Chapter 3: First Day
Fern-Lui called out when she saw the other gunman, making the man quickly take a shot at the other man, causing the other car to lose control and hit the other car that was behind them.
"Why where they shooting at us?" She asked in German as she looked up to see the man, who looked exactly like Germany as his light blue eyes seemed to glow with the limited light. She saw the man's lips move, but no sound was made as the woman, her mamma, who did look like Italy, only with long enough hair to put into a pony tail and the noticeable lumps on her chest. She saw her crying and seemed to be whining about something while the man, her vati, seemed to go into commander mode and she was able to drive again.
After he checked to see if there was anyone else that was after them before he spoke softly to her and she saw her smile and laugh like it was like any normal evening drive. She laughed as well as she felt him hold her tight and she looked up to see him smile, apologetic, but a nice smile nevertheless.
She leaned against him and felt completely at peace at that moment.
She woke up in a bed and got up to see that she was wearing a large black shirt and giggled, knowing whose shirt must've belonged to. She looked and saw the Iron Cross clips and placed them in her hair, bringing her hair back as she did, the hat back on her head, looked out of the window to see the clean, fresh layer of snow from last night's snow fall, and walked out of the room to see a hallway. She curiously looked around and walked down to find some stairs and went down to find the living room, only to see someone on the couch.
She went up to see that it was a man with silver white hair, which nestled a yellow chick. The chick seemed to wake up in her presence and she waved at the little bird, which lightly chirped and fluttered its way to the bill of the hat. She giggled at this, which seemed to wake the man up a bit and opened his eyes, revealing ruby red irises.
"Kann ya mich etwas wasser erhalten, Westen? Ich habe einen hauptkater jetzt..." (1) He said, which she went around the place and found the kitchen, got the water, and headed back to give to the man. "Danke…" He took a sip of water and got up.
He looked to see the girl and tilted his head. "Eh? Wer sind sie?" (2)
She smiled a bit shyly. "I'm Fernanda-Luigia Vargas Beilschmidt. You can call me Fern-Lui." She said as she lifted the hat up a bit so the man could see her clearly as the chick moved to her right shoulder.
"Fern-Lui?" The man said as he took a closer look at the girl. He blinked as he pinched his cheek, making him wince at the self-inflicted pain. "I'm not dreaming?"
She shook her head as the little bird made chirping sounds.
The man sat there for a moment before getting up. "Would you mind waiting down here?"
"Okay…" She said as she and the chick look at the man's back as he went upstairs. "Looks like I'm gonna make breakfast." She looked up at the chick, who only chirped. "I'm sure Herr Deutschland can explain to him, huh?" Another chirp and she giggled. "You're such a good little bird." She then headed to the kitchen and pulled in a chair to reach the cabinets. "Herr Deutschland and Signore Italia might not want me doing this, but I wanna do something for them." She said as she got onto the chair and looked at the various cabinets.
0o0o0o0
Meanwhile, the man opened the door to where Germany and Italy were sharing a bed and went over to the left side to where the German was still asleep. He grinned as he crouched down a bit, jumped, and cry out a good morning before falling onto the bed, waking up the German.
"Prussia! What the hell did you do that for!" Germany said, not really happy to wake up the way he did.
The man known as Prussia waved him off. "Well Guten Morgen to you to, West."
Germany sighed as he ran a hand in his hair. "Morgen, what brings you here?"
Prussia pointed out to the door. "There's a girl here."
Germany nodded. "Yes, she's Fern-Lui, she's going to be staying with us for a while."
"Isn't she a mortal?"
Germany sighed. "Remember that event I told you about a week ago?"
Prussia blinked as he looked back at the door. "That's the girl?"
"Ja."
"And she's staying with us… why?"
"Because I decided that." He said as he looked seriously at this older brother. "There's no record of her at all. So there's no reason to simply hand her to the orphanage."
Prussia nodded as he leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees. "I mistook her for you when you were little, but she looks like Italy as well."
