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Driving Lessons Chapter 73 We Don't Need Another Hero
"Henry? Could you please just take off your bloody armour? This broom cupboard isn't big enough for all of us? Or at least bugger off." England said again.
"Don't talk to my father like that!" King Henry VI said.
"Idiot dead kings…" Prussia mumbled.
"I will wrest your head from your body!" King Henry V rumbled.
"How? You can't bloody touch us!" Den replied.
"With the power of my will alone!" King Henry V told him.
"He's bloody charming isn't he?"
"But all I want to know is why they're not eating beef?" America whined again. For the twelfth time.
"Will you all just shut up?" England hissed. "They're just called Beefeaters, Alfred. They don't necessarily eat beef although they did used to be paid in beef…"
"Ha!" Alfred said triumphantly.
"Den, Pru, just shut up. He can't help it. He's dead." England added as Den began bullying the older King Henry.
"Don't insult me!" Henry V said.
"Yes but you are bloody dead!"
Prussia shook his head. They wouldn't have this problem if they'd had King Frederick (Fritz) with them.
England's nerves were shredded. Being trapped in a two metre square cleaners cupboard with America, Prussia and Denmark (aka the 'Awesome Trio') and two dead kings would do this to a Nation.
They waited - as they had waited for going on three hours - for the security staff and tourists at the Tower of London (where they now were) to go home.
"I hope dude Carl's okay," Den said for the seventeenth time (England had counted). (This was the name Denmark had decided to bestow upon 'Charlemagne'.)
England did not answer. As 'dude Carl' was the child who had kept him up most of the night with his screaming, England did not really care how he was. 'Dude Carl' obviously did not care if he was now so tired he was hallucinating.
As it was 'Dude Carl'/'Fritzy/Charlemagne was left in the capable babysitting hands of a jet lagged Russia and a drunken France who were watching Disney movies.
The refrains of the opening bars of Coronation Street suddenly rang out in the tiny cupboard. England quickly answered his phone. "Who is this?" He asked, in a thoroughly cross voice. There was panting on the other end. :Bloody heavy breathing pervert!" He said. He turned to America, "One of those dirty phone calls…"
"France." Denmark whispered to Prussia. Prussia nodded. Henry V alarmingly began telling them, again, about the battle of Agincourt. Den told him it was 'boring, dude' and the King shut up.
England listened to the refrains on his phone. "No you can't bloody watch porn! Not on my telly." He said. "I don't care, Francis." He added.
"But you watch it." Came France's whiny voice.
"No I don't."
"Yes you do, every Sunday. Those old people in pastel polo shirts waving old rubbishy paintings around in a field."
"That's bloody Antiques Roadshow you idiot."
"We are bringing up a new Nation and he should be moulded so that he can be the best," Russia said, interrupting the phone conversation, or probably just shoving France out of the way and grabbing the phone from him.
"Mouldy?" Pru asked. "You're mouldy."
"You will be mouldy when I get my hands around your neck," Russia said.
They quickly cut the connection.
(Russia had arrived back at dawn that same day carrying a toy panda (which he'd bestowed upon England telling him it was a special souvenir for him from Mr Panda, England had held it at arms length and then given it to Charlemagne) and a Union Jack umbrella which he'd obviously stolen from a scared tourist. He then fell promptly asleep after threatening Henry V. The only person who could threaten a ghost. He'd also announced that he could tell that Belarus had been there.)
Prussia was spending the time in the cupboard rearranging the cleaning equipment.
"Why man?" Den asked him.
"OCD man." Pru explained. "It's a Prussian thing."
"Shut up," England hissed.
"Man, you're grumpy," America hissed back.
"2 hours sleep thanks to that demon child tends to make a man grumpy. Getting up every bloody half hour to burp an idiot child tends to make a person grumpy. Feeding Charlemagne every bloody hour tends to make a person grumpy. Damn! I've raised a few kids but never one that ate quite so much…" he eyed America suspiciously. He had not altogether ruled him out.
"Man, I love Carl. He has the proper makings of a dude," Den said, whether this was because 'Carl' had kept England awake all night, is unsure.
"No he doesn't. He would if he were American," America said.
"What is an American?" King Henry V asked.
America almost fainted from shock until England explained to him that when Henry V was around the American nation didn't exist.
Before they could all start fighting in a space less than 2 metres square which would have done nothing for England's frazzled nerves, they realised that the building had gone very quiet and that the tourists had probably gone home, or 'back to their hovels', England said. The bags under his eyes cast shadows.
"Ready, men?" America said and opened the door.
"Who put you in charge?" England asked.
