Chapter 3: In which America floats, English cooking is inflicted on others, and France is worried about Britain's mental state.
The Beach of Freedom, Democracy, and Justice had a lot going on in it the next day, what with Britain gathering plants and stones and drawing half-finished pentagrams and trying to persuade everyone that this was really going to work.
"I need some eye of newt," he told France, with a glower that meant, 'do what I say or I will throw an unmanly fit of rage that you will wish you had never seen.'
France rubbed his chin. "Do newts have eyes? I thought they were blind..."
"No, of course they don't have eyes! That's the point! It's magical! And it's in that little green bottle in my bag and don't you dare rummage through my things..."
"Oh, I would not dream of it, Angleterre," said France, like he didn't mean it, before swanning off to, yes, rummage through Britain's things.
Britain kicked sand over another mystical diagram. "Damn it!" he said. "None of my usual spells will work! I don't have the right ingredients to perform them here!"
"Which ones are out?" China asked.
"Well, we don't have the materials for most of the death spells... Most of my offensive arsenal is gone because we're stuck on this stupid island, so I've got to improvise." He pressed a fist to his forehead, deep in thought. "Hello... there's an idea... What if I used a palm leaf instead of an oak one?" Britain mused. "Would that spell still work...?"
"I don't know." said China. "This is your area of expertise."
Britain shook himself back into reality. "That was rhetorical," he said. "But, anyway, there are some ingredients that can't be replaced. So, unless someone has some bottled virgin's tears then we won't be able to turn anyone into toads or lizards or anything like that..."
France came strolling up with the green bottle of eye of newt. "Virgin's tears?" he snorted. "Simple! All we need to do it smack Britain around a little or... does anyone have any onions? We could make him cut tem up..."
"From a female virgin!" shouted Britain. "If you're quite done mocking my personal life, France!"
"So, we use China then?" asked Russia, giving the nation a nudge.
The Asian nation bristled. "Aiyaa! That's! Not! Funny!"
(Cue opening credits)
Britain's Rescue Plan Journal!
Plan C!: Use the Dark Arts!
The Allies gathered on the very edge of the cliff, watching the three Axis Powers and the chained-up America through binoculars. "I think I've got everything I need," Britain told them. He grinned. "Let's get on with it, then. Let's try the soporific first. We'll cast a sleeping spell over the Axis that's so strong they won't wake up if we blew a fanfare in their ears. And they won't be able to stop us when we rescue America."
He raised his wand, pulled up the hood of his wizard's cloak, and started to mutter something under his breath that went a bit like this:
"Bonus dormiensque numen,
Inter terram Stygius flumen,
Cucurrit et nos dividemus,
Ergo in ripas nostras manemus,
Duc iam ad litoro somno,
Quemcumque ego nomino,
Vocabo his nomines statim,
Then I'll go and let you at 'em." (1)
Britain waved his wand and hurriedly gestured to the others to do their bit. Russia half-heartedly shook a small bag full of leaves in the air, China broke a fish bone in half and threw one of the pieces in the air, and France, looking bored as usual, handed Britain an acacia thorn. The nation took it, steeled himself, and prodded the thorn into the end of his left index finger. A tiny bit of blood welled up, and, wincing, he squeezed the end of his finger until three red drops had landed on the wand.
"C'est brut," said France, wrinkling his nose. "That's disgusting."
"Germania, Pretium (2), et Italia," said Britain a bit loudly, flapping a hand at France to keep him quiet.
"So, what's supposed to happen-?" China began, before Britain shushed him violently.
A strange mist was rising out of the tip of Britain's magic wand, and wafting down the cliff to where the Axis were sitting.
"Holy hell," said China. "I think it's working."
"Of course it's working," snapped Britain. "Magic always works. It just doesn't always work in the way you expect. But it will always do something... all right, now hand me those binoculars. Let me see if they've started to nod off yet."
He placed the glasses to his eyes and peered through.
"That's weird," mumbled Britain uncomfortably. "They don't look like they're getting sleepy. Perhaps it's... simply a delayed effect." He tried for a laugh. "Of course it is. What am I thinking?"
France snatched the binoculars away. "Of course not. Do not be so stupid. The spell did not work, and the is because magic is not real, mon ami."
"But... you saw something happen!" Britain exclaimed. "How can you say it's... oh, give me those!" Britain yanked the glasses back and practically jabbed them into his eyes sockets. "There must be some effect!" He scanned the beach furiously, looking for any sign of...
"Oh, blast," said Britain.
Secured snugly in his chains, America was slumped against the palm tree, snoring his head off.
~0~0~ Hetalia ~0~0~
Four spells later...
"It did work!" Britain protested, for the fifth time. "It just misfired, that's all!"
"That is what is called collateral," muttered China.
