Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia.

A/n1: Nelson Mandela, probably one of the most wonderful human beings that ever lived, passed away on 5 December – the day Sinterklaas comes by and gives presents to all the (Dutch/Belgian) children. I really can't explain how I felt when I heard all this, and even on such a specific day. It's very sad that the world lost such a great man, but on the other hand, he's had a hard, amazing and admirable life – I bet he's got one of the best seats in Heaven, which he absolutely deserves.
Let's hope he'll continue to look after humanity, one way or another.

A/n2: Well, this week has been the last week I worked at the cheese factory – I had more than enough of it. The people weren't mean or anything, but they never explained anything to me and only told me what to do whenever I made a mistake. I had times I felt so damn lonely and stupid there that I actually wanted to burst out crying, but thankfully, that's all over now.
The reasons why I quit the cheesy business? One: I felt fucking depressed when I worked there, two: I'm still a mail(wo)man that needs to deliver mail during the Christmas period, so I had to choose – mail or cheese.
Unsurprisingly, I chose mail. Because mail doesn't smell like stinky feet.

A/n3: Whoa! Over 500 reviews already! You guys are spoiling me so much!~ Thank you all!

A/n4: Don't you just hate cliffhangers? Man, I hate cliffhangers.
*runs away from you VERY VERY fast*

~~ And Three Makes Five ~~

Chapter 28:

Children and cats are the best machines of fun!
Mehmet Muran Ildan
(Turkish novelist and playwright)

'Well…'

England pulled a bit on his collar and cleared his throat.

'Before I'll share what the bosses have given me with all of you, I'd like to know if anyone has seen Alfr… America lately. Because. Um. Y-you see, this information is very important for him as well. It's not that I care about the wanker or anything…'

Oh man, I could practically feel his heart bounce through his chest in anxious anticipation as he waited for somebody, anybody, to answer his question. I never liked England, but man, I was fully aware of his pain. Hell, I could see his pain. The guy looked like he hadn't slept, ate or bathed in days. He looked even worse than the last time we saw him.

As far as I knew, England and America were still on a break. I hadn't heard any gossips about them getting back together, and considering the fact that America and Johnny have been hanging out together while hitchhiking through Europe, I took that as a sign that England had been all alone all this time. While his lover and their child went on exciting strategy/adventure/RPG-esk journeys in strange countries, England stayed at home and, probably, cried his eyes out whenever he saw a chance to do so.

…

That's so depressing.

That's so fucking depressing.

'Lovi?' Antonio suddenly softly said, 'Are… are you crying?'

'Fuck,' I muttered, quickly wiping my eyes.

Antonio got this concerned, heartbreakingly concerned, look on his face. 'What's the matter? Can I do anything for—'

'Yes,' I hoarsely cut him off, 'you… you can do anything for me. You can do anything for me. That's just so fucking amazing. You can even defy my goddamn pride nowadays. You have no idea how wonderfully soothing that thought alone is. D-dammit…'

Antonio didn't seem to completely understand what I was saying, but he did seem to get what I was upset about.

'They'll get together again, Lovino.' He smiled and brushed his hand against my cheek. 'You know them. They're like – and I can't believe I'm saying this – us, only a lot less…'

'…sexy?'

'I was going for honest, but sure, we're way more sexy, too.'

Now I had to laugh a bit, despite the fact that England's lonely love life still gnawed on my mind. Thankfully, not as much as a few minutes ago anymore.

'Right.' England all of a sudden said, his voice now sounding a lot stronger and firmer. 'If nobody has seen that twit, I guess I'll have to give him this information later on. Somehow. I'll think of a way. Maybe those pigeons I'm keeping out of sheer loneliness can help me out. Anyway, wait up a moment…'

He then bent down and sought for something in this very British briefcase he was wielding with him. When his pale face popped up again, he had a simple, plain piece of paper in his hands. I could tell it was scrabbled all over on, since the ink that had been used on it seemed heavy. Looks like they – the bosses of all European countries – used a marker or something to write stuff on it. So that means they must have been in a hurry when they wrote that info-thing for us. I mean, or else they'd had used a normal pen, or they'd printed it out or something.

