Greetings, HetaWriter/HetaReader here with another chapter. :)

Anyway, a BIG thanks goes to Northern rose of May for the follow, and to Falling Wings for the fave AND the follow. Also an even BIGGER thanks goes to Madam Platypus and xXBlueSariaXx for the reviews. :D

Madam Platypus: Thank you; I quite like writing descriptions, and it was a lot of fun to write out that storm scene. 8) out of all the Nekotalia cats, Russia cat is my favourite. :D it'd be nice to have a cat lime him in my opinion. =^^=

xXBlueSariaXx: Hehe, yes...that scene is quite distinguishable (as I mention before, this story draws great inspiration from that and one other film, however there are some other things that inspire me). Thank you - I really like doing descriptions; I love to paint a picture for people to imagine, only with words. :) again, I thank you for finding that mistake. TT7TT well, Gilbert's the awesome guy with the sense of humour after all. XD PruIta really is a pairing that I'm starting to fall in love with. :D

Short note over - onward we go!

Days had calmly passed by since that freakish storm, however it was obvious to see that many of the town's citizens were still quite shaken up from the event. It was after all, the only event that they had ever experienced that could ever be called or be even close to a death-related one.

Quan suffered quite a bit upon losing one of his best boats to such an unexpected lash out from mother nature, but much to everyone else's surprise, the Vietnamese man was taking things far more steadily than they were.

In fact, he was continuing work as if nothing ever happened. Despite the fact, that he was probably the one that suffered from it the most.

Losing a boat was one thing – especially one that was used quite a lot from any upper-class folks, and pulled in the greens that helped him support his family and himself, however he himself got almost caught in an explosion, and to make things all the harder than him, he almost drowned in cold, dark, salty water.

People still wondered how Quan was able to survive that event with only a bump on his head from some stray debris that came from his boat, but they were met with the same response that he was saved by someone.

When they tried to push forward, the Vietnamese man simply shrugged and gave them another low, repetitive response

"Don't know, didn't see the face. It was a man, though."

Mei deeply wanted to thank this mystery man for saving her cousin, but whenever she looked around and questioned people, she had no luck. Yong Soo and Emil had joined in the search for the Quan's unknown saviour, but the three of them came back empty-handed, and dumbfounded that they couldn't find him.

"Where do you think this guy even lives?" Emil questioned after another unsuccessful day of searching.

Mei shrugged, "I'm not sure…but come on! He has to be around here somewhere. He can't have just disappeared from out of thin air!"

"He could be living in the forest or the hills," offered Yong Soo. "Some people live there; he might've just come by to fish or something, then he saw hyeong and saved him."

Mei's face pulled into a scowl as she contemplated that motion, "That does sound plausible…"

Kasem himself was a little worried about his Vietnamese cousin, though – Quan had to sort out some financial problems, and even with Rosaliese's payment to him (which included a more generous amount of money to try and compensate for his lost boat), he lost a good number of customers who wanted to use that very vessel for their own objectives.

The Thai man noticed that Quan worked much later than usual, and at night, it seemed that he couldn't sleep, either. One time, Kasem went downstairs to get a midnight snack, but upon walking past Quan's room, he could see that the door was slightly ajar, and the Vietnamese man was sitting in his bed with stacks of paper and a few books surrounding him in rather dishevelled piles.

It was a known fact that everyone knew; that Quan built all of his own ships. He would go to a rather large workshop in town for the construction of the larger ships with his employees there to help him, however the smaller boats – rowboats, canoes, kayaks and parts of pontoons – were made in a workshop that was right next to his house.

Smaller boats were usually more of a request, but sometimes he constructed these smaller vessels just because he wanted to. He would focus on constructing the boat for hours and polish and paint it with very constructive care.

However, it was noted that Quan was taking more active participation in his work – much to the surprise of his employees, the Vietnamese man began taking some fishing requests and boat buoyancy testing tasks for himself.

Besides running a boat business, Quan was also well known for catching fish (since he had a good number of boats, why not?). They were caught by two methods – either by a fishing pole and lure, or with a net. Everyone noted that he was now frequently taking one of his fishing boats and stayed out at sea for hours – ideally, one every second day from the very rise of the sun to its descent.

