’s self-aware enough to admit that Thuringia matters much more than his image.
It doesn’t mean he has to be happy, no; no matter how enlightening being East was, the whole thing was infuriating in a thousand ways, and he would really like to not need to think about it anymore, thank you very much—
The urge to attack Bavaria is starting to get too hard to ignore, and Prussia forces himself towards the stairs before he does something he’ll regret.
——
“…didn’t I tell you to stay out, Gilbert?”
“Andreas needs a break.”
“Like hell I do—“
“You’ve been taking up my West time, you know? Shoo.”
“…Gilbert.”
“Yeah, yeah, Feliciano. I’ll be out of your hair soon enough, but we need one of us here to keep an eye on West. It’s me, Andreas or Signe, and Signe’s in Berlin for the week.”
“…you’re the only ones with medical experience? That’s—“
“Outside of battle.”
“—ah.”
“…just keep doing what you’re doing. Maybe West’ll start getting better, I dunno.”
——
“Do you hate him?” Pomerania demands one evening in February, when Prussia enters West’s bedroom to take her shift.
The question is… unexpected, and it takes the clink of metal hitting wood for him to realise he’s put his beer on the nightstand.
“West?” Prussia says, following Pomerania’s line of sight towards the bed, noting West’s pained face, his shaky breaths. “The fuck you’re asking that for?”
“…many reasons. Mostly because I do not know what to make of you, Ost. ” Pomerania stands, running a hand through messy auburn hair to narrow tired eyes at him; almost the same look he recognises from when his people had initially occupied her lands—
—and she’s continuing slowly, like taking to a fucking child, “You will die if he wakes. He will die if you carry on. I do not think that is an easy thing to swallow, least of all for someone like you. ”
The vitriol in that last word spans centuries, this is not a conversation that Prussia is at all prepared for, and beer is burning down his throat before he’s even finished that thought.
Clink, again goes the echo of metal on wood as he turns to face Pomerania again, backlit by the evening sun like they’re in one of America’s melodramatic movies.
“Like me,” Prussia repeats, taut grin straining like rubber. “Too awesome for you, Signe?”
Pomerania snorts as she stands to gather her paperwork; rustling paper crisp as an ocean breeze, words lingering like blood on muslin.
“Sometimes I think you pathetic. It happens considerably… less, now, I will concede, but you are still prideful and stubborn and selfish, and with all that combined I expected you to fight your sentence, Gift und Galle spucken—“
She cuts herself off, and Prussia only just catches her sharp inhale as she stills, a lull in the howling wind.
“You,” Pomerania mutters, “Are entirely too calm about this.”
Am I? He thinks distantly, another swig of burning beer going down his throat— fuck, he should have brought another can, but that thought’s easily dismissed as he sidesteps Pomerania, plops down in her seat.
Her glare continues to burn into him— frying ants through a magnifying glass, supplies his tired mind.
It reminds him too much of the aftermath of the wars over her territory, and Prussia’s beer touches ground with one more crisp clink as he sets it down, staring at West behind him; still pale as shit, thin face shining dim in Bonn’s evening glow.
He’s breathing, but he looks… worse.
“So what?” Prussia says, finally, into the stifling silence, pointedly ignoring the abrupt lump in his throat. “If you’re trying to say I’m an asshole—“
“Have you thought about how you will break if Ludwig does not wake?”
“The fuck if he doesn’t wake—“
But West looks worse.
West looks worse.
—no, he thinks again even as the words die in his throat, as Pomerania continues on without a shred of shame, voice knife-sharp and gunshot-loud and rebounding all over like broken shrapnel.
“As many faults as you have, you are not blind, Ost. We all know very well it is a possibility.”
“He won’t,“ Prussia tries, burying his knuckles into West’s blanket, but the way his voice cracks probably tells Pomerania all she needs to know; he grabs for his beer again, back pointedly turned towards the state that used to be his.
“Believe what you will,” Pomerania mutters. “Time will tell, I suppose.”
Her following sigh is condescending and pitying and disappointed all at once— and by God, Prussia wants to feel angry just for the sake of how cathartic that would be—
—but the heat doesn’t come, the door closes crisp as a gun’s safety, and he’s left with nothing but raw truth steeped in burning shame.
——
“I must say,” Chancellor Kohl muses, “I did not expect you to be Prussia when we first met.”
“I didn’t expect the Birne to become West’s Chancellor either, but here we are.”
Prussia doesn’t look up from his journal— not diary, he hasn’t written an entry since last year— but he does pause his scribbling, thoughts trailing off in the middle of reorganizing his schedule for the third time this week as he realises what he’s just blurted out.
Shit, he thinks, but Kohl doesn’t look too offended.
“Time brought me good fortune, I suppose.” The Chancellor’s voice cuts through the quiet, and Prussia notes him staring at the wide expanse of Berlin to their side, afternoon sun spilling unforgivingly through the giant window, pristine and newly-renovated like everything else.