But it was too late. The 'Awesome Trio', stealthily fell out of the door on top of one another, with America under Den and Pru.
"I bet you never thought you'd be in the Awesome Trio eh?" America said to England as he got up and brushed himself off. The American was in full camouflage gear, his face streaked with green make-up to make him blend him. (He was in a historic building England had pointed out at the time, not in a combat situation.)
"It's not a Trio if there's four. It's a quad." England wearily said.
"And that's why he's not allowed in it," Pru said.
"I don't want to be in it," England countered. He thought about asking if there was an application form but decided against it.
"Don't diss my mates," Pru said.
"I'm not dissing them, I'm saying…oh never mind… I'm tired from all this nonsense."
"So am I." Den said.
"You didn't get up until 2.00 pm." England said.
"Ja exactly," Den replied. "I can still taste the toothpaste."
"Where's this crown need to go then?" Pru said and swaggered off.
"Down in the Crown Room," England said.
"You don't say…" Prussia said.
Pru strutted off with Den hurrying after and America following kungfu-ing his way down the corridor. England looked at the blueprint of the Tower he'd found on Peter's old laptop (why on earth the boy had a copy of the blueprint of the Tower of London with the Jewel House outlined, England dreaded to think). Finding this (although it was Pru who found it in a folder named 'future jobs' - England had no idea even how to switch the damned thing on) had highlighted to England just how reprobate his son was but also to his shame how tempted he had been to 'dob him in'. This is what living with these imbeciles had done to him. But then he'd thought of incurring Sweden's wrath and decided not to.
"I hope there's armed guards," America said excitedly. He was actually unarmed himself after England almost had a heart attack when America announced he needed to take 'arms' with them. As it turned out, America had no proper guns, only a toy gun with caps and a light sabre. Both of these were banned.
"This is Britain, not America. The most dangerous thing in this building will be a gift shop selling shortbread," Pru said.
Den looked worried. "Scottish shortbread?"
"In tartan tins," Pru said in an ominous voice.
"Shut up, it's not funny," Den said.
"Piece of cake, this." Pru said and flung open the door in front of them which he knew that this was the correct door because he was bloody awesome… and almost fell in when the others piled in behind him.
"Woah, back up there!" He yelled, his nose two inches from the floor. America had caught him by the collar with his amazing super-fast reflexes.
The floor was criss-crossed with red lines indicating infra-red motion sensor alarms. If Prussia had fallen on them then the alarms would have gone off.
"Awesome," America breathed and pulled Prussia back.
"Right, let's go home," England said. "That's it. 200 years imprisonment. Could be quite bracing. Especially if I get solitary…". 200 years in solitary would mean he could finally finish reading some of those Dickens novels that he usually abandoned halfway through. He might even finish some of his embroidery - a cross-stitch that said 'I hate France'. His bloodshot eyes would have lit up if he hadn't been so exhausted. He slumped against the wall.
"I could do this by levitating," Pru said confidently.
England doubted the Prussian understood the word. He didn't think Prussia could levitate.
"What?"
"Oh sorry I mean elevating? Deviating? Meditating? Accumulating?" With each word England shook his head. Pru gave up and consulted with Den in a mixture of German and Danish with the Dane nodding seriously.
"Masticating." Pru said finally.
America looked utterly horrified and shocked. "That ain't nice dude," the American said.
England stared at Pru, "By chewing?" He asked.
"Never mind."
"We're getting nowhere, men," America said definitively and shoved them aside. "Watch and weep." He then backflipped and forward-flipped, cartwheeled and walkover-ed his way across the floor missing the red lines completely - sometimes just by centimetres.
"Wow." Denmark breathed.
America waved at them from across the room.
"Well?" Pru called.
"Wrong room," America replied.
England briefly closed his eyes and was preparing his speech for the Queen where he had to explain that 'yes he had the Imperial State Crown but was returning it and he hadn't sat on the upholstery and shouldn't that count for something'? He doubted that it did.
America backflipped his way back to them and then stood looking at the blueprint map in Prussia's hand. "So where is it then?"
Pru shrugged. "Can't understand this rubbish thing."
"What about this?" Den asked, giving them a touristy map complete with illustrations of Beefeaters, kings without heads and a rather cheery looking Queen Elizabeth I.
"That's not going to be any good. We need a proper map."
Den looked hurt. "It says here it's just down there," he pointed down some steps.
King Henry V pointed with is sword, "This way!" He said in a booming commanding voice. Henry VI looked at him adoringly.
"I'm in charge, Deadie," America said. "This looks completely stupid and infancile.. Infantish… silly… so I think we should totally do this, men!" America announced and led the way.
