You Destroyed Me {Cold War AU (Countryhumans)}

Incompatible (Chapter 5)

Japan was looking out the window beside her seat on the private jet. She watched as the buildings flashed in and out of view far below on the ground. It still amazed her, despite having ridden in countless planes before, how fast the flying vehicles moved. 

The Japanese country wore a small smile on her lips and turned away from the window to pick up the green tea the Americans working on the plane had provided to her, and took a small sip of it. She glanced at America over the rim of her cup before putting it back in the cup holder it'd been in before. She kept staring at America, watching him as he read through the papers in his hands.

It was almost impossible to imagine, already, that she was at war with America for 3 years. He wasn't so bad. At the very least, he wasn't as bad as she thought he was. America was obviously far from perfect but that seemed to be the thing she liked about him.

As the Japanese Empire, she tried to live up to the expectations her citizens, her enemies, and her allies had of her. She tried to be perfect and couldn't seem to realize that such a thing didn't exist. She looked at America and she saw imperfection. America was vastly diversified. He wasn't just one place. His states were a big part of him and he listened to them and cared for them more than she'd ever listened to or cared for any of her cities before.

America couldn't always hide his imperfections. In fact, it often appeared that he didn't try to hide them at all. He had these odd outbursts where one or multiple of his emotions would burst out uncontrollably. But he didn't seem to let that stop him. Japan found it admirable that he didn't care to let other countries see what was wrong with him. She found it even more admirable that all sorts of countries didn't think any lesser of him just because he was different.

Japan wanted to learn how to do that. How to be herself and not care what others thought of her. She wanted to figure out who she really was. Because she thought she did, she thought she knew who she was. But maybe she was wrong. She never liked being so strict all the time. She never liked being allied with Third Reich. America loved himself for who he was and didn't let anyone change him, it was easy to see. She wanted to learn how to love herself, too.

America looked up from the papers he'd been reading and smiled at Japan. "What's up?" He greeted. It'd taken a few days for Japan to actually realize that phrase was a greeting and not really a question.

"Nothing. What're those papers you're reading?" Japan asked in response, nodding towards the papers in America's grasp.

The American glanced down at the text and set the stack of papers down. "Just reading through my notes I took during that meeting I brought you to a few days ago. You remember it." Japan nodded slightly. "Yeah, I'm mostly checking through everything I wrote down relating to Soviet. I found how he was acting.. odd. But I can't figure out what it was that made me feel that way, I just know that I did." America frowned and sighed, looking down at the papers before turning his gaze to Japan again.

Japan nodded once again. "I guess he kind of was. I didn't think much of it, though. Are you concerned about it?" She asked.

America shrugged and opened his mouth to reply when his eyes flicked away from Japan to something past her. His mouth went slightly agape as he stared. Japan tilted her head in confusion and looked behind her, following America's gaze to the small, black-and-white television behind her. 

After just a few seconds of reading the subtitles, she understood why America gave such a reaction. Behind her, America grabbed a remote and turned up the volume on the television. The USSR's voice came fizzling and crackling out of the tv.

"What do you feel about allied capitalist and communist countries?" A reporter asked Soviet, holding a microphone in front of him. 

Soviet's frown he already wore grew and he looked at the camera on him, his stony eyes boring into anyone who was viewing this channel. "Capitalism and communism are incompatible. They've never been compatible and they never will be. I only joined the capitalists to get my revenge on Third Reich. I did not enjoy working with the countries apparently on my side. Especially America. He's too loud. He's not the great, big, powerful country everyone seems to think he is. If he'd been in the war when I joined the allied powers, I wouldn't have bothered allying with them."