A World Meeting or something of the sort
Sadiq knew that Heracles was just trying to piss him off. If Gupta wasn't sitting in between them, he would have thrown a tantrum long ago. Gupta occasionally eyed both of them with a weary frown lining his lips. His eyebrows were raised in suspicion and there was a peculiar way he leaned as to block Sadiq's view of the offending item in Heracles hand.
It was a bag of pork rinds. And hell if Heracles actually liked that crap, Sadiq mused. Every time he heard the snap of the crackle muffled by tawny cheeks, his eye twitched behind the white mask. At one point he actually raised his hand to bitchslap the snack away, but he suddenly felt a small, callous hand push his down and pin it to the seat, where it currently still was. Unfortunately, due to height differences, he had to lean a little to the side to avoid dislocating his shoulder.
The meeting went on around them, and the only other person that noticed the near war was another Mediterranean that seemed to take a keen interest in drawing a garden all over his notebook. Francis occasionally glanced over, carefully examining what was going on. He "accidentally" dropped his pen and sat back up, dissatisfied (from the lack of a secret hand job or something of the sort).
Heracles shifted his sleepy gaze to the notebook on Francis's desk (particularly a snail that took pleasure in eating a sketchy leaf), a smile twitching the corner of his mouth before he leaned to whisper into the other's ear. Francis's face was blank for a few moments before Sadiq witnessed a mischievous smirk on his mouth. Without raising suspicion by moving his head, he looked down to see the two nations shaking their hands under the flat, cold desk.
Before he even opened his mouth, Gupta shot him a glare and continued to divert his attention to Alfred babbling on the podium. Sadiq leaned closer and hissed, "I wasn' gonna say nothin'!" The Egyptian only frowned lightly and released his surprisingly strong grip.
Finally Sadiq could stretch his arms and cross them over his chest with a huff.
Bar somewhere in France
He really had no idea why they decided a bar in France of all places, but that didn't matter. Sadiq leaned his chin on the palm of his head, elbow on the booth table. He occasionally took a sip from the wine they had ordered, something in French (which his Turkish tongue almost punched him in the face for trying to pronounce) and expensive, bringing him to a much more relaxed state, despite being across the table from Heracles.
His hand wandered onto Pierrot as he stroked the bird's feathers tenderly, absent minded as he nibbled on something that tasted pretty good. At first he was weary, especially with the looks Heracles and Francis gave each other when the waiter brought it along, though he had figured that it must have just been poisoned or something.
It wasn't like he hadn't been poisoned before, after all. Damn plagues…
"… and I figured I might as well learn how to pick England's locks," Spain finished, absently curling his hair on his index finger, gaze drifted upward in thought. Sadiq snapped back to reality and bowed his head silently as everyone else chuckled and nodded as well. His hand drifted to the plate, only to find crumbs.
And he almost jumped out of his seat, scared shitless, when Heracles and Francis started laughing like maniacs, tears staining the corners of their eyes. For a moment, he figured that they had indeed poisoned him until Francis uttered a single word between breaths of laughter:
Escargot.
Sadiq stood up so fast that the entire table jumbled and he bolted to the bathroom, paling white and nearly tripping on his way. Behind him he could hear the two's laughter and felt eyes on his back. A distinct burn crawled up his body in a stuffy fever and he threw himself over the toilet, gasping and shivering with chills.
When his body refused to toss up the unclean substance, he could only grip his head tightly and choke for breath. Despite not already barfing up everything he ate in the last millennium, his vision swam and he felt blood pumping in his hears. Nasty images popped up in his head and haunted him until he felt a hand on his shoulder.
Antonio and Gupta looked at him with bemused expressions, the latter looking slightly more worried. "Are you okay?" Antonio asked, running a hand over Sadiq's forehead to feel for a fever, which was quickly slapped away as he leaned over the bowl again, coughing up whatever was in his gut with violent shudders wracking up and down his body. He felt his mask come off of his face, cool air brushing against his flushed face, comforting.
Two silent gazes asked him what was wrong, his only reply being a raspy, "This means war."
