What's in a Name

Chapter Six

"Ve, Lovino~" Feliciano stood in the middle of the room, looking happily confused over at his twin. "Are you sure you don't want any help?"

Feliciano was identical to Lovino in every way, except for his amber-brown eyes and distinct lack of any sort of stress. In fact, their personalities were so different that if they were to be judged on this alone, no one would ever have guessed that they were related, or that Lovino was only a few minutes older than his brother.

"No, Feliciano, I don't need help." Lovino rolled his eyes at his brother as he grabbed a pair of jeans from the pile he'd made and stuffed them into a duffle bag. "I'm perfectly capable of packing a few sets of spare clothes. And anyway," he turned to glare at the third person in the room, "why did you have to bring him with you?"

"But Lovino," his brother's carefree smile was directed towards the tall blonde, who was standing stiffly by the door of the apartment, "I can't drive and Ludwig offered to help. He's really being nice! He's not a problem, right?"

Yes he is...

Lovino huffed and turned his back on the younger two and cramming more of his and Antonio's clothes into the bag.

A familiar stomping echoed outside the room before the door slammed open (knocking Ludwig into the wall, much to Lovino's pleasure) as Gilbert made one of his overly extravagant entrances.

"Hey losers! Oh, West! I didn't know you were here too!" He smiled at his brother, chuckling at the angry mumbles about his more violent nature.

"Hi Gilbert!" Feliciano went to greet Ludwig's older brother before being held back by both his own brother and his partner.

"Oh, you two are no fun." Gilbert teased, pretending to pout at Lovino's dark expression that always read as 'touch my brother and you die'. "Don't be such sour pusses."

"Don't take advantage of Feliciano, Gil." Ludwig's stern voice contrasted completely with his brother's joking; only causing Gilbert to scoff further about his strict behaviour, even though he was the younger of the two.

"Wouldn't dream of such a thing." He laughed, winking at Feliciano just to make sure Ludwig was that bit more annoyed.

"What do you want, Gil?" Lovino gave up packing and slumped down on the bed, leaning on the bulging duffle bag.

"Oh yeah!" Gilbert stopped annoying Ludwig long enough to remember why he had burst into his friend's flat without so much as a warning. "Got a call." He lowered his tone, not wanting their younger brothers to overhear their conversation. "No meeting tonight, so me and England will be sticking around. The boss ain't happy though, 'cause we ran off to help you and Antonio." Lovino darted his eyes up to look at Gilbert, who met them with an unusually serious expression, "Make sure you two stay out of their way." He sighed and put his hand to his forehead, "I don't think I can handle fending him off. Not when he's serious."

Realising that Feliciano and Ludwig were watching, Gilbert quickly changed his tone back to his normal sniggering, "Anyway!" He announced to the room, "Antonio will get lonely if you're away too long; and seeing as I'm awesome and you smashed your bike, I'll give you the honour of riding on my bike!" He glanced over at the younger two, chuckling at their apparent confusion, which was obvious even on Ludwig's usually straight face. "You two want some alone time, right?" Gilbert's evil grin appeared on his face, giving his words a strong wink-wink-nudge-nudge implication. "Well you don't wanna bother sticking around here. Hop it!"

Ludwig frowned at his brother's exuberance but didn't argue. Feliciano, on the other hand, took the opportunity to moan ("Ooh~! I wanted to see the others!" "That's so unfair!" "Ve, Ludwig~ isn't that unfair!") before being led out of the room by the taller man.

"You didn't have to talk to my brother like that!" Lovino protested, resuming his packing into the already full bag.

"But annoying West is fine?" Gilbert laughed, knowing of Lovino's dislike of Ludwig.

"Of course. Because he's a bastard who's stringing Feliciano along." Lovino shoved a couple more pairs of boxers into the bag and pulled the string tight. "Come on. I need to lock the door or Antonio will go spare thinking that someone'll break in." He grabbed his key scowled at Gilbert. "And there's no way I'm riding on your bike!"

"Can we watch a movie then?" Peter jumped up at his brother, not letting the disgruntled England into the kitchen for a much needed cup of tea, leaving Antonio to laugh from his position perched on one of the countertops.

"What? Peter I'm tired." England tried to get around Peter, holding him down as he dodged past and put the kettle to boil.

