Hallo, all! Here's my new multi-chapter fic dealing with all the terrifying, pathetic, and vaguely entertaining things that happens when England doesn't get his tea. England will progressively get more and more OOC because, well, he goes through tea withdrawal. And his pain amuses me.
*A Very Special Announcement from the Government* Kids, remember: Tea is a drug, a terrible, terrible drug, and unless you want to end up like poor England, then don't drink it! Especially with the white, powdery drug known on the street as "sugar."
Rated T for England's mouth and mild France. Hah, what an oxymoron! "Mild France." Pffff!
Oh, and it should be clear from the context, but this takes during Hetalia's depiction of World War II. Great Britain's going through some crazy-restrictive rationing during this time period, including tea. Two ounces a week of loose-leaf tea! And the U.K. doesn't start using the metric system until about the 70s, which is why nothing is in grams.
It was early morning in England's country house. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, the birds were singing, the flying mint bunny was peacefully playing with yarn balls tugged out of England's knitting basket, and the sound of muffled expletives long preceded England's appearance in the kitchen.
If one listened closely, the words 'sodding Luftwaffe,' 'American git,' and 'bloody frog' could occasionally be distinguished, but overall the hoarse, drowsy voice was comprised more of incoherent mumbling than anything else. One got the impression that the profanity was more a sleepy, comforting litany than of any actual obscene meaning.
England trudged into the kitchen, tattered slippers on his feet and an old dressing gown wrapped around his shoulders. Eyes still mostly shut, he mechanically set a kettle on the stove and got out a china teacup and saucer. It was as ancient and sacred a ritual as any druidic ceremony, and England could do it in his sleep. This was only to the good, since he wasn't exactly awake right at that moment.
As the water heated, he leaned against the counter and stared vacantly out at the dawn, only stirring again when the kettle whistled cheerfully, startling him into slight wakefulness. After moving the kettle to a cool burner, he paused a moment in thought. Somewhere in his mind a small cog spun uselessly a moment before interlocking with another gear, and he reached over to turn off the gas before another one of his little Incidents happened.
Popping the lid off the tea-tin with a practiced twist, he reached inside to grab a few dried leaves, and, crumbling them, dropped them in the teacup. Picking up the kettle, he poured the water in as well, then added milk and stirred gently. After a minute to let it cool, he sipped gently, letting the cool, slightly bitter, delicious liquid roll—
He paused. Something was not right. He took another sip of the tea and tasted, if he had to pick a few words, watery milk.
Huh.
It took a while for his still half-asleep mind to try to reason this out. Why did he taste watery milk when he had clearly just made tea?
He looked down at his cup to see…not tea.
He blinked again in slow incomprehension, and turned to his tea-tin. When he peered inside, he was met with his own bemused reflection in the bottom of the tin, and not, as he expected, a large mound of dried tea leaves.
Consciousness gradually bobbing to the surface, he frowned and plodded downstairs to where he kept his bulk stores of tea. Greeted by the comforting smell that only comes from storing large quantities of tea in the same room for centuries, he relaxed a bit and opened the nearest chest.
No tea.
He checked the next.
No tea.
He checked the next, and the next, and the next, and the next…
No tea.
And England was suddenly very awake indeed.
~o0O0o~
It wasn't until twenty minutes later, once Minty had managed to convince him to get down from the branches of the old oak in the garden (old habits die hard) that he began thinking coherently again.
Although England knew blood ran through his veins—how could he not, when every night the Luftwaffe came a-calling showed him more of it?—he was nonetheless convinced his heart pumped tea. It was no extraordinary thing to him, no thing of wonder or magic; it was just the calm truth. His body, his mind, his empire ran on it, every gear and wheel turning with its astringent lubrication.
In earlier centuries it might have been woad dye or salt sea or his Navy's rum or any number of liquids, but it was tea now and had been for years. He could ignore injuries and limited food supplies without too much trouble—he had plenty of experience with such things, after so many centuries of warfare—but this? This was too much.
Ferociously petting the flying mint bunny on his lap as if doing so could make tea appear out of empty air, England shook himself out of such depressing thoughts. No, it's not too much. Even if it's important to my nation, it's little more than a habit to me personally. I can deal with this.
His people were rationing and fighting on like the stalwart Britons they were, and he decided he would just have to make sacrifices as well. Besides, the tea isn't an addiction, no matter what America blathers on about. No, it's just a habit, practically a hobby, really, and I just needed to slowly, carefully wean myself off the stuff so if I actually run out I won't need it any more. Ahah, not that I 'need' it now, of course; that was simply a slip of the tongue. Or thought. You can have those, right? At any rate, I'll be fine; it's not as if I drink all that much tea anyway. Just a cup every morning or so.
England nodded resolutely to himself and went to fetch his ration book. He needed to go to the market and buy some definitely-not-essential tea leaves. The ration for the average man was two ounces of tea a week, wasn't it? He did some mental calculations. Two ounces, that's what, ten cups or if I stretch it? Divide by seven days per week, carry the…that's about one and a half cups a day. I can do that. He swallowed dryly. I can do that.
Precious ration book in one hand, obligatory umbrella in the other, England went to the shops.
