Hetalia - Down the Rabbit Hole

Chapter 14! So sorry for the long wait. Uni work coupled with my new Nintendo Switch made getting down to writing this chapter very difficult. I'd like to give a heads up that because Uni deadlines are approaching, I will be putting this on temporary hiatus until they have pasted.

I would also like to announce that I have a Hetalia - Avatar (2009) AU outlined which I plan to post here on fan fiction and on AO3. I was feeling particularly inspired after watching the film again, listening to Peter Hollen's (a great musician) cover of Baba Yetu, and reading 'Of Song and Claw' by Ahro and HellieAce on AO3. The holy three spurned my inner plot bunnies, so I hope you all are enjoy the fic when I post it :D

Thank you again for your patience and without further ado, I present the next chapter!

(Apologises for any grammar and spelling mistakes.)

Enjoy!

Spades District, 221 Bakers Street, The Kirkland Residence.

'All hail Columbia and the Britannia Angel! Heroes of Terra!' Seamus cheered as Alfred, Britannia at his side, strode into the penthouse as champions robed victory; a ridiculously proud grin plastered to the American's face.

'Damn straight!' Alfred roared as he strode over to the sofa and leapt onto Matthew to pull him into a chokehold and noogie his head, the younger twin squealing in delight as he bucked against him. Britannia made a noise of amusement as he passed over to Dylan and tossed him the memory stick.

'Cheers love.' Dylan winked with a high British accent and plugged the stick into the port on his laptop. As his fingers tapped away at the keyboard and everyone gathered around the sofa, Alfred released Matthew to nudge Britannia with his elbow.

'So B, after this, what's say you and I ditch the suits and go for a drink?' He offered with a suggestive wiggle of his eyebrows and Britannia scoffed with an upturn of his mask.

'How about a yes to the drink. No to the suit ditching.' The Brit quipped with a return nudge, and Alfred's grin widened to one of a lunatic's as he mouthed over to his brother, 'Did you see that? Did you see that!'. Matthew rolled his eyes at the same time when at the same time, Dylan brought up the holo-table's interface.

'Let's see here,' The welshman muttered under his breath whilst a litter of documents and images popped up on the virtual screen. 'Woah, seems N.O.V.A has been pouring major funding into their neuroscience branch.'

'Particularly on the effects of inhibitors on brain activity.' Seamus highlighted, and Allistor leant forward for a closer look.

'There are experiment records that make mention of a inhibitor "X",' He read. 'Side effects exhibited by participations include; disassociation, hallucinations, dizziness, tiredness. A positive correlation was found between the concentration of administered doses and the severity of side effects.'

Alfred's brows furrowed as he continued to skim through the text. 'Wait. So Edelstein's working some drug?'

'The memory stick you found may shred some light on the subject.' Britannia hummed and with a few swipes of the mousepad, Dylan opened the files on Edelstein's memory stick.

'"X" is an enhancer drug. Capable of exponentially boosting the speed of the electrical impulses that diffuse across the nerve neurone synopsis by increasing the influx of sodium ions in the Schwann cells.'

Seamus grunted. 'That'd make the relapse period near nonexistent.'

'But wouldn't that overload the brain's capacity to process information?' Matthew pointed out, and Britannia gave a curt nod.

'Not so much overload as your brain would be receiving so much input, that it wouldn't be able to properly process it.'

'Meaning that the instant you formed a thought, it would be instantly be broken down for the next one and so forth.' Dylan carried on, a deep line between his comically thick brows. Now Alfred was not lame, but truthfully, the majority of this scientific babble was flying over his head.

'Uh, what does that mean?' He sheepishly asked as he glanced between them all.

'It means lad,' Allistor grimly concluded. 'that depending on the concentration of the dose, it could either enhance your senses and reflexes to superhuman levels, or trap you inside your own head.'

Next to him, Britannia sharply cursed. 'The gunman that attacked Edelstein for lobotomising his sister. She had to have been a test subject in these experiments.'

Alfred's veins felt as though all the blood in them had been replaced with lead. The very idea was…to a little girl…

'This is beyond fucked up.' He breathed, and chorus of 'Amen's' followed after. A moment of sober silence stretched out before Matthew cleared his throat to break it.

'Does anyone have any theories of what the idea behind this drug is? I mean, they clearly aren't going to submit this for clinical approval.'

'Judging from it's dual usage as a sensory enhancer, as well as a dangerous sedative, I'd say we're looking at the newest drug on the Underworld market.' Allistor put forward and Dylan hummed in agreement.

