---CHAPTER IX: Phone Calls (Part 1)---

//Third Person PoV//

Italy slowed his pace a bit and sighed, "They got really mad at me. Germany's face was so scary... straight out of a nightmare."

As he looked down on the floor, he noticed something and crouched down to inspect it.

"......Is this...blood? This place was free from blood a while ago... I swear there wasn't a monster here at this point in time..." Italy thought out loud.

He then spots something beside the drops of blood on the floor-- a small metal key chain that spelled, "Hetalia" in green, white and red. It seemed familiar to him.

Where has he seen this item before?

After thinking deeply, he snapped his fingers. "Ah! This is from the bella ragazza with us! She's with Germany and the others, right? Or...hold on--I don't think I noticed her go inside..? What? No... Sh-She's in the cell, too, righ--"

A sudden ringing of a phone was heard, surprising the Italian.

"Eeeeeeek!!! Germanyyy!! Japaaaaan!!" he shrieked.

He snapped out of it and looked around him. "Oh, right, they're not here..."

"My phone...? Scary... Who is it? And how can they call me, anyway?" he muttered whilst taking his phone out of his pocket.

Italy's eyes opened wide when he saw the name of the caller, "What?!"

"Um! Roma--", he said upon answering.

"You IDIOT!!! What took you so fucking long to answer, goddammit?!" someone on the other line angrily shouted with a thick Italian accent.

"What?! What? It's true?! It's really you?! How? You are Romano, aren't you?!" Italy asked frantically.

"Of course it's me! Ack, wait--Spain!! You can't take my phone! Give it back!" Romano shouted.

Italy gave a look of disbelief. "Spain, too?! It can't be true... Why?"

"I don't know what the fuck you're talking about. Now listen, Veneziano?

...? Are you crying?" the Southern Italian asked as he heard sniffling on the other line.

Italy shook his head. "No, I--I'm just so happy. Hey, Romano, can you fill in for me at work tomorrow?"

"Huh?"

"Tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and forever and ever... Can you?" Italy asked, his voice cracking.

"......No." his brother answered.

"Romano?"

Romano huffed. "It's your job. Just get your ass back here and fucking take care of it yourself!"

"An....... real..... idiot..... well......ly..." the other line started getting choppy.

"Romano? I can't hear you! Hello?! It got cut off..." Italy realised.

He then placed his phone back in his pockets and gave a small smile. "Hehe! Their voices. It's been so long!"

"... I wish I could go home." he said softly in a sad tone.

=========

"Tsk! It got fucking cut off. Oh, well. At least I got to call him."

======

-*-*-*-Outside the Mansion-*-*-*-

"God, my brother is such a pain in the ass...And Spain and the others are taking their sweet time getting here. Why aren't they back already?!" Romano ranted as he stood in front of the abandoned mansion.

"......Veneziano...

I'm coming."

===============

//Reader's PoV!//

Everything felt like a standstill when they told me that tiny bit of information.

"You mean....the....monster's actually...." my heart pounded upon my realisation.

The monster's actually working for the 2Ps? It...can't be...

Allen lowered his sunglasses and looked at me in the eyes, "Believe it, doll."

"B-But... how come there are tons of them roaming around the mansion?" I asked them.

Oliver placed a hand on my shoulder, "A little cloning spell wouldn't hurt, poppet~"

So it was them...all along?

"Hey! Before I forget, are you prepared to buff up my buddy, Steve, old man?" Allen

asked.

Oliver's head shot up, "Oh butterscotch! I overlooked that... Hmm~ Don't worry, I'll prepare the spell in a jiffy~" At that, the strawberry-blonde haired man walked

over to the other side of the room, near a fireplace.

That means...the steroid-taking looking Steve will be Oliver's doing? Given that Oliver forgot to prepare the spell...for now, it looks like it will take them a while before they take action against the 1Ps again.

Once I snapped out of my daze, I realised I was surrounded by the other 2Ps.

We were quite silent for a while, until someone spoke up.

"So...can I fuck her?" 2P! France asked.

That made me jump from my seat and hide behind a chair as I shouted at the grungy looking Frenchman, "Whoa whoa whoa! What the heck?! No. No. NO. Not cool, Francois!!"

"No need to be scared, honey~ We won't harm you in any way. It's those 'First Players' that we're after!" The fabulously dressed, blonde-haired, 2P! Romano reassured me. I breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing that.

