Zetsubou no Amai Kiss Shite? Chapter 14: Underground, a hetalia - axis powers fanfic

Zetsubou no Amai Kiss Shite?
(Won't You Give Me a Kiss of Despair?)

Last Chapter Summary:
After a month of being hypnotized by Arthur, Elizaveta Héderváry, she of the photography club, FINALLY found out the truth about Arthur's nature and decided to investigate further. Meanwhile, Gilbert Beilschmidt made true on his promise and sent Vampires to attack Arthur, who was banished from Vampire society. Fortunately, Antonio and Alfred helped. And of course, everyone arrived and saved our cynical British Vampire. Yaaaaay.

IMPORTANT! Read this! DL, DR!

Warnings: Violence, Language, Mentions of Blood, scientist!Poland, and nasty bugs. You've been warned, people.

Pairings: AmeriPan. Black and White both.

Genre: Horror & Supernatural

Chapter Summary: Kiku finds himself trapped underground as a biological scientist named Feliks tries to talk him into buying a unique kind of merchandise—that is, a merchandise that eats human flesh! Meanwhile, while searching for Kiku, Alfred is reminded again that his relationship with Kiku is far deeper than any contract. Will Alfred successfully find Kiku before feeding time comes?

Fourteenth Drop of Blood:
Underground

"A drop of Blood… is a drop of life."

Drops of vivid red Blood trailed down Kiku's slender fingers, and threatened to drip from the tips. Alfred, kneeling on one knee before his master, watched the glowing Blood as it was held tantalizingly in front of him.

"You may drink."

Alfred took Kiku's pale hand and applied his lips to the soft skin, his tongue snaking out to taste Kiku's Blood.

Kiku's Blood tasted as delicious as ever—drinking his Blood was like eating succulent food and drinking rich wine, all the while having comfortable clothes around you that warm you to the tips of your toes.

Alfred had to admit, his drinking of Kiku's Blood was like a private moment that only the two of them can bear witness to.

Kiku slowly opened his dark eyes, and strangely felt stiff all over. Wondering what the hell happened, he looked around and saw that he was in a moderately large cavern, and upon moving, he found out that he was bound tight by a strange, cocoon-like substance that stuck him right on the wall like a helpless fly.

Feeling highly amused by the situation, he looked around once more and saw Arthur's coffin bound shut with the same substance. No doubt the Vampire was still inside. Matthew was there too, his glasses askew as he slept peacefully, unaware of the immediate danger that he was in. There were two other people similarly bound in the room, but Kiku didn't recognize them.

Kiku was at least relieved that Alfred, Antonio, and Herakles were not in the cavern too, but he wasn't sure if they were locked up in another room of the same sort. But before he could expound further upon his thoughts, a crackling of static can be heard, and a voice said, undoubtedly from the speaker up on the ceiling:

"So, are you, like, awake now?"

Kiku frowned. He faintly recognized the voice, and he was sure that he had no pleasant connotations to be had with that person.

"It's, like, a pity to not see your pretty face, like, personally," the voice continued. "It's a pity that you have, like, that expression on your face that looked as if you, like, wanna die when you heard my, like, totally bitchin' voice, but…" The voice suddenly sank into a whisper. "…I have a nice proposition for you, like, totally!"

Kiku absolutely looked as if he would have crossed his arms and smiled sarcastically at the speaker if he just could. "Really, Feliks?"

"I'm home!"

Alfred had opened the front door wide and slipped off his black school shoes when he noticed something.

The inside of the house looked as if it had been attacked by mini-bombs. The floor was littered with large holes, and Alfred noticed that the house was eerily silent. No Matthew rushed to the hall to greet him back, no Antonio to suddenly bound into the room and ask him about his day, no Herakles to go from his gardening and look at him blankly, and most importantly, no Kiku to go down the stairs and smile sarcastically at him with a sweetly mocking "Good afternoon, Alfred."

"Kiku? Matt?" Alfred went around and looked into all the rooms on the ground floor of the house. "Antonio? Herakles?"

"Here…" a faint voice sounded from a hole that Alfred just passed.

