(...)

x x x Close Relations x x x

x...seven...x

[the two beer connoisseurs]

(...)

"Do I really have to?" Gilbert whined. Loudly. Because he could, of course. Ludwig - being the younger (and infinitely more mature) sibling, rolled his eyes, before nodding. "But it's a Wednesday!" Gilbert grumbled, "And Wednesdays mean that the pub on Fifth Street is open, and they serve Krombacher, West! Krombacher!!" he threw his hands up in the air, knowing that the two of them shared a favorite beer.

Ludwig, in response, simply steadfastedly ignored his brother, pushing him forth. Gilbert grumbled something about overly-excited siblings who were 'waayyy too into diplomacy to actually be really awesome,' or another, before grudgingly ringing the doorbell. Thrice.

"That's enough," Ludwig called out, after Gilbert had pressed said button about fifteen times. "All the people in the house will probably be deaf by now," he muttered, as Gilbert crossed his arms, muttering complaints under his breath. Within a matter of seconds, a terribly disoriented maid came to open the door. Ludwig - fluent in Mandarin, of course - gently pushed his brother inside, smiling at the maid and handing her a fifty-yuan note.

"Did you see that?" Gilbert crowed, "She looked at you like you were God or something!" More snickers, as Ludwig fought back the urge to elbow his ever-so-mature brother. "I still don't understand why we're in China in the first place! We could be in the Mathuraust! Or even the Natürlach!" Gilbert complained, listing off the names of a couple lesser-known bars, "But nooo..." he hissed, as Ludwig rapped firmly against the wooden doors, "Instead, we're in Beijing! In the summer! For no apparent freakin' reason either!"

Gilbert didn't know what made him stick with his silly little brother like this, but whatever it was - it sure wasn't paying him enough.

"Quiet," Ludwig said - serious face in position. Gilbert bit back a snicker, which was rather mature of him, really.

"Ludwig, aru...?" Yao asked, raising an eyebrow in complete surprise. And then he saw the less-than-delighted Gilbert. "And Gilbert as well?" He opened the door to the spacious, half-decorated room for the two brothers, beckoning them inside. "Well, aru," he started, "It's so nice to see the two of you... in China." He stared at them, bemused, before continuing, "But I must ask, what brings you here? Business?"

"Business - hah!" Gilbert scoffed, obviously still thinking about the Krombacher. Ludwig elbowed his brother.

"We came because we heard..." Ludwig started, clearing his throat.

"From Kiku, who said that he heard from Arthur who heard from Alfred who actually is on speaking terms with that bastard Ivan," Gilbert moodily filled in.

"...Right," Ludwig said, shooting an accusing glance at his brother before continuing, "We heard from these sources that your, ah, hair had been damaged by my brother's flamethrower?" He raised an eyebrow, giving Yao a once-over.

"Ah, that," Yao pursed his lips, "But it's really no matter, aru!" he laughed, "I mean, Gilbert wasn't even the one who was using the flamethrower - it was Ivan, wasn't it? And anyways," he trailed off, "Kiku has already cut my hair so that the singed bits have been completely unattached, so it's alright, aru!" He laughed, loosely pulling his ponytail for the two nations to see. "See? It's absolutely..."

"Still looks singed to me," Gilbert blandly pointed out.

"Oh that..." Yao furrowed his brow, "That was probably from when Alfred was trying to make a breakfast in my kitchen, aru!" He laughed - again - though Ludwig could not help but notice that Yao was still looking at the crispier ends of his hair, "But all the same, my hair has suffered no damage, and it wasn't even your fault, aru! So there's no need to apologize; everything's alright!" He said this all while still staring at his hair.

"Whelp, West, there you have it from the man himself!" Gilbert cheered, throwing his hands up in the air, "And now, we can get back to Natürlach - or even Dathhaust, if you want - because there's a tank of Krombacher with our names on it!"

"Gilbert," Ludwig said, in that trade-marked 'stern' manner. Gilbert rolled his eyes, sensing yet another hurdle between him and that beautiful, sparkling barrel of Krombacher. "Yao," he started, looking - at loss - at the nation who was still staring vacantly at the dry-and-curled bits of hair. "Is there anything that we can do?" it was the polite thing to say, of course. And it was also the kind of thing that would take Ludwig - and therefore, Gilbert - farther from the jugs of Krombacher.

"No, no, no," Yao said with a smile, finally looking up from his less-than-perfect strands of hair, "It's alright, aru! As Gilbert said, there's a tank of Klombasch with your name on it!"