England, who was falling asleep standing up, was jolted awake by Den who gave him a shove.
"Come on dude!" Den said.
"Damn you!" England said with a croak. He really really needed a cup of tea. And possibly a custard cream. That would wake him up. He was about to ask one of the Henrys if they could possibly get him one but America's next statement woke him up.
"What a dump," America announced as they went down the crumbling stone steps.
"This 'dump' was built in 1078 and is…was… one of the most important buildings in London," England said indignantly.
"I died here in the year 1471," Henry VI told them.
"They really need to re-decorate," America said.
Prussia nodded.
Henry V however just looked appalled. "It is terrible! My son! Murdered in the Tower!" He roared and waved his sword around. The same sword that had probably killed a lot of Frenchmen.
"Crown room you say?" America asked, totally ignoring the two dead Kings as if they were inconsequential (they were to him).
But before anyone could say 'yes', he'd already slammed open the door.
"Well?" One of the others asked him.
"Dunno how we're going to get across to that," America said and pointed to the glass cabinet which stood vacant.
Between that and them the floor was criss-crossed with heat sensors, infra-red sensors, and motion sensors top to bottom.
"Bugger," Den said. He'd liked this swear word that he'd adopted from England.
"Well, better get going than eh? Let England end up in prison, nothing to do with us." Pru said and prepared to swagger off.
"No!" America said, grabbing him by the lapels. "Without Artie dude where would we live?"
"Well you should live in the White House," Pru said.
"Precisely. Nobody wants that."
"I'll live there instead of you and get to know the First Lady a little better…" Den said and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.
"You don't know her."
"Is it that Michelle person?" Den asked.
"Not any more."
"Why?" Den whined. "I liked her! She gave me a cookie once when I visited with my Danish PM."
America didn't answer.
"Was she your mom?" Pru asked America in what sounded like a sympathetic whisper as if something terrible had happened.
America didn't answer the question but said something equally terrible. "We need to replace that crown or you two will have to get jobs!"
"We could get jobs," Pru said in a huff.
"Ja," Den didn't sound so certain.
"As delivery drivers," Pru said.
"We don't have a van since those dead guys stole it." Den pointed out. (Ignoring the fact that it was they that had stolen it in the first place.)
"It doesn't matter," Pru said.
America frowned. "Don't you need a vehicle to be delivery drivers?"
"Probably," Pru conceded.
"We could just deliver by bus. Or use your brother's car." Den said to Pru.
"The one that England hasn't destroyed yet?" Pru said, emphasising the 'yet'.
"Or we could use England's precious Bentley," Denmark suggested.
America looked around, "Where is dude England?"
Dude England was fast asleep in a corner, exhaustion at being up at all hours having finally caught up with him. He dreamt of Michelle Obama (weirdly) giving him a bubble bath, the Queen shouting at him about Antiques Roadshow - something about taking the Imperial State Crown to the Antiques Roadshow and then it all dissolved into Russia singing Slavic peasant revolt songs to Charlemagne. "The child… spare the child…" he muttered in his sleep.
"Poor dude. We'll sort this for you. Come on, men! I've got an idea!" America said and stomped off in full super hero mode.
Over at dude England's house France and Russia were indeed babysitting. Russia was singing Slavic peasant revolt songs to Charlemagne. They were watching Pocahontas and then the domestic scene dissolved into chaos when France had asked Russia if he wanted nibbles. Russia had been so insulted that he'd chased the Frenchman around the house. France had finished up in the broom closet with the vacuum cleaner telephoning Lithuania for help.
America hung upside down with just a wire harness around his waist. He had crawled through a ventilation shaft and then abseiled down from the shaft opening in the ceiling - all the while Den and Pru had watched open-mouthed - and all the while humming the Mission Impossible theme tune. God he was good!
"Right where does this crown thingy go?" He shouted across to Den and Pru stood in the doorway.
"What crown?" Den asked.
"Oh yeah… where is it?" Pru said with some realisation.
"Dead guy's got it," Den said, pointing at King Henry VI.
Henry shook his ghostly head. "I did have it, but not any more." He pointed at his father. "Daddy has it!"
"Come on, Deadie, give it up," Pru said and approached the Henry V. "If you don't give it to us, I'll give you a wedgie."
"Threatening dead guys…. Awesome!" Den said to Pru as they stood holding the crown. Henry V, the great warrior king, the victor of Agincourt, sat in the corridor holding his crotch (although it was encased in armour).
"Daddy!" Henry VI said, sitting next to him.
"Bunch of idiots," Den said. "Go and bother King Charles and his head." He told them.
