Y'all I'm procrastinating on getting actual work done for this shut up.

I was thinking about how I'm going to develop the rest of the plot of this fic since I completely scratched the original and I've come to the conclusion that my inspiration would come from critically-acclaimed movies from 2005, so yeah sorry it's kind of all over the place.

But think about it. SYMBOLISM.

Warning: This chapter does contain quite a bit of homophobia. I apologize if it makes anybody feel uncomfortable.

DISCLAIMER: I don't know I guess I just like writing disclaimer at the beginning.

September, 2011

They transported us during the second week in September to a very large orphanage in the northern region of Drammen. We said our goodbyes to Feliks and Toris and the other runaways before we left, wishing them luck at the shelter. Feliks gave me a dirty sock with pink horses on it to remember him by- he said he didn't have anything else; Toris gave me a pack of cigarettes he found lying in the middle of the corridor and brought his index finger to his lips after sliding it in my pocket- the universal "don't ask, don't tell" sign. I kept carton with me at all times, even when I had used up all the cigarettes and it was empty.

They said they wanted us to find a family. "You need to live with a family if you've ever going to grow up right," is what they said- what the social workers said, I mean. They said it mostly in terms of Emil being raised by a family, and shot me a dirty look as if I had neglected my brother all together and had an ill-certified proclamation of ownership over him. I would be eighteen the next May, which implied I would be separated from my brother. I refused to let that happen.

The orphanage was not much smaller than the shelter, standing tall against the sky, constructed of fading reddish-brown bricks and structured windows and doors that looked like they had been taken from a nineteenth-century novel. It had been raining the day we arrived, strings of rain drizzling into pools that lie below our feet. It was a cold rain, gray clouds obscuring the falling sun, and beneath my jacket I shivered. Birds flew overhead, and I remembered seeing a building quite like before when my family and I had taken a trip to New York City before my mother got pregnant with Emil. People did not flock from these buildings, yet they did not avoid them; quite, narrow buildings with families inside gathered and laughing on their living room carpet. I could only hope I could give Emil that same sort of happiness those families had in such a building.

The interior of the building was as basic and melancholy as its exterior. The main corridor was made up of a long hallway with ten doors on each side, the hallway breaking up into two other corridors that I would soon find out would lead to a mess hall, a large lounge hall, and two staircases leading opposite of one another to even more identical rooms. Emil and I would have a room on the third floor- room fourteen.

And that was that for the following months. We did not speak to anyone; we ate alone, with each other, never made a solid effort to converse with the other orphans. For Emil, it was out of shyness and fear. For me, it was out of utter apathy and lack of any motivation to speak to another living soul. And for the most part, they did not want to talk to me- they stayed in their own little posses of blond hair, Norwegian blood; and then others of different ethnicities and languages tended to stay with the children whom spoke their mother tongue.

In retrospect, the orphanage is actually quite empty aside from maybe a quantity of handfuls made up of boys and girls varying from ages before their first birthday and before their eighteenth. Whilst Emil had many young children his age to play with, I was one of the few adolescents there already in high school. I did not trust the other kids my age; the aura they carried was not pleasant and was very unusual.

It was during the second month I was there that I met Gilbert and Ludwig.

How I had never seen them before was something I couldn't quite grasp, despite them being at the home far longer than my brother and I had, but their greeting came with a punch-literally-that prompted me to take a formal disliking to them immediately. Gilbert was the younger of the two brothers, an albino with light skin and white hair and dark red eyes. He had a certain haughtiness to him that I did not like, and was quite find of quoting himself beyond his narcissism. Ludwig, on the other hand, was far more stoic. He had a menacing and stone-like appearance to him, blond hair nearly combed back at all times and sharp blue eyes and revealed the Aryan blood coursing through him. It occurred to me that the brothers looked nothing alike, nor were their personalities very similar, but then again, neither were Emil and I.

But, Gilbert had, in fact, punched me the first time I met him.

"Look at fag-boy smoking all proud out here. Why are you even in here, fag-boy? Mom and Dad didn't want a fag?"

I was in the courtyard smoking the pack of cigarettes Toris has smuggled for me, having not touched them since Emil and I had first arrived at the home. Autumn in Norway was exceptionally cold, and my patience was being tested as Gilbert tried the put out my cigarette by blowing on it. Was this guy really that stupid?

"And who the fuck are you to be trying so sly?" I hissed, taking a slow drag from the cigarette.