He wishes time would save West, too, but experience tells him it’s probably wishful thinking; it’s not a constructive way of handling this shitshow, and he looks down at his work again.
Hastily scribbled dates stare up at him from yellowing pages— yeah, fuck, he can’t really focus anymore, and Prussia resists the urge to close aching eyes, snapping the journal closed with a heavy exhale, letting himself sink deeper into his chair despite the Chancellor opposite him.
“I don’t think many remember me as Prussia anymore,” he says, running a finger along the grooves of the antique agar desk, voice pitched a careful neutral because he knows, painfully, the negative connotation his name still brings. “I don’t exactly advertise myself.”
Not after that first trip to the Soviets’ version of the camps, a few years before the Wall; the nightmares still mingle with some from the second War.
“…if I may, may I ask what’s it like, changing names? I can’t imagine it only being a matter of words on paper.”
Prussia doesn’t fiddle with his pen, but he does let his gaze wander unfamiliar titles, half-remembered paintings; Kohl’s words sound genuine enough, though he’s had more than enough experience with good actors to know that his judgment doesn’t always hit its mark.
“It depends,” he finds himself saying, before he’s come anywhere near a decision. “I’d say it’s like getting your heart torn out, West would probably say it’s just a formality.”
The lump in his throat is just a side-effect of thinking too much about West, thank you very much. Maybe he should’ve just kept his mouth shut.
Kohl hums, noncommittal, and to his credit he doesn’t seem too disturbed.
“I would say ‘interesting’, but I don’t imagine you want to feel like a specimen.”
And the tone makes Prussia glance back at the newly-elected Chancellor of Germany, makes him note the same resting bitch-face, how it continues to cast long shadows under bright sun.
No twitch of amusement like Honecker, none of Pieck’s false lightness.
That's— well. He’s not sure what to think about that, and it’s still too early to judge, anyhow.
The chair’s wooden armrest is cool under his hand as Prussia pushes himself back upright, unsteady gaze pointed at Kohl like a periscope at an opposite trench.
Kohl adjusts his square glasses, leans on the desk like he’s offering an olive branch or an ultimatum, and he says—
“I truly do not want to work against you, Prussia.”
The name registers a moment late.
Prussia, he repeats in his head, blankly, barely aware of how he freezes like a private in no-man’s land.
Kohl’s… referring to him. Neutral.
Neutral, but not demeaning.
“You— of course you don’t.”
The shaky words linger like Mecklenburg’s cigar smoke in the silence, the wood of the armrest digging into his hand’s tightening grip even as he tries to relate the use of his old name to unseen motivations, whether it was to irk him or to endear him—
And Kohl fucking frowns, like he doesn’t know he’s hit the bullseye of a hurt he thought he’s buried too deep to remember.
“I apologise for that— I assumed that Ost would be inappropriate, considering Reunification. Would you rather me call you something else?”
Would I? Prussia giggles in his head, high-pitched and hysterical even as he tries to school his face back into practiced neutrality, and he sits straighter, swallows again.
“You called Germany West, didn’t you?”
That sounds like an accusation, he realises too late—
“Only recently, I suppose.” The Chancellor puts his paperwork aside. “He insisted upon Germany, at first, but everyone called him West despite his wishes, and the habit just came naturally. It’s somewhat of a tradition, from what I’ve heard.”
He pauses.
“He is fine, isn’t he? His… sickness, it’s just an aftereffect of reunification?”
Prussia resists the urge to tilt his face away, forcing himself to meet the Chancellor’s eyes like he does most bosses— avoidance is something he prefers to only utilize when talking about things like getting his heart trampled over— and it’s not even a decision to tell the truth, despite how it feels like the ground’s been pulled from underneath him, the uncertainty that lingers.
This isn’t a foreign entity.
This is West’s Chancellor of eight years, one that he’s expressed a fondness for multiple-fucking-times over the course of the year before formal Reunification, and even if Prussia knows the propaganda posters more than the man they’re working towards the same thing.
That’s reason enough not to crash their relationship into a wall.
“We don’t know,” he forces out, finally, ignoring Kohl’s startle and near-miss of the antiques on the shelf behind him. “It… should be me, in theory. It’s strange.”
Kohl smoothes out his jacket, adjusts his glasses again.
“A-ah, I see.”
His voice’s weird, but Prussia supposes that happens when one hears an immortal entity talk about their own death like it’s no more important than overdue paperwork.
It’s not like he’s happy to die; God, no, but he’s raged enough about it last year, and the idea only stings, now—
“I— ah, so… what should I address you as, again?”
—Prussia blinks; once, twice.
Right.
That.
“Prussia is fine.”
Calling him by a dead name is fine; it’s leagues better than Ost, even if it reminds him further of his displacement, and it’s… familiar, anyhow.
Kohl gives a slow nod, reaches for his paperwork, and Prussia takes that as his cue to open his journal again, to try and force his mind back on track.
The sun’s still bearing down on them, bright and striking and everything this new country should be— everything his little brother will be, if he wakes.
When he wakes.
When.
——
Please let it be when.
——