Arthur truly hated his brothers. After sneaking back onto his clan's territory once he had left Alfred on Sunday, he went straight to his den and groaned unhappily upon finding his two most annoying brothers there waiting there for him to make his life miserable.
"Oi baby brother!" his oldest brother Alasdair obnoxiously greeted. Arthur gave a terse nod and moved into the room while mentally preparing himself for whatever ridicule the two were going to unload on him today.
"Where've you been off to Artiekins?" Seamus taunted. Arthur could practically feel a blood vessel popping in his forehead from his distaste at the name.
"That's none of either of your business," he stated coolly. Usually if he just went along with the teasing and answered the questions, the torment session would be over sooner, but Arthur was in no mood to cooperate with them today. He was sick of being treated terribly by his own kin and all he really wanted to do at that moment was take a nice nap.
The brothers hooted and hollered at Arthur's response and slithered closer in order to surround him.
"I'd bet five squirrels that you weren't off meeting with a mate," Alasdair challenged.
So that's what they are going to go after me for today, Arthur thought with dismay. His brothers had a range of topics they liked to tease Arthur for, such as his appearance, lack of friends, and grumpy disposition, but his lack of a mate was definitely their favorite. In Naga culture, most began to find their mates in their late teen years, so Arthur, at 23, was definitely pushing the limits.
"And what if I wasn't? As I said already, that's none of either of your business."
"No wonder you don't have a mate yet with that attitude," Alasdair commented. Feeling his blood begin to boil, Arthur did his best to pretend like he wasn't bothered.
"If that's the logic we are going to use, then it's a wonder you two have mates," Arthur spat.
Seamus raised his hands in what he thought was a peaceable gesture. "Don't be like that! We're just worried about our little brother. We want you to be happy and make lots of babies!" he teased.
"Like hell you want me to be happy," Arthur muttered.
Seamus snickered and nudged Alasdair, leaning over to whisper just loud enough for Arthur to hear. "Hey, how much you wanna bet Artiekins'll die a virgin?"
"Enough!" Arthur shouted angrily. "If this is the only thing you came to say, then I would very much appreciate it if the both of you would just leave!"
Now both Seamus and Alasdair were smirking triumphantly. They didn't actually care that Arthur was mateless, they just loved to use it as an excuse to rile him up. Unfortunately, Arthur's rather short temper allowed it to work fairly easily.
"C'mon Seamus, Artiekins needs some time alone to brood and absorb how empty his den is and always will be," Alasdair gleefully said. Seamus gave a short nod and the two of them gave him a "playful" cuff to the side of his head before mercifully leaving the den, allowing Arthur to be alone.
He sighed deeply, still breathing a little heavily from getting worked up. He knew his brothers were right; he was getting a little too old to still be without a mate. Not that he cared; he was living his life just fine by himself and he had found from experience that having people in life only causes more problems and creates unnecessary complications.
That night, Arthur curled up by himself in his nest for what had to be the five thousandth time. He had always been fine with just the warmth his own construction provided to him, but for the first time, he thought it seemed like there might be something missing after all. He didn't bother trying to pursue what exactly that might be and he wasn't sure if he even wanted to know, but right before he fell asleep he wondered if maybe Alfred was all alone too.
The next couple of days passed just like all the other days Arthur had spent in his lifetime. He would wake up early when the sun started to come out, soak up some of the morning rays of light on his favorite rock, and then set out to capture himself a lunch in the nearby woods. In the afternoons, he would maybe take a nap on his rock or in his den and try avoiding his regular tormentors (a.k.a. his brothers and sometimes Francis) as much as possible. To his extreme relief, he was successful at this on Monday and Tuesday. At night he would reread one of the few books he had laying around or join one of the clan meetings. He had been satisfied with this way of life for the entirety of his 23 years. Sure, in the recent years since he had been studying humans, he had wondered what his life could be like if he had been born as something different, but for the most part, he just went along with the restraints of his life in the clan. After talking to Alfred, however, he wondered how he had been able to go this long without losing his mind. Alfred was able to live so freely and go wherever he wanted and do so many extraordinary things for no reason other than to just do them. To Arthur, it was certainly something to envy.
By Wednesday, Arthur was more than ready to sneak out of the clan's boundaries again. He had to deal with Francis' flaunting all morning and he was sure that if he had to spend one more day with his clan he would end up committing murder. Just as he was leaving his den to head out and meet Alfred at their triangular rock, the worst sight imaginable descended upon him.
"Hey little bro! Where ya going?" Alasdair greeted as he slithered up with both Francis and Seamus in his company.