The albino let out a whistle, placing his hands in front of his face.

"Ooh, fag-boy thinks he's cool with that cig in his mouth. Take a look at this guy, bro." He motions to his brother. "How pathetic is that?"

"You're being unreasonable, Gilbert," Ludwig shot back coolly. "But you are rather pathetic, uh-"

"Lukas."

Gilbert's mouth creeped into a smile. He smirked then laughed.

"He even has a fag name! Isn't pure gold?"

"Gilbert, it's too goddamn cold outside. Let's just leave him alone and if he wants to kill his lungs he can do that."

I could tell Ludwig was also having his patience tested by his brother.

That's when Gilbert took one last look at me, smirked, and punched me square in the face.

I was out cold for at least twenty minutes. Being in a vulnerable state by smoking your lungs out in the snow puts you in no position to be winning a fight. This is what the infirmary nurse told me; a young woman with wavy blond hair cute in a bobs and green eyes soft calming. She reminded me Elizabeta in a way.

From that day forward, we were banned from being out in the courtyard by ourselves. It seemed as though adult supervision was the only solution to taming a bunch of rowdy teenagers, deemed suitable by the owner of the place. In actuality, it only made Gilbert hungry for more; hungry for pleasure in making sure he /knew/ he was better than anyone else.

And to make matters far worse, the delinquent was my roommate.

The rooms of the home were separated by age group, gender, and fit approximately two people within the small corners of the room. Emil, who was five now, was allowed to be on his own, and he did not like that at all.

"But I want to be with you, Lukey," he cried the first night we arrived, big tears rolling down his face as he clutched Mr. Puffin tightly to his chest. It would not be so easy to explain this.

I knelt down to his level and patted his little head. "I'm just across the hall, Emil. If you get scared you can crawl in bed with me and nobody will have to know.

"But what if I get lost?"

"I won't get lost. I'll leave my door open a crack so you'll know which room is mine."

I picked him up, resting him on my hip as he clutched onto the collar of my shirt and refused to let go. "Come on, let's get you to bed."

Emil's roommate was already sleeping soundly by the time lights out had been called and I brought my brother to bed. I had to pry him from my shirt to get him into bed, tucking in the sheets and checking for "monsters" upon his request; then I kissed his little forehead and went my separate way. As much I loved my brother, it was time I taught him how to start being a bit more independent. In a place like this, we needed each other more than anything, yet it was also a place where we couldn't rely on each other all the time. And knowing that, it killed me.

I hadn't even made it halfway across the hall when I heard the padding of Emil's feet across the wooden panel floor and a tug on my shirt, and I turned around and there he was.

"Lukey," he said with tears pinpricked in the corners of his eyes. "Can you sleep with me tonight?"

And that was that. Up until the time I first met Gilbert I had slept in my brother's room with him, holding him close as he snuggled into my chest and I cried when he had finally drifted into sleep. More than anything, Emil was the strong one here. I couldn't go a day without crying silently for our own well-being; and that first night where he curled up next to me and whispered he loved me before falling asleep, I knew I had to do whatever it took to protect my brother from being taken away from me.

Gilbert wasn't that much different in that sense. He was the older of the two brothers by only fourteen months, as I had later found out, and from observation I knew he cared for his brother as much as I did, despite him being a dick toward every new person he met. The way he cared, so ironically, for his loved ones…he reminded me of somebody in that way.

I made no move to tell any of the other orphans about Mathias, or Kya, or Elizabeta. They would ask, such as a young blond girl with a heavy accent to whom Emil had befriended, but I was clear that he would not speak of it. Even I wouldn't speak of it. Yet, I still remember the determined looks in Mathias' eyes where he found me at the shelter; his lips on mine was so terrifying yet so electrifying. His words were what stuck with me the most.

'I'm going to get you out of here no matter what.'

The next day, the day after I last same him, we were moved. I hadn't heard from Mathias since. I was a fool for believing him.

It wasn't long into the early weeks of arriving that our caretaker and the owner of the orphanage had enrolled Emil and me in school. Yes, orphans still had to go to school, and while he was at the primary facility I was at the secondary facility, the high school, although it wasn't so much of a privilege as it was a nightmare.

"We want him to be enrolled in the eleventh grade instead of twelfth," Yekaterina, our caretaker, told the headmaster of the school as I sat slouched in the chair next to her. She was Ukrainian, with large breasts and a tearful gaze, and not once did I see the headmaster remove his eyes from her breasts.

