Chapter Text
The halls of the UN compound echoed with absence.
Germany stood alone at the head of the council table, flanked only by Italy, who was fiddling nervously with a sugar packet from the untouched refreshments cart. The long oval table remained half empty; no Britain, no India, no Canada, no Japan. Their seats were vacant, folders unopened, placards untouched.
Something was wrong.
He had known since the night before. The sky above Berlin had been too quiet, not with peace, but with pressure, like a glass dome pressing down on the whole country. The kind of silence that came before lightning.
“I don't like this,” Germany muttered, not to Italy, not really to anyone. He tapped one finger against the hard surface of the table, gaze flicking to the map of North America pinned on the adjacent screen.
Italy looked up from where he was perched on the edge of his seat. “Is it… another war meeting? Did France forget to send the memo again? I knew I shouldn’t have taken that nap on the balcony, ve—”
“It’s not a war,” Germany interrupted, but his jaw stayed tight. “It’s worse.”
A pulse shot up his spine, cold and low, like a whisper in his bones. He had felt this kind of presence before and during the fall of Reich, during the division of Berlin, during the rise of ideologies that wore men’s faces but moved like something older. He didn’t recognize the exact flavor of it… but he knew what it meant.
Something unnatural had awakened.
Italy suddenly frowned. “Germany? You’re standing really still… even for you…”
(Italy squints at him.)
“Your aura’s doing that cold, spiky thing again…..are you okay?”
Then Italy paused. His eyes widened.
He felt it too.
A distant throb, like the ground shivering under the weight of an approaching thunderhead. It was America’s magic. Normally it was a bright crackling presence like static under the sunlight, but now it feels twisted and corrupted. It bled through the ley lines like oil in water. And something else rode within it.
Germany didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.
He grabs Italy’s arm.
“H-Hey!” Italy yelped as he was yanked to his feet. “Wait—where are we going?! You’re doing the ‘silent panic’ thing again, aren’t you? That’s worse than yelling—!”
“Come on,” Germany growled. “He’s in danger.”
They burst through the council room’s side doors, boots pounding tile as they followed the pull of the foul magic like bloodhounds. It coiled down corridors that flickered in and out of light, runes pulsing warning-red along the walls, as if the compound itself were trying to vomit out whatever had taken root.
A shattered containment ward blinked on a monitor. Location: lower level, Room C-7.
Italy clutched the wall as they turned a corner, breath shallow. “This feels like that time in Prague, remember the thing in the catacombs with the screaming bones? That weird plague spirit that kept whispering in Latin?”
“This is worse,” Germany said grimly. “This is familiar.”
The closer they got, the heavier the air became. By the time they reached the reinforced doors, it felt like standing on the edge of a black hole. Shadows curled under the threshold like spilled ink.
Then—
The door creaked open.
The scene that greeted them was chaos.
Sigils flickered. Blood smeared the floor in looping arcs. Nations stood in a defensive semi-circle, enchanted weapons drawn, magic, steel, and memory at the ready. And in the center, surrounded by wariness and disbelief, was the source of the corruption.
Not America.
Something that wore America’s shape, but twisted. Horns jutted from his head, one cracked and reforming, glowing like iron pulled from hell’s own forge. His grin stretched inhumanly wide, fangs gleaming behind chapped lips. His eyes… not blue. Red. Glowing like coals in a furnace too old to be forgotten.
Germany froze. His soul recoiled in unease. The aura flooding the air felt familiar, like Reich’s old and oppressive, corruption, but not the same. This wasn’t just residual hate being wielded; it was being devoured, amplified, spat back out as something fouler. He didn’t know what this thing inside America truly was… only that it echoed some of the darkest parts of what he carried in his own blood. And it terrified him.
France’s expression faltered. Even Britain looked up, wariness eclipsing contempt.
Nobody had ever seen Germany pale. Not like this.
Beside him, Italy whimpered. “That’s not America, is it?”
“No.”
Germany stepped forward, arm flung out to shield Italy, voice hardening like a blade drawn.
“Back away.”
It was Germany who spoke first, voice low and taut as a trip‑wire.
Confederate laughed. A slow, syrup-heavy sound that curdled the air.
