I'm going to start dedicating chapters to countries and the the people in them that read my story. So this chapter is for you, all my Germans!
This is the longest chapter yet so enjoy!
With a grumble she sat up and frowned as she checked and the damned ears were still there. Then she smelled something heavenly. And she knew that smell anywhere. Her favourite breakfast. Popping out of bed she practically flew down the stairs and skidded to a halt in the doorway to the kitchen. Closing her eyes and taking in another deep sniff her damned tail began to wag. Corned beef hash. And eggs. She had to wipe her mouth because she was starting to drool. Allistor was standing at the stove pushing something around in a skillet.
"When's it gonna be done?" She pipes up.
He turns around and grins when he sees her standing there with wide excited eyes, ears pricked forwards and alert and a wagging tail.
Snorting he answers,"Yeah in about 5 minutes. You should go wait at the table." He jerks his head over to the small kitchen table. She scurries over and watches him impatiently.
"So, I'm guessing you're the personification of Scotland. Your accent is more guttural than Irish one. Am I right?" She asks. It's also hot as shit.
"Mhm. M'names Allistor." He doesn't look away from what he's cooking.
"I'm Arianna, nice to know the name of the guy who rudely awoke me last night. Where's Arthur? He's usually up early isn't he?" The bushy-browed bastard is almost always up at sunrise having a cup of tea.
"Ha. He's been up all night tryna figure out how to fix the whole fox thing."
"Oh." 'Dammit, now I already forgive him.' She sighs and slouches in her chair a little.
He looks over at her, "Eh, well don't feel bad for him, I mean he did do," he gestures over at her,"so it only makes sense that he should remedy it."
"Yeah I suppose so. But he still didn't have stay up all night to do it." She says resting her cheek against the wood of the tabletop.
He finishes cooking and fills two plates before making his way over to the table. Sliding her plate to her he sits down across from her with his own and chuckles as she dives in hungrily.
When she finishes she rinses her dish and brews some nice breakfast tea. She then loads up another plate to take down to Arthur and gives a quick thank you to Allistor.
When she opens the door all she hears is tired grumbling and page shuffling.
"Hey. I brought you some vittles and tea. Your brother made the vittles part." She says making her way over to the scruffy blonde. After setting the dishes in a clear spot she looks around and grins like a maniac.
"You weren't fuckin' around were you. Jesus H. Motherfucker, it's awesome down here." She says smiling.
"Yeah." He just mumbles taking a sip of tea and still reading through a giant tome.
"You know you didn't have to stay up all night. I mean this is different but I roll with the punches so while yes this is fucked up I'm fine as long as eventually you fix it or it wears off or whatever. BUT, for me to totally forgive you, you have to wear animal ears and a tail to the G8 meeting if it hasn't gone away by then. I won't make you wear that to the world meeting because that's a little too far." She gives him a smirk and he groans in exasperation and grumbles something about Americans will be the death of him.
"Fine, but only if it isn't gone by then."
"Yes, but the G8 is tomorrow and I'll drag you out of here at 7 tonight so you can get some sleep."
He looked like he was about to argue so she cut him off," I'll see you later, I'mma go hang out with your brother." Before he could respond she was up the stairs and closing the door.
...hetalia!...
"Pffft, what? You don't think I can hold my liquor?" Arianna says putting her hands on her hips.
"No, I mean lookit ya, you're so... -" Allistor trails of as if looking for a proper term.
"Short?" She asks with a huff.
He gives her that smirk,"Your words, not mine."
"I'll have you know, mister, that I can out drink my own dad." She narrows her eyes at him.
"Must be a light weight then." He keeps smirking that stupid smirk.
"I know what you're doing, and if you wanted to have a drinking buddy all you had to do was ask. I mean such an old man must be lonely, huh?" She says leaning back in her seat, smirking and crossing her arms. After she had come back up from the basement she helped Allistor clean up the dishes and now they were just sitting at the table chatting. Somehow the conversation had turned from simple cultural inquiries to him hinting that she wouldn't be able to go to the pub and leave walking.