"Yes, we don't know why but such things happen." He said waving off.
Prussia smirked. "She could be your love child for all I know." He said, which earned him a pillow to the face.
"Es ist nicht wie das." (3) He said as he got up. "So, where is she?"
"Last I saw her she was in the living room."
He nodded as he went up to the closet to find some clothes to wear. "You should change, Bruder, you reek of last night's beer."
"So mean!" He said as he got up. "At least that girl is nice! In fact…" He rubbed his head. "My awesome chick took an instant liking to her."
"That reminds me, I have to feed my dogs."
"You think she would like those guys?" He asked with a teasing grin. "They're huge ya know, especially to a kid her size."
Germany lazily glared at the other. "They're good dogs. Now get out and change, and put your clothes in the hamper!"
"Okay, okay. You can be such a stick in the mud." He said as he got up and headed out of the room to see that Italy was still out like a light. "He's a heavy sleeper."
"He'll be up in a couple minutes." Germany said as he shoved him out of the room.
"Where's the fire?" He said teasingly. "Is it something kinky?"
Germany blushed red as he glared at his brother. "Italien ist mein Freund! Nehmen Sie nicht solche Dinge an!" (4) He said loudly before slamming the door, while his brother laughed as he headed to the room he usually uses when he comes here.
"Ah, Bruder, you're so dense it's hilarious!" He said to himself.
Meanwhile, back in the kitchen, she heard some commotion upstairs and smiled. "It's like I never left home." She said as the chick chirped. "Hey, can I tell you a secret?" The chick chirped and she smiled. "Okay, but you have to promise not to tell anyone."
0o0o0o0
At that moment, Italy woke up as Germany finished getting dressed.
"Ve… I'm gonna make pasta!" He said as he was about to head out when Germany stopped him and mentioned to put clothes on. "Yes sir!" He said with a salute as he looked for his clothes, allowing the German to walk out of his room and sigh.
"That's going to burn in my mind…" He whispered to himself as he now couldn't get the naked saluting Italy out of his mind now. He walked down to let his dogs in, which he saw they immediately went into the kitchen and barked like they would when greeting someone. He went to where the dogs were and saw that Fern-Lui was being welcomed by an overload of kisses from his three dogs: A German Shepherd, a Golden Retriever, and a Doberman. "Absatz!" (Heel!) He ordered, causing all of his dogs to go to his side as the girl laughed and tried to wipe away the slober on her now.
"Guten Morgen!" She said as the chirping of the chick became louder.
"Guten Morgen." He said as he looked at his kitchen and saw some flour on the counter and floor, a large bowl and the oven preset to a certain degree. "You making breakfast?"
"Ja! I'm making bread so we can have it fresh!"
He blinked, can't remember when was the last time he had a simple German breakfast. It was usually pasta or something else the Italian made, he made, or heaven help him his brother. "Need help?" He asked, a bit surprised a child can make bread by herself.
She shook her head. "Nope! I'm almost done with it. But it's going to take a while before the bread is ready."
He nodded. "Well, I'm just going to take care of them, and if you find anything I can help with, let me know." He said as he pointed to the dogs.
"What are their names?"
He pointed to the German Shepherd. "This is Blackie, he's mostly the fun one here, but still very protective." He pointed to the Golden Retriever. "This is Aster, he's a bit of a jokester." He then pointed to the Doberman. "And this is Berlitz, he's a bit serious but also loving."At that moment a dark gray cat came in wearing a ribbon that looks like the German flag and was looking at the girl in a confused sense and looked up at Germany, this was followed by another cat with white and some light brown spots and a curl on the left side of its head. "And the boys who joined us is Lutz (5), and Gino, Italien's cat."
She smiled. "It's nice to meet you all! I'm Fern-Lui."
"We'll be back in a bit." He said as Italy came down and blinked.
"Ve! You're making breakfast?"
"Sì. Fresh bread with either cheese, honey, or marmalade."
