Safeway Pyongyang // Reader x Countryhumans

Isolationist

      The two hour long drive back to Pyongyang was tense, Y/N quiet, North vibrating with restrained rage, and their driver trying not to make any sudden movements.

      Y/N's body ached to comfort the Countryhuman, but she couldn't in front of the driver. As soon as they got in the door of the high-rise, North stormed upstairs, Y/N following.

      Before they reached the main floor of bedrooms, though, North froze, grabbing Y/N and pressing her to the wall, hand over her mouth. Several voices were filtering down.

     "But ah'm hungry." High-pitched twang- Hae.

     "Korea's doing his best." Low and calm- North Pyongan.

     "The floodin' in my fields took out a good quart'r of the harvest." Morose and thead-bare- Ryanggang. "We're goin' to have to wait for mid-summ'r for a full meal."

      "I'm worried about the villages." Soft, worried- SH. "But Korea's going to fix it- we can trust him."

      Y/N felt something wet 'plink' against her face. Looking up, she felt shell-shocked.

      North was crying.

      His one good eye was open wide, unseeing, and tears were welling up in it, landing on Y/N's face.

      "N-North?" she whispered, lips against his palm.

       Shaking his head briskly, the country roughly wiped away his tears with his forearm, marching up the steps. The voices immediately stopped, hearing his purposefully loud footsteps. Y/N- after a moment of shock- hurried after him.

      "Welcome back, Korea." SH smiled, all traces of worry hidden.

      "What did that bastard want?" Hae asked, ignoring SH's rebuking look.

       After the briefest of pauses- "Nothing," North clipped, storming up to his floor.

      "Didjya have fun, N/N?" Hae asked. "What was it like? Didjya see France? What did the DMZ look like?"

      "M-Maybe later, Hae." Y/N smiled tremulously, hurrying after North.

      The country had already locked himself in his office, smashing sounds emanating from it.

      "N-North?" Y/N called. "Can you let me in?"

      He screamed in rage, and she winced.

      "North, please!"

    More crashing.

       Heart racing, she executed a trick that she had learned in Detroit- how to jimmy a slide-latch from the other side, taught to her by a woman on bath salts, whom she had not wanted to anger. Hopefully it worked on Asian sliding doors like this.

      Lift. Slide. Lift. Slide. And- The door slid open, just as the crashing stopped, North uttering a last frustrated scream.

      Y/N peered cautiously in.

      The room was trashed, papers everywhere, and the lamp bulb was broken, making it quite dark. North was standing in the center of the carnage, like a hurricane at rest, holding something. His back was to her.

      "N-North?" She walked towards him, a bit of glass crunching under her foot.

    'He's not going to hurt me, he's not going to hurt me,' she reminded herself.

         Peering over his shoulder, she could see the picture of young South and North, split down the middle.

      "Oh," she said softly.

       North steadily ripped it again, into progressively smaller and smaller pieces, scattering them to the floor.

      "North?" Y/N asked softly. "Are you okay?"

       "No," he said, almost too low to hear. "I'm not."

    This was almost worse than the burning rage- this dark tension.

     Carefully, she stepped in front of the Countryhuman, wrapping her arms around his torso, squeezing him. After a moment, he squeezed back, the rigidness running out of his body. 

       "Can you tell me... about the Reunification, and- and Juche?" she asked quietly, not wanting to set him off again.

     "Yes."

      They went across the hall, and Y/N wrapped herself in the futon, while North sat on the floor.

      "What Juche is isn't... important for this conversation," North said, sounding almost emotionless. He briefly drew his legs up to his chest, before crossing them. "It's just my form of Socialism, the way I built it. What matters is- I'm not an isolationist," he growled, regaining some vigour.

       Y/N waited patiently for the country to continue.

      "I've always had trade partners," North muttered. "I just wouldn't surrender sovereignty for better deals. USSR respected that. Part of my self-reliance is that I can support myself if I have to, in times of trouble. But thanks to that damn American and his sanctions-" North growled, punching the floor. "I had to become an isolationist. No one's meant to survive this long on their near own. Borders weren't drawn for self-sustainability. When my brother-" Venom tinged the word. "-says it's my 'self-reliance' that's killing me, it's his way of shifting the blame from himself."

       Y/N drew her knees to her chest. She knew what being forced to be an isolationist felt like, to depend on outside forces to throw you scraps of survival, and have to choke it down with a smile on her face. All of those years with him had been exactly that. The only difference was that she had become accustomed to her prison of existence, while North had clearly not.

      "The main principles of the Reunification are that we'll do it peacefully, and that there will be no foreign interference helping us," North continued ominously.

     Y/N's blood ran cold. "B-But, your brother was just being dramatic, right? He wasn't actually serious. Right?"

      North's face was grave. "The Reunification is sacred to us. Neither of us would ever say something like that lightly. My brother says that he doesn't care about the Reunification anymore."

      Y/N was horror-struck, her heart beating out of her chest. "S-So that means..."

        North nodded, his eye gleaming with a sharp, grim light.

      "America is coming for us."

Juche is the belief that humans are masters of the world, not in a biblical 'we're the supreme lifeforms' sense, but in a 'we shape the course of the future' sense. Every country, every culture, builds Socialism and works towards Communism in different ways. It's also being able to support yourself when you have to. I think that this is a good thing to apply to one's self- accept help from others when needed, but be able to rely on yourself. Shape your own destiny, сука.