~o0O0o~
Tea rationing was now in effect at England's home, and he needed to stick to it if he was to have enough to last through the week. His resolve was firm, his will iron, his determination as hard, as, well, a very hard thing. This made it all the more surprising when the very next evening he was yet again faced with the horrifying sight of an empty tea-tin. He stared uncomprehendingly at this for a moment before his eyes drifted to his empty tea cup on the counter and a terrible realization dawned.
Unless someone was somehow stealing the tea right out his cupboard (which was a little paranoid, but you never knew in wartime), then in the space of one day he had, without realizing it, drank his entire week's supply of tea.
Which meant he had nothing for the rest of the week.
Oh bloody hell.
~o0O0o~
In all his years as a man and a nation, there was perhaps only one time England had ever truly, deeply fallen in love. It had been at first sip in the 1600s—when Netherlands had sold him a bag of interesting-smelling dried leaves—and he had never left his teacup's side since. Alcohol in all its permutations had been a mainstay of his diet since his people first accidentally let some produce rot and then were foolish—or brilliant—enough to drink it, but on that wonderful day three centuries ago, staring into the strange ceramic cup, he knew he had met his soul mate.
These days it was practically his religion; what else could you call such daily rituals of china and pastries? He had known many rituals and religions in his millennia of life, and in his opinion the cult of tea was undoubtedly one of his more genial, delicious, and peaceful ones. Rather than splinter his people into sects, teatime somehow managed to unite his country under the imperative common to all mankind to stop working whenever possible, with the added benefit of a delightful afternoon snack. It also had the benefit that it was surprisingly difficult to declare religious war under the soothing influence of a good cuppa and a biscuit, and he knew from rueful experience that virgin's blood took far more work to get out of white robes than tea stains did out of sweater vests.
On more than one occasion he and other like-minded individuals had passionately and eloquently argued that if they were to add Wales's red dragon on top the rest of the Union Jack, they might as well go the whole nine yards and have it holding a pint in one paw and a teacup in the other. United under this cause, England and his colleagues would make plans to storm Parliament and demand tea be put in its rightful place at the King's right hand and a declaration of a national holiday in its honor. Yet despite wild and unanimous support these ideas never really got off the ground since it was usually at this point that the pub closed.
At any rate, three hundred years of constant companionship could do strange things to a country, he knew, once that support was suddenly torn away. Just look at what happened when Germany stopped France's shipments of hair products. He knew full well what he was doing to France with that, and he did it anyway, the bastard. Pity and sympathy was not an emotion England often felt in association with France, but that was one of the few times. England did not know what would correspondingly happen to him without his daily cup of tea, and wartime was not exactly the best time to reveal new weaknesses for his enemies to exploit.
It was a matter of military necessity, then: he needed to get some more tea. Surely there are some other ways to get it than the weekly ration? Some way to augment my supply?
So he traded with neighbors, in return for their tea rations buying their children milk…and meat, and butter, and biscuits, and eggs, and fruit, and sweets, and cheese, and clothing…As his stomach rumbled for the nth time that day, he reasoned that as a nigh-immortal national personification it wasn't as if he needed food. Not like I nee- er, want tea. And the happiness on their little faces was reward enough, really, and the relief in their parent's eyes. The tea had nothing to do with it, truly. Nothing at all. And if someone was silly enough to be fooled into thinking so by the way he nearly ran home to have a cup or five after these transactions, well then, they were just being ridiculous.
Yet before his long his ration book for each week began to look as empty as his tea-tin, and he turned to the black market. Is it illegal if the laws you're breaking are a part of you? he mused as he did so, barely feeling guilty at all at this point. In those dark corners and glancing eyes he couldn't help but be reminded of his old days as a criminal and pirate, and those who he dealt with couldn't help but be unnerved by the fresh-faced young man who demanded tea with an inexplicably nostalgic smile.
England managed well enough for a while, but he would not call this new development in his life comfortable by any means. The nerve-wracking nature of subsistence tea-drinking reminded him uncomfortably of the old days, when he lived only on hand-to-mouth hunting and gathering.
During meetings with his Prime Minister, instead of listening to how he as a nation was to survive the onslaught of the Axis he found himself staring at the man's steaming teacup, his thoughts not dutifully on looking under the figurative couch cushions for extra change but rather on how to best distract his boss and steal the liquid gold he so casually held before him.
Over paperwork in the evenings, instead of placing defenses and plotting troop movements, he unconsciously focused on the second hand ticking on his watch. Slowly, so slowly it ticked around and around, and England's knee juddered up and down, fingers tapping impatiently on the table, eyes darting from the kitchen door to the clock face and back as he waited until the time he would allow himself to have a tiny spoonful of tea.
It's all rather pathetic, England reflected. Here I am, practically ready to whore myself out for a cuppa. Actually…he paused to consider that idea, before quickly shaking it away. It was absolutely immoral and contemptible that he was even considering it, not to say disgusting. Besides, it wasn't as if anyone had any tea to pay him in anyway.
Even with all his trading, illegal acts against his own government, and surreptitious calling-in of favors, his tea was running low. Living hand-to-teacup-to-mouth was not enough, it seemed.
What other options have I? Well…there's always them. My dear, darling allies. Why do I have the feeling this is going to go wrong?
Little did he know it would not even be nearly as easy as he thought.
It's Hetalia, of course it'll go wrong! Who do you think he'll go to first?
I like how some of his paranoia is already starting to show ^^
And no, I won't tell you what happened with France and the hair product famine.
Yet. We'll see.