The two King Henrys dissipated - presumably to do so.
Prussia high-fived Denmark. They stood in the doorway and looked at America who was still hanging upside down by a wire.
"When you've finished bullying dead guys, I've got blood going to my head here," Alfred called.
"Ja, well we need to get the crown to him now," Pru said to Den. "And we don't have dead dude to do it."
"Ja, maybe we should have given Alfie the crown before he went down there?" Den said. The most sensible thing he'd said for half a century.
Pru thought about this and then nodded.
They stepped over England's prone sleeping form (he was still in his dressing gown and pyjamas and somebody had drawn spectacles on his face with a sharpie) and climbed up into the ventilation system.
"This is like that Die Hard movie," Den said excitedly, crawling through the narrow shaft.
Pru nodded, fought the urge to ask if the movie had featured a sad middle-aged Nation wearing a dressing gown and asked instead. "You got the crown?"
"Ja!" Den said. It was on his head.
"Gut."
"Do you think John McCain could have done this? Holding a pint of Carlsberg as well?" Den asked.
Prussia turned to look at him, saw the pint of lager and smiled, "Definitely not. He wasn't Danish."
"Exactly. So that means I'm better than him."
"Yeah and this isn't the Nakatomi plaza!"
Denmark looked confused.
"Die Hard?" Prussia asked.
"Is that what we're on about?"
"Can you hurry it up, men? I can't feel my head!" America yelled from beyond. "And yes, it's Die Hard and John McCain and the Nakatomi Plaza… actually a skyscraper. And this is nothing like that. Unless I put my vest on and take off my shoes and socks!"
"Pass me the crown, dudes." America called up when he saw Den and Pru finally peering at him through the open ventilation shaft.
"How?"
"Oh yes…" America thought hard. He was still dangling by a wire upside down into the Crown Room. They were fifteen feet above him.
"Haul me back up, men."
Pru nodded at Den, who nodded back and they began to pull the wire back up.
"It's like that Impossible Mission film," Den said.
"Ja."
"Mission Impossible," America corrected them. His extremities had gone numb from blood loss. The blood had rushed to his head making his complexion very red.
"Why are you blushing, man?" Den asked as they pulled him through the ventilation hole.
"Hung upside down," America said.
Den gave him some beer. America coughed. He wasn't a heavy drinker (having seen the effect it had on England).
"Big Jessie," Den said.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Get on with it. We're missing Antiques Roadshow." Prussia said with exasperation in his voice.
"Antiques Roadshow?" America raised his eyebrows. "You sound like England."
"Ja well England isn't that bad!"
"Man…"
"He's the only landlord we've had who doesn't charge us rent," Prussia said.
"True dat," Den said. "Wait! Are we living with England now?"
Prussia nodded.
"Wow." Den looked amazed. He thought, in his little head, that they were just visiting.
"He doesn't know it though." Pro said.
"I think he probably does though," America said and took the crown from Den's head. "Right, men. Let me down slowly…"
Ten seconds later…
"I said slowly!" America yelled hanging upside down, swinging wildly from side to side.
He was about to lift the lid on the vacant glass case when the refrains of 'Home on the Range' blasted out. He carelessly tossed the crown from one hand to the other and pulled out his phone.
"Yep? Alfred F Jones here! Lieutenant-Colonel of the US Air Force!" He shouted.
"Mon Dieu! Do you always have to shout?"
"Who is this? No I don't want PPI. I haven't had an accident in the last 12 months that wasn't my fault…" America yelled.
"No but you could!" Prussia shouted. "Get a move on!"
"Zis is Francis not PPI. I cannot get hold of Arthur. I am in ze closet. Can you talk to Russia and ask him not to rip my head off?"
America sighed, "Yeah sure… Put him on."
Russia came on the phone which subsequently crackled, static came on the line and the phone screen flickered ominously as if possessed by some supernatural force. "Privet!" He called.
America held the phone away from his ear. Amazingly he was on the telephone with someone louder than himself but the irony was lost on him. "I'm kinda busy here, dude."
"I do not want to rip Francis' head off, but I do not want him to have the power of the remote control contraption. He will only put silly things on like ladies with no clothes bouncing around on a trampoline."
America considered this, "So what do you have on now?"
"Clothes!" Russia shouted. He sounded utterly appalled. The line crackled angrily.
"No! What do you have on the tv?"
There was a pause. "TV?"
"Yes! TV!"
"Nothing. It is static."
"What do you mean?" America thought hard. Back when he was a kid (or more likely when he used to visit Arthur's house in the 1970s) the TV transmission would finish at midnight (if not sooner) followed by static (after the British National Anthem of course at which England would always stand to attention). America thought the country was truly backward.