“Well, well, well,” he purred, dragging the syllables out like a drawl across rusted barbed wire, “if it ain’t the Iron Son himself. You look like you’ve seen a ghost, boy.”
He twirled the ghost‑pale flag between clawed fingers, eyes glowing like furnace coals. “Oh, I remember your kind. Cold. Orderly. Built from ruin and fire like you were tryin’ to scrub the blood clean. But you ain’t foolin’ me, Deutschland. You’re Reich’s little shadow, wearin’ a uniform stitched from denial.”
Germany didn’t blink. But something behind his eyes shifted and tightened.
Confederate stepped forward, grin stretching. “Still usin’ that borrowed discipline to choke the real power outta yourself? Can’t risk lettin’ folks see what’s really in yer veins, huh?”
He leaned in, voice softening to a near whisper. “ You think they don’t see it anyway? That they don’t flinch when you raise your voice, or wonder if the old you’s just sleepin’ under the surface? You can bury Reich all you want, boy, but you still carry his teeth.”
Germany clenched his jaw, and for a brief second, something glinted between his lips. Not human teeth. But, jagged, sharp vestiges of what Reich had been, of what still lived inside his bloodline, no matter how hard he buried it.
His fist curled, muscles twitching like he was about to move, about to do something. The air around him thickened with restrained magic, an old pressure that hadn’t breathed in decades.
But then—
Nothing.
He exhaled through his nose. Slow. Controlled. Silent.
Confederate’s grin wavered, just slightly. His words had hit home, but the reaction never came.
Germany stayed where he was. Silent. Still.
Refusing to give the devil his flame.
Confederate’s grin lingered, waiting, taunting. But Germany gave him nothing. No retort, no outburst, no spark of rage to feed on.
Just silence.
A silence sharpened by the ticking pulse in Germany’s temple, the way his shoulders coiled like a spring too proud to snap.
Confederate’s tone soured, just barely. “Huh. No bark? I’m disappointed. Thought the Iron Son still had steel in his gut, not paper in his spine.”
He sneered, flag still flicking between his claws. “Reich’s magic is still buzzin’ in your blood, ain’t it? Bet it burns, not bein’ able to use it. Bet ya wonder if it’d make you strong enough to stop me.”
Germany didn’t flinch. But the air around him hummed. Barely perceptible, but it was there.
He finally spoke, voice low and controlled, every syllable carved with deliberate precision.
“I understand enough,” Germany shot back, though his knuckles whitened. “But, you’re not America. You’re... you’re the rot he buried.”
Confederate offered a lazy clap, each slap of his hands echoing with mockery. “And what’s a country but a graveyard of sins wearin’ a pretty smile?”
He stepped forward. With each motion the lights crackled, the parquet groaned as if trying to shrug him off. Wards along the walls fizzed amber and died.
He’s warping the room just by existing… Canada realised, stomach twisting. ‘And I kept this secret.’
Canada’s fists clenched. He forced himself to meet those coal‑red eyes where America’s sky‑blue should be. Please, Ame… fight him. He then thought back to confederate words, of Ame letting him in willingly. ‘He couldn't have, he told me he could handle it… this doesn't add up’
“I don’t believe you,” he managed, voice paper‑thin yet steady. “My brother wouldn’t— you’re lying.”
Confederate’s grin split wider, the kind that didn’t need joy, just teeth. And his gaze slid across the circle like a blade looking for something soft.
He then paused.
And Turned.
Slowly, deliberately, his attention peeled away from Germany and landed on Canada.
Like a beast scenting blood.
The air seemed to shudder. Canada flinched as those burning red eyes locked with his, like furnace glass warping under pressure, like something old and starving had just realized he was the smallest one in the room.
Confederate blinked once, slowly. Then cocked his head.
“…’Scuse me, sugar?” he drawled. “ Couldn’t quite catch that over all the quiverin’. Might’ve been the guilt rattlin’ in your throat. Or maybe that feather-soft whisper ya call a voice.”
He leaned in slightly, mockingly cupping one clawed hand around his ear.
“Say it again for me, darlin’. Loud enough so even the dead can hear.”
Canada’s face flushed, but he didn’t look away. His spine stiffened, breath sharp as frost.
