HELLO! I'm not dead! Neither have I lost interest in Hetalia or the story :D. I just had incredible amounts of work to take on. I now also have a beta reader, PeaceGem4! Thankies you very muchly for checking the story over :D

Italics indicate flackback. ~Wibble wobble wibble wobble~ (scone if you get the reference, seriously XD) or speech by unknown characters. You will know in which way it is being used when it gets down to it ^_^.

There is profuse colourful language in this chapter. Don't be offended D: *cowers*

Hetalia does not belong to me, it belongs to Hidekaz Himuraya-aru.

"Alfred-?" The small voice teased it's way expertly through the night, into the head of the blond sleeping peacefully on the scarlet sheets.

"No." He whispered back, trying to wave it off, but knowing subconsciously that this would in no way help, "Go away."

"Alfred-?"

"No! Leave me alone!"

"Alfred, it's your fault. You were the one. You killed them." It was right inside him now, reverberating nastily through his skull. Silence for a few seconds, before, "You're no better than a serial killer."

Alfred stopped responding, captivated negatively by the words. He could think of nothing to retort with, nothing to redeem himself. Now that he thought of it…that voice…he knew…he knew.

A figure began to form out of the swirling darkness, shedding lightening smoke, body slightly lopsided, short hair flapping limply by it's head.

It was small, smaller than him and very, very thin. As more details came into view, he saw that it's clothes were ragged and bloodstained, slashed as if by a sword, and scars were stretching mercilessly across the exposed skin. A walking horror film, almost.

It stepped slowly into the light and looked up, making direct eye contact with the unwilling man and opened it's mouth with a pained grimace.

"I blame this unto thee!" it screamed unexpectedly, making Alfred jump, tears springing quickly to his blue eyes, watching the thing collapse at his feet.

"Aaaaahhhhh-!"

"Alfred! What's wrong?" Arthur was by his bed, shaking him awake desperately, "Are you still hurt? Has Francis appeared? If he has, I swear…"

"No, I-it's not." He stuttered breathlessly through the night, Arthur quietened. "It's just…difficult to explain." Arthur's face was priceless, "Okay, sorry. That wasn't helpful." He took another deep breath and calmed down. "Just a nightmare. Yeah."

"Alfred, are you sure it was just that? You were screaming pretty damned loudly. And you never told me about yourself."

"Hm. That's a good point, I never did, did I?" he sighed and leant backwards, feeling more relaxed. "What? Do you want to hear about it right now?"

"Mm." Arthur grunted from the darkness, obviously settling himself down, "I should be sleeping, but you frightened me so much, I doubt I'd be able to relax enough."

"Sorry." Came the reply, half apologetic, and half amused. "Right. Where do we start? It's long, and it's uncomfortable."

"Are you fine talking?"

There was an awkward pause, before, "Oh, yes, yes. I think so. For the moment."

"Go ahead, then."

-o-

"Alfred!" The voice floated though the arid air to the young man with eyes so unlike his habitat, "Al!" Turning, Alfred saw Toris, his friend, shooting towards him, having no difficulty with the heavy stones that littered the floor. As he came closer, Alfred saw that Toris' eyes were worried. It was strange; Toris was barely ever troubled.

"Yo, Tors, what's up?"

"Alfred! They've moved! They moved to Southern Merga and are attacking the village with really, really destructive weapons…oh, shit, shit, shit…" he sat down, breathless and put his face in his hands in despair, "My girlfriend and family's there, it's where I live!"

"Woah! Calm down, Tors-"

"It's my family! We've got to stop them!"

"Right." Alfred stood up quickly, deciding that it must be serious if Toris of all people was in this state, "First, tell me this: How destructive are the weapons?"

"Light bombs, rifles, I think I saw a bazooka in there somewhere, I've seen aircraft too-come on, let's go!" He began to tug at Alfred's arm.

"Are you mad? Toris, we can't go there! We'll be killed."

"I don't care any more, Alfred." Toris set off at a jog, "I'm going. You don't have to come."

