A Rather Silly AU Fic

Disclaimer: I'm too tired to even pretend I own Hetalia right now…

A/N – This chapter consists mostly of lame jokes about filler and a reference to one of my favourite moments in the English dub. Also, tenth chapter! That means double digits!

Oh, yeah. Now on to the important bit… I changed my username from "Ame of the Water Tribe" to "Kiri Ame" since that (or some variation thereof) is my username practically everywhere else. Sorry if that causes any inconvenience to anyone, but it's just easier this way ^_^

Chapter 10 – Rainbows, Ponies, and Flesh-Eating Bats

Poland groaned and opened his eyes, feeling his head throb as he did so. "What on earth happened?" he asked as he sat up, staring at the still-sleeping bodies littered around the campsite.

"We all got drunk," Lithuania informed him from a spot near the ashes of the previous night's bonfire.

"And…?" Poland prompted.

"Can't tell you any more than that," replied his friend, as Australia stirred nearby, his "pet" blinking its demonic red eyes open just as his master woke.

"So, anyone else remember what happened?" he asked cheerily.

"Nope," groaned Poland and Lithuania in surprisingly tuneful unison.

"Neither," replied Australia, glancing around at the sleeping outlaws. "Well, there's no point in wasting time on goodbyes. We should probably leave before they wake up."

"Why…?" answered Lithuania slowly.

"They might not remember that they promised not to steal from you if they're too hung-over," answered their companion as he led the horses over. "Besides, staying with my friends was only worth one filler chapter. We have to have other sub-plots and side-trips and thingamabobs." Poland and Lithuania glanced at each other, and then shrugged.

"Makes total sense to me," said Poland.

"Let's go, then," added Lithuania.

And, since I'm listening to Simon and Garfunkel at the moment and I can't really concentrate on finding a less abrupt way of saying this… They left.

"Is it just me, or have we been, like, getting nowhere today?" asked Poland suspiciously later that afternoon as the group began to climb yet another hill.

"It always takes a while to get out of the Filler Hills," Australia explained. "There's no real way of telling where you are in here, either, so we could be wandering around for quite a while." Poland groaned.

"Are you sure there wasn't any way of, like, getting around these hills or anything?"

"As far as I can tell from the map, there isn't," answered Lithuania apologetically. "The Filler Hills seem to be pretty much unavoidable."

"Tell you what," suggested Australia. "It's nearly sunset anyway, so I'll go to the top of this hill and scout out a place for us to camp. Then we'll try to figure out where we are and which way we should go to get to South fastest." The other two nodded.

"Sounds like a plan," said Lithuania.

"Bye Australia!" added Poland, waving brightly. The slightly shady member of the trio turned and began to ride up the side of the hill as the other two plodded along.

"So, have you made any progress?" asked England, suddenly materialising beside the group and drifting along, suspended by his large, fluffy white wings.

"Our other companion is scouting out a campsite now," said Poland. "We're not exactly sure where we are at the moment, though." England glanced around.

"It looks like you're in the Filler Hills," he said, a slight frown creasing his forehead. "That… That's not ideal, but I guess it was inevitable."

"Do you have any idea how long it will take us to get out of here?" asked Lithuania worriedly. England shook his head.

"It's impossible to tell how long you'll be stuck here for, sorry. It could be anything from a couple of days to several months."

"Why do I feel that the very existence of the Filler Hills is some sort of pun going way over our heads?" asked Lithuania suddenly.

"Well, now that you mention it, I feel that way too…" agreed Poland, scratching the back of his head thoughtfully.

"You definitely have a point there," said England, before pausing. "Speaking of things going over my head, I don't believe I've actually met your companion. What was his name again?" Poland opened his mouth to speak, but at that moment there was a beeping sound and England pulled a mobile phone out of the top of his toga, staring at it a little confusedly for a moment before flipping it open and holding it to his ear. "Hello?" There were muffled sounds from the other end of the line as England's face grew steadily stormier. "He did what? Is he out of his mind? Hold on a second." He gave his charges an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, but I have some things to attend to back home," he said exasperatedly before vanishing in a cloud of green sparkles. A moment later, Australia returned to the group, glancing over his shoulder apprehensively.

"Um… We may have to leave now," he said in a strained voice. Poland glanced sharply at him.

"Why…?"

"There are archer bats nearby," Australia said, as if that explained everything. Poland and Lithuania stared at him as if he had mushrooms growing from his head.