"Well, how old is he right now?"

She faltered. "He's uh..."

"Seventeen," I mumbled from beside her. I was craving a cigarette.

The headmaster nodded, taking a note as he shifted the glasses perched on the bridge of his nose.

"Well, he'll need to start at the grade he left off on. When were you last enrolled in school, Lukas?"

I didn't even know the answer to that question.

"Some three years ago," I answered.

He nodded again. "And when did you stop?"

"April of 2009."

Another nod. "I see. So from where you left off, that would make you a freshman, correct?"

"I guess."

"Well, because you didn't complete the year in its entirety you will have to redo the grade."

He leaned forward. "I don't mean to pry, but why did you drop out, anyhow?"

I scoffed. "I had to take care of my younger brother and education was not the first of my priorities.

"Hmm," he hummed. "Well, we'll be happy to have you here. We just need to you sign some paper work and..."

And that was that. I was a seventeen-year-old freshman in high school and I was humiliated. Emil had never been enrolled in school before, so he was taken to the orphanage daycare instead, which he didn't mind. He would have to start preschool soon anyway. Still, I begged the headmaster to allow me into the twelfth grade.

"Please, sir," I prompted. "Just because I haven't been in school doesn't mean I haven't been keeping up with my own work."

The headmaster sighed. "I'm not the one to decide this."

"Then who the fuck is?!"

Yekaterina, horrified, looked as if she was about to cry as she scolded me in front of the headmaster, cursing me in a fit of Ukrainian profanity before turning back to the headmaster.

"I'm so sorry, sir. Please excuse his language," she said, pulling on my ear like a mother would to her misbehaving child.

The headmaster laughed. "Well, he most certainly does have a strong vocabulary," he joked. He then looked up at me, now serious. "We'll see how he does for the first week here and if he's able to pass, then he can stay in the twelfth grade. If not, we're going to have to move him down a few grade levels to where we think he'll be most comfortable in succeeding."

And that was that. At least the humiliation wouldn't be nearly as brutal as being the eldest student in the beginning stages of high school.

Oh, how naïve I was.

I had proved myself worthy of being in the grade level I was a week after the headmaster had asked me to qualify as such, and I was allowed to stay. That didn't make it any easier, though, and despite holding a solid reputation during the first month of school by hiding away in the shadows, it only got worse as the months went by and the material branched out into things I had never heard of before and could not even grasp. English was the worst of it all.

After vacationing to America several times before Emil was born when my parents were still alive, I had taken a rather adequate understanding of the English language with me. I was fluent, but I understood it well enough to where I could speak it in solid sentences. Or so I thought.

It was during the last week in November when I began to struggle as the teacher began to notice how I generally avoided speaking at all costs.

"And Lot's…" I struggled. "Lot's…"

"Wife."

"And's Lot's wife…of course, was told…"

And that's when I faltered, earning a symphony of snorts and giggles from the other students, who were obviously adept in comprehending the language of Kurt Vonnegut. The teacher sighed, asked another student to read, and then pulled me aside after class.

"Lukas, I don't understand why we've been struggling so much lately. You used to be a fine student."

As if I had suddenly turned into a bad student.

I did not look him in the eye when I spoke. "I'm sorry, sir. I'll try better next time."

"If you want, I can offer you some after school tutoring. The English language isn't the easiest for some students."

That was when I had enough. "What, because you think I'm not a star student anymore?" I spat. "I can read whatever I damn-well want in English and I don't need extra tutoring.

I snatched the book from off of his desk, flipping to the page where we had left off in class. "And Lot's wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people…those people…and…"

I looked up as a wave of sympathy began to roll into my teacher's face, and he looked at me with pleading eyes as a put a hand on my shoulder.

"Lukas, I just want what's best for you. I'd be happy to arrange something if you'd like."

I could only nod in defeat at that, shuffling out of the room and out of the school in a two mile trudge back to the orphanage. I was not met with any support from my roommate as I plopped my stuff onto my bed and turned so I was facing the wall adjacent to him.

"What's the matter, fag-boy?" he snorted, leaning over my motionless body. "I heard you couldn't read today. Is that true, little dude? Couldn't read a simple book because you're illiterate? You're pathetic."

He spit on the back of my shirt and promptly began to walk out of the room before he stopped. "You have a brother, right? What do you think he'll do when he finds out his older bro is trash? He's not gonna look up to you anymore. He's going to think you're as much of a loser as everybody else does."

