Chapter 10
Uh-oh
Arthur looked at the girl that now sat in his lap. The two that had interrupted had calmed down once he had stopped trying to get the one off of him.
They had called him uncle Artie. Which meant that he had Ireland to thank for their existence.
Afanasi watched and smiled slightly. "As it all gets told they keep coming, eh, Tsuki?"
Tsuki nodded, secretly worried for her friend. "It seems to be so." She said with a slight smile.
All the nations now looked at the oldest two to continue.
"Apparently, as this secret become more known to all of you, we, your children are arriving to make ourselves known. Afanasi and I were indeed the first, but I know that we are not the last. This is simply to inform as well as to protect us." Here Tsuki paused. "Nasi-chan, do you mind if I share of your time in South Africa?"
Afanasi looked around the room. Catching her fathers eyes and turning away she turned back to look at Tsuki before sitting down. "If you must." She simply said.
Tsuki inclined her head a bit in acknowledgment. "When Nasi was about seven or so, she and her mother were living in South Africa." Tsuki paused here, looking at Afanasi. She nodded her head, saying to go on. "A group of radicalists got wind of information, they got the files that listed where children like her and I lived at the time.. And Afanasi just happened to be the closest one on that list." She sighed. "Needless to say, that even without the confirmation of her father, they intended to kill her." At this she looked at Ivan. He sat straight backed in his chair, paying attention to his daughter's story. "They attacked on her mothers birthday-"
"I can take it from here, Tsuki." Afanasi said quietly. Her eyes were closed. "My mother and I were attending a bon-fire of the local natives. They were intending to honor her for her wisdom at that age. They came after us very much like poachers after an animal. The helicopter scared the natives, ensuing a panic. Her and I were separated. I ended up shot, after a long chase." Her eyes opened. She looked around the room. "I spent the next week in a cage with an infection induced fever. Then the task-force charged with my protection found me. Needless to say, that isn't something that I ever want to relive." She shuddered. Then coughed.
Tsuki sighed, patting her back.
"The point of telling that was to make sure that the risk is understood. If people know we exist then they will want to change that for their benefit. The very same with you, although... that may not be a problem considering that your geovernmaents don't keep records of you."
Afanasi sopke. "There are records of us because we most of us were born when there were systeams of records that were trustably accurate." She looked every nation in the eye. "We seek to change this, both for our safety and yours. If news of your existence were to get out it would be ten times as worse as it would be for any of us." Nasi looked around again, this time just glancing. "Higher powers would seek to end things. The situation would spiral out of control and merely get worse with time."
Tsuki looked at her friend. She knew that there was something that she wasn't telling any of them, even her.
…..
Afanasi sighed. The meeting had called a break, and by the look that she was getting from Tsuki there would be no escaping her questions.
"Nasi-chan?" Tsuki called her friend out of her thoughts.
"Hmm?" She said turning toward her friend. She was dressed in one of her many kimonos, she herself knew that this one was Tsuki's favorite. "What is it Tsuki?"
"You know something, don't you? There's something about the world that you aren't telling any of us." Tsuki said, her face rather expressive, she wasn't happy.
Afanasi nodded. "I do know things, but they aren't mine to tell." She looked out the window. "In time they might be known to the nations, but even if I wished, it isn't meant to be shared right now."
Tsuki watched as her friend avoided her question. She wanted to know why, but it seemed that Nasi had a good reason not to tell. "Alright." She began to walk away.
Ivan walked up.
Nasi looked him in the eyes, sighing. "Sit, Papa, it is alright." As she said this her voice grew hoarse, and she began to cough again.
Ivan handed her a handkerchief from underneath his scarf. "You should return to your bed Doch'." He smiled using the Russian word for daughter as a nickname.
Afanasi shook her head. "I'm fine." She insisted, walking away from them.
Tsuki looked at Ivan. "Do not be detered, Ivan-san. She is incredibly stubbourn, she will come around."
"I am more worried about myself, than her." He told her.
Tsuki looked at him. "How so?"
"I do not know what to do with a child, lest of all one her age." He shook his head. "I am also not the best to do any sort of raising."
Tsuki smiled. He was perfet if he worried about it. "Do not worry so, Ivan, you'll be fine. Believe me when I say that you have more in common with your daughter than you think." She told him, thinking of how Nasi had beaten up her attackers on more than one occasion, with severity.
Ivan smiled at her, a small smile, but a smile none the less; and it didn't cause shivers to run up her spine.
…..
The meeting resumed for the afternoon, the bickering a necessary and expected attribute. Nasi sat in her chair, boots on the table (without the frown of a certain German stiff) and mind wandering.
Tsuki watched her friend. Her behavior was somewhat normal, but there were secrets between the two now, that had hardly ever happened before.
Tsuki remembered when it was that Nasi had told her her real age.
Tsuki looked at the girl that she had now come to call her friend sometime a week after her rescue. "Nasi-chan, why did those girls call you a freak?" She used the nickname that she had aquired for her friend.
Nasi looked at her. "I'm younger than all of you." She told her. "I skipped three grades, and I'm still at the head of the class. That and I miss class a lot, and I still get all the material in. I'm only eleven, well, my birthday is soon so you could say I'm twelve, really."
Tsuki looked at her.
That was also the day that Tsuki learned of her friends health problem.
Nasi was laughing at something. Then she started coughing. Nasi reached in her pocket to get a handkerchief, only to double over with her hand on her mouth.
The teacher came over, telling someone to go get the nurse.
That was when Nasi started coughing teacher put her own handkerchief into her hand, Tsuki kneeling in front of her holding on to her shoulders.
"Nasi-chan, come on, breathe." Tsuki told her rubbing her back.
Half an hour later, she sat next to a bed in the infirmary of the school, next to a sleeping Nasi, who had an oxygen mask on.
"Why didn't you tell me, Nasi?" She whispered.
"Didn't know... how you'd react." She heard.
She looked up to see the very worried hazel green eyes.
"I am your friend. This makes that no different." Tsuki told her.
Afanasi smiled. "Thank you." She said, before slipping off for real.
…..
Tsuki was brought out of her thoughts by Arthur and Alfred arguing as Charlotte and Charlsea girls watched laughing.
Afanasi was sitting with her shoes still on the table, laughing. It was the resultant sound that had Tsuki out of her seat and by her friends side.
Afanasi coughed savagely, the sound hard on your ears, blood covering her hand as she knelt on the floor.
Needless to say that the room quieted except for that sound.
"Doitsu-san, get a doctor." Tsuki told him as she held Afanasi as the attack shhok her body.
Ivan stood over them, his face blank, evident worry in his features. "Will she be alright?" He asked as he knelt.
Tsuki shook her head. "I don't know Ivan. This is honestly only the third time it's been this bad in all the time that I've known her."
Ludwig retrieved the nearest doctor, and the next thing that everyone knew, Afanasi was in bed with an oxygen mask on, an I.V. In her arm giving her more blood.
Tsuki shook her head. I lied, I was wrong, Nasi. This is worse than ever before. She shook her head and laid it on the bed.
This week was going to be so much harder now.