It was rather odd – you would think that somebody who almost died from drowning would not spend any time near the sea.

However, many people linked the reasons as to why Quan was spending more of his time doing even more hands-on work in the field, because his business reached a bit of a bump.

Of course, with him working more often with little to no rest, it was no surprise that his family worried about him.

He still ate his meals and did his daily routine of exercise, however it was easy to see that from how he kept nodding off every so often, and there was evidential bags that were starting to gather from below his eyes, and he was more prone to yawning.

However, Mei and Yong Soo soon discovered that there may be something else that was making their older cousin so restless.

One day, Mei saw him in his workshop, eager to help him with painting a rowboat that a female customer had requested for, when she saw that he was leaning slightly on the workbench with the finished boat sitting on the hard, levelled ground. When she came over, she saw that he was actually busy carving something out of a spare piece of wood.

"Hey, that looks really pretty," Mei said brightly as she came closer for a better look.

Raising his hand slightly to put it into better view, Mei could see that what he was carving appeared to be some sort of tail. It had a smoothened surface, but the Taiwanese girl could plainly see very intricate detail was taken in carving some of the more individualistic scales with a great amount of care. The fins at the end was cut to such skill, that it was progressively almost paper thin right at the ends.

Quan brows furrowed down to a frown, "It's missing colour…"

"Can I paint it?" questioned Mei, however she got greatly disappointed at him shaking his head.

"I'm sorry, but no. But you can paint the rowboat; I was able to finish it early– you said you wanted peach and salmon pink, didn't you?" he held the wooden tail in a tight grip and a rather protective manner in one hand while he pointed at the rowboat and several cans and tins of waterproof paint.

The next two hours were spent painting the rowboat, and while Mei chattered excitedly, enjoying this quality time with her older cousin, she noticed that he seemed rather…distracted.

Several times throughout the conversation, he had a rather glazed tint on his golden hues as he stared at the strokes of paint he was applying to the boat's surface. However, it was plain to see that his focus and attention were resting elsewhere – on something that wasn't in the view of the naked eye, and most likely in his head. Also, whenever Mei shook his shoulder, snapped her fingers, or speak even louder, he would give a slight jerk as if he waken up, and after sheepishly apologizing for his lack of attention, request her to repeat what she said, and respond more accordingly.

It was tolerable the first few times, then a little exasperating in the next ones, however it soon got to the point that Mei was getting really worried for him.

Still, it was nice spending time with him in this little creative piece. And whenever he did respond, he seemed far more open to conversation and willing to say more words, which was a good thing.

The night of the very same day, feeling peckish for some reason, Yong Soo was casually making his way downstairs to grab a midnight snack, when he walked right past his older cousin's room, and, upon seeing the door slightly ajar, peered through it quietly, upon realizing that the lamp was still lit.

The Korean boy squinted his eyes to try and make out what he was doing, and saw that the Vietnamese man was surrounded by books. At first, Yong Soo wasn't so bothered upon reading the titles of some of these books, "Exotic Life Underwater", "Rare Aquatic Species" and "Fish Sighting's Guide" – it looked like maybe Quan was simply studying rarer fish species or something that would sell more and to cover his slight financial problem.

He was about to continue on his way, when he could hear a familiar little 'da~' from within Quan's room.

Ivan was curled up near the Vietnamese man, blinking lazily at the books pieces of literature – the cat seemed to want to spend more time with him nowadays, which Mei thought was extremely cute. It was as if the cat worried that something bad would happen to Quan again, she claimed.

It was what Quan said to the cat, though, that made Yong Soo wonder…

"It's a shame that you and Pochi can't talk. Maybe you can tell me what he looks like, who he is…what he even is, maybe…"

Expanding on his curiosity, when Quan left early in the morning for work, Yong Soo snuck into his room and saw that on the Vietnamese man's desk actually had a great stack of books piled there, as well as several sheets of paper. However, upon going past the first few titles that the Korean boy recognized from last night, but he soon uncovered much stranger titles.