"But you're never at home anymore!" Peter protested, sulking at England's success of making his brew.

"Act your age, Peter." England rolled his eyes at the younger version of himself, "You're twelve for Christ's sake. I swear didn't act like that when I was you're age."

"Yes you did." Antonio interjected, chuckling at England's responsive scowl.

"It's not like I've got school tomorrow!" Peter huffed, pulling off his tie and discarding it on the sofa before folding his arms and matching his brother's frown.

England sighed. He'd just walked through the door from work after getting the call from Russia to say that the gang's meeting had been cancelled. Despite this relieving news, Russia had decided to add the sentence "I know that you're helping them still, so you'd better be prepared for what happens next."

Nothing the boss said ever meant well for him and Gilbert now that Antonio and Lovino had been forced to leave the group. They were cornered a lot more as a group of two. It was harder to carry out what Russia wanted, and therefore, harder to please him. And even though his face was always smiling, England could tell when the man was angry from the look in his cold violet eyes and the icy tone to his voice.

Russia knew how to scare people and made no attempt to please anyone save himself. His smile was false and dripping with malice every time England was faced by the much taller man. In fact, England thought that the only person who wasn't scared of the gang's leader, was Belarus, who had that strange and unjustified affection for Russia, which seemed to make him, intimidating as he was, the slightest bit uncomfortable.

"Fine." England said after a long pause. "But I don't care whether you've got school tomorrow or not, you're not staying up past eleven." He smiled over at his brother, who had jumped off the sofa and punched a fist into the air.

Antonio slid off of the kitchen counter to stand next to England, chuckling at Peter's mad rush to choose a film off of his pile in the corner by the television. "Lovino and Gil will be back soon. We can make an evening out of it."

England nodded, content that it was going to be a quiet evening, without having to worry about gang activities.

"Can we invite Alfred over?" Peter piped up from his position in the corner of the room, destroying England's peaceful thoughts. However, Peter was too excited to be able to deny him anything at that moment. He hadn't had the chance to have any proper fun in ages.

"It wouldn't hurt." Antonio cut in before England could comment, smiling down at his friend.

"Antonio!"

"Oh, come on!" He slapped England on the back, chuckling at the insults that were followed. "It's not like he's a pain. And, he's been looking after Peter for you." He unconsciously ran his hand over the scar that had been left by Russia's attack, "The way I figure it, we kinda owe him."

"Alright, fine!" England huffed, abandoning his cup of tea and stomping towards the door. "I'll go and ask him."

The door slammed behind England, leaving Antonio to laugh at his departure. "You know," he turned to Peter, who was still rummaging around the television, evidently looking for a DVD that had been misplaced, "you really know how to wrap him round your little finger." Peter grinned and pulled another disc out from under the TV stand, discarded it and started fumbling again.

England didn't want to see Alfred. He'd had enough of his apparent 'heroism' every time he had gone to collect Peter from the other man's flat. It was like having another Gilbert around, declaring their how 'awesome' he is whenever there is an opportunity. It was tiring enough having to put up with such speech from one idiot, let alone two, even if both of these idiots were actually decent people (overlooking Gilbert's gang activity).

England stood outside Alfred's door, pondering over the possibility of just going back downstairs and telling Peter that the other man was too busy and couldn't join them after all, but didn't like the idea of lying to his little brother, that and Antonio would see through him straight away and send him back up to ask Alfred properly.

"This is ridiculous..." He murmured and knocked on the door, cursing himself inwardly at his reasoning.

There was a bang from inside the room, snapping England's attention back to what he was doing. "Ah! Wait a second!" Alfred's voice emanated from the other side of the door amongst a lot of rustling and swears.

When he finally opened the door, England found himself flushing unconsciously at Alfred's appearance. He wasn't wearing his glasses and looked younger for it. His hair was wet and flopped over his face; save for the one part that always seemed to defy gravity. Alfred wasn't wearing a shirt and looked as though he'd rushed to towel dry himself and pull on underwear and a pair of jeans that he had not yet done up.

"Oh, England." Alfred had obviously been worried that someone else would be calling and relaxed against the doorframe. "What's up? Come to see how awe-"

"Oh, shut up. One 'awesome' moron is enough." England was seriously regretting not choosing to go back downstairs. He could feel his face heat up from Alfred's appearance (why couldn't the git put a shirt on?) and was seriously hoping that the designated moron had not noticed.