My blood began to boil with rage at that. Really, I didn't give a shit about what he said about me. But when it came to my brother…that was a line I made sure nobody would ever dare to cross.

"So what if I am?" I spat, continuing to look toward the wall, not moving. There was a river of cracks running down the wall and several small speckles of paint bubbles.

Gilbert stopped where he was. "What did you say?"

This time, I rolled toward him, sitting on the edge of the bed. "What if I told you that yeah, I'm a fag, and yeah, Emil knows, and yeah, he's not a pretentious asshole about it like you. What would your brother say if he found out his older brother is a dick that's like's to make fun of others' sexuality?"

The albino paused first, and then let out a hearty laugh. "My brother hates fags like you just as much as I do."

"I'm not so sure about that. It looks like he pities you, almost, because he knows how pathetic you are."

I had set off a ticking time bomb, and I knew it. Gilbert took a step toward me. There was nothing joking about his eyes anymore- now, their vermillion color looked the same as blood.

"You wanna say that again?" he growled, he breath hot on my face. He looked like he wanted to kill. "You wanna say that again, you fucking fag?"

So I did. "You're just as pathetic as I am."

I'm not sure who threw the first punch, but the minutes following consisted of screaming and punching and hair pulling and blood, blood everywhere. It didn't take long before a crowd had formed and I was on top of Gilbert, pinning him to the floor until I had make his entire face look the same as his eyes.

"Don't you ever, ever, insult Mathias," I screamed, my bloody fist meeting with his even bloodier face.

Shockingly, he was able to speak through punches. "So the little fag has a little fag boyfriend, too?"

Those were the words that he knocked him unconscious, children chanting for the fight to go on by the time Yekaterina had run into the room and shrieked when she saw the scene and the condition of the other boy on the floor. I couldn't be stopped at this point, continuing to throw kick and scream even after she and two other boys had pulled me off of Gilbert, a mixture of tears and warm blood sticking to me face and I struggled to break free.

"Let me go! Let me go," I screamed. "He's a prick, he's a monster!"

"Get ahold of yourself, Lukas," Yekaterina cried, getting the two other boys, Vash and Sadik, to pin me down to the floor as Ludwig rushed to his brother's side. She ordered the crowd to go, telling them to go back to whatever they were doing before, and with a few disappointed groans they did. "What is this all about, Lukas?"

"He called—he called me—"

"Lukey?"

And then came the horror. Emil was standing in the doorway, looking from me then to Gilbert then to Yekaterina then back to me. Mr. Puffin was dangling from his left hand. "Why is Ms. Yeka yelling at you?"

He took another look at Gilbert, noticing how the blood on his face coincided with the blood that stained my knuckles, and when he made the connection he began to wail. "No, Lukey! We don't hurt other people," he cried. He was visibly shaking. "That's bad! You said hurting people is bad!"

"Emil—!"

"You're mean, brother! I hate you! I hate you!"

With that, he ran back to his own room as Yekaterina went after him, and as I tried to struggle free Vash and Sadik held me down and refused to look go until I felt like I was drowning in the blood rushing to my head. Emil, my own brother, the one I vowed to protect, had told me he hated me. I had almost killed a kid and my brother hated me for it. My brother hated me.

I threw up for five minutes straight before I had nothing left to vomit, followed by my mind blacking out.

Did I mention that I got a job? I got a job.

It was the only job in Drammen that was hiring and I figured that working at an aquarium store after school every day was much better than going back to the orphanage immediately only to be place in solitary confinement until the next morning.

After the standoff with Gilbert, we were both rushed to a hospital about twenty miles away. I got away with a fractured rib and a few wounds on my face that would not take long to heal, yet Gilbert was in far worse condition. It turned out that I had, literally, almost killed him as he was admitted to an overnight stay in the hospital for two weeks so he could heal. He ended up with a broken nose, a broken arm, four fractured ribs, and a face almost unidentifiable from the swelling. I never knew so much power brought into a simple fight could almost make me a murderer.

The school found out about the fight, and although it wasn't on school grounds, they were still obligated to put me into counselling.

"Mr. Bondevik, I wanted to talk to you about something that might help with this," the school guidance counselor, Mr. Honda, told me one day as I sat in his office during my lunch break. He was a small man in his late forties with a very think Japanese accent that made it difficult to understand him at times. Apparently, before moving to Norway, he was considered one of the top psychologists in Japan. It didn't make sense to me why he was working as a guidance counselor in a high school instead of doing something more professional.