Turkey's House
His mouth burned from the vast amounts of fluoride toothpaste that made his gums slightly raw as he rubbed the taste out of his mouth vigorously. He had made the mistake of using an alcohol based mouthwash, making him choke when he accidentally swallowed some from the pain. He had dubbed the day his crappiest within the last century or so.
Antonio peeked his head from the kitchen, the tangy smell of tomatoes and herbs drifting from the doorway, doing nothing to help Sadiq settle his still upset stomach. His large Kangal had itself sprawled over his lap once he reached the couch. Its golden fur shimmering healthily with the natural light flowing in from the wide window nearby, crimson curtains hanging loosely from each side. The blunt nose of the dog hung sloppily, tongue hung out of its mouth in satisfaction.
Antonio smiled broadly; despite tense relations with Sadiq in the past, he had found that he had gotten along well with the man, which had come with its benefits. He pulled himself away from the kitchen with a plate of some sort of red soup thick in a fine bowl. Sadiq flinched when it was thrust into him, arcing an eyebrow suspiciously. Antonio laughed and sat himself by the dog's head, "It's just tomato, I swear!"
He hesitantly brought the warm mixture to his mouth and slurped it silently, brain working hard in planning the revenge he had in mind. The only flaw in the plan was where to get it…
"You could probably find some road kill," Antonio hummed thoughtfully, a finger pressed over his lips and chin as he stared up to think. Sadiq considered this for a moment, drawling, "Ma-aybe we could jus' take one of his an'-"
"He'd notice," the Spaniard interrupted, shaking his head and diverting his gaze to the bear-like dog making itself comfortable. One of his fingers stretched out to point at the Kangal, "Do you think he could sniff out some road kill?"
Sadiq swallowed another bit of the sweet soup and laughed heartily, "'E could prob'ly make the road kill." His hand ran over the head and shoulders of the beast, making it groan happily in response. He leaned forward and cooed, "Big bad Ayı." Antonio clapped his hands together and nodded, "Let's find some dead cats then!"
Greece's House
Heracles was happy to see Antonio at his door with a paper plate covering some sort of dish, steam seeping out of its sides. Whatever it was, he thought, it smelled delicious. "Ahh~! ¡Hola!" He leaned forward and kissed each of Heracles' cheeks, an innocent, broad smile across his face. Before he could even let the other man talk back, he pushed the plate forward and hummed, "It's chorizo al vino! I had too much and we wouldn't want any to go to waste, ¿si?"
Heracles gratefully took the plate and bowed his head slightly in agreement, calmly looking back at Antonio and asking, "Γειά σου. Would you like to come in?"
He shook his head vigorously and held up his hands, hastily excusing himself, "I have so much to do! Veneziano's coming over with Ludwig and I need to buy groceries!" He skipped down the stairs and waved, "Maybe later!"
With his visitor off, Heracles dragged himself back into the house, to the enjoyment of many of his cats. A few perched themselves across his lap and broad shoulders while he kicked his slippers off and nibbled on the sausage. It tasted mostly of the sweet wine, appealing to his taste.
He took to watching TV until he was done eating (and just about half asleep), staring stoically at the worryingly violent talk show airing.
It wasn't until the doorbell rang that he realized that his legs were asleep and eyelids heavy. There was a distinct tension in the air that Heracles recognized. He picked up one of his more aggressive cats and perched it on his head, peeking through the gilded peephole on his door. He gave a sigh, watching for a few moments as Sadiq made faces (even licking) at the small hole.
Sadiq's smile was wide when the door finally opened, and he looked almost disgustingly happy. One of his hands was hidden behind his back. Heracles resisted the urge to squirm a bit in the discomfort of being watched with a nasty gleam.
"So how was the chorizo?" Sadiq cooed, leaning just a bit forward to bring himself to eye level. Heracles almost choked, "Did y-you make-"
Sadiq laughed loudly, startling the cats that had creeped along the fence and doorway. "Hell no, but I did provide the…" he paused for a second and brought a hand to adjust his mask, "… ingredients."
"What did you put in them?" his face was pale enough to be considered unhealthily pale. His fists clenched at his sides, just about ready to punch the broad smile right off of the other's face.
Which he actually did when he saw a decaying cat's foot in Sadiq's once hidden hand. With his steps clattering and a sharp yelp from the Turk, who had taken to holding his nose and ripping off pieces of porcelain from his marred skin, Heracles held himself over his kitchen sink.