Alfred went to the hole and peered in rather cautiously. It was about six feet deep, and on the bottom was Herakles, who was buried up to his waist in the rock and looking up into Alfred's face with his usual sleepy expression.

"Where's everybody?" Alfred said loudly, panic making his voice rise.

Herakles merely pointed in front of him. Puzzled, Alfred leapt into the hole beside the android and looked into the direction that Herakles pointed at. It was a dug tunnel, winding through the ground.

"So everybody's there?" Alfred looked at Herakles, who nodded.

"And I think you're buried in there because of your weight?"

The android nodded again.

"Well, that matter's cleared, at least." Alfred sighed to himself, and borrowing Herakles's flashlight and ax, he started on the tunnel.

"How long is this tunnel anyways?" Alfred wondered aloud as he walked along. The tunnel seemed to be stretching infinitely, and there were no distinguishing features in the landscape except for the occasional rocks strewn here and there. "Who made this tunnel, and when did they do this?"

Just then, when he stepped forward, the rock suddenly gave way, and the unfortunate Alfred fell through the floor and into another passageway below.

The first feeling that Alfred was aware of was wetness. When he rose from the water where he fell into, he found that he was in some kind of sewer system.

"Antonio?"

He had seen the Spaniard strolling along the walk that bordered the water, and his call made Antonio turn around in surprise.

"Alfredo? What the hell are you doing here?" Antonio's green eyes widened. "Hide! Quick!"

"Huh?" Alfred was about to ask why, when a loud buzzing filled his ears.

Two long pincers grabbed him from behind by the collar of his uniform, and he was lifted high in the air. Alfred had a split-second vision of the earth leaving his feet before Antonio raised his paw and sent the insect smashing into the water, dropping him safely.

"What the fuck was that?" Alfred asked in a whisper.

"Don't know, but they keep on appearing outta nowhere," Antonio said seriously. "Maybe bugs?"

"Something that big?" Alfred asked incredulously. "C'mon, dude."

"Seriously speaking, Alfredo." Antonio helped Alfred up onto his feet. "More importantly, we need to be careful. Even I can't sense their presence." He looked around warily. "Once we get caught, we're probably going to be taken somewhere, just like the señorito and your hermano Mateo."

"Oh, is that, like, a half-Werewolf?"

The scientist with chin-length blond hair smiled at the screen that showed Antonio and Alfred walking along the sewers.

"And that teenager… Could he be, like, a Blood warrior?" biologist Feliks Łukasiewicz wondered as he sat back on a comfortable armchair, surveying the screens in front of him. "A mere boy like that! What secrets could he have, like, possibly held?" Feliks smiled widely. "This is getting totes interesting! What do you think, Kiku-sama?"

Kiku prudently held his normally sharp tongue.

"As for the merchandise that I've, like, developed," Feliks continued, "you can totally, like, acknowledge it now! But as your, like, subordinate, may I ask you to, like, confirm its quality firsthand?"

Kiku's expression was kept carefully neutral. "Merchandise, you say?"

"I'm going to totally turn this into a business, you know," Feliks said, flipping his hair like a schoolgirl. "Biological warfare is very advantageous if you think about it! Creatures synthesized from, like, various insects are so amazing! And I would so like to sell them to you. They'd be totally useful in reconnaissance missions!"

Kiku could almost imagine the scientist jumping up and down on his seat. "That's alright," he said clearly, raising his voice. "Besides, your bugs are an army, and that's out of the question."

Feliks was silent for a few moments, and Kiku wondered whether he was angry or shocked or a bit of both.

"But didn't one of your, like, brothers openly defy that rule?" the biologist said slowly. "And when he annihilated your former Blood warriors, didn't he, like, use the most forbidden out of forbidden things?"

"Fufu." Kiku sneered with a vengeance. "If you are that desperate to earn money, Feliks, wouldn't selling my life to that traitorous brother of mine be more profitable to you? Negotiations will probably be quicker than a blink."

Feliks hissed angrily. "You forget that I'm a scientist. Maybe I should show you the fruits of my research!"

A faint buzzing filled the air.

"Examine them carefully," the scientist said. "Feeding time is still two hours away!"

