The last thing Ivan was expecting when he walked into the cell was that Alfred would actually be…asleep. Ivan blinked in surprise as Antonio excitedly walked in beside him. Feliciano was grateful for the distraction, but Lovino didn't so much as look away from The Dictator. But Alfred was fast asleep on his side on the bed.

"He's asleep?" Ivan asked.

"How did it go?" Feliciano asked. "What are they going to do about Gilbert, do you know?"

"Thanks to Ivan here, they're going to try to find a way to save him," Antonio quipped happily and Lovino finally turned to look at him.

"How the fuck are you gonna try and do that?" Lovino snapped.

"Well, if Alfred was willing to talk to us, he probably already talked to Ivan, too," Feliciano chimed.

"He talked to you?" Ivan asked carefully. Then again, Alfred seemed almost excited to talk to people, no matter who they were.

"He didn't exactly have a lot of intelligent things to say," Lovino grumbled.

"But he did tell us something interesting," Feliciano spoke up again. "He said that…uh…something to do with his immortality made him sleep. He can't help it, but he has to sleep 12 hours a day."

"And some bullshit about not being able to wake him up," Lovino scoffed.

"Have you tried?" Ivan asked curiously.

"Are you serious?" Lovino scoffed. "I'm not trying anything on him."

"You've talked to him, you know he's not that scary," Ivan rolled his eyes.

"What's he like to talk to?" Antonio asked curiously as Ivan eyed the wall of magic he was keeping up himself. Alfred was just…asleep? He couldn't sleep for 12 hours straight now, no matter what he said about it. They were going to be making a plan that directly involved him, it seemed.

"He's actually a very interesting guy," Feliciano smiled. "I mean, he doesn't seem like the big scary dictator everyone's saying he is. He seemed pretty nice, actually."

"That's probably all a part of his plan," Lovino scoffed. "He probably wants you to trust him, the bastard…"

"I'm going to wake him up," Ivan said simply, despite the immediate reaction of everyone else staring at him with wide eyes.

"Are you fucking stupid?" Lovino snapped.

"Maybe," Ivan said. "From what I know of him, he most likely won't attack me." As long as he wasn't using Dark Magic, he should be fine… Ivan walked towards the wall of magic and stepped through his own barrier. He knew enough about this spell that he could move the wall if he wanted to or make it permeable for certain people. It was still weird to be this close to The Dictator without him trapped in an immobilizing spell.

Ivan knelt beside the bed and carefully took hold of Alfred's shoulder, lightly shaking him. But Alfred didn't so much as stir.

"You're an idiot," Lovino sighed and Ivan rolled his eyes. He shook Alfred a little harder, but again Alfred didn't move. Ivan sighed heavily before shaking him even harder, but Alfred acted almost like he was dead, but he was breathing evenly.

"Alfred," Ivan said clearly, continuing to shake him. But Alfred wasn't even twitching. Ivan scoffed. "Alfred!"

"You shouldn't act so lightly around him," Lovino said again and Ivan sighed, standing up.

"It doesn't matter, he's not waking up," Ivan sighed. "If it's really true that he has to sleep 12 hours a day, this will be very annoying."

"How did he manage to almost take over the world while sleeping so much?" Antonio asked. "That sounds like something that would be a huge weakness."

"Maybe he made sure to keep it a secret," Feliciano mused.

"On top of it, his immortality basically guarantees he won't die if someone attacks him in his sleep," Ivan mused, walking back to the other side of the cell, through the wall of magic.

"Right, you said you saw his immortality," Antonio said in awe. "What was it really like?"

"I said what it was like," Ivan said simply.

"Really? What did it look like?" Feliciano asked excitedly. Even Lovino seemed to have his interest piqued. Besides, knowing that Alfred wasn't going to wake up for quite some time seemed to make everyone in the room relax.

"I had figured that his immortality just meant that if something touched him, he wouldn't feel the pain and he would just heal," Ivan shrugged. After all, most healing magic was Dark Magic. There were extremely few spells that everyone could use and none of them were extremely effective. "But it looks like his immortality acts like a shield. He doesn't need to heal because nothing can touch him. Bullets just…bounced off."

"Whoa, really? Feliciano gasped. "That sounds so cool! I'd love to see that, but at the same time, considering the circumstances, it must have been terrifying. Even after talking with him, he still seems pretty scary."

Ivan shook his head, chuckling. Try talking to him for a few hours. Ivan found himself far more terrified of The Dictator from history than Alfred. Then again, Ivan also had no doubt that Alfred was more than capable of doing what history said he did.

It was maybe three hours before Arthur walked into the room. The four in the room had resorted to just talking amongst themselves while Alfred slept peacefully. When Arthur walked inside, though, they all sat at attention. Lovino, Feliciano, and Antonio sat on the couch while Ivan leaned against the wall next to them. Arthur took in the room and glared at Alfred.

"Is he…asleep?" Arthur asked, almost sounding offended.

"Something to do with his immortality," Ivan shrugged. "He apparently has to sleep for 12 hours a day."

"Ivan already tried waking him up, but it didn't work," Feliciano shrugged.

"This day is already so strange I'm not even going to question anymore," Arthur shook his head. "We have a plan in place and then we can send some people home. Especially if he's really going to be asleep for 12 hours a day, we can keep the amount of guards down, at least for that time. We've called in another guard so all of you can go home. It's been a long night. But as for the plan, the guarding won't change much, aside from the fact that we will have two guards per shift. With that, you're likely to have multiple shifts per day. We will try to make sure we don't interfere with your school schedule, Ivan, but this may take priority."

"I understand," Ivan nodded.

