I don't own Hetalia.

Alfred pressed his face against the window of the bus, his little brother asleep in the seat next to him. The chatter on the bus varied in language and tempo, but he couldn't focus on anything but a sign of life outside the window. The pair of them had met up with the group of kids in New York City. Only two of them actually appeared to be their age, but when they tried to approach them the angry looking one sent them away with a curse in some sort of foreign language.

During the trip the pair of them had seen more of the northern United States, mostly trees, than Matt had ever planned on. "Well, I guess you should work on charming them all now," Matt said when the bus had stopped for a quick break. "After all, they're going to be voting for you in in a few decades."

" That's what I've been trying to do. I mean it's been such an opportunity to make my face known in the area. I even sold my autograph to this old lady telling her I was going to be famous one day and was really doing her a favor in the long run." His excited mood seemed to turn sour. "But, I screwed over any chance I'll ever have of being President."

"Not really, I'd vote for you."

Alfred rolled his eyes over his cup. "That's reassuring, I'd have one vote."

"Mom would vote for you."

"I don't think the dead can vote Matt."

His brother shook his head. "Oh well. I still think you'd have a chance."

"Have a chance," he whispered to himself on the bus. God what he'd do for a chance. All he had ever wanted to do was be President of the United States of America. He knew everything about the country that he could get his hands on. He could list every state, every capital, every senator, and every president. But, what chance did he honestly have anymore? The thought brought a gloomy expression to his face.

Some excited shouts broke him out of his melancholic stupor. Through the window he saw the first sign of life, a glint of metal gate. He shook his brother excitedly. "Matt, I think we're here."

The other boy looked up at his brother in a quiet daze. After adjusting his glasses he noticed what everyone was looking at. Through the bars of the gate you could see little glimpses of a stone building. Some weird almost excited feeling welled up between the two brothers, a feeling almost foreign over the past few months.

The bus became eerily silent as everyone stared at the building. It was small, barely big enough to be called a school. The dorms themselves seemed to take up more space than anything else and they could see a few figures mulling around outside. There was a very tall student looming over a much smaller boy whom he held very protectively. Another pair were next to them one talking animatedly, while the other was barely restraining himself from strangely the loud boy.

Suddenly, the bus stopped. Everyone looked around quietly no one quite willing to make the first move into this new world. After scanning the bus for a moment, Alfred stood up and cleared his throat. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I'm tired of sitting on this bus."

A perky auburn much shorter than him jumped up. "Si. Fratello I'm tired of this bus. Do you think school will have pasta? I am very hungry."

"Shut up," the 'fratello' in question pushed the boy back down.

Alfred grabbed his carry on and with a nod to his brother; they both left the bus. A man stood on the steps with a sign. New kids to the auditorium; returning students to the cafeteria.

The auditorium was far too grandiose for such a small school and soon the twins were lost among the crowd.

After fifteen minutes of arrivals, the doors to the auditorium slammed shut. Without a sound everyone's eyes affixed on the stage. "Good day," the headmaster said.

Without waiting he hurried along with his speech. "You are here, but you already know that. You are societies outcasts and for one reason or another have ended up here. You all have different reasons for being here, but regardless to say it's because no one wants you."

Some of the kids looked angry, but the man simply laughed. "Of course, no one wants to believe that. But look around, no once's exactly normal here."

He pointed at a large boy near the back. "Your name?"

The boy beside him stood up. "Mein bruder doesn't speak."

"Ah yes, the German brothers."

The boy seemed to take offense to that. "Hey I am Prussian, and you would do well to mind my awesomeness because one day you will all be bowing to me and my awesome five..."

His brother slammed him back down into his seat.

"You can leave right now if you want Mr. Beilschmidt but since you have no prospects I'd suggest you stay."

The boy's red eyes narrowed as he glowered at the man. He simply used the encounter as a segue to the next topic. "Speaking of siblings, I understand many of you would wish to stay with said siblings instead of complete strangers. This desire will be ignored. We want to encourage you to exchange words with other students specifically in English. However, we did take care when placing people in a room with each other. You are either geographically close or speak the same language. In the rare cases that neither of these were possible you were placed in the room by similar interests. You may not under any circumstance trade this roommate."