"Has the TV gone off?"
There was a pause. "Nyet."
America rolled his eyes. "I mean has the transmission ended?"
"Hey! Loser! What's happening down there?" Prussia yelled down at him.
America had never ever in his 'short' Nation life ever been called a loser and glared up at the Prussian.
"Are you having problems?" 'Tinks' suddenly appeared next to him. He jerked back and almost knocked his head on the glass display case.
"Hang on, I'm talking to a fairy!" America told both Russia and Prussia, neither of whom could see the said fairy so both narrowed their eyes.
"Have the programmes finished?" America asked Russia again.
"Russia has broken the television," Tinkerbell told America in a confidential tone.
"Whaaaaat?" America was appalled. It was akin to murder in his eyes.
"I think the screen may be a little fuzzy…No wait…" Russia said. "We are now watching something called In the Night Garden. Karol did something with the remote control." (Karol was Russia's name for Charlemagne - which was another area of contention between himself and France. Clearly, 'Karol' was also some kind of child genius who could fix televisions.)
"Phew." America glared at Tinkerbell. She had been sat in Russia's dark fathomless pocket for ages and having read up on Karl Marx's Treatise on Fairy's Rights, decided to go find England and demand extra pay. She'd found England fast asleep.
"In my opinion Oopsy Daisy is like my little sestra and is harassing the man known as Iggle Piggle." Russia told him.
America switched off the phone and concentrated on the task in hand. He wasn't usually averse to chatting about the romantic entanglements of children's television series' characters, but this was not the time. He also tried to ignore Tinkerbell telling him about going on strike.
"Let's do this," he said to himself.
"Fairy dude, slap my head for me, I'm going numb," he said to Tinkerbell.
"Hey! I'll do it!" Prussia yelled.
Tinkerbell, her wings fluttering madly, shook her tiny head.
"You do it all the time to Artie," he complained. He then spotted the crown in the next case. "Woah, what's that one? It looks way better than this one."
"It's the King Edward crown, dude!" Denmark yelled down. He waved the visitor information leaflet in Prussia's face. "I like to read up about places, man." Prussia shook his head.
"Not King Henry's?" America shouted up. And then wondered why they were talking about this.
"The original was melted down by Oliver Twist* or somebody," Denmark misread. (He actually meant Oliver Cromwell.)
"Yeah yeah whatever," America sighed, bored of the conversation. Kings eh? He was glad he didn't have any. He lifted the lid of the case and dropped the Imperial State Crown onto to its purple cushion none too gently. "Done and dusted," he said. "Yipikayay!" He shouted and punched the air. "Pull me up dudes!" He called to his co-conspirators. He really thought they could have a career as jewel thieves.
"You need to lose a bit of that holiday weight," Prussia remarked, heaving on the wire.
"What?" America asked.
"Nothing," Prussia said and winked at Den.
"Hey fairy dude! Come on! We're going! Go wake up Artie dude!" America said to Tinkerbell as he was suddenly flung upwards towards the ceiling, he missed the ventilation shaft hole by several inches, hit a random polystyrene ceiling tile, and then was pulled into the hole.
"Fairy dude indeed…" Tinkerbell said and flew straight up and knocked the ceiling tile loose.
"What a blast!" America said, and went to high-five Den, who mistook the gesture and hugged him.
"Ja ja ja…let's go, men," Prussia said and shoved them along the ventilation shaft.
"That's my line!" America said.
And then all hell broke loose. Or should one say the said ceiling tile fell and hit the infra-red lines.
Alarms rang out around them and somewhere steel doors came clanging down.
"Back to the cleaner's cupboard?" Den asked in a bizarrely cheerful voice.
That had not occurred to either Prussia or America but they nodded gratefully, hopped down through a hole and slithered along the corridor to their hideout.
"What about Artie dude?" America whispered suddenly as Den squashed himself inside and found a mop handle making close personal acquaintance with a part of his anatomy.
"Leave him, man. It's too late!" Prussia said.
"Wha…wha… why…who?" England woke from his slumber, drool down his chin, his eyelids stuck together. He inferred from the flashing lights and infernal noise that he had fallen asleep in a discotheque on the Isle of Wight again. He discovered this was not the case when he looked up, bleary-eyed, to see a Beefeater looking down at him and even more disturbingly, pointing a rifle at him.
"Bugger."
'Tinks' fluttered next to him and smiled malevolently before disappearing.
Author's Note:
Obviously Nakatomi Plaza and Yipeekayay refers to Die Hard.