Chapter One
Italy huffed as he ran home. Looking up, he noticed the yellow clouds becoming thicker. Pooky purred and kneaded his hair, bouncing up and down as Italy sprinted. "Don't make me search for you again, Pooky," he reprimanded the cat through his gasps for breath. "The tornado will hit any minute. Germany said so."
"Meow," answered Pooky. Italy ran with all his might, and soon arrived at his home. "Whew!" he sighed as he trudged in the door. "I need a siesta." He slowly walked to his bedroom and dropped on the bed, sound asleep in minutes. Pooky curled up on his chest, and neither one woke, despite the tornado raging outside.
"Ve…" Italy mumbled between his snores. As usual, he was dreaming about pasta. "Pasta, come back!" he cried in his sleep, as the pasta was floating away. He floated quickly after it, but to no avail; it kept eluding him. Thump! Down Italy went, and the pasta still floating away. Pooky, who had woken up after the thump, now began batting Italy on the face. "Wha-?" Italy said, waking up, too. "Meow! Meow!" Pooky pranced about on Italy's chest and stomach.
"Ouch! Cut it out. Okay, okay, I'm getting up!" Italy sat up and looked out the window. "What?" he said. "That isn't my yard…" rather than the familiar sights of his yard, what met his eyes outside was bright green grass and colorful fruit trees, intersected by a wide yellow road paved with bricks.
"Hello!" a cheerful face popped up in the window, startling Italy.
"Ack!" Italy shrieked and jumped backwards.
"I'm Sealand!" the cheerful face declared. "I'm Sealand too!" said another cheerful face, also looking in the window. "Come on out!" said a third Sealand.
Italy went to his front door and opened it, and was greeted by an odd-looking machine that was constantly spitting out Sealands. "Thank you, mister!" they all said, running up to him. "You killed the witch of the east!"
"Huh?" Italy said. "I couldn't have done that, I just woke up."
"You dropped your house on him, you did!" said one of the many Sealands.
Italy looked down, noticing a familiar pair of feet. "Isn't that China?" Italy asked.
"Uh-huh," said Sealand. "His workers went on strike and he couldn't produce anything, so he ripped a cloning machine off of Japan and wanted to make us work for him. We didn't want to, so we're real grateful, mister."
"You mind if I turn it off?" Italy asked.
"Sure, go ahead," they agreed. Italy made his way through the sea of Sealands and switched off the machine.
"Hey, look!" shouted a Sealand. Italy turned around to face a flying pink frying pan.
"What?" Italy said to himself. "Did I eat some bad pizza or something?" Italy laughed at himself a little; unless Britain made it, there was no such thing as a bad pizza.
Pop! The skillet exploded into pink sparks which floated for a moment, then grew closer together. They formed the shape of a young woman. She glowed pink for a moment, then the pink dulled and became Miss Hungary. "Miss Hungary!" Italy cried happily, running to her. "Do you know where I am? I've never seen this place."
"You're in Oz, Italy," answered Miss Hungary.