Alfred just stood there, dumbfounded. "Toris!" he yelled, making up his mind, "I'm coming with you!"

"Hurry up then!"

They ran, faster than they had ever run before, Alfred stumbling clumsily over heavy boulders, yanked on the quickening Toris. He never seemed to have had any difficulty before with the rough terrain, a skill Alfred often craved when he was on the dusty flats. It made walking difficult, and so it wasn't a surprise that barely anyone ever came out here.

"Come on!" Toris' hand was now firmly gripped around Alfred's arm, rubbing raw to the point of crimson the joint.

"Dude, slow down!"

"No, Alfred. This is my family at risk here. You don't know what it's like."

"Hm."

There, it came into sight, the looming grey town, an immense orange aura highlighting it against the azure sky. The two lowering their gaze, saw great swarms of heavily armed men, clad in black despite the sheer heat of the day. There was a bazooka there.

"I told you." Toris had lowered his voice to a whisper, evidently scared of the men, "Please, my family's there." He began to try to pull away, eyes beginning to redden with tears, ignoring the firm grip on his elbow now.

"Toris…" came the voice desolately, "There's no-one left."

-o-

Alfred sniffed and drew his wrist across his eyes, unable to carry on for the memories choking his throat, "I-I can't go on. Not r-right now."

"Alfred." Arthur bounded across the room quickly to comfort his friend, "It's okay. I'm sorry to have pushed you to talk."

Alfred nodded and smiled slightly, "It's okay. It did help a little." He looked up at the thick-eyebrowed man who was yawning. It was difficult to imagine that this was the teenager who had been so…cold earlier. Maybe it was because he had woken up too early…

"Are you okay? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to get you up-"

"Alfred, it's fine. I daresay this might be doing me good."

"Yeah, but you should go back to bed."

"It's okay?"

"Yeah. I'll be fine."

Arthur drew up, rubbing his eyes with the bottom of his palms, "That's…" he yawned, "That's fine. G'night." He made towards the door, before a voice interrupted him. He turned around, looking at the figure laid down on the bed, listening.

"Thank you for everything you've done."

"Hm." Arthur grunted and smiled. Alfred was almost like his little brother when he was like this. "See you tomorrow." He took one last look at the now snoring figure and nodded, carefully shutting the door behind him. He carefully picked his way down the wooden stairs that creaked sometimes and out onto the landing.

He heard a loud-ish rattling.

"Huh?" Arthur halted for a moment and listened carefully. There was silence.

There it was again, only louder, a medium clanging, like metal against metal. He swallowed, hard, feeling the familiar taste of iron shock his tongue. Damn, he had bitten his cheek again.

Not wincing, not even daring to breathe, he swirled the flavour around his gums, swallowing every few seconds, paying attention to every single disturbance to the night. His heart quickened.

A few more minutes passed before he finally dared to take a step towards the stairs down to the hall, bare feet padding lightly against the rustic wooden landing and looked down. A sharp spot of light was trained on the wall at the bottom, shaking, and hushed voices were barely audible. Listening carefully, Arthur couldn't hear any definite words, but it was enough to cause him to begin to climb back up to Alfred's room again in search of a weapon.

The door didn't make a sound as it swung open, throwing precious little light over the peaceful figure. It wasn't so peaceful when Arthur shook it roughly but silently awake.

"Wh-" The question was quickly muffled as the scruffy-headed man clamped his hand over the other's mouth.

Arthur responded in a voice that was so like a spy that Alfred could have sworn that he was in a James Bond film, "There's someone downstairs. I'm here for a rounders bat to get rid of them. I can't just leave them to get in the house." He tiptoed swiftly to the door and retrieved the wanted possession, "Here." He threw one to the now alert young man sitting up attentively, "You can either stay here and defend yourself, which would be preferable, or help me. I would rather you stayed safe."

"No way, I'm helping you!"

