A/N: This story was based on a prompt that I found on Tumblr, and I found it so interesting that I just had to write something for it. Supernatural stuff, dark historical themes, and romantic stuff ahead. Enjoy!
Warning: Quickly written, quickly edited.
"Do you just enjoy making a fool out of me, England?! I don't get what I did to make you hate me so much, but why don't you just drop it?" France called out in anguish, cupping his temples in his palms and storming through England's old house.
"Just drop it?! How am I supposed to concentrate on having a meeting with you acting like a complete loon? I'm so surprised Germany's so close to you with how childishly you act! You're just as bad as Italy!" the English nation called back, throwing his fists around in frustration with the neighboring country.
"Oh, so I'm not allowed to entertain myself at those meetings? Just because you don't know how to have a good time doesn't mean I shouldn't be able to!"
"I'm trying to strengthen the bonds in Europe before we all fucking fall apart due to the damn economy, you idiot! If that isn't a serious matter to you, then why don't you just fall off the map and die?!"
"My god, no wonder I'm friends with Germany, he's far more polite to me than you ever are, and that's saying something! You've been spending way too much time across the ocean-"
"Don't you dare compare me to that brat!"
"Oh and why shouldn't I? You seem to be so cozy with him and everything he seems to be doing, as of late! You and America have that 'special relationship' your bosses love to pride themselves on!"
"Go and fuck yourself, you fucking frog!"
"Fine I will!" France turned around and headed towards the door that led to the basement rooms of England's house, pulling the knob out and swinging the dusty door open in an almost violent manner.
"Where in the fuck do you think you're going?!" England screamed, crossing over across the room and grasping onto the door.
France rolled his eyes, "To the cellar to get some wine, where else would I go? You need to calm down, we're not going to get this post-meeting session done without it, seems like."
"Fine," England huffed, crossing his arms, "go get some damn wine, you bastard." And with a right slam, the Frenchman closed the door in England's face.
The french speaker let out a long sigh and massaged the base of his throat, already beginning to feel sore after all that yelling. It was amazing that he and England could have upheld hour-long sessions of screaming at each other in the past, but now it seems that was no longer the case.
He didn't like this. He didn't like it when England acted this way.
That damned man was still stuck in his pretentious "since I'm England I'm just going to shout and order everyone around to get every little thing that I want" phase that he should have outgrown after the second World War. It was so childish that America had grown out of it, or, at least, it seemed that way. England was no mighty empire anymore, and he needed to get out of that mindset. France respected England greatly. Loved him, even, but not like this. He was tired of arguing with the man, especially when that mouth of his could be used for something so much better than yelling, or at least, in a different kind of yelling.
He almost laughed, letting his tight fists out a little before clenching them again. England was the idiot, not him. A jealous idiot who was just upset that France had good ties in Europe as of late, and he was just left with the side bits, though he seemed to be so fine just being with America. France wasn't all that jealous, maybe a little bit, but not to the extent that England was. He hoped that some aged Pinot noir would loosen him up a little and get him to let go of his pent up anger.
Once he reached the wine storage, he grasped onto a nicely aged bottle of wine and headed back towards the door he had closed to come downstairs.
He passed by several doors, many of which were locked. However, one door did open once France twisted the handle and peeked inside. There was a window at the back that looked out to the hilly terrain of the land by England's house, with some sunlight illuminating the room. Inside were several bookshelves, a large cauldron off to the side of the room, and a pentagram drawn in the center.
This time, France couldn't hold back a laugh. "Oh my god, England," he chuckled, "I know that your people are strange creatures who believe in weird things…but this?" This whole "black magic" room just took the cake, the country already felt so much better.
However, as the man stepped closer to the center of the room, he felt the temperature drop at least ten degrees, and he even shivered. The ventilation in this part of the house must be horrendous. He turned to look back at the door, a negative feeling growing in his gut and he clutched the bottle in his hand tighter, but when he turned back - he was surprised to see a woman standing in the center of the pentagram, a woman who looked oddly familiar.
"Is…that you, France…?" the woman's voice gripped him like the icy chill of the room. She stepped towards him, her arm reaching out for him.
"You…it's been so many years…how can you…?" the country stepped backwards, fear beginning to drain into his bloodstream. What was she? A ghost?
"You have served well me in my life…" she smiled, but there was no light in that face, there was only the pale touch of death. She flashed a crazed grin and chuckled, "…now you will serve me again!"
France opened his mouth to scream, but it was too late. She was already ahold of him, and he was knocked to the floor, the world going dark.
England trudged impatiently around the living room, awaiting France's return. He didn't like this. He really didn't like arguing with the man.