Britain put his hands to his face. "I don't understand," he moaned. "Why did all my spells latch on to America?" He angrily scuffed up the pentacle on the ground. "It's not fair! Just because I had to replace a few ingredients... they all should have worked exactly as they were supposed to, regardless!"
"I suppose it is fortunate that Amerique was asleep the whole time," said France. "I would not have liked to be him otherwise."
"Yes, that's probably true," Britain admitted despondently. "I think they wear off within about hour or so. At least America won't stay unconscious, unreasonably happy, paralyzed, weightless, and stopped in time for too much longer."
China looked back through the binoculars at his chained-up ally. Due to the effects of one very odd spell, America was floating a few inches off the ground. He also had a line of drool coming from his mouth that was frozen in place like an icicle, and a giant grin on his face.
Despite himself, China sniggered a little, and then tried to pass it off as a cough.
"Perhaps you were thinking too much about him," suggested France. "This is how magic works, non? It is about belief."
"What would you know about magic?" cried Britain. "Just twenty minutes ago you didn't even think it was real!"
"Well... that was twenty minutes ago... and you did not answer my-"
"Speaking of time passing and things like that, I am getting a little hungry just sitting here," said Russia. "I think it would be good idea to go back and have some lunch." He looked at Britain. "Unless you want to keep putting funny spells on America. I will stay for that."
"No, no..." Britain waved a hand at the others. "You go on and have lunch. I'm staying. Someone has to make sure that..." Since he hadn't come up with the end of that sentence, he was relieved when the other three nations excused themselves rather quickly.
Britain sighed and settled down with the binoculars. "Probably they're just relieved that I won't try to make lunch for them," he said sadly. "No one ever seems to appreciate my cooking, even if it is the best in the world. Not even you, Frozen Floating Happy America. Not anymore." He rubbed his chin and adjusted the focus on the glasses.
France burst out of the greenery behind Britain. "All right, tat's enough!" he exclaimed, with a hint of hysteria in his voice. "That habit of yours is becoming pathological! And creepy!"
"Augh! Go away!" Britain shrieked.
~0~0~ Hetalia ~0~0~
(Side note (3): Britain, as you may have noticed, has a habit of making imaginary friends instead of real ones. This is because Britain isn't exactly the kind of guy most people want to make friends with. He tends to be rude and standoffish, and he's got a long history of taking control of poor, defenseless regions of the world and exploiting them.
Take India, for example. When Britain showed up at India's door, India had a long and powerful history, but mean Mister Britain managed to turn this country into a colony by letting businesses like the East India Company basically run things for a little while, and then engineering a rebellion so he could come in and take full control. How rude! And then, he made all the Indians grow things like opium for him so he could sell it to places like China and then wage war with them when they didn't want to buy his illegal drugs! Double-you tee eff!
~ "Ha! I know, right?" ~
Oh, shut up, Belgium. You're one to talk.
So basically, people are a little wary of Britain, even if he really does have a good heart underneath it all. Or, that's what they say. But they say a lot of things, don't they? Like how it makes sense that 'tall' Starbucks coffee is the smallest order, and how jet contrails are actually neurotoxins sprayed over cities by the government to make people stupid. As if they needed it.)
Britain did feel a little hungry, but he somehow felt guilty about having accidentally put all those spells on America, and the least he could do was stay and make sure nothing bad happened to him.
"I suppose it's lucky, then, that I couldn't use any of my really nasty spells," Britain said to himself. He sighed again. "Poor America. It seems like we're doing more harm to him than the Axis are. I wonder why they haven't started torturing him yet?" Smiling a little, Britain added ruefully, "Although from what everyone else seems to think, the worst harm I could possibly do to America would be to make him lunch."
Then the lightbulb went on. "Now there's an idea!" said Britain, grinning. "And in the state he's in, America won't be able to bodge this one up!" He stared through the binoculars, searching until he found the Axis. It looked as though they hadn't eaten yet. Italy was just making a fire.
"Perfect," said Britain, laughing evilly. "They'll never know what hit them."
Plan D!: Poison Them With Bad English Cooking!
After their lunch, France, Russia, and China returned to the cliff. France went ahead with a bowl of stew for Britain. He did not explain his uncommon charity to the others, only that he was "very worried about the man." And he looked it, too.
"Britain?" he called. "Are you still here? I brought you something to eat..."
"Well that's rather unexpectedly kind of you," said Britain, suddenly appearing from behind a tree and taking the bowl from a startled France. "Is it a bribe or an apology?"
After he got over his shock, France remembered what his point had been. "Neither," he said honorably. "Britain, you have been acting bizarrement ever since America was taken captive, and I think that there is more to it than simply your desire to win the war. If there is something that you wish to-"
"This is quite good," Britain interrupted, gesturing to the stew. "I didn't think things like raw fish and mangoes would go very well together, but I suppose everything tastes good when you're hungry and desperate."