'I'd second that. It's still in the prototype stages, and Britannia look here. "Patients that displayed abnormally high levels of brain activity (categorised as: Lucid) reacted strongly to even low percentage doses with unpredictable results. Some cases resulted in the Lucid patients completely losing their 'abilities', and in other cases, amplified them to uncontrollable levels,'

As Alfred scanned through Edelstein's personal notes, it became clear that the doctor had drew much perverted glee from experimenting on Lucid individuals.

Dylan continued to read aloud. 'In all these cases, the patients would attempt to engage in acts of self harm invoked by hysterical delusions and hallucinations, no longer being able to distinguish between reality and the nonexistent. Curiously, all patients that lapsed in insanity, spoke of a "Voice" that called out to them from the beyond. Whilst none have directly clarified what this "Voice" says to them, it is evident from the persisting insomnia and night terrors, that it is something to be feared.'

'Stop,' Britannia demanded, Alfred only now noticing how rigid he stood, tightened fists trembling at his sides. 'That's enough.'

Guilt slammed in Alfred like a freight train. Fuck, if he had found it hard to listen, how had someone who was Lucid themselves felt? 'Britannia…-' He tentatively reached for the Brit only to have him step away.

'I should of let Edelstein hang.' Britannia growled, and after all he'd read, Alfred couldn't find it in himself to argue against it.

Without warning, Seamus started up in his seat and pointed at the screen. 'Wait wait wait, wait. Dylan, scroll back up. I just saw something,' All eyes peeled now for what the irishman had seen, Dylan slowly scrolled back up and Seamus bounced in his seat.

'There! Six batches of prototype X3 was retrieved through extraneous negotiations between Yao Wang and the Winter Syndicate. The final price was settled at five million US dollars and a nonaggression pact between the two organisations.'

'Who's Yao Wang?' Alfred asked when he saw the brothers grimace at the name.

'A major crime lord of the Underworld, and not a fan of mine. I've dismantled more than a few of his smuggling and drug networks,' Britannia replied with a cross of his arms and tilted his head to Alfred, who was internally sighing at the reminder of just how badass Britannia was.

'Perhaps your theory was right, Columbia. To say Wang was the mysterious client behind the white woman wouldn't be a far throw. Wang's yakuza and the Syndicate have clashed over this drug before.'

'Well, for whatever reason, something must be up for him to break his nonaggression pact and hire this white woman to kidnap Edelstein and the other scientists.' Dylan proposed.

'Yeah, think about it. Get the scientists that are developing the drug, and you control it's production.' Seamus tagged on, but Alfred's brows drew together and he turned to fix Britannia with a look.

'But that still doesn't explain why the white woman was after you.' He frowned, and Britannia shrugged.

'Maybe Wang finally got tired of me fucking up his plans.' Was all he offered with nonchalance, and Alfred was not reassured.

Seamus got up from his seat and leant over to Dylan's laptop to tap at the keyboard and bring up a map of Terra, zooming in on the Hearts' red light district. 'Wang owns a luxury 'adult theatre' and brothel in the style of a Chinese palace named 'The Jasmine Dragon'. Built on a small island, the only access is via skyline connected to the end of the high end strip.'

'Sounds tricky.' Matthew mumbled around a chewed lower lip.

'That's not the worst part,' Dylan declared. 'the Jasmine Dragon website states that Wang is currently staying there as we speak.'

'Even better he's there. I'll interrogate him myself,' Britannia countered and ignored the looks of shock from the Kirklands in favour for Alfred. 'Columbia. I can't thank you enough for all you've-'

'Oh no. Don't think for a second that I'm backing out now,' Alfred cut off, sensing the concluding direction Britannia was leaning toward. 'We're in for the long haul baby!'

Britannia looked between him and Matthew, an indivisible look of worry on his face. 'We'd be infiltrating a crime lord's base of operations. It's not going to be like N.O.V.A. It's going to be kill on sight with the guards, there will be innocents in the crossfire.'

'We can do it if we work together!' Alfred reaffirmed with his brightest grin, and there was an echo of chuckles and sighs from their audience at the enduring display. Allistor stood up to draw everyone's attention.

'Right then lads, me thinks we should take a short break. Dylan has to data mine the rest of the Edelstein's hard drive and memory stick, and we all need a breather to get some normality back into our lives. Say we reconvene the day after tomorrow.'

The motion was met with a ripple of agreement before everyone broke away to depart, Matthew following Allistor upstairs to repack and retrieve his and Alfred's bags, whilst Alfred did not move from Britannia's side; a soft smile on his face as their gazes met.