Or maybe I should shut up about the goddamn paper and listen to the man already.

\0o0/

England decided to read the letter – because it turns out the ink-fested paper was a letter – out loud to us.

This is what it said:

"To all the personifications of Europe, plus the personifications of Canada and The United Stated of America,

It seems like you all have been having quite some tremulous times the past couple of months.

Thanks to all the problems and dilemma's Europe has been suffering, we, the Leaders of the North American and European Continent, certainly have kept you busy. Not only by executing several investigations that caused us to isolate all of you from the people and nations you know and care about for months, but also by asking you to take care of the strange children that appeared in your homes and lives.

We are very grateful for all of your cooperation, for we can now safely say that there has been gathered enough information to state if the children are human or not. However, the amount of information about the children is enormous. There are a lot of details and important points that need to be researched throughout before we can give you the answer to the questions you have all been wondering about: what are the children and what exactly is going on in Europe?

We beg you to wait patiently. We carefully calculated we will need three months to be certain about everything. Hopefully, you will understand the situation and leave us be, for the moment.

In the meantime, you can give yourselves a nice vacation. We will not be needing you for any conferences or meetings anymore for the following three months – so take some rest, have a good time and please, take very good care of the children.

That is all.

With kind regards,

The Leaders of the North American and European Continent."

'You know, it's actually quite amusing,' England said with a sad smile, showing us the front of the paper right after finishing reading the letter, 'all of these quickly-drawn scrabbles here really are all the autographs of our bosses. I even recognize my own Queen's. Boy, that broad sure has a nice signature.'

'It surprises me they managed to write that much on that flimsy paper with a thick whiteboard marker,' Estonia mused.

'Well, if they can introduce something like the Euro and make it work as well, of course they can write lots of important information on a thin piece of paper with a thick whiteboard marker, dear,' Hungary reasoned.

'But what does this mean?' Lithuania asked. 'Are they seriously telling us to… go on a vacation?'

'That's exactly what they said,' Austria said.

'Then my Big Brother, our daughters and I will go on a nice honeymoon vacation and it will be wonderful,' Belarus suggested. 'And we'll kill Belgium with a stick.'

'Please don't hurt her, I kind of like Belgium!' Russia stammered. 'Why don't you kill Poland with a stick instead?'

'Yeah, like, let's not do that, 'kay?' Poland instantly snorted.

England, who noticed things were getting out of hand, started waving his hands around in an attempt to silence the many confused and heated ramblings.

'Everybody, please stay clam!'

'Pffffrt, you said clam,' France giggled. 'You dumb English moron.'

'Shut up, you faggot frog!' England nagged at the fuckface. 'You know I meant to say calm! Calm down, everybody! Please! Let's just put one and one together and figure out together what this bloody letter means!'

It took him a few more of these random shouts to subdue the noisy conversations – if you could call our whiny discussions conversations – but in the end, it finally became somewhat quiet. Well, at least quiet enough for England to state his piece of mind about the letter.

'It seems like our bosses are finally realizing just how much of a breather we all need,' he said, breathing out rather loudly. 'At least, I know I need one. We've been struggling through the past few months a bit too much, if you'd ask me. So yes, I suppose we can all go on a nice holiday for the upcoming three months. Bugger, isn't that just great? Surely I can use all that free time to mumble mumble mumble…'

England started muttering something to himself all of a sudden, and so, naturally, we all thought that meant we were free to go.

Since nobody stopped them when the first few nations left the room after shouting a heartily 'Enjoy your vacation, everyone!', me and Antonio also decided to pack our things and stand up.

'How nice,' Antonio sighed, stretching himself. 'We finally got ourselves a break. Isn't it wonderful, Lovi?'

'Yes,' I absentmindedly responded, watching England frown and stare at a wall, seemingly lost in thoughts. He was probably thinking about all that loneliness that was going to hit him, now that he wouldn't catch up with us for three months.

'Come,' Antonio said, smiling as he grabbed my hand. 'Let's pick up the kids and tell them the good news, sweetie!'

