A/N: This is my first entry for Anna Week 2015, presented mostly-unedited for your amusement. It doesn't follow one prompt, exactly... both "Talking to the Pictures on the Walls" and "The Screw-Up" could potentially fit this. It is set in Ultranos's Domestic Assassin AU.
This was mostly inspired by a recent Tumblr post by Ultranos about "Awake Chocolate", but also partly by some recent caffeine-related DA!verse fics by Hathor-Aroha and mylittleartscapes.
"A Bite Too Much"
It was a normal morning for Anna—well, as normal as things got around the Arendelle household. She had the day off from med school classes, her crazy assassin sister was out on some errand or other (Anna never asked, because she usually really didn't want to know), and she was planning to meet Kristoff later that day when he got off duty.
She was sitting at the dining room table, still half picking at her breakfast and half glancing at the newspaper, when Elsa returned, making Anna nearly leap out of her chair when she came bursting through the front door.
"Hi, Anna, guess what I found!" Elsa said without preamble, closing the door behind her.
Should I be very afraid right now? Anna thought. Aloud, she said, "I take it from your unusually cheerful tone that it's something good?"
"Of course," the blonde replied, setting the bag she'd brought home on the table next to Anna.
Anna peeked inside, and asked dryly, "You came running home like you'd messed up a job, or you were on the run from the cops, all for chocolate?"
Elsa held a hand up. "This is no ordinary chocolate, Anna!" she said excitedly, pulling a modest-size chocolate bar from the bag, and held it up to show her the label. "It's super-chocolate. And before you ask, I didn't shoot anyone to get it."
"'Wakeful Chocolate'?" Anna read aloud. "So, what's in it?"
"As much caffeine as a whole cup of coffee," Elsa replied. "Possibly more. Not something for snacking on, or even for dessert. Unless you start working nights like me."
"Can I try one?" Anna asked.
"I . . . guess," Elsa said hesitantly. "Just don't expect to get to sleep at your usual hour."
"Fine, I can deal with that," Anna dismissed, grabbing a bar at random from the bag.
"Um, Anna . . ." Elsa said, suddenly looking worried.
"What?" Anna peeled back the wrapper, noting that it looked like dark chocolate, except darker. "I said I could handle it, and you said I could have one, Elsa." She took a bite, and added, "Hey, this is really good."
Elsa fidgeted anxiously. "Anna, maybe you should stop."
"Don't be silly," Anna finished off the little bar, leaving the wrapper on the table, and sat back, wondering what would happen when it kicked in.
"Anna, there's something very important I forgot to tell you," Elsa said, voice rising in her panic. Picking up the wrapper and straightening it out, she held it so Anna could see the whole thing. "There's more than one kind!" she cried, pointing to the words in bold print below the name: EXTRA STRENGTH.
Anna slapped her forehead. "Now you tell me . . ." she moaned, slouching in her chair. "Some med student I am, brought down by a simple dosage mistak—whoaaaaah." She nearly fell out of the chair when the caffeine hit.
"Well, you're not going to make Nursing Student of the Year," Elsa said, helping Anna sit up so that she wouldn't get any dizzier, "and I may miss my job tonight, but you've learned a lesson. If you even remember any of this..."
"Wait, what? Miss your job?" the redhead yelped, leaping out of the chair. "I may not approve of it, Elsa, but it's paying the bills, and I feel just fine, really! I feel like I could jog around the block a few times. A few dozen. Somewhere in that zone."
"Sorry, Anna," Elsa said sternly, putting a hand on Anna's shoulder to stop her, "but that stuff is going to have you totally wired all day and night, so I don't think it's a good idea to let you out of the house." She turned Anna so she could look her right in the eyes. "Please, please don't make me use anything resembling force, okay?" she pleaded.
"But, but . . . I was planning on meeting Kristoff at the coffee shop later!" Anna complained, shoulders drooping in disappointment.
"Well, I suppose he could meet you here," Elsa suggested. "But absolutely no coffee for you." Glancing around, she got an idea. "Why don't I call him, and you can tidy up the place?"