"After you have been here for a year, we will let you choose a roommate. And we will have no power to deny a roommate if both students want to live together. However, you must room with someone of your own gender. You can still date them if you're into that, just as long as someone doesn't get pregnant, we don't care. But if you decide halfway through the year that you hate each other, too bad you're stuck until the year is out."

He tapped the microphone to stop the murmuring throughout the crowd. "Refreshments are in the hallway where you will also get your room assignments and class schedules. After thirty minutes you will be taken on a tour of the school and dropped off in your respective first period class. Your teachers will take it from there."

Without another word he walked off stage leaving a stunned student body in his wake. After about five minutes people gradually started mulling out of the room lead by a pair of Italians who were too hungry to stay still any longer.

"Fratello! Isn't this exciting? Look they have pasta snacks!" He only received a glare from his older brother, but he shrugged before grabbing an entire plateful of breaded ravioli. "I'm going to go get our schedules Fratello!"

As soon as he left, the elder boy sighed. Then, he spotted something absolutely delicious. One of the tables had a make your own kebab station with an seemingly unlimited amount of tomatoes. It was just three steps away. One. Two...

"Hola, me llamo Antonio."He glared at the sudden intrusion."Te gustan tomates," the intruder said it as more of a statement than a question. The glare intensified and the Italian flipped the bird as he walked away with his stash of tomatoes. Finally, he had shut him... "Adios, bello."

The Italian's face reddened as deeply as the tomatoes he was eating. He narrowly missed running into some tall boy in his hurry to escape.

Roderich watched as a smaller boy hurried past him. Normally he would have apologized for getting in the way, but today there was another serious matter to take care of, because that could not be his ex-girlfriend behind him could it?

Just when he thought he could have a fresh start...and then he ran into the other person he had been avoiding. "Oh, Gilbert...what a pleasure."

The albino turned and smiled. "Roddy? I had no clue you were going to school in America!"

Roderich stuck out his hand politely for the boy to shake. Gilbert merely left it hang as he jabbered on. "Of course, it's hard to slip something by the awesome me! You should meet mein bruder Ludwig. You're both stuck up."

An extremely tall and buff boy shook his hand with a grip that made his hand rather sore.

"My stick in the mud of a bruder doesn't speak anymore. But he's still more awesome than you, because we have Prussian blood."

"Well," Roderich said. "At least I dressed up for the occasion, you look like you crawled out of a gutter."

Gilbert rolled his eyes. "Whatever, at least I'm not pretending to be a suit!"

"I'm still taller than you though."

"Whatever I'm still the most awesome, cheapskate!"

Before Roderich could respond he realized that the one person he had been avoiding had in fact caught up to him. Gilbert stopped mid-rant and looked at the new guest curiously. "So Roddy, who is this?"

He turned to the girl behind him who...what was she wearing?

Her hair was no longer long, it was now short and choppy barely sticking out from under her baseball cap instead of her usual flower. She wore a pair of ripped jeans and a hoodie that was several sizes to big for her. If it wasn't for the fact she was rather tall for a girl and had never been the most 'endowed', her attire would have been comical. However, as it was she made a almost attractive boy. Noticing Roderich's confused gaze, she took initiative.

"I'm Eli. Roderich and I used to date. He never told you about me?"

Gilbert looked confused. "No he never mentioned a boyfriend."

She made a puzzled face. "You don't look confused."

"Well, I always knew Roddy was gay. I was the first person he told after all. But he never mentioned a boyfriend."

All Roderich wanted to do was escape. The blonde who has been introduced as Ludwig looked somewhat sorry for the awkward situation but made no move to take his older brother away. The brunette began to pray for a way to escape the situation that was growing worse every second.

His prayer came to him in the form of a small Italian and an angry Swiss boy.

"Ve! I'm sorry I only said your sister was pretty!"

"Get back here and face me and my shotgun like a man."

"Don't shoot. I'm a virgin I won't be any fun to shoot."

"Let me shoot you first and find out."

"I have relatives in your country though; it's quite pretty!"

The Italian was proving to be too fast for the Swiss boy though; however he was running with his eyes closed and finally ran into something. That something being the stocky German boy who was politely listening to his brother's Austrian friend in order to avoid said brother.

"I'm so sorry! I didn't meant to...are you German? Ve, German's are scary! This German lady ran into me at the beach once and then she yelled at me and my fratello..."