"Ve! That sounds yummy!"
"Italy, how about you help her while I take care of these three."
"Okay Germany. Don't be out too long!"
He nodded as he found the leashes and saw his brother heading to the kitchen. "Looks like I keep getting more people here, huh?"
The dogs wagged their tails as he opened the door and was almost dragged out before he gave out a command in German for them to behave once more. He was about to close the door when the two cats darted out. "You two stay out of trouble as well." He said as he checked to see if there was anyone else needed to go out before closing the door. "Now where is Prussia's cat?"
0o0o0o0
About a half an hour later, he walked through the door with the dogs going back into the house and headed to the kitchen, he was going to grab the dog food only to see that their bowls were already prepared for them, but his dogs were looking at him for his permission to chow down. "Essen sie auf." (6) He said as he saw that the oven was on a timer and looked to see the bread was rising nicely and the smell was really good to his senses, before looking at his now clean kitchen and looked for the two nations and the girl, only to find them in the living room, playing a card game.
"Hey! That's so not awesome!" Prussia said as the girl giggled.
"Sorry, but you did say this game is quick."
"Ve~ you two are too fast…"
The girl smiled before she looked up. "Willkommenes Heim, Herr Deutschland!" (7) She said, gaining the other two's attention and looked back to see the German.
"Hey West, how was your walk?" Prussia asked as he threw down a card, earning a whine from the girl and both had a childish spat while Italy seemed clueless of the whole thing.
"It was good." He said, a bit surprised to see everyone behaving when normally his brother would come up with some crazy scheme, which causes him to have a headache. Or Italy would bother him to doing something when he has work, which was an even more of a headache. Speaking of work, he recalled having a big pile of paper on his desk in his office. But that can wait until breakfast is done.
He looked at the three and noticed that the girl was still wearing his shirt as an alternative to pajamas. 'Maybe I should call up Hungry to come over and make some clothes for her. At least until we get out next time to shop.' He thought as he headed to where the phone is.
"Ve, Germany, where are you going?"
"I'm going to make a call to Hungary to see if she can come over."
"Why would you call that woman over!" Prussia said.
"Do you know how to sew a simple dress for a girl?" He said as he pointed to the said girl. "I'm just going to ask Hungary to make a few outfits until Italy and I head out to shop next time. She can't always wear our shirts after all."
"Man, West, you sound like a parent." Prussia said, making the girl giggle.
"Well... I don't mind wearing your shirts, but you need them too…"
"How old are you again?" Prussia asked.
"I'm eight!"
"You're eight? You act a little older than that."
"I get that sometimes." She said with a bit of a blush.
'She even acts like West when he was about this big.' The albino thought, lifting a brow.
"Well, I'm still going to make that call." He said as he walked out of the room.
"If that's the case, I'm going to France's house, I don't want to be anywhere near that woman and that frying pan of hers!"
He sighed as Italy tried to counter argue in the woman's defense as he called her up.
'Either way, this place is going to have another share of unexpected events.' He thought with a sigh. 'Why does this always happen?'
"Hello, Hungary here." Said the woman's voice on the other line.
"Hello Hungary, this is Germany, are you available at the moment? I have a favor to ask."
"Oh? What is it?"
"You know the girl last week?"
"Who doesn't? Why? Is she okay?"
"Ja. I've sort of… taken her in, and I don't really have clothes for a girl so…"
"You want me to come over to make some?"
"If it's not trouble."
"I'll be right there!" She said happily before hanging up.
"That was… easy…"
0o0o0o0
About a half an hour later, Hungary walked up to the door and knocked on it, where she heard a few dogs barking before a German order to make them quiet down was heard in the undeniable tone of the blond German, and the door opened to reveal Germany.
"Thank you for coming at such short notice." He said as he let her in.
"It was no problem. Austria is out to talk to his boss, so I have nothing much to do." She said as she held up a large bag with some cloth sticking out. "Now! Where's the cutie?" Her eyes were shining at the possibility of making dresses for a girl.