I forced myself to tore my gaze off the Brit to answer Antonio's smile with a weak one of myself.

'Yeah, you're right. Time to go.'

\0o0/

'You know what,' I told Antonio as we walked to the kindergarten – just like every single other nation that had been in the meeting, by the way, 'maybe we should go on a vacation with the kids.'

'Ohh, go on a vacation, huh? That sounds great! It's been a while since we've been somewhere, after all!' Antonio said, thankfully sounding just as enthusiastic as I had hoped he would.

'I know!' I nodded. 'So, where should we go?'

'Well, we could rent a nice little shack at the sea close to the sea my place…'

'No,' I resolutely said. 'We're not going to stay in Spain. I meant a real vacation. You know, the kind that makes you actually leave your country and everything.'

'So you want to rent a nice little shack close to the sea in another country?'

'…um… pretty much.'

I have the imagination of a face cloth sometimes.

'Well, okay then!~' Antonio grinned and pulled me closer to peck my face. 'Let's dig deeper into this when we get back home, alright?'

'Alright.' I smiled back at him again, now a bit happier, and lightly squeezed his hand.

As a matter of fact, I really was feeling a lot better ever since America had come with his speech and reassuring promise he'd do everything to help us out. While most of the other European countries were getting worried and looking a little upset, I felt pretty good right now.

We didn't have to do anything work-related for three months, America and his son would do an investigation and we'd even go on a nice vacation!

What could possibly go wrong now?

\0o0/

Of course, I had to know that saying, or even thinking the words "what could possibly go wrong" always causes bad news to spring up all of a sudden, and that's exactly what happened, because when we got to the kindergarten, it turned out that our kids had been fucking pint-sized terrors.

...

Okay, maybe only Alejo, but still.

We barely set one foot into the kindergarten-building when Norway came stomping towards us – one hand holding the bleeding and bawling son of Austria and Hungary, the other hand holding a hissing and cursing Alejo.

'Alejo kicked Wolfgang in the face when I turned my back on them for one second,' Norway instantly told us, with a very blank look on his also very blank face. 'Then Wolfgang kicked back. Then Alejo went ballistics. And then I had to call security to keep your son from murdering Wolfgang. I hope you carry some money with you. Those security guys are expensive.'

'What?' I stammered.

'Alejo kicked Wolfgang in the face when I turned my back on them for one second. Then Wolfgang kicked back. Then Alejo went ballistics. And then I had to call security to keep your son from murdering Wolfgang. I hope you carry some money with you. Those security guys are expensive.'

Norway paused and watched our ash-colored faces twist in confusion.

'Do you need me to repeat it again?' he eventually asked.

'No, we… we get it,' Antonio said, staring at Alejo.

'He started it!' Alejo almost desperately cried out.

I scowled and folded my arms. 'What the fuck did he do to make you attack him like that! Dammit, Alejo! Control your temper already!'

Alejo's lower lip started to tremble. 'B-but he made Teo cry! And he said Lulu's weird! And he said lots of other mean stuff!'

'Did not!' the other boy screeched – but didn't dare to look us in the eye when he said that.

'Wolfgang Wiebrand Wilhelm!' a loud voice piped up. 'Your mother and I haven't raised you to behave like this, young man!'

Austria and Hungary had arrived as well now, and were, like me and Antonio, looking very pissed off.

'Shame on you!' Hungary said, crouching and wagging her finger at Wolfgang. 'You shouldn't make fun of other kids! You better go apologize to the kids you bothered so much! And that also means this boy!'

Wolfgang let his head hang. 'Okay, mother…'

'That goes for you as well!' Antonio glared at Alejo. 'You're a sweet kid, Allie, and I think it's good you wanted to defend your siblings' honor, but you shouldn't have attacked Wolfgang like that! You should have called for an adult! Am I clear, mister?'

'Kay, Papa Toni…' Alejo mumbled, averting his eyes.

'Now apologize to Wolfgang!' I told him.

Alejo muttered something I didn't catch and turned to Wolfgang, who had also turned to face him. Norway had released both them in the meantime, by the way. I guess he now was outside, catching some other kids.