"Please, Alfred. We don't know what these people are here for, and you're myguest, so it's my duty to keep you safe." He strode to the door once again, bracing himself for the almost definite fight, and probably loss on his part. "Don't follow me down or I willkill you."

Alfred's response was somewhat squeaky, "Okay."

"Good."

The journey back downstairs didn't last for half as long as Arthur felt it should have. All too soon, the blond was again confronted with the voices and the spot of illumination on the wall. His heart felt like it might explode from how quickly it was going, and the adrenalin pounded through his body, making him feel sick.

He took a moment to calm himself, before taking the first step down. Vague thoughts ran through his head of how incredibly foolish this was, that he should turn back right now and lock himself and Alfred in the bathroom and call the police or something similar, but in times like this, the logic centre of his brain rarely worked.

As the floor began to move towards him, snippets of the conversation became clear.

"Isn't this theoretically counted as breaking in?"

"Just shut up."

"You're being too loud."

"He's right, we'll wake them up."

"But we've been assigned the job by people above the very law. It's technically illegal, but-"

"Hey! What's that?"

Arthur stopped so suddenly he nearly fell over. Bending his knees to gain some sort of balance, he held his breath, waiting.

"Those were footsteps. I'm sure of it."

"Don't be so paranoid."

"I know, there's someone on those stairs who have heard us."

"I think it's better safe than sorry."There was a little rustling and footsteps that sounded heavily booted, "Even if there is no-one there, it'd be better if we left this for tomorrow."

"I'd rather do it-"

The sound of Arthur falling down the three steps that he had been listening from cut off the voice.

"Oh, bloody buggering hell!" He knew that he'd been found out, so why not release a few words to vent the stress? And he was upside down against the wall.

He scrabbled to right himself and snatched for the bat that had rolled a couple of metres away desperately. He knew that this could easily be a matter of life and death.

"Hello, who's this?" The voice was definitely male and slightly patronising. The black-clad figure loomed above him, moonlight flashing dangerously off grinning teeth. Arthur knew that he only had a few seconds-

"Gotcha!" The handle came into contact with the Englishman's palm, and he swung it clumsily at the man. It was dodged easily.

"We aren't going to hurt you."

"Bollocks!" He took another swing. This time, the opponent wasn't so nimble, and he was clipped on the elbow, but he quickly recovered, and more people began to emerge from the blackness and shadows of the hallway.

"Oi! You aren't having a go at him, are you, three?"

"Piss off. You're not involved in this."

"I was, last time I checked."

His attacker turned around briefly to stare down his challenger, and Arthur took this opportunity to whack at his knees. The effect was instantaneous. His knees buckled and he sprawled ungainly on the floor, hissing in pain.

"You little shitbag…"

"Hey!" One of the others in black raced to drag him back, "We're not here to kill people." The other looked at Arthur quickly, before letting loose a definite command. "Get out. All of you."

There were a few grumbles of protest, before all the intruders dragged their feet out of the door, one grabbing a large bag, odd gauges and scientific instruments sticking out of the top, and slinging it carelessly over his shoulder. He heard rustling, and decided that they were exiting via the window. He knew he should have boarded that up. Well fuck.

"I'm sorry." The person who had restrained the vicious man apologised quickly, "It won't happen again. May I…?" They gestured to the bat, and Arthur obliged, not wanting to be killed for not obeying. "He's too much trouble."He…or she…brought the bat down on the flailing man's head and he was still. "Ah. Much more peaceful. He was spoiling for a fight, so please excuse." The shape looked down and began to drag him along the floor. Arthur was too dumbstruck to ask what had just happened, and just waited for them to leave. Then he trudged upstairs and fell asleep, forgetting about Alfred.

Arthur turned groggily and looked at the alarm clock.

"Oh shit!"

The second thing he saw was a tall man looming over him.

"Late again?" It was Alfred. Arthur sighed.

"Alfred, you scared the living crap out of me."

"You didn't come and tell me it was safe. I've been up since 3am. Three-ay-emm." He obviously thought it would sound clearer if he pronounced it slowly.