That explains much, France thought. Britain must be always hungry and always desperate.
"Well, it's certainly a far better lunch than the Axis are going to have," Britain went on, with a knowing smirk.
"And how would you know that?" asked France suspiciously. "Oh, mon dieu... you didn't work another spell, did you?"
China and Russia were just arriving at the cliff. "He did more magic?" asked Russia, disappointed. "I didn't see it?"
"No, no!" laughed Britain. "I didn't use magic! That's why it's so brilliant! Come on over, and I'll tell you." He waited until the others had gathered around in their spying spot right above the Axis camp. "While you lot were off having lunch," he explained smugly, "I foraged a little more, I used what I found to make the most disgusting food I possibly could, and mashed it up into a sauce! Then I snuck down to the beach and used my fearsome spy techniques to get close to where the Axis keep their food supplies, and poured the sauce over it all! And they're just sitting down for lunch right now!"
Even France was duly impressed by this display of lateral thinking. Of all the people he could think of with the ability to poison people with food, the person that came to the front of his mind was always Britain.
"That's actually quite clever and resourceful," said China. "So does that mean you have finally admitted to yourself that your culinary skills are terrible?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Britain said stiffly.
China shook his head slowly. "Forget it."
Down on the beach, Italy was cheerfully passing out plates of pasta, babbling as usual. "Guess what, Germany?" he was saying. "I've figured out how to hold a gun the right way and I found this cute bird's nest over by the rocks and do you know why the sky is blue and..."
Germany patiently waited until this happy tirade was over. At least America had been relatively quiet for the last hour. He had wondered at first if their captive had somehow managed to escape, but when he looked over, he saw that he was just sleeping. A strange thing to do in the middle of the day, but then, it was perhaps normal for people like him. Italy, he remembered, also did that.
Still contemplating this, he stuck his fork into the pasta and then put it in his mouth. Japan did the same thing at the same time.
Their expressions simultaneously became ones of great surprise. Very slowly they turned to look at each other.
On the cliff, the Allies waited with bated breath. Britain and France were actually sharing the binoculars, one eye each.
"This is delicious!" said Germany.
"Quite delectable," agreed Japan. "How did you do it, Italy-san?"
"WHAT?" shrieked the Allies as one man. Somehow no one heard them.
Italy looked surprised but pleased. He blushed. "Well, it's the same as we had before... I didn't really do anything different..."
Germany actually smiled. "Vell, then it is as good as before but we did not notice it then," he said, putting a hand on Italy's shoulder.
The little nation's face went bright red and he sat down quite heavily with a thump next to his ally. "You... you mean that...?" Tears sprouted in the corners of his eyes.
"Oh, yeah, flirt, flirt!" hollered America from his tree. "I suppose you jerkwads aren't going to think about giving me anything to eat, huh? No, you're too busy making goo-goo eyes at each other!"
Japan sighed and marched over. "I thought you didn't want to eat any of our food," he said, in a long-suffering manner.
"Hrmph." said America, trying to cross his arms but failing because of the chains. "Well... I changed my mind." For some reason he was in a very bad mood. It was like he had come down from several kinds of highs at once. Including a gravitational one, which was weird. And now he was very hungry.
On the top of the cliff, Britain was banging his head against a nearby tree, and France was trying to stop him.
"How! The hell! Did! That happen!?" Britain was wailing, in between thumps. "It doesn't! Make any! Sense!"
"Britain! Stop that childish behavior right now! You are hurting yourself!"
"I don't care!" Britain moaned. "They liked it! They actually liked it!" He started to cry. "That's the first time anyone's ever complimented my cooking, and I was trying to poison them with it! Why does it have to be like this?"
TO BE CONTINUED~
(Cue credits and Marukaite Chikyuu, England's version)
AN: So, footnotes...
(1) I know you may choose not to believe me, but I did all that on my own, without using Google Translate. So that's why the grammar might be a little off. But it was fun. It's Latin, if you were wondering. Roughly it translates to:
"Good sleeping spirit,
The river Styx under the earth,
Runs and divides us,
So we remain on our own banks,
Now lead to the shores of sleep
Whomsoever I name,
I will call these names immediately,
Then I'll go and let you at 'em."
That first part is basically telling the spirit of Sleep to stay on his side of Hell and not get out into the world and cause trouble. I thought that bit would be important in any spell, and I needed a rhyme. :)
(2) 'Pretium' means 'Japan' in Latin (here I did use Google Translate).
(3) Read this part in that awesome announcer woman's voice. Also, if you're wondering what she's talking about, I'm referencing the British occupation of India, the Opium Wars with China, and briefly the Belgian Congo. Look 'em up.