He tips his head back as he busts up laughing. "You've got fire, I'll give ye that." He says once he calms down.
Cocking her head,"Say, Allie, why do you have that earring? Was it from when you were all crazy warrior-y?"
He chokes on air at the nickname she just called him. "Er, well it's to keep them blasted fairies of Arthur's tha fuck away from me."
"Oh, come on. How bad could they possibly be?" She raises an eyebrow.
"One isn't bad sure, but that little prick makes em swarm me. And they ain't all nice."
"He doesn't seem to be the kind to just do that for no reason. You must have been being a right bastard to him for him to want to make his friends fucking swarm you."
He frowns and scratches the back of his neck. She rolls her eyes."I thought so. I'm an older sibling too. My little sister could be Alfred's fucking twin except she's a little pussy. But you know what, for all the shit she gives me I know she loves me and I love her too." She stands up taking off her shirt and turns so he can see a giant silvery scar run from her shoulder to her hip.
"Crivvens!"
"Some asshole thought kidnapping my sister at knife-point was a good idea. I got this and now he can't walk anymore. My sister cried for a whole week." She slips her shirt back on and sits back down. "She thought I was going to die because of how much blood I lost. Even though all I needed was stitches. She was seven and I was 12. I had to be peeled off the guy. Apparently I was tearing at him and screeching like a rabid animal. I don't know. I have a tendency to black out when I fight while pissed off."
His eyebrows had damn near disappeared into his hairline, "You're like a little fucking berserker. But you don't have any nordic blood from what I can tell. It's like you're not fuckin' human."
She just shrugs."If I wasn't, then oh well."
"Well I feel like we need a drink." He says getting up and heading towards the wine cellar.
"It's only like 1pm." She follows him with her gaze.
As he opens the door and starts down the stairs he calls back,"Lass, think of it this way, the earlier ye drink, the longer you've got to sleep it off."
"That's some fucked logic you know that right? Alcoholics think like that!" She yells down to him and her response is some more laughter.
...hetalia!... one hour later...
Her face had a light pink dusting and they were both nursing about their 5th glass of whiskey. "And then she fuckin' called him a scratchcrotch!" They both started laughing hysterically.
"Man, yer family sounds fucked." She giggles at this.
"Yeah, but it's my fucked up family, and I wouldn't want em any other way. I can't stand boring people. And holy shit your eyes are sexy… Sorry! I really have a thing for green eyes. And purple ones, but it's mostly the green eyes that get me. Dammit self quit babbling." A lazy grin stretched it's way across his face and he leaned in closer.
"Oh yeah? Is there anything else about me ye find appealing?" There was a predatory glint in his eyes but it just caused her to grin back.
"I don't know, I'll have to think real hard about that." Cocking her head to the side the scrunches her face as if in thought.
"Oi, if ye need more convincin', I'd be glad ta show ye a few things that's sure ta make up yer mind." He says as he winks.
She busts up laughing. "Oh, what? You're going to show me what you keep under your kilt? What do you want me to do start blushing up a storm like a little high-school freshman girl? I got news for you bub, I may be a virgin but I ain't a prude."
"Oh, so you're a virgin? Well just so ye know, I'd be willin' ta fix that." He gives her a wink.
"Hmm, I might keep that in mind. But only if-" She was cut off by an explosion from the basement. She stood up wide-eyed and ran to Arthur's dungeon of magic. Looking around frantically, she couldn't see him. But on her 3rd glance over the room she saw a small cat unconscious where Arthur was reading when she came down to give him breakfast.
"Oh my gods," She says as she picks the ball of fluff up,"You went and turned yourself into a damned cat." Once she got him about eye level he started stirring awake.
"Good morning you fool wizard." She could see him scowl and and open his mouth to complain when then only noise that came out of his face was an irritated mewl. He then froze, his eyes almost popping out of his furry little head as he looked down at himself. When he gave a little whimper she felt her heart melt and she squished him to her.