"Oh God," Gilbert clasped a hand over his mouth in horror, "You... you're really not well, are you Yao?" With crisp strides, he walked over to the other, carefully placing the back of his hand against the other's forehead. "Hm," he muttered, raising an eyebrow, "You don't seem to have a fever," he noted, before turning to his brother, "But there must be something wrong with him, right West? I mean, he didn't know Krombacher." The weight which Gilbert's tone belied was terrifying in itself.

"That's silly!" Yao started out, "I-I'm just not very used to German, aru!" He looked at Ludwig for some sane support.

"That is correct," Ludwig pronounced, before continuing with, "I cannot fathom how anyone in their right mind would not know how to pronounce - much less not know the name of - a wonderful beer like Krombacher." Gilbert snickered - he had gotten his brother hooked now! - as Ludwig blithely plodded forth, "Clearly, you have been affected by my brother's flamethrower in more ways than the mere toasting of your hair."

"Wha-?" Yao, of course, was entirely lost.

"What do you recommend, West?" Gilbert asked with an entirely-straight face. "This is an absolutely critical condition - forgetting the name of a... of a 'wonderful beer'!" he continued, quoting his brother's words, "We cannot possibly allow our fellow nation to continue forth like this!"

"Huh?"

"You are absolutely right," Ludwig responded in the affirmative, much to Gilbert's delight, "We must administer some sort of treatment. What do the manuals say for burns?" And with that, Gilbert flipped open his (hastily-penned) fourth manual, titled "The Worst-Case Survival Guide for Men". With each flip of the page, Yao's eyes grew larger, unable to believe that Ludwig was actually planning on curing him of ailments he did not have.

"Ah hah!" Gilbert triumphant cried, pointing at a random page - 247, we'll say - and reading aloud off the top of his mind, "For second-degree burns from a flamethrower, make sure to douse the victim in beer." He grinned, and then 'read' the 'fine print' of the book, "On the rocks, too!" he chirpily added. Yao felt a large portion of blood drain from his face - not just because of the outright heresy Gilbert was reading, but because of Ludwig's more-than-believing response.

"Ah, yes," the other brother replied, "I seem to remember reading something about dousing in ice and beer." He nodded, flipping out his smartphone to check for the nearest breweries in Beijing, "A most effective method, of course."

"Of - Of course...!" Gilbert managed to choke out.

"Aah...?" There were many situations, particularly in these past three days, that made Yao wonder, seriously, if he had been living some weird version of reality. However, this combination was surely the highest up on the 'I am dreaming right now, aru?' chart. And the fact that there was a chart was even more terrifying. Ludwig, naturally, ignored Yao's nervous glance (and sound), as well as Gilbert's choked laugh, as he was too busy seriously searching for breweries.

Now or never, Yao thought.

"Oh my God!" he gasped out, dropping his jaw in abject horror and pointing out the window with a vigor he did not know he possessed, "Is that a giant sausage falling over the Prime Minister's Building?"

"A giant sausage?"

"Where?"

"Over there!" Yao wildly pointed, "And look - it's a little bit a steaming on the inside, aru!"

In the blink of an eye, both the manual and the smart phone were forgotten by the German brothers, as they simply dropped everything and ran for the possibility of a sausage so huge it would be able to easily crush a building in the Chinese governmental offices. With an equal amount of speed, Yao dashed to the door, lightly tossing out the fallen items, and then following through the entirety of his (well-thought-out!) plan of getting out and away without having to drown himself in beer. With a rather... victorious... smile, he wickedly locked the door behind the two brothers, glad to have had that problem out of the way.

"Now!" he declared, wiping away a bit of sweat from his brow (he wasn't one for impromptu acting, really) and placing his hands on his hips, "Where should I put these banners and posters, aru?" And with that, Yao worked, taping and gluing and arranging seats and cushions and nametags - all for the optimal amount of enjoyment, entertainment, and freedom, of course. Off-handedly, he thought it strange how neither Ludwig nor Gilbert seemed to be disappointed that there had been no giant sausage... or how neither of them had returned to retrieve either manual or smartphone. Then he shrugged it off as sibling idiosyncrasies.

Even better - perhaps they realized that the flamethrower had really, honestly, done no harm, and decided to return to Germany!

(Although the burnt ends of his hair - courtesy of Alfred who still owed him two thousand yuan as an individual - were still bothering him...)

"Yao?" Ludwig rapped - politely, as per usual - on the door, about two hours later. "Yao? We're truly apologetic for having rushed out like that," he paused to burp behind his hand, "And we hope that you'll forgive us by letting us help you in decorate the room, as we have noticed you are currently doing."

"Screw that!" Gilbert called out, though it was muffled from the food in his mouth, "I'll gladly decorate the whole room, that sausage was amazing!" He belched. Loudly.