Knowing that France was downstairs, he felt that it would be safe for him to let out an aggravated sigh. He knew that he wasn't the easiest person to get along with, but France really shouldn't make him seem like he was the only person who felt that way about him and his foolishness at meetings. He just wanted to get things done, and he didn't want to wait on those who wanted to fool around like the whole world was at peace. Yes, their job was stressful, but that meant that you needed to be serious about all issues for something to truly get done.
He would much rather be having a casual affair with France, it was just better that way. They could just talk and laugh about their memories, or perhaps do something even more enjoyable than that.
Clenching his fists, he came to the conclusion that he needed to swallow his pride and just apologize like a man to him. Nothing good would come out of a pair of old men who were forcibly trying to intoxicate themselves and were still in sour moods.
After what seemed to be an eternity, France finally came back upstairs, a bottle of wine clutched rather barbarically in his palm, around the neck of the bottle. The man seemed to be still upset, as he had expected him to be.
He exhaled and said to the Frenchman, "Look, old chap, I'm sorry for how I acted. I wasn't being a gentleman and-"
"I don't want to hear your worthless apologies, England," he suddenly rasped, colder than a nordic winter. He gripped the bottle in his hand to a point where his knuckles whitened and his lips curled into an animalistic snarl.
"What the hell? Suddenly you want to be the difficult one? What's the matter with you-" England didn't get a chance to finish his sentence before France lunged at him, aiming to strike him in the face with his fist. "What the fuck?!" France snarled and tried to grasp onto his jacket, but the Englishman was faster, ducking down and sliding out to the side, standing up and had enough time to shout, "What in the ever loving fuck is wrong with you?!"
His eyes shot open as France grinned and tilted his head to the side, popping a couple tight joints in his neck and hissed, "I've been waiting to do this for a long time," he added with a small chortle, "dearest Angleterre…!" Without any hesitation, he swung the Pinot noir bottle against the wall and shattered the glass until it was a usable weapon. Dark red wine covered the walls, and splashed against his clothes and face, marking him like a feral creature drenched in blood.
'Dear god…' England thought, 'he's lost it! He's snapped and lost his sanity!' This wasn't a common thing to happen to nations…it had happened before, but very rarely. France was so old and had lived through so much, it seemed like he was beyond something like that.
France charged at him, swinging the broken bottle at his chest, aiming to cut and carve and kill. He hit the wall and just kept running, chasing after the frightened country. England looked around, trying to improvise and find a weapon to work with before France killed him. He grasped onto a cane by the door, using it as a makeshift shield as France jabbed the pointed monstrosity in his direction. England really didn't want to hurt him, but he needed to defend himself.
With a swing of the cane, he struck him in the head, but it didn't seem to do him much good. France ripped the wooden staff from his hands, and swiped the glass bottle at him, wounding him up the arm. England squirmed out and ran into the kitchen, getting ahold of his kettle and throwing it at him, but France was just too fast. It was beyond human, beyond what nations could do even. He sidestepped and swooped in to slice him down the chest, causing England to scream in mercy.
"Scream, you brat! That's all you're good for anyway!" France shouted, laughing maniacally. England turned tail, jabbing him in the ribs to run out towards the living room again.
No…this wasn't France anymore…this was a monster.
France chased him around and caught him in stalemate in the foyer, pointing the glass at the island nation's face. England growled, finally giving into his fighter instincts, and kicked out at him, knocking him back to where England could kick the bottle from his hand and watch it shatter against the floor, rendering the horrific weapon useless.
Furious, the other man seized him in an iron grip around the throat, lifting him up and pining him against the wall, England gasping for any sort of breath. If he couldn't stab him to death, asphyxiation could work just as fine. France beamed wickedly, "Brûler en enfer, chien anglais." His gripped tightened and England squirmed in his hold, his hands trying to overpower France's strength.
"Why…are you doing…this…Francis…?" England asked, feeling his consciousness starting to slip out of reach.
"Francis…?" France giggled, "That's what you call him? How endearing!"
Him? Either France had really lost his marbles or this wasn't him. This was crazy! This couldn't be France! England gathered any remaining air in his lungs and demanded, "Who…who are you?! What have you…done…" he coughed and wheezed, his poor lungs squeezing him uncomfortably, "…to France…?"
"You have killed so many of his people, so many of my people, so many people!" France, or whoever was not France, snarled. He spat his words into his face and declared, "You will never be freed of your sins, you dog! Your misdeeds will drag your wicked soul to the darkest depths of Hell! Your existence plagues this world! Your existence shames my God!"
England's eyes were fluttering open and closed, "…Joan of Arc?"
At once, France threw his head back and laughed in horrible amusement, "Really?! Did you really just say that little girl's name to me? I'm so sick of all you countries just lusting after foolish virgins! That's the one thing you both have in common! Your strumpet ruined my life you stupid bastard! Your virgin killed the one thing your brother loved more than anything!"
