Sensitivity

It was too warm. Too stifling. Claustrophobic, the city smothering him like a scratchy old blanket suffocating him in the throes of a fever. Glancing at the digital clock on his bedside and confirming what he already knew - that it was far too early/late, at 2am in the morning, with another tedious conference to look forward to the next day - he gave a shuttering sigh, flipped onto his other side and tried to smother himself with a downy, hotel-grade cotton pillow.

Outside the city of Paris hummed and he could only just stand it. The cars and the people and the low-level noise that accompanied every built up settlement worldwide. He himself had always opted to live in areas close enough to cities for his work, but far enough that he was beyond the range that unnatural, human-made noise could affect him. He'd always been that way; ever since cities had developed to the point that such background noise was an inevitable consequence.

Right here and right now, the background bustling of night time Paris was the least of his worries, though.

His head was too loud. Everything was too loud. There was a vague buzzing in the corner of his ears that was slowly siphoning away the remaining dregs of his sanity. He knew Francis had done this on purpose (although rationally how could he? No one knew about this particular... quirk of his. Even that damned frog; he'd made sure of it) but the generator situated on the far corner of the yard three floors down from his own hotel room was going to be the death of him.

It wasn't really a fear, as such. Arthur would tell himself this until his dying day. It wasn't a fear; how could one be scared of something as simple and unassuming as a noise? He couldn't deny the terror that sound could create; after the Second World War it had taken years for him to bear the sound of oncoming aircraft without horrifying flashbacks to the Blitz, but to be left a shuddering mess over something as mundane as an air conditioning unit? Or a refrigerator? Or the vague-but-now-getting-more-noticeable-as-he-though t-about-it buzzing that the dreadful electric alarm clock by his bedside was continuously emitting?

Reaching a tired hand out, he grabbed the offending object and ripped it from its socket, uncaring of the potential damage he could cause. Unfortunately, this only solved one problem.

The generator kept on humming. He could feel his already rapid heartbeat increase in pace, pulse racing as though he'd ran a mile in sweltering heat, throat closing up and an almost silent keening noise escaping his mouth. Groaning aloud in a fruitless attempt to drown it out, he grabbed his duvet and added it on top of his head, but it only served the make him feel even more confined and claustrophobic, and now he was aware of how loud his heart was too.

Something in his head snapped. He pulled himself out of the rumpled and sweat-stained sheets and onto his weary feet.

He stumbled down the lamp lit hallway of the posh, five star hotel that Francis had procured for the purpose of this particular conference, barely remembering to pull the door to and certainly not caring to lock it. Despite the current economic downturn, the 'country of romance' always endeavoured to provided the highest quality accommodation for the other countries when the conferences were in his capital. Arthur had a suspicion that he did it simply to show off, a not unreasonable assumption in his mind.

The plush red carpet muffled his footsteps as he shuffled down the silent building. Although the nations had a reputation on the whole of being disruptive (drinking, yelling, sex in public places etc.) they usually reserved this sort of behaviour for the last evening before a world conference such as this ended. As such, it was safe to assume that all the present nations would be fast asleep and completely unaware of the state that Arthur found himself in, or the fact that he was wondering around in nothing more than his mint-green cotton pyjamas.

Without even paying attention to where his feet led him, he found himself stopping in front of a specific door. At this point there was no hesitation, no bracing breath with the knowledge that his next actions had the potential to very much change things, no vicious internal debate as to why he should just turn around and go back to his room and take the easier way out and fashion a noose out of his own bed sheets… he simply raised a pale hand and knocked. There was a pause, before the lock in the door clicked and the handle turned upwards.

It was only as the door was pulled open by a dazed and grumbling American that his actions dawned on him.

Shit, this was... mortifying. But at this point his preservation of pride had been completely overridden by his desire to escape all the painful noises and sleep in peace.

"Artie?" Alfred yawned, a perplexed look plastering his tired face. Arthur didn't respond, instead staring at the floor as he rolled back and forth on the balls of his feet. He couldn't force himself to meet his former brother's eyes. Instead, he did the second cringe-worthy act of those early hours in the morning and leaned forward into the American, ignoring his grunt of surprise. To give the lad credit where it was due, he recovered fairly quickly.

"… you're all sweaty, old man. Have a nightmare?" Arthur shook his head, although at this point it actually resembled a full-body shudder more than anything. "Oh. You ill or something?" Another shake.

Alfred shuffled. Arthur knew that the sweat and cloying scent of fear was probably sinking into the lad's t-shirt, but he couldn't bring himself to remove his face from the comforting contact. It was hard to breathe, but for some reason it felt safe. An awkward silence permeated the hallway, and Arthur realised that whether he wanted to or not, he had to say something. Unfortunately, when he opened his mouth everything he'd been holding in poured forth like a burst dam.

"It won't stop. It just keeps going and going and going and I think I might be going mad but that's fucking stupid cause who goes mad over a fucking noise and I don't know what to do and my head hurts and-" he was cut off by strong arms wrapping around his back, and was embarrassed to feel tears forcing their way through his tear ducts and dripping down his face, clinging to his eyelashes.