"Alfred, I can understand English, thanks."

"You're late. And you left me."

"I BLOODY KNOW I FORGOT!" Arthur finally snapped and screamed, "You also almost gave me a bloody heart attack, so I think we're equals. You've taken three years from me; I took six hours from you. Fair?" He jerked out of bed. "I'm going to be late."

"I packed your bag for you." Alfred said, handing the black rucksack over curtly, "You've been late for two hours now, so I decided to do some work for you."

Arthur stopped, feeling slightly touched and ashamed for his outburst. He took it slowly, and said, "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. Now get going, boy."

Arthur smirked and looked at him weirdly before leaving, yelling at him to hide in the attic if his parents turned up.

Alfred walked to a desk and sat himself down, thinking. He wanted to make something for Arthur in thanks for how he had treated him and given him a home for the last few days. Deciding that he would make some art (after all, you couldn't have Arthur without "Art"), he snatched a clean piece of paper and a mechanical pencil from the edge of the desk. This project, he decided, should be simple, with little cost and minimal mess, yet effective.

Ideas…he tapped the graphite against the white surface, watching grey marks appear with each casual twitch. He hated it when this happened. Maybe he could do something based on his home? That sounded like a good idea, it was a beautiful enough place.

He began by sketching the planet as he was taught when he was younger. He had never really been terrific at art, but then, he was just acceptable enough to get the basic shapes down. A few flicks of the pencil representing the ground, blocks for buildings, a giant orange halo…he stood up and held it to the light. It was acceptable and would do as a plan.

But, he wandered, what medium should it be in? He knew few methods of art; sculpture, drawing, painting, mosaic. Also, he could teach himself new methods, but that would take too long, possibly. In fact, he thought, why waste a perfectly good drawing on a plan? He sat down again and picked up the pencil, attacking the sheet and expanding on the sparse lines, producing a feasibly good drawing. He smiled at himself and sighed, heading to the kitchen for food.

-o-

"I told you before, Gil, he's just a homeless guy that wandered in off the streets."

Gilbert, obviously not believing his story, sighed. "You told me otherwise yesterday, you told me he fell from the sky. You don't seem to think that the awesome me can detect a blatant lie?" He furrowed his eyebrows, "Artie, I thought we were on reasonably good terms. What is making you lie to me like this?"

"I'm not lying. And don't call me Artie. I was tired, I explained before. So stop having a go at me." He turned back to the French teacher and took notes. Francis scribbled in his book diligently. "Teacher's pet."

"Are you directing that at me?" hissed Gilbert angrily, "Are you insulting me behind my back now?"

"N-no!" came the stuttered reply. The German could get very scary when he was angry, "I was thinking of…oh, never mind."

Ludwig chose this time to speak up, "Francis just likes the subject and he's good at it. And may I mention, Arthur, that you did also pick the option of French?"

"As did you, so why are you speaking to me?"

"You know," He replied, "You've become very nasty so suddenly."

Their conversation was cut short by the teacher, "That's enough." She went back to writing on the board.

The bell rang, and Arthur stood up without a word, sweeping his books into his bag and leaving the room noiselessly and promptly. At the moment, it would be unwise to dig himself into a deeper hole. He spent lunch alone, sitting on the wall reading poetry and overlooking the sea with its blessed waves.

He never noticed footsteps behind him and a head slightly shadowing the book until a quiet voice broke the quiet.

"The Tyger?"

"Hm?" Arthur nearly jumped from his skin, "Oh, yes. A favourite of mine."

"Mind if I…?" The black-haired man motioned to the space next to Arthur, and receiving a nod, sat down. Kiku looked at the poem a bit more.

There was silence for a few moments, before: "I always preferred The Lamb myself. Granted, it is the sister poem, but still. I prefer the idea behind the allegory to The Tyger."

"Ah, you're the first person I've met who also likes The Lamb. Very few people I've ever met have even heard of it."