With a newfound strength, he gasped in a deep breath and found that he recognized the person, that woman that Scotland have loved so deeply. He somehow gained enough strength to pull himself out of the death grip, and he fell to the floor, replenishing his lungs. He threw France away from him, but it wasn't France, it was…
"Mary Stuart, 'beloved' queen of Scotland and consort of France," he snarled in anger. How was she still in this world, an angry shade of her former glory? He would admit that she was a strong woman, one that he sort of saw what Scotland saw in her, and why France had protected her, but why was she here? Why was she controlling France's body?!
Mary smirked, throwing a lock of France's long blonde hair over his shoulders, and she stared at him with the hatred of a thousand devils, "I'm glad you recognized me." England loathed how she was talking out of France's mouth, how she was using him for her own purposes.
"What have you come here for, Mary? To get revenge on me for what Elizabeth did to you? You might as well forget it and crawl back into whatever crevice you slithered out from and give France back!"
"I think not, you foolish little nation," Mary seethed, her Scottish dialect cutting through France's natural accent, "Besides, my vengeance is not intended for Elizabeth. I am here for what you did to me!" She curled his lips, making his beautiful face turn into something from a grotesque nightmare. She screamed and pounced on him, France's nails digging into his skin, pushing far enough in to where he was beginning to bleed.
England kicked her off of him and charged off into the kitchen, hearing France's heavy footsteps behind him. His adrenaline was up into the highest of levels, and he seized his sharpest chef's knife out of his cutlery drawer and pointed it at her. However, despite the fact that she was armed with only a steak knife, she still looked so smug, as if she had already won. She stepped closer to him, holding her knife up.
"You damned wench," England barked, jabbing his own knife at her with several warning swipes, "You ought to stay back if you don't want me to end your pathetic existence!"
The specter of Mary only shrugged, "You won't touch me, you wouldn't dare." She ran France's fingers up his chest, looking almost lustfully at the nation across from her, "Not whenever I have his body in my possession. You wouldn't hurt him, would you?"
"Let him go! He has nothing to do with this!" England demanded, frustrated and fighting his urge to shed hot tears of anger.
"Oh, but of course he does, silly," she teased, raising the knife up and spinning it in France's hands, "His frustration and anger with you, no matter how fast it was dissipating, was enough to get me to take control of his wondrous body. Besides, he can't force me out if I was connected to his country for a long period of time, something that may have been tricky with Scotland, but France works just fine." She stretched his teeth to show a horrific leer, pointing the knife at him, "Besides, you're going to do whatever I say, or consequences will follow you."
England snarled, "Or what? You'll kill me?" he smirked, "I'd like to see you try."
"No," she giggled, turning the knife around and pointing it at France's neck, "I'll kill him." England took in a quick breath and the smile fell off his face, as if it had never been there, taking a small step towards her. She pushed the knife down a little, into the Frenchman's neck, "No no, England. That's not very wise of you," he watched with horror as a small trail of blood slid down his collarbone down his chest, "Look, you've made him hurt himself…"
"Stop this! It's me you want, isn't it? Do what you please with me but leave Francis out of it! Do what you came here to do and begone!" he took another small step forward, and Mary held out France's hand.
"If you take one more step, I will bury the entire thing in his throat," she snapped, pride boiling up, turning France's face red with her anger.
Unable to allow France to bear his burdens with Mary, he groaned in defeat and placed the knife on the counter. He held his hands up to show her that he was no longer armed, "What do you want with me? Your death was centuries ago, and Elizabeth didn't live for many years more than you did!"
"Elizabeth was not the cause of my death, English dog! You were! You told Elizabeth to condemn me for death and give me a sentence! You were the one who pushed me to the block and laid me under the axe! You were the one who held my bleeding head high above your head after I was dead! You're a demon of a nation and I want you gone!" She flipped the knife around in his hand and seethed through France's teeth, "You have beheaded me, and now I shall return the favor!" And before England could take one step to escape her, she pressed the tip of the knife to France's arm, "Keep in mind, his life is in your hands."
Right…he had to think about France and how he couldn't allow the man to suffer for what he had done to Mary Stuart. He stood down in defeat, getting down to the floor to show her that he would do as she pleased.
"Not here…no…it doesn't feel right to just kill you and leave you bleeding in a kitchen," Mary sighed, "Stand up, and do exactly as I say."
England slowly stood back up, holding his hands up again and she pointed the knife to his back, "Lead me to your bedchamber," she ordered, pushing the knife point tenderly against his spine. He gasped quickly from the pressure and stepped through the hall towards the bedroom, stopping before the bed. He could feel heavy drops of sweat on the back of his neck.
