Fallen Bridges {Hetalia fanfic}

Prologue

So this was death?
He was gazing up at a glorious rainbow of shattered light, spiraling away from the cruelty of reality. Dull pain throbbed across his body, but it was nothing anymore; as the burnt umber sky opened up for him, a rare smile graced his features. Somebody was calling, screaming...
silence.
The silence was calling his name.
And then the tunnel, and the light, and the stench of gasoline in the heat burning his throat. He was being torn away from the light; reaching desperately as he was dragged back through the tunnel. Images and shadows played out a disturbing the dance across the black walls, nameless- and yet familiar- faces glaring out at him...
And so this was how it felt? Death and life; to balance between the two?

Li Xaoi Wang opened his eyes.

He didn't know who he was, he didn't recognise the white walls. A sharp smell, a clean smell, assaulted his senses, but he couldn't place a name to it. A man dozed beside his bed-

(It was a man, right?)

-all unwashed long hair and dark eyes, face turned down in a frown even as he slept. Li-Xaoi couldn't move, couldn't open his mouth: the concept of words failed him. Noises weren't linked to their sources, smells had no name, he had no name... Nothing made any sense, and the only thing he knew for certain was that he was drifting away from everything he knew. Lost, cold, alone...

As the heart monitor sped up, he burst into tears.