"She's with Italy in the living room, which has turned to a studio it seems…" He said, a bit taken aback at the female nation's excitement, as he lead her to the living room, where Italy and Fern-Lui were sitting across from each other, sketch book in each hand and were facing each other as they sketched each other. "Hungary's here, Italy."
Italy looked up and he greeted the woman cheerfully. "Hello Hungary! It's great to see you again!"
"Same here!" She said as she looked at the girl and looked as though when she sees a cute puppy or kitten. "You are so adorable!" She went up and hugged the girl. "Oh! You remind me so much like Italy when he was little!" She then took another look at the girl. "Now stand up, I got to see what I have to do."
Fern-Lui got up, let the woman use the tape measure on her, and saw the woman look thoughtful.
"What's you name sweetie?"
"Fern-Lui, Magyarország." (8)
"Ó! Beszélsz magyar?" (9)
"Igen." (10)
Hungary seemed really happy as she hugged the girl more. "Így holmi!" (11)
"Ve! How many languages do you know?"
"A lot. Mein vati usually has to go to meetings and mi mamma loves to talk to everyone, so I was exposed to every language since the day I was born."
"Ve! That's amazing!"
"That's really impressive , especially for a child your age." Germany agreed.
She blushed as she brought the hat down to cover it. "Danke…"
"Well! Now that we know your wonderful gift of language, let us start getting down to business!" Hungary said as she opened the basket to take out a lot of cloth material, thread, needles, a pin cushion with some pins in there, and other things needed to make an outfit.
"Can I help?" Italy asked as Hungary agreed.
'That will keep him busy for a few hours.' Germany thought as he let everyone know that he was going to work in his office and went there to start doing the paper work.
0o0o0o0
A few hours later, he got at least one-third of the paper work done when he smelled the unmistakable scent of pasta and tomato sauce in the air. 'Lunch must be almost done.' He thought as he timed himself to get at least one paper done before Italy can come in through the door and announced that it was time to eat.
He just finished the one paper when there was a knock on the door and he looked up to see the girl, in a red plaid dress that looked like she was going to school.
"Mittagessen ist bereit." (12)
"Danke." He said as he got up and walked to where the girl is and they just walked to where the dining room is, where Italy and Hungary were talking and finishing up preparing the table. "What are we having?" He asked, knowing that Italy tends to make a different kind of pasta for every meal. He liked all of them of course because Italy makes them homemade, meaning they were fresh from beginning to end.
"We're having orecchiette."
He looked to see the small, almost ear-shaped pasta with chopped basil, tomatoes, and diced nut bits. He only had this once a while back, but anything of Italy's was a work of culinary art.
Lunch was a bit active, which wasn't a rare occurrence since Italy stayed at the German household, but now there's the energetic Hungry and a very interested child. The German often wondered how he ended up with this scenario again when the girl looked his way and smiled, which made him smile as well.
After lunch, he was dragged to the living room by Italy to have a small fashion show with the dresses that Hungary has made for Fern-Lui, who was blushing throughout the whole thing. He had to admit that the dresses looked fitting for a girl, and when the show was over, it was time for Italy's siesta which also became Fern-Lui's siesta as well as both started to undress. Germany was about to object, especially since they have a guest, but Italy undressed to his boxers and Fern-Lui, thankfully Hungary was able to think ahead, in a simple white tank top and panties that seem to poof out. Then both curled up onto the couch, which Hungary took out a camera and took a few shots, declaring that it was the cutest thing she'd seen.
Germany sighed as he found a blanket and placed it over the two, which Hungry took another few shots, and headed back to his office to finish the paper work, allowing Hungry to make herself at home.
