Title: Two Birds with One Stone

Pairing: USxUK. (Alfred F. Jones/ Arthur Kirkland)

Summary: Two soldiers fighting the same war, only on different sides. When the redcoat saves the rebel's life, their futures soon intertwines themselves with each other. The Briton starts to think that maybe… if they get out of this war alive… they could make things work.

Rating: T, M for later chapters

Disclaimer: Hetalia does not belong to me. Neither does the American Revolutionary War. I own nothing but the plot.

19 April 1775

Every step he took, Arthur felt his heart pound harder and harder against his chest- threatening to just shoot out of his chest, killing him before the war had even begun. Of course, he didn't know if it were actually a real thing or not- after all, they were just told at around five in the morning that there was a troop- coming from Boston towards Concord. But now the redcoats have spotted them- those rebels. Around seven-hundred men, including Arthur himself, were marching towards their possible death. Arthur wanted more than anything to turn back- to run away, to free himself from the burden of possibly killing somebody, to be free of actually getting killed.

But he knew- he knew all too well- that even if they let him leave, even if he slipped away, they would never accept him again. No- he fights for his country, he believes in loyalty. Their march abruptly stopped- and Arthur almost bumped into the man in front of him. Next to him were two strangers and he dared not look at them; as he feared that if they lay beside him dead after the war he would not be able to bare their faces that would certainly haunt him during the dark and sleepless nights.

His ears twitched at the voice of a man- an officer from the redcoats, who had rode forward and shouted something to the rebels. Even though Arthur strained his ears, the words were carried away by the slight wind.

It was just a few moments until a shot rang out, loud and clear. And then- Arthur could not think when men from his front, back, and side, charged. And as many men, perhaps more, retreated. More shots were fired; people fell, their blood staining the white of their clothes and their eyes cold and lifeless. Arthur felt dizzy and he reached for something to hold on to. But there was nothing he could reach for.

He felt the ground shake beneath him and almost got trampled by the retreating men on horses. Then he just ran. Ran for his life, ran like he had wanted to a few minutes ago. The wind felt nice, blowing against his face. The sun was up in the sky, the sky now clear, bright and blue, but all he saw was the blood that stained the white. His feet took him to wherever they could go, and he found himself entering the woods, not far away from the American troops. He wanted to stop but he couldn't, the fear of seeing battle again drove him farther away from the field that was littered with dead soldiers.

He finally stopped, in the middle of a clearing. His feet brought him a few steps to the side, and he slumped down with his back against the rough bark of an old tree. He was desperately trying to catch his breath, trying to lower the sound of his rapid breathing. Getting a hold of himself, he remembered what his father said during his early years of being a soldier. Calm down, and after that you check yourself for any wounds. The strict old man had said, or shouted in his case. Arthur put his standard-issue musket aside and shrugged off the red from his uniform. His green eyes scanned the white of his clothes, and he patted himself down. He sighed in relief when he found no injuries or gunshot wounds.

And then suddenly the wind brought to him a scent that was unrecognizable. He picked up his Brown Bess musket and stood up. Crack. A twig snapped, and an American rebel emerged from the woods. "Well, when they told me to scout the area for redcoats, I didn't think I'd actually find one." The man, holding his rifle up, said. "I hope this was a lovely surprise, then." Arthur said, his lips tilted up into a smirk.

"It sure isn't a very nice one," The American said. Arthur noticed that he was pale, and sweating. "I got nicked by a, I don't know, maybe a small knife. The others sent me out hoping that you know, I'd just die here instead of bother any of them." He shrugged, a grin appearing on his face. "Well, if you're going to die, then why are you even bothering to actually scout?" Arthur replied, his gaze fixed on the much taller man.

"I don't know; maybe so someone could just shoot me and get it over with?" The American said, suddenly dropping his rifle. "Shoot me, then." He pointed to his chest. "Shoot me right here." He said, in defeat. Arthur lowered his musket, and furrowed his thick eyebrows.

"I'm sorry; what was that?" Arthur asked politely. They were enemies; they fought for their own countries; they should have been at each other's throats already, one of them would actually be dead already. But here Arthur was, dropping his weapon and heading over to the American- who was incredibly handsome, Arthur thought.