Britannia gave him a single nod. 'That was something else, how you managed to lift that door. I- I admit that I wasn't certain about this at first, but tonight has cleared a lot of doubts for me.' He confessed, and Alfred felt his smile widen, his heart aflutter from the praise. Britannia had complimented him, complimented him. His pores opened, his crops were blessed, and the world was all that much brighter.

Now, now was the time to take his advances to the next level. Britannia had been responsive to them in N.O.V.A, that meant something right? Come on man! Answer with something cool, something flirty and something so goddamn smooth that you'd break your back slipping on it.

'Well, uh, y'know- We did…good.'

Britannia stared at him, and Alfred internally screamed at his stupid tongue before there was an adorable snort of laughter.

'Yes. I suppose we did.' The Brit chuckled and Alfred reeled to recover.

'I mean- I- I'd glad that I was helpful to you.' He stammered, the blood boiling in his cheeks.

Britannia's chuckling stopped, and he inclined his head. 'W-what are you getting all flustered about? Of course you were helpful, idiot. Weren't you the one blabbering on and on about how great we were together?'

Alfred's brow quirked. 'I never phrased it like that, but I'm glad you think so to, gorgeous. Must be a sign that we're made for each other,' He winked and Britannia made a strangled noise before he huffed and turned to stomp for the stairs, crossing Matthew with two duffles on the way up. 'Hey! Come on B, don't be like that! What about that drink?'

'You go shove it up where the sun don't shine!' Britannia yelled back and slammed the bedroom hallway door shut behind him. Alfred glared at his brother's shit-eating grin when he approached.

'Shut up.'

'I didn't say anything,' Matthew chimed with innocence as they left the penthouse and stepped into the elevator. The doors slid shut. 'Not going well, huh?'

Alfred carded his hand through his hair with the other resting on his hip, his reflections did the same. 'He's hard to figure out.'

'Maybe you should try taking it slower. Ease into it.'

Alfred turned to look at him with pained eyes. 'I just, get so caught up around him. I've been waiting months for this, I don't wanna wait anymore.'

'You seem to be forgetting that priority number one here is rescuing the scientists.'

'Don't be mean, man. You know what this all means for me.'

'Better than anyone I'd sure,' Matthew sighed and reached into his pocket to pull out the drive Germania gave them. 'I saw that you'd given it a read through.'

'It was more a skim,' Alfred shrugged and tilted his head when he saw his brother's brows pull together. 'What you thinking?'

'I was thinking about this Wang character, and how we know next to nothing about him. Well, the DIA would have files on him, wouldn't they?'

It was time for Alfred's own brows to furrow. 'Are you suggesting we bargain?'

'Yes. Germania is looking for the white woman. If we can offer a tip off about Wang's involvement and request files on the man, then it helps both our cases.' Matthew argued and Alfred folded his arms.

'Yeah, and when he asks how we found the lead, you can be the one to explain how we broke in a lab and stole top secret research.'

'We'll give the bare bones, and if he's still not satisfied, we'll play the final card and offer to relay back anything new we find out.'

Alfred fixed Matthew with a hard look. 'Sounds like something a chump would do.'

'It's the last resort Al. I really don't want to go into this blind,' Matthew pleaded, the vulnerable tell of his lip quivering, and Alfred give in with a sigh. He'd let him have this, the better position Columbia was in, the smoother he and Britannia would be able to pull this off.

'Okay, okay. Just get back to me or whenever if it works.' He relented. Matthew shot him a grateful look, and the rest of the journey back home was carried out in silence.

Clubs District, Groves Avenue, Patrick's Street.

'Look, all I'm saying is that these missing scientists is where it's at right now.' Mathias stated from the driver's seat, his phone on hands off mode as he drove past the striking light show that was the Clubs District. Lukas sighed and instead of meriting the man a response, pressed his forehead to the cool surface of the window, the patter of raindrop a soft comfort as they cruised. 'You can't deny that if Britannia, Columbia and Oz are following this, it isn't nothing.'

Over the three way line, Berwald's grunt came from Mathias' phone on the dash. 'Except everyone with a brain knows that Britannia works alone.'

'All three of them were on the scene when Doctor Edelstein was taken. They have to be involved.' Mathias protested as he indicated left and pulled into the next lane. Lukas watched the passing cars as they did, preferring like in most cases, to remain silent.

'That doesn't mean we have to be,' Emil's high tilted voice came, the faint hum of a washing machine audible amongst the muffled background chatter. 'It's not our fight, and it's drawn crazy attention.' He added with a blunt accusing jab, and Berwald sighed.