“I—I said I don’t believe you!” he snapped, louder this time. “My brother wouldn’t do that—you’re lying!”
Confederate chuckled. Low and guttural. Then he took a step closer, tilting his head.
“Oh, Maple Boy,” he crooned, twisting the nickname like a blade. “You reckon the hero didn’t want me? Lemme prove it to ya.”
He lunged.
In a blur, talons gripping Canada’s cheeks. Shadows poured from Confederate’s fingertips, sliding into Canada’s temples. Cold and heavy. Then—
A memory.
America, on his knees in a rune-lit cellar, shoulders drawn tight as wire. Black tears streamed down his face, not from ignorance, but from breaking. His palms were braced against the floor, shaking, not with fear, but with shame.
“I can’t…” he whispered, voice hoarse. “I keep failing. I can’t carry it anymore.”
The room pulsed around him, unstable with raw magic and containment sigils fraying at the edges. The air smelled like iron and scorched salt.
Then the voice came low, syrup-dark, and smooth with false sympathy.
“You already know what you buried.
You’re just tired of fightin’ it.”
A breath.
“Lemme hold it for, for a while.”
America didn’t speak. Didn’t argue.
His head bowed lower.
And then, soft as a breath he surrendering to the dark:
“…fine.”
The vision shattered. Canada hit the floor, retching iron and ash.
“You see?” Confederate drawled, almost tender. “He asked. I’m the solution y’all forced on him.”
“Parasite!” France cursed, hurling a brass candlestick. “Putain de démon!”(translation: Fucking demon) The projectile passed through a writhing shadow and clanged off the floor.
“And he liked it,” Confederate snarled, smile ripping wider. “He liked bein’ free of your judgments. So I gave him permission to have a break.”
Italy whimpered, clutching Germany’s sleeve. “Mamma mia… why are horns everywhere lately?”
Poland, voice high with nerves, muttered in Polish about “total bad vibes.” India whispered a Sanskrit prayer, palms sparking turquoise sigils that fizzled in the rancid air.
Japan’s sword now in hand, samurai focus razor‑thin, spoke; “This is not a haunting. This is a symbiosis of shame and hate.”
Confederate’s grin stretched. “See? Samurai gets it.”
Japan lifted the broken chair like a shield. “We must separate them while America remains.”
Confederate took a step forward, then stumbled. Just for a breath.
“You cracked somethin’, didn’t ya?” he muttered low. “Didn’t think the pretty little chair-boy had it in him.”
“Your strength is borrowed,” Russia finally spoke, stepping fully into the circle, voice like a glacier calving. “And borrowed power always runs dry.”
Confederate turned sharply, red eyes blazing. “Oh? Big Bear’s got claws too?”
He grinned, cruel and knowing. “Careful now, don’t want the ghost of the Union to wake up in ya.”
Then, with a flick of his wrist, dismissive:
“Though I reckon you keep that old hammer and sickle buried deeper than Germany does.”
His voice dropped back into a taunt, slow and goading.
“Come closer, let’s compare.”
Russia said nothing, but ice crackled up his sleeves, anchoring frost under Confederate’s feet.
Canada forced himself upright. “You don’t get to have him,” he said. “He’s not yours.”
Confederate tilted his head, mock‑curious. “Then come get him, Maple Boy.”
Without warning, he slashed at the air, ripping open a gash of void, shadows spewing outward like blood from a wound. They formed malformed silhouettes, twisted echoes of historical scars, things that looked half like soldiers and half lynched ghosts.
Germany barked an order,“Form up!” and the group surged.
France drew protective sigils mid-air, light flaring; India chanted counter-magic; Britain roared something ancient and half-mad in Old English.
In the chaos, Canada sprinted.
Right toward him.
Confederate laughed as Canada tackled him, not with fists, but with force of will.
For just a moment, their foreheads touched—
—and in the eye of the storm, blue.
A flicker. Clear and sky-bright. America.
“I see you,” Canada whispered. “You’re still in there. And I’m not leaving.”
Confederate screamed.
The shadows recoiled. His flag ignited, blue fire licking up its edges.
Canada held on.
We’re coming, brother. Hold on.