The rebel let out a nervous laugh, his lanky body shaking with the bellow. "Well! Since we ain't killing each other, I'm Alfred." The American- Alfred said. "Hello, Alfred. My name's Arthur Kirkland." The Briton walked over to where Alfred was standing. "You know, Mr. British guy, I thought you'd shoot me the moment I put my gun down." Alfred said, his blue eyes gazing down at the redcoat approaching him. "Hey! C'mon now, don't be shy; I don't bite." Alfred laughed again, this time, a clear, beautiful sound.

"W-well. I like my private space, thank you." Arthur said with a frown, inching closer to the taller man. "Now, if you don't mind, I might be able to fix your wound up for you." Arthur said, his frown not leaving his face. Alfred hesitantly hiked his shirt up, showing a quite nasty wound that ran across his stomach. Arthur's frown deepened. "That bad, eh?" The American chuckled nervously. "N-no, it's not. I can fix it, don't worry." Arthur lied.

He wanted to yell at the dumb American stranger, tell him that it was most definitely not okay, and that wound really could kill him. But, as he had experienced quite a few wounds nearly that horrible before, he was pretty sure a young man like the blond-haired blue-eyed man would be just fine. Well, maybe.

Arthur had gotten Alfred to sit still while he cleaned the wound. The American flinched as Arthur gently dabbed an alcohol-soaked cotton swab over the wound, and he didn't try to start a conversation, which Arthur was incredibly thankful of.

As Arthur finished wrapping the white bandages over the wound, he felt a stare- Alfred's stare on him. "What?" He asked, leaning back onto a tree. Alfred raised an eyebrow at him. "You're pretty good at this thing, you know, what you did for me just now." The rebel said to the Briton, causing his cheeks to heat up and redden. "Well, thank you." Arthur said. He almost added the fact that his father had gotten furious when he'd found out how Arthur had been watching the medics instead of being where he was supposed to wait for his father.

He knew that this was wrong, awfully, dreadfully wrong. He wasn't supposed to be exchanging banter with an American soldier, much less fixing up his wound. He was supposed to pick up his musket and click the trigger at the sight of one of those rebels. But here he was, anyway. Sitting side by side with an American rebel, listening to the man's obnoxious laughter and the constant movement of his lips, Alfred's tongue darting out every few minutes to moisten those perfectly pink and rosy-

"Arthur? You can stop staring at me now." Alfred said, those lips of his tilting up into a perfect smile. "I- My apologies, rebel." The Briton said, his lips tilting down slightly, deepening itself into a frown. "I suppose I should go now. Nice meeting you, Alfred." Arthur said. He pulled on his coat that distinguished him greatly from the American, and took his musket with him. Alfred too, stood, and he was happily whistling a foreign tune. "See ya later, Arthur." Alfred chirped with that silly grin of his, giving the Briton a supposedly mocking salute, before retreating back into the woods, where he had appeared in front of Arthur.

Arthur scoffed at the American's grammatically wrong farewell, and walked away. He was fortunate for his good memory, or else Arthur would've been hopefully lost. He'd gotten far into the woods, and he took a fair amount of time getting out, as well. By the time he reached back the English camp, the sky was a lovely orange shade. The soldiers raised an eyebrow at him as he passed them, and he glared at every single one of them. Reaching the tent he was looking for, Arthur entered tentatively. "Father? It's Arthur." He called out, and was immediately met by a man twice his age. "My boy! I thought you were as good as dead, I'm glad to see you alive, son." He said.

"As am I, father." He gave his dad a small smile. Arthur's father- or Captain Kirkland, to be exact, was a very, very important man. And while Arthur wasn't as important as his father, he still was invited to those strategy meetings the higher ranking officers often had, as an advantage for having a Captain as a father. It was less of an advantage and more to a disadvantage for Arthur, because most of the men that attend the meetings would be in a horrible drunken state, they'd never take Arthur seriously. And even though there was about a handful of other people that actually served a purpose during these meetings, those people seemed to think of him as invisible because they never, ever ask him of what he thinks they should do.

"Well now, lad, go off to your tent and have some rest. We'll have a short meeting later at eight o'clock sharp. Got it? Of course you do." The man said, and he let out a throaty laugh, pushing his son out of the tent as he did so.

Arthur stumbled a few steps and then straightened his posture. He passed some more soldiers on his way to his little tent that he shared with a stranger. As soon as Arthur entered the tent, he was willing to bet that his roommate was sharing a rather intimate time with some female and he decided to ignore them anyway. They were just barely inside a war and here were two people already lust-filled and shagging in a place that would've been quite private if Arthur really did end up dead.