"We'll go ahead with the plan and, while keeping him under restraints, have him offer his help," Arthur shrugged. "I still don't trust him, but I lost that vote, regardless. We've also summoned the head of the Williams family, who should show up soon. He'll be necessary in this, regardless. Luckily, there were no news cameras around and it was dark when Gilbert went on his rampage and The Dictator broke out, so no one knows. We're in talks with the police across the whole country just in case, saying that an inmate broke out. Other than that, we are also going to contact the most powerful magic users we know about. And Ivan, regardless of if you keep working with us, you are one of the strongest that we know of. I'll give you the spell you need to memorize tomorrow."

"Do you really think we'll need it?" Ivan asked. "He's already agreed to cooperate."

"I don't trust him," Arthur said simply. "And he's agreed to going back to his imprisonment after dealing with Gilbert. We will need you to memorize that spell and be willing to use it."

Ivan swallowed. "Of course."

"I'm a little wounded, Arthur," Antonio laughed, a hand dramatically on his chest. Arthur just rolled his eyes. "Why not choose me?"

"You don't have near enough magic for what this requires," Arthur scoffed. "I barely qualify and Francis isn't close, either. Don't you dare treat this as a game. One person on the lose with Dark Magic is bad enough."

"Anything else?" Lovino let out a long sigh and Arthur shook his head.

"Considering this development, we'll have to wait until tomorrow to even start…negotiating with him," Arthur shuddered at the very thought. "But we'll be keeping all of the guards posted. Things are going to start being very high stakes starting now."

"I better get a fucking raise," Lovino smirked and Arthur rolled his eyes, turning to the door.

"Once your replacements come in," Arthur said as he started walking through the door, "you can leave. We'll email you all your new shifts as soon as possible. Ivan, we will need you tomorrow for when we start discussing this matter with The Dictator, seeing as you thought up this plan and apparently seemed to be able to talk with him more than anyone else. Unless you two," Arthur glanced at Feliciano and Lovino, "talked with him more?"

"Ivan seems to be a bit more knowledgeable," Feliciano chuckled. "All we know is how long he'll sleep for."

"Fine, then," Arthur nodded and left, the door closing behind him.

Ivan was about ready to fall asleep where he sat. He just stared at his food, knowing that as soon as classes were over, he would have to go to the Detainment Center. And he'd hardly slept the night before partially due to staying so long at the Center and partially from studying for classes, as he knew he might be low on time for now.

"Brother?" Natalia asked and Ivan jolted, only just realizing he'd really fallen asleep. Ivan groaned, running a hand through his hair before looking up at his sister. It was lunch, one of his few breaks during the day, and he was supposed to be enjoying his time with his friends. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," Ivan nodded, offering a small smile.

"This have something to do with what I've been hearing?" Feliks asked with a smirk.

"What?" Ivan asked.

"I know you were working last night," Feliks leaned over the table to get closer to him. "I know someone who knows someone who was around the Center last night. They said some big shit happened, right?"

"No, everything at the Center is fine," Ivan shook his head.

"Whatever," Feliks rolled his eyes. "I know you can't say anything about it."

"Come on, Feliks, he had a rough night," Toris scolded him.

"Fiiiiiiiiine," Feliks stretched.

"Did…did something happen?" Ravis asked and Ivan sighed, shaking his head.

"Not now," Eduard muttered, elbowing their friend.

"Do you think I can come over to your apartment tonight?" Natalia asked, changing the subject, which Ivan was…somewhat thankful for.

"Not tonight," Ivan shook his head. "Someone at the Detainment Center is sick, so I've offered to fill in for them. Extra shifts for a while, sorry."

"Sick, huh?" Feliks smirked and Ivan shot him a half-hearted glare.

"Just make sure you have time for school, then," Natalia grumbled, angrily cutting her food. Ivan sighed. He should study, maybe just as an excuse to run away, but he needed this time to relax with his friends. Let his mind relax before jumping back into the chaos that was his new job. He looked at the time on his phone, realizing that Alfred was probably awake by now and annoying the hell out of some other poor sap.

"Toris, how are classes?" Ivan tried. Anything to get the topic of conversation away from his work. He just needed to forget some things before he went back to all of that stress.

Reading was nice. Ivan couldn't help but stretch slightly in his chair in the library. Reading the old-fashioned way was always relaxing. Ivan had a class canceled in the middle of the day so he had some extra time on his hands. What better way to spend it than to get lost in a story of someone's own creation? Ivan was normally a fairly fast reader and just a short book would only take a few hours to complete. He could maybe get halfway through this book before he had to go to class. And then he could come back tomorrow and hopefully finish it.

It was quite a nice book, like a fairy tale. Ivan really enjoyed fairy tales. Where he could predict the ending because the adventurer would always defeat the bad guy and get the girl in the end and everyone would live happily ever after. He'd always loved these stories, ever since his older sister started telling them to him to help him sleep at night.

Right now, however, the hero had just found the sword he was destined to find in a lost forest. It was quite an interesting part, really. The forest had a spell on it that lead to memory loss that got worse the longer you were in it. The hero had gotten the sword, but he forgot himself in the process. As long as he could leave, however, he could get those memories back. If he didn't stay for too long.

Just when he was about to run into one of his companions that had forgotten him, preparing for a fight, Ivan's alarm went off, signaling his next class. Ivan jolted slightly, but promptly returned the book to its rightful place before running off on his way.

If only his now spiraling story could get him a happy ending, that would be nice. But all considering, the person sparking the adventure in his life being The Dictator topping it all off, Ivan heavily doubted that.

Well…at least his life was interesting now.

Sorry for the fairly short chapter in which barely anything happened. On the bright side, we got some more characterization for Ivan and next chapter will be a million times better. Lots of stuff, Alfred will be awake, more Arthur, etc., etc.

So I will see you next time!