"I do not need this right now," Arthur groaned. Seamus frowned and came up right next to Arthur, drawing up to his full height to appear intimidating.
"You should be happy to see us. After all, we're family and Francis here is just about the only friend you have," he bit out.
Arthur frowned. "That perverted wanker is hardly a friend," he corrected.
Francis merely snickered. "So you admit that you have no friends then, non?" He exchanged amused glances with the other two brothers, happy to have selected something to tease Arthur about for today's session. Arthur fumed, but he supposed that he should have been expecting them to come around today since the last two days had been so blissfully free of the taunting.
"That's not what I'm saying! In fact, I just recently made a new friend," Arthur said haughtily, thinking of Alfred. He knew it probably wasn't a great idea to mention the human, but he so desperately wanted to prove the other three Naga wrong.
Francis, Seamus, and Alasdair collectively raised their eyebrows. "Oh really? And who might that be?" Alasdair inquired. Arthur stayed silent, unwilling to reveal anything further. When they received no response, the other three laughed, assuming Arthur had been lying.
"Oh, when he said 'friend' he must have meant one of his special invisible friends," Seamus sneered.
"Aye, it's too bad his invisible friend can't fuck him," Alasdair said with an evil glint in his bright green eyes. Seamus and Alasdair shared a boisterous, obnoxious laugh while Arthur tried to push his way past them. Out of the corner of his eye, he could tell that Francis wasn't laughing and was frowning lightly in disapproval at the last comment. Although Francis often partook in the teasing ritual, he was the only one that knew where to draw the line.
Noticing that Arthur was attempting to escape, Seamus and Alasdair immediately moved together to block the path.
"You never answered our question, Artiekins. Where ya going?" Seamus queried. Arthur, having nearly reached his tolerance, tried again to move past his brothers but only succeeded in getting pushed roughly back.
"I'm just going hunting," Arthur defended.
"Oh? Is that right? Maybe you can get the rabbits to be your friend little brother," Alasdair remarked.
"Yeah! That would work out well, actually. Maybe he could even get one to mate with him since we all know nobody else will ever want to," Seamus added. Francis started to look more conflicted upon seeing the hurt expression on Arthur's face.
"Just fuck off, will you?" Arthur squawked. He pulled back his fist in preparation to punch one of his two brother's in the face, but Francis quickly moved forward and grabbed his arm before he could carry out the action.
"I think that is enough, oui? We have our own mates to look after," he stated firmly, giving a fixed look at Alasdair and Seamus. Glaring heavily at Francis for stopping him, Arthur jerked his arm away and slinked down the path, leaving Francis to deal with his two brothers. The last thing he heard before getting out of earshot was Alasdair's cry of "Aw way to ruin our fun! Now he's off to be a pathetic loser by himself!"
Arthur managed to pull a stiff upper lip until he was out of the clan's boundaries and to the triangular rock formation, but when he found that Alfred hadn't yet arrived, he allowed himself to hide his face in his arms and cry.
Waiting three days for Wednesday to come was much harder than Alfred expected it to be. He had had a short attention span his entire life and had always had some concentration issues in class, but now he couldn't focus on anything for more than about 30 seconds before his mind wandered off without his permission. More often than not, it would wander towards a certain green-eyed blond that he was meeting again on Wednesday.
Monday wasn't absolutely horrible. Alfred was able to occupy himself by building an "Arthur" playlist on his Spotify account and adding a cross-section of music from every genre and decade he could think of. Once satisfied with the quantity and quality, he attempted to immerse himself in the numerous assignments he had for classes. When that didn't work, he tried distracting himself with video games. Kiku had recommended him a horror game called Daylight and he was eager to try it out and prove that he was absolutely not a wimp. He was doing well for the first five minutes, but the atmosphere proved to be too creepy for him and he shut down the game, proclaiming that "he didn't have the patience for wandering around like that anyway."
After he had been thoroughly traumatized, he immediately sought out human companionship in case his friends needed protecting from creepy shadow monsters. They took his whimpering in stride and had learned by now to go along with his excuses. After sitting with the group for about half an hour, Alfred's fear addled mind began to calm down and wander back to Arthur.
Since talking to him about the differences in their lives, nearly every mundane human interaction was making him think of the Naga. He amused himself by imagining how Arthur would react to television and cars and made a mental note to play some YouTube videos on Wednesday afternoon. When he was making coffee, he pondered if Arthur had ever had anything to drink besides water. When he went to the school café, he pictured Arthur's astounded expression upon learning that Alfred had never had to hunt for food and could just exchange some special paper for it.