'I'm sorry,' Wolfgang murmured to Alejo.

'You're sorry for what?' Austria insisted.

'I'm sorry for… being mean to your brother and sister.' Wolfgang swallowed some tears.

Then it was Alejo's turn.

'I'm sorry for wanting to make you dead,' he said.

'And?' Antonio commanded.

'And I'll never try to make you dead again.'

'Good!' Antonio was content with that. As for me… well, I wondered why nobody was even slightly disturbed by Alejo's words.

'Papa Lovi! Papa Toni!' a little voice then exclaimed, and we looked down to find Matteo, handing out flowers again.

Also, he wore a FUCKING FLOWERCROWN and A LITTLE PINK DRESS.

WHAT.

WHAT.

TAHW.

Antonio just glanced at Matteo once, before he clasped his hands in front of his mouth and started gushing: 'MY SON'S THE CUTEST THING SINCE MY HUSBAND, OH MY GOD!'

'Eehehehehe,' Matteo grinned.

'No!' I nagged, 'Not "ehehehehehe" – you're wearing a goddamn dress, Matteo! A dress! A girly dress, even! What the hell!'

Matteo stared at my face in shock and his enlarged eyes started to shiver and water up. He even accidentally crushed the few flowers he was carrying.

'P-Papa Lovi angry…'

'YES! I mean, no. I mean… ugh…' I smacked a hand to my face and lowered myself on my knees. It was no use leashing out to a small boy that happened to be a wee bit more sensitive than most boys of his age.

But shit, just when I was thinking Matteo was the most normal, most easy-going one of the three of them…

'Alright,' I started as controlled as I could, smiling reassuring at Matteo, 'I'm not mad at you, twerp. But who made you wear a dress? Could you point to him or her for me?'

Matteo hesitated, and he hesitated for a very, very long time, before he ultimately raised a small finger and pointed to himself.

Why did I even bother asking.

'Allow me to defend your cute son. It's perfectly normal for kids his age to dress up like whatever they want to dress up. In fact, you shouldn't forbid them to dress up like, for example, girls and princesses. There's nothing wrong with children, trying to place themselves into the shoes of people or sexes they're curious about. It's very good for his cognitive development. Also, it stimulates his ability to empathize with others.'

All of us stared at Norway, who all of a sudden was standing right in front of us again.

…

…

'Okay,' I slowly said, 'thanks, Norway. That was very… creepy, the way you suddenly… poofed back in here again. But thanks for the lecture. That was very… inspiring.'

'It was a pleasure,' Norway said.

'Papa Lovi?' Matteo's lips had started to quiver madly now and he held up a very, very bruised little daisy. 'F-flower, papa… f-for yuu.'

I made a weird, squeaky sound in the back of my throat as I nodded and accepted the little flower.

'T-thank you, Matteo.'

'I picked it for yuu, papa!' Matteo instantly brightened up his smile, his whole face now radiating with sunshine. 'I picked it allllllllllll by mahselv! Ehehehehehe…'

'Goddammit,' I croaked while patting his head almost aggressively, '…t-this guy's cuteness is almost fucking criminal! Don't you think so, Antonio?'

Antonio could only let out soft, incomprehensible cries of pure happiness, so I knew he completely agreed with me.

While Wolfgang now also offered his apologies to Matteo ('Sorry for calling you an ugly girl, you're accuallyyy kinda pretty'), I looked around me to see what we've got so far.

Well, we had gathered Alejo and we found Matteo – only one left to find was… Luisa.

But where could she be?

\0o0/

It turned out Luisa was playing outside of the building, in the garden. She wasn't alone, since there were a few other kids playing outside as well.

Oh who am I kidding – she was EXTREMELY alone, because there she was, reading her fairytale book in the sandbox all by herself while Feli's kid and Femke's kid were giggling together and clapping their hands right next to her.

Okay then. So Alejo almost killed a boy, Matteo dressed himself up like a girl and Luisa was acting like an arrogant little bitch.

'Why do our kids have to stand out so much!' I therefore complained to Antonio – but not too loudly. 'Can't they just… blend in and have fun already?'