Ludwig merely looked confused at the rambling boy and made no move to push him away. The other boy stood slightly away from the Italian and continued to yell at him, but refused to move closer.

"Roderich."

The small blonde boy looked at the boy speaking curiously. "What?"

"I'm Roderich. Might I know your name for when I have to report you for threatening to kill another student?"

"I don't have time a useless Austrian like you."

"Ah you are Swiss aren't you?" The boy merely glared.

"Is this your sister?" Without even a thought for the much smaller boys privacy, he leaned over and plucked it out of his hands. It was obviously from the boy's last birthday party. He was almost smiling and a girl who looked almost identical to him. "Well Vash," he said reading the name on the cake. "Your little sister is rather adorable, and I do like blondes, but I'm afraid the birthday boy is more my type."

"Do you want beat up?" the boy asked his cheeks now extremely red.

Roderich shrugged and handed the picture back. Then he used the distraction to escape for a while. Social situations just required too much energy, maybe there was a piano around here...

"Excuse me, could you repeat that without the half-masticated cow in your mouth?"

Alfred swallowed and looked at the guy in front of him. "Dude, who talks like that?"

"I do, 'dude'. Now will you please repeat what you said earlier."

"Name's Alfred, and you look lost little dude."

The English boy looked offended. "Little? I'll be fifteen in a week."

Alfred looked surprised. "Really dude, my bro and I just turned fourteen in July! You're pretty short though. Like what are you 5'5"?"

"I am a perfectly average height!"

"Whatever, I'm 8 inches taller than you. Maybe you British people are just short."

"Just so you know my older brothers are very tall. The eldest is even taller than you!"

Alfred laughed. "So then, you're the family shrimp?"

"No! I...why do I even talk to you?"

The American shrugged. "I don't know. You just came up to me while I was eating these burgers." He poked one of the ones left on his plate. "Dude! Now they're cold!"

"Oh please like that even matters, they're disgusting anyway."

"Hey dude, there are a few things you just don't insult. Number one is my brother. Number two my country. Number three video games. Number four my burgers. You got it?"

"Oh sod it you git!" the boy said walking off in a huff hoping to never see the bloody American boy again running directly into a boy who looked remarkably like the one he was running away from.

"Be careful mon cher, you are much to delicate to have people slamming into you like that. Are you okay?"

Matt looked up confusedly. "What?"

Standing there in front of him was a junior with silky blonde hair and kind blue eyes. "Mon cher, are you injured? That other boy hit you quite hard."

"No, no I'm fine."

"You are the student from Canada, non?"

"Yes, well technically I have dual citizenship with America."

The older boy smiled good-naturedly. "Bonjour, I'm your roommate Francis. May I inquire your name mon cher?"

"Matthew Williams, I didn't think they'd give me a roommate who wasn't a freshman."

"I asked for you specifically."

"Really? I...most people prefer my older brother. Where is he?"

"Well, I charmed one of the secretaries into telling me about the new students. She went on about how there was a Canadian boy who was going to have to room by himself. So I volunteered to make you my roommate."

"That's nice I guess." Where was Alfred?

Francis went on. "It's my goal to make you comfortable in your own skin. And you do have such nice skin, mon cher."

"Well..thank you, but honestly I don't think I'm all that special."

"Are you being serious, mon cher?"

"No one ever sees me. They always notice Alfred. These two people by the food just stared past me when I asked them a question."

Francis looked curious. "Who?"

"The two by the desserts."

"Oh, mon cher, they're Yao and Ivan they don't know much English. They probably didn't understand you. What did you want to know?"

Matt blushed. "I just wanted to know if they had any maple syrup."

Francis chuckled. "Let us see if we can find you some."

The headmaster chuckled over his glass. This was going to be the most interesting year yet and he absolutely couldn't wait for it to begin.

So yes this is a lot to take in. Each chapter from now on will narrated in one person's point of view.

If you can't tell the ships will be USUK, Franada, RoChu, SwissAus, Gerita, and Spamano. Prussia and Hungary are only there to further the story.

Also yes, Germany is a mute but we all know Italy will eventually get him talking.

If you have a tumblr account, you can go an check out the American Hetalia Academy page to learn about the back story of each of the characters, ask questions, or learn new things about them.