"Oddities of the Ocean", "Mythological Pearls: Collection of the Sea's Jewels", "Sink or Swim – Fantasy or Reality?" "The Ocean's Bottom – What Does Lie Underneath?"

"Da?"

Yong Soo almost jumped out of his skin upon hearing the mew of the large Siberian Forest Cat. The feline simply gazed up at the boy curiously blinking. The Korean sighed as he came down to his haunches and patted Ivan's head, stroking his ears.

"Hyeong was right," Yong Soo remarked with a nod. "It really sucks that you and Pochi can't talk at all…maybe you can tell me why he's acting all weird about the sea…"

The event of the freaks storm not only took a toll on the humans of the land, but also of the merpeople of King Romulus' kingdom.

Everyone was acting in a happier mood than usual from the party that was held in the king's palace, but as soon as that euphoric high had come up, it came sinking down straight away as everyone went back to work.

However, there was one that didn't comply to that.

Antonio was noticeably getting later and later to work upon collecting seaweed and kelp for the merchant he was working under, and also seemed to pay less attention to everything that was happening around him.

Francis, Gilbert, Lovino and Emma worried about their friend – since he was acting even more spacey than usual. That incident of the male human, they tried to forget and pretend that never happened (after telling Emma about it), but Antonio seemed to like bringing that topic up a lot, to which they quickly shushed him – fearful for the consequences.

So, Antonio stayed silent about talking about that incident, however that didn't mean he couldn't stop thinking about it.

They noticed that the red-tailed merman was humming and singing a certain melody over and over. For them, it sounded nice and beautiful at first, however it soon reached their nerves since that was the only song he wanted to sing. The merpeople of the town however didn't seem to mind – some even wanted to hear Antonio sing that tune over and over again; he was regarded as having one of the most beautiful male voices of the kingdom.

And it was no surprise that a lot of them hoped that Antonio was going to use that as his proposal serenade.

"Is that tune for somebody special?" Emma had asked him one day, curiously interested.

Antonio blinked, and here, much to everyone's surprise, his tanned face took a cherry hue as he gave a soft smile, "You could say that…"

However, that single melody expanded into several more as the days continued to come by.

There was also the matter that Antonio would disappear quite frequently – nobody knew where he went off to, and to those who had a feeling, they were afraid that he was going to one day get caught.

Of course, Antonio paid no heed to all of their worries and attentions; there was only one that he wanted right now.

His strong, streamlined figure swimming up to the surface, rippling along with the cool tides, the red-tailed merman came closer and closer to the human's parts, his bright emerald eyes scanning around until he found what he wanted.

A conical hat, dark hair, and a lanky build that was holding…some sort of strange weapon with a thin handle and a flat end that was probably used as means for attack.

Whenever he caught sight of this human, Antonio found that he couldn't have enough of him – his heart fluttered whenever this male human spoke, and a pleasant shiver would run down his spine when that human gave a soft, rare laugh. And the red-tailed merman's head spun, as well as his face catch heat whenever he found himself staring right into his eyes.

Those beautiful, goldfish-coloured eyes…

It was now a daily routine for Antonio to keep coming up to the surface just to watch and take glimpses of the human. At first, the red-tailed merman would come during sunset to observe him working on his boats and converse with his fellow humans in that calm, deep voice of his. And soon, Antonio found himself coming in the middle of the night as well with the moon as his light. He would swim up to the surface, to the beach that was closer to his home, and able to catch the silhouette of his figure from a window.

He could see that the human seemed very focused on something. He was reading a number of books as the days passed, and he was also always shifting his attention on a strange little object that Antonio couldn't recognize at first.

However, upon glancing closer at it during one night, Antonio was surprised to see that the object that his human was holding looked exactly like a miniature version of his tail.

And that was when the swelling pain started to throb in the red-tailed merman's chest the more he gazed yearningly at the human.

At first, Antonio was perfectly fine with just watching and catching glimpses of him; hearing his voice was a great amount of relief to his being, too. However, with all those beautiful feelings, came the bitter pain, which the red-tailed merman didn't want to feel.