Antonio grinned. 'Ah, you're forgetting that they are having fun, Lovi! On their own little way.'

'But they're so weird!'

'They're kids, sweetie! Kids are supposed to be weird.'

'Besides,' Norway totally snuck up on us again, 'some nations' kids are a lot weirder. Take Inna, Belarus' kid. She's been standing staring into the distance with this killer aura around her for two hours now.'

He nodded to a very petite, white-haired girl, that indeed was doing just that. Also, the air around her had turned purple. PURPLE.

'And let's not forget Desiree, France's daughter, who's constantly trying to walk around naked. Oh, looks like she managed to slip out of that harness I put on her again.'

Antonio and I succeeded to catch a glimpse of a small, blonde flash of girl, laughing excitedly as she and her butt-nakedness ran around the garden.

'And, last but not least, Falk – Switzerland's son. He's been guarding the wooden gate for the entire afternoon already and he only eats chocolates.'

We now noticed the tiny, blond guy in front of a fence-like gate, a branch in his hands as he looked around him suspiciously.

Norway shrugged. 'So you see, there's absolutely nothing for you two to worry about. Sure, your kids are interesting – but all kids are. Fighting, dressing up, doing things all by themselves… it's pretty normal kid-behavior for their age. Don't freak out too much about every small thing. Cut them some slack. Relax. Have fun with them. That's all.'

Although the Scandinavian guy told it to both of us, I felt like he was especially talking to me. And I have to admit, I felt kind of ashamed.

Maybe I did think about this a bit too much. Maybe there actually wasn't that much to worry about at all. Maybe I should indeed calm down and look on the bright side already. We were going to have a lot of quality time together, after all.

So why not try and make the best of it?

\0o0/

So anyway, Antonio and I picked up the kids, said goodbye to the rest of the countries and their kids, told Norway to please stop creeping up on us and eventually, we left Belgium.

While driving back home – Antonio was driving again, but only because he had looked so damn sad when I told him I wanted to drive this time – the kids were very peppy. They all blabbered about what they had done while staying in the kindergarten and I couldn't hear shit, because they didn't bother listening to each other.

Fucking annoying, of course, so at one point I yelled at them to shut their traps and listen to each other already.

Alejo started chuckling like "hyuck hyuck hyuck" and told me I was dumb.

'You said we can't say anything! So we can't speak words anymore! Mptgwrbmlk!'

'Mhnkmsnsl!' Matteo enthusiastically muffled his words as well.

'Mkjndrftlmnb,' even Luisa mumbled.

'Aww.' I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. 'Then I guess I can't hear about your adventures in the kindergarten. How sad. Not that I care.'

Unfortunately enough, the kids had figured out by now I kind of always said this when I actually meant it the other way – so they just ignored me and continued talking their wordless, vowelless language, until I had enough of it and offered something to them they couldn't refuse.

Reference not intended.

'Shall I tell you another story?' I suggested.

'Oh!' Luisa's eyes started to shine.

Matteo and Alejo didn't seem to care that much about the story and rambled further, until Luisa hissed at them to shut the hell up and listen to Papa Lovi already, dammit!

Antonio clacked his tongue. 'Language, Lulu…'

'But I wanna hear the story,' Luisa said. 'Tell us the story!'

'Should I?' I asked the twins.

'Yea!' they screamed, air-fisting the sky (which sounded very wrong and sick, but believe me, I meant the innocent kind of air-fisting, as far as there is one).

I laughed. 'Alright, I'll tell you a story! It's the story about a very fat bastard.'

'Loviiiiii…' Antonio glared at me via the rear mirror, but I very conveniently flipped the bird at him and opened my story.

\0o0/

'Once upon a time, there lived a very wealthy king. His name was Midas, and he was insanely, filthy rich. He also was a fat bastard, like I told you. Because rich people are fat, most of the time. You can tell by the size of one's tummy how rich that person is. The fatter, the richer.

Midas was a pretty lousy king. He wasn't a sadist or anything, but still, his country would have been better off with another king, since this king only cared about money, and getting more money. He was totally fucking infatuated with money. It was terrible, really.'