There was an awkward silence for a few minutes.

"I think it's unfair how you treated Ludwig-san today." He paused, but quickly started over Arthur's protests, "And I know that Gilbert-san was being horrible also, but he was probably confused. You have been giving off two different stories and it doesn't seem to make sense." He swiftly drew breath, "And you know how frustrated he can get when he's puzzled."

"Yes." Arthur agreed quietly, "And I was being kind of stupid now I think about it. But last night was so stressful…" he trailed off.

"Is there anything wrong, Arthur-san?"

"No…Well, yes. But can you promise not to tell anyone about it ever?"

"Of course I won't, but you can't have fallen in love with Alfred already, could you?"

"No!" Arthur yelled, his cheeks turning a delicate shade of rose, "I mean, that's absurd! No, last night, a group of people broke into the house-"

"Understandable, seeing as you have windows that are not intact."

"It's not like you to interrupt, Kiku. Anyway, they were all dressed in black, about four or five of them, and they had scientific instruments, as if they were measuring something. Also, they were talking about weird things: something about being ordered by people above the law to break in." By this time, he was very out of breath, and hung his head, sucking in mouthfuls of air.

"That sounds very odd. Could they be referring to the government-?"

"Very possibly. And it's so scary, and I'm afraid I'll get in trouble if I tell anyone. Promise you won't tell, Kiku?"

"I promise, Arthur-san."

"I feel slightly reassured." He sat still, alone in his own head, listening to the waves break over pebbles.

Kiku broke the silence once again, "Maybe you should go and say sorry to your friends?"

"Yes, I think so." Arthur stood up with a groan and offered Kiku his hand, which was taken. He pulled his friend to his feet and they departed for the courtyard, knowing that Gilbert would be there, maybe eating lunch.

-o-

"Hello?" Arthur called at the house door squeaked open, "Alfred? Mum? Dad?"

"Arthur!" His mother came running down the stairs, "I missed you!"

"Yes..." he choked back, struggling to breathe, "Yes mum. I missed you too." he flailed free and saw his father coming to join.

"Hi, Arthur. Have a nice time? How was your A-level?"

"It was fine, thank you. I think I made a few slips, but..." he collected himself, "But anyway, how was your holiday?"

"Ooh, it was great! Honestly, never been so relaxed in my life! Well, I have actually, but it was still relaxing." She started, "Did you say that one of your friends were Italian?"

"Two of them."

"Well they're very lucky to have come from such a pretty and historical place." She grinned, looking tanned, "Shall we have dinner early tonight, to celebrate?"

"Aye, that sounds great." Arthur's father interrupted, "I'm surprisingly peckish. Maybe it was the travelling." He shrugged his shoulders, "Arthur, go and unpack your bag so we can have tea early tonight."

He nodded and set off upstairs with a hasty, "Okay, dad. See you later."

Arthur got upstairs and threw his bag into his room, not caring much for the mess it caused, but headed right for the attic, where Alfred had been instructed to wait. "Alfred-?" he whispered carefully, "Alfred, are you there?"

"Er...er...yes. I'm here." A quick rustling could be heard, and Alfred emerged from behind the bed. "I'm here, and they haven't noticed me!"

"That's good, but what did you put under the bed?"

"Nothing!" Alfred jumped to intercept the blond, "Nothing at all!"

"I don't believe you."

"You have to!" The blue-eyed man's pleas went unheard as the other walked past him and reached under the bed.

"Oh, Alfred..."

Haha! It's done!

Now: I have had a tonne of stuff on, and school doesn't end for about 5 or 6 weeks yet, so expect updates to be few and far between. Really, don't expect anything soon unless I'm feeling particularly generous or been bored in an I.C.T. lesson XD

Another thing: I made an illustration inspired by Gilbert in the last chapter. There's a link to it at the top of my profile if you're interested (and yes, it has a mature warning because I'm paranoid).

I can't think of anything else at the moment. And thanks again to PeaceGem4 for beta-ing!