He had tried to stop coming to the surface to see him, but upon doing so, the pain worsened, and his thoughts were solely placed onto him. 'How is he doing? Is he okay? I wonder if he's still working on that boat from yesterday?' were only few of the thoughts that crossed Antonio's mind about him.

So, that was why he came back at once, and the pain was soothed upon catching sight of him working dutifully. However, that only caused his friends to worry all the more about his wellbeing and safety – really, they lost count on how many times Antonio had swum to the surface, but it was a miracle that he had not been discovered or found out just yet. But there was that grim notion of how long his good luck will continue to run until it ran out.

Antonio himself had a few close calls since he couldn't predict when a human was going to see him. However, the red-tailed merman was able to find several ways on hiding himself from their views. Many times, he hid behind the cluster of white rocks, he also hid underneath the boat's resting place, and he also stayed underwater a few times. He also gained clumps of seaweed to hide himself and peek through a little hole he made just to see what was going on, and how and what the human was doing.

However, there was a time when Antonio almost did get caught.

The red-tailed merman swam to the surface again as the sun was already beginning its journey down the horizon, and he wondered what his human was up to. He caught sight of him simply standing there with that strange instrument that he would continue to play those haunting melodies with.

Antonio felt bliss wash and an inexplicable delight wash over him whenever he heard the vibrating notes from that instrument. He would watch with an admiring gaze that lay on both the instrument, the musician, and the long, spindly fingers that contributed to its smooth changes between notes. Several times, the red-tailed merman would softly sing along with improvised lyrics.

However, Antonio found that whenever he sang along with the human's playing, his lyrics would always be romantic in nature. Romantic with a hint of longing and sorrow.

"Hey, Quan! How you doing?"

Antonio slowly swam a little closer to see what was going on, just stopping at the first boat ledge while he watched Quan who was on the second one. Honestly, though the red-tailed merman had heard that name many, many times and see the human respond to it, he wasn't sure if that truly was his name, or if it was a nickname or surname.

When he did whisper the name to himself, Antonio found it pleasantly roll over his tongue, tumbling out from his lips.

It was still a lovely name sounding name.

"Good day to you, Mr Adnan," the human responded with a bow to another human. This one also appeared to be male, and he was much taller and more darker-skinned than him. He was also wearing dark green and had a white thing that covered his eyes.

Here, the other human sighed, "You know I already told you – it's just Sadik! Mr Adnan makes me feel old…"

There was an amused glint in Quan's golden eyes, "It's a term of respect, too, you know."

"Still, there's no need to be so stiff around each other," the taller, older and bigger human placed his hands on his hips. "We've known each other for years, after all."

"Indeed," Quan nodded. "You were one of the first to welcome me here; you and your wife. For that, I am forever grateful."

"Seriously, don't talk like that," the other human said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head. "It sounds like you're in depth or something – if anything, I should be in depth to you; you give me the best cuts from the fish market, after all."

"It is only fair, is it not?"

"So, what are you staring at?"

Quan glanced pointedly, to which Antonio followed his gaze.

What he was looking at was a boat. This boat was smaller than the others ones around the boat ledges, however it was certainly not a small vessel. Also, there was something about this boat that made it more important than the others surrounding it. It could be because this boat had a very smooth looking surface and appeared to be finely polished and well looked after, making it appear elegant and poised.

Antonio then noticed that there was a little sign at the boat's rear that read a name.

Allie

It was finely carved with great care, and the writing was very neat, yet it was also easy to see that it was done with a shaky, nervous hand. There were some complexly designed star patterns also carved at two opposite corners of the sign, and there was one flower in bloom at the base of the 'A'.

The red-tailed wondered who was that person – was she his mother? He had never seen a woman at his house and shower him with the love and care that a mother would give her son. Maybe his sister? Antonio had seen a young girl interact him on many occasions, and she looked a bit like him.

Or could it be a lover?

That last thought caused something to stab cruelly into Antonio's heart, and he almost gasped in pain from it, but instead, he swallowed it down. If he made any noise, there was no doubt that he would get discovered, and that would be disastrous.

"Oh…" the other human looked rather uncomfortable here. "Your boat's still beautiful as always, Quan. You always look after them well."