"You wanna come in for a sec?" Alfred's smile never left his face as he stood to the side to let England past, beckoning him into the apartment room.

England sighed and followed the taller man into his flat. The first thing he noticed was the amount of mess covering the floor and tables inside the room. Didn't he clean at all? Alfred shoved some papers and books to the side and offered England a seat on the sofa, perching on the arm himself.

Before he sat down, England noticed that Alfred was wearing a hurriedly applied bandage on his side, obviously being used to hide something which was gradually appearing as the water that was left after his towelling session soaked into it.

"So what did you come for?" Alfred brought England's attention back and he sat heavily on the pile of papers that Alfred had previously moved.

"Ah! Sorry!" He hurried to move off the pile and rearrange what he had displaced, picking up the fallen papers from the floor. He caught a glimpse of one of them and stopped suddenly, confused by what he had seen. "The works of Shakespeare? You study literature?"

"Yeah, so?" Alfred took the papers from England and placed them messily on the desk next to him.

"Sorry, I just didn't think you were the type of person who was interested in that kind of thing." England apologised, standing to look at one of the textbooks. "I used to read this stuff back when I was still studying." He flipped the book open, smiling slightly from the memory.

"Nah, it's what my parents wanted me to study." Alfred laughed, relaxing back against the sofa watching England's brow furrow back into its usual frown. "If I'd had my way then I'd be doing something like chemistry and then develop the tech to give everyone super powers! Then I'd be a-"

"Real hero?" England questioned, sitting back down on the sofa, frustrated at himself for thinking that he and Alfred might have had something in common. "Don't be an idiot." He ran a hand through his hair, making it even more untidy than usual, and yawned as discreetly as he could. It had been a long day. "Anyway, I actually came to ask if you wanted to come down and watch a movie with us. Peter wanted you to come."

"Oh, right." Alfred hadn't expected England to ever invite him somewhere, even if it was just to watch a movie in the other man's apartment. "Sure thing. Let me just get a shirt." He pushed himself up and disappeared into the next room before reappearing with a t-shirt half over his head and his glasses stuffed into his jeans pocket.

England sighed and headed for the door, ignoring Alfred's grumbles that he couldn't find a belt. "Are you going to come? Or will I have to make an excuse to tell my brother?"

"No, I'm coming! I'm coming!" Alfred rushed, grabbing his bomber jacket and following England out of the door.

"I'd lock the door, if I was you." England said over his shoulder, "Even if you're only going downstairs, there's one person in this block who you can never trust." He motioned to the ground floor, "You never know what that frog might do."

"Fair point." Alfred grabbed his keys and latched the door before running to catch up with England, who had already started walking back down the stairs.

Coming up the stairs from the second floor, were Gilbert and Lovino, who were, naturally, arguing as loudly as possible, their voices echoing up the empty stairwell.

"I told you I didn't want to ride on it!" Lovino shouted up after Gilbert from a couple of stairs behind him.

"And I ignored you." Gilbert retorted, cackling at his achievement. "But you didn't have to kick me while I was driving."

"You forced me out of my apartment, carried me down the stairs and tied me to your bike! I think I was justified!" Lovino yelled, swinging the duffle bag dangerously.

Gilbert motioned a greeting to England before following him and Alfred into the flat, ignoring the insults that were being thrown at him.

"I don't see the problem, Lovino." Gilbert called over his shoulder, sniggering, "You ride with Antonio all the-"

Gilbert swiftly received punches from both Lovino and Antonio, who was smiling, but was giving off a surprisingly threatening aura. "Not in front of Peter, Gil."

Alfred noticed England give a small chuckle at Antonio's punishment and Gilbert's resultant whining. It hit him then that the smaller man could actually be cute- No. No! Where did that come from?

"Hey!" Peter raised his voice, evidently bored of the argument that Gilbert and Lovino had continued. "I thought we were going to watch a movie!" He was holding a scrubby DVD case that Alfred could just about make out the word 'vampires' upon. He groaned inwardly before smiling at the twelve-year-old at sitting on the floor next to him, followed by England who decided to take his place in an armchair rather than sit with Alfred.

"So..." Alfred tried to hide his nervousness, "What's the movie about?" He scratched the back of his head out of habit, trying not to appear to be acting unnatural.