Mary gestured to his bed, "Get up onto your bed and sit down. Don't you dare move after that." She drew out a deadlier knife, one that appeared to be a knife that a butcher would use to slice through bones easily. This was it…
"Bow your head like the sham that you are, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland." She scoffed, curling France's fingers around his shoulder, "I can't believe my own country joined an alliance with yours, and now you're practically one person. All you do is take and destroy whatever you want. You think the entire world will bow to you? Think again!" He didn't have to see her face, or France's face for that matter, to know that she was forcing him to smile, "It's such a shame really, though. I can hear him screaming and wailing for your mercy. It rings and rattles my brain around. He's crying and weeping and begging me to let you go, so…" she leaned in close, whispering into his ear, "…enjoy this voice while you are still alive to hear it." He felt her clamp France's teeth around the lobe of his ear, she glided France's hands down his chest, in some sort of meager attempt to arouse and excite him. This wasn't anything close to it, though. This was evil and demonic, and it may have been France's body, but a ghostly apparition of Mary was not what he wanted.
"I send your life into the hands of the creator, Arthur Kirkland, and may the lord have mercy on your soul," she said in France's beautiful voice, something he hoped he would never hear from the man, though he knew it wasn't him. Mary raised the knife above her head, pushing on England's neck so that he was facing down towards the sheets on his bed.
The knife came down, and England twisted around and pinned France's body down onto the bed, the wrist holding the knife firmly gripped in his palm to where she couldn't move. His knees pinned down her other arm and the rest of her body, at least for the few seconds it took to reach back into his pocket and pull out the salt shaker he had seized from the kitchen when he turned to attack her. There were only a couple ways to stop a specter, and salt was the best way to do it.
She screamed, "You fool! When I throw you off of this bed, your precious France will just be a pool of blood once I'm done with him!"
Ignoring her statement, he ripped the top off of the shaker and mumbled a quick, "Sorry, Francis" before shoving the salt past France's lips. The salt repelled Mary, as it would with any ghost, and she screamed, casting herself out of France's body and was propelled to land in the corner of England's room. She was back to looking like herself once more.
"England…?" he heard France's voice from behind him, weak, hoarse, and likely drained. He quickly put himself between the Frenchman and Mary, ferocity burning in his green eyes.
Mary screeched, "You cannot beat me, England! I shall reconquer France's body and end your pathetic life by my hand! I shall kill you for all you have done!"
"What happened to that lovely spirit that my brother and this frog always talked so highly about, hmm?" England snorted, smirking at her. Confidence radiated in his features and he suggested, "I think it's time you got a visit from one of your old friends." He whispered several words under his breath, the breeze in the room becoming much colder than it already was, and he said aloud: "From the highest places that souls have seen, I call for you, my valiant Queen!"
A bright light filled the room, Mary shrieking at it's sight and the nations protecting their eyes for a moment. The heavenly lights died down to reveal a ghostly spirit of Queen Elizabeth, in all her radiance.
Mary hissed, "You think that you can just bring that woman down here and I'll suddenly stop my crusade, you fool?!"
Elizabeth commanded, "Mary Stuart, you are finished in this world. You shall come with me to the next world willingly or I shall be forced to take action to push you to the afterlife!" When Mary refused to release her stance, Elizabeth smiled, "Very well then."
In a burst of bright and violently white light, England and France could both hear a crippling scream that seemed to burn away into the light, and soon, the world was silent once again.
The light faded, and Elizabeth strode up to England. She leaned down and gave him a kiss on his cheek and murmured, "If you need me again, my darling, I shall always be ready to serve you. I hope to see you again."
And then…she was gone.
England quickly turned over and crawled towards France, who had suffered his own wounds as well as the Englishman had. "Francis…" England touched his shoulder gently, "…are you okay? I'm so sorry this happened, I had no idea…"
"I'm fine, I'm alright," the Frenchman smiled, "I was just so afraid that Mary would succeed and kill you…I'm just glad that you were able to stop her. I'm sorry if I've scared you."
"Just shut up, don't you think like that," he leaned down and kissed France, closing his eyes and feeling the other's lips move against his, "you have nothing to be sorry for."
"I suppose this meeting needs to be rescheduled, I'm completely exhausted."
"I do hope you are not completely worn out, Francis," England snapped, frowning at him. He pined his arms on either side of his head, straddling the Frenchman.
"Oh, and why not Arthur?" France couldn't help but grin cheekily, no matter how tired he was.
"Because I'm finding that I need to relieve some of this stress after all of this madness," he cooed, leaning down and kissing France passionately, arching over him.
And with a small laugh, France nodded and moaned softly, "Please be gentle then, my dearest Arthur…"
Thanks for Reading! Let me know what you thought!
Translations:
Brûler en enfer, chien anglais - "Burn in hell, English dog." (Taken from Google Translate, sorry.)
Other translations should be fairly obvious.