Quan simply kept his gaze onto the boat, his golden eyes were blank, and his expression was void of emotion.

However, Antonio could just see a small flicker of flame get extinguished as more glass and ice formed in his human's eyes. Was this the reason why he was so cold and shut himself away? Was that the reason why he was creating such beautiful yet pained, bittersweet music?

Because he missed her, maybe…

The red-tailed merman knew for a while that there were powerful emotions that were sparking inside his very being in regards to this human as it was affecting him severely. Hearing the fact that the human may already be taken was greatly shattered his usually cheerful and sunny disposition. Antonio trembled slightly as he continuously told himself that it was just a name, not following the conversation conducted between the two male humans, now wanting to go home.

There was a sudden squawk that brought him back to reality.

Antonio frantically looked around to see that there was one of those annoying white birds with the orange beaks and legs. It was shrieking at his direction, which understandably made the red-tailed merman panicky.

Eventually, after hitting the bird with his tail away from him, Antonio dived back into the ocean and swam away as fast as his tail could allow him, not caring that his whole body was getting more and more tired.

When he made it back home, he found that he was gasping for breath, and that his heart had a tiny little crack formed. However, it seemed to repair itself the more that the red-tailed merman reasoned with himself that many names can be important to a person – a family member, a close friend, a pet, even.

After all, there was that fluffy, big-nosed animal that that human seemed to hold on a high regard; it certainly showed a lot of affection to him.

Quan knew that he was obsessing over this one thing, but he just couldn't help it. He just had to know, and he had built a hypothesis centred around it.

That very event was starting to plague his dreams at night.

He first felt his lungs burn with the salty, ice cold water invading his nostrils, choking him mercilessly. Then as he started to fully lose touch with reality and fell into darkness, he could feel warmth wrap around him as it started leading him away from the danger. Next, as he came to, he could hear voices that were warped and distorted in his sore ears. However, there was one that stuck out with him the most – a male one. That voice then sang; and in a lovely, pleasant melody that was progressively rejuvenating him.

Then more warmth touched him.

That warmth sent a lovely surge in his being, and for once after a rather long time to others and even himself, his heart swelled and the pulse quickened with his breath slightly caught in his throat.

When he attempted to open his eyes, he could only make out some of the figure – a beautiful smile and wavy locks of hair, though whether they were black, brown or simply blonde but just darkened from the shadows of a low angle with the sun shining behind him, he wasn't sure.

What captured Quan more however was this mystery man's eyes.

He could certainly make out the colour – they were green. However, the shade was also unknown to him.

Though he lost money from losing one of his better ships, oddly enough, the Vietnamese man found that he didn't really seem to mind or care about it. After all, he had suffered a financial crisis that was far worse than this one, and if he could get over that one, then there was no doubt that he could get over this one.

Besides, this one was an accident from the unpredictable character of Mother Nature, unlike that aforementioned disaster where it was intentional from the offender and done with underhanded tactics.

That voice and that song continued haunting Quan and his dreams; he soon couldn't sleep properly just by continuously getting fixated from that mysterious singing, however the words were blurred and the Vietnamese man was left to try and decipher the words again.

Because he couldn't sleep, Quan began using that time to try and learn more about what possibly that tail he saw could belong to. The two colours were also flashing in his mind whenever he did attempt to sleep every so often to see if he could try and calm himself and get over his new case of insomnia. Red and gold were melting together, and the tail appeared again before it disappeared beneath the waves.

So far, from all the books that he was reading, Quan could not find a match in any logs and documents about species of rare and exotic species of fish. He even searched in books about extinct marine life.

He also began coming out on a boat to see if he can gain sight of that tail again. He just had to have one more glimpse of it – he was still rather dazed from that only time before; his head was recovering from the pain that split it, and was now a huge bump that he hid with his nón lá, due to the size of it being a rather embarrassing and noticeable mass.

Many times and for many hours, Quan would gaze out into the sea as he fished. He searched the sea's great expanse with a scrutinizing golden eye, but was met with the same disappointment of nothing in his line of sight.

However, being the stubborn man he was, Quan continued to come out on a boat; sometimes with his employees, sometimes by himself. But the Vietnamese man was even more determined to find the answer that he was looking for.

