This Old House Is New

It was always easy to know exactly where to find Alfred. If he was not woken up early in the morning by Alfred banging on his door, by the time Kiku dragged himself out of bed he would almost always hear the sounds of Alfred, Ludwig, and Gilbert working on Alfred's house through an open window.

After waking himself up, getting dressed, and having breakfast Kiku would be awake enough to rush down to see the progress.

"Kiku! Kiku, look! Look! Kiku!"

"Yes! I see, Alfred!" Kiku laughed as Alfred grabbed him by the hand and pulled him inside to show him what they had managed this morning, along with things that they had done yesterday that he had already shown Kiku.

He was so ecstatic! Kiku was expecting him to burn out soon from all of this excitement. Instead Kiku found himself catching the excitement. Not that he minded, not at all.

"Don't run in de house!" Ludwig barked at them as Alfred and he ran past.

"Sorry!" Kiku had managed to turn his head to say to his friend as Alfred pulled him out of sight of the German.

"This is what we found!" Alfred finally said, stopping. Kiku found himself tripping into Alfred, but straightened himself up and looked at what Alfred was pointing at.

"A... hatch?" Kiku asked, blinking at it.

"I have a basement!" Alfred cheered, kissing him immediately afterward. It was sudden and Kiku had not been expecting it (though he figured he should just stop being surprised), but he squeaked and nearly fell over before Alfred caught him by the waist to keep up him upright. "Gilbert and Ludwig kept saying there had to be one, because of the structure and all, but I did not want to completely wreck the floor, so we looked around for where the trapdoor would be and I found it!"

"Does this change your plans?" Kiku asked, staring down into the darkness. Alfred shook his head.

"Nah. I mean, not with what we've already settled. It just means there is more to plan!"

"Alfred," Kiku began, changing part of the conversation in an instant as he looked up at the other. "May I program your house?"

Alfred stared at him. "You what?"

"Program your house!" Kiku restated, trying to contain his excitement. "Like iLudovicus and iMarcus, except for the fact this time I would actually get to design the personality! As you would like it to be, of course. What do you think?"

Kiku waited with anticipation, but when Alfred did not respond as immediately as Kiku had been expecting, Kiku found himself rather confused.

"You... know what I am offering?" he asked carefully.

Alfred nodded. "Yeah... yeah I do. And thanks, Kiku. Thanks, but I don't think so."

That was not what Kiku had expected. "Why?" he questioned. Alfred sighed.

"I mean, I like the idea and all. And those two are great!" Alfred rubbed back of his neck with one hand, his other hand now in his pocket. "It's just... I mean..."

"Yes?" Kiku prompted.

"It's already awkward kissing you in your house, knowing he's always watching," Alfred whined. "I can handle that, but when we st–"

Alfred stopped talking then. Kiku waited for him to finish his sentence, but Alfred simply flushed and looked away. So Kiku thought about it.

Oh.

Kiku found himself blushing and staring at anywhere else other than Alfred. "If... you do not want one, that is fine," he ended up blabbing out. "I will... get out of your way." And with that he skedaddled.

"No wait! I didn't mean– Kiku? Kiku!"

"Come up for lunch Alfred!" Kiku called back, getting out of the house as quickly as humanly possible. Moving at that rate it only took a minute to get to his house. It struck him then how close their houses were. It was almost like Alfred had planned for it. Which was really too funny and it made Kiku snicker. That was far too complex for Alfred when it came to a relationship.

Now that he had effectively made himself want to stay indoors for a little bit, Kiku cast his mind around for something to do. The main bout of his work was outside, actually. Observations tended to be that way. Well, there was always that package his associate had sent him.

-Fucking figure out what this does- said the note right inside of the box as he opened it. With a sigh, Kiku pulled on some gloves before he pulled the metallic object out of the box.

"Scan, please," he asked iLudovicus.

From work, to Hearth, to Alfred... Kiku was never going to get bored.

Notes:

Not that I have given you all much to work with, but from chapter one hundred and fifty from Much Ado and this I want to know if any of you have caught on to who Kiku's 'associate' is. It is a character from Hetalia, I have not made this one up. I actually do not believe it is a hard thing to guess, but I have failed so far to realize how easy or difficult guessing anything in my stories is. Anyway, Free request for a drabble for the first person who guesses correctly!