"I don't need help, Mr. Honda."

"Mr. Bondevik, your teachers and I have both noticed that you've been struggling with your schoolwork since the start of last month. We don't think you can handle it."

"I can handle it fine, sir," I spat.

He was unfazed by this. "You may think that, but I don't think you can." He took a sip of his tea. "It's okay to admit you can't do something, Lukas. Your caretaker had informed me of your situation and I think that's part of the reason why you're struggling so much. I'm not in any way against you continuing this year and graduating, but I also highly recommend we move you to some lower level classes so you can comprehend all the stuff you missed when you weren't in school."

I huffed. Was this guy being serious?

Mr. Honda stirred his tea for a bit before continuing. "If it isn't too personal, if you don't mind me asking, who is the young man that is provoking this?"

That was unexpected.

"Huh?"

"Ms. Braginskaya mentioned a young man to me that you happened to bring up as you were fighting another student. His name is Mathias?"

Where had that come from?

"Sir, he has nothing to do with this."

"It seems like you must care about him a lot for you to nearly kill another young adult like yourself for saying something negative about him."

I felt my cheeks growing hot. It baffled me how he could catch on so quickly after nobody else had; after having only known him for a few months.

He continued. "Don't worry, I have nothing against who you love and who you don't. But if you're comfortable talking about it, I'd like to know why you punched Mr. Beilschmidt in the first place.

"I—" I didn't know how to start. "This isn't—this has nothing to do with Mathias. More than anything it, uh, it has to do with my brother."

He nodded. "Ah, Ms. Braginskaya did mention you have a younger brother. She says you two are attached at the hip."

My throat began to grow tight. "Yeah…we've been with each other since he was born."

"Is there something wrong? You seem to be growing a little tense."

"No, I—"

Suddenly, a mess of tears began to stream down my face in warm layers, and I told the guidance counselor whom I had only known for a few months everything that had happened in the past three years- from my parents dying, to our house burning down, to the entire affair with Mathias, to us living in a shelter with Toris and Feliks, and then finally to the events that had happened only recently in which I had nearly killed Gilbert and my brother told me he hated me.

As I finished, I had gone through three separate tissues and Mr. Honda had already finished his tea and was pouring another has he continued to keep his focus on me.

"Lukas," he started. "I had no idea that happened. I'm very sorry."

I had no response. I continued to sob into my hands. This was so embarrassing, crying in front of somebody I barely knew. I couldn't say it was the first time, though.

The man took a long sip of tea before exhaling and looking at me for an even longer moment. "You know, in my twenty-five years of working as a guidance counselor I've never heard a story quite like yours." He moved to pull something from out of the drawer attached to his desk. "If it means something, I think I might have something that will help. There's a job opening at a local aquarium just a few miles from here. I've heard from other students that working with animals is a great way for them to break away from all of them problems for a few hours. I think it might help you."

And that's how I got working at an aquarium gift shop every other day after school and on the weekends. In Mr. Honda's defense, it was quite a relaxing job after all. In the afternoons, I was surrounded by nothing by nothing but a big open space of blue and water that I knew could not drown me, and on the weekends parents would bring their children to look at the fish. Seeing their smiling faces as the gaped at a whale shark smiling back at them was certainly a sight to see. I reminded myself to take Emil there someday.

Life went on as usual, though, and handing souvenirs to children and young couples on a first date had turned into a normal routine for me. I liked it, and as Mr. Honda had promised, it slowly started to calm my mind down.

What I wasn't prepared for was the unexpected consequences of working in a popular attraction.

Before I knew it, on a mellow Sunday afternoon Berwald Oxenstierna was standing right in front of me.

A/N: I honestly had no intention of making Prussia/Gilbert this douchey, but know that it doesn't make me love him any less. …But let's be honest, he can be a true dick at times.

This chapter may be over 5k but it's hella rushed so I apologize for that. I was in a bit of a hurry to get it done. It's also worth noting that I'm going to go back and edit the earlier chapters, because your writing changes quite a lot after three years, so if there's ever an update notification in the next few days, that's why. And yes, that is Slaughterhouse Five that Lukas is reading. It's one of my favorite books of all time.

The next installment should be out whenever I'm not obsessing over Eternal Summer and when I finish summer school. If you want to check out the audio post I made after writing this, you can find it on my Tumblr: arminspants (I can't post the link so yeah that's my url). Thanks again, you nuggets.