'Bas likes money, too,' Luisa suddenly butted in. 'He said his father said that money is the best thing since sex.'

Antonio made a choking noise and almost threw the car off the road.

'S-sex, Luisa?' I stammered.

'I don't know what sex is,' she frowned, 'Bas said his dad didn't want to tell him. But it must be pretty good.'

'It is,' I very seriously said. 'But I'll tell you more about that when you get older. Like seventy. Perhaps.'

I cleared my throat and quickly continued my story.

'So anyway, Midas was fat, rich and he wanted to get even richer. Because rich people aren't only fat, they're greedy as well. So he thought of all kinds of ways to get himself even more money: he bought stuff and sold them way cheaper on the internet, he tricked Scrooge McDuck into giving him half of his money bin and he made financial miracles happen on Wall Street.'

'Ohhhh,' Matteo said, since he always said "ohhhhh" during stories, I had found out.

'Soon enough, the king was rich enough to make Bas and his annoying father gasp in ecstasy. His palace was covered with expensive shit! All of his rooms were decorated with coins! King Midas, his wife and their son all slept in beds made of golden bars, and even the large parking lot – it was paved with diamonds.'

'Awesome!' Alejo grinned.

'And yet, even with all that gold and money, the king still felt like he needed to get more. He had everything he wanted already: a bunch of planes, a row of houses, an entire city and he even managed to let all of the oceans on earth sell themselves to him.'

Luisa's jaw dropped. 'The oceans sold themselves to the king?'

'You have no idea how easy it is to bribe oceans. Corrupt, wet bastards.' I snorted. 'So yeah, King Midas had everything. Seriously. He had all money could buy, and believe me, that's a lot. But still…'

'He wanted moarrrrr!' Matteo purred.

I nodded. 'You bet your Spanish father's tasty ass he wanted more!'

'I'll take that as a compliment,' Antonio said. 'A very improper one, but still. Thanks. You have a very fine backside as well, if I may say so.'

'You may say so.'

'Then I will. You have a very fine backside, Lovino.'

'What a wonderful thing to hear.' I laughed a bit, but then went back to the story.

'Ahem. So anyway, King Midas wanted to get even richer. But he couldn't think of more ways to get richer, which was kind of a problem.

Then, one day, a very tiny man, dressed up in green and wearing a nice hat and fantastic white mustache, came walking into the Royal Hall of the castle. He bowed deeply for the king and told him he had something for him. Something that would definitely make the king the happiest man in the world. Something amazing.

"Ha! I shall have none of the intriguing blue pills you are no-doubt trying to sell me, you conman," King Midas spoke, very suspicious of the stranger. "And my libido is working just fine, thank you very much."

"Ho ho!" the mustached man said, "I'm not doubting that for a second, my king! The queen looks absolutely exhausted! But I was actually talking about something I'd like to give you for free."

"For free?" The king's Dutch-oriented ears liked to hear that.

"Indeed," the little man said. "I want to give you something for free, because you're the most wonderful king of all kings."

"Lovely!" Midas said.

"Father, should you really listen to this man?" Midas' son then asked, looking at the stranger wearily. "He obviously doesn't know you at all."

But the king didn't want to listen to him. "Shut up, Gregory, you depressing, black-clothes-wearing emo. No wonder you can't get a girlfriend."

"But Father-!"

"Silence! I have decided to accept this man's urge to give me something for free! Now hand it over, if you please."

"It's a wish, sire," the green man told him, twirling his mustache.

"A wish?"

"Yes, you're getting a wish from me. I'm a magical elf, you see. I like playing pranks… I mean, making wishes come true for good men like you, King Midas."

"It's clearly a trap!" Gregory gasped.

King Midas handwaved his son's very reasonable, yet slightly hysterical argument away. "Don't mind my son, Mr. Elf, he's going through this exhausting phase some people call puberty. It's quite annoying."

"If you want, I can make him skip this phase," the elf said.

The king looked horrified. "And waste a perfectly good wish? No way, screw Gregory and his antics! I want something else! I want… I want…"

"Yes?" the little man said.'