Sadiq listened to the rather nasty sounds and smirked slightly under his bloody nose, quietly wondering why Latins tend to aim for his face of all places. As casually as he came, he seemed to just float away from the house with a satisfied smirk plastered across his face. His hand still clamped over his nose when he got strange looks from people seeing the blood seep between his fingers.
Turkey's House… Again
Gupta's voice was weird when he yelled, Sadiq thought, since the kid was normally quite reserved and usually saved his voice for important matters. Well, he added, this probably was an important matter. His mind started to drift off as the chastising escalated, despite having bits of his mask plucked from their places digging into his face removed.
"-And you should know better!" Gupta concluded, a frown obvious on his face. Sadiq was having a bout of déjà vu, especially since he had a similar lecture given to him by Ancient Egypt while she was alive. His eyebrows knitted slightly, making him cry out in pain, pushing in another splinter of mask further into his skin. For just a millisecond, Gupta's mouth turned up into a smirk before he continued plucking the bloodied porcelain.
Sadiq held an ice pack to the cleaned side of his face, gently numbing the stinging pain of antiseptic in silence. Only the drawn out sigh of his content dog seemed to bring his mind back into place. Gupta gently prodded at his nose, receiving a pained whine and a sudden jerk away. He huffed and pressed the icepack on the swelling skin, wincing at the contact.
"I didn't expect him to break your nose," Gupta sighed, brushing his hands against each other and leaning back with his hands on his knees. Under his breath he grumbled, "Worse than children…" Sadiq waved his hand dismissively, "Hı hı, whatever you say."
"Would you like a ride to the hospital?" Gupta sighed, rubbing at the bridge of his nose with slender fingers. A headache built up between his eyes and he knew he was going to suffer grey hair earlier than he should have. "Nah," Sadiq drawled, sprawling on the couch like a lazed cat, "'M good. S'long as I can breath, 'm fine." Gupta smiled a little bit and took his leave silently, urging his slim dog steadily by his side before locking the door with an echoed click.
He sat in silence for a while, running a hand through the gold fur of his precious pet. He expected Spain to come sobbing to his house, yelling something about Heracles hating him now or something like that, but it never came. As a matter of fact, it had gotten so peaceful that he felt his eyelids fall and his mind wander to sleep.
Gupta took the cue to sneak back in, scribbling 'Jackass' across Sadiq's face. He thought of it as payback for the crap he dealt with in the Ottoman household.
A/N: Yaay! I actually quite like this, I'm not sure why. It was a bit difficult to write out Sadiq's accent, since I've seen a lot of different ways it's been translated from the Edo dialect in Japanese. I decided just to stick with the basic drawl, like if he was too lazy to complete all of his words. And I get the feeling that Gupta would be more talkative when he's annoyed (which is probably often with Sadiq around) and isn't quite as hateful as Heracles about Sadiq (though obvious still slightly vengeful). Oh, and technically, France is a Mediterranean country since they touch the Mediterranean Sea (along with Italy and Spain).
For anyone that doesn't know:
Escargot is a French dish that contains snail, served in different ways. The majority of Turkey is occupied by Islamic and Muslim people, who consider snails unclean and unfit for consumption. (Correct me if I'm wrong, I couldn't find much about the Muslim people in Turkey. All I know is that they're mostly Sunni, and even then I cannot find too much info.)
Ayı means "bear" or something "boorish" in Turkish, which is what a Kengal looks like to me. Kengals are big dogs that originate in Turkey, who look like Great Danes with thicker, blond or gold colored bodies and more squashed faces.
I'm pretty sure most people know that Hola is "hello" in Spanish and that si is "yes".
Γειά σου is also "hello", but in Greek (prounced "geia sou"). Chorizo is a sausage that is (usually) made from pork, and chorizo al vino is a snack dish made from chorizo that's been cooked in wine.
Hı hı is a really casual way of saying "yes" or "yeah" in Turkish (pronounced "he" with a softer e, like in the word "met"). I've heard that you can also drawl it out to be hııı, but I don't think I can imagine Sadiq saying it like that.