Right now, after a moment of contemplation, Quan chose to go by himself more often with a boat that he hadn't used for ages, yet chose to keep in a prime condition.

However, he was very shocked to see that he was shaky and nervous coming to this special boat again. Though he seemed point blank and expressionless externally, inside, a huge turmoil of feelings were taking place in a spiralling mess.

Those strong emotions were only put on hold because of Mr Adnan coming up to and talking with him. With that, the Vietnamese man was able to roughly grab those emotions and throw them back into his Pandora box and seal it with a key.

That wasn't to say, though, that little wisps of it were still present in his mind the more he looked at the boat.

The more he looked at that sign he made…

That name was ringing in his head, and a giggly, high-pitched chortle was reverberating painfully in his head as the hand holding his paddle began to tremble uncontrollably. He could also feel a cage opening from within him; unleashing a beast that snarled, ready to roar the more he could hear that feminine voice coo into his ear and that laugh continue to play over and over again.

'Mock me still after all this time…how dare you…'

He was sharply cut back to the present, and everything was melted away when he could hear a shrieking squawk trill the air.

Turning his head, Quan could see a seagull knocked back in his direction, to which the Vietnamese man sidestepped. The bird gained its composure and flew away in a rather lopsided hurry, still rather miffed from getting stuck by…whatever it was that struck it in the first place.

However, upon turning his head to the direction it was flying caused his heart to stop for a moment and his breath got caught on his throat.

A flash of red scales and a glimmer of gold that the sun's light caught.

He stared with unblinking eyes as it disappeared under the water. When he finally did blink, and peer out at the ocean he could only see that tail slowly submerge back into the water – as if it was melting with the very aquatic molecules itself.

Quan took a few steps towards the edge of the dock to gaze out some more at the ocean. Glancing at the ocean's great spread, and seeing that strange tail again, the Vietnamese man felt all the more determined to know what it belonged to, and if his hypothesis was ultimately correct.

'What are you exactly? Someday, I will know, and see if I really am correct on my little theory…'

Chapter piece is now put to a close. :) almost up to the point where they'll actually be face-to-face (and Quan isn't knocked out or semi-unconscious). No new characters are introduced this time, but now, you can see why Quan is the way he is.

Because I feel adventurous and want to keep my writing juices flowing, here's a little challenge:
Who is it?

Remember - characters include: Hetalia, Nyotalia and 2P!Talia (also Nekotalia, but that doesn't apply here). You only get one guess. If you try to do multiple guesses, I will only take your first one.

Whoever gets it first will be able to make a fiction one-shot request. However, I must lay down a few rules for that, first:
- No hardcore, smut or lemon, please - I'm pretty much otherwise open to hetero, yaoi and yuri. I'm also fine with indicating, but please, don't expect me to write something explicit. Make out scenes are also something I'm still nervous in writing about, but I we'll see.
- No touchy or controversial subjects, please - e.g. Holocaust, 9/11 and anything else like that.
- Rape and abuse is a preferable don't, please, don't have me write something like that out - it's not an easy to subject to look upon, and it's not really a good plot device in my opinion: have you ever been abused or raped? I certainly hope not (I haven't, so that also explains my reluctance to write it).
- War fics are a maybe; I'm still not talented enough to pull of the battlefield atmosphere since I've never been on it. Also, I feel like anything that I write for that won't ever be able to capture it.
- Violence is fine, just please, don't make it the very core of the story. I tend to dislike needless excessive violence.
- Popular pairings may not be considered; however that can be discussed with you.

My strongest points:
- AU's; particularly human AU's. However, I'm getting into fantasy ones, too. :D
- Crack pairings; it's a good extension of thought for me, and I like learning more about bonds between countries and if they even have one.
- Fluff; apparently some say that I do this a lot. =^^=

If you do get it right, then I'll contact you via PM message and we'll arrange your request there. How long will it take me to write it? Should only be a day or two. Please, have faith in me there. ^^'

Anyway, thoughts and opinions? Have a nice day, and good luck! :DDD

Sincerely,
HetaWriter/HetaReader