'Yes?' Luisa said.

'Yes?' Matteo said.

'Yes?' Alejo said.

'Tell us what he wanted already!' Antonio whined.

I grinned. 'Alright then. This is what the king said…

"I want to get even more gold! I want everything… yes… yes! I want to change everything I touch into gold! EVERYTHING!"

"Are you sure about that?" the elf asked him. "Do you really want to change everything you touch into gold? Absolutely everything?"

"Did I stutter? Of course I want that!"

Gregory moaned. "God, Father, you're such a big, fat, greedy douche!"

"I think your emo son's right – you really are a big, fat and greedy douche," the elf spoke. "So I advise you to think your wish over carefully. You can still change your mind, you know."

"I don't care what you and my worthless son think of me. Just fulfill my wish already and get your ass out of my castle, before I release the hounds!" King Midas snapped.

So the elf had no other choice but to make the king's wish come true. He bowed his head to the king once more, raised a hand into the sky and made sparkles come out of it. Then, he all of a sudden was gone. Only a few glitters still silently sparkled in the Royal Hall.

"That's it?" the king grunted. "I now can seriously touch everything I want and change it into gold?"

"I suppose so, Father," Gregory said. He then put his hoodie and headphones on his head – not in that order – and slowly shuffled out of the hall, because emo teens can't walk out of a hall or room or whatever in a normal, decent fashion.

"I need to test this," the king said, and ran into the same direction his son was walking. Gregory was pretty surprised when his father suddenly dashed past him – and then he quickly increased his walking speed, because he had a bad feeling about what his father was going to do.

And yes – King Midas had indeed ran into his bedroom, flung open the doors of his drawer and turned all of his beautiful black goth clothes into golden robes and shit.

"Father! What the crap!" poor Gregory yelled as soon as he saw the massive load of golden clothes stocked up in his drawer. "Did you turn all of my clothes into… gold?"

"I've been wanting to do that for years, son!" the king grinned. "Say goodbye to your emo-phase now, you loafer! That'll teach you to only read Twilight-books!"

"My clothes! My wonderfully black clothes! NOOOOO! WHO AM I!" Gregory cried out, slumping on his knees and gripping his head very over-the-toppish.

Meanwhile, King Midas decided he had seen enough of his son's mental breakdown and happily went back to the Royal Hall. He now had found out his magical touch worked, and so, he started touching as many things as he could think of. Soon enough, the entire castle and everything within the king's property was effectively turned solid gold, and you bet the king loved every damn glistering bit of it.'

'Wait,' Luisa said, frowning, 'so everythin's going okay? The king gets all his gold?'

'All of it,' I nodded.

'The king's cool!' Alejo said.

'Yea!' Matteo shouted. 'Vedy cool! So he shuuld wear a coat!'

'I don't think things are going to work out for him, though,' Antonio said. 'After all, this is bound to go wrong. Right, Lovino?'

'Naah, this is pretty much the ending of the story,' I said. 'So kids, remember, greed is good!'

'What?' Antonio looked over his shoulder at me, only to see me grinning teasingly at him.

'Just kidding, you moralistic hypocrite.'

'Wha-! I'm not a… uh… wait, let me think that one over…'

'King Midas was very happy for a little while,' I abruptly started telling again, 'and hell, why wouldn't he be? Everything he touched magically transformed into a mini treasure! He could go on forever! But then his wife called him for dinner, and the king decided to pause his fanatic touching for a bit to grab a bite.'

'Yea,' Alejo said, nodding and sounding like he totally understood King Midas, 'making gold makes you wanna eat a lot.'

'It does,' I agreed, 'and man, King Midas was famished! The bastard could probably eat a horse or two when he and his family sat down the dinner table. The table was filled with the most delicious meals simple souls like us could only dream of. Roasted pork meat! Fresh salads! Creamy pudding! Salty French fries! An entire chocolate fountain with a swan created out of white chocolate in the middle! It truly was a spectacular thing to see!'

'I'm hungrey,' Matteo announced. 'Can we go to McDonalds? Johnny says it's tatsyyy.'

