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Canada was not having a very good day.
First, his alarm clock decided not to work that morning, so he woke up a full 45 minutes late. Then he found, to his utmost frustration, that he was out of both maple syrup and pancake batter; he had to eat cold cereal for breakfast that had gone stale months ago. Then Kuma decided it would be a nice idea to rip open the garbage bag in search of something to eat (even though he had perfectly good food just a few feet away), so Canada had to clean up that mess. But his morning was complete when he left the house only to run across a mob of his citizens chanting and carrying signs right outside the Parliament building.
"Canada on strike! Canada on strike! Canada on strike!" The protesters were walking in a huge circle, waving their colorfully painted signs around like there was no tomorrow. They blocked the entrances to the building, and were so numerous that they spilled out into the street. There were at least one hundred people, which was practically half the country's population. Canada himself watched, dumbfounded. On strike? On strike for what? What the heck are these people doing? And why wasn't I informed of this?
Hugging his sweatshirt tighter to his thin frame, Matthew scanned the crowd for someone who might be the ringleader of this little group. He noticed a man clad in jeans and a beige jacket standing at the top of the steps, holding a megaphone. "We will not stand for this injustice any longer!" He yelled. His voice sounded really familiar, so Matthew moved in closer. Unfortunately, that meant his vision was blocked even more as he tried to make his way through the crowd. He couldn't see the speaker at all within a few seconds.
"Yeah!" The people cheered.
"We demand that our conditions be met!"
"YEAH!"
"And if they want a fight, we'll-" He broke off suddenly to exclaim, "Oh, hey Mattie!"
What? "Alfred?" He managed to fight his way through the mass of people and scaled the steps. "What are you doing here? What's going on?" Meanwhile, the protesters quickly lost interest in what was happening in front of them and went back to chanting and circling.
"I'm here for the protest! These people are all from this place; it's called 'Canadia'." Alfred replied cheerfully. Matthew just stared at him. "What?"
"It's not Canadia, it's Canada. This is Canada. I am Canada. And that doesn't explain why you're here."
Alfred cheered and attacked him with a hug, "That's great then, bro! You can help!" He thrust his own sign, which proclaimed 'Canadia on strike' in big red letters, at Matthew.
Matthew shrugged and held it up, though frowning at the slaughtering of his country name. "If it's what my people want, then Canada on strike, I suppose. But on strike for what?" He looked to his twin brother expectantly. Alfred suddenly found the ground to be quite interesting because he just fixed his gaze on it, whistling innocently. That was more than a sufficient answer. "You don't even know why they're here, do you?"
"Not exactly..."
Matthew spent all of ten seconds trying to scrape the painted 'i' in 'Canadia' off the sign, before deeming it a lost cause. "Alfred, for all you know they could be… I don't know. They could be wanting to start a war with you or something."
"Now why would they want to do that?"
"Well-"
"Never mind!," Alfred practically yelled, holding his hands up to stop whatever his brother was going to say. He wasn't about to set the Canadian off on a three hour rant again. That was bad enough the first time. "But it's a protest Mattie! That has to count for something!" He took up that silly megaphone and began shouting vague, protest-like things again.
"Has the world gone nuts, or is it just this continent?" Matthew demanded incredulously. Alfred laughed at the question, but didn't respond. Matthew wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. He turned and walked down the steps. So America didn't know what was going on; that was nothing new. Surely his people could be a little more helpful. He stopped a random crowd-member who Canada thought looked like he might be in charge of the gathering. "Excuse me." The man completely ignored the teen next to him who had spoken too softly to hear above the mob. "Excuse me, eh." He repeated, louder this time.
"Yeah?" The man said, putting down his sign. "Uh, can I help you?"
"Yes, actually. See, I was wondering, what exactly are you all striking for?" He quickly continued, "What I mean to say is-"
"You don't know what horrible injustice has been done to the Canadian people? The absolute outrage we feel at the atrocity that has been committed?" The man's eyes were blazing, his fists clenched. That, coupled with the way his breath smoked in the freezing cold, made Matthew gasp slightly.
How could he have not known that this… whatever is was, was going on? He was Canada for crying out loud! If his people were unhappy, it was his job to fix it, or at the very least be aware that there was a problem! And now they were rallying over some 'terrible injustice' and he was still in the dark as to its cause. It was enough to make a country feel just a tad angsty. "Oh, no sir. I didn't know."
The man gave a curt nod. "I see, eh. Here's the deal-" He spun around in mid-sentence, responding to someone who had apparently called his name, "I'm coming, Josie!" He began to walk away, toting his sign and joining up with the rest of the group.
Matthew shouted after him, "Wait! You never answered my question!"
"Ask that guy! He'll be able to tell you, eh." The man shouted back, pointing over to one side.
Matthew stood on his toes and peered over the crowd, to see where he had been pointing. Then he groaned. "Alfred. Of course. This really isn't my day." Maybe someone inside the Parliament building would be more informative. He climbed the steps again, weaving through the crowd and listening to the yells of the protesters in the background.
Pulling open the frost-rimmed glass doors, he came upon a scene of chaos in the lobby. People were bustling back and forth in a panic, all frenzied over the mob blocking the street and causing quite the uproar. "Hello?" No one even acknowledged his presence. He raised his voice somewhat, "Excuse me!" Okay, this wasn't working. "HEY! WILL YOU PLEASE SHUT UP?" Now he had their attention. He flinched at the eyes burning into him, then forced himself to overcome his usual shyness. "I'm Matthew Williams, Canada. Now, can someone please tell me what's going on? The… those people are all on strike and I don't know why, and my brother, America, is being a stupid hoser, and that protestor guy ditched me for Josie- who the heck is Josie?- and now I'm late for a meeting, and I feel like such an awful country for being so clueless, and I'm making a complete idiot of myself in front of all of you and… and…" he realized he was near hysterics by this point. "Just tell me what their problem is." he added pathetically, feeling like a total stress-case.
One woman, a secretary who's nametag read 'Betty' came out from behind the lobby's front desk and put a hand on his shoulder. Wordlessly, she handed him some papers, which he took, adjusting his glasses and trying to pick up the remaining shards of his shattered dignity. He nodded thanks before studying them carefully. His eye twitched. "Canadia? CNN called Canada… Canadia. That's what this whole thing has been about?" Betty simply nodded ascent.
Oh, he will pay for this… "ALFRED!" He stormed out of the Parliament building, only to stop dead in his tracks. He gaped at the sight in the middle of the street. "Well this certainly is different."
His brother was on a makeshift wooden platform, tied to a stake with ropes and chains. Half the protestors were throwing wood onto the platform with one yelling for a lighter, the other half were continuing their 'Canada on strike' thing. Matthew quickly descended the steps. "Hey Alfred." he said casually, crossing his arms over his chest. "What'cha doing, eh?"
"Please please please help me Mattie!" He glanced at the growing pile of wood nervously. "See, apparently they thought I was you! I never told them I was you, but we look alike so I guess they just assumed. Then they found out that I wasn't you, that I'm America, not Canada, even though I didn't even know they thought I was you to begin with. Now they wanna burn me at the stake! Please don't let them!"
"It was your news station that caused all this…" Matthew tossed his own sign, the one that Alfred had made which read 'Canadia on strike,' onto the platform.
"Maaaattie!"
Okay, fine. So maybe he couldn't let his brother get burned at the stake. But they weren't quite ready to start the fire yet. There would be no harm in waiting just a little bit longer before rescuing him, right?
Right.