Breathing For 2! (A Hetalia Fanfic)

A Note from the Writer

A Note from the Writer

Well, today I am sitting here in the library, meant to be studying but I think I am going to pass an hour or two by writing this up.

Where do I begin? Firstly, I think I will discuss the general stuff about this story.

'Breathing For 2!' was about 3 years in the making, believe it or not. I remember sitting on my grandmother's bed on the last week of November, 2013 writing up the first couple of chapters. I am pretty sure I wrote "Life Goes On" and "That Horrific Day" that night, despite hardly even starting writing 'We Are 1!'. I knew from the beginning of writing 'We Are 1!' it was going to have a sequel and I knew that Taishya was going to be pregnant.

I think Taishya's pregnancy was the worst kept secret ever. Initially, I was aiming it to be a huge surprise but I just could not have written a sequel without the reader knowing about Taishya's pregnancy. If we look at 'We Are 1' there was a small hint about Taishya having more to do with the countries than she wanted when that lady in China pretty much tells her that.

I think Taishya's pregnancy was a bit of a risk in writing this fanfiction. The Hetalia fandom has quite an established lot of unsaid rules and one of those conceptions is that countries are infertile and can't breed. Evidently, I broke this rule. I decided to mallow it down a little so that countries could breed but it was extremely hard to successfully reproduce.

Whilst on the topic of other established unsaid rule is that there is a common theme in the Hetalia fandom that countries are all unsung heroes; they are all like Clark Kent's. The public cannot know about them or else all hell breaks loose! I broke that rule immensely and that was my proudest moment, I think, writing this story. The fact that I wrote about the countries being "discovered" was a spare of the moment decision. I had never planned on them being known to the public. When I was writing the "discovery" chapter, it was a spare of the moment idea to write about the media storming in. I was like, "Damn! I have to include that!" It defiantly added a whole new dynamic to the story.

Another thing that you may or may not have picked up on is just how planned Taishya giving birth to twins was. It seemed like such a "spare of the moment" decision when in actual fact, it was not at all. It was hinted within a few chapters and I am so keen to point this out. It has been on my mind for weeks...

So to begin with, there is a reference I think in one of the "catacomb chapters" where Selena mentions a fairy tale. Actually, I think it is Selena's titular chapter, "Wisdom from the Celestial Body" where she states to Taishya, "When I first saw you, I thought of Sun, Moon and Talia. It is funny how repetitive history is, isn't it? It shows just how circular history is rather than history being linear."

I have two favourite fairy tales, I really love The Fisherman and His Wife by Brother Grimm about the fisherman and his wife being greedy and continuously harassing a poor fish to make them rich and powerful. It's great. My dad is a fisherman so I was always hoping he would find a fish like the fish in the story, when I was little. I am getting off topic. This is irrelevant.

My other favourite fairy tale is Sleeping Beauty. It was never really my favourite fairy tale when I was younger, but as I have grown older, I have learnt to appreciate it more. There is something about it that is so eloquent more so than perhaps Cinderella and Snow-White. It is a darker story, a fairy tale that is more "3D" than "2D". It has a happily ever after but it also has consequences; yes, the princess is rescued but a century has passed? What is there for her to really live for when her whole life she knew is gone?

Sleeping Beauty was based off an even darker story titled, "Sun Moon and Talia". It is almost the same, plot wise in regards to how Sleeping Beauty got in her predicament but has more of a continuation. I shall quote Wikipedia for this next bit of information;