"Ah shit, does anyone know about this?" He sniffed and shook his head. He could feel himself shaking and his heart pounding like marching feet. He felt more than heard the sigh and simply went limp when the American lifted him off his feet, carried him into the room and settled him down on his own hotel bed. After four nights of suffering that infernal contraption, he was too exhausted to do anything other than collapse.

"Hey… hey, s'okay. I'll fix this. Can you still hear it?" Arthur stilled, trying to hold in the choked crying, before curling into himself with a plaintive moan as the humming once again met his ears, albeit slightly more muffled than it had been from his own room. It was faint, and he doubted Alfred could pick it up, but his overly sensitive ears and frazzled mind sought the noise like a moth seeks light.

Alfred sighed again, and Arthur felt the younger man still as he pondered the situation, a large hand resting on his slightly dampened hair. A couple of minutes later, still sniffling, Arthur found himself drowning under a sea of blankets and duvets and Alfred getting up to leave the room. The door clicked as it swung shut and Arthur was left alone. Again.

~SR~

As it was, Alfred (being the ridiculous man-child that he was) had opted to take the most direct form of action to solve the little dilemma he'd been faced with. Yes, he could have sorted out a new room for Arthur that wasn't near the generator or anything that made the sort of noise that triggered this little… problem, but it was way too early in the morning and it was probably safe to assume that nothing would get done until the next day anyway. And if that was the case, Arthur would still get no sleep, and Francis would in some way or another pick up on the change and then harass them until he knew the reason why. No, the most logical way of dealing with this was to go straight to the root of the problem

So, whistling quietly as he wandered down to the ground floor, Alfred made his way to where the noisy generator unit was attached to the side of a building (he was smart enough to realise that it was probably something to do with fridges and catering) and sized it up.

Alfred then hummed to himself as he tore the unit from the wall, face lit up with a light smile as shattered pieces of plaster crumbled to the floor. Then, clapping his hands together and shaking off any dust that had perchance ended up on his nightwear, he turned around and casually made his way back towards his room, and back towards Arthur, thinking to himself all the while.

He'd never known about this… aversion to noises that Arthur suffered, although in hindsight it was fairly obvious. The older nation had always refused to buy a house in London, instead choosing the live out in the countryside and make the tedious commute each day. And when on visits to other countries he either stayed at the hosting nation's house (if it was him or Canada or another of his commonwealth) or found his own accommodation to stay at if this wasn't a possibility. Now that he thought hard about it, the times when neither options were available were the occasions when Arthur would turn up dishevelled and disorganised, or get so drunk he had to be forcefully removed from wherever he'd finally collapsed.

The fact that he'd never actually noticed it before left a bitter taste in his mouth. He cared about the Englishman a lot… more than he'd ever admitted to anyone, although if the fact that he'd come to him of all people was anything to go by maybe he wasn't as much of a hopeless case as he'd first thought

The door barely squeaked as Alfred pushed it open and re-entered his hotel room. Arthur was still lying prone on his bed, although it seemed the exhaustion that had plagued him had finally taken it's toll and he was silent as he slept. Even in the darkness Alfred could detect wet patches on his face and a slight tinge to his cheeks. Briefly, he considered tracking down a spare duvet and sleeping on the floor to avoid accidentally waking up the older nation, but then he realised that the old man was so out of it that a bagpipe being played bedside probably wouldn't have dragged him from his slumber. Instead, he slipped into the bed and shuffled alongside the slumbering ex-empire, making himself comfortable with what duvet and pillows he had left. He could never imagine being that averse to noise himself; to Alfred, the sound of Arthur's strong heartbeat was the most comforting sound in the world and on the whole he thrived in the buzz of modern life. But to each his own, he guessed. This just meant that he had even more heroic duties than normal, but he was alright with that.

And in the morning he'd have hell to pay when the hotel found out about the mangled pile of expensive generator piled outside, and even bigger hell to pay when both Arthur and he missed the morning session due to oversleeping… but with Arthur lying next to him and the knowledge that out of everyone in the building, he'd come to him when he was in need to comfort, Alfred couldn't really bring himself to care.

Author's Note: This oneshot is rather close to my heart, because I suffer a similar sort of condition to this. As it is, some cider last night managed to convince me that it wasn't as ridiculous an idea as I'd first thought… so here it is! Sometimes, at it's worst I can't even stand the sound of the fan in my computer. Just knowing that there's a radiator in the next room that buzzes faintly can send me into fits of panic. It can be very stressful at times, and especially if I'm staying anywhere other than my own home. Just some facts (from wiki, the internet god):

Hyperacusis (also spelled hyperacousis) is a health condition characterized by an over-sensitivity to certain frequency ranges of sound (a collapsed tolerance to usual environmental sound). A person with severe hyperacusis has difficulty tolerating everyday sounds, some of which may seem unpleasantly loud to that person but not to others. 40% of tinnitus patients complain of mild hyperacusis.

Misophonia, literally "hatred of sound", is a form of decreased sound tolerance. It is believed to be a neurological disorder characterized by negative experiences resulting only from specific sounds, whether loud or soft.

My own problem is more closely linked to the former. I hope you've enjoyed this, and please read and review!