"Damn! Another dead end!" Antonio looked as if he was ready to tear his hair out at any moment.

Alfred looked despairingly past the bars of black metal that hindered their path, and sighed.

"Maybe we should go back to that last junction," Antonio suggested. "I—"

"Antonio."

"What?"

Alfred took a deep breath, and decided to finally express his suspicions. "There's probably a loop in here. And they're leading us around the place in circles."

Antonio frowned. "If that's so, I'll just break open these iron grates and we can—"

"Um, related to that, I don't think we have to necessarily do that," Alfred said cautiously, amazed by his brain wave. "I mean, those insects are in here without breaking anything."

"THEN WHAT SHOULD WE DO?"

"I don't know either…"

"If they didn't, like, discover the secret of this place soon, they'll, like, never be able to, like, reach you in time." Feliks chuckled lightly at the microphone, subtly taunting Kiku.

The prince, however, just raised his dark eyes to the camera and smiled angelically. "They're coming."

"How can you say that, Kiku-sama?" the biologist said.

"If Alfred F. Jones truly is aware that he is a Blood warrior, he'll find his way in here," Kiku said calmly, his eyes closing as if in a meditative manner. "Then I can go back home and drink some of Matthew-san's black tea."

A bug suddenly snatched Antonio from behind and carried him off into the air, but Alfred took heart and threw Herakles's ax at it, at which accurate shot tore it into two halves. Antonio picked himself up from the water and shook all over like a (ironically) wet dog.

"Where did that critter come from?" he gasped.

Alfred just shrugged, and ran over to Antonio. "Okay, dude?"

Antonio nodded absently, then his eyes widened as he saw—

"Alfredo!"

Alfred felt two sharp knifelike things stab him deeply in the back, blood spluttering out as they went cleanly through him. He knew that it was one of those infernal bugs.
Antonio had gathered his wits and had delivered a smashing roundhouse kick to the bug's head, making it draw out its pincers immediately out of Alfred and making the Blood warrior hiss in pain.

Before the gigantic insect could even react from the smashing kick, Alfred picked up the dropped ax and aimed for the head, tearing it off with a totally grossing-out kind of sound.

"I now know what it is," Antonio said seriously as the headless body of the giant bug dropped in the water. "They use camouflage. I didn't see it until about a moment before finally pouncing on you."

"And that is, like, the first amazing feature of my merchandise!" Feliks was saying enthusiastically like an overeager salesgirl. "And there's another one, but I'm not telling it to you just yet!"

"The first feature is camouflage, then?" Kiku said with a mocking smile. "I wonder what the second is…!"

"DAMMIT!"

Antonio punched the wall, detached bricks flying everywhere at the brute strength. Alfred flinched when Antonio looked at him with dark green eyes.

"This is hopeless, Alfredo!" Antonio snarled. "Tell me, how many days had passed since you last drank of the señorito's Blood?"

"Three days," Alfred said hesitantly, instantly knowing what Antonio was driving at.

"Then that means that you have roughly two days left," Antonio said with a heavy sigh. "We have to think of time as a factor now!"

Alfred stared at Antonio with a wary look.

"We must think of the worst case scenario—that is, the possibility that we may not be able to save the señorito." Antonio shook his head wearily. "It's possible that he wasn't even here at all in the first place!"

"Alfred, do you swear to place your life in my hands, to use in any way if needed?"

"…Yes."

Kiku smiled lightly and held out his hand, dripping with glowing red Blood.

"Do you promise to protect me as the Blood warrior of Kiku of the Golden Chrysanthemum, and to never desert me in times of difficulty?"

"Yes."

"…Alfred," Kiku's eyes were as soft as liquid darkness. "Should circumstances require it, will you swear by your half-immortality to let me kill you by my own hands rather than risk falling to enemy hands?"

Alfred scowled lightly and lowered his head in thought. Then he looked back up into Kiku's eyes.

"Yes. I give you my life."

"Oh, my! Have they, like, already given up?" Feliks giggled with glee. "Only ten minutes until feeding time, Kiku-sama! Have you, like, decided to buy my merchandise already?"

Kiku feigned a look of bored surprise. "Buy? Me?"

