Don't Mess with the British Empire

It was during the Imperial century when England had begun to learn many things about himself. It wasn't anything to do with his own country but merely his own self, who he was as a person, what he wanted to be, and what he wanted to gain. After the victory over Napoleon England was left with no serious international rival, of course Russia had always been considered some sort of threat to him, but on the sea, England was unchallenged. England had been standing tall on the steamship that powered onwards across the choppy seas that lay endlessly before him, his seas that he had policed with his supreme power.

Ten million square miles of territory making the British Empire the largest by far, it made him feel big, unstoppable, and invincible. England had found himself grinning and scowling out at the vast seas around him each time he had set sail on a voyage out into the seas he had claimed as his own.

A bittersweet smile of power and yet an overbearing loss that consumed his heart during the years of his splendid isolation. During this period of time England was separated from Europe as they made pacts between each other, England stayed separated from them holding their own without the influence of Europe. Never did the Emperor Island appear so magnificently grand, he stood by himself, and there was a peculiar splendour in the loneliness of his glory*. He didn't need the company of his fellow Europeans; he had the open seas and was in control of the economies of many countries, China included, and seeing his various colonies was company enough. He didn't need Europe.

That was what England felt through a lot of time during this period of Pax Britannica, that he needed no one and that he was all he ever wanted to be. Denying the feelings and thoughts that circled within his own mind, he was a pirate of the seas daring and brave. Exploring and controlling with his superior Navy, it made him the most powerful on the seas, contested by no one. We stood here alone on what is called our isolation – our splendid isolation, as one of our colonial friends was good enough to call it*. It truly was a splendid isolation, no interacting with the Europe nations and no interference, England stood taller than the rest of them for he didn't need Europe in order to be the most powerful.

His isolation was the main thing that helped him reach his desperate and bitter realisations. So much time alone to think for himself, think over everything he had fought through and fought for. It was during this time that he realised how desperately lonely he was. He no longer had any friends, no one to run to, he was alone just like his small island had always been. The other nations despised him because of his power, bitter relationships as he stormed across the world taking everything possible, unwilling to admit a small island like him had beaten them. He knew most of his colonies showed bitterness towards him, except maybe Australia, England truly believed he couldn't be bitter about anything. Still, Arthur's loneliness couldn't be settled by thoughts alone.

However, during this time after the Napoleonic wars had finally been won, the most terrible and painful discovery England had made his heart hurt with ever thought. It made his knees tremble with ever memory, and his heart pound with the bitter truth of it all. America was a free country, vast and strong, on his way to becoming a super power, his people advancing and becoming stronger in themselves, and they were working their way up. All with America leading their way. England thought he should be proud, he had raised the young nation and helped him grow into a man, helped to shape and mould his mind any parent or older rother would be proud, right?

Arthur however, found he could not be, he could barely think upon the man he had now become. The powerhouse he was rising into, he would always remember how warm he felt when Alfred welcomed him home, those sunny smiles he gave to him, the ones that made his heart melt. England got to watch him change from that beautiful child to a heartbreakingly handsome man, and then he left him. As callous and cold as being stabbed in the back by your best friend, he just left, leaving him feeling cold and bitter. He just couldn't understand why and how he could have done such a thing, why did he have to spring free from him? It was during this time alone that England ordered his feelings, he figured out that what he was feeling was no longer bitterness form him leaving.

He no longer saw Alfred as the child he had once met. No longer viewing him as an innocent little boy who didn't know his own strength he wasn't that little ray of light he used to see. This love had grown, and Arthur realised after Alfred left him that his feelings ha changed, that he loved America in the way a wife loves there husband and it had emerged without England ever noticing it, it had built up inside him without warning. Then it hit him like a tonne of bricks, this small realisation that he was hopelessly in love with America, with Alfred F. Jones and there wasn't anything he could do about it.

It was in 1900 when Arthur felt a change in the air, something big was coming, something destructive, and it would bring him inexplicably closer to the man he had grown to love.