"Vampires going around killing everyone." Peter replied, like it was the most normal thing in the world.

Damn... "Awesome!" Alfred swore that his enthusiasm couldn't be any more fake than it was at that moment, but he definitely did not want to appear to be scared in front the group that he was currently sitting with, particularly the blonde that was watching him curiously from his position on his chair.

"Oh, not this one again, Peter..." Gilbert groaned as he thudded down on the other side of Peter and ruffled his hair, laughing as the boy slapped his hand away.

Antonio and Lovino took up the sofa as the older of the two tried to pull the other closer towards him, much to Lovino's dislike, which was followed by a small struggle between the two of them before Lovino eventually gave in and leant in towards Antonio.

Peter mumbled at someone to turned the lights out (to which Lovino obliged, in order to get away from Antonio) before turning the DVD on and lying on his stomach in front of the screen with Gilbert.

The film was fairly tame (as horror movies go), which was why England allowed Peter to watch it. It wasn't exactly what anyone would call scary.

And yet, Alfred was terrified. It had been running for less than twenty minutes, nothing had happened to the group of unsuspecting teens who had wandered unwittingly into the abandoned house on the hill, and Alfred was already jumping at the slightest change in the lighting. He was seriously hoping that it had gone unnoticed.

No such luck.

England had had to sit through the film so many times with Peter that he wasn't really paying attention to it. In fact, he was watching anything but the vampires that had suddenly appeared to kill the first of the naive teenagers on the screen.

So far he'd watched Lovino slowly move closer to Antonio again, leaning into his tanned arm. Gilbert had taken to teasing Peter by tickling him and then pretending to watch the television whenever the annoyed boy turned to glare at him.

And then there was Alfred, who was shaking like a leaf, although he was obviously trying to hide his apparent fear of the bloody events that were taking place in the movie. He actually had to hold back a bark of laughter when Alfred jumped nearly a mile in the air when the vampires appeared on screen once more.

Enough was enough.

"Hey, Alfred." England nudged the scared blonde with his foot, getting the desired result.

"AAHHH!" Alfred literally jumped to the side, landing unceremoniously on top of Peter and Gilbert, much to their displeasure and Antonio's delight as he proceeded to burst out laughing at the shouting that ensued.

"Sorry! Sorry!" England stifled his own laughter, not wanting Alfred to realise that he'd done it on purpose when he was shoved aside by Gilbert back towards England's armchair. "I just remembered that I need to talk to you about something. You wanna come outside for a bit?"

"What? Oh... yeah, alright." Alfred stood to leave the room after England, relieved to have an excuse to get out of watching the film.

Alfred leant up against the wall in the corridor, letting out a deep breath, glad to be away from the killer vampires. "So, what did you want?"

"Oh, nothing." England actually laughed, a clear snigger showing on his face, "I just thought you would want to get away from the scary vampires."

"Hey, shut up!" Alfred interjected, blushing at the thought that England had noticed that he was scared and brought it to the attention to the others. "Everyone's scared of something."

"I just never thought that you of all people would be such a wimp!" England chuckled, rubbing his arm where Alfred had hit it slightly harder than he had expected.

"I'm going back upstairs." Alfred pouted, giving up his protests against England's unexpected snickering.

"Hey, wait!" England hadn't expected Alfred to take his teasing so seriously and subconsciously stopped the taller blonde from retreating back to his own room. "Sorry, okay?" Alfred was almost shocked to see a genuine smile on England's face. He looked so much younger for it, making Alfred forget for a minute that England was a member of an evidently dangerous gang. "Come back in? Peter'll get upset if you go right now. You don't have to watch the film if you don't want."

Alfred caught himself staring at England and quickly looked away. When he looked back the smile had vanished, a more exasperated look taking its place.

"Well, I don't wanna upset anyone." He grinned, trying to get himself back in character, "That just wouldn't be hero-like."

England scoffed, hiding a half-laugh behind his scepticism. He had to admit to himself (even if he didn't like doing so) that Alfred's smile was actually quite dashing as he stood further up the corridor, grinning away like the world had no troubles. And yet he could only think that the extravagant man was incredibly naive...

It was the shouting from inside his apartment that snapped England's attention back. He groaned and turned to enter back into the room (followed by Alfred), running his hand through his bangs in his latest frustration.