0o0o0o0
Soon it was six in the evening and he was done with the last of the paperwork. "This is really odd…" He said as he saw the finished pile of papers. "I'm usually never done…" He thought about the possibility of having the girl around to entertain Italy's whims, thus allowing him sometime to get things done faster and then join them. He got up and see what the two were doing and found Italy making dinner and Hungry making the finishing touches of a skirt. Then he heard a knock on the door and went to open the door to see Austria, mostly covered in snow that started to fall not too long ago.
"Mind if I come in?" Austria said, obviously cold and undoubtedly lost his way to get to his own house.
Germany let him in, also seeing his and Italy's cat dart in and ran into the living room, and announced to Hungary about it, who charged out of the living room and hugged the man.
"Hungary? I didn't know you'd be here." Austria said as he readjusted his glasses.
"Well, earlier Germany called me to do a favor that I was more than happy to do."
"A what?" He said as he looked at the German, who felt that the look was a promise of pain.
"He asked me to make some clothes for his little guest who's staying with him and Italy."
"A guest?" The Austrian asked as he saw the said guest come out of the living room.
"Hallo." She said shyly, dressed in a simple white ruffled top with a dark blue ribbon along the neck line and a dark blue skirt with some ruffles on the bottom hem.
"Isn't she just adorable?" Hungary gushed. "She's like a cute little doll."
"I'm Fernanda-Luigia, Fern-Lui for short. It's nice to meet you, Herr Österreich."
"It's a pleasure to meet you as well." He said in a monarchy fashion.
"She can speak mine, Germany's and Italy's language!" Hungary said.
"Ve!" Italy walked out to see Austria. "Austria, I didn't know you were coming."
"I came unannounced, Italy." He said as he hang up his coat on a coat hanger.
"Ve, will you join us for dinner then? I made enough."
"Might as well. It looks like the snow storm won't let up anytime soon."
Then the phone rang and Germany grabbed it and answered.
"Deutschland Wohnsitz." (13) He said.
"Yo West! It's your awesome brother!"
"Hallo Bruder…" He said as he talked to him a bit.
"So, Italy, is dinner close to being done?" Austria asked.
"No, it needs another hour." Italy said.
"Very well, I will entertain myself until then." He said as he walked to some part of the house.
"Ve…" Italy said with a tilt of his head while Hungry giggled.
After Germany talked to his brother, who was going to stay with France's place for the night, which he didn't want to imagine what those two would do. 'How is it that they're friends again?' He thought as he looked at Italy and was thankful that at least he was sane enough to have Italy as a friend, even if he did cause more problems than he was worth.
Fern-Lui went up to Germany and tugged on his pants a bit to gain his attention. "Herr Deutschland…"
He looked down at the girl, who mentioned him to come down and bent down so that they were almost eye to eye. "Was ist es?" (14) He asked as he was given a hug.
"Vielen Dank bleibe für Lassen mich hier mit Ihnen und Italia." (15) She said as she looked at the German's blue eyes with her own blue eyes with amber specks.
Germany was touched by this gesture and smiled as he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her up.
Hungary took the perfect 'parent-child' pictures as she and Italy were gushing over how sweet the sight was, which Germany went red and lost at what to do and Italy hugged the both of them, making Hungary go crazy with the pictures when the sound of a piano was heard.
"He's found the piano." Germany said.
"Let him be, you got to see the other outfits I made for her!" Hungary said, eyes sparkling.
0o0o0o0
And soon dinner was ready and everyone gathered around the table. Hungary brought her camera out to show Austria of the outfits and acting like a grandmother showing off to the other relatives about her grandchild. Both Germany and Fern-Lui didn't know what or how to talk to the woman to take it easy while Italy was no help, acting like a doting mother as he constantly kept hugging the girl and calling her cute.
Even with all the things going on Fern-Lui smiled just as much as Italy and enjoyed everything that went on until Hungary and Austria headed out of the house to return home. They looked for the girl and found that she was asleep with the dogs, arms wrapped around Aster, and Gino as Lutz looked on at the sleeping group, which Italy took a picture before Germany took her upstairs, dressed her for bed, took the clips off and noticed that they were worn, chipped, and there was a possible dent in that could've been caused by a bullet, placed those aside with a wonder of the significance, and tucked her in, which the animals entered and made themselves comfortable.
