Hetalia One-Shots

We Remember...

   Alfred made his way down the street, his feet dragging slightly, eyes scanning his surroundings. What was he getting so worked up about? Nothing bad had happened recently.
   But there was that sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, the slight spinning in his head, a ringing in his ears.
   Maybe he'd caught a bug, or something. Yeah, that. What could possibly go wrong in New York on some random day in 2001?
Wait, shit, saying something like that automatically causes karma to bitchslap you, America thought.
   But, nah. Heroes don't get bitchslapped.
Unless it's by that spunky leading lady love interest. He could use one of those about now.
   The nation checked his watch. 8:45. He watched the second hand tick slowly, deciding to make it a game to celebrate the next minute.
Another minute by with nothing going wrong.
   A sudden pain exploded in his chest, and red enveloping his vision. His ears filled with the screams of his people- or was that him, shrieking out of pure pain and fear?
   When did he get on the ground? Was he bleeding, or was that someone else's blood? Why was there so much weight on him?
   Rubble, he realized. From what? His vision returned in hazy flashes.
   Burning, screaming. An image constantly played behind his eyes; a plane, flying, turning, slicing into his beloved North Tower. The tower, he realized, that he had been standing less than a block away from.
   Another wave of pain ripped through his crippled body.
   More blood. More screams.
   He forced himself to open his eyes, to stand. The American stood in the midst of a mountain of rubble  and corpses, watching the scene unfold before his eyes. Something hit the ground hard in the rubble beside the building, followed by several more.
   Bodies.
   People were jumping from the falling buildings.
No, Alfred wanted to scream. Don't jump!  I can save you! I'm the hero! The hero always wins!
   But when he opened his mouth, he only succeeded in coughing up blood.
   He laid back down, closing his tearing eyes.
Heroes don't get hurt.
      Heroes don't rely on others.
      Heroes don't cry.
      Heroes don't need saving.
   But he did cry, and he was hurt, and he did need saving. Only he had no one to rely on. He was all alone. All the other countries hated him, who would come help?
   With these thoughts, he closed his eyes.
   More flashes of pain frequently came, the death of each person who passed flashing before his closed eyelids. Screaming, so much screaming, flooding his head, filling his ears, taking over every part of his being. The agonizing, burning pain, searing itself into his brain, his body.
   Then, suddenly, a light. Bright and blinding. Was he dead?
   His eyes shot open. Several hazy figures stood before him, faces wet with tears, angry and sorrowful expressions painted onto their faces.
   The other nations, he realized. A smile found its way onto his scarred and bleeding face.
   And, among all the chaos and bloodshed, he heard a chanting- the song of his people, coming from all around the world. The American National Anthem being played in millions of different places at once. Moments of silence breaking the melody. Ambulances, police, from all around the planet, crowding his country. And, above it all, ringing out, and unfinished sentence, with so much raw meaning, so much sorrow, so much hope and worry and destruction all mixed in to two small words;
We remember...