"There are what?" asked Poland blankly.

"Archer bats," repeated Australia. "You know… those little bats that chew up bits of wood and fly out in swarms spitting the wood at their prey to kill them and-"

"I'm sorry, but you had me at flesh-eating bats," interrupted Poland. There was a moment of horrified silence.

"I think we should get away from here," said Lithuania. The other two nodded, and, with terrified shrieks of "RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN!" our heroes continued their journey through the Filler Hills.

…I bet you thought that was the end of the chapter, didn't you? Well, it wasn't. This chapter has extra words in it! Isn't that exciting?

…ISN'T IT?

…Fine. Be that way.

"Uh, it's not like they can actually respond to you in the middle of a chapter," Conscience reminds me gently. My eyes narrow.

"Conscience, what are you doing here? This is my special time with Imagination!" Over in the corner of my brain, something crashes to the ground as Imagination swoops by, cackling evilly.

"I understand," sighs Conscience. "She's a bad influence, though, you know. Anyway, we'd better get back to telling the story. The self-insert is probably going to get annoying really soon, even if you are only doing it for cheap laughs."

…Yeah, she has a point. With an almighty self-sacrificing sigh, I return to my weighty task of writing crack fanfiction.

"How can we keep up this galloping anyway?" called Poland as our heroes sped through the hills in the deep of the night. "You'd think the horses would be just a bit tired by now!"

"I think they're running on plot power," answered Australia. "It works really well in settings like this."

"Is it just me, or is that squeaking noise getting louder?" shouted Lithuania.

"I bet it's the bats," said Poland. Australia nodded.

"The squeaking means that they've identified a target," he informed them.

There wasn't much to say after that.

"GAAH!" Poland shouted inarticulately as a splinter of horrifically sharp wood flew past his shoulder. "WHY ARE THEY ONLY SHOOTING AT ME?"

"They must have chosen you as their target," replied Australia, reaching up to his back and tossing Bruce into Poland's lap. "Here! He'll intercept some of the splinters for you, but we have to keep moving. Since they're close enough to start spitting, they're probably about to try and surround you."

THIS IS BECAUSE I'M THE MAIN CHARACTER, ISN'T IT?" wailed Poland. "BEING THE PROTAGONIST TOTALLY SUCKS!" The squeaking reached fever pitch as the archer bats barrelled straight into Australia and Lithuania, pushing them to the side as they formed a ring around Poland. For a moment there was a dreadful silence as all the bats breathed in and aimed.

And then they spat.

This would've meant almost certain death for Poland had his pony-turned-warhorse, Konik, not chosen that exact moment to begin glowing a bright pink colour and suddenly shrink. The splinters whizzed straight over Poland's head and towards the stunned bats, who began dropping like flies, victims of their own hunting method.

But Konik wasn't done yet. Still glowing, he slowed to a near-halt and began tossing his head around. Ribbons of rainbow light flew from his mane, and the archer bats began to spontaneously combust. Within moments, there was nothing left but the three shell-shocked companions.

"Oh, I remember now," said Poland brightly. "The spell that makes Konik a warhorse wears off every night at midnight!" He shrugged. "Heh, I guess that activates some sort of superpower mode in him, too." There was a pause.

"You know what?" said Lithuania. "I vote we just make camp and try to pretend none of this ever happened."

"Agreed," said Australia thickly.

"What? But that was, like, the best thing I've ever seen! Seriously!" protested Poland.

"Rainbow lights that make things explode are kind of weird even by this story's standards," replied Lithuania. "I'm sorry, but I really think it's best that we ignore this issue."

"That's just, like, the Filler Hills getting to you!" argued Poland desperately. "You have to fight it! We can't just pretend this never happened, or nothing we do here will be at all relevant!"

"What are we doing up at midnight?" asked Australia, yawning. "Shouldn't we have made camp by now?"

"I was just wondering that myself…" said Lithuania dazedly. "Something wrong, Poland?" Poland shook his head, trying to remember what he'd been thinking about a moment ago.

"I… thought I was annoyed about something, but I'm not sure what it was…" he frowned, before shrugging. "Oh well. If it's important, I'll remember it in the morning, right?"

"Right," replied his companions.

And so, yet another chapter of filler ended with our heroes forgetting everything they had learnt in the past four pages. Only time will tell when the plot will start continuing again properly…