The sarcasm wasn't lost on the scientist. "But inside you must be, like, realizing the excellence of my insects! They, like, so rock!"

Kiku rolled his eyes impatiently. "Excellence? Don't make me laugh. No member of the Royalty would buy such defective merchandise."

Feliks snorted into laughter. "Still? Then I shall tell you the second feature—"

"There is no need," Kiku interrupted with a haughty air. "You said that there's ten minutes left, right?" The silence was profound on the other side, so Kiku smirked and plowed on. "We'll see when the time comes. Although it can be a little bit earlier." He tilted his head slightly. "Why don't you ask your defective creatures to come and, in Arthur Kirkland's colorful speech, have a go at me?"

"So are you telling me to just give this up?"

Alfred's icy blue eyes were locked with Antonio's.

"I didn't say anything about giving up," Antonio said exasperatedly. "But you have to think of your own situation a little!" He put his right hand on his hip in a matter-of-fact manner. "If it comes to the worst, you could offer yourself up as a Blood warrior to Xiao Chun instead and—"

"But—!"

"No buts!" Antonio snapped.

"But I'm still alive, Antonio!" Alfred burst out, indignation coloring his face. "And Kiku is also still alive!"

"You may drink."

Antonio froze as he saw the enraged blue of Alfred's eyes slowly turn into violet and then a vivid red, and his constricted round pupils turn into slits. The Blood warrior trembled as he felt the steady reassuring hum of Kiku's Blood singing out to him from somewhere.

"I know where he is."

Antonio snapped out into it as Alfred suddenly turned tail and ran, splashing water everywhere.

"Wait!"

Alfred stopped at a certain portion of the wall and swung his ax hard at it. Antonio expected the blade to rebound, but it stuck fast to the bricks and blood spurted out of the crack it made. In amazement, Antonio watched as an insect suddenly appeared out of nowhere, pinned to the wall and its head cleaved in two by the ax. When it fell backward, it revealed a secret passageway into another chamber.

"Amazing," Antonio gasped.

Alfred silently walked inside into the adjoining cavern, his eyes returning into their original blue color.

Kiku looked up as he heard the crash of the insect's body on the floor, and the dark eyes met with the blue.

"You're late, Alfred," Kiku said with a sigh. "But at least you came."

"Are you alright?"

"Yes, merely bored out of my wits," Kiku said with an involuntary shudder as Alfred released him from his bondage. Kiku stretched his arms out with a grimace and watched Alfred as the latter cut Matthew free. "And Feliks? That second mystery feature… I think…" He grabbed Alfred's ax out of the latter's hands, to his surprise, and suddenly brought it down on the head of one of the unrecognizable people in the room, a young girl, which earned a shocked gasp from both Alfred and Antonio.

What astonished them more, however, was the fact that the young girl immediately morphed into one of the giant insect creatures after being killed in its sleep.

"Mimicry," Kiku said with a stifled yawn. "Or in other words, metamorphic abilities." He looked up at the camera's lens. "Wasn't the buzzing annoying, Feliks?"

"But aren't you, like, at the disadvantage in this instance?" Feliks answered snidely after evidently recovering from his shock. "Look…!"

The darkest corners of the cavern lit up with a thousand pairs of glowing red eyes. Alfred looked around and decided to appreciate the danger of the situation.

"Feeding time!" the voice boomed over the speakers, and Antonio shivered as he began cutting the coffin free from its bounds.

"Alfred," Kiku called the Blood warrior, thrusting the ax in his hands. "Here is your ax."

"But what about—?" Alfred started to say, but Kiku held his index finger up, and Alfred stopped speaking as if he was struck dumb.

"Fufu. I shall command as your master." Kiku crossed his arms and smiled enticingly at Alfred. "Protect me, Blood warrior!"

Alfred's eyes rounded out at this show of faith, and without even noticing, his eyes had changed color again from blue to red.

Antonio, meanwhile, had wrenched the lid of the coffin rather rudely and pulled Arthur out from his comfortable sleep. The Vampire began yawning and rubbing his eyes sleepily.
"Who the blazes is waking me up at this time of day…" he muttered grudgingly, vibrant green eyes half-closed.