It seemed that from the very moment that the two of them had stepped out of the room, Gilbert had thought that it was the perfect time to crack out the booze, and was proceeding to try and turn off the movie (still showing the vampires chasing the lead-female), much to Peter's displeasure.

"Stop being so fucking pissy!" Gilbert shouted over the screams of the film toward the younger boy, pushing him away with his foot as his hands were full of beer bottles of which he was trying to hand to Antonio and Lovino.

"Then leave the TV alone!" Peter protested, thumping Gilbert hard in the shins.

England sighed and walked past the commotion taking place in his living room. Upon reaching his bedroom door, he motioned for Alfred to join him, glaring at Gilbert's new assault on his younger brother which he could see out of the corner of his eye.

England was holding the door open for Alfred by the time he'd walked over, carefully avoiding the television remote that Peter had thrown at Gilbert (and missed dramatically).

"No point in staying in the chaos." England jerked his head towards the others, where Gilbert was not celebrating his success of turning the movie off in between the strikes he was receiving over the head from the cushion Peter had now acquired.

Alfred rolled his eyes and nodded, his slight smile contrasting with the thin line that England's lips had become as the older man closed the door behind them in an attempt to silence the racket his friends and brother were making.

England's room was as immaculate as ever, although it did seem very empty with a distinct lack of any personal belongings, save an old book or two.

England had flopped unceremoniously onto his bed, rubbing the tiredness from his eyes. Alfred noted that his thick brow was still furrowed as usual, and found himself wanting to see that smile again. England's face didn't look like it was meant to be frowning all the time.

Alfred caught himself yawning after watching England's attempt to stay awake. The smaller man noticed as well, and sat up to start rummaging through the drawers of his desk, pulling out a small packet of something and a couple of mugs before hitting a button on a kettle that Alfred had not previously noticed. It wasn't long before a flowery smell filled the room as England stirred the leaves of the tea and handed a mug to Alfred.

"Camomile tea." He said, holding his own mug up to his lips, inhaling the smell and taking a sip. "You look like you haven't been getting enough sleep. It should help a bit." A small smile crossed his lips and disappeared as quickly as it had come, "Well, it always has for me anyway."

"Thanks." Alfred nodded to England, kicking himself inside for wanting to see that smile again, and took a quick sip of the drink he'd been given. He choked slightly on the hot liquid, not expecting it to taste as it had, the milder taste running down his throat as he drank more than he had originally intended.

England moved to clap Alfred on the back to cease his coughing, but stopped himself when Alfred turned to look at him. "Are you alright?" He found himself retreating into the corner of the bed, leaning against the back wall.

"Yeah, I'm good." Alfred rubbed the back of his neck, still gasping slightly for air. He tried taking another swig of the tea, hoping the experience would be better than the last. England had taken to lying back on his pillow, obviously relaxed by the drink. "This stuff works, huh?" Alfred could feel himself getting more tired and was barely aware of the newly adopted drunken singing that one member of the group in the living room had now taken to. He yawned again, noticing England do the same, and laid back across the end of the bed.

Seeing Alfred do this, England leant forward to look at the taller man, whose glasses were pushed askew on the bridge of his nose. England pulled the glasses off of his face, thinking that Alfred was asleep, only to be taken off guard when he turned back after turning back to see the younger man squinting at him.

"You're pretty forward..." Alfred laughed through his nose, smiling weakly up at England's blushing face.

"Shut up, idiot." England pushed himself back up to the pillow, angry at himself more than anything for letting his subconscious get the better of him. It was a brotherly motion... He tried to convince himself.

"Hey England?" Alfred mumbled, obviously half asleep.

"Yeah?"

"Why are you scared of your name?"

The comment had taken him completely by surprise. Leaving England to simply sit on the corner of the bed and stare in shock at Alfred, who had fallen asleep completely unaware of how much he'd shaken England.

Maybe he wasn't quite as naive as England had previously thought. There were only five other people who knew why he didn't use his name anymore, and they were all present in the apartment block, four of whom were in the next room. How could someone completely oblivious to his circumstances make a comment like that so easily? Did this man know more than he let on?

No... No, that wasn't possible.

He was just... too innocent for his own good.

England leant over to make sure that Alfred really was asleep this time. He sighed and moved close to the other man's ear, "Because I'm a wimp too..."