A man with long, dark hair tied in a low ponytail with a purple ribbon, and had a scarred face--which I assume was 2P! Spain, was silently sitting beside 2P! Romano, but surprisingly spoke up, ".....'Francois'?"

"Hmm. That must be the old man's 'human name', eh?" 2P! Canada pointed out.

I nodded, "Yeah...he's 'Francois Bonnefoy'..." I said, pointing to the guy who disturbingly asked if he could uh...do things to me.

"Oh. Then care to tell us our 'human names' from your world, dollface?" 2P! America asked.

I crossed my arms, "Don't you guys already know that? I mean...you did sort of well, stalked me back in my world."

"No. We had limited time to do that." 2P! Russia told me.

I thought for a moment then spoke, "If...If I tell you your human names, will you let me see the 1Ps later?"

Luciano gave an annoyed look and shook his head, "Definitely not, ragazza."

"We cannot risk you running off back to them and helping them out. What's the point of all we're doing if you just get in the way against our plans?" 2P! Japan said.

I furrowed my eyebrows. "Then....then tell me why you want to 'banish them from this world' as you guys have said."

"Denied." 2P! China said bluntly.

I crossed my arms. "Hmph. Then I'm not telling anything."

"Awww~ But I wanted to know my 'human name'!! C'mon guys, we're just going to explain it to her! Maybe she'll even side with us fully when she finds out!~ Guys,pleeeaaasssseee?" 2P! Romano whined.

Several groaned before Lutz spoke, "Fine."

My eyes brightened. "Alright. Explain to me first."

"Well, ragazza, that's going to be a long story. To sum it up, we were just *used* by those beloved "First Players" of yours. When they didn't need us anymore, they just

threw us away like some disposable shit. We used to serve a purpose and meaning

in this hypocritical world, but they just took it away from us." Luciano explained.

Although I listened intently to what he said, I was still confused and couldn't comprehend what he was telling me. "I...don't understand."

"Dear fratello~ You ended up getting her more confused. Let me make it easier for you, hon." 2P! Romano turned to me.

"You see, honey, the 'First Players' were born with the burden of their whole nation on their shoulders. Everything their country was made to face, was dumped on them. Countries were born with the ability to withstand the stress of those problems and push through every obstacle. But at a certain point in time, several countries faced a phase in their immortal lives that they weren't able to take all on their own." he explained.

As I began understanding what 2P! Romano said, I nodded. ".....What was that 'certain point in time' that you're referring to?"

Spain looked up and spoke, "War."

I tilted my head, "....War?"

"That's right, doll. You've probably studied about wars in school, yeah?" Allen asked.

I nodded, "Yeah...I have."

"Mhmm. What happens when there's war?" Francois asked me lazily.

My forehead creased as I tried to cite a few things, "Uh...fighting, guns, blood, and er... death?"

From the corner of the room, a man peeked from his hooded cape and walked up to us slowly. "Don't forget fear, anxiety, terror, depression, suicidal thoughts and m--"

"--Yeah, yeah. Shut your depressed trap. She gets it." 2P! Canada cut 2P! Prussia off.

"That being said, basically, countries have faced an overhaul of negativity and almost broke their sanity and emotional handling. They weren't able to bear it. Fighting against countries that used to be their comrades, killing people who were either their enemies or innocent civilians, all the exposure to blood and dead bodies--those weaklings had just about reached the brink of losing it." 2P! Japan added.

After processing what he said, I sat back on the chair and spoke slowly,

"....Then...that's where you guys come along, am I right?"

"Heh. So she can use her head, after all. That is correct. As a result of all that, we came into existence." 2P! Germany answered, giving a small smirk.

Allen sat on a chair beside me and raised his feet up the table. "While those bastards where losing their shit, we were made to do all the dirty work for them.

Hey, it was mighty fine and all, beating people up, breaking their bones, making them puke blood out and all them pleasuring screams of pain--we couldn't get enough of it. It was what drove us on. But then! Then those fucking retards--"

"America! Watch your language, I told you! Stop saying those bad words in front of the poppet!" Oliver snapped while he was reading some sort of spell book.

"Whatever, old man! I do what I want." Allen retorted.

Oliver puffed his cheeks and muttered something like, "you meanie jerkface sassafrass", then continued scanning his spellbook.