"Aren't you quick to warm up." He said to them, which was responded with all three tail wags and Gino's 'venyaa' as he shut off the light. "Gute Nacht."
"Gute Nacht… Vati…" She said sleepily, not aware of what she said, making the German blink and blush before walking away from the door, and headed to his own, where Italy was already there and saw his face.
"Ve, Germany, what's wrong?"
"She called me 'Vati'."
"Is that bad?" Italy asked, knowing what it means, but not sure if the man liked it or not.
He shook his head. "No, it's just unexpected…"
Italy smiled as he mentioned the other over, who just blushed a bit more knowing that the other was naked in the bed but went to his side of the bed anyway. "Germany would make a great dad."
"I-Italy!" He said, not really assured. "What would make you think that!"
"Cause Germany is really nice and strong." Italy said as he wrapped his arms around the other, causing him to blush. "And you've always looked out for me when others would give up a long time ago. Remember those times I was captured back in World War II? I kept being sent back because they couldn't handle me anymore. But Germany never did that. Germany helped me time and time again." He kissed the man's cheek and smiled. "Even though I'm useless in ways of fighting, you never abandoned me."
Germany was touched by the other's words as he did recall a lot of things that happened at that moment of time, both good and bad. He smiled a rare smile that only comes up when Italy was around him like this. "Go to sleep Italy. We still have a lot of time before the next meeting."
"Oh! I better tell America that we don't have to do the voting thing, since there's no way we're getting rid of her. And today wasn't that bad."
"Only one day Italy. We still don't know why she's here or what happen before she arrived here."
Italy nodded, having a rare moment of understanding what was going on. "Do you think her parents are…?"
"We can't be sure just yet." He said, also thinking of the possibility, but for the girl's sake he can't think of that.
"Ve, if her papa is anything like Germany, then I'm sure he and her mamma are okay."
He smiled as he nodded. "We better get to sleep Italy, who knows what tomorrow may bring." He said as he shut off the light and settled in bed, only for the other to curl up close to him. He looked at the Italian a bit longer before he closed his eyes when he heard the door opening. "Fern-Lui?" He whispered as he got a whimper as a response.
The girl, wearing a plain white night gown that Hungry made, walked to Germany's side, tear stains evident in her eyes and she was followed by the other three dogs and two cats
"Was ist falsch?" (16)
"Schlechter Traum…" (17)
He petted her head and asked if she wanted to sleep with him and Italy, which he got a nod and picked her up and placed her in-between him and Italy, which she curled up against Italy and Italy wrapped an arm around her. He couldn't help but smile and the admittedly cute sight as he fell asleep.
Sometime in the night Germany turned to his side and wrapped an arm around both the girl and Italy and stayed like that till morning, when Prussia came home and was about to wake up his little brother, but stopped to see, to him, the awesomely cute sight that was rare for his brother and knew that if he caught this picture, he could bribe Hungry from not hitting him. He found a camera and took the shot and deemed it perfect and worthy of his awesomeness.
Translations:
(1) Can ya get me some water, West? I'm having a major hangover right now... - German
(2) Eh? Who are you? - German
(3) It's not like that. - German
(4) Italy is my friend! Don't assume such things! - German
(5) pet form of Ludwig; famous warrior - German
(6) Eat up. - German
(7) Welcome home, Mr. Germany! - German
(8) Hungary - Hungarian
(9) Oh! You speak Hungarian? - Hungarian
(10) Yes - Hungarian
(11) So cute - Hungarian
(12) Lunch is ready - German
(13) Germany residence - German
(14) What is it? - German
(15) Thank you for letting me stay here with you and Italy. - German + Italian (Italy)
(16) What's wrong? - German
(17) Bad dream… - German