I wonder what he's doing right now? Alfred could easily visualize him lounging around on some rock near his den or slinking around the trees in pursuit of a squirrel. When Gilbert called him out on not listening to the conversation, Alfred blushed and had to come up with an excuse for zoning out.
"Uh…I didn't sleep well last night."
"Really? But you went to bed early," Matthew commented, shooting his brother a surprised glance. Alfred had merely glared and steered the discussion away from himself.
On Tuesday, he began to seriously consider why he was acting the way he was. He could recognize that he was anxious and excited for seeing Arthur again, but he couldn't figure out why. Arthur was fun to talk to and very entertaining, but he had never been this excited to see someone before. Chalking it up to the novelty of Arthur's species, Alfred put it out of his mind and attempted to focus on his lecture.
Tuesday afternoon Alfred had to do an advanced lab for biology involving the observation of microbes under high-power microscopes. The "micro" part of biology was Alfred's least favorite, so he quickly got bored and his sweet lab partner from Liechtenstein had to do most of the work. She was understanding towards him, but he still felt really guilty that he was being too spacey to be of any help. At dinner on Tuesday, his friends were starting to get suspicious. He mentally cursed the fact that they all spent so much time together, allowing them to quickly notice that he wasn't acting like his usual self. While Ivan was creeping out Toris and Gilbert was flirting with Elizaveta, Matthew and Kiku were trying to conduct an intervention with Alfred.
"Al you haven't paid any attention to anything in the last two days. We know that isn't like you, what's on your mind?" Matthew inquired, munching on his maple burger. Alfred bit his lip and considered just telling them a half-truth; that he had met a new friend and he was excited to meet up with them again. They would probably buy it, since all of them had stuck within their friend group since they were little. A new friend was something to be happy about and it would get them off of his back for now.
Sighing, he wiped off his mouth with a napkin and took a sip of his soda to indicate that he was about to make an explanation.
"I'm just looking forward to meeting up with someone tomorrow and I guess it's just been distracting me," he said smoothly, feeling proud of himself for calmly giving a plausible reason.
Matthew and Kiku immediately exchanged glances with raised eyebrows before giving identical knowing smiles at Alfred.
"Good for you, Alfred. How did you meet them?" Kiku wondered.
"Uh…" Alfred floundered. He couldn't exactly tell them that Arthur had found him in the middle of the woods while he was unconscious. "I got lost and he helped me find my way." That was technically true, if Alfred hadn't been lost he never would have hit his head and then Arthur never would have had to fix him up.
Matthew rolled his eyes. "You're always getting lost," he chided.
Alfred stuck out his tongue at his twin and responded that it was probably because Matthew had done something weird to him in the womb, effectively rendering him incapable of normal functions.
"You realize that was just an insult to yourself?" Matthew deadpanned. Enjoying the familiar brotherly banter, Alfred allowed himself to laugh with his friends and relish in the next hour of distraction.
Later that night their dorm room, Matthew was sitting at his desk and Alfred was sitting on the top bunk of their beds listening to music and doing homework. Even though he only had a couple of his classes tomorrow, Alfred wanted to get most of it out of the way so that he could spend more time with Arthur at their rock in the afternoon (and he had decided that it was their rock, not caring if other people before them had been there). While Alfred was just starting a works cited page for his English paper, Matthew remembered something his brother had said at dinner.
"Hey Alfred? Didn't you mention earlier that you were going to meet up with your new friend tomorrow?"
Alfred looked up in surprise. He had forgotten that he mentioned that, but he figured he might as well tell Matthew about it now so that nobody would get suspicious when he wasn't around in the afternoon.
"Uh yeah? We're going to hang out after I get done with morning classes. Why?"
Matthew shrugged, turning back to his report on Canadian history. "No reason. I was just thinking about bringing up a friend into the room tomorrow, so don't be alarmed if they are still here when you come back, okay?"
Alfred furrowed his brow, wondering who on earth actually paid attention to his brother enough to become friends with him, but didn't bother to pursue the matter as he had just remembered the books he saw in Arthur's den and was wondering if he would be interested in any of Alfred's science books. Hmm…well he was curious about human history and stuff. I bet he would be into my biology and history textbooks. Satisfied that he would let Arthur look through them tomorrow, Alfred hurriedly finished up his works cited page so he could get some sleep.
"Hey Mattie, can I turn off this music? I'm going to sleep now," Alfred asked, reaching toward the stereo on the dresser next to the bed. Matthew gave a hum of acceptance, putting away his own work so he could get to bed.
"It's unlike you to consistently go to bed so early, Al. Is the apocalypse upon us?" Matthew joked, glancing up at the lump burrowing under the covers on the top bunk.