Not that anybody would care, anyway. Arthur thought, and as his head hit the bed with his arm as a makeshift pillow, the man fell into a rather undisturbed slumber.

And undisturbed it was, until the very roommate that was under the covers with another human- very rudely so- shook Arthur up, saying that he missed dinner and that it was almost eight. The green eyed youth immediately jumped off what was supposed to be a bed, and his fingers started to move frantically up and down, pulling on a pair of trousers, buttoning up his white uniform, un-gracefully pulling on the blue then the red, and slinging on that musket of his.

Arthur glimpsed at the mirror and considered himself fairly presentable- at least for a bunch of drunkards who never take anything seriously- not even war, and some people who were not even willing to notice him. Sighing, the twenty five year old exited the tent, his pair of feet bringing him to the venue of the meeting. He prepared himself physically and mentally, as the last time he walked into a meeting, a bottle was flung right at him.

And he walked in.

Arthur was surprised, if not pleasantly then fearfully, as all the high ranking officers were actually sober with stern looks on their faces and no less. What was even more surprising was that even though he'd come quite early- the man who had woken him had actually called him up at about half past seven- almost all the people were already pleasant. Feeling his cheeks heating up, and knowing with no doubt that he was indeed blushing from embarrassment and the stares of all the people in the room, he quickly planted his arse solidly onto the little chair right next to his father.

"Private Kirkland," His father said rather gruffly, and Arthur nodded, his mop of disheveled blond hair bobbing a bit due to the slight movement.

And before Arthur could return the hello, a man jumped up and started yelling in a furious tone. "The rebels have declared war on us! We must attack them back." The man drawled. He was one of the strategists- not a very good one, actually. Arthur was a bit surprised when he heard people actually agreeing. He said nothing though, and he glanced at his father, who seemed to have the exact same expression that was plastered on Arthur's face. He looked quite mortified, and Arthur bloody well knew why. If they actually planned on marching their British army to look for the Americans, it would be like suicide. Or homicide.

The mutters of agreement quickly escalated to roars of laughter and 'how the Brits are going to butcher those bloody rebels'. And before Arthur could really think about what he was about to do, he planted both hands on the table with an audible 'smack' and he glared at each and every one of the people. "Everybody, please, think rationally. I know that I'm not a strategist- I'm just a private, but if you people don't get it through your bloody thick skulls that if we just march ourselves over to war it would be like handing ourselves over to those rebels- we would die before anything would start!" Arthur said in a dangerously low tone.

His father cleared his throat and Arthur awkwardly sat back down, a light pink dusting his cheeks. "My son made a fair point there," His father said, and Arthur knew that by 'fair point' he meant 'he completely hit the mark' but said nothing. "Charging would be an idiotic move that even my son here understands!" Arthur rolled his eyes at that. "I suggest that we keep moving though. But we should move in groups- twenty, maybe thirty. We are here," His father pointed at a spot in the map. "Those Americans would most likely still be around the woods." Captain Kirkland shifted his index finger to where Arthur had previously been with that American man, and he couldn't help but felt a twinge of guilt. Was it treason when he helped the man? Bandaged him? Even talked to him? No, no of course not… it wasn't treason… or was it?

His train of thoughts led him to those beautiful blue orbs and that pearly white smile that seemed so nice, and generous, and not something he would expect from an almost- stranger. Especially not from one that was an American, no less. He thought about how Alfred said his words, that American accent that made them so much more interesting than his own British one. He remembered how to younger lad had flinched when Arthur cleaned up that wound, and how he'd smiled so appreciatively-

"Arthur, lad, you with us?" A man, one of his father's closer acquaintances, called out. Arthur nodded curtly, "Peachy, thank you."

Arthur's dad turned around and spared him a look. "Well, we agreed on moving around but we will do it in just the one big group we are." The highest ranking officer, Arthur didn't pay attention who or what the rank actually was, dismissed them all, and as Arthur gave his salute, he thought. What will be the odds of meeting that American again?

Eh... I'm sorry if there are any historically inaccurate things in this story. I didn't know anything about the Revolutionary War when I first started this story and had to do a lot of research- well, you get the idea. I hope you enjoyed the first chapter- and if you did, kindly drop a review- it's much appreciated!

Thank you, and see you soon,

J.

(See? I gave my initial there~)