"What an easygoing person," Antonio sighed, shaking his head with annoyance.

Alfred noticed someone else clambering in the cavern along to them, and he turned to see Herakles, who had finally succeeded in struggling out of his predicament earlier and was carrying another ax and a pistol. He casually flung the gun at the prince, who caught it easily as if he was used to having heavy things thrown at him.

"You came too, Hera-chan," Kiku smiled sweetly at the android. "Now we correct this little problem!"

And without another word, he started forward with the gun.

The battle was furious and chaotic—Alfred had to lop off a dozen of the creatures' heads before he could clear his line of sight, and even then another dozen of the bugs were upon him next. Kiku was mostly passive, blowing the insects' heads off without a flinch of any kind. Meanwhile, Antonio and Arthur were striking with just their brute strength, and Herakles was aiming rather recklessly at the insects' stomachs. Alfred had to admit, insect guts aren't exactly his most favorite thing to feel smacking on his face, but whatever. Herakles didn't seem to care either which way.

"—And that's what happened." Matthew sighed as he poured Kiku some more tea. "When I woke up,I had been asleep in bed. There were those holes on the floor too. Maybe we have termites here after all…"

Kiku looked up from his tea and fixed his eyes on Matthew's goodnatured face in a long, clear gaze.

"Fufu," the prince finally said, and he placed the cup of black tea on the table. "The tea you make is delicious as always, Matthew-san."

The blond beamed at Kiku's compliment. "Thank you, Kiku-sama."

The short, slender boy, wearing a pure white kimono with golden chrysanthemums embroidered at the hem, watched the scenery of the ravine far below him as he brushed back his troublesome bangs away from his face. However, the wind persisted in playing with his dark hair.

"The wheels are set in motion," he whispered to himself, gentle dark eyes smoldering on his pale face. "If Kiku of the Golden Chrysanthemum makes even one mistake against Yong Soo of the Pale Sharon… I'm afraid it'll be the end for the master and the Blood warrior alike…"

He sighed and bit the skin of his right index finger, dull red blood running out and dripping on the trousers of his kimono, staining the white and gold with red.

"Be strong, Alfred-kun," he said with a smile, holding out his bitten hand in the freezing air. "And we might just meet in the future… Maybe…?"

A/N: How do you like that? New loose threads to pick up!

Poor Matt. I made him out to be quite the oblivious one, which was really the opposite.

Any chance of more reviewers out there? Raise up the morale of this poor onee-chan who toils at her school work all week!

Also I'm planning a USUK story for the future—GOSICK-centric. OK with you all? Here's its tentative summary:

"'The year is 1939. On the base of a certain mountain in the land of tea and scones, battle-scarred England, stands the prestigious St. George of Lydda Academy, the only English school that still opened its doors to international students from Allied countries after the conclusion of the Great War and even while World War II was beginning to break out.'

"Alfred F. Jones, the second son of a high ranking officer of the American army, is one of its very few transfer students, making him a novelty in a school where urban legends and horror stories are all the rage. There he meets Arthur Kirkland, a mysterious yet brilliant English teenager who never comes to class and instead spends his days reading all the books in the library or else solving the most complex of puzzles.

"As war threatens to break out again in the form of World War II, Alfred must come to terms with his obligation to go back to the aid of his motherland America, his growing feelings for the cynical Arthur, and also his desire to save Arthur from a horrible destiny that, if fulfilled, will surely change the history of England… and of the whole world."

[Bloody kick-ass, innit? Gotta be awesome! If the idea ever pans out, it'll be my first USUK!] You could include in your review if you want it to be started on already, since I'm just dangling my pen in front of my computer and doing nothing lately… Okay, guys? I'm outta here!

Next Chapter Summary: The beginning of the First Blood arc. Feliks visits Kiku to make amends about his behavior, and as appeasement, discloses valuable information: A member of the Royalty's hideout! Kiku and his team go there to investigate the authenticity of the scientist's information and to grab the chance for first Blood, but a new enemy in the shape of Eun Soo of the White Magnolia appears, and her involvement might be deadly for Antonio and Arthur…