Allen crossed his arms. "Hmph. Now, where was I? Ah, yeah... Then those 'First Players' decided to stop us."

I raised an eyebrow, "Stop you?"

"Well, even though we sort of saw it coming, the war was supposed to end at some point." 2P! Canada answered. "While we were doing what we were created for, they backed out and decided that the war had to stop and that they all could make amends and have 'peace'."

"Si... But you know, it was actually fine with us because we knew that even if the war ended then, one day another one will stir up and we'd be back in the battlefield once more." Luciano said, toying with his switchblade.

"Oh. Then it was actually okay with you guys.. what was the problem, then?" I asked them.

"The problem was, they wanted to get rid of us." 2P! France said.

"What? Why?"

"Well, say you did something bad like, break porcelain or whatever...will you just leave it there and tell everyone that you broke it?" 2P! China asked me.

I gave a confused look, "N-No... I'd probably throw it away to hide the evidence and well, hope that they don't find out?"

"Exactly. That's what *they* have done to us." 2P! Germany said.

Kuro spoke, "They figured that if they left us to roam freely in public, they will be reminded of all the mistakes they have done in the past. Every single speck of their said evils portrayed in countries that almost look like their mirror-images."

"They tried having us eliminated from this world, but since we have their likeness as a country, too--the only thing that they could do was to banish us. That was not pretty at all, honey." 2P! Romano explained.

2P! Russia finished his bottle of vodka and spoke, "They made us flee from our homes. Rid us of essential needs in hopes that one day, we might somehow die and disappear. They never even acknowledged us from saving their hands from half of the bloodshed! They denied that we existed. They denied us of our existence."

"Right.. What were we to do then? All we could do was stay in this blasted forest. We built homes around here from time to time, but without people in it..it just wasn't enough. We were made to feel all the emptiness, doom and despair..." 2P!Prussia said in a remorseful tone.

"We--We were made to exist in this world without purpose. Without meaning. Tch. We weren't even allowed to kill like how we used to before. We were deprived of everything. What were we supposed to do?!" Allen exclaimed.

I was about to answer, "Fi-"

"--Get back at them, of course." 2P! China cut me off.

"Dangit! Really? Really? Even the 2P version of China cuts me off my sentences, really?" I thought to myself, pouting.

"Right. Then, when we finally get rid of them, we can establish ourselves as our own country. Take over theirs." Luciano said.

I just sat there in silence for a while as did they after that long explanation of the nature of how "Second Players" came to be. It was a lot to process.

....Who knew? Who even knew that beyond these people interpreted as "murderous pyschopaths" was a backstory of pain and negligence?

I didn't. Not until now.

In all honesty, they have a point. The 1Ps have a fault here, too.

But...their solution...is...isn't right.

Meaning? Purpose? Truth be told, shit like that runs deep. Numerous theories and fanfictions have I read about these Second Players...but...they barely mention topics like these.

Usually, it's just about them being their insane, blood-loving, bone-crunching kind of people.

Usually, when the 1Ps are involved, the 2Ps...well...they're...the antagonists of stories.

They're still the antagonists of this story...right?

...or are they?

The 1Ps figured it'd be best to have the 2Ps away from them because, well, it's given that they are dangerous...but to just throw them away...was also wrong.

The 2Ps figured that the only way for them to have a place in this world was for the 1Ps to disappear themselves, granted it's their way of revenge...but to try to kill the 1Ps...wasn't the correct way to handle it at all.

Each side had their own sense of justice...but which one should prevail?

Even though I'm starting to understand the 2Ps...I can't just let them hurt the 1Ps.

What can I do?

I'm back to the question, "Why am I here, anyway?"

I don't know why I'm here...but what I do know is that I want to get out of this mansion. With my parents...and my friends.

Maybe...maybe I can sneak out of here and ask the 1Ps to help me save my parents from the 2Ps? It may be dangerous, but it's possible.

But wait...

If I do get back to the side of the 1Ps...what will become of the 2Ps?

What --What happens after all this, after the 1Ps find out that it was the 2Ps doing...?

Will the 1Ps try to get rid of the 2Ps just like how they thought they have back then?

I rubbed my temples as my head started to ache from all the thinking and all the contemplation.

Then, something came to mind.

Maybe...I can fix this?

Maybe...

Maybe...words are the answer?