'Yes, you've made your feelings quite clear on the matter.' The older man scolded, but the Emil hadn't finished his piece.

'Come on! Is no one else the bit concerned that a government agency has been spying on us? They know our identities, they're probably listening in on this conversation for gods sake.'

'Emil, it's necessary if we're going to work with them.' Mathias bit back, and Lukas' head snapped over to him.

What.

'What?' Lukas demanded with subzero iciness, and narrowed his eyes when Mathias' cheeks reddened. His hands fidgeted around the wheel.

'I've been thinking about it,' He admitted. Lukas just stared at him, causing him to squirm. 'Yeah, I've been reading through the contract, and it's a got a lot of perks. We'd all be financially set, you wouldn't have to work that shitty excuse of a job. We could get a nice place in Clubs.'

'Exactly how long were you going to wait before telling us this?' Lukas hissed and Mathias fixed his eyes forward.

'Until we got the majority vote.'

'We? Who's 'we'?' Emil blurted.

'That would be me,' Berwald announced. 'Mathias and I were working on Tino.'

'Tino!'

'I haven't agreed to it yet!' The younger man cried in his defence.

'Oh, but there is a 'yet' huh?' Emil snarled bitterly.

Lukas rolled his eyes with his jaw clenched. 'Unbelievable.' He spat when just then, his phone rang in his pocket. Taking it out, he saw that it was Vladimir's number. Good, he thought and answered it, Mathias repeatedly stealing glances quick over to him.

'Lukas.' His Romanian confidant curtly greeted.

'Vladimir. What did you find?'

'Not as much as I'd hoped. Everyone's still lost, but there are some that are getting together to try to crack it. Again, they hadn't found anything major, but the word 'messiah' is cropping up.'

Lukas internally swore. Of course that was the next logical jump. Everyone dreaming of the same face was very 'the coming of Christ'. 'That's what I was worried about.'

There was a pregnant pause on the other end of the line. 'Is there something you're not telling me Lukas?' Vladimir pressed suspiciously.

'I know the man is. I've met him.' The words slipped from him before he could stop to think of the consequences.

Vladimir gasped. 'You know him?! Wha-What is he like?'

Lukas chewed on the bottom of his lip, knowing he'd said too much already. 'He is powerful. On a completely other level to anything I've seen before.'

'Messiah theorists are going to love this,' Vladimir mumbled to himself, causing Lukas eyes to go wide. 'You said that you met him, yes? Meaning he's in Terra.'

'Vladimir,' Lukas warned, not liking one bit the creeping anticipation in Vladimir's tone. 'You can't come to Terra. No, he's just as confused as the rest of us all. He doesn't know why this is happening either.'

'Relax Lukas, all we want to do is say hello,' Vladimir replied airily, the faint scratching of pen against paper heard beneath his words. Lukas felt his stomach churn. He'd betrayed Arthur's trust, now who knows how many of them would come to Terra looking for him. Fuck. Fuck.

'I will be seeing you soon Lukas. Thank you for your help.' The line went dead before Lukas could even open his mouth. The Lucid Norwegian sat there numb as he slowly lowered his phone from his ear, his throat dry and tight with the suffocating lump that had formed in it. All defensiveness from their earlier argument had evaporated on Mathias' face in replace of concern as he stared at his partner.

'Lukas?' He tentatively asked, his voice soft, and Lukas' eyes felt heavy when he met his stare.

'I have to warn him,' Was all he could bring himself to say. 'I have to warn him.'

Da da done! This chapter was admittedly a struggle to write. It's very expositional, which while is necessary, not very interesting to write. I felt that the banter between Alfred and Britannia spruced it up a bit, but at the end, as a writer it was tiresome to write.

We also had a POV section with Lukas and the Nordics, who we learn that Germania has also approached about becoming part of the Guardians. This bit of dialogue I enjoyed the most, having characters' clash and their motives and dynamics with one another. The plot point that more Lucid individuals will be flooding to Terra because Lukas accidentally let the cat out the bag made my inner sadistic clap her hands together.

Before I round this off, I'd just like to rehash that this story with be on a temporary hiatus until my uni deadlines are out of the way. As well as that I will be posting an Hetalia - Avatar (2009) AU on both fan fiction and AO3 in the near future. Look forward to it!

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. If you are liking this story, please take the time to leave a review telling me your thoughts, opinions and questions. Once again, thank you for reading and as always,

Until next time folks!