"Great idea, Elsa!" Anna said, oddly excited at the prospect of cleaning the house. She promptly dashed off to find supplies.
That's what I thought, Elsa mused. Now that Anna was out of sight, she quickly grabbed the bag of nuclear-coffee chocolates, and dashed out of the room, all the way to the large, fridge-sized gun safe in the garage. Unlocking it, she placed the bag inside, in an empty spot next to one of her handguns. She closed and locked it, briefly wondering whether she would need anything from it in the next few hours. Deciding against it, she headed back to the kitchen.
Quickly locating Anna's cell phone (where it always was in the morning, plugged into its charger), Elsa turned it on, and looked up Kristoff's number. Dialing with her own phone, she smirked and thought, She'll be cleaning for hours on that buzz she's got . . .
"How is she doing?" Kristoff asked Elsa when she answered the door. It was mid-afternoon, the earliest he'd told her he could get off duty to come help with this latest Arendelle fiasco. He had been rather surprised to hear Elsa's voice on the phone, since she was usually the one getting herself in trouble.
"Pretty good, given her condition," Elsa replied. "She's pretty much just been cleaning the house since I called." She led Kristoff into the now-spotless entryway, closing and locking the door behind her.
"She's been cleaning for over four hours?" Kristoff breathed, following Elsa to the kitchen. He knew Anna could be hyper sometimes, but still . . .
"Straight," the blonde confirmed. "She seems to be taking extra time with the pictures on the walls, for some reason . . ."
Sure enough, when they got to the kitchen, they could hear Anna's voice chattering away from the direction of the stairs. Elsa and Kristoff peeked around the corner into the next room, and saw Anna standing in front of one of the many pictures hanging in the stairwell. ". . . So I was saying to Elsa, 'Why can't you just use your ice to keep the house cool? Then we wouldn't have to pay for air conditioning!' But she's like, 'No, Anna, it would take too much energy for me to do that' and I'm all, 'Yeah, right, Elsa . . .'"
"Why don't you do that?" Kristoff whispered.
"Can't keep a low profile as an assassin if people think I have magic," Elsa murmured back.
"Oh, of course," Kristoff muttered. Watching Anna a bit more, he said, "Does she normally do this?"
"Well, usually only with Joan of Arc," Elsa said softly, pointing, and Kristoff took a good look at the picture Anna was having her animated conversation with. It was a portrait of the French heroine, sword lifted in defiance, inanimately listening to Anna jabber on about her life.
"Anna? Are you okay?" Kristoff asked, and the redhead jumped.
"Oh, hi, Kristoff!" she squealed, bouncing up and down on tiptoes. "I'm fine, just fine! I'm not quite done yet, but I'll be done in a jiffy!" Turning back to the portrait, she said, "Chat with you later, Joan!" With that, Anna resumed her frenetic dusting of the pictures.
Watching her go, Kristoff said to Elsa, "Four straight hours?"
"Yup."
"And she's been through the stairwell how many times?"
"About four, now," Elsa replied, grinning.
Kristoff looked at her, eyes narrowing. "You're enjoying this, aren't you?"
"Yup!" Elsa strode over to the dining table, picking up the chocolate wrapper that was still sitting there, and offered it to Kristoff.
Kristoff looked it over twice, then muttered, "She's not coming down from this anytime soon, is she?"
"Probably not," the blonde replied. "And I have a job tonight, so I was wondering if you could keep an eye on her for me . . .?"
"I . . . guess so," Kristoff said, crinkling the wrapper in his hands nervously.
"Just don't let her leave the house," Elsa said. "If you have to stay the night—and you probably will—there's a guest bed available, or you can use the couch." She ticked off the items on each finger. "Maybe you can talk her into eating something—just not the whole fridge, okay? Please don't let her dance with the cats. And whatever you do . . ." Her voice dropped, and Kristoff could feel the room temperature drop with it, ". . . do not let her have any more caffeine!"
Kristoff glanced at the corner of the kitchen where the multitude of cans and bags of coffee and tea sat next to the coffee maker. Great. This is gonna be a loooonnng night . . .