"Don't worry, I'll fix it for you." He looked up and nuzzled her cheek. They both heard chuckling from the bottom of the stairs. Allistor was there looking like it was his birthday.
"Why don't ye hand him ta me? I'll watch him while ye try ta fix his mess." He was smirking and Arthur started shaking looking frantically between the two. Bad sign. She just pushed Arthur up onto her shoulder and snorted. "Sorry, Allie, but if I do that I have a feeling I'll be signing his death warrant. I'll just hold on to him for now. And you mister," She turns her head to the grateful looking feline," If you keep this up, I'll go find someone else to live with. And then if you turn yourself into an animal again you get to deal with Al and Francis. And don't scratch me."
Once Allistor left she walked around the table to read what he had been attempting before he got cattified. She had to roll her eyes. "Seriously? This one screams 'I'm gonna backfire'. It looks like a fucking 7 year old wrote it!" She looked over at him and noticed the depressed look on his face and sighed. "But I appreciate your attempts to turn me normal. Now where's your cabbage seeds?" And with that she got to work.
After about 30 minutes of brewing and grinding herbs and various animal body parts up and dumping them into the thick sludge forming in the cauldron. She ladled out some to fill a wooden bowl she found on a shelf in the back. She set it on a clear space on the floor and pried Arthur off her shoulder and sat him in front of it.
He gave her an appalled look as if to say,'This is disgusting!' Unimpressed she crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow. "Yes I'm sure there's a spell in one of those books to turn you back but guess what? I think you rely on spells too much. Drink the fucking potion." Looking thoroughly beaten he finally started lapping up the slime in the bowl. After the first couple licks he gagged and looked up at her only see no pity. Once he was done he collapsed and started yowling in pain. Now she started worrying. Then she heard snapping and popping of bones and joints.
She cringed and forced herself to stay calm. She knew something like this was going to happen but it was the surest way to turn them back to normal. It was supposed to turn things into their natural form. She had to use it once when she turned her dog purple.
She lifted the ladle up and drank. She waited for the pain of her extra appendages disappearing but felt none. Dropping it back into the mixture she swore. That's when she remembered he had said he was trying to summon something to keep her company. Well apparently he had succeeded. It was the only explanation as to why the potion hadn't worked.
Sighing she sat down and started meditating. She started digging through her own mind for anything out of place when she felt a flittering near the back. 'There you are. Would you mind vacating me?' A fox's face appeared and started yipping and chattering at her. Telling her that it was asked to come and keep her from being lonely. And to protect her. They talked for a few minutes and figured out a compromise. The fox could stay. As long as it returned her to normal. Of course it could come out when it felt there was danger or that she was frightened or startled. Or at her will. Unfortunately she wouldn't look normal for a whole week still because it had to get settled and that was why it hadn't made contact yet. And apparently it would give her the ability to understand most animals. 'Okay, okay, that sounds pretty awesome. You can stay.' It started yipping and bouncing around.
Bidding it farewell she opened her eyes and instantly flinched back. Huge green eyes were staring into hers. "You know you did the exact same thing when we met." She said pushing him away by placing her hand on his forehead and giving a little shove. He toppled over backwards.
Grumbling, he sat back up and huffed."Well that nasty concoction you made apparently worked for me. Did you drink any?"
"Yes and did you forget that you summoned a creature? Yeah that thing is living in me now. Otherwise the potion would have worked."
His face twisted into a look of utter horror. She just waved it off. "It's fine though! It isn't malicious. We talked and I told it that it can stay. Don't worry. Oh and you don't have to wear the ears and tail tomorrow."
He sighed in relief."But, you should go to bed. Transforming into a cat and back must be exhausting. Not to mention the whole staying up all night thing. Yeah I understand it's only like 4 in the afternoon just go on I'll clean up down here." Giving her a grateful smile he trudged up the stairs and off to his room leaving her to the books scattered everywhere.