"Wh-What?" Yao spluttered, jumping off of the table that he had been standing on. He ran to open the door, only to be greeted by the two brothers... along with four plates - each - filled to the brim with sausage. "Wh-what?" he repeated, again. He blinked, rubbed his eyes, and then blinked once more, refusing to believe the huge slices of sausage that laid before his eyes.

"Yeah, there was a huge sausage that managed to topple off of the bus and into a couple buildings, though it wasn't the Prime Minister's," Gilbert supplied - all while snarfing down half a plate filled with sausage, "So then me and West came over to survey the damage, and the owner of the sausage was so scared of the police that he let us eat for free!" And here, he whooped - or attempted to, as it was rather hard to emit any noise at all with a mouth full of meat.

"It was most kind of him," Ludwig added, chewing off a chunk of his platter of sausage.

Yao's jaw dropped lower than he had thought possible. "Wh-Wuh... What, aru?" he exclaimed, again, refusing to believe that today - just now! - a sausage-carrying van had crashed nearby. "And... and did the two of you manage to finish the sausage, aru?"

"Well we would've," Gilbert said in-between bites, "But then there were these little kids - damn! I hate little kids!" he grumbled, "Who were looking like they were really hungry, and so West," he jabbed an accusing finger at his brother here, "Decided that it would be perfectly alright if we split the sausage, so that the little kids could have a couple pieces as well." He rolled his eyes, tearing off another chunk of sausage. "Hey, do you want a slice?" he offered off-handedly to Yao.

"S-sure..." Yao hesitantly replied, eyeing the preserved meats with entirely-reasonable doubt.

"Open wide," Gilbert said with a grin, dangling the meat before Yao.

"Gilbert," Ludwig muttered, "How entirely unsanitary," he set down his own plates of sausage on the (newly-cleaned) table in the room, reaching for a fork and knife to cut a piece of a piece of the sausage. "Here," he handed the slab of meat to Yao, "It's actually reminiscent of Fetzer's, don't you think?"

Yao had no idea what Fetzer's was - much less what 'Krombacher' was. Ignoring the fact that Ludwig had just bitten off a chunk from the sausage piece he had cut for the other nation, Yao closed his eyes, hesitantly taking a bite.

"Well?" Gilbert asked, an entirely-too-smug grin in place. "Are you feeling less traumatized by my entirely awesome flamethrower?" And here, he leaned in closer to Yao, dangling some bit of sausage once more - as if enticing the other to take yet another bite - while whispering, "Just tell West that you're totally recovered so he won't take away my flamethrower, okay?" And then, before Yao could protest - or even acquiesce - he shoved the ambrosial (for him, at least!) food down the other's throat.

"Mmph dtydlly gurred!" Yao mumbled out, taking a sip of the already-placed water, before downing the sausages entirely, much to the amusement of the brothers, "I said," he grumbled out, feeling that he had been sampling too many new - and entirely surprising - things in the past days, "That I'm completely cured! Ah~" he sighed out, basking in the rays of an invisible light, "The wonder and glory that is Krombacher, oh, is there any better wine?"

And with that, Ludwig dropped his final plate of sausages. Gilbert, in response, didn't even look at the fallen meat, simply dropped his jaw in unison.

Yao laughed nervously, "Wine, Beer, Vodka... it's all the same, isn't it, aru?" A quick glance around told him that no, to those two, it was not the same thing. And all the same, he tried to save himself - digging his own grave deeper, really, by tacking on, in his own defense, "But they're all just alcoholic beverages, aru! I mean, there aren't vast difference, right?"

"Yao," Ludwig said, pinching the bridge of his nose, "I sincerely hope this is simply an after-effect of my brother's flamethrower..."

"Hey!" Gilbert cried out, "I've tried the flamethrower on plenty of other people - Ivan and Alfred, for one - and it's never caused them to forget all of our teachings about beer!"

Yao groaned, sensing that the room would remain undecorated for quite some time to come.

(...)

did you know? Germany and China are actually really good trading partners - in terms of imports and exports. The ratio between them is a whole lot better than the US/China trading balances, although that's not saying much. D: Also, Prussia was too much win to not write (I have no idea why I don't have more Prussia!fic...); as yugiL put it, it was his flamethrower after all!

and also: Beijing does have a giant sausage manufacturer (maybe multiple?). I was so surprised when I went there, I was wondering why there were so many pig carcasses. They transport them on bread-buses (they're minivans, I think?) and parts of the sausage (wrapped in plastic) stick out. This chapter was inspired by the thought, 'what would happen if the bus carrying the sausage overturned or something?'