'I'd rather die,' Antonio answered, squeezing the wheel.

'Oh.' Matteo blinked a bit. 'But can we?'

'No.'

'Oh.'

'Fastfood isn't good for you!' Luisa scolded her – older – brother, flicking his nose. 'Now shut up and listen to Papa Lovi, dammit!'

'Uwuuu…' Matteo teared up and touched his nose.

'Anyway…' I said, sighing and rubbing my temples, '…King Midas wanted to eat some of all the food. He really liked pork chops, so he went for the pork chops. But! What do you think happened when he touched the meat!'

'He spilled it and his papa got mad at him!' Matteo said.

'No – but good try,' I chuckled.

'Oh, oh!' Alejo flailed his arms around and stared at me with huge, sparkling eyes.

'It… it… it changed into gold!'

I grimaced. 'You… are overreacting a bit, but yes. Yes! Everything the king touched, turned into gold, remember? So his food turned into gold as well!'

'Is gold yummy?' Matteo asked.

'No, dummy,' Luisa snorted. 'You can't eat gold.'

I smiled. 'Your bossy sister's right, Matteo: you can't eat gold, your stomach doesn't like digesting that. So King Midas quickly realized this was bad. If he couldn't eat, he would probably starve to death. And if he died, he couldn't turn things into gold anymore. And that was horrible!

And yet, King Midas wanted none of that and tried to ignore it a bit. He didn't mind not-eating. Hell, he was a fat bastard anyway! Maybe not-eating would help him lose some weight already!

"This is still the best thing that ever happened to me," he said out loud, and touched his grassy field outside.

His wife and son didn't really think so, though, and had to watch him growing weaker and – somewhat – skinnier over the course of a few days.

"Father, I can't watch you like this anymore," Gregory eventually said, when he caught his dad desperately nibbling on a piece of golden chicken wing one day. "Please stop this nonsense and go look for that elf! You'll die if you continue this madness!"

"Madness?"

The king slowly raised his sunken-in face to glare at his son. Then he gritted his teeth.

"THIS! IS! SPARTA!"

'Oh god,' Antonio groaned, shaking his head.

'So yeah, anyway,' I carried on, 'the king still thought his wish was wonderful and that his hunger was part of some weird, Spartan training. Poor king, the hunger had made him completely delirious.

A couple more torturing days passed, before something absolutely terrible happened: the king accidentally touched his son.

…

Not in a creepy way, though.

King Midas had been slowly dying, you see, since he was so very hungry, and then his son had given him a very shitty but well-meant cheer-up speech.

"Father, once you've foolishly starved yourself to death, you shouldn't worry. We'll bury your body in the golden garden. Mother and I thought you'd like that."

"Will you put huge-ass diamonds on top of my coffin?" the weakened king asked.

"I'll put rubies, sapphires and yes, even huge-ass diamonds on top of your coffin, Father. And a drawing."

"A drawing?"

"Yes. A drawing I made of you and the Angel of Death."

"My boy, even the maid's cat barfs hairballs that look prettier than your ugly attempts at art." Yet, the king started crying. "But thank you. Here, let me hug you even though I haven't hugged you since the day your mother chucked you out of her uterus!"

And so the king got himself up and threw his arms around his son. The guy was only able to mouth a shocked "NO SO UNCOOL" before he, just like all the other things the king had touched, turned into gold.'

'No…' Luisa gasped.

'Yes,' I said.

'His dad killed him!' Alejo laughed. 'Yay!'

'He's ded?' Matteo stammered.

'Did you just kill Gregory, Lovino?' Antonio scolded me, almost hitting a tree on the side of the road because he glanced back at us again.

'I didn't kill Gregory – and seriously, keep your eyes on the damn ROAD!' I grabbed Antonio's head and literally turned it back to the place it was supposed to be watching.

'A-and I haven't finished my goddamn story yet, you dipshits!' I directed this commentary at pretty much the entire population of the car. 'Just let me talk freely! Okay?'

'Okay,' everybody obediently nodded.

So I continued.

After all, it would be very horrible dick-move of me to end all of this with a cliffhanger, huh?