Alfred barked a laugh, trying to play it off like it wasn't actually anything too unusual. "Nah, haven't you noticed the flying pigs all over the place?" Matthew rolled his eyes but didn't press the issue further, chalking it up to his brother just being a strange person.
Alfred nearly cried the next morning when he saw it was raining. According to the weather channel, it was supposed to stop by early afternoon, but he was unhappy about the slight chance that it would continue into the evening. He had been waiting for three days to meet with Arthur and he had been looking forward to seeing the pleased expression when he saw all of the cool stuff Alfred was planning on showing him.
He quietly tiptoed around his room, trying not to wake up Matthew. He knew that Matthew didn't have any morning classes and he knew from a lifetime of living with him that if anyone woke Matthew before he needed to be awake they were highly likely to be hit with the hockey stick Matthew secretly kept underneath his bed. After going to the bathroom and pulling on a t-shirt and some jeans, Alfred trudged dejectedly downstairs to the dining hall to grab a plate of bacon and some hashbrowns. Next to nobody was up at this time on a Wednesday, since almost all students had Wednesday mornings off. Alfred, however, being in the honors science program, had to get up early for comparative physiology and organic chemistry, two of his least favorite classes.
When he was done eating breakfast, he quickly dashed back up to his room to grab his backpack and car keys before driving over to the academic buildings. Sitting through his two classes was nearly physically painful, but he tried his best to take careful notes and understand what the professors were saying. By the time his organic chemistry class was over, Alfred was practically bouncing in his seat from anxiety. Glancing at his watch, he saw that it was only about 11 A.M., so he decided to stop off at the dining hall upon returning to his dorm building and grab a bite to eat before trekking out into the woods. Thankfully, at some point during the morning it had stopped raining.
Alfred rushed upstairs after eating to grab his phone and textbooks, noting that Matthew wasn't in their shared room. That's strange, Alfred realized. He hadn't seen his brother getting any food and he didn't have any classes right now. "Didn't Mattie mention something about a friend yesterday?" Shrugging to himself, Alfred put it out of his mind and went downstairs so he could leave.
Just as he was cutting through the dorm common room to get to the exit, he heard someone call out his name. Jolting to a stop and glancing behind him, he saw that it was Ivan. Alfred frowned, wondering what his least favorite friend wanted and what could be so important that he needed to talk to him now and make him run late for meeting with Arthur.
"Privet Alfred. Where are you going?" Ivan inquired with a childish grin on his face. Alfred had always hated that grin; the Russian had been doing it for as long as Alfred had known him and it gave him uncomfortable goosebumps every time.
"Uh…" Alfred tried to quickly think of an excuse for why he would uncharacteristically be taking a walk out into the woods. His mind immediately landed on his classes, since anyone who knew his biological obsession wouldn't question it as a motive. "I'm just going out to catalogue some wildlife. It's for a personal project of mine," Alfred said with as much enthusiasm as he could muster.
"Excellent! I, too, have a personal project I would like to work on. I will come with you, da?" Ivan said happily in a manner that suggested there could be no refusal. Alfred mentally cursed himself for forgetting that Ivan was also a biology major who was known for doing things a bit unconventionally. There was no way in hell Alfred would let Ivan go with him. If he found out about Arthur, he would likely want to capture him and use him for creepy experiments.
"Uh, sorry, this is something I really need to be alone for. Besides, I'm going to be out there for a pretty long time, so…" Alfred let himself trail off, hoping Ivan would take the hint. Unfortunately, the other student's smile merely got wider and his eyes hardened, indicating he had no plans for backing down.
"That will not be problem. I have to be out there for a long time, too," Ivan enforced. Alfred was really starting to get nervous now and wondered if Ivan would follow him if he just bolted for the woods.
"Yeah, no, like I said I need to go alone…uh it's just a personal thing, sorry," Alfred said weakly. Ivan was just about to open his mouth and reinstate that he would be coming along anyway when Toris suddenly came down the stairs, likely on his way to his own afternoon classes. Alfred thanked every god he could think of when Ivan's attention was momentarily stolen away from him and diverted to the retreating Lithuanian, allowing Alfred just enough time to slip away unnoticed and jog away from the building towards the woods. See you soon, Arthur!
A/N: I'm posting this from a random hospital. My mom and I were out hiking when she broke her ankle and now I have to camp out in a hospital room. On the bright side, I have literally nothing to do except write!
I know nothing super interesting happened this chapter; I was just trying to make the point that they are starting to view their world differently since meeting each other. Things will start picking up next chapter and don't be too sad for poor Artie, he has a heroic Alfie on his way to comfort him :D
